Oscar Picks

Okay. The day is here. These are the nominees that I 1) think will win and 2) who I want to win. If either choice is correct, I was right.

Best Picture

Will - LOTR-ROTK - it made too much cash not to. Not my fav of the year.
Should - Master and Commander - The Far Side fo the World, I didn't see it but... I know Lost In Translation won't get it, sigh.

Best Director

Will - Peter Jackson
Should - Peter Weir

Best Actor

Will - Sean Penn
Should - Bill Murray

Best Supporting Actor

Will - Tim Robbinson
Should - Tim Robbins

Best Actress

Will - Charlize Theron
Should - Diana Keaton

Best Supporting Actress

Will - Renee Zellweger
Should - Shohreh Aghashloo

Best Original Screen Play

Will - Lost In Translation
Should - Lost In Translation

Best Adapted Screenplay

Will - TLOTR-ROTK
Should - American Splendor

Look to the Hobbit movie to sweep.


Oh, HAPPY SUNDAY!!!!

HAPPY SATURDAY!!!!

Yay Blogger

Blogger gave me an upgrade to ad free status!! Go Blogger.Com It's Your Birthday!!! Thank You Blogger.Com!!!! YAY!!!!

Ewwwwwww!

I am deeply offended by the GOP ad running on my page. Yuck. Compassionate Conservatism? The Hell? I want it gone. You notice they don't say "Republican" or "GOP". Eww. Eww.Ewww. Who can I call to get that mess of my page?

Memeeing of snow days gone by



Now, y'all aren't even going to believe me, but I picked out this snow topic thing last weekend. I was over at Brosky and Alphagals mooching their computer and shopping for memes trying to figure out what I'm going to do with my computer - I'm going to be spending a lot more time either mooching off Brosky and Alphagal or hanging out at the public terminals at the library. Yay. By the time I got around to Wednesdays edition, topic "What is In You Yard", answer dog shit I was really getting over the whole thing. Fortunately, Shrub was willing to hep' a blogger out and gave me a new entry for the day. If he wasn't such a bigot you would had had to read about the dog shit in my yard.

But, then today. It snowed and snowed and snowed some more and I think it may be snowing still. So I said "Hey! I have this meme thing I was going to do earlier and didn't! I could just um, build on it. I like snow!
http://3forthursday.blogspot.com/

http://www.iampariah.com/projects/memeslist.php

Snow with out further ado


1. What are 3 things you love about the snow?

It's very dramatic as its falling, it looks like the weather is doing something. In my experience when you can see weather, it's not usually a good thing. Snow is visible and not for the most part, deadly. It's not like watching a tornado or a hurricane. It's a nice, mellow reminder that the weather is active and taking part in the world. I like to watch nature work sometimes. I do not love ice or ice byproducts; those are completely different and do not fall under the "not deadly" umbrella. Ice is bad. Boo.
2.
It dressed up everything it touches after it has fallen and it photographs beautifully went out to pick up some lunch today and drove down the same way I that I go everyday to go home. I was looking at the houses, and they looked so pretty. One house had a motorcycle parked in front and it was covered with snow and I was like "Oh, that motorcycle has snow on it, isn't it pretty! Everything looks all post cardy when it has snow on it.
3.
It makes the world it falls on silent. It really does. Everything goes and hides wherever it hides and it's so still. Dogger and I go on walks and it feels like we're the only creatures stirring. I really like it. It's very restful. Dogger thinks the snow smells wonderful. I do, however, refuse to take the blame for this snow. My former temp is to blame for the snow. She really wanted more snow. She got it. I hope she's happy with it.

3. What are 3 things you hate about the snow?
1.It eventually refreezes again and turns to ice, you can’t make snowballs all snow, and it makes your socks wet and cold. It was a big surprise that there are a variety of snows. I grew up with insta snow. It snowed and it was instantly gone. In the few minutes he hung around it made great snowballs and teeny, tiny snowmen. I didn't know that snow dried out and got powdery and useless. It is great for skiing, but I never thought about how it got that way. I thought it was Special Mountain Edition snow. I thought high altitudes did something to it
4.
2.Eventually gets all brown and dirty and gross and muddy and unpretty.

3.It makes going to the store hard and the shelves empty once you get there. People here behave as thought the sky itself is falling. It snows all the damn time and these people react like they are facing Armageddon. Every damn time.

What are the 3-funniest/funniest moments you can remember that happened on a snow day?

We didn’t have snow days when I was little. It didn’t snow and if it did snow it had melted by morning. We always went to school. I don’t remember any funny/ ist/er event.

Its snowing hard now.

Lighting Up


I finally had to let go of the Eames/Danish Modern/Retro/Vintage/Funky lamp dream. I got tired of having all my lamps snaked out from under me. I did not start out to be a table lamp coolness avatar but there you go. If I was bidding on it you can bet that some hipster was just waiting to pounce on it. I decided to leave those to the fashion victims that had the deeper pockets. I had no idea that kitsch was so highly sought after. They were spending huge amounts on these things that to be totally honest, were not the most attractive things in the world and won't be the most attractive thing in there living room even. I will mock them in my very kitsch rayon Hawaiian print shirts.

These were fifty-year-old lamps for Gawd Sake! Most of them if you read the fine print had rather dark things to say about the wiring. They all suggested getting the lamp rewired prior to use, that this was a minimal cost. How do you get a lamp rewired? Call up your Lamp Man and have him take care of it? Not a clue. They were very pretty though, if you like that kind of thing and I do.

There was another problem with the lamps. Shipping. One that I really wanted for a while there thought I was going to get and of course got out bid on, was going to cost $60! That was in the very, very small print, even smaller then the "get it rewired or it will burn your house down" small print. $60 was twice what I would have paid for the damn thing. The seller said they were having it "professionally wrapped", and then what buy it a seat in first class?

Oh but Wahhhhh! One of them was really pretty and would have rawked my living room! It was so Mod and fifties and my house wants Mod and Fifties. My house is Mod and fifties! I was watching House Hunters the other night and one of the places they showed the guy was full of fabulous Eames lightage. There was a $300 Sputnik hanging lamp in the breakfast nook! The guy didn't even have a clue!

But I have moved on.

I am now about Antler lamps. All. About. Antler. Lamps . They are much closer to my outdoorsy. rustic, lodge-y theme I want for upstairs anyway. I got significantly off topic there for a while. I must remind myself, Upstairs! Knotty Pine! Lodge-y! Hipster cool would be nice too, if I could find it but most Lodge-y themed stuff is very, very unhip, and not in a cool, tragically unhip, ironic way either. In a lame, broken hip way.

So I went back to the auction board. I found some, and wow! Cheaper too! Chip Hipster isn't feeling Antler lamps right now. Well, I did bid on one so Chip will be nosing around sooner or later. Screw Chip! He got my Atomic Retro Lamp all ready! He doesn't need any more table lamps.

The Antler lamps are all cheaper but most of them don't come with shades. The shades are what makes them all lodge-y… but I did find one with a shade and it's not a great shade, it's all right and I think I could live with it. But. I have to win the little bastard first and that has been my waterloo. I can't win a damn thing. I thought you were supposed to be able to get fantastic deals on Ebay. All the stories are about people getting these amazing deals and so far? No amazing deals for me. Amazing escalating prices but no deals.

People Suck

If there are say a limited number of parking spaces and you are faced with two parking spots, do you

A) Take 1 of the spots.
B) Take 1 of the spots and park too close to the line, you're special.
C) Park in both spots. You're too special for a single spot.

Answers B or C, you are not special you are an asshole.

Yeah. Still no computer, I'm still on the road and at the mercy of assholes and parking lots. Sigh. I haven't heard from the computer rehab either. No News is Good News? Silence is golden?

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness

And then to clarify what was meant by all

Amendment XIII - All Men damn it.
Section 1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.


Amendment XV - All Men should have the vote 1870
Section 1. The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.

Amendment XIX - And… Women too 1920
The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex.

Amendment XXIV - We said ALL 1964
Section 1. The right of citizens of the United States to vote in any primary or other election for President or Vice President, for electors for President or Vice President, or for Senator or Representative in Congress, shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or any state by reason of failure to pay any poll tax or other tax.

Amendment XXVI - We said All, damn it. Voting age lowered to 18 - Nixon elected in landslide.
Section 1. The right of citizens of the United States, who are 18 years of age or older, to vote, shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or any state on account of age.

I don't know about y'all but gay marriage isn't really making me feel less secure in my heterosexuality. I haven't noticed a lot my fellow breeders exclaiming "Hooo Boy! Now that gays are marrying, I think I'm going to go ask my neighbor to settle down and drive up property values in depressed areas and maybe raise dachshunds. I feel the gayness washing over me now! My marriage is suddenly worthless to me! I think I'll go wipe my ass with my marriage license!"

Puh-lease.

Gay marriage isn't going to bring down "our way of life" or cause the birth rate to plummet. or bring on Armageddon. All gay marriage will lead to is gay divorce.

No where does it say All Straight Men are created equal, it says All Men and fifty years later, it was amended to say All Women. No where does it say sexual preference. It says ALL. All means all, every, the whole lot can pursue happiness. It's an unalienable right, Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness…

Prohibition got passed to appease a similar set of religious zealots and that was supposed to protect the institution of marriage too.

Amendment XVIII - Prohibition 1919
Section 1. After one year from the ratification of this article the manufacture, sale, or transportation of intoxicating liquors within, the importation thereof into, or the exportation thereof from the United States and all territory subject to the jurisdiction thereof for beverage purposes is hereby prohibited.

Amendment XXIc - Repealing Prohibition 1933
Section 1. The eighteenth article of amendment to the Constitution of the United States is hereby repealed.
Section 2. The transportation or importation into any state, territory, or possession of the United States for delivery or use therein of intoxicating liquors, in violation of the laws thereof, is hereby prohibited.

Marriage Survived. I have no doubt that eventully, All will mean All

http://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/constitution.table.html#amendments

From CNN

- President Bush announces he supports a constitutional amendment to ban same-sex
marriage.

Church and State are now as one. Welcome to the future boys and girls. Are you Khristain enough?

I still don’t have a computer

Rant On

I have noticed that the people who are late are often so much jollier than the people who have to wait for them.
-- E. V. Lucas
http://cfcl.com/vlb/Memes/iow_prev.shtml#_prev

http://www.iampariah.com/projects/memeslist.php

Tardiness is a major issue to me. If I were ever in charge I would really have to put a stop to habitual tardiness. It’s disrespectful and lazy. My office is populated by people who seem to think that time is elastic and variable. If mine isn't how is theirs? These people wander in whenever they feel like it, whenever they get ready - late. It makes me crazy. Why can’ these people have a schedule in the morning? I understand that most people have families to get ready in the morning, but - don't they have to be someplace at the same time everyday as well?

Why do they think that being late is okay? It’s not okay! In my world, and it is, make no mistake, my world, it's wrong and its a serious character flaw. If I can get to where I am going every morning why can’t everybody else

? This is a huge deal to me. I have an alarm, I get up, I get dressed I read the paper and deal with the animals, with one eye on the clock! I know how long each task takes. I should run a seminar on cut outing tardiness. And effective ways of tormenting the tardy. I don’t think corporal punishment is out of hand and failing that, for habitual tardies? Capital punishment might act as an object lesson to the rest of the slackers.

"Oh, I'm sorry! This is the fourth time this week and the sixteenth time this month you've been late. Please step over the wall and your executioner will be with you shortly"

I liked the quote because it's so true. Folks who wander in when ever they feel like it seem to affect this jovial attitude about it, like its funny that they can’t make in on time. It’s not jolly and the rest of us are not laughing. It’s not a good habit. I like things to have a scheduled quality. I would to know that X thing is going to happen at X time. I know this isn’t always going to be possible, shit happens, but if it is understood that you are going to be at a place at a time, you should leave where ever you are in time so that you can get there. You don not leave wherever you are at X time if you are supposed to be arriving at X time! It bugs the shit out of me every time. I don’t need to be able to set my time by other people but I would like them to at least have the good manors to show up when they are supposed to show up.

I have been late, I’m not perfect. It happens to all of us. But I don’t do it on purpose and I make sure it doesn’t happen again for the specific reason I was late. I leave early, change the route, and make everything tighter.

/Rant over.

Stop me before I Bid Again

Ebay is a bad, bad thing.

One of my friends turned me back on to Ebay. She is a mean lady. I started out looking for stuff, just getting my feet wet. So far so good. Then I decided that the knotty pine attic space needed something - it needed some out doorsey nature themed stuff and it needed it from Ebay. I didn't find any that I liked, okay, I found some wall paper border that rawks, but that action isn't up for another four days and, ya know. I get bored.

So. Then I started to think that the upstairs really needs light. Really, really kewl lights. I think about the knotty pine, the low ceilings the general cavelike nature of the space. So I right away think about retro/vintage/eames/midcentury table lamps. Well, first I tried searching for "retro" and didn't find anything, then I did "vintage" which got me a lot of Oil Lamps. I screwed around with "rustic" and "lodge" themed before I followed "Eames". Today I went with "Mid Century" also "Art Deco" - ugly and expensive and "Danish Modern" sadly, less expensive.

As soon as I find one I can't live with out, everybody suddenly also can't live with out it. Everybody has much thicker wallets and higher credit limits then I do. So far everybody has snaked my lamps. Bastards. There I am doing the hard work for them, trying to figure out where the ggod laps are hiding - Okay! Vintage! Woo-Ho-, No! Damn it! Retro! no, tacky, Eames!!! Oh My Gawd! its the mother load! so far I have had four? five? really awesome Eames lamps stolen by higher bidders. Bastards

I'm getting smarter. Instead of bidding too early, a total kiss of Eames death, I'm just watching the stuff I'm interested in, I was very unsmart today though. I found two that I really, really need - one or the other, there is no way I'll get both, but, they have a reserve. Which sucks. Hard. I don't think they really want to sell them, the seller is just trying to get a figure for their home owners insurance. Lamp Teases.

A week of Memes or I don’t have a computer


In each of the following questions, fill in the blank...

1. When I sing, I sound like a -

There is nothing in nature that I can compare it to. Noise that bad can only be man made. I think I sound the most close to the sound of a modem calling out. Only less on key. Very, Very bad. I don’t sing in church less I cause someone to lose his or her faith. Really, really bad. I would like to sing, I sing in the car and I pretend I’m doing well, harmonizing with the band- but I sound more like Yoko Ono then John Lennon. I’m pretty much a Spoken Word kind of performer.

2. July - is my favorite month of the year. –

Its warm, there is a great holiday and day off that month and it’s in the middle of the summer before I’ve gotten tired of the heat and over the summer reruns. I really don’t start looking forward to the new season until August at least. July the networks are still showing specials or other filler and I actually like Blooper shows. I’m easy that way.

3. I've always wanted to improve my _Home Improvement skill.

I would really like to be able to look at a household problem and just shrug and go and get my tool chest and fix it. I don’t have a tool chest and so far none of the problems have been things that scotch tape and Elmer’s glue could fix. I would like to have more tools and know how to use them. I’m held back by my Loud Noise issues. I can’t fix whatever it is if I’m cowering in the corner. Thus far I have been able to do minor yard work and hang pictures.

4. It's Monday morning, and the first thing that goes through my mind is -

Here We Go Again.

5. My favorite day of the week is

Saturday because- it’s the one day I can stay guilt free laying on the bed with the Kitty curled up on my chest and listen to it rain for as long as I want to and not care about running late or where I need to be. I do have to get up but I don’t have to do it right now.
-

6. I used to/currently collect

Post Cards

7. At the end of a work day/school day, the first thing I want to do is - Go to my chair and watch TV with my feet up. But I can’t because the Dogger needs to be taken out and fed and walked and the Kitty wants to be fed and then I need to be fed so I don’t get to put my feet up and watch TV in my chair until much, much later on.

8. I really look forward to Christmas because it's my favorite holiday.

I like the build up, to a point, I like giving the gifts, and I like getting the gifts. It s happy holiday. Plus I get three days off!

9. When I need some down-time, I usually –

Watch TV instead of dealing with whatever it is.

10. I plan to travel to - Europe someday.



http://mmadness.blogspot.com/

http://www.iampariah.com/projects/memeslist.php

On The Road again part duh


So. I talked to a guy at the rehab place and asked him about this whole desire to wipe the computers hard drive, to lobitmize my computer as it were and how I am strongly againts this idea. I can not back up my machine, I don't know how to do this and I don't have copies my software, I've had the machine since 1998 for Gods sake!

I tried to talk to Microsoft the last time the machine had issues, a week ago, and they couldn't give me a code for my version of Windows 98 because it was so damn old. Sorry, I fell behind on my constant upgrading. Thanks Bill "I want tbe like Carnegie ( a robber baron who still rots in hell despite building librarys) Gates.

At some point today I'm going to take the machine back to the rehab place and leave it with them again. I'm then going to go to Brosky and Alphagals and tie up there machine for several hours and try to crank out some content for ya'll for next week.

Oh, HAPPY SATURDAY!!!!!

Whatever

Hurry up guy! you have two minutes. I need the machine!

The library is everything I thought it would be. And so much less. If you were in grade school in the early 70s, think of your school library - like that, only smaller. My public library has a subscription to The National Enquirer!.

The machine has had a relapse. The rehab place has said ugly things to me about the machines' chances of pulling it together. They used words like "Wipeing The Hard Drive" and " Backing up my files", they didn't mention how I would do that with the flurry of ugly messages from Microsoft all over my screen and even worse,"Nothing Else They Can Do". Over the phone the guy seems to be blameing Windows 98. I haven't got a flurry of ugly messages from Windows 98.

Anyway. You know those trendy, oh so cool Internet Cafes that people talk about? Yeah. They talk about them but they don't tell you where they are.

Sigh.

Ghost in The Machine


The machine came back from rehab and everything was fine. Brilliant actually. The machine is running faster and everything was good. It was nice to have it back. The stint in rehab was just what the doctor ordered, cleansed it of all the spy ware and joke ware and all the other uninvited guests that had been making the machine hang around street corners at all hours and vandalizing the neighborhood.

So. Machine came back. Really self involved, but that’s a rehab thing, it’s all about them because its all about them. You have to wait this out and be glad they aren’t dead in some ditch or appearing in reality shows.

But. The clock was wrong. Not very wrong, like seven or eight minutes. I would change it and it would change back. Kind of a pain, but it had been doing that for a while and I got used to it. Then. Then, I went to my browser and it was wonky. It was text only . I’m not text only. I wanted my HTML. So I went to the task bar and fooled around until I found the right sequence of buttons to push and it went back. Until I wanted to go to another page or navigate inside the same site. Over and freaking over.

I went to work and talked to the computer person. She was puzzled. She suggested I go to Microsoft and check out the Knowledge Base. You can’t even ask a question there unless you have some idea why your problem is happening. And it helps if you speak geek. My geek is rusty. So my problem stuck around.

Right Round Baby Right Round Like A Record Player Right Round Round. You spin me right… Okay! I start to firm up my Buy A New Computer With My Tax Rebate plan . It’s a good plan.

I was trying to go check my email and the machine was making its working wrrrr, a lot. It was just an email. Wrrrrrrr. Wrrrrrr. Wrrrrrrr. I look at the bottom of the screen, Authorizing . Authorizing? Authorizing what? So I clicked on it and made it stop. The machine crashed. Damn.

While it was in rehab the guy that worked on it made all the umpteen programs that I had stupidly set to start at start up, to not not start. This is cool. It makes start up really fast and for the first time in a long time I didn’t have to enter through a handful of messages telling me that programs I had uninstalled and reinstalled were not there. This made me happy.

Well. When it came back up this time all those annoying messages were there again plus some more. Damn. And all the programs were running on start up again. Another Damn. And now the kewl antivirus software they gave the machine at rehab suddenly wants me to give it a password! I don’t have a password! Damn! Damn!Damn!


But. My browser is back to its old default and I can see pictures and color again, the clock works! and I didn’t have to do the whole reset thing 30-40 times every time I want to do something… I’m going to call the rehab place and get a password for my kewl new antivirus toy. You would be surprised what I will put up with for a working clock.

I am not a baby sitter. Please do not assume I want your child in my office or that I can or want to entertain said child. Just because I have toys does not mean I want to play with them. Thanks!

If Ya Don’t Like The Weather, wait five minutes…


Growing up in Texas I thought I knew from weather suffering from multiple personality disorder. Its cold, it’s raining, it’s hot, now it’s snowing. It sucks but it’s interesting.

I also liked the seasons. All two of them. It was very hot until it was very cold and then it was very hot again. Its simple but there is a rhythm to it and you get used to it.

And then I moved here. With all its seasons. Multiple seasons. Multiple tiresome seasons. Spring and Summer and Fall, Fall they get a real Fall! Too lazy just to get on with winter they insist on stalling. The colored leaves and the less heat and the autumnal autumnness of it all, I get, I like the orange leaves. They also don’t understand that basketball is a just a game, something that kids play in the park, its not a big deal thing. It’s not Football. They don’t understand that football is a religion.

The only pro football team this place has just went to the Super Bowl and you couldn’t even tell! I went to the boat show that afternoon and the place was full of people! What were they thinking! If your team is going to the Super Bowl you do not leave your TV! You stay there! It doesn’t matter that the game hasn’t started yet! You have your place and it is not at a boat show.

It’s just sad.

This morning it was cold. It’s February. Cold is normal. Fine. Then it was snowing. A lot of snowing. That’s okay too. I like snow. It didn’t last, after it snowed it rained and then it sleeted. Yuck. Sleet is not nice and cold rain is even less nice then sleet. Snow is nice.

After we ran through winters repertoire we settled on Cold. Not an original choice. It’s just cold. Cold and dark. But it was bright. Snow is bright. After winter rain through most of its repertoire, it settled on cold. Cold and dark. Winter came back for the second act and brought ice with it. Goodie, nothing betters then cold and icy. It may also snow again.

Yay Winter. It didn’t have to be such a curb buster and do everything all in one day. It could have just been really cold, or just snowed – people really like snow, it’s a top ten hit! but no Winter had to be all over achiever . Next we had rain and sleet! Go Winter!

I miss Summer. I miss being warm. Okay, I miss the blast furnace of my youth! I miss leaving the house in the morning and feeling all the moisture in my body suddenly evaporating. I miss walking into a wall of heat. I don’t miss the sweat. I don’t miss being hot at ten after seven in the morning. It was warm though! Even when it was very cold there was warmth in it. Kind of. If you live with heat you get thin blood, any amount of cold was very cold. I miss it though. It was transient. Here? It gets cold and stays that way. For Months! Like a whole season dedicated to being cold. Like it thinks its winter or something. I liked winter better when it came and went, I don’t like it when it becomes a life style choice.

I went and put gas in the truck after work and some guy gave me a rose. I always knew I looked fetching in my parka!

Where there’s smoke there’s…


As I posted before I am going to start a job search. I made a stupid, rather sizable mistake at work that I never would have made if I wasn’t on terminal auto pilot. I don’t want to be challenged at work, I just don’t want to bore myself out of a job. I’m just boring myself to incompetence. I’m pretty damn competent when I’m not buried in paper work.

The mistake got made, I freaked out. My boss did not freak out, something that really worries me. I went back to my office and smelled smoke. I work with a lot of paper, I don’t take the smell of smoke casually. It was me. I’m so burned out I’ve turned into a fire hazard. I have to get out.

So far they aren’t talking the F Word, it’s very difficult to fire a state employee – I would have to kill some one and then miss file the corpse in order to get the bums rush. Instead, they have to document everything. They have to share it with me. They have to let me have a chance to change my ways. I could change my ways if I had full time help, or office supplies that I could work with, with out taking my life in my hands.

I want to change my job.

There is the lateral move school of thought. I could just go elsewhere in the state, keep my vacation time, seniority and benefits. I could also go another three years with out a raise.

Another State job might not even be easy to get. The job market and economy are bad and a lot of divisions are under hiring freezes. And do I want to keep working for the state? I have worked for the state and so far, I’m not doing better then I was when I worked in the private sector. But, I’m finally getting good vacation time – not that I use it, fear not being on the job less I get even further behind than I am now. I really dig the bonus time thing too, again, I don’t use the time and I would rather have money – they gave is us the time instead.
They can’t fire me but they can make me miserable. I am all ready miserable, I don’t want to imagine how bad it could get.

So.

So. I went back to Monster. Com. I tried them when I was laid off before. It wasn’t really a help. I was long distance and the jobs I was interested in weren’t the kind that would pay for me to come and interview, neither did the state for that matter. I still had a resume there and I just had to update it – while removing all reference to “Trained Chimp” and “Incompetence”

I wish I had a hard copy resume. I went through my files and found only portions of past resumes and there wasn’t one on my computer. I had this computer at the time and I worked on it on this computer so it should be here somewhere. It’s not. it may be on my parents old computer but it is no longer with us. Sigh. I found a couple of good leads but I don’t have a resume to send them.

SIGH

Hey! I'm almost famous, I was interviewed over at Idlehands.com!

I have offically decided to start looking for a new job. I'm going to find my resume, update it and post it at Monster.Com. I looked through there earlier and saw at least a couple of positions I would be able to handle.

That Darn Cat! or Absent With Out Leash

Friday night, I thought that I would celebrate it being Friday and take myself to McDonalds. I have a choice. I can go to the McDonalds by the Poverty Barn and be tempted by its Barn-y Goodness or I can go to the poverty McDonalds and be a temptation to the Thuggy Badness. So its open the purse or fear for the purse. I go with fear. I may not get mugged but I will with certainty, spend money at Poverty Barn.

I take Dogger with me because I don't leave the house at night with out her. She takes up almost the whole front seat and when she's in the truck by herself she looks very big and threatening. No one is going to steal a 10 year old truck with a huge Dogger in it.

I pick the wrong McDonalds. It is full of people. Dressed Up Date Night, annoying people. People who stand in line and whine about standing in line. People who say thing like "We haven't mooooved! of course, these people work in Fast Food because they have no skills". I stood there and thought, “He took you out to dinner at McDonalds, honey, you have no skillz”.

Anyway. I finally get home. I decide that it would be easier to get the food inside and then bring in the Dogger. So I leave Dogger in the truck and go inside. I have to open the back door. The Kitty is at the door. I'm putting up the food and my back is turned. The Kitty is out the door.

I don't notice this until I turn around to go back outside to get Dogger. I see Kitty wandering around outside by the truck only after I have Dogger and I can't grab the Kitty and control Dogger at the same time. So. I put Dogger back in the truck and try to head of Kitty. Kitty gets away. Fast

I go back inside and throw Dogger into her crate and go out after Kitty. It's night time. Its dark. Kitty is black, very, very, black. And very, very, fast. He gets away. I tool around the front of the house whispering "Kitty! Come see me! Come See me Kitty!". Nothing.

I peer under the neighbors cars and hope no one shoots at me while I’m in the dark skulking around their car with a flashlight. Nothing.

I look on the dark side and head off to the near by busy street to look for shiny black speed bumps. None! I am wandering around my neighborhood in the dark. You know all those things that go bump in your night? they live in my neighborhood and I was wandering around Doggerless.

I go back to the house and haul out Kitty’s food and his treats. A couple of more times around the front yard shaking the food, Nothing. My food is getting cold. I bring the food outside and sit on the front steps,

PleaseGodbringmykittyhomeChew,chew pleaseGodbringmykittyhomeChew, Chew. "Come See Me Kitty, come see me!". Nothing. The neighborhood strays are also not around. The last time he got out, they wandered in and out of my search and mocked me. It can't be good that all the cats are gone. Did something eat the other cats? is something eating my cat!

I go back into the house and get my book to read under the porch light ReadreadreadpleaseGodbringmykittyback ReadreadreadpleaseGodbringmykittyback

I hear something rustling in the shrubbery. I peer around it and We Have Kitty! or not, Kitty sees me and goes back under the neighbors car. It takes me kneeling in the wet yard and whatever was making the yard wet for a good ten minutes shaking his food and begging before he would come out and then he ran away again! This time the little bugger wasn't getting away from me. Trespassing be damned. I corralled the rat bastard under another neighbors van and yanked him out head first. He growled at me.

So last Friday, inside freaking out. This Friday, outside freaking out.

Woo-Hoo! Bill Murray won a BAFTA, AKA British Oscar! Scarlett Johanson won as well! Go Lost In Translation!

Self Medication

Well. In the light of a new day and the Valentines Day self righteous self pity gone with the dawn, the mysterious curtive powers of the (finally) thawed Chocolate Cream Pie left along with the pity; Without a heavy dose of self pity the pie is just chalky and not chocolaty. Damn healing powers of time.

HAPPY SUNDAY!!!!

A Little Slice of Heaving

You can not extinguish self righteous self pity by falling head first into a key lime pie. Full on self pity can only be cured by applications of chocolate cream pie. I waited until almost Nine pm before I finally gave in and went to the store. I didn't want to be one of those people in line at six with their little single serve frozen dinners buying half off Valentines candy for themselves. At Nine in the evening I could be in there recovering from a bad date.

All I really needed was a couple of slices of pie, a little creamy hand holding, I don't hate myself after all, if I am going to debauch myself, I still want to be able to respect myself in the morning. When I got to the store and cruised the desert isle, there were no individually slice chocolate cream pies left!, I was too late! All that was left was individually sliced Key Lime pies! Key Lime pie does not have the curative properties that Chocolate Cream pie has! And everybody knows it! I was too late and I all I could do was buy a whole damn pie!

I got the pie home . The pie was frozen. Pityus Interuptus.

HAPPY VALEN-, PHHHTTTT, I hate Valentines Day, grrrrr. WAIT the drug Dealer showed me some love! he removed the dead SUV from his front yard! HAPPY VALENTINES DAY!!

Fair Weather Friend


It rained all day. All day. It was raining this morning and up all day. Not hard rain, just that misty drippy stuff that can’t make up its mind whether it wants to be rain or fog. It never warmed up and it never got brighter then dull gray.

It must be getting closer to spring. The rain didn't turn into ice or snow. It was supposed to. They promised all kinds of ugliness was coming our way. They ran a crawl across the TV to let us know they were going to be on the job at 4:30 ayem to breathlessly bring us the live footage of the weather. It drizzled. I hope they weren’t out there at that hour to bring us live footage of drizzle.

The school district stayed open. I’m sure thousands of school children were shocked to hear that. The superintendent will close the schools if there is even a hint of possible bad weather. I’m always surprised when the kids go to school in the rain. The way they carry on you would think that instead of average school children the county is made up of some here to for unknown bizarre, unfired clay based life form . I have heard that in the past that poor, malnourished, vitamin deprived southerners would eat clay, I had no idea they were using it to build children.

Speaking of wet things. The carpet finally dried yesterday. I took it in and made sure it made it to the high ground.

It has gotten progressively colder as the day has worn on. It was not unwarm when I took Dogger out this morning, it was down right nippy when I took Dogger out after work.

Dogger did not, as I had hoped when I was driving home in the rain, magically turn into a really large orange cat while I was at work. I had been hoping. I don’t understand why an animal that can be house trained can not be litter trained. It would have made my evening much less soggy. I don’t think Dogger loves walking in the rain either. She shakes herself a lot and gives me the doggy equivalent of the stink eye. I can hear her thinking:

Hey! Hey! Ya know, I’m pretty sure that I can hold it. I really don’t need to go outside right now. I have a huge bladder and I bet I can hold it until, oh, whenever it finally stops raining! No, honest! Lets not go out. Lets stay inside and watch some TV! It is so much less wet inside! Okay! You want to go outside. I’m done! Hey! Look at that. Really! Lets go back inside okay? What? Do you have to go? Can’t you go inside? What! Why are we going away from the house? It is not dry out on the street. I want to go home. It is still wet and the park is not inside! Lets go home! Okay! I peed, is that good enough? I voided. I’m done! Yes! Yes! I am. I have no more. Nope, my bladder is a hollow bladder shaped place. And the lower GI? Not an issue! Lets Go Home!

Speaking of TV. I think I’m no longer watching That 70s Show. I was watching it. I liked it. A lot. I was on a couple of mailing lists, I sought out fan sites, and I read very, very, very bad fanfic… I don’t know what happened. I liked it. I liked the characters, I was happy with them. I think I may have narrowed it down to Ashton Kutcher – he is so thoroughly over exposed that I can’t separate him from his character. I didn’t have an opinion of whatshisname, he was just kind of there. And then. And then he just looked too much like Demi Give Me More Publicitys’ Asshat boyfriend in the Trucker cap and I couldn’t do it anymore.

Snow What?!


It was very pretty yesterday. Warm, partly sunny. Mild. So, of course they are predicting snow for today. 2 - 4 wet inches. Yay. (Edited to add, just rain! Woo-Hoo!)

The job will still be there and where there is job there is me. I don’t want to burn through any more of my bonus time then I all ready have this year. There’s going to be a lot weekends at the beach that I’m going to want to stretch out this summer. So, I will be in. I told one of the girls that I would tie Dogger to the car and have her pull me to work if I had to. She said I wouldn’t do that. I told her she hadn’t seen Dogger lately.

I have still have a few things to get done at work and I want to be as caught up as I can. My temp’s (sob!) last day is today and that leaves me back out in the cold again. I wish TPTB would see that, oddly, when I have help, I don’t get behind. When I do not have help, I get behind, way, way behind. In an I’ll- never- catch- up-Oh-I’m-Having-An-Anxiety-Attack-In-The-Middle-Of-A-Leo-Dicaprio-Movie Way. Not fun and not much in the way of being a service to the public. People want stuff and they want it sooner rather then later.

I can file or I can fill requests. I mean the lovely women from the other office could, as pointed out by both my temps, get off their phones and work in my office when they don’t have work in their office. Butthat would be too much like right and we don’t do right. Whatever.

So.

I’m going to redecorate my entry ways! Aren’t you excited? I am. I’m all about looking at color swatches now. I think I’ve decided on a color scheme about a dozen times now and I keep changing my mind. What is written in stone is the bead board on the walls. I think it will class up the spaces while making the walls easier to clean. I also like that it will add another texture to the walls. I want to paint the door one color, the walls another and the trim yet another color. Today it’s going to be gold’s and yellows and bright white. I also am thinking I may like lavenders and purples too. I have this round door and I just think it’s the coolest thing. I want to highlight the roundness of the door and I’m afraid I may fall down the Hobbit hole in my pursuit of cuteness.

The exterior of the door is going to be Algerian Red. That’s on another part of the stone. That leaves the window panes in the door. I have a stick on fake stained glass thing now, but I think it blocks too much light and make's the space darker then it needs to be. I experimented with glass paint on the other entry ways door windows and that didn’t work at all. I think it may have been a vocabulary issue. I think I should have used “translucent” instead of “clear” which seemed to translate to “solid”. I want to do something to those windows. I also want to put shutters up too.

On another part of that stone is painting out the aluminum on the windows at the front of the house. They are great windows, but the aluminum does not add to the whole look. It’s about curb appeal. When the drug dealers clients drive by, I want them to say “Hey, if DD would clean his POS house up, it could look really nice! Wow, lets tell DD to get that house fixed up, Hell! Lets fix it up for him!”.

I haven’t even started telling you about the other entry way and what I want to do with it. Think Reds! Dark Reds! and bead board…

I also want to fall into a whole pile of money.

Bitch and ye shall receive attention


Remember a while back when I said I went to give blood at the Red Cross, and then I said Time Warner had ceased donating cable to The Red Cross? Because Time Warner couldn’t hack donating $89 a month? Well. I wrote them

To Whom it May Concern,

I was at my neighborhood Red Cross yesterday and they mentioned that Time Warner had in the past generously gave them cable for free, as Time Warner is such a good corporate neighbor and member of the community. They then mentioned that Time Warner had pulled their cable as $89 dollars a month for three locations (total) was too steep for Time Warner to keep doing.

I find such corporate behavior on the part of Time Warner shocking and offensive.

Cutting off the Red Cross shows negligible corporate leadership on the part of Time Warner. This is not how Time Warner wants to be known, and trust me, you will be known for cutting off the Red Cross’ cable. I will tell everyone I run across, in my neighborhood, at the store, at work and online.

I want a return phone call as soon as possible to my work number to explain why Time Warner cut the cable to this very worthy group and when Time Warner is going to restore their service.

Diana


A few days later I got this


Response: Dear Diana

Thank you very much for your feedback. I am trying to figure out who handles the customer accounts that you are referring to. I will have some research this and contact you if they are able to discuss the details with an outside individual. Thank you for your inquiry.


Time Warner Cable Support



Hmmmmm. Today I got this

Dear Diana,

My name is (blank) I … work in… Public Affairs for Time Warner Cable’s Division. I was forwarded a copy of your e-mail (below). I wanted to respond to you regarding Time Warner Cable’s spirit of corporate citizenship. One of my primary responsibilities here at time Warner Cable is to ensure that we are viewed as a good corporate citizen, and to maintain close partnerships with more than 50 non-profit groups through central and southeastern North Carolina. I would like to share with you what Time Warner Cable does to improve the quality of life in the communities we serve. Please see press release below. This event will take place this Friday.


FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE



MEDIA ADVISORY



Time Warner Cable Contributes One Million Dollars to Non Profit Organizations

Morrisville, NC –February 9, 2004 – Time Warner Cable’s Division will contribute checks and in-kind services to more than fifty non-profit organizations… at a luncheon event dubbed, “From Our Heart to Yours”. The value of contributions from the Morrisville based company and News 14 Carolina, exceeds one million dollars for 2004. The value of this year’s contributions is more than double the amount contributed in 2003. Much of the increase this year relates to the value of in-kind services provided by News 14 Carolina and the company’s cable operation.

Time Warner Cable’s Charitable Contributions program emphasizes the arts, education, health and human services, Chambers of Commerce and economic development. In addition monies are contributed to the company’s Road Runners Partners program and to other organizations..

Charitable giving has been a priority for Time Warner Cable’s Raleigh division for more than twenty years. The company re-organized its program in 2002 developing an application process which is followed by all organizations applying for grants or in-kind services. Time Warner Cable partners with these organizations to increase their ability to serve their constituents….

Have a great rest of the week


This is great, but I do not see any mention of the improvement of the quality of life at my local Red Cross and it getting its cable back. I want their cable back on. A guy in charge of something to do with Public Affairs, a different person at Public Affairs the then emailer, actually called me at work today. He left a message. I called him back and I left a message. We’ll see.


If you do not even try to be heard you are nothing more then part of the herd. You have a voice, USE IT! Bitch about things that piss you off, annoy someone, button hole that person, pipe up at that meeting, ask the question when you have the chance.

Talk With The Animals


2:15 am


shred, shred, tear, rip

mmrphKitty? Come see me.

Mweep?

Come See me.

womp, womp, thud my fur beach ball bounces onto the bed and on my throat.

Ow! I said come See me not come suffocate me move!

MOVE

Puuuuur?

Over there!

Mwreeef!

Okay. From my throat to my chest.

Meep Meep purrrrrrrrr!

Do you want food? Food for you? Hokay. Food For you. Move so I can get up. Food For you?

Mewuurrrphhh

I get up go downstairs, oh, look it’s still dark. Good. I hate getting up early. I’d like to think of this as going to bed very late. I find the kitchen, blind myself with the light and put more food into his bowl. What?, you all ready have food? What? Where are you?

Fine! Stomp back upstairs. Stub toe on bed, back to bed. Ahhhh bed. Damn Cat. Zzzzzzzz.

shred, shred rip!

ZzzzzzzWot?!

3:45 am

Slidey, Slidey, roll

Huhmumph, Kitty. Come see me, come see me!

tip, tip, toss, rattle

Go To Sleep!

If I ignore him long enough he will stop. He will run out of things to break. Okay. Get out of bed, stub my toe on the bed again and retrieve Kitty from shelves.

See Kitty? Sleepy sleepy! Lay down with mummy. Sleepy Sleepy!

Rrrrrrrwwrh

Just lay down. Mmmmm. See nice bed, beddy,beddy bed, next to Mummy, see? Mmmmmm.

Rrrrhhhhhhhhhhfft!

OW! FU-

Tip, Toss, shatter

CK!

What do you want?! I fed you! Is it your box? Is your box not clean enough? I cleaned it this, er, yesterday morning!

Shred, tear, rip…

6:45 am

Blearily I read my paper. The paper would be less bleary if there wasn’t a cat stretched out across it.

Now? you love me? Now? you are being all cute and kitty like? I fed you all ready. Go Away.

Mee, Mee, Puuuurrrrrrrrr?

How can a cat so big make such small noises? You are soooo cute.

Meeep!

I fed you. You have food. Do you not like your food? Is it not fresh enough for you?

Meeeeeep, Mulph, Puuuuuurrrrrrrrrrr, head butt, head butt


Awwww! Mummy’s itty bitty kitty witty! Fresh food for you!

Tell Ralph Nader Not to Run

Tom Tomorrow on the admins most recent outrage In America it's the same link I posted over the weekend, but with some new business from one of the protesters involved. Sucks being us right now. Come next Novemeber, Vote often, vote early. We have to get the bastards out while they are still planning to allow us to go to the polls.

More Joys of Home Ownership


So what were you doing Friday night at about 11:30 till about oh, say 1 am? If you were tucked into your little bed I don’t want to hear about it.

If you were down in your basement in jammies and rubber boots up to your ankles in muddy rain water trying to hold back a deluge with a broom, we should talk.

I had thought that since I had the new wet dry vac that I had any potential flooded basement problems handled. In that it wasn’t going to flood any more. I thought the drain, if cleared on a regular basis, would drain. No, it won’t. It will drain what it can , and the other water will wait in line to get drained; no it won’t. Water doesn’t wait in line, a lot of the water will want to go inside and use the drain there.

So, Friday night. I’m getting ready to go to bed. I had a long week and I was looking foreword to going to bed and staying there for a long time. It was raining and the rain makes a nice sound on the roof and I as thinking how relaxing and soothing it was, how nice it would be to fall asleep to. And then there was this not at all soothing sound, the pump was going on.

So I got up and looked for my shoes and went to the basement. I turn around and go back upstairs and argue with myself about what I need to do first. I decided that better footwear was Job 1 and I went in search of rubber boots – I couldn’t find them. This makes me hope they are with my TV remote which I also can’t find and that makes me look behind couch pillows.

I find the rubber boots but not the remote and try to think about what I should be doing. The pump is still pumping and the water is still flowing and there really isn’t a job for me. I find a job. I move the now sodden area rug ( yes, I have an area rug in my basement. Shut Up), tugging and pulling on the sodden and filthy thing makes me sodden and filthy too.

My new job was to help direct the water flow by sweeping it in the right direction and keeping it from going on side trips.

I decide I should open the door and look to see how much water has collected out there - I see a lot of it coming in the open door. I do this stupid thing twice. The water is coming down the steps like a water fall. I make a note to myself that I can claim this on my wet lands designation paperwork. Eventually the rain slows and the drain catches up and I go back to bed.

Saturday Morning. Its warm, its dry and the basement is merely damp.

The rug is still sodden and heavy. I put on work clothes and roll the nasty thing up and re-flood the basement. I drag it up the former water fall stairs and through the back yard and lay it out flat to dry in the dryish front yard.

I call Brosky to whine about my night and tell him about the flood and how I heroically moved the heavy, sodden rug. He says that no, the rug should not be out flat in the yard it should be up over something.

I heroically, heft, move and rearrange the rug again . After my second shower and second change of clothes for the day. I make another note to myself, No matter how sunny it is outside, sunny doesn’t make heavy, sodden and filthy any less heavy, sodden and filthy.

Feds Win Right to War Protesters' Records

Oh. My. God. I'm a war protester.

HAPPY SUNDAY!!!!

HAPPY SATURDAY!!!!!

Insert something clever here

I spent another day alternating between crawling around on my knees and hefting heavy file boxes. I still haven’t found what I’m looking for and I don’t think Bono couldn’t find the damn thing either. He wouldn’t know from not being able to find what he’s looking for until he’s looked through thousands of pages of paper trying to find it. I don’t even care anymore. I was looking through the folders and I couldn’t remember what I was looking for. I’m not going to find it because its not there. I know its not there, the temp knows its not there, the woman I eat lunch with knows its not there. But its not there until the big boss says its not there.

So, still I look and look and look. Some days I wonder where filing was on my degree path. My diploma turns itself to the wall and weeps.


But. I have my computer back! I’m not the object of mockery any longer. Yes I was mocked. Every time I watched an ad on TV and they said call 1-800-CRAPPYJUNQ or go to our web site www.crappyjunq.com. Mocking, mocking everywhere! Want some free stuff? Go to our site, want more information? Go to our site!, want to buy our crappy junq? Go to our site! Suddenly all these cool web sites were popping up all over the place and there was nothing I could do about it. I was flipped through my 80 something channels, everyone of the advertising something with a web site. I’ve been feeling so left out. Web sites were everywhere! I walked Dogger and the light poles were covered in hand bills advertising bands and they all said “Check out our rawking site to learn more! Go to www.screamingbeersoakedgroupies.com !” the poles that didn’t have bands on them had lost kitty signs and even they referenced web sites. I went to the store to buy Kitty more dust and the dust had it’s own web site!

My college also joined in the mocking. I got a newsletter, which is odd because I didn’t give them any money and I told them they didn’t have a giving level that sufficiently met my ardor for the school. I would think that the newsletter would go to paid up alumna before it went to me. But anyway. They changed the name of the school and now they will send us new diplomas with the new name on them if we go to their web site and if we don’t mind waiting six to eight months to get our new diploma. I would like one if only so I can have another thing with my name on it that isn’t a utility bill but I would have to go to www.newdamnname.com to get on the list. Mocking name changing losers.

Everything has a web site now. Even those crappy craftmatic adjustable beds™ has a web site. They sell hospital beds to old people and they have a site. It would be a hard life if you wanted to be a Luddite full time.

Oh. I need to send out congrats to one of my girl cousins who just had a baby boy. Go Her! And I also need to send out condolences to Cuz SSG (Ret.) who fell down and bunged up his ankle in a less then cool way. He is so going to have to lie about it when people ask. “Oh, why, yes. I was injured while I was chasing rebels across the desert and I tripped over Hussians spider hole”. Much cooler then having to admit he hurt himself playing volleyball. He’s way kewl though, so he may be able to get away with the volleyball angle. He was playing in Kuwait.

Did I mention that Lost in Translation is available on DVD and video? And that you should rush out tonight and rent it?

We Have Lift off!


One small step for computer repair, one giant step for dianaversekind.

Good Morning Children! I’m baa-ck! I know you probably couldn’t tell, but I was all kinds of put out. Both out of my space and mind. The Tour wasn’t as far reaching as I had feared it might be, i.e. , the use of public facilities – I still had to do more driving back and forth and worrying then I would have. Big Props for Brosky and Alphagal for the use of their machine while mine was Away.

This will be shorter then usual as it is later then usual. Some short hits.

Why is it if you are responsible for a, um, problem. The whole world is going to come to a fiery end and it is all your fault. It’s on you to fix it and fix it NOW! . Oh, and you are totally inept, inefficient, you suck and you are lamo drain on society. They have you, or me, as it was, look the world over trying to find this thing. I looked and looked and looked again, cause it might be hiding – Nothing. Nada. It was not in my office, in the building or even possibly in this city. I know because I looked and looked and looked.

I am an idiot. It’s gone and its my fault. The day passes. I want to pass out. “Tomorrow is Another Day”, blah, blah, blah. Phhht.

Yesterday. Suddenly, it may be someone else’s doing. Oddly. It may not be my fault at all (ThankYouGod!!!). Hmmm. Suddenly, it isn’t that big a deal. Really. It has happened before… We can explain, they can deal. It might have been lost in the mail. Oh well.

No mention of inefficiency, fault or general lameness. Suddenly, it’s ok-ay. Not that big a deal. It happens. We can explain. They can deal.

I spent the better part of two days working myself into a state of barely controlled freak out, worrying myself sick , and it’s lost in the mail. When it was my fault, and there is still a chance it could turn into my fault – really not that big a deal. We can explain, they can deal… Until it’s my fault again.

Another hit.

Dogger and I walk the same route everyday. I pass a lot of little houses. Some occupied and some not. Last walk, there was one fewer little house and one more pile of crap. Whatever, one more green lot, one less empty, abandoned property.

The house was abandoned but it wasn’t empty. In that pile of crap was the remains of a couch, a chair, a roll of Christmas paper, and the loudest curtains known to man – I mean fabric I would bet the neighbors called the cops on Saturday Nights. There was also a very loud shower curtain, a floor fan, window shades, chunks of stuff and a vase. A glass vase. All by itself on what was left of the back porch.

A glass vase survived being stomped on by a rental backhoe and having a house fall on it. Not a scratch. A whole damn house fell on its little vase-y head and not a ding, not a chip, not a scratch, not shattered . It was still all in one piece, even after having a rental backhoe stomp on it and having a whole house come down around it. That’s resilience.


I can learn from that vase.

Bubbaville



To get my mind off the withdrawal symptoms, I went to a boat show. I have only been to one other boat show and it was fantastic. I had no reason to not think that all boat shows were fantastic. That was Dallas this is Bubbaville.

I was wrong, some boat shows are fantastic. Some boat show are about showing off floating fantasies and the newest and best technologies the field has to offer. They can make RVs float and make you feel that you will not know nirvana until you own one of those floating paens to excess. I wanted to own a floating RV. I don’t even like boats! (I would as soon not even go on a cruise because all those cruise ships are in my mind, are ways to dump a lot of people into the trackless deep and leave them out there bobbing around to be eaten by sharks!)

Anyway. Other boat shows are about boats that you can afford. I don’t want to pay $8 to look at boats I can afford, that my neighbors might have parked in their side yard, boats that I would probably see at a local marina. I want to pay $8 to look at boats that I will not even be able to look at in the wild – boats too grand for local shores. I want to see Life Styles of The Rich and Buoyant. I mean, I can go to Bubba’ Boat Shack for free, whenever I want to. For money? I want to be hugely impressed, and I want a free drink coozie. And some magnets. And, possibly, some nautically themed note pads. At least.

My other baseless boat fear involves boats and sinking and drowning and being lost in the trackless deep. The shark fear is another water fear – and I don’t think that is entirely baseless. I caught a baby sand shark once and eventually pretty much caused it to die. I know somewhere Mama Sand Shark is still looking for me: I watched Orca, I know Mama Sand Shark has my number.

After the first boat show I went to, I believed that floating RVs not only would not sink but could transform into flying RVs if the boat thought that the worst might be on the horizon. You walk aboard a floating RV and you too would be convinced that it would take care of you.

This boat show didn’t have anything grand or interesting or even vaguely RV in nature. This boat show didn’t have a single boat that couldn’t be trailed. I don’t want to see boats on trailers. I want to see boats that had to be airlifted in. Boats that could be ships. I want to see boats that when lost in the trackless deep, as boats inevitably are, would be large enough to see from the air.

The kind of boat I would feel comfortable on would be a beometh that would have it’s own staff somewhere tracking the thing as it went along it’s way. I want some kind of boat AAA on the look out for me.

But that was Dallas and this is Bubbaville. The Powers That Be do not want Bubba to know what kind of floating RVs he could have if he lived in a better place or had access to better job training and fewer tobacco fields. Bubba is only allowed to dream about small speedboats and low-end fishing trawlers. No Yachts for Bubba, no House Boats to sun his buns on. Bubba could check out some pontoon boats and one or two bass boats. Bubba should not know about the floating RVs.

Stuper Bowl



So how 'bout that Super Bowl? Yeah, yeah. I know everyone else got there Super Bowl entry out first thing Monday morning, but everyone else has 24-7 access to a computer and they be all timely with the entries, while I am reduced to standing on the corner like the Little Match Girl, crying little analogue tears. and offering to blog for the passers by. Sigh.

Still, I persevere.

I didn't get to see Janet Jackson's titty. I didn't know until Monday morning that there had been a "wardrobe malfunction" at all. I will say that if'in I wasn't planning on my titty being on display, I probably would not have taken the trouble to get it dressed to go out. I don't know about y'all, but if I'm not planning on whipping out the girls on national television, I would probably try to keep them roped in a little better. I mean, dayum, if she was having problems with her titties being all wild and hot to get out she could have taped them down or used bungies or something. Obviously she has free-range wild bronco titties and they are not used to being penned in.

I don't really understand what all the who-ha is about anyway. Didn't Li'l Kim wear less then that to some awards show a few years back? I don't remember any full throttle apologies stemming from that. I mean if FOX had been airing the Super Bowl this year we would have seen that lose titty in slo-mo, some one in the commenters box would have had a them circled and highlighted and they would have repeated the moment for us all to catch and you know tthey wouldn't have apologized. Rupert Murdock is a total neo con ass, but even he knows that Titties make for good television Embrace the titty! Gawd knows there was nothing going on in that game until them. I've seen soup bowls that were more interesting on then the first half of that game. There is only so much excitement that can be generated by repeated updates of that one player's bloody nose.

I wasn't watching Tittygate because I was watching the Move On ad on CNN. I was really expecting something much more out there and in your face then it turned out to be. CBS refused to air this? I've seen more hard-hitting political commentary on Daria, hell MASH had more political content and CBS aired that for years.
I had been trying to watch it on my computer but it would never work for me. I was really surprised that CBS wouldn't air it. Most folks would not have "gotten" it anyway. The Daisy ad from before Gulf War 2 was much more incendiary and it was shown on regular TV.

Did David Letterman know that CBS was going to attach patriotic meaning to his throwing shit off the roof? I didn't see how they warranted red white and blue CGI whooshes. I hate CBS. I think they staged the whole Free Range Titty thing to make themselves look more "edgy". Sorry! Janet Jackson hasn't been "edgy" since about, well, 1991 and no amount of Free Range Titty action is going bring "edge" to CBS.

I finally talked to a human being at the Computer Hospital. The guy said they might be able to look at my machine tomorrow. I fought the urge to belt out Tomorrow for the guy, but he sounded like too much of a hard ware geek to get show tune humor. Pity. I don't get to use show tune humor very often, I mean, who does really? If you want to piss a Who fan off you can comment that Tommy is a show tune, but they don't want to hear it.

I just talked to the Computer Hospital and they won't be able to even look at my machine until tomorrow. Waaaaaah!! no wonder rock stars end up on drugs, this being on tour thing sucks.

Pioneer Daze

A whole weekend offline and no end in sight or site for that matter. I am about to see if the Dogger and Kitty want to learn to play Uno™.

I'm totally at lose ends– in a What – Am – I- Going – To –Do - I-Can’t-Obsessively-Check-My-Email way. It’s like being away on vacation, but with out the whole “away on vacation” part. Mostly the vacation part. The part where there is nothing on TV and I don’t get decent radio reception or decent radio at all, and all my friends are long distance are or they aren’t long distance and they are getting tired of hearing me whine again about how much not having my computer sucks. So as to break up my whining about how much it sucks not having my computer, I try to intersperse my whining with news about the little animals. Oddly, friends who would spend hours on my long distance dime, going into loving detail about the contents of Timmy’s’ diaper, aren’t really that interested in hearing a first hand account of how I heroically made the sacrifice of making myself Ramen for lunch instead of going to Wendy’s™ for a new toy or a breathless rundown of the really cute Kitty looked when he got all embarrassed after he rolled off the bed.

It’s not like I spend a huge amount of time online over the weekend anyway. Most of the sites I visit really don’t have new content over the weekend and I have all but stopped going to my TV sites that do have an ever evolving content because I have a hard time maintaining a state of obsessive paranoia about the state of a television show and the characters that populate it. It is always it for these people who kindly provide the new content – they only seem to be able to watch one TV show at a time and have no patients for rank amateurs that lack the total dedication to a single hour of broadcast TV like they do. I did share this state, in the past, but the people on the boards today do not want to hear that Angel –The Series is no The X-Files. Also, I refuse to get hurt feelings in honor of a character that everyone else feels should have hurt feelings, whether the character does or not. I want my computer back. I want my computer back NOW

Whatever. I have a sick hard drive and I am having issues. I don’t have the time to obsess over TV Shows. I can’t! My hard drive is in the hospital and I can’t be all Internet obsessive about anything! When I dropped it off the guy at the nurse’s station took down the machines medical history and told me that they will get to it as soon as they can. I know exactly what this means. I tell this to people every day. It means I’ll get to it when I get to it and I might not get to it at all! Waaahhhh!

I think I’m going to have to go to the library and see if they have computer I can check out for the next, oh, ever. I don’t think they would let me do that though. I don’t want to go to spend a lot of time there because I’m pretty sure it is a defacto day care center and the last thing I really want to deal with are packs of unsupervised children wandering around at will. I also do not think they would let me bring Dogger with me and I don’t think I could pass her off as any kind of a service dog – especially if they see us getting out of the car and its clear she did not drive, even if I agreed to crate her while I was there. I’m totally open to that – if they crate the kids.


I want my computer back.


Took a while for The Super Bowl to turn into a game, but dayum, it turned into a good game!

Sadder Sunday

The Machine still can't have visitors and I am sad.