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I was excited to know that the Goddess Festival CDs were on the way and thought about how happy my mother would be to know that I’m on it. And that got me thinking about a time in fourth grade that not only shows one of my favorite sides of my mom, but also kind of explains why I am the way I am.
One of my fourth grade teachers submitted me for the school’s gifted and talented program. I got to sit in a little side area and fill out a test that, in retrospect, would have said more about me if it asked what the test had to do with being gifted and/or talented. Because I still don’t know. The man who was in charge of the program then looked over my test and called me and my mother into a conference.
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Last weekend I got to join my buddies Jori Costello and Niki O’Brien on a Big Bad Gina tour of Kansas City, Missouri. Jori was looking at playing five shows in three days so we were determined to have some fun while we were at it. We drove down a night early and checked in to the Super Inn Hotel.
It looked ok from the outside. In the dark. Late at night. So we entered.
The first thing we noticed was the smell in the unheated hallway. I’m not sure what it was, but it wasn’t pretty. Still we thought we’d give the rooms a shot. Maybe one of the other guests had simply had way too much barbecue.
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There’s part of this that will only make sense to my cousin Stacy, but believe me, if you’d been here, you’d laugh.
On Sunday, I grilled a week’s worth of chicken and pork chops so I could just warm stuff up for dinner. When I got home I put some stuff together and thought to myself, “if Stacy was still here I could just sit in the living room and food would appear.” As if to put an exclamation point on my misery, the microwave decided to shoot sparks.
It only scared the crap out of me the first time. The second and third time I expected it. I can be a little slow sometimes…or maybe I’m still a little pyromaniac at heart. Regardless, it became obvious I’d have to take the thing back to Wal-Mart, so into the car we went.
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My neighbor has two wonderful, spoiled Basset hounds. This week his mother-in-law is staying over and with her came her itty bitty wraith of a dog, Cookie.
Cookie might be eight inches tall. Maybe. She appears to be some sort of bug eyed breed and often bounces when she barks. She’s also quite adorable in her “I really want to be a dog” way. The best part about her though is her bark. She opens her little mouth as wide as she can, and she goes, “ret!”
Picture that in the smallest and brightest font imaginable. Ret. Not arf. Not woof. Ret. What I love about it is what happens when I come home and Barley and Bella, the lovable Bassets, see me get out of my car. They always feel the need to let me know they see me, because they love their auntie Chris (and her once a month goodie bags from Petco). Well Cookie is not to be outdone, so now I get treated to the Hilarious Bark Brigade, as the dog wraith tries to match wits with the Thunder Dogs:
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Customer service at Google is obnoxious if you’re a webmaster. First they direct you to a specific page in order to make contact with them. On this page you can’t write a single thing, you just pick a bunch of options somewhat in the vicinity of your problem, wait for them to respond with the wrong answer, and then email back with your complete question.
It would be fine if they then actually answered the question. But they don’t. They may answer a completely unrelated question, or tell you to do the things you just told them you already did. It would be like emailing Disney and having this conversation.
Part one: submit form letting them know you have questions about Mickey Mouse.
First response: “Thank you for contacting Disney. You can see Mickey at any Walk Disney store or theme park.”
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I’ve ranted before, sometimes in an amusing way, about those long side effect tirades you hear in drug commercials. Stuff like, “some side effects may include headache, nausea, hives, exploding eardrums, purple skin and loss of hearing.” Of course, your left eye will no longer itch, so it’s all good, right?
Well tonight a Chantix commercial came on and I know I heard the guy say, though not in these exact words, “do not take Chantix if you’ve experienced a previous adverse event while taking Chantix.”
What he just said is, “don’t take this if we’ve ever screwed you up before.” Him saying it is one thing, but they obviously believe they have to, which means they think their users are people who would honestly say, “well, the last time I used this I got severe hives, migraines and suicidal thoughts. Hmmm. I think I’ll take it again.”
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For years I have owned one wearable semi-decent button-front shirt. This is partially because I apparently have a body shape that no one else has, and partly because of my absolute loathing of all things clothes shopping. I do have one other nice shirt, but it’s in storage until I lose 40 more pounds. Usually my limited wardrobe is not a problem, but two events conspired to force me into a department store:
1. My second cousin’s upcoming wedding
2. My one decent shirt ending up as one of Buddy’s new favorite chew rags
A word to the wise: if you purposely clean one room so your shepherd/corgi/husky mutt can’t possibly find anything to chew on in the whole four minutes he will be left alone there, he will invent ways to find something other than the toy you provided for him. In my case, Bud found my one shirt and proceeded, in less than 60 seconds, to shred it for me.
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I’ve had kidney stones twice, and both times I ended up in the hospital (this will get funny in a minute). The first time, they pumped me full of a couple painkillers and then sent me home on morphine. As much as I’d love to tell the story of what happened that night, I really don’t remember much. I remember sitting with my neighbor in the ER as the first painkillers kicked in, looking at a sign on the door, and going on and on about how badly edited it was. I mean, come on, a hospital has to have one person who can write a short paragraph with decent grammar, right?
Yeah, I’m that annoying sometimes. I’m not a grammar perfectionist (as my own writing can tell you) but this is just wrong: ”Due to the flu outbrake, we ask that Patients should stay in there room.” The sign didn’t say that exactly but since I don’t remember the sign exactly anymore, this is a good approximation.
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I have to admit to something some of you might consider a bit silly – I just got contact lenses again for no reason other than to wear sunglasses. It’s not a hatred of my glasses; it’s not an obsession over constantly pushing them up on my face. Nope, I only got contacts so I could wear sunglasses. Why? Because sunglasses are awesome, and here’s why.
1. You can stare openly at people and they will never know for sure. No more looking off to the side while driving behind someone so they know I’m not staring. I now greatly enjoy staring directly at the back of the driver’s head. I swear I’m not a stalker, and I have no idea why I enjoy it so much. I just do.
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I blame the rapid growth of technology, though it may all be Paris Hilton’s fault. I don’t why, but I just had a Kathy Griffin-esque urge to blame it on Paris. Regardless of whether it’s the doing of that overly blond, overly tall “socialite” or not, I came to the conclusion today that I am officially….THAT age.
I have reached a weird go-between point (a first of many, I’m sure). I can clearly remember times when I honestly thought I knew what I was talking about, but when I hear 18 year olds now say the same things I did then, I think they might be slightly retarded. Not long ago, all the people I liked on television were older than me, something to aspire to (or fantasize about). Now all my favorite wrestlers are in their early 20s…I’m in older sister and aunt territory! And as for the fantasizing, now it just seems kind of dirty. Like I might soon be tempted into entering cougar territory. Yikes.
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More stuff to see...
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