S and I traveled to Rockville today to take a look at the fine offerings just off Viers Mill Road, which as it turns out doubles as a parking lot. We met our real estate agent this bright and cheery morning. Note: The morning itself was not cheery, or in retrospect, bright. The light was a bit more like that of a fifty watt bulb through a grey lamp shade. Anyhow.
House 1
We always like to begin our days of house hunting by looking at something out of our price range, thereby making the rest of the day a never ending series of disappointing houses that don't quite measure up to the one that we can almost afford. I recommend this method highly if you enjoy being miserable. The townhouse had a nice brick exterior and a garage. Garages being a great place to store things like loppers and hammers, and other tools that frighten me with their inherent masculinity.
Real Estate Agent: You could probably put in a hardwood floor yourself.
M: Or you could do it for me.
The strange thing about this listing was that every room seemed to be at slightly different levels, thus causing me to feel as though I was walking on board a rolling ship.
M: How's the mainsail in this place?
Agent: What?
M: What are the chances that I'll get scurvy?
Agent: What do you think of this place S?
On the whole it was a nice listing, with a relatively cute (not a word I use often) deck and a hot tub. Which at this point in my life it's probably important that I have a hot tub, especially if I'm going to be wandering up and down stairs all day causing the joints in my seventy year old (in terms of joint health) knees to recover.
House 2
While approaching this listing we noted the proximity of the train tracks to the yard. Ie, your back yard is pretty much train tracks. As a child who grew up in a generation that watched Stand By Me, train tracks are right up there with clowns (damn you Stephen King) in terms of things that strike the fear of God into my heart. I'm already picturing our imaginary kids playing on the tracks and all the elaborate stories we'd have to tell them in order to keep them from going on the tracks as well as the no doubt nascent fear that I'd have of a train derailing and coming through our bedroom window to kill us. This fear is sort of akin to the fear I had of taking a bath after watching the movie Jaws. Rational? No. Plausible? Eh, lets go with yes.
House 3
House 3 was a charming little three bedroom. The only problem was that it backed up to the tracks, and was also the size of a two bedroom one bath condo, but actually had three bedrooms. Oh, and a woodworking shop. Which, as an aside, if we end up getting this place you'll all be receiving hand-crafted elves as gifts for the next three to five Christmases. Too small.
House 4
This was probably the real charmer of the day. The exterior of the house was simple enough. A large tree pushing up bits of the sidewalk, a small chain link fence skirting the exterior, and a pile of thirty beer cans and three bottles of wine ready to be taken out for the garbage man. Which, I'm assuming in this tenant's case the garbage probably had about five days until it was ready to go. I'm not judging this guy for having thirty beer cans in his front yard on a house that he was showing, and I'm not blaming him for looking as though he had had about ten of them that morning already, and I'm not blaming him for watching a show called, "Fugitives on the Run." However, I do draw the line at walking down the hallway and seeing a sign, (put up with your lower quality masking tape and the "sign" has been written in the sort of hastily scribbled black pen that makes you think of an insane asylum) on a wall that read poopsville. At this point we beat a hasty retreat from the house, partially from fear of what else we would find, and the fact that the tenant had disappeared without telling us where he was going, and we weren't entirely certain that he wasn't hiding in a back room/waiting to kill us vis a vis Fugitives on the Run. Poopsville. Seriously.
House 5
By house five, any home buyer pretty much feels like they have been sitting in the sun for about four hours, sans sun block, and you are now looking for a place to lie down/wondering why you're hallucinating a perfectly nice kitchen in yet another small house.
10:00 P.M. Tell S that I need to get cracking on my blog.
10-10:45 watch two episodes of 30 Rock.
10:45 P.M. Head of S's attempt to start a third episode.
M: You're interfering with my creative blogging space. This area, (denoting a small area around our Ikea furniture) is for blogging only.
S: Am I blogging your creativity?
M: (Laughter).
Friday, July 31, 2009
Thursday, July 30, 2009
Cooking
As has been exhaustively documented in this blog, we've been dealing with a bit of roach problem, which has caused a disruption in our usual evening meals. The two of us now squatting against the couch and staring at our blank television and wondering what happened to our lives. One of the interesting side effects has been that I've taken up cooking this week. Apparently they provide these things called "recipes" which if you just follow these "recipes" closely the end product is usually pretty good. For years my kitchen demeanor has been to pull from the counter and spice racks and throw in ad-hoc whatever appealed to me. Scene: Huh, I like garlic and chocolate chips. Why hasn't anyone ever thought of putting them together? Queue to actual scene of me mistakenly frying up a cucumber thinking that it was zucchini then eating it noisily proclaiming its relative tenderness to S who would not even partake of the cucumbers, which in her defense had also been rolled in brown sugar.
Anyhow, if you just google something like "roasted potatoes," it turns out that you can find a "recipe" for roasted potatoes. This is pretty much ground-breaking stuff for me and I hope for the casual reader as well.
Job Front:
I'm being considered for another couple of jobs at the library where I've been toiling away for student wages over the past few months. I'm fairly certain that if I get turned down for these two jobs that my rejection count from this one job will have far exceeded any rejections I got while asking the fairer sex out. (Note: I think I may have asked out two girls in my life. I went 1 for 2, which is like batting 500 is we're playing baseball, and would be an all-time mark. However, if we're playing basketball and I'm at the foul line, I'm shooting like 50 percent, which makes me like Shaq. Like in my early twenties you'd be fouling me (providing copious drinks) just to see me try and casually strike up a conversation with a disinterested girl, who is typically looking around the bar to see where she has A) left her purse B) Left her Friend C) Left that handsome guy that she had been talking to earlier. The exciting part of this story was seeing the female in question a few months after her gentle dismissal in a local bar and pointing her out to one of my friends who said, "What were you thinking? She's way out of your league." Which, hey, at least it didn't stick with me and scar me these eight long years. Thanks Brian. You bastard.
Plural vs. Possessive
I've apparently made a routine habit of using these incorrectly in this blog.
S: You should proofread your blogs
M: Did you think it was funny? Note: add child-like need for validation somewhere in a portion of my irises.
S: "I mean, you just have quotation marks at the start of a sentence and then you leave them off completely at the end.
M: (Ashamed).
New Computers:
The most fun thing about buying the new computer was briefly pretending to know what things like gigaherz and RAM and dual core meant and shaking my head as the attendant rattled these things off in Best Buy. Tapping the computer meaningfully and saying that I just wasn't sure if 250 was going to do it for me.
Attendant: Are you going to be storing thousands of pictures and music and movies on there?
M: Possibly. I was thinking of running a small movie company solely based on my computer's graphics. Sort of like a Pixar thing. I've got this idea for an ornery hedgehog who travels around in a land of giants, and while he has this sort of complex relationship with his parents, who are aging, deep down he has like a heart of gold.
Attendant: Then this is the computer for you.
M: I think I need to work with someone else. Someone a bit more creative. I just told you the hedgehog's got a heart of f-ing gold. Do you think kids are going to want to watch a movie in which all the other predators are trying to rip out his heart of gold and sell it on the black market for cocaine? Is that the sort of movie you want your kids watching? Do you even have kids?
Note: The above interaction is a dramatization of a fairly simple conversation about computers. Plural.
Anyhow, if you just google something like "roasted potatoes," it turns out that you can find a "recipe" for roasted potatoes. This is pretty much ground-breaking stuff for me and I hope for the casual reader as well.
Job Front:
I'm being considered for another couple of jobs at the library where I've been toiling away for student wages over the past few months. I'm fairly certain that if I get turned down for these two jobs that my rejection count from this one job will have far exceeded any rejections I got while asking the fairer sex out. (Note: I think I may have asked out two girls in my life. I went 1 for 2, which is like batting 500 is we're playing baseball, and would be an all-time mark. However, if we're playing basketball and I'm at the foul line, I'm shooting like 50 percent, which makes me like Shaq. Like in my early twenties you'd be fouling me (providing copious drinks) just to see me try and casually strike up a conversation with a disinterested girl, who is typically looking around the bar to see where she has A) left her purse B) Left her Friend C) Left that handsome guy that she had been talking to earlier. The exciting part of this story was seeing the female in question a few months after her gentle dismissal in a local bar and pointing her out to one of my friends who said, "What were you thinking? She's way out of your league." Which, hey, at least it didn't stick with me and scar me these eight long years. Thanks Brian. You bastard.
Plural vs. Possessive
I've apparently made a routine habit of using these incorrectly in this blog.
S: You should proofread your blogs
M: Did you think it was funny? Note: add child-like need for validation somewhere in a portion of my irises.
S: "I mean, you just have quotation marks at the start of a sentence and then you leave them off completely at the end.
M: (Ashamed).
New Computers:
The most fun thing about buying the new computer was briefly pretending to know what things like gigaherz and RAM and dual core meant and shaking my head as the attendant rattled these things off in Best Buy. Tapping the computer meaningfully and saying that I just wasn't sure if 250 was going to do it for me.
Attendant: Are you going to be storing thousands of pictures and music and movies on there?
M: Possibly. I was thinking of running a small movie company solely based on my computer's graphics. Sort of like a Pixar thing. I've got this idea for an ornery hedgehog who travels around in a land of giants, and while he has this sort of complex relationship with his parents, who are aging, deep down he has like a heart of gold.
Attendant: Then this is the computer for you.
M: I think I need to work with someone else. Someone a bit more creative. I just told you the hedgehog's got a heart of f-ing gold. Do you think kids are going to want to watch a movie in which all the other predators are trying to rip out his heart of gold and sell it on the black market for cocaine? Is that the sort of movie you want your kids watching? Do you even have kids?
Note: The above interaction is a dramatization of a fairly simple conversation about computers. Plural.
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
Choosing a Realtor
Inexplicably, Stephanie and I find ourselves as the proud almost clients of two perspective realtor's. The reasons are moderately complex and not really worth mentioning, which if you've been reading along, you might be apt to say that I've already wasted your time.
We decided to ask each of them a series of questions to determine the top candidate. Kind of like a Mrs. American pageant minus the bikinis and sashes and Ed McMahon and a stage and...Ergo; I've posted our findings below in an attempt to get help from the wider community in choosing an agent. Note: I've excised/summed up/truncated/amended answers to increase the fluidity of the prose. The Agents are listed as 1, 2, and 3, my conception of an ideal Realtor.
How long have you been in the real estate business?
1. 3 years
2. 8 years
3. Ideal Realtor, "I was actually selling properties in the womb and had developed a complex exchange for the rights to my severed placenta by the second trimester.
How many clients are you working with?
1. 14
2. Not telling.
3. I've actually just e-mailed/texted/called every one of my others clients and told them that I'm putting them on hold until the three of us can work out a sale. Have I told you that you look great for someone who's almost twenty five? Thirty? You must be kidding? (Loving punch administered to arm).
Where are most of your sales?
1. Silver Spring
2. D.C./burbs
3. I typically sell most of my houses in ritzy upper NW neighborhoods to poor couples who look good in family photos.
What do you charge?
1. Some
2. Some
3. I'm actually doing this whole thing pro-bono because I liked that family picture you sent me so much. I'm not even sure what pro-bono means, but I'm as eager to find out as you are!
When am I officially working with you?
1. When we sign an agreement.
2. We're not already working together?
3. "Working. I can hardly call spending time with you work. Heck, you should charge me!"
How often can yous show us properties?
1. As much as my schedule allows
2. Lets get you in a damn house already!
3. Often. Can the answer contain part of the question or is that just a problem when defining something?
What is your average list-to price sales ratio?
1. Pretty good.
2. How dare you ask that.
3. I typically help a buyer get in at about 70-80 percent under the listed value. This typically involves a bit of arson and some scare tactics, but you're committed to this aren't you. Do I hear flaming bag of poo?
How quickly can you get us into a home?
1. Well, that depends on how many houses we look at on a given weekend and so on...
2. Why are you wasting my time with these questions? Lets get that house!
3. How quickly can you fashion a paper bag mask and develop a threatening tone? (Not sure why our ideal realtor has turned into a crook).
Do you represent buyers and sellers on the same house?
1. No
2. No
3. No
What haven't I asked you that I should?
1. What a good list of questions you've prepared. I'm ready to share references.
2. Where did you get all these stupid questions from?
3. You haven't asked me out for drinks yet? Oh, just kidding. you're just both so damn good looking it's hard to focus. Here's a picture of my cat. Isn't he cute?
Votes will be tabulated and we will select a realtor based on your input. Thank you for your support.
6:00 P.M. Return from work at the library in the middle of a phone conversation that S was having with our landlord related to rent remission based on the proliferation of cockroaches in our humble abode.
S: I mean, I think 200 dollars is actually an insulting amount to offer.
M: (In my head: what a great thing to say).
Later
S: You know what my favorite thing that I said today was? When I told our landlord that 200 dollars was an insulting amount to offer.
M: Me too!
"It was more the deeper, more tragic and universal conflict. The conflict between the subjective centrality of our own lives versus our awareness of its objective insignificance." Oblivion DFW
S: "Hmmm. I guess that's true. Like even your parents can't be as central to your life as you yourself are. I mean, even your life is a lot less interesting to me than my own."
M: "That's sweet honey."
We decided to ask each of them a series of questions to determine the top candidate. Kind of like a Mrs. American pageant minus the bikinis and sashes and Ed McMahon and a stage and...Ergo; I've posted our findings below in an attempt to get help from the wider community in choosing an agent. Note: I've excised/summed up/truncated/amended answers to increase the fluidity of the prose. The Agents are listed as 1, 2, and 3, my conception of an ideal Realtor.
How long have you been in the real estate business?
1. 3 years
2. 8 years
3. Ideal Realtor, "I was actually selling properties in the womb and had developed a complex exchange for the rights to my severed placenta by the second trimester.
How many clients are you working with?
1. 14
2. Not telling.
3. I've actually just e-mailed/texted/called every one of my others clients and told them that I'm putting them on hold until the three of us can work out a sale. Have I told you that you look great for someone who's almost twenty five? Thirty? You must be kidding? (Loving punch administered to arm).
Where are most of your sales?
1. Silver Spring
2. D.C./burbs
3. I typically sell most of my houses in ritzy upper NW neighborhoods to poor couples who look good in family photos.
What do you charge?
1. Some
2. Some
3. I'm actually doing this whole thing pro-bono because I liked that family picture you sent me so much. I'm not even sure what pro-bono means, but I'm as eager to find out as you are!
When am I officially working with you?
1. When we sign an agreement.
2. We're not already working together?
3. "Working. I can hardly call spending time with you work. Heck, you should charge me!"
How often can yous show us properties?
1. As much as my schedule allows
2. Lets get you in a damn house already!
3. Often. Can the answer contain part of the question or is that just a problem when defining something?
What is your average list-to price sales ratio?
1. Pretty good.
2. How dare you ask that.
3. I typically help a buyer get in at about 70-80 percent under the listed value. This typically involves a bit of arson and some scare tactics, but you're committed to this aren't you. Do I hear flaming bag of poo?
How quickly can you get us into a home?
1. Well, that depends on how many houses we look at on a given weekend and so on...
2. Why are you wasting my time with these questions? Lets get that house!
3. How quickly can you fashion a paper bag mask and develop a threatening tone? (Not sure why our ideal realtor has turned into a crook).
Do you represent buyers and sellers on the same house?
1. No
2. No
3. No
What haven't I asked you that I should?
1. What a good list of questions you've prepared. I'm ready to share references.
2. Where did you get all these stupid questions from?
3. You haven't asked me out for drinks yet? Oh, just kidding. you're just both so damn good looking it's hard to focus. Here's a picture of my cat. Isn't he cute?
Votes will be tabulated and we will select a realtor based on your input. Thank you for your support.
6:00 P.M. Return from work at the library in the middle of a phone conversation that S was having with our landlord related to rent remission based on the proliferation of cockroaches in our humble abode.
S: I mean, I think 200 dollars is actually an insulting amount to offer.
M: (In my head: what a great thing to say).
Later
S: You know what my favorite thing that I said today was? When I told our landlord that 200 dollars was an insulting amount to offer.
M: Me too!
"It was more the deeper, more tragic and universal conflict. The conflict between the subjective centrality of our own lives versus our awareness of its objective insignificance." Oblivion DFW
S: "Hmmm. I guess that's true. Like even your parents can't be as central to your life as you yourself are. I mean, even your life is a lot less interesting to me than my own."
M: "That's sweet honey."
Tuesday, July 28, 2009
How to Choose/List a proper house
I've discovered that S and I have different methods for narrowing down the list of houses on Redfin that we're interested in. My method is to begin with a large number of houses and then gradually narrow them down via a process of elimination until I reach a reasonably small numbers. Meanwhile, S's version, (which I'm in no way denigrating) is to "narrow" down the choices by consistently adding houses to our list.
Narrow-make or become more narrow or restricted.
Now, a typical dunce is merely going to see narrow defined in such a way and assume that my process is perhaps more effective at helping us to make our decision. Note: My list has 15 houses and S's has 121. However, I submit that the person who supports that definition is being narrow minded and is narrowly avoiding the mistake of not having enough houses with which to narrow down from.
Later: Success! We're down to ten!
Things that helped us winnow down our housing choices/helpful suggestions for home sellers.
1. If you have an old rusting play set in your back yard it is not the best idea to feature it prominently in photos, declaring the neighborhood to be full of tots, and the house as a potential daycare.
2. We do not need to see pictures of water heaters or wall sconces.
3. Only take multiple photos of your basement if it is finished. Basements are where people put bodies and are generally regarded as scary/dungeonesque abodes of dwarves and brown recluse spiders.
4. It is best to include pictures of your house if it is listed. Putting up a blank picture with details attached pretty much just says, "We'd really like you to take this piece of shi- off our hands for close to the asking price. We'd include pictures but then we wouldn't have suckered you in to coming by to take a look at this "great deal."
5. Sellers loss is your gain. Don't make me feel bad about buying your house at 100,000 less than you paid for it. Take the loss like it's the nineteen fifties, meaning grin and bear it.
6. It is best to remove drying laundry from the back of kitchen tables. That says, "We'd really like to sell this house but not enough to move this Washington Redskins jersey. In fact, maybe we've just been letting this place go to hell and we're hoping you'll take it off your hands, but would you mind changing the channel while you're up, we can't quite reach the remote from our arm chair."
7. Light is good. Take pictures of your house when the sun is shining! Other than the aforementioned (strangely often by this blog) trolls and poisonous spiders, nobody wants to live in dark rooms.
8. If you have kids, get rid of them. Okay, I'm just kidding on this one. But kids are kind of dirty and you should probably have those rooms staged and just have the kids camp out in the crawl space of the attic until the house sells.
9. Great neighborhood! Stop lying. I can't afford to buy in a great neighborhood, that's why I'm looking at your house and wondering what happened to all the listings in the Upper Northwest of D.C.
10. Close to Metro! 1.3 miles is not close to the Metro. It's a distance that's far enough away to make me never want to walk it and secretly hate my choice of ever having picked a house so far from public transit. Note: I'm spoiled, I've been walking to school/work for three years. Forgive me.
11. If your wife had the great idea of painting the bathroom pink, take a black and white photo.
12. If your lawn is brown, call it an opportunity for sprucing up.
13. Stop listing your house in as in condition. I take this to mean you've been breeding rabbits and the herd has gone feral, and is now in control of your unfinished basement.
14.. At the very least, if you're going to take photos of your crappy yard/laundry/neighbor's dog just crop it out of the picture. Don't put it in a slideshow and set it to muzak. You're not helping.
Thanks for helping us reduce/restrict/contract/shrink/diminish/decrease/straiten our choices! Note: straiten is an archaic synonym.
Narrow-make or become more narrow or restricted.
Now, a typical dunce is merely going to see narrow defined in such a way and assume that my process is perhaps more effective at helping us to make our decision. Note: My list has 15 houses and S's has 121. However, I submit that the person who supports that definition is being narrow minded and is narrowly avoiding the mistake of not having enough houses with which to narrow down from.
Later: Success! We're down to ten!
Things that helped us winnow down our housing choices/helpful suggestions for home sellers.
1. If you have an old rusting play set in your back yard it is not the best idea to feature it prominently in photos, declaring the neighborhood to be full of tots, and the house as a potential daycare.
2. We do not need to see pictures of water heaters or wall sconces.
3. Only take multiple photos of your basement if it is finished. Basements are where people put bodies and are generally regarded as scary/dungeonesque abodes of dwarves and brown recluse spiders.
4. It is best to include pictures of your house if it is listed. Putting up a blank picture with details attached pretty much just says, "We'd really like you to take this piece of shi- off our hands for close to the asking price. We'd include pictures but then we wouldn't have suckered you in to coming by to take a look at this "great deal."
5. Sellers loss is your gain. Don't make me feel bad about buying your house at 100,000 less than you paid for it. Take the loss like it's the nineteen fifties, meaning grin and bear it.
6. It is best to remove drying laundry from the back of kitchen tables. That says, "We'd really like to sell this house but not enough to move this Washington Redskins jersey. In fact, maybe we've just been letting this place go to hell and we're hoping you'll take it off your hands, but would you mind changing the channel while you're up, we can't quite reach the remote from our arm chair."
7. Light is good. Take pictures of your house when the sun is shining! Other than the aforementioned (strangely often by this blog) trolls and poisonous spiders, nobody wants to live in dark rooms.
8. If you have kids, get rid of them. Okay, I'm just kidding on this one. But kids are kind of dirty and you should probably have those rooms staged and just have the kids camp out in the crawl space of the attic until the house sells.
9. Great neighborhood! Stop lying. I can't afford to buy in a great neighborhood, that's why I'm looking at your house and wondering what happened to all the listings in the Upper Northwest of D.C.
10. Close to Metro! 1.3 miles is not close to the Metro. It's a distance that's far enough away to make me never want to walk it and secretly hate my choice of ever having picked a house so far from public transit. Note: I'm spoiled, I've been walking to school/work for three years. Forgive me.
11. If your wife had the great idea of painting the bathroom pink, take a black and white photo.
12. If your lawn is brown, call it an opportunity for sprucing up.
13. Stop listing your house in as in condition. I take this to mean you've been breeding rabbits and the herd has gone feral, and is now in control of your unfinished basement.
14.. At the very least, if you're going to take photos of your crappy yard/laundry/neighbor's dog just crop it out of the picture. Don't put it in a slideshow and set it to muzak. You're not helping.
Thanks for helping us reduce/restrict/contract/shrink/diminish/decrease/straiten our choices! Note: straiten is an archaic synonym.
Monday, July 27, 2009
A few problems that I have with the world
First, a sincere apology to my good friend Mr. Steve Myers for not providing any visual proof that I was indeed briefly a part of the subset of species typically defined as trolls. I have agreed to go out this weekend and roll around sans clothing in a patch of poison ivy and to post pictures within days of my release from the hospital. Apparently blogging is about the continued need to up the ante in terms of "exposure" and far be it from me to disappoint. I'll detail my brief battle with cocaine in future installments.
One of my primary problems with the world currently (and believe me I've got plenty, if I can ever get a job I can't wait to retire so I can tell people about the ills of the world all day) is the facebook pop-up ad that says, "Check who searched for you." Inevitably the photo is of some scantily clad, though no doubt beneficently intelligent co-ed who has come and hither written on each of her eyes. I'd like to see a concerted effort on the part of Ad-Sense to change the pop up to something more akin to reality. Perhaps the ad accompanying the "guess who's been searching for you" could be accompanied by someone who appears grandmotherly, perhaps new to the Internet, and just curious about how to track down her erstwhile relative on the net. Or perhaps a former teacher, or strange colleague from work whose name you're not really quite sure of, but who calls you by your name on a daily basis and keeps inviting you over to check out their prominent collection of stuffed snakes.
The only other thing that troubles me these days is that I had to replace our old computer this week, replacing it with a new and updated model that doesn't appeal to me because of its distinct lack of character. Who wants a computer that actually has a battery life over 30 seconds? I already miss the mad rushes from chair to desk in an attempt to print out one sheet of paper before hibernation. I was beginning to feel that with all the coaxing and TLC that we were giving our old computer that we'd actually adopted a somewhat needy child. Quite frankly, I think all teens should not be required to carry around bags of sugar to dissuade them from having children, but should instead be required to care for an aging/dying computer. Note: this project would include trips to Best Buy and local computer specialists, checking prices, standing in lines for an hour while inexplicably at 10 A.M. in the morning Best Buy conducts some unseen construction, which seems to involve a power saw and sheet metal, at intervals roughly akin to Chinese water torture. Not a personal experience obviously. Anyhow, the sheer logistical weight of caring for this computer would no doubt put girls off the idea of ever having offspring. Besides which, the computer's "death" (accompanied by the blue screen) could give children all the benefits of dealing with mortality that is traditionally provided for by pets without any of the hassle of upchuck on your carpet, or poop on your lawn. I suppose I could go on and on about the relative benefits of owning an aging computer, the scars, the spills of coffee, the random pieces of hair occluding the use of the question mark.
Well, this whole post has me rather distraught, and I've still got to spend some time rolling around in ivy and preparing a list of questions for our realtor's to answer in order to determine who we'll be going with. I'd quote something else here, but I'm not entirely certain that I or (apologies to those I spoke with) said anything that even remotely approached being funny, interesting, worth quoting, as it was pretty much a day to get real life adult stuff accomplished. I wish someone had given me a damn bag of sugar when I was in Junior High, I've have avoided this adult mess all together and just gone to live Where the Wile Things Are.
One of my primary problems with the world currently (and believe me I've got plenty, if I can ever get a job I can't wait to retire so I can tell people about the ills of the world all day) is the facebook pop-up ad that says, "Check who searched for you." Inevitably the photo is of some scantily clad, though no doubt beneficently intelligent co-ed who has come and hither written on each of her eyes. I'd like to see a concerted effort on the part of Ad-Sense to change the pop up to something more akin to reality. Perhaps the ad accompanying the "guess who's been searching for you" could be accompanied by someone who appears grandmotherly, perhaps new to the Internet, and just curious about how to track down her erstwhile relative on the net. Or perhaps a former teacher, or strange colleague from work whose name you're not really quite sure of, but who calls you by your name on a daily basis and keeps inviting you over to check out their prominent collection of stuffed snakes.
The only other thing that troubles me these days is that I had to replace our old computer this week, replacing it with a new and updated model that doesn't appeal to me because of its distinct lack of character. Who wants a computer that actually has a battery life over 30 seconds? I already miss the mad rushes from chair to desk in an attempt to print out one sheet of paper before hibernation. I was beginning to feel that with all the coaxing and TLC that we were giving our old computer that we'd actually adopted a somewhat needy child. Quite frankly, I think all teens should not be required to carry around bags of sugar to dissuade them from having children, but should instead be required to care for an aging/dying computer. Note: this project would include trips to Best Buy and local computer specialists, checking prices, standing in lines for an hour while inexplicably at 10 A.M. in the morning Best Buy conducts some unseen construction, which seems to involve a power saw and sheet metal, at intervals roughly akin to Chinese water torture. Not a personal experience obviously. Anyhow, the sheer logistical weight of caring for this computer would no doubt put girls off the idea of ever having offspring. Besides which, the computer's "death" (accompanied by the blue screen) could give children all the benefits of dealing with mortality that is traditionally provided for by pets without any of the hassle of upchuck on your carpet, or poop on your lawn. I suppose I could go on and on about the relative benefits of owning an aging computer, the scars, the spills of coffee, the random pieces of hair occluding the use of the question mark.
Well, this whole post has me rather distraught, and I've still got to spend some time rolling around in ivy and preparing a list of questions for our realtor's to answer in order to determine who we'll be going with. I'd quote something else here, but I'm not entirely certain that I or (apologies to those I spoke with) said anything that even remotely approached being funny, interesting, worth quoting, as it was pretty much a day to get real life adult stuff accomplished. I wish someone had given me a damn bag of sugar when I was in Junior High, I've have avoided this adult mess all together and just gone to live Where the Wile Things Are.
Sunday, July 26, 2009
Not all mythical creatures are racist
Started the day by reading "Good Old Neon" by David Foster Wallace from his collection Oblivion. My assessment of the short story is that it was brilliant. An incredibly insightful look into the mind of the modern American attempting to make it in a world that relies heavily on appearances and perceptions. It is essentially the story of a man who is so obsessed with appearing to be good in the eyes of others that he eventually discovers he has no inner-self. Thus, the story winds up being a meditation on the incredibly complex relationship that we have internally, and how that effects our perception of our place in the world.
Further signs that old age is encroaching-
Woke up in the morning and wandered around my in-laws house in my "gym shorts." Gym shorts being the colloquialism used for underwear, and isn't that the sort of thing you start doing comfortably when you start to age? By all rights I've no business to wander around my in-laws house in my skivvies, but I wasn't sure where my shorts were, and it seemed appropriate enough. But of course the whole time I'm walking around I was conscious that I shouldn't be just wearing my gym shorts, and maybe when I get to the point when I'm not even worried that I'm wearing my gym shorts I'll know that I've attained some degree of yet unscaled adult height.
Further signs of old age encroaching at the Olive Garden-I wandered into the men's room, looking at pictures on the wall, comparing everything to Italy, and I walk up to the traditional three urinal wall arrangement, and while I'm surveying posters I begin to utilize the center one. Under no circumstances should any male ever use the middle urinal if they are the first person to approach the urinal wall. By utilizing the middle urinal you are essentially inviting people to come and pee next to you, which only seems natural after high consumption of alcohol, otherwise, it is not an acceptable place to have a conversation and by choosing that middle urinal I'm inviting the conversation, or at the very least making the next person uncomfortable because they don't have the nice buffer of a center urinal with which to distance themselves from me. And there I am blithely admiring a grainy black and white of some small alimenari in Italy trying to remember what it was like to walk those narrow cobbled streets more than a year ago.
Lunch at the Olive Garden involving the brief recounting of an episode of Flight of the Conchords in which Alby the racist dragon plays prominently and gives me my quote of the day. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g9Qu3iP3RYA
In which Jonathan recounts the story of a unicorn who wanders into a cave, gets knocked out and has a kidney stolen.
S: Was he racist?
J: Stephanie, not all mythical creatures are racist.
Came across a book called The Secret, which is apparently sweeping the nation right now, and Oprah has been flogging it and trying to raise its profile, so that people can finally just start thinking really positive thoughts to make life better. Of course, psychological experiments have proved that doing something like smiling more frequently can actually have positive effects on brain chemistry, however, wishing that your bills will suddenly turn into checks is not sound thinking...it's insane. I guess I just can't really get behind a book that advocates positive thinking to the point of starting an idiocracy. I'm not sure my cable company would understand if I just told them to take a look at my bounced check again, but this time with a bit more positivity as it related to my finances.
Applied thoughts from the Secret to my house.
Came home to a house with only one baby roach to greet us. I've rescinded my earlier position, I don't miss the roaches at all. I'd like to see them all die in horrific and complicated ways that really strain their infinitely small minds into considering just what it means to be a roach, to have roachood, and to consider that perhaps leeching off human beings light, warmth, and general good nature (when we're not spraying them or trying to get them to eat poison to take back to offspring) is not really an admirable way to live, and I want them to develop some small agrarian parties that exist peacefully, perhaps herding bits and pieces of saltine crackers and teaching them to mate. I'd then like them to evolve a bit more and develop (preferably within the space of a week but bear in mind I'm thinking positively and using the secret hear) a mini-set of the ten commandments, or at least, thou shalt not steal, and to have some sort of religious awakening that can eventually lead to our peaceful co-existence after a series of treaties, minor prophets, and perhaps a period in which they regard me as some sort of demi-God that eventually winds up in a sort of feudal serf lord kind of arrangement. Some people might say that I'm being too optimistic, but my answer to those people is that they are wrong. Those people just need to expect a little more from their household pests.
Further signs that old age is encroaching-
Woke up in the morning and wandered around my in-laws house in my "gym shorts." Gym shorts being the colloquialism used for underwear, and isn't that the sort of thing you start doing comfortably when you start to age? By all rights I've no business to wander around my in-laws house in my skivvies, but I wasn't sure where my shorts were, and it seemed appropriate enough. But of course the whole time I'm walking around I was conscious that I shouldn't be just wearing my gym shorts, and maybe when I get to the point when I'm not even worried that I'm wearing my gym shorts I'll know that I've attained some degree of yet unscaled adult height.
Further signs of old age encroaching at the Olive Garden-I wandered into the men's room, looking at pictures on the wall, comparing everything to Italy, and I walk up to the traditional three urinal wall arrangement, and while I'm surveying posters I begin to utilize the center one. Under no circumstances should any male ever use the middle urinal if they are the first person to approach the urinal wall. By utilizing the middle urinal you are essentially inviting people to come and pee next to you, which only seems natural after high consumption of alcohol, otherwise, it is not an acceptable place to have a conversation and by choosing that middle urinal I'm inviting the conversation, or at the very least making the next person uncomfortable because they don't have the nice buffer of a center urinal with which to distance themselves from me. And there I am blithely admiring a grainy black and white of some small alimenari in Italy trying to remember what it was like to walk those narrow cobbled streets more than a year ago.
Lunch at the Olive Garden involving the brief recounting of an episode of Flight of the Conchords in which Alby the racist dragon plays prominently and gives me my quote of the day. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g9Qu3iP3RYA
In which Jonathan recounts the story of a unicorn who wanders into a cave, gets knocked out and has a kidney stolen.
S: Was he racist?
J: Stephanie, not all mythical creatures are racist.
Came across a book called The Secret, which is apparently sweeping the nation right now, and Oprah has been flogging it and trying to raise its profile, so that people can finally just start thinking really positive thoughts to make life better. Of course, psychological experiments have proved that doing something like smiling more frequently can actually have positive effects on brain chemistry, however, wishing that your bills will suddenly turn into checks is not sound thinking...it's insane. I guess I just can't really get behind a book that advocates positive thinking to the point of starting an idiocracy. I'm not sure my cable company would understand if I just told them to take a look at my bounced check again, but this time with a bit more positivity as it related to my finances.
Applied thoughts from the Secret to my house.
Came home to a house with only one baby roach to greet us. I've rescinded my earlier position, I don't miss the roaches at all. I'd like to see them all die in horrific and complicated ways that really strain their infinitely small minds into considering just what it means to be a roach, to have roachood, and to consider that perhaps leeching off human beings light, warmth, and general good nature (when we're not spraying them or trying to get them to eat poison to take back to offspring) is not really an admirable way to live, and I want them to develop some small agrarian parties that exist peacefully, perhaps herding bits and pieces of saltine crackers and teaching them to mate. I'd then like them to evolve a bit more and develop (preferably within the space of a week but bear in mind I'm thinking positively and using the secret hear) a mini-set of the ten commandments, or at least, thou shalt not steal, and to have some sort of religious awakening that can eventually lead to our peaceful co-existence after a series of treaties, minor prophets, and perhaps a period in which they regard me as some sort of demi-God that eventually winds up in a sort of feudal serf lord kind of arrangement. Some people might say that I'm being too optimistic, but my answer to those people is that they are wrong. Those people just need to expect a little more from their household pests.
Notes from South of the Mason Dixon
Delaware is actually located north of the Mason Dixon line but for all intensive purposes it's the South. People speak with an accent and make jokes (that turn out to not be jokes) about working in chicken houses, and drive trucks with gun racks on them, and all in all are just the sort of God-fearing people who are just like you and me. Only different, because I'm from the city and the city=evil as proved by Old Testament cities like Babylon, Jericho, Sodom and Gomorrha (sp) and Los Angeles, which even then was noted for its bad traffic.
On the drive to my wife's ten year reunion. Things that struck me as odd. Driving along a small two lane road, past rows of corn, local food signs abutted by rising developments. The sort of cookie cutter houses that make you wonder if we'll ever stop building new houses and propagating 1950's carthrocentric values. Can we get some more of that economic stimulus package dedicated to infrastructure please or are we going to waste all of our money on a president from Kenya!! Note: Only a joke please YouTube the crazy woman from DE.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9V1nmn2zRMc
(Image of Andrew leading a crowd in Georgetown, DE in the pledge of allegiance and yelling "he was born in Kenya and he probably don't even know it" neither of which have anything to do with health care. Please note the cheers in the background of good old America. This is our country people.)
Passed by Fish Killers crab shack. The small white cart parked along the side of the road in a patch of dirt at a gas station. It sort of makes you wonder how much fish killing the crabs are doing while they are waiting in the crab shack's hull to be dredged up and eaten fresh. Are they feeding the crabs fish while they wait? Are the crabs wearing bibs? They should be.
Crabs eat primarily dead stuff anyway. I guess crabs are technically fish-killers, but I'm sort of upset that the sign wasn't: If no algae or other dead invertebrate isn't more readily available and if the fish are sort of unaware or unassuming Fish Killers crab shack. I think it has a nicer ring to it.
Full Service Florist-What is the difference between that and a half-service florist? I don't think I've ever seen a sign that says half-service florist. Are there florists out there who won't properly fill your flower order, who short change you on greenery and perhaps a rose or two? Should I open a half-service florist place? Are any florists that aren't advertised as full-service in fact only half-service? Is this a case of useless name-branding to create an artificial difference between florists? Are they upset about this?
Speed checked by radar-Is this sign mandated by law? This falls in the middle category for gradations of speed checking.
My favorite is speed checked by aircraft. I'm thinking, if I'm stupid enough to not avoid being caught by an airplane than I must be a grade A jackass. I mean, to make an arrest they're going to have to land the plane on a pretty small stretch of freeway, and if I don't notice the pterodactyl sized object coming in for a landing and take evasive action then I deserve to be caught like that little dear who gets run down by the wolf in planet earth. Don't separate from the herd. There's no way they'll land the plane on a freeway full of cars right? Am I right? (Note: I realize they call highway patrol instead).
A gradation somewhere between speed checked by radar and aircraft.
Speed checked by guessing small-town police officer:
Cop: Do you know how fast you were going sir?
M: No.
Cop: Me neither, because I don't have the equipment to check, but it seemed like you were going pretty fast.
M: Oh, so.
Cop: Can you make like an estimate for me because I've really got no idea
M: thirty-two
Cop: Lets call it thirty five.
M: Is that fair?
Cop: Points to sign.
On the drive to my wife's ten year reunion. Things that struck me as odd. Driving along a small two lane road, past rows of corn, local food signs abutted by rising developments. The sort of cookie cutter houses that make you wonder if we'll ever stop building new houses and propagating 1950's carthrocentric values. Can we get some more of that economic stimulus package dedicated to infrastructure please or are we going to waste all of our money on a president from Kenya!! Note: Only a joke please YouTube the crazy woman from DE.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9V1nmn2zRMc
(Image of Andrew leading a crowd in Georgetown, DE in the pledge of allegiance and yelling "he was born in Kenya and he probably don't even know it" neither of which have anything to do with health care. Please note the cheers in the background of good old America. This is our country people.)
Passed by Fish Killers crab shack. The small white cart parked along the side of the road in a patch of dirt at a gas station. It sort of makes you wonder how much fish killing the crabs are doing while they are waiting in the crab shack's hull to be dredged up and eaten fresh. Are they feeding the crabs fish while they wait? Are the crabs wearing bibs? They should be.
Crabs eat primarily dead stuff anyway. I guess crabs are technically fish-killers, but I'm sort of upset that the sign wasn't: If no algae or other dead invertebrate isn't more readily available and if the fish are sort of unaware or unassuming Fish Killers crab shack. I think it has a nicer ring to it.
Full Service Florist-What is the difference between that and a half-service florist? I don't think I've ever seen a sign that says half-service florist. Are there florists out there who won't properly fill your flower order, who short change you on greenery and perhaps a rose or two? Should I open a half-service florist place? Are any florists that aren't advertised as full-service in fact only half-service? Is this a case of useless name-branding to create an artificial difference between florists? Are they upset about this?
Speed checked by radar-Is this sign mandated by law? This falls in the middle category for gradations of speed checking.
My favorite is speed checked by aircraft. I'm thinking, if I'm stupid enough to not avoid being caught by an airplane than I must be a grade A jackass. I mean, to make an arrest they're going to have to land the plane on a pretty small stretch of freeway, and if I don't notice the pterodactyl sized object coming in for a landing and take evasive action then I deserve to be caught like that little dear who gets run down by the wolf in planet earth. Don't separate from the herd. There's no way they'll land the plane on a freeway full of cars right? Am I right? (Note: I realize they call highway patrol instead).
A gradation somewhere between speed checked by radar and aircraft.
Speed checked by guessing small-town police officer:
Cop: Do you know how fast you were going sir?
M: No.
Cop: Me neither, because I don't have the equipment to check, but it seemed like you were going pretty fast.
M: Oh, so.
Cop: Can you make like an estimate for me because I've really got no idea
M: thirty-two
Cop: Lets call it thirty five.
M: Is that fair?
Cop: Points to sign.
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