Going on a Golf Trip With Your Bar

The staff and friends of Tai's Til 4 returned Monday night from a Golf Trip to Galena, Illinois. I attended this trip with them, and had a purely lovely time. I've spent the last few days compiling a list of Dos and Don'ts so that you'll be able to glean the maximum enjoyment out of a trip with your bar, should you have the chance to go on one.

• DO ride there with your bartender. He already knows how to get there and he'll buy you lunch and play the Cow Game* with you**. He will also take you on a very fun and entertaining "Girls I fucked in Galena" tour.
• DON'T expect a direct route to Galena when riding with your bartender. He will stop repeatedly, including an hour and a half detour to take his niece for a throat culture at the hospital. Go with the flow. It will be worth it when he announces he knows how to cure his niece's sore throat, then walks over and farts on her.
• DO remember to bring your bathing suit, lest you find yourself doing some emergency shopping at the brand new 24 hour Galena Wal Mart.
• DON'T just decide "Aw, fuck it" and go swimming in your underwear. Especially if your underwear are a pair of white boxer shorts. And if you forget and do go swimming in your see through undies, please, please don't get out of the pool and go running around the banquet room where everyone can see your drippy wiener. Trust me: NO ONE wants to see that shit.
• DO room with your bartender. He will handle check in and check out and will carry your bags in for you.
• DON'T expect to get any sleep if you room with your bartender, between his snoring and his jumping on your bed at 4:30 in the morning when he gets done drinking while asking you why you disappeared an hour earlier. You can nap when you get home. (and at the golf course clubhouse under a table before dinner)
• DO steal a golf cart and ride around the course harassing the people who actually went on the trip to golf.
• DO partake heavily of the free alcohol the bar owner provided at the convenient filling stations placed strategically around the course. DO also take advantage of the tiny bottles of Captain and Jaeger the bar owner has stashed in his golf cart.
• DON'T forget sunscreen if you're going to be driving around harassing golfers in a stolen golf cart all day.
• DO invite the little boy bringing you ice to have dinner with the group. Do engage him in a deep conversation about the life of a dairy farming family when he tells you he can't have dinner with you because tonight is his turn to milk the cows.
• DON'T ask him if he has to milk the cows by hand. He'll look at you with scorn and say "no one milks by hand anymore" and then you will feel stupid. Or go ahead and ask if you don't mind feeling stupid.
• DO hang out with an ex-marine CPD sharpshooter and watch him try to cure someone else of the hiccups through Extreme Breathing Relaxation techniques. DO laugh about this with a guy who has a master's degree in religion but dropped out of seminary to be a bouncer.
• DON'T leave your arm hanging out the window for the duration of the 2 1/2 hour return trip - especially if you burned it on the golf course the day before because you forgot your sunscreen.

* The Cow Game is this thing my mother invented when Cap and I were kids. When you go on long car trips, you look out the window on your side. Any cows that you see you count out loud. How ever many cows you count is how many you get to have. As you pass more cows, you add them to the cows you already have. If you pass a cemetery on your side, you have to bury all of your cows and start over. Whoever has the most cows at the end of the trip wins. It took me until high school to figure out that my mother only invented this game to get us kids to shut the hell up and stop touching each other.
**He'll play it but he won't play it right. For instance he'll see a field of cows, and instead of counting them, he'll just estimate "Oh, 100 cows." when clearly there aren't more than maybe 30. Or neither of you will pass any cows for a long time, and then suddenly there will be some on your side, so while you're basking in the glow of your hard earned 4 cows, he'll say, "Well yeah, but I've got like 60 horses." You can try to tell him horses don't count, but he won't listen. At this point I advise that you just sigh and be content with the fact that you got him to play your asinine game in the first place.

Drama-o-rama

So my friend gets very sick while he's on vacation with his family out of the country, right? If you were his girlfriend back in the states, what would you do? Would you:

a. Send him cute e-mails with pictures of soup and ginger ale and other sickbed items, along with messages about how you miss him and hope he feels better;

b. Try not to bother him, but plan a big "Welcome Home!" surprise for him when he returns;

c. Jump on an emergency flight packing a thermometer, throat drops and Vitamin C and rescue him in his hour of overseas need;

d. Have your ex sleep over your house, cheat on your boyfriend with him, tell him about it in an e-mail when he's ill and far from home and friends, then get upset when he breaks up with you and go cry to HIS friends expecting sympathy.

I'll let you think through your answer for a bit while I discuss the concept of consequences. Dictionary.com gives the following definitions for consequence:

1. Something that logically or naturally follows from an action or condition.
2. The relation of a result to its cause.
3. A logical conclusion or inference.

It seems a very simple concept, no? Yet people seem to be struggling with this concept at present. For example, if you should, say, cheat on your boyfriend, the naturally following action is that he may break up with you. This should not be a surprise; it is the consequence that fits your particular action. That you e-mailed him and admitted it really has little bearing here. Nor does your being remorseful about it after the fact. Cheat on boyfriend = no more boyfriend. Similarly, assume that now you have cheated on your boyfriend and he dumped your ass, you decide to call his friends looking for advice because you are hurt. Whose friends are they? They are his. Who is their loyalty to? To him. So if you call them up and try to play the "I'm the victim" card, the logical conclusion of that is that rather than the validation you crave, you will end up getting a big "Fuck you". That is the consequence for deliberately hurting that person's buddy. How you feel about the whole situation: irrelevant. See? Consequence. It's simple.

Now, back to the SAT question at the top of the post. In the context of this recent discussion of the consequence principle, which of these options seems like a good way to NOT keep your boyfriend hanging around?

Epilogue

After drying my body and hair with paper towels and throwing some clothes on, I headed for work. As I stepped out onto the front porch and locked the door behind me, I glanced into the laundry basket.

Mother fucker was still in there.

Amberance and The Visitor (a comedy in three acts)- Part III

Part III

I woke up this morning long before dawn. As in 4 a.m. Usually if I'm up at 4 a.m. it's because a) I haven't been to bed yet or b) the bartender has called me because he 1) is drunk 2) is angry 3) has a bar story to tell 4) feels like making fun of me 5) some combination of the above. Today however, I set my alarm for 4 a.m. on purpose because I needed to be in super early today to run some last minute Monte Carlo simulations (Fish insists on referring to these as "Monty Python" simulations, and to be honest, with as well as this endeavor has gone for me today, that is probably more appropriate. But I digress). Let me just say that because of the bartender's bizarre phone-in hours, I'm generally awake at 4 a.m. as often as not. Somehow though, when you are doing it on purpose for work related reasons, it is almost unbearable.

By 4:45 I had finally tired of bashing my alarm clock to death every 9 minutes, and so I stumbled out of my room and toward the general direction of the shower.

Ah, the shower. The shower is a special place for me. How I love to lather up my head with shampoo and twist it into funny shapes. Or to draw little cartoons on the steamed up window. Or endlessly play with my navel (which contains a small shiny object, which I have mentioned before I am fascinated by). But also I do some of my best thinking in the shower.

Today's shower was a fairly long one since it was far too early to be functional and the longer I stayed in there, the longer I could avoid going to work. Meaning I had a lot of time to think. So there I was scrubbing away and thinking about my waking nightmare the prior evening. I went over my decisions for errors, now that I was out of any immediate spider danger, but concluded that at each turn I had done the only thing I could have done to survive. I was quite pleased with my outer calm and rational* behavior. Concluding that that particular hellish episode was behind me, I turned my thoughts to the few scraps of clothes I had in my closet (since my laundry was still in the car) and attempted to make a reasonable professional ensemble for work. Dark gray slacks and a red mandarin shirt were still available, so I was all set. So, having done the best thinking I was going to do for the day, I rinsed myself off and shut off the water.

Which is when it hit me.

Every single towel that I own is in the backseat of my car.

And "every single towel" literally means every single towel, including beach towel, hand towels, dish towels from the kitchen, even my tiny little scrap of wash rag were all outside and a block away from naked, wet, dripping me. Folks, this is my life. This is the way it is in my world all the time. Every single day is some variation on my being trapped in the shower, dripping wet and cold, with no towel in sight, because of a teeny tiny fucking bug.

I started laughing. I laughed and laughed, so hard that it hurt. And then I laughed some more, so greatful was I for having with a sense of humor about myself.

*or at minimum, rationalized.

Amberance and The Visitor (a comedy in three acts)- Part II

Part II

I'm really not a fan of doing laundry, which is why I own enough underwear that I can go 3 weeks to a month without washing clothes. The drawback to this is that by the time I sack it up and do my laundry, there are TONS of clothes. Enough to usually require me to make several trips when transporting them from house to car, car to laundromat, laundromat to car, and car to house. Also I will be standing there listening to Spanish language television and folding them for a really long time.

Aside from the Mexican soap opera blaring from all corners of the room, laundry goes fairly well. I have enough laundry to use the Big Washers, which for some as yet unexplained reason, I think are really neato. So I'm happy about that. I also get a surprise call from my friend Minnick in Cleveland, who may potentially visit me late next week, so I'm also happy about that. And by the time I'm done washing and drying my metric ton of laundry, almost everyone else has left, and I have the folding table all to myself. So I'm happy about that. While I'm merrily folding my underwear in thirds (not even kidding you), Fish calls. He's on his way home from work, and I tell him how the laundry's going and that my buddy called and so forth. Fish says, "So what about your visitor?" I am momentarily perplexed. We had just discussed the possibility of Minnick visiting, so he couldn't be talking about that. And boys don't typically refer to women's periods as a "visitor" (as we girls do), and in fact, generally don't bring up such topics at all, so I'm pretty sure he's not talking about that.

It is then that I remember: There is a spider on my porch. And it's dark. It will be waiting for me. Waiting for me to struggle up the steps with heavy bags of laundry, repeatedly. Waiting for it's chance to jump on my head and Eat Me. "Oh God," I say in dismay. "Um, can I sleep at your house?" This would seem almost reasonable (almost, because who sleeps over someone else's house because of a spider on the porch?) except for the fact that Fish lives a solid hour away from me, and it is now 10:30. And I have to be at work early. Which gives me another idea. "Oh! Or, I could just go to work now, and sleep under my desk. That might work. There's no spiders in the Loop."

"I'm pretty sure that's not true," said the wise Fish.

I park my car while talking to Fish. Fish tells me about some games he's playing and we chat amicably. Ten minutes later he asks "Are you still in your car?"

Me, sheepishly, "Yeah. But it's because I was watching this little bunny hop around."

"Amber, you have to go in the house."

"No. I'm sleeping in the car. With my laundry." I had already determined that I was going to have a hard enough time getting myself back in the house without having to lug a clumsy, not to mention heavy bag of clothes up the stairs. It would slow me down and give the spider more surface area to use in order to get ON ME. My plan was to leave the laundry in the car overnight, and bring it in the following evening, when it was still light out and I could watch for the spider. I had a few scraps of clothes still in the house that I could wear to work the next day. Assuming, of course, I could find the inner strength to go in the house.

"You are not sleeping in your car. Go in the house."

I meandered my way towards home. Passing my neighbors, whom I've never spoken to, I wondered if maybe they wouldn't mind my crashing on their couch for the night. I stood at the bottom of the stairs and looked up, paralyzed. He's up there. Waiting for me. Waiting to jump ON ME. And I realized that as I stood there quaking with fear, directly above me was an enormous tree. And everyone knows that trees are giant spider army bases. Any second one or 50 of them would be parachuting onto my head. I was trapped between a spider infested tree and a spider infested porch with nowhere to run. I narrated for Fish, in case something happened to me, so he could explain to the police when they found my half-eaten corpse halfway up the stairs. "Ok. Ok, Fish? I'm going. I'm going up the stairs right now. I can't see anything. Oh God. What if they've built a web across the stairs and I walk right into it in the dark?" (Seriously, these are things I was actually thinking. In my head, I imbue them with an overwhelming intelligence, malice and superior organizational skills. And so, so much evil.) I felt something touch my head. "AAAAAAAGGHH! AAAAAAGH? WHAT WAS THAT? WHAT TOUCHED MY HEAD? (pause for hyperventilation) All right. Ok. I think I'm ok. I'm pretty sure that was just a tree branch. All right, I'm almost there..." Fish's patience is absolutely astounding, I'm telling you.

After my flight through the gaunlet of terror, I slammed the door behind me and locked it (you know, so they can't turn the knob and just walk right in). I made Kristen sniff my head for any spiders that may have transferred there from the tree branch, but she didn't find anything she wanted to play with, so I figured I'd lucked out on that one. Fish kindly listened to me wax psychotic about how they have magical powers and can fit into tiny spaces and come out huge again on the other side, and that I could feel them crawling on me,and about how they are Dastardly, in the way the villains from the pre-talkie cinema days were dastardly, laughing maniacally and twisting their mustaches while the train bears down on the damsel they tied to the tracks.

Finally Fish talked me into going to bed, and I fell asleep, waking only occasionally with the sensation of evil eight legged monsters crawling all over my skin...

Amberance and The Visitor, (a comedy in three acts)- Part I

Note: The only, and I mean ONLY reason that any of this happened is because I was dumb enough to actually laugh and enjoy Heather's story about her own run in with a spider. In the future I will take better care when tempting fate.

Act I

I stand in my dining room, staring fixedly at the laundry basket on top of my dining room table. I have my phone to my ear. Fish cheerily picks up the phone on his end and hears me say "Fish, there is a fucking *spider* In. My. Laundry basket."

Fish is 35 miles away and at work. How exactly I thought he was going to be helpful in this situation I have no freaking clue. "Uh oh," says Fish.

"Fish! What am I going to do?! It's inside my dining room!"

I love Fish. I love him because he is possessed of much logic. Unfortunately for me, logic does not help in these types of situations. "Kick it down the stairs and outside. It will come out."

"ARE YOU CRAZY?! I can't touch the laundry basket! It's IN THERE! It could GET ON ME! It's contaminated now. I'll have to throw it out." I am entirely serious when I am saying this. Under no circumstances can I put clothes that touch my body into a container that once harbored a spider. Clearly I must buy a new laundry basket. Eventually. But someone else has to get it the hell out of my house because I can't touch it.

Fish calmly tries again. "Do you have a spray bottle? Spray it with water, and it will crawl to the middle of the basket, and then you can kill it with a shoe or something."

I'm not having it. "You want me to SPRAY IT WITH SOMETHING?! And piss it off even more? No way. No. Fucking. Way. If I spray it, it will *move* more! And my shoe? I can't kill it with my shoe. It could get ON ME FISH. And I'd have to throw my shoe out too. Think of something else."

"I'll call you back," he replied. This is not because he was thinking of solutions for me so much as it was because he had customers with problems he could actually solve and thus, wisely decided to focus on them instead.

I am left to deal with the spider alone. We are having somewhat of a staring contest (I think at one point I even said to Fish in my best crazy-talk voice "He's staring at me!"). I have to get my laundry done tonight. And I can't just leave when there's a spider in my house. There is no way around it. I must pluck up the courage and Act.

I run to my front door and open it wide. I am going to carry the basket out there, but I can't pause to open the door with the basket in my hand, because the thing might get ON ME. So I do it ahead of time (score one for advance planning). I go back to the dining room. Carefully I check all over the outside of the basket, looking for more of them (another of my irrational spiderisms is that if I see one, there is obviously an army of 65 others hiding nearby waiting to pounce). Finding no other interlopers, I grasp the edge of the basket and start walking quickly toward my front door. As soon as I start moving, IT starts moving. Blood curdling screams fill the house, if not most of the neighborhood. Immediately upon getting to the porch, I drop the thing like it's on fire. The spider bounces and almost falls out one of the side holes. I shriek again, because if it is airborne it could get ON ME. But he falls back into the basket and scrambles back to his post to stare at me some more.

Quickly as I can I make several trips to the car, always watching for movement from the basket, and skirting it as much as possible. I get everything into the car and lock myself in. Paranoid, I check every surface of my car for the elusive Spider Army. Fish calls back in the middle of this sweep. "Any progress?"

"Um. Um. Um. (I struggle with words when I'm on the verge of panic.) Lateral progress. The basket with spider is outside on my porch, and I am in my car with my laundry."

"Well good! How is that lateral?"

"Um. Yeah. Um. Well, you see, I'm going to go do my laundry now, but when I get back it will be dark. And I won't be able to SEE where it is. So. I have no idea how I'm going to get back in my house. But I don't have to deal with it for a few hours, so the problem is temporarily solved."

Fish talks to me calmly while I drive to the laundromat. He graciously gets online to research characteristics of the Brown Recluse, since I have now convinced myself that that is what this creepy fucker is. He is patient and makes affirmative sounds as I ramble on about how they are Evil, and Conniving, and Dastardly, and most importantly, Trying To Eat Me. My blood pressure has nearly returned to normal by the time I pull into the parking lot.

You Bastard(s)

I am tired. I am exhausted beyond belief. I sleep and I sleep, and I'm just as tired as before. I also have a sore throat and a headache, and my body is sore. And because I stayed at a Holiday Inn Express last night, I know that what I have is mono.

Alright now, who was it? Come on, fess up. Which one of you fuckos that I've been kissing was sick and didn't fucking tell me? You know who you are. Hell, you know who each other are (hint: if you haven't been in the Chicago area in the last two weeks, it's probably not you). I swear to you, next month when I have the energy to stand for longer than 4 minutes at a time, you'll pay big.

You just think about owning up, you germ-leaving kissing bandit you. You think about it...while I go take (another) nap...

Mini-Update

Someday, and someday soon, you will stop by Bizzybiz and, lo and behold, there will be a long and involved post about the serious and intense drama I've somehow managed to let envelop me yet again in my life. It will make you laugh and it will make you cry. Mostly it will make you smack your forehead and say, "How does she continually get herself into these types of things time and time again?" That day is not today.

Today what you get is a link over to Heather's Blog where you can find details of an experiment the two of us have cooked up for your inevitable amusement and our probable embarrassment. Though honestly I can't wait for my dare. I'm never happier then when I'm making a complete ass of myself and then photographing/writing about it so that the general public can see me for the shitpencil I really am.

So, to recap, and in the interest of brevity: Drama abounds. Hilarity ensues. Posts are forthcoming.

Heather & Amber: Clearly Not Punks

VelociHeather: hey, does the PGS in your name stand for pukey girl socks?
VelociHeather: pungent gritty soda?
VelociHeather: perfect green silk?
VelociHeather: pussy goat shit?
VelociHeather: ugh, that was gross, sorry
VelociHeather: prancing gargantuan sweeties?
PGS DenMILF: haha
PGS DenMILF: i'll suggest those to joe
PGS DenMILF: it joe and jim's band
VelociHeather: putty grape stains
PGS DenMILF: pale green stars
PGS DenMILF: seriously
VelociHeather: haha, gay
PGS DenMILF: is that the worst name for a punk rock band ever?
VelociHeather: lol
VelociHeather: looks like we feel that same about the name
PGS DenMILF: it would explain why joe was rubbing jim's nipple the other day anyway
VelociHeather: pale green stars for a punk band?
VelociHeather: lame
VelociHeather: iron fist of death
VelociHeather: punch the throat
VelociHeather: ass kickers
VelociHeather: those are names
PGS DenMILF: fucked your sister, thad be good
VelociHeather: suck my wang
VelociHeather: punch that bitch
VelociHeather: something like that, you know? needs more rage
PGS DenMILF: indeed. rage is important
PGS DenMILF: it's the main reason i can't be a punk myself
VelociHeather: they could use one of our awesome insults for a name
VelociHeather: like shitpencil
PGS DenMILF: people are like "FUCK YOU" and I go, "okay"
VelociHeather: tinselfucker
VelociHeather: You have no rage?
PGS DenMILF: not enough to fit in with the anarchists
VelociHeather: hmm
VelociHeather: don't they have punk rock for passive aggressive people?
VelociHeather: Groups with names like, "Whatever, go ahead and do it, I don't care"
VelociHeather: "Sure, fine, whatever"
PGS DenMILF: yeah. bouncing souls
PGS DenMILF: also an incredibly bad punk rock name
VelociHeather: hmm, but not as bad as the pgs one
PGS DenMILF: no that sucks mad dick
VelociHeather: there you go
VelociHeather: "sucks mad dick"
VelociHeather: for you avg homo punk band
PGS DenMILF: oh, i like it

This Is Ponderous, Man. Really Ponderous.

Recent events have got me debating: Is it better to have a fuck-friend, or a friend-fuck?

Now I know you're saying, "Amber, you tawdry slut! Perhaps you should be less of a tart and get into an actual relationship."

Someday kids, someday. But the truth is, I'm not over the ex, and I'm even more not over the kids, and I'm having a good time justifying this behavior as "finding myself". So, kindly blow it out your ass.

"Fair enough," you say. "But what in Bilbo's pocket is the difference between a fuck-friend and a friend-fuck?"

The difference is this: A fuck-friend is someone you are sleeping with and that's it. You don't hang out with them, you don't go for drinks or have long telephone conversations, you don't get them a nice birthday card. In fact, you may not otherwise even be able to stand each other. There is nothing there but the physical. A good example of this is the Rusty Nail (nickname compliments of my dear friend TupperDoug, who explains, "Rusty, because he's old. And Nail, because he likes to nail you." Thanks, D). The Rusty Nail used to work with me several jobs ago. He was an ornery bastard who never turned his timecards in on time, and resented having this 21-year old fresh from college with her fancy degree little lassy nagging him about it. For my part, I thought he was a stubborn mule and general all around asshole. We used to get together on Tuesday nights and make hate to each other. The next day we'd be back at each other's throats. This went on for an entire summer. We never started hanging out, we never went to dinner. Hell, we never even learned to get along. I haven't seen him even one time since I quit that job. That's a fuck-friend.

A friend-fuck is someone that is just exactly like your other friends. You get together, hang out, go to parties, talk on the phone, e-mail, whatever. You also happen to occasionally fall into the same bed, and subsequently each other. Everything else stays the same. You don't start holding hands in public, or buying them flowers or shit like that. You're just friends. Friends with a cherry on top.

So which is better? With the fuck-friend, there is no chance of getting any more deeply involved. There are no feelings there, even of the non-romantic variety, and therefore no real chance of getting hurt. But along with that, there is never going to be anything deeper, and if it goes on long enough it will start to get hollow (read: boring). Conversely, with your friend-fuck, you have the benefit of being with someone you really care about. You actually have something to talk about in between takes or what have you. But what you also have is a connection. A connection that can grow into romantic feelings on the part of one or both parties. A connection that can lead you down a path of fear and jealousy. The dark side of friend-fucking if you will. The kind of stuff that if you don't tread very, very carefully could unravel your entire friendship.

Over the years I have found myself in both of these situations a number of times, and I have to tell you people: I still don't have an answer for you. Or, for that matter, for me. The benefits and drawbacks for each still appear pretty evenly balanced.

It's a mystery kids. And that's why, so is mankind.

Murphy's Law

Today I'm wearing a dress. It has material of three colors: white, red and black. Also today, I stopped for a very rare cup of Starbucks finest on my way in. Because I am Captain Klutzo, I spilled it within seconds of leaving the shop. Where did it land?

Yes. Only on the two white parts.

6th Grade English

Remember when you were in junior high or middle school, and your English teacher made you write in reflective sentences? An example:

Homework question: Did Suzy go to the grocery store with her mother?
Your answer: Yes, Suzy did go to the store with her mother.

Some guy was talking like that on the train the other day:

Reflective Sentence Guy: What do you want to do tonight?
Aquaintance: I don't know. Would you like to get some dinner on the way home?
RSG: I would like to get some dinner on the way.
A: Do you think we should just grab takeout?
RSG: We should just grab some takeout.
A: Oh! I think I have some leftover cake for dessert!
RSG: Yes, leftover cake would be good for dessert.

This went on from the Loop all the way to Belmont. You know what? It's annoying.

This Is Why My Friends Always Run Away

Have I mentioned my childlike awe surrounding small shiny objects? Fascinating I assure you.

Such as yesterday. I took a break from working* to use the latrine yesterday. I was sitting there (as girls do) looking at the floor, and I noticed some little tiny silver pieces of something I couldn't identify.

Which obviously made me think of mercury. You know, the mysteriously expanding-with-heat, in a liquid state at room temperature metallic element, formerly of thermometers**? That's what tiny silver specks on the bathroom floor remind you of right? Right?

So anyway, I'm in the can, pondering mercury. I once spilled some mercury by dropping a thermometer on the floor. And immediately panicked because, you see, I have a cat. A special one. A young one. Who, like many young animals of various species, likes to put things in her mouth. And completely brain-addled person that I am, in my head I start picturing my cat, floating in water upside-down with x-shaped eyes. Because that's how they always draw mercury-poisoned fish, so I figured Kristen would eat some, draw x's on her eyelids, find a body of water, willingly get in it, and keel over dead if I didn't do something to clean up the mercury right then.

Have you ever tried to clean up mercury? It's hard. It beads up all weird-like and rolls around on the floor. Eventually I discovered that if I blew on it, the whole mess would gather as one large quivering silvery bead. Once I did that, all I had to do was get a paper towel and mop it up right? Because, hey, liquid!

But that didn't work - I did successfully get the mercury bead on top of the paper towel, but instead of absorbing, it just rolled around on top like a spineless marble.

All of this went through my head while I looked at the shiny metal things on the floor of the bathroom. When I got back to my desk I asked my friend Fish via AIM what he thought about my bead of mercury, and his take was the same as mine: that the molecular structure of the mercury must simply be too big to fit into the holes in my paper towel. It is a metal after all, despite it's viscosity. But then, as always happens, Fish wanted to know where I even came up with such a question.

And that is why my friends consistently end up running away.

*carrying on multiple IM conversations with Fish, Vicodin Jim and PGS JoE.
** Hot Heather informed me last night that thermometers are now made with alcohol instead of mercury, assuming you can even find one that isn't digital.

I'd Tell You About It, But I'd Have To Kill You

Just coming off of one of the most awesome weekends ever. It was beautiful! There was sex! There was booze! There was rock and roll! (though, not all at once nor necessarily in that order)

I had so much fun that, unfortunately, I can't really tell you about it. There are people who are reading who will barf if I post all the gory details, and other people who might read them and find out Things of Which They Need Not Know (T.W.T.N.N.K.).

What I can tell you is that the guys from Sum 41 are really nice guys. And that that opinion is based on spending 35 seconds watching them sign a big glossy photograph for me and the collective 6 words they spoke to me. But they did it while smiling, so obviously they are very nice.

I can also tell you that Rise Against rocks so much ass I started to think that maybe I should become a punker. And I can tell you that when Rise Against is rocking out all hardcore-like, and a torrential downpour starts, that it is very cool and punk rock to just keep jumping up and down and waving your fist (or potentially your "rock on" finger-pose) while getting thoroughly drenched. Until they are done playing, and you are cold and wet, and no one knows if Sum 41 is even going to get to play, let alone what time it will be, so you go home. (Note: after careful consideration of this last part, I have decided that being punk is still not quite for me.)

I can also tell you that my brother makes a mean Long Island, and that by "mean" I mean "Gets You Fucking Drunk". And that if you're ever at a party of my brother's, make sure to order his very tasty self-invented shot called Barney's Balls (it's purple). Just be prepared to wait 20 minutes for it, as it involves about 17 kinds of liquor, a shaker that leaks and the ice which he stores in a separate room.

I'd like to tell you about how cool my cousin Sarah is, but much of her visit occurred during the T.W.T.N.N.K. So I'll just say this: she's really fucking cool.

So is my friend Fish, but again T.W.T.N.N.K. prevents me from elaborating.

So you see, a good time was had by all, but really you don't see, because the best parts happened during T.W.T.N.N.K. and I've entered into a C.T.K.S. (Conspiracy To Keep Secrets) even though in my humble and sober opinion, the T.W.T.N.N.K. wasn't really as B.A.D.A.P.A.M.I.O.T.B. (Big A Deal As People Are Making It Out To Be).

But whatever, y'all. It kinda harkens back to the days of Tim Doesn't Know and that's never not fun. My advice? Come visit me if you don't already live here. We will create our own nights of T.W.T.N.N.K. and you too will have something to hold over the heads of your friends and torture them with.

*Addendum: Hot Heather would like me to add that she was present for nearly every event chronicled and not chronicled in this post.

Tai's Til Noon

Hey, you know what's weird? Being in the neighborhood bar all by yourself. And I'm not talking about when the bar just opened, the bartender is in the corner playing video games, and you're the first person to show up. What I'm talking about is, it's 7:30 in the morning, the staff has left, the sun is shining and the only noise is coming from the TV that the owner left on for you, which is blaring a story about Danika Patrick only being 100 pounds for the 15th time in a row on ESPN News. You are in the bar and you are alone. Dude, it's really weird.

I found out that being in a bar all by yourself on a Sunday morning is weird this past Sunday morning, when I was in Tai's all by myself, feeling weird.

No, I didn't pass out under the pool table unnoticed and get locked in. And no, no one suggested that since I'm there all the time anyway, I might as well just stay there. No, I was there all alone because I was painting the bathrooms. And I was painting the bathrooms because, well, because they really needed painted.

The owner had patched the walls some three months ago, but never got around to painting them. And, you know, I'm always taken care of in that bar. My friend the bartender has been known on occasion to pay for my drinks, and even when he doesn't, I don't have to worry about having cash on me, because the owner is always cool with me paying my tab at some point in the future (the reason this works, for those of you who are thinking about walking out on a tab at Tai's, is that he knows I will, in fact, come back and pay it). So I got to thinking about that, and the half dozen people who were quickly tossed out for their inappropriate handling of me by the wonderfully attentive staff, and I felt like I should give something back for all their generosity, so I decided to offer to paint the bar.

Aw, who am I kidding? The walls looked like seven kinds of shit and it was driving me up a fucking wall every time I had to pee. I had to paint them. I begged to paint them. For free. Anything. I would have done anything to get those walls painted.

Luckily, the owner was sympathetic to my plight*, and agreed that indeed I should paint the walls, I should paint them whenever I wanted, and I should paint them whatever color I wanted. So after much consideration, I painted the walls a very dark blue right after close on Saturday. After close to give them the maximum time to dry before they opened again, and dark blue because it seemed like one of the more difficult colors to write people's phone numbers/leave kiss marks with lipstick/draw cartoon penises on. And they look really good. The owner and the bartender and others all stopped by during the day just to check out my handiwork, and all called to say how nice of a job I did.

But man is it an eerie feeling being locked in a bar by yourself for 6 hours on a Sunday morning.

*wanted his walls painted inexpensively

Ladies and Gentlemen: He's Done It

If you have not yet been to see Star Wars III: Revenge of the Sith, stop reading this right now and go see it. I mean it. Drop whatever it is you are doing: tell your boss you are ill, take the kids to the sitter, turn the lawnmower off, get off the phone, take your hand off your dick...whatever it takes, and get thee to the nearest movie theater. Because George Lucas has done something wonderful.

I know, I know. Twice burned you were. Trust in George you do not. A bunch of crap lately he has made.

Listen. The Force is strong in that one. He has turned back to the good side, and just in time for Anakin to turn away. I cannot express to you properly how impressed I was with that film. The best I can do to illustrate is to tell you that I have completely forgiven him for Jarjar, indeed, for Phantom Menace in it's entirety. What I saw, at 12:01 on Thursday morning was truly, truly a Star Wars movie. Without spoilers, here is my review:

Anakin Skywalker's descent into darkness is absolutely heartbreaking. Peeps, the kid tried so hard to do the right thing, but in the end he just wasn't strong enough. He did all the wrong things for all the right reasons and it cost him absolutely everything. Watching the original trilogy will be for me like watching brand new movies, because I will now see them through the filter of what Anakin went through to become Darth Vader. He is finally a three-dimensional character, rather than the two-dementional character that I grew up with.

And speaking of Darth, the scene where he first suits up is everything I ever dreamed of. There was complete and utter stillness as the entire theater held their collective breaths and watched the mask go on, the helmet come down, a pregnant pause, and then...he take his first hollow, mechanical breath. But it doesn't end there. I don't know why this didn't register with me, because I knew it would have to happen, but when they tip him upright and Palpatine asks him, "Lord Vader, can you hear me?", hearing the answer come from the voice of James Earl Jones rocked me through to my core. It felt like I had been waiting my entire life to hear that sound.

Palpatine, by the way, steals the show. Steals it. That guy is just such an incredible actor. He is so evil I actually felt colder whenever he was on the screen.

Yoda too. Yoda rips some shit up in this one in a way that makes his battle with Dooku look like an afternoon at the ballet. I would not want to mess with that little green dude, I shit you not. The things they can do with CGI these days, I'm telling you.

Natalie Portman. It is ri-fucking-diculous how incredibly fucking hot that chick is.


The viewing itself was an interesting experience. I'd talked this thing up for weeks, and when the day finally came, my boss showed up at the office with a HUGE cake for me as a surprise. It has little action figures of Obi Wan and Jango Fett from their fight scene in Clones, complete with a backdrop. He had written "Happy Premiere Amber!" on it. By the way, did I mention that my boss is cooler than your boss? He is.

I took the cake with me over to Heather's house where I prepared for the movie dressing up as Padme, making Heather take pictures of me sitting outside in the grass like the scene I copied my outfit from, eating the cake and doing shots of DayQuil with Jim since we were both feeling shitty.

We headed for the theater early and were in our seats nearly two hours before showtime. As was almost everyone else. We sat and we sat, until finally two nerds generously offered their fancy, hundred dollar lightsabers up to any volunteers who wanted to duel. The most popular duel was the one between two girls in their pajamas. By the way, if you're a single gal who likes pimply nerdy guys who have never been laid, midnight premieres of sci-fi fantasy movies are the place to be. Dudes outnumbered chicks by my estimate at about 6 to 1. If was a festival of self-abused sausages in there.

Few people were dressed up, although I did see a 4 year old Vader (It's midnight! WHAT ARE YOUR PARENTS THINKING?), but it seemed like everyone had a lightsaber. I had left mine at Heather's and felt slightly left out, but being that all the geeks treated me like it was Padme Appreciation Day I didn't dwell on it much.


Hey! What are you people still doing here? Didn't I just tell you to get your ass off the internet and go to the damn movies? Scram, and may the Force be with you.

Star Wars Day

Hey everyone! It's Star Wars day! Look for a post tomorrow or Friday on:

-My spoiler-free review of the film.

-What it's like to be at a midnight Star Wars showing.

-Photos of me and the other geeks dressed up like complete morons.

-Photos of the cake my boss gave me this morning.

Also, if you haven't checked it out yet, it looks like today is the last entry for the Darthside Blog. I will be sad to see it go.

Eleven hours and counting! May the Force be with you.

Grillin' With Chef Vinny

With summer fast approaching I am reminded of another story involving Vinny the Guinea. (I know it doesn't seem that summer is fast, or at all approaching, but work with me on this one people.)

Back in the day, Vinny, along with half the other people we knew, was employed at a certain telemarketing firm hawking magazine subscriptions. He was good at it. At least, he was marginally better at it than all the other magazine subscription hawkers in his office. We know this because one hot sunny day, he won a prize for being the top seller of the month.

The prize was a brand spanking new propane gas grill. And he was excited, and justifiably proud. He had earned that shiny new grill and by gum, he was going to enjoy it! He called up the whole crew and invited them over his house (we all still lived with our parents back then) on a Sunday afternoon for some down-home grillin' featuring his lean, mean propane powered grilling machine.

But, like most of Vinny's grand schemes, there was a flaw in his plan. See, when you win a free propane grill, you do not always win a tank filled with propane gas. Sometimes, as in this case, you win an empty tank and your cheapskate ass has to go buy the propane for it yourself.

Everyone arrives at Vinny's house late on a Sunday afternoon and starving, only to learn that there is no propane to be had. See, all the propane sellin' joints in southwest suburban Cleveland were closed for the day. Vinny hadn't got the tank filled on Saturday because he thought it already had gas in it. When questioned what in the world would make him think the tank was filled already, he responded, "I don't know. I guess I should have checked. I mean, I guess the tank did seem like it was kind of light..."

So: It looked like a burgerless afternoon for our heroes. But hark! What is that I hear from inside the house? Why it's Vinny's mom! And she's carrying a bag of charcoal, lighter fluid, and a book of matches out to her hapless son! Hooray! The day is saved!

Vinny's mom disappeared into the house while Vinny went to work on his parents more traditional charcoal grillin' getup. The rest of us settled in around the picnic table with our beverages and conversed amongst ourselves. Soon the scent of burning charcoal and sizzling beef filled the air. And it was good.

At least it seemed to be.

The first batch of meaty, juicy goodness was set before us, and we leapt on it like a pack of ravenous dogs. I bit down into mine and let the rich flavors slide over my tongue: salt, meat, lighter fluid...wait a minute, lighter fluid? I looked around me at my fellow carnivores. Aye, everyone at the table was looking from their burger to their neighbor, back to their burger and finally, over to Vinny at the grill.

Vinny was standing in front of the grill. From our vantage we could see another batch of meat, Vinny and his spatula, and a roaring inferno of angry flames. On closer inspection, we further saw that Vince had the bottle of lighter fluid in his non-spatula wielding hand and was frantically pouring it over the hot coals. "Vince," someone finally was able to intone, "WHAT are you DOING?"

"I'm grilling, what does it look like?" he replied in confusion.

It was then that we learned Vince had never grilled over charcoal before. Apparently he had also never WATCHED anyone grill over charcoal before either, because he really and truly thought that charcoal grilling involved the use of an open flame. When the fire kept dying down to embers, Vinny, not realizing that this was by design, began pouring lighter fluid over the briquettes to keep them alight. With our meat mere inches above them. The effect was a taste as though our burgers had been marinated in the stuff. Oily and bitterly disgusting they were, and I was merely thankful that no one had felt the urge for a cigarette with their meal and gotten their face blown off.

Shame of all shames, Vinny's mom heard the shouting, and came to Vinny's rescue by taking over the grilling responsibilities and salvaging what meat had not been tainted. While we sat at the table enjoying our revised dinner entrees, John leaned forward and asked casually, "Hey Vince, do you think you could go in the house and get me, just a bowl of lighter fluid so I could DIP MY BURGER IN IT? This one just doesn't taste right."

Here's to a delicious summer everyone!

Attack of the Stupid Brigade

I went to Best Buy last night to pick up some filmage for Sunday night viewing (High Fidelity and Holy Grail). If you shop at Best Buy as often as I do, you already know about the deal they have going where spending money in their store entitles you to your choice of 8 free issues of Sports Illustrated or Entertainment Weekly.

The woman in line in front of me does not shop there with the frequency I do, and the cashier was explaining this fabulous opportunity to her. Clearly this was a MAJOR life decision for her, because she hemmed and hawed about it for about 10 minutes before finally settling on Entertainment Weekly.

Entertainment Weekly, people. Remember that.

Even after making a selection she was still a bit confused by the whole process. "Eight free issues," she mused. "So, what is that, once a.....month?"

I am not kidding you.

But it gets even worse. I look at the cashier, wanting to share my amusement at this woman's stupidity with someone else, but she can't meet my eye because she's busy reading the back of the card to find out how often this woman will be receiving her Entertainment Weekly.

Sometimes I question why I ever leave the house.

HypoCatdriac

Few people know this, but the center of the universe is a 10 lb. tabby cat named Kristen Ann.

She was a gift to me from my ex. He bought her from the Animal Protective League for $40. For that price she was spayed and had all her shots taken care of. From the first moment she was placed in my arms that fateful Christmas Eve in 2002, I was in love. She was soft and warm, with huge yellow eyes and little white toes on her front paws and when you held her she purred like crazy. 1153 called her the Mitten. She quickly became the fifth child in our house, and everyone spoiled her like mad.

Almost immediately, I think it was even that very first day, I became a complete basket case about her well being. I loved her so much, but I struggled to enjoy her company. Every time she curled up to me, or slept on my stomach, or looked at me with those HUGE kitty eyes begging for treats, all I could think of was "What if something happened to her? What would I do without her? What if she gets sick?" Everyone told me I was ridiculous, and I was. When I was younger I could never understand how people got so wigged out over their mangy animals. I'd never had a pet before. Kristen was my first, and the first time I laid eyes on her I understood.

In February I had to drug her to get her to Chicago because she hates the cage, and the car, and a 6-hour ride surrounded by both like so many nesting dolls was not going to go well without some dope. So I took her to the vet for her annual a few months early to make sure she was healthy enough for a tranquilizer. My vet in Cleveland declared "this is one incredibly healthy cat!" We packed up our lives and came here, and my amazing and resilient kitty settled in much more quickly than I had anticipated. All was going well.

On Sunday, I was sitting in my bed writing some lyrics while Kristen sat next to me having a bath. When I glanced up at her she was licking her arm, and that's when I saw it: an angry red rash, the size of a nickel on the inside of her arm. She had obviously been licking it like crazy for a while, because all the hair from around it was missing. I FREAKED OUT. She has skin cancer. She has a lesion. They're going to have to amputate. No, they'll just put her down. I'm a horrible kitty mom. How could I have not noticed this? She's going to keel over dead by morning. Jim and Heather worked on calming me down. It's just a little rash, cats get them all the time. The vet will give her some ointment and it will go away. It hasn't been there that long, it only looks that bad because she keeps licking it. I finally conceded it probably wasn't that bad, but continued to horde the guilt, because I'm shitty like that.

On Wednesday I took her to the vet. My vet oohed and ahhed over how pretty she is (because she is!) and how well behaved, and how sweet. She looked at the rash, said it wasn't a big deal, suggested I might want to have her teeth cleaned in a few months and listened to her heart.

And listened.

And listened.

And listened some more.

Finally: "Did you know your cat has a heart murmur?"

WHAT!?!?!?!?! I JUST had her checked not three months ago and was assured she was the healthiest cat alive. What heart murmur? The vet explained to me that she had a level 3 heart murmur on a scale of 1-6, and that the fact the she was checked three months ago and had no problems then was worrisome. A heart murmur could be just a ventricle that's not closing entirely, not a big deal, or a sign of a very serious heart condition for which she'll need to be medicated the rest of her life. How do we know which is which? We don't. Not without an echocardiogram, x-rays, ultrasound, blood work....

It was like my worst nightmare realized. I'm completely convinced she's going to die any minute. It's obviously my fault as well. Despite Jim and Heather and the vet all insisting that anything wrong with her is genetic, I KNOW that the truth is that I caused this by stressing her out to much and moving her across the country, away from 1153 and her home and everything she knew. The vet says that because she's asymptomatic, if there is a problem, we've caught it early enough that she should have a long and healthy life. But I know she's just saying that to keep me from panicking. The angel of my heart is going to croak and leave me here all alone and there's nothing I can do about it.

If you've never had a pet, don't get one. They break your heart.

Tests are forthcoming. I'll keep you all posted.