tumbleweeds

A parent is often mistaken for a parrot. Around my house, an oft-repeated mantra is "When the fat girl steps on things, things get broken," which of course means that if your things are left lying on the floor and Big Mama stumbles over them, they will get destroyed.

Big Mama also regularly feels like a nag, especially when it comes to electronics. One of these days, I do believe I will smack The Boy right upside his cranium because he "borrows" my computer and downloads crap onto the desktop rather than directly onto his thumb drive. I also can't begin to count the number of times I've had to nuke a hard drive and reload Windows because nobody but me updates virus protection.

This last week, I had the pleasure of not only blending those two facets of my existence into reality, but also to demonstrate the truth behind the words. From the moment it was unpacked, I repeated over the course of several days, "Mister, don't leave your laptop lying flat on the floor. If it gets stepped on/If I step on it..." yada yada yada.

And so, Thursday evening, in a search for something else, I stumbled over a toy left on the floor and stepped on the corner of his laptop, the very same laptop for which I stood in line in a store I don't particularly like in order to get a very good bargain, and I hear a sharp, "Crack!"

I instantly transform into Sailor Swears, but, being in a rush, I didn't check it and promptly forgot about it. The following night, Mister reports that his LCD screen is definitely cracked. I honestly don't think I've ever peppered my speech with so many f-words in so many languages. After inspecting the unit myself, it is still usable but would benefit from a new screen.

I just priced a new screen. Mister can bite my butt.

Days Like These

On a whimsy, we decided to drive two hours to Atlanta in order to visit a 'family' cemetery that was described as the centerpiece of the parking lot for a Walmart store, and then we went to a Persian restaurant to spend over $100 on kabobs and stew for dinner.

The 'family' part is that the people buried in the cemetery may be long-distant relatives of Mister's. It is in fact part of a parking lot, but it's actually cut off from the main Walmart parking lot and is instead off to far front corner.

The dinner was a quick hop a few exits up the beltway, and was extremely delicious. I didn't even like what I ordered but its yumminess was still begging me to eat it, and so I did. Even my non-adventurous girls were stuffing themselves.

How was your day?

Stay on target!

When the monkeys were younger, my problem with Christmas shopping was never what to get them but when to stop buying for them. I was mindful of not spoiling them; people who get everything they want inevitably suffer a decline in ambition.

Now that the monkeys are teenagers, I am almost at a complete loss.

They are in possession of portable entertainment devices. Our home also has a video game console, albeit not the one The Boy preferred. While they always have fun with the Smithsonian products I place under the tree, it's kinda boring to only get "educational" stuff as gifts.

Rock Band will be purchased, but as a "family" gift. Every year we also get movies and games (table and video) for the family. Individual gifts, however, are what stump me this year.

The Girl is an artist. She loves to paint and sketch. She also plays the flute, although I never hear her practicing anything. However, it's not her entire life. She also wastes an inordinate amount of her free time playing MMORPGs. Okay, she plays just one. She regularly spends her own cash money to buy virtual crap for her avatar even though gameplay is free.

The Boy loves computers and video games. He also plays an MMORPG, and exchanges labor for paid gameplay. He has a blog about video games. He will talk you into a coma about video games--you'll be like that guy on Airplane! who douses himself with gasoline and lights a match before Ted Striker is asked to fly the plane.

The Baby loves her Webkinz brand stuffed animals, but she really has way too many stuffed animals altogether. She is also an origami prodigy. You should see her miniature dragon. The full-size is hard enough to fold, but her mini is a perfect rendition and it's only one inch long. She's really artsy-craftsy, and enjoys learning new skills. Oh, and here's a surprise--she also has a favorite MMORPG, but it's Webkinz-related.

I had considered just purchasing each kid a brand new laptop, thereby allowing us to declutter the dining room, but several clever friends pointed out that laptops are non-repairable by DIY enthusiasts like me, and they get dropped/damaged on a regular basis. Plus, since they travel, they might very well end up in bedrooms, which is not allowed in my house. Instead I will upgrade the desktops we have and redesign my office space to create a more open look, replacing the hulking armoire-style cabinets.

I don't want to wimp out and just hand them all cash this year, but I'm stuck in a vacuum and just can't think of anything. I also don't want to spoil them or spend a metric assload of money.

Help!

Genius!

I'm watching an "old" concert on VH1 Classic channel by Queen. If I ever have any regrets in this short life, it will be that I never had an opportunity to see the band live in concert before Freddie Mercury's untimely death.

I'll be honest: I don't think The Beatles were all that great. I feel it's more that they hit the market at the right time and then changed enough over time to remain relevant. But brilliant? I dunno. I guess if you call writing music and lyrics whilst stoned "brilliant," then I'll have to give you that, albeit unwillingly. I will admit to being a rather big fan of "Octopus's Garden" and "Yellow Submarine." I'm sure if there were others that I liked, I could name them, but alas. Ear wax.

But Queen... They were just awesome. Every song had butt-kicking music, some had silly lyrics, some songs were heart-breakingly sad, all were singable. Their multi-talented front-man presented himself in the gayest way possible but rocked so hard that most fans just said "meh" and carried on regardless.

At any rate, you have to admit that a guy who can seriously compare feeling in love to wiggling like a jellyfish in a rock song is pretty awesome.

Things seen at high school football games

Possible answers:

• Crack, as in butt-crack
• Inappropriate t-shirts worn by band chaperones
• Hurling, as in lunch, especially when it's too humid to be outdoors
• Gang fights and tasering
• Arrests

The crack episode involves a spectator who is either addicted to tanning or really well over 40 but likes to dress as a teenager. Early in the season, after the national anthem was played, I spotted her as she bent over to fuss with a small child. The waistband of her thong panties clearly showed over the top of her skinny jeans. Add to that her tank top, zip-up skinny jacket, ball cap, and big hoop earrings, and we've got a woman who is refusing to act her age and embarrassing herself in the process.

A couple of weeks ago, a band chaperone was wearing a black, form-fitting tank top that had a big pink-ribbon logo on the front and read "celebrate ta-tas." As if that wasn't bad enough, "ta-tas" was about six inches tall and positioned directly over her breasts.

Yesterday was surprisingly humid after a week of cooler weather. Normal operating procedures have the band kids scattering after school to scarf down food. Most go home while some find fast-food. Yesterday was no different. Skip to the half-time, where the band is free to use the concession stand. One student didn't make it; the humidity was too much and he was sick to his stomach. Worse--his parents did not attend that game, an away game in a run-down neighborhood.

As a chaperone, I like to be last out of the stands to make sure we've got everyone. Last night was no different. As I was walking from the gate to the area where the buses were located, I noticed a group of youths walking with a sense of purpose from across the street into a grassy area located between the gate and me. There was lots of yelling going on, so I looked behind me and saw a second, similar-sized group of youths walking with a sense of purpose from the gate area into the same grassy area. Fighting commenced immediately; however, the police were rigth on top of things. Within moments I heard the sound of a Taser being fired. I looked back and saw a young man squirming on the ground. I announced that we needed to get out of there as fast as possible.

We arrived at the buses only to discover police at our end, too. Some "locals" decided to try to get onto the buses, and were being arrested for trespass. We were encouraged to board the buses as quickly as possible and then shut the doors.

Where were we? Downtown Augusta, at a school known for its quality educational program for "gifted" students.

no chinchilla

For the last two years, I have managed to average one post every three-ish days for a total of 100 posts annually. This year is nearly done and I have only managed 45 posts.

I don't believe there has been less to talk about; I think it's more a matter of motivation. I haven't been too motivated to post to my blog, and feel that maybe I have let you down. The Pittsburg Pirates still blow. People hopped up on drugs still do stupid stuff. Our government may have "changed the guard" but still has its head up its butt.

The only thing I can really report with any newness is that I am helping a gay man design and sew a Halloween costume, and while there will be neither Bedazzling nor fur or feathers, he is most excited.

oh the huge manatee

I love irony. Thanks to Fark.com, I can share this little tidbit:

"Yes, true change has come. Toby 'put a boot up your ass' Keith to perform at Nobel Peace Prize concert in Oslo"

The article goes on to list other artists who will be performing live at the concert. Fark's headline, however, is too awesome to pass by unmentioned.

woah.

Here's a quote you never expected to read, ever:

"This is believed to be the first time that a civilian has been killed by a box of public information leaflets."

Thanks, TimesOnline, for making me laugh at something sad, you evil bastards.

Light's Out!

"The Guiding Light," a daytime soap opera, is going off the air after 72 years. It was one of my beloved grandmother's "shows," and one of the odd ways I've always felt a connection to her, even after her death. And now, just like my sweet grandmother, it, too, will be gone.

My grandmother's house is an oddity. Normally one would enter the house from the front porch and then walk through a sitting room and living room to enter the dining room, kitchen and then bathroom. However, the rear entry was used as a front door because that was where the driveway brought you. Everyone entered into a small 'mud room' and then directly into the dining room. The dining room itself had a huge window looking out onto the front yard, main driveway, and road.

My grandmother never sat anywhere but in the dining room, and always at the head of the table. Within easy reach were her latest crocheting project. CB radio (they were in the sticks, and calls were expensive--heck, the area still doesn't have cellphone reception!), her typewriter, her address book and her radio.

She did not have a television in her dining room until she bought one with a remote back when I was still in elementary school. Instead, she used a special radio which had "TV" selections, and every day she listened to "The Young and the Restless" and "The Guiding Light," in the dining room while her daughters watched "that nonsense" show, "General Hospital" in the living room. She enjoyed clucking over the misadventures of the residents of Genoa City and Springville. In between the episodes, she would make dinner, type out a letter to a friend, or polish our nails with white-out. During the shows, however, we would sit with her at the dining room table, quietly drawing or writing while the episode was played out in our imaginations in time with the radio.

My grandmother was born before the show began, and had followed it nearly every day of her life until she died at age of 72. I think it is only fitting that if one of her favorite shows is also going to die, it should be at the ripe old age of 72.

Expectations are down...

...on the realization that sometimes words don't mean what you think they mean.

I'm shopping for a fancy dress. I'm a big girl which makes the shopping tricky. Another handicap is my attitude towards shopping in general and the mall in particular: I'd rather have my eyebrows waxed again.

Any smart shopper is going to do a little research before heading out. I am no exception. Because of the nature of the quest, I tried to limit myself to stores normally found at the mall. I found a few examples of dresses I kind-of liked at one, and so moved on to store 2 in hopes of finding the style I think I'm into this year.

Talk about raising an eyebrow. Now, I realize that the store is not actually a 'barn.' However, I do expect there to be some 'dresses' in it, since the damn store is called 'Dress Barn.' Inconceivable!

Don't want to be an American idiot

So I'm looking over some of the Facebook entries I missed during Dragon*Con, and I came across this item posted by a guy with whom I went to school:

"I bet anybody from Germany who remembers how Hitlers Rise To POWER happened is laughing at the USA right now. Hitler plead to the children with speeches sounding soooooooo good. Just like Obama now wants to SPEAK to the children. He changed his speech when people who how to think challenged him. HE IS EVIL!!!!!!!!!!! WAKE UP AMERICA"

Comments:

*Even though he changed his speech, I called the school and told them my kids wouldn't be watching it there. They will watch it AT HOME with me!
*i signed the permission form for paige to watch at school(6th grader)...i will watch today at home and compare notes when she gets home. she is pretty opinionated--wonder what she will think?
*I didn't get a permission slip or anything stating if they were going to watch it. Ryan is sooooo anti-Obama though and he doesn't care who knows it!!! LMAO

This guy and his regular followers are so "anti-Obama" I feel like maybe I never really knew some of my classmates at all. Mr. Obama's election to the presidency has encouraged them to loudly proclaim their opinions as facts, and that's fine because I'm an admirer of the Bill of Rights, but they sound more like parrots repeating the words of prominent pundits, capital letters and all.

These "friends" of mine have never traveled outside of the USA, not even to visit Canada or Mexico. Back in school they were not interested in the events of the world ("Bangladesh? Oh, you mean the company that makes my shirts. What about it?") or in learning world history or culture. Our high school offered only one foreign language (Spanish) and only state/USA history. "Honors" English was about as close to "culture" or "world history" as it got. I really thought that would change once we became adults and could spread our wings.

Or, maybe it's me.

Maybe I really am a socialist-nazi-communist, as suggested by the person who wrote the last comment quoted above. Maybe I'm naive and think that the 'truthers' and 'birthers' out there are completely insane. Or maybe I've become the one who doesn't know what's going on, although I do try to stay informed.

Growing up, it was vital that we watch the NBC evening news every night as a family. I think this was mostly because my dad was a controller, rather than that he wanted us to be smart. After all, girls don't need to be smart, just pretty.

As an adult, I could not function without my daily dose of CNN, and later, FoxNews (although I did quit that completely after I realized that the hosts of "Fox and Friends" were total morons and that Sean Hannity was a rabid lunatic). I also watched the local news morning and night.

I stopped watching all "world" news after Eric left for Iraq because I didn't want the kids to worry. Since then, I watch the local morning news, periodically check BBC Online for world events, or I watch the BBC World News on TV, but not regularly. This may have caused a problem.

For one, I don't understand all the hatin' vs Obama. I fail to understand how a person can attend a Christian church for all of his life and be considered Muslim. I also don't understand how people think Obama is destroying our nation. Supposedly he's a socialist and ruining the Constitution. I would argue that Bush was a communist who did in fact ruin the Constitution with the Patriot Act and Homeland Security.

Second, I sometimes worry that I'm raising children so completely unaware of the world at large, they are almost idiots.

After school, I asked the kids if they watched a special show at school. I got blank stares. I added, "...a speech by the President..?" and got several oh-yeahs in return. The older two did not see it, the younger one did, in social studies class.

I asked what she thought of it:

Her: Thought of what?
Me: The President's speech.
H: Oh.
M: Well?
H: Well, what?
M: GAH! What did you think of the President's speech?
H: I guess it was okay.
M: You "guess"?
H: Well, I didn't really watch it.
M: What else were you doing while it was on?
H: Uh, I don't know. I think I drew a picture. Or maybe I was thinking about origami. I don't know.
M: So, you don't know what he was talking about?
H: Who was talking?
M: ...

Oy.

Ni!

For yesterday's Big Game, I bought along a snack food that I have taught myself to love in spite of its citric bite and the shock to my sensitive tooth fillings: grapes.

We began discussing the grapes and my forced adoration because of my kidney malfunction. My fellow players knew that I did not drink alcohol but were unaware of the reason. I explained my particular kidney malfunction and said that when my kidneys fail, the amount of water I can consume will be limited, but gaining water through natural food sources is a different quality of water. Nothing holds natural water like grapes and watermelon. Grapes, I like. Watermelon, not so much.

It also occurred to me in the tellilng that I have developed a nonchalant attitude toward my problem. I know that I am in Stage 2 of ADPKD, that my liver is already affected by the disease, and that eventually one or both organs will fail. I know that when that happens, if I survive the initial failure, I will be added to the tail of a rather long list of people in need of a kidney and/or liver transplant. My options will be severely limited, and there is no cure apart from a transplant, but why tilt at windmills? It could be worse.

Yes, there's worse.

A friend here at The Fort has cancer, and her family is devastated, obviously. We all are. She has children at home as well as her husband, extended family, and friends. She's trying to fight it, and we're all pulling for her in our own way.

As much as my diagnosis was a shock to me, I already knew that ADPKD was a genetic malfunction, and that there was nothing to be done but get my body healthy in all other aspects in an attempt to prolong the inevitable. Cancer, on the other hand, is completely different. There are things that can be done in a lot of cases, but they're pretty much all frikkin' miserable treatment programs, with hair loss the best of the side effects. While some cancers are hereditary, most come out of the blue. Sometimes the cancer is very tough to beat, and sometimes it just won't quit.

Her situation and that of Mister's friend from school have opened my eyes to the surprisingly large number of people I know who've either had cancer themselves or who have had someone close to them with cancer. It's absolutely shocking how many! It has also brought to my attention the disparity in treatment options when insurance is inadequate or unavailable as well as how some hospitals deal with that situation.

My father's wife discovered a lump in her breast. A biopsy turned up cancer. Because she had no medical insurance, the cheaper option was to perform the double mastectomy with reconstructive plastic surgery later than to even attempt chemo/radiation.

Luckily for my dad's wife, the oncologist who confirmed her diagnosis had staff privileges at the one hospital in the tri-state who would allow her surgery pro-bono. Well, not so much pro-bono as "we know you won't pay us, but we'll pretend we don't," and they did not refuse to treat her. A big thank-you from me to the hospital, because even though I don't like her much, she takes care of my father and I don't have to.

I have my own problems, but they seem so small when compared to the crises of others. As much as I would love a non-surgical cure for my problem, cancer really needs it more.

I ask for nothing

I was raised by a family and society that expects me to be Christian of some variety. My father expects me to be of the Catholic bent, at one point encouraging "the fat one" to become a nun. Events have occurred since I became an adult which have shaken my hesitant faith into non-existence. However, to say that I am not a Christian is to suggest that I am some other thing, such as a Buddhist or Muslim. The greater truth is that "religion" is no more than a history-based mythology for me.

Instead I believe in the power of me. Whatever I can do to make our world, our society, our friendship better, I will try. I will recycle, install solar panels and rain barrels, grow my own tomatoes, smile in the face of rudeness, listen to hurt feelings, give comfort and relief, and meet for karaoke in bar even though I neither sing nor imbibe.

It is human nature to need something to believe in. It is my opinion that belief in oneself should be enough. However, humans are emotional and occasionally weak. A person might require belief in someone or something else in order to believe in themselves.

For those people, the power of prayer is amazingly beneficial. When one feels helpless, "lifting" ones troubles to a god is like removing a weight off the shoulders. In the case of a dear friend slowly dying of cancer, the prayers of her friends and family not only eases their pain, but helps her feel their love for her and so calms her spirit in the face of death.

However, some people take this prayer thing a little too far, in my opinion.

A relation of Mister's often sends out prayer requests. They are as varied as the weather. When her granddaughter was born premature, the prayers were along those lines. Later, they shifted to prayer requests for a safe drive to/from the doctor's office and the like.

A week or so ago, an in-law passed away. It is my understanding the the lady had lived a long, full life and was much loved. Fantastic. If only I can be so lucky! However, if I judge the requests correctly, this relation's spouse was absolutely devastated and required much praying to make through the week. Really? Am I the only person who celebrates a life well-lived? Why not pray thanks for that? She could have been beset by misfortunes, or like my friend with cancer, painfully wasted away while her small children watched, helpless.

And now we're being asked to pray for this guy who has worked nearly 40 hours this week, with another 20-30 to go before his working week is done, so that he may have the strength to make it through. How about instead we pray our thanks that he's got a job at all, adding an additional prayer for those who are unemployed and hungry that they might find relief soon?

Day after day, week after week, this relative posts request after request. The sheer quantity of of requests, all along the lines of gimme-gimme (give me strength, get me there safely, etc) even if for the benefit of others, makes me frown. On the one hand, it is very generous of her to be thinking so much of others. On the other hand, only one request of the dozens so far was a request for thanks to be given.

Am I being harsh for thinking of this as very selfish and un-Christianly?

lulz wut?

I hate purposely-misspelled words. Hate them! For instance, the use of the word, "pak" or "pac" instead of "pack," makes me nuts!

On the other hand, hilarious-but-innocent misspellings get me laughing and it's so much fun.

This weekend, a teenage friend on Facebook posted the notice that he was "makin pancaks." Another comment reads, "HOLLY CRAP I JUST LOOKED AT THAT PIC AND IT SCARRED YHE HECK OUT OF ME!!! WHY THE HECK WOULD YOU PUT SUMTIN LAKE THAT WAHERE THE PUBLIC CAN SEE!!!!! hahahah jk jk but it is scurry!!"

I laughed so hard just now, that I decided to find and join a "misspelled words" fanpage on the site.

Yes, there are fanpages for misspelled words. There are also fanpages for "watching clouds go by" and "turning the pillow to get to the cold side."

On the first 10 of the 225 fanpages related to misspelled words was a 43-member prayer group titled

PRAYER FOR THOSE EFFECTED BY MISUSED AND MISSPELLED WORDS

I'm going to let that soak in for a moment. If it weren't all so darn funny, I'd cry.

Serious blogger is serious. Srsly.

The "actress" Jessica Simpson is an airhead. Everyone knows this, and usually what comes out of her mouth is disregarded after some eye-rolling and/or rude giggling at her expense.

She was recently asked if she would demand the return of a gift she had given to her ex-boyfriend, Tony Romo. Her comments pissed off many Native Americans because she said she was no "Indian-giver."

This anger confuses me. I had always assumed "Indian-giver" was a slam against white people, because of the many treaties signed and then broken by the white settlers in North America. You see, much was given to and promised to the Native Americans ("Indians") by the whites, but much was retracted and ignored by the whites. In this respect, an "Indian-giver" is one who gives a gift only until such time as the giver wants it back. No gift is truly "given." As I read her statement, I got the impression she thinks the same way.

Sure, she made her case worse by stating outright that she was herself an "Indian," but who knows? Perhaps she is.

If my interpretation of the phrase is in fact incorrect, please help me. I want to be as well-informed as I can, although I haven't used that phrase since I was a child and didn't understand how words hurt people.

Update

Remember my birthday and the bad waiter incident?

Turns out that had I complained, it would not have mattered. Not one little bit.

The guy at my table who didn't get his order did complain after I left. The owner was on-site, and my friend let him know what happened. The waiter was called out on that situation, and he said in his defense that he simply didn't hear my friend give his order. The owner was satisfied with that, and quite literally shrugged the whole thing off.

I'm sorry, but that's just ass.

If you are in customer service, you are supposed to make eye contact with each of your clients. I know that as a waiter/server/whatever, your interaction with the clients is critical to receiving a decent tip, which might even put you over the full minimum wage if your tip is awesome enough. I fondly recall the old days when servers actually wrote down your order, noting all the special details, and then repeated the order back to you. This clown barely gave us the time of day. If he approached our table at all, it was because we rudely flagged him down.

No, it wasn't rude of us to flag him down; he just acted like it was.

On the other hand, the alcohol-swilling drunks out on the veranda received non-stop care and attention from the same server who ignored us all night. I guess one solution to my dilemma is to just become a public drunk.

All I can say is that it will take a guarantee that Mr. A. Hole is not our server to get me to eat there again, and even then I will decline after I remind myself that Mr. A. Hole is supported unconditionally by his boss, Mr. WishyWashy Pants.

We are not amused!

Yesterday was trivia night at a local island-themed restaurant. The food is interesting, although their drinks menu is longer than their food menu.

We always join others who regularly arrive anywhere from about 30 minutes or more ahead of us to halfway through the game. This is standard operating procedure for trivia night no matter where it's held, and the restaurant has been hosting the event for some time now. Nobody should be surprised by late-comers.

The two who were already at our table were well into their meals when we arrived. In a series of long waits of at least ten minutes, we were offered a beverage but no menu, received our drinks and had to ask for the menu, were given the menu, and had our order taken. About 20 minutes later, our appetizer arrived, a simple dish of six shrimp in a coconut-rum sauce. A few minutes later, I actually managed to flag the server over and ask for a bread basket.

By the time the bread arrived, our final two companions had joined the table but were completely ignored by our server until he delivered our main courses, which was about 20 minutes after the shrimp had been delivered--at least 40 minutes after ordering. Getting refills on anything that wasn't alcohol was negligent at best.

Of the two who joined us last, one got her food, the other did not. Luckily, he wasn't billed for it, although I suspect that initially he was but then the server realized he'd never put the food order in. No apology was issued by the server at any time.

We had the worst time trying to get his attention all night. One of us ordered fries, but the ketchup bottle we were forced to borrow from another table was absolutely empty. Another ran out of both salad dressing and cocktail sauce. Two wanted to order seconds on the peel-and-eat shrimp-by-the-piece special, but in the end had to get theirs "to go" because it was almost 9 pm when they were able to place that order. And still, one companion never got anything other than a glass of soda-pop.

Meanwhile, there are two tables outside on the veranda where every Monday is the same group of people who sit for hours drinking alcohol and smoking cigars and cigarettes. Our server was also responsible for them, and they received prodigiously good care and attention in spite of the fact that while I was there, none of them had eaten any food. Perhaps they already had; I don't know.

However, when it was time to hand out the checks, we could not shake this guy. He hovered around the table until each one of us had pulled out cash or card.

And so I present this dilemma: Mister was so ticked off, he didn't want to leave a tip. I paid with cash on purpose so that my amount couldn't be changed later, and left slightly less than 10%. The owner of the restaurant stopped by our table because he is a personal friend of one of my tablemates, but none of us complained about the server.

I didn't even know how to broach the subject. I've never had to complain about really bad service before, and couldn't start. I had hoped that one of the others would speak up, especially the guy who didn't even get the food he'd ordered. No one did. Also, I felt uncomfortable with the tip. I've never given so little, but then again, I've only once had just comically bad service from a brand-new server (which resolved itself happily and is now a running joke with my dinner friends). Last night's server, however, has been at that restaurant at least for as long as we've been going there.

Please advise me on how best to proceed. By sheer luck I will not be returning to that particular restaurant again, but I still want to have my arsenal ready just in case this unfortunately happens again.

All-American

I was browsing at a discount store last week and found this:




Yes, my friends, that truly is an Inaugural Lava Lamp. It is also, in my opinion, yet another example of why the rest of the world generally disregards the United States of America.

I'll take Insane Genius for $1000, Alex.

Happy birthday to the late Nicola Tesla, a most magnificent genius and my first nerd crush. (Second was Carl Sagan, but that's another story for another day.)

Too bad he was very all dead by the time I discovered his brilliance, otherwise I would have stalked him for sure.

Self-Entitlement VS Stupidity

A local grocery store is part of a larger shopping plaza. At one end of the building is a spur road that connects the plaza to the two main roads that it bisects. Where this spur meets the parking lot is a 4-way stop. Let's assume the plaza runs east-west.

I was driving from the north and came to a stop as required by law. I noticed to the east a very large red SUV parked in the fire lane at the video store in the plaza. The driver's door was open, and my guess is that it was still running. Common sense told me to wait. A quick check of my rearview indicated that no one was waiting behind me.

That hesitation on my part probably saved my car's life. The whole event was over in a matter of seconds beginning with my decision to wait.

A well-manicured soccer-mom type bounded out of the video store, climbed quickly into the SUV, and then shot forward with no regard to the car that was legally coming up behind her in the proper lane. As she approached the intersection, she just barreled through it, not bothering to even slow down or look. She turned south, the same direction I was intending to go.

The new car to the east sat waiting at the intersection, a look of shock on the driver's face. I caught his eye and he waved me on. I graciously waved back and followed Ms SUV through the intersection. I later watched as she rolled through the T-style intersection (with no merge spurs) to join heavy traffic on the main artery road behind the shopping plaza, headed in the same direction I needed to go.

At the next intersection, the light turned red just as Ms SUV reached the crossing. She did not stop. Although it saddens me greatly to say this, fortunately the good people of the Asscrack of America are used to driving such as this, and no one popped out into the intersection until she had cleared it.

Stupidity, self-absorption, or overweening sense of entitlement? I report, you decide.