Inane Chatter

I was listening to the radio in the car the other day, and I heard a commercial for the National Association of Realtors.  Except they didn’t say it that way.  Not the way I say realtor.  Not the way anyone I know says realtor.  You know, like realter.  Kind of.  Anyway, no.  The guy on the radio announcing the official name of the organization over and over again pronounced it real-tor.  Over and over again.  Tor.  Like the rock formation.  Or the publishing company.  I assume that’s how it’s pronounced.  Tor.  Like or.  Four.  Bore.  Core.  If tor is pronounced “ter”, then I’m just going to keep saying it the wrong way ’cause that’s ridiculous.  But when it’s at the end of a word?  And that word is realtor?  Please.  Real-tor.  As if there are fake tors out there somewhere.

Reminds me of these guys.

People annoy me.  I had lunch today with someone I’ve barely seen or talked to in months (we don’t work together anymore), and it was kinda good and kinda awful.  Awful like I don’t want to talk to her anymore.  Good like it was nice to catch up, but awful like after about 20 minutes, I couldn’t handle listening to her (and didn’t want to share anything from my life, either).  Lunch ended eventually, though, and I got to come home and relax a little and then I got to go to yoga and relax a lot.  And now I have to give Roxy her medicine (her 5 tons of medicine), so I’m off.  Sorry for the lack of entertainment going on up in here.

This makes so much sense.  You know what doesn’t make sense?  Radio stations.  And holidays.  The DC area’s easy listening station is ALREADY PLAYING CHRISTMAS MUSIC.  What is wrong with people?  Everyone knows Christmas music season doesn’t start until the day after Thanksgiving.

Riley is going insane, I’m freezing to death, and I think I just heard “Gangnam Style” coming out of John’s office.  The world is ending TONIGHT.  Hug your loved ones and duck and cover.  (Isn’t that what the Mayans said to do?)

Riley has been one uncontrollable bundle of annoying energy today.  If he could focus that energy on keeping me warm, I could handle it, but instead he’s been bouncing off the walls while I sit at my computer and shiver.  The thermostat says it’s 67 degrees in here.  I don’t see how it could be. I’m so COLD.

[Pause while I wrap myself in a blanket.  It's times like these when I wish I had a snuggie.  Kind of.]

Just got distracted by Bookshelf Pr0n and Better Book Titles.  And my fingers are too cold for typing.  So…sure, I’ll publish this disjointed and not very entertaining blog post.  Don’t judge me!

Dear Internet,

Why are you so big?  You make it very hard for me to keep up some weeks.  Don’t misunderstand; I’m THRILLED you’re as big as you are because that means there’s always something new to find.  Lately, though, I don’t have time during the day, and I don’t have the energy after work.  I’m missing out on so much.  I haven’t visited my bloggy buddies (I think I’m stealing that from Wombat – Wombat, can I steal this please?) in forever, and I certainly don’t mean to neglect them.  Some evenings I open tabs for all of my favorite websites and I still don’t get to them all.  Also, why does WordPress insist that I’m misspelling favorite?  Also, why is “Moves Like Jagger” allowed to be used in commercials?  I’ve managed to avoid hearing it for weeks and weeks, but now it’s back and stuck in my brain.  Also also, if happy little bluebirds fly beyond the rainbow, why, oh why can’t I?  That may help with my song-stuck-in-brain syndrome.

Oh, wait, this is a letter.

Affectionately,

Zannah

What? I love the internet.

Background: Yesterday evening, I got up to make some tea.  (Good background, right?  I mean, that really sets the scene for you, doesn’t it?)

Me, to John: What size mug?

John: Mexican.

Let me explain.  We don’t do sizes the normal way when it comes to mugs.  Oh, no.  Small, medium, large, tall, grande, venti – those are not descriptive enough. Here’s a selection of the mugs we use most often:

• In the front row, from left to right, we have littlest and little – these match our dishes.  We’ve had them since we got married.
• In the middle row, also from left to right, the answer to the mug size question is college (the last remaining dishware from our college years – I think the rest of those dishes went to Tom after we graduated), Jess’s (no one uses those but her), Mexican (we bought them  in Mexico, I swear), and big Mexican (same as the others, but bigger)
• And in the back row, we have the more obvious self-explanatory descriptions: Superman, Beatles, Mad Hatter

We have entirely too many mugs.  Okay, now I need to know how many.  Hang on.

You can let go now.  41.  We have 41 mugs, not counting travel mugs.  And how many people live here?  Yeah.  TWO.  Ridiculous.

I’m always disappointed by falafel.  I get it every once in a while, but I never end up happy about it.  Today’s lunch was a falafel, hummus, and cucumber wrap.  Should have been delicious.  It sure sounds like something I would like.  But it was so very BORING.  Part of the problem may have been that there wasn’t any actual hummus in the wrap.  It was more like a hummus-flavored watery mayo.  The other part of the problem was that the falafel was only so-so.  I’m not trying to say that all falafel is boring.  I’m very willing to concede that I’ve never had really good falafel.  I certainly hope that’s the case.  Knowing that there is good falafel out there in the world gives me strength.  Or hope.  Or something.  But I think I’m done with falafel until someone I trust gives me a recommendation.

Also, the nice man who makes my salad at Panera recognizes me and waves when I walk in the door.  It’s time to start grocery shopping again.

…that if I don’t drink coffee/tea/something with caffeine in it on the mornings I drive to DC that I will be struggling to stay awake by the time I get to the GW Parkway?

…that Riley doesn’t like it when John plays his guitar?  He gets all nervous and whiny.

…that we’re putting off watching the 2nd season of Sherlock so we’ll still have it look forward to?

…and that we’re doing the same thing with Doctor Who because of how freakin’ long we have to wait between seasons?  We’re two episodes into season 6 and afraid to watch any more.

…that we haven’t watched the Downton Abbey Christmas episode yet because it seemed weird to watch it when it’s nowhere near Christmastime?

…that once I start thinking about TV I really like I apparently can’t stop?

…that Roxy can tell time and is nudging me because she knows it’s time for her medicine?

I’d better stop before I reveal too much. I’ve gotta keep some secrets.

Oh, how I want this dress.

(More pictures.)

And I want to be a princess.  And I want a pony.  And world peace.  I can’t have any of that, but I can have funny cat videos. It’s one of my inalienable rights as an internet user.

Also, if you have 4 minutes to spare, watch this. Jimmy Steward wrote a poem, and I cried.

Purses collect trash.  All kinds of junk.  And I only carry mine to and from work.  I can’t imagine what it might look like if I carried it everywhere I went.  I cleaned out my purse Sunday afternoon.  Receipts accounted for most of the crap I pulled out of its three compartments, but there were a bunch of random business cards and a couple of (smashed) granola bars in there, too.  Judging by the dates on some of the receipts, the last time I cleaned out my purse was about a year and a half ago.  I have no idea how long the granola bars were in there.

This is a picture of the bag of trash I filled.  The apple is next to it for perspective.  I emptied my purse out completely, vacuumed it out, and only put the essentials back in.  My bag is a couple pounds lighter today.  My shoulders thank me.  Now if only I could convince work to get me a lighter laptop.  That’s the bag that’s going to turn me into a hunchback.  I guess I could get a wheelie laptop bag…

Update: I think that bag of trash might be bigger than my purse.  How is that possible?  Wait – could my purse be bigger on the inside?  Just did a quick search, and oh my god, I want this.  Or maybe this.  But probably the first one.  While I’m at it, I also want these, and one of these.  Etsy is cool.

Update x2: By popular demand, here is a picture of my purse with the same apple next to it.  I think that might be a small apple, because my purse looks huge next to it.  It’s really not that big.  It’s divided into three equal compartments, and all the trash was in two of them.

The only thing I can say for sure about the person who owns this car is that she (possibly he, but I’m going with she because someone has to make a decision here, and I really hate using they) loves to knit.  Or crochet.  Or whatever it is you do with yarn.  Or maybe she’s just really into wool.  And/or sheep.  Maybe it’s goat wool.  Does yarn have to be made out of wool?  I assume not – I’m sure there’s such a thing as synthetic yarn.  What I’m really interested in knowing, though, is if she’s a pirate or a zombie.

She might wander around the area squinting her eyes and asking strangers, “Ahoy matey, do you know where I can find the new yarrrrrn store?  Me parrot’s in dire need of a new sweater vest.”  Or else she shuffles down the block after the poor scared little lamb, with a blank stare and her jaw hanging open, mumbling “Yarrrrrnnnn…”  Poor scared little lamb.  I’ll protect you.

Next time I see, I’m going to ask.  I’m going to hop right out of my car, knock on her window, hope the light is still red, and ask her which end of the zombie/pirate spectrum she prefers.  Of course, she doesn’t have to choose.  Maybe she’s into zombie pirates. Or pirate zombies.  (How do you tell the difference?)  Or ninjas.  Maybe that’s the sound a pirate makes when he’s killed by a ninja.  Or maybe she just likes yarn, and when she says yarn, she says it the way Homer does when he thinks about donuts.

I’m out of ideas, so let’s hope I see her again soon.

I went to lunch with a coworker today (I kind of had to, even though I’m considering never eating again after this week) at the Cheesecake Factory, ordered the chicken salad sandwich, only ate half, and put the other half in a box to bring home.  And then I left the box in the car.  For four hours.  In this crazy heat.  And then I remembered it and threw it away.

Good story, right?  Here’s another.

Every once in a while, we find a peanut hidden somewhere in the yard.  Not hidden very well, actually, but you can tell it’s supposed to be kind of out of the way.  Once there was in a flower pot.  We found another one in a crack on the steps to the porch, and today John found one in the mulch under a bush.  And when I say peanut, I don’t mean one that’s ready to eat.  We’re talking circus peanuts.  Bar peanuts.  Still in the shell.  Like Mr. Peanut, but without the top hat, cane, and monocle (more’s the pity).  So…we think we have an industrious little squirrel or chipmunk or something, hiding peanuts away for winter.  We have no idea where the peanuts are coming from.

Maybe it’s not a chipmunk.  Maybe, just maybe, there’s an elephant tiptoeing around our yard hiding peanuts.  And maybe it’s invisible.  And silent.

We’re at the breakfast table this morning with Gaby, who is writing in her journal about what we did yesterday.

Gaby: Well, I want to write that we saw monuments, but…I don’t know how to spell “saw”.

John couldn’t hold the laughter in.  She had no problem with monuments.  And then I heard her spell Washington with very little hesitation.  She’s a genius!

We’re all on our laptops (except Gaby, who’s using a cute little spiral-bound notebook) this morning, after a nice lie-in.  Wolf Trap cancelled last night’s performance of The Pirates of Penzance, so we stayed in and had our picnic dinner in the family room with The Muppet Show.  It’s just as well – we were all pretty worn out after the heat and the driving.  We met up with Jess (Hi, Jess!) for a yummy lunch in Annapolis, blew some bubbles at the harbor (also thanks to Jess), ate some really good ice cream, and tried on lots of hats at Hats in the Belfry.  Hey!  That’s news for us – John found a hat.  One that fits and looks pretty cool and will keep him from burning his head every time he goes out in the sun.  It’s a miracle.  I fell in love with a plum-colored cloche hat, but then I looked at the price tag.  I just can’t spend $175 on a hat.  Even when it’s this cool.

Today the plan is to stay inside and hide from the heat.  No plans, no schedule, just whatever we want to do, whenever we want to do it.  And now that the internet is back (the storm late Friday night knocked it for most of yesterday)…you know, I really don’t know how to end that sentence.  I don’t remember where I was going with it when I started it.  Now that the internet is back, we can…play on the internet?  But we’re not really going to do that today, so…yeah.  No idea.

I……ain’t got nobody.  Oops.  That just came out.  I meant to say that I don’t have anything to say today.  Which is not really worth saying.  But I said it anyway.  As you can see.  If I tightened that up a little, I could turn that into a tongue-twister.

We still have a land line at home.  I’m not sure why, really.   We use it to make some calls (the vet, the pharmacy), and our parents use it to reach us sometimes, but they use our cell phones at least as often as the land line.  We mostly ignore it because despite registering for every Do Not Call list out there, we get tons of telemarketers, political robocalls, and other spam.  We talked about getting rid of it not too long ago, but I think our main reason for keeping it is because it’s our primary contact number for every bill, every account, every everything, and it would be a pain to update those.  Not the greatest reason to keep paying for it.  It’s Vonage, so it’s cheap, but still.

As long as we still have it, though, I get some entertainment out of its visual voicemail feature.  All voicemail goes to my Yahoo account (another dinosaur, but I have better reasons for keeping it), but Vonage doesn’t always do a good job of transcribing what was actually said.  Sometimes the program gives up altogether, but usually it tries.  Just about half an hour ago, I got this visual voicemail:

“Hi Ms. Bird, this is Sharon calling from pointless mom. Just calling to let you know that your contacts are ready for pick up. Thank you”

That’s Vonage’s punctuation, not mine, and this is better than most since at least the second half makes sense.  It’s also only the second half that told me it was my eye doctor’s office calling.  I might suggest they change the name of their practice to Pointless Mom when I swing by tomorrow.  Much funnier.  I don’t know where that came from, though.  It doesn’t even rhyme with the actual name.  Speaking of names, no names had to be changed to protect the innocent – Bird is not my last name, and Sharon is not the name of the woman who called.  (I listened to the actual voicemail, too.)

None of this is convincing me to keep a land line for the house, but it has convinced me that I don’t have to worry about evil robotic overlords just yet.  Or maybe they just want me to think that…

Lunch today: one peanut butter and jelly sandwich and one small container of applesauce.  It occurred to me that I was eating the lunch of a first-grader.  All I was missing was the little half-pint container of chocolate milk with a straw.  Except I keep hearing that kids aren’t allowed to bring peanut butter and jelly sandwiches to school anymore, so maybe this is no longer a typical lunch.  I wouldn’t really know.

John had brunch with the band this morning (Rock stars do brunch, don’t they?  No?  Well, they should.  Brunch is awesome.), so I took my book (The Bloggess‘s hilarious Let’s Pretend This Never Happened) off to Starbucks with me.  I got my favorite drink (tall skim no-whip toffee nut white mocha – I mention it all the time because I assume you’re planning on memorizing it so you can order one for me next time we’re at Starbucks together without even having to check with me.  You’re planning to do that, right?) and sat at a table outside to sip and read.  Lovely half-hour or so, only slightly marred by the kid at the next table who stared every time I laughed at my book (which was about every 10 seconds).  He was just jealous.  Then Wegmans (Yes, I actually went to the grocery store this weekend.  Can you believe it?), home to unload, and back out to get my nails done.  I was desperately in need of both a manicure and a pedicure.  I went to my favorite place, but for the second time this weekend, I was turned away.  Terribly sad.  The first time was Friday evening.  My friend Chastity was in no hurry to face traffic on her way home, so we decided to get our nails done and went to this place.  Turns out this weekend was prom weekend, so they were fully booked.  Sad.  We gave up that night, but I assumed that by Sunday I’d be able to walk in.  I should have asked, since when I got there today, there was a sign on the door that said they were closed for a private party.  Disappointed, I went to my old favorite salon.  Unfortunately, they’re under new management, and I am not happy about it.  It wasn’t a terrible experience, but it wasn’t the relaxing afternoon I’d hoped for.  They didn’t stab me in the toe or anything, and my nails look okay, but they’re cut too short, and the lady was a bit rough with my cuticles.  So I have to find another back-up nail salon (or plan ahead).  My life is so hard.

You probably know lots of things that are awesome, but I have a nostalgic (for me, anyway) addition to my list of Things That Are Awesome.  (Note to self: post list of Things That Are Awesome.  Everyone should have a list of Things That Are Awesome.)  In college, I went to Au Bon Pain for lunch fairly regularly (it was just off campus – probably still there), and I always got a turkey sandwich on a croissant with lettuce and honey mustard.  GREAT sandwich.  But it was the honey mustard I kept going back for.  It had the consistency of honey instead of mustard, and it had more of a horseradish-like kick.  I loved it.  But then we moved away, to places that don’t have Au Bon Pain, and I was left without this fantastic honey mustard.  I found a bagel shop in Newport that used it (or something very similar), but that was 11 years ago.  Au Bon Pain doesn’t have many (or any, in some cases) restaurants in the places we’ve lived since Newport, and I have tried many different honey mustard dressings.  (I’m not obsessive dedicated enough to try to make my own, but you probably already knew that.  I hope.)  Today, for the first time in, yeah, about 11 years, I found my way back to an Au Bon Pain (they just opened one in the building I work in when I’m in DC), and I ordered my sandwich.  Same honey mustard, same kick-ass sandwich.  Awesome!

What?  You think it’s weird that my list of Things That Are Awesome includes a sandwich?  It includes more than one sandwich, so there.

You know something? I’m pretty good at babbling.  Sometimes it’s entertaining (I hope.  It is to me, anyway.).  More often, it’s not.  And sometimes it’s surprising just how long I can go on about something (like school, for instance) before I realize it’s boring.  To you, to me, to the dogs.  Flat out not interesting to anyone at all.  I TRY to delete (deletedeletedeletedeletedeletedeletedelete) that stuff.  Like I just did.  Blah blah boringcakes.

Unfortunately, there are some times (like, oh, I don’t know…now?) when I don’t have anything rattling around in my head to replace the long-ass rant I just deleted about the waste of time and money my statistics class has turned into (because a full half of this course is a repeat of the last two chapters of the previous statistics course, a course that was a pre-req to this one – I get review chapters, but these two review chapters are the only subjects on the @*&$%&*^ midterm – that was a much more concise way of putting it).  Do you think that’s going to stop me from posting?  Hmm?

Maybe.  It depends on a number of things.  Like, what time is it?  How tired am I?  Is my book particularly engrossing?  If the answers are a) late, b) very, and/or c) ohmygodyes, then no post is forthcoming.  Sorry.  If it’s today, however, and the answers are a) midday, b) not particularly, and c) have you looked at the time? What do you think I do all day that I could be reading my book right now?, then the fact that you’ve read this far should tell you something.  (Psst.  Come here.  Closer.  Just you.  You’re my favorite.)

Do you get the Uncommon Goods catalog?  You should.  Because it’s got some cute stuff in it.  A few weeks ago, I bought myself a sugar bowl and little pitcher set.  I couldn’t resist.  I mean, look at them.

They’re just the cutest things.  Then John noticed that the feet look a lot like the Monty Python foot.  I knew there was a reason they called out to me.  It was fate!  And THEN I noticed that when you look at the pitcher from the other side, the placement of the handle makes the little pitcher look like it has a butt.  The cutest butt.

So, no, I don’t work for Uncommon Goods or know anyone who does (in case you were wondering).  I’ve just ordered a few things from them and I really like their catalogs.    And they sell pitchers with butts.