Monday, November 24, 2003
Adventures in Firearms 101:
Went with husband and husband's friend to shoot skeet yesterday morning. This apparently involves firing off 25 shells from a shotgun while attempting to kill fake flying animals.
I fired off about 10 shells (8 from a 20 gauge and 2 from a much better padded 12 gauge) before stating without question: "This hurts! Why is this supposed to be fun?" and letting the testosterone producers finish off my rounds.
The weather was nice at least! Today my whole right shoulder hurts and I have a big ugly bruise, too. Skeet is not fun! Skeet hurts! Why is this supposed to be fun? Freaks! Sheesh! Ouch. Whimper.
Went with husband and husband's friend to shoot skeet yesterday morning. This apparently involves firing off 25 shells from a shotgun while attempting to kill fake flying animals.
I fired off about 10 shells (8 from a 20 gauge and 2 from a much better padded 12 gauge) before stating without question: "This hurts! Why is this supposed to be fun?" and letting the testosterone producers finish off my rounds.
The weather was nice at least! Today my whole right shoulder hurts and I have a big ugly bruise, too. Skeet is not fun! Skeet hurts! Why is this supposed to be fun? Freaks! Sheesh! Ouch. Whimper.
Sunday, November 23, 2003
For your slightly strange voyeuristic needs, you can go
here and read other people's grocery lists.
Do you make a grocery list when you go shopping?
If you do, does it have bananas on it? Seems like most everyone else's does.
Also observed:
Item on List:: Douche.
Do people really still douche? If you did douche, wouldn't you know that you needed to without adding it to a list? Like "Oh, my doctor told me to do a douche" and since that's such an incredibly strange thing, wouldn't it be at the top of your mind?
Trait #1: LOTS of people can't spell the most basic grocery staples.
Trait #2: Some people write the price of each item on their grocery list. Did they write this before going shopping, to guess how much they would spend? Did they write this after shopping but before checking out to see if they were over their limit or if they had spent enough to get a free turkey for Thanksgiving? Why write it when you get a computer printed list with the item and the price that you can take home with you as a lovely parting gift?
Trait #3: I only found one person who does what I do when I have a list to keep track of what I still need to get - they tear the paper from the edge through each item to show it's been picked up - this person is like me and doesn't ever have a pen with them to maniacally scratch through each item until it has been obliterated from the paper. (Looks like lots of people take out a lot of hostility on grocery lists).
Trait #4: Some people date their grocery lists. (In a chronological way, not in a romantic way - er - as far as I know.) Why? Do they have a list they're going to go buy on June 6, but they have another list they're planning to get on June 7? What if, say, toilet paper is on the list for June 7, but you run out on June 5. Do you have to wait for the appropriately dated list to buy some?
Trait #5: People are embarrassed by bodily functions, even on grocery lists. Very few lists I saw had the word "toilet" spelled out - they all write "t. paper" or "t.p." instead. Toilet! Toilet! Toilet! I happen to think we should be thrilled with toilets! Imagine the alternative!!
Best List:
squirt gun
hot peppers
strawberrys (sic)
bee trap
pie pans
OK - first of all - what the hell are the people with this list about to go off and do? Who needs a bee trap, a squirt gun and pie pans at the same time?? I want to know these people. They sound fun! Or at least adventurous.
Second Best List:
Cake
Candles
Carpet
Wine
OK - Where do these people shop? What store has both a fine wine and a good berber with a 10 year stain protection warranty?
Third Best List:
Vodka
Lighters
Milk
Ice Cream
Sounds like a flaming good party to me!
here and read other people's grocery lists.
Do you make a grocery list when you go shopping?
If you do, does it have bananas on it? Seems like most everyone else's does.
Also observed:
Item on List:: Douche.
Do people really still douche? If you did douche, wouldn't you know that you needed to without adding it to a list? Like "Oh, my doctor told me to do a douche" and since that's such an incredibly strange thing, wouldn't it be at the top of your mind?
Trait #1: LOTS of people can't spell the most basic grocery staples.
Trait #2: Some people write the price of each item on their grocery list. Did they write this before going shopping, to guess how much they would spend? Did they write this after shopping but before checking out to see if they were over their limit or if they had spent enough to get a free turkey for Thanksgiving? Why write it when you get a computer printed list with the item and the price that you can take home with you as a lovely parting gift?
Trait #3: I only found one person who does what I do when I have a list to keep track of what I still need to get - they tear the paper from the edge through each item to show it's been picked up - this person is like me and doesn't ever have a pen with them to maniacally scratch through each item until it has been obliterated from the paper. (Looks like lots of people take out a lot of hostility on grocery lists).
Trait #4: Some people date their grocery lists. (In a chronological way, not in a romantic way - er - as far as I know.) Why? Do they have a list they're going to go buy on June 6, but they have another list they're planning to get on June 7? What if, say, toilet paper is on the list for June 7, but you run out on June 5. Do you have to wait for the appropriately dated list to buy some?
Trait #5: People are embarrassed by bodily functions, even on grocery lists. Very few lists I saw had the word "toilet" spelled out - they all write "t. paper" or "t.p." instead. Toilet! Toilet! Toilet! I happen to think we should be thrilled with toilets! Imagine the alternative!!
Best List:
squirt gun
hot peppers
strawberrys (sic)
bee trap
pie pans
OK - first of all - what the hell are the people with this list about to go off and do? Who needs a bee trap, a squirt gun and pie pans at the same time?? I want to know these people. They sound fun! Or at least adventurous.
Second Best List:
Cake
Candles
Carpet
Wine
OK - Where do these people shop? What store has both a fine wine and a good berber with a 10 year stain protection warranty?
Third Best List:
Vodka
Lighters
Milk
Ice Cream
Sounds like a flaming good party to me!
Friday, November 21, 2003
Reprinted Without permission: The following is a cut and paste from an email a friend sent in response to my emailed statement that one day I would get her to go tent camping with me. She's every bit as funny in person, too!!
Quoth Lisa:
I'm not opposed to the idea of camping, but it would probably be... interesting... for you to *see* me camping. No Starbucks or bookstores or movie theaters anywhere around, ya know:
Lisa: "So this is nature."
Carol: "Yep." (Pokes the fire, or some other naturely type thing)
Lisa: "Huh."
5 minutes pass.
Lisa: "So... this is nature."
Carol: "Yep..." (looking vaguely annoyed)
5 minutes pass.
Lisa: "Nature. This is it."
Carol: "..." (Looks more annoyed)
Etc., etc. Repeats every 5 minutes (sort of like Waiting for Godot, only in nature) till Carol gets tired of it and decides to drive back to Starbucks, bookstores, movie theaters.
Quoth Lisa:
I'm not opposed to the idea of camping, but it would probably be... interesting... for you to *see* me camping. No Starbucks or bookstores or movie theaters anywhere around, ya know:
Lisa: "So this is nature."
Carol: "Yep." (Pokes the fire, or some other naturely type thing)
Lisa: "Huh."
5 minutes pass.
Lisa: "So... this is nature."
Carol: "Yep..." (looking vaguely annoyed)
5 minutes pass.
Lisa: "Nature. This is it."
Carol: "..." (Looks more annoyed)
Etc., etc. Repeats every 5 minutes (sort of like Waiting for Godot, only in nature) till Carol gets tired of it and decides to drive back to Starbucks, bookstores, movie theaters.
Tuesday, November 18, 2003
Today stands out for a number of reasons and here are two of them:
According to my boss, "HELL IS FREEZING OVER!".
This is because:
1. I wore a dress to work.
2. I wore pantyhose under the dress.
3. I valet parked at the luncheon.
4. I danced at the luncheon.
My boss is a smart ass, in case you hadn't noticed.
The other reason it's a red letter day?
My husband actually agreed to go to Cafe Express for supper tonight and even though that's pretty impressive, that's not the thing. The Thing is - get this - he put little chopped up green onions on his baked potato. Now, I know it was just to screw with my head, but the point is, he DID IT.
TWELVE YEARS, people, and he hasn't eaten even a tiny bite of a green onion. They're green and they're onions, after all.
I didn't tell him about the Hepatitis outbreak that has been connected to raw green onion. I just couldn't.
According to my boss, "HELL IS FREEZING OVER!".
This is because:
1. I wore a dress to work.
2. I wore pantyhose under the dress.
3. I valet parked at the luncheon.
4. I danced at the luncheon.
My boss is a smart ass, in case you hadn't noticed.
The other reason it's a red letter day?
My husband actually agreed to go to Cafe Express for supper tonight and even though that's pretty impressive, that's not the thing. The Thing is - get this - he put little chopped up green onions on his baked potato. Now, I know it was just to screw with my head, but the point is, he DID IT.
TWELVE YEARS, people, and he hasn't eaten even a tiny bite of a green onion. They're green and they're onions, after all.
I didn't tell him about the Hepatitis outbreak that has been connected to raw green onion. I just couldn't.
Sunday, November 16, 2003
My husband puts up with so much from me. First you have to understand that he's been known to pull me from a dead sleep at 3am and shove me bodily into a closet on the bottom floor in the center of our home because there was a severe storm out and he was concerned about tornados. You have to understand that he doesn't like me to even stand by or a door or a window (forget going out and partying) on New Years because so many people shoot their guns at the stroke of midnight. You have to understand that my dear husband always assumes the worst will come his/our way.
Tonight when he just needed some chocolate chip cookies, I told him I'd go into the store if he would drive. So we got up, got dressed and headed out. On the way, we passes a small white pickup truck with its flashers on going very very slowly in the right lane on a neighborhood street. We saw a woman walking on the sidewalk. She was carrying a baby and had another child on the sidewalk with her, holding her hand. The truck was keeping pace with them.
We passed, and my husband started a monologue "No really honey I'm sorry if you'll just come home I'll never hit you again - really!", interpreting what looked like an obvious domestic disturbance.
I had thought when we passed that it looked funny and I asked him to just turn around and make another pass, just to look. And...he did. We went by them again and the same - she was walking and the truck was keeping pace. I asked again - can we go back just once more? C'mon - and he did. But he said, Look - I'm not stopping - that guy could have a gun or be crazy or whatever. I know - the sky is always falling.
The third time I asked him to stalk the poor woman she was near a street corner that has a convenience store - and he agreed to pull up in the parking lot and make sure she made it to the lighted area with people ok.
When she got close I hopped out of the car and went to her - I asked her - Excuse me, Miss - are you ok? Do you need help? And she was crying - she said through her tears No, I'm ok. And I smiled, and told her that it didn't look like it. I pointed back down the road where she had walked from and told her I had seen the truck following her - was she hurt - did he hurt her? Could I help her? She looked up at me and said he wasn't hurting her now - but I could see she had a black eye, and the little girl holding her hand was crying, too.
She wouldn't let me call the police - but I offered her my cell phone. She tried her mom, her brother, her cousin but no one answered. Finally she called a friend who was home who lived two blocks away and she would go there for the night. I offered her money - did the baby need diapers? but she wouldn't take it, saying she had some.
She told me the guy was the father of the two kids, that he works offshore and when he comes home he gets crazy - and that his mother lives there and he's a real momma's boy, and that the mother starts fights between them. She told me the 3 year old says she doesn't want to live with Daddy - she is afraid Daddy is going to kill her. I told her about 211 and that it's free and confidential and she repeated it to me twice and thanked me and said she would call when she got the kids down for the night. I told her there are shelters and day care and job assistance - that she didn't have to go back.
I hope she calls.
She said it wasn't the first time. I know if she goes back it won't be the last.
Makes me even more grateful for my husband. Who is so wonderful that he was willing to turn around three times when he didn't really want to, that he puts up with me when I get crazy ideas to butt into people's lives like that when it's maybe none of my business, or maybe dangerous.
I hope she calls.
Tonight when he just needed some chocolate chip cookies, I told him I'd go into the store if he would drive. So we got up, got dressed and headed out. On the way, we passes a small white pickup truck with its flashers on going very very slowly in the right lane on a neighborhood street. We saw a woman walking on the sidewalk. She was carrying a baby and had another child on the sidewalk with her, holding her hand. The truck was keeping pace with them.
We passed, and my husband started a monologue "No really honey I'm sorry if you'll just come home I'll never hit you again - really!", interpreting what looked like an obvious domestic disturbance.
I had thought when we passed that it looked funny and I asked him to just turn around and make another pass, just to look. And...he did. We went by them again and the same - she was walking and the truck was keeping pace. I asked again - can we go back just once more? C'mon - and he did. But he said, Look - I'm not stopping - that guy could have a gun or be crazy or whatever. I know - the sky is always falling.
The third time I asked him to stalk the poor woman she was near a street corner that has a convenience store - and he agreed to pull up in the parking lot and make sure she made it to the lighted area with people ok.
When she got close I hopped out of the car and went to her - I asked her - Excuse me, Miss - are you ok? Do you need help? And she was crying - she said through her tears No, I'm ok. And I smiled, and told her that it didn't look like it. I pointed back down the road where she had walked from and told her I had seen the truck following her - was she hurt - did he hurt her? Could I help her? She looked up at me and said he wasn't hurting her now - but I could see she had a black eye, and the little girl holding her hand was crying, too.
She wouldn't let me call the police - but I offered her my cell phone. She tried her mom, her brother, her cousin but no one answered. Finally she called a friend who was home who lived two blocks away and she would go there for the night. I offered her money - did the baby need diapers? but she wouldn't take it, saying she had some.
She told me the guy was the father of the two kids, that he works offshore and when he comes home he gets crazy - and that his mother lives there and he's a real momma's boy, and that the mother starts fights between them. She told me the 3 year old says she doesn't want to live with Daddy - she is afraid Daddy is going to kill her. I told her about 211 and that it's free and confidential and she repeated it to me twice and thanked me and said she would call when she got the kids down for the night. I told her there are shelters and day care and job assistance - that she didn't have to go back.
I hope she calls.
She said it wasn't the first time. I know if she goes back it won't be the last.
Makes me even more grateful for my husband. Who is so wonderful that he was willing to turn around three times when he didn't really want to, that he puts up with me when I get crazy ideas to butt into people's lives like that when it's maybe none of my business, or maybe dangerous.
I hope she calls.
Thursday, November 13, 2003
OK so my brother calls me last night and he's all puffed-up-chested and excited because he's found his name on a baby-naming site and its source is Polish and its meaning is something akin to 'heroic spear man'.
He wants to know if I know what my name means. I say 'yeah something like holiday song or big event song or happy song or something along those lines'. He says are you sure I mean how do you know that? I think but don't say well maybe because it's a common word in my native language and I hear it every season around this time of year coming up and I use the term 'Christmas Carol' when I'm saying my name to someone who obviously thinks I just said 'Karen' instead of 'Carol'. Instead I say 'I don't know I'm sure I've read it somewhere.' I try to take pity on him sometimes - I have to remember that he's not asking a stupid question, he's asking a foreigner's question.
I'm not all excited about any of this because I have such a common name and because well...just because.
I can understand why he's all excited because his name's meaning is a nice masculine meaning - it's not like he looked up his name and it means 'noodle dish cooked in clay pot buried for three days in wet sand' - so that's cool, and also because his name is such a terribly unique name that no one in this country ever ever ever gets it right the first time and it's not like he can say "Christmas Carol" - he'd have to say something equivalent in a language my computer doesn't even have the ability to type in. So bully for him.
But what really matters? What's really the big damned deal these days?
Six working days 'til vacation, that's what.
Not that I'm counting.
Well, not that I'm counting more than 9 or 300 times a day, anyway.
He wants to know if I know what my name means. I say 'yeah something like holiday song or big event song or happy song or something along those lines'. He says are you sure I mean how do you know that? I think but don't say well maybe because it's a common word in my native language and I hear it every season around this time of year coming up and I use the term 'Christmas Carol' when I'm saying my name to someone who obviously thinks I just said 'Karen' instead of 'Carol'. Instead I say 'I don't know I'm sure I've read it somewhere.' I try to take pity on him sometimes - I have to remember that he's not asking a stupid question, he's asking a foreigner's question.
I'm not all excited about any of this because I have such a common name and because well...just because.
I can understand why he's all excited because his name's meaning is a nice masculine meaning - it's not like he looked up his name and it means 'noodle dish cooked in clay pot buried for three days in wet sand' - so that's cool, and also because his name is such a terribly unique name that no one in this country ever ever ever gets it right the first time and it's not like he can say "Christmas Carol" - he'd have to say something equivalent in a language my computer doesn't even have the ability to type in. So bully for him.
But what really matters? What's really the big damned deal these days?
Six working days 'til vacation, that's what.
Not that I'm counting.
Well, not that I'm counting more than 9 or 300 times a day, anyway.
Monday, November 10, 2003
The joys of married life include:
I go to use the dryer. I pull out the lint filter. It’s got 1.5” of lint on it in four or five obviously different color layers.
ME: Husband! This dryer is going to konk out on us after just a few years if you don’t start cleaning the lint filter and when we have to buy another one it’s going to be your check book, not mine!
HIM: I clean the lint filter after EVERY LOAD!
ME: (stalking into whatever room he’s in with multi-colored lint) Oh really? Well then why are there neatly divided layers of color on this lint filter and what is so new that your washing that would leave this much lint???
HIM: I clean it! I clean it!
I go to use the dryer. I pull out the lint filter. It’s got 1.5” of lint on it in four or five obviously different color layers.
ME: Husband! This dryer is going to konk out on us after just a few years if you don’t start cleaning the lint filter and when we have to buy another one it’s going to be your check book, not mine!
HIM: I clean the lint filter after EVERY LOAD!
ME: (stalking into whatever room he’s in with multi-colored lint) Oh really? Well then why are there neatly divided layers of color on this lint filter and what is so new that your washing that would leave this much lint???
HIM: I clean it! I clean it!
Saturday, November 08, 2003
I'm a normal American woman and, like all normal American women, I hate Martha Stewart. She makes me feel like a failure since I can't take a few simple common household items like: a twig, a square of the crispest, whitest cotton paper, some silk hem tape in a soft celery color, a dried cranberry and a staff of 13 and turn them into a charming, clever place name set for my next dinner party.
I have less hostility for Sandra Lee, who's bit is the semi-homemade world. You can, for example, make a fabulous frosted raspberry early morning breakfast ring, but you don't need your staff of 13 and your own organic raspberry farm - you use Pillsbury crescent rolls for the pastry part, for example.
Well I was on her web site a little while ago because I bought her dessert book for a friend today. I now have an almost unbearable urge to go out and buy some white roses just so I can bring them home and stick them in a vase of blue and green food coloring and dye them cyan. This is something I could actually make work.
I have less hostility for Sandra Lee, who's bit is the semi-homemade world. You can, for example, make a fabulous frosted raspberry early morning breakfast ring, but you don't need your staff of 13 and your own organic raspberry farm - you use Pillsbury crescent rolls for the pastry part, for example.
Well I was on her web site a little while ago because I bought her dessert book for a friend today. I now have an almost unbearable urge to go out and buy some white roses just so I can bring them home and stick them in a vase of blue and green food coloring and dye them cyan. This is something I could actually make work.
Friday, November 07, 2003
Kool-Aid. How the hell long has it been since you've made up a pitcher of Kool-Aid? Frankly, I didn't even know we had any until we came home from a short errand to find that one of the dogs had gotten into the food pantry and pulled a packet out to snack on.
So I mixed it up with some wonderful filtered water and was delighted to be reminded how much I love Tropical Punch Kool-Aid. Yummy!
So I mixed it up with some wonderful filtered water and was delighted to be reminded how much I love Tropical Punch Kool-Aid. Yummy!
Bumpersticker seen on the back of a dirty dirty minivan:
I might look weird but I'd kick your ass on Jeopardy.
I might look weird but I'd kick your ass on Jeopardy.
Thursday, November 06, 2003
I'm usually a little bit of a news addict - at 10 p.m. my husband hands me the remote for the t.v. and leaves the room because he knows I'm going to obsessively hop back and forth between our three local network news shows until the sports reports come on.
The one time of the month that he's safe to stay in the living room is November. Can you TELL it's sweeps month? Hell yes - just from the news teasers!
-FIRE ALARM! Are local dance clubs packing in too many people? Why haven't local police and fire marshals stopped this heinous crime against humanity???????
-THE TUITION - TAX MONEY CONNECTION!! The University of Texas is raising tuition - but if they would just keep a better hold on the equipment that YOUR tax dollars pay for, you could probably get an education for free!! Over 16,000 items walked off the campus - and they're reported "lost" - not "stolen" for SHAME!
and my favorite...
-SEX IN THE BIBLE!!??!!???!!?? One local pastor is helping his flock enrich their sex lives by finding biblical references to a better sex life! Film at 11! Sheesh!
The one time of the month that he's safe to stay in the living room is November. Can you TELL it's sweeps month? Hell yes - just from the news teasers!
-FIRE ALARM! Are local dance clubs packing in too many people? Why haven't local police and fire marshals stopped this heinous crime against humanity???????
-THE TUITION - TAX MONEY CONNECTION!! The University of Texas is raising tuition - but if they would just keep a better hold on the equipment that YOUR tax dollars pay for, you could probably get an education for free!! Over 16,000 items walked off the campus - and they're reported "lost" - not "stolen" for SHAME!
and my favorite...
-SEX IN THE BIBLE!!??!!???!!?? One local pastor is helping his flock enrich their sex lives by finding biblical references to a better sex life! Film at 11! Sheesh!
Saturday, November 01, 2003
I was in the shower scrubbing this morning when my husband came in to relate a story:
Last night, when he went to rent Matrix II at the video store, a girl in a black witches costume was getting out of the car next to his. She was talking to another girl who was with her and the part of the conversation that stuck with him was her opening line:
"Every time my Daddy marries another woman her kids get to take part of my inheritance!"
We agreed this was surely trying for the girl, but the fantastic part of the story came when I asked for more information about the girl and he told me she was about 8 years old...
Last night, when he went to rent Matrix II at the video store, a girl in a black witches costume was getting out of the car next to his. She was talking to another girl who was with her and the part of the conversation that stuck with him was her opening line:
"Every time my Daddy marries another woman her kids get to take part of my inheritance!"
We agreed this was surely trying for the girl, but the fantastic part of the story came when I asked for more information about the girl and he told me she was about 8 years old...
