All posts by Licketysplit

State and Mania

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Our Lambchop hasn’t been the only one hitting the open road, oh no! I took the opportunity last weekend to hit the high seas. Mr. H and I stayed in a swanky hotel in Portland, Maine, complete with an all-glass porno shower stall separate from the tub. We meandered around Portland, where we discovered the chief pastime of the locals is heavy drinking. Then we headed over to Peaks Island on the ferry, a 15 minute ride past WWII gunnery fortifications and inexplicably large houses on private islands in Casco Bay. Mr. H’s grandparents live in a little house on the island, which they bought in 1961 for $750. Average property value on the island is now approaching half a million dollars and up for ramshackle cottages. But they ain’t sellin’, and I’m glad because I like to visit.

Mr. H took some pictures:

Even the housepets on the island are ramshackle.

Godzilla.

A dire warning by the Great Head Light House:

(Ok, it is not really called that. It is called Portland Head Light.)

To the lighthouse.

Oh, as Lambchop so rightly pointed out, this *is* a blog, so I shall also detail my menu: Saturday Lunch: Pot Roast, 4-bean salad minus one type of bean that no one cared for. Saturday Dinner: Shrimp and Lobster Scampi, Lobster Quesadilla. Lots of locally brewed beer. Sunday Breakfast: Seafood omelette, red pepper home fries. Sunday Lunch/Dinner: Lobster Roll, fried scallops (to be fair, this was consumed in Portsmouth, NH), chocolate ice cream with chocolate jimmies. I’ve lived in New England 7 years now, and I can finally wrap my mind around saying “jimmies.”

And parking, let’s not forget about parking, this being a BLOG and all. There is a top secret FREE parking lot in Portland. Portland also features ample meter parking, and the valet rate at our hotel was a scandalously low $10. The locals are friendly, and will chat you up and make fun of the people from New Yawk City. One waitress also thoughtfully pointed out that since the economy is based on tourism and fishing, there is “fahck all” for jobs up that way.

-xxoo

Blow me up Buttercup

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So, the project I’m dealing with is now officially in “flaming barge of school children heading right for the Statue of Liberty” mode. Did I mention the kids have explosives strapped to them? And head lice? In other words, an unmitigated disaster. Only Spiderman can save it now. You think I’m kidding? Well, someone just asked me a question about an “XML std.” Uh, that person meant dtd, but I’ll take all the comic relief I can get. Now I’m just going to sit back, put my feet up, and wait for the FBI and possibly the ATF to contact me regarding my earlier gratuitious analogy with the school kids. And tomorrow I’m going to call out sick with a bad case of the “XML.”

Speaking of firearms, I have a new hobby a’ brewin’. Target shooting with small side arms. With a wedding gift haul of unwanted Precious Moments figurines just a month or so away, I’ve got to learn to shoot. A friend has promised to buy me and Mr. H a gun for a wedding present if we get our licenses to carry. We actually hope we get some sad-eyed angel figurines now, so we can take them to the range and pick them off one by one. The destruction will be filmed. Sometimes just returning something to the store is not spiteful enough!

I’m feeling especially entrepreneurial lately, as I wile away the hours thinking of how to get out of this job without being totally poverty stricken. So Mr. H gave me the idea for “blowyourshitup.com,” an extension of our own awful gift disposal plans. It’s a niche market, to be sure. Newlyweds unfortunate enough to not receive wads of cash will mail us their stash of useless crap from Things Remembered, and we’ll do the rest. Just choose “shotgun,” “steamroller,” or “sumo” from our destruction menu, and your commemorative DVD in a flocked velvet box will arrive in 4-6 weeks.

But really, my true calling is designing escape fantasies. I’m a natural. No, really. It’s my number one export these days. The gross national product of Licketysplit.

On a much more positive note, Lambchop has landed! There was a sighting today on Newbury Street. It was hard to tell it was her at first because of the huge dark glasses, but the fawning throng that assembled gave it all away. So she’s back in Boston, and you should beep her 9-1-1 and call her on her cell phone. Meet her by the friendly-ass bear.

-xxoo

Annie got my gun

Let me hear your body talk

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Murphy’s Law #421: right after you go try on your backless wedding dress and decide, “eh, it looks good but I have absolutely no muscle tone whatsoever,” and vow to do nothing but eat protein and do lat pulldowns til the wedding, there will be a free Herrell’s ice cream buffet in the lobby of your workplace.

But I resisted! I am SUPER HUMAN. In another month or so, I will look like a SUPER MODEL. Yes, I’m shallow. Whatever gets you through. My inner bridezilla has ripped through my chest like one of those acid-drooling aliens. I had one woman down at my feet pinning my hem, and another woman with the most incredible face lift plying me with tiaras and yards of tulle, while still another clucked in indeterminate Eastern European at the one hemming my dress, no doubt commenting on the junk in my trunk. I gazed lovingly at myself in the gigantic mirror, tossing my hair this way and that, pausing only to kick Magda when she slowed her rate of pinning.

My bridezilla is tap dancing with a cane now, “Hello my honey, hello my baby….send me a kiss by wire, baby my heart’s on fire.” It’s oozing a trail of slime behind it as it goes off to form a kickline. I’m sunk.

-xxoo

No, je ne regrette rien

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Nous devons apprendre à mourir, et à mourir dans le plus plein sens du mot. La crainte de l’extrémité est la source de tout le lovelessness; et cette crainte est produite seulement quand l’amour commence à s’affaiblir.

(We must learn to die, and to die in the fullest sense of the word. The fear of the end is the source of all lovelessness; and this fear is generated only when love begins to wane.)

I am not afraid to try new snack foods

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I have frequent opinions, and I love giving them. It’s even better when I am paid to do so.

See, I was walking through Faneuil Hall, and I saw that a crazy lady up ahead seemed to be stopping people. I was about to scuttle by and avoid her, but I was arrested by her line of questioning: “Do YOU eat yogurt?” Why yes, yes, I do.

“Do YOU want to make $15?” Once I ascertained that it would take about ten minutes and not involve photography or removal of clothing, I could honestly say “Why yes, yes I do. ” Self-interest really is the key to any sales pitch.

So I was ushered up into an office above the F.Y.E., and filled out a short demographic questionaire, on which I lied flagrantly. Then I was taken to a conference room. The table was covered in empty yogurt packages, all different brands. My interogator came in, bearing a tray of dixie cups and little baby plastic spoons. She made me identify the yogurt brands I currently purchase, those being Stonyfield Farm and Colombo. She seemed pleased. Then she hauled out some Stonyfield Farms cups with new packaging. The first one was a chocolate flavor, and it featured wavy grass with some chocolate chips in it, being surveyed by some omnipresent cow head.

I started laughing, because I am exceedingly juvenile. “You must know what that makes me think of,” I said. Oh Lawsy, what a design mis-step. I hemmed and hawed, mentioned that they had better add a dewy sheen to their fruit photography, and I want to see some fruit cross-sections, damn it, and that the ivory plastic looked more hippy-dippy recycled than the white plastic, which is what they are going for, right? Then I had to go through a tedious evaluation of competitor packaging. As a general aside, I will say that those Yoplait whips, custard yogurt infused with air, have got to be the nastiest thing every invented. Carbonated milk curd, mmm.

Finally, on to the taste-testing. And the first flavor was…banana-vanilla. I fucking hate any unnatural approximation of banana. I politely gummed around a spoonful, trying not to gag. “Well, it tastes like some ungodly bastard offspring of a tropical Starburst with an infection. I wouldn’t buy this in ten million years. What were you thinking?”

Next, blackberry. Hurrah, why not. It was pretty good. A little too sweet. I was given water and made great show of cleansing my palate. What fun. “Wait, wait, let me SWISH.” Then I tried some other stuff which was basically flavors they already have reformulated with that franken-fiber, inulin. Whatever. “Will this make me poop a lot?” Enquiring minds want to know!

Finally, “So when do YOU eat yogurt?” Ummm….when I’m crash-dieting? I mean “as a healthy snack to supplement meals.”

Soon I was being hustled out the door, $15 in cash in my sticky paw. I also got a whole bunch of coupons. Whee.

After I spotted this link on Rebecca’s site, I realized I had been a part of the ground-breaking “Trends in Yogurt Consumption” study. How monumental! If I could only secure employ doing a survey every hour. That’s $15 an hour, plus I would never have to buy food again. Sure, the sour cream survey could get a little hairy. Don’t get me started on the prospect of the hot dog survey. But I would be doing good in the world, as banana-vanilla has so far stayed off shelves, clearly all thanks to my vehement protest.

-xxoo

Better off dead

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Licketysplit

This week is not going so hot.

But on to a much more cheerful topic than workaday doings: death!

On Monday I went to a wake for someone I didn’t even know (extended extended family of Mr. H). I had to fake Catholic or risk looking like some kind of disrespectful jerk. I come from a family that never even attempted any religious affiliation. I was never baptized, and Christmas was distilled to the purest form of commerce. Presents were half-heartedly wrapped in non-Christmas paper, stacked on the couch, and marked with a note that read “from ‘Santa.'” Luckily I went to an Episcopal high school, so at least I know most of the words to all the top 5 prayers.

So I crossed to the left, I crossed to the right, I bobbed, weaved, mouthed a Hail Mary here and there. I got blessed by Officer Nightstick, er, Father Buzz Cut. This guy was right out of a Tom of Finland illo, verrrry studly. When in Rome, right?

The most awkward part was the kneeler at the casket. I’d made it through the grieving receiving line, trying to be as supportive as could be given that I’d never met the ol’ gal. So there I was, next to Mr. H, with an actual dead person right at eye level. I am not particularly upset by death, but I did note that if I am ever to be displayed in death, I would like to make sure my nails are painted. Preferably She-dragon red. It’s just like women and sunscreen: they always forget to do the hands.

“What are you supposed to do up there?” I asked him later.

“Oh, I usually just say an Our Father to get the timing right.” So there you have it.

I have decided that my own coffin will be lined with white fun fur and equipped with a sun lamp in the roof, and I will be sporting a bikini. Lambchop said, “I want an open-toe casket!” So even in final repose, we mustn’t neglect our pedicure. Tropical drinks will be served. Nothing like a little Harry Belafonte to lighten the mood. Coconut shrimp on skewers, bacon wrapped scallops. Mm-mm. Everyone must compliment their neighbor’s attire and say one nice thing about me.

“She always flossed.”

“She could rip out checks without tearing them.”

“She really liked cheese.”

Thus shall be my legacy, thus it is written.

xxoo