Well, I beat the bacteria, but the virus threw a knockout punch to the head so I’ve had the joy of lying in bed all day with a throbbing headache and trying to keep from coughing as much as possible. What a swine the swine flu is, if that’s what I’ve got but it’s hard to know for sure since they say that it has about the same symptoms as regular flu except that you might, or might not, get a fever. One thermometer said I had a fever of 100.2, the other said I’m at a steady 98.6. At any rate, I set a goal to comment on this blog every day for 365 days, and no stinking virus is going to stand in my way, even though I’ve got the chills and can’t stand to be on this computer anymore. Stay well, my friend, and beware Halloween parties, which is surely where I got this bug. Next year I’ll deck myself in a clever costume to avoid contact – I’ll go as a surgeon and wear a white mask and latex gloves, and stuff myself before I leave home to avoid the inevitable double dippers, which would make a fine topic if I were feeling better, but since I’m not, too-da-loo!
Where do you go for inspiration? I go to the refrigerator. If I’m feeling at a loss for anything, like I can’t find my black gloves, I’ll open the refer door and, no, I generally don’t find the missing gloves, they’re usually in the bread bin, but I will find something that makes me forget that I’m at a loss.
The something is comfort. I don’t know what it is, but staring into that bright box, one hand braced on the outside of the refrigerator and the other swinging the door back and forth, has a calming effect on me.
There’s rarely anything in there to eat in an emergency. Jars of assorted pickles only appeal on occasion, like when I’m pregnant, which hasn’t happened in awhile. Those pickles would be covered in mold except that even bacteria won’t go in those jars.
Bacteria are a funny thing. I feel like I’m catching a cold right now because I’ve got a scratchy, dry throat. I guess I’ve got the swine flu. That’s caused by a virus, you know, scientific name: the swine flu virus. Viruses seem to like to cause damage to your lungs and their associated apparatuses. Bacteria, on the other hand, seems intent on making you upchuck or get a festering, oozing, swollen, and I would say puss-ie but I’m not sure how to spell it, infection from an innocent cut.
I once tripped over a vine at Girl Scout camp, and it made a little cut on the front of my ankle. That thing swelled up and got so red and puss infested that I had to go to the doctor and get a tetanus shot in the bottom. Gosh that hurt. I limped around for two days because the nurse reared back and aimed that syringe at my cheek, and it went right through the muscle and lodged in the bone. The nurse and doctor were yanking and pulling, trying to get it out, sweat beading on their faces and dripping to the floor as they strained, me screaming like a banshee birthing a porcupine. Yes, I’m kidding. But it did hurt like a son of a gun.
Bacteria aren’t anything to mess with. That being said, yesterday I made a huge pot of fresh vegetable bean soup, and, what with the time change and everything, I left the pot on the stove all night. This morning I promptly put it in the refrigerator, but I knew those bacteria had been partying in there all night. I saw some swimming in the broth this morning when I opened the lid. They dove for cover behind green beans and carrots, but they were in there — I could see the splashes.
The all-knowing Google said I should pour the whole pot down the drain, ladle and all, and I started to, but I couldn’t bring myself to waste all the food and time and energy, and besides it was a rare batch of soup for me—it was fit to eat. I had a giant bowl for lunch, figuring I might as well make it worth my while if I was going to be heaving all evening.
Knock on wood, so far so good. But I do have this puss-ie thing on my leg I’m going to keep a very close watch on. No sense in having those bacteria in my belly joining forces with the ones on my leg, with the swine flu virus playing tag team. BACK OFF, BACTERIA! VAMOOSE VIRUS! I showed them who’s boss. I’ll be fine now.
I went into Starbucks this morning to get my once weekly latte. Caffeine gives me a jittery buzz followed by a headache, but on Sundays I succumb to the craving for a fine cup of coffee – fine meaning any coffee I don’t brew myself.
Because it was early and I was the only one at the counter, I noticed the tip box right by the cash register as I was handing over my money. I got $2.50 back in change, which I wanted to pocket except that the tip box, already seeded with a couple of dollars and some change, made me feel like a cheapskate.
I carried on this really quick debate in my head: “All she did was repeat what I wanted to the barista, take my five bucks and hand me my change. Why do I have to put extra money in the tip box?” To which I replied in my head, “They probably don’t make much money, and it’s only fifty cents, just put it in there, you tightwad.” To which I responded in my head, “Why the heck doesn’t Starbucks pay them enough money rather than making me feel like I’m taking food out of their mouths when I don’t want to reward them just for doing the job they were hired to do?”
The generous half of me won – I put the money in the box, grumbling in my head the whole time and wondering why tipping is becoming the norm these days. I worked as a waitress during college, and I’m not sure how they got away with it, but they only paid us half of minimum wage. We were supposed to get the rest of our income from tips, which we all managed to do. One woman I worked with did quite well for herself. She’d race over to everyone tables and steal their tips if we didn’t beat her to it. It was like those bonuses managers gave themselves from the bailout money. They didn’t deserve it either, but that didn’t stop them from stealing our hard earned tax payer dollars.
I’m okay with tipping people who give you a lot of personal attention like your massage therapist or hairdresser. Also tipping the bellhop who drags your overstuffed luggage to your room. Paying him to put his hand back in his pocket and vacate your room is worth it.
But people whose whole interaction with you is to take your money? I’m not sure about that. What’s next? The grocery clerk at Safeway? The person selling tickets at the movies? The kid hawking Girl Scout cookies at your front door?
So I’m going to generously give you a tip, Starbucks, along with every other coffee shop and deli in the world. Put up a sign saying, “No tipping, please! We pay our employees more than enough to scrape by – they don’t need any handouts from you, thank you very much.” Then actually pay them a decent wage.
You guys are just like coffee. You leave a bitter taste in my mouth and give me a headache.
This has got to be my fourth favorite holiday! The other three are Christmas, Mother’s Day, and my Birthday since people are expected to give me presents and don’t scoff at the idea.
I have such good memories, one of which, if you haven’t guessed already, I’m going to share. Me and Christine, my best friend all through childhood, were about ten years old and were dressed up like hobos. It was our costume of choice every year, because back then it was all about the candy. The only thing standing between us and free goodies was a plate full of fish sticks and twenty minutes worth of painted-on freckles, baggy clothes, and a sock-stuffed bandana tied on the end of a stick that we carried over one shoulder. Virtual rivers of hobos flowed between houses.
We always walked a few blocks to the rich part of town because that’s where the candy motherload was. At one mansion-like house, the creaking door was opened by a tall, thin, uniformed butler who invited us into a candlelit entry hall for “witch’s brew.” At the end of the dark hallway, long enough to swallow my whole house, was a maid bending over a steaming cauldron. Scary music played in the background, and I got the eevy-jeevies big time. Curiosity trumped fear; however, and we started down the long hallway. We could hear the cauldron bubbling as we got closer. The gray-haired maid, decked out in a black dress with white apron and cap that was not a costume, dipped a ladle into the pot and filled paper cups with witch’s brew without saying a word. She smiled and slowly handed us the cups. We weren’t sure whether to drink it or toss it in her face and run, but again curiosity won. The brew was cold and sweet and red and steaming and wonderful. We handed the empty cups back to her, too shy to be like Tiny Tim and say, “More?” She smiled and nodded, our signal to move along, the show was over. That was our treat – no candy, no apple, no stupid pencil, just the experience of surviving that long, frightening walk in a strange rich guy’s house, with a cup of steaming punch at the end.
I can’t recall the countless candy bars and other treats I got over the years, but this memory is as fresh as cotton candy. I don’t think you could get away with it anymore, though. Some pedophile would be lurking in the hallway, or the punch would be laced with something. Most kids don’t roam the streets parentless like we did back in the day, either.
Now here’s my treat to you – a poem we learned in my daughter’s preschool – it should be read with enthusiasm for best results, and clap at OUT:
Five little pumpkins sitting on a gate,
The first one said, “Oh my, it’s getting late.”
The second one said, “There’s witches in the air,”
The third one said, “But we don’t care,”
The fourth one said, “Let’s run and run and run,”
The fifth one said, “It’s Halloween fun,”
Then WHOOSH went the wind and OUT went the lights and five little pumpkins rolled out of sight.
Happy Halloween!
I’m going to a costume party tonight and my costume makes me look fat, which isn’t surprising since everything else does too.
I’m not so fat that I have to sit on two stools at a café counter (one for each cheek), or my breasts would slap me in the face if I run, or that I can’t get through a turnstile. I’m just muffin top, mushroom belly, spare tire fat.
In other words, I have a lot of lumps and ridges where there should be slopes and curves.
I’m going to be a Spider Woman or Black Widow – whichever sounds best at the time. I’ve got a lacy, spider web looking dress that slips over top another black, spaghetti strap dress that looked okay until I put on the spider web tights. The elastic at the top cuts into me like a rubber band around a wad of pizza dough. Stuff is squishing out the top and bottom, and I tried everything to flatten it out.
I have this Wonder Woman strapless bra thing that I hoped would work, but the fat oozed out the bottom. So I put on a girdle, and that took care of the fat around my torso, but it all came out the base of the girdle like someone had stepped on half a balloon. I looked like I had massive goiters growing on the tops of my thighs.
So I tried pulling the tights all the way up under my bra. That worked pretty well, but they wouldn’t stay there. They migrated back toward my waistline, pushing fat in front of them like a steamroller. I thought about sewing them to the bottom of my bra, which would have worked perfectly but could I use the restroom? I’d have to take off the dress, take off the under dress, unhook the bra, and let the whole apparatus fall down around my ankles. This wouldn’t be out of the question except I go to the bathroom a lot, and I worried I wouldn’t have the stamina to keep it up through a long evening. I’d have to crawl into the host’s bathtub and taking a nap after the 13th trip.
By a sheer stroke of genius and after hours of trying everything else, I figured out that I could l cut little notches in the elastic to make it not so tight. I’m happy to report that it works just great, except that the elastic has lost a lot of its holding power and I’ll probably have to fidget with it all night and pull the tights back up as they creep down my legs. I wonder what spider webs look like when they bag around your ankles? I have a feeling I’ll find out tonight.
I find it fascinating that not one of us has a clue what is going on in anybody else’s head. We can sit there with a new boyfriend in a quiet lull and say, “What are you thinking right now?” and he’ll either tell you what he’s thinking or flat out lie – and there’s no way on earth to know the difference.
One way people try to get in someone’s head is to use body language. People profess that they can “read” what you’re thinking by observing your posture or position of your head to see if you’re lying, flirting, daydreaming, and so on. Up to now I’ve only been able to know three body language cues for certain: If a person burps loudly while you’re talking, they aren’t very interested in what you have to say. If a person passes gas while you’re talking, they disagree with what you’re saying. If they stick their middle finger in your face, you can bite it if you react quick enough, and they won’t try that again.
But what about more subtle cues? I went to Google for answers and found a site, wikihow.com, that had all sorts of very scientific ways to read what people are thinking, followed by disclaimers that pretty much told you you’d wasted your time reading it. Like this one: “Dilated pupils mean that the person is interested. Keep in mind, however, that many drugs cause pupils to dilate, including alcohol, cocaine, amphetamines, MDMA, LSD and others…Also, some people have permanently dilated pupils (a condition known as mydriasis).”
So either the person is interested, inebriated, or incapacitated. Thanks for clearing that up, wiki. What is a wiki anyway?
I got excited when I saw the one that pertained to me, since I often cross my arms when I’m standing. “People with crossed arms are closing themselves to social influence. The worst thing that you can do to people with crossed arms is to challenge them in one way or another, no matter how they react. This annoys them. Though some people just cross their arms as a habit, it may indicate that the person is (slightly) reserved, uncomfortable with their weight (therefore trying to hide it), or just trying to hide something on their shirt.”
What’s annoying is reading an endless list of things that could be causing a person to cross their arms, and when you finally reach the end, not knowing anything more than when you started.
Personally, I don’t want to know what people are thinking. I have enough trouble keeping track of my own thoughts. If you don’t like me, or you’re lying to me, or aren’t interested in what I have to say, I don’t really give a rat’s ass.
My daughter is going to take the SAT test next month, and it reminds me of the day I took my ACT test and how my friends helped me prepare.
My best friend in high school, I’ll call her Mary because she’s a pillar of the community and might choke me if I use her real name, had called and asked me to come get her after her folks went to bed. She was grounded but could sneak out because her parents went to bed early.
It was a cold, clear Friday night in November and my friend, Clark, and I were cruising around in his gigantic Oldsmobile that makes today’s SUV’s look like matchbox cars. Clark’s first name was Pryor, and a few years back someone had made up a nickname for him because in those days, when whole battalions of kids gathered in the street to pass the time, making up fool-hardy names was entertaining. Clark’s nickname, say it fast, was: Pryor T Coon Type Dog Liar Makes His Rules Up As He Goes Along. This isn’t important to the story, but I thought you might find it interesting.
When we picked up Mary, she was drunk. “I just took a little bit of my daddy’s cough medicine,” she said. Mary lolled from side to side in the back seat, even when we weren’t turning corners, and I twisted around from the front and tried to keep her upright as best I could but it was a losing battle.
We drove out in the country, and Mary, who kept mumbling about the cough medicine and other things you couldn’t understand because her chin was resting on her chest, finally said something we heard very clearly: “I’m gonna throw up.”
We pulled over and dragged her, rubber legged, away from the car to avoid splattering. She lunged sideways, lost a shoe, and fell down backwards laughing like a drunken psycho. We tugged her to her feet like we were lifting a sofa, and she commenced to throw up an ocean of southern cooking into the shoe like it was a target. Meantime, at her very first heave, I got a gag reflex, and when the smell hit, I emptied the contents of my stomach like I was throwing out buckets of dirty water. Pryor T, bless his heart, braced us both up until the chorus of Ralphing subsided.
We got Mary in the car, minus the shoe, and took her vomit wreaking carcass back home, all windows down and the heat turned up full blast to melt the icicles forming on our faces. We knocked on her door until a light came on, then shoved her into the arms of her mom without much more than a “sleep tight” before we bolted. Pryor T dropped me off at home where I showered, slept, got up the next morning at the crack of dawn and took my ACT test. Thanks to Mary, Pryor T, the night air, and wretching, which must have cleared my head, I scored higher than all my friends. I don’t think I’ll recommend it to my daughter, though.
I was randomly placed on a team today for a golf tournament with a couple of women who I vaguely knew but who seemed to be pretty nice. I figured we’d have hits and giggles, and talk about important current events like who got kicked off of Dancing with the Stars last night. For the first couple of holes, we exchanged pleasantries and learned we had a few things in common: mainly that we weren’t the best golfers in the world and the men in our lives were buffoons.
Then I noticed one of the ladies, I’ll call her Pecker to protect her identity, was pecking away at her iPhone, pushing her golf cart along with her stomach and working those fingers like a concert pianist. That left 50% of the women for me to talk to, which was okay except I turned around to let her catch up, and she was doing the same friggin’ thing.
It started raining about that time, which is par for the course because as they say, when it rains it pours, and (here comes another cliché), this was certainly icing on the cake. It’s hardly fair to be ignored AND drenched at the same time. Pecker and Texttrix single-handedly put their umbrellas on their push carts to protect their electronic idols without missing a beat, and moseyed along mute, while I mumbled to myself as I hit balls into mud puddles, gulleys, sand traps, and bird’s nests, because it’s hard to hit straight when you’re cranky.
Sixteen more holes of this I endured, and I was already pre-disposed to frustration because I’ve had a belly full of texters at movie theaters, in the car with teenagers, in church, in the library, in restaurants. It’s pervasive, it’s annoying, and it’s down right rude.
But it is pretty fun, all things considered. My kids will not answer a ringing phone, but they’ll respond immediately to a text. Plus you don’t have all that down time like on a phone where you have to make polite conversation while wanting just to ask a simple question and hang up.
But on the golf course? For four hours? Come on! I ask you, is no place sacred? What is this world coming to? Goodness gracious! If I ever get my hands on one of those iPhones, I tell you what’s the honest truth, I’d be a pretty happy gal. You’d have to call me Cranktrix, because I’d be cranking out the emails. Whoo-whee!
I’m so tired of being hit on. I’m not talking about guys, though that can get overwhelming too. I went to the beach for a couple of days to catch up on writing, and this semi-toothless drunk tried to pick me up with an offer of a quick beer while I was waiting for Chinese take out. Granted, at 8:00 pm on a Sunday night, he probably figured he had nothing to lose. Still, I seem to attract more than my share of ill-suited suitors. Like the short, bald, pudgy checkout clerk at the grocery store, who, I have to give credit, did have a complete set of teeth. It’s insulting that these people think they have a chance with me.
No, I’m talking about being hit on to bake snacks, volunteer for committees, buy Sally Foster gift wrap—in other words, donate my time, talent, and treasure at work, church, my children’s schools, for my family and friends, the neighborhood dogs, my boss, and a couple of invisible spiders who breed incessantly and oblige me to rescue their offspring from the guest bathtub.
Before you start thinking that I’m just a whiner, let me assure you that I am. I complain to everyone about this stuff, but it does no good.
I know the reason why there are so many volunteer opportunities these days. It’s committees. Every time you get a bunch of people together, at a luncheon, a PTA meeting, waiting for a red light, they’ll come up with something new and wonderful and fun, and they’ll need volunteers to pull it off. These people have no shame – unless it’s the shame they make you feel when you attempt to say no.
They form subcommittees and coerce volunteers to chair them, and the people in charge of their little piece of the action get very excited and want to do a really bang up job. That’s when the emails start flying from all directions – guilt tripping pleas for donations for auction baskets, or to set up and tear down, or watch everyone’s kids during planning meetings that last three hours.
I especially love the emails saying that every family is expected to do their part to help pull this gargantuan extravaganza off for the sake of the children. Oh, please. For all the expense they’ll plan into it, it’s going to barely break even, much less raise any money for the cause.
If I could find that toothless drunk right now, I’d go for a beer just to calm me down. Instead, I’ll be whipping up brownies to satisfy the latest email sent to poor, mistreated, so-called “volunteers.” Makes me want to spit – and you might be wise to avoid my brownies. Just kidding, maybe.
I’m terrified of flying. I’ve taken some pretty awful road trips to avoid planes, so I’m in awe of those who fly without fear.
Like those two pilots who were preoccupied for 88 minutes and overshot Minneapolis. They were so utterly fearless, so amazingly relaxed in that cockpit that they managed to take a little snooze or have a heated conversation and completely lost track of time. Investigators are supposed to listen to the black box, and I can just imagine what they’re going to hear.
“Woo, did I have a late night – got involved in a mystery novel and couldn’t put it down. I think I’ll get a few minutes shut eye. Okay with you?”…“You know, that sounds like a good idea. Let’s put this thing on auto pilot and have a little quiet time.” Then there’s a long silence on the black box.
If I’d been on that plane, I’d be white knuckled in the back of coach sandwiched between a baby trying desperately to expel its very lungs, and an overweight man with B.O., and the only thing keeping me going is the knowledge that the plane will be landing soon. And the guys in the cockpit are curled up like happy kittens sound asleep. What I wouldn’t give to have that attitude about flying.
Or say they got in a heated discussion. “I don’t like how they barely pay us.”…”Yeah, and we have all this experience”… “And we have a plane full of people depending on us”…”That’s right, and this plane can’t fly all by itself.”
A third scenario has crossed my mind, and it involves the mile high club. The investigators will get an earful if that’s the case: “Oh captain, it looks like the co-pilot is sleeping like a kitten and…”
Here I am, out there in coach fearing for my very life with visions of this giant hunk of metal racing toward earth like a meteor, oxygen masks dangling, overhead baggage raining down like…rain, and the pilot is so distracted that he turns the plane loose like a galloping stallion thundering across the sky.
Unfortunately, I don’t know how I’ll ever step on a plane again because I’d not only have to worry about whether they’ll get the beverage cart out of the way in time for me to make it to the bathroom, I’d also have to fantasize about what the pilots are up to, and if the plane is steering itself, and whether it knows how to land itself, too.