Thursday, In Which Things Go Awry

Here’s how this morning was supposed to go:

• Wake up at 6 AM, leave for airport by 7 AM
• Pick up Melody and Mark from their direct flight, landing at 7:51 AM
• Go to Hillside Spot for breakfast on the way home
• Get home, rest, go for a hike this afternoon
• Pick up Mike from work
• Go to Scottsdale for the Desert Botanical Gardens, then dinner 

At 8:30 AM, here’s how the day has gone thus far:

• Wake up at 6 AM to a message from my sister that their direct flight has been delayed for at least two hours
• 6:20 AM update: they’re now leaving five hours later for a flight to Charlotte, which will then go to Phoenix, arriving at 4 PM
• Mike realizes he has a conference call in 10 minutes, so he runs upstairs to the office to take it instead of driving into work first
• While Mike is on said conference call, toasting English muffin sets off the world’s most sensitive smoke detector, which is located directly next to our kitchen doorway
• Follow usual smoke detector protocol, open the front door and flap a dish towel to get any hint of warm air away from the damn thing
• Charlie decides that Age 5 is when Scottish Terriers start trying new things, shoots out the front door while my back is turned, darts across the busy street, and disappears into the desert across from our house
• Run into the desert in sweatpants and Crocs, screaming “CHARLIE” until he pops out from under a bush where he was looking for rabbits and freedom
• Deposit idiot dog in the living room and start lecturing him about safety
• Smoke detector decides we’re all about to die in an invisible fire again

Through all this, Mike is still on a conference call upstairs, trying to pretend he’s somewhere professional instead of a deranged sitcom.  I'm drinking coffee now, but expect it will spontaneously combust shortly.

How's your day going?

*quiet sigh*

There's a cool breeze outside and it's raining a little bit.  I'm sitting on the couch with my dog and Mike, getting a neck rub.  And I'm just having one of those moments where you realize you're safe, you're happy, you have food and a home and people you love... and you're just pretty damn lucky.

Sunday Endorsements

Banana bread with peanut butter glaze

This month’s Cooking Light had a recipe for banana bread with peanut butter glaze (as well as a picture of it on the cover).  Their banana bread recipe was all modern and funky, though – they had plain yogurt in it and peanuts and… no.   I made my old faithful banana bread recipe, which has bananas, flour, sugar, eggs, baking soda and salt.  Done.  Delicious. 

THEN I made the peanut butter glaze to put on top – powdered sugar, peanut butter and milk.  It definitely put the bread close to the dessert category, and in the best way possible.  Next time, I’ll serve the bread heated, with vanilla ice cream, and drizzle a little more of the peanut butter glaze on the ice cream, and then I will bask triumphant as the Queen of Banana Bread.

The Merona fall collection at Target

I’ve been watching Mad Men recently, and been resisting the urge to wear nothing but pencil skirts and shirtwaists with pearls.  However, the entire Merona fall line at Target is straight out of 1961, so I am now just going with the flow.  Quite happily.  

Deep tissue massage

I get rebound headaches when I take too many drugs for my initial headaches, so I look for any other way to manage them.  A one-hour deep tissue massage on my neck and shoulders = near magic.  There was a slight improvement the next day, but two, three days later?  Noticeable improvement.  I’m getting another one on Monday.

The weather this weekend

Right now it is 76 degrees, sunny, and breezy.  The high today is 82.  I’m giddy.  GIDDY.

It's clean fun, at least - not sure about good...

Ahh, so much for posting every day.  These headaches are killing my ambitious blogging schedule – when you wake up every day with a stabbing pain in your eye, it’s more challenging to have ideas.

I soldier on, though.

We went to see a comedian last night, and while the show was fine, I found myself paying much more attention to the audience around us by the end of the set. 

The comedian was Brian Regan, who I knew from seeing on TV from time to time.  He was funny – he also, apparently, has a strict “no cursing” policy in his set.  It’s a testament to his skill that I’ve seen him perform a few times and never noticed that. 

He also has an extremely enthusiastic fan base.  Like… I don’t know if a lot of these people have ever seen any other stand-up comedy.  They do things that are normally only appropriate at concerts, like SAY THE PUNCHLINE ALONG WITH THE COMEDIAN. 

Seriously.  This guy is building up the joke - and some of them have significant set-up time – and huge parts of the audience are just waiting to shout the end of the joke with him.  As a performer, is that more flattering or annoying?  I mean, I guess he can just go home and cry into his giant piles of money if it bothers him.  But it bothered me. 

There was a couple behind me where the guy was one of the above –mentioned fans, and the girl was either deaf or very, very stupid.  I was listening closely to them by the end of the night, and I have to say, I think she was very, very stupid.  The two of them had a running dialogue that went something like this:

Comedian: “So…in beaker 1 we have….acid….and in beaker B we have…”

Guy Behind Me: “It’s funny because B isn’t a number!”

Girl Behind Me: “Oh.  OH, right!”

Comedian: “Why did Jefferson stop at naming his house?  Why stop at Monticello?  What about… would you like to borrow my can opener, Eduardo?”

Girl: “Who’s Eduardo?”

Guy: “No, see, he’s naming all the stuff in the house, but that’s just the name he picked for the can opener.”

Girl: “Uh, ok.”

Brian Regan was funny, but they were HILARIOUS. 

Robots 1, Humanity 0

My friend Cathy named her blog after robots - she's what I'd call a robot sympathizer.  When our metal masters finally make their move, Cathy and I will have one of those tense, emotional face-off scenes, like in 'The Sound of Music' when Liesl and her family are escaping and they come face to face with Rolf and there's that moment of silence...where he might do anything...where he might tap into his humanity and let them go...but then Rolf blows his whistle and sh*t goes down.

Now, I love Cathy, and she's funnier in her offhanded comments than I am when I try really hard, and she also named her blog after tea, which is the perfect beverage, and I am in NO WAY comparing one of my dearest friends to a Nazi.  I'm just saying that if Wall-E and that creepy little kid from A.I. had me cornered in an Austrian nunnery and Cathy stumbled across my hiding spot, the next thing you'd hear would be the piercing digital activation of her robo-whistle.

But it turns out that Ray Bradbury was on Cathy's side.

"I am not afraid of robots.  I am afraid of people."

Back in the 1970's (or as the metal ones will call it, during the Era of Flesh), author Brian Sibley wrote to Ray Bradbury to say how much he admired his books, and also to comment on how insanely creepy those animatronic Disney robots are.  Brian Sibley is clearly a right-thinking fellow.  Bradbury responded with a nice little note, followed by a lengthy P.S. in which he compares robots to books, says humanity is the true threat, and suggests we let robots teach our children.

I share some of Mr. Bradbury's doubts about people.  But much like my dear Catherine, he has been blinded by the shiny metal promise of robots - blinded to the sad, inevitable truth.  *sigh*  I'm sure their robo-ganda posters will have Ray Bradbury's face plastered on them.

Vive la Robo-sistance!

In which I pay a stranger to hurt me

I’ve been in a terrible mood lately, which makes writing anything interesting a challenge.  Like:

“We saw Wall Street 2 tonight.  It was… I don’t know, it was fine.  Whatever.”

Did you enjoy reading that?  I didn’t enjoy writing it.  It felt like pulling a tooth. 

In an attempt to turn this bitch-train around, I got a massage last night.  I joined a chain massage place a while ago, where they charge you every month for a session, but they charge you less than a normal one hour session would cost.  In exhibit #847 that I’m not great at relaxing, I now have four sessions banked, which means that in the five months I’ve been a member, I’ve gotten one massage.  

So last night was my second one, with Nick.  Give Nick credit – I went in for a deep-tissue massage on my shoulders and he TOOK THEM APART.  My neck and shoulders still hurt to the touch 24 hours later.  It was excruciating.  I’m going back next Monday and I can’t wait.  

Recommended: @DalaiLama

Twitter is by and large a superficial place where I get my news headlines, read amusing bon mots, and become vaguely familiar with celebrities.  The Dalai Lama also tweets, though, and provides actual ideas and concepts to think about during the day.  I didn't realize the 140-character format was so good for meditations, but...

http://twitter.com/DalaiLama

TAR is back!!

Ah, it’s Amazing Race time again!  It’s a new season, and yet there’s so much that seems familiar….

Hello, passive-aggressive couple where the guy has a superiority complex and the girl seems to both enable it and bitch about it! I look forward to hating both of you.

Hello, over-confident dorks!  It’s nice to see you’re Ivy League this time.  And it’s VERY nice to see you feel your a capella singing skills will be an asset when communicating with foreign cab drivers… (wha?)

Hello, beauty queen!  You have a formidable list of beauty queens and former beauty queens who have been appalling and clueless in some pretty spectacular ways, so I hope you brought your A game.  And some Vaseline.  

Hello, long-distance couple just meeting for the first time!  You’re a mother-daughter pair with an adoption twist this time – nice. The producers are expecting you to work out your issues on-camera, so please oblige.

Hello, pair of doctors!  So…they’re young, and they’re surgeons… how on earth do they have the time to go racing around the world on a game show for six weeks?  Are they super-doctors, or really bad doctors?

Couple taking things too quickly, I think you’re my favorites so far for the sole reasons that a) you’re from Florida, and b) you swear a lot... oh my lord, in the time it took me to type this sentence, Chad revealed himself to be a total asshat.  OK, never mind that.  

Yay!  I'm so excited!

Exactly.

From Kelly Oxford:

“If you’ve been socializing online since 02’ or earlier 1. You’re a loser like me. 2. Like me, you’ve already figured out the twist in Catfish and you know at least 5 ‘online based’ stories that are much, much worse."

—

No one needs to tell me. I figured it out.

...look at them boots!

I went through a few stages with country music. 

Stage 1: I did not listen to country music.  At all.

Stage 2: I listened to all of the country music all the time and loved it!  Nothing but country all the time woo hoo yeah country!

Stage 3: I stopped listening to country music because, whoa, easy there. 

Stage 4:  I like country.  But only certain country.  And I define it a certain way, and I mix country in with all my other music. 

The music I like now is not the country/pop crossover artists I used to listen to, because honestly, they’re not country.  I still like some of them.  I mean, who hasn’t had Taylor Swift Dance Night with their Scottish Terrier and a bottle of wine?  Amiright?

No?

Well, either way...

Taylor Swift?  Not Country Music. 

I don’t have a technical definition that excludes her.  I just know that she is mostly pop music, and while there may be a wee bit of country flavor in there, it’s not enough – she’s just pop.  Because.  Other things I just know?

Faith Hill?  Not Country Anymore. 

Rascal Flatts?  I don’t know if you’re a person or a band or what, but you’re more of a girl than I am, and you’re not country.

Keith Urban?  Ha.  NOT Country.  Also, from Australia.*

Real country music is Johnny Cash.  Obviously.  George Strait.  Without question.  And you don’t have to be old school to be real country - the Dixie Chicks are country.  Heidi Newfield wailing out “Knocked up/ shame shame/ Imma gonna ruin my family name” is more country than Carrie Underwood has ever seen in her lifetime.  Brooks & Dunn?  Hell yes, they’re country.  Julie Roberts is country, and she’s even MORE country because Taylor Swift shamelessly ripped her off.  Ryan Bingham is country because my heart aches a little when he sings.

To paraphrase the distinguished Justice Potter Stewart, I may not be able to define country, but I know it when I see it.  And it’s good stuff.

*This doesn’t disqualify him automatically, but it adds a little oomph to my disdain.

Ok, Thursday.

If I was a character on Mad Men, today would be the day I b*tchslap my neighbor in the grocery store, then give the kids a dryer bag to play with while I mix vodka with whatever is in the fridge.

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The Illusion of Dog Training

What I Think Happens

Jenn: “Good morning, Charlie!  Time to wake up!”

Charlie hears this, knows it’s time to get up, and hops out of bed.

Jenn: “You hungry?  Ready for breakfast?”

Charlie knows ‘breakfast’ and trots into the kitchen.

Jenn: “Ok.  Sit.  Wait.”

Charlie obeys these commands.

Jenn: “Good boy!  Go ahead and eat!”

Charlie eats.

What Probably Happens

Jenn: “Good morning, Charlie!  Time to wake up!”

Charlie: (sees that some lady who looks familiar is talking to him) Was she here yesterday?  I think so…. Oh, well, she’s excited about something.  Do I lick myself or follow her?  She seems pretty excited – I’ll follow her!

Jenn: “You hungry?  Ready for breakfast?”

Charlie: She’s making more noises… ohhhhhhhmigod, she’s going to the Food Room!  I LOVE THE FOOD ROOM!  I’m with you, lady-who-looks-familiar!!

Jenn: “Ok.  Sit.  Wait.”

Charlie: (not sure what the delay is) I’m just going to sit down and wait right here until she finds the food.  Can’t leave – might not get food.  I’ll be right here.

Jenn: “Good boy!  Go ahead and eat!”

Charlie: FOOOODMGILOVEYOUCHOMPCHOMPFOOD and WAAAAATER!!! SO THIRSTY!!!  ILOVEYOUWATER!!  HEY FOOD!  WHERE DID YOU COME FROM?!?!? CHOMPCHOMPCHOMP...

Morning Lake

If you don't know who the village idiot is...

Living in Florida can be seen as a series of trade-offs. For example, we have mild winters and lots of sunshine. We also have a lot of animals that should only be seen on the Discovery Channel. In the past year, while walking Charlie in my highly-populated suburban condo neighborhood, we have seen:

• several large turtles (cool)
• two bunnies (aww!)
• an otter (awwwwwww!)
• an alligator (….oh), and
• a cottonmouth snake (ACK and also Charlie tried to fight it)

Recently, a lot of spiders have been in the area. I know a few things about these spiders. I know they’re about the size of a silver dollar, and I know they like to spin big-ass webs from low tree branches to the ground. I also know…now…that when Charlie takes off after a lizard, he will not hesitate to drag me the hell through one of those webs.

It was ok, though. I handled it with dignity and grace and screaming.

I dropped his leash, clawed at my hair, ripped off my hoodie and (I’m not sure about this part) kind of smacked myself all over my face and shoulders. It seemed like I was clear, but I still had the creepy-crawlies all over, so I stopped at the next SUV I passed to check myself out in the window

After about 20 seconds, I realized there was nothing crawling on me.

At the same time, I ALSO realized there was a man sitting in the car. Staring back. At what was clearly a crazy person who had a Flashdance fit in the parking lot, then ran over to stare creepily at him through his window.

I’m lucky I didn’t get smacked with a car door.

THE PRESSURE! THERE'S SO MUCH PRESSURE!

I feel actual stress that the Fall TV season starts this week.

Things I have considered doing:

- making a spreadsheet of all shows I want to watch

- ranking existing shows in order of favorites, then ranking new shows in order of potential

- putting all decent shows on my calendar to help me keep track of when they air

- using one of three (3) tv apps I downloaded to my phone

- quitting my job to stay abreast of all television related events, both network and cable

- running and hiding

- just reading books

Not on the list? Remembering that this is supposed to be purely for entertainment.

*sigh*