On the Road Again!

So I love you all, but I want to let you know that I'm on the road, en route to seeing my son get his Master's degree! (Shout out to Rob! Ya-hoo!) Can't give you much of a post, but I can tell you this:

1. We stopped at a rest stop on I-70 today (heading from St. Louis to Pittsburgh) and saw that the 'v' was missing from the Vending Machines sign.

My hub, the Center of the Universe pointed it out, and wondered if they were the machines set up by President Obama's fictitious death panels. You know, like you put in an old person and get a big old wad of soylent green? You know, the sign said "Ending Machines".

2. I forgot what the second thing was.

More soon-- really!

Mean Streets

What does one say when finding this notice on the front door of her humble abode?

The correct answer is: Now???



Now that we’re supposed to get four solid days of rain, after a completely dry 2 ½ weeks?

Now that I’m supposed to be hosting my book club here tomorrow afternoon, meaning eight women will be parking their cars (where ours are) up on the cross street, and hoofing it down the hill to our house?

Now that this means you’ll barely have the street open for us to bring the car we’re not taking to Pittsburgh back to the garage while we’re gone? (Yeah, that’s going in my archives as the worst sentence I’ve ever written…. I think I’ll keep it.) I’m sure our neighbors up on the cross street would not appreciate having our car there an extra week!

Yes. Now.

Btw, another of the 'bookees' agreed to host (thanks, Linda!) and we averted that crisis! (I insisted on taking the dessert, since I was already psyched to make it-- will tell you about that-- and provide the recipe soon!)

So bright and early the next morning, in came the big equipment, shaking the street and rattling the windows. Soon the cutting began. The concrete saw did its thing, and loudly sliced the old slabs into sections. Then a mechanical ram (possibly hydraulic?) street-buster turned the sections into chunks o’ concrete. It was all kind of like a slice-and-dice operation, but on the street instead of an onion.

Meanwhile, the house was shaking like crazy, and I had to wonder what this will do in terms of settling, foundation cracks, door frames, and my weight loss. (I always have to wonder about that, even when it’s totally unrelated. You know, “Does this concrete mixer make my butt look big?” --stuff like that.)

When the shake, rattle and roll stopped, the pre-mix truck came down to pour all new slabs. And a crew of non-hottie guys did the smooth and finish stuff.

So because he’s as big a nerd as I am (though often about totally different things,) the Center of the Universe (CoTU) went outside and shot some videos of the festivities. And now, because he’s a bigger attention whore hound than I am, he wants me to post them here.

And to make the whining and whimpering stop, I’m doing it. Besides, I’m pretty sure that our 3-year old grandson will get to see the video this way! (No, he’s not a subscriber [yet] but his mom’s a frequent reader.) And he’s all about the streets and the signs. So this one’s for you, Zachary: check it out!

Shame on Me!

Shame on me…


I judged a book by its cover, and I’m not talking about what my book club read this month (American Wife by Curtis Sittenfeld—don’t bother, we all hated it.) No, that one I judged by its content, which was sub-par, in contrast to Sittenfeld’s excellent “Prep” of a few years ago. But anyhoo…

 

I was watching the news while making dinner, and some video was shown of a public demonstration. To be honest, I was barely paying attention, so I couldn’t tell you what the issue was, or what the crowd was trying to achieve.

I looked up at the screen in time to see an enormous, middle-aged woman in a tight tee-shirt and shorts sitting on an aluminum lawn chair, holding up a hand-written sign that read,

“Do you think I am stupid?”

My immediate reaction was, Um, yeah.

Like, lady, don’t ask any question you don’t want to hear the answer to.

Now, this woman might be a Ph.D. in biochemical engineering who’s also earned a law degree and holds a black belt in karate and won the Pillsbury Bake-off. But I doubt it.

There’s something about the sign, and the look, and the groaning of the webbing on the chair that made me think otherwise.

I’ve tried honestly to figure out why this is. It’s truly not her weight—I have told you that I am definitely not at MY ideal weight, and some of my best friends struggle with their weight. That doesn’t establish any hierarchy of worthiness or smarts.

It’s not the tee-shirt. I wear tee-shirts sometimes. So, ditto on the hierarchy of value.

Is it the sign? The willingness to ask such a question and put it on what became, essentially a billboard? I believe so. Because if she was serious, and wanted to accomplish something by attending this rally, why wouldn’t her sign say, “Save the Whales”, or “Don’t Save the Whales”? Isn’t that the best way to make your point? If she had done that, I’d know what the story was about. Now all I have is my disdain for her, and my soggy trench coat as I walk the Boulevard of Broken Dreams. You know.

But I’m still ashamed.

And you still won’t like American Wife.

Gum Chewers and Knuckle Draggers

There are some things in life that are truly defining: a Quasimodo-type hump, an eardrum-piercing laugh, an eye patch combined with a parrot on your shoulder and a peg leg. But most physical characteristics are not so black and white. There’s a massive gray area, where these things are nuanced.

This brings me to my point.

Chewing gum.

From the time I was a kid, I was taught that if you chew gum, you chew a small piece, you conceal it discreetly in the side of your cheek, and you never let your mastication show. And that was the norm—you didn’t see a lot of people (beyond the schoolyard age) chomping away on a wad of gum.

Recently, plagued as I am by seasonal allergies, I’ve been experiencing a dry mouth as the result of my antihistamine use. It has pushed me to chew the occasional piece of gum. Discreetly. I was at a meeting, and I tilted my pack o’ Trident to the woman next to me, and said, “Gum?”

She looked at me with disdain and said, “I’m not a gum chewer.” ZING!!!! A gum chewer… it sounds a lot like an axe murderer, or a knuckle dragger, doesn’t it? Cuts me like a knife! The irony here being that this woman could clearly benefit from a course in personal hygiene—one that teaches people how to shower, wash their hair and launder their clothes. Seriously, when you have this woman looking down her nose at you, you have to take a real serious look at yourself.

So I did. Take a look at myself, that is. My gum is quietly resting between my cheek and my back molars, just slightly keeping my mouth moist. No popping, cracking, or blowing of bubbles. You wouldn’t even know I’ve got it in my mouth. But now that I’ve been deemed unfit for social contact by virtue of this faux pas, I’ll have to put my axe away and bandage my knuckles.

Battlestar Grammatica

Isn’t it interesting that some people who go out of their way to puff out their chests and pretend to be smarter/richer/younger than they are (or than YOU are) often shoot themselves in the foot (or the groin) without even realizing it?


A few days ago, a nationally recognized author was here in town, and was interviewed on a local news program. He got the full hour, and took every bit of it to toot his own horn, pat himself on the back, and rattle off his accomplishments and achievements. His grammar wasn’t perfect, but sometimes I think you have to chalk that up to the speaker being a little nervous, or just being human. (But yes, I do tend to think more highly of folks who use proper grammar. Sue me. Mrs. Burns made a serious impression on me in high school English.)

So he was getting on my nerves somewhat, mostly because he was so darn full of himself, but I was driving a rather long distance, and I just hung in there. And then it happened: He spoke of all the “allocades” he’s received over the years. Um, sir? The word is “accolades”. Don’t use it if you don’t know what it is! My respect for you? Sorry—major nose dive. Try again next year.

Obviously this stuck in my craw, or I wouldn’t be bothering you with it today.

Besides, today that scab was picked off by another seemingly innocuous occurrence. A very nice young woman was helping me choose a give-me-back-my-youth new foundation at the Clinique counter in a major department store. She was upbeat and friendly, without being cloying or chipper. Nice balance, and she seemed to know her stuff.

I was all ready to exchange BFF necklaces with her, when she pointed out that this shimmery stuff that was part of my free gift package could be used on my cheekbones or my degligee. Yes, you heard right—a new name for what she indicated (on her own body, I should add) as the décolletage. Somehow, she combined that with negligee, for reasons we can only guess at, and came up with a new word. I don’t expect to see it in the list of new words for 2010, but you never know.

Meanwhile, I’m glad she doesn’t sell men’s cosmetics. She might offer my husband something for his chockstrap.


(Sorry-- can't bring myself to post a photo here!)

The Early Bird

What’s nicer than watching the birds frolicking outside your kitchen window when you’re washing dishes? Okay, that was too easy: it’s watching birds frolicking outside your kitchen window when you’re not washing dishes.

Or watching the birds playing tag in the trees any time is actually a good stress-reliever.

What’s NOT a bird-related stress-buster? Listening to them chirp, sing, trill and warble their little hearts out at five-freaking-thirty in the morning. When I’m in bed, trying to sleep. What’s up with that?

They are super loud for about a half-hour, then it gets relatively quiet again. Of course, usually I can’t fall back to sleep after the thirty-minute cacophony serenade.

A couple of weeks ago my daughter was visiting from Sacramento. We both happened to get up at a little after 5, and met, groggy and droopy-eyed in the middle of the hall, simultaneously planning to check on her 3-year old son. We peeked in and saw him sleeping like an angel, shut the door, and agreed we’d be going back to bed, too.

As we hugged, she asked, “What’s that noise?” I listened, and didn’t hear anything out of the ordinary. She persevered. “Listen—there—what’s that?”

“Um, gee, Honey, I know you haven’t lived in the Midwest for a while, but those are birds.”

“No!”

“Really. Get some sleep. The birds in California don’t sing? They haven’t even built up a quorum here yet—in half an hour it’ll really be something. For now, catch a few more winks.”

We went back to our respective beds, but I never did fall back to sleep. I was reminded of a little poem a coworker of mine gave me at my first job out of college. His name was Buddy Bunch (for real) and he was almost old enough to be my father. That didn’t stop him from being the ‘class clown’ of the office. Here’s Buddy’s poem in its entirety (please forgive the profanity—it’s copied from his original):

The Early Bird

He sang upon my window sill

So sweetly did he lull.

I brought the goddamn window down

And crushed his tiny skull.

I didn’t say it was good, I just said it came to mind.

The Cat's Away...

Gosh, what’s that very old saying about the cat and the mice? Hmmmm… Oh yes, “When the cat’s away, the mice will play.” Well, I have a slightly different take on it: “When the cat’s away, the mouse gets a lot more done.” Doesn’t have the same ring, does it?

Yeah, but right now the Center of the Universe (CoTU) is out of town for a few days, and I’m knocking stuff off my ‘to-do’ list right and left. –and it feels like play…

Research the Grand Canyon trip: check.

Iron CoTU’s nineteen shirts and four pairs of pants previously held over from last summer: check.

Take the in-laws to their volunteer gig: check.

Rearrange the garbage can area of the garage: check.

Make copies of in-laws’ tax returns, affix postage, and mail: check, check and the check is in the mail.

Am I tired? Yes, but energized, too, because I’m getting somewhere. I’ve also gone to the gym both days he’s been gone, and will continue to go and work out, because I need it.

So what’s the difference here? It can’t just be that I’m only making meals (and doing dishes) for one instead of for two. That just wouldn’t make sense. It can’t be that we spend so much quality time interacting when he’s here. In fact, if it weren’t for the sexual harassment, some days there’d be no interaction at all. The truth is, when he’s at home and I’m away, he feels bereft because there’s no one here to ignore.

I’m thinking it’s just a difference in the energy flow. I’ve got the ball in my court, and I’m shooting lay-ups, free throws, and whatever I feel like. It feels free and open. I’m playing ‘horse’ against myself, and I’m winning. It’s different. Do I miss him? Yep, I do. But I’m enjoying the feeling of open space this seems to have created, and hoping I will carry it over to the time when he’s back.

Meanwhile, I can do the daily Sudoku while I eat my lunch, and the New York Times crossword puzzle while I eat my dinner. It’s not as much fun as the verbal ping-pong match of a long-hitched couple like us, but it’ll have to do for a few more days.

(Post to my blog: check!)