Monday, July 25, 2011

U Can't See Me

I have known for a long time that I have a superpower.  I wish I had more control over it, but unfortunately it only occurs periodically: and that’s when I’m in my car.  You see, when I’m in my car, I’m invisible. I know this is true, because if people could see me, then they wouldn’t be doing/saying/wearing what they are while I’m in my car.
For instance, late Friday afternoon I took Kitty to Blockbuster because she just had to have a DVD.  Yes I know she’s the only person who still goes to the actual store, but I digress.  Anyhoo, I opted to stay in the air-conditioned car because it was still almost 90 degrees and I had the air on.  As I’m sitting there, idly watching the world go by, this car pulled in ahead of me.  I watched as a couple got out, and great googly-moogly: let me tell you what I saw.  A woman got out of the driver side.  She was wearing a tank top and a pair of shorts.  Neither article of clothing would have been bad, if she had either a) realized she had big boobs; b) realized said boobs needed to be in a bra; c) worn underwear; and d) realized said missing underwear would have aided in keeping said knit shorts out of her butt.  Fortunately, the man she was with fared better than she did.  Although you could tell that the waistband of his shorts was under his belly, at least it appeared that he was wearing underwear and surprisingly didn’t have moobs.
Even though I wasn’t too happy with what I saw, it’s not the worst thing I’ve seen while sitting invisibly in a vehicle.  One time I was on the highway in a truck, which sat very high up.  I looked out the window and saw a man – let’s just say he was REALLY enjoying his afternoon commute ALONE.  Seriously???  Both hands on the wheel buddy!  And I mean the STEERING wheel!
When we lived at 441, I had grown to hate going into the house, because there was such a bad vibe about that place.  So I would sit in the car in the parking area in the back and read, or just collect my thoughts before sucking it up to go inside.  As I was sitting there one day, I noticed the next door neighbor and a new “friend” christening his new motorcycle.  It’s not like you can roll down the window and yell “Get a room!” because then they know you’re there and will end up not liking you.  The best bet was for me to just avert my eyes and try to hum loudly to drown out any other sounds emanating from between the bushes.  And those sounds were NOT melodic!
I also got to see a few drug sales go down while in my Taurus.  After all, there were at least 2 drug dealers also living at 441 during any given time.  6 apartments in that place and during my entire tenancy there were always drug dealers living there that the landlord didn’t do anything about.  Or I’d see “Mr. Swastika”, as I dubbed one of the neighbors due to the fact he never wore a shirt and had a big swastika tattoo on his chest, sitting out in the back with his cronies, smoking pot and drinking beer.  He’s the same guy that had a sign on his door that read, “Both me and my wife are on probation, so no alcohol or drugs are allowed inside.”  Guess that’s why he was outside!
But I wish I had Harry Potter’s cloak of invisibility so I could really be invisible sometimes though.  What a rush that would be!  So instead of seeing random people that look like they’re from the people of Wal-Mart website, I can be selective with what I want to see.  Wow, I can think of lots of places, and people, I'd like to see while wearing that cloak.  Hmm, I’ll have to work on that J
 

Thursday, July 14, 2011

Chew On This

Her Majesty Ms. Kitty doesn’t drive.  She says she’s afraid of getting in an accident, which is smart on her part.  This means that I run errands for her.  I usually don’t mind because I can stop by the grocery store on my way home from work.  But one night it’s like 9:00, and she decides that she wants Lucky Charms cereal.  Wait: not wants, NEEDS Lucky Charms.  For dessert.  Or a bedtime snack.  Or something else totally unrelated to breakfast.  And when Kitty sets her mind on something, you’d better take care of it or prepare to be harassed beyond human endurance!  Like she’s harassing me now.  About her manuscript.  That I’m supposed to be editing.  But instead I'm writing this blog entry…
Anyhoo, as I was on my way to my local Hannaford muttering under my breath about ungrateful children with a sense of entitlement, I started wondering: whose idea was it to put marshmallows in cereal?  Regardless of whom it was let me tell you: it was a bad idea.  The reasons should be obvious.  First of all, any cereal that would have marshmallows in it already has too much sugar.  Second, the marshmallows taste fake and they squeak between your teeth. That’s just annoying.  They’re generally hard, like they’re stale already, and even if the milk does soften them up a bit, they just turn slimy and still squeak: plus now your milk is a funky color like you had a bowl of Kaboom cereal.  That may be fun for kids; but not for adults that are kids at heart and like a sweetened cereal every now and again instead of bran flakes with flaxseed!
While I’m thinking of marshmallows, why is it that when you make your own rice krispies treats they’re wonderfully gooey and delicious, but when you buy them pre-packaged they’re hard and cut up your mouth?  Is the secret ingredient tiny shards of razor blades?  Sometimes I don’t have the time or the inclination to make them so I’ll buy a couple; but it’s like inviting cuts and wounds into your mouth.   Maybe that’s the price of being lazy.  And that kind of dims the enjoyment of eating the marshmallow treat, or anything else for the next day or two.
Don’t get me wrong because I love marshmallows, but what’s the real premise behind marshmallow peeps?  Marshmallows covered with granulated sugar? I like the animal shapes but can’t stand that sugar crunching between my teeth.  But then again, maybe as an adult I shouldn’t be eating them.  I have several friends that still like them, which defies explanation; and they say they taste better stale.  Mmm, hardened marshmallow with crunchy sugar: what a treat!  Who can resist a piece of heaven like that?
You know what I think?  If someone is so hot for sugar, which is basically all that peeps are, pixy Stix would be the way to go.  I shouldn’t admit this but I absolutely love them, much to the chagrin of my friends.  Colored sugar: yum!  And before you ask: the reason why I don’t mind pixy Stix sugar as opposed to marshmallow peep sugar is because I don’t chew the pixy Stix; I just let them dissolve in my mouth for a delightfully legal (sugar) buzz.  Delicious!
And if you pour pixy Stix into your hand it looks like kool-aid, which I enjoy as a refreshing summertime drink.  However, just because they look like Kool-Aid, you can’t add pixy Stix to water for a refreshing beverage.  First you wouldn’t have enough pixy Stix sugar to make a sweetened beverage.  Second, it would be more expensive to buy a hundred pixy Stix for a pitcher of beverage, when you can buy a packet of kool-aid for 25 cents and sweeten to your own taste; or an entire canister for less than $3.00.  In these tough economic times, we need to err on the side of monetary caution.
You may be wondering:  what’s the difference between kool-aid and the poor-man’s imitation stuff, besides the name and price?   Nothing that I can taste.  Sweet colored water is sweet colored water, in my book.  I shouldn’t be drinking it but sometimes my inner child still wins!  Plus, you can freeze some for ice cubes for double the fun!
But why is it that ice cubes, when they melt, don’t make your glass overflow?  I’m sure Her Majesty Ms. Kitty, or Queen Huff ‘N Puff as her sister calls her, could answer that one, but I don’t want her to know that there’s another science question her mother isn’t smart enough to answer.
Getting back to my shopping trip:  when I returned home from Hannaford, Kitty was in her bedroom.  I put the cereal on the table and went to tell her it was there.  I opened her room door, and she was asleep!  Are you kidding me?  I made that trip to Hannaford for nothing…
Defeated, or outsmarted, depending on how you look at it, I went into the kitchen, got out the milk and a bowl, and poured myself some Lucky Charms.  As I sat there chewing and stewing and squeaking I couldn’t help wondering: why would anyone want cereal with marshmallows in it?

Tuesday, July 12, 2011

Welcome to my Mood

If I had a boat I would sail into
the Sea of Forgetfulness.
When I’m midway across I’ll drop anchor
and wait for sunset.
As the last vestiges of color sink below
the horizon.
I’ll release my memories of you,
one by one,
into the onyx depths.
Each smile, each kiss, each touch
will disappear as though Merlin’s
Wand was brandished in air.
Each word, broken promise and betrayal
is erased as the night closes in
on me, aboard my vessel.
When the last ripple is stilled I
wait for dawn to be sure
nothing rises to the surface.
Then instead of going back
I sail forward:
away from the Sea of Forgetfulness,
away from who I was with you
and into the blank slate of tomorrow.

Friday, July 8, 2011

Soothing the Savage Beasts

This might sound odd (have you met me?) but every night before bed and every morning before I leave for work I turn the living room TV on for the pets.  I just think that they need a little noise or something to keep them company during the night.  Sure they should be sleeping but still: I believe that they like it.  After all, I like having the radio on all night so I wake up to sound.  Why shouldn’t they?  And if we are all leaving for the day, this way they still have human sounds or something to keep them company.
Of course there has to be an issue with this, because depending on who is the last one to bed or the last one out the door in the morning, the channel can be changed by someone else.  We didn’t used to have this problem, because we’d set the TV on “Soundscapes”, soothing New-Age music and nature sounds.  What cat or little dog wouldn’t like that?
But after a while, when Kitty started putting it on that channel all the time when she was home: well, this really started to grate on my nerves.  It made me feel lazy and sleepy.  So then I’d put it on the Easy Listening channel, which was light and mild but wouldn’t put the pets into a catatonic state.
This worked for a while, but then Brie decided the pets needed something to perk them up.  So that meant: the hip-hop channel!  No worries about any sleeping during this!  She wouldn’t do it at night, but when she’d leave the house so the pets could “cat daddy”, apparently.  But this drove Kitty nuts so she’d scowl and put it back on Soundscapes.
I really love old-school jazz, like Cannonball Adderly, John Coltrane, Art Tatum and Billy Strayhorn.  On the weekends I get to listen to a lot of this jazz, so I started leaving the TV on the Real Jazz station so the pets could listen to what I’d be listening to in my room.  The girls respected this so I figured I had won; then Sunday mornings before church I’d turn to the Daystar channel so the pets could have some religion.  (Lord knows they need Jesus.)  Or if I was doing “church at home”, I’d turn the radio on to the Moody Bible station so we could listen live to the services at the Moody Bible Church in Chicago.  I really think they like when I do that because I’ll sit in the living room with them, and they’d gather around (Pumpkin with the place of honor in my lap, of course) so we could enjoy what Erwin Lutzer was preaching about.  The bonus was that the girls would usually still be in bed so it was just me and my furry friends.
Both girls do not like if I leave the TV on TNT in the morning when “Charmed” is on.  I just love that show, or at least the first 2 seasons when Shannon Doherty was up there.  I still watch the reruns if I’m home.  But they don’t think the pets should watch a show that has witches in it, so as soon as someone else gets up they immediately turn it.
This morning I happened to turn to Classic VH1.  One of my favorite old videos, “Dude Looks Like a Lady” was on. I just love Aerosmith!  Especially Joe Perry: the best thighs in rock!  After that they showed KISS’s classic “Rock ‘N Roll All Night” and hey: who doesn’t still drool over Paul Stanley??  So that was the channel I left it on for the pets to enjoy.  Sure it’s unusual for videos nowadays to actually be playing on a music channel, so I thought it would be good for the pets to see and enjoy the same videos I enjoyed in the 80’s and early 90s J.
Now that I think of it, I wonder why we go to so much trouble to make sure the pets have human sounds.  They sleep upstairs anyway!  It’s just another example of how we try to humanize our pets.  As if they don’t already think they’re people…