I wish I had you always, even if I do have to work through you anyway since the freelance doesn’t just stop for a federal holiday. In your honor, I would like to give you this:
PS. If you’re easily offended, don’t watch, you perfectly tanned shitbird.
Some of you may know this already, as my identity is not so anonymous as I might like it to be, but I went to high school (5th grade through 12th, in fact) in a smallish-to-midsized Alabama town called Decatur.
Yes, there’s one in Georgia, too, and Illinois, for that matter. But my dad (a chemical engineer who’s now back to work after retirement, congrats Dad) was transferred to the one in Alabama to help manage one of the big chemical plants.
photo credit: milena mihaylova
Confession: I watched Baby Boom again last night (for, like, the at least fifth time in my life, thank you Lifetime) and, um, I cried. Fortunately I still had tissues left.
Not because of the baby part, even though that baby is damn cute, and, remarkably, only cries like once in the whole movie … and even though the part at the end where she turns around and says “Mama!” is obviously voiced-over, it’s still touching in a cloying sort of way. Anyway, I’m not so middle-aged that I have to cry at that. Yet.
A quick donation request: I know you were about to donate to me, all of you wildly generous people, but instead, donate to Haiti, okay? You’ve all heard about the earthquake, right? Well, a donation is as easy as texting 90999 on your cell and writing “HAITI” in the text message. The phone co. will add 10 bucks to your cell phone bill, and God knows that thing is so high you’ll never even notice. I just did it, and it was easy-breezy-peasy. I also hear you can donate through your Amazon one-click capability on the Red Cross website. Anyone done that?
Or, check out the White House blog for other donation options. Because as bad as the unemployed may have it, I dare say the poor people in Haiti have it quite a bit worse right now.
photo credit: juhansonin
It’s wonderful when you come out from under that cloud of sickness and can shout heavenward (or, in my case, froggily croak): “I’m alive! Praise be, I’m alive!”
Because the last few days, I’ve felt pretty undead, if you know what I mean. So here I am, workout clothes donned for some “light cardio” (they say it’s good for you if you have a cold, you know, immune-system-wise), writin’ posts all over the place, even calling Verizon to find out why my phone insists on erasing all of my text messages every 24 hours …
Update for those concerned: Voice slightly better, still bad, but not waking up next to a guy in tighty-whities bad. I managed, after sleeping until noon, getting up to craft a post, and then going back to bed until 4:00, to take a shower and go pick up my laundry and dry-cleaning. Over and out. High (or middling-to-low) expectations for tomorrow.
In other news, let’s all raise our glasses (mine has OJ and Sprite, okay?) to Matthew Van McDaniel, a fellow in Orange County, CA, who wanted to get to jail so badly that he drove right into it. (That’s what we call drive, folks. Bah-dum-bum.)
According to the report, Read the rest of this entry »
photo credit: notanartist
I used to think silence might be golden, or at least enjoyable, especially in an airplane or crowded elevator.
But when you’re all by yourself in your apartment and all of your friends are afraid to come near and catch your germs—and you can’t even speak to them on the phone because, really, you can’t speak at all, except to quietly try saying “Hello” to yourself now and again to test out your voice, but despite countless mugs of Ginger Honey Throat tea you got nuthin’—well, that silence is actually not golden. I’d call it rusty tin-cannish, maybe, or cubic zirconium-infused, but not golden.
photo credit: rwentechaney
Here are some things that happen when you’re 33 but think you might be more like 28 and act like you’re about 23.
On a Tuesday night, your friend M. who now lives with her husband H. in way-off Malaysia comes to town, and you learn she has sold her first screenplay. This is exciting news, and along with the fact that we haven’t seen one another in a year, insists on celebration via excessive drinking (of course), burritos, and staying out late.
Today I have so little concentration that my to-do list (which has 4 items on it, only 2 of them priority) has not even one thing crossed off.
When my electronic prescription refill failed to go through, I hung up rather than actually speak to a “pharmaceutical representative.” I didn’t answer my hair salon when they called to confirm my Saturday appointment and now I have to call them back, too, but have made no progress in that.
I tried to read this article about how breakups are sooooo hard in today’s era of Facebook and digital blah-blah-blah and then I just stopped. And now all I can think about is lunch.
I mean, don’t get me wrong, I did manage to make it to the office and am sitting here ostensibly ready to tackle anything that comes my way, but really, focus is about nil until I’m actually presented with something.
photo credit: nevermindtheend
Let’s talk keyboards. See, I’m working with one—how do you not work with one? It would be almost like working without a computer, and goodness knows how we’d get anything done then!
Anyway, when you’re a freelancer you end up getting put at any number of desks with any number of keyboards. The only thing they have in common, really, is that they all have keys, unless you’re working at a really low-brow sort of institution. Oh, and they’re all dirty as hell. (I apologize for the picture and if it makes you want to throw up, cause it makes me want to throw up, and in fact I am averting my eyes quickly so as not to do so.)
