Mysteries of the Universe

Sooo, I’ve not been blogging much lately, but…

Good news:  I’m back.

Bad news?  My mind has been a bit fractured lately, so this is all you get.  *smirk*

Random Questions Raised in the Dark Recesses of My Mind

Why doesn’t the romantically candlelit cavern in the sewers where the Phantom of the Opera lives smell like poo?

Why in movies and television, do they always take the duct tape off the mouth before untying the hands or legs?  Wouldn’t it make more sense to undo the feet and hands, and let them take the friggin’ duct tape off their own mouth as they run?

Junebugs.  Just their existence in general – I mean, just why?

Since moonlight is just reflected sunlight, why don’t vampires at least get sunburns from being outside at night?

The popularity of Dr. Phil – again…why??

Why does time go by slowly when you are a kid and can’t wait to escape the bullying, the braces, the difficulty in obtaining booze…and then speed up when you are an adult and need all the extra time you can get to try and accomplish all the crap you set out to do when you were younger?

Why did I see a man handing his child a Red Bull at the grocery store at 11 pm the other day?

Who ARE you, mystery blog-stalker who keeps accessing this page from a WordPress link that misspells my name as ‘Andea’?  Who aaaare you…I hate such mysteries.  But you must like me, because you visit several times a day.

They keep making Kraft macaroni and cheese easier and easier to make – why don’t they just skip right to making it for us?  Do we really need that small sense of accomplishment so much?  (*apparently*)

Why don’t I have a robot?

Broken Heart Rescue Balm – A Home Remedy

Before Broken Heart Rescue Balm

Now, I myself am not capable of incurring a broken heart (because I’m, you know, a superhero and all), but it occurred to me that perhaps some of you might need a fix for this particularly annoying human ailment.

Because sometimes the universe does things like, say, dump a person in your lap that seems to be super-special and you think, “Gosh, the universe isn’t so bad after all!  I should send a gift basket with a nice thank-you card tucked inside!”  But sometimes this seemingly kind gesture is tempered by the fact that the universe – being the sick little pulling-wings-off-flies little fucker that it is – also chose to dump a big fat ocean in between you and that special person and things just don’t work out.  (In the movies, this wouldn’t slow things down, of course, but instead would inspire a cinematic climax involving a bouquet of flowers being waved out the sunroof of a limo, or at the very least, a boombox serenade.  But alas, that universe is actually a parallel one, one that is less of an asshole than your own.)

So should you find yourself in the blue zone (not me, because of course, my own heart – yes, I have one…a tiny one – is made of high-grade titanium wrapped in Kevlar with a thick coating of Teflon, thus I am impenetrable by such weak emotions as anything resembling this ‘heartbreak’ that I have heard so much about), I have a few suggestions for you.

First of all – it is important to make the most of your wallowing.  It is like sweating out toxins.

Ingredients to have on hand:

1.  A plentiful supply of tissues (or for the environmentally friendly, a pillow that you don’t mind getting snot and tears all over).  A cat will also do.

2.  Chocolate.  This likely won’t help a whole lot, but it won’t hurt, either.

3.  Ice cream.  Ditto.  (And what the fuck if you get fat, you’re never going near anyone ever again anyway.)

4.  A large stack of trash magazines with a high volume of articles about LiLo, Britney, Jon and Kate Plus Eight, etc.  This will serve to show you that somebody else’s life probably sucks more than your own.

5.  The phone – for when your best friend calls repeatedly to offer condolences.

6.  Sleepy drugs that you can’t OD on, like Nyquil or Benedryl.  Feeling drowsy will help you feel vulnerable and sorry for yourself.  This is a good thing – if you can count on no one else to pity you, at least you can pity yourself.  Plus, you are probably sleep-deprived from all the being-in-love crap.  But under no circumstances should you indulge in alcohol or other recreational drugs just yet.  You don’t want to numb the pain or risk a drunk-dial.  So spoon yourself around that box of Kleenex and give in.

7.  Soft, comfy clothes (even better if you have one of his old sweaters to wrap yourself in.  But improvise if you must.  Just make sure you don’t coordinate.  You need to look as bad as possible.)

8.  Hot showers – though you don’t want to waste any wallowing time on grooming, you will need to periodically rinse the salt out of your eyes or you will risk going totally insane from the burning.  Even better if you can manage to actually cry in the shower.  This is another one of those cinematic acts that will make you feel like a tragic heroine, which is a highly desired state and a key ingredient in Broken Heart Rescue Balm.

9.  A box in which to put everything that reminds you of him – pictures, letters, gifts, anything and everything.  It all goes in.  You might think this goes against the rule of wallowing, but it doesn’t.  You see, you have been living with his photo next to your bed/on your fridge/on your computer for so long that the absence of them now will be more tear-jerking than if you just left them where they always were.   You may replace these items with other things, just make sure the substitutes will not, under any circumstances, make you laugh.  For example, replace his photo with a photo of a sad-looking puppy.  (Not a puppy you actually know, or else your angst will be re-directed, forcing you to begin the process of wallowing over him all over again once you finish crying over the puppy.)

10.  Male friends who think you are fabulous.  Surround yourself with them.  Don’t under any circumstances let them kiss you, though – at this point, you will just be reminded of the person you wish you were kissing and this may lead to contaminating a perfectly good friend with the broken heart virus.  Perhaps later you can come to some sort of friends-with-benefits kind of arrangement, but right now it is too soon….far, far too soon.

11.  Caller ID.  You do NOT want to have to deal with mothers or telemarketers right now.  They do not deserve to feel the burn you are giving the universe right now.

Take all ingredients in any combination desired or required, as quickly as possible before scar tissue begins to develop.  (For those of you with hearts, you really want to keep it as young and healthy and flexible as possible.  It’s good for the circulation.)

The next day, shovel all those used tissues into the compost, put on your hottest shoes  – with the highest, sharpest heels possible, all the better to drop-kick that asshole of a universe – and go back to planning your summer vacation.  Go somewhere fabulous, like Paris.

After Broken Heart Rescue Balm*

*Results not typical

The Curse of the Ringbearer

Some of you already know that I wear one of those oh-so-millenium symbols of feminine independence, the right-hand ring.  It’s one of those ‘marry yourself first’ kind of things – it went on right after I gave my last serious live-in the boot and it pretty much never comes off.  It’s a reminder to be a little more cautious in the future about what kind of crap I put on that same finger on the other hand.  (Yeah, okay…and it’s pretty…)

But today I took it off to do dishes (okay – fine - I wasn’t doing dishes.  It was to measure my finger for some half-baked Facebook quiz a friend challenged me to.  Whatever.  Shut up.)  No biggie, I put it back on right afterwards and carried on with my day (which still didn’t include doing the dishes, sadly).

Imagine my reaction when I had that ’something’s not right here’ tingling – and looked down to see that I had somehow put the ring on the wrong hand!!  You may be having trouble picturing it.  Okay, try this:  Imagine the reaction I would be likely to have if I looked down and saw a seriously pissed-off tarantula about to take a slice of my finger for lunch.

Why this drama, you ask?  Why the slightly mental overreaction?  Let me illustrate.

I’ve been proposed to a lot.  This is not a boast.  It is case in point of the fact that I possess that je ne sais quoi that brings out the crazy in people.  These proposals have ranged in seriousness from the dude who threw himself down on one knee three seconds after being introduced to me – to the tool who showed up at my parents’ house in a suit and tie, requesting an audience with them to ask for my hand (result:  mom, wearing her Rolling Stones tongue logo t-shirt, secretly wishing she were a drinker; dad, not saying a word, but quietly chuckling away to himself the whole time.)

People probably think that the reason I haven’t gotten married yet is because I have commitment issues (not really), or because I value my freedom too much (possibly), or maybe I just haven’t met the right guy (could be).

But I believe the real reason is this:  Every time some guy sticks a ring on my finger, I get hurt!  I don’t mean emotionally – no, I mean full-on physical, literal HURT.  Like with blood.  I swear to god.   Here, I’ll show you…

Ring # 1:   4th grade (shut up – it still counts).  Royden…somebody.  I arrive at school one day and on my desk is a small brown box.  Inside – a ring (gold with a green stone), 29 cents in change and a note on a scrap of paper that says, “Just a little something.”  Cute, huh?  Yeah, sure.  Until I tried the thing on, and immediately developed a horrifying rash highlighted by the bright green circle it left around the afflicted digit.  Not cute.  Not at all.  Of course, setting a pattern for later stages of my life, I still let him take me to the movies.  (Okay, so not a lot of actual blood in this one, but hang tight – I’m just setting the stage here, people.)

Ring #2:  Age 28.  Fiancee #1.  We’d been together for 10 years.  I’d moved out and moved back in about five times that year.  Things weren’t going so great.  In a final act of desperation, during lunch one day he comes over and does the whole one-knee thing (which I just find really silly – and my first thought at the time was “Shouldn’t he know I would find that silly?”).  Now, you should know that if this had happened about 10 years earlier – hell, five years earlier – I would have been ecstatic.  When I was in my early twenties, I wanted nothing more than to marry this guy.  A classic case of too little, too late.  And I believe the actual proposal went something like, “If we work things out, would you consider marrying me?”  (At that moment, a tiny rift occurred in the fabric of space/time and my younger self, overhearing this, paused in her browsing of china patterns and proceeded to slit her wrists.)

ANYWAY – the ring.  It was silver (score – I hate gold).  It wasn’t a diamond (score – at the time, I hated anything so traditional.  I have since been enlightened.  Though I still only approve of fair-trade bling.)  It was wrought in the shape of a sun; a recurring theme in our relationship…partly because of a dream we once shared of starting our own theatre company in Jamaica and partly something to do with me being (yeah, I know) the centre of his universe or something (yes, I am aware that the sun is only the centre of a very small solar system, not the whole universe.)

It didn’t take long.  As it turned out, the sun shape had some very pointy bits.  Which proceeded to completely shred my fingers.  One day it got so bad, I ripped the damn thing off and threw it across the bedroom, where it was forgotten about until later that day when it embedded itself in the sole of my foot.

Ring #3:  A couple of years later.  Fiancee #2.  This time I picked out my own ring – a simple silver band with a small round amethyst set flush with the rest of the band.  Loved it.  Until the day I was being rushed out of the apartment by F2 and in going to turn off the light, the ring somehow got caught on the corner of the switchplate.  In some freak moment of ridiculousness, the momentum was just right to force the ring to open up at the seam where the ring had been re-sized (made smaller for me), pulling the ring, with its now raw metal edges, all the way up and off my finger, creating two long ragged gashes the entire length of it.  I still have the thing, actually, and it looks like it was hit by a train.  That wedding never happened, either, by the way.

Ring #4:   A few years after that.  Fiancee #3.  This one proposed on the second date, so a ring was not immediately produced.  Actually, this guy was bipolar and refusing medication, and was also an artist, so while there was big talk of the amazing ring he was going to design for me, and many intricate drawings made, no ring ever actually was produced.  So technically this ring never actually hurt me, but since he tried several times, I still feel it counts.

In any event, this is why I panic at the sight of any jewelry anywhere near that hand.  My friends find it kind of entertaining.

But you know, I might consider marriage…if I ever got a ring on that hand that didn’t try to kill me.  I’m not holding my breath, though.

Waiting for the Worms to Come

I think I must have been taking a smoke break or something the day patience was handed out.  I know this.  (I am nothing if not self-aware, even when it hurts.)

So this is why last Friday, when I was taking my father to a hospital in the city for day surgery, I prepared myself.  I knew there would be a fair bit of sitting around in the waiting room.  But how long could it take to remove a kidney stone, anyway?

The answer is:  11 hours and 12 minutes.

Yes, that’s right.  My sorry ass was in that chair for ELEVEN HOURS AND TWELVE MINUTES.

But I get ahead of myself.  Let’s back up.

The day started out optimistically – Dad was in good spirits, I had a bag filled with survival tools (three books, one of which was a brand-new copy of ‘Long Way Down’ by Ewan MacGregor and Charley Boorman, which I’d been dying to read, my dayplanner and to-do list, candy and water).  It was sunny, a great day for a drive to Halifax.  I was also psyched because I happened to know that this particular hospital had a kick-ass food court with this awesome Lebanese place, and I planned to score some dolmas and falafel and tabouleh to take home with me.

Dad’s appointment was for 1:20 pm.  We got there with lots of time to get him registered and things went as planned for a while.  We made it to pre-op.  That’s when things slipped into the Twilight Zone.

I was a bit worried because my dad had never been under general anesthetic before, and he did have a heart condition…and it didn’t help that every show that came on the television involved some sort of graphic video footage of operations in progress or corpses…and every magazine I picked up was filled (I’m really not kidding) with articles about medical screw-ups – like where the guy goes in to have a mole removed and ends up having his liver removed or something.  I was a wreck.

One-twenty came and went.  The waiting room began to empty out.  At around 4:30 pm, the nursing staff shut down the computers and went home.  I was starting to get light-headed from lack of food or water, but since Dad hadn’t been able to eat or drink anything since midnight the night before, I couldn’t bring myself to eat or drink anything if he couldn’t.  I was already fantasizing about the water in my bag…the hummus downstairs was calling my name….

YES!  Five pm – they take Dad away.  I offer the least sincere ‘good luck’ ever as I race for the elevator to take me to the cafeteria.

It was closed.  I swear to fucking god.  FIVE PM!!

All there was left to choose from was a bare-bones version of Tim Horton’s, and a fridge full of nasty-looking iceburg-lettuce-based salads and a few old sandwiches.  So I begrudgingly purchased an egg salad wrap, which I ate quickly with large doses of self-pity.  But it was okay, because they had told me that the procedure would only take about 20 minutes, then about 30 minutes to an hour in recovery…and we were out of there.  I might still make it back to town in time to hook up with my friends at the pub.

I returned to the waiting room around 20 minutes later, just as they were wheeling my dad’s bed back down the hallway.  And any worries I’d had were quickly dispelled – he looked wide awake and alert and not in any pain at all!

“Done already?”  I asked, full of boastful pride at our good fortune.

Ummm, yeah, no.  False alarm.  They weren’t quite ready yet.  They needed to wait for space to open up in the recovery room before they could proceed.  So they thought he’d be more comfortable here where he could watch tv.

Sooo, we settle in for a bit longer.  At least I had been able to drink some water and had eaten something, even if it was an amazingly soggy sandwich.  Poor Dad’s lips were starting to crack.

Now, I’m not sure if this happens to other people, but when I get bored waiting for things, my inner anarchist takes over.  I start plotting revenge.  Though I have never so much as shoplifted a lip gloss in real life (oh, okay, fine, there were those few articles of tavern signage that struck me as particularly funny – but it was on a dare), my inner anarchist begins to calculate how much of that tasteful faux-Tuscan furniture I could fit in the back of my dad’s station wagon.  I was thinking that painting might look sweet above my fireplace.  I was sure I could find some use for those neglectfully left-out prescription pads.  I couldn’t understand why Dad didn’t want to take me up on the offer to have a wheelchair race in the hallway.

At 6:30, I accosted a nurse passer-by, who explained that they were now waiting for the anaesthetist, who was running late in his previous surgery (six hours late?)

At 7:10, they finally take my dad away, for reals this time.  And the nurse said reassuringly, “Well, at least it’s a quick procedure.”

By this time, the waiting room was deserted.  They had shut off every light in that wing of the hospital exept the light directly over my head.  It was like the hotel in The Shining. The room was freezing – I was curled up with my coat over me like a blanket.  I could hear not a sound beyond that room – no signs of life anywhere.  But it was okay – Dad would be back any minute and we could be off.

An hour and a half passed.  Any minute now.

The janitor came in – a person!  A real live person!  In what was likely a desperate attempt to confirm that I was still real myself, and not some doomed spirit waif, destined to haunt that tastefully decorated waiting room for all eternity, I smiled my biggest smile and lifted my feet for him, asking if I was in his way.  He smiled his biggest smile and gave me a ‘don’t-speak-English’ kind of look.  I heaved a sigh and snuggled back under my coat.

Another hour and a half pass.  Okay, now I was freaking out a bit.  It was past 10 pm and they took my father away 3 hours ago for an operation that should have taken 20 minutes?!   I searched everywhere for an intercom, a buzzer, a ring-bell-for-service…nothing.  I toyed with the idea of setting off the fire alarm.

This was when my inner anarchist took her leave.  Now my inner panicker was taking over.  Where was my daaaaaddddy???  Had he been taken to an evil parallel dimension?  Would I ever see him again?  Was he still in this dimension, but deader than dead due to an unforeseen allergy to the anaesthetic and how would I tell my mother?  I could no longer sit still.

At the end of the corridor, there was a huge sign that read “Hospital Staff Only.”  I peered as far around the corner as I could, without feeling like I was being ‘bad.’  (I told you, my inner anarchist had long since thrown in the towel.  Probably went off to find a falafel.)  I could see nothing in either direction.   I whistled a little tune and tapped the clickety heels of my boots, hoping to possibly remind someone that I was there.  I strained to listen for signs of life.  Nothing.  Absolutely nothing.

My heart started racing.  The clock now read 11:10 pm.  I had been there since 12:35 pm.  I was this close…

HEY!  There’s a guy!  Walking toward me down the Forbidden Corridor!  Wearing a coat, carrying a backpack, looking kind of doctor-ish!

I threw myself at him.

It turned out he was the anaesthetist.  And in true Drea style, although a few hours ago I wanted to drink his blood for breakfast for making me wait so long, he was instantly forgiven (partly because he was pretty cute, but mostly because he was sososo nice and I was sososo grateful for information.)  Apparently the operation went great and they were about to release him.  Of course.  Now that I’d already had a heart attack.

Top the day off with a late-night hour-long drive home with a streaky windshield and a chatty father that was stoned out of his mind on painkillers and you have the whole story.

I wonder if the kidney stone would have been less painful?  At least it would have got me some drugs.

How To Suck At Animal Rescue

It was a bitter, cold winter day.  I sat in my office typing transcripts, when I heard my co-worker say, “There’s a duck in the road.”

I leaned back in my chair and removed one earpiece.   “A duck?”

“A duck.”

“A duck???“

“A duck.”

What can I say?  I like to look at wildlife.  I threw down my headset and ran over to the window.

Sure enough.  There was a duck in the road.  A kinda dead-ish-lookin’ duck.

A man got out of a nearby truck, placed the mallard drake on a snowbank on the curb and got back in his vehicle.  I could only assume he was the murderer.

But wait – what if the duck still had life?  It must be saved!  Leaping into action like the superhero that I am, I raced to the coat closet and grabbed my shawl.

I raced down the stairs and out the door, barefoot in the snow (I work in a very casual office – don’t judge), darting through traffic as I made my way across the busy street (well, okay, sort of busy…ish).

The duck was clearly in shock, though without too much visible injury.  It lay on the snow, looking up at me with sad, pleading eyes.  Wrapping it tenderly in the shawl, I carried it quickly to the heater inside, barking out phone numbers of vets for my co-worker to call as I ran.  After a few hasty phone calls, a doctor was found who would treat the wild bird and a driver for my car was found to transport us both to the clinic.

The car wove in and out of traffic, making every second count as we rushed the injured bird to the doctor.  It refused to stay in the box designed to be used as an emergency stretcher, preferring instead to stay in my arms, twining its long neck around my own.  This bird would not die!  This bird must be saved!  It was DESTINY!

Leaving the animal in the trusted care of the doctor, I returned to my office, triumphant.  Confidant that I had made a difference.  Grateful that I had found the bird and been able to play a part in its survival.

Glowing and relieved, I bounded up the steps to the office two at a time.  Several regular clients were at the top.  I greeted them cheerily and waved, smiling my big I-just-saved-something smile.

They looked at me weird.

I went to the washroom to wash my hands before returning to my desk.  That’s when I noticed my face was smeared with mallard blood and my sweater covered in feathers.

And, um…yeah.  The duck died.

On How the Universe Will Bite You in the Ass Every Time

I was a freshman in theatre school.  Never trust a first year theatre student.

I was having one of those days.  I just wanted to be left alone.

I needed clean clothes.

So I was sitting in the local laundromat, waiting for said clean clothes, reading and thinking about the first year language requisite I was taking – Russian, because by the time I’d gotten the call to tell me my audition had been successful, all the ‘normal’ language classes were full.

That’s when I noticed that the laundromat lady was a little crazy.

Okay, maybe ‘crazy’ is a bit harsh.  The laundromat lady was… ’special.’  And I didn’t feel like making small talk with her. 

But sure enough, she was headed my way. 

I can’t remember the icebreaker she used to start being my ‘friend’, but I do remember what I said.   In a heavy Slavic accent, “So sorry…do not spik…Inglis…ya styudenka pa Rusky…” 

Laundromat-lady’s face lit up like she’d just discovered diamonds in someone’s pockets.  She nodded and smiled and left me alone.   I buried my face back in my script.

A few minutes later, I heard her speaking to her replacement prey.  “See that cute little girl over there?  She’s from Russia!“ 

It hadn’t occurred to me that I was going to want to wash my clothes there for the rest of the school year.   I became so good at the accent, I minored in Russian the following year.

I’m Not Clumsy, I Just Live a Dangerous Lifestyle, Godammit.

I’m sitting here watching blood seep out of my index finger.  I sliced it open this afternoon while cutting lemons (and yes, it stung as much as you would expect).   It probably could have used a stitch.

But I cannot go to the emergency room in this town anymore.

Why, you ask?

Because it is a very small town, with a very small hospital, and the same doctor seems to always be working the emergency room when I need to go there.  And because I am a wild, reckless woman who likes to live life on the edge and walk the path of danger, my visits have been many.

And as a result, said doctor thinks I’m hot for his form and that I am deliberately hurting myself to be close to him.  Strangely, the psychotic part of this delusional theory doesn’t seem to frighten him.  I kind of get the impression he finds the idea appealing, which makes him even sicker than a girl who would send herself to the emergency room on purpose in order to stalk the doctor.

The first time I met Dr. McHottiePants [not my nickname - this is what he is generally known as around town...with the women, anyway; I suspect the men call him something different], I had been playing with my scroll saw (it was an art commission thing) and despite the protective goggles, a stray piece of sawdust managed to make it in and scratch the crap out of my cornea.  Real sexy.

Not a week later, I discovered that working out a lot and not drinking enough water can lead to a kidney stone.   Dr. McHP jumped up on the bed with me and scooched up close.  Putting his arm around me, said in what I think he thought was a schmexy voice, “Drea…we have to stop meeting like this.”  I recoiled.  NOT the way you want someone to behave who has just been handed a cup of your urine.  Seriously.  Ew.  Again, real sexy.

After this, there was another sliced finger incident, and another time, a pulled tendon.

There is nothing sexier than a chick with a faceful of road rash.

The capper was the night I stumbled in, barefoot, with a completely shattered arm and wrist after taking a bit of a tumble (completely sober, I swear to god).  In the car on the way to the hospital, I was chanting my mantra, “Please don’t let it be McHP, please don’t let it be McHP…”  And who do you think it was?  Of course.  And this time, he not only gets me in a bed, but gets to render me unconscious in order to set the bones.  (Doesn’t that sound x-rated?)

 

Of course, the benefit of having an emergency room doctor who likes to flirt with you is that they make sure your cast matches your pretty pink dress.

Anyway, my cut today took hours to stop bleeding, but it finally did.  And now, I’ve just noticed that there is blood all over my hand again.  But I’m not going to the hospital.

I’m pretty sure I saw a sewing kit around here somewhere.

Crap Whose Ass I’m Gonna Kick in 2009

1.  Cords.  Yeah, that’s right.  I’m talking about you, you horrid tangle of discombobulated monsters down by my feet.  Listen up, because I’m about to kick all of your asses.  I’ve done my research.  I’ve been communing with Martha.  I’ve drunk a lot of coffee.  I have purchased a ‘cord closet’ – a glorious piece of fake cherrywood furniture with regularly spaced holes for all of your sorry asses and a sliding panel for access to switch off the power bar that gives you life (see #3).  I’ve made little tags out of little round pieces of card stock, printed neatly with all of your names.  Drea = 1.  Cords =0.

2.  Cordless phones.  (I’m damned if I do, damned if I don’t.)  So, yeah?  You say you’re going to let your battery die right in the middle of a call from a cute guy?  Yeah?  You collaborated with your homey, the backup cordless so that its battery would mysteriously die at precisely the moment he called back?  HAH!  Sucks to be you.  I’m thinkin’…’cordless’ = ’spineless’…or something that would make more sense if I wasn’t so buzzed on caffeine, but whatever, ’cause I’m going old school on your ass.  I bought a phone with a cord today. 

3.  Global warming.  Okay, I don’t have anything really clever for this one, I just wanted to point out again that I intend to start being more diligent about saving energy.  And the cord closet thingie is really friggin’ cool.

4.  Time.  I am as well-armed as a 5-foot-tall chick in cute boots can be.  I have:  a wall calendar (which is turned to the correct page, I might add *bow*), a daytimer for my new organized, clean and free-of-stray-LifeSavers purse, brand new pens in assorted cheerful colours (not part of the organization plan.  Part of the ‘make things pretty’ plan) and a new notebook for my extensive to-do list (and it’s pretty).  I have programmed my email account to ping me with reminders of important events.  Look out, 2009.

5.  Inertia.  So, yeah, getting older, eh?  Settling down, huh?  Stagnating in the small town?  HAH!  This is the year of zigs and zags, my friends – you’ll never know which way I’ll go…I’m gonna shake it up.  Go back to school?  Maybe.  Give up all my worldly goods and go live in a hut on the beach in Jamaica?  Possibly.  Swim with the sharks at the Great Barrier Reef?  You never know.  Become an astronaut?  WHY NOT?  I’ll give you settled down.  I’ll give you old.  Up yours, Inertia.

 

I bet the space shuttle could use some really good cord management.

The Suckiest Day Ever – A Comedy in One Act

There comes a point with sucky days where things cross the line and go from being ‘frustrating, annoying and horrible’ to being ‘twistedly and almost-enjoyably funny.’  Which is what my day yesterday did.  I even found myself hoping for more disasters just for the cheap laughs.  (It was a full moon, too, for what it’s worth.)

Now, I had worked a full graveyard shift already, but there was no time to sleep, as I had company coming over in the evening and many, many errands to run since it was my day off. 

Things started off with a bang, with me stepping directly into a pile of cat puke in bare feet right after I arrived home from work.  Things don’t get much suckier than that, my friends.  No, they don’t.  Or at least that’s what I thought at the time.  Read on.

It was raining.  A massive thunderstorm with a heavy rainfall warning in effect.  After washing off the cat puke, I went out to pay bills and discovered that although knee-high black rubber boots with 3-inch heels are very Catwoman-esque and definitely fit the criterion for ‘cute-boots’, they are not, in fact, waterproof.

Back home to clean.  The vacuum cleaner broke about 5 seconds into the clean-fest after sucking up a cat toy.  (Ironic, since without the stupid cats, the vacuuming would have been unnecessary.)  Then the store was out of replacement belts for my model.  Cat fur would remain on carpet.   

Now, you would think that from the way my day was progressing, I would have the sense not to choose this particular day for a makeover.  But…some people learn by watching, some learn by reading, and some just have to piss on the electric fence themselves. 

I didn’t discover that my shower’s water pressure had been mysteriously reduced to a trickle until I was standing in it with a head full of chocolate-brown hair dye.

And then, also mysteriously, the tension rod holding up my shower curtain suddenly decided it was going on strike.  No matter what I did (remember the hair dye slowly running down my back, threatening to leave my skin striped), I could not get the damn thing to go back up.  Not that it mattered – it wasn’t like the spray was a big problem, what with the water pressure issues.

After about 800 years, the hair dye was finally rinsed out and my hair conditioned.  My now-pitch-black-instead-of-chocolate-brown hair.

Shortly after this, my friend showed up, happily bearing copious amounts of alcohol and cigarettes (I don’t smoke except on occasions such as these).  Of course, I only like menthols and those she had brought were not.  Of course.

Throw in a texting drama-fest with an old boyfriend and running out of mix and my day was complete. 

But if you know anything about me, you know I am a survivor. 

Sometime around 2 am, I discovered that regular cigarettes taste just like menthols if you suck a piece of candy cane while smoking.  And Tia Maria is delicious mixed with mushed-up mocha soymilk popsicles and crushed ice.  Black hair?  How very striking, á la Betty Boop/Elizabeth Taylor/Morticia Addams.  Add Killers videos and conversation with good friends?  

All better.  And really, you just gotta laugh.

(Incidentally, both the shower curtain rod and the water pressure were back to normal today.  Go figure.)

On the Importance of Always Remaining Just a Bit Out of Touch With Reality – Part II

A girl sits alone in a small emergency dispatch office.  It is the middle of the night.  The room is dark but for a single light above the desk and the twinkling of the Christmas tree lights.

She sits before the monumental task of preparing the monthly emergency reports with the satisfaction that comes from creating order from chaos.  It  is a good job.  It makes her feel important.

But in the back of her mind, she is dreaming of far-off places and the adventures that they hold.  The smell of the Christmas tree stirs a sense of anticipation; the old year draws to an end and a new one is about to begin.  She inhales deeply and shivers with pleasure at the mysteries that lie ahead.

Suddenly, a radio crackles to life, a radio which ensures constant communication with emergency personnel.  The girl casts aside her musings and leaps into action.  There is important business here, lives to be saved.

She keys the mike and speaks.  “Scotia here.  Go ahead, over.”

The speakers crackle again.  A momentary pause.  Then the firefighter’s voice bursts forth, with only a hint of suppressed laughter.

“What are you wearing?”

*headdesk*

Another Friday night in Bridgewater.