Get On The Bus

I'm sitting on the Fung Wah bus (aka Chinese bus) to New York. It's only $15 per person so we thought it would be better than the train, although for that price, I have to admit I was kind of expecting a bus with chickens in crates interspersed along the ceiling, and let's not forget uncomfortable, cramped seats.

I'm pleasantly surprised to find it's more like a Greyhound. It is crowded; D and I are sitting across from each other. He's sleeping. He must be really tired; normally he can't sleep in moving vehicles.

I was particularly proud of us for making our bus on time. I thought I had the transit system figured out and we had plenty of time, but the train stop by Rachel's house is an outbound only, when we wanted inbound. We actually managed to walk to the next train station, catch the train and walk to the bus station (stopping along the way for some quick breakfast a la Dunkin' Donuts). And we made it!

Now for New Year's in New York. Should be interesting...

Killing Time

I'm leaving for my Boston/NYC trip at 1 a.m. tomorrow morning.

The house has been cleaned and prepped for the housesitter.

I am packed, except for a few last-minute things I'll throw in before I leave -- like my toothbrush. I'm planning on sleeping through the flight, so I'm sure I'll want to brush my teeth before I leave. Better not forget that!

Other than that ... I'm kinda bored. Waiting for said housesitter to get here so we can maybe grab some dinner and then chill till it's time to leave!

Christmas Eve

I just got back from my mom's house; we did Christmas tonight instead of tomorrow because she has to work.

And it was nice. We ate dinner; Mom and I poured ourselves some wine; and we did the traditional present-opening in a circle. I think my fam liked the gifts I got for them, and they definitely hooked me up with some stuff I didn't know I needed until I had it.

But. It seemed strange ... stranger than it was last year, maybe, even. My dad wasn't there keeping track of whose turn it was and snapping pictures (from which I hid incessantly ... I mean, honestly, who takes a picture on Christmas morning when you've all just rolled out of bed? Well, lots of people, probably. I guess I don't have much of a point, but I am notorious in my family for hating/refusing to have my picture taken.).

I never really noticed before that it was different on the holidays after a loved one dies. To me it seemed like any other day to begin with -- I miss him every day; I think about him every day. This was something more. Maybe it takes longer for your brain (or your emotions) to register that someone's not around during a time of year when people really value and cherish the connections between them.

There's a wonderful image in The Power of One (Bryce Courtenay; awesome read if you ever get the chance, way better than the movie) where the author talks about loneliness birds flying into his chest -- his heart -- and laying stone eggs. Kathy and I would talk about the physical effects of depression. When people use phrases like "it's weighing me down," or "it broke my heart," those words make perfect sense to me. I think you feel it to some extent when you break up with a boyfriend or girlfriend or get in an argument with someone or are disappointed in yourself. I don't think most people realize how severe those feelings can seem when something really bad (damaging, traumatic, life-altering, unfixable) happens. It's crippling.

I'm not that sad. I'm functioning still. But there is definitely a stone egg or two incubating (or, more probably, failing to incubate ... that would make more sense) in my chest.

I'll be okay. It was just sad.

Thoughts on Textese

I think I am the last person in the world who still spells out "you" while text-messaging. Abbreviations bother me. And it bothers me even more that textese has crept into the common vernacular ... and when I say common vernacular, I mean primarily e-mail and letters. I've gotten e-mails before from people wanting to write for me, but when they type: "i really want to write 4 u," it kind of makes me think that maybe they shouldn't be given any assignments at, you know, a newspaper.

That being said, I do understand that textese allows the texter to text faster, thus increasing the speed of communication. So the sacrifice of spelling and grammar seems to be a small price to pay for the reward of more efficient communication ... but I read about a study the other day (which, of course, I now can't find) that confirmed textese makes it easier on the texter ... but the textee takes longer to read textese than he or she would ordinarily take to read a normally written sentence.

Take these as an example:

"R U going 4 coffee w/ Emily 2day?"

"Are you going for coffee with Emily today?"

Most people take longer to process the first sentence than the second, even though it's shorter; this is because when we learned to read, we learned on full sentences. Maybe that will change as the next generations grow up with cell phones in their hand instead of Dr. Seuss.

In any event. I don't like textese. I think it has something to do with my job as a spelling/grammar policeperson of sorts.

Biggest Winner

Last night, Michelle won the Biggest Loser competition. I was so happy for her -- especially because I really, really, REALLY didn't want either Heba or Vicki to win. Those two connivers were so manipulative and almost had the final three down to what they wanted ... ha, ha, America decided, and Heba didn't get to be in the final three. Which was kinda funny, because last week I was on pins and needles ... I knew that we would get to vote the third contestant in because I'd been watching the commercials, and I was ready to flood NBC with votes for Michelle. But then it came down to Ed and Heba. Heba said, "Vote for me." Ed said, "Vote for Heba."

And you know who America decided to send into the final three, by a landslide decision of 85 percent? Ed.

I didn't even bother voting, because I was just happy Michelle got into the final three ... and I also thought that, as bitchy and rude as Heba was throughout the season, it might make her pretty sad if she realized that most of America hates her. So I didn't go down that road. But plenty of other people did!

And really, what I think did it for Michelle is her youth. Ed and Vicki didn't have a chance against her once she really started going. She looks hawt. I'm so happy for her!

And ... the new season starts January 6. This is just perfect as far as I'm concerned: I'm working for the next week (about), then I get time off for Christmas, then I'm going on vacation, and when I get back, a brand-new season will be all ready for me to watch. Thanks, NBC!

All I can report is a size ten.

You know ... I don't like George W. Bush as President. In fact, I would argue he's the worst President in the history of the United States. The only other President you could even make a case for is Andrew Jackson (way to almost wipe out an entire race of people, AJ).

But I have to admire the man's ability to make a joke -- immediately, to boot (ha! ha! I did it, too!) -- when an Iraqi journalist throws two shoes at his head.

"Who throws a shoe?! Honestly!"

Marilyn Musgrave Says Thank-You

Ugh.

So, here's the story: Marilyn Musgrave was a Congress representative who had a very protracted and messy battle to retain her seat in November, airing a bunch of attack ads against her opponent. She lost. I voted against her; personally, anyone who says that gay marriage will lead to people marrying their dogs will never, ever get my vote.

She's made national news because she refused to concede -- or to call and congratulate her opponent. Sulk, sulk, sulk. Poor Marilyn. Those mean ol' liberals and gay-lovers really effed you up.

But today, she wrote an opinion column for the Denver Post, basically saying how great it was to serve Colorado, how she's not sorry for being a rabid homophobe, anti-choice and candidate for Worst Woman Ever, and how she refused to change her principles in order to win an election.

Well done, Marilyn.

The funny thing is the comments behind the story. She had one comment supporting her, everyone else basically said, "Okay, so, 'Thanks, Colorado?' Well, you're welcome. Don't let the door hit you on the way out. We won't miss you."

And as far as I know, she still hasn't conceded or congratulated her opponent.

I mean, really. One commenter said it best, and I'll paraphrase: Isn't it awesome how these wholesome, let's-keep-things-the-same-and-never-change-them, I'm-Joe-the-Plumber-and-Suzie-Sixpack-mixed-up-in-one conservatives can't even manage basic manners, like saying "congratulations?"

She is a douchenugget. I, for one, won't miss her -- and neither will the rest of her district, apparently, because she lost in a landslide.

And this is a complete non sequitor, but every time I hear the name "Marilyn Musgrave," I think of a muskrat. A rabid, greasy, disgusting, diseased muskrat. That is her legacy in my brain.

Wilde Times

It's been a while (sorry, Jocelyn!), but I was compelled to write when I turned on my radio to Alice 105.9 for the first time in several months this morning and it was the morning show with "BJ and Howie." And I thought, "what happened to Jennifer?" So I listened for a few minutes and sure enough, they had changed all the intros around to just list BJ and Howie. So when I got to work, I looked up Jennifer Wilde's MySpace page to see what the deal was and found that she had been a victim of downsizing.

Which, I think, is pretty freakin' lame. Her blog said that her contract was up and she'd expected to negotiate a new one, but that didn't happen; they just let her go. And the reason why this is lame is because Jennifer was the best out of the three hosts on that morning show. I used to listen to Wilde on Hollywood when I caught it in the mornings, and really anytime she was talking as opposed to when BJ or Howie are talking. I hold a serious dislike for one of those two -- either BJ or Howie, I'm not sure which, because I usually change the station when either of them is talking. But one of them is always going on about how his wife essentially is not allowed to do anything -- have male friends, go out by herself, etc. That's the path to divorce, according to BJ/Howie. I'm just waiting for his wife to meet someone new (less anal and controlling) in the checkout line at the grocery store.

Alice, you had a strong morning crew, that was certain. And I will still listen to Slacker & Steve on my drive home when they're talking and/or taking calls -- but your music sucks. By getting rid of Jennifer, you have lost 50 percent of my listenership. Good job.

Road Trip!

I have to say, I'm pretty darn excited about our trip to Boston/NYC over New Year's.

But you know what I'm even more excited about? A secret road trip to Lambert's. Yes, Lambert's, home of the throwed rolls, in Springfield, MO.

Jessi, D and I made a pact to head to Lambert's at the earliest opportunity. It will take us about twelve-and-a-half hours to get there. We'll eat, stay the night in a hotel and then eat again the next day ... and drive back.

And trust me. It will be worth it. Lambert's rocks.

I Deleted My Horses

I deleted my horses -- all ten of them -- and my puppy, Peanut, on Facebook.

It was too much time suckage. I loved them, but I loved them too much, and I am too busy and important to deal with horses and puppies the way I was.

(I kept my Pet Society pet Imogene, though. She is awesome. I love her.)

Thoughts From An Unapologetic Liberal After the Election

It's been a while since I posted, and what better place to pontificate on the mixed feelings I'm having after the election?

Last night was amazing. First: How quickly it all was over. I really only have had experience with the two previous elections, one of which took days and the other of which took hours upon hours to be settled. Second: The speeches, both the concession and the victory speech, were truly awesome. Both candidates did an excellent job -- but I have to say, Obama's victory speech gave me goosebumps.

Last night I was feeling elated. Today, I'm feeling for the people who backed the losing candidate, too. I was there the past two elections. I know how heartbreaking and devastating it is to see all the hopes you've wrapped up in the person you want to win come crashing down. And it makes it worse when people who backed the other candidate are gloating. So I'm trying not to do that.

Here is what I am thinking and feeling right now:

*Relief that Hillary was not the Democratic nominee. I have a lot of respect for Hillary, don't get me wrong. But I've seen as the Democrats have tried -- and failed -- to beat the Republicans at their own game in the past two elections. The Republicans have the monopoly on attack advertising and using key words and phrases to hammer home a point. Nobody does it better. And the Democrats have been doing themselves a disservice by trying to beat the Republicans at their own game. The only way to respond to that kind of campaigning is to act as if it isn't worth your time -- to rise above it, as it were. To spend as little time as possible contradicting and correcting the misconceptions being perpetrated by the other side, and then move on, focusing on the positive aspects of your campaign and not playing tit-for-tat with the other candidate. I think Obama did that admirably. He never once appeared flustered or upset by some of McCain's comments during the debate -- while McCain was huffing and puffing like a big bad wolf with some serious angst issues every time Obama scored a hit. Obama's campaign ads were uplifting and positive, leaving a good taste in the viewer's mouth, while McCain's were frightening and negative, leaving a bad taste in the viewer's mouth. And I don't think Hillary could have run a campaign like that. I think it would have been too much for her to resist to bite back at McCain and give him a taste of his own medicine -- and that didn't work for Gore or for Kerry. You can't fight that kind of fire with fire. You can fight it with water, though.

*Empathy for supporters of McCain. Really, I do feel it. Although I also feel as though many of them are being -- for lack of a better word -- poor losers. But that could just be due to my exposure to many of my McCain-supporting acquaintances via social networking sites. I didn't have a MySpace or Facebook page in 2004, so it's hard to say. But I can say this: I'm pretty sure I wasn't that ungracious. Was I depressed and sad? Absolutely. And my husband did say, more than once, "Maybe we should just leave the country" -- the refrain I'm hearing over and over again today. I kept telling him no -- that the thing that makes this country great is that every four years, we get to start over again. It's not a lifetime sentence to be saddled with a Bush; it's only four years. Eight, tops. It's going to be okay. And as hesitant as I am to use words like "unAmerican" -- I think that leaving the country because someone you didn't vote for won the presidency is, well, unAmerican! That's why this country is so great, and that's what I tried to explain to my husband: We have more freedoms here than any other country in the developed world. (Except gays. But I don't think that's permanent.) Our freedom of speech and freedom of the press is absolutely unprecedented. I don't WANT to live anywhere else! I truly do love my country. And it made me so, so sad to be called unpatriotic for feeling the way I do about it. I don't believe I said anything (out loud) like, "Well, better start praying harder for the country," or "Now things are really going to go down the tubes." I still had hope. Which leads me to ...

*Hopeful. Above all, I feel hopeful. I feel like Barack Obama was the better candidate by far, and I feel alive and glad that other citizens rallied behind his banner. I feel like we really ARE going to get some actual change in this country. I'm very, very happy with how the election turned out. I feel like the sky is the limit for Americans again; like we can regain the respect we've lost throughout the world; like we can again deserve descriptions such as "the city on the hill" or "the light in the darkness."

*Right. Not in the sense of right vs. left, or wrong vs. right -- just like this is exactly where we need to be at this moment in time. I think Sarah Palin (in her infinite wisdom, or lack thereof -- there I go being catty about the woman; I can't help it; I think she's a beyotch!) was right: God will choose the person who was supposed to win. God has spoken, Sarah. God has spoken loud and clear.

*Secure. This mostly has to do with that awful amendment (48) on the Colorado ballot -- the "definition of a person," aka life begins at conception. I feel as though my reproductive and privacy rights are intact. And that makes me feel good.

Oh, what a night!

The Craziest Person I Ever Met

It seems a shame to waste my first blog in just over a week on this -- but I'm going to anyway. Brace yourself, kids, it's gonna be a long one.

A few years ago, I became inadvertently entangled with a crazy person. The story is below. For the sake of literary flow, I won't interrupt the telling with details on how I obtained certain pieces of information, so you should know that once I could see this was turning into a real mess, I visited the police station and obtained some public records -- notably a tape and reports of some 911 phone calls that were made. These records, plus voice recordings and transcripts of said voice recordings, were part of the evidence that we collected that the judge refused to look at ... but I'll get to that later.

So. One day D and I were hanging out with our friend "Todd." Todd was living with this guy, "Caleb," and Caleb's wife, "Penelope." Todd was complaining about life with Caleb and Penelope -- mostly Caleb. Caleb is a very controlling man. He created a list of daily chores for Todd and would call Todd when Todd was out and say things like, "You need to come home and do the dishes right now or I'm kicking you out of the house." He was one of those people who does that kind of thing: Threaten people with the most extreme punishment you can think of for petty, stupid things. He gave Todd the room with a broken window, in the wintertime, and then bitched that Todd hadn't fixed the window. He would also call Todd's mom and tell her that Todd was partying way too hard and that he, Caleb, was worried about Todd. Very manipulative guy. Caleb is also from Evergreen, oddly enough (although several years older than myself), and Caleb claims to have been a professional snowboarder.

(This is a total aside. Todd still believes that Caleb was once a pro rider -- despite copious evidence that Caleb is a liar -- but I don't believe a word of it. 1) Because Evergreen isn't that big, and 2) because I know some professional snowboarders -- REAL pro riders -- from Evergreen, and 3) because they have never even heard of Caleb. Also because the only proof he offers is that he's a good snowboarder and he has a bunch of boards from this one company -- which he easily could have bought or been given as a gift, as it's a local company. He had these pictures he tore out from magazines and would say things like, "This is me doing a jump, but I got like twice that high, the photographer just didn't get that." (He didn't say these things to me, I only was physically in proximity to Mr. Crazy thrice.) And there would be no label on the magazine picture ... and let's not forget that sports photographers have cameras that can take, like, fifty shots a second. Liar, liar, pants on fire!)

So Todd is telling us all this, and eventually D and I are like, "Dude, why are you putting up with this? You're not on a lease. You don't HAVE to live there. If he is making your life that miserable, just move out!" Todd had a vehicle at the time, but no license, so we agreed to help him move out.

That went like this: Thursday night, Caleb calls Todd to bitch at him about something and says, "You need to get over here right now or you're kicked out." Todd says, "Actually, I don't even want to live with you anymore, so I'll come get my stuff." Caleb swears at Todd a little bit, threatens him some more, and we go over there with Todd and pack up some of his stuff. When we get there, Caleb says, "Sorry I freaked out on you, man, this is probably for the best," so we think everything is cool and we get a bunch of Todd's stuff, but we can't fit it all in his vehicle and my vehicle. So we ask if it's okay to come back later and get the rest of his stuff, and Caleb says that's fine.

Friday afternoon Caleb calls Todd. He tells Todd that it's his and Penelope's anniversary, so can he wait until tomorrow to come get the rest of his stuff. Todd says no problem.

Saturday rolls around. D and I are at work all day. We leave around 5 to find a very distressed Todd. Caleb has been calling his phone all day -- which Todd has not been answering, because it was in my car -- saying progressively crazier things like, "Hey man, you need to come get your shit out of my house and you need to come get it NOW, or I'm gonna get it out of my house for you, and you're not gonna like the way I get it out of my house. I need this room. I need this room NOW. Come get your shit."

So we go over there and pack up the rest of Todd's things. Caleb is stomping around moodily -- he must have just realized he wouldn't be getting rent from Todd anymore. Or something. I don't know what his deal was. He's being a big baby, is the point. We get everything loaded up and start driving back into Columbia. (Caleb and Penelope and Todd lived about fifteen minutes outside of Columbia -- this is pertinent, I promise.) So we're driving home and it's about to ice storm. Not good weather to be out in. We're almost back in town when Caleb calls Todd's cell phone and tells him we need to turn around RIGHT NOW and give him back the mailbox key. Todd tells D to turn around. D asks why and Todd tells him. D says, "screw that, the weather is horrible and there's no mail on Sunday anyway, he can wait until you see him in school on Monday and you can give him the key then." Todd (who is kind of a pansy) is too scared to tell Caleb this, so he asks D to call and tell him.

D calls Caleb and reiterates: No mail on Sunday, it's ice storming, you can wait until Monday to bring the key back. Caleb says, "You need to turn around right fucking now and give me back my key." D is not happy with this. He says, "We're not turning around, you can wait until Monday, it's not going to kill you, and the way you're acting, you're lucky nobody's beat your ass yet." Hangs up the phone.

At this point, Caleb calls the sheriff's office and tells them that D and Todd stole his HOUSE key, they're driving a so-and-so year and make and model, pull them over if you see them. Lie #1 that I could prove.

We make it home without incident and Todd calls the Columbia police non-emergency line. He tells them what happened and explains that his ex-roommate is a little unhinged and he's not sure what to do. The dispatcher tells him not to take the key back, to just wait until Monday and give it back to him in a public place.

Sunday. All day, Todd's voicemail is blowing up with Crazy's messages. "Give me back my key, man, or else. I'm gonna do something you won't like, don't make me do it." Penelope even weighs in at one point: "Please give Crazy -- I mean, Caleb -- the mailbox key back and it will all be over. He's going to do something stupid if you don't."

Monday. A sheriff's deputy shows up at D's work with an ex-parte -- a temporary restraining order. On it, Caleb says that D threatened to "kick his ass and kill him," that D is a drug trafficker and that Caleb fears for "my life, my wife and my property." (Those were Lies #2, #3 and #4, in case you were keeping track.) D tells the deputy it's total BS, and the deputy says, "Well, you'd better get it taken care of, otherwise it will become a full restraining order and if you two run into each other at Wal-Mart, you can be arrested for violation."

We go to court a couple of weeks later. We have the aforementioned evidence that Caleb flat-out lied to the police. Caleb's evidence looks like this: Some pictures of D and Todd blowing up action figures with fireworks one summer (not illegal), and a letter from someone in Colorado claiming that "things happen" to people who have disagreements with Todd. D tries to show the judge our evidence (police records, phone recordings), and the judge says, "I'm not looking at that, if you have evidence you want me to look at, you need to file a restraining order against Mr. Crazy here."

Then the judge says, "You two just leave each other alone for the next six weeks and we'll drop this whole thing. Okay?"

THE VERY NEXT DAY, I'm dropping Todd off at school. He calls me about twenty seconds after he leaves the car and says, "Guess what I just saw?"

"What?"

"Caleb was lurking behind the bushes so he could memorize your license plate number."

That is it. That is the last straw for me. I go to the Columbia police, then to campus police when they won't help me, because I want it on record that this guy memorized my license plate number, so when he calls and says, "Um, yeah, someone threw a brick through my front window and I just saw a 1999 Subaru Outback with plate # so-and-so drive away," they know he's full of it. I find a detective willing to listen to me at campus police. I tell him my story and show him the evidence. D tells him the story. I drag Todd into the station and bully him into telling the story, too, because he's the one who got us into this mess -- he was being a baby about it, too. "We're going to work in the same field, I don't want any trouble with him." Little late for that.

The detective finishes listening to all of this, expresses amazement that the judge refused to look at our evidence, notes that Crazy Boy has perjured himself and could thus land himself in jail, and finally says, "Do you want me to talk to him?" "YES!" I tell him, in tears at this point. "I don't even know this guy. I just want him to leave me alone."

Six weeks later at the second ex-parte hearing, guess who doesn't show up? The judge dismissed the order, and Crazy Boy had to pay all the court fees. Ha ha.

Fast forward to a couple of years later. I'm in Colorado starting an internship when Todd calls me. "Hey, remember when Caleb memorized your license plate number?" Yes, I remember. "Well I asked him why he did that and he said he wanted to do a background check on you so he could show you were an unreliable witness."

Two problems with this story: 1) I never talked to the judge. In fact, my involvement was limited to procuring public-record documents until that jackass decided to involve me and my car on his own time. I was not a witness to anything. 2) You can't get information on a person using a license plate number. You can find out if the car is stolen or has been involved in any crimes, and to whom it's registered, IF you have access to a police database.

"Anyway, he had his friend in the CIA look up your plates and you have a warrant out for your arrest in Denver." For what? "Parking tickets."

I'm sure you can see the holes in this story without me having to point them out. I'll just say this: I'd been pulled over two weeks before for having a tail light out, and didn't get arrested. No warrant. But to make sure, I called the city and asked if there was a warrant out for my arrest. There was not. I asked if I had any outstanding parking tickets. I did not. I called Todd back, told him that Crazy was full of it and recommended that he not believe anything else Crazy told him.

This all came back to me because last night I was hanging out with Todd and he mentioned that he'd been taught to snowboard by Crazy. I said, "I can't believe you still talk to him," and he said (finally!) that he doesn't talk to Crazy anymore, but that Crazy and Penelope have a kid. "That poor child," was all I could say.

Then I said, "You know, what a crock of shit. That guy was such a liar. 'Ooh, I have a friend in the CIA who's going to risk his job to look up something because of a pointless vendetta I have against this girl I've never even been properly introduced to. She has a warrant out for her arrest.' What a crazy, crazy liar. What, you have nothing better to do with your time than make things like that up? Seriously. Get a life, loser."

And finally, Todd agrees with me.

But I don't know if that's the end of the story. I hope it is. I get this feeling sometimes, though, that I'm not rid of Crazy yet. I hope he's learned his lesson: Don't lie to the police, especially not when someone who's been trained as an investigative journalist is involved, because she'll send a detective to your grad-school class to pull you out and warn you that you're headed for jail time and probation if you don't quit being crazy.

I think it just kills him that he didn't do anything to us -- he was crazy, he had to pay court fees for being crazy, nothing happened to us. We "won." I hope he's not looking for a rematch.

Moral of the story: Stay far away from crazy liars.

One of those moments ...

I had a flashback today. (Not a fun one, though, so get your mind off that drug-addled track!) For some reason I started thinking about the day I found out my dad had died ... most of that day, as you might imagine, is pretty fuzzy for me. I was dazed. But there are a few moments out of that day that stand out crystal-clear. It's odd thinking back on it, like swimming in a sea of salty, briny water and suddenly being struck in the face with a freshwater current.

What I remembered today was calling my dad's friend to tell him the news. I don't remember dialing the phone number or even who answered the phone, maybe I left a message and he called me back ... I really don't recall. But I do remember the conversation we had. I told him we had some bad news and said, "You know Dad's in Australia right now ... well, he had another heart attack."

"So what's his status?" this friend asked. "Is he okay?"

"No," I said, but that's all I could get out. I could not for the life of me come up with the words. I thought about trying to break it to him gently, which by itself was ironic -- him, old enough to be my dad, literally, and me trying to be gentle. "He's dead," I think is what I finally said, although "said" is too strong a verb, really, for what came out of my mouth. More like, "choked," "gasped" or "whispered."

It was surreal. And it reminds me that life is not fair. It's not fair that I had to make that phone call and say those things. It's not fair that the stock market crashed today (well, almost). Life ain't fair. But you know, it's still pretty good.

Yesterday, I had a good moment. I was leaving work and the general manager said he had to do my employee evaluation. I was like, "Okay, let's set up a time," and he said, "Actually, all I really wanted to say to you is that you're awesome. I wish all our employees were like you. I wish you worked more than once a week. And I would kick anyone off their shift if you wanted it so we could have you work."

Nice.

Jerkface McJerksalot

Up in Conifer yesterday, I was made aware of a well-known truth.

But I need to back up a bit to tell this story properly.

One of my managers up there is an extremely nice woman. Nice, nice, nice. Her husband comes in to sit at the bar sometimes. He is not so nice. He's a motorcycle guy -- used to work on them, now just rides one, when he's not in his new SUV -- and is one of those depressingly negative people who never has anything good to say. (Except about his wife -- he really does love her. That's about his only redeeming quality, however.)

He wears a lot of leather and he has a silver skull ring on just about every finger. No, I am not making this up. He also tells misogynistic jokes at the bar and seems to try and find ways to be offensive just for fun.

I try not to be one of those feminists who yells, "That's not funny!" at every stupid joke. I never, ever respond to this guy's prodding, a) because he's not important enough for me to really give two shits, and b) because that would only make him happy. But just so you get the idea, I'm going to record here one of the jokes he's told that I actually remember, which I did not respond to when he told it:

Q: Why do doctors spank babies when they're born?
A: To knock the dicks off the dumb ones.

Hahahahahahahaha.

Point being, the guy is an asshole. A self-affirmed asshole. He likes it. But I always was under the impression that beneath the asshole lay a misunderstood man with a heart of gold.

So yesterday, one of the bar regulars (but not necessarily MY regular) asked me if I had a boyfriend. I responded, no, I have a husband.

"You're not married," Asshole tells me. (He is also one of those people who doesn't ask questions, he makes statements and waits for you to contradict him. You know the type, I'm sure.)

"Yes, I am."

"Since when?"

"Since August."

"Let's see the ring." I show him the ring.

He responds with a scathing, dismissive: "That's not a real ring."

Honestly, this just made me laugh inside. First of all, because for all of this guy's authority-shunning, macho man, I-do-things-my-way-and-to-hell-with-everyone-else, he clearly still buys into the whole diamond ring business. Which is ridiculous. Second of all, because he wears so many rings -- I was half-tempted to say, "Well, I guess you'd know, wouldn't you?" But that probably would have gone over his head.

Or I could have said, "Gee, I could have sworn it was circular and fit on my finger in the way a ring usually does. My bad!"

Or I could have said, "Yeah, it really sucks that instead of buying me a diamond, instead I got a 3.5-karat ring with the rarest gem IN THE WORLD. Which will likely appreciate in value, whereas if you tried to pawn your diamond, you'd be lucky to get one-tenth of what you paid for it."

I could have said all these things. Instead, I just chalked one up to me being too likely to see the good in people.

He's not an asshole with a heart of gold. He's just an asshole.

The upside is, he also thinks he's the quickest wit in town. The other day he told D he needed to buy a new hat because his current hat is "gay/faggy." Some combination of those words. I'm ruining this by forgetting the comeback D hit him with, which was funny.

So it'll be interesting to see future visits from this dude, because he's bound to heckle my man, and D has no reservations about heckling him right back.

Put Your Money Where Your Mouth Is

It's easy to feel disenfranchised and powerless in modern society. We hear about all these massive problems and think, "Well, that's truly awful, but what can I, a single human being, really do about it? Nothing I do will have an effect, anyway. Might as well just forget about it."

That is deceptive thinking. I don't believe in the devil as such, but if Satan really is running around putting thoughts into our heads that will mire our souls in an existential bog, then those are the kinds of thoughts he is working with.

We all make choices. Some of them are big, obvious choices -- voting comes to mind. But other choices, although smaller, are just as significant. We can choose where to shop and what to buy there. We can choose what brands we support. You get the drift.

People often ask about my wedding ring because it's unusual. I didn't want a diamond -- not only because my dad told me that diamonds are the most overpriced gems on the planet (they aren't rare, but most of the world's diamond mines are controlled by a single company, DeBeers, so it's quite easy for DeBeers to set the price on diamonds and the rest of the world will blindly follow along), but also because diamonds are the source of a great deal of bloodshed and calamity on the other side of the planet. People say that maybe the rising divorce rate has something to do with the advent of the third wave of feminism and the rise of women in the workplace, (b.s.) or our culture's increasing tendency toward instant gratification, or pick your argument.

But what if it's something more insidious and subtle than that? (I'm about to start sounding like a freaky New Age hippie right about now. Fair warning.) There are many people who believe gems and minerals have the ability to absorb energies. What if you're using something to symbolize your commitment and your union that is literally dripping with negative energy? What if that diamond you're wearing on your finger is slowly but constantly poisoning your interaction with your loved one by mixing your energies with the energy of pain, of death and of loss? And do you really want to carry around a chunk of stone on your finger that someone shed blood over? That might have been used to purchase an obscene amount of weapons that will be used against innocent people just trying to dig a life out of the dirt?

I don't. So I have my moldavite ring, which has one of the highest energy resonances out of any gem (probably the highest, actually), and nobody died to put that gem on my finger. It's a symbol of love that is untainted by negative energy. You don't have to have a diamond engagement/wedding ring. You can choose something that's more personal and better reflects your own tastes, or you can go with a diamond. Whatever. But you do have a choice.

Believe it or not, I don't spout my opinions about diamonds and other things outside this blog unless I'm asked directly about them. People ask about my ring, and I tell them what moldavite is and why it has significance for me. If they ask why I didn't want a diamond, I'm happy to share with them. But if they don't ask, I try to just keep it simple. My choice is between me and the universe. I remember going ring-shopping with my buddy who was getting ready to propose to his wife. Once the diamond-seller figured out who I was and what I was doing there, she started in on me: "Do you have a boyfriend? When is he going to propose? Have you thought about what kind of diamond you'd like?" And since that wasn't the time or place to go into it, I demurred, and later told my friend he was lucky that the saleswoman didn't get to hear my diatribe on blood diamonds, since she was being pushy about it -- trying to get another sale.

I guess I just think it's sad that so many people feel so powerless to effect change in the world, when all it takes is intelligent consumerism. I was buying green products before you could find them on the shelves of your friendly neighborhood grocery store. I had to go out of my way to get them, yes. But it was that important to me, and it still is. I'll happily pay a few cents more for the product that's safer for the environment. Soon (I hope!) there will be a label available that designates whether products are slave-labor free. When that label is available, I will seek out those products that carry it and use my choice as a consumer to make it more difficult for people to be sold on the black market as slaves. If the people buying those slaves suddenly can't sell the fruits of that slave labor to any corporate entities, they might start looking for easier ways to make money. Because people don't buy and sell slaves to be evil. They do it because it's lucrative.

Tangentially, that's also why I don't shop at Wal-Mart. Let's just say I don't agree with their operating practices, at all, because to detail why I don't shop there would take up a whole nother blog. I can't even remember the last time I bought something at Wal-Mart. It was probably seven or eight years ago. And more than one person has said to me, "Big deal, YOU don't shop at Wal-Mart. It's not like they're losing money, there are plenty of people still willing to shop there." That is very true. But just think for a moment ... if I were in the habit of buying everything I could at Wal-Mart, they would have made thousands upon thousands of dollars off me in the past eight years. Instead, they don't have a dime of my money. And in every consumer survey I've taken that's asked about such things, I have noted that Wal-Mart will never get any of my future money, either, unless the company makes some serious changes. At least I know, when I read a horrible story in the newspaper about something Wal-Mart has done to an employee, that my dollars did not contribute to Wal-Mart's legal defense. And when people are interested in my reasoning and ask me about it, I happily share with them. Maybe I've even converted one or two. I don't know. It doesn't matter. It's my choice, nobody else's.

And, in my opinion, it's the responsibility of each and every consumer to examine their choices and to choose wisely. I think it's safe to say that nobody reading this blog has ever bought a human being (did you know that the market for people has actually dropped -- you used to have to pay the equivalent of $40,000 to buy a person, now they go for about $300) and forced them to work without pay, under the threat of pain or death if they try to stop or leave. But how many of our cell phones contain materials that were mined using slave labor? How many of our cars? How many of our clothes?

It's hard to say, because that special little label hasn't been made available -- yet. But in a perfect world (okay, in MY perfect world), everyone would take these things into consideration before making a purchase. Nobody would knowingly buy something that was created using the blood and sweat and tears and suffering of another human being, just because it costs a few dollars less.

There is a high cost of low prices. Someone always suffers when we decide we want to cut corners and have this great style of living but not pay quite as much. Be aware. Think. Choose well.

Word to the Wise

On October 10, find out where Call + Response is playing at a theater near you, and then go see it.

Then tell all your friends.

It's a "rockumentary" about human trafficking. But that doesn't even begin to capture how powerful and moving it is.

And it's not one of those documentaries that leaves you feeling hopeless and overwhelmed, despite the very serious subject matter.

And 100 percent of the proceeds go toward various projects to stop human trafficking around the world.

And it's a just plain freaking awesome film.

Fringe Pisses Me Off

I know everyone thinks J.J. Abrams is a genius. Well, I don't. (J.J. Abrams is the man behind such television hits as Felicity, Alias and Lost, for those who don't know). I've never really gotten into any of his shows, and because a friend recommended it, I found myself watching the series premiere of Fringe on Sunday night (they re-ran it, I guess to try and get more people hooked).

And I think Fringe sucks.

Let's be clear: I was an avid, avid X-Files fan. I'm all about the creepy government conspiracy alien abduction demon possession television.

But Fringe is trying way too hard. Plus, the belief line in television is fine. Really, that's why it pisses me off. They over-explain the mystery to make it sound plausible. But inevitably in the over-explanation, there's a flaw that I just can't dismiss, a flaw that renders the entire plot completely implausible. X-Files was a real mystery/spooky conspiracy show -- nobody knew what the hell was going on, although they had their theories, and nothing was ever really explained. This gave the viewers the opportunity to conjecture solutions to the mystery on their own, plus it never tried to force some obviously fake solution into a good mystery hole. X-Files ruled.

I can even give a good example of this. In last night's episode of Fringe (which I had to endure watching because Damon, for some unknown reason, actually is engaged by the show), they were seeking a man who was murdering women and performing surgery to remove some part of their brains, the pituitary gland, for some unknown reason. At the beginning of the episode, the man had just had sex with a stripper and was preparing a sedative so he could do the surgery on her.

First problem: Strippers aren't prostitutes. I know that might seem like a small distinction to the writers of a television show, but really, they're not. Most of them, although they do choose to remove their clothes for money, have too much self-respect to ho themselves out on top of it. Not all, but most. So for this guy to find an attractive stripper willing to meet up with him in a seedy hotel room -- not likely. Just make her a prostitute, writers. What the hell?

Okay. So then, the stripper starts to experience severe abdominal pain. The guy puts her in his car and drops her off on the street. She winds up in the hospital and they tell her they need to do a C-section on her to "get the baby out." She tells them she's not pregnant (in between screaming bouts of pain). She dies on the operating table. Instead of reviving her, they do the C-section and remove whatever is inside of her. People start screaming and fainting when they see what it is they removed.

Second problem: Sure, don't even worry about the chick who just died on the table. I mean, she's just a prostitute. The "baby" is more important.

Then we find out that the thing inside her actually was a baby. Just a baby that grows really fast.

Third problem: That's not fucking scary. I mean, I wouldn't want that baby inside me, that's not what I'm saying. But come on ... it's a baby. It's a baby that's growing quickly. And you're going to scream and faint over that? Come on!

So we come to find that the serial-killer man was a result of an experiment to grow human soldiers for the military. The soldiers grew to the correct size very rapidly; the problem was stopping the aging process once they reached the ideal "age" for a soldier. This guy is a remnant of that experiment, and the only way he can keep himself from growing super-old, super-fast, and dying, is by stealing other people's pituitary glands and doing god-knows-what with them.

I know. I know.

So what happened to the stripper/prostitute? Well, before he was able to remove her gland, they had sex, and she got pregnant.

Fourth problem: A genetic experiment is unlikely to be able to reproduce. Bear in mind this experiment was supposed to take place back in the '60s or so. We hadn't even gotten as far as cloning at that point in time. Cloned beings probably can reproduce, but when you start messing with DNA and hormones to make something grow faster, or slower, or whatever it is that you're doing with it -- Mother Nature doesn't like that shit. She usually finds a way to make sure that whatever you're doing with her can't be replicated through reproduction.

And fifth problem: It takes several days after fertilization for an egg to implant itself into the uterine wall. That's what the morning-after pill does, people, it prevents the fertilized egg (now an embryo, I suppose) from implanting. And I guess I can buy that, if this magical genetic growing-and-aging man actually can reproduce, that once implanted, the embryo would grow at a frightening rate. But. Did the embryo suddenly develop little fins to swim itself down the fallopian tubes? No? Then I guess it's still going to take a couple of days to get to that point, isn't it, boys and girls? Yes.

I told you Fringe sucks.

So once I figure out what's going on in this lame show, I point out to D that none of this is feasible and that Fringe is stupid. He says, "Well, most people don't know that much about pregnancy." I guess we can thank the religious right for that -- I mean, why would it be remotely important to know the basics of how pregnancy occurs? Exactly.

If I were a Fringe writer, here is what I would have done: Forget about that stupid surgery crap to remove the pituitary gland. I would have made the soldier-man a sort of hybrid who could only reproduce via sporing or something crazy like that, because he's not human. So he tries to spore, but it doesn't work unless he has a protected area in which the fetus can gestate. He starts trying to use the uterus for such things, but obviously, the baby kills the women and usually dies right after birth. He's got this tremendous urge to reproduce, so huge that he doesn't care how many people he kills until he succeeds, and he just keeps trying these messed-up methods until he gets caught. That is some weird, alien, unbelievable television right there. A super-growing man stealing pituitary glands is just stupid. Like I said, not scary. Vaguely creepy, but not really. It's definitely no X-Files plot.

And whoever they have playing the lead female -- I don't know her name -- is no Dana Scully. And Pacey isn't even close to a Fox Mulder. Not that every show like this needs to follow an X-Files dynamic, but they're trying hard enough to copy the X-Files that it's obvious, except they're not doing a very good job.

And the worst thing about Fringe: It comes on during The Biggest Loser. Which, as you all should know, is my favorite show.

Next week, I'm putting my foot down. No more Fringe. It's lame. If I have to miss the ending of Biggest Loser again (yes, I missed the ending this week; yes, I was pissed off about it; yes, it was the season premiere; yes, Fringe sucks big salty donkey balls), then I'm going to take some drastic anti-Fringe action.

Fuck that show.

Yum.

I heart angry rocker boys.

Trent is at the top of my list. He is so cute.

Then come the boys from Rise Against! Mmm.

That is all.

table for one

I'm one of those oddities among humans, one who's happy to spend lots and lots of time alone. Right now I'm eating lunch at Le Central, one of my favorite restaurants, alone. I didn't bring a book with me, which is why I'm blogging with my delicious tomato basil soup. I just dribbled some down my chest, and there's no one here to laugh except the snooty servers, and they are too snooty to laugh.

I just think maybe it's a little odd that I don't even consider asking my coworkers if they'd like to join me, because truth is, I'm perfectly happy all alone.

Am I Mean, Or Just Honest?

I was talking to my BFF Rachel the other day, and she informed me that one of our mutual friends back in CoMo is getting married to her long-term boyfriend.

"Oh," I said. "How's he doing?" (Let's call him Joe for the purpose of this exercise, and she can be Jane, although anyone from the CoMo area who ran with the same Chili's crew as I did will be able to recognize both Joe/Jane and the other couple I'm about to discuss.)

And the reason for me asking how Joe was doing is because Joe was released from prison a couple of years ago. Jane was dating him before he went in and continued to visit him and keep their relationship alive while he was in. But another reason I asked is because I heard, from a very reliable source, that Joe has a tendency to beat the shit out of Jane for no apparent reason. It's not something Jane likes to talk about, for obvious reasons, and it was something she apparently hid very well, judging by the continuation of my conversation wtih Rach:

"He's doing really well, actually," she tells me.

"Oh, that's good," I say. "Has he stopped beating the shit out of her yet?"

Pause. "Oh. Um. I didn't know that was a problem," she tells me.

Then I feel kind of bad, because this was following on the heels of another conversation about another Chili's CoMo couple. Let's call them Josh and Janet. Josh and Janet have been married for a few years and they have a kid together. Josh has been having some pretty serious health problems lately.

And some more background on Janet/Josh: I was working with both of them when they first started dating, and I didn't think it was going to last -- I still think she was kinda stupid to marry him. First, because he comes from a country outside the U.S., and a man who comes from the same small town as Josh used to work with Damon, and he told Damon once that Josh has a wife, kids, entire family back where he's from. There was really no reason for that dude to tell a complete lie about Josh. Second, he was such a player. He used to come up to me all the time, because I can hold a conversation in his native language, and he would say things like, "You are the most intelligent, beautiful girl I have ever seen." "Your eyes are gorgeous." "You are the most beautiful girl here." "You are so smart, I've never met anyone as smart as you." Ad nauseum. You get the idea. When he would turn on the charm, I would say, "But, Josh, what about Janet?" And he would reply, "Who's Janet?" I lost a lot of respect for him over that. But it didn't stop him; he would do that shit ALL THE TIME until he and Janet finally got married.

And one time when Rachel was back in CoMo visiting, he tried to kiss her while Janet was at work. Same, smooth style: "You are so beautiful, you could have any man you wanted," blah blah blah. This was while he was married to Janet, incidentally, and after their kid was born.

Anyway! Earlier in my conversation with Rachel, she said, "I finally talked to Janet again, I haven't heard from her in months, it sounds like Josh is doing really well and his condition has entirely cleared up."

"That's good," I said. Then: "I wonder if he's cheated on her yet." (I think he definitely has -- and if he hasn't, it's because the girls he's tried it with have been too smart to fall for his lines.)

So after I told Rachel about Jane and Joe and how Joe likes to hit Jane, I started to feel bad, as in judgemental. Why can't I just be happy that Jane and Joe are getting married? Why can't I just be happy that Josh seems to be better?

Is it because I'm a bitch?

Or is it because I'm not swallowing the sugar coating they put on their relationships?

Beats me.

short one today

1. Nine Inch Nails -- awesome. Trent Reznor -- still my celebrity crush. Mmm. Tasty.

2. I have a serious pimple farm breaking out on my forehead. SERIOUS.

My Postal Worker is Very Weird

The guy who runs the post office in Morrison, Carl ... well, let's just say he's a little unusual. A lot unusual. This morning I had to mail a package to my youngest brother for my mother so it would reach him in time for his birthday (it's his first year of college ... wow, unreal!). So I head into the post office at about 9 a.m. to mail the package.

I'm writing the address and he says, "So, I'm finally meeting the person behind mailbox 327! Susan, right?"

"No, it's Amber," I tell him. "You were close."

But this is not even remotely the first time I've met Carl. No, no, no. A brief history of my interactions with the fun postal workers in Morrison:

* First, before I had to sign up for a post office, my neighbor, Maja, warned me that the people at this post office "are stupid." (I believe those were her exact words.) I wasn't quite sure what that meant but decided to give them the benefit of the doubt.

* Second, I first met Carl when I was signing up for my PO Box. My house, which is only about a three-minute walk from the post office, does not have a mailbox simply because it's so close. I actually had to deal with Carl twice during this little episode, once when he explained to me how to go about getting a mailbox (which requires a Colorado driver's license, which led me into a strange Catch-22 situation, because I couldn't get a PO Box without a driver's license, and I can't receive mail at my house, so once the license was issued, there was nowhere for them to actually send it -- because Colorado can't make it simple and just give you the license before you leave the office, like they do in Missouri. And let me tell you: Colorado's DMV is hell on earth. If you ever have to go, bring a book, because you could easily be there for hours. I was there for four the first time I had to go, then for three when I needed the license reissued because, obviously, it never made it to me.)

* I spoke with Carl again last year in November when I had to renew my PO Box.

* I spoke with Carl again in November, when there was a note in my PO Box that I had too much mail to fit in there, and I had to pick it up from the front desk. He lectured me about checking my mailbox every day, and I told him I'd checked it the day before and it was empty (which was true; he didn't believe me). Proof that it wasn't my fault, but that rather, the post office was hanging onto my mail, came when I found the November and October issues of Glamour in the stack of mail. Magazines get to you at least two weeks before the month starts. What was a six-week-old magazine doing in this stack of mail? Hmmm.

* I see Carl (although don't necessarily talk to him) every single day when I walk in the post office to pick up my mail at my box. Except on Sunday. But he doesn't work Sunday anyway.

* I distinctly remember mailing a package (can't remember what or to whom) and hearing all about Carl's time spent in Vietnam and his post-traumatic stress disorder, and how thunderstorms wake him up (I think there had been a thunderstorm the previous night).

* Within the past two weeks, I've had to pick up a package from the front desk because the contents were damaged and leaking. Carl was very inquisitive about this package; when I returned to give him back his plastic box, he even asked me what was in it (is this legal? I wasn't sure).

* JUST LAST WEEK, I bought stamps from Carl. In fact, every single time I've mailed a package or bought stamps (except for one stamp-buying incident), it was from Carl. And last week we spent about five minutes on the stamps, because they were out of the ones I wanted and I had to select an alternative.

And he finally got to meet me this morning.

???????

Obsession for Amber

Facebook did something evil recently.

They added an application called "My Stable."

I always wanted a horse. Now I have two. I have a female mustang named Orange Tang and a female Arabian named Soul Train (aw, yeah).

I've had Orange Tang for a day or two longer than Soul Train, and she is at 100 percent for stamina and prowess. Now all I have to do is feed her and baby her and enter her into some events while keeping her stats up. The mustang is a Western events breed, so I'm not sure what that will entail -- cattle roping? I have no idea. But Orange Tang is more than up for the challenge, believe me.

Soul Train is going to win me some money in our virtual races later ... I'm not a betting woman, but I know my horse is the shit and will win once I get her up to speed, which will take a while. They come to you with 1/35 Stamina and Speed (or whatever the combination is for the breed; Arabians are a racing breed). Right now I've just gotten her over 10/35. It will take a couple of days to get her to Orange Tang's level, but she's been doing really well so far. I love both my horses.

When I get enough horseshoes to buy another horse (that will be tomorrow), I'm going to get a female Appaloosa (eventing) and name her Belle Starr. Then I'm going to get a male Lipizzaner for eventing, a male paint for Western and either a bay or a chestnut thoroughbred for racing, haven't decided yet.

And lest you think six horses will be too many for me to handle -- you clearly don't know me. I'm going to have the best horse stable on Facebook, mark my words.

Annoyances

Recently I did a MySpace survey and it asked me about things that annoy me. I cleverly replied "annoyances." Which is obviously true. But here is an expansion on that thought:

* Freecycle maniacs. I give a lot of stuff away on Freecycle, mostly because I can't be bothered trying to get money for things I just want out of my house and out of my life. It's much easier to give it away. But there are some people on Freecycle who seem to think they are granting me the mother of all favors by taking this stuff and want me to answer every stupid little question they might have about it. (Not that they're not doing me even a little favor; I see it as a mutually beneficial agreement.) Like when I gave away a wrought-iron wine-bottle holder. It was wrought-iron. It held three bottles. It had a leaf pattern on it. Seems simple enough, right? "We are interested in this item but want to know if it will fit in with our kitchen decor. Could you describe the leaf pattern in detail or enclose a photograph?" No, I could not, because there are ten more people interested in it, and I really don't have time to take your silly picture and send it to you. Seriously. If I'm giving away a rug or something, okay, then I'll enclose a picture, but otherwise, eff off! I gave away three bags full of VHS tapes and DVDs this week, and I literally had about twenty responses. People were falling over themselves to get these bags. And a woman e-mails me yesterday, two days after the posting, and not only is she the very last person to contact me -- in other words, no chance she's going to get the bags -- but she says in her e-mail, "I'm interested, but first I want to know if our movie tastes are similar, so do you think you could let me know what titles are included and then I'll decide if I want them or not?" Um. No. It's free. Take it or don't, I don't care, there are plenty more where you came from who are less annoying.

* Politics. This may surprise some of you. I am interested in politics even while I loathe it. Specifically, I loathe televised politics. Let's take the DNC for an example. "Hey, we have an hour and a half to go until Hillary Clinton gives her speech. Isn't that Bill Clinton over there? Yes, Bill Clinton is about fifteen feet away from me right now. How amazing. Why don't we go to another reporter, who can talk to us about what Hillary Clinton might talk about during her speech. Other reporter?" "Yes, I'm here, I see you're sitting no less than fifteen feet from former President Bill Clinton. That's great. Hillary Clinton is going to give a speech here in about ninety minutes. It will be an important speech. Let's talk to yet another reporter about how important this talk, ninety minutes away, will prove to the Democratic party. Other reporter?" ... and on. And on. And on. I can't handle it. I don't watch it. If I have my way, the TV is OFF during election season. Unfortunately, D is a political junkie, and he actually likes watching that stuff (do not ask me why). I'll read about it, sure, but it's like watching football to me. Twenty seconds of action followed by twenty minutes of discussion on the action. Argh. (Yes, football really, really annoys me, too.)

* Somehow, some way, several music publicists got a hold of my phone number and e-mail address, and they seem to have no problem passing it along to their colleagues. That would be great, if I covered music -- which I do, occasionally, but usually only for the blog, and only in the paper if our music editor has already passed on the music in question. So I have people e-mailing and calling me, ad nauseum, about all these bands, and "do you think you'll cover this band who's going to be here in September '09?" I don't fucking know! I'm not the music editor! I do respond to my e-mails (although not anymore), and I do answer my phone, and I try to be helpful, but really, I'm not the person here you need to talk to about music. I'm not. I'm not. I'm not. Please, tell all your friends. Don't call me or ask me about your indie rock band who's about to blow up the charts. Unless you're a trip-hop or dark, dirty drum and bass DJ, or unless you're Blackalicious or the Digable Planets or Dilated Peoples, just don't even try, because I don't care.

Wow. I feel much better now.

Division of Labor

For some reason, I've been seeing a lot on the division of housework labor on the Internets. I don't understand why, it's not like I'm seeking things out, but it's been in one of my daily advice columns and also an MSN story.

And it got me to thinking about my own, personal division of labor -- which some might argue is unfair. Here is how it's broken down: D mows the lawn, D fixes broken things in the house (like leaky pipes), D usually makes the bed when he has the day off and I have to work, and D does various other tasks which I assign him, like taking out the trash or vacuuming or whatever I put on his list for that day (he likes lists).

I do: everything else. Dishes. Laundry. Dusting. Bed-making five days a week. Tidying up. Bathroom. All. Of. It.

And I'm okay with that. No, really, I am. Because it makes more sense that way. And most of you know I'm one of the biggest feminists you'll ever meet in real life -- I even define myself as a feminist, which many women won't do.

But take laundry as an example. First of all, D hates to do laundry. HATES IT. So that's one factor in the assignation of tasks. Second, laundry in my house needs to be done a particular way. Some things get washed on the "casual" setting, some on the "normal" setting, some in hot water, some in cold water, some get hand-washed in the sink. Some get hung up to dry and some get to spend time in the dryer. Some don't use fabric softener and some do. Beyond that, I have three separate bags for laundry on my cart -- a darks/color bag, a lights/white bag and a delicates bag. If I were to ask him to do laundry, he'd do it, but my asking would go something like this: "Hey, can you do laundry today, it's time for whites, but don't put any of my panties in the dryer, hang those up instead, and make sure my sports bra isn't in the whites, because it doesn't use fabric softener." It's much easier to just do it myself. And since I do a load of laundry every day, it's never very much.

Or take dishes as an example. I make my lunch and do dishes every night. We don't have a whole lot of dishes because it's not really necessary when you do them every night. I do them right after dinner. If I ask D to do the dishes, he will -- but normally not until right before he goes to bed, whereas I'm usually doing dishes/packing lunch simultaneously. So what if I need a plastic container for something in my lunch and it's dirty? I have to wait until 10 p.m. until it's clean and then I can pack my lunch. And sometimes he forgets to do the dishes, and I wake up ready for my morning smoothie, except the blender is dirty, and so is my travel mug. And I won't even go into how much soap I use to do the dishes -- my dishes are CLEAN, dammit! -- and how little he uses. Unless I want to stand over his shoulder and ask him to do the dishes rightthisverysecond and then agonize over the amount of soap he uses, again, much easier to just do it myself.

And the thing is, as long as he's on board with my keeping-things-clean agenda, I don't need him to help. Like bathroom cleaning. We don't keep anything on our bathroom counters except the electric toothbrush & charger, hand soap and lotion. This is because every morning when I'm done getting ready, I spray down the mirror and the bathroom sink and the toilet, grab a paper towel from under the sink and wipe it all down, brush the toilet with a little toilet soap, and I'm done. The bathroom hasn't been disgusting for ... um ... I don't even remember the last time the bathroom was disgusting, because I do this every single day. It takes maybe one minute of my time. At first, I had to remind him: Don't leave stuff on the bathroom counter. Don't leave stuff on the bathroom counter. Like a broken record. But he sees what I'm doing, he gets it, and he keeps his stuff off the bathroom counter so I can wipe it down and we can have a fresh, clean, gleaming, sparkling bathroom every single day.

Same with the coffee table/dining room table/top of the dryer/bedside table -- all those spots that get completely out-of-control. There are designated things that are allowed to be on those surfaces. Every day when I get home, I do a little patrol through the house and put things away that are out of place. That keeps things tidy. It takes maybe three minutes. Easy.

In an ideal world, would he look at my own personal list of things to do and see what's next on it and do it and check it off for me? Yes. But in the world we inhabit, it's fine that he doesn't, because it doesn't take very long anyway, I still have several hours to myself every evening to spend doing whatever the hell I want (usually reading a book), the house is clean, we don't fight about it and it's fine.

Plus, I get a little bit of extra leverage whenever I ask him to do something and he's dragging his feet a tad. "I don't ask you to do much," I tell him. "This isn't a big deal. Just do it." And he knows it's true.

Win/win.

size does matter

Last week I thought I lost my water bottle. (I'll give you a moment to imagine how traumatic that was for me.) It was in D's car all along, but I couldn't find it -- actually, he couldn't find it for me -- so I used some money I had on a Starbucks card and bought a new water bottle at Starbucks, and then I found my old one, so now I have two. Which, for a water-drinkin' fool like myself, isn't a bad thing.

The new one is only twenty ounces, it has a brown lid and brown rubberized bottom and some weird coffee plant-like designs on it (brown and green and beige). It's pretty cute, but the thing that I find most interesting about it is that I seem to drink more water when I have it.

I'm not sure why that would be -- and honestly, I'm really not certain that I am drinking any more water than normal. (Normal for me is around 100 ounces a day.) But even if the only result is me making more trips across the building to the water cooler, it can't be a bad thing. I keep my old(er) water bottle in the fridge and use it for working out, as the straw is much more useful than the screw-top lid, but it's also noisy in a cubicle area, so the screw-top lid is a better option for work.

Other random thoughts:

*I've been bad about blogging. I will endeavour to do better.

*I didn't watch a single second of the Olympics, in case you were wondering how my boycott went. Take that, China!

*I don't like purple bell peppers. I don't hate them, but I like a little sweetness in my salad with the red or the yellow. Purple bell peppers are not sweet. They're kind of like the green ones. Just so you know.

I'm A Freak

My erstwhile therapist, Kathy, used to (gently) get on my case about using what she called the "S-word." Should.

I use that word a lot. A lot more than I should, anyway (ha!). Yesterday was the saddest anniversary I have in my life, but despite the sadness, I was still happy. I am a happy person; I think we were put on this planet to be happy and love each other (yes, I know, I'm a revolting, disgusting hippie). I wake up every morning with joy and energy, and I feel fulfilled by my daily activities and tasks. I have a lot of love in my life. I'm healthy (for the most part). I do a lot of stuff -- go out to the theater, to films, to club nights, to hang out with friends. I do a lot of other stuff, too -- read, write, contemplate nature and the meaning of the world. I am satisfied and happy with my life.

But. Part of me feels as though I shouldn't be. Part of that feeling comes from knowing that I can't give my family members the peace and satisfaction that I have in my own life. I wish I could just bottle it up and drop it on them, but I can't. And what really makes my insides twist is the thought that even though I am happy with my life, not everyone else is.

Here's an example. My dad used to take me out for special one-on-one meals together. During these meals, he'd invariably say something that was totally cheesed-out (or so I thought at the time). Something like, "You know, you can do anything you want with your life. You can do or be anything. You have the potential."

He thought I was brilliant. He was, clearly, biased. But maybe I am brilliant. It doesn't matter. What does matter is this: There are things I will not sacrifice my peace-of-mind for, and one of them is work. "But it would make your father so happy to see you be very, very successful," I feel I can hear disembodied voices intoning around me when I start to feel content with my life as it is. "You could do so much more; you have it in you."

The thing is, I don't think I do have it in me. I don't want to be a person who spends countless hours at work. I don't want to throw myself into a job for social recognition. (I would throw myself completely into writing books -- novels, self-help, whatever -- if given that opportunity, and that is something I am working on manifesting in my life. But being creative to me isn't work; it's not on the same level as going into an office every day and grinding out a product. The grinding out a product part might still be there, but it has its roots in joy and love for the effort itself.) I like my job, I like the level of effort I put into it and I like what I get in return. I'm not looking for bigger fish to fry, as such -- I'm looking to turn myself into a different kind of fish, but that is another story and a completely different professional/lifetime ambition.

But then I feel bad, like I'm disappointing the disembodied voices. I'm just not all that interested in pursuing fame and fortune (well, maybe a little bit of fortune, but just so I can do my own thing). I feel ashamed of my life -- my happy, fulfilled life -- because it's just there, being happy and fulfilled, while I work on parts of myself that are not immediately evident or even interesting to the rest of society: my spiritual status, my creative mind, my just plain having-fun agenda.

And because I'm ashamed, I'm afraid to put it out there and say, hey, this just isn't me. I am just not one of those people who's going to throw their lives into a publication, or a company, or a house, or a whatever. A cause? Maybe. A way of life? Sure. But a thing -- I am not interested in things. I'm interested in the intangible, questions about why we were put on this planet to begin with, what we are doing here, what we can do here. That's really it: Not just what we are, but what we could be. I don't accept that the way things are is just the way they ought to be. I think they can be better, and I'd like to help make that happen, and that is my priority in life.

And sometimes I just have to remind myself: I am okay. I might be weird to be all happy with my life and my job and my husband and my dog -- and so what? I am weird. I admit it. I have to stop "shoulding" myself. It's not that I "should" be more this or less that -- it's that I "should" accept who I am and revel in it.

Besides, every group needs a freak. It's not always easy to fulfill that need, but all I can do is try.

first one in a while

Another haiku
I sit at Red Rocks watching
the moon rise above

It started off orange
Bigger than a great beach ball
Now growing pale, small

The band on the stage
Is playing "Three Little Birds"
My fav'rite Bob song

I'm drinking Dale's draft
Hoppy, cold, foamy goodness
In a plastic cup

Zoolander starts soon
Incredibly good-looking
And filled with Blue Steel.

paul never ever uses monia

Anyone else use that mnemonic device while learning to spell pneumonia?

I've been coughy and wheezy for a few days now. The wheeze has taken on a life of its own, muttering in my chest as I exhale. I'm the first to admit: it doesn't sound good. I may have to actually visit the doctor soon. Like tomorrow. Bah!

the lengths I'll go to

We just drove to Northglenn just to eat at Cracker Barrel. We never do this because it's so far away, but I think the drive is worth it, when we have the time.

Also: MySpace plus Facebook plus BlackBerry equals a very dangerous equation for me. Let's hope I can keep it under control.

this could get dangerous

I got a new phone today ... It's got capabilities for the interweb. So I can post now when I'm out and about.

Heaven help us all.

Against All Odds

Today is actually going (fairly) smoothly. We'll see how that continues. One more day, I keep telling myself. One more day. One more day before I can take a day off.

The up side is, when I get back to work after my time off, my job will seem like the easiest job ever. I suppose that's the end result when you morph using superpowers into three people instead of one.

We might go to Casa Bonita tonight! I shouldn't have to tell anyone how exciting that is.

There's this dude who parks his SUV and his motorcycle in the garage. I wonder a) why and b) whether he even considers that he's taking up two spaces -- obviously he's not being charged for two -- and how fair is that? Not very.

I bought some new tea yesterday. Traditional English Breakfast. Quite delicious, particularly with a splash of milk.

Back to the grind.

Things I've Learned

* I've learned I like having girlfriends, and miss them when they're not around.

* I've learned that, despite being one of those freaky people who knows what they wanted to do even when they were six years old, I was right ... and I was wrong. My career path has taken some interesting twists.

* I've learned not to let other people's expectations of you get in the way of what you really want.

* I've learned to make sure of what I really want before I go defying people's expectations of me.

* I've learned that doing three jobs at a time is even less fun than it sounds.

The Sad Truth

Here's the deal:

In 2005, I was skinny. Not that I'm obese now, but really, I was quite skinny, and I bought a pair of the cutest jeans EVER. I wore them until I got fat(ter), they became too tight, but I held onto them because I love them. They are, as stated, super-duper cute.

My goal this year has been to fit back into Cute Jeans. Hence the exercising. Seriously, I've been working out six days a week for almost two months now, and the changes I've noticed in my physique are both exciting and promising.

But.

Because I've been so hard core about working out -- a sweat-dripping regimen of at least thirty minutes a day is nothing to sneeze at -- subconsciously, I guess, I kind of think I can eat anything I want.

And here is the sad truth: That is not so.

It's not like I'm resigning myself to a life of salads. What I mean is, when our food writer walks up to me with a greasy, fatty pepperoni pizza in hand and says, "Hey, Amber, you want a slice of this?" and I have already eaten lunch and am not really hungry but I do kind of want a slice, I can't just take the pizza. Especially when I already had (healthy) pizza the night before. And especially when this is followed by a couple of days of eating deep-fried yumminess that has no place in my current diet. On a similar note, when I go to visit family, I can't just stuff my face with all the delicious goodness that abounds on those visits. I don't need to eat fried chicken and mashed potatoes and pie. I just don't. That is a sad truth to me.

I like food. I love food. Food is my friend. Food keeps me alive and gives me energy. But sometimes I have to say no to food. Even though I'm working out. Because what happens is, I think that I burn off enough calories to compensate for the food -- which is true. But I will never fit into Cute Jeans again if I don't start saying no, and saving the stuff that's really bad for me that I love for special occasions.

Plus, I'm really developing some serious ab muscles like I've never had before, and I kinda want to see what they look like under the flab that's taken up residence around my midsection since the Dawn of Time (aka puberty).

It's Late, I'm Tired

And I want to go home.

So here's a quick story for you:

Just now, I had the sudden urge to do a cartwheel in the middle of the hall. Which would have been disastrous, because I can't do a cartwheel.

I think it was the Dale's.

Haiku

Here I sit at work
drinking from a blue beer can
a Dale's Pale Ale brew.

I should edit more
but my window seat invites
car-gazing instead.

Back to work I go.
It's almost six o'clock now
and the end is nigh.

(Yes, I can drink beer at work. It's that kind of place. Pretty rockin' when you think about it. My boss even gave me the beer.)

Funniest. Thing. Ever.

First, I'd like to apologize that spelling and grammar have fallen so by the wayside. That's what happens when you have, literally, no time to proofread.

Second, I'd like to be sad for a moment. I was supposed to go to this stationery store's grand opening tonight, and I can't, and stationery is my secret obsession. I love the stuff. Even though I never actually, you know, write letters.

Third -- I could get in trouble for this. But hopefully (probably) by the time our home computer is up and running again, this blog will no longer be visible to the naked eye. Or something.

So last night I'm laying on the couch with D, and we're both stretched out. I'm reading a book and he's asleep (but pretending not to be asleep). We're both kind of shifting and moving around, because it's not very comfortable, and then I notice that his balance is off and I look up. I watch him slowly (almost deliberately, if not for the whole asleep thing) fall to the floor. He wakes up and gets the most offended, grumpy look on his face -- the kind of look you usually don't see outside the faces of kids. And I can't help it; I start giggling. It's too, too funny.

"You pushed me off the couch!" he accuses.

"No," I tell him. "You were asleep. You slid off."

"You pushed me!" he insists.

"No," I repeat. "You don't even remember. You were asleep. I was watching you; I saw the whole thing."

So we engage in this long, pointless, bickering argument about whether I pushed him off the couch. I use exhibit a: my weight vs. his weight as my main argument, pointing out that if I actually were trying to push him off the couch (trying being the operative verb here), he would have woken up. He continues to insist and accuse me of pushing him until, finally, I start pinching him. Hard. On the soft insides of his arms. Because I figure if I'm going to be accused of doing something as mean as pushing someone off a couch, then I should at least get the satisfaction of actually doing something mean.

But the funny thing is, this morning he remembered the (baseless) accusations, and even apologized for him, but he didn't remember the pinching until I told him what I did and that he deserved it.

I really am a bitch sometimes.

Just Me and My Salad

Here is how I eat my daily salad:

First I eat the grape tomatoes (if any). I don't cut them up before I put them in the salad, I eat them whole because I love the sensation of biting into one and having it explode in my mouth. Mmmmmmmm.

Then I eat the meat (if any; usually there isn't). Chicken or salmon.

Then I eat the red onion, which is sliced very thinly. I try to eat all my salad greens, too, while I'm doign this (herbed spring mix).

What's left is usually a mix of diced red bell pepper, soy nuts and avocado, which I eat in a medley. Yum yum yum.

And the dressing, of course, is part of all of it -- Kraft Light Balsamic or Light Raspberry Vinaigrettes. Delicious.

Me Today

I have mermaid hair, as my friend Jessi has dubbed it. And since Jessi is way cute, I'm going with it.

I walked under a ladder no fewer than four times today. My question is -- if you walk under a ladder an even number of times, does that cancel the bad luck? I guess I'll find out.

Gotta Have Faith

This is about to go more deep & meaningful than I usually tread. Be warned ...

It's probably not common knowledge that after I lost my dad, I went through a serious period of doubt concerning the existence of a higher power. This was pretty traumatic for me, as I'd never before even considered that God might not exist. I'd always been certain that God did exist. But the more I thought about it, and the more I comprehended the pain and suffering and complete random cruelty of the universe, the more likely it seemed to me that we are just one big cosmic accident.

I got over that, needless to say. I have my faith back, and I'd say by now it's pretty well unshakable. But it's changed. I no longer consider myself a Christian. I believe Jesus walked the earth, performed miracles and said some pretty amazing things in parables, but I don't believe he was the be-all end-all savior, that he's coming back to earth, etc. Maybe someday I'll go into what I do believe, but that'll suffice for this post.

On Sunday I did a favor for my mother -- and it was the last time she'll ever get that particular favor out of me, I've decided. She asked me to go to church and I said okay. It was so, so uncomfortable. First, singing the hymns and praying the prayers that I don't really endorse. It felt wrong. Although I might not label myself a Christian any longer, I still have respect for the church and the religion, so to me, it seemed extremely disrespectful and blasphemous for me to be paying nothing more than lip service by participating in church.

Second, the sermon itself ran counter to just about everything I've figured out for myself in the past couple of years. It was difficult to sit there and listen to it when what I wanted to do was stand up and explain to the entire church (including the sermonizer) how very wrong they are. Of course I didn't do that -- I played the Magic Eye trick with the front of my hymnal instead; its title is Sacred Selections, so I made the two capital "S"s in their fancy script line up, over and over and over again.

It was a good lesson for me, however, in what I will and won't put up with. There are some things I will do with and for my mother out of love, even if I don't particularly feel like it. But compromising my personal beliefs is not one of them, and that's what it felt like I did. I think it's good that I went, because now I know what one of my lines drawn needs to be and where it needs to be drawn. No more church for this girl.

Plans for the Future

This is going to have to be a quickie, cause I'm busier than all get-out ...

I'm going to write a best-seller. I've thought about it long and hard and I figure this is the only way that I, personally, can make enough money to pay off all my debts, buy a house and some property somewhere isolated in the mountains, and help support my family. There just isn't enough money in journalism right now, and anyway, I'd rather write fiction.

I'm not sure yet what the plot, or even the genre, of this bestseller will be, but I'm thinking a quasi-romance-cum-murder-mystery could be in the works.

Another blog to come later.

Going Green

Everyone is talkin' green these days, so I thought I'd share some tips on how I keep it green, yo!

* Recycle. Duh.

* I use environmentally friendly cleaning products, from window/glass cleaner to all-purpose cleaner to dish detergent to laundry detergent to an Oxi-Clean type cleaner to fabric softener.

* I use kitchen towels for most of my cleaning, saving paper towels for things that really require paper towels. The paper towels I buy (and the toilet paper I buy) are 100-percent recycled. Nothing wrong with that.

* I have this great thing called a Star Mop. It's kind of like a Swiffer, but it's got reusable (washable) pads that you attach to the bottom to sweep up pet hair or mop your floors. I like it.

* My vacuum cleaner has a container for dust and dirt that you can empty -- it's bagless. Way cool.

* I use power strips on my TV and other such things so I can turn them all the way off when I'm done. It's good for your electric bill, too.

* Whenever possible, I try to buy local, organic food to cut down on the carbon footprint of my food.

I'm not at the point yet where I can ride my bike everywhere (I wish!) but another thing I've been thinking about is arranging my schedule to where I can take the bus to and from work at least one day a week.

New Toilets

We have new toilets in the building.

This is particularly exciting for me because (grossness alert!) the other day, when I was in the Bad Mood, something really disgusting happened that quite possibly sent me over the Bad Mood edge. What happened was this: I walked into the bathroom to use it and there were two women standing in there chatting. I thought, whatever, and went into the stall. There was toilet paper spinning around in the toilet -- bloody toilet paper, very bloody -- and the toilet was just running and running and running.

Which pissed me off -- I think it's fair to assume that the bloody toilet paper belonged to one of the two women who couldn't be bothered to make sure it flushed down, and who instead thought it was appropriate to just leave it and gossip with each other. I took the top off the tank and fiddled with the chain that holds the stopper that fills up the tank -- the stopper wasn't all the way down, which is what was causing the toilet to run like that, and basically, it was just gross. Beyond gross. Disgusting. And frankly, if I know enough to fix the toilet, anyone should know enough to fix the toilet.

So I got it fixed but was still irritated by whoever's bloody toilet paper that was. Ick.

Now, though, the toilets flush like champions, and I even think they're low-flow. We also are getting rid of styrofoam cups in an effort to be green. More on that later ...

Bad Mood!

I was in a bad mood yesterday. I forgot my water bottle at home. I had to fix a bunch of convoluted sentences. There was the plane fiasco. I didn't think I was going to get my shift covered. And on. And on.

Then I got home and really didn't want to work out. But I did anyway. And I can't even tell you how much better I felt when I was done. It was awesome.

Then I ate some delicious dinner and went out to a really funny, fantastic production that I am in love with now.

I think I just have too much on my plate. I have things to do most evenings of the week, things to see, things to write about. But I need to start limiting myself. I don't have to watch all the screeners I'm sent. I don't have to read all the books. And I don't have to feel bad about limiting my time to stuff I want to do.

Wow.

True Blonde

I think sometimes that I am secretly a blonde. This is because I am ditzy beyond belief. Today I had one of those moments that made me re-check my hair color in the mirror.

I'm also trying really hard not to be frustrated at a loved one in my life (not D, thanks for caring). I just have one question: Is it reasonable to expect advance notice when someone wants you to go on an out-of-town trip? My schedule, as you may have gathered, is a hectic thing. This weekend I have volunteering on Saturday and a bar shift on Sunday. I can't do either of them because someone bought me a plane ticket ... and neglected to tell me exactly when I was leaving and returning.

Nice to buy a plane ticket.

Irritating as all get-out not to inform me as to my travel information.

I hold some blame here, too -- I should have asked, and asked, and asked again, until I got an answer. Today I made about eight phone calls (none of which the person in question answered) until I finally had to call this person at work, and he/she was all, "Oh! I didn't tell you?"

NO, you didn't tell me! And now I have to get this shift covered for the bar, and nobody can do it, and I don't know what the hell I'm going to do. It's beyond frustrating.

I need at least two weeks advance notice if someone wants to take up more than a few hours of my time. AT LEAST. If you want two days, it's better to make it three weeks. This person had to buy me a special plane ticket -- I can't go out with the rest of the group because I have prior obligations and can't leave when they are leaving. And then I have to deal with other members of the group acting all affronted because I've made plans already and I can't just drop them last-minute, no matter how much you'd like me to do so.

GRRR-animals!

Gross But Good

The first item in this post is actually just gross. Usually it's good. I'll elaborate: Yesterday D went grocery shopping and brought me home my usual containers of salad mix. I get the organic King Soopers brand "herbed spring mix" -- essentially, it's spring mix with dill, basil, cilantro and other herbs added to up the flavor profile. It's actually really delicious, and even though it's more expensive (obviously) than buying my own spinach, red cabbage, arugula, baby romaine, etc., and mixing up my own spring mix, that would be a giant pain in the ass, I wouldn't do it and then the greens would end up rotting in my fridge. Trust me, I know this. So I spend a few more dollars and, in return, I get fully washed and prepared spring mix with which to make my salads. And it actually all gets eaten. (I'm growing some herbs at my house as we speak, so possibly in the near future, I'll start buying the plain spring mix and adding my own herbs. Just in case you cared.)

So I open up one of the containers last night to make today's salad, and ... it's gross. At least half of the greens are all dark and slimy, which is what lettuce does when it gets beyond the point of edibility. Well -- maybe you could still eat it. I'm not about to find out. It's the nasty. I'm picking through the container, saying "Ugh" a lot and trying to find some salvagable salad mix from this mess. It's really gross. D comes over and checks the expiration date (7/25) and gets all heated, so today he's going to take it back to the store, show them exactly what they sold me and exchange it for some (hopefully) fresh produce. Thankfully, the other container was in much better shape, so I could still assemble my salad (which I just finished eating).

Another gross but good thing are these vitamins my brother hooked me up with. I'm about to go into informercial mode here. The brand is called Passion4Life. It's a liquid vitamin, and 98 percent of the vitamin/mineral/etc. blend gets absorbed into your body within three minutes of taking it. It's also kind of a pyramid marketing scheme that Art's involved in, so when he first told me about it, I was kind of like, "Yeah, okay, I'll buy some of this to help you out." Then I quit taking it for a minute and just started again yesterday. And wow! What a difference. He swore up and down that it helped his energy levels and his focus -- he was absolutely right. Weird that I didn't notice it sooner, but it's definitely helped a lot in both of those aspects. I feel like I can do everything on my list and then some today. It's pretty awesome. I just ordered another bottle of it and plan on continuing to take it. If anyone is interested in learning more, let me know -- I can get you Art's consultant number; you'll pay the same price for the vitamins but he gets credit (and paid) for it. They are kinda expensive, but completely worth it for the effect you get, in my opinion.

But. It tastes awful. Like those natural vitamins you can get, that you can smell as soon as you open the bottle, and kind of taste when you swallow them, but not really, cause it's only on your tongue for a second? Worse than those. It really does taste, as Art would say, "gnar." So what I do is this: I blend it into a smoothie which becomes my breakfast first thing in the morning. Here is the recipe:

3 ice cubes (crush these in the blender before making the rest of the smoothie so you don't get big chunks of ice in the smoothie)
1/2 cup mixed berries, approximately*
1/2 cup mixed fruit, approxmiately*
1 baby banana, or 1/2 a regular banana
1 serving (individual cup) Yo Plus vanilla yogurt**
1 ounce Passion4Life

Blend and enjoy.

*I buy frozen mixed fruit and mixed berries from King Soopers (again, the King Soopers brand). I defrost them for about 24 hours in the fridge -- when I'm putting them in my morning smoothie, I'll replace what I use in my special container in the fridge. I only defrost one day's worth at a time. You don't really have to defrost them, but it makes the smoothie thinner and thus more drinkable.

**I've tried both Yoplait's Yo Plus and Dannon's Activia. Yo Plus blows Activia out of the water, in case you were wondering. Not only does it have the fiber, protein and the other added stuff that Activia leaves out, but that whole claim about "regulating the digestive system?" Activia did nothin' for me, Yo Plus actually works. Plus it is much creamier than Activia, and tastes better.

Poor, Poor Pitiful Me

I don't have enough time. And it's getting worse. I get screeners for movies I don't have time to watch. I get review copies of books I don't have time to read. And then I feel bad because when I do, by some chance of the stars, have time for something pleasure-related -- I never want to read or watch what I get sent for free.

It's frustrating.

This next week, by the way, is going to be hell. (Not this week, but next week.) My supervisor, whom I cover for, is leaving for a week. AND the copy editor, whom I also cover for (for whom I also cover?), is also leaving for more than a week. So I get to do three ... three ... three jobs in one!

It's going to be bad, I already know it. I'm trying to prepare. The most frustrating thing is that, outside of my job, the thing that demands the most of my time is family. I feel bad for being frustrated by that. But there are times when all I want is to go home to my quiet house and hunker down on the couch and read some and catch up on some laundry and do a little bit of cleaning and go to bed early. But my brothers consider my home their refuge away from home. Don't get me wrong; I like that. But what I don't like is how they call up and invite themselves over at precisely the times when I most want to not have anyone over. My friends do it, too. It's maddening.

I love them, but I also love being by myself every once in a while. At least I got my brothers to start calling me ... they were in this really bad habit of just stopping by whenever, and I managed to convince them that was a really bad idea. Sometimes I wasn't home. Sometimes I was working or otherwise engaged. And sometimes I just don't want any visitors.

Well, I'm running out of daylight already -- time to blow this popsicle stand.