On Television and nostalgia

And you could even argue that a great deal of this blog is dependent on television as a common cultural text. Note: always describe things as texts when attempting to write a graduate level thesis. I believe Shakespeare captured it with a bit more flair in As You Like it than all the dreary literary critics who followed him:

All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely players:
They have their exits and their entrances;
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages. At first the infant,
Mewling and puking in the nurse's arms.
And then the whining school-boy, with his satchel
And shining morning face, creeping like snail
Unwillingly to school. And then the lover,
Sighing like furnace, with a woeful ballad
Made to his mistress' eyebrow. Then a soldier,
Full of strange oaths and bearded like the pard,
Jealous in honour, sudden and quick in quarrel,
Seeking the bubble reputation
Even in the cannon's mouth. And then the justice,
In fair round belly with good capon lined,
With eyes severe and beard of formal cut,
Full of wise saws and modern instances;
And so he plays his part. The sixth age shifts
Into the lean and slipper'd pantaloon,
With spectacles on nose and pouch on side,
His youthful hose, well saved, a world too wide
For his shrunk shank; and his big manly voice,
Turning again toward childish treble, pipes
And whistles in his sound. Last scene of all,
That ends this strange eventful history,
Is second childishness and mere oblivion,
Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.

And that brief quote darlings clearly shows why it is a good thing to occasionally turn off our dear friend the television and pick up a book. Anyhow, the original point was something along the lines of this very blog needing a common cultural text of television to make jokes about the Snorks, Inspector Gadget, Duck Tales, Care Bears et al. I have a feeling that if I used Ulysses or even a contemporary classic like Beloved as a common text I would find myself preaching to a rather empty choir loft beyond a few graduate students who would profess their love for the high modernist tome or the lyrical language of dear Miss Morrison.

Home Improvement is a much more universal tool for describing my housing troubles than Song of Solomon. Wilson, standing on the other side of the fence makes more sense than Rabbit running down to talk with his local pastor. Which, to that point, our toilet overflowed again tonight, despite the fact that we had a plumber fix it. And, at some point as I was hauling the mop upstairs, in my sweatshirt and long pants because we can't turn up the heat, that this home ownership thing is a damn racket. American dream my ass. Thank the good Lord the real American Dream now is to be famous, even if it's only for fifteen seconds. I recommend becoming independently wealthy before you ever buy a home because the cost of keeping it functional will sink you faster than the Titanic and without the symphony playing.

In my mind, television winds up doing double duty in most households. We are simultaneously inspired and depressed by it. We see people on television, particularly the reality TV craze, and think that perhaps we could join them in the world of fame, or perhaps we watch a transcendent athlete like Michael Jordan and then go out in the yard and shoot hoops. However, we are simultaneously often discouraged by what we watch on television. We watch other talented individuals doing things with the same slack jawed amusement that our parents feared. Is it better to watch someone dance or to learn how to do the damn thing yourself? But who has the time or the energy? How different are the stories on television than the ones we used to hear from books? What makes Peter Pan the book so much better than Hook? Pure snobbery? Perhaps. I'd argue, and did previously, that good television and good books both exist. It's merely a matter of cultivating a taste for what is fine and good.

Note: A good start would be to read the finest critics of both television and literature. Snobs don't exist in vacuums. They become snobs by studying a hell of a lot harder than your garden variety individual. Our current cultural disdain for cultural elites seems a bit misguided. I'd rather have the plumber fix my shower than a roofer. Of course, the plumber didn't do the damn job either so perhaps, in the spirit of being a true self-made American man, I should just do it myself. It's like I always say to S, "I got my master's degree so that I can pay other people to fix my stuff." Of course, my master's degree is entirely useless when it comes to monetary gain, and the real reason that I shy away from home improvement projects is that I take to them like a hippo takes to people wandering through his patch of grass...Not well.

Anyhow, not sure I've said anything of real consequence herein, but at least you got some Shakespeare. And I've got to go check and make sure that my bathroom is not flooded again and making more water spots in the ceiling below. I have a sinking feeling that real life is going to turn out to be a hell of a lot less entertaining than what I've seen in movies....

On Television and nostalgia

It's funny how swayed we are by articles that we read or interesting radio stories. All it takes is reading some blurb about carbs making us fat and suddenly the whole population is an expert on losing weight and what the body needs. These sorts of things come up often within the bonds of marriage because as we all know, spouses or sig. others are the people we get to tell all the boring/complaining/possibly interesting stuff that we bottle up all day while pleasantly smiling at co-workers whose name we're not quite sure of.

S: I read that dancing is supposed to make you smarter.
M: That's why I'm always trying to get you to go to the club.
S: The article also mentioned that you should only watch, at maximum, two hours of television a day.
M: What a shocker. Finally an article that let's us know that television isn't great for us.

M: New stunning research comes out, "If you punch babies in the face you may be an asshole. More to come on Channel 7 news.

Time passes.
S: Let's do the dishes.
M: I'll be downstairs lowering my IQ.

I have conflicted feelings about television. Television was something that I used to watch with my dad and my brother. We'd bond over sports games, exulting in the win, or feeling downtrodden with each loss. We still talk about what is on television, it somehow manages to tie us together across all these thousands of miles. It's amazing to think we can be witnessing the same events simultaneously from all across the country.

I remember watching X-files with my mother when I was the only child still left at home. The special treat that it was to call her into the living room and watch that show. My mother rarely watched television but for those two years we rarely missed an episode. When I think of Thanksgiving I think of family, of turkey, and of television. I think of watching the game, or being told to stop watching the game and socialize. I think of the hours spent early in our marriage watching episodes of AD on those Friday's when we were too worn out from work to do anything else. I remember being in college, and watching episodes of Family Guy, ordering pizza, and sitting together and sharing in communal laughter.

I listen to NPR. I have a Masters degree. Some days I still think I want to be a writer. This pretty much makes me the sort of person who has complicated feelings about television. I'm simultaneously annoyed and thrilled by people who don't own televisions. I can't imagine how much time they must have, not spending hours upon hours in front of the television. Privately, I loathe the time I spend watching television. I berate myself or S for watching too much and claim that we should be out making meaningful relationships or writing or serving the homeless.

I am of the generation that knows that television makes you less intelligent. My God, just look at the awkward construction of that previous sentence as proof. This study wasn't telling me anything I didn't already know. But what about all the good television shows that are on right now? What about the shared enjoyment of an episode of AD? or the fantasy of Lost that reminds me of being curled up in my mother's lap listening to Tolkein? I actually think television is getting better. But is it making us better? I occasionally have feelings of guilt when I watch television. I imagine that I should be reading, or writing, or listening to a podcast about philosophy. I think of all the other things that I could be doing that would make me a better human being.

Are they all better things? Were human beings a more moral or happy species before the advent of television? Were families and marriages less likely to break up? Did people gather round and sing folk songs late into the night? Is it a compelling argument to ask, "At the end of your days will you be remembered for all the television shows you watched?" Or is that just implicitly a bullshit question? What else are you likely to be remembered for? Ashes to ashes dust to dust. How much does the interim matter in any grand scheme? Do people who watch less television really enjoy life more? Or are they just smug bastards who can't afford cable and enjoy feeling better than other people? Is TV the devil?

My current opinion about the old boob tube is that it's not all bad. I think that watching a good television show can be a worthwhile experience. I think that the insidious trap of television is no different than that offered by any other things we humans partake of. It is good in small doses. The ubiquity of television makes it perhaps a bit more dangerous than other options. But you can watch television shows that make you a more well connected and intelligent human being? Or you can watch two and a half men. The real trick, I suppose, when watching television or doing anything else for that matter, is to figure out when you've had enough enjoyment out of it and when it's time to move on to something else. Let that be a self-reminder for Thanksgiving meal as well. Learning to be grateful for the good things and not gorging oneself is a damn near impossible lesson to learn.

Because the temptation (often given into in my case) is to sit until I am well past the point of satiated. That's not actually televisions fault though, it's mine. Treating television like it's the problem seems a bit short sighted. Humanity tends to have one major problem and that problem is humanity. The self. We have a tendency to demonize things that are really only symptomatic of our own inability to control impulses. Certainly their is something to be said for not tempting yourself, but applying negative connotations to something that is essentially a non-entity seems like a misstep. And perhaps related to my own inability to slip out of its grasp. And you risk making something compelling when you outlaw it. If television is restricted it often becomes something that is desired all the more. It's a tough balance to strike, and I don't envy parents of our generation. The best way to show control over the television is probably to illustrate a healthy relationship with watching it yourself, not treating it like a long lost lover nor like Lucifer himself.

Related story. Every time that I hear this song on Pandora with the refrain, "if you could only change one thing in the world, what would it be?" I think... myself. Sure it's easy to say world hunger, poverty, oppression of all kinds. However, Michael Jackson esque though it may be, I'd have to say the most problematic thing in the world that I have any semblance of real control over is me. And I'd like to change that first. I don't think I'm alone in this. I think St. Paul pointed this problem out long ago.

For the good that I want, I do not do, but I practice the very evil that I do not want. Romans.

This from one of the most hard ass Christians you'll find. Point being, I'll probably always have conflicted feelings about television and they are likely related to conflicted feelings I have about a number of things like what is the good? how does a man/woman spend his/her time on the earth? what gives meaning? All that to say that I'm really enjoying Modern Family, V, Flash Forward, The Office et al, but I do listen to NPR on the way to work...

To be continued....

Stalking

S and I spent the evening putting together a bed from IKEA. This largely consisted of S asking for tools from me while I begged to be allowed to back to the basement to watch my recorded episodes of V. We (the term is obviously being used pretty loosely) successfully put together the beginning of the frame and now our guest bedroom.

I hold unpopular opinions about IKEA. That is, despite being a newbie to the realm of house shopping and furniture buying, I sort of hate IKEA. I don't like putting together furniture. I don't like walking through the store and being overwhelmed by the fact that everything is for sale. I do like that birds live in the rafters at IKEA. I like that when you put together a piece of IKEA furniture it looks just like the real thing but doesn't cause your back to go out when you lift it.

After putting together the bed.

S: That bed looks too big in there.
M: (Blogging).
S: Can you help me put this bed caddy corner?
M: Are you doing it because you need to or are you just futzing around?
S: I'll just go do it myself and break my back.
M: Remember, lift with your lower back. The legs are weak.

It was nice to receive an e-mail from a friend this week congratulating us on our new home. Now, this friend doesn't read my blog or check our facebook statuses, but he found out anyway. Why? Well, he attached the link to this decidedly more creepy and less entertaining blog about DC housing.

http://dc.blockshopper.com/news/story/1700045131-Environmental_policy_analyst_buys_Manor_Park_home,

While it was nice to know that we actually bought our home in Manor Park, and here I'd been telling people Brightwood, I was a bit disturbed to find a pictures of yours truly painting away in his yellow room. The picture was lifted from this very blog. Which, if you click on the external link and then click on Mr. Bertaina (I would prefer that everyone now start calling me that so that I can say, "Mr. Bertaina, that's my dad. Call me sir.") and it takes you back to this blog. It's an incredibly insidious loop that keeps leading you back to the blog. Thank you strange other blog.

Note: Please disregard all the information in the enclosure link as it's drastically wrong and just in bad form. It may not all be wrong, but I've been asked to keep all of our financial records a secret. The last time this happened I wound up burying all of our savings in the backyard and making a map to it. Apparently that is not exactly whas S had in mind. Women.

I look forward to raking more leaves this weekend while the neighbor's dog/death wolf growls and barks at me until I retreat inside to the comfort of my cold dark home. Yay!

GPS voices and couches and shopping fatigue

We finally settled on a couch. We finally made this complex decision by equitably splitting up the marital duties. I watched the Michigan football game, got slightly buzzed, and took a two hour afternoon nap. Meanwhile, S made pizzas and bought two couches while I was sleeping. Then, she came downstairs and woke me up to tell me that she had purchased them. Like most afternoon naps, I woke up from this one feeling like someone had been hitting me solidly with a wooden post for the past hour and that a gremlin had been stealing my sleep. Needless to say I groggily congratulated her on the purchases and tried to go back to sleep in a futile attempt to attain actual rest.

Friend: Can you choose the different GPS voices?
M: Yes.
S: You can choose British, Australian, American English, male or female.
M: The problem with turning on the female one is I always disregard the instructions. She doesn't know what she's talking about.
Friend: That's what I expected to hear.
S: Yeah, we have this great idea to make a GPS that interacts with you like a real person.

So we ended up with a nice new couch with a chaise. And yes, I did have to say at one point today that if I heard the word chaise again that someone was going to die horribly somewhere in my vicinity. I'm not exactly patient when it comes to making decisions. I blame biology.

Ex: (Buffalo herd capering by).
M: (Charges into buffalo herd wielding a large rock attempting to brain (I do love that term) everything in sight.) And yes, occasionally when you charge into the buffalo herd they all escape, but more often than not you at least end up with the satisfaction of having attempted to brain something.

Other Ex: (Buffalo herd grazing peacefully)
S: I want to eat, but I'm just not sure how to go about it in the right way. Does that little calf look the best to you? His haunches seem a little slight, and I notice that the mother seems particularly protective.
M: Grunts in disapproval.
S: Are you sure you really want to do this? We could wait for nightfall and set up an elaborate trap with maybe some of our fellow cave men friends braining them with large rocks as they attempted to go through that small pass.
M: Grunts in frustration.
S: I mean, I think it's the best way but maybe we should pick on a juvenile one instead of the baby to increase the odds of sustainability.
M: Grunts signifying "Ah dammit the whole herd just left for greener pastures.

Other GPS ideas.

Female voice after a wrong turn: Are you lost? Perhaps you should pull over and ask for some directions.

Male angry voice: Did you really just miss that turn? I'd like to say something like, "When possible make a u-turn" but you'd probably just fu-- that up as well. Do you think I like being trapped inside a machine? If you rub me three times...sorry, this apparently devolved into I dream of Jeannie.

I think the above passage pretty much illustrated the essential differences between the sexes. I'm going to write a book about the differences between men and women, loosely based off men are from mars and women are from Venus. Seminar announcements to come soon.

M: I've been watching a lot of television lately because S has been gone.
Friend: Yeah me too.
M: Turning on the television is kind of like having a spouse.
Friend: You should write a book about marriage.
M: Really?

I also would like to know if any research has been done on the extreme pain that shopping inflicts upon my body. It's one of those cliches that we've grown up with,"Oh men, they just don't like shopping. Hah, hah, silly men." But let me tell you that I literally get a headache after about twenty minutes of wandering through IKEA and also begin to feel extremely tired. And I could make a joke about being a petulant child, but I literally begin to feel ill while shopping. The counter point is that if I'm shopping by myself and know exactly what I'm getting it can be a pleasant experience. But, shopping with only a vague idea of what you are going to get or just to get ideas would have appeared as a level in Dante's Inferno if he'd have had the forethought.

The real long and the short of the couch lesson is that I suspect that I've been misled at some point along the way about what a good decision making couple looks like. I purport that part of learning to compromise is occasionally letting your spouse make a decision without any of your input at all. The real act of compromise afterwards is figuring out how to struggle through the real hard decisions that you have to make together. In general I'd say that the lesson that I learned is that I'm a pretty flexible person. And even though a small part of me dies inside when we buy a wire bed frame instead of a solid one, I'll still probably be able to sleep on it. And after a week or ten years I won't even bring up that awesome bed frame that we could have had. And it's best to just save my breath for something that's really worth arguing over like whether I misplaced my bag after work or whether S "cleaned it up" read: hid intentionally to punish me. Life's too short to sweat couches.

Couches

It's so fun to finally get a chance to spend copious amounts of money! Oh wait, we already did that recently. Anyhow, couch shopping turns out to just be a sort of mini house shopping experience. S feels passionately about microfiber couches, and I feel passionately that anything that S likes is probably irrational and motivated out of a desire to punish me for original sin.

S: I like this tan one.
M: Oh it's just probably that time of the month.
S: What are you saying.
M: I don't know. I just love playing devil's advocate.

I didn't realize how passionately I felt about fabrics until we spent the better part of the first week of our marriage cleaning off a curduoroy (and yes, I spelled it wrong. And I have no idea how to fix it. But screw cuorduroy anyway for being such a hard word to spell) couch that two dogs had apparently been living on and inside. That thing was nasty. Ergo; I'm not really as opposed to the microfiber as I'd like to pretend. However, I am opposed to the idea that I can type a sentence about my preference for couch material without an ounce of irony.

Related proof that I might as well be thirty. Unsolicited age guessing over the past few years of my late twenties.

When I was 27.

You could pass for twenty five.
(blushing)

When I was 29.

Are you twenty eight?
No twenty nine.

Unfortunately at this rate the future looks like so.

Age 32

Oh you could totally pass for thirty four if the light was low.
(depression setting in).

We've also been encouraged to not buy a cheap piece of furniture but it's crazy to actually be embracing the idea. I mean, students throw these things away at the end of every school year and here we are spending a significant amount of money on a new one? Crazy? Yes. Stupid? Yes. I got nothing else.

S: I think I've decided on which couch I want.
M: I can tell you right now that I don't like that couch.
S: I haven't even told you which one.
M: It's not my fault that the good Lord blessed me with a Frank Lloyd Wrightesque sense of style.
S: Do you have anything to contribute or do you just want to shi- on my ideas?
M: Can't it be both?

Anyhow, we legitimately spent seven hours shopping for couches without finding a damn thing. Most people's taste is abominable, particularly in the burbs. I never realized how much I dislike other people's taste until I saw what they keep in stock at these large furniture stores. I can't even begin to describe to you the level of depression you feel walking around looking at all this crappy furniture and knowing that someone is going to buy it.
Aside: Yes, it is sort of elitist to judge other people's taste. And typical of a city person to judge someone from a smaller town. Someone queue "east coast liberals/wall street main street. However, I would argue that seven in ten people would walk around in the store with me and not find one good thing. I'll grant you that seven out of the ten people would be big city folk with a healthy distaste for overstuffed, but I think any good science experiment is conducted with none of the variables controlled. This may not be true.

In which S and I have a protracted argument about whether to buy certain pieces of furniture.

M: I guess I just don't want our house to look like a dorm room.
S: What else are you suggesting?
M: I'm suggesting that we buy something classically stylish.
S: Like what specifically?
M: I don't have specifics. I have vague ideas for improvements that I dispense freely right before we make a purchase.
S: That's helpful.
M: do you mean that? (childish light in eyes).

We finished yet another day couchless, but we learned something about each other. Mainly we learned that no matter how many decisions you make as a couple, it's still kind of a pain in the ass to pick something out with a spouse. You have developed your own unique and beautiful taste and you can't see why that idiot you chose to marry, date, live with can't accept the blindingly apparent truth that you are right. It's hard when you both are so blindingly correct to find common ground. I'm thinking we should each just go out and buy our own separate couch and then have friends come over and vote on them.

Note: If you don't pick mine you are not welcome back in our home...ever.

Hose bibs?

It's a nice image isn't it? Your garden variety (insert laughter here) hose wearing a nice little bib. And no, I don't know what a hose bib is, but I do know what a bib is. Apparently as the weather gets colder we need to turn off the water to our hose bibs. Just an example of one more thing that you learn when you own a home.

I'd like to take a bit of time to thank the fine folks over at Verizon for making the Internet switch into our new home so easy. I mean, I just called them up and asked for a change and it happened right off with no hitches. And after fourteen days, two trips out by a technician, five separate phone calls and no less than five disconnected calls we had Internet. I'm not sure if anyone else has noticed the Kafka-esque labyrinth of useless phone trees that they've constructed around Internet service, but it's truly commendable.

M: Can you help me?
Verizon: I'm sorry. I can access your account, but I can't actually change anything. I'll need to transfer you to billing. Billing isn't open right now though, so you'll have to call back tomorrow.

And yes, at some point I did start breaking out into some random f bombs. And no, I don't feel proud of it, and I ended both conversations in which I flipped my shi- by talking to the operator as if they were a lover that I'd been unkind to.

M: I know it's not your fault. I'm sorry. It's just that you're working for a soulless and crappy company.
Verizon: I'm sorry sir.
M: I'm sorry that you have to work at that p.o.s. of a company. That's what I'm sorry about.

I'm pretty sure that if they recorded my interactions for quality control, they'd fine a couple of really nice operators listening to me rant. However, I suspect that they are actually recording calls to see how many disconnections and horrible service a person can take before they lose it. It's kind of like Verizon is running a wide scale version of the MTV show Punk'd. "Oh yeah, you probably thought because you pay us money and took time off work that you'd get to have Internet. You got Punk'd." (Am I spelling it right? I think my spelling is hip.) Suffice to say, it's clearly a large scale government project to see how much we'll take as citizens of this lovely country. Your death panels will not take me!

Overheard in the library and further proof as to why wearing your iPod at all times is overrated. Forget the fact that you wind up deaf. You miss out on gems of conversations going on like this one.

Girl 1: I’m sitting next to these guys I don’t even know and they are talking about all these girls and who has the nicest boobs.

Girl 2: Mmmhmmm.

Girl 1: All guys are the same.

Girl 2: That’s because every guy ever is a douche.

M: Though the words may seem needlessly harsh, in girl 2's defense she did have a pretty nice....kidding.

One of the best things we did in our first two weeks in the neighborhood was to bring down home values by keeping a pile of trash in our back yard. The previous owner illegally dumped (not as bad as it sounds, well maybe worse, but, less so. May my sense of humor never get beyond the point that I see a sign that says no dumping and have a good laugh) trash and the DC trash people claimed that they wouldn't take it. Ergo; we welcomed ourselves to the new hood by having reams of trash piled up in our backyard with raccoons and squirrels foraging through bags for tasty treats.

It only took about two weeks for some people from the DC trash department to show up at random and take the trash away. This, after we had called them several times and been told that they
a) wouldn't pick up the trash
b) would send someone by on Monday
c) Would pick it up on our normal day.
The answer provided depended on whom you spoke with like all good bureaucracies. Consistency is the first sign that peasants will take back the power. Keep them guessing. Thus, on a random Friday, two days after they said they'd pick it up, and a day after our normal trash pick up they cleared the trash from our back yard. And I have to say they took a little piece of me away with that trash. The piece of me that likes to move into a neighborhood and immediately make it crappier, merely by being there.

Other awesome things we did.

Direct TV guy: I couldn't get a signal, so I put the satellite on your neighbor's roof.

Us: You mean. You can't find a signal so you might have to put it on their roof.
DTVGuy: Oh no, it's up there right now.

US: Okay. (Stepping back and expecting to see it near the middle of our shared roof. And no, it is almost completely off to the side on their side of the roof.

Nothing says welcome us to the neighborhood like a giant satellite dish on someone else's roof. We're hoping to rake some leaves onto someone else's lawn, park in people's designated spot, and threaten to have the neighbor's barking dog taken away by animal control before the week is out. Wish us luck!

That bear is blue

We still don't have a couch so perhaps I'm not ready to talk couches quite yet. Apparently my last blog post could have incorrectly intimated that we had done all sorts of things to the house like constructed a patio. I hope it goes without saying that our greatest accomplishment, since our initial excursion into the realm of home improvement, was putting our clothes away. I mean, how homeonwerly of us, to remove our clothes from the floor in our bedroom and put them in dressers. What will us crazy kids be up to next? Maybe we'll buy some trash cans or wait, I have distant memories of trash problems. For another night.


Tales from our new old home.

We are learning quickly that life in a an old new home isn’t all rainbows and bear hugs. (I guess what I’m really getting at here, is that I watched an episode of the Care Bears a few weeks ago and wondered just what the hell was going on. Shouldn’t all the boy bears be blue and …..blue or whatever color bears are. Are bears blue?).
What we thought was nice tile in our bathroom turned out to be rather cheap paneling. The cheap paneling is about the consistency of your garden variety cardboard, which is awesome, but as you may know, we don’t generally make cardboard showers. This is because wet cardboard doesn’t hold up as well as say a nice pink tile. Which, related story is underneath the paneling and it’s debatable whether it’s worth pulling out crappy paneling just to end up with some pink tile.

M: I don’t know why I’m so hungry.
Boss: Maybe you’re getting your period.
M: It probably doesn’t help that I just picked up an US Weekly. I just want to know what’s going on with Molly and Jason.

Unfortunately the shower in the master bathroom leaks. Aside: Why is it called the master bathroom? I’m currently typing this sans internet, so I’ve no way of figuring out why it was ever called the master bedroom and bathroom. The genesis of the word master in my own pea brained memory being some sort of vestigial term conferred during our less intelligent years in terms of human equality. When did the term originate? It's a wonder people even got out of bed in the morning, before the advent of the internet with the misguided notion that they could do something in the world. Aside: The first chapter of Moby Dick is sheer genius for the mere fact that Wikipedia and the Internet weren't a part of Melville's research. Perhaps I’m wrong, maybe it’s roots are Neo-Galic. I just kind of wanted to type Neo-Galic.

Needless to say we embarked on anther fix it project, the toilet venture going oh so well, and put on a new shower head. The plus is that we know have a new shower head that leaks in quite a different manner than the old one.

S: How was your shower?
M: It was a fine mist.
S: What?
M: You heard what I said.

So now we’ve got a nice new leaky showerhead, which is light years cooler than an old leaky shower head.
In other highlights of my day I dressed up for work today, wearing a nice red shirt. On the plus side I received compliments from several people who basically said, “you look nice” or “spiffy” or something. On the downside I interpreted their compliments as not genuine compliments but an indictment of my usual work attire.

Aka, Did your wife or your mother dress you today?
I didn't recognize that usual stench of failure that accompanies your t-shirts?

Boss: "I keep wondering who this guy is that is just wandering into our office."

Translation: Perhaps if you didn’t resemble a hobo on a day to day basis you’d receive some respect around here.

I’ll be wearing a t-shirt and jeans to work tomorrow. I kept wanting someone to ask me why I was dressed up, so I could say, “They always say to dress for the job you want not the one you have. I’m planning to work as a salsa dancer.” But no one ever asked. (And why do people say this anyway? This only applies to job interviews correct? Otherwise you're not dressing for the job that you really want, you're the idiotic looking guy who overdresses at his job. Judging by the tips and requests for water that I received from several library patrons I'm not sure that dressing for the job I want really worked. Besides which, what if you really wanted to get into surfing or semi-nude modeling. What then? I want to be a writer. Does that mean I should show up for work smoking a pipe? while taking sips from my cup of whiskey while reassuring people that I'm just dressing for the job I want then banging away on a typewriter I brought from home? My point is that that saying is yet another example of the culture logic of late capitalism infecting our beliefs about what it means to be a success. Maybe I can be a success just by doing my job really well no matter what it is, maybe....

I'm just f-ing with you all. Money may not buy you happiness but it can buy you friends and things that will make you happy. I mean, money could even do something great, like buy you more money from a different currency so that you'll be even richer. Ponzi scheme.

Okay, someone did, and I said, “All dressed up no place to go,” because I’m almost 30 years old and that’s the sort of strange thing that older men say to make sure that people find them creepy.

Other scenarios:
Worker: Why are you dressed up?
M: Why aren’t you dressed up you dirty slob.

Worker: “”
M: To make you feel inadequate about the way you’re dressed.

Worker: ""
M: What, this old thing? (Laugh companionably and throw arm around shoulder).

Worker: “”
M: I’ve got a really important meeting after work….with your mom! Zing.

And so on....

Ah, memories

I'm dying to blog about couches, but I'm going to hold back in order to recount the first evening that we spent in our new home alone. (Obviously we flooded the place and rigged it with booby traps in the event of an incursion by hapless burglars). I'll hold off on couches for now and just bask in the glow of the memory of our first night....Awwwwww. Refer to picture of baby panda above.

Spending your first night in a new home:
Your significant other is wearing something gauzy, vaguely reminiscent of romance novels, but as we know, the romance novels got them from somewhere. And tonight, you realize that they have taken them from your life. Her/his long hair is pale in the softened glow of the room, and it falls like water across her bare shoulders, paler still. The moon is low and heavy. It’s light is gleaming across the long oak boards of your new floor.
You lie down together. Your feet are warm. The mattress and the bed are new. And you realize that buying this house and everything that comes with it is a new spring time in your relationship. You pull your lover close to your own body, smooth curves and hard lines blending together like water coming together with other water. You own a new home. You have done this thing together, achieved the American dream.
Okay, as it turns out we couldn’t actually get a new bed in time. We also couldn’t manage to get our box spring upstairs though mild moving attempts were made.
Mover 1: Maybe if we turn it this way. (Grinds object into new stairs).
S: Stop.
Mover 2: Maybe if we just push it up on your side. (Takes a large chunk of plaster from newly painted wall).
S: Stop.
M: Maybe if we lie down on our backs and push it up with our feet and pretend like it’s Superman it will fit.
S: I guess we’re just not getting it upstairs.
M: It hurts when you shoot down my ideas.



So, we weren’t actually sleeping in a brand new bed. We were camping out on the floor like a couple of Bohemians. Though I believe Bohemians were having a bit more fun than we were. Needless to say we eventually drifted off into the thick arms of sleep, dreaming wholesome American dreams of apple pies and cigarette trees, our two bodies warming the small space between us.
Oh wait, that’s right, let’s tell it how it really was.
S: Go down stairs and get a mop! (Bright lights flash on).
M: (Running downstairs to get a mop) Note: It’s interesting how when you are wakened up from a dead sleep at two in the morning how quickly you’ll obey directions. Usually I’m like a petulant child. S should probably start waking me up at 2 A.M. for all of our conversations as I’m seriously ready to obey. Anything to go back to sleep. Aside complete.
S: (Mopping the floor in the bathroom) The toilet is leaking.
Yes, that’s right. The beauty of home ownership. The very first night that we spent together, we spent mopping up the floor and figuring out why our toilet was leaking. I encourage anyone who is thinking about buying a home to listen to this cautionary tale and just say yes to condos!
After that I proceeded downstairs to admire the water stains that were appearing on our ceiling and to wipe the water off our living room floor before it warped. Fortunately or unfortunately, depending on who you are in this scenario, I had previous experience with water in an upstairs room. I’m sorry Eddie’s parents. I know you guys didn’t like me anyway, and I’m guessing the water in your ceiling didn’t help. I didn’t have my contacts in. I’m blind without them. If I was born two thousand years ago I’d have wandered off a cliff at age seven. Aside complete.
And somewhere around four A.M. when we settled back to sleep, I waited patiently for the voice over to start. For a narrator to describe how we’d really learned something our first night together, that somehow, the leaking toilet and water stains had brought us closer together, that we understood the gravity of this decision even more. I waited for him to describe how a relationship is like a house, how you work really hard on it, that it’s a labor of love. The fan blades turned blankly above, casting shadows on the bare walls.
Perhaps we did learn something, or perhaps we just muddled our way through the night. I suppose, like most of life, it’s just a matter of how you choose to view it. Goodnight moon!

Post Number 100!

I could go on and on about the hardships of not having internet over the past couple of weeks, but I think it's fair to say that not having the internet as a twenty first century American is akin to being a knight during the middle ages who is stabbed repeatedly by a sword in the lower intestines. And then, right before your noble death, being transported into the future and ending up at a Renaissance fair, and just getting horribly depressed about your life because these people are making a mockery of it and tracking down some fair wench, which is not the sort of term you'd even use because real knights don't talk shi= like that, and asking her to make sweet love to you in yonder alley and having her laugh in your face, and then trying to return home to your house and just get on the internet for a while to complain about how life is hard as a middle aged knight living in the twenty first century only to discover that Verizon sucks. Huh. I guess the analogy ceased being an analogy at some point and just became me, rather oddly, going on and on about not having the Internet. It's good to be back, but I'm going to miss corsets.

Something I wrote in the early days of owning a house. Those were sweeter days indeed, and you'll be able to identify the romantic/idyllic attitude I had about our domain at first. Ex below: From on or around October 29.

The only thing better than actually spending money on a new house is the incredible amount of money you spend in your head on a house. Owning your first home is when you first realize that you were born for greater things and that through some cosmic mishap the good Lord has not gifted you with insane amounts of money that will allow you to put in the track lighting, tile, granite, patio/indoor disco bar/heated pool that you deserve.
We already spend a decent amount of money on getting the floors refinished but already we’ve spent money on a charming new patio, some area rugs (the fact that I’m even using the term area rug is a good sign that things have gone fairly awry for me in life. I mean, do other rugs exist that don’t cover area? Are these rugs invisible? Do they not take up space?), track lighting, and of course the ever-present pass through to turn the kitchen from the dank galley of a ship into the wide open top of a carnival cruise liner.
Upside of owning a home:
For the first time in our six plus years of marriage I finally have a defined space to call my own. My defined space is the basement. The basement has quality stick on tile, dim lights, and it’s beneath the foundation of the house where the sun never dares shine. I guess the moral of the story is that when you are just beginning to have set places in your home you don’t get to start at the top. In fact, sometimes you have to start at the bottom. I’ve noticed that “my defined space” is also the current repository for all of the junk in the house, and I feel like S might consider my space (why the quotes above but not here? Damn people and their inconsistent quote use!) a bit less of a priority than her kitchen. But riddle me this, when man was first learning to cook where was he? Was he in a nice sun-filled room with adequate counter space and lovely appliances? No, he was in a dimly lit cave that was possibly a little bit damp, with a moose head on the wall. That’s right, the basement is the original kitchen. I’ll see if I can talk S into putting in a fire pit.
Down side of owning a new house: Opening random doors and discovering various items that should never have been painted over. The attitude of previous generations apparently pretty much being, paint cures all ills. And what it can’t cure carpet can take care of.
Also, these houses built in the 1940’s don’t have three prong adapters. Come on nineteen forties home builders, you should have seen this innovation coming. For crap’s sake we were on the moon a scant two to three decades later. You’d think that these guys would have seen the trend was moving more in the direction of innovation. As such, we’re replacing all of our two-pronged adapters with four pronged adapters to stay ahead of the curve. Whoever buys this house in 2060 is going to thank us.
Also discovering that various outlets are wired to immediately short out and that the previous owner must have gotten her box spring upstairs by grinding it on the carpet. Unfortunately, as you’ve just spent willy nilly (the fact that I’m using a term like willy nilly is a good sign that my life has somehow gone awry) on a brand new hardwood floor, you’re reluctant to follow suit. And thus, you’ve got a sweet looking floor that you’re actually afraid to walk on, and that is preventing you from sleeping on a box spring. Thus, as you sleep on just a mattress in your upstairs bedroom and walk down into your living room devoid of furniture it occurs to you that you might as well start growing pot because your bohemian lifestyle has already begun. More uses for the basement….