So I am thinking about Halloween that is coming up. I am in need of a costume and the failure of the Spider Vixen costume from last year haunts me still. So I was in JoAnne's Crafts, home of reject art teachers and scary crap that only old ladies and really, really, really gay men would like. I fall into none of the above. My friend was buying something fluffy. But the store makes "Hello Kitty" seem mild.
Well, I started to look at my choices. Nurse with fishnets, Swedish milkmaid with fishnets, an even better Spider Vixen outfit. Or at least larger. A flight attendant outfit, Casperina, the Sexy ghost. Or some random combination therein.
It is appropriate as I write this I am listening to the Rolling Stones:
You can't always get what you want
But if you try sometimes, you just might find
You get what you need...
There was a snake lady suit, a policeman's uniform (add a boom box and the imagined strip-o-gram will seriously hurt my co-workers), a female pirate costume (the mind reels on that one given a certain in-joke that uses "arrrggghhh!" liberally).
I just wish I had asked what exactly are "husky girl sizes." Sigh.
Monday, September 14, 2009
Saturday, July 25, 2009
Traffic Rant
New blog finally! I was in need of something snarky to say. I am there now.
First off, to my ambulance chasing following (all 5 of you), this could have been about me pinning myself in the backseat and amusing the Sikh taxi driver, or my accident with the waffle batter, or my last breakdown with the truck. It could have been about my intense dislike of the Greenwood parade or why you should not pour the wrong fluids into your engine.
It could have been… but it isn’t.
My suffering can wait.
Instead I want to rant about others.
Other drivers. In fact maybe even you!
So really my rant goes something like this: Why are my fellow drivers retarded?
To frame this correctly, I am going to examine my drive to and from work. It is the same stupidity every day and I have actually developed a series of mind-teasers regarding what I see.
So bending a rule of good writing, I now refer to “you” as the driving retard, not my adoring reader, however I do not always consider the two mutually exclusive. So if “you” seems sort of “in your face” despite my reader’s innocence, it’s nothing personal, I’ve just lumped everyone together as vehicular bottom-feeders.
Let the rant begin…
Hey You!
Yes, you… on the cell phone… ever heard of Bluetooth? I see you! Is that call so important? I am sure it isn’t. Use the technology and quit trying to kill me because your goddamn wife is too lazy to get off of her bubbled ass and get into her soccer mom mobile and get the milk and bon-bons herself. No, really, that call to your best friend about whether she slept with the hot bartender – unimportant. As unimportant as you are. There is this law… Oh wait, that begs another question…
Seriously, why does the f-ing law apply to everybody BUT you? You wonder why I laugh and point at you while you are pulled over getting a ticket? It’s because the law applies to everyone AND you!
Ha!
You in your Mercedes SUV? Oh, it makes my heart sing when I see a person of self-imposed entitlement get a $242 speeding ticket shoved up their bum for being a complete a-hole. Next time you’re at El Goucho in the Pampas Room, swirling your glass of Robert Biale Monterosso Sonoma Zinfandel and nibbling on your not-so humanly created foie grois, please tell your equally obnoxious associates how you actually were doing 45 in a 20 mph zone and almost ran over a little old man with a walker because you have to get home because little Hayden has to get to her fencing class and then be rushed to her play date with the other six going on fourteen year-olds because you don’t want her to miss any socialization windows.
God, what I’d give to key your car.
But wait, my contempt is not limited to wanna-be aristocratic suburban white folk, oh no I have a much wider field of vision than that.
Hey you, the extreme sports skate/snowboarding goatee and mutton chop side burns flannel shirt wearing granola boy! Yeah I am talking about you too!
Riddle me this, Stephan…
Why do you have to bomb down the freeway at 85 and then slam on your brakes when you get up the traffic jam that you have clearly been able to see for a mile? Do the math (if you can, use your fingers AND toes if you need to), you save not one second! If you drive reasonable, you get there all the same. Oh and tailgating me, only makes me slam on my brakes to scare you to back off, I am not going to speed up because you are trying to make me think you are going to bully me and my P.O.S. truck. Don't you get the "I have no will to live" vibe come from my truck?
Why do you think that changing lanes in gridlock is so f-ing critical? Does going 6 mph, really make it go better than 5 mph. You are going NOWHERE. Chill out. And no, that car length in front of me is NOT an invitation for you to jump in. It is because I don’t want to rear-end the dumb ass in front of me, when some retard like you cuts him off.
By the way, you single-tasking, talking on the cell phone mofo, that turn signal thing really isn’t optional if you don’t want to have some a-hole in a P.O.S. truck like mine not hit you and crumple your little “save the planet” Prius. Especially when you are a dart-in-and-out of traffic punk. If you have any doubts, yes, the silver P.O.S. truck IS screwing with you and deliberately not letting you be the spastic you are.
But wait…there is more…
Hey you, the “I am nearly retired, get off my lawn you kids, stick up my ass, by God I am a Republican Tax Payer, driving my mustard yellow Hummer” I got some words for you too…
For starters, the fast lane is for people who drive the speed limit or somewhat faster, it’s commonly known as the “passing lane”. Despite you, it is not known as the “I have a small penis and drive a Hummer ten miles an hour slower than the speed limit because I can” lane. On that note, stay out of the HOV lanes, that’s a double crime against humanity: Going slow and acting like God’s chosen. Speaking of HOV lanes… Don’t get all pissy, but since you’ve just bypassed nearly an hour of gridlock by zooming up the HOV lanes. Don’t get all whacked when no one wants to let you in, we who have been sitting in traffic and try to nose your way in because you are in that big ol’ Hummer. I can’t speak for everyone else, but I’ll let you hit me AND let you have the ticket for not yielding the right of way. Buy me a new truck please!
Oh, before I sign off, let me take a shot at some others…
To the jerk with the over-powered bass in his trunk... If I wanted to hear your rap music from 10 blocks away, I’ll download the album. Turn your crap down…
To the grandma who insists on turning left on a major arterial out of the gas station parking lot. Turn right again go around the block, it’s just as fast. You are wasting not only your time but mine.
To Mr. California, I understand taking u-turns wherever you feel like it is legal back home. You are not home, dumbass.
To the homeless guy on the side of the road. Yelling at me and demanding money doesn’t endear you to me. It makes me wish you’d get a real job, or go off into the forest and die.
To the holier than thou, carbon-foot print shrinking, bicyclists who are not bound by the laws of traffic because they are noble creatures like bald eagles and Bengal tigers, all I have to say is go ahead and ignore traffic laws and assert yourselves as if you have the same rights as both cars and pedestrians at the same time. Physical laws trump traffic laws every time and all I can say is my favorite law when dealing with you self-righteous pricks, is the law of tonnage (oh and Newton’s law about things in motion stay in motion until acted upon…).
But I have been saving my best vitriol for the over-the-hill, absolutely uncool leather bound clod on a motorcycle or as I will refer to them as…donor-cycles. Forgive me, my friend, but because you think you should do 90 mph and weave in and out of traffic, or zoom up between lanes of slow traffic, or even just idling, revving your engine like you are Thor, god of thunder, when you die doing your completely brain-dead antics, well I can’t help think it is proof of Darwin in action. One less of you…
Rant over.
I feel better.
Time to love my fellow humans… until I get behind the wheel again.
First off, to my ambulance chasing following (all 5 of you), this could have been about me pinning myself in the backseat and amusing the Sikh taxi driver, or my accident with the waffle batter, or my last breakdown with the truck. It could have been about my intense dislike of the Greenwood parade or why you should not pour the wrong fluids into your engine.
It could have been… but it isn’t.
My suffering can wait.
Instead I want to rant about others.
Other drivers. In fact maybe even you!
So really my rant goes something like this: Why are my fellow drivers retarded?
To frame this correctly, I am going to examine my drive to and from work. It is the same stupidity every day and I have actually developed a series of mind-teasers regarding what I see.
So bending a rule of good writing, I now refer to “you” as the driving retard, not my adoring reader, however I do not always consider the two mutually exclusive. So if “you” seems sort of “in your face” despite my reader’s innocence, it’s nothing personal, I’ve just lumped everyone together as vehicular bottom-feeders.
Let the rant begin…
Hey You!
Yes, you… on the cell phone… ever heard of Bluetooth? I see you! Is that call so important? I am sure it isn’t. Use the technology and quit trying to kill me because your goddamn wife is too lazy to get off of her bubbled ass and get into her soccer mom mobile and get the milk and bon-bons herself. No, really, that call to your best friend about whether she slept with the hot bartender – unimportant. As unimportant as you are. There is this law… Oh wait, that begs another question…
Seriously, why does the f-ing law apply to everybody BUT you? You wonder why I laugh and point at you while you are pulled over getting a ticket? It’s because the law applies to everyone AND you!
Ha!
You in your Mercedes SUV? Oh, it makes my heart sing when I see a person of self-imposed entitlement get a $242 speeding ticket shoved up their bum for being a complete a-hole. Next time you’re at El Goucho in the Pampas Room, swirling your glass of Robert Biale Monterosso Sonoma Zinfandel and nibbling on your not-so humanly created foie grois, please tell your equally obnoxious associates how you actually were doing 45 in a 20 mph zone and almost ran over a little old man with a walker because you have to get home because little Hayden has to get to her fencing class and then be rushed to her play date with the other six going on fourteen year-olds because you don’t want her to miss any socialization windows.
God, what I’d give to key your car.
But wait, my contempt is not limited to wanna-be aristocratic suburban white folk, oh no I have a much wider field of vision than that.
Hey you, the extreme sports skate/snowboarding goatee and mutton chop side burns flannel shirt wearing granola boy! Yeah I am talking about you too!
Riddle me this, Stephan…
Why do you have to bomb down the freeway at 85 and then slam on your brakes when you get up the traffic jam that you have clearly been able to see for a mile? Do the math (if you can, use your fingers AND toes if you need to), you save not one second! If you drive reasonable, you get there all the same. Oh and tailgating me, only makes me slam on my brakes to scare you to back off, I am not going to speed up because you are trying to make me think you are going to bully me and my P.O.S. truck. Don't you get the "I have no will to live" vibe come from my truck?
Why do you think that changing lanes in gridlock is so f-ing critical? Does going 6 mph, really make it go better than 5 mph. You are going NOWHERE. Chill out. And no, that car length in front of me is NOT an invitation for you to jump in. It is because I don’t want to rear-end the dumb ass in front of me, when some retard like you cuts him off.
By the way, you single-tasking, talking on the cell phone mofo, that turn signal thing really isn’t optional if you don’t want to have some a-hole in a P.O.S. truck like mine not hit you and crumple your little “save the planet” Prius. Especially when you are a dart-in-and-out of traffic punk. If you have any doubts, yes, the silver P.O.S. truck IS screwing with you and deliberately not letting you be the spastic you are.
But wait…there is more…
Hey you, the “I am nearly retired, get off my lawn you kids, stick up my ass, by God I am a Republican Tax Payer, driving my mustard yellow Hummer” I got some words for you too…
For starters, the fast lane is for people who drive the speed limit or somewhat faster, it’s commonly known as the “passing lane”. Despite you, it is not known as the “I have a small penis and drive a Hummer ten miles an hour slower than the speed limit because I can” lane. On that note, stay out of the HOV lanes, that’s a double crime against humanity: Going slow and acting like God’s chosen. Speaking of HOV lanes… Don’t get all pissy, but since you’ve just bypassed nearly an hour of gridlock by zooming up the HOV lanes. Don’t get all whacked when no one wants to let you in, we who have been sitting in traffic and try to nose your way in because you are in that big ol’ Hummer. I can’t speak for everyone else, but I’ll let you hit me AND let you have the ticket for not yielding the right of way. Buy me a new truck please!
Oh, before I sign off, let me take a shot at some others…
To the jerk with the over-powered bass in his trunk... If I wanted to hear your rap music from 10 blocks away, I’ll download the album. Turn your crap down…
To the grandma who insists on turning left on a major arterial out of the gas station parking lot. Turn right again go around the block, it’s just as fast. You are wasting not only your time but mine.
To Mr. California, I understand taking u-turns wherever you feel like it is legal back home. You are not home, dumbass.
To the homeless guy on the side of the road. Yelling at me and demanding money doesn’t endear you to me. It makes me wish you’d get a real job, or go off into the forest and die.
To the holier than thou, carbon-foot print shrinking, bicyclists who are not bound by the laws of traffic because they are noble creatures like bald eagles and Bengal tigers, all I have to say is go ahead and ignore traffic laws and assert yourselves as if you have the same rights as both cars and pedestrians at the same time. Physical laws trump traffic laws every time and all I can say is my favorite law when dealing with you self-righteous pricks, is the law of tonnage (oh and Newton’s law about things in motion stay in motion until acted upon…).
But I have been saving my best vitriol for the over-the-hill, absolutely uncool leather bound clod on a motorcycle or as I will refer to them as…donor-cycles. Forgive me, my friend, but because you think you should do 90 mph and weave in and out of traffic, or zoom up between lanes of slow traffic, or even just idling, revving your engine like you are Thor, god of thunder, when you die doing your completely brain-dead antics, well I can’t help think it is proof of Darwin in action. One less of you…
Rant over.
I feel better.
Time to love my fellow humans… until I get behind the wheel again.
Monday, June 1, 2009
Okay, already!
Apologies to those whom I disappoint with a lack of blog. Joel, Ken, Melissa, etc. I needed some material. So from my Spokane trip, it’s the “How Did I Spend My Day” Show.
Day One:
So this morning starts out at about 6:30 am with some baboon in workman’s chothes working outside my hotel door dropping a ladder and banging away. I half expect to hear Jane Goodall narrating:
“See how Bobo makes his first attempts at using tools. He starts by mimicry but I believe he is actually learning to use the tools differently to yield best results after a while…”
Bite me Janey, it’s 6:30 am and if you want to see tools be used, check out the cranky primate without his latte, but with a .30 shotgun learning to use the tool differently to yield best results.
So my cousin and I finally get our act together and head out in her jeep which is totally tricked out with all the gadgets and joy that makes men love cars and we proceed into Spokane proper to collect my grandmother. Grandma insists on “Shari’s”. For those of you that have been to a Shari’s, I really don’t need to say more, but for those of you that have standards and/or feelings of elitism, let me paint a picture.
Imagine a place that looks identical no matter where in the world you may find the franchise. You could be in war-torn Iraq and go into a Shari’s and it would look exactly like a Shari’s from Iowa. Even more so than a Denny’s or a IHOP. Identical. I actually believe there is one Shari’s that is a nexus between dimensions and if you know the mystic words, you can travel anywhere. But I think I have to take back the identical label, because in Spokane, Shari’s is staffed by the un-dead.
“Would you like coffee, dearie, “ the She-Crypt-Keeper rasps and gurgles, as parts of her fall off.
Looking around the restaurant, one realizes that this is geezer central. Median age 120. I am sure this is the Spokane Retiree elephant graveyard and Gus, and Elmo are just waiting for the angels to take them to the “Monster Truck Rally” in the sky.
The menu has pictures of what the idealized version of the meal looks like. I find myself thinking the idealized version is sort of scary. Stuffed hash browns? WTF? Wait, I don’t want to know. But the interesting thing is the menu has been cut back quite a bit since I was last tormented by this ritual suicide. Guess the recession has other victims that GM and Morgan Stanley. Please Barack, do not bail out Shari’s.
So we go back to Grandma’s lair and do the gossipy family thing. Who’s sleeping with whom, when parole dates are coming up, etc. Then the Camel Killer calls. He wants to take Gram out for lunch. Part of me is torn. I’d like to tag along and see if he would be taking us all out to lunch, but I know since he is the world’s most stingy man (I once had to shame him by yelling out quite loudly in a restaurant that he forgot his tip), he’d be very unhappy to see me there and well, I also had no desire to listen to a one-sided conversation about himself and the fact he just discovered that Star Wars action figures can do the same job as a well placed gerbil. Ok, I am just being mean. To the gerbil.
Or God forbid, more tales of "Hospital Cop", his security gig at the local hospital. He once told me he was given the most heinous assignments because he lost his sense of smell in the Army. Don't wonder, just go with the flow.
Or how his girlfriend is bleeding him dry. Too much 99 cent store for her!
Or the series finale of Battlestar Galactica (which made me reel with how stupid I found it) and how humans sprang from the stars despite the fossil evidence. Reality it seems is subjective.
So I not only make an excuse for myself, but my other cousin who is sharing this little trek with me, that we need to “run errands”. My cousin is also relieved because she knows her peril. Plus she knows she’ll get a shot on Saturday which is the big party or what’s known as “Free Lunch On The Elderly” day. I think he will be doing a cameo and splitting before his brother, the born again White Supremist shows up. They don’t get along. I think it had something to do with CK being a dullard and his brother being a thug, but that’s just a guess.
Now this cousin I am traveling with is my favorite of the bunch because she has class and style and knows what to do with utensils. But she has siblings in Spokane and she was catching me up to speed. Apparently, her sister whom last I saw looked vaguely similar to beef jerky, has a new career as a “makeup consultant for Walgreens.” I am afraid this inspired me to want to go see this for myself. I wanted to watch her weave magic on the bovine cud chewers. What shade of mascara will attract the most mullets with El Caminos? My cousin who can match me pound for pound in derision and scorn would not indulge me, but we did laugh our asses off.
Getting back to the part with my cousin being able to use utensils, I think I should point out that she has a liberal definition of use. Numerous times, she has said to me, “I am going to so stick you with this fork…” I think she said it when I told her 15 year old niece who hadn’t seen her in the last decade and didn’t recognize her that my cousin just got out of the “joint” for killing a man. Truth is ol’cuz just can’t stomach Spokane, but why tell the truth when you can lie?
So more to come, but I gotcha something finally…
Day One:
So this morning starts out at about 6:30 am with some baboon in workman’s chothes working outside my hotel door dropping a ladder and banging away. I half expect to hear Jane Goodall narrating:
“See how Bobo makes his first attempts at using tools. He starts by mimicry but I believe he is actually learning to use the tools differently to yield best results after a while…”
Bite me Janey, it’s 6:30 am and if you want to see tools be used, check out the cranky primate without his latte, but with a .30 shotgun learning to use the tool differently to yield best results.
So my cousin and I finally get our act together and head out in her jeep which is totally tricked out with all the gadgets and joy that makes men love cars and we proceed into Spokane proper to collect my grandmother. Grandma insists on “Shari’s”. For those of you that have been to a Shari’s, I really don’t need to say more, but for those of you that have standards and/or feelings of elitism, let me paint a picture.
Imagine a place that looks identical no matter where in the world you may find the franchise. You could be in war-torn Iraq and go into a Shari’s and it would look exactly like a Shari’s from Iowa. Even more so than a Denny’s or a IHOP. Identical. I actually believe there is one Shari’s that is a nexus between dimensions and if you know the mystic words, you can travel anywhere. But I think I have to take back the identical label, because in Spokane, Shari’s is staffed by the un-dead.
“Would you like coffee, dearie, “ the She-Crypt-Keeper rasps and gurgles, as parts of her fall off.
Looking around the restaurant, one realizes that this is geezer central. Median age 120. I am sure this is the Spokane Retiree elephant graveyard and Gus, and Elmo are just waiting for the angels to take them to the “Monster Truck Rally” in the sky.
The menu has pictures of what the idealized version of the meal looks like. I find myself thinking the idealized version is sort of scary. Stuffed hash browns? WTF? Wait, I don’t want to know. But the interesting thing is the menu has been cut back quite a bit since I was last tormented by this ritual suicide. Guess the recession has other victims that GM and Morgan Stanley. Please Barack, do not bail out Shari’s.
So we go back to Grandma’s lair and do the gossipy family thing. Who’s sleeping with whom, when parole dates are coming up, etc. Then the Camel Killer calls. He wants to take Gram out for lunch. Part of me is torn. I’d like to tag along and see if he would be taking us all out to lunch, but I know since he is the world’s most stingy man (I once had to shame him by yelling out quite loudly in a restaurant that he forgot his tip), he’d be very unhappy to see me there and well, I also had no desire to listen to a one-sided conversation about himself and the fact he just discovered that Star Wars action figures can do the same job as a well placed gerbil. Ok, I am just being mean. To the gerbil.
Or God forbid, more tales of "Hospital Cop", his security gig at the local hospital. He once told me he was given the most heinous assignments because he lost his sense of smell in the Army. Don't wonder, just go with the flow.
Or how his girlfriend is bleeding him dry. Too much 99 cent store for her!
Or the series finale of Battlestar Galactica (which made me reel with how stupid I found it) and how humans sprang from the stars despite the fossil evidence. Reality it seems is subjective.
So I not only make an excuse for myself, but my other cousin who is sharing this little trek with me, that we need to “run errands”. My cousin is also relieved because she knows her peril. Plus she knows she’ll get a shot on Saturday which is the big party or what’s known as “Free Lunch On The Elderly” day. I think he will be doing a cameo and splitting before his brother, the born again White Supremist shows up. They don’t get along. I think it had something to do with CK being a dullard and his brother being a thug, but that’s just a guess.
Now this cousin I am traveling with is my favorite of the bunch because she has class and style and knows what to do with utensils. But she has siblings in Spokane and she was catching me up to speed. Apparently, her sister whom last I saw looked vaguely similar to beef jerky, has a new career as a “makeup consultant for Walgreens.” I am afraid this inspired me to want to go see this for myself. I wanted to watch her weave magic on the bovine cud chewers. What shade of mascara will attract the most mullets with El Caminos? My cousin who can match me pound for pound in derision and scorn would not indulge me, but we did laugh our asses off.
Getting back to the part with my cousin being able to use utensils, I think I should point out that she has a liberal definition of use. Numerous times, she has said to me, “I am going to so stick you with this fork…” I think she said it when I told her 15 year old niece who hadn’t seen her in the last decade and didn’t recognize her that my cousin just got out of the “joint” for killing a man. Truth is ol’cuz just can’t stomach Spokane, but why tell the truth when you can lie?
So more to come, but I gotcha something finally…
Monday, February 16, 2009
McDonald's and Darwin
Geez, blog writing is a bitch. Now I am getting dinged because I don't post pictures and my prose is too dense. Sigh.
So this is for Christine...
So it is 2003 and I've been out of work for a VERY long time and quite broke and unhappy. I have a few dollars cash that is all I have that is not tied up some which way and I decide go to McDonald's to buy the cheapest hamburger for lunch I can.
I am standing in line and miserable and whilst in line I become aware of these noxious yard monsters and their intensely awful house frau mother. What draws my attention is the puling of all three...
"Mommy, I want..." in a hellish chorus from the midget snot machines and a nasal whine from ol' ma as she confronts our order taker.
"Well I need a minute to decide..."
WTF?
"What have you been doing the last ten minutes of this grueling exercise of people herding?", I think to myself. But before I can answer the voice in my head, Hagatha starts in on the poor cashier.
"You know the shakes are a rip off? If you buy a large shake, the price per ounce is less than a small shake. What if I want a small shake? The price should be the same." Not content with our cashier's weak "if you insist" smile, Haggy presses her point.
"Don't you think?" A high pitched nasal assault that certainly has the local dog's ears bleeding.
"It's a total rip off. I can't believe it. I think that your company thinks we are all stupid. Don't you agree?"
Having stood in this line for at least ten minutes and being hungry and tired and broke, I step forward.
"Pardon me, but if you think you are being ripped off, perhaps you should order something else?" I say somewhat evenly despite my desire to bludgeon her with a "Happy Meal".
She turns slowly to me and sizes me up.
"Well, EXCUSE me, but if I want your opinion, I'll ask for it."
Shazam! She told me. My god, the internal bleeding!
"Well, EXCUSE me," I acidly replied, "if I was to give you my opinion. I would have to say, judging from you and your spawn, Charles Darwin was wrong."
She was taken off kilter, noticeably shocked by my obnoxious, but clearly educated insult. She then huffed, puffed and dragged her awful, loud and whiny children out of line. As I watched, I noticed the rest of the line did not disapprove.
I stepped up to place my measly burger order. The cashier looked at me smiling and she kind of mouthed the words "it's on the house."
I ate like a king that lunch. Or at lease like Mayor McCheese.
So this is for Christine...
So it is 2003 and I've been out of work for a VERY long time and quite broke and unhappy. I have a few dollars cash that is all I have that is not tied up some which way and I decide go to McDonald's to buy the cheapest hamburger for lunch I can.
I am standing in line and miserable and whilst in line I become aware of these noxious yard monsters and their intensely awful house frau mother. What draws my attention is the puling of all three...
"Mommy, I want..." in a hellish chorus from the midget snot machines and a nasal whine from ol' ma as she confronts our order taker.
"Well I need a minute to decide..."
WTF?
"What have you been doing the last ten minutes of this grueling exercise of people herding?", I think to myself. But before I can answer the voice in my head, Hagatha starts in on the poor cashier.
"You know the shakes are a rip off? If you buy a large shake, the price per ounce is less than a small shake. What if I want a small shake? The price should be the same." Not content with our cashier's weak "if you insist" smile, Haggy presses her point.
"Don't you think?" A high pitched nasal assault that certainly has the local dog's ears bleeding.
"It's a total rip off. I can't believe it. I think that your company thinks we are all stupid. Don't you agree?"
Having stood in this line for at least ten minutes and being hungry and tired and broke, I step forward.
"Pardon me, but if you think you are being ripped off, perhaps you should order something else?" I say somewhat evenly despite my desire to bludgeon her with a "Happy Meal".
She turns slowly to me and sizes me up.
"Well, EXCUSE me, but if I want your opinion, I'll ask for it."
Shazam! She told me. My god, the internal bleeding!
"Well, EXCUSE me," I acidly replied, "if I was to give you my opinion. I would have to say, judging from you and your spawn, Charles Darwin was wrong."
She was taken off kilter, noticeably shocked by my obnoxious, but clearly educated insult. She then huffed, puffed and dragged her awful, loud and whiny children out of line. As I watched, I noticed the rest of the line did not disapprove.
I stepped up to place my measly burger order. The cashier looked at me smiling and she kind of mouthed the words "it's on the house."
I ate like a king that lunch. Or at lease like Mayor McCheese.
Monday, February 2, 2009
No Good Deed Goes Unpunished
A truly worthy blog for Joel.
So this is the twentieth anniversary of one of the best cautionary tales I have. Sometimes in the retelling, I break it into smaller portions, but for you, I give you the entirety. Some I remember, some of it I was told (you'll see why in a bit).
Setting The Stage
It is 1989 and I am 23 years old. I have been working as a computer lab assistant for a few years at Seattle Central Community College and have been a teacher's assistant for a woman who would be my friend for many years after, Pam.
Pam taught a desktop publishing course for the graphic designers and I was her flunky. I thought it was a grand way to meet hot graphic designers and I had a lot of fun. But there was this one weekend where things got a bit out of control.
Now those who know me today probably don't imagine me as a young, slender man, but I was. At 23, I would be in the best shape I ever was in, clocking in at a whopping 155 and wearing my 30x30 jeans. However, I was a bit of a lightweight in the drinking department (a skill I grew into as I grew). So this one weekend in May, there was a college function where my division was celebrating something or other. This was a Friday night and Saturday morning, Pam and I were giving a presentation in Tacoma to local printers and design houses on using our students as apprentices.
The College Event
So Friday night we are at this function, Pam, myself and this little Japanese woman named Jeanette.
There was boxed wine.
I had not eaten.
I awoke at 5:30am Saturday morning in my clothes at my mother's house.
This is what I am told happened. I even still have the scars, so I am sure it went down as I am told.
So apparently I had more than one glass of wine (I remember the one) and decided that after an hour or so of drunken mingling, I needed to liven up the joint a bit. This manifested itself in my declaring my undying school spirit to all in the room and crawling into the college president's lap as he sat in some chair, to give the stately African-American gentleman a kiss on the forehead and to try to enlist everyone in a round of "For He's A Jolly Good Fellow". Pam at this point, decides to extricate me from this spectacle, apologizing profusely for my lack of sobriety.
Apparently I resist leaving, not having spread as much cheer as I wanted, so Jeanette, a martial arts girl puts the hurt on my wrist to coax me along. Somewhere along the line we meet Jack, Pam's other teaching assistant who is roped into stuffing me into Pam's brand new Thunderbird. Somewhere along the way I inform Pam that I am going to barf in her car and she whips it over to the side and commands me out of the car. So out I go, but unfortunatly for me, Pam has pulled alongside a rather steep embankment and not knowing any better, I step off into space and proceed to roll down the embankment full tilt only to stop having become wedged underneath a sports car that was parked at the base. I guess I was wedged pretty good, because I still wear the scars where I was drug out from under the car by my arms.
Not knowing what to do with me, they took me to my mom's house. My mom is cool. She doesn't freak or anything, but does get a little miffed when I crawl into her downstairs bathroom to pray to the porcelain gods and get myself wedged between the toilet and the wall and somehow rip the toilet out of place in my attempt to get free.
I have a dim memory my mom's voice telling me to just go to sleep.
The Next Day
So at 5:30 am I awake up myself again and feeling like death warmed over. Strangely I am so hung over that I am beyond hung over. I put myself together because I am supposed to be in Tacoma. I collect my car at the college and go to Tacoma to set up Pam's presentation for her with the A/V and computer equipment.
The look on Pam's face when she saw I was actually, not only alive, but functional was one I'll not forget. Absolute disbelief. But I got her stuff done. I don't stay but head back home to crash. I tell her that when she gets back to town, I'll collect the equipment.
She calls me on breaks to tell me how horrible it is going and how she is going nuts, because she has enlisted this student to help her and the student is a bit of a whack job. Being Seattle Central, student whack jobs are a dime a dozen, but this one, Skye is a major leaguer. She is what I'd call now O.C.D. meets A.D.D. A totally goofy, twitchy woman about 40 who you know is destined to turn into the little old lady with 87 cats. And she's a talker. A real motor mouth.
Well, late in the afternoon, Pam calls me and says we need to hookup down at McCormick's (her favorite bar) and I need to cheer her up. I say sure and head down. Well, what I didn't know was that on my way down, Pam would start chatting up this guy, Dr. Dave and was quite happy to go off with him. She just had one loose end: Skye. Now, Pam is no idiot, she was going to pawn Skye off on me to entertain.
So I walk in and am greeted to the sight of Pam chatting up this dude with her back literally to Skye and Skye tormenting the bartender, Fred (the coolest barkeep ever). Pam ignores me for the most part as Skye locks onto the fresh meat.
Yak, yak, yak... I am trying to get Pam's attention, but Skye won't stop. Fred senses my dismay and pours me a pint. I am just about to enjoy my pint when another nasty Skye-ism starts. Not only does she talk a lot, she sprays while doing it. My beer falls victim almost instantly. I am just staring at my beer in shock, when Fred smoothly takes it away and has a fresh one waiting. I move my beer further away, but in a really animated moment Skye is able to nail it again. Again Fred saves the day. This time I insert myself between the Spray Queen and my beer. After a few moments, Fred hands me a napkin. I tipped Fred big ever after.
Finally after being ignored by Pam and spit on by Skye, I demand Pam's keys so I can load my car with the school equipment and get the hell out of Dodge. I should note at this point, if you had not guessed, Skye was a bit bombed.
So Pam tells Skye to give me a hand. Skye trundles out after me and helps me load the car. As I close the trunk, Skye launches into some weird lecture on Seattle architecture, pointing out the various downtown buildings. I nod politely and she has me look up at one of the nearby buildings. As I am doing so, she spins me around, puts me in this anaconda hug and proceeds to literally suck my face. It was like French-kissing a squid. I managed to squirm free and say something to the effect of "I am not that kind of boy!" meaning I still had a will to live.
I quickly escaped, Pam went off with Dr. Dave and who the hell knows what happened to Skye. But she turned up later so it could not have been too bad.
Pam and I had many more adventures, but I was always able to get her to beg forgiveness by growling in a low tone "Dr. Dave".
So this is the twentieth anniversary of one of the best cautionary tales I have. Sometimes in the retelling, I break it into smaller portions, but for you, I give you the entirety. Some I remember, some of it I was told (you'll see why in a bit).
Setting The Stage
It is 1989 and I am 23 years old. I have been working as a computer lab assistant for a few years at Seattle Central Community College and have been a teacher's assistant for a woman who would be my friend for many years after, Pam.
Pam taught a desktop publishing course for the graphic designers and I was her flunky. I thought it was a grand way to meet hot graphic designers and I had a lot of fun. But there was this one weekend where things got a bit out of control.
Now those who know me today probably don't imagine me as a young, slender man, but I was. At 23, I would be in the best shape I ever was in, clocking in at a whopping 155 and wearing my 30x30 jeans. However, I was a bit of a lightweight in the drinking department (a skill I grew into as I grew). So this one weekend in May, there was a college function where my division was celebrating something or other. This was a Friday night and Saturday morning, Pam and I were giving a presentation in Tacoma to local printers and design houses on using our students as apprentices.
The College Event
So Friday night we are at this function, Pam, myself and this little Japanese woman named Jeanette.
There was boxed wine.
I had not eaten.
I awoke at 5:30am Saturday morning in my clothes at my mother's house.
This is what I am told happened. I even still have the scars, so I am sure it went down as I am told.
So apparently I had more than one glass of wine (I remember the one) and decided that after an hour or so of drunken mingling, I needed to liven up the joint a bit. This manifested itself in my declaring my undying school spirit to all in the room and crawling into the college president's lap as he sat in some chair, to give the stately African-American gentleman a kiss on the forehead and to try to enlist everyone in a round of "For He's A Jolly Good Fellow". Pam at this point, decides to extricate me from this spectacle, apologizing profusely for my lack of sobriety.
Apparently I resist leaving, not having spread as much cheer as I wanted, so Jeanette, a martial arts girl puts the hurt on my wrist to coax me along. Somewhere along the line we meet Jack, Pam's other teaching assistant who is roped into stuffing me into Pam's brand new Thunderbird. Somewhere along the way I inform Pam that I am going to barf in her car and she whips it over to the side and commands me out of the car. So out I go, but unfortunatly for me, Pam has pulled alongside a rather steep embankment and not knowing any better, I step off into space and proceed to roll down the embankment full tilt only to stop having become wedged underneath a sports car that was parked at the base. I guess I was wedged pretty good, because I still wear the scars where I was drug out from under the car by my arms.
Not knowing what to do with me, they took me to my mom's house. My mom is cool. She doesn't freak or anything, but does get a little miffed when I crawl into her downstairs bathroom to pray to the porcelain gods and get myself wedged between the toilet and the wall and somehow rip the toilet out of place in my attempt to get free.
I have a dim memory my mom's voice telling me to just go to sleep.
The Next Day
So at 5:30 am I awake up myself again and feeling like death warmed over. Strangely I am so hung over that I am beyond hung over. I put myself together because I am supposed to be in Tacoma. I collect my car at the college and go to Tacoma to set up Pam's presentation for her with the A/V and computer equipment.
The look on Pam's face when she saw I was actually, not only alive, but functional was one I'll not forget. Absolute disbelief. But I got her stuff done. I don't stay but head back home to crash. I tell her that when she gets back to town, I'll collect the equipment.
She calls me on breaks to tell me how horrible it is going and how she is going nuts, because she has enlisted this student to help her and the student is a bit of a whack job. Being Seattle Central, student whack jobs are a dime a dozen, but this one, Skye is a major leaguer. She is what I'd call now O.C.D. meets A.D.D. A totally goofy, twitchy woman about 40 who you know is destined to turn into the little old lady with 87 cats. And she's a talker. A real motor mouth.
Well, late in the afternoon, Pam calls me and says we need to hookup down at McCormick's (her favorite bar) and I need to cheer her up. I say sure and head down. Well, what I didn't know was that on my way down, Pam would start chatting up this guy, Dr. Dave and was quite happy to go off with him. She just had one loose end: Skye. Now, Pam is no idiot, she was going to pawn Skye off on me to entertain.
So I walk in and am greeted to the sight of Pam chatting up this dude with her back literally to Skye and Skye tormenting the bartender, Fred (the coolest barkeep ever). Pam ignores me for the most part as Skye locks onto the fresh meat.
Yak, yak, yak... I am trying to get Pam's attention, but Skye won't stop. Fred senses my dismay and pours me a pint. I am just about to enjoy my pint when another nasty Skye-ism starts. Not only does she talk a lot, she sprays while doing it. My beer falls victim almost instantly. I am just staring at my beer in shock, when Fred smoothly takes it away and has a fresh one waiting. I move my beer further away, but in a really animated moment Skye is able to nail it again. Again Fred saves the day. This time I insert myself between the Spray Queen and my beer. After a few moments, Fred hands me a napkin. I tipped Fred big ever after.
Finally after being ignored by Pam and spit on by Skye, I demand Pam's keys so I can load my car with the school equipment and get the hell out of Dodge. I should note at this point, if you had not guessed, Skye was a bit bombed.
So Pam tells Skye to give me a hand. Skye trundles out after me and helps me load the car. As I close the trunk, Skye launches into some weird lecture on Seattle architecture, pointing out the various downtown buildings. I nod politely and she has me look up at one of the nearby buildings. As I am doing so, she spins me around, puts me in this anaconda hug and proceeds to literally suck my face. It was like French-kissing a squid. I managed to squirm free and say something to the effect of "I am not that kind of boy!" meaning I still had a will to live.
I quickly escaped, Pam went off with Dr. Dave and who the hell knows what happened to Skye. But she turned up later so it could not have been too bad.
Pam and I had many more adventures, but I was always able to get her to beg forgiveness by growling in a low tone "Dr. Dave".
Saturday, January 31, 2009
Why I Am Too Lazy To Be A Fanatic...
This blog has been deleted because the judges have voted it off the island as too boring.
Friday, January 9, 2009
Kimmi, Kimmi, Where Are You? Call Me, Baby!
A short, but somewhat humorous snippet...
So I have a dear friend who is under the weather and I'd been checking in on her daily with a text message so as not to wake her up. Well this is good and all and I was racking up good karma points until...
I typed in the wrong phone number into the phone for the text message. I was one digit off. Well I didn't realize I had done this and I sent off what would be a totally innocent message if you had the context and the receiver was the right person. But to a random stranger, well maybe not - without context.
Message was:
"Hey hon, how are you doing? Thinking of you..."
Well now the next morning while away from the phone I get a voice mail from the number I mistyped...
"Kimmi? Baby is that you? Oh I was so hoping you'd get back in touch..."
I ignored the message because I knew I wasn't Kimmi and well my desperate sounding drive-by text messaging victim was some dude.
Bored now.
Later that day the phone rings again and I miss it again. "Kimmi? Kimmi? C'mon, baby, pick up!"
Still bored now,
Even later, Mr. "Kimmi Doesn't Love Me Anymore" calls again. This time I pick up and feeling mischievous, lower my voice, "Hello?"
"Is Kimmi there?" says our lost soul.
Instead of telling him he had the wrong number, I simply say "No."
There is a long pause and then he hangs up.
Not so bored now.
I'm going to Hell.
So I have a dear friend who is under the weather and I'd been checking in on her daily with a text message so as not to wake her up. Well this is good and all and I was racking up good karma points until...
I typed in the wrong phone number into the phone for the text message. I was one digit off. Well I didn't realize I had done this and I sent off what would be a totally innocent message if you had the context and the receiver was the right person. But to a random stranger, well maybe not - without context.
Message was:
"Hey hon, how are you doing? Thinking of you..."
Well now the next morning while away from the phone I get a voice mail from the number I mistyped...
"Kimmi? Baby is that you? Oh I was so hoping you'd get back in touch..."
I ignored the message because I knew I wasn't Kimmi and well my desperate sounding drive-by text messaging victim was some dude.
Bored now.
Later that day the phone rings again and I miss it again. "Kimmi? Kimmi? C'mon, baby, pick up!"
Still bored now,
Even later, Mr. "Kimmi Doesn't Love Me Anymore" calls again. This time I pick up and feeling mischievous, lower my voice, "Hello?"
"Is Kimmi there?" says our lost soul.
Instead of telling him he had the wrong number, I simply say "No."
There is a long pause and then he hangs up.
Not so bored now.
I'm going to Hell.
Saturday, January 3, 2009
Winter In Narnia 2008
So the plan was that I'd take two weeks off at Christmas and just putter around, doing a little of this a little of that. I knew I had several projects around the house that were in desperate need of getting done and the computer situation had gone completely cyber-jungle on me. So that was going to be the chores part of the holidays, but as rewards I would go out and visit friends, hit a few nice restaurants, fart about on the computer doing my facsimile of computer music or computer artwork, do the family thing and play Uncle Ross.
I would also take a day and hit the outdoor mall and casually finish my Christmas shopping taking in the the holiday ambiance watching the bustle and knowing that I was finally enjoying this holiday for once after long years of grinchiness.
Yeppers, that was the plan. How could I have guessed that Seattle would be hit with the snow storm of the half-century and that due to our collective snow preparedness, I would be reliving Stephen King's "The Shining" with a twist.
So first off, let me explain something now that comes into play a bit later. The house I live in has no central heating. If I get cold, which in a normal year is about three nights a year, I fire up the space heater in my office and my bedroom and just wear a thick sweater and I am good to go. Ok, so no heat going into the storm. Coincidently, this house has a bit of a history. In the Korean War, Seattle's north end city limit was 85th Street and I am at 97th, and this nice little house was one of the popular north end brothels. The layout of the house is very odd, but makes sense when you have that little factoid.
When the big cold hit, I fired up my meager space heaters and settled in. Winter in Seattle consists of snow for a day and then melting and rain. The weather site I use on the Internet hinted at worse, but really since it was calling for the storm on Wednesday and there was nothing, then I concluded they were wrong again. In this case they were a day early. But when it did hit, I found myself with two coolish rooms and the rest of the house a freezer. It was really intolerable to be anywhere but my office or bedroom. The restroom stops were cold reminders of when I used to ski. Nothing like putting bare butt on ice cold plastic. So when I actually had to leave one room, I scurried to the other room like a rat in a very cold maze. I actually left the orange juice out on the kitchen counter the night it hit 15 degrees only to have it mostly frozen the next morning.
So my house sits on a fairly steep hill, but not very far up the hill, so when it snows most of the time, I just muscle the truck out and get it on the main street at the bottom of the hill and I am good to go. Unfortunately this time was a little different. The truck's battery had gone flat.
The poor beastie needed a jump which was problematic because of the parking (no good access to the battery to jump off of another car). Given my super-intense phobia about jumping cars, this is actually okay with me. I had my chargers.
My car phobia comes from a time when I had no fear of electricity and jumping cars. I knew you could have some issue if you cross-connected and things like that, but my attitude at the time was retarded monkeys could do this kind of thing blindfolded, what harm could I come to? Lesson one for me: not all jumper cables are created equal. Some are absolute crap and well quite dangerous. Guess what kind I had? Lesson two: if you are going to jump a battery try jumping batteries that are not completely mismatched in power and size. Jumping a battery from a monster-sized Mercedes from the 70's to a tiny Toyota Celica (my darling "Car From Hell") is like mating a Newfoundland with a Scottish Terrier. Nothing good comes from it. It didn't help that I remembered some stupid tip that the jumper car should be running. So the Merc was kicking out even more electric fun. As I got out of the Celica after successfully jumping the car I got a rude surprise. Much to my shock and horror, I watched the black jumper cables quickly (and I mean seconds) go from black to dark gray, to lighter gray to ash color AND the leads start to glow red. I suspect that if I had not disconnected the cables as fast as I did, battery go boom. Strangely this has stuck with me since. But I am not afraid of slow charging battery chargers. Odd, huh?
So short story long, in theory I could get the truck going any time. Just needed to get out my trusty charger(s). Funny thing about chargers is they need to be charged. That requires you charge them with power and that requires a power cable. Yes, our hero has misplaced all of his cables and all his chargers are drained. This is starting to shape up to be a horrorfest. You know when you want to yell at the teenagers on screen, "Don't go make out in the van! There's a crazed axe-wielding killer waiting? Don't you know anything?" This was similar. "Why didn't you charge when you had the chance? Don't you know anything?"
So mobility impaired. I had the Lexus, but that was my last choice. Not a snow car.
So I am going to be indoors for a few days. Not a problem. I don't get cabin fever easily and had lots of unwatched DVDs and books to entertain me and being a computer whore, I can spend days zooming in and out of applications. Plus I could also chat with friends both on the cell and online. Plus that first day, I could do my online shopping for Christmas. The 18th. Yes, as you can see I am not very bright.
I had not done a lot of shopping online at Christmas and I had assumed 2-day shipping meant that the very second I hit the submit button, magic elves would whisk my order out of inventory and get it in the mail near the speed of light. Now the veterans of Christmas mailings are no doubt scoffing at my foolish, foolish naiveté. But when the email confirmations started to appear in my email that the package was just about to be sent at the same time I was actually expecting the package to arrive, all I can say I was glad I had the cover of bad weather when it came to explaining why most of the online gifts arrived late. I was even more grateful most of the people I was dealing with had the same line; "Sorry, UPS didn't make it."
Note to self: Online shop early.
So for the first four days I was set. In fact I was quite happy to have downtime and the excuse I couldn't go anywhere.
Then by about Day 5, I'd had enough. So I ventured out down the street to Fred Meyers to finish my Christmas shopping. Not quite the outdoor mall with ambiance, but it was better than a 7-Eleven “Post-it notes for everyone” Christmas. I also hit a nearby toy store, but it did not give me the joy of Toys 'r Us on Christmas Eve.
You see, the last several years I have had a holiday tradition of going to Toys 'R Us on Christmas Eve to witness the total carnage that out of control yard monsters can inflict in the Mecca of junior greed. It captures perfectly the spirit of the season my friend Wayland calls "Consuming for Christ". Ripped open packages litter isles and store employees wander the halls looking zombie-like and speechless pleading for someone to pop a cap in their brain to end the misery, As I write this, it occurs to me I really should make a Boxing Day jaunt to the store next year to see the after Christmas returns and bargain hunting. That could even be more apocalyptic. Hmmn. I'll have to make a note for 2009.
Now being quite used to hauling crap in cars, I had not taken into account that I would be walking up hill for about a half mile on ice and snow. My balance on a good day is is marginal. On the trek back there was sliding and swearing and gifts a' flyin'. Yes and since the main road had been somewhat cleared, there was dirty slushy snow that would be kicked up and flung by morons driving in the snowy part of the road not not the clear part. Again I curse the SUV owners. But after about an hour I made it home. Boy getting out was fun. I was so much more relaxed.
So Tuesday's big event was wrapping the presents. I have a bad habit of not wrapping gifts because, well, um, I am a single guy and well, I bribe others with my hopelessness usually - I am not trained well. Plus when I do wrap, it sort of looks like I am post doctorate of the Helen Keller Gift Wrapping Academy. But this year I would be better. So I got out the scissors and the paper. I scrounged up the Scotch tape only to realize I had about 6 inches left on the roll and no other gift tape. Was I going to go brave Snowmageddon just for tape? I tried other methods such as string and staples, but I drew the line at duct tape. Nothing says "I am a lame-ass" more than a thoughtful gift wrapped in duct tape.
So Christmas is approaching and several decisions were going to have to be made. I had an invitation to spend Christmas Eve with my friends Susan and Kevin. Kevin is a great cook and there would be great beer and wine, including my favorite beer of all time, the Belgium beer "Chimay Blue Label" and we'd watch DVDs and graze on gnosh and play with their dogs. I would crash there and have breakfast in the morning and we'd swap presents. Quite lovely. But I had to get there.
However, Union Hill in Redmond was not happening. It was closed they tell me, but with Greenwood somewhat treacherous, all bets were off.
Being alone on Christmas Eve was ok, if not a little lonely, but the next decision was Christmas itself. Since my mother was gone and my sister was on the east coast and my father had canceled his trip to Seattle, I had no immediate family, but I usually went to Wayland's moms for Christmas dinner and had been doing this for twenty years, so this was a tougher decision. I really wanted to go, but given she lived on Capital Hill (a very horrid area for snow) this was going to require me to resurrect my truck. So with the clock ticking, I set out to find the power cable for any charger to charge the truck. After giving up I hiked back down to Freddy's and bought yet another charger. Sigh... This was four or five now.
I got the charger home and opened it. WTF? It didn't come with a cable. It would take an extension cord. But I didn't know what bin or box I had sorted all these into. At one point, I had sorted all kinds of household things into bins for possible donation and abandoned the project and forgot the contents. Boy after several moves, you would think I'd be smarter.
Back into the snow to go down to Safeway. More slipping, more sliding. Finally a cable. Back home. So I charged up Mr. Battery Charger, but it was a very slow process. Eventually on Christmas day I brought life back to the Toyota and made my way to Capital Hill. It actually was quite an easy drive despite what I expected until I got to 19th Ave.
What should have been relatively clear was a giant icy-slushy rut-ridden joke of a street, But what can't be cured, must be endured so I proceeded to head down 19th. The snow was pretty wet and heavy and the ruts bounced the truck around like a lunar rover. I saw all these SUVs and little cars sliding and getting quite stuck. I needed to get a fair ways down the road, but after getting nearly stuck myself trying to yield the way to someone. I realized that I couldn't get any further and was just about to pull over and hike the rest of the way when lo and behold a plow comes along. Saved! I waited for Mr. Plow go by thinking that this was awesome. If he went all the way down 19th, I could just follow, This was where I got to experience first hand the city's absolute moronic mandates. As the plow past me by, I realized the the plow was leaving almost everything the way it was. Maybe it plowed a few inches off the top, but there was at least a foot of crap. So essentially he was making it just slightly less hard to drive this damn road. Still totally screwed up even after the plow.
Well I fought my way down and about a block away gave up. I walked it with my gifts.
So I did the second family thing. The nieces and nephews are all taller and one of them now stares down at me and says things like, "Play Mario Cart with me." only to be followed a while later with "You really suck at this, don't you?" I start to wax nostalgic for the old Commodore 64 days and he looks at me like I am speaking of ancient times. From his point of view I probably am.
Dinner and the gifts were fab, but I was fascinated with the social experiment of giving an 8 year old a computer and then telling him he can't build it until he gets home. I thought his little blood vessels were going to pop out of his neck at the stress. You could have fed the kid a bag of sugar and not got him as hyper.
I ended up crashing there for the night and the next day made the reverse trek in the same amount of snow, just slushier.
Not much else to say about my winter torment other than I ended up playing Cranium's Family Fun on New Year's Eve and had to stack a set of six diced sized blocks in a stack using only my elbows. You see where this goes...
I should have been drinking more, much more to be talked into that one...
And of this writing it is snowing...again.
I would also take a day and hit the outdoor mall and casually finish my Christmas shopping taking in the the holiday ambiance watching the bustle and knowing that I was finally enjoying this holiday for once after long years of grinchiness.
Yeppers, that was the plan. How could I have guessed that Seattle would be hit with the snow storm of the half-century and that due to our collective snow preparedness, I would be reliving Stephen King's "The Shining" with a twist.
So first off, let me explain something now that comes into play a bit later. The house I live in has no central heating. If I get cold, which in a normal year is about three nights a year, I fire up the space heater in my office and my bedroom and just wear a thick sweater and I am good to go. Ok, so no heat going into the storm. Coincidently, this house has a bit of a history. In the Korean War, Seattle's north end city limit was 85th Street and I am at 97th, and this nice little house was one of the popular north end brothels. The layout of the house is very odd, but makes sense when you have that little factoid.
When the big cold hit, I fired up my meager space heaters and settled in. Winter in Seattle consists of snow for a day and then melting and rain. The weather site I use on the Internet hinted at worse, but really since it was calling for the storm on Wednesday and there was nothing, then I concluded they were wrong again. In this case they were a day early. But when it did hit, I found myself with two coolish rooms and the rest of the house a freezer. It was really intolerable to be anywhere but my office or bedroom. The restroom stops were cold reminders of when I used to ski. Nothing like putting bare butt on ice cold plastic. So when I actually had to leave one room, I scurried to the other room like a rat in a very cold maze. I actually left the orange juice out on the kitchen counter the night it hit 15 degrees only to have it mostly frozen the next morning.
So my house sits on a fairly steep hill, but not very far up the hill, so when it snows most of the time, I just muscle the truck out and get it on the main street at the bottom of the hill and I am good to go. Unfortunately this time was a little different. The truck's battery had gone flat.
The poor beastie needed a jump which was problematic because of the parking (no good access to the battery to jump off of another car). Given my super-intense phobia about jumping cars, this is actually okay with me. I had my chargers.
My car phobia comes from a time when I had no fear of electricity and jumping cars. I knew you could have some issue if you cross-connected and things like that, but my attitude at the time was retarded monkeys could do this kind of thing blindfolded, what harm could I come to? Lesson one for me: not all jumper cables are created equal. Some are absolute crap and well quite dangerous. Guess what kind I had? Lesson two: if you are going to jump a battery try jumping batteries that are not completely mismatched in power and size. Jumping a battery from a monster-sized Mercedes from the 70's to a tiny Toyota Celica (my darling "Car From Hell") is like mating a Newfoundland with a Scottish Terrier. Nothing good comes from it. It didn't help that I remembered some stupid tip that the jumper car should be running. So the Merc was kicking out even more electric fun. As I got out of the Celica after successfully jumping the car I got a rude surprise. Much to my shock and horror, I watched the black jumper cables quickly (and I mean seconds) go from black to dark gray, to lighter gray to ash color AND the leads start to glow red. I suspect that if I had not disconnected the cables as fast as I did, battery go boom. Strangely this has stuck with me since. But I am not afraid of slow charging battery chargers. Odd, huh?
So short story long, in theory I could get the truck going any time. Just needed to get out my trusty charger(s). Funny thing about chargers is they need to be charged. That requires you charge them with power and that requires a power cable. Yes, our hero has misplaced all of his cables and all his chargers are drained. This is starting to shape up to be a horrorfest. You know when you want to yell at the teenagers on screen, "Don't go make out in the van! There's a crazed axe-wielding killer waiting? Don't you know anything?" This was similar. "Why didn't you charge when you had the chance? Don't you know anything?"
So mobility impaired. I had the Lexus, but that was my last choice. Not a snow car.
So I am going to be indoors for a few days. Not a problem. I don't get cabin fever easily and had lots of unwatched DVDs and books to entertain me and being a computer whore, I can spend days zooming in and out of applications. Plus I could also chat with friends both on the cell and online. Plus that first day, I could do my online shopping for Christmas. The 18th. Yes, as you can see I am not very bright.
I had not done a lot of shopping online at Christmas and I had assumed 2-day shipping meant that the very second I hit the submit button, magic elves would whisk my order out of inventory and get it in the mail near the speed of light. Now the veterans of Christmas mailings are no doubt scoffing at my foolish, foolish naiveté. But when the email confirmations started to appear in my email that the package was just about to be sent at the same time I was actually expecting the package to arrive, all I can say I was glad I had the cover of bad weather when it came to explaining why most of the online gifts arrived late. I was even more grateful most of the people I was dealing with had the same line; "Sorry, UPS didn't make it."
Note to self: Online shop early.
So for the first four days I was set. In fact I was quite happy to have downtime and the excuse I couldn't go anywhere.
Then by about Day 5, I'd had enough. So I ventured out down the street to Fred Meyers to finish my Christmas shopping. Not quite the outdoor mall with ambiance, but it was better than a 7-Eleven “Post-it notes for everyone” Christmas. I also hit a nearby toy store, but it did not give me the joy of Toys 'r Us on Christmas Eve.
You see, the last several years I have had a holiday tradition of going to Toys 'R Us on Christmas Eve to witness the total carnage that out of control yard monsters can inflict in the Mecca of junior greed. It captures perfectly the spirit of the season my friend Wayland calls "Consuming for Christ". Ripped open packages litter isles and store employees wander the halls looking zombie-like and speechless pleading for someone to pop a cap in their brain to end the misery, As I write this, it occurs to me I really should make a Boxing Day jaunt to the store next year to see the after Christmas returns and bargain hunting. That could even be more apocalyptic. Hmmn. I'll have to make a note for 2009.
Now being quite used to hauling crap in cars, I had not taken into account that I would be walking up hill for about a half mile on ice and snow. My balance on a good day is is marginal. On the trek back there was sliding and swearing and gifts a' flyin'. Yes and since the main road had been somewhat cleared, there was dirty slushy snow that would be kicked up and flung by morons driving in the snowy part of the road not not the clear part. Again I curse the SUV owners. But after about an hour I made it home. Boy getting out was fun. I was so much more relaxed.
So Tuesday's big event was wrapping the presents. I have a bad habit of not wrapping gifts because, well, um, I am a single guy and well, I bribe others with my hopelessness usually - I am not trained well. Plus when I do wrap, it sort of looks like I am post doctorate of the Helen Keller Gift Wrapping Academy. But this year I would be better. So I got out the scissors and the paper. I scrounged up the Scotch tape only to realize I had about 6 inches left on the roll and no other gift tape. Was I going to go brave Snowmageddon just for tape? I tried other methods such as string and staples, but I drew the line at duct tape. Nothing says "I am a lame-ass" more than a thoughtful gift wrapped in duct tape.
So Christmas is approaching and several decisions were going to have to be made. I had an invitation to spend Christmas Eve with my friends Susan and Kevin. Kevin is a great cook and there would be great beer and wine, including my favorite beer of all time, the Belgium beer "Chimay Blue Label" and we'd watch DVDs and graze on gnosh and play with their dogs. I would crash there and have breakfast in the morning and we'd swap presents. Quite lovely. But I had to get there.
However, Union Hill in Redmond was not happening. It was closed they tell me, but with Greenwood somewhat treacherous, all bets were off.
Being alone on Christmas Eve was ok, if not a little lonely, but the next decision was Christmas itself. Since my mother was gone and my sister was on the east coast and my father had canceled his trip to Seattle, I had no immediate family, but I usually went to Wayland's moms for Christmas dinner and had been doing this for twenty years, so this was a tougher decision. I really wanted to go, but given she lived on Capital Hill (a very horrid area for snow) this was going to require me to resurrect my truck. So with the clock ticking, I set out to find the power cable for any charger to charge the truck. After giving up I hiked back down to Freddy's and bought yet another charger. Sigh... This was four or five now.
I got the charger home and opened it. WTF? It didn't come with a cable. It would take an extension cord. But I didn't know what bin or box I had sorted all these into. At one point, I had sorted all kinds of household things into bins for possible donation and abandoned the project and forgot the contents. Boy after several moves, you would think I'd be smarter.
Back into the snow to go down to Safeway. More slipping, more sliding. Finally a cable. Back home. So I charged up Mr. Battery Charger, but it was a very slow process. Eventually on Christmas day I brought life back to the Toyota and made my way to Capital Hill. It actually was quite an easy drive despite what I expected until I got to 19th Ave.
What should have been relatively clear was a giant icy-slushy rut-ridden joke of a street, But what can't be cured, must be endured so I proceeded to head down 19th. The snow was pretty wet and heavy and the ruts bounced the truck around like a lunar rover. I saw all these SUVs and little cars sliding and getting quite stuck. I needed to get a fair ways down the road, but after getting nearly stuck myself trying to yield the way to someone. I realized that I couldn't get any further and was just about to pull over and hike the rest of the way when lo and behold a plow comes along. Saved! I waited for Mr. Plow go by thinking that this was awesome. If he went all the way down 19th, I could just follow, This was where I got to experience first hand the city's absolute moronic mandates. As the plow past me by, I realized the the plow was leaving almost everything the way it was. Maybe it plowed a few inches off the top, but there was at least a foot of crap. So essentially he was making it just slightly less hard to drive this damn road. Still totally screwed up even after the plow.
Well I fought my way down and about a block away gave up. I walked it with my gifts.
So I did the second family thing. The nieces and nephews are all taller and one of them now stares down at me and says things like, "Play Mario Cart with me." only to be followed a while later with "You really suck at this, don't you?" I start to wax nostalgic for the old Commodore 64 days and he looks at me like I am speaking of ancient times. From his point of view I probably am.
Dinner and the gifts were fab, but I was fascinated with the social experiment of giving an 8 year old a computer and then telling him he can't build it until he gets home. I thought his little blood vessels were going to pop out of his neck at the stress. You could have fed the kid a bag of sugar and not got him as hyper.
I ended up crashing there for the night and the next day made the reverse trek in the same amount of snow, just slushier.
Not much else to say about my winter torment other than I ended up playing Cranium's Family Fun on New Year's Eve and had to stack a set of six diced sized blocks in a stack using only my elbows. You see where this goes...
I should have been drinking more, much more to be talked into that one...
And of this writing it is snowing...again.
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