Tales from the Cryptic

I'm ashamed to post two short entries in a row, but I'm a busy lady and blog posts are time consuming. (Or, at the very least, I pretend to be a busy lady and pretending to be too busy to blog is an important part of the illusion.)

Today I wanted to walk my dog and as it was a little chilly I went into the coat closet to grab a jacket. I couldn't find my usual chilly-but-not-cold jacket (blue, nylon/cloth, fake elbow patches of the same color and material) so I grabbed an old corduroy jacket that I used to wear quite often in college. I preceded to I walk my dog and we had various small adventures that were thrilling but not relevant to the story so shall be ignored.

When I got home I emptied the pockets of the corduroy jacket (so that I wouldn't end up with my keys hidden in the closet inside of a jacket that I rarely wear) and found a receipt dated 11/22/2008, which is exactly a year and a day ago.

The receipt is from Original Pete's Pizza. It lists 1 pint of Midtown Ale, 1 pint of Bud Light, and some tax, all equaling the sum of 7.50. I apparently paid with a 20, suggesting that I had more available cash at the time and received 12.50 in change. I pro'lly paid 3 dollars in tip.

All of these calculations are not important but I enjoyed writing them down so I'll keep them. The point is this: a year and a day ago I had more cash on hand. I also had just gotten engaged, lived in an apartment in a different city where I often walked to pizzerias and drank pints of Bud Light, and definitely never had to think of the consequences of putting my keys away in a coat closet because I didn't have a coat closet.

I didn't have a coat closet but I had a 20, a new car, and (apparently) a Bud Light. I had just landed the job that I quit two months ago.

Lots of things are crazy, but mainly time (the passage of and ect.).

In Bangkok

The following is an excerpt from the box of the weird insta-noodle thing that I just tried to eat:

"Trader Ming's Noodle Boxes were inspired by the noodle carts on the streets of Bangkok, Thailand. In Bangkok, people enjoy all kinds of wonderful foods from street vendors.

In a way, the streets are really just one big open air cafe. We have imported three great flavors from Thailand and now you have an easy way to ear these noodle dishes."

Trader Ming is grossly mistaken. Those noodles (Best by: August 2009) tasted like burnt plastic and the the shoe leather of someone who works at Panda Express. Spend a little less time on the sweeping generalizations about Bangkok and a little more time on the noodle sauce, Trader Ming.

Peanut-butter toast it is.

Pretty g.d. gross

I’m sick but I don’t have the swine flu, because I’m not trendy enough to catch such a popular disease. I’ve got a cold.

I am probably the worst person ever at having a cold. I don’t like dripping things, I have a Victorian fear of making people aware of my bodily dysfunctions (i.e., sniffing, coughing), and I love whining. So my colds, while marvelously unpleasant for me, are also extremely unpleasant for others.

I pride myself on being a rather healthy person. Excepting a brief chunk of my college career when I barely ate, showered, or slept, I have an impressive track record of rebuffing illness. But I do occasionally get a cold and even though I generally recover swiftly I find the whole experience unpleasant and embarrassing.

You see, when I get a cold my eyes water constantly. This neat effect, combined with my sniffling, makes it seem as though I have just finished crying and creates opportunities for complete strangers to try to console me. I do not enjoy being consoled on a good day, but when I have got a weird twinge in my sinus cavity that is making my eye water – random consolers had better watch out. This is not the time for a back-pat and a sympathetic smile.

I think that the worst thing about a cold is that it is temperamental. You can be distracted from your cold by a pile of drugs and good conversation to the point if you wonder if you’ve just invented your cold to give yourself an interesting personality quirk.

But if you are at work or in a situation where you have to hang your head down (and I’ve never had a job that didn’t require or make me want to hang my head) there is nothing more uncomfortable. The dripping nose, dripping eyes and the way that the silence enhances each disgusting sniff is like a nightmare about taking a final. And also pretty g.d. gross.

Safe as houses

Today I had a Jamba Juice for the first time in approximately 6 months (see my previous posts about attempting to buy a J.J. in a shopping mall near a high school – worst idea ever) and it was still amazing. I justified the expense by reminding myself that an immunity boost is cheaper and probably more effective than a swine flu vaccine but mainly I was just craving some squashed fruit mixed with gallons of sugar water.

A slight aside on my favorite topic, “things that I used to order from restaurants all the time but are now no longer listed on the menu.” My favorite smoothie was called a Strawberry Tsunami, but a few years ago the word tsunami became too offensive and they changed the name to Strawberry Surf-rider. In the early days of this transition I would order the Strawberry Tsunami out of misplaced loyalty (just as I order the unlisted two cheese burger meal at McDonalds) but today I said it purely by accident. The girl behind the counter affected ignorance and I had to excuse, and then correct, myself.

Speaking of girls behind counters, I have some commentary about being one. On Sunday I suffered my first bout of retail rage, which considering how people love to throw tissue paper on the floor, took an awfully long time to sink in. The story is actually very short: I was supposed to be folding and straightening sweaters and people kept touching them with no intention of buying them. For some reason, though I touch all manner of crap that I have no intention of buying, this seemed unforgiveable.

I think this was one of those learning moments and I suddenly sympathized with people who always over-tip the waitress because they once worked in food service. I am never going to go rooting through a pile of sweaters that I don’t really want ever again. Nor will I ditch something on a random shelf that I’ve carried all the way around the store twice and am too lazy to return. Well, maybe in really big stores that you aren’t allowed to go backward in…like IKEA or a Walmart Super Center.

And in unrelated news, I would like to start using the abbreviation “g.d.” instead of “goddamn” when typing. I would also like to integrate the phrase “safe as houses” into my vocabulary.

2 o'clock block

The wall I hit at 2 p.m. is a hearty one. All progress halts as I consider unnecessary snacks and conpulsively check my email. Compulsive email checking for unpopular kids like me is a waste of time and ego; I could check that thing every ten minutes all day long and never get an email that wasn’t a misguided Facebook alert about someone who commented on a status that I also commented on.

Hitting this wall is very disheartening for me everyday, but especially so on Fridays. On Fridays I have a strange desire to earn my weekend through hard work and perseverance. It’s a freaky throwback trait to my 9-5 days and a real indicator that my brain hasn’t fully grasped the fact that I usually work on the weekends now.

Today started off well enough. I was productive from 8 a.m. to noon, and then I ate some food and then did a little more work. I was relatively pleased; I started a new story that might have eventual promise and then hacked away at some unpromising story for about an hour. But as 2 p.m. neared, the barking of the neighbor’s dog became more pronounced and I suddenly became aware that my own dog was licking the floor in the kitchen and producing rending tongue-scrape noises.

I figured that killing my neighbor’s dog would be slightly less PC than the time that I read aloud from the Wikipedia entry about skinheads with the windows open (and I’ve a very carrying voice, you know) so I satisfied my own angst by asking my dog if she wouldn’t mind not licking the floor anymore. My dog, of course, interpreted this request as an invitation to stand beside me and breathe laboriously. And that, perhaps, is why I am writing this blog.

I’m trying to recall if I had anything else of note to mention while I am on here. I haven’t read much lately that hasn't been pointedly instructive and my television (cough, internet, cough) time has been divided between a bad British miniseries about scullery maids and an unforgivably raunchy HBO show about kings.

Something weird that I learned today: In some states there is a wolf hunting season and Montana’s closed today after the 12 wolf quota was met. That brings a tear to my Julie of the Wolves lovin’ eye.

Almost as good as the Christmas episode

Last night when I was laying in bed trying in vain to recover from my Halloween hangover (I went as a person who had to work until 9 p.m. and then drank 4 beers) I realized that I love flashback episodes. And I mean episodes as in sitcoms, not as in episodes in my life (i.e., “episodes of derangement”).

I strongly dislike this facet of my television personality. First, one should not be so familiar with sitcoms that one is able to identify trends in sitcom material. Secondly, there should be nothing that you love about sitcoms unless you are a lady who lives alone and you love that there is something as mind-numbing and confidence building as Spin City on at 3 a.m. when you wake up and are afraid to go back to sleep. (Note: if I lived alone, this would be me. I’m massively afraid of prowlers. Michael J. Fox soothes me.)

Flashback episodes bring a smile to my heart and I wonder: is it the cheap thrill of period-dress and age-appropriate speech patterns that floats my boat? Is my taste in narratives really so slap-stick? It certainly seems that way.

I endeavor (with all of the snootiness of my degree in finding symbolic things) to see it more as an appreciation of the spectacle of transformation. Veteran readers are likely bracing themselves for some unfounded proclaiming, and they are correct; this is going to be one of my specious arguments with myself.

I think that the flashback aspect appeals to me in the same way that “make-over montages” in movies appeal to me. I tend to emotionally over-invest in media, and in the same way that I quail when a character is embarrassed I feel mild triumph when they are made over. I’m not immune to movie plot patterns, I know that these transformations frequently result in the character losing sight of their true values (Pocahontas 2, hello) but the montages are still charming. Anne Hathaway has built her career on the value of these scenes.

Judge me if you will, I also like opening scenes in high school movies where you are introduced to the characters by watching them don their stereotypical apparel and seeing them arrive at school. Jocks have cars, self-righteous nerds have skateboards or bikes. Surfer kids (why do they even include this mythical subculture?) are randomly carrying around surfboards.

We could delve into the reasons for my fascination with these scenes, but after four (count ‘em four) bad pop culture shout-outs I think we’ve had enough personal revelation for today. I will chalk it up to the superficial; I’m bad at dressing myself and find joy in watching others liberated from the task.