2007

A recap of 2007 through pictures. :D

A trip down to Portland for a Super Bowl party. The first quarter was amazing. the next three... well hence the picture above.

St. Patty's Day!

Easter!
Oh, wait...

Yes. We made an Easter Bunny cake. You can not see it in this shot but we added raisinettes to make it look like it was shitting. :)

Sebastian had a little bit of a scare and had to spend a weekend at the animal hospital.

A weekend in SF for some baseball, beer and hot dogs in the sun, nights out with friends, and this...

What do you expect from Dodger fans...

Ren Faire.
Note to self: After polishing off 3 bottles of mead DO NOT volunteer yourself to the knife juggler. :-o

Camping in Mammoth.
These guys were so cute. :-)

Moving.
Not really that special except I found out I needed to be out of my place the day I was suppose to be flying to Germany in one month. Errrrrr.

Germany! Where everything is gorgeous...

...the beer comes in jumbo sizes (did you know it is possible to consume a gallon and half of beer in one day, and survive?)...

...and it is served with breakfast!
I am not joking. I ordered breakfast and they just brought it out with beer. :D

Halloween!
Uh, that isn't my costume. Obviously. But I sure did appreciate the view. :)

I went to my high school 10 year reunion. Oddly enough I had a blast.

Raf's house warming party in Portland.
I think he actually finished that whole bottle of champagne...

Christmas back home in San Francisco.

Goodbye 2007! :D

What D&D character am I?

I Am A: Neutral Good Human Bard/Sorcerer (2nd/2nd Level)


Ability Scores:

Strength-10

Dexterity-11

Constitution-13

Intelligence-14

Wisdom-15

Charisma-13


Alignment:
Neutral Good A neutral good character does the best that a good person can do. He is devoted to helping others. He works with kings and magistrates but does not feel beholden to them. Neutral good is the best alignment you can be because it means doing what is good without bias for or against order. However, neutral good can be a dangerous alignment because because it advances mediocrity by limiting the actions of the truly capable.


Race:
Humans are the most adaptable of the common races. Short generations and a penchant for migration and conquest have made them physically diverse as well. Humans are often unorthodox in their dress, sporting unusual hairstyles, fanciful clothes, tattoos, and the like.


Primary Class:
Bards often serve as negotiators, messengers, scouts, and spies. They love to accompany heroes (and villains) to witness heroic (or villainous) deeds firsthand, since a bard who can tell a story from personal experience earns renown among his fellows. A bard casts arcane spells without any advance preparation, much like a sorcerer. Bards also share some specialized skills with rogues, and their knowledge of item lore is nearly unmatched. A high Charisma score allows a bard to cast high-level spells.


Secondary Class:
Sorcerers are arcane spellcasters who manipulate magic energy with imagination and talent rather than studious discipline. They have no books, no mentors, no theories just raw power that they direct at will. Sorcerers know fewer spells than wizards do and acquire them more slowly, but they can cast individual spells more often and have no need to prepare their incantations ahead of time. Also unlike wizards, sorcerers cannot specialize in a school of magic. Since sorcerers gain their powers without undergoing the years of rigorous study that wizards go through, they have more time to learn fighting skills and are proficient with simple weapons. Charisma is very important for sorcerers; the higher their value in this ability, the higher the spell level they can cast.


Find out What Kind of Dungeons and Dragons Character Would You Be?, courtesy of Easydamus (e-mail)

Formal Announcement

I quit my job, I am going back to school, and I am moving to Portland.

Um, no joke.

I got bored. I felt like I was doing the same thing every day and living for the weekends. For you who know me, you know I can not really do change in a small way. For everyone else, well... they think I flipped my lid. It may be a bit of both.


So lately I have been on the emotional roller coaster. One minute I am dragging myself to work counting the days till I am out. The next I am overwhelmed with "this" and "that" that needs to be done. The very next minute I am hit with a wave of fear and shock to the point that I either just stare at a wall or just begin to shake. Next I am so excited I start grinning and giggling like I am off to my first prom.


I hate what I fear, and I fear the unknown and being alone. So why not venture off and try both at the same time?
He he, ah crap, here goes that roller coaster again...

3 years ago today...

I didn't know this would be the last time I saw you guys...

God I wish it was three years and a day ago.

And in contrast...

This last week sucked balls.

I watched Barry's last game as a Giant (I'll admit it, I cried), watched my Smith get his body smashed at the beginning of a much anticipated game (I won't include that he may be out for 4-6 weeks because that news came this week), and watched a pathetic game by my team all the while surrounded by a bunch frat boys and their sorority has been girlfriends.

My reprieve in between these has been going to my boresville job or looking through pictures of and reminiscing about the glorious two weeks before. Oh, and did I mention that the weather has become rainy and cold?

Ugh. Okay, bitchfest is over. I'll write more after I snap and quit my job. :)

Pictures!

Yep. All 432 of them. And that is after dropping about a hundred or so. :)

http://picasaweb.google.com/skik42

Reminders of war

People's ability to pick themselves up after devastation and rebuild is a wonderful trait that has allowed us to continue and prosper, but I think it also allows us to forget and repeat the same mistakes not once, but over and over.

To go to a memorial or view the rumble left after a war only serves as a picture into what occurred. It does not give all the emotions, the death, the loss, the sadness... the lasting imprint. A crumbling building does not give the stories of the people who lived and died there. Pictures do not show the faces or carcases of our loved ones. A memorial only seems to teach us of a specific atrocity so that it specifically is not repeated.

From these we take away who was the victim and who was the wrongdoer, we do not place both of these as part of ourselves. We take away a lesson as specific as memorizing 2 + 2 = 4, but not the concept as a whole so that later we make the same mistake and only them learn that 3 + 1 also equals 4.

Berlin (part 2)

Our first time in Berlin we stayed in the old West Berlin. This time we stayed at a hostel in the old East Berlin. There is a striking difference and maybe oddly I prefer the eastern side. It is a bit more gritty and younger. It is like a jigsaw puzzle of new and old weaved together by graffiti. A street lined with cafes and bars with outdoor tables packed so closely it is hard to determine which cafe you are sitting down to will have a building that looks like it was just put up, next to a building were only the cracks along the base give away its age, and next to that a building that looks almost the same as it did since the war, dark and gray with half of its facade gone and old brick underneath showing and signs of smoke still surrounding the windows. On all the buildings beautiful graffiti art mingles with simple tagging, broken up by posters new to years old.

Sobering moments broke up our stroll when coming upon synagogues with guards and men who look like the secret service outside who quickly stop anyone who comes with in two feet of the building or a high and thick walled Jewish cemetery with a security system of cameras, gates and guard houses. Around these it seemed even the locals stopped chatting and everything was silent.

To end the day, on our way back to the hostel we noticed streets being blocked off by police and a helicopter hovering in the distance. Enough experience has taught me that this means a happy and festive occasion or a protest. Curiosity has not bitten me enough in life so we trucked it towards the helicopter.

We came up to a protest and not seeing Bush or America on any of the signs and the punk style dress of the crowd, we felt safe enough to walk along side of it till we got to the middle. There were a few times of having to dodge fighting or riot police but it was really interesting to see the differences and similarities between this and protests at home.

I think it was a fitting end to the day and oddly an uplifting one too. While protesting sadly I don't think will ever put an end to war, oppression or discrimination, it does mean that there are always those who are willing to speak out for others and help others when it is needed.

Munich (part 2)

Not much new to talk about this time. We hung out chatting at the hostel, walked around town, ate a one inch thick slab of meat sandwiched in a tiny bun and drank beer.

We met a girl from New Zealand, a guy from Connecticut, played foosball with some guys from New York and Sweden (respectively), played pool with a guy from Switzerland, chatted with a Russian guy in town for just a couple of hours, shared a beer with two guys from Australia and kicked back a few rounds with a German couple and two brothers from Italy. And that was only one day. :)

Why am I leaving???

Ars Electronica

Ok so maybe it was cooler than I thought it was going to be...

Actually it was a lot of fun! I didn't understand how any of it worked but you could play and have fun with everything.

There was a picture taking booth that then puts someone else's face on top of yours. Lets just say that if Derrick and I had a child it would be one ugly kid.

There was a cool computer you could draw right on the screen but the "paper" you were drawing on was constantly rotating.

There was this table that if you put stuff on it, depending on how solid or soft the object was, it made a different click or thud sound so you could experiment and make beats.

The best was a massive virtual world you could make with little boxes. You put the boxes into cubby holes and either took video or made pictures and then put the boxes on this table and whatever you recorded in the box entered your virtual world that you traveled around through a camera or a scooter.

Reading back, none of this makes sense but it really is how it was. I think Derrick can better explain...

Link

Also if you would like to read his side of the story for other adventures, um, like the castle...

Link

The Danube (part 2)

The other part of the day needed to be separated from the Danube cruise because it has a completely different theme. This post should more aptly be titled "Um, Derrick?"

To explain a little, the only part of our trip that I did not read or research about was of outside of Vienna and alongside the Danube. Derrick did, and his interest revolved around old castles and an "electronica museum" in Linz.

The day started in the early morning taking a train out to Leobendorf where we had a 3/4 mile hike to an old castle. Actually, scratch that, when we arrived Derrick realized it was not 3/4 a mile but 3/4 an hour hike.

So we began our hike through the fog shrouded woods in the direction Derrick claimed the castle was. The fog of course shrouded anything natural or man made farther than 20 feet away so whether or not there was a castle at the top of the hill we were climbing was anyone's guess. All the signs were in German, which Derrick claimed to understand, and he continuously kept replying, "it is just up here," to my question of, "Um, Derrick?"

To end any suspense, yes there was a castle and seeing it while half shrouded in mist was definitely eerie and cool at the same time. Derrick only told me on the way back that he too was unsure the entire hike up though.

After this we headed to the pick up point for the cruise and experienced three hours of eye popping beauty.

Later we left the boat and walked over to a cafe and had some amazing food. Once again small towns are where its at for awesome food.

We were suppose to explore a large abbey after that but were in such a euphoric state it was too much effort so we opted to catch the train to Linz.

In Linz, Derrick had been raving about the "electronica museum," so that night I grabbed a brochure to begin excitedly reading about it for the next morning. Three sentences into the brochure I looked up at Derrick and said, "Um, Derrick? This museum.. it isn't about music, is it?"

The "electronica museum" is not in fact about electronica music, but instead about electronic arts. In fact it revolves around one of the biggest electronic arts conventions in the world.

The moment of silence after Derrick told me this, us starring at each other both stunned from across a table, and the fit of laughter after realization set in for both of us is an indescribable moment, but so hilarious it is necessary to write about.

So tomorrow instead of writing about the museum I have been anticipating for weeks I will let you know how the Ars Electronica was. :-)

The Danube

Describing yourself as speechless usually means you are so awestruck that you try and try to think of an accurate word but are so struck, you are dumb to think of anything more descriptive than basic words. There are times though that you truly are speechless. You are not so awed that you can not find the words or the ability to form a sentence, you are so taken that you don't even think to speak. You simply look. What is in front of you is such ecstasy to your senses that all else (speech included) ceases to function or matter. You can not and need not speak, eat, drink, breath too if it were not an automatic recurrence of your body.

Hiroshima was horribly and the Cinque Terra fabulously like this, but to compare them to each other or the Danube would lessen each, even if only slightly, that is just enough.

I will not try and describe my cruise up the Danube; I would only ruin it. I can only post pictures later even though they only half at best portrait the experience and proclaim (demand even) that everyone make it a necessity in life to experience this.

Vienna

I would say that I ate and drank my way through Bavaria. In Vienna though I more sipped and slurped. The wine was awesome (especially the white) and the goulash soup to die for. I am definitely picking up a cook book once I get back. We also tried some of the famous Sachertorte and wine mixed with tonic (interestingly good).

In Vienna obviously music is a big thing all over and we were lucky enough to catch a band in a local bar. We bought there CD and took some video of their show.

Vienna itself is just amazing. Every building looks like a palace with massive columns, graceful statues or ornate stucco decorating them from top to bottom. Every couple of blocks opens up to a small to large plaza with a beautiful fountain or statue in it. There are churches dotted all over breaking up the landscape with tall intricate towers.

While strolling around (you can't help but stroll instead of walk) there are street performers playing everything from violins to clarinets to pianos so that there is like a fog of music throughout the city.

So now we are off to cruise the Danube and explore some small towns along it. Life is so rough. ;-)

Life's ridiculously great moments

After a night out drinking till 4am, waking up at 12:10, hastily dressing and packing in order to sneak out the back door of the hostel because check out was at 11. After draining a double espresso, sauntering in to the oldest beer garden in town at 1:30 and by 3:30 having guzzled half a gallon of beer.

After having lived (survived) through the Abrego House years, the only odd part for me is the fact that it takes place in Germany and it is heartening to know that seven years later that is all that is odd.

:-p

Life's odd great moments

Sitting in a dimly lit tavern nestled in a cobblestone alley deep with in Vienna, surrounded by a giggling and boisterous crowd, hunched over a smart phone watching your football team's come from behind win. Your squeal in delight not even warranting a glance from the crowd around you, and in celebration having a quiet toast with glasses of fabled Viennese wine. :-D

Life's little great moments

One of life's little great moments is sitting in a smoky tavern down an alley in between looming old palace homes in Vienna, surrounded by the soft drone of many intense conversations, casually weighing your options for the days to come. Vienna, the Danube, Prague or Munich?

:-)

So few times in life are decisions so difficult and so easy at the same time. Perhaps that is what creates the casual manner in which they are met; the likelihood of regret is slim.

Hohenschwangau

I finally got to see a castle!

It was while bumping elbows with droves of other tourists from all over the world but hey, how often do you get the chance to see a castle? (Disneyland does not count.)

Getting there was a bit of a leap of faith. The hostels in Munich were all booked for the weekend so we found a fairly cheap hotel online and with out a map and just an address we took off from Munich.

We took the train to the closest major town and hoped there was a bus once we got there. (If not the town we needed to get to was only 5km away.) Luckily there was a bus but once we got to the town we were having trouble finding our hotel. We asked a couple walking by if they could point us in the right direction but they were unsure of where it was. This is about when we started to worry because the town was only 4 hotels and less than 200 residence.

They asked around and offered to give us a ride to the hotel. This was a God send because it turns out we had booked a room above the restaurant just outside the castle gates up a dark and windy road outside the town. Going to bed in the shadow of a castle I think will be listed as one of the highlights of this trip.

The castle (Neuschwanstein was amazing and the view jaw dropping. I have a ton of pictures but again, you are just going to have to take my word for now until I can post them.

Next stop: Vienna.

Munich (Part 1)

I have a bruise on my back from where my shoes in my backpack have been knocking against me while walking, half my face and one arm have broken out in bumps from the starch and chemicals in the hostels bed sheets, and because I have been mostly speaking in single words of German my English has become that of a kindergartner. I am having the time of my life!

First, we did not make it to Prague. We decided to double back and take another day in Munich and Berlin in stead. But that is getting ahead...


While on the train to Munich (the first time) I wrote that I might not return to America. Things have seriously changed since visiting Munich. I am currently drafting an e-mail to quit my job and researching how difficult it would be to move the cats out here.

No, to be serious now. The German school system has made private tutoring of English a profession as useful as palm reading. I am actually currently trying to learn the basic German needed to be able to mop floors at a tavern. :-)

Munich is like a much older Seattle; life revolves around hanging out with friends and drinking good espresso or beer and eating.

I did go sightseeing but the majority of the time was spent chatting and then heading off to a spot recommended to us. This routine began on the train ride to Munich with the guys in the food car and went from there.

One of our waitresses for lunch listed out four places we needed to go and then described them to us as, "beer garden, beer garden, beer garden, place you make picture." We didn't make it to the photo spot because at the second beer garden we got to chatting with a group of people and before we knew it it was 10pm.

Everyone seems to have their favorite local beer and beer garden. One waiter gave us back our tip and told us to use it to try his favorite beer at the place he recommended.

The hostel we are staying in was a lot more like we are use to. The one in Berlin and Wurzburg did not have a common area or bar so there was not much interaction with others. This one though has one of the better common areas\bars I have seen. Both nights we were up till 3 or 4am talking with other travelers and the people who work there.

So I basically spent two and a half days chatting, drinking great beer and eating amazing food.

I have pictures of some of the meals we had (meat, meat and more meat) and I will post them with descriptions if I get back. ;-)

Oh, I also took pictures of famous landmarks.

Wurzburg

I apologize for the delay and for there not being any pictures. I have taken almost 200 so far and the upload time would take over an hour. I will post them with descriptions once I get back.

I must also apologize for the extensive usage of "damn" "awesome" and "amazing from here on out. I left my thesaurus at home. ;-)

Wurzburg is an amazing town a little more than half way to Munich from Berlin. I swear, it does not matter what country you are in, small towns are where its at for good grub.

Our first stop was a pub where I had the local schnitzel and Derrick had a local specialty of cooked meat in gelatin. Damn good!

Later that night we had a platter of Bavarian cheeses and Franconian wine. The cheese was... can you guess...amazing. The wine was.. bet you can't guess... kind of odd. Ha ha got you there. :-)

No seriously, the wine was very different and not really my type. The odd part was that it was very sweet and tasted like it needed to be decanted but if you swirled it in your glass it then tasted great, but only a minute later it would be sweet again.

The next morning I was introduced to Bavarian breakfasts. This is by far the most awesome breakfast I have ever had. First, no eggs! (I don#t like eggs) It is sweet schnitzels with sweet mustard and a pretzel. Oh and it comes with a hefeweisan.

We didn't just eat while there, we spent half our time walking around too. We went to their fortress and the palace. Quite a contrast but both were really grandiose.

We meant to go for one day and then head off to Munich the next morning but ended up staying until the afternoon. Oops. ;-)

So now we are in Munich walking and eating our way through...

I may not come back home.

Berlin

It seems to have become a tradition for Derrick and I to spend the first hour or more in a new country walking in circles looking for the tourist information office. Trust me this is not an intended tradition.

After (finally) finding the tourist information office and buying a map we began our quest for coffee. Doing this after two weeks of five hours or less of sleep and no sleep on the plane ride here, not an ounce of coffee in our systems, and it being early on a Sunday morning...

The rest of the day was a lot easier. We met Connie at the subway station and she gave us a tour of the city while telling us some of the history, interesting facts and personal experiences of the Berlin.

(BTW, Dad, if you find some erroneous spelling errors, there is a fifty percent chance it is not me but the small differences in the key boards. Some slack is appreciated.)

The architecture here is unbelievable, both old and new. Even the apartment buildings are interesting. They form a ring around the block and a courtyard in the center, but then there is another ring with in the courtyard and maybe another
after that.

I unfortunately am not able to upload photos right now, but will later. Trying to describe all the different buildings, churches and monuments would take half a day there are so many styles spanning over different centuries and eras.

We went to the monument to the Jewish killed in the Holocaust. While it was very different than the A Bomb Memorial in Hiroshima it was just as dramatic. Over the area of about one block there are perfectly smooth concrete blocks placed so that they create a grid of narrow paths. Around the outside the blocks are ankle to knee high but quickly go to six feet and higher asyou move inwards. The effect is so that once inside you feel completely isolated, only being able to see down the narrow aisles in front and in back of you and from side to side. Every now and then someone passes through the aisle you are looking down and then quickly disappears, almost like a ghost. If you look up, the walls of the blocks almost look to be looming over you,about to to close together and cut off your view of the sky. Definitely an experience!

By the end of the day I had been awake for a total of 33 hours. Combine that with with two weeks of five hours of less of sleep and I was almost in tears with joy to be going to bed without setting an alarm...

Well sleep in I did! I slept in a whole half hour! Yep, after five and a half hours of sleep I was wide awake. :-/

I guess the bright side of this is that I was ready and out the door to explore Berlin again by 7am.

We went to Potsdam to look at four old Prussian palaces. The first one we came upon was with amazement. The second one had us shaking our heads. By the third one we could not help but say out loud, "you have got to be kidding me." and maybe a few expletives in there too. The best part
is we only viewed the outside of these palaces and their gardens. By garden I mean the area of a football field. I remind you that there were four. We ran out of day to view the insides of these "homes."

We are going to try and circle back to Berlin in order to go to museum or two or perhaps the interior of a palace or two. As for now we are off to Würzburg :-D

Oh. And yes, the food and beer is awesome!

Day 1

Day 1:

Slept 5 hours, woke up, showered, dressed, hopped in a car, hopped on a plane, sat on a plane.

Thus ends day 1. :)

Break on through to the other side

The oddest thing has happened. The last couple of weeks I was so stressed that I became completely overwhelmed, but just yesterday I got so overwhelmed that I think I broke. Somewhere in between moving, preparing for a trip overseas, applying for school, work and my Mother, I simply cracked. I mean to the point of laughing, well actually giggling (but in that mentally deranged sort of way) when I found out that the keys I had just handed off to the cat sitter an hour ago don't actually work.

Anyways, yeah. So I moved last weekend. Really that should have been a post in itself but, uh, I've been a bit busy. It was fun driving a 16 foot truck through half of Seattle though. (No, I did not kill or maim anything or anyone.) I have only unpacked what I need for hygiene purposes and not getting arrested for indecent exposure. The rest went into the closet or is in boxes in the kitchen. Hmmm, actually maybe I should try and find the boxes with all the food in it...

Ah, whatever.

I am taking off to Germany, Prague and Vienna this Saturday. I am taking only a backpack like normal but have not even started packing. (Note: when you are only bringing a school-sized backpack pre-packing and planning are highly recommended, all other situations I normally pack an hour before leaving.) In fact I am hoping to God that something I need is not in one of those boxes in the kitchen or closet. He he, cross your fingers for me.

In order to prepare for being gone for two weeks I was going to train my co-worker, but she quit a month or so ago. She is going to come in for a couple hours each day while I am gone but instead of having tons of time to train her I have had an hour each day for 8 days. I have also been working 9 to 10 hours each day the past couple of weeks, which normally is not a problem... except when you are trying to move and prepare for a trip, but whatever, it's a job.

Speaking of jobs and moving on, I am applying for college... again, yeah, I know. I really should finish this time because it is becoming more and more of a bitch to get all those transcripts together (the more there are) and test scores out of the archives (the older they get). So I guess again, cross your fingers for me.

Oh, and then there is my mother...

She does this every time I am about to go traveling - she gets worried but won't say she is worried. She calls me two to three times a day with a question about something, or can I help her with this, what do I know about such-and-such... You get the point. This in itself can be a problem (read previous blog post) but when I am super busy, it really is NOT okay.

Ugh, lets change the subject.

Oh! And just on Tuesday I found a message sent to me back in May telling me my high school reunion is in November! Woohoo, right? Actually perhaps this is good timing? This way I am either too busy to actually care or perhaps will be so busy I will forget. ;-D


Oh, and the quitting smoking is... going.

Fucking whatever. I am going to go get my sixth cup of coffee now (only 4 to 5 hours of sleep each night for almost two weeks does catch up to you), finish up work (working late again), go home and pack for Germany (finally), WITH A BEER AND A FAT SMILE ON MY FACE. :-p

Because after all, I am heading off to the land of beer, can't start letting myself get rusty all of a sudden. Actually, fuck work, I am heading to a bar and starting things right. :D



Coming up next: Did Skick make it to Germany alive?

Quiznos Bitch

Every year my family meets up in Mammoth Lakes in CA. We have been doing this since I was a ball of mush floating around in embryonic fluid. It used to be we all jumped in the car and drove for eight hours together (and oddly no one was ever killed), then once I moved to Santa Barbara I took a Greyhound for 10 hours to get out there and after I got my car I drove for 6 hours in the middle of the night (my car would overheat trying to tackle the incline). Now living in Seattle I have to fly out to Reno and then drive down from there for three hours. No big deal, right?

Wrong! I can't stand flying to Reno.

There is always a group that is already drunk before getting on the plane and they only get worse. The majority of the rest of the plane proceeds to get piss drunk on the way there so that by the last half hour no iPod earphones in the world can tune out their screeching and wailing.

Landing in Reno is always bumpy and windy and very very nerve racking and nauseating. I know this is not actually Reno's fault, but the only planes that fly there from Seattle are those little 30 seat propeller planes, so you can imagine how the wind tosses and turns them every which way. Add this to the drunk crowd within the plane of which half are hooting and hollering because they think the idea that we might crash sounds fun and the other half is trying to not puke.

As soon as you exit the plane half the passengers run squealing to the first slot machine they see, which oddly enough abound just along the corridors of the airport. Hmmmm. This trip I even saw a chauffeur holding up his sign with a last name on it in one hand while hitting the button on a slot machine with the other.

On the way out is no better. Now the plane is filled with people still hung over, grumpy they did not win "their" jackpot and just starting to fully realize how much money they just "spent" (lost). A fight between a couple or two is mandatory, at least one group of "friends" needs to be "discussing" (fighting) about something one of them did while drunk, and one or two people need to switch their seats because they do not want to sit next to the person they came with. Oh yeah, loads of fun. One piece of advice: do not agree to switch seats with anyone. You will be subjected to a complete "unbiased" version of what so and so did and why it was so wrong and how they have never been like that before but what they did was so wrong that it is unforgivable.

Anyways, that is that. But this trip I was lucky enough to also meet the most stupid and bitchiest Quiznos employee this side of the Mississippi. Words can not best describe her complete lack of brain cells and complete disdain for life so I will simply give you the dialogue that took place.



Me: Looking up at the list of "specialty subs" they have listed.

Quiznos girl: "Are you ready to order?"

Me: "Hi. Is it possible to just get a roast beef sandwich?"

Quiznos girl: "The sirloin steak sub."

Me: Look up at the "sirloin steak sub" and read that it has marinated roast beef, grilled onions and mushrooms and melted cheddar cheese. "No. I really just want a plain roast beef sandwich."

Quiznos girl: Cocking her head a giving out a loud sigh. "That IS our roast beef sandwich."

Me: "Oh. Well I just want roast beef with lettuce, tomato, mustard…"

Quiznos girl: Cuts me off by saying, "Do you want regular mustard or spicy?"

Me: "Regular."

Quiznos girl: "We don't have regular mustard. We only have it in the little packages over there." Points to the stand with the napkins, cup lids, etc.

Me: "Oooookaaaaay. Then I will just put the mustard on myself later."

Quiznos girl: Pulls out the bread and a little bag with roast beef in it and barks, "Do you want sauce on that?"

Me: "No. I am going to put mustard on it."

Quiznos girl: "Do you want your onions and mushrooms grilled?"

Me: "Noooooooo. I don't want onions or mushrooms. I just want a plain roast beef sandwich."

Quiznos girl: Getting really annoyed at this point. "I heard that, but you have to tell me what you DO want on your sandwich."

Me: "Lettuce, tomatoes, pickles…"

Quiznos girl: Completely exasperated now. "We DON'T HAVE pickles"

Me: "Look, all I want is a plain roast beef sandwich. Is that possible?"

Quiznos girl: Rolls her eyes, because how on God's green earth could I be so stupid to have asked not only for plain mustard and then pickles, but then to ask if she could make a plain roast beef sandwich when it is sooooo obvious that, "We are not like the other Quiznos. We only make the specialty subs." Gives me look that says 'duh'.

Me: Lean over the counter, look her right in the eye and very condescendingly say, "You know what, how about I make this easy for you? I'll have the chicken." And walk away down to the register.

The glare she gave me was priceless and a few minutes later when she walked over and tossed my sandwich down on the counter and growled, "Here you go ma'am" as if it tortured her soul to have to act politely to me, I was for a brief moment no longer in the cesspool of rotting lives and dreams, but lifted to heaven. If only briefly but oh so sweet of a moment.

Let me help you with that asterisk

This post is meant for those who have an opinion of Barry Bonds and his HR record who know little about baseball and/or Barry yet have decided to vocalize their opinion of him.


Barry Bonds:
757 HRs (1st)
1983 RBIs
514 SBs
2916 Hits
.608 SLG
7 MVPs (1st)
14 All-Star Games
8 Gold Gloves
12 Silver Sluggers
73 HR in a single season (1st)
.863 SLG in a single season (1st)
.609 OBP in a single season (1st)
13 consecutive seasons w/ 30+ HRs (tied for 1st)
400/400 only player
500/500 only player
40/40 one of four

3 Grand Juries
0 Indictments


If you do not even know half of what that all means - don't take this personally - but shut the hell up about what you think of Barry Bonds.

Barry Bonds has been playing in MLB since 1986; that is 22 seasons (including this one). He is 43 years old, has been playing on the Giants for 15 seasons, 7 seasons with Pittsburgh before that. If you only just heard about him in 2003 when BALCO got raided, again - shut the hell up.

If all you know about Barry Bonds is what you read in 'Game of Shadows,' chew on this. The grand jury testimonies included in that book were illegally leaked by Ellerman, who is serving jail time for that. So you read parts of a grand jury testimony that were first picked out by a disbarred lawyer serving time and then by two journalists on a hunt for a story. There are countless other pages of testimony and evidence that remain sealed and unpublicized. Aka: the evidence that makes multiple grand juries not indict him or the boring stuff that does not make a good story.

If you think 'Game of Shadows' is all about Barry Bonds then you obviously only read the excerpts in Sports Illustrated. That was some great marketing by the way, put Barry on the cover of the book because people recognize him and then as a pre-release teaser publish a section of the book that is about him.

If you think they are trying to indict Barry Bonds for steroid use - you get your news from Fox Noise and it is in your best interest that you never mention this to me in person. They want to indict him for perjury, not steroid use. He has already admitted to using topical steroids, what is under investigation is whether he was telling the truth when he said he did not know they were steroids.

If you think the only thing keeping Barry from being indicted is that Anderson won't testify you are so dumb you are now dead to me. First, Anderson can not testify against any of the players he worked with, it was part of his plea deal. That means he talks and his plea deal is off and he can be tried for dealing illegal drugs, so you can bet your little asterisks he has no problem sitting in jail for the length of a grand jury. It is not because of some sort of loyalty or pay off, it is a simple comparison of maybe 1 year in jail to 10 or so. Second, if the case against Barry, with all the 200 sources and 1000 documents used just to write 'Game of Shadows', hinges on the testimony of one drug dealer, well then this whole thing has been one big expensive show.

That's right, while the sports networks and writers have been happily racking in the profits of high ratings and the money spent on magazines and book sales, we have also been paying for this investigation. Woo hoo right? Have you enjoyed the show?

Moving on...

Most of those awards you see listed above, he received prior to 2000 (that would be the year Anderson became his trainer). And do you think he racked up all those HRs, Hits, RBIs and stolen bases just in this decade? No. He was and has been an awesome player long before the media frenzy. In 1993, his first season with the Giants (or the skinny pictures for the rest of you), he had 46 HRs, 123 RBIs, 29 SBs, a .336 AVG, .458 OBP and .677 SLG!

It is mostly because of Barry Bonds that the Giants still remain in SF, made it through the mid-90s and reemerged as a contending team with a brand new baseball park.

It is mostly because Barry Bonds was on the Giants that most people did not know of him even though he was considered one of, if not the best, active player at the time (I am still talking about the 90's by the way).

I grew up watching Barry Bonds. I remember when he was really the only thing to watch at a game. I remember a home run he hit in the bottom of the 9th to win the game just before the July 4th fireworks show at Candlestick. I remember the first time I saw him up close. I remember trying to decide whether to get left field bleacher seats so we could heckle Henderson or right field so we might catch a ball during batting practice. All of these memories were before he even hit his 500th home run.

So as I am sure you meant no offense by your loudly proclaimed proclamation based on little knowledge and blind faith following of mainstream media, you will then understand that I too mean no offense when I tell you to shove your asterisk where the sun don't shine and shut the hell up.

Summer Halftime Report

Good afternoon everyone and welcome to this edition of....

The Summer Halftime Report!

Let's check in with Surtur Supreme for the latest updates on Entertainment, Sports, Fashion and who the hell knows.

Thank you Surtur for that exciting update.

Well thats all the time we have for today folks. Be sure to tune in next time for all the latest and greatest happenings this summer and beyond. Thank you and good night.

(cue closing music and credits) :)



Okay, so I kind of cheated, but I am just too tired to come up with anything on my own right now. In between family, friends, a birthday, traveling, looking for an apartment, quiting smoking and some how losing one of my toe nails (not kidding there) I am a bit tired.

I love summer. :D

Crossing the border

I never really had a problem crossing the Mexico/USA border back in California. Hey, I look like a gringa, act like a gringa, and when I speak Spanish, boy do I sound like a gringa too. So yeah, no problems crossing the border even when piss drunk. There have even been a couple of times while on a greyhound, at the checkpoint just north of San Diego, they did not even wake me up to ask to see my ID.

The Canadian border? Not so much luck. Here are a few things I have learned NOT to do while going across the Canadian/USA border:

1) If you did not understand what the officer just said, do not repeat what you think they just said.
2) Do not try and crack jokes.
3) Do not ask if it is appropriate for them to ask you the question they just asked.
4) Do not laugh in the officer's face when they ask a question you think is funny or absurd.
5) Do not go into detail about the type of hand cuffs used that one time you were arrested.
And finally,
6) While in the border crossing lobby, do not grab your friend's passport and waive it about and exclaim that the reason you were stopped is because they look like a thug in their picture.

Well actually number 6 isn't really a no-no for crossing the border, just a polite thing not to do.


A little bit more on the different occasions where I picked up these gems of knowledge:

1) If the Canadian officer asks if you have any turpentine on you, it is quite possible that they are actually saying tobacco.
2) If the officer asks which one of you in the car is (insert female name) and you are the only female in the car, he/she is not stupid, this is the normal protocol and they do not like it when you point to a male in the car.
3) If the officer asks if you went to Canada to get married, they are simply trying to take you off guard and you asking them if that is an appropriate question makes them suspicious. I am still unsure if they are okay or not with comments such as, "Oh, is that illegal now too?"
4) If the officer asks if you have $10,000 in US or Canadian cash on you, this again is standard protocol. They don't appreciate people leaning out the car and bursting into laughter in their face.
5) If you are pulled out of line and have to go into the big ominous building for more questioning, small talk is not advised. This is mainly due to the fact that the only topics being raised, and hence small talk can stem from are: your previous illegal actions, if you have anything illegal in your car, and any illegal activity that you could do while in the country.
6) Well like I said, it is not really a no-no and was actually quite funny, but you might want to check your friends' passport pictures prior to trying to cross the border. Either way it could bring you a few laughs.


The picture is of one of the road blocks I saw while waiting in line to cross back into the USA. Nuff said.

Mystery Solved

Last weekend I went down to SF for a Giants/Dodgers series. Three whole days of baseball, greasy food, beer, screaming and yelling, and more baseball. :-D

Well we lost all three games. :-(

But I got to meet up with Sirena, Martin, Derrick, Staci, and Daniel. :-D

All in all it was a GREAT weekend, and to top it all off a mystery in my life that has had me perplexed for years was solved!


So to back up a little bit, for as long as I can remember my Mom has had a jade bracelet on her left wrist. This of course could be because she got it just prior to me being conceived but that is besides the point. The point is that I remember that bracelet even when I was really young, you know, when the most important thing in life was convincing your parents to let you have five instead of four Oreo cookies for dessert.

Either way, when I turned 21 my Mom got me a jade bracelet. Some olive oil, a quick 1-2-3, and bam, that bad boy was on there. The sides of my hand was bruised for a while but thankfully you only have to go through that process once.

Well here is my mystery. A while ago I noticed what looked like pencil marks on my bracelet. That is really the best way to describe them, but they would not rub or scratch off and when you felt the area where they were the bracelet was completely smooth.

Now I was positive they were not there when I originally got the bracelet. I could not say exactly when they appeared, but there they were, pencil marks on my jade bracelet that were not scratched into the stone but would not come off either. I was pretty pissed and really confused.


So back to this last weekend. I was at dinner with all of the above mentioned friends when Sirena asked about my bracelet. In talking about it I mention these strange markings and showed them to her. Well lo and behold Sirena knew exactly what they were!

"That is metal. That is what metal looks like when it strikes stone, and yeah it will feel smooth and not scratch off."

At first I was totally shocked and happy that I finally knew what these marks were but then it dawned on me HOW they had gotten there. I was so excited that without really thinking or taking into consideration that we were in a small restaurant of about 10 tables, ours being the one in the middle, I yelled out:

"Oh! Oh! I know where they came from! They are from my nipple piercing! They are always clinking together when I am in the shower!"


So the mystery is now solved and there are now a handful of people out there who know of a girl who has a problem with her nipple piercing clinking against something while she is in the shower.

I think it was an educational experience for all. :)

Mallrats. :-p

Dread going to the mall? Can't stand the cramped and confined aisles, dodging strollers and runaway small children, the constant and deafening drone of the masses, or the glaring florescent lights that give everyone that waxy look?

Solution: Bring a friend who hates it more than you and has vocal cords that they are not afraid to use.


Need an example?

Derrick


If you do not have a Derrick handy, below is an example of what type of behavior to look for in picking your Derrick alternative...

As we entered the parking lot, Derrick took a deep breath and exhaled, "Okay, I am steeling myself." Of course then after having to squeeze through two SUVs creeping through the parking lot in order to get into a spot before a truck that was trying to swoop in, he grumbles, "God, I am not even in the mall yet and I am already surrounded by assholes."

As we enter through the mall doors, walking out of them is a tired looking woman with three kids, each with bright party hats on, a balloon in one hand and a happy meal in the other. Derrick barks, "Sheesh, they don't give you any transition time do they? It is just like BAM, you are in the fucking mall."


Once you have a friend who fits this description, ready your shopping list, comfortable shoes, credit cards, and bring your friend along. You are sure to have intermittent moments of gut wrenching laughter that will undoubtedly break up the day and prevent your brain from turning to mush.


Want proof?

Below are examples of some of the entertainment you might experience. Of course results vary depending on mall and friend.

In the lingerie section, Derrick picks up some underwear, holds it in front of his face, squints and asks, "Is this two pairs stuck together?"
"No, that is one pair."
Derrick then shouts, "Wow! These are like overalls?"

A little bit later, over near the bras, Derrick is again squinting, but this time at the signs.
"Full coverage?"
Derrick pauses and the woman just behind him who is also looking at the same section raises her head.
Derrick then yells, "Oh, full coverage! Like body armor. Full protection from the elements... liiiike MEN!"
He looks up at me and smiles. The lady to his right and just behind him, glares.


And that was just one department. After a couple of hours, while weaving through the racks of clothes, you could be entertained by an improv dialog between Derrick's balls and his brain. And after four hours you will get to experience growled comments like, "I am bleeding capitalism."

All in all it makes the time fly by faster, prevents you from concocting ideas of mass murder, and most importantly... keeps the sales people away. :-D

Am I morbidly sick?

So I just wrote up what they call a holographic will tonight while making dinner.

My Mom has been freaking out due to recent deaths of younger people in my family and friend's lives, and one of the things she has centered on is not knowing my wishes or anyone being able to make decisions for me if I am lying drooling in a hospital bed. So she has been wanting me to write out a will of sorts.

So I wrote the draft while cooking (chicken with garlic, parsley and celery, cooked in white wine with pasta on the side) and wrote the final draft while eating. Except now I am noticing a grease spot on it so maybe another final draft is needed. Oops.

Most of it was pretty simple: What I want done with my body, my stuff, the cats, etc. The difficult part was what to do if no one knows if I am dead.

Sure, if the doctors say I am a goner and just taking up bed space that is easy, but what if they are not sure. Well then, really the only person who knows if they should pull the plugs or not is me, but I can't really say what to do, can I?

So what do you put down?
Well, if more than half the doctors say I am gone...
If you ask me and I don't squeeze your hand...
Give me a week... no actually I am a heavy sleeper, give me two weeks...

What a crappy thing to have to write down someone's name and say, 'Well, it is up to you. You make the call. I hope you make the right one.'


A few random thoughts:

Does including a joke or two in your will make it less legit in the eyes of the law? And why do they say, "in the eyes of the law"? Isn't that lady blindfolded?

Dinner came out really well. The chicken came out near perfect and I have now found that you can make boxed white cheddar macaroni and cheese taste awesome by adding the celery and spices cooked in white wine instead of the milk. Oh, but it does stain wills.

And lastly, I put in there that there has to be a party. You all are invited of course.

I could never have kids.

I already have a laundry list of reasons as to why I do not want to have kids: first of all... ouch, but also I saw what I did to my Mom and I know karma would give me a girl. But now I have another reason, I could not handle it if anything went wrong.

My cat, Sebastian, is my baby of the bunch. Not favorite, but the baby. Saturday night I got out of the shower and walked into my bedroom and there on the floor were a couple wet spots. I went and got a paper towel to clean them up thinking that they were just bile from one of them trying to cough up a hairball (two long-haired cats in the house means this is not unusual) when I notice a wet spot on the bed too. When I went over to this one it distinctly smelled like pee.

I jumped up and walked into the hallway where Sebastian was sitting. I asked him if he had peed on the bed. (Yes I talk to them.) That is when he got up and walked over to the cat liter, and right where he had been sitting was a wet spot. But the wet spot looked weird. I crouched down and realized that not only was it a very very dark color, it was also gel-like!

All the while I am doing this; Sebastian is sitting in the litter box looking like he is trying to pee and like he is in pain. What do I do at this moment? Panic.

With just a towel on my head I ran out to the kitchen where Sebastian is. That is when I notice more spots on the kitchen floor near the liter box. Then another a little further away, then another… There were some on his cat tree, some on the living room floor, kitchen floor, under the table, etc. I am now running all over the apartment with nothing on but a towel on my head, looking at the floor and every time I find another spot making some sort of unintelligible gasping squeal. I so hope my neighbors were not home.

I then run to my cell phone and call Derrick.

Derrick: “Hi”
Me: “Derrick, I need you here NOW!”
Derrick: “What’s wrong? What’s going on?”
Me: Repeated stuttering for about 30 seconds “I – I – I”
Derrick: “I will be right over.”
Click.

This is when I realize I am standing naked in my kitchen so I run to the bedroom and throw on a pair of pants and shirt that is lying on my floor (meaning what I slept in last night).

Derrick came over and I frantically told him everything I had found. He called the emergency vet because I still had a bit of a stuttering problem, and they told him to bring Sebastian in IMMEDIATELY.

And that is when I started to really panic…



Sebastian is fine. He had to spend the weekend at the emergency vet, and we transferred him to his normal vet this morning. He will have to be on a prescription diet from now on to prevent this from happening again, but beyond that it looks like there was no permanent damage.

Perhaps once this is really all over I will write about how it went at the emergency vet and the procedure, but for now this is getting long and I still have a few more chances to have a breakdown of all my sensibility.

This was fun to do.

It seems pretty right on. Well except it says I am a bit high-brow...

Fuck That.

Read my VisualDNA™ Get your own VisualDNA™

It is so odd how at the same time a picture can seem such an empty and 2 dimensional thing that can not be held or hugged, but can also be that dim light that reminds us of happy times when everything else seems so dark...

St. Patrick's Day

A few shots from St. Patrick's Day. :-D
And this was only halfway through the night...
I have no idea what Derrick is doing.
Look at the loving cousins.
We look so happy and sober... he he.
An artistic shot. ;-)
Again, I have no idea what Derrick is doing.
Five drunk girls trying to not fall over while walking on slippery pavement.

Perspective

Every now and then life throws a cold pail of water on you that puts things into painful perspective.

When my apartment was broken into, the fact that Sebastian was missing completely outweighed my missing computer. The absolute relief and tearful joy when he was found could not be diminished by what 'stuff' had been stolen.

Life every now and then is put into perfectly clear perspective.

And then it starts to get fuzzy again. Grey areas or special circumstances come up. All things become debatable. Value, worth, hierarchies are assessed and formed. The clarity fades and that ice cold water that drenched us dries.

Would it be better to remain in a fuzzy world, not ever having a clear view of yourself, life and the world around you, but also not experience the painful events that create that ice cold pail of water?


I use to think that a person who knew what they wanted in life was very lucky, but it is actually a person who knows what they want and gets it that is lucky.

So is it worse to know what you want and not be able to get it than it is to never know what you want?


In the end, does that really matter either? When it is all said and done, for each of us, we will all have regrets. What we did do, what we didn't do, etc, but that means we lived a life with choices to make, experiences to navigate, paths to pick and follow, and with that is of course going to come some regret. So would it be better to have had less choices to make and less or no regret?


I think I have pretty solid answers to all of these questions, but ask me again in a week or two when the gray and haze start to set in again.

Tech Support

My Mom calls about every other week with one question or another about her computer, which thankfully is a Mac so most things are super easy to walk her through over the phone. But I am now beginning to realize that I may have been going about things totally wrong.

You see, instead of just answering her questions, I have been explaining things to her, showing her shortcuts, showing her cool things she can do, and putting applications on her computer for her to play with... That was a bad idea! I now have a Mom who knows what she can do with her computer but does not know how to do it.

The most recent scenario was this last week: My Mom decided she wanted to put together a slide show for my Grandma’s 85th birthday.

Tuesday:
First phone call: My Mom calls and tells me the scanner is not working.
(It was working, it just did not “look” like it was because the pictures were not going into iPhoto or her desktop, they were going into her Pictures file.)
Second phone call: The scanner is going too slow, can’t she put a bunch of pictures on at the same time.
(I had to explain that with out actually being there for this one I could not help her, and no, this was not something I could fix by remote access.)

Wednesday:
My Mom calls and tells me that she is having problems getting the pictures to work in iPhoto.
(I ask if she has imported them into iPhoto.)
Yes, she has but when she opens them none of the iPhoto controls are there.
(Hmmm. I ask if she is viewing them in Preview.)
She says no, but when I ask what it says in the top left corner of her screen she yells, "oh no I am only previewing the picture." :-/
(So we run through the process of importing the pictures into iPhoto. Nope, error, it says that the files are already in the Library. Turns out that she had gone into her Pictures folder and dragged the files into her iPhoto library folder, so after going through and deleting those, we then go through the process of importing the pictures again.)

Thursday:
First phone call: My Mom calls; she has forgotten how to create a slide show.
(Won’t bore you with the details, but we went through the process of creating a slide show.)
Second phone call: My Mom calls; does she need to make a play list for the slide show or can she just pick out the songs?
(Make a play list)

Friday:
My Mom calls and tells me that she cannot get pictures that people have e-mailed her into iPhoto.
(The pictures had been e-mailed to her old hotmail account so I just had her forward - no, forward Mom, not reply - forward them to her gmail account. I wish everyone in the family would stop using her hotmail address but they tell me that, “once you put an address in there, you cannot change it.” :-/ It is a lot easier to just have her forward her e-mails to gmail then to try to explain editing contact information to 10 plus family members.)

Saturday:
Unsettling quiet for the day before the 85th birthday party.

In between here was a normal Saturday night out, getting drunk, getting home late, and completely forgetting about daylight savings.

Sunday morning:
A frantic voice mail from my Mom telling me that everything is wrong and that “there is a major crisis over here!”
(Turns out that she only wanted fragments of the songs she had picked and had gone into iTunes and had put in the start and end times but this does not carry over to iPhoto. Figuring that out was the first hour. When my Mom is frantic she starts pressing buttons, not listening to me, and does not describe what she is looking at very well. I think 15 minutes alone was spent on her telling me over and over again that the “music icon was not there, nothing was,” but once I got her to describe what was there she tells me there is a drop down menu with Adjust, Settings and Music listed. :-/ I had her e-mail the songs to me, Derrick then got to work clipping them down to just the portion she wanted, then e-mailed them back to her, walked her through importing them, and putting them in the play list.)
My Mom calls; it is not working. They are still the whole song, and she needs to leave in 15 minutes!
(Turns out they did work, just with the first song she wanted a minute and a half of it and after 30 seconds she stopped the music and called.)
My Mom then sighs in relief, tells me that this has been “fun” and that she will call me when she gets back home to tell me how it goes.
(Did I mention that I am not going to this party? I don’t get to see this creation or eat any of the homemade food. :-/ )


I now realize that it was not a good idea to put iLife on my Mom's computer when she still says FoxFire instead of FireFox and every time she wants to IM me she says she is going to Fire me. Oh man, the instant messaging! Now that was a bad idea also!

Unanswered questions

I read a really good piece about Anna Nicole Smith's death today.

Link

It made me start thinking about what questions would I leave behind.

Now most people at the time of their death will not have even one-third the chaotic mess as Anna Nicole. Maybe a needed paternity test, but not three to four prospective want-to-be fathers (note the want and not could-be fathers). Perhaps a lingering legal case, but not a billion dollar one with a class action suit on the side. But really, what questions will be raised and left for speculation when you die?

At the time of your death your family, all of your different friends, your co-workers, your neighbors, and those acquaintances you have that feel obligated, will all converge together to mourn your death.

What memories or words will be said about you that will shock people? Baffle some? Awe others? Or have people wishing they had known when you were alive?

What secrets will come out? What lies will be found out? What parts of your life will come to light?

Who will be left angered by you? Who will be left feeling like they did not know you? Who will be left now hating you? Who will be left wishing they had known you better?

Who will be left shaking and scratching their heads, trying to put the pieces together, but unable to, because there are so many unanswered questions?

But even if you could, could you answer them? Could you explain the gaps between your lives? Could you explain to your family the person your friends know and vice-a-versa?

Is that a bad thing? I am not sure, but I think that is the most important question, because if it isn't, then the uneasy feelings we have about what will come out at our death is just a waste of time, but if it is a bad thing then it should be cause to change, and now. I don't think I could change, but that is not an answer to my question, maybe just a hope as to the answer.

Sorry for my list of questions without answers.

Piercing Malfunction

It is almost certainly assured that if you indulge in body piercing beyond the usual ear lobe then you are going to experience situations that are humorous, embarrassing, or just down right gross. I mean come on, you have a foreign object stabbed through your skin, fatty tissue, cartilage, and/or other anatomical types of things I don't know the name of, your body is not going to treat it the same as it does all the other appendages and attachments you were born with. Also you are going to have to get up close and personal with your now decorated body part, sometimes while that part of you is not too happy with what you just did to it, and depending on the type of or placement of your chosen piercing(s) that in itself can be a story worth telling (or never tell).

That said, obviously I have had these types of situations arise, and over the years with each new piercing they have grown in frequency.

There was the time the ball of my tongue ring popped out and bounced across the table while ordering from a cute waitress. There was the other time that I swallowed my tongue ring and for some reason mentally felt like I could not correctly maneuver my tongue and therefore could not talk so had to hitch a ride and get a new one ASAP (thank you Derrick). Just getting my tongue pierced was comical, have you ever had a waitress start slurring and drooling while she is trying over and over again to ask you if you want a "side salad or coleslaw" with your sandwich?

There was the time in Lake Havasu that due to a little run in with the law I had to take my nipple piercing out just two weeks after getting it. There was the time that I went in to change the ball on my nipple piercing and upon lifting up my shirt the guy yelled, "Oh my God" in disgust and I screamed back, "Well they are all I got." Turns out he was gawking at the gauge (or size) of my bar, not the size of my chest.

Well, my clit piercing decided it was time to join in yesterday. Everything started out so normal, I woke up, went to work, had my first cup of coffee, that first cup of coffee made its way through my system, I went to the bathroom. Except this time when I dropped my pants a little black ball went bouncing across the stall floor and I thought to myself, "How did Derrick's earring get into my pants?"

Now that may seem an odd or absurd thought but let me first explain that I had only had one cup of coffee, it was only 8am, and I am not of sound body and mind until my second cup of coffee around 8:30. Secondly I had just gotten back from visiting Raf in Portland with Derrick and while there he lost one of the black balls on his cartilage piercing and we were unable to find it. So can you see why that thought popped into my mind?

Anyways, I reached over and picked up the black ball and realized that it was not the right type of ball for a cartilage piercing; it was for a dumbbell piercing. Now I want you all to imagine a person standing in a bathroom stall with their pants around their ankles, holding up a small black ball and then all of a sudden bending over to stare at their crotch, and pop back up with a "oh shit" look on their face. Yeah. That was me.

Here is where I will stop in the detailed descriptions, but I want you to know that it is not the easiest thing in the word to try and screw a little black ball back onto a little silver bar, when the before mentioned bar and other ball that is still attached to the other end is resting on a very very sensitive area of the female anatomy. Oh and did I forget to mention that all the while I am still in the bathroom stall at work?

The rest of my morning in the office was very... interesting.

Hot Damn.

Can you believe that Vin Diesel is 39?!?

Ya know, I don't really care. :)

Bush on 60 Minutes

Let me just get this out of the way first: this "thing" that resembles a member of the species homo sapiens is a moron. I mean that literally; a comatose person has more brain wave patterns and more connected synapses than he does. A person clinically diagnosed with multiple personality disorder is less wishy-washy than he is. Furthermore, an elementary school student could formulate better sentences than this idiot. It is more than just painful to listen to him - it is depressing and embarrassing when I remember that he is the President. Actually listening, trying to decipher his gibberish is both infuriating and scary at the same time. He is void of emotion and logical thought and, worst of all, he has no memory of what he himself has said, claimed or vowed at any time in the past, even up to mere days before.

So, on to his interview.

Bush: "I can remember thinking that it's gonna take a monumental effort to keep the country's attention on this war because it's an interesting dilemma for the president. On the one hand, you want them to understand we're at war. On the other hand, you want people to go about their daily lives. In other words, people can't be looking over their shoulder and seeing the next terrorist attack."

Hello, what the hell is a daily-updated color-coded terror alert where the higher levels are bright orange and red? Yes, people will not forget about the "war" but did he actually think people would also be able to go about their daily lives, terror free? Excuse me, but bullshit. That is bullshit with out pulling in the fact that the "terror level" has been increased (oh I am sorry, updated) right around important times that Bush has needed public support. Oh, and what about asking people to "look out" on their fellow neighbors? Yeah, that really instills a sense of comfort. Oh oops, I also forgot the TV ads with buildings blowing up, pictures from 9/11, Osama Bin Laden, and scripts reading that "they" are out to kill us. I feel so safe, almost like a babe in her mother's arms - don't you?

Bush: "And the point I make is that what happens in the Middle East matters to the homeland."

Just wanted to point out that the guy is still using the word "homeland". Do you think they will go with the tried and true yellow stars and pink triangles, or do you think they will update them with more posh "logos"?

Bush: "Envision a world in which Saddam Hussein was rushing for a nuclear weapon to compete against Iran."

Dude, I thought we already went through this, you were either wrong or were lying when you first claimed this. I hate bad reruns, especially when I disliked the original. I could go on about this one but the main reason for my rant is the next quote.

Bush: "And the reason I brought up the mistakes is, one, that's the job of the commander-in-chief, and, two, I don't want people blaming our military. We got a bunch of good military people out there doing what we've asked them to do. And the temptation is gonna find scapegoats. Well, if the people want a scapegoat, they got one right here in me 'cause it's my decisions."

You @#$%ing @#$hole. Just two days ago you (finally) made a haphazard flippant half-apology, the first of your presidency. That apology was for mistakes that may have been made by others, but you being the gracious, empathetic, caring leader that you are, were ready and willing to take the blame. (And the next day you claimed that you, as the commander in chief, are in charge and do not need to listen to the Congress or the people for your decisions, but whatever right?) You now are portraying yourself as a scapegoat!

You think you are a scapegoat to the pain, the loss and sorrow of the families that have had to bury their family members? You think you are a scapegoat to the misery, the death, the uncertainty and the emotional strain of the people you have sent to war? You think you are a scapegoat to the destruction, the constant bombing and the unknown death toll of Iragi people?

I say it again, you @#$ing @#$hole!

Regarding the video of Sadam Husein's hanging...
PELLEY: I'm curious. How did you see the video?
BUSH: Internet.
PELLEY: You called it up on the internet and watched it?

OMG, Bush used "the internets"!!!
I know, cheap shot, but I am not in a very diplomatic mood right now.

Just had to get a bit of anger and venom out after reading the transcript of that interview. I am sure that if I had actually watched it and had to hear these quotes (and others, I actually only covered the first half but this was starting to get a bit long) in his fake down-home "aren't I just like you" tone, all the while giving that sideways glance and lip curl like a bad impersonation of a spaghetti western cowboy, I would have been too busy puking in the toilet to speak, let alone to type anything.

By the way, I am posting this on my blog because if I have not been marked on some secret (but oh so important for national security) list yet, I want and need to, because at least then when our children are reading about the horrors of this time I can have some proof that I was against it, because obviously voting does not mean #$%& now.