why the canadian girl deserved to lose.

Whilst channel surfing tonight, I stumbled across ABC's live broadcast of the Scripps Spelling Bee.

It was down to two girls, a girl named Katherine Close, from New Jersey, and a girl from Canada, whose name I never caught. Or maybe I did, but it wasn't mainstream enough for me to remember.

The rules are such that if you miss your word, not only must the remaining participant spell her word correctly, but she must then spell the word in the next round correctly.

In round 18, the Canadian girl was given the word, Welschmertz, which basically means "ironic pessimism," and is German in origin.

Okay, I've never heard of the damned word before, nor would I probably have gotten the spelling completely correct, but I definitely wouldn't have spelled it Velschmertz.

Because after saying the word over and over, asking a zillion times to have it repeated, and some furious hand scribbling, that's how she spelled it.

Even I know that in German, words that start with w are often pronounced v. Vagner didn't write the Ring Cycle. The Veimar days never happened.

Then Katharine Close got her two words correct, the last being Ursprache, which is "protolanguage: a language that is the recorded or hypothetical ancestor of another language or group of languages." Ursprache is also clearly Germanic in origin.

Go teen USA!

As an aside, I would also like to point out that kundalini is a pretty pussy word to have in a spelling bee. Yoga's pretty fucking popular these days, and that there's yoga terminology.

musings not about my hair.

Monday, as I was driving home from work, I realized that I had somehow moved from bright sunny daytime, to moody foggy dark daytime, all in the course of about 3 blocks.

Looking back in the mirror, I could see the sunshine beaming down upon the earth behind me, bright pools of light.

I looked east to the lake, and realized that I could only see a narrow band of beach, breakers, and a bank of white nothingness.

Above and west of me, tall buildings were engulfed by fog, looking half-consumed, and reminding me of a Stuart Davis song, "...chow down, chow down the buildings..."

Once, someone told me that she lived high enough in a building facing the lake that often times her view was of empty quiet nothingness.

Eerie blank whiteness wielding the primitive powers that makes stories like the original version of "The Fog" stick in your memory.

I was half tempted to write down some sort of epic poem to the strange weather in this city, but the ennui won out, and I instead watched television.

..........

Watching Aninal Planet lately has served to implant the idea that kittens need rescued from bad situations, and places like the pound. They need homes filled with love.

It has also made me more aware of Cricket's behaviors. She's always been strange, but she's gotten so clingy and meow-y lately, I wonder if she's in need of companionship -- someone to burn off her excess energy, wear her out, and keep her from being lonely when I'm not here.

I am stricken with kitten fever.

Not the tiny mewling baby kitten kind, but the gangly litterbox-trained adolescent version.

I want to get Cricket a kitty of her own.

Cricket could lord it over her kitten until it got bigger than she is, and then she could get the well-deserved smackdown that she has earned many times over by then.

But I have concerns as well.

I am afraid that Cricket might hurt the kitty when I am not here.

Or they could create so much collateral damage from fighting that I'd need to pack away anything breakable forever.

Or worse, that she would just hide and skulk around to avoid the kitty, and probably start acting out more, making the sink peeing, the bathtub whizzing, and the front door marking the least of my worries.

Cricket is a strange one -- she has the capacity to get used to things and warm up to them, eventually accepting them. Case in point, she now attacks and sleeps upon the Flokati rug I got at IKEA, where before she avoided it like the plague, scrambling over furniture and making stunningly gymnastic leaps from here to there. And it's a damned big rug.

However, she is also completely capable of carrying a burning hatred that will never be extinguished, deep in her weird little heart. For the first 8 or so months of her life, she was in the same house with Chase the dog, and never once did she accept him. She mostly just ignored him, or gave him the stink eye and a very wide berth. To this day, 3 years later, she still swats and hisses at him.

She still won't accept anyone's touch except those of my family members, and she's truly only affectionate to me and Dad. (I think she pays him attention because he's not really hot on cats, and it's either that she senses a kindred spirit and the sharing of a common bond, or simply the expression of a perverse need to antagonize someone that doesn't like cats, because she is both evil and a cat. And she has to suck up to me or else I might stop feeding her, or possibly introduce her to the hard life of the common alley cat.)

I still want another kitty.

And if N. hadn't had to get back to Chicago so quickly from another pointless management meeting in Wheaton, we just might have stopped off at a PetSmart and picked up a cute black 6-month old kitty that looks just like Cricket except without the random white hairs.

Instead, after dropping N. off at the nail salon, I bought the weasel-bunny a new litter pan.

............

I also want a Yaris.

I don't need one, and other than knowing that they are fairly inexpensive, small, cute, have decent gas mileage, and are made by Toyota, they're completely foreign to me. Ironically, I could get a brand-new, tricked out Yaris now for less than I paid for my gently-used Camry 5 years ago.

almost a trifecta

The other day, I took a Target bag and filled it full of packing materials and old catalogues, with the intention of throwing it away.

As you can imagine, Cricket won't get the hell off of it.

A plastic sack filled with crinkly plastic and crumpled up paper?

The only way it could possibly be better is if it were a Binny's bag inside a Trader Joe's brown paper bag filled with crinkly plastic and crumpled up paper.

muse my hair.

I love my hair short. It is a short, bleach-blonde pixie crop that stays the hell out of my eyes, and takes about 60 seconds to style.

But then I see these pictures, and I decide that I really like how my hair looks at that length.

Oh, and then, I remember that I had to look like this for a while to get to that length.

Which, I have to admit, is kinda scary.

And I'm not sure I'm ready for that kind of committment.

because i'm awesome

Earlier today, some lady called the salon, and immediately addressed me as "Sweetheart."

She sounded like she knew who I was, and I wracked my brain for a name.

I had absolutely no idea who it was, and I felt guilty for not recognizing someone that I know with some familiarity's voice.

I thought and thought, and then quit caring.

She asked if we still had the Mother's Day fragrance GWP, which I did confirm we still had, and then gave her the directions to our store from the Kennedy Expressway.

She also called me sweetheart a couple more times.

I still didn't know who she was, and it wasn't really important enough for me to worry about after I hung up the phone.

Like 5 hours later, she called back, and asked me where there were other stores located in Chicago.

I told her the locations of the other two in Chicago, and she asked me if there was one closer to Norridge.

I told her that there was one in Norridge, and proceeded to tell her exactly where it was, giving very precise and easy to understand directions, even pointing out a couple of stores in the area that would identify the location, in the event that she couldn't see that store's sign from the street.

She thanked me profusely, telling me that she'd talked to around 4 or 5 other stores, and they all wanted to send her to Oakbrook or thereabouts, which is far. She also said that most of the people weren't polite, and that they had acted very put upon when asked for directions.

I apologized for her negative experiences, and she thanked me again, saying that she felt like she should tell someone how great I was.

I laughed, and then she seriously asked me how to go about praising me on the record.

I gave her the number to the Help Desk, told her my name and title, and politely told her thank you, and wished her a good day.

About an hour later, we got an email from Guest Services saying that a woman had called to say what a nice and helpful person I was, that I had gone out of my way to help fully assist her, and that she felt I had singlehandedly turned what was for her a very negative experience dealing with The Company for Whom I Work into a very positive one, and that I deserved a lot of praise.

I printed out the email, and put it in my Work Praise file, which I keep just in case I need some good feedback some time.

Then I told everyone how awesome I was, because I totally am. I may not be the best or the brightest, but I am awesome in every way that I can be awesome.

Big head, you say? Well, not 20 minutes later, a random customer that I had helped a few weeks ago stopped me, thanked me for working with her for so long to find a product that fit her needs, and then shared that she totally LOVED the product I recommended.

I told her that I tried to be helpful every once in a while, and she said that I had been very helpful, and asked for my name.

I thanked her, and wished her a nice day.

I had originally set out to go to the office at the front of the store to submit an order for supplies, so as I walked past the GM to my predetermined destination, I loudly whispered, "Dude, I am still awesome," and then went inside the office.

The customer happened to ring out with the GM at the register right next to the office, so I got to enjoy the woman telling the GM about how great I was, and how I was an asset, and that I was nice and incredibly helpful, and about how I had spent a long time helping her replace a beloved but discontinued volumizer with one she actually liked better, Redken Weightlifter, several weeks earlier.

She raved about the product being fabu for another minute or so, and then went back to praising me.

The whole time I was in the office, with one of the LP Deputies searching for crime to prevent in the store by dividing his time between actual visual observation through the one-way mirror, and watching the monitors with eagle eyes, I kept saying how awesome I am, and even shared the fact that I am HOT in Vegas, which is another story for another time.

Somewhere in the middle of my ego-stroking, the GM shut the door completely (the lady couldn't hear me, but he could sort of make out what I kept saying), and I went back to working on the order.

A little while later, the DM came to pick up some paperwork from our store's office, where I was located, and she proceed to amusedly listen to me talk about how I had been given mad phat props for being so awesome TWICE in one day.

Then she high-fived me.

Because I'm awesome.

that bites.

Okay, as you may recall, I am missing a couple of teeth.

Once upon a time, I had braces.

But before I could get the braces put on, the dentist had to pull the first molars from both sides of my lower jaw -- they were baby teeth, and had no adult teeth below them.

So, thanks to the gaps in my jaw, which I was later informed would cost $1500 each to repair, I have a chunk missing out of my left second molar, and a chip in my right second molar. I also have a badly receded gumline along that area.

In order to protect my teeth from further breakage, and to prevent my gums from disappearing entirely, which they seem currently destined to do, I need to get a crown and an implant.

My cheap-ass insurance is only willing to pay like $750 of the roughly $1750 price, so I am really hoping the dentist's office has a payment plan.

Because pixie needs a new tooth, bitches.

well, that's just swell.

Last night right after I got all comfy and tucked away in bed, I had a sharp stabbing pain directly below the sternum, that radiated into my back below the shoulder blades. It seriously felt like someone had just knifed me.

As I tried to sit up, I started to feel all dizzy and clammy, and thought I might be nauseous, but wasn't entirely sure. I kinda stumble-walked to the bathroom, and hung my head over the toilet, but then decided the bathroom smelled really bad, and I didn't want to be in there.

I climbed back into bed, and tried to find a position that didn't feel like I was dying of something horribly painful, but ended up groaning, "Owwwww-unnnnhhh, that hurts worse," everytime I shifted my weight, which was about 20 times.

I seriously thought about calling Tifling to come and get me because I was dying and clearly needed to go to the hospital, but the phone was really far away from the bed. Plus, I'd have to buzz her into the building, and that would have required standing up clear across the room.

Somehow, I managed to find position that only really hurt, instead of really really really hurting, and passed out.

Today, I still have some pain below the sternum when the flesh is pressed downward, mostly to the right. My back also still hurts, almost in a band across my back. And it kicks Tylenol's sorry ass.

When I got home from work today, I typed in my symptoms and got hits for the following:

Hiatal hernias can cause pain behind the sternum, which can be aching or stabbing. "It sometimes feels like a sharp knife goes in unwarned! That can either be from the diaphragm being too stretched from a hernia, or it can be from a heart condition, since it's in the same vicinity."

Gallbladder issues can create similar symptoms, although generally located to the right of the sternum, in the upper right quadrant.

Aortic dissection, also called aortic aneurysm-dissecting. Symptoms can include sudden, severe, sharp, stabbing, tearing, or ripping chest pain located below the sternum, then radiates under the shoulder blades or to the back, intense anxiety, anguish pallor, rapid pulse, profuse sweating, dry skin/mouth, thirst, nausea and vomiting, dizziness, fainting, excessive yawning, clammy skin.

Okay, I do have a previously diagnosed small hiatal hernia, which could be the culprit, and most likely is.

However, the symptoms described by aortic dissection almost perfectly match everything I experienced last night. And I'm always yawning, seriously. I can't help but yawn. It drives me crazy.

Well, we'll just have to see.

the claws that catch...

God bless Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom.

"...No other family has members as disparate and as weird as the claw family."
Courtesy of Animal Planet:

"Long ago, giant, odd-looking creatures roamed the plains and forests of South America. Larger than elephants, these behemoths wielded foot-long, dagger-like claws with their huge, muscular arms. They lived alongside our distant human ancestors, but less than 10,000 years ago they mysteriously disappeared. It seemed that the "fellowship of the claw" had come to an end. Or had it?

Giant ground sloths belonged to the Xenarthra family, an ancient and bizarre group of mammals that evolved shortly after the dinosaurs went extinct. Xenarthrans continue to roam South America today, and though none are as large as their supersized ancestors, they are truly among the strangest creatures on the planet.

Some have long, tube-like mouths with 2-foot-long tongues. Others have prehensile tails, which they use to grasp thin vines and stems. Some spend nearly their entire lives upside down, while others are coated in thick plates of armor. Together, they form the claw family, each sharing the characteristic of long, sharp claws.

Amazon Claws reveals the truth behind these weird and wonderful animals — anteaters, sloths and armadillos — with an intimacy like you've never seen before."

On what other show would the narrator describe a group of animals as being the most different from, and entirely stranger than any other family of animals?

Well, technically they are the Order Xenarthra (edentates), and are then subdivided into four animal families: Family Bradypodidae (three-toed sloths), Family Megalonychidae (two-toed sloths), Family Myrmecophagidae (anteaters), and Family Dasypodidae (armadillo).

And no, I didn't forget aardvarks. They belong to the Order Tubulidentata, and Family Orycteropodidae.

Of course, in true Wild Kingdom style, the armadillo loses her baby in a fire, and the sloth mother and her child fall into the river after a huge flood, where they are quickly swallowed whole by an enormous anaconda.

rambling stock talk.

I don't really dig spam, but sometimes I love the randomness of the spams I get.

I've been getting a lot of them lately regarding RRBK, De Greko, Inc. & HE-5 Resources, Corp.

And it isn't so much that the messages are interesting.

I am just amused by the randomness of the subject lines...

• plenty
• sprinter
• John Doe
• determined
• modern
• effortless hid

• haphazard arcade
• foil
• sweetly
• quash
• petty
• hypnosis botanical
• convict eaves
• king childbearing
• sheet so that
• frightful
• selling point
• bloodstain matron of honor
• gunshot
• correspondingly
• forefinger preemptive
• taxpayer attentively
• rode
• eccentricity
• boundless
• prosperous
• ensconce uproar
• warehouse
• cheefully
• odd Tuesday
• morale
• waterfront
• bottleneck
• demanding innocently
• anyone mummy
• acting
• elite
• load Protestant
• seasonal
• suitcase grocery store
• Insights Newsletter
• aspire satirical
• racetrack
• self-defeating worry
• extravagantly uncover
• wheat
• noticeably
• stockade
• neatly
• shrinkage
• arraign
• agility
• forge
  
• fitness
• frankfurter hundred
  
• 
  

Not that all of them are so entertaining, but I do have to admit that I particularly enjoy "haphazard arcade," "hypnosis botanical," and "bloodstain matron of honor."

"Forefinger preemptive" is also pretty good.

it absolutely figures.

This morning, N. and I drove to Naperville, for Salon Manager training.

We were there to learn the new interviewing methodology, as handed down by Corporate, which was intended to supplement the recruiting methodology that we'd covered 3 weeks earlier.

Despite the fact that the existing recruiting and interviewing standards are pretty fine as they are. But whatever. Not in charge, have no say. Move on.

N. had appropriated her store's "Staffing Binder," since we now take all applications online and have no need to store paper copies anymore.

And I decided that was a great idea, so I wouldn't have several file folders of whatnot about generalized recruiting, and stuff like specific stylists information. Plus. we were given some handouts that really have no home, but would be great in a binder like that.

As everyone touched base on how recruiting was going, I mentioned that I was concerned because no one I'd directed to apply online had done so. It was suggested that I focus on following up with the stylists that I had already spoken to, and go back through my older application and recruiting files to touch base with people that had applied in the last year or so.

I decided I'd get on that first thing when I went in to work this afternoon, and felt all good and motivated to do the part of my job that I like the least.

Imagine my surprise when I took down the "Staffing Binder" from the shelf of binders, only to discover that the Admin had cleaned out the contents, as per an organizational Corporate directive from the prior week.

I can see throwing out the store applications that were like 6 months old, but to go through and toss over 2 years of applications, contact information, notes about stylists, stylist leads, and the like that belonged to the salon, without asking anyone, boggles my mind.

One of my pay stubs from like 2 years ago was recently discovered behind the filing cabinet, and then immediately put in my in/out box, for criminy's sake.

And of course, not only did the trash get taken to the dumpster this morning, but the dumpster was also emptied by a garbage truck shortly thereafter.

Which leaves me in the position of having to start over from scratch, which I suppose is sort of a good thing.

And I get to tell the DM that I couldn't follow up with anyone, because my files have magically disappeared in a fit of spring cleaning.

It would figure that immediately after I finally g0t off my slack ass and bothered to file all my applications, assessments, leads, etc, after having it all sit around for months in a variety of places, and immediately before I got all motivated to actually use all of that information for the powers of good, it got pitched.

Because that's how my life works.

In other news, I also received a letter today from Capitol One, informing me that because of my excellent credit history with their company, I was eligible for some large, extremely high interest loans they were offering customers.

And me? I hate Capitol One with a passion that burns with the fire of ten thousand suns.

fyi:

I will not be around my computer at all Wednesday through Sunday afternoon, so if'n you've got something of great import to tell me about, you'll have to call me.

And if you don't know my number, you probably don't need to call me.

Just make a comment or drop me an email.

Ciao.

dear kenmore, maytag & whirlpool:

Washing machines should have a "mend" cycle.

That way, when you toss an intact dirty shirt into the laundry, should the seams become unravelled on both sides in the same place during the wash cycle, revealing an astoundingly symmetrical lack of structural integrity, and it isn't noticed when you remove the shirt from the dryer, fold it, put it away, and then later wear it, one of your clients won't point out the fact that your shirt is split at the seams on the left side.

Then when you tell this story to one of your cow-orkers, s/he won't also then point out that your shirt seam is split in the exact same place on the right side, but didn't say anything because s/he thought that it was built that way, what with both sides open at the seams in the same place and way and all.

Because, let me tell you, if I was going to design peekaboo side slits into a shirt, I certainly wouldn't choose to expose a random 2 inch section of flank, almost midway between the armpit and navel.

Not that I would really consider designing such an odd feature into any hypothetical item of apparel that I might create, but still.

As an aside, there should obviously be a "leave torn" cycle, so that you don't end up with expensive designer jeans that come replete with cute little patches midthigh or on the knees, or don't have one ass cheek hanging out, as God and the designer intended.

special edition tiny

I went down to Q101 to pick up my special edition RHCP iPod, and got it a little too easily.

I showed up to the studio, told the woman squirreled away behind the reception wall of bulletproof material who I was, she presumably called the promotions department, and some dude showed up to hook me up with my prize.

When I had originally spoken to the lady from the promotions department, she had told me that I needed to provide a photo id and my social security card.

And I brought them along with me.

Oh, so very unnecessarily, it would seem.

The dude looked like he had kicked off happy hour at about 4:20, ahem, and seemed to be a little slow on the uptake.

He asked me what my name was, I told him, he handed me a list of people's names, told me to sign next to mine, and then handed me a small black box and an envelope.

He told me congratulations, and then wandered off back into the mysterious inner depths of "free speech radio."

When I opened up the box later, I was confused, because all I saw was a little black iPod with a silver back. It didn't look particularly magical or RHCP-y, but it was free, so it's all good.

Thursday, I had to go to an early management meeting at work, on my day off mind you, so I skipped on over to Best Buy afterward to get myself a lovely storage and protective case for my new iPod. I had some lovely reward zone gift certificates to cash in from buying my computer, so I figured why not use them for that...

Mind you, this is like a week after I actually picked the thing up from the radio station.

When I was actually trying to figure out which case to buy, removing the cases from their packaging when possible, I happened to turn the iPod over and see what looked like a smudge on the shiny silver back of the thing.

Upon closer inspection, it became clear that what I was seeing was not a smudge, but was in fact a tiny engraved RHCP logo circled by 4 tiny engraved autographs of the individual band members.

Dude, if I were making a special edition iPod for myself, you sure as hell would looking at the front of the thing to see what was special enough about it to require it's own edition.

Me, I'm expecting a red RHCP logo on the center of the click-wheel, or maybe something art-worky all around the face of the iPod that ties in with their new album, Stadium Arcadium.

But, whatever.

It sounds good either way.

words that aren't used enough.

1. gobsmacked
2. gawp
3. lollygag
4. smote
5. twain
   
6. cleave
7. betwixt
8. queue
9. obfuscate
   

A busy day.

First, I had the yearly girly poke-n-prod at 8am, complete with Doctor Lisa getting to first base (although I think she technically made a home run, what with the speculum and all), and the biennial cholesterol check.

Then I went home and took a nap for an hour.

At 11:30am, I went to the dentist, because I was convinced that my back teeth were riddled with decay, pestilence and cavities.

The dental hygienist took 12 bitewing x-rays, inadvertently creating sore spots in various gumline locations. She said she'd be back in 5 minutes, after the images were developed.

For the next 10 minutes, I listened in horror and amazement at what the dentist was telling the woman in the room next to mine.

No joke, he actually told her that they would clean all of her teeth, but the tartar build-up was the only thing keeping several teeth from falling out, and they'd have to leave those few teeth alone. He also had a lot to say about the rest of the teeth, saying a bunch of them needed removed, that she needed root canals and crowns and bridges and all sorts of other stuff. As he went through each tooth

She asked if all of that was necessary, and he told her the other option was to pull them all and wear dentures.

I wanted to see her teeth so very bad, just because they were unbelievably unhealthy-sounding. But I also didn't want to gawp at her.

When the dentist finally paid me a visit, I asked him how bad the damage was, since I was convinced that my second molars were shite.

Smiling, he told me that from looking at the x-rays, he couldn't find anything wrong with any of my teeth, and that other than a little gum recession around where I am missing a tooth on each side, and some tartar build-up, my teeth were fine.

He also suggested that I consider getting a crown on my second molar and an implanted first molar on the left side this year, and then get the other side done next year, when my dental benefits reset.

Because I am lacking lower first molars, the second molars and the second pre-molars are afforded no protection to their sides, which on the left side has manifested as a significantly absent inside rear corner of my left second molar. (Your teeth are not pliers. If you can't open a bottle of nail polish using your hands after it's had hot water running over it for ten minutes, you probably won't be able to get it open yourself without breaking the bottle. Your teeth are not pliers.)

Fortunately, my right second molar and pre-molar are pretty much intact.

So, I got a cleaning, and the dentist's office is getting my tooth repair preapproved. I hope they have a payment plan, because I'm not going to charge my $750 or so co-pay to a credit card.

Next, I went to the Store for a 2:00pm district-wide conference call to learn how to use the new online application system, called UNICRU. People can apply from any computer, and then at the store we can look at their computerized applications, should they make it past the established criteria quiz, and proceed with interviewing and hiring from there.

Mostly, it means no more paperwork or paper applications. And the Company isn't going to pony up the loot to have a kiosk at each store for people to use to apply, so if you don't have access to a computer with web access, you're boned if you want to work Where I Work. Which will probably be more of a burden than a boon at first.

Here I thought that Washington, IA was tornado alley...

Confirmed F2 Tornado Struck City - Metro
IC suffers at least $3M in damages - Metro

One time, long ago, I had to sit in the dark in a hallway of the Old Capitol Mall with a bunch of other people, because 75+ mile an hour winds were wreaking havoc in the streets of Iowa City and Coralville.

It was pretty scary, but the resultant damage wasn't too bad.

Power was down for about 5 hours, streets were flooded, and the street traffic was being regulated by the Iowa National Guard.

A train crossing the Iowa River on a narrow bridge was about half derailed, dangling cars into the murky nitrate-ridden depths of the river itself.

Limbs blew down everywhere, about a third of the trees on campus turned instantaneously turned into scrap lumber and firewood, but there was very little property damage beyond a few banged up car and some flooding.

Damn, I'm glad that I moved the hell out of there.

We don't really get the whole tornado thing here by the lake.

god bless celexa, for perfect endings.

Last year, when it was annual employee appraisal time, the old GM assigned set of employees to each member of store management, and of course the stylists to me, and told us all to write the evaluations, then give them to him.

He then went through, downgraded almost all of the ratings, and told us to do them over again.

If someone was given an "above target" rating, he most likely changed it to "on target," because everything associates or stylists would do to go above and beyond target would probably be something they were supposed to do as part of their original job descriptions already, and if they were doing their jobs, they were "on target."

Now, he hasn't been at our store since before the holidays, because he got shipped out to another store to run it while the GM of that store was on maternity leave. Then the GM of another store quit, and he was permanently reassigned there.

So, he hasn't worked with me for like 6 months, has no idea what I've been doing with the salon or the staff, and doesn't pay attention while we're all on weekly district-wide conference calls, so even if we were discussing the disposition of the salon, he most likely wouldn't be following along and would thusly be ignorant of our salon achievements and challenges.

He got to write my appraisal, which was fairly sucktastic, which is also what I was expecting from him. And the new GM got to give it to me, as he had gone over it with the old GM a few weeks ago.

I'm completely baffled about a few things I was rated poorly for, but overall, I don't care what he scored me. I still got a raise (Woot, I'm extra rich now!), which at 2.9% isn't the greatest, but is still more money than I made yesterday. (Last year I got a 4.26% raise, with lower sales and productivity, and a different GM rating me...)

So, somehow I guess I find the appropriate ending to this day is that immediately after I went both 1 & 2, the blue toilet tank tablet that was added to my living situation earlier this week by building maintenance decided to deposit itself immediately underneath the stopper in the tank, forcing the toilet to overflow all over my bathroom floor.

And the bottom couple of inches of my pants.

And my slippers.

And the rug.

Etc.

Of course, it wouldn't stop flowing, and the closest scooping device to lower the water level in the bowl enough so that I could use the plunger without worsening the situation, just happened to be my hands.

How appropriate that I finish my day by scooping yellow water out of a toilet bowl and into the bathtub, plunging vigorously, knocking my hairbrush into the toilet tank while I fiddled around with the blue thing and the stopper, and then wound it all up by spending a half hour crouching on the bathroom floor with cleanser, rags and a dustpan, cleaning up a disgusting mess.

On the plus side, my bathroom floor is very clean, and I make 2.9% more now that I did before.

Which just makes it all worthwhile.

And other than being annoyed and a little amused, today was fine. No crying, no whining, no pouting. Better living through legal chemistry rocks.

P.S. Princess Stinkerbell came in to the salon today to get her hair colored and cut, and her eyebrows rescued from whatever evils had been perpetrated upon them by some hack in the recent past. It was a nice surprise, both the getting to see her and hang out, and the getting to do her hair again.

why i rock, sometimes.

Okay, so the radio station I listen to in Chicago is Q101, and they label themselves as an "alternative rock" station, which is pretty accurate. Mainly, they play the sort of music that would have only hit the airwaves on college radio, like 15 years ago.

Their big tagline is that they play "everything alternative, now on shuffle." Like an iPod, you know.

Sometimes it's Green Day, sometimes it's System of a Down, sometimes it's Johnny Cash performing "Ring of Fire."

Mostly it's Green Day, System of a Down, Korn & something like Death Cab for Cutie or Interpol, for some indie-type street cred or something.

Either way, they don't play boy bands, either of the Simpson girls, Aerosmith, Eric Clapton or Phil Collins.

Which is fine with me.

The other day, either while I was getting ready for work, or while I was driving to or from work, I heard a radio promotion saying that if you submitted a "my shuffle" including a song by Red Hot Chili Peppers, & they liked it & wanted to play it, you'd win a special-edition RHCP iPod, a $10 gift card to iTunes, & get entered in a drawing to win an iTunes gift card for the entire RHCP song catalogue.

And I didn't really think much about it.

Then, because I'm a 101 Club member, I got the weekly email from Twitch telling the public what promotions they were running, what the concert calendar was playing, & the like.

So, I decided to go over & enter to win Death Cab for Cutie tickets.

And I saw the "my shuffle" RHCP promotion being boldly advertised on their mainpage, so I figured, "Why not?"

What you do is pick 5 songs, give it a title, & write a little blurb as to why you want to have these 5 songs played, then submit it.

So, I called mine the "Lollapalooza 2 Mainstage minus Ministry," & picked a song each by Jesus & Mary Chain, RHCP, Soundgarden, Pearl Jam, & Ice Cube.

And submitted the following,

"Once upon a time when I was 20, a friend at work asked me if I wanted to go to Lollapalooza. I asked when, & was told, "Tomorrow."

Living at home for the summer between college sessions, I left a note on the table that said where I was going, packed a bag, & got into a tiny car with a bunch of other people, most of whom I didn't know. Next stop, Cincinatti.

I had my first White Castle, saw The Jim Rose Circus Sideshow for the first time, discovered cheap smokes in Florence, KY, & had a rock ass good time all around the Riverbend Music Center.

I pioneered the "It's too damned hot to wear a shirt so you can just deal with my bra & -- hey, my face is up here" movement (one minute a slutty social pariah, next minute just another bra in a crowd of many), kicked a lot of ass with my steel-toed jump boots, & bought a bootleg t-shirt in the parking lot after the show.

Now that I'm "grown up" & "responsible," I generally don't feel particularly cool or edgy. And sometimes, when I'm feeling my lowest, squarest, lamest, & dead-end-lower-management-iest getting me down, I like to take out the ticket stub from that show that I keep tucked away in my files, look at it, & remember when I was a rebel & a tease, care-free & stupid, a bitch & your best friend, & usually quite happy."

Honestly, I knew right after clicking the submit button, I'd be the proud new owner of a special-edition RHCP iPod & a $10 gc to iTunes.

How you ask?

Why, because a lot of people that work at that station are probably about my age, or at least an age appropriate to my situation, which allows me a window for quality written emotional manipulation. Like the above, well-edited, much thought out, golden ticket to the music factory.

And today, at 12:51pm, Ned from Q101 called me to let me know that they wanted to play my shuffle, that I'd won the iPod & iTunes gc, & that I needed to record some intros for the air.

So, this Sunday, in the 10am time slot, you get to hear my radio-unfriendly voice introducing "Suck My Kiss," by the Red Hot Chili Peppers.

And that is why I rock, sometimes.

The end.

an object lesson, and a certain truth.

Cricket peed on the hallway floor again. And on the wall. And on the door.

And it made me mad, not in little part due to the fact that I was sick and it was very late at night.

So I grabbed the little weasel by the scruff of her neck, and smushed her little face into the mess.

Which prompted her to scamper off under the bed and meow piteously.

Giving me the ample opportunity to scrub the rest of the mess from the floor and the wall and the door. Inhaling lots of bleach fumes in the process.

And then, of course by the time I had finished, Cricket forgot that I was mad at her, but was clearly upset about having been traumatized in some fashion or other, and clingily sought succor from yours truly, despite numerous attempts at dislodgement and discouragement.

Teaching me two things in the process...

1) Much like rabbit fur-lined leather gloves and other organic textiles, cats covered in cat fur saturated with cat pee smell like cat pee for a very long time.

and

2) Bleach is neither the friend of the upper respiratorily-issued, nor the polished surface of the hardwoodedly floored.

the nemesis responds.

"March 3, 2006

"Dear pixiemartin:

"We apologize if you were not satisfied with the servicec provided during your interactions with Capitol One. We wish to assure you that our goal is to provide all of our customers with the highest level of quality service during any interactions with our company.

"At your request, we have designated your account to close. Please be sure to cancel any charges that post automatically to your account, as your account will not close unless the balance remains zero.

"The balance on your last monthly statement may not be the final amount due on your account. We suggest your contact our office at 1-800-955-7070 in order to verify the balance prior to making a final payment.

"Please allow 30 to 90 days for the credit bureaus to update the information on your credit file.

"Sincerely,

"Joel D. Amey
Capitol One Bank"

First and foremost, BULLSHIT.

BIG STEAMING PILES OF BULLSHIT.

BIG STINKY, SQUISHY, STEAMING PILES OF BULLSHIT.

Secondly, crazy me, I was already under the impression that my account had been closed on February 12, 2006.

You know, not by the 'na-na-na-I-can't-hear-you-na-na-na' jackass that hung up on me the first time I called that day to close the account, but by the second one, the snotty bitch that told me that she didn't care why I was closing the account, that she was just going to close it. (Except much less politely.)

But no, my account wasn't closed at all. I was lied to about that as well.

See how they also gave me the empty apology there, saying they're sorry if I wasn't satisfied? They're making my perception the issue, rather than their actual behavior.

How dare I want to close my account, much less be treated like a decent human being!

I fucking hate Capitol One.