This morning I woke up twice. I first woke up to Matt getting dressed and letting the dogs out. He does this quietly. About as quietly as a hippo all hopped up on meth goes running through a china shop. In the deadening silence I fell back into my strange, beautifully frightening dream in which Benicio del Toro ruled the world and we all smoked weed in copious amounts and sat around discussing the importance of stuff. Not anything really. Just, stuff.

I woke up the second time about two hours later. I crawled out of bed and looked around the empty room wondering where Matt was. I drug myself over to my chair in the corner and pulled my knees up, tucking my feet in under me. I looked around the room some more. I’m not sure what I was looking for. I think I thought he would magically materialize before my very eyes. Or something.

It’s just very weird to expect something, to have no reason not to expect something, and then have it not be there. That’s all I’m saying. And I was expecting to wake up next to Matt on this Sunday morning.

Then I started percolating.

I wondered. Have I come there, then? Has he really gone off to play golf? He and my brother had been talking about it last night. But he never mentioned it to me. Am I really there? Is this the place where you wake up and find your man is vanished? Off and gone before everyone else to sneak in a few holes of golf? Did he not tell me because he thought I would say no? Why would I do that? Because Sundays are family days? Because he just played golf with him all day Saturday? Because for weeks now it’s been nothing but golf, golf, golf?? Because I’m a manipulative, controlling shrew and he’s not a big boy so he needs to ask for permission? Maybe that’s it. Maybe he didn’t feel the need to ask for permission or even let me know where he was going. Well, that’s just stupid.

But then, right in the middle of that rational and reasoned reverie, he bursts in and sets me straight. It turns out he wasn’t golfing at all. He was kidnapped by aliens and forced to teach them the ways of our people.

Shewwwww! I’m SO glad i didn’t jump to conclusions and assume the worst about him! He’s SUCH a good man!

Jacob did this for me…

(Click for large view)

This one time I met a guy at a club. He was kind of good looking but he was also a little rough around the edges. A little creepy, but cute, still. He asked me to dance and I was like, sure, why not? I didn’t have anything better do to. So we danced. The music was annoying. It was that boomp chh boomp chh techno rave kind of music. The kind that’s hard to dance to anyway unless you pretend you’re having some kind of epileptic seizure and especially with this guy cause he had one of those cones on his head. Like those dogs wear? When vets don’t want them to lick their wounds? Which was weird, but I didn’t want to make him feel uncomfortable or anything. Plus, you know, the lights shining on it made it really bright and hard to look at. I had to squint when I looked at him. I kept looking for an incision over his nebulum or something, but I couldn’t find anything. So, I just tried not to look at him very much. I looked everywhere but at him. I looked at all the sparkly, spandex-clad booty and all the the goth-clad poseurs looking disdainfully down their noses at us from the sidelines.

Well, it’s just difficult to talk about because it ended tragically. We dated off and on for a few months, always he wore the cone. I never mentioned it. Then I discovered one day that he was from an alien race and the cone was a permanent fixture of his race. And then. One day. We had a particularly bad rainstorm. We were caught out in it. No shelter in sight.

He drowned.

Tragic. Tragic.

The leader of his planet sent me a holographic message a few months later. Told me they all pulled up roots and went home. They don’t have rain on their planet. I was all like, look, I don’t want to get involved. I was only dating him because I couldn’t figure out a tactful way to end it. But I didn’t tell him that. Instead, I was all, “Ohhh the horror! The horror! I’ll never love again!”

In some ways it is very beneficial to date outside your species.

I know! I’m terrible! I’ve neglected you once again.

You know, I used to look at dogs and think they had it made. Man, if I could be a dog, that would be the life. All they do is lay around the house and sleep until someone feeds them and then they get up, eat, go outside to do their business and come back inside to sleep some more. What could be better?

Well, it turns out a lot could be better. A whole lot. A dog’s life blows! I know cause I’ve been confined to bed rest and there is nothing worse. I mean NOTHING. You lay in bed. Someone brings you food. You hobble off to the bathroom occasionally. You get back in bed. You find there is nothing better to do than sleep. The internet gets boring after the first day. Your will to live begins to seep away after the second. How do dogs do it? I’ll never know!

PLUS! I slept right through Anji’s challenge! I’m TERRIBLE! I’ve never been tagged before. It’s dreadfully exciting!

So here you go, here’s six random things about me:

1) I was runner up in the Junior Miss South Carolina Pageant. (clearly I was robbed)

2) I was in a commercial while in college. For insurance. I think. I can’t remember now.

3) I am deathly afraid of clowns, like most people. But I am also afraid of monkeys. And dolls.

4) I once met Country music star, Kenny Rogers in a truck stop with my dad when I was six years old.

5) I was once arrested for domestic violence…but it was self defense! And he soooo had it coming.

6) I love cabbage so much that when I found a twenty dollar bill on my way home from school I gave it to my parents to buy me as much cabbage as they could with it. Being in the first grade I didn’t realize that you could buy way more than a mere three heads of cabbage with twenty dollars…especially way back then. To this day when I eat cabbage at my mom and dad’s house I make sure to remark, “This is good, but it’s still not $20 worth of cabbage good. Keep it comin.”

And now, the rules:

• Link to the person who tagged you.

• Post the rules on your blog.

• Write six random things about yourself.

• Tag six random people by linking to their blogs.

• Let each of the six know they’ve been tagged by leaving them a comment (on their blogs).

• Let your tagger know when your entry is up.

The victims …

My Danny

My Jacob

and…uh…that’s it. Cause, I doubt Trouble would do it and I don’t know anyone else who blogs or hasn’t already been tagged. I know. It’s a crying shame. : \

I took a little break from answering complimentary emails about my new shoes to sign in here and report the latest news about my brakes.  The car has over 76,000 miles on it and the front brake pads are down to 20-25% and the rears are still at 70%.  Yes, the SAME brakes that came from the factory.   I attribute the longevity not to Honda’s brake pad vendors but rather my own judicious use of the middle pedal.   I know she’ll never admit it, but Kim is proud, and unable to refute the hard proof of my generally cautious driving disposition.   Also, I rented a courtesy car to use while my car was in the shop.  They gave me an Element.  What a…soulless little box that thing is.  At least they didn’t give me an Insight.

I can’t believe the spam email I get. Sometimes, instead of just junking it immediately, I will peruse the subject lines and content of some of these beauties. I’m telling you, the world is awash in hysterically, darkly creative people all wasting their talents away in the spam industry. Need proof? Here’s the subject lines of a few gems from this week:

“Immense augmentation of your tool”

“Get a rod of colossal measurements”

“Bomb her womb from your huge canon!”

“Witness a miracle happening in your life”

“Don’t let her laugh at nights on your inability to satisfy”

“problems caused by ya tiny PE?”

I’m not sure what my PE is, but it’s probably too tiny and causing me problems. Sure. Why not?

“Dodn’t you just want to run away when cannot satisfy_your_gf?”

I didn’t say dodn’t. They said dodn’t.

“your expected xmas gift will be your increased PE!”

Xmas? Xmas is a long way a way. I would hope they have a better fulfillment center than that. There’s nothing worse than a sex shop that doesn’t fulfill.

“New gigantic rod is easy to get!”

“Don’t blame us for not telling you about this herbal revolution”

Yeah. Don’t blame them. They did everything they could. They won’t have that on their conscience.

“Our target is your happy life”

“You can also forget about losing your erection in the middle of sexual intercourse”

That sounds like a threat, actually. So does the one before it. “You can just forget about ever having sex again, mister. Our target is your happy life. It’s going down.”

“If you have a small penis and it bothers don’t lose heart.”

“Be not afraid to vary and change the life, after all, all becomes to the best.”

That sounds awfully philosophical for a Viagra pusher. More like a meditation than an email subject line.

and my favorite:

“It is well known that women”

Women what? What do women do that is so well known? I’d like to know!

But alas, the email will not yield easily its secrets. It’s shrouded in an air of mystery. Just like my tiny PE.

Seriously, bomb her womb??

Here’s where we are, as a society. We absolutely don’t question the loss of the most basic human kindness and civility. It’s now the exception rather than the rule and any evidence of it is met with paranoia and suspicion.

If you doubt me, just go to your local airport, hop on a plane and go somewhere. Anywhere. The destination isn’t the point. It’s getting there. It used to be half the fun. Remember that?

Oh boy, I do. Seriously. I remember long road trips and sticky car seats. I remember no air conditioning. I remember resting my head on the open window, the air rushing through my hair. The heat of the sun beating down on my forehead. I remember watching the world rush past my eyes. Trees and cars. Mountains and rivers. Cheap and tacky tourist traps. Beautiful spectacles of nature. I remember the thrill of a flight. The romantic notions I had. The exotic feel of it all. The luxury! I remember feeling so privileged. I remember reading books and stretching the limits of my imagination inventing new license plate games. I remember actual conversations with my family. Discussions. Debates. Arguments. Jokes. Silent Treatments — without the aid of a game boy or an iPod.

And that’s the thing. I saw this comedy thing with Bill Maher. He made some joke about minivans now, how they all come with a dvd player standard in the headrests of the front seats. His punchline was something like, “Because, I shouldn’t have to be forced to talk to YOU, dad.” and isn’t that just a little bit like the truth? Not that we’re so innocent. Dad could spend a little less time on his cell phone and a little more time talking to Junior. But who am I to preach?

There’s all this stuff, it insulates us. It keeps us separate from everyone else. What do we care that what we say or what we do that might be rude or even downright hurtful to someone else? How does that negatively impact us?If the answer is not at all, then what are you all up in our grill for? This is me having a stern argument with myself. I don’t expect it to make any sense to you.

The point is this, I went to Santa Fe this weekend. It’s nice and all, but I expected it to be….uh, I don’t know. Nicer? It was sort of a bleak place is all. There was this weird division of classes there. There was outer Santa Fe which was pretty rundown and ugly. There were a LOT of homeless people and just a very general air of desperation.

By the time we got to our hotel however, the scenery had changed. The buildings were nicer and the streets were clean. I saw only a couple homeless people and instead there were throngs of disgusting rich old fucks walking around in their stupid hippie outfits. They wore their turquoise jewelry and over-tan skin and shopped in the trendy art boutiques to support the “local” heritage. Holy hell, I’m telling you. You could choke on the hypocrisy in this place.

It was like this place, the part of Santa Fe they call the “Historic District”, was this capitol of a poor, third world country and they were the benevolent (yet secretly evil and exploitive) dictators to the poor masses who resided beyond its walls. Beyond its walls being the rest of Santa Fe, of course.

So take that for what it’s worth. But Santa Fe isn’t the point either.

Look, I realize this post is already three days long, but whose session is this? Yours or mine?

The point is, I went to Santa Fe and I had to travel by plane to get there. As I have well learned, travel by plane should be avoided at all costs. Let me just sum up for you how horrible an experience this one turned out to be:

1.) Up at 5 a.m. to catch first leg of flight. Out the door. Everything is going fine.

2.) Horrible rain.

3.) Horrible traffic.

4.) Construction.

5.) Am now worrying about missing my flight.

6.) Finally arrive at airport.

7.) Construction at airport.

8.) Short line at ticket counter. (very rude agent)

9.) Long line through security. (very rude agents. plural.)

10.) Finally make it to gate.

11.) Flight is delayed due to heavy winds.

12.) Flight is still delayed. I am now worried about connections.

13.) Flight arrives, we pile in.

14.) HORRIBLE turbulence.

15.) Pilot tries to land, but can’t. HORRIBLE turbulence.

16.) Pilot tries again to land, but can’t. HORRIBLE turbulence.

17.) Pilot tries a third time to land, but can’t. HORRIBLE turbulence.

18.) Pilot announces after flying around in the air in the HORRIBLE turbulence for twenty minutes that he will have to contact air traffic control for alternate flight path as this one has some HORRIBLE turbulence.

19.) Fly around another twenty minutes until Pilot announces that he has to fly around the airport again and then we can land. Am now DEFINITELY concerned about connections.

20.) We finally land, but I come shockingly close to losing my lunch from the last 3 weeks.

21.) We rush off the plane but some freaked out woman goes rushing out to the terminal and trips an alarm. The door closes shut and we are now locked in the long walkway from the plane to the terminal. Whatever that thing is called.

22.) I don’t want to name any airline names so I’ll just say a Schmelta Airlines Agent OPENS THE DOOR to tell us that she’s getting someone who can COME OPEN THE DOOR. Seriously. Then she closed the door again and left us standing in there. Good old Schmelta Airlines. They LOVE to fly. And it shows!

23.) I run at breakneck speeds to catch my plane. They are holding the plane for me. Thank god.
24.) Okay they weren’t actually holding the plane for me. They can’t take off because of the wind.

25.) I sit on the plane for 35 minutes with no explanation or announcement.

26.) Someone finally complains.

27.) We get an announcement.

28.) They announce that it’s windy.

29.) We leave nearly an hour late.

30.) We make up time because of the tailwinds.

31.) I arrive in New Mexico and I turn on my cell phone. It rings.

32.) It’s Matt telling me the house we really,really,really,really wanted was sold. To someone else. Not us. We weren’t the ones who would be living in it.

33.) I said some very un-christian things in a very loud volume in a very crowded place.

34.) I cried for five minutes at the baggage claim.

the weekend happened.

35.) Back at the airport there was a lady in a wheelchair with an oxygen tank. I watched an agent wheel her to my gate.

36.) And leave her there.

37.) The plane was boarding and no one helped her.

38.) No one.

39.) She tried pushing the wheelchair and the oxygen tank.

40.) I grabbed my bags and put her tank in her lap and pushed her to the agent at the front desk. She looked perturbed when I insisted on her attention.

41.) The flight was long and boring.

42.) I was all the way at the back and I waited until the plane was almost empty to get off. I was too tired to fight a crowd.

43.) The 91 year old oxygen tank lady was back there too.

44.) They effing FORGOT HER. AGAIN.

45.) I asked her if someone was coming for her. She was scared.

46.) I went up front and got an attendant.

47.) They came rushing back and I went to get my stuff.

48) They pushed me out of the way. I forgot my ipod on the seat.

49.) I didn’t discover this until the next flight. Asked the flight attendant about it. She said, “Oh yeah. If they find it they’ll turn it over.”

50.) The guy next to me laughed and remarked that I would never see it again. He looked at me as though I were crazy. I asked him if he thought I should have just left her there. His response to me was, “They would have found her eventually.”

Eventually? Like when? When they were sweeping up napkins and tossing the half-read issue of USA Today left in the seatback? SHE’S A PERSON. Not leftover refuse.

51.) When we landed I had to fill out a lost item report. If I understand this correctly, I’m supposed to trust that Schmelta Airlines will return to me the iPod if they find it — but they couldn’t even keep track of a living, breathing person?

52.) When I got my bag and headed home I couldn’t find my parking ticket.

53.) When you can’t find your parking ticket, you don’t leave the garage. Unless you pay them an amount equal to one year’s salary.

54.) Although it was now well after midnight at the end of the best weekend of my life and I had been looking for a half hour, I still can’t find the ticket.

55.) I found the ticket.

56.) I paid the ticket, left the airport and drove home in the rain to fall into bed exhausted just after 2 a.m.

I wish I could say this is an anamoly. I wish I could say nothing like that has every happened to me before. But sadly, this is becoming more and more common in all my travels. What the hell ever happened to that half of the fun? Who took it, what did they do with it and what do we have to do to get it back? Come on, cut me some slack here. Enough is enough.

Overhead at the deli today:
Woman #1: “I know! Can you believe it!? And his name was Jesus too!”
Woman #2: “Well, pffth. You just would have expected more from him.”

A phone call with my thirteen year old son:
Helllooooooooo, Jacob!
Helllllloooooooo, Mom!
How’s the family? The wife? The kids?
They’re woooooonderful!
And the job? How’s the job?
Ohhhhhhhhh, it’s bad!
Ohhhhnoooooo, it’s bad? What happened?
I got fired!
You got fired? Why did you get fired?
It was the boss. He caught me.
Caught you?!?? Caught you doing what?
Peeing in his computer.
You wha- you peed? You peed in - IN his computer? You shouldn’t do that!
Oh, well. I had to go.

and, finally:

LAZARE PONTICELLI: You shoot at men who are fathers. War is completely stupid.
(France’s last remaining veteran of World War I, in an interview shortly before his death on Wednesday at the age of 110)

This has been the day. I reject the notion that I am exaggerating. I bolted out of bed and spun around three times. I couldn’t find the phone and it was ringing. I couldn’t find it and it was loud. I opened the bedroom door and ran through the house looking for it. The floor was freezing on my feet and I was panicked. I finally found it and (for some reason) ran all the way back into my bedroom before answering and then yelled, “Three for the table, Three!”

Of course there was no one there. I stared at it for a minute and then frowned and put it down. There was something I was supposed to be doing, but I couldn’t remember what. I turned around a couple more times, still frowning. I spotted my laptop on my desk and moved in that direction. I sat at my desk, still in my pajamas and checked my email. Nothing there made any sense. Here was something to make my penis bigger and something from a sponsor and cheap, legal vicodin and a test to grade. I wasn’t even aware I had a penis. If only I could concentrate! I glanced over at the bed. Oh yeah! I was sleeping!

I moved back in that direction. I pushed and shoved at Poe and then begged and pleaded until I finally managed to carve out a small corner of the bed and just a small snatch of the blanket. Just enough to allow me to find sleep again.

Until Kaileb burst in the door five minutes later. “MOM, WHERE’S THE WAFFLES?” This is his idea of whispering. I told him where, in the only freezer we have, to find them. He apparently found them because he came back two minutes later to “whisper” at me again. This time he couldn’t find the syrup. I told him where to find that too, but he had already looked there. Naturally this is childspeak for, “You’re not going back to sleep.”

I got up, got him off to school, came home, had breakfast, had a nine o’clock conference call, a ten o’ clock meeting, worked until 2:30, picked him up at 2:30, went back to work until 5, came home, made dinner, broke down crying because of two ants, broke a potted plant in the kitchen, had to make a new pot of macaroni and cheese, helped with homework until 10:30, and now I’m done with housework and everything else and I’m writing this.

Also, there was this. This actually happened. We now live in a world where people either aren’t familiar with, or have forgotten what a library is. This, sadly, is where we are. This is our handbasket in which we will descend into hell.

It’s called a library. Google it.

Jacob sent me the AOLer Translator. Just for kicks I decided to translate an excerpt from my blog. Here’s the original:

When I was young I romanticized everything. Everything was a grand adventure and something wonderful to be discovered, even the tedium I didn’t want. I don’t do that so much anymore. These days the only time I get like that is when I’m premenstrual and the hormones are raging an all out war for control of my mind and body. If at home when that happens the noise is drowned out by endless chores, yipping dogs, squabbling children and Law & Order.

I know, right!? So deep and …uh, philosophical, huh? And heeeere’s the AOL translation:

WH3N I WAS U I ROMANTICIEZD EVERYTHNG!11!11 WTF LOL AVERYTHNG WAS A GRAND ADV3NTURE AND SOMETHNG WOND3RFUL 2 B DISCOVERAD 3V3N TEH T3DIUM I DIDNT WANT!11!1111 OMG WTF LOL I DONT DO TAHT SO MUCH ANYMORE!!1!11!1 WTF LOL TH3S3 DAYS TEH ONLEY TIEM I G3T LIEK TAHT SI WHAN IMM PR3M3NSTRUAL AND DA HORMONES R RAGNG AN AL OUT WAR FOR CONTROL OF MAH MIND AND BODY!1!!!111 LOL IF AT HOME WH3N TAHT HAPANS DA NOIES SI DROWNED OUT BY ANDLAS CHORES YIPNG DOGS SQUABLNG CHILDRAN AND LAW & ORDAR!!!11 WTF LOL

I know what you’re thinking. What an improvement! I particularly like how it’s all in caps and the spelling and punctuation is vastly, like, better and stuff. Totes def!