Inane Chatter

Seriously.  There’s so much.  I have two amazing nights to tell you about.  I’ve written notes, and I’ll post soon, but it’s late and I have to work tomorrow, so the full posts will have to wait.  I’ve had three hurricanes and a lot of water, and I can barely finish a sentence without running to the bathroom.  (Hurricanes are good.)  Let’s just say that I am one degree (or is it two? I haven’t figured that out) from Harry Connick, Jr, via three or four people now, not just one.  I’ll figure out a way to turn this into an introduction somehow or another.  I love music.  I love musicians.  I love jazz.  I love music, and I love Harry Connick, Jr. 

There’s a train going by my hotel.  Loud.  Provides character.

I’m both ready to come home and ready to stay for a month.  More music please!  I keep finding out that all these musicians I would LOVE to see are regulars at this club or that bar or that restaurant over there, but only on nights I’ve already missed or nights after I leave this week.  I need more time to see them all, but I really want to come home.  I really want to be on vacation, really.  Having to work is really cramping my style. 

I am officially one degree away (or is that two?  I know someone who knows him.) from Harry Connick, Jr.  Tonight was awesome.  Details to come.

Just busy.  Taking notes.  Will probably have some time tomorrow night (when I’ve been abandoned by all who love me) to catch up.  See?  So busy I have to start in the middle of my sentences.

My skin is dry, I look tired (I AM tired), and my hair is awful – all staticky and flat in weird places.  Let’s go get on a plane and make all of that worse!  Woo!

I’ve never cows look as happy or move as fast as the ones in this video.  If I’d been confined to a muddy yard and barn all winter, I’d be happy, too.

(A very special happy-cow-in-spring thank you to nn.c for the video link.)

More credit goes to Nancy for finding Tom and Lorenzo.  If you like celebrity fashion (if, like me, you browse through People magazine after the awards shows to see all the dresses while waiting in line at the grocery store) and you want to read snarky critiques, you will love their blog.  This post about Daniel Craig is hilarious.

If you’ve ever gotten tired of listening to your three-year-old (or four-year-old or five-year-old or thirteen-year-old) tell jokes badly, you may want to watch this.  Or maybe you don’t.

I’m supposed to be packing.  Not packing tonight will lead to panic in the morning.  Actually, it will lead to not sleeping tonight, since the clothes I’m going to pack are strewn across the bed.  (I may be over-packing.  A bit.  Don’t try and stop me!)  So I’m packing.

Have I said where I’m going?  I don’t believe I have.  From tomorrow night through Friday, I’ll be in New Orleans for work.  I have to support a conference for the client.  Or support the client at a conference.  Whatever.  I’m going to miss John’s band’s first gig that isn’t a block party.  (Hey, if you’re in or near Bethesda and you want to see a band Saturday night, let me know.  I can get you in.)

Right.  Packing.  I’m going.

The health care industry worked at super-speed for me today.  I went from work to my doctor’s office to the hospital and back to work in 90 minutes.  The visit to my doctor lasted no more than ten minutes (if you count parking the car and waiting for the elevator).  It mostly consisted of twisting my ankle around and poking and prodding.  “Does this hurt?”  “No.”  ‘Does this hurt?’  “No.”  “Does it hurt now?”  “Not really.”  “How about when I poke the bone really hard?”  “Yup.  Hurts.”  (Before you ask why I was there at all if nothing hurt when the doctor asked, it hurts when I put weight on it and lean in any direction.  I was sitting down when she twisted, poked, and prodded.  I tried to tell her it mostly hurts when I’m standing up, but she wanted to do it her way.  Silly doctors and their silly training.)  Then she bundled me off to the hospital for an x-ray.  Apparently, the radiology department does walk-ins.  Fifteen minutes after I arrived, I walked out and drove back to work.  Super-quick.  I barely had time to read my book.

Later this afternoon, the doctor’s office called with the results: my ankle is fine.  So….what do I do about the pain?  Not much, apparently.  I’m not supposed to do any exercise that puts weight on it for a week to ten days.  Which is kinda not cool.  It pretty much confines me to the exercise bike, which is not my favorite thing in the world.

Tomorrow is going to be a busy day (no work – all prep for leaving town), so I’m going to take advantage of tonight’s quiet to listen to some yoga/spa-ish music and relax.

I’m traveling for work next week (for the first time since last June – this isn’t anything like a continuation of last spring’s craziness and stress), so I’m making lists.  I have so many lists I need a list to track my lists.

• List of stuff to do at home before I leave
• List of stuff to get done at work before I leave
• List of work stuff I need to get done while I’m away
• List of stuff I need to take with me (personal)
• List of stuff I need to take with me (work)
• List of stuff I need to be ready to do when I get back (personal)
• List of stuff I need to be read to do when I get back (work)

I can’t think of anything I have to do that doesn’t fit into one of those categories.  Sometimes a list like that makes me feel organized, like I can get everything done in time.  Not so much tonight.

And the yard.  Several, really, but there’s one that’s getting bigger along the fence line between our yard and one of the neighbor’s (the uphill side).  I just let Riley in, and he’s got dirt on his nose, on top of his head, and around one eye.  We should start calling him Patch.  That neighbor doesn’t have pets, so his yard is probably where all the rabbits live.  If we give the dogs enough time, they may soon have two yards to run around in.  I can’t believe we have a digging problem.  What do we have to do?  Fill the holes with rocks?  Fill the dogs’ heads with rocks?  Done.  They came that way.

Yesterday’s XKCD comic is hilarious.  And relevant, like I never am.

This is irrelevant, irreverent, and a little unbelievable.

And I’m off to read.  Haven’t been doing enough of that lately.

Have bananas been ripening weirdly for anyone else?

That’s how I described why I had to go to the grocery store today.  If I don’t go, I will make bad eating choices.  We don’t want that.

I realized (again) this weekend that I am a creature of habit.  We went to John’s parents’ house for the night (last night), and as I decided what to wear and what to pack for the ride home, I realize that I was about to choose the same two t-shirts I always wear when I go there.  And it’s more than just when we visit his parents.  I always travel in these shirts.  And I’ve always done this.  I have countless vacation pictures of me traveling in my Stomp t-shirt (purchased at a Stomp concert at Centre College my junior year in high school), and now I have countless vacation/holiday pictures of me in this green t-shirt I picked up at a Timberland outlet.  It’s so comfortable.  I can’t help it.

Wednesday evening, before I went to gym for my class, I had the windows open (because it was a beautiful day), and I was singing along to some of my favorite new songs (using the TV and the big speakers, because I can).  My next-door neighbor came up to me in class later and asked me if John’s band was practicing earlier.  I turned crimson, I’m sure, and said “No…that was just me being loud.”  How loud was I?  She said she was outside, so at least she couldn’t hear me from inside her house,  but still.  That’s me, disturbing the neighbors.

I had some major balance problems in my strength class last night.  I kept teetering over during lunges, and when we were doing push-ups on the balance ball (you lay on your stomach on the ball, put your hands on the floor, and walk yourself forward until the ball has rolled down to your shins and ankles), I rolled off three times in a row.  I wasn’t the only having problems, though.  The guy next to me tried to take out my knee with his weights when he rolled off during chest presses.  I forgave him; he looks like Jon Hamm.

Speaking of celebrity look-alikes (who are all around – it’s getting weird), I ran into young Stockard Channing again recently at work.  An eerie resemblance, at least in part because she’s not that young.  She’s like an alternate version of Stockard Channing – another way she could have looked if she’d aged in another direction.  I know exactly what I mean by that, but when I read it over, I don’t know exactly what that means.  In the same meeting, there was a woman who looked (and sounded) like Catherine Keener.  Maybe it WAS Catherine Keener!

To add to the weirdness in that building (I was downtown when I went to the meeting with all the celebrities), they have a public bathroom that – wait for it – actually smells good.  It smells like flowers, clearly an air freshener and not actual flowers, but it’s a nice air freshener that doesn’t seem to be just covering up bad smells.  I like that bathroom.  I don’t want to hang out in it or anything, but it’s my bathroom of choice before I hit the road to come home.

Oh, oh!  Wildlife sighting!  The dogs and I were jogging on the trail this evening, and I saw NINE DEER.  At once!  Just hanging out.  They saw us, but they didn’t run (which is why both of my arms are still attached to my body – I think if the deer had taken off, the dogs would have, too); they sort of ambled off into the woods, looking back at us over their shoulders.  Nine of them!  I don’t think I’ve ever seen that many deer in one place.

When I got home, I got a little lost in TV Tropes.  If you’ve never been there, be warned!  Don’t do it at work!  It can sometimes be hours before you come up for air.

It’s been a very exciting evening.

Roxy had a very strange episode last night.  It definitely goes into the seizure category, but it wasn’t like anything she’s ever done before.  She skipped the convulsion part and jumped straight to her recovery zone, where she wanders around the house and bumps into things for a while.  This time, though, she was skittish with us and she was halfway crouched down as she hurried from room to room.  It was weird.  She’s fine now.

In some strange way, I’m sure it led to the somewhat off-the-wall dream I had after finally going back to bed, involving an obstacle course/marathon through a city, in and out of houses and hotels and malls, through windows instead of doors, across bridges and boats and parks.  I was determined to beat my pal Jess, even though I knew she was better and faster than me in this event.  She was always just ahead of me, almost in arm’s reach.  The rest of the people running in the race were way behind us.  Because we’re awesome.

I’m sore all over.  I’m tired.  My brain is fried.  Lightly, like tempura, but still fried.  (Is it insensitive of me to refer to anything Japanese?  I don’t mean to be insensitive.)

I just got an email from TurboTax that says “It’s time to put the ‘fun’ in refund!”  Good luck with that ad campaign.  If I dream about doing our taxes, we’ll know they put subliminal messages in their emails.  I’ll let you know.  I’ll be doing important investigative work in my sleep.

My willpower and I had a showdown today at work, AND I WON.  I said no to a crock pot full of warm melted white chocolate.  I said no again to the crock pot full of warm melted milk chocolate.  I said yes to the strawberries piled up next to the two crock pots full of devilishly wonderful bad stuff.  (I had to say yes to something or I might have cracked.  Any why say no to strawberries?)  And then I left the room.  Didn’t look back.  Only drooled a little bit over the plates my coworkers brought into our next meeting.  I am stronger than white chocolate!

Then I went to the gym for two hours (back to back classes), and then had a little bit of cheese with crackers and apple slices with peanut butter for dinner.  I need to feel virtuous (and crow about it) or I might lapse into recriminations for making myself missing out on strawberries and bananas dipped in melted white chocolate.  I’m on day three of calorie-counting again, and I’ve instituted the rule that worked so well for me last time: if I can’t count it, I won’t eat it.

Yesterday, I went to the mall.  (Cue the screechy violins.)  I had an Ann Taylor LOFT gift card (my mother who loves me sent it for my birthday), and they were having a 30% off everything sale, and I found an outfit.  Went to the counter, asked about my gift card, and found I can’t use it in the store.  It’s an e-gift card, and I can only use it while e-shopping.  Not a big deal – I wrote down exactly what I planned to buy and continued my shopping (Target, Home Depot, other stores in the mall to find shoes for this new outfit I couldn’t buy, etc).  When I got home, I hopped online, found the website (30% and free shipping on the website!), put the skirt in my shopping cart, found the top, and that’s where I got stuck.  Turns out the top isn’t available online.  In stores only.  Really?  REALLY?  SO irritating.  I ordered the skirt anyway.  Today, I went back to the store.  I was in and out of the mall in less than 10 minutes, maybe less than five.

But just because my return trip was relatively painless doesn’t excuse Ann Taylor’s behavior.  Why would any retailer NOT sell everything online?  Yes, I know malls are endangered, and yes, they got me to visit their physical location TWICE in two days, but they also made me a tad less likely to order from them again.  A tad.  A teeny tad.  That was a good sale.  And free shipping.  Who am I kidding?  I’m still irritated, though.

I heard something a little (a lot) ridiculous that made my mall visit more palatable.  On my way out, I went through the shoe department in Nordstrom and listened to the pianist by the escalators.  I heard the opening chords of something familiar, but I couldn’t place it for a minute.  Then he got to the chorus and all of a sudden I recognized it.  Why would anyone bother to arrange a piano-only version of Justin Bieber’s “Baby”?

Why do I still ask these questions?  A quick search on YouTube found lots of piano versions of it.

It’s amazing how much easier Friday is to get through when you didn’t go work on Thursday.  I should take every Thursday off.  Or take ginseng or ginkgo biloba or whatever the memory-enhancing stuff is.  I’m totally losing my mind.  The other night I went into the dry cleaners to pick up a pair of pants I’d dropped off that morning (the ones someone dumped coffee on the day before – that was fun).  The guy hung the pants on the rack next to the register for me, I paid, and then I walked out of the store.  He came running after me, shouting “Pants!  Miss!  Pants!” and waving my pants over his head.  That’s not embarrassing at all.

I stayed home today, hoping for a quiet and restful day.  I mostly succeeded (am still succeeding, really).  My gym offers yoga classes at 9:30 on Tuesdays and Thursdays, so I took advantage of my day off .  I’ve never tried yoga before.  Turns out I kinda like it.  Especially the end, with the laying down (big hit with me) and the quiet music and the breathing and the focusing.  I still feel fairly calm.

I like it.

I also like these things from The Daily What:

1st – If you like Stephen Fry or Molly Lewis, you will like this video.  If you like them both, you’ll be over the moon.  Super-cute.

2nd – Speaking of super-cute, here’s a puppy going head to head with an ice cube.

Lunch might be overstating it, but I did eat cheese and crackers, some carrots, and celery and peanut butter.  All between about 2:30 and 4:30.  And I had breakfast.  AND a mid-morning chai latte.  Maybe I should start a food diary again.  That sounds like a lot now that I’ve written it down.  But it’s not the amount of food I’m concerned with right now; it’s the timing.  I JUST ATE.  Still hungry.  But no – I’ll stay out of the cookies that are calling my name.  I’m going to the gym and coming home to find dinner waiting for me.  (John’s cooking tonight – yay John and yay salmon!)  So no cookies.  Cookies I wouldn’t even have bought if it weren’t for Wegmans and their evil, sneaky marketing plan.  Wegmans smelled like warm chocolate today.  That might be the best smell in the world.  I like the smell of jasmine, too, very much, but when I smell warm chocolate, I want to find some and curl up inside it.  I’ve never felt the urge to cuddle up with a bed of jasmine.  On the other hand, if Wegmans had smelled like jasmine, I might have bought a plant instead of fresh chocolate chip cookies from the bakery.