Music: Codeine by Jason Isbell. I can play this over and over and still not wear it out.
Book: The Year We all Left Home. I bought quite a few books already, getting ready for my summer vacation. Has anyone read the book Wild ? It's the book with the hiking boot on the cover. I bought that one too.
Odd Moment: I had it just now. Our staff had our end of year lunch (hence the pad thai leftover for dinner) and i got home at 3:30. Because of those damn menopausal night sweats i was so tired I went straight to bed. I woke up three hours later, forgot where i was, and thought it was time to get ready for work.
Other Oddness: Our staff going to lunch as a group. It's just one of those awkward things i would rather avoid. Do y'all have this where you work? I can get along with each of them separately and consider two of them friends, but we as a group don't make a very good team. It kind of makes me sad because i used to know the family connection of the office in past work years. (Yay! only one more year!!!!!)
Best Movie I've watched lately: Julie (jj here) told me about 10 Items or Less and i blogged about that as a subject line but only watched the movie earlier this week. What a great little indie film. Morgan Freeman plays an actor in the part, pretty much playing himself, and Paz Vega (the gal from Spanglish) is his counterpart. She's adorable.
Why i liked it: I wish that kind of thing happened more often, where you make a real solid connection with someone you just met.
Ok, on with the Stupid Cautious Stuff....
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1. I sleep with a pair of shoes under my bed. A long time ago i read that you should do this in case of an earthquake in the middle of the night. You need to protect your feet as you get out of the rubble....Assuming you are alive.
2. I sleep with a baseball bat that is stored in my hamper in the closet. I think it's for two reasons: in case of an intruder...especially when i am home alone...but that's just stupid. When i played softball i was aterrible at bat!
We actually put it there when our condos had an arsonist a few years back. (It even made the news, they never caught the person, though i think it was someone who lived here.) Anyway, I thought we might need it to break out the bedroom window.
3. And in spite of living in only 1000 square feet we also installed two extra smoke alarms, so now when Brian cooks we can have all three going off at the same time!
4. Actually #3 was Brian's caution. (He's as bad as I am. )
Oh! funny, in the movie 10 Items or Less there is a great scene where Paz and Morgan are driving around L.A. and the song Duncan by Paul Simon came on. And just now typing the above that song came on the playlist that i randomly chose. I love this song. It's not as well known. Great lyrics and for some odd reason i know every one of them, except one:.... (see below.)
My father was a fisherman
My mama was the fisherman's friend
And I was born in the boredom
And the chowder
My mama was the fisherman's friend
And I was born in the boredom
And the chowder
I never knew he was saying BOREDOM in the 'born in the boredom and the chowder". I doesn't even make sense! Glad i got that cleared up. The only reason i found out is that we couldn't understand Paz sometimes so we put up the subtitles.... hahaha.
Oops...i digress.
5. I always open a bottle of champagne with a towel over the cork. You could poke an eye out! You know if i ever poked an eye out (i actually know someone who did this gardening!) I would lie about how it happened and say it was champagne. (And i dont' even like champagne.)
6. I keep a pair of running shoes in the trunk of my car in case it breaks down. Even though my car has only 20,000 miles on it!
7. Brian bought me a battery charger and put it in my trunk in case my battery ever died. But i'm too responsible and cautious and would never leave my lights on.
8. Plus i don't think i would even know how to use it.
9. I check my online banking once a day since i had that checking account fraud a few months back.
10. I open all junk mail, in case it isn't.
11. When i drive away from home if i can't remember putting down the garage door i turn the car around and go look. And it's ALWAYS down. Always. Always. Always. Not once have i left it up. But still, i keep finding myself turning around because i can't remember.
12. I finally bought flat irons that turn themselves off so i never worry about those anymore.
Oops...i actually have more, but i just saw how very long this post was! What are your idiocyncracies about being cautious? (That spelling is wrong, but i don't know how to correct it and i'm too lazy to look it up.)
13. I lied about the wine. I just poured another glass.
13. I lied about the wine. I just poured another glass.
14 comments:
IT's 6/28 and I'll be 59. Ach.I said it. 59.
Happy almost birthday, amulbunny! in case anyone wonders what are talking about, i posted on HER blog asking when was her birthday and was it a big one!
Ok, not so big!
hahahaha!!! i do most of those, too. especially the garage door and the online banking every day. at least i'm in good company. we had a really nice argentinian mendoza wing last night. filini or something like that. drank the whole think and then opened a bottle of rioja. too much. so i had a headache this morning. i should be more cautious about that!
i will have to look up that movie and the duncan song. i love the line about being born in boredom and chowder.
~eque/BB :)
eque...what does it mean...the boredom and the chowder? I totally don't get that lyric!
I think i remember you and i talking about the garage door.
I'm very curious about the Wild book. I think she hiked the entire Pacific Crest Trail with no backpacking experience. I'm curious if the writing is any good. I think she wrote the book 20-some years after she did the hike, so that makes me cautious. If she's anything like me, how I remember things is not always how they happened.
I do the garage door thing, too. Same with the flat iron. It's safer for me to come to work with wet hair.
Another stupid cautious thing is that I unplug everything except my alarm clock and the phone every single time I leave the house. I worry about my dogs burning up in a fire. If that ever happened because a lamp shorted out or something equally trivial, I'd never forgive myself. I also won't leave my dogs in the car anymore.
When I think of Duncan being born in the boredom and the chowder, I think of a really quiet, seaside home with no one talking and everything being white and gray. I think it would drive anyone crazy. It's no wonder he left home. I like it, even though Paul Simon isn't my favorite.
Brian probably already knows this, but I hate group work lunches. I love everyone individually and in small groups, but when everyone is in one place, at one big table, and there's so much noise…I kinda lose my shit. My brain can't process that much stimuli. I turtle up. I feel guilty hating the lunches, but it's nothing personal about anyone. It's totally me being a weirdo. I try to get out of my own birthday lunch every year. Never works.
When is your summer vacation?
Amanda, i think the writing is very good. Don't buy it, i'll loan it to you. I think this book is probably just what you would like. And i could see you maybe writing this book. Though i say this very early into it.
Thank you for saying that about group lunches. I have never ever been a work group lunch person. The dynamic is too weird to be in the same place all at once. We can work together for years and years and turn into strangers over the teriyaki special, just like that. Don't feel guilty. I imagine louie will weigh in on this one too.
Every single year i get out of my own birthday dinner with The Family Louvrak. (That's how i'm going to keep referring to them.) I love them all. Especially my two brothers and Marie my sister in law and my nieces Kylee, Ashley and nephew Brian. But i just don't want to do a birthday thingie. I'm the only one that gets away with it. My mom plans these birthdays for her kids like it's HER birthday. But mine is far too close to Mother's Day and i can't tolerate that much alcohol anymore so close together to get through it.
My summer vacation starts Monday. I'm off until August 6th. I bought 8 books (not on the Kindlefire cause i can't read by the pool our on the patio if i do). And i have a few more in mind. Like the new Augustus Burroughs book.
Leaving my lamps plugged in is a fire hazard? Shit, you should see all the crap plugged in behind our TV/stereo armoire.
Brian comes home from his Arkansas trip tomorrow. He did manage to find some cool places there in spite of it being a dry county and the origin of Walmart. (He actually visited a Walmart museum!)
Tomorrow is his birthday. I bought him a lot of presents. (It's so easy to shop for him. And though i hate shopping for anything, i keep finding stuff for him.)
I doubt he will be checking this blog, so i can say this: i bet one of his favorite gifts is the stupidest one. I made him a coupon that said i would play THREE games of Stratego with him at his request. (Though i added a disclaimer that i can refuse a second game in a row if i lose the first one. And i put an expiration date as the end of summer.)
He's a nut about games like this. I like Scrabble. Cause i sometimes win. I have never won in Stratego.
Anyway, he'll love this gift. I won't say any more in case he does check this out on his iPhone.
Amanda writes: "When I think of Duncan being born in the boredom and the chowder, I think of a really quiet, seaside home with no one talking and everything being white and gray. I think it would drive anyone crazy. It's no wonder he left home."
i like the white and gray reference. And maybe they had chowder all the time which added to the boredom burden. I like how that sounds: boredom burden.
Anyway, Amanda, i am reading two books at a time (i do that often) but i'll send this WILD over with Brian as soon as i finish it. I may have different thoughts about the book as i get deeper. But my knee jerk reaction is that i think this is a book you might like.
I posted a photo on Brian's facebook of the presents i bought him and he is emailing from his iPhone with the plane in the air. Now i'm afraid he'll get bored and decide to check my blog too. Probably wondering how many parties i had and how many men i entertained in the 6 days he was gone. And now he is going to see his favorite present : the Stratego Coupon.
Work lunches
I would almost just as soon (is that a real expression, “just as soon”? can’t remember ever typing it before) eat lunch at my desk than in the break room. I like the people I work and eat with just fine (maybe because they’re all secretaries) but they’re like fake-friends. We’re nice enough to each other (I watch what I say) but would never go anywhere after work together or see each other off-site. Although I think they all go to each other’s Sensaria or Party Lite or Pampered Chef’s parties – just not me.
The worst thing is work baby showers. I don’t want to go to a shower for people I really like and/or am related to, much less work folks. It’s always so weird sitting around in a conference or training room while someone you only sort of know opens up gifts and everyone tries to make small talk.
My teachers did have a sort of surprise goodbye party for me in the bar of a Mexican restaurant last week. I’ve got to say it was fun. Maybe it was because I was getting the presents, and they were saying nice things, but maybe it was the booze.
I don’t know what I’m overly cautious about. I don’t think I’m overly anything, not cautious but certainly not risky.
I knew you would weigh in on this louie about group lunches. I think you and Amanda and I could have a group lunch just fine! hahahahaha. We would be bitching the whole time about group lunches, baby showers. and fund raisers that our workmate's hit us up for their kids.
Are you talking about when you quit being a principal with the party? Did i tell you i met one of your former math teachers at Gary and Sherry's house last week? His name was Jack i think. I will remember the last name if you tell me.
i did not mean to make an apostrophe on 'workmates'. I don't know where that came from , but i blame it on Brian who came in and interrupted while i was writing the comment.
How did the Stratego coupon go over? Has he already cashed it in?
Thanks in advance for lending me the book. You're the best!
Think I can’t talk about Jack – a professional evaluation thing. Let’s just say I once knew a guy who reminds me of Jack, who called in sick every Thursday my first year in that school. Told him if I knew he was calling sick and he wasn’t sick it would be against the law for me to sign off on the sick leave request and I would lose my job. You know, knowingly falsifying a leave request – maybe a gift of public funds? My memory he then switched up his golf games so it wasn’t every Thursday.
The party with my teachers was just last week – I won’t be their program supervisor anymore as of today. Apparently they liked/respected me more than they let me know.
I am home now, sick actually. Moy mom recommended Irish Whiskey and Cheeetos. So far working well, plus Ron brought me hot and sour soup; Feel pretty good right now except for the runny nose. Hope I’m not hung over in the morning.
You're sick, louie? Are you better now?
Amanda, we haven't played Stratego yet cause that's a game played outside on the patio in the summer with wine and now that i'm on vacation we'll play.
I'm almost finished with "Wild". I think i will be done by tomorrow, so i'll give it to Brian to get to you probably Monday. I have never hiked any kind of trail ever, nor do i want to. But i do think this is a good read, even if i do get pissed at her for different things, that seem so easily avoided if she had prepared herself better. But in the end what she is accomplishing is amazing.
For me, this book sort of does for hiking what " Into Thin Air "did for mountain climbing. I was very interested in all things Mt. Everest after reading that book, but yet i have no desire to do these things at all. That's why i love books so much. They make me feel like i did.
I think you will like it, i think you might get frustrated with her at times, but i think you will like HER too. The people she meets along the way are so cool. For that reason alone, i could sort of see the allure of setting out on such a trip.
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