Saturday, February 27, 2010
Friday, February 26, 2010
What I Did on My First Vacation
Well, not my first vacation ever, but my first vacation that is paid for my new job. Here are some of the highlights:
Alice and the Mad Hatter had a baby! I have affectionately been calling her Squeakers because she makes all the cute little newborn squeaks. She might get a different blog name down the road, but who knows.
Baby Girl might possibly have succeeded in beating me at pool, had she been exerting all her effort. Fortunately for me, she was more interested in the ball with the 4 on it, 4 currently being her favorite number. I was not to hit the 4 ball. She ensured this by kindly repositioning the cue ball for me each time it was my turn. I was kind enough to not hit the 4 ball, or many others, for that matter....
Alice is kinda smitten with Squeakers. She provides hours of fun. Our favorite thing to do is stare at her. And take pictures.
Alice and the Mad Hatter had a baby! I have affectionately been calling her Squeakers because she makes all the cute little newborn squeaks. She might get a different blog name down the road, but who knows.
Her family kind of likes her. This is Jumping Bean's first time holding her, right after she came home from the hospital. 
Baby Girl is a big sister! And yes, she is still Baby Girl. Just like Little Man might possibly remain Little Man well into his senior years, when I am 100 and he is visiting his crazy Aunt Holliberry in the old people place, like a dutiful nephew.
Baby Girl might possibly have succeeded in beating me at pool, had she been exerting all her effort. Fortunately for me, she was more interested in the ball with the 4 on it, 4 currently being her favorite number. I was not to hit the 4 ball. She ensured this by kindly repositioning the cue ball for me each time it was my turn. I was kind enough to not hit the 4 ball, or many others, for that matter....
Alice is kinda smitten with Squeakers. She provides hours of fun. Our favorite thing to do is stare at her. And take pictures.Tuesday, February 23, 2010
And I Quote:
"Which one of you is above 18?" ~~Skeezy man in the grocery store to me and the 17 year old I have with me. Ew. Ew. EW.
BABIES!!!
Alice and Mad Hatter are having a baby today! Yay for baby snuggles! If I can gain consent from the parents I will post pictures!
Also, I get to take vacation days. To go snuggle the baby. Good week!
Also, I get to take vacation days. To go snuggle the baby. Good week!
Monday, February 22, 2010
I Done Got Me a Car (and a Diet)
So I'm sure you noticed this on your own calendar, but Saturday was Daddy/Daughter bonding day. For my special daddy/daughter event, we went car shopping. Because the stupid-head collission repair center totalled my car. I ended up getting a car which I am quite pleased with, for a payment that might allow me to still purchase groceries every other month. But that wasn't the fun part.
At the first place we pulled into, we parked the car and walked up to the little building (picture seedy looking used car lot), and this youngish guy wandered out and said something disinterested like "so I guess you've done some research and you probably know what you want?" I believe my father was holding piece of paper in his hands. So, you know, he was deducing and all. Then we told him the car we wanted to look at, and he was like, oh, that's not here. That's on our other lot. "But it was listed online as being at this address," my father pointed out. *Blank stare*. Oooooookay. Well, um, thanks.
At the second place we looked (the other lot--also seedy), we parked and walked towards the little building. A young man and woman in jeans and t-shirts, enjoying a smoke, stood there. As we approached, they were like, "hey." After a moment, they extinguished their cigarettes. At some point they asked us if we were looking for a car. And then informed us the one we were looking for was on another lot. And showed us the crappiest used car, that wreeked of cigarette smoke (blank stare from the woman when I pointed this out..."I haven't been in that one.") and I'm pretty sure the holes in the upholstery were from cigarette burns.
At the third place we looked at (an actual dealership), there were five or six salesmen just standing around when we got there. They all kind of looked at each other, and quite possibly did rock paper scissors, and then one came our way. The one with the cowboy heels with clacky heels. Seriously? Cliche much? He was all humble, gorsh, let's see what we might have on this here lot. And then he wandered around like he'd never seen the cars before. And then he looked for a car that I'm pretty sure didn't actually ever exist while he pointed out other cars far above the mileage and price point I had specified. And then we got in a car and drove down the street to the other lots they owned. We got out, looked around, he scratched his head some more, and then we went back to the first lot. And he scratched his head some more. And he showed me a car that was out of my price range, too high in mileage, and crappy. And THEN (and I swear he was trying to create the appearance of working really hard for us to produce this magical car by going through all the aforementioned motions), he showed me a cheaply made car, with no bells and whistles, that was about 4,000 abovie my price point, and had 97,000 miles on it. Yeah, I did not feel saved. I think that's what he was going for. He ran inside to "ask what price he could knock it down to," while my dad half-heartedly looked at the car and discussed leaving. He emerged to introduce his associate, who was taking over because he "had a phone call." Associate proceeded to inform us that he was from Brooklyn, where they talk straight. And then he babbled about the pro's of the car, including the fact that there were screws you could loosen all by yourself to change the headlights. They shore do have some straight talk in Brooklyn.
Once we escaped there we went to a whole other county and found an unslimey salesperson who looked like they had not had their will to live sucked out of them, and we got me a car. And that, my friends, is how I plan to lose weight.
At the first place we pulled into, we parked the car and walked up to the little building (picture seedy looking used car lot), and this youngish guy wandered out and said something disinterested like "so I guess you've done some research and you probably know what you want?" I believe my father was holding piece of paper in his hands. So, you know, he was deducing and all. Then we told him the car we wanted to look at, and he was like, oh, that's not here. That's on our other lot. "But it was listed online as being at this address," my father pointed out. *Blank stare*. Oooooookay. Well, um, thanks.
At the second place we looked (the other lot--also seedy), we parked and walked towards the little building. A young man and woman in jeans and t-shirts, enjoying a smoke, stood there. As we approached, they were like, "hey." After a moment, they extinguished their cigarettes. At some point they asked us if we were looking for a car. And then informed us the one we were looking for was on another lot. And showed us the crappiest used car, that wreeked of cigarette smoke (blank stare from the woman when I pointed this out..."I haven't been in that one.") and I'm pretty sure the holes in the upholstery were from cigarette burns.
At the third place we looked at (an actual dealership), there were five or six salesmen just standing around when we got there. They all kind of looked at each other, and quite possibly did rock paper scissors, and then one came our way. The one with the cowboy heels with clacky heels. Seriously? Cliche much? He was all humble, gorsh, let's see what we might have on this here lot. And then he wandered around like he'd never seen the cars before. And then he looked for a car that I'm pretty sure didn't actually ever exist while he pointed out other cars far above the mileage and price point I had specified. And then we got in a car and drove down the street to the other lots they owned. We got out, looked around, he scratched his head some more, and then we went back to the first lot. And he scratched his head some more. And he showed me a car that was out of my price range, too high in mileage, and crappy. And THEN (and I swear he was trying to create the appearance of working really hard for us to produce this magical car by going through all the aforementioned motions), he showed me a cheaply made car, with no bells and whistles, that was about 4,000 abovie my price point, and had 97,000 miles on it. Yeah, I did not feel saved. I think that's what he was going for. He ran inside to "ask what price he could knock it down to," while my dad half-heartedly looked at the car and discussed leaving. He emerged to introduce his associate, who was taking over because he "had a phone call." Associate proceeded to inform us that he was from Brooklyn, where they talk straight. And then he babbled about the pro's of the car, including the fact that there were screws you could loosen all by yourself to change the headlights. They shore do have some straight talk in Brooklyn.
Once we escaped there we went to a whole other county and found an unslimey salesperson who looked like they had not had their will to live sucked out of them, and we got me a car. And that, my friends, is how I plan to lose weight.
Saturday, February 20, 2010
Important Community Resources
So I was watching The Soup with Joel McHale, a Seattlite, and naturally this led me to think about sex offender registry search web sites. You know, because he was talking about those creepy pageants that deranged mothers put their five year old daughters in where they dress them up like divorcees from the 80's and put more makeup on them than I think I've worn in my life and teach them to pose like grown women lookin' for a date in a seedy bar. And I wondered to myself, self, do they have a search engine for my area? And the answer is yes. You should look in your county and see if you have this kind of resource.
There are three creepy men living in my neighborhood. I know that I would recognize them if I saw them because I saw their pictures and they are clearly creepy. So my advice to you, besides to look up the registry in your area, is to look for creepy men. Those are the ones to watch out for.
But seriously, folks. How cool is it that you can get email alerts? I'm not one to get all paranoid and wrap my kids in bubble wrap before I let them ride their bike or something (these are my imaginary kids, Phoebe and Luke, naturally-- I call Pheobe Phebes for short), but with all the crazy things going on in the world today it's kind of nice that you can be a little more aware of who your neighbors are. Or is it? Is it better not to be reminded of creepy men constantly, given the number of kids that grow up without encountering them at close range? I know what I think, but what do you think?
There are three creepy men living in my neighborhood. I know that I would recognize them if I saw them because I saw their pictures and they are clearly creepy. So my advice to you, besides to look up the registry in your area, is to look for creepy men. Those are the ones to watch out for.
But seriously, folks. How cool is it that you can get email alerts? I'm not one to get all paranoid and wrap my kids in bubble wrap before I let them ride their bike or something (these are my imaginary kids, Phoebe and Luke, naturally-- I call Pheobe Phebes for short), but with all the crazy things going on in the world today it's kind of nice that you can be a little more aware of who your neighbors are. Or is it? Is it better not to be reminded of creepy men constantly, given the number of kids that grow up without encountering them at close range? I know what I think, but what do you think?
Wednesday, February 17, 2010
The Benefits of MyFace
I'm telling you... hours of fun:
Call the Nestle Hotline at 1-800-295-0051. When asked if you want to continue in English or Spanish, wait quietly for about 10 seconds and I PROMISE you will smile. Keep going and press 4. Then press 7.
Call the Nestle Hotline at 1-800-295-0051. When asked if you want to continue in English or Spanish, wait quietly for about 10 seconds and I PROMISE you will smile. Keep going and press 4. Then press 7.
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