stream of consciousness

Isn't it odd how you bounce around from thought to thought and wind up someplace that really had nothing to do with the first thought?I sat down to study for my constitutional law class and started reading a chapter on the 2nd Amendment (which actually I should have read a month ago but hey...procrastination is a skill I've mastered, though frankly it took a long time ba-dum-bum). So I started thinking about gun ownership, which made me start thinking about the DC snipers. That made me think about the media and how for the longest time all you heard about was Malvo and Mohammed and their lives before they went bat-shit crazy. So then I started thinking, "Wow, wouldn't it be weird to have known them before that and have thought they were pretty cool guys who just did some weird shit?" Which made me think about something I saw on television once. It was a show about crime in the military. Some quick background, when I joined the army years and years ago they had just started integrating basic training (females & males together), so for a while there were video cameras following us around. So I'm watching this show and I swear I see people I know from boot camp and then I swear I see myself marching past the camera, which of course makes me continue watching the show. Then they start talking about Ft. Carson, Colorado, where I was stationed for less than a year. They start talking about street gangs in the military and show some surveillance camera footage of a military guy buying guns for the gang he's in. So I'm thinking, "HOLY FUCK, that looks just like ______." Then they say his name and lo-and-behold it is _______. They show his apartment and I had actually been there, but apparently I missed the closet full of weapons, the potato silencer, the backpacks full of weed and crack, and drawers of money the feds confiscated. WHOA! So now I'm looking on the internet for the name of that show so that I can buy a copy of it and see if I really was on the show, which means that I'm very much NOT studying. And that's the story of how I went from reading about the meaning of the preamble in 2nd Amendment to looking to see if I've actually been on A&E before.

unremarkable part deux

A couple of days has passed since my encounter with the guy I work with, the one that left me slightly humiliated as D. didn't recognize me, even though we've worked together for about a year. So on Monday I saw him on my way to break and I screamed in my high-pitched, whiny- girl voice "So do you recognize me now?!?" He laughed, and I guess as an act of contrition he sat with us during breakfast. He complimented me profusely, "You looked so nice...Your makeup was gorgeous, it looked airbrushed...I didn't know your hair looked like that...You just looked so different." And today he told another gal we work with the same thing, "D. said he saw you Saturday, he said you were SO pretty." So, I guess that means I look ten kinds of ugly at work since they went on about how pretty I looked that night. Not being one to NOT point out a backhanded compliment, I said, "So I guess that must mean I'm really ugly at work." Wow, who knew I looked so hideous during daylight hours. I suppose this makes me the antithesis of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, I go from nasty during the day to normal when the sun sets.

dropping the kids off

Every day there is some family here to look at the house. And within ten minutes of them showing up for their appointment I feel the urge to...well you know. But I don't want to drop the kids off and then have somebody coming through the house. I can just picture it, a nice young couple holding hands and giggling at the prospect of having their first real home. They look at the fireplace and think of all the romantic evenings they can have, lying in front of the roaring fire naked, sipping only the finest wine that Fetzer offers. They're touring the basement and small bedroom thinking "Golly Susan, wouldn't a family room be nice? We could make this bedroom the guest room and then maybe it can become a nursery later?" Then they open the bathroom door and whammo, eau de fully digested processed cafeteria food. I wouldn't want to associate this money-trap with the number two, I hope my landlady appreciates the sacrifices I'm making for her.

unremarkable

So this weekend I went out with G.H. Dickington, the artist formerly known as Bobby. We get there and decide to go to the drag show and low and behold I see somebody I work with at the table in front of us. So being the gracious queen o' manners that I am, I went over to say hello. It went a little something like this:
Me: HEEEYYYYYY! How are you?
Him: Hi, ummmmm okay.
Me: Did you watch the other show?
Him: Uhh. Do I know you?
Me: Ummm, yeah we work together?!?
Him: Where?Me: Ummm, at __________ in the lab.
Him: We do?
Me: Ummmm yeah (at this point my self-esteem has been torn to teeny shreds that float to the ground with the shards of my dignity as I whip off my glasses and push my bangs away from my face to become my own version of Diane Prince)
Him: OOOHHHHHHHHH!!!! Wow, I didn't recognize you. It's the make-up and hair and glasses. You look so different.
Me: RIIIIGGGHHHTTTTT!
So we do the whole small talk, make nice song and dance and then off I go to my table. Then later that night I see somebody I know through a friend. We're in the bathroom, and since I can never make the same mistake just ONCE:
Me: Hi, how's it going?
Him: Good, how are you?
Me: Good.
Him: Where do I know you from again?
Me: I'm a friend of ______'s. We sort of hung out last weekend.
Him: Oh that's right. I'm sorry, I meet so many people and you look different tonight.
Me: RIIIIGGGGHHHHTTTT!

So I've figured it out, when I turn to my life of crime to pay for my bad habits...I'm going to rob gay-bars because apparently they won't be able to identify me and I won't even need a disguise. It'll be perfect!!!

hush hush

Can I tell you a secret? Promise not to tell ANYBODY? Okay...I'm warning you though, it might completely change the way you see me. Ready?









I just bought a Kelly Clarkson song off of iTunes.
Don't hate me, I just couldn't help myself. The song grew on my like a bad case of herpes, one day I was fine and then BAM full-blown bad pop-song mania. I think this might be a cry for help.

setting up shop

While perusing other blogs, I noticed a mild disagreement in the comment section about what constituted a person "living" somewhere. I guess somebody said they had "lived" somewhere for six months and another person said that six months didn't count as "living" somewhere, merely visiting. Well my personal opinion in this matter is that if you have received mail and paid at least three different bills (i.e. rent, phone, electricity) then you have actually lived there. So with that in mind, here are all of the places I've lived:

Pusan, Korea
Seoul, Korea
Amsterdam (Everybody always gets excited when they hear this, but seriously...I was like three, one of the few things I remember about that place is that an ice-cream man would come by and sell the most awesome waffles EVER!)
Ansbach, Germany
San Bernadino, CA
Redlands, CA
Ft. Leonard Wood, MO
San Antonio, TX
Puyallup, WA
Steilacoom/Lakewood/Tacoma, WA
Colorado Springs, CO
Washington DC/Arlington, VA
Newport News, VA
Mililani/Honolulu, HI
Radcliff/Louisville, KY

the answer is always no

Maybe the idea of springtime romance is making all the users of yahoo messenger a little hormonal and crazy because I have been getting more im-ing than usual and more visitors to this site from my yahoo profile. So just in case you are here from yahoo, let me clue you in to a few things:

o Don't pretend like "my English...not so good" and then the VERY next question be able to say, "Are you sexy? Do you have any pictures of you naked?" Seriously, the answer to that...NO!
o Don't ask me to be my friend and then say "I would like American wife, I want come to America for making money." Again, to all marriage proposals, no matter the location of the asker...the answer equals NO!
o Don't ask me to send pictures of me if you don't have pictures of you. Especially when you say something like "I don't want random strangers on the internet knowing what I look like." Ummm, okay shallow asshole hypocrite...gonna go with NO! here.
o Don't assume that because I'm bored enough to chat with you on yahoo that I'm even vaguely interested in meeting you in person. Don't ask me to call you or hang out with you or get drunk with you. Not only is that a NO!, but it's a HELL NO!
o Don't under any circumstances have your first line be "You're hot!" or anything along those lines. Seriously, the reason why I have that weirdish picture and not some cleavage baring glamour shot is because I don't have low self-esteem, ergo I don't give two shits or a fuck about whether you find me attractive.

tick tock tick tock

Wow, barely a month to go before I leave this place. It's starting to make me a little nostalgic for the things that I'll be leaving. Some of the things I'll miss.

o Bobby, aka GaBS Calhoun. The f to my h, the person who keeps me entertained with his gladiator conquests, my sometimes alter-ego who makes me want to be a more outgoing person.
o Katie McW. The person who stuns with me her breadth of knowledge of the weirdest things...like the meanings behind cemetery sculptures, ornamental grasses, and bagworms, my fellow Zhongwen learning friend and road-trip companion, the gal who makes me want to be more easy-going.
o School. What's better than going to school for a few short hours a week and then justifying only working part-time by claiming to be busy with school? Plus associating with young people makes me look younger than I actually am...Score!
o Low cost of living. It'll be a sad sad day when I actually realize how little my housing dollar is going to get me in the Seattle/Tacoma area. Probably a studio with a leaky ceiling, faulty electrical wiring that reeks of cat urine and has a crack-house next door.
o Work. It'll be even sadder when I have to work a job that isn't as accommodating and doesn't pay me too much for the lab-monkey, button pushing work I do now.
o Digital cable and HBO/Showtime. Who knows how long I'll have to do without? But I refuse to go without at least a DSL line. I'll pimp myself on the streets before I ever have to hear that click-click-click then whir of the relic known as dial-up.

Things I won't miss:
o My stupid landlady who doesn't take care of shit and is being overly aggressive about selling her money trap house and not taking into account the fact that I still FUCKING LIVE HERE!!!
o Humidity...and bad hair.
o School. I can't pontificate about feminist scholarship any more.
o The fact that nobody around here uses a turn signal. Seriously, what's so hard about it? You don't even have to take your hand off of the steering wheel.
o Ohio valley crud. It'll be nice to have a sense of smell again.

movie reviewie

I saw Sin City this weekend. After reading Katie's glowing review of the movie I had really high expectations. Maybe they were too high because honestly, I couldn't really get into this flick. Granted, it is the rare movie that can do a comic or book justice on the big screen. But if you want my opinion (which you must because here you are reading a page devoted to my mental vomit) this was an amazingly stylized cliche wrapped in the vision of bad actresses with big boobs. I have to say though that I loved the look of the movie, the black and white with the occasional vivid splash of color, the portrayal of seedy urban decay, Clive Owen...but the rest of it just didn't do it for me. And for the love of god, this movie was LONG, REALLY LONG. It was like Return of the King...every time a vignette ended you thought, "Oh, this has to be it, I really have to pee." BUT IT NEVER WAS. There was always another story, and frankly I think I did irreparable damage to my bladder. If anybody else saw it, what did you think?

that's what friends are for

There is nothing worse than a person who tells you they are going to do something and then flakes without at least the courtesy of calling you and LYING about why they're blowing you off. Well maybe somebody who blows their nose while you're eating is worse...but it's definitely a close call.

birds and the bees

Ahhhh, spring. When the hazy blue skies and warm weather are mere indicators of the balmy sweaty summer months ahead, when hair like mine goes from just slightly frizzy to just slightly less attractive than Roseanne Roseanna Danna When the suburban automatons go out to their lush velvet yards and plant their hopeful spring gardens, hoping that by Memorial Day they'll have the best rhododendrons and roses on the block. When people start walking their dogs again and the amount of poo you have to dodge in the park increases trifold. When condom sales become inversely proportional to the amount of clothes people are wearing. I wish it were autumn.

touchy feely

What is it about drunk people that makes them think that touching is ok? I can barely stand people I know touching me, but then you throw in the drunk, spittle machine, sweaty stranger factor and ugh...geeerrooossss.

zestfully clean

I have a couple of extra minutes to post this morning because I CAN'T take a shower since I have one of those holter monitor heart thingies on. Let me tell you, wiping at your armpits with a towel is nowhere near scubbing at them in a burning hot shower. I feel gross. And sometime during the night one of the LEDs unplugged themselves so I'll have to start all over again. Bummer.

living on a prayer

If I win at least four numbers on my lottery ticket, I will IMMEDIATELY buy tickets for this.

imagine the world's most beautiful flower

Some things I just cannot understand. At work towards the end of the shift, we were standing around shootin' the shit as we were unusually slow. Somehow we ended up talking about autopsies and then the conversation turned to "What's the grossest thing you've ever seen?" I always lose this game because I can't even look at pictures of the Pope laid out, much less actually be near some lifeless body. So we're talking and then somehow we end up talking about doctor's visits and somewhere along the line I say "Yeah, I have a pap smear tomorrow." Judging by the uncomfortable silence and the uneasy shifting of eyes, you would have thought I had just admitted allegiance to al Qaida, the Nazis, and the Huns. So we can talk about the two week dead lady with maggots eating out her eyes or the burnt carcasses of a couple that had been caught cheating by the husband or the big fat loogie hanging out of a trache hole...but GOD FORBID I mention the routine exam on my cooter. For god's sake fifty-one percent of the planet have one, and about fifty-one percent of the planet want to have an intimate relationship with somebody else's. So what's with all the unease?

sports page

Granted I'm not much of a sports fan but I have to give it up to our basketball team. They competed against huge schools with much bigger programs and recruiting potential, were often considered the underdog and STILL managed to make it to the Final Four. U of L has had a really good year for sports and while it would have been sweet to graduate the same year the Cards won it all, you gotta admit this team was awesome.

official papers

Maybe I've seen While You Were Sleeping too many times, but today I went out and applied for a passport. I'm not really sure why, I have no out-of-country travel plans in the near future but I figure if I ever meet a old-monied Dutchman who wants to take me jetsetting throughout Europe on his dime, I might as well be prepared right? Anyway, part of the application process involves submitting your old passport, which I got when I was thirteen. Looking at the thirteen year old version of LisaM. and the twenty-nine year old version, I realized that I look exactly the same, and I do mean EXACTLY THE SAME. Even the postal worker was amazed. It's almost freakish, I am either extremely youthful looking now or I was really old looking when I was thirteen. Personally I'm going with the former as the narcissist in me refuses to believe that I'm aging, in fact in my mind whenever I picture myself I look just like I did when I was twenty. A little denial is good for the old self-esteem.

reality check

Last night I was running late and didn't get to class on time. On Tuesday the professor (the one I constantly complain about) had said something about maybe cancelling class because he had a colonoscopy on Wednesday. Honestly, I had really hoped he would cancel the class...the weather was perfect and it just seemed wrong to be cooped up in a windowless cell with a bunch of overly fake-baked sorority girls. So as I walk up to the building I see a girl that sits in front of me. "Hey, awesome...is class cancelled?" Then she looks at me with tears welling up in her eyes, "Dr. X came in, he's not teaching the class anymore, he just found out he has stage 4 cancer and only has a 1 in 20 chance of living a year, he started to tell us and then his face started getting really red and he started crying and walked out and didn't come back." Then tears started falling out of her eyes which were already captivating my attention because she had glitter eyeshadow on and the sun was really making the glitter twinkle, like a disco ball. Wow, talk about putting shit in perspective. I take back all the mean things I said and even thought about him and all of the things I had planned on writing on the student evaluations. I just can't imagine waking up in the morning thinking that your life was going as it should and then coming home that evening having been told that you are on death's doorstep.

lemon zinger

When a recipe calls for a 10x10 in. square pan, it REALLY isn't a good idea to use a 9 in. round cake pan in its place. This, at least according to the box, is SUPPOSED to be lemon bars. What it actually looks like is yellow lava.

i really have to change my yahoo profile...

Otherwise I will continue to have conversations like this (just a quick fyi, I only respond in this manner because it's funny not because I'm actually interested)

him: hello Maam. i was curious to know if you were looking for a slave to pleasure, please and amuse you? my approach is blunt but sincere. i am a submissive male and i am looking for an open minded woman who wishes to use me as she sees fit. i am not looking for cyber or a quickie either Maam
me: i need somebody to mow my lawn
him: check the yellow pages maam
me: well i guess you weren't being sincere when you said i could use you as i saw fit.
him: was very sincere but not just looking to be a yardboy maam
me: well then what kind of boy are you looking to be? a kitchen boy? a laundry boy?
him: sex toy slut maam
me: like a vibrator?
him: one use for me. yes maam
me: do you have a big penis?
him: no maam. only 7 inches.
me: how big around?
him: dont know maam. a good handful.
me: what do you look like? are you fat?
him: i can show you a picture maam. i can stand to lose a few punds but i am not fat.
and then he kept trying to send me a picture but that didn't work. Too bad, it probably would have gotten a lot funnier after that.

PS-M., see this is why I can't settle for the meatman! I would have to give up ALL OF THIS!!! It's just not fair to ask a person to do that is it?

kindness of strangers

Attention: To whomever keeps googling the phrases low hanging balls, big hanging balls, big hairy balls, and multiple other phrases that produce uncomfortable mental images...yeah I get it, you really seem to like balls. And because I am a thoughtful and caring person who loves nothing more than to give, here is your picture of low hanging balls. You can thank me by mailing me a fruit basket but if you don't mind, leave out the nuts...you've already done enough to associate my blog with testicles. I thank you.

friendly fire

It's true, I'm not a very nice person. I don't smile recklessly, I reserve them for special occassions like the fine china you only use for Christmas dinners. I don't do small talk, I think it is absolutely painful to sit around with people you don't know very well and have conversations about the weather and mulch, frankly if given the choice I might opt to eat my own vomit. Plus I have the unusual, uncanny ability to sabotage most of my existing relationships with my unrealistic expectations of people. And of course my unrelenting standards of others prevents the development of new relationships even though I certainly recognize that I'm no prize. So what does it all mean? I'm really fucking lonely right now. I think I need a hug.

first's the worst, second's the best, third's the fairy princess

Do you remember that book All I really need to know I learned in kindergarten? While I agree that the things we learn as children are the most important things we'll ever learn, this guy just has far too positive a spin on things for me. Here's what I think we all learned in kindergarten:
o Only share when people are looking so they think you're nice. Otherwise keep what's yours...selfishness has its own rewards.
o Choose friends and sides all the time, always make sure somebody feels left out. That feeling you get when you make other kids cry...it's called power, some day having this power will pay off.
o Don't hit people. There are MUCH better ways to hurt somebody...tell them you hate them and then tell everybody else they still pee in the bed. Emotional pain always hurts more than physical pain.
o Wash your hands before you eat...but not necessarily after you sneeze. Communicable diseases help boost your immune system. And hand-washing after booger picking? Don't even worry about that...just wipe it under your chair when nobody is looking.
o Don't take things that aren't yours, let the teachers take it away and then cry until they give it to you. Manipulation...almost as good as power.
o Boys have cooties.
o Even though you know you're a pretty girl...it's always a good idea to wear ribbons and curls because nothing is more satisfying then everybody telling you that you're pretty.
o Pick a new best friend everyday. To make sure all the kids want to be your best friend, always have an extra cupcake.
o Playing house is fun until people stop playing the way you think they should/the right way. Instead of compromising, kick them all out of your house. Compromise is for sissies.
o Never be the last kid chosen for anything. You may never be the best, but always make sure you're at least a little bit better than the worst kids.
*I'm sure this makes no sense, I'm really tired. I need a nappy.

sunuvah...

Shit Shit Shit! First of all, let me say that I loves me some ebay and I will do just about anything to save a buck or two. So I bought printer ink off of ebay recently because I use so much of it and twenty bucks for a teeny-tiny cartridge just seemed like way too much. Low and behold the stupid cartridges don't work...well no, they work but not very well. And now I have to turn in a shitty-looking assignment to a professor who already busts my balls (well proverbial balls anyway) about every little thing. Fuckity fucking fuck. And I don't have enough time to find my stupid memory stick, figure out how to use it, drive to school while having to stop and get gas because I was too lazy to fill up yesterday, run to the library or copy center, and then print the damn thing. And yeah you're probably right, I'm being way too dramatic about all of this.

post script

While talking to Katie about the stick-it game, we decided that no island adventure/catastophic event would be complete without the complete and unabridged set of Choose Your Own Adventure books. Of course all 150+ books would count as only one choice, because it's my sticky and I said so and it would inevitably help you with your survival skills.

eureka

Last night in the midst of my R.E.M. I had an epiphany. I remember waking up thinking..."Oh my god, THAT'S IT!!!" But I can't remember what jumble of hazy, dream induced thoughts brought about the revelation. Maybe it was the meaning of life, the steps to a successful future, the ultimate weapon to smite the people I find annoying like those with an overreaching sense of their own self-importance and superiority (unlike me who has the right amount...just a pinch, not quite half a teaspoon), or maybe it was just a little piece of subconscious-to-conscious girl-talk like, "stop eating raw onions at dinner, your morning-breath is unbearable, thank god you're single." I just don't know. I thought about keeping pad and pen near my bed so I could wake up and scribble down my cerebral noctural emissions, but I'm too lazy for that...I can barely get up the energy to make a grocery list half of the time, yes grocery lists are so suburban housewife but some habits are hard to shake. My life's worth of questions could verily be answered while I'm shrouded in my overly soft mink blanket choking on my own post-nasal drip, but I guess I'll never know.
PS-don't worry, mink is just an adjective...I only commit animal murder for sustenance and shoe-wearing.

five-oh

I haven't had that many run-ins with the police. I've never been arrested, I've never really even gotten in any trouble with the law other than traffic violations. So considering that I give the impression of being a law-abiding, respectable citizen...why do cops always have to act like total dicks when I am in a situation that requires the presence of a police officer? Is it because I don't do the whole damsel-in-distress, where-are-my-smelling-salts thing? Is it because I ask questions rather than just stand there and be appreciative because they've graced me with their time? My mom would say it's because I'm lippy, actually she would say "noh...doh...doh...mah-dee man-oh." But that shouldn't matter should it, because the police are there to do a job and helping me is part of their job...even if they don't particularly like me or what I stand for. How can you have faith in a person to help you when they've actively avoided helping you in the few instances that you've needed it? How can you put your faith in a person who lacks any visible signs of compassion and obviously missed the day they taught tact? Somebody who is more concerned with projecting an image of the tough-guy ball-buster than trying to find out negligible things like oh say truth and facts? Am I just having run-ins with the wrong officers?

sticky fingers

Yay for me...I got a shout-out from a person with a salon.com blog, which means they are well-read and not a cheap-ass like me and willing to pay for a salon.com subscription rather than sit through a daily barage of advertisements. So Andrew sent me a meme and I'm actually a little embarassed to answer it because then people will KNOW that I'm a complete dunce rather than merely suspecting it. Ahhh well, since I've always felt the need to make myself look ridiculous...here goes.

Stick It Game

You're stuck inside Fahrenheit 451; which book do you want to be?
From the first question I'm forced to bare my soul with one magnificently horrifying admission... I've never read Fahrenheit 451. BUT I HAVE AN EXCUSE, I SWEAR! I think I might have seen parts of the movie though...wow, I'm so ashamed.

Have you ever had a crush on a fictional character?
I'm not completely sure what "crush" really means here. Did I find myself attracted to a character? Sure...I think it would be almost impossible to connect with a book and not find some measure of attraction to the characters in it.

The last book you bought was:
I like to cruise the clearance rack at Borders which means you don't really get top quality selections (I know...I'm just making excuses now), so the last book I bought but haven't read is The Autograph Man by Zadie Smith.

The last book you read:
The last book I read in its entirety was Choke by Chuck Palahniuk. It was hilarious but very similar to Fight Club, so I'm guessing that all of Palhniuk's books touch on the same themes.

What are you currently reading?
Constitutional Law for a Changing America: Rights, Liberties, and Justice. Clearly a textbook, I haven't read a real honest to goodness book in a long long time.

Five books you would take to a desert island:
Wow, this is a tough one. I'm assuming this question means that you're chances of being rescued are pretty small so you better choose books that you wouldn't mind reading over and over again.

For practicality's sake I would have to choose, Living Off the Land: Tracking, Building Traps, Shelters, Toolmaking, Finding Water and Food because otherwise I would spend my days questioning why I was on the last scrap of land that didn't have a Starbucks within walking distance.
The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon by Stephen King, I can't really say why but I really like this book.
She's Come Undone by Wally Lamb because I read this book and I find the similarities between the main character and myself frightening.
The Color Purple by Alice Walker.
Any of The Far Side collections. No matter how many times I see those cartoons, I always laugh and I suspect that you would need the laughs. Of course when you introduce the collection to your volleyball-shaped friend, it'll be like discovering the humor for the first time and you can sit back and giggle under your breath while Wilson looks at them. Good times...good times.

new orleans sights

From left to right, top to bottom
o Parade through Bourbon street
o Lots of feral cats in New Orleans, but look how civilized they are
o Cops in N.O. get Vespas. How awesome is that?
o Strolling through the French Quarter
o Cathedral in Jackson Square
o The Natchez steamboat
o Inside the cathedral
o Supposedly the oldest pub in the French Quarter
o Lafayette Cemetery #1
o Local flower...the something iris
o Former residence of Anne Rice
o Bourbon Street
o Bourbon Street balcony
o Jackson Square
o The world reknowned Pat something or other bar
o Pigeons cashing in on leftover beignets at Cafe du Monde

singularly random

I would have to say that one was my magic number in N'awlins. Everything pretty much happened just once.
o Some random drunk man at a bar handed me a dollar bill. First he asked me if I wanted the dollar and I was definitely suspect..."You're giving me a dollar just to give me one?" yes. "I don't have to do anything for it?" yes. So I reached for the dollar like a dog reaches for a treat from a stranger. I don't even remember if I said thanks because it was just so WEIRD. Drunk people are awesomely random.
o I suffered a random head injury because one of the thousands of suits in the city (due to a cell-phone industry conference) threw a set of beads off of a balcony and they hit me in the head. At the VERY moment the plastic weapons of mass inebriation were diving towards the pepetual target that is my head, I was telling Katie..."Knowing my luck, I'll get beaned in the head with...OWWWWWWW"
o I met some guy who was from San Bernadino (although that in itself isn't amazing since S.B. is huge) but it's still pretty random considering that Katie and I were drunkenly giving compliments to people who walked past us and he was the first person to stop and chat.
o Got a psychic tea-leaf reading. It was everything I expected, just a bunch of generalizations to make a person feel good about their life...I didn't fall for it, optimism is for suckers. Let's see in a year I will meet the most amazing person, my twin flame and I will have the ability to make lots of money since I'm heading into a new four-year cycle of life. Katie had a cooler experience. We have it all on tape.
o At some random half-empty bar, we started talking to a pretty hot guy with a very large suitcase. Turns out he's a magician and he talks to us for a bit and then does a magic trick for us involving two rubberbands. Mind over matter.
o Tried almost every "famous" N'awlins food tradition once...gumbo, red beans & rice, jambalaya, po-boy, muffaletta, etc. Except for the beignets...we had those twice...they were yummy-yummy fried death covered in powdered sugar.
o Once, just once...the number of times I got so drunk that I vomited up everything from my tongue to my rectum. It was the day we left, lesson learned....no binge drinking the night before you head out on an eleven hour drive.
o Got a discount at this awesome little shop Roadkill, from one sexy biker dude. How did I get the discount? By speaking Chinese...who knew that the Zhong-wen would come in handy?
o And so on and so on. N'awlins is a crazy city.
PS-Yes, I saw boobs. Yes, I have beads. NO, I did not "earn" them.

dear blog. stop.

Just arrived home STOP Have so much to tell STOP But first must unpack and get much needed rest and shower STOP Will talk again soon STOP
LisaM.

do or die

I just woke up, not less than twenty or so minutes ago. I didn't go to work which was probably a very bad thing since we had our big-time inspection today. I also didn't go to school. I'm sure most of you are cursing my slothful ways but dammit I'm sick. At least I think I am, why else would my body be shutting itself down and going into hibernation mode, spring is here after all. Ahhhh, but therein lies the problem...spring means allergies and being as how we live in the armpit of the Ohio valley, where allergens are more plentiful than bad drivers...well my allergies have made me sick. My head feels like somebody snuck in at night and inserted two lead weights right in my sinuses. My ears itch like crazy, an itch no amount of Q-tips shoved dangerously into my ear canal can fix. Post-nasal drip is making my throat hurt, in fact I believe that my throat is plotting my demise... probably a scheme hatched up with my liver, who's still mighty angry with me because of my overindulgence in the drink. See late at night while I'm sleeping, my sinuses (who are also in on the act) start producing gobs of snot that goes down my throat and pools right by my airway. So I wake up coughing and sputtering, choking on my body's reaction to the hopefullness of spring. Down with spring, fall forever.

ready, steady, go

oClean house so housesitter doesn't find pizza boxes under the bed, wads of tissue stuffed in the couch, and...ahem...inappropriate videos laying around? CHECK
o Guilt trip father into giving spending cash? CHECK
o Pack totally age inappropriate outfits with lots of pink and Sanrio? CHECK
o Pack make-up worthy of any of the gals from Priscilla Queen of the Desert to include ridiculously and dangerlously long fake eyelashes? CHECK
o Bathe dog so dogsitter doesn't think I'm a terrible doggie-mommy and not give Iniki gobs of love and attention as punishment? CHECK
o Slough and shave off entire winter's worth of nasty dead skin so feet can look passibly sandal worthy? CHECK
o Buy Chaser tablets to ensure there are no over-the-top public displays of drunkeness? CHECK
o Say aloha to blog, see you in a week, provided I don't end up in the slammer or end up a super-sexy-sidekick/slave to a voodoo priest like in the best Bond flick EVER, Live and Let Die? CHECK
o Toodles people...don't miss me too much...no actually miss me a lot, it bolsters my inflated sense of ego.

clean and close

o For some reason I felt compelled to trim my arm hairs today, well not for JUST some reason but because of the influence of peer pressure. So I charged up my electric shaver thingie and you know what I discovered? You can hurt yourself just as easily with an electric shaver as you can with a razor. God I'm a dumbass.
o I did okay on my midterm yesterday. At least I thought I did okay. Who knows how he'll actually grade it.
o I cut my hair fairly short. I like it except I wake up with some seriously nasty bedhead now. I scared myself this morning.
o I also woke up this morning with the zit from HELL. Any minute I expect it to pop open and spiders come crawling out like in Serpent and the Rainbow.
o Two more days until I'm in New Orleans. Heeheeheee, I'm so excited.

wrap up

o I thought higher education was supposed to be about critical thinking, so why the hell am I doing rote memorization. If professors want somebody to spew their own thoughts right back at them, buy a fucking parrot.
o Just finished watching America's Next Top Model (cause Katie is a bad influence). What kind of message is this show giving girls? Don't be fat (and by fat I mean 138 pounds on a 5'10" body) cause that makes you NOT HOT...but you can act like a total asswipe, give everybody attitude and because you supposedly look FIERCE then the world will forgive your every trespass. That's right, fuck being a good person...just look good for the camera...consider that lifetime supply of ex-lax and ipecac an investment in your future.
o I pay how many thousands of dollars per semester? And my tuition keeps going up and up and up so that the athletic department gets enough money to pay seven figure salaries to coaches who'll sell their souls to every local business that'll pay them a few bucks. So when you mail me my final "How'd we do?" survey like the one's you find next to the syrup station at iHop...would it be too much trouble to include a fucking postage paid envelope?
o I have to stop measuring myself against all of the other hapa people out there. It's demoralizing.

sally's kids

I need to find a charitable organization willing to offset the high cost of inebriation by giving me money for my vacation. Either than or I am going to have to start selling my body and/or its various organs. Generally I don't care very much about money, as long as the basics are covered... you know designer clothes, bottled French water, fancy restaraunts, plastic surgery, status car, houseboy...then I'm fine. But since lately I seem to have less and less of the cashola, it's importance has been growing. My poor sad little checking account...once so voluptuous and Rubenesque, now suffering from anorexia and a really bad case of the shits...I weep for it. Of course I could cut back on my expenditures but honestly I would give up food and quite possibly electricity before I give up HBO, Showtime, or cable internet, especially since Deadwood and The L Word just started, for I love any shows that liberally sprinkle the words cocksucker and twat throughout. Maybe I should start one of those websites where I beg for money because I would rather not reap the consequences of my own stupidity and irresponsbility when I can mooch off the kindness of morons...ooops, I meant strangers, hell it worked for her...maybe I should ask her to spot me a couple of Bens.

and then

o I'm so tired. So tired that I can't sleep because my body is drowning in adrenaline and unhealthy amounts of caffeine. I read once that sleep deprivation gives a better high than any drug. I wonder how long you need to go without sleep for that to happen, before the hallucinations and paranoia start?
o I love the smell of the air when it's pregnant with rain, that slightly metallic smell that reminds me of the sensation you get when you put a 9V battery on your tongue. Maybe I don't love that smell so much as a I miss that smell, that's what home smells like.
o I had more fun this weekend than I have had in a long long time. I actually remembered what it was like to have a real life, not the semi-agoraphobic life I've had for the past few years. But I went to a place with the most revolting bathrooms I have ever seen in my entire life...well maybe not as disgusting as the outhouses in basic training...but pretty damn close.
o In one week I'll be in New Orleans with Katie, taking vampire tours and snapping pictures of the front of Anne Rice's house, eating beignets and drinking cafe au lait al fresco, sitting in intricately wrought iron chairs, going out to bars and hearing rumors that Lindsay Lohan might be making an appearance that night, looking for a real voodoo shop and having a psychic reading that will hopefully involve a chicken's foot and dust from the ground bones of somebody's great-grandmother who had the gift and passed it on to the person in front of me, maybe actually believing when they tell me something specifically vague like "your money will be tight for the next year but then it'll get better, and love is waiting for you but you're not ready to accept it." It's gonna be great. I'll take a ton of touristy pictures with no artistic value whatsoever for people to enjoy or criticize.

pants on fire

Distraction plays a very important role in my life, though usually not a positive one. I get distracted often. Sometimes I have trouble maintaining a conversation because I'll see a fly or somebody with a bright colored piece of clothing will walk by. Tonight I was backing into the driveway and I heard a weird crunching sound under my tire and got really distracted because I was worried that I was driving on the next door lawn, which would be a bad way to start off a new neighbor relationship. So I'm looking at the lawn and forget that my foot is still on the gas and BAM, I run into the fence. So I broke the fence, but it's still standing and I mostly got it back into place. And the obviously broken parts...well the landlady has ivy and morning glories growing all along it so come spring time when I vacate these premises...the plants will cover the splintered wood. I've already rationalized not telling her about it (ie lying) by mentally tallying all of the slum-lord things she's done like A. not fixing the gutters so that the porch becomes the super-slippery path of death or dismemberment after it rains or B. the fact that she didn't mention the fact that the cracks in the house let out all the heat so even though I leave my house at an average of 58 degrees, I still pay a two-hundred dollar electricity bill. What's a shitty, moldy three foot fence compared to that?

serenity now

If I ever end up in a comaor lose my mental faculties with ageor go completely bonkersor if my glorious mane thins and my strands become limp and stringyPLEASE for the love of all things good in the world, NEVER EVER let me believe for one moment that a perm is a good idea.

second guessing

Have I mentioned that I'm planning on moving back to Washington (state not DC, although I wouldn't mind living in DC again)? Yep, after this semester ends, the family is trucking on over to Kentucky to watch me graduate and then help me move. I really don't know how to feel about all this, I definitely have mixed emotions. On the one hand, it will be nice to be near the family again and it'll be cool to reconnect with the few people I still know. And it'll be nice to live somewhere a little more accepting and diverse...not that Louisville is all that bad, but I hope never to hear phrases like "that neighborhood is getting dark" again. And Louisville is known for NOT having a "scene" for younger people, particularly single people in my age bracket...it's all about the family unit here. But on the other hand I'm reluctant to go back because I have a certain sense of security here, I have a decent job and I can mostly afford to live on my own here, unlike in Washington where I am doomed to either live with my mother or live with roommates, neither of which is a prospect I look forward to. I can most likely get into the graduate program of my choice here. Honestly though, I think worst part of this moving thing is the idea that in ten years, my life has gone in a big circle. In ten years I'll have ended up exactly where I started...the only difference being that I'm older, fatter, even more cynical, and incredibly jaded...not really the way to start buildling a "new" life I suspect. And I know my fear/reluctance/second-guessing is nothing unique, I know that everybody asks the same questions. But if everybody has asked...shouldn't somebody know the answer?

question?

How do people manage to finish school in four years and then go on to grad school and finish that before age 28? I realize now that I never should have put off going to school. I am seriously questioning my ability to make it through this last semester. Not because the classes are even remotely difficult, but simply because my motivation level decreases exponentially the closer I get to graduation. What ever happened to the second wind? That last minute burst of energy that propels you across the finish line where you collapse into a pool of your own sweat and bile? And then there's the whole matter of what to do post graduation. I know I need to go on to grad school because my degree is even less useful than a solitary square of one-ply toilet paper, but just thinking about it gives me a huge brain-ache (not the same ache that get from my requisite skull abuse mind you). Plus I haven't taken any steps to get into grad school. I'm fooling myself into thinking that I'll just take a year off...which incidentally I told myself at eighteen and that turned into ten years off. It's inevitable that I'll end up either (A.) testing vials of blood, piss, and shit for the rest of my life or (B.) working as a barista at some corporate coffee wasteland.PS-I heart I Heart Huckabees

hard headed

Crap, I have a HUGE headache. Yesterday I helped Bobby move. As we were putting stuff into the trunk of my car, SOMEHOW the trunk managed to slam down on my poor unsuspecting head. And the best part, the latch almost created some kind of brain shish-kebab since it practically impaled my cranium. I don't know what it is about my head but shit like this happens all the time and always when somebody else is around to witness my klutzy humiliation. I am convinced that it isn't the brain-cell mass murder I commit with the drinking et. al. that has left me with no memory and poor motor skills...no it is constant shaken-brain syndrome. I am two headbutts away from needing a bib to catch my drool.

fright night

Last weekend I saw the movie Constantine. I'm pretty sure I've seen it before, it was called The Devil's Advocate or was it The Prophecy? At any rate, this movie was a total supermodel movie...visually pleasing but mostly it was best when everybody just stood around looking moody and brooding because the talkie portion, not the highlight of the film. Anyway, back to the topic at hand, that night I made Katie sleep over because I am a wuss-baby with a hyperactive imagination, and anything even resembling a scary movie or even a psychological thriller makes me stay up late at night watching shadows in the corners and avoiding looking into anything that produces a reflection. So this is definitely a downside to living alone because though I creep myself out way too much, I LOVE to watch scary movies. I've bought two or three scary movies, most of them Asian originals to Hollywood copycats, and I've yet to watch them. Well I guess I can always just sleep with the lights on, but I don't think Iniki will like that very much.

fingers crossed

Katie and I decided that it was IMPERATIVE that we get the hell out of dodge for a little vacation before school ended. So hopefully if everything works out, we're heading down to Nehowrlins for spring break. Color me excited, I've never been there and though I don't plan on indulging in the Girls Gone Wild version of spring break, I think it'll still be a lot of fun. Plus, my dad's ladyfriend is hooking us up with an awesome deal so it'll be pretty cheap (relatively speaking of course) and that just means more drinkin' money. Wow, I haven't been on a real vacation in about ten years. Mostly it's been more like taking time off work and visiting the family and wondering why I'm not on a real vacation. Not that I don't like spending time with my family but who has ever had to mow lawns and vacuum to earn spa treatments while on vacation? Seriously? Nobody! Unless you're "vacationing" at your mother's house.

cah-ray-zee

So many weird goings-on today, I don't even know where to start.
o I had such a shit day at work today. I'm pretty sure it's because some people have a different sense of urgency than I do. Some people like to work at the pace of a Wal-mart greeter and other people (like myself) would like to fucking kill them.
o Anybody who believes that women cannot make it in the business world because they aren't cutthroat enough just needs to come work with me. The machinations of the female-type supervisors and managers are extraordinary. I'm often torn as to whether I should hate them for being a bunch of calculating back-stabbers or be impressed by it.
o I have some bad mojo with southern Louisville. Today on my way to school I'm driving down the street and stop at a red light and then I hear a horn blaring. So I look over and there is a car in front of an SUV and then another SUV behind it. The car in front and the SUV in back are crooked and really close to the middle car so I knew something was weird. THEN cops rush out of the first and third vehicles with their guns drawn and start shouting at the driver of the middle car. OH it was TENSE and even though there was a strong possibility for a shoot-out, I couldn't tear myself away. I totally rubbernecked, and for quite a while because for some reason the lights wouldn't change.
o I read some really bad news at work today, terrible news even. Apparently drinking and smoking marijuana can increase your risk of stroke, even at a young age. So I've learned my lesson, gotta cut out the drinking. Teehee.

uninspired

For some reason I have nothing to say lately. And I think this disease has infected a ton of the sites I view regularly. So I'll just leave you with these words of wisdom, courtesy of the Museum of Bourbon in Bardstown, Kentucky.

oh so mysterious

Last night Katie and I were at a dinner party. We're sitting around talking about movies that we find hilarious and naturally Napoleon Dynamite comes up because it's just so stupid that it's funny. So one of the guys starts talking about how there REALLY REALLY are ligers in real life. He SWORE he saw it on CNN. We teased him mercilessly, we mocked him, we questioned his sanity and his sobriety, we just refused to believe something so ridiculous. Naturally, my curiosity got the better of me and I checked it out. Whoops, guess they really do exist along with their smaller siblings the tigon. So does this mean I have to build a cake or somesing to apologize or pretend I never found out about any of this?

quitter

I haven't mentioned this before because I didn't want to be the boy who cried wolf since I've said I was quitting like two-three other times and quitting didn't last more than like three days. BUT, today is like the third or fourth week since I've smoked. AND if I manage to not jinx myself by bragging about it...I might actually have officially quit smoking cigarettes.
PS-if you're thinking about quitting, these nicotrol puffer things....GEEERRROOOOSSSSS! I'd rather smoke a turd

moving on up

One of the recurring themes here is how much I hate getting older. From what all the middle-aged folk at work tell me, turning thirty is the hardest birthday milestone and the imminence of my 30th year is haunting me. I mean before thirty, life seems great and full of new adventures. Up until thirty you have all these great things to look forward to:
o Turn sixteen-YAY you can drive. The first sign of independence.
o Turn eighteen-YAY you're an adult AND if you're so inclined (which shamefully most people aren't) you can vote. You can also buy cigarettes and get into NC-17 movies.
o Turn twenty-one-YAY you can do a lot of things now and most of them involve vices. You can drink, you can gamble, you can go to strip-clubs AND drink, the possibilities at twenty-one seem endless.
o Turn twenty-five-YAY your insurance premiums go down and somehow people start acting as if you're more mature even though you know that you still drink too much and still suffer through some horrifying displays of drunkenness. There's also the extremely exciting possibility that you'll still get carded, maybe even for cigarettes, and each and every time you think to yourself that you're just as youthful as you were four years ago.

But after twenty-five, birthday milestones are nothing to look forward to.
o Turn thirty-BOO, your youth has slowly slipped away, like some pathetic cliche of holding sand in the palm of your hand. Do you still pretend to be the young stallion of yesteryear or do you fully immerse yourself in responsible adult life, throwing dinner parties and going to cocktail hours while still longing for the all-consuming fun you had when you were twenty-one...when you truly didn't give a rat's ass about the impression you were giving total strangers, when you didn't start playing the what-if game because the truth of your mortality became evident somewhere around twenty-six when you threw out your back playing a pick-up game and all of the sudden words like good fiber, bad cholesterol, retirement accounts start to have meaning.
o Turn forty-BOO, you have been slapped square in the face with middle age. Now you get to say things like "Forty is the new thirty" and at some point start thinking of the very real possibilities of hot flashes and hormone replacement therapy. Not only that but forty is the turning point for tortuous medical procedures. Women get to look forward to boob-squishing mammograms, men get to look forward to prostate exams. The fun just doesn't stop.
o Turn fifty-BOO, fuck you're FIFTY. Now the panic sets in, you're paying for the kids college and debt is positively seeping out of each and every pore, you've realized that you didn't start saving for retirement soon enough, there's always the very real possibility you'll be laid off at work and you'll never be able to compete with those twenty- something whippersnappers. Maybe, just maybe, you'll become a grandparent and even though you act excited around your friends and co-workers, you secretly cry in the shower because you never thought your life would end up like this and now you're too old to fix it.
o Turn sixty-BOO, you're sixty. Well at this point you're so old you HAVE to start looking at the up-side to everything. You can retire soon and now you qualify for the senior special at Denny's and you get to say pretty much whatever the fuck you want to say because for some reason people love sassy geriatrics.
Of course this is just how it looks like from twenty-nine. I'm sure at thirty-nine I'll have a whole new perspective.

v-d

Happy Greeting Card and Confectionary Corporation Marketing Genius Day. Happy "I get to take you for granted every other day of the year but TODAY you're special" Day. Happy "Thanks for making me bitter and more lonely than usual" Day. Happy "Great, another way of making me feel inept, guess I'll just get another toaster" Day. Happy "Like we need another excuse to gorge ourselves on chocolate" Day. Happy Valentine's Day.

mystery machine

Hey, did I tell you that I figured out which neighbor has the CB? I figured it out because I am a GENIUS. I mean it would take an astounding level of geniosity to realize that the house with the fifty foot high antenna is probably the house with the CB radio. You probably think I'm exagerrating about the fifty feet, but alas I'm not...in fact it very well could be like 75 feet, I don't have a very good perception for lengths/distances. So let's see...hmmmmmm...big long antenna attached to the side of your house = radio antenna = CB radio antenna...gawd I'm smarter than Velma from Scooby Doo. Of course, it should have been a dead giveaway from the start...what with the fact that they have no living grass on their lawn because they usually have five cars parked out front, only two of which run at any given point in time. That and they have this wood paneling on the outside of their house...in my Sims game they refer to it as ramshackle clapboard or something of that ilk. Plus, considering the one-sided conversations I've picked up through my speakers...I really should have known it would be THAT house. I guess that actually makes me pretty fucking dumb for taking this long to figure it out.

no dumping

Am I the only person that finds the fact that my dog pooed right by this sign incredibly funny?

things i have been wrong about

o The dreaded poli-sci class...the Professor does know who I am. He called me by name yesterday evening. I was dumbfounded and lost my train of thought and then ended up looking really stupid (not a terribly difficult task I realize, but it happened nonetheless).
o The idea that when you pass gas around somebody, they will consider it a sign that you are comfortable around them and appreciate the gesture.
o The notion that things will improve when I move to a new place and "start fresh" somewhere.
o That if I really put my mind to it, I can accomplish just about anything.
o If I wear enough glittery make-up, people will think I'm younger than I actually am.
o Honestly really is the best policy.
o I'm not domineering, controlling, and anal-retentive with indications of a mild obsessive-compulsive disorder, it REALLY is just natural leadership skills.
o The order of "old sayings"...apparently you're not ever supposed to be a dollar short and a day late. I blame my mother for this because she says them wrong and that's how I learned them. Her favorite expression..."Hold your horse puckey."
o If you blow into your cupped hand and then move your hand quickly to your nose, you can smell your own breath.

mousecapades

I got this in the mail yesterday. It's a card from B., just his way of making sure I don't forget about my fine rodent roommates and neighbors. Too funny. But this card made me have the WEIRDEST dreams last night. I dreamt that my kitchen was again riddled with mice, except this time they weren't sneaky, fit-in-the-palm-of-your-hand rodents. NOOOO, they were the size of chihuahuas. And apparently the girl mice wore red aprons, too much Leave It to Beaver I guess. So I tried to knock them unconscious by hitting them with a box of Corn Pops, but they weren't ordinary mice, not only did they wear clothes and were obviously the result of nuclear testing, but they were like Mighty Mouse and would fly on top of the refrigerator and elude me. Finally, I just opened the front door and they walked out and ran into the Gollum neighbor's yard. They'd like it better there anyway, in real life she tries to create a kind of Vermin Wild Kingdom in her house. She's even let possums come in out of the cold, ewwwwwwwwwww.

paranoid android

Once upon a time I went to a therapist. He made me fill out this questionnaire that somehow deduced what kind of crazy you suffer from. Part of it involved questions that pretty much asked whether or not you were paranoid. As it turns out, I am a little paranoid. Not like super crazy paranoid where I think that the CIA/FBI/NSA are tracing my every move because my mother is a super secret-spy who put a microchip with the plans for the world's deadliest weapon in my skull when I was a baby and the real reason we moved a lot was because the KGB was always plotting to kidnap me and steal my precious secret by cutting open my head and sucking the chip out with a red and yellow striped straw they kept from a McDonalds strawberry milkshake when they were sent to Kansas to train to be the ultimate midwesterner and somehow all of this is why my life sucks. No, instead I'm just mildly paranoid, and mostly in a self-serving way to make myself feel important. For example (thas right...all in bullets):
o I'm not doing very well in my poli-sci class. In fact, I am doing worse in this class than I have done in my entire college career. Today we got back an assignment and my grade totally sucked some stinky ass. But then I noticed that the girl who sits next to me, well her original grade sucked way worse than mine. BUT the professor bumped her grade up to a perfect score (because the original grade is from his grad-student TA). I got no bump, I got just my plain old shitty grade. Immediately I assumed it was because he must not like me. But then I remembered that he doesn't even know who I am, he can't put name and face together. So then I figured out that he doesn't hate ME, he hates my NAME. Something about the way the four-letters are strung together to make my first name, and the fact that my last name is NOT spelled the way people think it should be....I'm convinced, he's lowering my scores because he hates my name...damn you moniker. (and yes I know that this is like a scene in The Jerk)
o I'm also convinced that I am being baited by somebody. And because I'm being baited, I assume it's because this person looks down on me. AND even worse is talking shit about me. Definitely a "K" moment.
o I think my computer is haunted by some paranormal entity that changes my poli-sci assignments and makes them total shite. I've been trying to put my computer in standby at night and when I leave for work or school. I know I put it in standby because I watch the screen go black and I hear the fan shut off. BUT when I get home, or even worse in the middle of the night, the computer comes back on BY ITSELF. Sure, some computer person would chalk it up to some computer glitch, some malfunction on some card or some such computer-talk nonsense. BUT I KNOW that it is a ghost, who chose to haunt me and my laptop because the guy with the CB-radio was probably too dumb to figure out he was being haunted.

not just for children

Cupcakes are like little serving sized portions of youthful joy and sunshine. When have you ever eaten a cupcake and not immediately felt better? Well maybe right before you went into a diabetic coma...but that's just different. Last night Katie and I made and decorated cupcakes. It was more fun than either of us probably expected. The top three rows are my cupcakes, the bottom row is the work of Katie's creative genius...LOVING the poodle cupcake. When I eat my cupcakes, I like to lick off all the frosting and then eat the cake...sometimes if I'm so inclined I'll stick the cupcake paper thing in my mouth and chew on it for a while. Some people like to carefully remove the paper then eat the cupcake so that they get a bite of frosting with each and every bite of cake. How do you eat your cupcake (and I do mean cupcake, not some euphamism for body parts)?

now you're on the trolley

I use a lot of "street" vernacular, I could lie and say that I just do it because it keeps me in touch with 'mah rootz' but really I just have a shitty vocabulary. But I'm starting to realize that as I'm getting older, I just don't know what the slang means and I don't learn the new words. So rather than face the fact that I'm too old and boring to be one of the cool kids any longer, I've decided to use 20's slang. I'm not going to try to be 'pimp' anymore, I'm going to be the cat's meow. I don't want to get 'fucked up at da club', I'm gonna get splifficated at the juice joint. And I don't want cool stuff to be 'tits', I want it to be jake. I want to put on my glad-rags, go to swanky parties, drink a bunch of giggle water and get an edge, meet some big six and hopefully get some cash rather than a check. It'll be great because a) nobody will know what the fuck I'm talking about and b) my nostalgic use of the language from another era will totally keep me from turning into one of those old people that tries so hard to keep up with "youth culture," you know the person you laughed at when you were younger.

dongseng

I love my sister. Of course, this wasn't always the case. Apparently when she was a baby, I would wait until my parents left us alone together and then I would take her bottle and dump the contents all over her. Afterwards I would hide the bottle underneath the couch and go into another room. I've envied her from the moment my parents brought her home, not necessarily everything about her but a lot. First of all, she's beautiful and gets more exceptional by the day. She has an different kind of beauty too, a "can't quite place my finger on what it is about her" kind of thing. Plus she's extremely quick witted, it's best not to argue with her because she'll just shoot you down. I usually end up saying something evil and trying to make her cry just so I don't "lose" our verbal battles. She's also really confrontational (and yes that isn't ALWAYS a good thing), but I'm sure that most people secretly wish they could be the kind of person that would tell somebody off rather than just seething inwardly, I know I wish I could. One thing I don't envy about her is her time-keeping. This is my Christmas present from her, only about what...six weeks late? Although I did actually get it before spring for a change. I don't mind though, I love SANRIO (as I let out a high-pitched squeal and twirl around in circles with the bag on my arm). I am an eleven year old girl trapped in an adult body...either that or the soul of a young transvestite lives inside of me.

random thoughts to mask the fact that i am not all that creative

Although chances are most of you have already figured that out. By the by-I love bullets.
o I'm pretty sure the guy driving behind me today had Tourette's syndrome. He kept twitching and talking to himself. At first I thought he was singing to the radio, but there wasn't any rhythm to it. I'm ashamed to admit that it made me laugh.
o While walking my dog two of the people on my street waved to me. I've never seen either of them before. I wonder if they were thinking the same thing when they were waving.
o On my drive home, one of my neighbors was also behind me. I realized that she looks a lot like Gollum, except with hair...and glasses.
o I went to the doctor today. We agreed that I might be having small anxiety attacks. But apparently the only way to treat that is with anti-depressants and I'll never take those again. I didn't like being a zombie, crazy just works better for me.
o Sometimes I think men in tight/skinny pants are sexy, unless they are Wranglers and then I just think it's gross.
o I hate intellectual masturbation.
o I'm going to find out which person around here has the CB radio and then break in and steal it. I'm not sure how or why, but whenever he uses it, my mouse doesn't work and I hate using the keypad.

funny in hindsight

To lighten the mood, I've decided to share some embarrassing and occasionally horrifying incidences from my past and yes it is completely okay to laugh.

o In the fourth grade I raised my hand to ask my teacher a question, instead of calling her by name I called her mommy. The whole class laughed and called me mommy for the rest of the day.
o In junior high, we girls decided it was funny to depants one other. Finally my time came, except it wasn't just my pants that came down. At that exact moment, Charlie B. (resident school hottie) was standing outside of the gymnasium and saw the whole thing. He later drew a picture of the whole event on a phone booth just so I wouldn't forget what it all looked like to him.
o In the sixth grade, on a dare, I french-kissed this boy named Martin. He was a white guy who got a perm so he would look like he had a jerry-curl. I threw up immediately after. I didn't kiss anybody again for another six years.
o In my senior year of high school I had hair down to my butt. I also took wood shop. One day, Amy and Susie and I stayed after school to make up for missing school the day before. I was making a beautiful koa bowl on a lathe (you can probably guess where this is going). Susie was working at the lathe behind me and asked me a question. I turned around to answer her and my hair flung out behind me. It got caught in the lathe and the machine literally ripped the hair right out of my scalp. I had a bald spot the size of a golf ball. Luckily I could arrange the rest of my hair so you couldn't see it. I really don't know if anybody in school knew about that other than my small group of friends and my sister. The teacher asked if he could keep the fistful of hair to display, so all the girls would know why he insisted they put their hair up...I said no.
o My very first day of officially being in the Army we were standing in line for breakfast. The guy in front of me smelled something awful and the whole world starting spinning, and then the lights started to dim. I passed out. I later found out that I passed out at the exact moment that they were explaining to us that you shouldn't lock your knees when you stand at attention or at-ease as it most assuredly will make you pass out. Months after that, at a completely new duty station, people would come up to me to ask me if I was that girl that fainted in the chow line. I never once thought to deny it.
o Once in a sleazy bar in DC these totally skeevy guys were trying to hit on me and Stephanie. I played the bitch role and made them leave us alone. I also got way too drunk that night. Later, after the place closed they found me outside puking in an alleyway. It turned out I lived in the same building as one of those guys. He reminded me of this incident every time I saw him.
o Some of you might remember that last semester I dropped a large and still full cup of coffee during a class. Then trying to escape the coffee before it ended up in my lap, I pulled over a desk and ended up falling down. Not the most gracious thing I've ever done...although not the least either.
o In the 9th grade, we all thought it would be fun to cut class and go to Burger King for lunch. While standing in line I felt a big whomp on my shoulder and turned around. There was my dad standing in line behind me. I was horrified and started to cry, a really blubbery ugly cry, in front of all of my friends. Luckily he didn't tell my mom.

heavy

Have you ever had that feeling in the pit of your stomach, you know where it simultaneously feels hollow and yet still feels like the weight of the world in being held in there? I've had this feeling for the last few days, eh who am I kidding, more like the last few months, and I can't seem to shake it. I don't know if it's a reaction to shit gone wrong or a predictor of shit still waiting to happen. In the big scheme of things, the big picture that my dad tells me to look at while he's packing his suitcase for an all expenses paid vacation to Belize, I know things aren't that bad, not really. But I can't let go of this feeling that good things are happening for other people while my life remains relatively stagnant, as if I'm wading in some festering cesspool of my own making. My apathy has become almost debilitating and I've let myself feel shitty for way too long. But I can't figure out where to go from here, all I can think is "okay...so now what?"PS-I did fail those quizzes last week...and not fail as in perform at a lower level than normal...I seriously FLUNKED. The professor literally flung the papers into my hand, probably so as not to hold onto the flaming piles of dung for too long.

worth it?

I'm back from the exciting Volunteer State, woohooo Tennessee. The vet visit went exactly as I expected...fifteen quick minutes of "Oh, he looks fine...keep up with the medications and remember, you can never use too much eye gel." So let's break that fifteen minutes down shall we:
o The visit itself cost $60.00...so that becomes $4.00 per minute of the vet's time.
o The whole trip took 7.5 hours...so for every minute the vet spent with Iniki, I lost 30 minutes of my ever diminishing young life.
o I had to fill up my gas tank twice...so $20.00 a pop and god knows how many pollutants, well I don't know how to break it down but it still seems like the doc is coming out on top.
o I had to drug-up my dog...and considering I don't know exactly how much to give him, it's a pretty damn good chance that my dog is overdosing from too much benedryl...so the cost of another vet visit for the toxic drug reaction plus the pulmonary problems I've created by funneling drugs into his mouth...god only knows.
But there is a bright side to this situation. I got to go to Jack in the Box, they don't have Jack here in Kentucky. I had some yummy yummy curly fries and my fave...Jack in the Box egg rolls. YAY! I don't know what they put in those rolls to make them so delicious, probably something really evil like ground up bones of bengali tigers and the flesh from baby seals. But man, they were good. It doesn't even matter that I burned the roof of my mouth and tomorrow it will be a bunch of tender, blistered mouth meat. It was worth it.

headin' south for the winter

Well damn-it-all, the day has finally come. I have to drive to Nashville to see the super-special veterinary opthamalogist today. I am very much NOT looking forward to three hours of constant whining and the possibility of cleaning vomit out of my drink holder...and god knows what the dog is capable of. Ugh.

a piece of advice, direct from me to you

When a recipe calls for a 10x10 in. square pan, it REALLY isn't a good idea to use a 9 in. round cake pan in its place. This, at least according to the box, is SUPPOSED to be lemon bars. What it actually looks like is yellow lava.

winky and twins

Katie and I went to the movies last night. We had wanted to see Closer but it isn't playing in any of the theaters around here any longer. It was playing yesterday and had been playing since it opened, but I don't just use my amazing procrastination skills for studying alone. So instead we went to see Sideways. It was HIY-LAY-REE-USSSS!!! I don't know about you, but sometimes I'm a little wary of movies that are critic favorites because frankly I like my movies Oscar-worthy (and not this Oscar, this Oscar). This one though, its got enough low-brow humor to keep me happy. AND it has gratuitous nudity, but not of women...no this movie shows the man-junk. This got me thinking. Independent flicks (well movies made on a non-Hollywood massive blockbuster scale) love to show penises, unlike the Hollywood movies which are all about the women's bits. Why is that? Does showing a penis somehow give legitimacy to a movie as a NOT-Hollywood movie? Are smaller producers giving Hollywood the finger by showing the crank? Or is it because we're so unaccustomed to seeing old winky and the twins that it can be used incredibly effectively for shock value and laughs?

stewing in it

My friend B. is coming over on Sunday and I am making stew, so tonight I went out and bought the ingredients. Seriously, I go to the grocery store once every two to three weeks and always at different times of the day...so what are the chances that Sam the Meat-man will be there, ready as ever to stalk me??? Pretty good, let me tell you. I saw him long before he saw me. Frankly, he's not hard to spot since he looks like a beer-drinking, hirsute Poppin Fresh. So being the stealth former commando that I am, I went down two aisles and snuck back into the flesh-peddling section. But the meat-man...he got mad stalker skillz yo! There I am, making my selections and out of the corner of my eye, with my uncorrected peripheral vision, I see him ambling over with a goofy little grin (pause for gagging). Man, I have never pushed a cart so fast in my life. I was down the kool-aid aisle before they could call a clean-up on aisle four. I need a new grocery store, this one is going to cause nightmares.

didn't your mother teach you not to believe everything you read

So after blowing the other quiz in my poli-sci class, we started talking about standing to sue and finding fault. So we start talking about the infamous McDonalds coffee case, then we move on to litigation against tobacco companies, which leads us to trying to sue McDonalds for making people fat, which brings us to suing gun manufacturers. So there are different opinions and eventually we end up talking about tort reform, just a cursory conversation. This one guy starts on about how lawsuits are getting frivolous and people are winning large sums of money for their own stupidity. He tells everybody about this ONE CASE where some guy buys a new RV and takes it on a trip. The guy sets the cruise control and leaves the driver's seat to go in the back of the RV. Of course the RV crashes and the guy sues the RV company for not properly explaining cruise control and wins a large sum of cash. Ironically, while not studying for my quiz....I read this today. What are the chances that some random dude would talk about some random lawsuit/urban legend that I randomly read about on a random webpage?

sick

I think these little flash animations pretty much sum up what I feel like at work most days.

season of discontent

I HATE winter. Specifically I hate dry winters. I had a bloody nose this morning, in BOTH nostrils...at the SAME time. So I'm walking around with tissue shoved up both sides of my nose, very much not fun, though if it were somebody else it would be pretty funny. Also, I haven't quite figured out the whole science of how my hair manages to be dry, static-y, and full of winter snowflakes and yet still manage to look greasy and unwashed all at the same time. It is mystifying. Besides that I got my electricity bill and those corporate fascists at LG&E raised their rates like they do EVERY winter (this time by something like thirty-forty percent), I guess they didn't want to leave all the energy corruption to California, why let those hippies out west have all the fun right? Anyway, I can't believe how much it is and the thing is my house is COLD, the kind of bone-chilling cold you usually only experience in hospitals and museums. God I hate winter...every year during this time I constantly ask myself...what was it that I didn't like about living in Hawaii?
Now I must study for a Chinese quiz, hopefully I won't mess it up like the one I took yesterday.

beauty and the beast

There is a girl on campus who looks remarkably like one of my favorite young & quirky actresses. The actress in question plays my favorite cutting, punishment loving, admin. assistant. So this girl is totally cute, down to her wavy chestnut hair, button nose and double-sided dimples. Well, her boyfriend looks to be a mix of Grizzly Adams and a young Charles Manson. Yeah I know, he might be a great person, blah blah blah, although my thoughts on the matter are usually something along the lines of "Man, he must be hung like laundry on a Sunday afternoon." Not that it matters, it really doesn't. I'm just saying...you see a lot of really cute girls with some really not so cute guys BUT you rarely if ever see the situation reversed. I can't think of the last time I saw some hot guy with some average or subpar girl.

blast from the past

I woke up at the ass-crack of dawn this morning because I have to study for a vocabulary quiz. Not for my Chinese class however, because that would totally make sense; I'm studying for a vocab quiz in my political science class. God, I haven't taken one of these since like the sixth grade. In my long, drawn out college history I can't remember ever having taken a vocabulary quiz. I hope spelling, punctuation, and neatness of handwriting doesn't count too, 'cause then I'll be screwed.

Update: Dear lawdie, did I ever fuck that one up. I ASSumed the quiz would be multiple choice, but that professor...he's a sneaky one. It wasn't multiple choice, it wasn't even fill in the _____, it was the word and then some empty space to put the definition. Needless to say I wasn't prepared. Man, I haven't failed a quiz or test since...actually I don't think I've ever failed one. I have two more quizzes this week, maybe I can start a quiz failing streak or something.

silver mining

You know, I am a person of little sympathy and that includes towards myself. I'm tired of being depressed and sad, I don't see the point of it. And if I'm half as annoying as I find other depressed people, well then more the reason to try and snap out of it (ahhhh, if only it were that simple, but denial ain't just a river in Egypt). So, I'm going to try and find the proverbial silver lining in being alone and living alone:
1. You never have to close the bathroom door
2. Nobody ever complains about your conspicous overuse of toilet-paper
3. You don't have to brush your teeth within five minutes of waking up because the dog's morning breath...even worse than yours.
4. Nobody else eats the last scoop of Ben & Jerry's chubby hubby ice cream.
5. You can make up stupid rules like no fish stick eating while washing whites on Tuesday and the rules don't get broken
6. You can walk around the house completely naked, even on an ugly/fat day
7. Shaving your armpits and legs...only for special occassions
8. Sole proprietership of the remote control
9. You can play the soundtrack of Miss Saigon at dangerously high decibel levels and nobody complains
10. Nobody steals the covers on the coldest night of the year
11. In re #10, dutch ovens only exist in the kitchen

so where do i rsvp for this pity party?

I found this at work today...I think they were off by about two days:

If a British psychologist's assessment is correct, next Monday (January 24th) will be the most depressing day of 2005 for man.
Dr. Cliff Arnall, who specializes in seasonal disorders at the University of Cardiff in Wales, has devised a form for such factors as weather, time since Christmas, monetary debt and motivation levels, reports MSNBC.
"Following the initial thrill of New Year's celebrations and changing over a new leaf, reality starts to sink in...The realization coincides with the dark [winter] clouds rolling in and the obligation to pay off Christmas bills."

UPDATE (1/24/05)-Hmm, I don't feel particularly depressed but I did wake up this morning with a fever blister on my lip. Right now, it's just a minor irritation, like a burning zit. By tonight, it will have taken over my face. My fever blisters are like the British Empire, they colonize every scrap of space available to them.

bitter fruit

So I just found out that my ex is getting a fat-ass disability payment from the VA. First let me say that he totally deserves it because the Army screwed him every which way that they could. But you know I can't deny being a little bitter about this turn of events. Now that he's his own separate entity, not obliged to have anything to do with me (though I will say that we have maintained a good relationship), all sorts of good things are happening for him. He has a good job and now he'll be getting a nice little tax-free monthly stipend. So why the bitterness? Now that my life is slowly vortexing into a big pile of poo, everybody else's life seems to be percolating nicely. Sonuvabitch, where is the balance in life? HUH?!?! Where the hell is it??? And yes I realize this probably makes me sound like a vengeful, heartless, selfish bitch but since I know it's far more complicated than what this post can express, I can live with people thinking that.

debate

Okay, I've had this discussion before and had it again today. For some reason I always end up on the losing side of the argument but I stand firm in my opinion. You know the haircolor strawberry blonde? Do you consider it more red or more blonde? I say it is more red than yellow, therefore I consider people with strawberry blonde hair to be redheads. Everybody else I know says that they are blonde. What say you?

on the down-low

I'm feeling blue lately, at not a pretty sparkly iridescent shade that I prefer in my eye make-up, definitely more of a navy. I don't know if this self-pity (the most worthless emotion ever) has become part of my body's hormonal square dance or if I'm just starting to fully realize some things about my life, some bitter truths that I've managed to keep at bay. All I know is that I feel shitty, like at any moment if somebody looks at me too long I'll either start crying uncontrollably or smack 'em in the mouth. Lucky for me, I don't just bring overwhelming sadness with me on my journey through mild-depression, I bring unrestrained anger too.

achilles heel

I swear, if I were a superhero my kryptonite would be directions. I am so bad at directions. I could get lost going in a straight line between point A and point B. I'm smart in so many other ways, I don't know why getting from one place to another is so difficult for me. I guess it's a good thing I can always tell people that I like to take the "scenic route."

princess sophia v. krull the warrior king

We all have euphemisms for sex. It is inevitable that we come up with cute little ways to discuss something prurient in nature, particularly in a society that glorifies and yet at the same time is afraid of sex and all things sex related. For example, some of my old army friends and I devised the cheesecake methodology to talk about the ess-word. There was of course plain cheesecake, the most vanilla of all cheesecakes, cherry-cheesecake, and the epitome blueberry cheesecake. So going on with my previous post about BUSINESS, I give you my new euphamism-ratings system (a work in progress).
At the bottom: small business (tsk, tsk to the people that fall into this category)
At the top: Fortune 500 business or maybe publically-traded business though that sounds kind of slutty
Now my creative, funny friends, I need help with the mid-level euphemisms. Be creative, do it in the form of tax-codes or something interesting.

getting down to the meat of it

There are a lot of compelling reasons to go vegetarian or vegan, tonight I may have been exposed to the most compelling reason yet. I was at the grocery meat counter and immediately the guy behind the counter recognizes me, which is pretty unusual because people tend not to remember me. Then he starts getting my order together and says, "Nice BCGs." To those out of the military acronym loop, BCGs are birth control glasses and it basically refers to the ugly freebie glasses the military gives you...so ugly in fact that they are considered a form of birth control in their own right cause nobody wants to have sex with somebody wearing those glasses. Oookkkaaaayyyy, so first of all he's saying my hyper-fashionable, vaguely emo but mostly Wonder Woman's human alter-ego Diana's hip black-rimmed glasses were ugly. Mmmhhhmmm , the fastest way to win a woman's heart...insult her.
Then he says "Them glasses sure are purdy on you" (with no exaggeration on the twanginess of the compliment which immediately makes me think of "your mouth sure is purdy"). "Wow, your eyes are almost black, I never saw eyes that dark...I prefer brunettes myself, them other guys can have them blondes." Yeah right, Sam the meat-man, this brunette, NUH UH! Let's put it this way, ever heard the expression "A face only a mother could love"? Well I'm pretty sure he might be the mother-loving exception.
After that, as I stand there uncomfortably, wondering how long exactly it takes to wrap up a half a pound of ground round, it became the start of my favorite game. "Contestants, are you ready to play LisaM.'s favorite game...'What's your nationality?' You have five, that's right five, chances to correctly guess Lisa's nationality."
First let it be known that I was too tired to correct the meat-man about the difference between nationality and ethnicity/racial make-up so I let him guess. "German (uh no and a first for me), Italian (again no but one I've heard a million times), Irish (well half-right but still kinda no)." So I tell him, "You're not even on the right continent." "Not Indian? (well also part-right if he was referring to Native American, which he wasn't and let's face it, who DOESN'T claim one billionth part Cherokee or Sioux)...okay then habla espanol (nope not Latina either and frankly he was SHOCKED to hear that)."
So finally I was like, "Dude, I'm half Korean and half white." And then we moved on to the next part of the program..."REALLY?!?! You don't look half Korean (yeah, like I haven't heard THAT my ENTIRE life)...my cousin's brother's girlfriend's brother's friend is married to a Koh-ree-inn and her kids eyes are slantier than yours."
This is where I gave my faker than fake smile, grabbed my purchase and ran for the hills, just before my anger runneth over in a big old tirade. So...vegetarian...I did it once for a year or so, it's starting to sound pretty damn good right about now.

a funny thing happened on the way to the forum

As is my usual lunch-time custom, I sat with the old people at work and heard tons of stories about kids and grandkids and blah blah blah. But today they were actually kind of amusing. This one lady, who talks about her daughter ad-nauseum actually made a funny today, and I thought I would share because a. friends don't let friends suffer alone...or is that drive drunk, after four or five beers I have trouble remembering and b. it actually IS kind of funny, a nice little anecdote to wrap up the evening. So apparently my co-worker has a daughter who's like 2 years old or 20 years old...I don't really listen to the details. Her daughter has apparently started to call her nether regions her "business." So she says stuff like "mommy i forgot to wipe my business" or "mommy my business hurts." Now phrases like "stay out of my business" or "that's none of your business" have a whole new meaning. So if you'll excuse me I'm gonna go "mind my own business."

eye of the tiger

My dog/child has congenital eye problems. He can't make tears. Because of this I have to give him multiple daily doses of a ton of really expensive medication and I have to take him to the vet a lot. You would think, considering the fact that my dog is like 1/10th the size of a person, that the bills would therefore be 1/10th of a doctor's bill. But no, it is outrageously expensive. I regularly spend upwards of $150.00 every time I see the vet and that doesn't include the special medicine I have to have shipped from New Mexico of all places. So now because the eye has gotten worse lately I have to go back to see a veterinarian opthamologist...and yes there is such an animal (excuse the pun). What this doctor should really be called is dog-lover's proctologist because I really end up taking it up the ass everytime I see this guy. Overlooking the fact that I have to drive to Nashville for the visit, which is the entire state of Kentucky away, this guy charges me a bundle for five minutes of "Oh he's doing fine, just keep doing what you've been doing." Yeah thanks, do I bend over now or would you rather I did it up by the credit card machine? So considering the amount of cash I have to drop to see this guy, you might assume that customer service would be included. OH BUT NO NO NO that is definitely not the case. Those office people can eat my ass. They were positively dramatic about making my appointment, all but blaming me for being too poor to see the doctor for the last two years. Oh I'm sorry mizzz nasally-borderline-hysterical receptionist, I forgot that you were doing a vital organ--doctor's visit exchange program. Didn't I leave my liver with you last time? Oh that only covered the visit, not the medication? Sorry, I guess this time you can have my bladder, I'll just have to start pissing out of my navel.

that's what friends are for

I was just commenting in my drinking post about Katie's lush-ful habits. See, Katie's family has a major hook-up. Her mom is friends with a liquor vendor so they have oodles of those little airplane liquor bottles in all sorts of fruity flavors like apple & raspberry vodka. So I started thinking about what other friends it would be good to have on tap:
1. Obviously a liquor vendor or a bartender. I'd prefer the vendor because with the bartender you would end up becoming a barfly at some seedy joint and once that happens, you'll never get laid.
2. A mechanic friend so you don't get hosed everytime your car makes a weird nose.
3. A manager at a really good restaraunt so you can get free food.
4. Somebody who works as a supply specialist for the government. You will never have to pay for office supplies again and unlike civilian businesses, nobody notices a ream of missing paper.
5. A doctor. At first I thought it would be good to have a gynecologist friend because the comfort level might make it easier on you, but then I starting thinking that I wouldn't want my friend to see my powderbox because then s/he would start telling all your other friends about your dirty bits and that wouldn't be good, especially if you ended up with a horrific case of the clap.
So what kind of friends would you like?

time to make the doughnuts

So I'm back in school, nose to the grindstone and all that. As is my usual custom I made a noisy little entrance into my Chinese class. I walked in the door and somehow ended up knocking over a podium thing. Clang, bam, boom, it toppled to the floor and everybody looked up at me like I had just developed a third eye in the middle of my forehead, then the giggling started. Luckily I didn't have any coffee to drop and spill all over the ground. Even luckier, I didn't fall on my ass. I swear, klutziness is now becoming part of my schtick and I can't even blame it on public drunkenness or some weird physiological disorder.

aging

Do you remember how, when you were younger, all you could think was "I am never going to turn into those old people." Well lately I've come to the stunning realization that I am getting way too old. First it was television, who can watch all of those stupid reality shows? Then it was music, I can't recognize two-thirds of Top 40. Now liquor has turned its back on me. I remember when a bottle of cheap wine coupled with a few swigs from a forty was just a precursor to a night of heavy drinking, dancing on speakers, and vomitting in alleyways. Now three measley drinks is all it takes for me to have to choose between telling strangers I love them and telling them to meet me outside for a colon examination courtesy of my black leather doc marten, mary jane encased foot. All the while Katie, the young doe, is drinking just as much as me and even has to finish my beer in addition to her own. Oh well I guess if you had to put a positive spin on getting older...it's a lot cheaper to get drunk.

let's get physical

So Men's Fitness Magazine, not to be confused with Men's Health Magazine, which is often mistaken for the International Male Catalog, did their annual rating of the fittest and fattest cities in the United States. The top three fittest cities are Seattle, Honolulu, and Colorado Springs. Ironically, I've lived in all three. Trust me it's definitely ironic because at this very moment I AM the poster-child for at least two of the seven deadlies. I'm sitting here couch potatoeing it up at my computer, alternating between shoveling big spoonfuls of Cocoa Krispies into my gullet and drinking copious amounts of Red Bull to keep me going for the rest of the night.

another one bites the dust

So the smarty-pants mice turned out to be not so smart. Last night in the wee hours of the morning I heard the traps go off which lead to numerous dreams about rats. When I woke up this morning at first I had decided that I would deal with it when I got home from work, but then my curiosity got the better of me and I went to check out the traps. The traps my landlady bought that we put in the pantry had been released but there wasn't anything in them. So I picked one up and looked at it, it was COVERED in blood, it was like watching Terror Firmer again. Then I looked under my sink and there were mice in both of the traps I put out, teeny dead little mice with their big black eyes and pointy noses. So I had to pick them up and throw them away. I felt guilty about it all day. Yuck.

of mice and men

The mice in my house are straight out of The Secrets of Nimh. On the left you will see what the mouse trap looks like right out of the package, and on the right you can see what the mouse (mice?...shudder) did to the trap. Monk ate all of the peanut butter off of the plastic and then ate some of the plastic too. YAY for mice that are smarter than me because though Monk et. al. managed to elude capture, my thumb somehow managed to get mangled and let me tell you, it hurt. I'm so creeped out right now.

creepy

I've been working in various aspects of the medical field for about ten years now, so you'd think I wouldn't be shocked by much. But today I was walking into work and I saw these two empty gurneys pushed up against a wall. It was clear that they were gurneys from a mortuary, although the black and charcoal gray clad workers that usually accompany the gurneys were nowhere in sight. So after ten years you would think I would be accustomed to the idea of death, particularly death in a hospital, but I can say without a doubt that I am NOT. I am still shocked to see those gurneys in the halls. Just as I'm shocked when I open the pathology refrigerator and see a sawed off leg just sitting there like a leg of lamb waiting to be cooked for Sunday supper. It doesn't gross me out like it used to, like when I threw up when I saw a breast from a mastectomy in a jar of brown liquid. But I'm definitely not jaded. And you know, I hope I never will be. I never want to go into work and see body parts or hear about somebody who died and think to myself, "No kidding? (pause) What's on the menu for lunch?"

nah-may-stay

I have a belly full of Indian food and beer and just had an eyeful of a mostly Indian movie although the movie part wasn't planned. It was pure serendipty that we would find it on the television after watching Garden State, a really good movie that almost made me cry. I'm almost afraid that I'm turning into one of those pretentious people who "loves everything about __________ culture." But I can't help it, masala is delicious and even better when you have a healthy buzz.

revenge

I think I have a subconscious passive-aggressive thing going on. For the last week I have forgotten to put deodorant on before I leave for work. I wonder if anybody else has noticed.