bathroom follies

My cube at my current gig is conveniently located between 2 bathrooms. Niiiice. The one on my left is a ladies' room, with 2 stalls and the necessary wicker loveseat upon which to drape oneself when one has an attack of the vapors.

It's pretty average as bathrooms go, but the design of the toilet bowl is such that half the time you drop toilet paper in there, it doesn't go down with the water. It clings, screaming, to the side. This is kind of gross, especially when you go to use the thing and someone else's toilet paper is still stuck to the side. People don't want reminders that other people may have used the bathroom before them. The solution for those who don't wish to offend, perhaps, is to reach down into the toilet and give the stubborn toilet paper a shove, and then wash one's hands thoroughly afterward. Or try to sneak out before anyone knows you've been in there.

And stop spraying that Airwick! We know what you're doing in there, and yeah, it's as gross for us as it is for you. But the Airwick just adds insult to injury, if you ask me.

The bathrooms on the right are for whoever gets in there first.

About 10 most mornings, the smell of extinguished matches wafts around the corner and into my cube. I discussed it with one of the writers yesterday.

"Yo. What is UP with the matches? I mean, who does that at work? What's the point? Like that smell is any more pleasant than what he left behind? Why not just open up a can of tuna or crack open some hard-boiled eggs while you're in there? Or just bring some stinky cheese in with you?"

"I think it's some guy from accounting."

"Big guy? Glasses? Slovenly?"

"Yeah."

Hmmmm. Is this the same guy who I've heard coughing up a lung in those bathrooms on several occasions, late in the afternoon, when perhaps he thinks everyone has left?

I mean, it's like he's being exorcised in there, coughing up hairballs or choking on big chunks of bad meat or something. Like he was going to fucking die. So much so that the first time I heard it, I very nearly called 911.

The cleaning woman was on the other side of my cube. She heard it too one day. She peeked around my cubbie.

"Did you HEAR that?" I asked.

"Yeah. Guy sounds like he's dying."

I mean, hacking and coughing and choking and ...well, I think of Kane, in Alien, when the thing pops out of his stomach. That's what I imagine is going on in the bathroom when this guy is in there.

This has happened a few times, so I finally popped my head up out of my cubbie like a whack-a-mole to see him. That's the dude, breathing heavily. The slovenly fat dude from accounting.

Every company has one.

Thankfully, he kept his matches to himself.

panic at the friendly's

Boo and I went on a date this weekend, which mostly consisted of me buying him stuff. We started at the Asian market, because he's going through this phase. Japanese and Chinese people are so much cooler than we are because they make anime. Something like that.

We continued to Barnes and Noble, then Target, the bike store and finally to Friendly's. He's finally at the age where he feels a little stupid going to Friendly's, but he forgets all about that when the ice cream comes.

So we're finishing up our lunch...he's enjoying his mint chocolate chip and Reese's cup sundae (yech) and I'm having a modest dish of chocolate ice cream (oooh, don't tempt me.) (That's a shout-out to all you MST3k fans out there.) (And that's the first and last time I'll say "shout-out.")

All of a sudden, we notice raised voices next to us, and this rather...well, ugly, yes, I'll call her ugly, woman said, "DON'T CALL ME A TRAMP!" And we turn and watch this altercation going on right next to us: apparently, this ugly woman had changed a kid's diaper in the booth. And I missed it!

But apparently that's what happened, because here's soccer mom and dad and the kids sitting in the booth across from us, which is one up from the diaper booth, and soccer mom is saying, "But you don't DO that! People are EATING!"

"I DO!" yelled the ugly woman, with some authority.

"You're a TRAMP!" said soccer dad.

"Don't call my sister a TRAMP!" the tramp's sister yelled.

Friendly's grew very quiet as the four of them went back and forth like that for a minute. It looked like soccer mom and dad and the Tramp and her sister would come to blows in the Friendly's, ironically.

But then the Tramp family gathered up their stuff and left, leaving soccer mom and the kids visibly shaken by the conflict. Soccer dad didn't even look up. Just sat there and said "Tramp" several times, leaving his wife to do the dirty work: trying to reason with them.

Me, I don't like conflict. If I saw this woman changing a diaper in the booth at Friendly's, I'd figure, you know...this is not the kind of person who would listen to reason anyway, so why bother bringing it to her attention that a BOOTH IN WHICH PEOPLE SIT TO EAT DELICIOUS FRIENDLY'S ICE CREAM is NO PLACE TO CHANGE A DIAPER.

That's why they have parking lots outside, in which to dump said diaper after you've changed it in the van. I'm pretty certain these people leave a trail of dirty diapers lying around wherever they go. Balled up wads of plastic and shit and industrial strength absorbent material that goops up into a gelatinous mess when wet.

Tramps. You've gone and put me off my Friendly's.

unexpected items

This whole brain tumor thing has really thrown me off my game. It's hard to go through a day and not be conscious that its presence--and now, its absence and accompanying mental and physical deficits--will always be there. You don't want to be defined by it, but it shapes everything.

And it didn't even belong to me.

Anyway, it's been difficult to recapture my sense of humor, which I depend on to get through the day. I certainly don't want to blog about how things suck right now and sound all woe-is-me and shit, so instead, this is what happened at the Ack-a-me the other day.

I go through the self-scanner lane because I like to create more work for myself. I only have a few things and normally I can speed through. This time, however, was different.

I scanned a couple of things. The holding area was full, so I moved some of the stuff into the cart.

"Unexpected item removed from bagging area. Please return item to bagging area," said the scanner lady with a voice that suggested that a SWAT team was about ready to swoop down on me any minute. I dutifully put the stuff back.

"Unexpected item in bagging area. Please remove item from bagging area."

Confused, I removed the bag and put it back in the cart.

"Unexpected item removed from bagging area. Please return item to bagging area."

I take the bag and wave it around the scanner, trying to convince it that it's paid for.

"See? It's in a BAG. Because it's PAID FOR," I patiently explain to the machine. "Now I'm going to put it back in the sacred 'bagging area', and then I'm going to REMOVE it to make room for more stuff." I put the bag in the cart.

"Unexpected item removed from bagging area. Please re..." the scanner stops speaking abruptly as I take the bag from the cart and slam it back down in the holding area.

"Unexpected item in bagging area. Please remove item from bagging area." The scanner is clearly teasing me now and I begin to wonder if I'm being punk'd, but quickly realize that this is NJ and we don't fool around with that stupid crap here.

"LOOK! SEE??? IT'S PAID FOR! IT'S IN A BAG. I'M TAKING MY PAID MERCHANDISE AND PUTTING IT IN THE CART!" I shout, loudly enough for the cashier to note that I'm not actually stealing a box of Cheerios, some half-and-half, plastic wrap and tampons. "LOOK! SEE? WHAT'S WRONG WITH YOU ANYWAY?! SEE?"

I frantically moved the bag back and forth several times from the cart to the holding area, just to confuse it. "What! WHAT! Which way did it go? HUH? Where's the bag NOW??? Oh, WHAT, cat got your tongue?"

By this time a line has started to form, and I turn exasperatedly to the guy behind me. "Is it ME?" He smiles, shakes his head knowingly. He's been through this hell before.

The thing is yelling at me to return the bag, but I toss the bag in the cart in the hope it doesn't notice, and start quickly scanning more stuff, trying to confuse it. It seems to work.

"Two. Ninety-nine." she says pleasantly.

"Three. Forty-nine." she says, again pleasantly.

She remains calm and collected throughout the transaction, certainly more than I was. I hope the Ack-a-me security cameras got my good side. If I only had one.

cheap sunglasses

For the record, I'm now a managing editor of an unimportant in the grand scheme of things medical magazine, all the while continuing to freelance write (in my spare time!) dry, clinical articles about...advanced gastric cancer and why docetaxel is a beast (www.hemonctoday.com/...it's the cover story!)

I'll be there for a few months until, well, I don't know. Recent events have necessitated a giant rethink about life in general, and what the hell I'm going do with it now.

Deep thinking isn't one of my strong points.

So the other day I went to Target to get Target stuff. I needed sunglasses. I refuse to pay a lot for sunglasses because they invariably get lost or broken.

Sunglasses always look a little askew on my head, I think because my ears must be crooked. They never seem to sit straight across my face.

And what's the deal with those huge 60s-style sunglasses? Who felt the need to resurrect that look? It's frigging stupid. There are some ugly-ass sunglasses out there.

Generally, when you go to buy sunglasses, it's not because you have a bunch of new, previously purchased sunglasses waiting around in a pile at home. When you buy sunglasses, you need them NOW because you don't have any. You drive around squinting for a week until you finally decide, yeah, I need sunglasses. I think I'll get some now.

So you get back in the car and eagerly grab the sunglasses from the bag because you don't want to go another day without them. But because of advanced adhesive technology, getting the damn sticker off the sunglasses that you want to wear RIGHT NOW is impossible. The sticky tag folds onto itself, creating an impenetrable bond that clenched teeth cannot chew through. And even if you manage to get the sticky tag off, the super adhesive stays on the frame, encouraging whatever hair or lint or whatever is flying around the air to stick to it.

Or, with the other pair...the tag is attached with the dreaded loopy-plastic tag holder thing. Sure, maybe you could cut it with scissors or a knife, if you kept those things in the car. But you don't. The paper tag detaches easily enough from the plastic loopy thing, leaving the plastic thing firmly looped around the frame, conveniently located right around the nosepiece, where everyone can see it because you don't give a shit anymore, you just put them on anyway because all you needed was a pair of DAMN SUNGLASSES. NOW.

Fortunately, you remembered to peel off the UV protection label from the lens. Didn't you?

note to the MSM...

For the love of CHRIST, STOP saying "change agent." That's the person who gives you a roll of quarters in the casino. It does not refer to EVERY CURRENT PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE, not even if they call themselves that. Just stop it now. Stop.

my house... is a very very very clean house

My rich friends gave me a gift yesterday, arguably one of the greatest gifts ever given to a busy woman:

Two cleaning ladies from Poland.

The joy of having the whole house clean at once is immeasurable. It's almost impossible to get it all done in one day, so I clean a room here, a room there, but they're never all clean at the same time. I'm constantly in a state of mess.

Yesterday, Yolanda and her friend fixed all that for me. Armed with cleaning supplies and knee pads, they went to work upstairs while I went out and got stuff done.

When I came home...oh! The glorious smell of bleach and lysol and method cleaning products greeted me at the door! The carpet so vacuumed, I lay down and created a carpet angel on it. The sparkling floors! The made beds! And the bathrooms almost made me cry. Or maybe that was the bleach. I don't know, and it doesn't matter.

I'd never had my house professionally cleaned before. It's a beautiful thing.

And then stuff will start to pile up again, and the boys and their stinky friends will come and mess everything up. The cat will shed, the dog will slobber, the dirt will find its way back. It always does.

But for now, I'll try not to spill anything. And everybody takes off their shoes before entering the house.

Thanks, ladies. Thanks, friends.

steaming piles of crap

Wow, I haven't posted in a month!

A lot has happened. Truth to tell, the end of the year mostly sucked, and so far, 2008 sucks too.

But I won't dwell on it, because it's pretty tiresome to write (and read) about despair and woe and..well, things that suck.

Unless it's something like this:

We got this puppy, see, and he's called Hooch. He's going to be 7 feet tall. He's about 3 1/2 months old, and his feet are as big as hockey pucks. He's great, but he's a puppy, albeit a huge puppy, and puppies are a big pain in the ass. I'd forgotten that. No, I didn't forget it; I never really knew that, because when I first had a puppy I was 11 years old, so I mostly forget about its care and feeding, except I suppose my mother mostly took over those duties.

I do remember that when you took the dog out, he crapped wherever he felt like, and that was that. There was no fussy scooping, no tricky turning the plastic bag inside out to pick up the crap. The steaming crap in winter. No, you just left it, and it hardened eventually, and disintegrated. Maybe someone would step in it and drag it into the house, but that didn't happen often.

You never heard of anyone getting a disease from stepping in a pile of dogcrap.

That's all changed now. It's a federal offense to let your dog crap freely around the neighborhood. People give you the hairy eyeball if you don't pick up the crap. Little children blithely pick up and throw dogcrap at each other, sometimes even sampling a morsel because they think it's chocolate. And they now DIE from that, evidently.

And yet, there are still piles of crap on the ground. Someone's not following instructions.

Me, I always pick up the crap because I don't want some neighborhood Mrs. Kravitz giving me shit about not picking up crap. It's a distasteful chore. And the idea of picking up dogcrap in a plastic grocery bag is totally ludicrous, essentially giving the crap a half-life of a thousand years in a landfill, rather than, what, a couple of weeks out on the lawn? It's stupid. I'd really prefer to just let it sit and become one with nature.

Now they have compostable and recyclable poop bags made from corn, which I suppose is a slightly better alternative. Someone's making money making compostable bags for the rest of us to pick up and dispose of our dogs' crap. The idea is just a little insane.

Hooch can be quite prolific. It's unbelievable what a dog's bowels can hold.

So that's my first post of the new year, a post about picking up steaming piles of dogcrap. Surely a harbinger of the year ahead.

puppy!

In support of the dh, I've taken a complete leave of my senses and rescued a labradoodle puppy. Here he is, as yet unnamed. His foster family called him Houdini, because he liked to escape. That's pretty good but we're looking for other options. Any suggestions?

if i only had a brain...tumor

Ok, the dh got through surgery. Over 5 1/2 hours. Now I can make jokes about the hole in his head.

He can't see or speak well. His eye-hand coordination is askew (a forkful of mashed potato is just as likely to land on his cheek as in his mouth). Hasn't started walking yet. He's in a safety bed for now, like a big play pen for adults. He can do somersaults and cartwheels in it, but he can't escape from it. It's kinda funny.

He'll start intensive rehab today: physical, occupational, speech...they promise to work him hard and not let him get in any trouble. He'll be in rehab for weeks.

His recovery will take awhile, but the surgeon keeps telling me that he'll recover most, if not all, of what he's lost. So then I can't make jokes about him losing his marbles.

I have to make the jokes. There's no other way of getting through it.

an ependymowhat?

Well, in an unusual turn of events, it appears as though the dh has a rather rare brain tumor called an ependymoma. When he found out I started combing the net, researching and digging up the worst possible information. When someone has a dangerous brain tumor, this is probably the last thing you should do. But to me, I'd rather know than not know. It's a strategy that doesn't work for everyone.

I've been telling him for years he should have his head examined, and he finally did. The MRI shows a tumor the size of...a tangerine? A small orange? Something bigger than a clementine, but smaller than a grapefruit. Something in the citrus family.

Maybe a sports ball comparison would be better. Maybe a baseball? A hockey puck?

It's hard to tell, really, but the thing is big, and it's right there in the back of the head, close to the brain stem.

It needs to come out.

So he has surgery on Friday, before Christmas. The outcome is uncertain. He could be up and about in a couple of weeks. He could end up in rehab. He could lapse into a coma.

Of course, the best way to deal with this, as with all other catastrophes and misfortunes that befall us from time to time, is with seriously dark humor, which hides a cautious optimism.

Consequently, there is an upside to this: I've successfully bailed out of making Christmas dinner for 12. Yay!

pee-wee returns? dare i hope?

I hear that Paul Reubens may be coming out with a new Pee-Wee movie. "The time is ripe," he said. The public is ready for his triumphant return to the screen.

I know I am. I loved Pee-Wee's Playhouse back in the day. When I left Florida, my co-workers pitched in for my farewell presents: A pullstring Pee-Wee Herman doll and Chairry, to keep me company on my return to NJ.

Chairry has a mouth-slot between its cushions that you can move using a knobby thing in the back. In the show, Chairry was a rather uninspired and bland character, almost the moral center of the show. Playing with the moral center of a kids' show isn't much fun. I mean, it's a chair for pete's sake.

Pee-Wee, on the other hand, was fun to play with. He's stuffed, not bendable. Maybe 16 inches tall. At one point, he said "I know you are but what am I?" among other famous expressions.

Now, however, he sits in my lonely attic with Chairry, and when I pull his string he says "beeedeeebeedeeebeeddeeeee" in a very high-pitched whine. I should have taken better care of him so I could unload him on ebay, but the truth is: I could never part with him.

Sexual symbolism runs amok throughout the commercial, featuring a too-smiley 12-year-old kid, his banana-eating dad (or perhaps his "funny" uncle) and a bunch of monkeys in propeller hats. Honestly, though, I think Reubens got a bum rap in the movie theater. If getting caught masturbating in a porn theater is enough to get you thrown in jail (and isn't that the whole point of the porn theater, to provide a safe, secure and nurturing environment in which to "shoot one's wad"), surely that makes Pee-Wee the perfect presidential candidate.

love via currency

I got this in change the other day. A stamp like this would've come in handy back in my bar-hopping days. At the bar, enjoying a few cocktails...a guy buys you a drink and thinks that's a contractual obligation for sex later. You're not interested, so you make a bet:

"Ten bucks says you won't get lucky with me tonight."

But how can I possibly spend this? I mean, I thought this was funny, but I don't want to offend anyone. And I surely don't want people to think I'm sitting in my basement maniacally stamping away on all my currency. Perhaps I'll put it in the household emergency fund box, which I've just now invented.

I got this on the same day:

See there at the top? It says "I love you, cary 11-26-07" Maybe it says "cory." I can't tell for sure. In any event, that's almost me. Surely this is God's mysterious, cosmic way of telling me he loves me, even if he can't spell my name right. Although if he really wants to express his love for me via currency, if he really felt that way, he'd have showered me with a million of these. Hmmm.

yeah, i got your wintry mix right here, pal

I can't seem to concentrate, so this is just stuff that occurred to me, like, just now, or that pisses me off.

Whose idea was it to make rice crispy, and then put it in chocolate? I mean, rice and chocolate. That's like sliced bananas on a saltine.

Weathercasters here in the Northeast use this term "wintry mix" to describe a windy, rainy, snowy, sleety, icy, crappy weather condition that up until recently had not had a suitable adjective to describe it. Now they say it all the time, because it's a "wintry mix" time of year. Every channel. All the time.

"This morning, look out for a 'wintry mix,' and don't forget your umbrella. You'll need it for that 'wintry mix'! Hahahaha! Back to you, Juanita."

I frigging hate that expression now. "Wintry mix." Sounds like it should be something happy and sparkly, with little sugar snowflakes and peppermint, bits of silver and blue, maybe a festive pudding or a bowl of candy or something. But no. It's not something to look forward to. It's something to fear, encouraging people to run to the Ack-a-me RIGHT NOW to load up on milk and salt and a shovel that will only fall apart the moment you use it on the "wintry mix" left behind.

Speaking of pudding, I hate it when you're at the cashier, at, say, the CVS, say, this morning, and the person behind you just can't manage to hold onto their stuff, and stands very, very, too close to you to facilitate placing it all on the counter while you're still standing there continuing your transaction. Or even in the Ack-a-me, when people just can't wait to put their stuff on the belt after you. You barely have begun to put the divider thingy on, and they're already piling up their shit on the 1/2 inch of belt left.

Ah, yes. It's that grouchy, ho-frigging-Mchoho time of year.

sorry-ass cake

See? Even without the green food coloring, which I conveniently forgot when I went to the Ack-a-me to buy it, this is one sorry-ass cake.

It's not too badly misshapen, but what's with the bits and pieces of cake and crumbs in the frosting/icing? What's a gal gotta do?

To prevent her from donning her "martyr-mom" cape, I ought to mention here that yesterday was also my mother's birthday. Happy birthday, Mom.

boo! happy birthday!

Boo turns 13 today. 13. That mystical age where a child absorbs all the knowledge in the world, becoming both genius and sage...while said child's parents turn into complete babbling idiots who know nothing, never knew anything, and will never learn or know anything, ever. Because we just don't understand!

Birthdays require cake, so I made a layer cake this morning. Usually, if the boys have a birthday party I wuss out and make a rectangle cake, only requiring frosting on the top. Or icing. Frosting. Icing. Is there a regional difference? My past attempts at layer cakes usually result in a sadly misshapen, leaning lump of cooked cake, with the outside frosting infiltrated with bumps and crumbs and small bits of cake. Not a very appetizing presentation.

For Boo's birthday, I'm expecting an even more unappetizing presentation, as his cake will have a mint buttercream frosting. And of course, nothing screams MINT!!!!! like green food coloring, which, of course, requires a special trip to the Ack-a-me, because the concept of "food coloring"--whereby a normal-colored food is transformed into an even more delicious NEON color--is lost on me.

The cake is done and cooling now, the devil's food.

My mother used to make a flour icing, with flour, sugar, butter and frigging Crisco. Crisco! A half a cup of white grease! This is a frosting made famous during World War II, when people ate Crisco by the spoonfuls to support the war effort. It sounds horrible, but it's really good on the devil's food. Not too sweet.

That's why I don't like canned frosting, unless I'm eating it directly out of the can like Crisco. Canned frosting is too sweet for cake. It's designed for direct can-to-mouth consumption.

Kids don't care, though; they don't know about the hardship and painstaking effort that's required to make the perfect frosting/icing. They can't tell the difference between canned and homemade. They don't care about the effort you put into the misshapen cake, or how many times you had to make the icing before it was just the right consistency. No matter how many times you tell them that homemade is and always will be superior to "store-bought" or "canned" or "BJs brand"...they don't care. They can't tell.

They just don't understand.

no more beating my brains

Thankfully, it seems that Obama's recent admission to a bunch of high school kids that he "experimented" with drinking and drugs in his youth--something he wrote about in his book--has not generated much media frenzy.

(I have a love/hate relationship with the media anyway. I hate the way they swoop down on some stupid, irrelevant crumb of information (Britney ran over a photog's foot! How could she not when they're surrounding her car all the time?!) and turn it into an earth-shattering event. Yet, they're now telling us (well, maybe Fox isn't) that Scott McClellan is throwing Bush under the bus. That Bush and his evil gang of criminals actually--gasp!--told him to lie to the American public about their role in exposing Valerie Plame. So, I like that. I just wish they'd impeach this fucking guy and be done with it. We should be storming the frigging White House to physically remove this corrupt, cowardly sack of shit. And I rarely use the term "sack of shit" because it's kind of stupid, so it really means something coming from me.)

Anyway.

You kind of have to expect a younger candidate might have a history of some drinking and drug use. And I'm not sure I'd trust him/her if they didn't. I don't trust most of the "holier than thou" crowd, who surely have some skeletons in their closet somewhere, along with the leather bondage gear.

What irks me is the word "experimented."

You "experiment" with a childhood chemistry set. You "experiment" with your mother's makeup, your dad's razor. You "experiment" with kitchen ingredients, concocting this ghastly, delicious meal of Captain Crunch, Fluff and avacado.

What's it mean to "experiment" with drinking? Is that the same as creating a Long Island ice tea, just throwing a bunch of different liquors in a glass with ice, maybe mixing in a little soda or juice? How does one "experiment" with drugs? You either "take" them or "smoke" or "snort" them. I mean, there's no explanation for "experimenting." It's disingenuous, much like saying you didn't inhale.

It's supposed to make us think that, while you may have tried drinking and drugs back in the day, and even enjoyed doing those things for a while, you no longer indulge, at least to the extent you might have when you were younger. You grew out of it.

If you're a serious presidential candidate from Harvard Law School, we figured that out already. So you can just skip the "experimenting" part. We get it. We did it too.

stfu

Yesterday's holding area for the movie had been moved from the high school gym to the "Green Barn," an unheated shrine to some kind of Indian mysticism. Indian artifacts, prayer altars, neatly stacked piles of stones, drums and what looked to be didgeridoos lined the room. A finely carved canoe hung from the ceiling.

None of this really served to chill the general bad vibe coming from some parents who still don't quite understand that moviemaking isn't an exact science.

The boys were called at 9 am. (To get there by then, we had to leave at 7 am to account for rush hour traffic.) They sat and didn't start shooting until about 3 pm. We got home well after dark.

Now, I have no problem with this. I brought a book, my laptop, my ipod. But there were a few parents who just bitched the whole time about having to wait. Why was lunch so late? It's so cold in here! We should've been called in later. Aren't they DONE yet?

To those parents, I offer these immortal words from Julianne Moore, as Linda Partridge, in Magnolia:

"Shut the fuck up. Shut the fuck up. Now, you must really shut the fuck up now, please - shut the fuck up."

You wanted your kids to be in the movie. You knew, going into it, that it would be a huge inconvenience to you to drive them to the set, to wait, to miss work...you knew all this going into it.

And yet, you're sitting there bitching about the inconvenience, the waiting, the missed work.

Parents love to bitch. I get it. But you're sitting here in the Green Barn, which has just been infiltrated by a bat, and there's nothing you can do about it now. It's cold. It's dark. You missed work. Look at the bright side: Your kid is filming a movie by a disheveled Academy Award-winning director. And the port-o-pots have a sink.

So shut the fuck up.

the lovely leftovers

Boo had more filming yesterday. A few of us moms snuck out onto the set, behind a high school somewhere near Chadds Ford. At one point, we stood maybe 12 feet away from Peter Jackson.

Which was kinda cool, except he's a short, rumply, disheveled sort of guy. He looked like he'd been out all night drinking sometime during 1976, fell asleep in his clothes, and woke up from a time warp to direct the movie.

Moviemaking is very slowgoing and tedious. At one point, one of the PAs tried to corral us back into the holding area, but we ducked inside a classroom, where we could view the filming outside. Which mostly consisted of the boys running around in their short shorts and tight t-shirts and kicking a soccer ball. Hell, we could do that during a Sunday soccer game and have a cocktail to go with.

But the food! The food has been delicious.

As parents, we are the last in line for lunch, and if there's nothing left by then, we miss out. We've hovered and paced the hallway like hungry cougers. We've had to wait for for the cast and crew to get their second and third helpings before we've been allowed to eat.

And damn! They've served many different kinds of salads, cold salads, fresh mozzarella (yum), lamb chops, turkey, ribs, chicken, pasta, salmon...and it's been good! Not like the buffet at your cousin's wedding. We try to restrain ourselves so as not to appear greedy, but I suppose we look like hungry moms, eagerly wolfing down anything that's not nailed down.

Food always tastes better when someone else makes it for you.

mechanical bull-riding mini pads

Ok, this is probably the most absurd commercial I've seen.

You know the one: where the mini pad is riding the mechanical bull? Maybe it's a panty liner. It hardly matters.

And why not? I know the first thing I want to do after I've stuck the thing to the crotch of my underwear is ride a mechanical bull. My crotch really craves that rough stuff at the peak of its flow!

Sanitary pads (or "napkins" as they were so graphically named way back when, when sensitive mothers explained this mysterious find to their children after finding them prying in the cabinet beneath the sink: "Yes, Billy, it's called a napkin, but not the kind you wipe your chin with." "And Billy, by the way, that's "chocolated" Ex-Lax, it's not real chocolate. Well, heh, heh, you'll find out soon enough.") have really evolved so much over the years. When I started menstruating, I needed a damn contractor's toolbelt and an instruction manual to strap this brick-like thing on. Now they can go swimming and ride horseback and mechanical bulls all by themselves!

And, really, why should I have all the fun? Hey, mini pad, get on the bull and ride! It's fun! Yee-haw!

I'm a tampon gal myself. But sometimes a gal likes that extra layer of protection. And when I go supermarket shopping for mini pads, I think, "hmmm. What brand of mini pad would be a better mechanical bull rider? So many choices. Do I go with the extra-longs? The extra absorbent? That would make sense. The ultra-breathable? The freshly-scented?"

And then, of course, the choice becomes obvious. The winged mini pad. Of course! The wings keep the mini-pad from flying off the mechanical bull! It's genius! The wings must have spurs built in!

But wait. Unless...the wings help the mini pad..go flying off the mechanical bull! Because, well, they're wings, after all.

Geez, it could go either way. I don't think I'd be having this debate about tampons. Have you ever seen a tampon trying to balance itself on a mechanical bull? They fly off, they climb back on, they go flying off...it's pathetic. They shouldn't even try.

At the end of the commercial, I was told to "have a happy period." Is there any other kind? God, I'm ecstatic when I'm on the rag. I can't think of anything I'd rather do than down a few shots, strap on my winged mini pad and go hump a mechanical bull.

And that's just on a Monday night. Imagine what me and my mini pad would be capable of on the weekend! Just me and my high-flyin' bull-ridin' mini pad! Yee haw!

making no scents

I went to Kohl's today to spend my free $10 in "Kohl's cash." What a subversive, manipulative trick that is: we'll give you $10 for every $50 you spend. I'm a sucker.

Anyway, Yankee candles were on sale. The sign said a 12-ounce Yankee "Simply Home" candle was $14.99. Next to that was a sign declaring that said candle, in the "autumn foliage" fragrance--so it smells like dying leaves--was 25% off.

I took the candle and a couple of other items to the cashier. She rung me up. It seemed to add up to more than I thought it should. I was on my way out the door, and I looked at the receipt and sonofaBITCH! They charged me $20.99 for this stinking tinyass candle.

Hey, I'm a mighty consumer! I'm confident! I can stand up for my right not to be overcharged!

So I go to customer service and meekly, politely, explain the dilemma. She rescanned it. It came up $20.99.

"I'm sorry. It scans $20.99."

Oh, even the the all-knowing, omnipotent ouija-scanner makes mistakes, my stuck-in-the-back-room-dealing-with-dissatisfied-customers customer service lady friend.

"Well, it might scan that, but the sign says '14.99' for the 12-ounce candle," I politely informed her. "Plus the 25% off." I stood there in a daze as my lightning fast head calculations put the final cost at about, what...11, 12 dollars. Give or take.

She was unimpressed. "You'll have to show me the sign."

The burden of proof now rested on my shoulders. She probably expected me to back down at this point, so I wouldn't embarrass myself marching around the labyrinth of aisles with the customer service gal in tow, my arms flailing wildly as I explained my point.

She was wrong.

We marched down the aisles, my arms flailing wildly as I explained my point. We arrived at the candle display, where--very clearly, it seemed to me--the prices of the various sizes of candles were listed, next to a sign that promised 25% off of 3 different fragrances, the smell of dead leaves and rotting foliage among them. As it happens, there was a candle for sale that was $20.99, but it was a much larger candle.

"Here. It says $14.99 for the 12-ounce candle. And 25% off of that." It was CLEAR AS A FRIGGING BELL THIS GODDAMN CANDLE WAS $14.99.

"Well, no. The $14.99 is the sale price, including the 25% off."

"Well, when you have sales, you post the sale price next to the regular price. That's how I, as a consumer, know that an item's on sale." I pointed to another sign that in fact did this very thing. "That's not the case with this sign. As a consumer, I look at this sign, and it says $14.99."

"But that's with the 25% off."

"No. That's not how you do it here at Kohls. Do you understand how I would interpret this sign to mean that this particular candle is actually $14.99?"

"Well, no. You know, that's probably an old sign. I'll take it down." She removed the 25% off sign.

"Um...I'm not sure you're getting my drift. The sign that's still here says the candle is $14.99. Taking away the 25% off sign doesn't matter. The problem is, the sign says one thing, but it's scanning $20.99. Taking the 25% off sign won't change the scanned price. Which, according to the current sign should amount to...(again, using my zippity math skills)...about 11 dollars. Or twelve."

By this time she had crisply removed the 25% off sign that magically added 6 dollars to the advertised price and we marched back to customer service.

"You have to understand. I don't normally do this. I'm not a nag, I'm not usually a very assertive consumer. But I'm just trying to save you from yourselves." By this time, a line had formed at the counter.

I continued. "You keep that sign up, and you'll have more people like me demanding the price be changed."

"Oh, I don't think that will happen." She smiled insincerely.

"Whatever." By this time, I wasn't angry, but...a little agitated that she wasn't agreeing that Kohls was, in fact, wrong. I was right, she was wrong, dammit. The price couldn't have been interpreted any other way. It was like trying to explain the miserable failure of the Bush presidency to...oh, never mind.

I glanced behind me to see the line had grown. "If the price on the sign is wrong, you need to change it. If it's right, then you need to change it in the scanner. Whatever. The point is, the sign very clearly says $14.99, regardless of the 25% discount. I don't even care so much about the discount. But this candle is not $20.99," I said triumphantly, brandishing the candle about for emphasis. The people in line gave me the hairy eyeball and seemed to take a small step backward.

She just wasn't getting it. But at this point, perhaps sensing that I might be armed and crazy, she gave in. The price ended up being about $12. Which was great, but I was disappointed that I had not been persuasive enough for her to just say, "you know, you're right. And I'm a moron."

I'm tempted to go back today and look at the candles again. Just to see if they caved. In the meantime, "Autumn Foliage" actually smells pretty good.