Damn you, Jordan's Furniture!

I baked a chocolate cake last night, and it's Jordan's Furniture's fault. I had neither the time nor the energy to bake that chocolate cake. I needed to pack for a weekend wedding trip, and before I packed, I needed to figure out what dress I was going to wear to the wedding, and what outfit I was going to wear to the Friday night dance party before the wedding, and before I picked out my outfits and packed them, I needed to shower.

But before I knew what was happening, right in the middle of Two and a Half Men (come on, it's a pretty funny show, don't judge me), a Jordan's Furniture commercial came on, and that white-bearded and bespeckled Jordan's Furniture guy was standing in front of a bunch of beds, holding a giant piece of chocolate cake. I didn't hear a word he said. "I want chocolate cake!" I blurted. Brian looked at me. "So do I," he said, in wonder. Brian doesn't really care for dessert. Chocolate usually leaves him cold. But damned if we didn't both burn for chocolate cake with a passion that could not be ignored.

I cracked open 'Joy of Cooking', flipped to page 645 (Chocolate Cake Cockaigne-- Joy of Cooking delightfully adds the word 'Cockaigne' to the title of every recipe they think is especially delicious) and got to work. I melted down 3 oz of bittersweet chocolate, creamed butter and sugar, separated eggs. I picked out an icing and measured out butter and cream for it. The house filled with the scent of Jordan's Furniture-inspired cakelust.

Two hours later, while watching the dubious "My Super Ex-Girlfriend" (did they write that movie in one sitting and shoot it without a single re-read? What a waste of Uma Thurman) we sat down to piping-hot slices of Chocolate Cake Cockaigne. I hadn't packed, showered, decided on outfits. But I guess sometimes you have to prioritize. Sometimes the siren-call of chocolate cake must be heeded.

It's Edu-tainment!

Any Book Club in which we spend the last 20 minutes casting the film version of the book, is the right Book Club for me.

So Many Damn Holidays

Yesterday I opened an envelope from a school and found an invoice with a dime taped to it. My company had sent an invoice for $0.10 to a school, and this was their response. It seemed fair to me.

Later I got a letter from a customer with a $0.41 cent stamp on it, and a penny taped next to the stamp, in lieu of postage. Apparently you can do that, and it works. Or maybe the postal inspector was feeling generous.

Apparently, Thursday, May 15th was Tape a Coin to a Document Day. No one told me!...With words.

Can you please repeat that?

Lately I have found myself saying 'What?' a lot when people are talking to me, because I didn't understand something they said. I mean, I say it a LOT. The scary thing is, I only say it around half the number of times that I WANT to say it-- meaning that the other half, I do my best to interpret, through context and tone, the general idea of what is being said to me, and I respond accordingly (and vaguely). This tends to work pretty well-- I don't find myself responding in a totally inappropriate way very often, because conversations don't tend to switch gears suddenly. By which I mean, if I am talking to someone about how lame our respective commutes are, and the person says something I can't quite make out while making a wry face and I respond with, "Right, totally, that sucks", chances are they will nod and continue, because they probably said something about how the T smells. However, in one case out of ten, they might have actually said something like, "But at least I can drive sometimes, and I really love my car," so that when I respond with "Man is that lame!" it throws things off a bit.

The problem (well, one of the problems) is that constantly saying, “What?” to the person you’re talking to also puts a damper on a conversation. So, it’s a tough call for me either way. Maybe I need to get my hearing checked. Maybe my ears are lazy—or maybe the part of my brain that interprets sounds is lazy. I feel that laziness is the root cause of this, and not hearing trouble. But you never know. I used to listen to the Mighty Mighty Bosstones pretty loud in highschool. Not their new stuff—the oldschool screaming Skacore stuff they did in the beginning. That’s right! I was cool.

Riding the Red Line, Part XVIIVXCM

Blonde girl on the bench
your bright pink heels are awesome
and I covet them

Graffiti on T
dated with tomorrow's date
Boston thugs are dumb