Friday, April 28, 2006

PISSED (In both senses of the word)

Hi! Yeah, it's been awhile. My life has been pretty uneventful. Until today.

I hopped out into the driveway to head over to my weekly work meeting. Threw my purse onto the passenger seat, thrust the key into the ignition, and turned.

This is when the car revved like the pedal was going THROUGH the floor and possibly also through the driveway. It wasn't in gear, nor was my foot even on the pedal. It was like my mild mannered little 'vertible has morphed suddenly into Christine.

I did what any sensible woman would do. I screamed, flapped my hands at warp speed for about a second, and then turned the car off. There also may have been some hyperventilating in there somewhere.

I cautiously looked down at my floorboards, to see if the pedals were stuck down or something. Then I tried turning the key again. The same thing happened. Oh, and The Man came barrelling out of the house to demand WHAT the HELL WAS I DOING?

Me: "I turned my car on."

Him: "AND?!!"

Me: "Uh, that's about it."

Him: "Ok, let me try it."

Do I need to say that the same thing happened?

We turned off the car and popped the hood. There was a lot of "Holy SH*T" and "What the HELL!!!"

Suffice it to say that someone? Somewhere? Needed parts for their 1999 Chrysler Sebring and decided to go shopping beneath the hood of my car.

The bastards took what we THINK was the throttle body, and (to add insult to injury?) left behind the bolts that kept it in place. They also disconnected a whole bunch of things and cut some wires. Oh, and they damaged my hood. Yes, insurance covers the repairs and a rental car- but we have a $500 deductible, which we really didn't need to deal with this month.

I am going out for drinks tonight, and since I am definitely not the designated driver, I plan to take full advantage of the situation. A few drinks will definitely not be amiss.

So, yeah. Happy Friday.

Wednesday, April 12, 2006

Out of the ordinary

I saw some really amazing stuff today.

One instance was at the gym. I have been slacking lately, and making excuses not to go, and generally feeling sorry for myself. So I went.

While I was on the elliptical, I saw a woman coming towards me from the locker room. She had beautiful, smartly-styled silver hair, and was wearing a vivid pink outfit and a gorgeous, brightly lipsticked smile. I grined back at her, and then I realized one more detail- she was in a wheelchair.

It sort of stunned me- and then I realized that of course, she could be doing physical therapy in the pool. And then I thought about all the dumb excuses I make to keep from getting my exercise in, and I felt both inspired, and like a total ass. But mostly inspired.

Then driving home, I saw this tree in my neighbor's yard swaying oddly. As I drove closer, hundreds of tiny birds burst out of it like fireworks. There must have been at keast 500 birds in that tree, and all in constant motion. As I watched, they kept taking to the air, and then landing back in the tree or hovering around the branches. It looked more like a swarm of insects than a floxk of birds- I have never seen anything like it.

Tuesday, April 11, 2006

Et tu, Blogger?

I am over the hair thing. Finally.

Possibly because the new job has begun, and I am loving it. LOVING it. I am hoping it continues in some form or another during the summer. It's so rewarding, working with these kids. And ironically? My weak points don't seem to be where the problems are. Math? No big whoop for these kids.

The areas where the problems lie? English. Spelling. Science. Which are all fairly strong points for me. So I am basically having a blast.

In other news? I decided to reward myself for generally being fabulous. I have been slowly eradicating my old wardrobe mishaps and so:

Duh. I bought shoes. Fabulous springtime shoes. Hopefully by the time I actually wear them out of the house, I will have bothered to shave and use moisturizer, and I will be much less...well, "pasty" seems like a good word here.



These are totally going with the white prairie skirt and the orange beaded tank. And the jean jacket. And some turquoise jewelry. And a tan....yes, definitely a tan...which means they might get shelved 'til summer.



OK, can't you just see these with a cute little white or black dress? And a cardigan? Well, I can.



These were 5 bucks. No, totally not kidding. And as we all know, red + sparklies + high heels = MINE, all MINE! Muuuahahahahaaaa!

Sorry.

Other signs that spring has sprung?

That Dove I mentioned?



She comes back every year. I did try to get a better picture, but it frightened her when I got too close. So before she got back, I took this:



Yes. I am a dove stalker.

Saturday, April 08, 2006

For the record...

The buzz from the new job has worn off. But I am EVEN MORE pissed about my hair. It's shorter than I previously thought- it used to be down to my waist when straight, and now it juust dusts the bottom of the bra strap. What is that? At least six inches. SIX INCHES.

The dastardly thing? I let him style my hair in a curly way, and I know he talked me into it because he KNEW I would be pissed, and he didn't want me to realize how short it was until I got home.

&^%$!

Friday, April 07, 2006

It could go either way...

Good day: I asked an innocent question at work, and ended up with a whole new job! I am going to be tutoring kids- and it's all according to my schedule so I will now have two jobs. Aww yeah. I should be making at least half of what I made at my previous job, but will be working way less than half as many hours. Take that, Company Which Shall Not Be Named!!!

Bad day: My haircut? It's about how I wanted it, except about four inches shorter than I wanted it to be. Which uh, YEAH, pisses me off. It took me a long time to grow that hair, dammit! I mean, it's still cute. And it will grow back. But I'm pissy about it.

Good day: There is an adorable (but kind of stupid) dove who has built a nest on top of our entryway supports. She has two eggs in progress (I took pictures, which I will post as soon as my camera battery recovers). My lavendar from last year is blooming, and so are the azaleas in our front yard. Spring has sprung!

Bad day: I made it to the gym, but my iPod took a huge dump 20 minutes into my workout, even though it previously showed the battery power at 75%. I ended up cutting my workout a few minutes short, because the music that the gym pipes in makes me insane. I tried it again when I got home, in the driveway, and it was fine. This is the THIRD TIME this has happened. What the hell?!

Good day: The weather was gorgeous- no rain!!!, and I drove the 'vertible with the top down. And I looked HAWT, having actually applied makeup, and was wearing jewelry and a long flowy skirt.

So, I will have to declare this a good day by a 3/2 margin.

Use it or lose it

I know, I have been snoozing on the blog.

Between recovering from my random sickness and the trip to SF last weekend, I have just sort of been chillin'. Even work has been slow- thank God for spring break!

Let's see- I got new glasses, and I hate them. I don't know what I was thinking, they make me look like I am looking out through two giant fishbowls- my prescription is so bad on one side, I guess I shouldn't be surprised. There is NO WAY that they are venturing out in public as-is. I think I am going to pop out the prescription lenses and just use them as sunglasses.

I've been doing a lot of reading and movie watching- I actually managed to hang out with Mr. Phancy last night, for the first time this year. We went to see The Jerk at Flashback Flicks, and then headed over to Starbucks and ended up getting kicked out when they closed. So we stood around in the parking lot like teenagers, albeit, teenagers who were freezing their asses off, until I realized that it was almost 11:30. I didn't have my cell phone, and I hadn't called The Man to let him know what was up.

So I headed home, cursing. Because The Man is a little hesitant about me hanging out with my male friends. His test of the situation seems to be asking, "Well, can I go?" As long as I say, "Sure!" he's OK with it. I guess it makes sense.

So I made it home, and he was playing World of Warcraft and had hardly even noticed that I was gone. Why was I even worried? I guess that stupid game is good for something, anyway.

I get my hair cut today! Just a trim, and some cleanup on the layers. I am so excited!

Although now, when I call the guy who does my hair, I have to introduce myself as Jenna from the Science Program, because otherwise he'll pretend to not know which Jenna it is.