Excuse Me, While I Curse The Sky

Posted on August 13, 2004 by Frog

Pardon me while I pout.

Hurricane Charley is going to hit Tampa sometime today. I feel for them that live there. My sister lives on the other side of Florida (the Atlantic coast) and said she was going out to get supplies (beer, soda, snacks). I told her those supplies sounded about right to me.

Since there is something about Virginia that screams “other states please send us your problems”, we’re expecting backlash from Charley (know where trash goes to die? Virginia. Look it up we’re a huge dumping ground for other states). Saturday night we’re expecting winds that could knock over trees. Great. We still haven’t gotten all the wood taken care of from the last hurricane that kicked through. I can hardly wait for “winds that could knock over trees”–that is exactly what the local weather dude said on the radio this morning.

Other problems abound. Directv sent their incompetent dish installer a few weeks ago and as the asshat did not show up when scheduled he never came in the house to actually point the dish to the new coordinates. We no longer have local channels. It was so bad that when we called Customer Service, the other night, the phone rep said “I recognize your zip code”–in other words, lots of people were screwed by the asshat. They can’t send someone until sometime in mid-September. I was not on the phone (the better-half was handling it) but I screeched loud enough that the phone rep immediately refunded us two months worth of local channel charges. Damn straight. You know what that means…no Olympics. The absolute horror. I can’t stand that thought. I can’t believe I’m going to miss ALL OF THE OLYMPICS BECAUSE SOME MORON DIDN’T DO HIS JOB. May you rot in Hell.

Posted in General Spleen Venting | Comments Off

Welcome all fetishists

Posted on August 12, 2004 by Frog

Over the weekend the better-half and I were talking about feet and how I think I’m about to have an ingrown nail on the second toe of my left foot. No matter how carefully I keep that nail trimmed it will turn on me every few months or so. Here’s my theory on why that toe nail is doomed.

My second toe on both feet is almost a quarter of an inch longer than my big toe. I’m freakish like that. I think because of that length my toe hits the ends of my shoes and that causes my nail to get shoved down into the nail bed. Of course, there’s another equally probable theory and that’s my preferred way of sitting.

Continue reading →

Posted in Generic Thoughts | Comments Off

Have Lopper Will Travel

Posted on August 12, 2004 by Frog

For over a month, some kind of bush or weed tree or something (that’s the botanical name) has blocked my view of the road at the office. I guess that section of weeds/grass/something belongs to someone other than our landlord because his landscaping team stops short of cutting that junk down. Since there is construction going on next door there isn’t any landscaping work going on at all. Therein lies the problem. And, I was sick of it.

This morning I pulled into the driveway, parked on the side amongst the construction trucks and marched up the little hill back to the road with my long-handled loppers. Those nasty view-blocking things are all a nice cut-off height. I learned that they have thorns and one prick on the finger is a small price to pay for being able to see oncoming traffic.

Need anything cut down? I’m your girl.

Posted in General Spleen Venting | Comments Off

Better than Black and White

Posted on August 11, 2004 by Frog

On the drive into the office this morning, I heard a StoryCorps excerpt on NPR. It was incredibly funny and sweet. Here’s the link. I told the better-half that our marriage is like a color tv too. He said he thought it was almost like digital. Then he told me he had originally thought “wide-screen” but didn’t think it appropriate to compare his bride to a wide-screen tv. Amen, buddy. But it did make me laugh.

Posted in Listening | Comments Off

Next Step: A Shiny Coat

Posted on August 10, 2004 by Frog

After lunch, I tried the Oral-B Brush Up my friend J. gave me yesterday. I have to admit, I was a little skeptical when she whipped it out yesterday after lunch. She said I should try it. I told her it reminded me of one of these. It also reminds me of something else but I refuse to link to a picture of that.

Now that my mind is in the gutter let me tell you how I felt about using the Brush Up. I liked the fact that you get to stick your finger in your mouth and instead of looking like a complete clod picking things out of your teeth; you are actually cleaning them. It worked. My teeth were clean and my breath minty. I can only hope that all those people who crowd around in work-place bathrooms will take the hint (*begin rant* it is gross when you brush in there–have you taken a deep breath in there lately? have you noticed how no one seems to manage to put their paper towels in the trash can? what’s up with all the water all over the counter? don’t even talk to me about the state of the stalls *end rant*) and use the Brush Up instead. That way the rest of us don’t have to watch you spit and not clean up after yourself.

In all fairness, I should note that I have brushed my teeth in an office bathroom before but only if I was headed to the dentist and certainly not on a daily basis.

Posted in Eating | Comments Off

Yesterday Came Suddenly

Posted on August 10, 2004 by Frog

Yesterday, my friend J. and I went out to lunch for her birthday. We dined at Graffiti Grille, which I didn’t even know was open for lunch. It was delicious. I had a grilled shrimp BLT on challah and she had tortellini pasta with andouille sausage. On the way to lunch she opened her gift. And, I think she was pretty pleased with it. I made her a 3-CD set of songs for every year of her life. It started with “Hard Day’s Night” and cruised through the 70s with only a smattering of laugh making: “Stand By Your Man”, “East Bound and Down” and “The Devil Went Down to Ga”. The 80s got her caught up with the Dazz Band, Culture Club and Chaka Khan. The 90s slid into more of a country twang (she is a country fan) but I had to include “Livin’ La Vida Loca” because what other song screams 1999 than that one? I hope she gets a good chuckle when listening to the discs.

Continue reading →

Posted in Generic Thoughts | Comments Off

A Wall without a Door

Posted on August 9, 2004 by Frog

On late Friday afternoon, I posted the entry titled “Super Freak”. I posted from home where we have a Norton Personal firewall running. We also just loaded Mozilla. Something in the Norton Personal firewall didn’t like me using Movable Type to create an entry using the Mozilla browser. My entry didn’t post until the better-half rebuilt the site using his laptop.

He spent some of the weekend troubleshooting the problem was but since his laptop (which uses a VPN and therefore no firewall) worked it was a bit difficult figuring out the riddle. That is until we connected it to the problem I’ve been having reading some blogs (images appearing as broken links) and the blasted firewall.

While I appreciate the protection the firewall gives us for all the back door/trojan/whosits/whatsits that try to connect to our computer at home, I do have to wonder why the firewall deemed it necessary to stop something I was sending out. To the computer and all its software, I say “I’m the Boss, Applesauce”.

Posted in Thinking | Comments Off

Super Freak

Posted on August 6, 2004 by Frog

I just read that Rick James is dead. I’m sure we’ll listen to the CD “Street Songs” tonight (yeah, we have all the classics).

When I was in high school, my eleventh grade math teacher’s husband, apparently, looked like Rick James. I don’t really know for sure, but that’s what someone had scrawled on the loudspeaker in the front of the room. I don’t remember the name of the teacher, but she must have agreed because that graffitti stayed up the whole second semester.

Posted in Listening | Comments Off

Dinner Last Night

Posted on August 6, 2004 by Frog

Yesterday afternoon, when I got home from work, I concocted a marinade for chicken breasts and it went something like this: zest of a lime, juice from the lime, salt, pepper, jalapeño pepper diced, parsley chopped, triple-sec, a small bit of tequila. Then I realized the wrongness of opening a bottle of tequila to cook with it only. So I poured a shot and added some lime and lemon juice and got on with my business. The late afternoon flies by when you have a warm spot of tequila in your belly. If you think that the tequila needs a partner, I suggest cranking some Stevie Wonder on the stereo.

To round out dinner, we had a tomato from my parent’s garden, fresh yellow squash with onions and corn on the cob. As we were eating, I ticked off all the items from our fair Hanover County–tomato, yellow squash, jalapeño pepper, corn. The better-half said something to the effect of it’s good to live in Hanover.

Posted in Eating | Comments Off

Entering the Electronic Age

Posted on August 5, 2004 by Frog

Today, at lunch, I took my mother to BJ’s so she could stock up on electronic equipment. Their VCR has one foot in the grave and she’s been looking for an economical replacement. I told her we’d seen a couple of VCR/DVD players while at BJ’s last weekend. Her conditions on purchasing were a good price, simple to use and simple to hook-up. I think in all the years of owning a VCR (since I was in junior high?), my father has never touched the VCR.

We also found a portable phone for them. One of the phones my parents had was an old-school-heavy-weight-from-my-grandmother-it-didn’t-even-work types. The criteria for purchasing the phone matched the criteria for the new video equipment: simplicity.

Continue reading →

Posted in Generic Thoughts | 1 Comment