Time is on my side

9:00 on a Monday morning, and my work week is done! I don't have to remotely think about work again until about 5:00 on Friday afternoon. It's a strange and wonderful life I have right now. Too bad/so sad I can't use all of this free time to travel. Stupid debt.

You can't always get what you want

I went to my neighborhood "7-11" this morning (this convenience store deserves its own post; all in due time) to get this 12 ounce bottle of liquid ecstasy:
I am hard pressed to remember a single episode of greater disappointment than when I searched in vain for this specific flavor and found that they were out of it. It was a crushing blow to me and my incredibly nauseous belly. So I went with the next best thing I could imagine, and it totally turned my frown upside down.

The best part is that these sodas are totally justified because they are not made with high fructose corn syrup and they are caffeine free! Drink up!

Book update

Ok so books 13 and 14 are not "Siddhartha" and "The Tempest." I stopped midway on both of those because I was too excited about my findings at the Humane Society thrift store. Adult onset ADD? Much!

Book 13 was "Jailbird" by Kurt Vonnegut. I love me some Vonnegut. My friend John thinks he is so overrated, and that just kills me. The guy's got it. Period. (Vonnegut, not John. Although John's got it too. Just a different "it." Hi John!)

Favorite passage, about a little dog obsessed with a rubber ice cream cone toy: "I observe how profoundly serious Nature has made her about a rubber ice-cream cone - brown rubber cone, pink rubber ice cream. I have to wonder what equally ridiculous commitments to bits of trash I myself have made. Not that it matters at all. We are here for no purpose, unless we can invent one. Of that I am sure. The human condition in an exploding universe would not have been altered one iota if, rather than live as I have, I had done nothing but carry a rubber ice-cream cone from closet to closet for sixty years." You would think this philosophy of his would make for extremely cynical and depressing books, but it doesn't. His characters are always happily resigned to their predestined fates, good or bad.

Book 14 was "Mrs. Dalloway" by Virginia Woolf. One of the best opening lines of any book. "Mrs. Dalloway said she would buy the flowers herself." The entire book is about one day in the life of Mrs. Dalloway. If you never knew a thing about Virginia Woolf, it would probably become pretty obvious to you after reading this that she was a deeply troubled soul, completely ill mentally. This book is a technical masterpiece. It is the "drip, drip of one impression after another." It will stay with you for days when you are done.

Book 15: "Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim," by David Sedaris. Meh. Another collection of his family-based anecdotes. Second rate. Disappointing.

Next was "Laughable Loves" by Milan Kundera. A collection of short stories about male/female relationships. On the surface, some very problematic representations of women, and for the male characters, love seems to be almost exclusively about sexual conquests. But if you dig a little deeper, there is some great stuff in here.

I am starting to have serious doubts about making it to 100 books!!

Sleepover

We had Emmaline and Merritt over to spend the night Friday night, and it was good times all around. The energy in the house goes from zero to sixty immediately when they are here. (Not that Aunt Laura and Uncle Adam aren't totally exciting and fun every second of the day by themselves!)

We colored and made pizza and baked cookies and watched Mary Poppins. I was down for the count by 10 but heard Adam in my half awake/half asleep state tuck the girls in about 15 minutes later and say bedtime prayers. So totally sweet. The next morning I woke up at about 6:30 to a very upset Merritt who didn't exactly appreciate having just been licked in the face by one of the dogs. It was not even light outside yet and Emmaline's all "Aunt Laura can we finish Mary Poppins now?" Inwardly, I'm like this is some kind of sick joke and I'm going back to bed. Outwardly, I go, "Of course! Spit spot!" and we finish the movie at that most unholy hour.

Here are Adam and the girls making pizza.

Seasonal Trickery

I know spring and fall have their similarities but man if yesterday didn't feel exactly like this:



In the immortal words of Bush, "Fool me once, shame on... shame on you. Fool me... can't get fooled again!"

Hackneyed

I have never considered myself a patriotic person. This is not to say that I don't appreciate the benefits of having been born in the United States rather than many other countries. But you are not going to find me arguing with a Swede, a Cuban, or a Colombian that I am happier and 100% better off with my U.S. citizenship. Not to get all hippie on you, but I just believe there is a much larger and greater reality than citizenship. National borders are not physically real. They are on paper and in our minds. And they change. I am more interested in being loyal to mankind and defending what I believe is good and lasting and common in all of us, no matter where on the planet our mothers gave birth to us.

Having said all of that, I am going to have an old-fashioned hissy fit if I hear one more person say they are moving to Canada if their preferred political party's candidate doesn't win the presidency in November. It is the emptiest of all threats, and it just feels like a childish tantrum to me. People who make comments like this seem to be just begging for people to take note of how passionate and unwavering they are when it comes to their political beliefs. Except we all know they probably couldn't even name all of their state senators and representatives.

I know I need to relax because we have a long way to go til November. It is just depressing that we squander this opportunity every 4 years to have a real dialogue about how sick and diseased this country is and what to do about it.

Oh dear

Have I really ignored my 5 faithful readers for 10 days? My Circadian rhythm is wacked right now. When I am not working or sleeping, I am generally lying in bed trying to sleep. It hasn't been much of a life. I am determined to get it straightened out this week!

DM Freakin' V

I am 100% cursed by something evil when it comes to the DMV. I have never had an easy time of it, no matter where I have lived. Adam and I discussed this early on in our relationship, and I discovered that he has basically never had a bad experience with the DMV. How is this possible!!?? He is blessed among men. Or he is lying. Can't decide which.

After 6 months of living in Mississippi, I finally got around to getting my license changed over. I won't outline all of the ways in which this went badly. Let's just say that I spent a total of about 7 hours trying to get it taken care of. SEVEN HOURS OF MY LIFE.

And now, gentle reader, please feast your eyes upon the Harrison County Department of Motor Vehicles Licensing and Registration Division.



Doesn't exactly give you the warm fuzzies right away. But at least they thought of the handicapped. Kind of.



This sign is the reason people that aren't from Mississippi like to ask us kiddingly if we still use the outhouse or remark sarcastically that they are surprised to see us wearing shoes!