4/12/05

An Isolated Incident, still. Not a bad book, though the love scene I just read was a wee bit hokey. In less than a minute, they had rid themselves of the remainder of their clothing, and then there was no more need for words as their bodies began to communicate with one another. Um, yeah. Hokey.

* * * So when you’re walking the parkway in Gatlinburg, there are these booths every so often, and these booths are staffed by people whose main goal is to get you to attend a 2-hour informational meeting about buying timeshares in Gatlinburg and Pigeon Forge. You’ll be walking along minding your own business, and the people in the booths will be all “Ma’am! Ma’am! Are you planning on attending any shows? I can give you tickets to see the shows for free!” Now, I ignore these motherfuckers, because you know what? I’m NOT INTERESTED in what they’re offering, I’m not interested in buying a timeshare, I’m not interested in being sucked into a dialogue with them. Fred, however, politely smiles and says “No thank you!” every single time, and he thinks I am the RUDEST PERSON EVER for ignoring the people in the booths. This is the way I see it: it’s MIGHTY FUCKING RUDE to try to sell me shit I neither want nor need, when I am wandering along the sidewalk minding my own business. And this is, last time I checked, a free country. Just because the fuckers are talking to me doesn’t mean I’m obligated to listen to their bullshit, does it? What are they going to do, have me arrested for ignoring them? Fuck those fuckers. I know they’re just doing their job, but since their job is to part me from money I don’t need to be spending on something I don’t need to be buying (not that that usually stops me!), as far as I’m concerned, they can go jump in a lake. So can telemarketers and door-to-door salesmen, for that matter. * * * Fred and I slept in THE SAME BED in Gatlinburg, did I mention? GASP! The first night sucked, because Fred just couldn’t get to sleep, and ended up hanging out in the living room, watching TV, and getting only about three hours of sleep. The second and third nights, though, were just fine. We both slept the whole night through, and slept well. I think it helped that the bed was king-size, and the mattress was pretty hard, so that if one of us moved the other couldn’t really feel it. I won’t lie, though: we were both really happy to get home to our own beds. It’s much easier to sleep when you don’t have to worry about waking up the other person in the bed. Also, once Fred goes off to his own bed, I can turn the light back on and read until I’m ready to go to sleep. Two thumbs up for separate beds! * * * The thing about going on vacation to a place in the Eastern Time Zone when you live in the Central Time Zone, just a week after Daylight Savings Time goes into effect, is that your body has no fucking clue what’s going on. I got up at 6:30 yesterday because I had to go feed the cats at the pet store, but on non-pet store days I like to sleep in until 8ish. This morning, though, I woke up when Fred was getting his clothes out of the dresser, stayed awake while he was in the shower, said goodbye to him, and made a good-faith effort to go back to sleep, but by 6:50 decided I might as well give it up. It’s 11:30 and I’ve done two loads of laundry, exercised, answered email, checked the checking account online, vaccumed the entire house, took my shower, got dressed, blow-dried my hair, went to the post office to mail a box, got a large Diet Coke at Burger King (mistake: it’s not nearly as good as McDonald’s Diet Coke), and now I’m halfway through my entry. Pretty good, I’d say. * * * The people in the post office – both customers and employees – moved so freakin’ slow this morning that after ten minutes I became pretty sure that Ashton Kutcher was going to pop out with his big,dumb, goony Kelso grin and tell me I’d been Punk’d. * * * I thought I’d killed Mister Boogers last night. I was laying on my stomach, and he was laying on top of the covers, between my legs – he just loves to pin me down like that. I half woke up and decided to roll over onto my side, only because I was still half-asleep I didn’t think it through, and so rolled over onto my side with Mister Boogers still between my legs. Basically, with the covers, I made a Booger burrito and sealed it closed with my legs. I was almost asleep again when Mister Boogers started frantically flailing around. Obediently, I rolled back onto my stomach, and he was exposed to the air again. Before I could come up with a good way to get onto my side without smothering Mister Boogers, I went back to sleep. About an hour later I woke up and decided to push Mister Boogers from between my legs so that he would be laying beside my leg – that’s usually what I do when I want to move from my stomach to my side, and he usually gets pissed off, chirrups at me, and stomps off to find a place to sleep, usually with the spud, who LOVES AND CHERISHES HIM in the manner to which he has become accustomed. I hate to upset the Booger, but I CANNOT SLEEP ON MY STOMACH ALL NIGHT LONG, PEOPLE. It hurts my BACK. Anyway. So I used my right leg to push the Boog over my left leg, and he just kind of slid over my leg and laid there without moving, as though he were DEAD. That woke me up, believe you me. I sat up and petted him. He woke up, gave me a confused and annoyed look, and stomped off to find a place to sleep where people wouldn’t wake him up by checking to make sure he wasn’t dead. I’m pretty sure I heard him mutter “Annoying goddamn people” under his breath as he went. * * * We keep the cat carrier under the desk by the garage door, because Miz Poo has to go to the vet regularly for her immunoregulan shot (for her lip). Every night, without fail, when we sit down to watch TV, I hear a thump, and look over to see The Boog hanging out in the box, waiting to see if we’re going to take him somewhere interesting. But we never do.]]>