I know this helps A LOT of people, so when I ran across it - I knew I had to post it here.
Showing posts with label Grant. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Grant. Show all posts
Tuesday, January 26, 2010
Erin, Grant...possibly others
For those inclined to this sort of thing:
Simpleology
I know this helps A LOT of people, so when I ran across it - I knew I had to post it here.
I know this helps A LOT of people, so when I ran across it - I knew I had to post it here.
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
if you love something...
"If you love something, set it free"
This was a passing comment between Grant and myself this morning in the Florida room.
I had to walk into the living room to collect myself. It offended most of my senses and now it's stuck in my head and I find it increasingly irritating. So, you know, the proper protocol is to inflict it on all of you...
This is right up there with the "is the glass half full or half empty" thing to me - which you all know I fucking hate.
And again, it's just simply HALF - no more, no less. It's MATH.
I came back out to the Florida room and said, "What the hell does that even mean?!" - because I don't get it.
He repeated the whole thing - which helped me understand it, not at all.
-Richard Bach
Earth sign alert! Earth sign alert!
Terra Firma!
Foundation! Roots!
Structure! Cultivating! Building!
Red alert! Red alert!
All senses fully offended!
If you love something, you don't set it free!
If you love something - you nurture it, you care for it, you love it, you make it feel safe and secure, you make sure it's at least content, you cherish it, you give it a wide range to grow, you protect it with everything you're worth, you don't sell it, you don't trade it, you don't give it away, you're loyal to it, you're devoted to it, you live for it, you're willing to die for it and you don't treat it cheaply.
Oh my God... and if you can set it free, you didn't love it enough in the first fucking place!
My head may explode.
I admit it, I called Richard Bach an idiot.
Sorry, Richard - I'm sure you're a lovely person, on the inside...
Now this quote...
- Joan Crawford
...I can at least understand.
Wednesday, September 2, 2009
women's bathrooms
You can always tell the sign of a good restaurant/party house/hotel by the condition of their women's bathroom(s).
That's just a fun little fact.
If you want to know if you should plan any kind of event at a place, send some random female into their facilities and just observe the look on her face when she walks out.
If she comes out with a look of total disgust - don't even think about eating there.
It's as simple as that.
The look is unmistakable too. It's that clenched jaw, eyes half closed, every muscle in her body is tense and there is usually some subtle, if not full on, sneer on her face - stance.
For the male gender who may not yet be informed, let me explain.
We take our settings very seriously. We expect it to be clean. We expect to be able to see when we look in the mirror. We expect all the locks on the doors to work. We expect there to be plenty of supplies at our disposal.
We expect room to move. We expect there to be somewhere for us to put our purses and whatever other junk we happen to have with us.
We expect hooks on the backs of our doors - even if some of us aren't comfortable throwing our stuff up on said hook because we also know how easy it is for someone to just reach over and yank our stuff up and out.
NOT THE POINT!
We expect to not feel like we need to shower when we leave a public restroom.
Yes, I said it.
We expect this.
I always crinkle my nose whenever a bathroom is a) some one room thrown together with no thought enclosure or b) co-ed. Bite me. I don't want to share a bathroom with a male in my own house, let alone a bunch of strangers.
No offense. You men are wonderful. I just don't need to know *that* much about you. I see no real need to bond with you in that way. Stop peeing in front of me for crying out loud.
Now, a really well run place who cares about it's guest/clients/customers will build a real bathroom for women.
This will include up to three separate rooms. A foyer, a waiting area and the facilities themselves - which is large and has stalls on one wall and across from the stalls will be an entire wall side to side of mirrors and sinks.
The sink dispensers won't have the equivalent of Lava soap in them. It will be something fruity or flowery, usually some Yardley something or other that you wouldn't bother to spend the money on to put in your own house.
There will be lights - everywhere, so you can actually see what you're doing when you go to fix your make-up. There will be a large garbage can with a swinging lid on it so you don't have to actually see the garbage in it (if not two - one on either side of the room).
There will be a hand blow dryer AND a paper towel dispenser. Half of them have a folding changing table for babies attached to the wall that you can pull down and make your life easier. There is usually a machine that you can get tampons and pads from if you pay the quarter charge or whatever it is these days.
Each individual stall has a metal box for tampons and pads to dispose of and there is usually a huge roll of toilet paper (and another one behind it) and most of the time there will be a dispenser for those toilet seat covers which are more trouble than they're worth. It's nice to know it's available anyway.
There is at least one handicap, over-sized stall. This is not like a handicap parking space. The same rules do not apply. It's acceptable for anyone to use provided that no one is wheeling themselves in to the room before you go to use it.
Our sitting areas contain couches and nice chairs and mirrors with elegant frames on them. Some will have tables that contain baskets with items such as: bobby pins, safety pins, hair spray, spritzer, nylons, handiwipes, cotton balls, Q-Tips, pads, tampons and sewing kits in them. There is art on the wall, low lighting lamps on the table (designed to make our jewelry sparkle, no doubt) and either carpeting in these rooms or very nice tiles; usually carpet.
This is the norm.
Our bathrooms aren't just bathrooms.
They're conference rooms.
and yes, we *are* discussing *you*...
Now, let me set the scene now that you have all of that information floating around fresh in your head.
We were driving from Maryland back to New York. We found ourselves in the middle of East Nowhere, Pennsylvania when we decided to stop at a Citgo.
Seems normal enough, right?
Wrong.
My daughter and I go in search of the restroom. It is, of course, a one room hovel that we both squeezed into.
Fine.
We made our comments and then I looked up at the wall thinking that the dispenser was the usual tampon/pad dispenser.
Wrong, again!
I pointed to the dispenser silently until she looked up at it. When it registered what it actually was, she started laughing out loud.
Condoms!
In all my years, I've NEVER seen condoms sold in a women's bathroom.
But wait!
Not just condoms - adult novelty items too.
That was on the left side.
On the right side was - aspirin.
Seriously, aspirin.
All for the low, low price of $0.75 each.
We found the cracker jack mother of all dispensers!
You may get a condom or you may get an adult item - how lucky are you feeling tonight?! The right side was solely aspirin, but the left side - total guesswork!
She is, unmistakably my child. So we did what anyone would expect us to do left in a situation like this -- We wasted $4.50 on crap we wouldn't buy over the counter and laughed our asses off every time we dropped in three quarters and turned the knob. We had the added bonus of the bathroom wall being 5' from the outside cashier counter too and a full line in front of it.
We didn't care. It was too much for our senses as soon as this dropped out...
Tattoos.
The Ultimate in Fun & Fantasy.
Clearly, I have a lot to learn if tattoos are the ultimate in Fun & Fantasy. I've been doing it all wrong then. I'm going to have to rethink everything!
Grant must have given up on waiting for us because we found him outside at the car checking the oil. We maintained our silence on our newly purchased stash of Black Magic condoms, tattoos and massage oil.
That is, until we couldn't take it anymore and started laughing again.
Then he made the distinct mistake of finally asking us what took us so long.
My daughter and I exchanged a bonding smirk and then I casually said, "Oh, we were buying condoms..."
He rolled his eyes.
Like he didn't believe me.
Then he must have taken a second to think about it.
Because he knows that if whatever I say sounds really off - there is a 99.997% chance that it's 100% true...
Grant: "Did you really buy condoms?"
Me: "Yes."
silence...
Grant: "You did not."
Me: "Okay."
silence...
Grant: "Why in God's name would you be in there buying condoms?"
The two of us in stereo, all excited: "Because we've never seen a condom dispenser before in our bathrooms! It wasn't JUST a condom dispenser either!"
more silence.. at this point I can see why he's confused... I've had my tubes tied for the last 14 years and my daughter is waiting until after she graduates high school at least... this is SO NOT THE POINT!
We produced our bounty so he could bask in our excitement with us.
He still wasn't getting it.
Grant: "You know those are the kinds of condoms you get when you want to get someone pregnant or take your chances of getting an STD from the condom itself from a place like this..."
Me: "DON'T RAIN ON OUR PARADE!"
a whole lot of staring at our excited little faces while trying to figure out what in God's name to say to us to get us to stop...
Grant: "I'm not sure what the big deal is - that's standard in our bathrooms."
Me: "Yeah, we went into your bathroom too (WE HAD TO!). You had a two sided dispenser too. One side, regular condoms. Other side, ribbed condoms, "for her" - no aspirin..."
a whole fuckload of silence...
That's when I felt it was time to break open the marital aid package with the massage oil in it, you know, to break the silence. And what did I get for my efforts?
NOTHING!
That's what!
The freakin' box was EMPTY!
Empty, I say!
What the Hell kind of rip off bullshit is that?!
I looked at my daughter and said, "I think we should go back in and complain!" - being my offspring, she was all for the idea of witnessing that.
Grant: "Get in the car..."
Me: "Fine. I'll write them hate mail instead."
If any of you B&I employees are reading this:
Dear Barnett International Corporation,
You suck. We hate you.
Oh, and you owe me $0.75
Signed,
A Disgruntled & Disappointed Dispenser User
And that, is my condom story.
Oh, and by the way - the tattoo box contained a scorpion and a cartoon kitten playing with a green tennis ball...I don't even want to know who thinks that's the ultimate in Fun & Fantasy...
That's just a fun little fact.
If you want to know if you should plan any kind of event at a place, send some random female into their facilities and just observe the look on her face when she walks out.
If she comes out with a look of total disgust - don't even think about eating there.
It's as simple as that.
The look is unmistakable too. It's that clenched jaw, eyes half closed, every muscle in her body is tense and there is usually some subtle, if not full on, sneer on her face - stance.
For the male gender who may not yet be informed, let me explain.
We take our settings very seriously. We expect it to be clean. We expect to be able to see when we look in the mirror. We expect all the locks on the doors to work. We expect there to be plenty of supplies at our disposal.
We expect room to move. We expect there to be somewhere for us to put our purses and whatever other junk we happen to have with us.
We expect hooks on the backs of our doors - even if some of us aren't comfortable throwing our stuff up on said hook because we also know how easy it is for someone to just reach over and yank our stuff up and out.
NOT THE POINT!
We expect to not feel like we need to shower when we leave a public restroom.
Yes, I said it.
We expect this.
I always crinkle my nose whenever a bathroom is a) some one room thrown together with no thought enclosure or b) co-ed. Bite me. I don't want to share a bathroom with a male in my own house, let alone a bunch of strangers.
No offense. You men are wonderful. I just don't need to know *that* much about you. I see no real need to bond with you in that way. Stop peeing in front of me for crying out loud.
Now, a really well run place who cares about it's guest/clients/customers will build a real bathroom for women.
This will include up to three separate rooms. A foyer, a waiting area and the facilities themselves - which is large and has stalls on one wall and across from the stalls will be an entire wall side to side of mirrors and sinks.
The sink dispensers won't have the equivalent of Lava soap in them. It will be something fruity or flowery, usually some Yardley something or other that you wouldn't bother to spend the money on to put in your own house.
There will be lights - everywhere, so you can actually see what you're doing when you go to fix your make-up. There will be a large garbage can with a swinging lid on it so you don't have to actually see the garbage in it (if not two - one on either side of the room).
There will be a hand blow dryer AND a paper towel dispenser. Half of them have a folding changing table for babies attached to the wall that you can pull down and make your life easier. There is usually a machine that you can get tampons and pads from if you pay the quarter charge or whatever it is these days.
Each individual stall has a metal box for tampons and pads to dispose of and there is usually a huge roll of toilet paper (and another one behind it) and most of the time there will be a dispenser for those toilet seat covers which are more trouble than they're worth. It's nice to know it's available anyway.
There is at least one handicap, over-sized stall. This is not like a handicap parking space. The same rules do not apply. It's acceptable for anyone to use provided that no one is wheeling themselves in to the room before you go to use it.
Our sitting areas contain couches and nice chairs and mirrors with elegant frames on them. Some will have tables that contain baskets with items such as: bobby pins, safety pins, hair spray, spritzer, nylons, handiwipes, cotton balls, Q-Tips, pads, tampons and sewing kits in them. There is art on the wall, low lighting lamps on the table (designed to make our jewelry sparkle, no doubt) and either carpeting in these rooms or very nice tiles; usually carpet.
This is the norm.
Our bathrooms aren't just bathrooms.
They're conference rooms.
and yes, we *are* discussing *you*...
Now, let me set the scene now that you have all of that information floating around fresh in your head.
We were driving from Maryland back to New York. We found ourselves in the middle of East Nowhere, Pennsylvania when we decided to stop at a Citgo.
Seems normal enough, right?
Wrong.
My daughter and I go in search of the restroom. It is, of course, a one room hovel that we both squeezed into.
Fine.
We made our comments and then I looked up at the wall thinking that the dispenser was the usual tampon/pad dispenser.
Wrong, again!
I pointed to the dispenser silently until she looked up at it. When it registered what it actually was, she started laughing out loud.
Condoms!
In all my years, I've NEVER seen condoms sold in a women's bathroom.
But wait!
Not just condoms - adult novelty items too.
That was on the left side.
On the right side was - aspirin.
Seriously, aspirin.
All for the low, low price of $0.75 each.
We found the cracker jack mother of all dispensers!
You may get a condom or you may get an adult item - how lucky are you feeling tonight?! The right side was solely aspirin, but the left side - total guesswork!
She is, unmistakably my child. So we did what anyone would expect us to do left in a situation like this -- We wasted $4.50 on crap we wouldn't buy over the counter and laughed our asses off every time we dropped in three quarters and turned the knob. We had the added bonus of the bathroom wall being 5' from the outside cashier counter too and a full line in front of it.We didn't care. It was too much for our senses as soon as this dropped out...
Tattoos.The Ultimate in Fun & Fantasy.
Clearly, I have a lot to learn if tattoos are the ultimate in Fun & Fantasy. I've been doing it all wrong then. I'm going to have to rethink everything!
Grant must have given up on waiting for us because we found him outside at the car checking the oil. We maintained our silence on our newly purchased stash of Black Magic condoms, tattoos and massage oil.
That is, until we couldn't take it anymore and started laughing again.
Then he made the distinct mistake of finally asking us what took us so long.
My daughter and I exchanged a bonding smirk and then I casually said, "Oh, we were buying condoms..."
He rolled his eyes.
Like he didn't believe me.
Then he must have taken a second to think about it.
Because he knows that if whatever I say sounds really off - there is a 99.997% chance that it's 100% true...
Grant: "Did you really buy condoms?"
Me: "Yes."
silence...
Grant: "You did not."
Me: "Okay."
silence...
Grant: "Why in God's name would you be in there buying condoms?"
The two of us in stereo, all excited: "Because we've never seen a condom dispenser before in our bathrooms! It wasn't JUST a condom dispenser either!"
more silence.. at this point I can see why he's confused... I've had my tubes tied for the last 14 years and my daughter is waiting until after she graduates high school at least... this is SO NOT THE POINT!
We produced our bounty so he could bask in our excitement with us.
He still wasn't getting it.
Grant: "You know those are the kinds of condoms you get when you want to get someone pregnant or take your chances of getting an STD from the condom itself from a place like this..."
Me: "DON'T RAIN ON OUR PARADE!"
a whole lot of staring at our excited little faces while trying to figure out what in God's name to say to us to get us to stop...
Grant: "I'm not sure what the big deal is - that's standard in our bathrooms."
Me: "Yeah, we went into your bathroom too (WE HAD TO!). You had a two sided dispenser too. One side, regular condoms. Other side, ribbed condoms, "for her" - no aspirin..."
a whole fuckload of silence...
That's when I felt it was time to break open the marital aid package with the massage oil in it, you know, to break the silence. And what did I get for my efforts?
NOTHING!That's what!
The freakin' box was EMPTY!
Empty, I say!
What the Hell kind of rip off bullshit is that?!
I looked at my daughter and said, "I think we should go back in and complain!" - being my offspring, she was all for the idea of witnessing that.
Grant: "Get in the car..."
Me: "Fine. I'll write them hate mail instead."
If any of you B&I employees are reading this:
You suck. We hate you.
Oh, and you owe me $0.75
Signed,
A Disgruntled & Disappointed Dispenser User
And that, is my condom story.
Oh, and by the way - the tattoo box contained a scorpion and a cartoon kitten playing with a green tennis ball...I don't even want to know who thinks that's the ultimate in Fun & Fantasy...
Thursday, August 6, 2009
Man...
Ever have a week go by and every one of those days you stare at your keyboard and think, "I have a million things to write about and not one of them should ever be put into print, let alone be said out loud or in public!"
I can't even say that anything really out of the ordinary has happened either. The mind has just been in over-drive lately - maybe, rampaging is a better word for it.
Rampage is certainly a better word for it than, "certifiable" or "needs sedation"...I'm just saying...
I'm filled with social problems and their solutions, long term outcomes of social issues, screw ups in history, personal crossroads, reanalyzing theories, etc, etc.
As if that wasn't enough, this morning Grant and I had a lengthy discussion about quantum physics that easily could have resulted in a mental fist fight.
Grant called me over to watch this on his monitor:
Let me just say this...
Sometimes literal people shouldn't talk to outside of the box thinking people that love to deal with space and time and stuff you can't see or hold.
There is a natural tendency for those of us that are too literal for our own good, perhaps - to want to find some practical application to whatever bizarre shit you just came out with that you're taking as gospel.
Me: "If "A" is true, then it could conceivably be a factor in examples "B, C and D" this way (I'll spare you the details.)"
Grant: "No, you're not thinking big enough."
stare
Me: "Okay, then it matters... why?"
Grant: "You're not getting it..."
Me: "I understood everything you just said."
Grant: "Yeah, but you want to use it literally."
Me: "Yes, I do... of course, I do!"
Good Lord...
I don't see what the hell good a theory is if I can't apply it literally. We BOTH know this about me - why on earth would you ever expect anything different.
Did I become someone ELSE over-night when you weren't looking?
Don't get me wrong, I'm ALL for theories.
Give me your theory!
I'll listen!
I might not take it as Gospel, but who cares if I do or not. It's something else to think about and I'm good with that. I'll even throw out whatever practical application I can think of going on the basis that said theory could be etched in stone as fact.
I'm there!
The above, I'm okay with. Got it. My issue is, it goes on the assumption that there are some kind of holes/spaces/openings that exist in our dimension versus the possibility that all these particles are just trapped in a giant box like container.
That's all I was saying!
Grant: "Everything is made up of particles and this new revelation fucks E=mc2 and gravity."
Me: "Okay, that's great - except you can count on your particles plummeting out of a tree to the ground if you go up that ladder and then fall. You don't have to see the particles with the naked eye to know what the outcome is going to be - so I wouldn't be so quick to dismiss it."
Then this came up:
I said, "That could conceivably explain why twins can be raised separately and in other countries by other families and still have the same idiosyncrasies and know when something is happening to their siblings thousands of miles away" - which I thought was a valid point.
To further that line of thinking, it would explain why we still maintain a sense of tribal togetherness when a world wide crisis takes place.
Building on the surprise that I felt when people all over the world who live in far more horrendous conditions than Americans do, on a regular basis, felt such sorrow over 9/11... I've been trying to reason that out for ages...
Me: "Then you have to allow for figuring out if any of the particles have been diffused over time versus remaining the same or evolving to become stronger."
Grant: "You're not thinking big enough. You're contemplating the little things and not the universe as a whole."
I'm sure I visibly twitched...
Me: "Well, I can SEE people! I can SEE my surroundings! Of course, that's going to be my first thought... have we just MET? It's not like you haven't known me for the last 25 years! And you want me to IGNORE the fact that the universe is made up of ALL THESE TINY LITTLE PARTICLES IN FRONT OF ALL OF US because I'm not thinking BIG enough? There wouldn't even BE a BIGGER PICTURE without those little details."
This is what divides the big thinkers and the people that actually CARE about the details. He is one and I am clearly the other. It really doesn't have to be an argument. You need BOTH sides to figure stuff out.
Throw all the pieces of the puzzle on my desk in any order you want and I'll eventually make a picture out of it. While I'm working on that though, throwing another 6 sets of 10,000 puzzles pieces in the mix is only going to result in me having to sort out what pieces go to which set first.
Then this came up AGAIN. It's brilliant and the series is the easiest way to comprehend the concept. I own the book and I love it. The whole show is worth viewing if you have the time.
Okay!
Granted!
Then that's our handicap.
And quite frankly, there's no real reason why we can't create contact lenses that allow us to see better than 20/20 if we can make lens for microscopes that can amplify vision down to the kind of level that allows us to SEE tiny particles...please...
Me: "Just like monitors. You see images on the monitor in 72 dpi (dots per inch). We are capable of SEEING more colors than that, but the monitor can't handle it (which is more due to how big the image file would be for downloads too). That makes the handicap the monitor, not your eye-sight.
When you design something print-worthy, you'd use a 600-1200 dpi creation. If you print out something that's 72 dpi, on paper, it will look like a bunch of fully formed dots and a lot of space not filled in. If you print out something that's 1200 dpi, it might look the same as the 72 dpi image on the monitor - but when you print it on paper, it will look as smooth as a photograph (depending, of course, on the paper as well as the printer)."
I thought that was a good comparison!
Which leads back to our eye-sight being the flawed piece.
Grant: "Why do I talk to you..."
Me: "I have no conceivable idea."
We decided we were better off just moving on to a different subject.
laughs
That is, until we were standing in an aisle at the grocery store and he looked at me and said, "The only reason I'm here is because you see me."
That made me laugh.
I want credit for biting the inside of my cheek and not saying, "WTF?! I'D STILL BE HERE WHETHER YOU SAW ME OR NOT!"
I can't even say that anything really out of the ordinary has happened either. The mind has just been in over-drive lately - maybe, rampaging is a better word for it.
Rampage is certainly a better word for it than, "certifiable" or "needs sedation"...I'm just saying...
I'm filled with social problems and their solutions, long term outcomes of social issues, screw ups in history, personal crossroads, reanalyzing theories, etc, etc.
As if that wasn't enough, this morning Grant and I had a lengthy discussion about quantum physics that easily could have resulted in a mental fist fight.
Grant called me over to watch this on his monitor:
Let me just say this...
Sometimes literal people shouldn't talk to outside of the box thinking people that love to deal with space and time and stuff you can't see or hold.
There is a natural tendency for those of us that are too literal for our own good, perhaps - to want to find some practical application to whatever bizarre shit you just came out with that you're taking as gospel.
Me: "If "A" is true, then it could conceivably be a factor in examples "B, C and D" this way (I'll spare you the details.)"
Grant: "No, you're not thinking big enough."
stare
Me: "Okay, then it matters... why?"
Grant: "You're not getting it..."
Me: "I understood everything you just said."
Grant: "Yeah, but you want to use it literally."
Me: "Yes, I do... of course, I do!"
Good Lord...
I don't see what the hell good a theory is if I can't apply it literally. We BOTH know this about me - why on earth would you ever expect anything different.
Did I become someone ELSE over-night when you weren't looking?
Don't get me wrong, I'm ALL for theories.
Give me your theory!
I'll listen!
I might not take it as Gospel, but who cares if I do or not. It's something else to think about and I'm good with that. I'll even throw out whatever practical application I can think of going on the basis that said theory could be etched in stone as fact.
I'm there!
The above, I'm okay with. Got it. My issue is, it goes on the assumption that there are some kind of holes/spaces/openings that exist in our dimension versus the possibility that all these particles are just trapped in a giant box like container.
That's all I was saying!
Grant: "Everything is made up of particles and this new revelation fucks E=mc2 and gravity."
Me: "Okay, that's great - except you can count on your particles plummeting out of a tree to the ground if you go up that ladder and then fall. You don't have to see the particles with the naked eye to know what the outcome is going to be - so I wouldn't be so quick to dismiss it."
Then this came up:
I said, "That could conceivably explain why twins can be raised separately and in other countries by other families and still have the same idiosyncrasies and know when something is happening to their siblings thousands of miles away" - which I thought was a valid point.
To further that line of thinking, it would explain why we still maintain a sense of tribal togetherness when a world wide crisis takes place.
Building on the surprise that I felt when people all over the world who live in far more horrendous conditions than Americans do, on a regular basis, felt such sorrow over 9/11... I've been trying to reason that out for ages...
Me: "Then you have to allow for figuring out if any of the particles have been diffused over time versus remaining the same or evolving to become stronger."
Grant: "You're not thinking big enough. You're contemplating the little things and not the universe as a whole."
I'm sure I visibly twitched...
Me: "Well, I can SEE people! I can SEE my surroundings! Of course, that's going to be my first thought... have we just MET? It's not like you haven't known me for the last 25 years! And you want me to IGNORE the fact that the universe is made up of ALL THESE TINY LITTLE PARTICLES IN FRONT OF ALL OF US because I'm not thinking BIG enough? There wouldn't even BE a BIGGER PICTURE without those little details."
This is what divides the big thinkers and the people that actually CARE about the details. He is one and I am clearly the other. It really doesn't have to be an argument. You need BOTH sides to figure stuff out.
Throw all the pieces of the puzzle on my desk in any order you want and I'll eventually make a picture out of it. While I'm working on that though, throwing another 6 sets of 10,000 puzzles pieces in the mix is only going to result in me having to sort out what pieces go to which set first.
Then this came up AGAIN. It's brilliant and the series is the easiest way to comprehend the concept. I own the book and I love it. The whole show is worth viewing if you have the time.
Okay!
Granted!
Then that's our handicap.
And quite frankly, there's no real reason why we can't create contact lenses that allow us to see better than 20/20 if we can make lens for microscopes that can amplify vision down to the kind of level that allows us to SEE tiny particles...please...
Me: "Just like monitors. You see images on the monitor in 72 dpi (dots per inch). We are capable of SEEING more colors than that, but the monitor can't handle it (which is more due to how big the image file would be for downloads too). That makes the handicap the monitor, not your eye-sight.
When you design something print-worthy, you'd use a 600-1200 dpi creation. If you print out something that's 72 dpi, on paper, it will look like a bunch of fully formed dots and a lot of space not filled in. If you print out something that's 1200 dpi, it might look the same as the 72 dpi image on the monitor - but when you print it on paper, it will look as smooth as a photograph (depending, of course, on the paper as well as the printer)."
I thought that was a good comparison!
Which leads back to our eye-sight being the flawed piece.
Grant: "Why do I talk to you..."
Me: "I have no conceivable idea."
We decided we were better off just moving on to a different subject.
laughs
That is, until we were standing in an aisle at the grocery store and he looked at me and said, "The only reason I'm here is because you see me."
That made me laugh.
I want credit for biting the inside of my cheek and not saying, "WTF?! I'D STILL BE HERE WHETHER YOU SAW ME OR NOT!"
Thursday, June 11, 2009
how does this happen...
Fucking A.
Grant just got a new doctor now that his insurance just kicked in in New York.
He just called me.
He called the doctor's office three days ago, made an appointment, saw the guy for 8 whole minutes and is on his way home with two narcotic prescriptions and two other prescriptions for his migraines.
HOW THE FUCK DOES THIS HAPPEN?!
I go to the Critical Care Unit with a stack of papers IN HAND and the results of a MRI confirming a ruptured disk in my spine from two days BEFORE I walked in - and the chick gives me 6 whole freakin' pills of glorified aspirin and I had to fight for those.
He's going to stroll through the house with a 90 day supply of something way better than what the Critical Care Unit gave me.
He's a STRANGER.
He has NO RECORDS in this state of any kind.
He could be some homeless drug addict that just walked in off the street for all anyone fucking knows... and they whip out the prescription pad and start looking for a pen.
HOW THE FUCK DOES THIS HAPPEN?!
He doesn't even have so much as a headache at the moment.
Oh my God...
For those that have had a ruptured disk, you know that at its onset (and usually for the following 2-4 months straight) - you're looking around for someone to beg to kill you with a hammer.
It doesn't even have to be a hammer.
Really, any kind of blunt object will do.
The thought of turning into MacGyver crosses your mind as you search around the house for some implement that will allow you to gouge your own spine out.
Whatever!
You're not picky at that point!
You will freely accept being run over by a Toyota Corolla.
And THEN ask them to kindly BACK UP OVER YOU.
One time my former doctor had me stand up and pushed against my lower spine and I literally said, "If you do that again, I'm going to punch you in the face."
That's how bad it gets.
HE strolls in and gets three months of high powered pain killers for something that MAY fucking happen.
Do you see the justice here?
...and he just had the nerve to call me and say, "Well, now you have something to write about today."
I told him I was already doing that.
Not that he ever bothers to read this.
He's been here all of ONCE.
Every time he calls I just pick up the phone and my first word is, "Unreal..." and he just laughs.
I'm convinced I could be laying down in a pool of my own blood and some dickhead would say to me, "What, you want an over-the-counter Advil that anyone can obtain? I don't know... are you sure you need one?"
It's not just my current doctor either.
It's every fucking doctor I've ever seen in my whole life.
I lead the cleanest life of just about everyone I know too!
I hate narcotics.
I'm a control freak.
They violate everything I stand for.
No history whatsoever of ANY kind of drug abuse.
If I have to go to the hospital, I even take in two other bottles of muscle relaxers so they know which kind don't work - and half the pills are still in them!
The only time I ever ask for shit is when my disks try to leave my body to go live on their own. It's been exactly four times in the last SEVEN YEARS.
The only thing I could get in over his laughter was, "Do I just find the only doctors that have actually gone to medical school versus printing their certificates off the internet or what?!"
What's worse is I could probably go to his doctor and it would be the same exact thing.
Throw some dirt on it and walk it off...
Unbelievable.
Grant just got a new doctor now that his insurance just kicked in in New York.
He just called me.
He called the doctor's office three days ago, made an appointment, saw the guy for 8 whole minutes and is on his way home with two narcotic prescriptions and two other prescriptions for his migraines.
HOW THE FUCK DOES THIS HAPPEN?!
I go to the Critical Care Unit with a stack of papers IN HAND and the results of a MRI confirming a ruptured disk in my spine from two days BEFORE I walked in - and the chick gives me 6 whole freakin' pills of glorified aspirin and I had to fight for those.
He's going to stroll through the house with a 90 day supply of something way better than what the Critical Care Unit gave me.
He's a STRANGER.
He has NO RECORDS in this state of any kind.
He could be some homeless drug addict that just walked in off the street for all anyone fucking knows... and they whip out the prescription pad and start looking for a pen.
HOW THE FUCK DOES THIS HAPPEN?!
He doesn't even have so much as a headache at the moment.
Oh my God...
For those that have had a ruptured disk, you know that at its onset (and usually for the following 2-4 months straight) - you're looking around for someone to beg to kill you with a hammer.
It doesn't even have to be a hammer.
Really, any kind of blunt object will do.
The thought of turning into MacGyver crosses your mind as you search around the house for some implement that will allow you to gouge your own spine out.
Whatever!
You're not picky at that point!
You will freely accept being run over by a Toyota Corolla.
And THEN ask them to kindly BACK UP OVER YOU.
One time my former doctor had me stand up and pushed against my lower spine and I literally said, "If you do that again, I'm going to punch you in the face."
That's how bad it gets.
HE strolls in and gets three months of high powered pain killers for something that MAY fucking happen.
Do you see the justice here?
...and he just had the nerve to call me and say, "Well, now you have something to write about today."
I told him I was already doing that.
Not that he ever bothers to read this.
He's been here all of ONCE.
Every time he calls I just pick up the phone and my first word is, "Unreal..." and he just laughs.
I'm convinced I could be laying down in a pool of my own blood and some dickhead would say to me, "What, you want an over-the-counter Advil that anyone can obtain? I don't know... are you sure you need one?"
It's not just my current doctor either.
It's every fucking doctor I've ever seen in my whole life.
I lead the cleanest life of just about everyone I know too!
I hate narcotics.
I'm a control freak.
They violate everything I stand for.
No history whatsoever of ANY kind of drug abuse.
If I have to go to the hospital, I even take in two other bottles of muscle relaxers so they know which kind don't work - and half the pills are still in them!
The only time I ever ask for shit is when my disks try to leave my body to go live on their own. It's been exactly four times in the last SEVEN YEARS.
The only thing I could get in over his laughter was, "Do I just find the only doctors that have actually gone to medical school versus printing their certificates off the internet or what?!"
What's worse is I could probably go to his doctor and it would be the same exact thing.
Throw some dirt on it and walk it off...
Unbelievable.
Thursday, June 4, 2009
sounds like...
Grant has been not-so-patiently waiting for the UPS guy to show up. It seems that when a male buys a car, the first thing he has to do is get a stereo for it.
We actually had this conversation:
Grant: "You know I need to get a stereo now, right?"
like I care... if it will make your life better in some way and you'll use it on a daily basis... have at it... it doesn't need to be a discussion...
Me: "I have heard that's the typical male protocol, yes."
What, you're unhappy with the cassette player in the car?
This led to hours and hours and hours of online research to find the best - all of which I had to hear about.
Grant: "I'm looking for one with the..." - and this is where the two handed visual aide came into play.
he uses both hands to make this up and down wiggling fingers gesture...
Me: "First word?! Sounds like?! Crazy person! Really, what the hell are you trying to say to me? In English this time."
it's probably needless to say that he didn't appreciate my not getting it...
Grant: making the same two-handed up and down wiggle gesturing motion and adding in English..."You know, with the cool lights and remote!"
Me: "An equalizer? Yeah, okay. Does anyone really need a remote in a car though? Is leaning forward 6" THAT strenuous?"
I'm in awe that anyone even made a remote for something a half a foot away. That just seems like more work than actually leaning IN and we all know it's a matter of time before the words, "Where's the damn remote?!" becomes a part of every day conversation in the car.
Grant: "We really shouldn't spend the money on it"
he says this, but he's saying it while still looking up car stereos - so, it's not really convincing...
Me: "Will it make you happy?"
"Will it make you happy?" is girl speak for, "Can I stop hearing about it then?" - I would have made someone a great husband.
I'm a girl. We don't really see your happiness as a huge win. No female ever bragged, "Oh, I made my husband/boyfriend so happy the other day" - We brag to our female friends when you make us happy.
Not the other way around.
If you make us happy, we'll be on the phone to everyone we know going, "You know what that darling man did the other day?! He's the best!"
No female is going to mass call her girlfriends and go, "I made him so happy by consenting to a ridiculous amount of money being put into a car stereo!" - it just doesn't work that way.
Perfect example, if Grant hated how the shed looked, I wouldn't be all up in arms about it and run out to get paint for it to make him happy. I would be like, "then do something about it if you hate it" - see how that works?
Fair? Probably not.
Honest? Yes.
Somehow this has led to a new car stereo, a remote, speakers - and him now waiting on a subwoofer to be delivered.
Fear for the UPS guy if it doesn't show up soon.
* I want credit for only making a handful of comments about all this stuff costing half the cost of the car.
We actually had this conversation:
Grant: "You know I need to get a stereo now, right?"
like I care... if it will make your life better in some way and you'll use it on a daily basis... have at it... it doesn't need to be a discussion...
Me: "I have heard that's the typical male protocol, yes."
What, you're unhappy with the cassette player in the car?
This led to hours and hours and hours of online research to find the best - all of which I had to hear about.
Grant: "I'm looking for one with the..." - and this is where the two handed visual aide came into play.
he uses both hands to make this up and down wiggling fingers gesture...
Me: "First word?! Sounds like?! Crazy person! Really, what the hell are you trying to say to me? In English this time."
it's probably needless to say that he didn't appreciate my not getting it...
Grant: making the same two-handed up and down wiggle gesturing motion and adding in English..."You know, with the cool lights and remote!"
Me: "An equalizer? Yeah, okay. Does anyone really need a remote in a car though? Is leaning forward 6" THAT strenuous?"
I'm in awe that anyone even made a remote for something a half a foot away. That just seems like more work than actually leaning IN and we all know it's a matter of time before the words, "Where's the damn remote?!" becomes a part of every day conversation in the car.
Grant: "We really shouldn't spend the money on it"
he says this, but he's saying it while still looking up car stereos - so, it's not really convincing...
Me: "Will it make you happy?"
"Will it make you happy?" is girl speak for, "Can I stop hearing about it then?" - I would have made someone a great husband.
I'm a girl. We don't really see your happiness as a huge win. No female ever bragged, "Oh, I made my husband/boyfriend so happy the other day" - We brag to our female friends when you make us happy.
Not the other way around.
If you make us happy, we'll be on the phone to everyone we know going, "You know what that darling man did the other day?! He's the best!"
No female is going to mass call her girlfriends and go, "I made him so happy by consenting to a ridiculous amount of money being put into a car stereo!" - it just doesn't work that way.
Perfect example, if Grant hated how the shed looked, I wouldn't be all up in arms about it and run out to get paint for it to make him happy. I would be like, "then do something about it if you hate it" - see how that works?
Fair? Probably not.
Honest? Yes.
Somehow this has led to a new car stereo, a remote, speakers - and him now waiting on a subwoofer to be delivered.
Fear for the UPS guy if it doesn't show up soon.
* I want credit for only making a handful of comments about all this stuff costing half the cost of the car.
shed, garage, neighbors and lead paint
All week Grant has been busting his ass.
I have a shed in the backyard and I've always hated its baby blue trim. It was like that when I got here. For four years I've been staring at it and saying, "I really hate that blue" - it was my ritual.
I have a deep large cement porch in the front of the house.
On the side of my house under the canopy section of the driveway is where buggies use to pull up and pick people up from a platform. This way, since the platform was an even height with the buggy floor, people could just step right into them. The door to the platform is one of two in my living room.
There are eight doors that lead into the main part of this house; including a second floor entry.
My house is 99 years old.
It will be 100 years old later this year.
The platform has since had a brick wall covered in stucco added to it. The steps are concrete as well.
I'm a fan of concrete.
It's solid and dependable.
The concrete of the front steps, front porch and the side steps are a deep garnet red. A lot like the color of semi-dried blood and I love it.
You can see how the ugly baby blue trim on the shed in the backyard just mocks the ruby redness of the concrete on the rest of the house and violates every sense I own.
Hence my, "I really hate that blue" sentiment.
Grant and my daughter were out there scraping the shed at the beginning of the week and two days later - a newly painted white shed with dark red trim that matches perfectly was in play.
It looks great.
They did a wonderful job.
There are two features of my house that are, what I consider, an eyesore. The masonry around the bottom of the house where the stucco is cracking away from the brick - and the garage.
The garage was added twenty years after the house was built, so it's only a mere 80 years old to the 100 year old home.
Grant has been out there for the last three days blasting the hell out of it with a pressure washer. Come to find out, it use to be painted dark red and then before that a deep forest green, which I also really like.
There are 80 years worth of paint chips all over my yard, the flower beds, the drive way, Grant, the girl child and the trees.
...and I couldn't care less.
The neighbors will just have to deal.
These days, Grant is sporting a mask more often than not. I'm not even going to get into how much lead he would be inhaling if he didn't.
Brain damage isn't attractive.
People have been stopping by all week to stop and say something about all the improvements.
We live in the Historical Village of a town and believe it or not, my house is the baby in the area. Some of the houses are from 1840.
Four neighbors have already been over today. If there was ever an area that could still be considered to resemble a Norman Rockwell place - this is it.
Every neighbor that stopped by said the same thing, "If you need anything, just yell - we've got more tools than Chase Pitkins" - this is said because everyone around here knows that dealing with an old house from another century is far different than making improvements on a house from 1970+.
It's nice.
They're all friendly people without getting all in your business.
It's a delicate balance.
Since there's no way in hell that I'm going to be working with pressure washers and power sanders and re-injure my spine, I've been taking care of everything inside.
Except the kitchen floor.
Every day until today, I've been down on my hands and knees cleaning that God forsaken fucking floor. It's a stately looking floor when it's done. It's the black and white squares like below.
Let me say this...
Don't install that shit. I don't care how it looks, it's a giant pain in the ass to stay clean. Beautiful when it's done, but unless you're going to shoot everyone in the Florida room before they walk on it - it's NEVER going to stay clean.
When I first moved in here, I use to have to clean it three times a day.
WHO THE HELL WANTS TO MAKE A PART-TIME CAREER OUT OF CLEANING A FUCKING FLOOR?
Not... me...
And since no one in this house has figured out that they can't track all sorts of crap across it 875 times a day from outside and it remain clean - I'm not doing it.
Really, WHY do I have a mud room again?
Trust me on this one, even if you're one of those easy going pacifists - if someone makes a mess of a floor like that that you cleaned, you will consider choking them or using some kind of violence.
At the very least, poisoning someones coffee WILL cross your mind.
It's not worth the felony charge.
I'm not saying a felony charge is never worth it.
I'm just saying it should never be over a kitchen floor.
That's all.
Can you see how stupid you'd look to the other inmates?
"What are you in for?"
"I killed 27 people at McDonald's back in the 80's. What are you here for?"
"Nice to meet you. Aren't you the ambitious one? I killed someone for tracking paint chips and mud on my kitchen floor."
"O-kay! You know what, I don't even want to know you. Freak."
It would not be a confidence building exercise.
That was probably all very wrong to write.
You get the picture though.
I have a shed in the backyard and I've always hated its baby blue trim. It was like that when I got here. For four years I've been staring at it and saying, "I really hate that blue" - it was my ritual.
I have a deep large cement porch in the front of the house.
On the side of my house under the canopy section of the driveway is where buggies use to pull up and pick people up from a platform. This way, since the platform was an even height with the buggy floor, people could just step right into them. The door to the platform is one of two in my living room.
There are eight doors that lead into the main part of this house; including a second floor entry.
My house is 99 years old.
It will be 100 years old later this year.
The platform has since had a brick wall covered in stucco added to it. The steps are concrete as well.
I'm a fan of concrete.
It's solid and dependable.
The concrete of the front steps, front porch and the side steps are a deep garnet red. A lot like the color of semi-dried blood and I love it.
You can see how the ugly baby blue trim on the shed in the backyard just mocks the ruby redness of the concrete on the rest of the house and violates every sense I own.
Hence my, "I really hate that blue" sentiment.
Grant and my daughter were out there scraping the shed at the beginning of the week and two days later - a newly painted white shed with dark red trim that matches perfectly was in play.
It looks great.
They did a wonderful job.
There are two features of my house that are, what I consider, an eyesore. The masonry around the bottom of the house where the stucco is cracking away from the brick - and the garage.
The garage was added twenty years after the house was built, so it's only a mere 80 years old to the 100 year old home.
Grant has been out there for the last three days blasting the hell out of it with a pressure washer. Come to find out, it use to be painted dark red and then before that a deep forest green, which I also really like.
There are 80 years worth of paint chips all over my yard, the flower beds, the drive way, Grant, the girl child and the trees.
...and I couldn't care less.
The neighbors will just have to deal.
These days, Grant is sporting a mask more often than not. I'm not even going to get into how much lead he would be inhaling if he didn't.
Brain damage isn't attractive.
People have been stopping by all week to stop and say something about all the improvements.
We live in the Historical Village of a town and believe it or not, my house is the baby in the area. Some of the houses are from 1840.
Four neighbors have already been over today. If there was ever an area that could still be considered to resemble a Norman Rockwell place - this is it.
Every neighbor that stopped by said the same thing, "If you need anything, just yell - we've got more tools than Chase Pitkins" - this is said because everyone around here knows that dealing with an old house from another century is far different than making improvements on a house from 1970+.
It's nice.
They're all friendly people without getting all in your business.
It's a delicate balance.
Since there's no way in hell that I'm going to be working with pressure washers and power sanders and re-injure my spine, I've been taking care of everything inside.
Except the kitchen floor.
Every day until today, I've been down on my hands and knees cleaning that God forsaken fucking floor. It's a stately looking floor when it's done. It's the black and white squares like below.
Let me say this...
Don't install that shit. I don't care how it looks, it's a giant pain in the ass to stay clean. Beautiful when it's done, but unless you're going to shoot everyone in the Florida room before they walk on it - it's NEVER going to stay clean.
When I first moved in here, I use to have to clean it three times a day.
WHO THE HELL WANTS TO MAKE A PART-TIME CAREER OUT OF CLEANING A FUCKING FLOOR?
Not... me...
And since no one in this house has figured out that they can't track all sorts of crap across it 875 times a day from outside and it remain clean - I'm not doing it.
Really, WHY do I have a mud room again?
Trust me on this one, even if you're one of those easy going pacifists - if someone makes a mess of a floor like that that you cleaned, you will consider choking them or using some kind of violence.
At the very least, poisoning someones coffee WILL cross your mind.
It's not worth the felony charge.
I'm not saying a felony charge is never worth it.
I'm just saying it should never be over a kitchen floor.
That's all.
Can you see how stupid you'd look to the other inmates?
"What are you in for?"
"I killed 27 people at McDonald's back in the 80's. What are you here for?"
"Nice to meet you. Aren't you the ambitious one? I killed someone for tracking paint chips and mud on my kitchen floor."
"O-kay! You know what, I don't even want to know you. Freak."
It would not be a confidence building exercise.
That was probably all very wrong to write.
You get the picture though.
Saturday, May 30, 2009
Saturday...
I wrote, "Saturday" because for the life of me, I haven't figured out how to make the dates work with this template...yet.
My daughter is out with Grant scraping the garage and shed to get it prepared for the big paint job they have planned for it.
That's not quite accurate.
It's the big paint job that Grant has been talking about for two weeks now. I just taught him to be an opportunist since he's never had kids. When you have kids, it's ALL about being an opportunist.
She wants to go to her best friends house and spend the night tonight. He needs help with the garage and I'm not doing it.
Hello?
Do you hear opportunity knocking?
I'm a mom, so I don't need opportunities. With me, it's simply, "you're not going anywhere until I can see the floor of your room again. I KNOW there's a rug under there somewhere, I vaguely remember the color."
This stance is non-negotiable.
Then again, I don't care if she likes me or not.
which is probably why we're so close...
and we're ridiculously close...
Grant, on the other hand, sometimes takes her hormonal teenage girl moody ways - personal.
Which is a fatal error on his part.
The funny part about it is - for a teenage girl, she's a piece of cake.
I've been around her friends, trust me, it could be a whole lot worse.
She's a pretty, pretty girl - but doesn't really get it yet. She knows she's not ugly, but she doesn't really care one way or another either.
I drilled into both of my kid's head that looks are not something you can bank on. Everyone is one good car accident from whatever looks they have being taken away from them.
It's the luck of the draw.
So you HAVE to have something to back up your existence.
to quote Judge Judy, "Beauty fades, stupid is forever"...
She couldn't be less concerned about her weight either.
Thank God.
My son tried his best to die on me when he was 27 months old. I lived in a hospital with him for five weeks, literally. I slept in what can, at best, be considered a critical care unit's parental closet. It consisted of a cot and the door was off of the visitor's lounge.
I mention this because the Critical Care Unit for his age didn't have any room for him. So they put him in the adolescent ward portion. Being there so long, you get to learn who the other patients are and their families because you're all in this horrendous situation together - where your kid is fighting for their life.
What I remember from the experience of being on that ward is that 90% of the kids on that floor were there because they were either anorexic or bulimic - and they were DYING because of it.
The age range was from 9-18.
Kids.
Little kids.
Nine year old's that thought themselves too fat and were literally starving themselves to DEATH over it.
Girls AND boys.
Let me say again that causing insecurities in the other sex does NOT make us even - it makes it equally WRONG.
To this day, I can recall how I felt when I heard that time and time again there.
That sealed in stone exactly how I was going to deal with my kids and weight and beauty. My daughter was only 5 weeks old at the time and I swore to God that there was no way in hell that either of my kids were going to grow up capitalizing on their looks to the point that it could turn into that.
The fact that they both turned out to be okay with how they are as people and don't place so much concentration on vanity is half me and half dumb luck.
I'm sure no parent wants that for their kid. So that's not a judgment call from me, that was just an awareness that I hadn't had before slapping me in the face while being in that ward.
You would be SHOCKED at how cruel kids are to other kids.
Even at the age of 11/12/13 - a lot of my daughter's girl friends were on diets. They're all rail thin too. It makes me cringe.
The sick part is it's usually over some comment that some boy has made to them.
That's another reason why I've drilled into my son's head that he's not to say a cruel word to a girl growing up - because we remember things like that. It sticks with us, forever...and at some point, you might want to date her later in life and you'll be cutting off your nose despite your face.
That and I will kill you.
I have to tell this story...
A boy tried to get my daughter to be self-conscious about her weight once. She's never been heavy. She's actually very petite. Tiny. He saw her with a purse full of assorted snacks though and said something about her weight.
She has a purse of assorted snacks because she's been diabetic since she was 18 months old.
It totally backfired.
By the time she got home, she was livid.
LIVID.
She informed said boy that he didn't have an ounce of authority over her, she didn't care what he thought and then proceeded to dedicate every forkful of food to him during lunch...and the whole following day.
I've never been so secretly thankful in my entire life.
Then I got pissed though and I thought, this little 12 year old boy knows exactly what to say to a girl to get under her skin normally. If he had said that to any of her friend's, they wouldn't eat again for a week and I could easily see them winding up on that wing in the hospital.
Yes, I did go to my son and tell him that story to reiterate that he can't do things like that.
Ever.
It's rude and damaging.
I have no idea why I told that story. It's just one of those things that still bothers me about society.
If you have a son, point that out to him!
If you have a daughter, make her feel like she never has to follow some media created ideal of beauty.
Here's the real kicker too, I polled my male friends and guess what? They're more attracted to someone with a shape versus someone that resembles a sheet of paper.
How's that for irony.
Even bigger than that though, it will ALWAYS be better to actually have a personality.
Be smart, be witty, be strong, be funny, be creative, be interesting, be honest, be dependable, be responsible, be a decent human being - be something lasting and worth-while.
That goes for both sexes.
Present yourself the best way you know how, definitely, but for the love of God - let there be something more to you than vanity.
The most angry I ever get at Grant is when he makes comments like, "You're beautiful, that's why you can do what you do."
I...fucking...hate...that...statement.
I hate it with a passion that you don't want to see.
Do not reduce me to how I look - like that's all there is and that's all that counts.
My looks didn't have dick to do with being trusted with tens of thousands of dollars running an International charity. It didn't have a thing to do with being able to run my own company of some sort since I was 18 years old. It didn't have a thing to do with having a 4.0 G.P.A. in college.
It didn't have a thing to do with being able to raise two kids that I would want to know if they weren't even mine. And it damn sure doesn't have a thing to do with being able to maintain friendships that I've had since I was 5 years old.
Infuriating.
I know he does this when we're fighting and he's just trying his best to piss me right off, but it sticks with me and it makes me hostile. I know he doesn't mean it because of the other 50,000 comments he makes to the contrary when he's not trying to get under my skin. It's still a stupid route to take with me.
Oh my God, what is this, purge day?
See, this is exactly the sort of thing that I never want my kids to go through. I couldn't be more happy that my daughter can have something like that said to her and it would just roll off her back like you didn't even open your mouth to speak.
More people should be made up of what she's made up of.
Hell, I wish I was more like her.
I adore that kid.
All that said, I'm not her friend and not interested in ever being her friend, really. I'm her mother and there is a food chain and I'm on the top of it.
I like her, she can always come to me with anything and that would be okay.
To this she always replies that I'm her BFF - because she knows that makes me insane. For those of you that don't read teenage magazines, BFF means Best Friends Forever.
She's constantly fucking with me about one thing or another.
She can't even help herself, it brings her too much joy to watch me roll my eyes and tell her that I'm not even going to give her the P.O. Box number of where I move to when she's finally out of the house.
Going back to being an opportunist, Grant wanted her to go to Lowe's with him to pick up painting supplies. She asked if she could be the one that drove them there...opportunistic move #1 on her part.
He said if it was okay with me, she could, but if she did, then she had to help him with the shed too...Good job, opportunistic move #1 on Grant's part, he's learning.
Once they got back, they negotiated that if she did one wall of the garage and the bottom of the shed (she's short, he's tall) - can she go to her best friend's house?
They're both playing the game like a pro now.
Then I looked at her and said, "your room..." and she said, "Oh, I know. That goes without saying."
And it does, because like I said...
...there is a food chain.
and it's good to be on the top of it
My daughter is out with Grant scraping the garage and shed to get it prepared for the big paint job they have planned for it.
That's not quite accurate.
It's the big paint job that Grant has been talking about for two weeks now. I just taught him to be an opportunist since he's never had kids. When you have kids, it's ALL about being an opportunist.
She wants to go to her best friends house and spend the night tonight. He needs help with the garage and I'm not doing it.
Hello?
Do you hear opportunity knocking?
I'm a mom, so I don't need opportunities. With me, it's simply, "you're not going anywhere until I can see the floor of your room again. I KNOW there's a rug under there somewhere, I vaguely remember the color."
This stance is non-negotiable.
Then again, I don't care if she likes me or not.
which is probably why we're so close...
and we're ridiculously close...
Grant, on the other hand, sometimes takes her hormonal teenage girl moody ways - personal.
Which is a fatal error on his part.
The funny part about it is - for a teenage girl, she's a piece of cake.
I've been around her friends, trust me, it could be a whole lot worse.
She's a pretty, pretty girl - but doesn't really get it yet. She knows she's not ugly, but she doesn't really care one way or another either.
I drilled into both of my kid's head that looks are not something you can bank on. Everyone is one good car accident from whatever looks they have being taken away from them.
It's the luck of the draw.
So you HAVE to have something to back up your existence.
to quote Judge Judy, "Beauty fades, stupid is forever"...
She couldn't be less concerned about her weight either.
Thank God.
My son tried his best to die on me when he was 27 months old. I lived in a hospital with him for five weeks, literally. I slept in what can, at best, be considered a critical care unit's parental closet. It consisted of a cot and the door was off of the visitor's lounge.
I mention this because the Critical Care Unit for his age didn't have any room for him. So they put him in the adolescent ward portion. Being there so long, you get to learn who the other patients are and their families because you're all in this horrendous situation together - where your kid is fighting for their life.
What I remember from the experience of being on that ward is that 90% of the kids on that floor were there because they were either anorexic or bulimic - and they were DYING because of it.
The age range was from 9-18.
Kids.
Little kids.
Nine year old's that thought themselves too fat and were literally starving themselves to DEATH over it.
Girls AND boys.
Let me say again that causing insecurities in the other sex does NOT make us even - it makes it equally WRONG.
To this day, I can recall how I felt when I heard that time and time again there.
That sealed in stone exactly how I was going to deal with my kids and weight and beauty. My daughter was only 5 weeks old at the time and I swore to God that there was no way in hell that either of my kids were going to grow up capitalizing on their looks to the point that it could turn into that.
The fact that they both turned out to be okay with how they are as people and don't place so much concentration on vanity is half me and half dumb luck.
I'm sure no parent wants that for their kid. So that's not a judgment call from me, that was just an awareness that I hadn't had before slapping me in the face while being in that ward.
You would be SHOCKED at how cruel kids are to other kids.
Even at the age of 11/12/13 - a lot of my daughter's girl friends were on diets. They're all rail thin too. It makes me cringe.
The sick part is it's usually over some comment that some boy has made to them.
That's another reason why I've drilled into my son's head that he's not to say a cruel word to a girl growing up - because we remember things like that. It sticks with us, forever...and at some point, you might want to date her later in life and you'll be cutting off your nose despite your face.
That and I will kill you.
I have to tell this story...
A boy tried to get my daughter to be self-conscious about her weight once. She's never been heavy. She's actually very petite. Tiny. He saw her with a purse full of assorted snacks though and said something about her weight.
She has a purse of assorted snacks because she's been diabetic since she was 18 months old.
It totally backfired.
By the time she got home, she was livid.
LIVID.
She informed said boy that he didn't have an ounce of authority over her, she didn't care what he thought and then proceeded to dedicate every forkful of food to him during lunch...and the whole following day.
I've never been so secretly thankful in my entire life.
Then I got pissed though and I thought, this little 12 year old boy knows exactly what to say to a girl to get under her skin normally. If he had said that to any of her friend's, they wouldn't eat again for a week and I could easily see them winding up on that wing in the hospital.
Yes, I did go to my son and tell him that story to reiterate that he can't do things like that.
Ever.
It's rude and damaging.
I have no idea why I told that story. It's just one of those things that still bothers me about society.
If you have a son, point that out to him!
If you have a daughter, make her feel like she never has to follow some media created ideal of beauty.
Here's the real kicker too, I polled my male friends and guess what? They're more attracted to someone with a shape versus someone that resembles a sheet of paper.
How's that for irony.
Even bigger than that though, it will ALWAYS be better to actually have a personality.
Be smart, be witty, be strong, be funny, be creative, be interesting, be honest, be dependable, be responsible, be a decent human being - be something lasting and worth-while.
That goes for both sexes.
Present yourself the best way you know how, definitely, but for the love of God - let there be something more to you than vanity.
The most angry I ever get at Grant is when he makes comments like, "You're beautiful, that's why you can do what you do."
I...fucking...hate...that...statement.
I hate it with a passion that you don't want to see.
Do not reduce me to how I look - like that's all there is and that's all that counts.
My looks didn't have dick to do with being trusted with tens of thousands of dollars running an International charity. It didn't have a thing to do with being able to run my own company of some sort since I was 18 years old. It didn't have a thing to do with having a 4.0 G.P.A. in college.
It didn't have a thing to do with being able to raise two kids that I would want to know if they weren't even mine. And it damn sure doesn't have a thing to do with being able to maintain friendships that I've had since I was 5 years old.
Infuriating.
I know he does this when we're fighting and he's just trying his best to piss me right off, but it sticks with me and it makes me hostile. I know he doesn't mean it because of the other 50,000 comments he makes to the contrary when he's not trying to get under my skin. It's still a stupid route to take with me.
Oh my God, what is this, purge day?
See, this is exactly the sort of thing that I never want my kids to go through. I couldn't be more happy that my daughter can have something like that said to her and it would just roll off her back like you didn't even open your mouth to speak.
More people should be made up of what she's made up of.
Hell, I wish I was more like her.
I adore that kid.
All that said, I'm not her friend and not interested in ever being her friend, really. I'm her mother and there is a food chain and I'm on the top of it.
I like her, she can always come to me with anything and that would be okay.
To this she always replies that I'm her BFF - because she knows that makes me insane. For those of you that don't read teenage magazines, BFF means Best Friends Forever.
She's constantly fucking with me about one thing or another.
She can't even help herself, it brings her too much joy to watch me roll my eyes and tell her that I'm not even going to give her the P.O. Box number of where I move to when she's finally out of the house.
Going back to being an opportunist, Grant wanted her to go to Lowe's with him to pick up painting supplies. She asked if she could be the one that drove them there...opportunistic move #1 on her part.
He said if it was okay with me, she could, but if she did, then she had to help him with the shed too...Good job, opportunistic move #1 on Grant's part, he's learning.
Once they got back, they negotiated that if she did one wall of the garage and the bottom of the shed (she's short, he's tall) - can she go to her best friend's house?
They're both playing the game like a pro now.
Then I looked at her and said, "your room..." and she said, "Oh, I know. That goes without saying."
And it does, because like I said...
...there is a food chain.
and it's good to be on the top of it
Friday, May 22, 2009
free form tackling
Two days ago, I walked out into the backyard to see Grant diligently working hard on his creation. He decided to trim the tree that I've been mildly complaining about every time I see it. It grows so fast that its reach went from the patio to over the shed.
It was out of hand.
So, to make me happy, he whipped out the chainsaw and went to work. Every time he turned around and looked at me, I said, "take it back further."
"Are you sure?"
did I say it? of course I'm sure...
"Yes, I'm sure. It's making me insane. Our yard is covered in shade. I'd like to be able to grow stuff. Let that big ball of fire in the sky through!"
I got that, "I think you may be crazy, but if it'll make you happy - I'll do whatever stupid thing you want me to do" look.
I get that look often, but in the end - he'll see that I'm right.
He lopped off a good 22 feet worth of tree.
The backyard is filled with sun now and I don't have to go all the way over to the shed to lay out. It opened the entire area up and I did get my, "That was a good call; big difference" validation.
Of course, now I have wood up to my eyeballs laying in the yard because the wood chipper village guys aren't going to be here until the first week of June.
Grant started the long laborious act of cutting all that wood down to size and stacking it next to the stone fireplace and seperating the leafy branches and putting them over stuff I want to see dead so it all dries out and doesn't kill the grass that he's painstakingly been spraying with weed killer and reseeding.
Yesterday we're sitting at the table on the patio just talking and admiring his hard work while having iced tea.
Then the neighbor cames out...
This would be the other opponent in the infamous on-going Lawn Cold War of 2009.
Grant is suddenly on high alert watching his every move.
Let me just say that even though I would have no choice due to my overwhelming, "who-do-you-think-you-are?!-you-can-NOT-one-up-me!-we'll-all-die-before-I-let-you-win" sense of being - when it come down to it, I would really rather not go to war with someone like Grant.
Yes, pride is my sin.
We'd both die in a blaze of glory.
The guy starts spraying his lawn with weed killer.
I'm sitting across from him, but I can tell the tiny hairs on the back of Grant's neck are raising.
I have to all but commit suicide to not start making remarks to escalating the situation because it's so utterly amusing to me. I couldn't care less what the neighbors do.
"That son-of-a-bitch. Do you see what he's doing?!"
"The horror..."
I'm still being good...
"Oh my God, what is he doing NOW?!"
This is all too much for me, I know my limits... I have to go inside to compose myself...
Once I went through the myrid of comments in my head, I went back outside.
It wasn't over yet.
"Do you see what he has on his lawn? A GAS CHAINSAW. And all we have is this stupid ELECTRIC one!"
That's because when I bought that stupid electric one, I only had a few small things to take care of and it didn't require me to spend $200 more unnecessary dollars four years ago when I needed it. This is summarily dismissed as poor judgment.
"Great, now I have Chainsaw Envy"
I couldn't even take it.
That almost made me burst out in laughter.
"You see that, he just came out, put it on his lawn so he knew I would be sure to see it and then went back into his house"
I'm trying not to completely lose it at this point because we both are aware that he's creating something out of nothing and the guy probably doesn't have a clue what in the hell Grant is going on about and it's a one-sided war.
"That fucker. I'm just going to go over there and tackle him. That's what I'm going to do! I'm going to go over there, tackle him to the ground, sit on his chest and go, "STOP DOING SHIT TO YOUR YARD!"
...and then he's going to say to me, "Who are you?"
That was the straw that pushed me over the edge and I just started laughing uncontrollably.
Really, how funny is that?
Of course he's not going to do that, but that mental picture is hilarious.
You know what though? Today the neighbor has a sprinkler system out on his front lawn, a pile of trimmed tree at the curb and he cut his grass again.
So, the cold war might just be recognized by both parties.
And where is Grant right now?
Cutting the lawn...
It was out of hand.
So, to make me happy, he whipped out the chainsaw and went to work. Every time he turned around and looked at me, I said, "take it back further."
"Are you sure?"
did I say it? of course I'm sure...
"Yes, I'm sure. It's making me insane. Our yard is covered in shade. I'd like to be able to grow stuff. Let that big ball of fire in the sky through!"
I got that, "I think you may be crazy, but if it'll make you happy - I'll do whatever stupid thing you want me to do" look.
I get that look often, but in the end - he'll see that I'm right.
He lopped off a good 22 feet worth of tree.
The backyard is filled with sun now and I don't have to go all the way over to the shed to lay out. It opened the entire area up and I did get my, "That was a good call; big difference" validation.
Of course, now I have wood up to my eyeballs laying in the yard because the wood chipper village guys aren't going to be here until the first week of June.
Grant started the long laborious act of cutting all that wood down to size and stacking it next to the stone fireplace and seperating the leafy branches and putting them over stuff I want to see dead so it all dries out and doesn't kill the grass that he's painstakingly been spraying with weed killer and reseeding.
Yesterday we're sitting at the table on the patio just talking and admiring his hard work while having iced tea.
Then the neighbor cames out...
This would be the other opponent in the infamous on-going Lawn Cold War of 2009.
Grant is suddenly on high alert watching his every move.
Let me just say that even though I would have no choice due to my overwhelming, "who-do-you-think-you-are?!-you-can-NOT-one-up-me!-we'll-all-die-before-I-let-you-win" sense of being - when it come down to it, I would really rather not go to war with someone like Grant.
Yes, pride is my sin.
We'd both die in a blaze of glory.
The guy starts spraying his lawn with weed killer.
I'm sitting across from him, but I can tell the tiny hairs on the back of Grant's neck are raising.
I have to all but commit suicide to not start making remarks to escalating the situation because it's so utterly amusing to me. I couldn't care less what the neighbors do.
"That son-of-a-bitch. Do you see what he's doing?!"
"The horror..."
I'm still being good...
"Oh my God, what is he doing NOW?!"
This is all too much for me, I know my limits... I have to go inside to compose myself...
Once I went through the myrid of comments in my head, I went back outside.
It wasn't over yet.
"Do you see what he has on his lawn? A GAS CHAINSAW. And all we have is this stupid ELECTRIC one!"
That's because when I bought that stupid electric one, I only had a few small things to take care of and it didn't require me to spend $200 more unnecessary dollars four years ago when I needed it. This is summarily dismissed as poor judgment.
"Great, now I have Chainsaw Envy"
I couldn't even take it.
That almost made me burst out in laughter.
"You see that, he just came out, put it on his lawn so he knew I would be sure to see it and then went back into his house"
I'm trying not to completely lose it at this point because we both are aware that he's creating something out of nothing and the guy probably doesn't have a clue what in the hell Grant is going on about and it's a one-sided war.
"That fucker. I'm just going to go over there and tackle him. That's what I'm going to do! I'm going to go over there, tackle him to the ground, sit on his chest and go, "STOP DOING SHIT TO YOUR YARD!"
...and then he's going to say to me, "Who are you?"
That was the straw that pushed me over the edge and I just started laughing uncontrollably.
Really, how funny is that?
Of course he's not going to do that, but that mental picture is hilarious.
You know what though? Today the neighbor has a sprinkler system out on his front lawn, a pile of trimmed tree at the curb and he cut his grass again.
So, the cold war might just be recognized by both parties.
And where is Grant right now?
Cutting the lawn...
Thursday, May 7, 2009
going to Maryland
Apparently I will be leaving at some unGodly hour in the morning to go to Maryland for the weekend. If I can swing it at all, I'll line up some posts so you won't even know I'm gone.
Today was seven hours of running around all over town and I'm beat. Clearly, I'm not done with the whole healing of the ruptured disk thing because I wanted to shove a fork through my right side after walking so much - which, ironically, wasn't much at all.
Oh, and I ate Mississippi catfish for the first time today.
With a side of deep fried pickles.
That sounds horrid, doesn't it?
it really wasn't bad...
I had to get the fork somehow though, right?
I've come to the conclusion that I'm a real asshole when it comes to just giving in. I can't do it. I don't know WHY, but I can't. Three times I should have just said, "Fuck this, I'm not walking over there" and refused to get out of the car.
That must be some character flaw.
I never really think there's anything I can't do (just things I won't do) - even if I say I can't (which I rarely say, because again - stubborn and see first part of this long ass sentence).
So, of course - I'll be paying later for being a dumbass today.
You would think that being my age, I'd own at least ONE pair of shoes that weren't heels, right? Wrong. So, yeah, that was fun too.
I can't even think about a seven hour drive either or my mind will explode and I will pack cutlery. I know me. I'm not above that to prove a point.
Grant is out cutting the lawn. I got an amusing little speech about how cutting the lawn is important for the social...something or other... basically, he likes the social aspect of fitting in with the neighborhood.
I guess so people don't look at the house like it's a foreclosed abandoned lot or something... and we're just squatters... never mind that practically everyone on the two streets I intersect all know me...
It was akin to the, "Keeping up with the Joneses" speech. I just stood there and smiled. I figure it's a matter of time before he finally realizes that I *am* the "Joneses".
as if he'd hear me anyway...
I don't keep up with anyone.
Everyone else can keep up with me.
Or not.
I really don't care.
It's your house, your lawn - do whatever the hell you want with it. More power to you! I don't care what you do, I don't expect you to care what I do. Though, I promise to not turn old cars into lawn furniture. That's the deal.
FYI: I want credit for not making ANY cracks at Lowe's while picking up another gas can for the lawn mower. Saying things along the lines of, "You know, I can take care of that pesky dandelion problem with that and a pack of matches" and, "I don't understand why you have such a problem with me cementing the whole thing and painting it green" was always 2 seconds away from coming out of my mouth...
He's a good guy though. He's out there mowing away - because he cares more than I do. He totally ignored my, "The world will not stop revolving if it has to wait until Tuesday" comments.
I'm sure he didn't even hear me... but I heard me and I find me funny most of the time even if he doesn't... so, all was not entirely lost...
The kitten is still alive.
Cute as a button and ready to take her first road trip.
If I'm laying down on the couch, she HAS to be all squashed up under my face to sleep. I'm unsure as of yet whether she really, really likes me - or is trying to suffocate me.
Jury is still out.
She's currently rolled up in a ball on my lap purring away like a motorboat.
And for the record: No matter what anyone says, including Grant - this cat WILL be trained. I've never in my life had an animal that wasn't trained. Trained the last cat, this won't be any different.
I like her - and I'd like to KEEP IT THAT WAY.
So, she has no choice but to be trained.
Today was seven hours of running around all over town and I'm beat. Clearly, I'm not done with the whole healing of the ruptured disk thing because I wanted to shove a fork through my right side after walking so much - which, ironically, wasn't much at all.
Oh, and I ate Mississippi catfish for the first time today.
With a side of deep fried pickles.
That sounds horrid, doesn't it?
it really wasn't bad...
I had to get the fork somehow though, right?
I've come to the conclusion that I'm a real asshole when it comes to just giving in. I can't do it. I don't know WHY, but I can't. Three times I should have just said, "Fuck this, I'm not walking over there" and refused to get out of the car.
That must be some character flaw.
I never really think there's anything I can't do (just things I won't do) - even if I say I can't (which I rarely say, because again - stubborn and see first part of this long ass sentence).
So, of course - I'll be paying later for being a dumbass today.
You would think that being my age, I'd own at least ONE pair of shoes that weren't heels, right? Wrong. So, yeah, that was fun too.
I can't even think about a seven hour drive either or my mind will explode and I will pack cutlery. I know me. I'm not above that to prove a point.
Grant is out cutting the lawn. I got an amusing little speech about how cutting the lawn is important for the social...something or other... basically, he likes the social aspect of fitting in with the neighborhood.
I guess so people don't look at the house like it's a foreclosed abandoned lot or something... and we're just squatters... never mind that practically everyone on the two streets I intersect all know me...
It was akin to the, "Keeping up with the Joneses" speech. I just stood there and smiled. I figure it's a matter of time before he finally realizes that I *am* the "Joneses".
as if he'd hear me anyway...
I don't keep up with anyone.
Everyone else can keep up with me.
Or not.
I really don't care.
It's your house, your lawn - do whatever the hell you want with it. More power to you! I don't care what you do, I don't expect you to care what I do. Though, I promise to not turn old cars into lawn furniture. That's the deal.
FYI: I want credit for not making ANY cracks at Lowe's while picking up another gas can for the lawn mower. Saying things along the lines of, "You know, I can take care of that pesky dandelion problem with that and a pack of matches" and, "I don't understand why you have such a problem with me cementing the whole thing and painting it green" was always 2 seconds away from coming out of my mouth...
He's a good guy though. He's out there mowing away - because he cares more than I do. He totally ignored my, "The world will not stop revolving if it has to wait until Tuesday" comments.
I'm sure he didn't even hear me... but I heard me and I find me funny most of the time even if he doesn't... so, all was not entirely lost...
The kitten is still alive.
Cute as a button and ready to take her first road trip.
If I'm laying down on the couch, she HAS to be all squashed up under my face to sleep. I'm unsure as of yet whether she really, really likes me - or is trying to suffocate me.
Jury is still out.
She's currently rolled up in a ball on my lap purring away like a motorboat.
And for the record: No matter what anyone says, including Grant - this cat WILL be trained. I've never in my life had an animal that wasn't trained. Trained the last cat, this won't be any different.
I like her - and I'd like to KEEP IT THAT WAY.
So, she has no choice but to be trained.
Wednesday, May 6, 2009
Aretha is the QUEEN
Did you hear me?!
Aretha Franklin is the QUEEN of Soul.
QUEEN OF SOUL
say it with me now... Queen... of... fucking... Soul...
I swear to God, Grant and I almost had a fist fight this morning when he came downstairs. As all the literate that visit this page know, I was blaring music to my heart's content. And he had the AUDACITY to say that he didn't like Aretha.
are...you...kidding me... please tell me that you're kidding me, so I don't have to put forth the extra effort of plotting your death...
I can take the fact that he hasn't learned the fine art of hanging up a jacket in a room that's solely devoted to the intricate jacket hanging process. I can take the fact that he's a fire sign and is more emotional than I am.
I can take the fact that he needs a schedule and I couldn't care less about ever owning one of my own. I can take the fact that his favorite music is techno.
I can take the fact that he's a list person and I never have any intention of writing a list unless I have to go to court for something and it's for someone else.
I can even take the fact that he thinks bananas are real food and he drowns his coffee in sugar and milk - and basically flat out refuses to eat a solitary molecule of fat on his steak and would rather cut his own arm off than eat something spicy like I do.
Fine.
Oh my God, but don't you ever disrespect Aretha Franklin in my presence again.
DON'T EVEN THINK IT IN YOUR HEAD!
Matter of fact, take out 'in my presence' from that sentence.
I had to bite the inside of my cheek to keep from saying all the things that were immediately at the forefront.
We're talking about Aretha 'Queen of Soul' Franklin here! Go say 150 Hail Mary's and 50 Our Father's for even letting those words fly out of your mouth!
He's sorry, Aretha!
He knows not of which he speaks!
For his transgressions, we pray at your alter of talent.
You've have to be out of your ever lovin' mind to get up on stage and sing ANYTHING with Aretha. Her voice is so utterly RICH.
.. and she's something like 56 or so in that video... imagine her when she was PRIME.... though, talent like THAT... NEVER dies...
Oh my God, and I so would NOT fuck with Aretha either. Whatever guy she's talking about was either awful brave or incredibly stupid.
Yeah, you heard that right... R E S P E C T...
Grant apologizes, Aretha... he wasn't THINKING like you said...
Seriously, don't get up on stage and sing next to this woman. When she opens her mouth, just shut up.
Gracious on top of it.
Say a Little Prayer for him, Aretha...and if that's not enough, Aretha... I'm totally willing to smack him for you...on his behalf... I'M SORRY!
Aretha Franklin is the QUEEN of Soul.
QUEEN OF SOUL
say it with me now... Queen... of... fucking... Soul...
I swear to God, Grant and I almost had a fist fight this morning when he came downstairs. As all the literate that visit this page know, I was blaring music to my heart's content. And he had the AUDACITY to say that he didn't like Aretha.
are...you...kidding me... please tell me that you're kidding me, so I don't have to put forth the extra effort of plotting your death...
I can take the fact that he hasn't learned the fine art of hanging up a jacket in a room that's solely devoted to the intricate jacket hanging process. I can take the fact that he's a fire sign and is more emotional than I am.
I can take the fact that he needs a schedule and I couldn't care less about ever owning one of my own. I can take the fact that his favorite music is techno.
I can take the fact that he's a list person and I never have any intention of writing a list unless I have to go to court for something and it's for someone else.
I can even take the fact that he thinks bananas are real food and he drowns his coffee in sugar and milk - and basically flat out refuses to eat a solitary molecule of fat on his steak and would rather cut his own arm off than eat something spicy like I do.
Fine.
Oh my God, but don't you ever disrespect Aretha Franklin in my presence again.
DON'T EVEN THINK IT IN YOUR HEAD!
Matter of fact, take out 'in my presence' from that sentence.
I had to bite the inside of my cheek to keep from saying all the things that were immediately at the forefront.
We're talking about Aretha 'Queen of Soul' Franklin here! Go say 150 Hail Mary's and 50 Our Father's for even letting those words fly out of your mouth!
He's sorry, Aretha!
He knows not of which he speaks!
For his transgressions, we pray at your alter of talent.
You've have to be out of your ever lovin' mind to get up on stage and sing ANYTHING with Aretha. Her voice is so utterly RICH.
.. and she's something like 56 or so in that video... imagine her when she was PRIME.... though, talent like THAT... NEVER dies...
Oh my God, and I so would NOT fuck with Aretha either. Whatever guy she's talking about was either awful brave or incredibly stupid.
Yeah, you heard that right... R E S P E C T...
Grant apologizes, Aretha... he wasn't THINKING like you said...
Seriously, don't get up on stage and sing next to this woman. When she opens her mouth, just shut up.
Gracious on top of it.
Say a Little Prayer for him, Aretha...and if that's not enough, Aretha... I'm totally willing to smack him for you...on his behalf... I'M SORRY!
Tuesday, April 14, 2009
since last wednesday
Even though she doesn't even read this, nor does my SO, Grant - this is what's been going on for the last few days:
Grant's mother has come to visit us - and really, she's been a Godsend. I've only met her a few times in the last year, since Grant and I were dating from a distance of 400 miles.
We have, however, known each other for 25 years. We dated back when we were 15 years old, ironically.
Grant decided to move to where I am in New York, a few months ago, at the beginning of February.
This is his mother's first trip here and I'm so glad she made it.
Aside from having this lovely ruptured disk in my back, which she has been very sympathetic about - she's been a lot of fun.
I've been able to spend a decent amount of time with her without Grant being around, so we could really talk.
We spent roughly ten hours straight together yesterday.
We shared stories and thoughts and feelings and it's been truly refreshing. There is nothing that I've found to date, that either of us has said - that the other didn't understand without further explanation.
I think I'm going to try to con her into staying another week.
---
My daughter came home all excited last weekend because her best friend's cat - had kittens. She went on and on and on about it until I just looked at her and said, "do you want one of the kittens?"
That was met with an immediate, "YES!"
I have no earthly idea what the hell made me ask that...
I need a cat like I need a hole in the head.
The kittens are only three weeks old. Not old enough to take from their mother yet, but it looks like we'll be proud owners of a baby kitten in a few more weeks.
The one she picked out originally has been promised to someone else. So her second choice is a greyish colored cat with bits of white splashed on her.
She and Grant have come up with ever conceivable idiotic name they can think of to come to me and ask if they could use on the new kitten...........all of which the answer has been a resounding, "No!"
So, we're having naming issues already.
Seriously, "BS" or "Ball Sac" is NOT an appropriate name for any cat.
What in the hell is wrong with those people?
I kid you, not - I spend approximately 25% of my life with a particular look on my face while my mouth is forming the single word, "Why....."
Really...who even utters those words in a full and complete sentence with a straight face. They must have practiced it for ten minutes before they came to me with it.
I swear they do it just to see the look on my face...
They fuel each other and use their powers against me just to try to figure out which thing is going to finally make me snap.
I want it noted for the record that I'm not above having both of them restrained and committed. Something I remind them of at least once a week.
Grant's mother has come to visit us - and really, she's been a Godsend. I've only met her a few times in the last year, since Grant and I were dating from a distance of 400 miles.
We have, however, known each other for 25 years. We dated back when we were 15 years old, ironically.
Grant decided to move to where I am in New York, a few months ago, at the beginning of February.
This is his mother's first trip here and I'm so glad she made it.
Aside from having this lovely ruptured disk in my back, which she has been very sympathetic about - she's been a lot of fun.
I've been able to spend a decent amount of time with her without Grant being around, so we could really talk.
We spent roughly ten hours straight together yesterday.
We shared stories and thoughts and feelings and it's been truly refreshing. There is nothing that I've found to date, that either of us has said - that the other didn't understand without further explanation.
I think I'm going to try to con her into staying another week.
---
My daughter came home all excited last weekend because her best friend's cat - had kittens. She went on and on and on about it until I just looked at her and said, "do you want one of the kittens?"
That was met with an immediate, "YES!"
I have no earthly idea what the hell made me ask that...
I need a cat like I need a hole in the head.
The kittens are only three weeks old. Not old enough to take from their mother yet, but it looks like we'll be proud owners of a baby kitten in a few more weeks.
The one she picked out originally has been promised to someone else. So her second choice is a greyish colored cat with bits of white splashed on her.
She and Grant have come up with ever conceivable idiotic name they can think of to come to me and ask if they could use on the new kitten...........all of which the answer has been a resounding, "No!"
So, we're having naming issues already.
Seriously, "BS" or "Ball Sac" is NOT an appropriate name for any cat.
What in the hell is wrong with those people?
I kid you, not - I spend approximately 25% of my life with a particular look on my face while my mouth is forming the single word, "Why....."
Really...who even utters those words in a full and complete sentence with a straight face. They must have practiced it for ten minutes before they came to me with it.
I swear they do it just to see the look on my face...
They fuel each other and use their powers against me just to try to figure out which thing is going to finally make me snap.
I want it noted for the record that I'm not above having both of them restrained and committed. Something I remind them of at least once a week.
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