29 and not-so-holding

31 and holding - Birthday #1

2009-01-27T13:00:00.000-08:00

Last weekend was birthday weekend for me, so I thought I'd share a few of the things we did.
First off was Friday night bingo and bowling. Seriously.

I had no idea that people still regularly played bingo. Our group of 12 got there late, dressed like freshmen in college (yes, that was the costume code), and struggled to find a seat quietly while trying to catch up on all the numbers we'd already missed on the first card.

Bingo lesson #1: You have to bring your own bingo marker. They charge $1.50 for them at the hall.

From 31st Birthday

Bingo Lesson #2: You apparently don't just have to get "bingo" anymore. For the first game, when we had no idea what was going on, RL got an actual bingo right away, and ran up to the front to show the lady calling the numbers. No bingo, you have to make the letter "P" on your card. The next one was a musical note or something. Confusing.

From 31st Birthday

Bingo Lesson #3: They kept saying something about a "pickle bar" and everyone in our group thought that meant there were actual pickles for sale. Pickles are actually like scratch tickets that you can buy for a dollar. Weird.

Bingo Lesson #4: You have to be very, very quiet. We actually got shushed once, even though I was very proud of my friends for keeping it to loud whispers. Apparently the two times the woman calls it, the video of the ball coming up, and the two boards that flash the number are not enough for the bingoers. Must have total silence.

From 31st Birthday

Bingo Lesson #5: The only people that win are the ones that have like a gazillion boards in front of them. We only had one board. None of us won. Not even Q, who had a lot.

From 31st Birthday

By the end, we were all ready to go (my friend Tim even said something like, "I think I'm dying a slow death" in the middle of a game). Off to the bowling alley next door! We magically got three lanes together, I was not the worst bowler, and there were cupcakes. Awesome.

From 31st Birthday

Cold conversations

2009-01-11T09:56:00.000-08:00

So somehow in the last few days I managed to get a cold. Yesterday I spent the majority of the day sitting on the couch, watching movies, and using more Kleenexes than I have used in all previous life colds combined. I filled up buckets of sopping wet tissues (seriously). RL just looked at me with feigned sympathy and said:
I wonder if you took all the snot you got rid of today and put it in a pool if you'd be able to swim in it.
Me: Ew. Probably not. Maybe Little could swim in it. I can imagine her doing the backstroke.
RL: Really? I imagine her as more of a front stroker.
Me: Meow! Stroke. Meow! Stroke.
(If only she knew the entertainment we got from imagining her doing ridiculous human things. Like swimming in snot.)

Later RL was playing with my belly button and was threatening to tickle me when I said:
Listen! I'm very vulnerable right now!
RL: Hmm, interesting.
Me: Watch it mister. One fierce blow and you'll have snot all over you.
That seems to have discouraged him for awhile.

I woke up this morning and could miraculously breathe through my nose. I wasn't sure I was going to sleep at all since the snot faucet just would not turn off, but somewhere in the middle of the night it slowed to a drip. (I think it was the swig of Nyquil at 3am, followed by the Kleenex I stuffed in the worse nostril, just to make sure I didn't drip all over the pillowcase.) RL had already been awake for awhile when I woke up, and told me that he had been listening intently to my breathing to see if it was actually my nose I was breathing out of. What a sweetheart.

So I've taken pretty much every cold drug under the sun, including this homeopathic thing called Oscillococcinum, which, I found out, is made from dilution of dissolved Barbary duck livers and hearts. Apparently they only need one duck to make enough to serve the world for a year, but don't you think they should tell you that this is not a vegetarian product?!?

Anyway, the nice people at Pharmaca said it was the best thing for colds and flus, and I'd only need to take it for two days to start feeling better and meanwhile I could take all the other western cold remedies I wanted (because this "works on a whole other level" the lady told me). So I figured that the duck was going to die anyway to cure other people's flus, and I had already taken half of it by the time I figured out it was animals, so I might as well finish it. I am a bad vegetarian.

But thank goodness for Kleenex with lotion. I mean, seriously.

Three Engagement Stories

2008-12-16T09:59:00.000-08:00

So, a few weekends ago we went on a hut trip up to Francie's Cabin outside of Breckenridge. It was amazing for lots of reasons (great snow, perfect weather, sauna, good friends, etc.), but the best reason was that our friends J and L got engaged! They've been together more than six years and we all knew it was going to happen very soon, but no one on the trip (except J) knew we'd all get to be a part of it. He even hid some champagne in his bags (could be why the trip up there was arduous, and well, heavy) to celebrate afterwards. Congrats.

Our other friend D and K also got engaged last week. Again, we knew it was going to happen soon, but K was uber surprised when he finally did it. Congrats to them too. Way to go boys!

The last story came from a Nuggets game we went to the other night. It was half time, and they were doing the whole "kiss cam" thing where they focus the camera on a couple (or just two people randomly sitting together) and the crowd cheers for them to kiss. We were delighted to see two couples who had on the ugliest Christmas sweaters possible, but that was nothing compared to the last one...

When the camera focused on this last couple, the man immediately got down on one knee. His proposal flashed on the jumbotron. She stood up, covering her shocked face with her hands. A few uncomfortable moments passed, he's still kneeling, and she's just not responding. Rocky the mascot and a couple cheerleaders are standing there, waiting. The whole stadium is hushed, trying to figure out what she's thinking.

To make matters worse, this woman had on the lowest cut blouse possible, and everytime she moved it looked like her boobs were about to spill right out of her shirt. Now everyone is staring. Trainwreck! Even the players on the court had stopped what they were doing to watch. She just kept shaking her head and saying "I don't know." I'm sure the guy, and everyone else, was really hoping she would just say yes and then discuss later, because after all, he put a lot of effort and money into this.

Finally, she mumbles yes and hugs him. From what I could see she was the young fake-blondini and he was the older (probably rich) man. Match made in heaven? Possibly. I'd like to know how it all turned out.

Note to men: A basketball game is probably not on the top of your lady's list of places she'd like to be proposed to.

Everything comes with Green Chiles in Taos

2008-11-10T15:05:00.000-08:00

We just went to Taos this weekend to commemorate eight whole months since RL's incident with the rock. The main point was for RL to talk to the ski patrol who untangled him from said rock and tell them about brain injuries and to reassure them that he was doing quite well thanks to them.

We stayed with two different sets of friends, both of whom have built amazing houses down rutted out dirt roads. These people know how to build a house...it's all about captured rain water and solar maximization and wood-burning stoves and they're just so fricking cozy that you don't care that you're in the middle of nowhere (spoken by a true city girl).

We first stayed with AO and Jenny (AO's on the ski patrol), and they made us amazing chile rellenos before we tucked into our comfy bed for the night; next up was Dan* and Liza, who made delicious fajitas (actually, both the men cooked, which I made a point of mentioning to RL). Great hospitality, these folks (AO even made us freshly baked cookies and tea for our ride home on Sunday).

Aside from the welcome, the thing about Taos is that it's enchanted. Right next to town is the oldest continually inhabited community in North America (Taos Pueblo), and I'm pretty sure there's something to be said for that. One of the weird enchanty things is the Taos Hum, which I read about last time we went down there. It's supposedly a low, vibrating noise that only like 2% of the population can hear. Liza said she hears it all the time (they call her a "hearer"); Dan said it's gotta be one of the mining operations in the valley; AO was insistent that people who hear it are just tripping. All of them got really revved up when I mentioned it, though! The speculation abounds, and still no one knows what it is.

The other enchanted story we heard was about a piece of pottery that was found in the Taos Ski Valley (actually, on Kachina Peak, where RL's rock is). It was apparently put there years ago by the Taos Puebloans as an appeasement to the gods of snow. When it was found in 1996, the owner of TSV took it and placed it into his private collection. That year was the worst snow year on record for years, and the drought continued until 2003 or so, when the owner finally decided enough was enough. The owner took the pot, along with some Puebloan elders, back to its rightful place, and voila: snow that year. I'm sure local legend goes a long way in encouraging these stories, but I really like the idea that history is present in Taos (what do we know about the people that lived in our community hundreds of years ago?)

Anyway, another important part of the weekend was a hike up to Kachina to pay our respects to the rock that took a little piece of RL's brain. We were totally unprepared for there to be snow already, so it's a good thing AO lent us some poles and pants for our trek. Our first stop was at Honey's Huck, which we've so named because it's the biggest rock I've ever skiied off of. We took lots of pictures and marveled at its grandeur (and later I casually mentioned to AO that they might want to name it after me).

After Honey's Huck, and a lot more hiking, we got to the bottom of Kachina. It's impossible to see in pictures how steep this thing is, and I was a little hesitant when RL suggested traversing across the steepness that was covered in snow. After some falling and cursing, we finally made it to the bottom of his rock. He went on by himself, chisel in hand, to give the rock the old what-for (as I said, that rock's had eight months to think about what it did). It was good closure for him, I think, and AO said the ski patrol is going to name it after him (suggestions?).

After our hike we went and checked out the Rio Grande Gorge Bridge, which spans the 650-foot drop into the tiny Rio Grande below. What's shocking is how long this river has been flowing to have created such a ravine (similar to the Colorado, I guess). As a side note, the gorge bridge, which still features graffiti from the 1970s, was awarded some Best Steel Construction award in 1966. That's it's claim to fame. We're hoping that even though they haven't cleaned up graffiti in 30 years, they've done some other preventative maintenance).

Taos is cool, and it helps if you've got locals to hang out with. We went to breakfast at this amazing place called Gutiz, which had a dish called Taoseno that I could eat for the rest of my life (scrambled eggs, pinto beans, rice, green and red chile). We're excited to go back and check out the other good stuff!

______
*Interesting side note: Dan's a musician, and he often practices when he's on the road. One time he was actually pulled over for playing a harmonica and a mandolin while driving.

Dreams

2008-10-04T07:04:00.000-07:00

I really should just start a dream journal blog because I have really complicated dreams all the time. Lately I've been dreaming a lot about babies: one time I was pregnant (scary), another time I was pleading for my life and for my niece's lives, and last night RL and I were taking care of our newly married friends' (non-existent kids). What's the deal? I also dreamt that Britney Spears and I were being kidnapped and she kept taking her shirt off to distract the kidnappers.

In last night's dream RL was deftly feeding our friends' infant, who then threw up on our bed. The parents were around somewhere and they vaguely apologized, then handed over the next kid, who was actually like 20 and a BIG kid, but for some reason he was supposed to be in preschool.

Anyway, in the midst of the weird kid madness, there was a secondary story happening in the background. Apparently I knew this guy who had just set off to track down a woman he knew (loved/was stalking, who knows?). He started sending text-message updates back to me with news and pictures of the this woman. The texts were coming rather frequently, and I remember thinking, sheesh, this guy is a little insistent on sharing his news! They're coming every two seconds!

The funny thing is that I had actually brought my cell phone into the bedroom--a friend was flying in last night and I wanted to make sure she didn't need anything. Well, the friend texted me (and my phone will continue beeping until I look at the message), and for FORTY FIVE MINUTES I incorporated the sound of the beeping into my dream.

I'm rather impressed with my creative dream-state abilities, aren't you?

Me + Bus = Abusive Relationship

2008-09-26T07:46:00.000-07:00

For some reason this semester is the first time I've had to wrangle the 9am buses, along with a mazillion other students, to get me to school on time. I've been conning RL into dropping me off more often than not, but when I do end up taking the bus, it's frustrating.

Case in point: I leave the house at 8:45 yesterday morning, get to the bus stop five minutes later. Of course the last "Dash" bus has just passed, so I settle in to wait for another 15 minutes. When the bus comes 20 minutes later (did I mention that this bus is always late?), about 20 other people have joined me at the stop. So late busdriver lets about three people on, says "I'm full!" and drives off.

I stand in disbelief, trying to figure out what I should do. What happens if the next bus comes in 15 minutes and the same thing happens? The other bus that takes me to campus leaves from the other side of this four-lane road, and it's a dicey prospect because I don't know the schedule. Should I run home and drive to school? Finally, a bus comes that can take me as far as Broadway, so I hop on, hoping to get to another bus on Broadway. Of course, that bus passes right before I get to that stop.

At this point I really can't believe my bad luck. Now I'm totally screwed, because there's only the one bus that goes right down Broadway. Except...the Dash! Amazingly, the original bus I should have just sat at the stop and waited for shows up just a few minutes later, not full. I board the bus, passing all the people I had just left at the previous stop, the people who were patient and not freaking out. I felt a little sheepish, but I don't think they noticed.

The moral of the story is: the Dash, 75% of the time, gets me where I need to go without drama. The other 25% it pushes my buttons and makes me nervous, only to show up to save the day just in time. What kind of a weird relationship is this?

our two year anniversary

2008-08-23T15:03:00.000-07:00

Yay! It was our two-year anniversary last week, and we celebrated by going back to the camping spot where we first fell in love.

Here are the highlights:
I am really good at setting up the tent, so I do that while RL set up the "kitchen" (which comprises a cooler, a stove, and a Horseshoes set. Don't ask me why.). Then we have a Jack and Coke and a good conversation.

RL bought a bowsaw on the way out of town so we could saw through just about anything. We go out to forage for dead wood, and start a magnificent pile which we later decide is too big to carry back to our campsite. RL goes and gets his car. When he returns, he's chatting on the phone with a friend (in the middle of nowhere, while camping). I assume he's going to get off soon, but doesn't so I am left piling wood in the car and giving him dirty looks. After that he decides to turn his phone off. Thank God.

Once we get our fire going, it starts to drizzle, so RL decides to put up one of the three tarps we brought with us (we even acquired a new one that someone left behind at the campsite, along with a heck of a lot trash and some basketball shorts). It's dark already, and RL is trying to cut the tarp rope with a Swiss Army Knife (well, a cheap SAK knockoff. I think it may be a Swedish army knife), but he gets the blade the wrong side out, and promptly gets a huge, bloody cut in his knuckle. A couple of dunks in the freezing stream (adjacent to our campsite) and a couple Bandaids later, he's ready to get back to it.

Later on we decide to go for a little walk and see if we can find a spot to look at the stars. A thunderstorm is going crazy over on the other side of the mountains, so even though our sky is clear, we can still see flashes of lightning from over the pass. Have I mentioned how amazing the stars are in the Colorado mountains? Milky Way and everything. And tonight, lightning flashes.

The next morning, RL gets it into his head that he needs to build a "toilet" with all of our leftover wood (there was a lot). See below.

In the end it's a masterpiece, except for he's built it basically in the middle of our campsite. I say that I need to pee, but don't really want to pee in the middle of everything, especially when a vanfull of older people (I think they were Polish) shows up and starts wandering around. Well, finally RL decides he's going to just do it, and afterwards begs me to use it too. He says he'll stand watch. Good thing, too, because I finish up about two seconds before the old Polish women come wandering into our campsite (apparently they were mushroom hunting). Yay for peeing in the middle of nowhere which is not actually the middle of nowhere!

All in all, it was a great camping trip. We tried to reenact our two-week-old-roommate conversations that we had the first time we came here, but it didn't work so well. Turns out you have other conversations as two-year-old-partners that are just as good.

My Visit to the Doctor

2008-08-11T13:45:00.000-07:00

It's been awhile since I've been, so I saved up a couple issues to talk to her about (which was fairly disconcerting at the start of the appointment. Front Desk Guy: "Did you tell us you had more than one issue? Because we only have a set amount of time. You might have to come back for another appointment. She only has 15 minutes with you." Then I got to my exam room and go through it all again with the actual doctor: "Did you tell them you had more than one issue? Because we only have a set amount of time. You might have to come back for another appointment. I only have 15 minutes with you." Meanwhile, she got to the office 5 minutes early, and ultimately, we had plenty of time to talk about all of my issues.)

So, all that to say that I have some weird glob of tissue in my eye that seems to be growing scarily close to my iris. The doctor walked in, looked at me and said, "It's a pinquinilla." The doctor knew exactly what it was! She even had one of her own! And I'm not going to go blind! What a relief when a doctor can show you exactly what you're suffering from and can tell you that it's totally benign. She pulled out her book to show me "worst-case scenarios" of said eye infliction.

The weird thing was that she kept saying "pinquinilla." Then when she showed me in the medical book, it was spelled "pinguecula." Does this seem at all like the correct pronunciation for this word? There's no Q, no second N. But she was so confident in her pronunciation that I'm pretty sure she's dyslexic. Great, smartypants doctor has issues.

Well, after the whole eye globule affair, she told me I could only pick one more affliction to deal with today ("because of time constraints"). So I showed her my pinky finger that I jammed playing kickball. It hurts when I bend it certain ways, and the joints healed up funny. She looks at it and, finally, says I probably broke it!

Now, I have never broken a bone in my life. To have broken it playing kickball, of all glorious things, means that I am true hard-core kickballer. I even re-jammed it a week after I jammed it the first time....and KEPT PLAYING!!!

Obviously, I'm looking for a little credit. Since RL's x-rays at the hospital came up with an old fracture in his pelvis that he didn't even know he had, I feel like I deserve a little slap on the back for sacrificing my body. For kickball. Just don't slap too hard. I have a broken finger, you know.

Weird things people ask for at a Mexican restaurant

2008-08-02T09:44:00.001-07:00

So I'm still waitressing at the hole-in-the-wall Mexican restaurant I told you about earlier. It's a funny job because you interact with so many different types of people. most of them normal, and some, well, not so normal.

The other day an older couple came in. The woman seemed to have something wrong with her face, like she couldn't stop smiling uncontrollably or crossing her eyes. It took me awhile to adjust to having a conversation with such a person. The first thing she asked me for was cottage cheese, because she wasn't that hungry and didn't want anything spicy. (Apparently she had come out just because her man friend wanted dinner). Unfortunately, most Mexican restaurants don't have cottage cheese. After a long conversation about what else we do have that might fit the bill, she settled on a cheese quesadilla.

In other quesadilla news, a woman and her two young sons were sitting in my section last week. She immediately asked for a grilled cheese sandwich for the kids. I said we didn't really have any bread, just tortillas, and maybe a quesadilla would work? Mommy said the kids don't do tortillas. So she ordered them a plate of French Fries (which we do, randomly, have). Much better option. How about getting your kids to branch out a little? Like, to other wheat flour-based cheese-holding options?

Finally, the first table of my shift on Tuesday was a pair of older men. It was happy hour, so they ended up ordering the cheap tacos, which come with meat, lettuce, tomatoes, and cheese. Pretty basic, but what more do you expect on a taco? Well, when I put the plate down in front of one them, he looked at it and said, "What am I supposed to put on this?" I looked at him, kind of confused, but said maybe he wanted to put some salsa on it?

"Isn't there like a sauce? A Spanish sauce? I mean, a Mexican sauce?" Again, I offer up the salsa (which, in fact, means sauce in Spanish) or suggest a Cholula or Tabasco. He decides the Cholula could probably do, and mows through two tacos only to order another two.

Unfortunately the credit card machine wasn't working at that moment, so Mr. Cholula got away without leaving me a tip. I love this job!

Bad insect jokes

2008-06-25T13:14:00.000-07:00

RL and I were eating dinner outside the other day when I noticed that a spider had strung a web between the legs of our BBQ. I said, "Honey, look! There's a spider all up in your grill."

The other night I couldn't sleep and came downstairs to watch TV for awhile. It didn't help much, and I wasn't feeling any more sleepy. As I was laying on the couch, lights off, and all the sudden I see a little shape moving across the floor. I frantically turn the light on to find a millipede-type thing racing around the living room (now I'm definitely not sleeping). I get kind of freaked out because I really don't like things with lots of legs, and search for a glass and a piece of paper to trap him and take him outside (because really, something with that many legs is just not something you want to squish into the carpet). Before I can do that, though, Legsy has hidden under the couch. Trying to ignore the fact that he's still in the house, I decide to just go upstairs to my hopefully bug-free bed.

The next morning I tell RL about it, and ask him if millipedes are dangerous. "I don't think so...unless they kicked you to death with all those legs." Me, with an image of a cartoon millipede karate chopping my leg: "You mean like a kung-fu millipede?"

Okay, maybe it's not that funny, but you have to imagine it.

my family's finest moments

2008-06-17T13:07:00.001-07:00

The other morning RL and I were sitting on the couch (watching CBS Sunday Morning, no doubt), and Little the cat got the fire in her blood. Below is a picture of the darling girl, just so you have a good visual.

Anyway, she was running around the house like a crazy cat--from the patio through the living room and on her laps in the upstairs bedrooms. At one point while she was running around upstairs, I got up to close the screen door to the patio. Unfortunately I didn't tell her that. So RL and I watch as she races down the stairs, flies past us, and...bonk, right into the screen door. Apparently she's just not all that smart. It took her awhile to finally face us again (I think she was a little humiliated, honestly, and probably had a bit of a headache). We laughed for awhile about that one.

The next day, RL had his own embarassing moment. I was sleeping in, and he graciously got up early and rode his bike to get us some breakfast. He brought it home, fixed up a tray so I could have breakfast in bed, then decided to heat up the syrup for the pancakes. It was too tall to fit in the microwave, so he layed it on its side. But then he didn't want syrup to leak out all over the microwave, so he thought he should have something to prop it up. So he looks around, and, right in front of him is his wallet. What better prop? Good size, right shape.

So he wedges his wallet in there, right underneath the syrup, and puts the microwave on for 30 seconds. When he pulls it out, he notices that it smells a little funny, like burnt leather (hmm, interesting). When he finally tells me about it a few hours later, I say, don't you think your credit cards might have suffered some damage too? And then he starts thinking about the fact that there's METAL on the back of them, and starts worrying that maybe they won't work.

Fast forward to us at Nordstrom Rack a few hours later, where RL is purchasing a new wallet. He pulls the credit cards out of the old one and realizes that there have been little explosions all over the back of them, and that no, they don't work. The stink is horrible too, and the girl checking him out is less than pleased that she has to manually enter his information while holding this foul-smelling piece of plastic.

I'm sure I did something equally embarassing this week, but I just can't seem to remember it...

two, no three, random musings

2008-06-13T13:45:00.000-07:00

First, i'm in a five-week summer class with some fellow grad students on media ethics. exciting! actually, it is really interesting. in our class is one of the research-track students, a guy from chile. I give him a lot of credit--it's hard writing journalistically in a language not your own.

Anyway, mr. chile came to the first day of class with one of those blue-velcro-soft-cast type things on his foot. When i asked him what happened, he said, "oh, it's really a silly story." Apparently he broke his toe while "taking a nap." His leg fell asleep, and when he woke up, he jumped out of bed too quick and jammed his toe. I tried really hard not to laugh when he told me, but I immediately came home and told RL, who decided he would start telling people that was how he broke his neck. "Well I was taking a nap you see..."

Second, I just started a job waiting tables at a little Mexican restaurant. On Sunday i was there for nine hours (way too long for grandma tplate), and got to meet a variety of very young hostesses and bussers. One of the hostesses, Iris, was telling me that she had tried to quit a few weeks ago, but just kept coming back. "This place is awful. Everyone backstabs and talks about each other. You think you won't get sucked in but you will." Uhhh, ok? Note to self: Don't tell this girl anything.

She told me she was 16 and I asked her if this was her first job. "Oh no, I have a lot of responsibility. I go to school and cosmetology school. Yeah, I've got big aspirations. (Read: I'm not planning on working in a restaurant for the rest of my life and I'm silently judging you right now for your decision to work here at your advanced age.)" Wow! Good for you! I'm pretty hopeful that I won't be in a restaurant for the rest of the my life either. The kicker came when she asked me how old I was. "How old do you think I am?" She said she really didn't know. I told her I was 30. "Oh," she said. "Well that's not that bad." Thanks sweetie.

Finally, I was on the bus home today and noticed this sign. I think it's funny for a variety of reasons.

1) Shouldn't you designate an area TO stand, not an area to NOT stand? I thought that was the point of designating something. As in, "please park only in designated areas." I had to read it a few times to understand the logic.

2) Wouldn't it have been easier to say please don't stand in the yellow area? Instead of having to draw a big arrow to show what you're talking about?

3) And what is Mr. Naked Man doing leaning against that door anyway? Is he trying to look cool? And I'm pretty sure that no person would ever be able to maintain that pose while on a jerky bus. The moral of the story is, don't be Joe Cool. Joe Cool could die when the bus takes a sharp corner, especially embarassed by his nakedness and the fact that he failed to stand in an undesignated area.

RTD Denver, if you need any more signage help, you know where to find me.

Life with a 12-year-old

2008-05-28T11:04:00.001-07:00

A couple of funny conversations between RL and I of late....

We had a block party last Sunday, and RL paid for a kind of pricey keg of beer for our party-goers (something about "gas" prices up means "transportation costs" are also up, and therefore "everything" is more expensive these days. who knew?) Anyway, RL's not drinking right now, so he wanted some money back on his investment. He decided to make a little sign directing people to send donations his way.

RL: Do you think the sign should say "look for the guy in the neck brace and the red visor"?
Me: Um, I'm pretty sure you can leave off the red visor descriptor.
RL: Really?
Me: Like there's going to be another guy here in a neck brace and a blue visor?
RL: Oh.

+++++
Last night I went upstairs to bed while RL was enjoying his favorite, obsessive past time of Tetris (that's right, on the original NES!). It was almost 11pm, way past his bed time, and I told him he should probably shut it down for the night. After about the tenth "just one more game" exclamation, I gave up.

So I'm upstairs brushing my teeth, and I notice that the jingly Tetris music isn't going anymore, but I don't hear RL moving around or anything. What I do hear is the little squeak of the Nintendo controller, and RL trying to be quiet.

Me, from upstairs: Did you just turn the music off so I would think that you weren't playing anymore?
RL: (suppressing giggles) Ummmm, no?
Me: What are you doing then?
RL: Stuff. (more giggles)
Me: You are like a 12-year-old.
RL: I can't believe you busted me!

RL came upstairs finally, still laughing about his feeble attempt to be sneaky. Ah yes, he is a 12-year-old. And of course, I'm the one that can't get the jingly Tetris music out of my head.

you know you want this pillow

2008-05-21T07:10:00.000-07:00

Since RL's had to wear his neck brace at all times for the last few months, the quest for a comfortable sleeping position has been rather elusive for him. Awhile ago he was laying in bed, dreaming of the perfect pillow: it would be low in the middle, for when he was sleeping on his back, and higher on the sides, to support the side-sleeping positions. He even developed a whole As-Seen-On-TV scam, complete with $300 off if you called in the next 30 minutes, and a free pillow for your cat.

It sounded like a great idea. Unfortunately the pillow already exists. Tempur-pedic sells the Millennium Pillow, with RL's exact specifications. (RL was actually convinced that someone at Tempur-Pedic overheard his idea, developed, patented, and began selling the pillow all in the week that it took him to think it up and find it).

Well, needless to say, RL bought the pillow, and it's pretty fricking fantastic. It cups your head just right, offering gentle support. It's like a little cushion of delight. The other night I was wondering out loud if I would ever get to experience the delight myself, and RL offered it up! I was shocked. He said we could share and he happily traded pillows with me.

For about 20 minutes. I'm sinking in, feeling tempur-pedic-riffic, and falling asleep. All of the sudden RL's waking me up, saying he's sorry but on second thought, he can't give it up. He's been laying there all uncomfortable and stressing about the possibility of not being able to sleep. So I wake myself up and hand it over.

No really, I'm fine. No delight needed here.

watch this if you want to get freaked out

2008-05-03T15:31:00.000-07:00

as you probably know, RL's been convalescing because of a big ski crash in early March. We've seen the other video of the accident a number of times, but finally got a really good shot from a friend who was recording the competition. mind you, i was watching the other video live as it happened, and couldn't really tell what was going on other than that he was laying there not moving for quite awhile. i am SO GLAD i wasn't watching this video, because i would have thought he was dead for sure.

so, here it is. it's scary, but definitely gives a better picture of why his helmet was banged in two places and he ended up with some minor brain trauma and a few fractured vertebrae.

obviously he's doing much better these days!

one day left

2008-04-29T11:39:00.000-07:00

it's been forever and it's because i've been busy trying to finish year one of grad school and take care of RL, who needs a lot of attention and driving around these days.

i'm tired, and particularly sleepy today, which is bad because i have about two hours to finish both finals. plus my pinky hurts because i jammed it playing kickball last night. i was a defensive kickball rockstar though, and we won the game, so it's all worth it.

so, more next week maybe when i don't have so much hanging over my head? if anyone wants to send me to italy anytime soon, i'd be game.

lessons from a farm

2008-03-06T17:55:00.000-08:00

I met some cows today. They were really fricking cute. I don't think people know how cute cows are. They're like horses, only smaller and fuzzier and have cuter noses.

I also met some chickens, and a herding dog that barked at the chickens until they moved out of the road, out of harm's way. Apparently this herding technique works, even though the chickens are all pissy as they're obeying mr. shepherd dog.

Did I mention I was on a farm? I went to meet some delightful people who do biodynamic farming for a CSA up east of Loveland. They grow food all summer long, then can things and ferment things and put things in "clamps" which is a sort of natural outdoor refrigerator that keeps large amounts of produce fresh. At this point in the season they have only a small bit of onions and leeks and radishes, but they're preparing for the summer season of growing.

They also raise dairy cows (only seasonally, because when the green grass to feed the dairy cows dries up, the milk doesn't taste as good), and slaughter a few at the end. It was traumatic for me to stare at the big beautiful eyes of these little calves and know that someday they would be dinner. But I completely respect the fact that these farmers put everything they have into raising these little buggers, and give thanks for the life they give in the end. Really, it's the only way it should be.

The couple who run this farm literally live off of it. The woman told me that when they run out of the veggies they have in a few weeks, she'll go harvest dandelion greens and wild asparagus for supper. Of course they have their canned goods and their frozen meats, but for them, not having spinach in the fridge doesn't mean a trip to the grocery store. Can you imagine?

Toward the end of our talk, I went into their house alone hoping to use their restroom. I walked in and saw two toilets--one conventional, and one compost. There was a little sign next to it explaining how to do it (complete with a bucket of sawdust), but I just couldn't bring myself. So I held it. I'm such a wuss.

After two hours, part of me was ready to get out of the country, to get back to a place where I can have my spinach any time of the year. But on my drive home, I was uber-conscious of the semi trucks full of building equipment blazing past me on the highway. So many trucks ready to build so many more houses, destroying the prairie for ugly housing developments with ridiculous names like "Sweetgrass" and "Prairie View."

It feels like it's too late to go back to living like those folks do. Too late for me I guess, because I really enjoy spinach in January.

love song

2008-02-29T15:23:00.001-08:00

It's hard not to fall in love with Boulder on days like today.

Sixty degrees means finally going outside without a jacket. It means people riding their bikes, walking everywhere. Boys and girls holding hands. Soccer games and frisbees. And wearing shoes with no socks.

After months of air dry and heavy with nothing but snow and cold, finally, today, a waft of milkweed, my favorite Boulder scent. It's always reminded me of my mother.

The sky is, as usual, an incredible shade of blue. The warmth of the day contradicts the snow-flecked ever-present hills. The windows are open, and there's not a drop of snow on the ground.

I ride the bus and sense the energy of excitement, of potential, that everyone must be feeling.

I do research for my classes and discover that despite the horrors of the world, despite poverty and factory farms and violence, there are people doing amazing things. Teaching children how to plant gardens, get their hands dirty, live from the land. People learning, traveling, sharing. And people rallying around their candidates, putting more time and energy into democracy than we ever thought possible.

It's about to be spring. Isn't it time we used this newfound energy to do something?

On days like today, it's hard not to fall in love with life.

lobster fest 08

2008-02-28T11:53:00.000-08:00

Yeah, it's been awhile. But that's because nothing terribly exciting has happened recently. Until last night.

That's right, it's Lobster Fest at Red Lobster, and boy, did we celebrate those lobsters.

I know what you're thinking. Tplate, aren't you a vegetarian? Well, yes, but once in awhile I'll indulge in a little shellfish. Nevermind that these bottom feeders have twice the cholesterol of red meat, and that there was an actual tank of live lobsters as we walked into the restaurant, one of which inevitably ended up on our plate of Lobster Lover's Dream. (At least it's fresh, right?)

The good thing about lobster is that you can pull the edible part out of the shell fairly easily (none of those "bones" to get in the way, one of the reasons I can't deal with meat) and then dip it in melted butter. I mean, come on.

We went with our friends, one of whom received a Red Lobster gift card for Christmas, and had been literally holding onto it until Lobster Fest came around. So we happily donned our plastic bibs, munched on those delicious herb cheese biscuits, and ate our fill of crustacean delicacies.

Afterward we went and saw U2 in 3D, which I would highly recommend if it's playing in your area. I was a tad disappointed with the fact that Bono did not once point his crotch at the camera, but he did reach out to touch us at least once (with his hand). The 3D thing was great (made possible, in part, by RL's company) and made you feel like a really tall person wandering around the crowd and the stage. I got all inspired by the music, then started daydreaming about Bono running for president. Would The Edge would be his running mate? Would they run under those names? The Edge is actually named Dave. Bono is named Paul. Borrrring. They could be like the first rock n' roll leaders of the free world. The Bono/Edge ticket. Yeah.

I wonder if Bono and/or The Edge have ever been to Lobster Fest? I think they, like us, might do it just for the kitsch factor.

whose rhetoric is this?

2008-02-10T08:49:00.000-08:00

Reading a NY Times article this morning about yesterday's caucuses, I was amused by the language the Republicans are using about this election. Also kind of frightened. I know I am firmly entrenched on the other side of things, but my candidate just isn't talking like this.

On his win in Kansas: "Mr. Huckabee declared that the voters had been heard from. “They spoke with one voice,” he said. “They said I am the authentic conservative in this race.”

I honestly can't believe people fight over who's more conservative, who's more authentic. Have you been with us for the past eight years? That's not going to win this race, not in this America. The people he's speaking to are an ever-diminishing group. Do they not realize this? Why not expand your horizons a little? Open up to new possibilities?

Mr. Huckabee compared himself to Ronald Reagan when he challenged President Gerald Ford for the 1976 nomination. “He was the pariah of the party,” he said. “Now people love Ronald Reagan.”

I'm sorry, but I don't know anyone who loves Ronald Reagan.

Then, his opponent:

A spokesperson from McCain's camp said: “Our focus remains the same: uniting the Republican Party to defeat Democrats in 2008.”

Way to go! It's all about defeating the enemy! Unite to defeat! Who cares about the real issues at stake? We just want to make sure we win! Indeed, I have lost much respect for McCain in the last few weeks, as he has basked in his wins and lost sight of anything that matters. (And by the way, did anyone see his 96-year-old mother on stage with him the other night? Apparently she takes her fashion cues from Barbara Bush. Hey, it worked for George W., right?)

Finally, let's look at this very apropos picture of Mr. Obama, which topped the NY Times story. I don't know if they were trying to make a statement or what, but he seems to be sitting in the center of those two background colors quite nicely.

why i'm annoyed today

2008-02-04T16:18:00.000-08:00

I had a nice, relaxing yet productive weekend, and even enjoyed some time out with the girls on Saturday night. The Superbowl was even fun!

But now it's Monday, and the crap has set in. I've got a story deadline for school tomorrow night, so this morning I got up and got to it. I had done all I could before the weekend (because honestly, when you're calling professional sources, they're not going to talk to you on the weekend. No one bothered to remind my professor of this, however, when she gave us this ridiculous deadline.). I was feeling good before class today because I had found a perfect source and emailed and called him. I really thought it was going to be one of those days where everything worked out perfectly.

Turns out, I was wrong. Not only am I getting sick (throat yuckiness), but I missed the bus to school by about one minute this morning, and the next one was late. That equalled me standing in the snow, feeling sick, wasting time that I should have been spending on this article.

Finally got to class, heard another two journalism professionals tell us just how hard (and poorly compensated) this job is. Great! Class let out early, so I went to my internship and worked for a couple of hours on the article (which is also for the internship. Shh.).

Was actually feeling like I had made some progress, interviewed a woman, got some other good contacts....then I realized that because of the stupid PC I work on there, the changes I had made had somehow not saved. I've done this before on this computer, so I should know that when you download something from an email and don't save it right away on your desktop, it disappears. Ludicrous!! I did all this work, hit save, and then couldn't find the document for the life of me. Called IT who was no help, and then just frantically tried to remember the quotes this woman had just given me.

When I had done all I could do, I left for the day, not even helped by the piece of toffee my nice co-worker shared. I walked out of the office and could see the bus waiting, but knew that there was no way I was running on the snowy sidewalks with a sore throat. So I managed to miss that bus by about one minute too. Then I'm standing waiting for the next one, and some crazy man (maybe not crazy, maybe just Tourrette's) walks up and starts yelling nonsense at everyone.

Then I started thinking, if I had Tourrette's and couldn't control what I say, wouldn't I try to tell people? Would I wear a sign? Something like, "Please ignore my offensive rantings, I really can't help it"? Just a thought.

The biggest bummer is that tonight is supposed to be Date Night for RL and I, and the dumping snow and throat yuckiness are making me think that's just not going to happen.

At least there's Tuesday...right?

i heart the waiting room

2008-01-29T19:15:00.001-08:00

I went to the dentist today, first time in almost a year (gasp!). When I checked in I told the lady behind the counter who I was and that I had new insurance. She took my card, made a copy, gave it back to me, and I sat down. Then, one minute later she comes out and calls "Tplate?" like I hadn't just told her my fricking name, and like there are more than two people in the waiting room. Weird.

She brings me into the office, sits me down and puts on one those bibs to catch your drool (which came in very handy later, when I was, in fact, drooling), and leaves. I sit in the chair for 10 minutes waiting for the hygienist. Without the comfort of the magazine I just left in the waiting room.

Why do they do this? A few months ago I had to go the lady doctor and the same thing happened. I'm all sitting in the waiting room, reading any of the 100 fascinating magazines they have available, and then they call me back. I go in the office, undress, and sit on the table in my paper nightie until the nurse comes back in and tells me that the doctor just got in with a patient who happened to be late for her appointment. I was going to have to wait 20 minutes or so. Okay, so I, who was EARLY to my appointment, have to wait for some other jerk who happened to be late for hers. But not only do I have to wait, I have to wait in a paper nightie with NOTHING TO READ. Delightful. So I read the posters on the wall about the reproductive system about fifteen times. (I had no idea the fallopian tubes were so lengthy!)

Today's dentist appointment ended with them telling me that I had FOUR cavities, and another filling from childhood had disappeared. (Apparently I swallowed it. Delightful.) Now, I haven't had cavities since I was 15, so I really don't know what the numbing/drilling/filling regime is like now, but I'm pretty sure I'm not going to like it. Also apparently, when you turn 30 weird things like this happen.

Like I don't have enough to do now that I'm 30.

sled fest 08

2008-01-28T07:21:00.000-08:00

Well, as you can see, I had to change the name of my blog. Yup, I couldn't hold on to 29 any longer, and the 30s are here. I'm okay with it though, and, as my older and wiser family members keep telling me, it's going to be a great decade.

For my birthday my awesome Colorado-side friends indulged me and went sledding! It was 60 degrees but our sledding hill managed to hold on to enough snow to make it fun. Here's a peek at one of cardboard box races (the "station wagon" of sleds as RL calls them). Team Tplate vs. Team Cardboard Box. We totally won, as you'll see. Please ignore the point where I put the camera down to put my gloves on. :)

After we tried to squeeze eight people into a box and the boxes subsequently fell apart, we raced on what I can only describe as "rocket sleds" which propelled us down the snow/ice/grass into the padded trees and hay bales at the bottom of the hill.

For my final run of the day I decided to go a totally different route and ended up narrowly missing a tree and landing gracefully in the gravel under the swingset of the nearby playground. Everyone watching was pretty sure we were about to go to the hospital, but I managed to come out of it with just a few scrapes. (Apparently there is something you can do called "bailing" which would have diminished the risk, but I was unaware of he technique at the time.)

Once we were all cleaned up, we went for burgers at Red Robin, a classic teenage experience!

My friends are great. Thanks guys!

Update!

2008-01-10T21:42:00.000-08:00

Update: I posted a Missed Connection for incessant-bus-cord-puller-guy, at the advice of Tracy Jane. Hopefully he'll get back to me soon and I can let you all know how it turns out.

Stay tuned!

This just in...

2008-01-09T10:58:00.000-08:00

I got on the bus today, and seated in front of me was a man on his cell phone. Soon after I sat down, he pulled the cord to request a stop. When the bus driver stopped, the guy kindly got off his cell phone long enough to say, "Oh sorry, I pulled it for the wrong reason." Then he got back to his phone conversation.

At first I thought he must have meant he pulled it for the wrong stop, and that he would be getting off at the next one. But no. He was on the bus all the way to the end with me.

So I spent the entire bus ride trying to figure out what the hell other reason you would have for pulling the bus cord other than to request a stop. It's like that Lewis Black bit about overhearing a waitress at the IHOP saying "If it weren't for my horse, I never would have spent that year in college." In his words, don't even try to understand what that means or your brain will explode! So I tried to keep calm as I went over the options.

Did he just get excited and have to pull something? Does he have a tic? Was he about to fall out of his chair and grabbed onto the nearest thing?

This is the kind of language you use when you get into relationships you know you shouldn't be in: I did it for the wrong reason! Or steal some kid's milk money on the playground to get in with the cool kids*: I did it for the wrong reason! This is not the kind of language you use on the bus.

+++++++
*Please note I have never, ever done this.

Flight 161, DFW to DEN

2008-01-07T09:02:00.000-08:00

I had an unusually eventful trip back from Ft. Worth the other day, and I thought you might find it interesting.

Got to the airport, checked in at the kiosk while 50 other people stood in line for a desk agent. Don’t they know the glories of airport machinery?

Got in security line with the bottom outside pocket of my suitcase open because it has the liquid goods in it that I’m about to remove (more on that in a second). Kindly woman behind me in line tells me that the bottom of my suitcase is open. I just smile at her and tell her it’s okay. Not til I get to the scanner do I see that the actual bottom of my suitcase is unzipped, and clothes are sneaking out. Kind of feel like an idiot. Think that somewhere behind me she must be staring and feeling smug.

Spent the rest of the time in the security line wondering whether they were going to bug me about the fact that my clear plastic zip-top bag was in fact a gallon size, instead of a quart. Picked up the bag they provide and saw that it is actually something more like a pint, not a quart, and there was no way I could fit all of my goods in there. Decide to chance it and get through.

Went to Burger King in the hopes of some ounce of protein/nutrition. Indian guy ahead of me orders a Croissan’wich* without the meat or egg, for which I am grateful because I’m about to order one without meat and I am happy to have someone forge that path ahead of me (a treacherous one at places like Burger King). Started a conversation in my head, which went something like this: Do Hindus also not eat eggs? Why? Are they used to going to Burger King? How awful. Seems like there are plenty of other good things they could eat. A croissant with some American cheese on it just doesn’t seem like it would fit the bill.

Sat eating my Croissanwich, sans meat, and watched the plane before mine disembarking (debarking?). See a guy from my neighborhood get off the plane, a guy who I met once at a community gathering, and whom I always see on the bus in town. Weird.

Went up to the desk to ask a question, but had to wait for the desk agent to get off his cell phone, talking to goodness knows who about some possible emergency at home.

Finally, he gets off:

Me: Is there any way to swap my window seat for an aisle?
Older man who suddenly springs up beside me: Is this where you place your breakfast order? (obviously joking)
Desk agent: Only seats left are middle seats, honey.
Me: Okay, thanks (kind of annoyed that I just got called honey).
Older man: Don’t take the last of the eggs benedict!
Me, looking at the older man strangely: uh, huh, ok.

Older man wanders off too, and I wonder if he came up to the desk when I did just to pull my leg.

Got in line to board and watched the boarding agent tell a passenger, somewhat harshly, that she has to have a stroller tag. The agent’s primary language is something like Chinese, so her exhortations seem even harsher. Then she starts arguing with the other desk agent about who exactly is going to get her the stroller tag. Poor stroller-laden woman doesn’t know what to do.

Later, when everyone is seated, Chinese agent gets on the plane, and tells a little man across the aisle from me that the box he’s checked is not going to make it on. “Your BOX is not going on the plane!” she says. Then the other desk agent tells him that the airline is not responsible for the perishable stuff in the box. It’s not clear why the BOX is not going to make it on, but Chinese agent just keeps saying “the BOX, it’s not coming on the plane. The BOX.” The little man apparently does not speak fluent English, so she just keeps getting louder. Or this woman just likes to yell at people.

Weird. After that everything seemed okay. Meaning, after we got the heck out of Texas everything seemed okay.

++++++
*Is that the correct apostrophe placement? I don’t think I’ve ever eaten a Croissanw’ich before so it’s hard to tell.

Grandma Evelyn

2007-12-31T15:31:00.000-08:00

My grandmother died this weekend. She’s my father’s mother, but I haven’t seen her in years. She had a stroke several years ago, and I know that she was having a hard time even recognizing my dad of late. Thankfully, it sounds like she didn’t suffer long. As I look down the face of my 30th birthday, it scares me to think that, ultimately, my body too will simply shut down.

But for now, I can remember my grandmother. She lived in St. Paul, Minnesota, for the majority of my life. The summer I was eight, I flew by myself for the first time to visit her. I spent a few days with her in her small apartment, roasting in the Minnesota heat.

I remember sitting by the screened window, trying to stay cool in the absence of air conditioning. Grandma sat in her chair, quietly doing her crosswords. Almost every night a tornado warning was issued, sounding loudly from the local emergency towers. Grandma and I diligently hunkered down in the basement of her building for hours with other residents. Grandma read her Reader’s Digest as we listened to the radio. A neighbor brought down her cat, who, knowing that Grandma wasn’t much for cats, spent the entire evening trying to get her attention.

When Grandma would visit us in California, she did everything and went everywhere with us. She couldn’t drive, and never got her license because there was always one of her seven kids or 10+ grandchildren around to do it for her. I thought it was odd (who wouldn’t want to drive?) but I think she was just old-fashioned.

I remember how she always smelled sweet, and always had her hair permed. I remember her purple hair pick lying in the bathroom we would share when she stayed with us.

I remember how her chin moved when she laughed, and anyone laughing with her could tell that she was really tickled.

I remember how my other grandmother called her “Evy,” even though no one else ever seemed to call her that.

I remember how she “tsked” at any risque moments on the television or at a saucy story—remnants of her conservative background.

I remember how strange it was to hear her call my dad “Glenn,” or even “Glenny,” and to understand that this diminutive woman was my dad’s mother.

From what I know of her, Grandma worked hard her entire life for her husband, her children. She didn’t have the luxury of a college education or a lot of money. But she was sweet, and easygoing, and sent me cards on my birthday. And she was my grandma. She’ll be missed.

No, I’M the boss of YOU

2007-12-27T14:31:00.000-08:00

My niece Bella is adorable, but a handful. She’s five now, and can hold her own in quite grown up conversations. She's started saying "for real" after making any statement she thinks we may not believe, and can even get her dad in trouble once in awhile by calling him out on things he shouldn't say. She also likes to make up stories and play with her dolls, which I totally admire because I never had the creativity to play with dolls. They just sit there, you know?

So I got to spend a few days with her and her little sister Sofia over Christmas. Bella got a new makeup set as a gift, and when she “did my makeup” she managed to coat my eyes in enough glitter that it’s still with me three days later. Sofia was running around with blue cheeks and purple lips all of Christmas day, and when RL was leaving Bella told him he couldn’t go because she still had to do his makeup. Gender shmender!

(Bella, in all her sassiness)

My favorite moment was when she was getting ready to go to bed on our last night together. I told her she could sleep with me, so she eagerly got in her pajamas and climbed in bed, along with her five dolls. It was pretty quickly evident that she did not view this as bedtime, but as a way to continue playing with the dolls and making up stories for her lucky audience (read: me). The stories go something like this: “Ariel went to see her daughter Melody and she told her, you can’t have my legs!” followed by much giggling on Bella’s part. I’m always a step behind her trying to figure out what’s going on, so usually I just end up with a confused look on my face.

When I finally told her she needed to lie down and start being quiet, Bella says, “no I don’t! Mommy and Daddy didn’t say I had to. For real.”

I start arguing with her about the fact that I was in the room when Mommy and Daddy did in fact tell her to go to bed, and then realize that this type of logic has never worked with her. I just have to be firm! So I say “Bella, it’s time to go to bed.” At this she grabs my hand, looks me in the eye, and says, very articulately, “You’re not the boss of me, I’m the boss of you!”

It’s hard not to laugh when a five year old is so completely testing you and your ability to withstand her strong-willed adorableness. But I stood my ground, and somehow she agreed to go back to her own bed and go to sleep.

Phew! Score one for Aunt Tplate’s negotiations with the five year old.

Ridiculous Christmas Presents

2007-12-12T07:26:00.000-08:00

Christmastime is that great time of year when commercials for really inane gadgets come on TV (well inane gadgets and electric razors. Did you ever notice that?). It's like these "As Seen on TV" product developers know you're only going to buy their product when you're really desperate to find a last-minute Christmas present for your weird Uncle Ed.

So last night I saw this commercial for the Clapper "Plus"--it's the new and improved version of the clap on/clap off light control. This one doesn't just function off of clapping. No, this one has a remote control that comes with it, so that you can always carry with you the ease of turning on and off your lights at the touch of a button. The problem is, the thing is tiny. I can imagine it getting lost at pretty much the first use.

So to solve that problem, the ingenious people at Clapper productions have added Velcro to the back of the remote! So you can just stick it up on the wall when you find a convenient spot for it. Thank goodness they solved that problem. But wait, that kind of seems like a...light switch.

Last I checked light switches came pretty standard in most houses. No need to pay the extra $24.95 for each and every lamp.

I know you were all about to buy the Clapper Plus for your loved ones, but I'm here to give it to you straight. You're welcome.

The best Christmas tree ever

2007-12-05T11:27:00.000-08:00

so ever since, oh, the middle of November, i've been dreaming about a Christmas tree. So last Sunday we went up to Winter Park with some delightful friends and chopped one down!

At first we were hesitant about the two-hour drive, but since it had snowed the previous day and Sunday turned out to be gorgeous, it was the perfect tree-cutting day. Five couples tromped out into the woods with one saw and one hatchet, and somehow we all made it back with perfect (albeit different) trees.

Ours took awhile to find, but when we did, RL dubbed it the "crown jewel" of Christmas trees, then hung his hat on it to stake his claim. Also so we could find it again. We brought him home, and I gave him the more appropriate name of "Ed" and decorated him up!

(The blur on RL's lap is Little the cat, who is very upset because RL tied a little red ribbon around her neck. Little don't jive with costumes.)

Now for some presents to go under it! I love Christmas.

Big Fat Will Pinch You

2007-11-27T19:01:00.000-08:00

Another funny photo--RL's relations have an affinity for picking up stray cats. This one happened to come with six toes. His name's Big Fat and I luff him.

yeah, so....

2007-11-27T18:42:00.000-08:00

it's been awhile. here are some funnies from our trip to NY.

The sign at RL's favorite childhood sub shop. I had to take a picture of this renegade rooster who has apparently ripped his own leg off, fried it up, and is serving it for your pleasure. I also enjoy the chicken leg necklace. Beware the Renegade Rooster! He will destroy his own kind and feed their body parts to unwitting sub shop customers!

Multiple of these signs were posted in our room at the swanky Howard Johnson outside Toledo, Ohio. They did have a coffee maker (minus the coffee pot. Details, right?) and a hair dryer, but you couldn't use them all at the same time. But what I really love is the use of caps AND parentheses. It's like simultaneously emphasizing and deemphasizing the main point of the signage.

More about our trip later. Good stuff!

adventures in cooking

2007-11-08T14:01:00.000-08:00

so after i posted my last recipe, i realized that there are a lot more recipes i'd like to share...just stuff i've come up with and gotten good at making. they're not all original, but i've tweaked them to make them easier.

so i started a new blog! if you're looking for good veggie recipes, visit me.

and now for something completely different

2007-10-30T09:32:00.001-07:00

>>HOLD UP, I forgot a very important part of the recipe--the lemon juice! See below for revised recipe.

i've been into cooking a lot more lately, and i'd like to think that i'm getting better at it. of course, i always watch the food network when nothing else is on, so maybe i'm subconsciously getting inspired. (like yesterday, giatta was working with chocolate and made the most delicious looking panini out of brie cheese, chocolate, fresh basil and sourdough bread, which pretty much represent my four food groups. i have yet to try it but i'll let you know how it goes).

anyway, here's a less fattening recipe for my hummus, which has gotten good reviews at some recent parties. it took me a long time to arrive at this recipe, which is a conglomeration of other recipes and my imagination.

Tee-plate's Curry Hummus

In a food processor/blender*, mix:

1 can drained Garbanzo beans (reserve some of the juice for later)
4 1/2 Tbsp Tahini
3 Tbsp Olive Oil
5 Tbsp Lemon Juice
2 cloves Garlic
1 Tbsp Curry
Couple dashes of Cayenne Pepper
Couple dashes of Sea Salt

Mix it all up, then add some Garbanzo juice if it's too thick. Add more salt, curry, cayenne to taste. Delish!

Sometimes i double the recipe just to make sure it lasts. This stuff is good with triscuits, carrots, on sandwiches, with blue corn chips. And it's pretty healthy, right?

+++++++++
*RL got me a food processor for my birthday last year. He also got me a Kitchenaid mixer by mistake, because he accidentally forgot the name for Cuisinart. Anyway, i do appreciate them, but i think it's funny that for our very first Christmas/birthday together he got me two kitchen appliances. I mean, didn't he ever see Father of the Bride?

yeah? well you smell like nail polish

2007-10-23T19:55:00.000-07:00

Sunday was a fairly uneventful day, seeing as it was snowing when we woke up. So we decided to go on a little shopping excursion (RL got a little J Crew gift cert for his birthday. yay! except none for me. That place is pricey.). But then we got to go to PF Changs for those delicious lettuce wraps. Yes it's a chain restaurant, but those things are like crack.

Afterwards, RL decided we needed a little manicure action at the local nail shop*. As he explained to the woman doing his nails, we spent some time shingling a friend's roof on Saturday and our hands needed a "treat." I'm pretty sure that his manicurist spoke little to no English and couldn't have cared less about our Saturday even if she did.

My lady was a different story. She was friendly, asked us questions about us, what we did, etc. Finally she asked us what we had been doing that day. I told her about the shopping and the PF Changs. She was like, "Oh, yeah, I thought you smelled like Chinese food."

Ummm, thanks? What kind of a thing is that to say? I would never say that to a friend, much less someone who was expecting a tip from me.

After that I didn't know what to say to her. She finished my nails, pretty shoddily, and I decided I don't really like manicures. I don't want to have conversations when I'm being pampered, much less conversations about how I smell. From here on out it's all pedicures.

As long as I can stick my nose in a magazine and keep my Chinese-food stench away from everyone, I'll be okay.

++++++++
*RL does like his manicures. It's these getting-in-touch-with-his-softer-side moments that make me love him.

politicians, god love em

2007-10-19T17:29:00.000-07:00

Okay, i know i'm treading in dangerous political waters here (well, at least for a blog that's supposed to be light-hearted), but i just have to share this.

For school i've been doing a little research on my home town of San Diego, figuring out just how little their major media outlets are talking about their impending water crisis. In my research i came across a little clip of the Republican mayor of San Diego speaking out for gay marriage. Apparently his daughter is gay (Hi. Dick Cheney? Are you watching this?) as are members of his staff, so he's now asking the city attorneys to pass a resolution to allow gay marriage. In San Diego of all places!

Watch at least the last half of the video. It's amazing that he's so emotional about this--gives us a little insight on what it's like to be a politician that's promised one thing to his constituents, and another thing to his family. But kudos for actually doing the right thing for once (Hi! Dick Cheney? Are you watching this?).

In other news, Barack Obama recently linked his faith to his environmentalism. Wha? God never told us anything about taking care of the earth. Oh wait, yes he did.

can't i just have a normal hug?

2007-10-17T10:06:00.000-07:00

there's a new epidemic in the world of hetero relationships*, and it's called, for lack of a better term, "over-excited affection." boys, it seems, have a hard time administering affection that's not either:
a) bouncing up and down
b) picking their girlfriends up and tossing them (nicely, but still tossing)
c) poking in inappropriate places/at inappropriate times
d) grabbing or squeezing all manner of body parts

Now, it's understandable that boys like to show their affection in a variety of ways, but when it's done in one of the above ways 90 percent of the time, it's also understandable that a girl's gonna get annoyed.

I myself am often a victim of a, c, and d, with an occasional butt slap thrown in. early on in our relationship, RL stopped hugging me normally and started hugging me while jumping up and down (with weird sound effects). When i asked him for a normal hug, he said "come on! this is the deluxe hug! you're so lucky!" the other day i asked him again and he complied. for about five seconds. then he says "boorringg" and starts bouncing again.

now the "deluxe" has come to mean any sort of bouncing that RL does, and my least favorite is the i'm-still-sleeping-and-RL-is wide-awake deluxe. usually he does this because he wants me to wake up, and sometimes it works. My favorite is when i wake up to him standing over the bed with a wild-eyed look on his face and his body poised to jump on me.

when discussing this with my girlfriends, including Sara over at
Dating Tales, we realized that one of the issues is that you have to laugh when someone is bouncing/poking/grabbing you, which naturally means that the boys think we're enjoying it. Which we're not. But laughter is the go-to response that we fall back on, and sometimes we just can't help it.

So what's a girl to do to stop the over-excited affection onslaught? More importantly, why do boys have to be so difficult?

+++++++++
*i have no idea how this is playing out in other types of relationships, and it may very well not just be limited to the heteros i know. it does seem to be kind of a straight boy thing, though.

my bf, apparently, is 12 years old

2007-10-10T21:38:00.000-07:00

But he's cute. Which is good. Because on Wednesday he decided to wake up at FOUR O'CLOCK in the morning to drive an hour and a half and stand in line for three hours to ski two runs at Arapahoe Basin, the first mountain to open in the United States. RL was wearing a pumpkin costume, which got him some good coverage in the Denver Post. In one of the longer quotes, he decided to rub winter in my face by saying something like "summer's over!" it's funny because when he was saying that, i was still sleeping warmly and comfortably in my bed.

Just in case you need a visual:

In other silly bf news, he got an original Nintendo for his 30th birthday last week. I was excited because i thought i could relive my childhood too, but then he bought Skate or Die (sp?) and Commando, which i never played (i was rooting for Tetris and Bubble Bobble). Then the other night he called me from work saying he was going to be late because he had just bid on Excite Bike on eBay and he had to wait for the auction to close.

Aside from the primitive graphics and music that are fun to laugh at, for some reason Nintendo is really easy now that we're adults. I'm still trying to figure out if this has something to do with an increase in our intelligence or just an increase in familiarity with technical gadgets. Or maybe it's easy because RL, somehow, remembers all the secrets that we worked so hard for when we were little.

Actually, as we speak he's trying to conquer Mario Brothers for the third time in three days. Excuse me, I've gotta go help him out.

...my dear, i don't give a damn

2007-10-05T13:46:00.000-07:00

being the super-anal grammar and language person that i am, i always notice when people say things repeatedly, or wrongly. when RL and i started dating he said "to tell you the truth" a lot, which i thought was funny. when i pointed it out he stopped doing it. i sure hope you're still telling me the truth RL!

he also said, "least we forget" until i corrected him. apparently all of his life he'd been laboring under the assumption that the least we could do is not forget.

my current boss' name is frank. he says "frankly" a lot. as in "frankly, i think the design isn't what we need right now." it's like he's using himself as an adjective. like, what other way are you going to do things but frankly? i wonder if he notices the inherent irony. i do things tee-plately. how do you do them?

one of my professors is moroccan, though he's lived in the states for awhile and is a working journalist. for the most part he's got the language down, but there are always a few words he just can't pronounce right. my cohort and i sit in class and make notes of his weird pronunciations and then compare after class. the other day he was telling us a story about a coroner, but the way he said it sounded like Tony Danza ordering a mexican beer. Cor-OWN-er ("Hey Angela, go get me a coroner."). it was hard not to giggle in class.

but my absolute favorite saying of this professor is the substitution of the word "gouge" for the word "gauge." as in, "think about your surroundings and gouge your stories appropriately." i'm sure he doesn't even think about it, but the word takes on a totally different meaning when you pronounce it this way. does this not happen in morocco?

and it's got some hip music, too

2007-10-04T13:22:00.000-07:00

on the heels of britney not being fat, let's all take a moment to watch Dove's new internet ad about caring for your daughter's body image. it's like they heard my cries! at least somebody's paying attention.

Choose wisely, my friend

2007-09-27T07:58:00.000-07:00

At the risk of sounding blasphemous, I have to tell you a story. The other night RL and I went over to our friends-that-are-now-our-neighbors' house on a Friday night for a little campfire action. We had a few beers (I had my wine) and started a cornhole tournament. Well, RL and I were doing pretty well, and managed to make it to the final round against the formidable duo (the party hosts who we always lose to by just a smidge).

For some reason, someone decided that before the final round could begin we should do a little shot of tequila. There were a good number of us there, so the kitchen's entire shot glass collection all came out for the event. There were tall ones and short ones, shiny ones and dull ones.

As we gathered round the ole tequila to choose our shots, it dawned on me that this choice was like finding the Holy Grail. You know, like in Indiana Jones when he only has one chance to find Jesus' cup or his face would melt off? Sometimes I make these connections in my head and I'm not sure if anyone else if going to be on the same page as me. But I risked it.

Me: Choose wisely everyone. Think about what Jesus would drink out of.
Partygoer: You mean WWJDOO?

Hilarity ensues. Yes, WWJDOO. It's just funny thinking about Jesus standing around at a party drinking tequila out of a carefully chosen shot glass.

In other alcohol-related funnies, I flew Southwest to Chicago last weekend. The feisty flight attendant was taking our drink orders and the woman two seats down from me asked me what kind of red wine they had.
"Red," he said.
"Is it like a Cabernet?" she said.
"Um, it's red," he said.
"But is it--"
"It's red!" he snaps.
"Okay," says the passenger, resigning herself to drinking whatever the heck this guy was going to put in front of her.

This is Southwest people. Don't expect any frills.

Join me, on my high horse

2007-09-14T10:29:00.000-07:00

It's Thursday, let's talk about what's wrong with the world.

Rant #1: the people at wendy's in laramie don't care that i'm a vegetarian

It's true, they don't. Maybe I went a little overboard with my reaction to the poor cashier, but seriously? The fact that Wendy's has all of these nice salads, but they are all prepackaged with MEAT in them, is what's wrong with America. Did you notice that we're all fat (except for Britney, see below)? Did you notice that we treat animals horribly? Did you notice that there is absolutely nowhere in Laramie to go on a Sunday night to get a quick bite to eat that's not going to make you feel disgusting?

Sometimes I'm ok with agreeing to the fact that you're just not going to find a lot of vegetarian-friendly places in a small town in Wyoming. Sometimes I feel like saying, why the hell not? Evidence is coming out that our meat-consumption habits are doing more to harm the environment than driving our SUVs. I know people get nervous when we talk about something so close to home, but it's time to start really thinking about this.

Rant #2: people think Britney is fat

She may be kind of dumb, and sad, because capitalism/the promise of love and attention lured her into being nothing but an object. But please, folks, she is not fat. I know this conversation has been happening all over the place--"give her a break, she just had two kids" is the one I've been hearing a lot. I appreciate that people are pointing this out, but even if she didn't just have kids, SHE WOULD STILL NOT BE FAT. She's a perfectly normal sized person who just hasn't been able to keep up with her totally-unfeasible-in-the-real-world four-hour-a-day workouts.

The problem is that up until this point, Britney has existed only for our consumption, and we are angry at her that she is no longer the perfect little hot schoolgirl we wanted her to stay forever. What's even sadder is that the teenage girls who are carefully observing our behavior as a nation are internalizing our treatment of a woman like Britney.

This means that at 16 most girls are way over-sexualized*, that they will do a lot more to get the attention of boys, that ultimately they will place more importance on being attractive than being smart. What happened to the women's movement? Our rampant comsumerism is eclipsing our desire for equal rights. At some point, this is going to come back to haunt us.

Maybe I'm just speaking from my naive standpoint, since my teenage years were pretty well sheltered. If any girl in my high school came to school dressed like the girls are now, we would immediately think she was "troubled". Of course, that was almost 15 years ago, and I guess times do change. And I, apparently, get older.

What do you think?

++++++++++++++
*A side anecdote: I was in JC Penney in Amarillo, TX a few years ago when I overheard a few 50s-ish women browsing the junior's section. "Look at how short this skirt is!" I heard one of them say. "It's no wonder they all get pregnant--they just bend over and oops! there you go."

It's like we were in National Geographic or something

2007-09-13T15:16:00.000-07:00

Yeah, yeah, it's been awhile, but I've been busy. Last weekend I was busy attending wedding #3 of the summer (only one more to go!) in beautiful Jackson, Wyoming.

The highlights of the trip:

1) Staying in a fantabulous condo at Snow King resort (discounted courtesy of the bride and groom's connections). The master bathroom suite was bigger than our whole upstairs. And filled with Wyoming cowboy goodness.

2) RL's debut as "reverend" for the new couple. (He's already booked for several next year. What's the deal?)

3) Last but not least, an amazing float trip down the Snake River, at the foot of the Tetons. I was promised wildlife, but nothing like this. Within the first hour of the trip we looked over to the forest on the side of the river to see a herd of at least 100 bison tromping through the woods. We were all in shock, until, 10 minutes later, we see the bison actually crossing the water in front of us! We all got a little nervous when it looked like we were on a collision course for the guys just heading into the water. Everyone in my boat paddled quickly to make sure we didn't accidentally run into one of their horns (and end up in the water with them), and made it within 10 feet of them. A woman on our boat got these amazing pictures as we were passing them.

I have never before seen bison in the wild, and to come this close felt pretty surreal. We followed it up by an incredible bald eagle siting, and then a peek at a moose just hanging out in the woods (doubtless trying to not be seen).

Thank you, Wyoming!

Tuesday: Tripping to School

2007-09-04T20:55:00.000-07:00

My friend gave me some feedback on my blog and told me she liked the self-deprecating nature of it. In the spirit of that, here's a little more self-deprecation. It's amazing how easy it comes when you're kind of a klutz.

So today I was feeling sort of rushed as I left the house to get to my 9:30am class (so early). I managed to get on the right bus to get to class on time, but didn't manage to get there very gracefully. I got off the bus and was happily walking down the street, coffee in hand, when all of the sudden the sidewalk jumped in front of me and I nearly went down (to be fair, the sidewalks on that part of campus are notoriously frost-heaved*. Everyone knows it).

I don't know what I was looking at, but one of my classmates was about three feet in front of me, so when I almost went down, I nearly took her out. She's all walking down the street, totally not tripping, when all of the sudden she hears "Ack!" from behind her and turns to see me nearly crashing into her.

Some nice older ladies who were just passing stopped to make sure I was ok, and I of course tried to play it cool, but there was just no going back with the classmate. I tried to start a normal conversation as we walked to class, but I think she thought I was a little weird. To make matters worse, I totally cut my toe up on the stupid sidewalk. By the time I got to class it was bleeding and gross.

Ah yes, tripping during my second week of grad school. Reminds me of the time I tripped down the stairs on my first day of high school (true story! In a brand new school and everything). Here's to me learning how to walk better.

+++++++++++++++
*Meaning buckled, sticking up, whatever you want to call it. Thanks to RL for the whole "frost-heaved" descriptor though. He's very technical when it comes to cold weather problems.

Grad school is just like college, only different

2007-08-29T10:26:00.000-07:00

So I’m almost done with my first week of graduate school. It’s been a big week of firsts for me, since I took the bus for the first time (well, in Boulder), got lost on campus (had to ask a freshman for directions), and met a lot of new people.

Last week was actually the first time we met everyone, as we all sat through an entire day of orientation talks by just about every group on campus (no Womynists though. What kind of a PC campus is this?). By the end of this long day we were all sort of bonded in our common tiredness and looking forward to our short-by-comparison 2.5 hour classes.

But it was fun getting to know everyone, and, well, sizing each other up. Journalism is a practical degree, but only about half of the people have actual journalism experience. There’s that one woman who was working as an associate producer for Martha Stewart Living in NYC, another one who’s been writing for a newspaper in Argentina, and still another who’s making her own documentaries.

And then there are the brand new college grads, who have for some reason decided that two more years of school is the way to go right now. There’s the 50-year-old woman with three kids who wants to do something new and interesting, and the Jersey girl who, after getting to the orientation 30 minutes late, asked five million stupid questions in that irritating Jersey girl way. Later she proceeded to eat a bag of chips while sitting right behind me, crunching her way through a kind of important talk by the Dean. (Note to self: Do not sit near to Jersey girl in future classes.)

My favorite part of the day was on the bus ride home. I got surrounded by undergrads, who were sharing their own stories of life at school. Two boys/men sitting right next to me were chuckling about all of the freshmen who were wandering lost around campus, huddling around school maps trying to find their way to class. Then the subject turned to food, and boy/man #1 says “we’ve got to get some real food to eat. I mean, all we’ve been eating is ramen, hot dogs, ramen, pop tarts, and more ramen.” Ah yes, the foods of the undergraduate gods. Thank god I’m not one of them anymore.

Friday: Bad Manners at the Movies

2007-08-24T15:59:00.000-07:00

I like going to see movies, and I don't mind going to see them alone. What's the point of having a date? You're there to watch the movie, not talk to the person (ya hear that, movie-talkers*?).

Today I was in the new theater in town, the one with stadium seating and everything. The problem with these theaters is that now you have to enter from the front, in full view of all of the already-seated audience members. Before you could sneak in the back and find a spot without drawing too much attention to yourself. Not that I have a problem with doing things on my own, I just don't want to have to give anyone that "yeah, i'm alone, you got a problem with that?" glare (must be leftover from city living).

So I found the closest seat--careful not to make eye contact with anyone--which happened to be in front of three chatty older ladies. A moment later, an older gentleman walked in the theater and took the chair two seats down from me.

At this point I'm not worried. Until the opening credits start. Chatty Cathies 1,2, and 3 start up their conversation again. I breathe deep, and think that they'll have to stop when the movie actually starts, right? Then Mr. Older Gentleman starts up his own conversation. With SLEEP. This guy seriously came in, sat down, and started snoring. Seriously? Why would you pay $8 to take a nap?

I sit there for awhile, thinking about moving up a row, when someone a few chairs down (past Mr. Snores-a-Lot) starts shaking the dregs of their Slurpee and making that whistling sound with their straw. The last straw, as far as I was concerned. So I picked up my stuff and moved.

After that the movie was great. If only I could see movies totally alone, minus the annoying strangers with bad manners. And hey, at least it wasn't as bad as the time I was watching Snatch by myself and was almost molested by that creepy stranger who had clearly misinterpreted the title. Talk about bad manners.

+++++++
*As a sidenote, my friend Mindy actually got into it once with some chatty people sitting behind her at a movie. "I wish you wouldn't have talked so much," she said as they were walking out. "Yeah, what are you gonna do about it?" they replied. "Whatever, you're just a bunch of, of, movie-talkers!" Not Mindy's wittiest moment, but I think she imbued her jibe with just the right amount of passion.

Punchbug, in all its glory

2007-08-22T13:12:00.000-07:00

RL and I pride ourselves on several things: making up silly words and phrases, blaming each other for our own misdeeds, and the most serious game of Punchbug the world has ever seen.

It's no longer just one punch when you see a Bug. It's two punches if the Bug's moving. You can punch someone multiple times if you see the Bug twice in a short amount of time (e.g. coming into and out of a parking lot), unless you have agreed that that Bug is off-limits. If you are alone and you see one you have to punch yourself, but you can also punch the other person when you get home for all the Bugs you saw without them. Lately RL has taken to just punching me as many times as possible before I scream "ow!"

Didn't I tell you it was serious?

The other day, as we embarked on a road trip to go camping, RL decided to pre-emptively punch me for all of the Bugs he was bound to see before me on our journey. I'm convinced that was why, as we slept in our tent later that night, RL woke up to ME punching HIM. Here's our verbatim, mostly asleep conversation.

Me, solidly asleep: (punch-punch-punch)
RL, waking up: What are you punching me for?
Me, groggily realizing that I have just dreamt about bugs, and that it doesn't count if they AREN'T REAL BUGS: Um, nothing, I was just dreaming about a bug.
RL: There was a bug in your dream and you want me to kill it?
Me: No, it was a Punchbug!
RL: Well if there was only one Bug, why did you punch me three times?
Me: There were two bugs.
RL, surprisingly lucid: That still doesn't count for three punches.
Me: I was sleeping. I don't really know what I was doing.

Sorry babe. But you started it.

You guys know this place is clothing optional, right? (Part II)

2007-08-21T09:26:00.000-07:00

When we left our heroines, they were about to embark on an exciting campground adventure…

As we drove into the site, snowflakes began gently fluttering to the ground. We parked the car, unloaded the “mondo condo” (the only tent left at the rec center) and began blindly trying to put together this unknown and ridiculously large tent in the pitch-black, near-blizzarding mountains of Colorado. Neither of us had thought to bring a flashlight, and the batteries in the tiny keychain light that we had brought died within minutes.

So we ditched our tent-erection attempts, and decided to hunt down some firewood. If we could get a fire going, we’d be able to see much better, right? We wandered over to the campsite’s designated wood pile, consisting of a rather sizeable log in a trough, which we were meant to cut with a rather less sizeable hacksaw.

Cold, tired, and not really knowing what we were doing, we made our first few feeble attempts at hacking. Suddenly, out of the nearby sauna building came a gray-haired man with a pot belly and a cigar. Naked. He sat outside the steamy enclosure for a few minutes and watched as we struggled in our frustration. Finally, Mr. Pot Belly gets up, saunters over our direction, and tells us we’re doing it all wrong. Naked. Then he proceeds to pick up the saw and show us how the saw is meant to be used. Did I mention he was naked?

Daisy and I stood back, stifling giggles and giving each other “is this really happening?” looks. Finally, once Mr. Pot Belly felt he had sufficiently demonstrated his sawing prowess, he left us and went back into the sauna. We stood there for awhile, incredulous, frustrated, and ready to give up.

And give up we did. As it turns out, we didn’t have the skills, equipment, or patience to finish the job. Hanging our heads in shame, we packed up the car and headed home. In hindsight it was a good thing we did—the storm of the decade dumped on Colorado that night, closed roads and stranded hundreds of students on their own adventure. If we hadn’t been so ill prepared, we might have been stuck sleeping in the sauna with Mr. Pot Belly, smoking cigars and eating the last scraps of our PB&Js.

Wednesday: My No Good Very Bad Day

2007-08-17T11:30:00.000-07:00

Today I:
1) Woke up on the wrong side of the bed (apparently);
2) Stubbed my toe;
3) Dropped a plastic jar of hummus on the ground and broke it; and
4) Pissed my cat off, to which she responded by scratching me. Repeatedly.
And that was before I left the house.

When I did leave the house I got in the car to run some errands, namely getting a wedding present ready to send. I had already re-hot-glued the homemade present (it had come apart after sitting in my hot car for an hour), and was finally ready to get it in a box and ship it off. Since I didn’t have any boxes lying around (one of the downsides to not having an office job—no access to random stuff like that), I thought I’d just go to a nearby packaging store and get them to find a box and fill it with peanuts.

The clerk at the store takes some measurements and asks how I want to send it. “Cheap!” I respond. He says the cheapest he can do is FedEx Ground, and that’s $21. The cheapest is $21?!!?? “Half of that is the box, and half is the shipping,” he assures me.

Unfortunately I’m not really prepared to pay $10 for a cardboard box. Nuh-uh, I say, and walk out of the store, resolving to find my own box and stuff some newspaper into it, like all normal shipping people. As I’m driving home, I remember that the liquor store around the corner always has boxes to give away. I stop and pick one up, and am delighted to find a Sierra Nevada box (the happy couple that I’m sending this to love this beer, and they just got married in the Sierra Nevadas. What could be cuter?).

I bring my little box home, happy I have saved myself $10, when it dawns on me that you can’t send liquor boxes through the mail. Even if they don’t have liquor in them. Erg.

Frustrated, I set aside that project, and get ready for a bike ride to run a few more errands. I run around the house, looking worriedly at the darkening sky, and resolve to ride no matter what. Then of course, the moment I step out of the garage, the rain starts. I linger for a few minutes, go back to the house, linger for a few more minutes, and the rain dwindles.

Now that the rain’s gone, the bike ride is hot—and rather humid. But I make my way to campus, and get right to the building I was looking for. Success! Except for the fact that I’ve forgotten my bike lock (rookie mistake). From what I’ve heard, leaving your bike unlocked on campus is not the best idea. So I leave it where I can see it from the windows of the card office, where I’m about to get my picture taken for my school ID, envisioning a scenario in which my bike gets stolen and my bad day turns into a really bad day.

In the card office, I learn that the computers are down all over campus, and I might have to wait awhile. Fine, I think, I’ll go check on my bike, and stop by the career services office. There I learn that they can’t really help me, and I probably should head over to the student employment office across campus. Great, I think. Another errand. I walk back outside and check on my bike (still there) and head back to the card office. They look at me sadly, say they’ll do their best, and apologize. I decide to wait it out, as long as I can see my bike. Finally, miraculously, they are able to print me a card. The sad news is that sweaty bike ride does not equal terribly attractive ID photo. I shrug, take my card, and get back on my bike.

I ride up the hill, stop at a light and wait to cross. Suddenly a big truck passes, and in a split second something has flown off the top of the truck and hit me in the leg. It was a mushroom, of all things, a big one. Thank goodness it wasn’t a chunk of cheese, or, god forbid, a steak.

By this point I have to laugh at how ridiculous the situation is. I’ve just been hit by an errant mushroom on Broadway. What? I giggle to myself the whole way home, where I swap my bike for my car to get to my next appointment. The next appointment is a haircut, which I think is at 3 o’clock. It’s not—it’s at 2:30, so by the time I get there my girl is on her next client. Looks like I’ll have to wait awhile til she’s free again.

Finally, errands done, bangs trimmed, I go home and collapse. The day’s not over yet, but apart from the hurricane-like hailstorm outside, I think the evening’s got to get better.

Tuesday: Fun with Animals

2007-08-16T07:43:00.000-07:00

Mr. Squirrel: "Maybe if I just flatten my tocks I'll blend in."

Mr. Squirrel: "Gah! Kitteh! Steady, steady. Just be cool Mr. Squirrel, you know what to do. You've dealt with evil kitteh before and she hasn't beat you yet...Commence squirrel barking!"

You Guys Know This Place is Clothing Optional, Right? (Part I)

2007-08-14T15:31:00.000-07:00

One of my favorite stories ever happened in a moment where my still-to-this-day-good-friend Daisy and I were becoming close and trying to be adventurous. We were in the middle of college, and we decided that a good old-fashioned camping trip would solidify our friendship. I knew of a spot in the mountains, about three hours away from school, and after class let out on Wednesday, we packed up the car with our PB&Js—pilfered from the school cafeteria—and a borrowed tent from the outdoor recreation center.

Daisy had talked to me of her life-changing Outward Bound experience as a teenager, and though I was a bit of a camping virgin, I trusted that she knew enough about the outdoors to get us both through. We had shelter, snacks, and some sleeping bags. What more did we need?

On the trip out there Daisy and I taught each other our favorite car games, talked about life, and realized that we both loved the same obscure k.d. lang song. But by the time we arrived at our campsite/hot springs, it was nearly midnight. We paid our dues, collected our towels, and listened to the campground manager tell us two things: a snowstorm was moving in—and it was supposed to be a big one—and the hot springs were clothing optional (so don’t be too surprised if you see people wandering the campground naked).

We laughed, overconfident in our college worldliness and outdoor preparedness. At that moment we should have just turned around and gone home for all the good the next hour did us.

Old timey radio voice: Stay tuned for Part II of our exciting adventure, wherein our two daring heroines face cold, snow, and a little too much nudity. Will they survive?

Two broken windows, with a side of redneck please

2007-08-06T10:56:00.000-07:00

Sometimes you try and do a good thing and you just end up getting pooped on. Last weekend, as RL and I were wrapping up the Relay for Life we helped plan, we had a little accident with a light stand and a generator. We were hauling the thing back to the rental place—whose drivers had all worked too much that week, and couldn’t drive the extra two miles to pick up this unwieldy piece of equipment—when the hitch came undone. Hearing the thing dragging on the ground, RL hit the brakes and all of the sudden the boom was in our backseat.

Now, I don’t love this car. It’s a 17-year-old Blazer, and about every single luxury feature the car ever had has managed to stop working (and by “luxury” I mean air conditioning, defrost, and the ability to tell which gear you’re in while driving). So with a crunched back gate, now windowless, the first words out of my mouth are, “at least now we’ll have better air flow.” Seriously, the car is on its last legs, and that’s why neither of us was terribly upset over the accident.

But without any plans to replace the car in the next few weeks, RL decided to head on over to the junkyard and see if he could just grab a few parts and replace the back end himself. $125 later, he’s got a new back gate and a new window. Though I’ve never actually done any auto body work, I agree to watch/help as he installs the stuff.

So all is going fairly, strangely, well—we get on the gate without any major problems, and move onto the glass. Only a few more bolts through the window and we’re set. So here I am holding the underside of the glass as RL is tightening the window onto the car, when all of the sudden the glass shatters, about two inches from each of our faces. Amazingly both of us survive without much more than some tiny scratches and a few straggling bits of glass (and in RL’s case, those straggling bits all got trapped in his forest of arm hair. It's quite impressive). Once we realize that we’re okay, we start to laugh about the inevitability of something going wrong in every project that we do.

But we never could have predicted how this project was going to turn out.

The next day RL heads back to the junkyard. Of course he has to hang his head a little in telling these guys that yes, he needed another window because the last one didn’t quite work out. By the time he arrives at the yard they’ve pulled out just the window for him. I think they felt sorry for him, so they helped him put it on, obscene sticker and all.

I’ve amended the photo, but you get the idea. RL has since removed the sticker in embarassment, but I knew we had to have some way of remembering that, for at least a few days, he was a redneck.

My Kickball Team, or How I Spend My Monday Nights

2007-08-02T12:49:00.000-07:00

Last Monday night my kickball team came dangerously close to ruining our one-loss-per-season streak. Against a team that hadn’t WON a single game. And who were fairly skeezy kickball players. That's right, skeezy.

I should start by saying this is how we spend our Monday nights: dressing in silly costumes, drinking Pabst Blue Ribbon, and running the bases with all we’ve got. And our team rocks. We refuse to create a batting order, give out an award each week for the person who has most sacrificed their body for the game (read: bleeding most profusely), and generally try not to take it too seriously.

Until we meet another team that does take it too seriously. This last team was pretty good, but they also played pretty dirty. The pitcher was hurling balls at our batters so fast that we barely had a chance to kick. One runner took out our second basewoman as he was rounding the base. And one husky woman kept trying to lead off the base (this is what we call cheating).

After I saw that, I knew I had to keep an eye on her. She was one of those ex-softball player types, and reminded me of Velda, Shelley Long’s troop leader foe from Troop Beverly Hills (don’t pretend like you don’t know who I’m talking about). Velda, as I’ll call her, bossed her team around, edged in off of the grass when the girls kicked (also cheating), and generally made me mad. I’m sure I sounded like a little whiny brat when I was trying to get someone—anyone—to pay attention to my pleas to watch as she led off. But kickball is about having fun! It’s not about cheating! I’ll whine if I have to to protect the integrity of this game!

In the fifth inning my mom, who was in the stands, began cheering for me as I walked up to the plate. “Do a Leckonby!” she yelled, referencing my boyfriend’s earlier two-run-producing kick. Thanks Mom, I always love to be held up to someone else’s standard of athleticism, especially my boyfriend's. The resulting kick was a pop fly—right into Velda’s arms. Erg.

The thing with our team is that we have a lot of fun, but only because we manage to beat almost everyone. If we didn’t keep winning, I can’t imagine we would have such a good time. We cheer every time one of our players slides into a base unnecessarily (hence the bleeding), makes a diving catch, or pegs out an opposing player with a great throw (you can do that in kickball! If only that was legal in softball). Oh yes, the glories of kickball are many, especially when your third basemen is wearing a Twinkie costume.

My date with Mr. Entomologist

2007-07-31T07:35:00.000-07:00

Or as I called him, “the bug guy.” I used to work for a natural history museum, one of those with a large collection of dead mammals, dead birds, and of course, dead bugs. The entomologists who researched these bugs would display their drawerfuls of colorful beetles, many legged centipedes, and rare stick insects with pride and excitement as they talked about what makes the study of insects just so fascinating.

So one Friday evening, as people from around the museum came together and drank their way into the weekend, I started chatting up one of the guys who worked in the insect collections. I had noticed him before, knew he was a bit older, but thought he had some sort of Clooney-esque charm to him. He was not terribly interesting to begin with, but I hadn’t been on a date in awhile—since I had gotten out of my last long-term relationship—and I thought I could use the practice. He asked for my number and we planned to have dinner the following week.

The evening of the date, I got ready, feeling happy about the simple fact that I was going out on a date. I wasn’t desperate, it had just been a few months, and it felt good to be, well, normal. We met for dinner at a Mediterranean restaurant, talked about our lives, and it seemed to be going okay.

Until he pulled out his favorite bug. Seriously.

I think he felt like things were going well enough that I could be trusted to appreciate the things that made him tick (no pun intended). He told me that this small beetle, encased in its little resin cube, was the reason that he got into his field, the thing that really inspired him about entomology. Blah, blah, blah.

Now, picture me on the other side of the table, mouth somewhat agape and a million things running through my mind: What do I say? Why didn’t I foresee this? I guess it’s nice that he feels inspired, but by that? I don’t even like bugs. How do I get out of this?

After (what felt like) a few minutes I pulled myself together and tried to change the subject. By the end of dinner I was feigning tiredness and trying to play up the whole “I have to be at work early tomorrow” thing. He tried pushing for another drink, but I managed to cut it short.

So you’d think I could put the date behind me, right? Not quite.

By 9am the next morning I had an email waiting for me from Mr. Bug Guy. “I really enjoyed our time last night. You’re smart and sexy and I’d like to go out again. What are you doing this weekend?”

Bad form, dude. Hasn’t anyone ever told you that it’s not cool to contact the girl within the first 12 hours after the date, especially when it was clear that she wasn’t that into you? Wanting to nip the situation in the bud, I quickly wrote him back and said maybe we could be friends, but I didn’t really think we were “relationship material.” Then came a flurry of emails over the next few days, all saying about the same thing: “Maybe I came on too strong. Give me another chance. Won’t you just have one more drink with me?”

After awhile I stopped trying to spare his feelings and just didn’t write back. The next week he began apologizing for the previous emails, saying that he felt like he was digging himself into a hole and he didn’t know what to do. Unfortunately I didn’t know what to tell him. There was certainly a hole, and I wasn’t going to help him out of it.

By then it was comical—I started sharing Bug Guy’s ridiculous messages with my friends, who looked at me with that I-told-you-so look. As in, they told me not to date someone from work. Especially someone from bugs. What was I thinking? In the following months I avoided him as best I could, and tried to seem friendly, but his complete and utter inability to act in a normal social manner made it difficult to overcome what was, possibly, the worst date I’ve ever been on. Since then I’ve made sure that future dates have passed a serious screening and reference process, including a “pocket check” to ensure that there aren’t any unwanted creatures joining us for dinner.

Check out other people’s bad dates at Dating Tales.

Warning: Cattiness in Courtroom 12

2007-07-22T09:57:00.000-07:00

A few days ago I did some volunteer work for my company, sitting as a member of a “fake jury” and critiquing lawyers on their “fake delivery” of opening and closing statements. The attorneys use a “fake case” to practice their courtroom skills, and in some instances, they will actually practice these skills in front of folks who get paid to pretend like they actually care.

For years my company has relied on groups of retirees for this service, paying them a small fee and feeding them breakfast for their time. I got recruited because they were short a few senior citizens (don’t ask my why), and they needed another person to sit in. Eager to get out of sitting at my desk, I agreed.

When I walked into the gathering room at 8 o’clock that morning, I could already see that these seniors were settled into their social cliques. They had separated to different tables, munching their bagels and holding their private conversations.

When we moved into our individual “fake courtrooms,” I got placed with three white-haired ladies, of varying ages and states of hearing loss, and sat and listened as they chatted about their upcoming social activities.

Apparently they were going to the dinner theater. And apparently, one of their fellow retirement-village residents had waited too long to purchase her tickets. Suddenly, everyone was talking about this woman and rattling off the times that she had “forgotten” something or had screwed something up. I was shocked by the downright maliciousness in these women’s comments, talking about a friend of theirs who was getting on in age, and in their words, “really failing fast.”

I tried to suppress a chuckle as I sat and thought about the irony of this—these women, breaking down someone else’s “failings,” which were not such a distant prospect in their own lives. And really? Their behavior was not so different than what we experienced on the playground. When we’re threatened by what the world is about to offer us, we find the weakest link and start picking, just to assure ourselves that we are not so bad off.

For me it was a reality check. I thought I had left that cattiness behind in high school. Now I know it’s just a few short years before I’m right back in the middle of it.

You and me and the parking spot we fight over

2007-07-16T18:11:00.000-07:00

When I lived in Chicago parking was a big deal. My apartment near Wrigley Field had such limited parking that I literally planned my life around not going out with the car past 7pm on weeknights, 5pm on the weekends. Later, when I lived in a more normal neighborhood, I relaxed my parking policies, but was still thrilled when I could find a spot on my block.

Now I live in an apartment/townhouse complex in uber-relaxed Colorado, and there’s almost always a whole blockful of parking right in front of my house. You’d think this would make me happy to no end. And it does. But in addition to the plentiful street parking, there’s also a parking lot, right next to my house. We have one reserved parking spot in said lot, and there’s a great unreserved spot right next to it. Now, to be honest, this spot is actually an extra few steps to my front door than the almost-always available street spot in front of the house. The difference is that the street spot’s much harder to get out of, as the u-turn required to leave the complex necessitates a several point turn.

Small details, right? It would be, except that now it’s a matter of honor.

A few months ago, a blond-bearded hippie in a rusty grey Jetta started parking in my lot spot. Being the hippie that he is, he only uses his car once in awhile. This means that when his car’s parked somewhere, it’s parked somewhere.

Last weekend was a perfect example of my annoyance with this situation. I left my house for a few hours, clearly noting that the Jetta was parked in a lot across the street (where Hippie’s house actually is).

When I came home his spot across the street was empty. But my beloved spot was not. Convinced that he had seen me leave the house and stealthily slipped out to move his car into my spot, just to piss me off, I nearly shook my fists into the air (in the general direction of his house). The Jetta then sat there for days.

But today, the game changed. Coming home from work, I rounded the corner to my house, and saw it: the beloved parking spot was free. Ha ha! I had beaten him at his own game! I had chosen the perfect moment to arrive at home, during Hippie’s one miniscule outing of the week, and could reclaim the glorious slot.

But wait, what was that in my rearview mirror? It looks like a Jetta. A grey, rusting Jetta. Could it be? Had I actually cut it this close? I glance back and see him glaring at me, knowing he knows that I am his foe and I have won.

Instinctively I speed up, wanting to eliminate any possibility that he could sneak by me in the next 300 yards and take the spot out from under me. I slow towards the lot, making sure my turn signal is on and Hippie knows where I’m going. That’s right buddy! It’s mine!

He pulls into the lot across the street, and I work hard at looking casual as I exit the car, covertly glancing over as he makes his own way home. As I enter the house, I breathe a sigh of relief. For the moment, I am the parking lot queen. And boy, does it feel good.

ingredients: marine lipids

2007-07-12T14:50:00.001-07:00

My boyfriend smells like fish today. Why, you ask? Did he munch on some tuna for lunch? Spend an afternoon at the seaside? Nope.

Last night, when he was rubbing yet another goop-ful of Neosporin on his kickball wounds, I suggested that some Vitamin E oil might help it heal quicker. Not wanting to go all the way upstairs to get said oil, he says he'll do it later.

Fast forward to us going to bed two hours later, wherein I have placed his two nightly vitamins on his side of the bed (I'm sorry, when did we turn into our grandparents?). The supplements are Vitamin C and Fish Oil, to be exact. Now, even though the vitamin bottles reside on my side of the bed, RL knows what he's taking every night. He knows that this little capsule is fish oil, not Vitamin E. Yes, they LOOK an awful lot alike, but they are not, in fact, the same thing. But before my very eyes he bites off the tip of the fish oil and proceeds to spread the marine lipidy goodness all over.

The funniest part of this story is that I didn't think a thing of it. I am the one that emptied the little capsule into my hand, directly from the fish oil jar. I watched him as he spread. And then I quietly went to sleep beside him.

After this morning's shower he went back to his half-empty capsule, and continued spreading. Something clicks on in my mind--I see the jar flash before my eyes, replay last night's conversation about Vitamin E, and it dawns on me even as I catch the first scent of fishiness emanating from his person. "What you're using there? That's fish oil. Why are you doing that?"

A few hours later I get the following email:

"Computer is locking me out and i smell like fish. f%*k."

It's okay, the absent-mindedness is endearing and reminds me of my mother. OMG.