Miscellany

Iran apparently needs a dayjob, since they don't have anything better to worry about.

Of course, I say this and yet the very county I live in, Frederick County, MD, made national news because they voted to make English the "official" language of Frederick County. I am SO PLEASED to know my elected officials have nothing better to do and look forward to helping them move on to the next phase in their professional lives come election time.

Last Night
I had a great zombie dream-Michael had turned into a zombie but was trying to play it off. But I knew. So I was going to sneak into the bathroom, find a pair of scissors, stab him repeatedly, and then crawl out the bathroom window and escape via my neighbor's roof in case he "survived." I was just about to execute my plan when he woke me up. I was irritated with him all morning. Actually, I don't know if I was irritated because he woke me up or because he stole my chance to kill Zombie Michael.

By the way, did I mention his birfday is in two days? See what the poor guy has to put up with?

Baconator

Tilda fancies herself as a "nouveau chef", I think. She likes to, shall we say, "experiment" with food. Typically she does this by creating various "dips." Sometimes, it is perfectly acceptable-chicken nuggets dipped in ketchup, for example. Other times, it's pretty odd-toast dipped in water.

Today, Tilda experimented with bacon dipped in milk. "Mmmm, good!" she exclaimed during breakfast.

Michael's eyes widened and he snatched a piece of bacon, dipped it in Tilda's milk, and ate it.

And gagged.

And we laughed at him.

Rock the Vote

My brother-in-law's Threadless design got accepted for submission-please check it out and vote here.

Man, I feel old...

I often joke about feeling old because I don't really have a good sense of humor. Therefore, I have to resort to sarcastic self-deprecation.

But I read something that made me feel truly old for the first time ever.

In talking about the new X-Files movie, some commentator wrote that the average college kid today would have been around 4 years old when the series began.

EGAD!

I remember anxiously awaiting the series to begin in middle school. While my fellow classmates with social lives were out doing things on Friday nights, I would hole up in my room waiting for 9PM and the show to begin.

Afterwards, I would hope online to these newfangled things called "chat rooms" and exchange theories about the show with other geeks.

I was crushed when they moved it to Sunday-I was once again left with nothing to do on Friday nights.

But 4 years old? Really?!?

Hey, Threadless Fans

Come vote for my brother-in-law's new design (when it becomes available). I'd buy it.

I'm in the Jailhouse Now

This will probably get me jailed, but really-she did this herself.

Oprah's Big Give

I imagine she keeps John Travolta in a basement wearing nothing but a leather leash. Trots him out whenever she had need of his "services."

Ew.

AAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!

Tension-breaker. Had to be done.

Purgatory

Have I died and gone to Hell? TNT is showing Peter Jackson's King Kong for a 3rd friggin' night in a row.

And I am watching it because its the only thing on and CNN's "Compassion Forum" is over.

Beer Bloggles

Check out the first of my two-part installment (unless I find additional restaurants that have beer) of Charlotte beers here.

Fitter, Happier, More Productive...

Suprisingly, Charlotte seems to be full of pretty healty people.

When one thinks of North Carolina, one thinks of the South, BBQ, fried chicken, etc...so I am pretty shocked to observe that most of the people I see in Charlotte's Uptown (think 95%) seem healthy and fit. At lunch, most people around me were chomping on salads and water. (Myself, yes, a salad but also a sampler of beer from Rock Bottom Brewery.)

They also seem to be happy people. Haven't seen anyone who has acted unpleasant, mad or sad.

I have only seen two homeless guys. They are the same ones and occupy the same corner. They sidle up to a group, nod enthusiastically at whatever the conversation happens to be and then politely and excitedly ask for spare change.

In short, it's kinda creeping me out.

But in this Uptown area, there really is nothing to do. I ended up walking around aimlessly for a few hours and then camped out in this little park and bothered my mom for awhile. Ended up getting sunburned. Egad, I am pale.

Or was. Now I am red.

Did I mention that I don't have access to Food Network? It makes me a little jittery. Very limited number of channels in the hotel room. Right now, Peter Jackson's King Kong is the only thing on. Not exactly my favorite film-I think it is kinda pretentious in a way. But I also recognize that what I see as pretentiousness might just be Peter Jackson's fanboyish love of the original after decades of fermentation. A yeasty brew of geekdom.

Charlotte's Web

So Charlotte reminds me of Fight Club for two reasons. One, it is one of (the?) America's "financial capital(s)."Two, I hope to God something subversive is happening in Charlotte's basements because, if not, the blandness would act like a black hole and suck the life out of all of existing matter within a 100 mile radius.

Okay, maybe that was a bit harsh.

The only thing I have seen in Charlotte thus far, besides the convention center and my hotel, is a handful of restaurants and financial buildings. Wachovia and Bank of America (I think) are housed here. They take up what appears the only skyscrapers in the city and they are all connected by tubes.

Yes, I said tubes.

But it's not a bad town. It's extremely clean, I feel quite safe walking around by myself with a laptop and people seem friendly enough. I actually even saw pedestrians with a right-of-way stop in the middle of a crosswalk to allow a car to turn right. I can't quite say I have EVER seen that.

I tried to call Maddy to tell her goodnight. Apparently, when Michael told her "Mommy was on the phone" she yelled "No!" at the phone and backed away. I feel loved.

I got the Tarmac Treatment today. For some reason, they decided to shut down the runway my plane was supposed to depart from. We sat on the tarmac for 45 minutes and watched planes lift off all around us.

I had a window seat so I spent most of the time alternately watching other planes depart, worrying about showing up to my lunch meeting on time and snoozing. I tend to chose window seats so I can lean my head against something and because it reduces my change of potential conversation by 50%. If you sit in the middle, you may have two people try to talk to you. If you sit on the end, you could have up to 3-4 people trying to talk to you (think aisle people).

This time, I ended up regretting it. My seatmate was talking to the gentleman next to him-a young, handsome fellow who was returning to North Carolina from a 15 month stint in Iraq. He was extremely talkative, but pleasant. He was obviously still getting used to being back in the States-he had been traveling for two days and was still unused to seeing things like real commercials and buying his own food for the first time in over a year. He was 20 years old and was going home to tell the wife and kids of one of his friends that her husband wasn't coming home.

I tend to be proud of the things I accomplished by the time I was 20-I had proved myself in school while working several jobs, I had convinced Michael to try to get a better job, and I was managing living by myself pretty well. But that is nothing compared to what this kid/man had seen and was about to do. So, I was really put in my place.

He was an interesting case study-he was happy to be home but certain-and looking forward to- go back in August. But I got the impression that he didn't agree with the war-he seemed to think that a lot was being held back from the American people, that the only reason that America has been successful in some provinces was because they gave Iraqis water and he was full of horror stories of how children were being mutilated and tortured. Overall, what really struck me is that he repeatedly said how lucky he was-whenever his seatmate made a comment about how the whole situation sucked, he would repeat that he couldn't complain, that he was lucky because he was alive. Despite everything that he had seen and heard (and was about to do) at his young age, he was still positive.

Me, being the negative person I tend to be, was very put in my place. I'll probably be thinking about him for a long time. I hope you do too.

Argh!

There are strangers in my house!!!

They are here right now-Michael is showing them The Mist.

I am upstairs, drinking my third (!) vodka and diet coke because I can neither handle strangers in my house (!) but, even more so, the ending of The Mist(!).

Because I would totally do THAT.

And it makes me nervous just realize IT.

Searching for Bobby (not Fischer)

Today should be a joyous occasion. Mike and I should be celebrating National Happy Sidewalk Day wherein we rejoice in the fact that our crumbling, decaying, and probably extremely dangerous sidewalk has been replaced by beautiful, silvery smooth concrete. (Thanks, dead Roman inventors-of-concrete dudes!)

mmmmm....Concrete Joy.

Instead, I am looking for a kid, probably around 8 or 9, by the name of "Bobby." Because Bobby took it upon himself to scribble his DAMNED NAME into my BRAND NEW SIDEWALK.

I am also looking for his comrade "J*s*l*e" who (I hope because of extreme fright at being caught) either couldn't spell his name right or who is so friggin' inept that he cannot even vandalize property correctly. (Seriously, what are the public schools teaching these kids?)

Bastards!

These creative youngsters also decided that History must not forget the day the Robinsons got a new sidewalk so they also carved the date into the corner.

Uncreative bastards!

The concrete had not even been down more than 12 hours.

I mean, if you are going to vandalize, you should at least have some sort of meaningful manifesto-type symbol, right?

So naturally I was hopping mad (I hate it when people touch my things) and called around to get sympathy from my sister (thanks, sister) and my mom (no luck there-"that's what kids do!" she says). They were touching my things, mom!!!

If it hadn't cost so much, I wouldn't have been as upset. But replacing the concrete means that we had to put off remodeling our icky kitchen for another year.

I did talk to the police, who said I was probably overreacting.

Erg.

I talked to the Concrete Man (I never got his name-as far as I know, that IS his name-it's printed on his truck) who said that he thought the marks would fade over time.

Erg.

I complained to almost everyone I came in contact with today.

Erg.

So I have turned into that creepy woman who constantly peers out her window, looking for evidence that kids are misbehaving. Looking, watching, and waiting for "Bobby." And "J*s*l*e."

On the plus side, at least now I have a hobby.

April Foo's

So I "accidentally" left this page open on our Internet browser today. It was enough to cause Michael cautious concern. Nobody wants toddler 2.5. Right, Kel? :)

Leaving for Charlotte in about a week for work. Michael did a preliminary Q & A into what there is to do in Charlotte, NC. He received advice that the Shriner's parade was pretty good (erp!) and that there were pig brains to be had (eep!).

(Honestly, though, with Maddy touching into this Terrible Twos phase, I think I will welcome the peace and quiet a week in Charlotte will bring. Pig's brains or no.)

So, Maddy is in this strange phase where she makes assumptions about the things she sees around her-I think I have already mentioned that she believes all churches are castles. I started correcting her and then started to think it was more fun to believe what she believed. The new thing is that this is actually butterflies-at first, I told her that it was just dust reflecting in the sunlight and then I remembered my own childhood, thinking that the dust/particless/unknown looked golden and magical in the sunlight and why the hell should she not think it they are butterflies?

I wonder if Mom knows how much I liked the dust in the house...bet she does now....she would probably spaz to know that there was dust to be had in the house...

Speaking of OCD, Maddy no longer likes to take baths. You would be amazed at how difficult it is to give a 2 year old a shower. One time she found a bug in the bath and now searches meticulously for "ants" in the tub. (Wonder who she got THAT from?) Anyways, I myself can't really argue with this logic. So I stick her in the shower. Erg.

And today was one of the warmest days we have had all year-and also the day of my first buggy kill-a small fly. I consider it a warning to any other flies that dare to think my house is a safe haven. Until they help pay the mortgage, they are not welcome here.