i think the area between the geek tests is most accurate.

I AM 30% GEEK! You probably work in computers, or a history deptartment at a college. You never really fit in with the "normal" crowd. But you have friends, and this is a good thing. Take the GEEK test at Fuali.com

a de-lux apartment.

i got back at him for the cleaning thing:
i was commenting in L's blog and mentioned the jefferson's and got the theme song stuck in his head.
cuz we're movin' on up
to the east side
to a de-lux apartment, in the sky ...



yeah, it's in your head too, now, right?
too bad it's in mine too.

boyz don't do clean.

i think that boys just have a completely different concept of "clean". like, i cleaned the living room and the dining room and said that i had to clean the bedroom and bathroom next. so he says, "i'll clean them. no problem!" and i was all for that because it meant that i didn't have to clean. so the next day he comes home and says, "oh! i have to clean!" and takes out the mop and cleans the kitchen floor and the bathroom floor. but he doesn't sweep first, so there's still crap on the floor that didn't stick to the mop. and he didn't "clean" anything else. so today (two days later, mind you) i cleaned the bathroom and started to fold the laundry (god, i hate that) and tomorrow i'll finish and clean the bedroom. oh, and when he comes home today he says, "i cleaned the kitchen and put away the dishes and cleaned up the dirty ones," but there's still dirty dishes in the sink, and the pan and cutting board he used to make breakfast are still laying out all dirty. arg.

tip for you boys:

half clean = not clean.

period.

high score: 127

other score: 125.

i win, yay!

so i went bowling with ivan and his friends tonight (christen worked) and had a good time. i don't hang out with "other" people very much, so it was fun. they are the type of people i hung out with a lot at school ... i feel old. everyone there graduated high school in like 2002 and stuff, and i graduated college in 2003. yeah, i'm old. but we went to taco bell afterward and i got cinnamon twists and nachos and a small drink for $2.75. hurrah!

when you're good to mama ...

how is queen latifah as big as she is and not have any cellulite? bitch.

so i was thinking. i know i know, you thought you smelled something burning. anywho, i think that if we have to have a fat albert movie we should get a picture pages movie too. you know, picture pages, picture pages, open up your picture pages ... i think it's only fair. then they can make a bill cosby box set that has picture pages, fat albert, his comedy routine, the best of the cosby show and the the best of kids say the darnedest things. see, i even have their marketing strategy planned out. now if only they could find someone to play the pen.

what you missed.

On the last post, I meant to write more but I was typing in the dark and I used the wrong shortcut key and ended up publishing. Oh well, I just went back to bed. Christmas was fun; Jamie spent the day with me on Eve doing Christen’s last-minute shopping for the grandmothers and his father, and then we made cream pralines and pillows for her friends and watched Princess Diaries 2. It was much fun. But we went to bed at 11:30 and woke up at 4:30 to start the chaos. Christen and I exchanged gifts before waking Jamie up – I got a föm pillow from Brookstone, the extended Empire Records on DVD, Clerks X, a vacuum for my car, a gund teddy bear (gotta get gund!) and something else but I can’t remember. Then we drove to my mom’s house and exchanged gifts there, and went to his parents’ house and exchanged gifts there, and to his Nana’s to do the big gift exchange and breakfast and lunch and poker!, which is my favorite part of a holiday at Nana’s. I got gift certificates to Best Buy, Circuit City, Sport’s Authority (to get my bowling ball), Barnes & Noble (woohoo!), and Red Lobster and got lots of froggie things (3 pairs of froggie socks, froggie accessories for my car, a wine glass with frogs on it, etc etc etc) and money and other random things that I can’t remember. I never care much about what I get, but I had a really good time. The pralines went over well with the mothers and grandmothers, although my mom’s pit bull ate hers when she left the room and got very sick. Stupid dog. I have to make her some more this week, since I do have leftover pecans and cream. Sunday we went to my dad’s to exchange gifts with him (got money from him, woohoo!) and to Best Buy to use up my gift certificate and so Christen could get a HDMI to DVI converter for his new DVD player. He got one that upscales to HD quality, but I can’t see it. He can’t either, so he’s not too happy with it. We’ll see if he keeps it; I have to keep bugging him to return things he doesn’t like because otherwise it just sits in the apt. collecting dust.
So I think I might be getting sick. It may just be the constant change in temperature, but my nose is all runny and my throat is constantly dry. And I keep sneezing. That’s no good. It seems to be warming up a little, so maybe it’ll get better.
Christen stepped on my glasses last night, so I’m wearing my old ones until I get my good ones fixed. Ugh. I hate these; the prescription isn’t quite right and I have a constant headache. I had them ground at the same time as my other ones, but it’s still not the same. Plus they have those stupid nose things that leave impressions on my nose. Arg. I’m stopping by VisionWorks on my way home today to drop them off. Hopefully Sheila still works there so I don’t have to pay. She always hooks me up.
I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I’m trying very hard to use the appropriate capitalization. I figure I may as well, so that’s one of my New Year’s resolutions. I’m starting early. Since I’ve decided to make resolutions this year, here they are:
1) Start capitalizing correctly. Arg.
2) Find a new job. And take a leave until February when I get said job so that I can get my bonus from this job (for making the year and quarter. Read: major bucks.
3) Get in better shape. Will keep this by riding my bike at night at keeping a food journal, cutting out soda and most sweetened tea so I can splurge with a bit of candy, because I know I can’t cut all of that out.

merry christmas!

merry christmas, everyone! it's 5:19 the next morning and i can't sleep.

the purse/book tote i made for melissa's birthday 

if you put out an album, what would it be called?

and it can't be your name, your band's name, or the title of any song on your album.
christen's would be "whatchu mean, walk da earf?"
the jury's still out on mine.
and i want answers, people, answers!

this quiz rocks. rox, even!

You are 67% geek

You are a geek. Good for you! Considering the endless complexity of the universe, as well as whatever discipline you happen to be most interested in, you'll never be bored as long as you have a good book store, a net connection, and thousands of dollars worth of expensive equipment. Assuming you're a technical geek, you'll be able to afford it, too. If you're not a technical geek, you're geek enough to mate with a technical geek and thereby get the needed dough. Dating tip: Don't date a geek of the same persuasion as you. You'll constantly try to out-geek the other.

Take the Polygeek Quiz at Thudfactor.com

one of the pics i took of my gram's grave 

everything i made today 

the tote bag i made for my sister 

hey, i've never seen the sun come up in the west?

where in my "welcome to florida" handbook does it account for 35 degree weather? i didn't see that. i certainly wouldn't have chosen to live here if that were the case. oh wait, i didn't choose. the carolinas? sure, it'll be cold. i can live there. my choice, even. but freakin' florida is supposed to be sunny, you hear me, damn it! sunny and warm!

i really meant to sleep in today, but it didn't happen. i was up again at 8:30. i was a productive little girl, though. i finished that tote for jamie and 4 pillows (hurrah!) so all i have is a little purse thing for deja (daughter of friend from work) that should take no time at all. she's 3 -- i can do the whole thing on the machine because she wouldn't notice the difference. i'll do that tomorrow night when i make my dishes for the wednesday potluck. i'm making stuffing and cranberry sauce. yum yum. :D

i took my brother and sister to lunch today (with jamie's friend; she was there so i couldn't exclude her, much as i would like to). the damn guy from the credit union called me at 9am to tell me i didn't have enough money in my account for my car payment (which i knew; i had planned on driving a check over tonight) but he was so forceful about it that i dropped everything and drove over to dunedin (an hour drive, thank you) to take him the check and he wasn't there. no office hours until 1:30. so why the fuck was he calling me at 9am?! i am on time every friggin' month for my car payment. asshole. for that i drove the 10 minutes from dunedin to palm harbor to see the sibs and take them to lunch. i'm such a good sister (i'm a sucker).

this is what i'm saying, though. in tampa it takes forever to drive from one part of the city to the other, and it's not even really that big. if you live in one section, you don't even want to battle the traffic and lights to get to another part of tampa. but in pinellas (that's the county across the bay, where my mom lives and i grew up) it's no problem to go anywhere. us19 runs the entire length of the county and there are plenty of ways to get anywhere you want to go. 10 minutes to any mall, 15 to get to any normal place, and when traffic gets real bad, there are a million and one other ways to get to the same place. arg. i hate tampa.

if only your wife was this dirty.

i saw that written in the dirt of some guy's back window. sure beats "wash me" any day. i knew i shouldn't leave the house today. all morning i debated: sew, shop, sew, shop ... i chose shop. i made the wrong choice.

mostly the reason i chose to shop was because i agreed to take a thumbdrive to christen's mother, and i figured as long as i'm on my way out i may as well. no. no. no. i got lost. you wonder how, right? well, his mother lives off of waters and armenia, so in order to get to citrus park (where best buy was) i needed to take anderson to busch. but i missed anderson. does henderson go all the way through? i wasn't sure, so i passed it up. i took the next road. let me tell you, twelve oaks blvd does not go all the way through. half an hour later i found shelden, which does go all the way through. best buy didn't have what i wanted. circuit city didn't have it. i went to rhino games on busch and they had it (the older contra for ps2). on my way out i figure out what rhino is on the corner of -- busch and henderson. argggg!

plus no one wanted to go faster than 30 mph on busch (50 mph minimun) and i think i got motion sickness from changing gears so much.

on the plus side, though, the dude at the meat market beat my chicken for me. hehe.

it's really not a euphemism. i'm making chicken kiev tonight, and i usually make a giant mess hammering it flat (no mallet, all i have is a hammer that i cover in foil). so i asked the dude to do it for me. all the guys behind the counter got a good laugh at he who was beating it though. cuz, you know, he was beating it!

fred mcgriff came by the store the other day. he's really in a lot, but i don't pay attention to the fact that it's fred mcgriff. he's really nice though -- looked at laptops. sarah was standing near the front and turns to holly (when she directed him to laptops) and says, "you know who that is, right?" and she didn't. i don't see where it matters. i sat 3 tables over from derek jeter one time for breakfast when i went out with brad and his family. his dad was freaking out about it.

could just be that i'm not into baseball. if martin st. louis came into the store i'd be all over getting an autograph.

safe pedestrians? i laugh at you.

there's a story on the news today about how tampa is the least safe area for pedestrians. they run this exact story every year, and it never gets any better.

as a matter of fact, florida has 5 of the top 10. does this bother anyone else?

1. Orlando

2. Tampa-St. Petersburg

3. W. Palm Beach-Boca Raton

4. Miami-Fort Lauderdale

5. Memphis, Tenn.

6. Atlanta

7. Greensboro-Winston Salem, N.C.

8. Houston-Galveston

9. Jacksonville

10. Phoenix

blahhhhhhhhhhh ...........g?

okay. 1 l&o movie and 4 l&o episodes and i'm fried. i've wrapped all the presents i've bought (yeah, yeah, eventually i'll finish that shopping) and not finished any of the sewing projects i planned for presents. however, (woohoo, there's a however!) i have 3 days off this week so i have much more time to procrastinate. as long as i finish jamie's tote bag before she comes to stay with me (i should probably finish all the other sewing projects too, since she has plans for 5-6 pillows to make when she comes over) i'll be set. so tomorrow it's sewing sewing shopping! hurrah!

i swear i'm not a harpy!

it was an interesting evening ... christen's mother has been riding us to get pictures together so we did last night. half an hour and 96 dollars later, we went for dinner at logan's steakhouse and saw ocean's 12. pictures look like shit, logan's was good but we left our leftovers in a box on the table, and the movie was pretty good but the cinematography sucked ass. they used that hand-cam technique that is all shaky so it looks like they're following behind the guy on foot ... it gives me such a headache. last time i hated the filming of a movie worse was changing lanes, which i refuse to watch again. i had a migrane for two days afterward.

one of these days (hopefully before christmas) i'll finish my sister's tote bag. maybe i should be working on it now .....

i got to see autumn's scar yesterday -- she had brain surgery last wednesday, and i finally had time to go visit her and bring her stargazer lilies. she likes calla lilies best, but i couldn't get them. the florist gauged me on the freaking stems, too. spent a few hours with her; it made me realize how much i really miss spending time with her. she's been seeing this guy david since early this year, and i think he's really stabling her out a little. and she've even stopped smoking (and still she's stable!).

i also got white roses for my gram's grave, and finally got the guts to visit it. she died in 2000 during finals week and was buried when i had to take a final (from one of those teachers who have ridiculous "no make-ups" rules) so i never went. then i was just too chicken. it's easier to forget that she's dead when i don't see it. i broke down horribly; i was hysterical. but i'm glad i went. i miss her.

my best picture 

dr. dick doodle 

wow it's early for my day off ...

i've never gotten up this early on my day off. at least, not without a reason (you know, disney world and all that). but i woke up and was like "hey, i'm not tired!" and for once, i didn't follow that up by rolling over and going back to sleep. so i'm eating a bowl of half-stale corn pops (still tasty!) and watching the end of the river wild on usa.

i went to burn my new tmbg cd and found that i was missing one of the tracks. arg. so i emailed them to see if i can get the track (damn good times, atlanta) so i have the full album that i paid for. we'll see. i really don't want to pay for it again, especially since it took me all freaking day to get it to work (everytime i downloaded i got empty files) and finally around 10 pm (a full 12 hours later) i downloaded song by song and it worked. yay! but now i need that last song.

my favorite tree (taken from www.nice-tits.org) 

dr. dick.

it was in college when i met richard.

we call him richard now, because he's dating shelley and she'd kill us for calling him dick.

i digress.

so shelley and i and some random friends that no longer exist in my world were sitting around at the ashtray (this piece of cooper hall that juts out a bit so we could be higher than all the other numbnuts that hung out there) killing time between classes. this big jolly guy walks by, and he knows one of the guys in our little group. he's introduced to us as richard, but i'm feeling slightly sarcastic, so i start calling him dick. i tell everyone about this gyno whose name was richard prick and who went by dr. dick. i don't remember anymore if it was a real story or an urban legend, but the name stuck. for months he was dr. dick. then, as we were all english majors (except richard, he was business admin) we decided to make him the leader of our "band," dr. dick delicious and the dangling participles.

i know; we're dorks.

can't spell procrastination without the p-r-o ... you get the idea.

i have set apart today to do all of my christmas shopping, only i still don't have any idea what to get anyone. here's my list:
christen: well, i was going to break down and get him a sirius tuner for his truck, but he wants one that will work with his cd player and not one of those external ones you see everywhere. the problem with that is the dude at circuit city said they're not making them right now because they were having problems and they plan on having another manufacturer make the tuners in '05. so for '04 i'm screwed. now what i'm getting him is ???

mom: AAA and these cute renoir cafe car screen things that she probably won't use but they look nice. and i bought them for me but they don't fit my car. i'll probably get her something else while i'm shopping today.

dad: a nice b/w sailboat pic from work and a mini paperweight clock shaped like a golf bag.

jamie: a bunch of art supplies and a new journal, and i'm making her a strawberry shortcake tote (i'll post a pic when i'm done -- it's very cute)

ian: as many used books as i could get for about 30 bucks, and copies of those new tmbg albums. plus, i made the cover art into these nifty cd sleeves.

shea: ???

kyle: ???

christen's parents: ???

snacob:a big fat juicy mouse.

the girls at work: i think i'm going to make them all little pillows with their initials on them. i think. and for deja i'm going to make a little strawberry shortcake purse with my leftover fabric (she's 3, she'll understand).

but now i should be taking my game back to blockbuster before they charge me another $6 and go shopping for all these people. i'm not as bad off in the gift-giving catagory as i thought. but i still should get going.
in other news, i've hooked up my tree lights to the plug that i can use the lightswitch for, so now i've no reason to go behind the couch anymore. whew yeah, because that was hard work.

they might be your downloads!

tmbg released two new albums available for download only (www.theymightbedownloads.com). hurrah! you don't want to know the problems i had with this today -- it was an all day affair. but i now have almanac and venues. yay! get yours today!

fireplaces.

another store called the other day to get our fax number. they were having trouble with their fax, and wanted to see if they could fax out but, and i quote, "the fax machine was sorta on fire." on fire? a fax machine? how cow! how? i can only assume that it was smoking or something. things don't just catch on fire.

unless you leave a candle on it.

a girl at work came in awhile ago and said that she no longer had a big screen tv. (correction: her boyfriend no longer had a big screen tv.) she had left a candle burning on top of the tv and it burned through the plastic, fell through the box and caught the whole thing on fire. the only thing i can imagine is those videos of a fireplace that you can put on during christmas. fire!

odd?

what does it mean if you dream about blogging? i had some wierd dreams last night. but here's an interesting tidbit (not from the dream):

picture this hypothetical situation ....

wait, how do you picture a hypothetical? anywho ...

so girl and boy are in bed watching television. they're naked because that's how they sleep, but she's frisky and he's getting tired. so a very bad movie is on tbs (it'll be a guess that movie later) but she watches it anyhow while she messes with him, trying to get him awake and "in the mood." finally, after he has turned on his stomach with his face toward her she shoves her boob in his face and says, "suck it .... bitch."

giggling fits ensue and nothing happens.

stupid movie quotes.

wait, did i say hypothetical? ummm, yeah.

now for the name that movie:

"pain heals and chicks dig scars, but glory is forever."

i'm a lazy bitch.

because 'bitch' makes it sound so much better.

i've actually got some things done. snacob's cage got cleaned out and he ate one large mouse (i actually did this all by myself a la jeff corwin -- i put him in a handy scooby pillowcase while i cleaned).

and i made beef stroganoff the other night (not last night; that was grilled hot dogs). it was damn tasty. i think i'll take the leftovers to work tomorrow for lunch, unless christen doesn't come hom for dinner and then i'm eating it tonight. this leads me to my 10 favorite things to cook:

1) lasagne.

2) chicken bryan a la carrabba's

3) rosemary chicken with roasted potatoes.

4) beef stroganoff

5) chicken mignon

6) pancakes

7) mushroom rice

8) macaroni & cheese (baked and stove top -- have i mentioned lately how much i love mac & cheese?)

9) sausage stuffing

10) challah braided bread

11) all of thanksgiving dinner

12) prailines

13) chili

14) homemade chicken noodle soup

15) cookies

oh, did i say 5? oh, the hell with it. i love me some cookin'.

anywho, i've mostly been lazy because i've looked at my blog (this is the reason all those links are on the left -- quick access) but i've not been writing. at all. but oh well, you know? fuck it. hehe. yeah, that's it! fuck it. fuck it all, dammit. oh wait. i don't curse.

the 4 and 5 of the "unrequited loves" shouldn't count because i was the one doing the unrequiting. so screw it. i didn't like them. they liked me. back and forth, repeat as necessary. repeat until you enjoy it, sucker.

plus, 5 will also be in my "4 most ridiculous situations i've ever gotten myself into," and will be known as "my-god-scott-i-swear-you-get-shorter-everytime-i-see-you." so you'll know the story; no need to do it twice.

unrequited loves.

1)nathan perley. 4th grade. in mrs. uhl's class there were not desks; there were round brown tables. mrs. uhl, being the extra smart teacher that she was, decided that all the left-handed kids should sit at the same table so we wouldn't bother our neighbors (the beginning of my ousting). i don't remember most of the people that sat at that table with me, but i do remember nathan. i had the googly eyes for him from the beginning. i'd stare sideways at him while he worked on his writing assignments; i joined art club to be closer to him (and to make really cool fake mcd's fries from melting yellow crayons and dipping styrofoam strips into it). but when valentine's day came around, laura, the short jehovah's witness (that's all i remember about her -- she didn't stand for the pledge) got the "would you be mine?" valentine, while i got the "you're a pal" valentine. and then i got stuck disecting an owl pellet with frank q. yick on all accounts.

2)clay hardman. 5th grade. so i got over nathan (he moved, i think) and clay transferred into my class halfway through the school year. it was here that i learned my stalking tactics. there was a girl that i knew in his apartment complex. we shortly became best friends. i spent the night at her house whenever i could, we roamed the complex at dusk hoping to get a peak at him (and his brother -- they traveled in packs). then one day she and clay ... well, let's just say she got the better valentine. and to hold hands with him.

3)jeff klein. 6th-8th. i fell hard for jeff. hard. due to the wonders of alphabetical seating charts, he and i always sat very close to each other and in 6th grade we were in 5 out of 7 classes together. jeff had the adorable habit (we all know i love the class clown) of making snide comments under his breath, and i laughed every single time. every time. i was the stupid giggling girl. i perfected my stalking techniques, getting invited to the same birthday parties (my roll of film from olivia lupee's 12th birthday has a piece of him in every picture) finding out his address, biking past it every weekend hoping he'd be around ... (he lived on jefferson, how cute is that?) memorizing his phone number and calling and hanging up ... in my yearbook i made little hearts next to his picture and then wrote (not!) next to it ... like i was fooling anyone.

he had to have known i liked him. everyone else knew, right? i even got up the courage to ask him to my 13th birthday party, and he gave me a stuffed squirrel, which i cherished for years (i may still even have it somewhere) but nothing ever came of it. every once in awhile i still drive by his parents' house to see what's going on with him. last i knew he was going to pfeiffer university majoring in poly-sci.

4 and 5 tomorrow.

i think someone's getting married.

the lady that lives two doors down from me keeps walking back and forth in front of my window in a fancy white dress. and then some other chick walked by in a black foofoo dress. i think someone's getting married. i'd wish her luck but i don't talk to them. it's kind of an icky day though, so i hope she's doing it inside.

so this morning i was all for it being cold because it's been quite chilly the last few days. i woke up at 11 (i know, i know ... but i'll have to get up at 6 the rest of the week, so i'm getting it while i can) and put on a long-sleeved black button-down ... yeah, it was 85 degrees out. i changed.

went to lunch with christen today. the dude at alehouse marvelled that christen had company today, since he goes there every day by himself. i don't like alehouse, actually. i usually get a hotdog. today i got the french dip but it wasn't very good. oh well, i got to see christen and that's important.

i went to just books again today and bought some for my brother for christmas. i've now filled a paper box with books, so i think he's good for awhile. i also stopped at michaels for drawing supplies and b&n for a good animal drawing book (for jamie). i bought charcoal pencils, but now i don't know if i should get drawing pencils instead. i don't draw, so i don't know.

i found out today that a good friend is being proposed to this month (i don't use names just in case, because i was told to keep my mouth shut. i'm keeping my mouth shut, but what about if i let my fingers do the talking?) and while i'm jealous, i'm also so happy for her. she's been with her boyfriend much longer than christen and i've been together, so good for her. i got the day off, so we'll be there when it happens. yay!

for autumn. (a poem)

autumn is death
for the play in numbers
finding joy in places
of brilliant creation.


autumn is death
with a straight razor
at the throat of a plump gazelle
or boar, stealing life
from worthlessness.


autumn is life
within death
a voice of succulent
maliciousness
in her marrow
of midnight danger.


autumn brings me
dandelions and calla lilies
in fanciness
in happiness
and in death.

this is it.

this is my third day off in a row.

i think i should go christmas shopping, but i still don't know what to get people. and oddly, my closest friends lately have been blogging people that i don't really know but feel inclined to get christmas presents for. so this is what i've come up with for people:

my sister: painting supplies and a few canvases so she might try her luck at painting.

my brother: as many used books as i can get him for 20-25 dollars. i'm scouring the bookstores for lovecraft right now.

my mom: AAA for her shitty nissan she's getting friday.

my dad: ???

christen: ???

shea: ???

kyle: ???

i usually get brad, autumn, adrian, shelley and richard things, but i don't know if i am this year. i don't see anyone anymore socially. everyone is so busy (me included). if i see something that is specifically "them", i'll pick it up. but i do that anyhow. autumn is going into the hospital on dec. 8 for almost a week (brain/spine surgery) and i'm very worried about her, so i might shop for her just to get my mind off of it. and i might get jordan a present to make him not grouchy, as he has been during finals.

i slept till 11 yesterday, and decided to go to my mother's. dern dogs. her pit stepped on my big toe (i should learn from this experience never to wear flipflips to her house) and scratched it up (but you know i won't learn). she has three huge dogs (1 lab/chow mix, 1 pit and 1 mastiff) ... as well as 2-3 snakes, 3 cats (i contributed, neko is mine but he kept peeing on the carpet so i gave him to her), 2 ferrets, a hamster and 2 birds. and a partridge in a pear tree. she's also had an array of iguanas, a sugar glider (i met him when i had a sunburn. ouch, those are razer claws!) and a variety of other animals. my mother's house is why palm harbor claims to have a zoo already. :)

then last night was the store christmas party. we had olive garden, which was pretty good, and sat around the funiture pad. and i got to play with katie, sarah's baby, and deja, jessica's daughter. so i had a good time. i got a christopher lowell candle set. yay! and we bought a vonage setup kit so i'll have a home phone soon.

high score last night: 133.

all scores: 130, 133, 98, 117, 108, 112, 94.

terrible. (with spanish accent)

but! but! i got my first turkey ever. yay!

something borrowed.

found this on someone else's blog (indydown) and thought it was amusing so it ended up here.

The Columbus Dispatch11/16/04CANADA BUSY SENDING BACK BUSH-DODGERS
by Joe Blundo
The flood of American liberals sneaking across the border into Canada has intensified in the past week, sparking calls for increased patrols to stop the illegal immigration. The re-election of President Bush is prompting the exodus among left-leaning citizens who fear they'll soon be required to hunt, pray and agree with Bill O'Reilly. Canadian border farmers say it's not uncommon to see dozens of sociology professors, animal-rights activists and Unitarians crossing their fields at night."I went out to milk the cows the other day, and there was a Hollywoodproducer huddled in the barn," said Manitoba farmer Red Greenfield,whose acreage borders North Dakota. The producer was cold, exhaustedand hungry. "He asked me if I could spare a latte and some free-range chicken. WhenI said I didn't have any, he left. Didn't even get a chance to show him my screenplay, eh?"In an effort to stop the illegal aliens, Greenfield erected higherfences, but the liberals scaled them. So he tried installing speakersthat blare Rush Limbaugh across the fields. "Not real effective," hesaid. "The liberals still got through, and Rush annoyed the cows somuch they wouldn't give milk."Officials are particularly concerned about smugglers who meet liberalsnear the Canadian border, pack them into Volvo station wagons, drivethem across the border an d leave them to fend for themselves."A lot of these people are not prepared for rugged conditions," anOntario border patrolman said. "I found one carload without a drop ofdrinking water. They did have a nice little Napa Valley cabernet, though."When liberals are caught, they're sent back across the border, often wailing loudly that they fear retribution from conservatives. Rumors have been circulating about the Bush administration establishing re-education camps in which liberals will be forced to drink domestic beer and watch NASCAR.In the days since the election, liberals have turned to sometimes-ingenious ways of crossing the border. Some have taken to posing as senior citizens on bus trips to buy cheap Canadian prescription drugs. After catching a half-dozen young vegans disguised in powdered wigs, Canadian immigration authorities began stopping busesand quizzing the supposed senior-citizen passengers."If they can't identify the accordion player on The Lawrence Welk Show, we get suspicious about their age," an official said. Canadian citizens have complained that the illegal immigrants are creating an organic-broccoli shortage and renting all the good Susan Sarandon movies."I feel sorry for American liberals, but the Canadian economy just can't support them," an Ottawa resident said. "How many art-history majors does one country need?"In an effort to ease tensions between the United States and Canada, Vice President Dick Cheney met with the Canadian ambassador and pledged that the administration would take steps to reassure liberals, a source close to Cheney said."We're going to have some Peter, Paul & Mary concerts. And we might putsome endangered species on postage stamps. The president is determined to reach out."

ha! hell yeah, dude.

You scored as Derranged Cat. Wow. . . lay off the halucinogenics and brush your hair once in a while. You're one sick, derranged s.o.b.

Derranged Cat 75% Pissed at the World Cat 67% Ninja Cat 67% Love Machine Cat 58% Drunk Cat 50% Nerd Cat 17% Couch Potato Cat 8%

Which Absurd Cat are you?
created with QuizFarm.com

a superficial dickwad. and 5 favorite comfort foods.

the book for today was her fork in the road -- women celebrate food and travel. a very good book, though i was disappointed to see that the ruth reichl essay was an excerpt from her book tender at the bone, which i've already read. i've also clammered through 63 pages of notes from a small island by bill bryson, which is very amusing. note the british dictionary at the end. also read: 20-odd pages of naked by david sedaris at b&n. must start scouting more local used bookstores -- it's possible i may go broke before christmas.

after starting notes, though, it seems to me i need a good cockney slang dictionary/history book. did you know bread meaning money is from bread and honey? and raspberry tart = fart, which is why blowing a raspberry is making a stinker-noise. i'm fascinated. plates of meat = feet, shortened then to plates.

also, shirt-lifter is a gay male.

we were going to see santa v. the snowman and vikings at the imax dome but got caught up in the hoopla of shopping at citrus park town center. stupid mall. christen made the enlightened reflection that we see the same damn stuff everytime we go, but we still go. a trip to maida's bookstore beforehand made the trip bearable. i bought 3 books for myself and 4 for ian for christmas -- a couple clive barker (the thief of always, which was a fabulous book for any age) and a couple ray bradbury. after the mall we spent nearly two hours trying to get christen's mop cut (his head's been a bit more bushy than usual) by his barber while ducking the old dude's insistence that he cut christen's hair. the last time that happened it wasn't short enough and was way crooked. no thank you, we'll just wait in line for the good barber.

in light of my fascination with food, i've decided to do a number of lists having to do with those fabulous morself. todays? 5 favorite comfort foods. these are foods that are easy peasy to cook and are nice to make when you're by yourself and don't want to do anything.

1) mac & cheese. i will order m&c absolutely anywhere. mimi's? no good. that little pretentious cafe in old hyde park? marvelous. i make it baked and stovetop, but i won't make boxed anymore. when i was young it was velveeta m&c all the way. those kraft powdered things were fine as long as you didn't think of it as cheese; it was a completely different food. now my usual mac and cheese consists of noodles, a little bit of milk and sliced american cheese. american breaks down so the cheese isn't stringy. my recipe: cook approximately 8 0z. noodles until tender. drain. in same pot lower temp. to med. high, put enough milk in pot to cover bottom of pan. one at a time put about 6 slices of american cheese in pot, using each slice of cheese to stir the mixture. stir cheesiness until well mixed, add noodles and mix. eat until overstuffed.

2) grilled cheese. when i was younger we had a sandwich maker so that we wouldn't burn down the house while making our grilled cheese sandwiches. i bought one when i moved out but it stays permenently in my pantry now (though it does make tasty quick pizza and brownies) and i continue to go with the old standby stovetop version. you know the drill. butter both sides, stick a piece of cheese (or two) in between and grill until right before burnt. some people make it in the toaster oven, but i'm still in awe of mine. it makes toast and cookies?

3) buttered egg noodles. this favorite is due to a memory of mine. see this entry for details. i think you should know how to make it. buy egg noodles (i get those cholesteral-free ones), cook till tender, drain and mix with butter. yum yum.

4) peanut butter and jelly. there's no real consensus. i love smooth peanut butter, christen is a crunchy fan. he loves grape and so do i, though i love rasperry sometimes too. but pb&j is love, man. pure love.

5) cereal. this is a real do-it-yourselfer. apple jacks, corn pops, total raisen bran. it's not the meal that matters, it's whether or not you drink the milk. me? if i'm having another bowl i'll reuse. if it's my last bowl, i drink it.

my top 5 teachers.

1) Ms. Dalton. kindergarten (1985). i went to PHE for kindergarten with the butterfly lady. even now people call her the butterfly lady. every year she collected monarch caterpillers and raised them in her classroom so that the kids could learn the metamorphasis process and how to treat them, what they ate, etc. it was a huge thing. they've done stories on her, they muraled one wall of the school with butterflies and cocoons and forests and everything. she was amazing. plus, i freaked her out twice. once i had a nosebleed that was so bad it wouldn't stop bleeding and she thought i had a clotting problem and the other time i got really allergic to the punk trees on the road (those are the trees that have bark like paper) and my eyes swelled shut and had to go home. ahh, allergies, my friend. sweet blinding allergies.

2) Ms. True. freshman english (1998). i learned to love to write, other than whiny poetry.

3) Mr. Hines. 11th grade english (1996). i copped out of advanced english because they wanted a portfolio and all i wanted to do was play cards in the backroom of the bandroom. so i got stuck with the stupid kids. all the non-advanced english classes weren't stupid, but the people in this class were. and i kept getting cheated off of and had to explain everything to the stupid people around me. but mr. hines never lost his cool and made us watch really great movies, like shawshank redemption and the emerald forest and a midnight clear. as opposed to spanish, where the same stupid people convinced profe that friday didn't have anything objectionable in it.

also, i wore this button on my backpack that had pinocchio on it and it said "would i lie?" and he really liked it.

also, he realized that the rest of the people in the class were stupid and let me get a pass to the bandroom whenever i wanted one.

4) Mr. Blackburn. 6th grade geography (1991). it really isn't mr. blackburn's fault that i'm so terrible at geography. he really tried; i know it. but he is responsible for my impecable sense of direction. his introduction to the cardinal directions was to stand on his desk and scream north! while pointing to the north wall of the room. it's engrained in my head now. north!

5) ms. vaccaro & mrs. sapashe. 2nd grade (1987). since they were both my 2nd grade teachers, i feel justified in giving them a tie. ms. vaccaro taught me to close my s's (not to be confused with esses) in cursive, and mrs. sapashe taught us the value of plastic money when she set up shop in her classroom. plus, i learned how to do my 9x tables on my fingers in her class.

when did nick and jessica become sonny and cher?

funny part in the terminal:

the guys are playing cards and the indian dude brings out the grand prize: cher's panties. and they say "these are cher's panties. there are witnesses." and victor says "does that mean we share them?" and black dude says "not if i win them."

so why do nick and jessica have a christmas variety show if they're broken up (if i can believe the tabloids, and i know i can). and a better question: why am i watch it?

i'm not ... anymore. wow, that was major suckage.

better. i thought dirty dancing was on oxygen, but when i turned it on it was clueless instead.

in the spirit of memoirs and christmas (lists) and moocow's (lists) and high fidelity (lists) i'm going to write some ... lists. i'm going for 25 different lists, but i need ideas. favorites, worst things, funniest somethings, most embarrassing stuff, etc. so comment and tell me what to write about. you were just waiting for someone to invite that, right?

when're we going to jasmine thai?

i love making up contractions.
like "when're we going to jasmine thai?"
and "why've you been out all week?"
it's so fun to watch people try to figure out what you mean.

still giving it out for free.

that was a quick intermission, right?

after my excitement over empire records the other night, i did some amazon.com research and found out that there was indeed a new version that came out on june 4th. (which incidentally was when i was supposed to be born. now isn't that interesting? i made mom miss the fireworks though, cuz she was in labor for 13 hours and they found out i was not a boy like they thought on july 5th.) back from sidebar -- the new version has more than 16 minutes of never-before-seen footage. that doesn't really seem like a lot, but it's more like an extra 5 seconds of dialogue in every single seen. and some things are way different. like when liv tyler takes her clothes off for rex manning, in the original he pulls down his zipper and says "let's rock and roll." in the new version he pulls down his zipper and grabs the bottle of salad dressing and says "i hope you like blue cheese." -- another sidebar --- it wasn't blue cheese, it was ranch.

overall, from what i saw the new scenes don't really do much for the movie but the extra lines are very amusing. i talked to christen about it so much last night that i think he's now getting it for me for christmas.

do you have an appointment?

ahh! i can finally get into my blog. it's been frustrating, to say the very least. let's hope it sticks around long enough for me to rattle off an entry and get back to urbz. i have to figure out what to do next, you know?

went to dinner with brad. oh, how i've missed brad. we talked about books and resignments in the white house and what's going on at the paper (when i left i appointed him copy desk chief, and now he's going to be an associate editor) and all that jazz. he bought a book solely because it was published in 1896. he's so like me sometimes i have to look twice, yo. except for the pot and all that. :D he's just sowing his seeds late.

in the news: ken jennings has finally lost. jepardy will be so much more interesting.

also in the news: they're making a new law & order. wonder if it's as good as the others. i'm addicted to l&o.

adrian called to find out about my bakery. actually, he wanted to know how to order the puerto rican bread that i used to get (phonetically it's pan-so-bau, but i have no idea what it really is) without getting laughed out of the bakery. we'll see how it goes. i need to take a trip down there.

i think after the first of the year christen and i are going to try camping around the keys. i don't want to try the mountains in january, but i'll go closer to the border. maybe i can check out all the hemingway shit. there was a little restaurant in clearwater called the rum cay grill that christen and i used to go to, and we called it the hemingway house. it was very neat. they razed it. we were usually the only ones there, so we would get grouper sandwiches and red beans and rice and play rummy for two hours before i had class. good times.

off to urbz now. and law & order.

the quickie (you know you like them)

I didn’t get up in time to blog as I wanted to this morning. I was going to do it anyhow, but I would have been mad late (I was 10 minutes late to begin with). And then I tried to log on but blogger was down. A sign from the heavens, right? So msword will be my friend now and take notes. Take notes, will you? Anyhow, that’s why I’m actually capitalizing some things. Dern msword.
I had a dream last night that a few of my blog pals had come to florida for Christmas and I bought them scrapbooks. Don’t ask me why. For some of the time we were all camping in the north Carolina forests – but in florida. The funny thing is, I don’t think I saw real people. I think I just saw the words “moocow” and “shipwrecked” floating in the air and knew it was them. Odd … I know I’m odd.

excuse me, mr. bandwagon driver. i'd like to get off here.

no masturbation references. well, okay. you can reference. heck, you can even wank off, if you wish.

i wonder what i could get charged with for walking through the mall parking lot yanking off all those damn ribbons. would it be destruction of personal property? vandalism? would it be worth it? i think so.

ahhH! adding to christmas list: the dvd of empire records. i'm watching it on the hdtv station and there's parts i haven't seen. wow! like major differences! is there a rated r and a pg-13 version? i have the vhs, which i've worn way thin (and it'll go to my sister when i get the dvd because she is crazy about anything i'm fanatical about -- she's seen newsies almost as many times as i). aj and lucas are so hot. i'd even go for hawt. or hott. how many ways are there to spell it now? this is crazy cool, there being a different version than i'm used to. maybe i won't wait for christmas. do i ever wait for christmas?

an update before urbz.

the funny thing is, i have so much to say and no drive to blog. so i've made a list of what to write about that happened in the last week, since i know you've missed me terribly. and i've missed you.
1) my grandmother's in love. my dad actually started the conversation "we've lost your grandmother." she went on a cruise to hawaii and met some guy who lives in texas. they came back and moved into her place. then they started travelling the country. arkansas, south carolina, north carolina, texas ... they're supposed to be back soon, but no one can get ahold of either of them. my uncle just ends up with rushed messages on his answering machine.
2) dad lost $3000 in vegas. he went because he won the local billards competition and the finals we in vegas. he took $800, won $500 there before getting knocked out of the competition and spent the rest of the week playing blackjack. he got up to three grand and blew it all in the last day.
3) thanksgiving was fun. we spent it like usual, going to christen's dad's family house first for lunch turkey. this year they got most of it from publix. i missed my stuffing. i wanted to bring stuffing but they said they had enough and it ws that nasty stovetop shit. for the dinner meal we went to steak and ale with his mother's family. it was good, but not thanksgiving, really. i had a steak because i couldn't see ordering turkey from a restaurant. i did, however, have a sweet potato if that makes any difference. christen and i plan on having our leftover steaks tonight, but we're going to stuff them with feta cheese and re-grill them. yummy yummy.
4) black friday madness was, well, mad. but it wasn't really that bad except that the day didn't go by nearly as fast as one would have expected. our district was no. 1 in the company in sales. i need a new job.
5) ethan got his tattoo on friday night; i went with him. he got tux the linux penguin on his arm. yeah, all my friends are geeks. isn't it fun that way?
6) my sister is spending christmas eve with me. mom doesn't want glenn (ex-stepfather) threatening to keep christmas unless he can see jamie, so she's coming over here and spending the night. that's cool, though. we can do last minute shopping and wrapping together.
7) it doesn't feel like christmas yet. we've had intermittent days of cold weather, but it's not cold enough to wear my scarfs (though i did to dinner friday night) and very few people are playing christmas music in stores. everytime i try to play it at work i'm bombarded with death threats.
8) i went to the just books sidewalk sale and bought 16 books. yay, books. i even bought some interesting non-fiction books just because. like blossom of bone -- reclaiming the connections between homoeroticism and the sacred. sound interesting? i told my boss about it and he just kinda looked at me odd. it's alright; i'm used to that. i saw another book there called look homeward erotica, but i didn't buy it. i showed restaint. but after i bought all those books, i went to target and bought something guaranteed to prevent me from reading all my new books and even from blogging. i bought urbz- sims in the city for gba. yay! i've been playing it all weekend. i got very mad because i got pretty far into it and the damn game started freezing. everytime i tried to buy something from the thrift store it would freeze. so i took it back to the local target (i bought it from the supertarget) and they charged me 26 cents because of the tax difference. pain in the ass.
9) high score last night: 157. all scores: 137, 157, 136, 127, 151, 142. they say i'm getting more consistant, but at least i had some better scores on the board so it makes me feel like i may actually be getting better too. that game i got a 151, though, kyle got a freaking 206. so that sucks.
anyhow, i think that covers it. so if i'm not around, you know what i'm doing. work is calling (or will be if i wait any longer to get ready, because i'll be mad late, yo.)

pants a'fire

blogger lies. it says i have 44 posts but this is no. 60. huzzah, no. 60! 60 is incidentally the amount of geocaches i have to my name. -- and they say it's all about the numbers. i ain't no number 'ho.

anywho. the editor-in-chief at my old newspaper was forced to resign because of plagarism. i'm so glad i'm not there anymore. i loved it dearly while i was there, but i think it way downhill directly after my class left. i feel bad; i know there's great people still there, i just hope that they can get it all together and put together a good paper again. i know they can. he wasn't the eic while i was there; he started in the fall but he was news editor while i was there. maybe he was too young and the pressure got to be too much. dunno. enough of that.

the car my mom is getting is still there. she freaked out because when i went by to check it out it was gone and she was scared it got sold. she's getting a purple nissan sillouette. she's already bought new bumper stickers. "my karma ran over your dogma" "do not meddle in the affairs of dragons for you are crunchy and taste good with katsup" "i'm only supposed to use my powers only for good" (or something like that) and another one but i don't remember what it was. why, oh why does she have to junk up her new car? it was well taken care of before her. oh well, it's not my car. she says it's really only to keep the JWs away from her front door, but people stand on her corner and pray. maybe that's why she keeps such big dogs.

i have a new favorite quote:

"I don't know yet what I am capable of doing, but, by God, i have genius -- I know it too well to blush behind it." --Thomas Wolfe

odd; is my head supposed to throb in time to mr. roboto?

high score last night: 139.

all scores: (saturday with the kids, 116,118) sunday 128, 139, 99, 125, 109, 117.

why am i not getting any better? is it truly because i don't have my own ball, or should i take lessons, or is it possible that i just have already hit my high score (156) and am destined never to bowl better than that? i need to know if it's a lost cause, so i can drown my sorrows in sweet tea. last night i had two bailey's before we left for dinner and i had most of a guinness at applebee's. mostly because i don't like applebee's. and they didn't have yuengling. i had chicken alfredo that had no taste.

was sick at work today. not like barfing in the dumpster sort of sick (although if the store had smelled like that nasty squid stuff from the asian market next door it would have been a possibility). the sickness was more of a severe allergy problem that made my head all cloudy and icky, and when that dried up a little my throat and ear started hurting. i stayed for 5 1/2 hours of my 8 hour shift. afterward i stopped by mr. jacoby's bookstore to see if he had any of the books that luke recommended. this time i came with a list. he couldn't find any except the orchid thief (which i bought for $6 almost new), but i am to call his wife tomorrow and she'll check the warehouse. and he invited me to an invite-only saturday morning sale, where about 2,000 books will be sold for a buck a piece. ahh, the most beautiful part of a rummage sale. the cheap books. christen will kill me; he'll also be there with me if i don't let him sleep while i hoard.

i also bought look homeward, angel, which i've been itching to read ever since asheville. i always forget to look for a copy when i'm at a bookstore, and just books is so deliciously well-organized. he thoughtfully reminded me of my wish to buy him out when he retired and i also thoughtfully reminded him of my lack of funds with which to purchase said bookstore.

my book of the day was tender at the bone, by ruth reichl. it was a wonderful book, easily the most satisfying read in awhile. it's a memoir by a food critic who decided she could learn who people are and what they mean to her by what they eat and where they like to eat it. me: seasoned but not spicy, and eclectic. that's me, through and through. give me bread and something to dip it in and i'm happy.

it's 7:39pm -- do you know where your serial killer is?

i decided on a glass of baileys before tonight's festivities. i always want to drink when my mom cries when i leave. and since i saw her, she cried when i left. i might feel bad, or honored, or something like that except that she's not crying about my leaving; she's crying because there's yet another thing wrong in her life and nobody will listen to her.

i feel bad; really, i do. but i've been taking care of her all my life. i lend her money; i give her a cell phone that i pay for (and i replace it every time she breaks it); i take the kids for weekends so that she has some time to herself. i'm half her age and i feel like her mother all the time. sometimes it breaks me. it broke me. i'm having another drink.

also breaking me is that i gave in and am closing saturday. i really don't want to, but i feel bad because jess worked for me today. so i'm closing saturday. drop in and say hi!

i hope that lady calls me about that other job.

so my mom's car is dead. it broke down a few weeks ago and she's been having trouble finding someone to fix it. newest diagnosis: she siezed the engine. goodbye shitty van. hello shitty car with which she has to replace shitty van.

everytime my brother seems normal to me, he goes and fucks it up and makes me realize he's never going to get better. his best friend gave him a piece of paper on which to write a recommendation for him for geography. my brother is 14. this other kid (also has asberger's) is 13 but two grades behind because of his illness. on said piece of paper, he wrote the following:

marky is good at losing to other people.

marky is good at being fat.

marky is good at making other people feel smart.

marky's mom pounded on the door at 10:30 at night waking my mom up about this, and they woke ian up to yell at him about this, and took him over to marky's to apologize. now this is the way ian has always been, but i never thought he'd hurt someone about it. i'm really just dumbfounded. and i know he's got a disorder and that he'll never be exactly normal. but he knows right from wrong. most of the time.

no title.

also, i watched requiem for a dream tonight. it was ... interesting. i'll bring it back for you soon, ivan. it's only been, what, a month? two?

nothing like making stew with a $20 porterhouse.

christen's dad gave us a couple porterhouse steaks last sunday but we forgot them in the truck so they thawed out and they couldn't be refrozen. so we put them in the fridge to cook this week, but he's been closing every night and we couldn't cook them. so thursday night we grilled one of them, and since the steaks were really on their last legs (or whatever cut it was) i cut up the other steak and made a damn good stew with it. but i still made tuna for dinner (yeah, i was still a little hungry after the fudgecicle ... dern protein).

wednesday's book was romeo by elise title. a paperback-sort of book, but it's very well done in the whole psycho-sexual thriller way. it actually scared the crap out of me. i was up most of the night (though it may be because christen was up until almost 5 playing gta). i didn't fall asleep until after 5 and i was up at 6:30 for work. ick. now you know why i haven't been particularly prolific lately.

there's this singer named richard cheese who sings really great '50s big band versions of songs. look him up. i'm listening to beck's loser as sung big band-y. also sung by him: baby got back. you really must hear this.

speaking of seeing/hearing ... check this link out. and turn up the volume for maximum effect. really. you'll thank me. it's quite amazing.

i've got my brother and sister for the weekend. i pick them up tomorrow and we've got the whole weekend together. he's 14 and she's 12. it will be a weekend of geocaching, bowling, mini golf, go carts, and movies and gorging. ahh, children. can't wait to have one of my own someday. and then i will again spoil them and hand them off to my mother.

oh my darling clementine ...

you should be singing huckleberry hound-style here. i bought a box of clementines yesterday (clarification -- i dropped them in the cart; christen technically bought them) and my-oh-my are they tasty. are they? yum. i ate two and a fudgecicle for dinner. hehe. i love being on my own sometimes. no one to tell me how to eat.
christen is going to a bachelor party tonight. a friend of his knocked up his girlfriend and they're getting married next friday. i told him no lap dances. (ivan cover your ears ... i mean eyes) no one is allowed to get that close to his dick -- hands off. so no lap dances. but i don't think i have too much of a problem with his going to some cheesy strip club. i don't think i do, anyhow. as long as he doesn't crawl into bed tonight smelling like sex.

you know the song "you're so vain" ... you're so vain, you probably think this song is about you ... i was listening to it yesterday on 107.3 and i kept thinking -- you know, this is just like when those stupid chicks tell guys "if you don't know why i'm mad at you, i'm not telling you. you should know." and so the song started to annoy me. and i love that song. arg. if you think the song is about you, you're not likely to admit it because that would mean you're that vain, and if you don't think it's about you, well it's probably not. what ever happened to the chicks that just outright says "you're a vain sonuvabitch" and throws a drink in his face? friggin' mind games, i tell you.

luke, thanks for recommending eats, shoots and leaves. that's a great freaking book. what's amusing is that my ex-roommate (the one who i gave my job when i left the paper) recommended it when jordan and i went over to his new place a few months ago but never said what it was about. also, christen told me the joke on the back of the book (though he botched it considerably) and said he got it off a book we carried at work, but i never made the connection. i've been reading it at work now, and it's made it to my christmas list. i don't care that i'll already have finished it by then; i want my very own copy.

i had more to say but i spent the last hour arguing with a friend about the benefits of grammar, so now i'm dry. more later.

god loves sushi rice.

as do i, of course. i bought a 5lb bag from that asian market on saturday so i made some today. yay, it was yummy and sticky, just like tasty take-out chinese rice.

i read michael connelly's lost light today. it was not bad, in a hard-boiled sort of way. it perpetrated stereotypes and had a lot of cliches, but after the last two it wasn't too bad. anyone have good book ideas for me? my favorite authors are pat conroy, nick hornby, alice sebold, frank norris and later dean koontz (the ones without aliens). i need new reading material.

oh, and in the name of christmas and giving and all that, i've started a christmas list blog so you know what to get me. i've linked it right below my resume, because it's probably best for me to get a job before a tom lehrer box set.

dead puppies, poisoned pigeons and me.

dead puppies aren't much fun.
they don't come when you call,
they don't chase squirrels at all ...

if it were spring i'd be singing:
All the world seems in tune
On a spring afternoon,
When we're poisoning pigeons in the park.
Every Sunday you'll see
My sweetheart and me,
As we poison the pigeons in the park.

but for now i guess it's just:
Take your cigarette from its holder,
And burn your initials in my shoulder.
Fracture my spine,
And swear that you're mine,
As we dance to the Masochism Tango.


as you see, i've got it bad for tom lehrer (the first one isn't him but it's on dr. demento's 20th anniversary, which is the best one except for when they had TMBG on the 25h anniversary edition)
one of these days i'll actually get some of the tom lehrer albums, which are so great. he's so great. you hear that tom? you're fabulous, dahling.

we are the knights who say ni!

A 19-year old virgin, you live in the Castle
Anthrax. You use your wiles to lure in
strangers...tie them to big soft beds and....

a few immature posts ... what? did you think i'd post otherwise?

You Are a Snarky Blogger!

You've got a razor sharp wit that bloggers are secretly scared of. And that's why they read your posts as often as they can!

What kind of blogger are you?

Your Boobies' Names Are: Twin Peaks

Get your own Boobie Names

Your Girl Parts Are Named: Twat Waffle

Get your own Sex Name

It's Not Sex. It's ... : Sinking the Titanic

Get your own Sex Name

my resume, if you please.

i gave up the ghost on my NaNoWriMo blog, considering it's the 3rd week and i haven't actually begun to write. yet. so instead i posted my resume. it's down there under the heading "my resume." i know, i know. it should be under the "genius" heading, but i needed to separate myself from the crowd, so i went inconspicuous.

betting the nuts.

not such a great night at the bowling alley last night. high score: 134.

all scores: 108, 109, 102, 111, 122, 134, 121, 85.

the boys won. glad i didn't bet the nuts on it.

i think i'm going to go tomorrow after work at do some bowling on my own. i don't know why i just can't stay consistent any more. :(

i'm learning how to quilt now. a lady who's friends with one of my customers is teaching me, and i'm excited. now i can finish my gram's quilt from the '20s. i've been carrying it around from apt. to apt. since she died 6 years ago (that's 7 apts) and now i may actually be able to finish it. well, not now, but maybe another 6 years from now.

so popular writers not to ever read: fern michaels, james patterson. more to come, i'm sure. i read a james patterson novel two days ago (violets are blue) and it was so bad, i just don't understand how he gets published. or on any bestsellers lists. geez! people, get a clue! yesterday i read night spider by john lutz. it wasn't entirely bad -- there were some good things about it, but there was an inconsistency with the names early on -- he uses the name anne when he meant to use a different name. the editors should have picked up on that.

tonight is a different book; i'll let you know how it is. unless i just watch law & order all night, which is a distinct possibility. i was going to watch requiem for a dream but christen still has the ps2 set up for gta and i don't know how to switch back over to the dvd player. i hate watching dvds on the ps2 because i can't control it the same way. stupid game.

a day without chocolate is a day wasted.

that's what my dove dark chocolate promise said, anyhow. doesn't your chocolate talk to you? for shame.

i spent two hours at the mall today in a not-so-horrible shopping trip to find some new black pants. i didn't find any at ny & co., although i tried on every kind they had (seven different styles) but i bought a couple of really great striped button-downs, and i found some black pinstripe pants at old navy and a nice striped button-down there too. so i spent far too much money, but i've been doing really good, and if i do get this job i'll need clothes for work (no uniform, huzzah!) . i really hate shopping, so i was amazed it went so well. i have an interview with that lady at 9am on thursday and i need to be ready and lookin' good wouldn't hurt. i picked up crab rangoon and white rice for dinner and now i'm trying to do research for a couple of articles i'm trying to write for today's cacher. i hope they work out alright. more later, bored now.

nebraska ave. is the only place for whores.

they want to change the name of nebraska ave. to ray charles blvd. (hey, i'm down here on the corner of ray charles and dr. martin luther king) because nebraska has been synonomous with drugs and prostitution. i say no! how else will we know how to find the heroin and pussy?

in other news...

high score: 148.

all scores: 145, 113, 103, 122, 148. it was wave, trough, wave.

i finished one door away from heaven. i feel cheated. i read an entire science-fiction novel without realizing it was one until most of the way through. and then, of course i was going to finish it; i just felt it was unjustly put in the horror section. it was way too removed from reality. i know that koontz often has wisps of supernatural in his books; indeed, often it is the central theme. but those books are also much better than this one -- better spun. and i read all 681 pages.

i met with that woman about finishing my quilt. it would cost about $400 to finish it, so instead she's going to teach me how to quilt so i can finish gram's quilt myself. it will be beautiful (at least, from afar) and i'll post pictures in 10 years when i finish. i'm scared to death to touch it with a needle, afraid i'll mess it up royally. i've pretty much mastered all other sewing (well, i can't follow patterns but i do well enough without them) but i'm scared of touching my gram's quilt.

i got an email today from someone offering me a job. i emailed her back (yes!!!!) but really i think my reply was rather stilted. since the job pertains to proofreading, i read over the email i sent several times to be sure everything was capitalized correctly and was elequent and spelled correctly and i accidentally left out my personality. i hope that doesn't make a difference; my winning personality would definitely shine through in interview if i could get past the um's (you know, the um, yeah i know i could, uh, do whatever is needed, um, of me). and BTW, she mispelled it's (the email said its temp-to-perm instead of it's). i wonder if i pointed that out if i'd get the job?

dinner: tuna fish sandwich and sweet tea. yum. christen doesn't like tuna, so i chose tonight to make myself some since he's working and doesn't have to endure the smell (i lit candles for the dolphins).

how about that?

Outgoing (E) 69.44% Withdrawn (I) 30.56% Imaginative (N) 66.67% Realistic (S) 33.33% Emotional (F) 60% Intellectual (T) 40% Improvised (P) 51.35% Organized (J) 48.65% Your type is: ENFP You are an Inspirer, possible professions include - conference planner, speech pathologist, HR development trainer, ombudsman, clergy, journalist, newscaster, career counselor, housing director, character actor, marketing consultant, musician/composer, artist, information-graphics designer, human resource manager, merchandise planner, advertising account manager, dietitian/nutritionist, speech pathologist, massage therapist, editor/art director.

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over the meadow and through the woods...

i'm off to mom's house today. i would have already left, but i made an appointment of sorts in town here at around 9:30, and while most people would be thrilled to get appointments over with, i don't know if the appointees would appreciate me knocking on their door at 8:30 this morning. i'll wait till almost 9:30, i think.

so my appointment is with this lady who might finish my gram's quilt for me. since my gram died nearly 5 years ago i've been carrying around this unfinished quilt from home to home (i've moved ... 6 times since then) and i would really like to get it finished (i'd really like to finish it myself, actually, but i'm scared to near it with a needle). it's nearly 8 feet squared and really nice -- i've gotten in approximately dated to the 30s. but there's this guy who always comes into work and ships singer sewing machines and he told me he sells them mostly to quilters, so i asked him where i could get this finished and he called his wife and put her on the phone and her friend is in town for a few months (snowbird, i guess) and could do it. so i told them i'd drop it off on my way out of town so she could get a look at it. i'm so excited!

i bid on a new phone for my mom. she broke the last one, so she's completely without a phone except ian's that his dad pays for. so i bid on one for $40. hopefully i get it because she's been without a phone for awhile and i can't afford one of those really expensive ones. it's only at $26 right now and there's 2 hours to go, so we'll see when i get home if i won it or not. it's a LG-VX510 (i think) -- the little black flip one that they have -- it's actually the same one she just killed, so i know she'll like it. she's been through 3 phones since i gave her the phone and started paying her service, which was 1 1/2 years ago or so.

i think i'll take my sister geocaching today. she always asks if we can go and i stopped leaving the stuff in my car, so this time i'll throw it in there. also i'll take my bowling shoes in case she wants to go bowling. since she's growing up, i've become so much closer to my sister than my brother. when he was young we were inseparable and she was the outcast because she was a baby and was very needy. plus i couldn't tow her on my bike. i could take him anywhere, and i did, but i tried to tow her once and she stuck her foot in the spokes and almost broke her leg -- quite literally. we were all crying, and that was the last time that ever happened.

but now she's 12, which makes ian 14 and he's hopeless right now. if i'm not an animated video game, he's not interested (and no, i'm not a video game). but she always wants to hang out with me and know about my interests and spend the night -- like we're friends, and it's very cool. i wish they lived closer (but christen doesn't because then they'd always be over.) i'm only 24, so the gap seems to be getting closer as she ages. she looks up to me and i can ask her questions to make sure she's not fucking up her life, and what to watch out for so no one takes advantage of her like they did me. and she knows what happened to me when i was her age, so she's better off. my stepfather is her "father", but she's adopted so that doesn't have to stop anything in his mind. and she's damn cute.

it was my first real 6-string...

bought it at the five and dime. played it till my fingers bled. was the summer of '69.

i made creamy chicken pasta for breakfast. maybe i'll have a toaster strudel for lunch. you know, for balance.

i had a really wierd dream last night, but i don't remember all of it. -- there were children (mine) with downs syndrome, and lots of shooting near my old high school and some sex (not with the children -- what are you, some kind of perv?) and ... i just can't remember it, but it was really wierd in a kind of good way. maybe it's because i went to bed when christen was still playing gta san andreas. i tried to play but i can't drive the dern car. i get stuck in a back alley when i'm trying to take a whore to her john and lose the pimping mission trying to pull back out.

i wasted two hours of my life last night reading a fern michaels book. never read a fern michaels book. it was one of the ones that melissa gave me and i thought "well, i've never read a fern michaels books so what the hey." no. bad idea. it had so many errors and was so confusing without having a knowledgeable plot to begin with ... ack! i can't believe i read the whole thing. yes i can, because unless i lose a book, i will finish it one way or another. and it only took 2 hours; it's not like the book was hard to read or 800 pages or anything. no worse than sitting through dogville. that was 3 hours of my life.

i feel it necessary to justify my lack of caps. jordan criticized me last week saying that my grammer was terrible (how dare he?) because i don't capitalize anything. well, maybe i don't feel that any one word is more important that any other word. i am no more important than you or bob or scuba. so there. or maybe i'm just lazy and am used to ms word capping everything that should be.

in my father's house (cue christian music)

my parents split when i was 5. i don't remember much of before i was 5 except a few hefty duty fights, and i do remember my room. i remember our oscar fish (look it up, it's a damn ugly fish) committing suicide by jumping out of its tank in the living room and flopping into the kitchen and dying on the linoleum before we got home. he had done this before but we had been able to rescue him before death. i remember my mom telling me when there wasn't a santa claus because we were poor and she didn't want me to think that when i didn't get the appropriate amount of gifts that i would think i had been bad (although there was that little bag of coal in my stocking every year. ... some jokes never wear thin.) i remember learning to ride a bike without training wheels (they put me on a 10-speed and pushed me down a hill) and i remember my dad leaving on my birthday and taking the coffee table so we had my cake on a cardboard box.

but after the split i only remember certain things about being at my dad's house. they are all good memories and i relive them sometimes.

-- wrestling. i hate wrestling, but when i was over, dad and i would watch it and mimic their moves in the living room. they wrestled, we wrestled. i think i won a few more times than necessary, and i think my dad body slammed me more than neccessary (but it was great fun).

--swanson's chicken and dumplings. dad couldn't cook, really, so everytime i went to his house and stayed for lunch or dinner he brought out the can of swanson's. i haven't had this as an adult so i don't know if it's any good, but it was dern tasty at dad's house. if i was there for breakfast we had ...

--eggs over easy and limp bacon. he liked the meat part of the bacon cooked and the fat limp and uncooked. i can't eat it that way now, but it was good there.

--denorex shampoo. in college i started getting anxiety attacks that started with a bad case of ecsema (sp? anyone?) and would scratch my scalp raw and even a little sticky. so i got some denorex and i was seriously transported back to childhood. my dad used denorex almost exclusively, and when i spent the night i would have to use that smelly dark brown shampoo too. good times.

atari-- dad had one of the ones that had a white ball you rolled around instead of a regular controller, and we'd play pong and snake for hours and hours and hours and hours ... well, you get the drift.

--wide brimmed straw hats and cheap plastic sunglasses. my dad is a surveyor for the city, so he wears these ugly straw hats and sunglasses. when i was little he'd always leave them on the passenger seat and i'd invariably sit on one or the other, ruining it. there's a guy who comes in to OD regularly who wears the same straw hat and the same uniform (white polo shirt with the city seal and khakis) and i get a little homesick everytime i see him. the first time i gushed at great length about how he looked like my dad, but he really doesn't. he just walks the same and wears the same clothes.

--buttered noodles. this one is from before the divorce, but i attach it to my dad so i'm including it too. dad was on a bowling league when i was real small, and every thursday night we would go there while he bowled and then we'd have dinner at the little restaraunt there. i was a picky little shit and i wouldn't eat anything on the menu so the cook took pity on me and would make me buttered egg noodles for dinner. i completely forgot about this until college when i picked up a bag of no-egg egg noodles for beef stroganoff and had a bowl of buttered noodles and freaked out when i remembered. for a week after i ate nothing but egg noodles for dinner.

i think that's all the memories i have of my dad in connection with my childhood. i've used many of those memories in poems and short stories ... so they're copywrited. hehe. i began an actual relationship with him in '96 when everything came out about my stepfather's sexual abuse.

trailers for sale or rent...

...rooms to let, fifty cents.
i listened to the swingers soundtrack on the way to work today for a change of pace. most of the album is so good, and then you get stuck with "she thinks i still care" or something like that. oi. but it had "king of the road" on it (not really a great driving song, i kinda need something faster) and "you're nobody till somebody loves you." ahh, great stuff. i love tooling around in my little car with the ultra black tint and the nifty rims and 50s music blaring out of the car. gives people a nice reality check.
i talked to jesus about how he had to change his bank account because someone got his numbers when he ordered checks last month. now i'm worried -- i'm glad i didn't uncheck the box for fraud protection that cost $1 per box of checks. i don't know what they'd do, but i'm happy for protection. that's why i'm on the pill, after all. (oh, and jesus is pronounced hay-zeus, you heathens. but it's really funny at work when he puts something on hold and the packaging says "hold for jesus. will purchase friday." i always get a giggle.
went to the mall to buy pants with christen and i kept trying to fall asleep on his shoulder. i think this time change is effecting me pretty bad. the biorhythms are off and everything. i always wake up at 9 at the latest now (before it was 10:30 unless i was sick) but i'm tired by 7pm. hope my body catches up to the earth one of these days before march when it goes forward again.

which describes how you're feeling all the time ...

i wonder if i write in single lines if it'll fill up faster.

if you can read it easier.

but then it looks kinda wierd.

of course, there are fifty-one characters per line.

so if i filled most of the fifty-characters ...

yeah, it could work.

okay, that was an exercise in futility. i had to go to the bank today and spend $1.50 on 8 checks so i could pay my bills this month. i forgot to order checks. okay, so i didn't forget. i haven't had to order checks in 2 1/2 years, so i didn't realize when i went to pay my bills that i didn't have checks to pay them with. today i ordered these adorable froggie checks -- fernando in the blue convertible did it for me. i tried to have a fudgecicle (is that how you spell it? looks kinda wierd) for dinner because christen decided to eat without me and we didn't have any bread for pb&j but it made me feel icky so i had ramen too. now i just feel all over icky. and there's nothing good on tv. law & order, where are you when i need you?

i started another book last night. it's alright though, because i finished it today. cold heart, by ... oh heck, some hard-boiled writer. it was actually pretty good, in the murder she wrote sort of way. i don't know where i put one door away from heaven so i figured i'd pick something else for the night. i got really into it and was reading today at work (those drawers under the till have to be good for something) and finished when i got home. sometimes i love easy-peasy reading sometimes.

i need some sleep, i think. dern 7am worktimes.

more tomorrow.