My Day Starting With Last Night And Ending Right Now, Which Is Technically Not "One Day" But Then I Never Said It Was, Did I? DID I???
or
If You're Going To Burn The Crap Out Of Yourself, You Need To Make Sure That You Burn The Three Main Fingers On The Hand You Eat, Write, Type, Wash Your Face, Put Your Hair Up, Close The Dishwasher, Scratch The Dog, Shift Gears With. Because Otherwise Where's The Fun?
or
Prepare Yourselves: This Is The Absolute Most Incoherent Blog Entry Ever Written. Follow The Twisty, Twisty Path.
I want to preface this story by telling you a little something about my mom. She has the pain tolerance of a goddamned shoeless Inca warrior. Or one of those women that you hear about in some urban legend third-world shithole who picks beans until her labor contractions are regular then strides off behind a tree to squat and push and grunt her baby out so she can chew through the cord, sling the baby on her back and go back to picking beans. My mom would totally have done that if it had been an option in Atlanta in 1975 and 1978. As it was she was in an army hospital, which she will argue is actually
worse because at least if you're out behind a tree somewhere no one can cuff your wrists and ankles to the bedframe. She had no pain medication
at all with either me or my brother, unless you include biting down on a leather strap, which I personally don't. For the record she
will tell you that she was fairly certain that she was going to die both times, but she says this matter-of-factly, like while she's cleaning her sunglasses on her shirt or balancing the checkbook or something. So when she pulled a Pyrex casserole dish full of molten hot baked beans out of the oven years ago and tried to pry the sugary, syrupy, beany lid off with a knife and her thumb slipped and went INTO THE LAVA BEAN GLUE, she screamed and cried and swore for about three minutes and then just shut up and found the bandaids. The blisters came up underneath her thumbnail and pushed it off. She'd pop blisters while we watched TV at night. Then we'd have ice cream.
See, now I've completely forgotten why I brought this up. I think I was going to tie my mom's apparent lack of nerve endings to my own burn experience last night and how I handled it completely differently (ran screaming to the doctor, sucked down the codeine and sucked up the attention). But the pain medication is making me care less and less about clean segues, so now I'll just tell you that
I burned
my hand last night steaming broccoli and it hurt like a son of a bitch. And when I got up this morning and saw that my first three fingers were nail to knuckle blisters, I thought I should probably go to the doctor. It's a good thing my mom is out of town because if she knew that I had gone to the doctor and not let her pop the blisters like human plastic bubble wrap she'd be mad as hell. As it was I was sort of hesitant to go anyway... having been brought up in a house where I had to be bleeding from the eyes to stay home from school, the doctor's office has always been something of a guilty pleasure. I've let strep throat go too long and had it move into my eyes. I broke my arm in highschool on a Thursday and went to the hospital on Monday.
SO I WENT TO THE DOCTOR. Jesus. And I was pretty cool up until then; I could drive and button my pants and shit. But then when the pretty nurses saw my fingers and started cooing and coddling I sort of fell in with it. I let myself be talked into a long soak and multiple future appointments with other doctors complete with a "follow up" tomorrow, free bandaging material and some creams, and when the nurse looked at me with her big brown eyes and asked, "Does it hurt much?" I said, "Oh yes. It's unbearable." And she clucked and cooed and then gave me a virtual lifetime supply of codeine and I bet you guys NEVER WOULD HAVE GUESSED.
Here you go. You can see that Samuel the Pinkie is pretty happy that he wasn't around at the time of the incident. Unfortunately for Carlton Finger, Sedgwick Finger and Meriwether Finger, the rest of the Finger Squad was what we in Codeine Town like to call "fully involved".
Housekeeping, No Toilets. Or Anything Dirty.
1) Man, I need to apologize to
Erika. She was the very first person to send me a Jake valentine, and I managed to erase it somehow. Which sucks, because I remember that when I opened it I was really tickled and laughed out loud which prompted R's "What?" which prompted my requisite "Nothing."
Erika does teeth like
I do teeth: retarded. Awesome. I think what I like most about this one is the subtle dichotomy: your eye is so busy celebrating the adorable floating hearts and the hearts in The Jake's eyes and the fact that his ears are barely attached and one of his paws looks like a biscuit that you
almost miss the blood spatter on paw number big. *shiver* Creepy. I spent an inordinate amount of time determining the anatomy of the chicken parts... check out the legs. There easy to find because they're the only things identifiable that isn't a head. Hey, and there are even two of them. A+ for accuracy. Sort of. I love you Erika, and I'm sorry that I'm so fundamentally unorganized that I even lose shit on my computer.
2) I was taking a bath tonight and when I went to rinse my hair-- which in the tub consists of that "total head submerge" move that always leaves my hair suspiciously "not rinsed" feeling, probably because I have to physically scoot about fourteen tons of bubbles out of my hair path and they never
stay away-- and The Jake, who was until now content to continuously lick the drippy faucet, became concerned that maybe I had fallen into some bubbly sixth dimension so he decided that the best move would be to JUMP ON TOP OF MY SUBMERGED HEAD. Should I: a) be touched that I have a pet who is so concerened with my welfare that he'll throw himself into the sixth dimension to save me? or b) go to the emergency room and get some stitches IN MY FACE?
3) I've got to give a shout out to Jeremy at
Queequeg Films: I found his blog randomly on Blogger's "recently updated" list, and when I left him a comment he came here and left me one of the nicest comments I've ever gotten. I can't remember the link to his blog, but I've been checking out the Queequeg film site that he left behind, and OH MY GOD. If he needs cash I'll totally back him; anyone who does a horror film about plastic bags has my full and undivided attention. Jeremy, come back and leave your blog link.
The Jake Loves The Chicken Insides.
The thing about The Jake that I keep forgetting is that he's a dog. It doesn't really matter how much I talk to him or how many physics textbooks I leave in his crate... he's still an animal. It's therefore perfectly normal that, upon discovering a pulpy piecemeal chicken in the neighbor's yard, he would not immediately grab a plastic trash bag and a rake.
The Jake
loved his dead chicken parts, both the inside parts and the outside parts. I was just as likely to see him prancing through the yard shaking a chicken leg around as I was to spy him hunkered under the trampoline lovingly licking some spleen. Yes, this love affair vacillated from the flirtatious to the profoundly moving to the tragic "wait, where's the rest of my chicken?" on trash day. Allow me to sort of illustrate:
We all know The Jake.
Can we agree for the purposes of this reminisce that this stuffed fish (dubbed "Farto" by an ex-boyfriend who is now, no doubt, a captain of fucking industry) is our chicken? If we can't, then I'm sorry. I guess I should have killed another chicken for you, Mr. Unable To Imagine That Stuffed Toys Are Mangled, Bloody Animals. Hold on, there's a cute fuzzy little baby chicken cooing outside... I'll go bludgeon her and snap some pictures of the carnage.
Okay. Jake meets The Chicken.
The mutual attraction is palpable. If there has ever been a relationship worthy of Microsoft Paint, this is it.
Kathryn hit the proverbial dream nail on the dream head, here. The Jake dreams about his chicken all the time (how do I know, you ask? I read his journal.) and when he gets to the part where he gets to snap that wishbone, he always wishes for a second chicken head. P.S. Bonus points for giving Jake a tail. Bonus bonus points for making it stabby. Wait, hold the phone: Kathryn, did you sign Jake's ass??? I think you signed Jake's ass. I couldn't make a capital "E" in Microsoft Paint, let alone sign an ass. You might be a Paint ringer. I'll make no Paint bets with you.
Oh my god, Lori, Jake totally smokes! I am so in love with this, partly because it's soft porn (and who doesn't love soft porn), and partly because it could never happen. No, seriously. Let me explain: First of all, if the chicken had been sipping a glass of merlot as we're led here to believe, there would be wine all over the pillowcase. It's an "esophagal containment" issue. Plus, Jake would never have allowed the chicken's legs to stay all connected like that. He doesn't have that kind of self-control. Lori, what does "K S" stand for?? I'm dying! And how did you know that I only have one lamp in my bedroom? And that it's really ugly? You're good, my friend. Very good.
Jesus, Scott, this is kind of scaring me. Not the dead oozing chicken parts or the blood affirmation, but that it's so fucking accurate. I mean, that leg? That IS "the leg". And the "x" for the eye? Yeah, Jake ate the eye first thing. Nice job on the multi-textured blood... some airbrush, some paintbrush... very realistic. And while The Jake didn't grab anything in his fist I know that if he had, he would have done it just like that. Only with less knuckles.
First of all Michelle I need to apologize for all the little black dots on your valentine; I had to resave it as a GIF because it was THE BIGGEST FILE IN THE WHOLE UNIVERSE and wouldn't upload otherwise, and for some reason we got all of these dots. I think it works though, because... flies. Nice job on finding a picture of an actual Aussie... it's too bad that Jake is the most fucked up looking specimen of the breed ever. The AKC people mandate that proper Aussies shouldn't have more than 10% "white space"; any more and the chances of blindness and deafness and legs falling off and general unattractiveness get exponentially better. Jake is about half white. Give or take. Maybe a little more. So thanks for reminding me that I need to get his vision, hearing and legs checked. A+ for no chicken eye... like your husband you recognize the chicken priority delicacies when you see them.
This is the Mystery Valentine, made all the more creepy because my dog (or something that looks remotely like my dog) isn't in it. Which is, frankly, the number one reason why I dig it. That, plus the fact that it's actually large enough to jack my entire template. Rock. Let's look at the positives:
1) Those talons! Are chicken feet generally referred to as "talons"? No matter. These are. Dig those nails. Damn.
2) Yoga Cat. Self-explanatory.
3) Stars.
Remind me sometime to tell you the story about when we pulled the cover off the ski boat one spring and found three kittens living inside the cabin and then took the boat to the lake twice and skied and then had the boat serviced and they pulled two more kittens out of the hull. Because that's a good story.
(DISCLAIMER: All the kittens were alive. But two were wetter than three. They all went to good, adoring homes where they can run and romp and ski and wakeboard to their tiny little damp hearts' content.)
Hannah, I like yours because I'm still trying to figure it out. If I had asked Picasso to do a Jake valentine, he would have said no. But if I had gotten him drunk first and then maybe had sex with him and afterward he had doodled a little one-handed something in lipliner on a coaster just to get me to shut the fuck up already, I bet it would have looked like this. And I've never seen a better beak in my whole life. I keep expecting it to say something wry.
Kim, there are a plethora of things I can say about this, but I have to go with the obvious first: are those testicles or boobies hanging from the chicken's neck? DRIVING. ME. CRAZY. I also like how the dog is so obviously transfixed by The Power Of The Chicken. If the chicken were alive it would be crazy not to get a restraining order. And Jake did ask me to cook the legs for him. I refused.
Joy, what can I say? The airbrush blood spots on what might be the World's Cutest Microsoft Paint Chicken is KILLING ME. Hey, you did this whole spread in airbrush, didn't you? You officially win the Airbrush Award... I should make you a tee shirt with some palm trees and the ocean on it with a big hot pink Joy across it. Or a license plate! Something.
Chris opted for the "rotating shadow puppet approach", which is fresh. And conveniently lacking in gore. The little rotating dog reminds me of a Clean Up After Your Dog sign I saw in Amsterdam, except that this dog silhouette isn't taking a shit. And I'm not high. Hey, what's that thing after the dog? A tumbleweed? Is it feathery dog throw up? I need answers. Can you teach me how to make a decapitated shadow chicken, Chris? I sure hope so. I'm tired of cheating.
I love you guys. Thanks for participating. Joy, your license plate is in the mail.
I'm home.
Someone took a picture of me with my arm around R and my ass hanging out of my shorts in a "yeah, it's been like that all night" kind of way.
My crack den carpets got cleaned while I was gone... imagine the spoiled luxury of coming home to clean, dry, crunchy carpet that you don't even have to tiptoe around until it dries and stops smelling like wet dog and throw up. I feel like one of those billionaires who calls ahead from the plane to have the Tahoe house stocked with peel and eat shrimp and the jacuzzi turned up to eight.
I'm going to go pee (not on the carpet) and shake sand out of my clothes and I'll be back.
Mmmmm. With olives.
Hey, am I overdoing the "p align=center"? Because I feel like I might be. But I'm not sure I can stop. It's like when you start accenting your handwriting with cute little dots in all the letters and you start out putting like three dots on an "S" and two dots on an "L" and then by the time you finish you've got thirteen dots on an "E" and someone has to come in and organize an intervention and take your markers away and shit. Supervise your poster making for a while. Just to make sure your shit is cool. Yeah. That's kind of where I am.
And Dayment? I sent R into the grocery store to buy you some vanilla, and when he came out he had the biggest bottle of $2.00 imitation vanilla I've ever seen.
Sorry.
Oh, and it leaks.
Sorry again.
See you guys on Friday.
R finally broke down and bought a new cell phone today. Betsy the Eighteen Pound Giant Plastic
Star Tac finally gave up the analogue ghost after being dropped onto concrete twice a day and run over by the car more than five times. This has been traumatic for R; he uses his cell phone an average of seven hours a day. He was the very first person in America to spring for the 1987 toaster-sized phone with the four pound battery and the $2.99 a minute charge. He understandably has an unlimited calling plan... a business decision that resulted in two guys getting fired from Verizon. R's ear is physically hot to the touch when he gets home. BOTH ears. He uses his cell when he's sitting on the couch next to the landline, just because it "feels right". He coiled up the old charge cord a minute ago and set it gently in the pantry while bitching about the "pansy cradle" that the new phone comes with.
I only mention this because C is over and we've been trying to help R understand why the new phone has a screen and keys with numbers on them and an antenna and volume control. He has like nine hundred polyphonic bullshit ringtones, like "When the Saints Come Marching In" and "Stars and Stripes Forever". It's really fucking him up. He doesn't understand why the phone won't make that jacked up original "dodo
dodo--dodo
dodo" noise that the old phone made:
R:"Doesn't it just have a ring like a
normal phone?!?!?"
(C, fools with phone, phone emits perfectly harmonious replica of actual telephone ringing.)
R: "NO! God, a
phone! A
PHONE ringing!"
It's pretty fucking funny. In an extremely disturbing, postmodern "apocalypse now" kind of way, but, you know, what isn't?
I Think The Chronic Wholesale Remodel Guy Across The Street Has Officially Sawed Through The Internet Cable And Has Furtively Taped It Together So That We, The Long Suffering Neighbors, Won't Have ONE MORE THING To Add To The List Of Reasons We're Never Going To Accept Him.
or
Soon To the Chicken Love. Picture Uploading Is Time Consuming.
1) Yeah. I haven't had internet access all day. And the guy across the street better be planning thirty-six separate swimming pools to justify all the holes in his yard. Fucker. He's like a human gopher. Only with giant rental digging tools. (They won't rent to gophers. They're always late on the return.)
2) My hair is still up in it's frantically sticky updo. I'm officially in awe of the Power of the Updo. I went running today as an Updo Stamina Test... not so much as a wisp break or a part shift. I bent over today to get clothes out of the dryer and a spare tire fell out of my hair. I'm thinking I have to wash it tonight, though. It's one thing to not wash your hair multiple days when you can elude people into thinking you're fundamentally clean by wearing different gritty styles. With the twisted, beaded, tucked and smoothed curl nest I'm currently sporting, I'm not fooling anyone. I wake up fancy. I go to the gym fancy. I take a bath fancy. I'm fancy all the time. I'm in my sweaty gym clothes as we speak... no makeup, smelly... FANCY. I only wish I had a tiara.
3) I was rereading that last point when I realized that I'd been scratching my head for too long to pinpoint. I have to trench-dig UNDER my hair from the "flanks", if you will, because I can't feel my head through the plastered hair. I'm showering. Now.
Well, Big Party #1 went fabulously. I wore one of the indomitable Sassy's gauzy, beaded homecoming dresses and almost tripped myself with EACH AND EVERY STEP. But I felt like a princess (albeit a clumsy, non-balancing one) nonetheless. I talked my obligatory bar-side shit about The Mayor... until he looked at me in the eye and sent me Earnest Street Politician Hypno-Vibes. Then I took him a vodka gimlet and offered to pick up freeway trash. I explained to three different oglers that my bodyguard-sized diamond earrings were $6 at Target. I took my sequined stilettos off around midnight and ceremoniously pitched them in the trash, no doubt a gesture that to onlookers seemed cavalier and spoiled; little do
they know that those goddamned shoes were $30.00 four years ago and were on their "one more chance" legs. A woman with tupperware-bowl fake breasts bought a mini-schnauzer for $1900 at live auction, then vomited all over her black silk dress and passed out in a folding chair. Two men carried her to a cab, another man set the dog kennel on the passenger side. All remaining women found themselves momentarily physically ill imagining the fate of that teensy, big-eyed fuzzball until it was discovered that some brave pink taffeta commando had snatched that kennel back before the cabbie left. We skipped the afterparty and opted instead for Jack in the Box monster tacos. And now a full day later my hair is still securely and perfectly stapled back; it feels like some kind of extremely flammable pillow stuffing. Occasionally a bobby pin works its way to the surface for air but I've managed so far to fight them all back, gasping and wheezing.
Big Party #2 went better than even wildly expected. C cleared more than two grand; the police-- while unable to break the party up as no one complained-- were forced to officially direct traffic at the intersection into my house. R and I ate our tacos while driving around the neighborhood checking for damage. There were crushed red Solo cups every half mile for a three mile perimeter.
And the port-o-potty's full. I couldn't be more proud.
Stay tuned for "Jake Loves The Chicken Insides".
These paint pictures are fabulous. Go ahead and keep sending them if you haven't... I'll post them tomorrow before The Big Party.
Ooooh. The Big Party. Technically it's The Big Part
ies. Here's why:
Big Party #1: Giant city-wide formal affair. Think charity excuse to get dolled up and talk shit about the mayor. (In case that last sentence seems a trifle haughty, I'd like to throw in that I don't actually
know who my mayor
is. I also talk shit about the alderman and the councilman and the marshall and a lot of other people who, quite frankly, I think only ever existed on
Good Times. But a good shit talk is a good shit talk, especially when I'm holding a martini in an eighty-pound beaded gown, even if the martini is in a Solo cup and the gown is just Sassy's homecoming dress from two years ago.) This is an event that R's non-profit group puts on so my attendance is mandatory. My participation is
also mandatory; last year I offered up my services as a blackjack dealer. Here's how that went. In the crunchiest of digressing crunchy nutshells:
a) If you're under the assumption that because you're enough of a fucking genius to count your OWN cards in your HEAD while you're
playing blackjack, do not assume that you can therefore count EVERYONE'S cards in your head. I couldn't do it. At all. I did the accounting for a retail store pulling in half a million dollars DAILY for FIVE YEARS and it took me twenty seconds to add four and one and one and six and five. I now think all blackjack dealers are
Rainman savants. I gave up about halfway through the night, wiped the concentration drool off my chin and decided that if I couldn't add it up in three seconds then that person wins. Even better, I'll not bother counting at all, I'll just keep hitting myself until I bust. And everybody wins. As long as everybody wins, maybe people will forgive that I'm evidently retarded and not laugh about me to all of their friends and then inadvertently get me locked up in some special center somewhere.
b) Even when you're playing for charity, and no one's even actually MAKING any MONEY, there's still going to be that one dick who wants the fucking pit boss to come over when you don't hit a soft sixteen. Or hard five. Something. EVERYBODY WINS, you big narc. Shut the fuck up.
c) Ask me how many times I forgot to deal myself in. IT DOESN'T MATTER. EVERYBODY WINS.
So this year I'm volunteering to look hot and mingle. Fuck you guys and your genius mathematical standards.
Big Party #2: C is having a huge party like the parties of yore only with more beer, better wristbands and a stripper pole. There's a port-o-potty sitting in my back yard
as we speak, just choking at the bit to get filled up with seventeen-year-old vomit. I don't imagine it will be disappointed. I may have to drive back and forth between parties; the stripper pole
alone is worth the hassle. I'll keep you posted.
Man, I've been so
swamped this week! And I'm doing NOTHING! I seriously can't figure it out. I don't have time to eat lunch and yet the only thing I can think of to blog about is the dead chicken that The Jake stumbled upon and fell hopelessly in love with. If "in love with" means that the chicken is in like fourteen pieces and Jake has lovingly shaken and licked every bone and every feather. Which of course it
does. So because the Chicken Love Affair is sadly paramount in my life, does anyone want to Microsoft Paint some The Jake and Dead Chicken valentines? I think you should. That would be awesome. If you
send them to me by noon* tomorrow I'll post them and link them to you.
* In accordance with my outraged ban on time zones, anything from "around ten" to "threeish" counts as noon.
And I'm doing stuff this weekend that doesn't involve dogs, chickens, rice cereal or the bench press. I'll take detailed notes.
How Could The Need Deceive Us Into Thinking Things Might Change?
or
"I'll Take 'Completely Random Song Lyrics' For A Thousand, Alex."
1) This whole babysitting thing is working out nicely for all involved. Allow me to break it down:
a) Her parents seriously can't believe that a 28-year-old unemployed masters candidate who was a full-time nanny for three years is willing to watch their infant twenty-five hours a week in exchange for-- get this-- gym time. From the present vibe I think it's 96% "include me in prayers" grateful and 4% "911 on speed dial, maybe we should have someone watch the house" cautious. I've given the baby back every time though, so that 4% should be falling.
b) R thinks it's the best thing ever to have a baby around. He adores babies. Plus he thinks that the more I'm
around the baby, the less I'll pester him about
having one. Pretty sound logic if you ask me. I can't think of anything that could dissuade me from wanting a baby as much as HAVING THE CUTEST BABY ON THE
PLANET hugging me and cooing at me five hours a day. Yeah. I can already feel my maternal instinct draining away; nice work, R. Moron.
c) The Jake is enthralled. I was afraid that he might treat her like another puppy, jumping and nipping and barking. And I think he
does think she's a puppy but, like, a handicapped one. He smells her so hard he inhales her clothes. There is much licking from both parties. She has a giant lab at home who she plays with, so her reaction to The Jake is screaming laughter, flank beating and chasing. This morning she was scooting along the floor and Jake, being a herding dog, wouldn't stop nudging her back. At one point he nipped her sock and tried to pull her. The Jake has a tiny, sticky, giggly job.
d) Oh my god. This is the snuggliest, cutest, smiliest, happiest child I've ever met in my life. If she's not amusing herself by playing with her toys she's singing along with the television, and if she's not singing along with the television she's hugging me. She's perfect. Oh, and I'm getting my ASS KICKED every fucking day by her maniacal dad. I think he shows his gratitude with extra squats. I show my gratitude for HIS gratitude with less cardio.
2) I'm THIS CLOSE to eating a Gerber Arrowroot cookie. Just to see if I could eat it without half of it turning into paste. I'm actually pretty sure I can't. Nevermind.
3) So I got a message from a college friend today asking me to call her around 9:00 EST. You know what? Fuck time zones. Seriously. Like I have time to figure out where you are, and how many hours ahead or behind that is... I'm in Phoenix, man; our shit doesn't change. Steady Eddie, baby-- the only thing saving us Arizonans from complete senility is that we don't have to deal with more fucking
daylight. To me, "9:00 EST" pretty much means "between 6 and 12". I called the Compaq support line yesterday and got some recording about hours of operation; I spent ten minutes doing that "If it's five o'clock
here, then..." thing before I gouged my fucking eye out. JUST TELL ME WHAT TIME
I NEED TO DO SOMETHING. I DON'T
CARE WHAT TIME IT IS WHERE YOU LIVE.
Hey, and that friend lives in fucking
Iowa. That's not Eastern Standard Time. What the fuck's
wrong with her? If I have to bust out with my Texas Instruments high school calculator and fucking solve for cosine to figure out when you want me to motherfucking
call, your ass is going to be sitting by the phone for a while. Like,
through your wedding. P.S. Don't count on me as a bridesmaid.
4) My parents could be the last people in the western world who have yet to take the daunting DVD player plunge. This isn't particularly surprising; they've always seemed to find new technology legitimately daunting... plus you've got to add in that "pioneer hardiness pride" they feel every time they heat up a Hot Pocket in the oven or wash dishes by hand. I bought my dad a telescope for Christmas the year I turned eighteen. I took out a $500 signature loan from my credit union to do it. I remember being so proud and excited when he unwrapped it; he exclaimed appropriately and we assembled it and carried it into the yard... where I looked through it gleefully and he sort of worried around with his hands in his pockets, no doubt mumbling about how much you can see if you squint through a rolled up newspaper.
My point, you ask? TBS is showing "Contact" this weekend. My parents think it would be GRAND if I could come over and watch it with them. Now how long do you think it's going to take TBS to show "Contact"? Thirty hours? Thirty-three? What if it's one of those "Dinner and a Movie" gigs... they'd have to spit-roast a fucking buffalo. OVER A LIGHTER. Oh well, we'll probably miss part of it, anyway. It starts at 2:00 EST.
I'm proud to report that I'm officially stuck on Mister Crunchy's Reverse Survivor
Island Of Doom, Complete With Moltenriffic Volcano Action. It's only a matter of time before someone gets pushed in. From behind. With a snicker.
More later.
Some Problems Associated With My Having Told My Personal Trainer That I Would Watch His Nine Month Old Baby From 8 To Noon Monday Through Friday In Exchange For Daily Personal Training Sessions:
1) I don't really want to.
2) The Jake thinks that she's another puppy, but a puppy made completely out of sugar and liver. He would lick her until she dissolved.
3) The Baby thinks that The Jake is another baby, but a baby with black and white fur covering his entire body. She would lick him until he dissoved.
4) Who the fuck wants to work out every day? Jesus.* Plus, I told him today that the annual lake trip is coming up and that I want TO
WIN. I assumed that as a personal trainer with approximately .007 percent body fat he would know that I was referring to the completely superficial. He didn't. This concerns me.
*Please note that my use of "Jesus" above is not intended as an answer to the preceeding rhetorical question. (ie: "Who the fuck wants to work out every day?" "Uh, I think Jesus works out like
almost every day.") If you're ever in doubt as to whether or not I'm actually
referring to someone I've named who belongs to the Holy Trinity, try to remember that I'M NOT.
It's seven in the morning. R is at the gym. I've decided that I
HAVE TO HAVE an asiago cheese bagel with fat-free cream cheese and tomatoes. Toasted. R has left his phone in the car specifically to the lessen the likelihood of having to stop at the bagel place, the coffee place or the croissant guy. Should I:
a) Call his cell phone "Clapton concert tickets redial style" until he either randomly answers or sees that I've called him 219 times and calls me back to find out which hospital one of his children has no doubt been emergency admitted into?
b) Put shoes on, drive to the gym and leave a pleading bagel note on his car?
c) Just stab myself in the face with this letter opener?
A few nights ago
Amy challenged me to prove that I do, in fact, reside in Arizona. The geographical gauntlet was thrown down. On AIM. Which, if you ask me, is the best way to throw down a gauntlet. Particularly a geographical one. So I sent her a picture of a giant stack of firewood and a picture of a sleepy horse and a picture of my dog. All three of those things SCREAM "I obviously live in the desert", but whatever. Not good enough. So today when R and I decided to drive up to Paradise Valley for what promised to be the high-end estate sale to end all high-end estate sales, I brought my camera. Pay attention as I pick up the gauntlet, dust it off, claim I haven't seen it but then sell it on eBay.
So this is the amazing house full of amazing stuff up for auction. A 6 million dollar home for the bargain price of 3 million. You'll notice here that this lushness and greenness looks suspiciously like southern California, and in so noticing you'll have stumbled onto the entire point of Paradise Valley-- to look like southern California AT ANY COST. We walk up the Carmel driveway and around to the Monterey garage where the brand new "his and hers" Harleys, the four jet skis, the "his and hers" Hummers and the Mastercraft sit. I didn't take a picture because I was too busy asking other wide-eyed browsers what the hell happened to this guy. "Was it good?" "Was it IRS?" "SEC?" "Ooooh, Mafia?" The guy working the food booth said that he had heard tax evasion. I'm going to pretend it was the Czech Mafia. The
Ninja Czech Mafia.
We weren't in the market for purple motorcycles so we meandered inside. Most of this guy's personal belongings had already been shoveled out but these trophies were still on display. I bet there were fifty of these, and they were
all for
power lifting. Jesus. I would have thought a career power lifter could have taken care of a couple of pussy Czech ninjas. I'm a little disappointed, frankly.
You'll notice here that these are original Picasso pieces. They were part of the auction. Pieces that are worth tens of thousands of dollars sold for five or six grand. The auction guys all but tossed the framed works at the buyers. My "A" caliber taste cried out in redfaced rage while my "D-" checkbook picked its teeth with a bad credit card. A travesty for the owner, you ask? A shame? A heartbreak? Maybe, maybe not.
Because this fucking monstrosity was in the house, too; leering at everyone, silently threatening all of the happy little bronze children...
BUT IT WASN'T FOR SALE.
Just in case the ramifications of this aren't clear, let me further illustrate:
Original Chagall = MAKE ME AN OFFER...
Scary eagles ripping apart a freakishly thrashing bronze trout = NO, I WANT TO
KEEP THIS.
Yeah. We were forced to leave when the auctioneer accidentally dropped a bucking bronze stallion on an original Dali and shattered the glass. I hope the ninjas don't have any incredibly valuable art lying around their Czech Mafia dungeon; the power lifter chained to the wall MIGHT NOT GIVE A SHIT.
Oh. Here are some cacti. I'll take a picture of a patio chair and basketball later and really
seal this gauntlet deal.
I was on the phone with
Dayment and I was telling her about the huge monsoon blowing in from the east, but while I was talking I took this picture of the west.
I'll have to go hiking soon and take pictures of cactus and sand and... hot ass rocks to prove that I do, in fact, live in Arizona.
