Mr. Boo

Anywhere from 4 to 6 times throughout the day at my office you can hear the sound of a man screaming.

It's not a long, terrified type of scream, but more of a short burst of surprise. It almost sounds like Homer Simpson when he says "Doh!", except it's more like "Ahck!". It's alarming the first few times you hear it, but on my first day of work when I heard the scream and nobody else seemed to notice it, I assumed that someone in the office had Tourettes or something.


After I had been there about a week or so I finally asked one of my co-workers just what in the hell that noise was all about and it turns out there is a man who works several cubicles down from us that enjoys scaring people, and is also quite easily startled himself.

We'll call him Mr. Boo.

The screaming that I hear several times a day is a grown man with a wife and several children going around startling innocent people who are hard at work. Occasionally his screaming is the result of someone coming up and scaring him back.

Do I have to tell you how disgusted I was to hear this news?

How inappropriate.


I don't know this man very well so I think it is unlikely that I will ever be his victim. Besides having catlike reflexes my computer faces the opening of my cubicle so it's kind of difficult to sneak up on me. Although mentally I've begun to prepare. I will scream bloody murder and fake a heart attack. I might even "accidentally" punch him in the throat as I'm falling down on the ground. Maybe I will pee my pants to make it look really authentic.


Obviously I've been thinking about this, but it didn't really upset me or make me totally angry until a couple of days ago when out of the blue he came up and startled my dearest cube mate Hey Mr. DJ. Hey Mr. DJ is a lovely old man with some health problems, not the least of which his "bad ticker".


It startled me too as I'm not used to hearing the "Ahck!" so close to my own work area and then I heard Hey Mr. DJ react with a sharp intake of breath. I started to run over to see if he was OK, but before I got there heard him say to Mr. Boo, in a flat fake chuckle, "You got me". What I heard in that flat fake chuckle, "You suck".


Mr. Boo has worked there FOREVER and has apparently been going around startling people the whole time. Why has nobody stopped him? Why does everybody go around acting like it's funny?


I very nearly confronted him after he frightened Hey Mr DJ, but remembered that I am a Temp and that I have been fired for speaking out about less maddening practices at other jobs and that I really like and need this one.

Pick A Little, Talk A Little, Pick-Pick-Pick, Talk A Lot, Pick A Little More

So I talked to my friend Steph tonight who gave me permission to post this lovely photo of her sporting my napkin rings as eye glasses from Thanksgiving 2004.

Since we moved up here I'm usually a dork all by myself, so it was nice to have someone to back me up in my dorkness. I need that support sometimes.

I say this after having spent part of my evening acting out some of the musical numbers from Fame and Oklahoma in my living room while wearing florescent green pajama pants and a mixing bowl as a hat. What can I say? MDH is having dinner out with his boss and there is just simply nothing on TV tonight. The show must go on.

It's such a relief that the neighbors behind us have moved out. I could have performed my musical numbers in the nude and no one would have been any the wiser. I love not having neighbors!

The other night we noticed that the lights were on in the empty house and a realtor appeared to be showing some people around which caused MDH to immediately strip down to his underpants and stand with his backside to the picture window in our dining room. We hope they saw him and were frightened enough to back out on any offer they may have already made to buy the house.

He and I agreed to try to appear as unsavory as possible from here on out, starting with the empy kitty litter container that we have filled with water, that has since frozen, and put on top of the hot tub to keep the high winds we have been experiencing this week from blowing the cover all over the back yard. The concrete bird bath (that MDH refers to as the Malaria Factory) blew over and we haven't bothered to pick that up either. Take that.

It Couldn't Be More Random

I don't have a lot of time this morning, but I feel like posting a little something something, so this will be pretty random.

1. While driving thru lovely Rockford, Michigan with Frenchie and Nature Boy the other day I pondered aloud, as we drove by a nail and tanning place in a strip mall with a big sign that said "California Nails", what mental image the name "Michigan Nails" would conjure. We had a good laugh over it because it wasn't a good mental image. But it's not like the women in California have cornered the market on having pretty fingernails, or like the women in places like Michigan, Wyoming or Arkansas have skanky fish guts under their nails or something.

I do however see the wisdom in not naming your tanning salon "Wisconsin Tan".

2. I have a love/hate relationship with the show/train wreck "House Hunters". I watch this show in the same way that MDH watches "Face the Nation". I yell at the TV, and boo and jeer at the dumb people in their bad outfits making bad real estate decisions. Where do they find these people? What is wrong with them? Why do they always seem to choose the most boring home and complain about the stupidest things like paint color and construction noise? Buy some paint MORON! Construction will eventually end DIPSHIT! I also get annoyed by the people's apparent love affair with granite counter tops and stainless steel appliances.

These people have ecru pile carpet on their hearts. I can't take it, and yet I can't stop watching.

3. Why do my neighbors, seemingly all of them, never use their garages? All of the houses on this street have 2 car garages and everyone parks their cars in the street. What's up? Are my neighbors all hoarders who have filled their garages to the brim with shopping bags from the dollar store, leaving no room for their automobiles? Curious.

When we moved to Michigan, my single demand was that our home have covered parking for my car. Preferably a garage. The idea of scraping 10 inches of snow off of my car every other day was unbearable to me, and yet I see my neighbors scraping snow off of their cars which are parked not 20 feet from their garage. Why people? Why?

In keeping with the "random" theme of my post, I closed my eyes and the picture at the top is where my cursor landed in my "My Pictures" folder. That's me from Thanksgiving a few years ago using napkin rings as eyeglasses. I'm a dork. Nothing new about that.

Artsy Fartsy Wet Burrito

Hey. I mean good morning. I mean, you will get a good feel for what kind of day I'm having by looking at the time this post was created. Yeah. Fuckin' early.

I adore my husband in so many ways, but the snoring, oh god, the snoring.

It's lovely to wake up being spooned, but not when his mouth is centimeters from my ear and he's assaulting my senses with morning breath and loud blubbery jackhammer snorts. Right in my goddamn ear. Actually a jackhammer might be soothing compared to this noise. Anyhoo... I opted to get up and shower rather than jam my pillow up his nostrils. I'm up and showered at 4am. Almost perky too. Kinda scary.

My intention this morning is not to tell you about my marital problems, but to give you a recap of the two lovely days we spent with Frenchie and Nature Boy who drove all the way up here to visit us. I was sceptical about their timing, as March is an iffy month weatherwise in the Tundra. One moment it's clear blue skies and 50 degrees and the next you know you could be in the midst of a winter storm advisory getting 8 inches of snow dumped on your head - and that is exactly what happened.

When they arrived late Thursday afternoon it was clear and beautiful. I put out a spread, we drank some wine and it was still light out and we were still sober enough to go for a drive and show our friends some of what the Tundra has to offer. I complain about it a lot, but there are some cool things here.

The nature of Nature Boy being nature, we took them downtown to see our fishladder. There weren't any fish, but there were lots of fishermen. I would say fisherpeople so as not to be sexist, but there were no women fishing as we are way too smart to wear rubber pants and stand around for hours in freezing water. Besides, I can get all the salmon I want at the supermarket.

Anyway, between the glorious weather, the wine, the food and the wonderful company of Frenchie and Nature Boy, I would call the evening a great success.

The next day however started off with a whimper as Frenchie and Nature Boy contemplated leaving early due to reports of impending doom in the form of lots and lots of snow headed our way and affecting their exact route home. They decided to stay, much to my delight without any coaxing or begging on my part, and tough it out.

In addition to being a lover of nature, Nature Boy is also a lover of art so when he happened to notice the nickname of our town "Calder City" and we explained the city's connection* to the sculptor Alexander Calder and he mentioned that Calder happens to be one of his favorite artists the die was cast and we took them to a pretty amazing sculpture garden near our house that I declared was "lousy with Calder's". So that is where we spent most of our afternoon on Friday.

Our time at the sculpture garden was the most time that I have spent outside in the cold in the 4 years we have lived here combined. I'm being totally serious. I don't go outside when it's cold and/or snowing unless I absolutely have to. My ass was frozen but I have no regrets.

Before I start posting the photos, I should tell you the running joke of the visit was based upon an unfortunately named restaurant that we drove by during our brief jaunt thru the town of Rockford called Jodi's Wet Burrito.

My reading the restaurant's sign out loud caused Frenchie and Nature Boy to laugh for about half an hour and all the rest of the day, you only had to mention Jodi's Wet Burrito in passing with vague and sometimes not so vague references to girl parts to make us all bust out all over again.

Anyhoo... here are some pictures:

Nature Boy and a sculpture that IS a Calder.

Nature Boy and MDH contemplate another sculpture that is also not a Calder.

New unfinished installation - no artist's name attached and no title so I'm calling it "The Freaking Bunny People". I'm pretty sure it is also not a Calder.

This one either lost a contact or is about to throw up.

Nature Boy seemed pretty excited by this work. He correctly named the artist from far away, as Andy Goldsworthy.

MDH and Frenchie huddle together, slightly less impressed with the Goldsworthy than Nature Boy.

This one is by an artist whose name I don't remember. The title was something along the lines of "Lady Holding a Bird", but c'mon it's a smiley face...

Oh yes, the photo at the top is a bronze of Rodin's Eve. She looks cold doesn't she?

*I can find no evidence that the city actually has a connection to Calder, other than that it has a few of his sculptures peppered around here and there in public places. We do however have an abundance of places to purchase wet burritos**.

**Appears to be a regular burrito with enchilada sauce poured over it. I've never seen these anywhere but Michigan and as I've mentioned in previous posts - I've been everywhere man.

The Assface Chronicles - A Clarification

I would just like to clarify my statement in example #1 below about why Assface is a big clot because Amy isn't around to prevent him from doing nutty things anymore.

I would like to say that wearing a suit and carrying a briefcase are both fine things to be doing if you are gainfully employed and on your way to or from work.

It is also fine to do if you are unemployed and on your way to or from a job interview.

But if you are wearing a suit and carrying a briefcase and you are, like Assface, both unemployed and doing something non job interview related ie, proctoring a piano competetion in which other parents, even the employed ones, are wearing t-shirts and jeans, then you are a giant douchebag.

Assface has been to these competetions before and as far as I know his vision is fine and he was able to look around and see that it's a pretty casual affair and that you might come off like a big douche if you wore a suit, let alone carried a brief case.

What would an unemployed douchebag like Assface be carrying around in that briefcase anyhow?

I like to think he must be carrying around his and Amy's divorce papers in there. And maybe some Little Debbie Swiss Rolls.

The Assface Chronicles - Screen So Soft

Last night I talked to my best friend Amy on the phone for a long time. We don't get to do that very often these days as she is the mother (and new step mother) of 3 unruly and obnoxious teenagers. Talking to her for any length of time is glorious and certainly I always take whatever time she can give, but last night was an extra 2 hour after school special. I was over the moon.

First of all she started off her conversation with me as she often does by declaring her ex-husband Assface to be an even bigger dickhead than he was the last time I spoke to her and then she tells me of his crazy antics and I agree with her that yes, indeed somehow he has become a bigger dickhead than he was before. Only last night I analyzed why he keeps becoming an increasingly large clot and here is my theory and a list of examples:

1. Assface no longer has Amy to stop him from doing asinine things like wear a suit, carry a briefcase and generally behave like a self righteous stiff when proctoring their daughters piano competition at OSU so that everyone mistakes him for a judge.

2. She is no longer around to pull him away when he has overstayed his welcome when visiting friends and trust me he needs it. The man is missing the natural ability to tell when he is boring the snot out of people in addition to being too thick to take polite hints that people would like to go to bed, thus resulting (we heard stories thru the grapevine) in slamming doors and situations escalating to near violence (being brusquely escorted to his car by the elbow) and tearfully told in plain English (after many hints were dropped) that he must leave.

OK. I made up the part about the elbow escort, but all the rest is true.

When they were still married I always took the direct approach with Assface, having learned of his handicap early on and even then it didn't always work.

Me (smiling, with one eyebrow raised: ALLrighty Assface GET OUT OF HERE...

Assface: 010101010101

Me: I mean it dude - VA MINOS - Adios Muchacho... On yer way...

Assface: 00011110000101001

Me: I'm shutting the door now. I have to go take a shit so please leave.

Assface: 000011100011110001

You get the picture. By the way Assface speaks in a low, inaudible monotone that is remarkably similar to what I imagine binary sounds like.

3. He no longer has Amy around to give a list of 25 good reasons why you don't allow your daughter to have a sleep over at the neighbor's who have the police and social services visiting 3 times a week and then act surprised when your child ends up with head lice.

There are lots of things that he still does that Amy was never able to talk him out of when they were married like wearing black socks with shorts and spraying every surface of his home with Skin So Soft in the summertime for it's supposed bug repellent properties.

Notoriously, Assface once spent over an hour obsessively spraying every inch of the screens of the screened in porch of their old house with Skin So Soft before a BBQ. For those of you unfamiliar with Avon's line of products, Skin So Soft is a spray-on oil conconction - for human skin.

I don't really know if it kept the bugs away, but it rendered every doorknob unturnable, caused every guest at the party to slip upon the oily surface of the porch floor and Dan and I to giggle incessantly (and to this day) about the supple, touchable nature of the porch screens and forever think of the substance as "Screen So Soft".

What a tale of terror, now, their turbulency tells

Ahh... Sunday morning. I found myself awakened this Sunday morning, as I am on most Sunday mornings, at 9:15 to the glorious tintinnabulation of the bells from the Colonial looking church around the corner, calling the flock to gather for worship, or whatever it is Presbyterians flock together to do. At least I assume it involves worshiping the lord and then eventually exchanging stock tips, talking about golf and eating Waldorf salad.

Normally I find this a pretty nice way to wake up. I'm not a church goer myself, as it would be a little deranged since I'm a devout Agnostic, but church bells are OK in my book. It's a hell of a lot better than the ten thousand decibel rhythmic bleating of my alarm clock anyway.

But today I found the bells more like a death knoll.

Fuck. Shut up already.

Slightly befuddled, I also found myself in the guest room.

Slowly it started to come back to me. Last night's outing with Rachel and E to a night club and the two very large, house special cocktails I enjoyed. The server described the drink and the ingredients list of sugary booze was too long to keep track of when I ordered them as a sober person, let alone remember the day after.

I'm hung over (is that one word or two - I'm seeing double)?

I thought that I had downed enough water and waited a reasonable period of time before driving home. I felt fine. Not drunk at all. The only physical sign of ailment from the evenings events was throbbing feet from the bronze patent peep toe slingbacks I had decided to wear. I even stayed up a little bit when I got home and called MDH who is away in Indianapolis this weekend on a corporate Boondoggle for some big deal college basketball thingy, to let him know I was home safe and to whisper lovey-dovey goodnights into the phone.

Next thing I know I'm wrapped up in a polyester comforter on the sheet less bed in the guestroom cursing the goddamn Presbyterians and their goddamn fucking bells. The floor is strewn with my now wrinkled outfit. The shiny slingback resting next to my throbbing head causes me to notice that my feet are still throbbing with tiny blisters on each pinkie toe.

As a side note, the polyester comforter was a wedding present from my mother who never checks fabric content labels. It looks like gorgeous green and gold wide striped silk with gold braided trim, but it itches like a son of a bitch. I have a mark from the braiding embedded on my temple.

Why the guest room? Well, it's not uncommon for me to sleep in there when MDH is away. It's warmer in there as it's smaller than our cavernous master bedroom and for some reason the bed doesn't seem so empty.

Anyhoo... I'm not normally a drinker of giant cocktails containing shot samplings from then entire Bacardi flavors collection served in pint sized glasses. Certainly, I wouldn't normally drink two. I'm more likely to sip one martini, or a glass of red wine with a meal. On special occasions, like when it's blazing hot outside I may, if I'm feeling nutty or on the verge of profuse schwitzing , chug an ice cold beer or two. Who am I kidding? I never finish the second beer.

So hang overs are not commonplace. I probably haven't had one for... shit I don't even remember. I do however remember a time when I could drink half of a $5 bucket of beer all night (they used to serve Milwaukee's Best tap beer, literally in gallon mop buckets at a place I frequented called Mustard's. Come to think of it, it's where I met Dan and Nature Boy) and wake up fine. In fact I could get up, go to work all day and go out drinking all night all over again. I don't remember this head pain or feeling like my ears are numb and my eyes all fuzzy and made of cotton balls.

I'm too old for this. I need a drink.