Maybe we'll meet up with red stapler for a cappuccino after.

The longer I go without updating the easier it is not to update, inertia being what it is and all. I’ve always enjoyed this totally pointless site—as I tend to enjoy most totally pointless things—so I need to break the non-updating habit. This is a step in that direction.

I met my boss for lunch today. I was a split second away from impulse hugging her in greeting before she broke my cuddle stride with a green three-ring binder held at arm’s length. I’ve been out of the workplace so long I’m like a business etiquette caveman. You’re probably thinking, no, a lot of people hug their bosses, I’ve been known to hug my boss. And that may in fact be the case. But how many of you have bear hugged a green three-ring binder?

At lunch I signed a contract for a second book project, one that begins now and ends in November. I’m not writing so much as serving as a managing editor of sorts, and that’s all I’m going to say because literally the last thing I need is for Google to turn this website into a résumé.

The book project I started almost exactly a year ago stopped making forward progress about eleven and a half months ago. More accurately, everyone else associated with the project stopped making progress—I continued doing independent research and interviewing potential subjects for several months. At some point I stopped, though; it’s no use researching and investigating a topic when you have no idea the direction the project is supposed to take. I could have persevered, I suppose, dedicated myself to a guess and just run with it, buried myself inside museums and historical societies only to come up for air seven months later with three hundred pages written on the flood irrigation practices of the Hopi people.

“This is great,” the client would say, “but we were really looking for something about oranges.”

“Oranges?” I’d repeat, not sure I’d heard.

“Please let go of me,” the client would reply, his voice muffled against my coat.

It looks as though even that project is starting to move forward again, fingers crossed, so with luck I could be completely overwhelmed by unattainable deadlines any time now!

Okay, that’s plenty for today. I promised green three-ring binder a steak dinner. 
¶ posted by Erin on Tuesday, June 23, 2009

  Sock Zombie Updates

The last couple of months have been off the charts busy and I've got like fifty different things happening so I'm going to have to catch up here next week in earnest. But in the meantime.

My new best friend Nita Gale orchestrated a complete professional remodel of sockzombie.com, proving once again that if I slap a bunch of bullshit code on the internet and call it a website, skilled programmers and designers everywhere will be helplessly drawn by the horror. I'm convinced it emits some kind of Bat Sign, only instead of a bat it's just an unclosed link illuminated in the sky, harkening them near. I haven't had a chance to add a lot of content to the site yet but it's absolutely gorgeous and I love it. Even if I didn't make it myself out of $40 software and a first-grader's knowledge of html. (And I mean an old school first-grader, not the first-graders I see walking around today, with their bluetooths and their MacBook Pros. A friend of mine, Allie, has a first-grader named Molly. She has no idea what a Trapper Keeper is and her résumé is fucking ridiculous. The only thing keeping her from stealing my job is her inability to stay awake past three in the afternoon. I can stay awake until almost five. It's a small edge but I'm taking it.)

Also in sock zombie news, the intimidatingly talented Kate Danley created this movie with a Sock Zombie puppet and I can't stop watching it. It's a whole new level of inspiration.

 
¶ posted by Erin on Tuesday, June 09, 2009

  I'm thinking I'll hang it in the attic.

I recently inherited a giant wind chime from my parents. I was over at their house helping clean out the garage and there it was underneath a half-empty bag of potting soil.

My dad saw me see it there, the wind chime, its mute brass tubes splayed out all over the place like a washed up robot squid.

"You want to take that home, you think?" he asked, a little sheepish. I snorted.

I bought the wind chime for my dad a few years ago. Father's Day, maybe. Or a birthday. My grandparents, his parents, had hung a wind chime in their yard decades ago; as they became ill our memories of time spent at their home grew sharper with the appreciation of better days and my dad started mentioning the sound of the chimes enough that I sought out a specialty store and bought him a close approximation of the same chimes.

I dragged the giant, clanking cardboard box into the family room and I could tell by my dad's face that he was hoping against hope it was three thousand pairs of cufflinks. He reached inside that box, pulled out a polished tentacle, and cringed as if I'd just thrown a church organ against the wall. It didn't help that when he pulled out the entire contraption it did, in fact, sound like I'd just thrown a church organ against the wall.

"I love it," he said, sprinting the whole apparatus outside to the patio. I think that's what he said; I can't be sure, I had my hands over my ears. My dad hung it roughly five inches from the arcadia door and prayed for some global catastrophe that would eliminate wind. Months later, his prayers dissappointingly unanswered, he took matters into his own hands and he wrapped a bungee cord around the chimes so they couldn't move.

I walked into their backyard and there they were, bound and gagged, listlessly drifting from side to side like a wind chime mime.

My dad saw my horror and tried to cover: "We love them," he started, "just... not when they move."

"Well sure," I snorted, "obviously. That's what wind chimes are all about-- looks." I half suspected that an inspection of my dad's car would unveil a trunk full of handcuffed songbirds.

"We have pretty much the same wind chime and we enjoy it!" I elbowed Randy for support. "Right? I mean, we really love ours. It's not right by the door, though, it's... " Huh. I couldn't remember. I looked at Randy. Randy turned his attention to the space just to the left of my head.

"Where is it? Where'd we hang it?" I asked him. I couldn't actually remember seeing it-- or hearing it-- since the patio remodel a year ago. "Do you remember?" Randy peeled some paint off the door jamb with his thumbnail and shrugged. I had a vision, then; a shallow grave, the desperate clink! a shovel full of dirt would make as it landed on a helpless brass tube.

Finding myself suddenly in menacing company, I dropped the subject. Several months later in an effort to mediate peace my parents presented Randy and me with a handmade brass whirligig designed to hang and spin in the wind. My love of shit that hangs off the house was now presumably sated, as was Randy's love of shit that shuts the fuck up. And it was nice, this little thing, with its silent little blue glass ball that spun silently down a brass spiral to nowhere, but it didn't heal my wounds.

Soon after, we had my parents over for dinner and I made sure the brass whirligig was front and center on the patio-- with a pointed modification-- but no one noticed. In hindsight they probably saw it and just assumed I'd finally come around, that I'd seen the crotchety light. The light where nothing is allowed to move and everything is better if it makes less noise.

Meanwhile, my parents' wind chime was inevitably making its slow, undignified crawl into the garage. It started one blustery night when my dad, frustrated that the entire bungeed contraption was banging manically against the house, took the whole thing down and laid it on the patio. Whereupon my mom immediately stepped on it in the dark and almost brass tubed herself into a concussion. That was the beginning of the end.

So last week when my dad asked me if I wanted to take his wind chime home with me, desperate as it looked lying there on the garage floor, cords all tangled, tubes all dented and akimbo, I didn't have a choice. I'd certainly asserted myself as a champion of noisy crap in the yard-- every day when Randy came home he was afraid he'd find a rope of monkeys and tambourines swinging from the patio ledge. Plus getting it away from my parents would be like helping Catherine Martin out of that well-- yeah, it might take some work to get her back to normal, but at least you've freed up some bungee cords. 
¶ posted by Erin on Thursday, May 21, 2009

  What about weevils, can weevils live on people?

So yeah, hey, what's happening? Things are great over here, Randy and I are great, marriage is great. Well, for me, marriage is great for me, I can't speak for Randy. I'm married to a handsome, responsible, functioning member of society-- Randy's married to a woman who didn't wash the up-do out of her hair until six days after the wedding, and only then on account of the fruit flies. Last week Randy's wife hurriedly bit a bunch of Dots in half and stuck them all over his windshield while he pumped gas. Yesterday Randy's wife called him at his office because she filed her taxes all by herself like a big girl (for the fifteenth year in a row) and thought it deserved some validation.

"I almost said fuck it," I told him over the phone, showboating, swatting at my head, "but then I figured I'd be in big trouble next year, what with the 'filing jointly' and whatnot."

"Yeah, good job," Randy said, either distracted or horrified, they sound the same over the phone. They actually sound the same in person, too, I think he must practice that. Either way, he managed to impart exactly the same amount of validation that he might convey had I called to announce I hadn't yet lit a match and held it to the living room drywall that morning. Which is to say, little.

So to sum up: I'm married to a smart, well-adjusted person who gets up every morning to go participate in society and who isn't perpetually herding a small farm of something around on his scalp, and Randy's married to... not that. 
¶ posted by Erin on Wednesday, April 15, 2009

  sockzombie.com

So I've had http://sockzombie.com forwarding to my Etsy shop for the past... year, so yesterday I started building an actual site for the domain. And this morning I think I might have something resembling a website.

If you've got five minutes, will you head over there and let me know of any weird glitches or resolution issues? I've got it set for 1024 x 768 (my resolution is 1440 x 900 and this allows for plenty of room in any browser I use) and if you can't see something or have to scroll past the background image to read the text, this is helpful information.

I also incorporated a lot of mouse rollover animation pop-up stuff and I'm curious if that's working for anyone but me.

Seriously, any and all feedback is hugely appreciated. 
¶ posted by Erin on Friday, April 10, 2009

  Except maybe leprosy.

My wonderful aunt sent me this picture today (hi, Sissy!) of my dad, me, Randy, and my mom after the ceremony. We were taking pictures and I happened to see another bride leaving her staging room fifty yards away, all white and flowery and flanked by secret service agents bridesmaids, making her way to her own wedding ceremony on the other side of the resort.

"Hey!" I hollered, waving. "Hey!

One of five cohorts in a berry colored dress got her attention for me and she stopped and turned.

"High five!" I yelled, raising my arm in the air in front of me. "High five!"

She laughed, passed her bouquet to the other hand, and high-fived me.

Proving yet again that there is no situation that cannot be made more awesome with a high five.

 
¶ posted by Erin on Tuesday, March 24, 2009

  TA DA!

Randy and I were married on Saturday and it was somehow even more wonderful than we had hoped. I've never been more happy or more full of love or more completely exhausted. I've totally neglected this website for months and that's going to stop, seriously, but not until the swelling in my brain and in my heart subsides just a little.

In the meantime, here's the only picture of my husband and me on our wedding day that was on my personal camera. You're welcome.

 
¶ posted by Erin on Monday, March 23, 2009

  Dry leprosy is for quitters.

I’m happy to report that my left shoulder received the last of the rabies shots on Tuesday. Needless to say, right shoulder was relieved. The nurse celebrated with a fancy Dora the Explorer band-aid and I celebrated by licking the nearest monkey. I have magical blood now and I’m officially free to harass even the most feral of nature’s creatures without fear of suffering a quick foamy death. The doctor didn’t say that, exactly, what she said was, “Don’t touch anymore random animals in third-world countries,” but I know what she meant: “Your blood is superblood—go forth, my child, and smack a bat in the face.”

Despite what you may have heard, rabies shots aren’t all that common; it took the Department of Health an entire day to even find a hospital that had the vaccine on hand. And the medicine comes in these giant syringes that look like Halloween props—evidently the rabies people think safety needles are for pussies because this thing could stitch a leather couch together. I always mentioned that to the nurse, that the needle was huge and the vaccine was viscous so if she could, you know, ratchet down the enthusiasm… and then she’d JAM! the needle into my arm with one eye closed and her whole fist wrapped around the thing. Like she was smacking a suction-cup dart against a window.

Turns out the doctor was a pretty good salesperson; it’s a sign of the economic times when a patient shows up for a rabies shot and gets upsold to a pap smear, but that’s exactly what happened. Granted I was an easy mark:

“So you’re here for the rabies protocol?”
“That’s right.”
“Got a few extra minutes and the urge to take your pants off?”
“That’s right.”

Imagine my disappointment when he reached for a speculum.

HEYYYY-OHHHH! That’s not how it happened.

But I did get talked into a physical and a well woman exam that came with this whole Q&A interrogation wherein the doctor tried valiantly to find some other more expensive shit wrong with me but alas, my thyroid is aces and I don’t need medication for anxiety or mania or sadness or boredom.

There were also fifteen or twenty THOUSAND questions thrown in there in an effort to determine exactly why it is that a healthy 33-year-old woman in a ten-year relationship doesn’t have any children. I think the first few were probably valid and then, flummoxed, she started improvising.

“Have you ever been pregnant?” No.

“Are you on a birth control pill?” No.

“Are you currently trying to conceive?” No.

“How are you preventing conception?” When my period’s late I drink warm tequila and throw myself down some stairs for a few hours. Not really. Vasectomy.

“How’s that working for you?” I haven’t gotten pregnant yet so… great?

“Are your periods regular?” I don’t know, what time is it?

“Have you ever taken any kind of fertility drugs?” Like Boone’s Farm? No.

“Have you ever been pregnant and miscarried?” I thought we covered this.

“Have you ever been told you were infertile?” Guaranteed I would have mentioned it to you by now if I had.

“So… you just don’t want children?” Correct!

“Well!” she said, the victor, finally. “And that’s just fine.”

Oh, is it? Is it fine? Thanks. Thanks for that. I feel so much better now that I have your tepid approval. I guess now we can bypass the rest of your investigation:

“Do you have a family history of a horrible genetic disease that’s preventing you from fulfilling your true and only purpose as a woman?”

“Do you have something against blessings?”

“How many babies have you hit over the head with a hammer?”

I’m just going to start telling people I’m using my uterus to store my bakeware. No room for a fetus, sorry, that Creuset roaster takes up a lot of space.

In the interest of bringing this series of misadventures to a close, I’ll tell you that Jessica sent me this fantastic rabies bunny the other day and, Dora bandage notwithstanding, she thus helped end the whole stupid ordeal on a positive note. She better get “malaria” and “wet leprosy” bunnies ready for me because I’m feeling pretty fearless with all this superblood rolling through my gig. I’m going to be out there touching all KINDS of shit, you don’t even know. 
¶ posted by Erin on Friday, February 20, 2009

  Not a proverbial one.

Randy and I are getting married on Saturday, March 21st. Today is Sunday, February 15th. Last Tuesday I drove my mom to the Arizona Biltmore to show her where, exactly, her daughter was getting married. That’s not exactly true, I didn’t actually drive—she had to drive because I couldn’t remember how to get there. Once there the wedding coordinator, a very cordial, very competent woman named either Sheila or Mary, I can’t remember which, handed me a wedding planning timeline.

“It will help you keep track of what you need to do when.” According to this timeline I’m roughly sixteen months behind. There are only a handful of things a bride should have to check off inside the five week mark, and two of those include “Remind Your Groom to be on His Best Bachelor Party Behavior!” and “Try to Get a Good Night’s Sleep!” So no hookers and a fistful of sweaty Benadryl. No different than any run-of-the-mill Tuesday. Check and check.

Despite my obvious inability to adhere to a two-year timeline, the entire affair is shaping up to be exactly what I hoped it would be: A small, elegant outdoor ceremony with our immediate family. Less than twenty people total. Ceremony, pictures, cocktails, dinner, spend the night, Advil, brunch, pool. I finally met with a florist last week—it took me a while to decide which one would be the most likely to just make all of my decisions for me, but based on the overwhelmingly high percentage of her brilliant ideas to the very few vague thoughts I mumbled into my shirtsleeve, I think I chose well. Essentially I shook my head no at some stuff and then nodded my head yes to some other stuff; it’s through this “colder / warmer” method of wedding planning that I really seem to shine.

The best part is that there isn’t any pressure. I’m not trying to micromanage a huge social event, I’m planning one gorgeous, special day to celebrate with the people we love the most. And the fact that Randy and I are going to be husband and wife when it’s over makes literally everything else icing on the proverbial cake.

Note to self: Get a cake. 
¶ posted by Erin on Monday, February 16, 2009

  Phoenix Comicon!

Rabies shots hurt. Somebody write it down.

It's actually not that bad-- the first dose is the worst just because of the sheer quantity of shit they have to jam into your body with a syringe. The doctor kept having to move to different parts of my body to pump in more of this crap. So now my ass and both shoulders are sore and lumpy with immuno-goblins***. The next four doses aren't that bad-- a single small injection apiece. At least that's what they say; watch, it'll be a giant 40cc syringe directly into my eyeball or something.

The Phoenix Comicon is this weekend and Stacey and I are sharing an artist's table to sell sock zombies and amazing puppets. It's going to be three-and-a-half days of killer times and if you live in the area you should definitely come out with your brightest pink wig and your tallest paper mache hammer and say hi. Mia and Ryan are driving out for it and they're staying here! With me! Of course they didn't know I had rabies when they accepted the invite so it's possible they're second-guessing, I don't know. It's cool, guys, if I get out of line Randy will just strap me into my cone.

My Etsy shop is going to be closed through the Con and possibly beyond, depending on sales; if I do as well as I hope I won't have any inventory for a while. So if you've been meaning to welcome a Sock Zombie into your life, now might be the time.

***immunoglobulin 
¶ posted by Erin on Wednesday, January 21, 2009