Butt, Er

Waitre...I steal butter. Or rather this is my first coup. I've never been that person, but times are tight. And snax is good with actual butter. These little gold popcorn pats of it are super duper handy too.

Excu...Fits right there in yer purse for emergencies. Cuz you never know when you might need a dab of butter. Gum in your hair. Stuck ring. Sap on the hood of your car.

But I...And I snagged them like a stealth burglar in the night. What with our waitress taking an hour to even take our drink order. RIGHT?! Indeed, me and my dinner date, thought we'd take the sneaky option and sit outside since we had that warm January night you always look forward to every year. See, there was a lively fundraising function on the inside...with a band, and tots (the running giggling kind not the tasty fried treats) and an hour wait for a table.  Did you say an hour???

Er...Yeah, so we waited an hour in the 'waiting area' of the restaurant, sitting outside reading our menus and wishing for drinks. We couldn't get an order in edgewise. I was glad to see my friend's function booming with success. The waitress says the Event Planner (they have one of those? and they still have a job? can I turn in my resume? just in case?) only expected 24 people. Are you kidding me?

As my friend said, I am truly shocked that they were only expecting 24 people. I mean what the heck?  I mean do they know who I am??? :) KK brings in a party! And that's NO LIE.

Quilt, Quibble, Quit.

We all have our obsessions I suppose. She has hers; I have mine. The girl on one hand has a healthy supply of scissors, bet you thought I was gonna say T-shirts! I, on the other hand, think each pair of scissors should have a specific, defined role. She, clearly, does not.

Eight pairs of scissors and not a one that can cut material. I think it may have been a set up. See, the girl also has an unhealthy supply of T-shirts, ah, there it is, the T-shirt reference. And doesn't want a single one cut.

I like to make quilts. Out of T-shirts. Little cut squared pieces of T-shirt. Cut with a clearly defined pair of material scissors (used on nothing in its lifetime but material). She likes to hoard, yes hoard, T-shirts. And what does a hoarder do? Clings to every day items in an abnormal obsessive irrational way.

I get it. Kind of. I did an essay in college about the importance of T-shirts. But I believe in a time and place to let go. And if you've got T-shirts from college, or worse yet, high school...it might be time. Or not, hence, the immortal T-shirt quilt. I thought it the perfect match; she and I. She has 852 T-shirts. And I have the ability to turn them into a blanket to keep us warm.

Wrong. She can't bear to let a single thread be cut. "What is it about this one?" I ask. "I went there", "my friend made his one", "I like Peanuts", "the color", "I've had this one 30 years". Yes, I could tell from the smell and the fact that I can actually see through the shirt. Baby, not only is it time to let go, but I can't even use those for a quilt...be a chilly blanket.

So I gave in. Keep your ratty T-shirts squirreled up in the unfinished room, you can use them as insulation. I'll cut all of mine and make a boring TV quilt. She actually buys shirts, I can't blame her. I get so many free I wouldn't dare spend money to get one more. And I'm not that great at quilting so it's just better this way for sure. At least for the sake of the relationship.

Below the Fold

When my friends find out how much I make (and the fact that it doesn't pay the bills) they think I'm crazy for quitting my financially comfortable job. They also suggest asking my boss for a raise. Mmmm...yeah, I think they call it non-profit for a reason.

So indeed, I took a bit of a pay cut, but the flexible schedule, nights, weekends, and holidays make it all worth it. I think. And yet, I struggle:

1. Where to get my news.
This has been quite a big dilemma. I used to get my fill of current events on the clock. I tried watching local news, but it turns out they need to pay me to watch that crap. I can't afford the paper nor do I want the pressure of reading it every day. Online...well, I spend a majority of my day on the computer and don't really want to do it a minute more. So if it doesn't cross my facebook newsfeed, it ain't news.

2. How to get exercise.
I used to commute to work by bike. Now I walk down the stairs, brew my coffee, and wear my pajamas into my home office. No commute required. I've gained 20 pounds. And aged 10 years. I can't touch my toes and my hips ache. When I walk the dog my arm hurts the next day. This sucks. When did I become that person?

3. I'm dehydrated.
Oh, I know how it sounds. It's true what they say about the water cooler, there's a certain social aspect tied to it. My kitchen faucet doesn't have nearly the same effect.  And I'm downing beer, coffee, and tea but now I'm hearing that doesn't even count. I've seen how they're all made and I can assure you plenty of water goes into everything. In fact, you can even see it in certain mass brews.

The good news is I've found a solution that addresses all three downfalls at once! At least for those days when I'm in the city. If I ride down to the Newseum I can get the front page news from across the nation in one quick ride by. Then I flip and climb back up the hill. Inevitably I get thirsty.

News. Exercise. Hydration. I still can't pay the bills, but I had Christmas and New Years off. And...there's your Christmas bonus!

Stop Waffling

Once upon a time I cried to my friend, "I just want someone to make me pancakes in the morning." See, I'm not great with breakfast foods and even worse at pancakes. And I don't want them often but every now and again I get a hankering for pancakes.

And I thought my time would never come. I would never be so lucky as to find someone to love who loved me back. No one to share my life with. No one to swap social theories or life dreams. No one to have sleep overs, pillow fights, or pint night...and I'm talking ice cream here. No one to decorate the tree, drive while I sleep, or tell me to put my laundry away. No one, damn it, to make me pancakes and coffee!

 

And this friend that I whined to about life and pancakes gave it to me straight that day, "Girl, you need to learn how to make your own pancakes!"

 

Well, I never did. To this day I still can't make pancakes. But I did get a waffle maker for Christmas. Actually I got a waffle machine, the waffle maker has been around for a while...and she claims she's not great with pancakes either. But she does make a mean egg.

Shaken and a Bit Stirred

The other day I left the house. We're talking country now, of course. It sounds crazy, but I don't often leave the country house. As much as I hate city traffic, I often find it harder to get around in the country. It involves gas and vehicles and miles. I can't hop on a bike, ride to the store, and be home in a flash. Nothing is as close as it appears.

So I load up the car with supplies for my big adventure to the big city. Water, snacks, GPS...Now I had seen this several times before but never actually read the sign. There, at the local watering hole, was a sign promoting the not-so-recent Skyfall. You've heard of it? You've seen it!? Great, let's grab a drink.

All you need to do is bring your ticket stub to this establishment and you'll get a drink at a discounted price. And I'm pretty sure it's not PBR. I wonder, though, would they really honor my ticket stub (I saw it in the actual city, or rather, not SBY. And the ticket doesn't exactly say Skyfall.

See, I know I should have blogged about this when it happened, but what with the holidays and all I guess I didn't have time. But the girl brought it up in conversation often. I guess it was a little bizarre. The girl wanted to see Skyfall (a fairly recent release at the time) one Friday (in fact BLACK Friday) whilst we were perched in the city. No prob. we've got theaters on every corner. HOWEVER, she said, I want a theater with only 18 people there. It was just an insane challenge not a crazy phobia or anything. She thought I couldn't do it. To be honest, so did I.

I mean really, where in the hell could you see a new release in the city on Black Friday??!? WHEAton of course. So I took her to the 'hood. There was no fooling her, she red.neckenized it right away. Cue Carol Anne in the vein of Poltergeist, No, No, you said NOT to go into WHEAton after dark, NO.

We enter the theater directly. The box office outside was dark. At the concession stand we were able to purchase our tickets. They made two little chicken scratch marks on a piece of scrap paper under a handwritten Skyfall heading. We were then issued two carnival style Admit One tickets in return for a twenty. Sit over there they say and motion toward an array of black pleather office chairs lined up in the lobby. It looked a bit like a small airport waiting area. OR a going out of business sale at Office Depot, which by the way, could be where they came from.

And there we sat, with a growing group of others who also collectively scratched their heads wondering if they truly understood the candy counter lady correctly. Finally, a man said, Skyfall? You can go in now. Slightly skeptical and somewhat untrusting we cautiously followed each other down a long darkened hallway as if we were about to be laughed off the screen in the latest version of Scream 8. The leaders taking two steps, turning a questioning glance sideways back at us, taking two more steps, shrugging, laughing, wondering where the hell this deserted hallway was leading us next.

To the theater of course. We eventually made it. And we should have brought the lobby chairs. No stadium seating. No drink holders. There was a bonus squeak in the chair and a spring poking up in an unpleasant place, so you had to sit still. But the film was focused and centered and the audio not too shabby. And by the way, 18 ticket holders joined us as the reel started to roll.

Now, about that $3 martini....

It's A Trap

No creatures were hurt in the making of this photograph...the blog, however, a different story.

So, I couldn't help but notice the girl's sadness whenever we came home to the country home to find empty mousetrap, empty mousetrap, empty mousetrap. Behind the dryer, in the ceiling, in the attic, nipping at my toe in the bathroom...

You may recall she had an escaped colony from NIMH creating a humansized mouse maze within the walls of her country home not so long ago. Well, perhaps long ago and never moving out, hence the headsized hole that now hangs in the spare room. And I don't have to tell you, nobody likes a sad girl. So I fixed it. Fixed it like one might fix a basketball game or an SAT score.

 

Because you can't really make a mouse jump in a trap, you do what you can. I borrowed a kitty's Christmas gift, as you can see above, stocked the stockade. It was cute for all of about a half second. THEN, we found the crime scene in the next room. When we checked trap #2 in the Hot Zone, ZAM! ZING! BOOM! Ladies and Germs we have a broken-necked-blood-drained winner! And my dear Watson, just to be clear, my work here is done.

 

After I confirmed the carcass was present and lifeless, dangling precariously above our heads just out of sight in the ripped apart ceiling, I slowly removed myself from the ladder, tagged the girl, and stepped aside, like any good city girl would. This is after all her kill. My job is to set the scary, snapping traps, thank god. Occasionally I rig them with fluffy catnipped replicas, for the sake of exciting the girl, and apparently then, I am called in to confirm when they've been successfully deactivated. At that point I then call in the CSI team, which does NOT include me.

 

I just lure them in...Girl!

 

"The bitch set me up"