computer death

My computer died. When it gets resurrected, I'll be back.

So, this new job - when do I get to feel like it's real?

After I get the email with the start date details that shows the background check is finished?
After my first day?
After my first paycheck?

I've got to figure out how to stop waiting for the other shoe to drop. If it's going to fall, it will fall. I don't need to stress out waiting for it. Sheesh.

(Have you ever felt like this?)

the will of God (5)

sometimes the dark part
of the moon can be clearly
seen beside the light

Attack of the R.O.U.S.

You know the R.O.U.S. in Princess Bride?  I was coming home very late one night after work and barely keeping it together as a driver when I saw one.  I was on the last road to my home, and I was really spacing, admiring the stars and the darkness.  I scolded myself awake with the threat that if a lovely deer stepped out into the road near the railroad tracks I cross 50 yards from home, I wouldn't be alert enough to stop in time before the majestic deer or my car became distinctly unlovely very fast. 

Lo, and behold, a creature did appear and cause me to slam on the breaks, but it was nothing graceful like a deer.  It was quite possibly the largest opossum I have ever seen, and watching that thing waddle/lope/lumber across the road gave me an unpleasant flashback to the movie Princess Bride (which you should see if you haven't already seen it but do possess a sense of humor and have nothing against fantasy). (The bookis good, too.)

Luckily, nothing dropped onto the roof from above or bit me, so I was okay.  If something as big as that critter had fallen onto my car, it would have killed me, since the top of my head is 1.23" from the roof.  Also, there were no quicksand pits.  A successful day, all in all.

Cell Phone satire

I didn't notice that the post "Do You Find People Annoyed by Cell Phone Users Annoying?" was labeled "File Under: Satire Seriously" until someone in a comment mentioned that it was so.  I was, however, 99% sure that this rant was in a non-serious, humorous vein by the end of the post itself.  Unfortunately, it seems like some of the commenters never reached that conclusion.  I wanted to give you the heads up, so you can enjoy it in the spirit it was meant to be conveyed.  Also, be sure to read some of those comments from people who feel entitled to use their cell phones in an annoying manner in public.  Unintentionally hilarious.

So funny.  Donald Miller writes as someone who rudely uses a cell phone in public and blames the others around him for being selfish and insensitive for being annoyed at him for these behaviors.  I think we've all met the people who think this way and aren't being sarcastic about it.  Sigh. 

I can't even tell you how infuriating this can be when you work in retail.  There are several satisfying suggestions on how to deal with the situation in Pretending You Care: A Retail Handbook, but recently, I've been able to keep my blood pressure under control by just telling myself they were raised by wolves and have just been reintroduced to society or something.  I try not to think about how they ignore the questions I'm required to ask and thus move me closer to being fired because, obviously, they don't care enough about the people around them to, well, care.

Do you have any enraging or just irritating public cell phone menace stories?

Night racing

Can someone explain why people scream down the highway late at night racing each other?  They make an unbelievable racket and sometimes wake me out of a lovely temporary sleep at, like, 3 in the morning.  Don't they go deaf being that close to that much noise? 

At least they don't do it when the roads are wet, which is another reason to love thunderstorms and rain.  As if I needed another reason for that.  :)

A little allergy-inspired poem

Sometimes it's hard to tell
whether it's dandelions or
cottonwoods drifting
until you sneeze.