Oh, my stars and garters!

Open letters, high blood pressure version:

To everybody in front of me in traffic today: Wow! That is so awesome that you have all the time in the world to get to your destination! I think your inability to settle on a lane to drive in really shows your flexibility, and you really display your determination and steadfast nature when you slam on your brakes to get over a lane despite there not being anywhere for you to turn for at least two blocks. Nevertheless, cut it out. All of you. Drive the speed limit, and in a straight line, and we'll all be better for it.

To the guy who ran out in front of me from behind some stopped cars without even looking to see if someone was coming at him from the other direction at 30 mph, WHICH I WAS: Life is hard sometimes, confusing and complicated and painful, and often when things start to get overwhelming, it's hard to see the point of things. I understand, really I do, but please leave me out of your little death wish. Because if I killed you, I'd have to kill myself, and that's no good to anyone.

To me: Babe, leave the house just five minutes earlier and you won't feel the need to condemn every poky, indecisive driver in front of you to hell, ride the clutch, or bellow "LET'S DRIVE, YOU FUCKING FUCKOS!" while approaching stale green lights.

Oh, and you look nice today, has anyone told you that? Too bad about the pitiful timing with your laundry this afternoon, but I won't tell anyone how damp your jeans are if you don't.

Joolie and Eric's Kitchen Korner presents the most unhealthful snack in the world:

Bacon-fried chicken-fried bacon!

Oh, yes. A long time ago I read about a restaurant somewhere in East Texas that serves chicken-fried bacon. I had always wanted to try it, and I decided this was the weekend.

It was easy. We got some thick-sliced bacon and fried it up real good (can you say "fry it up really well" without sounding like a complete tool?), draining the bacon grease off as needed but keeping it aside. Then we set the bacon to cool on some paper towels.

Tee hee.

Wow, everyone at work looks kind of rough tonight.

Happy-hour summary

Two hours isn't long enough to drink, but five hours might be too many.

Oof.

Happy

In one hour I get to go to a post-work happy hour at Melinda's house. This is important, because it means we get to hang out past two. Going out to bars at midnight is good, but two hours just isn't long enough to drink sometimes. Usually right about the time everyone's getting good and comfortable, the lights go on, the glasses are confiscated, and it's time to clear out. That's probably for the best in terms of responsibility, but not so great for the social aspect.

Anyway, in addition to cocktails, Melinda will be serving pigs-in-a-blanket and onion dip, and she's making hot toddies to entice the handful of people who are wavering because they feel like they might be getting sick. That's good hostessing.

Frippery

Oh, no! I need new clothes. I found a pair of jeans I didn't hate about a year and a half ago for $11, so I bought four pairs, two black, two blue. I also bought four black T-shirts around the same time, which I layer with the polyester blouses I pick up at thrift stores every now and again.

With a few variations, that's about it. It's not a very inspired wardrobe, and even if no one else cares, I am mightily sick of it. But I hate shopping even more than I hate dressing like this, so I'm trying to convince myself I can ride this out until spring.

Final update on the stray cat: He was back within hours for his nightly feeding, as though nothing had happened. And his name has been refined, thanks to my friend Deborah. Final version: Ball-less Wallace the Asshole the Cat. Awww.

Bad sign:

Did I just write like six posts about getting the stupid cats fixed? I believe I may have. Whoops! Sorry!

Wallace the Asshole

The cats are home, and no, I didn't tell the vet's office the stray's name was Asshole. I chickened out and had to come up with something on the spot, so I told them his name was Wallace. Eric was disappointed, but Wallace is a perfectly respectable name. Besides, judging by the violence with which he bolted out of the cage and through the bushes on our property line, there's a chance we'll never see him again anyway. 

I got to sleep by nine a.m. and was awakened around 1:30 by a birthday girl and her beau. We drank coffee, shooed away baby stink bugs, and worked the NYT crossword until I had to get dressed to pick up the cats. When that was out of the way, I went to work, but not before treating myself to chicken fried chicken with cream gravy from Hoover's.

The End!

Aaargh.

Now the sun is up, it's a beautiful day, and I'm not sleepy. At all.

The human body is a perverse thing.

I wanna go to bed so bad.

The vet's office opens in an hour. It's not even that much later than my usual bedtime. It's just that I've exhausted all my other not particularly strenuous or noisy late-night activity options, and now I'm numb and bored.

Hey, all right! Now the vet's office opens in 52 minutes. Nothing helps pass the time like a little whining, right?

(It didn't take me eight minutes to type those two whiny paragraphs. I mean, it did, but it was interspersed by long stretches of staring out the window. I'm going to shut up now....Hey, just 48 more minutes!)

Cat trapped

It was so easy. A tiny piece of tuna, a few nuggets of kibble, a little cautious sniffing, and SNAP!

He was not pleased and immediately began thrashing around and making those horrible warbling yowling noises that sound disconcertingly similar to a three-year-old's crying, especially when they wake you up in the middle of the night. Poor little Asshole.

I admit I felt a little bad, deceiving him like that (here, kitty-kitty! delicious treats!...hahahaha!  there were hardly any treats at all in there, plus--hahaha--we're gonna have your sack surgically removed! sucker!). Mostly I was just hoping he wouldn't wail like that all night. The neighbors probably think we're weird enough already without suspecting us of torturing cats in the garage. But he settled down as soon as we covered the cage, turned out the light, and left him alone.

So now the only problem is staying awake until drop-off time at seven a.m.; the way my schedule is now, I figure it'll be a lot easier to stay up than get up. So no beer for me tonight, although I am enjoying a cup of coffee reheated from this morning.

Woohoo!

I can jump double-dutch! For like ten whole seconds!

Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go trap a cat.

Oh my god I actually got up before noon today and went out and did something before work

I met Melinda and Brant at the Austin Museum of Art to see the Andy Goldsworthy exhibit and documentary, Rivers and Tides. (I keep wanting to call him Jeff Foxworthy, but so far have managed to keep that to myself. You might be a Scottish environmentalist scupltor exploring the boundaries of time, art, and nature if...)

Rivers and Tides was slow and beautiful, but as it was also beautiful outside today, I spent a good bit of the movie wondering if I shouldn't have just gone to the park to experience the ever-changing elements of nature firsthand, instead of squirming on a bench in the museum, watching some artist manipulate them on a slightly unfocused screen.

This may bore you.

There wasn't much to today. Work was busy, cat-fixing appointments were made. The trap is really for the sad little stray guy who's been hanging around and eating our food. Enjoy those balls tonight, kitty, because you're spending tomorrow night in the garage and Wednesday under the knife. I guess he's ours now, even though he's mostly feral and won't let us touch him. I suppose now that I'm officially taking responsibility for him I should give him a name other than "Asshole," huh?

Um. What else? Oh, I had a really good big chef salad tonight. Mixed greens, sprouts, cheese, avocado, eggs, tomatoes, apples, and ham. Also sesame-garlic Sass dressing, which is frigging great.

I think it's funny how women's magazines and well-intentioned people always have to remind you that fixings and dressings can add millions of grams of fat to your salad, as though the only reason anyone would want to eat salad is because they want to lose weight. No, no one would ever eat a salad because it's delicious. Nitwits.

 

I'm gonna catch me some roommates:

Heeeeere's mortality!

So Johnny Carson died today. Eric and I were talking about it, and he said that probably some of the 21- and 22-year-olds who come into his bar don't even know who Johnny Carson is. And I said bullshit, everyone at least knows who he is, even if they weren't old enough to stay up for the Tonight Show when he was on it.

Shortly after that, we drove to Megashoppingland South to return a chair to Cost Plus and to buy  linens 'n' things at Linens 'n' Things.

The cashiers at Ls 'n' Ts were talking about Johnny Carson and how sad it was, until the 17-year-old who was ringing us up asked who he was. We all stopped.

You don't know who Johnny Carson is? said the older cashier.

The girl thought for a few seconds, then shrugged and said she'd heard of him. Eric smirked at me, and I felt acutely old, or at least older, for the first time in my life. And also kind of small because if someone who was one of the most famous men in America for thirty years will be almost completely forgotten in the next fifty, where does that leave all the rest of us chumps?

WHRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR RRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR RRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR

Ok, there is one thing I hate about working the night shift:

Every Friday evening they test the diesel backup generator for our building, I guess under the assumption that no one in their right mind would be working right now.

It's right under our office area, and for a half an hour each week, it produces a loud, dull, constant roaring noise that's overlaid by a slight, high whine. If I try to ignore it, it just becomes louder, and then I am painfully aware of it and begin to detect a subtle cycle of tone changes within its growling sameness. It's maddening. It's horrible.

On the other hand, just as I typed "(i)t's horrible," it stopped. Blissful silence; peace reigns again. Thank you for reading. You do know that you are all very special to me, each and every one of you, for a variety of reasons, each more splendid than the last. 

Zombies!

I saw Shaun of the Dead again last night. I love that movie. It's gory and surprisingly sweet.  I also think it's clever, charming, and a blast to watch.

Of course Eric and Roone, who both work in a bar that has many entrenched regulars, doublebonus like it because of the running joke about sad sacks who spend their entire lives at the same pub. And the twenty-nine-year-old protagonist who's had the same job since college and isn't really doing anything with his life but drinking beer and fucking off with his friends?  Oh, heavens, that didn't resonate with me at all.

Scary baby

...eeeevil baby.

Chairs to mend, old chairs to mend

Hooray! I bought furniture today.

For many, many years, due to a combination of inertia and frugality, we've been sitting in dining chairs that look like this:

(And really, I didn't pick the best chair to illustrate the absolute awfulness of the chairs we've been using. I should have taken a picture of the one with the wicker back all smashed out and unraveling and the vinyl seat cover flapping down over the back of the chair. But you get the point.)

Anyway, we now have a dining set that looks like this:

Or at least we will once we screw all the stupid legs on. We only had one chair assembled by the time I had to leave for work. I didn't say it was quality furniture.

It's nothing special, true, but for a nonaesthete tightwad who has relied almost exclusively on hand-me-downs of functional but not particularly attractive furniture, this is a little exciting. 

Post post post

Vickie's solution to my button-mailing problem, inspired by the postal experiments story that was featured on BoingBoing yesterday:

Speaking of Vickie and mail, check out the print she made and sent me last week:

Dude. She's good.

Post post

I got a report from a button recipient that despite the extra stickers, extra postage, hand canceling, and "Fragile" stamps, some of her buttons tore through the envelope and escaped.

This is disappointing, especially since they were intended for the Rochester, New York, chapter of the Pointy Fan Club. I'll have to refine my mailing technique to avoid future breaches. Live and learn.

In the meantime, if you were promised a button but received nothing but an insipid note in a slightly ripped envelope, please e-mail me so I can send you another one that's wrapped up nice and tight.

Providence

I was morosely picking a disgusting frozen wrap apart to isolate its more edible components and wondering what the hell else I was going to eat tonight besides three water chestnuts and some stringy onions. Just then, Joel called to tell me he'd left his Mulligatawny soup in the office fridge and I could have it if I wanted. Fucking perfect timing; if I were the squealing type I would have.

Now for the bad news: My smoking buddy, Amy, is out sick today. That's bad for her and for me. A bunch of my coworkers quit smoking after the new year, and Amy's been making vague noises about quitting lately. Getting sick might be the impetus she needs.

I should encourage her to stop, I know, because she's not just my smoking buddy, she's a friend for whom I wish all good things. That includes pink lungs. Still, I'm terrified she's going to quit soon, leaving me to smoke outside in the cold dark by myself.

I mean, jeez, can't everybody just wait until I'm ready to quit? Then we could all do it together, and bring each other hard candies and salty snacks and extra patches. When the stress got to be too much for us, we could snort rails of Wellbutrin off my desk and beat the shit out of each other in the parking garage.

Come on, it'll be fun.

Splendid

I preordered season two of The Wire today. That'll be a much better thing to aim my eyes at for hours, don't you think?

I'm sorry, I can't post today.

I have to proofread 60 pages of single-spaced 10-point type, half of which is sans-serif. And actually, I have to read it all twice. 

My poor eyes. They only ever wanted to be vehicles through which I could perceive light. They just wanted me to be able to do things like experience beauty, or be alerted to things like oncoming traffic or writhing pits of poisonous snakes. Yet this is how I repay them. It's almost tragic.

 

%^$#ing @!*&.

Eric, Dan, and I went on a photography excursion this afternoon. We spent three hours taking pictures by the power plant and the railroad tracks. Dan and Eric got many beautiful shots. Unfortunately, my camera battery is going, so when it was my turn to get my prints at the photo lab, I was handed a uniform stack of gray 4x6 rectangles. It was still fun to be walking and climbing around in the sunshine, and I got a few pictures from another camera, so there's that, at least.

Jam

Oh, if only you had been there for Choo's and my triangle/clarinet improv piece "Paint it Brown: A Musical Tribute to Roone's Room." If only you could have heard our subsequent skronky noise outburst. If only you had seen Roone's fashion show featuring various pieces of his new suit and boxer shorts with car-driving turtles on them.

The best things seem to happen at my house after four a.m. and many beers.

OD

I had two nice, thick, fatty brisket sandwiches this afternoon. Pickles, onions, squishy white bread, spicy bar-b-q sauce, the works. It was beautiful. But then I wandered around in a daze for a while and finally passed out for an hour and a half, dreaming about bike wrecks, plane crashes, and street detours. I guess I should follow up with a nice salad and about nine glasses of water before I end up with gout.

Bye, tree.

March 25, 2004:

Coffeecoffeecoffee

We have lots of really good restaurants in and around our neighborhood, but ever since Sacred Cup closed, there hasn't been a coffee shop in miles.

Pato's, the reliable-but-never-that-great Mexican restaurant up the street, burned down a few years ago, and while they made a few stabs at reopening, they were always losing backers and kept having to change categories and start over again.

Every time I drove by it was something new. Open. Closed. Now Open! Closed for Remodeling. Open Soon! Open on Fri. and Sat. Closed for Remodeling. And so on. You can see how hard they tried by their permanent sign: Full bar, Mexican Food, Cheesesteaks and Wings. That's an ambitious but ultimately tragic combination.

Anyway, I guess they finally gave up:

Quackenbush's! Decent coffee and a place to sit and read will soon be a two-minute walk from my house! I wish they'd hurry.

Now we just need a Vietnamese restaurant within walking distance, but I'm not holding my breath.

In other news:

It's cold, clear, and dry, and the stars are stunning tonight.

Also, we're trying to learn to double-dutch jump rope on our breaks at work, and I'm so close I can taste it. I can jump in now, but I can't get my feet going quite yet. One woman totally nailed it tonight, and the rest of us are hoping for a breakthough soon. If anyone has any tips on basic double dutch technique, I'd be grateful.

Meanwhile, check out the Snazzy Steppers for some amazing double-dutch action. (The link has audio and a several-second intro you should just put up with. They're frigging great.)

Today's problem, expressed with the moderate use of profanity and font style manipulation:

Due to an overzealous application of fucking prescription face cream, my fucking face is chapped. It fucking hurts.

This is some fucking bullshit, man.

One-eyed guilt snake

A long time ago, I wrote about my problems with eye floaters and jokingly linked to some crackpot's site that claimed they were caused by self-love. Since then, aside from the obvious search for "garters," the number-one single reason people come to this site via search engines is because they are looking for information about the link between eye floaters and masturbation. Seriously, this shows up in my referrer log at least three times a day, usually more.

Clearly people are worried about this; someone left this comment the other day, and I'm not convinced it's a joke. See what you think:

hello;

I masturbate sometimes and now I feel there is a dark ring (circle) under my eyes. I feel my mind is more slower than last.

NOW HOW CAN I DO FOR TREATMENT THIS SUBJECT .
PLEASE SEND ME A GOOD WAY TO MY ADDRESSE SOON.
GOODBYE

If it's not a joke, that makes me really sad. People, lots of them, are out there feeling filthy and self-destructive for enjoying the practically involuntary act of rubbing one out. Isn't life hard enough?

If it were up to me, I'd make masturbation a sacrament, or at least reclassify it from a sin to a private act of reflection and purification.  I think we'd be a lot better off as a species.

(Other common searches in my referrer log: "monkey fuck," "shit feet," and "meteorologist Dave Schwartz.")

Return of BLACKLUNG

I am slowly arriving at the sad realization that I have to quit smoking again.

I hate quitting smoking. It is my very least favorite thing to do in this life. The last time I tried was in 2003. The first few days were okay, but after the initial shock subsided, I cried for weeks. I said things like, "if I can't smoke I don't even see what the fucking point is," and meant it. It was supposed to get better, but it kept getting worse.

That alone should have been a big tipoff that smoking is evil and I am weak and pathetic. That should have strengthened my resolve and made me all defiant: fuck you, smoking, you can't break me, sister's doin' it for herself, uh-huh; fuck you, big tobacco, whoo hoo, I'm sassy! 

But no. It broke me; I was broken. My judgment was clouded by lack of endorphins, chronic insomnia, and the blackest case of self-pity I've ever entertained. I was appalled.

I gradually started again. Spending three weeks in Europe during one of my weakest points didn't help, I suppose, but that was just an excuse. Within a month after I got back, I was up to a pack a day again and have been hovering around there ever since.

The whole thing sucked big stubbly smelly chancrous balls, and I am not the slightest bit anxious to do it again.

But still. I'm thinking about it. Or at least I'm thinking about thinking about it.

Maybe this summer.

This never happened:

 
It's been more than 24 hours since my demon meal, and I never got assflames. Not even ass sparks. Thanks to all who expressed concern or participated in the spirited discussion about digestion rates. It's people like you who make it all worthwhile.

Dull round-up

It's been warm and excellent outside, so I walked to work this afternoon. According to my trusty talking pedometer, it's exactly 1.5 miles from my living room table to my desk at work. It was pretty great; I feel a little more awake and oxygenated than usual.  I'm going to try to walk and ride my bike to work at least once a week each, weather and post-work plans permitting.

My job is boring, but I have to go do it now anyway.

Note to those to whom I have promised buttons: I haven't forgotten, I swear. They're all packed up, sealed, stamped, ready to go. But they're kind of bulky and should probably be hand cancelled at the post office. Each day since Friday I have intended to go but have run out of time. I'll go tomorrow, maybe, I swear.

Tempting fate

My dinner from Veggie Heaven is so spicy and delicious that I don't even care that there are peas in the rice or that I'll have flames shooting out of my ass in about 12 hours.

Maintains professional environment at all times

I cleaned off my desk in a rare fit of cleanliness, ruthlessly tossing all the paper scraps, mangled paper clips, and outdated reference materials.

I even bleached out the coffee and ink stains and raked my tiny Zen garden, the very existence of which seems to negate the purpose of a Zen garden. It's always in the way. The stupid little pagodas and cranes always tip over and then grains of sand get into everything, causing clutter and aggravation. Mostly it's just crap. A crap garden.

I guess the lesson of the Zen garden is discipline. In order to reap its benefits and avoid an appallingly gritty work area, you must faithfully devote some time each day to tend to it.

Yeah, whatever, I haven't learned shit. All I know is that it was pissing me off, and it's not anymore. I also know that my office and much of the surrounding area smells like a curious blend of Comet and Mrs. Meyer's all-purpose cleaner and that I feel very virtuous sitting in front of my bare, tidy desk.

Shoppin' Fun!

I've been spending more time in craft stores lately, looking for printing supplies and whatnot. Today I was out hunting for a 1.25" hole punch so I can cut out button designs without scissors. Anyway, all this stuff has been assimilated into the scrapbooking category; sadly, this is an aisle I'd usually avoid like scabies.

I don't know why, but I have a really violent reaction to all that cutesy crap. I know I'm being a snob and I should be glad that people are are able to engage in something they find fun and rewarding, but it's so incredibly sappy. 

The worst offender is a company called Jolee's Boutique, which cranks out all manner of stickers and stamps, with such diverse themes as "She's Expecting"  "Bathtime,"  "Hunting," and the tantalizingly named but disappointingly executed "Lady's Leather."

I think I should start a rival crafting concern. I'll call it Joolie's Abattoir and as a sideline, I'll run bets on how long it takes the scrapbook trend to peak out and tank.

The story of kimchee

  nce upon a time there was some leftover kimchee, and a drunk girl came home, put it in the microwave, and ate it. It was delicious.

                        The end!

The story of sushi

Before



After

(Photos by me; concept by Dan)