On the Road Again

Posting from Baltimore, where I've come for my cousin's wedding (where I'll try out the new dress).

I had to get up at 4:30 in the morning (which wouldn't have been so bad except I went to bed at 1:30) and had to change planes in Dallas, and both my flights were a little bit delayed, but I ended up making it here ok, and that's not what I'm ticked about.

Here's what I'm ticked about.  I used the valet parking at the airport.  (This because the self-parking adds up to another 45 minutes to my travel time waiting for the damn shuttle, and when I'm only gone for two days, the price differential ain't that much.)  So, I pull up into the valet parking area.  There are a few rows of cars that have backed up -- which is to say, the customers have already been dealt with -- their cars are just sitting there waiting for the valet dudes to park them.  So the valet dudes wave me over to start a new column of cars.  I pull up.  There's about four valet dudes standing there.  One of them starts walking around my car to check to see if there's any damage that he has to mark on the little ticket.  Since I'm in a hurry, I get out of my car and go around back to take my suitcase out, rather than waiting for valet guy to do it.  I figure he'll give me my ticket while I'm standing at the back of my car, and I'll be on my way.

Except valet guy has disappeared.  By the time I'm standing at the back of my car, valet guy has gone over to the car that pulled in behind me and is talking to that guy through his window, taking down his information.  I'm standing there -- with one hand on my suitcase still in the back of my car -- staring at "my" employee, who has just flagrantly blown me off to deal with the guy behind me. 

The other three valet guys are just standing there, oblivious.  One of them asks me if I need help taking my suitcase out.  "No," I say, "but I thought that guy was helping me."  One of the other valet dudes then takes the hint, walks over to me, and starts filling out a little ticket for me (for the second time).  Apologetically, he says, "I thought someone else was helping you."  "Yeah," I say, "So did I."

I understand how certain rules of etiquette and politeness are considered outdated, but I honestly can't figure how someone in the customer service line of work can just overlook the first customer in line and serve whomever the heck he wants.

One for the folks who wear glasses

I've worn glasses all my life.  Pretty much since birth.  (And, boy, reading the chart was a challenge before I could, y'know, read.)  And today I did something I've never done in my life. 

I hit myself in the eye with my glasses.

I want to be clear here.  This wasn't, like, being real drunk and trying to put my glasses on and missing.  This was, sitting here, playing Freecell, somehow smacking my eyeglasses with my palm, and pushing the lens right up against my eye.  And, remarkably, my reflexes were so slow, I didn't even manage to close my eye before the impact.

Brilliant, eh?

Somebody owes me a weekend

It dawns on me, around Wednesday, that I am way, way, way, way behind at work.

I don't get this behind.  Like, ever.  There is a solution:  I can work all weekend.

I don't like this solution.  I'm also way behind in terms of being a theatre critic.  (I'm supposed to see a certain number of shows per year and I am nowhere near where I should be by July.)  For a moment or two, I actually debated whether to see a bunch of shows this weekend or do my job.

My job won.  Obviously.  My job pays me; being a critic is for fun and for free.  I promised my boss that I would never let being a critic interfere with my work and I have to hold true to that -- even on those rare occasions when my work bleeds over into critic-ing time.  So, I brought a ton of work home to just plow through over the weekend.

Friday night, I worked.  I took a break around 9:00 to go over a friend's house for a few hours.  It's a good friend who has been going through a particularly unpleasant course of chemotherapy, and whenever she's feeling good enough to want company, I find the time.

Came home around 11 and (as is my way), I needed to watch TV for an hour or so to unwind before bed.  I watched crap.  Absolute crap.  Like, reruns of game shows crap.  Around midnight, I was about to turn in, when I figured I'd channel surf.  Stupidest thing.  (I've noticed my Dad does it, too, though, so maybe it's genetic.)  You're about to turn off the TV and go to sleep, but you check all the channels just to make sure there's nothing on any of them that you absolutely have to watch.  It's really ridiculous.

Except, this time, for the first time in, like, ever, there was actually something on that I absolutely had to watch.  Those weasels over at the Sci-Fi channel had finally decided to air the third season of (new) Dr. Who, and hadn't told me about it.  (At least USA sends an email whenever Monk starts a new season.)  And what's worse -- they started the first episode at 11:30!  I'd spent a half hour watching I've Got a Secret when I could've been watching the first half hour of an episode I've been waiting to see for, like, six months. 

I actually missed the next ten minutes of it while I searched my program guide for the next week, to see if they'd be rerunning it.  They would not.  They would, however, be running the next episode at 1:00 a.m.

I set the DVR to record whatever was left of the first episode, and the second -- which I'd anticipated to be a largely futile act as I'd most likely be watching them anyway.  And I did -- although, to my credit, I was actually getting ready for bed during the second one.

Saturday morning, I woke up bright and early because I had a monthly Critics Circle meeting.  Went to meeting.  (Amazingly, arrived on time.)  On the way home, I stopped at the store for some groceries.  Got home.  Worked.  Worked some more.  Kept right on working.  Had the good sense to stop around 11:00, unwind, re-watch that second Dr. Who episode giving it my undivided attention, and go to sleep.

Except the smoke alarm went off around 11:00.  Not in my condo -- in the whole building.  We all came out of our units to check for fire.  There are a few vacant units and I have keys to one of them.  And there's a lock box with keys to another one that I happen to have the combo for.  So, the Fire Department drives up (our alarm system automatically calls them) to find me and the President of the HOA Board standing in front of the building aiming a flashlight at the lock box trying to get the keys to a vacant unit so we can make sure it isn't on fire.  We check all the units, figure that an alarm went off because someone had been painting, and go our separate ways.  Which, for me, was back to the TV, and bed.

Woke up this morning ...  well, I first woke up this morning around 7:30 when the cat decided to do that insane thing where they run around the house for no reason and my bed happened to be in her path.  So I was awakened by my cat doing a drive-by.  I went back to sleep for about an hour, but then had to get up because I was meeting a friend for breakfast.  (There's this restaurant we love to eat at -- but there's always a huge line on the weekend.  They open at 10:30 and we try to get in line by 10:00 so we'll be sure to get a table when they open.)  After breakfast, I stopped off at the mall (to buy the appropriate bra for the dress I bought for the wedding this weekend, and to get a wedding present) and headed home.

Where I discover that my cat, my purry little princess, my precious wecious, the sweetest widdle kitten ... has been walking around my condo all morning with some, er, uh ... OK, cats poo in a box, which is great, but they can't exactly wipe themselves.  And they got a lot of fur back there.  And, every so often, something gets stuck in the fur.  So I have to pick up the cat in one hand, grab a wad of paper towels in the other, and take care of business. 

I am so not having children.

Once that's taken care of (and I clean a place on the carpet where she must have sat) I get down to work.  And more work.  And even more work.  I finish at 5:45.  I'm about to head out for dinner (a reward for a job well done) but I figure I'll check my email first.  At which point I discover that the law student working for us has just emailed me a draft of what she's been working on, so of course I print it out, pick up my red pen, and do some more work.

I'm just about finished at 7:15 when the aforementioned friend calls to ask if I've had dinner yet.  As a matter of fact, I haven't.  We head out for some eats.  I get back around 9:00, put a load of laundry in, and get ready to enjoy my weekend free time.  All two hours of it.

The Fly on the Wall

There is a fly on the wall in the ladies' room at work.

I'm not talking in metaphor here; it's an actual fly.

Actually, it looks a bit smaller than a fly.  Perhaps it's a gnat.

I've been able to examine it closely because, well, I believe it is deceased.  It's on the wall of the first stall, just sitting there on the ceramic tile.  It's at about eye-height.  I reckon it didn't just expire sitting there perched on the wall -- someone must have smashed it.  But not hard enough to, well, leave gnat innards on the wall.  And certainly not hard enough to make it come off the wall. 

It's been there for weeks.

We've got cleaning folks who come in and clean the bathroom every night.  They clean the toilets, restock the supplies, and wash the floors.  I guess removing dead insects from the walls is outside their job description.

I haven't removed it because ... well, because I didn't remove it when I first saw it.  I mean, when I first saw the dead gnat on the wall, I figured, "Hey!  Dead gnat.  Someone will clean that up tonight."  But nobody did.  And the next day, when I saw it again, I thought, "Y'know, if I clean that off now, someone will wonder why I didn't just clean it off yesterday."

Apparently, the same thing went through the minds of the cleaning staff.

And everyone else who uses stall number one.

I mean, that thing was there before I left for Alaska.  When I came back, I was shocked to find it still stuck to the wall.

Now I think it's almost like a science experiment -- let's see how long it takes before the dead gnat falls off the wall.  Either that, or it's a test of wills to see who will weaken first and wipe off the gnat.

It's not gonna be me.  I'll use another stall before I crack under the pressure.

Day Off

As days off go, this was a pretty good one. 

Slept in, but not too long.

Walked to the movies.  This isn't as impressive as it sounds, as there's a movie theater about three blocks away.  Still, it was over 90 degrees, so I should get a little credit for exercising under less-than-ideal circumstances. 

Saw the Die Hard film.  I haven't seen a movie in months, and it seemed like some nice, brainless entertainment.  I was actually pretty pleased with it, although part of that might have been the novelty of seeing a movie.  Fun watching Bruce Willis and the "I'm a Mac" guy kick some ass, although one of the least-believable sequences was a bit laughable.  Also a nice character in McClane's daughter, who got laughs or cheers with every one of her (very few) lines.  Actress will probably get a bit more work because of this.

Had dinner with a friend, which was nice.  We weren't really up for being particularly picnicky, but we went to a nice restaurant and had good supper.

Came back, watched a little TV, and I baked brownies.  While we were waiting for them to cool, we heard fireworks from outside, and went out on my balcony and watched them.  I used to never be able to see fireworks from my balcony, but, earlier this year, my downstairs neighbor removed the tree that had been blocking my view.  It was kinda nice that the very same neighbor was the friend who was hanging out at my place, so she got to experience the view that she was responsible for.

And that's about it.  I have lots of stuff to do around the house (and probably stuff to do outside it, too) but I figured it was a good idea to spend the holiday like an actual holiday and just spend the day enjoying life.

REALLY hard-boiled eggs

I'm supposed to have "afternoon protein" -- usually some string cheese or a hard-boiled egg.  I've had about a month worth of string cheese, so I thought I'd boil up a dozen eggs tonight.

I still use a cookbook for this. 

Don't laugh.  I don't boil eggs very often and I keep forgetting how long I'm supposed to boil them for.  Joy of Cooking says 12-17 minutes (that's 10-15 for hard-boiled, plus 2 since they're right out of the fridge).

I put my eggs in the pot.  I cover with cold water.  Now, Joy of Cooking says to cook over medium heat till you get a boil, then drop them down to a simmer for that 12-17 minutes.  I put over medium heat.  I'm about to set the timer, but I think, "No, I'll wait until they've reached a boil before I do that."  Joy of Cooking also advises to "plunge the eggs into cold water" after they're done to arrest further cooking and prevent that grey ring from appearing on the outside of the yolk.  I put a plastic bowl in the sink, so I'm prepared to fill it with cold water and plunge the eggs in.

I sit down.  I've got bills to pay.  I pay a lot of bills. 

The dryer buzzes.  It's been going for about an hour.  I reset it for another half hour and ...

Oh damn.  The eggs.  I never even dropped them to simmer.  They've been boiling away over a medium heat since ... gee, was that two episodes of M*A*S*H? 

I remove the eggs from the heat.  Still boiling.  While I'm pretty sure the grey yolk ship has already sailed, I plunge the eggs into cold water to, you know, stop any further further cooking.

I honestly can't wait to taste one.  I'm wondering whether I've ruined an entire dozen eggs, or if boiling them for an hour results in still-edible eggs.

I peel one.  I can already see that the outside of the yolk has gone grey -- it's so dark, I can see it through the egg white.  But it tastes pretty normal.  Still warm (still cooking, I assume), but tasty.

I do not appear to be experiencing any ill effects. 

Then again, if I find myself needing another dose of Pepto-Bismol, I'm prepared.

WARNING: This post references bathroom bodily functions

OK, so, um, yeah.

There's no way to put this delicately.

Here's the thing.  It took me about 20 minutes looking at health websites online, reading about all sorts of horrible things that my, um, symptomology could have been caused by, until I stumbled upon the real source of the problem.

And, now, I think that if I was manufacturing Pepto-Bismol, I would put on the outside of the package, in big, 24-point red letters:

Warning:  Don't freak out.  May make your poo black.