Last Thursday, the delightful Miss Shanny came to knit night, and we had much fun with the group, knitting, drinking, noshing, all good times. We finally got the cameras out, and Shannon’s an expert at the self-portraiture, mostly because she’s got them long arms and can get at a good angle away from herself. Me? I got them T-Rex arms, only good for bunching up yarn close to my bosoms and flapping my hands at anything that gets too close for comfort. (Mind you, I do NOT have the Short Arm Syndrome, where my arms are 3″ too short for my torso. I’m Just Plain Short.) So my series of self-portraits featuring Shanny are a little like how I feel when I’m trying to get into the top cupboard and not crash all the dishes down on my head. Peeking! Peeking! They also had a photobooth feel to them, albeit a photobooth with the camera jostled out of proper pointing direction.

Fun times – good eats – great yarn! We’re glad you visited, Shanny!

AND a day-after shout-out to JWo, Happy Burfday to him! Love you sweetie! For the first time ever, he actually had to teach school on his birthday. But all the 5th graders sang to him! How cute is that? Next year, he & I will be celebrating birthdays again, but this year we kind of back-burnered ’em. (We’ve had a lot going on, you might say…)

When I was at my last job, I sat for a time near the microwave area/small kitchen on our floor. This was disastrous when people would throw a bag of popcorn in, hit a few buttons, and then run off to the restroom. After one particular bobblehead did this, and then EMPTIED the burnt bag into the trash, I finally wrote a page-long remonstration titled, “Popping Popcorn: Rules of Engagement”. It informed the reader that the microwave in question was to a normal microwave the same way a Tritan Missile was relevant to a squirt gun. It was one step below military-grade, and thus needed to be used with extreme care, caution and attention. I believe I also quoted the great Rick Springfield, urging snackers, “Don’t Walk Away!”, but to monitor every moment as their salty snack remained in the device. And if they did, in fact, still screw up and char their popcorn, to BURY the bag, contents and all, in the garbage. Don’t open it to further dissipate the stink! I apologized if it made them feel like a nocturnal animal, rooting around in the trash, but they were warned, they disregarded the advice & now they have to pay the price.

So we have a new business meeting in 20 minutes, and someone burnt popcorn about an hour ago. (And I don’t mean a little burnt, where you eat around the ten kernels that are singed brown, I mean, It’s-A-Wonder-It-Didn’t-Catch-On-Fire burnt, Look At The Veil of Smoke In the Air!) It has created high drama, as everyone started running around with fans, candles, Febreze – doing anything and everything to diffuse and eliminate the smell, which, if you’ve ever smelled it, you know simply can’t be done.

My boss just strolled by and pronounced the whole place smells like “Burnt Vanilla Febreze”.

Awesome. I think we’ve got this account in the BAG, baby.

I was having a conversation with a co-worker about SNAKES! on a PLANE! and my fascination with the whole “thang” – less with the movie itself, but with how the surge of fans grew and awareness was built and the viralness and popularity of the movie – long before it was ready to be released. And how they went back & added & edited the movie, based on that fan buzz & devotion. Would that people got that excited about VOTING. In any event, I was describing how there’s an audience participation script already written, and when I went to Google it, I had dyslexic fingers, and kept typing “Snales”. I burst out laughing & said, “Snails on a Plane! Can’t wait to see THAT movie! RUN! There’s SNAILS! Well, ok, WALK! Oh hell, just move over a seat.”

But if you do go to the official website? You can have Sam Jackson email or phone message a directive to go see the movie, and he incorporates all the details you select. So of course, JWo got a message. And since we’re not big movie-theater people, we’ll probably wait for the Netflix copy….via snailmail.

There you have it. I’ve started my day with chili-lime pistachios (Archer Farms/Target brand, aren’t they doing crazy things these days with their house brand? Kudos!) And I’m drinking diet Black Cherry Vanilla Diet Coke. Piss off, Wheaties & coffee! I’ve got a new bizarro combo!

I’m notorious for strange consumables in the morning, especially on the weekend. I’ve had spaghetti for breakfast, I’ve rationalized Triscuits as simply Shredded Wheat with salt, instead of sugar, and I’ve eaten more cheese for breakfast than I’ve ever had as an appetizer. I even know a certain someone who has ice cream for breakfast. Hey, it’s dairy!

What’re some of the strangest things you’ve eaten for breakfast? Not counting brunch, or cold pizza (shudder). I can tell you, even though this was dinner on Friday night? I’d eat all this sushi for breakfast in a New York minute. YUM!

We had a fabu knit night last night; the lovely Shannon drove over from visiting her parents & joined us for knitting, beer brats & sangria…. pictures to come this weekend, let’s just say she’s much better at the arm-extended portraiture than I am. However, we’ll have an entertaining series from my camera, as I sliced the bottom of our faces off at different points, repeatedly.
Some things are hard for me to learn.

It’s Friday, this will have been the first full week of work for me since I-don’t-know-when and I don’t really care to figure it out, since most of the weeks involved sadness or badness. I mean, yeah, I left an hour early last night, but I’m not counting that. It’s almost the weekend, there will be much knitting & netflixing, and I swear, by the time I watch all my Prime Suspects, Crackers, and finish reading the first Thursday Next book, “The Eyre Affair”, I’m going to be affecting a faux-British accent just like Madonna by Monday. Minus the leotard, mind you. I do have good taste, and I don’t want to drive someone to putting their own eyes out.

Happy weekending to all of you, too! And if you want to wear a leotard, in the privacy of your own home, then bollocks, just go and do it.

We’ve got some new business we’ve been working on, and last night, all I did was dream about lasik surgery. Well, for the first half of the night. I woke up multiple times, and each time was after I’d just had some lasik done. I’m actually considering the surgery, more seriously than I ever have before. I think one of my challenges that I didn’t admit to is my own vanity. I feel like my glasses define my look, add character & personality. But the argument for being able to see the moment I open my eyes in the morning outweighs that vanity!

In any event, I didn’t come here to tell you about THAT dream, but the other one, later in the night. I dreamt that (much like the gasoline crisis) there was a tomato supply crisis. And since much of my job involved chopping tomatoes, I panicked, quit my current job, and went BACK to my old agency in the same day. Without getting their sign-off on hiring me back. As soon as I got there & was waiting to talk to the powers-that-be, I realized I’d made a horrible, horrible mistake. I could weather this tomato crisis. I raced back to my current employer & hoped they hadn’t discovered I’d left. Then I woke up.

Now, it’s no shocker my old place is floating through my head – they just lost a big chunk of business, and everyone’s buzzing – surprised and not surprised all at once. I still have some friends there, I still care about those people, and I hope they don’t find themselves without jobs in six months. Or they find new ones in the meantime. When I think about some of the other people, I see the smugness, the clubbiness, the superiority complexes & apathy towards change, I hear the public statements to “be more creative! think beyond the numbers” and I remember the pounding down, dressing-down, near-hatred of me when I was told, “you’re too creative! you just don’t GET it! You get to the same conclusion but you don’t do all the research to get there. You don’t fit in.”

And when I remember those words? And even though those bastard people probably won’t pay the price (and the little people will) for the client loss? I’m ecstatic I’m chopping tomatoes someplace else.

I’d sworn I’d written a blog several years ago about how complacency kills – maybe I was too paranoid then? I did find a post referencing myself as the Ringleader of the Unhappiness Circus. Now I’m more the Ringleader of the Insane Ass-Clown Posse and our Fabulous Days of Hysterical Laughter. There’s hope, people. It can, and does, change.

1. Today is election day in Kansas City, and I personify the great American unwashed voter: I’m uninformed and apathetic. At least when the zoo bond was up for a vote, the city (and our yard) had cool polar bear signs. Don’t politicians understand all it takes is a cute, cuddly (but deadly) icon & their awareness would shoot through the roof? In any event, I’m going to spend some time today & review all the questions & candidates and vote after work. I’m just glad the phone will stop RINGING constantly with political polls, tape-recorded pitches…. for a little while, anyway.

2. We should have a minimum of 12 days per year that are “I can’t get out of bed” days. I felt like I was a danger to myself and others driving in to work this morning, and you know how I feel about bad drivers. I gave myself the finger at least twice and shouted a couple times, just for penance.

3. With daytime highs forecast to hit 104 AGAIN this week, I am Officially Ready For Fall. ORFF. You’re either with me or against me, and if you like this weather then I’m going to run you over in the street. Don’t worry. I’ll honk at myself afterwards.

4. I’m so absent-minded, I opened my first Diet Mountain Dew, and then turned to the left & opened the second one. Out of embarassment with myself, I chugged the first one. I’m well into the second one and the fog is still not clearing.

5. Overheard at breakfast at Sharp’s in Brookside:
Me: “I just felt like I was … settling, on the car I want.”
JWo: “Do you hear that sound?”
Me: “Bop BAAAHHHHHHHH!” *

*Referencing my theme song at the last job, “Sound of Settling” by Death Cab for Cutie.

OK. I’m starring in my own non-Oscar independent movie today. I’m wearing this shirt:

And it’s a “mock wrap top”. So that would make you think it’s not a real wrap shirt, right? Well, it’s not, in the sense that you have to wrap & tie , blah blah blah, BUT the whole panel that goes into the side & stretches across, the “underneath” panel? That baby ties to the far right side: there and ONLY there. So I have a triangular panel of fabric that quite adequately covers my left bazoomba, BUT, should a wardrobe malfunction take place, like a slippage or bunching, then? Left boob al fresco.

Whenever I’m presented with the opportunity to be paranoid, I grab it. Sieze it, really. Shove it in my mouth and swallow it whole. I love to incite the Paranoia Gnome within. So all day, I’ve spent spare moments stealing moments to check my left boob panel, and assure myself that I’m not exposing myself to the office. I’d like to think I’m subtle, but let’s face it, I’m not exactly a master of the art, and the boobs? They’re not exactly “shrinking violets”. More like uh…. Kansas Sunflowers.

Yeah, I know. Safety pins, quick whipstitching with a needle & thread, yadda yadda. But then where would the EXCITEMENT be? Hm? I have many sources in my wardrobe: I haven’t fallen in my Doc Marten sandals yet today, so that disaster’s still out there, lurking. And you know if I fall down, Left Boob is totally flying out of the panel and putting on a matinee show.

I tried to post this video early this morning & it didn’t work, and then I forgot all about doing it. So now, I’m back & trying again & I think it’s going to work, finally. Am I the only one who just shakes her head with amazement at the entity we know as “YouTube”? It as if the greatest invention we never even knew we needed sprang from the earth with a flourish and said, “Howdy! How’d you like to waste some time today?” Even my boss loves the YouTube.

I was thinking to myself, which I do in excessive amounts, always have, sometimes I even mutter, and as I am wont to do, I check in with myself and see how I’m doing, and then I search for words and images that might describe it, whether or not I’m going to put them in a blog. And I got the imagery of mercury balls, scattering across a flat surface. I remember when I was young, maybe 7 or 8, and I accidentally broke a thermometer, and proceeded to spend a fair amount of time captivated by the silver skitterings until my mother caught me. Then, later, when she was telling my dad about it, he had me retrieve the rest of the broken thermometer & we had some good times playing with the mercury (but not touching it, as I had been doing earlier.)

Sometimes the best thing we can do is not struggle. Not grasp. Not try to mold, control, compress, strangle. Just marvel. And many years ago, I had taped this video & showed it to my dad. We marvelled at the simplicity of the imagery, while also reflecting on the complexity of emotion, symbolism and commentary on human nature it made. If you’ve never seen it, thanks to our good buddy YouTube, now you can. It won an Academy Award in 1989, and I first saw it in Minneapolis at a Spike & Mike Animation Festival. I think it’s as stellar today as it was 17 years ago.

Balance

The story of Bob Smith’s life was in the paper today, and while I never met him, I was absolutely captivated by the photo! He was an interesting character. And I think I could put his aunt in my purse.