Fight or Flight

Okay, so I was coming back from Florida and was not in the best of spirits. My dad is battling cancer, and it sucks and I just wanted to listen to my ipod and stare out the window.

Lo and behold, the following stereotypical items all happened to me:
1. The 6- year old child behind me kept kicking my seat. Hard. Apparently grandma thought was ok for little precious to do this, unbuckle her seatbelt during takeoff, put her feet up on the window, and jump up and down on the seat mid-flight. Now I have a lot of respect for parents when they bring their little ones onto a plane. It’s challenging, I know. So I was proud of myself at first for putting up with it quietly. When I did start making the passive-aggressive head motion of looking behind me, grandma started glaring at me. And that’s when I started to get pissed. But apparently not as much as the flight attendant, who came by every five minutes to tell the girl to get in her seat because, as she put it the third time, "the plane can hit turbulence and you'd hit your head".

2. Really tall guy sits next to me. That’s fine, airplane seats suck, not his fault. But it was his fault that he had to read the paper like he was sitting in a booth getting his shoes shined. He was so in my bubble. It’s not the Bible, dude; fold those pages.

3. Every 20 minutes, somebody let loose with an obnoxious fart that wafted over the cabin like a storm that never ends.

They say that we Americans are the worst with having to have personal space. I don’t know how other cultures do it. The Japanese people pretty much are crammed like sardines into trains. Maybe I need to go to one of these highly populated small countries, come back, and I’ll feel like I have a seat in first class.

Making Peace

I am terrified of spiders. I don't know what it is; if they had 2 or 4 less legs they would be just like every other bug. I think it's the mobility that scares me. They are sort of like the Navy seals of bugs. After a rather alarming hiking incident a few years back I made a pact with them. The incident was this: I was hiking, I turned around and saw a daddy-long leg spider. I hiked a little more, and now there were 3, and they were PURSUING me. I stopped, they stopped. I went on a little, so did they. When I turned back around I could have sworn they were looking around whistling. When I told people about it, even my hiking companion (you know who you are), they didn't believe me. Well, I like a good joke as much as the next person. If I was a spider, and could tell human fear (which I think they can) I would probably gather my friends up and say, "Let's run after this chick. It'll be HILARIOUS." Not to mention the joke later where they all perched on top of the tent and their shadows looked giant on my sleeping bag. Yup, good times, daddy-os. Anyway, my pact was this...I will leave them alone. I will not kill their kind. Spiders have popped up in my life all over the place. When I was a kid they were on my pillow. In the bathroom? Scuttling across the floor. In a house, in a boat, in a car, with a goat. In school and in the pool. Trying to kill them is a hunt of unimaginable proportions. It's like a horror movie where the bad guy just won't die. The most dire situation is when you simply injure the spider and it runs away to gather ammunition for revenge. I decided it wasn't worth it. I'm not keen on killing things anyway. So I was not surprised to see two suddenly with no warning take up residence in the corner of my bedroom. And here is the thing. Have you seen a microscopic view of a daddy-long-leg? I was going to display one to show the horror. So I googled it. And I find myself strangely at peace seeing it's little wee turtle-shaped head. But if you look at it, it's really got quite a cute little face. (It's the tiny head poking out of the giant pink horrible sack). So my friend/savior Angela came to my rescue and scooped them up in a cup and threw them outside. And I felt a bit more at peace about it.

Picture Surprise

Do you remember that episode of the Twilight Zone where the fellow was flying on a plane and he looks out and there is some weird monster dude hanging out on the wing mid-flight? This episode always freaked me out but I also think it's a concept that's kind of funny. On SNL, Andy Samburg did a great sketch of the suddenly-appearing person.

Well another aspect of this phenomenon is when you take pictures and realize later there is a random person in the background. And usually, they are looking at the camera with possession-like intensity. So this happened to me this past weekend. My friends and I had a girl's weekend for my cousin's birthday. Here they are in Blue Ridge, GA enjoying lunch:

Nice pic, if it wasn't for chilling Frau Helga peering from the bushes. Let's look more up close, shall we?


Frau Helga stared at the group of girls, enraged. "Why, those little tarties didn't even smile at me when they passed," she's thinking, " I'm going to make them into a stew."

Potty All the Time!

Women have a lot of crazy stuff to do in the bathroom. There's a lot of navigation for us that men don't have to go through.

I've always been fascinated by the bathroom. When I was a kid, it was a way to take a break from a boring dinner out, or wander around aimlessly. It apparantly was also a way to drive my mother batty, knowing that as soon as we got somewhere I would have to go. And it's not like she could say no; because I might really have to go. There's something unsettling about a 7 year old who is really excited to go check out the bathroom.

Anyhoo, I wish I could say I grew out of it, but nay. A weak bladder and a sense of misadventure gives you an appreciation of a nice bathroom. Best bathroom I have ever been in? Has been when I was visiting my friend Angela's last hotel of employment, the JW Marriott Starr Pass in Tucson. I would pay to simply stay in the bathroom.

Worst? This port-o-potty in Italy featured to the left that was just a hole in the plastic, and then before you could say holy manicotti disinfectant was sprayed all over the bottom of the thing, soaking feet as well. It's apparantly the one thing in Italy that is done in haste. Everything else, luggage delivery, eating, directions, takes a freakin' half of a day. I emerged reeking of Pine-Sol and no better for it.

Is it weird to say I feel safer in an airplane lavatory? For some reason I've always envisioned that if the plane went down, I would be safe, screeching to a halt and fully encapsulated in the pod of the bathroom.

Is it weird that when I worked for the Air Force as a civilian I was the only girl in our building, which made me the only one to use the bathroom, which made falling asleep for 2 hours on the toilet one day due to "college stress" (i.e. staying up until 4am watching Mystery Science Theater 3000) seem pretty normal, since it was my bathroom anyway? Well, don't answer that, I know it's weird.

But then I was thinking about it. My friend Stephanie and I went to the REM concert at the outdoor Merriweather Post Pavilion in Columbia, MD the other day. As with most concerts, the bathroom line was long and the bathroom was disgusting. By the time I got up to the stall, got in, it was too late to bow out just because the door didn't lock. Without missing a beat, I adopted the following stance:

As you can see, I had a sizable purse, which could not be put on the ground for fear of contamination. So, I clenched it in my teeth. The door didn't lock and there were a lot of people, so I leaned forward and closed the door with my head. Additional challenges include the standard not sitting on the seat, and being unable to obtain a square of toilet paper in the oh-so-helpful dispenser.

It was gross. It was done quickly. But dammit, I felt a rush of pride for my gender. Look at all we endure! As I balanced my forehead against the crappy wooden door that failed to lock, I thought, "wow, I'm a tough chick! look at this! and i know all my friends have done this." Well, except my friend Simona who refuses to use any public restroom.

It was a good feeling. As I ran my hands under the scalding hot water, squirted out the non-existent soap in the dispenser, and pulled the lever only to be gravely disappointed by the lack of a paper towel, I glowed with my pride. Then I went home and took a scalding hot shower and used lot of hand sanitizer, because, let's admit it, I wouldn't have done that unless I absolutely freakin' had to.

It's Not Unusual for Anyone to Read This

Tom Jones, "It's not unusual to be loved by anyone..."

This song was going through my head the other day. Then I thought, what the hell does that mean?? "It's not unusual to be loved by anyone"? So, it's commonplace for anyone at all to love you? Do they know you? Why are they considered anyone then??

I realize this is a stupid post, but I just haven't been too inspired lately. And it gives you some rich food for thought. And some jazzy eye candy to the left.

Ol' Irish Yarn

Here's the thing: I come from a big ol' Irish family. The biggest thing I would say that is among all of us is that we can sure tell a tale.

The story could be that Uncle Joe went to the store to get bread and they were out. It turns into Uncle Joe had to driving through DRIVING WINDS AND HAIL and then got to the store and the manager came out and yelled at him because he knew the guy that Uncle Joe worked with from the electric company, who said Uncle Joe was a jerk. Well, turns out that guy said that because he was clinically insane. So, really there was no bread but there is no telling what the crazy guy's manager friend did before Uncle Joe got to the bread aisle. Oh. and the cashier revealed that she has gout.

It's something my cousin Sara (featured in pic) and I talk about all the time. We talk about it with fondness, and irritation, and make every attempt to not do it although I would imagine we fail terribly, and it is simply karma that we will tell our kids outrageous stories about her growing up in New Hampshire and battling 10 feet of snow, and me in New York battling...uh...the mob? Yeah, that's it; the mob!

Well, I don't know what got me thinking about this, but I started to think of all the little things that have been told over the years in our family that have gotten quite mythological in nature. Here are my top favorites.

1. Grandpa said he was a terrible person.
Our family is Irish Catholic, meaning that we have giant guilt attacks over small things and blow them into giant, God-smulching acts. Grandpa, who was the patriarch and leader of telling an entertaining tale, would look at Sara and I and say, very seriously and rather cryptically, "Pray for your grandpa. He's done some bad things". We would both promptly burst into laughter. My grandfather was many things- an excellent host for a party, a chocoholic, a purveyor of fine port and smokes; a mysterious guilt-ridden sinner he was not. Especially because he, like many in our family, had OCD, and had to tell everybody every "bad thing" he had done. "I ate the last of the ice cream, ma," he would tell my grandmother, somber and contrite. "You bozo!" she'd laugh.

2. Mom said she had a glass eye.
I was quite little and I was on my mother's lap. She proceeded to rub her eye and it made some sort of squeak noise. I asked why. She looked at me and said very seriously, "Honey, mommy has a glass eye." It was ridiculous. I was very concerned though, for my mother had obviously lost her eye in some sort of accident. "Do you take it out?!" I demanded. "How long have you had it?" She then told me she was kidding, but the damage was done. I eyed her eye suspiciously for about a year.

3. Aunt Eileen claims that if you get your tongue pierced, you could get tongue cancer.
Aunt Eileen is Sara's mother. Sara had her nose, ears and bellybutton pierced at various times, which I believe Auntie Ei also assigned those appendages a horrible mutilating disease if she pierced them. I guess if she went to the trouble of coming up with these consequences to convince her daughter not to get them, she did not appreciate Sara and I arguing with her about the medical validity of her claims.

4. Mom and Dad claim that I will be spotlighted while bowling.
Ok, this one really gets my goat. I was really nervous about going bowling for the first time (I don't know why, I was a nervous kid, okay?) My parents asked me if I would be okay when the guy on the loudspeaker announced my name and everyone turned to look as I bowled. 'Nuff said. I spent the entire time waiting to be "called out", and then was oddly disappointed when I was not. It's the yin and yang of my horoscope of Leo.

5. Sister makes claim of eventual pig nose.
My second grade teacher, Mrs. McAuley, blew her nose in an interesting way. She would forcefully blow, and then move her fingers around in her nose with the tissue, clearly removing all debris and making it squeaky clean. I appreciated the habit and began to do this myself. My sister Meg apparantly thought this was WEIRD and told me, "if you do that, even for like a little while longer, you are going to have a giant pig nose. And it will never go back." I was horrified but could not go back to just blowing and wiping without getting the internal refuse. Well, I'm going to be 30 in a month, and NO PIG NOSE MEG. YET. (though I did stop with the circular cleansing motion. It was a tad weird."

6. Aunt Maryann.
Aunt Maryann is my Aunt who is the eldest sibling on my mother's side. Therefore, she has the dubious distinction of having the longest time for all her punk-ass little brothers and sisters to make up stories about her. Including:Aunt Maryann WRAPPED A CAR AROUND A TREE. (It's always said with an emphasis that would make you believe she seriously performed some feat of physics). She banged a car up when learning to drive is what the story really is.

CrazyGoods

I'm a big HomeGoods fan. For those of you not familiar, it's a Marshall's-style store with, well, goods for the home. They have nice furniture, and good finds as they have new stuff come in every week.

However, the clearance section is a horror of the ugliest chachka you ever did see. Which is entertaining as well. However, last week I came across this:

Yes, it's a candle holder of FINGERS. There were 2 of them; a set. The longer I stared at it the more agitated I became. Were they all middle fingers? If I snapped a ceramic finger off would it howl in pain?

I went back a few days later to show the monstrosity to my friend Angela. She was bemused, but I couldn't seem to express to her the hideous feeling I got every time I looked at it, yet I COULD NOT LOOK AWAY. So I snapped a picture, to spread the damning horror for all to view. On another note, if you ever need a gag gift, the clearance section at HomeGoods is an excellent place to go.