A Series of Conversations Proving A and I Have Lost Our Minds
(Or, why gmail chat is maybe not such a great thing for us.)
(Monday)10:00 am.Citycat: This? Fantastic.
http://www.fullyramblomatic.com/features/armaged.htmA: HAHA "antichrist is small tin of pickled herring." --> "antichrist is eaten by cat."
Citycat: Grin.
"Four horsemen firmly advised to stop dicking around."
A: Haha
This person must be British right?
Citycat: I am assuming, what with the pickled herring and dicking around and all.
A: Haha exactly.
The herring was an early indicator.
Citycat: Ok, that? Is a FANTASTIC sentence.
12:30 pmA: God im hungry
Citycat: Go to lunch, silly.
A: I did its in front of me :).
Citycat: Potbellys?
Chicken noodle soup?
A: Well clearly Potbelly.
But HAVE YOU SEEN HOW HOT IT IS??
Citycat: How hot…
Potbelly's is?
A: No soup today...instead a cool refreshing milkshake :)
A: No, outside.
Citycat: OH,
outside.
Yes, it was damn hot. I had salad-
and could only eat 1/2
A: I’m working on fattening myself up for winter
Citycat: Ha
A milkshake and what else?);
A: a sandwich
and some chips
...and a giant cookie
.........and a second sandwich
Citycat: ??
A: No, I’m kidding
Citycat: What kind of sandwich?
A: Roast beef and provolone
with smashed up chips
(sour cream n onion)
Citycat: yum
A: I wish I could puke it up and eat it all over again.
That... sounded better in my head.
Citycat: yeah…
Kind of nasty in actual print
A: Totally...but you see my point about enjoying the taste so much id like to eat the meal again
Although i am too full to do
Citycat: Hee, you're being all Roman
A: Haha
Totally
Except with unfortunately fewer orgies
4:43 pm
A: There is this church bell that chimes.
But its always 3 minutes behind.
Don’t you figure they’d fix that?
Citycat: Haha.
Maybe it's some secret cult thing-
The Davinci Bell!
A: Haha
I’m going to write that book.
I'll be the handsome hero.
Citycat: Can I be the smart and witty female?
A: But of course.
And we solve the mystery via Google chats and searches.
Citycat: Hey, Google is a powerful crimefighter.
A: And also there are cats dressed as historical figures.
Citycat: And also? Still manage to make all our...
What?
A: You know, like in costume.
CATherin the Great.
Sir Meowsalot.
Citycat: And... and what would the cats in costume
do, pray tell?
A: Also, probably they dance
Citycat: Oh. ...Dance.
…
Well, when they make the movie based on the book, we can make it one of our Very
Special Musicals.
A: Exactly.
Citycat: Can we title the book, "The herring was an early indicator"?
A: Absolutely.
It’s perfect.
Oooo that can be the secondary title or whatever they call the thing after the colon.
Hahaha.
The thing after the colon...the asshole.
Hahaha.
Sorry.
But you know what I mean.
Citycat: Totally.
The DaVinci Bell: The Herring Was An Earlier Indicator.
A: Exactly
Citycat: A musical novel (with Dancing Cats)
Starring A and Citycat.
A: (and Dancing Cats)
(Historically Attired)
Citycat: Do they get "star" billing?
Clearly, they are linked to the herring...
5:00 pmA: How funny was that Bush-Blair conversation?
Citycat: That was awesome
Of course, Bush has about as firm a grasp of the definition of "irony" as Alanis
Morrisette.
A: Ooo, the bell was FOUR minutes late this time
Citycat: It knows we are onto it.
A: The conspiracy grows deeper.
5:30 pm
A: Ok bell is back to 3 mins.
All is right again in thew rold.
Citycat: Ahh, good old Thew. :)
A: Thew Rold, the mystical plane on which The Davinci Bell exists.
Citycat: Oh, this is just getting better and better.
(Tuesday)11:00 amA: Why am i so hungry so early today?
Citycat: I... don't know?
A: Yes you do, stop keeping things from me.
Citycat: Maybe because lunch was SO good yesterday that you just cannot wait to have it
again?
A: hm this is possible.
I forget if tues or thurs is corn chowder day.
Citycat: Because you couldn't eat it again yesterday, subconsciously you have been thinking
about it for almost 24 hours.
And now you just want it
A: Yes, and now i get it without the vomiting
Citycat: See?
The brilliance of the human body: every day, we get to
eat again.O metabolism, my metabolism.
A: AND my pulse rate, low pulse rate.
Citycat: Why is it that we talk sense for about 20 minutes but eventually always descend
into madness?
If something were to happen and someone subpoenaed our gmail chats?
We'd be wearing white coats WAY after labor day, if you know what I mean.
(Dancing cats. In historical costumes.)
A: Haha
That’s so true
Cause its like, oh, this legal thing, blah blah,
work work,
Oh! that reminds me of a song!
(madness, strange words)
Back to normal
Citycat: And the thing is, we speak the
exact same language of crazy.A: Yes. British.
Citycat: Pickled herring.
A: Stop dicking around.
I Am No Longer Amused By This Whole Nature Thing
(This entry contains a lot of bad words. This is because a Very Bad Thing happened to me).
Ok. So I did
yardwork. And we killed creatures and it was funny. And then Peanut and I got poison sumac, and that was less funny, but still kind of amusing in the “poison
sumac? Who the hell gets poison sumac?” kind of way. And then the
hail happened, and that was a LOT less funny, and far more on the ouchy scary side of things. But now? Now nature has gone too far. Nature needs to give it a fucking rest already, because I live in a highrise apartment in a city and there is no reason for my summer to involve this level of battle with something that I by all rights
should never encounter.
Wednesday night I went to the gym, and when I came home my apartment was filled with people, wine, and sushi. (Which seriously, is possibly one of the best ways to come home ever. I highly recommend all of you go out and get a roommate who fills the house with people, wine, and sushi, so all you have to do is show up for Instant Party.) And everyone was there for the debut of
Project Runway, of course, because my apartment is the gathering point for all things reality TV related. So we were up kind of late, having the normal Project Runway debates, (Keith: Hot or kind of looks like a weasel? Could Tim Gunn BE any more awesome?), and finally everyone left and Kate and E went to bed.
And I went to shower. Like any normal human being.
So I am in the shower, and I am shampooing and lalala everything is fine, everything is just awesome and wonderful and the water is warm and relaxing and life is good and I turn around and look up and
HOLY SHIT, EVERYTHING IS NOT FINE, EVERYTHING IS NOT FINE
AT ALL, BECAUSE THERE IS A GIANT MOTHERFUCKING COCKROACH IN THE SHOWER WITH ME.
Cockroach.
In the shower.
WITH ME.
Oh, y’all. This is just so not ok on SO. MANY. LEVELS. The shower? My private time. No one and no
thing gets to come into the shower with me without
express permission, which I assure you, the roach did not have. And did I mention he was a giant motherfucker? Because, yeah.
So you all know my reaction to cockroaches in general, when I am
not naked and extremely vulnerable, so you can just imagine what ensued next. Luckily, I had the presence of mind to wrap a towel around myself, but if a towel hadn’t been handy, I seriously think I would have just gone naked. Into the hallway. Dripping. And shrieking.
Kate and E: (in bed, like any sane human.)
Me: (in hallway. Dripping. In a towel.) “KATE? KATE!”
Kate: (flying out of bedroom in fear that I might be dying.) “What???”
Me: (having “creature seizure”, in which all parts of my body were moving involuntarily and with absolutely no relation to each other.) “There (shake) there is, is… a cockroach… in the shower. With me. IT WAS WITH ME.”
E: (turns on light in bedroom.)
Kate: (calmingly. Also? Laughing.) “Ok, ok. I need a shoe.”
E: (blearily.) “Kate needs her shoes?”
Kate: “No. I need I
your shoes.”
E: “Kate needs… my shoes?”
Me: (still shaking) “Cockroach! Shower! There!”
E: (catching on.) “Oh. Ok.”
So Kate and E arm themselves with a tennis shoe and paper towels, and march into my bathroom all brave and hero-like, (where yes, the shower? Totally still running.) I am following nervously behind, less “brave and hero-like” and more along the lines of “ineffectual pansy”.
Me: (totally still in my bedroom, refusing to even cross the threshold of the bathroom.) “It was on the curtain. Up to the right."
Kate and E: “We don’t see it.”
Me: (terrible, terrible thought occurs. Could roach be on me? Soul begins to die.)
Kate: “Whoa, there he is!”
Me: (Soul perks to life.)
Eric: “My god, he is HUGE!”
Me: (soul dies again.)
E: (Thwack.) “Oh. Hmm. He’s not going to fit down the drain, is he?”
Me: (contemplating life without soul.)
E: “Um… Kate? You deal with disposal. That is not in my job description.”
Me: (wait… there’s
protocol now?) (Protocol! Drink!)
Toilet: (flush).
Kate: “You are safe now.”
So yes, I did actually return to the shower and finish, although I am still not completely comfortable. And if I highly recommend roommates who provide sushi, I
really highly recommend roommates who will wake up in the middle of the night and kill creatures for you.
E mentioned that the roach probably crawled through the drain, which makes sense. (except for the part where he didn’t fit down it, but I am assuming he can squeeze his way into things). Especially since our building recently flooded. (A flooding that, unlike all the other flooding, was not caused by nature, but “sprinklers”, which to me means someone kicked a soccer ball at it. But maybe that’s just the college talking.) So in theory, my bathroom (which is clean! I swear! Clean and in no way attractive to dirty roaches!) is not actually infested with roaches, and he was just a one time thing. Just in case, however, I intend to spend some quality time this weekend in my bathroom introducing every available surface to its new best friend: bleach.
And nature? Can seriously go fuck itself.
This Entry Contains the Word "Balls" A Lot
I LOVE bowling. In fact, it seems like a secret underground thing where
everyone loves bowling, but for some reason this never comes up in the exhaustive “what do you want to do this weekend?”, “I don’t know, what do
you want to do this weekend?” conversations, maybe because somehow there is some stigma surrounding bowling where you assume that you are isolated in the universe in your enjoyment of it and no one will ever speak to you again if you allow the others to find out your secret.
Then, inevitably, someone suggests bowling, and everyone you know comes out to bowl, and you have an absolute blast and find out the real truth about your friends. Because y’all, nothing brings out an inner evil competitive spirit like bowling.
Anyway, Peanut and I decided to go bowling Friday night. So we found a place with open bowling, got our lane and shoes, and began the first ritual of the bowling alley.
The Search For The Ball.
Because, as everybody knows, the key to great bowling has nothing to do with the skill of the bowler. At All. The key to great bowling is
finding the right bowling ball. You know this is true. Someone throws a bad frame or two, what is the first thing they do? Go get another ball. I have actually seen fights among people where person A started using person B’s ball, and bowled better with it, sending person B into a riotous snit fit because that was
their ball, and all of the magical good luck that went with the ball was discovered by
them and the person A was
stealing it, and that is
cheating, and who wants to bowl with a
cheater?
My hypothesis was proven by a quick glance around the lanes. Peanut and I were bowling on one lane, with another couple on the attached lane. Four people bowling.
Nine bowling balls. The group to the left of us? Six people. Twelve balls.
My amusement was only heightened when The Great Ball Swap occurred. Peanut and I had not started out exactly on fire, and so of course we were looking for new balls. However, as I explained, given the ratio of bowlers to balls, we weren’t having much luck. Then we noticed that that couple? On the attached lane? Had a
very nice green ball. It was like the Platonic Ideal of bowling balls, and the Peanut and I very much coveted it, sure that if we could just get our hands on
that ball, all of our woes would be over. (Actually, the couple had two green balls, but again, see above re: number of balls). We, however, did not have the green ball. At that point we had a light blue ball, a dark blue ball, and orange ball, and a marbled blue ball.
But then… the woman next to us picked up the orange ball. Which was clearly
our ball, but we weren’t going to complain, because then we could steal the green one! And we sort of made this swap without actually saying anything, but we all bowled better, and everyone was happy.
Except, just to recap: after spending an inordinate amount of time trying out and collecting balls, Peanut and I ended up using the same one, that
we didn’t even find.
Of course, the ball really is the critical part of the game, because the ball is psychically connected to you. You know this. This is why it is impossible to just throw the ball down the lane, turn around, and go back to your seat. How will the ball know where to go? It is scientifically required to stand in front of the lane, talking to the ball, and if possible moving your body in the way you want the ball to go.
There are many methods of doing this, including:
The Bowler Lean: Planting one foot on the floor, lift up the other foot and lean the entire body in the direction you want the ball to veer in. Bonus points if you actually fall over.
The Hop: As the ball goes down the lane, make very teeny tiny hops in the direction you need the ball to veer. Challenge: Get as many hops in as possible without crossing into the next lane. (Note: This requires very tiny hops).
The Fake Out: Before bowling, whisper to the ball what you want it to do. Throw it, and then turn around and pretend to nonchalantly return to your seat. At the last possible moment, turn back around, and in movement as reminiscent of an epileptic seizure as possible
remind the ball where you wanted it to go, with arm motions and jumping.
General Rule: The psychic connection between bowler and ball increases proportionally with the amount of beer consumed.
Unfortunately, Peanut and I did not consume a lot of beer, as it was Friday, and we were tired, and really, the beer would not have helped so much with the already excruciatingly bad bowling we were doing.
However, we intend to go bowling again very soon. And this time? I will not rest until I find the perfect ball.
Time Flies. So Does HAIL.
It’s July 5. Good lord. How does that happen? I am all, “I will be more write-y and talk-y” and I post a bunch and then it’s
July and I haven’t posted in weeks. But lots has been happening! So I’m going to pretend it’s Friday and do a random collection of thoughts, and sorry, but this is going to be all over the place.
1. Rocking the Suburbs: An Addendum, Part 2:
Remember how Peanut got poison sumac? And we took her to the emergency room and she was on steroids and pain medication and I felt bad but was so happy that I, at least, did not have poison sumac?
I have poison sumac.
And apparently I am one of the “very rare” cases (according to the internet, which we all know is the best place ever to look up health related information, especially if you want to be told that you are, in all likelihood,
dying right now) where the poison does not show up for several weeks. So now it’s July, and I did yardwork a freaking
month ago, and about a week or two ago my body suddenly just
freaked the fuck out and I’m itchy and disgusting, and I am also on steroids and the like. Nature is trying to kill me.
2. No, Really. Nature is Trying To Kill Me.The other day I was walking home and I decided to go to the further stop on the metro, because when I walk home from that one I pass my bank, and I needed to make a deposit. I knew that there was a storm in the area, but when I got off the metro it was not raining, and so I thought I was fine.
Until I got around the corner, where luckily there is an overpass, because no sooner did I get under that then the sky opened up. And basically just started dumping water. Which, fine, I’m under the overpass. Then the thunder and lightning started, and it was loud and really, really scary, but… I’m dry, or at least, dry-ish. Then the wind starts, and it starts blowing the rain completely sideways, so I run all the way to the far end of the overpass and turn my back, but it doesn’t matter, because the rain gets me anyway, and I am now completely soaked, and it is no longer
warm, it is
cold, and I am not happy, at all. Then the wind changed.
And it started to hail.
Like, for real, large chunks of ice not so much
falling out of the sky but being
propelled downward by remarkable force, and hitting me directly in the face. At this point I sort of just crouched down and covered my head, and it was ouchy and scary and I DID NOT LIKE IT.
Eventually I hid with random biker guy between two tour buses, and called Kate, who rescued me.
3. Actually, Nature is Trying to Kill Everyone, and is Seriously? Kind of a Bitch.
The rain? There has been a lot of it, and there has been bad flooding here, and I have spent the last several days working with the Red Cross a few miles away from where I live, which is an actual disaster zone. Which has been awesome, and insane, and I am exhausted, but again I totally love the Red Cross and working with them is awesome.
(Also awesome? Firemen who have to unload a truck full of relief supplies just as it starts to pour, so they end up soaking wet. And hot. I’m just saying.)
4. Happy BirthdayTo the blog site that did not crash and eat all my writing. This blog is now officially one year old. And while the last weekend was far tamer than
last years fourth, (
Wave is in Europe, for one thing, and the whole disaster thing, for another), we did manage to drink beer and margaritas and this year I even saw the fireworks.
Now lets see if I can keep to my goal of actually writing more this year.
