Royal Distraction

I have been MIA for the past couple of days because I took a quick trip to Delaware. (And so help me, if the first thing you associate with Delaware is Wayne's World's, “Hi. I'm in.. Delaware, hyuck hyuck” then I disown you as a cyber friend. Or any other kind of friend, for that matter.)

We went back for a little bridal shower so that some of the relatives (several of whom I don't think are going to make it to Colorado for the actual wedding) could get together and talk about Very Girly Things. I got to hang out with my Grandmom, who at 95 is still able to keep up with the Grand Marnier digestif (post-several bottles of wine) after dinner along with the rest of us alcoholics that make up our family, but is now wheelchair bound and very frustrated about the whole thing. (Though Grand Marnier helps.)

Something you may or may not know about me is the fact that I am terrified of flying. I have been flying my whole life, and when I was a kid, I even used to look forward to it. Mostly for the magnetic wings pin and peanuts, but I was down with the whole being-in-a-pressurized-tube-zooming-through-the-air-thing, too. Then suddenly, somewhere around age 14, I had the ultimate meltdown, and started having raging panic attacks on planes. This did not prevent me from traveling several times a year, it merely introduced me to fun, hard-core anti-anxiety medication. Trust me, Chicago O'Hare is AWESOME when you are high, with that whole flicker-y neon lights and New Age music thing they've got going on at the bottom of the escalators.

Back to this trip. Over the years, I have weaned myself off of the drugs, for as fun as they were while flying, they were a nuisance once I was on the ground because I wanted to enjoy my trip, not drool my way to the nearest bed to sleep through the entire first day. But unfortunately, as we were coming home yesterday, we hit some major air current-thing-ies. It was... terrifying. But! I think I have found a cure for my phobia! Unfortunately, it's not as fun for The Funasaurus, but it certainly helped my anxiety. I went to go grab The Funasaurus' arm as we hit yet another mountain of rattling wind, and as I turned to clutch his arms I noticed his eyes were closed and his normally lovely, tan face was an odd shade of... green.

Well, you don't just see a green Funasaurus every day! I was immediately distracted. “You o.k., baby?”

“Murmph. Seasick.” And then his coloring shifted from seafoam to seaweed.

Suddenly, I was a girl on a mission. A mission to find a barf bag. I ignored the severe turbulence as I helped myself to the pocket of the guy sitting in the aisle seat, and then glazed over a jolt of wind as I poked my brother (who was conveniently on the same flight, sitting in the seat in front of me) “Any barf bags up there?”

“No. But apparently planes are not taking off from DIA, because of the severe wind. But our captain is going to try and land, anyway,” he replied, plugged in to the control tower communication in his armrest.

Super. Thanks for that.

But I was back to searching through my own bags for something suitable for the now cringing Funasaurus to expel his half-digested, overpriced snack box contents into, because so help me there would be no barfing on my new Nambe serving platter that I was hand-carrying back to Colorado from the shower on MY watch!

I didn't find much, other than an in-flight magazine to cover aforementioned serving platter, but fortunately the landing happened soon after, and The Funasaurus was able to keep his shit together and slowly began regaining normal flesh tones. And I really was able to focus on something else (pretty new gifts for our house and an ill fiance) without freaking out about landing in a wind storm.

Now we are home again, to the evil kitties and the work that never ends. Next stop, Orlando.

True Princess Confessions

So I found this website, True Bride Confessions, a couple of weeks ago. It’s fairly entertaining. Somewhat similar to PostSecret, but without the effort of artwork or postage. At first, it made me sad, because so many people seem to be unhappy at this stage, which is tragic, because I am having a blast planning my wedding. I like my mom. I like The Funasaurus’ mom (almost running her off the road was totally an ACCIDENT, I swear, but that’s another post for another day), I like my dress, and most surprisingly, I like my fiancé. After a while, I started feeling guilty for enjoying myself so thoroughly through what obviously should be a terribly difficult and trying time, and I tried to stop looking at the site. But it taunted me. Taunted me with its regular updates and intriguing bitchiness. So I went back.

And then I discovered the sister sites, True Mom Confessions, True Dad Confessions, and True Office Confessions. Whoo-boy, that is a whole lotta time killer for you right there! The mom and dad stuff I don’t check as regularly, because, eh. I don’t really relate. And they can get pretty whine-y. But the office ones are funny. While at first I scorned the losers who would post anonymous confessions about their tedious lives on these sites, my own dirty little secrets began brewing in my head.

It took a while, but two nights ago, I let the demon out and submitted my own confession. I got the generic reply, about it being received and reviewed before posting. I felt strangely relieved. I kept hitting the “refresh” button, to see if it had posted, yet, but alas, they took their time in updating that night.

Yesterday when I came in, I checked the site eagerly to see how many “me toos!” had been posted. How many people share my juicy little secret?

Turns out, I will never know. Because apparently, my confession was not good enough for True Office Confessions; it had not been posted. Maybe I am not scandalous enough. I was horrified. I thought it was a good confession. But apparently it did not make the “I want to bend my secretary over and boink her brains out” cut.

So fuck ‘em. I thought about it, and I have decided… to post my confession here. Because I can. Because I think it is good enough. So here goes.

...

“I practice my ballet leaps in the office hallway after everyone else is gone.”

EEEEEEEEEEEK!

Oh no she did-unt! Girl, you so crazy! Yes, yes I am. And yes, I do. I am not god at ballet, but that does not stop me from attempting to execute the most ungraceful of jettés all the way down the hall to the candy dish at the receptionist’s desk! Ha-ha! When halls are that long, I find it entirely wasteful not to take advantage of the leaping room. So I occasionally get a little skippy start, and leap, appendages flailing everywhere, and soar (?) across a small stretch of carpet. It’s rather fun. I highly suggest it for any of you who work in an office with a good hallway.

And screw you, True Office Confessions, for not thinking my entry was good enough. I still posted it (albeit less anonymously) on the World Wide Web, anyway.

Plbthbthbthbthbthbth

Can You Tell I'm Running Low on Material?

I went to dreammoods.com, one of my all-time favorite websites, to try and figure out what my dream was about, the other night. Unfortunately, when I went to the animals section, “llama” was blatantly missing. So no hope of finding the meaning of miniature llama/catlike llama, anywhere. Now, I might have forgiven them, llamas not being a particularly common animal, but they had a definition for jackdaw and orca! I don’t even know what a jackdaw IS!

Fuckers.

On a totally unrelated note, I have hit another milestone in the tri-weekly torture that is my jogging routine. I passed my first NON-STATIONARY people, today! Of course, it was an extremely fit gay couple who were strolling along, and as soon as they decided to start jogging themselves a couple of minutes later, they quickly lapped me like was standing still, but still… for a brief moment, I felt the power of “ *heave* On your left!”

I rewarded myself with mocha on the way in to work this morning. I like to moderate my healthfulness.

Oh! And speaking of work, for those of you who were interested in what happened with DaG on her date (echo…echo… echo…) I bit the bullet yesterday and asked her how it went.

“Oh, we didn’t really have chemistry. He didn’t have much to say.”

!

!!

Is it perhaps because you talktalktalktalktalktalktalktalktalktalktalk and then pause to sniffle and wipe your tired eyes and then talktalktalktalktalktalktalktalktalktalktalk some more without letting anyone get a word in edgewise? Maybe? Maybe?

Then she continued on for about ten minutes, telling me about a picnic in the park with a friend who’s a friend but not a friend and she brought some olives that were leftover from her birthday party, and oh, there were only about nine left, but whatever, he didn’t seem to mind, oh and she brought some crackers, too, and since there was wine they didn’t mind and the music was o.k. but not great and the really likes saxophone players well some of them but she didn’t get to meet the musician this time because she was talking (no shit) to this guy and they kind of had chemistry but she’s not sure and did she tell me she just (9 months ago) got out of a relationship and so she’s just taking things slow and not so sure that she’s ready to start up something again so soon and….

Then I poked my eyeballs out with a nearby paperclip.

Summary: apparently, her date was ho-hum. Aren't you so glad you asked?

Dreaming of Sleeping In

So last night I had a dream (Hey, get back here! I promise this isn’t going to be one of those blogs) that I was sitting in the yard in the house where I grew up, and I came across this animal that was kind of a humanoid cat with occasional llama tendencies, depending on the moment in my dream, and it turned out to be this cuddly little harmless creature, but the FBI (or some big hateful government agency with agents who looked oddly like the guys from the Matrix) wanted it exterminated for some reason, so I was trying to protect it… and I had the presence of mind, amidst hiding potentially dangerous exotic species in my childhood home from scary men with unnecessarily dark sunglasses to think, “This’ll be a great blog entry!”

Sadly, it’s less good material when it was all a convoluted mess in my subconscious. But I really thought, for a brief moment this morning, that I’d really have a hum-dinger for y’all, today.

Instead you get: spaghetti. Made by: me. … And also: The Funasaurus, who took over when I got sick of stirring and wandered off to play on the computer, instead, and it almost bubbled over except for The Funasaurus’ mighty quick reaction time, thus saving the starchy mess before it became a disaster that I would avoid cleaning for another week or two.

Then we watched a ridiculous amount of The Office reruns, and went to bed. Whee whoo.

However, I was woken up at about 4:13 AM this morning, to the most violent wind storm I’ve hear in a long time. Of course, I was too busy dreaming of clandestine operations involving unknown species to really pay much attention to the weather in the real world, but the wind was so loud it kept me semi-conscious until about 6:30 this morning, when our alarm went off. … At which point we bypassed the snooze button and pushed the “shut the fuck up forever” button, because we were both exhausted from all my tossing and turning due to the wind.

Plus, it was very dark for 6:30 AM in July.

So we slept until 8:00, which was kind of bad, since we were thinking of getting to work around that time. But again, it was very dark, so it felt very early, and we got extra sleep which was much-needed and neither of us seem to have gotten in trouble for arriving, oh, at least an hour late to work, so we’ll take it.

Now that I’ve been here for a good three hours, I think it is time for a lunch break.

Boats Don't Have Brakes

For those of you who care (hi, Mom!) The Funasaurus and I are getting married in front of a little lake. (Arguably, an oversized puddle.) It’s very picturesque, complete with little white, wrought iron archway and faux wrought iron vines wrapping around said archway.

There is also a gourmet raft right behind the archway, that goes out on the lake, giving the bride and groom some quiet time right after the ceremony to absorb what’s going on. We kind of liked that idea, since at the various weddings that we’ve attended, the newlyweds seem to be perpetually accosted by well-wishers for the rest of the evening. (Not that we don’t want well wishes, we just like the idea of a few minutes of private time to talk… unless someone is desperate enough to wade out to our raft in the middle of their lake in their good clothes, in which case I will whole-heartedly invite them onto the raft to wish us well all they want, and partake in the champagne which I plan to take on the raft, as well.)

So anyway, the owner of the venue had told us that if we wanted to use the raft, that we should come up sometime before the wedding and practice getting around a bit, since it is a bit clunky and large, being sturdy enough to accommodate a couch, a table, and a bride who will absolutely kill aforementioned owner should her ridiculously overpriced dress get the least bit damp. The idea is that the couple gets pushed out to the middle of the lake, and then it is up to them to get themselves back to the shore using very long staffs, much like punting on the Thames.

Since The Funasaurus went to England once, and actually had the opportunity to punt, and apparently sucked royally at it, we thought it would be prudent to practice.

So we packed a picnic of cheese, pâté, and bottles (plural!) of wine, and headed up with some friends. As the six of us gathered on the raft, we realized that the max capacity was probably somewhere around 5 and half people. The wine already flowing, so that did not deter us. We pushed out, and then spent the next hour running around the raft, trying to counterbalance the weight of whomever was on the edge punting, so that we would not sink.

As The Funasaurus tried to navigate the docking maneuver at the end, I took it upon my rather drunk self to help him. Since we wanted to go right, I went to the left and started pushing on the staff. The Funasauaurs, however, was at the back, trying to guide it in, straight. So I managed to send us off into a spin, then tried to overcorrect by pushing back left, then whacked one of the friends (already on the shore) in the head with a pole, and eventually The Funasaurus suggested (NOT NICELY, I might add) that could he not just do this alone, please?

We eventually got on shore, bloated from cheese, drunk from wine, with very soggy shoes. I nagged The Funasaurus for not wearing sunscreen. He told me to stop being a drunken backseat driver. Our friends laughed, mercilessly. We topped it off with pizza, and came home. I think we are ready to get married.

Private Office. Sane People Only.

So I am struggling to find time to write because this job expects me to WORK, which is really inconvenient for my blogging and e-mailing and wedding planning and whatnot. What I do like about this job, though, is the solitude. I am in a little office, all of my own, with my very own four walls and a door that I sometimes close because I CAN. The girl who worked here before me apparently quit because she got too lonely. I, for one, am not lonely. I am reveling in the peace and quiet and for once, and unlike any other job that I’ve worked at, I can really focus and put my mind to the task at hand, thanks to all the quietness and lack of interruptions.

My boss has come in exactly twice, since I’ve started here. (What, two months ago, now?) He came in on the first day to give me the key and take me out to lunch, and he came in once to pick up a document he needed. Otherwise, I don’t hear much from him. He is fairly hands-off, which I love 99% of the time, and makes me panic the other 1% of the time when he needs the Bumblefuck Report right away! And I! Have never heard! Of the Bumblefuck Report! And so I say, “What is the Bumblefuck Report?” and he says, “Oh, it’s the one on server ShutsDownforRepairsALot,” and then I spent another hour trying to find this server, only to discover that a) I don’t have access to it, and b) Bumblefuck Report isn’t on it, anyway. It’s on yet another server that I don’t have access to.

But anyway. The rest of the time it’s great, and while I do spend a lot of time in the office, I don’t mind because it’s quiet, and I am un-messed with and don’t have to come up with inane “Isn’t the carpet ugly?” coworker talk.

Except. Except for Ms. Doom and Gloom, (DaG for short) who works across the hall from me. Technically, we work for the same company, but in totally different departments. Our lives should never cross, other than having someone to say, “Good morning!” to as we walk past each other’s doors. Unfortunately, DaG is bored. And she doesn’t appear to do much work, at work, as far I can tell. She’s always on the phone, and she always has a crisis du jour. She’s always exhausted. She’s always being asked to do too much. (HA! I say. HA HA. Get off the damn phone and you shall be surprised at how much you can get done!)

DaG does not leave our conversation at the socially acceptable, “Good morning!” minimum, which I would so dearly love to do. DaG often wanders in to my office to tell me about a TV. special she watched last night (even though she never really watches TV.) about falling in love. Or about a crazy biker she almost ran over on her way into the office this morning. Or about how her boss used to live here and now doesn’t and that’s too bad because they just got along so well and she’s just not sure if this job is worth it if she doesn’t have someone to go over the creative process with on a daily basis and her commute is just too long (same as mine, 30 minutes) and blah blah organic mushrooms BLAH.

When The Police concert came through town, I had to listen to the same story of her meeting-up-with-her-dad (from-whom-she’s-a-little-estranged-but-not-really) for-a-beer-beforehand,-and-the-long-train-ride,-and-the-walk-to-the-concert,-and-the-getting-up-close-well-kinda-to-the-stage,-and oh,-was-someone-looking-at-her-funny-and-she-didn’t-bother-to-corect-him-that-she-did-just-buy-a-house-with-someone-but-that-someone-was-her-dad-and-she-just-let-him-think-it-was-a-boyfriend-and-were-her-bangs-a-little-poufy? about ELEVEN different times, because apparently she felt everyone in her world had to hear that hum-dinger.

This morning I was rushing to get some reports done when DaG wandered over to announce that her internet connection was out. “Gee, that’s too bad,” I said, not looking up from my Excel spreadsheet.

“Yeah. I’ve been having trouble with my connection at home, too. What is it with me and the internet?” she continued.

Maybe it’s mad at you for talking too much?

She went away, and I continued to have something of a lover’s quarrel with the auto-sum feature. (Crappy program needs to learn to TRUST me when I tell it to sum the whole column, and not just the part that it’s comfortable with. I am not cheating on it by entering other digits that shouldn’t be there, I promise to be more forthcoming and not leave blanks in the columns in the future, O.K., darling? Don’t pout and make the ####s, anymore, I’ll still be here even if you need to expand just a little to make it fit.)

fuuuuuuuck

So anyway, I got through the mess and got the report sent off, and DaG wanders back in and asks if she can borrow my computer just to check her e-mail. Since I wasn’t really needing the computer as urgently, I benevolently said, “Sure.”

“Oh, thanks,” she gushed. “I just need to check my e-mail really quickly. I promise I’ll just be a sec. I have a lunch date I just need to check on.”

?

“I’m just so tired. I really don’t want to go. But it’s kind of a set-up thing,”

I’m beginning to think that perhaps this is not a business lunch date.

“And he’s halfway cute, but he wants to meet at Panera, and I am just so tired, I can’t remember what time, and I really don’t like that place, I mean, I ONLY eat organic stuff, and you can just tell their chicken isn’t taken care of, properly,”

I’m thinking about how I can take care of her, properly.

“Anyway, I just got out of a long-term relationship about nine months ago, and I’ve just started dating again and. … Oh. … Damn. It looks like my good friend isn’t going to be able to come to my birthday dinner.” Sigh.

I stand up from my guest chair, not-so-subtly.

“Oh. .. Well, at least Amy looks like she’s going to make it to dinner, even if Amanda can’t. I mean, we’re not BEST friends, me and Amy, but it’s nice of her to be there for me, we haven’t always gotten along…. You don’t mind that I’m checking these, do you? It didn’t look like you minded.”

Didn’t it?

Did the standing and pacing and staring not convey the message that I would like my computer back sometime before you start replying to everyone who’s coming to your birthday party to tell them to be sure to bring big presents?

So DaG finally stands up, stretches, proclaims her exhaustion one more time, and begins to squeeze by my desk, and I think I see the light at the end of the tunnel which is my long-lost spreadsheet. Except she stops, and turns back around.

“Hey, you don’t mind if I look up the menu at Panera really quick, do you? I’m just so tired. And when I’m tired, I just can’t make a decision! It’ll just take a sec.,” DaG flashes me a big smile with weary eyes, and sits back down at my desk.

I debate screaming.

She goes over the vegetarian options, laments the untextured-ness of their turkey, and the complications of ordering a sandwich (because she’s really hungry for something more than just a salad) on a first date. You just can’t eat a sandwich neatly, can you? But if this guy is going to judge her on her eating habits the first time he meets her, well, then he’s probably not worth it, anyway.

I have made the decision to run down to Panera and warn off her potential suitor INCOMING: CRAZY! RUN FOR YOUR LIFE! YOU WILL NEVER GET HER TO STOP TALKING EVER AGAIN EVER! when she does another big stretch, and ambles back off to her office.

Where, not ten seconds later, she calls across the hall gaily, “Hey! I seem to be back on-line! Thanks for letting me borrow the computer, anyway!” and I close my dearly beloved door and sit down, gnawing on my fist, to write this post, instead of finding another spreadsheet.

This weekend I am buying a lock for my door and a handle of JD for my desk.

Alpine Theater

I need to get to the theater more often. Last night I saw the most amazing performance. You all may remember my plug for Murphy’s blog way back in the day? She was in the process of writing a script about her life, and was using the blog as a way to get some feedback on some of the scenes. Well, the play evolved into something much bigger than those original blog posts. But it was still extremely organic and moving.

I am not much of a laugh-out-louder or crier, in general. (Well, at least when it comes to movies or theater. If I am feeling stressed at work I will sob my little heart out as undignafied-ed-ly as possible, once I am in my car on my way home.) I mean in terms of movies or book or theater. I enjoy the arts very much, but I am not usually emotionally moooooooved. However. Last night. I was guffawing out loud and fighting back tears in the first five minutes.

If you live in Colorado (which most of you don’t, and I realize that makes this post utterly irrelevant to you, but tant pis, this is moi’s blog) you must find a way to get yourself up to Breckenridge this summer and go see Crazy Bags at the Backstage Theatre. It will be so worth it, I promise you. Not only is the mountain town adorable and shop-able before hand, it is also 20 degrees cooler, and with global warming shoving the thermometer up to triple digits in June in Denver, I was thrilled to get the fuck out of here, for an evening.

So, yeah. I was back in my mountains last night. And it felt like coming home, in many ways. I miss the mountains desperately. I do not miss freezing, and scraping snow off of my car every morning. And I know my car does not miss having to 4-wheel over snowdrifts to get anywhere near the front entrance to the grocery store seven months out of the year. But I do miss the clean air. I do miss the humility that comes with standing in the shadow of a mountain that is miles away from you. I miss the thin grass, the hardy evergreens, and the bat shit crazy people.

Here’s hoping the library thing works out, and maybe there’ll be money for a quaint weekend home in the mountains, someday. I'm picturing something simple, like a little chateau.

It's a Sign

Dear God, I could not have planned this.

But I think it is a sign.

I was screwing around, looking for a new t-shirt, and I just found THIS.

Go. Look.

I am buying one in every color, also in the hoodie and bag.

Screw the salads (thanks for the suggestions, though, some of them even sounded a little tempting) but I think I have found my mantra.

You Say To-mae-toe, I Say, "NASTY"

Well. The unthinkable happened, this morning. I (me!) lapped somebody while on my morning jog. Granted, the somebody was rather stationary when I BLEW past him, as he was trying to wrangle the most adorable golden retriever puppy who was taking orgasmic, full-body face-plants into the mud in the grass, and I may have snorted just a little when I saw him do that, thus diminishing my superiority rush from the incredible feat of Passing Somebody, but WHATEVER because I now rule the jogging world!

Speed walkers, beware. I am catching up to you.

Meanwhile, I thought of another random fact about myself that I forgot to add to the list, yesterday. I don’t like tomatoes. I really don’t. I don’t even like tomato sauce or ketchup. I eat them now that I am older (I hated birthday parties as a kid, because they inevitably involved pizza) because I have learned, in my wise old age, that ooey-gooey melted cheese and bread trump a bit of sauce, but I still don’t looooove tomatoes.

But I have decided that I want to like tomatoes. I want to be the type of person who eats them. They are on everything, from sandwiches to salads to 95% of the entrees in Italian restaurants. And I like the idea of tomatoes with hunks of mozzarella and basil on them. Mmm, mozzarella. So I am on a quest to learn to like tomatoes. Recently, I have been forcing myself to eat them in very small bites.

The Funasaurus, who is a faux-tomato-hater because the thing is, he really loves them, he adores tomato sauce and puts ketchup on pretty much everything (including eggs and filet mignon) but swears that he hates the actual little fruit in its unadulterated form, says that I am buying into tomato propaganda. He says I’ve been hooked by the tomato lobby, and I should fight back.

By eating a lot of mustard, I suppose.

But I am still curious, and wanting to fit in with the tomato eaters, so if anyone out there has a good recipe for something tomato-y but not too tomato-y, let me know.

Eight

Eight Random Things About Me

I got tagged for this meme by PasstheZoloft. I am supposed to write eight random facts/habits about myself, but I am super intimidated. What have I not told you, already, in previous posts? I used up all my good stuff HERE.

I am going to attempt to dig a little deeper. Hello, subconscious! I need to make a withdrawal. … It’s quite the clusterfuck, in here, isn’t it? I apologize for the ensuing lack of any sort of theme.

1. I still fantasize about being a princess. I somehow missed the social cue to give up on the glittering tiaras at age eight, and stubbornly forged ahead with a passion for froofy ball gowns and state dinners and Nobel Prize award ceremonies. I fantasize about this all. the. time. Hence, my justification for spending a ridiculous percentage of our wedding budget on a dress I will wear once in my life for six hours.

But they will be six glorious, princess-like hours.

2. I used to live in a log cabin on a mountain on National Park land. When the wind blew just right in a snowstorm, a little *poof* of snow would come through the window seam and land in your lap. Insulation was not the architect of that house’s priority.

3. In said cabin, I used to also have an amazing dog. She was part lab, and part malamute. She liked to fetch, and if you threw a stick, she would retrieve an entire tree. She was… burly. And I miss her desperately, sometimes, even though I wouldn’t trade Sugar in for the world. (Tatum, on the other hand….)

4. I have reoccurring dreams about tsunamis and tidal waves.

5. I had a crush on The Funasaurus when we first met. It took me seven years to convince him to take our friendship to the next level. (Mostly it involved cheap beer, and the option to either sleep on the dirty floor of a cobwebby attic, or next to me in my nice, soft bed. I was subtle.)

6. Despite recycling, buying Earth-friendly laundry detergent and organic produce, and using the revolving door, I don’t feel like I’m as environmentally conscious as I’d like to be.

7. One of my biggest pet peeves is driving past a car that’s driving really badly and seeing that the driver is a woman. Stop perpetuating the stereotype, jerkfaces!

8. Despite my uppity tastes for things like sushi and fois gras, I love McDonalds french fries. So very much.

Now I am supposed to tag eight people with this same meme, but I am not sure I know that many!

Murphy? Chico? Diana? V? Marcia? Angela? Diane? Anyone else want to play? Consider yourself tagged!

Stinky Fish and Ear Wax

So the midsummer party went well, I ate pickled herring in many forms, along with anchovies mixed with egg… and for some reason found it delicious. Perhaps it was the three shots of Swedish schnapps I consumed, post two glasses of white wine and one hard cider. Oh, and another shot of homemade blueberry vodka poured out of a nalgene. Perhaps it was the leftover adrenaline from the most passionate round of croquet that I had ever played. I don’t know, but, mmm, stinky fish are tasty!

There was indeed a May Pole, which come to find out is a big ol’ pagan representation of a penis, complete with balls, which made me happy. We didn’t laugh at it too much when had trouble staying upright.

The rest of the weekend was full of errands and babies. Not ours, ours friends. I am recommitted to my I-don’t-want-one-of-those convictions.

A few days ago, The Funasaurus went to the doctor, and among other things, it turns out his ears are full of wax. So the doctor made him get this little ear cleaning kit at the store, and we proceeded to put the droplets in his ear last night. And then waited for grossness to ensue.

But it didn’t.

It just kind of… re-gunked in his ear, apparently.

So the directions on the box say that if “stuff’ doesn’t come out, you can irrigate the ear canal with a rubber-tipped ear syringe.

Being fresh out of those, we decided to use a turkey baster.

So I’m sitting on my bathroom sink, basting my future husband, looking for copious amounts of ear gunk, and the only thing I find myself thinking is, “How thoroughly did I wash this thing? I wonder if there are leftover bits of giblets from Christmas being flushed into his head, currently?”

So, he’s psyched. The turkey baster didn’t really work (SURPRISE) so we tried again this morning with minimal luck. It was an odd morning altogether. We both overslept. Sugar became fixated on an invisible bug in the corner of the room, and would do nothing except stare into the corner. I tried to lure her out with treats, and she ignored me. Tatum attacked her, and she let out a pitiful squeal, but managed to remain wide-eyed and vigilant. So we went through our morning routine, gave Tatum a mouse, and last I checked before leaving, Sugar was still staring wildly into the corner. If she’s moaning something about “the others” by the time I will get home, I am going to take her to the vet and revoke her T.V. privileges.

Gainless Censorship

Is your day boring and long? Do you need a way to fill the hours gleefully desecrating every single one of your loved ones' names? Look no further, folks.

Here is internet crack for your brain:

Click me, I'm horribly addictive!

I totally pilfered it from The Silly Kitchen Witch, I’m not even sorry. But she has a great blog, go look, and thank her for providing such fabulous entertainment.

Love,
Gainless Censorship, of course

P.S. When you run out of friends', families', and 5th grade crushes' names, progress to celebrities... like, say, Angelina Jolie. Or George Clooney. Or, at the very least, Alanis Morissette.

A Princess Copes with Summertime

To expound just a little, Little Swan’s wedding this past weekend was gorgeous. In fact, I would go so far as to say practically perfect. Which has made me a little sulky, honestly, because I’m pretty sure she used up all the good wedding mojo, and I was planning on saving some for my wedding.

Everyone who RSVPed showed up. The food was excellent. The air conditioning in the limo worked. The dress did not get dirty, despite dragging it all over a golf course. Many people got buzzed, no one got drunk. The best man’s speech was tasteful. The weather was perfect, warm and sunny with a slight breeze to keep everyone from overheating, despite predictions of 50mph gusts of wind. The pictures were beautiful. They remembered to sign the marriage certificate. And the night culminated in a good dance party.

And if that’s not the sign of a successful wedding, then I don’t know what is.

Nicely done, Mrs. Swan. Can I get you to do your sun dance for my wedding, please?

Back in Colorado, it is stupidly hot for June, the temperature hovering in the mid-90s yesterday, and possibly reaching triple digits, today. Nevertheless, I had tickets to go see the Rockies play the Yankees, and I was determined to go. I met up with my Swedish friend, who is gorgeous and petite and tan, and we stopped at a bar to get a requisite glass of wine before overpaying for Coors Lite and Dippin Dots at the ballpark.

The Swede was shedding clothing as we hiked up the stairs, and was in a teeny tiny tank top and shorts by the time we sat down. I could almost watch her skin turn a deeper shade of tan. I, on the other hand, much like a polar bear or fine electronic equipment, do not handle heat so well. I go from pale to burnt in .02 seconds. So I had on long pants, an undershirt, a long-sleeved sweater with a hood, sunscreen, and a ball cap.

“I love summertime!” she announced, throwing her head back to get more sun on her high cheekbones.

I murmured something hateful in return, while working hard to ward off heat stroke.

Fortunately, the Rockies won, the Dippin Dots didn’t melt, (and neither did I) and we had a good ride home. Next up is her Midsummer’s Party on Saturday, even though Midsummer is technically tomorrow. (Today? Tomorrow?) We discussed, among other things, an impromptu May Pole.

Oh, yes.

If it happens, I will so post pictures.

Because I'm Hard Core Like That

So the wedding in New Mexico went incredibly well, despite my tattoo deciding to bubble and then molt like a snake on the Discovery Channel, and despite my having to get fairly drunk in order to pull off the toast. (Which went well, considering I had a mini-crisis had to send The Funasaurus back to the hotel for my prop immediately after the ceremony and before consuming any of the cocktails at the cocktail hour, which I had forgotten, and was quite sure I couldn’t do without. I feel a prop makes any speech better.)

Since I was able to rage (kinda. Does “desperately wishing for a warm bed that doesn’t smell of stale beer” count as “raging”?) for the bachelorette party and shake my booty all night long, I decided I could not get away with using my tattoo as an excuse not to run, anymore. So this morning I got up at the crack of dawn, and re-commenced my M/W/F routine.

However, I started this week off on a better note. Not only was I well rested (read: hung over) but I was wearing NEW SHOES. When I went to California, my friend M practically had a heart attack when she saw my 1996 hard plastic relics. When she asked, “Why did you not throw those away 11 years ago?” I began to think that perhaps it was time to invest in a new pair.

And it really isn’t hard to convince me that I need to buy something newer and prettier and softer. So when I got back to Colorado, I invested in a new pair of shoes. And this morning, I gave them their maiden send off. We went around the park and back. And at first, I was like, “Holy hell, I’m running on clouds!” which was great. But after about a minute and a half, I realized that even if slightly more squishy, it was still running, and so it still sucked. But at least I was less embarrassed to be seen, which counts for something.

So now I must go back to work, because there is a crapload of work to do, and I am not quite sure how to squeeze it all in before I go to the ball game tonight and watch the Rockies (!) beat up on the Yankees (!!). Who’d have thunk?

Swans Finally Get Their Prince

This weekend I am going to a wedding in Albuquerque. One of my dearest friends is getting married, and I am her maid-of-honor. This means I am not only packing the usual sundresses and sandals, but also emergency mimosa kits, extra safety pins, bachelorette party supplies, a Very Pink taffeta dress, and crap to inspire me to write a speech.

The speech scares me more than the penis paraphernalia. I am terrified of public speaking. If I write mindless babble on a blog, no one is forced to read it. But 150 of my Little Swan’s nearest and dearest are going to be forced to listen to me blather on in a cracking Minnie Mouse voice. (The cracking is due to nerves. Minnie is just me, au naturel.)

What to say…. We have some great stories. But I don’t know how much her family wants to hear about freshman puke fests, or how much her soon-to-be husband needs to hear about the escapades involving ripped but skanky cadets from the Air Force Academy, who were just down the street from our hippie college. Or the stripper our whole freshman hall went in on, together, and got her for her birthday that year. He was very odd, with his rip-away snap-up jeans. He also had some technical name for his thong, if I remember correctly.

I still have pictures.

Although I’m not sure I can slip them into the slideshow unnoticed.

Do I talk about the two of us meeting up in Italy and eating the equivalent of a small engagement ring’s worth of gelato? Do I mention our “dress up” phase, where we’d do an entire fashion shoot in our very best homecoming wear at her aunt and uncle’s house while they were out of town? Do I talk about how we passed up on wholesome backpacking adventures that the rest of our class went on, to spend four glorious days at the mall? Or the vicious slaughter of my dignity when she dragged me to ballet class?

So many memories. So few that are “wedding appropriate.”

Congratulations, Little Swan. I don’t know what I’m going to say. But should the topic of false idol worship come up at your wedding, I promise to keep any mentions of ritualistic blood sacrifices to our Audrey Hepburn and James Dean posters to a minimum.

Time to Invest in Earplugs

Last night The Funasaurus and I drifted off to sleep at about 10:30. Around 12:30, the phone rang. Thinking it was another prank call from King Soopers, I ignored the first couple of rings, until the paranoid part of my subconscious woke up, all, “DEAD RELATIVES!” “GAS LEAK!” “TATTOO INK RECALL!” “FLOOD OF BIBLICAL PROPORTIONS HOWEVER UNLIKELY SEEING AS HOW IT WAS NOT EVEN RAINING TWO HOURS AGO!”

So I bolted upright, dashed downstairs, and groped around until I found the phone buried under a pile of papers on the coffee table.

“Missed call: Emergency Notification.”

That didn’t do so much for my paranoia.

I went back upstairs and handed the phone to The Funasaurus, all, “DO SOMETHING!” while he stretched, wondering what the hell I was screeching about after only two decent hours of sleep.

“Is there a message? Check the messages!” I said, lobbing the phone in his general direction.

(Note to self: Maybe it’s time to bother to learn how to check the voicemail on our damn home phone.)

But no sooner did The Funasaurus hit talk, than the phone magically dialed a number and said something to the effect of, “You have been contacted about a possible emergency. Please turn on the T.V. or radio to listen to your local news.”

That was helpful.

So we went downstairs, The Funasaurus grabbed the remote, and I suddenly said, “What if it’s a gas leak?!?! You’re not supposed to turn on the T.V. if there’s a gas leak. If there’s even the tiniest spark, it will blow up our house and kitties and probably scorch the side of our neighbors house and THEN who will we watch American Idol with?”

The Funasaurus looked at me groggily, and I debated grabbing the cats and forcing him outside, to test the range of our remote control. Then I decided I was too tired to go back upstairs for decent pajama pants, and just turned on the T.V.

Fortunately, we did not blow up. And the local news station was playing Will & Grace reruns.

So we watched Will dish out the pithy commentary for a minute, before deciding that we really needed to DO something, because we were both too tired for Grace’s crisis du jour. So I called 911, which felt very official and simultaneously scandalous, even though it was a totally legitimate call.

“Officer Noddamyproblem speaking”

“Hi. Um. My name’s Cat. I live in this neighborhood. We were just woken up by an Emergency Notification call, but we don’t know what the emergency is.”

The officer took a minute.

“Oh, yes. It was a reverse 911 call. We’re sent them out to everyone in your neighborhood.”

He paused long enough for me to look outside and see no pending tornado or flood, as well as the dark windows of all of my neighbors who were smart enough to sleep through their emergency notification calls.

“There’s a missing child reported about five miles south of you.” And he proceeded with the description.

“Fine. Thanks, sir, if I see any eight-year-old males with a striped t-shirt and green shoes on my way back to bed, I will be sure to let you know.”

And The Funasaurus and I went back to bed, after peeking out the window to make sure no missing children happened to be wandering on our sidewalk at 1:00 AM.

Now I don’t take Amber Alerts lightly. I KNOW missing children are a Big Deal. But really, did they think it would be helpful to wake up an entire suburban neighborhood (well, at least me, see: smart neighbors, above) at 12:30 AM on a weeknight on the off-chance that the missing child would be spotted in the lamplight only five miles north of where he disappeared from?

And no, it wasn’t any major skin off of our back. But it did take me a while to get my adrenaline to calm down, before I was able to get back to sleep. And in that time, I decided to invent the caller ID that says, “You are not about to die, but we need you to be on the lookout for a missing kid.” I think it'll sell.

Tat the Cat

So, I did it. I was nervous, and worried that it wouldn’t happen for some reason, so I didn’t post on Friday, because I didn’t want to jinx it. I was sure the parlor would call and say they were overbooked, or that we’d hit horrendous traffic and be so late that they were closed, or something….

But everything went smoothly, and on Friday Shooting Star picked me up, and took me to get my tattoo. I've waited 10 years. 10 years. (Minus two days.) I decided I wanted a tattoo on my graduation night of high school, and I told myself I had to wait 10 years, because tattoos are very permanent, and if I still wanted one after 10 years, then I could get one. And I still wanted one. (Also: holy fuck, I graduated from high school a decade ago.)

So here’s a picture:



Isn’t it lovely? In your face, Angelina.

Ha ha!Just kidding, mom.

Here’s what I really got:



Edeweiss is hard core, too, right?

I realize the picture is ginormous, and you get to see every disgusting, irritated pore, but at least it gives the impression of being HUGE, when in actuality it's about the size of a ping-pong ball.

Edelweiss has a special meaning for me, it’s a small, seemingly delicate white flower that actually thrives in high alpine environments. And it’s the national flower of Switzerland, lest you forget my pre-princess aspirations, not to mention, my fond memories of the Swiss and their police stations. And while, yes, you might say, it’s very pretty, isn’t it rather, BLUE for a white flower?

And to you I would say, apparently YOU don’t know how tattoos work. (Neither do I, really, but I just found this out) that white is kind of not really do-able as skin art, and that you often do blue to represent the shadow of white, which, I guess I get, since snow in the shadow is definitely an icy blue color, and so my flower is just very… shadow-y.

Perhaps it is being shaded by a high alpine boulder, or something.

I don’t know. But I do love my new tat, I am feeling very proud of myself, especially when I just continued to sit there on the table, instead of running away screaming when the dude picked up the tattoo gun and jerry rigged it, sparks flying and everything, to drill. The dude (they were all dudes. “Men” seems insanely formal for someone with a devil goat skull next to a marching Grateful Dead bear on his elbow) on the other side of the room was like, “Ha ha, here’s what a normal one looks like,” and clipped it into place and it went “brrrrrrrr” all nice and smoothly, whereas MY dude’s little gun was going, “prrrt, prrtt, SPARK! SPARK! prrrrrrtt!” Fortunately, Shooting Star was there, talking wedding stuff, so I was nice and distracted and hoo boy those dudes could not get over the a) extreme whiteness of my skin ("She's paler than I am!" said the practically albino dude. Thanks, y'all. I get it.) b) the girliness of the two of us in their very dude-ly tattoo place.

So I spent most of the weekend admiring my (now swelling) ankle and working because holy crap, for a 35-hour a week job, I have been putting in an awful lot of time….

Too Bad They Don't Pay Me to be a Film Critic

In an unfortunate turn of events, my company has decided that I need to WORK in order to earn my paycheck, much to the detriment of my avid blogging and e-mailing life.

However, I have persisted in my stair climbing endeavors, and my hatred for anything exercise-y is manifesting itself in odd ways. My subconscious is displeased with my persistence with the whole get-back-in-shape idea. When I go downstairs, I almost start to panic. I feel like something is chasing me, which is actually great for getting my heart rate up quickly, but not so great for the leftover nectarines from lunch, which get horribly bruised in the rapid decent. The further down I go, the more relieved I feel, since I am further and further away from my floor of origination, thereby giving myself more and more space from my pursuer. As though if somebody were to be chasing me they could only start from the 14th floor. Impossible that they’d come in on the 5th.

Crap, I shouldn’t give my subconscious ideas.

Anywhos. So… I’ve apparently gone a little crazy, another point in favor of the fact that too much work is not good for you. More wine should be consumed on the average workday. ... I decree.

The Funasaurus took me to see this movie last night, which was better than I expected, and also more serious than I expected. But in a good way. The plot was more believeable than most good summer commedies. For example, I loved Wedding Crashers, but it really was almost ruined by the lack of plot and resolution. It was mostly just a vehicle for Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson’s witty and humorous repartee, which, you know, is awesome, but could only have been augmented by plot or character development, in my humble opinion.

And now I have to go back to work. Please send chardonnay.

The Princess Does Sonoma

I'm back. Grumpy about being awake this early, but I'm back.

California was a blast. I spent the weekend drinking a copious amount of wine, eating a copious amount of vegetables (for me, anyway, who normally thrives off of pretzels and cupcakes) and talking about everything under the sun with some amazing women. We crammed a lot in, but I still can't believe it's over, and I'm back to the real world, already.

We got in on Friday night, and managed to eat some fabulous Thai food in Berkeley, before going home and crashing, like the old ladies we are. The next morning, two of the women decided to go for a run, and although I brought my running shoes, I SO did not join them because one had just completed a triathlon and one still plays competitive soccer (after having played D1 in college) and so, no thank you, because I did not feel like being humiliated. They laughed like I was joking when I said it takes me more than 12 minutes to run a mile.

So I ate bread and very expensive organic orange marmalade, instead, while I waited for them to get back.

We then toured some wineries, ate at a delicious restaurant for dinner, and a different, even deliciouser restaurant for dessert. Even though we had to tackle a waitress to finally serve us. Please, miss, let us give you money for overpriced port and a slice of whatever desserts you have sitting in the back! Please!

Then we came home, and decided to try and rally because we could not wake up feeling proud of ourselves if we had gone to bed before ten two days in a row, on our very brief reunion. So we squeezed dinner and dessert into bikinis and headed out to the hot tub where we pruned ourselves discussing all 1,400 ways that GWB has screwed this country over.

When we came in, we weren't quite ready for bed, yet, so we rented THIS movie from OnDemand, and whooo boy. You can skip that one. I was all excited for Sofia Coppola's rendition, despite the fact that I hate Kirsten Dunst with a passion. DOESN'T ANYONE ELSE SEE THAT SHE PLAYS THE SAME CHARACTER OVER AND OVER AND OVER? SHE HAS ONE TIGHT-LIPPED, HALF-ASLEEP LOOK, whether she's being dropped from a very tall building by a nemisis of Spiderman, or gambling her way through 17th Century France! IT'S LIKE BLUE STEEL, EXCEPT NO ONE SEEMS TO BE MOCKING HER!

Anyway. The movie was not really good at all. It was just a montage of amazing costume changes, which, you know, great, but find a better model than ol' Kirsten.

Sunday we went for a little hike, did some more wine tasting, had a lovely BBQ with gorgeous veggies and homemade croutons topped off with the most gooey dessert ever... and then went to bed early since we had proven our still-youngness the night before.

I flew home, yesterday, and proceeded to get a verbal lashing from Sugar about my recent absence, and then a very reluctant snuggle. Then Tatum flew at us with crazy eyes, and I almost lost a pinkie.

Life is back to normal.

If Norway Doesn't Work Out, I Might Settle for Boston

I loooooved Boston. I tried to convince The Funasaurus that we should move there, but he said, “no.” I intend to bribe him with sex. It’s too fun of a city to pass up. (Although I vaguely remember thinking not-so-much when we went in early February and got caught in a snowstorm… eh.) I had a wonderful time, and immediately felt at home on the 14th floor of a gorgeous old building right in downtown, with beautiful New England-y architecture and columns, and marble, and yellow walls lined with pretty books. (I am working for a publisher again, although this time it’s more assistant-y stuff rather than the fun marketing/editorial stuff I did before, for those of you who were wondering in my last set of comments.) They day-to-day database maintenance may not be fun, but the people are, and when a publisher is able to put you up in a fancy-schmancy hotel, you know they're doing something right! I sat in the waiting room, on my first day, marveling at my good fortune and reapplying lip gloss because I’m sure that’s what really matters to the New England bookish crowd for about an hour and a half… until I realized I was done reading all the covers on the displays in the room, and wasn’t it a little odd that the woman who told me to be there at 8:30 had still not shown up by 10:00? The security desk (!) called someone else in the group, and a woman we’ll call Monique came and got me, apologizing profusely because Hester, the woman who was supposed to train me, had taken the day off. But Monique leaned over with a twinkling eye, her very red pageboy haircut swinging across her face dramatically, “WelcEHm to Baaahstin!” She led me through the mahogany (!) doors and up the elevator that required an ID badge (!) and said, “Dontchew werry, I’ll shew you the really important stuff. The cawfee room, the caeh-feh-teria, the vieuww…..” So we spent the day sipping our cawfee, sitting on the deck, admiring the skyline of Boston in 70-some degree weather with about half of the rest of the office that managed to trickle in sometime between 9 and 10 and I had found my home.

They let me go about 4:00, and suggested I go shopping on Newbury Street for the rest of the afternoon. And. You know. Who am I to turn down such a sensible suggestion? Hester came in the next day, with leathery skin, a moustache, a tight chignon, and the raspiest voice I’ve ever heard. She had taken two cigarette breaks by the time we got my computer up and running, and then we took a walk back to my hotel for a tour of the new ballroom because she’s also the event coordinator for the company. The ballroom was lovely, I turned down a 10:30 bloody mary, mostly because I could not juggle tomato juice plus celery stick AND my luggage (which I was dragging along, by this point) and by the time we got back to the office, we had just enough time to have another leisurely lunch on the deck, admiring the view, before I had to catch a cab back to the airport.

Now I'm off to California for a weekend of drinking and debauchery with pretty much the most fabulous women, ever.

This is the life for me.

Four Time Zones and Three Maxed Out Credit Cards

I have no idea where I am, or what time it is. I just had dinner with D, who is a resident of Boston, so I’m pretty sure I’m in Massachusetts. Yesterday I was in Omaha. Then Denver. Then I got up at o-fuck-thirty this morning and flew here. And then I pit stop in Denver on Thursday night to fly to California. I am tired, and out of money, between having to put the hotel on my card (oopsie in the hotel/company communications, the company gave them a card #, but they need the physical card to swipe to charge it, so in the meantime, I had to hand over mine) and the cute new LBD I just bought at THE TWO MALLS CONNECTED TO MY HOTEL VIA SEXY GLASS PASSAGEWAYS OH MY GOD.

Fortunately, I have to work, tomorrow, and will therefore be distracted from buying too many more pretty things at the mall that houses Dior, Jimmy Choo, and Louis Vuitton stores. Not that I went in many of them.

Here’s the secret, though. I’m terrified to go to work, tomorrow. I’m terrified they’re going to realize I have no idea what I’m doing, and they are going to think “Wow, big mistake on our part, much like her hotel payment mix up, what WERE we thinking, hiring her?” I have visions of them yanking my pretty hotel room away from me, and taking my crackImean, company-issued-desktop-with-wireless-access, and making me sit in the airport for the next 48 hours, until I can get on a plane going home. Which they will regret having paid for, seeing as how I have been no use at all, and just a complete drain on company resources.

Plus, if my incompetence doesn’t do it, my hair will. I spent the entire Memorial Day Weekend in Omaha, which is humid, and now I’m in Boston, which is humider, and my hair is FREAKING OUT. I look kind of like a large, fuzzy, elongated peach in a cute, new, LBD, at this point. I’m sure it would frighten the beejezus out of the nice Boston people who pay for me to fly out here and sit in a lovely hotel room and shop on my first afternoon here. I can see them saying, “Pretty dress. Too bad about the hair devouring her head and most of the air in a three foot radius around it.”

So that’s kind of what I’ve been up to.

AUGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

There was just a loud, terrifying noise outside my hotel room! I'm not sure I am conveying the scariness of it. I will go investigate and report back.

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That took freaking forever mostly because I forgot how to un-deadbolt the deadbolt. You would think that would be asininely simple, but then you underestimate my incompetence. Much like my employers.

Anyway. The noise that sounded like boulders mixed with marbles on a steel drum (or the thoughts of a faux-mouse looking into Tatum's crazy eyes right before being flung across the living room) turned out to be the ice machine, which is conveniently located about two steps from my door. So I suppose I have that to look forward to, tonight. Anybody want a sno-cone?

Fetch Me Some More Chai, Kitty

So I am sitting here at my new job, when I get an e-mail from a random person saying, “Hi, I’m your Very Important Boss’ friend, and I would like to take you to lunch. Would today work for you?”

And I write back, all blasé, “Well, I suppose. I am a little busy. It’s not like I’m sitting here in my very own office writing on my personal blog, or anything.”

Then I take a satisfied gulp of decaffeinated chai and SLOOSH, out it spills, all over my pale green shirt and (what else) my white pants. So I have just returned from the bathroom, and now I look like I’ve wet myself, on top of sporting the scent eau de starting-to-get-stale chai, for the rest of the day. I’m sure I’ll make a great first impression.

I blame Tatum.

Mostly because he spent the whole night fetching this piece of plastic that you have to tear off of the milk jugs that we have delivered every week. (I SO have a real milk box and milkman. Are you jealous?) For whatever reason, the softness of the plastic, the round, slightly mouse-esque shape, the bounce-ability factor, whatever, Tatum enjoys retrieving these things when there are no faux mice readily available. Now last night I was trying to sleep, and Tatum fetched one of these milk things and it landed on my face and I remember thinking, “This is not good, you should remove it,” and then thinking, “But I am SLEEPING” so I didn’t, and paid the price of one googly-eyed kitty pouncing on my eyeball.

That sucked.

So Tatum got the boot, and I hid the plastic thing under my pillow, which is often my solution for making his nocturnally fetched objects disappear. When I wake up in the morning I usually look under my pillow, because often there is a surprise, since I have become so good at confiscating fetchable crap mid-sleep. I have found hair ties, collar stays, string, pieces of Christmas trees, straws, leaves, and a mish-mash of other stuff.

So anyway. Tatum spent part of the night trying to play fetch with this thing, and pawing at my pillow because he is not always as dumb as he looks. This morning I rolled over, and the plastic thing poked out from under my pillow and Tatum pounced on that thing like a 13-year-old on a PlayStation. There was no sleeping in for me, Tatum was all, “Play!PLAY!PLAY!” So I finally conceded his victory, threw it a couple times, and began my morning routine.

Eventually I needed counter space in the bathroom, and Tatum would not give it to me, because Being in the Way is pretty much his favorite game ever. Besides fetch. So I hunted around for the plastic thing and threw it for him, and I swear that cat rolled his eyes and was like, “Bitch, please. I get a mouse in the morning. Now could you hurry it up?”

So I am currently hating Tatum. And I blame him entirely for the current state of my shirt and pants.

Princess Bubbles

Besides jogging, now, I have also started taking the stairs to my office, like every beginner exercise book or In Shape article will tell you to do. Unfortunately, I do not work on the third floor. I work on the eleventh floor. And if you have ever tried to hike 11 flights of stairs (upward, people, UPWARD) then you know what an excellent workout I am getting every morning. And sometimes after lunch. Although I've noticed my lunchtime excursions have limited themselves to the break room, as opposed to one of the many nearby restaurants, having now put the “stairs only” restriction upon myself. See, I'm even lazy enough to cheat the system when I create the system.

In any case, at least once a day, those stairs make me more out of breath than a 30 minute jog will. Every morning I tell myself, “Come on, it's not the Matterhorn. It's a staircase.”

And then myself always goes, “But isn't there a cozy little tram you can ride up the Matterhorn?”

So I've been good, and while I cannot feel the results, yet, I feel less guilty about entering BBQ season.

The Funasaurus was away playing volleyball last night, so I decided to treat myself to a bubble bath. Because, um, yum.

The only downside to a bubble bath is that you must clean the bathtub, first. A chore which has led me to decide, “I don't really want a bath THAT badly,” on any number of occasions.

But it was long overdue for a cleaning anyway, so with the help of Sugar and Tatum, I scrubbed the heck out of the bathtub, rinsed thoroughly, and retrieved some bubble bath goo from the nether regions of under-the-sink while the tub filled up with copious amounts of unnecessary warm water.

Al Gore and Laurie David be damned. At least I recycle.

So I soaked in the tub for a good 40 minutes, at first being nervous about any remaining Lysol going up my bum, or sticking to my hair despite the OCD rinsing I gave each section of the tub. (I am a germaphobe who's scared of chemicals. It's been a tricky life.) Once I was sufficiently dehydrated and soggy all at the same time, I got out and curled up in bed. I do not remember the rest of the night, but I am all mushy and happy-feeling, today.

Maybe even too mushy for 11 flights of stairs...?

It's Not Easy, Being Lilac

This weekend I took The Funasaurus tux-shopping, for the wedding. We had to make our reservation and pick out colors and styles. For any of the groomsmen who might read this blog (ha ha) you should know you have a good friend in The Funasaurus. I fought mightily for the lilac (read: shiny lavender) vests with a swirly flower pattern, but The Funasaurus adamantly vetoed those, despite how well they would have matched my sash.

He also vetoed the chocolate brown tuxes, opting for a more traditional black. Whatever. I thought that would have been pretty pimpin', but The Funasaurus, I found out, is fairly pimpin' adverse.

We also spent the better part of the weekend listening to the radio and mix CDs, trying to pick a first dance song. We have the same taste in china patterns (classic) and sofas (comfy) but when it comes to music our tastes diverge drastically. Mostly because I like good music, and he likes Journey.

We can agree on Bon Jovi, at least, (though I think it's pretty un-American to NOT like Bon Jovi, I'm pretty sure it's written into The Constitution somewhere) but as we listened to the lyrics of “Always”, we realized that “unrequited love” was not quite the theme we wanted to start our marriage off on.

Then, last night, “She Drives Me Crazy” came on the radio, and I jumped up all, “I have a version of this song sung by Kermit!” (Who is pretty much my hero. I grew up with the Muppets, and developed a rather strong attachment to the fuzzy green frog. Ask my roommate from college about the posters, collectors items, mouse pads, sippy straws, mugs, and.... better yet, don't. We've just started talking, again.) Having met The Funasaurus in college, he knows something of my affection for Kermit. So when I told him that it would be just so perfect and fitting for Kermit to sing our first dance song, he said, “That's fine, baby. If you want Kermit to sing our first dance song, then we can do it.”

And I began to get teary eyed, thinking of the perfectness of it all.

“I mean, it's not like people will laugh at us, or anything,” he added.

And he wonders why he didn't get any, last night.

Running on Empty

Since “sausuage coming out of pressurized can” is not exactly the image I want people to associate with me in my wedding dress, I took my fitting as a wake-up call and have begun jogging again. Which I hate. If you do not know how much I hate it, go here. That is how much.

So this morning I got up with the alarm, The Funasaurus was kind enough to shut it off and grab my pillow from me, before turning over and going back to sleep, so I begrudgingly got ready and got out the door. I've been telling myself it's o.k. to go slow, that I don't need to break any personal records in time or distance just yet, that I need to be realistic to sustain this. But I was feeling pretty good, and putting along at what felt like a good rate, when I saw a shadow behind me. Now, the sun was just coming up, so the shadow, I knew, would be long. However it still took it about .0002 seconds to grow taller than my shadow, and then this lovely woman comes speeding past me like a Ferrari on an open course. I am horrified- she was not even out of breath, all, “Good morning!”-ing me as she raced by as though I was standing still. But as she ran ahead of me, I noticed she had one of those zero-fat bodies, and extremely muscular legs, underneath an expensive-looking sweat-removing-type runner outfit thing-y. No wonder her “jog” was as fast as a sprint. I imagine she's an Olymipic athlete, probably.

So I don't feel bad until the older, larger woman in grey sweatpants and a dingy t-shirt comes flying past, all, “Good Morning!” me as well. She was barely speed-walking, and she lapped me like a racehorse.

At that point I began to think that perhaps I should upgrade my visor to a fucking paper bag so that I am utterly unrecognizable in my apparently track-and-field-happy neighborhood.

Fortunately someone's sprinklers were on, on my way home, so I ran through them, screwthegrass, the water felt good, and for a split second I was tempted to try out an old slipe-and-slide move on their perfectly manicured lawn. I decided against it, (mostly due to the shuddering in my kneecaps) but even just considering the deviant maneuver made me feel a bit better.

Of course, I've also been having jaw issues, as in waking up with a very sore jaw, and eventually The Funasaurus had commented that perhaps it was due to the fact that I am “clanging” my teeth at night (apparently not just grinding, but clanging) so I have also recently invested in a mouth guard to sleep in. Which, you know, has done wonders for my self-image as well.

T.G.I.F.

Love,
The Epitome of Cool Herself,
P.i.G.

Shouldn't a Princess Have a Limo with a Chauffeur?

Last night I went to a happy hour with a girlfriend from Sweden. (That bit of information, I realize, is not that important. But I just like typing Sweden. Try it. It's fun. ... Seriously. Sweden. SwedenSwedenSweden.)

So we got half price glasses of wine, and a small pizza appetizer, and began to talk about things like pedicures and boys and trips to Norway. Well, that kind of thing makes me so happy, naturally we went for glass #2. And I kept running to refill my meter. On my second trip to the meter, I noticed, “Woah, there's the wine!” as I barely avoided a head-on collision with a railing. So on my way back into the restaurant, I had a very stern talk with myself.

Me: You are going to have to drive. You cannot be drunk. You must stop drinking now.

Self: But... wine! Sweden! Norway.

Me: Yes, but a DUI probably does nothing for getting you to Norway faster.

Self: ... I don't see the connection.

Me: Naturally, you wouldn't. You are drunk.

Self: True. But., then, wouldn't you be drunk, too?

Me: Erm.

Self: Ah-hah! You DON'T see the connection, either, you drunken no-sense maker!

Me: I'm sure there's a connection, somehow! Drinking and driving are not good combination.

Self: I know. But let's just finish this nice little glass of chardonnay, and we'll order some water, o.k.?

Me: Well, that sounds like a good compromise. Maybe we could get a little calamari, too.

So I went back in, but actually did not finish the wine. I was really feeling it, and knew it would take a while to wear off. I have become something of a lightweight. That is not good for my street cred, but I was actually relieved when we realized that my friend had missed her bus because we had been chatting too long, and I was going to have to give her a ride home.

I hate having to be reasonable when I am having a good time. Especially when I am drinking. It is a huge, internal conflict of interest. The obvious solution is that I must build up my tolerance, again. It will take discipline and training, but I am ready.

I am also thinking I should look into the local bus system. I want to support public transportation, and maybe if I am drunk the ghetto route to my house will seem less sketchy. Of course, that will not help either me or my poor Swedish friend the next time we get to talking and BOTH of us miss the bus. Maybe that'll just be a sign to stay for some more calamari.

We Spiked the Punch, So We Think We Can Dance

The Funasaurus thinks I should write about my unnatural excitement for the upcoming season of So You Think You Can Dance.

I say, no, I shan't write about my “unnatural excitement,” because that's just silly. It's silly, because it's the most natural thing in the world. Young adults doing skippy little foxtrots and waltzes and hip hop in ways I could only dream of? It's SO much better than Dancing With Celebrities Whose Days Have Long Since Been Over. The pure skill, the uniqueness of the routines, the slight humility... it's all so much better!

Plus, American Idol is almost over, and I want to start a new weekly dinner and T.V. routine with our fabulous neighbors (hi, Leah!) because it forces us to cook instead of going to Subway for the third time this week. Last week I even made scallops, and no one died, or choked, or anything!

Last night I was feeling a little down, and searching for positive reinforcement from The Funasaurus, who is always willing to comply, as long as the Broncos or Scrubs are not on. So we're lying in bed, and he said I should be happy because I'm, “Fantabulous” and while I can hardly disagree, I laughed it off, because the editor in me was like, “Um, not so sure of the grammatical correctness of, 'Fantabulous'.” So I went to pick his nose, a little something I do just to annoy the crap out of him after he's been nice.

I know how to woo 'em, baby.

So as he pulled my still-booger-free finger away from his face, The Funasaurus looked at me gravely and said, “But THAT is why you're not fantasmigoric.”

“Fantasmi...? ... I'm not?”

He shook his head.

“But you are?”

“Baby. Of course I'm fantasmigoric. I'm drinking fantasmigoric punch,” he explained.

* * * * *

If any of you need to up your fantasmigoric quotient, apparently The Funasaurus is the man to see. Maybe he'll let you have some of his punch.

Utter Darkness and a Strung-Out Sugar

So homegirl Sugar had to go back to the vet, yesterday, for some dental work. Homegirl now kinda looks like homeless girl, because she had to get three teeth removed!

Sugar is pissed. Pissed at the world, and pretty much everyone.

But she doesn't know this, yet, because Sugar is on pain medication. And Sugar reacts to hard-core pain meds as much as anyone would. She's enjoying the hell out of them! Her pupils are dilated, she's rolling around on the floor in ecstasy, she wants her cuddling rough. Apparently kitty pain meds are similar to kitty coke.

Meanwhile I get the lovely task of sticking a syringe in her mouth twice a day, to keep the high going, and then I get to start brushing her teeth every day. For the rest of her life.

I told the vet I valued my fingers, and he laughed like I was joking.

Seriously, though, dude. Typing is going to suck if Sugar has bitten most of my fingertips off.

So the first part of my first day on the job involved taking Sugar to the vet, Very Early.

The second part involved stressing about serious traffic jams and Sugar's reaction to anesthesia.

The third part involved sitting on the phone for half an hour, listening to the computer help desks' wait music, because my computer wouldn't dock correctly.

The fourth part involved complete and utter blackness, in which I perhaps squealed just a little bit. Fortunately, I found my cell phone on my desk, and with its display light, managed to get myself out into the hall where I could actually see, due to the fact that the offices on the OUTSIDE of the hall actually have windows.

The fifth part involved hanging out in said hallways and offices with windows, waiting for the P.A. announcement that said we were having a power outage (no shit, huh?) and that we could expect it to be at least another two to four hours before the lights came back on.

The sixth part involved me gathering up the (still not functioning) computer by the light of my trusty cell phone display, and hiking down 11 flights of stairs.

The seventh part involved sitting on the phone for ANOTHER half hour with the computer help desk, once I got home, trying to establish a network connection.

The rest of my day was a blur of spreadsheets and cracked out kitties. Tatum didn't recognize Sugar when we brought her home, and he was scared of the wide-eyed crack kitty, so he retrated into a corner and hissed. Sugar was so high she didn't really notice, but she did think it was funny that the normally very aggressive and rough-and-tumble boy was acting so skittish. So she chased him around the house, looking kind of surprised (but who can really tell if it was surprise or just drugs with such dilated pupils) that he would run away. So she spent the rest of the evening asserting her newfound dominance and rolling on the floor with pleasure. Maybe having a few teeth out isn't all bad.

Princesses Require Air Conditioning. And Low-Fat Ice Cream.

So I am back from Tucson. If you ever have the chance to go... don't bother. Unless you feel the need to run from over-conditioned hotels to air-conditioned cars trying to beat your sweat glands before they realize that HOLY FUCK it's 99 degrees out, and it's only May!

Also, go if you want to deal with lots of old people driving like REALLY old people.

Get off the damn road and let us youngin's drive. You don't get two lanes just because you're old enough to have babysat my grandmother.

The training was fine, although the woman who was training me was more into showing off 5 foot high piles of spreadsheets that she has compiled for my boss in the past, than she was into showing me how to actually retrieve the reports I would need. When I asked what time I should get there in the morning, she was like, “Oh, whenever....” so I asked what time she normally started to work, and she said, “Oh, about quarter to five.”

....

“A.M.?” I finally squeaked.

“Yes! But you can show up whenever. I'm something of a workaholic,” she added, kindly. Which was the biggest, fattest understatement of THE YEAR, as I came to understand, seeing as how she's on the computer all night and all weekend, just doing reports and triple-checking everyone else's work. Given that we are doing basically the same job, I am a little nervous that she has set the bar rather high for the amount of work that can be expected out of a supposed 35 hour work week. We'll see. I am debating setting up a cot in my new office, just in case.

And possibly importing a case of Jamo to keep me company as I sludge my way through an endless amount of sales reports.

The hotel, I must give props to, however, because they use halogen bulbs in their lamps, instead of 60 watts. Go conservation! Unfortunately, they only had two lamps in the whole room, neither of which gave off as much light as a 60 watt bulb (or so it felt) so from about 7:00 P.M. on, I was in darkness.

But I did manage to make it through most of PopCo, despite the lack of light, and it is really good, so far. Much better than I expected. If you are all about deep, illegal-substance-induced conversations about conspiracy theories, big brother, and mathematical theorems, this book is for you!

This weekend was going to be fun. Saturday I went to try on my... dum dum dum, wedding dress, which just arrived! Hooray! I was a pretty pretty princess, in a pretty pretty gown... except apparently there's been a few too many crème soufles (or trips to Cold Stone) in the kingdom, and the pretty pretty princess has turned into quite a plump princess, and while this does wonders for my boobs (they grew! For the first time EVER! SCORE!), I was barely able to squeeze into the most important dress I will ever wear in my whole life. I came smooshing out at all the wrong points.

Ew.

“Can you let it out?” asked my mother, carefully.

“Erm,” said the saleswoman, looking at the intricate French lace on the bodice.

“Ha ha,” I said, wishing to die, right there on the pedestal, in front of all of the other stupidly perfect and skinny brides walking through the salon, JUDGING. Because that is what they do. That is how it works. You do your hair and makeup extra prettily, and then go in and look at dresses, supposedly focusing on the ones on the rack, but really just scoping out the women in the 3-way mirrors, taking copious mental notes of exactly what You Will Certainly Not Do, once you are on the pedestal, yourself.

So that wasn't IDEAL, but I suppose I get to spend the summer losing extra poundage. Perhaps that will happen naturally from hauling 10 metric tons of Excel spreadsheets to the recycling bin in the new office, every day.

I can hope.

Sleeping In and Almost-Dead Kitties

Today was my first day on the job. My boss suggested I arrive no earlier than 10:00 A.M., seeing as how he didn't plan on being there any earlier. I was agreeable. Then he took me out to a nice lunch. Then we figured out how to log in to my computer. Then he said he was going home for the day, and that I should do the same, since there wasn't much to do, and to have a nice trip tomorrow.

So at 2:00 I came home.

First day? Not so rough.

Except for Tatum. Who almost made me miss the glorious experience of a very difficult day at my best-paying job ever.

When I woke up this morning with the alarm, there was no crack kitty bouncing off the walls going, “MOUSE MOUSE MOUSE GIMME GIMME GIMME!” Instead, a sedate little kitten with sleepy eyes peered at me from under the covers where he had apparently snuggled with my armpit all night.

Sick monkey.

So I got up and took a shower, and was surprised at the lack of batting that normally comes from a Tatum bouncing between the shower curtain and liner, because apparently he thinks there is a chance I will produce a furry little mouse toy from my wet and steamy tile chamber.

When I got out of the shower, I left the towel and peered into the bedroom, looking to see if The Funasaurus had gotten up and taken care of the little ball of psychoticness. But no, The Funasaurus was fast asleep, with a little Tatum right next to him. I hissed his name, and slowly, his little head turned like an ancient turtle, and looked at me with big, sad eyes.

Something was NOT RIGHT.

I went downstairs, naked, in search of the cat toy that will normally make Tatum jump around with dilated pupils. No response. I went back upstairs, and the eyes looked at me, all, “Sadly, we are dying, and can no longer play with that little toy.”

And then my heart broke.

Ker-plunk.

So I put the mouse in front of his nose, and he sniffed at it sadly, and then laid his little head down, in an act of pure agony.

I fought back tears, hating myself, the vet, the car, and anything else that could have ever possibly traumatized my poor little angel. When I tried to pick him up and he squealed in pain, I ran for the phone, and called the vet, swearing to quit the job I had not yet really even begun. The vet assured me it was probably just a reaction to the vaccine, yesterday, and as long as he wasn't puking or hyperventilating, he would probably be just fine.

I was not so sure, and made The Funasaurus swear on his my, and his mom's life that he would come home at lunchtime to check in on our darling baby. Litigation be damned.

And he did, bless his heart. Which is reason #692 I am going to marry him.

Meanwhile, Tatum continued to look Very Sad, and curled up in a corner, resting his weary head on the ridge of the cat tree, making me want to kill myself if only it would lessen his apparent pain.

Sugar snored through the whole thing, all, "How nice that I am not being chewed upon as usual."

The Funasaurus convinced me I should probably try out work, that he would call at lunchtime, and I finally left, after four (not even kidding) about-faces from the garage, to go back in and check on Tatum one last time.

Fortunately, my day at work went well (see above) The Funasaurus did come home at lunch, and I got home around 2:30. And Tatum looked a little better. He was moving slowly.

And by the time our neighbors came over for dinner, he decided to crawl up the back of J's shirt, like the evil little hellion we all know and love.

They seemed a little incredulous that his darling little pokey clawed self was really all that out of sorts, EVER, but I assured them that he most certainly was. Then I plied them with alcohol.

Now I am off to Tucson for training. See you all on Friday night!

Animal Torture

On Sunday The Funasaurus had to work, so I had the brilliant (?) idea to take a little (three mile) stroll to Einstein Bagels and get us a little breakfast while he furiously wrote an 11 page memo. Because, well, he is weirdly capable of writing an 11 page memo on a glorious Sunday morning. And I was craving a strawberry bagel.

So I take my cell phone, because as nice as the fresh air and nature are, I am not sure I can entertain myself the whole way. On the other hand, I am very aware of THE BEES, now, so I walked a good two blocks before I broke down and called M out of sheer boredom.

We had a great conversation, M was in the middle of explaining how her darling daughter has developed a little chomping habit (as in, chomping on mom's hand when things don't go her way) as I walked through a green park when suddenly I saw a wolf running towards me.

So. That's kind of unnerving. I mean, I was in a park, surrounded by suburbia. I looked around, hoping the wolf was perhaps, you know, tame, and being followed by a human with an invisible leash. Sadly, the wolf and I were alone on the green belt (since the miniature trees and struggling weeds surrounded by sidewalks and houses can barely be construed as a “park”) and it was barreling towards me, gnashing its teeth. (That, or panting, seeing as how it was in quite the gallop. But I have a tendency for fearing the worst.)

“Hi puppy,” I offered, telling myself to suck it up, at least Red Riding Hood-esque would be a novel (ha ha, I kill myself) way to go.

“What?” said M, probably confused as to my sudden canine greeting, in the midst of her story about her daughter in the bathtub.

I let her go on, as I continued to imagine my death by fangs. As it got closer, though, I realized that it was not a wolf, but a long-legged, very wet husky. The drenched, matted fur just made his long legs look even longer and svelte.

Well, sweet. I used to have a dog that was part-malamute. I can handle big snow dogs. I just can't handle the wild packs of hungry carnivores. So the very wet husky came over and shook himself at me, drenching my cute white shoes, but otherwise leaving me fairly unscathed. He followed me for a while, and I got a dirty look from a passing family, as though I was the owner of this disgraceful, un-leashed dog. And while: not mine, folks! I almost wished he was, because I'm pretty sure I saw their purebred poodle ROLL HIS EYES at us. Soak him, Fang. (For at this point, I had named him.)

So that was the main event of my weekend. Other than being taken to the aquarium by The Funasaurus for dinner, which, admittedly, I wasn't sure what to expect, but I have to say, it's kind of thrilling to look at the fish, and then eat them. It was really fun. They even have seahorses now, which are like, my favoritest animal ever. (Next to goats, belugas, my cats, and penguins.) So I'm always excited to see some swimming around, floating from algae to algae stalk, mating for life, and whatnot.

Unfortunately, today was much worse, starting with a trip to the vet, for which Sugar has still not forgiven me. Tatum was so scared I actually felt bad for the little, stiff lump of what is normally pure evil, but today was just a shivering pile of unbearably pitiful cuteness. Although he was easy to trick, the vet offered him a mushy bit of meat-flavored goo, and the goat in him came out and was like, “oooh, yummy!” as the vet poked him in the butt with the rabies shot. He didn't even notice.

Sugar, on the other hand, NOTICED.

And fuck y'all, Sugar was GOING HOME, so HELP HER! motherfuckers.

Oh she was a very angry kitty. And kept escaping into her traveling crate, and I kept trying to coax her out, all, “Here princess! Here, Kitty Kitty!” And the vet tech, after about attempt #462 got a wee bit impatient, and was a little more... firm, and yanked her out by the scruff of her neck which IS SO NOT HOW SUGAR ROLLS, and Sugar proceeded to cuss that bitch out, which was hysterical, but I couldn't laugh because of the daggers of death that she was shooting me from her over sized big brown pupils. So I snickered, instead, and Sugar has decided to hate me forevermore.

Which, you know, sucks. Because I love her, and like to cuddle her, although she is having None of It right now, and even turned her back on me when I turned on her little heat pad that she likes to rest on. But I have decided to do Not Much about it, because she has to go back next week to get her teeth cleaned, and hoo boy, I am so not sure she will come home with me after that.

Poor thing. If only she knew, she would have WILLED that wet dog into being the famished, princess-hungry wolf that I had originally imagined it to be.

Snobby Princess

Last night The Funasaurus and I ordered Chinese. We got sesame chicken, because, well, what else do you get?

It arrived, and we set about opening our greasy white boxes with wire handles. (Seriously, does anyone actually USE those handles?) The lo mein looked perfect, the wantons were crispy. The sesame chicken was... not so sesame-y. It was a box of dry-ish looking fried chicken. We discovered the sauce and crispy noodles at the bottom, and set about mixing it all up. We got most of the chicken coated, but when we sat down to eat, we realized it just wasn't quite the same. Not bad, actually very tasty, but just different.

And then it hit us.

We knew what it tasted like.

Dark meat Chicken McNuggets.

The Atlantis of McDonalds, the lost paradise, never to be seen again in the name of “nutrition.”

Did no one else find that a bit oxymoronic? I do not think McDonalds should worry their pretty little felt redheads about nutrients and low-fat anything. That is not why they are beloved. They can add all the salads and hippie breakfasts they want, but I felt it was (ironically) a very dark day, the day they took the dark meat Chicken McNuggets away. Those were my favorite. I used to break my McNuggets apart, as a kid, and figure out which ones were dark meat and save them for last, because I loved them so. I could not believe someone somewhere in the McEmpire thought it would be a good idea to do away with them.

I even wrote a letter. (I did.) But somehow it did not have the sway I was hoping for. They have not returned. So I boycotted McDonalds for quite a long while. I used to go pretty regularly, even if it was just for a 6 piece Chicken McNugget, but NO MORE.

Well, until I got hungry one day, and decided my one-woman protest hardly seemed to be having the devastating impact I had planned on, and went for fries. Because, lord help me, but I do love me some McD's french fries. They are the best.

And I am something of a fry snob. I do not just like any fries. I think most fast food fries are a joke. But there is just something about the thought of fabulously greasy, un-food-like nature of McDonalds fries that makes my little heart skip with joy. (Or maybe it's a clogged artery. Whatever.)

And I came to THAT brilliant realization this morning because the talk radio station that The Funasaurus listens to in the morning was talking about how we are all snobs about something. And they were asking their listeners to call in with their snobberies. At first, I thought maybe mine was wine. But then I realized I'm something more of a wine whore. Not really so snobby at all. While I can appreciate an old Chateauneuf du Papes as well as the next sommelier, I also like me some cheap house pinot. I do not care, I just love fermented grapes. Any color, price, or age. It does not matter. (Except for white zin. Even I don't stoop that low.)

So it took me a minute to realize that my real snobbery is more along the lines of fries. I care very much about my fried potatoes, and hold enormously high standards. Only mass produced frozen deep fried ones will do.

I have also been known to turn up my nose at certain brands of American chocolate.

Perpetuating the conversation from the radio show that I don't really like, what are you snobby about? T.V.? Sports? Unicorns? Tell me.

Snotty Employed Princess

As I lay in bed on Friday, pondering the wonders of phlegm (seeing as how my sore throat had turned into a raging sinus infection) and feeling overall very weary and sick, I hear a peculiar noise, seemingly coming from my stomach.

HAA-AAACH-KGRHK

?

My stomach does not feel ill.

HEERR-EECCK

!

That was definitely not my stomach. That was coming from under the bed.

Heave

HHAARRR-HARRRCHH!

I pull my woozy body out of bed, and crouch on the floor on my aching knees. (My knees ache with a sinus infection. I don't know why.)

And I come face-to-face with a surprised-looking Tatum, who is in the process of coughing up his very first hairball. What he lacked in consistency, he is making up for in quantity. He appeared to be emptying out anything that was not attached to his skin. He seemed confused, as to whether he should be embarrassed or proud.

HEEEEGGGGGG!

I realize my hand is damp, having placed it in Tatum's first attempt, before he retreated further under our bed to continue spewing everything disgusting that can come out of an animal.

So me and my inflated and tender nostrils went and found paper towels and Resolve, and began cleaning.

It was an auspicious start, but fortunately, the rest of the weekend went much better, and even included a wine tasting at my parents' house, although I did not get the full benefit of it since I was severely doped up on decongestants and about halfway into my third glass I began to feel really weird.

Alcohol and drugs don't mix, kids. For a while it's fun. Then you feel oddly lightheaded and miss half the party by laying on your parents bed while the rest of the people in your life continue to get drunk without you.

Sigh

Monday I went for an interview at 9:00AM, and when I got home around 11:00 the phone rang and it was HR saying the job was mine! I'm back to being a contributing member of society!!! How fabulous! And it's even in book publishing. Who knew there'd be so many opportunities in Denver, Colorado? The commute, benefits, and pay all trump the previous gig, so I'm already feeling good. Plus, they believe in lunch. I'm worried they must have a skeleton in the closet, it sounds too good to be true. But I'll take it, and even be able to pay for my lunch while I'm at it.