The Green Room

Hippiewood

kitrimae — Wed, 04 Oct 2006 19:47:52 +0000

My new house is great. My new roommate is also great. My neighborhood is also… well, entertaining.

For those of you who haven’t already heard this story, I had an ‘incident’ with the local grocery store when I first moved in. After a long, hard day of schlepping boxes and unloading things, I said to myself: Self, you need some dinner. Why don’t you go to the cute little hippie grocery store a few blocks away and pick up one of those ready-made sausage and cheese lasagnas? You can come back home, pop it in the oven, unpack a few boxes, and Voila, it will be ready and waiting and full of hot steamy deliciousness. So I did.

My wonderful SO and I then made the short hike to the store and marvelled at the wide selection of Vegan foodstuffs and healthy options. We stopped at the frozen foods aisle and started searching for the sausage and cheese lasagnas. There were a plethora of options, including but not limited to: cheese, spinich, vegetarian D-lite, and mushroom. No sausage. So we looked for ready-made ravioli instead. Same options. We looked at the frozen pizzas. Same thing too! An awful truth fell upon us… the only meat options in the whole store were organic and raw and behind the meat counter window. Nothing else in the store contained even a trace of meat of any kind.

Oh, my. Since I’m a slight carnivore, this posed a problem – at least for my ready-made dreams that night. Since then, I’ve been more than a little entertained (and most of the time pleased) with the hippie antics of my neighbors. Some of my favorites:

* The angry smiley face signs with NO HIPPIEWOOD WAL-MART captions

* The bumper stickers that say things like “Are you breathing? Thank a tree”, “Practice Safe Politics: No Bush. No Dick.” and “Global warming is uncool”

* The gardens in front of everyone’s house with enough veggies growing in them to feed a small nation

* The “impeach Bush” signs on every power pole. I mean EVERY power pole.

I’m sure there will be more stories to tell. In fact, I’m looking forward to it.

Witty Anecdotes

kitrimae — Thu, 28 Sep 2006 21:48:52 +0000

Just so everyone knows, I’m number two on the list when one searches for “witty anecdotes”. Ha!

I’m Sorry, Come Back Later, I’m Trying to Escape…?

kitrimae — Thu, 28 Sep 2006 05:21:20 +0000

You know, sometimes, at the end of a long hard day at work, as I’m digging the grape pumace out from under my nails and picking various small crawly things out of my hair, I start thinking: should I stay? Maybe I should just run. I wonder how far away I could get before 8:30 the next morning rolls around and they drag my po’ ass back in to work. Do I have enough money on my credit card to charge a flight to Bora Bora? You know, I’ve heard that Greenland is icy and Iceland is actually quite green. Maybe I should go check it out in person, for myself. You know. Just to be sure.

My stressed mind works in an interesting way… as far as I know, only my best friend and my mother truly know the depths of how I deal with stress and being, well, kind of exhausted. First comes Grumpasaurus Rex. The stage when every nice thing that comes out of my mouth is accompanied by ten more terrible, cynical and sarcastic remarks in my head. Next comes sad/cry time. Normally, I only cry at very sad things such as death and the lack of fudgesicles in my fridge, and the occasional sappy commercial (okay, every sappy commercial. Gosh.). The only thing that cures sad/cry time is sleep. I then go to sleep, and as long as it’s enough sleep to refresh me, then I wake up and all is right with the world and it’s as if nothing ever happened. Convenient!

So now I go to sleep. Tomorrow is a new day… hopefully with lots of fudgesicles and no sappy commercials.

People are Strange… When You’re a Stranger

kitrimae — Tue, 26 Sep 2006 20:30:59 +0000

So I’ve been left all alone! … in my house, that is. Isn’t it strange how normal things that you live with every day seem different when the situation is different? Everything seems so much bigger when Jessalynn gone away at grad school orientation. Like not just a little more roomy, like huge. Cavernous, even. And, as anyone who knows me is aware of, I don’t do well with scary things… like big-seeming empty houses.

And as if my house knew this about me, it made both my closet doors come off the hinges… at the same time. Open closet doors are scary too.

In other words, I think my house is trying to scare me. Luckily I have a big, tough boyfriend to do things like put my closet doors back on the hinges so the monsters can’t escape while I’m sleeping, and he checks to make sure there’s no homicidal maniacs or big hairy spiders hiding behind the shower curtain. He’s really an all-purpose, helpful kind of guy. The boyfriend, not the homicidal maniac.

Only two more nights until Jessalynn comes back. Phew. Then I can go about my regular, calm, not scary non-monster nights.

box it up

kitrimae — Wed, 20 Sep 2006 21:37:18 +0000

Why is it SO HARD to unpack those last two boxes after moving into a new space? I’ve been at my lovely new house for close to a month now and those two boxes just stare at me every time I walk in. They look at me with sad puppy dog eyes and whimper a little as I walk by.

But they’re full of stuff that I know I’ll need someday but have no place for and am not really to get rid of. Sigh. Like that extra portable CD player – you never know when you’ll need one of those. That little bedside fan for warm summer nights. That crystal vase that your dearest auntie gave to you on your college graduation day but is so godawfully ugly that you’re afraid to display it lest your friends think less of you. What to do?

The prognosis is yet unclear, but I feel the need for simplification. And I don’t want to feel guilty in my own home. By my own possessions. Any tips?

A _____ Sort of Day

kitrimae — Mon, 18 Sep 2006 17:17:03 +0000

It’s one of those sort of days today. One of those curl up on the couch under a blanket and watch a 12-hour British miniseries sort of days. One of those eat soup and grilled cheese for every meal sort of days. One of those I’d rather be at home doing anything than be at work sort of days.

But of course I’ll be hard at work* today. However, I vow to myself and to this gaseous puppy I’m again dogsitting, that this evening I’ll go home, make myself some grilled cheese and soup of the tomato variety, and watch an oh-so-fake British Edwardian-era drama. Ah, rainy days.

* The phrase “hard at work” does not in any way relate to me writing blogs during normal business hours.

not my job, m’kay?

kitrimae — Fri, 15 Sep 2006 17:34:26 +0000

So everyone has tasks at their place of employment that they do on a fairly regular basis that was never in their job description. Erm, so for example, let’s take…. ME. I was hired on at a certain winery in a certain small town to do marketing, website work, and sit in front of a computer all day. Blah blah blah. But a little something has been added to my task list, however. By “little” I actually mean “big”, and by “something” I actually mean “standard French poodle”. Well, shoot, folks. How is dogsitting NOT included in general office administration?

Normally I don’t mind. I like dogs. Dogs tend to like me. It’s a symbiotic relationship we have here in the downstairs office. But today we have a problem. My officemate, B, and I are of the opinion that our current sittee got into some kitty poo, or “kitty roca” as we lovingly refer to it as. Our poodle does love him some stinky roca for a tasty breakfast snack. And now our office is full of the “backdraft”, if you will. Nothing like poodle farts to start your day off right. We’ve nicknamed him Hamlet… there’s definitely something rotten in his state.

Also at work, we’ve started to fire off what we lovingly call the Bird Cannons. No, we’re not shooting birds, we’re shooting loud blasts of propane to scare the birds away. Every 30 seconds, a round of cannon blasts go off around the vineyard. It sounds like the calvary is coming, or like we’re on a pirate ship that’s under attack. ARRRR, mateys.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch… my boyfriend looks good in sweaters. I just saw him in one for the first time this morning. HOLLA.

it defines a generation

kitrimae — Wed, 13 Sep 2006 23:35:43 +0000

Oh. My. GAWD.

www.pimpfants.com

Watch your language, young lady!

kitrimae — Tue, 12 Sep 2006 05:21:50 +0000

So I’ve decided not to be amazed by some of the delightfully insulting things that servers say. But it’s difficult. I enjoyed dinner with my family the other night at a restaurant that shall remain nameless but has an Austrailian theme and boasts delicious fried onions that look like flowers. Mmm….

Anyway, my Dad told a great story about a waitress he had while out at breakfast the other day. He was sipping his caffienated morning beverage with, I suppose, a normal amount of enthusiasm when a waitress came by toting two steaming carafes of coffee. Dad set his mug out, hoping for a refill. The waitress paused, looked at his mug and then alternately at the two carafes in her hands, and said, “Are you regular?” Dad looked right back at her and says, “Well, I was this morning.” Yikes.

As if this anecdote couldn’t get any better, my family’s server then walked by with food for the table behind us. I have to believe that she was referring to the status of a diner’s drink when she said, “So, do you need a diet?” Oh, my. That went over like a fart in an elevator.

In other news, please help me out with my new ‘n improved blog. I appreciate any comments, either in the form of scathing and scandalous remarks or lavish praise.