See, they kind of hang out together sometimes.
But I'm about to close that door and go look for some more shoes. Thanks, Tracy!
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Saturday, January 26, 2013
Friday, January 25, 2013
A Nedendum
Tried to watch Safe Men, another horrible movie from that "Best Movies You've Never Seen" list. Another horrible movie. I think I made it ten minutes before yanking the disc out of the DVD player, flinging it across the room, and then stomping on it while screaming and crying. Just kidding. I just put it back in its envelope and went ahead and did the same for the other movie I got from that list. Instead I watched The Player, which is clearly full of inside Hollywood jokes that I don't get and lots of celebrity cameos. Whoopi Goldberg has the best role by far as a detective in Pasadena. In what I think is the best scene in the whole movie and possibly any movie, she interrogates Tim Robbins while winging a tampon around. (Unused.) Is that not reason enough to watch this movie? She OWNS the scene. This woman deserves respect.
But I was going to tell you two different things relating to yesterday's blog.
One is this item from Mental Floss:
"You probably know that the modern forms of some words have lost letters, as if by magick. But not all letters that are 'lost' disappear. Some of them just move around. 'False-splitting' occurs when speakers and writers unwittingly redraw the boundaries between words and their articles. It's a phenomenon that made a few Middle English words less valuable in Scrabble."
Today: Originally:
An apron A napron
A newt An eute
An umpire A noumpere
A nickname An eke name ('an added name')
An apple A napple
Tell me that is not fascinating.
The other item is my theory about the source of why people are confusing the apostrophe s. I think it came from the name signs on houses or those painted on mailboxes:
The Johnson's
What this means is that it is the Johnson's house or the Johnson's mailbox, as in belonging to the people named Johnson. And in fact, this sign should probably read The Johnsons' because it belongs to a group of people named Johnson, but I think the s apostrophe has fallen out of favor as the way of showing the possessive of a plural. But instead of reading The Johnson's as the Johnson's house, people read this as: there are multiple Johnsons here. A house of Johnsons, which sounds like the box of penis, so maybe I should have used a different name for this example. Maybe that house IS full of johnsons. Well, anyway... that's my theory.
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Thursday, January 24, 2013
Grammar Nazi
Gaaaaarrrgggghhhhhhhh!!!!!!
You use what to be cool?
Does no one check these things? Now, god knows I wouldn't want an English professor evaluating my punctuation, but I think there is a level of basic English. To see this on the flipping radio being broadcast all over the place makes me want to scream. Your handwritten yard sale sign may have mistakes, but not something professional that you're sending out to the world. If you don't care about these things, hire someone that does. This, to me, is on par with this horrifying trend of adding an apostrophe s to make something plural: someone makes a sign that says "Free Kitten's." Free the kitten's what? Oh my god, make it stop before this becomes the rule. People can't seem to remember that apostrophe s is possessive, not plural. Maybe you remember my grammar graffiti in the art building stairwell at UNR? Someone wrote "breath fire," which sounds more like severe halitosis than the poetic, artsy nonsense the student intended. I brought a Sharpie and added the e. You're welcome. That's you're welcome, not your welcome.
I recognize that language evolves. I realize that it has to. I just wish it changed a little slower, like one or two spellings over the course of my lifetime. I cannot handle it when I encounter a sign that says you are "suppose to" do something. I grab my Sharpie.
I do have a suggestion for how to remember plural vs. possessive. Just think of a box of pens. If you label the box in all caps and write pen's, it will look like you wrote PENIS, and you do not have a box of penis. You have a box of pens. Someone at the tow yard labeled a box like that and every single day I had to restrain myself from asking them why on earth they had a box of penis. I wish I had. I bet they would have never misused the apostrophe s again.
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Small victories are still victories!
Jody asked if she could bring the dogs over to my place today while her house is being inspected. I said sure, but to watch out for Riley being territorial. Solo will be a non-issue, as she will hide under the bed.
We met up at the park for a walk this past weekend and Lucy promptly rolled in poop. Then Snoopy ate some poop. Jody asked if I would like to take her dogs for about a week or so. Maybe they did something worse last night and she is actually just leaving them at my house permanently today.
I get to escape early today and that is still not enough to keep me from being bored to tears. I've had a couple interesting calls and those were nice- I got compliments and appreciation- but otherwise, this is a boring job. I got put in two different workgroups for a pilot program, so those days are stressful, but how nice to have chaos and deadlines and stress for a change! Plus, I've got this class and its homework and implied obligation to become a LEADER.
I read last night about envy and pride. Envy is useful because it inspires you to strive harder for the things you see that other people have. So there's that idea about surrounding yourself with successful people- it's for the envy. That seems a little less altruistic... And then there's pride. I loved this and cut out the blurb because this researcher says he thought depressed people had an unrealistically low level of self-worth, and it turns out that people who do not suffer from depression just have an unrealistically HIGH level of self-worth. Denial is the antidote to anxiety. I should not question my kitchen safety skills- I should believe that I could teach Home Ec! Well, maybe it's more like confidence pointed in the right direction would be helpful.
And while I'm on the subject, let me just tell you how productive I became again. I have this list of projects and the list looms when I am writing lists about what I need to do. I'm starting to think that lists may not be my friends. I started one project, got about halfway through (in one night!) and now I feel like it's almost done, so I may as well finish it! I started reading my book for the class and got halfway through AND wrote notes! Now I know how much time it will take to finish the book and I can start writing my essay.
What these workgroups are teaching me is that it doesn't matter how far off the mark you are- the important thing is to start the project. Get anything going and edit from there. What I ended up with yesterday may not be perfect, but all I needed was a starting point- something to gather feedback with- and I created something way better than that. It needs tweaks, but it is something solid and clear.
Finally (and this seems small, but I find it important), I have this box of brain teasers from the thrift store that I bought maybe last spring. Ant and I looked at a couple, and my idea was that we could read one every day. Instead, they sat on a shelf until Chris broke up with me and I moved out. I've had that box sitting by my microwave ever since I unpacked- intending to give myself that daily mental workout- and I finally figured out that I needed to take the damn cards out of the box! The deck of cards is sitting unconstrained on my microwave and I read them as I am nuking the cat food or making breakfast. I did this maybe a week or so ago, and I am already halfway through the cards! When I'm done, I'll pack them up and donate them back to the thrift store. I'm figuring out how to make these intentions into reality. That feels like something to celebrate.
We met up at the park for a walk this past weekend and Lucy promptly rolled in poop. Then Snoopy ate some poop. Jody asked if I would like to take her dogs for about a week or so. Maybe they did something worse last night and she is actually just leaving them at my house permanently today.
I get to escape early today and that is still not enough to keep me from being bored to tears. I've had a couple interesting calls and those were nice- I got compliments and appreciation- but otherwise, this is a boring job. I got put in two different workgroups for a pilot program, so those days are stressful, but how nice to have chaos and deadlines and stress for a change! Plus, I've got this class and its homework and implied obligation to become a LEADER.
I read last night about envy and pride. Envy is useful because it inspires you to strive harder for the things you see that other people have. So there's that idea about surrounding yourself with successful people- it's for the envy. That seems a little less altruistic... And then there's pride. I loved this and cut out the blurb because this researcher says he thought depressed people had an unrealistically low level of self-worth, and it turns out that people who do not suffer from depression just have an unrealistically HIGH level of self-worth. Denial is the antidote to anxiety. I should not question my kitchen safety skills- I should believe that I could teach Home Ec! Well, maybe it's more like confidence pointed in the right direction would be helpful.
And while I'm on the subject, let me just tell you how productive I became again. I have this list of projects and the list looms when I am writing lists about what I need to do. I'm starting to think that lists may not be my friends. I started one project, got about halfway through (in one night!) and now I feel like it's almost done, so I may as well finish it! I started reading my book for the class and got halfway through AND wrote notes! Now I know how much time it will take to finish the book and I can start writing my essay.
What these workgroups are teaching me is that it doesn't matter how far off the mark you are- the important thing is to start the project. Get anything going and edit from there. What I ended up with yesterday may not be perfect, but all I needed was a starting point- something to gather feedback with- and I created something way better than that. It needs tweaks, but it is something solid and clear.
Finally (and this seems small, but I find it important), I have this box of brain teasers from the thrift store that I bought maybe last spring. Ant and I looked at a couple, and my idea was that we could read one every day. Instead, they sat on a shelf until Chris broke up with me and I moved out. I've had that box sitting by my microwave ever since I unpacked- intending to give myself that daily mental workout- and I finally figured out that I needed to take the damn cards out of the box! The deck of cards is sitting unconstrained on my microwave and I read them as I am nuking the cat food or making breakfast. I did this maybe a week or so ago, and I am already halfway through the cards! When I'm done, I'll pack them up and donate them back to the thrift store. I'm figuring out how to make these intentions into reality. That feels like something to celebrate.
Wednesday, January 23, 2013
Big Dummy: A Confession
Walk or blog? I feel this NEEEEEEEEEEEED to type on a keyboard instead of on my phone. Ahhhhhhhhhh, that feels better.
So my beautiful couch was delivered on Monday evening and I spent a while rearranging furniture (my favorite pasttime as many of you know), and eventually I settled down to watch a movie. I decided that it simply must be Lord of the Rings. Those are usually my sick day movies, but they are just so good and full of relevant advice, like this approximated reconstruction of one such conversation:
Frodo: "I wish the ring had never come to me."
Gandalf: "So do all who live to see such times, but that is not for them to decide. All you can do is decide what to do with the time you have."
Or something like that.
So I was all excited and confident and happy and threw a quiche in the oven. Much later, because the movie was still on (It has to be like a three hour movie! I don't know because I am normally sleeping through most of it.), I decided to make some tea. Sleepytime to ready myself for bed, because I am so on top of things with my new couch and my awesome apartment and my good job and amazingly efficient use of time. I filled up the kettle and turned on the wrong burner, as I am constantly doing. Why are those diagrams so difficult for me? Of course, I didn't KNOW I had turned on the wrong burner because I had carefully paid some attention while turning it on because I know I have this problem. Not enough attention, apparently. Or I am just that stove burner dyslexic. So then I make my second boo-boo and leave the kitchen, which is something I constantly drilled into Ant's head never to do when there's a burner on. Well, I said when you're cooking, but clearly I need to take that advice a little further. I went back to watch my movie because I have this nice new tea kettle that screams bloody murder when it's ready, so there was no way I was going to miss that.
Now let's take a moment to talk about intuition. I have a particularly lovely ability to sense something's wrong and then procrastinate. I can't tell you how many times this skill has helped me... learn a very important lesson for future reference, because I don't respond in time to deal with the immediate problem. I'm sitting there on my awesome couch and I think, "I should go check the kettle."
Maybe there were already chemical fumes in the air that I was smelling and my nose was sending my brain important messages that were deemed much less of a priority than whatever murderous fantasy I was imagining about Chris's tramp or whatever obsessive, repetitive thoughts I was having at the time.
"FIRE! FIRE! FIRE!" yelled the smoke detector. "EH EH EH EH EH!!!"
Like a true ding-dong, my first reaction was to get a towel and wave it at the smoke detector instead of finding the location of said fire. Quick, stop the noise! Then I'll be able to think and find the problem! When my towel attempt failed, I struggled with the hanging lamp/ceiling fan cords and corresponding light switch, trying to find the right combination to turn that sucker on. Then I found that I had turned on the wrong burner AGAIN, dammit, and was burning the shit out of the cookie sheet that I had left on the stove to cool. I yanked the pan away and turned off the burner, opened the window, and stood panting in the kitchen. It was freezing outside, but I saw no other option than to free the toxic chemicals that were surely coming from the cookie sheet. I waited until the pan was cool, then took it out to the patio and made a plan as to when I could take it to the dumpster- it needed to be when the least amount of people would see it and recognize how dangerous it is to live near me.
Perhaps it's questionable for me to live on my own. Did I tell you about how I left the oven on all night once? My tub has no grippies and I should probably install a safety bar as well. Sometimes I trip going up the steps while wearing my FUgg boots; sometimes Riley does too, and I'm afraid she'll fall through the steps and we'll end up at the emergency vet with internal bleeding. Sometimes I trip over the bedspread and I narrowly miss cracking my head on the corner of the cubby shelf. At least I have a downstairs neighbor and if he hears a body hit the floor, I'm sure he'll call the paramedics.
It's taken me a couple days to write about this because I'm so embarrassed. I took the pan down to the trash with Riley's sweater strategically placed over the burned part. Oh, this pan that looks perfectly fine? I'm just throwing it out because I have plenty others... yeah... Maybe I need to go back and take Home Ec again. Maybe I was so distracted by our teacher's blue hair that I missed some important parts.
In my defense about the poor reaction to the smoke detector, maybe the chemicals were already affecting my brain. And really, why doesn't my oven have a light on it to remind me that it's on? A light next to each burner switch would help, too. And maybe I should go buy some bathtub grippies and slow down a little. And stay in the stupid kitchen when the burners are on.
Big dummy.
So my beautiful couch was delivered on Monday evening and I spent a while rearranging furniture (my favorite pasttime as many of you know), and eventually I settled down to watch a movie. I decided that it simply must be Lord of the Rings. Those are usually my sick day movies, but they are just so good and full of relevant advice, like this approximated reconstruction of one such conversation:
Frodo: "I wish the ring had never come to me."
Gandalf: "So do all who live to see such times, but that is not for them to decide. All you can do is decide what to do with the time you have."
Or something like that.
So I was all excited and confident and happy and threw a quiche in the oven. Much later, because the movie was still on (It has to be like a three hour movie! I don't know because I am normally sleeping through most of it.), I decided to make some tea. Sleepytime to ready myself for bed, because I am so on top of things with my new couch and my awesome apartment and my good job and amazingly efficient use of time. I filled up the kettle and turned on the wrong burner, as I am constantly doing. Why are those diagrams so difficult for me? Of course, I didn't KNOW I had turned on the wrong burner because I had carefully paid some attention while turning it on because I know I have this problem. Not enough attention, apparently. Or I am just that stove burner dyslexic. So then I make my second boo-boo and leave the kitchen, which is something I constantly drilled into Ant's head never to do when there's a burner on. Well, I said when you're cooking, but clearly I need to take that advice a little further. I went back to watch my movie because I have this nice new tea kettle that screams bloody murder when it's ready, so there was no way I was going to miss that.
Now let's take a moment to talk about intuition. I have a particularly lovely ability to sense something's wrong and then procrastinate. I can't tell you how many times this skill has helped me... learn a very important lesson for future reference, because I don't respond in time to deal with the immediate problem. I'm sitting there on my awesome couch and I think, "I should go check the kettle."
Maybe there were already chemical fumes in the air that I was smelling and my nose was sending my brain important messages that were deemed much less of a priority than whatever murderous fantasy I was imagining about Chris's tramp or whatever obsessive, repetitive thoughts I was having at the time.
"FIRE! FIRE! FIRE!" yelled the smoke detector. "EH EH EH EH EH!!!"
Like a true ding-dong, my first reaction was to get a towel and wave it at the smoke detector instead of finding the location of said fire. Quick, stop the noise! Then I'll be able to think and find the problem! When my towel attempt failed, I struggled with the hanging lamp/ceiling fan cords and corresponding light switch, trying to find the right combination to turn that sucker on. Then I found that I had turned on the wrong burner AGAIN, dammit, and was burning the shit out of the cookie sheet that I had left on the stove to cool. I yanked the pan away and turned off the burner, opened the window, and stood panting in the kitchen. It was freezing outside, but I saw no other option than to free the toxic chemicals that were surely coming from the cookie sheet. I waited until the pan was cool, then took it out to the patio and made a plan as to when I could take it to the dumpster- it needed to be when the least amount of people would see it and recognize how dangerous it is to live near me.
Perhaps it's questionable for me to live on my own. Did I tell you about how I left the oven on all night once? My tub has no grippies and I should probably install a safety bar as well. Sometimes I trip going up the steps while wearing my FUgg boots; sometimes Riley does too, and I'm afraid she'll fall through the steps and we'll end up at the emergency vet with internal bleeding. Sometimes I trip over the bedspread and I narrowly miss cracking my head on the corner of the cubby shelf. At least I have a downstairs neighbor and if he hears a body hit the floor, I'm sure he'll call the paramedics.
It's taken me a couple days to write about this because I'm so embarrassed. I took the pan down to the trash with Riley's sweater strategically placed over the burned part. Oh, this pan that looks perfectly fine? I'm just throwing it out because I have plenty others... yeah... Maybe I need to go back and take Home Ec again. Maybe I was so distracted by our teacher's blue hair that I missed some important parts.
In my defense about the poor reaction to the smoke detector, maybe the chemicals were already affecting my brain. And really, why doesn't my oven have a light on it to remind me that it's on? A light next to each burner switch would help, too. And maybe I should go buy some bathtub grippies and slow down a little. And stay in the stupid kitchen when the burners are on.
Big dummy.
Monday, January 21, 2013
Rosey
This is Rosey Grier, the guy whose autobiography I've been reading. I decided to read while waiting for my dinner to cook before starting the movie and I just got to the picture pages. (Picture pages, picture pages, have some fun with picture pages...) What a goober! I love this guy. Oh, and sign with a booking agency and wrote songs, Tracy. He toured with the Coasters! Good grief, this guy...
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My new couch!
I had to rearrange a little and I was afraid it would start feeling cluttered, but instead it feels cozy. My little corner of the world. My elephants are dispersed throughout and facing the front door for luck; my yoga DVDs are in a visible spot next to the TV for motivation; spicy orange is everywhere for inspiration. Time to get this year rolling.
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That's a new one.
There is a new feature at Duds n Suds.
I have to hurry up and dry my disintegrating comforter so I can get home and move furniture to make room for my couch! Jody and I are going to walk this afternoon and I need to read my book for class and sew my stupid comforter and lie down on my couch! Movie night! And rearranging furniture! What could be better? Oh, a cream cheese bagel. On my way.
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