Queen Mediocretia of Suburbia

Breakthrough

I have arguments in my head. Considering what has gone on in my head in the past, arguments are an improvement, but still it's exhausting arriving at work when you've spent the drive to work stating your case over and over to someone. In my head, those people just argue back, and I never make any headway. Sometimes, in my head, they attack me and I spend the drive in defending myself. Usually some tangential person also weighs in on how I am wrong.

I though at first that this is the Voice of my depression from the link above, and that I'm just projecting my self-criticism on to other people. So there's an improvement, at least I'm putting up a fight this time.

Now, though, I think I'm just bored while driving, I need a little argument drama, and since I'm headed to work I'm getting my brain into problem-solving mode. Only, of course, these problems and people cannot be solved. It is what is is, they are who they are. I tell myself that, as soon as the arguments start, but that doesn't fill up my imagination as dramatically as the thought of me making all the points that I can't make in real life.

I decided, since all this is going on in my head anyway, why not go the extra step and fantasize the other people seeing my side? Even my imagination couldn't make that leap, and believe me, my imagination concocts unrealistic scenarios in which I end up in bed with celebrities.

So then I decided — and this is the breakthrough — when I hear these arguments beginning I am going to channel my imagination  into fantasizing some way my opponents agree with my position entirely on their own, through some deus ex machina that visits their lives. They are converted to my point of view, sometimes through positive life experiences, sometimes traumatically, sometimes through industrial mishaps that deliver what amounts to electro-shock therapy.

It's much more entertaining and challenging, and not boring at all.

Schedule

Gary grew up on a schedule. According to him, not only were breakfast, lunch, and dinner served at precise, set times, but there were schedules and time limits for bedtimes, fun outings in the weekends, and so on. His parents still adhere to a schedule - they allow themselves thirty minutes a day for local news, a certain number of hours for the newspaper, and their evening fruit snack is always at the same time.

Naturally, Gary rebelled as soon as he began running his own life. He has never stuck to itineraries or set work hours. And now that he's retired, one night he goes to sleep at 5 a.m., another night he's asleep at 7 at night. And more power to him, I say. I get it. Where I grew up dinner was scheduled when the food was done cooking, so I can't even imagine what it might be like to have to leave the zoo at three p.m. because dinner was scheduled at five.

The only time his impromptu lifestyle is a nuisance is on the weekends. I want to get a few tiny personal goals done on the weekends, because I Have a job, and weekends are rare and precious. It's just hard to plan my time, given the moving target that is Gary's day.

The friction begins when Gary wakes up.

Me: "I'm going to run  to the grocery for milk."
Gary: "If you just wait a minute I will go with you."

And the for the next two hours Gary does a variety of things, and when I say, "What's this? We were headed to the grocery and now you're Facebooking / in the bathroom / feeding the raccoons / clipping your toenails/ shopping on Amazon?" Then he says "Stop bugging me! You know I hate being on a schedule! Gimme a minute!" And, then, repeat.

What I need to do is yell from the garage, "MILK, BYE!" and not wait. I've learned this lesson before, when he worked all evening and would show up when it suited him. Don't wait. Live your life and if he's there when you're there, all the better, but don't wait.

Of course, that’s just going to lead to more friction. 

The Yearly Post in Which I Complain About Winter

God in Heaven, I hate winter. It isn't the snow or the ice or the dry air. I hate the light in winter.

Summer is a candle. Winter is an LED.

Winter light comes in to my house and makes it look filthy, even when it's clean. It's like a flashlight held at ground level that shows every speck and crumb. Give me an overcast gray winter day over a sunny one, because at least I don't have the harsh white winter light.

If I hated the snow and cold, I could drive someplace warmer in a day or so. The winter light, though, you can't get away from it in the entire hemisphere. I would have to go to Bolivia to get the quality of light I need.

Given that I hate the winter light so much, it is odd that I drove to work last week, pleased that I had driven to work after dawn and home before sunset, so the days are longer. You would think I'd like the Arctic circle instead, given that the light is gone for entire days, but I just watched this amazing narrative of the Greely expedition on PBS and I am sure I would be the first person to go mad in the long dark.

Guitar Again

Since I reached the end of the teacup painting, I returned to my guitar after a week's hiatus. I intended to return earlier, but I made a delicious meal of thinly sliced pork tenderloin, sliced caramelized onions, and caramelized apples. What does that have to do with the guitar, some of you ask. Some of you do not prepare meals. Those who make the meals know what happened. I played the mandolin too enthusiastically.

Not this mandolin.

This mandoline.

It bit a gouge in my thumb, and yet I did not stop until I filleted my index finger knuckle two minutes later. Of course, in both cases when it bit into me I stopped immediately, so all the flaps of flesh were still attached to my body instead of in my dinner.

And yes, I know, who is injured by a mandoline twice in a row? One is wounded, so one stops, or slows down, or something. In my defense, the first bite was just a nip. I did stop entirely after the second incident, which involved hands held over my head and Neosporin and gauze. Gary had to be waved off. He was quite concerned, and he didn't even see the flow of blood.

It was on the thumb and index finger of my right hand, so no guitar finger-picking for me for a week.

That means my muscle memory had a week to establish, or set, or whatever magic thing it does, and it would seem that now I can think the three variations of the C chord and one G chord and my hands play them without conscious thought.

And, I have been eating a tasty pork tenderloin melange all week. Can't taste the blood at all.

Oscars

I remember hearing that the Oscars were going to start a new policy this year of having a separate category for "popular" films. That was a real thing, even though you might read this delightful article and think otherwise.

Some blockbusters must have been promised nominations in that category, because I can think of no other reason to give a Best Picture nomination to A Star Is Born. Black Panther might fall into that category, but I don't know, since I only made it a third of the way through.

Were there an Oscar category for Best Picture I Did Not See and Have No Desire To, that category would include Bohemian Rhapsody. I think this is because A Star Is Born soured me on all movies with concert footage. Concert footage, chase scenes, edit that plot-killing crap out.

Nominated for Best Picture I Wanted to See But Could Not Convince Gary: BlacKkKlansman, Green Book, and Vice. I was sure he would want to go see Vice, but he heard bad reviews, and on second thought did I really want to trigger Gary's political rants? Better to save it for later when he can pause the TV and go off in private.

And, finally, other Best Picture nominees I actually saw: The Favourite (excellent), and Roma (huh?).

Of course, I will be watching the Oscars tonight, and I am sure that Roma will win, and Lady Gaga will get Best Song, and other non-deserving nominees will take home awards. Thank heaven for Twitter, so I can commiserate with people who share my unpopular tastes.

Big House Returns

Gary has had so many recurring dreams about a Big House that it rated its own Blog Category. And then - no Big House dream for five and a half years, since he has been retired.  I believed that made the Big House dream analysis easy: Big House = responsibilities. It did tend to surface when he had family or job responsibilities.

It isn’t a pleasant dream, usually the Big House is falling down, or invaded by drifters, or family members have invited themselves and will not leave.

After a hiatus of five and a half years, he had a Big House dream last night, and that it was a pleasant dream. “Way fewer bugs and vandals than usual.”

This time the Big House was like a skyscraper, ten stories tall. It had two types of stories or floors: the decorated floors where he lived alone in the rooms and ... pleasured himself, and the empty run-down floors with no interior walls where an artists’ colony had squatted. 

Every artist floor was devoted to a different “permanent art exhibit: sidewalk chalk, giant rubber balls, dance.” (I do think it’s odd that all the permanent exhibits are temporary art forms.) He was initially unaware the artists were there, but they all knew about him and ate his food. 

He also said he led a tour of his Big House for some rich people, who had found the house on Google maps. They envied him.

So, if the Big House dreams are about responsibility, I suppose this recent dream is about his responsibilities in retired life. Masturbating in decorated rooms, socializing with rich people (me) who envy him, and having artists (me) eat the food he makes. 

Lego

Remember when I bought the Lego that looked like my new boss? I did a little editing on the mug, and here he is:

Since he protested earlier that he doesn’t have as much hair as Rex Dangervest, I removed the Lego snap-on hair and used a Sharpie to draw his actual haircut underneath.

I presented it to him at our first official staff meeting. I was not fired on the spot, so I hold out hope for the new boss.

Lending Library of Love

When Gary walked off his job, he brought home ten boxes of computer books. He had assembled that library over his entire career: whenever he heard of a new language or software, he’d buy a book on it in case he might need to use it later. After he quit and/or retired (quitired?), he moved all the books into our basement, because you can’t just toss out a collection it took years to amass.

A few months later, I was working at home and on a conference call with my team, who needed someone to learn a programming language called PL/SQL. “Not me,” I said. “That is way over my head.” Others insisted. I continued to protest. 

I heard Gary get out of bed, scuttle around in the basement, and then a few minutes later he was in the doorway with three PL/SQL books.

“Oh all right,” I told my team, “My husband seems to think I can learn PL/SQL.” Which I did, eventually, using his books and the Internet. That was five years ago.

I used the PL/SQL on a project that was supplanted by SharePoint. People at work seemed to think it would be good for me to bone up on SharePoint. I came home and complained about that to Gary. This time I didn’t even notice when he went into the basement, but he materialized again with SharePoint for Dummies and the SharePoint Administrator’s Manual. 

I kept the Dummies book, then said, “Get that Administrator’s manual away from me. I’m not doing that. They don’t even want me to do that. One of them wants me to learn C++ so I can program it.” 

I didn’t learn to program in C++. That was a mistake, because this past week I’ve been researching Augmented Reality software, and I really should have learned C++. 

I complained about that to Gary, who said, “I have a C++ book in the basement.”

His confidence in me knows no bounds.

Two Reviews: I Am The Night and Roma

I Am the Night
What I expected: True crime
What I got: Family drama

While I was looking for good podcasts, my niece attended a live broadcast of My Favorite Murder, so I started listening to that. My first MFM broadcast did not get to the murder quickly enough. Instead, there was a lot of pre-murder giggling that turned me off, but now that I know to ignore the non-murder silliness I quite enjoy the murder silliness.

A few weeks ago MFM focused on the Black Dahlia murder so they could promote the new I Am the Night TV series, which - and this may surprise viewers of I Am The Night, and also SPOILERS - is only tangentially about the Black Dahlia murder. Instead, it's all about the peculiar family dynamics of one of the primary suspects. Granted, he's the most interesting suspect, but I signed up for murder and I'm getting incest and baby-selling and other lesser crimes, yawn. I think I would have preferred an anthology series in which each episode deals with a different Black Dahlia suspect, because I am four episodes in and I am tired of this weirdo and his family.

Roma
What I expected: a plot
What I got: As Kathleen Madigan tweeted, "#WhatTheFWasThat #WhenDoesItStart #WhyStuffedDogHeads"

Had I known there was no plot to Roma I would have watched it with a completely different attitude. Instead, I kept checking my watch, thinking the plot was going to kick into gear any minute now. There's an earthquake an hour or so in, and I felt relieved, because now we were going to see how the family deals with the earthquake, but no, fooled you, this is the director remembering an earthquake and making it look lovely and striking and black and white.

And it wasn't even episodic like Huckleberry Finn, where Huck and Jim wander toward the resolution of a conflict. They're on the river to get Jim to freedom, and Jim [SPOILERS! And HOW DO YOU NOT KNOW THIS EVEN MY NEWLY INTEGRATED HIGH SCHOOL HAD TO READ IT] is re-enslaved and then freed at the end.  Of course, maybe it's more like War and Peace, my favorite Giant Slice of Life. Still, in both of those books, the characters end up someplace different from where they started.

I don't know. Maybe I should watch it again without expecting a plot or a revolution or an earthquake.

Art Careers

A friend with an artistic teenage daughter reports that she’s considering becoming a video game artist.

I couldn’t help but smile when I imagined myself in her place, a teenage girl, being paid to draw the ladies below: 

“If it were me, I couldn’t do it,” I said. “I couldn’t make my hands draw those bodies.”

I mean, I already know the insecurities that exaggerated comic book bosoms gave me in the late 70s. “MY cleavage doesn’t touch in the middle! MY nipples aren’t that high!” Can you imagine having to not only look at but draw video game bosoms every day?

Noom, Huh.

Noom has been advertising all over the news channels, and now the demographic oracles on Facebook have decided I am in need of a diet, and they sent me this Facebook ad:

Noom claims to help you lose weight with a combination of "small bowls and psychology." I looked closely at the image to see what psychological mind games they are playing.

Most of the foods look barely edible - whole wheat bread and greenery - looks like cream cheese, pesto, bell pepper, baby spinach, basil, and some ornamental shrub there in the middle.

But the foods on the left top and bottom are, if I am to believe my eyes:

An open face sandwich of whole wheat topped with unpeeled limes and unpeeled avocados.

An open face sandwich of whole wheat topped with five pickle spears.

Is... is this the psychology? "Next to the whole wheat bread and lawn clippings, that cream cheese and okra looks delectable." 

 

 

His / Mine / Ours

Gary and I have always had separate bank accounts, and when he retired we re-purposed his into a 100% responsible savings account and mine into a 100% reckless spending account, and we both share both accounts. Of course, we transfer a percentage into the savings account automatically, and when extra money accumulates I shuttle it to savings after a few weeks, because I can't wait around forever for that money to be spent. The grasshopper gets at most a month to spend it, and if he doesn't, then the ant takes over.

It has worked out well, after a disastrous early start in which I tried to get him to economize. If you look at his actions it seems that he's fine with the arrangement: he spends money on me, he spends money on his parents, he spends lots of money on raccoon food, but only on rare occasions will he spend money on himself. Recently he bought his father a muffler he admired, and I couldn't get him to buy one for himself. "Spend your money on yourself for once!" I will say.

It's frustrating, because he will say, "Well, it's not my money, it's your money."

I always counter this with the same argument: We can spend at least a mortgage payment on him per month because he spent years paying off our mortgage. We can spend a car payment on him because  he doesn't want to buy a new car for his ego. We can spend the extra money he saved up for retirement because he isn't taking social security.

The second argument, which I never get to, is: if it's my money, why does he think I'd have a problem spending it on him? Does he think that I'm too stingy for him to have new shoes, but that I'd prefer that our gold is alchemized into raccoon poop?

I got his iPad while he was asleep and bought him that muffler.

 

High Pressure Trivia

Friend #3 and I were invited to a trivia match by Friend Anne and her new team at work. I went in thinking it was very nice to be invited to trivia by, essentially, a group of strangers (plus Anne). When we got there we discovered that Anne, #4, and I were there as ringers, specifically invited to put a W in their column. They were very nice and paid for our seats and our food. 

I did better than usual. When no one else could answer, I knew who invented the steel plow blade (John Deere) and the location of the world’s largest bat (Louisville, KY), I identified the HP logo sans initials, and I knew Sopranos was the first HBO show to win an Emmy - though Friend #3 questioned my answer, and stubbornly talked me out of it. I was robbed of that answer, but still we lost by three points, not just by one.

We were in the lead until one of the final rounds, in which we were asked to identify all the McDonald’s mascots. It was brutal. I actually joked that the green blob character was O’Grimace, and if anyone had written that down we might have only lost by two points.

I felt bad we didn’t get the win, especially since this was our first outing as Trivia Hired Guns.

Valentine’s Day

When Gary and I agreed on Wednesday night that there would be no exchange of Valentine’s gifts, I admit I thought forlornly of my fortieth birthday, when a put-upon florist deliverywoman staggered into my foyer under the weight of a Chinese vase full of forty roses, one for each year.

So when I heard him come home today I was surprised to see this:

He couldn’t decide between red or yellow, so he asked the floral department if they could put two different types of roses in one vase.

This is how he is. This is good. I asked if he was annoyed that I hadn’t purchased a surprise gift for him (because WE AGREED) and he said, “The red roses are for you and the yellow ones are for me.”

Teacups: Done, Because I Have Run Out of Patience

I am done (so so done) with the teacups.

It is odd. The teacups seem to follow you with their eyes! No, but they do look very different depending on the lighting and the orientation. I hated it in the basement, I liked it upstairs in the kitchen, and I like it much more when it is sideways.

Usually when I turn something sideways, the flaws jump right into view. I think I like this one sideways because it puts the middle of the left teacup in the optical center, and the middle of the left teacup is the best part. Only, I grew tired of the gold-on-blue pattern and I got sloppy, which is fine, because it isn't like the Medicis are drumming their fingers waiting for this.

Also the highlights on the cut glass bowl should be brighter and sharper, but they just would not adhere. I know there are three oil painting rules:

1. Slow Over Fast - paint slow drying things last  (like white highlights)
2. Fat over Lean - you have to add oil for each new layer (thins things out so they won't crack)
3. Thick over Thin - and there's my problem. If I follow the previous rule and  add oil to paint the white highlights, that will thin them down so much they won't make an impact. I suppose I'm supposed to make two layers of increasingly thin white.

Ugh. So that means I am not done.

Gary 2.0: The Appetites

The other day, I read that the Mother-In-Law restaurant will soon be acquired by the Rack House restaurant, a place I’d never heard of though it’s only three miles away. I looked up their menu on-line.

“Hey Gary. There’s this place by us that has chicken-Brie-bacon sandwiches and - ”

“Let’s go. Let’s go now.”

Unexpected. The old Gary would not have been a) that spontaneous or b) that hungry. But now we have Gary on drugs, specifically the thyroid drugs. We went immediately to the restaurant, where he did not have the chicken sandwich but instead put away an ample pork chop the size of my upper arm. We named the chop Piglet. “Piglet went down easy” and “Piglet kept me up all night.”

Then, all day Sunday, he made suggestive remarks about women. Any woman. Every woman. The Progressive Insurance lady. Joy Reid. Amy Klobuchar. All are hot, incredibly smokin’ hot. He has never noticed before how sexy Nancy Pelosi is. Unprompted: “I would do her.” I have not met this version of Gary. Even when he was 29, yes, he would appreciate a well-formed lady, and yes, he would share that opinion with me as if I were a guy, but it was not this day-long game of MSNBC Hot or Not. It was as if I had a glimpse into the mind of 18-year-old Gary, a man I have never met.

All his appetites are stirring. He’s awake, hungry, and if I can spruce myself up to compete with Nancy Pelosi (she does have nice hair), he might be looking for love. Interesting.

This Has Not Happened In Years

At the start of this month, on Groundhog Day, this miracle happened:

My Fitbit said I slept over seven and a half hours WITHOUT WAKING UP TO PEE.

I don't know how I did it, though. I ate and drank normally. It was truly miraculous.

Since then I have not had more than two hours of uninterrupted sleep a night, but it was nice to have a normal bladder, briefly, just for the holiday.

Then, last week, I made it to six and a half hours without waking up. 

Last night, who knows how long I could have made it. Unfortunately, at 2 a.m. Gary came in and woke me up. “Ellen ... Ellen ... Ellen!”

”What is it?” 

“The metal bowl was delivered. I just looked at the porch when I was locking up and it’s here!”

(Long pause.) “You woke me up to tell me a package you ordered is on the porch?”

”Well ... the pears came too.”

And now it’s 5 a.m and I’ve been awake since then.

Calypso: a Review

Usually, after I read the latest David Sedaris book, I am amused for a day or two. This last one, Calypso, gutted me for a day or two. Or, more like a week or two, since I'm still thinking about it.

Calypso is the one I ordered in German. A reminder: “Tiffany ... Cool. Stoned. Hacke. Durchgeknallt.” (It's notable that the first words I read were about his sister Tiffany.)

After I got the English version, I started reading, expecting the usual David Sedaris book. I had already read the lovely essay about the fox: that was typical fare. I wasn't prepared to have him bump up the stakes in Calypso.

Did you think you knew the Sedaris family from all the other books? No. You might have had a few hints, but no, not really. There are some just gut-wrenching revelations. And he crafts it and weaves it in so skillfully. It's remarkable. There's a theme. And who knows, there might have been themes in all of his other books, but those themes didn't resonate with me.

You might think you know me, too, but I have my own “Tiffany” about whom you hear very little. I don't know if I could ever be as frank about that as he is. Maybe someday.

Again, go read Calypso, a real memoir instead of this craven blog.

Night Sounds

A few days ago, Gary woke me up at four thirty in the morning.

“Ellen! Ellen!”

“Whaarmfmumu ... ?”

“Ellen! There’s something dying in our backyard.”

“Whuh?”

“I think one of the raccoons is wounded in the backyard and it’s dying. It’s making awful sounds right outside the window.”

We went together to the back door where I heard the doleful, anguished, desperate,  unmistakeable cries of a ...

”Beagle. That’s a beagle, Gary.”

I convinced him after a few minutes of “Really, that’s what beagles sound like, there’s a beagle across the street, I thought they were torturing him when I first heard him,” and so on, he settled down. 

I may be painting all beagles with too wide a brush, though, because I thought all beagles made the same god-awful sound the neighbor's beagle does. I was surprised when I had to hunt on the internet to find video of a beagle that makes the same noise I hear every morning and that Gary heard that night. The neighbor’s beagle sounds like the one here. You have to wait nineteen seconds: it takes a little coaxing to make the same distinctive sound the neighbor's dog does.

Sadly, neighbor beagle does not require any coaxing. It really sounds like a dying animal.

Embarassing Bezos Photos?

So, Jeff Bezos has out-balled the National Enquirer after they threatened to publish "embarrassing" photos. Were I in the same situation, even minus the Bezos billions, I wouldn't have given in to that blackmail either. Because they had nothing.

Here are the photos the Enquirer threatened to publish:

"· Mr. Bezos face selfie at what appears to be a business meeting."

Is it a naked business meeting? How is this a threat?

· Ms. Sanchez response — a photograph of her smoking a cigar in what appears to be a simulated oral sex scene.

I could see this in any cigar advertisement in any magazine.

· A shirtless Mr. Bezos holding his phone in his left hand — while wearing his wedding ring. He’s wearing either tight black cargo pants or shorts — and his semi-erect manhood is penetrating the zipper of said garment.

Okay, I'll give you that one, that would be embarassing. If I were him I would hang my hopes on the word "semi." I'm betting it's entirely floppy. There's something fishy about how they described it as "penetrating the zipper," as if they needed to give it some imagined firmness.

· A full-length body selfie of Mr. Bezos wearing just a pair of tight black boxer-briefs or trunks, with his phone in his left hand — while wearing his wedding ring.

So, he's essentially in his underwear, while married. Is the point of mentioning the wedding ring to undermine his contention that he was having the affair while separated?

· A selfie of Mr. Bezos fully clothed.

Shocking. I must delete all the fully-clothed selfies from my phone this minute.

· A full-length scantily-clad body shot with short trunks.

Is he supposed to be ashamed of this because it might get him thrown out of McDonalds?

· A naked selfie in a bathroom — while wearing his wedding ring. Mr. Bezos is wearing nothing but a white towel — and the top of his pubic region can be seen.

Naked selfie? You aren't naked if you are in a towel. Look up naked. I'm pretty sure. And Michael Phelps opened up the top of the pubic region for public consumption years ago.

· Ms. Sanchez wearing a plunging red neckline dress revealing her cleavage and a glimpse of her nether region.

... and ...

· Ms. Sanchez wearing a two-piece red bikini with gold detail dress revealing her cleavage.

So they will show photos of his girlfriend in clothing that she purchased and then wore in public. I don’t get how this is embarrassing. Also, am I to assume the neckline plunges down to her nether region? In addition, why does she only have one nether region when the term I have always heard is “nether regions”? 

Minus the semi-dick pic, none of that would even embarrass me. And given that they've already published the revelation that there is a full-dick pic, why did they think a semi would give him the fantods? They can't publish either photo without blurring it, so one blur will be smaller than the other.

I thought Jeff Bezos was a baller, but he isn't making a big noble sacrifice here, at least this time.  

Emergency Alert

This is what the Emergency Alert test in my area looks like:

Two colors. Fixed width. Old school. Shit is going down, people, no time for graphics or kerning. 

That’s why I was surprised to see this on my screen when I heard the familiar sounds of the Emergency Alert system ths past week:

It’s the CBS-specific version of the Emergency Alert graphic. Evidently, CBS feels that a graphic that evokes a city burning down is enough to make us perk up and pay attention. It's interesting that "This is a test of the" is in a smaller font. So, when it is a real event, what happens? They leave off the top line? Perhaps the letters are red too?

I'm concerned that people are going to become habituated to the above EAS message, because the graphic is too much like a commercial. That, and because there have been a number of false alerts in this new-fangled Emergency ALERT System - six in twenty years, as opposed to the original Emergency BROADCAST System, which plugged away for over thirty years with just one mistake. Which sounded like this.

It's all too easy to ignore. The tornado sirens go off once a month. so we ignore those. Even the Emergency Presidential Text Alert they debuted this past October sounds too much like an Amber Alert.

I think they should do what the cable company did when there was a tornado three miles from my house: make the screen go black and only show only the block printed words "THERE IS A TORNADO IN YOUR AREA. TAKE COVER IMMEDIATELY." No weather reporters anymore, no map, nothing to see but the marching orders.

I fear no one would listen unless all the TVs and all the iPhones and all the Applebee's digital menu screens went black with all-caps white letters that say "THIS IS NOT A TEST."

 

We Are Too Stupid to Have Nice Things: YET ANOTHER Ill-Advised Purchase

We have had two ill-advised purchases lately, both from Amazon, and one successful purchase from a brick and mortar store.

That's exactly why when we ran out of printer ink we skipped Amazon and just went to Target, as we did back in the day. I carefully made a note of the printer model. I emailed myself that note, so I would have a backup, because I have bought the wrong type of printer ink before and it is very discouraging.

We were inside the Target, and I could not find the note or the email. ‘Not to worry,” Gary said smugly, “I will look up our printer model on Amazon because I bought it there.” He did. “It’s a Canon TS9020.” 

“You are the Best,” I cooed. ‘You have Saved the Day. You are So Smart.”

An hour later my email finally let me know that I needed to be sure to get the right HP ink for our HP printer. 

(Yes. Shhh. I know. You spotted that right off, didn’t you? That’s because You are So Smart.)

”Oh, there’s the email about the printer ink.” I said, “We don’t need that anymore. You Saved the Day.” Delete. Do not read, of course, no, no, because ... stupid.

Days later I got around to replacing the ink, and of course I sat there looking befuddled at the two vastly different ink cartridges until I noticed the printer said HP and the ink cartridge box said Canon.

After I shook Gary awake, it became obvious what had happened - the printer purchase Gary saw on Amazon was the printer he’d bought his Dad six months ago, not the one he bought us in October.

So, it’s fine, Gary’s Dad is going to get a backup set of ink cartridges. Gary felt guilty and bought the right cartridges immediately .. off .. of Amazon ... kind of in a rush, so ... who knows what we’ll end up with.

Stockpot

A tedious post ... In Which I Document My Purchases. (Ah - if only I had thought of that category thirteen years ago.)

The induction stove only works with ferrous metals, so one thing I had to give away was Mom's giant aluminum stockpot. The replacement was a $15 Walmart stockpot.

That stockpot lasted five years, until this past Friday when I burned some apple pie filling in it. I went at it with the Brillo pad until I remembered that Facebook had been set on me buying a gorgeous stockpot via one of their ads. A stunning, heavy stockpot that would match all my other cookware. I scrubbed a little more before I said goodbye, old stockpot, you served me well this five years on, and we had many soups together, but now you have burned the apple pie filling and I can't look at you any longer. There are younger, hotter stockpots to be had.

And then, it turned into one of those Missed Connections personals. I had seen this mouth-watering photo of a stockpot, and I didn't go for it, and missed my shot at long-term stockpot happiness, because Facebook would not show me that stockpot photo again. After a day of searching I put this on Facebook:

Facebook kept mum. So I gave up on the Facebook Tease Stockpot (probably some bogus Russian stockpot put there to foment discontent), and paid an old-school in-person visit to the Bed Bath and Beyond. I found a friendly knockoff of an outrageously priced All-Clad Bells and Whistles stockpot set. Honestly, this one was a third of the All-Clad price. It was also three times the price of my original Walmart stockpot, as if there’s some stockpot logarithmic scale in which each level of stockpot is three times the price of the previous level. 

I don't make bulk corn, or even bulk pasta, but I can see throwing bones and aromatics in the insert and later lifting it out instead of trying to strain 12 quarts of stock.

And yes, I did take careful measurements, first thing.

 

Further Vindication

So, about a dozen years ago I told my friends about a Clydesdale mass murder that had happened in the 1980's, and was ridiculed, but was eventually - partially - vindicated.

You'll notice the vindication above doesn't come with a newspaper citation, though. Every once in a while, when I think of Clydesdales (as one does during the SuperBowl), I go scouting the internet to see if I can find a 1980s article about the crime. I usually can't, and I assume that's because the Busch Family owns this town and all its newspapers.

Well, here's an excerpt from a New York Times article from the mid 70s, four years before the one I recall:

ST. LOUIS, Oct. 9 (AP) — Vandals armed with a high‐powered rifle shot and killed a pregnant Clydesdale mare yesterday. The mare had produced several colts for the Anheuser‐Busch Inc. brewery's famed eight‐horse hitch teams.

Veterinarians were unable to save the unborn animal that the 18‐year‐old mare Peggy Lyndale was carrying. Three other mares were wounded. The incident occurred on the Budweiser brewery's Clydesdale breeding farm in St. Louis County.

See that? Years earlier, when I was in high school there had been another Clydesdale murder, and an attempted mass murder at that. And, this is pretty scary: it was done with a high-powered rifle. Watch out. Clydesdale serial murderer is still at large.

Posts: Where Are They Now? An Update On Three Recent Posts

Pie Crusts - Four pies ago the gods cursed me and I had a massive systemic failure. Three pie crusts ago I made an ideal quiche. Two pie crusts ago, I doubled the recipe, but neglected to double the flour. I tried pre-baking that, and you can imagine my dismay when I pulled it out of the oven and found butter-shortening soup in the bottom of the pie tin. Then this past week I tried to make a cherry pie and forgot the salt in the crust. That was vile. Gary won't even eat it. He has the grace to 1) keep it in a bowl on the counter and not just pitch it in the trash and b) encourage me to try a chicken pot pie next. Instead, I made another one apple pie last night - which I overbaked.

Gary Cheating - Gary and I played our game by the book, finally, and he exclaimed it's much more fun when you play by the rules. It's also much muuuuuuch slower. We played three hours and moved two spaces because every detail had to be researched in the rule book.

Elevator - I spoke to some people who have hired on in the last ten years and they say "Ladies first" is no longer taught in orientation. In fact, they laughed at the idea.

I Need to Try Some of this Beer Beverage People Speak Of

So, at the moment I am writing this (8:30 CT Saturday night) the currently current, regrettably Democrat Governor Northam of Virginia has (let me check) decided not to resign because he does not recall having posed in blackface as shown on his yearbook page, and claims now that he is not the man pictured. I understand he spent today calling old classmates to see if any one of them could jog his memory (or take the fall for him, she muttered cynically, rolling her eyes).

Here is an interesting excerpt from this article:

Beneath the photo, Northam lists his alma mater and his interest in pediatrics and offers a quote: “There are more old drunks than old doctors in this world so I think I’ll have another beer.”

This, after Supreme Court Justice Kavanaugh indignantly employed the Beer Defense, made me think: "Damn, maybe I should give beer another try.  It seems to be the favorite of successful politicians. Like, they defiantly adore this stuff. Like it fucks you up enough to sexually assault women while wearing blackface, but it makes you a 'man of the people' at the same time."

I mean, I don’t like beer because it tastes like flowers. (Really, people, don't drink flowers. It is wrong.) I did not realize until this last scandal that it has hallucinogenic properties and a Get Out of Jail Free card that goes with it.

 

Ah-nomatopoeia

Gary has a little trouble with accept / except, and frankly, I do too. They’re homophones and then the two exceptions just throw it all off. I have to study up every time. I once edited his Facebook posts for accept/except, but it’s just too much.

I’ve also noticed that instead of typing  “Uh-oh,” he spells it “Ah-oh.” 

I don’t know if I could truly correct that. Perhaps that’s what he hears and what he means. If Ukrainian cats say “nyav” and not “meow,” then I think Gary can say “Ah-oh.”

Speaking of what cats say, does anyone know what bats sound like? Gary has come in from feeding the raccoons these last few days and he says he can hear a chorus of bats in the trees. I’ve heard it too. It sounds like dozens of squeaky birds singing in the night. 

Bats would be SO cool. But, sadly, I looked it up and unless they are flying around (and unless we both have remarkable hearing), they don’t make any of the typical freaky static bat sounds.

Yet Another Ill-Advised Amazon Purchase

First I bought the German book. This time it was Gary's turn.

He was trying to buy a big salad bowl, because if he makes salad then I can't use the metal bowl to make pie crust (it's the smaller one).

He claims he measured. He claims it didn't cost that much. It cost FIFTY FIVE DOLLARS.

To be fair, he has no idea what a metal bowl costs, and there was nothing in the photo on Amazon to use for scale.

He tried to justify keeping it. I suggested we make an in-ground pool for the raccoons. Or, if we had a baby, we could use it to bathe the baby. Or chop it up in a salad.