Content?

Uh...right.

Ahem.

So...how're things?

Yeah? That's good.

Hmm? Oh yeah, things are great here...

Just not much going on to talk about.
.
.
.
Oh, don't look at me like that.

I know, haven't been around much. There's just not a lot to say. Go to work, watch TV, cook dinner, play some video games. You don't want to hear about that stuff.

Yes, yes, I know, you want news. Exciting stories. "Do the voices!" you say to me.

But there is nothing. It's like writer's block, if by "block" you mean "boring life right now."

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Or more accurately, things happened, but nothing that I would feel comfortable writing about. So we press on, with one glaring Week of Omission. If it makes you feel any better, imagine that 9 days ago I took up a bottle of tequila and a handful of speed and had many interesting adventures along the Mexican border before waking up yesterday morning in a strange man's bed in Guadalhara.

I know it makes me feel better already.

-------------------------------

So I went to see Hide and Seek on Friday, continuing the new tradition of going to see every scary movie that comes out in the theatre, no matter how horrible. Not that Hide and Seek was horrible. It was okay. The beginning was much better than the payoff, but it definitely had its moments. Particularly one moment that scared me enough that I wanted to scream, but realized about 0.2 seconds into the scream that I was in a crowded theatre and am not actually a 12 year old girl and it would be embarrassing to freak out in such a dramatic fashion, so instead I just sort of had this stifled gasp and silencing of the vocal cords. Something along the lines of a "AHherrreghhhsshiihg." Not my finest hour.

Also, Dakota Fanning is awesome as a creepy-ass emotionally-disturbed small-child. There is a dinner sequence in that movie that ranks right up there as The Most Awkward Thing I was Party to Last Week. And if you know from my last week, that is saying something indeed.

--------------------------------

My hair has completely taken over my life. It is huge, imposing, and slightly feathered. It hangs over my ears and into my field of vision. I now have to brush it to the side so that I can see. It's too heavy to brush in the normal configuration - if I do, I end up looking like a reject from an 80's hair band. You know, moreso than usual. I really should get it cut, but I can't bring myself to. Because as strange as it sounds, I kind of like how it looks. I'm all rebelling against the system, I'm now one of those people that I used to yell at.

"Get a haircut, ya hippie!" I would say.

And yet, now I am a hippie. Except for all that "peace and love" crap. Screw that. We go with the more toned down, "I will try to limit the number of people I kill to a reasonable amount." And even that is subject to interpretation.

But anyway, no haircut for now.

--------------------------------

Speaking of movies that I saw this weekend (which we totally were, just not right this second), I caught a rerun of that movie Copycat on TNT or TBS or something similarly cable-like and movie-like. I really, really love that movie. Sigourney Weaver and Holly Hunter? With that cute guy from that other movie? And throw in some completely bat-shit insane Harry Connick Jr? I mean, it's not even my birthday.

And did I mention that Madame Weaver is a pill-popping alcoholic with agoraphobia and a penchant for swearing at every available opportunity? Seriously, it's so awesome that words can't do it justice. You must watch it.

--------------------------------

Oh, and speaking of things you must do (and "Yes, segue properly achieved!"), if you haven't yet you must go out immediately and read The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay. Michael Chabon. Learn it, live it, love it. This is sort of the most belated public service announcement in the history of the world, considering I first read it about 2 years ago, but Oh My God. So good. Almost perfect, in fact. And I am usually the most critical person on the planet.

Seriously, go read it. Now. If you can't find a copy, call me and I will drop one off at your house. I just finished it again (because I now own one of those cute half paperback editions that came out recently, and when you buy a copy of a book, you have to read it again, it's like a rule) and I didn't think it possible, but I love it even more on the 3rd or 4th reading. I don't even want to say anything about the plot, because I feel like it will ruin some of the magic. Trust me, just do it.

It's so funny, and sad, and real. Like really real.

Sigh.

And people wonder why I don't talk more.

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This entry was brought to you by the letters R & C, for Random Crap.

Someday I totally plan on having something interesting to write about.

But obviously that day is not today.

Dislocation

I am exactly three steps behind the rest of the world today. It took me 5 minutes to order lunch because I couldn't seem to wrap my brain around each individual question as it was posed to me.
"Grilled or battered?"
"Huh?"
"8 or 12 piece?"
"...Uh,"
"Medium or Large?"
"...Er,"
"Fries or coleslaw?"
"...Umm,"
"What kind of drink?"
"COKE, for the love of God, a Coke!"

I'm not sure what's causing it. I actually got some nice sleep last night and it's a Friday, I should be rocking. Instead, I have this blank stare on me at all times and there's at least a 3 second delay between the time someone tells a joke and the point where I get it. I'm finding it very difficult to keep from staring at my shoes when I walk around. I would fear a carbon monoxide leak in the building, except 1) I was exactly the same at the restaurant, and 2) the canary beside me is doing just fine.

Look at that. Is that a joke? I can't tell. It feels like it should be, but it's not funny. But I kinda think it is. But it's totally not. I should probably erase it. But I probably won't.

I heard a good joke yesterday. Goes like this:
----
Why do anarchists only drink herbal tea?
Because proper tea is theft.
----
Of all the things I enjoy in life, I think my favorites are the nerd puns.

Oh, and also:
----
I know a farmer who has 200 head of cattle.
He thought there were only 196 until he rounded them up.
----

Okay, I really need a drink right now.
Cheers to your weekend!

Proof That the Internet Works

I swore that I would never do this, but screw it.

So I was checking my referral logs (because I'm compulsive like that). My #1 google referral?

Search for: "Sexy badminton player".

If there is better proof that the internet has something for everyone, I don't know what it is.

Disassociation

Yesterday I forgot to do many things.

A Short List:

• I forgot to watch the start of American Idol. Usually I'm first in line to view that train wreck of a television experience.
• I forgot to go to the bank and deposit my three tiny checks that have been sitting in my wallet for a month now. There's just no motivation when they're all less than $50.
• I forgot to eat dinner. Not sure how that happened, but when I went to get into bed, I thought about it and couldn't remember eating anything all night long. So that was weird.
• I forgot to do my jump roping exercise for the day (meaning that I stalled out on day 4 of Operation Keep Jason From Dying Young. Quite the operation there.)

And most importantly:

• I forgot to iron any of my work clothes.

See, with the necessary time sink in my life that World of Warcraft has become, I no longer complete all of my weekly chores in one single setting. Instead, I spread them out into tiny 10 minute segments that can be completed on the fly. So when the game is loading up, I go wash a couple of dishes. When my little guy is taking a flying bat ride to another city, I'll go iron a shirt, etc.

This works fine, except that yesterday, between needing to watch The Amazing Race (buh-bye Johnathan, may I never see your damnable face again!) and my hunter's urgent need to not get himself or his groupmates killed, I didn't have many of those short breaks. (Which, now that I look back, probably has something to do with missing dinner. Oh well.) (Hey, shut up, it's not an addiction! It's not like I was hungry and didn't go eat, I just forgot about the concept of nutrition. And yes we played until after 1:30 in the morning, but we really needed to get all of those cat whiskers in one sitting.) (Y'all just don't understand, I can quit anytime.)

This resulted in me forgetting to iron anything for work today. And since I was up late, this meant that I wasn't getting up early to do any morning ironing, that was for sure. What is the end result, you ask? Today I am wearing, to work mind you, a grey, form-fitting, long-sleeved, microfiber pullover, with the most ridiculous collar in the world at large. This thing clings to my body like nothing else, and could easily be one of the most inappropriate work outfits ever conceived.

And to top it all off, for some reason it picks up static electricity like no one's business, so I am constantly shocking myself on every available metal surface, an average of once every 43 seconds. And my hair is constantly standing out like in science class when you rubbed it with a balloon to learn something, probably about physics. Or chemistry. Possibly biology, I don't know, it was a long time ago.

Anyway.

This is not my beautiful office job.

Dissonance

In yet another round of "you never know until you try," I managed to fix the heating problem in the truck of malfunction yesterday. It required pliers, a screwdriver, and the fervent hope that I wouldn't electrocute myself while wedging metal objects into the innards of the dashboard. I think the truck and I are very well tuned to each other, spiritually, because in real life there is no way I could possibly fix anything remotely mechanic that isn't a computer. Maybe all the computer science DNA is phasing out of my body since I haven't programmed in 8 months. That would be sad. I'll let you know if I start feeling the need to play sports or something.

Oh, but then just to even things out, the back right speaker blew out completely this morning, so now I have to turn the radio entirely to the left if I want to hear anything, which is insanely irritating and almost not worth it. Britney Spears does not sound as good through just one ear. There is a joke there, but I'm not going to make it, because I have at least some class today. Hardly any, but some.

----------------------

So last night, the Disney Channel had Remember the Titans as their Monday night movie. Considering the fact that I haven't turned on the Disney Channel in ages, I thought it was a nice coincidence because I really like that movie and there was nothing else on. (Although I ended up missing Medium because I got engrossed, which is too bad. Patricia Arquette rocks my world for reasons that are nigh impossible to explain. Girl looks rough, yet I still love her.)

Anyway, the movie's a little sappy, and the voice-over girl at the beginning and end could give Mischa Barton a serious run for her money as worst actress in the history of the world, but it's nice enough overall. A cute little overcoming-racism, join-with-your-fellow-man-to-fight-discrimination, don't-forget-high-school-football-is-the-most-important-thing, feel-good movie.

But goddamn the Disney Channel. In a movie basically full of veiled (and direct) racial slurs exactly what do you think the Disney Channel would deem to censor? None of that stuff(which I'm not saying is a bad thing, it's part of the story they're telling.). What they decide to cut out is the 0.5 seconds of the movie devoted to the part where the quarterback turns out to be gay, and the rest of his teammates end up accepting him (the main part cut being the most awkward guy-on-guy kiss ever recorded on film).

So according to the Disney Channel, learning tolerance for your fellow man = good. Just make sure it's according to race, and not sexual orientation. Because we can't have, literally, 0.5 seconds of screentime devoted to throwing the smallest bone to another, readily prevalent, kind of discrimination. This is a "family channel" where it's cool to bring up difficult issues, so long as we're certain that bigots can't complain about it publicly without fear of recrimination.

I mean, come on. The storyline wasn't even a storyline. It was muddled and not that well-handled in the movie anyway, but it still should have been left in. Christ, I'm way more pissed off about this than I should be. It's the goddamn Disney Channel. It was followed by an episode of Lizzie Maguire. Why am I not more outraged at the continuing career of Hilary Duff?

Ugh. HATE.

(Not you, Hilary. You know I secretly love you. Your lyrics are awesome. If the light is off then it isn't on, indeed.)

(P.S. - Fuck you, Disney Channel.)

Several Ways To Die Trying

My usual dose of morning disorientation is pretty severe. The process of finding and silencing my alarms has reached almost cartoon levels of comedy, mostly involving me slamming my fist into the alarm clock repeatedly for about 5 minutes, until I realize that it is actually my phone alarm that is going off. Repeated by snooze, every 12 minutes.

This morning, though, it was an entirely new plateau of disorientation. It was like I woke up with no functional knowledge of who or where I was. I was just blindly swinging my arms to try to silence that horrible noise, all the while wondering who I was and why, exactly, I thought I needed to be up this early. I came up with no acceptable answer to either question for a long, long time.

That never bodes well for a morning. But then I hit the shower, which tends to make me at least semi-lucid, or at least enough so that I can get to the office where there is coffee available to provide that little fix of my addiction to get me over the hump into consciousness. Instead, today I fell asleep standing in the shower, slumped over against the wall. And when I woke up (probably only a few seconds later) I had the worst case of water-in-the-ear ever seen or felt by mankind. It is still affecting me as of this writing.

I wasn't aware of this before, but I am physically useless with water all up in my ear. I can't hear, I am slightly off balance, and I'm constantly shaking my head to the side like a wet dog. (Which, with my way-too-long hair that I'm sporting, makes me look like a sheep dog gone horribly, horribly wrong.) Seriously, I might as well just be curled up in a little ball under my desk (which is where I would really like to be, truth be told) . I would be equally effective down there. And I could get some more sleep. Mmmm, sleep.

----------

In other news, it is goddamn cold outside (28 degrees this morning) and the Truck of Malfunction has officially decided that it no longer wants to provide heat anymore. And with this final heating malfunction, the TOM has officially manifested every single car problem in the history of car problems, short of anything bursting into flames under the hood of the car. And even that happened once, so nevermind. Short of the engine exploding and rocketing out from under the hood (don't get any ideas, TOM), every malfunction has occurred.

Haiku for the TOM

Oh my poor, sad truck.
Malfunction is all you know,
Jason's early death.

I did, however, reinflate the mostly flat tire I had been sporting all last week, so I have forestalled said death for at least a little while longer, unless it is by frostbite. With my luck these days, the cold will turn the water in my ear into ice and the entire right side of my head will freeze up and become functionally useless. At least then I'd stop having to shake my head all the time.

Oy, can you tell that I have no idea what is going on right now?

Sold Out

I'm good for nothing today.

Go read something older. It will suck less than what I could write at this moment.

I'm in a very minty place right now. (Minty being the word of the week.)

Maybe I'll be able to come up with something better later on.

Sharpness

You know those days where you feel really sharp? I love those. When you actually wake up before the alarm goes off and you have time for a good long shower, and your hair doesn't look like ferrets with OCD have been building a nest in it? Awesome.

Yesterday was totally that day. Rocking hair, got to work early...I was feeling it. Of course, these are the days I have to watch out most for. Because I usually have my guard up during a normal day. Actively scanning the sidewalk ahead for places I might trip. Careful mirror examination of my entire body for misapplied clothes/ink stains/unknown odd physical traits. Just the normal series of defensive stances that I need to make sure that my normality-to-fool ratio stays in line. I'm not saying it's very effective, but God help me if I didn't do it, y'know?

Anyways, when I'm feeling pretty confident, I get a little lax on the Checklist Against Folly, and bad things can happen. But really, what is the point of having a sharp day if you're constantly worrying about screwing it up, right?

So, I made it through the whole work day excellently. No mishaps, some good comments on some papers I wrote up, and a great word put in for me by a new client. Rocking.

I get home after a grueling drive through riot-level traffic. (There were actually people wandering across the highway. Like, seriously. 3 people passed in front of my car on foot during the traffic jam. You probably haven't been on Highway 75 lately, but there is no earthly reason for someone to be walking on 75. It's self contained. There are no stores, it's just a road with walls around it. It had a very zombie-movie-walking-dead-post-apocalypse vibe going on. Except I was listening/dancing to a Mandy Moore CD and then traffic started up again within 5 minutes. But it was totally creepy for a second in my mind. I have fallen off track completely here.)

God, where was I? Okay, so I get home. Theoretically this means that the good day is complete, because how could anything go wrong once I've hit home? I plan on seeing no one, all I need to do is watch TV, play video games and fall asleep. I rule this day.

No wait, I need to do laundry. And cook dinner. No problem, am master of both of these operations. So I collect all the laundry, pull out the ingredients for an actual meal and turn on the TV for some background noise. I go ahead and get the food started, since it requires a long oven time and boiling ingredients. I then grab the clothes and head to the laundry room. Master of Efficiency.

Problem the first: When I get to the laundry room, I see that there are people already there. This does not bode well for getting a washer, but it would look weird to not at least go in and check, right? One does not just get 5 feet from the room with a basket full of laundry and then sprint away at the sight of others. That would be odd. So I go to check the machines.

Unfortunately, I misjudge the great big step that one must take to get into the room. I bark my shin intensely against the concrete step, overbalance, and slam my whole body directly into the ground, with the exception of my face, which slams into the lip of the basket that I was holding. Oh, and my forehead, which smacked into the bottle of detergent in said basket.

It is one of those moments that seems suspended in time. Exquisite pain racks your body. At the same time, you watch as everyone in the vicinity turns in unison slo-mo to gape at you, writhing on the ground, covered in your own dirty laundry. There is no way to properly salvage your dignity anymore.

I brush it off as well as I can and wave off any inquiries of concern, mentally trying to cast it as some sort of intentional performance piece. Sure enough, there are no machines available and that spectacular flop to the ground was for nothing. Well not nothing. Now I have a bruised leg and two nice bright red marks on my forehead and lip. Sexy.

I slink back to my apartment, as you do when there are no washers available and you must admit your defeat to dirt publicly to the rest of the apartment complex. Sadly, this little bout of clumsiness and washer examination has taken far longer than it should have. The pot on the stove has overflowed and blackened whatever it was that I had planned on cooking, leaving behind no smoke, but a stench of something so powerfully awful that it continues to haunt me. It was a smell that defies both explanation and logic. No words can convey its power, and even experiencing it first-hand, you can't wrap your mind around how bad it was. If Guiness is what evil tastes like (as had previously been asserted) then that was what evil would smell like.

Recognizing exactly when to cut my losses, I clean up the horror that is the kitchen, bleach everything, deodorize as much as possible, and then spray air freshener to mask the pain. I then run for fast food (which was great fun to order with a swelled lip) and when I come back, things almost seem okay.

The rest of the night passed without incident, unless you count the death of my hunter in World of Warcraft due to falling out of a zeppelin, which is like one meta level of clumsiness removed from my usual antics.

So yeah, even in my sharpest days, I'm still a little dull. Rock out.

Unsent Letters to the World

Note: For maximum effect, this entry should be read aloud to music, a la Alanis Morrissette's song Unsent. Because I am alt rock like that.

----------------------------
To: The driver of the white Infinity on Highway 75
Re: Driving Etiquette

Dear sir,
For future reference, if you are going to drive on the highway, please recognize that a) there are other people on the road, b) weaving in and out of traffic at 80 mph during the lunch hour can be dangerous, especially if c) you don't use turn signals, and d) have your goddamn trunk open with crap falling out of it. At least one of us (who happened to be driving a truck of malfunction) was hit by a freakin' tennis ball that sailed out of said open trunk. You'd best watch your back.

Love,
The Other Drivers of Dallas

------------------------------
To: Snooty Bank Teller
Re: Yesterday's Deposit

Hi there,
I'm not sure if this has ever been mentioned to you, but your job (bank teller, in case you forgot) is to help customers by taking their deposits, issuing out money, and other such bank-like duties. It is not, as you seem to believe, to sit over in the back by the vault and read Us Weekly, smacking your gum, whilst the customers mill about in the lobby. Especially when you are the only person at the bank, since you are the afternoon courtesy teller. And when the customers actually get you to come over and help them, try not to act like it is the largest inconvenience in the history of your short life.

Also, I'm an incredibly liberal kind of guy, but even I think it's a bit much for a male bank teller to be wearing a fake diamond earring, and what I can only assume was face glitter, to work. I mean, rock that on your own time, yo. It's just sort of creepy in a professional setting.

Sincerely,
Jason and the other customers over in Oak Lawn
------------------------------

To: World of Warcraft
Re: Our Time Together

You know I love you baby, but I'm starting to get addicted. My hunter needs new boots and is just shy of learning the multi-shot. My gnome is about to learn the next level of frost armor and I haven't even been playing my alt warrior. My other relationships are starting to wane. I don't even remember what Tales of Symphonia looks like anymore. And I think the last time I saw a human being outside of work or in my apartment was over 4 days ago. I might have to pull the plug on this whole thing. It will be for the best.
.
.
.
Don't look at me like that.
.
.
.
Oh, who am I kidding. I'll see you tonight. You're like a drug to me. It's always you, baby. You know that, right?

Love,
Jason

----------------------------------
To: Cute Teller at Bank #2
Re: Our Future

Dear Cute Bank Teller,
You're really cute. Let's get married. We would be blissfully happy and have beautiful, fiscally-minded children. They would understand both the mortgage industry and be able to handle money efficiently. If, y'know, we could have children. Which is a stumbling block, I admit, but no good relationship comes without trials. I know we have only known each other through three bank transactions totaling 5 minutes of face time, but I know a connection when I see one. You and your bank smarts and your power tie complete me. Call me.

Love,
Jason

Without Even Trying

So the latest in memes among the internet community which I frequent is to come up with 10 things that people who read your blog would not know about you. Sadly, I can't think of a single thing about me that isn't complete public knowledge. I keep nothing bottled inside, the word vomit is my constant companion. y'all know that.

That being said, let's try anyway. Most of these things are pretty commonly known, but I bet at least a couple are new.

10.) I was born in Chicago, IL. (As opposed to Texas or England, which are the two most common answers I get.)
9. ) In the course of my life, I have lived in 9 different Texas towns.
8. ) My proudest moment to date was being named salutatorian of my high school class. This was closely followed by my least proud moment, since on that same day... 7.) I won my high school dance contest for Best Hula. (The pictures that remain from that night will forever ruin my dreams of holding public office.)
6. ) I have irrational fears of : clowns, roaches, and being unable to wake up from a dream.
5. ) My family has a documented history of insanity. (See how well 5 & 6 pair up?)
4. ) If forced to admit it, I don't actually hate children that much.
3. ) I have committed a felony in the past and gotten away with it. (as of this typing, at least)
2. ) I have written, and continue to write, poorly-plotted fanfiction elsewhere on the interweb, under an assumed name. (And no, I will never provide a link. Ever.)
(And since everyone else had this as an entry)
1. ) My celebrity crush is still Elijah Wood, no matter how many people tell me he is creepy and bug-eyed and 15 year-old-looking. Y'all just don't get it.

Wow, that was kind of liberating. And sordid. Now that all my secrets are out in the public domain - Will people still respect me in the morning?

(Ed. to add: The most common response to my question was: "Still?" You guys are all going to hell.)

This Just In...

I am officially over working.

So on Friday I got a job request from my temping agency. It was a quick 4 hour shot on Sunday mid-day, at a hotel. Because I needed to rationalize a bit of spending that I was planning for Saturday -

Sidebar: On Saturday I went to Best Buy and doubled the RAM in my computer. It was possibly the most satisfying experience I've had in months. I don't smoke, but if I did, I would have needed an entire pack afterwards. Considering I haven't used any of my computer science skills in months now, I don't think it should have brought me as much joy as it did. It was just like the Dilbert strip, where he does the same thing and Dogbert asks "Does the church know about this?" Because, damn.

- I went ahead and took the job. And it helped me realize an important fact: Temping is horrible. As jobs go, this one was actually very easy, and yet the entire time I had to resist the urge to just get in my truck, drive off and never return, all the while yelling "See ya, suckers!" out the window.

It was four hours of basically standing around so that once every hour we could move things around for 5 minutes. I mean, that sounds like an awesome thing to get paid for doing, but it actually combined most everything I hate into one compressed ball of pain:

• wasting time (weekend time for that matter),
• being bored,
• making small talk with people you have nothing in common with,
• ridiculously overmanaging bosses,
• people who are loud, sexist, racist, laugh uncomfortably about everything, and use the word gay pejoratively,
• lifting heavy things,
• cold weather,
• car exhaust fumes,
• wearing uncomfortable clothes,
• and the intense feeling that you're wasting away the prime years of your life.

I thought long and hard about it (during one of the hour long breaks in which we would stand in the cold inhaling as much exhaust as we could) and really, there was no reason for me to be there. I would make approximately $50 for the entire thing. Which would indeed cover the cost of my awesome computer purchase, but really, the cost-benefit scenario was so lop-sided, had it been drawn out, it would have needed the symbol for infinity.

So I think I'm going to hang up my temping apron for good. Sure it provides wacky anecdotes about carnivals, serving the drunken rich of Dallas, and quotes that you can't even make up (i.e. from the job yesterday (and I do apologize in advance): "Man, God is like a dick that never stops coming.") but it's just not working for me anymore.

It brings something of I a tear to my eye to think that I can never be a carnie again. Of course, that might just be the residual car fumes irritating me, because hell yes, I never have to be a carnie again!

Baby It's Cold Outside

One of my random tasks at work is to manage the multiple bank accounts for the different companies that operate out of my office. This usually involves much driving around to the different bank locations and waiting in a bunch of lobbies, which is never much fun.

One of the (usually) lucky things is that two of the bank accounts are held at banks which have branches in the big shopping center next to my office building. So for those I can just jaunt outside and take a quick lap around the center by foot and not have to waste time getting my TOM out of the garage and all that nonsense. (Plus, I'm still sort of skittish about driving since the bagging lady incident.)

Only today, it is freaking cold outside. Not like "kill me now here comes the snow" weather but more, "insidious frosty winds that penetrate all fabrics and your soul" weather. And of course, I still have no work-appropriate jacket, so when I headed out on the errands today, I didn't even think to look for something to cover up with.

Oh my God, my work clothes provide no help whatsoever in protection from the elements. And now that I examine my garb closely while in the warmth of my office, yeah these things are made of nothing but micro-thin synthetic fabrics. If it weren't for the fact that I'm wearing all-cotton undershirt and boxers, I'd probably be dead of exposure right now.

But in any case, I step outside and it is like a slap to the face. And ears, and arms, and pretty much the entire body. I really just want to run back inside and drink a gallon of coffee, but I soldier on with my job and head off towards the shopping center.

To get there, I have to pass through our courtyard that delineates the middle of the two towers of my office building. There is this huge-ass fountain in the middle of it that generally sprays 50 jets of water up in a cute little marble circle about ten feet in the air. Luckily (or so it would seem) they have lowered the water pressure and it is barely running any water at all on this particular, viciously cold, day. I walk by, completely oblivious, until suddenly it turns on full blast, right after I passed it. Shocked by my good fortune, I almost skip down the stairs, happy that I missed getting soaked by about 7 seconds.

As soon as I have my back turned to the fountain, a huge icy gust of wind comes up and I am drenched across my back with what I can only describe as the coldest water I have ever felt in my entire life, save that time I was at Lake Michigan in Chicago on December 28 when I was 10 and stuck my hand in because I didn't believe my dad that it was 'really cold.'

So, I had to complete the rest of my journey with my back slowly icing over and the pneumonia festering as fast as it could fester. Which was fun.

Oh, and then. So I'm heading back to the office after all the drop offs have been done. Another really cold gust of wind comes up and I groan inwardly, but then I feel a really cold breeze, um, south of the border. Which I have felt a couple of times today, but never really paid attention to. Careful examination of my person reveals that throughout the entire day, from the morning meeting with the affiliates, greeting the courier, talking to my boss and the partners, joking with the secretaries, at lunch, and through all the drops I just did, my fly has been wide open. Ever since I got dressed at dawn and failed to properly secure myself.

So that's awesome, as well.

Minton (You know you love it)

I really miss playing badminton.

For my last semester at SMU, I took badminton for my one required PE credit, figuring that it couldn't be that hard. I mean, you're indoors, on a tiny court, with a tiny racket, swinging at a little bird thing, there's no way too much damage could result, right? I am notoriously horrible at sports, or any physical activity for that matter, so I always choose my athletic battles very carefully.

I could not have been more wrong about badminton. For one, it is infinitely more difficult and interesting than tennis, at which I had some previous success. Everything moves way too quickly, there is almost no time to set up a shot, and many portions of a successful game depend on the ability to hit the shuttlecock hard enough to clear it from one baseline to the other. Do you know how many injuries are available to the enterprising klutz in this? Shuttlecock to the eye, causing blindness, swinging the overly light racket into your shin, or arm, or head, in a zealous attempt at clearing, and the many bruises, scrapes, and burns associated with diving for things on a hardwood gym floor. Yeah, I thought this thing through beautifully.

I managed to lose my first 14 consecutive matches. That was three whole badminton classes in which I was regularly schooled by girls half my size and weight and guys who had never held a racket in their life, up to that moment. But I took it with aplomb, I know that I suck at sports, you just gotta embrace the pain.

Then, a couple of weird things happened. 1) I started to get into the game, and 2) I started to get good. Not good in any conventional sense, in that my shots were never hard enough, my serves were never deep enough, and I had no sense of touch or placement of the bird. But it turns out I have incredibly fast reflexes in terms of racket handling (years of clumsiness paying off in random ways) and I would totally run down every shot on the court until I was ready to pass out. Sometimes illogical persistence works for you despite, you know, the whole lack of logic thing.

It's weird to say that you totally got into the game of badminton (when you say that, people look at you like you just said that you're really into Victorian-age ballroom dancing and/or the accordion) but seriously, I looked forward to that class so much. My doubles partner was Frank (he of the broken html page title) and we made an unbeatable force of him standing in one place cursing and swinging the racket wildly, and me running around spazzing out diving across the court bruising my elbows only to miss the shot by a clean 7 feet. We were an awesome force to be reckoned with.

We even had an arch nemesis team, John & Gina, to whom we usually lost, but played against constantly due to the win-loss tournament style of the class. There was an endless amount of trash-talking going on there, and you haven't really lived until you've heard badminton trash-talk.

Anyways, by the end of the semester, I was totally awesome at badminton. And by totally awesome, I mean that I sucked, but could parlay that sucking into winning a few games by being singlemindedly determined to always hit shots back at my opponent with no sense of skill at all, until they made a mistake and I won the point.

The last thing in the semester was a singles tournament. You would go around and try to play every person in the class and records were kept. The top 8 people then competed in a single elimination tournament to see who would be The Champion of Badminton. (The Champion of Badminton winning an awesome badminton class t-shirt, which I coveted with all my heart, even though I had never seen it.) I played my tiny unathletic heart out and tied for 2nd place in the rounds playing, but lost the tiebreaker, since one of my losses was to the guy that I tied.

But still, Oh my God, 3rd place overall in the class in the intro tournament from 14 straight losses to start out. I was so impressive that it made my brain hurt. Never mind that I fall down an average of 6 times per day and hit myself with the racket at least that many times. Impressive, I say.

In the final tournament, I totally lost in the last round to the guy who was seriously like the best badminton player in the history of time and space. (Not to play up his skills or anything.) But yeah, he just destroyed me. BUT, since we managed to complete the whole tournament in like 30 minutes, we got to have a second tournament on the last day of class. And in that one, my arch-nemesis John managed to beat the best badminton player in the history of time and space, which meant that after I finished an epic 28-26 victory over the guy who considered me his arch-nemesis, I got to play John for the title of Champion of Badminton, on This Particular Final Day.

And so, with the two of us the only ones playing in the entire gym, on the first court, in front of those many badmintoners who stayed (at least 5 people) I tasted the victory of badminton. It was good. Kind of minty, though.

The battle had been ridiculous, though, and included the longest point I ever played, which I swear had to have gone on for at least 5 minutes and involved John smashing the bird on my side and me barely popping it back and him smashing back on my side and me barely popping it back endlessly throughout time (which I ended up winning and should totally be on ESPN's greatest points of all time. Unfortunately there were no cameras. And no one cares but me. But still.). The best badminton player in the history of time and space then requested a match to determine who the real badminton champion was, but I deferred, preferring to stick with the version of events that the BCS goes by - who ever wins on the last day gets to be named the champion, never mind who the best team is.

So I won my very own Badminton Champion t-shirt, which actually did not mention badminton at all, and was in fact a blue Wellness t-shirt that you get your freshman year for having perfect attendance in the required health class at SMU and which I already had, in red form. But it was still awesome and I wear it often, telling everyone that I see that it is proof of my superiority at badminton. You know, on that one day. Without any skills, but plenty of tenacity.

Whatever, it's awesome. Y'all don't even know.

Sigh.

Marketing

Heh.

So on Sunday, I woke up at the crack of dawn for no good reason and could not get back to sleep. I blame the boomerang effect from the drinking and the up all night Friday, followed by the never getting off the couch all day on Saturday, football extravaganza. In any case, it was 8:00 and I wasn't getting any more rest.

So I did what any well adjusted person would do in the wee hours of a weekend morning, I busted out the World of Warcraft and decided to get my Undead warrior girl to a decent level so I could play in a group with my friends without dying every 4th second. Soloing with a weak warrior is hard when you're running about the undead forests of the world, so I was in it pretty thick, all swinging my gigantic sword at Giant Bears and missing every single time.

Around 9:30, I finally got into the area I had been working towards all morning and started on my quest to end as many werewolves as I could get my hands on. Of course, as soon as I get into it completely, with 2 and sometimes 3 werewolves crowding around, wanting to get a bite of little old undead me, the phone rings.

Luckily I have an extension sitting right next to my computer, so I don't have to actually leave my seat. But you have to understand, to play World of Warcraft, you must have both hands free at all times. Your left hand controls movement on the keyboard, while your right controls actions with the mouse. Using my keen gaming skills that I have honed lo these many years, I manage to get the phone answered and tucked into the crook of my neck without slowing down my vicious brawl with the werewolves (there is no pausing in WoW. Real time all the way.)

Phone Guy: Hi, is this Jason?

Jason: Uh, [hits the Rend button]...yeah...

Phone Guy: Hi, I'm [some random name that I didn't pay attention to because there was a werewolf on my back]. I'm calling on behalf of [some organization somewhere in the world, did I mention that there are 4 werewolves now?]. We are soliciting donations for all the hard work done by, blah, blah, blah, can I put you down for $50?

Jason: Uhh, [hits thunderclap, starts the little undead girl running up the side of a mountain to get away before death-of-the-undead can occur] What? No, I don't think so, not right now. [Turns warrior to fight off the one remaining persistent wolf.]

Phone Guy: Well I understand that it's a busy time of the year, blah, blah, how about just $25?

Jason [under his breath to the wolf]: Why won't you die? [to the phone guy] No, really I don't think so, thanks. Goodbye. [The wolf dies] Yes!

Phone Guy: Hmm, are you sure, come on, how about just $10 dollars? It's tax deductible...

Jason: Uh, what? [Suddenly, the wolves return in force. There are 3 more surrounding his already weak character] No! Monsters! Kill them! Swing you fool!

Phone Guy: Uhhhh...

Jason [realizes that he may have said that last part really loudly and that he is still on the phone]: Oh...

Phone Guy [very quickly]: Okay, youhaveanicedaynowbye.

[click]

So you heard it here first: Need to get rid of a telemarketer? Sound like a paranoid schizophrenic who's being hounded by imaginary monsters surrounding him from all sides.

I'm like a walking Public Service Announcement over here.

Woah Woah Woah

Some days it's just not your day. And other days crazy people become possessed of visions of your future and freak the bejesus out of you.

But I'm getting ahead of myself here.

So I left work and was desperately hungry. I went over the various options in my head of what I could make for dinner when I got home. This going over made me realize that I have nothing in my fridge besides a month-old gingerbread house, and nothing in the kitchen but the heel of a loaf of bread and a quarter bottle of rum.

I find these three things to be less appetizing than you would think, so I decide to go grocery shopping - braving the West Village for a chance at a real meal. Of course, it is right at rush hour, so it takes forever to get there. And the place is so packed that I get what I firmly believe to be the only available spot in the entire lot, all the way on the far side of the complex. I was closer to my house than I was to the store. Oh, and of course, it is pouring down rain.

But whatever, I have braved far worse conditions in search of food. I got all loaded up with things that are high in sugar and low in nutritional value (like you do) and beeline for the register, knowing that it will take a good half hour to get through the checkout portion of the night's festivities, because this is the most popular store in the history of mankind.

Surprisingly, my line moved very quickly. This was good, but inversely proportional to my mood, as the next two people behind me in line each have a small child with them, and each small child was vying for the title of World's Most Annoying Carbon-Based Life Form. By the time I got my items up on the little movable conveyor belt, my left eye was twitching uncontrollably and I was mere minutes from flinging a pack of baby carrots at one of their tiny little heads.

But blissfully I swiped my card and could finally get out of Dodge. The bagging lady pushed the cart over to me and says "Have a nice day!"

I am free.

Suddenly, the bagging lady grabs my arm.

[Note: This actually happened, as totally weird as it will soon sound.]

Bagging Lady: Wait!

[She starts staring off into the distance, her head cocked to one side. Her eyes are sort of unfocused, and she has a death grip on my arm just below the shoulder. ]

Jason: What?!

Bagging Lady: You must. Be. Careful. Driving. (suddenly she is channeling William Shatner)

Jason: Ooohh-kay...

Bagging Lady: It is. Raining and. Slippery. Don't crash. (on the "and. Slippery" she starts shaking me in time with each new word. "and (shake) Slippery (shake) Don't (shake) crash (shake)")

Thus far I have been sort of standing perpendicular to her and her crazy ranting. Meaning I am in position to push the cart and she is standing to the side of it. Following the last shake after "Crash" she does this weird sort of push release of my (now very sore) shoulder and looks down, sighing heavily. This push sort of pivots me so that I'm directly facing her.

I start to move to get the hell far away from her (Jason's brain: Ahh! Possessed baggers! This is exactly why we usually go to Krogers!), when all of a sudden she pops her head up and looks right into my eyes. And not to sound all sexist or anything, but bitch be crazy. She's got one mean dead-eyed stare in her that I haven't seen as well perfected since Children of the Corn.

Bagging Lady (all creepy and monotone): Don't crash. Don't die.

Jason's Brain: Woah, Woah, Woah, WOAH!

And the weirdest part (okay, not the weirdest part. That right there was the weirdest part) was that no one else noticed anything odd at all. Following this little declaration of my death, she turns around and starts bagging stuff again. I look over, and the woman with the hateful little child is writing a check, the cashier is running items through, and all the other shoppers are merrily (or wetly, y'know) leaving the store.

I frantically run from the store out into the pouring rain and stuff all my purchases into the cab of the Truck of Malfunction (Jason's Brain: She just predicted your death by car crash and you drive something call the Truck of Malfunction! Jesus Christ!). I am now sopping wet, my glasses are covered in water and nothing I do will get them clean enough to see out of (Jason's Brain: And you're now basically blind in a rainstorm! In a Truck of Malfunction!!!).

To say that the drive home was a bit stressful is an understatement so great that it deserves some kind of award. But it happened without much difficulty whatsoever. It was only 2 miles, after all. Still. I never want to drive again as long as I live.

Way to ruin my life, Crazy Bagging Lady.

New Year

I am tired. A deep and pervading tired that can only come from illness, too many video games, excessive celebration, alcohol, staying up too late, and getting up too early. Otherwise known as college, but damn. Actually, in college I would never be up before 12:00, so that's not entirely accurate. But it's college for most normal, non-lazy people.

Let's see, since it is the first post of the new year, one is obligated to discuss the new year's resolutions made, or reflect back on how last year you didn't actually follow through on any of the resolutions from 2003.

But I don't think I'll do that, 1) because I don't have any resolutions for this year, and 2) I only had one from last year, and I actually did it (Resolved: I will graduate from college. I like to aim low, so as not to be disappointed.)

Except, now that it comes down to it, I feel like I should have something to resolve. I've got to come up with it on the fly here now, but I'm totally gonna have something to plan on improving this year.
.
.
.
Okay.

1) I resolve to keep the weight that I gained last year. I finally made some progress at retaining my weight even when I don't go to the gym every single day, or ever for that matter. To make it measurable, I resolve to always stay above 150 pounds. This one will probably fail, since I invariably lose a ton of weight in the spring, but we can always plan, right.

2) Hm, I was going to resolve something about exercising, but it would directly conflict with #1, unless it was more "gym, gym, gym, weights, weights" which I don't really want to do. I could go back to the jumping rope, but that never seemed to work out without near-deadly injury, so this one will need some refinement. We'll go with "Resolve to in some way become fit enough that carrying groceries from the truck to the apartment does not make us winded." (Always aim low, I'm telling ya.)

3) I would put something in here about SOS 2005 (Significant Other Search - 2005, for those you who don't know me from back in the day) but we know how those always end up - with unflattering photos plastered all over the internet. So that's out. Two resolutions are enough, right?

Don't want to overexert ourselves this early in the year, you know.

Did I mention that I am exhausted?