You're Doing It Wrong

Is there an easy way to remove ivy? We have ivy on one half of the yard and every summer at some point I decide to tear it out and I do about an hour of work and choke on dirt and scratch my arms up and then poop out. There is still one patch that I cleared out last year (and never planted anything there) and now there’s another patch I worked on yesterday. But it was totally exhausting. I want to get all the ivy out and bring in some better dirt and bark dust and put some pretty but easy to deal with plants in there. At this point the ivy has no trouble growing faster than I can clear.

Yesterday a couple of big orange trucks came and hacked at the trees on the street behind us. They did a crappy job. When we look out the kitchen window we can see this row of beautiful trees except the one on the end has been brutally hacked so that it looks like a mistake. Poor tree. At first I thought they were doing it because of the power lines. But there are no power lines. It looks like they were doing it to be mean.

I’m still addicted to Big Brother. I keep saying I’m not going to watch again but then I can’t wait for it to air again. There are still at least 4 more weeks.

We have new neighbors and other than one of the cars out front occaisionally moving, I have seen zero sign of them. They keep the windows closed and the shades drawn and I’ve seen the woman out watering once but otherwise they are like the mystery people. The only reason I know there are two people is because there are two cars and once before they got the shades, I saw them take turns working on the computer in what used to be Trevor’s room. They took down the sun/moon curtains, too.

Some dog has been using our front lawn as a regular turd drop. What are people thinking? Bob says sometimes dogs are just running around and it’s not the owner’s fault where it turds. Yeah right.

Where are the grammar police when you need them? I’m talking about the endless incorrect use of the reflexive. I don’t want to be one of those people with bizarre grammar fetishes but now it’s too late and this one is bugging me. For example: memos from clients that say: Bob and myself attended a meeting last week. Or on Big Brother where every week in the diary room every house guest says something like: Robert, Justin and myself did blah blah blah. Here is a very nice grammar guide to help you out. It says, “whenever there is a reflexive pronoun in a sentence there must be a person to whom that pronoun can ‘reflect.'” So you could say “Robert, Justin and I won the HOH.” Or you could say, “The POV was given to Robert, Justin and me.” Or you could say “I hurt myself during the competition.” The house guests have nothing else to do in there — a grammar lesson could be quite informative.

Insomnia again. Three nights in a row but it’s been coming and going for several weeks now. On Saturday I could not sleep to save my life. I did a lot of reading — there are few unread periodicals in this house. Time for the books now.

I saw today I finally have a dahlia from the new batch I bought. It’s a generic pink but a nice treat from the zillions of red and yellow ones.

Here’s an article about trolling on the web. I’m the only person I know of who is a regular usenet reader although I never post. The 2 or 3 times I’ve posted on a public bulletin board I’ve gotten bales of weird email so I don’t think it’s worth it. But back to the trolls I can’t understand why people continue to argue with them. It’s so stupid. Is it that important to be right? Is it that important to defend your opinion? It’s just an opinion. Think about it — it doesn’t really mean anything?

I’m completely in love with Queer Eye for the Straight Guy. Here’s a good, um, guide to the Fab 5.

So this morning on the way to work, when I was stopped at the light at Fourth Plain, I noticed the car in front of me making a hand signal (?) out the window and then again at the rear view mirror. I had no idea what he was up to (broken down white Acura something, disheveled, unshaven 40-ish guy) and figured it had nothing to do with me. When the light changed he crossed the intersection and then pulled into the 5th rate tire store so I assumed he was gesturing to someone there. Moments later I was stopped at a light on Mill Plain and a car pulls up next to me and honks and I look over and there is Acura guy and he says something that I can’t hear and sort of shakes his head and then drives on. What was that all about?

For the last several months I’ve been thinking about dropping my Bust subscription but I find a lot of cool stuff there that I don’t see anywhere else so I guess I’m hanging on for another year. This month I learned about Hairpolice Salon for fabulous rock star hair. Another stylist at Hairpisalon gave advice on bangs. I’m sure mine are all wrong and very seventh grade. PanhandleGirl has soaps and body scrubs. This must be a super easy do-it-at-home start up meaning making soaps and stuff because every farmers market has at least 4 stalls with handmade soaps and Bust seems to tout one in every issue. I’m all for smelling good but how much soap does a girl need?

Then there’s Kiki’s Kitsch Corner — in case you’re looking for a styling toilet seat. And now that I’m probably too old to ever get to go to another bachelorette party, here is the perfect source of fun party favors. There also is a hilarious review (scroll down to Glow Job) of this glow in the dark massage lotion that looks like a great gift idea.

Now I’m running late.

I feel like I’m always rushing around. I know some things could be cut out but I’m not cutting them out.

We went to Seattle last Tues to see the Man U v. Celtic soccer game with Kenman, Hannah and Andy. Super fun time. We took the train and I got a clue what we were getting into when they announced at 9:05a that the lounge car was open and a herd of jock-types in shorts and soccer themed t-shirts headed in that direction. We saw soccer people all over downtown Seattle. I think the game would have gotten a lot nuttier if Celtic had managed to get on the board. We had a whole section next to us in green and white striped t-shirts and drums and large quantities of high priced beer. We had a great time.

I used my time on the train to make progress on Empire Falls which I finally finished — fantastic book. I immediately jumped into Ian McEwan Atonement which was also fantastic. I had trouble transitioning into McEwan though. Both writers have such strong distinct voices that I guess I needed some sort of palate cleanser before diving into the second book. Finished it this morning. Next is a book Sinead let me borrow and I still have Life of Pi to look forward to.

I am SO OVER Seabiscuit already. Enough Seabiscuit. Please, I’m begging you.

Another thing I’ve noticed a lot lately is the word: peripatetic. It seems like it should be about ulcers or digestive problems but Webster says: pedestrian, itinerant. It sounds wrong.

I haven’t mentioned how fabulous The Whale Rider is, or if I have, I forgot. But please go see it. And bring at least 3 boxes of tissues. I also saw Pirates of the Caribbean which for a movie based on a theme park ride is pretty damn good. But then you’ve got Johnny Depp, Orlando Bloom and pirates. It would be a crime if it were messed up. One story problem though: a lot of energy spent fighting the undead. Why would you fight to kill pirates who can’t die?

Last night during the movie I had an idea. You know those airports where they have TVs everywhere? You can’t escape the drone of the TV and it plays this CNN Airport news recycled endlessly. I think it was in MINN where I had a 4 1/2 hour layover after an international flight. We finally found a cluster of chairs in a corner to get away from the noise. Anyway, I think airport TVs should show Winged Migration on an endless loop. It would take years to get sick of it and it would add peace and beauty to an otherwise chaotic place. We could get TVs at the DMV and bank, too. It would be great.

We went to see Winged Migration tonight. Amazing. I can’t begin to describe how amazing it is. Even if you think you could never sit and watch birds for 90 minutes, go anyway. You can.

On the way home Bob told me he cut an article out about an 8 1/2 hour movie called La Commune (Paris 1871) about this historical event (I don’t know enough about it to explain properly). I said I didn’t want to see anything for 8 1/2 hours unless it had Jedi or elves in it. (The article actually says it’s 5 1/2 hours.)