You're Doing It Wrong

I was going to write a really good post today. One with not too much complaining but a bunch of super funny observations. Like I was going to try to make a story out of this dream I had which had many bizarre elements but the strangest was Obama was over for dinner. Then I woke up with a toothache. So now I think of it as the Obama toothache.

But I’ve been up to my elbows and eyeballs in projects all day so this is going to have to do. I’m going to leave with a much loved quote from the Simpsons a few weeks ago, that I’ve written on a little card and set by my computer.

A Simpson never gives up until he’s tried at least one easy thing.

We have two sets of sheets at our house: summer and winter. That’s about as high maintenance as I get.

When I do the big switch I usually take the whole bed apart and wash the mattress pad. I shake out the comforter and wash and carefully fold the stuff I’m putting away.

I’ve been wanting to buy us a new comforter for several years and I usually think about it in the fall. But since I hate shopping I always put it off thinking it will be easier to do next weekend. Then I next weekend it until the holidays. Who wants to deal with buying new bedding during the holidays? Then I’d plan to do it during the after holiday sales and I’d keep putting it off until next weekend. And so on until the holiday sales were over and why not just wait until fall?

For some reason I felt very determined about doing it this year and we’re long overdue to switch to winter sheets so I made myself do it today. Shortly before the economy went to hell a ginormous (aside: I can’t believe spellcheck doesn’t recognize “ginormous”) strip mall of big box stores opened near our house and I’ve been to the Target but nothing else.

I’ve never seen more than 5 cars in front of the bedding store and today was no different. The store had no customers besides me and an old lady who looked like she might be part zombie who at one point had to be in the precise aisle I was trying to be in.

I decided on a comforter and then looked for a cover. I want flannel. Summer is cotton. Winter is flannel. That’s how I do it. I have no interest in changing. What’s the point of enduring all this aging crap if you can’t be rigid and uncompromising in your ways?

They have no flannel covers. This is a store you could park a 747 in. It is filled floor to ceiling with tons and tons of crap related to beds, baths and beyond. You know what they told me? “They don’t make them anymore.”

I drove across the parking lot to this other store I’ve never set foot in. Their selection was even more grim but they didn’t have “bed” in giant letters on the outside of the building so I’ll cut them some slack.

As soon as I got home I jumped online and I found a few things but nothing I loved. The Company Store has a huge selection but I’ve always been afraid to order from them because I don’t think you can ever get off the mailing list. Even if you die. But then I thought what the hell, I want a new flannel comforter cover.

They have an amazing selection except you know what? I don’t want to sleep under something with: penguins, horses, elephants, butterflies, cats, dogs or polar bears on it. These must be very popular choices especially the penguins because there were two different kinds. I tried to think if there was ever a time in my life where I would have wanted to sleep with elephants on my comforter. No. Maybe when I’m even older and crankier? I doubt it.

They only had one that I liked and I realized it looks almost exactly like what I already have. (I have other requirements which include: dark colors, not too girly.) So I said: Screw It! I will just use the old one.

This is my bus stop on the new transit mall. I’m not sure about the three tiny chairs. The display screen doesn’t include the Vancouver buses and has been stuck on October 5 since October 5. I was wondering how that clear roof thing was going to hold up and it is already dirty with leaves on it. But maybe these monsooning rains will clear it off.

The big fancy Fred Meyer on Hwy 14 has a pretty decent cheese selection. There’s a little basket in the case with small chunks of cheese so you can try different things without spending a lot of money.

Since I knew I was going to be bringing my lunch this week, I bought a couple of samples thinking I could eat that with a hunk of bread. You know how in adventure stories they’re always eating bread and cheese?

Yesterday I cut a piece of both samples and brought them in. One was Manchenga which was fantastic and the other I will not name but will say that it smelled like dirty socks that had spent a hundred years soaking in rancid yak fat. I tried to be game and I cut it in half and stuck it on my bread and took a bite.

Yikes. At first I thought I was fine and was going to go ahead and swallow it. Then I ran from the room and scraped it off my tongue with a paper towel. Determined to teach the cheese a lesson, I chucked it violently into the trash. Then the trash in the lunch room stunk like a yak’s locker room. (We don’t really have a lunch room, it’s a closet-like space with a copier, mini-fridge, cupboards and a sink.)

So much for adventure. It reminded me of when me and my sister were really little and went to Germany to meet our grandmother. She had some limburger cheese and I guess we complained about it so she put it in the bathroom. Or maybe she stored it in there all the time. I don’t know. One of us had to use the bathroom and we cried because of the smell.

I will probably surprise you when I tell you that I’ve had a huge variety of office jobs since the late eighties and I’ve never used PowerPoint. In fact, until very recently I’d never had a computer with PP on it and until even more very recently, had never even opened the program.

And even though I’ve never used it, I don’t like it. I’m like those people who want to ban books they’ve never read or complain about movies they’ve never seen.

There’s a situation coming up in a few short days and I’ve been advised (not ordered) that a PP might be valuable in this situation. And I said, I can’t do it. I don’t know how to use PP.

Every single person I’ve told this story to has said, “Sure you can. PP is easy.”

Baking chocolate chip cookies is easy. Driving a car is easy. Juggling flame-throwing chainsaws is easy — IF YOU ALREADY KNOW HOW TO DO IT.

Yeah, I’m sure even a wizened intellect like mine could figure it out. It’s hard to tell when I haven’t even tried. But it’s not like I’m just going to cut and paste an outline. I need to think about how to organize my information for the intended audience using this type of communication.

Also I don’t want to because I think PP makes you stupid. Wasn’t there a study or something to support that? PP makes you 5 to 75 percent more stupid? I thought I heard that.

I guess instead of sitting here whining I could be learning PP.

This is a neighbor cat that ran over to say hi and then got suspicious when I broke out the camera.

My sweetheart did a lovely post of shots around the neighborhood.

Today had some great parts and some aggravating parts. I woke up at 3am and couldn’t get back to sleep, we had a plumbing problem which was eventually resolved and then the Internet died. So I spend most of the morning tired and trying to problem solve.

At Noon we zoomed out of the house to the Wordstock Festival one of our favorite annual events. We cruised the floor and saw several people we know. We had tickets to the special Sherman Alexie event. Have you read this great poem Unkissed by him? If you’re thinking, oh – I’m not a poetry person, you should read it anyway. It’s a poem for everyone. He was awesome as usual and we now each have a signed copy of his new book.

We also saw Shawn Levy talk about his Paul Newman book. We’ve seen him speak once before and he’s always super-interesting with lots of filmgeek details.

You’d think an event like Wordstock: tables and tables of books and a room filled with book geeks would make me more excited about writing. But actually, the volume of stuff overwhelmed me. I want to support the business and buy small press stuff and magazines but I don’t have time to read the stuff I already have. Who can read all this stuff? Besides the moms and really loyal colleagues of the writers?

On the way home I was thinking that maybe I’d just recycle 75% of the stuff in my current magazine pile to catch me up to the current month. That was how I resolved my discomfort.

So getting back to Wordstock, it felt like there are already so many books out there. I don’t think that’s the right attitude I’m just telling you how I felt at the time.

Then we tried to take care of an errand on the way home and were thwarted so now I’ve got to try to keep my eyes open and finish my daily word count.

I never even went there but I miss it already.

Two Depressing Moments From TV Last Night

1. Hearing classic Blue Öyster Cult remade as dancebeat twaddle and sung by a breathy teenie-bopper and used to pimp a car that I wouldn’t drive if it was offered to me for free.

2. Three small children playing doctor. The “doctor” tells the other small children that what they need is more fiber. The solution? Froot Loops. I don’t even know which part is more depressing. Kids discussing fiber or the advertising brain trust that decided that the real selling point for a candy-flavored cereal is fiber.

Oops, the morning got away from me so only a couple of quick updates.

1. The good news is that I’ve completely restored my home email to exactly like it was before I upgraded it. Yay. The bad news is that all new mail on the machine since I switched is gone.

2. Simpson’s Review that includes a line about how the episode feels like it was written by elderly people. We thought it was hilarious. Ouch.