If you’re going to do laundry, DO IT. Don’t leave it to mildew while I wait for you to come back & move your shit around so I can do my own laundry. Pay attention! Wash takes 35 – 40 minutes; dry takes an hour. Git! Goin’!
10 more minutes and I’m stealing your Mighty Mouse underwear.
I had a fabulous dream last night where two corporate headhunters asked me how best to approach Saint Aardvark about a very high level position working with computers. They thought he was the perfect mix of knowledge and personability but they were concerned about one possible stumbling block: his appearance. They wondered what the most effective and tactful way would be to make over SA so that he could blend in as a Chief of Computing. They were thinking maybe a suit, or at least a shirt with a collar; maybe a beard trim; perhaps a new pair of glasses. Like Queer Eye except there was no dance music or strange camera angles. Oh, and no annoying team of know-it-all Pier One & Armani-flogging boys either.
Without a second’s pause, I explained that his makeover would need to directly impact the availability and acceptance of open source computing in the world. If you tell him, I said, that by growing his hair a little and wearing a tie once a week he will be in a position to convince the masses to turn from their Windows machines and embrace Linux, he will be at the beauty salon in a heartbeat.
They thanked me profusely and suggested we all go to Boston Pizza to seal the deal. I agreed.
I’ve got a serious case of the Icks from the phrase, ‘warm regards.’ It positively steams, as a phrase. I am put in mind of:
‘My dog deposited warm regards on Dave’s lawn,’
or
‘Marissa’s diaper contained many of her warm regards.’
You know?
I get the feeling people think just ‘regards’ is too informal so they add a l’il something extra. Warm is just the wrong word. I don’t know why. Sometimes language just pokes you in the no-no spot.
I was struck tonight by the fact that I am not very old. Yet I am not so young that I get dressed up in a metallic dress and sandals and a glittery handbag and ride the bus downtown to go dancing on a wednesday night.
There were two men ahead of me in line at the cold beer and wine store (that was So Bright! Brighter than any liquor store could ever be! Everything was yellow and fluorescent and first-week-of-school exciting!) who smelled strongly of lengthy preparations for a night out. They chose a 6-pack of Sleeman and while they waited to pay, discussed someone’s wedding and how it was just going to be a total party.
‘Yeah, like, the ceremony?’
‘Yeah?’
‘It’s gonna be, like, really fast. And then Boom – pictures and Boom – then it’s the party.’
‘That’s the way to do it.’
‘Yeah, total party.’
When I got to the counter, the man behind it looked surprised to see me. He was a skilled customer servician, in that he thought he knew what each of his customers wanted to hear. The men before me got, ‘You guys have a great night! Right on!’ and the girls before them got, ‘All right you ladies stay out of trouble!’ (he was rewarded with giggles for this and I think the security guard gave him a high five) but I got,
‘That’s a nice wine. Have you tried it?’
Oh, so fucking polite. He might as well have called me ma’am. Ma’ams do not buy things at the cold beer and wine! Madams, yes. Madams and desperate people and people who are already drunk buy things at the cold beer and wine. Otherwise, they would go to the liquor store.
So to destroy his assumption that I was in any way ma’am-like, I replied, ‘No, but it’s white and it’s cold. It’ll do.’
I was aiming for a scary, reckless feel. A “This woman is not to be coddled and complimented on her wine choice. She is to be feared! She owns pits of unstoppable power!” feel. But he assumed the wrong kind of scary – not dangerous but alarming – and immediately reclassified me from a pleasant matron to a depressed single who was probably going to go home and watch Sex in the City reruns, get drunk and talk herself out of calling her ex-boyfriend about a bazillion times.
‘Aha,’ he said, avoiding my eyes and offering me a justification (good customer servician, yes), ‘that kind of day, is it?’
And I agreed because otherwise who would I be? I would be an even more pathetic level of alcoholic, the kind who drinks for no reason. That’s not cool! That’s almost less cool than being ma’am or 30-single.
While he was waiting for my receipt to print, he turned to the stereo and switched off the live Van Halen. He glanced at me when he did it. I wanted to say something like, ‘I totally love Van Halen, woooh! Panama!’ but I knew I wouldn’t be able to pull it off. I’d end up the cougary alcoholic matron trying to relive her gentle youth at the cold beer and wine with the counter boy with the many piercings, like so many counter boys with many piercings gone before.
So I took my wine and came home.
It is very tasty.
“Oh, any monkey with a pot of strong coffee can complete a PhD.”
