Lemonade, that cool, refreshing drink

As I have mentioned before, sometimes I like to kick back, grab a Diet Coke and geek out and watch educational television. Last night, J and I were watching a program about the Dead Sea. Quite fascinating. Apparently, about 75,000 years ago, the sea flooded into that valley and created the Dead Sea. But eventually the seas lowered in the Ice Age and it left the Dead Sea just sort of sitting there like "Ummm...guys?" So now it's on its own, chilling in one of the lowest spots on earth, just getting saltier and saltier. And did you know that if you swallow Dead Sea water, it can actually damage your organs? And breathing in the air can scar your lungs? True! And then, of course, they show a shot of some wacko just floating in the Dead Sea and swimming around thinking it's good for his chi or something. Moron.

I wanna be a princess!

J and I were just discussing vacation as we were driving into work today. There's nothing like piles of black, sooty snow to make you think about getting the heck out of town. We were throwing around the idea of Florida because he has a couple friends who live there, and I'm liking the fact that South Carolina is on the way. I've been to Orlando, St. Augustine and Tampa Bay, but does anybody know of other nice places to stay? Is there anywhere you can go where you don't need a car to get around? That was one of the things I always liked about Vegas--that you can walk most places so you don't have to get your car in and out of parking every day. But, I'm telling you, a vacation sounds most delightful right now. It's not even that life is particularly hard or stressful...I just wanna throw on some flip flops and eat a mango in peace and quiet, you know? Dig it.

I got two watches, but I ain't got time for you

I must confess I hardly watched any of the Oscars last night. I saw a few minutes of the beginning, enjoyed the Will Farrell/Jack Black/John C. Reilly musical number, and then I promptly fell asleep. It sounds like a lot of the people who were predicted to win did just that, although I'm kind of sad Marky Mark didn't win. I could totally see his acceptance speech: "Thank you, everyone," and then he'd punch the presenter and leave the stage yelling "Boo yah!" cause I'm pretty sure he's on steroids.

Monster truck family update: we have determined that the family next door has at least three cars, none of which seem to have a muffler. Was I born under a bad sign? How do I keep getting neighbors like this? And we had a new group move into the rental house across the street from us. Generally, it's not even worth it getting to know whomever moves in there, because they're always evicted within six months. But I will say they've already made themselves quite at home because there's already a tire and underpants in their front yard. Classy.

Ya burnt!

Wow, Roy has an anger management problem! I get so emotionally involved in The Office that I was actually scared for Pam for a second there. And I'm a tad worried that Roy is going to wipe the floor with Jim, too. Although, as J pointed out, that probably wouldn't be a good career move for Roy. But that was a good episode. I loved Kevin's "I would appreciate some space on this!"

I'm excited today because I get to leave at lunchtime since I have to work tomorrow. I'm not overly thrilled to come in on a Saturday, but it's always nice to have the Friday afternoon off. My big plan is to purchase toiletries at Target. Speaking of which, I have to catalog a lot of French paintings here that are titled "Woman at Her Toilette," and every time I do, I giggle. Hee, toilet.

It's the hardest-working uterus in town

An old friend of mine dropped by work yesterday. It was cool to see her again because it had been a few months since we'd talked, so we were catching up, and she told me that she's getting married in three weeks. She's very excited, and her fiance seems like a very nice guy, but it got me thinking because she's about 24, and I was trying to remember what I was like at 24, and, people, I can't remember. That was 8 years ago, and I'm pretty sure I was at USC taking classes and working, but I can't remember the small stuff. What car I drove, where I lived, it's all a big blur. I can definitely narrow down apartments and cars, but I honestly couldn't pinpoint for sure, and I certainly couldn't tell you what I did day-to-day because the only image that comes to mind is palmetto bugs and the darkened seminar room in Sloan. But I suppose this really isn't that surprising. I couldn't even tell you what I wore to work yesterday. I gotta stop drinking so much! Heh heh.

Inconvenient truth, my @%#

So Spears finally checked into rehab, eh? That Dr. Keith Ablow was on tv yesterday saying that perhaps Anna Nicole Smith's death at such a young age gave Britney pause and motivated her to check into rehab so she wouldn't meet the same fate. Uhh...I think that might be giving the girl more of a sense of analytical reasoning than she merits. But I could be wrong. Heck, maybe Jessica Simpson does calculus in her spare time, I don't know.

Happily, I got a lot more sleep last night, but I still woke up this morning wanting to punch a kitten. Sometimes I wonder if this is a female thing all women go through, or if my years of using humor as a defense mechanism are coming back to haunt me...like I've been building up all this frustration and rage, and any day now I'm just going to lose it and start screaming at street signs. Like, do you ever see hippies who are all peaceful and talk about being in harmony with the earth, and you wonder "Hey, are these hippies for real or do they go home at night and listen to Megadeath while sprinkling crack on Krispy Kremes and writing hate mail to Al Gore?" Again, I don't know.

That would be a devastating edit

I've been up since 3:15 this morning because our neighbor pulled into his driveway, music blaring, and I couldn't fall back asleep. I don't think he was driving the monster truck because it was only loud, not ear-splitting (for some reason, these neighbors don't believe in mufflers). So I'm thinking that if J and I can't figure out a way to rotate our house on its vertical axis so that our bedroom windows are facing our quiet neighbors, we're just going to have to move. Because as bad as it is in the winter with the crunchy snow and people letting their engines warm up in the morning, it only gets worse during the summer in our neighborhood. Fireworks, gunfire, stray dogs getting into fights with stray cats, teenagers up at 2 a.m. yelling across the street that they need some meth, etc.... My poor ears. I swear, one day I'm going to move to Greenland. I don't care how much snow it is. I'd much rather be woken up by a barking sea lion than Eminem's greatest hits. I honestly think the sea lion has more talent. Zing!

Feel the burn

J and I went to a state park on Friday for our Valentine's Day dinner, and let me just say that the chateaubriand was fabulous (I'd never had chateaubriand before...I had no idea it was basically just really delicious steak. Huh). Anyway, below are some pictures we took so you can get an idea of what the weather was like. Truly, a tropical paradise.

It's made up...like Santa Claus and eskimos

Sweet merciful crap, I just saw a news story about the poor people who were trapped on a Pennsylvania highway for 15 to 20 hours yesterday! That had to suck. I'm guessing I could keep up a facade of good cheer for about an hour or two, but I'm quite certain that after sitting in a frozen car for 4 hours, I'd be pretty dang crabby. I'm not even sure what a person does to pass the time in that situation. Times like that, it would be handy to know a lot about botany so you could go outside and decide which pine needles would cause highway patrol officers the most pain when you stab them in the eye for not letting you move your car. Take that, Mr. Man!

And I thought The Office was good last night. I felt so bad for our girl, Pam. And I saw Scrubs, but I fell asleep during 30 Rock. I'm so mad at myself!

Sunday! Sunday! Sunday!

I don't think I mentioned it already, but we have new neighbors. The house next door to us had been sitting empty for a few months, but last weekend a new family moved in. And so far, they had been just fine, no trouble at all. But this morning, they started their monster truck (which sits directly beneath our bedroom windows) at 4 a.m. and let it idle for about 10 minutes. For Pete's sake. And I'm not even exaggerating that much when I call it a monster truck--it's got enormous wheels, it's got no muffler, and it seems really angry when you look at it head-on. So I'm hoping that either this waking up at 4 was a fluke, or they put a muffler on it, because that is going to get real annoying real fast.

And we're back at work today. The main roads were nice and clear, and since J cleaned the ice off the car yesterday, we only had to spend about 2 minutes yanking the car doors open this morning. Honestly, it was an improvement over what it could have been.

Do they make rubber pants our size?

We got a snow day today! And, believe me, it's not just my inner slacker that's rejoicing about this--the weather's really bad out there! It's very icy. The trees are covered in ice, my car is covered in ice, the 6 inches of snow on the ground are covered in ice. Lotsa ice, in other words. So I figure I'll put on a pot of coffee soon and watch some DVDs...unless the power goes out. They keep saying on the news how we need to get out candles and battery-powered radios because there's a very high probability that our power lines will freeze and snap in the high winds. I do not look forward to that development. If that happens, I'm getting in the car and heading to the nearest open McDonald's. Word up.

Does Gap.com sell snowshoes?

I finally got to CVS last night to get my annual bag of Sweettart hearts! Yay! I love those things. Back when I was in my teen years (and wooly mammoths roamed the earth), I used to be able to eat an entire bag of Sweettart hearts in a day. I'm amazed now that the lining of my mouth is still mostly intact. It really should have dissolved years ago.

I hate to bring it up again, but we're in the midst of another craptastic winter storm. There were at least three inches on the ground this morning, and we're supposed to get another 5 to 8 inches as the day goes on. That is just wonderful. All the public schools and even the public libraries are closed today, but we're still here. And by "we," I mean me and my one coworker. Everybody else has called in to say they can't get out of their driveways. Lucky jerks.

It might have been the ghost of Patrick Swayze's career

J and I have definitively concluded that our house is, in fact, haunted. The house alarm went off at 1:00 last night, so J went to investigate (I stayed in our bedroom to perform the very important duty of lying completely still so no burglars would find me), and there was no sign of activity at all in the house. Curious. So we figure it's the ghost of the elderly woman who used to live there. In fact, when I first started hanging out with J, we had an episode where we were upstairs and we both heard footsteps coming up the stairs. So J went out the investigate (and, again, I stayed completely still), and nobody was there. But we were talking about it later, and we could each describe exactly where the footsteps were and where it sounded like the person went. Spooky! This is what you get when you live in an 80-year-old house and have seen The Exorcist too many times.

Spin's the verb

I went over to Dayton last night to go to this mystery theatre dinner with my Mom and sister (which was fun, by the way), and since I was driving by myself this time, I turned on the radio to keep me occupied. See, normally, I'm not much of a radio person because the amount of time and effort it takes to find a good song on the radio is about five times longer than an actual song, so I just don't bother. But I was listening to that Nelly Furtado Promiscuous, and I strongly suspect that whoever wrote that song doesn't really know what "promiscuous" means. And then some Justin Timberlake came on, and I once again had an internal debate about that guy. Mostly, I think he's an egotistical punk with an incredibly annoying falsetto, but, then again, he's kind of a personal hero for singing Cry Me a River. I just can't make up my mind about him. Then, fortunately, Blackstreet's No Diggity came on, and all was right in the world.

I'd kill Jenna

That's crazy about Anna Nicole Smith dying! J's theory is that her ex-husband's family killed her to get their father's money back, I tend to think that she overdosed on drugs and Wubby J. just wanted us to stop watching tv and pet him. So, really, any one of us could be right. I was watching some recent interviews of her on tv, and something really weird was going on with her face. Not that she looked bad, per se, but it seemed like her eyes were frozen in place somehow, like they were swollen and painful or something. Maybe that was just Botox though, I don't know. I remember a few years ago hearing a story about how Janet Jackson liked to get enemas made out of coffee grounds, and from that point on, I've given up trying to understand what celebrities do to themselves. Coffee ground enemas...I mean, really.

Two steps forward

We were watching American Idol last night and there was a strange Puerto Rican fella on there who mentioned Paula Abdul's Opposites Attract video with the animated cat. Well, you know how I've told you before that we like to change lyrics of songs so they're about the Wubby J.? So J starts singing "It ain't fiction, he's an actual cat" and I started laughing so hard I was crying. And then he started laughing so hard he was crying, so we're both sitting there on the couch doubled over giggling with tears streaming down our faces. And even while it was happening, I was thinking "Is this going to be half as funny when I write it in my blog tomorrow?" You be the judge.

It's still outrageously cold here. Yesterday, my part-time worker told me it's supposed to get up to 28 on Saturday, and the whole library erupted into applause. Pathetic. I'm going to hop on a plane for Puerto Rico this afternoon. Carne asada!

Toonces

Wow. It started snowing yesterday about 2:30 in the afternoon, so the drive home from work was ridiculous. Ridiculous, I say! It took us about 40 minutes to get home when it normally takes 20, but because we get off work half an hour earlier than most people, we got lucky. I heard all sorts of stories about people whose drives home took 2 or 3 hours. For. Crying. Out. Loud. All the public schools are closed again today, but we're still slogging into work. I'm not going to lie to you, people, I'm starting to get bitter about our lack of snow days around here. And I know you're thinking "You're not 8. You don't get snow days anymore." And you're right. But I still want them.

The good news about all this is that I have absolutely no desire whatsoever to go to the gym at night when the weather's this bad, so I've just been sitting at home bundled up and throwing milk caps at the Wubby J. to pass the time. It's not bad. I don't even feel guilty because I believe the extra layer of fat will come in handy when the wind chill hits me.

Dang kids

It was -12 with the wind chill when I got up this morning. Yesterday it was -19. And today we're supposed to get 1 to 3 inches of snow. All the public schools are closed, but I'm still here at work. Tomorrow, I'm just going to call in cold.

Apparently, I should not have had that second glass of wine with dinner last night because I fell asleep on the couch at 8:45. Honestly, any day now I'm just going to stop fighting fate and purchase a walker, orthopedic shoes and a subscription to Soap Opera Digest. I'm going to start coloring my hair gray and wearing caftans. I'm going to reminisce with friends about the Great War (I've read books, so I'll come up with something) and how I miss doing laundry by hand. There's just no point in telling people I'm 32 anymore. There's nothing 32 about me. Sigh.

Yeah, so if anybody saw Heroes last night, let me know what happened. I seriously didn't catch a single minute of it.

Try dragging it

That was a good game last night. My Mom came into town to watch the game with me since I figured J would be on the computer most of the night (which turned out to be an accurate prediction), and we had a delightful time rooting for the Colts. It was a fun game to watch. I like Super Bowls a lot better when it's not a completely one-sided blowout. But, I must say, I thought the commercials weren't super-entertaining this year. Now, the pregame show, on the other hand, that was an emotional roller coaster ride. I'm not even kidding--I started crying about four times watching those stories about football players who've passed away, watching current players talk about their hard childhoods, etc.... I was a wreck. It's like when I watch the Olympics, and I'm all prepared to hate the competitors, but when they tell the stories about them growing up in Lithuanian orphanages and only having their ice skates to bring them hope, I cry like a baby. Man, I'm such a girl sometimes! I make myself sick!

Jazz! Charleston! Interpretive!

I woke up this morning feeling stressed out. Generally, I just wake up feeling confused and sleepy, but this morning I had a tightness in my chest. And you want to know why? It's not a good reason. I just have actual plans for the weekend. That's right: having things to do on Saturday and Sunday stress me out to the point where I'm having myocardial infarctions. I am that big of a wuss. And I'm really quite excited to see my family this weekend and watch the Super Bowl, but the prospect of having to make my house look presentable (instead of its normal status of "acceptable" or occasionally "borderline") for visitors is giving me anxiety. I swear, sometimes I think the world should hold a pharmaceutical lottery so I could get a lifetime supply of Valium. Is that so wrong?!?

I joke. I joke because I love. Stay off the drugs, kids!

I always say "no pain, no pain"

J and I went to his niece's basketball game last night (this is his next-oldest brother's 13-year-old daughter), and it turned out to be pretty fun. Our niece did a good job out there on the court, and, even though her team lost, they were very sportsmanlike about it. It was funny because at one point in the game, I mentioned that I'd forgotten a lot of the rules of middle school basketball, and J said I need to stop watching ESPN and start watching the Middle School Sports Network (or MSSN). And once I had that image in my head, I just couldn't stop laughing. Think of how hilarious a middle schools sports network would be: teams of 12-year-olds half-heartedly playing kickball, out-of-shape 8th graders throwing up during track meets, middle school figure skating programs that consist of skating backwards and lifting a leg up for half a second...the possibilities are endless. You could even have an MSSN Zone featuring the latest in sparkly gel pens and Justin Timberlake stickers. It's genius!