The Motherfucking Squirrel is Back

"Hey, man. I'm a starling, and though annoying and territorial, I am still a better candidate for that suet. Because I am a BIRD, and you are a FAT ASS SQUIRREL who clearly does not need to chow down on food intended for BIRDS."

"Oh really, fool? Then why would the lady of the house place this lovely suet at such a convenient juncture? She already hung the feeder full of delectable seeds out of my reach (though I am sure to outsmart her soon enough), so this is payback. Just retreat from my dinner table. Away!"

"Ha! Now that the obnoxious iridescent bird is gone, I can gorge myself on this stuff. Nom, nom, nom. I wonder what it really is, anyway."

(Editor's note: Suet is raw beef or mutton fat, especially the hard fat found around the loins and kidneys. It is especially fattening, making it a good choice for birds in the colder months.)

"What? That's DISGUSTING."
...

"Nom, nom, nom."

And Now, An Installment of "The World Revolves Around ME!"

Bait: Ten dollars

Four forties of Miller High Life: Eight dollars

Skipping work to go fishing: Gutsy

Blocking traffic as you aimlessly load your crap into the car: Asinine

(Thanks to Mike for the picture and story. Also, I love that my boyfriend sends me blog fodder.)

100 50 Things

I never got around to doing this for my one hundredth post, but would you settle for my nine hundredth post?

(I can't believe that this is my 900th post. I should have been out in the three dimensional world doing something interesting instead of writing about Virginia motorists or DC's Madame Tussaud's franchise).

So here are one hundred fifty things about me:

(I realized that I didn't even want to know 100 things about me, so I'm sure that you people don't either. Here are fifty instead. You're welcome.)

1. I am allergic to cats.
2. The clothes in my closet are arranged by color.
3. I drive at least ten mph faster than the speed limit.
4. I almost flunked calculus in college.
5. I am an avid bird watcher.
6. I wear a size four shoe.
7. I hate cooking on electric stoves.
8. I always wanted to be a counselor at a sleepaway camp.
9. I really miss DC's metro.
10. I eventually want children but am absolutely terrified to be pregnant.
11. I have stood up in the weddings of five friends/relatives. With another this summer!
12. I hated trying new cuisines until I moved to DC.
13. If I ever found them, I would spend hundreds of dollars on the perfect pair of jeans.
14. I drink too much Coca Cola.
15. I love my sister-in-law like she's my own sister.
16. I like apple cinnamon scented candles.
17. If my teenage self had had the discipline, I would have pursued ballet as a career.
18. I think designer purses are ugly.
19. I love the smell of used books.
20. I don't like getting flowers as a gift, but I love giving them.
21. I don't know what I'd do without my mom.
22. I procrastinate about ten times a day. This list has taken me a week to complete.
23. I've saved all of my National Geographic magazines since 2002.
24. I can find a Friends quote for any occasion.
25. I love Polish food, but I hate how long it takes to prepare.
26. I didn't do my taxes until April 13 this year.
27. I've had the same winter coat for six years.
28. Even knowing what I do now, I still wouldn't redo high school.
29. My favorite movies are all about princesses.
30. I interned and worked at the Smithsonian Institution.
31. Audrey Hepburn is my idol.
32. I don't think that one can ever have too many blankets.
33. I think my dad is the most intelligent person I've ever known.
34. I don't weigh enough to give blood.
35. Walking in the dense woods of northern Michigan is the closest I have ever felt to God.
36. I have a difficult time throwing things away.
37. I only applied to one college, and four years later to only one graduate school.
38. I love the Sherlock Holmes stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.
39. My favorite mixed drink is an Amaretto Sour.
40. I love falling asleep during thunderstorms.
41. I have a BA in history with a minor in archaeology.
42. My favorite ice cream is peanut butter and chocolate.
43. I've visited the battlefields of Gettysburg more than five times.
44. I love cider and Guinness, but pretty much no other beer.
45. I am 50% Polish.
46. I own over 500 books.
47. I suffer from migraines.
48. I played the saxophone for seven years.
49. I first visited Europe when I was sixteen years old.
50. I fall more in love with my boyfriend every day.

Getting Lucky

Where am I going to be this weekend? Oh, I'm so glad that you asked. That was thoughtful!

Mike is taking me for little trip to Mount Pleasant where I am going to win millions at the fancy-schmancy casino.

I have never been to a casino. Okay, no - I have been to a casino, but it was only to see some band. Man, though... Atlantic City was trashy. Shudder.

But I've never gambled at a casino. I am planning on winning big with my beginner's luck and then eating at all of the restaurants on site. And I hear that there's a pool.

All I've ever really known of casinos is what I've seen on screen. I have a feeling that my experience will be like that of my ER visits. No sexy doctors at the hospital, and no sexy Brad Pitts or Casey Afflecks at the casino. I'm sure that I will see my fair share of sweet outfits, though, if my online search has proven truthful.

See, I'm just not a gambler. When one has limited funds, the idea of throwing it away on games of chance doesn't make much sense. But when one's generous boyfriend is supplying the quarters for the slot machines? That I can get behind. I don't plan on bringing anything else with me save my license and my trusty chapstick. I can't be tempted to play just one more hand or hit the button (I hear that the slot machines no longer have levers? What the shit is that about?) just one more time.

I am pumped to watch him play poker, though. I have a feeling that it's going to be kind of hot.

How Time Goes By

Tomorrow is Graduation Day here at the University of Michigan, and I had to count on TWO HANDS the number of years that have passed since I walked across the stadium grounds. I graduated from college seven years ago. Seven! And I finished graduate school five years ago. Five!

So many things have happened in my life since 2002.

I was blessed with two nieces. Two!

I moved to Washington, DC:

I made some amazing, wonderful friends.


I visited Kristen in London. Twice:

I interned and worked at the Smithsonian Institution:

I moved back to Michigan:

I went to California for the first time for my old roommate's wedding:

I visited my cousin in Arizona:

I stood up in five weddings:

My beautiful cousin, Holley

My friend for life, Kelly

My new sister, Kari

My darling Merrick

(And there's one other wedding, but it doesn't technically count, because the real one is this summer.)

And finally, I met the love of my life:

I know that all of my life choices brought me here, and I wouldn't change a thing. So on Graduation Day here in Ann Arbor, I am excited for those starting their journeys - I hope that their experiences are as wonderful as mine!

What Can The Facebook Do For You? Create Friendships With Inanimate Objects, Apparently

Just like me, Kelly has a total love/hate relationship with The Facebook, mostly because it's too easy to discover things about distant "friends" that one never really needed to know in the first place. Especially since there are reasons one hasn't talked to said "friends" in ten years.

Drama aside, she often calls me with hilarious tidbits that she discovers, and this one had me laughing so hard that it was just too good not to share:

"Another thing that I don't understand about Facebook is that apparently you can become friends with a cheese biscuit from Red Lobster? How does that work?"

I'm with you, Kel.

"We are excellent listeners."

Head On! Punch Me Directly in the Forehead!

Last night, I had the worst migraine of my life and called Em for advice. Should I go to the hospital? Should I double up on drugs? Should I waste myself and be done with it? I was terrified and I honestly thought that my head was going to explode. I was nauseous and seeing spots and my extra strength prescription migraine pill was seemingly worthless.

Em's been battling migraines since she was a teenager and is my go-to guru every time a particularly bad one invades my life. She thought that I should wait on the hospital visit (she waits for a migraine to torment her for TWELVE HOURS before she eventually goes to the ER, which just confirms my belief that she's the toughest girl I've ever known. Especially since, once at the ER, she gets a shot. And since I do not enjoy needles, I wanted to avoid the hospital at all costs), and that I should take Mike up on his offer of a vicodin. And since I am the wussiest wuss who ever wussed, I was too nervous to take someone else's pain medication, and turned them both down.

So Em suggested that Mike run to the drugstore for Head On. You've seen the commercial:

Easily the most irritating commercial to ever hit the airwaves,
oh my freaking God.

And I hate to admit it, but the combination of my migraine pill, the Excedrin migraine, and the Head On Apply Directly to the Forehead... worked. The Head On was menthol-y smelling and cooling, and it seemed to take my attention away from my pounding head. I finally fell asleep. When I awoke at 5 or 6 in the morning, the migraine was gone completely.

I don't know how to explain it, but I don't just feel fine. The absence of that horrible, throbbing pain is impossible to describe, and now that it's gone it's not like I am back to normal. I'm better than normal. But absolutely terrified of the next time...

Not So Dirty Little Secret

For those of you who know me on The Facebook, this probably is no shocker, because most of my "friends" on The Facebook are from my hometown. For those of you blissfully unaware of the infamous and ridiculous social networking site that is The Facebook, know that it is a total mindfuck battlefield. People who didn't talk to you more than twice in high school are now "friending" you. You see thousands of pictures of their children. You find out that one of your cousin's old roommates once went on a date with your boyfriend. And secrets that you thought were deeply buried have a way of clawing back to the surface.

So I have a secret, and it's not a huge deal, really, except that being a member of this high school group isn't going to make me any cooler than you all probably don't think I am anyway.

(What? I thought that sentence made total sense.)

I was in the high school band.

Sigh. I was outed by my former band director, who posted a ton of band nerd photos for EVERYONE TO SEE.

But yes. It's true. I was a band dork. I played the most bitchingly awesome instrument available to me, however: the saxophone. In sixth grade, my parents wanted me to play the flute, and I was all, "The flute? Fuck that, the flute fucking sucks. I'm playing the saxophone." And they, happy that I wanted to be in the band at all, especially since my trashy hometown didn't have an orchestra, gave in (oh man, did my dad want me to play the violin...).

Plus, having band as a class meant that I didn't have to take gym. And though I wasn't opposed to exercise, per se, getting sweaty would have meant having to redo my hair and when you are a girl in middle school in 1993, you can imagine what an Aqua Net nightmare that would have been.

And? I legitimately liked playing the saxophone. I was teased, but that was concurrent with the sixth grade glasses and brace-face phase. "But it is bigger than me," I agreed with the mean boys, "so it's not that funny." And I really didn't think that being called "Lisa Simpson" was that much of an insult.

Then in high school? I went to band camp. I did. For four years. And there were definitely moments worthy of "this one time, at band camp," but as we learned from Michelle in American Pie, they would mean nothing to you unless you were there.

In general, being in the high school band - at least in my hometown - wasn't horrible. Sure, its members were mostly the creme de la creme of nerdery, but there were a ton of stereotypically popular people thrown in for good measure. Guys who also played football and ran track, girls on the cheerleading squad and volleyball team - a good mix. Lots of us were on student council (although... that's kind of nerdy, too, isn't it? Sigh). But really, in my area, our band was huge - we had over 200 people. Most bands in the surrounding towns had maybe half that. We thought we were the shit.

The months before my freshman year began, we were thrown into a summer of intense practices before we even went to camp. We got to know the upperclassmen, which wasn't as scary as we expected, and it slowly dawned on us that we had a lot of work ahead. And we nervously awaited camp.

We were on edge that we, like every single freshman class before us, were going to be hazed into the ground. Our director pissed off everyone (but us) by putting a ban on hazing starting that summer, and we escaped being covered in shaving cream, peanut butter, and glitter and getting thrown in the lake. Thank God.

Camp was tiring, exhausting, draining, and sunburningly hot. We were stuck in cabins with our entire class. It was freezing in the mornings. Each year at Karaoke Night, we had to endure the senior class singing "Summer Lovin," and the last night at camp was always a cryfest.

But in the end? Those four years were a total fucking blast. I got to know really nice, really smart people I would have never had the courage to talk to in school. I dated a junior when I was a freshman. I got to act as a mentor in my senior year. Friendships solidified into lasting, lifelong relationships.

It's hard to explain, really. I suppose that it is just like going to any other themed camp. If you're not in it, you just won't get it.

Revisiting My Insanity

As I reached for a paperclip at work today, I could only find a massive clip, which annoyed me to no end. Then I realized that I had already written about paperclips, which just makes me laugh. I've written an entire blog post about paperclips and my insane prejudices against some of them.

I figured that I would revisit that post now, because it is too awesome to forget.

Originally posted on 2/27/06:

Scary!

After receiving over 200 internship applications for the summer, I've learned a great deal about Microsoft Access, the copy machine, and the applicants themselves who just WON'T. STOP. CALLING about their applications. "Have my reference letters arrived?" "Have my transcripts arrived?" "Did it arrive on time?" "Did I remember to sign it?" "Did I use enough staples?" (answer: Never! You can never use too many staples! Interns apparently LOVE staples, staplers, and any device that will adhere as many staples as possible to their required five complete copies. My hand hurts from using my trusty staple remover to extract them from each packet). Did I use the best, most unique paperclips?

And that's where the contest begins...

(FYI - This gets scary. Not just the content - that alone is terrifying. It's scary because it shows how completely insane I am. You have been warned).


If you sent in an application with any of these "paperclips," I would disqualify you if at all possible. I hate these paperclips. They're huge! And some are rusty and scary! It's bad enough that I could get anthrax from the hundreds of envelopes I opened - I could get tetanus! There exists a mini version of these clamp-like things, which I adore, but I didn't receive any applications with those :(

These are nice. Small, free of rust, and sometimes colorful, these paperclips make an application desirable. Ah...

You can't tell from the picture, but these are large paperclips. I HATE these. Some of the silver ones are grooved and they tear the hell out of your carefully constructed application. Too late - your application sucks!

I don't know what the hell this is. Scary!

These. I don't know what these are. They were almost impossible to pry off of the applications and left the paper bent and ugly. Ew!

Check out this rogue mini paperclip! It's blurry, but you can see the amazing pattern. Green and white striped! Your application goes in the "maybe" pile!

Let's take a look at all of them together. So many emotions...

~~~

Now, the paperclips below are awesome. I've never seen anything like them. These applicants win everything! Yay!

Have you ever seen any paperclips as cool as these? That regular-looking one in the back is special because it is extremely tiny. I LOVE the tiny paperclips. These are all perfection.

See? I told you I was INSANE.

(Though I am insane, rest easy. I actually have very little say in accepting interns. I review each applicant's interests and experience to see with which staff member s/he would best fit, and I'm not allowed to throw away the stupid applications, i.e., the high school students who didn't read the internship description that says UNDERGRADUATE SENIOR OR GRADUATE STUDENT).

Sunrise Photos I Took From A Moving Car. As I Was Driving...