Tuesday, March 31, 2009

hi Subject Lines ... blah

I was just about to write an email to a friend of mine when I realized I didn't know what "subject" to give the email... "Hi" was my first thought, but then I decided that didn't really say anything... so then I thought... "ok maybe I should just write the email and the come up with a subject line later", but then I realized I really wasn't going to write to her regarding any subject in particular... ok well there was one subject I was KINDA curious about who won the poker game at her house on Saturday night, but that hardly seemed like a lengthy enough topic to warrent an entire email... so then I ended up just closing the "compose message" window to stew on it some more.

I realize though that subject lines can be kind of intimidating to somone, like myself, who stresses about every small detail of social interaction the way I do. Having "NO SUBJECT" seems like an immediate declaration that you are sending a pointless email that isn't really worth reading anyway, and subjecting ( I know I'm not using that word right, but oh well) your email as "Hi" seems like pretty much the same thing as having no subject... I have a few other token worthless subject lines that I throw out every once and a while to good friends who I am just writting to to see where the key board takes me... one is "..." the other is "blah"... blah usually indicates that I am going to complain about something or that I am bored and am just subjecting (using that word correcltly now) other people to random typing so that I may feel slightly more amused.

I think actually now that i think about it, I rarely have a pertinent subject line to my emails... at least not the ones I compose as part of my personal life. (I am all about consicise pointful subject lines when I email at work... so I'll just go ahead and pat myself on the back for that super accomplishment !) Anyway, I am looking through my "sent mail" from my Gmail account and the occasional event crops up that gets a poinent subject line such as "Reno?" or "tonight" but most of the subjec lines I've written recently are "hey" or "hi" or "happy monday (tuesday, wed... etc)" ... damn I suck... I can't believe I never worried about Subjecting (New meaning again) my emails before. I guess I usually just go for the emailing before I give it too much though, but the particular email I was going to write that prompted this blog entry was kind of a way for me to feel out if I did something wrong or not... 'cause I am worried that I might have jacked up the poker game I was playing in last Saturday when I left early and sold my chips for less than they were worth to someone else especially since that was right after I had just kind of questionably won a hand...

....We were playing texas hold 'em and there was an off suit straight on the table and I was a little tipsy and wasn't paying too much attention so I thought that was the best thing I had, but I also had a flush and I had the king or ace of the suit and the other guy who was still in had a flush also and had a lower card in his hand so my hand was technically better, but he asked if I wanted to just play what was on the table and I said yes, so he thought I should have lost the hand, but everyone else said I should get the pot... so I took the pot and sold all the chips...

I guess I kind of want to find out what happend with the game to assuage my guilt, but I dont want to come off like I feel guilty because then that is like I am saying that I am guilty of doing something wrong and I'm not totally sure if I am... but if I just drop it then its like I was just drunk and didn't know any better... I mean I was pretty tired and watned to get enough rest to be able to enjoy going to Reno the next day... and I was TRYING to be thoughtful of the rest of the players in the game ... someone had offered to let me put my chips away and take back the initial $20.00 I had bought in with, but I knew if I took my $ 20.00 out of the pot that the winner of the game would end up with a smaller pot so I decided selling my chips was the best thing for the game (even though I had about $25.00 worth of chips that I sold for $17.00)... anyway since I dont think anyone from that poker game reads my blog, I guess I have decided that rather than subjecting and writing an email about the game to my friend who hosted the game I am going to just go ahead and publish this entry as penance for any problem I might have caused in the poker game...

Damn, when I started this entry I really thought I was just going to write about how hard it is to write a good subject line for an email, but instead I seem to have uncovered my underlying issues with subjecting a particular email and have dealt with those issues... what a productive entry this has been (for me... sorry for wasting anyone elses time who might have wandered upon my self help therapy session)... and also I've come up with a new usage for the word subjecting... that is to say I used the word subjecting wrong several times because I was too lazy to figure out a more appropriate word. SCORE!

My Weekend of Gambling and Bikalaciousness

Last weekend was the weekend of Gambling... On Friday night Tony and I went to a poker game at Shane and Vika's house and I was doing pretty good but was kinda tired and wanted to go to bed so I sold my chips off to other players for $37.00 and recouped nearly all of the $40.00 that Tony and I had bought in for... I'm not sure if Tony and I will be invited back for more poker games in the future though 'cause I'm pretty sure it was somewhat disruptive to the game for me to sell my chips 'cause I unloaded a bunch of them for under face value... what can I say though one thing that seems to instantly evaporate my respect for games and competitiveness is sleepiness... plus I knew we were going to Reno on Saturday so I wanted to make sure we had some cash on hand to lose in the "BIGGEST LITTLE CITY ON EARTH"(... that phrase is written and repeated by Reno-promoters all over Reno by the way...) even though there really doesn't seem to be anything big about Reno at all... I'm not complaining, I'm not a size queen or anything...but the down town area where the casinos and stuff are is only about 4 square blocks... OF CRAZY FUN!!!!



Tony and I had a jam packed 30 hour trip to Circus Circus in Reno / a Random snowy area on the side of the road on the way home from Reno (I think it was in Truckee).... and we managed to come home with $2.00 of Cash and about 6 new stuffed animal friends (and we didn't even have to get cash from an ATM to play with at any point.) I'm actually really proud of how thrifty we were with our spontaneous little vacation. The room was about $ 60.00 and we spent about $40.00 on dinner the night we got there and maybe $30.00 on Gas and lunch on the way up, but since I was expecting to lose our $40.00 in cash at the poker game the night before we left I don't even consider that a loss... plus we got to have a super cool winning moment at the first slot we played... it was a huge wheel of fortune slot with a wheel that is the size of the one they use on the TV show ... and we were actually up about $50.00 after about 5 minutes of playing, so that was pretty cool... Tony wanted to keep playing, but I had dreams of paying for our trip entirely with slot machine winnings... oh well... at least we lasted most of the trip before we ran out of cash.







Anyway, We made it home by 3:00 pm on Sunday (after stopping briefly to play in the snow and take lots of wintery looking pictures)...















and I had kind of told myself before I left work on Friday that if we won any money this weekend I would take that as justification to buy myself a new bike... and also Shane had given us a catalog of bikes on sale at "Performance Bike Shop" and there was a bike that he pointed out that was perfect for my commute and was on sale for $150.00 off... but the sale ended on Sunday at 6:00... so at about 4:30 I decided that the $ 0.15 voucher that Tony and I had brought home with us (so we could take a frowny face picture of our loseriness) counted as winning something over the weekend, so we headed off feeling fully justified in purchasing me a new bike... and so I did... and it is GLORIOUS!!! Her name is Sherpa and she is shiny and bluish and she has disc brakes and is sooooo much faster than my old bike.


I didn't even realize what a pile of shit my old bike (that I didn't bother to name because it was just another bike that i figured I would ride for a year or so until I finally busted the crank) was... but I LOVE SHERPA. She is the most magnificent vehicle I have ever owned and I am definitely going to take care of her so she has a long thriving life and we can ride many many miles together... I actually have shaved 15-20 minutes off of my commute by riding Sherpa... and I have gotten passed by other bikers way less... so that makes me feel less losery on my commute than usual. YAY! Now I totally wanna plan a time next year or something to try to ride to Socal or go on a long bike camping trip. I want to see the world with my little Sherpa... Ok, now I'm getting creepy, but yeah it makes such a difference to have a nice bike as opposed to a Costco, dumpster or early 1990s bike to ride!

Wednesday, March 25, 2009

My whiteness

Last Saturday when I was buying bananas at el supermercado down the street from our house the cashier looked at me and said "es dos en once" ( well she actually probably didn't say that exactly, but since I suck at Spanish that is what it sounded like to me... ). It was super flattering that she though that I was Latina though... I wish I was Latina... or Asian... or something ... Anyway, I didn't want to ruin the illusion for either of us, so when I handed her a five and she gave me my bananas and change and said "gracias" I just said "mmm hmm" and left so I wouldn't have to say "thank you" in English or "Grassyass” in my I-can't-speak-Spanish-too-well accent and totally blow my cover.

Other cultures just seem to be so much more interesting than white American culture and Latina women and Asian women and Native American women and women from most anywhere other than the general Anglo decent are so much more exotic and interesting looking and prettier than I am, so of course it felt like a great compliment that the cashier that day assumed I was Latina... it was like she thought I was prettier than I really am.

I think one of the best unintended compliments I've ever gotten was when I was in college going to a swim meet. I was looking at a magazine my friend had brought me from Japan and one of my teammates from Hawaii said "Oh are you Japanese? I didn't know that".

I was floored. The notion that I could even remotely pass myself off as Japanese just tickled me pink! ... and this notion had come from someone who is pretty much Asian herself. (I think technically Hawaiians are considered Pacific Islanders, but they get grouped together a lot on surveys where you are supposed to check a box for your ethnicity... I'm pretty sure I've seen "Asian/ Pacific Islander" more than a couple times as an option... and I think the native inhabitants of Hawaii came originally from Japan although I could be totally pulling that out of my ass but I do feel like I heard that somewhere) , so it made it all the more powerful of an implication coming from her, but Before I could tell her that I wasn't actually Japanese another girl on my swim team, who is actually Japanese laughed and said "geeze she's obviously not Asian. Not everyone who can read Japanese is from Japan."

So my moment of feeling like a beautiful lotus flower from the East was quickly dashed to the ground and then when my teammate asked me to read something to her from the magazine I also had to explain that I did not read Japanese either but was just looking at the pictures in the magazine... and then I felt really boring and plain for the rest of that bus ride. Oh well. It was a nice moment anyway.

It's not that I think I’m ugly. I don’t. I even have moments where I pass by a mirror and wanna go back for a second eye full of myself… but then I’ll be watching tv or surfing the net or looking at magazine covers while I’m in line at the grocery store… and I’ll realize that I am pretty…PRETTY AVERAGE LOOKING (ZING !). There’s not really anything wrong with me (aside from the occasional wart, cold sore, pimple, dandruff flake, stretch mark, oily hair or split end … ok, well yeah I guess I’m somewhat busted looking, but more than that) I just don’t have a super exciting and exotic look… Apparently even when I am actually excited and having fun… I still look dull.

All my life I have constantly heard that I should “smile more” and I’ve had people asking “what’s the matter” when the answer really and truly is “nothing”. My neutral expression is just kind of frowny I guess… so my excited expression just seems to come off as mildly amused. Last weekend, for example, I took Tony to a magic dinner show for his birthday, and there were magicians coming around and doing card tricks and things while we were waiting for dinner to be served and I was having a really good time and I thought all the tricks were good and stuff, but I think I was going to have to just get up and start dancing or something if Tony had to say “This IS what she looks like when she’s excited” to one more roving magician who thought he had to point out sarcastically how “EXCITED” I looked. Blah…

One thing that is going pretty well for me lately though is my skin… I seem to have finally found a skin care regime for my face that works pretty well. I have been loyal to Clean and Clear ever since I found their moisturizer that actually contains acid… I’ve had Acne issues for as far back as I can remember and pretty much any moisturizer I used made my skin break out, but I finally was able to give my face the moisture that it deserves once I found “Clean and Clear’s Duel Action Moisturizer” which pampers my face with cool moisturizing lotion… while also burning my face with salicylic acid… its pretty awesome !!! I feel my acne is so much better since I found that moisturizer… but I still would not say I have great skin. My big (pun intended) skin problem I think is that I have huge pores on my face… (wow suddenly I feel this post turning into a wanna be proactive commercial…)

Anyway, here is an example of how awfully big my pores are… About a year or so ago after Tony and I had just returned from a camping trip I was squeezing a black head on my cheek and it turned out to actually not be a black head at all… a flea suddenly wriggled out of my face… it was so very very VERY disturbing... and itchy… so yeah I kind of put it out of my mind, but there has been an onslaught of commercials recently for pore minimizing cleansers and creams and what not and I would say pores that small blood sucking insects can hide in are too large, so while I was at target a couple weeks ago buying groceries I wandered past the skin care aisle and I noticed that there were some skin care products ON SALE… and Target was so kind as to put big enticing red stickers on these items to let me know what GREAT BUY they were… so I ended up buying 3 new facial cleansers and a night-time moisturizer… and I saved $3.00 on the whole lot. SCORE! Anyway, the random on sale products that I got work great (three were clean and clear and the third was Biore, but it was so cool I had to buy it… it’s a “warming facial scrub” and it heats up almost to the point that it feels almost like touching a hot stove just by rubbing it around in your hand with water… chemistry is CRAZY) … anyway my skin has never looked better, but I’m pretty sure that since all the products I bought were marked down they will soon be discontinued and my face will go back to being a gross pitted desert. Until then I’m going to enjoy it though… even if it is only smooth WHITE PERSON skin at least its smooth.

Wednesday, March 18, 2009

names... and a random thought about chapped lips

I like naming things. I just decided that when I buy a new bike I'm going to name it Zippy. It will be a pretty ironic name if I continue to ride as slow as I do now, but the next bike that I buy is going to be an actual expensive light way hardcore cyclist bike, and I rode my friends fancy smancy bike the other day and I think if I could only use one word to describe that experience I'd have to say I felt ZIPPY... those bikes are pretty darned efficient!

Anyway, another name that I recently bequeathed was Herbie ... I felt that was a good name for my cold sore since Herbie kind of sounds like Herpes... and since I get a cold sore in the same spot at least 2-3 times a year I thought it was about time I give it a cute name.

I think I better have a lot of pets before I have kids 'cause there are a ton of names that I like and I don't plan to have a ton of kids, but I wanna be able to give the names out to someone... Nathan for example... I think I will save that name for a child 'cause it just sounds so cute for a baby or you could call him Natie if you wanna make it even more babyish but then when he gets older he can be Nate and that is just a cool sounding name... but if he wants to still be Nathan that still sounds professional and sophisticated for an adult... plus there was a hot guy in one of my classes in high school named Nate and so I assume that any child named Nate or Nathan will grow up to be attractive... and you've really gotta do all you can to ensure that your kids have every advantage in life so I think I owe it to my son (if he should ever come to exist) to name him Nathan.

Another of my favorite boy names is Tavis. Ever since I heard that one of the trumpet players in Reel Big Fish was named Tavis I was blown away by the coolness of that name. It is almost a common name (Travis... which is a crappy name that I hate by the way) and yet it is so unique. I bet a child named Tavis would get his name mispronounced and mispelled ( spell check has just informed me that I MISSPELLED "mispelled" but I think that's kinda funny so I'm gong to leave it) all the time though so I am thinking maybe Tavis is a good dog or cat name... although I tend to like to give pets names that are descriptive of their physical appearance or personality. Misty, my cat, is so named because she is a long haired gray cat and her fur kind of resembles a mist surrounding her body... I wanted to just name her Mist but my ex boyfriend who I was dating at the time when I got her said that was a lame name, so now, even though he is no longer in my life, he is still keeping my cat from having a slightly cooler name than she otherwise would have...

For girls I like the name Chase and Corsica. I think if I have a daughter i will name her Chase though... or maybe Chaise... yeah I think with the I is better. I like that name 'cause I've always liked androgynous names for girls I think it makes them more mysterious or something, but yeah it just appeals to me for some reason it just sits well for me, but I can't think of any chicks I've ever known named Chaise... maybe it was a character in a movie or something... The name Chase for a boy doesn't have an affect on me one way or another though. I knew a guy in college named Chase and he was really cool, but I wouldn't name my first born after him.

There are Tons of other names that I like but I can't think of any others right now... oh I do think my brother and Nicole picked an excellent name for their daughter, Bailey, its a very pretty girl name I think and its also a bit androgynous so she will grow up to be cool and mysterious a little. So that's good that I'll have a cool niece. My cousin's son is named Brek and I really like that name too. Its very unique but it has a good strong sound to it and stuff... so yup, good names in my family. The next generation will be full of cool kids!

by the way why (this is totally unrelated to the rest of this blog and might be better suited as a status update on face book... or perhaps just a random comment to through into a conversation, but here I am typing so I'll just throw it out there...) why is it that sucking it up and wait until your lips heal themselves is better than the best chapstick on the market ? Chapstick and carmex and lipstick and lip gloss and all of those things just seem to make your lips feel better for about 15 minutes and then they dry up worse than ever and crack and bleed until you put more stuff on them... but if you just leave your lips untreated they may get chapped every once and a while, but ultimately you will experience much longer periods of soft managbleness than you will with the products... why is it so hard to make a long lasting unharmful lip moisturizing product?

Friday, March 13, 2009

The Shoevolution is coming... aren't you intrigued?

The other day I was riding my bike and my feet were FREEEZZZZing, as usual, and I had a brilliant idea for an invention... bike powered shoe heaters. I have no idea why they don't exist already... it must be because my genius ass didn't get around to thinking about it until a few days ago!

Here is the basic concept: There are already special shoes that attach themselves to your bike pedals and you already have to pay hella money for them so why not throw a heater into them. The power for the heater would come from kinetic energy produced as the wheels on your bike spin around and turn a tiny turbine via a magnet attached to the spokes of your bike and another magnet attached to the little turbine and then you just need to run wires from the turbine generator through the frame of the bike and have them charge a battery that would be in the bottom of the shoe. The battery would then power a little heat coil system in the shoes and voila toasty toes!!!

Since they already have lights for bikes that are powered using the energy from the revolving wheels on the bike and they already have batteries for hybrid cars that are charged in the same there's no reason why someone shouldn't put all this existing technology together and keep my feet warm during cold winter bike rides... and hell, I bet with a good enough design the shoes could hold a charge even after you are done riding. Thus I could have bike shoe heated feet all day long (provided I don't feel like a dork walking around in bike shoes all day and it's not uncomfortable to do so).

These shoes would save so much electricity ! With my self warming shoes I wouldn't have to use a space heater anymore and space heaters are total electricity hogs...but why stop at a heater... maybe you could pull the battery out of your shoe once you've arrived at your destination and use it to power your lap top, ipod or coffee maker as well... this invention could be the answer to the energy crisis... I may have just saved the world!!!

Now I just need to think of a name... my first instinct is to go with: "Magic Shoes", but I have a feeling the creators of Forest Gump may not be too keen on that... or maybe they would... the business world is all about synergy... or maybe I could call them :"shoevolution"... as in "spread the word, Global warming will be reversed: the shoevolution is coming" ... I think that would be a pretty good billboard campaign. (who isn't a sucker for those vague ad campaigns where you have to go home and google what you read to find out what they hell its about ? I know I am !!! I think Forgetting Sarah Marshall had a pretty good campaign like that. I only saw a couple billboards for that movie and they just said things like "My mom always hated you Sarah Marshall,” and “You do look fat in those jeans Sarah Marshall." and it seemed conceivable to me that this was just a personal vendetta some guy had against his ex since I didn't know yet that Sarah Marshall was actually a character in a movie... I seriously considered seeing that film in theatres solely based on the genius billboard campaign... but then the price of movie tickets scared me away so I waited for netflix... it was  pretty good though... anyway, that is the kind of ad campaign I'm gonna go with for the shoe heaters... they are going to be the biggest thing since Heeleys! You just wait!!!

...damn I googled shoevolution and it seems to already exist... I wonder if Shoeloution (Shoe/ solution ?) is as powerful... or maybe just something like "Volt" ?

Thursday, March 12, 2009

Thoughts aboutThinking…

I wonder what thoughts are like when you don’t speak any language… my cat, Misty, always looks like she is plotting something, but I wonder what that is like for her… I wonder if she is visualizing what she will do using only imagery instead of language or if she does have some form of language. I usually think about what I’m going to do using words… it just seems quicker and easier than imagining a visual scenario of what I want to do. Animals seem to be able to interpret scent and sound much better than people, so they probably recall scents and sounds in much better detail than we can, so I’m sure those senses are a lot more involved in their thought processes.

Misty doesn’t talk, but she can definitely communicate with Tony and I though. For example when she started to see moving boxes appear around our apartment last year it put her in a pretty shitty mood. (Literally … Her preferred method of expressing her distaste in Tony’s and my actions is to crap on Tony’s pillow), so when she was upset about the idea of moving she found a way to let us know it. She also glares at us when we’re annoying and leads us to her food when she’s hungry… and also she mews at us all the time with the same sounding mew, but Tony and I are unfortunately too dense to figure out what she’s trying to say.

...There seem to be different layers of brain activity. What I consider to be my “thoughts” are the words I string together to form a notion of something in response to a situation or the way it makes me feel. Right now I am thinking about each word I type… and also thinking about the words I want to use to type my next thought… the part about finding words to use seems to be coming from a different part of my brain than the part about the words I’m using though… its like the non-verbal part of my brain has a notion that it is trying to convey to the verbal part of my brain so it can match a word up with it… so I guess I can come up with the same ideas with or without language… its just a lot harder to convey them in a way that I can share with other people or in a way I can remember later… I can read the words I am typing or maybe even remember the words later without rereading them or I can share my words with others to convey what I’m thinking, but the general notion that I’m conceiving of seems to be back in the way back of my brain without needing words to go with it… there had to be a notion of the concept of thought before there was an actual word for it… you can’t really make up a word for something that has never crossed your mind.

Even having the advantage of being able to use a language I sometimes get inclinations that I don’t really understand at all… like I’ll have a craving for SOMETHING? And I have no idea what exactly… like I have a general direction like sweet or savory, but there will be some specific texture or something that I want and I just do not know what I can eat to satiate that hunger. SOo annoying… also sometimes get a vague urge to DO SOMETHING… usually its like a desire to create something… so I will draw for a while and that’s ok or I’ll write and that’s ok… but it doesn’t really fulfill my creative urge, but I know I wanna do something artistic or sometimes I’ll feel like I want to do something athletic, yet nothing seems to really sound fun when you ask me about it… maybe when I feel like that it just means I’m getting a craving for something I had or did a long time ago, but I don’t remember what it was… anyway, this is starting to feel like one of the awful philosophy papers I wrote in college, so yeah I’m done now…

Friday, March 6, 2009

Me + Facebook = : ) Me + phones = : <

Sorry about the title…for some reason lately: me + fake math equations = YAY : ) !!!

I seem to be turning into a veritable Facebook socialite lately… I feel a need to post pics, and status updates and links all the time these days… and I feel like every single one of my facebook friends needs my commentary on everything they do on facebook as well… This is a fairly recent development. When I first joined facebook I was very hesitant to post anything, but now all of the sudden I just can’t get enough!

I can see this turning into the beginning of some dark downward spiral that ends with me going broke after joining one of those virtual world things where I have to spend actual money (or at least the virtual money that is directly deposited into my bank account for working at my actual job) on cute virtual outfits and virtual pets and virtual beers and whatnot in the little virtual universe. God knows I love role playing games or RPGs if you will ( I keep getting final fantasy withdrawals… why won’t Squarenix release FFXIII already?)

…I am pretty sure if I actually allowed myself to go check out one of those virtual sites I would be pretty screwed… When I was in college I was hooked on this video game for N64 called Harvest Moon, which was a game that basically consisted of 15 minute cycles of doing daily chores such as watering plants, milking cows, selling my milk, harvesting my plants and going fishing… after about 15 minutes the next day would start and then I would do all of my chores again… I did this for HOURS AT A TIME rivet-TING!! It seems so sad to think about it now, but when I am playing an RPG I just get totally sucked in… which I guess is ok in moderation.

I am also avoiding twitter ‘cause I figure the “status” thingy in facebook is pretty much the same thing as twitter and I don’t know if I have enough material to put up a witty “status” on facebook AND then tweet some other clever thing as well… and it just seems tedious and stupid to be twittering and facebooking the same thing, so I shan’t be twittering anytime soon… Although I am probably a few days away from breaking down and subscribing to other people’s twitters… what’s the harm in reading what everyone else is doing every minute of the day?

Anyway, even though I do love facebook, I don’t have a ton of friends on there like some people do. The other day I was doing some facebook stalking and I saw that my friend’s sister has over 750 facebook friends… HOLY CRAP! I am quite positive that I have not met 750 people throughout the course of my ENTIRE LIFE! Not to mention the fact that of all of the people I have ever met only like 5% of them could remember my name to look me up on face book. I don't even remotely have the time to meet 750 people... I'm way too busy facebooking all the time to go meet people... geeze.

I seem to have the opposite problem with phones as I do with facebook. Whereas I am becoming miss chatty over-poster on facebook, I am tremendously shy almost to (or maybe all the way to) the point of being phone-phobic. In general I just get really shy and can’t think of a damn thing to say when someone calls on the phone… I think my social schizophrenia has something to do with the fact that I have a lot more time to formulate the perfect witty little quip to throw down on facebook, but with the phone I’ve got to DO IT LIVE! And that kind of pressure melts my brain into a puddle!

I can do a really strong “hell-o” on the phone but everything after that just feels like I am desperately grasping in the dark for something to say… I have a few friends where this is not an issue… I’d say I probably have 4-5 casually-phone-chattable peeps, but with everyone else that I talk to on the phone I suddenly start acting like a parrot or something. The majority of the phone conversations I have consist of me giving 1 word answers to all questions asked of me and then repeating the same question back to the person with whom I'm speaking in a really quick awkward fashion… so for example if someone says to me “how was your weekend” I will say to them“GoodHowWasYours?”… and I also have this problem on the phone where I don’t really know how or when to end the phone call so often it ends like this:
...Them “ok So I’ll see you around 6 then”
Me: “Ok…”
Them “ok
ME: (not sure if they’re still there)…
Them: (not sure if I’m still there)…
ME: (look at the phone to see if we are still connected… then hang up slowly whether or not it is)

So it’s no wonder that I’m not exactly a bustling socialite in real life… Thank God I seem to be able to handle phones like a normal human being at work though. I have the keen ability to turn on my “its just a job” personality once I walk through the door of my office and I have no problem calling people up and pestering them about paying past due bills and I answer phone calls and seem to be able to converse on the phone in a fairly articulate and cheery manner, yet when it comes to talking with people in my personal life… phones scare the bejeesus out of me… even ordering a pizza is like my worst nightmare… I have no problem… or at least less problem going to a pizza parlor and picking up a pizza to go, but for some reason making that simple phone call just makes me want to hide under my bed. It makes no sense and I wish I knew what the hell my hang up is, but I just do not like phones.

I remember one time when I was in Jr. high my brother and I were home alone and we were supposed to order pizza for dinner, so my brother, knowing that I have a ridiculous phone phobia, got me to wash his car in exchange for him ordering the pizza. Despite the fact that I feel that I have progressed pretty far with my social skills since junior high, if given the choice today I still would rather wash a car than call and order a pizza. Forutnately though internet pizza ordering seems to be getting more and more prevalent... so maybe I am not alone with this whole phone phobia thing.

Thursday, March 5, 2009

I love you iGoogle ; )




I am completely amazed when an artist is able to illustrate two totally different pictures within the same exact space. Or better still three...

How did anyone ever figure out how to encompass three faces in one simple picture ... every time I see that sort of optical illusion, MY MIND IS BLOWN!!!! I have tried many times to draw one of these multifaceted optical thingies, but my repeated failure has lead me to believe that perhaps you have to be able to draw well to begin with in order to become a successful illusionist. My attempts at optical illusions seem to all look like nothing in particular from one angle and then when you look at them from another angle they just look like crap.

Artists know how to trick the human brain into seeing something in detail while furnishing as little detail as possible. Those clever artistic bastards play on the mental weaknesses of their viewers to make them fill in the missing bits of an incomplete picture and we are left wondering if we have some weird perversion that makes us see dolphins when we are looking at a picture of people groping one another.

Anyway, Both of the above illusions come from the "optical illusion of the day gadget" on my igoogle home page. It's kind of sad how much my iGoogle home page is my window to the world... I think I may have written this in my blog before, but an alarming percentage of my conversations with people seem to begin with either " The other day on the morning show I listen to... " or they begin with a quote from something I read or saw on my iGoogle homepage:




Isn't is GLORIOUS?
... it is my source of news and weather, a reminder of upcoming events... Also, I've been known to try to work a Spanish word of the day into a conversation with Jose or quote an iGoogle quote of the day or joke of the day here and there (today's joke and quote of the day were pretty lame, so I'm not going to throw either of those down right now)... and recently on my iGoogle page Tony put up some GPS gadget that is linked to the GPS in his cell phone so I can see where he is at all times... HOORAY STALKER TECHNOLOGY! so with all of my sweet ass gadgets I pretty much get hours and hours of joy and entrainment from my iGoogle home page...At this point I can't even search things on the "classic google home" page anymore... It's just so boring: it's all white and empty like some pale sickly person with no imagination... SO LAME! I need my screen to be filled with art and optical illusions and all of my personalized crap if I'm going to bother to google things... if Google ever took away "iGoogle" I don't know if I could handle it... I would certainly cry and throw a temper tantrum at the very least...I LOVE YOU iGOOGLE LETS BE BFFS FOR LIFE!

oh, by the way, guess who finally figured out how to put pictures in her blog (after only having a blog for like 3 years)?!? ... That's right this girl right here:




SCORE!

Oh and speaking of having this blog for 3 years... I would like to take a moment to note that 2009 is now officially my most productive blogging year EVER... it didn't take much to make 2008 suck it, but 2007 can suck it now too 'cause I have now blogged more this year than I did in 07'... so I guess that means '09 just pretty much rules! Oh YEAH!

Wednesday, March 4, 2009

Oreos + Biggest Loser = a recipe for one delicious Tuesday Night

Tony and I were watching the biggest loser last night… and eating Oreos…and I think I should feel more hypocritical about that than I do, but they talk about food throughout the whole damn show, so it’s bound to make you at least little hungry. I always tell myself when the show starts “tonight I am not going to be that person eating crap while I sit around and watch this show about how eating crap and sitting around will make you morbidly obese and ruin your life”, but the show just seems like its setting you up for fitness failure… it’s a 2 hour TV show, so right there you are losing 2 hours that you could potentially be using to participate in a productive activity and then they always have these “temptation challenges” where they show really enticing video footage of all sorts of unhealthy foods.

During the “temptation challenge” the contestants on the biggest loser are supposed to not eat some really tasty looking high calorie food and sometimes they will offer the folks on the show cash and stuff like that to eat the yummy food, but pretty much everyone on the show doesn’t eat it…good for them. It must be cool to have tremendous will power, anyway, that part of the show always makes me really hungry… and since no one is going to throw 250K my way for losing 100lbs (and since I don’t have 100 lbs to lose) I usually end up making 2 or 3 trips to the kitchen to gather up various forms of fatty carby snacking fodder to stuff in my face with while I watch the Biggest Losers work out and eat healthy light meals.

They have “trainer tips” on the biggest loser too, where the personal trainers on the show usually have some shameless plug for a gum or low calorie oatmeal or whoever else sponsors the show. Occasionally they will say something that does not seem to be a plug though, like: “you will burn 300 calories if you do jumping jacks throughout the duration of all of the commercial breaks during the show”, and I’m always like: “hey that’s a good idea… I’m going to do that next week… its too late to start now ‘cause I already missed 2 commercial breaks… but next week fo’ shizzle I am all about the jumping jacks” but somehow despite all of the enthusiasm and encouragement from the trainers, they just haven’t been able to get me to ACTUALLY DO ANYTHING GOOD … and yet every time they show a huge bowl of Cheetos or a 6 pack of beer and tell you how horrible those things are for you… I immediately want to run out and buy Cheetos and Beer… funny how that works… I wouldn’t be at all surprised to find that Coors and Frito Lays are the top sponsors of The Biggest Loser. They do seem to be awefully keen on product placement on that show...

It makes me feel a little guilty ‘cause I know I am sort of missing the whole point of the show, but I think subconsciously… or well actually pretty consciously come to think of it, I am jealous of all these people on the biggest loser… they get to hang out on a “RANCH” and PLAY GAMES all day… they’ve got all these cool buddies to play sports with and they get to go on hikes and take field trips to cool places and do other cool outdoor activities… their little FAT camp looks like a pretty PHAT place to spend a few months if you ask me! (wow, did you see that pun ?... Zziiing).

I love competitions! especially when there are prizes… and I totally miss being in school and being able to hang out with my friends and not have to go to work… If I was guaranteed that I could get on that show I would totally gain a 80 or 90 lbs so I could go to the ranch and play games all day. That would be soooo fun! … but since I have no casting guarantee I guess I’ll just have to stick to board games and easter egg hunts to get my competition fix… I'm actually really really stoked for easter...egg hunts rule!

Tuesday, March 3, 2009

Fluffy Globbs of Bloop in a Forest of Firm Tomatoes

My gynecologist was giving me my yearly exam the other day and while she was checking for tumors on my breasts she said "Wow your breasts are so easy to examine." and having no idea what that was supposed to mean I said "oh... o...k." so then Dr. Gandhi felt like she should expand and she continued. " I mean most womens' breasts are so firm, and dense which can make it really hard to tell if there is a lump there, but yours aren't like that at all! They're so soft you would know right away if you had a lump."

Well shit... I kind of thought my breasts sucked... I mean pretty much every celebrity rack I've ever seen is infinitely better than mine, but I figure actresses can afford to make them look that way...I assumed they probably had breasts like mine but they put them in a better bra and maybe put make up on them or something ... I don't know...

I haven't actually felt up too many chicks, ( There was a phase in high school when me and all of my friends on swim team would go around grabbing each other's boobs, but we were usually in swim suits and even my rack was fabulously firm in the tight-ass Speedos I used to wear so that doesn't really count)...so I would say I don't really have much basis for comparison when it comes to breast firmness, but Dr. Gandhi, would know.

I had been living in this ignorant haze where I thought, "hey maybe most women's breasts really aren't that firm... just like me..." I mean sure I figured there were the lucky few that had the firm tomato boobs, but I figured those voluptuous vixens were few and far between... but nope, after that remark from my OBGYN there is little doubt in my mind... my breasts are fluffy globs of bloop... while most women have pleasantly perky pectorals ... I'm sure Doctor Gandhi she sees more breasts in a day than Col Sanders ever did. She is a mammoreal connoisseur and she had to make a point of saying what unusually squishy and un-firm tits I have... AWESOME!

I would have so much rather have heard her say "Damn your breasts are just too firm for me to be able to tell if you have an unusual mass or not... we're going to have to do a mammogram... they're rock solid those knockers of yours... soo... soooo firm". That would have been cool. I wish I had those breasts, but nope... I've got a chest that would rival the stayed puffed marshmallow man. BOO : (

Oh well... I know I am being really petty and stupid right now... I should consider myself very lucky just to have two healthy breasts...and I do. I am very grateful to be as healthy as I am... I just wish I could be a little hotter... Tony seems to think I'm pretty though and he says he thinks my breasts are "fantastic", so I guess some people prefer their tomatoes a little overripe and squishy.