Of Fireworks and Thunder

Don't get me wrong, I love Independence Day, its the idiot neighbors who purchase all manner of armaments (illegal in the state of Merryland) that set them off for weeks before and after that I'm not too crazy about... because we have a 70lb dog that totally freaks out over loud noises.

Close proximity fireworks and thunder are not our friends.  At the first sign of either, we have a panting, stomping, clawing  nutcase husky on our hands.  Since both activities (fireworks and thunderstorms) generally occur at night... we don't get a lot of sleep.  While I can't control the weather (and neither can Al Gore), I simply curse the fact that thunderstorms happen a lot at night, but I do curse, and threaten bodily harm and the full force of the law on the neighbors... in my head, of course.  Because we're pretty much Libertarian, its still a free country, and what kind of morons would we be to celebrate Independence by calling the authorities on someone practicing a form of freedom.

To prepare for the onslaught of fireworks, we sought the big guns.  Rescue Remedy.  Touted as the cure for neurosis of all manner, and proven to work as friends from all over the world have experienced its amazing properties to naturally calm and mellow up the most phobic pet, we found a bountiful of the product at the local Whole Foods store.  Armed with three boxes, we were hopeful.

Around dusk last night, the joyful citizenry began setting off their fireworks, and we dispensed the required 4 drops for Meeshka (70lb razor sharp clawer and main freaking dog), and Loki (65lb cowering, trembling in fear drooling dog) and crossed our fingers.

In general, Loki looked as though he had drank way too much and sat drooling slightly next to us with a glazed look in his eyes.  Meeshka settled on an air vent.  This was GREAT!  It seemed that we had found a solution for sleepless nights and rude awakenings.

Then the idiot neighbors started shooting off their mortars at 10 pm.  This is when we discovered that the mellowing affects of Rescue Remedy could not overcome the sound of someone shooting off large explosives less than a block away.  Frankly I was tempted to drink some.

Since there would be no sleep for us, even after giving her another dose (Loki continued to stare at a wall and drool, totally oblivious to everything), we went out on the deck to at least watch the neighbor's display of weaponry.

I truly don''t wish ill on anyone, but there was a a moment of guilty glee when one of the mortar rounds skipped sideways across the ground (an obvious tube malfunction), and exploded most likely right next to his neighbor's house, and probably right next to all of his cars in the driveway.  We resisted the urge to applaud.  There didn't seem to be any running around or movement to suggest a major fire, damage, or loss of limbs (unfortunately for our entertainment value), but it did put a rather sudden stop on the fireworks display for the night.

We were able to go to sleep without further interruption... until 4am (which is when I'm writing this) when the very large thunderstorm came crashing down upon us along with the 70lb panting, clawing husky.

More rescue remedy taking just a small edge off the panting and clawing, and I sit here waiting for either Lobsterman to get up and be the object of her clawing, or the storm passes.

I will be napping today... despite storms and fireworks, I'll sleep under the bed if I have to... seriously.

Little Things That Totally P*SS Me Off

My Printer

I have one of those HP "all in one" printers that scans and prints... frankly that barely scratches the surface of all the things one thing can do, so I have no idea why its called "ALL in one"... but that isn't what totally P*SSES me off.  Its the fact that every time I print something, it pompously spews out a blank sheet at the end.  Does this thing think that paper grows on trees.... SHUT UP!  I know where paper comes from.

You would think that there was a setting somewhere where I could tell it to stop doing that.  I'm tired of printing something, stacking the spare unused piece of paper on top of it for later introduction back into the queue of soon to be printed paper, only to have to relocate the pile when I want to scan something.  Yes, I would suppose that at that time I should shove it into the tray, but that's not the point.  It shouldn't be there in the first place.

I looked through the settings and found nothing... of course.  No button to click that said "press here to stop the annoying waste of paper when you print", nothing.  So I Google searched and found one person bitching about the same thing on an HP help forum... with no answer.

FINE

So I look around some more and find some people complaining about it, and an actual step by step process to make it stop:
1.) reboot your computer.  Seriously?  That's the oldest trick in the lame tech support book.
2.) Preview your document before you print it to see if you application is putting a blank page at the end.  Seriously?  That's the second oldest trick in the lame tech support book: blame every application or device but your own.
3.) Re-install your printer driver.  Seriously?  It was a pain in the ass enough getting it installed in the first place, what makes you think that re-installing the exact same printer driver is going to stop something that has no setting?  Are there viruses out there that infect your printer driver to cause it to slowly drive you insane by printing a blank page after everything you print out?  I don't think so.

Therefore... no solution... yet.  I still haven't tried Step 4: beat it with a hammer.

Women's Dress Pants

I inherited my shopping gene from my father, which means I know what I want, I swoop into the store, grab it and head straight to the check-out counter, pay for it and flee. I don't want to try anything on, it should be sized so that I know what size I need, but thanks to self-conscious, vain women or manufacturers who think that all women are self-conscious and vain, women's pants sizes are in some alien language and measurement that varies from type of pants, to manufacturers, to types of fabric.  I'm pretty sure that places that make women's pants just make up a fucking size and slap them on random pants because no two pair of pants are the same fucking size!

I only have to guess that women around the world would fall dead if they had to actually pick a pair of pants that was sized by their ACTUAL measurements (frankly I see the return of actual measurements as a handy thing in the "war of obesity"... which isn't an actual war, just something NATO wanted us to do without congressional approval), so some elaborate measurement system was thought up to keep women "fooled" by thinking that if they wear a "2" they are wafer model thin without realizing that "2" is really heifer size outside of Hollyweird.

So, while men have a size chart that includes ONE chart (for shirts), women have the following convoluted non-standard charts:
Misses
Misses Petite
Junior
Junior Petite
Young Junior
Women's
Half sizes

Then there's the "catalog sizes".  Since around 1980 Companies were allowed to just make their sizes up, and they can vary among different styles of the same freakin pants!  So, even if you figure out what size you are in a store, depending on the brand, type, and style, if you buy something from a catalog, you are DOOMED because they just go all rogue and do whatever they damn well want. 

So, instead of going into a store and thinking "hmm, I need some pants... these look nice, and they're my size 36X34", you go into a store, try to find a department that fits your age, style, and price range (for instance, one department store has what I call the "I'm 12 and want to look like a street walker" section), stand in front of a rack of pants and cry, because you have ABSOLUTELY NO IDEA WHAT 2 petite/slim/junior/half FREAKING MEANS other than you'll spend about 6 hours trying on the same style of pants in 14 different sizes and none of them fit.

That's not even the worst part... the worst part is the fact that apparently its against the law to put pockets in women's dress pants.  I'm sure it also a vanity thing, because after you finally find a pair of pants that fit, the LAST thing a woman wants is to have an unsightly bulge somewhere (unlike some congressmen), so 99% of women's dress pants don't have pockets... unless they are decorative pockets. 

SERIOUSLY WTF is up with decorative pockets?

Is it the assumption that since women carry handbags there's no need for pockets?  I hate to inform you all, but only 80 year old woman carry their purses EVERYWHERE, and anyone younger than 80 who carries their bag to the bathroom is sending out the international "I'M ON MY PERIOD" signal, because they can't tuck their period junk in a pocket that doesn't exist!

The first company that designs women's dress pants with pockets and with the right freakin sizes, will be the ONLY company I buy my pants from... even if they make them out of freakin marmoset skin, I'm still in!

So, in case you are wondering, yes... I went out to find a pair of women's dress pants, and in a fit of rage, I bought a pair of men's cargo dockers... AND I DON'T F'ING CARE!

Fond Air Force Memories - Cherry Tomato Incident

I have to admit that I don't have too many fond Air Force memories... mainly because I was drunk most of the time... except on duty and I can't talk about what I did on duty, so about the only clear, lucid, not involving aliens or talking animals memories are from the early Air Force days.

Having survived:

• 6 weeks of basic training at Lackland Air Force Base
• 6 weeks of English at Lackland Air Force Base
• 47 weeks of Russian Language at Lackland Air Force Base
• I forget how many weeks at Goodfellow Air Base (Crystal Confectionery 5 for 1 happy hours)
• 3 weeks of leave in Indiana during the COLDEST FREAKIN winter of the century

I was finally winging my way to my first duty station: Berlin, Germany.

When the plane finally took off from La Guardia to Frankfurt, back in the days when they gave you real food, allowed you to use real knives and forks, and you could smoke, I looked forward to my first international flight meal.

To this day, I have no recollection (and I was totally sober during the flight) of the meal after the salad because of the horrible international incident I nearly caused.

The salad had cherry tomatoes.  I love cherry tomatoes.  I especially love to pop them whole into my mouth and bite down, causing them to explode in your mouth.  I love that.

Since I was on an international flight, and because biting cherry tomatoes so they explode in your mouth seemed so kid-like, I wanted to be all international and worldly, so I poked a cherry tomato with a fork and proceeded to bite one end... like all world travelers and high society people do.

The only problem was that instead of exploding harmlessly in my mouth (had I been kid-like) this tomato exploded out the other end like a bomb, showering the woman in front of me right in the hair with such force that I thought she would be knocked unconscious.  Lucky for her, she was sporting one of the largest bouffant hairdos I have ever seen (until the creation of Marge Simpson), which probably saved her life and spared her from feeling the assault from behind.

I glanced around frantically, thankful that nobody else had seen what just had happened, but then a wave of guilt came over me and I really wanted to let her know that she had the guts of a cherry tomato imbedded and slowly oozing off the back of her head.  When I heard her speaking German to her seat mate, I knew there was just no way I could pantomime the event, and to make matters worse, I started giggling uncontrollably. 

That happens to me when something really serious happens (not serious life threatening serious, I'm really good at staying calm and rational during those things), but if something non-life threatening happens that's serious... I laugh.  I'm pretty sure if I tried to explain it while laughing, there would be all sorts of horrible national implications and I'd end up starting some kind of war. 

I opted to stay quiet about the whole thing, and then spent the rest of the flight transfixed by the goo in her hair.

This is how I saved the world from certain annihilation.

R.I.P. Baby Bird

I'm sorry to report that baby bird didn't make it.

Although the parents were still diligently bringing it food, and it was peppy and happy and eating, last night I found baby bird had once again plummeted out of the nest near the back door again.  This time its landing must have injured it, because it was showing definite signs of something seriously wrong.

I knew when I first saved it that its chances were slim to none.  All of its brothers and sisters were HUGE fledglings, and baby bird was tiny.  It looked as though it was a good week behind its siblings, and whether that was because it was a late hatcher, or because of some medical issue, it didn't really matter, it really didn't stand a chance.

I was torn between trying to hand raise it (and I would have if I thought it had a chance), or letting nature takes its sometimes cruel course, and opted for nature.  I put baby bird back in the nest, where I was sure it would at least be comforted with its natural surroundings during its final time.

This morning I climbed the ladder and found what I expected.  I removed baby bird, nest and all, said a few words for it, and disposed of it properly.

I hope its happily swooping around across the Rainbow Bridge.

Baby Robin Update

I watched Bully Robin fly the coop into the bush near the neighbor's yard.  I also located the two other fledglings: one is high up in a tree over my yard, the other is hanging out on the back part of our fence.

I took baby robin and plopped it back into the nest, where it seemed happy, but I don't know if the parents will feed it. 

As soon as everyone has left the nest (one way or the other) I'm removing the nest and putting freakin spikes up there so I don't have to deal with this another year!

My Week In Review

So, this week at work was one gigantic brain suck of a week (remember, my week only contains 4 days, so that's saying a lot).  It was one of those "if it ain't one thing, its another" type of weeks. 

On top of it sucking like a black hole, it was also a bazillion degrees out and humid.  Going outside was like opening the oven door and sticking your head in to retrieve a cooked roast without letting the heat disperse (and I do that ALL the time).  Getting into the truck was torture, and then turning it on so that the air conditioner would throw molten hot air on you until it cooled off, you could feel your flesh melt.

I was SO looking forward to my relaxing Friday.  Although it was suppose to be another "feels like" 103 day, we were suppose to get a cool wave for Saturday, so I had planned all sorts of relaxing things to do in the luxurious air conditioning of my home, like napping, lounging, and then napping.

So this morning I get up and let Sam and Loki outside, look up at the robin's nest and belatedly realize that out of the 4 birds that were in there... only 1 remains.  HOLY CRAP we have free range fledglings in the yard and that only means carnage!

It was at this time that the robin mom and dad start throwing a shit fit, screaming, swooping, and generally freaking out in the back of the yard (where Loki is sniffing) and I do that slow motion "NOOOOO" run toward the back of the yard to save the fledgling.  Luckily my full tilt bozo freaking out confused Loki, who semi-sorta obeyed me by running to me (he probably thought I was having a stroke and maybe when I fell down some treats would fall out of my pocket), while Sam was totally oblivious to his surroundings because he was searching for the perfect place to poo.

I get Loki under control by the scruff of his neck and order him to the house, which he does in a circuitous route with me yelling "IN THE HOUSE" all along, until finally we get to the back steps and WTF!  There's a tiny baby bird sitting right in front of the back door. 

This thing was SO not ready to leave the nest, and I have to guess that its much larger sibling (probably a bully robin that beat the smaller robin up for its regurgitated worm food) had thrown it out of the nest.  Bully robin was still perched on the nest, laughing.  I hate the bully robin.

My problem now was, if I let go of Loki and try for the baby bird, it would probably scream, Loki would hear it, then it would be a race for who got to the bird first, as earlier experience has shown... Loki is faster, especially when the stupid birds run away from me and straight into Loki's mouth.

I had to risk it because it was either that, or stand there holding on to Loki until the bird grew up, went to college, found a job, got married, and had a mid-life crisis... and its so hot that I'm sweating profusely.

I'm not sure if the bird was smart and realized I was saving it, or it was stunned after plummeting 10 feet onto concrete, but it just let me pick it up... great... now what?

Meanwhile, the parents are freaking and swooping at me now, so I take the bird inside and through the front door, to the front yard, and deposit it outside of the fence, but close to the place where I found it.  Birds are smart, and the thing will cheep and announce its location, right?

I herd the dogs inside and go about my business, but after a half hour I go back out and there's the parents feeding that worthless bully robin while I hear tiny desperate peeps coming from the other side of the fence.

GAH!!!!!

I close the gate to the deck so the dogs can't get up there if I let them out, get a box lid, go retrieve the stupid baby robin, carry him inside (where the dogs go insane), take it out on the deck, plop it in the box lid and retreat.  Sure enough the parents come check it out and give it a worm.  So much for the theory that the parents will shun a bird if you touch it.  I pat myself on the back for a job well done.... then watch the stupid baby jump out of the box lid, bounce crazily after its parent and fling itself off the deck.  The bird has a death wish.

Sure enough, the thing survives and is now clumsily trying to follow one parent who is looking for food for it.  I can't leave the thing in the yard, the dogs will get it!  FINE!

I google "what to feed a moron baby robin" and some site said you can feed it canned dog food... FINE, so I open a can (dogs go insane again), gush it into a bowl and go outside and relocate the stupid bird outside the fence again, raising it over my head as I go to show the parents where its going... found a nice shaded hidey spot for it, give it some dog food (which it liked), and left the gate open for a bit so the parents would get a clue.  Apparently robins aren't very linear and can't figure out change well... the robin kept going back to where the baby WAS, glaring at me. 

OHMYGAH FINE!!!!

I really want to put it back in the nest, but the bully robin is stomping all over it and will probably toss it to the pavement again, and I was half tempted to throw the bully robin in the yard to finally fend for itself, but I'm guessing it wants to stay in the nest until its 26 and glom on to its parents' health care program, so I get a box that has walls higher than the box top, but not too high that the parents couldn't get into it, put some nice leaves and stuff in it, go get the baby robin AGAIN (it now thinks I'm its mother and opens its mouth for food), put it in the box, put the box on the deck on a chair near the nest and retreat.

I hide downstairs and watch... hoping... will they.... YES, they figure out the baby is in the box and are willing to feed it from the box... WHEW!

Now I have to leash walk the dogs in the backyard until everyone makes it out of the yard.  I really have no delusion about the future of baby bird.  Its tiny, its survived two very large plummets to concrete and probably has issues and won't most likely survive, but I at least tried.  I couldn't just stand there and let Loki play with it, or throw it over the fence and listen while it peeped until it peeped no more... I tried, I gave it my best shot, but I'll still be sad.

Knowing my history, it will survive, get to the fledgling stage... and fly straight into Loki's mouth.

So much for my relaxing Friday, which is why I created my new icon

What a Difference a Pillow Makes

For a while now I've woken up feeling like total crap.  Stiff, creaky neck, headaches, stuffed up nose, post nasal drip dry cough and generally feeling like a herd of River Dance people stomped on me (a nightmare in itself).

I tried drugs, thinking it was just allergies.  They didn't really work, still woke up feeling crappy.  After trying a myriad of different possible solutions, I decided that I needed a new pillow.  I liked my squishy down pillow, but it was about all squished out and not supportive at all, so I went in search of a pillow that would fit my sleeping patterns, which consist of this:

Every night, Meeshka sits on my head, Sam and Loki fight for the foot of the bed. 

After about 20 minutes, Meeshka gets too hot and jumps down, so Loki stomps all over me and takes her spot and sleeps half on the end table and the other smelly half is shoved in my face.  Sam takes the whole foot of the bed.

After about 20 minutes, Loki spreads his full ample ass and takes over the whole head of the bed through the ingenious use of swift kicks to my face with his pokey little feet, and Sam oozes into taking over the foot and half of the middle of the bed. 

The "No Dog Zone" is Lobersterman's side of the bed.  He made it very clear from the beginning that no dogs are allowed over there, and they respect it, unless he's eating something, and then all bets are off.

So, the perfect pillow would have to be for someone that sleeps on their side, back, face, half off the bed and toward the center of the bed, sometimes sliding off the bed.

I went to Kohls and searched.  I found two really nice dresses for work and then actually made it back to the pillow department, where I tested each pillow for comfiness, but most were ONLY for one position or another... until... I found this:

Now I have to say that I'm not crazy about the whole memory foam thing.  Lobsterman had one and it seemed like it was too squishy and it also was HOT!  Coming from someone who is a potential candidate for spontaneous human combustion at night, the LAST thing I need is a pillow to contribute to the overall over-heating problem I have, but this one is different.

Its actually a memory foam pillow on one side, and a nice squishy down-like pillow on the other side.  It felt really supportive and its made for sleeping in any position... oh and it was half off.  Oh hell yeah, its mine!

I took it home, changed the dog fur laden sheets and put a new pillow case on it, and then couldn't wait to go to bed to try it out.

This morning I woke up... and felt AMAZING!  No crappy sinuses, barely any neck ache, no headache, slept like a log (even with Loki kicking me in the face) and wow!  Holy crap!

Now I'm wondering if I was allergic to the real down pillow.  I really can't believe how much better I feel after using this thing.  I give it two solid thumbs up and can't wait for my afternoon nap.

Fond Childhood Memory #937: Running Away

As I'm sure the majority of you have done, when I was a teenager I decided to run away.  I don't distinctly recall the reason, but I'm pretty sure it was something major like my parents wouldn't let me do something that would have ended with me losing some fingers and an eye, which is just like parents to keep their kids from doing fun things.

Regardless of the reason, I pronounced to my father that I hated everyone and was going to run away.

Dad: Ok
Me: I'm serious, I'm running away.
Dad: Fine, where do you want to go?
Me: I'm not telling you because then you'll know and that defeats the whole purpose of running away!
Dad: Well, I was going to offer to drive you to the bus station and buy you a one way ticket.
Me: what?
Dad: You don't have to stay where the bus drops you off, but at least I'll know that you are out of the county.
Me: What?
Dad: well, if you just "run" away from home, you probably won't get very far and end up back here.

I was going to mention to him that I ran Cross Country and would at least make it five miles away before tiring, but...

Me: FINE!  Let me go pack my things.
Dad: Well, I would like to point out that most of your stuff isn't really yours, I mean your mother and I paid for those things, we're just letting you use them.
Me: WHA?
Dad: You can take whatever you paid for, but the rest has to stay here.
Me: but... but...
Dad: ok, fine, you can take the clothes you are wearing, now is there anything else you've paid for?
Me: YOU'RE NO FAIR!

At this point I stomp upstairs

Dad: well, if you aren't running away today then you'll have time to weed the garden before supper.

This Old Foreclosed House - Update

Yeah, yeah, I know, its been a while since I've updated my blog.  Frankly there's just so much stupidity going on that its overloaded my brain.  There just isn't enough time in the day to blog about all of it, it would be a full time job... if full time job meant sitting on my ass all day and blogging while shoving cheese doodles in my face and not getting paid.

So, here is the latest installment of "This Old Foreclosed House", because there's just oodles of stuff going on there.

First, let's all recall what the craptastic foreclosed house looked like for a few years while it went through the foreclosure process:

Through years of complaining to the Health Department, we finally got them to cover the half filled with crap and water mosquito swarmed inground pool wreck:

So... there it sat for a few years, with more phone calls, more complaining to the bank that owned it...

FINALLY, some work started getting done on it, but we're pretty sure they contracted out to the local "some guy who has a pickup truck and a screwdriver" to do the work because...

Some guy with a pickup truck and a screwdriver and some friends started dismantling the back addition to the house and throwing all of the debris into the pool.  When they were done throwing the back end of the house in the pool, they threw the vermin filled shed in the pool, broke up the concrete around the pool and threw it in the pool and then...

Yep, brought in fill dirt and started burying all of the junk.  They also left half of the rickety deck up... for some reason.  Sure, we called the health department about it, but by the time they showed up...

In ground pool?  What in ground pool, I have no idea what you're talking about... please note, the fence is gone now... 3 guesses on where it went.

Allrighty then.  It came as no surprise when this happened:

Which meant even more dirt on top and some straw, to make it very tasty:

There!  Nobody will know what kind of crap is buried under there, and lets rip off the siding while we're at it... yeah, that looks GREAT!

How about we build an extension to the rickety deck using 2x4s for supports with no supports at the back... yeah, that would be great!  We can also throw mis-matched gray siding to it, and as an added bonus, lets throw some of that gray siding over that window we boarded over... yeah, that looks GREAT!

There was a LOT of speculating and even some betting as to whether the deck was level.

 Hubby claimed it was all an optical illusion because of the way the boards were, and the darker crappy rotted wood of the old section... so I went over and checked.

Yep, its level... amazingly enough, its level.

So then... they started painting the gray siding white... I have no idea.

The part that really pisses me off... their "yard" looks better than mine

But at least I know that if I dig in my yard, I'm not going to unearth half a house, a shed, some fencing, concrete, insulation, drywall, mold and probably the body of a mobster.

Taunting Telemarketers (Part 386)

Actual telemarketer call

6pm, while I'm chopping up veggies for fajitas, the phone rings, and rings, and rings, and rings, I finally answer it:

me: what?
TM: Hi, this is a courtesy call from blah blah home improvements...
me: who?
TM: Dumbass home improvement company, we'd like to offer you a free estimate on new windows...
me: do you know what the definition of "courtesy" is?
TM: um
me: courtesy isn't calling someone at 6pm after they've had a crappy week, and its ONLY TUESDAY, while all they want to do is make some tasty fajitas, after which I'll need to be hosed off, and then crawl into bed with the realization that tomorrow will be another crappy day, and if I don't get some tasty fajitas then I'm half tempted to drive my truck into my garage, close the door and let it run until I'm dead... but I don't have a garage.
TM: um
me: hey, do you build garages? I could totally use a garage right now because instead of making fajitas I'm talking on the phone with you.
TM: um
me: seriously, I'd leave you a check for it, but I have to be up front, the check is going to bounce because... well, I'm dead and I don't care if you get paid for the garage or not, can you do an estimate on a nice garage that's all sealed up so the carbon monoxide fumes won't escape and I'll die quicker?
TM: um
me: ok, how about you just stop calling me because I'm on the "do not call" list
TM: ok... have a nice night
me: you too clueless wonder
click

Spray Painted Mailbox Part II

Yeah, yeah, its been a while since I had a good rant, but there's just so much madness going on in the world that I was overwhelmed with stupidity and took to sitting on my ass and playing Angry Birds.

FINE!  I don't really need an excuse to sit on my ass and play Angry Birds, and seriously, I'm not addicted to it in any way, its perfectly normal to sit for hours on the toilet and play it, so SHUT UP AND STOP JUDGING!

I figured I'd follow up on the spray painting the mailbox post a few after the fact... mainly because I wanted to be sure that  the new paint job wasn't going to wash off in the rain and then I'd be sitting here gloating over how pretty the mailbox actually turned out when in fact I'd be a liar, liar, pants on fire with a craptastic mailbox.

So... if you recall in our last adventures, I tried to spray paint numbers on the stupid thing, but the numbers ran, so I had blobs of white paint and ... oh good gah, just go read the last blog entry and catch up.  Hurry up, we'll wait for you, and no, we won't talk behind your back (bitch).

Ok, so rather than hack off my finger trying to install a new one, or paying someone to replace it, I just bought more spray paint.  Of course you are rolling your eyes thinking I'm sadistic, but this time I actually did research and found out that the spray paint that I used isn't for plastic.  So I found the stuff that you can actually use on plastic, except it wasn't the BRAND I wanted, which meant they didn't have the cool plum color I wanted (bastard Home Depot), so I opted for the "Hunter Green", although the bright orange was tempting... and had I been single, it would have been my color of choice, but part of marriage is give and take... mostly give, with some taking when the other is asleep or passed out or handcuffed to the radiator.  Please note, we have no radiators in the house, so I'm not disclosing any family secrets here.

After 20 minutes of circling the spray paint department of Home Depot, I go to pay for my purchases, and opt for the self checkout, because I was in a foul mood to begin with, I just wanted to scream at the faux happy mechanical check-out bot and leave.  Of course that was impossible, because apparently in the state of craptastic Merryland, you have to show someone your drivers license to buy spray paint.

Why?  I have no frickin clue what this accomplishes... that I can drive to my next tagging gig?  That I'm old enough to drive a car and therefore know to buy the gold spray paint to huff (p.s. I have no idea why huffers like the gold paint, but a friend speculated it was because gold is expensive... looking, or they want to look like Goldfinger, although they would actually look like Jill Masterson, the hapless employee of Goldfinger, who is spray painted gold by Oddjob and killed by epidermal suffocation... which isn't even a plausible cause of death, and more likely she succumbed to the stupid plot line, but I digress).

So, even though I did everything humanly possible to avoid human contact, I was forced to show the "keeper of the machines" my drivers license and then wait for her to figure out how to let the machine know that I'm old enough to huff spray paint if I damn well want.

As there was a pretty stiff 60mph wind that afternoon... ok, it was like 10 mph, I waited for the next day and then spray painted the mailbox Hunter Green... and it looks pretty good.  Of course I should have waiting for the mailman to pick up the mail, because the timing from completion to completely dry was interrupted by mail delivery and once slightly pissed mailman, so there was some touch up to the door, but otherwise it went smoothly.

The next day, using the stupid stencils, I used a paint brush and white paint and TAH DAH! 

No, I'm not going to take a picture of it because then my street address would be there for the world to see, and I'm not going to airbrush it out because then you would all be like "look at the big glob of airbrush on it, that looks like crap", and since I know most of you are haters of pretty green mailboxes, you can just imagine and scoff to yourselves.

Tomorrow:  I cut the Federal budget with wood chipper.

Why I Spray Painted My Mailbox

I hate my mailbox.  It was here when we moved in.  Its brown, its plastic, it sits on a wooden pole, and it holds the mail, so its functional.

I don't want a giant trout mailbox, or a racecar mailbox, or even a husky shaped mailbox, I just want a mailbox that will hold the mail and keep it dry... which is one of the main problems with our mailbox.  It hates us.

If it rains, the door will magically open and the mail will get wet.  We blamed the mailman, but watched on several occasions as the mailman came and went and diligently closed the door, through rain, and sleet, and all that other crap, the door was always closed with a resounding thud.  We even hid our cars and pretended not be be home, because mailmen are cagey and would know they were being watched and only do it on days when they knew we weren't home... but sure enough... diligent mailman.  The only other alternative: the mailbox hated us.

FINE, I don't much like it either.  Mainly because I can't get the stupid reflective street numbers to stick to it.  Oh sure, we have decorative worthless street numbers that you can't even see unless you were inches away with a magnifying glass, so we put the reflective stickers on the mailbox itself... only to see it shed them off at the slightest wind.

FINE! So we got one of those things that you bolt to the top... except someone stole it.  Yes, I went from street to street and checked out everyone that had the same street number as us, but you can only go to so many streets before you realize you should just go freakin buy another one.

FINE! So we buy another one, except they don't make the one that will fit on our box, and even if they did, the bolts that hold it are so rusted we'd have to rip them off and probably break the spindly plastic mailbox, so we bought another one, and that one requires drilling new holes and who freaking has time to do that (especially since the new level of Angry Birds came out).

FINE!  So at Lowes this afternoon I bought stencils and spray paint.  I would also like to take a moment to bitch to the stencil people who only put 1 copy of each freakin letter and number in there, so I had to buy TWO sets of complete stencils.  Why don't they sell individual stencils?  HMMMM?

FINE! So I get home and carefully put the correct numbers in the correct order and tape the row of numbers together so they stay straight and go out with the stencils and spray paint... AND I CAN'T GET THE LID OFF THE SPRAY PAINT!  Apparently its a "safety" thing to keep kids from huffing spray paint... like they can't afford spray paint, a paper bag AND a screw driver to jam under the lid? 

FINE! So I go inside and get a screwdriver and the STUPID PIECE OF CRAP LID STILL WON'T COME OFF!  So I beat it to pieces with a hammer, and go out and attach the stencil to the mailbox and spray the "drip less" spray paint.  "Drip less"?  SERIOUSLY?  Its dripping all over the place, and not only that... but the numbers look like a freakin blob of white.  Now I have a freakin blob of white on my mailbox.  Great, that looks like crap.

So I sprayed the sides and top of the stupid thing and now it looks like crap... and I don't care.

Eventually we'll have to get another one... which means replacing the rotting pole its on, cutting through power lines, and probably severing a finger... I'll pay any of you to come replace it.... because you still can't see our address numbers under all that dripping white spray paint.

Sudafed Protocol

For the third day in a row I woke up with a cement block in my left sinus and an ice pick embedded in my left eye.  No amount of over the counter drugs hoarded in the house seemed to be making things better, so I did a silly thing and actually called for a doctor's appointment.  Lobsterman assured me that I would most likely get in a month from now... dead or alive.

Some masterful whining got me an appointment with some doctor at my usual clinic, not my usual doctor... but at that point I just wanted to see anyone that had a license to write a prescription, so in theory I could have just gone to any street corner in Baltimore, but Baltimore is such a hassle and you can never find parking.

Doctor appointment time came, and the guy pretty much told me I was out of luck.  I wasn't running a fever, therefore no infection, therefore no drugs.  He told me to suck it up, buy better over the counter drugs, and come back if I got worse.  Yep, and that's why I pay $350 a month for health insurance!

After I ripped his still beating heart out of his chest and showed it to him (ok, not really, but I did in my head), I ventured to the pharmacy for something stronger than what we currently had. 

This meant taking one of the little slips of paper with the picture of your drug of choice to the pharmacy, where they take your driver's license, run a back ground check on you, strip search and cavity check you, then tell you they only have the generic version of the "over the counter" drug of your choice.  FINE!  GIVE IT TO ME!

I bought the last bag of Cherry 3-muskateers, so this means that I can make cherry flavored meth in my bathtub had I not failed miserably at being a crack-ho (and yes, I know there's a difference between crack and meth, I didn't fail that miserably at being a crack-ho!)