The Junk Drawer

Notice: This post has been edited since its original publish date. I removed the link to the website in question because the person who took my material wrote me last night, made her site private and hopefully removed my stuff. I can’t prove it, since the site is no longer available to the viewing public, but I’m giving her the benefit of the doubt.

However, I’m leaving this post otherwise intact to remind everyone to periodically check for stolen material. Use Copyscape.com, which is free and will scour the web for places where your material has been republished.

Here is my edited post:

This is going to be one mean, angry post.

There is a woman, a fraud, who is posting my blog material to her Xanga website: [LINK REMOVED]

You’ll see on the first page my bathroom story from the other day. If you scroll to the bottom and click through “Next 5,” (bottom right) you’ll see more stories I’ve written (plastic bag story, First Holy Communion, and so on and so on).

She posted no less than ten of my blog posts, some in their entirety, some not, and some edited to make it look like those were her experiences. I also recognize some of my friends’ blog posts there. I’m disgusted and frustrated.

I’ve written her directly, posted to her guestbook, commented on each of the stolen articles and asked her to remove them immediately. I also submitted an email to Xanga to report the violation of their Terms of Use. Is there anything else you guys suggest I do?

What’s upsetting me the most is that she’s getting tons of comments on those posts from people who think she wrote them. As a writer, this is a most bizarre feeling. To have over 30 people comment to her about what a great story she wrote is extraordinarily painful.

It makes me want to give up blogging if people are blatantly stealing my content and getting away with it. This isn’t the first time it’s happened. I managed to get a MySpace page to “go dark” because I outed another thief.

Please, please, please do not tell me I should be flattered. I am not. I am fuming. Tell me something to make me feel better, and if you have any other advice for me, I’m listening.

—-

Fellow humor bloggers, you might want to see if she stole your stuff, too.

Back in November, I wrote about a cake I bought from a new bakery in town. I threw it out because it was too dry and the icing looked better than it tasted. I promised I’d give them a second chance and post back about it.

They blew it. Again.

Yesterday after a 45-minute walk with my sister, I thought I’d reward my effort and ruin whatever benefits I gained from exercising by making a return visit to The Dry, Gross Cake Bakery.

Everything looked scrumptious in the case and I ordered three items (pictured above): A Napoleon, a Southwest pizza thing (don’t remember what it was called), and a half-dozen donuts.

The Scorecard:

1. The Napoleon: Not horrible. The cream and flaky pastry part were serviceable, but the icing was overly-sweet and gummy. It may or may not have been fondant, which is a bakery staple for wedding cakes that looks really pretty, but sometimes tastes like crap. Grade: C+

2. The Southwest pizza thing: Bad all around. The bread was rubbery and tasteless. What I remember of the topping was diced tomato, corn and some unidentifiable meat. I thought it had cheese, but no such luck. Had the topping been 100% bacon, I could have salvaged it. Instead, it went in the trash. Grade: D.

3. The donuts. Ah, the donuts. How can a bakery screw up a donut? Donuts are Pastry 101! I should have known something was wrong when the cashier handed me the bag containing a half dozen of the lovelies. They were so heavy, I almost lost my balance. In my opinion, glazed donuts are supposed to be light and airy. Artery-clogging, yes. Deliciously sweet and fattening, yes. Brick-heavy, no.

Here’s a closer look. See that nice sheen? That’s perhaps how a glazed donut should look. Except for one thing. That’s not the glazed side. It’s upside down. Go ahead and click to enlarge, just put your sunglasses on first.

That shininess is caused by deep-fryer fat globules that are soaked all the way through. I wanted a donut, not a blob of lard. It tasted oily, burnt and slightly rancid. And crunchy. Donuts aren’t supposed to be crunchy, right? Grade: A Big Fat Lardy F!

Now look at the bag they came in. The grease reached flood stage about two inches from the bottom of the bag. It’s soaked through solid up to the first crease. If I thought all the grease got sucked out of the donuts, I might actually consider eating the rest. It seems such a waste to throw them out, but that’s exactly what I’m doing.

Here’s a question: It’s obvious I’m never going back to this bakery, but should I let the owners know how dissatisfied I am with their products?

They should know how un-yummy their stuff is, so they could at least fix the donuts. I refuse to believe I’m the only one who finds crunchy, oily donuts unappetizing. I wanted to love the bakery because they’re close to home and I need a new place for all my forbidden food needs.

I don’t want to post the name of the bakery, since I’m not a professional food reviewer (although I should be). If you know me and want to know where it is, give me a buzz. The rest of you don’t have to worry about stumbling into this greasy dive trying to pass as a bakery.

Now that the weather is getting warmer here in Pa., my sister Marlene and I have begun walking 30-45 minutes a day after work. We weave our way through her neighborhood, happy in the knowledge that spring is right around the corner and that we’re so dedicated to our exercise routine. We’ll be hotties by May, I’m sure of it.

Our walks are always pleasant and uneventful. But last Thursday was different. As we passed a random house, I heard a dog barking nearby and glanced over to find an unleashed one running straight towards me. I prayed there was an invisible fence that would stop it in its tracks. No such luck. He ran out into the street, right up to my knees and thought to himself “Do I take a bite out of the left leg or the right?”

I screamed immediately and Marlene grabbed my hand and pulled hard. “Come over here! Hurry!” My heart was already racing from our aerobic walking, but it was beating even faster at the prospect of having to fend off this creature. Its owners called to it, but it did not respond.

Marlene yanked me along and I never looked back. And then I almost started to cry. Still shaking a block away, I lectured to no one in particular that dog owners need to leash their dogs. Yes, I know most of the time dogs are fuzzy-wuzzy puppy wuppies, but you can never really predict how they’ll act in every situation.

I’m afraid of a lot of strange things, but my fear of dogs is not without reason. When I was a kid we lived near a couple who owned a German Shepherd we’ll call Satan. Our backyards faced each other, split by a small alley. Whenever they couple would come home from somewhere, the dog would freely jump out of the car and start barking at everything. He was as nasty as they come, but its owners loved him. “Oh, he won’t bite,” they would always say.

One day while sledding down the Ice Hill of Death, I made the mistake of heading down just as they were coming home. My timing couldn’t have been worse. Their car door flew open and out came Satan.

All I remember was “Uh-oh. This isn’t good.” I was completely prone. Laying on my back and unable to stop the sled, it wasn’t long before I was met by a face full of glistening, razor-sharp teeth. I’m shaking as I write this. I never felt as defenseless before or since.

I remember screaming as Satan lined up his jaw, ready to take that first succulent bite of me. He went right for the head. Because I was shielding my face with my arm, that was all he could manage to sink his teeth into. Luckily, I was wearing a very thick coat and his teeth only got as far as the inner lining. Thank God for small miracles.

The woman yelled “Oh, it’s OK. You’re OK.” Um, no. I’m not OK. Your dog’s trying to eat my face and would you kindly get him off me? Her husband managed to break things up and I hightailed to my house, tears freezing to my face.

When I got my coat off and showed my parents my arm, we were all relieved there was no blood. He hadn’t punctured the skin, but there were rows of swollen red marks where a clamped jaw had just been. My peace-loving parents contemplated the rest of the night whether they should press charges against the owners, since it could have been much worse and I was still such a mess afterward.

They ultimately decided against it and everyone went on their merry, separate ways. Our families never spoke again, though a few evil eyes were exchanged over the years.

No, I wasn’t seriously hurt and I’m thankful for that. But some thirty years later, I still remember what that bite felt like and I’ll always be fearful of strange dogs, except ridiculously tiny ones that I can swat away like gnats. It’s the big ones that do me in every time. Thanks, Satan. Thanks a lot.

Last week I wrote about the attempt by the Nielsen Ratings company to get my husband Dave and me to become a Nielsen Family. You can catch up here. The saga may not be over. If it continues, I’m getting a restraining order.

Here’s where the story picks up.

Three days after I contacted the Nielsen representative to tell her for a third time we wanted no part of becoming a Nielsen family, she called and left a message at work. All she said was “I need to confirm one piece of information you gave me, so I can update our records. Please call me.”  I didn’t understand why she needed more information other than us saying no, but I called her back anyway to be polite.

What she wanted to confirm was whether I said there were no children in the house, or if I said there were no children under 18 in the house. I replied, “No children at all in the house.” Fine. End of story. NOT SO FAST. Because Nielsen has such trouble understanding the difference between yes and no, she asked me for a fourth time if we would like to take part in the program.

So here we are again. Her begging me to join and me begging her to stop. I repeated that we want no part of this and that I hoped this would be the last time I’d hear from her. She thanked me for answering the question and we ended the conversation. I hung up wondering if the question she asked was bogus — used only as a way to get me on the phone again. I can’t tell you how much I regret giving her my phone number.

That night I received another letter from Nielsen. “Our sampling department chose your home to represent television homes in your community. As a member of the panel, a small unit will be attached to your TV and any VCR in your home.” It goes on to say how we’ll be remunerated and thanks us for our cooperation. The problem is, we’re not cooperating. We’re not participating. We want this to end.

I’m willing to give them the benefit of the doubt that the woman who came to my house didn’t immediately tell them we weren’t participating, and so the letter was sent to us on the assumption we said yes. That she didn’t tell them after the first time I said no tells me she had no intention of giving up on us.

And so it was no surprise that she showed up at our house again on Sunday. This was a week after the first series of no’s and three days after the last phone call where I said no.

When the doorbell rang, my husband looked out and saw a car with New Jersey plates. A-ha!!! I remembered from the first visit that she drove from Jersey and I knew it had to be her.

“Don’t answer the door!!!! It’s Nielsen!!!!!”

To be sure, I waited until she walked back to her car. I recognized her immediately. We are now annoyed in a borderline-call-the-cops kind of way.

She and an unidentified man remained seated in the car for another five minutes or so.  Her partner was seen flipping through what looked like a small phone book, while he casually smoked a cigarette. I was crouched down on the floor of my dining room, watching for what they’d do next. They eventually drove away and then I thought it was over.

Not exactly.

The next day, on the way home from work, I approached my house and what should I see a few doors down but a car with New Jersey plates, idling in front of a neighbor’s house. Oh. My. God. Could it be?

As I passed slowly by the car, I quickly looked over and saw it was indeed our Nielsen friend again. She had her head down and so didn’t see me. But now I had a new problem.

If she looked up, she was going to see me pull into my driveway and into the garage. Then she’d know for sure I was home and I had no doubt she would barrel down the street and pound on my door. She did it before, she can do it again.

So I drove around the block, pulled over on the street that runs behind my house and called my husband. “Dave? Look out back.”

“What are you doing?”

“I’m hiding. The Nielsen lady is back. She’s out front, six doors down. I can’t come home. She’ll see me.”

“Hmmm. Then go to a movie. I’ll hold dinner for you.”

“Wiseass. No, seriously. What should I do?”

“I’ll put up the garage door and you can come around opposite her. If you floor it, you can get in quick. Ready?”

“Yeah. I’ll see you in a minute.”

I backtrack the way I came and floor it up the street. The garage door is open. I don’t see that the woman is where she was parked before, but I have no time to see where else she might be. I shoot in and lower the door. And then we wait. No one comes to the door. No one loiters outside. I think we’re finally safe from the Nielsen people.

What’s clear is they haven’t found another family to replace ours. Because we refused, they need to find another house on our street. What I don’t like is how they’re going about it. To be idling outside people’s homes, flipping through directories, tells me they haven’t sent a letter of invitation to anyone else. Now they’re just desperate.

There is something seriously wrong with this process. Under any other circumstances, if a stranger came to my house uninvited, twice, and kept badgering me to join their group, it might be considered harassment by communication (at least in the State of Pennsylvania). It’s not as though I was selected for jury duty and refused to participate.

There is no legal reason why a person needs to take part in the Nielsen Ratings system. If asked, and a person declines just once, they should cease and desist immediately. If I receive one more phone call or visit from them, I’m contacting the company and you’ll be hearing about it here. Stay tuned.

Think I’m overreacting? Nielsen doesn’t just want to know what you watch. They want your brain, too. (See last paragraph, first page).

Be afraid. Be very afraid.

My husband Dave and I received a thick, official-looking envelope from the Nielsen Ratings Company last weekend. The Nielsen ratings system measures television viewership in the United States. The information they gather establishes commercial advertising prices and determines which shows stay or go in the program lineup.

Having this kind of control is a huge deal. Think of it as the adult version of being crowned Homecoming King and Queen. Not just anyone gets picked and you can’t volunteer for the privilege. Being selected as Nielsen Family means you’re something. People would kill to be you.

The letter gave a brief overview of how the system works and explained that we could make up to $450 for taking part. Sounds good, right? Wrong. I decided to do some research. Little by little, I realized we didn’t want to do this, since it comes with a whole lot of annoying strings attached.

The letter stated they’d like to “stop by to talk to you about this excellent opportunity.” I planned to give them an emphatic “We don’t want to do this” and the case would be closed. For some reason, I assumed they’d call to schedule the visit.

Instead, my door bell rang at 6PM last night.

Turn on the porch light, open the door and who do I find standing there but a Nielsen TV Ratings representative.

“Hi, you received our letter?”

“Yes, but we’ve decided not to take part.” Deaf to my response, she moved right into her spiel, explaining how wonderful an opportunity this is for me and wouldn’t I like to be part of the select group that was chosen by a very elaborate, scientific process… and on and on it went.

Rah, rah. I still don’t want to do it. It should be noted I did not invite her in. From what I’ve read, they can be pretty forceful and I knew if I let her in, I’d wind up making her dinner.  In more than one case, people have compared these folks to the FBI. My FBI agent came bearing a box of chocolates.

I gave her a look that said, “It’s not you. It’s me. I’m not ready for a relationship.”

She persisted with her cheerleader-y speech and I knew I was in trouble. I was going to have to fight. I was going to have to make her hate me. I was going to have to kill her with questions, and so began The Inquisition.

“I’d read that technicians come to your house and attach wires and boxes, and even solder something to every TV set in your house. Is this true?” I asked.

“I’m not sure. Maybe. But we wouldn’t damage anything.”

“We just bought a very expensive high-def TV and we don’t want anything to happen to it.” Concerned about the amount of time it takes to set everything up, I followed up with “How long will that take? I read it can take six or seven hours.”

“Well, probably not that long. Maybe four.”

I counter, “But then I’d have to take a vacation day. The amount of money you pay us isn’t worth the aggravation. I’m a very annoyed person.”

“Well, we could do it on a weeknight.”

“That’s worse.”

“We could do it on the weekend.”

“Not much better.”

I probe further. “I’ve also read that you have to login to a device every time you walk into a room with a TV on, and then logout when you leave. Is that true?”

“Yes. You need to punch in your name and age.”

“I don’t want to do that. Plus I’ve heard that if you don’t confirm you’re still watching TV after 42 minutes, a box starts flashing red lights until you press something on the remote.”

“That’s true.”

“But I’m a very annoyed person.”

She kept the joust going. “If it helps, we asked other participants if they found the process annoying and they said after about ten days, they got used to it.”

Ten days?!?!?!

Now rubbing my temples, and freezing because I’m standing in my doorway in a pair of shorts on a 35 degree night, I tell her “Really. We don’t want to do this. I know you’ll have to pick someone else on our street now. I’m sorry.”

“Well, I wish you’d reconsider. Here, at least have these chocolates as a token of our appreciation.”

“Thanks, but no. We’re dieting.”

“No, really. You’ve been so kind.” Kind? How? For letting you stand in my doorway and not inviting you in from of the cold?

“OK. I’ll take them and share them at work.”

“Would you allow me to call you in a few days to see if you changed your mind?”

Oh my God, lady! I said no! No means no!

Because I’m a crumpled, guilt-ridden, chocolate-box-holding mess now, I sigh, “Yes. You can call, but I really don’t think I’ll change my mind.”

I reluctantly give her my work phone number, knowing full well when she calls me, I’ll be saying no all over again. She thanks me, we part ways, and I finally get back inside my warm house with my box ‘o chocolates.

The first thing I do is get on my laptop and email my sister about tonight’s bizarreness. Her response:

She came all the way from New Jersey!!!! What if you weren’t home? What if you were a serial killer? I would never go to a stranger’s home by myself. Oh yeah, the chocolates would protect me. The idea is intriguing, but I would probably regret the whole thing if I had signed up. Do you have to fork over all your financial statements, too? It’s like the IRS, they’ll make you do it, or else! I would do it for maybe $5,000.

She’s right. If I signed up, I’d regret it immediately. The last thing I want to do when I get home from work is do more WORK. Press buttons, log in, deal with flashing lights if I don’t press a button in 42 minutes?!?! Yikes. I have enough pressure 9-5.

Not wanting to put off the inevitable, I contacted the representative today at lunch, hoping I’d get an answering machine. Unfortunately she picked up. I explained to her that after careful consideration, we still didn’t want to take part.

She was deflated. I reminded her for the third time what an annoyed person I am and to please understand that my time is more valuable than the money they offer, but if they really wanted people to take part, they ought to up the anty to $5,000.  That put an end to the ordeal. FINALLY.

Today I picked up our mail and found another package from the Nielsen people, which contained brochures, a questionnaire and five single dollar bills. A five spot? Multiply that by a thousand and we’ll talk. Or bring me a box of diamonds.

UPDATE: There’s more to the story. See http://www.junkdrawerblog.com/2008/03/next-step-restraining-order.html

Can someone please tell me why I can configure and order a pizza online and have it delivered to my house in 30 minutes, but I can’t get an HMO referral form from my doctor without making four phone calls and have no confidence that the referral will get where it’s going without making a fifth call?

It’s the 21st century, people. Can we please get online now?

When I call my doctor to get a referral, I’m greeted by an excruciatingly-long introductory message that explains what numbers to press on the phone to be connected to a certain place.

The first three “If you need to ______, press # ___” instructions tell you to press either 1, 2 or 3. You would expect the fourth option to tell you to press #4, wouldn’t you?  Of course not. You press 15 on the keypad. Makes perfect sense.

Next, the nice recorded-voice lady tells me the seven pieces of information I need to leave in a message to get my referral, in very quick succession:

1. Name

2. Date of birth

3. Phone number

4. Doctor I need the referral for

5. Practice name and address

6. Nature of the visit

7. Health plan I have

Now, that’s all well and good, except I’m already stressed out that I won’t get all this information spat out in the right order and I’m not sure I heard it all. So I call back to go through the menu again and to hear the instructions again. Didn’t get it all. Call again.

Now, and only now, I’m ready to call back with all my information. I’ve rehearsed it well. I wrote it down on three post-it notes and I’m also on my second cup of coffee.

I leave all 7 pieces of information. But now do I press the pound (#) key to leave the message? Do I just hang up? What if they didn’t get it? Do I have any hope of reaching a person if I call again?

I guess I can call my doctor who needed the referral the next day. Another menu. Another wait until I get a human on the line. I finally get through and they confirm that they got the referral.

Yes, I’m glad I have health insurance. Yes, I’m glad it pays for my visit. But for crying out loud, can’t someone figure out how to set up a secure referral request system so I can do this online?

It would be such a simple form and I would get an email confirmation that everybody got what they needed. My God, my blog can do that! It boggles my mind that we are still using phones and fax machines for this process. You can’t tell me that the doctor’s office staff wouldn’t love this, too.

Thank you, slow, horrible, inefficient, non-online referral request system. Cripes, I could have had a pizza by now.

I have a co-worker who farts. Well, not in the conventional sense. She doesn’t fart, but her shoes do.

Apparently Dr. Scholl’s makes a product called Massaging Gel Insoles that are supposed to provide added support and comfort to your feet all day long. Slip them in your shoes and you’re Ginger Rogers.

The problem, she says, is they’re made of plastic. Plastic makes your feet sweat. Sweaty feet make farting noises when you walk. We always know when she’s coming because she sounds like a fart machine. Farty fart fart.

Doesn’t anyone test these things in the real world before putting them out on the market?

I would make an awesome product tester:

1. If I worked for Dell, I could have told them years ago how stupid it was to stick front side USB ports underneath a big plastic panel that you have to lift up and then search around for the ports. The uplifted panel shields light from the area you’re poking around in, plus the ports are fixed at a 45 degree angle. Some of my clients at work ripped the damn things off permanently and it’s still hard to insert a thumb drive.

2. If I worked for Charmin, I could tell them that their Ultra Strong version of toilet paper doesn’t stand a chance in hell of being flushed down the toilet on the first try. It’s the consistency and thickness of paper towels, and no one with half a brain would try to flush paper towels. Stick with the Ultra Soft brand if you want to save a thousand gallons of water.

3. If I worked for any computer manufacturer, I would have told them how hard it is to read which is the DVD drive and which is the CD drive. Nice job printing which is which, embossed in black writing on a black background.

4. If I worked for TV manufacturers, I could tell them that people need about five buttons on a remote control, an ON/OFF button, two for channel-changing and two for volume. If it’s a DVR controller, a few more. I do not need half the buttons on my current controller. I can’t find the ones I need. Oh, and it’s the size of a mailbox. I almost need two hands to use it.

5. If I worked for Honda, I would have told them that the trunk latch and the gas cap release are too close together. I’m either opening my truck at the gas station, or opening my gas cap door when I need to unload groceries.

6. If I worked for a bedding company, I would have told them to make comforters the way they used to be made — so they’ll fit in your home washer and dryer. For God’s sake, at least put a label on the package that says “You’ll have to drag this beast to a laundromat and spend your Saturday afternoon pumping quarters in a jumbo washer because that’s the only one big enough, and then you’ll have to drag it half wet to your car because it’ll never get dry, and you may drop it on the way because it weighs fifty pounds and it’ll get nice and dirty again.”

So there. Will somebody please hire me as a product tester? And Dr. Scholl’s, you need to do something about your farting insoles.

———

Humor-bloggers wear fartless shoes.

My husband hit the jackpot when he married me. Not because I’m a knockout (I’m not), and not because I can cook (I can’t). And certainly not because I need to keep up with the Joneses (that’s a race that never ends).

The reason he hit the jackpot is because I’m extremely low-maintenance. I’m a no-frills, simple girl who doesn’t need to have all the latest designer fashions, jewelry or expensive home interiors.

Which is why it makes no sense to me that it took three weeks, hours of online searching and nine stores to find a simple pair of black shoes. The kind of simple shoe that kindergartners would draw when asked to draw a shoe. The process shouldn’t have been so hard, it wasn’t fair and I’ve begun to think there’s a conspiracy against me.

It starts out with the day I discovered the heel separating from the right shoe of a pair that I loved. The shoe went from perfectly normal to crap in about a week. I can’t understand why. Both my legs are the same length, I do not have a limp, and I never ran the New York Marathon in them. Its partner is just fine. Righty has issues.

Just when I thought I should enter it into Ripley’s Believe It or Not as the Freak Shoe of a Freak-Footed Woman, I was relieved to read I’m not the only one with inexplicable clothing disintegration issues. My friend Jeff has a peculiar problem with wearing out only the left knee of his jeans. We are two peas in a pod. Abnormal, anatomically-disadvantaged peas in a pod.

Soon after my shoe started falling apart, I began my search for a replacement pair. Naturally, I thought I could just go online: Punch in Croft & Barrow. Click. Add to Cart. Click. Done. Then I remembered nothing is that easy for me. Not furniture or lamp or cake shopping. What made me think shoe shopping would be any different?

I’m not a total moron. I understand that shoe styles change from year to year, and that if you find a pair you really love, you should buy every single one in the store. Otherwise, you’ll never find them again. I’ve done that in the past with other shoes, but never in my wildest nightmares did I imagine I’d have such trouble finding a pair of plain black, lace-up shoes with a rubber sole. The store I bought them from doesn’t carry this style anymore. Shame on you, Kohl’s. You sold me a shoe I loved and then you took it away.

Here’s my opinion about the state of shoes today. Stores should always carry a base supply of regular shoes that have no buckles, snaps, clasps or adornment of any kind. After that, designers are perfectly welcome to go ahead, take their LSD and make shoes like these. When I did a general online search for "black lace-up shoes," these were among the selections: 

I did not type in Frankenstein, Dominatrix or Elton John. I typed black, lace-up shoes. Period. I fast ran out of patience browsing the 1,001 ridiculous ones and concluded it was unwise to order unfamiliar shoes online anyway. I wear shoes between a size 7 1/2 and 9, depending on the brand. It was best to try them on.

The week before Christmas, I stopped and browsed at six different shoe or department stores. Nothing. I would come home each night shoeless, and Dave would give me a "You’ll do better tomorrow" hug and hope a simple black shoe would magically make itself known to me.

After four days of striking out, I awoke one morning to find Dave had left this note for me on the fridge. Funny guy.

I gave up searching for a while, then the day after New Year’s, we traveled around town hitting up all the stores I hadn’t been to before. I thought I’d get lucky at a new upscale outdoor mall nearby. According to their website, they had ten shoe stores. Ten! This HAD to be the place.

I hit up L.L. Bean first and thought I had a winner. I picked out a black, lace-up shoe I marginally liked, and stood there waiting for a sales person to help me. At least three other women stood around with a single shoe in their hands waiting for someone to assist them, too.  I could see never getting waited on, so I gave up and put the shoe back on the shelf. Strike one.

We sought out the rest of the stores at the mall. Turns out, of the nine remaining stores, one sold only sneakers, one was a men’s store, three weren’t even in business yet and the other four only sold dress shoes. I hate you, 10-shoe-store mall! Strike two.

We soldiered on to the one remaining place to get shoes: a crowded, high-traffic mall that I never shop at unless I’m desperate. I hit up a JC Penney’s first and while perusing their selections, I overheard a woman complaining to a salesman: "I bought my favorite pair here last year, and you keep changing the styles. I can’t find them anywhere now!" I turned around to her and said "It’s a conspiracy." The salesman, wearing a pair of nice, plain black shoes, looked at us weird and offered up nothing. We ladies just shook our heads and walked away. Strike three. I’m out.

Wait…. maybe not.

There was one other department store in the mall I hadn’t checked — Boscov’s. This time, Dave didn’t come into the store with me, since he was tiring of our strike-outs. Better to just sit in the car, avoid my madness, and pray to himself that when I emerge from the store, I would be carrying a bounty of shoe boxes and we could get on with our lives, full to the brim with simple black shoes.

I hit a home run. Right out of the park!

Boscov’s had a simple black pair of shoes I loved. Not even lace-up! I almost kissed the salesman when he brought me this pair of shoes and they fit perfectly! Hello, Clark’s "Music"! My only disappointment was that they had just one pair in my size. No matter. I can order more from them online, knowing the brand and size. My prayers were finally answered.

I’ve just ordered two extra pairs, and as long as my feet don’t suddenly get fat, I’m golden. I’ll be in plain black shoes for years to come. Like everything else in my shopping life, this was an ordeal that tells me I’m being punished for something. I just don’t know for what.

Imagine if I was high-maintenance……

I know. It’s sad and it doesn’t make any sense. Welcome to our Pumpkin Tree Display. We never intended to leave our autumn pumpkin display out on the patio, but it just happened. OK, strike that. It didn’t just happen. It happened because we are the laziest people we know.

Then a friend gave me a small artificial tree to stick out there because we can’t keep a tree in the house. Our cat, Lucky has "chewing issues," and would likely eat the needles and puncture a necessary organ. This is how we still enjoy a tree and keep Lucky from using up some of his nine lives.

I want to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas. I hope that Santa is good to you and better than he was to me. Today I woke up with a huge zit on my chin. So now when I have family pictures taken of me today and tomorrow, I will be instructed to cover up that thing or get out of the picture. Can someone please tell me when the pimples of my youth will stop showing up on the face of my 40-something self?

Happy Holidays to all my zit-free bloggy friends!

At this moment, I’m trying not to scream.  I have just read that Google rescinded the change that forced me to move my blog to WordPress. All that pain and suffering was almost for nothing.

From BloggerBuzz:

December 20, 2007

You Blog, We Listen

Two fixes just went live, before we sign off for a brief holiday break:

• Unregistered commenters can once again provide an auto-linked URL [Help Group Thread]
• Images in the Header page element will no longer be cropped vertically [Help Group thread]

We apologize for having broken these features for you. Your blogs and Help Group posts showed us the true extent to which you used and cared about these features, so please let us know if they’re still being problematic.
Thanks for your patience!

What this means for people leaving comments on Blogger blogs is that they can again leave links directly to their blogs without having to use or create a Google account.  Simply click on the Nickname field and then a URL field is enabled, where you can enter your blog’s address. No more having to setup an OpenID account or login to Google.

Do I regret having moved to WordPress now? Not exactly. I still have way more control over my blog and more flexibility with features than I ever had with Blogger. There are some very cool and useful widgets and plug-ins that I’m using now with WordPress and that I’m planning to implement in the future. So all is not lost.

I just wish I hadn’t been forced to learn a new platform so quickly. That’s not how I operate. I prefer having enough time to research things and move ahead cautiously and carefully, instead of flying by the seat of my pants like I did with the migration to WordPress. At the time I moved, there was zero indication that Google would come to their senses and bring back the URL field for direct blog links.

I recognize that there are far greater problems in the world than my difficult migration to WordPress, I really do. But it did cost me a significant amount of time and effort. And hosting is not free, so there is a cost there as well. When Google states “We Blog, You Listen,” they should add “And We Fail to Think Ahead and Don’t Know How to Communicate.” The way they went about the change, with no concern for its implications in the blogging community and no warning, is deplorable for such a large corporation.

Bringing back the feature now is too little, too late for me and others who fled to WordPress or other blogging platforms. And, for that, they deserve a huge bag of coal for Christmas. And a punch in the face.

As you know, I’ve been struggling with what to do about Google’s idiotic change in its commenting system. It’s been a nightmare dealing with the issue and considering my options.

After much pain and anguish, I’ve decided to move my blog to a new platform. No more Blogger. It’s WordPress, baby! I’ll let you know when that happens. Hopefully, the migration will be seamless.

My good friend, J.D. over at I Do Things So You Don’t Have To has been listening to me grouse about the Blogger mess for several days. She knows I’ve been irritated and consumed by this problem, especially because it’s kept me from writing about anything else.

She told me, "Well, you can’t always write about fluffy kittens and sunshine." As I pondered that nugget yesterday, I watched my cat Stinky twitch about while she was dreaming. I caught her just as she was waking up out of what I suppose was a nightmare about Big Bad Google screwing up my blog.

Because I wanted to post something cute, fluffy and non-Googly today, here she is for your viewing pleasure. The other cat to come into the picture is Stinky’s arch nemesis, Lucky, aptly named because he escaped death for ruining our furniture.

Yesterday I posted about the recent unannounced change to Google’s commenting system on Blogger blogs. If you host with Blogger, this change is significant and will likely cause a drop in your readership.

The post I wrote didn’t include a complete enough explanation of why this will impact you, so I would encourage you to visit BlogCatalog, where there is a more involved explanation of the problem and links to other blogs where the issue is being discussed.

There is also a link to the appropriate place to voice your concern to Google about this change.

Check out the discussion on BlogCatalog today!

And speaking of problems with Blogger, there is a problem with the way pictures are handled in posts. When a reader clicks on a picture, they are asked to download it or open it with a program of their choosing. Before, the picture would simply open within the browser. This is a known bug and Google is working on a solution.

Seems this is a big weekend for Poopy Heads. Google has just changed the way people can leave comments on blogs hosted on Blogger, such as this one. I’m not happy with this change and it’s made me seriously consider moving to another blogging platform.

Until I decide what to do, I thought I’d at least announce what happened and explain all the commenting options now in place.

Why is Google a Poopy Head?

When leaving comment, no longer can you click on the Other option and enter your name and URL back to your own blog. They’ve replaced that field with Nickname, which only allows you to type your name. Poopy Head Move #1.

The old way was much more user-friendly and gave you a way to easily link me and my readers back to your blog.

What to do?

Commenters WITH Google accounts may still login with their Google User ID and password to leave a comment. But when the comment is posted, people will get a link to your profile (not your blog). I know, that stinks. Poopy Head move #2.

Commenters WITHOUT Google accounts have several options, none I like very much. Big Giant Collective Poopy Head Move.

1. Create a Google account and just use it for commenting. This method also means you can check the box to be notified by email of responses to comments.

2. Choose the Nickname field and just enter your name. Simple enough, if you just want to leave your name behind.

3. Enter your blog’s URL below your comment. It’s a poor substitute for the old method, but at least it means anyone who wants to visit your site can copy and paste it (or type it) into a browser URL field to get there. It will not be clickable!!!

A pain, I know, but this is probably the easiest option if you want to display your blog address. (Read on for how to make it a clickable link).

4. Click the drop-down arrow next to “Sign-in using:” and choose one of the services listed if you have an account with one of them. Enter the information it requests (assuming you know it — not all users will).

5. You can still click Anonymous, if you prefer.

Yeah, but what if I really, really, really want to leave a clickable link to my blog in your comments? No problem. You just have to enter your blog’s address in this format:

<a href=”http://www.yourblogname.com”>Text to Display</a>

Of course, you would replace the “yourblogname” part with your blog’s address, and replace “Text to Display” with whatever you want the link to read.

I’ve done this myself and it takes just a few times to memorize the format. You could also keep a little text file handy with your code already formatted. Just copy and paste into your comment and you’re off. Go ahead and copy the above text and practice it by leaving me a comment and a link to your blog!

If you have any questions, or if you just want to complain about this new system, drop a comment in the drawer. Oh, how we love to complain here! It’s good therapy.

UPDATE: Google has rescinded this change. Read about it here. Sorry, Google. Too little, too late.

Dear Poopy Head Truck Driver:

I know you didn’t mean it when you had an accident on the bridge I cross to get to work. But I just have to tell you what you were responsible for this morning.

1. You made me 45 minutes late for work.

2. You made about 2,500 other people 45 minutes late for work. That means the world lost 1,875 man hours of work, about a year’s worth of a typical job.

3. You forced me to look death in the eye and try crazy stunts to shoot off the last exit before the bridge in an effort to get away from the traffic jam.

4. You made it so that 1,000 other drivers tried the same thing and caused us to get in a second traffic jam on side roads.

5. You made my office have to make a pot of Disney Mickey Mouse coffee that’s been in the refrigerator for about a year, since I had the supply of new coffee in my car.

6. You caused all the people who could finally get moving again to gun the accelerator and violate every driving rule known to man, trying to make up lost time.

7. You made me hate the innocent cyclist who I saw whiz by me at one point, getting to his destination on time.

8. You made a thousand people, who just finished their morning coffee, wish for a Port-o-Potty on the side of the road.

I hope you totaled your truck, don’t have insurance and have to take a bus to work for a month. I hope you were cited and fined for your incompetence. I hope everyone flipped you off when they made it past your stupid accident. You should be lucky they didn’t kill you. I know I wanted to.

P.S. Poopy Head isn’t what I was calling you that whole time, but this is a G-rated blog, so that’ll have to do.

Because we apparently angered the furniture gods, Dave and I are still having problems with our living room. In this case, it’s a problem with our lamps. More on that in a minute.

I promised an update on the state of the living room. Here it is:

When we bought our couch and chair (the one with the black cat on it), we realized that they needed to be separated by lots of space. It looked too cramped with everything on one side of our small room. The coffee table is now scratched beyond recognition because of the trouble-making cat you see on the couch, so now it serves as our TV stand.

And yes, that’s a teddy bear sitting next to him. It belongs to the third cat, Stinky (not pictured). Yeah, my cats have favorite stuffed animals. Got a problem with that?

With the set now split apart, we needed something to bridge the canyon in the middle of the room, so we threw down a rug and pulled the red chair in from another room.

Yes, we know it looks like we were inebriated when we set it up like this, but it fits our style and we don’t mind that the colors don’t match. We’re choosing to call this look drunken feng shui eclectic.

So what’s up with the lamps? Long story. It involves a set of brass balls.

We bought two lamps (you see only one here) from a place about 20 miles from home. It was a pain in the butt to drive there, but we’d spent weeks on an unsuccessful hunt for a specific kind of brass lamp, and we got it on good authority that this place would have what we wanted.

Turns out they had tons of brass lamps in their showroom, but we ultimately went with a catalog order because it offered brass lamps with pull chains instead of on/off knobs. We insisted on pull chains with brass balls hanging from them. But ordering from a catalog meant a six week wait.

Six weeks finally came and Dave picked up the lamps and brought them home. We ordered two of the same one. And why do I want to kill people now? They didn’t match. One set of balls was smaller than the other set. So we hiked back to the lamp store and plopped them down on the counter.

"Hi. We bought these lamps and they don’t match. See how the pull chains are different? These balls are smaller than those balls. Plus they hang crooked. And when you pull on one, the chain grinds."

"I see."

"And one of the sockets is broken. The bulb won’t light."

"OK."

"And see how the shine is duller on this one versus the other?"

"Uh-hmm."

We expected to hear "We’re sorry. We’ll order another one." Instead we got "Hmmm, not sure what I can do here."

"Say what?"

"They were imported. I’m going to have to let the company know. They might not even know they’re having a problem."

Still taking in the part about "not sure I what we can do here," I almost missed that last little nugget "…they’re having a problem" as in, she didn’t feel she had any responsibility to make things right. Lady, it’s not the company who has a problem. You have a problem. Me.

She said she’d call today and let me know what the company can do for us. Said she’d order another set and maybe they’d come in identical.

What. The. Hell.

"Maybe they’ll come in as a matched set? I don’t understand."

"Sometimes this happens with lamp manufacturers. You can’t guarantee that if you order two, they’ll be identical." She even had the nerve to say "If you hadn’t seen the two mismatched ones together, you wouldn’t even have noticed the brass balls were wrong if they’d both come in with the balls you don’t like."

"But we ordered the lamp with the bigger balls. They look better than the smaller balls. We want the bigger balls."

I asked her to cancel the replacement order. Fine. And why am I still cranky about this? Because we’re total idiots and left the lamp shades at home and now we have to drive another 40 miles to return them. We thought they would just replace the lamps and so we didn’t think to take the shades with us.

So now we’re just hoping the stupid lamp store will reimburse us at 100%. And I’m hoping a place that sells the brass lamps with big balls will come to me in a vision. We are angry and still lampless. Will someone please throw us a bone?

All we wanted was nice, normal furniture and lamps with balls that match. We do not know what we’ve done to deserve this. A friend of mine said he recently had to replace his furniture and he and his wife went to ONE store and picked out things they liked in TWENTY MINUTES. I hate him and I hope all his stuff falls apart the day after his warranty runs out.

UPDATE 11/27: Dave dropped off the shades today and we got a full credit for everything. We’re back to square one again, but at least the nonsense with the lamp store is over!

They can’t say I didn’t try.

Back on October 1st, I made a resolution to stop saying "like" so much. I got tired of hearing myself say it in every other sentence. I vowed to drop a quarter in a jar every time I used it as a filler word. I dropped a lot of quarters, and then bills, as you can see.

I would have had the same degree of success if I’d vowed to, say, drive to work every day backwards at 120MPH wearing big clown shoes. It fast became an impossible task.

Thankfully, resolutions are meant to be broken. So I’m back to saying "like" and what a relief. LIKE LIKE LIKE LIKE LIKE LIKE!!! Ahhhh, that feels better.

Throughout my little experiment, every time I felt a "like" coming on, I would stall, stutter, and stumble for something else to put in its place. Or I’d just skip the word entirely and replace it with an uncomfortably long pause. But that was unsatisfying, like when you feel a sneeze coming on, but can’t get it out.

I wanted and needed a "like" in there and it felt ridiculous to try not to do it. It got embarrassing, too, because people thought I was having a stroke when they saw that vacant look in my eyes while I searched for a word. She alright? What’s wrong with her?

After a few weeks of this crazy challenge, something really weird started to happen. I developed other speech and gesturing problems when I talked.

Out of nowhere, I began to say "literally" a lot, even when I knew it was stupidly inappropriate. As in, "Jason, I literally forgot my lunch today. Wanna go out for something?" It’s as though my brain was looking for any filler word, no matter how dumb it sounded.

Whenever "literally" didn’t cut it, out came the air quotes.

I’ve been accused of being animated with my hands when I talk excitedly about something, but I’ve never done the index and middle finger quotation marks thing to express sarcasm or anything else. This may be a subconscious gesture due to my obsession for finding pictures to submit to my favorite specialty blog. Or it could be that if I wasn’t letting myself speak the way I wanted, my hands were taking over by force.

So what did I learn from all this? I learned that the likes, the you knows, and the I means are essential in speech. I learned that it’s not a personal weakness to use them, unless you’re a teenage girl who uses "like" every third word. I mean it, ladies. You sound flighty and stupid and you’re giving me a headache. Bring it down a notch, will ya?

Would I try this again? No. Did anything good come out of this? Yes! I have just over $100 in my Like Jar, which I’ll put to good use for Christmas. It was an interesting savings plan, one I didn’t have to think about.

Saving without pain. I like when that happens.

News flash: I just learned my old Catholic grade school is celebrating its 80^th anniversary. A call went out to former students to send in a little blurb about where we are now and any memories about the school we wanted to share.

Hmmm. Memories? Share? With the school that gave me the memories I’d rather forget? Tell me, did anyone have a joyful grade school experience? If you did, you’re either lying or you were the kind of student who made life miserable for the rest of us.

I’m going to take a trip down memory lane, but it’s just for the nerds, the shy people, the insecure and the socially-awkward. So get lost, perfect people. You’re not welcome here. Neener, neener, neeeeeener! If you were like me and wonder how you made it through school and came out the other side, hop on the bus. We’re going for a ride!

You’ll see soon there is no rhyme or reason to what I remember about grade school. But knowing a little bit about Grade School Me at least puts things in perspective:

Fact 1: I had to wear a plaid uniform every day, which could be worn only with a white blouse, white or green socks, and sensible shoes. The only thing that made you unique was the length of your skirt. The popular girls always wore them short, short, short!

Fact 2: My skirt was one of the longest of any girl’s in the school. The rule was “Hemlines below the knee.” The only Moms who followed that rule were mine and the mother of a girl who went on to become a nun.

Fact 3: I wore glasses from kindergarten to third grade. To jack up the ridicule quotient, I also had to wear a patch over one eye to improve the strength of the other, though thankfully, not during school. But I was still known as the poor little Pirate Girl by people who saw me wear it.

Fact 4: I had kinky curly hair and tried to wear it as a shag. I have pictures of how this looks, but they’re in a safe-deposit box where they can’t hurt me anymore.

Fact 5: The first four letters in my last name were M-E-S-S, which lent itself to some interesting name-calling by all the mean girls, as in “Kathy, did you mess yourself today?”

With that vision of Grade School Me in your head, perhaps it won’t surprise you what Grown Up Me remembers. Ready?

Day 1: I Hate it Already

By far, the worst memory is of my first day of kindergarten. I felt like my Mom had sent me off to prison. I cried so hard, I almost threw up. None of the other kids was having a problem, and realizing this only made things worse. My mother was called to come collect me. I don’t recall how the second day went, although it’s possible a teacher’s assistant sat with me to make sure I didn’t go AWOL. I really wanted out.

The Bishop is Coming! The Bishop is Coming!

One day in the 7^th grade, our principal got a call from the diocese that the bishop was coming for a visit. I don’t recall why he was coming, but I got the sense that it wasn’t expected. Because as soon as the word got out, I was handpicked along with another student to run outside with brooms, dust pans and garbage bags to furiously tidy up the front of the building for his visit. Leaves, garbage, branches, dog poo, you name it. What said “Housekeeper and Landscaper” about me, I’ll never know.

Roll with it, Baby.

During a 4^th grade talent show, I massacred the gymnastics routine I’d been practicing for days. I’d forgotten almost all of it, so to the tune of It’s a Small World, I did the only part I could remember — somersaults. That, and oh yeah, more somersaults. Roll, roll, roll up the mat, Roll, roll, roll, down the mat. I ended the performance with a fist-pumping ta-DA! I got a round of applause, but only because the audience was happy I’d put an end to my own suffering. Worst. Performance. Ever.

I’ll Cast a Spell on You!

In the 3^rd grade we had the nun from hell. Only one person liked her. God. And we weren’t even sure of that. Her name escapes me at the moment. Let’s just call her Sister Hates-Kids-A-Lot. One day while she led our class down to the gym for an assembly, Sister Hates-Kids-A-Lot fell down the stairs and broke her arm. Then she did something that we didn’t expect. She began to cry real, human tears. We thought we should help her, but we were immobilized by fear and confusion. Fear, because she was the nun with death ray eyes, and confusion, because we didn’t think she had a soul, much less the capacity to feel pain and emotion. After the accident, we still hated her and she still hated us. And we feared her even more, now that she was wearing a cast on her arm and could use it to crack open our skulls anytime she wanted. To this day, I feel guilty for not having helped her, but I’m also not ashamed to say we thought she had it coming.

What’s in a name? Too many letters, that’s what.

I was the last child in kindergarten to be able to print her full name without the aid of a cheatsheet placard. In my defense, my last name was twelve letters long. But being the last at anything is no fun, and I remember that trailing-behind feeling like it was yesterday.

The Agony and the Irony

In the 4^th grade, I received a punishment that did not fit the crime. Painfully shy, I wouldn’t open my mouth unless someone talked to me first. Even then, I was afraid to say anything. One day, as class was preparing to take a quiz, I was turned around in my seat talking to another girl, but never realized the test was starting. The teacher loudly and ceremoniously called me a Chatty Cathy – a Chatty Cathy! Me! The one who never speaks! — and told me to turn around and write a big fat “F” on my paper. She said nothing to the girl behind me who was also talking. I was mortified that day and ruined for weeks after that. Just when I thought I’d finally put it behind me, Geico came out with this commercial. Whenever I hear it, I’m transported back to the 4^th grade and I flop to the floor, start sobbing and my husband has to remind me where I am and what year it is.

Being a bad sport about it

In the 6th grade, I made my first attempt at organized sports. I joined the basketball team and at the first practice got hit in the nose with the ball. I bled profusely and then promptly quit. This would be the first in a long line of sports I tried and sucked at: gymnastics, cheerleading, and softball, among others. If you’re a parent and your kids want to quit a sport, let them. There is no value in making them embarrass themselves in front of their classmates. No value at all.

We Don’t Need No Stinking Child Labor Laws

I recall the weekend one summer that some of us kids were picked for a chain gang, whose job it was to paint classrooms and hallways. I’m quite sure someone volunteered me for this job. I couldn’t have wanted to waste a weekend smelling paint and getting lead poisoning. Catholic schools always drew on slave labor one way or another. If it wasn’t painting the school, it was going door to door selling candy like some hobo begging for a place to sleep. But even hobos didn’t have to meet a quota.

I saved this next incident for last because while it starts out badly, it ends on a high note. You need to know that sometimes there was a silver lining.

She Almost Made a Grown Man Cry

My house was only four blocks from school, so I walked there and back every day. Sometimes I’d walk along with another student, Rob S., who lived in my neighborhood. One day as we were dismissed, I paired up with Rob and then heard my fifth grade teacher, Mr. G., inexplicably shout at us “Kathy and Robbie sittin’ in a tree, k-i-s-s-i-n-g!” It embarrassed me so much I thought I’d die. I didn’t tell my Mom about the incident until the next morning, after stressing about it the whole night before. She made an effort to take my mind off it and I thought “Case closed.”

But what happened next, I’ll never forget. She showed up during recess, and in front of everyone, she marched right up to Mr. G and opened up a can of whoop ass on him. I had never seen my mother like that before or since. She stood there waving a finger at him “How could you say that? What is wrong with you? You ever do that again, and you’ll have me to deal with.” Mr. G. was never more polite to me than after he got a face full of Mom.

Perhaps I’ve triggered some grade school memories that you have. Perhaps you’ll hate me now for doing so. Would anyone care to share their grade school horrors? You’ll find a box of tissues and a shoulder to cry on in the comments section.

The Junk Drawer is here for you.

If you were here on Sunday and joined the support group for people who are bothered by certain noises, you’ll know that Jeff from View From the Cloud invited people to join his local chapter, and I invited others to join here at The Junk Drawer. Since Jeff is scary-organized, he took meeting minutes and posted them on his blog.

Head on over and check ’em out. Just knock quietly before you enter.

What amazes me is the sheer number and odd nature of the noises that Jeff harvested from the comments that were left in his blog, my favorite of which is "hotdish ingredients being stirred." Of course, now that someone mentioned that, I’ll probably never make another casserole again.

I had no idea when I wrote my original post about my hyper-sensitive hearing skills that it would spawn such madness. I have Jeff to thank for suggesting this support group because clearly there are a lot of people in need of help.

To supplement Jeff’s list of noises that make our ears bleed, I’ve collected the ones left at the Pennsylvania chapter of our support group. Thank you Jeff, Marie, Regan, Peter, Maureen, JD, Terry, Cardiogirl, Gale, Steve, LindaF, MomThumb, and Bennie, for standing up and admitting your weaknesses.

The first step to recovery is realizing you have a problem. And, boy, do we have problems:

Pogo stick boings
Flyscreen security doors banging
People talking loudly
Cell phones (2)
Silence when trying to sleep
People clicking utensils against their teeth while eating
Snoring (2)
Excessive throat-clearing
Blaring car stereos (3)
Truck beeping while backing up
Clocks ticking
Alarm clocks
Mom’s nagging voice
Christmas tree lights that buzz
Styrofoam or cardboard rubbing against each other
24/7 Christmas-music radio stations

Cicadas/locusts/crickets (2)
Hockers and spitters
Whistlers
Elevator/store Muzak
Gum-poppers
Rap music
People who like to hear themselves talk
Screaming babies (2)
Fingernails on a chalkboard
Squeaky erasers

I’ll notify everyone of the next meeting when the time comes.

Until then, our group needs a name. When you head over to Jeff’s place, cast your vote in the comments box for one of these names suggested so far:

P.A.I.N. (People Annoyed with Incessant Noise)
Sounds without Bounds
S.L.A.P. (Sounds Leading to Aggravated People)
Noise without Joys
H.U.S.H. (Having Unusually Sensitive Hearing)

If you are visiting here for the first time and want to join, be sure to leave the noises that annoy you in the comments section. New members are always welcome, but don’t slam the door on your way out or someone will punch you in the face.

Last week I wrote about my superhero powers, which include the ability to hear sounds that no one else can hear.

My pal Jeff, over at View From the Cloud, wrote me to report that he also has some trouble with hearing noises that bother no one else. He suggested we may need a support group. Since it’s impractical for us to meet, what with Jeff in Minnesota and me in Pennsylvania, we’ve agreed to hold a meeting of sorts in our respective blogs. You, too, can join the group. Membership instructions follow.

But first, this is the part where you stand up, state your name, and announce all your problems to complete and total strangers. Let us begin.

Hi, my name is Kathy. Here are all the sounds that make my ears bleed.

Clashing radio stations — It’s one or the other, people. There is plenty of static in my head already. I don’t need Rush Limbaugh duking it out with the weather report.

Shiny, happy whistling people — I know I’m going to hell for this, but when I hear someone whistling, I want to shove a fistful of crackers in their mouths and see just how much they can whistle then.

Computer fans – I can hear the slightest fan noise in any make or model PC. I can also hear my external hard drive "breathing." I want to snuff it out, but I need it to, you know, backup my data. And so I allow it to live.

Sitar music or Japanese singing — Kill me. Kill me now.

Squeaky doors — None of my officemates were bothered by the squeak emitted by our office front door, although they did thank me after I blasted the door hinges with a can of WD-40. Seems they didn’t realize how loud it was until I silenced it. See, I’m not entirely crazy. Only partially.

TVs or radios playing in doctor’s offices — Last November I threw my back out and saw a chiropractor a couple times a week in December. All his patient rooms were outfitted with radios tuned to a station that played nothing but Christmas music. The day I had to listen to the Chipmunk song was the day I decided to delay the rest of my visits until January.

Leaf blowers — The only reason I don’t run over the guys who have gas-powered blowers strapped to their backs is because they must be living their own little hell. They are, after all, walking explosives.

Turn signals — I don’t let my husband put them on until he’s just about to make the turn. I don’t know how he puts up with me, and I’m sure if you’re a regular reader to my blog, you wonder the same thing. The man is a saint. Yeah, St. David, Patron Saint of Long-Suffering Husbands.

My neighbor with the RV — Every Sunday when he and his wife return from a trip, it takes him 15 minutes to back it into his too-small-for-an-RV driveway. Because it’s attached to a diesel-powered behemoth of a truck, I have to listen to it shake, rattle and roll as he backs it in while his wife screams at him "A little to the left, a little to the right!"

This concludes today’s meeting.

If you would like to join

our support group, check out Jeff’s post of sounds that annoy him. All you have to do is leave a comment on either of our blogs with one or more noises that drive you nuts and you’re automatically a member!

Meetings will be held on Wednesday evenings in a soundproof booth.

Addendum: The results of our first meeting are posted here.

For 51 weeks out of the year, I pay zero attention to sports. It’s only during the World Series that I even realize sports exist. Because I’m living in a sports-free vacuum most of the year, I was surprised to learn about the new rule that evidently all ball players are required to follow.

They must eject a half-gallon of spit on the field every game.

What I thought was going to be fun to watch on our new HDTV turned into a disgusting salivary waterworks display that I could not ignore and that ruined me for sports for even that one measly week I let myself go.

Every other minute, cameramen zoomed in on one or more players shooting spitwads on the field. And then there’s the manager for the Colorado Rockies, who was chewing a wad of gum the size of a grapefruit and spitting out long, thick, stringy wads that could fill up a shot glass.

What. Is. With. The. Spitting????

After a few days of this, I happened to mention this ickiness to my Dad, an avid sports fan. He understood how I could be so disgusted, but quickly informed me that "Baseball is a spittin’ game." Yeah, Dad, but why?

He shared our conversation with my Mom, who then sent me a clipping from her local paper, The Express Times, with a note that read "Kath, Somebody else agrees. Mom."

She sent me a letter to the editor, written by a woman who is as appalled as I am.

All things being relative, this letter will fall under the category of frivolous. However, I am serious. My interests in and knowledge of sports are limited. I really enjoy the NBA games and watch baseball during playoffs and the World Series.

Here’s my question: What is the connection or reason behind baseball players, and on up to managers, and spitting? The more you notice it, the more you can’t help but notice it. It is a revolting, disgusting habit.

The other night I watched a rookie pitcher for about 10 minutes. He spit nonstop. I gave up watching. Also, what are they all chewing nonstop? Is it gum or tobacco wads or what? These habits really take away from the pleasure of the game.

In what other setting in polite company would they be tolerated?

Shirley Ann Korth
Phillipsburg, NJ

I’d like to meet that woman. She understands that baseball and spitting need not go hand-in-hand. At some point, it takes over the game and all you’re doing is waiting for the next shot of someone dumping their saliva all over the place.

During Game 6, I even took pictures of one particularly lively spit. I don’t know who the player is, but I have to admire his method. His spit sprayed in no less than twenty directions. Kudos. I guess.

I’m not sure I’ll be watching the World Series of Spitting next year. I might be better off listening to it on the radio. At least that way, I won’t get wet.

One of life’s greatest indulgences is flying first-class. I had the opportunity to do so in 2002 when my husband Dave and his brother Dan got the idea in their heads that we should leave a freezing cold November in Pennsylvania and take a trip to Las Vegas and splurge by flying there in style.

Here’s how we were punished for wanting to live a little.

If you have never flown first-class, you absolutely must try it once before you die. The entire experience is a ridiculous display of lavishness that only a $1,000 ticket can buy. From the time you set foot on the plane, people are waiting on you. The ratio of flight attendants to passengers is about 1:3. Back in coach, it’s 1:3,000,000. There is a reason the tickets cost so much. You’ve bought yourself a servant.

Seated comfortably in cushy, wide leather seats, you can really kick back, breathe easy, and relax. Since first-classers are seated before anyone else, you have the pleasure of watching all the coach- and business-class people salivate over your seats while they walk back to Sardine Land. You know what they’re thinking as they pass you. "I hate you and if the plane crashes, you’ll die first."

But we soldier on and ignore the stares, grunts and eye rolls from the less fortunate passengers, and prepare to be waited on by one of the five attendants dedicated to us. The first thing they do is take your coats and hang them up in a closet so that you are completely unencumbered by your travel paraphernalia. Next, they put your bags in the overhead compartments for you so that you are not inconvenienced by common folk duties. Up next, real pillows and real blankets. You can put your seat back just about all the way without disturbing the person behind you.

Were we not flying at ten thousand feet and had a remote control for the TVs in the seats ahead of us, we would have thought we were laying on our couches at home in our living rooms. And even there, you don’t get someone asking you every ten minutes if you’re comfortable enough and whether you need anything. They ask you all the time if you’re cozy and how they can make your trip more enjoyable.

Once we’re in the air awhile, we are served the first course of our meals. Yeah, first course. There are more to come. We’re given a selection of cheese and fruit, served on a restaurant-quality plate with real silverware. There is no plastic in first-class.

After we finish our fresh fruit and cheese, we are served our second course of chicken cordon bleu with rice pilaf and warm bread. Again, served on real dinnerware with real knives and forks. The suckers in the back are handed sandwiches with meat-of-questionable-origin in plastic wrap, and if they’re lucky, a pack of crackers. We finish up dinner with an assortment of cheesecake, mousse and more fresh fruit. So this is how the other half lives…..

It’s impossible to be too full on a plane unless you’ve brought your own meals, but here we are, fat and happy in first-class. All this eating has made us a little tired. Propping up our pillows and pulling our blankies up to our chins, we lie back in our virtual beds and take cat naps. You can’t do that in coach unless you take coma-inducing drugs that make you forget exactly where you are — seated millimeters next to smelly, irritated people who, if given the chance, would kick you out in the aisle if it meant they could have five more inches of space.

After a thoroughly enjoyable flight that felt much shorter than it was, we deplane and begin our adventures in The City That Never Sleeps. For the first few days, we win and lose some money here and there. We vary our time between soaking up some sun, hitting the casinos and the pool and strolling up and down the strip taking it all in.

We’re having a great time until …..

Dan hails us a cab from one resort to get us back to our home base and we all pile in. The cab driver is chit-chatting with us about where we’re from and where we’re staying and whether we’re enjoying ourselves. Then he drops the bomb.

He mentions how there are hundreds of travelers scrambling to get flights back home because they just got the news that National Airlines, our airline, has just filed for bankruptcy and they’ve canceled all of their flights.

All together now….. Say WHAT?!?!?!

We go from zero to depressed in two seconds flat. This news means that we’re going to have to make other flight arrangements to get us back home and now we’re not even sure we can leave when we planned. Once back at our hotel, Dan makes a flurry of phone calls and secures us a flight on We’re Not Flying First Class Anymore Airlines. Because we had to take what we could get, we can’t fly back in luxury. We had been given keys to the Emerald City and now they want them back.

After Dave picked me up off the floor, I came to and got all the details. First, there’s the no first-class thing ("Stop telling me that!!!"). Then there’s the problem of seating. We can’t get seats together. Lastly, we have to cut the trip short and leave that night on the red-eye. It is called the red-eye for a reason. If you have been up since 5AM and have to leave town at 11PM, then take a six hour flight, you will have red, bleary, Marty Feldman eyes that will scare small children when it’s all over.

After I recover from this news, I try to make the best of our last day in Vegas by sinking a few bucks into a slot machine. Maybe if I pray hard enough, a first-class ticket will fall out. Later in the day, we sulk as we pack our things and prepare for what would become the worst flight ever.

Just a few days ago, we were secretly laughing at the people who filed past us on their way to coach. Now we were those people, cursing under our breath at the people who were going to get nice soft pillows and blankets, and delicious food served on real dinnerware. All we could think as we walked past them was "If the plane crashes, you’ll die first."

As we approach Sardine Land, we get into position for our separate seating arrangement. Dan got a spot next to a window in one row, while Dave sat in the row behind him in a middle seat. I wind up in the same row, but on the other side of the plane.

I am not a good flier. It is almost a requirement that I be allowed to dig my nails into Dave’s thigh during take-off, the part of the flight that makes me the most anxious. I doubt now that I’ll be able to dig my nails into the thigh of Random Traveler next to me, and now I don’t want to because I find out soon enough that my seatmate is a crazy person.

He is wearing a sleeveless camouflage T-shirt, camouflage pants, combat boots and has no reading material or other things to keep himself occupied for six hours. He begins talking to me immediately about where he’s from and how his girlfriend just dumped him. Sure, take away my first-class status and sit me next to Psychotic Nothing-to-Lose Guy.

Dan and Dave have their own little traumas over on the other side of the plane. Dan has the misfortune of getting seated next to a very large man whose body is spilling over the edges of his seat. I later learn that Dan was just about to reach into his pocket and pull out a wad of hundreds to make an offer to ANY OTHER PASSENGER to give up their seat so he doesn’t have to take the seat with half another person in it. But the lights go dim and he won’t be able to get anyone’s attention.

So he sits down in the little room he has left and curses National Airlines for hitting the skids. One of the only ways that Dan can get enough room is if he holds and bends his left arm over his head and scoots over so that he’s plastered to the wall. Dave is seated directly behind Very Large Man. I cannot count the ways that this will make for a bad flight.

In the air for a few hours now, I reflect on the fact that we’ve all been awake for over twenty hours now and are beginning to get Marty Feldman eyes. At some point, I glance out the window past Nothing-to-Lose Guy and see the sun coming up on the horizon. I’m in such a no-sleep stupor that I forget where I am for a minute. Am I dead?

I glance over at Dan and Dave and notice the interesting contortions they’ve been forced into because of Very Large Man. Dan is still stuck with his arm over his head. I can’t tell if he’s sleeping, but if he is, when he wakes up he will probably not realize that the arm is his own and will come out swinging.

Very Large Man has, of course, reclined his chair and appears to be resting comfortably. With the reclined chair four inches from his head, Dave decided to make the most of things by planting his forehead into the back of the seat and sleeping on his face.

When I see these twisted configurations and consider that neither of them are good travelers to begin with, I laugh inappropriately loudly, which unfortunately wakes up Nothing-to-Lose Guy. I look at him and explain that we flew to Vegas first-class and I’m supposed to be up there with all the lucky people and instead I’m sitting here! He shrugs his shoulders and goes back to thinking of all the ways he can get revenge on the girl who dumped him.

Another hour in flight, I’m counting down the minutes until I can get on the ground, get in a car and get in my bed. All told, by the time we fell asleep at home, we’d been up for 27 hours. We looked like we felt and it took two days before we got our normal eyes back.

The lesson of the story is that if you do manage to fly first-class, check out the financial situation of your airline and make sure they’re solvent. We were reimbursed the cost of the return ticket, but it hardly mattered. I’m left wishing I’d never flown first-class.

Because having it ripped out from under you is worse than not having had it at all.

Warning: This is yet another post about stuff that goes on at my grocery store. You might think I’m there everyday. You’d be almost right. See, our grocery store is just two blocks from my house, which makes running in for a few items on the way home from work too easy. I promise I’ll get back to non-grocery store posts as soon as annoying things stop happening there.

So I run over to get some cat food since we’re almost out. I’ve been given very specific flavor requirements by Dave, who thinks the cats can actually tell the difference between generic slop and Diet Ocean Whitefish Supreme. Um, they lick their butts clean every day. Do you think they have a flavor preference in the food they eat?

Before I head in the store, I remember to grab my cloth "environmentally-friendly" shopping bag out of the back seat of my car. I don’t use it enough as I should, but this time I remember to bring it. I’m trying to do my part to minimize plastic consumption in our household.

Once in the cat food aisle, I peruse the selections. I cannot find the diet version of ocean whitefish, so I grab a ton of cans of regular ocean whitefish. We’re all gaining weight in the house, so the cats can join in the insanity. A family that eats together gets fat together. I also grab a ton of salmon-flavored and then a bunch of cans that have pretty-colored labels. By the way, that’s also how I root for football teams. If I like your uniforms, you’re in!

A few more incidentals later, I queue up to the self-checkout line, cloth bag in hand. No sooner do I start scanning my items does a bagger from another aisle come over to start loading my items in a plastic bag. I quickly warn her "I have my own. Thanks." She retreats.

I scan some more items and a different store employee comes over and asks "Paper or plastic?" I reply, "Neither. I have my own bag. See?" He leaves to go bag someone else’s stuff.

I’m almost done scanning now, but I can see a cashier leave his now-empty checkout lane and approach my bagging area. By now I look like Medusa with snakes writhing out of my head and fire balls rocketing out my eyes.

I HAVE MY OWN BAG!!! I’m sure he thought I was demented. Or, perhaps by the appearance of my thirty cans of cat food and little else, I was just one of those Crazy Cat Ladies. No matter. He left my aisle and walked away with a story to tell his teenaged friends about the woman who went all postal on him for trying to be helpful. I’m sure they’ll call me something colorful. Bag Lady Bitch has a nice ring.

I’m hoping before I die, it will be commonplace to walk in a store with our own shopping bags and we’ll look back and ask ourselves how we could have been so wasteful "back in the day." Until then, I’ll keep fighting the "paper or plastic" question. But I’ll try to be a little nicer to those who ask. Besides, I’m sure I’ll find myself back in the store tomorrow to get something I forgot today, and I don’t want them running away when they see me coming. With my bag.

Dave and I have been struggling with the layout of our living room since getting the new furniture. Our challenges are many:

1. We want to keep the couch and chair as far away from each other as possible to create an open flow.
2. The coffee table is getting butchered by the cats. Since the first scratch, two more have gone on. And one is nearly a foot long. We decided to put the TV on it to keep it from getting damaged further.
   
3. Moving the coffee table from the middle of the room really opened things up, but now it’s too open. The carpets are also looking dingy from years of spills and cat accidents.
4. I put down this oriental rug to minimize the open space, cover stains and create a visual bridge between the chair and couch.

Now — we can buy another rug, but don’t know what color scheme would work well with the furniture. We don’t want to overdo blue. This rug is 10 years old and has been in storage since our now deceased cat, Calvin, started clawing at it. For now, it’ll do, and we almost don’t care if the cats destroy it. At least we can enjoy its beauty for the first time in a decade. Better to be on the floor than in a closet.

We really want some opinions now. If you’ve never commented on my blog before, now is the time to go nuts. The future of our living room depends on it.

Last month I wrote about 10 Things That Annoy Me. If you follow my blog, you know there can’t be only ten things. There can’t be only a hundred, really. So keep checking back for more lists.

Let’s get on with the show!

10 More Things That Annoy Me:

1. People who get on their cell phones as soon as they put their cars into gear. What? You couldn’t have had that conversation before you pulled out onto the open road where you will pay zero attention to other drivers while you order take-out?

2. My nose runs when I eat. Doesn’t matter whether I’m eating hot or cold food. I just finished a snack bag of Doritos and had to blow my nose. A co-worker saw me do it and asked if I had a cold. I lied and said "Yes, but I’m fine." That’s better than explaining the issue with my nose. No one understands. It doesn’t have a cool medical name. It garners no sympathy. It just runs.

3. Giada De Laurentis, host of Everyday Italian on the Food Network. She speaks perfect English without the slightest trace of an Italian accent. But when she says any word of Italian origin, suddenly she’s Sophia Loren. "Now we’ll add our ree-GAUGH-ta cheese and Rrrr-egiano parmi-GEE-ano…." Oh my God. I just want to punch her.

4. Two of my cats do not understand how to use their water dish. One won’t drink water unless it’s coming right out of the faucet. And the other picks up his food with his claws, while hovering over the bowl. He lets the morsels drop into the water and then promptly gets P.O.’d that there are chunks of food floating around in it. So he tips the bowl over and drinks off the floor. Guess which cat.

5. I’m physically unable to burp. The closest I get is a gurgle, which sounds like a sink backing up. It’s not only annoying, it’s painful. Please do NOT suggest I guzzle a carbonated beverage. No burp will come of that. It only backs up the pipes more.

6. Kazoos, bugles and bagpipes. They’re not instruments. They’re noise-makers. I used to work in the same office with someone who played a CD of nothing but bagpipe "tunes," if you can believe someone made a CD of only bagpipe music. I was tortured slowly for a few months, for no good reason.

7. My answering machine. It takes the stupid lady forever to GET TO THE FREAKING MESSAGE ALREADY! Have a listen.

8. Toyota, for not understanding that a sun visor has to be big enough to, you know, BLOCK THE SUN. Both Toyatas Dave’s owned never had long enough visors, so when I’m riding in the car, I have try to keep really straight and tall, squint, and wear sunglasses.

9. Starbucks, for making it impossible to order a cup of coffee without a PhD. Coffee used to be so simple. A friend of mine who has a PhD helped me out by writing this on a store business card. The front reads: "Please help this woman." On the back: "Mocha. Extra shot. Dark choc. Whip." Works for me.

10. Saran wrap. Tear off a sheet of cling wrap, and it does exactly that. It clings to itself and then you have to ball it up, throw it out and try again. I would never use this stuff if not for the need to see which of my leftovers is turning into penicillin in the refrigerator. What someone needs to invent is clear tin foil! Anyone? Anyone?

I’m throwing in a bonus 11th annoyance — this one from my husband, who wants to get in on The Annoying List action. He’s not a very annoyed person by nature, which is why we’re a perfect match. If we were both as annoyed as I am, we couldn’t live in the same house. But apparently some things do bother the man.

Here’s what annoys Dave: People who put slashes through 7’s and 0’s. His rant goes thusly: "And it’s always the ones who have perfect penmanship!!! It’s the slobs who need it, but they never do it, and the ones who do are probably the same people who write xx’s in place of zeros on their checks. You’re supposed to write 00/100!!!! Numbers go on checks! An ‘x’ is not a zero you half-wit!

Oh-kaaaaay.

About three times a year, I have a nightmare about a plane crashing. This is because my house is located directly under the flight path of an airport three miles west of me. Since they say most crashes occur during takoff and landing, my odds of being involved in a crash are greater than if I were a passenger on a plane itself.

In the ten years I’ve lived here, I’ve gotten used to the noise, but I never stop wondering if some day an injured plane won’t make it to the airport and instead will crash into my neighborhood. The only good thing about these nightmares is that when the planes crash, they never hit my house. They hit other people’s houses all around me, though. My subconscious keeping me safe, I guess.

Last night’s nightmare went like this:

I was a passenger on a 747 getting ready for takeoff. Not at the airport, but instead on a highway near me. We begin to accelerate down the highway, passing cars on either side of us. I’m not sure how it is our plane fits on the highway, but it’s a dream, so anything is possible.

We approach a hill in the road that will be used to get us up in the air. Nevermind engine thrust and the laws of physics; in my dream it’s the tiny 4 foot incline that’ll give us lift and get us airborne. As we get to the hill, the pilot announces "Uh-oh, there’s an aircraft with trouble ahead." As it passes over us, I glance out the back window (I’m inexplicably in a car at this point) and see the troubled plane trying to make it back to the airport.

Our pilot slams on the brakes and we come to a stop on the berm of the road. We all turn around and see that the other plane’s back left wheel is on fire. The plane comes to a complete stop, in midair, and then flips over. The plane is shaped like a shoebox, and tapers at the rear. Its squarish figure makes it impossible to keep its momentum and it drops like a rock in a ball of flames.

Seeing this, I buckle my seatbelt (?), put on my watch (??) and begin snacking on a box of white cheddar cheese crackers (???). We continue watching this event unfold and are relieved to see the Three Stooges jump out of a fire engine that arrived earlier because they were alerted about the impending disaster (????).

Why the Three Stooges? Well, there’s a great scene in the movie It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World where Moe Howard, Larry Fine and Joe DeRita appear as firemen responding to the end-of-movie mayhem. I haven’t seen the movie in months, but dreams have a weird way of pulling out memories from the deep recesses of the mind and sticking them in random places.

As the Stooges put out the fire, we return to our starting point because we’re going to make another attempt at takeoff. But I don’t wanna try and take off after what I’ve just seen! I scream "Shouldn’t we wait another day before trying this again?" but the pilot doesn’t hear me because he’s way up front. I realize that we have to go through this despite my objections, so I put on my life vest and get into the crash position. Nobody else on the plane is doing this and I feel silly for being alone in my panic. I start to sob quietly and then I wake up.

I always wake up at the moment I think I’m doomed. Dear Brain — thank you for working in that crazy way you do. I appreciate whatever connections you make to shake me up out of my nightmarish sleep to save me the agony. I just wish you could make me forget these dreams, now and the next time. Because I’m going to have another one in about four months, right on schedule.

We’ve all had moments where something fortunate happens to us and it can’t be explained by logic or reason. Some call it luck, some call it fate, some call it divine intervention. One of those moments happened to me this week.

WARNING! The post includes the following: cats, rodents and bugs. If you’re turned off by any of these things, I urge you to click away now and come back tomorrow.

When I started this blog two months ago, I vowed it wouldn’t turn into a blog about my cats. Just so you know, it’s still not going to be a cat blog, but this story does involve a cat, so I have to make an exception. It’s more about bugs, which isn’t much better.

First, let’s meet Stinky.

Stinky is one of our first cats together. We got her and her brother from some friends almost 15 years ago. Her brother, Calvin, is since deceased (RIP buddy). In human equivalent years, Stinky would be on Medicare by now. She’s a self-confident old girl whose partying days are behind her. She doesn’t care, for instance, that this pose is not a good look for her. She lets it all hang out and we let her do whatever she wants. At her age, she’s pretty harmless.

However, there are times when she surprises us and acts all kitteny and spry. About two years ago, she shocked us by bagging her first mouse (I’ll spare you the picture, and yes, I took a picture). We didn’t witness her kill her prey, we only saw the damage. She dropped it on the patio and then laid down next to it, all proud of herself. Luckily for us, the mouse was gone the next day and we didn’t have to worry how to dispose of it. We presume it met its second demise at the claws of some other ravaging animal that happened upon a free lunch. Such is nature.

After the mouse incident, we realized Stinky’s days of being harmless were over and now we had to be mindful of whatever she set her eyes on out in the yard, whether it be bugs, birds or chipmunks. No one is safe now.

Fast forward to this week. I’m reading a book all comfortable on my nice new couch and for reasons unknown I decide to check on Stinky. Despite the collar she wears to keep her within the bounds of our invisible fence, she’s been known to not care too much about the shock fence and sometimes crosses it despite the zap to her neck.

When I look out back, I’m instantly relieved to see her still on the patio, but this relief quickly turns to fear when I see that she’s crouched over the edge of the porch staring at something. This can’t be good, since cats stare at only two things:

1. Imaginary objects that exist only in their pea brains.
2. Living things that are smaller than them that they’re thinking of killing.

I’m instantly aware it’s something in Category #2. I can just about make out what that something is — looks like a meaty spider. But because it’s fairly dark outside, I can only make a positive ID if I get within inches of it.

I don’t have many choices here. Get closer and see what it is, and freak out. Consider that whatever it is might jump on me when I get very close, and freak out. Pick Stinky up by the hind legs and drag her away from what she wants to maim, kill and eat, and freak out. Basically, I’m freaking out. And Dave is nowhere to be found, so that is not an option either.

With my crappy options, I proceed anyway. I opt for picking Stinky up by her backside and she begins to growl at me. Not a problem, since I don’t have far to get her in the house. When I get to the door and deposit her inside, I glance back to see what it was she was so intent on investigating.

Meet the praying mantis.

I suspect what I thought was a balled-up spider was just the head of this thing. What will give me nightmares for months to come was the fact that it RAN AFTER ME while I was carrying Stinky inside. I barely made it in before I slammed the door shut on it.

Can someone please explain to me why bugs can’t just simply be gross? Do they also have to torment me by chasing me down?

It was long, ugly and FAST! Apparently they can attack and kill prey larger than themselves. Read more about that here, but only if you’re not eating right now.

Once safely inside, with the door shut, I began to thank God that I got up off the couch when I did. I don’t know what made me go check on Stinky, but I’m convinced if I hadn’t done it at that exact moment, I would have had to try and get this disgusting creature out of her mouth somehow, some way. I can barely think about it without wanting to throw up. I like to think it was divine intervention that saved me.

I’m sorry if I grossed anyone out here, but if you stuck with the story, thanks. You’re a better person than me.

Taking a twist on New Year’s resolutions, I’m making one for the new month. Starting today, October 1, I’m vowing to stop using "like" so much in conversation. A friend and I were discussing how much you hear it uttered in every day speech, sometimes as much as ten times in a couple minutes. Believe me, now that I’ve said it, you are guaranteed to hear yourself do it. And if you’re like me, you’ll be shocked at how much.

Today, while talking about whether I could keep a resolution such as this, I counted how many times I used "like" and stopped short every time I did it. It was so often, I almost rendered myself speechless. An exercise like this makes you keenly aware how much you use what are called "discourse markers." These are words or phrases that mark a boundary in speech, and usually serve no purpose. Other examples are "you know," "I mean," and "actually."

There is some disagreement as to whether the words are unnecessary filler, or are essential to conveying information in conversations. I see it as a little of both. Whatever the case, it’s annoying to hear it so much, from myself or others. Just listen to a teenage girl on her cell phone for five minutes, and you’ll, like, know what I mean.

Here’s how my resolution will work: For every time I use "like" in a sentence, I will drop a quarter in a jar. The way I see it, I’ll either succeed at ridding myself from my own annoyance quickly, or I’ll have a nice little nest egg to use for my next trip to Paris. Either way, I win.

If you want to follow along with my resolution, I’ll be keeping a daily "like" counter in my sidebar, updated each morning. I may not always be aware I’m saying "like," so if you work with me and hear me say it, feel free to point at the jar on my desk and wait for the clink. You might also want to buy me lunch, because I’m pretty sure in the first few weeks, I’ll be completely broke. Like, bummer.

UPDATE: The experiment is over. Click here to see how it turned out!

I love a good deal. One of the best is combining my grocery store club card with a pile of coupons to realize fairly significant savings. It gets better when my store runs a program where you can redeem points for an additional percentage off, depending on the amount accumulated from past purchases. Dave and I amassed about 1,200 points, so that would earn us 20% on top of our regular savings. We were looking at about 35% off the total bill.

Until we got to the register.

After filling two carts to the brim with a lot of things we don’t buy until this gigantic points program runs, we gleefully queue up to the register. I announce to the cashier with great fanfare that we’d like to redeem our points.

She begins scanning our items and says “Do you want include these points for the bakeware?”

“Bakeware?”

“Did you pick out all your bakeware already?”

“Bakeware?”

Dave chimes in, “Bakeware?”

“Yes, certain pieces are worth certain points and you turn them in against your total points.”

Again, Dave. “Bakeware? I’m sorry. I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

The poor cashier must’ve thought we were on drugs or stupid or both, given our stoney-faced stares and furrowed brows. “We usually give a percentage off discount for the points program, but this time you get bakeware instead of a percent off.”

We didn’t want bakeware. We don’t cook. We microwave, we use the stovetop, but we definitely don’t cook. Besides, there’s nowhere to store bakeware since our kitchen cabinets are too small. I’m not happy about this little turn of events. Dave just wanted to get scanned and get out, but I wasn’t about to leave empty-handed.

I look at her all hangdog and ask “Where is this bakeware?” She points to a display nearby and off I go to pick out bakeware I have no intention of using. EVER. When I get to the display there’s another woman scoping out what to get and I chat it up with her how this bakeware thing is such a scam. She agrees, “Yeah, they offer a percent off every other time and then we get bakeware now. No warning. Just bakeware.”

I choose three items whose point value gets me near the 1,200 mark. I pick them out based on who I think I’ll be giving them to right after I get them home. I think my sisters will like what I selected. They use their ovens.

After packing up all our things, I look at the so-so discount for this trip. I’m severely peeved because it could have been a great one. Today’s discount amounted to only 12%. Had the store run its usual program, it would have been 32%.

Yes, I know we’ll use everything we bought, but it would have been nice for the store to have posted a notice somewhere that this points redeeming period would not get us any kind of savings. Bakeware is not a deal unless you cook, and even then it’s not much to write home about. Bastards.

Halleluia! All of the work and waiting is behind us. The furniture arrived today! After getting it in place, we realized while we like it, we don’t love it and began having flashes of buyer’s remorse. But that could change after a few days of getting used to it.

Here’s what we like about it:

1. Both the recliner and the couch are extremely comfortable, and that’s the biggest plus. The old furniture was too soft for comfort. No more sinking into the middle crevasse.

2. We think we hit the mark on the color scheme. The dark colors are richer-looking and warmer than the old pieces. The table lamp you see here is from another room. Seeing brass with the furniture tells us that’s what we need to buy. For a while we were thinking porcelain, but not anymore.

Here’s what we’re on the fence about:

1. The recliner is probably too big to be paired with the couch. We didn’t know this because it wasn’t paired with it in the showroom. To make it worse, our living room is so small that this is the only configuration that’ll work.

2. The patterned pillows are a bit much. They actually sent us the wrong ones. We asked for a set of two patterned, and two solid blue (to match the couch). It’s an easy fix, but we’re bugged about it now.

Here’s what could get Lucky killed:

See him under the chair? It’s the first place he went because he likes to play fast and loose with his nine lives. Dave’s already worried that when he gets up from the reclining position, he’ll squash him. We figure Lucky will crawl into the metal folding mechanism, fall asleep in there and get crushed when he puts the chair in its upright position. Lucky may not be so lucky one day.

UPDATE: Ten hours after seeing our new furniture arranged the way you see here, we’re working hard on rearranging it. We’re not making maximum use of the space we have, so we want to figure out a way to move the chair as far from the couch as possible, and put the television in its place.

Not sure how this will all go down, but I’ll post back with another picture if we get it just the way we like. For now, we’re still only liking the setup. We’d much prefer loving it.

Always on the lookout for things that make it easier for my visually-challenged Dad to see better, I jumped at this giveaway posted on our work "For Sale" board:

I am giving away my beloved telephone with its oversized number keys to whoever can promise to give love and care equal to its comically large digits.

This desk telephone can dial through both tone and pulse, giving the new phone owner the power of choice, which we all know is so hard to find these days, what with the state of the world and all that jazz.

This item is a MUST HAVE for anyone serious about early-90s desk telephones with large numbers, so the phone will go to whomever contacts me first.

I emailed a picture of it to my sisters. "Wow! Look at this phone for Dad!" which prompted a reply from my sister Marlene, "I need that for my cell phone."

When exactly did our eyes get so bad? I wasn’t expecting all these problems until I hit 50 or later. But already I have such trouble reading small print.

I had to use a magnifying glass recently on two products whose labels were impossible to read. I have to take my glasses off to read the newspaper and put them back on to see the TV. I’m giving very serious consideration to buying one of those chains you attach to your glasses so you can wear them around your neck. I don’t care what it looks like. Oh, and I have a lazy eye. I’m a mess.

Does anyone know whether or not there are grocery stores in the Lehigh Valley where you can place an order of deli meats and cheeses in advance, and have them ready for you when you get to the store?

It would seem to me that in our technologically advanced society, where one can order up just about anything via phone or internet, we can muster up a system that keeps me from waiting in line behind twelve other people who need four kinds of cheese and two kinds of meats, all sliced to different thicknesses.

To make matters worse, sometimes my local store has a ticket dispenser available, and sometimes not. Do they not feel like taking people in order some days? I want a ticket!!

It would make sense to me that they can take advance orders. They do it in the bakery section for cakes. Why not cheese? I mean, it’s not like I’m going to make a crank call for 3/4 lb. Heidi Ann Swiss and a half pound Schaeffer’s baloney. They can DO this! No one would abuse the system, I’m sure.

And I’m not even asking that there be a special pickup place for it. I’d get in line like everyone else. It’s just I wouldn’t have to announce my order, one cold cut at a time, and then wait forever while they go to the case, find my item, unwrap it, go to the appropriate slicer, ask me again how much I wanted, walk to the scale, weigh it, not get it right, walk back to the slicer, get a couple more slices, walk back to the scale, get it close enough, and then ask "Will there be anything else?"

I could just walk up and say "I’m here for my cheese." Pick up my order and go. What’s so hard about that?

Me thinks I’m getting cranky again. Is it Friday yet?

I’m cranky this week because it’s been so busy at work that I thought Tuesday was Thursday already. It really felt like four days’ worth of work crammed into two. We have our old ugly furniture paired with our new tables and now it looks like Unclaimed Salvage & Freight in my living room. And we’re starting to wonder if La-z-Boy will ever send us our new furniture. I have to fight for space at my kitchen sink because my fat cat insists on drinking her water straight from the faucet … and I keep letting her. How stupid am I? Don’t answer that. Plus a spider may have just crawled into my cup of coffee.

What better time to post a list of 10 things that annoy me. I’m so in the mood!

1. People who can’t control their car alarms. Guess what? No one cares if your car is getting broken into, stolen or damaged in any way. In fact, is there anything I can do to help?

2. People who pay for groceries with a check. A check? Are you kidding me?

3. Brittney Spears. Tell me, why is she still here? After Sunday’s MTV Music Awards disaster she needs to pack up her lingerie in a really tiny suitcase and call it a day. Call it a career, actually. And take your dancing pole with you.

4. Billy Mays, the ear-piercing, high-octane infomercial pitchman for OxyClean and something orange that cleans everything. I can never get to the mute button fast enough.

5. People who let their dogs crap on my lawn, and then walk away. You’re supposed to be carrying it around in bags, aren’t you? And, by the way, how does that steaming pile of poo feel when you pick it up with your bare hand from the inside of the bag? Reason number #284 why cats rule.

6. Red light runners. Um, you do know you can kill people doing that, right?

7. Microsoft for too many reasons to list. But just for today, you annoy me because you think everyone has the 20/20 vision of an 18-year-old. Why on God’s green earth can’t you make the Office 2007 program buttons bigger? You know, the ones people use a hundred times a day? Plus now to open the File menu, you have to click that big gumball Office logo, that’s if people even know what it is.

8. That lady who drove practically attached to my trunk yesterday who was not only talking on a cell phone but smoking a cigarette. It was fun to watch how you managed that and I did want to see you get into an accident, just not with me.

9. Hard plastic packaging you have to risk life and limb cutting open. Since when did a $10 cable require Fort Knox protection? Seriously, can’t it just go in a box with a lid?

10. This video and accompanying song. I stumbled onto it a while back and now every time I see a furniture commercial, I’m reminded of it. Not as bad as Pop Goes the Weasel, but it’s in the general vicinity. Beware.

Please don’t write me to say "lighten up." If you do, you’re going to make my next list.