Thoughts in English Class

I was in my english class, bored out of my skull, and this is what I wrote instead of taking notes:

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I live halfway between my real life and my dream life. When I take my shower in the morning, I spend the time grasping at my memories -- seeing which ones fall away and which ones I can keep my hands around. Unfortunately, this means that I can never be sure what is a dream and what is reality until about 10am.

My dreams are in technicolor with dolby surround sound and comfy seats. Real life is a 13-inch black and white TV with bunny ears and crappy reception. My dreams have three acts with sub-plots, villians, heroes, and a wacky neighbor. Life is reruns of a cheesy soap opera you saw 10 years ago. You can't quite remember exactly what happens next, but you're never quite surprised by its convolutions and plot twists.

Would I trade my real life for the small world inside my head? Maybe. Lord knows I tried, but it didn't work out well for me. What's worth more: entertainment or the truth? Are the two mutually exclusive? And how true are my dreams, for that matter? They have more internal logic than the real world, so I suppose that's a good argument against my dreams. Life, on the whole, is not internally consistent.

I love my dreams. They make me laugh, they make me cry, but in the end, I can't share them in all of their colorful glory. Pinning them down takes away their luster. It's like listening to that song you adored in the summer between your junior and senior years, but haven't heard since then, and when you hear it, something is missing. The song no longer sounds like sunshine and freedom, it sounds like over-engineered pop from the early 90s, cotton candy light and cringeworthy. You remember it had these mind-blowing lyrics that, like, totally changed your life, man, and now it makes you laugh at its treacly-sweet platitudes.

So how do I share the stories my brain entertains itself with during my nightly collapse into unconsciousness? How do I take these gossimer strands and weave them into something I can hold up and see how the light shines through it? Movies? My dreams *are* cinematic. Music? They *are* lyrical. Writing? I *am* lazy, and that *is* the easiest way to share things these days.

Unfortunately, it seems like quantum mechanics: the moment you observe them, you change their quality. Dreams are their own medium, and no other will do.

In which our heroine is proposition in the most curious of ways

This was a while back, but I didn't realize I hadn't blogged it. Here we go:

One of Asimovian and my friends was in town and wanted to go to a club. There is a Friday-night-only club that several friends like to go to, and it was decided that this was the club we would be patronizing, even though we'd never been. This club is... I guess you might consider it a saucy kind of club. Free spankings on stage and all that. However, being freaky is only encouraged, not required, so we fit in just fine. I spent a lot of the evening hanging out with Space Kitty.

Now, I have to take a second to explain a couple of things here. First off, our heroine is not particularly a looker. I mean, everyone who gets to know me totally wants me, of course, but people aren't stopping me on the street to ask my phone number, if you know what I mean. Space Kitty, on the other hand, is adorable as hell and was dressed particularly saucily. And was very drunk. Very, very drunk.

So back to the dance floor. Several of us were shakin' our respective thangs. This creepy guy had been following Space Kitty around (cute + drunk = creepy guy magnet) and he was just STANDING on the dance floor STARING at Space Kitty, looking her up and down, repeatedly. So, I maneuvered myself between Creepy Guy and Space Kitty and turned my back to the guy. So, a few moments later, little creepy guy came up behind me, put his hands on my shoulders (yick), leaned into my ear (double-yick), and said,

Creepy Guy: Hey, wanna come back to my place? I have bagels and salmon.
Me: WHA?
CG: You wanna come over? I have bagels and salmon.
Me: Uh, no. I'm married.
CG: Wha?
Me: Married. ::points at her wedding ring, then points at her visibly upset husband::
CG: Huh?
Me: ::points at wedding ring, then her husband, then waves bye-bye::

I mean, I do look like a gal who enjoys herself some tasty breakfast snacks, but first off, does he not even know what it's called lox? Secondly, EW! Thirdly, don't piss off the black man who has 6 inches and 100 pounds on your scrawny ass.

Truth be told, it was more pathetic than anything and hey, I got a funny story out of it. The most amusing bit is that we're going back to the same club on Friday. I guess I'll bring my appetite in case he offers again. 'Cause who am I to turn down bagels and salmon?

In which our heroine discovers that she's rather predictable...

Christmas always brings out the best and worst in people. In me, it usually brings out the weird, which is to say, it brings out the best AND the worst in me. I have an odd sense of humor, and not everyone gets it. However, one of our programmers at work totally gets my sense of the absurd. He's also a long-time vegetarian. So, when I was in the $1 bin area of our local Red Dot Boutique (that would be Target), and I spied a "Meat Playset," I knew I had to get it for him. It's a little basket with a pork chop, a steak, a hot dot, a hamburger, and other plastic facsimiles of dead animals. C'mon, it's perfect for the vegetarian programmer in your life.

Anyhow, I wrapped it up in very generic paper, and left it on his chair this morning. I disguised my writing and simply wrote that it was from "Santa." A few hours later, a certain programmer dropped by my office and it went a little something like this:

Veggie Programmer: You got me the meat playset, didn't you?
Me: Wha?
VP: Yeah, someone left it on my desk this morning, and I'm sure it's you?
Me: No, I had David in the gift exchange. I didn't get this... what was it? Meat? for you.
VP: Well, this is the first place I stopped by because I was sure YOU bought it.
Me: So someone buys you meat, and I'm the FIRST person you think of.
VP: Well, it said it was for ages 4 and up...
Me: Haha. Alright, yeah it was me.

Yep, I was the first person he thought of. I'm getting predictable in my old age. And kudos to VP for engaging me in the most surreal conversation I've had all year.

Leaving to go to dinner...

Jake's sister, TooTall, and her husband, Vroooooom, were getting ready to take Jake out to dinner for her birthday. (Yes, send a card. ) Jake remarked on how freakin' freezing it's been the past few mornings, and how she uses Asimovian as a timer for the heater. ("It's cooooold... go turn on the heeeeeater... then the shooooower... then come back to bed so I can put my cold feeeeeeet on you!")

And now, back to our program already in progress:


TooTall: Well, you could get a thermostat with a timer on it.

Jake: Well, we rent, and it seems awfully complicated.

TooTall: No, it's actually really, really, REALLY easy. I mean, Vrooooom put ours in...

Vroooooom: I'm starting to feel a little insulted here.

TooTall: But, you put it in and it works great.

Vroooooom: You're not making it any better.

TooTall: But what I'm trying to say is...

Vroooooom: Nope, still feeling insulted....

TooTall: [to Jake] He could HELP YOU. He could help you install it is what I'm TRYING to say!

Vroooooom: Uh, no.

Jake: Uh, hey... how's about some dinner?


No marriages were harmed in the making of this scene.

In which our heroine loves her glasses...

Another quick tale from the aforementioned grocery trip. Also, a little background:

I wear prescription sunglasses. I choose to wear glasses instead of contacts because I think I look better in glasses, and my prescription is primarily for astigmatism. I keep my sunglasses in the car, and sometimes I forget to switch from my sunglasses to my normal glasses. If you see someone walking around the store with their sunglasses on, chances are that it's me, and I'd look all squinty if I took them off.

However, I always feel a bit self-conscious when I wear my sunglasses indoors, so when the grocery trip turned from long to epic, I decided to take off my glasses and try to get used to looking around without them. My evil nephew, BP (Bottomless Pit), turns around and looks at me with surprise. He says, "Aunt Jakey! You have really dark circles under your eyes!"

Me: "That's because I have allergies kid. You have allergies too, right? You're looking at your future, buddy!"

BP: "Yeah, but they came up really suddenly!"

ME: ::puts back on her glasses:: "So, did they disappear?"

BP: "Ohhhhh!"

I guess it didn't help that I was up until 3:30am the night before, but I never miss an opportunity to make my nephew fear for the future. I figure I'll tell him about how guys have to trim their nose hairs the next time he's truly rotten.

In which our heroine terrorizes the local supermarket patrons

Thanksgiving is this Thursday. You may commence to sobbing. I, however, decided to be a grown-up about it, so I wiped away my tears and made a shopping list in preparation for my Fakesgiving celebration (that would be making a big dinner on Friday instead of Thursday). I called my sister to ask her something and we ended up deciding to go grocery shopping together. We used to do it more often, but she lives a couple of towns over now, so it's no longer convenient. However, this is a special occasion, so we figured we'd get it done together and spend some quality time (gack!) together.

So, we're moseying around the supermarket. My sister, Jo, has her infant daughter (Babyzilla) in the shopping cart and my 11-year-old nephew, Bottomless Pit (that's BP to his friends), is helping us shop. Well, let me back up. We weren't moseying. We were on a mission. It may have looked like moseying to the untrained eye, but we're hard-core bargain hunters. We were moseying like a motherfucker up in there.

Seeing as how we're both cooking much of the same food, we needed many of the same ingredients. If Jo grabbed olives, she would ask me if I needed a can while she was at it and vice versa. She'd then have BP grab an extra can and put it in my basket. After a while, Babyzilla got a bit impatient with our shopping, so Jo started carrying her while BP pushed the cart. We were in the dairy aisle, and I found that butter was on sale. I checked with Jo that she needed a pound of salted butter, then grabbed it and dumped it in the cart BP was pushing while saying, "Here ya go, kid."

Then BP said, "Uhhh, Aunt Jakey?" I look up and realize that I've put the butter in the wrong kid's cart. There was some random kid passing by, and I stopped him, told him, "Here ya go, kid," then put butter in his cart. The poor random kid was about 10, and looked appalled and confused. I said, "Uh, oops. Sorry. I thought you were my nephew," and took back the butter.

When I saw poor random kid with his mom, I told her that I was sorry I terrorized her kid and tried to put butter in his cart. A random lady passing by laughed and said, "Been there, done that." That was the best time I've had in the supermarket EVER. I'm finding random people and putting stuff in their cart from here on out.

Oh, and the best part: we were shopping at a store that tells you how much money you've saved. Turns out my sister, who taught me my bargain-hunting ways got a 27% discount, and I got a 34% discount. That's right, the student has surpassed the teacher. HA!

In which our heroine sees the street signs

So, our local radio station has been doing an all 90s weekend. Considering I graduated high school in '94, of COURSE I thought that this was pretty fuckin' cool. So, I've been listening on and off all weekend. A few minutes ago, it hit me: When I was just out of high school, they used to do all 80s music weekends, and I TOTALLY dreaded them. I hated all the "old" music and thought that people who couldn't get on with their lives and start liking the new music were really pathetic.

City: Oldsville
Population: Me