So the other day, my husband was having a conversation with a woman at work (poor guy, he's one of only a few of his gender there) and she casually asked him what he was getting me for Christmas. He said he had a few ideas, probably an appliance or something like that. The woman gave him an abhorrent look and promptly snapped, "You can't get her that!" She went on to explain he needed to get me something personal, something special...like jewelry or something like that. She then lectured him for several minutes on the etiquette of gifts for his wife and he quietly listened. When she was done, he said, "but she's just not that high maintenance."
I have to agree with him. I wasn't' expecting anything so expensive as diamonds or a new car. Of course, getting that new Camero I've been drooling over would've been nice, but after 23 years of marriage I know my husband would never think to buy something that financially significant without talking to me about it....for weeks....before making the purchase. All in all, I think my husband gets off pretty easy and he agrees. We did have a good laugh over it, especially when I said he should've told her he was getting me cooking lessons. She probably would've gone apoplectic on him when the truth is I would love to have some gourmet cooking or wine and food pairing classes.
What did I get? An immersion blender/chopper, three bottles of wine, a gift certificate for more wine and four different sets of two wine glasses and the 6th season of Deadliest Catch. See? Give me wine and good TV and I'm happy. Not high maintenance at all.
Showing posts with label Subjects You Probably Coundn't Care Less About. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Subjects You Probably Coundn't Care Less About. Show all posts
Monday, December 27, 2010
Tuesday, December 30, 2008
The Hated Muse
Nora Roberts once commented that you couldn't wait for your muse to show up, you had to hunt the bitch down and beat her into submission (I tried to find the exact quote because it's funny, but Google failed me). I'm off work for ten days and had all the intentions in the world of writing, but unfortunately, someone forgot to tell my muse that and she's been off in a bar somewhere, no doubt drunk and picking up ugly men. Several times I've hunted her down but I've decided that not only does she need to be beaten into submission as Queen Nora says, but she needs a good dose of Ritalin for what seems like her short attention span these days. I've been able to round up The Bitch for maybe a chapter but then she's off again, doing something else while I stare at a blank page wondering where do my characters go next. I hate this part of writing. Nothing seems to help any more and I'm beginning to doubt myself and my desire to be a writer. Yes, I have a lot going on my life, but others can write through the stress of daily life, why can't I?
So here I am, once again chasing my muse around the room, trying to get her to focus but she's more slippery than a greased hairless chihuahua and about as much help as my seventeen year old daughter (who IS the center of the universe in her opinion) and it's getting difficult. So here I sit, listening to Harry Connick Jr to get inspired (and irritate the Center of The Universe just for fun), and instead of writing, I play Roller Coaster Tycoon. If Nora were here, she'd be appalled....and more than likely beat me into submission, which is probably what I need. I'd gladly give up my seventeen year old to channel Nora about now (then again, when she's in one of her moods, I'd give my seventeen year old up for pretty much anything)
Once again, the muse has escaped her restraints. Now, if only she'd come home with someone who looked like Roarke.....
So here I am, once again chasing my muse around the room, trying to get her to focus but she's more slippery than a greased hairless chihuahua and about as much help as my seventeen year old daughter (who IS the center of the universe in her opinion) and it's getting difficult. So here I sit, listening to Harry Connick Jr to get inspired (and irritate the Center of The Universe just for fun), and instead of writing, I play Roller Coaster Tycoon. If Nora were here, she'd be appalled....and more than likely beat me into submission, which is probably what I need. I'd gladly give up my seventeen year old to channel Nora about now (then again, when she's in one of her moods, I'd give my seventeen year old up for pretty much anything)
Once again, the muse has escaped her restraints. Now, if only she'd come home with someone who looked like Roarke.....
Monday, December 22, 2008
Let it snow, let it snow.....
According to my daughter's estimates this afternoon, we received 11 inches of snow last week here in Seattle. The news is saying it'll be the first white Christmas in 18 years.
Yes, Cathy, I can hear you laughing all the way from Alaska.....
I'd probably enjoy it more if I didn't have to venture out in it to go to work. Now granted, I grew up in Wisconsin where 11 inches in a week of snow is a minor inconvenience, however there, it not only is a heck of a lot flatter in terrain but the city knew how to deal with snow. Here, there's hills everywhere (may of which would be classified as "mountains" in WI) and to compound that annoying problem, IF the city does anything, they put down a useless mix of sand and deicer which does squat. They plow a few main roads but the secondary and side streets go unattended making driving near to impossible. They you got the morons driving with chains on the bare pavement....always fun to watch the light show from the sparks they are throwing off or worse, the idiots who are driving like there's NOT really 11 inches of snow.
But what's really disturbing is watching how snow brings out the natural selection process, taking out the human beings whose IQ level is in the range of possibly a cardboard box (can you say Jackass?). Like the teenagers, or twenty-something males who think that tying a sled to the back of a moving car doing 20 mph down the street of their subdivision is an awesome idea and then are actually surprised when the car pulling them stops suddenly and they go smacking into the back of it or that they swing wide and end up going cranium first into car parked at the curb of the street. Or the brain surgeons who sled down the secondary streets thinking they are above the laws of physics and really are going to stop before they get to that perpendicular main road with all traffic.
So, here's to more snow in the forecast and more incidences of sheer stupidity...after all without them, they'd have nothing to report on the news.
Yes, Cathy, I can hear you laughing all the way from Alaska.....
I'd probably enjoy it more if I didn't have to venture out in it to go to work. Now granted, I grew up in Wisconsin where 11 inches in a week of snow is a minor inconvenience, however there, it not only is a heck of a lot flatter in terrain but the city knew how to deal with snow. Here, there's hills everywhere (may of which would be classified as "mountains" in WI) and to compound that annoying problem, IF the city does anything, they put down a useless mix of sand and deicer which does squat. They plow a few main roads but the secondary and side streets go unattended making driving near to impossible. They you got the morons driving with chains on the bare pavement....always fun to watch the light show from the sparks they are throwing off or worse, the idiots who are driving like there's NOT really 11 inches of snow.
But what's really disturbing is watching how snow brings out the natural selection process, taking out the human beings whose IQ level is in the range of possibly a cardboard box (can you say Jackass?). Like the teenagers, or twenty-something males who think that tying a sled to the back of a moving car doing 20 mph down the street of their subdivision is an awesome idea and then are actually surprised when the car pulling them stops suddenly and they go smacking into the back of it or that they swing wide and end up going cranium first into car parked at the curb of the street. Or the brain surgeons who sled down the secondary streets thinking they are above the laws of physics and really are going to stop before they get to that perpendicular main road with all traffic.
So, here's to more snow in the forecast and more incidences of sheer stupidity...after all without them, they'd have nothing to report on the news.
Friday, July 4, 2008
But I wanna turn on the Harley!!!
My mother was deathly afraid of motorcycles having known someone that was hit while riding one and subsequently paralyzed. She always told me she'd kill me before I'd get a chance to kill myself if I ever dated a guy that rode one. Although I knew my mother well enough to know that she would actually carry out that threat to a certain extent, it may have stopped me from getting my butt on a bike but not fantasizing about riding one some day. Born and raised in Milwaukee, home of Harley Davidson, that's always been a part of that dream.
I've talked about it for years, my husband not really reacting to it that I can remember. But after seeing the movie The Bucket List (along with some encouragement from his boss who rides a BMW bike) he decided he wanted to learn to ride a bike and asked me to take the safety course with him. He passed (the rat) I didn't (hey, I'd just came back from Mexico, okay?) As luck had it, our neighbor was selling his bike and we now are proud owners of a 2000 Harley Sportster. The plan was to share it. He buys everything from the boots to the gear so that it will work for both of us.
Not that I can ride it yet.
My husband has taken to it like a fish to water. Meanwhile, being a beginner, thinking about riding an 833 cc scares the CRAP out of me. But, I'm going to do this because I wanna be a biker chick. Practice will help. But the question is, will I actually GET to practice? It just makes me wonder if and when I'll ever get to ride it. Maybe I'll just have to beat him with the helmet to get him off the damn thing so I can ride it once in awhile. Naaaa, it would destroy the integrity of the helmet.
Hey, I know...my birthday's coming up, he can just buy me one of my own!
I've talked about it for years, my husband not really reacting to it that I can remember. But after seeing the movie The Bucket List (along with some encouragement from his boss who rides a BMW bike) he decided he wanted to learn to ride a bike and asked me to take the safety course with him. He passed (the rat) I didn't (hey, I'd just came back from Mexico, okay?) As luck had it, our neighbor was selling his bike and we now are proud owners of a 2000 Harley Sportster. The plan was to share it. He buys everything from the boots to the gear so that it will work for both of us.
Not that I can ride it yet.
My husband has taken to it like a fish to water. Meanwhile, being a beginner, thinking about riding an 833 cc scares the CRAP out of me. But, I'm going to do this because I wanna be a biker chick. Practice will help. But the question is, will I actually GET to practice? It just makes me wonder if and when I'll ever get to ride it. Maybe I'll just have to beat him with the helmet to get him off the damn thing so I can ride it once in awhile. Naaaa, it would destroy the integrity of the helmet.
Hey, I know...my birthday's coming up, he can just buy me one of my own!
Monday, April 21, 2008
Poo-pourri
We were having a discussion the other day at work about the show Seinfeld and it struck me that we have a very Seinfeldian (is that a word?) situation at work. Don't think it was one they touched on in the gazillion years the show ran, but since I don't remember each of show in their run, I could be wrong. Warning: the rest of this post will dissolve quickly into bathroom humor...literally.
In the place I work we have two bathrooms: A large, multi-stalled one with good ventilation and a smaller two-stalled one with not so great ventilation. There's an unwritten rule among the males that if you have to uh...'punch a grumpie' as a one put it, you use the bigger bathroom because the ventilation is better. Now, I don't know where men got the idea that women are dainty little things whose...uh...grumpies don't stink, but I'm here to say, this just ain't true. And the whole dainty thing could have argument too once you've been in two-stall room with.....
The Grunter.
Yes, the Grunter. Everyone knows her and avoids her as much as possible because it's just really hard to look a person in the face when you know what she sounds like working so hard on the other side of the stall wall. And boy, she can leave behind a residue to make your eyes water. Now, before you ask about the whole bathroom freshener thing, you have to understand we are in a 'fragrance free' office because there are some in the building allergic to everything known to man--this rule of course excludes our boss who walks around smelling like an Estee Lauder perfume factory to cover the smell of cigarettes she's not supposed to be smoking in her car on the property because it's against policy...but I digress...
The Grunter had been on the schedule of every day after lunch and we all had it timed out where if you didn't get in there before noon, you didn't go in until after one. If you were really desperate, you could go down to the bigger bathroom, but then it looked to everyone like you were doing something you really weren't so most people just waited. Well recently she's changed her schedule in an effort to throw us all off. Now, no one knows when it's safe to breathe the air in that little room. Of course no one wants to actually confront her about it, telling her that this "rule" is in place for everyone's breathing safety, so we all suffer in silence.
Where is that spaz Kramer when I need him?
In the place I work we have two bathrooms: A large, multi-stalled one with good ventilation and a smaller two-stalled one with not so great ventilation. There's an unwritten rule among the males that if you have to uh...'punch a grumpie' as a one put it, you use the bigger bathroom because the ventilation is better. Now, I don't know where men got the idea that women are dainty little things whose...uh...grumpies don't stink, but I'm here to say, this just ain't true. And the whole dainty thing could have argument too once you've been in two-stall room with.....
The Grunter.
Yes, the Grunter. Everyone knows her and avoids her as much as possible because it's just really hard to look a person in the face when you know what she sounds like working so hard on the other side of the stall wall. And boy, she can leave behind a residue to make your eyes water. Now, before you ask about the whole bathroom freshener thing, you have to understand we are in a 'fragrance free' office because there are some in the building allergic to everything known to man--this rule of course excludes our boss who walks around smelling like an Estee Lauder perfume factory to cover the smell of cigarettes she's not supposed to be smoking in her car on the property because it's against policy...but I digress...
The Grunter had been on the schedule of every day after lunch and we all had it timed out where if you didn't get in there before noon, you didn't go in until after one. If you were really desperate, you could go down to the bigger bathroom, but then it looked to everyone like you were doing something you really weren't so most people just waited. Well recently she's changed her schedule in an effort to throw us all off. Now, no one knows when it's safe to breathe the air in that little room. Of course no one wants to actually confront her about it, telling her that this "rule" is in place for everyone's breathing safety, so we all suffer in silence.
Where is that spaz Kramer when I need him?
Thursday, March 13, 2008
I was trying to figure out something funny and interesting to write about, but sadly, I got nothin'. I lead, and have led, a pretty damned boring life. I don't get lost in the woods like Cathy, and I don't have online dating adventures like Sharron (thank GOD!!!). I work full time and have children, which pretty much suck up time, energy and brain cells -- which isn't very conducive with having a life.
But even before that, I can't think of one thing interesting to tell you about. I got married at age 22, moved to Atlanta and started working full time. That job was probably the most interesting one I had -- a medical transcriptionist in a hospital pathology lab. We saw some pretty interesting things come through there...one of those tiny little ice cream spoons from someone's stomach and things that make you ask questions like, "what would possess a person to put that in a bodily orifice???" or "Wow, that had to hurt going in...what the hell were they thinking?" The docs that we worked with were an interesting bunch as well...smart as hell with a bizarre sense of humor for the most part. They actually started their own personal freak show of various items removed from various individuals who again, found it necessary to put these said items in places not usually reserved for such things (thank God we never had a gerbil come through). Cost to view the freak show was a quarter a viewing. Although once they added the hot pink dildo so huge, it boggled the mind that someone would actually consider using it for anything other than beating a cheating spouse to death and then the cost of admission went up to fifty cents.
Working with these docs was always a learning experience....whether you wanted it to be or not. One question usually resulted in an hour long answer you couldn't help but walk away from thinking, "Wow, that was interesting," or "Ewww, too much information." Like the time I was pregnant with my daughter and the docs were absolutely sure I wanted to see what my body was doing on the inside and pulled me into the lab to show me an example of a uterus and how stretchable it was.
Oh boy.
I also ended up having my daughter in that hospital. It was a constant parade of co-workers in and out of my room while I was in labor--some of them there legitimately to take blood, others just there to cheer me on. One poor young sap had a wife due to deliver in the next three weeks....I'm sure he had nightmares after seeing me in the throws of labor. Looking back, I should've had a clue as to how life with my daughter would turn out....the entire time I watched the breaking news of Jeffrey Dahmer, and when she was actually born, it was amongst tornado and severe storm warnings.
So, now, wasn't that interesting? Hey, you! Yeah, the one snoring in the front row. I asked you a question, dammit! Never mind. I'll just go back to my boring life.
But even before that, I can't think of one thing interesting to tell you about. I got married at age 22, moved to Atlanta and started working full time. That job was probably the most interesting one I had -- a medical transcriptionist in a hospital pathology lab. We saw some pretty interesting things come through there...one of those tiny little ice cream spoons from someone's stomach and things that make you ask questions like, "what would possess a person to put that in a bodily orifice???" or "Wow, that had to hurt going in...what the hell were they thinking?" The docs that we worked with were an interesting bunch as well...smart as hell with a bizarre sense of humor for the most part. They actually started their own personal freak show of various items removed from various individuals who again, found it necessary to put these said items in places not usually reserved for such things (thank God we never had a gerbil come through). Cost to view the freak show was a quarter a viewing. Although once they added the hot pink dildo so huge, it boggled the mind that someone would actually consider using it for anything other than beating a cheating spouse to death and then the cost of admission went up to fifty cents.
Working with these docs was always a learning experience....whether you wanted it to be or not. One question usually resulted in an hour long answer you couldn't help but walk away from thinking, "Wow, that was interesting," or "Ewww, too much information." Like the time I was pregnant with my daughter and the docs were absolutely sure I wanted to see what my body was doing on the inside and pulled me into the lab to show me an example of a uterus and how stretchable it was.
Oh boy.
I also ended up having my daughter in that hospital. It was a constant parade of co-workers in and out of my room while I was in labor--some of them there legitimately to take blood, others just there to cheer me on. One poor young sap had a wife due to deliver in the next three weeks....I'm sure he had nightmares after seeing me in the throws of labor. Looking back, I should've had a clue as to how life with my daughter would turn out....the entire time I watched the breaking news of Jeffrey Dahmer, and when she was actually born, it was amongst tornado and severe storm warnings.
So, now, wasn't that interesting? Hey, you! Yeah, the one snoring in the front row. I asked you a question, dammit!
Thursday, January 17, 2008
But, I Don't Wanna Go to School, Mom!
At forty-two, the last thing I wanted was to go back to school, but, thanks to my teenager, I'm being forced to. It's January and that means the end of the semester: projects and cramming for finals. So tonight, for the second night in a row, we are working on a civics project.
Oh joy.
So here I am, struggling to recall what the information I've retained in the years since high school which, I'm sorry to say, is pretty damned little. Being ADD, I wasn't a good student to begin with and then you add teenage angst, hormones along with the fact that I got mono TWICE my senior year and almost ended up not graduating, and you got yourself a cornucopia of delightful educational memories. And now I get this!
Daughter: Describe Capitalism.
Me: Bill Gates
Daughter: Describe Communism.
Me: Itunes...oh, no wait, that would be Amazon.com now since their deal with Sony.
Daughter: Contrast and compare Democratic and Republican parties.
Me: Dumb and dumber.
My daughter wasn't amused.
After we finished the civics project, it was on to advanced algebra. Now in my world, letters and numbers don't mix. It's sort of like putting blue cheese on your Cocoa Puffs... IT JUST DOESN'T WORK! The minute you start substituting numbers with letters, my eyes glaze over and the drool pools in the corner of my mouth before forming a puddle on the floor by my feet. I...just...don't...get....it. Who uses this anyway? Maybe in some occupations, but certainly none my artistic daughter will go into. But it's required for school. Sorry kiddo, Mom's out on this one.
After that came American Lit....Hellooooo have you read some of this stuff? Harry Potter is ripped from the shelves while being touted as demonic witchcraft yet the schools insist our children read things where depression, poverty, murder and at times perversion run free because it's "Classic Literature". I'd rather sit and listen to Barry Manilow all day while plucking my eyelashes out one by one.
Again, daughter isn't amused. So she picks up her things and heads up to her room There at least she can make up better answers than her mom can in peace and quiet.
Oh joy.
So here I am, struggling to recall what the information I've retained in the years since high school which, I'm sorry to say, is pretty damned little. Being ADD, I wasn't a good student to begin with and then you add teenage angst, hormones along with the fact that I got mono TWICE my senior year and almost ended up not graduating, and you got yourself a cornucopia of delightful educational memories. And now I get this!
Daughter: Describe Capitalism.
Me: Bill Gates
Daughter: Describe Communism.
Me: Itunes...oh, no wait, that would be Amazon.com now since their deal with Sony.
Daughter: Contrast and compare Democratic and Republican parties.
Me: Dumb and dumber.
My daughter wasn't amused.
After we finished the civics project, it was on to advanced algebra. Now in my world, letters and numbers don't mix. It's sort of like putting blue cheese on your Cocoa Puffs... IT JUST DOESN'T WORK! The minute you start substituting numbers with letters, my eyes glaze over and the drool pools in the corner of my mouth before forming a puddle on the floor by my feet. I...just...don't...get....it. Who uses this anyway? Maybe in some occupations, but certainly none my artistic daughter will go into. But it's required for school. Sorry kiddo, Mom's out on this one.
After that came American Lit....Hellooooo have you read some of this stuff? Harry Potter is ripped from the shelves while being touted as demonic witchcraft yet the schools insist our children read things where depression, poverty, murder and at times perversion run free because it's "Classic Literature". I'd rather sit and listen to Barry Manilow all day while plucking my eyelashes out one by one.
Again, daughter isn't amused. So she picks up her things and heads up to her room There at least she can make up better answers than her mom can in peace and quiet.
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