Because I'm Better Than You, That's Why

Sometimes, sometimes I don't wash my hands in public restrooms. Now you know. Don't hate me though. Keep reading. I have my reasons and alternative solutions. I feel a little bit funny about it when I don't, but then I think it's probably OK because typically I don't have to touch my lady junk directly, so to speak, and I don't pee on my hands when I'm using a public toilet (or anywhere else for that matter, at least not on purpose - I felt I must clarify for those of you smarty pant-ses out there) and since it's not physically (it's really a mental block) possible* for me to poop in a public restroom the difficulties that might sometimes arise in cleaning up after that simply don't come up.

Now that I've gotten that important announcement out of the way I'd like to say that what I worry about more than sometimes leaving the ladies room without washing my hands is that sometimes other public women's room patrons (see bullet points of previous post below mentioning my friend Dan's extensive, habitual use of women's restrooms - we don't want to be politically incorrect and assume that all women's room patrons are necessarily women now do we?) seem to notice that I haven't washed my hands and when they do they give me the hairy eyeball, or at least I perceive that they do and this post is my way of giving an explanation. You see most times I do wash my hands in public restrooms provided that the circumstances are such that:

A. There is an option for warm water to be dispensed from the tap. When you live in colder climes having the water blast from the tap at minus ice balls degrees is both a blessing and a curse. A blessing when you'd like a nice cold glass of water to drink and a curse when you would like to wash your hands after using a public toilet and discover the water is not only coming out of the tap freezing cold enough to stop your fucking heart, but also that there is really no option to warm that shit up. Oh sure the tap has an "H" on it indicating that hot water might be available if only you wait long enough, but some middle management penny pinching asshole has turned the hot water off and you are only kidding yourself that it will ever warm up. Not to make a pun, but hell will freeze over first before that water heats up. The hot water is a ruse. I'm not washing my hands here.

B. There is a paper towel option for drying my hands. Those air dryers are for suckers. It takes a year and a day to make any progress and I've got places to go and people to do. The air dryer fritters away my life and I haven't got time for that shit. Half the time when I do consent to using the air dryer the air blowing out is just as freezing cold as the tap water and/or I end up frustrated and drying my hands on my pants or desperately going back into a stall and dabbing at my hands with toilet tissue to dry them. Either way it ends in tears.

C. Please don't even get me started on the cloth diaper towel dispenser type of hand dryer that just spins and spins in filthy, germy circles. I have never in all my travels encountered one of those contraptions that wasn't brownish-yellow and dripping wet with ladies room cooties. No thank you. Even if I had whizzed all over myself why would I wash up and then dry off with that gross spinny diaper towel.

D. The absence of miscellaneous other minor gross outs and inconveniences including but not necessarily limited to:

No soap. No towels. Broken hand dryer. Bathroom filthy in general. Sink clogged with tissues or paper towels. Puddles of water (I hope it's water) on the counter and no place to lean without touching it. Not enough sinks and/or towel dispensers thus causing me to have to wait in line to wash my hands or stand dripping waiting to dry them afterwards. Unable to make the appropriate Ninja moves or otherwise psychically connect with the automatic laser tap/laser soap/laser towel in such a way that causes the laser dispenser to hook me up with the necessary hand washing supplies to make it happen (I'm performing freaking Tai-Chi in a mirror front of ten strangers who are waiting to use the facilities after me and nothing is happening).

So in closing the main reason I don't wash my hands in public restrooms is because I'm a germophobe. Would you like another helping of crazy?

If it makes you feel any better or at least less inclined to hit me with the stink eye, rest assured I usually carry disinfectant wipes in my purse that I employ just in case of such emergencies as not being fully satisfied with the cleanliness of the facilities at hand. I'm not going to pee, leave the rest room without washing my hands and then run off and make you or anyone else a sandwich. It's cool, don't worry about it.

*For those of you that may have been reading my blog for a long time you might remember** that I have previously mentioned being able to poop anywhere. That used to be true but is not anymore. At one point when I was living my life on the road (anyone seen the movie Up In the Air yet?) I adapted my body so that I could poop or sleep anywhere*** and under any conditions.

**It's kinda creepy that you remembered that Dude.

***Anywhere indoors. I have always and probably will always**** be unable to sleep or poop out of doors.

****OK. Like maybe if end of days came and everything was destroyed and I was left here with no running water (how will I make my tea?) and only pine needles for a bed, because I can guaran-fucking-tee you that I will not be called up to Jesus when the rapture comes. When that happens, that's when I'll poop outside.

News Round Up

1. Weekend before last MDH and I drove to Indianapolis (I know, I know, we are just too posh and glamorous and need to get over ourselves immediately) where we met with some good friends and saw the traveling King Tut exhibit at the children's museum.

It was the weekend of our wedding anniversary so MDH and I decided to arrive a day early to take in the sights of Indiana's state capital which is how we ended up touring the home of 23rd president Benjamin Harrison (yet another "feather" in our cap of presidential homes visited across America , we are now up to 7 - I know, I know, you're jealous of our James Bond like jet-setting life style filled with danger and erotic intrigue the level of which would bring a blush to the cheeks of the editors of the Penthouse forum). We thoroughly annoyed the poor docent by interrupting his scripted and well practiced room by room guided spiels to frequently and vigorously interrogate the poor old fellow on the origin and subspecies of various displayed items and tchotchkes about which he knew nothing. At the end of the tour Mr. Docent was kind to enough to call over one of the historians to help answer some of our questions.

Mr. Docent insisted that it was no trouble and explained that he actually considered our intense interest refreshing and enjoyed our challenging questions because he is used to corralling busloads of unruly school children who could care less about American history and our 23rd president and don't ask him to answer any question more taxing than the location of the restroom.

MDH and I topped off our busy day of sight seeing with a romantic dinner at St. Elmo's where we gorged ourselves on typical steakhouse fare such as shrimp cocktail, giant cuts of aged beef and a bottle of moderately priced red wine. Afterwards we waddled drunkenly back to our hotel room, bellies full and proceeded to spend the rest of the evening lolling around our hotel suite and stinking the place up with our noxious gasses. So sexy.

Anyhoo... we had a good time in Indianapolis. Thankfully I packed some Tums.

2. The following Monday afternoon after our return from Indianapolis (that would be last week) my dad called me to tell me that on Saturday as my mother was bending over, filling out a form to bid on an item in a silent auction at some affair they were attending at their country club someone at the table where she was bidding moved a box that had been under the table so that the box was now out in the aisle in front of the table and when my mother was finished filling out her bidding form she tripped over the box and fell down and broke her pelvis.

My mommy fell hard and broke her pelvis and was still in the hospital when my dad called to tell me 3 fucking days later. Fucking A man. I'm not sure why they do this, but not contacting me is pretty much included in all of their emergency planning meetings. Granted they live in Florida so I wouldn't have been able to do anything anyway, but still, keeping me, their only living child out of the loop, it's weird right?

So now my mom is in a rehab center learning how to perform exciting tricks like putting on her own underpants and rolling over in bed by herself. She may have to be there for several more weeks.

She refuses to talk to or see anyone but my father and me (with one exception described below) and even I'm not allowed to call her without permission. She arranges for me to call her via my dad who will call me at 11:27 and say "Your mom wants you to call her today at 11:30 and she will talk to you for 20 minutes or so...". It's like mission impossible.

Anyhoo... you may assume that I am concerned about my mother's condition for all the normal reasons that anyone would be, but I am also concerned that the multiple new medications she is taking for pain and anxiety (apparently she has mini-freak outs just before some of her more intensive physical therapy sessions) won't mix well with the Scotch my father has been sneaking in for her on his daily visits.

I am also concerned that my dad, left to fend for himself has thrown his low fat, low sodium, no cholesterol diet right out the window without my mom there to control every bite he puts in his mouth like she normally does.

The situation has gotten further out of hand because you see my father is a handsome and charming old chap who is very popular in the community, especially with some of the ladies, who have wasted no time swooping in to fill my parents refrigerator with their home cooked pot roasts, quiches, lasagnas and various other meat, cheese and egg heavy meals. My dad is far too polite to tell these sweet, concerned creatures that he cannot eat their fatty foods and frankly having all that good stuff conveniently prepared and ready to eat has been too much of a temptation so he's been eating it and now his ulcer has been acting up again.

An elaborate plot?

It wouldn't surprise me one iota to find out that any one of these ladies (not actually pictured above), who I personally have witnessed shamelessly flirting with my dad right in front of me and my mom, planted that box for my mom to trip over in an effort to get my mother out of the picture. There are a lot of lonely widows and divorcees in the neighborhood and my dad would be quite a catch.

My level of importance...
The charity auction where my mom fell and broke her pelvis was organized by a famous golfer who happened to be standing near my mother when she fell and who has been sending my mother flowers and calling her every single day since the accident. My mom is thrilled and I haven't the heart to mention that the famous golfer is probably only trying to butter her up so she won't sue the plaid pants off of him. She takes every call from the famous golfer even though the famous golfer has a tendency to call at the most inconvenient times, like when she is on her bedpan or sleeping or what have you. When I suggested that she simply not take the golfers calls or explain to the golfer that she was sleeping or in the middle of a big shit she acted as though I had lost my mind. How rude not to take a call from the famous golfer. And yet all my phone calls to her have to be by appointment only. At least I know where I stand.


Only 2 items in the News Round Up?
Other than job searching, overeating and watching too much TV that's really all that's been going on around here lately. I'll write again when I have more farting to discuss and issues about my parents I feel like airing publicly.

Kindest Regards,

Lady

The News Round Up

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That's It I'm Outta Here

Michigan winter can suck my dick. That's right. Suck. My. Dick. I'm so fed up with snow, ice, sub zero temperatures and skin so dry that I'm starting to look like someone carved me out of an apple, that I have resorted to speaking like a 13 year old boy in juvenile detention.

The Hawaiian vacation that MDH and I have been planning for well over a year has finally arrived. We are ditching the road salt and snow shovels for a couple of weeks and trading them in for warm black sand and snorkel gear. Fuck yes.

I'm so excited that I don't even care that I'm still carrying around the 50 lbs I vowed to lose last January when we booked our flights. Fuck it. So yes, in addition to having a shriveled dried apple doll complexion, I'm fat, but I'll be shriveled and fat in Hawaii. Anyway, the humid tropical air will smooth out my craggy skin in no time, and all the hotel sex and fresh fruit I can tolerate (quite a lot) will have me trimmed down before you know it.

I don't even care that it's the "rainy season" and when anyone mentions that it probably won't get any warmer than 75 I laugh right in their face (ha ha!), which frankly hasn't done much to win me any friends, but who cares? Rain? Bah! At least it wont' be snowing every freaking day and when I walk around outside I won't have to worry about whether or not my eyeballs will freeze solid and crack into a million pieces.

To be fair to all the people I know and love that live here in the Tundra, I promise to bring back as much sunshine and warmth as is humanly possible. I also promise that when I come back I won't bitch about winter any more. Until next year.

In my absence please enjoy some of the photos we took on our previous trips to Hawaii.

20 Questions - Part Three - Travel Edition

When I decided to steal Gwen's 20 Questions idea I was expecting a slightly different outcome. First of all, I thought for sure there would be a slew of raunchy inquiries about my sex life and B, I thought there would be many more inquiries in general. I was a little let down until I tried to answer the STD and pick-up line questions posed by Pistols and realized that I am sadly lacking in the kind of bawdy material that would have made the asking and the answering of such questions worthwhile.

I was more pleasantly surprised by the number of questions you asked pertaining to travel adventures. There were enough of them (well all right, there were only 3, but still) that I decided it would be appropriate to save them for this travel-themed edition of 20 Questions.

Those of you who may have been reading my blog for awhile know that I used to travel extensively around North America for work and also that the primary source of delight in my personal life is traveling just about anywhere with my husband. It's what we do, so I know a thing or two about a thing or two when it comes to travel.

My long time blogger friend, the prolific Miss Tara asked:

Where's the best place you've ever traveled to and why?

This is a tricky one because I rarely have a bad time anywhere. Also I've been so many places it's hard to nail it down to just one best place. So true to form I'll break it down into two separate categories, the United States and abroad, thus causing the answer to this question to be much windier and wordier than necessary.

United States: I love Chicago. We are one quick train ride from where we live (Dullsville) and boom - big city. We try to mix it up and focus on different neighborhoods when we visit, see live music and eat ourselves silly. Chicago is great because it's familiar and yet a completely new experience every time we go.

Abroad: I love Paris. I've been twice, once when I was a teenager I was there for a couple of days and once with MDH for our honeymoon when we stayed for an entire week. I would go every year if I could. It's the best place in the world to eat, drink and people watch, two of my favorite activities. I realize that that is 3 activites, but I didn't notice my error until I had already hit the publish button.(Here's a photo of our last night in Paris, wining and dining it up.)

Churlita over at Churlish Figure, another of my long-time blogger friends, and the first blog I ever put in my Favorites folder, by the way, asks:

What would be your dream vacation if you could go to a place you've never been before?

I've always wanted to go to Portugal and the Azores. Well, not always, but since I met MDH because that's where his family is from and also because before I met him I didn't think it was possible to meet someone who wanted to travel as much as I did. Prior to that Portugal was not even on my radar. Anyhoo... I love the idea of his exotic, ethnic background and the fact that his family has an "old country". We'll get there someday. It's on the agenda.

One could argue that my family has an "old country" too, but I've already been to Kentucky several times and it's just not the same.

Speaking of travels to exotic lands, this next question is from the only regular reader that I have in a foreign country (that I know of - otherwise reveal yourselves!), the lovely lipped Australian, Sparsely Kate:

Have you ever been on a plane with terrible turbulence? What is the worst air plane experience of your life? What flight was it, where were you going and what happened?

Sparsely the answer to your first question is yes, I've experienced terrible turbulence, but after so many years on the road, during which time it was not usual for me to be on up to 6 flights a week (that's including stopovers folks, so don't get too excited), I have become jaded. It's true, I am entirely unfazed by turbulence. Typically I fall asleep as soon as the engines start up and the plane backs out of the gate. Something about that low, constant humming is as good as 2 Ambien and a lullaby to me.

I do, however, remember once being sharply awakened by the screaming of the other passengers during a particularly bumpy red-eye while coming home from Phoenix. I hazily looked about and after establishing no sign of flames, box-cutter wielding terrorists, or that the little oxygen thingys hadn't popped out of the ceiling, I rolled my eyes and went right back to night-night time. Totally jaded.

The worst airplane experiences for me have nothing whatsoever to do with the flight itself and more to do with a lack of tolerance and over all bitchy attitude toward the more dim-witted of my fellow travelers. You can read about it here if you like.

In case you were wondering, the photo at the top is for Evil-E over at Random Crap, another long time blogger friend and constant cataloger of random graffiti. I took it for him on our trip last month to Philadelphia. I meant to post it last night, but MDH was hogging the office and I couldn't squeeze in long enough to make it happen. Better late than never! Anyhoo... looks like Dean was either outed by another tagger or became a little unsure of himself and decided to add a more readable signature to his handiwork.

Planes, Trains & VW's

Gracious me! It's been awhile since I've checked in with my blog. MDH and I have been traipsing all over North America for the last 3 weeks. A veritable whirlwind of romantic and exciting locales.

OK. So it wasn't exactly all over North America.

Or romantic.

Or exciting.

It was mostly locations within a short driving distance or train ride from our home, like Columbus and Toronto. But - there was lots of hotel sex (OK, we did it once) which counts as both whirlwind, because it was over pretty quick, and romantic, because we brushed our teeth first.

Also we did fly to Philly using up the very last drop of the frequent flier miles I accrued from 5 long years of life on the road. I thought something on my boarding pass looked amiss and soon realized that there was a big giant empty space where it used to say "Silver Elite".

That's right.

I'm no longer Elite and am now one of the teeming masses. It's nothing but coach class for me from here on out. Before you know it I'll be standing around looking clueless, joking with TSA agents about having bombs in my luggage and generally annoying the crap out of savvy business travelers at an airport near you. Watch out.

And OK, we weren't exactly gone the entire 3 weeks. We were just away on the weekends. But they were long weekends, like 4 day weekends and I worked every day that we weren't gone off somewhere.

Anyhoo... I'm home now and lucky you I'm going to post some of my vacation photos, starting with our trip to Philadelphia where we met up with my best friend Amy and her lovely husband Ted*.

Philadelphia is known for it's murals - here's a jazzy one (har-har).

And now up close.

Amy got trapped on the wrong side of the turn styles in the subway... it's a long story. Why doesn't she just squeeze her bony, size 2 ass thru or climb over, you may ask? Surprise! She has a hernia and is only weeks away from surgery. I told you it was a long story (I will tell you more about it in an upcoming post. Hurray! Hernia stories. I know you are thrilled. Try to contain yourself. Seriously. Pipe down.)

A groovy newel post at Independence Hall.

A statue of some guy. Fen Branklin or something.

Ted enjoys a steak sandwich.

Amy & Ted at the Phillies game.

*There are no photos of me from this trip posted here as there is not one in the entire bunch that I approve for public viewing. In fact in every photo taken of me on this trip for some reason I look like a goddamn dairy cow, albeit a dairy cow with very expensive blond highlights. I posted the picture at the top, taken the day before we left for Philadelphia, in which I look somewhat normal just to prove to myself that I don't really look like livestock.

Gypsies Tramps & Thieves

One of the perks of having no children is that we can just pick up and go and do stuff whenever we feel like it.

Last summer I didn't have a job so we didn't do jack shit or go anywhere (except Comfest, of course). But this summer I am sort of gainfully employed so we can afford a few adventures here and there, and for some reason we seem to have squeezed a great many of them into the next three weeks.

Tomorrow MDH and I are taking off for a long weekend in Philadelphia with my best friend Amy and her husband Ted. I've always wanted to do this kind of thing, you know, the grown up couples holiday, but it has never worked out for me and Ames. I was single for a long time and then she was married to Assface and he never wanted to go on any trips except to visit his family. When I finally hooked up with MDH, he and Amy didn't get along very well (they do now), so it just never seemed to be in the cards.

I'm beside myself with glee. Plus Amy and Ted have totally laid back and allowed MDH and I to plan pretty much everything, which is what we like to do.

The weekend after next MDH and I are packing the car for Columbus because it's Comfest weekend and we never miss that. Well, since we've moved away to the Tundra I pretty much drop MDH off at the entrance to the park on Friday morning and never see him again until Sunday night.

If you don't feel like clicking on the link above, Comfest is a community festival in our old neighborhood in Columbus that has been going on since the early 70's. It's totally free and there are no corporate sponsors allowed - the whole thing is funded by beer sales and volunteers. Basically it's 3 days (from 11am to 11pm) with 5 stages of bands all day long. At any given time there is a band playing on every stage. It can cause some serious conundrums for my poor darling when two or three great bands are playing at the same time on different stages. What is a man who has been drunk on draft beer for 2 days straight to do?

Comfest is special to us for a lot of reasons. For me it's a tradition, but a freakin' kick ass tradition. For MDH it's the entire reason that he decided that Columbus didn't totally blow when he moved there from Boston and ended up staying long enough to meet me. He stumbled upon Comfest quite by accident one afternoon while going for a stroll through the neighborhood and fell instantly in love with my city.

Frankly, I liked Comfest a lot better when we lived down the street from it and I could come and go as I pleased. These days it's a bit of a cluster-fuck and I get a little claustrophobic in a crowd. (I also think I have mentioned before that I'm not a huge fan of the port-a-john.) I pretty much go and hang out for an hour or two and see one or two bands that are old friends of mine and then take off for the suburbs to hang with my peeps like Dan, Steph, Amy, Frenchie and Nature Boy.

It is understood among our friends that if you want to spend any time with MDH during the last weekend of June - go to Comfest and you're likely to run into him. I suggest going very early as his state of intoxication intensifies later in the afternoon and early evening and he is highly likely to already be reduced to a wet, incoherent mess, rolling around on a picnic blanket with the remnants of a broccoli burger all over the front of his shirt.

I'll be at Amy's. Or at our hotel. Where there is running water and air conditioning.

I recently discovered that my company will be closed for Friday July 4th and also the following Monday. God I love that place! So fuck yeah - a four day holiday weekend and what better place to celebrate our country's independence from England than Canada? Yes. We are spending July 4th in Toronto. MDH has a big boner because I finally agreed to take the train into the city.

My baby loves the choo-choos.

I, of course have big issues with the train toilets, but I've got to throw him a bone sometimes. Besides gas prices are outrageous and it's easier to enjoy all the city has to offer without being encumbered with a car.

Anyhoo... What I'm trying to say here is that I won't be blogging for awhile. Not to worry, I'm sure wherever I am, I am having a marvelous time and I hope that you are too!

Meanwhile I will leave you with some random photos of summer travels passed.

My first (and last) Red Sox game in 2004

My first (and last) NASCAR race in 2003
(I am silently mocking everyone within a 20 foot radius of me)

Chatham Bars Resort Cape Cod in 2003 - Swanky!

Waiting in line at the beer tent at Comfest 2005

The Main stage at Comfest 2006 - like I said - clusterfuck

By the way the photo at the top is of me at Comfest in 1999 - my first Comfest with MDH. Ahhh. He asked me to crop him out of the picture - party pooper.

Ill Communication

Buon giorno! It's quarter to 10 on Sunday morning, MDH is still sleeping and I've got a little bit of time for blogging before the beast awakens.

Well, he's not a beast just yet, but he will be. Trust me. He's got a job interview in Chicago on Tuesday which means that he will begin preparations today - trying on every suit he owns, laundering every pair of underwear, researching the company, chanting, anointing himself with oils, and beating himself with willow branches until he bleeds - and begin to transform into a total asshole for the rest of the day. When this man, who under normal conditions is a marshmallow, gets nervous he displays a form of grumpitude equal to no other.

When he wakes up I'm getting the fuck out of here for the rest of the afternoon and early evening.

I woke up refreshed and perky and if I'm around Sir-Gripe-A-Lot for very long my lovely mood and graceful disposition will be crushed like a grape and since shit always rolls downhill - I will have no one else to take it out on but the cat. It's always the innocents who suffer the most.

I have some shopping to do anyway. I'd take the cat with me if I could.

So, since I don't have much time before the bear comes out of his den I'm going to hit you with a quick and dirty recap of recent events, conversations and observations, in no particular order.

1. A clerk with a name tag that said Cecil above the word Turkey, at the check in desk of a hotel we stayed in recently handed us our room key and asked MDH if he would like to have the password to the Virus. MDH and the clerk proceeded to have a verbal volley that lasted for far too long and consisted of my husband saying things like, "I'm sorry, what?" and "Could you repeat that again?" while Cecil responded back with "The Virus!, The Virus!" in the kind of increasingly frenzied tones one experiences when not being understood. Poor Cecil. Poor MDH.

I put an end to the escalating heated exchange when I realized that putting the country of origin on the name tags was the hotels clever way of keeping us aware of the ethnic diversity of their staff. Later that day I was to meet Clara, Hong-Kong and Rosalee, Trinadad. Cecil, Turkey was an indication of where Cecil was from, not a personality trait or strange job title.

Remembering from experience my old boss who was Turkish and had a strange accent that always reminded me of Count Dracula, with the endearing way that he pronounced his W's as V's and was always swallowing his L's, I had the epiphany that Cecil was trying to say "Wireless" - not "Virus". Thank god.

MDH and I wondered on our way up to our room how many people never bothered to investigate Cecil's offer of a Virus and lived out the rest of their hotel stay with no internets.

(My gracious - #1 has turned out quite long!)

2. It is very hot an humid here this week and we have been peppered with Thunderstorms. It's the kind of weather that causes my normally smooth and shiny hair to frizz out like a fright wig. In an effort to go with it, I decided to style my hair in such a way as to work with the frizz rather than try to smooth it all out like I normally do.

At first I was pleased with the results, but after working a full 9 hour day when I finally plopped down in my steaming hot car to drive home and viewed my head in the rear view mirror and the combination of heat and humidity throughout the day had caused all my make-up to melt off too. I looked like Phyllis Diller.

3. Late yesterday afternoon MDH shocked me by asking if I'd like to get out of the house and go out to dinner. Although I'm pretty sure he only did this to get out of going to the grocery store to pick up hamburger buns like I'd asked him to do earlier in the day, it worked and we drove to the beach to have dinner in a lovely spot right on the water.

We had been to this restaurant a year or so ago with some friends of ours that have since moved away to Oregon. The night we ate there our friends drove, so MDH and I didn't remember where it was exactly, except that it was next to the water. We couldn't remember the name of the place either.

Needless to say when we got to the beachy town where the restaurant was located we drove around in circles, arguing and bickering like a couple of spider monkeys over the last banana chunk, until we remembered that MDH's new crackberry has a GPS feature. I typed in the word "restaurant" and zoomed in on locales that were on the water and we (I) finally found the place, reaffirming my earlier statements on this blog that I would make an excellent contestant on that show The Amazing Race.

4. Just as we were polishing off a lovely dessert of strawberry shortcake with strawberry ice cream, the sky started to get very stormy with lots of lightening strikes. The storm was heading toward our house so we decided to leave the restaurant right away and try to get home before it hit. We made it, but along the way we passed a giant RV sales lot with big balloons and banners desperately displayed in an attempt to get some poor dumbass to buy a camper with gas prices at $4.09 a gallon.

Anyhoo... it was at this moment that MDH surprised me yet again, twice in the same day, and expressed his lifelong desire to someday travel the country in an RV - the following conversation ensued (those of you married for any length of time will relate):

Me: Really? I will miss you while you are away.

MDH: I thought it would be something the two of us would do together in our old age.

Me: Have you learned nothing about me, 'lo these past 9 years? Maybe we can work something out where you sleep in the RV in the parking lot after you drop me off at a hotel. I've never pooped in a camper and that's a record I'm not planning to break in my lifetime if I can help it.

MDH: I've always wanted to sleep in one of those camper beds (grabbing my knee)

Me: Oh, I get it now... if this camper's a'rockin...

MDH: It's probably out of alignment.


PS: I chose the tag "electrocution by coat hanger" because it popped up when I tried to type something else and then I was interested to see what the original post was that caused me to create that tag. It'll be a total surprise.

For Your Amusement

Based on SRU's comment in my last post about traveling I looked up this review I did last year. I was stuck there for a full, miserable 7 days. Thank Dog the people at the clinic were terrific.

I've Been Everywhere Part 2

Reading Tara's post listing all the places she's been prompted me to ponder my own travels. I started going through my old expense reports, which I needed to do anyway because we're getting ready to do our taxes, and counted 38 states I've been to in the last 5 years.

The names of the places are mostly familiar and some of them stand out more than others because of the length of time I spent there, frequency of visits and sometimes just the sheer weirdness of the people or the town.

Anyhoo... here's an official "Good-bye" to my old career in the form of an overview of the the little stroll I took down memory lane as I perused my old expense reports:

Worst "Hotel":

Methlab, MD
It seemed that people (rather unsavory people) were living in this "hotel" as if it were an apartment building. The place reeked of mildew, curry and body odor. Once in my room I immediately called MDH who began working furiously to find me alternative accommodations in the area. There were none with any vacancies.

As I was sitting on the bed, lamenting the horrible and possibly dangerous surroundings with my husband, I heard the a key turn in the lock on the door and a strange man walked into my room. I dropped the phone and screamed at the man, who didn't speak English, but clearly understood "GET THE FUCK OUT OF HERE MOTHERFUCKER!!" and the gesture implied by an angry frightened woman coming after him swinging a chair at this head. (Turns out the man was some kind of confused maintenance person, but still lucky to have removed himself before I smashed his fuckin' brains out.)

It was this incident that caused MDH, who of course heard the whole thing because he was still on the phone when it happened, to suggest that perhaps I should find another job.

Worst Hotel, Honorary Mention:

Truckstopwhore, Nevada
To start with, I had a horrible head cold. I stayed in a motel attached to the town's casino. The bed had one thin blanket and one pillow on it that I'm fairly certain was just a busted vacuum cleaner bag with a pillow case over it. My cell phone didn't work, there was no Internet service and I couldn't even use dial-up because the phone was actually attached to the wall with a permanent cable. As an added bonus - there was no TV. It was not unlike what I imagine prison to be. The vet was really nice and offered to let me stay at her house, but that could have been even weirder so I politely refused. It was only 2 days. I survived.

Crabbiest (Catty-est?) Clinic Staff:

Pick One
It's a tie between every single "cats only" clinic I've ever been to. I feel bad to say it, because one of the pleasures of my job was meeting the mostly wonderful and amazing people, but "cats only" clinics tend to be staffed with unpleasant grouches. I'm sure their foul moods have a lot to do with the fact that nearly all of these clinics reek of cat piss.

Most Rural:

Cowflop, MI

This was an equine clinic with a very cool doctor/owner who specialized in race horses and it was foaling season so there were lots of cute baby horsies prancing about. The clinic was about a 3 hour drive from home, but once I got off the highway it was 3 miles on a rutted dirt road, then turn on another dirt road and drive another 2 miles. The training was performed in a dusty old barn and the nearest hotel was 45 mins away. At least I racked up a lot of good mileage reimbursement.

Most Crazy Doctor/Clinic Owner

Baboon Buttock, MI

The poor man had whipped himself into a red-faced, blustering frenzy long before I arrived. The first day he was in a constant state of freak out and challenging me throughout the training to the point that I had to give him a time out and explain that he was wasting my time (which was really his time that he was paying me for) by being ridiculous. I handed him a brand new legal pad and told him to write down his questions instead of interrupting the training every 5 seconds and that we would address all of his concerns when the training was over at the end of the day, which we did. He seemed to have calmed down, but the next day when I arrived at the clinic, he wasn't there because he'd gone to the emergency room with heart palpitations. With him out of the picture the rest of the training went great. He is fine now, by the way.

Most Crazy Doctor/Clinic Owner - Honorable Mention

Whackadoo, KY

It was only my 3rd solo training and I was still learning the software myself. The owner was an older, country vet who had printed, read and memorized all 650 pages of the reference manual prior to my arrival, causing him to know more about the software than me. I was impressed with his brilliant memory, but the guy followed me around, buzzing questions like a goddamn horsefly. There was no relief from his incessant quizzing. At one point he followed me into the ladies room and I thought I would cry.

Most Fun Clinic
Bongwater, CA

There was just something special about this place and all the people who worked there. The manager was so relaxed about everything and fully prepared for the training (without having memorized the manual). To my amazement they had done all of the pre-training work I had assigned to them before I arrived. The clinic was in a big strip mall and there were lots of great little independently owned restaurants (best carne esada I've ever had) and a terrific little coffee shop right next door. Since they had prepared so much before the training I got to spend more time getting to know them and having a laugh. BTW - although they were very laid back, nobody was high as far as I know. I just think the word bongwater is funny.

Biggest Waste of Time

Pick One
Clinics that refused to close or even scale down the number of appointments they booked during the training (I would make this suggestion a priority in conversations with them in the weeks before I arrived) caused me to sit, sometimes for several hours, with nobody to train. Of course these are the same people that give you a bad evaluation, saying they didn't learn enough from the training.

Ah well...

Out with the old, in with the new...

A whole new world of things to bitch and moan about awaits when my new job starts on Feb 13th.

Be Kind To Your Well Traveled Friend

It was only a matter of time before I posted about airline travel. The following is a longwinded nastygram fueled by 4+ years of life on the road, but ultimately I'm here to help and you are welcome.

As the holiday traveling season approaches I can’t help but reflect upon my former career and how much I despised the holiday traveling season. Soon we’ll start seeing video on the news of crowded airports crawling with angry, exhausted travelers standing in lines or stretched out on filthy airport floors using carry on bags and purses as pillows.

Fifty percent (and sometimes more) of my work required me to traipse about the United States and Canada on airplanes during all seasons. You get used to it and begin to recognize the same poor souls every week. Eventually you get to know the valet ("Where to this week, Mrs. Lady?") and airline employees on a first name basis, especially if you live in a small city like I do. To those of you who travel more frequently than that for longer than 4 years - if you do this and are somehow able to maintain your sanity, let alone personal relationships with real people, you're a flippin' superhero.

My work typically had me flying out on a Monday and returning on Friday, but occasionally I would have to fly on a Saturday or Sunday which required me to intermingle with the families and visiting vacationers, otherwise known as annoying people who don’t know jack about air travel. During the holiday season you will run into these folks on any given day, not just weekends.

Now that I am no longer traveling and am not nearly as irritable as I used to be (it's true your stock in Tylenol has gone down) I have come to realize that it's not their fault they don't know jack about airline travel. So, in the spirit of the upcoming season (hey it is too upcoming, I saw Christmas ornaments on display at Macy's weeks ago) and hope that we all will get to our destinations more swiftly (and with fewer dirty looks) I offer these tips for safe holiday airline travel, and also not getting clobbered senseless with a briefcase by haggard, work weary corporate traveling types:

1. DO please (for the sweet love of BABY JESUS) when it is your turn - step up to the next available computerized check-in machine (uh, the thing that looks like an ATM). Don't stand there at the head of the line like a jackass waiting for one of the uniformed human beings behind the counter to help you. They are busy putting stickers on luggage and checking ID's of the people who went before you who you surely observed during your 30 minute wait, using the computerized check-in machine. You must help yourself. It is your turn. The time is now. Go to the available machine. Go to it. Go to it now. Yes, you. It's your turn. Right now. Go.

2. Stay the hell out of the way of people carrying laptops who already have their jackets and shoes off in the line for the TSA. These people (formerly me) obviously have done this a time or two before and don’t want to stamp around, impatiently behind you while you fuck about and take 10 minutes to get your shit together. Fucking about defined as behaving in a way thay may cause safety hazard, delay or mess including but not limited to:

- Waiting until you are at the roller belt and bins area to take off your complicated boots or stilettos lacing up the calf, that means you, glamorous woman wearing gobs of make-up. Gentlemen, please remove your belts and move along.

- Crying or fussing when the mean old TSA tosses your 4oz. mister of Fantasy by Brittany Spears into the garbage because it was not properly stored in a plastic ziplock sandwich bag. It's your own fault for not being prepared, shut your yap and move it along. Please refer to #3 below for further instruction. BTW Please note: If you are wearing an overpowering fragrance everyone already hates you and are hoping to hell they will not be seated anywhere near you.

- Hurriedly jamming your Big Mac and fries into your greasy cake hole, leaving a trail of sesame seeds and special sauce all over the floor while others behind you, in bare or stockinged feet, are forced to dance around in your crumbs. This applies to any other food source purchased in an ignorant rush outside of security, including but not limited to:

- Nasty weird “breakfast sandwich”
- Nasty weird “breakfast burrito” although less messy.
- Styrofoam bowl of Frosted Mini-Wheats - yes, I once stepped in milk.
- Cinna-bon, although they do smell delicious, please refer to #7 below.
- Healthier items brought from home such as bananas, apples, carrot sticks. Are you seriously going run that banana peel thru the x-ray? Yes. I guess you are.

3. Do not argue with, sass or otherwise engage in conversation with the TSA except to say please and/or thank you, have a nice day, etc..

4. Don’t make a spectacle of yourself in the terminal with sobbing, tearful goodbyes. Do you think the rest of us aren’t leaving loved ones behind? Hold it together or hug and cry it out at home. (People in military uniform and their loved ones are exempt from this guideline - as I'm likely to grab on and cry with you, and if I do it that makes it ok.)

5. If you are seated next to a person donning sunglasses (especially at night) and headphones with her head leaning against the window who appears to be sleeping – Do NOT poke her in the arm and try to engage her in a conversation. (Yes, this happened to me, not once but twice. Once to ask me where I was going – ah, the same place as you dumbass, and once by a totally different dumbass on another flight to ask if I would switch seats – ah, no dumbass, I’m sleeping and I specifically booked a window seat and boarded the plane early in order to more easily do so. Night, night.)

6. Make every effort possible to stay in your seat and if you absolutely must get up – DO NOT grasp the seat rest in front of you for leverage as there is a sleeping lady in it (me) being catapulted forward and startled awake each time you do.

7. Once more on the subject of food and fragrances. If you are bringing your own meal onto the flight, be aware that whatever it is probably stinks to high heaven and doubly so in such a small, cramped space. In particular (stinkwise) and apparently wildly popular in flight snacks, including but not limited to:

- Beef jerky (or for that matter, jerky of any kind)
- Tunafish sandwiches
- Sausage pizza
- Garlic chicken stir fry

- Anything with onions or garlic

- Cinna-bon - although not because it stinks, it actually smells quite tasty and is making the sleepy lady even hungrier than she already was.

8. Unless you are under the age of 5 and traveling to Hong Kong, do not wear pajama pants and bring your bed pillow as carry on. While it poses no safety risk or irritating delay, it does make you look like a rube who has never traveled farther than the peapatch except to go to the feed store. My otherwise beautiful and perfect nieces do this and it drives me mad. I guess this guideline only applies if you are traveling with me. If you're not traveling with me I don't give a shit what you wear, unless of course it's sleeveless and you keep bumping your bare skin into to me.

9. And finally - Do not make snide comments when boarding as you plod past the sad corporate slugs in first class. Some of us are indeed assholes but hear me out.

- When I hear this, “It must be nice to be rich!” I am thinking this: It is a domestic flight and only marginally nice and I am not rich. Being seated in first class most likely means that we have spent countless, weeks, days and possibly months away from our homes and the people we love, thereby earning us the much deserved points required for a "free" (there is a steep personal price, my friend) upgrade.

All that time I spent rolling my eyes and giving withering looks to strangers in airports I was dreaming of the day when I could have a normal job and come home every night after a short 9 hour day to a husband who will hold me tight and where my pajama pants are only a few feet away. I was also longing for the day that I could be one of them, the dreaded traveling family and visiting vacationer, annoying the crap out of the homesick corporate assholes. At long last, now I'm one of those lucky bastards.

UPDATE 10/18/07 10:15 am

As is the nature of my passive aggression I now feel the need to add in a few disclaimers to this post. Upon reflection and reading it over and over I have decided it's mucho on the mean side and most of these numbered steps highlight only one side of the story. The side of me that has spoken in this post is the side coming home after 5 or more 12 to 16 hour workdays where I have been in some strange place among strange people, the center of attention talk, talk, talking my head off the entire time. It's the side of me that is exausted, lonely for my own bed and sick of the sound of my own voice.

The other side of me in the airport at the beginning of the work week is a kinder, gentler me, more prone to actually help people use the check-in kiosk, stay awake (not wearing sunglasses and headphones), and probably even smiling at and speaking to my fellow travelers. I hope you run into her sometime, she's really nice. Although, the angry side is the one with the better sense of humor.

10:38 - One more thing - because the airlines haved jammed the seats together so close, it's nearly impossible NOT to grab the seat rest in front of you, especially when it's "reclining" (a whole inch! I'm really relaxed now!) so I just wanted to say I'm guilty of it too, and am less inclined to be upset when other people do it to me if they acknowledge the catapulting and say "excuse me" or "so sorry".