Not Married to the Idea

Fantacrap (adj): a combination of Fantasea and Crap

2009-10-06T18:22:00.000-07:00

The last time I was this embarrassed I was rinsing a dirty plunger in the bathtub at a friend's apartment. But that was lifetimes before the Shedd Aquarium's new show Fantasea.

Before the Shedd calls me a family-fun hating monster, let me say in my defense, "Shedd, I don't get any special joy out of nicknaming your new production Fantacrap. The show isn't even open yet, and you can bet when it does there will be dozens, if not hundreds, flocking to the internet to bash the show you've called Fantasea. Besides, Shedd, if you're going to get criticized, wouldn't you rather hear it from someone who loves you?"--At least, that's what my Mom always said to me...

Fantasea could have been interesting, if it were kept under an 30 minutes, ditched the Disney/Sea World feel, and was altogether redeveloped. The one thing Fantasea has going for it is, for the first time Shedd audiences can go to the Oceanarium and see several animals, including the dolphins, do tricks. (Yes tricks... because if you try to tell me that a sea lion tugging a rope with the word pull on it is a "natural behavior", I'll go from embarasse to ashamed.) Every other element in the show is working against Fantasea, from the colorful seaweed hoola dancers, to the out of place Mary Poppins-type characters with umbrellas suspended from the ceiling, to that poor young girl who's planted in the audience with her "mom".

The emcee of Fantasea had asked everyone in the audience not to discuss the show because it's official release is still a few days away... so I won't give any more spoilers, but I cannot say this enough: The show is embarassing! It's embarrassing to watch he Shedd Aquarium endeavor to put on a Disney-esque performance and miss the mark completely, becoming a corny production with no value in entertainment, education, nor otherwise. I don't have kids, and I can't tell if any in the audience were buying the show, although my boyfriend swears he saw one 2-year-old roll his eyes.

Fantasea completely undermines the great and interesting things going on at the Shedd. It's a shame Fantasea reached the point of expensive lesson to be learned, when any dopey focus group would have axed it in pre-production phases and helped the Shedd avoid what will certainly become a big black eye.

Do you know "good" pick up lines?

2009-03-03T11:31:00.000-08:00

Add your pickup lines to the comments section of this article I wrote for Denver Six Shooter.

Pickup lines are the frisky, bastard cousins of the Hallmark's Valentine. They're the one- or two- liners that could get you laid, but more likely get a drink thrown in your face. I asked dozens of people from six different Capitol Hill bars for pickup lines, and this is what happened.

Buffalo Wild Wings Trivia

2009-02-16T21:22:00.000-08:00

The bad mood began when the DJ announced a competitor's team name was "Multiple Scoregasm", which clearly trumped our team name, "Scoregasm."

"Yes, that's right," said the DJ (i.e. Wade). "There are two teams who have the word 'Scoregasm' in their name."

How humiliating!

Things continued to go down hill as I displayed unjustified confidence in topics I should really start considering lessons in the Golden Rule. On trivia of "Name-D-Year" variety, I should be seen and not heard.

Yet I'm not completely useless at bar trivia. I jumped up quickly at "What is the largest organ of the body?"

At the DJ booth, a regular stands, looks at me, and says ironically:"Blah blah blah largest organ in MY body."

I laugh a sarcastic, "Har, har, har" giving him the three elbow jab, and I remembered something that happened last Halloween.

My boss's son wanted me to print him out pictures of skeletons. I printed on, and he comes up to me and says, "No! Not a girl skeleton! I want a picture of a boy skeleton!"

"Kid," I says, "that's not a bone."

He looks at me incredulously... made me second guess myself.

In the midst of this internal dialogue, I return to my seat and continue to do piss poor at Buffalo Wild Wings Trivia.

One word, via Facebook

2009-02-07T15:34:00.000-08:00

I keep getting all of these things via Facebook. I think there used to be a time when these were forwarded endlessly throughout a circle of friends via email. I like the Facebook method better; keeps my inbox clean. Anyway, here's my responses to ONE word answers.

Type only ONE word answers

It's harder than you think!! Here is what you are supposed to do...and please don't spoil the fun...copy and paste into your own note, type in your answers and tag a bunch of people - including me.

Where is your cell phone?..... dunno
Your hair? ......... oily :(
Your father? ........ daddy
Your favorite thing? ........... Kyle
Your dream last night?....... forgotten
Your favorite drink? ........... smoothie
Your dream/goal? ........... mastery
The room you are in? ...... bedroom
Your fear? ......... trickery
Where do you want to be in 6 years?..... adventuring
Muffins? ............. nope
One of your wish list items?.......... money
Where you grew up? ........ Chicago
The last thing you did? ....... cleaned
What are you wearing?....... pajamas
Your TV?........... nonexistent
Your pets? ......... dead
Your computer? ..... sux
Your life? ......... cluttered
Your mood? ........ resourceful
Missing someone? ...... constantly
Your car? .... sold
Favorite store?..... museum
Your summer? ..... unplanned
Your favorite color? ........ changes
When is the last time you laughed? .....yesterday
Last time you cried? ....... dunno
Last person to email me? ally
My favorite food? ........ all
A place I would rather be right now? ..... home

International Snow Sculpture Competition (Breckinridge, CO, 2009)

2009-02-07T15:09:00.000-08:00

Jump Into Boulder Dive Bars

2009-01-27T14:46:00.000-08:00

So another fun and exciting thing I've been up to: Drinking!

I've got a little gig going around to bars and chronicling the escapades for DenverSixShooter.com

Check out my first post, Dive Bars Beneath the Streets of Boulder.

Disney World Marathon... check!

2009-01-15T09:00:00.000-08:00

"No!" in response to: "Are you ready?"

Maybe I shouldn't be so brutally honest to the staff of the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society, but honestly, I was not feeling very ready to run that marathon.

But Sunday rolled around, and I showed up, started, and I finished the Walt Disney World Marathon! It was my first and last.

Kyle and I met with my parents in Florida on Thursday, January 8th. We had a few great days hopping around parks before my 6 hour run/walk on the 11th.

Some things to note

The altitude made a huge difference! I ran the first 18 miles wihtout getting the least bit winded.
Running stinks! One should only engage in running to save one's life, and often that decision should really be weighed more carefully.
I walked from 18 to 25. Although my cardio system felt great, the altitude didn't save discomfort from ligaments and muscles in my feet, of all places.
Disney has characters throughout the course. Many racers stopped to take photos, I did not.
I spent almost 30 minutes in line for port-o-lets along the way.
During the race I ate 2 bananas, 2 cups of honey, and probably drank more than 2L of water.
I finished the 1/2 marathon in about 2 hours and I crawled through the second half to come in at 6hrs.
No injuries. No joint paint. No major muscle soreness. I crossed the finish line on my feet, and each of the succeeding days were pain-free, with only slight stiffness in my shoulders.
Goals accomplished: (1) completed the race, (2) didn't get hurt, and (3) won't be in a state of recovery for any part fo the following week.

Now onto a bigger and better 2009, in which there are no marathons, but plenty of chocolate cake.

"Newly" Published Article about Politickin'

2008-12-16T15:55:00.000-08:00

I scoured the internet and found an article I sold to an unknown bidder last month.

Check it out: Dear John...That Sarah Palin Thing... it was a joke, wasn't it?

How Amazon.com Users Describe Products

2008-11-26T21:13:00.000-08:00

Paranormal Romance.

I know what you're thinking. You're thinking, "No shit! I just tagged about 50 items on Amazon.com with the phrase 'paranormal romance'." Well, you're not alone. Of all the phrases and words in the English dictionary, "paranormal romance" is the 6th most popular adjective that comes to the minds of Amazon.com users when they want to describe Amazon products.

Nearly 42,000 products on Amazon.com are tagged with the phrase "paranormal romance".

Tagging is the Web 2.0 practice of labeling items with keywords. As far as I can tell, the theory is to "tag" web content with keywords to improve search engine rankings.

I was initially shocked to learn that 42,000 items exists on Amazon.com that are worthy of the tag "paranormal romance". Then I became shocked at the number of common terms that get used less than "paranormal romance". Here's just a couple:

"Book" only had 32,000 tags.
"Disney" owns 14,000 tags.
"Christmas" gets a nearly 13,000 tags.
"Toys" and "Sex" (not one phrase) each get fewer than 9,000 tags.

Please feel free to not believe one word of this, and check out the Amazon.com Tag Map for yourself. Hover over the words to get stats on the number of tags for each of the "popular" phrases.

World War Z, you should read it this weekend!

2008-09-25T21:15:00.000-07:00

Everyone should read World War Z or at least listen to it on tape as soon as possible!

The World War Z is the story of the great zombie war told through the words of dozens of individuals throughout the globe, and in the end, you get a fantastic book, excitingly action-filled and forebodingly satirical. I just finished World War Z, and I am completely in awe at how engaging and evocative the experience was!

The story begins in rural China with a doctor witnessing Case Zero, the first documented case of the living dead. From there the story takes off across the globe crafting the stories of different nations: from how they become aware of the zombie epidemic to their progression of reactions including denial, concern, panic, retreat, and finally, regrouping and offensive.

Each of the characters had unique stories to tell, and each of them had unique mannerisms and culture backing them up. The military figures have a broad command of weapon and strategy terminology. The Israeli scholars speak methodically yet conversationally. The businessmen seem to swagger and strut.

Of course interesting characters are nothing without action and conflict and with millions of zombies hungry for human flesh, there was plenty of decapitation, skull-busting, disembowelment, and cannibalism (on both ends of the fence). Even before the Great Panic, international tensions are high. Palestinians fear that offers to take asylum in voluntarily quarantined territory may just be Israelis trying to lure their enemies in for enslavement. Without diplomatic relationships, misunderstandings lead to nuclear war. Celebrities become torn off their pedestals by the very people that initially instated them. Civilians flee in all directions, and everyone falls under the category of refugee.

Above the action and the impeccably crafted characters, is the satire. Every character that told a personal story in World War Z had some keen insight into our modern world, without being corny. The book was rampant with topical themes such as community vs. isolation, selfishness vs. cooperation, practical vs. prodigal.

The setting in time added tremendously to the book's allure as well. The author constantly references the Cold War and pop figures so that you know exactly when this story took place. In short, if World War Z was a prophetic book, zombies will be taking over the globe in something like 2 to 5 years from right now! Keeping within the frame of reference of the reader only enhances the illusion of World War Z.

The audio version of this book is like listening to a movie! Its only 6 hours long, and whereas many audiobooks are done by one reader playing voices for each individual character, World War Z featured a new reader for each character. readers included, among more than 12 others, John Turturro, Mark Hamill, and Alan Alda.

Download it from audible.com, listen to it on your way to work next week or while you're at the gym, and you won't be sorry.

Vote for my TShirt

2008-09-18T18:29:00.000-07:00

Well, the infamous flying fish drawing is now a TShirt design and available for you to vote on Threadless.com... so please do!

Threadless.com, Everyone should look and critique my TShirt Design

2008-09-08T21:20:00.000-07:00

Okay, I would post and post and post some more, but this little gal is pooped and needs to get her beauty rest because she starts marathon training (again) tomorrow early morning-style!

If you come across this post, you should check out Threadless.com or at least go to this site and critique my TShirt submission! There will be a day very soon that I will ask for voters. Hurray. And goodnight.

The Walrus (a poem)

2008-08-16T12:20:00.000-07:00

Let's all be on the outside,
Who we are on the inside.

Let's go to the Walrus on Tuesday,
Dressed as your spouse.

Shame what?
Embarrassed, huh?

Fall on your face while dancing.

Queue up with the other guys,
Glazed over eyes,
Waiting to put their "drink order"
Into the waitress.

Respond: "I am a robot."
When a stranger says,
"Someone drew lines
And wrote numbers one through six
on your back."
Respond: "Robots don't sing."
When the same person
Asks you to duet Meatloaf.

Do the monkey on stage as
Your new best friend
What's-his-name
Sings "Baby Got Back".

"Unchained Melody", "Eclipse of the Heart", "Big Booty Bitches"
An entire genre of songs use
Lyrics such as mlaah la la la.
Dhaaa.

When you're asked if you'd
Like another Cherry Coke,
Feel free to say, "No thanks.
I'm driving."

Because here at the Walrus,
Singing karaoke with the mic
Parallel to the floor
With your eyes closed,
Here at the Walrus
We are all
Openly retarded.

The Best Dating Method Ever: Get over yourself and get a girl

2008-08-08T06:53:00.000-07:00

I knew I was going to be sitting down with my friend W last time I came into town, and I knew that our enjoyable conversations were going to go toward love troubles. We all have them. I was trying to come up with a good plan to get W out of his head and into a girl.

Thus the Krenn Method was born!

I have to say it is a pretty great, nay INGENIOUS Method!

Let me set this Method up a little better with some of the fundamental observations that lead to its conception:

Everyone gets rejected a lot. Here I'm using a loose definition of the word "rejected." It's not so much as having a girl tell you she won't go on a date with you. It includes a member of the target gender bailing out on plans, not being interested enough while conversing with you, etc. The trick is that most people rack up rejections at an early age (junior high-ish). By the time they hit college, they can read signals well enough to make good decisions on who is worthy of their attention.
Rejection leads to relationship maturity. Let's face it. Girls in their mid-twenties and beyond expect guys to behave and react in certain ways. Don't ask me for examples. I don't have any. All I know is that things I hear my female cohort describe can often be shielded under the umbrella of relationship immaturity or inexperience. Unfortunately, it seems that the most socially mature individual can still be relatively immature in a dating relationship. These immature daters are at a terrible disadvantage because the relationship maturity is what intelligent women base their romantic (not to be mistaken as sexual) decisions on.
Time is constantly being wasted. Pining over the target gender was fine and dandy for Shakespeare. Afterall, the dating pool in any play is only a max of 5 people. In the real world, every second you waste pining is time you're out of the game and missing opportunities to find the next best thing.

These observations lead to conflict.

How can an immature dater rack up the experience to get a girl? Only through rejection. But how do you get those worried about rejection to throw caution to the wind and try anyway?
What advice can you give an inexperienced dater so that he stops wasting time on girls that are not worthy of him?

The answers to question one lie in The Seventy Five. The answers to question two lie in The Steps.

As my friend has already done such an amazing job of explaining the method on his Live Journal page, I'm not even going to bother getting into it.

Check out Don Burleson on Live Journal.

An omen of better times to come

2008-08-01T16:46:00.000-07:00

Acupuncture: My deeper sensation

2008-07-29T09:27:00.000-07:00

Today I got stabbed in the back with a needle, and I immediately was reminded of having my teeth drilled at the dentist. It was my 2nd acupuncture treatment.

Magic Ingredients

Acupuncturists do this thing where they light herbs on fire and stick them to your body. When you feel the heat, it gets removed. The herb is called Moxa (possibly misspelled).

On my first acupuncture treatment, I was told that I was going to get Moxa in my belly button. To disperse the heat evenly and prevent burning, my acupuncturist was going to put salt into my belly button. I immediately envision some magical Chinese salt that you have to buy from the same store where that kid picked up Gizmo from the movie Gremlins. Limited edition, thousand-year-old salt from the bottom of an ancient sea. And as I'm in the middle of this imagination frenzy, my acupuncture gal begins to pour into my belly button the salt from none other than a standard blue Morton Salt container... I felt a bit like a cake...

Today there was Moxa, sans salt, all over the place and lots of it! I don't know if the Moxa was a compounding factor or what, but there were plenty of "deeper sensations" today as well.

Deeper Sensation

When you hear about acupuncture, maybe you're used to hearing phrases such as "really works" or "balances energy". What you do not hear tossed around is "deeper sensation".

I owe my deeper sensations to luck. I've always been curious about acupuncture, but my curiosity has never motivated me to open up my wallet. My first two visits to this acupuncturist have been pro bono on account of my going to a health fair to get my cholesterol checked and getting my name picked out of the magic acupuncture hat.

Anyway, the first visit my acupuncture gal was prepping me on what to expect. She said, "You're going to feel a pin prick, and then you may feel a deeper sensation."

"What is a deeper sensation?"

"Well, it could be a dull pain, or like a shock of electricity..."

"So you're telling me, something bad."

For that first treatment, she had drawn four X's around my ankles. These were the treasure map to the points she intended to jut a needle into to aleviate the following symptoms: stress, cold extremities, and mood swings.

First needle goes in and out, and there wasn't much in the way of a deeper sensation. Second needle, things stay boring. Third needle, starting to yawn. Forth needle, a huge rush of energy from the needle point shooting out my toes. (Days later, I recounted this to my mom who thought this could have been a "hit nerve". I've been wondering about that, and decided that it was somewhat different: Pinching nerves leave a pain after you remove the simulus. In my case, the needle came out and the excitement was immediately over.)

Anyway, this "deeper sensation" left me on an "acupuncture high" until at least the following day. I felt drunk, to be quite honest, and that evening when I was talking with my friend Kara, I found myself more eager to laugh than usual--quite a feat, because Kara is generally funny anyway and this was definately a heightened experience.

So today I had my second treatment.

One point in my back and I mistakenly thought my teeth were getting drilled. A point on my calf and I thought I was standing on hot coals. Probably 4 deeper sensations in all, all somewhat unpleasant, and this was with about 10 points.

Also I got stuck in the stomach. I didn't like that very much.

Flying Puppy

2008-07-18T01:52:00.000-07:00

Question: What's worse than phoning your boyfriend at midnight-thirty to say that you have abandoned you room because no one is around to save you from the gigantic moth that slipped into bed with you?

Answer: Re-branding the nemesis from "fluttering menace" into a "flying puppy."

"Just trap it with your hands," he said. "It's soft."

"I don't care what it is," I said. "I tried to capture it with the tupperware, and it just started flying around!!" (Truly an outrage.)

The problem with moths, more so than other bugs, is that they're just as clumsy as I. Flies are easy to shoo out of the open door or window because they have a predictable trajectory. Moths, on the other hand, are all willy-nilly, and I find myself imitating their behavior, wiggling around as if I had no bones.

Let's be honest, I don't do well with other bugs either.

In college, I had two carpenter ants in my apartment. I had moved all of the lights into the affected room so that I could see their every move. It's debilitating. Like being a child that saw a scary movie too close to bedtime. In the end, I bought very hard soled shoes and mashed the ants into the carpet. Then I covered their little carpenter ant corpses with a desk.

One time, that same year, I had a big spider in my apartment. I was on the phone with Walter at the time, and I started panicking.

"Walter, what should I do!"

"Turn off all of the lights and hope it goes away!"

"Will you come over and kill it for me?"

"God no!" were his exact words.

Fastforward to two years after the carpet ant/spider apartment, and I was living in an apartment with straight up roaches! They were nice, because although very gross, the adults were very secretive. You never had to look at a live moving adult roach in my apartment. Just the little baby roaches would hang around in the sink, and the remedy was simple: Turn on the hot water, dump a cap full of bleach into the drain, and spend the night at a friends house for about a week.

Earlier this month there were two big wasps in our apartment. Wade lured them toward the screen door by turning on a nearby light. Then he crawled GI-style toward the screen door and slid the door open without getting so much as 4 inches from the ground.

It was pretty impressive, and luckily for me, his demonstration on how to rid the apartment of a wasp occurred before he left for his DJ gig. So when the second wasp was in the house and I was alone, I had the survival skills to get it out the door. Then I had the common sense to close all of the doors and windows and turn on the AC.

Well, I've procrastinated long enough... its time to leave the lights on in the hall, build a fort out of my blankets, and get some sleep.

beat that!

2008-07-18T00:24:00.000-07:00

I had a friend in college who maintained that her father's dream was to have a photograph of her and her mother wearing matching floral dresses.

Summer Book Review #1

2008-07-17T21:11:00.000-07:00

The Books
Positioning--Al Reis and Jack Trout

The 22 Immutable Truths of Branding--Al Reis and Laura Reis

The Sort-of Review
Okay, so I've finished two books this week--never mind that one was an audio book! Both of them are from my Additional Work-Related Reading list, leaving only one left in that caegory for the summer.

These two books, both related to marketing, branding, and positioning were incredibly insightful for me, being that I'm the "Marketing Director" despite being entirely clueless about marketing.

The point is that if anyone is interested in marketing, these two books are quick, easy-to-reads. They are very instructional, i.e. repetitive and full of good examples. They were perfect starting points for me to get my feet wet in the first step of marketing a new product--branding it. Even if you're not interested in marketing, these books provide fun insight into the way that people think when they go to the store.

While reading, I identified a dichotomy in myself between when I am a consumer and when I am a marketer.

The rule? Repetition creates a brand and a position in the mind of the consumer.

As a consumer, I best remember things that have been repeated over and over again. That "how many licks to the center of the tootsie pop?" commercial. Perfect example. I don't think the Tootsie Roll people made any other commercials. So in my mind, I have a special, uncontested place for Tootsie Pops. I also have a unique place in my brain where I store tips from Louie the Lightning Bug with regards to power lines.

As a marketer, I enjoy coming up with different looks to our brochures. Although it's fun for me to keep coming up with new designs, it doesn't help establish a singular idea of our company's brand in the mind. As it turns out, a singular, uncontested version of your company is the best way to go.

For more on these things, read the books!

NOTE
You can download a 1-hour audio version of The 22 Immutable Truths of Branding from Audible.com for less than $7.

Short Hair is Fierce Hair! Agree? Vote!

2008-07-17T20:55:00.001-07:00

TRESemmé How "Fierce" is Your Hair?

Sponsored by TRESemmé

My Summer Reading List

2008-07-16T20:19:00.000-07:00

If you plan to do something, over-plan it to the point nothing may get done. ~Sortajack

After a year of almost inactivity, I decided to take up reading again. This time two years ago, I was reading a book every two weeks, as well as The New Yorker (I can't wait to get my issue with the controversial Obama cover, btw) and The Week.

So to jumpstart my summer reading, I've started with a "healthy" list including titles I already own, as well as Business Week's recommended MBA poolside reading.

In no particular order:

BusinessWeek Titles

The Entrepreneur's Guide to Finance and Business (Steven Rogers)
The World is Flat (Thomas Friedman)
True North (Bill George)
in progress Field Notes from a Catastrophe (Elizabeth Kolbert)
Ulysses (James Joyce)
Five Future Strategies You Need to Know Right Now (George Stalk and John Butman)
Competitive Strategy (Michael E. Porter)
The Back of the Napkin (Dan Roam)

Other Business Titles

done Positioning (Al Reis and Jack Trout)
done 22 Immutable Truths of Branding (Al Reis)
The Wisdom of Crowds (James Surowiecki)

Family/Friends Recommended Reading

The Kite Runner (Khaled Hosseini)
The Crimson Petal in the White (Michel Faber)
in progress When You Are Engulfed in Flames (David Sedaris)

Honest Foods Poster Entry

2008-07-16T19:17:00.001-07:00

Design an ad for Honest Foods!

Sponsored by Honest Foods

One day I'll own a hybrid, but until then...

2008-07-13T23:12:00.000-07:00

Brickfish Gas Card Design
Brickfish

Vote for my weird-ass clock!

2008-07-13T18:20:00.001-07:00

Mysterious Mr. X's Circus of Strange
Brickfish

Pee-Wee is still great after all these years

2008-07-12T11:59:00.000-07:00

Kyle and I got drunk last night and went to a showing of Pee Wee's Big Adventure really late. And you know what? It was just about as fun as going to the theater to watch The Rocky Horror Picture Show! Except, you know what? The script is actually very funny!

I recommend to you and anyone you know to get drunk and watch Pee Wee's Big Adventure on the big screen if ever the opportunity arises!

There's my plug. Also, I love Tim Burton and Danny Elfman!

900 miles to be ditched, straight up!

2008-07-12T11:58:00.000-07:00

So did I tell yous that my friend B. got engaged? She got engaged two days before my marathon, and of course she's all excited... Anyway, she called to tell me, and then asked me to be her maid of honor.

Anyway, I knew I'd be going home for vacation for a long time, and so a month ahead of time I call her up. I had one day (Friday) that I would be in Chicago and then my fam and I were going to drive to Minocqua, WI, for the rest of the week. So, two weeks before she gets engaged, I tell her that I'll be in town and she "pens me in" to spend all morning and afternoon Friday together. The original plan was that we'd go to the beach downtown, as I'd land at 9 in the AM and then at 5 in the PM, I'd ride the train home with my friend W and hang out with him for dinner.

So then she gets engaged, and one week before I'm supposed to fly in she calls and says, how about we go looking at banquet halls for the reception instead, which sounded like fun because I'm always getting asked to be in wedding parties but then the b2b never wants me to help with anything... which is a mixed blessing of course, but I was still pretty excited to go look at halls with her and be on the inside track a little...

Now it's Thursday at 7PM Chicago time, and I just finished with that lab accreditation BS, and we were out having a drink. B calls and I say I'll call you in 15 minutes. We're about to leave. I call her back and she says her fiance's cousin invited her to a "cross-town" ball game (Cubs v. Sox) and she was going to go to that instead. She's saying, you know how hard those tickets are to get and how expensive they are and blah de blah de blah. And I'm sitting in the bf's car heading into Denver and all I can think is, " This is an OUTRAGE!" She says, let's hang out at night instead. I say I have plans with W. She says, can I hang out with yous? I say, call me tomorrow. And hang up.

Of course I'm LIVID! B is NOT A DIE HARD BASEBALL fan!! She doesn't know any of the players. She doesn't watch the games on TV. And I'm flying in from across the country, her fucking maid of honor, and available for one day only! To really tick me off, I start thinking, I could have called my uncles and made plans to have lunch with them. I could have called my cousins and said I'd drop by for an hour in the afternoon. But I cleared an entire afternoon for her, and now it's 10 pm Chicago time, and I can't call anyone!!

So I curse and curse in the car with my bf, inventing all sorts of great fun expletives. I eventually get disappointed as I'm realizing that my bf is not joining in on my curse-a-thon and that I have no way to get home from the airport tomorrow morning. I call my dad and say, "Dad, you'll never fucking guess what B did!"

He says, All right, let's have it!

I say, We've had plans to hang out tomorrow for longer than a month, and she just called me NOW to say she's going to a cross-town game instead.

Dad says, What?!

I say, yeah, what a bitch!

He says, Yeah what a fucking bitch!

I say, she doesn't even pay attention to baseball and I'm flying across the country for one day only and she's going to a fucking ball game!

Dad says, Fuck her. Fuck her.

I say, This is an OUTRAGE! A Mother Fucking OUTRAGE! And you know what else? She just asked me to be her maid of honor and we were on the phone 2 times earlier this week talking about hanging out and she was telling me all about how she broke it to her other close friends that she's not having anyone else in the wedding party!

Dad says, And then she pulls this shit?

I say, Yeah, what a bitch!

Dad says, Fuck her. Fuck her! We'll pick you up from the airport and eat omelets and we'll go to the Japs for dinner.

(God bless him!)

The good thing about all of this is that I was planning to check on a bag so that I could bring her birthday/house warming (she and the fee-fee-poo are moving in together) present--it's a liquor carosel that holds 6 bottles of booze and dispenses a shot every time. Now that she was a confirmed huge fucking bitch, I didn't need to bother with checked baggage. Which was nice.

Anyway, I fly in and I end up having a very nice little day with my mom and dad (which was a moot point as we were destined to spend the next 7 days together anyway), and then I have a fabulous time with W, bitching about her... and at 1030 at night she calls and says she wants to meet us up.

Then I'm torn, right? If I were living in town, I would perpetuate this squabble for months and months until I'm satisfied, and then we could just meet up one evening and everything would be fine. Now I'm half way across the country, and if I'm going to hold this grudge, the route toward resolution is much less certain. I was trying to weigh these things with W earlier, because I knew she was going to call. W enjoys conflict and agreed that I should keep up the grudge. But when she calls, he says, Just have her come out. Now that she's making effort you've lost all the awesome upper hand. So she comes out to A BOOKSTORE reeking of booze, and wants to show off her ring and talk about the game, which "her side" lost, and I was feeling pretty righteous and smug having chosen to wear the other team's hat.

Anyway, she was acting all happy to see me and I was like, ho hum, and not intentionally either... but maybe just because I was ho hum...

It really makes you realize who your friends are, you know? I mean, I have guy friends who are religious about baseball, but I'm 100% certain that if they were presented with cross-town tickets when we had plans and I was flying across the country for these plans, they wouldn't go. W, for example, hates bars, and only goes to them when the Sox are playing, and I KNOW he wouldn't go to a cross town game if it meant canceling plans.

Fast forward to coming home from family vacation. I totally carried two frozen Chicago-style pizzas on the plane and invited my roommate to my boyfriend's house to eat them that night. At the bf's house my roommate notices the same liquor carousel I bought for B's birthday and says how cool it is! The next day I go home and give my roommate the boxed-up liquor carousel saying,"I was going to give it to B for her birthday/ house warming, but now she can just suck my ass!"

Then we got drunk and took out a sharpie and crossed out all of the kind words on the birthday card I had bought for B, so that all that was left was "Birthday". (Obviously leaving "Happy" on it would have been highly disingenuous...) I still haven't sent that card to her, but I'm thinking more and more that I will. Afterall, she's a bitch.

Birthday, B, Birthday.

Sore but Certified

2008-07-12T11:43:00.000-07:00

To start with, the certification guy was this old southerner, who clearly had a problem with women. I don't like being one of those gals that thinks that everyone's against me because I'm a girl, so I'm only saying this because I had a feeling this was the case but then my boss brought it up, entirely unprovoked.

I kindda got the feeling immediately. The guy, my boss, and myself were having an "opening meeting". And every time I asked the guy a question, he would answer, without looking at me at all, and one time he finished by gesturing toward my boss and saying (notice the quotes) " so to answer your question, Boss's Name..." I wasn't super insulted by it at the time. I just thought this guy doesn't like women, and I thought it was kindda funny. Glasses that made him look like a fish. And all of the body language and mannerisms of someone who mail ordered a wife. The kind of mannerisms that no one would find endearing and only women sold into his clutches would tolerate. Uber dweeb with something to prove.

Ever since I got to this job my primary role has been "operations development", meaning I was writing all of the Standard Operating Procedures and Quality Manuals and lab forms, etc. Basically, I set up the entire quality system at our company, and I did it following, from the point-of-view of someone who sits outside of the certification body, difficult as hell rules straight out of the Federal Registrar!

Part of the problem is that I was supposed to make a quality system based on the "guidance" of this certification body. But they (nor other certification bodies, as it turns out) never define the terms they use, and often times they uses the same term in about 3 different ways. The example that comes to mind is "demonstration of capability". This term means that our equipment is proven to measure we say it does. It also means that our analysts have demonstrated that they can perform our experiment in a statistically reproducible way. It also means that the laboratory has the infrastructure in place to handle incoming client samples.

So the guy says he wants to see our policy on demonstration of capability, and I ask, Are you interested in our policy on analyst DOC or the instrumentation? To which he rolls his eyes (in a VERY GRATUITOUS way) and repeats himself, raising his voice and getting in my face a little. Of course I have a problem in which I mimic behaviors, and this situation escalates for two more instances of his repeating himself. So I just pick one to show him. He reads it, and starts belittling me saying it wasn't what he wanted and he's never had such a hard time dealing with a laboratory and blah blah blah. And I say, It's not in my interest to give you a hard time. But it would be helpful if you could clarify a little more about what exactly you are interested in. Then I say, maybe if you show me your checklist so I can see what you're referring to I can save us all some time. (Of course I was trying to say diplomatic words, but I was saying them aggressively enough that it was making my boss, who was in the room at the time, nervous.)

So then after that day (Wednesday), my boss, our lab tech, and myself (the fourth of our crew was on his family vacation) went out for a few drinks, and my boss kept going on and on about how the guy really was out of line, which made me a little ok, but still really annoyed.

Anyway, the second day with the certification guy worked out fine. We refused to give him any coffee (he drank 16 cups within 4 hours the day before) and then he was a bit more personable toward me, at least.

In the end, we were certified, but I still don't know what lesson I should take away from all of this? Let people beat you up verbally and hope you get what you want out of the deal in the end? Even with all of my hard work paying off and getting our place certified, it still culminated into an emotional and disappointing end.

Landscaping at the Art Museum

2008-07-12T11:41:00.001-07:00

I went to the Denver Art Museum with Kyle last month, and they have greeters at the front door who tell you about the new exhibit. Without fail, these people are foreign. So the guy says they have a new temporary "landscaping" exhibit. Well, I was perplexed. What are we going to see? Lawnmowers? Weedwackers stacked to look like lawn mowers? Nope. It was a LANDSCAPE exhibit featuring french impressionists. Blah-zay!

They Got the Gestures Down!

2008-07-08T01:10:00.000-07:00

Brickfish Political Dream Team
Brickfish

This is my response to the Brickfish Political Dream Team Campaign. For supporting links, visit the brickfish site, by clicking on the links above. Below is a copy of the blog entry for this contest.

Let's be serious for a moment. Jolie and Lohan in 2008? What a load! The real political dream team would be Venutra/O'Brien, with some famous, well-chosen appointees.

Jesse Ventura, former World Wrestling Federation Star, former governor of Minnesota, current political guru would make a great president. Not only would he body slam those competitor chumps all the way to the White House, he actually has some pretty amazing policy ideas, outlined in his book "Don't Start the Revolution without Me." For example, Ventura would work to make a governmental system that realizes its “for the people” pledge. In his book, Ventura discusses how the Democrats and Republicans took control of Presidential debates away from the unbiased League of Women Voters in 1996. Why? Ross Perot made such a showing in the 1992 Presidential election, the League of Women would have allowed him into the debates in 1996. Of course that would have taken votes away from republicans and Democrats alike. Rather than beat Perot in an open fight, the parties seized the debates from the League of Women Voters, effectively muscling out third party candidates. Another point Ventura makes in his book: Stop ignoring Cuba. During a visit with Fidel Castro, Ventura learned that Cubans import their milk from across the Pacific Ocean from New Zealand. Ventura's convincing argument: The U.S. policy to ignore Cuba was based on the idea that if we ignore them, the Cuban people will rise up and insist on a more American-style government. Clearly this policy is not having the desired affect. Instead, by ignoring Cuba as a trade partner, we are ignoring our American dairy farmers who dump milk on the streets in response to low milk prices. Clearly, Ventura is above the political parties, yet in tune with the real world globalization we experience in our modern world.

Conan O’Brien, your next Vice President of the United States of America—What a smart choice! Before you laugh off the suggestion, consider this: Conan O’Brien graduated Magna Cum Laude from Harvard (our current President Bush graduated a straight C student from Yale). Being witty and personable, Conan O’Brien could definitely find ways to bring the opposing parties of Congress together to make the important decisions and compromises we need here in the U.S.

So who is the logical choice for Secretary of State? Why George Clooney, of course, and by all accounts, I suspect Clooney would be happy for the new role! Already he has standing as an international diplomat. He has spoken in the U.N. as well as organized others to raise awareness about the genocide in Darfur, Africa. Clooney is routinely described in articles as wanting to make his company comfortable. A charismatic people-person, such as Clooney, would surely help mend the U.S.’s broken international reputation.

On to Internal Affairs with Oprah Winfrey. Through her shows and missions, Winfrey has proven herself a compassionate billionaire, with a big soft spot for charitable work. Her dedication to helping those less fortunate would make a great contribution to the Office of Internal Affairs. With all of the discussion over illegal immigrants, I believe that having Winfrey as the Internal Affairs head would help our Congressmen remember the humanity of our nations immigrants and perhaps help to level out the conversations, discussing immigrants as people instead of just numbers and dollars.

Not pictured here, the Director of the EPA, Harrison Ford. Ford is a real nature-lover, and after the gutting of the EPA during this last Presidential administration, the environment could sure use a little lovin’. Ford organizes other celebrities to pool money together to buy up wild lands, keeping them in their pristine form, and saving them from development and sprawl. Surely he would be able to help guide the EPA in their efforts to better monitor our nation’s environment.

Make way for the Director of the Department of Agriculture, Wyclef Kean (also not pictured). Beyond the rap, we have a truly outstanding statesman! Kean is completely engrossed in his charity to help Haitians. His main focus is food and grain shortages and a lingering economy. This would make Jean perfect for helping develop an agenda for America’s Department of Agriculture. Maybe he could find a good use for all of that grain that grows moldy in American silos every year.

The SCARIEST statistic I ever heard!

2008-07-07T18:33:00.000-07:00

Question
Last year there were more than 200,000 bats in a specific cave in southern Vermont. How many were there this year?

Although I am probably most concerned with the HONEYBEE CRISIS at the moment, the mass die-off of bats is beginning to muscle it's way to the front of my interest.

I had been trying to get in touch with people who study bats for the past month or two. Essentially, our laboratory had recently (and indirectly) made headlines when one of our clients got published in Science using data our lab generated. We were able to do mercury speciation of single spiders. So then I thought, what other animals eat insects? Bats.

So I called up the gal who edits Bat Research News, the premier scientific journal for bat research, because if anyone should know who in the bat science community researchers what, well it should be the editor of the only bat-exclusive journal.

Although she didn't know whether any researchers were looking into mercury in bats and bats' diets, she did offer the few names of people who conducted studies in the past.

She said it was difficult to get research permits right now because of the bat crisis. Apparently to do analytical studies, researchers have to kill the animal and analyze its organs, and with more than 90% of all bats in America having died this year, the government wasn't too interested in trace metal studies of bat kidneys.

I had heard of the White Nose Syndrome. It's a fungal infection that seems to have been the cause of death of many bats that have been found dead. However, according to my contact, there have been instances of bats being infected with the fungus, but otherwise appearing unaffected. The scientific community, she said, is now starting to question whether the fungus is an opportunistic infection. Like how people infected with HIV do not die from HIV itself, their demise is usually due to another infection that can get a foothold in the body due to a weakened immune system. Perhaps the bat's immune system is weakened due to other infections or contaminations and under these weakened conditions the fungus does the worst damage.

However, the fungus itself does not kill the bat. Instead, it causes a chain reaction that ends in starvation. White Nose Syndrome, she said, infects the bat and causes an immune response. As a typical immune response, the bat's metabolism increases. This is a problem for hibernating bats. When its metabolism increases, it comes out of hibernation and starts looking for food. In the winter, there are not enough insects available to eat, so the bat starves to death.

So far, as many as 90% of America's bats have perished! And that brings you back to the question at the beginning of this entry.

Question
Last year there were more than 200,000 bats in a specific cave in southern Vermont. How many were there this year?

Answer
Five. That's right five. 5. Cinco.

That's the most shocking statistic I ever heard!

I like honey bees

2008-06-08T00:11:00.001-07:00

So, in talking with my good ole chum pals, I'm getting more and more frustrated with how little everyone knows about Colony Collapse Disorder and the American Honeybee.

I recently signed up for digg.com, which is an interesting little place to post/rank and discuss news, and while reading a story about the extinction of the Caribbean Monk Seal, I found a little comment thread of the theme "how much bad stuff has to happen before humans take a careful look at how their activities lead to extinction?"

One of the comments said, maybe if the honeybees all die and we have a food crisis, we'll all start caring. The next commenter said, humans have nothing to do with honeybees dying. ::le sigh::

So I posted this on Digg, and I'm pretty proud of it, so I'm reposting here.
1. Last I heard (let me know if you've heard something more recent) Colony Collapse Disorder was more likely the effect of a virus, not a fungus.
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2007-09/aaft-vna083107.php

2. Whenever you have viruses, you see that some individuals in a population are genetically able to resist them.

3. Most honey bees in the U.S. are kept by bee keepers and their hives are rented to orchards and other farms. These bees are genetically uniform, meaning if one of the bees in the hive can get sick form a virus, it's highly likely that all the others are susceptible too. (This has been demonstrated through the collapse, i.e. deaths, of 50 to 90% of the American honey bee colonies kept in the U.S. in 2007.)

4. Habitat destruction (humans) reduces genetic diversity. Not only do we breed genetic diversity out of the kept hives, when we destroy habitats, the wild honey bees suffer too because the majority of these bees end up dying off as opposed to relocating.

THE POINT
Human's attempt to control the honey bee population could be the ultimate reason honey bees drift toward failure.

Luckily honeybees reproduce like mad, unlike mammals. So that have that going for them.

A little off topic from monk seals... but still...

Political Cartoon Attempt

2008-06-04T02:10:00.000-07:00

Immigration Illustration
Brickfish

my new thing

2008-05-23T00:05:00.000-07:00

Nick Greene came through Colorado last Sunday, and man! It was AWESOME to see him!

So awesome, in fact that I completely forgot to take photographic evidence of our reunion.

Anyway, one thing Nick Greene said was that he really dug my stupe blog :) Hurray for Nick Greene! Hurray for the blog!

I'll definately start posting more, but in the meantime, I've joined brickfish and I'm playing with that.

Vote for my picture and I could win Northface gear and finally fit in in Colorado!

Never Stop Exploring™ Photo Challenge
Brickfish

Gay-dar by ring tones

2008-05-15T12:34:00.001-07:00

Picture a morbidly obese man walking down the street with the smallest possible dog. The dog, as I imagine it, has little stumpy legs that give the impression of fluttering as it scurries to keep up with its owner. This vision appeared to a co-worker when he was flipping through ring tone options.

The ring tone, a fruity little number with (literally) bells and whistles that inspired visions of fat men with dogs waddling about town, was the ring tone the coworker chose. It is this same ring tone that, for others in the office, proved once and for all: The ring-tone-coworker is gay.

I'd say it was a Sherlock Holmes moment, but for these coworkers, there is no mystery to explain to Dear Watson. There was no real "Aha!" moment. The ring tone's evidence of gayness is too obvious to require further discussion. Like police who had all the evidence to a murder. The suspect was put in jail. Then they found the murder weapon in the suspect's pocket. Clearly, we're not surprised.

It's as obvious as finding a fully intact dead body with a name tag on its lapel that read "Hello My Name is Jimmy Hoffa". It couldn't be more obvious if this corpse would animate to slap your face silly if you or the medical examiner try to say he might be Paula or Jusef instead.

Yep. Gayness is now worn in your pocket in the form of a (bad) musical alert. Finally, a gaydar system that actually works!

Excerpt from an old email

2008-04-09T10:00:00.000-07:00

I searched my gmail for the term "Borders" because I all of a sudden had an urge to buy a book with a 25-40% off coupon. Instead an email I wrote, titled "yo mama" popped up, and it included this little ditty.

Here are funny things that happened to me today:
1. I went over to Dufek the Designer's cube to talk work, and of course, I was there for 25 minutes laughing about whatev. And he pulls out this book called "Why did Grandpa die?" and then he opens the front cover which includes the inscription: To Abbey and Sarah Love G'ma and G'pa. And we laughed and laughed at the following: (1) Is G'pa distributing presents from beyond the grave and (2) Was G'pa alive when he and G'ma went over to Borders and G'ma said, "This looks like a lovely gift for the girls." Did G'pa agree? or (3) Did G'ma, with a wry smile and slanted eyebrows, sneak it into a shopping cart and say "Oh nothing" when G'pa peered in and asked, "What have you got there, Ma?"

Safari in the Denver Airport Savannah

2008-04-03T15:28:00.000-07:00

African elephants, during the dry season, will travel hundreds of miles in search of water. In an episode of Planet Earth, I saw them circling through air-borne sand in their desperate search. When they finally get to their destination, the elephants find other elephants, lions, and various species all congregated around the waterhole, suspiciously eying one another. At any moment, the competition may try to displace someone at the waterhole. Ignore a lion too long, and your pride and joy becomes the meal of the pride.

Patrons of the Denver International Airport provide a parallel study in animal behavior. Thirsty, they prowl the waiting areas of the terminals. Hugging their possessions close to them they circle and circle between the rows of blue stereotypical airport seating. Mouths dry. Hungry. And for what? Juice.

I don't mean Welch's, Tropicana, or Motts. I mean precious electricity.

Some how the word got out that this circus tent in the western corner of the Denver-city limits houses more than just blue seats fused together at the arm-rests.

The DIA internet is free and wireless, accessible anywhere in the joint. The only trick is stalking out a good seat within power adapter distance from an outlet, of which there are shockingly few.

A technology-hungry business person takes two outlets, one for his blackberry and another for his laptop. A person employing two outlets becomes stalked by those with their own electrical hunger. As soon as that person moves to unplug one device or the other, the pack pounces. The outlet is taken down quickly, and the strongest of the competitors enjoy the spoils until satiated.

Prowling outlet-seekers routinely hold their laptop close to their chest. Usually it is in a hand, while the empty satchel swings from the other arm. Members of the searching pack do not keep their electronics stowed. They are alert to pounce at any opportunity.

When all of the other seats and outlets are occupied, a prowling lion will sit next to the person with the most lines into nearby outlets. At some point, their iPod will be charged and the lion will make his kill. Yet while it waits patiently, yet eagerly for an opportunity, it gets eyed as a predator getting a little too close to the herd. The power-hoarder knows what you're after, and hovers over his wire herd. If he's traveling solo, there is a twinge of panic in the way he monitors the lion's position. If he's traveling with a pack, he enlists them to keep the lion at bay with suspicious stares. As if you might snatch some of his personal junk. When in fact, all you really want is the outlet.

Animals around the outlet do not converse with one another. Times are tense. There's no room for pleasantries.

My 25th Birthday

2008-01-30T23:28:00.000-08:00

A modest little birthday party.

Birthday dinner: One Giordano's Pizza

Birthday Snow

Birthday Precursors

2008-01-27T23:30:00.000-08:00

Looking ahead to my 25th Birthday, Kyle asked what I wanted to do to celebrate. Aside from replying, "Not grow up" I had nothing.

We were talking about taking a pottery class, so we decided to try something similar. We went to a pottery joint, and I painted myself this fruit bowl :)

Good times.

Simulated Nausea

2007-10-23T20:03:00.000-07:00

Wade and I are ready to flight the crap out of that flight simulator!

(P.S. That green thing in my hand is a straight up barf bag!!)

It was a suggestion that initiated growing excitement: "How would you and your roommate like to try out the flight simulator?"

At first, I have to admit, I was a little skeptical. A video game, at what, Chuck E. Cheese? No, Kyle assured me, a for real simulator that commercial airline pilots train on before they can officially say: "Uuuuuh. Folks. This is your. Uuuuuuh. Captian speaking." How cool is that?

I was the first to fly because, well, I'm a lady! (And I'm sure it didn't hurt to be dating the flight simulator operator/maintenance guy.) I was trying to be a safe pilot. Keeping the plane level. Bank right. Bank left. Then Wade took off from O'Hare Airport, and we were zooming all over. Climb quickly. Dive hard. Ducking inbetween the poorly rendered buildings of Downtown Chicago.

On my second go, I was a little more adventurous: Diving under the Golden Gate Bridge. Wade and I yelled at each other as I pulled us up, just 10inches from the water. He tried to pull a loop-de-loop, and the thing felt so real as it stalled and fell back to Earth, I just about got sick.

Pretty awesome time!

Youth Inspired Fall Romance

2007-10-22T17:34:00.000-07:00

After 10 years of abstinence, I've jumped back into bed with the Halloween spirit. It was a long awaited romance, which started in a pumpkin patch and climaxed with a Nightmare Before Christmas themed design and roasted pumpkin seeds.

Photo courtesy of Mr. Kyle Wright, famed pumpkin genie, still photographer,

and patron of the Save the Janet Foundation.

Casper the Humping Dog

2007-10-08T21:13:00.000-07:00

I was talking on the phone late Saturday night, when a leg of my chair fell through the deck. I lost track of the conversation for a few seconds, but even when I got back on track, I was pretty disheartened. Having your own weight push a hole through solid wood is not a good sign.

I was playing accomplice to my roommate, who was dog-sitting for his cousin, and I wouldn't have been outside had not said dog, Casper, become enamored with my leg and desparately tried to mount it over and over. And over again. He would come at me, make a play, and after I pushed him off and yelled, he'd make one lap around the couch and try for the other leg. I'm trying to flirt here, and this is just too distracting!

So I go to sit outside and break the deck, and I thought, Good job fat ass. Then I pulled the offending chair leg from the hole just to inspect it a little. The chair only slid about one-quarter of the way through. And then I, perhaps because I got anxious that the gravity and the chair would conspire against met, moved the chair over to one side, and switched to another for the remainder of the conversation.

I found my roommate and immediately confessed. He was unphased but said he'd make sure to tell his cousin. With that out of the way, we sat in the basement watching Heroes. I sat next to him on the couch, and then began round two. In vain and desparation, Casper the Humping Dog was trying to persuade a threesome. He'd play for my roommate, get rejected, walk behind the couch, and make a play for me. Between this and the bad acting that is Heroes' first episode, those two hours were the longest of my life.

When it was time for bed, we tricked Casper the Humping Dog into his kennel. Then, four hours later, we awoke to his barking howls. My roommate let the dog on the deck, and we cashed in a couple more hours. Of course, when we went to collect the dog, he was busy, digging out the rest of the hole I exposed the night before. I pulled him away, and chunks of deck fell off of his paws and snout. While I stood in shock, Casper made one more attempt at my roommate.

And that's how I got humped by Casper the Humping Dog.

Bustime Entertainment

2007-09-30T21:16:00.000-07:00

About the time the man--covered in every color paint (blue, green, red) and wearing shorts that were so short that the legs of his boxes showed out the bottom--walked on the bus, the pair behind me began talking.

First they catelogued the people they knew who looked at them and thought they had it all. "But people never think about the time I was kidnapped and held for ransom," said the man.

"You're right," said the woman in a it's-a-damn-shame tone.

Apparently the pair was returning from a dream interpretor, which they termed a dream consultant. The woman got all excited, realizing she hadn't told her most recent, vivid dream to her counterpart.

In said dream, said woman and extraneous friend were in a zoo. The woman dream-magicked herself into a pen with a bear and its cub. She began describing some gate, which looked like this:

"Which is just silly, because with a triangle gate, I mean, what's that fence supposed to keep out?" says the woman laughing gently at herself.

"Now, let's not debate the nonsense of dreams," said the man.

"I'm just trying to give you an idea of what the gate looked like." And she went on to say, that the dream consultant told her the bear symbolized her parents and that the three pointed gate only proves Freudian theory of the child, mother, and father being the center of a person's life.

"Yes," said the man, "Isn't that the truth!"

Then, the man said he needed to make a phone call. He got up and walked to the front of the bus where the painted man was sitting. When he came back, he said some mutal acquaintence of theirs was going to the same concert they were headed for.

"He said he wouldn't miss it for the world," the man said.

"I just thought it would have sold out, and he couldn't get tickets," the woman replied.

"Well, I'm sure when he said he wouldn't miss it, he only meant that if there were tickets available, he would get some and go to the concert."

"Yeah," said the woman, "I get it."

The New Job

2007-09-28T21:41:00.000-07:00

"Metals don't just go running around naked in solution," was what my boss told me when we were doing a quick chemistry briefing about how the heck his lab equipment works.

Later he made falafel for everyone, and we discussed the fact that Hilary Clinton is unelectable, but Obama is kind of naive. Afternoon conversations revolved around getting one of the lab guys laid with his "gramma" friend. Then we shot tequilla from the "evidence locker."

Luckily for me, I tend to get involved with pretty cool companies. My last one gave us icecream when we participated in fire drills. What's not to like? Keep from dying in possible flames and get icecream. Or don't. Here in the big CO, we get lunches made for us daily. If you can get over the underlying, constant panic of going broke at any time, this job is pretty laid back.

The Things that Colorado Janet Does

2007-09-26T22:58:00.000-07:00

Colorado Janet is taking measures above and beyond those that Chicago Janet has taken in the past. Colorado Janet takes figure drawing classes and sketches nude women. Observe!

Colorado Janet goes to the Rocky Mountain National Park, and sees Aspen trees turning yellowy-gold up the mountains. Observe!

Colorado Janet sees Elk. She sees lots of elk.

Colorado Janet hikes to the top of the Tundra when it rainy snows and clings for dear life to rocks as the wind blows.

Hooker in a Bind

2007-09-12T09:49:00.000-07:00

I've got posts in the works right now, but until they're ready, here's a little something I wrote about a year ago (07/23/2006):

A hooker went looking for an apartment today. Well. Not really a hooker. When I asked her what she does, she said, "I'm a dancer."

"Really?" I said. "Where?"

"Bachelor parties."

"Interesting." I wasn't lying. It was interesting. I wanted to immediately look over from my computer, which was displaying all of the one-bedroom listings under $1000. I wanted to survey her. The body of a woman whose sexual prowess is legendary. Stripper. Synonymous with lust. Endless appeal. Sexual mystery.

This particular stripper was a banker until her supervisor denied her time off on a Wednesday afternoon about five years ago. (Was it really a Wednesday? If it were me, I can't be too sure I would remember, but this stripper said Wednesday, and she seemed to have a good memory.)

"I had a friend that was doing it at the time," she explained as though stripping in Vegas was something casually common like drinking, knitting, or bobsledding. Stripping is just something you get in to by happenstance.

People would ask me, as I drive them around showing apartments: "How did you get this job?"

"There was an ad in the paper, and I called every day until I got an interview." This is happenstance. I saw a help wanted sign in the stripper-store window, and I decided to apply, is not happenstance.

"That guy who just passed us," she said referencing a 5-foot 2 dude wearing a white-base, purple ringer that had the word "Wonka" written in characteristic script where a breast pocket might have been on a less socially awkward shirt. "That guy was at a party I did a couple of weeks ago. That's the thing about working in this area: If I go to the Cubbie Bear or something, I'll definately run into someone. They'll come up to me and be like 'Hey' and they're all careful about coming up to you if they think you're with a boyfriend."

The guy in the Wonka T-shirt didn't do anything at all.

While we were driving about, we had covered a lot of topics. Actually, she did most of the talking. She grew up in Chicago. She took off a Wednesday afternoon from the bank, and then, jobless, moved to LA. Once out west, she considered continuing her BA in writing that she started at UIC. But most of her credits didn't transfer, and she wasn't privy to spending money on coursework and books just because her American History course didn't include a component of California state government.

Then she moved to Vegas where she worked strip clubs and eventually got into bachelor parties, which were the sweet life of exotic dancing. This of course supposes that a person's ideal work hours are Friday and Saturday from 9 in the PM to 1 in the AM.

From what I gathered through round about answers, she left Vegas for two reasons: (1) she split with the boy she moved there for and (2) she wanted to finish her writing degree. "I've got two semesters left, if I work hard."

The think I immediately noticed about this girl was her vocabulary. Off hand, I can't remember the exact words that impressed me. But my syntax, I'm pleased to say, would give most seventh graders a run for their money. Her's had my brain's personal assistant thumbing through reference materials at lightning speed. "Psst. She means promising or good," my assistant whispered in my ear.

Disney World Parenting

2007-08-21T13:09:00.001-07:00

"Go in the bathroom and see if she's on the phone." First of all it was a little too demanding for my taste. Secondly, I may be 24, but I still think I'm a kid, so don't ask me to do adult things, such as help raise YOUR kids.

I was in Disney World last week, and man, was it fun? It was! A nice little trip down memory lane that included Peter Pan, my parents, and my cousins. Every summer when I was a kid, we went on vaca with my cousins and their three boys. Our collaborative vacations ended when, 13 years ago, they finally popped out a little girl. Of the boys I grew up with, I knew two of them pretty well: one two years older than me and the second two years younger.

But on this Disney vacation, I finally got to spend time with the two youngest kids that I didn't really pay attention to growing up. (One of them is my cousin V, 20, who Kate thought was hot from a pic of he and myself at my bro's wedding.) It was kind of fun to see Vito had his own little spunky personality. While we were in line for Space Mountain, he learned that if you had a special ticket, you could get a wristband and stay in the park for an extra three hours after close. Then he conned some kids in line to let us borrow their tickets, and we rode Pirates of the Caribbean until 2 in the am.

My cousin A, 12, is another story. I thought she would drive me bananas because she's that age when girls get whiny and annoying. Instead, she wanted to be my bff, and that was fine. The problem was this: Her parents own several businesses back at home. So they gave her a cell phone to get in touch with them in case of emergencies because they can never be certain at what locale they'll be. Of course, she's cute and she gave her phone number to everyone, including boys.

So the whole trip, she's lying to her mom and saying she has to use the bathroom so she can check her VM and call people from the stalls. Which is ri-dick. I get wind of what she's doing because now she wants me to read text messages that boys send her and listen to their VMs. She's got like 4 boys telling her, I love you, I miss you, when are you coming home? Some of the more funny things that they said included one boy saying he wrote a song for her because he misses her so much. Second funny thing: One boy said he deleted all of the songs from his iPod and made a playlist of tunes that makes him think of her. (Which I thought was hi-LAR-ious!)

So I don't know what to do, right? I mean, these things would be funny in a made-for-tv movie, but this is real life, where sassy young girls get molested and stuff. I say, "A, are you smooching boys?" Of course she says no. So I say, "It's okay to talk to boys, but don't go smooching, okay?" I continue and tell her don't think that when you turn 14 or something that the rule doesn't apply. I said, when you think you want to smooch a boy, talk to your mom or someone first. Because she's kind of a cute little girl right?

But she's goofey. We were walking and she sort of tripped, and I said, "What did you do that for?" She says, "I didn't do it on purpose. I only trip on purpose when I'm trying to impress a boy." I was like, jigga WHAT? Number one, that's nutz. Number two, does it really work? Because I might try it out sometime this weekend. And she wears makeup around and low cut tops and pouts out her lips on purpose and when she fixes her hair in the mirror, she finishes saying, "Now I look pretty."

I go to my mom and tell her about A using the phone in the bathroom, and ask if I should tell on her. My mom says, she thinks it's better that my cousin trust me. Then my mom says, I should pull my cousin to the side and reassert that she shouldn't smooch boys and tell her to avoid boys who try to touch her.

Well, then I'm getting all nervous. Because all of a sudden, I'm supposed to have a role in this girl's life? I mean, I'll watch cartoons with her, but trying to have any hand, even a small one, in keeping her out of trouble kind of freaked me out! What if I mess up? And, let's not forget, I'm not a model of how to avoid bad behavior with boys.

Then my mom tells me that V tore into his parents when A and I were in the bathroom eariler. (I was trying to squeeze out a crap and she was on the phone again.) V went on all about, how could you give her that phone? Don't you know what you're doing giving her that phone? And my older cousin, Anth, let's fly about all of the boyfriends she has. According to my mom, they were going to take the phone away later.

So then, that night, they apparently started getting mad at her about the phone and told her not to bring it to the park the next day. Well, she brought it anyway, and told everyone that it ran out of batteries so it's no big deal. Of course, it was not out of batteries and she ran to the bathroom every 30 minutes to turn it on and check her VM.

Later that day, we were sitting in a restaurant, and A gets up for the bathroom to wash her hands. And her mom says, she's not using the phone this time because it's out of batteries. I say, The phone's not out of batteries and that she's been using it all day.

There. I felt relieved that I'd done my part, you know? So everyone at the table stares blankly at eachother, and my cousin's mom, says, "Janet, go in the bathroom and see if she's using the phone. "

And I went on the express track to freaking out. I say, "I'm not a disciplinarian. What am I supposed to do?"

She says, "Just go in there and let us know if she's on the phone."

The deal here is, A's mom desperately wants to believe that her daughter isn't growing up and lying to them (which is what this whole thing right now is really about), to the point that she's trying to avoid having to witness it, but simultaneously knows that it needs to be stopped.

I say, "Sorry, I'm not comfortable with that." And she gets up and goes. Of course, A is NOT using the phone this time. This was good for all of us, because it would have exploded into a black hole that sucks fun from a light-hearted vacation. Anyway, isn't that CrAzY!

Raising kids is tough, and I really don't want to be a part of it, prolley forever.

Mosquito in a Nudist Colony

2007-06-01T13:22:00.000-07:00

-"I'm leaving right now. I'll give you a call when I'm getting closer."

"Yeah," I say, "give me a call when you're about 20 minutes away."

-"OK."

::ring ring ring::

-"I just turned on to Balbo."

"You're that close already?" I was panicking, sopping up over-easy egg yolk as quickly as I could. No time to salt the stuff. Pack it in and roll.

My cousin had never been to the Art Institute of Chicago. I don't think she'd ever been to an art museum or gallery period. And when I finally got over there, she was ready for a good time. Glowing face. Always smiling. She was always the loudest person in vicinity.

She had no particular interests. Should we pay special attention to the French Impressionists? The Rennaisance? "Whatever! I just wanted to come here! And you know I couldn't convince my husband or son to go!"

When we got inside, it was like I lit a gunpowder trail into a fireworks shed. She zig-zagged across rooms, skipping corners and moving on. "OH! Look at THIS!!" She'd rush right up to something and point with her finger as if she wanted to simply stroke the air just next to the canvas.

Beep!

"Do you HEAR something?" she'd ask, nonchallantly inching her nose toward the paintings, and some little seismograph-alarm would start freaking out.

It took three rooms or so before I was able to point out that most paintings have little explanatory plaques next to them. Most said, donated by some rich people who need to have their names etched permantently on something besides their tombstones. Others has more useful information.

In a room of sculpture, there was a string hanging from the ceiling. Small, doll-sized clothes were attached to it at different intervals. I read the plaque aloud, and found that this artist's signature was hidden on the tag of the yellow dress on the floor.

"OH!" And before electricity jumped through my brain quick enough to get what was happening, my cousin lent over the protective, stay the shit away, string and moved to pick up the little yellow dress.

BEEP BUZZ HOLLER

It was like we were trying to escape from Alcatraz, and in zooms the Warden, a nice looking security lady that was annoyed by the sounds yet tickled by this mosquito in a nudist colony.

Wait! Wait! I Fantasize!

2007-05-25T07:36:00.000-07:00

When I walk to work, I go through a progression of thoughts. For the first two miles, I think: "Hey! I'm walking! Look at all these dogs! This sidewalk needs to be replaced! That cloud looks like a gymnast!" In the second stage, I retreat into my head, and start fantasizing. (See April 16, 2007)

And because I was going to see Wait! Wait! Don't tell me! that night, the majority of my fantasies were topically thematic and included becoming best friends with Mo Rocca and impressing Peter Sagal to the point that he convinces NRP to make me a panelist. Eventually, I abandoned those thoughts and went on to more realistic ones--winning Project Runway.

I had low expectations going to see Wait! Wait! I've listened to entire shows before without smirking. But J from work had brought it up as an idea for a combo-birthday event. The trick was she only wanted to go on days that featured Paula Poundstone on the panel, and I only want to go on days that had Mo Rocca.

Clearly, I had big, incomplete plans for Mo and me. It's like that episode of SouthPark with the gnomes. My plan went a little something like this:
Of course no amount of fantasizing could have prepared me for what happened: I became scared out of my mind! I had to drag J into the photo, and I couldn't say anything to him except, Thanx. Great show. And although it really was a hilarious show, I said this without enthusiasm and ran away. So, I'm not sure if Mo Rocca and I will be best friends, but, hey, I got my picture taked with Mo Rocca!

Photo is HERE!!

Can you tell I'm terrified of touching him? Hahaha!

Octa-Tales and The Evolution of Young Women

2007-05-21T13:15:00.000-07:00

L and I have been utilizing company property to grow an octopus. She retrieved the prize from a bag at the end-of-the-project party last July. I, having pulled out a pencil or a toothbrush or something equally inferior, fixed on the octopus. Its orangish skin. Its fierce eyes.

The front of the package raved: "It grows 600% in only 72 hours!" The back of the package provided three drawings illustrating the progressive size increase. By drawing three, the octopus gets so big that it climbs out of its container!

The thing lay dormant and small in her cube for almost a year. This was not out of lack of excitement. Nearly every week, we'd talk about growing the octopus. The problem was remembering to bring a bucket to work on Monday so as to maximize observational time during the week.

"What will I do when you're gone?" She asked me this in a very real, non-idiomatic way.

Over the past two years, L and I have become somewhat unlikely friends. Our boss picked up on this and often announced during meetings that "the two of them seem to get along very well, even though they have nothing in common." This always strikes her as odd. Almost as much as my reprisal of last weekend in which B and I found ourselves in a cab with an unknown third passenger. ("Buddy, where did you come from?" and "What is this guy doing here?") "Wait," L stopped me, "were you drinking?"

Despite our many moral inequalities, we have compatible self-reflective natures. We both wrestle with the same questions, such as How important is family? How fulfilling should a job be? and Can one convince oneself of being happy or is happiness really based on something other than willpower?

When we decided to work from Borders one afternoon we got to talking about lamenting over mistakes in our past. "I generally don't bother with regret because it's a waste of an emotion. I'm more of a fate-believer. If I make a mistake, it was because I was supposed to make that mistake."

"What if you make the same mistake twice?"

"Then, clearly, I didn't learn enough to move on from it the first time."

I've only very recently started feeling regret, and both instances had to do with her--not calling her that week she was helping her parents move through Alabama and the weekend we were in Nashville for a conference and she got the call that her Dad, a lifetime nonsmoker, had lung cancer. Of course there was nothing I could have done. But I still feel regret. It's like Uncle Jimmy says, "There's nothing worse than not being able to help someone you love."

"You know what's a good idea?" I'd say after we'd been bleeding hearts for a bit, "We should grow that octopus." Months ago we said that. Hundreds of trips to CVS. Mid-afternoon naps in her living room. Her Dad got worse. Nana died. Friends left town. Lovers dissipated. "People come and go, but mostly they just go."

Finally one of the gumshoes in our department stayed for a late evening and found that, at the end of the day, the blue recycle bins get dumped into the same trash bag as the black trash bins. (The discovery caused quite an uproar with tons of people on the floor, all of whom religiously recycled, but none of whom ever bought recycled notepads, yarn, or bicycles.) So last Monday, after L had calculated that I only had 13 regular days left in the office, we decided to make the first good use of those recycle bins and perform our experiment.

Within 24 hours, it was slightly bigger. The researchers wondered if it would increase 600% in length or volume.

Day Two. Not much more growth. Researchers decide that, if experiment repeated, starting volume should be determined. Researchers postulate various methods that could be used to measure volume: displacement, calipers.

Day Three. Almost no change from Day Two. Researchers begin to use words such as disappointing; they flip over the package to compare the illustrated octopus climbing out of its line-art container to the real foam octopus still quite submerged in the recycle bin. Researcher bring outline of octopus, traced at the experiment's beginning, to the copier and attempt to blow it up 600%. Researchers determine what the width of one tentacle should be at 600%. Return to the recycle bin and curse the Chinese for getting their hopes up. Colleague walks by and says, "You know, 600 percent really isn't that big." Researchers consider cursing her too.

With the official experiment concluded, we just let the thing sit through the weekend. By Day Seven, when we came back into the office, two of the tentacles were stretched and reaching out of the water. "Small victories, J. Small victories."

Brits Hear that We Americans Luv dAvid Beck'um

2007-05-05T09:47:00.000-07:00

"I 'ear you Americans luv dAvid Beck'um," C said to me.

"He's okay," I said, "But I don't like his wife. She's too flashy."

"Oh yes!" he replied with rising excitement. "I 'ear she's dating other men! Behind dAvid Beck'um's... be'Ind 'is? be'Ind 'is?"

What can possibly be cuter than a little 7-year-old Brit tapping his lower lip and trying to come up with the proper idiom to discuss celebrity smut? (Only one million puppies!--and that's only if they're all real fuzzy AND chasing their tails in unison.)

As far as little first graders go, C wasn't the worst reader. He wasn't a reading stud neither, and that is why his British mama decided he needed reading help outside of class--to keep up with the Americans he now sat next to in school.

The thought was kind of silly to me. In America, we always hear about how our kids are so far behind in math and science, but we never hear that our reading skills are above average. (If I'm reading this Washington Post article, Jan. 2007 correctly, American students outread 18 of the 22 top-performing industrialized countries.)

In actuality, I don't care why C comes in! I just love having him around. He's so blissfully energetic, completely wide-eyed about his trans-Atlantic move. His happy-go-lucky attitude is entirely opposite of the "everything's going to shit" perspective I've inherited from my Dad. And that's why it's so appealing. I think of how I have dealt with change throughout my life, and, man, if it was a subject in school, I would have been held back for about 3 years before some principal would insist that I get socially promoted. The even more shocking thing is: Moving between countries is no small change! AND the catalyst for this intercontenental adventure was his parents' divorce.

Another tutor and I had discussed this: "You know, kids are much more resilient than we give them credit for. Sure some of them are sensitive, but some of the younger ones hear their parents are getting a divorce, and they think, 'Cool! Now I have TWO houses!'"

It reminded me of young children who've lost their mothers. A co-worker had lost his Mom when he was five. "All of my brothers and sisters were upset with me because when my Dad got remarried, I started calling his new wife Mom." He said it wasn't until he was in college that he started have dreams about his biological mother. Like he was too young to deal with it when it happened, but once he could wrap his mind around the events that occurred, the memories tried leaping the gap between his sub-conscious and conscious minds.

My high school and college friends who lost their mothers had a terrible time coping! It was as if at some older age, they had started to visualize their futures, and their parents were always in it. One of my friends lamented that her mother wouldn't see her graduate or help her put on her wedding gown.

I don't know what C's relationship with his Dad was like before the move. But I do know that his situation doesn't dominate conscious-thinking neurons. He just speaks matter-o-factly about topics of concern to him, saying things such as:

"Michael Jackson is quite ugly."

-or-

"The Queen is very lovely, and maybe she can teach the American President to be less rude." (when discussing the Queen's upcoming tea with President Bush)

But in the meantime, he taps his lower lip, trying desparately to communicate his pressing, important thoughts: "Be'Ind 'is?"

"Behind his back?" I offer.

"Oh yes! That's it! Be'Ind 'is back!"

Things I Fantazised While Walking Home from Work

2007-04-16T13:28:00.000-07:00

Owning a house and making someone else mow the lawn.
Whether performing the reproductive act while buried under avalanche snow will postpone hypothermia or bring it about immediately following the deed.
Classes I could take in the summer.
Sitting in a leather chair, clicking a pen, and seducing people to buy whatever it is I'm selling.
Starting a foundation that supports cab companies with 100 percent hybrid fleets.
Ballroom dancing.
Having a wiener dog.
Having a big sheep dog.
Being a dermatologist and removing patches of questionable skin on some one's neck.
Whether inducing heavy breathing, as if I were exercising rigorously, would prolong hypothermia if buried under an avalanche of snow or tire me out and cause me to die right quick.
The steps I need to go through before I can complete a painting I have stored in my Mom's basement.
Laughing at how funny it might be to get drunk in the house I own, ballroom dance around its living room, then trip over my sheep dog.
Planning the kind of duvet cover I would make myself if only I felt I wouldn't be moving around so much.
Wearing a white swimsuit.
Reading all of the books I've got so I can go to the store and buy some new ones.

It's Polite to Ask First

2007-04-02T06:40:00.000-07:00

Although my plans are ever-changing, and I seldom feel responsiblity to account for my newest-fad train-of-throught, I would care to legitimize this one: Why I've decided to move home this summer.

Mom is really having a hard time. Last week was her spring break and most of the time, if I called home while she was alone, she was crying. So I decided to go home for the weekend.

On Saturday I wandered into Nana's room to borrow supplies from her sewing box. I walked in and said to myself: "Nana, can I borrow a needle and thread?" In my mind, I could hear her telling me it would be okay, and then she would give me detailed instructions about how to find the sewing box. 'It's in that closet, on the floor on the right. Look in there.' (She always gave specific instructions on where to find things. But for most stuff, it was pretty simple. On the closet floor, there was only the sewing box.)

When I went to return it, Mom found me and asked what I was doing. Then she said, "Did you ask to borrow Nana's sewing needle?"

Who's more nuts? Her for saying it, or me for preemptively doing it? "Yeah," I said. Then she lost it.

Sunday night, before we went to bed, Mom said, "Janet, thanks for coming home to spend time with me." Broke my heart.

Broke my heart.

Urban Signs of Spring

2007-03-29T10:13:00.000-07:00

People say Chicagoans don't have spring. We go from snowy and cold to rainy and cold. To the dismal heat of heavy, humid summers. But I say we do have spring, and it's easy to identify.

You know it's spring

when you come across women, who sit in a tavern, but look as if they'd just comes from an audition for The Rocky Horror Picture Show.
when 10 men in a bar all take shots on the one girl in the joint who's trying to use powers of persuasion to egg-on summer by dressing as if it were twenty degrees warmer.
when a girl rides the Red Line and drinks from a Heineken bottle, not so expertly concealed in a transparent sandwich bag. Sipping from a straw. Sip Sip Sip. Then pulling a long black hair from the back of her head, forming a neat little crop circle amidst the tall fields.
when three prostitutes all proposition the neighborhood bum in the alley behind your apartment, and the bum says, in a Polish accent, "Fuck you! I know how you are!"

Yessir. That's when you know it's spring. Because at just above 45 degrees, the crazy-repellant stops working.

Delayed Responses and a Two-Timin' Workin' Woman

2007-03-28T12:52:00.000-07:00

To add to the list of things you'd never suspect, why not try 'going on an interview, bombing it, and then getting hired the next day'?

I've been trying to pay off my credit cards at a quicker rate, which thus far means I've been budgeting myself better. But it's difficult to really feel progress with only one income being pinched inward from both sides. So I've been trying to get part-time gigs for a while now. Nothing has come close to an interview.

In January, I applied to work as a tutor. I didn't get an interview. Then in March, I found the ad posted again. So I looked at my old application and decided to try to make my cover letter more enthusiastic. I got a call back the day before Nana's wake.

So of course I didn't return the phone call right away. I waited about a week and finally called back. If you don't do it now, Janet, you never will.

I was not confident about the interview. I didn't have my normal levels of 'interview energy' because (1) general depression and (2) when I walked in, they had me fill out a 20-page application. Also the girl interviewing me eclipsed me in bubbliness and enthusiasm.

So then I go home, thinking, 'Another opportunity lost.'

The very next day, BAM! Phone call. Hired. Start on the 31st!

That's how a girl gets through the 3 month screening process--persistance!

Blind Men on the Moon, Buoys in the Sea

2007-03-21T11:41:00.000-07:00

"You look like a blind man walking around on the moon!" That was how Mom scolded John and me as we played pool when we were younger. He or I would take a shot and walk away with our cues still held in a lateral, shooting position. And she'd tell us to hold the cue straight up and down after comparing us to the visually impared in a gravity-free environment.

I always liked the analogy. Imagine! A blind man walking on the moon! Bobbing like a buoy, just like how astronauts do in videos. Slowly trying to detect the absence of nothingness around him. And the analogy works outside of pool too!

Like when I got accepted to college. I was bobbing along, working in a craft store. I didn't want to go to college. I didn't even apply. Bob. Bob. Bob. Then I came home from a day shift, and my Mom said the U of I called and wanted to give me a scholarship. All I had to do was send in the scholarship application and do an interview. Simple enough! And completely out of nowhere! Here I was, bobbin' around, not looking for anything. Not seeing anything heading my way, and there it was: a small 4-year scholarship, but free money nonetheless.

It applies to things that aren't so pleasant too. For example, I was bobbing along the weekend before Saint Patty's Day. A group of kids and I were at the South Side Parade. Drinking. Bobbing. Oblivious to the world. Then, that night, I get the call that Nana's dying. Just like that! No major warning!

When I talk about this, it's hard for others to understand how a 90-year-old woman's death can shock me. It does seem irrational to think that a person, of any age, is perpetual--especially a 90-year-old one. But she was youthful to the point that it was easy to forget about mortality. She went on a senior citizen's bus a couple times a week and walked around a mall. She never had a major heart attack or stroke or anything like that. She told jokes. She chatted on the phone, and she remembered everything--except how to program her VCR, but she couldn't do that when she was 75, neither.

We were all bobbing along, blind men on the moon. Lazily holding out white canes, never expecting to hit an object. Just like that. Seemingly out of nowhere. You're left to consider: "If I can run into something on the moon once, surely I'll always be in danger of finding something again later." But you can't persist, vigilantly looking and remaining prepared against what you cannot see.

When you're on the moon, you encounter problems at irregular intervals. Soon your guard is down. And you're apathetically bobbing along again. Like a buoy in the sea.

Bereaved in Chicago

2007-03-19T09:19:00.000-07:00

In a letter to K and A:

My little 90-year-old Nana died this morning :'( The events leading to that took up most of my weekend, beginning at 6 in the AM on Friday... so, nothing too fun/exciting to report, except that I was so sleep deprived at one point that I almost went for real hysterical... and that could have been real interesting, honestly... it might have been interesting in a movie or something... just so you know though, I'm doin alright. When she was in the hospital, my heart broke into tiny pieces, but once she was out of pain, I felt sorry for myself, but glad because I really do have strong faith (believe it or not)... and I've seen enough people die to come to the conclusion that the remains of a person is not really the person you knew... you know? just kind of the box that holds the present... or like how the ring symbolizes a marriage, but the spirit of the relationship is what the marriage really is... something like that. But I know I'll miss her in ways that I can't even imagine yet.

Bananas and Interrelated Horseplay

2007-03-09T12:31:00.000-08:00

I sat next to a banana on the train ride home today. It wasn't at the window seat, though, and that is why my gym-locker salad and I didn't mind it.

I bought the salad two hours before. I went to the grocery store with my Mormon friend.

"Do you think I could take this salad to the gym with me? You know? Unrefrigerated?" I said.

"Yes," she said.

I phrased the question wrong. Just because one could do something does not mean that one ought to do something. So my salad hung out in the gym locker for a couple hours while a scrawny little bitch kicked my ass in yoga.

At the end of the lesson, she said everyone should lie on their stomachs to cool down. "If you want, I'll come by and give you a crazy-Asian-word massage with my foot. Here, I'll demonstrate on you!"

"Me?" I don't like feet. Nor eyes. Nor tongues. But I seldom get bothered by feet as they are 70 inches away from my mind. "I don't know." I immediately re-regretted taking my socks off per her request at the beginning of the class.

"Com'mon," she said. I felt the way I do when someone tries to press me into sampling a condiment that I know I don't like. It's just ketchup. Try a little.

Earlier I was depressed and talking to Michael on the phone. I was depressed because earlier that afternoon I had gone to talk to K. Grace in HR. He confirmed what I'd been hearing from outside HRs: Sup, Janet, you're not qualified to do anything other than the exact job you're doing now. News like that could make me cry. I almost did and was grateful that, when I came back from my meeting with HR, everyone else in my cube row was gone--enjoying the treats and games of a baby shower that I missed so that K. Grace could tell me I've got nothing going on for myself.

So I was sitting at my desk and I thought, I have to go back to school--but for what? (Are you ready for the options I'm weighing?)

MBA
Masters of Biomedical Communication/Illustration

Now, if I were to take the Illustrator Route, I'll have bigger problems than more student loans: building a portfolio. My plan, then, would be:

Take a job as a 3rd-shift baker at Panera.
Get a certificate in studio from the Art Institute of Chicago for the

experience
prestige
references

Transfer to the University of Toronto for the M.S.

The Mormon said, "You know medical illustrators get paid about the same as us?"

"But what if it's more fulfilling?"

"When I went to my first weight watchers meeting, they asked why we wanted to lose weight. I said I wanted to lose weight to show off in front of the people I used to be friends with."

"I know exactly what you mean!" I said. "It's like" I made a stabbing-and-twisting-the-knife motion.

"Yeah," Jen said. "Sticking it to 'em! The other women at the meeting said they wanted more energy to play with their kids in the yard. I said I wanted to stick it to the people who may take the info back to my ex-boyfriend."

"I know! Like, I've got a couple of things I'm looking to buy for that same reason. The I'm-casual-and-hot-and-better-than-you." I did have some hot little numbers que'd up on the computer. But when I got back to my desk, I bought the blue T-shirt with a picture of a squid on it instead. I bought this shirt because it was $13, which was $245 more economical than the hot items I had picked out from Vicki S.

I sought out Jen early in the morning because I wanted $1.10 to buy an OJ to go with my Cheerios. "You don't happen to have any strawberries, too?" I said. "To put in my cereal?"

"Sorry. You can use part of my banana."

"Ew. Gross! Banana!"

Mom and Dad Were Once People, I Suspect

2007-03-01T12:17:00.000-08:00

As I grow up, I'm trying harder to imagine my parents as people. Apparently, I'm not the only person grappling with this. A video documenter examined this theme in a story about his parents, and how, three months after his mother's funeral, his dad was setting up to get married again. (LINK)

When you're a kid, your parents are a single unit. If they're together, it's always mom and dad. They're almost like a law of nature—two people who have always existed together, and probably did not really begin existing until the birth of their first child. I imagine that for children--excuse me, young adults--whose parents are divorced, there's some similar feeling.

As a child, you assume that your parents know everything. You learn that your sweater is a sweater by listening to your parents talk. Your parents hold the answers to puzzles, such as how to tie a shoe. When you ask questions, such as Is there a Santa Claus, you know your parents have the authority to answer that question. They have a vast knowledge that their young children accept as their parents' own exclusive mastery of the world.

When you get into the middle years, you start questioning some of that authority. But you do not do it because you recognize that parents are fallible human beings. You question authority because you want to win some control. You want to disconnect from the people who act as if they have all of the answers. You want to learn to experience and discover things on your own, without the parental filter.

At some point, though, you learn that your parents' command of knowledge is not inherent. Their wisdom, or lack thereof, was derived from their own life experiences. When I first had this notion, all I could think was: Wow! My parents had a life outside of my brother and me! Somehow they were real people and parents all at the same time.

I knew this in a kind of second-nature way. I knew this in the way that people wake up every morning and know the sky is still going to be above their heads. But I did not feel it! I did not feel the epiphany or the eye-opening realization that Yes! My parents are real people! Real people who had lives and experiences that have had nothing to do with me.

Young Parents
I did not begin thinking about it until I graduated from college. The idea of merging the words parents and people came with my firsts job. I was working with M. He was in his low-thirties and an awesome person! He was fun and energetic and young. He would spend time downloading music, laughing. He said things such as, "When I was a kid, I wanted to be a rock star or an astronaut—or both!" His charm was so youthful, you'd never suspect that he had two kids of his own.

He didn't have that authoritative, decision-making, life-managing poise that I associated with parents. He once found and purchased a tin can of squid "in its natural ink" and displayed it in his cube. It sat for more than a year next to a company issued award certificate that he modified, with bright red pen, into a bathroom pass.

But he wasn't irresponsible or negligent as a father. He told stories about what he and his kids would do over a weekend. When his little girl became big enough, he couldn't help but tell everyone how cool it was to see her enjoying her first trip down a playground slide. Or how his son had finally gotten big enough to help his wife bake cookies.

At some point, it occurred to me: My parents must be real people too! They had lives before each other, although they don't reminisce much on times before their early dating years.

I always knew my dad played guitar and college hockey—we had the sticks and pads to prove the later. But it wasn't until last weekend, when he was showing off the ukulele he and Mom bought from Hawaii, that I had ever seen him strum strings. Mom majored in Fine Arts, and although her college pieces hang still in their house, she hasn't produced anything new in my lifetime. It's difficult to imagine Mom holding a paintbrush. It's difficult to imagine Mom and Dad as anyone but Mom and Dad.

Even when they talked about human things, I could not make the leap. Not even when, sitting around the living room, Mom and Dad were talking about what it was like when they first got married. In a side bar, Dad said, as calm as can be, "When we first got married, every Friday night, your mother and I would rent a movie and order a sausage pizza. Then, we'd have sex. Every Friday."

"Don't say things like that in front of your daughter!!"

"What? We did, didn't we? Every Friday night."

It wasn't news to me that my parents got it on. Maybe this is why I still didn't hear this information and have that epiphany: Oh, right! They're people! Silly, bickering, sex-having people!

Money Toilets
Of course, Mom and Dad still get on my nerves. Especially when Mom forgets that I am an adult, and she gives me too much nagging input. But I forget just how much more trouble I've caused them, as people, throughout their lives.

T at work is low-forties and recently divorced with two sons. The divorce didn't seem messy. But the aftermath of having only one income is. In the divorce, he got the mortgage on the house, and he still pays child support and other expenses for his kids. He keeps the house that he can hardly afford so that he can make his sons' biweekly stay comfortable. He's canceling his cable so that he can foot 100 percent of his eldest son's car insurance.

With all of the changes and difficulties, T doesn't complain really. I only know these things because we cheer on one another's get-out-of-debt plans. If T spends meagerly, he'll be out of debt in four or five years. When he talks about these things, he says, "I just have to buckle down and do it. I'm not eating out for a few months.."

The thing that really hits home for me is that his sons do not know what's going on with their father's finances. They don't realize that every activity they add to their agenda has their dad scrambling to find new freelance work. He won't tell his sons these things. And he won't deny his sons a level of normal niceties, such as car insurance, cell phones, delivered pizzas. He sucks it up silently and provides, beyond his means, so his sons can have access to the things he considers normal.

I think, then, of my parents. Both worked low-paying Joe-jobs until I was in double-digits. Mom worked for years at a grocer chain. Dad held two or three jobs at a time for my entire young life. He worked full-time as a funeral director—a job he later explained to me as: "I went to embalming school so I could marry your mother."

When I was young, my grandmother lived with us. This served the dual purpose of keeping her near family as well as providing my brother and me with a constant babysitter while Mom and Dad worked weird hours, trying to provide for us: bikes, dogs, trees in the yard, decent clothes. But they put themselves out in the process.

When Dad lost his bread-and-butter funeral-directing job, savings got depleted. They spent in the red for five years, trying to keep giving us “normal” lives. My brother and I couldn't have noticed. There were a few more arguments, but we still ate well. Still went on vacation. And I remember, as a kid, feeling as if everything they gave was owed to me. I still thought this through college. I resented my parents for not having as much money as my classmate's parents.

One hundred percent of my college expenses went on student loans. When I saw the first bill, I felt cheated that I was responsible for it. My parents, by that time, were making very good money between them. But they were still paying off debts from 10 years prior when Dad lost his job. Neither of them had a savings or retirement plan to speak of, but I felt, without rationall thinking about it, that they had let me down.

Mom once told me that she was "a slave to this house". Fifteen years later, I know it wasn't just a colorful idiom. It was a glance into her humanity. It was the lamentation of a real woman with her own life-expectations--not just those for her kids.

Where I'm At Now
Even with the things I've realized, I'm still don't think of my parents as people. I have to get from the point of meditation on the issue to the nirvana of completely understanding the many facets of adult-and parent-hood. But I think I'm well on my way. I just need to keep myself from slipping backward into forgetting that Mom and Dad are really Karen and John.

Fashion Plates and Say What You Will

2007-02-26T11:05:00.000-08:00

Little that J might say could surprise me. When he says something like "Did I tell you about the time I hung out with panhandlers?", as he said yesterday, I don't think "What?!" or "Really?!"

Instead, I think, Yes, that sounds about right.

Little that I say actually insults people. This is a good thing, because I don't sensor well.

The hockey game we were going to was set up to be a group event, but only J and I went. As we were training in, I chided him on his shiny shoes and long wool coat, saying I didn't realize that hockey had become a bis-cadge event. He said, " I actually bought these shoes because you were ripping on my old ones. Remember? You said it was time to put them down and I said something along the lines of piss off? Well, then I got these ones."

I didn't remember saying that. I supposed I was drunk at the time. But I said, now, completely sober: "I was thinking today that I say very personal comments to you kids. And it occurred to me that if I were a guy, you'd all consider me to be a jackass. But because I'm a girl, I can get away with it."

"Yeah. Well, you know, when you're living on your own and you don't have your mom to tell you things like, hey, buy some new shoes, you just don't think of it."

I wasn't pleased with being likened to the team mom--mostly because I think I'm pretty funky. But it's better than being a jackass, I guess...

"Do you recognize this sweater?" he asked.

"No," I said honestly.

"You found it in my closet once and said you never seen me wear it. So I thought, I'll wear it today."

"Well," I said, "that sounds like something I'd say." And I immediately decided to not tell him about the slight hole in the back neckline.

::sigh:: I'm a snob :(
Today I'm wearing a longer and bigger necklace than usual. My mom got it for me when she went to Hawaii, and it's a little more BAM! than the things I might normally wear. But there's nothing wrong with expanding your fashion tastes. This particular one, however, has made drinking from a watr fountain very difficult. And I imagine it will be the last of the long necklaces for me.

Barrel's Bottom Rents Last

2007-02-25T15:35:00.000-08:00

The clawfooted tub on the 2600 block of Marshfield did not inspire the same romance, nor did it invoke a mediocre appreciation, as other, vintage clawfooted bathtubs might. In magazines and on cable tv, the four feet of such a tub would rise majestically from a highly polished marble floor. It would stand opposite a pedestal sink and an open organizational system for towels and toiletries.

But this tub on the 2600 block of Marshfield rose from an old laminate floor. The color of said floor was the yellow-tan tone you'd expect to see a newpaper turn following 15, 20 years of neglect. And the tub did not face a pedestal sink. There was no sink in the bathroom in the Marshfield apartment. There was no organizational storage system, open nor otherwise. Only a small toilet and a clawfooted tub, whose fourth foot was poised atop a general biology textbook.

In statues or paintings, when the subject has one foot poised atop a box, pillar, animal, or severed human head, many words come to mind, though they all have that serenely powerful connotation: triumphant, proud, conqueror. It's easy to gaze awestuck at such a figure, who cleary held mastery over something.

I sincerely doubt the tub had mastered general biology, and I say this forgetting that tubs do not invest in science. I say this with an air of pompousness: How could a tub, living in these conditions, ever improve itself to learn general biology?
Thankfully, one would not notice the textbook upon entering the bathroom. This was precisely because the textbook was from 1970--at least-- and the corner of it that was nearest the door was worn or chewed away, revealing pages that blended in perfectly with the laminate floor.

Aside from the bathroom, the rest of the apartment was in poor shape. So bad, in fact, that the bathroom seemed the highlight--which is why we started there.

The walls had holes. The wood floors collected dust balls so large, they must be considered dust rabbits, not bunnies. The dry wall rippled around the windows where water had come in and stayed. Then there was the second entryway.

The second entry was framed by an old wood trim--except, of course, where it was completely lack. Eight inched above and below the deadbolt were exposed. Where the trim began again, it was splintered and disrupted. The owner had replaced the absent accent by hammering a four-inch-long block of unfinished wood over the place where it seemed the deadbolt had plowed from its space within the frame to the inside of the apartment.

As an added sales aid, the owner took the sole lightbulb out of the main room. This gave potential renters a modified version of the "look around". It seemed that the owner believed, to view this place in its best light, required absolutely no light at all.

I hated bringing clients there. But everyone wanted to see it. It was the only apartment under $600 in all of Lakeview, and each renter wanted to believe this would be their gem--the perfect place that only they had been lucky enough to find.

Marshfield was in the database for months before I started apartment leasing in the summer of 2006. And soon I realized its usefulness. If clients had just seen an apartment they really liked, show the Marshfield apartment to make them understand just how bad the other options were. This isn't as manipulative as it sounds. It's actually doing the clients a huge service. The dumps remained available for months. But the gems--hardwood floors, eat-in-kitches, closets in the bedroom, and heat included--would stick around for a couple of hours or a day at most. As agents, we knew if a place would rent in less than a week. And if we showed a gem to clients who seemed keen on it, they'd surely be disappointed if they came back later in the afternoon and discovered it was gone.

But Marshfield was going nowhere fast.

Clients would ask me, "Would you live here?" and I would say something like, "I'd rather move back home with my nagging, coddling, nosey, controlling parents. But you don't really have any better option." I would walk into Marshfield and immediately start appologizing for the 40-year-old refrigerator and the moldy general biology textbook. I would point out the absence of the sink in the bathroom, but quickly announce that the kitchen sink is just a short trot away.

I knew I had no chance of renting it when I was showing places to a couple of college-student sisters. They were nice as can be. Fresh off the boat from Nigeria, I believe. They were used to living sparsely. They told me that they were not accustomed to air conditioning, and they were accustomed to sleeping in the same bed. We looked at the few places that were in their price range, of which Marshfield was the gem. In the end, they decided to stay another semester in the dorms.

I had only been in the leasing business for three months, long enough for my temporary license to expire. And during that time, only Marshfield was available from the start to the finish of my short career. It wasn't until Christmas time that I had gotten a call from a former coworker, inviting me out to celebrate that, in an apartment shortage, someone had finally rented the old Marshfield place.

LENT UPDATE
Four days of Lent and one Sunday: two margaritas (both on Sunday)! And I was in attendance for this weekend's mass...
Sha-Blam!

Forty Days Dry

2007-02-23T08:30:00.000-08:00

For Lent, I decided to give up booze. Forty days on the wagon doesn't seem like a challenge to me. I've only been drinking for the past couple of years. It's just something I do to socialize.

Why are you doing this to yourself?
Here are three reasons I'm giving up the sauce:

If I stay out late on Saturday night, I can't motivate myself to go to church. And during Lent, I'm going to make the good effort to go every week.
I'm getting ready for summer, and all of those calories seem to be making my daily workouts less effective than they should be.
I would like to spend less money. The second I leave the door and head out into the city, it's $40. A $20 cab ride out to where ever I'm going, and a $20 cab ride home--nevermind the food and booze!!

What the Friends Had to Say...
So I went to play a soccer game on Wednesday, and I told my cohort about my new leaf. Here are some of the responses I got:

W said:

"Are you kidding me? I took off work tomorrow so we could go drinking after the game!"
"Do you really think you'll make it 40 days?"

M said:

"You can't be serious? What are you going to do if you don't go out drinking?"
"Are you studying for a test or something? Why would you do this?"
"Why don't you give up something else? Like sex?"

J said, "What about the hockey game on Sunday?"

I told him that Sundays are not included in the Lent season. (If you don't believe me, start on Ash Wednesday and count days until Easter. You'll only get 40 if you don't include Sundays. A special thanks to Vatican 2!)

"Oh," J said, "so you can just come out and meet us up at midnight on Saturdays, then."

"Yeah!" agreed M, "That makes sense!"

I tried to explain that that would ruin the whole idea. Besides, I said, I'm bothered that you guys don't think I can get by without drinking! "The point is that if I get drunk on Saturday night, I won't be able to get myself up in time for church."

"Well, why don't you just not drink on Saturdays, but still come out with us on Fridays?" asked M.

It was an uphill battle against these nonCatholics. They just don't get that Lent is supposed to be a quite, calm, and reflective time.

Jeez! Even the heathen I'm boinkin' gets that!

LENT UPDATE
Two days without any desire to drink... take THAT doubting Thomases!

When It Looks and Tastes Like Food: It's Done!

2007-02-11T08:29:00.000-08:00

Most things are not as difficult as people make them out to be.

I applied for a part-time job as a barista at a coffee shop near my house. I could, potentially, hop off the train after my day job, make cappicinos for college students, and with my revenue, get $80 more drunk each week. When I go in to apply, the manager, a hippie guy who forgot to eat everyday for the past 3 years, says, "Do you have experience as a barista?"

"I have 24 years of practical experience holding cups and pouring drinks for myself," I say.

I didn't get the job...

Cooking. Another perfect example. A group of friends and I were out for dinner. A pair of them are recently married. The wife says they have appliances they do not know how to use.

"What do you do with a mixer?"

If four of us could have stacked the notes in our voices, we would have made an excellent barbershop quartet when we responded: "Mix things."

Then came the cateloging of reasonable items that require mixing. For example, any dough that is preceded by an adjective: cookie dough, bread dough... Our one friend offered the idea of mashed potatoes.

"Mashed? Potatoes?"
The girl who brought it up proceded cautiously. Was our married chum joking? This launched into a whole orated treatise on how to make mashed potatoes. First, you boil the potatoes. Ah, but how do you know when they're done? Why, you stick a fork in them. A fork! Genius! Then you put them in the mixer... Yes, yes! Go on!

I have few qualms with being a snob, so I'll just go ahead and say it: Are you kidding? Mashed potatoes is the only food where the ingredients and the preparation process are in the name!

And cooking, in general! I'm a fair cook, and the trick to cooking anything is to keep looking at it and when it looks and tastes like food, it's done. If you're cooking fish, and it doesn't look like the food you got last weekend when you ordered it from a restaurant, it's not cooked completely.

When it looks and tastes like food, it's done!

Pre-Maturely Aging: Knitters, Cat Ladies, and Meetup.com

2007-01-24T11:41:00.000-08:00

My page designer pointed out that when you're out of college, making new friends is like dating. You can't depend on running into someone the same time every week. When you meet them the first time, you must actively set up more opportunities to hang out. This becomes even more hazardous because dating and having friends cost money, and if you hardly know someone, you could just be spending on someone that you really could never be a good friend with. When money is tight, you just can't afford that.

As a 23-year-old woman, this is a two pronged problem: (1) finding women I might like and (2) forcing them to be my friends. So where do you find other girls?

This is how I went to my first Meetup.com event. If you've never heard of it, check it out. They have groups that meet for just about everything: investing, speaking French, playing flag football, drinking wine... what follows is my first experiment with attending a meetup.com function.

Meetup.com: Chicago Knitters Unite!
That's right. I believe in knitting in bars.

Why knitting?
I want to find people that do quiet, money-saving activities. Knitting is such an activity. Very calm. Not much in the way of dollar-dropping excitement, but you can talk while you knit. So there is that potential to meet people and decide whether you'd like to see them in other, money-spending, situations.

What's more, if you're saavy enough with a pair of blunt weapons, such as knitting needles, you can make some supa cool apparel items: shurgs, knit purses, funky hats. And, although they'll take you a million years to make, that's a million years you're sitting occupied at home, or with others, and not spending money. You see what I'm sayin'?

Is knitting really the activity for me?
Probably not. I am no professional knitter. Thus far, I've knitted two squares. I've crocheted some squares in my life too. But you're lookin' at a real-life wanna-be. And although I like to think I can be pretty artistic, I have very little pride in craftmanship.

What happens when a first timer goes to said knitting meetup?
Let's just say, whenever I'm sitting in a ten-person conversation on cats... no, not cats, kitties... I'm a little more than just a little disconcerted. Disclaimer: It's not that I don't like cats. I think they're cute, and I particularly appreciate the ones that think they're dogs, what with the fetching etc. But I've never had one of my own, and so I don't quite understand the appeal of treating them like human offspring and giving them little high-pitched voices to narrate the cat's thoughts.

So half of the group was not my speed, and unfortunately, the set-up of the room and the stationery activity that is knitting discouraged much movement. But I did enjoy working on a new square, if for no other reason than to have other people around me. And I also have high hopes that the other women and homosexual men will have something else to talk about aside from the timely topic: "Convincing your kitty to sleep in the bed you knit for him even after you move to a new apartment and the kitty says, 'I don't want to sleep on that because it smells like the old place.' "

I'll definately be trying this meetup again. But next time I'll be a little less punctual and a little more particular on who I sit near.

Walter Knows What's Up

2005-07-13T11:38:00.000-07:00

Walter is one of those people with a firm grasp on ridiculous things that come out of my mouth. He seems to pick up on the undertones of a conversation that no one else does.

One time, I asked him why that was. "No one ever picks up on these things," I told him. "No one else realizes how ridiculous I am."

"Sure they do; they just don't tell you about it," he said.

After a breif, nontechnical survey I decided he was wrong. My other friends were all baboozled by my confidence and the stern authority with which I spoke when utter nonsense fell out of my face. I was preaching gosple, and they sopped it up.

"Walter, do you have goals?" I asked over dinner.

"You mean like, 'by the end of this month' goals?"

"No. Like, 'In a year, I'll want this' goals."

"Sometimes I do. Like when I decided I was going to start running every day over 64 degrees, but then I got shin splints. Now I want to read books of the genre blank and blank and learn to play the guitar better." Walter had recently read Crime and Punishment. He was now on to War and Peace, and he had his sights set on Pride and Prejudice or Sense and Sensibility. Either or. Eventually both.

"I have no goals."

"Bullshit. You always have goals. Like that time you wanted to make out, and you made that plan. Step 1 b was to devise the plan. Or the second time you wanted to make out, and you had five different plans to get you there depending on his mood for when he came back from spring break."

"Yeah, but those goals were plans. I had a logical process figured out to get me from point a to point b."

"The process wasn't logical," Walter said. "The whole plan, the first time, was to devise the plan."

"No. That was the second step."

"Titled 1b. There was no step two," he said. Walter obviously wasn't as impressed as he ought to have been from the fact that I at least numbered the steps of my plan. No matter how silly it might have been. "That whole plan was bullshit."

"Well, I made out with him, didn't I?"

"Yeah, but not as a result of either plan."

"Fine."

"Besides, you have goals. You just decide you want something, and it's a goal."

"I want to stop being fat."

"You're not fat. But if you were, that would be a goal."

"I was thinking of joining a gym, and I would work out every morning."

"In the morning!? What time would that be?"

"I dunno. Like 5."

"Why don't you just workout at night?"

"Because I don't get home until 730."

"So? It's better than going in the morning."

"But it's not like I can just drive there from the train."

"Why no--oh... no car."

"Yeah. So I'd have to come home, eat..."

"Don't eat. Just go straight to the gym."

"But it'll be easier in the morning because I won't have to fight with John for the shower, and I..."

"But you'll go to bed at like 8pm."

"Yeah, but maybe that's a good thing, because it's not like I have anything to do at night, anyhow. Maybe I'll fight less with my mom and my brother."

"Ooooohh... this is just an elaborate scheme to avoid your family."

"No."

"Yes it is."

"No it's not."

"Yes it is. Those are your only reasons for working out in the morning."

"I have other reasons too."

"They're all just excuses. Fine. Wake up at frickin' four in the morning to avoid your family."

"Maybe I'll just stop biting my nails instead."

"That's a goal too."

"Yeah..." The waitress came by and asked if we wanted appetizers.

"I don't," Walter said.

"Me neither."

"I have big fat thighs," Walter said. "I haven't done any exercise since my shin splints came back." Walter weighed about 115 and was over 6 feet tall.

"Walter. You don't have fat thighs."

"Yes I do, and now you know how ridiculous you sound."

The Ditch You're in... or Happy Birthday to Me

2005-01-30T08:02:00.000-08:00

When my mom slams the breaks while driving in the burbs, she throws her arm over whatever is in the passenger seat, be it one of her children, her mother, or her purse. That's her reaction to what she preceives as an impending crisis -- keep the contents of the passenger seat put.

Apparently, I have my own reactionary device -- saying 'hold on' as many times as I can, as fast as I can, until the command becomes backwards and interpreted as 'on hold.' I say apparently, because it had just become apparent to me that this was my reaction-to-crisis.

Z and I were in a ditch. And somehow, despite the 4 inches of snow in the streetside trough, my window was sprayed with long stems of dried, dead grass. My cell had died, and Z's only worked when the window was open.

No sense cooling down the car, I thought. I took Z's phone, and I was pacing around my car, waiting for Triple A to pick up the other line. I lost signal a couple of times, then opened up my door again: "I'm going to go walk by that sign and see where we are."

About 60 feet away was the back of a sign. From its size and shape, I concluded it must be one of those green signs that give you some sense of where the shit you are. 180 miles from Memphis. 17 miles from whatever other city was located outside of Chicago. (Who the hell knows?)

Last thing I saw before that guy cut me off was a huge sign: ADULT. That was in Buckley, but how long ago did I pass that sign? I couldn't tell.

A lady from Triple A picked up, and started asking questions:
- What is your reason for calling Triple A today?
"My car and I are in a ditch."
- What city are you in?
"Well, I'm not sure exactly. I'm on 57 going south, in the west ditch. There's a truck stop about 150 feet north of me, and it's the first truck stop south of Buckley."
-57?
"Yeah, you know... it's the number 57 in a blue shield-looking thing, and there's red on the top of it."
-Interstate 57?
"That's right! Interstate 57.
- What city is that?
"I don't know. The last sign I saw said Buckley. You know, Buckley, Illinois? When going south, after passing that exit, there's a truck stop south of there. We're just 150 feet south of that truck stop." (I started walking back ot the car.)
- What intersection are you at?
"There is no intersection. I'm on the Interstate. 57. South of Buckley."
- What town is that?
"I TOLD YOU, I don't know. Maybe 2-5 miles south of the Buckely exit."
- How far from the road is your vehicle.
"Oh, I dunno. 20 horizontal feet and 10 verticle feet."
- How far is that?
"How the hell should I know? My car is in the ditch! I don't have a calculator! You find the damned hypotenuse!"

I walked back to the car. "They said it could be as long as an hour," I told Z. I gave her the run-down of the frusterating conversation I had with the Triple A woman. About how she kept asking where we were, and I kept telling her all I could think up.

"Well, did you get to the sign?" Z asked. "What did the sign say?"

"Yeah! It said 'Don't get plowed... Drive Safely'!" We both laughed.

"Bastard sign!" Z said.

I had been planning myself a birthday party for quite a while. I invited about 20 people over to my apartment for some pre-gaming and whatnot on a Saturday, which was the day before my actual birthday. My friends and I considered this a big deal. It would be the first time in my entire college career that I had even acknowledged my birthday, more or less celebrated it.

The first unfortunate thing that happened was my old roommate's mother passed away. When I heard the news, I rounded up our other mutal chums and headed for the burbs, a two hour trek from central Illinois. The mother's wake and funeral were combined into one ceremony that was to take place on the Saturday morning that I had arranged my party for. I called all of the guests and postponed my event by a couple of hours, giving me time to attend the funeral, eat dinner, and drive back into Urbana.

While we left on time (5pm) to make it to my apartment by the party's start (8pm), we were set back while tranversing the 6.5 miles of LaGrange Rd. The normally 20 minute dash took upwards of 60 minutes. All of a sudden, our schedule was pushing it.

I say 'we' because I was driving with my good friend, Zaynab. She and I attended the funeral together. I drove her northward with me on Thursday night, and now we were headed back. She was coming to my party as well.

I normally hit the interstate going about 80mph, but it was snowing lightly -- does any other region in America call it 'flurries?' -- and I wasn't entirely convinced that the roads were in tip-top shape. I drove between 65 and 70, reasoning that I had less than 2 hours to get to my apartment and finish cleaning it before people started coming over.

Coming up on Buckley, about 30 minutes from our destination, a car in the right lane, about 5 lengths ahead of me, decided to pass whomever he was following. Instead of speeding up, however, he maintained his 40 mph in the left lane. I didn't slam the breaks. I tapped them. (Z agreed with me later that this is how it happened.)

The car started fish-tailing, we turned at least one complete circle (accounts vary depending on the level of sympathy we could score from our audience) and went front-first into a snowy ditch.

I tried calling my parents from her phone, but they weren't answering. Just before I had left, they went out to a new resturant with my mom's best friend and her husband. That was over 2 hours ago, and they still were not back.

(Dad: What time are our reservations?
Mom: They told me that all of their reservation tables are filled.
Dad: So where else can we go?
Mom: Well, they said that they only allow half of the resturant for reservations. The other half is first come first serve.
Dad: I'm not going to go all the way out there to wait around for four hours before I can sit down at a table!

The conversation continued like that, with my dad becoming more and more ridiculous. Heating up his voice by a degree or so with every slanted word and sentence. Anyway, it was obvious to me, now that I was in the ditch, that the proclamation of the long-ass dinner had come true.)

"Are you going to tell your parents later that we got in this ditch?" Z asked me.

"No," I said, "I tried calling them earlier for advice, but so long as there is no damage and no one's hurt, there's no reason to make them freak out... Unless you plan to sue us."

"I don't think so," she said, laughing. "I'm not going to tell my parents either. It will just make them worry. But I think I'm definately going to start calling all of my friends to milk this situation for what it's worth."

She hopped on the phone, and it was quite a specticle. Our one circle became three, and all of a sudden we braved the ditch in between the north and southbound sides of the interstate and headed into oncoming traffic and then deposited into the next furthest ditch.

I tried my phone again. I had one bar of battery and a wavering one bar of antenna. While I was on Z's phone calling Triple A, I asked her to try calling Bridgette and Kara, the only two commuting any reasonable distance, on my phone to tell them that the festivities are postponed. She had told me that she got through to both of them, but Bridgette was the first.

"WE'RE IN A DITCH!" was the first and last thing I hear come out of Zaynab's mouth while she was talking to Bridgette and I was walking toward the back of that sign.

When I got through again to Bridgette, it wasn't more than 20 minutes from the initial hysteria. She was due at my party in 30 minutes. She couldn't be more than a 10 or 20 minute drive from where we were. I was thinking that she could probably just stop off and hang out with us on the side of the road. Why not? We weren't doing anything. We were stuck in this ditch. However, Bridgette, after hearing that we were caught in the ditch, turned around.

"You're home already?" I couldn't believe it. "You were supposed to be at my apartment in like 30 minutes and you were just starting to leave when I called?... Fine! I'm going back to my apartment and I am having my party anyway!"

I hung up the phone in disgust. "What the hell," I said to Zaynab. "If she called me and said that she flew off the side of the road, I wouldn't have turned around and went home. AND even if I didn't get into the ditch, she would have been hours late to my party. What was I supposed to do? Wait all night for her?"

"You should have told her we spun around four times," Z said as she was dialing her next victum.

"Hey," she started in a raspy, aloof voice. "I got in a big car accident. I'm in a ditch on 57. Yeah, we spun out of control and I think I have whiplash." After 2 minutes, her friend Omar was eating out of her hands. "I'll send someone to get you and drive you home!" I heard him panicking.

I was calling Kara on Z's phone when she got an incoming call. "Kara, I'll call you when we're back on the road again," I said, handing the phone over to Z. It was her sister Nida.

Nida was off and running the second Z answered with her waivering "Hello?" From where I sat, it sounded like someone was fast-forwarding an audio tape while the boom box is still set to play. Nida raced through her account of waiting in line at Best Buy for two hours trying to acquire a new computer. Z burst in with a "Yeah! Well, I got into a huge car accident and now I'm in a ditch!"

"You're in a ditch!?" N responded, followed by the softer, distant yell of Mrs. Kamal, "Ditch!?"

A meek "Bye" followed a few seconds later. "So much for not telling your parents," I joked.

<>We looked at eachother. Only one thing left to do:
"Should we open up one of those two liters in the truck and start eating the cookies?" I offered, and that was that. Here we were, sub-zero temperatures, eating her leftover pizza and my party snacks.

The binge turned into a game, 'who would be the worst person to be in this situation with.'

"You know who would be the worst person to be in a ditch with?" Z provoked. "Liz!"

We laughed. "Worse yet? Matt N.!"

"No! PJ!"

"Hey Z," I began, "Knock knock!"

"Who's there?"

"The Ditch!"

"The ditch who?"

"The ditch you're in!"

About 30 minutes into our fun, an ambulence pulled up. They were just surveying the scene, but I told them that we would be okay. Triple A would be arriving within the next 30 minutes. We called them, and they said they would send someone out.

Next was a tow truck. I talked to the driver briefly, but turns out that Triple A had not sent him. No thanks, I told him, I have a Triple A membership, and so we'll just wait for them.

"Triple A?" The driver said. "Towers around here don't usually work with them because we find that they find ways to not pay people after they already did the work."

I went back into my car, and a policeman showed up. He asked me if we needed help, and I told him no; we called Triple A. He told me the same thing that the tower told me. People in Central Illinois don't like using Triple A because they don't pay the companies after they perform the work.

"You see, it's not fair to the drivers then," the officer told me. "When are they supposed to have someone out here by?"

"Within the next 10 minutes. They said they were sending K&H."

"Okay," said the officer. "I'll circle around a few more times, but if you girls are still here when I get back, we'll have to call another company to get yous out."

I thanked the officer and walked back into the ditch. About 2 minutes later, the same officer had come back. He said he had just called his dispatch and they called K&H. According to them, Triple A had never contacted them at all!

"We put you in for a towing, but they said you might be waiting another 2 hours," the officer told me. "Would you like me to try and call around to get someone out here sooner?"

The person who showed was the same tower I had talked to over an hour ago. He hooked us up, and began surveying the scene. He tapped on my window. "You have a flat back here."

I got out of the car, and sure enough two of my cheap-ass hubcaps had broken clear away, and one of my rear tires was flat. So, while the tower was hooking up my car, I started to clear things out of the trunk. 16 2-liters of soda, baskets of clean laundry, bags of chips, pretzels, and cookies. I dug out the spare. Then I hopped back into my car as he towed us up onto the street.

So, we were on the road, when he started to change the tire. We felt the car being lowered down, and a tap on Z's window. "The spare's flat."

I got out again to see for myself. Sure enough, the tire was flat. I laughed in disbelief. The tower said he could tow us to Paxton, about 10 miles south, and try to fill it back up. "I don't think it's busted anywhere," he said running his fingers along the threads. "I think that the pressure from the car sliding down into that ditch pressed the air out of it. If we fill it up with air, you should be fine."

I went back into the car to tell Z that we had to get into the tower's cab. "Triple A just called," she told me when I opened the door.

"What did they say?" I asked.

"They said they couldn't place our call," she said.

"So what did you say?" I asked, temperature rising.

"I said well thanks a lot! We got someone else to come and get us out of the ditch!" She said. "And then they said, good, tell Janet that we're glad she got out of the ditch."

Well, we got to Paxton and got the tire filled up. Then we were on the road again, laughing at our predicament.

As we were turning on Main, toward my house, I called Jason to come and help us unload. While we were waiting, however, Z and I unpacked all of my stuff. Just as Jason arrived, we went ot Z's house. Jason helped Z unpack and bring her stuff up into her apartment.

Doot Doot Doot doo doo doo do

Walter was calling. "I'm already at your house, where are you?"

When Jason got back into my car, we drove to my apartment, where Walter was waiting in the parking lot. I pulled in and parked.

I only got to the trunk end when Walter started to brush away the grass that was stuck to the entire driver's side and the rear window. I started to cry, and Jason came over to me.

"I just wanted to have a fun birthday, and now my party's ruined," I sobbed.