I'm Heather! I'm Disgusting!

Mike's bathroom has a better shower than mine. Mine is a tub shower with a shower curtain, and it's very nice, but his is a step-in, with sliding doors and little seats! It has a sauna effect, and if you're cold, it's the best place to be to get your blood flowing. He was in Dallas this past week for work, and I practically moved in there. For REASONS.

Sure, we could share - we did for a while. But take the fact that I have to get up earlier than him and couple it with the fact that he has a hard time falling back asleep once I'm making all sorts of noise in the bathroom that is just steps away from the bed, and you've got a very cranky boyfriend. 

The condo has two and a half bathrooms (I KNOW!), and so I carted all of my girly crap into the other full bath and set up shop. 

Mike's shower also has the distinct advantage of not being clogged with my hair.

So... 

I am usually pretty good about dealing with issues as they arise, but when said issues dictate my getting dirty or being uncomfortable, I tend to ignore them for far longer a period of time than I would most anything else. Example: cleaning out the fridge (I've actually paid my sister-in-law to do it for me before). 

Case in point - a majorly clogged drain.

You know how when your shower fails to drain as quickly as before? How you basically end up ankle deep in your own filth-water because it's failing to drain at an acceptable rate? Yeah, I am not going to tell you how long I allowed that to go on before I finally did something about it. But definitely be aware that there is a reason for the title of this post.

After a particularly shitty day, I was NOT leaving the house again. My shower that morning had been disgusting and I knew that it needed to be dealt with. But Mike had used the rest of the Drano weeks before.

To the internets!

I soon discovered that I could use household products - products I actually had on hand - for a more natural, chemical-free solution: baking soda and vinegar.

Basically, I made an erupting volcano in my bathtub. (Of course, this was after I used a hanger to remove all of the hair from the drain, leaving me dry heaving for a good five minutes. IT WAS SO GROSS.)

And you guys? The erupting volcano worked so well! Here's what you need:

• 2 cups baking soda
• 4 cups boiling water
• 1 cup white vinegar

Steps:

1. Pour one cup of baking soda down the drain
2. Pour two cups of boiling water down the drain and wait a few minutes. Apparently, this mixture helps to clean all of the slimy gunk from the pipes.
3. Pour the remaining baking soda down the drain, followed by the cup of vinegar. Immediately plug the drain, because it's volcano time! You'll hear sizzling from the chemical reaction going on in your pipes (dirty!), and little bubbles might escape. Give it a few minutes.
4. Unplug and pour more boiling water down the drain.
5. Repeat if necessary, re: you are disgusting like me.

Enjoy!

Quinoa Salad and the Rolling Pin of Doom

I get on these kicks where I am determined to do something - usually prepare some recipe I found online - and I jump in head first without even thinking about the needed materials, the time frame, the sheer ridiculousness of the idea, and on and on and on.

This was one of those moments. BUT. It was one of the moments when I TOTALLY REDEEMED MYSELF. 

They approve.

I decided, on a whim, to make this recipe: Quinoa Salad with Hazelnuts, Apple, and Dried Cranberries. I found it on the interwebs on FOOD52, and could think of nothing else until I got to the store, purchased the few food items I needed, and got home.

Cook the quinoa. Okay, fine. But first! Rinse the quinoa. Have you ever made quinoa? It is the tiniest little grain-like entity ever, and even my fine mesh strainer was not fine enough to contain them. It took a bit of swishing in a bowl of water, but I finally got them sparkly clean. (Also, it apparently isn't really a grain, it has some kind of bitter coating on it - hence the rinsing - and it is loaded with protein. Worth the hassle, it seems.)

Disclaimer: Many pictures have been staged to protect the innocent.

Chop the parsley - done. Chop the green onions - done. Sautee celery and yellow onion - done.

Roast the hazelnuts.

Hmmm.

Fine. 

What it should have said was, "Roast the SHELLED hazelnuts," because my dipshit self had never cooked/baked with hazelnuts before (unless Nutella counts) and didn't realize that she needed to get the fucking nuts out of the fucking shells before throwing them in the fucking oven.

They took three different trips into the oven before I realized this.

So there I was, sitting on the kitchen floor at eleven o'clock at night whacking a ziplock bag of hazelnuts with a rolling pin. Those fuckers were SUCH bastards. It took a while of trying before I got the movement down, and when they cracked, it was the most satisfying crack.

It didn't get easier from there, however. They went back into the oven, and the recipe promised that the peels would slough off, but THEY DID NOT.

This is a picture of PURE FRUSTRATION.

My perfectionist self did not appreciate that the peels were still there, and went at them with a paring knife until realizing that it was after midnight and perhaps I was a jackass.

But this is the output, and it was awesome:

I forgot to take a picture, so here's the one from Food 52 instead.

Anyway, it was a huge success in that it was delicious, but it was not a success in that I didn't get to bed until one in the goddamned morning and had to get up at six. 

There's Always a Silver Lining

I was falling in slow motion.  I heard the bones snap as I lowered myself to the ground.  I knew that my foot was stuck in something, and I knew that the outcome wasn't going to be pleasant, but I really didn't think that my simple misstep was going to result in this:

I was hoping that it was just twisted.  That it could be popped back into place. (Spoiler: it couldn't.)

I don't completely remember what I sounded like during the incident, but I imagine that it was something like this:

Yeah, that sounds about right. 

I tried to be optimistic, but I knew that it was broken. I heard the bone snap.

Going to the ER was a much better experience than my last two visits.  I was not left to my own defenses in a bed in a hallway, and I did not have to get stitches in my skull.

This time, I was practically the only person there, things happened quickly, and before I knew it, I had in IV in my hand and I blacked out.

Thank goodness, because I missed the part where the orthopedic surgeon rearranged my fucking foot. And when I awoke, I was too high to feel anything. 

Surgery is scheduled for May 13, and shit's gonna get real - they're putting in a metal plate and some screws and Lord knows what else.  So I've set up my "Recuperation Station" in the living room:

Yes, that is a bag of bottlecaps under the HGTV magazines.

So you might be wondering about this supposed "silver lining" referenced in the title.  There are several.  Here they are, in no particular order:

--Mike isn't traveling as much, so he's home taking care of me. This is awesome because I hate it when he's gone. Sometimes there is Taco Bell. 

--Kari comes to visit and brings the baby and we get lunch and Biggby and it's pretty much awesome.

--My parents come over and take me shopping and to the library and cook food for me and clean the house and do the laundry.  It's incredible.

--Kelly got me a wheelchair from her work and I am able to get my peg-leg self around SO MUCH FASTER than I was.  Because I was using crutches and also just scooting around on my ass.  Which is still how I go up and down the stairs, by the way.

--I can't drive or go to work for three weeks.  When I can't drive, I can't take myself places to spend money. Which is good because I am not working.

--Arrested Development Season 4 is going to be released on Netflix IN FULL on May 26 and I am going to binge-watch ALL OF THE SHOW without worrying about staying up too late.

So those are the things that make all of this bearable.  The vicodin helps, too.

Heather Is An Idiot, Version INFINITY

So I think that I have embarked on a really stupid journey.

I am starting a week-long cleanse/diet, and it's definitely more than a little ridiculous.  It's called the Cabbage Soup Diet, and apparently, it's been around for some time.  Basically, you make a big ass pot of cabbage soup (which is actually pretty good, believe it or not) and eat it every day.

Day One - Today!

Breakfast
Fruit.  All I can eat!  I had berries and an apple.

Lunch
Cabbage soup. But I can have as much as I want!

Dinner
It doesn't matter. I made myself a sandwich because I WAS SO FUCKING HUNGRY.

And thus ends an experiment in stupidity.

Fuck you, CABBAGE.

July/August Round-up

So here's the thing.  It's not that I am super busy.  I'm not, really.  In fact, I've been incredibly lazy lately!  And it's not that I don't have anything to write about - there are many stories to be told, book reviews to post, and recipes to share!

So I have made a decision to be better about this blog for the rest of the year... which... well, we'll just have to see how that goes. 

Anyway, the summer was fun, you guys!  I did things!

First off, on July 5th, my parents celebrated 37 years of marriage, which is pretty awesome.  Thanks for setting a good example, parents!  Maybe even I will get married one of these days...

In mid July, my third niece was born (!!!!):

Haley Grace

So that was fun!  It was especially fun because I wasn't the one doing the birthing.  

Soon after that precious miracle, Ann Arbor was hit by the precious tornado that is Art Fair:

This is the calm before the storm.  The morning the Fair started.  My building is in the background, and I was walking to work with my fancy coffee.  The next time I looked out of the window, it was mass hysteria. So. Much. Overpriced. "Art."

I saw The Dark Knight Rises:

It was good!

(But version #2 - Heath Ledger Rules All - was better.)

During the first week of August, my work switched from Outlook email to Google mail.  The old-timey professors collectively lost their shit and HILARITY ENSUED, especially since some of them still used PINE.

Ah, freshman year of college...

I turned 32 years old.

OLD.

And August crawled to the finish line and students moved back to campus, ruining the serenity and calm that accompanies this town in the summer, yet ensuring my employment.

And that is it!  There is nothing more that happened this summer!  TIME FOR SEPTEMBER. GO.

Onesies

"Rawr!"

I don't know that there is a single inanimate object cuter than a onesie. I mean, LOOK:

Look at the dinosaurs' smiles. Incredible! I purchased two of these ADORABLE onesies for Mike's nephews, but they will never wear them because I am an idiot.

Yay!

You might be wondering, "But Heather, what happened? That is the cutest dinosaur onesie ever! Children should wear those always! If they made that onesie in adult sizes, I'd be wearing one right now instead of this Snuggie!"

"I mean, wouldn't you be?"

HERE IS WHERE OUR STORY BEGINS. I have two nieces. Mike has three nephews. You would think that I would have figured things out by now, but ALAS I HAVE NOT.

This Christmas, I was (happily) tasked with purchasing the most adorable, comfy, dinosaur-y outfits imaginable for Mike's nephews, age: almost 2. I would have sent Mike to get them himself, but I have a feeling that it would not have ended well, I would have ended up at Target and/or Kohl's myself anyway, and time would have been wasted, the end.

And so, with explicit instructions to buy 12-month clothing, I went shopping.

"Hey! Idiots! The twins are like, 20 months old."

I found the CUTEST things: matching outfits (they are twins, after all), pajamas, shirts and pants... I saved an assload at Kohl's with their scratch-off coupon at the register and headed to Target to spend more!

"This isn't going to end well."

The next day, I shipped everything to Seattle and felt mighty proud of myself. Until Mike called on his lunch break:

"What size clothes did I tell you to get for the twins?"

Heather, confidently, "Twelve months."

Long pause.

Mike, dejectedly, "Yeah. They're almost two."

Heather and Mike, simultaneously, "Fuck."

And then I got to go shopping again! I figured that it would be easier, but let me tell you, IT WAS NOT. Shopping for infants is easy. Colors are important, but not tantamount. Onesies are not only acceptable, they're pretty much mandatory.

It gets so much more complicated when they get older. There are many levels of complication:

First off, there are about eleventy billion more options of clothing for little girls. Like, 90% of the children's clothing is for girls. I mean, obviously that's great when you have girls to buy for, but I did not. And it was frustrating.

Secondly, two year-olds don't really wear onesies that much, right? I wish they would. Onesies, as mentioned earlier, are the best and the cutest. Why can't they just be babies forever??!?

Third, girls can wear whatever they want. If they like outfits with dinosaurs or trucks or football, they are totally welcome to wear them, and hopefully are encouraged to wear them if that is what they like. So not only can they already wear 90% of the toddler clothing, they have access to the remaining 10%. Boys aren't so much um... able to wear pink princess shirts without inviting unwanted commentary and parental criticism.

Not that I would buy pink clothes for Mike's nephews, even if I wanted to, but you know what I mean.

"I would totally wear Disney princess pajamas,
but that's because I am a pterodactyl."

ANYWAY. I found new clothes. They were purchased and mailed to Seattle. The 12-month clothing was donated. All is well. I remain - and Mike remains - stupid for not remembering how damn old the twins were as of December 2011.

Gah.

MINI RANT: Is 24-month clothing the same as 2T? If so, WHY HAVE THEM BOTH? Why do you buy months-sizing for a while, and then switch to "T" sizes? Are those ages? I DON'T KNOW. Conspiracy.

Oh, and not only is Mike's sister preggers with another boy (Four boys! Kill me!), my lovely sister-in-law, Kari, is pregnant as well (sex of child TBD in March)! So I'm thinking that I should probably figure this out, and figure it out soon.

Or at least keep a better calendar.

This is Why We I Can't Have Nice Things

After reading about my laptop's destruction, were you wondering if it was possible that I could be any more idiotic? Well, let me tell you. It most definitely IS possible.

Not what a tire should look like.

This is one of the front tires on my car. Those are steel wires. Sticking out of the tire. Apparently, this is not a good thing.

Also not a good thing? Spending your morning at Belle Fucking Tire as they replaced the original tires with a brand you've never heard of: Hankook. Hankook?

Yes, Hankook.

Mike and my dad have now formed a two-man army against me and my idiocy. Every week, I hear from at least one of them about the status of my last oil change, fluid levels, and windshield wipers. And... it turns out that I need the support.

I shouldn't be allowed to own a car, is what I'm saying.

Although, thanks to their meddling, I will get an oil change this week, and I didn't go 8,000 miles since the last one! Not this time!

Sigh.

The Grand Idiot

Okay, so I've done some stupid things in my day. Hell, I've done some stupid things in the past day. But this one takes the cake.

Here is where I would tell you what led up to the tragedy, but it's extremely boring and involves me tripping over things, because that's what I do because I am my mother's daughter and I constantly have bruises and cannot remember how said bruises came to be.

Anyway, I broke my damn laptop. The screen is busted and I am an idiot and I really, really hate myself.

I know that it's not the end of the world - it's a thing, not a, I don't know... leg - and it can be replaced. I know that this now gives me an excuse to get a computer with the kind of memory that I've been craving, but I have not the money for this kind of situation.

I have not the money for many situations. For example, it would be nice to fix the side mirrors on my car, but do I have the money for this? No, I have not the money for this. I would also like to purchase nice bookcases for the living room so that my beloved books do not perish from mold and neglect in the storage unit, but do I have the money for this? No, I have not the money for this.

Anyway, my laptop has now become a desktop and I'm using a monitor my friend Josh gave me back in, I don't know... 2005?

Who Even USES Checks Anymore, Anyway?

I went strawberry picking with my lovely sister-in-law and my adorable nieces today.

See? ADORABLE.

Anyway, we went strawberry picking and it was a highly fruitful endeavor.

Heh.

Kari paid because she had cash and I had none, but I told her that I would write her a check for my half. Later, I got my checkbook, flipped it open, and realized that I didn't have any new checks.

Now, like most people in this digital age, I rarely use physical checks and do most of my banking and bill paying online. During the last year or so at my old apartment, I was sending electronic payments to my landlord instead of handing her a check with "RENT" written in the subject line. I couldn't tell you when or why I wrote my last check.

So I've searched all afternoon for my extra checks (of which I KNOW to exist), and I have NO idea where it is hiding. I looked in every conceivable box, bag, and drawer, and then I moved on to my car.

My car's trunk was full of stuff from the apartment that I just hadn't gotten to yet, and to be honest with you people, it probably would have remained untouched until another one of these inevitable situations arose.

Alas, no checkbook.

I then moved on to the few boxes that I have stored in the garage. There aren't too many - just things that I didn't want to place in storage in case I needed to get to them in a hurry. One would assume that the checks would be there.

They were not.

The next step is to search the storage unit.

I don't want to.

Maybe I Should Have a Shopping Buddy...

All I wanted was a few comfortable summer dresses. The ones I've been wearing for years have become a little too "young," if you know what I mean, and it was just time.

Target is Mecca, as many will attest, and I happened upon a rack of dresses completely by accident. They were comfy and flowy and didn't make me look like I was twelve. I got home and modeled them for myself and set one out to wear to work the next day.

It was a little windy that day, and it kept catching the dress and puffing it up. In the stomach area. There was a LOT of extra material.

Y'all, I accidentally bought maternity dresses. And trust me, I am NOT pregnant.

I wondered why an extra small fit so well...

THIS STORY IS HYPOTHETICAL

So, hypothetically, say someone was driving down an Ann Arbor street, at or maybe possibly above the posted speed limit, when, all of a sudden, some doucher in a Land Rover wouldn't share the road and I, I mean, someone, was forced to swerve toward the curb and possibly hit the right side mirror on a garbage can that someone forgot to remove from the fucking street and this happened:

What would one do to fix this? I'm just wondering. Hypothetically.

Anthropologie, You Make Too Many Weird Things That I Want

Is it bad that I want to spend $58 on a watering can when I don't have anything to water?

But... Gross!

I have a problem, you guys. In the medical community, I believe that it's called, "Picking at My Bottom Lip Until it Bleeds."

This isn't a bad habit that I've had since childhood or anything; in fact, I really can't figure out when it started. All I know is that my lips are chapped, I cake on lip balm, and before I know it, I am picking off my lip skin.

Lip skin. Ew.

Can anyone recommend anything to help me break this habit? Because I'm getting tired of looking like I've been lost in the wintry woods of North Dakota for days on end.

Climate Control and You!

Ever since my eyes rebelled against contact lenses, I wear my glasses almost exclusively. I save contacts for extremely special events like birthdays, weddings, and going to San Diego. Of which I am doing this Sunday. Bitches.

Anyway, my office is located on the lower level of the art museum on campus, and the building is climate controlled year-round. This is nice, but that doesn't just mean temperature. It also controls the humidity levels. You know, to take care of the stupid artwork that is art and that isn't dinosaurs.

(God, I wish my office was in the Natural History Museum. It would be so much cooler if it was.)

Right, so during the winter, I walk my ass from the bus station, grab a coffee and/or slurpee, and attempt to get to work on time. When I enter the museum, my glasses fog up immediately and stay that way for a few minutes.

At the risk of looking stupid (because apparently I've decided that I care what people think, but only at this moment), I remove my glasses right before entering the museum and make my way down the stairs to the lower level.

Clearly this is a good idea, right? You don't need to have good eyesight before heading down a set of marble stairs with no distinguishing features, right?

Well, you can breathe safe, my pretties. I've only almost fallen down the stairs like, twice. The odds are in my favor at this point.

So my vision is seriously compromised at this point, but I hold on to that railing and I've made it through. It's when other items cross my path that causes tension in my brain.

When the brain doesn't get a clear picture, it becomes disoriented. Or, at least mine does. Mine gets annoyed, then confused, then scared, and then annoyed again.

Like when I wake up in the middle of the night and realize I can't see anything. It's pretty annoying until I remember that my eyes suck. But then I can't find my glasses on the nightstand because I probably knocked them onto the floor with the blanket at some point during my slumber, and this is confusing.

Then I start to believe that I'm hearing noises and become convinced that the floor lamp is a murderer. This is also the same emotion behind the reason why I don't look into mirrors at night because of the mirror ghosts, obviously. Scary.

And then I just get annoyed that I am awake at all because sleeping through the night is pretty much a delicacy.

Okay, so there you have it: annoyance, confusion, scariness, and annoyance.

When I arrived at work the other day, I removed my glasses and made my way down the stairs. Halfway down, I stopped. There was a strange guy at the bottom, talking on his phone, and staring at me.

I didn't want to make it weird, so I kept walking.
Why was he still STARING AT ME?

Oh.

What Am I Supposed to Do On My Commutes Now? Listen to the Voices in My Head?

Balls on a stick, I think I lost my iPod.

FUUUUUUUUUUCCCCCCCCCCKKKKKKK.

I'm really not sure where, when, or how it happened, but I'm guessing that it's my own damn fault. I carry it with me everywhere, and it's possible that it fell out of my bag. More likely? Someone stole it. MOST LIKELY? I lost it.

Now That I'm Realizing How Much Money I've Been Wasting, I Want to Throw Myself Off Of a Building

I hate admitting that I am wrong. That I was wrong. That I will possibly be wrong at some point in the future. The whole idea of giving up the infectious power of BEING CORRECT makes me nauseous.

It's bad enough when I am wrong... having to admit it? Gah.

So here goes, "Jill, I was wrong. WRONG, WRONG, WRONG."

And now you're all, "OMG, what was Heather wrong about?" and "My stars, who the hell is this Jill person?"

You see, I was lucky enough to meet Jill last summer, while temping at the Medical School. She hated her real job, and I hated my temp job, and eventually she transferred out to another department, and I got a real, actual job that paid me benefits. Which was awesome for the both of us, except that we were now working miles apart. MILES.

So because she drives to work and stays there all day, she has a parking permit. I work there in the mornings only, and then have to get my ass to Central Campus, where a good parking spot is more valuable than 77 virgins. So I hadn't gotten a parking pass because lo! Buses exist! And I could take one in the morning and then when that job was over, I would take another to my main job! Of course, that would mean an hour of bus riding each day, but that's what books are for!

So that happened. For about three weeks. Then I started getting lazy. Hitting snooze repeatedly. Staying at Mike's. Staying at Mike's and hitting snooze repeatedly. And I started driving to the A.M. job.

For someone like me, without a permit, it costs $1.10 per hour to park in the visitor lot. I work for four hours, give or take fifteen minutes here and there. That's ... almost five dollars a day! And I've been doing this for... way longer than I would like to admit.

So Jill told me, pretty much every time I talked to her, that paying for visitor parking was completely retarded and that I should get a parking pass. I may be a temp employee up here on North Campus (making me ineligible for a pass), but I am a salaried employee on Central Campus. BEATING THE SYSTEM IS FUN.

Yet, I ignored her. It would be silly to have a pass! There are many gradations of permits, and the one I would need to park up on North Campus was practically nonexistent on Central Campus.

But the other day, when waltzing into work, I noticed a sign about parking permits and how "easy!" it was to order one! So I checked out the site.

Basically, I can park up here for less than twelve bucks each month, and the fee is taken out of my paycheck before taxes. So six dollars every two weeks, or five dollars A DAY?

So I ordered a permit.

And I wonder why I never have money to like, buy food. God, I'm an idiot.

Brain? Are You Listening to Me? LISTEN TO ME!

It was fucking HOT today. HOT.

I got to my morning job at 7:45, and since it was Friday, I was wearing jeans. I love this dress-down rule, especially in the summer. Since the majority of the college students are rarely better dressed than the panhandlers, I still look slightly official.

I was fine throughout the morning in the overly air-conditioned building, and when I left at 11:45 to stop home to grab some lunch, I changed out of my jeans into a skirt. But THEN, my brain decided that there was no reason to change into something cooler. I replaced the skirt with my jeans.

That was all well and good, until I missed the bus by half of a block (DAMN YOU, EARLY BUS), and had to hoof it into campus. That's two miles, baby.

And I was wrong about the temperature. WRONG. It was 89 degrees at this point. The humidity was relatively low, however - at a nice 70 percent.

By the time I made it downtown, I was dying. I stepped into my favorite shop for some air conditioning, but that only seemed to make it worse.

As I was waiting to cross Main Street, wiping the sweat out of my eyes, and trying to keep my glasses from sliding off of my face, a hippie chick asked me for thirty cents. As I handed over the only change in my wallet, I think that she decided I was crazy (or possibly high), what with the exorbitant sweating, and backed away slowly.

But not before calling me "sweetie."

The closer I got to campus, my thoughts of dying increased. I had on a black tap top (but not hooker-ish. Classy, you know? Classy.) with the jeans, and my flip flops. Black was clearly an inspired choice. Sure, I was sweating like a crack addict, but at least you couldn't see the sweat.

I was a block away from Orchid Lane, a total hippie store (lots of hippie talk today, eh?) that just happens to stock one of my favorite lines of clothing. I could see skirts flowing in the breeze as they hung on racks on the sidewalk. I was practically halfway out of my jeans by the time I got to the shop, and into the dressing room before I could count to ten.

I wore it to the register and they removed the anti-theft device and price tag (cost for a linen wrap skirt? $12. I LOVE THE HIPPIES). The relief was immediate and amazing.

But I'm still an idiot.

I'm An Idiot, Part ONE MILLION

So I dropped a vase on my head.

You might ask yourself, "How would one do such a thing?" And I am here to tell you that it definitely wasn't planned. Does that make you feel better, or does that make you think that I am a bigger idiot than you already think?

So I was getting ready for work the other morning, and I had a few minutes before I had to leave to catch the bus. Because I have to get up before six a.m., I'm usually still dragging when I need to leave the house at seven. (A ha! Clue #1.)

And just because I should get up before six doesn't mean that I actually do. Which, again, just proves that I am a complete moron when it comes to planning my time.

Anyway, I didn't get out of bed until 6:35. (Clue #2.)

Lately I've been smart about setting out my work clothes the night before, but I hadn't actually done that this time because why would I? God. Most of my summer wardrobe was either strewn about on my window seat, folded nicely in bags that brought it to my house after its laundering at Mike's, or dirty (there are several places that dirty clothes have been kept lately, and that includes the floor, the bathroom, and the actual hamper). So as I rushed through a lightning quick shower, I mentally prepared an outfit in my head, NOT KNOWING if it was clean or available or, most importantly, FINDABLE. (Clue #3.)

I got out of the shower and proceeded to run around like a banshee. As I was combing out my hair, I was trying to find a bra. As I brushed my teeth, I was trying to pack something for breakfast. As I was drying my hair, I was trying to put on a skirt. It was ridiculous.

I should also mention that I have this cute piece of furniture in my bathroom. Because it's an older house, there is no storage in the bathroom. I found an old nightstand at a garage sale last summer and it works perfectly. And so there, right on top, is where I have a little glass that holds my makeup brushes and a larger, heavier vase that holds my hair brushes and comb. (Clue #4.)

I was actually doing okay with time and decided that "Today can be a day that I actually wear makeup, yay!" and started applying mascara. I don't know how, but I somehow knocked into the nightstand and heard something small fall off the surface. I figured that it was a bobby pin and finished getting pretty (for once).

I was ready to go! On time! And all that I had left to do was to grab some jewelry and zip out the door! I keep my everyday jewelry on my dresser in a little ceramic bowl, and yet, my ring was not there.

Where do you think it was?

Knowing that I had to free my ring from dust-bunny doom and catch the bus on time, I ran to the bathroom, plopped to the floor, and attempted to slide the nightstand away from the wall.

"Hmmm... this fucking thing is heavy with actual stuff in it. I had better just give it a shove regardless of what is on top!"

And that's how the square, heavy vase fell on my head and then on my arm, making me cry and convincing me that I had a concussion and was going to die if I fell asleep.

I still caught the bus. Be proud.

I'm Really Not Sure How to Title This Post, But I've Definitely Added the 'I'm An Idiot' Label

So I got my latest issue of National Geographic in the mail yesterday and glanced at it quickly to see if there was an article about dinosaurs, upon which I would read it immediately. Obviously. Unfortunately there was not, but there was an article on "The World's Rapiest Cat."

No, wait. That's "The World's Rarest Cat." Hmm.

(Also, here is what the "World's Rarest Cat" looks like, in case you were wondering:

My guess is that if he were to be in fewer kung fu movies, he wouldn't be as rare. Because even if he was a powerful fighter, he would still be but a cat.)

Anyway, I was relieved that the cat was the "rarest" and not the "rapiest," because though I don't want to think of cats as rapists, sometimes you do have to wonder about the animal kingdom. I mean, have you seen video of elephants? Male elephants? I mean, that shit's scary.

Wait, I seem to be getting into a weird area here.

Forget about the elephants. Rapey cats, now, those are difficult to ignore. You just don't know what they're thinking. They might just get all rapey all of a sudden, and you would have no way of preparing. We have no way of knowing. CATS DON'T TALK.

God. The whole point of this insane narrative is that I think that I have some form of disorder where I read words incorrectly. Like, ALL OF THE TIME. Part of it is that I read too quickly, scanning groups of words rather than reading one word at a time, so I can sort of see how I could mistake one word for another.

And the weird thing is that, more than anything else, I see dirty words instead of normal words. "Rapiest" is clearly a dirty word, but what about seeing "public," but without the "L?" Or "sex" instead of "six?"Or "naked" instead of "building?"

I think I'm messed up.

The Winter of My Discontent

When you're about to head out of your house and into your day, you go through a checklist in your head. Okay, maybe you don't, but I do. In the winter, my list is a little longer than usual.

Phone? (I forget mine ALL THE TIME.)

Wallet? (I... forget mine ALL THE TIME.)

Lunch? (I leave it on the counter more often than I'd like to admit.)

Umbrella?

Gloves?

Hat?

Keys?

Book?

iPod?

There are more items on this list at times, but the point I am trying to make is that even the best of us make mistakes. And when a person, say, oh, I don't know... sleeps in late and is scrambling to catch the last possible bus before having to succumb to a brisk two-mile walk or waiting for the next and rolling into work thirty minutes late, it makes sense that things are going to be forgotten.

And you know? When it's 7:03 in the morning, and the sidewalks aren't cleared of snow, and you're about to haul ass down the middle of the street to the bus stop to avoid falling on your ass, you're just not of sound mind to be expected to remember everything on that list.

And why are you late? Because of the jerk-ass snooze button.

WHY is there a snooze button? The evil snooze button of pure evil has left people like ME to our own devices, which means that we give in to our inherent laziness and return to half-sleep only to be rudely jarred awake minutes later. Why do we give in? Why do we hit snooze? We're just making it more difficult to get out of bed in the long run, and we're running the risk of constant tardiness. Constant! DAMMIT.

Of course, when it's snowing, you'd think that one would remember one's fucking hat, instead of leaving it at the top of the stairs, where one purposely left it the previous night, before clearly stepping OVER IT on one's mad rush to catch the bus.

What the hell, HEATHER?