9.30.2009

a quiet evening with mes amis

so, i'm going to pretend that my work day wasn't something along the lines of hurling myself at a wall full of really large, revolving drill bits while being pelted by fresh meat in the face of a pack of hungry, unrelenting hyenas.

yes. i'm gonna smile and pretend that didn't happen.

instead, i'm going to lovingly recount my evening at château mellisa & joel...château meloel (pronounced mel-O-L)? château jolissa? whatever...i think the latter sounds right. good. glad we got that settled.
indeed, château jolissa...a magical place filled with animals, guitar hero and, you guessed it, yummy food stuffs!

so, yes, i got through ye olde day o' tues yesterday and made my way to château jolissa via a leisurely walk whilst having a lively conversation with my paramour.

i landed a hair before 7pm, filled with anticipation and joy. as expected, the door opened and i was in the direct line of fire...a deluge of animals was released like a breathtaking wave of anxious shoppers at the opening of a sale at century 21...except, instead of wanting sensibly priced items that are out of season, these animals only wanted love and attention...which i would happily provide.

...but first, love for dear melissa! then an introduction to the infamous beau, joel (pronounced jo-elle, people...not jole...not jowl). aaaanyway, hugs all around! hugs abound!

next it was time to greet the furry members:
  • butch: a most lovable pup with thoughtful eyes and floppy ears...handsome and solid.
  • maryjane: a black kitteh that likes to touch noses, stare, and considers herself a canine.
  • tank(!): my goddog...as in, i'm his godmother. a nervousy little lovebug chihuahua who's afraid of sudden movement and loves to cuddle.
  • madison: the hyperactive, yet equally lovebuggy and cuddly, younger chihuahua.
wonderful! so much love, both human and animal, concentrated in one location...château jolissa is like frozen orange juice concentrate, if that orange juice was liquid gold made of hearts.

so, what now?

to the laundromat, grocery store and video rental shoppe, of course!

so, off the three of us went.
i watched jolissa put laundry in a dryer while smoking a cigarette by the magical blue light of a neon laundry sign and continued on to the grocery with melissa while joel went to get a movie.

i suggested forgoing the fish and just purchasing lots of bacon...cooking said bacon...and then annihilating it...with our mouths.
it was considered...

...but like responsible people, we opted out of that situation.
i ended up trailing behind melissa as she picked through sad little blocks of salmon and decided on sea bass for the two of us and tuna for joel.
we almost got string beans, but, sadly, the basket where the string bean colony resided had been very obviously raped and pillaged. there were a few survivors, but we decided to leave them be so they could repopulate.
no string beans. boo.

we reunited with joel and made our way back.
and then?...

let the lumpiness begin!
i plopped on the couch (as lumps tend to do) and let my furry friends curl up around me.
melissa began her intense kitchen magic...baking, glazing, sautéing...like the mayor of culinary town...where everything is made of food! even the children!
ok. that was bizarre.

so, yeah...
you know i would've helped, people...really.
but there were a few points of contention here:
  1. um, hello? i'm covered in loving animals!
  2. i respect the boundaries of those who cook...i will be there to taste sauces & glazes and let my opinions be known, but i will not start actively participating for fear that i will end up making everything taste like cardboard or plastic or cement...or something else equally bland and non-foody.
  3. straight up: i'm lazy after a long day of work
  4. joel asked if i wanted to play guitar hero...and it would've been rude to say no, right? ok, ok. i love guitar hero...but, i swear, i'm not used to the xbox guitars and ended up utterly failing...AND i was playing one of my songs! oh, failing at life is never fun.
  5. let me reiterate, moi...living under a blanket of loving animals.
so this went on for quite some time...joel and i walked the dogs and picked up the laundry whilst dear melissa continued cooking...cooking so furiously that if she were a dancer...she'd be a maniac, maniac...on the floor.

upon arriving back, i continued diligently with my lumpitude and joel played some tunes.

we popped in the movie and, at some point, melissa had contructed three drop-dead gorgeous plates of food.
the seabass had a miso glaze!
melissa doesn't mess around, people. let's get that straight.
she . makes . a . mean . dinner.

she even made string beans for me (i'm not sure where she found them - her magical string bean drawer, i reckon)...so thoughtful...and she used lots of organic garlic.
did you know that some organic garlic comes in the form of what looks to be a magic wand?...OF FLAVOR (obviously).
swing that thing around you got yourself the an array of the most deliciously garlicy dishes you ever did see.
very interesting stuff.

so, yep, she sautéed the string beans with loads of garlic and even made these heavenly sweet potato fries.
one thing only to say after eating such a meal: "MAH TUMMY HAS A HAPPY!" (yes, it's a lolcat reference. so shoot me.)

we watched the movie during dinner and i ended up curling up with the animal blanket and nodding in and out of sleep...
but i was pulled from my sleep by the only two reasons anyone should ever be derailed from the bullet train to slumbertown.
chocolate-covered marshmellows AND chocolate-covered strawberries.
eh hem...may i remind you...melissa does not mess around!

the rest was a blur.
lots of animals...warmth...and melissa & joel cuddling up together on the other side of the couch.
oh, so comfy...

...and, with that, we all closed up shop and went our separate ways...they to the boudoir...i to get ready to rock on stage...the stage being a couch...and the rock being sleep, mainly.
if there's one thing i love, it's the fatal (fatally monumental) combination of sitting, eating, lounging, laughing, friends and cuddly pets.

is it weird that i cuddled with butch all night?
no!
NOT weird.
totes approps...
you would too had you been in that situation.

...and that was the evening!

so, jolissa, thank you for some much-needed fun.
melissa, your meal was amazing...merci beaucoup for all of that effort.
joel, thanks for listening to my nonsense and trying to deduce some sort of logic out of something completely illogical (namely, the things i discuss).
you guys are the best hosts evAr.

let's do it again soon. <3

9.29.2009

friday: on tuesdays

i'm not sure if anyone informed you...
but i figured you should know my feelings on tuesdays.

to put it shortly, tuesday is the most useless day of the week.

i lamented about my philosophy on the elevator this morning to two co-workers and a poor delivery guy who, i'm sure, just wanted out.
let me explain...

sunday: oh, what a wonderful day to be a lump and do lumpy things... to do as much or as little of whatever your little blood-pumping organ desires. go ahead and read that trashy novel you've been hiding under your bed. go ahead and watch an entire season of a television show while nommin' on the snack of your choosing. go ahead and take that scenic drive. take that photo! take that and that and that and everything in between that and that!...and get to bed at a decent hour.

monday: one still has the soft afterglow of the weekend and has many tall tales to regale their co-workers and friends with. there are things to discuss. movies that entertained. sales that were fruitful. parties that were fortuitous.

tuesday: will explain*

wednesday: by golly, we've made it halfway through the week! congratulations, my dears. your suffering has diminished to 2.5 parts per 5 (not counting the weekends)...as opposed to the very scary 5 parts per 5. let the rejoicing begin! for my office, this day also comes with delicious new york bagels in an array of different styles and two big blocks of philly cream cheese. bagels ftw!

thursday: wait, what day is it tomorrow? friday, you say?! my goodness, we're almost there! let us don our floral wreaths and prance around like pan on goat day.

friday: my day. need i say more on this particular subject?
oh, and donuts. we get donuts on fridays. donuts, people...rings of frosted joy!

saturday: the magical day where you don't have work and you know you don't have to wake up early tomorrow. it's like awesometown redux (the year 2053) where things have become exponentially more awesome than the present day awesometown. i mean, that's pretty awesome, no?

*so, right, let's follow the asterik like responsible readers and get back into the philosophy of the day of tues.

ye olde day o' tues is like a vast wasteland in the middle of a matterless void, slathered in nothingness compote and feasted on with a warm, comforting cup of oblivion...and some might call that deep space...but, let's face it, deep space has some matter floating around and it's far more interesting than ye olde day o' tues (which is now this insufferable day's nickname...although, as a nickname, i suppose it's supposed to be a little shorter...more of a synecdoche...but whatever.)

right, right. i'm rambling.
so, back to ye olde day o' tues.
it represents nothing to me relative to the other days of the week.
it holds no hope, no promise.
just an empty day full of empty hours that will be filled with work.

however, there was a momentary lapse in my seething indifference to this day (today...not every ye olde day o' tues) when my co-worker came in with a gift for me...it was (insert large grin) a croissant(!) from the patisserie a few blocks away. oh, that made for a joyous few minutes as i zealously jammed it into my mouth and showered it with shimmering floods of latte.

...but, yes...i digress.

the only highlight on my ye olde day o' tues as of now is that i have standing plans with my dearest of dears, melissa.
SO, ce soir i get to meet melissa's beau and get to eat her tasty food.
...if this tradition keeps up, perhaps ye olde day o' tues won't be so bad afterall.

for now though, it is an insignificant stain of compote on the napkin of my life.

9.28.2009

on peut marcher sous la pluie...

once in a while (almost always), i get this crazy notion in my head...

namely, that i don't need an umbrella if the weather report clearly states "rain!"

well, dear reader, let me start by saying that today was one of those days where i might as well have jammed fiery lumps of coal in each eye and called myself frosty the NO-man.
it was that good.

monsieur boss and i have begun to speak over each other...this is bad..
i mean, i was already grumpy von grumpenbergerstein from the minute i woke up this morning...so, attempting to speak over me while in this state is basically like hurling yourself into a boiling vat of pancake batter...made from equal parts corn starch, glass powder and the shrieks of a few thousand perturbed harpies. (in retrospect, that doesn't sound like pancake batter at all!)

so, yes, monsieur boss felt a bit of the wrath today...
how could i tell?
because he asked how i was feeling later in the day...
he never asks that sort of thing...
he must've noticed me grinding my teeth into a fine powder (also used in the batter if one so chooses) while we were having our lovely chat earlier on.

the best event today?
waking up at 4:30am and realizing i had another 1.5 hours of sleep to go.

...did i mention i choked on my own saliva while walking to work this morning?
i mean, i know it's neither here nor there, but that can make even the most bogartly cool person instantaneously uncool.
...and i'm not all that cool...so imagine just how uncool i ended up looking!
i'd say that choking on my own saliva is not something i'd like to do on a regular basis. (duly noted...to myself).

soooo, yes, weather report exclaims "rain!" and i say "hm. looks nice outside."
there seems to be some erroneous wiring in my brain...but, seriously, it was sunny and mild this morning, so i opted for less baggage.

fast forward through a 10 hour day with no real lunch break...

as i began to finally pack up, i took a look outside and discovered that the sky had turned this lovely apocalyptic shade of gunmetal greyish green.
splendid!

i blinked a few times and headed out...quite frankly, this faulty wiring in my head causes something akin to no-logicitis or, in much the same vein, intensified idiocy.

i step out, take a lungful of humid, city air and lightly step away from the scaffolding so conveniently set up right outside of my building.

my foot goes straight into an undesirable manhattan puddle. my flats fill with murky water and my stomach, simultaneously, groans from the lack of sustenance. (5 cookies does not count!)

lovely! lovely!
i make a quick call to my paramour and attempt to maintain some shred of enthusiasm while leaving a voicemail as the rain begins to really beat down on me.

no doubt it was all very james dean from afar, but up close i'm sure i was a sore sight...probably closely resembling the molecular melding of a sad clown and a wet cat.
all i can say is, thank goodness for gabardine trenchcoats...
but, at the end of the work day, no matter how rockstar you are on the inside, melting mascara and soaking wet hair is not the way...especially when you're sitting on public transportation.

so, just bring your umbrella, ok?
wait, you probably bring an umbrella to work and i'm just ridiculously lazy about carrying extra things. man, you are SO responsible.

9.27.2009

happiness: qu'est-ce que c'est?

alors, i found myself at my nephew's 2nd birthday extravaganza, sitting amongst my family, lovingly watching mon cher plow through various food stuffs and a birthday cake armored with the thickest layer of butter cream frosting i've ever seen.

he was actually much more excited by the fruit platter, which makes me happy. he sure knows how to demolish some watermelon, lemme tell ya.

my nephew, brandishing utensils like the suburban warrior that he is, sat there giggling. his hair was a puffy ball of baby fuzz - all curly and wavy and out of sync. his face, scraped from smearing it against a concrete wall the day before as he attempted to climb fences with the big boys. oversized jeans, cuffed at the ankles AND waist to keep them from slipping off of his lanky legs.

my nephew was a hot mess.

as we all gorged ourselves on celebratory delectation, he sat there, poking at his wall of butter cream and let out one word that stopped us all in our tracks.

"happy"

we all paused and stared in wonderment.
this simple little word, spoken with complete sincerity and enthusiasm, has the ability to disarm an entire army of cynics...this army being my family.

don't get me wrong. we all strive for so-called happiness...but it's a concept that one seldom feels like they've obtained...even partially.

but a baby & his birthday banquet...boom: happy.
he paused a few times, furrowed his eyebrows and thought about it some more.
after much contemplating, he repeated it.
happy...
smiling and nodding...he, matter-of-factly, said it one more time.
happy.

i was overcome by a deadly typhoon of nostalgia and sadness. i realized that there was, probably, a point in my life where i must've felt the same way he did. when life was uncomplicated and my birthday dress, strawberry shortcake and paper crown were all i needed to be content.
i began to wonder what i had accomplished in my life that would've made petite fille friday happy (ya know, aside from matching hangers in my closet).

let's take a moment to rehash petite fille friday's dreams & aspirations, shall we?
  • i want to be a farmer (fail...although, "farmer" does not specify what is being farmed...if it is a farmer that cultivates drawings, daily ramblings and feasts on the hopes of children...then it's an epic win. ok, yeah. i fail...you don't need to rub it in.)
  • i want to be a ninja (i don't have the ability to run through a snow storm and not get hit by a single snowflake...so, fail.)
  • i want to be a museum director (i am a museum visitor...fail.)
  • i want to be a fashion designer (i am a fashion enthusiast...fail.)
  • i want to be an artist (that's loaded...i get all awkward and uncomfortable labeling myself as such...and when people label me as one, i get all "pshaw" and "oh, no, no" about it...TBA.)
  • i want matching hangers in my closet (EPIC WIN!!!)
  • i want to be happy (TBD)
huh. yeah.
i'm probably going to work on that last one.
the other aspirations just don't seem as important to me now.
i do, however, plan on maintaining matching hangers wherever i end up in life. this small sliver of unity, in the form of garment organization, calms me like the tender winds of perfumed air wafting off the luscious prairies of nutella and toast on a sunday morning.

it's good for my mental health.

aaaanyway, i spent the rest of this familial bonanza on the floor with the young birthday boy, helping him put together a legendary train set complete with a vehicle that moves on its own through tunnels and up little hills. a plastic contraption with all the bells and whistles...literally. it even has a little chunk of white, bubbly plastic that bumps up and down, pretending to be smoke.

he oooooohed and aaaaaahed every time the train would go through the tunnel...and would echo my choo-choo's...his glee was undeniable...and his long diatribes of oh's and ah's and eeee's and choo-choo's inevitably always ended with a very succinct "happy."

if anything, the little guy put my faith back in the youth. there are still dreamers in this world.
what a relief.

in other news, i killed a chipmunk.
the horror!!!
...on my way to see the paramour's parents.

trenchcoated and armed with some bright, yellowy-orange gerber daisies, i puttered along the local streets. my nerves, admittedly, a bit frazzled at the thought of spending time with these lovely people without mon amour.

suddenly, the little woodland creature skirted in front of my car and i instantly slowed down while releasing a long "noooooooooo", hoping to allow him time to figure out what was happening.
i checked my side mirror...

...and there he was.
on his back...i could've sworn his backhand was laying dramatically across his little, furry, four-legged forehead.
mort!

soon after, i walked into chez awesome (let's just say paramour's surname is awesome, ok?)...and, like i had stepped into a confessional, threw my hands up while offering the daisies and exclaimed, "i just killed a chipmunk!"
the guilt and shame emanated from my pores.

they tried to drown my sorrows with chicken stew, fresh chard, peach crumble pie, tea and bushels of very entertaining conversations that had me squealing with laughter and wide-eyed with wonderment.
dare i say, it totally worked.

r.i.p chipmunk.
o.m.g dinner (so good!)
i'm such an insensitive cretin.
...but you totally would've been the same way. stop waving your virtual finger of judgement at me.

9.26.2009

heart attack days / hot jersey nights

so, once in a while i like to have a throw-back evening with my dearest cohorts from my college days...an evening filled with the wonders and sparkling authenticities that only locales in new jersey can provide.

yes, i'm openly admitting that i went to university in new jersey.
now, before you close this page and vow never to read it again, let me explain something, my lovely listeners. not all of new jersey is comprised of the turnpike, exits off the turnpike, housing developments with cheeky names & identically hideous nouveau victorian huts in endless rows and malls.

my college days were spent in small, hopper-esque diners, sipping coffee and spewing angsty rhetoric between classes and constructing sets in a black box theatre...oh, and fending myself off from sleep in order to take part in all those necessary life lessons like:
  • it's 1am. oh noes, i locked my keys in my car...what do i do?
  • i'm in a public bathroom with a passed out transvestite, a man in a suit who's vomiting into a wastebasket and a man in all black chuckling in the corner and it's 2am. how did i get here? more importantly, how did i become the person responsible for watching over them?
  • it's 3am. whose keys are these in my bag?
  • it's 4am. where's the nearest 24hr home depot? i need to pick up some wood planks and concrete.
  • it's 5am. yes, i think it's a good idea to take that 3 hour drive to the beach and see the sunrise on this lovely finals day...clearly that will help me do better on my tests.
  • it's 6am. crap. i spilled redbull on this computer lab keyboard...what can i do to fix this without the comp lab assistants noticing?
  • it's 7am. the age old conundrum (after realizing the contents of my wallet are: receipts, chinese fortune cookie fortunes, a few singles and a canadian coin): tea & toast or cigarettes?
ok. good. you still there?
you haven't abandoned me, have you?

great. thanks for sticking around...

so, i spent the early afternoon hours having a pretty little heart attack about purchasing a new laptop. it just seems absurd the amount of money people spend on technology that will be trumped the next year...but i just couldn't say no...
shiny new technology that promises a more streamlined, unpixelated, backlit keyboard kinda life cannot be turned away. sometimes one must embrace the fact that they will be making their own lunches and counting the number of cigarettes they smoke each day to make up for money that is spent on such nonsense.

in this particular case, "nonsense" is defined as swirling digital fairy godmothers that transform my outdated desktop into a carriage...a silver, mono-bodied, sexy, helvetica-lovin' carriage.
...and this carriage doesn't turn into a pumpkin after a designated time.
this carriage is my chariot towards a new life...a life filled with eclectic furniture, modern architecture, french pastries, italian leather, swedish design sense and the hording of everything that is beautiful.

...in my head that's what that carriage will do...
in reality, it'll make my life a little easier.
...and when things are easier in one department, you can concentrate on all that other tomfoolery.
(insert a loooooong sigh of consumer guilt)
i like nice things, ok?

so, that was my morning and early afternoon.
me, holding the edge of my desk, nails digging into the wood finish, as i tried to convince myself that this was not an atrocity. that after the initial shock of draining that much coin, i would be a better, more efficient human being. i stayed in that strained position for a while...as if letting my hands go limp would pull me straight into the vacuum that is OMG-what-have-i-done(!)-ness.
my constitution quaked like the monsoons of millions of pacific islands in an apocalyptic haze.

i eased my anxiety by meeting at a cafe with dan & nick.
liam soon followed suit and arrived, making our tricycle into a four-wheeled automobile of conversational gaiety.

we sat outside, in denial of the ever-dropping temperature, and sipped our teas and lattes while trembling ever so slightly in the face of every chilly, increasingly autumnal breeze. i completely broke my 8 cigarette/day limit (this did not help the consumer guilt) and we discussed some economical activities for the evening.

after ditching a possible videogame tournament idea, we decided that dinner and a movie sounded right...alors, off we went to a brewery for boutique beers (they drank. i watched while internalizing my mild envy of the ability to drink while slapping the figurative hand of my horrible alcohol tolerance and asian enzyme-lacking genetics).

and, and, aaaaand...bbq!
i was designated a radiant little pile of pulled pork and two mini-buns which were very quickly constructed into two scrumptious sammies and then ingested with the zeal of starving kittens gorging on tuna fish straight out of the can...so excited that they barf it right back up afterwards as their stomachs reject the deluge of pescatarian delights.
no, i didn't throw it up.
i'm just saying i was that excited.

the conversation touched upon some very important subjects:
  • if you only want to sleep with a woman, isn't it more important for them to have a beautiful ass as opposed to a beautiful face?
  • man, history is great...so is architecture in prague.
  • that woman over there has a very nice posterior.
  • let's take a holiday...to where? maine? montreal?...how many miles of driving can we average between 4 drivers?
  • ..."when i woke up the next morning, i realized that, though she had an amazing body, her face looked like someone had beaten her with a baseball bat."
  • leggings are really all the rage in europe right now...even ireland!
  • so, the loose guideline for the limit on how young your sexual conquests can be is as follows:
if y/2 + 7 > x, NO
if x > y/2 + 7, green light says GO

x = the age of the innocent, yet nubile conquest
y = the age of the dashing, vibrant, wise and witty older participant

so, as you can see, the beer and barbecue clearly kicked open the flood gates of testosterone...and, yet, these are the same men i can discuss anna wintour, the ill effects of thin models on female youth, gingham, hairstyles and what to wear to an oscar wilde themed party with. we are a curious group.

cut to us, sitting in the car in the parking lot of the brewery having a serious sing-along to weezer's blue album. serious, people. this was not light, half-hearted singing (ya know, like "i kinda know the words, but not really...but this album was pretty popular back when i was young, so i can follow along" kinda singing)...no, no, no.
this was full on belting with air guitar solos, perfectly pitched harmonies and dramatic hand gestures. the songs were interspersed with infectious laughter...at ourselves...for reverting back to the age of 16.

did i mention we were in a parked car?
...and there was definitely a man in the car next to us, attempting to concentrate on his newspaper while the 4 of us, with the windows up at least, thrashed around in our seats like salmon swimming desperately upstream.
...near 30-somethings desperately clinging to their youth. oh, we are amusing creatures.

the singing continued until our throats were ragged and we all sounded like cowboys...from marlboro country. cool in the tall, swaying grasses of the flatlands, surrounded by horses. questionable in the middle of new jersey on a rainy saturday night.

the evening ended with a few games of pool (the movie idea was a vision of grandeur in the face of our getting-older-exhaustionitis) and a late-night diner run (now that is jersey)...
the conversations began to falter, we all adopted that glazed-over stare of soldiers without sleep on the longest campaign of their lives...
and it wasn't even midnight. it might've been around 11.
so curmudgeonly.

i'm home now...showered and cigaretted, my eyes rolling to the back of my head.
even with that evening cup of coffee, i can't function all that well.
it was an entertaining jersey aberration with my treasured testosterone trio.
we now return to our regularly scheduled programming.

9.25.2009

i scream, you scream, we all scream...period

every few months, i have a day that makes me want to stab my eyes out with rolling pins made of ice that are covered in spikes fashioned from rusty nails.

today was one of those days.

yes, even though i'm sporting my new forever-vision contacts sprinkled with pixie dust.
stabbity-stab!

it's a friday, dearest reader. my day. friday.
but i walked in and the stress immediately started to flow like the river styx and i was up its creek without a paddle. well, to be mythologically correct, without charon, the ferryman.

i understand. i get it. customers get what they want and they have no shame in making changes up until the very last minute, on the brink of schedulecide (definition: the killing of schedules, if that wasn't obvious...which it was...but anyway).
they think a small change is no big deal...that the tweaking of a shade of blue is like the echoes of childhood laughter and hot chocolate on a cold winter morning.

this equation is completely true with the following changes:
echoes = screams
laughter = misery
hot chocolate = drain-o
on a cold winter morning = burning fatal holes in your esophagus

...but, ya know...i'm not bitter or anything. i'm just being honest.

now, i'm usually calm and collected, but when i started throwing my arms up in frustration, talking a million miles a minute to my boss and making my head spin like i was in the exorcist (don't i wish i really had that ability - what a hit i'd be at parties), i got the worst response possible.

"don't get involved. let me handle this."

...oh, ok.
cut to friday in a racecar constructed of knives, flying down the hardship highway.
next exit: NO-town.

but after i had my mid-morning cigarette, as nicotine wrapped its loving arms around me and rocked me while i mentally wept, i made a decision.
none of it is that important.
these things will get done.
i will stay neurotically organized and everything will be ok.

c'est la vie.

then my boss started asking me questions about what was going on and i was, clearly, thrown right back into the mix.

...and with that, friday reclaimed her day and all was well again.
...and by "well" i mean "tolerable."

9.24.2009

sensational-eyes

so, i scheduled a doctor's appointment.
to be more specific, an ophthalmologist appointment.

it's been a while and i'm abominable and irresponsible when it comes to my own body. it's not that i'm paranoid something will be found or that i'm afraid of needles (ok, ok...i'm not a fan)...it's just that when faced with the choice between getting work done, spending time with friends & family, updating my blog, or, say, drawing something...OR sitting in a waiting room, getting poked & prodded AND having to pay for being poked & prodded...

well, clearly, the former choices are much wiser. right?
...right?

right.

so, i decided to leave work for an hour to deal with my eyeballs.
i guess they're one of my most important body parts because...well, i like to see things. last i checked, drawing is usually slightly easier when you have the gift of sight.

alors, i jump in a cab because, of course, the minute i realize i'm running late and sprint over to the elevator, i find out it's not working...then i wait for the freight elevator and the gatekeeper likes to take his time.

after giving him the password, the secret handshake and the souls of 5 seafarers, i'm allowed to take the elevator down where he offers me his bike. i consider it momentarily and then realize that it's a little dusty (which i normally wouldn't mind) and i'm wearing a blindingly white button-down shirt.
foiled.

cut to the waiting room where i have to fill out a encyclopedia's worth of information sheets (this is the part where i curse technology for beating my ability to remember phone numbers into a bloody pulp with an anvil made of lava)...which i always end up writing little notes all over such as:

EYE REDNESS: yes: X no: this is because i wear my contacts for too long and stare at computers screens all the time

OR

STATUS (MARRIED, SINGLE, DIVORCED, WIDOWED): single but involved!

OR

DO YOU SMOKE CIGARETTES? yes: X no: , if yes, how many? (occasionally, 1/2 pack/day, 1 pack/day, ___packs/day) 1/2 pack/day but, actually, slightly less!

...it's really no wonder why most assistants at doctor's offices think i have problems. it takes me a really long time to fill things out. i mean, who wants to be inaccurate about their own medical history? what if i forgot to tell them that i'm allergic to bad tailoring or uggs or asparagus? (i'm not allergic to any of those, by the way)...nonetheless, it could be chaos. (like cats-&-dogs-living-together kind of chaos!)

so, yes, a lovely staff...some great decor and a calm, witty eye doctor in a cute shirtdress (yay, shirtdress!) and tasteful earrings that i was ordered to stare at several times while she shot laser beams (bright lights) into my eyes.

they also had the most impressive (and neurotically organized - i appreciate such things) collection of national geographics. i entertained myself with the issue about white owls.
epic win.

a particularly amusing segment of the visit consisted of me holding the plastic spoon (i know it's not a spoon, ok?) over each eye to read the rows of letters. i mumble a lot during these exercises.

"A...3...5? wait. S?...O...no...0...it's something round...wait. don't tell me!"

"ok, ok, i got this one. F, 4, H, 7...wait. P!...wait...oh, i fail."

"...hmmm...this row looks like a line of oddly shaped dots..."

so, yes, i got numbing drops and bright lights...but no puff-of-air-in-the-eye (i know it's just a puff, but it feels like a vaporous cement block) OR dilation drops! apparently, my pupils are large enough. my co-worker now claims that i'm a drug addict. if by drug addict she means a nutella-lovin' son-of-a-gun... (i am neither male nor birthed from a piece of weaponry, so now i'm just not making sense.)

the numbing drops were interesting...
i mean, fine...numb eyeballs...they don't feel all that different. somewhat awkward...kinda like, "hey, eyeballs. i know you're working because i can see n' junk, but are you actually there?"

...but when said drops stream down your face and onto your lips...problem.

i realized, as i was speaking to the doc about my slight astigmatism (qu'est ce qui se passe?! i knew i had bad vision, but now astigmatism is added to the mix? bad vision turns into baaaaad vision. yes, folks, i did not add an A once, not twice...but thrice) my lips started to feel tingly.
by the end of the appointment i didn't feel like i had lips at all and i was mildly slurring.

possibly drooling on myself.

perhaps punishment from above regarding my lack of dentist visits.

so, i left...without paying. they took cash or check...of which i had neither. so, they sent me off with a cute little addressed envelope and told me to send payment later. talk about trust!

they armed me with new contacts, sprinkled with the magical pixie dust of fairies from the land of astigma...where everyone's retina is ovular.

now i can see forever (as in distance, dear reader...not time). i feel like a hawk! (insert echoing hawk cry over misty, purple mountains majesty...followed by a quick cut to ray and charles eames' powers of ten)
so, now i don't have to furrow my eyebrows! i can see into the windows of apartments across the way from my office! i can find waldo!

everyone better watch out! there's a new friday in town, eyeballs fitted with ocular precision, to silently judge every pore and fiber on your person!

wow. soooooo many exclamation points!

by the by, happy punctuation day to all! xo!