5/2/06

List three celebrities you’d like to knock upside the head: 1) Chloe Sevigny. The MOST smackable face in all of Hollywood – although I will admit that I’m continuing to watch Big Love, which means I can apparently get past the smackability factor. 2) Bill Paxton. The second most smackable face in all of Hollywood – seeing the scene in Twister where he yells “We’re going innnnnnnnnn!” makes me grind my teeth. Someone in Hollywood’s got a wicked sense of humor, putting Chloe Sevigny and Bill Paxton in the same show. See above about how I continue to watch it, though. 3) Brad Pitt/ Angelina Jolie/ Tom Cruise/ Katie Holmes. I’m SO FUCKING TIRED of seeing their faces on the covers of magazines. SO TIRED. So they’re having babies. BIG FUCKING WHOOP. List three material possessions you’d hate to have to live without: 1) Books. 2) My digital camera. 3) BobPod. I wouldn’t be walking outside every day if I didn’t have podcasts to look forward to, and they just wouldn’t be the same without my cute little BobPod to play ’em for me.

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I forgot to mention that Fred and I went to the Space and Rocket Center and watched a couple of Imax movies on Saturday. I’ve never seen an Imax movie before, and the first one we watched – Fighter Pilot: Operation Red Flag – was really cool, even though it made me dizzy a few times in the beginning, because I really felt like I was on a plane, flying, and I had to close my eyes so I’d stop the dizziness. (Side note: When Fred and I got home, I said “That lead instructor, Rob Novotny, reminded me a lot of James Patrick Stuart.” Fred gave me A Look and shook his head, saying “I can’t believe you remembered his NAME.” “Well,” I said. “They kept showing his name tag, and it was bigger than your head. Of COURSE I noticed it.” Who wouldn’t remember the name of a cute, clean-cut military guy, fer godssakes? He was adorable, and he could probably come up with 20 ways to kill me using a ballpoint pen in ten seconds flat. I find that SEK-SAY.) In summation, Imax movies = very cool. Except for when they’re 20+ years old, like the second movie we saw, Hail Columbia! I liked the first one much better; I recommend it.
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You Are a Peacemaker Soul
You strive to please others and compromise anyway you can.
War or conflict bothers you, and you would do anything to keep the peace.
You are a good mediator and a true negotiator.
Sometimes you do too much, trying so hard to make people happy. While you keep the peace, you tend to be secretly judgmental.
You lose respect for people who don’t like to both give and take.
On the flip side, you’ve got a great sense of humor and wit.
You’re always diplomatic and able to give good advice. Souls you are most compatible with: Warrior Soul, Hunter Soul and Visionary Soul
I gotta say, I think this one hit the spot. I will almost always bend over backwards to avoid a confrontation, and conflicts bother the shit out of me (unless, of course, it’s a conflict between two people I barely know, and then I find it FASCINATING). If it’s a conflict between me and someone else, it stresses me OUT. I like my life to be conflict-free, thank you.
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My parents are going to be here in a little less than three weeks. They were originally going to drive from Maine, but my father’s still not at 100% from having his gallbladder out – plus he’s started having MIGRAINES – and he found a coupon he could use for money off airline tickets, so they’re going to fly down. They’re arriving on the 20th, staying a few days, driving down to Tuscaloosa to meet with my father’s siblings and finish planning the big family reunion, then the reunion takes place on the 27th and then I guess there’s breakfast on the 28th, and then they’ll be back up here through the 3rd of June. I’ve already decided to drag my mother to the Unclaimed Baggage Center in Scottsboro, not that I guess there’ll be all that much dragging involved; I’m sure she’d be happy to check it out. Are you kidding? Shopping? She’s THERE. Anyway, I really need to start cleaning the house, because it desperately needs it, and I do try to not give her an excuse to go home and bitch about what a pigstye I live in, but if I do a massive cleaning now, I’ll just have to do it again the two days before they get here, so what’s the point? I should just do NO cleaning between now and two days before they arrive, and then do it all in one fell swoop. Hmm. Wonder if I could convince Fred to hire a professional cleaning service before the day they get here?
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Speaking of flying and vacations and such, I finally signed onto Expedia Friday night to start getting plane tickets for the spud, who, this summer, will be visiting her grandparents in California, her father and his wife in Rhode Island, and then my parents. (You’re asking me, “What about her job?”, to which I respond that I told her she could talk to the manager and ask if she could have five weeks off, because she wants to spend time with her ailing grandfather (not my father, her paternal grandfather), and if they couldn’t give her five weeks off, she’d understand and give her two weeks notice. After all, all she’s working there for is to get experience, and she’ll have two full months of experience before she leaves, which will (I hope) help her get a job when she gets back. We’ll see. I don’t know, is it irresponsible of me to let her work a job for just a couple of months, then quit to travel? This is probably going to be the last year she’s going to be able to take so much time off in the summer, because next summer’s going to be the summer before she starts college, and she’s going to need to be working as much as she can. And it’s not like she’s planning on (I HOPE) making a career in the fast food industry. I wouldn’t wish that on anyone.) So anyway, I got her tickets to fly to California, then from there to Rhode Island, and then I looked to see what was available for when I wanted to go to Maine, and I opened another window, signed on to Expedia from that window, and tried to match up her return flight from Maine to Alabama with MY return flight from Maine to Alabama, only when I tried to match up our return flights, hers ended up costing more than $600. And I tried it six ways to Sunday, and just couldn’t figure out a way to make it work that didn’t cost an arm and a leg. We were pretty tied down to having her come back on a certain day, because she has to pick up her schedule and pay fees and all that happy crap for school. Finally, I realized that – she being 17 – I could have her come back on Sunday, and then I could fly back on Monday. That way, I didn’t have to worry about matching up our return flights, I could get her the cheapest flight, and since I was staying an extra day, it actually cost me about $50 less. I’m glad I got it figured out, but MAN what a pain in the ass. I rue the day Independence Air went under.
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It cracks me up, how incensed Sugarbutt gets when Tommy gets the upper hand. Especially when Sugarbutt STARTED IT. He swipes… he misses! Tommy The Evil Hellbeast prepares to rip out Sugarbutt’s throat. OH how they love the feather toy.
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Previously 2005: …and then she smacks the shit out of him, and he closes his eyes and smacks blindly at her, never ever ever landing a single smack on the portly Poo. 2004: No entry. 2003: It appears that the mother of Crunchy, Chewy, and Cheesy had a hard-core craving for the Crunchy Gordita during her pregnancies, and thus (possibly when she wasn’t smoking crack with one hand and downing the hard liquor with the other, one assumes) named her children after it. 2002: We sure are some dish-using motherfuckers around here. 2001: As if the little bastard had said “Oh, can’t poo on Mom’s newspaper, don’t want to get it all nasty!” 2000: (Every entry won’t be a laundry list of my day, I promise. This not-working thing is still new to me!)]]>

14 thoughts on “5/2/06”

  1. I don’t think the spud’s leaving would be a big deal for her getting a job later on, especially if she leaves a good impression with her boss now, and since it’s not like she’s leaving because she secretly ate the french fries when she thought no one was looking or waited on customers while picking her nose.

  2. I don’t think it’s a bad thing at all. She’s a kid, and if she quits because she wants to spend the summer with her family, that seems perfectly reasonable. After all, a lot of college kids, especially the ones who live in dorms, quit their part-time jobs over the summer so they can go home, and it doesn’t ruin their future.

  3. We went through the same thing with our daughter her last summer of “freedom” to take a trip to France with her school. I say let the spud quit the job if they won’t let her take the 5 weeks off. These are just minimum wage jobs. The places are used to these kids changing around all the time. They take it in stride and just grab the next app to hire another kid.
    I just love seeing all your kitty pictures. The ones today reminded me of a cat fight our two got into in January. That vet bill cost us $1100 to repair the ripped ear. Actually, it had to be resewed twice because she ripped it out again in a fight. No more fighting allowed in our household. Well, at least while we’re watching. Who knows what goes on in the middle of the night! heh

  4. I don’t want to sound snobby or imply that you’re a snob. But, frankly, unless the Spud has to work her way through college because you can’t help her out in addition to whatever student aid ahe gets, those two months should be plenty.
    It sounds like you guys have too much money for her to qualify for work-study, so most of the on-campus food service jobs will likely be out. Off-campus food service jobs (waitressing, etc.) tend to be hard as hell to get. Two months of some kind of work experience is probably enough to get her considered for non-work study jobs like the library. And a few more months of volunteer experience would serve even better.
    Now if it’s a matter of her having to save up to pay for something – like a car – then that’s a different story.
    Just my take. I never worked a real job; my grades and volunteer work were enough to land me a library job, which in turn was enough to land me a fellowship. This was a public university.

  5. Oh, the kitties. So my husband and I have a new game we play with the cats. We like to call it, “Cat Hold’em” because we’re incredibly clever that way. Anyway, here’s how to play: Each person picks a cat and holds it in their arms. If the cat is squirmy, it’s even better. Sloowwwly move the cats towards each other until they’re face to face. Whoever’s cat gets bopped in the face first, loses. HOURS OF FUN.
    Note: it helps to have a good selection of cats to chose from – thus when you issue a challenge you can say “CHOOSE YOUR WEAPON” and both lunge for the crankiest animal.

  6. I don’t see anything wrong with the Spud quitting her job to spend the summer with family. It’s not like you guys are dirt poor and she needs every dollar she can scrape together. I worked all the way through college and hated it so we’ve already started a college fund for our 4 year old so that he can afford to go to school (I hate to think what tuition will be in 14 years!) and not have to worry about working every second he’s not in school.

  7. It would be odd if they didn’t let her take time off to go on a trip. I quit my job in high school for 6 months cause I just didn’t feel like working anymore and they rehired me immediately when I went back. Places like that are usually hurting for employees, so I wouldn’t worry about that.

  8. I agree with Mary. I would quit jobs for the summer to travel with my parents and could always go back. Summers spent seeing family will be great memories for her later on in life.

  9. I think it’s great that she’s going to have a chance to visit family again this summer. At this point in her life, jobs will come and go fairly easily. All too soon she’ll be out on her own and won’t have the flexibility she does now. Enjoying these last summer vacations is important!

  10. I forgot to say yesterday how much I adore the new logo!!! Your readers rock!

  11. IMAX movies usually make me want to puke. The kids would always end up going to one every year on a field trip when they were younger. I’d get to listen and nap cause you always had to go on the field trips… :o)

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