Onward!

When I realised that it was not a good thing that the company I was working for was moving out of our sweet sweet office space and into the owner's home--not to mention the fact that he was using money *I* was bringing in by booking bands out to pay the bands *he* was bringing in (instead of paying me and my bands), I started looking for an hourly job. Sound Warehouse it was. Wow. They are still around too. You may remember that it used to be a chain, but in a big hooray for the little indie stores, when the chain started to implode, Rudy and Holly bought out the place and made it their own. Or something like that. The fact that they are still around makes me happy.

When I worked there, it was a combination video/record store. Yes, records. Vinyl. Cassettes. Old school, baby. I discovered Akira Kurosawa there, and named my (best friend's and my, that is) first-outside-the-safety-of-my-parent's-home dog after him. My Akira ate a bottle of blue paint and lived to tell the tale, but that's another story for another time.

I worked with a guy named Kevin Blakely (he played bass for Punkinhead)--the first black guy I'd ever really spent time around. His buddies used to come in and they would start chatting in this unbelievably incomprehensible way; it was utterly fascinating. I was too naive not to express my curiousity, and thankfully he was too well brought up to make fun of me or take offense about it. Thus I learned my second foreign language. The only thing I really remember is "Aight den". Which, of course, means "All right then".

I got a lot of free cd's and a lot more free passes to this or that live show. Mike Watt of Firehose showed up on my doorstep one morning after a show. He'd lost a filling or a cap or something during the show, wasn't going to be able to get to a dentist for some time, and I happened to have had a prescription for Tylenol w/ codeine (I'd recently had my wisdom teeth out and couldn't stand to take the stuff). Sleuth that he is, he got my address off the bottle, and showed up for breakfast the next morning.

And this one time, I got a boot to the head at an Agnostic Front show. Damn crowd surfers (thanks Shanny, for the proofreading!)

The job itself? I don't remember a whole lot about it, except for the part where we used to have to handwrite all the receipts. I used to be able to tell which album and which record label was represented just from the barcode. No joke.

Stay tuned for tales of how I moved on from my life in the music biz. . .

It'sThe Little Things: Witness

I just took this photo after the FOURTH time vacuuming the first floor of the house(the first two were sans belt). I'm shocked and a little embarassed at how filthy the carpet was/is. But I've got the new belt on, and a spare waiting in the wings. I'm ready for it!!

Sent from my iPhone

Vacuum Cleaning and Diagnostics

Add that to my list of jobs?

Well, unofficially. Probably more of a hobby than anything, I suppose. I was wondering today why a simple stray string wasn't playing along with the whole vacuum-suction thing. So I upended the machine and took a screwdriver to it. Turns out that odd sweet smell I've been noticing for...oh, let's just say a rather long time...was a direct result of the belt having melted and fused to the roller brush. And then disintegrating. Turns out two heads of long hair are mightier than the Eureka Power Vroom or whatever the hell it's called. I think I pulled enough hair off of the roller mechanism to donate to Locks Of Love if I'd washed and combed it out. So we're in the market for a new belt in the short term...but high on the wish list is a whole new machine. I did feel rather...crafty...for having dived in and taken the thing apart. Would that I'd have done it months and months ago. Word to the wise: if you have long hair or other sorts of windy (wine-dy) stuff on your floors, clean your vacuum from time to time. I am available in the Phoenix markets if you need such a service performed.

What's that you say? How can I digress so boldly when I've neglected the completion of my epic saga of past employment. A-Ha! It was a lead in, don't you see?

So yeah. Jobs after college.

Booking agent for Rock Solid Entertainment and Supersports. I had a lot of nerve when I got out of college. When I moved to Fayetteville, I started calling around to all of the hot clubs in town and asking for jobs. Amazingly enough, Chris King of JR's Lightbulb Club knew of a guy who needed some help booking bands and events. I gave Beau Whalen a call, and he gave me my first job in the real world, although you could hardly call it that.

I was fresh out of college, sharing an apartment (and soon after, a house) with my best friend, booking the hottest bands in NW Arkansas. Don't laugh. There was a pretty hip music scene in Fayetteville back in the day (still is, for all I know). I worked with Punkinhead (omg, they're still around! amazing!) The Faith Healers, Gypsy, Cosmic Giggle Factory--several others whose names escape me. I worked part time, at best, rolling out of bed late in the morning, working from no earlier than 11am--usually going in after 1pm (the clubs we booked into weren't generally open before then, anyway) and staying only until 5 or 6 at the latest. I got paid cash commissions off the bookings, and got into free shows almost every night of the week. Oh, and we lived about 3 blocks from where I worked, so I walked every day. The primary clubs the agency booked *into* was less than a mile from where we lived, so we walked there as well. Ah, the good ole days.

Still to come: The realisation that a regular wage is better than commission only.

But first...sleep.

Working Title

I did it. Last Friday I put in my notice at work. I gave them one month to replace me, given that A) it's the holiday season and they'll want to get someone in to train pretty quickly (although I've seen no movement to that effect) and B) I'll be hard to replace. :P

Of course I've been thinking about what I'm going to do next, aside from spending a couple days cleaning the HELL out of the house and perhaps hosting a garage sale to unload some of the stuff that's been boxed up for 3 years with nary a thought.

Thinking about what's next invariably gets me thinking about what's in the past, so I thought I'd share a rundown of my illustrious working history.

1. Babysitter. I don't know how old I was, but I know I was barely old enough to be left alone myself. I used to stay with my mom's friend's boy Ryan a lot. It was more like an unsupervised playdate than anything else. After Ryan there were a lot of in betweens, but the main other kids I sat with were Chris and Kyle Corbin, and the Lane boys, whose names escape me. I don't really recall ever babysitting little girls--at least on a regular basis, and I now find that odd. I always got along better with boys, anyway...

2. Video Store Clerk. I once made an error on a receipt that made it look as though we were $2,000,000 short at the end of the night. I didn't get fired!

3. Lifeguard. Yep. I worked as a lifeguard at a country club. Once, a friend of mine from school walked up to me and asked what the writing was on my hip. Turns out stretch marks don't tan well, and look like a form of writing from far away...

4. Disc Jockey. I was an unpaid DJ in college, and then one summer got a real live paying on air job at a local radio station. Power 105.9FM Northwest Arkansas' Best Music! I was the overnight weekend DJ. There are some freaky people up late at night, and they are not afraid to stalk the dj booth.

5. Baby Chicken Processor. Somehow I had in my head that this job would look good on a Peace Corps application. I debeaked and innoculated baby chickens, among other horrible, horrible things. It was godawful work, often for 16 hours a day. I saved a baby chicken from becoming chicken food once (oh how I wish I were kidding). Any "off coloured" chicks were tossed into the grinder, so I stowed a tiny black chick in my shirt pocket and took him home. He lived in a box in our front room and hung out with me on the front lawn. His name was Little Moufette.

6. College Radio Station Manager. After I was a dj for 2 years, I managed to become Station Manager. This entailed mainly making schedules, reading CMJ, and creating and booking a lot of live shows, including but not limited to: The Mongol Beach Party, Bunnies of Doom, and Sweet Baby. Ah the good old days of bands sleeping on the couches and floors of the house and getting their tour trailers stuck in the back yard. Good times, good times.

So that's the jobs up through college. Post college forays into the world of work will be for another day.

This green behemoth is the last place I lived in Lawrence, Kansas. The window(s) just above the porch roof? Mine. I had a fantastic 2 br/1bath apartment, with the smallest kitchen known to man. My cookie sheets wouldn't even fit into the oven, it was so tiny. If I had owned a microwave at the time, it would have had to sit in my spare room because there was absolutely no place for it in that kitchen. Literally, I'd say it was probably about 7-10 square feet. And that's probably being generous.

But that wasn't the only quirky thing about this apartment, oh no! As you might have guessed from the exterior, it was an old house, and as we all know, things tend to sag as they get older... My apartment ran the length of the entire house, and if you stood at either end of it and put down a spherical object of any kind, it would roll to a point roughly in the middle of the apartment.

And then there was the fact that all of the utilities were included, but communal. What that means is that although I had purchased a spiffy window air conditioner a few years prior to moving in, I was not allowed to use it. That would have shifted the electric bill rather a ways up, but everyone split the bills, so no go. The house did have a/c, but it was woefully inadequate. My "scrape-the-freezer-ice" trick was put into play again, but I also cleverly parked my self in the main hallway of the house on the hottest nights. There was a vent at either end of the hallway (there was but one in my rather large room, which happened to sit over the open entryway of the house, so was bordered on three sides by hot hot air), so I hung blankets to keep the cold air in, and slept between them on the floor.

Ah, the good ole days! I lived on a brick street, the photo of which I can't show you because Blogger apparently hates me just at the moment. But I had always wanted to live on a brick street, from the very first time that I visited Lawrence (thank you thank you thank you to my good friend Kevin Waddell for moving there and inviting me up--and introducing me to the guys that sold me my very first mountain bike too, btw!), and this house gave me that dream. And let me tell you...it's no picnic, especially in the little pickup that I was driving at the time. Or on that mountain bike. But it sure was pretty.
Ah! Now it works. See? I told you it was pretty.

Ravaging Burros

Yesterday, I went back to Lake Pleasant for National Public Lands Park Cleanup Day. I'm fairly certain that the wild burros were culprits behind all of the trash. They were clearly feeling surly about the fact that we were removing all the tasty styrofoam cups and Capri Sun pouches:
The day was strictly volunteer; I wasn't serving any community service for wrongdoings (despite the constant and very real urge to do bodily harm--or at the very least, curse at--the folks who frequent my place of work), and I wasn't having a guilt attack for tossing a huge pile of garbage out of my car window while driving down the highway (NEVER!). I just wanted to get outside, do something I could feel good about, and maybe meet some cool folks in the process.

So I took a floating holiday--and a lot of flak from my co-workers for having another Saturday off after having just been on vacation--and hauled myself out of bed at 5:30am in order to get to the lake by 7am. It's only a 30 minute drive, but a girl has to bathe and eat you know. I was paired with three other "singles": Krista--a girl about my age, Beverly--an older lady, and Arthur--a much older gentleman with what appeared to be Parkinson's. I only mention that because I was so amazed and impressed that he was out there climbing around and bending and lifting and shaking visibly the whole while.

Our little posse spent about 5 hours picking up junk from a day camp site and a big ravine on the side of a roadway. It truly is amazing how many Capri Sun pouches we found. As many or more of them than beer or soda bottles. True story. Another odd fact: plastic cups and lids disintegrate at a touch after sitting in the dry Arizona heat for a few weeks or months. So many times I'd reach for one of those quick stop plastic lids, only to have it break into a thousand teeny pieces at my touch. Oh the humanity! We found socks, flip flops, a couple styrofoam coolers, feminine hygiene products, lots of diapers, and tons of plastic bottle caps and plastic shopping bags, among other things.

At the end of the day, I looked like I'd stuck my left
arm into a clump of these.........................................
(which I guess, sort of, I had)
and I was more tired than I recall being in a very very long time. More tired than I was after chasing my best friend's 2 year old all over Kansas City! I actually laid down and took a nap after lunch. I never nap!

So I got out of work, got out of the house, got some scratches, and got some sun. I didn't get Krista's number, which I should have, because she seemed pretty cool. My friend Shannon would have done it, because she's outgoing that way. I need to take some more lessons from her on that front. Despite coming away without any new buddies, I had a really good exhausting day! And yes, there is water in Arizona!

The 21st Street Duplex

So as I mentioned a few days ago, I lived next to a psycho in that little brick duplex. I can't even really tell you how I discovered that he was a psycho. Maybe I just knew it all along. Sometimes you can just sense these things. I could probably count the number of times that I actually saw his face on one hand, but I immediately remember beady little eyes in a balding head--a sure sign of psychosis, right?

There were the long, long, long nights of extraordinarily loud music until about 4am (at a time when I had to be at work by 6am), and conversations that I listened to through the apparently thin wall separating us. I don't think he ever had anyone over to the apartment, so I *assume* he was on the phone, but you just never know. I couldn't hear everything, but I'm pretty sure I heard the words "score" and "rocks" on more than one occasion. I'm also pretty sure he wasn't talking about sports or music.

And then there was the night that he pounded on my door at around 3:00am demanding that I fix him something to eat. It had been a night of loud loud music, and he was obviously drunk/in an altered state. And he was pounding on my door. My door that shook visibly when pounded. My door that, I'm fairly certain, was less sturdy than even foam-core--"air core" if you will. And it wasn't a friendly "Hey, got any food in there?" Oh, no. It was a mean, drunken "HEY! Get up and make me some FOOD! Come on, damnit, I'm HUNGRY!" I happened to have locked my pitiful front door that night, which is a good thing, because he actually rattled the handle a few times.

Needless to say, I did *not* make him any food. I'm not even sure I responded to him at the time, at least not directly. I may have told him to go to bed. The action I did take consisted of protecting myself. I pulled my phone into my bedroom (this was back in the dark ages of land lines) and shut and locked the door. I think I stated before that from that point on, I slept with a steak knife under my pillow, but that was a lie. I was living alone, and I don't eat beef. I owned no steak knives! Besides, I'm far too much of a klutz to sleep with something so easily dangerous so close to my head. No, I slept with a cloak pin. Because that's safer than a steak knife, right? Thanks to an exboyfriend who happened also to have been a blacksmith, I had this little dandy in my Renaissance Faire repertoire. I'll pause for a moment to let all that sink in.

Renfaire geek with blacksmith boyfriend ---------> Recovering WoW addict with interactive web designer boyfriend. My how the times change.

Anyway. I called the property management place the next day and told them what had transpired. He remained there until long after I moved out (he was, in fact, still living there when I returned to Lawrence 3 years later--my old apartment was up for rent again and I would have moved back into it in a heartbeat had it not been for his presence), but the loud music ceased to be a problem and the drunken hunger rages were never directed at me again.

Didn't stop me from sleeping with my cloak pin for a long time afterward, and I *always* remembered to lock my door from then on.

There are more, slightly less life threatening stories from that apartment. Like the time I chiseled ice from my freezer and put it in a big metal bowl between my bed and a big fan because it was 115 degrees outside and I had no A/C. For three weeks it was over 100 degrees. I used to go hang out in the library for relief. So all winter long I saved and saved and saved and bought myself a really nice programmable window A/C unit for the following summer. And it never got above 90 degrees.

Good times. Good times.

We Interrupt This Program. . .

...because I've been distracted...

yeah, I've traded one video game fixation with another. It's purty. But it gives me bad dreams if I play too close to bedtime!

At least it doesn't make me want to sleep with a steak knife under my pillow like the psycho that lived next door to me in this Lawrence, Kansas duplex:

I'm off tomorrow, and after I spend most of my morning waiting for my windshield to be replaced, I'll have pretty much all day to relay the story. So you'll just have to wait.

A little. Bit. More.

Hold That Thought

The second installment of musing on past housing situations will have to wait. I ended up working about an hour late tonight and I've got a nasty headache. I'm tired and cranky (yeah, I know...what's new?), so your storytime will have to wait until I'm feeling cheeky enough to do it justice.

I have great news though...I just saved a TON of money on my car insurance.

No joke. I switched to AAA; I'm going to be saving almost $600/year for the same coverage I had under Progressive. Nice.

Memory Lane

One of the other things when I did while in Lawrence was visit my old apartments/houses.

This little stone dandy I shared with 3 other folks, Annika and John and a boy named Kerry. Then he moved out and was replaced by a real jerk whose name escapes me. Annika's folks owned the house. They were from Dubai and her mom told me my toe ring was inappropriate because it meant I was married. Except that I was wearing it wrong because there were supposed to be two, etc. etc. She was actually quite lovely about it, and now I have that little tidbit to dish out. I lived in the basement. Those two little tiny windows at the base of the house? That's me. There used to be a giant tree smack in the middle of the front yard. I wonder why they removed it?

Annika volunteered at a wildlife rehabilitation place, so we always had odd critters in the house--sickly squirrels, baby owls and bats, rabbits with broken legs. . . When I found an abandoned nest of Starlings, though, she told me that the rehab place wouldn't support them--apparently they are considered the cockroaches of the bird world. Or something equally disdained.

She did, however, offer to show me how to take care of them. She showed me how to use a paintbrush to feed and water them (watered down and mushed up dog food--but you really have to jam it down in there. It's. . .disturbing!!), and I took them to work with me every day for at least a week or two in order to feed them every two hours. These were baby baby birds!

When they started to fledge, we put them in a laundry basket and created a screen to place over the top of it. Eventually they got big enough that they could fly up and push the screen off of the basket, and they actually used to fly (hop/flap) around my room and return to the cage on their own. Soon after this we figured it was time to start the release process, so I'd take them out to that front porch and remove the lid from the basket. They'd hop up on the edge and have a look around, but for the first few times, they'd just as quickly hop back in. Soon enough, though, they ventured off the basket's edge and out to that now-missing tree.

For one of the babies, that was that. He (she?) never came back. Just sat in that tree and cried and cried. The other one sat for a few minutes and decided he just wasn't ready for that much of a challenge and came back to the "nest". I left the basket out for a while longer, and while he jumped up to the edge again to sit and ponder the wide world, he didn't fly off. I brought him back inside for the night and we tried again the next day. Maybe he missed his brother/sister, or maybe he'd just decided the time was right. Whatever happened in his little bird brain, he took off for that tree, sat for a few minutes, looked back at me (I swear!), and flew away.

Tomorrow: Apartment #2. . .The Psycho Next Door

gimmegimmegimmemoremoremore

Memory Lane

When I visit Kansas City, one of my primary destinations is always Lawrence, Kansas. I lived there off and on for 6 years or so, and it holds a lot of good memories for me. Plus, there's good eats and good shopping! While I missed visits to *both* Papa Keno's and La Familia, I did get to visit one of my very very favourite non-food places: Clinton Lake. I sent a photo/post from my iphone that day. I'm far too lazy to create a link at this moment...just scroll down a bit; it was only about 4 posts ago! I took a bunch of photos with the regular camera as well, and I love the green green green path, so I'm going to spam the rest of this post with some of those shots. Enjoy!

This is the stealthy trail. Off to the left there, going up that slight embankment. Just south of the dam, on the west side of the road.No marking on any map that I've ever seen. I couldn't even tell you how I know about it. It was very overgrown, which sort of made me happy in that sort of "it's my little secret" way...and kind of sad in that "no one else knows about this wonderful place" way.

This is actually on the way *out* of the trail--the entrance would be just 20 yards or so on the other side of that very sunny ridge. Sorry for the sunspots, but then again, I kinda like the feel of 'em.
This one, it's just a close up of the rocky top of the trail. It can be a bit challenging to get down without fallin on yer butt. And it's the primary reason I never tried to take my mountain bike on this trail. :)

Just look at all that green, will ya? it's just...mmmm.... Bit overwhelming. Sort of like trying to work all these photos into one post. Blogger is not being friendly about the entire process, so I'm going to leave it at this for now. Trust me, there will be more!

In Flight

Okay, I'm not actually *in* flight, as that would be both dangerous
and against the rules. I am, however, sitting in the Dallas airport,
awaiting my boarding call. If I may fess up to a most macabre facet
of my personality, I'll just say that I always check out my flying
companions, and wonder what it would be like to be stranded on a
remote island with them. Who would the leaders be? Who would cause
trouble? Who would try to steal my remaining protein bar, and my
bottle of water???

Yes, I'm ready for the new season of Lost.

And the plane? It's now ready for me! Next stop, Phoenix!

Sent from my iPhone

It's A Dirty Job. . .

I mowed *part* of the ginormous lawn at my parents' house today, and
this is what I have to show for it. Those are NOT tan lines--that, my
friends, is layer upon layer of dirt and grass and, well, hair (I
haven't shaved in... a week?). I imagine there is even a chigger or
three (thousand) in there somewhere. I was actually talking to
someone in Arizona a few weeks ago who had never heard of chiggers, if
you can believe it! Another person had heard of them, but had assumed
they were mythical critters. I wish! Before mowing, I was picking up
walnuts, and I'm certain I felt the little buggers creeping around and
munching on my ankles. Ahhh, green stuff! How easy it is to recall
your beauty, but completely forget the terrors harbored within!!

Well the upside of doing all this work is that I'll have a mighty
appetite for the all-good-things-injected smoked turkey we are having
tonight, not to mention the Mad Mad Mud Pie ice cream and homemade
cookies coming up a little later this evening!!

Current View

This is my current view, off the back deck of my parents' house. I
don't get good (any?) reception out here, so this will likely get to
the Internet *after* I've entered a blog from the computer proper. . .

Best seat in the house

This is the view I have right this second. I'm at Clinton Lake--one
of my favorite places in Lawrence. When I lived here, I frequently
brought my backpack, a journal, and much more hike-friendly shoes out
here for the day. The point off in the distance there is the very old
site of a very old
home. The foundation created a secluded and oddly mystic place for me
to sit and read or write for hours. There is always a good wind off
the lake, and the constant lapping of the water is so soothing-- even
mixed with the cacophony(sp?) of all the seabirds that have somehow
found their way here.
My best friend was good enough to lend me her car for the half day she
is at work, so I made my "all the places I've previously lived" tour
and came right out here. If I have time when I've gotten my fill
here, I'll hit Mass street, but for now I'm really content with the
sounds of the lake.

Mini Calzone Maker

When she told me that we were having mini calzones for dinner, I
assumed she meant that she had a mini calzone maker... This was not
what I had in mind.

Back east

I made a comment to a couple from Louisiana the other day that they
were from "back east", which they did not find nearly as amusing as I
did...but I still maintain that, relative to phoenix, it is indeed
east--and since I grew up in the general region, I can certainly
qualify that description with "back".

So now, at this very moment, I am Back East. I'm in my best friend's
guest room, thumbing out this blog entry on my phone just for the
challenge of it. We stopped on the way home from the airport for some
Taco Bueno and caught the second half of the Princess Bride. It's
already shaping up to be a great trip :D

It's nearly 11 here and everyone else is fast asleep. When in Rome...

Sent from my iPhone

'spearmintin

bear with me as I attempt to figure out this mobile blogging thing. yes, that's right! it's not enough that I neglect writing from the comfort of my own home. I want to compound the guilt I feel about not keeping up with the blog by enabling myself to blog from *anywhere*! :)

the photo of Bucket was supposed to have a line of text, which I do not see, so apparently there are kinks to work out. If things look a little whacky today and in the coming week, you now know why.

Witness: Clouds of DOOM

I don't recall which day this was, but here is my Cloudy Sky shot taken on the way to work recently. It's so rare to see a single cloud in the sky here, much less this leaden blanket...it was an absolute joy to witness. A bit bass ackwards, I know, but such is life.

And yeah, I got my email and phone linked up, so I should be able to post a few photos from the road to keep ya'll interested. And then of course there will hopefully be an album of sorts when I get back.

Hooray Vacation!

gear head

so, what does it mean that the first things I made sure were absolutely ready to go for my trip were my iPhone, the digital camera, and my DSlite? I've thought about what clothes to take, and even what book(s) to take, and tonight I bought some airport/plane snacks...but the first things actually packed up and fully ready to go with no tweaking were the electronics.

I'm not the hippie chick you used to know...but then again a lot of me still is. It's an odd amalgam I've turned out to be. Gimme my organic foods and none of that earth-killin beef, but I'll be damned if a day passes by that I don't engage in horrific abuses of electricity and airwave pollution. I'll happily soak in a patchouli scented bubble bath whilst I toil at the remaining unsolved Sudoku puzzles on my portable game system.

yeah, I said whilst. omghax! :P

Surprise!

You thought since I took two days off that I was gone for good, eh? Oh ye of little faith! I'm back with not much to say, except that I leave for Kansas City in less than 3 days and I'm SO excited. Thinking about all of the places I want to visit....La Familia, Papa Keno's, KCRF, Bloom Bath and Body (try as I might, I couldn't find a link!)...
And of course I'm excited about visiting my best friend and her hubby and Sweet V, and my folks. It will be lovely to be out in the sticks again, although I'll almost certainly be put to some sort of strenuous work by my father, whose sole delight in my visits is handing over a giant To Do list. I've tried to explain that these visits are my vacation time, but that doesn't seem to carry much weight. And besides, there is a sick sick part of me that actually likes those projects. I'm a tasker, so seeing something get crossed off a list really soothes a part of my soul that gets no relief in a life of retail. Also, my dad's not the mushy sort, so these projects are really the only quality father/daughter time we have. And, I usually learn something useful while doing them. So I'll whine and complain, and end up with blisters and a giant backache, but ultimately I'll look back and love the fact that I picked up 30 pounds of walnuts from the back yard, or flushed the gutters or helped patch a hole in one of the boats. Or something.
With any luck all that backbreaking labour will be offset with some time in the kitchen with my mom (and no, I don't mean cleaning out the pantry, mom!). We both love to cook/bake, so maybe we can whip up some goodies while I'm there. And of course, shopping. There are always fun little odd shops out in the middle of nowhere. I don't know how they stay in business, but I'm glad they do. And I'm glad my mom knows where they all are. And even though we've tried--and failed-- everytime I've seen her for the past three years, maybe *this* time, the knitting lessons will stick. :)

OMG 3 Days in Row!

Another lovely shot of yet more cacti, clouds and mountains. From the same jaunt as yesterday's photo--heck from the same perspective, almost identically. I really liked the way the clouds shaded some of the mountains. I like the way the clouds shade *anything* here, if you want to know the truth. A few weeks ago there was an absolutely glorious dark, rainy, cloudy day (I have a photo on my phone to prove it, but haven't managed to get my email set up and working on it yet), which I much bemoaned missing out on as I was headed into work. Far cry from the days when it only seemed to rain on--and ruin--my weekends. It's a topsy turvey world.

That's all I've really got to say for now. I've just dyed my hair, and I'm anxious to go look at it. Again. And in true Shanny fashion, I want to go start planning what I'm going to take/wear to KANSAS CITY! The land of GREEN. And TREES. With LEAVES! H'ray!

So I went for a drive last week on my day off. I had originally intended to actually *leave* the car and go for at least a short walk, but when I arrived at Lake Pleasant (roughly a 30 minute drive from the house--not really all that bad when I had always assumed a general dearth of water in the entire state), I realised that I didn't have the $5 required to actually enter the park. So I drove. And drove. It was an atypically cloudy day, and as I popped over one hill Iwas startled enough at the view to stop and snap a photo. The Lake, hidden by such hills (mts?), is to my right. I was able to sneak a tiny peek at one point in my drive, but it didn't really translate on the camera to much more than a streak of shiny blue, so I didn't take the photo. I'll go back sometime, cash inhand, and manage to take that walk by the water. And I'll bring you photo documentation lest you continue to believe, as I did, that there is no water in Arizona.

twig?

Since my writing has been less than regular, perhaps I should invent a term for those like me..the sporadic bloggers. No longer writing Web Logs, we now can only manage Web Twigs. Or Web Detritus.

My humour. Obtuse, I know.

So it's a (relatively) new month and it's nearly fall, so I'm going to give this being a regular blogger thing another go.

I've been in a fairly decent mood lately, what with all the bike riding and the looking forward to my fast approaching trip back to Kansas City and the 'rents. They go together, you see. Because although it's still hitting 90-100 degrees by 10am, I've been riding my bike again--all with the aim of getting a little shape back before my trip. My best friend and my parents love me, but I don't need them worrying about whether I'm going to singlehandedly put the all-you-can-eat food bars out of business when I come to town.

Besides, bike shorts tan lines rule and let me know where to put the tattoo.

Scraping and Rasping

Not home improvement, no. Teeth cleaning. They actually used a device today that looked VERY like a rasp. A very small, very thin (such that it could slide between teeth) thing, but a rasp nonetheless. And my teeth, they do feel very clean. Bit nekkid, but clean.

First thing I did when I got home? Finished off the last 3 bites of Cinnamon Bun ice cream in the freezer.

I really don't have any other tales to tell. Tonight will be the last night of the overnights, apparently, so I have no clue what I'll be working for the next week. Everyday is an adventure!

I do know I'm off for the next two days. Friday is a payday and I have some stuff callin my name at REI, so there you go.

I got my face drilled today.

It sounds so dramatic, doesn't it? To have one's face drilled. And no, I didn't take a soccer ball to the face. There was a time in my life when such a phrase would have meant precisely that, but this is not that time.

No, I had to have a filling replaced. Seems I clench my teeth (no, really? stress? me?), and I had cracked a rather old metal filling. So today I got a snazzy new amalgam, and a half frozen face. All in less than an hour. The anaesthetic is starting to wear off, so I have that lovely tingly feeling, in addition to the lingering pain of the injections and the several times that I've bitten my cheek in the interim.

My dentist has tvs hovering over the exam chairs though, so I got to watch US v Haiti soccer match. (Hey. Soccer again. Twice in one post. Totally unintentional. What's that mean?). We were up 2-0 when she finished, but honestly I think the Haitians were playing better. I'm a dentist's chair expert on these things, you know.

So here's the story

I've been 37 for just over a month now, and while the prospect of being even *nearer* 40 causes me much chagrin, it hasn't sucked entirely.

We went to Charleston, SC towards the end of May, for another gathering of WoW friends, and it was soooo awesome. Check it out. There aren't a lot of notes to lead you through the madness, but I think you can see easily enough what a great time everyone had.

It's summer here now, which means 100+ temperatures on any given day, so we're spending a lot more time inside, listening to the dogs whine. I was cycling and even walking the dogs with a moderate amount of regularity until the heat came. Now I will be a hermit. Lots of movie watching, I guess.

Or, I can just do stuff outside when I get off work at THREE A.M. for the next week or two or three. Yeah. I said it. I'm working 7pm to 3am for the next little while. Should be good times. We're resetting part of the store, and lucky me--I get to head up the overnight team doing it. Oh no, it's not because the boss thinks I have a particular talent for leading such a crew...it's because I'm the only one of us keyholders with no children to share with my "spouse". I was the easy choice. Don't get me wrong, I'll thoroughly enjoy being in the store without having to deal with all those pesky customers, but still...it burns!

And that's what I know for now. Happy June! (I'll try to get back, really I will!)

I wear one, do you?

linky goodness
(check out the entry from May 25th if you're coming to this late in the game)


I've worn a band for a couple years now. I'm glad to see it's not just a rubbery yellow fashion statement after all. . .

Rock the Pink!

So I'm a blog addict. You've heard me mention Fatty before. Well his wife is climbing a mountain of her own right now, and in her honour, the good folks at Twin Six have created a Pink version of the Fat Cyclist jersey. If you bike, know anyone who does, or just want to help a great family and a great cause, please check it out. Please support Twin Six as well, since they came up with the idea. Pass it on.

This is oddly right on the money...sorry Shanny!

You Are the Thumb

You're unique and flexible. And you defy any category. Mentally strong and agile, you do things your own way. And you do them well. You are a natural leader... but also truly a loner. You inspire many but connect with few. You get along well with: The Middle Finger Stay away from: The Pinky

What Finger Are You?

Travel Humor

1. Go to google.com.

2. Click on Maps.

3. Click on Get Directions.

4. Enter in “From” box: New York, New York.

5. Enter in “To” box: Paris, France.

6. Then, read line #23 of directions.

7. Laugh.

Thanks to my best friend in the Entire World, even England (and France), for sending this my way. :D

Mourning

Days and days of things to write have slipped by, but now I'm struck with this bit of sadness.

I accidentally started reading Kurt Vonnegut one summer in college. We were allowed to check out books for the summer, and I randomly roamed through the basement stacks and grabbed titles I thought looked interesting. One of them was Cat's Cradle. I think the writing on the spine was some sort of crazy orange 70's looking lettering and it caught my eye. I read the synopsis on the back and it sounded like an interesting read, so I added it to my pile.

I was instantly hooked on the zaniness of the characters and the not-so-subtle social commentary/political satire. I'm fairly certain that I had read his entire bibliography by the time I graduated, and I had the great pleasure of seeing him speak at the Lied Center in Lawrence, Kansas when I lived there.

It's been ages since I've read his books; perhaps it's time for a refresher. I recommend that you do the same, or try one for the first time if you've not yet discovered the wonder of Vonnegut.

Aspirations (!)

So I read The Fat Cyclist regularly. Recently he lost the Bloggies to Confessions of a Pioneer Woman. There were links, and much fun made (in a "damn, she's really good" kinda way), so of course I had to check out the site. I'm hooked. Check it out. It's the rustic version of Dooce!
If I ever make it to "kept woman" status, I'm going to have a cool blog too, with photos and contests and cooking class too! Thing is, these women (Ree and Dooce) are kept by their blogs, not just their men. Dooce's blog makes enough revenue in ads to pay the bills for her family (she and her husband both work at home now, on design projects and. . . blogs!) and I imagine Ree's pulls in a fair chunk as well, although I'm newer to her blog and don't know the entire story. . . At any rate, it's a brave new world out there, and while I don't believe that it's easy work by any stretch of the imagination, I bet it beats the hell out of retail.

Failing in my duties as a blogger

I get kind of antsy when my friend Shannon doesn't update her blog for a couple of days, and that got me thinking about this thing. And I *still* didn't write. Sometimes there is nothing to say, and other times there is just too much.

Here's what's goin on:

I'm still riding, only a couple times a week, though, as my work schedule has gone back to being completely erratic and stoopid and Phoenix is starting to go back to being completely unlivable and oven-like. Right now I have a mysteriously flat tire--I rode about 7.5 miles last week with no problems at all, and a day or two later I came home to find that my front tire was completely wasted. I haven't investigated, but I probably caught a thorn or something. I've got gel tubes though, so it's gotta be a fairly good sized hole. And I don't have any spares. Alas...time to go shopping at the bike shop!

I took the dogs in last week for their yearly shots and whatnot, and got the doc's opinion on Delilah's lame back leg. "You're not going to like what I have to say about her leg," the doc said. "Do you have pet insurance?" Eep. Apparently our little devildog has a torn CCL, which is the doggy equivalent of an ACL. Surgery! Whee! So of course we panicked and started looking into insurance--nearly every policy of which states that you cannot be treated for a CCL injury less than 12 months after opening a policy.

So we also did a lot of reading on the injury and the surgery themselves, and found out that dogs that *have* the surgery almost always end up with at least some arthritis in the joint, and will be somewhat lame on the leg. The surgery is very invasive and requires an extremely rigorous recovery period. Dogs that don't have the surgery, but are limited to less strenuous activity over several months, develop scar tissue around the injury that will stabilise it anyway. They will be slightly more prone to arthritis, but still completely able to get around.

Delilah is now taking lil baby aspirins on days when her leg seems to bother her, and she and I are sharing a brand new bottle of Glucosamine/Chondroitin (both suggestions of the vet). She's taking little 10-15 minute walks with me and *not* roughhousing with Bucket like she used to.

In other news, it rained for an ENTIRE DAY a few days ago. I was so happy. And then my allergies brought out the big stick of pain and itchy and beat me about the face with it. I was not feeling groovy. The cool thing is, it's going to be even worse in a couple of weeks when everything that got a good drink starts to bloom! A friend of mine at work suggested Bee Pollen, so I'm going to give that a try.

I'll...uh....keep you posted....

Confessions of a Hater

I hate peas. The little green monstrosities have haunted my entire career as a food-eating human. From the time I was a child and would eat peas by the spoonful only because I could swallow them whole with a mouthful of milk (Oh! The horror of actually biting into and "popping" a pea!), to recent years when I would go to great lengths to pick peas out of soups, salads, fried rice or any other pea-riddled abomination, peas have been my food nemesis.

But then. One day. . . Last Sunday, to be exact. . . I dragged R out to a new place called Sweet Tomatoes. They have a mile long salad bar with every imaginable salad related food (including my new favourite...Warm Bacon Salad Dressing--it's LIQUID BACON! What could be better? Seriously.) . . . even peas.

Knowing my sheer abhorrence for them, and always looking to get a rise out of me, R hastily spooned A LOT of peas onto his salad. Peas were rolling down the side of the spinach mountain, and threatened to fall onto my plate. I accommodated him by shrieking in (not mock) horror, and we moved on to the soups and breads and suitably yummy distractions. I forgot all about the peas.

And then, in the midst of eating, R attempted to sneak peas onto my salad. There were only a few of them--3 or 4 at most--but my reaction was swift and exclamatory; I attempted to throw them back at him. He's quick though, and knows me well enough to have expected such a reaction, and my throw was blocked, sending all the peas but one back onto my salad. The one pea? Landed in my drink.

One lonely pea, covered in a protective layer of ranch dressing, bobbing around in my Dr. Pepper. I fished it out and then, for some reason--perhaps it was an act of defiance of some sort, cos I'm all about the defiant acts--I ate it. I didn't try to swallow it either. I bit into it. And it wasn't nasty and mushy and gross at all. It was kind of snappy and green tasting, and...kind of good. I was shocked and excited all at once. Sure, my taste buds had betrayed a long standing and well defined intolerance of mine, but now. . .NOW. . .peas! It's a whole new world!

old new addictions

There is a recreation area called Reach 11 here in Phoenix. Recently, they completed a sports complex very close to our house that includes access to about 18 miles of trails. What they lack in personality they make up for in proximity and ease of use.
Even after going through my four months of physical therapy last summer, I still have fairly constant back pain, and my knees still make a gawdawful cruchy racket every time I go up or down the stairs, so I have been reluctant to get back out on a bona-fide mountain bike trail. It just causes too much stress and strain. However, these Reach 11 trails are moderate to say the least. Straight, flat, not terribly bumpy. . . Benign. A few years ago I might have dismissed them as beyond boring, but now they are reminding me of my love of speed and the wind in my face.
I went out for the first time this past Sunday and road a little over 7 miles. The trails run adjacent, under, parallel, and perpendicular to a couple of major interstates, so the sounds of traffic were an ever-present buzz in my ear, but after a while I could tune it out and just enjoy the spinning of the cogs and the crunching of the dirt beneath my tires. I saw other riders, a few runners, and a rabbit. And I completely left behind everything else in the world.
I took a day off on Monday, mainly to give my butt a rest (of all things, riding will most make your butt sore if you're not used to it), and partially to keep myself from overdoing it, as I am wont to do. But I couldn't wait to ride again. There was this longing to be out in the fresh air and away from...just about everything. The solitude of riding is a great thing, especially when I have to deal with people all day long. I used to ride every day after work...2-3 hours at a time, depending on how long the light lasted. It became such a part of my routine that I didn't feel quite right when I didn't get a chance to ride. I craved it. It was probably my first real addiction, besides music and chocolate.
When I ride I think about a million things, but nothing really bogs me down. I can kind of zone out and let thoughts and ideas just sort of float around effortlessly. It's a bit like dreaming, I think. Daydreaming, perhaps. I just peddle and peddle and peddle and love the burning in my legs and the wind in my ears.
When I'm done I am completely exhausted, but it's exhaustion laced with this weird euphoria, because riding just makes me feel *that* good. I can't really say why, I just really enjoy it. I rode again on Tuesday--another 7.5 miles or so. I skipped the last two days for various reasons (it's cold! and I worked late today to be specific), so I'm hoping for a beautiful sunny day on my day off tomorrow so I can take an extended jaunt into the desert. I'll let you know how it goes.

Ghosts

I was cleaning today, going through some old (old!) papers, and I came across a collection of poems I wrote. Here are a couple of my favourites:

*****
he sings the names
with conviction--
so unlike the unconscious
humming harmonies
of night whistling
that I hear so often
in reply to the silence
afforded by intimacy.
those arms are betraying--
strong but terrified
they cling to their fear.
I've felt them and wondered at their contradictions.

beauty offers no protection,
honestly little more
so those strong arms keep clinging
and questioning
and helpless I stand and smile
and wonder--
offering no explanations
whistling in my own darkness

---written early 1990, for my friend Samuel

****
in the green
in the wet
in the smooth
of the deep
green
wet
pools of your eyes
I can see so many things. . .
and then you blink

---22 may 1990 about my then crush, Will.

Cheap and Conflicted

Cheap? Perhaps not the best word to define my chagrin at having started the year off with such a bang and finding myself, here not much more than a month later, whimpering in a corner. It sort of works though. As in, my attention is cheap. My appetite is cheap. It doesn't take much at all to distract me from the goals at hand which were, in a nutshell, to eat better and exercise more.

Which I did. For exactly 16 days, until The Burning Crusade was released.

I wasn't going to write about the game today. I was going to talk about the smell of wet dirt and how much joy it brings me. I was going to mention the fact that I think it's immensely ironic that I spent much of my childhood picking rocks out of the grass at our various houses-in-the-country but now I have to pick errant bits of grass out of the desert landscape that is my yard. I was even going to mention the fact that Sundried Tomato and Basil Parmesan Wheat Thins are the best snack cracker currently on the market (yes, even better than Chikin in a Biskit!).

However. The game dominates all. It is social for me. I have friends there that I've known for longer than some of the people with whom I work. It is therapy for me. In my crazy job, my task oriented psyche gets little comfort; the game sets distinct, ascertainable, goals for me. It's catharsis for me. After a day of bitchy co-workers and rude customers, I like to pretend that I am gorgeous and powerful. I can beat the crap out of the bad guys and/or lead my less powerful friends to safety. I can create items of amazing power and utility. I can fly.

Five Minutes?

Yes. I said 5 minutes with regard to the bowflex. Hey, I have a back injury and I haven't worked out in a while. Cut me some slack. Plus, I was just really distracted with the thought of getting on my bike again after a long hiatus.

Today is my day "off" (workin out), so all I did was wash a load of dishes and scrub out the sink while boogie-ing to OK GO. I grabbed the wrong album off iTunes, and it doesn't even have that immensely catchy "Here We Go Again" song on it, but it's a great album nonetheless.

Chris..I couldn't get the link to work! What and where is the con of which you speak? R and I might be interested in going too. And of course you are welcome to stay with us if ya like. I imagine the event is in Tempe or downtown, which we're not exactly close to, but hey..it'd be free! :)

2007

Everyone is always so excited about a "new year" but, really, the only thing that ever changes is the date on the checks I write. I'm still going to eat a boatload of junk food and not exercise nearly enough. I'm going to have great plans for working out more, sure--I may even spend a bunch of money on some gear or other to enable the dream. But when it comes right down to it, I'm just going to end up sitting on my ever increasingly fat ass and play video games or watch HGTV. I'm going to continue to complain about my crazy work schedule, but I'm too afraid to make a change. I'm a Taurus. I wallow in my ruts.

All cynicism (realistic-ness) aside, we have made pacts to get back in shape. I worked out on the bowflex for about 5 minutes this morning, and then went on my first bike ride in months (I was trying to download all the fascinating data from my Garmin 301 for your perusal and ridicule, but I can't get the computer to recognise the unit). R has been jumping rope and walking. We plan on throwing away all the extra holiday goodies we haven't already consumed. We probably won't, but we *plan* on it, and that's what counts, right? The thought?

I'm also, supposedly, working on my resume so I can show it to a woman R works with; she has offered to help me with it. Here's the scary part. I'm too embarrassed to show it to this woman to critique--and yet it's what I send out in hopes of finding a new job?

It's really just a ramble here, folks. A train wreck of words and emotions. Thanks for stopping by. Another of my "resolutions" is to write more and write better.

Oh, and Ink! You do realise that Albuquerque is not so very far from here, right? We should get together sometime. R and I would love to see you guys!

bahahahahaha

hahahahahaha (pause to gasp for air) hahahahhahahahaha!

oh. and I saw a real life roadrunner today. stalking me. from my driveway. Kettlecorn?

and this is just awesome. maybe cos I'm a chick, and a "soft girl" at that (R teases me when I get weepy over kodak commercials), but just check it out.

blah blah blog

ahahah isn't the english language funny?

anyway. nothing really to comment on here, unless you want yet *another* earnest tirade on the depth of human idiocy and ingratitude. Attention people who shop retail: The people who work in those stores have lives too. They are human beings, and deserve your kindness and respect.

Anyway. I love wrapping gifts. I tend to acumulate (sp?) stuff for people throughout the year because a) it's more in the spirit of things--seeing something someone would like and picking it up then--than doing a sudden, frenzied rush of shopping and b) I lack the bank account to do the sudden frenzied rush of shopping--I like to spread the spending. Makes it seem...less.

Anyway, when it comes time to wrap gifts, I have a couple of boxes in the spare room that are just *full* of gifty things. I simply pull out the boxes and start unpacking all the fun stuff that I've accumulated (that's it!) over the past year. I get to sort it all out, thinking about the people I bought it for, or the adventure that led me to that particular item (an arts & crafts fair? a vacation?). And then of course is the purely girly enjoyment of picking out the wrapping paper and tags and bows and dressing the thing up. I was never much into dolls, so I guess this is as good as it gets for the Tomboy that I am.

All this, and I have to confess--I have wrapped one gift so far. The anticipation though....it's killin me!

Winter

So, Arizona experiences winter. For the past several days, it's barely been above 60, and last night temperatures dropped into the 30s. This thrills me because, even despite the lack of snow, I can pull out and wear my silly winter hats and wear Russell's yummy sweaters (there's really nothing better than a boyfriend sweater, is there?).

Just a week or so ago I recieved an L.L.Bean catalog in the mail and was getting all verklempt at the thought of never again having to don long underwear or silk gloves under my wool gloves under my mittens. And while this little cold snap hasn't required such dire layering, it has allowed me to wear scarves and hats and gloves and such.

Oh! And the food. Winter food rules. I made tortilla chicken soup. I'm planning on making turkey black bean soup (one of my favourites, thanks mom!). I've been drinking hot cocoa and glogg by the gallon. Thinking about whippin out the bread machine for some nice home made chunky goodness. ahhhh...

Yeah. I miss winter. And if this is as good as it gets here in Phoenix, then I'm gonna milk it for all it's worth!

Weekend of Firsts!

I cooked Thanksgiving Dinner for the first time. By myself. It took two days, but I managed a Turkey Breast, rolls, sweet potatoes (yes, with marshmallows, tyvm!), Fatty's Mashed Potatoes, stuffing, cranberry sauce (which was meant to be cranberry relish but, with a Vitamix in lieu of a full-sized food processor, it turned out a bit more on the...liquid side), green bean casserole, and Pumpkin Gooey Butter Cakes, courtesy of Paula Deen.

And you know what? It all turned out okay. I even had it all (mostly) hot and ready to go at the same time. Of course we destroyed in less than 20 minutes what took me so long to prepare, but it was totally worth it. I loved every minute of the preparations. I'm not a great cook, but I do enjoy it. Blame my mom for that. *She* is a great cook. I would have much rather had her homemade stuffing than the boxed type, and her green beans are better than any mushroom soup/fried onion combo could hope to compare with, but all in all, we were both plenty pleased with the results of my first attempt at Thanksgiving.

The other crazy thing we did this weekend? Got up at o'god thirty on Friday morning to go out and see if we could find a Wii. We'd both read reports that many places had been restocked for the holiday weekend, but that proved not to be the case. At any rate, it was a fun adventure to see just how many people had camped out at Best Buy (about 300) for...whatever reason. Thing is, with all the wandering around we did, I never saw any deals that were worth getting up that early for. There were some nice sales, but nothing really earth-shattering. It was pretty disappointing, really. Well, that and the fact that *NO ONE* had any Wii's. We were home by about 7am, and promptly fell asleep on the couch. It proceeded to be a wonderfully lazy day of lounging and leftover munchin.

Anyway. It was a good couple of days. Happy Thanksgiving!

Damn you, Shanny!

She tagged me. :(

The Guidelines: List 5 weird things about yourself or your pets. Tag 5 friends and list them. Then, those people need to write on their blogs about 5 weird things, and state the rules, and tag 5 more people. Don't forget to let the people you tag know by posting a comment on their blog.

1. I can't stand to watch anyone shave. It completely makes my skin crawl. I have no trouble shaving myself (although I did go razor-free for about 12 years..perhaps that should have been another item on this list...), or other people for that matter (I used to work with adults with developmental disabilities, and had to shave the men's faces), but I can't watch it. Gillette commercial comes on and I have to cover my eyes or leave the room.

2. I like to make lists. Shopping lists, to do lists, things I want lists, etc. Sometimes I'll even add something to a list while shopping or running errands, just so I can cross it off and feel accomplished.

3. I love my scars, and I have a fair few. They all have stories--some more animated than others--and I love that I have them to tell.

4. Delilah, our lovely little girl, sounds like a wookie when she gets riled up. I keep meaning to take a video/audio clip so I can share it, but haven't yet. Obviously. It's a crazy bizzare sound, and seems to escalate with our laughter.

5. I can pop my feet. Not my toes...my feet. Not my ankles. My feet.

And as far as tagging 5 people goes, the only person's blog I read that I actually *know* is Shannon, so I'm not sure where to go with this. I guess I'll say that the following people need to email me--or post in the comments of this blog--five wierd things about themselves:

Kimbra.....Mom and/or Dad...Russell....Chris....Dean

Go!

Never post when you're grumpy....

I had a really bad day at work on Sunday. Suffice it to say that I had a series of angry, violent dreams that night, culminating with visions of holding a body down in a creekbed while stabbing it repeatedly in the face.

It was one of those odd things where it was actually someone else doing the dirty work as I watched. But I knew...*knew* that it was really me. You know?

So that's why I didn't come here and write about my day.

You understand.

the blogger gods hate me

I did try to post last week. I did. I wrote it up, I created links to another great Ze Show...and Blogger shut me down. Poof!

So I was meandering around the internet just now and came across This Guy. Pick any song. They are impossibly catchy, and clever to boot. Hooray, singer/songwriters!

Drivin with the windows down...

The wind rushed in, bringing crisp, wet smells of asphalt, dirt, and grass.
My hair went Yahoo Serious,
and I grinned wickedly at the decadence of it all.

Happiness Is...

A trip to the home improvement store.

I had to pop into Lowes tonight to try to get a replacement garage door opener, since I so carelessly smashed to pieces my previous one (not really--it fell out of my pocket on a bike ride a couple days ago and the diode broke is all...but it sounds much better, and feels psychologically better, to imply that I willfully smashed it). I didn't get a replacement yet, on account of being completely clueless about whether we had an Intellicode system or not. Who knew you can't just take in the old one and say "Here, make it better!"? I'll go back tomorrow, now that I've done my homework, and pick up a nifty new remote that I will take much better care of now that I know how expensive they are.

Anyway. That second trip back will just allow me to bask once again in the glow of home improvement. I don't know if it's a "memories-of-the-house-in-OK"C thing, or just some wierd genetic "get things done around the house thing" from my parents, but I LOVE...LOVE...going into these types of stores. It's better than a candy shop. Better than a shoe store. Better, even, than an arts/crafts supply store. I love the smell of cut wood and paint and industrial strength cleaning products. I love to browse the powertools and make mental lists of stuff I want. I love to think about having our own house again and all the "customizations" we can do.

Tomorrow I may have to spend some quality time browsing. Although, I'll probably be too excited about coming straight home and programming my new Garage Door Remote. Good times. Good times.

...huh?

Creepy!

hrm. well. the page I initially linked to didn't require any memberships or secret handshakes. Basically, a genetically engineered to be less likely to cause allergies cat is just wierd. wrong. unnatural. google search it. you'll see.

Thanks Shannon!

Find your own pose!

She always has the crazy quiz links, but I gotta say....It's true! It's true! We snuggle and chit chat, but when it's time to sleep--to the sides we go! Wacky stuff, this.

I'm back!

From a jaunt to KCMO. That's my excuse for not writing, you see. Getting prepared for the trip, making sure the hounds were ready for the kennel, making sure all the loose ends were tightly bound. You know how it goes. But I'm back now, and I took notes (YES!) on Things I never Realised I Miss:

1) Giant fuzzy caterpillars crossing the highway. Giant. As in, "easily viewable from an oncoming car at 65mph", really really big, fuzzy, caterpillars. I think they're poisonous too, but that's a different list.

2) Barns. Real barns. Old barns. Barns with lots of hay in them. Or lots of rotting wood. I love and miss old barns

3) Redtailed Hawks. One on every highway sign, it seems. They are just a nice reminder of what is wild and just out of reach.

4) Not just green. Olive green, lime green, pea green, teal green...every colour of green you can imagine (and some I never would). And oranges, reds, and yellows. Fall had just started to happen in Missouri, and it is a lovely sight.

5) Everywhere ponds! Water water everywhere. Little ponds, big lakes, creeks, streams, you name it. It's pretty. It's wet, and it means FISHIN!

6) Wierd livestock. I'm sure there is some around here, but in Missouri you can't throw a rock without hitting an Emu or an Ostrich or some other form of exotic livestock. It's both completely disconcerting and totally natural at this point.

7) Roadside produce/nut stands. All along the highway--yes Interstate 71, even-- there are tiny little "stands" that farmers set up to sell their tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers, pecans and whatever else they happen to grow. Often the "stand" consists of little more than the tailgate of the pickup and a patio umbrella. I've never stopped at one, but man I miss seeing them.

Things I Don't Miss:
1) Billboards. I never really realised it, but there are no billboards in Scottsdale/N. Phoenix. At least not on the main highway. North Kansas City has digital billboards now--aren't they swanky? I was pondering the fact that we don't have any digital billboards here when Russell pointed out that we don't have any billboards period. And there was much rejoycing.

2) A church every 100 yards. There are a LOT of churches in Missouri. You really can't get out of sight of one before you see another looming up. I'm all for people being able to worship as they please, but when there come to be that many churches you start feeling, well, put upon, you know? One house actually had the 10 Commandments attached to its mailbox. Another town was advertising "GIG Fest". Dad and I were thinking they were going to go down to the creek and gig some frogs, but no...it's "God Is Good Fest". That is something I don't miss--having religion shoved down my throat at every turn.


It was a great great trip and I wish I was back there now. It's a glorious sunny day here, and I've been for a bike ride and trimmed the bushes in the front yard already, but I'd sure not mind sitting on the deck at my folks' house, mosquitos or no. Or hanging out at Casa Leatherbury with my best friend and her crazy baby that I love so much.

11:11am. Time to make the day happen.

Shannon!

You must make some of THESE!

Oh. my. gosh.

Channel surfing on the net will get you anywhere.

Commute

This is what filled my field of vision on my drive home tonight.

What, exactly, is The Pillsbury Doughboy doing moonlighting as a chef teddy bear with loose morals? I'm intrigued.

Try this:

The Scribbler

Ze strikes again. Amazing.

Ha ha ha

So in last week's kickball game, I went up to the plate and made a crappy kick. The ref called it a bunt and, although I would have made it to first base on that crappy kick, I had to go back and take a re-kick because we'd called no bunts at the outset of the game. Thing is, tho, I just got a really really crappy foot on the ball. It was never intended to be a bunt, it just didn't go very far. Apparently, though, it made a little history:

Ignominy!

nothing new under the sun

Or in my brain, for that matter. Just figured I'd post a few words so my oh-so-few readers wouldn't have to resort to the normal indignant emails of "Why haven't you posted?"

I'm off for the next two days, and I'm feeling joyful about that. I always enter my "weekend" with big plans for all the stuff I want to get done: Clean the house, work in the yard, take long liesurely walks with the hounds, work on my bike, clean the car, sort through the junk on my desk, etc ad infinitum... And what I ususally do is start strong and take what I intend to be a short break. Then the short break turns into 3 hours surfing the net and/or playing WoW, or watching episode after episode of makeover shows on TLC and Discovery.

So far today that's exactly what has happened. I got up and did a load of laundry *and* a load of dishes and then thought to myself "I should go email our itinerary to my folks and Kimbra". So far I've done everything online *but* that, but I'm getting to it!

It doesn't really matter what I spend my time doing, I suppose. The important thing is that I have two days off...IN A ROW. I can relax. Right after I get that itinerary sent... :P

bahahahahaha

My Kickball Team is Number One!

We just won our big game against the only other undefeated team in the league, putting us in first place. Yes, I play for Off Constantly. And our win tonight just goes to prove that you can't beat.... well you get it, right?

Terms Of Endearment

Maybe it's because I spent a lot of my "formative years" in the south or near south, but I enjoy it when someone calls me "hon" or "dear" or "darlin". I stopped off at Starbucks (it's less than a stone's throw from my PT's office--and hey, I deserve every sip of that Mocha Light Frappacino goodness!) and the girl at the window handed me my drink with a "Here ya go, dear." I know a lot of places poo poo that kind of familiarity, but it made me feel instantly warm and welcome.

Your thoughts?

Be Afraid, be Very Afraid....and as an aside...You're Kidding, right?

So today my boss goes on vacation for a week. Our AGM is in Tennessee for a new store set. So about an hour before he leaves he pulls me aside and says "By the way, you're in charge for the week." He claimed it to be a combination of "most reliable and capable" and seniority, but I think mostly it was an opportunity for him to watch me in mini-meltdown mode. Me. In charge. Of a $100,000 a week store. During the transition from our biggest clearance event to the receipt of the bulk of our holiday gourmet selection. Oh, and we just did inventory with more than a few discrepancies, no thanks to the morons employed by the contractors we brought in to do the job. Lots of spreadsheets and notes floating around about all the stuff that needs to be fixed. Gads. I'm more than a little nervous about the entire thing.

And more good (!?) news...the service company actually found a replacement ice maker for our 30+ year old fridge. I'm not kidding, although I wish I were. They are coming out tomorrow to fix it. Maybe the transplant will be rejected and we'll still get a new fridge. I'm not holding my breath.

Shot Through the Heart

and you're to blame ...see Question #24: Thr33

Hi-Larious!

Unusual Suspects

I mentioned in Friday's post that I was awaiting the arrival of the refrigerator service man. To my delight, he showed up just before 11am--a full hour before I expected him. Perhaps he's new to the industry.

At any rate, after a lot of poking around and much scraping of unintentional ice, he determined that our Ice Maker was the cause of the problem. Apparently in the mid to late 70s, when our fridge was made (I wish I was kidding), the ice maker was an integral part of the Big Picture. When it goes out, the rest of the machinery becomes confused and forlorn and just sort of stops working the way it should. Our ice maker hasn't worked since long before *we* rented this house, which would explain the three days it previously took to defrost the thing. Or maybe it doesn't. The ice maker doesn't work, and yet there are several inches of ice forming in the back and sides of the box, according to Bob the repairman. At any rate. The call has been put out for a replacement ice maker for a late 1970s Kenmore refrigerator. Pardon my coughing fit. In lieu of finding that replacement, discussions will then start with the warranty company for a replacement fridge. Obviously we are hoping for the latter--not the discussions, which could take months, but the actual new fridge. It will be nice to keep perishables in the house again.

Hooray For Boobies!

So Thursday and Friday were my days off, and I went shopping...for clothes. I rarely go clothes shopping--with intent. Sometimes when I'm out and about I'll pick up a spare shirt or pair of shorts, but this time I was out for real loot.

I didn't come home with much. The rarity of my shopping--with intent--excursions is a direct result of my continuing frustrations at finding stuff that fits appropriately and yet doesn't fall into the stand by category of middle-age-casual. I did find a fabulous wrap-ish shirt, and a number of great camisol/tank top shirts that will ultimately find their way into my pajama drawer.

The big expeditures came in the bra department. I tried on eleventy billion bras, and actually--over the course of two days--came home with probably 5 or 6 of 'em. This will seem unexciting to most people (women) and just plain weird to others (men), but I LOVE my new bras. It's like getting a boob lift and a new wardrobe all at the same time. I'm sure I've made this vow before, but I'll make it again and hopefully hold to it, I will never to wait so long between re-bra'ing again! Shirts that I thought looked sloppy on me, or just didn't fit right are now cute again! The girls are up where they belong, with nary an adjustment all day long. Oh happy day! And this is just bra #1! I have a week's worth of new bras to try out.

So I'll take the little victories. Yay boobs!

Still Standing

okay, okay..the emails and queries have started up again. time to post!

I went to my first Kickball game last night--a double header in which I was "at bat"(?) three times and on the field maybe four. Some folks from Russell's work were building the team, and needed a few more female players, so he brought the news home to me, knowing a) how competitive I am and b) how much I want to get out of the house and meet more people.

I signed up a few weeks ago, wondering how my wonky back and knees would tolerate it, but I needn't have worried; seems the primary objective during these games is to stand around, tolerate the heat as well as you can, and drink a lot of beer.

Everyone on the team was a stranger to me, but most of the women introduced themselves at least. The boys were being boys, and young ones at that, so they were preoccupied with the brilliance of the team name, which is Off Constantly. I'll give you a few moments to think about the connotations of that, and then present my theory that there were no females present when the name was chosen.

Instead of following the herd to a sanctioned drinking establishment (I've never before played on an athletic team where players took their beers out on the field), I came home for a long hot soak in the tub, followed by a massive dose of ibuprofen and some stretching. My social life surely suffered for it, but my body feels a whole lot better than it should.

And now...sitting around waiting for the service dude to show up and have a look at our--again--frozen over fridge. Between 10 and 12, they say. My money's on 11:53. :P

Something to chew on

While I don't necessarily agree with the way the information is presented or the conclusions that the narrator comes to, there is some *really* interesting stuff here. Check it Out

I promise...

1. To never EVER buy these shoes for any child of mine, my friends, or even my enemies.

2. To not obsess about the germs on a high chair/table in a restaurant to the point where I pull a handi-wipe out of my bag and SCRUB down aforementioned surfaces, completely ignoring the fact that my child is running amok in the restaurant, putting her grubby little hands on every item that is not tied down.

Yes, the "amok" child in the above not-made-up story was indeed wearing those damnable shoes. So much for a peaceful lunch out of the store.

*sigh*

Another yummy link...

Wierd Al comes through again!

wikiwikiwikiWOW!

WikiHow rules!

acting the part

it's exhausting, really, pretending to be nice and interested in what people have to say ALL.DAY.LONG. I'm sure Shannon can relate to me on this, as can anyone of you who has ever worked in a service industry. There are days when I'm tired or sick or just in a rotten mood, and switching on and off to "happy crappy" mode is a real drain. The upside of it is, however, that sometimes pretending to feel good and be in a good mood positively affects the way I actually feel.

today wasn't really one of those days. I woke up with my right eye all swollen and nasty (allergies?) and one of those related ever-so-slight headaches that doesn't really warrant medication but which dogs you constantly--sort of taunting you from the edge of conciousness. People were rotten today, but in retail you just can't be rotten back, so I'd don the cheerful interested girl face and chat away. The effort of being nice in the face of nastiness just wore me down even more. The puffiness went down, but the headache remained, and the exhaustion set in. I could collapse into a ball of neediness at any given moment.

maybe I will...

Confession

On my drives around Phoenix, I find myself looking longingly at office buildings.

True story.

Curse you, Shannon!

'What will your obituary say?' at QuizGalaxy.com

Clearing the Cobwebs

Three of the closest people to me have now asked what is up with my blog. I guess it's time to jump back in the saddle and try to put some words to...cyberspace?

I'm not really sure why the prolonged absence. I think I had high hopes for the photo/video revolution that I expected to take place after we got the new camera, and when I couldn't figure out how to make it work, I just sort of tucked my tail and fled for a while. It's a little humiliating for me that I whined about not having a good camera (and later, just a camera that works, since our old one bit the dust), and now more than a month later I still don't understand how to use it to its full potential. So that's one excuse.

The other excuse? Just laziness, I suppose. I usually come home, jump online and read emails and some news items, and by then there are so many things occupying space in my brain that it would take a team of excavationists to sort through it all. I am only one person, and not much of a digger at that (reference the above failure to dig any deeper into "how does this damn camera work"), so I leave it all in there and head straight for the game or dinner or whatever.

It's far too hot now to do anything but sit on my ass when I'm not working or at the physical therapist's. It was around 113 degrees or so today--119 in the car when we went to go see Superman Returns (a wholly sappy movie, but worth seeing if for no other reason than that Brandon Routh has some fantastic nods to Christopher Reeves in his portrayal of the man of steel). Russell's been doing some early morning workouts but I just can't take the heat. And, well, I'm still gimpin around. My back is better, but I'm now having some problems with my left knee...*sigh* So I go to work and run my butt off, and then come home and park it in front of the computer for the balance of the day. Good times.

Anyway. No promises, but I'll try to stop by more often. Sorry for the dust. :P