You're Doing It Wrong

We have two sets of sheets at our house: summer and winter. That’s about as high maintenance as I get.

When I do the big switch I usually take the whole bed apart and wash the mattress pad. I shake out the comforter and wash and carefully fold the stuff I’m putting away.

I’ve been wanting to buy us a new comforter for several years and I usually think about it in the fall. But since I hate shopping I always put it off thinking it will be easier to do next weekend. Then I next weekend it until the holidays. Who wants to deal with buying new bedding during the holidays? Then I’d plan to do it during the after holiday sales and I’d keep putting it off until next weekend. And so on until the holiday sales were over and why not just wait until fall?

For some reason I felt very determined about doing it this year and we’re long overdue to switch to winter sheets so I made myself do it today. Shortly before the economy went to hell a ginormous (aside: I can’t believe spellcheck doesn’t recognize “ginormous”) strip mall of big box stores opened near our house and I’ve been to the Target but nothing else.

I’ve never seen more than 5 cars in front of the bedding store and today was no different. The store had no customers besides me and an old lady who looked like she might be part zombie who at one point had to be in the precise aisle I was trying to be in.

I decided on a comforter and then looked for a cover. I want flannel. Summer is cotton. Winter is flannel. That’s how I do it. I have no interest in changing. What’s the point of enduring all this aging crap if you can’t be rigid and uncompromising in your ways?

They have no flannel covers. This is a store you could park a 747 in. It is filled floor to ceiling with tons and tons of crap related to beds, baths and beyond. You know what they told me? “They don’t make them anymore.”

I drove across the parking lot to this other store I’ve never set foot in. Their selection was even more grim but they didn’t have “bed” in giant letters on the outside of the building so I’ll cut them some slack.

As soon as I got home I jumped online and I found a few things but nothing I loved. The Company Store has a huge selection but I’ve always been afraid to order from them because I don’t think you can ever get off the mailing list. Even if you die. But then I thought what the hell, I want a new flannel comforter cover.

They have an amazing selection except you know what? I don’t want to sleep under something with: penguins, horses, elephants, butterflies, cats, dogs or polar bears on it. These must be very popular choices especially the penguins because there were two different kinds. I tried to think if there was ever a time in my life where I would have wanted to sleep with elephants on my comforter. No. Maybe when I’m even older and crankier? I doubt it.

They only had one that I liked and I realized it looks almost exactly like what I already have. (I have other requirements which include: dark colors, not too girly.) So I said: Screw It! I will just use the old one.

This is my bus stop on the new transit mall. I’m not sure about the three tiny chairs. The display screen doesn’t include the Vancouver buses and has been stuck on October 5 since October 5. I was wondering how that clear roof thing was going to hold up and it is already dirty with leaves on it. But maybe these monsooning rains will clear it off.

The big fancy Fred Meyer on Hwy 14 has a pretty decent cheese selection. There’s a little basket in the case with small chunks of cheese so you can try different things without spending a lot of money.

Since I knew I was going to be bringing my lunch this week, I bought a couple of samples thinking I could eat that with a hunk of bread. You know how in adventure stories they’re always eating bread and cheese?

Yesterday I cut a piece of both samples and brought them in. One was Manchenga which was fantastic and the other I will not name but will say that it smelled like dirty socks that had spent a hundred years soaking in rancid yak fat. I tried to be game and I cut it in half and stuck it on my bread and took a bite.

Yikes. At first I thought I was fine and was going to go ahead and swallow it. Then I ran from the room and scraped it off my tongue with a paper towel. Determined to teach the cheese a lesson, I chucked it violently into the trash. Then the trash in the lunch room stunk like a yak’s locker room. (We don’t really have a lunch room, it’s a closet-like space with a copier, mini-fridge, cupboards and a sink.)

So much for adventure. It reminded me of when me and my sister were really little and went to Germany to meet our grandmother. She had some limburger cheese and I guess we complained about it so she put it in the bathroom. Or maybe she stored it in there all the time. I don’t know. One of us had to use the bathroom and we cried because of the smell.

I will probably surprise you when I tell you that I’ve had a huge variety of office jobs since the late eighties and I’ve never used PowerPoint. In fact, until very recently I’d never had a computer with PP on it and until even more very recently, had never even opened the program.

And even though I’ve never used it, I don’t like it. I’m like those people who want to ban books they’ve never read or complain about movies they’ve never seen.

There’s a situation coming up in a few short days and I’ve been advised (not ordered) that a PP might be valuable in this situation. And I said, I can’t do it. I don’t know how to use PP.

Every single person I’ve told this story to has said, “Sure you can. PP is easy.”

Baking chocolate chip cookies is easy. Driving a car is easy. Juggling flame-throwing chainsaws is easy — IF YOU ALREADY KNOW HOW TO DO IT.

Yeah, I’m sure even a wizened intellect like mine could figure it out. It’s hard to tell when I haven’t even tried. But it’s not like I’m just going to cut and paste an outline. I need to think about how to organize my information for the intended audience using this type of communication.

Also I don’t want to because I think PP makes you stupid. Wasn’t there a study or something to support that? PP makes you 5 to 75 percent more stupid? I thought I heard that.

I guess instead of sitting here whining I could be learning PP.

This is a neighbor cat that ran over to say hi and then got suspicious when I broke out the camera.

My sweetheart did a lovely post of shots around the neighborhood.

Today had some great parts and some aggravating parts. I woke up at 3am and couldn’t get back to sleep, we had a plumbing problem which was eventually resolved and then the Internet died. So I spend most of the morning tired and trying to problem solve.

At Noon we zoomed out of the house to the Wordstock Festival one of our favorite annual events. We cruised the floor and saw several people we know. We had tickets to the special Sherman Alexie event. Have you read this great poem Unkissed by him? If you’re thinking, oh – I’m not a poetry person, you should read it anyway. It’s a poem for everyone. He was awesome as usual and we now each have a signed copy of his new book.

We also saw Shawn Levy talk about his Paul Newman book. We’ve seen him speak once before and he’s always super-interesting with lots of filmgeek details.

You’d think an event like Wordstock: tables and tables of books and a room filled with book geeks would make me more excited about writing. But actually, the volume of stuff overwhelmed me. I want to support the business and buy small press stuff and magazines but I don’t have time to read the stuff I already have. Who can read all this stuff? Besides the moms and really loyal colleagues of the writers?

On the way home I was thinking that maybe I’d just recycle 75% of the stuff in my current magazine pile to catch me up to the current month. That was how I resolved my discomfort.

So getting back to Wordstock, it felt like there are already so many books out there. I don’t think that’s the right attitude I’m just telling you how I felt at the time.

Then we tried to take care of an errand on the way home and were thwarted so now I’ve got to try to keep my eyes open and finish my daily word count.

I never even went there but I miss it already.

Two Depressing Moments From TV Last Night

1. Hearing classic Blue Öyster Cult remade as dancebeat twaddle and sung by a breathy teenie-bopper and used to pimp a car that I wouldn’t drive if it was offered to me for free.

2. Three small children playing doctor. The “doctor” tells the other small children that what they need is more fiber. The solution? Froot Loops. I don’t even know which part is more depressing. Kids discussing fiber or the advertising brain trust that decided that the real selling point for a candy-flavored cereal is fiber.

Oops, the morning got away from me so only a couple of quick updates.

1. The good news is that I’ve completely restored my home email to exactly like it was before I upgraded it. Yay. The bad news is that all new mail on the machine since I switched is gone.

2. Simpson’s Review that includes a line about how the episode feels like it was written by elderly people. We thought it was hilarious. Ouch.

Wow. I’m grumpy this morning.

I just wrote 400 words about how much I hate all email programs that aren’t 2005 and earlier Eudora. Then I poured another cup of tea and realized no one wants to read that.

Then I started ranting about Ann Taylor. But I found some cookies so I deleted that, too, and will just say that my attempt to burn through my giftcard via Internet ordering failed so I’m still not done with them. They are doing nothing to convince me that they want my business.

I think I might break open this box of See’s and see if I can get some work done.

Timbers!

This is going to be another rambling thematically unlinked post.

This morning I got on the freeway behind a giant truck that I think was running on coal and camel fat. It was a curious smell coming from those bursts of murky exhaust.

Yesterday afternoon I went to the Timbers playoff game which was completely awesome. It was sunny, big crowd, cold beer. Exciting game. It ended in a 3-3 draw but the Timbers were eliminated because they lost the previous game 2-1. Bummer. But a great way to end the soccer season.

I’ve just started a major writing project that involves soccer so I’ve been thinking about soccer all weekend. World Cup starts June 11. Woo! Check out the official mascot Zakumi. He looks like the lovechild of a leopard and the Jolly Green Giant. I might have to replace my Shane in the lily pads desktop background for one of these Zakumi wallpapers because they are hilarious.

We found my camera battery charger yesterday. And when I say we, I mean Bob who miraculously found it downstairs in his man cave.

I noticed yesterday that the bulb company didn’t send me a catalog this year. Normally I’d be ordering my spring bulbs now. This reminds me of an experience I had with a completely unrelated company and goes under the heading: WTF with the marketing?

A couple years ago Mom gave me her bulb catalog to order. Now I was in their system. I started getting blizzards of catalogs. They didn’t just have X Bulb Catalog. They had about 20 bulb and flower catalogs. And maybe birdhouses. Or knitted things. I can’t remember. I called them up and told them to knock it off. The following year I ordered from them via the Internet. Now they had my email. EVERY WEEK I would get an email pimping some evening birdsong kiwi crocuses or Danish sunset tiger lilies.

You know what I don’t even think about much less purchase every week?

Flower bulbs.

So I told them to knock it off.

So now I get nothing? That’s the choice: bombarded or nothing? That’s what happened with the other company, too. They sold my name to every Tom, Dick and Harry in the world and when I told them to knock it off they stopped sending me their catalog. The one with stuff that I actually wanted to buy. So I called and asked what that was all about and they said I could open a new account with a different name.

They are doing it wrong.

My haircut lady phoned me last weekend to tell me she’s getting out of the business. She started working out at the mall at the beginning of the summer and I knew she didn’t like it there. I asked her if she meant the mall or cutting hair altogether. She said she was trying to get another business started. The styling job was too slow.

If you’ve ever seen my hair you’d wonder why I’d pay someone to cut it. I cut my own hair for years and years after I gave up that horrible Carol Brady shag I had in college. (Barely exaggerating – the haircut was so awful I don’t even think it was funny. I burn any photos I run across. I’m so grateful there was no Facebook back then.)

I started seeing my current person back when I was trying to improve my style and I wanted to get highlights or a weave or some fancy thing I thought was a good idea. I liked it at first but it cost a lot of money and took forever to do. I don’t have the patience to invest a lot of time into vanity.

Then I went back to my regular boring hair but I like my person so I still went to see her for a cut and style every other month. I don’t know the exact timeline, I think I’ve been with her 10 years. She’s moved salons at least six times. The mall was the sixth.

I hope it all works out for her. Meanwhile, I’m cutting my own hair again.