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A gesture

Filed Under: Coupledom, Deep Thoughts, Rick by Julie — 4 Comments
November 22, 2010

I’ve found conversation posts are easier than writing actual posts, apparently, because this is the third one in a row. Hopefully I will have an actual written post tomorrow about my experience Four Loko. Yes, I drank some. I even have pictures. But that will be discussed tomorrow.

Last night they were talking about Prince William’s engagement on the news (big surprise) and one of the op-ed guys that Rick and I hate was wondering why so much media attention for this event. There are two reasons for this, Larry Mendte, the first being that we got rid of monarchy in this country over 200 years ago and have been the tiniest bit sorry ever since. The other is that since things turned out so tragically for Princess Diana, we’re hoping that her sons get the happy endings she was denied, and William is taking the first steps to that.

I told Rick that last night, and this followed.

Rick: “Yeah, we all want him to be happy. But he’s getting married, the poor sap.” (Rick has a jaded view about marriage, as you might imagine.)

Julie: “Well, they’ve been together eight years.”

Rick: “Yep.”

Julie: “We’ve been together eight years.”

Rick: “Yep.”

Julie: “You could get me a diamond and sapphire ring. You know, no marriage involved. Just as a gesture.”

Rick: “I could.” (he couldn’t keep a straight face after he got this out and started laughing hysterically)

And this is why I will never be married.

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The eating habits of feral boys

Filed Under: Coupledom, Rick by Julie — 5 Comments
November 11, 2010

I went grocery shopping on the way home tonight for the second time in a week (I realized I wanted to make spaghetti and chili next week–not on the same night–so I needed sausage and ground beef). I bought a $.99 (really, how annoying is it that there’s no cent symbol key anymore?) bag of Doritos and ate half to stave off hunger on the way home. I rubber banded the remaining half and stuck it on the counter, meaning to take it to work for part of my lunch tomorrow. That was about four hours ago. Rick got in about a half hour ago, noticed I was doing homework, and went off to the kitchen to make a hot dog. He came back to watch a You Tube video with me, then went back to the living room. I thought nothing of my Doritos until two minutes ago, when I suddenly noticed Dorito crumbs on the bed beside me.

Me: What are these??

Rick: What?

Me: Where did these Dorito crumbs come from?

Rick: Oh. Probably from my mouth when I was back there.

Me: Did you eat the Doritos that were sitting on the counter?

Rick: Um…

Me: I was saving them for lunch tomorrow.

Rick: Oh. Well, they just looked so good, sitting there. I didn’t know you were saving them. I was hungry!

(I point out the entire fridge full of food we have as a result of my two shopping trips, including cheese, pickles, olives, and other snack type foods.)

Rick: I’m sorry?

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“Move or I’m gonna have to cut around your B-cups.”*

Filed Under: Skool by Julie — 4 Comments
November 10, 2010

*actual line spoken by Hawkeye to Hot Lips in the pilot of M*A*S*H.

So Janice is a genius. (Say that three times fast, and I guarantee in the end you’ll be doing the conga. Janice is a gen-ius! Janice is a gen-ius!) In this comment right here, she suggested that I turn on captions while watching M*A*S*H. This had not occurred to me, mostly because I never use the captions. Because I am stupid. If I miss something, I might rewind the movie several times, and if I don’t catch it? I just let it go. Seriously, it had never occurred to me to switch on the captions.

But last night, I did, and GAME CHANGER! I was only watching episodes of the TV series last night, and while the captions are occasionally a little off, missing a word or so that I guess didn’t appear in the script, it made transcription So. Much. Easier. (Why yes, I am trying to use every possible method to convey emphasis in type. Emphasis does not come in just one kind, people. It’s a rainbow.)

I only made it through three eps last night, and they were all relatively early in the series (pilot episode, episode three, and one from the second season), but I can’t believe how totally misogynistic they were. The movie, yes, I knew the movie was misogynistic, but when I was little, I had a crush on Hawkeye and totally wished he would pay attention to me like he was to those nurses, because he was so cute! (Give me a break, this was ages 5-13, I didn’t know any better.) But last night, I was watching it thinking “Jesus, Hawkeye is a complete ass to those women. And so is Trapper.” (I might have had a crush on Trapper at a young age as well.) “And goddamn are they mean to Hot Lips, she hasn’t done anything to deserve this kind of treatment.” Ah, the distance between a 70s/80s dramedy and someone who came of age in the age of political correctness. I still enjoy the show, it’s still funny, but it’s got an edge to it that I never noticed before and will probably never miss again. It’s a good thing Alan Alda’s real feelings about women surfaced in the character of Hawkeye in later seasons and he stopped being such a bastard.

Piece of advice: when looking for paper topics, remember that you will have to examine your subject critically, even if it was a cherished part of your childhood, and bear in mind that this could ruin it for you. Choose subjects accordingly.

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My life is so freakin’ hard.

Filed Under: Skool by Julie — 7 Comments
November 7, 2010

I was very proud of myself, thinking up watching M*A*S*H for my term paper. The one thing that I hadn’t counted on was the note taking process. With books, you highlight or copy and paste, or whatever. With a movie, you have to rewind over and over again to get the lines transcribed perfectly. This wouldn’t be a problem with most movies whose scripts are available online. However, since it’s a Robert Altman film, there was a lot of improv, and the script available online bears little relation to what was happening on the screen in the end.

I have seven pages of notes, and although the film is only 116 minutes, it took me about three and a half hours to watch the whole thing. Still massively entertaining, and better than reading a monograph, but not as easy as I had thought it would be. And I still have to watch about five episodes. If this were Twitter, I would totally tag this post #firstworldproblems.

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Actual Conversation Between My Mother And I

Filed Under: Fambly by Julie — 2 Comments
November 5, 2010

(subtitle, “Can You Feel The Love?”)

My mother’s hearing is not what it once was. It hasn’t been for years, and for years, I have teased her about getting a Miracle Ear. Last night provided us with another example of why she should.

Me: And then Lori and I are going to dance at the last LCDJ event.

Mom: What about Janice?

Me: What? I didn’t say anything about Janice. I don’t know anyone named Janice.

Mom: You said something something Janice. Say what you said before.

Me: Um…LCDJ?

Mom: No. Before that.

Me: What about “dance”? Dance could sound like “Janice.”

Mom (laughing): No it doesn’t, you idiot. 32!  [aside, this is what she randomly assigned as my IQ number years ago]

Me (laughing): Who’s the idiot? I didn’t say anything about Janice! You need a Miracle Ear!

Welcome to my family, we mock with love.

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Staying and fighting

Filed Under: Politically Incorrect, Rants by Julie — 2 Comments
November 3, 2010

Today I wake up to find a map of my country that is mostly red. I find that my president this afternoon will once again take responsibility (in a press conference in a few minutes) for something that is not entirely his fault – that red map. And so I’m going to take responsibility, too.

I voted yesterday, just as I do every single time I am given the opportunity (I am out there on primary day as well, and I vote every year, not every two or every four). But that was the extent of my political activism this year. I was too worn down by more political commercials than I can count, too tired of hearing about it for the past year, and I didn’t do everything I could. I didn’t make my own get out the vote calls as the Obama administration and MoveOn and the Democrats asked me to do. Instead, I posted on Twitter and Facebook, and let it go at that. I didn’t even post my get out the vote message on this blog. I was complacent, I relied on social media to do my job for me, and I woke up in a red country. I’m sorry for that, and I will do better next time.

Now, Republicans, I’m willing to listen to what you have to say. I’m eager to see how you think you can do better. But if by better, you mean “Take away the healthcare that gave many of my friends with pre-existing conditions a chance to see doctors,” if you mean “Call everyone who doesn’t agree with us Socialists and Nazis and Communists and Hitler,” if you mean “Get rid of the things Obama has been able to do in the two years he’s had to clean up the mess it took Asshat Dubya eight years to make,” well then, you’re on notice. I’m here, I’m not leaving, and I’ve been reminded that it’s not just my civic duty to vote, it’s my civic duty to fight for what I believe in, because no one else should be expected to do that for me. I’m going to start doing that, just like a MOTHERFUCKING ADULT!

(Credit to Allie Brosh for the last phrase, even if I didn’t use it in her original context.)

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Even the blind monkey sometimes gets the coconut

Filed Under: Da Cats by Julie — 4 Comments
November 1, 2010

For as long as I can remember having cats, I’ve always had one bright cat and one…well, not so bright cat. Joe was a genius among cats, and so we had Tik, Jesse, and Freddie to balance him out. Since Joe passed, Charlie has taken on the mantle of smart cat in the house, because obviously Freddie wasn’t going to become smart over night. Or over a year. I mean, this is the cat whose big trick was getting on a stepladder, as seen here:

Charlie does many tricks. He fetches his toy mousies and brings them back, he begs for food at the counter (okay, that’s probably not a good trick, but it’s cute as hell), and he will sit like a prairie dog or give you a high five for a treat or a bit of food. He’s not quite as smart as Joe, I don’t think, but we praise him often for wanting to please us and perform, because Little Man was practically feral when we got him. We expect more from him than from Freddie because he’s obviously smarter, and because he does tricks, you often hear “Goo’boy, Charlie!” in our house. Tonight, however, Freddie must have gotten tired of all the praise showered on the interloper, because when I held out a piece of turkey to him, he slapped me four (he doesn’t have thumbs, four is all he’s got). I made him do it four times to make sure it wasn’t a fluke, but it seems that he’s learned a new trick. He also apparently learned how to sit like a prairie dog somewhere along the line, because he did that, too.

And yes, he has been praised repeatedly for his new skills. Sped Cat has proven that even slow cats occasionally learn new tricks. Goo’boy, Freddie!

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Conspicuous lack of SAFF post

Filed Under: Assorted Ailments, Craftiness Is Next To Godliness, Story Time by Julie — 2 Comments
October 29, 2010

As the gap in my posting shows, I went to SAFF. As this post shows, I survived SAFF. I spent a lot of money, drank a lot of alcohol, didn’t get a lot of sleep, and even have some pictures to show for my time away, which I hope to upload this weekend. (Cut me some slack, I got home Monday night after many delays and luggage lost, then found, by Delta, got sick Monday night, spent Tuesday in a haze, then went back to work and class Wednesday and yesterday. It’s been a busy week, and I’m seeing OK Go in concert tonight, so no time to upload photos.) Uploading photos mean that I can procrastinate cleaning the apartment in the manner that it deserves, as well as doing homework, so I foresee it happening.

Without the visual aid of photos, I don’t really have anything to write about. Wait, I take that back. I can tell you about Typhoid Marco. Please note that this story is not really new if you’ve read my Twitter or Facebook feed, but it’s a story, so what the hell.

I sat across the aisle (all two feet of it) from a whiny one year old named Marco and his mother on the plane ride back from Atlanta. Now, I totally understand about whiny kids, particularly around naptime, so it didn’t bother me so much, especially when we were above 10,000 feet and I could use my iPod. BUT, when we landed and were sitting on the runway (we had also been delayed for like an hour in Atlanta, so I had plenty of time to listen to Marco), she makes a phone call to someone and says “Yeah, we woke up to Marco throwing up, so I was washing sheets at 4 AM, but he seems fine now.”

1.)     No wonder kid was whiny. I am also whiny when I have spent the previous night throwing up.

2.)    They were apparently flying to the Czech Republic to see family, and I imagine those tickets were expensive, probably too expensive to reschedule.

3.)    But seriously, “he seems fine now” should have been code for “he’s still contagious, and he’s infecting the entire plane.” (Thus the sobriquet Typhoid Marco.)

4.)    We had no real food in the house when I got home, so I ate chocolate from the Chocolate Fetish for dinner Monday night. This was a waste of good chocolate when the germs Typhoid Marco had infested me with took hold at about 1 AM. Used chocolate really burns the nasal passages when it comes back.

6.) I felt better within 24 hours, so Typhoid Marco didn’t have the flu, just some 24 hour virus. This is good because I haven’t gotten a flu shot yet.

I could belabor this some more, but I won’t.

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TMI post!

Filed Under: Assorted Ailments by Julie — 4 Comments
October 19, 2010

A few months ago, after an entire summer fighting a raging infection of various sorts in my nether regions (not helped at all by the extreme heat and humidity), I found myself a new ob/gyn because the last one thought his time was more valuable than mine and saw no problem with me taking six hours to get through his office. I asked new ob/gyn (a woman, since I had determined I only have problems with male ob/gyns, like the other one who couldn’t find my ovary) perhaps some of my infection was caused by the birth control I was on. We talked about various symptoms I was having and determined that no, that wasn’t a cause, but hey, did you know your brand of birth control was invented in the stone age? I had never really thought about it, but since I’d first been placed on that pill in 1997, I could see where she was coming from.

She put me on a different kind of pill, one that was supposed to give me lighter periods and make me run faster and jump higher and stop that pesky spotting mid-cycle that meant I was probably ovulating – OOPS! Since I had been on stone age pill with only a few breaks since 1997, she warned me that my body would have to adjust to the new pill.

I had no idea what that actually meant until about three weeks into the new pill, I realized I was kind of batshit crazy as my body adjusted to new hormone levels. I think the craziness lasted three weeks the first month. It is now down to apparently only the three days before my period, since I realized that Shark Week starts on Thursday, and probably my sojourn through Bat Country was responsible for me hating everyone at work this week.

Some people will tell you that liberated women shouldn’t blame their bodies for their moods, because that’s something unenlightened men will do: ask you if it’s your time of the month. I, on the other hand, own that my hormones are hanging out in the mosh pit right now, and if a man asked me if it was my time of the month, I would tell him yes. Right before I put the smack down on him. Bat Country, it’s a hell of a ride.

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Like an Ivy League Disney World…on crack.

Filed Under: The Girls by Julie — 2 Comments
October 17, 2010

I have gone crazy at fiber festivals, dropping cash like there was never going to be more yarn or fiber. I have done the same at Disney World, thinking “Well, what the hell, you’re on vacation.” But I have never, not at Disney World, not at SAFF, not even at the STR booth at Rhinebeck on Saturday, seen a feeding frenzy like I saw at the Coop this weekend.

The Coop, for those of you who don’t live in Cambridge, sells Harvard and MIT logo merchandise in every size, shape, and price range. Well, maybe not every price range. I didn’t see anything under $5, for instance. But everything above that, yes, I saw. And the swarm of people in there this weekend for Freshman Parents’ Weekend…my god. It was like we had all been drinking the Harvard Kool-Aid. You could see it in everyone’s face: “My kid (or pseudo-stepkid) is in Harvard and seems to like it here, WE CAN FINALLY BUY THE LOGO STUFF!!!”

In my insanity, I might have bought a blanket, a t-shirt for Samang, a coffee cup for my mom, a Harvard Fair Isle winter hat, and two collapsible beer cozies. Among other things. Rick might have bought me a blinged-out Harvard shot glass. (He bought way more stuff than that, I just picked out the most random thing he bought.) Oh, the insansity.

And yet…my pseudo-stepkid is in Harvard and not only seems to like it there, she seems to be doing fairly well there. I think I have a right to be a proud Harvard parent. If you see me on the street, decked out in my Crimson gear, please try not to mock me. I will thank you for it.

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