Things To Which I Am Morally Opposed, episode V

Fox News perpetuating a culture of Islamophobia

Lady bike parts being pink. What is this?! Just because I have lady bits sitting on my saddle instead of manly bits means my saddle has to have PINK on it?

Stovetop burners so gross that the pilot won't light.

My nice stainless steel cookware not being clean.

Ubiquitous credit card offers.

Being angry.

PEOPLE WHO LIE TO ME.

People who don't understand their own religion, let alone any real attempt to understand anyone else's religion or spiritual lifestyle.

Let me mention again how much I hate EVERYONE WHO PERPETUATES THE CULTURE OF ISLAMOPHOBIA.

Feminist Hulk say FUCK THAT NOISE.

Today is Thursday

and I am cold.

I understand it is the case that I have not blogged in a long time. It is now October. It gets cold at night and often during the day it is not all that warm.

One of our biggest squashes is moldy?? Not rotting, moldy on the surface. I discovered this with no time to deal with it today, so I will deal with it tomorrow.

I have been listening to wayyyy too much pop music, but I did get to see the New Pornographers again on Sunday!

I was pretty disappointed by 30 Rock's live show last week, but I found the west coast show much more entertaining. Kelsey Grammer is guest on tonight's show!

I have almost finished my November budget! My finances are in pretty decent order, as it turns out.

For how short my attention span is, I can't stand flipping channels.

I keep having dreams that I wake up and my hair is long again.

Now that it is cold, Rhett is cranky again, and Zoe is cuddly except she keeps trying to escape.

Nine days until the Rally to Restore Sanity!

These are things that I know.

Hello Little Sproutlets!

DC WASA came and fixed our water leak, and dug up the front yard. I got an email from a Roommate NorCal while I was in NYC last Friday about how the Squash Monster was okay. I came home that night and looked at the squash all dug up and hanging out on the dirt and wondered what Roommate NorCal had been smoking. Squash Monster pretty much not okay.

Then on Monday, DC WASA came back and brought us "topsoil" and so I skipped ballet class and all other previous obligations and attempted some hack gardening. I was too lazy to go get mosquito spray at Rite Aid (which is two blocks away, so maybe I was just too broke), and it was about 90 degrees, and remember that our lawn had been a pond and we have the lovely shelter of a ginormo Squash Monster. The next day I started to count my bites, got to 15, realized I was halfway down my first leg, and gave up. Anyway I dove into the plant and cut off the parts that were very clearly dead and rearranged the bits that looked like they might be okay still. I dug a hole and put the okra plant in the ground with a tomato cage around it, and took off all the dead leaves which was all of them, and harvested the 6 inch okra dudes, because no one in my house pays attention to stuff like that. Then I dug some weirdly placed trenches and poured in some flower seeds just to see what would happen.

Because we don't have a giant water leak any more, OR a spigot at the front of our house, I have now assumed the responsibility of massive watering duty. This means filling up a huuuge bucket at the spigot in the back of our house and then hauling it through the house to the front, where then I fill up the watering can and water twice a day.

Here is the status on plants at our house.

Squash Monster: ALIVE! Flowers blooming! I think I saw one fruit today that might still be growing, but I would be super surprised if we got any fruits. It's still nice to know that it is alive.

Okra: Almost certainly dead. I'm gonna give it until I go home next week to rehabilitate, and if it's not alive and doing things by then, that is okay. No one knows how to harvest okras on time anyway.

Flowers: sproutingggggg! I do not particularly care if we get real flowers or not, I just want to have plants in the yard because right now we have dirt and a sickly squash and a dead okra. I have sproutlets, and they are alive.

Soon my bike will have yellow housings for brake and derailleur cables, and it will look so fly. I have been going on and on about yellow housings for so long that the bike shop [personified] just got sick of me talking about it and ordered them. when that happens my bike will be looking fly like this but I have yellow water bottle cages (and a black saddle) so even fly-er than that one.

and I'm more Atari

I know this has been making its rounds on the internet, and I'm a bit late in furthering its journey. I have been totally addicted to this song for a week. It is ridiculously ridiculously good and more music must be made like it. but not too much 'cause then I'd get bored. NO NEVER.

Squashtopus

I am not very good at posting because my August got insane crazy, as my Augusts seem to trend!

Here is a funny thing.

Once upon a time in June, we thought our squash plant was going to die.


Now it is trying to eat the house. And the neighbors' house. and the dead tree, and the fence, and the everything ever.

Yes, that is one single plant. A SINGLE PLANT. ONE. JUST ONE SQUASH PLANT. it's gone all hydroponic on our asses.

I'm gonna debauch the hell out of this blog post

Last night:


I went to a barbecue at the house of a coworker of my roommates, where there was brick, and a fire escape, and pretty lights. We decided it didn't look like New York, but a movie about New York instead. It was delicious and fun and I smell like mesquite still, which is funny now but was probably really obnoxious at all the bars last night.

Oh, except I'm kind of sad because I just put clean sheets on my bed and now they smell like barbecue smoke. I can't be too upset at myself, though, because even if the thought to shower had crossed my mind when I got home last night, I wouldn't have been able to accomplish becoming clean, as I was far too focused on the cricket that I was absolutely convinced was under my bed. The cricket! It was there, I swear to David DeJesus.


I have had excellent times in Augusts in the past few years. This marks the second year in a row that Maeg has called me from a wedding the night before she moves back to DC and conveys all the ridiculousness that has happened so far at the nuptial party for one of her one hundred fifty three thousand three hundred and forty cousins. This year there was fountain swimming, none by Maeg unfortunately.

oh, wait, sorry, that's not how many cousins Maeg has, that's how much water we got billed for by DC WASA as a result of this little baby:



That's right, the spring, the source of life, the reason for our $1505.66 water bill and 153,340 gallons of water sitting in our front yard. For some perspective, China reported its giant oil spill as being 400,000 gallons. (Also, holy smack what is with all the oil spills. Sorry, Earth, I think we're beginning to get the picture...) (and, couldn't we have had one more dollar's worth of water in that 33 day billing cycle, so that our bill, which we received on Friday, August 13, was $1506.66?!? That would have been too much)

Yesterday one roommate and I were standing on the platform of the NY Ave metro station, watching some dudes bike past us on the MBT , and one guy yelled something to the effect of "Hey stop being such lazy asses! Get a bike!" which I thought was situationally hilarious and also infuriating. Someone came up with the idea that back before that idiot started to ride, someone yelled that at him once, and so now he thinks he's the shit and wanted to pay it forward to try and make himself look cool. How many combined hours in the past six weeks have I spent on my bike or at the bike shop or drinking with the guys who work at the bike shop? Hey entitled douchebag, I'm taking the fucking metro so that I won't bike drunk, because biking drunk is FUCKING STUPID.
And, let's talk about how biking is a policy of choice and not everyone can afford a $1500 Bianchi and the time to leisurely ride the MBT, because some of us have $1500 water bills to pay, and cooler plans than you for Saturday night.

Things For Which I Am Eternally Grateful, episode III

(this appears to have gotten lost in the drafts during my 6-week hiatus from blogging, so... I publish now, yes?)



Babies that say my name

Squash blossoms

Amanda Peet's character in Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip

When the bus tracker doesn't lie!!

A clean bedroom

Mrs. Meyer's Clean Day dryer sheets in Basil scent

New bike pedals! They are the SHIT. and I have these toe clips, which are also real rad. (As a side note, it appears that I am paying too much for bike parts. Though I'm getting discounts on stuff now and don't have to pay shipping.)

GUHHH MY BIKE MY BIKE I LOVE MY BIKE

The B-12 Shot

So, that math alarm clock. Let me just tell you how I couldn't multiply 9 and 7 at 7:45am, and as a result, I am now fully showered, breakfasted, dressed, and have started laundry and watched 15 minutes of a Studio 60 episode. Let me also tell you about how I have no commitments today, I have stuff to do but no time frame, so I am up at early o'clock on my day off! And all because 9 times 7 is not 56.

Here is a funny picture:


It is Rhett and Sawyer hunting a squirrel on the neighbor's porch, and Sawyer's ear is pressed against the screen because man she wants that squirrel so hard.

Here is another one that almost embodies our house perfectly:


Cats 'n' bikes. If there was a mango and a glass of whiskey on the windowsill, and if you could see the giant squash plant out front, you would have all the essential elements of our house in one picture.

A Man Among Boys

It's a great day. Not only did I wake up because of an awesome storm, I woke up with enough time to get coffee before work! which was great. Also, I got great news from one of my baby mamas. Stellina was in a great mood because she had slept for 13 hours. Also, our air conditioning is working again, which is great. And I just downloaded this great new app that makes you do math before the alarm will turn off, so it's supposed to be real great for awful awful wake-up times, which is every wake-up time ever.

I would go to the bike shop and order new pedals because I HATE the pedals I have now, they keep stabbing me and I keep almost dying trying to get them upright because they don't have tabs. I ran into a curb during such an attempt yesterday, fell, and skinned my ankle? that's possible? So now all the skin on a patch of my right ankle is gone and I have 7 (seven!) gashes on my calves, and yeah I look mega hardxcore but, really, I'd rather have better pedals, ones without stabby bits even though the stabby bits are good for when it is raining. But I don't have any money! So that is not a thing I will do today. Which is a great day!

This blog is about my injuries more than I would like it to be.

Thursday Morning Wake-Up

Fifteen minutes before my alarm was set to buzz and ring and generally suck, this is what woke me up:
Except that at 7:30, that delightful purple bit was ever so slightly to the west, meaning directly over my house. There were more lightnings with immediate thunder (so, the impression that lightning was RIGHT on top of us, and I think the science says that means the strikes were within a mile, and I did see one bolt hit a building at Gallaudet) than I had ever witnessed, the rain was pouring in the window through the screen and onto my laundry, and my cats were sitting by the window, watching the storm.
Though, I think that might have been because there was not only water pouring in the window but also somewhat cool air, and seeing as how our house's air conditioning broke yesterday, along with all the outlets in one of the bedrooms (??), I think they were just trying to get a little bit of relief.

Maximum Strength Cortizone and I are like *this*

Things I did not accomplish this weekend:
1. Cleaning my room
2. Laundry
3. Purchasing eggs at farmers market, they were out before 9:20am! Boooo

Things I did accomplish this weekend:
1. Showered Captain Bananio with kisses this afternoon when I ran into him and his daddy at the store
2. Harvested squash blossoms
3. Singlehandedly provided enough blood to increase the world's mosquito population threefold
4. Started watching Doctor Who!
5. Started a project
6. Cooked and consumed stuffed fried squash blossoms oh hey oh hey oh HEY.

It is Zannah's 8th birthday!!! She is sooooo big

This was my Friday:

This is my cat sleeping at night:

And this was my dinner this evening!:
and theennnn we sopped up all the extra browned butter with bread that was fresh from the oven. This house was a good choice.

In re: sharks

I sat in the front of the first metro car tonight while I was headed home, and watched out the front window, which is usually too reflective to see through. Going on the track between stations was like some perverse Disneyland ride - perverse because Disneyland has a higher safety record than WMATA. it did make me want to go on Indiana Jones 15 times in a row.

Happy Shark Week!

Speaking of shark, my new platform pedals that I switched to on my bike are made of shark. The stabby bits on them keep biting me and then I am awkwardly bleeding and people are constantly informing me that I am bleeding and asking if I am okay.

HEYOOOO CALIFORNIA
now, onto appeals, and all the way up to the Supreme Court, so we can get this ridiculous one man-one woman bullshit kicked out of the country. No mans! No womans! All people!

Step on it, Velma, step on it!

A very successful final Screen on the Green for 2010. I miss it already!

This lady photobombed my picture of the sunset through the trees by smiling and looking cute.


Bonnie and Clyde sure do get real dead at the end of that film. Real real dead.

Silver Jenny Dollar

I went to Annapolis today! It was kind of like this:


Maybe tomorrow I will upload the thrilling video I took of some boats and stuff.

On saving money, and the word "also"

I gained cred today in two major areas!

First I got in a bike accident, which really doesn't count, because traffic was pretty much stopped, and I only just clipped the door of the Comcast truck with my brake lever, but I did fall to the ground! And I do have a bruise from it! And the Comcast dude was freaked out!

And then I cursed everyone in Georgetown for sucking, because everyone in Georgetown sucks.

EXCEPT JAVIER AT THE MAC STORE.

Because he helped me learn how to install a hard drive! He was all "No no, don't do it here, it'll cost you so much, let me write down everything you need to know and then go to Best Buy and get the stuff." So, I bought Snow Leopard for $30, and then went to Best Buy in Tenley and bought a 320 gig hard drive for $60, and ALSO 2 gigs of RAM for $80. Because of math, I spent $170, but if I hadn't done the RAM it would have been $90, which is awesomer than the $250 at the store, which only would have been a 160 gig hard drive and no RAM upgrade! And then I went home and did it myself, with a quick pause for a trip to ACE to buy a tiny Torx screwdriver. I was kind of freaked out and my hands were shaking but I did it with all the tiny screws and everything. Then I just reformatted and installed Snow Leopard and then I took an old copy of Microsoft Office 2004 from BB's family, and now MY COMPUTER IS AWESOME.

The one thing I am sad about as a result of doing it myself is that I was looking forward to the Mac store cleaning my computer, which they always do no matter what problem they are fixing. Now I have a dirty but fast computer, for cheap! So I am not really sad.

Also while I was at the bike shop I ordered toe clips, and then while I was at Best Buy I bought Serenity, Fever Pitch, and Whip It, and then while I was at the hardware store I bought that torx screwdriver and shower cleaner, so I did end up spending a bunch of money today, but it wasn't all in the direction I thought I would spend it when I woke up this morning!

Oh also I did all these things while wearing my Old 97s shirt, so I HAVE SO MUCH CRED LOOK GUYS AT ALL OF IT

ALSO IT IS ALMOST SHARK WEEK

SHAAAARK WEEEEEEK

Sea to shining sea each year

The other day I went on one of the most frustrating journeys of my life (biking to Georgetown at any time on a weekday is never worth doing again) to find out that I need a new hard drive in my laptop. So, that is a thing I'm doing tomorrow, so that I can trade $250 for 160 gigs.

Next to me on the counter is a shopping list that says:

Keg

Grill

Eli. parts

Roofer

order cleats

Partially because I need to pay for things like emergency hard drives all the time, partially because I've been freaking out about student loans (what do you mean my balance has gone from $13k to $16k?!), I am taking lots of extra hours of work. I skipped ballet tonight for the baby named Dave Jr. (he looks like a tiny version of my friend Dave). Tomorrow I skip enjoying the pleasant evening for the baby who shall be known only as BB. This sometimes stands for "Baby Beibz," because with his current hair situation he kind of looks like Justin Bieber, but mostly it stands for "Blorfy Baby," because his favorite pasttime is blorfing ALL OVER ME. All the time. Dave Jr. is a pretty pleasant baby, he's 18 months and the worst thing he does is refuse to sit down in the bath. BB is adorable and all that, but he's 9 months, weighs 28 pounds, has the aforementioned blorfing problem, and is really fussy, which is only exacerbated by the fact that his mom works from home and naturally comes every time he screams for longer than 30 seconds. It is fine! It is just hard work. what?! I have to work for my moneys?!?

Nothing is new and I am dying for something new!

And this is what we wanted, a place to settle down

It turns out that the bar next to the bike shop has an excellent happy hour, and if you sit outside and drink a gin & tonic while waiting to meet a high school friend for dinner, one of the bike shop dudes might recognize you and tell you that you should come to the shop for a beer.

Speaking of bike,


There you can see also my rad polkadotted helmet, and my new 24 oz. insulated water bottle that was on sale, and also my shiny new stem that makes me feel like I am sitting upright when I ride, even though if you look at my bike, you will see that I am still nowhere near upright, especially because I ride in the drops most of the time (better brake control with my tiny hands, necessary for city riding... you can see the dirty spot where my hand goes, yuck). Also, there is Sawyer. She has her eyes closed but she is modeling her fabulousness all the same.

Also, I love Natalie.

Happy Tuesday?

Some interesting use of second person in this post today!

Matt Lauer was shaking his head

Sometimes I forget how great Girlyman is, and then I smack myself in the head for wasting time listening to other, lesser music.

I am a border collie when it comes to listening to music. I listen to one artist / band over and over until I get sick of them, and then I go to another artist, and listen to that over and over, etc. This happens with Neko Case, the New Pornographers, Girlyman, Rhett Miller, the Old 97s, Michael Jackson, Glee, Chuckanut Drive, and sometimes Dar Williams too. (Side note, you should listen to all of these things, except Glee, omg Gleeeee it's so bad) Right now I'm taking a break from the NPs to have this song infiltrate my brain, or rather to listen to that song repeatedly and wonder how Girlyman infiltrated my brain. Also, that whole album.

OH ALSO one of the other ones that I cycle through is Lady Gaga. of course.

Anyway the point is I am not very good at mixing things up.

Um so yeah, this is an example of me trying to get any work done at all at the Eastern Market Starbucks and FAILING MISERABLY. it's so cold here and there is just so much free internet and so many amusing bougie white girls to watch and did you know that a dirty chai frap tastes just like gingerbread??

there is a girl here in a pink and white striped boatneck 3/4 length sleeved shirt, and also snakeskin gladiator sandals, and also high-waisted shorts that are navy blue with tan diamonds on them, and her pink shirt is tucked into her shorts, which is a thing I don't understand. It is maybe one of the weirdest fashion choices I have ever seen. Power to her for wearing sleeves in 8109283 degrees Celsius. Amusing white girls.

It is too hot to get work done at home, and everywhere else is too air-conditioned.

A roommate and I went on a bike ride yesterday and it was like 15 miles (or, at least, over 10, and I am rounding up because it was so hot) and I got a new stem on my bike, and it is so great and I never want to get off my bike but my butt hurts from riding and also I need a little bit of a break from being drenched in sweat.

Today is Stellina's birthday! She is two now. Later I will write about our trip to the bike shop last week, which was super fun and great.

THIS HAS BEEN A SUPER INFORMATIVE AND INTERESTING POST THANKS FOR READING GUYS

West Virginia to the north

People who are my sister will now be attacked by this image for a third time (first email, second Bookface), but it is too amazing to not share a lot:


Today was rainy, so Stellina and I couldn't go outside really, we have been having crazy crazy thunderstorms, so she attacked my bag, and put on my extra shirt (NatsTown) and socks (argyle), and then my shoes and bike helmet, and went through my wallet and dragged around my Timbuk2 a bit and generally impersonated me. The shirt is a unisex medium, so, huge on me, extra ginormous on her. The bottom of it dragged on the ground and the sleeves covered her hands all the way before I rolled them up a bit.

She turns 2 on Sunday. Already if you ask her how old she is, she says "Do! Do!" which seems to be the only number she knows. I got her a couple of books, one called Baby Giggles (the kid is absolutely obsessed with babies), and then Maisy Goes to Preschool (Stellina will be starting preschool in the fall, and I will miss her but I don't want her to be scared), and also Elmo's ABC Book (if you thought she loved babies, she loves Elmo even more, and also she will need to learn the alphabet soon).

Another really important thing that happened today was that I bought my plane ticket to go home for a bit in September. Now I need to make a comprehensive list of all the things I want to do in Portland and Seattle! It will come up very very quickly I know, and I am so excited but also I will be sad to be gone from here for so long. I will miss my cats and my bike and my kids and my city. Mid-September is a great time of year in DC.

I am having a problem with my bike. When I get on it I do not want to get off. I don't care where I go, I just want to ride around and look at stuff and get totally lost and just spend time going fast or going slow and swerving to avoid potholes and stopping at stop signs and running red lights (of course when it is safe to do so) and getting angry when people drive or park or walk in the bike lane, which I learned some things about today. I guess my bike continues to be an extended metaphor for my current place in life, though I don't think that metaphor is the correct literary device, please help.

The day before yesterday my roommate and I converted his bike to a single-speed after his rear derailleur broke to unfixable proportions (that is not a fixie pun, his bike is not a fixie), and then we decided to ride to Screen on the Green, which was much more fun than I expected it to be. Both the ride and the movie. Halfway through the sky opened up and it started to flood, complete with lightning right on top of us. Roommate was terrified of the lightning so he dropped his keys and phone and wallet in the middle of the ground and then just kind of ran in a circle and then just stood there looking sad and confused. Then we decided we probably weren't going to die and so we danced in the sheets of rain until it stopped and we were soaked all the way.

And so, we rode home on the wet streets, which were nearly empty in the dark, and we went up a huge long hill at the Capitol, and roommate's bike doesn't have gears, and I can't change gears yet because I have to have two hands on the handlebars or I will die (my shifters are on my frame, not handlebars), so we sang Livin' On A Prayer at the top of our lungs to get to the top of the hill. The Hill, I guess. The view of the Capitol as we rode east on Constitution was breathtaking, or maybe it was just that I had just ridden up a crazy crazy hill without being able to downshift.

Then when we got home we got fried chicken and mac & cheese and ate it sitting in the middle of the kitchen floor.

A Ginger in a Red Sox Onesie

I read a lot of Kate Beaton's comics yesterday from her Twitter, (also you should read Hark A Vagrant if you do not already go and read every single one right now it is worth all the hours) (this one is one of my most favorites ever) so then I remembered that I had wanted to do hourly comics so today I am doing hourlies and maybe I'll do them tomorrow too because even though my life is boring, picking out one thing every hour to put down makes me feel kind of important, in a boring and insignificant kind of way.

Then I remembered that I am bad at drawing and so a lot of my comics today are made only of words. except the really profound drawing of me waking up in the morning with crazy morning hair and crazy angry morning eyes.

I went to get my bike at the shop today, Future Bike Shop Husband called me last night and said that the wrong stem came from the supplier place (sidenote: I hope FBSH was right about the stem business, I forgot to tell him that even though I am 5'6" all my length is in my torso. Longtorso is loooong) and I should pick my bike up and then come back later when it will be in for real. So then I did, and then I rode my bike up 8th Street from Barracks Row to my house, and I learned a thing. The thing that I learned is to not ride on 8th Street.

Today is Captain Bananio's birthday. He is two! Happy birthday little guy.

EDIT: Kate Beaton just yelled at the people for calling their comics boring and sucky. MY HOURLIES ARE SUPER INTERESTING AND AWESOME GUYS.