Hard Luck Woman

Why is it that when I plan something nice, it always goes horrifically wrong? Yet, when I scheme something that's on the naughty girl side, I pull it off without a glitch?

For the past week, I came up with this plan that I was going to cook these pork tenderloin things for Paul for his birthday. Those of you who know me well know that I can barely make toast and powdered iced tea mix. So this was a really big deal and a really big surprise for me to pull off. It was all I thought about all day.

I ordered a coffee flavored ice cream cake from Coldstone Creamery for him last week. Of course, my dad had a cake for him yesterday and his parents did too. So we already had a lot of leftover cake, but thankfully no one got him an ice cream cake and I know how much he loves a good one. I still needed a few things from the store to make the meal and there is a grocery store in the same shopping complex as Coldstone. I figured I'd grab a few things, pick up the cake and be home by 6 pm, right?

Wrong.

Well, I made it to the grocery store. Looked everywhere for breadcrumbs and then finally found them...BY THE BREAD! Go figure! I got back into the car to go to Coldstone which is in another building of the shopping complex across the road. But as I was driving, I noticed people staring at me more than usual. And my little electric car that is usually silent when going under 25 mph was actually making noise. I pulled into Coldstone and discovered my tire was completely flat. Well, ok, maybe just flat on the bottom. But still. I wasn't going anywhere.

What to do? AAA or Toyota Roadside? I figured I'd have to use Toyota, right? So I call, and the guy asks me if I'm in a safe place and I said yes. Then he asked where I was and I told him the name of the shopping complex. Then he gets all indignant and is like, "Ma'am, I'm in Arizona. I don't know what you're talking about." Thanks, asshole. This shopping complex is right on the border of two towns and I wasn't exactly sure which I was in, but the guy finally figured it out and remorsefully joked with me about going into Coldstone and getting some strawberry shortcake ice cream. I called Paul and left a message for him to call me back on my cell. I was going to have to ruin his surprise because I learned that it would take 45 minutes for someone to come help me. I'm pretty sure I know how to change a tire, but goddamn it, I pay for these services, I should use them. And I was still in my work clothes.

Then I tried calling Tommy at the house to let him know that he should probably eat dinner, but I think he's afraid to answer the phone here. And I didn't have his cell. So then, I did what every princess does when she's in a jam.

I called my daddy and cried.

He told me that it was okay. That I had a good heart for even thinking about doing what I was doing for Paul and that he'd understand. And he was right. But it still had me upset.

But nothing cures tears like ice cream. So I ran into Coldstone and told them that I hadn't forgotten the cake and explained the situation. Then I had some Irish Cream icecream with Oreo pieces. I felt a little better.

So then Paul called me back and I had to tell him. More crying. Paul left work and said he'd come sit with me while I waited. He called Tommy and told him to eat. As I was waiting, this lady parked next to me in a big SUV and had this obnoxious little tie dyed clad child who kept saying, "MOM! MOOOM! That car has a flat tire! That tire's flat! Is that bad?" And she was like, "Yes, that's very bad."

I've never actually wanted to kick a child in the nuts before.

So Paul got there and I climed into the Protege and waited. Then I get a call from a chick (!) saying that she was trying to find me "They said you were at some creamery??!?! I'm at Turkey Hill. I'll turn around and come back." I'm thinking "Great! Some diesel dyke is coming to help the little princess with the flat tire at the mall." I felt so dumb. Then the girl showed up...all 90 pounds of her, in butterfly fling flongs with nicely pedicured toes. That's about when Paul joined me in feeling dumb. Turns out I ran over a nail. It must have happened at work. Four years I've been at that place and I never ran over a nail. Why today when I had such great intentions?

We ended up getting sandwiches at Panera and I picked up the cake. When I got back to my car, I started it up. I noticed one of my doors was open, so I got out of the car to figure out which one. But I forgot to put it in park (see, in the Prius, "park" isn't an option on the gear shift. There's this button that you press and I just forgot.) Of course I didn't notice all the warning lights that went on when I opened the door. I was too far gone until I felt the car slowing going forward while I was now out of it. I jumped back in and put it in park. I'm sure the children nearby learned a few new words.

Luckily, I made it home. Of course, when I got home I discovered that the cake wouldn't fit in the freezer!!! Grrrrr!

Paul has to drive the car tomorrow to get my new tire since I have to go to Philly and have school. He's afraid to drive it. This should be interesting.

It's not like I wasn't stressed enough with school starting tomorrow...geez!

Too Many Margaritas

So last night Brenda had a party and I finally got to see this house that she has been working on since I bought mine. Gorgeous! Just fucking gorgeous! I would never be able to do what she did. I didn't see any before pictures, but from what everyone said, it needed work. You'd never know it from what I saw last night. That girl just constantly amazes me.

I drank all these margaritas and watched everyone play cards. My friends are so funny when I'm drunk. Danni, the sober mormon was cursing up a storm. Paul kept saying, "That word isn't in the Book of Mormon." Then Griff was talking to this girl and Griff, being Griff, used sign language. The girl's boyfriend looked at Griff and said, "Did you just use sign language?" And Griff said yes. And the guy said, "You know she's not deaf, right?" I love hanging out with people outside our circle sometimes. And of course Neil got drunk and we baited him all night for the stinky kid on the bus story. This time it was embellished with a product endorsment for Irish Spring soap.

There was this guy there who was such an asshole. After discussing my Prius for a long time he started telling me how he could put my car inside his Expedition and how he'd never drive a small car because he has bad luck and they're unsafe. He went on and on about why he chose the Expedition over the Escape. I tuned him out and decided that the reasoning had to be based on the size of his small penis. And, well, you know me. I like to call people's bullshit. The guy was like, "I can drink! I drank 15 Guiness in 4 hours when I was in Dublin." And I was all, "Regular or extra cold?" And he looked at me dumbly and said, "In pints...Guiness.." And I was like, "Right...regular or extra cold. There's two kinds." He had apparently never heard of the extra cold and I had to explain it all to him. Bullshitter. Paul thinks I made him cry. Then later he was talking about how he's deathly alergic to cats, but not when he's drinking. I made an ass out of him for that too. My friends who arrived late thought I was being harsh at first. But after playing cards with him, they actually thanked me for being evil.

We came home at 4 am, passed out and got up and noon. It rained today so I really didn't feel like going anwhere.

My Cat the Cartoon Geek

For the last two nights, Shmuffin and I have developed a little ritual. I set the sleep timer on the tv and put on Adult Swim while I try to relax and doze off. Shmuffin has decided to lay by my head and rest his head on my shoulder, facing the tv to watch ATHF with me. He loves it! He just stares and purrs. Everytime Meatwad comes on the screen his eyes get real big and his ears perk up. I can't tell if he's intrigued or hungry. And if I happen to change the channel, he gets up and leaves.

I Am Not Your Seniorita...Tori Last Night

Last night, Paul and I drove to beautiful downtown Camden, NJ to see Tori Amos. It's always a pleasure going to Camden...the projects, the hookers, the poorly labeled street signs.

First we hit Max and Erma's for some sangria, sandwiches and freshly baked cookies. They came out to us fresh from the oven. Amazing! We ended up taking most of them home and they were still just as delicious today. Then we hit the road. After seeing a man freely peeing on the side of Rte 422 (yep, I got a good view of his fling flong) and lots of Thin Lizzy on the way down (it was Phil Linott's birthday) we ended up in Camden, somewhat lost and pulled into the first parking lot we found...$15 (ouch). We looked at some whack job's pictures in the parking lot. Then we came in, entered to win plane tickets from Southwest, bought a t-shirt that says "Potential Sinner" and got our seats. Fan-freaking-tastic seats, dead center about 35 rows back. No one ended up sitting in the seats directly in front of us, so we had an incredibly clear view. The Tweeter Center has now installed two large screens on each side of the stage, which was really nice. On the screen before and between the acts, they had this thing where you could text messages in and they would put them on the screen. That was cool to watch.

The first act was a bunch of hippy chicks called The Like. As we were walking in, someone game me one of their stickers, which was cool. It had this bunny drawing on it. They were pretty good. The second act was the Ditty Bops. Paul hated this. But I loved them. They were cool, but in a way that would require a special occassion to actually listen to them. They're a little vintage and blue grassy. I thought they were cute.

Tori's set list was the best of the four times I saw her. This was all piano and keyboards, no band. That is what I prefer anyway. At one point this girl in front of us asked if her band was there and seemed disappointed when I shook my head no. Blasphemy! She opened with "Original Sinsuality" and finally closed her second encore with Ribbons Undone, two of the few songs on the new CD that I like. She also played the other song that I like called "Goodbye Pisces." I almost fell over when I heard the beginning notes of "Mother" because that was the one song that I really really wanted to hear and it's probably my absolute favorite. She played "Icicle" which is oh so dirty and a lot of songs from Under the Pink, actually. For her covers, she did this part called Tori's Piano Bar (it's what the screen above her head said) and she played "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" and "Tiny Dancer." When she played "Tiny Dancer," I called Griff, because I missed her and I hope she got to hear it because it was so freakin' loud I couldn't tell if she answered her phone or not.

On the way out, this chick was giving out samples of Dentyne Ice and gave us a ton of it. Unfortunately, I put it in the bag and then accidentally spilled the bag tonight and it is now all over my closet. I better go clean that up now.

Talking Sweet About Nothing - Yesterday's Adventure

Paul and I started off on our adventure to Atlantic City to see the Pixies. We were on the road all of an hour before we hit nasty stop and go traffic and got rear ended by a princess and her friends on their way to the mall. We were stunned and really didn't realize what happened at first. Paul, who was king of the one liners yesterday, finally said, "Now why would she do that?" No real damage done, but I'm pretty sure that girl peed her pants. Paul got out of the car and looked at the bumper. Nothing was visibly wrong with either car, but I let out a nasty yell, "Paul, make sure you get her information anyway!" because you just never know. So they exchange info and the girl, who must have said she was sorry like 500 times said, "So now what's going to happen?" And Paul told her that he wasn't going to do anything unless something was wrong. I'm kinda disappointed that he didn't fuck with her more, "Well, now I'm going to call the police and have you written up for following too closely, young lady." She was young. I'm pretty sure she thought we were going to call her parents. It was their insurance info. And I also wonder if she was even supposed to have the car out at all. Needless to say she stayed way back from us until she got off at the King of Prussia exit.

So after a car ride full of silly "how to beat the system in college" stories and a brief nap (by me, not Paul. He was driving), we made it to Atlantic City. The show was at the House of Blues, which is in the Showboat casino. I've never been in that one. We checked the place out a bit and played the slots for a little while. At one point, we were up around $200 on a nickel machine, but we lost it eventually. I hit a big jackpot on the one spin and Paul yelled, "Look at your mellons!" We got coffee and then realized that I left the concert tickets in the car. We went back up to the parking garage, got the tickets and came back. Then Paul showed me the joys of video black jack. And I didn't even break out in hives like I usually do around cards! I found myself playing in a bit of a trance. This little old Asian lady came over and sat next to us and put her player's card in Paul's machine and just sat there and watched him. She didn't say anything to us, just smiled. That could have gone on forever, but we left and made our way to the concert hall.

The House of Blues in Atlantic City just opened a few weeks ago and it's really cool. The general admission floor area is standing room only. And if you're somewhere that you can't see the stage, then it's your own fault. It's set up really well. We actually had seats in the balcony and considered not using them. But then I remembered my low tolerance for people and thought better of it. Even upstairs, there is no bad seat, though.

Before the show started, they were playing this creepy French music and sounded a bit like campy 60's surf stuff, but with these frightening vocals in French. Don't care if I ever hear that again. It freaked me out a little. The opening act was Mark Mulcahy, a guy with an accoustic guitar, a drummer and a hot Irish bass player. The bass player's last name was O'Rourke. I didn't catch his first name and I don't really care. I would just call him "slave" anyway. The group was good, if you like that kind of thing, which I do. The crowd was totally fucking with Mark, though. They asked his name and he said, "Well, we usually just go by my name, Mark Mulcahy, but you can call us whatever you want" And the guy in the crowd said, "Okay, how about Soul Asylum?" And Mark said, "Yes! We're the three children whose faces were on milk cartons that Soul Asylum found." Dude, I'd like to find that bass player in the back seat of my Prius....

Anyway

The Pixies came out and I totally blew the first/last game...and Paul actually got the last song right. I guessed Nimrod's Son (which they didn't even play) to open and U Mass to close, but it was actually Wave of Mutilation (UK Surf version) to open and Gigantic to close. And that's fine. You gotta love a song about big black cock. Throughout the show, Kim Deal kept calling Frank Black by his real name (Charles). I wonder if that pisses him off and if he bitch slaps her back stage for it. And I wonder if she does it deliberately to annoy him. The show was great. I think it was better than the last time I saw them when they were in Camden.

So the show was over and we left. Some chick stepped on the cuff of my jeans and ripped them. I'm just glad that I didn't fall down the steps when she did it.

I offered to drive home at least six times, but Paul insisted that he was okay. I told him that he should try to sleep since he was going into the office today and I was not. He refused and said he was fine. He really hates the way I drive. We just put in some weird old mix CDs and sang along to all these hokey songs that were on them ("I had some dreams they were clouds in my coffee, clouds in my coffee..."). We had a long conversation (well, actually, it was more like Paul giving me a lecture) about how you really have to be careful on this one back road we took to get home. It's hilly and curvey and there are animals on it and stuff. We just got off this road and were about seven miles from home and we saw the lights in the rear view mirror. That's right. We got pulled over.

The cop claims Paul was doing 70, but there was no way. Paul asked for proof and the guy didn't show him the tracking device that he used to time it, just gestured to the ticket and explained how he calculated it. I'm not even positive that he pulled off of the same road that we were on to stop us. My personal theory is that he saw a car driving in the middle of the night and thought it would be a cut and dry DUI case. But no such luck when he pulled us over and didn't smell alcohol because we didn't drink. He didn't immediately tell us why we were pulled over either. It was like he was trying to think of something. I call bullshit. He also didn't write the right date on the ticket. He had it dated for the 3rd, but it was the 4th. Paul is so fighting this one.

And you know what he said when we got home?

"I should have let you drive."

I got to bed around three am. I slept until noon and when I woke up my eyes were so red. I had never seen them this bright red before. I studied a little for the final I have to take tonight. I'm kinda nervous about it. It's my first test in seven years.

Wish me luck!

Hey! Shouldn't You Be Studying? And is that Cheesecake I smell?

Yes and yes. I know. I know...you see that I'm online and not, in fact, reading my boring ass ethics text book.

1. I promise not to embezzel, screw anyone out of their pension, discriminate against anyone because they have a pre-existing medical condition that will drive up insurance costs or because of race, creed, sex, yadda yadda yadda, or knowingly create or sell a product that I know will kill or hurt someone just because legal settlements will be cheaper than fixing the problem. Okay? Can I please have an A now?

2. This is the most boring thing that I've read since Tess of the D'Urbervilles in 9th grade. And I recently found some really interesting things that I really want to read. Please. Stop the torture. I beg you.

3. Yeah, I ate some of my cheesecake. So? Okay, I know I was going to use it to reward myself for doing some of my work. But what am I? Two? This isn't potty training. If I want to eat my fucking cheesecake, I'm going to eat my fucking cheesecake.