fishcrockpot

Happily Eastered Up

2011-04-24T18:48:00.000-07:00

Happy Easter everyone!
Hopefully today has been a wonderful and relaxing day full of peace and love and chocolate eggs for everyone. My Girl Scout Cookies emerged from the freezer this morning and have been a delightful addition to my day. I've also thrown in a few chocolate pretzels for good measure. And I won't even get into all the stuff I took down at my friend's very smorgasbord-y Easter brunch. Yep. I've been eating a lot! And though it is Easter, I hilariously did manage to get my usual Sundays - the dread of the week to come, what I need to do, what should have been done. So yes, yes I am squeezing in a few loads of laundry and working on the other writing project I am terribly behind on (surprise surprise), but now I am once again bolstered by the option of eating myself into a food coma by way of Tagalong cookies. Ah, spring. Easter renewal at its finest.

It seems this is my standard Easter fare, - yay Easter! yay thanks for reading! yay, but I'm not going to write much today but maybe I will another time...and then I don't.
We'll see. I feel like I have had a far more phoned in crockpot this go-round, and it's not a proud feeling. Maybe there will be some cookie-fueled inspiration. We'll see.

Happy Easter!

Bunny Ears in the Distance...

2011-04-23T15:00:00.001-07:00

Hop hop, I hear the faint sound of the approach.

Guys, as it turns out, I've got a lot going on today! A lot of stuff needs to get done and happen and occur. The time frame available to write something new and spicy here that is not just space-taking jibber jabber is not large. So, I've decided to attempt to share a piece I'd written (fiction!) that was then scooped by real life. Here's the real life story that appeared in The Atlantic maybe a month after , but take your pick about whether you read real life or the fake life I constructed first. I might read real life second, as it totally trumps my fake life description.

Connectivity

From the unauthorized autobiography of the Verizon Guy

If a tree falls in the forest and no one is there here to hear it, does it make a sound? There was a time not so long ago when that tree would have asked, without hesitating, “Can you hear me now?” And you know what? That tree would have received smiles of acknowledgement. That tree would have been one of the funniest in the forest. That tree would have never been asked to leave (see, I’m still capable of being funny). But at the end of the day, it still would have fallen.

I suppose it is ironic that being the spokesman for a product promising universal connectedness with people all over the country and all around the world led me to the loneliness and isolation I feel today. I must admit, when I signed the contract for my first national t.v. ad, I did not see that coming. But I wasn’t wearing my glasses at the time, so I guess I can’t point fingers. But it doesn’t mean I don’t want to.

Being not quite that famous is not without its drawbacks. I achieved a status of recognizability that came with all of the life-disrupting personal invasion but none of the respect afforded to that of mega-stars. Eventually dinner in a restaurant rarely occurred without interruption from a stranger, but usually involved semi-mocking discussion of why the stranger knew my face. And my dinner was never paid for. Never. I assure you Matt Damon is never approached for being “that guy from the Bourne franchise I see on billboards and bus stop ads.” He is approached for being Matt Damon. I’m here to tell you that a rose by any other name – or worse, without a name – does not always smell as sweet.

I do have a name though. I was not born “the Verizon guy.” I was Paul.

My parents wanted me to be an accountant. Really. Seriously. Maybe Paul was the name of someone careful and conscientious? Though the Bible would have us believe otherwise. How careful are you if you’re falling off of horses? Accounting was not an idea without merit, though. When I was young, I loved math and numbers and still believed in the thrill of learning. Addition and subtraction were the mountains I could climb. Each math test that was returned to me with a sticker on top became the flag I planted at the summit of a new chapter in the math textbook. I could do it. I was impressive. Then I met pre-algebra, and it all went away.

I got fat, not just from pre-algebra, but more so because about the time the kids in my neighborhood ended their open invitation policy for joining in the fun and running around outside, my mother was toying with the idea of becoming a pastry chef. Suddenly just being in the same age range no longer meant you could walk outside and approach your peers and be assured of an invitation to do whatever they were doing or not doing – cool or not cool. Social stratification hit my block as my mother hit the butter cream frosting chapter in her cookbook. There was no escape. No batch was good enough. No batch buttery enough. No batch creamy enough. And until the literal crème de la crème was isolated in its purist form in the ugly 70s-orange mixing bowl that suffered the brutal beatings and mixings of my mother’s spatula-wielding mania, I was expected to support her progress and indulge in her failures by consuming any number of cupcakes and pieces of cake. My mother suddenly had arm muscles like Popeye from hours spent churning and folding ingredients in efforts to achieve the perfect icing consistency while I sat idly by, blowing up like Bluto. And as my frustrations at social isolation were compounded (multiplied, actually, but damn it all if I could figure out the equations to know that at the time) by my inability to isolate variables and proclivity for being foiled the wrong way by quadratic equations, my mother was encouraging me to indulge in the fruits of the labor that was frustrating her most. Batch after batch of perfectly acceptable and delicious baked goods were thrust before me to consume only to serve as confirmation that something was lacking. Can you tell nothing was ever good enough for my mother? You would perhaps then be able to guess that acting was not on the same level as accounting in terms of professional aspirations of an acceptable ilk for my mother, but my fate was sealed by the discerning eye of Brother Francis, and it was my mother herself who had insisted I attend Catholic high school.

I was culled from the crowd in fourth period study hall. Brother Francis was in charge of the theatre program at St. Simon Boys Preparatory, and I had absolutely no interest in being a part of his show. But that did not stop Brother Francis from working on casting with the cunning of a Hollywood agent and the ruthlessness of a mob boss. He knew that to get the talent, he’d have to offer something they’d want in return – point out what was in it for them, how they could overcome their weakness. For me, it was being excused from gym class.

Surprising to no one, it turns out that taking years off from playing with other children thanks to social shunning by one’s peer group makes a kid not that great and confident in gym class. Especially when the same boys that had done the social shunning were in that gym class, using their well-practiced, hard-earned nicknames for one another while calling plays in any variety of sports in which the rest of the gym class interlopers were now forced upon them and royally fucking things up with their unpracticed ways and terrible fear of physical failure, borne from their already-achieved social failure. Not that it was hard to go to gym class, or anything.

Brother Francis must have seen the dread in my eyes any number of times as I un-wadded my gym shorts from my bag as study hall ended, looking ready for a death march in fifth period gym, because that is when he approached me that one fateful day toward the end of study hall.

“Hey, Paul. How would you like to help me with something and skip gym class.”

I looked up at him, stunned and doubtful. I didn’t even have him for a class. How the hell did he know my name? And what on earth could he be offering?

This was back in the days before sex scandal was synonymous with the Catholic Church, so “help me with something” rang no alarm bells of suspicion in my teenage head at the time. This guy probably just needed help. What he needed, I was about to find out, was more convincing guidos.

While not a child molester, I would guess that Brother Francis was a member or a different subset of people who disproportionately seemed to find themselves in service to God, but this time to acceptably, to substitute for some lifestyle choices they dared not act upon but which are not morally reprehensible, unlike child molesters. At a different time, in a different world, born to different parents, I have no doubt Brother Francis would be at Elton John’s Oscar parties every year with his own super-hot boyfriend, sucking down bellinis and talking about the injustice of alterations to couture gowns that weren’t pre-approved by their designers. He’d be Broadway royalty in any number of capacities – choreography, directing, costuming, all of the above. But, unable to live that life, he came as close as he could by making production values at St. Simon Prep as close to the Great White Way as he could. Big on realism, he could not stand to put on a production of Guys and Dolls with such an obvious grease-head in the audience uninvolved in gambling, grift, and most of all, glorious, glorious choruses. I was too close to typcast not to be cast. So – in exchange for relief from the indignities of gym class – I became a member of the gamblers’ gang, and the theater bug did bite.

The fates did align. By the end of Guys and Dolls rehearsals, my costume had to be altered before opening night. Freed from hours with my mother after school (she was onto the soufflé chapter by then), I lost weight. I hit a growth spurt too. I was actually a pretty good-looking little gangster. And when the lights went up, suddenly there were girls. Googly-eyed girls from Elizabeth Anne Seton High were looking at me in ways I’d never seen before. It might have been the pinstripes and the fedora, but it didn’t matter. I was suddenly worth a look. It was enough for me to become a theatre kid.

Just a sophomore when Brother Francis plucked me from obscurity and misery, I went on to bloom a bit in the theatre world. I even gained enough traction and, let’s be frank, body hair to not care about gym by senior year. I had my own thing. And my grades were still good enough to keep my mom happy enough as they were good enough to get me into college.

Mom and Dad were of course waiting for college to snap me out of my dreams in the pretend worlds of theatre. The song and dance routine could get you to third base maybe, but they couldn’t feed anyone, in their opinions. I promised I’d take an accounting class my first semester just to appease them. After getting a D on the first exam the day before the add/drop deadline, I realized I was being given a sign. I did the math on that one, and dropped the class. And any illusion that I’d become an accountant. You would think my parents’ expectations would have also dropped accordingly, but it was not so.

I became a theatre major with a minor in communications. Yeah, it should have been cellular communications if there were a true force of fate at work there. But I really did kind of anoint myself in college for the role that would make me who I am today.

My parents never really got on board my theatre leanings, though they did come to see a few productions when we did plays they’d heard of that weren’t “too sexy,” as my mom considered anything by Tennessee Williams to be. But when I graduated and decided to take a coffee shop job in order to audition, they made no secret about the fact that I was taking the “actor” role a little too seriously, preparing for it a little too method for their comfort. No nice girl would ever want to marry an actor, much less date one. She’d starve!

I dated a few girls who I actually think were into the expectation that they’d starve with me. They hated food. It made them fat, which was just one more way they would not be cast in roles they wanted. Actors themselves, my lack of interest in buying them dinner was all too enticing for them, as was my lack of stability, long-term planning, and matching furniture. But eventually I realized a girl who hated food probably wouldn’t let me eat much of it, and with decades of baked goods under my belt, literally, I was not prepared to settle. Also, nothing was worse for an actress than a familiar role that required nothing from their dramatic range. A boring, normal girlfriend, which eventually became what I wanted, was not a coveted role.

I flew solo for a while. I got a little fatter. My mother worried about me. And fed me more.

It was never the Verizon gig that made my parents feel ok about me. It was Alex. Always Alex.

I met Alexandra at the coffee shop. I made her an Americano and she took the time to come back and tell me it was really good. I thanked her and said I hoped she would come again. She did. Soon I found myself pouring every ounce of my dramatic skill and flair into the preparation of her daily dose of caffeine. I started doing my hair before work and wearing better t-shirts. When I wore the shoes I usually wore to bars that were trendy and cool tennis shoes rather than my crappy tennis shoes that were brown-blotched from coffee spills, I realized I was in trouble. I really liked her. My shoes would undoubtedly be ruined by a day’s-worth of foam overflows and coffee drips. But I didn’t care if it would impress her. I had to do something.

I had a moment of panic wherein I realized that this girl might really just like the way I made coffee and have no interest in specifically seeing me every day, but rather whomever was holding a cup of addictive substance with her name on it. I was deeply into at least the fourteenth level of hypothetical scenarios and rationalization about what an idiot I was to think she gave a shit about me, much less liked me, when she spoke.

“New shoes? What’s the special occasion? You always wear the gray ones,” Alex said absent-mindedly, as she meticulously stirred her drink.

“Would you go out with me sometime?”

I blurted it out. If she noticed the shoes, I had to gamble. We could go on and on with our coffee gauntlet for years without knowing if there was more between us. I did not have time for that. I did not have time to wonder if I’d just lost a good tipper and steady customer. I was about to ruin my shoes and I damned better know if there was any reason for it.

“Sure. We don’t have to get coffee though, do we?” she replied.

“No. Definitely not.”

Just like my parents, I often marveled myself that I had managed to get someone as great as Alex to like me, or even tolerate me. She was fun and generous and tolerant of theatre and my underemployment. She hated hammy performers, especially if they were my friends, and would always give me fair and honest criticism of my own work. She liked eating. She hated how long her full name was and thought it sounded pretentious. She was the one who encouraged me to audition for some commercial gigs. She was the one who said I’d be a great cell phone guy. And inevitably, she was the one I hurt the most.

It didn’t happen overnight. It happened over 1 month, 2 weeks, and four nights. At first I was just on t.v. a bit more than before. But then Verizon’s ad team realized I really worked. America liked me. America wanted me in their living rooms. America wanted to hear me now. So why not make now as often as possible? And why not put me everywhere? Bus signs. Bus stops. Billboards. Afternoon t.v. Sports programming. Cable. Jeopardy! Jeopardy!! The time slot of the elderly! Even the elderly liked me. I was a nice young man who understood cell phones could be problematic. I wanted to fix that for Americans – young and old alike.

Relatives called when they saw me. Friends called. Friends I wasn’t friends with any more called. And then it happened when we were out to dinner. The night of our two-year anniversary. We were talking about what might come next for us. We were talking about how excited we were that we could pay all of our bills. We were talking about getting a dog.

“Your that ‘Can you hear me now?’ guy!” a woman passing our table on the way back from the bathroom said.

“Hi,” I said. I let go of Alex’s hands to extend mine toward a total stranger, a fact Alex would tell me about in the eventual breakup not quite a year later.

“You look just like you do on t.v.! Are you doing a commercial here?”

“No, he’s eating dinner here,” Alex said, trying to remind this woman of the boundaries of television.

“Oh! Are you pretending to be his girlfriend?” the woman said, even more excited at the prospect my commercial character might evolve to include a love story with someone or something other than just the fantastic service coverage provided by Verizon Wireless.

“Something like that,” said Alex.

Her retorts never lost their sting in the months ahead. A girl who was always able to keep things in perspective, Alex never thought I would be a guy who couldn’t. But part of her must have had some sort of animal premonition at my capacity to fail her. Something led her to ask me.

“Are you going to become that guy? I’m not going to be the girl dating the Verizon guy, am I?”

“Alex, can you hear me now?”

“Oh, fuck you,” she said smiling.

“Hear me. No, you will not be dating that Verizon guy. No.”

“Good.”

I was, unfortunately, wrong about that.

“It just happened. I don’t know what else you want me to say, and no, I can’t fix it. Yes, I’ve already tried, mom. I know she was a great girl. Don’t you think I know that?”

I didn’t know what to tell my mom when we finally broke up any more than I know what to tell myself now about all of it. It did just happen. It happened too fast and it happened without my being able to control it and it happened hard enough that I went along with it. I was suddenly someone everywhere I went, and my options were either to enjoy being recognized as a character and not myself, or go crazy being unable to just be myself. I chose the first. It seemed escapist. It seemed like a way to deal with it all. It did not account for my susceptibility to gaining an inflated ego from being liked by strangers.

When it did just happen, it just happened fast. Suddenly I was filming new commercials all the time in locations across the country. I stopped wearing glasses so people would stop saying “Can you hear me now?” to me, but then the contacts bothered my eyes so much I had to go back to glasses. Even with different frames, it didn’t matter. People knew I was the Verizon guy. “Can you hear me now was everywhere.” I was looking at posters of myself asking myself if I could hear myself as I was getting onto the subway. And coming out of the subway, there I was again. Waiting for myself. Asking if I could hear myself. There was so much potential for an identity crisis, I decided to own it.

I learned to say it in fifteen languages for filming. I traveled around the world. And eventually, I decided I was the Verizon guy. I made him cool, because there was no him without me. If there was no me that was not him, I would take credit for him. I was his look.

I was cool glasses before they were a thing. Tina fey owes me money for thinking glasses can make you a superstar. They can, Tina, and guess who got there first? Suddenly dudes everywhere were wearing plain uniform jackets to be sexy. Hipsters were looking at me – on their televisions, on their billboards, and in their mirrors. I was everywhere and I was them. And that’s where I lost me. Somewhere in there.

At parties, I was still him. I spent one party recording voicemail messages on the phones of everyone there in between taking pictures with people and prank calling others. We pretended there was a Verizon contest and got people to tell us they could hear me. It was fun. It seemed harmless. I hadn’t really noticed Alex was hanging out in the kitchen all night. When I found her coming inside after having smoked a cigarette on the fire escape with a few moody single dudes, I was worried. She didn’t smoke.

“Hey are you o.k., Alex?”

“Listen, Paul, there’s a big difference between hearing me now, and listening to me now.”

“Hun, are you drunk? What are you even talking about? That’s the slogan.”

“I know. And I am drunk. Just remember what I said.”

“O.K., I will.”

“Good,” she said. And she seemed to mean it.

Then another thing just happened that she swears she forgave me for, but I will go to my grave believing that was the final straw for Alex. I was rich. I was happy. I wanted to go buy a ring to propose. It was New Year’s Day, and I could not believe Alex had gotten out of bed early. We had gone to a media company party the night before that had been stocked with incredibly good, incredibly free champagne, and I could tell that, despite my optimism for the year to come, I was going to have a hell of a hangover.

Alex came into the bedroom in running clothes, sweaty despite being bundled for the cold. She had bought a beautiful new dress for the party last night, which was still thrown over a chair in the corner of the room. It had been a splurge, but she looked amazing in it, and we’d had such a great year, it seemed fitting that she should have a new party dress to celebrate. At first I thought her cold attitude was from seeing the dress again and feeling guilty about spending so much money on one dress. A paralegal, Alex was not a big spender on that which was not deemed a necessity. I tried to lighten the mood to see why she could already be so tense while I was so hungover.

“You’re really ushering in the new year, already giving it the runaround, I see,” I said, aware that I hadn’t made that much sense.

“Yeah, wanted to get some air,” she said, not looking at me as she moved around the room faster than I would be able to do all day.

“It’s January. It’s freezing outside.”

“Well, it’s still a nice day.”

“You looked so good last night,” I said, trying to take a different tact.

“Thanks,” Alex replied coldly, not looking at me, as she grabbed the dress slung over the chair and crumbled it into a laundry bag.

“Whoa, don’t be so rough with a dress that hot!”

She pivoted faster than most NBA centers, turning to me with a look of pure rage.

“You don’t remember, do you?” she nearly whispered.

“Uh…”

“You don’t even. Fucking. Remember,” she continued as she threw the bag, dress hanging sadly out of the top, into the corner with our other dirty laundry.

“I was pretty drunk, Alex. Might still be. Can I get a little help here?”

“Un-fucking-believable.”

“Alex, what did I do? I can’t fix it if I can’t remember.”

“Oh you can’t fix it is right, Paul.”

“Alex, tell me.”

“No. It’s too degrading.”

“Come on.”

“Fine.” She tapped her foot a few times before leveling the blow – the depravity of which I still could not fathom, given her state. “You said it.”

“What? Said what, Alex.”

She was crying. I could see that she was just at the beginning of tears that had been forming throughout her entire run, and probably the night before, and who knows how long before that, and that they were all going to come gushing out now.

“What do you mean ‘what?’? What do you always say?”

“That I’m the luckiest man alive to be with you?”

A sob. My last attempt to salvage this without a full-blown metldown was met with a sob. She was crying so hard that her shoulders were shaking as she tried to get out more words.

“Nooo-o-o-o-o,” came with the heaves of her tears. The next was whispered. “You said ‘Can you hear me now?’ to me.”

I was out of bed now, trying to grab her shoulders to comfort her and pull her toward an inevitable forgiveness hug.

“Honey, I say that sometimes when I get wasted, of course I’m sure I said it to you once or twice last night.”

I could not have said something much worse than that. She wriggled away from my touch, her entire face reddened, and screamed.

“NO! Not just at a party! NO!!! You asshole! You said it during sex! When you…UGH!!! You disgust me! You said it. You said it to me. You said it to me.”

“Oh my God, Alex, I am so sorry, you know I never would want to – ”

The slam of the bathroom door saved me from having to say something good enough to make things right, as it was clear at that moment, nothing I could say would make it right. She went to a friend’s that day to watch football. All day. I stayed home with my hangover and felt the worst I had ever felt in my entire life, and wondered what her friends were saying if they were hearing the story behind why she was taking her own hangover on the road, sans live-in boyfriend, and wondered if I’d still be awake when she came home, if she came home.

Flowers. Dinner. And I took her on a daytrip to ice skate on a frozen lake that she’d always wanted to do. But it took some time to recover, and still some signs that she hadn’t really let go. Drunk once, a few months later, after margarita night with work friends, she laid into me.

“You know, you don’t really have an entire flock of people behind you all the time. You don’t have that network. That’s not a real thing.”

“I know. How about a snack before bed? I could make you some nachos,” I said, hoping to change the subject.

“I’m your network, Paul. I’m the one who’s got you covered, ya know?”
“I do. You’re certainly my favorite contact.”

That worked at the time, the urge for drunken snacks being overtaken by the urge for drunken sex at the mention of contact. But her words still stuck with me.

I had already picked the ring, but not yet bought it, when she ended it. One Wednesday, I came home with Thai food and she had her coat on.

“I can’t anymore, sweetheart. I love you, Paul, but I can’t. I can’t.”

“What? Wait, Alex, where are you going? What are you saying? Take your coat off.”

She was already crying. After talking, screwing, reheating thai food, eating, crying, talking, and screwing again, Alex called in sick to work, and we were officially broken up. It was amazing how quickly we were able to apply the clinical remove to our situation that we needed to be able to make decisions about moving and the apartment and whose stuff was whose. Like everything else, it was sudden. It just happened. But I never stopped thinking it was my fault.

It took a while, but I eventually got to the point where the combination of self-loathing and self-pity became so potent that I decided to use the Verizon guy persona to get laid. I would wear clothes that made me especially Verizony. I’d add extra gel to my hair so I looked so shiny that I was noticeable to strangers. I’d look puzzled on the subway or talk on my phone just so people would make the connection. If I noticed someone checking me out and recognized the look of someone wanting to talk to the Verizon guy, someone I wanted to bang, I’d ride extra stops just to give them the chance to get the bravery to strike up a conversation with me. And it worked. Surprisingly, disgustingly, it worked. Chelsea Handler even did me after a fundraiser just for the punchline, though really, couldn’t she have done a joke without the sex to legitimize it? I really doubt Larry the Cable Guy is out there installing cable boxes in his off time just for the act. But whatever, I took the sex. I used the image that I felt had used me up and made me drop the only connection I really cared about. The only person who liked me in glasses before my notoriety as an ad man, and that includes my mother.

And that’s how I ended up fat again. I ate a lot of cupcakes again. My mom is a sympathetic baker, and it worked. I tried to not be him. It was a win-win situation. Heal my pain with cupcake medicine. Get fat to the point of only moderate public recognition. “The Verizon guy got fat.” Try having that be your new Twitter claim to fame. Or finding a picture of yourself online as a result of searching that sentence. It hurts. The phones I sold to you are how you tell the world that I am fat. How you post it on facebook. You’re so connected you’re connected to who I was, who I am. I hear you now - always. I hear the voice of my ex girlfriend, my mother, the kids in school. I get it. Now community theater is back to being my basic plan. Just great. But I feel a little better. At least Alex doesn’t have to stare at giant versions of my face all day any more. I mean so far they don’t want the fat Verizon guy for iPhone print ads.

It’s hard to be asked to come back to be the guy I’ve been running from to introduce the Verizon iphone. That’s great that Verizon is up to speed, but I don’t know if I’m back yet. Mr. Whipple came back years later for Charmin, but I’d still have to wait decades for that kind of traction. And the worst is I have to see stuff like I saw last weekend. I saw this guy using his new iPhone on his fun hot hip date with a hot little indie girl. You know what he’s wearing? Glasses. Bigger than mine. My hipness is now obsolete. Pretty soon Jared will be asking me if I’d like to cross promote Subway sandwiches and accompanying weight loss with some sandwich app that lets you count calories like a text plan. Actually, that’s not a bad idea. Is Fogle in the phonebook? Maybe I’ll ask my agent, if he’ll even take my calls. That’s the hardest part of all this you know. Networking.

Things I have seen on the road in LA this week, in chronological order. No exaggerations. No lies.

2011-04-22T16:31:00.000-07:00

1.Early morning- Woman in white VW van with license plate "JESUS 08" almost collided with me while making a lefthand turn. While I did need to use my horn to avert actual collision (intended use of horn in automobiles, if driver's ed memory serves), I did refrain from extra horn time to express anger and annoyance at the driver, making "Jesus saves" true in several senses. I also wondered how many other Jesus license plates were out there. It was definitely eye-catching in being like, the real deal version of something that would seem completely like a vanity plate you could not acquire. At least not without assistance from a higher power. Or a California version of a Vatican gift shop.

2. Rush Hour standstill – Guy and girl smoking a doobie in stopped traffic. Windows down. Discretion levels – low. Everything else – high. This occurred on a ramp that merges two freeways together. Not only was traffic stopped on this ramp, but I was next to this car at a point where 2 lanes on the merge ramp merge themselves, becoming one lane entering freeway traffic. So I was really close to their open window, and definitely watched a girl pass a cigarette-looking item to her driver/presumably boyfriend. Just as soon as I'd asked myself, "Are they just openly smoking weed In a moving motorized vehicle? That’s so LA," the answer came billowing out of their windows on both sides. An unmistakeable smell. The sight of the smoke issuing forth from their car was also suitable to be filmed and inserted into any weed-based comedy movie you have ever, or will ever see.

3. 9 p.m. - Crosswalk of a Prince concert – Despite there being an actual crosswalk painted on the ground, an estimated 15 pedestrians in the crosswalk, and a traffic cop directing said pedestrians across the street, a gentleman in an escalade began accelerating into the crosswalk so that he could, presumably, snake the traffic that accumulates when everyone is trying to park for a Prince concert. The traffic cop used a very firm, stiff-armed "STOP" motion to let this guy know that was not going to happen. The gentleman proceeded to roll down his window and ask questions about where to go to get in. As if the giant 2 lane line of traffic he was stuck in all flowing in one direction wouldn't answer the question. When the cop explained that he was currently physically next to the parking lot, that was visible to all, to the right, the gentleman tried to then motion and agree to that location as if trying to trick the cop into letting him DRIVE THROUGH A CROWD through a hole in a gate to park. The cop was not falling for such shenanigans and indeed gave him a look of "Oh hell no, sir." It was astounding. Yet I am confident that gentleman does similar self-serving feigning of ignorance on the reg. Just a hunch.

4. Noon – parking lot near bank – speaking of hunch, I did a double take while spying a gentleman who was driving with his dog slung across his shoulders just beneath his headrest. It was as though he was wearing a live mink stole. But the stole was a dog. And actually not a stole, but more of a travel body pillow. Like, if he covered it in stretchy fabric, he could take his dog on planes and sleep with him wrapped around his neck. I've seen birds on shoulders and cats on backs, but this was my first driving pillow dog sighting.

Also, those who read yesterday's post or number three's location above will note that I went to a Prince concert last night. It was amazing. And mind-blowing. And exceeded my expectations. Which were for nothing short of personal transformation and life change. Amazing. Also I do not think I have ever seen a better live guitar performance. Incredible.

If you're in LA, take a freeway and go see him! More about him later, but today's time did not allow me to write a 20-page document about it.

All of my hangups are gone

2011-04-21T17:25:00.001-07:00

I am going to see Prince tonight. The artist formerly known as Prince who turned into a symbol who turned back into Prince. Tonight. I am literally, physically, metaphysically, metaphorically, and magnificently going to see Prince tonight.

I am expecting nothing short of total personal transformation. I kind of do expect to be reborn in the uncharted waters of Prince. Some sort of Prince air will reach me, even in the high high cheap seats, and I will awaken tomorrow a fully realized woman. I mean, it's Prince, right?

These expectations do not seem extreme. It's Prince.

And, for those of you keeping track of his influence here, I did some Prince searching. He turns up in 10% of the posts. Ha! That's a good enough percentage, right? Obviously statistically significant. I hope that somehow I am willed into his path. Forces draw us together. And seeing me he says, "Girl, you need a haircut like hell." And, acquiring scissors as if by magic, he'll just go ahead and proceed to give me a makeover. Of body and spirit.

No, it is not likely that I will turn out like Carmen Electra.

But I would settle for Sheila E.

PRINCE. Ladies and gentlemen. Prince.

More to come...

and also,

Happy Birthday to Den! Crockpot faithful, and all around wonderfully encouraging human being.

The Political Deep End

2011-04-20T21:04:00.000-07:00

In addition to liking cheese (as per last, yes, I know, kind of cheap and short post to try to make up the one I missed on Saturday), I also like swimming quite a bit. Cheese and I get along swimmingly. Which, in the way in which I enjoy swimming, is quite a bit.

At one pool location, there is typically an intense 10-15 minute period in which anyone in the women's locker room is unable to escape the social circles, and accompanying distresses and joys, of 11-14 year old girls. As a former 11-14 year old girl myself, it is both enlightening and challenging every time. It is hard to remember ever acting that way, but I am certain I did as, well, everyone of them pretty much IS acting that way. Or trying to get in on the action of the alpha girls who are really good at acting that way. Or trying to escape the notice of the alpha girls who are acting that way.

What do I mean by "acting that way"?

Well, high-pitched shrieking for no reason. Very loud discussions of absolutely mundane matters for no reason. Inquiries about vacation days, workout schedules, siblings, school topics, school projects, school papers, school boys, school girls, mothers, fathers, birthdays, parties, iPhones, cars, backpacks, teachers, life as they know it. All at VERY loud volume levels. Especially if someone needs to interrupt someone else to make sure their point is conveyed.

There's also a certain hysteria of activity as everyone tries to do the same thing at the same time and be a part of the communion of shampoo that occurs - regardless of how many adult outsiders are waiting to use a shower - all at once. The water wasted alone would make anyone who actually pays a water bill or watched an episode of "Captain Planet" insane. These girls are too young for both. Too loud for adult ears to hear, especially amplified in the damp echo chamber of a brightly tiled shower room, all nozzles blazing. The only way to get silence and downcast eyes (though occasionally you can catch curious eyes, if you're fast enough), is nudity.

These young women are at an age where they are unable to stop staring at the bodies of adult women, and completely mortified to be seen naked themselves. Never mind that their main recreational activity involves bearing most of their skins' surfaces by way of swimsuit coverage only. These girls would rather be burned alive than have you glimpse their naked flesh.

The adult women take off their bathing suits and let it all hang out. And yeah, it hangs in a lot of cases. The not quite adolescents - mortified. They stay bolted into their suits like superhero action figures.

So today, it was completely fascinating to overhear political discussion by these young women. President Obama is coming to Los Angeles tomorrow and will be approximately 25 yards from the location of the pool. The obvious topic of discussion was, in fact, Obama's visit. Traffic would be a mess. Things would be crazy. Oh my God. Oh my Gahd OhmyGAWD.
Derivations and varieties of "Oh my God" are quite popular with that age group.

One girl, it was determined, would be going to Obama's appearance in person (OHMYGOD!). One lucky girl? That depends on who you ask.

Below, my closest recollection of verbatim girl talk:

Girl 1: Yeah, it costs like, a hundred dollars to see him and it's tomorrow, I DOUBT there are any more tickets. It's a fundraiser.

Girl 2: A fundraiser? Fundraiser for what.

Girl 1: The election and stuff. So he can run for president again.

Girl 2: (incensed) What?! He wants to be president again!??

[author had to keep head down to not look at the girl to be like, are you serious? There's an age that does not know that's what happens politically? Yes, and she was it]

Girl 1: Of co-oourse.

[author was relieved that this girl was also shocked the other girl didn't get it]

Girl 2: Oh. I don't really like him.

Girl 1: What? Why

girls 3-7 descend on the conversation. clearly Girl 2 has a minority, and unpopular opinion

Girl 2: I just liked McCain better. I'm a republican.

[author tried to remember whether she claimed party affiliation at that same age and tried to ponder whether this girl had any idea that she was blindly adopting the stance of her parents, while also noting that the other girls too clearly knew Obama was cool and, to their perspective, RIGHT]

Girl 1: Oh.

Girl 3: I love Obama. I'm going tomorrow.

Girl 4/5/6: You're GOING?!?

Girl 3: Yeah. (to Girl 2) Why do you not like Obama?

Girl 2: I just liked McCain better. I'm not even that political. I just liked him better. Why do you like Obama?

Girl 3: Because he's black and I'm black. And he's awesome. No, you know what? Actually he's biracial and I'm biracial. And I'm a democrat. Why do you not like him, exactly?

Girl 2: I dunno, I just don't. I don't like the things he says.

Girl 3: So you mean, you don't like his politics? Like, it's not that you don't like him as a person, right?

pregnant pause in which girls 1,4,5, & 6 wait for girl 2 to answer correctly. [author also waited through the tension]

Girl 2: No, it's his politics. I don't like those.

Girl 3: Ok, yeah.

Girl 1: It's going to be so crazy tomorrow.

Girl 3: I know and I'm going!

[author nearly falls over while trying to make stealthy escape when shoe gets caught, ironically, in a no-slip mat]

Girl 1: (to author) Are you ok?

Author: Yep! My shoe got stuck!!! Ha!

[author flees in horror at her own clumsiness and is in awe at witnessing a political discussion that was both about young girls upholding the viewpoints they'd been taught in their homes and by friends' opinions (and probably Jon Stewart or their favorite celebrities) as the right ones to have, and Girl 3 simultaneously using a discussion about politics to ask her friend if she was racist. Because that is what her eyebrows and face implied. And what the whole room waited to hear her answer to - it's not personal, right???]

Even if Girl 2 had a well reasoned argument about Obama's moral failings as a person and had a picture of him kicking a puppy dog, she could not have said any of that without confirming the subtext that ehhhh maybe she didn't like him just because he wasn't a white dude like her parents hang out with. Remarkable unspoken interaction to see.

Also, I feel like I remember having pseudo-intellectual arguments at that age just to try to seem smart and mature. Not that any smart mature people I knew were having debates in sitting rooms or town halls. Just funny that it seemed to be both completely par for the course of events in the locker room, and yet had a remarkable weight not usually found in the conversations of these girls. And it was also interesting to see how deeply some of the girls personally identified with a political side. Um, duhhhh, I'm a democrat!
Interesting indeed.

Temptations - not just a motown band anymore

2011-04-20T16:14:00.000-07:00

Guys, I know we're WAY low on the countdown to Easter, but somehow this week is, while the deadline closes in on Lenten promises, also the hardest. Maybe it's getting through that last mile? Maybe I crave dairy fat in a way that my cheese consumption cannot possibly satisfy alone?

Anyone who knows me knows how shocking the previous statement is, even to consider. I love cheese. And I consume a lot of it. A lot of it.

But seriously, it suddenly seems as if the entire world has an ice cream cone. Many times, an ice cream sundae. And yes, yes this is exacerbated by my proximity to a Baskin Robbins and my birds-eye view of others consuming ice cream cones, and yes, I am still pleased to see their smiles, but now I'm also REALLY wanting to go to Dairy Queen. Being friends with Dairy Queen on facebook? Dangerous in Holy Week! Ha.

There's also Easter candy at work. At home. In my freezer. I know where I'm going, just need the patience to get there.

Did I mention patience isn't my strong suit?

Quantum Leaps and Boundaries

2011-04-19T17:38:00.000-07:00

I was just perusing the internet one last time before shutting down for the day, and found this news about teleportation. Pretty much the only part of the article I actually understood was the reference to Galaxy Quest and a botched teleportation attempt. About Galaxy Quest - I find it is one of the most consistently underrated movies ever, and a great use of Tim Allen, among others in its stellar intergalactic cast. Have I already written about this? How Sigourney Weaver essentially spoofing being the hot chick in sci-fi movies which, BTW, is kinda her deal, is awesome??? Or how the guy I've only ever seen on "Just Shoot Me" is one of the most believable and delightful alien life forms since ALF himself (also it is only in instantly writing that upon writing "alien life forms" that I realized I knew what ALF stood for in every fiber of my being).ly And how Tony Shaloub basically plays Monk here? And Sam Rockwell. Is there ever something not to like? I really feel I have covered how much I love Galaxy Quest before here, which hilariously makes me wonder if future me is teleporting back and forth for the past three years to write the same things in this blog over and over again, given that more often that not (including in a 2 week span!) I end up repeating myself or what is of interest to me (t.v., 80s pop stars, cheese, food, sports, NCAA tournament, sleep, self-loathing). If I am on the move, I'm going to encourage myself to watch more Quantum Leap while I'm at it. Another fantastic and relevant to the article but still not enlightening me about understanding it unless Al himself comes here to explain what Ziggy is doing.

Perhaps, for Tuesday, a gift from the interwebs. Quantum Leap re-mix. Which is somehow a quantum leap of its own. Enjoy!

Well gang, not today for (and/or by) the extreme

2011-04-18T16:52:00.000-07:00

There's a very good chance tonight is not going to be the night I post twice and have my makeup day. Somehow I have felt like I've been beaten with a bag of hammers all day. Perhaps this is because of residual effects of a Saturday spent behaving like a 20 year old, or because I spent a bit too much time last night watching programming on TLC and failed to go to bed early enough, but really, I am both super tired and consistently want to eat a meal one would obtain at Hoss's, a restaurant in Pittsburgh that involves usually ordering a meat product and then enjoying the salad bar while waiting for your meat to arrive. And yes. Yes there is a soft-serve machine involved at the end of the Hoss's line. Their tagline? Hoss's is Hoss-pitality!

Yeah, I liked it.

I'm actually not sure why we didn't go there more. It was fairly cheap for a family and really, everyone could get what they liked. And children ordering hot dogs would discover their name sliced into the hot dog when it arrived! A meat devotional! Who could ask for anything more?

Hot dogs are one of the items that you can apparently buy in bulk on sale if you're into extreme couponing. Which everybody on TLC's show "Extreme Couponing" most decidedly is. I just looked to see if I'd talked about this before, as it is super fascinating. Didn't I though? I think I did. It is so intense that I can't turn away. Like a train wreck where if you bought one storage car you'd get 50 more free for your train. Then that whole train blew up. It's that compelling, both in how much money these people save, and the absolute all-consuming devotion they have to couponing and the drive for saving. I mean, wow. And wow.

Last night's episode featured a set of twins who went about collecting all the free things they could on their shared birthday. One woman has like, two-years worth of diapers saved for a child she does not have. This paled in comparison to a gentleman who had built and a garage for storage of his stockpile, and then had to add onto it for the toothpaste, estimated at 51,000+ brushings, that he had saved up. He, by contrast to the as-yet-childless twin, had saved shelves of feminine hygiene products. Presumably she can see to it that she one day has a child, but that guy is probably not going to menstruate any time soon. Just my two cents.

There was also a sort of sad subtext like, ohhh boy, what if you never use those products? Eek.

(Also not sure why there isn't a dating component to the show, because this is absolutely a lifestyle, not a casual hobby for these folks, so it seems couponers would need each other to be fully understood and to flourish with a partner who shares the same lifestyle. And I believe my count for new shows I've pitched in this blog is now at 6 or 7. Haaa).

Anyway, while this show seems far less sinister in the voyeuristic pleasure of witnessing the obsessions of others play out in all consuming ways than say, watching someone about to be hospitalized for "bird lung" because they refuse to get rid of a single one of the 30 parrots that lives in their house and is slowly killing them, it's still extreme (as stated in the title). There is some excitement for their exploits. It's the American Dream to use the system to beat the system, and these are people doing just that - devoting their lives to doing just that. But what about if it doesn't work?

The guy with the toothpaste wall uses his good old fashioned American ingenuity with coupons to help support our troops. He makes care packages full of the stuff he gets for pennies or nothing at all by way of coupons. Really, it is nice of him to do. So imagine the stage being set for him to buy things on national television for our troops - what a moment of glory. Then imagine the stakes are raised because he's not going to the supermarket alone. No! This man is going with the woman who taught him everything he knows about couponing - his mother! His mother says he's a mathematics genius. She is beaming with pride at her son's achievements. He has calculated he'll only need $50 to pay for 2 separate orders at the store.

IMAGINE THIS MAN'S DISTRESS when he is, filmed on camera, in front of his shocked mother and sympathetic cashier, underestimating his overall total. It was cruel. He was mortified. Humiliated. And disbelieving that he could have so drastically miscalculated.

A flustered, sweating couponer saying "I have to use my debit card," with embarrassment and disbelief. At home I said, "He's going to hurt himself. This is terrible."

LUCKILY- resolution was a happy one.

There was a stack of coupons that somehow, in the midst of 75 cans of soup and 40 boxes of toothpaste on the conveyer belt, went un-cashed by the cashier. THERE was the answer. His couponing reputation - and budget - were saved. Humiliation - overthrown by pride. Cashier - apologetic. Mom - beaming again. Toothpaste guy - grinning like he brushed often.

Poor guy. A nice moment of redemption that showed just how intense this process is for those who do not like to pay retail. Ever.

And hey, God bless 'em and their savings! I just wonder if couponer's thumb will become a repetitive motion injury syndrome among couponers. Annnnd I should probably buy a couponer dating website domain name and go ahead and make some money there, and some people happy. One way to get people to join?

Coupon. I'll guess a coupon might work.

Hits and Misses and Holy Week

2011-04-17T22:14:00.000-07:00

Well gang, for those of you playing along at home, you'll note yesterday was a skip day but I'd just used one on Thursday! Yesterday was not on the skip day schedule! But the sun came out and way lead onto way. So I owe one before all is said and done. Which it kind of almost is! Today is Palm Sunday. We're at the one week countdown mark. Woo!

Palm Sunday is one of the longest masses of the year because the readings tell the story of the end of Jesus's last week once he gets to Jerusalem. For this occasion, the congregation is usually allowed to sit because - eh, it takes a while. Today however, I also noticed Palm Sunday is the only day where everybody is kind of given a toy to play with. Not really, that's probably sacrilege, but the Palm fronds that are blessed and then waved to reenact the adoration of Jesus as he rode into town really are a great source of distraction and fidgeting for young and old alike. Today the frond action was intense. A small girl, I'd guess she was maybe 4, used hers to try to tickle her mother's nose ever so slightly while her mother was kneeling to observe the death of Jesus. The girl was understandably confused when her mother did not find her joke tickles as amusing as they indeed were. I liked this girl. And so too did the man in the pew in front of me who made her a cross out of his palm frond. The girl was surprised and, well, completely tickled. A new toy of a sort made from the toy she had too. She showed her mom and aunt her new palm cross with surprise and pleasure. An unexpected gift from a stranger. But as cute as the little girl's face was in showing off her cross to family, it was nothing compared to the man in the pew behind her. Her delight was his. Pretty good stuff. He made her another one before the story was over!

The Wait List

2011-04-15T16:40:00.000-07:00

Hi ho, crock readers. It's Friday! At last! Yay!

First, a shout out to loyal reader and author-BFF Erin for providing some follow up intelligence to my rant about how Olive Garden cannot possibly have anything in Tuscany that is a cooking school. Apparently the author of this piece was even more outraged by the notion than I was.

Second - Friday Friday Friday! Woo!

Not only is it Friday, it's the last Friday before Good Friday, which is the last Friday before Easter. Which is exciting, because I have acquired and now have in my freezer, in addition to the box of peanut butter patties (Tagalongs!) Girl Scout Cookies, an entire bag of buckeyes, ready and waiting for consumption. What are buckeyes, you ask? Delicious. And so extraordinary that they are always the basis for the only times anything related to the word "buckeye" is roundly praised and adored in my family's home, given its staunch Michigan affiliation.

My aunt makes what I do not think it would be an exaggeration to classify as the most delicious candy available for human consumption every year at Christmas. Bittersweet chocolate covers a sweetened peanut butter center. The candy resembles the buckeyes that trees produce in appearance, but they don't scatter on the ground like tree buckeyes do unless there has been some sort scuffle among siblings in attempts to get another one. Knowing how intensely they are cherished by her family, my aunt counts them so that we each get the exact same allotment at Christmas. Once they are gifted to you, it is your responsibility to defend them against errant knaves like your brothers. They're so good. Really. Probably one of the top 5 items that would comprise a dowry in my family. Buckeyes come with.

And yes THAT, that type of deliciousness, in a brother-free household, awaits me on Easter.

I'm ready!

Somehow thinking more about Easter also reminds me and makes me miss two family records: Peter Cottontail and Jesus Christ Superstar. Both have obvious relevance to the holiday, but both are delightful in their own ways. The Peter Cottontail album had the title song as it's opener (classic!) and then had an array of original bunny, Easterish-related songs involving Easter baskets and candy and forest animals engaged in fun activities. One particularly great song detailed the exploits of Jack Rabbit, a baseball player. Again, the song was catchy, but I loved it more for its lyrics than its tune as they were full of word play and a storyline. "Left field, right field, any field at all, he can hit them over the WALL yes he caaaan! Who's the greatest there, who beats 'em by a hare? Jack Rabbit, he's our man!" A good one.

And then, when you're more into feeling funky in your religious devotion, Jesus Christ Superstar and its guitar-pedaled pomposity. There are some great songs in that album, and playing it annually really did sort of drive the season home. And the urgency and confusion of the whole, hey dude, save humanity! situation that Jesus finds himself in, and then really jams about with electric guitar accompaniment, it's intense. Maybe I'll have to see if these interwebs provide a few of the favorites for viewing and singing along!

A Few Good Questions - Who's On Trend First?

2011-04-13T16:53:00.000-07:00

So, because I do watch "Project Runway" but not enough "Rachel Zoe Project" to really have a grasp of whether fashion designers have some sort of secret meetings like the League of Justice, but with issues of importance like shoulder pads and cut of jean and what should be worn at any given time, I have the question, who decides what is on trend? And how do all designers seemingly bring back the same retro stuff at the same time? Who goes first? Who's deciding ohhh yeah, let's get 80s leggings back in action, and then everyone else follows suit. Literally, if suits are the fashion in question.

My best guess is conspiratorial meetings.

My question then is, are you guys going to bring back the perm? And I don't mean ironic, hipster style (in the way of the moustache), I mean like, for real, yo. Another good question: Was my previous question inspired by Hall & Oates? Yes. Yes it was. "Say It Ain't So" (the song, not the sentiment) was playing on my pandora station, and I couldn't stop looking with jealousy at Oates's coiffed curls. That'd be fun for a bit, right?

Now, nevermind that a perm would probably cause my already thin and brittle hair to just fall out all the way, and that it's probably too short to even hold the curlers acquiring a perm necessitates, I'm just thinking of what I might be able to do if I achieved the smoldering eyes of Oates. Do I dare say it?

I could be a maneater!

Ha. Ok, probably not.

But somehow it's a mental visual transformation I'm finding holds appeal. Even if reality doesn't hold curl!

You Scream, I scream we all scream for ice cream! (and can you believe there's another Scream movie?)

2011-04-12T16:52:00.000-07:00

It's Ben & Jerry's scoop day, which is a great time to think about all of the wonderful flavors and punny names Ben & Jerry have provided the world. There's a Chubby Hubby enthusiast at this keyboard, I will say that. I also discovered, thanks to Facebook's newsfeed being reset to show "all my friends" (thanks, Den, for letting me know how to change that setting), that my "friends" at Chick-fil-A and Dairy Queen have new frozen treats themselves - the first with a milkshake that replicates the flavor of banana pudding including, I am told, Nilla wafer bits, and the second (DQ) offering a chance to win a Mini Cooper to anyone who films the enjoyment of a mini Blizzard. Ahhhh the ways in which I would eat all of the above. I am reminded of a peanut buster blizzard, a blizzard of the month offering I enjoyed on the Arizona freeway almost a calendar year ago. DELICIOUS. Yes.

My office window, in addition to overlooking people who are stymied by shopping carts controlled by magnets (I talked about this, right?) also provides a view of a lot of folks who are eating the ice cream acquired at the shopping center's Baskin Robbins. Especially on Tuesday, which I think is 31 cent scoop day. And people definitely take advantage and get 2 scoops on Tuesday. Kind of like watching fish swim, watching human beings enjoy ice cream is a rewarding activity for me personally. Adults with ice cream cones cannot help but look like kids. The cone maintenance that occurs. The concentration on where to lick next. The enjoyment, and the bright color of mint chocolate chip contrasting with their business attire. It's fantastic. Equally enjoyable are tiny children given sundaes. It's like you've given them a million dollars. Really. They just don't know what to do with themselves and all the treatness of it!

My recommendation to the world - get yourself a cone!

That's the scoop I've got to report today.

Yo, Robot

2011-04-11T16:05:00.000-07:00

Last night, as I was still trying to avoid doing my taxes (yes, I did finally do them, but only God and presumably the IRS know if I did them correctly) I was flipping through my television's cable listing to see what happened to be on t.v. and came across "Yo, Robot," which to me sounded like the best thing ever. Somehow the title "Yo, Robot" instantly conjured images of a cross between Mr. Wizard, Fat Albert, Robocop, Turner & Hooch, and just a dash of Futurama. All set to click on that channel, it took me a second to realize that it was a Spanish language channel, and that the programming being offered was actually the movie "I, Robot" in Spanish. Which I know without having seen it is nowhere near as good as what "Yo, Robot" would have been.

I ended up, as I have since the day I ended up watching a marathon of last season, watching "Sister Wives," the show about a polygamous family and the trials and travails of living in what most nuclear families would consider to be village style, but without the flair of the village people (though they do seem to do more baking than the construction worker did during his stints in the Navy and at the YMCA). There is something ridiculously compelling about the show considering NOTHING happens in the show. Really. Seriously. Nothing. Happens.

One wife, her children, and the multi-husband took a road trip to Vegas. Now, mind you, aside from the polygamy thing and its strangeness to most of America, these folks do the cleanest living you can get your hands on without directly burning your skin with bleach. They say "flippin'," and not just because they're on television. It's the word that is used. So the wife proclaiming her love of Vegas ("I love love love Vegas!") seems a bit odd and begs the question, why? Begs the question enough that you end up watching a half hour of far too many people under one roof for most people's comfort until you learn they're staying at a Christiany retreat hotel 30 miles outside of Vegas. Mkay. And yet every time I watch and say "Man, why am I watching this show?" I end up watching again. It's almost the reverse curiosity of the Real Housewives franchise in which you can't turn away because you can't believe people that terrible and vapid exist and don't realize they're like that- with the Sister Wives, you can't believe people that wholesome and clean-fun-loving exist and seem to inhabit a world that is mostly free of cynicism. I don't know. I could go on. And suggest the Real House Sisterwives of some County become a reality, but I'm sure Bravo is already looking into it if there's a way to make it happen. And a way to make it sexy.

And after the Sister Wives, what new discovery was TLC leading me to learn about with tender love and care? "Extreme Couponing." An incredible program. Incredible. Inspired by the go-to win formula of their other shows that examine obsessive or addictive behavior ("Intervention," "Hoarders," "Pet Hoarders,"), this program follows families and individuals who pursue couponing as a lifestyle. The use of coupons in the episode I saw controlled the ebb and flow of their free time, their education, their recreation, and the physical layout of their home. One of the children (the mom kept referring to her kids as "her litter") slept on a bed that was elevated off of the ground to make room for the bulk toilet paper they'd purchased previously with coupons. Amazing. They'd built an elaborate system for cans that rolled the oldest cans to the front so that none ever expired and they used them in the order in which they'd acquired them. Again, amazing. The detail. The shots of "the litter" gathered round a table, scrutinizing weekly grocery store ads. The sheer mania with which the savings WERE going to be had.

My family loves saving, and frequently we call each other when good deals are gotten, but this makes us look like spendthrift a-holes! These people went to a grocery store, wracked up 2 separate $500 totals. Why two totals? Because they'd verified the store's coupon doubling/tripling policy and discovered there had been a change, which led them to each check out separately to maximize savings. (Seriously. Do not try to beat these folks to savings. They are way ahead of you). The woman's $500 total shrunk to like, not even $5. 98% savings. Seriously. Her husband's $500 total shrunk to not even $40. Seriously.

Yes, they left with cart after cart of hot dogs, cream cheese, and Special K, but they also left the customers around them (and me) with jaws hanging open. Now, do they ever eat a fresh veggie? I don't know. The show does not delve into actually nutritional practices. Just savings. And MAN. Did they save.

Remarkably, you'd think the family of 21 over at the Sister Wives house might be extreme couponing too. And now, of course, I have to suggest a battle of super couponers, which would be like reverse Supermarket Sweep, a show that rewarded expensive purchases at the store. This belt tightening could lead to a heavyweight belt of savings!

Again. If anyone would like to pay me to pitch ridiculous show concepts all day, I'm available.

Go Fish! Go!

2011-04-10T10:03:00.000-07:00

Remember all those tasks I was supposed to have done yesterday but instead wrote a rambling review about a t.v. show? Yeah, that happened, so today I'm trying to get this out of the way pretty much before anything else really to hopefully move my productivity levels out of the zone of "eh, run-on sentences are not as beneficial and laudable as like, running a mile" to "taking care of business like BTO."

So, as I stared at this blog's homepage wondering what to write about, I found myself becoming totally entranced in the motion of the fish at the top. Like a cat staring into a virtual fishbowl with the top open, I sat silently staring, trying to detect a pattern in their behavior. Though they definitely are not as enchanting as real fish (and have been described by more than one person as "looking exactly like sperm"), it's still amazing how long fish in motion can be of interest to the eye.

Considering this sent me to the archives of childhood to consider great fish tanks in days of yore. My pediatrician had a huge fish tank. It was positioned high enough in his waiting room that you could stare up and see all of the fish moving, floating, and swimming among the green plants that were stuck in there without actually being able to paw all over the glass or do anything that might result in injury to fish or child. A great way to pass the time if other kids were playing with all available toys or reading all the Highlights for Children magazines. My pediatrician also gave you a pretzel stick when you were done with your appointment. Good times.

Mr. Rogers also had a fish tank that figured into childhood. He let us watch him watching the fish. It was confirmation that yes, yes that curiosity you have IS ok. They are interesting to watch. Go right ahead. And, he also took special care to feed them, providing us lessons in what it means to have a pet. Gotta take care of them! Responsibility and curiosity - no wonder he was such a good neighbor.

In teen years, my dermatologist had a rather large fish tank. This one made the pediatrician's fish tank look like child's play. And, thinking about it now, made dermatology seem like an obviously lucrative choice for medical specialty. She had tropical fish. Not only was the tank bigger, but the fish in it were bigger. And exotic colors and shapes and sizes. Electric yellow and luminescent blue fishes would make their black eyes unmoving and stop their swimming all together, hoping that I wouldn't see them there if I were a predator. Well, the cruel joke was that they were on display and trapped. Yes, yes I could see them. But I guess they had the upper hand in not having out of control acne. The other fish probably weren't making fun of their awkward teenage years. And, safely exotically out of reach to human hands, they were not in danger of being caught, even as they were definitely being seen.

I don't know why it's fascinating and spellbinding to watch water creatures move. I even like lobster tanks. Though I guess because maybe I've never chosen one to eat? I dunno. Just neat to watch the underwater world.

I should probably look into scuba diving, huh. Snorkeling at least.
Or, barring that, go to a doctor's office.

Random Review: TV's "Body of Proof"

2011-04-09T14:28:00.000-07:00

Today I have a lot of items on a to-do list, but somehow, as is wont to happen when that is the case, the priority order of the items is a fairly direct inversion of the order in which I approach them. As such, here's today's blog entry, which is somehow more approachable in the middle of the afternoon than income taxes. Who's surprised? No one! That's right. Check mark next to "fishcrockpot." Uncle Sam? Still waiting.

Well, after discussing "Law & Order" a bit yesterday, and a bit more with loyal crock reader and entertainment connoisseur Den, and further reflection upon my real and true love for the original (and best!) version of the show, I decided to go ahead and share my review of ABC's new series "Body of Proof," a show that ehhh, I'm going to say stole a character model from "Law & Order," then expanded a bit and borrowed some Grey's Anatomy themes to make a one-hour drama I'm giving a C. But do recall that I have exacting television standards (though I watch a great deal of crap) and also that my loyalty to "Law & Order" makes my reviews of anything that might borrow from it a bit harsh. For instance, my take on "Law & Order Los Angeles"? Abomination.
Really. Talk to me, Dick Wolf. Why the melodrama?

Anyway.
Dana Delaney stars in "Body of Proof" as a neurosurgeon turned medical examiner who takes to solving murders based on the clues the dead bodies themselves give to her about the lives they lived and the emotions they felt, which in turn lead her to the real killer rather than the easiest target and most obvious choice of individual on whom to pin the murder and call the case closed, which is invariably the tact taken by the, we're to presume, donut-loving schlub of a detective who doesn't respect the medical examiner's powers of deduction, because aren't you just supposed to slice up dead people and not be a mouthy broad anyway? Yeah. Looks like he's learning a lesson or two about powerful women! And our hard-nosed coroner had to start working with dead people to let her own emotions come to life! Quite a twist!

I have seen 2 episodes of this show, the pilot, and episode 3. I gave the show a second chance after watching the pilot and saying out loud to my television at several points "This show is so bad!" because I had initially had a so-so reaction to the pilot episode of the Fox cop show "Chicago Code," but now have added it to my DVR list as a regular. Also, television is currently in that doldrums period before May sweeps but after shows air their regular episodes in which I am scrambling for new blood on the boob tube. "Body of Proof" did enough advertising for me to give it a shot, but this new blood, like the blood on the show, is, unfortunately, cold.

Dana Delaney is ok and apparently remembers all of the basics of putting on rubber medical gloves for dramatic effect from her days on "China Beach," but her character on that show was far more charming for seemingly having nuance as a human being, which this new character is still struggling to establish. We're to believe that this super type-A hardnosed, take-no-prisoners-or-B.S. coroner only became one after literally wrecking her own career, marriage, and relationship with her daughter by way of driving and fighting with her ex-husband while on her cell phone and ending up T-boned by an oncoming car, which put an end to her days as a neurosurgeon. Now, I'm even willing to take the leap that a neurosurgeon would become a coroner, but she's seemingly the coldest fish in the morgue, stiffer than the stiffs she slices and dices, only finding redemption by slowly realizing she should connect with other people around her, all of whom are wowed by her brilliance yet put off by her icy attitude. List of coworkers who are impressed and puzzled and loving and hating her includes:
- Curtis, a character who is, in my opinion, the male Jackee of this series. He's sassy and African-American and eh, I'm going to go ahead and say I find him moderately insulting in the flatness of his character. He doesn't get the respect afforded Dr. Hunt (Delaney), and everyone calls him Curtis, even though he's a doctor. Trying to prove himself on part with Dr. Hunt and not threatened by her as a person has, thus far, failed miserably and comically, but don't think he's not bringing the sass as he learns the hard way she is not one to be trifled with. Sigh.
- The young nerdy guy who wants to learn all he can from her and is also helplessly inept at dealing with human beings
- Jeri Ryan, an inexplicably hot boss who I still can't determine whether she's a cop or a medical examiner or a city official? Somehow she's a hot, self-assured boss who wears the business clothing that characters on soap operas wear to show they're businessy yet sexy, and is slowly trying to chip away at Delaney's tough exterior while still being in power above her (in a position I don't understand). I'm still hoping that her character ends up being a lesbian, because otherwise I am confused about the instances in which she shows tenderness to Dr. Hunt that to me seem to also be slightly like she's trying to seduce her. Someone let me know how that storyline plays out!
- The schlub cop who is, much like the sassy black man, right out of central casting in his annoyance and schlubery when confronted with the no-nonsense sophistication and troublemaking of this new coroner who'll NEVER back down when it comes to avenging the deaths of the bodies she's given. I could not figure out why the actor playing schlub cop looked so familiar to me and in a role that was so different from schlub cop or at least way more likable. I kept thinking of the guy who was the Dude's landlord in The Big Lebowski. Turns out this guy was Margie Gunderson's wife in Fargo. Lovable. Adoring. Into his stamp art. That guy in a very small movie part in which I'm guessing he had about 12 lines total was completely and totally a well-rounded and real and believable character. This? Not so much. We get it. He's going to have to learn to work with and appreciate Dr. Hunt. And vice versa. But is it really going to be a "tell me what killed the guy and then beat it!" conceit every episode? Looks that way.

My guess at inspiration point for this show is, because she was fantastic, the M.E. on "Law & Order," expertly played by Leslie Hendrix in a recurring and stone-cold way. Sure, her hair color changed, but her wry smile and emotionless delivery of terrible news about victims that then sent our favorite detectives down the right path toward the perp was consistent and delightful in its cold remove. What if she were the principle character? What would her home life look like? What if that icy exterior had left her cold and alone? Dead in her own life, in a way? Now of course I could be wrong. The inspiration for this show could have just as easily been Doc Hollywood or Mrs. Doubtfire. But unfortunately for me, it has not established a character likable or believable enough that I care about her redemption, or a crime drama believable enough that I don't groan when the case is solved by the coroner asking the guilty party enough questions about their morally reprehensible crime that finally the guilt and the pressure make them break and admit they did it. Jessica Fletcher and Matlock could get away with that because they were unexpected super sleuths and lovable old people. Somehow the totally unlovable science-based yet heart-driven crime solver does not, to me, inspire the same degree of gut-spilling from the guilty. But that is how the show resolves itself. Usually then ending with Dana Delaney considering her own life, and learning lessons from the dead. And her coworkers, of course.

I think "Body of Proof" will be a success.
But much like Dr. Hunt is too driven to have prevented alienating her own child and husband from her life, I am too damned invested in the quality of crime drama presented season upon season by "Law & Order" original to settle for a reductionist and unbelievable version of a powerful woman solving crimes of the heart with the cold heart she's finally warming up to.

Morgue than You were Asking For

2011-04-08T20:47:00.000-07:00

Well, it seems my pattern of taking one day off per week from this has usually resulted in a Friday free from a new post more often than not, but due to the parental fun this past weekend, I've already taken this Monday off. And here I am. Exceptionally under-interested in writing this, but aware that I MUST AS CHEATING IS NOT TOLERATED IN THE CROCKPOT.
Ha.

Point A.
Do not drop a 27/28ths full jar of jelly on your toes. It will hurt. You will use a bad word that your upstairs neighbors will probably hear. Even if your toes probably saved you from cleaning sticky shards of glass off of your kitchen floor and sticky blackberry splatter from at least 3 of your 4 total kitchen appliances, it will still not quite seem worth it at the time.

Point B.
Do not eat another fiber plus not quite food flavored bar chocolatey product as you wrote about yesterday and then be expecting to go out of your apartment without the gastrointestinal side effects advertised on product, even if it is nighttime an now you would like to be able to socialize with others without farting obviously and repeatedly.

Number 3.
Do not give any type of charitable funds to anyone who might profit from selling your address to other non-profits who somehow think that if they send you a glossy enough package, you will spend the money you don't have to save their whatever-needs-saving, unless you're prepared to receive a barrage of mail reminding you how many people need helped and also how much time and effort goes into marketing, even when it's marketing third-world poverty. Right now I'm staring at a giant envelope that says "Tibetan Prayer Flags Enclosed" and then tells me there's "A Message from His Holiness the Dalai Lama Inside
YOUR PROMPT REPLY REQUESTED."

First of all, that seems a little bit pushy from His Holiness, no? And second of all, Dalai Lama, aren't you taking a page out of the Catholic playbook in sending a gift that will in fact make me feel guilty for enjoying it without helping your cause unless I send you money? I can only hope my good friends at Oxfam are as efficient with distributing the pittance I send them to those in need as they are in reminding me how much my support is needed by those in need. Pretty
sure we might only be covering the cost of postage of what you send me with what I send there, Oxfam. Then sending me 3 to 4 insistent notices that I help more (all giant, glossy, photo-laden, many-colored thick printed page notices, by the way), only makes me wonder - huh, did they not process that? That was it, Oxfam. Please don't sell my information to the Dalai Lama or the Women's Cooperative or the Smile Train. Oh, you did already? Great. Hope it was more than my contribution to you was so that you're at least doubling my gift. And do you have any partners concerned about conservation? When the Sierra Club sent me junk mail and a membership sticker, I felt REAL weird about it and did not affix the member sticker to my vehicle. Which is not electric, in case they were wondering. Not even a hyrbid. Not even American! Oy. Does the Sierra Club even want me???
No.

It is funny the names that the organizations have, and also funny to consider that I'm sure a year's worth, minimum, of meetings and consulting group presentations, and board member votes went into properly branding these non-profits for the most donor-centric appeal. And yet I'm throwing their hard work in the trash, thinking I need to look up how to get off of their lists, wondering if there's a separate non-profit dispensation for junk mailing.

It's also funny the ways in which their misspelling my name from time to time provides just enough indignant remove that I can tell the Dalai Lama to get enlightened somewhere else (not really, I'd imagine it's quite worthwhile to spend time with him...). But let's just say I'm tossing the junk mail and getting myself free.

Best non-profit junk mail? I got an envelope, addressed to me with return address? Sam Waterson.

That's all it said. The actor who plays Jack McCoy on Law & Order was sending me mail. I assumed he had been receiving the fan mail I'd mentally been sending but not writing, or that someone had somehow heard me talk to my television during every episode when I say things like "oooh I love Law & Order," but then, realizing that was probably a bit far-fetched, I assumed he was writing me on behalf of Ameritrade, the investment stuff he sells on t.v. It wasn't! He was actually representing the Southern Law Project? See, this is terrible, I don't even remember the name of the group, but I know they work for justice, and here was the television embodiment of the guy who works for justice when he could make a boatload of cash in private practice but he's just too damned principled for that RIGHT IN MY MAILBOX.

Unless some of the profits from syndication of the show are going to the cause, I'm afraid Sam Waterson will have to come to my door himself.
Which would maybe only be outdone by the Dalai Lama working the Publisher's Clearinghouse prize patrol.

I'm ready.

Pop Quiz, Hotshot

2011-04-07T15:26:00.000-07:00

Which product features the following warning?:

NEW USERS: Increase your fiber intake gradually. Gastrointestinal discomfort may occur until your body adjusts.

A. Metamucil Original Blend (orange flavor)

B. Metamucil Lite for Women (acai berry flavor)

C. 5-hour Energy Drink

D. Organic Broccoli Florets - 12 ounce bag

E. Fiber-con Fiber Supplement pills

F. Taco Bell "It's-Beef-to-Us" Chalupa Supreme

G. Centrum Copper - Specially Formulated for Women in their 30s

H. Vintage 1999 Lays Potato Chips - original Olean formula

I. None of the Above

If you said I, then you know your packaging (or you talk about yourself a lot)! And that I J K! I was just kidding (and you don't talk about yourself a lot, I'm the one blogging, right?). I don't know if the above products exist. But I did happen to purchase and consume the product whose box includes the above warning label, set apart from the rest of the text in a way that makes it seem like they were legally required to inform me of the potential for gastrointestinal discomfort. The above warning belongs to the fine folks at Kellogg's and their glorified granola bars "Fiber Plus Antioxidants." I realize now that that is the actual product name. There's nothing suggesting a food base is under all this "health." Even the flavor assigned to this product is not quite owning up to being a real flavor. "Chocolatey Peanut Butter" is not chocolate, and it's not peanut butter. It's like what, a flavored version of a flavor? Peanut butter that tastes like chocolate? Is the chocolate not chocolate? Ha! I just read the ingredients more closely and NO, no it is not chocolate. There's some cocoa powder, but there's nothing that's identifiable as chocolate itself, apparently. You know what there is a lot of? (In addition to dangerous levels of fiber, apparently) SUGAR. Not only is it the fourth ingredient on the list, it's the second ingredient on the list of sub-ingredients that comprise the third ingredient on the list. So, to recap:

fiber powder

oats

rice that's mostly sugar

sugar

And we haven't even scratched the surface on hydrogenated oils! So, now having basically consumed a candy bar, I get to the notification that this sweet treat might tear me UP! Awesome. This just cannot be good for me. I think this is what broccoli is supposed to do. Even chocolatey broccoli.

There are a lot of promises here that these allow one to "treat yourself to better nutrition," but I sort of feel like the "TM" logo after that phrase should instead be an asterisk warning "actual nutrition most probably not that much better..."

I do get:

7 grams of whole grains

zinc

vitamin E

antioxidants

a buttload of fiber

and a rich chocolatey layer (TM) [note: real chocolate not promised]

This angst at a product that sells nutrition when it's actually a granola bar is most probably sourced by my having given up some desserty treats for Lent, and supplementing their absence with all manner of "nutritional" bar items. These FiberPlus Antioxidants are an egregious offense to the integrity of my efforts. I mean, quite frankly, these are a not-too-shabby approximation of the flavors found in Girl Scout Samoas (now Caramel Delites) cookies. So it's really like I'm feeling gastrointestinal distress in my SOULLLLLLLLLL. Well, more so in my...ahem...moral fiber.

Thank God I'm supplementing!

Keeping my Smile in Working Condition

2011-04-06T16:12:00.000-07:00

Somehow the remainder of this week is unfolding with a slow motion sort of speed that is leading me to dream of escape and nature and outer space. I've definitely acquired some sort of funk that has, thus far, proven hard to shake. Today I was returning to work after lunch, mired in my own bad mood, when I happened to bump into my dental hygienist.

There are some people in life who are like peace resources for me, lighthouses of calm and goodness for times when I feel adrift in the sea of the world. Or even if I am riding the waves, these people improve what is already going well. Some people just give off a sense that everything will be ok. These people are treasures. Even more so when you're not expecting to find treasure. My dental hygienist is one such gem. A diamond in the rough of tartar and plaque and whatever else might be on teeth, I love her.

And I know that sounds ridiculous. I don't even know her last name. But I love her as a person. She is full of kindness and cannot hide it. When she asks questions about my life or my flossing, I know she is sincere. Her work space has several inspirational, partially religious quotes in Spanish posted on cabinets under labels that say things like "suction" and "t.brushes." I guess it is comforting to know she is actively working on moving through life with kindness and light for others, but I still feel like she HAS to have come that way. I do not imagine her default setting ever being "rage" for life experiences unless it was for something completely justified, not "that guy littered," which would be all it would take for me (note I wrote that as a hypothetical, but it definitely actually happened. I know it is all it would take).

Today we talked about how she waves at patients and they do not recognize her out of context and without a mask. I told her I liked her new haircut (I did!), and talked about the weather. It was maybe a 2 minute exchange. She told me to keep flossing. It was 2 minutes that totally made the difference in my day. Life, improved.

I love her as a hygienist too, not just a friendly face. She always asks several times about my comfort throughout a cleaning. And she's got a great sense of humor. And she listens to the Oldies station and hums or sings along as she works. It's so comforting, I can't even do it justice. It's like the opposite of my experiences in hair salons where there is forced banter and stress at not having a cool enough conversation and feeling I've let down the stylists personally by not doing a thing with my hair and not really giving them adequate information about what I'd like them to do with it. That's not how I feel at the dentist, a location that should, comparatively, be far more anxiety-inducing. I give all credit to Isabelle. The keeper of my smile.

Thanks, Isabelle!

Steeling the Show - Holy Pittsburgh, Batman!

2011-04-05T23:02:00.000-07:00

I learned today that Christopher Nolan is bringing his whole caped crusading gang to Pittsburgh to film the next installment of Batman. Now, I'm not sure if you've read my other rather lengthy rambles about the importance people from the city of Pittsburgh place on letting other people know about the city of Pittsburgh when cool things happen in the city of Pittsburgh (or when famous people are from the city of Pittsburgh), but let's just say, we're the little city that cares big time. So this news comes like a bat signal of its own to Pittsburghers - living there and relocated - to let others know immediately just how awesome our city is (duh!).

Sure, Batman already wore black and gold (at least before he became a darker sort of knight), but now he's going to be fighting the forces of crime and corruption in America's most livable city! (Oh, did I mention that was an honor bestowed upon the city? It was). There's a very good chance that Gotham just got a lot more bridges than it ever had before, based on this new location. There's also a good chance CGI will not be necessary for some abandoned industrial set pieces. But be warned, Christopher Nolan's location scout, you will need to bring your own lung-choking industrial smog and smoke if that's the gritty grit Batman will have to battle! We are not a dirty steel town. Do not let your perception from 1972 hold sway.

After seeing Christian Bale portray a Lowell, Massachusetts, resident and life so gosh-darned believably, I'm not going to lie and say it's not a deeply rooted fantasy and hope that he'll do some character studies while in Pittsburgh and, I dunno, make a fantastic Pittsburgh-based movie quite immediately. I don't know if it'd be Flashdance II or the next installment of Inspector Gadget (yeah, those were filmed in Pittsburgh), but it'd be great.

Also amazing - the way in which a few shots of Batman together with the Steelers, creating a Pittsburgh-specific justice league (with Hines Ward hoisting his mirrored ball Dancing with the Stars trophy, at some point, of course) could single-handedly inspire the largest opening weekend gross in one city in movie history. Maybe throw in some shots of Dan Rooney, have music by the Clarks, and for the love of god, include I.C. Light at the after party.

Just something to think about!

Vacationality - it's spreading!

2011-04-03T23:11:00.000-07:00

The funny thing about having someone visit you on what is a vacation for them is suddenly you also lose all track of day, time, and sense of responsibility to a world or activities other than whatever is next on your agenda o' fun. Today my parents and I enjoyed a giant brunch and a Dodger game. Dodger dogs were had, even after a giant brunch. The wave was waved. And the Dodgers won! Defeating the Giants and allowing for ample opportunity for enterprising young people to chant "Giants Suck!" at the opposing team. It was indeed, a good Sunday! I'm not even dreading going to work tomorrow. Probably because I'm not.
Instead, there's a museum to visit, and I'm sure about 7-12 meals to eat.
I would write more, but I really need my rest. Gotta be fresh when living the retired lifestyle!

Living up to the Tagline

2011-04-02T23:11:00.000-07:00

The happiest place on earth.
No, really.

The "No, really" could have easily been added to Disneyland's advertising today and accurately described the experience my parents had during their first foray into the wonderful world of Disney theme parks and attractions (I realize that is probably a phrase that is somehow subject to copyright infringement or enforcement). Never having seen a princess's tower made real, or a Mickey Mouse in gleaming top coat and tails wave with a look that is so smiley and reassuring that you can't BELIEVE that's really Mickey and he's really waving to you, my parents were on cloud nine. And the cloud was wearing mouse ears.

They also had astoundingly unbelievable luck. They walked into the park, and Mickey was standing there. There was a 20 minute wait on Pirates of the Caribbean, and it only took us 10. We walked onto It's a Small World like we were the guy in Carly Simon's "You're So Vain" walked into the party like he was walking onto a yacht. We had it in the bag, easy. And my parents loved every minute of it. The world of laughter, the world of tears, the world of hopes and the world of fears, and even the song 100 times in a row. They loved that the trash cans were thematically different in every part of the part. They loved the flowers. They loved the characters. They loved the stories and the worlds, and everything that kids of all ages are supposed to love about Disneyland. It's as though my parents were the people Disney's ad firm followed around to gauge visitor reaction to the park, but just decided to cast 3-year-olds and 5-year-olds in the commercials that sell that image to the public, because they are cuter.

I am, as one inevitably is after a day in the happiest place on earth, spent!
Thank you, Space Mountain. And good night Mickey Mouse.

Go West to a New Nest

2011-03-31T23:25:00.000-07:00

Big shakes for me this weekend, and most probably sub-standard blog efforts as a result - my parents are in town! The empty nesters have come home to roost. In my nest! And so far so good, though they both have winter coats and hats, as well as flannel pajamas, to keep them extra warm amid a west coast heat wave. Also, my dad, ever the minimalist, has a suitcase with him for this weekend excursion that I believe is one size shy of a steamer trunk. Very good to be prepared. And amazingly, neither my brothers nor I were in scouts organizations as children. Is that sentence right? Sounds funky! Anyway.

It's kind of nice to get a new perspective, even if familiar, on the daily surroundings. My parents left snow on the ground and 30 degree temperatures this morning and deplaned to 80 degrees and sunny this afternoon. It's nice to be reminded of the incredible fortune that is typical California weather. Even as I spent the day sweating through my shirt on a repeated basis. I also am reminded that yes, traffic is a bit wilder in the wild west, mostly by the "I can't believe he did that!" comments made by my parents about the behaviors and actions of other drivers. My mom's most used phrase "I'm trying not to watch." My dad, by comparison, is so elated to see sp much sun at once that he's pretty darned easy going.
It's as though he gets a vitamin-D infusion that is of an amount that renders an effect akin to that of using illegal drugs. Suddenly, stressors just don't seem like a big deal. It's so sunny. I'm sure whatever the problem is, eh, it'll go away.

And, speaking of illegal/legal drugs, our first trip to the beach netted a shiny new business card that I tried to let my parents decode, but to no avail. It was for a marijuana dispensary. Our first foray out of the car since I'd picked them up and not 5 minutes later, they were being offered an easy, convenient way to buy drugs at a beach storefront.

Welcome to California, mom and dad.

The Look that Says it All

2011-03-30T23:26:00.000-07:00

This evening the sunset was a sight to behold - pink and blue and bright, especially so after leaving a Walgreen's victorious, temporarily, in my personal battle (seemingly ongoing, perhaps due in no small part to my place of business and the college kids running rampant therein) against oblivious entitled 20-somethings who seem to lack all self-awareness, or are aware of themselves, but just don't care if they're COMPLETELY ANNOYING AND ABSURD and well, obviously more important than you. Obviously.

Do I sound old and bitter? It's generational, I'm sure.

But why was there a silent war? And how was I a silent victor? A silent alliance with a sympathetic "Are you effing kidding me???" look from the woman working the pharmacy counter at Walgreen's (bless her!) made it so. Because she made them wait. And checked me outta there and back into the sunset. And even did so professionally.

So, most times a pharmacy counter might be a bit crowded in an after work buzz time, like the grocery store, or Taco Bell's drive-thru line at 2 a.m. Part of making a trip easy involves avoiding a busy time. I thought I might be remotely safe at 7:30. There was still a line, but not too bad. There was a man who seemed intoxicated picking up something for his wife. There was an annoyed woman chewing her gum like a cow chews cud while not looking up from her iPhone. And then there was the oblivious couple canoodling in the pharmacy line, talking about how it's awesome to not have claaasss on Friday and like, how it's so crazy how even in such a tough semester, not having class on Friday like, totally just happened. Midterms are going to be crazy. But at least it's almost the weekend.

The girl was wearing short shorts and flip flops and her college sweatshirt (sigh, yes, that same one) and her beau was wearing a surf-brand endorsed aquamarine professionally distressed t-shirt and shorts. They were discussing how many things were like, totally hard. And how many things were like, totally awesome.
And somehow, when the red sea of their love and sympathies for each other's daily struggles conversationally broke and they physically parted, they revealed warfare - a cart. A cart full of stuff. At the pharmacy counter.

Now, did I buy two items at the same time as my prescription? Yes. Yes I did. But do I believe there's an unwritten "express-ish lane" law governing acceptable behavior in the pharmacy register area? Yes. Yes I do.

Sure. If it's 10:30 a.m. on a Wednesday, and you are checking your blood pressure like you do every week and maybe you have 2 boxes of epsom salts in your cart because there is a sale and suddenly the tin of danish butter cookies in there is holding up the tube socks you are buying because they were on the display, sure. Go ahead. Because there is probably not a line behind you. And the pharmacy isn't closing at about the same rate that the sun is setting. And you are probably 85 years old and retired and enjoying some shopping, and EVERYONE ELSE THERE IS TOO. That's the custom at that time of day! And you've earned the right to bring your cart to the pharmacy - you're 85.

This did not qualify to the two able-bodied-yet-highly-annoyed-while-oblivious-to-the fact-that-they-were-highly-annoying young people in front of me. When I say able-bodied, I do not exaggerate. Like, I wondered if this girl was on the diving team. She had the muscle definition to qualify. But not, apparently to wait in the line at the front of the store to avoid pissing off the 4 people behind her.

Cart contents:
Giant jug of water
Giant box of tampons
Lean Cuisines thrown randomly about the cart
Toilet paper
Miscellany*

*There was enough miscellany to necessitate use of the front and the seat portion of this cart. A lot of miscellany.

So this girl starts unloading her items, puts about 4 of them on the pharmacy counter like it is in fact the grocery store but the checkout girl just happens to be wearing a white coat, and casually asks for her prescription.
Which was like, called in like 10 minutes agoooo.

Amazingly, the prescription was not ready, as it had to be prepared in the real world, where gratification is not, in fact, instant at all times (even I have to suffer this hard lesson in my impatient moments).

Response to this news?
"Ohhhhhhhh. Ok."

Totally un-stymied, she left the 4 items she'd unloaded on the counter, and just lingered there with her cart and her boyfriend and her car keys and her hair twirl, oblivious to the fact that the woman working the counter intended to help other people in the space she was occupying.

"Next," said the pharmacy tech. I loved her. She was not about to put up with this b.s.

The drunk man's wife's prescription was also not ready yet.

"Next," she said, and eyed me like she knew I had murderous rage on my mind.

She even went so far as to re-orient the credit card machine to me and away from the girl's 4-item road block in a passive aggressive attempt to get this girl to get an effing clue and move herself, her stuff, her cart.

It was her boyfriend that picked up on it, but said nothing. He just went and sat down in the chairs (usually occupied by the elderly at 10:30 as they wait for their prescriptions to be filled) set apart from the counter, and she soon followed.

"These are like, massage chairs or something..." She said, acting as though she was in Brookstone at the mall and not a Walgreen's.

I don't think I rolled my eyes, but something must have come out on my face to show my disdain because that was when the pharmacy tech and I had the most loaded "Here you go" and "Thank you" exchange I've had in a long, long while.
In just saying that and moving our faces, here's what was really said.

Me: I cannot effing believe she just left her lean cuisine spaghetti and meatballs and a pack of mini kleenexes on the counter in everyone's way and just has no clue it's totally annoying.

Her: Not as annoying as what's coming out of her mouth.

Me: Tell me about it. When's the last time I felt sorry for a college kid who had to suffer the slings and arrows of a 4 day week?

Her: Never. Which is about when I want to fill that prescription.

Me: Yeah, but they'd probably never get the hint and would stay here until their cell phone batteries ran out.

Her: L.O.L. I'd say if I were her, instead of laughing.

Me: Totallyyyyyyyyy.

Her: Anyway,

Me: Thanks again. Keep fighting the good fight.

Her: You too. Into the sunset you go.

And so I did.
The best medicine perhaps? Being understood!

The Train Has Left the Station

2011-03-29T23:46:00.000-07:00

Well, I just wrote two rather lengthy emails that could have just as easily been non-responders by me, and I realized both were very elaborate distracted avoidance attempts by me. Apparently, nothing gets my creative juices flowing quite as fast as the actual need to get my critical thinking/logic juices flowing. Except I don't even think those are juices. Probably some sort of infusion. Or micro-powder. Whatever it is, I skew toward juice, when pressed, to think.

Now I'm imagining myself with a rind. It's kind of fun!

See, even here I'm coming off as a little bit drunk when folks, unless the granola bar I ate has fermented oats n' honey, is not the case, not even a lick.
Juicy Fruit - it's gonna move ya!
It might not, but trains will.

I love trains. I like the idea, I like the noises, I like the motion, I like the connectivity, and I like when "The Soup" on E! makes fun of the show "I love toy trains" even though I love that the show is so earnestly named and that everyone on it truly does love toy trains. One college I visited while trying to decide where to apply had an ice cream shop with a train on the ceiling. I think I remembered that more than any other part of the trip.
I did not attend that institution, but I did admire the train.

Anyway, another great part about trains? Songs about trains!
Most of the time, if you write a song about a train, I tend to like it a little more, just because of the train advantage you get.
I even loved the old Amtrak commercial jingle.
"All abooooaaaaard, America! All aboard, Amtrak."
Yes. Indeed! Choo choo!

As such, I offer the following list of beloved or noteworthy train songs, in no particular order. Are there exceptions to every rule about train association being absolutely positive? Yes. Is the band Train one of them? Yes. Though I refuse to say I don't sing along to "Drops of Jupiter" while laughing at myself for doing so. I refuse as it would not be true.

Anyway - all aboard, America.

1. Midnight Train to Georgia - Gladys Night and the Pips
When the Pips sing "Woo Woo!" to make a train whistle that's usually so cheery cut into the sadness of Gladys telling the story of her failed man's departure home (to the life he left behind), and her decision to go too, it's a sad reminder that the lonesome whistle does blow, often in more than one way.
Speaking of - how about I heard that Lonesome Whistle Blow? Hank Williams.

2. Crazy Train - (ay ay ay!) = Ozzy Osbourne
Crazy, but that's how it goes. YES, Ozzy. A nod to the sensation of whoops, I'm nuts, huh? that we all run into now and again. But still completely upbeat. It's a happy "I've lost it!" anthem rather than one of despair. An achievement in and of itself.
Honorable mention - Long Train Running - Doobies. (seems they forced the song into the context of a train, but ok, it's not terrible)

3. Peace Train - Cat Stevens
This song does officially belong in the category of "that's my jam." It is so great! It sounds like Cat Stevens is the pied piper of peace and that he had an entire party with him in the recording studio to clap and sing along, and share the message of hope for the train that's coming to take the country by storm. A train of peace, wreaking PEACE HAVOC on the nation and its people. I mean, strong imagery, but it's so dynamic and good natured all at once - I love it and believe it. Every time I hear it, I am ready to get on board. Come on come on the peace traiiiiiiiiiiiiN! Seriously. Can we get one of those? Like, build a high speed peace train rail system?

4. Love Train - O'Jays
While unfortunately co-opted by the folks at Coors to sell beer, the Love Train is not surprisingly up there with the peace train in being super duper fun and exciting. Who does not want to get on this train? It's full of LOVE! Really. Let it riiiiiide. Let it riiiiiide. Again, a driving, positive, upbeat message. On a train.

5. Groove Line - Heatwave
You know the song "Always and Forever"? It's a slow jam. It's by Heatwave. It's on a lot of soft rock and R&B stations and features prominently in the nightly request and dedication section. It is about 180 degrees from the tone, tempo, and feel of the other awesome Heatwave song, "Groove Line," which suggests that we all should get riding on the Groove Line, tonight. It is a train to jump on, because it's a party train. Which brings me to....

6. Party Train - The Gap Band
I don't know if it's an L.A. radio station's play of the Gap Band, or maybe the general maturing and refinement of my tastes, but dear lord, discovering the work of the Gap Band was like discovering part of my personal soundtrack that had been missing for decades. You know? Like, if everyone had to make a playlist that reflected who they are as a person and the events/moods/etc. of their lives, they'd have a soundtrack when they were done. The Gap Band explains a lot about me, I swear. The Party Train, an 8-ish minute song of theirs, explains the need to get aboard, and cautions listeners "don't miss that train, don't miss the party train!" All of this, while incorporating real train whistle sound effects. Yes. Yes. and Yes. Also, like a train, the song does not stop. If you were stopped at a railroad crossing and the party train went by, you'd be annoyed, because it's a long train. Which, to me, makes it all the more realistic as being a train. Real trains have a lot of cars. And real party trains have a lot of reminders about the need to be sure you are on the train. Be sure to get your ticket. So you don't miss it.
You got it, Gap Band. And thank YOU for the reminders. I love risk management.

7. The Gambler - Kenny Rogers
The entire story of the song, which is a great one, begins with the premise that the narrator is "on a train bound for nowhere" with the Gambler himself. It is by way of train travel that this guy learns everything about life from a stranger who knew when to hold 'em. (I'd imagine he held his ticket to the party train fairly tightly, for example).

8. The Loco-motion
WELL, when you don't know that it was Little Eva before Kylie Minogue, or that Grand Funk Railroad (yeah, I kinda like their name better than most of their music) did a version of the song and you have to go to wikipedia to see what's what, THAT is where you learn Carole King co-wrote this song. Wow, that lady is everywhere. Anyway, this song, while catchy, is less one of my favorite train songs and more on the list for another special reason - providing one of my earliest A-ha moments (Take on me!) with wordplay. I distinctly remember realizing that it could be locomotion, like a train, as well as loco-motion, like craaaazy motion and dance! It seemed so smart! It worked 2 ways! And the song is stuck in my brain as a great example of why words are very awesome and added to my lifelong love of those who use them to clever effect.

9. Train Song - Phish
This is just a good story song about a train ride and what's out the window. The sense of travel gained is a good one, and there's a quiet, peaceful feel to the song. Not a peaceful, easy feeling. Don't get me wrong. (I just really don't like the Eagles man....GET OUT OF MY CAB...)

10. Runaway Train - Soul Asylum
I mean, come on. Really. Look it up on the internet. Listen to it. And see if you're not both transported to the year it came out in your head, and also a little sad because of the song. You areeeee. It got ya. Wrong way on a one-way track.

11. Bluegrass train songs - general
You can make a fiddle sound like a train whistle, and like a chugging train, and do it all together all at once until you honestly hear a train coming in a song. I really have yet to meet one of these songs I don't love. I think it's the orange blossom express? Yep. That's an example. It sounds like a train! Listen!

12. Train Song - Chet Atkins
I know these were in no particular order, but this would probably be my number 1 train song, if pressed (like an orange that fell off the orange blossom express, of course). This song makes me really ridiculously happy. It's instrumental as a song, and instrumental to improving my mood, day or night.

Speaking of, gotta put this train in the station for bed.
Choo Choo!

Under the Tuscan Sun...You're Family

2011-03-28T22:22:00.000-07:00

Hi gang,
Thanks for bearing with yesterday! Sunday is over. Woo!

SO
today I saw an advertisement for the Olive Garden that was supposedly showing the training grounds for Olive Garden chefs. That training ground was Tuscany, Italy. Everyone in tall tall tall chef hats, gathered around artisan tables, making faces of concentration as they watched a more Italian-looking (older and tanner) chef cut a chunk of cheese the size of a slice of cake from an even larger hunk of cheese. They looked impressed. They had just learned to cut the cheese. Which most people learn to laugh at in 2nd or 3rd grade. But, don't let me be degrating to cheese cutters.
Uh oh...slid that one in. Had to.

Now sure, the premise of the commerical was in fact that these chefs are going to Italy to learn how to make the Olive Garden's new signature dish. For those of you unfamiliar with Olive Garden's signature dishes, many times they end up being stuffed with stuff on top of a bed of stuff that's got a delicious stuff sauce. Served with salad and breadsticks. (Duh!) I sort of think the appeal of simple Italian cooking probably gets lost after the second round of stuff, but the idea is there are like 40 authentic Italian flavors in one dish.

Like the Olive Garden's new lobsteruccini alfredo with butter parmesan sauce, on top of angel hair with spicy tomato cream sauce. Served with salad and breadsticks duh.

I feel like there is a formula in the Olive Garden test market kitchen that could generate meal ideas through algorithm rather than kitchen innovation.

MEAT/PROTEIN + ITALIANISH GOGNATE + PASTA TYPE + VEGETABLE/SPICE/SEASON OF THE YEAR + SAUCE + SALAD AND BREADSTICKS DUH.

Someone could build this and make it a facebook quiz "What Olive Garden meal are you?" And a new "seasonal selections" menu insert for the restaurant itself.

Also, I kinda feel like that could even be a part of the final exam that all the Tuscan training chefs have to take to become certified Olive Garden "family" members. That and the game, how far can you stretch a stick of butter?

I guess my question is, who, anywhere on earth, who is over the age of 9, actually believes there is a training center in Italy where Italian chefs, nay, MASTERS of chefery, in the Italian tradition, are teaching America's best...franchise owners? Menu planners? the most careful ways to authentically make Italian dishes. I really have to believe that they just decided enough of their market overlapped with the market for the movie "Under the Tuscan Sun" and picked Tuscany as a fictional location.

Like, the Domino's ad campaign where they're fessing up to sucking? And then showing us what they're doing to try to not suck? Far more believable.

But convincing me there's a plane full of chefs somewhere, all dressed up in their chef whites, boarding Alitalia flight 4382 to Tuscany from Milwaukee, harder. The specialty dish the chefs were learning? They did look delicious. But they were essentially puff pastry shells. Like apple turnovers full of cheese instead of apples. And the best was, they were thrown on top of other stuff. You could eat these traditional delicacies in like, a meat and veggie broth, or like, as a side/topper to the rest of your meal. Not at all like, acknowledged as a deliciously cheesy pastry thing that has no relation to Italian food and more in common with the original pastry baron from the old country, Don Entenmann.

Why can't we just say we all sometimes get hungry when we're leaving the mall?
And we say we'll only have one breadstick, but oops, we need more.
Is breadsticks the first lesson of Tuscany?
How to keep them bottomless?

I suppose I'll never know. Never, that is, until Olive Garden, Lifetime Original Movies, and Diane Lane team up to make the thrilling television romance, "Under the Tuscan Sun II: All for the Gnocchi."

The tagline?
When you're here, you're family, but how far will you go to get there?

with salad and breadsticks.
Duh!

Thunder Only Happens when it's Raining

2011-03-27T21:36:00.000-07:00

I heard this song on the radio this evening and realized for the first time that thunder happens when it's not raining. It sometimes foretells the approach of rain. Or sometimes tells of a storm passing you by but raining on others. And sometimes it's the sign that nature is churning, working up to a storm to be announced at a later time. Storm in the works. But thunder happens.

Apologies to crockpot readers. I've got a case of the Sundays something fierce. The Sundays occur pretty regularly on Sundays - the inevitable end of free time to be replaced by the work week brings on a bout of the blues at the prospect. I also feel like this Lent's crockpot is suffering from an interminable case of the Sundays, in spirit at least. My heart doesn't seem to be in it this year. Or at least it doesn't seem to be pouring out on the page. More like flopping around like a dying fish. Not good reading folks.

A recurring life theme for me seems to be the interplay and confusion of intention, obligation, happy coincidence, effort, guilt, want, fear, and self loathing/self adulation. I guess kind of like thunder, the blogosphere does not always guarantee a satisfactory resolution to these sometimes competing and sometimes complementary factors.

But it is true that players only love you when they're playing.
That we can all agree on, right?

Saturday Night Fever

2011-03-26T15:15:00.000-07:00

In the middle of washing dishes, completely randomly, I remembered I had a dream last night that I was talking to my niece about disco. One of my nieces is four. The other, not yet 1. I was talking to the one who can talk. And we were sharing the joy of disco. I don't even think we were listening to it! Just out of the blue she said "I like disco." And so it began.

I was insisting it was as wonderful - probably even more wonderful - than she thought it was. And I was talking about all these fabulous disco songs she needed to hear, and landed upon the Disco Mickey Mouse record that I unearthed in my parents' record collection a few years back. A goldmine of disco grooves that feature Disney characters almost spoofing/more homaging popular disco songs (which I love every time I hear one of them on the radio and think fondly of Donald Duck's similar version), I immediately absconded with the record, as my roommate at the time had a record player in California. Now I still have the record, but not a record player. And so, in the dream, the realization that I could NOT share my love of a great record with my niece was a crushing blow. I was failing to educate her as well, having no faith in my brother's respect for disco, apparently.

As I washed a pot with some spinach stuck to the edges, I realized that my subconscious had been using Disco Mickey Mouse as a symbol of my anxiety and sadness about being far from my nieces and losing opportunities to share important passions with them - like disco. Somehow that in itself was surprising, yet not, yet hilarious. What symbolized exactly what they needed to know and understand and appreciate that no one could teach them but me? Disco. And Disney disco at that.

Ah the mind works in mysterious, funky ways.

When Duke Loses, America Wins

2011-03-24T17:39:00.000-07:00

Below is the post I originally devoted my time to today. It is about my dislike of sinus discomfort. That's before coming home, getting into 3 types of sweatpants material based clothing items, sidling up to my t.v. remote with a piping hot bowl of soup and stumbling my way into the second half of the Arizona vs. Duke game. What follows below is me whining and complaining about my face. What I have now instead? Total elation. Oppressive regime ---> OVERTHROWN. And what is that regime? Duke basketball and Coach K. Tossed from the tourney by an unlikely, ON-FIRE, deep-benched Arizona team. Amen and hallelujah! Enjoy the flight home, blue devils. The Cats got WILD tonight.

I came home eagerly anticipating checking the scores of today's games, not being all that surprised or interested in watching them play out as expected, then diving into NBC's Thursday night lineup.

Butler was beating Wisconsin, as I thought they might. SDSU had fallen to UConn, as I hoped they wouldn't. Florida beat BYU, and I wasn't really interested.
What I was not expecting and could not take my eyes off of was a 10 point Arizona lead in the 2nd half of a sweet 16 game. A lead on Duke, tormentor of so many close college losses I've watched. The never say die blue devils who I SWEAR can overcome a 10 point deficit with 30 seconds left on the clock. Coach K, while evil (moral judgments found in fishcrockpot not confirmed by higher power or moral governing body), surely knows how to win games. He especially knows how to not choke in the tournament. When everyone else gets the big dance jitters, Coach K tells his team to waltz. And they do. 1-2-3, all the way to the final four. Lest I compliment him too much, might I say some of his coaching does involve swearing, berating officials about calls to get the fouls he wants called and those he doesn't avoided, and well, I'm pretty sure black magic somewhere in there.

So to find Arizona, a Pac-10 team that lost many regular season games to far lesser opponents, ahead on Duke. Well, I assumed Arizona was in the middle of a run that Coach K would correct through angry timeouts, tearing into his players, bitching to officials, and then having his automatons turn on their 3-point shooting ability like wildfire while one of the assistant coaches added goat's blood to the gatorade. That's just how it works. Duke might get on the ropes, but then they bounce right back off of them. Boomerang in your face. And suddenly everyone on your team has 4 fouls. And everyone on his has 2. And it's 1 and 1! And they don't miss. And if they do, your players foul his trying to get a rebound. Arggggggghhhhhhhh I've seen this scenario so many times. So. Many. Times. Been excited so many times at what looked like an impending Duke defeat only to find it was whoops- a surprise win. So. Many. Times.

I was nervous. I didn't know if Arizona knew that's how it worked.
Maybe their players didn't need to know? Maybe not knowing helped? Or maybe, just maybe, they did know, but they didn't care!

They were on fire. In the zone.
Unstoppable.
Limitless.
Insidious.
Oh, I'm sorry, those are just movie titles. No idea why you'd name a movie Insidious unless you took the SAT less than 2 years ago (maybe that's the target audience), but yeah. Those are all movies.

I kept waiting for Arizona to falter. Kept waiting for Duke to be Duke. And they did a little bit.
Coach K bawled out the refs after his players were called for fouls (that they had committed).
For the next several minutes, Arizona players had to make incredible shots while being impeded by fouls from Duke that were not called.
They also were called for fouls that were not fouls when committed by Duke players.

I nervously ate pretzels. I'd seen this so many times! I knew what happened next! I would watch the double-digit lead be whittled away by some pure shooting white kid who drained 3 3-pointers in a row. Then a foul that would both put U of A in foul trouble and give Duke a chance for 3. Then whoops, suddenly it's a 2 point game. I've seen it SO MANY TIMES. So. Many. Times. I can't even tell you.

But.

THAT DIDN'T HAPPEN!!!!
I couldn't believe it! They stayed hot. Duke stayed cold. Foul schemes didn't work. The announcers pronouncing victory in a way that surely would be the kiss of death when Duke was involved did not work! The jinx was OFF! Arizona was ON! It was incredible.

And, of course in my excitement, I had to be proud of the Arizona coach, Pittsburgh's own Sean Miller. Really, as stated before in the crockpot, any time any one related to Pittsburgh does something great, expect EVERY Pittsburgher you know to tell you how that person is from Pittsburgh and to claim them as his/her own. So yeah, that. Congrats, Sean Miller. A coach who really worked his way up through the ranks assisting, head coaching, and now bigger conference head coaching.

While texting my glee (that's right, it was a word before it was a show) about the Duke loss to my brother and excitement about the win, what did he mention? The high school which the Arizona coach attended. We then discussed seeing his picture in the trophy case of his grade school. At the time he played for Pitt, so it was like seeing a celebrity photo without having the equivalent of Access Hollywood in Pittsburgh.
It was exciting. He was good. And now, YAY! Go Sean Miller. Go Arizona. And thanks again for a tournament that makes such unexpected awesomeness possible on a rainy Thursday.
As for Duke, the apropos movie title? Sucker Punch.
And sorry as I should be to delight in their loss, I've been handed one by them one too many times to not enjoy this shock to their systems.
Besides. They'll be back. They always are.

If you'd like to read my original whining about my face, carry on!

(original bitch n' moan post for today)
What Really Killed the Dinosaurs

I think it could have been the cold virus. A total change from theories they were killed by a fireball, I know, it was something cold, not hot. Actually, I put forth this theory only as I myself am a Whineosaurus Rex as I am enjoying the third straight day of having active feeling in my sinuses and eyeballs, and using kleenexes like college kids (and Rachel Zoe) misuse the word "literally," literally liberally. Yet I stubbornly and moronically am not just taking a tylenol and sucking it up like the rest of the world does when they have a cold or allergies. I think it might be because I don't know if it's a cold or allergies? I'm somehow still trying to test the symptoms for self-diagnosis by monitoring my symptoms over many days. Not that I would then take allergy meds, but maybe. This morning in fact, awakening for the second day in a row with the crusty snot that adorns the faces of toddlers who have colds but lack the capacity to use kleenexes on my own face, I decided I would use my allergy meds (having yesterday decided it has to be allergy, right?) Well, that Zyrtec I was banking on expired 2 years ago. Whoops.
Apparently I don't rotate the stock in my personal pharmacy that often, but at least I know to be horrified. It is a practice I come by naturally.

My parents' medicine cabinet might actually contain DNA from the dinosaurs, based on some of the liquid concoctions in there that have now separated and solidified in ways I cannot understand, their labels long worn away by time. Who knows what's preserved in there? And who knows why the good people of Vick's VapoRub changed the font from the 1970s model of the product. That looked so inviting and medicinal! It's the label I know from childhood. And yes, adulthood. I'm quite sure it's still in there, the vapo-long since rubbed.

I think my issues are as follows:
-Sinus pressure and congestion makes me CRAZY
-I wish I could suck it up and not care about it, as everyone on planet Earth has colds and allergies from time to time
-The fact that I become crazy when experiencing sinus pressure means I have to SHARE this craziness and my frustration with nearly everyone I meet, should they not already notice something is wrong from the kleenex wads falling from my face like snow flurries.
-The fact that I have to share makes me hate myself! Come on man, it's a runny nose!
But nope. Every time – if there's a chance I can push somewhere on my face and liquids emerge, I'm going to tell you about it. Then hate myself for it. Then drink a carton of juice a day until it's gone!
Ha.

The Powers of De-Ducktion

2011-03-23T16:37:00.000-07:00

In the wake of Gilbert Gottfried's ill-conceived return to relevance by way of insensitive tsunami tweets (does anyone else find it funny that making birdly-named noises stripped Gottfried of his job as a professional bird noise maker?), a few things remain to be seen.

1. Will Gilbert Gottfried be relevant again?
2. Who will become the voice of the Aflac duck now that Gilbert's duck duck goose is cooked?

Number 1 will take some time to answer, and possible media coaching from Chris Brown's team of image revamp wizards. I say that to support my point that while completely not cool, I don't think Gottfried's twitter behavior is surprising, and he joins a long list of celebrities whose ability to instantly share their thoughts (irony of blogging about this noted!) without first vetting them through their PR rep has done some bad things for them or their images or careers or all of the above. It's a risk to give a comedian primarily known for brash annoyance - vocal and otherwise - a means to reach the masses and expect sensitivity. I used a Chris Brown reference here to show I am not immune from temptation of talking about what's hot now, and nearly every single person I know who uses facebook to try to be even remotely funny had a Chris Brown comment or joke about his violence yesterday, one way or another, but nonetheless condemning him, all. Sure, while Chris Brown is a personal train wreck who is in no way on par with a devastating natural disaster affecting an entire nation (though I will say the fact that he's even still on television says something bad about our society's tolerance for violence against women), he is still what's being tweeted about or status updated, etc., because he is the disaster de jour. So, while not awesome, and totally not great for his relationship with a company that does a lot of business in Japan, I don't think Gottfried making tsunami jokes was all that shocking. Please know that yes- I do think he should have been fired, and yes - I do think tsunami jokes are tasteless, but I'm just noting the fact that he did what he does - make jokes from headlines. And whoops, doing so in this scenario turned him into one.

That turned into more of an aside than I had planned! And with a lot of circuitous logic, to boot.
What I really was hoping to do was make a list of top replacement duck voices for Aflac to consider.

QUACKPOT SCHEMES - My Brainstormed List of Top Ten Eligible Duck Voices

10. The guy who is the voice of Smuckers jams and jellies
A complete role reversal for the duck, suddenly that smooth country sound you hear that reminds you of jam is a frazzled bird, trying to let you know you're covered - even smothered, in insurance. Especially good if something unforeseen happens and you end up in a jam (get it!) Actually, now that I think of it, having known, famous spokespeople have a go at being the duck would be a pretty funny rebuttal and ad campaign that would make lemonade out of the lousy story that was the Gottfried jokes. Auditioning new ducks, with no one being neurotic enough - a premise that quacks me up. Aflac, call me! And the Geico cavemen. We're going to need them...

9. Fran Drescher
The female equivalent of Gottfried in voice annoyance used for "comedic" effect. A fun spin on the duck's nasally frustrated outbursts, perhaps.

8. Morgan Freeman
I mean, again, this guy makes anything sound good. But I'd made this whole list before I cam up with the new "the ad campaign is using well known voices to fail at being a highly frustrated duck" idea. I'd save Morgan for that.

7. Andy Rooney
He kind of sounds like the Aflac duck sometimes, depending on how fired up he is about whatever he's talking about. They definitely share a ruffled feathers approach, and appearance, with his still-lustrous white feathers on top.

6. Joan Rivers
The joke here would be that they'd be casting someone who notoriously pisses people off with her jokes. And has a distinct voice.

5. Carlos Alazraqui
Though the voice of many things, perhaps hilarious to have the Taco Bell dog's voice come out of a duck's mouth. Again, think this would also fall under the #10 ad campaign...

4. Voices from the show "Ducktales" (Ooo-OOO-Ooo!)
Best duck voices I can think of in modern day cartoon work. And one heck of a theme song.

3. Mindy Kaling or Aziz Ansari
I know this seems like I'm racially profiling two very funny Indian-American comedians, but I'm profilng them for character work, not ethnicity. Really. You would not be able to tell a voice's ethnicity from a duck, right? Both Kaling and Ansari are expert at being self-assured and highly annoyed as their characters on The Office and Parks and Recreation, respectively, which the Aflac duck is as his attempts to save people money are repeatedly stymied by physical obstacles and misfortunes that befall him. Either of these actors could bring some sly wit to the part and have the duck be annoyed at the customers' inability to see the savings they'd get, not just at the bad luck that befalls them as they try to spread the gospel of Aflac.

2. A Japanese voice - now just as I spent a good bit of time in #3 describing how I was not making this a race issue, allow me to make this a race issue. Seriously though, maybe one-up Gottfried and show support for the resilience of Japan by having the duck be bad-ass. I think this would be awesome. Though obviously might take some time and test-audience work to be sure it walks the fine line of tasteful and respectful not crappy and reductionist, or unduly cheery in the face of devastation.

1. Again, with a nod to acknowledging that racism is bad and that I'm merely suggesting turning the tables on an insensitive situation by using that insensitivity as a weapon in return, have a commercial in which, in a very obvious model city from horror movies of old, Godzilla eats/eliminates the Aflac duck out of revenge. Show a duckling or the new adult duck in another part of the city commenting on something like "guess we're done with him," which both introduces the new voice of the duck/personality of the replacement duck, and gives good riddance to the Gottfried-legacy Aflac duck. A clean slate, a controversial comeback, and a new brand identity built on the old, all in one!

Ok, I still might like the one where they audition folks...we'll see!

The Sticky Topped Trail of Underachieving

2011-03-22T16:52:00.000-07:00

My purse.
My desk.
My fridge.
My gym bag.
My car.
Wadded at the bottom of my purse under the other one.

All of the above are suitable locations for me to find remnants (or active paths) of the sticky note trail I seem to create for myself, weaving a path of partially sticky loose lists of to-do items from home to work and back home again. Maybe it is the fact that they're only partially sticky themselves that makes me seemingly unable to stick to completing the tasks and to-dos I list upon their post-it faces? Or maybe it's my temptation to include too many areas of life tasks on one sticky note? Do months' long goals belong on the same note as a random errands list? "Taxes" which hm, I'll say has made it's way to – conservative estimate – 10 to 12 lists, is not on the same level of ease of completion as "take out recycling," so why are they on the same note? There is such satisfaction, SUCH satisfaction in throwing off a completely item crossed-off list, and yet I almost never succeed, instead transferring big ticket items to the next, newer list that takes over once the original post-it loses its stickum.

I suppose this would not really be sending me spiraling toward existential crisis in regular circumstances, but I guess I feel like it's a nice representation of a larger, me-specific problem. I don't seem to finish things. Which is maddening considering I hate it when people don't follow up, follow through, follow along with the bouncing dot on the screen so they can sing too. Recently, the writers' group I am in made it clear that a piece I wrote was remarkable, not for its content, but specifically for having a beginning, middle, and end, all in one go. And, the long-suffering Den, a loyal crockpot reader, only recently allowed a blog post to qualify for a story I'd promised him YEARS ago! Years! What is wrong with this picture? Something. Open to interpretations if you've got them...

If only I could apply this inability to finish what I've started to nacho chili cheese fries, Girl Scout cookies, beers, and episodes of the Real Housewives of ______. Then we'd be getting somewhere.

Hold on, lemme put that on a list.

The Human Condition - Stubborn with a Chance of Swear Words

2011-03-21T16:36:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I totally forgot a post title and realize now that there are a lot of funky spacing issues going on with that post. Apologies. Of all things, my internet was not working so I copied and pasted from word processing, and some formatting went haywire as a result. But it is nice that "my internet not working" now qualifies as a through line! Though not one of my favorite things (anyone notice that's not really been upheld as a theme? anyone notice I take one day off a week? I do!)
Anyway.

Today I've been looking out my work window a lot. Even more than I regularly do, which I regularly do a lot. Despite just stating that I stare outside from time to time rather than working, I staunchly maintain the position that having a window view is a boost for work time productivity. I don't know if it's the promise of the outside world after work is done? Or an opportunity to observe the world and feel mildly engaged in it just by way of observation? Or, well, natural light and a view of the sky (yes, it's gotta be that)? Could be a combination. But whatever it is, I cherish my window. Today's rain had me checking the puddles for action, the sky itself, and the umbrella-usage levels of passerby before heading outside. It also made me feel even worse than I usual do for those poor bastards whose shopping carts magically stop working, because they were getting wet.

My window overlooks the exit of a grocery store in a shopping center that was probably designed and built in 1981 or '82. The grocery store is unintentionally ironically named "Superior." Really, there is nothing superior about the store. Sometimes the checkout lines are superiorly long, but there's nothing that makes you say "Yeah, let's not have mediocre grocery shopping ruin our day. Let's go to Superior." What usually sends me to Superior? Hunger. Trolling for snacks mid-workday. But I am in a minority among Superior shoppers. Most are families who are buying a week's worth (or more) of groceries in one go. Most carts exit the store loaded for bear. And that's where my birds-eye view makes my sympathy muscle strain time and time again.

There is a magnetic stripe underground a few feet from the exit of the grocery store that activates when carts roll on top of it, stopping the wheels full-tilt. There is no signage indicating that a cart full of your week's-worth of groceries will magically stop rolling, just about the time you're in sight of your car and thinking about the next part of your day. And the magnets are embedded far enough away from the door that you would not think it's a manmade defense mechanism to keep the carts from being stolen, you would think your cart magically stopped working.

Sure, every now and then you pick a shopping cart with a bum wheel. The one that makes hellacious noise all over the store as you roll it. Or sure, you might have one that stops a bit and proves to have a kink. But these carts come to an immediate surprise halt, jilting patrons pushing with some force time and time again.

I have seen little old ladies with canes do battle. I have seen mothers make their children get out of the carts and walk while they try to force the cart forward. I have seen old men reposition themselves at the rear of the cart, pulling on the basket portion rather than pushing from the handles. Human beings are stubborn in the face of completely baffling grocery cart malfunction. No one, really, no one thinks, "Wow, that was sudden and inexplicable. Must be beyond my power to fix." Everyone tries. And tries. And tries. And looks exasperated. And tries some more from a new angle. Even the little old ladies. Probably mostly the little old ladies, now that I think of it.

Watching this same cart/human tragedy over and over again would be hilarious if I were the producer of Jackass, or looking to make a gag reel for America's Funniest Home Videos, but lacking both of those vocations, I end up having to look away from being unable to prevent or fix the struggle that I totally understand the cause of. I want to yell "GIVE UP! TURN BACK! IT'S MAGNETS! The damned magnets always win. They always win."

The window does not open. And people always work it out. Necessity is the mother of invention. Or an improvised plan B. Often times that involves precariously juggling 17 grocery bags in a Herculean dash toward one's car. But never are food bags abandoned. And, as of yet, never have I seen anyone beat the cart and overcome the magnets. Or beat the cart by way of destruction. Things can get dicey though, so maybe one of these times humans will in fact prove to be Superior.

2011-03-20T21:12:00.000-07:00

It has been raining since I woke up this afternoon, and yes, I say afternoon in the most literal of ways as I made a concerted effort to sleep in. Let’s just say my effort did not fail. The rain moved in and made just enough noise to be a perfect rhythmic accompaniment for sleeping. A little bit of cold in the air made blankets all the more comfortable and warm. Raindrops plunked against the giant leaf of the plant that grows outside my window like some prehistoric super brontosaurus snack. The light was fuzzy. My hibernation impulse took over, as strong as if I were half-bear.

I might be, actually. I’ll eat almost anything, can be quite grouchy, and enjoy naps. It’s possible.

I felt very bad for those who ran the L.A. marathon today, as at no time has the rain dwindled to qualify as “sprinkling.” These are showers for sure and have been all day. And running 26.2 miles in them does not sound like the best plan to me. But then again, neither does running 26.2 miles. (Bears don’t do that, do they?)

I did venture out into the rain a bit – not for any activities involving endurance, mind you – to indulge in the warmth of a latte and, of all things, to buy a bra using a discount coupon for Victoria’s Secret that was sent to me by my mom with a note explaining the lack of likelihood that she would use it. Not just before it expired, ever. Sure, she will collect the free panties when they send a coupon by mail (though she will never use the word “panties” to refer to them, bless her, as we have never used that word to describe underpants ever in life. The word grosses me out. That’s definitely another essay for another time). But she’s not ponying up that much cash for a bra anytime soon (she would use the words “in this lifetime” to describe the time period involved).

Hilariously empty due to the rain (I guess you don’t think to acquire sexy, frilly, lingerie when it’s solid sweatpants weather), it was like being in Victoria’s Secret if the store were actually a secret. Typically, Victoria’s Secret is a store that makes me nervous to be inside it. Not just because I’m usually wearing a t-shirt that is not a t-shirt requiring a special t-shirt bra they sell, but more likely one that is a men’s large and was acquired in 1999, but because part of the sales approach of the Vicky’s team is STRONG AND CONTINUOUS APPROACH. You might just want to discreetly zig-zag past what’s hot and sexy now (that you have no use for and certainly not the discretionary funds for and you wouldn’t spend it on that if you did) and scurry to a bra drawer and pick out a plain bra in your size and complete your transaction with the cashier as fast as possible, without opening a Victoria Secret credit card account, thanks anyway, but chances are you’ll be dive-bombed by sales associates as you bob and weave your way through circular table displays that have underwear fanned in the most aesthetically pleasant way possible, like paint chips on a designer’s color wheel.

“Can I help you with anything?”

“Need help finding anything?”

“Finding everything ok?”

No. No. Yes, thanks.

“Well, let me know if you need anything.”

Thanks. Yes. I get it. You’re here to help.

“Did you know are lotions are buy one get one half off?”

No.

“Did you want to look at those?”

No.

Today, while I was shown directly to the drawer I was already zig-zagging toward when asked if I was looking for anything, the “I’ll be back to check on you in a minute” promise made to me by the woman in black was definitely broken.

Bra in hand, ready to check out, it was like I was behind the scenes and wearing a cloak of invisibility. I could see arms hanging and folding things, hear conversations shouted from one side of the store to the next. This was definitely a backstage pass. I was seeing Victoria’s Secret in her underwear. After a few moments of milling about the register area, I actually had to roam the store to get someone’s attention.

“Did you need help?”

Yes.

“Yes, I wanted to buy this.”

You know, like folks do in retail stores selling products.

“Ok, let me get someone to help you. Rita, can you ring her up?”

Hilariously I was passed along to another customer service associate. She was kind enough to let me know I’d been given a free secret discount card that I could use in April for anywhere from $10 to $500 of value.

I took a moment to imagine myself with $500 of Victoria’s Secret store credit. Mentally, the neon green underwear was in my hand, yes.

“Great. April.”

“Yep.”

Leaving the store, I noticed a possible cause of the Vicky’s ladies’ absentmindedness in the face of customer presence: a leak. Two workers were positioning a garbage can under a hole in the roof right near the front window of the store. As I left, a piece of plastic from the exit sign hit me in the head. Both an employee and I looked up at the sky, puzzled. It was funny. The weather was on the attack now.

I recommended they hold things up with bras.

Then I really enjoyed the elaborate image my imagination created of bras strung together and tied to the ceiling, bra cups overflowing with water like some modern sculpture with a message about support. It cracked me up to imagine the Vicky’s team going Macgyver with their own bras, forsaking the entire image they’d probably spent countless hours being trained to uphold. The glamour the fabulousness the hint of allure – gone! It was raining. D cups runnething over.

Oh well. It’s almost time to get back in bed and listen to the rain!

Overtime!

2011-03-19T17:22:00.000-07:00

Right now, San Diego State and Temple are in their second overtime, grinding forward to one or the other being eliminated from the tournament. It's just a wonderful time of the year for anyone who is remotely interested in sports. Or humanity. But, as I've said before, I do have a biased opinion that everyone should enjoy sports at least a bit. But it's probably because I enjoy them a lot.

Earlier this afternoon, I went to a swim workout and was sharing a lane with a gentleman whose comment at the wall to his lanemates was, "I always end up in a lane with all girls." Which was followed nearly immediately by "Don't take it that way, though." Though I did not bother to ask "Which way?," I assumed he intended it as it sounded, as a nine-year-old boy might, to indicate he was grossed out by girls and disappointed to be stuck performing an activity with them. I didn't say that a lot of men might consider his predicament a lucky position to repeatedly find themselves in. And I didn't suggest that he should build a treehouse at one end of the pool allowing him the benefit of a "no girls allowed" sign. I actually moved up a lane, so inspiring was his comment at the time to my own performance ambitions. Thanks, that guy. You had me workin' overtime.

San Diego State won, by the way.

In another moment of "Wow, I never knew that could be so pleasant! Maybe I shouldn't be such a raging cynic and pessimist," this week, I had an incredibly delightful experience receiving assistance from an IT guy by phone. My internet access was missing, and I actually wanted to stay on the phone with the gentleman who was helping me. He was so nice. And it made me think of the anonymity of the whole process. So, I decided I would like to write a fictional scene based on the help desk. And you, my beloved guinea pigs, are my audience.

The Help Desk
It was as pleasant and sunny a day as any Thursday could be when my internet connectivity went away on my laptop. My coffee was delicious, traffic had been light, and now the email checking and world updating that would complete my ease into my work day, and eventual march toward productivity, stalled. The little thingy at the top of my computer screen that looked both like a signal being sent to the world and the seating chart for the Hollywood Bowl would make its best attempts to turn all bands to darkness. But the stripes flashed futilely before they rested in grey and were interrupted in their center by an exclamation point, notifying me no internet connection was available. Exclaiming it, as a matter of fact.

It was too early for exclamations and this kind of excitement. I was trying to have a Thursday be as easy as Sunday morning, Lionel Richie-style. Hello? I've just got to let you know, I wonder where you are...internet.

Was there a nuclear meltdown in Japan? Was Libya still a country? Who had picked whom in the NCAA tournament pool? No way to know with the exclamation point spanning from orchestra seating to row ZZ.
And my boss called. I actually needed to be able to do work that involved my email inbox.

I restarted my computer.
I changed a few settings.
I had no idea what I was doing. It was time to call the help desk.
I navigated the phone tree until a real live person answered.

"Hello, may I have your user i.d.?"
"Bartholomew."
"Can you spell that please?"
"B-a-r-t-h-o-l-o-m-e-w."
"Ok, thank you, please let me repeat that back to you, B as in boy, a as in apple, r as in railroad, t as in toy truck, h as in hat, o as in octopus, l as in love, o as in octopus, m as in mammal, e as in exoskeleton, w as in windshield wiper. Is that correct?"
"Yes."
"Thank you."
"Can I ask you a question?"
"Yes, please do."
"It might be several, actually."
"It is the primary job duty of my position to answer questions. Please proceed with comfort in your inquisitive nature."
"Ok, thanks. Is that a standard list of letter distinction words? Or do you get to make them up as you go? And do you ever change things up? And would you have said toy car for t?"
"No no, car starts with c."
"Yes."
"That would be confusing for the person in need of help."
"I guess."
"But no, the example words I used were not the words issued to us in our training manual. Well, some were."
"A as in apple?"
"Yes, and b as in boy."
"Pretty standard,"
"Yes. A while ago I realized my job afforded me the opportunity for creativity, which I missed. So many days I'm following process flowcharts in our manuals. If-then scenarios. It does not leave much room for new ideas. So the letters seemed like one place I could make my job less tedious. "
"Do you ever not repeat?"
"What do you mean?"
"O as in octopus. There were octopi for my name."
"Hm. I hadn't thought about it. But I don't think I do."
"Repeat?"
"Yes. You would always get more than one octopus. Never an octopus and an otter."
"Well I guess that's nice. Octopi need friends. Someone to swim with. But I guess an otter could swim too."
"Hmm. That's true. But maybe not in the same water as octopi? I don't know."
"Me either."
"How long has L been like that?"
"Love?"
"Yeah."
"I don't remember. It's been a while."
"Is L always love?"
"Yeah."
"That one made me smile."
"Love will do that."
"Yup."
"It just seems nice to share. Most times people call me feeling very unloved by their computers. So it's like a verbal hug. But still professional."
"I felt it."
"I think this is the first time anyone has confirmed something works without me."
"What do you mean?"
"You did my job. I usually have to give people information before they tell me something is working again. But you've told me L as in love works."
"Oh, I'm sorry."
"No, please don't be. I've already helped you before even trying to understand your technical problem. And I never talk about love this much at work."
"Oh, are you in love?"
"Yes, yes I am. But she doesn't know it. It's a woman who lives in my building. She gives her mail such careful consideration every time she takes it from her mailbox. Even junk mail. It is such concentration, such care. I love to watch her get her mail."
"Mmm."
"I'm sorry, that must sound creepy."
"No, it sounds like you really like her."
"I do."
"Maybe you should talk to her."
"I can't! I can't."
"Why?"
"I just can't. I am so nervous in person. I can't talk."
"But you're great on the phone. You sound very nice. Very polite."
"Thank you. But it's different in person. I can't. I can't do it."
"Could you practice? Maybe start with 'Hi' and then build up to conversations?"
"No, I really can't talk in person. I sweat. I stutter. I look like a crazy person."
"That's not good."
"No, it's B as in bad."
"Hm. Well, have you thought about sending her a letter?"
"A letter?"
"If she loves her mail, maybe you could just mail her something. Introduce yourself. See if she responds."
"That's not creepy?"
"Well, it probably is a little bit."
"Yeah."
"I dunno. Maybe try it. If it doesn't work, follow the other line on the troubleshooting chart. And talk to her."
"I can't."
"Well..."
"I'll write. But what do I say?"
"Just introduce yourself. See if she writes back. Say you enjoy correspondence. And mail. I don't know."
"Ok."
"But don't tell her you watch her."
"No."
"No. Not that. Oh, my internet is back."
"Oh! Your problem has fixed itself."
"And maybe yours?"
"M as in maybe."
"M as in maybe. Hey, not to be creepy, but can I call you again for help?"
"Please do."
"I will. I want to know how the letter goes."
"Alright, give me a week."
"Ok. Well, have a good day."
"You too. Thank you for calling the help desk."
"Thank you."

St. Patrick's Day is Fun!

2011-03-17T23:37:00.000-07:00

That title seems simple, but it is true. St. Patrick's Day is kind of a nice excuse to be in a good mood. It's a day when it is easy being green, and encouraged, too.

I just deleted a few run-on sentences (read: blog entry) that followed the sentence "I had some pleasant experiences today." I did. But listing them would be boring to read. Trust me, that's why they were deleted.
It involved a banana, socks, the help desk, a burrito, and several drinking straws.
Not that newsworthy a read. I will try again.

In the past two days, more than one person has asked, Seinfeld style, "What is the deal with St. Patrick? Who was that guy?"

My answer has been that he was the guy who drove snakes out of Ireland and used a shamrock as an evangelical teaching tool.

Tonight, when someone asked, "What's a shamrock?" a friend brilliantly responded, "Didn't you eat Lucky Charms growing up?"

A fair and valid question. But a question that brings us to the dicey intersection of pop culture, holiday celebration, and religious iconography. (Is this a three-way street? Maybe it's a shamrock shaped exit ramp). When/why/how was there a plague of snakes in Ireland? And how did he drive them out? And does Ireland have snakes now? And was this literal snakes, or snakes like "the serpent" in Eden or the kind that would plague Israelites? I mean, those guys had it all. From athletes foot to angels intervening to save them from sacrificing their own children, Old Testament plaguery was its own opera. Big. Dramatic. Too long. (note: Biblical accuracy not assured).

But somehow I think of St. Patrick as more recent than all that, which makes me 1. want to run to wikipedia but I'm resisting the urge, and 2. think of St. Patrick's version of Snakes on a Plane and really want it to be made. Perhaps as a cartoon? And perhaps the "Plane" in question would be a plain, like those on the other side of some rolling hills in the lush emerald isle? And yes, of course Samuel L. Jackson lends his vocal talent. Of course. Maybe as the exact same character he was in the movie.

I also somehow, in this vision, cross St. Patrick with the pied piper, and see him playing bagpipes to draw the snakes forth, shimmying their way toward a cliff maybe? From which they hurl themselves? Or all of them crawling at once into a burlap bag used to hold potatoes? That also happens. Other characters who are definitely in this cartoon:
- The chick from The Cranberries, who actually at first tricks the snakes into thinking she is one with the song "Zombie" as it looks like she could unhinge her jaw on the refrain "zooombey-ey-ey-ey-ey0h-oh ay yay yayyyy" before pleasantly asking them if they have to linger, at which point
- The Edge plays some moody and repetitive guitar riff and they take to moving toward
- St. Patrick, who's beautifully moving in time and tempo with the guitar part and bumps into
- Jake the Snake from WWF, and they have a good laugh as he says, "Naw, I'm not jumping off a cliff"
- Then of course Samuel L. Jackson says "There are too many snakes in this m'f'in' country!" with a terrible fake accent before saying (direct to camera) "Hey, if it ain't brogue, don't fix it."
Then someone appears with a Guiness book of world records, but it's about the beer and random anecdotal folklore, and the math is done indicating St. Patrick could break a record if he drives out 3 more snakes than St. Seamus, who was still not officially beatified, had done 11 years earlier, and, in the time since, "Saint Shamey's Day" celebrations really failed to allow people the personal freedom to become very publicly intoxicated.
-So, then Jake the Snake shows up and says, "I heard you needed more snakes!" and rather than sacrificing himself, delivers Bernie Madoff, Spencer Pratt, and that PR guy who is supposedly Kim Kardashian's friend and had his own show for a minute on E!
-Then, cartoon deus-ex-machina style from Monty Python interjects and there's a "We heard you needed more snakes too," but then God interjects and says, "Hey, that's my gag. And besides, I'm afraid you guys might work blue, and this day is green."
-Then the guys from Green Day show up and say "Hey, we heard you needed a hand!"
-Then a giant explosion removes Green Day from the scene, and from the dust cloud, Colin Farrell emerges and says, "I borrowed some explosives from Michael Bay. I heard we had a snake problem."
-Then St. Patrick says, "Well, it was a good thought, but a little too much on the special effects," at which point Colin Farrell says, "F'in' tell me about it," and Samuel L. Jackson says, "There are too many m'fin' snakes in this m'fin' country!"
Then St. Patrick plays a bagpipe song that transitions into a delightful Irish Reel, and the snakes do throw themselves off a cliff.

That's just in my head, though.

The Deadline for Bracketology

2011-03-17T00:26:00.000-07:00

For many of the more important things in life, I wait until I'm up against a deadline to get around to doing them, and filling out my NCAA bracket this year was certainly no exception. In fact, in the time it took me to do so online, my computer's battery indication went from black, to red, to little sliver of red making this post a time-sensitive situation as I am not about to sit at a table right now when the couch is already an inferior substitute for the bed I crave. This year's picks seem more in the dark than ever, probably because the very lousy performance of my alma mater's basketball team was SO BAD that it did not warrant a trip to the big dance. There was less reason to follow college basketball as there was less joy to be had in watching it, for me personally. As a result, I'm far more out of step with the realistic odds of my gut feelings being right than I usual am. My southwest and southeast brackets were re-worked several times, and now I'm not exactly positive how or where they happen, but I do know I threw some upsets in there. And I suppose that is what makes the tournament truly great - the potential for upsets from any team, any time, anywhere, any size school, any person, any shot - to change the fates of the expected, the oddsmakers, the statisticians, the broadcasters, everyone. Writing that sentence I realize I've written about my love of the tournament and its endless opportunities in crockpots of years past. This sounds familiar!

And in good news - it's never too late for an upset. Two of mine today -
1. The neighbors who drive me nuts on occasion know my name and specifically said that if they were too loud I should just let them know because sometimes it's hard for them to know what I can hear or what is too loud.

WHAT?!? This was shocking - SHOCKING - to me as it came from the neighbor I consistently believed hated me as there was not a whole lot of neighborly friendliness going on between us. Like, not even hellos were exchanged to the point that I stopped trying. I'd come to the live and let live place of peace with this situation (while sure, my selfish desire for neighborly pleasantries and mutually respected noise boundaries might have made me sometimes skew a bit live and let die, I'm not perfect), and out of nowhere, I not only got a hello, I got a confirmation of my name, and an offer to respect mutually agreed upon noise boundaries! I even got some friendly neighbor banter! I could not believe it. I have no idea what turned the tide on this. But it was like if suddenly the standoffish girl in the cool clique at school singled me out to tell me she loved my shoes and wanted a pair just like them. What? Me? Amazing.

Yes, of course I spent some time mired in paranoid thoughts that maybe I'd yelled at the walls or spoken really loudly while unlocking my door about how I wished they'd shut up but also say hello, or something that was actually awful that had given them a clue about my desires. But it all seemed so sincere, I'm not going to overthink it and will wait for the flaming bag of poo on my doorstep to float new theories about passive-aggressive neighborly love.

2. I publicly and intentionally watched a tournament game with others who were also interested in basketball and the outcome of a game with more than passing fancy!
Yes, when the initial alma mater fails, why not try grad school? Delightfully and surprisingly, an entire group of friends planned to watch tonight's play-in round together and hope that we would in fact have a dog in this fight (our dog has been taken on a drive to a farm where he'll be able to run around and play a lot more....). Much like I'd written off a friendly neighbor relationship, I'd kind of written off the experience of a group game watch for the NCAA tourney, at least until really late rounds when maybe it'd be an inescapable activity, given the lack of participation from a team I know some people care to watch. This surprise game spirit was a totally unexpected fun binge in the middle of the week, as well as extremely pleasing to those of us who enjoy sports.

And battery warning given, LET'S POST THIS ONE AT THE BUZZER!!!!!

As it turns out....

2011-03-15T23:07:00.000-07:00

Random thoughts ARE some of my favorite things!!! Yay! Sometimes, some days, they can still qualify as a blog entry about my favorite things! Today is one such day. I've spent the second half of today convinced it's Wednesday. I overshot the springing forward mechanism of daylight savings, apparently, as I was also convinced, until I looked at the clock moments ago, that it was 12:30 in the morning. It's not (yet)! Yay.

"I'm relatively sane for a girl." - Quinn, from "Glee" discussing reasons we might be surprised she's interested in being prom queen. Also reason number 347 "Glee" jumped the shark for me and am waiting for the finale so that it is the actually finale for my viewership. Sure, it jumped it, did a few dance moves, and there were a couple of runs by the soloist while back up singers harmonized, but have no doubt, there was a jump at the top of this number, and a shark somewhere below. Was it a Shark from West Side Story? If you want it to be, sure.
My note: Girl's aren't inherently insaneeeeee, writers from Gleeeeee, and your character wasn't saying it in a jokey I'm in high school waayyyyyyyyyyy.
But really. No reason to nitpick this one line. But I just did.

"Fill it up let's pump the jams and ride." - Part of opening, pre-chorus lyrics to the song "Stomp" by the Brothers Johnson. Also, a contender for what I might like my tombstone to say. Wait, serious question - just wrote "engraved on my tombstone" and thought wait, engrave like in a grave, ha! Wait is that where that word comes from? Does everyone know this but me? No. Maybe not. A trip on an aside of the interwebs indicate that relates to carving...
Anway-not really kidding there about the tombstone. It's such a great party directive. The notion that it's all about to get started is clear. And it is fabulous.

While one image is of gassing up a car before a night on the town, adding that to a gravestone would imply to all funeral goers that they should throw in a corpse then go play some party music - which sounds awesome. Like, hey, I'm dead! You guys get outta here and go live life!
I know this sounds especially morbid, but it's a great message, in life and beyond. Yes, I'd also like that to be my screensaver at work. And the meaningful quote automatically attached to the signature portion of my emails. And the info sections of my online profiles on any given web site. Yes. It's just a good set of directives with a good indication that fun is about to happen and should. The momentum boost you could always use.

There is a not so small part of me that wishes I'd been around for the disco/funk heyday. I don't know where I think I would have gone then that I don't go now, but somehow I feel like I at least should have. Like I might have just gone dancing a bit. And that maybe I could get a perm and have it be cool.

Do you ever think astronauts miss space meals once they get back to earth? Like the sometimes nostalgia you get for the best school lunch your cafeteria made or the best, actually-not-that-great meal from your childhood. Something low-brow but specific? That. Like, do astronauts ever get that twinge of flavor memory from something that was dehydrated and rehydrated?

I want Nate Dogg to be the voiceover for most things for me personally. My voicemail message. My book on tape. My computer-aided voice production device when my vocal chords are crushed in a freak disco food re-hydration accident. It would just be so good.

Do you think Eminem ever goes to 7-11 and buys m&ms just to see if the cashiers show any sign of recognition that it's funny? Or that they know him? Or that it is ok to try coconut m&ms? If I were Eminem, I would. Often.

If you were forced at gunpoint to be at tattoo gunpoint and you had to get a tattoo to save your life, would you get a tiny dot the size of a freckle to appease your captor but not actually get a tattoo, or would you get something either large, specific, or ridiculous, just because you'd have the story "But I had to" to back it up, allowing you total creative freedom? If you wanted to really get risky, you might ask for "BANG!" and then when your gunman asked if you thought you were funny, just tell him you're a hairdresser and it was more of a styling suggestion people would see and subconsciously process, then accept as a desired haircut. Say it's the only cut you're good at. Then if he still didn't believe you, ask for tweety bird too.

"Everybody take it to the top we're going to stomp! All night! Going to party.
Til the morning light."
Yep, even the Brothers Johnson sound better when Nate Dogg is involved. As he is in my imagination. As he will be tomorrow when my Nate Dogg alarm clock goes off.
"Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. It's time to wake up." So smooth yet intimidating yet sexy, Nate Dogg.

Oh well, a girl can dream.

Big in Japan.

2011-03-14T22:25:00.000-07:00

I definitely rely on the internet for all manner of both news and distraction from what could be perceived as more worthwhile endeavors, tasks, or ahem - job duties. The devastation in Japan following the earthquake, tsunami, earthquake, and nuclear site explosions with threat of meltdown pending are omni-present on the internet, often in mind-blowing visual form as people captured water destroying a city on camera. What I cannot seem to wrap my head around is the seeming lack of distinction made between horrific news in the wake of a natural disaster and the same old same old celebrity b.s. and mindless internet filler that is usually on the top of major homepages. I guess I'm also finding myself having trouble confronting the reality that people are finding corpses wash ashore in Japan. Others are living in school gyms with no access to heat and running water. Others have been wiped off the face of the earth like they were never there. I know that's terrible, and this is not a "favorite things" entry, thematically, but it is hard to reckon with the seeming inability to reckon with something just happening like that. Like, that is reality. That is fact. There is now a pre/post 2011 earthquake distinction for Japan. And I am still thinking about the Real Housewives of Orange County and the Sister Wives of Utah and Bethanny in New York City and how they all might fare in feminist critique - but still watching! Yes, still watching. This is after thinking about whether or not I should buy pretzels and whether or not I should take netflix up on their free trial and whether or not I should consider a shirt I've worn 4 times sufficiently dirty to qualify for washing yet.

And it's not just me, which should be comforting, but is not. I think it's the opposite. The fact that there isn't a "HOLY SHIT" section of every media outlet prior to the "Usual Piffle" section, with distinctions of a similar grade, makes a curious study in our ability to process terrible news and, because it's not directly impacting us in the next 10 minutes, move right along to the next thing. As an example, i give you real Yahoo!.com headlines:
1. Japan Faces Potential Nuclear Catastrophe
2. Ways to Stop Static Cling
3. The Unhealthiest Energy Drinks
4. Japanese Village Vanishes

These stories do not have the same weight. They are not of the same importance. Static cling is probably not going to contain nuclear fallout for a generation of citizens, except fashion fallout- am'i right ladies? But they have the same billing! Maybe it's because considering the powerlessness of others in the face of natural disaster - really giving it some thought and brain space - is too terrifying because it highlights our own helplessness and vulnerability? Or maybe it's the feeling we can't help or change things? But it somehow seems amazing to me that the Kardashian news cycle continues, along with Bieber, Lohan, Gaga, as if really not that much new happened. Maybe this calmed Charlie Sheen's spotlight for 3 minutes, but I think I would feel better if - ok, not if there were public panic, but maybe some sort of pop culturally accepted O.M.G. moment. Ok no, that would be terrible too, and invariably lead to pandering.

I dunno. Obviously this is not a situation with a feel good ending and an easy fix. It's just tricky to evaluate how media examines and reacts to Japan, and, in turn, how I do the same. And while I'm mad at media avoidance, I actually also avoid.

I might have ambitions for fun like the Irish, but my liver's a teetotaler

2011-03-13T23:37:00.000-07:00

I learned yesterday that if you go to a beach town's St. Patrick's Day observed day of drinking, even if you are a bit late and just catch the tale end of the bagpipers, turns out you still have plenty of time to get drunk - drunker than you thought you were getting. Even after years of experience, I still might forget the eventual potency of large volumes of green beer. So much so, that today was really spent as a shame Sunday, where I was just kinda convinced I was not fit for consumption by the world at large as I probably hadn't been the night before, and that I should primarily stay on couch arrest and think about being a terrible person.

Somehow I find that a new incidence of drunken shame or the perceived need for shame based on a sense you did something wrong but don't quite remember (Emily Kite's genius phrase "douche chills" is called out here) often results in recall of past moments of shame - drunken or otherwise. Like, hey, it's 4 p.m. and you're still in your pajama pants and you've eaten a half a block of cheese and watched approximately 6.5 episodes of "Say Yes to the Dress" because it's a marathon and you just let yourself get hooked by the teaser for the "Sister Wives" marathon that starts in 5 minutes and they ARE about to show a whole season. Maybe we should talk about the shame you should be feeling now, when you realize your boob is itchy because there are chip crumbs down your shirt not just from a random itch, rather than the shame you felt in 8th grade when you think you alienated the new girl without even trying or the time you licked a dog on a dare in a bar.

But yeah. I did end up watching a lot of "Sister Wives." It's completely fascinating and very curious, especially from a woman's perspective (though I say that as a woman without any other perspective to call upon). These women spent a lot of time discussing the ways in which they felt jealous or angry, but then felt they were selfish when they were feeling that way because they had all these other great perks, like other wives to help mother their children. Very very interesting. Also, season two (I think) opened with them "outing" themselves on national t.v. by going on the Today Show. Or maybe it was GMA? Or both? I don't know. But I really wanted them to address the obvious question of "how are you not already out by being on a national t.v. show?" Like, if I happened to see those ladies at the grocery store, I'd definitely be like, hey Christine, did you get over your feelings of inadequacy and adjust to the fourth wife? And are you still afraid of toasters (really)? And how DO you make homemade hamburger buns? They look delicious. And you're so good with a curling iron! (She is!)
I just spent a hungover afternoon with them and feel like I know them, so are we to presume no one in their town has cable television?
And somehow I did want to see who went to the grocery store. And who paid bills. And what the teenage kids do when their parents aren't around. Oops! Fascinating television.
Also, they specifically said they did not want their children reading blogs about them and here I am blogging about them. Janelle, wife #2, said she'd rather these no-account bloggers tell her things to her face. Well, Janelle, I want to know where you work. You seem very busy and to have a demanding job, and I wanted to know what that job was. Thanks!

And as far as accountability, well, I guess I would just like you to know I'm acknowledging my time as a jackass yesterday. This little puppet grew donkey ears, and when today I turned back into a real boy, it hurt!

But now shame Sunday's close draws near. An hour earlier at that. Thank you to today's new reality friends for keeping me distracted from my own.

Friday: disaster control law order toilets

2011-03-11T22:42:00.000-08:00

Today began with some text messages from friends and family on the east coast who were letting me know that there were tsunami warnings for the California coast as a result of Japan's gigantor and devastating earthquake and tsunami. The tsunami evacuation route signs are posted about 5-7 blocks inland from where my bed is situated, which was where I was when checking my phone to receive such notice. Once the internet I take for granted as existing and accessible from my home computer gave me sufficient knowledge to know that I was not in imminent danger, I proceeded to the next important order of business of the day, hiding clothing that needed to be put away under my comforter rather than putting it away, all so that the company tasked with replacing my impressively highly functional toilet with a low-flow, green toilet could tromp through my apartment to do so without knowing what a mess I truly was.

Which potentially disastrous event do you think caused me more repeated and intense stress throughout the day - confronting the realization that something similar to the devastation in Japan could happen to me at any day or any time and, despite assuring my father to the contrary, I didn't really know what I would do nor did I have backup batteries for my flashlight (where is my flashlight again?), OR pessimistically having no faith that my apartment's plumbing would be functional upon my return home this evening and believing with certainty that strangers would be knocking on my door to turn off my water (if it wasn't off already) and rip out an old toilet at 7 a.m. tomorrow to replace it with an eco-friendly toilet I was certain would not get the job done?

Yes. Door number two.
(I'm not going to even go with the obvious joke there...this entire post could get very scatological very fast).

Why am I full of indignant rage and outrage because of the tiniest of life's transgressions, yet actively avoidant about eh...what really matters?

To simplify, if only a touch - not having plumbing of any kind due to natural disaster or not having plumbing due to perceived incompetence of building management's inability to make demands of contract workers, my energies go off the charts to the latter.

I really actively spent time throughout the day trying to think positively about the plumbing and NOT assume that my apartment would be a mess (not by my own hand), without running water, and toiletless to boot. It was out of my control. I shouldn't worry about it. Every time I opened a web browser NEW photos of planes and cars heaped together haphazardly like children's toys were being shown. NEW shots of fires, crying people, and bodies in the street. NEW footage of waves overtaking buildings and everything else that we couldn't see below the water in Japan. Threat of a Nuclear Meltdown. I use caps there because, really. Nuclear. Meltdown.
Yet I was still working through my inability to control the likely (to my pessimist's mind) scenario in which the toilet left me, well...shit outta luck. I think I included my fears in 3 emails to friends? And a phone call. Yep. The one where I admitted I was avoiding going home because I was afraid of what I'd find. The same phone call where I assured my father I did indeed have a plan.

If I was freaking out this much over the potential of an inconvenience that would not be a disaster, what would I possibly do if it were truly a disaster? Happy thoughts...no idea. Best move on to the immediate and then try my best to exert control.

A relevant aside: hilariously, I did not realize I was a control freak until fairly recently in life, and still probably would try to answer dishonestly on an internet "Are you a control freak?" quiz if I thought the answers would peg me as one. (Thereby controlling the outcome, OF COURSE).

Today is a rare day when such an incredible, unbelievable, staggering event beyond control happens that it forces reflection, whether you want to or not, because you can't help feeling like everything you're doing throughout your day is ridiculous, insignificant, and really not that big a deal when compared to people who are suddenly stripped back to survival as the only goal for the day. For me, what was thrown into sharpest relief was my seeming inability not to be either fired up or outraged at the little things. Why?

Well, hm, too much time on my hands, perhaps? Too nosy about other people's lives/comments/driving habits/misuse of the word "literally"? I am not sure.

Rage point 2 of the day.
So, just after convincing myself this new low flow toilet mandate was a good thing because it actually got me to do the dishes and clean up some papers (and hide clothing) before going to work, I left and made my way to a McDonald's for a cup of coffee (oh goodness, I'm realizing now my email complaint to McDonald's about what amounted to giving drivers trick cups [lids that didn't fit the cup sizes] falls into this larger effort's theme). I was in a drive-thru line behind an individual with a disabled designation on the California license plate. The driver tried to throw some trash in the trash can that appears a few feet before the drive-thru ordering box. Deciding he could not reach, he proceeded forward a few feet, stopped short of the ordering area, and threw his pile of trash on the ground.

Now, this was not McDonald's trash or something that related to McDonald's, not that that would make it excusable. This was "hey I've slowed to a speed that is juuust a bit more than stopped, so why not clear my car of hindrances like a cardboard cracker box full of other crap hanging out the top before pulling ahead to ask a man behind a speakerbox for a mcmuffin?"

I wanted to beep. I wanted to shout. I wanted to tattle to the man behind the speakerbox. I wanted to pick up the trash and return it to her (oh yeah, surprise! by the 1st window I realized that the guy was actually a woman) and say "You dropped this," with faux sweetness. I wanted to tattle to the guy at the 1st window! I tried to find a way that the disabled person's license plate would make this ok, but no - my outrage won out, just like the California did on the license plate - a person in the state of me, worried about the state of me. I had my coffee, but I still wanted to confront this woman. I wanted to roll down my window in traffic and say "Hey, you're not allowed to litter! It's really pointless and lazy and unfair to everyone else who doesn't throw trash out the window but might like to." She turned a corner. She seemed disoriented. And elderly. And inoffensive.

Yet her offense haunted me. And even writing about it makes me pissed again. The need for justice in the face of the most minor societal infractions would seem to suggest I'd be the world's most unexciting super hero.

A small reward for taking the time to articulate rage - acknowledgment.
Much like sharing that I've taken the time to complain to McDonald's (WHO DOES THAT?) after having let my annoyance and frustration at a system that could be better had built to a point that was no longer sustainable, I found myself doing the same with the dirty towel return policy and procedures at the gym. Suffice to say, my long-standing, well documented frustration with the current system and its absolute lack of ease and efficiency have been the fodder for more than a few laughs and opportunities to make fun of my mania by friends. Rightfully so. So when I finally sent (in response to a related email the gym staff initiated to all members, by the way) a long response to their request that towels are returned properly that outlined in no uncertain terms the ways in which the system is currently inconvenient or could be improved, I felt great. I felt relieved of a burden. I felt certain that at least 3 offices' worth of employees were making fun of my email and labeling me crazy. I would have.

But receiving a polite, generic response that acknowledged my opinion WITHOUT acknowledging I'd probably been placed on an at-risk list in some database somewhere really made me feel better. Someone had pretended to hear even if they hadn't heard. Thank you.

Rage point 3 - Jerks.
This was valid rather than ridiculous. I watched some folks take the opportunity to repeatedly make someone new, young, and intimidated feel dumb and incompetent and unwanted in group activity. I wanted to yell. I wanted to pounce like Wolverine. I wanted there to be a societal gimme for 1 sucker-punch per person per day to spend with impunity on anyone who needed it so that I could use it. I wanted to lay on the horn the same way I did with the little old manly lady at McDonald's. I wanted to ask these people why they thought they could treat other people like shit? I was furious. And remained that way wee wee wee all the way home.

Speaking of shit...

The moment of truth was upon me.
A bit bedraggled, and eager to be done with the day and take my shoes off and open a beer, I came around the corner from where I'd parked to be confronted by the sight of two even lines of toilets and toilet-related paraphernalia waiting curbside.

At first I feared they were toilets waiting to be installed, standing together like it was ladies night at some toilet country line dance bar. But upon closer inspection I saw they were the toppled thrones of the inhabitants of my apartment building, all left to be taken to a dump of their own for once. The variety was striking. Some were clean. Some looked as though they'd been in the backrooms of mechanic's shops that had run out of Lava soap for the past 40 years. Some had 70s kitsch flowery toilet seat covers. One, a fake wooden seat. I did not stop try to find my own, but really did feel the obligation of wanting to thank a reliable piece of equipment for not quitting on me just because it would have been easier.

Inside, my new toilet sits surrounded by the crud of workboots and the remembrances of toilets past. My toilet paper roll was empty. It was also in the sink, where the roll holder had likewise been deposited for safe rusting.
This machine has 2 settings and I've yet to really test its mettle. I'm also still kind of scared of it. But at least it's there and running. And maybe even saving water.

Disaster averted, I settled into a few episodes of Law & Order - original (and best). My God, I love that show. I cheer at the television when especially cutting justice is delivered (often by the aptly named, Mike Cutter, if not the real Jack McCoy). It was only in having some self-satisfied smiles while looking for shoes I could wear into my dusty, dirty bathroom that I realized I like the show so much because it presents what does not exist in real life. Order. Justice. People being forced to be accountable for their actions (even if their actions are murder, not general jerkiness). And let's not forget, Jerry Orbach.

And now, a day out of my control over, I am thankful to be able to hit the reset button, and climb into bed with all of my partially dirty clothing. Littered everywhere. Like towels that weren't returned properly. I am my own jerk! And after all, the order is restored.

As so many have said, thoughts, prayers, love to Japan.

Oprah, Catholicism, Austria, Canned Tuna, Expiration Dates and Pee-Wee Herman

2011-03-10T22:38:00.000-08:00

Oprah, Catholicism, Austria, Canned Tuna, Expiration Dates and Pee-Wee Herman.
Day 2 of Lent 2011! Woohoo!
These elements and how they fit together, at least in my mind.

Part of my resistance to Lent is that well, it's a total downer. Really. In addition to not wanting to be pushed to do something I should be doing like writing, I also kind of don't like the overall oeuvre of Lent. Yes, it signals the return of the filet o' fish and its like-reconstituted seafood fast food brethren, which in turn means there's a shamrock shake somewhere in there too, just by way of fast food calendar, but other than marking the passage of such "for a limited time" times, Lent is also when church gets real moany-like musically. You lose all the upbeat joy to the world of the Christmas season, and you've just settled into the good vibrations tunes of ordinary time when BANG!, the pre-dirges, the dirges, the reminders of just how sinful you are come out in every minor key known to man (and, if sung reverently, one presumes higher powers).

Lent. It's when you decide to give up cookies and the Girl Scouts are friggin' EVERYWHERE reminding you you've made the dumbest decision ever in self-denial. It's when every time you congratulate yourself for being able to abstain from a box of Thin Mints and instead eat an entire tub of ice cream as a reward for your asceticism you end up hanging out with someone who has given up swearing or caffeine or alcohol or dairy products or television or naps or all of the above. Something that just seems really above and beyond the call of duty. I mean, several of my family members gave up cheese one year. CHEESE. Come on. I do not believe God wants that. I just don't. Not the God I'm familiar with, a God who had the omnipotence to make a moldy cheese like bleu superior to so many other cheeses! I mean, that's a no-nonsense, no waste kind of God if even the funky stuff is good eatin'!

There are people in the world who think climbing K2 would be a really great challenge and SO worth the experience just to say they'd done it. Then there are those of us who think that just sounds like a terrible idea and about one of the least exciting ways to end up short of breath. The extreme self-denial inspired by Lent in some cases puts me in mind of the mountain climbers. And don't even get me started on people who use Lent as a diet plan.

So, speaking of climb every mountain, that's where Austria and Oprah come in. The Sound of Music made "My Favorite Things" a household tune, universally known for sharing a message of can-do optimism and comfort that puts everyone in mind of the Austrian pajama party we all wanted to be a part of. And if you actually think of the words, they are lovely images and favorite things. Cream-colored ponies and crisp apple strudel. Yes! Those are nice thoughts! Pleasing for the mind to conjure. And lyrically pleasant as all hell! Poetry. All that "C" and "P" and then ending with "llll" on "apple" and "strudel." Yes. I like it. And when Julie Andrews sings it, YES. I love it.

Oprah took "favorite things" and consistently produced episodes of television with crowd shots of Americans losing their minds over material goods in a manner akin to evangelical healing. Yes, I too would be excited if Oprah gave me an iPad. But more so if Julie Andrews told me how to look as great in a signature haircut all my own. Though I'm no Oprah, I do think that maybe co-opting my favorite things for use during Lent might be a good idea for the moments when the dog bites, but inspiration does not. Also, in thinking about my favorite things and reflecting on the things that make me very happy (see yesterday: FRIENDS), maybe I'll be less inclined to ramble on about my own life and the imperfections and neuroses that dance across my mind like a traditional Austrian folkdance. (Please be aware that is not a promise. Just a mild goal. The hills are alive. The mountains are still pretty steep).

SO! The Sound of Music is one of my favorite things. Fact. Hard.
And while Lent is not, and well, it's not really designed to be a happy time as I understand it, but more one for super reflection and maybe some self-sacrifice, I think I can make it a bit more useful if I embrace it as a time of contemplative appreciation. Like that which I experience while eating cheese.

Let's see, is that everything? No.
Canned Tuna and Expiration Dates - the Lenten forced meat denial brings out the carnivore in me like Lymon brings out the Sprite in me. It was day ONE yesterday of being a day you're not supposed to go to Shorty's Rib Shack, and suddenly nothing was of culinary interest to me that did not involve meat. Never mind the canned tuna just sitting patiently on the shelf, ready for duty. And the expiration date on the eggs in the fridge seemed to be a bit too close to Groundhog Day for my comfort, so I felt myself hating on Lent and all its restrictions approximately 8.75 hours into Lent. So yeah, I still have some room for personal growth with the self-discipline/self-denial thing.

And finally, Pee Wee Herman was on Conan O'Brien's show last night, which was a strange pairing of someone I loved watching when i was 10 with someone I love watching now. The two together somehow merged my childhood t.v. with my adult t.v. in a way that was both amazing and vaguely off-putting. A show combo fit for the enterprising mind of Uncle Max.
Next year's folk festival? Maybe.
Or at least an appearance on Oprah.

So here's to climbing every mountain! Well, maybe not every mountain...

Lento n' Steady

2011-03-09T23:26:00.000-08:00

Here's the real truth. I hadn't really given much consideration to blogging this Lenten season. The consideration I did give was basically - ugh, Lent's coming up? What should I do this year? What should I give up? I should really try to get myself to stick with something hard.

The ideas for new lifestyles, new devotions, and new means of sacrifice and denial were certainly numerous, ambitious, unrealistic, in some cases to the point of being laughable. Yet the one thing that is probably of the most use and in some ways the most obvious - turning the heat back on in the crockpot and having to write something more than zero words a day - was given the dedicated thought of a passing fancy or fart in the wind.

"Ooh some frozen yogurt would be nice...I wonder what Joyce DeWitt is doing right now... Did I ever get that oil change I was supposed to?" That kind of passing fancy. The kind you have when you're waiting for the dental hygienist to call you in to your appointment or watching the clock's seconds tick on your microwave when you'd really like to eat what it is cooking for you. That kind.

The real truth of that matter, and how the passing thought passed so easily? I kinda didn't think anyone would notice? That. And if they did, did not think they'd call me on it.

Whoops! I get by with a little help from my friends.
And I get called to task for not doing what I should be.
Which is why I am grateful for my fantastic friends, especially when they seem to know me better than I know myself (or at least am willing to admit to myself). I mean, I am grateful beyond words! But see, even that is me trying to get out of writing...

I should say, I am grateful to the point of words for my friends and their nudges.
So, I'm going all in on this pot.

I've been thinking about ways to try to create more cohesion or a through line here, and I've been thinking about relating the following: Oprah, Catholicism, Austria, Canned Tuna, Expiration Dates and Pee-Wee Herman.

Well then, tomorrow! Stop by, the soup should be on.
If not, I have every confidence a friend will let me know it's not.
Thank yaaaaa!

Dancing with the Stars - Suggested Canned Lines for the Judges

2011-03-01T17:22:00.000-08:00

Since the new cast of “Dancing with the Stars” (DWTS) was announced it is safe to assume there are already people hard at work crafting “witty” remarks for the judges. It is likewise safe to assume that the writers of E!’s “The Soup” are also hard at work on jokes about Kirstie Alley and Wendy Williams, since both have signed up for the show.

Here are some guesses at repartee from the judges. Well, just Bruno, really. Or maybe no one. They’ll be tasteless. And horrible. But Bruno could make it work. I’ll leave the jokes to the pros and look forward to watching "The Soup’s" coverage of the show rather than the show itself. Though obviously I’ll be rooting for hometown favorite, Hines Ward. Also, if you haven’t seen clips of Bruno’s visit to "The Soup," you should. He takes his shirt off and stays a while. It was excellent enough for me to respect the heck out of him. And that was BEFORE I learned he was in the Elton John "I’m Still Standing" video dancing his buns off, which is amazing and perhaps the best use of body paint in the 80s entirety. I know! Bold statement.

Anyway...

Kendra Wilkinson

“Your husband might be a Baskett case watching you dance, but I don’t know why. You are one Playboy bunny who has mastered the bunny hop! It looks like you have two lucky rabbit’s feet with moves like that!”

Hines Ward

“Well it wasn’t the Super Bowl shuffle for you this year, but I still think you could hoist a trophy this season after all! You’ve got your first dance moves down and your partner is so good, you musn’t let anyone Steel’er! Touchdown.”

Ralph Macchio

I could wax on about your poise and posture all night! Clearly you haven’t lost all of your focus since you’ve certainly brought the mojo from the dojo! You might not sweep the leg, but you’ve certainly swept me off my feet tonight! Bravo, Ralph our Macho Macho Macchio man!

Sugar Ray Leonard

“That dance was a total knockout! Were you named after the band Sugar Ray? Because I just want to fly watching you float like a butterfly around the dance floor tonight!”

Kirstie Alley

Well, Kirstie, you'll be getting nothing but CHEERS for that performance! Bartender, pour me another! Will anyone come close to topping you tonight? Fat chance! Which I mean to say you'll be shedding pounds AND competitors with moves like that. Tasty!

Wendy Williams

Wendy, you always ask, "How YOU doin'?" and let me just tell you, ask your stylist for more bobby pins, because I hope you continue to get wiggy wit' it! Fantastic moves that I'm sure will have everyone on THEIR couches doing the talking for once!

Petra Nemcova

Look out everyone, take 'cova! It'd naturally be a disaster NOT to have you on this show! A triumphant comeback for you - turn the tables and take this competition by storm! You are this year's Jennifer Grey storyline due to personal tragedy. You get that, right? Great. This time around you'll be Singin' in the Rain', footloose and fancy free!

Chris Jericho

WWE? More like WW-we would love to see more of that! It's certainly raw in here! What have you been doing wasting your time wrestling? With moves like that, you should be pinned in the dance ring, not throwing yourself off of ropes. You’ve certainly got a body slam that makes me excited. Let's get ready to rhumba!

Li'l Romeo

Well this is one Romeo who is more of a star-crossed DANCER and I am certainly loving it! Romeo Oh Romeo Wherefore art thou cha-cha-cha? Tonight your fate and your partner's entwined for one romantic, SEXY dance! Can't wait to see a Li'l more!

Psycho Mike Catherwood

With moves like that, no one will be ask "who the hell is that?" soon enough! It is psycho that you've never waltzed before tonight! That was certainly easy as 1-2-3 for you. I'd be crazy NOT to love that dancing!

Chelsea Kane – Disney tween

(Shameless ploy by Disney/ABC to promote Disney programming to another audience. I am unfamiliar with this star).

Zippitydooda indeed, Chelsea!

For Natalie, Who Said Even Rants Were Fine

2010-08-08T23:46:00.000-07:00

Hello to anyone who might stumble here. Apologies. Regret. Reality television has sucked my brain and stolen my attention for quite a while, as well as lack of good ole' fashioned motivation, ambition, will, hmm...I could go on. All the stuff that makes one susceptible to reality television's whims. Distraction. Fear and loathing. Snack foods. etc.

I am in a terrible mood and have not been able to shake it for the majority of the day. This happens often on Sundays, but usually some sort of food treat, outdoor adventure, television pablum, or mindless task accomplishment can push me over the hump and into the week. Today, however, I have been stewing a bit. Why not stew like a fish in a crockpot? I don't even think the fish at the top of the page are interested any more! Anyway, I decided, presuming I'd be lying awake for a bit, to return to the crockpot. I give credit to Natalie Kranz who, upon seeing me recently at her gorgeous home with her gorgeous kids and gorgeous quiches where she was hosting a divine baby shower, suggested I write something as she was "sick of LA!" being the leftover post of this crock page.

How true. The Lakers aren't even the biggest story in the NBA anymore since the Heat set about making a boy band. Backstreet's back - all right! And so too, should I be.

Maybe I'm back because somehow my unease seems to have a need for reckoning at its thematic core. Today I felt as scattered as Waffle House hash browns and I don't quite enjoy it (though I enjoy hash browns, though not as much as cheese n' eggs), and I am certain that is due in no small part to having to replace my cellular telephone. Since arriving in Los Angeles, I have had three definite instances of phone loss or failure. All three have resulted in immediate and existential angst of varying degrees. It is interesting, however, that the angst has changed in its causation.

The first time I was cell phone-less, I had been thrown in a fountain while the phone was on my person. I had not been in L.A. for a quarter of a year yet. Though my brother and sister-in-law were visiting that weekend and physically in my presence, I felt panic as though I'd been irreparably severed from my life and loved ones on the east coast. Panic panic panic. I believe that entire weekend was a watershed "maybe I'm having adjustment issues" moment.

The second time I was cell phone-less, I dropped it at a concert venue when I'd switched to a new, smaller purse to have a non-bulky purse at a concert and believed I'd put it in a pocket of said purse. I'd put it on the outside flap of the purse. Ready to fall. Then, as with this most recent instance, my phone loss occurred when I was participating in a new and fun activity. Though both evenings in question were fantastic, the realization of phone loss the next day made me feel like I'd forgotten the penalty for new fun. Like, whoops - you can't go doin' that and not expect a tariff. The 2nd time I again had panic about not being able to contact, or be contacted, by people who might be trying to find me. But L.A. people too, not just east coasters. That had a happy ending and an "Oh L.A. does have fine and upstanding individuals" as both someone returned the phone to the lost and found portion of the venue, and someone in that office used my phone to contact my parents, who they assumed would track me down. They did. The next night I drove across town to retrieve my phone and had to battle my way through a line of rather rowdy, mostly pleather-clad individuals who were excited for the venue to open the doors for admission to, I believe a nigh S&M performers' ball. Looking like I'd just walked out of the pages of the Babysitter's Club series in my t-shirt and jeans (and original bulky purse), the white-faced-makeupped transvestite in a leather girdle and thigh-high boots very easily believed that I was not in fact trying to worm my way past the security, which they believed to be inadequate for the crowd's enthusiasm, but rather HAD lost my phone the night before. I needed to go to the business office on the top level. A back office lackluster security detail (girl in a black t-shirt with a flashlight who worked there and happened to be passing by) was kind enough to escort me upstairs at the behest of the doorman/woman. They found my phone. They gave it back. My niece's tiny face was smiling on the front. Numbers were inside. Connection! Phew. And what nice people to understand losing one's phone sucks. And to not make me pay the $5 cover to go inside to get it.

This weekend's phone loss occurred in downtown L.A. as a Friday happy hour morphed into a bar crawl. It was fun! I downgraded to a smaller purse for the evening! And soooo the story repeats itself. I realized my phone was missing in the middle of our fun. Backtracking spots and coming up empty, I tried again the next day, calling, texting, leaving email addresses at a restaurant - hoping that my good fortune in the face of bad phone retention might also repeat itself. Saturday it was ok. I actually liked the freedom from the phone, as I tend to cling to its possibility on weekends. I hadn't lost hope that it would physically return to my sweaty palm, and could enjoy a day fast and loose. Unhindered and unchecked.

Sunday things turned south. Quickly too. I realized that I had to suck it up and replace the phone and did not want to head to the phone store on a weekend. I realized I'd probably missed absolutely no calls in the absence of my phone. No one was looking for me. And worse, would people even write to give me their numbers? It was like a crystallized symbolic mental retrospective of contacts I was, well, a little out of contact with. Somehow having a name in your phone, even if you never use it again, seems important. The name of the limo driver from your best friend's bachelorette party. The friend you only text regarding one sports team one season a year. Your old landlord. Just in case.

Somehow this phone loss marked the enormity not just of distance from loved ones on a different coast, but of the passage of time in a whole new way. Here I was, out of touch. Off the grid. In a city where I hit a traffic jam at midnight that brought me to a complete stop the night before. And would the college friends I see once every 2 years even bother sending me their number to replace?
(this sounds super depressing! I don't mean it with quite as dire a tone as it might seem to convey)

I was assisted at the phone store by a gentleman named Njall. Or Nihall. Or hm...the second one looks more accurate. He was definitely not originally born in America. He was also like, the best and most non-salesy, non- B.S.y phone store guy I'd ever met. Here was the efficiency I wanted when, after getting coffee, I decided to do what felt like impulse shopping and suck it up and head to the phone store, lines be damned. I needed to know what I'd missed and if someone was using my lost phone to make the phone calls that would keep their long-distance relationship with their bon hunnybun in Paris going strong.

He explained things. He told me the price point for unlimited texting. He showed me the phones that did the things I wanted and nothing more. I pointed. He went and found the box. It worked.
I loved him, and somehow (again, perhaps I woke up with more emotional turmoil than I gave myself credit for) his efficiency and kindness made me want to cry, because I wanted him to be recognized for taking care of business, business that I had failed to take care of myself. I love the TCB feeling. Scattered self - not so much, though it seems to be my default setting.

When I got home, I realized I hadn't shopped for the phone at all. Aside from rejecting a phone as a conceivable option because its display font was Comic Sans, I had really just taken his word for it. I had no idea how this thing worked. No idea.

It rang. I panicked. I hated the ringtone - the default ringtone that only those over the age of 65 keep, so the ringtone you always hear as the ringers are often turned up really loud. I couldn't unlock it. I didn't know if I was answering the call. It was my Dad. He said I seemed to be in a bad mood. I confirmed I was. After I hung up, I sent a text message reply to an automated 900 number unintentionally. I couldn't see my sent messages. I couldn't believe the new keyboard thingy that was supposed to set my world on textual fire did NOT adhere to standard typewriter letter order. QWERTYIOP motherf*cker! Do I look like I can learn a second keyboard? Where were the punctuation marks? Was I being charged for email I wasn't using? Oh God. I don't even know my best friend's phone number. And if I do, I won't be able to save it. I didn't get the insurance, despite being there for a totally insurance-plan-is-smart-based reason. The screen would probably shatter by week's end. All of this I pondered as the sun dropped a little lower on the weekend.

How is it back-to-school time? How is there an NFL game on? How am I ever going to figure out this phone, much less what to do with life?

An oversight in the story...
When I came back home from the phone store, I am foolishly sharing with the readership, my door was wide open as if I had just stepped outside to get my mail or do laundry. The kind of wide open for when you are coming right back. No big whoop. Oven isn't on, but it could be and it wouldn't matter.

I had left my apartment in such a state of distraction that I didn't even shut the door behind me. Maybe that speaks to the necessity of coffee in my life, but that threw me for an even bigger loop than my phone. I wasn't just losing my phone, I was losing my mind.

The great part of the phone confusion is that I now have an even greater appreciation of my dad's new confusion with his newly acquired cell phone. No, it's not a new model - it's his first ever phone. He and my mother had been sharing one phone previously. She'd been mission control on the tech side of that one. He'd just talked into it.

His newly acquired phone gifted him, not only the capacity to let my mom know when he's taking a detour to the grocery store because he might need neosporin and the nectarines are on sale, but also a fairly good run of phone bumble anecdotes. He thought the cell phone was the alarm clock one morning, and got out of bed only to later discover the beeping had been a text message. He wrote out the words "question mark" in the first text he sent me, having no idea how to make punctuation marks appear. Hearing these tales I'd laughed and laughed. Teased a bit and assured him he'd get the knack sooner or later. Recommended he switch from the awful default ring tone and thought he was being too picky when he said all the pre-loaded ring tones were crap.

One more moment of being the apple at the base of the family tree for me today. Where were good ring tones? Where was the button to talk? Where was the text menu? Where, for God's sake, was the question mark???

I suppose Dad and I will have to learn the tricks of our new phones on phone calls to one another. Assuming I can hold onto mine and he can find the snooze button on his, we might just be the technologically out-of-touch keeping in touch. We'll see. I've got minutes with his name on them. And well, about 2 other contacts.
My former landlord could call any day now, letting me know he's also unable to reconcile with change, but finally ready to return that deposit.

If he does, I'll put it toward the phone insurance.
Or a new ring tone. Maybe my Dad can suggest some good ones. I'll call him, if I can figure it out.

We love L.A. - we love it!

2010-06-17T21:38:00.001-07:00

I just finished watching game 7 of the NBA finals and boy are my arms tired. Actually, somehow in today's personal mental crockpot, I had a very stinky fish in there. Hard to get rid of the smell of a bad day, but the Lakers did it!

Yes, the Lakers come from behind win was a thrill. But somehow it was also enough positive distraction to get me out of my own brain! Reasons this win was fantastic:

1. Lakers over Celtics. This is my preference in this match-up. Has been, will be. Blame the 80s, but my family skewed Lakers then, and have stuck with it. Also, not a fan of: Paul Pierce, KG, Rasheed Wallace (gag). Do love Rajon Rondo though. That guy- GOOD! And props to Ray Allen.

2. I know it probably makes me a bad feminist, but I love Kobe! Love him. Such a competitor.

3. Last second win!

4. Kobe, who is an all-star, was relatively cold shooting tonight! Had to rely on the TEAM. And then recognized it. Gave a specific shoutout to Pau Gasol saying, "I can't say enough about the Spaniard." Pau Gasol looking like a giant perhaps Spanish descendant of Abe Lincoln, getting choked up and crying! Then palming what appeared to be a beer in the locker room that looked like a 5-hour energy bottle in his hand, given how friggin' huge his hands are. I kinda wanted Kobe and Pau to make out. I can't lie.
Kobe parading his kids out? Not a fan of that...can't lie again.

5. Then there's the post-game sound bytes. Amazing. Amazing. Hilarious. And it's like suddenly everyone who's in front of a television camera is wearing a "dance like no one's watching" t-shirt and going for it. Hysterical!

Ron Artest, first player to be interviewed, thanks his hood, and his psychiatrist. Hell yes Ron Artest. Know who put you where you are today. Hell. Yes.

Magic Johnson - this guy looks great! And can't go off script! Loves Jerry Buss, Phil Jackson, Kobe Bryant, city of Los Angeles...and if given a chance to talk again, has to repeat that in different order.

Bill Russell.....REALLY want him to go off script. Want him to say whatever he's thinking. For like, an hour.

6. Local News! Amazingggg!
Sports guy, former player, and Lisa Leslie in a Laker jersey, blazer, with Laker bluetooth still in her ear, encouraging families to go get something to eat to celebrate rather than rioting in the streets, as it makes no sense. Smashcut to "And now we go live to the guy in the chopper with shots of fans rioting in the streets..."

The game has been over, maybe 48 minutes, and they're already using rubber bullets on the crowds who are scrapping with mounted police, police on bikes, fighting each other, turning over sawhorses and traffic monitoring signs. Local news is offering a split screen of Kobe Bryant, kids on either arm, cocky as all hell, and aerial shots of the developments outside the Staples center.
Their man on the street reporter already nearly lost his microphone to a young, sweet looking girl who, when offered the mic for comment, tried to take it from him entirely and went into mocking newscaster mode. Hilarrrious. The crowd luuuuved it. Rightfully so.

Rowdy fans. Fires in the streets. Jumping on cars. Storming streets. Sawhorses through car windows. Wow. It's so bad it's funny. Probably because I'm not there. And probably because attempts at the NBA and Lakers making formal commercials to stop crowds from acting like wild angry mobs rather than respectful sports fans failed so tremendously. Also funny, the city has been encouraging fans to celebrate responsibly all week. I've mostly heard these warnings and requests from NPR reporters. So yeah...pretty sure they got to their target riot audience there.

Lisa Leslie is lovely. And she just said POO on t.v.

I am a sports fan. I like winning. But I've never wanted to overturn a schoolbus after a win. Maybe I'm not that big a fan after all?

Poo!
Lisa Leslie, please get on Dancing with the Stars. I might watch.

wow thanks!

2010-05-03T22:16:00.000-07:00

Hi All! I haven't written since Easter - who's surprised. No one.
But I'm excited! The mail has me jazzed. I came home and found my mailbox full of nice cards and then a jury summons. But then it was for the person who used to live in my apartment not me! And then a new neighbor was like, hey..., because he had his door open and i was walking past checking the mail. And i was scared he'd hate me because I had a loud and rowdy party on saturday. but he just asked to be invited the next time i had a loud and rowdy party (which is still not good as i try to pretend i don't frequently have loud and rowdy parties and really, i dont!). but better than open hatred! and he told me happy 23rd birthday and i said it'll be better the 2nd time! and then i found a package near my other neighbors' door and was like, wait is that for me? And I opened it, and it's got a hunger monster inside! like the orange furry guy from weight watchers ads who tries to get people to eat snacks. which um, it kind of works. i want to hang out with him and eat snacks. and NOW I CAN! thanks momo!!! we had some cheese and chips and a delicious cookie and watched 2 law & orders! in a row! and i'm afraid they're going to kill off the chief, which will make me sad. she's leaving the show! but maybe not by way of death? let's hope.
ooh i 'm just excited i guess huh.
yay! now some sleeps!

Easter is Especial!

2010-04-04T22:32:00.000-07:00

HAPPY EASTER EVERYBODY!!!

Today included:

Girl Scout cookie breakfast!
fatty treats everywhere I turned!
Swimming!
Latte!
egg dyeing!
sunshine!
family fun fone calls!
an earthquake!
a cheeseburger!
all-day friend fun!
red wine!
french fries!
How to Train your Dragon the movie not in 3-D but still so great!
Rain!
And it's about to have a dash of Salman Rushdie!

This day has been full of surprises and reminders of love and life and joy.
This morning I learned a friend just gave birth to a baby girl.
This evening I learned a friend just lost her father.
And all day I saw people running the emotional range available to us - from the husband and wife really pleased to be in church together, to their teen son who looked as if he'd been asked to stand on hot coals for an hour by sitting next to them. Experiences experienced everywhere from the best to the worst, and today i'm sending positive peace to anyone who will take it.

Peace peace peace peace peace to you and beyond

Easter Eve!

2010-04-03T20:34:00.000-07:00

Hi all! It's Easter Eve! Which means, as of tomorrow, I am not Lentenly required to write this anymore. That is some relief, as I won't be writing bleary-eyed half-coherent "from bed without contacts" posts, but I also feel it's bad as I don't think I've accomplished as much in my blog this year as last year. And I also feel like I kind of have gotten on more of a roll as of late. Maybe I've just been writing longer, more rambling posts? Which feel way more natural to me? I dunno. Anyway.

Yesterday, in addition to having a fantastically calm and quiet Friday, I also got a new book out of the library - Fury, by Salman Rushdie! When I saw the title and realized it was indeed the word fury, i went for it. Lately I've been seemingly full of rage or negative energy, which also sometimes fluctuates to completely elated, fantastic energy. I'm sure someone's thought of a better way to describe contrasting depression and mania...hm...manic behavior....angry behavior of the depressed. Hm, if only I could think of something. Maybe with a hypen.... Anyway, I was thrilled to find a book by a favorite author that seemed to touch upon what I'd been feeling lately, I happily tucked it under my arm then giddily skipped across campus and toward my car, glad to be let out of work a bit early for the Easter holiday. There was a Police cover band playing "So Lonely" on the quad. The sun was shining. I was free! And felt good! Woo! In the spirit of my giddiness, when I looked at what was playing as listed on the movie theater marquis on the way to my car, I saw the phrase "Train Your Dragon" (yes I want to see that movie). My head just kinda started running with that in a commanding way with this crazy energy that's been around lately.

So tonight, though I'm more drowsy than fired up, I'm going to let myself run with that first found thought and see where it takes me. Happy Saturday everyone!

Friday Sunshine - So Lonely, So Lonely, So Lonely

Train my dragon
Paint my wagon
Ride my see-saw
Laugh at hee-haw
Keep the faith
Fail the safe

Come on in
Yes, we're open
Shirt and shoes required
Meter time expired
For a limited time
Let your light shine

Feel so alone
Throw a dog a bone
Got sin? Atone
Lo-lo-lo-lo-lo-lonely

What's love got to do with it
Where's the baseball to hit
Who's on first after all
When you need a friend, call
you're OUT my name

There's so much sun at the setting
Too many names worth forgetting
Too many shames for regretting
Too many rains that do not let in
the ease or the sleep or the win

This will be the time
My Sting operation
This thrill will be mine
This dance my vocation
Know my hope
Know my buzz
Know the frenzy
of the klutz
This will be the transformation
Every little thing YOU DO
is magic
is mine.

Turn that Rock into Meat...and put it on Bread

2010-04-02T22:19:00.000-07:00

Somehow when the light is brightest in the Lenten tunnel, the temptation somehow seems worse. While I am most certainly a lapsed Catholic in many ways, I try not to eat the meat on Fridays, and I've given up on the cookies and am doing a shoddy job of blogging. When my Girl Scout samoas were delivered more than a month ago, I opened them and shared them with others, and did not feel compelled to eat one. It was not hard, because it was like, nope, still have a long way to go. But as of last night, they've been glowing heavy from behind the closed cupboard door like the Ring in the mind of Frodo. I'm not saving the world by not eating cookies, mind you. I certainly just transfer cookie desire to chips and chocolate. But my self control is really really bad. And apparently, getting worse toward the end.

Today a coworker announced he was in search of his traditional Good Friday philly cheesesteak sandwich, a hilarious premise and tradition in and of itself. Kind of a real F you to the whole Lenten Friday meat abstaining thing, more so because it takes place on THE Friday of Lenten Fridays. But after talking about cheesesteaks all day, and then watching/smelling/salivating as two coworkers ate them, I was having trouble with the no meat thing. I just wanted to go through the Wendy's drive-thru on the way out of work and get the Bacon/Bleu burger and a frosty and dip chicken nuggets in that. And I don't typically go through the Wendy's drive thru after work. It was absolutely a case of wanting it more because I could not have it.

After making it through, and looking at the samoas knowingly as I put some clean dishes away above them this afternoon, I found myself able to have the Friday I wanted to have last Friday, which instead became me writing an angry rant about the noise control issues of my neighbors. Sure they've got a phone book that was delivered 2 days ago and 2 take out menus outside their door inviting trouble and indicating disregard for their space, inches from my door, but hey, they're very QUIETLY not taking in the junk mail left on their stoop. Thank you neighbors.

Tonight I did the two loads of laundry I wanted to, and the dishes, and the sitting in peace on my couch eating chips and watching a movie I had not seen but wanted to - yep, it was Cars, the Disney/Pixar movie. Happened to be on the Disney Channel. And I only missed about 3 minutes of it!

Yes, yes it is the same premise and a story that's very close to Doc Hollywood, but guess what - I loved it. I love talking cars. I really am a sucker for animation - this is fairly widely known. But once again as I will gladly tell anyone - Up was the best movie I saw last year and do not understand how it was not the best picture given that it made me experience close to 75% or more of the gamut of human emotion and I was still thinking about it for weeks after, telling people to see it like I was trying to convert them to a new church or the Atkins diet - It will change your life! The Pixar folks really make round characters and tell good stories. Yes. Yes they do. I love those cars! Like I loved that old man and his boy scout! They manage to make me care about everyone in the movie. Mission accomplished.

Also, this movie, like Fantastic Mr. Fox of Thanksgiving, made me go - Wow, that's amazing that even just the voice is incredibly well acted. Paul Newman is a tremendous car! He brings some grit, emotion, and depth to what might otherwise be the feel-good old timer character of this movie. I had the same reaction to Meryl Streep in the aforementioned Mr. Fox. I mean, even as a fox, she is exceptional. I feel her fox's emotions. I believe that fox. Like I believe the anguish of a tarnished past for Newman's car.
That takes some chops!

Well, a TGIF to all with especial hopes that your Good Friday is a really good Friday, and that you avoided, or indulged in the cheesesteak you so richly deserve as needed.

Making up for sleep time

2010-04-01T17:37:00.001-07:00

While it may appear to a casual reader that I was wasted or one-armed while typing last night’s entry, I promise that everything written there was, in fact true. I was just in bed and without the corrective lenses required to operate motor vehicles and, apparently, blogs. Apologies. Skip that one.

Today I’ve got a jumble stewing in my own brain. I think it might involve the massive quantity of caffeine I consumed around 2 p.m., which, as I type this, I realize might mean I’ll be crocking again this evening at about 2 a.m. when I’m unable to sleep. I mean, I’m affected. Addled even. I just went to the library to return one book (the one recommended yesterday!) and check out another, and I realized upon arriving there that I had not brought my library card. Turns out that whole loaner system only goes so far. It’s not a trust library. They’d prefer an actual record of what you’ve got and when you should bring it back. Library, I respect you. This one was my bad.

Anyway – rapid fire topics!

Topic One: Insidious marketing in my favorite t.v. shows – everyone sees this for what it is, right?

Last night’s episode of “Modern Family” – handsdown the funniest new show on t.v. at present – involved an A storyline that revolved around a character’s birthday desire to own an iPad. Now, this ABC show is Disney affiliated = Apple affiliated = iPad-happy. So the episode focused on the mania and excitement one lovable nerd would experience in desperately wanting Apple’s newest i-gadget. And yes, while very true to life for many iNerds and even common un-techie folk alike, the fact of the matter is that was essentially a 26 minute informercial for the iPad. Yes, I get it has to happen, but man, sometimes I hate it when there’s no acknowledgement of marketing’s fourth wall and there should be. Like, television programming is around so that we are encouraged to buy products, but I hate when the commercials get all up in the television programming to the point of being essential to the story rather than throw away product shots (every HP computer used on NBC Thursdays), or one-off mentions by characters (the guys checking the navigation system of their Ford on “White Collar” or Chuck of “Chuck” using the backup cam on his Nerd Herd Toyota) and pretend like they’re not there. The same thing bothered me about last week’s “Office.” Yep, it was funny, but how many time did the character Michael Scott say the phrase “Date Night!” excitedly? Coincidentally the name of his movie soon to be in theaters this April 9^th take your whole family! I guess the manner I prefer, if we have to have such blatant in-show promotions to the point that character dialogue reflects the product, is that employed by “30 Rock” – making fun of yourself for doing it, and for the company doing it, and the entire industry. They go for broke. And it’s true to character and show. It’s self-skewering! I like it.

Topic Two: Refrigerators

This I bring up just to close the loop on yesterday’s mention of today’s topics, and because it’s top-of-mind concern to me. As we know, things I value most: food and television. I have some concerns my refrigerator might not be functioning at top speed/freeze any more. I think it’s still functioning well enough to keep things cold enough not be outright rotten, but that there’s a window where it warms up enough to make bad stuff grow, then cool down juuuust enough to cultivate those funky bad things so that my refrigerator is slowly becoming a den of self-poison! This could be the caffeine talking, but I’ve actually had this theory prior to jazzing myself beyond all reason with a giant Wendy’s iced tea this afternoon. Now, even if that’s not what is happening in my fridge, I still think it’s a compelling idea for a movie or short story or episode of Law & Order (I LOVE YOU LAW & ORDER!)! The slow and painful poisoning…done from the inside! Something as rotten as a crockpot full of fish.

Did you catch that?

When I shared these concerns with friends, I was informed that I was indeed boring and ridiculous with the story I was telling. It was quite hilarious at the time because that assessment was 100% correct.

Topics Three and Four: Spinning Austrians!!!

I had a hilarious experience at a spinning class yesterday. The instructor was so intense and ridiculous that everything he said made me laugh rather than inspiring my fastest pedaling on a stationary bike. All of this was done to the backdrop of a house mix from a euro-rave. I think this might be fertile ground for a full essay, so lemme just stop there. Here’s the punchline – though I pedaled far, I got nowhere.

Topic Five!: Cheating!

A few days ago I heard the song OPP on the way to work. A fantastic song that masterfully samples “ABC” by the Jackson 5. But the whole message of that song is hey, I like getting with other people’s lovaaa’s. No big whoop, but there’s an entire verse devoted to the blatant message and advice that the key to getting with OPP is not TALKING about OPP so you don’t get caught. It was so hilariously shameless. Like, hey dummy, cheating is awesome. But don’t talk about it! You’ll get busted!

That made me think of other songs that are blatantly about cheating, and I remembered crockpot lists were fan favorites last year. So here’s some great songs about cheating, in no particular order. Suggestions welcome. And a great many oversights in the country realm are acknowledged.

OPP – naughty by nature

Have you ever loved a woman – Derek and the Dominoes (one of many of Eric Clapton’s great, cheating with George Harrison’s wife – inspired songs. Really, whole awesome album came out of this)

Run to You – Bryan Adams - yep, listen closely. That love is forbidden!

Tusk – Fleetwood Mac – again, one very direct entry in a collected work that has quite a few homages to lovers-scorned

It wasn’t me – Shaggy, featuring Rik Rok(?) HILARIOUS. Like, this one is so shameless that I can’t help but love it – you were caught? In person? On camera? With a ton of supporting evidence? Deny it anyway.

Pina Colada Song (escape)– Rupert Holmes – when is cheating hilarious? When you want to cheat on your partner and your partner wants to cheat on you too! Ahhh, ain’t love grand. Really. A case of figuring out a song was ridiculous well after hearing it many many times.

Two Silhouettes on the Shade – the Rays, covered by Herman’s Hermits – This is a case of mistaken cheating identity, but it’s still a great song, great story. The Herman’s Hermits version is of course…upbeat

Chain of Fools- Aretha Franklin – it’s a good song.

Anyone Who Had a Heart – Dionne Warwick – I’m pretty sure this one is Burt Bacharach, right? No one does devastating love better. And this one, though “untrue” is the only real cheating reference, seems to work for me

Maybe I know that He’s been Cheating – Lesley Gore – this is as edgy as Lesley Gore gets, and I like it.

Cecelia – Simon & Garfunkel – shaking our confidence daily!

Ok, I have to go, but I’ll think of more!

The Blurry Blank Page

2010-04-01T00:12:00.001-07:00

Hey all, dspite better intentions, i have not written in the crock today. I've taken my contacts out. And brought my comptuer to bed. I'd much rather bring a book. I highly recommend The Plague of Doves by Louise Eldrich - incredible stories, inclredibly lyric.

Anyeay, I can't see what I"m typing without squinting right now, and all i really wnat to do is sleep sleep sleep. I even was attending a writing related meeting- not just watching tv! But as i just received a package for Easter that compels me forward toward the deadline without skipping more days, I hvae to come here and tell you how much I don't want to be writing this right now. Also this current position is some sort of tricep exercise given my current arm position. Anyway. I really do apologize for making this more like a facebook wall than a functional blog. I am tired ya'll!
things to talk about tomorrow
cheating
spinning
austrians
refrigerators.

until then

It Aint Fever Cheating me of Reason, That's My Neighbor

2010-03-30T21:48:00.000-07:00

Um, so yesterday I might have mentioned that I thought Gary from Gary's Old Towne Tavern on Cheers lived in my building, but that I thought it might be the fever making my eyes a bit less than reliable and the time on the couch trapped in my apartment making me delusionally make my apartment a bit more interesting than it deserved to be. WRONG!!!

So tonight I pull in to park my car, and there's the guy I mentally call Gary speaking with the nice neighbor from upstairs who also is a sports fan. (Really, my ranting blogs are all coming full circle here. The other thing that was awesome? The nice guy who actually is a sports fan qualified ME as an actual sports fan, indicating to Gary that we follow sports a lot more than he does [! and that other guy next door to me!]). Amazing. If he only knew I called him the only actual other sports fan in the building. Mutual respect. Booya.

So I talk to I-think-it's-Gary and Sports Guy Upstairs for a while, and am introduced by name to Joel, the would be Gary. I'm from Pittsburgh, he's from Philadelphia. We chat a bit. Chat about sports affiliations. Sports Guy Upstairs talks shit about Big Ben Roethlisberger, I don't try to defend him all to much because how can I right now, and Would-be Gary talks about loving trees, loving the air, fighting the man, all the stuff that makes it verrrry likely that he's an actor. whose been living in California for a while. I almost ask. I almost ask if he acts and bring up my Gary's Old Towne Tavern suspicion, but then realize if he's not an actor at all but rather an avid activist who hates televisions and those who use them, I'll be on the outs. Wanting to keep up the neighborly vibe without giving off my own creep vibes, I decide to just take my context clues, leave my "good to meetchas" and head back to the interwebs.

BANG.
Joel from Philadelphia plays Gary of Gary's Old Towne Tavern on Cheers. And what's more? His headshot could have been taken today.

Now, the coast difference makes this difficult as I know my brother who would absolutely be as impressed by this as I am is in bed asleep. Or not checking his email. So here I am, left to bring the enthusiasm of sitcom love to the crockpot for dissemination.

Remember all that stuff about Boner, and how Boner as a character was like a real person in my childhood? Gary, aside maybe from Francoise, who tried to steal Woody's girlfriend by tauntingly saying "Woody, I'm going to steal your girlfriend!" in a French accent, is probably the most loathed character on Cheers! A great source of bar rivalry episode fun, but the guy we loved to hate with the Cheers gang. And now he lives upstairs!!! I mean, Andy Andy was also great, but he was also crazy. (And now the reason I typically add an "Andy" after one-named Andys in my head, because it just sounds right).

So yeah, to answer your question, yes. Yes I will be saying, "Hey Joel, didn't want to freak you out if you weren't Gary, but I wanted to ask you if you were Gary and then internet stalked you and found out you were!!! That's awesome! And way not creepy, right? Great. Nope, not planning on stealing your mail. If you were wondering....Nope. And you probably weren't wondering. I'll stop talking now. YOUR BAR SUCKS!"

And then I run away.

Sometimes you wanna go, where everybody knows your name, and they're always glad you came...

a.k.a. - t.v.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have to get where troubles are all the same. I think the t.v. might have a beer waiting.

You give me Fever!

2010-03-29T21:57:00.000-07:00

Well, maybe it was fishcrockpot soup, but something certainly gave me fever today, which resulted in me doing a lot of sleeping, cracker eating, and liquid drinking. In a disjointed bit of haze today, I must admit that this crock is way beyond phoned in.

I did watch the rest of Undercover Boss from last night and yep, it made me cry. I think this one is a bit more insanely emotionally direct to the aims of American people than Extreme Makeover Home Edition, and let me tell you why. That one takes tragic stories of exceptional people and families, just trying to raise good families with good values, and often overcoming crazy adversity to do so, by living the American dream of home ownership. It helps people have a home, which guess what - Americans want. Longstanding thing we try to achieve. Yep yep yep.

This Undercover Boss show??? Captures and delivers the ideal that hard work will be recognized. While hard work is its own reward, honest, commited, hard work and can-do spirit, even in the face of hardship and lack of personal, financial, or emotional resources, is worth doing well and will, eventually, be recognized and appreciated. This takes people in the business-running/decision-making capacities of companies and forces them to do the real hard stuff - the roll up your sleeves down and dirty, under-appreciated grunt stuff. And beyond that, it shows them just how necessary that work is to the bigger picture. So this show rewards the idealized American work ethic. The people who give 110% every single day and also have families and are beating tremendous odds at home (these folks were working through: homelessness, poverty, being single parents, natural disasters, etc.) are rewarded with a good job recognition hug from the CEO, and news that the company they bleed for will be helping them with what they need. Really really gets to core American can-do spirit hard and fast and effectively. Oh yeah, I cried.

Then today, not sure if it's the fever or not, I watched an episode of Cheers and became convinced that Gary from Gary's Olde Town Tavern, longtime rival of Cheers, lives in my apartment building. HA which would be awesome. And would explain the odd hours that guy seems to be around if he's a working/former actor. But it really does make me want to stare at his face when I see him rather than scurrying out of sunlight like a vampire without a parasol. Perhaps IMDB could help? I dunno, maybe it will give his street address.

And finally, Ricky Martin is gay. Which I think is actually less shocking to me than Clay Aiken coming out, only because it seems like old news now and Clay Aiken was so hell-bent on telling us he was not going to hell due to wrongful sexuality and the like in his initial fights against being gay. But maybe Ricky has a new album? I dunno. But good for you Ricky Martin. Good for you. Ole Ole Ole! Total el mundo a pie! I'm happy that you're gay! Enjoy it.

Well, bed beckons. La vida loca can make a blogger tired.

My Unwitting Arrival in the Century Club

2010-03-28T22:34:00.000-07:00

Upon logging in today, I noticed I've written 100 posts, according the blog manager feature of this thing. I was rather surprised, I have to say. Were this a sitcom (as that framework manages how I perceive most things in my world, which is probably another reason I enjoy the character Abed on the sitcom "Community" so much, as he relates everything to entertainment forms from his childhood), we'd be having a 100th episode retrospective. Or a clip show. Or a super long version of the theme song to play us out at the end of the show.

Seeing as I had not realized this was the case prior to logging in, I'll have to consider that idea for tomorrow's post. Perhaps a flashback to better times in these murky waters, given the angst of late? Could be fun! Also, it seems that last year's crock posts were really really a lot longer. Is that good, bad, or ugly? Probably all of the above. Maybe they were more interesting?

The weekend winds to a close with me a bit tired and groggified, having channeled my angst of yesterday into an evening with a bit of debauchery and the booze that should flow to the lips of the young, and their livers of exceptional functionality, their kidneys that filter and process like the mind of Stephen Hawking - fast and well. West Virginia did win yesterday after all, which was a bit of fun. I saw the neighbors - whose exploits I've detailed in excruciating detail - return home looking maybe a bit dejected? But their arrival did confirm my theory that that dude does not actually care about sports all too much. They were strolling back in when there were less than 2 minutes left in the game and this guy's proclaimed team was within 7 points of making a comeback. Again, not that I care if he doesn't care. Not everyone has to love sports, but why fake it in your own home with your own wife and the door open? Anyway. Congrats West Virginia! Hope you have another one in you, at least.

As the sun set on the weekend (painfully as always) bringing a veil of depression in anticipation of a week where a desk and a distinct lack of natural sunlight will be the home of my activities and hours I found myself considering the Sunday night television line up. I kind of wish the Sound of Music had been on. I think it'll be on on Easter. Usually is. But man, it always seemed like that movie would be on, tempting me away from my homework on nights when I had a lot of it. Tonight I think I would have watched a bit, and tried to use the commercials to achieve the things I was supposed to have already taken care of. Julie Andrews was not around, but there's an amazing amount of pick-me-up television airing on Sundays. The Extreme Makeover Home Edition and the newer show Undercover Boss, which involves a company big wig working at the lower levels of the company, gaining a new respect for the work they do and, of course, helping recognize them for being great in a big, surprise-laden way.

I was watching a bit of tonight's episode which featured a CEO of many Christian-owned theme parks going to theme parks across the country and meeting hardworkin' folk who really cared about doing a good job and wanted him to do the same. There are even some extra touches, like we get to see a rich CEO staying in a fairly shabby motel with the bad art and bed comforters that fairly shabby motels are famous for. It was in one such hotel that this gentleman prepared himself a microwave dinner. I haven't seen enough episodes to know if that's standard practice among contestants, or if this guy was just enjoying a Hungry Man enchilada for the treat of it, but it really seemed sort of overly "common" of him. Like, was I supposed to take from that that everyone he works with who is not a CEO also eats microwave meals? Or is he roughing it because he has to? Was this meal a hardship. Was that the message.
Whatever the intent, I did find myself fairly engaged in the show and wanted to see the big reveal. But i ended up DVRing as I had a shower to take and a blog post to post. Somewhere in that first activity, I had the notion that it would be hilarious if they did a show called undercover boss that was actually bosses going undercover to see what their employees did. Because it would be different. The tips from insiders? There would be a lot more, "Usually the boss comes in late on Mondays, so I end up getting here around, I dunno, 9:30, 9:45? What I'm saying is, don't kill yourself getting here. So not worth it."

There'd probably be a fair bit of information given about co-workers too. "Her? Well, as long as you don't steal her pens, or use any of her office supplies without asking, you can stay on her good side. Oh, and she LOVES Jesus, so don't make any jokes about that either. And consider adding her to your SPAM list. Lady loves email forwards about kittens, prayers, and blonde jokes."

The undercover boss would get to play solitaire, minesweeper, tetris, sudoku. Look at facebook, myspace, youtube, and other sites. Write personal emails. Take personal calls. Make personal calls. Send e-cards to family. Send someecards to friends. Send emails to friends to discuss being annoyed by professional obligations. Send emails to discuss personal plans after finishing professional obligations. Check flight prices. Check celebrity news. Check mate - be beaten by the computer in a game of chess. Thumbs-up some facebook statuses. Comment on others. Look at pictures of friends, friends spouses, friends significant others, ex's significant others, everybody's babies, sonograms, or dogs and cats. The boss would be emailing others about how crappy a work task was. Looking for a reason to loiter in the hall. Text message a friend. Think about what's for lunch. Think about what's for dinner. Think about doing laundry. Think about getting back to that weekend sunshine.

The real undercover boss show? I almost think it'd be entertaining too. As entertaining? More? Hard to say. But It'd sure resonate with the hard-working American folk just waiting for their microwave meal and a reality show at the end of the day.

Most important thing about work ethic? Cut vents in the plastic covering or your microwave meal will EXPLODE.

Country Roads Take Me Home...To a Quiet One

2010-03-27T17:14:00.000-07:00

Today I woke up late after not being able to sleep because I was so fired up by my neighbors last night and I felt guilty. I felt bad about writing a rant about them, I felt bad that I’d been so affected by their actions but done nothing about it, and I felt bad that I was becoming even more Andy Rooney in my youth. I don’t want to be the angry, ranting cynic. I don’t want to actively wish ill upon others like, say, a meteor would crash through their apartment and silence them. I did not like it. Felt guilty.

And as I went out to enjoy the sunshine and people in the rest of the world were exceedingly friendly today for some reason, I again felt bad that I’d been stewing in negativity.Things are great.The sun is shining and warm on our skin.

AND THEN I CAME HOME. Argh. They must just have a different concept of both volume and what it means to live in a building with some common airspace. Guess whose favorite Portuguese music was back on, though at least at a reasonable level? Yep. I think they saw me shooting lasers from my eyes at them through their screen door as I let myself into my apartment. But this time, I did not care. And then it got worse. The husband (you remember, the good cop bad cop stripper) is apparently a last minute sports fan in the NCAA tournament. Our cable must not be on the same timing (mine is usually a little slow for some reason) so for a while I assumed he was watching a different game than I was, so seemingly random were his completely overzealous and very telling shouts of “Yeaaahhh BOOOY!” and “Aww YEAH!” and the like in comparison with what I was watching. It was very clear to me that this guy is not a diehard sports fan. He’s just not. He’s overcompensating. And ridiculous. And shouting things that don’t match the action on the t.v.
You know who is a sports fan? The guy who lives upstairs. The guy who wears sports affiliated clothing and hats every day. The guy who is a carpenter and has a UNION bumpersticker in his front window (of his apartment) and a cross on his door. The guy who asks me about the Steelers and USC every week during the fall because he knows I care. The guy, who I’m SURE is also watching these games, but is not screaming wildly to prove to his loud wife that he is such a fan. Nope. No. Not that guy.

How do I know that annoying neighbor was watching the same game I was? Because he said (of COURSE loudly enough for me to hear) “We’re going to beat those yokels!”

He’s referring to West Virginia, who is currently playing Kentucky. So yep. KENTUCKY is talking smack about West Virginia. Really, sir? Maybe you haven’t heard any jokes about KENTUCKY. Because they’re pretty much interchangeable punchlines in the stupid line of jokes you just went for. He also (thankya jesus!) left his apartment with his wife, whom he had to tell that the game was important, wearing a Kentucky jersey. Sheesh, ya’ll. I hate being bitter. But this is on my doorstep. And unless I move out or close my door and windows on the best day of spring thus far, it’s all up in my face. I now hope West Virginia beats the crap out of Kentucky. Then once they’re home and I know it, I’ll turn on “Country Roads” by John Denver and let it blare its way into their apartment. All yokel-like of me. Let's GOOOOOO mountaineers!

Also, that guy that lives upstairs? The real sports fan? I sure hope he doesn’t think I’m the jerk having parties and screaming! Because he might. And he gets up at 5 a.m. to go to his job. Which means he goes to bed early. Might not want to hear Portuguese music late night. I want to put a sign in my window that says “Hey neighbors, I try not to be a jerk when possible” just to clarify. Sheesh.

Also, as I was annoyed by the neighbors again, I was writing the blog post I was going to post tonight. I do get that I could wait and count this as my double day of catch-up, but I’m just going to go ahead and post it now, but consider myself off the hook. It’s a little pointless to wait maybe, since one rant is bleeding into another topic.

For days I’ve been supposed to list the answers to the lyric sources of my found poem. I actually went back to the found poem I wrote last year from song lyrics to see how much overlap there was. I used the exact same lyric twice, but I used several songs again (though different lyrics). It was interesting too to see that the last poem was much longer. It also somehow seemed more positive. Like last year’s seems to say “Live and let live” but this year’s is far more “Live and let die.” Based on all my ranting, not that surprising. I'm a negative nancy. A debbie downer. An ANGRY RENT PAYER!!!! And now, Andy Rooney.

The poem, their songs, and artists, appear below. Those with asterisks after the artist indicate song repeats. Those with asterisks directly after the lyric indicate that was used before.

You're too pretty in the daylight - The One Thing -INXS
I can't stand losing – I Can’t Stand Losing You - Police
I know I'm not wrong – I know I’m not Wrong – Fleetwood Mac

Grow flowers in the desert – In a Big Country – Big Country
Reflect the stars – Africa – Toto*
Holding hands – Everybody Wants to Rule the World – Tears for Fears*
Down the road* – Kyrie – Mister Mister
To the world – Message in a Bottle - Police

There's nothing you and I – I’ll Stop the World and Melt with You – Modern English*
Crystal Blue – Manic Monday – Bangles
Freedom without – Don’t Dream It’s Over – Crowded House
Change – Change – Tears for Fears
Chase you even – When Doves Cry – Prince*
Your sweet nature – Brand New Lover – Dead or Alive
Burning down – Burning down the house - Talking Heads

Think twice do – Billie Jean – Michael Jackson*
Like dolphins – Heroes - David Bowie
Like the deserts – Missing – Everything But the Girl
Like a lover's voice – In a Big Country – Big Country
Leave me standing*- When Doves Cry – Prince *

Lets' go – Let’s go - Cars

Here Comes That Old Feeling Again...

2010-03-26T23:49:00.000-07:00

My rage! It's a growing problem! Ah! Control Control Control.

I used to have a neighbor named Yoko. She was sometimes kinda loudish on the phone when her screen door was open. But I could tell it was when she was talking to someone far away. It was one of those situations where you compensate for distance and the hearing of others. It was ok. And rare.

Yoko moved away and some new kids on the block showed up. When I was in middle school, the New Kids on the Block were very popular. I thought they were terrible. I especially hated the song "Have a funky, funky Christmas." It's insulting to funk. And Christmas. Apparently not much has changed in the way of my opinions of new kids on the block.

I was really looking forward to a Friday of sloth, gluttony, a little laundry, maybe some reading. I had sloth, gluttony, and a little laundry, but all of this was done in the rising tide of my rage and angst as my neighbors (not Yoko, and not on the phone) had a continuing social gathering from about 6:30 p.m. to the present. It makes me feel old. It makes me feel like I hate fun. But I want them (still do, as I did all night), to shut the fuck up.

Now, I try not to use the F word in the writing as it's not real great, and I know several folks who might sometimes navigate the crockpot stew who don't love the F word or expect me to use it, so I really try not to stoop to filthy, but I really really really wanted them to shut the fuck up. Not the hell up, the fuck up. And maybe that was because they were talking about sex for a good, I'd say more than half of the evening. This laugh riot climaxed with the return of the husband to the apartment where he joined wine drinking already in progress and was greeted with "Oh good, the stripper is here! WOOOO!" His wife, who must have the vocal projection capacity of, oh, I dunno, I'm going to say Paul Revere or friggin' James Earl Jones on Broadway, and I do not think I'm exaggerating here, then asked him if he was the good cop or the bad cop. His reply?
"Man, I would love to know what you ladies have been talking about all night!"

It took everything in my power to not open my door (which I'd been forced to shut around 6 p.m. when she was playing Portugeuse music so loudly that a neighbor asked me if it was me playing it because my apartment is closer to the shared courtyard), and say "Hey, come on over bad cop, I can tell you every word, especially those of your wife! Apparently she thinks you make a normal amount of noise while having sex. I know this because she was SCREAMING ABOUT IT WITH FRIENDS." (If I were Sophia Petrillo, I would have done so).

Their door was, at the time of my hearing such information as if I were in a face-to-face conversation with her and not sitting on one side of a locked door and her on the other side of a half-open door. She even at one point admitted "she's always been loud, she just screams, that's what she does."

Yes. And how.

Why did I not go over there and say HEY! Can you shut the F up?

Well, I don't want them to know I'm old and uncool and want them to be respectful of the comfort boundaries and expectations I have for my home on a 9:30 on a Friday evening (which involve silence and the hum of the television and refrigerator, my two best buds). I don't want them to think I'm that jerky neighbor who always complains because - oh yeah, I already ratted her out once when they brought a barking dog to their apartment and then tried to leave...which led to that dog barking it's yippie little head off while running the length of our apartments' shared wall, stopping occasionally to scratch desperately at the wall for release. Guess whose apartment building does not allow dogs????
This one.
I like me a good dog. I do. Much more dog person than cat person. But not crappy barky yippie toy spoiled annoying dogs. Who hate being alone. After that one there was like a month where she really shot me eat-shit and -die looks. Now she only sometimes remembers to fake friendliness. It's nice though, I have a "You're so friendly, except what I mean is not at all" song that I sing when I see her.

I have to admit to myself that I think a third reason to avoid confrontation (a fourth - i dislike confrontation) might be that I knew that once I went over there and apologetically asked them to shut up (which I'm sure I would have done like, ohhhh could you do me the great kindness of possibly lowering your speech volume and that of your accompanying bass-heavy Portuguese music) they would talk about me, and I'd probably be able to hear it. Well, this happily un-fashion jean-clad, t-shirt from college-wearin', didn't shower recently, crumb-covered lady at home on a Friday is just fine with it. But somehow I could not endure the woman who daily annoys me with her telltale high heels on the concrete outside my window (I do not think she owns shoes that don't make noise) kvetching (Oh yes! Conversation 4 - you're on J-date? Can you find my sister a nice Jewish boy, she needs one too) with her girlfriends as they sipped on their fifth glasses of wine (this was the wine served at my wedding!) about how I'm a lonely, bitter, pathetic, often shabbily dressed and generally unkempt, unfriendly neighbor who probably doesn't even know what these graphic dirty web sites we're cackling about entail. What a loser (was that guy bald? was he a doctor? what's the problem???).

Just don't want the month of icy stares. Don't want to be the bad guy. Don't want to be the loser. Don't want to be the bad cop! Don't want to have to be fake friendly when what I really want to say is Shut the fuck up. You live in an apartment building, not a sorority house.
The shrieks, squeals, and sex talk pitches achieved tonight are all well within the range of standard sorority fare. Kappa Kappa I'llbe Damned'A if I want to live in a sorority house now. I am old. And a loser. And the bad cop. And the bad guy. And I want to spend my evenings without hearing about how you're a screamer by way of you screaming such information.

The best part? The husband came home and about 40 minutes later, began the sentence "See, guys think about sex like this..."

Oh good. More expertise.
Well, if I hear any screaming tonight, I'll know where it's coming from.
My response will still be, shut the fuck up.

I know I know

2010-03-26T00:51:00.000-07:00

I was supposed to reveal the song sources from yesterday. Yes, but amazing things have happened. I hung out with a rocket scientist and he was the SECOND MOST IMPRESSIVE scientist I hung out with this evening.

Maybe you've heard of him? BILL NYE THE SCIENCE GUY!!!

Turns out, that guy is awesome. Like no, not just as you remember him on the show, but because he was absolutely gracious and hilarious with his celebrity, and brutally honest. And completely into school spirit. Bill Nye the Science Guy received his science guy training, at least in part, at Cornell. Cornell's basketball team attempted to do the impossible (Butler!) and make it to the Elite 8 in modern times of the NCAA tourney. They would have had to have taken down Ashley Judd and the entire state of Kentucky, but by gum, they looked (at first) like they might do it. And they never gave up!

I just attended, as the guest of a Cornell alum, a Cornell game watching. It was downright inspirational. What did I say outloud? "I would give to Cornell's annual fund right now, this turnout is amazing."

Really, I did not know there were that many big, red people in L.A. There SURE ARE. And after they lost???? THEY CLAPPED. THEY WERE EXCITED FOR HOW FAR THEY HAD COME.
I mean, my goodness. They were enjoying the sport for the sake of sport and camaraderie. It was a beautiful thing.

And then Bill Nye the Science Guy walked past. And someone had nerve. And a camera. And he loved it.

Thank you NCAA tourney, you do NOT fail to impress. Cornell? For the love of Ivy....you are it.
GO BIG RED.

Next year, but still.

Great show.

Found Again

2010-03-24T20:59:00.000-07:00

Last year I did a found poem from song lyrics and I liked it, and instead of talk about what I ate for dinner and my incredible meat-lust (I dare say it was carnal), I've decided to try that again. This is also in lieu of an entry about how I formally apologize to anyone with whom I've been in debates over the correct lyrics to the song "Africa" by Toto (yes there were several people!). In recent listenings I have discovered yes, yes I have been wrong about such things. They say a lot of different wonderful things in there. It's a very good song. Also to my friend Kelly, "Brandy, You're a fine Girl" has grown on me. My apologies.

Anyway, here's the find. Tomorrow - where they came from!

You're too pretty in the daylight
I can't stand losing
I know I'm not wrong

Grow flowers in the desert
Reflect the stars
Holding hands
Down the road
To the world

There's nothing you and I
Crystal Blue
Freedom without
Change
Chase you even
Your sweet nature
Burning down

Think twice do
Like dolphins
Like the deserts
Like a lover's voice
Leave me standing

Lets' go

To this Koi Mistress

2010-03-23T22:04:00.000-07:00

I realized that I spend a good bit of time most evenings, or rare daytimes immediately before writing a new post, staring at the fish that now live atop the crockpot's page. Only today did I happen to become entranced enough to notice they sometimes look like they are fighting. One fish will charge across their electronic aquarium, or birds-eye e-pond view, and disrupt other fish from chatting with one another. It seems these fish, like most people, may not be immune from jealousy, or the paranoia of conspiracy, or perhaps worse - boorish, unthinking interruptions (I specialize in these myself). Are fish as susceptible to social pressure as the rest of us? Do they really take it hard as adults if they weren't the cool kid in school? I could see how it could make sense. Especially to fish.

I certainly sometimes wonder about how much things are nature's own cleverness, and evolutionarily influenced to our advantage, and how much they are the trappings of the nurture and any number of social constructs. Today I read an article discussing biological and evolutionary reasons for children of the same parents, raised in the same household, to hold politically opposing opinions or beliefs. There was some speculation about Oedipal conflict and rebellion and distinguishing oneself from siblings for evolutionary advantage, as near identicals - were they to be at a disadvantage somehow by a charecteristic (I think it was applying this thinking to politics if I read correctly!) would both die or be killed, whereas if the two offspring became diversified by their own accord, at least one would be likely to survive. That thinking makes sense to me, but it's really fascinating to consider applying such innate tendencies toward political views. The article did also go on to say brain chemistry matters in decision making, so no two brains would function 100% the same. But still. Fascinating. I think this was in Newsweek.

I feel like I may have brought up such issues in the crock previously, or maybe I've just thought about them before so I think I've written about them before, but stop me if you've heard this one - if shame is such a merciless emotion, does it serve an evolutionary advantage? I think it's only after years of talking to others about personal low points that I had the realization that my inability to either forget or lessen the effects of shame, even from my youngest moments and deepest memories, was not unique. Lots of people are horrified by what they've done or said, or how they've behaved, previously. Even when they were five years-old and so young that their actions could not possibly be prevented due to their young young age. But the feelings of shame from their five year-old selves are as raw and potent as they were then. Shame sticks. Even when it's something a rational person could say, forgive themselves for. Really? You peed your pants once, inappropriately? Yes. Many have. Join the club.
But why do you still recall that moment and cringe? Why is it so powerful?

I'm guessing the shame memory hardwiring taps into the part of us that understands acceptable cultural or group behavior. So if you do something that would be unacceptable to the pack that could say, lead to the pack abandoning you or worse, you keep the lesson stored deeply enough that it's at the survivalist level. Why are most of the most painful shame moments SO emotional though (like when you were caught saying something you shouldn't, rather than peeing when you shouldn't)? I'm guessing to modify behavior with ironclad certainty. I don't know. Also, I realize this is not a novel, groundbreaking take on the concept of shame, but it's interesting to think about in more depth, at least to me. Is that in there because, somewhere at some point along the line, we figured out we cannot do it alone?

I think so.
That, and to keep Friars in the business of roasting.

E-Fishency

2010-03-22T18:42:00.000-07:00

So I just looked at the calendar today and realized that this coming Sunday is Palm Sunday, meaning that Easter is a week after that. I found this to be particularly shocking for a number of reasons. 1. How is it almost April? 2. I'd better hurry up and think about pulling a double-post day if I'm going to be done with the Lenten crockpot on Easter, 3. Cookies! 4. Man, I don't even feel like I've been writing posts for that long this time. 5. Man, I sure have fallen off that church wagon I was trying to stay on for Lent. 6. Here comes Peter Cottontail, hopping down the bunny trail, hippity hoppity Easter's on its way...(that's from a record we had growing up, one stored close to the Disco Mickey Mouse record).

I would like to think that it has not seemed like that big of a deal to write every day for Lent this year because I was acclimated to the schedule last year, but I think there's a far greater likelihood that I have not been doing as good a job this year. It's been more of a task than a target for creativity without bounds. More blargh than blog. :(

I don't say that to go fish(crock)ing for compliments, but rather to phrase the apology of whoops, sorry I've been phoning it in a bit more this year. Or at least I feel like when I have written things , they've been more angry and direct and full of judgment (and the requisite run-on sentences). Last year, I don't know. Maybe I included more music? Maybe that kept me honest and optimistic? Maybe I'm a curmudgeonly bastard now (as I always have been, deep down), using the internet as a platform for ranting and jibber jabber (as most do)? I haven't even followed up on Prince challenging MJ and Paul to a game of his choosing. They've been left dangling in cyberspace! Terrible.

In order to combat this bad energy, poor form, I will offer up the following as the rallying cry to myself to get my head back where it belongs.
Am I hiding, somewhere behind those eyes? Let's find out. A week and change left to go. Let's see if I can change it up!

This never disappoints.

How Funky is Your Chicken?

2010-03-21T22:14:00.000-07:00

Maybe it was the addition of "Gap Band Radio" to my pandora.com station list. Maybe it is the preference the local old school station shows to the Gap Band due to personal relationships with Charlie Wilson of the Gap Band? Maybe it's that it was recently Sly of Sly and the Family Stone's birthday and suddenly it was my "family affair." Or maybe it really hit me when I downloaded "Stomp" by the Brothers Johnson and realized it was an instant mood-improver and boogie-maker that my life had been missing.

Whatever it is, I recently have begun to think I may have been inappropriately born after the age of disco roller skating venue popularity. I realize that a lot of coordination would be needed - both physical coordination and coordination of outfits - for me to have been successful in that scene, but man. I kind of love a healthy dose of disco and funk. This is also true of the Disco Mickey Mouse album, a fabulous spoof homage of the biggest hits of the disco era. "Macho Duck" - hit. "Watch out for Goofy" - classic. "Welcome to Rio" - don't even get me started unless there is enough room for my limbs to flail. I mean it.
Ooh, a sample exists!

When I was young enough to be going to basketball games when my brothers were still playing at the less than j.v. level, I remember being enchanted by the cheerleaders and their synchronization. An especially memorable cheer also somehow fits into this other life I could time travel to enjoy. It was a call and response cheer between 2 halves of the cheer squad.

How funky is your chicken?
How funky is your chicken?
How loose is your goose?
How loose is your goose?
So come on everybody, and shake the ole' caboose.

How funky is your chicken?
How funky is your chicken?
How loose is your goose?
My goose is TOTALLY loose.
So come on everybody
COME ON everybody!
And shake the ole' caboose, WOO!!!

There was a lot of jive, as it were, in that cheer. Done by the all-white cheerleaders at the small Catholic grade school. I loved it.
My goose IS totally loose. That's probably why it resonated with me so significantly. That and my extremely shaky caboose.

Nanzty Boys

2010-03-21T01:18:00.000-07:00

Well folks, it is indeed a miracle I'm writing at all as I've been involved in some concentrated game watching beer drinking chip eating efforts since about 4:30 p.m. today, but I'm making it! I thought today might be the day I made it to two posts, but not so, not so.

I started to write this earlier, then failed.
Basically, while watching Murray State and Butler, prior to Northern Iowa and Kansas, I saw a commercial featuring Jim Nantz reprimanding a dude in a lingerie store with his girlfriend. The premise of the ad, similar to Bette White eating a Snickers and being less than friendly about it, was that Jim Nantz, the Guy Smiley of college sports broadcasting (really, his favorite phrase is "Oh my!" was berating a dude for letting his girlfriend force him to go bra shopping instead of watching basketball during March Madness. Now, as I spent the day in the company of more women than men interested in March Madness, I take issue with this ad as it contributes to the lore that March Madness is a male phenomenon. That, my friends, is bunk.
Also, if you're dating someone who wants you to shop during something you love, you're dating a bitch. So consider that.
Or consider, as Jim Nantz suggests, that you have no spine, and need to say you'd rather watch basketball. That said, and FOR REAL YO', seriously? Are there tons of men dating women who hate sports who love their men? Am I the only one who does not know these women? Even the women I know who care nothing about sports aren't terrible people who'd love to deprive men of sports watching if given the chance. Like, yeah, I get it, mean Jim Nantz is funny. But guess what?

WOMEN ENJOY MARCH MADNESS.
WOMEN LIKE SPORTS.
HETEROSEXUAL WOMEN ENJOY WATCHING SPORTS, SPECIFICALLY MARCH MADNESS.
NOT EVERY WOMAN WANTS A MAN TO GO BRA SHOPPING INSTEAD OF GAME-WATCHING DURING THE BEST TIME OF YEAR FOR SPORTS FUN.

your.
ads.
are.
sexist.

I.
Love.
March.
Madness.

Please reconcile these, American media. I'm not the only woman who gives a crap in America. I'm one of many.

All that said - Wake, good job guys. Love you.

I'm Lovin' It

2010-03-19T22:24:00.000-07:00

So, I think last year we reached the point of the Lent blog where I spouted on about my love of March Madness and how it's such a pure sporting endeavor and a chance for actual merit to shine through in do-or-die situations and you get to see fairly young kids be kids and cry in joy and in disappointment in pretty rapid fashion, no? And that maybe I spent days reiterating how it's soooo great and compelling and engrossing and I love it and it improves my work day, and possibly my work performance, because I'm so jazzed and alert? Well, after Wake's win last night, I woke up today walking on sunshine. It was like waking up and remembering, yeah. That DID happen. That was awesome. Still is. All day today I had a little Wake beneath my wings.

Today I enjoyed the refreshing (literally re-newing their accuracy, not refreshing like ice cold Coca-Cola) banner headlines of game scores all day at work. Cornell? Cornell? Are you kidding me? Cornell???

THAT is fantastic. Go Big Red. If not now, when? And it is within this spirit that I look forward to tomorrow's Wake vs. Kentucky matchup with something that's not quite optimism, but something similar. There's something a little bit extra - like a faith in magical realism as being possible. A pre-emptive suspension of disbelief? I pass this on through good vibrations to the Demon Deacons who are, I'm sure, nestled all snug in their beds, while visions of Cinderella teams dance in their heads.

Things I don't like - the tainting of the tournament by crappy refs' crappy calls. I only saw the last 1:03 of the Robert Morris vs. Nova game, but apparently they'd been jobbed resolutely in the time leading up to that final minute. And today, as I watched New Mexico State battle Michigan State and a very cheap, nearly never called unless it's blatant like a fourth-grader does in pee-wee leagues in a bout of over-excitement infraction was called - lane violation on a CRUCIAL foul shot, I thought MAN. Not you NCAA. Don't make me question this whole thing.
Don't cheat for the franchise teams. Not good. Not cool. Not right!

Anyway. March Madness, to reiterate, when done fairly, is awesome. It makes me giddy.

And back to today's title - I'm Lovin' It.

McDonald's, not to call bullshit here, but whaaaa? There are several billboards in the Los Angeles area near McDonalds locations that advertise mini meals. I think they're $2.99. But the meal pictured is a drink, a bag of fries, and a double cheeseburger. How is that mini? That's more than a happy meal! And it's 2 patties 2 cheese slices, right? So, all that's missing is some special sauce, lettuce, and sesame seeds in the requirements to comprise a Big Mac. How is that mini? It's not! And I am all for American's taking some inventory of themselves before eating McDonalds all the time. I don't think you should go away entirely as I need your goods and services when I am hungover, traveling, in need of coffee, really craving a cheeseburger with the chopped onions and pickle combo, or like, in need of a salt lick that would come from your french fries or any other product available. Ahhh the breakfast sandwiches too. Good. I don't think you should bear all the blame for our obesity. I get it. We're eating your stuff. That's us.
But "mini?" Don't you think that's taking a few liberties with the whole power of words? That's a bit like calling a Suburban a Mini (like a Mini Cooper) just because it's not a Hummer. A stretch Mickey D's.

Another stretch that I actually would like to see the ad agency brainstorming notes to learn the answer - there's a commercial that airs during the basketball coverage that shows a woman knowing the value of a dollar throughout her lifetime. She starts tiny - buying a fish for a dollar. Then she's a hot teen - she buys sunglasses for a dollar. Then she's a savvy moneysaver who also enjoys food - she's buying things on the McDonald's dollar menu. That's a value. But I swear that there's a shot of the Filet O' Fish. Maybe not? But I think there is. Which made me think - wait, is your pet fish in that sandwich you just ate? Because at the end of the commercial she leaves McDonald's totally content with her valuable meal selection, and puts on those bargain shades in the sun. But my question was - wait, where's the fish? Then I thought...oh. Filet O'ed.

Is it a filet o' fish? If so, do they use a fish as the 1st purchase on purpose to get you thinking about the filet o' fish?
Is the ad campaign in your brain?

Well, before I'm accused of being a McDonald's conspiracy theorist, let me share some great seasonal story time with you. This actually got me!

Bah da da da dahhhh I'm Lovin' It

Wake!

2010-03-18T23:35:00.000-07:00

Forest! Wake! Forest! Wake! Forest!

So Wake Forest, a team that has been in the doldrums of confidence and performance in recent weeks, won their opening round game against Texas. Why this is amazing, in a day full of some of the most stunning tournament upsets in recent memory? Prior to time expiring, you didn't really get the sense that Wake believed in themselves even. This was not a team of destiny, it was a team of fate. And totally accepting of that fate, good or bad. But in the last moments of overtime after several opportunities to salt away the game were squandered, a miracle shot went in. Prior to that? My quote? "We are going to lose. We've quit playing. We'd need a miracle." And we got one from Ish Smith. A shot that fell when it mattered. Unlike the poor Texas guy who bricked not one but two free throws when he could not afford to. The shot fell! The confidence boost came! Elation! Wake was on the right side of a buzzer-beater for once.

Wake and UT were an 8/9 matchup, meaning really it should have been anyone's game. The underdoggedness was not what it was for some truly victorious underdogs - Murray State, Old Dominion, Northern Iowa, Saint Mary's...these were some maybes, but never, ever were they counted as sure things. In any other tourney, one of them winning today might be the focus of the "cinderella story?" super interest story. One might see a giant spike in admissions applications and merchandise sales. One might get to be at the top of the Sportscenter hour. But as it is, it was a day of upsets. And I think the biggest upset for me was not being upset!
Wake won! Believed in themselves when I'd quit!
My apologies, Wake Forest. Thine is a noble name. Constant and true.
Though my fandom is constant and true, my faith was not. I apologize.
And on Saturday, let's do it! Go Deacs!

The March Milestones that make the Road that Rises to Meet You

2010-03-17T22:46:00.000-07:00

Lent, the NCAA tournament, St. Patrick's Day, Girl Scout Cookies, with a dash of Fat Tuesday and Easter and baseball and the time change around the edges. I'd say Lent and March comprise some of the most expectant days of the calendar year. There's somehow, in the space far enough away from the holidays and MLK day, and just after Punxsutawney Phil announces six more weeks of winter and Mardi Gras pronounces the end of fun, a glut of time spent in the expectation of big things to come. And good things at that.

More sunlight. Warmer weather. Daffodils that have survived snow and frost. Easter that will release the penitent from their bonds of self-denial and back into the sticky embrace of chocolate or cookies or booze or caffeine or Facebook (though I've noted far fewer people giving up Facebook for Lent this year than last)! And a basketball tournament that will break the monotony of work life and the post-football world and allow for a spiral of excitement and elimination that tornadoes its way to crowning a new champion of college basketball. To my personal sense of the calendar year, St. Patrick's day is a very important respite from the life of un-fun or waiting. It's a little reprieve from our better behaviors and a one-stop shop for fun and excess. An allowance of our more basic instincts - drunkenness and singing, irresponsible weekday behavior, green, green and more green.

I spoke with my brother and sister-in-law by phone this evening after they'd enjoyed the thrills of a bar on the east coast. Somehow my brother and I fell to discussing the general lack of fervent participation - regardless of fashion sensibility - of the majority of people on the streets today in the wearin' of the green. My brother was, to my great joy, outraged and appalled by people's failure to wear green. I explained I wore green on green on green, looking totally even more fashion-inept than I usually do, because that is what one does.
"Oh, I did too!" was his reply.

Yes. Yes. Because that is what one does! It's St. Patrick's Day! When else will you wear all green? Come on! Participate!

It was a moment of shared point of view stemming, no doubt, from our childhood in a home that featured some family fun hoopla for St. Patrick's day - lots of green was worn, parades were attended, songs were sung, cabbage was boiled, beef was corned, green bagels were eaten and the subsequent unexpected side effects of green food coloring were discussed. The shared point of view also came from our childhoods occurring in Pittsburgh, a city that cares about St. Patrick's day a good bit. Sure, some of that is from the many Irish immigrant families in the area, but more so, I'd say it's from the city's need for a break in the long winter's dreariness. A break made of whiskey and soda bread. Lent and winter and cold and March and the bleak black and gray of wardrobes used to being dragged on bedraggled bodies through slush and ice and snow to the safe warmth of office spaces only to be forced out again into the dark cold of night, and back home again to the welcoming glow of Jeopardy! after a dinner that was used as much to warm the bones as to feed them. Winter can take its time, especially in March. But not when everyone is smiling drunk and wearing enough mismatching green to confuse a chameleon.

Sure, it was about 80 degrees here today. Or more. Yes, more. The "bleak winter" is not so much a fact here as it was in Pittsburgh, but the March drag is still a reality. St. Patrick's day injects the newness of youth, even if only in excess, back into the month, with staggering ever, and ever staggering, sweet sweet green.

Frazzamatazz!

2010-03-16T23:25:00.000-07:00

Kids, the discontent continues. Perhaps the ides of March? Or actual madness for March madness?

Also, for anyone who happened to read my cougar rant about March Cougar Madness a few days back, please note that a magazine, I think Esquire?, is also having the hottest women bracketology contest for readers too.

I don't know why this frustrates me so. I guess because I do not appropriate tournament brackets to heterosexual males as much as it would appear mass media does. Really, many of the most rabid March madness lovers I know are women. Many of the most degenerate casual gamblers I know are men, but I still don't equate NCAA brackets with men, or men of a certain degree of gambling addiction. I consider filling out brackets a tradition that is a wonderful take all comers equalizer that opens the joy of NCAA basketball to all. So glorious, in fact, that it makes me ask - can you imagine if there were an equivalent NCAA football bowl situation?!?! Crazy even to ponder.

Once the games begin on Thursday there's quite a good chance that the crockpot will turn, as it did during the Olympics, to matters of buzzer beaters, surprise upsets, tournament favorites, and other things Jay Bilas might say on television. Just a warning.

Today had all the makings of a hybrid of two of the best books of my childhood - Wacky Wednesday and Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No-Good, Very Bad Day. The reasons are not important, and many reside within my own little brain crockpot, but I think I should have known to just turn around and go home when I heard some hilarious soundbites on NPR during my drive to work.

The first was a British gentleman explaining to Renee Montagne (Montane? Montaine? Montaigne? MawnTayun? Anyway...) who David Beckham was. "You have to understand, Renee, he's somewhat of a national hero here."
It was sooo hilariously matter-of-fact and understated. So British. Such a British reaction to Renee's question - which was absurd and somehow flippant enough to be condescending and also so very stereotypically NPR in its reflecting the total lack of grasp of David Beckham's influence on soccer as a sport globally, and particularly, in England. Oh, and let's not forget America. He was basically sent to colonize America for the kingdom of soccer. Look at that - total fragment. And another describing the fragment. And another right there (and here!). Anyway, Renee was asking a sports reporter being called upon to represent the expert opinion of sports in England whether, at 34 going on 35, Beckham wasn't getting a little long in the tooth to be running around playing soccer? The implication was something akin to, "I mean, yeah, he had a pretty devastating injury, but shouldn't people lower expectations? I mean, he's been playing for what, more than ten years? Can't this guy just admit he's getting old?"

Really, like I cannot imagine that being asked on an American sports show without the "sports expert" responding with yells. Phones would ring off the hooks. Email inboxes would flood. What?!?! It's DAVID FREAKIN' BECKHAM. Kind of a big deal to the sport of soccer. I can't even imagine Renee asking that to the guys on Click and Clack and not getting laughed off the air. It's David Freakin' Beckham!

Anyway, I was still pondering that when another story aired involving the record breaking sale of Michael Jackson music rights (record breaking in two ways! Crazy! and booo....bad one). The interviewer was asking another British expert - this time a music rights guy - if MJ would become the new Elvis in his posthumous popularity and sales. After a rather lengthy comparison and explanation that actually made a lot of sense, he capped his interview by saying, "The time is right for a new dead artist."

I mean, grace in soundbites of a high degree. If he waits, oh whaddya think Renee, another 10 minutes? maybe he can get old man Becks. He's sure to kick soon.
Actually....that's kinda the thing....
He can't kick.

Nina Totenberg, take me away!

Turn and Face the Strain

2010-03-15T20:40:00.000-07:00

Apparently my biorhythm or internal clock or turkey popper has a very sensitive time frame for proper function. Even the one hour time change has rendered me useless. Yesterday I gave over to the sloth, but today I am really out of it, which I find to be especially annoying given that there's much fun sunlight to go out an enjoy!
Not me! I had to come home and immediately take a nap, and even then I woke up groggy and freezing cold. It's like 80 degrees today and I'm huddling with soup in front of my space heater.

Many might wonder if this slowed function results more from completely disrupting my sleep pattern by way of staying up half the night on Saturday to have wild n' crazy fun with the younger kids whose bodies handle such events on a regular basis than from daylight savings. Here I am two days later, limping to the finish line of the day and then plunging for the couch like it's the crash cart ready to take me to the locker room after returning a kick off for a touchdown and pulling something in the end zone.

Gatorade. Cortisone? I've been shooting myself up with English muffins.
Nooks and crannies. That makes them very restorative. I think the Thomases lived down the English lane from the Pine Brothers, actually. Should be no time before I'm feeling 100% refreshed and reinvigorated.

Speaking of the British and devastating reduction in function, how about David Beckham tearing an Achilles heel. YEOW that must be painful. And yikes he may have to rely more on his cologne/underwear/fashion/eyeglasses/sunglasses modeling than soccer to pay the bills.

Hm, I somehow feel like I've managed to qualify myself as being in the realm of superior athletes when, in all honesty, what I'm saying is I'm apparently too old to go out and have wild fun and not feel the after effects for days. And days.

Yikes! Going to have to work on finding the equivalent of modeling to fall back on to figure out how to overcome this!

Man, I do not feel like I am making sense.

Sun-day Sun-day Sun-day!

2010-03-14T21:42:00.000-07:00

Today's the Sunday that we make a sleep sacrifice to gain sunlight. The reversal and reprieve of the loss of sunlight Sunday, where suddenly the weekend's end approaches even faster. And before long - bam! - hibernation sets in.

Today marks the official repeal of the hibernation lifestyle! Great news. But in the immediate - as with any time change, I'm out of it! Disoriented! And hibernating harder than ever!

I've taken advantage of the day's sloth by enjoying such delights as English muffins and a t.v. airing of the movie Knocked Up, which I had never seen before. If anything, that movie confirmed my feelings that I'm definitely a Paul Rudd fan and not so sure I'm into Seth Rogen as much as everyone else. I also enjoyed an episode of Law & Order featuring the dream team! A young Jack McCoy working with Jill Hennessey's Claire and for Adam Schiff. Brisco and Lenny. They're all there!

Hm, I just checked the spelling on Jill Hennessey's name and in so doing learned that apparently my sloth and hibernation was spent in the company of many a Canadian! Jill Hennessey, like Seth Rogen, is from our neighbor to the north. O Canada! Thanks for the olympics. And for a believable assistant district attorney. And a guy who reaaaalllly likes the weed jokes.

Anyway, I'll see all of you tomorrow in the vitamin D rich environment of newsun times!

Scattered & Hopin' for Beer-battered

2010-03-13T18:03:00.000-08:00

Well crocker fans, I'm sorry to report that I feel my shoulders have been living up around my ears lately, as I somehow have remained wound pretty tight this week, even into the weekend. Though I've accomplished much today, I still think I was generally impatient while doing so. That, plus the fact that the tasks involved were less than my favorite, made me a face full of furrow! Dunno. It will stick that way, I know. Just ask the botox folks. My scowl will damage my brow. So it goes.

I guess I'm being full disclosure honest here in saying writing this, my shoulders are still hunched. This is as to-do list item today. Yes, it is good for me, but it's kind of feeling like flossing right now. I'd much rather just do a shoddy job brushing my teeth and get into bed. Which I almost can!

I managed to do six loads of laundry, including washing my sheets (ALERT- world's most boring blog post! But hey! Every day means every day unless there's a happy hour to go to!). I hate making a bed. Hate it. Much prefer scrubbing a bathroom sink to making a bed. Maybe because I'm not great at it? And impatient? And want Martha Stewart results with Marty McFly effort (maybe he rolled out of bed late for school? maybe I just like Back to the Future?)? Well, my comforter is on drying cycle number two right now, and once that's out, I can end my hm...four hour extended effort in laundry - including having to go to the store to get more quarters! What a great excuse to buy an US Weekly.

That's the US Weekly pictures I'd like to see in the "celebrities are just like us" section.

Charlize Theron is one quarter short of the four she needs for her last load to dry and is wondering if a European coin wedged in her junk drawer for ages will jam the machine or trick it into functioning! Just like us!

Jake Gyllenhaal just dropped his clean favorite shirt and several pairs of underwear in the seemingly permanent, overflow soapy, dirty water puddle in his apartment building's laundry room. Looks like an F bomb is flying out of the pretty mouth of THAT brokeback star! He CAN quit laundry duty!

Eva Longoria Parker's laundry day ugly non-functioning waistband pants fall down while she walks through the courtyard of her building while carrying an arm full of partially wet-from-the-one-crappy-dryer clothes revealing a bit of her laundry day, hole-ridden underwear to neighbors! Hanes NOT her way!

Just like us.

The clock informs me my comforter should be at least more partially dry! Gotta go put laundry day to bed!

Whatta Maroon

2010-03-12T22:41:00.000-08:00

Bugs Bunny used to use the phrase "What a maroon" often to describe morons. Bugs Bunny is a pretty funny guy. Today, I felt like a maroon on many occasions. The F in TGIF was really big today, and very pronounced. I somehow had no energy, too much nervous energy, too much silence, and I kept putting my foot in my mouth and stepping in it. And then putting my foot back in my mouth. Then falling on my ass because my feet were in my mouth.

This week has gone ahead and beaten me down, but in more of a mind game sort of way. Like, I didn't anticipate it's moves, but this week really made me fight to get out of check mate quite a few times. And in my evasion, I only built the pathways to my own downfall. Poetic work out there, week. You've won. My crown touches wood in defeat.

The topper for me came at the hands of what I must assume to be middle school girls, perhaps the cruelest and most vicious creatures on God's earth aside from wolverines (they hunt for sport) and actual sociopaths (not good).

I went swimming this evening at a local community pool. The adult practice is preceded by a middle school practice. The transition in the locker room between the two practices involves a lot of the word "like," a lot of shrieking (ungodly, unnecessary shrieking), and a lot of catty, petty, ridiculous, but obviously important, extracurricular social assessment. Even though I'm sure I must have been that horrid, I honestly do not remember being that horrid. And having no concept of my body, voice, or space in social constructs governing human interaction. Sure! Walk right in front of me! Sure, flail your arms while talking about what Tyler said in math class while blocking the only exit. Why not take a twenty minute shower with your friends where you're not even naked and are very much only getting your hair wetter than it already was in the pool. I mean, ten people are waiting, but hey! Go for it. You've got a lot of surmising to do. There IS a dance coming up.

Perhaps such lack of sympathy has caught up with me in the karmic sense. I arrived at the pool in a frenzy of excess energy - thrilled to be released from the defeat the week had just handed me, and pumped up by Air Supply, whose cd had allowed me to breathe again, spiritually at least. I had to hurry. I was wearing a bulky sweater. My shoes could be classified as "brogans." This stuff was not all going to fit in my bag. I opted to use one of the four rows of lockers of varying sizes to store my clothing, and just take my bag and swim crap with me to the poolside.
Super.

Well, my goggles broke and I was a discombobulated mess all practice long, which - whatever, there are worse fates. Like returning to the locker room to find the locker where you left your clothes EMPTY. (Yes, I had used a locker without a lock. I'm a fool).

I was glad I had packed the bigger towel. Especially since it appeared I was going to be driving home toga style. I enlisted the help of friends in my frenzy - "I think someone stole my stuff. Like, my pants, my shirt, my sweater, my shoes, my underwear...my clothes." While this was a hilarious notion, we all could agree on that, I was still furious at the prospect. These were crappy clothes. I kept rechecking a 3 locker radius of the one in which I'd left my stuff. Livid. Who does that??? I was certain it was middle school.

Then, one of the friends who was busy opening every locker on the row asked, "Are these your clothes?"
Sweet relief. There was my stuff, balled in a pile.
However, relief was soon replaced with fury. At least the theft option appealed to my sense of the possibilities that someone either needed clothing badly, was a kleptomaniac, or thought the clothes could fulfill a need somehow. When I realized the clothes had just been moved to trick me into thinking my clothes had been stolen and incite my panic, I became even more pissed off. Who DOES that?!! Who plays nasty tricks for the sake of being cruel?
Middle school girls.
Yes.
Middle school girls.

I was so mad. I wanted revenge. I came up with the idea of leaving a turd in clothing that was just decoy clothing for them to move. Jokes on you! That's a turd you've got now, not just my underoos!

Is that akin to middle school prankness? Yes. Does it seem horrendous? Yes. I was appalled at the thought myself. But somehow, after a roller coaster week of a sort, I wanted it to happen. Just so I could say, "Doesn't doing mean shit for no reason infuriate you on a human and intellectual level???"
But I don't think middle school girls work that way. And I hope I don't.

Oh well. TGIF at last.

Cougar Pause

2010-03-11T21:51:00.000-08:00

A quick note of actual personal opinion. I was driving home today, wondering about the extent of the damages in the opening rounds of NCAA basketball conference championships today, pondering the immediate and abysmal loss by Wake Forest, when I heard the local radio station advertising a March "Cougar Madness" tournament. Women can send in pictures of themselves being couga-riffic and be entered in the bracketology of cougars. Should they advance to the final round and win (based on picture only), they also win a new car. When they did one of these contests before for guys, you know what was "madness?" Mustaches. The male equivalent of this was mustache growing. Which, to my knowledge, does not carry one specific set of stereotyped associations with it. Depends on the type of 'stache. Cougars? Not so. That's very specific.

Now, the cougar phenomenon is a fairly recent one by popular culture standards, with it taking, I'd say, what, three to four years for the use of the term cougar to describe older women hunting younger men to become so universally understood that it could become the name and premise of a popular television show on a major network? My issue with it is hm...how do I say... its popular use in culture as a term that is not inherently offensive, stereotypical, and indicative of still entrenched gender/power/sexuality/money stereotyping and perceptions. Guess what laaaadies? Cougar is pretty insulting! Um, a premise and notion fully embraced and exploited by the SNL skit "The Cougar Den."

Here's what 93.1 Jack FM's website gave as a definition of a cougar, thanks to Urban Dictionary:

Cougar-Coo-garr- Noun. A 35+ year old female who is on the “hunt” for a much younger, energetic, willing-to-do-anything male. The cougar can frequently be seen in a padded bra, cleavage exposed, propped up against a swanky bar in South Bay (or other cities)waiting, watching, calculating; gearing up to sink her claws into an innocent young and strapping buck who happens to cross her path. “Man is cougar’s number one prey”

First of all - 35!?!!!?!!!! Wowsers! This entry MUST have been written by a 17 year old because, folks! 35 is not. that. old. Secondly, note that the description of the woman is inherently insulting in its insinuation that women in question are both lying in wait to attack (physically and violently - with their sexual desire) young men, and are desperately exploiting their bodies' sexuality to do so. Please note that this is not an endearing term! It makes women animals. And desperate hags. In one fell swoop! Women who OBVIOUSLY are too old to have sexual desire that's valid directed toward younger men are DESPERATELY waiting and slinking across bars and clubs trying to ATTACK men. This is not a positive view of women! Anyone?

Aside - Appropriate uses of "cougar"
1. Distinguish the awesomeness of John Mellencamp in relation to other people from Indiana named John. He rocks harder. Long after the thrill of livin' is gone.
2. To name a fine member of the Mercury family of automobiles. I remember these from my childhood. The Cougars and the Sables. (BOTH ANIMALS). Sleek, sophisticated, and a lot of burgundy interiors.

The presumption of the term cougar is NOT that women can date, bed, attract, marry younger men and do it with finesse, ease, and the same careless abandon as some men who prefer younger women. Those men, by the way, are called "heroes," and "good catches," and "yacht owners." But does anyone say, oh they are some desperate old men getting hair plugs and fake tans and wearing really tight graphic tee shirts to try to bang unsuspecting much younger women who won't see them coming? No. The implication in most cases THERE is also that the young women are either stupid or golddiggers who are fine with the age and beauty imbalance because they enjoy the financial perks of their older, caretaking bang partners. Does anyone ever say hey, those young men are golddiggers, gettin' with cougars like that? No, not to my knowledge. More like, ohhhh he got CLAWED by that cougar. And God forbid a younger man might actually be ATTRACTED to an older woman!!!! WHAT?!?! Impossible! The inherent presumption is that an older woman could only attract and retain a younger man by sexuality tricks and essentially, entrapment. Like bears get entrapped. Yep. Hunting snares and attacks on younger, unsuspecting men who get fooled by their cleavage into thinking they're of a socially acceptable age.

Old dude bags a young chick - hero, and she was looking for that guy anyway.
Old lady bags a young dude - she's so desperate, he must have mommy issues, I bet she's paying his college tuition and trying to recover from a divorce because her husband left her for the aupair in her twenties.

I found the use/misuse/casual embrace of this, to my thinking, insulting term for women by the Jack FM web site to be particularly telling. They have their own list of members of the cougar hall of fame. Yes, Demi Moore is on there, and Madonna too. They like 'em young. But then Marisa Tomei is on there apparently for being hot and over the age of 35. So it's not because she's an attractive woman who is over the age of 30 that you like her, it's because she's still sexual in any way over the age of 30, which must be an anomaly in the larger scope of the female population? Great. The most hilarious to me? Catherine Zeta F-ing Jones! Folks, she is MARRIED TO A DUDE WHO IS WAY OLDER! If anything, Michael Douglas is the cougar! She's just a very attractive woman over the age of 30! Her husband is not called desperate hunter of an unsuspecting, willing to do anything younger woman. He's called a very lucky man. A hero even. Because wow. Hasn't he achieved in finding someone THAT hot?
Yes.

I tried to watch the show Cougar Town because it's creator gave us Scrubs, a show full of quirky fun that I love and enjoy in all its syndicated glory, and even in its new iteration, Scrubs the Med School years (which I compare to A Different World from Cosby, which brings us back to Marisa Tomei), as the characters frequently say what they're thinking, even if it's not quite appropriate. Cougar Town - I couldn't get through it! Courtney Cox's character was caught early in the morning by another neighbor (formerly the powerhouse power-bitch on Scrubs - an entitled rich bitch who used and abused men and owned it without any neuroses about if she should, could, or had the right to - a great character written for her by her husband...Bill Lawrence who also created Cougar Town) while outside too early in the morning to be awake, so the neighbor knew she had to have been getting busy with that young hottie she bagged, but also inquired about her makeup being so perfect so early. Cox's character described waking up super early so she could put on full makeup so that the young guy would never know that she looked like hell, and old hell at that, early in the morning. Totally hysterical LAAADY time in commiserating on the need to perform TRICKS to ensure physical attractiveness to maintain sexual success with younger men. And obsession with appearance, and neurotic mania, and just a great, wonderful, shrill conception of women as they age.

Didn't Oil of Olay used to say grow old gracefully as their ad campaign? Sure, they were advertising avoiding wrinkles, but at least they were advocating the reality of aging. And grace. The term cougar removes all the grace from women and replaces intelligence with desperation, lust, over-the-top sexuality and cunning to target that which would be unattainable without these - sexual interest from any man not as senior as his lover.

A depressing outlook!
I take pause with these paws.

The Penalty Lap!

2010-03-10T20:59:00.001-08:00

Hey guys! Did you notice I missed yesterday's post? I say that to the larger world of unlikely stoic readership, but realize that for many - nahhh, it was no big deal. It was for me though, as it constitutes a break in the Lent pact, but one for which I'm willing to take the heat. I will either have to have a day with two posts to make up for this OUTRAGE, or I'll have to go a day longer. Somewhere the penalty lap will be calculated. Much like the winter olympic biathlon - no target can be missed without penalty.

Really, I already believe I've written an aside about my love of the biathlon somewhere in days past, but here I go again. Combining guns and skiing! Amazing! And it involves a penalty lap system and, for my money, most closely resembles a drinking game in its machinations. If you miss a target (after skiing to it with your RIFLE on your back), you have to take a penalty lap. So the sport involves endurance strategy, precision marksmanship from a variety of positions, and sprint skiing, depending on one's aim. What a sport! And I generally hate guns!

Much like those athletes, please know I am aware that at some point, I have to take a lap before moving forward. Publicly acknowledged and intention to pursue action declared.

Why did I fail (totes epic fail callback!), you ask? Drinking on a Tuesday! Behaving like it was Friday! Woo!

At the beginning of the week, my coworkers and I found little cards advertising our employer's mental health services that posed the question, in bold no less, What does it mean to be mentally healthy?

Great question. And the answer? Well that was provided with a checklist that included actual check marks as bullet points (which I apologize for being unable to simulate here).

"Mentally healthy people...

Feel good about themselves
Feel comfortable with and relate well to others
Meet the demands of life with relative success"

Upon reflection, I realized WHOA! I sure don't think I'm checkin' those check boxes in pen. And pencil seems like way too much commitment. Um, could you be more specific about "demands" and "relative"? And when you say "good" does that mean like, absence of flu-like symptoms? Or do you mean able to make it a week at work without having to give oneself a pep talk about not crying at one's desk? Or like, being able to look down when in the shower without giving oneself a pep talk? And when you say "relate" does that mean like, by blood? General success at sharing genetic material with "others"? Because, yep! Yep, I feel comfortable that I do do that. And I would even say I do it well. Being related to other people actually contributes greatly to my "relative success." It's awesome! I'm so related. I've got like, four first cousins and then a bunch of other folks stray down the DNA. Also if "others" involves imaginary conversations I have with either real people I see in the real world, or characters in my imagination, or say, the Microsoft Office helper dog I've named Bobbydog who spends a great deal of time on my desktop (he reads books! he's hilarious!), then yessss. Yes, I relate the hell out of others. All the time.

But with a little more thought and some discussion in my immediate cubicle zone, we determined no, that's probably not what they meant. So when the opportunity to go to an inter-collegiate alumni group event became available to me, I decided to challenge my mental health and go, knowing my preference for my couch and television would really not lead me to more actual "relative success" than it already had. And THAT, is how I ended up drinking drinks on a Tuesday. At cut rate prices. And I even interacted with others! Due in no small part to the drinks! And name tags! Wonder of wonders! I might need to sharpen a pencil to get ready to make a mark next to bullet point two there. Baby steps.

When I got home from this adventure, I decided to make myself a delicious, post-midnight omelet, like ya do. I noticed the piles of mail strewn across the coffee table, left idling near the t.v. remote I usually cradle like a baby. I was reckless with my spatula work, and I didn't care! Those eggs could wait until tomorrow to be scraped from the pan and the stove top. I was going to throw my jeans in a heap with the rest of the clothes I'd been wearing this week - whatever man, I had just related. This mess would be here tomorrow, and that's when I could be a responsible little apartment dweller without anyone knowing the difference.

Well, imagine my dismay when I arrived home today feeling the pain of having slept about three hours less than I normally do on Tuesday nights, having drunk several more cut-rate beers than I normally do on a Tuesday night, just ready to get back on that couch and let that t.v. remote know it had not lost its control over my emotions, and realized the handyman and my building manager had been in my possibly tornado-struck-mess-level apartment to fix a fuse unannounced. Well, they may have literally been walking on egg shells, but at least they didn't have to feel bad adding paint chips to the shitstorm. For several moments, I did not feel good about myself. I did not feel comfortable about how the state of my home had related to others. I did not feel like I'd met the demands of life (surpassing "squalor" in the apt descriptor of your home's cleanliness has to be on a list somewhere, right?) with relative success. And I thought, oh crap, I didn't write either, I have got to clean up my act. But then I got on the couch, and realized I had not the night before and thought eh, no one's perfect? I can relate.

More Orca-stration

2010-03-08T23:16:00.000-08:00

Sometimes it's odd how one discussion topic you never think about leads to weeks and weeks and weeks of mentions in passing and general attention to a topic. Such is the case with Sea World. I have not been to a Sea World in my life thus far. I somehow have no interest. I think I remember Sea World in Ohio? Like it was advertised in Ohio? Am I confusing Cedar Point with Sea World? In any event, I did not go. And I remember being stubbornly, and now I feel like almost irrationally opposed to going to Sea World on a college spring break service trip in Florida. We were there working on houses in the last El Nino year I remember as very very rainy. Florida getaway that helps people trip!!! turned into our van full of college dorks who did not either go home or go away with our Greek-affiliated friends to somewhere booze-filled going to KMart and desperately hoping we could find flannel anywhere in Florida in March. I think I paid $2.88 for a flannel shirt. It was on sale, and it was the best $2.88 I'd ever spent at that point, as underdressed and underpacked as we all were.

Toward the end of the week, we had the opportunity on our one day off to take a day trip if we wanted to. Orlando was within our sights. We could make it, but no one wanted to spend 90 bucks for 3 hours at Disneyworld. Another idea that was floated to the group was Sea World. Somehow, despite my massive desire for group cohesion, I was nearly violently opposed to driving 3 hours to go to a dolphin and whale show that cost a lot of money. It seemed like a terrible idea and a terrible use of time, particularly since I was enjoying the access we were given to the YMCA (also our overnight home) facilities. They had an outdoor pool in March. To me that seemed way better than watching whales swim. I could swim! For free! (The novelty of swimming has never worn off, really. God bless my grandmother who took her grandchildren to Florida to see Mickey Mouse only to find out that they were as, if not more amused, by the hotel swimming pool. By "they" I mean me). I remember just refusing to cave. Like saying I'd rather just go see Orlando than go see Sea World.
I think that is what we ended up doing, because the needs and wants of our group were so varied at the time. Some people were ready to pay any amount of money for action. Some people had 5 bucks and a free day. Mediation went to the common denominator of "let's just go."

After being enchanted by the vehemence and hmm...almost uncharacteristically fiery debate about Sea World and its merit or lack thereof in the face of the recent killer whale attack that was being broadcast on NPR, I had another Sea World encounter this evening. I was in a locker room (about to go swimming...was not joking about that novelty before) and heard one hm, nine year old girl say to another:
"Guess WHAT." (leaving no room for her friend to not say "what?")
"What?"
"On Friday, I'm going to Sea World."
"You're so lucky!!!"
"I get to leave school early. I have to."
"I wanna go, you're so lucky."

It made me laugh because it really was the most earnest expression of privilege and envy by the young that I'd heard in a while. Totally genuine interest in Sea World's splendor. And its power to be worthy of missing school - the ultimate in childhood value systems.
Despite being quite a bit older, it made me think, really? You're jealous? I can't ever remember wanting to go to Sea World when I was young. Or ever, actually.

But the instinct of sharing good news about getting to do something fun that gets you out of an obligation that's not fun? I don't think that ever goes away.
Really. Think about a meeting ending earlier than expected and sending you home sooner than you thought you'd be going home. Even if only by 15 minutes, it still feels pretty special.
And the next day, you'll probably tell someone. Their response?
"Really? You're so lucky!!!!"

We're all still chasing that whale, wherever it may be.

Some thoughts from today's most popular guy

2010-03-07T14:05:00.000-08:00

"The Oscar goes to-"

This phrase will be uttered again and again tonight and that little pause before the envelope is opened will be full of tension and a four- or five- or ten-way split screen of actors doing their best to act like they don't care, don't need it, fully love everyone in their category, or in the case of many women, like they're not about to pass out from hunger while simultaneously worrying if their hair is holding its curl and their tits are holding their perk. But does anyone ever stop to consider the tension and AGONY we, the Oscar statuettes experience? No. Absolutely not.

Being an Oscar statue, sure, it's a glamorous life, but the most glamorous part really happens on one night. Then, after that, there's a far better chance of oblivion and dust-gathering on a bookshelf than you might think. At least the Olympic gold medals get to go to middle school gymnasiums or on the front of Wheaties boxes, but we Oscars are made for one night of glam, and are then left to the whim or mania of whomever might happen to take us home.
The pressure is awful. We're the mail order brides of the entertainment industry! No choice in the rest of our lives, and there's just as much chance will be used to prop up someone's encyclopedia of French film collection as there is we'll be painted green and given any number of undignified appendages by Hollywood eccentrics (read: drug addicts). The last place an Oscar wants to end up is coked up and sunk at the bottom of someone's Oscar celebration pool party in the Hollywood hills. We're heavy, remember. By the time Consuela finds us on Tuesday, we'll be halfway hellbent on mildewing, and given about as much attention as one of the other silver candlesticks or sex toys that our owner has demanded she polish. The rich. The famous. The praised. Gag me.

Which they do!!!!
When you're kiln-molded to have no discernibly functioning lips, do you think anyone wants to hear what you have to say, or if you think Avatar was some derivative morality play, or if you'd rather be melted down for use in the Franklin Mint collectible coin series for purchase by some old lady in South Dakota than go home with Tarantino? Have you seen him when he's "just being himself?" Come on. Yes, I would delight in the chance to be held in Colin Firth's gentlemanly arms, but will I get the chance? Probably not. Much better chance of going home with some weirdo named Eveleengela who finally earned the recognition she deserves for achievement in costuming for her work in some foreign film no one saw. Great. A lifetime of wearing tiny, couture outfits for the amusement of her dinner party guests. I'd love to be a living doll. Sure, that's why I've been working out so much for this physique.

Really. Turn the cameras around, Ryan Seacrest. Great! Eva Mendes looks stunning again? Wow, shocker. Has she DONE ANYTHING OF ARTISTIC MERIT aside from looking orgasmically satisfied in a shampoo commercial lately? Come on. Why is she even here?!? You wanna talk hot bodies? Turn the cameras toward gold. They love us. Do you know how many times I've been described as "statuesque" in my day? Often. Let's just say often. Probably as much as you get compared to Dick Clark. But does anyone give a damn? No. Just some sweaty palms clutching my rock-hard, gilded ass and pumping me above their head like I'm the whistle on their choo-choo train. Guess what? The view from up here? I can see down your dress. Looks like you're giving yourself a little boost in the boobs, huh? Tape much?
You can't tape solid gold. There's nothing to hide.

There's always the tiny hope of going home with a French ingenue and living out your days overlooking the tower from the wide-open perch on her table near the window. There's the lottery-stats hope of going home with Meryl. But most often it's either a spot next to the Yoda gumball machine of the technical merit geeks, or under a hot spotlight next to some other lesser industry awards in the office of someone who spends most of his day on the phone using the F word. Le Sigh. What can I do about it? A life of glamor is, after all, a thing of beauty. There's always a chance to go home with the animators. They seem fun. As long as it's not a writer. Anything but a writer. Gawd! I'd rather be the beer-laden, frootloop soaked, baby-butt-hugged bowl of the Stanley Cup than go home with a writer. Insufferable. Mostly the sobbing. And especially the singing.

Wish me luck tonight. The envelope? Please.

All that crap

2010-03-06T23:09:00.000-08:00

Sometimes living in L.A. is hilarious, like when it's raining in a fairly typical rain fashion the day before the Academy Awards. The news of the evening comes on at 11 p.m. as planned, miraculously so, given the inclement weather. The top story? The weather.
It's raining. It's winter. So it's a winter storm.
Rain is on the roads! And the Kodak Theatre, home to the 82nd Annual Academy Awards....NOOOOOOOOOOOOOoooooooo!

The top story's weatherman reveals the rain might stop. Maneuvering away from footage of cars on roads, we go to the graphic display of tomorrow's outlook.
Morning - partially cloudy
61 degree Red carpet
Evening - 20% chance of rain

Red carpet? Is that a time of day now officially? Or is the carpet kept at a constant 61 degree temperature? Either way, it's assumed it is of note to everyone.

Story two - The rain's effects on the Academy Awards.
Cutaway to someone live at the scene, a giant Oscar statue shrouded in protective plastic behind her. Concern on her face? Evident. Pronounced. Gripping.
A lot of preparations have been made for tomorrow...
Will this city survive? And, by associative property, will the rest of the world since they're obviously relying on this epicenter of award action to serve as a social barometer for the nation. Just ask media-rologist James Cameron (too tired for my Avatar rant now, but know it's inside if I've spared you thus far).

All this hype reminded me of something I saw while digging around in crocks past, looking for Mr. Roboto. Something that seemed quite appropriate. At least watch until the one minute mark, that's all I ask. After that, it's funny because the point is undercut by the giant fake tree forest illusion on stage behind them, but still a good one. Also, I believe Tommy Shaw in this video (is that him? a replacement?) may be the inspiration for Kate Gosslin's new hairstyle and extensions. Another grand illusion of its own.

"Dont you go believin' in movies and tv and rock videos and all that crap, Come On!"
Dennis DeYoung of Styx

Learning To be a Housewife

2010-03-05T23:33:00.000-08:00

Yesterday's quiz answer? I think I'd be H.M.S. Ginnafore. Still thinking about what the HMS stands for.

Today!
I've spent some crock time devoted to my devotion to Bravo programming, let's be honest. Well, last night I realized just how much I rely upon television to provide order in my world. A circuit tripped in my apartment at the exact 30th minute of the episode of Project Runway, leaving me in the dark figuratively and literally. Not only was I not going to know what happened (still haven't caught up yet, no spoilers), I also knew I was not recording the remainder of the episode! Or the Real Housewives finale! Terrible news! And imagine my consternation today when I did not know whether or not power would be restored in time for me to come home on a Friday night, hunker down with the Guide menu of my DVR, and record some programming I missed last night. WOW. I was tense all day! And mad at my building manager all day! Why such callous disregard for my need to plug in entertainment-providing appliances!?!?!

Well, joy of joys, I came home to discover power restored. Sure, there's one circuit that's just been left in the off position that appears to be unresolved and possibly a fire hazard, and sure, maybe there are paint chips from around the circuit breaker all over the kitchen floor, but hey! There are also back to back episodes of the Real Housewives franchise - an OC finale, and the NYC season premier.

Heaven...I'm in heaven....

Housewives on t.v. are professional bickerers. I kiiiiinda hate bickering! Yep! But man oh man, am I watching this shit. So, to honor this for being as ridiculous as it is, I've decided to take the "Which housewife of Orange County are you?" quiz on the bravo web site. Let's see who I am!

Uh oh, question one and I've already failed. "Who do you consider your best friend?"
Options for this are daughter, boyfriend, husband, and mother. Um....none of the above? Can my best friend be my best friend? Guess not. Let's pick mom. Question 2 - another failure! "Do you consider yourself a workaholic?" Isn't this one a yes/no?
No, no it's not.
Uh oh, how do I handle conflict with my significant other? Do you mean my best friend? Wait, that's my mom.
Uh oh! Am I comfortable making big purchases? This involves my man's opinion or gifts? Eek! Whole Foods sushi was a big purchase for me this evening...
Ahhh finally we've found a question for me. After speculation about whose celebrity fan club I'd join and my parenting style, a question about what gets me up in the morning, and the perfect answer - a bucket of coffee!

Twelve questions later and we've figured out who I am. Though I've seen quizzes in both Seventeen and Cosmo that seem more applicable to my lifestyle, I probably think this quiz is correct in its correlation with my OC Housewife style. I'm Jeana!

"Always able to keep a cool head amidst the chaos of her bickering brood, Jeana is a powerhouse realtor and the one most likely to dole out the best advice to a fellow housewife in a tough situation. Being Jeana means you're a kind soul, an amazing listener, and above all a true and genuine friend. Sure, you tend to have high expectations of the people you love, but it's only because you want them to realize their true potential."

Does this mean I'll do Playboy? Or let my daughter get implants? Or maybe that I'll host some good pool parties. We'll see. And yep, one day of minor television discontinuation might in fact make me an OC housewife in my obliviousness to real problems of the world. That one....yeah. Way more on point!

Abbreviated thoughts

2010-03-04T17:20:00.000-08:00

Today I was thinking about L.L. Cool J. Why? I have no idea. I really think I'd be an excellent candidate for a brain mapping study that examines childhood music and television exposure and that effect on long-term thought organization.

Really, if you ask me to sort by lyrics, the process typically goes much faster in my brain than say, sorting by importance. Somehow, when I thought of L.L. Cool J, I thought of the song "O.P.P." and how good it is. I then thought hm, abbreviations are pretty awesome, as are using them forever, as L.L. Cool J has done in his career, even as he works for Sears as a fashion designer. Sure, ladies love cool James, but ladies also love Sears. Ludachris cutting out the Luda for acting? Well, I get it, but how great is Ludachirs as a name? Good. L.L. Cool J didn't switch for Sears or his cop show. And I guess neither did Ice-T. Ice-T made me think of Ice Cube, and then the end of all of that were my grand conclusions that: 1. I'm down with O.P.P., and 2. Today was a good day.

Uh oh! In looking up a picture of L.L. Cool J, I just discovered Sears ditched his clothing line!!!! What??? Maybe the love of the ladies does not come from the same ladies? Terrible news. I can only hope he will rectify this situation and become a part of L.L. Cool Bean, the direct mail catalogue for every urban outdoorsman.

This is a crock question I pose to readership - if you were going to make initials to throw at the front of your name that meant something, which letters would you choose? And what would they stand for?

I'm going to have to think on this one.

Now That's a Crock, If I've Ever Heard One

2010-03-03T21:20:00.000-08:00

So I am a hm...whore for Bravo television programming? Hm. Maybe not a whore but certainly not very discerning in what I'll watch. One of their more train-wrecky programs that I tend to watch but can't really believe I watch and may carry a bit of the personal shame spiral in watching more than once is the Millionaire Matchmaker. This show involves one very high octane "matchmaker" L.A. yenta taking 2 individuals (usually men) per show and parading hotties in front of them in a cocktail scenario. Each dater picks a match, then cameras follow them on one date that is usually conveniently located at a resort, day spa, restaurant or club that might enjoy promotional benefits of being seen on national television as a romantic location (same premise as just about everything the Real Housewives do when they happen to "go away" to an amazing, named, five-star chain resort once every three episodes). The other option is for these folks to go on a date that's completely ridiculous and outlandish, and very unlikely to be duplicated by the viewing public. Usually the dates either go blandly well, or are total disasters. In either event, Patti is shamelessly self-congratulatory, either saying "of course, because I knew that was the match for you" or "of course, because he didn't pick the one I picked for him." For one who talks about the phallus as much as she does, she's pretty infallible in her own mind.

I believe the fine print of the show indicates that all participants filmed on the show are given services in the Millionaires' Club (the dating service that costs like $25,-000 - $50,000 bucks to join) gratis. That means free, even in fine print. So yeah, it's a thing, but more than anything, it's a show.

And the men are most times characters - whether deluded, eccentric, or so utterly self-absorbed they're unable to converse with others one-on-one in any significant way, it of course makes for disastrous dates, and good television.

Though the show holds my attention well enough, quite often while I'm doing other things, it's really Patti that I would like to know more about. Not in an Access Hollywood or E! News kind of way, but in an A&E biography way, and even then in the A&E before they went kind of trashy cable sort of way. Back when the voiceover guy for A&E was boring, deep, and dignified. No scintillation at all. Dog the Bounty Hunter was not on the payroll yet. That A&E - please take me back to Patti's Jersey childhood.

Those are the people I want digging into Patti's past. Her own parents have been on the show, but somehow I want to hear high school friends' impressions and see the middle school pictures of her with braces and, I'm assuming, a lot of curly hair. I assume this because her hair is now probably very expensively chemically straightened, and I believe I've seen her call curly haired women things just shy of "hussy," given the kink in their hair's disposition. It's an irrational hatred and meanness that I think has to have some internal autobiographical source in relation to her own hair, but psychoanalysis is not what keeps Bravo in business. In fact, quite the opposite.

The show also devotes usually 4-7 minutes per episode to Patti demeaning women who come to her "club" to be considered as candidates for matchmaking. True to pimp form, Patti breaks these women down without mercy, bitchslapping them with insults about physical appearance, fashion sense, hair styles, age, career, and, of course, hair texture. It's the most absurd part of the show, but I'm also guessing the biggest audience grab of each hour. Patti insulting women and telling them they're not good enough to be paraded before men at a cocktail party like whore-derves - it makes no sense. Is that supposed to make me think her club is that selective? Or that she hates women? Or that she hates herself and takes it out on women who want men's approval by hating them as meanly as possible? Or that she's good at television.

She's certainly good at lip gloss.
Anyway, if anyone knows the scoop, please update her rather underwhelming Wikipedia page .
But don't tell her that. She hates it when people challenge her authority on anything.

Livin' La Vida Loca

2010-03-02T21:50:00.000-08:00

I'm not, actually. Surprise! Fishcrockpot shocker!
But I did hear that song in an exercise setting today and it was suddenly the best song I'd ever heard. As were "What is love" yep, that SNL skit song, and "You dropped a bomb on me baby" GAP BAND HOLLA!!!, and "The Tootsie Roll."

It is amazing how many song lyrics you know that I'm sure you think you don't.
Suddenly I was going well beyond "cotton candy sweet as gold" to "it ain't the butterfly it's the tootsie roll." Yes. Yes that stuff sticks! A bit unexpected, but true. Also, and don't hate me here, I'm going to argue that "Livin' La Vida Loca" stands the test of time WAY better than you'd think. Especially the 007 theme song inspired bit in the middle? Yes. A highly catchy, highly processed pop song. You can blame me if it's stuck in your head now. I understand. But while it's in there, don't you kind of like it? Yep. Tell the crockpot. We understand.

So that was one unexpected surprise.

Number two - I heard such a volatile "To the Point" on NPR this evening that it was actually, though intended to be serious, very hilarious to me. They had the head trainer and whale lover from SeaWorld on to defend the decision to reintroduce the Killer Whale that recently killed a trainer into the SeaWorld show, and to continue to use Orca in shows at all. The opposition came in the form of Naomi someone (again, I'm going from memory here, not even bothering to look up Warren Allney's actual name or its spelling) who works for the Humane Society of the United States (ah! looking to be sure I had that right I stumbled upon the Naomi Rose article. Is this headline a bit cheeky for anyone else? Considering that someone died, this seems a lot like tea for two, which I believe is usually reserved for tap dancing routines).

These two warring factions spent a great deal of effort trying to out-do each other in their sincere condolences. Warren Alnie (covering the bases here) was having none of it, basically cutting off both speakers in their effusive claims of empathy for family, friends, whale lovers, and anyone else affected by the trainer's death, saying very succinctly that yeah, everyone feels that way if they're a decent person, let's move on to what we're here to discuss. It was such a direct simultaneous admonition to those who would use sympathy for the loved ones of the deceased for personal image embellishment in their argument making, and a statement of actual sympathy for those mourning the deceased, that I really thought wow, this guy does not fall for just any old line. He must have done high school debate. Not one to be taken. (I had to look it up. It's Olney). [who knew that show was local?]

The same ability to cut through the bullshit (and in this case I am referring to a bull whale) came in very handy as his guests jumped upon every chance they were given to both personally defame and undercut the points of the other. I really have not heard anything that obviously personal and heated on NPR since "You LIE!" soundbytes were played, directed toward Obama! And hilarious too was that all of them were couched with polite introductions, for instance, the Sea World rep beginning a retort with, "With all due respect, Miss Rose has never TOUCHED an orca and all of her biological studies took place from a BOAT." Both Naomi Rose and Mr. Sea World (35 year head trainer in charge) went to great lengths to clarify......the truth behind the inspiration for Free Willy.

No, I'm not kidding.
Someone died. A person, not a whale. Someone just died and they were going head-to-head, drudging up details, calling each other liars over what really happened to Keiko, a whale partially released from captivity? And they agreed on nothing about the case. Sea World claims all the whale lovers walked off the job when the Humane Society came in and mucked up operations. Naomi claims that the Humane Society sent a team to fjords with this whale. Fjords. For. Real.
But in any event, um...Hollywood made a movie about it.

Never before has NPR triggered, "Hold me, like the river of Jordan, and I will be faithful. I will be Free-eee." Michael Jackson's Free Willy theme?
Yes. I know more lyrics than I thought I did. Not surprising.

The whale debate? La vida loca. The Sea World guy's come back when asked if working with whales in captivity for entertainment is still a good idea? NASCAR. He compared it to NASCAR in terms of participants assuming risk. Drivers drive fast around tracks every day, knowing they could die at any moment.
Yes, but cars aren't sentient, right?

It was an incredible debate, if only for Warren Olney's annoyance at the participants unwillingness to stay on topic.
I believe the audio link may be found in the Olney link above.
I also believe Ricky Martin described the same type of situation saying, "She'll make you take your clothes off and go dancing in the rain."

Her skin's the color of mocha.