Something Shiny! - Musings category

Damn you, high fructose corn syrup!

Tue, 15 Jul 2008 14:00:50 GMT

I've officially turned into THAT person, I know, I know. The person who can't go five minutes without talking about how all the BPA in plastic water bottles is slowly mutating us, or about how what goes on at CAFOs is enough to turn the most rabid carnivore into a vegetarian. I know, I do. But I can't help myself; once you see it, you can't un-see it. And the thing is, I really MISS a lot of those things I'm forcing myself to go without! Dammit, I MISS bottled water! (Sometimes... sometimes I buy a single bottled water and drink it down in an instant, reveling in its glorious bottled-water-ness.) I LIKE ordering food and not worrying about what's in it! Ignorance truly is bliss, folks. Take high fructose corn syrup. We had breakfast for dinner the other night, and I can't tell you how much I wanted to get some Mrs Butterworth's (sue me, okay?) to put on a huge stack of pancakes, evoking days long past when my grandparents would take us all to Perkins and I'd get a plate of silver dollar pancakes swimming in syrup that doesn't even pretend to be good for you. Those were the days. When did life get so complicated, anyway?

Summertime, and the living is... stressful

Fri, 11 Jul 2008 13:09:38 GMT

Some people deal with stress by exercising. Not me, no sir. I bottle it all up. It's a technique that's served me well over the years. The only side effects are 1) occasionally I give myself an illness that even doctors can't figure out and 2) the stress, it comes out, well, in my dreams. My friend Amy, who's also in graduate school, does the same thing and she and I compared stress dreams the other day. She sent me this email:

"I was up most of the night in panic about my class and how I'm going to get it all done. You will appreciate the stress dream I had: I dreamed that people were holding me down and cutting gashes in my arms and filling the gashes with heroin so I'd become an addict."

To which I replied:

"DUDE. That's a stress dream if I've ever heard one. Wanna hear mine? I dreamt that I went to the doctor for a checkup (which I never do) and they told me I was pregnant. Not just pregnant, though: ABOUT TO GIVE BIRTH. But, uh, I didn't look pregnant. I didn't feel pregnant. I was not, that I knew of, pregnant, and CERTAINLY not nine months pregnant. But the doctors, they were convinced that I was pregnant, and had decided to cut me open to haul the (nonexistent) baby out."

Probably not the best way to deal with stress, but it certainly makes for interesting conversations!

Multiplying like rabbits

Wed, 09 Jul 2008 16:35:33 GMT

I think our belongings might be breeding. Allow me to explain. A couple times a year, for the past several years, John and I have lugged anything from boxes full of random stuff to huge pieces of furniture to the Salvation Army. A conservative estimate would be that we've made six such trips since we bought this house in 2004. I'm no mathematician, but doesn't that mean that we should have less stuff than we have now, and more closet/garage/general space? Assuming that's correct, why does it so often feel like there's no room in our house? I'm left to believe that our belongings are multiplying. Anyone? Anyone? Bueller?

Dragging you down with me

Sat, 28 Jun 2008 02:37:13 GMT

I'm not a complainer. Let me rephrase that: I'm not one to complain to anyone who can actually remedy the situation. I don't send food back when it's gross; I don't call the insurance people when our (cough *overpriced*) insurance doesn't cover a routine exam; hell, I don't even complain to the parking lot attendant when he overcharges me (which doesn't happen that often, to be honest). And, clearly, I don't complain to a bed and breakfast owner whose bed is breaking my back and whose breakfast I've not tasted but have been made to feel guilty for missing. That said, and as this blog clearly evidences, I'll complain loudly and often to anyone else who'll listen. Why is that? I know I'm not alone in this trait, this willingness to go along to get along, to not make waves, to make lemonade, and so on and so forth. Why do so many of us seem perfectly happy to whine about our problems to anyone but those who ought to know about them?

All nosy on the breakfast front

Thu, 26 Jun 2008 02:30:16 GMT

This morning, as John and I headed for the front door of Badly Decorated Bed and Breakfast, the breakfast saga got even weirder when the owners' personal trainer remarked that we weren't sticking around for breakfast for the second day in a row. Whaaaa? I'm sorry, I don't believe we've met. My name is NONE OF YOUR BUSINESS. Seriously! When did it become a federal crime to refuse the breakfast portion of a bed and breakfast?

On the air mattress front, John didn't sleep well last night (understandably), which for John means that he talked in his sleep a lot. He woke me up at 4 in the morning wondering aloud what was on his face. He kept pointing at his nose and saying, "what's this??? What's this???" to which I replied "... ... ...it's your nose." Apparently that wasn't satisfactory, though, because then he began touching his upper lip furiously and saying, "there's a bug here! A bug! I CAN FEEL IT!!!" And, really, how can you argue with somnolent logic like that? I hate to admit that I actually looked (smacks forehead), then hissed at him gently encouraged him to go back to sleep.

And now for something completely unrelated: I like Rose and Radish just as much as the next person. But $34 for a single napkin? Isn't that a bit much? Are they individually handmade by Belgian unicorns or something?

"What, no breakfast? Fine, don't worry about me. I'll eat alone."

Tue, 24 Jun 2008 02:01:53 GMT

We're in DC again this week; more research for me to do at the Library of Congress. And as we couldn't get into the bed and breakfast we usually stay in, I got us a room at another bed and breakfast. I knew when I booked this place that it would be... different. But nothing could have prepared me for just how different. The house itself is a nice brick row house with a great little garden out front and a pretty porch in the back. The inside of the house, however, is like something out of this world. The carpeting is blood red. The wall paint in our room is blood red. The walls throughout the house are covered (side to side, top to bottom) in enormous framed prints. The rooms are crammed full of oversized furniture. The bed we're supposed to sleep on is (wait for it) an AIR MATTRESS. We're paying $150 a night for the privilege of sleeping on an air mattress. I can hear the people down the hall coughing, quietly, which means that I can also probably hear them writing to-do lists and thinking really, really hard. But all of that pales in comparison to the owners. We'll call them Alice and Bob. When Alice showed us to our room, she took great pains to tell us that we shouldn't just stay in our room, that we should feel free to sit! In the many sitting rooms! And make ourselves comfortable! As guests should! And read the guidebooks! The many guidebooks! At some point during the grand tour (during which she, no shit, showed us how to unlock the front door-- if you guessed that it's just like unlocking the front door at your own damned house, you get a gold sticker), she talked to us at length about breakfast. Breakfast, apparently, is a communal affair and is prime socializing hour. It begins at 8:00 and everyone eats together. Dude. I'm not paying $150 a night to sleep on an air mattress AND be social in the mornings. If we didn't want breakfast, she explained, we merely had to note that on the whiteboard in the kitchen. Which we did, when we got back from dinner. Except that when we then turned to walk up to our room, she followed us and made certain that we knew just how disappointed she was, tut tut tut. I'm sorry, I didn't realize when I booked this place that it came fully equipped with a Jewish mother! *sigh* It's a nonrefundable reservation, so unless disaster strikes we'll have to tough it out, I'm sorry to say. If you don't hear from me in a couple days, send help.

No rest for the sleepy

Fri, 20 Jun 2008 12:40:54 GMT

So, I've not been sleeping well lately. SHOCKING, I know. I'll give you a minute to crawl back up into your chair, having recently fallen out of it because you were so surprised at my sleep update. All settled? Good. Now, I was reading about Eden's on-going battle with insomnia the other day, and she mentioned that taking a calcium supplement with magnesium before bed helped her sleep. To which a commenter added that eating a banana and drinking a glass of milk had helped her sleep. So that's my new plan: eat a banana (food miles be damned!) and choke down a glass of milk before bed. Hopefully that will keep the night terrors AND the light sleeping AND the drooling at bay. Stay tuned.