Wednesday, July 23, 2008

Keep your effin' kids outta the street

Okay, I have 86 things I should be doing besides bitching on my blog, but there is something bothering me and I just need to whine.

Want to know what it shwas? I'll tell you. It's those stoopid dumb "Watch Out for My Kids Playing Where They Don't Belong" signs that people put in the street.

People! Watch your own kids! I'm so tired of driving down my own block, minding the traffic rules set forth by my city, and the ones generated by common sense, and happening upon one of these signs.

Now, I live in the suburbs, on a winding, tree-lined street by a lake. It is common knowledge that this sort of neighborhood usually is home to many young children.

Is there anybody who loves children more than I love children? I think not. I adore the little boogers, and if I ever ran over one with my car, there's no chance that I'd ever be able to stop crying for the rest of my life, regardless of whether the accident was caused my my negligence or somebody else's. I want children to have safe places to play and frolic and chase after balls and ride bikes and roller skate and shoot baskets and giggle and squeal and run in the sprinkler and swim and laugh.

These places are called parks, yards, driveways, beaches, pools, and recreation centers. NOT city streets.

Our city has beautiful parks and beaches. We have a YMCA. We have lovely, safe, car-free areas in which our citizens of all ages can freely and happily go about the business of play.

Streets are for cars. Streets are for driving. Streets are not for "kids at play."

I managed to keep my kids out of the street while they were going up, and I don't see why people think it's not their responsibility to keep their own kids out of the street.

Come to think of it, I think I'm going to make a sign that says, "Suburban, Middle-Aged Housewife at Play" and then take a lawn chair out there with a glass of iced tea and my knitting.

Tuesday, July 22, 2008

Hey, remember that time you slithered out of my vagina?

That's what I keep asking Rose, much to her dismay, because exactly 22 years ago today, Rose did, indeed, slither out of my vagina.

22 years! When Rose was born, I was 22. My daughter is now the age that I was when she was born. She is exactly half as old as I am. I am twice her age. Boggles the mind.

As much as I loved having that slithery, mashed-up, bruised and battered baby, then that wiseass little toddler/preschooler who was so stubborn she broke the wood frame of her bedroom door to get out of time out, then that first grader who hated "that Becky" and the middle schooler who made white-kid Snoop Dog videos, and the high school speech geek, I have to say I like 22-year-old adult Rose even better (most days). 22-year-old Rose is fun, smart, and sweet, and sometimes we even manage to have a conversation between rounds of Guitar Hero. She's very very good at that, too.

Happy Birthday my sweet little Wugglesby B. Bear. Your mama adores you.

Tuesday July 22, 2008

Hair, dresses, dancing, tequila, and other grownup prom festivities

Well, here they are, as promised, the photos from Claire's prom party. There were too many, so I put them in a little slideshow. Enjoy (or skip it, as you see fit)! Click here for raucous entertainment.

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Friday, July 4, 2008

The week in review, and Happy Fourth and stuff

I had a couple of light days where work is concerned, so I scrounged up my two favorite little kids (who aren't all that little anymore) to hang out at my house and amuse me with their antics.

Monday night, my brother and sister-in-law met me at the gas station in Jordan, where I heaved their duffle bags into the trunk while JohnHenry and Sophie hopped into the car, JH calling shotgun, which he automatically gets because he's the only one big enough to hold his own against a deployed airbag. I always enjoy the looks from strangers when we make the switch like this. I'm sure we look like a very friendly divorced family, me playing the role of the mom who shares custody with her ex-husband and his pleasant new wife. Someday when we do this, we should start swearing at each other and threatening to go back to court.

1 a.m. seems to be the typical bedtime when the little kids come to visit. I don't know why that is, really, other than trying to keep them awake as long as possible in order to get the maximum amusement quantity out of them. Monday night we stayed up playing Wii, which they had played a little bit at friends' houses, but here they had it to themselves. Turns out that JohnHenry is a heckuva a baseball player, while Sophie excels in boxing.

Tuesday morning we slugged around and played more Wii, after a delicious breakfast of unibrow french toast—Sophie always draws a syrup face on hers, with a syrup unibrow. I had a meeting, so Rose and Kelly and Kelly's brand new boyfriend, Scott, took the kids to Davanni's for lunch. Once there, JohnHenry welcomed Scott to the Family of Awkwardness with questions like, "So…are you guys gonna have your first kiss right here at Davanni's?"

After I finished that meeting and did just a teeny bit of work, we headed off to the zoo with my mom and dad, aka Grandma and Grandpa.

The Minnesota Zoo has a new exhibit of Russian Grizzly Bears, which was our first reason for visiting. Now, any other zoo bear I've ever seen has been a huge snooze, lying on a rock in the sun, or hiding behind some grass. The sun bear will pace a little bit, but that's about it, so I expected the same kind of lethargy from the Grizzlies. Well, it turns out that these particular grizzly bears are big giant goofball showoffs! Really, they're more like guys in bear suits than boring ol' bears. They swam around in the fake lake that is directly in front of the viewing area, so you can see their underwater antics as well as their land antics. They chase each other around. They climb trees. They wrestle. They growl, and their area has microphones, so we can hear them. Really, if you're within driving distance, head out to the Minnesota Zoo to see Russia's Grizzly Coast. It includes wild boars and sea otters, but the real draw is those wacky bears!

The zoo was extra fun with Sophie, because the night before we went, we had a long discussion with her about how our family had adopted her as a baby monkey, and raised her as a human child. We told her we were really pleased with our experiment, that she was almost everything we'd dreamed of in a human girl. She can read and write. She can dress herself. Sometimes she even bathes without fussing about it, which is unheard of in the primate community. So at the zoo, we kept asking her to translate what the animals were trying to communicate to us. Especially the monkeys.

The other zoo highlight (for me, anyway) is the Meerkat exhibit, because I love those meerkats! They seem to be smaller than the ones on Meerkat Manor, and it's sort of hard to know what they're up to without Stockard Channing anthropomorphizing their every move, but they are so entertaining! And check this out—you can send your nephew and monkey/niece through a tunnel and into the Meerkat's habitat, to give the little rodents an up-close-and-personal look!

From there we headed to Kelly's softball game, so here's a picture to make up for all the impressive shots I missed at the tournament last weekend.

After all my bragging from last weekend, Kelly's team lost this game. Unfortunate for her, because we keep losers locked in the basement without food or water until they decide to be winners, and because of the holiday, she won't have another chance until Tuesday.

Good heavens, this is long. I'm going to just summarize the rest in the blogging style of Rosie O'Donnell:

we r we, these kids and me
salon only hair deep
hot dogs, burgers, picnic
heaving apples into the lake
One Demented Tooth, pushed out of the way by bigger, badder, bully tooth
will not budge
Instead, stays put and opens tiny Barbie pop bottles
This is my yellow

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Thursday, July 3, 2008

Watermelon has Viagra-like effects

I was skeptical of the news that eating watermelon in large quantities can open your blood vessels and give you a four-hour erection, but I'm here to tell you, it's absolutely true!

I'm so glad to know where all those mystery boners originated. I've been baffled by them for years!

Thursday, July 3, 2008

Make fingers longer! Make look so better!

I just found this ad as I was paging through the latest version of SuperDuperShopperCouponDealzSav'r to grace the inside of my mailbox this week. As you can see, it's a perfect example of why knowing the mechanics of using Photoshop does not necessarily make you somebody who should use it.

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Wednesday, July 2, 2008

Hoooo boy, do I appreciate having health insurance

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US Women's Open, the prequel

Not a golf fan, here. However, I'm enjoying watching a little golf news these days because I can catch glimpses of my old stompin' grounds, Interlachen Country Club Golf Course in Edina, where the US Women's Open is currently taking place.

I grew up in Interlachen Park, the neighborhood that abuts the golf course. My parents still live there. We never belonged to the country club, since neither of my parents play golf, and we were too busy (and too classy) playing Pong and blowing up eggs in the microwave, anyway. Still, I was pretty familiar with the golf course because late at night, when our parents were asleep and we had to be quiet or make our noises elsewhere, we Interlachen Park kids would traipse around the golf courses (Meadowbrook abuts Interlachen Park to the East). It was always completely dark, so tripping and falling down was about the worst thing that ever happened to us.

Our favorite activity: Removing the flags from the holes and poking them into the ground somewhere around twenty or thirty yards away from the green.

Second favorite activity: Filling the holes with sand or dirt or eggs.

I'm sure that today's Interlachen Park youth have nowhere near the fun we did, on account of the invention of the pesky motion detector.

Being a kid today must suck.

Saturday, June 28, 2008

Addiction

Hello, my name is Suzi, and I'm an addict.

Remember that time a few weeks ago when I bought that Wii? Remember how I'm a 44-year-old mother of grown and almost-grown kids, and how I've never owned a video game before? Remember how I have been looking for Wii Fit, but can't find it?

Well. I still want Wii Fit, because Wii Fit is the whole reason I bought the Wii in the first place, but I'm content to wait until I can buy one from an actual store instead of a sleazy eBay seller, because you know why?

Dance Dance Revolution, that's why.

Yes, I realize I am about 4 years too late to imagine myself as trendy, but I'm telling you, it's the best game in the world. I'm playing in the morning. I'm playing during work hours. I'm playing in the middle of the night. And get this: it's EXERCISE, people!

I look like an epileptic spaz, stomping and shaking and tripping all over myself, but I don't care, because I sweat, and I'm talking the Kevin Garnett, dripping-off-the-chin kind of sweat, and I can keep that sweat up for hours.

The best part? I'm the mom, so I don't have to take turns. I am a little concerned that I might end up on YouTube, though.

Thursday, June 26, 2008

Demanding the finest

For me, a car is something I need to transport me from place to place. And that's all. I have no particular love for cars. In fact, I don't care about them enough to even have an opinion about what I drive, ordinarily.

When I buy a new car, I sort of wring my hands and fret about what might go wrong. Will it start when I need to go somewhere, even when it's cold? Will the brakes stop its forward motion when I expect them to? I much prefer the security of my same ol' car to the "excitement" of a new one.

I travel just enough that I probably drive four or five rental cars every year. Last week, I rented a car in Dallas. Like always, I reserved the smallest, cheapest, crappiest car I could find, and like always, they rental place "upgraded" me to something better.

By the time I had been in this car for ten minutes, I was calling The First Baseman to tell him about it, and that the next time I need a car, this is the one I want. I told him that I don't even care if we have to save up some extra money first, because this is the only time in my life I've ever felt this strongly about a particular car. Mine. I want it.

It's a smallish car, but not so tiny that it feels like it will fall apart if it's pelted with a snowball from just the right angle. It has a small engine and gets good gas mileage, yet it has enough kick to enter a highway at the normal speed limit. It has no blind spots. The headrests push down really far so I can see around them (I use my mirrors, but also glance over my shoulder when I'm changing lanes). Best of all, the blowy. I hate hate hate having air blowing on me, and this car's blowy things can be pointed so that they blow elsewhere, but not on me!

I don't need a new car yet (KG only has 83,000 miles), but when I do, I am going to buy that car I rented. I asked The First Baseman to start looking around, talking to people, and choosing a dealer. Oh, and devising a plan for paying for it, because I want it even if it's expensive.

I suppose you're wondering what fine car company makes this impressive automobile, hmm?

It turns out that my taste in cars is similar to my taste in food. Is there anything more delightful than a forty-nine-cent gas station hot dog? No, there is not, and this car is the automotive equivalent to that cheap delicacy.

It's Kia. My dream car is the Kia Optima, which turns out to be about the least expensive car on the market, and someday in the next few years, I will be driving one to the gas station to get a hot dog.

Tuesday, June 17, 2008

The Redneckiest place in Minnesota

Tonight I went to JohnHenry's baseball game in Kasota, and on the way back to St. Peter, JohnHenry, in the navigator's seat, directed me down Rabbit Road, which turns out to be the Avenue of the Rednecks. In about two blocks, we saw (or should I say, "we seen…"):

A toothless redneck inside a smashed-up race car, being pulled by a tow truck.

A real junkyard. I mean for real, and not just a messy house we refer to as a real junkyard.

A sign that said, "Beware of vicious dogs" that was NOT at the real junkyard.

A dead, smooshed cat.

JohnHenry saw a Sasquatch, but Sophie and I missed it.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, it's 2:30 a.m. and Rose and I are still up playing with our new Wii. Right now she's laying a hurt on a guy that looks sort of like Jesus in the boxing ring.

Monday, June 16, 2008

Up your nose wit' a rubber hose

Kelly and I have just returned from the ENT's office, where a doctor shoved a teeny camera up my child's nose in order to "have a look around." For some reason, this did not horrify my child. It horrified me, but not so much that I didn't remember to snap a sneaky picture of the festivities:

Of course, the teeny camera didn't find anything that looked like something that could cause Kelly's weird pain, so I am turning to you, my colleagues from the Google School of Medicine (where I earned my Ph. D. and currently conduct research on a variety of subjects), because conventional doctors have not been successful in identifying a cause, treating the symptoms or curing the ailment.

**If you want to skip the boring blah blah blah about my kid's health and get to the really important news, skip to the ** below.

Symptoms: For the past two months, Kelly has had pain in the area behind both ears, though the pain is more severe on the right than on the left. This pain waxes and wanes, and lessens with ibuprofen. On two or three occasions, the pain was severe enough that she missed school, but then again, she misses school for colds, sniffles, hangnails, stubbed toes, and particularly dastardly pimples.

Professional Opinions: The first doctor we saw diagnosed a throat infection. He said that the pain was referred pain from her tonsils, which were enlarged. A 10-day course of amoxicillin didn't have any effect on the symptoms.

The second doctor diagnosed TMJ syndrome, and said that the pain is referred pain from the temporal mandibular joint (jaw hinge), and is caused by gum chewing, clenching, or grinding teeth in sleep. Kelly doesn't chew gum very often, and doesn't clench or grind. I know, because I observe her sleeping almost daily, during her afterschool nap on the green couch. She talks in here sleep, but no grinding. That doctor prescribed two weeks of every-six-hour 800mg of ibuprofen. She has been following that regimen. The pain is reduced significantly as long as she takes the medication. When she skips a dose, the pain returns, which tells me that IF the pain is caused by inflammation, the inflammation is not being reduced by the ibuprofen.

Today's doctor, the first specialist we've seen, did a thorough hearing exam (perfect), a test for fluid (negative), and SnortCam™. He also jammed his hand into Kelly's mouth and felt her tonsils. That was a first! Her tonsils are enlarged, and he felt two swollen lymph glands in her neck, but was unconcerned since they weren't that abnormal. His opinion: muscle strain caused by exercise. My opinion: don't be silly; it's not strained muscles. She can point to the exact spot of the pain, which she identifies as "right in the Eustachian tubes." Maybe that's where the pain is, or maybe she just feels like that's where it is, but she knows what sore muscles feel like, and that's not it.

Okay, get to it, volunteer Internet medical professionals. Please post your diagnoses in the comments.

**My Wii is on a UPS truck, right now, cruising around the south suburbs, waiting for its turn to get out of the truck and into its new home in my family room. I feel like making a big Welcome Home banner to hang on the garage.

Tuesday, June 10, 2008

Gotta new toy

I have been a parent for nearly 22 years, and for those 22 years, I have managed to refrain from buying a single video game. Until now, anyway.

I just ordered a Wii, and Rose and I are heading out to one of the mart stores in a somewhat-nearby city, because rumor has it that they have Wii Fit in stock, and for only $89. I'll believe that when I see it, but it's worth twenty bucks in gas to find out.

I'm so looking forward to these games! I only want the kind where you have to stand up and actually move. I can play the sitting down kind of games on the computer.

So, all you Wii-ers, what's your favorite game? What do I need to buy next?

Wednesday, June 4, 2008

Where is Dad's gun? I need to shoot that bird.

That is a text message I received from the recently returned oldest daughter. Don't worry, though. Nobody is going to shoot anything, or anybody, though we are all tempted.

Every year, a robin builds a nest under our deck. Every year, some soft baby birds bash their way out of some eggs and fly away. Every year, we say, ahhhhhh how sweet, and go about our lives.

This is our 16th summer in this house, and for some reason, this year's bird is more bird-brained than previous years' birds. It spends the day flapping and pecking and bonking into both the upstairs and downstairs sliding glass doors.

Evidently, it sees its reflection as another bird, and so it defends its territory and its nest against itself. What a dumbass. It's thought process goes a little something like this:

Hey! A bird!>Ouch that hurts!>Hey! Another bird!>Ouch! That hurts!>Hey! There's that bird again!>Ouch! That hurts!>Get away from my babies, bird!>Ouch! That hurts!

So how do I make it knock it off? It's really, really irritating, and distracting while I'm trying to work or nap or watch Dr. Phil, and no amount of whining and shouting quiiiiiit iiiiiiit seems to work any better than it did against my brother when we were kids.

Yesterday I went to The Wild Bird Store. That's a real store, folks. They sell birdhouses, birdfeeders, birdseed, bird-motif gifts, and stuff to seduce birds into visiting you. They also have a cat, which they should name Irony. I bought some decals of hawks and hummingbirds there, because the Birdmaster said that if the robin perceives that another breed of bird is there, it will respect its territory and step off.

This bird is not intimidated by bird decals of the hummingbird or hawk variety. It doesn't seem to be any more or less interested in its own reflection. It is also not afraid of our inflatable Crunch (Timberwolves mascot) punching bag, even though it has big, scary jack-o-lantern eyes. In fact, The First Baseman put Crunch outside on the deck last night, and now Crunch is covered in bird shit and his head is popped.

I could move the nest, but that's mean. I don't know if the bird would take care of the babies if I did that.

I could find Pat's gun and shoot it, but that's mean and I'd probably manage to shoot my leg instead.

I could just wait until it dies of internal injuries, or leaves because the babies are grown.

Or I could move.

Hey, maybe I should call 911!

Any other ideas?

Wednesday, June 4, 2008

Police Report: The HUH? edition

Shakopee

MAY 5

Animal complaint. A loose calf was reported in front of a house in the 12900 block of Marystown Road.

Huh?

MAY 6

Smell. A person in the 200 block of 4th Avenue W. reported smelling something hot in the area.

Huh?

Belle Plaine

MAY 2

Miscellaneous. A resident in the 24500 block of Keystone Lane reported having trouble with their teeth and grinding them.

Huh?

Dahlgren Township

MAY 22

Animal complaint. Someone reported a cow was stuck in mud up to its neck in the area of County Road 43 and Hampshire Boulevard.

Huh?

South Lake Minnetonka Police Department

MAY 16

Animal complaint. A resident reported three baby squirrels were following him around in his yard. The squirrels were relocated.

Seriously. Huh?

Property damage. "Pen scribbles" were found on a vehicle in the 1800 block of Sherren Avenue.

Huh?

MAY 26

Theft. A vehicle was jacked up and its tires were taken off in the 1800 block of Kenwood Drive.

Huh? Oh, jacked up as in, lifted up with a jack. Huh.

President Peterson gave her a wink, as if to say, "Lost paperwork is not going to prevent a kid from graduation on MY watch." President Peterson, you are a gentleman and a scholar.

I'll never forget this day. Incredible.

A tale of woe

First, let me say that I realize that, compared to the problems that other people have (houses in foreclosure, daddies and mamas and kids in Iraq, teenagers drinking themselves to death), this is nothing. We won't even remember it in a month or so, but today has been a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day.

Our completely fabulous daughter, Rose, is graduating from Gustavus Adolphus College tomorrow, and there have never been parents any more proud of their kid than we are of ours. Some of you know her, and you see why. She's smart, she's funny, she's beautiful, and sometimes she's even kind to people, if she's in a decent mood. Kidding! She's always kind to people.

This week has been full of senior week activities—a boat cruise, a banquet, parties, a Twins game—and it's also been rather emotional. It's sad for Rose to move away from this place she's called home, where she's learned who she is, and from these friends who have become more like sisters and brothers.

When she arrived for graduation rehearsal this morning, she was surprised to find that there was no "stuff" for her—no name card, no cap and gown, no anything. She didn't panic, but asked around and was told to go to the registrar's office…

…where she was told that they did not have a stoopid dumb form they needed, a form called the Application for Graduation. A form that she completed and turned in MONTHS ago. A form that the registrar's office had LOST. I know she turned it in, because we happened to be chatting on the phone as she walked across campus to do it, and we had a moment of celebration that the form was in, and that graduation was just mere months away.

The registrar was very rude, and told Rose that there was nothing she could do at this point to make it possible for her to participate in graduation tomorrow, and nobody else she could talk to about it. She did point out that there was some Kleenex nearby, because by then, Rose was crying.

After talking to other faculty and her friends, she called the Dean of Students, leaving a voice mail message on his cell phone, and she also emailed him. We waited all day for him to call back. He never did. So around 7:30 tonight, against Rose's wishes, I called him at his home.

He was very nice, very sympathetic, and promised to call around and find out what could be done. The only thing I fault him for is not carrying his cell phone, and not checking his voicemail or email the day before graduation. He called Rose a couple times to ask for information, and we had hope.

Then, Rose's academic dean called and said she had bad news. She said that they couldn't possibly process the goddam form overnight, and that gee sorry, you're out of luck. Can't graduate.

I called the academic dean back as soon as Rose gave me the news, and got her cell phone voice mail. I'm pretty sure the college supplies their faculty with cell phones that they can turn off as they wish. I also left a weepy voice mail message for the president of the college, who is retiring after tomorrow, so probably doesn't care.

This is something I can see happening at a large university, not at the little college on the prairie, where they promised to care about every student. They sold us that. They sold us that individual attention, that caring. This kind of thing is not supposed to happen there. And yet, it has.

Like I said, this isn't that big a deal, in the scheme of things. She'll still have her degree, we're just as proud of her as we can be, and in the long run, it isn't going to matter that she didn't march across a stage in a cheesy robe and a hair-wrecking hat.

Today, though, for a couple of parents who didn't go to college but make it a priority for their kids, and the kid who worked really hard the past four years, this is disappointing, and I don't think I'm finished sobbing about it yet.

Goodbye, lady stache I never knew I had.

Yesterday, I took Kelly to the mall to get some lame polo shirts for her new job. There's a little clue for you about where she works. That'll narrow it down to 500 places.

So while we were zooming through the middle of Burnsville Center, a sign caught my eye. It was atop one of those annoying kiosks that block your path, and it said something like "Eyebrow threading."

Hey! sez I to Kelly. I read about that in a girly magazine! It's an ancient art in, oh, India or somewhere, I think. What happens is that they spin a thread really fast and tight against your skin, and any little hairs get all caught up in the thread's bizness, and then they get YANKED clean out.

Once Kelly was nerdily outfitted, she went off to meet some people who are more qualified mall companions than her mother, and I wandered back to meet Oozma the Torturer.

Now, let me first say that although I regularly have my eyebrows waxed, and have one pesky-but-sorta-cool whisker that reappears every six weeks or so, I'm not one of your hairier-faced ladies. Just a regular-faced lady. Still, Oozma pointed out that I do (did) have facial hair.

Yes, it was the kind of facial hair that is not even visible. It is "like a baby," as Oozma put it. It's the same hair that you might see if you look at the inside of your arm, or anyplace else on your body that is not regularly tended to with wax, razor, or threading.

Still, when somebody tells you that not only do you HAVE facial hair, but that she can relieve you of that facial hair for a mere twenty-five dollars? Oh, believe me. You jump at the chance.

And what could go wrong, right? I mean, it's just thread! She can't possibly hurt you with a couple strands of thread, can she?

Oh. Yes. She. Can.

Holy mother of Krishna! From the first roll of the thread against my face, it took every bit of strength and Lamaze breathing to refrain from jumping out of that chair, kicking Oozma in the gine and running for the exit. Those little, barely-existent hairs have the same kind of nerve endings as teeth. I swear. It was like thousands of simultaneous facial root canal procedures. The eyebrow-hair nerves must be dead from years of waxing, but the cheek hair nerves are quiiiiiite sensitive.

Because physical pain is never enough, it occurred to me about ten minutes in that I was in public. I was in a tippy-backy chair in the middle of Burnsville Center, in front of TJ from T-Mobile and everybody. Larry Brown, the Sears guy who sold us our appliances and not the dynamic NBA coach, could have witnessed the procedure on his way back from the food court. For their amusement, Oozma told me to "hold like this," which means reach your right hand around to your left eyebrow and pull up. Then she made me "put tongue like this," which means poke your tongue into your cheek, so it looks like you have a huge jawbreaker in there. After that, "make face like this," Adam Sandler in Waterboy. Really lovely poses, and all with tears running down my face, partly because of pain (did I mention it hurts like a mofo?) and partly because Oozma's 4000-watt lights were pointed right at them.

Finally, it was over. I was so happy about that that I let out an inadvertent squeal of joy, and that was even before I knew about the heavenly facial massage.

Talk about heavenly! Oozma lubed up her hands with some sort of soothing balm and laid 'em on me. It felt so good! I couldn't believe that it was the same skin that felt like it was being scraped off my bones just moments before!

Believe it or not, I might consider having Oozma yank out all my baby beard hairs when they grow back again, because we women don't make decisions based upon pain, but upon vanity, and I really love how my skin looks and feels now!

There are LOTS of videos of threading on YouTube, if you want to see, but before you watch them, you absolutely MUST go and read (I think she doesn't use her real name to blog)'s hair removal tale. Or should I say tail. Her hair was not on her face, and her story is much more adventurous! Go right now to Wiping Up Snot. Warning: you will see the word vagina.

Friday, May 23, 2008

Favorite moments in grocery shopping

The First Baseman and I went to the grocery store together tonight, because that's how we celebrate long, holiday weekends, and I can't decide what I liked best—when somebody came looking for a suburban housewife ass-whooping when they stole my cart, or when The First Baseman had a conversation with the cashier about the volume of toilet paper consumed in our family, ending with "especially you" and a glance my way.

I guess that's his way of "blogging," because he thinks "blogging" means "saying embarrassing things about your family." I don't know where he gets that.

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Thursday, May 22, 2008

Busin' it.

Pay close attention to that there 'postrophe. I'm talkin' 'bout takin' the bus, not 'bout 'busin' anybody.

So today, I drove down to St. Peter, taking The First Baseman's gas guzzling vehicle to Sophie's adorable spring concert, because Kelly had driven my car to school, and I thought it only right that I fill up the tank before I picked up the First Baseman at the airport. It wasn't even completely empty, and the numbers on the pump didn't stop until they got all the way up to $58.80.

That is sixty damn dollars, people!

Now I am on the MTC website, learning how to ride public transportation to all my spots. "All my spots" would be the Target Center, Metrodome, Hennepin Avenue Theater District, Ordway Center in St. Paul, and my mom and dad's house in Hopkins. It turns out that, though I'm pretty far out here in the suburbs (Burnsville, the part that is almost Lakeville and almost Apple Valley), I can get to these places within about 2 hours, for about 2 bucks.

I am going to start doing it, because hello bus weirdos! Hello, twitterable events! Hello, not filling up that stoopid dumb gas tank so much!

The only problem that I can see is that the route that comes waaaay out here to the 'burbs only runs on weekdays, and the last bus out of downtown at night is about 9:00. But, come on, people! If we all start using it, they'll get more bus drivers and drive us around later at night, and on Saturdays and Sundays, too.

Maybe one good thing will come out of these ridiculous gas prices, and maybe that one good thing will be that more stubborn dumbasses like myself will start using the public transportation that we all pay for, anyway.

Sunday, May 18, 2008

Why I'm not allowed to work at a photo studio

In keeping with the theme of customer service mishaps, I bring you one that belongs to somebody else, for a change.

Lifetouch is in the news for shipping a load of jacked-up yearbooks to a school in Texas. When the yearbooks arrived, the students found that about 40% of their photos had been altered. Girls' heads and been stuck to boys' bodies, limbs had been removed, clothing changed or removed. Yuk yuk yuk. That's exactly the sort of stuff I did when I first used how to use Photoshop. There is no denying the fun aspect, though I would have probably added pro-Bush t-shirts and stuff.

Anyway, here is what the PR Director at Lifetouch had to say. You can see that the job comes with a manual, and the manual has a section on Responses to Complaints, though the responses are not specific to the details of such complaints. Here's her quote, fromStarTribune.com:

"Our people misinterpreted guidelines for the yearbook''

I love when a company tries to blame the customer for the issue, in this case, implying that there was some sort of communication breakdown between the school and Lifetouch, like the school maybe wasn't clear in specifying that it was important for everybody to keep their same head on their bodies, oh, and please don't clone out any limbs.

Now THAT is the kind of customer service I have encountered this week. Welcome to my world, Dallas High School!

Friday, May 16, 2008

Customer Service Twilight Zone

It occurred to me tonight, during my 45th minute on "hold" (heh, Freudian typo—I first typed "hole" instead of "hold") with Federal Express International Customer Service department, that I am in some sort of customer service twilight zone, and I've been here all week.

I am almost always satisfied with the outcome of any call to any customer service department. I usually get what I want, and you know why? Because I am nice. I'm patient, I'm friendly, I listen, I don't interrupt, and I'm reasonable in my expectations. People usually want to workwith me, not against me, because I am more pleasant than 99 out of 100 of their other customers. It works for me. Once, T-Mobile credited $345 to my account because I was nice, and I didn't even ask. Long story, but the charge was for a phone that we returned, but they never got it back from UPS. I was just looking for tracking numbers, and because I was nice, they told me not to worry about it.

Being nice really works well toward getting what you want. Try it.

This week has been different, though. I don't think I've been an ass to anybody, but man! Things just have not gone my way any time I've needed the assistance of a customer service agent of one sort or another, and the experiences have been as ridiculous and shockingly unexpected as finding Britney Spears' vagina on your dad's MySpace page—you know, annoying at first, then sort of fun because it's challenging to deal with, but then you just want it to go away, and for things to go back to being the way they were.

For the record, my dad, to my knowledge, has no MySpace page. That was just an example, you see, but when he gets to the above sentence about his MySpace page, he is going to tense up, bounce out of his chair, grit his teeth, grimace, and go, GAH!, which is the same reaction he has to the phrase "social networking." So there's your disclaimer.

First off was my experience with sending flowers to my mom for Mother's Day. Here's a handy visual:

Ordered	Delivered
Roses•Lilies•Carnations•Sweet William•Alstromeria Pink•Purple•Burgundy•Orange Tall, clear, glass vase Orange ribbon Butterflies! Keyword, BUTTERFLIES! Flowers are alive	Cheap, bushy roses Red•Pink Stubby, cubical, smoky glass vase No ribbon No GODDAM BUTTERFLIES, and they were the whole point. Mom likes butterflies. Wilted Saturday, dead Sunday

When I called, I fully expected that there had been some sort of mix-up, and that they'd run right out and bring my mom the flowers I'd ordered for her. Oddly enough, there was no mix-up. They were busy, you see, and tired, because it was Mother's Day, and no butterflies for you! Three phone calls later, I finally gave up and called the credit card company to dispute the charge. Still, strike one. I didn't get my way.

Then on Monday, I called our phone company, Frontier, because I need an 800-line in our house. Does that sound like an odd request to you? Because it was baffling—simply baffling—to Shalanda at Frontier, and I do not blame Shalanda for that. I blame Frontier for their lack of training. It's pretty mean to send your reps to the phones before they know how to help a customer set up a phone line, considering you're a frickin' PHONE COMPANY. It was as if I'd asked them to send me a Spanish-speaking five-horned rhinoceros with a basket of orange M&Ms and a portable antigravity chamber. I was on the phone with Shalanda for an hour and 15 minutes, and then she said she'd call back when she had an appointment set up for the technician to come.

During a normal week, that call would have come a few hours later, and the technician would have set me up for the next day. Since this is Customer Service Twilight Zone Week, that call never came, but the technician did, on Thursday. Turns out he didn't need to be here. Turns out all they had to do was switch one of our lines to the 800-number. It took another hour and 15 minutes on the phone with Adam to figure that out, but good news! The technician turns out to be a friendly neighbor, so we had a nice chat for an hour, and the 800-number would be turned on the next day! That's today.

The 800-number is not turned on. Nobody knows why. Strike two.

So yesterday, my boss sez to me over the phone, HEY! DRIVE OVER TO MY HOUSE AND GET SOME SAMPLES OF OUR NEW LITTLE PLASTIC TURTLES AND MAKE THEM GET TO CANADA RIGHT SKIPPY! I packed up the little plastic turtles, addressed them to two different sales reps in Canada, printed the international shipping forms online, and took them to Kinko's, which is now the same as FedEx, which is really convenient. Every other time I've sent little plastic turtles to people via FedEx, the little plastic turtle delivery has been smooth sailing. This week, not.

I tracked the shipments to find that one was delivered. Cool. The other one had been on the truck for delivery at 8 this morning, but at 5 this afternoon, it was back at the station. I called to find out what's up, and get this. Here's the official response: "Uhhhh…looks like the driver ran out of time. It will be 'attempted' for delivery on Tuesday."

Whaaaaaaa? What happened to absolutely, positively, has to be there overnight? Little Plastic Turtles, Inc. spent the equivalent of two tanks of gas to get it there on time. I spent 90 minutes on the phone, being my nicest self, to try and get them to deliver the package tomorrow instead of Tuesday. Finally Sergio, the manager for whom I waited over an hour, told me that the problem is that although FedEx HQ is in Memphis, that he is in El Salvador, and FedEx Canada wasn't answering their phone. Huh? I'm not sure what Memphis and El Salvador have to do with it, but he assured me that some Canadian will call me tomorrow, eh.

Anybody want to place a bet? What are the odds of that phone call coming? I'm going to predict strike three.

I'm just thankful it's the weekend, and that I deal with little plastic turtles and not transplant organs or bomb neutralizer.