October 2006

no wire hangers ever!

There’s only so much you can do with makeup when you just don’t look a damn thing like the woman in the first place, but I gave it a shot. Things I learned at this year’s Halloween party: False eyelashes are itchy (and come off if you laugh so hard you cry) but not having to wear mascara kind of rocks Skin-colored latex works great for making little patches to cover your real eyebrows A costume consisting of polyester clothing covered in baby powder that’s set with hairspray and a plastic wig is really quite flammable Doc is a fantastic sculptor Sure, Leslie likes mayonnaise, but not THAT much Ben brought some of the best salsa I’ve ever tasted I love olive dip You people didn’t eat nearly enough candy All the costumes this year: fantastic!! Not a lame one in the bunch. Even the “Best Costume Clearly Thrown Together At 6:30 This Evening” was quite good! White Elephant costume contest prize selection was a fun method I probably flew my Geek Flag a little too proudly when I recited the whole “Holy Hand Grenade” speech to Arthur, King of the Britons (Mark)

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blinky mcbroken

My car is smart. A couple of days ago the left turn signal started blinking and clicking at twice the rate of the right. I thought “Oh great… just one more thing to add to the Broken List,” a list that includes Leaky Sunroof When Raining, Barely Working Automatic Windows, Fake Woodgrain Peeling Off, Holes In Pleather Seats, Ancient Multicolored Carpeting That Used To All Be Pretty Light Gray, Clock That Can’t Be Reset, Broken Radio Knobs, and Broken Antenna, for starters. Doc figured out yesterday that it was blinking in doubletime because the front turn-signal light bulb has burned out. How cool is that, letting me know when a light has gone out! Otherwise, how would I ever figure it out? (“No, Officer, I didn’t know my turn signal was broken.” That’s how, probably).

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i’m not sure i’ve complained enough lately…

…. so let me complain some more. I have thrown out my back again. Goddammit. I don’t know why they say “thrown out.” In fact, I hesitate to use that phrase when I’m telling people why I’m walking funny with tears in my eyes and a pained look on my face. “Thrown out” sounds so active, so agressive. It was appropriate the time that I was pitching fastballs in the World Series (that’s baseball, right?), and OOPS! I threw out my back. Or the time that I had to dash out onto a highway to save 5 year old twins AND their twin kittens from being squashed flat by traffic, and I threw out my back in the process but didn’t notice until later because I was too busy saving lives and what with the dashing between cars and all. So anyhow. This time, “thrown out” doesn’t fit. And it’s not a cramp, or a sprain. “Muscle spasm” is actually quite accurate but it sounds so… I don’t know. Almost dirty somehow. The truth is, I felt a strange *twinge* in my mid-back, right side, as I was ROLLING THE TRASH CART OUT to the street this morning (quite a sexy and adventurous way to be injured, eh?). And it’s not like it was full of heavy things like bowling balls or tree branches or severed alien heads; in fact, it didn’t have anything in it besides a bag of cat poop (3 cats, 2 day’s worth, to be exact) (maybe they’re alien cats). I stretched a little bit before getting into the car, to ward off the possibility of it turning into something worse, but I guess it was going to happen no matter what. By noon I was in pretty severe pain and left work at the insistence […]

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four things

Four jobs I’ve had: Web designer File clerk for a mayonnaise company Ice cream drone at Baskin Robbins Cat washer (it’s just as fun as you are imagining) Four movies I can watch over and over: Dogma Monty Python and the Quest for the Holy Grail Raising Arizona The Princess Bride Four places I have lived: Roach-infested apartment, Dallas, Texas House by the airport, Dallas, Texas Lake Highlands, Texas (ok, so it’s still technically Dallas…) Sherman, Texas (yes, I know, I haven’t left Texas yet. It will happen.) Four television shows I love to watch: Scrubs Battlestar Galactica Stargate The Office Four places I have been on vacation: London Moscow Seattle San Francisco Four of my favorite dishes: Pizza with pineapple and Canadian bacon Field greens, spinach, and raw veggie salad Balsamic chicken linguine Pad thai Four websites I visit daily: Wil Wheaton in Exile My personalized Google home page Stumble Alternet Four places I would rather be right now: The Pacific Northwest Snuggling under a blanket with Doc (it’s cold and rainy today!) London Training for my marathon 🙁 Four bloggers I am tagging: You. That’s right, you. If you are reading this, consider yourself TAGGED. That means that you now have to answer these questions on your own blog or by posting a comment here!

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fat and lazy

It’s not that I’ve completely quit trying… but maybe I kind of have. My marathon training has fallen back to April/May levels, if that. Part of it is that I was trying to give my stress-fractured leg a rest for a while, to see if it would maybe magically heal itself over a 4 week period. Part of it is that it really hurt to run. Part of it is that Yvonne, for her own reasons, probably won’t be running the whole thing either. I have realized over the past couple of days that I’ve actually been forgetting about my training. Like, it doesn’t even occur to me anymore to exercise. I had gotten into the habit of almost daily doing a run after work, or in the morning on the weekends, more-or-less happily striving towards my goal. And now it’s not even entering my mental “to-do” list. I hate the feeling of realizing that I’ve forgotten something like that. It’s the same sick feeling I get when I think about one of my worst fears: forgetting to take care of something I’m responsible for, and having it die or other horrible consequences. Plants, animals, children, mortgage, etc. I think I have dreams like that a lot, where I realize that I’m supposed to have been doing something all along. I also feel like my eating habits have been … what is the opposite of “improving”? Yeah, that. I want to get back into a routine now, though. Leg pain or no leg pain, I have to do something. The weather is cooperating and has cooled down nicely (58 right now, I have the windows open and thick socks on), which will make outdoor runs much less painful. Something occurred to me the other day, though, as I was trying […]

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the truth about childbirth

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Childbirth has been so romanticized. I guess because if people really knew the truth… Narrator to 1950s husband and wife: “Congratulations! You’re expecting! Don’t worry, your doctor will tell you everything you need to know. Hi, Doctor!” Doctor: “You’ll fart, pee, puke, and poop in front of ten complete strangers who’ll be staring intently at your vagina, which, by the way, has an 80 percent chance of tearing!” Wife worriedly turns to husband: “You do it.”

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