Annabelle Speaks

It Could Be Worse; I Could Be Living In The Movie Psycho

I have never seen Alfred Hitchcock's The Birds, but judging from the title and random references to the movie that I've encountered over my life, there are some pretty pissed off crazy birds out to get people.  I think my family has somehow found our way into a distant cousin of that movie, where all flying creatures are out to get us.

 

Yesterday a pigeon ran into my leg, which was made all the more horrifying by the fact that I was wearing a skirt so it touched my skin and EW.  Also, pigeon, get thee some flying skills or you'll find yourself flattened by a CTA bus.

 

On Monday T was shat upon by a bird while walking across campus.  She is thankfully it landed on her arm and not in her hair.  She is good at looking on the bright side, that one.

 

AND THEN THE BEST STORY OF ALL.

 

So.  At four in the morning on Sunday my mom was awoken from a dead sleep by my dad yelling "GET UNDER THE COVERS!"  Wisely, she obeyed.  It seems a bat had found its way into their room and had LANDED ON MY DAD'S FACE AND BIT HIS LIP.  Let me pause for a moment while you think that over.  Landed. On. His. Face.  The fact that he did not up and die of a heart attack right then is quite impressive, in my opinion.  My blood pressure rises just thinking about that happening to me.

 

What followed was a very silent-movie-era-comedy-routine involving my mom locking herself in the bathroom and my dad running around the room buck naked trying to knock the bat out of the air with his jeans.  (T:  Thank goodness it only bit his face!)  The bat was captured and contained in a gallon Ziploc bag (which my mom flung into the room before locking herself in the bathroom again).  My parents live close to the University of Minnesota, so the next day my dad brought the bat there to be tested for rabies, and the results came back negative.  So I guess all that foaming-at-the-mouth was from one too many root beer floats.

 

Myself, I am going to use this as an excuse to stay indoors and away from windows, lest more flying creatures decide to attack.  And I'll keep a pair of jeans and a Ziploc baggie around just in case one gets in the house.

Bring It, Brett.

I have been a Green Bay Packer fan since I took my first breath.  On Sundays when I was young (before we moved to Minnesota when I was nine) it seemed as though there were always piles of family members gathering at our house to watch the games.  It wasn't about winning.  Hell, this was the 1980s.  Did the Packers win anygames in the 80s?  But it was about being with the whole family and having fun.

When I was a touch older I decided that I really wanted to start to understand the rules instead of just blindly cheering for the green and gold.  I remember concentrating very hard, trying to understand all the different penalties.  Periodically I would ask my dad for clarification on important parts of the game.

"So...when they throw the yellow flag, that is against the Packers, right?"

Time passed and Brett Favre came and joined the team and the Packers enjoyed some pretty spectacular success.  Brett was never my favorite player (I'm a sucker for the running backs), but of course I enjoyed the success he brought with him.  In our family it was often said that he was an idiot and a fucking hillbilly...but he was our idiot and our fucking hillbilly.

Time continued to march on by and 283,982,981 publicity stunts "retirements" later, I have to say I am beyond sick of him.  There are few things in this world that I love to hate more than the Minnesota Vikings, and him going to play there has moved me straight passed the ugly temper-tantrum emotions (I am very attached to my football) and straight to a combination of eye-rolling and determination to squash him like a bug beat the Vikings into the ground in both games this year.

Me, bitter?  I do not know what you are talking about.

All of this is a long-winded way to go about posting this, which my dad sent to me this morning.

Bring it, Brett.  We're ready for you.

How NOT to Die on My Lunch Hour

Around lunchtime yesterday a coworker stopped by to ask if I wanted anything from McDonalds.  I don’t actually like McDonalds, but I do like it when people-who-are-not-me go out and brave the wilds of downtown so that I don’t have to deal with tourists.  If I ever gain the ability to make peoples’ heads explode just by looking at them you should know that the following activities would become more hazardous to your health than ever before:

 

1. Posing for pictures on the Michigan Avenue bridge, stopping all foot traffic on the sidewalk.
2. Stopping your large group in the middle of a crowded sidewalk to discuss the pros and cons of whatever you just bought at the American Girl Store.
3. Coming to a dead stop in front of the revolving door because you can’t walk and check your Blackberry at the same time.

 

So you might want to not do those things.  Unless you want your head to explode, in which case knock yourself out.

 

What was I talking about?  Right, McDonalds.  I did not end up getting McDonalds for lunch because while I like several things on their menu well enough to have a taste, I do not like any of them enough to make a meal out of them.  If I could order half of a fish sandwich, half of a hamburger, two chicken nuggets and a small fry I would be ALL OVER THAT.  Alas, I cannot, and no one of those things is good enough to bother with on its own, so I had to brave the crowds to get my own lunch.  After getting frustrated with the crowds all of seven seconds after leaving my office I panicked and went into a take-out buffet to randomly grab things and get out of there and back to my nice, quiet office as soon as possible.  I ended up with a shockingly color-coordinated lunch consisting of broccoli, green beans, kiwi, and some sort of spinach pasta.  It seems panic draws me to the color green.

 

In closing, I bring you a sign from an adorable store of Random Things near my house, because that place always makes me smile and I have to head out into The Land Of Tourists soon and thusly I need all the smiles I can get.

 

Don't You Wish You Lived With Us?

THE SCENE:  6am, our master bathroom.  T is in the shower, I am blow-drying my hair, and the radio is on.  The cats are probably climbing in the sink/on the toilet, because That Is What They Do.

T:  *from shower*  I have a problem.

Me:  Oh?  What is it, my dearest, love of my life?  (It is possible I'm paraphrasing some here.  Or, you know, flat out making it up.  Work with me.)

T:  My poop is really loose.

Me:  ...huh?

T:  My poop is loose. 

Me: ...

T:  It's all falling apart and just not right. 

Me: ...

T:  I struggle with it every time I'm in the shower.  It's really hard to, like, get clean.

Me:  !!!...?  I...are you telling me you have diarrhea?  IN THE SHOWER?

T: ...I said POUF.  POUFFFFFF.  With an "f'.  My loofah.  That I wash with.  It is loose and falling apart.

Me:  OH!

T: ...

Me:  That would have been a lot funnier if it were really about poop.

T:  I love you.

FIN

I Think I Have An Addiction Problem

You know how in preschool/elementary school many classrooms motivate kids to put away their mats/hang up their coats/do their math by having a CHART of some sort with the kids’ names and GOLD STARS or some such thing for the stuff they have done?  You know how some kids go positively APE SHIT over said gold start?  How they will do anything and everything you tell them if you just put one more GOLD STAR by their name?

I was that kid.  Oh, hell, who am I kidding?  I still am that kid.

We’re doing a Wellness Challenge of sorts at work where we all got free pedometers and are tracking our steps as we walk across the country over the next seven or so weeks.  There are PRIZES and a LEADER LIST and frankly it is all set up to be the GOLD STAR CHART for adults.

I am so going to be at the top of that list if it kills me.

I suspect that whatever competition/GOLD STAR LOVER gene I have that is causing me to obsess over my step counts for this challenge is the same gene that gets me all excited when I find a new time-management game on my iPhone. 

I’ve been addicted to those stupid time-management games since I first came across Diner Dash lo those many years ago.  I’ve owned them ALL.  Ranch Rush, Diner Dash (and many versions thereof), Cake Mania, Turbo Subs, Sally’s Salon, Sally’s Spa, Drive-Through Dash…the list goes on.  There is something so incredibly satisfying about frantically completing the ridiculous task lists and following the ludicrous story lines to their completion and earning SPARKLY GOLD DIGITAL TROPHIES for doing so.

If only I could set up the rest of my life with such rewards.  Anyone want to set up a chart with GOLD STARS to motivate me to sweep?  Because the cat-hair tumble-weeds are really getting out of control, but I’ve got a pile of time-management games I have to get through tonight.

T Thought The Bra Beads Were HILARIOUS Until The Middle Of The Night When The Cats Were Still Finding More To Play With

Today's diet is one I like to call PMS? WHAT PMS?  I think I came up with the name round-about the time I decided that fruit rollupswere a NECESSARY EXPENSE if I were to SURVIVE the afternoon.  I've eaten two so far.  Stay tuned for important fruit-rollup related updates.

But I don't much care, for I am giving myself a pass on strange food choices or other oddities that get me through the day today.  Yesterday was one of those days that was hard not in an epic, character-building way, but in a "man, can one more annoying little thing go wrong today? Oh look THREE MORE JUST DID" kind of way.  Bad train luck, paper cuts, broken necklaces (causingg beads to fly EVERYWHERE in my therapist's office, *sigh*), missing papers, a twisted ankle, and one of those headaches that is just sort of always there no matter what you do or take all combined to make yesterday very Monday-like.  Especially annoying since it was Tuesday.  I gave up on the day and curled up in bed after taking off my bra caused a cascade of beads to fall out of my bra (where they had been unnoticed for SEVEN HOURS after the necklace-breaking-in-therapy thing) and scatter about the room, much to the delight of the three cats present.  Alas.

On the plus side, I am not wearing a beaded necklace today, so I expect no surprises when I change clothes after work today.  I do, however, expect ICE CREAM.  NOM.

Best Stuff I've Bought In The Last 24 Hours

Yesterday I found the COOLEST THING EVER when I was out shopping.  I was at Petsmart, of all places, gazing blankly at the random crap by the register as I waited in line to check out, when my eyes fell upon this (my car key pictured for scale):

It was marketed primarily as a way to hook a bunch of dog leashes together to walk a whole pack of dogs at once, but not being a dog walker or even a dog owner, I didn't particularly care about that function.  HOWEVER, there was a much smaller picture of someone using the carabiner to hold a bunch of plastic grocery bags all at once (something like this, which appears to be a similar product).  This use I AM IN LOVE WITH.  Depending on how many cat-litter-scooping bags we are in need of I either get my groceries in plastic bags or I use our reusable tote bags.  Either way I end up carrying several in each hand up to our third floor apartment, setting them all down, unlocking the door, and then doing a snazzy dance maneuver to pick up the bunches of bags while using one foot to keep the cats from sprinting outside and straight off the balcony.

Frankly, these things were awesome.  The padding on the carabiner is much more comfortable to carry than the plastic/canvas bags we use, especially when there are particularly heavy groceries involved, and picking up all the bags after opening/unlocking my door no longer involves stringing each finger through a different handle while standing on one foot and shooing the cats back away from the door.  I just pick up the two handles and all the bags come with.  ROCK.

The other thing I just bought is an updated version of my lunchbox.  Normally lunchboxes are not terribly exciting, I will grant you.  But I am completely in love with mine, and if those darn legislatures would just let me I would totally marry the thing.  This is the version I have now, complete with a random lunch I packed whenever I took this picture:

It is from Laptop Lunches.  I've had it for about a year now and it is the best lunchbox ever.  I love that four different containers fit in a nice little box and are all space-saving and cute.  I love that it makes me think a bit more about what I pack for lunch to get it to fit and be a balanced lunch.  I love that it is so damn CUTE.

The only thing I didn't love about it was that of the four containers pictured in my lunch, only the green one comes with a lid.  The other three stay closed by being flush with the top of the lunchbox when it is closed, but that doesn't help if I want to bring more than one wet food (pudding, applesauce, yogurt, etc).

NO MORE.  They came out with a Bento 2.0 box that has lids for two containers, and now I can buy Bento Buddies that fit in the new box that ALL have lids.  You cannot imagine how unnaturally excited I am about this.  I am such a lunchbox geek.

Anyway, those are the two best things I've purchase in the last 24 hours.  Just in case you were wondering.