Slippery
Sometimes stupid people get lucky and as the rest of the world lets them be – who the hell wants to be involved with stupid people? – they start to believe they are invincible. Their set of circumstances makes them truly believe they are geniuses. Not Einstein, but extraordinarily in their own special way. So much so that Einstein would be just a tiny bit jealous, you know?
But every once on a while, one of the little people have a flash of brilliance and anticipate a move. They take a tiny stab and wait it out. Just on the off chance that they can have a finger, if not a hand, in a beautiful moment.
I witnessed such a beautiful moment today. It was poetic…
The road ahead it winds and curves and it may not lead anywhere near the expected destination, but this pit stop was bitching!
The evil genius are never quite as smart as they believe themselves, nor as evil, and it never ever does well to underestimate the creative infusion pure hatred engenders in the little people that have nothing left to lose. Isn’t this in the evil genius handbook?
Sharp end of the weekend
I cut my nails earlier, because I want to add a little speed to my typing. I aim to do a project that ordinarily takes a few weeks in the space of some 17 days. It can be done, not necessarily well, but that is not my problem.
By “cutting” I actually mean a wanton act of destruction… I used my teeth just like I did when I was a little girl.
I also cut my hair. As the temperatures rise, my hair tends to grow like weeds – fast and furious. But it is also thick and hot as hell. It makes tiny, needling jabs to the back of my neck in a pony tail and acts like a fur hat when I put it up.
Again, by “cutting” I mean I grabbed a pair of sheers and whacked out 2 or 3 inches and what felt like 4 pounds of hair off my head.
One of the girls at work hates it that I do that. Her hair barely grows and seeing me grab my pony tail and just start cutting away one day when it was about 87º inside made her cry out in horror. I thought it was really amusing, but she was truly shaken as if I'd performed a bloody and violent act of self-mutilation.
If only it were just as easy shed a few pounds! Or the nasty piece of shit people that insinuate themselves into your existence and whose by-product (because calling it a purpose would be giving them more credit than they deserve) is to ruin joy.
Whatever, I am leaner and ready for the next battle. I care less and les about the outcome because my stake is not insignificant. I will meet my responsibilities, but the days of heroic measures are long gone.
It might seem a little depressing to live under that sort of regime, but it does not take up my whole life. Besides, there is tremendous freedom in accepting the things you cannot change. There is only a small price to pay and I get it back the moment I leave. More importantly, those front row seats to the coming train wreck: priceless!
Trader Joe’s Weekend Journal
Dinner tonight includes large blue shrimp, red and green peppers, zucchini and onions – skewered and grilled. The kabobs sit in a zesty garlic marinade right now. The side dish will be plain couscous as the shrimp will be the centerpiece of this meal.
For dessert, we have strawberries in a rum sauce.
There were far more vegetables left over than I expected, but I suppose they’ll be the base for some stir-fry on Monday – as the temperature rises we will be working around recipes that put us in the kitchen for less than 20 minutes at a clip.
Sunday’s menu includes a couple of salads (carrot with fresh dill and green bean with red onions). With them, I’ll be serving grilled swordfish. The fish will marinade overnight in a spicy, Dijon mustard sauce (with olive oil, lemon juice, some crushed garlic and Tabasco sauce).
We’ll be supplementing our nutritional choices with dried fruit covered in chocolate while we watch movies till dawn (we are rebels!).
Recession be damned, malignant influences reside not in my house: living well is the best revenge.
Shades of Montreal
The last week in June is a very emotional time for me. Every pore in my body down to my soul wants to be in Montreal for the jazz festival. Any thought of that city includes a memory of an old junkie literally dragging her purse behind her, on the ground, as she walked off her high up rue Sherbrooke… It was such an incongruous site it became instantly embedded in my head.
To this day, a decade later, we still refer to her as “la arrastrada” (she who drags); and the rest of the story and the image is instantly conjured.
Today I saw the mother of junkie nods. This woman blocked the corner of Court Street and Atlantic Avenue. She had bent over forward, her knees were bent at almost a 45º angle and her head was about two inches from the ground. She had a cigarette in her mouth, surely held in place entirely by a bit of saliva and encrusted on her dried up lips until it dislodged and rolled under her to her feet. She was staying upright by some sort of providence because it clearly defied the laws of physics.
I saw her a block away. As I neared her I considered crossing over and then back to reach the Trader Joe’s. But then I saw a concerned and clearly naïve old lady approach her cautiously and try to find a way to console her or inquire if she needed help. I quickened the pace and grabbed her by the elbow, “No, no, let it be. Step away from the junkie!”
An NYFD EMS bus stopped at the corner – obviously someone called them – and came out to aid the junkie. She refused attention beyond being helped back upright. I crossed the street and watched from afar as I finished a smoke. She was informed she had the right to refuse aid, but that she needed o sign a release form. She couldn’t hold the paper. It kept slipping through her fingers – a sure metaphor about her very life.
I’d never condone the use of recreational drugs, but nobody ever needs to be quite that narcotized.
Small victory
We had two extraordinarily good days here and I feel a little trepidation about mentioning it for fear that enjoying it too much and saying it out loud might anger the gods, who might misconstrue my short-lived joy for some sort of imprudent boasting…
If god really is in the details, its divine presence was all around us. I could explain it, but that would be telling and those involved (the witnesses, as it were) know of what and whom I speak and nod their heads at their computer screens and rejoice with me.
My great grandmother smiled from heaven and quietly said,
“Paciencia, mi niña.”
Better than drugs!
Something interesting happened this morning.
I decided to take car service to work. I usually am a bit on the catatonic; I sit back and watch Brooklyn. Some mornings, if the driver is Latino, they listen to this morning show that can only be described as incorrigible and completely inappropriate. The host was this DJ, his name is Raymond Broussard, that used to work in Puerto Rico and he did a morning drive show when I was back in junior high school.
At 7:30, they’d do a parody of this very popular telenovela. The usual suspects (I was the token chick and, some claim, one of the ring leaders) used to sit in the back of our first period class, algebra, and giggle. Our teacher tried to teach us all a lesson occasionally and would try to catch us off guard, but one of us was always paying attention. He eventually made a deal with us. He picked the drunken junkie of the crowd and made him solve a monster polynomial equation – if he solved it correctly, we could *quietly* listen to the show, as long as we did not disrupt his class. He figured he would finally silence us. The boy was obviously under the influence of several substances (some of them probably illegal and lethal). It turns out the little bastard was a freaking math genius! He’d solved the damned thing before he reached the blackboard. He didn’t even bother to proof it. He just wrote down the answer, walked to the back of the room and sat back down with that smug grin only a teenager can give an adult when he knows he has bested him at his own game.
And now, a lifetime later, I sit in the back of a car listening to this same clown… But it never takes me to the past. “Moonshadow” and his posse of idiots are just elevator music to my ride. My mind remains blank until something unexpected pops up on its own. If work related, I suppress it.
Somehow today, the thought was a cinematic treatment in which I perfectly envisioned the setting of a short story I wrote almost 2 years to the date. And in that instant scene, part of the back story came flooding and I had to take notes on the back of a moving car.
What a rush!
Ask and thou shall receive, right?
All I wanted was a few rays of sun. That is exactly what we got. Sometime around 1:30 pm today, the sun peeked out from the stronghold of a few clouds. It lasted all of 3 minutes, but it was glorious.
I was almost manic. I dared to stare at the sun. I could almost hear a song – all things considered, it was probably me singing. I don’t know. For three minutes I experienced the sweetest narcotic known to man: sheer bliss.
Then it was gone again and everything turned back to grey.
Here's a piece of advice helpful to those who pray just as it is for those who choose to sell their souls: be specific!
Gimme some sun!
Four days of doing virtually nothing takes a toll on the body and mind, but it doesn't even compare to the problems half the world faces daily. Despite the whine that follows, I realize how blessed I am.
According to the calendar it is finally summer! You wouldn’t know it by looking out our windows. It is gray and wet and I have this recurring nightmare that evil little green men have transported me to some sort of damp hell (some call it Seattle East).
My excitement is tempered by the albuterol taste in my palate, the rawness in the roof of my mouth and a little bit of soreness coupled with stiffness. Could be worse, so I’ll take it because I know it will go away. I am not exactly in pain, so I don’t care as much. Meh, y’know?
Right now I’d give my kingdom for some sun, I am desperately jonesing a few rays. It literally feels as if the memory of a sunny sky is a fantasy I made up in my mind. Seriously, I mean to the point that you have to question your sanity a little bit. You have to feel a bad for the scores of folks who can’t afford to go anywhere and whose only vacation this year is to hit the area beaches. Poor bastards!
Which reminds me, speaking of bastards: useless then, useless now (you know who you are). Happy Father's Day, Mom!
Under the Weather & Unamused!
There will be no extraordinarily awesome gourmet experiments this weekend because I did not visit TJ’s this week. I spent the last two days at home, doing my Darth Vader impersonation with my nebulizer and sleeping a lot – in between coughing bouts. Right now, it no longer feels as if my lungs weigh half a ton, but my head is still awfully congested. I’m experiencing that lovely lava lamp effect whenever I move too fast. Plus I have that acrid chemical taste in my palate that makes everything so appetizing!
To be fair, I feel good right now and I have for several hours. So I think the phlegm factory has closed down and I will be left to get back to whatever normal is. But considering the fact that the weather is unlikely to change significantly until later next week, I’ll have to thread lightly.
I had been weaning myself off the Advair and this puts me back where I was a couple of months back. Not too worried about it, but not pleased either…
The plan is to do stick with simple. So we’ll go with Loretta’s chicken and two different salads and lots of rest because we have a looming deadline that must be addressed this coming week (and we’re already behind).
This spring has been odd, at best. Now I’m just tired of it (and especially tired of the flip-flopping temperatures, the constant rain and the absence of sun). Come on summer! I want to complain about something else altogether.
Evil.
It takes something radical and extreme to drive me to my wits’ end. Despite my “passion”, I have mellowed in my latter years. Today I was so enraged by a person (and I use that term loosely), that I seriously considered the pros of getting arrested. How bad can it be? Seriously…
I was horrified to such an extent that I still cannot comprehend the level of darkness in a soul so desperate for attention and power, and so goddamned convinced of some god-given entitlement to love and respect (never mind that it’d be unearned and undeserved) that it – yes IT – cannot even mimic a moment of humanity. Even sociopaths can simulate humanity for short periods. This character is a more evolved, in a negative sense, daemon than the usual sociopath; which is to say that it is highly probable that there are sociopaths out there who are more deserving of sympathy and compassion than this douche.
It isn’t funny so I can’t laugh about it. I can’t cry because the sheer shock has sucked out all emotion out of me. It would, however make for a powerful screenplay that I can only describe as horror dipped in horror with a touch of horrifying horror. But scarier!
We all fantasize that there is a special kind of hell for people we despise. I can tell you that I am living a special kind of hell right now and I feel soiled and violated just by being in close proximity to this monumental asshole.
This as ugly as ugly gets! It is like a wall of fire preventing me from my journey in beauty and it is literally killing me.
I don’t want to play this game any more. This game sucks. And I possess at least a modicum of decency.
Nobody expects this!
Going topical tonight and then dropping the whole theme as if it never happened.
I will not comment on the big picture of the Letterman/Palin imbroglio. As you should expect there is a healthy dose of cynicism oozing off me about that whole deal.
Here’s the thing I am unclear about: the Fire Dave movement was adamant about not canceling their event because as Christians they were outraged… Isn’t one of the tenets of Christianity the whole philosophy of forgiveness, that God gave us his only son to wipe away original sin and, in doing so, signifying that no human is beyond redemption. All it takes, according to Christians, is an apology to God to be forgiven.
If God can accept an apology, why can’t these folks?
Isn’t that unchristian?
That’s not human foible, that’s outright arrogance. If you refuse to perform a simple act of love, aren’t you putting yourself above your god?
Don’t try to explain it; my brain doesn’t contract beyond stupid.
Show’s over, nothing to see here, move on. And take this with you:
For if you forgive others for their transgressions, your heavenly Father will also forgive you.
But if you do not forgive others, then your Father will not forgive your transgressions.
--Matthew 6:14-15, American King James Bible
Do *not* make me quote scripture again!
Fashion Oddity
This morning, I stood in the corner for a few minutes before heading to the office and I witnessed a bizarre runway of fashion oddity. I suppose it is important to explain that at 8:00 am it had been 58 degrees, but at 8:45 it was already at least 10 degrees higher. Everyone moved quickly and cautiously under a gray sky, threatening to open up a curtain of punishing rain – indeed we’d had several thunderstorms since before dawn. It was so humid the air felt dewy and sylvan.
What I witnessed was a bizarre runway fashion show. There were people in raincoats – from jackets to full-length. Then there were those in suit jackets, others in hoodies, and still some others in sweaters. There were kids in tee shirts and many in sandals. Open toed shoes, flat shoes… There were women in flimsy, sleeveless tank tops. And then the ones that have been baffling me for weeks: girls in shorts and ugly plastic rain boots.
Do you remember those ugly, yellow plastic rain slickers? They came with the ugly, yellow plastic hats that look like tacky
slicker hats. Well, they now make the boots in all these colorful combinations – all tacky (1970s flower-power seems to be a huge theme). And these girls wear those things. Not little girls, not tweens, not teenagers. These are adults wearing these things in public. Voluntarily! On clear, hot days and with shorts. These things are waterproof, so the material does not breathe – your toes are literally baking in those goddamned ugly things. I just don’t get that. And no one can explain it to me either.
I mean, really, rubber boots are a fashion statement? Is this just an upshot of the porn industry permeating all American culture?
Confucius say wang chung
It was a very odd day, cool in the ways of early spring, and it felt like inhuman levels of allergens were released into the air with some sort of “Alias”-like DNA magnets come to find me specifically.
We spent the evening catching up with the season 2 of Torchwood on DVD and time just flew.
This afternoon I made shrimp rolls for lunch, they were overstuffed and full of bits of fantastic flavors and different textures. I put capers, scallions and dill weed into a bit of mayo with country mustard (with cracked mustard seeds) and a healthy sprinkling of pepper and boiled eggs. The shrimp had been marinating overnight in olive oil, garlic and lemon and quickly grilled.
For dinner, I made the chicken pesto sausages with the pesto-filled tortellini from Trader Joe’s. The very idea just tickled me immensely. Once in the house, the difficulty of it was how to serve it. I am firmly opposed to the idea of pasta and meat with no dressing. Naked pasta bugs me. It’s simply against my religion, as it were. That sort of minimalism strikes me as lazy, like swearing a tuxedo without socks.
But then, each component is injected with pesto, so you cannot make anything too complicated because you do not want to take away from the flavors that are already there. And my solution was a drizzle of virgin olive oil with a drop of lime juice.
The sausage had more salt than I use ordinarily, but that also means you need not salt the pasta water as it balances out nicely.
We had quite an exciting weekend and the highlight of it was watching a former Panamanian beauty queen explain that Confucius was an ancient Japanese that invented confusion. Mull on that for a bit. Have a lovely week...
I can haz Caturday!
One of the reasons I love weekends is that I am cocooned in love and away from all the unpleasant things the world has to offer me on a daily basis. I am in control – outside of extraordinary forces – and there is very little that can penetrate my bliss, unless I allow it to remain. And I have more tools to block out the unwanted.
The Trader Joe’s weekly visit dictates this weekend’s menu. I bought shrimp stir-fry and extra shrimp because I was dissatisfied with the 6 shrimp in the package… I also bought chicken sausages with pesto and pesto tortellini. I still have
Saturday turned out to be like Xmas here. First, my tiny but powerful Logitech speakers for my laptop arrived in the mail – making my laptop a newfangled ghetto box. Okay, so I tested it out with Jean Luc Ponty, it boomed. Sorta. I also received my Roku player (I’m watching a Paul Mooney special from my Netflix instant queue right now!). [Note: this is Paul when he still said nigger, not New Paul.] We also got a box of magazines, books and chips (it makes perfect sense in our world).
Later we will sit back and watch “The Hangover” because it seems like the perfect accompaniment to a Xmas-in-Spring-Caturday.
Tango is necessary
Today, in conversation someone I know said, “I’ve never danced tango.”
This gave me quite a start, “Never?!”
“Not once in my life,” she said.
She seemed somewhat neutrally resigned to the fact, as if it meant next to nada.
You have got to dance a tango at least once in your life! It’s necessary. Absolutely.
Between the fluidity of movement, the playful pull and push and controlled steps and breathlessness, and the primal beats… ¡Sí, sí, sí!
At least once! And never with a virgin, doing the tango is not like taking an experimental toke. You need an expert hand to lead you.
Image: http://www.art.com/products/p10264855-sa-i821811/misha-lenn-tango-argentina.htm
Micromanagement is mismanagement
Some days, I wonder if getting a giant prop of “The Peter Principle” and wearing it as a hat would drive the point home or if that’s just too subtle…
When insecurity and incompetence meet and hook up like horny, drunken teenagers on prom night, a micromanager gets their voice to shrill a full octave higher – it’s like wings for angels but evil, annoying and fucking useless to humanity.
There is absolutely nothing I can do but sit back, do what I have to do to survive the ride, and wait for the freight train to meet its inevitable wreck.
Goddess likes big boom!
And she shall get one.
On the DL
My back was killing me this morning. You know how your shoulders tend to shake when you let out a hearty laugh? That hurt like a
mofo.
It started at the shoulder and annoyingly spread out diagonally across my back. There, unreachable, it mocked me. Old piece of shit!
So I am here to sing praises to that stinky stuff that goes on cold and then turns hot from RiteAid, to my trusty heating pad and the miraculous wonder that is Aleve.
I still can’t raise my arm over my head, but I can’t imagine why I would need that particular talent right now. As long as I don’t do
that the pain is almost all gone…
I attribute it to sleeping in the pretzel position a couple of nights in a row, a very high humidity, and enough stress to virtually be considered explosive by ATF-standards.
Of course, tomorrow my sheets are going to have that chemical-mentholated smell, as if I’d had an orgy with Puerto Rican drug overlords. As long as I can sleep in peace and don’t feel the pinch of pain, I’d gladly smell like a meth-whore!
Freaking bursitis sucks.
Sit on it and spin, bitch!
I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction. I will not be an instrument of destruction.
It was not a very good day. No blood was shed. Still not sure whether this is a good thing or not… On the one hand, I am a fucking pacifist. On the other hand, destruction is just an act of creation defined only by a narrow view.
The lunatics are running the asylum!
There was screaming, tears, threats and recriminations this past week. We had technical difficulties and the emotional whirlwind equivalent of a monsoon with a hurricane chaser pouring in by way of walk-ins, phone calls and badly written e-mails. I can only describe registration at work like stepping into a bizarre, psychotic world where moderately literate, overgrown children rule entirely to test my patience.
It’s like a sitcom married to horror but without the charm. It’s just disturbing… Not at all like
King of Hearts!
Thankfully, I get to go home and decompress or who knows what the consequences of that much craziness and stupidity could possibly be! The postal possibilities are enormous.
Dinner tonight consists of grilled jumbo shrimp with 2 dipping sauces and orange peppers stuffed with orzo with capers and fresh parsley in a lemon oil dressing.
Poetic Justice
Nobody likes a know-it-all narcissist asshole. But a narcissist loves herself above all else and just enough to counter the psychic rays of unadulterated hatred she gets when talking smack.
The Royal Highness of I-Know-It-All-upon-Brooklyn actually uttered the words, “Explain it to me as if I were in the first grade.” She said this to people to whom she has proclaimed her superior intellect, even in their respective areas of expertise, which explains why she always feels the absolute need to express her displeasure with their inability to meet her exact expectations.
I discovered today that as awesome as it is to cut a Know-It-All down to size, nothing (and I mean
literally nothing) can replace the pure joy of watching the narcissist self-mutilate.
Fucking sweet!
If she truly knew it all, she would have bought a little Know-It-All Breath Spray, available at Merch Bot.
Tantrums 'R Us
Today, someone tried rip me a new one in a badly written e-mail because I was not sufficiently ass-kissy and it offended her deeply.
My response was, “If it helps alleviate your frustration to insult my abilities, I am happy to help in any way I can.”
She did not thank me.
To quote three quarters of the adults I’ll speak to this week,
“It’s not fair!!!”The rest of the week is the annual summer salute to adult tantrums. It’s exhausting but it fuels the in-jokes with other tech support geeks.
We live for this shit.
Sometimes stupid people get lucky and as the rest of the world lets them be – who the hell wants to be involved with stupid people? – they start to believe they are invincible. Their set of circumstances makes them truly believe they are geniuses. Not Einstein, but extraordinarily in their own special way. So much so that Einstein would be just a tiny bit jealous, you know?
