Month: December 2005 (Page 1 of 4)

Two days ago, I made sure I stayed home between 2 & 5 pm, to meet the cable guy. With the HD TV and the HD cable box, all the regular channels look like they are being filmed off a TV in Alaska, during the middle of a snowstorm. Maybe that’s an exaggeration, but still, the clarity on the regular channels suck. First Tech Dude determines there is a problem with the signal on the main line. Little pinholes let water in, the line goes to hell, or a rogue gang of squirrels has chewed it up. Second Tech Dude will come tomorrow. I stay home. STD (god, isn’t this indicative of how things are going) shows up and says FTD (where the fuck are my flowers?) should have installed an amplifier (for my rock band) because the signal at the house is just fine (15) but at the cable box, not so good. (-5). We are losing 20, and the amplifier should fix it. Someone will come out tomorrow (meaning today) between 2 & 5. So I bust my lovely lady lumps to Target first thing in the morning, score an amazing deal on some holiday dinnerware & charger plates (75% off! $15 for 8 plates & 8 chargers!), get back home and there’s a blinking light. A message. From Third Tech Dude, who was told to install an amplifier on the OUTSIDE of the house, and he cheerfully tells me I don’t need one, cuz the signal’s 15.

This is when I go blind. I call up Time Warner and explain how I was told this afternoon, how I have had to accommodate two techs already, and someone is coming back to my house TODAY. She puts me on hold, and then disconnects me.
Did you know I can leave the earth like a rocket ship? Even if I’m already blinded. I shot through the ceiling, through the roof, went to the sun and it hid behind a cloud out of fear. You think the SUN gets hot? Sweet cheeks, was I pissed. I call back, and go through their punchity-punch-punch punch mother humping menu at lightening speed and get an new CSR (Cretin-Suck-ass Representative). She puts me on hold for the lifetime of a fucking cicada, and then comes back on to tell me this has to go to a supervisor level and he will call me back. I levitate off the ground, but stay within cell phone range. I explain I will wait. She cannot put me on hold for him. I express my need that he call be back before noon. Oh, did I mention JWo had the misfortune to call in the midst of this? I don’t think I needed a phone to tell him what was going on, he could have just rolled down his truck window and listened like the RCA dog.

Anyway, then I sulk and stew and steam and spew and scrunch up my face in irritation for two hours. Noon comes and goes. At 1:00, I call back. Now, I’m using my very calm, very angry voice. Everything I touch, crackles as it freezes immediately and shatters. I explain this is my third call, and we are heading towards a fourth day I have spent on my vacation accommodating their technicians. She puts me on hold. For 20 minutes. I concentrate on rotating the coconut-sized ball of fire that is sitting in my stomach. I mist it with gasoline, focusing on creating blue arcs of light. Finally, a man comes on the line. Presumably the supervisor. I re-explain everything, the light tinkling of ice shards falling all around me as the air now freezes from my voice. For the first time, I get an apology, instead of an accusation for not being home this morning. Eventually, we have resolution. Not perfect, but they are coming Thursday evening, and he waived the charges. Oh, there’s the white hot arcing again. Charges? STD told me the amplifier was no charge. Oh, no. They’re $45. Plus $15 to plug them in. My eyes are narrowed and irritation sloughs off my skin like dry skin getting loofahed in the shower. Then, the final olive branch: the last two weeks credited to my account. I finally reach contrite, but I know one thing: the charges WILL appear on my bill, and I WILL have to call back to get all my credits applied to my account. But when that time comes? I have this person’s ID number. And a big arcing ball of fire.

My father had his hip replaced yesterday, and is doing well – as well as can be expected, anyway. My understanding is that the physical therapy for recovery is the worst part of the process. He’s an irascible sumbitch, and has forbidden visitors, even sending his wife home last night. I understand it somewhat, because it’s a bitch when you’re not feeling well and everyone comes in and looks at you with this concerned face & you have to expend energy to reassure them (or as he views it, entertain them.) So we’re going to wait until he’s gone through the worst of his recovery before we go and visit, but of course, I wanted to send him something so he’s reminded of how much he’s loved & wished a speedy recovery.

First thought, flowers. I looked online at various arrangements, including plants and gift baskets, and then…. then….. the perfect notion came to me. Betty Jane’s Candy. One quick google search, and I was ecstatic to discover they had a good website. I talked to my stepmother this morning & got all the medical updates, his room number, etc., and then three minutes after they opened, I was on the phone with a sweetheart of a candy store order-taker. There’s something about how the accents change, gradually, as you move north through the Midwest, and I’m from northeastern Iowa, so while we don’t “tube” our O’s (think of the movie “Fargo”) quite as much, when I talk to people from there, I’m just awash in the memory of sounds and speech patterns and as much as I wanted to leave home as a teen, the homesickness surfaces.

I end up telling this woman my life story (well, ok, just the part that relates to Betty Jane’s Candies), of how my dad & I would always stop at the candy store on our way out of town (Dubuque is the closest “big” town, and would be the only place to get certain things). Our candy of choice was chocolate-covered orange peel. Milk and dark, mixed. (Holy crap. Just typing that caused a huge surge of saliva into my mouth. Hi, Pavlov, you rang?) Anyway, Dad would buy about ten pieces, and we’d savor them on the hour-ride back home. It truly was “our” thing, something we shared and was a bond, odd as that may seem. Of course, I tell the Betty Jane Lady all this, too. She was so diplomatic; she just said, “You know, that particular candy, it seems like one of those that you either really really love it, or you want nothing to do with it.” Her way of saying, “Jennifer, I don’t share the crazy love for the orange peel, nor am I telling you where I live.” Anyway, I got him a pound of those, and then, since they deliver in-town for a nominal fee, I also got him a pound of chocolate covered nuts. We’ve never been much on the cream centers, because there’s always that ONE you get that brings the candy-consuming experience to a screeching halt. I couldn’t even tell you what ONE that is, usually for me it’s something artificially fruity, like strawberry (yecccch), and I didn’t want to mess with it.

I have no idea if candy helps the recuperation process more than flowers, but knowing my father, chocolate-covered orange peel will certainly help his spirits, and he will know his only child loves him beyond words, as expressed through the language of chocolate and memories.

Yeah, I am still a little blinky-eyed at yesterday.

5:30 am BAHHN BAHHHN BAHHHN the evil awakening machine summons me from sleep.
7:00 am arrive at office to carpool to airport
8:30 am depart KC in an aluminum sardine can
9:30 am starving, grateful for small chewy granola bar & tomato juice
It was a 2 hr 40 minute flight to Salt Lake City, but they’re an hour behind us. I do not do well with the time-travel-calculation-continuum, and if I’m only staying a day, I’m not bothering to figure it out. Upon arrival, we get our rental car & drive in to the client.
Have meeting with client, while silently praying they do not hear my stomach growling. Finally, go have lunch at 2p their time.
After lunch, collect things, go back to car, go back to airport, and do about 1.5 miles of walking between car dropoff, going to the wrong terminal, getting to the right terminal, getting to our gate which is apparently in the Provo zip code. Say aloud, “I am having a drink when I get home!”
4:20 pm (SLC time) Boss buys us a drink.
5:00 pm (SLC time) board identical sardine can
8:15 pm (KC time) touch down, am grateful to have lived, because I had a dramatic (false) preomonition last week that I was going to DIE on this flight. Appreciate the fact that coming home, the same flight is only 1 hr, 50 minutes. God bless the wind.
9:00 pm arrive back at agency to get car, drive home
10:00 pm eat leftover thai food for dinner
11:00 pm COLLAPSE

I did have interesting seatmates, and they were both perfect in that they were inclined to chat & talk during preparation for takeoff & then landing, but not the 2 hours in between, so I could read my book and they could listen to music/work. My boss recounted a seatmate he’d had long ago, who had asked about the book he was reading. And then after my boss had read two pages, the guy said, “So! What’s happening now?” Hi, I am going to stab you with my watch and shove you in the trash bag when the flight attendant comes by again.

So today, I feel pretty wiped out, and am so glad I took today & tomorrow off! My cold is almost gone, and I’m going to (hopefully) get some of my projects done this weekend that I’ve been meaning to get to for some time. I know I’ll be watching some movies & knitting – which for me, is an excellent way to ring in the new year. Yes, I’ve gotten old. er. older. Maybe even wiser!

I am steeling myself for the next couple of days…. Today will be a major work day, with tons to get done & reassurances made. Tomorrow, I head to the land of Beth and Dooce, because nothing says “long day” like a day trip to Salt Lake City! And yes, I am that fat woman you have to sit by on the plane. Sorry.

I lay in bed last night, my mind racing. I wrote about six blogs in my head (all of them? Brilliant!), and made mental lists of everything I need to do in the next couple of days. Tomorrow, for instance is Unlimited Trash Day in Kansas City. This is huge! I must find & amass all the trash in the house to take advantage of this one-day opportunity! Plus, there’s laundry! Prepare for cleaning lady! The lists, they go on and on.

One of my mental blogs was a half-hearted wish for some gigantic machine that dispensed energy (daytime) and sleeping (nighttime) pills, based on the list of needs you gave it. Average workdays – average energy, perhaps you didn’t even need a pill. Today? I need one that crams 12 hours of work into 6, gives me plenty of zip & zing, and then the ability to chase it with a pill that gives me a rested night sleep in under 5 hours. So I can get up & travel (pill please, one that shrinks my butt), present to the client, and then travel back home again (inflate butt upon landing, you know, for extra safety), to drive home & collapse. I’m betting I won’t need a pill for sleeping on Wednesday night…..

I’m hoping yesterday was the worst of my cold. It felt like someone had packed my sinuses with sand – pretty! I started the morning with a last-minute dash to Target, to pick up a few more gifts for our nieces, and then we were off to Arrowhead, where we watched the Chiefs resoundingly stomp the Chargers, though it’s a magical mathematical formula that must happen if we’re going to get into the playoffs. After the game, we were off to James’ mom’s house, where we watched the girls open their gifts, played cards & hung out until around 8:30. By then, I felt like I’d been dipped in tempura batter & tossed in the fry daddy – I was DONE with the day. :)

I had long-ago declared today as a Day of Sleep. I don’t know if that’s really going to happen, but it was nice not to be awakened by an alarm for the first time in a long time. It’s also an Official Day of Laundry – yippee! I can find many, many things to celebrate, given enough time & cold medicine. For all of you (who are even on the computer – I think this is a “slow week” in Blogland), I wish a merry happy day, may your burdens be lifted & may you find joy & happiness in the moment as we have time together & the hustle & bustle pauses – if only for a day.

I’m off to celebrate a Box of Kleenex.

So yes, the big tv came into the home, along with a new surround system, the primary purpose for which was to stymie and madden me to the point I would become weak and a cold bug would sneak in. But nevermind that, it was an anticipated and planned purchase. Apparently, the microwave had some Grecian tragedy love affair with the old television, because on Sunday, we came home from James’ family’s Christmas, he tried to reheat some thai food, and KERPOW, the microwave was. no. more. Deader’n a Monty Python parrot.

We knew it was on the decline, as it would groan and struggle sometimes to heat things. It gave a last hurrah on some gravy a couple weeks ago, as I warned my friend Shelley, it might take a while because it’s starting to die. Apparently the microwave heard me, because in less than a minute, the gravy was molten nuclear sludge, and the container was almost warped in half. Sorry! In any event, it did finally bite the dust, and since it had lasted 13 years, we nodded solemnly & went off the next night and bought a new one.

Now? Apparently the cordless phone carried some Shakespearean torch for the microwave & is preparing for its own swan song death. I knew it was also on the decline, because a month or so ago, it became very difficult to press the number “3” on the keypad. Since we don’t use the home phone that much, it was only inconvenient when we’d call across the state line…. the prefix there being 91 :press press press BEEP: 3. Then, last night, it started emitting a harsh tonal honking in the middle of our conversation. So in a preemptive strike, I’m getting a new phone today, and saying a little hopeful prayer that we don’t have to buy any more new electronics equipment in the next couple of months!

God only knows what random item in the house has pined longingly for the frickin’ cordless phone & will also commit hari-kari once the new phone moves in……Yes, I’m lookin’ at you, Mr. Sonicare Toothbrush.

I don’t know, maybe they had mistletoe in their little Toyota truck. Maybe the Spirit was Moving Them and they needed to express their deep burning passion for one another in the face of retail madness. But as I sat there in the World Market parking lot, blinker on, waiting, waiting, WAITING because there were no parking spaces, because hello, it’s December 21, and then waiting and waiting and WAITING and my patience was ebbing faster than a bleeder on the triage table, I am noticing that these two in the small truck with the engine running, these two are MAKING OUT. In their truck. Big passionate kisses. Long ones. Presumably with tongue. Just when you thought they were done? MORE KISSING. Jesus. Have you just met? Can you please go park over in the Chili’s parking lot and do this shit?

The only reason I didn’t honk? Because I figured they’d just git it on and have full-on Festivals of the Genitals in the truck just to spite my impatience, and really, what would I have done then? Gotten out and knocked on the window? Stymied, not giving a tinker’s damn about Love or Compassion or Romance, I tried to convey my impatience with large hand gestures and shouting at the top of my lungs in the comfort of my car. Because there was wine to be bought, and lines to stand in, and by God, I know Consumerism is not exactly the True Spirit of Christmas, but public displays of passion are not acceptable anytime of year, and you can liplock on YOUR OWN TIME.

Speaking of spirits, my Christmas spirit is called “Bombay Sapphire”. Hey, gin kinda tastes like a Christmas tree, what with the juniper berries……

Don’t worry, I’m not turning this into an infomercial for Radio Shack. But my aforementioned terrier-obsession with fixing my TV connections? Is at ease, for the moment. Here’s the story of yesterday – along with a frightening glimpse into the Pit of Madness – aka, my brain.

So, over my lunch break, I got into PowerPoint. And I created boxes & text boxes within them, for all the electronic components that needed to be hooked up. (I even made little boxes for each of the speakers. NERD.) Then, on my way to pick up my lunch, I swung into the midtown Radio Shack. And was completely ignored by every salesperson in there. I was nervous, anyway, so I didn’t get all indignant (typical path), and instead bought one red-blue-green video cord. Because of everything I didn’t know, I had at least figured out that I needed it. Got back to work, set everything aside, except for the terrier in my mind who was shaking the new cord back and forth and not lying down. Whatever, buddy, I have a shitton of work to get done, I can’t obsess every minute of the day.

On my drive home, I made a last-minute lane change, and went to the bigger Radio Shack, by Ward Parkway Mall. I could see there weren’t many people in the store, and I thought, “Maybe. Just maybe.” So I go in. I have my little folded up piece of paper. A young, somber little man named Scott walks up to me and, unbeknownst to him, opens the Door of Madness, saying, “Can I help you?”
“Yes. OK. I have a home entertainment question. I am extremely stubborn. I know I can do this, but it’s NOT WORKING.”
I proceed to tell him everything, smoothing the paper out on the counter. I omit the conversation from earlier in the day with my father, who told me to approach the project like a dullard. “Because the Geek Squad people aren’t necessarily SMART, Jennifer, they’re simply CAPABLE.” Glimpses into my formative years, people, GLIMPSES.

And then? Scott encouraged me to go back to my car to get all the owners manuals I had confessed to bringing with me but not into the store. And Scott? Spent half an hour analysing everything & we drew on my PowerPoint slide and I only needed to buy two more cables, and while Scott never smiled, I knew he was one beautiful cat inside his pasty geeky body and that he wasn’t a dullard, but he sure as shit WAS CAPABLE. And I came home and collapsed from the stress flowing from my body, and I didn’t even get on the floor to start the rewiring process, because I KNOW now how to do it, and that is 9/10 the battle, and if I encounter any problems? I KNOW WHERE SCOTT WORKS.

Just so you know, I’m not the only one dipping my toe in the Pool of Insanity this week. In fact, yesterday afternoon, Kristin came into my office and threw herself down on the floor. Flailing. While telling me she was DONE with the holiday knitting (because she wasn’t actually done with it), and then a couple people came over because they thought someone had FALLEN in my office because her foot was poking out the door, and really, in retrospect, what does that mean they think of ME? That I would just let someone fall down on the floor and not even get up & just TALK to them while they writhe in agony and pain? And while I’m talking about crazy, NO MORE POPCORN. Sweet baby jesus, the tins of popcorn keep pouring in. I thought about donating one, but to where? Old folks home? EEEK. Denture Madness. I love popcorn, and I love presents, but we have 3-4 tins in our kitchen at work (for under 30 people), plus Kristin & I each got three tins apiece yesterday. (One was a mini tin, all caramel with pounds of pecans. Uh-huh. YUM! Terrier likey!)

By tomorrow, I expect I’ll be barking. The terrier inside will take over on the other things, like work, cards, presents, whatever, and instead of using language, I’ll just bark. That will cut down on my time spent on phone conversations, I suspect. Peace out, peeps. Stay crazy, and keep on truckin’. And wirin’. And diagramming all your problems so the nice people at Radio Shack can give your inner terrier a rawhide bone.

When Suzy learned to swim, she inflated herself by filling her lungs with as much air as possible. You could squeeze her like an accordion & make her grunt-burp, and it was hilarious. Polly, on the other hand, did everything in her power to stay above the water by trying to walk on top of it. This meant she raised her head up high, and high-stepped with her paws, like a drum major or something. The drawback was that she created immense splashing, causing her to squint, but not inconveniencing her enough to get those paws below the water. She’s gotten better, but it, too, was one of those priceless things to watch.

Right now, I’m marching-band-dog-paddling. We have a whole bunch of work, the holidays are almost upon us, vacation needs to be taken, relaxation needs to happen, and I’m completely aware I’m splashing myself in the face with my panic, but unable to stop.

Thing was, I was a terrier of some sort in a former life. Right now, I am maddened and frustrated by my electronics hook-up with the whole new tv setup. Everything was fine until we exchanged the DVD burner, and re-connecting the new one has knocked out everything but the cable. It’s all there, somewhere, and there’s a nagging suspicion I need better cables to improve the picture, and it’s all this stuff that I barely know anything about but should be able to figure out because I’m smart, just not patient. But I get obsessed. And because I know there is a “right” solution, I can’t let go of it. I spent an hour on the floor last night, trying various connections, reading each owners manual, and stopped short of taking all the wires in my mouth and shaking them viciously from side-to-side like the bad weasel they are.

That’s when I realized I’m just a few high marching steps away from Holiday Breakdown, where you sit on the side of the road, torn paper and ribbon around you, cable wire between your teeth, a crazed and empty stare as you pray for it to all pass. Soon.

We went to the lake this weekend to celebrate Christmas with James’ family. On the way there, we drove by a swarming field of snow geese (and took some pictures), and then a little bit later, we saw something almost indescribable. At first, I thought it was a retail business. Because nobody would have that many inflatable holiday decorations out, unless they were displayed for sale. Of course, we stopped & drove by that location as well – and discovered rapidly that this was no retail establishment, but 4 mobile homes situated near one another, and obviously had a close, co-ordinated relationship. There were easily 100 balooning figures dotting the landscape. I took a whole bunch of pictures, and yet, it still failed to capture the enormity of the scene. Short of renting a helicopter, I don’t know how I could convey the huge open countryside, the surrealness of seeing ALL these blow-up holiday decorations, and the mobile homes & barking dogs & bizarreness of it all. I’d recommend seeing the whole photo assortment on my Flickr Account; I have a lot of editing to do with commentary & boxes, that I’ll get to eventually. A select few pics for those who don’t want to see the whole shebang:

I’m not kidding when I say we both felt like we needed a stiff drink after we left the scene. It was…. something. And it sure makes my neighbors down the street look like small potatoes with their measley THREE blow-ups on the lawn. I can only imagine how commanding this panorama is at night….