Tuesday, September 30, 2014

Spinach recalls and police.

The media is driving me crazy with all of this police news.


I’m a true Libra, so I am almost always right in the middle – I try to see both sides of the fence.


I hate that most of the population is easily swayed by shiny things and loud noises.

Whatever the news stations and the interwebs are saying – that is exactly what the people swallow.

I feel very alone at times like this.  I feel like if I say the wrong thing in the wrong crowd, I’m dead meat.

During the peak of the Ferguson, MO shenanigans, everyone on the television had pitchforks and torches.  I can’t handle it.  I want to shake everyone and tell each of them to calm their tits and actually look at the situation.  

Speak of the devil, and he shall appear.  That is how the saying goes. 

Speak of Miley Cyrus dry humping at the VMAs, and everything in the news is Miley for a few weeks. Then we forget and find a new hot topic.  That doesn’t mean it goes away, just some other shiny topic came along.

Speak of Ebola, and everything in the news is Ebola for a few weeks.  Then we forget and find a new hot topic.

Speak of police brutality, and all of a sudden, all the news stories are about police brutality.  It’s the hot topic on which the general public is currently feasting.  This topic comes up every few years, n’est pas?

This hits me close to my heart though, because of the way that it directly affects society so immediately.

It also makes me wonder wtf is wrong with me.  Have I had too much exposure to the world?


A month or so ago, Kate and I were at the Yanni concert at Wolftrap.  After the concert, we were hanging out down by the stage, and then as we were leaving, there was some altercation, and the police were arresting a man.  They had him pretty laid out in the grass, and were cuffing him.  It was a normal take-down arrest.  I thought nothing of it, and hardly noticed it, but Kate…. Kate was a different story.  Kate was watching intently.  She was saying things like, “how can they do that, he’s an old man!”  I could see it in her eyes… the planted media thoughts.. I could hear her thoughts…  Police brutality.

Media is poison.


It was a normal take down.  I told her that.  She said, “I guess I’m just not used to seeing it.  You work in the city, so you see it all the time.” 
This led me to the most terrifying thought –
Is this what is happening to America?  Have I been overexposed to the world, and am now so calloused?  Kate absolutely had a lily-white naive upbringing, but… is she normal, or am I? 

This is like when there is an e-coli breakout in spinach, from one state, from one farm.  The media blows it up.  Then all spinach in America is burned, and no one will touch the stuff.  Doesn’t matter if 99.5% of spinach farms had nothing to do with it – they are dead meat.  Guilty by association.

That’s what this is.  Media highlighted the tragedy in Ferguson, and now police everywhere have to pay the consequences.  That officer will never stand a chance in the courtroom.  His side will never matter.  As someone who is a fence-sitter/observer, I hate that.  He will never have an impartial jury.  Not to mention; he will never have a normal life.  Ever again.

 Mass hysteria makes me very, very nervous.


I don’t know the solution.  I just know that it makes me feel very depressed and alone and patriotic.


What an uplifting blog entry!!!!  Look, I just need you to tell me that everything is going to be okay and that I’m normal. 


Wednesday, September 24, 2014

Bars, skin, God, grapes, blood.

Bars

The night before last, someone asked me to go out to dinner with them, and for a drink, because they were having a very bad day.  

Look, let’s be honest – if you are having a bad day, I’m pretty much the one person you want to be around.  

We went to this brand new place that just opened weeks ago.  It was lovely.  It’s kind of in the middle of nowhere, but there were people there… get this… at the bar… ready?... TALKING TO EACH OTHER.

  



It was the strangest phenomenon.  They were socially networking… in real life!  Like, they thought, “Ugh, what a tough day at work, I’m going to go get a drink by myself at this new bar, and then I’ll talk to people while I am there.”

Mind. Blown. 



I’m sorry, I know I’m from a new generation, but I just don’t see that a lot.  I’m a pretty independent soul, so I do, well, basically everything by myself, unless folks tag along.  I’ll go to movies, restaurants, whatever.  But we are living in a time when people simply don’t like talking to strangers.  Well, anyway.  Hopefully I’m wrong.


Skin


I was babysitting a 4-year old the other day.  It was  a lot.  But she is adorable.  Here is an actual conversation we had:


Veronica: I think that this time next year, when the weather is like this again, you will be going to Kindergarten.

Little Girl:  Yeah.  My friend Lucy is already going to Kindergarten.  She is my best friend.  Her skin is a different color.

V:  :: super awkward, yet curious pause. ::   Did you say her skin is a different color?  What does that mean?

L.G.: Her skin looks a lot different than mine.

V:  It does?

L.G.:  Yes.

V:  Why do you think that is?

L.G.:  Well, because God makes everyone different.  We can’t all be the same.  He makes every single person different, with different hair and different skin.  God makes us all different because it would make no sense if everyone was the same. 

V: I think you are correct.

 Which leads me to...

God

I’ve been thinking a lot about faith, and religion, and if there are any action items on my part.  Well, to be fair, it’s something I always think about, and always ask people about.  I like to find out what conclusions other humans have come to.  I believe in everything.

I've gone to a few churches lately.  I don't know why - I guess I'm trying to see if I feel compelled to go back.  I used to - in a previous life.  


So when I go to modern churches, it's the weirdest experience to be standing in the crowd, staring at the lead singer of the band, and remembering what that felt like.  Remembering what it felt like to stand in front of thousands of people and just... feel.  Now, I think that capacity to feel has been locked up in some chamber, somewhere deep inside of me.  Not sure that it will ever surface, and maybe that's fine.

Until then, I don't know what I'm supposed to be feeling.




Grapes

Also, I went to this place called Grapes Bar in Annapolis with my friends Karen and John.  It was magical.  Karen had a gift card that she needed help spending.  It was fun to order food and wine that I would never in my life normally order.  

I just want to say… there were definitely times of inappropriateness.  Especially when the fig/goat cheese/caramelized onions/Applewood smoked bacon flat bread came out.  

Seriously, we all had a mini-O.  No joke, it was like a real-life version of Meg Ryan in "When Harry Met Sally."


   

Not even an exaggeration.



 I don't even remember what exactly this was called (due to having gone through 2 bottles of wine), I just remember it was actual heaven.  Shrimp, linguine, ... truffle oil?  I can't even remember. 


 This would be on my menu for my death-row prison last meal.



John is taking it seriously.




I love hanging out with these people, because they take food photography just as seriously as I do.


Blood

I got my flu shot yesterday, and gave blood today, like a good human.



Do you give blood?  You should.  Shut up with your excuses.  Come on.  Do it.  What if you need blood one day?  Where do you think that comes from?



Take care of yourself.


Friday, September 19, 2014

Oprah


Every month or so, I get a coupon from Target for 5% off.  It’s an all-day ticket, so I always hand it to the person in front of me, and then the person behind me, and everyone around me.  Cashiers hate me, but it makes me feel like Oprah – “YOU GET 5% OFF!!!  AND YOU GET 5% OFF!!!”  Look, it really helps, especially, bless their hearts, those folks with a cart full of baby food and stuff.






I had a dream in time gone by...




Okay, well, I'm out of time... I have other things to discuss with you, but it will have to wait.


Tuesday, September 16, 2014

“Well, the QUEEN is coming, better get fresh vegetables.”

 

I have so many things to share with you, that I don’t even know where to begin!




A couple of my friends had me over for dinner the other night, and it’s been a while since I have seen them.  A long while.  For dinner, Peter made (period food - "Well I was thinking about what they would have eaten in 1814...") dill carrots, baby baked/roasted potatoes, green bean casserole, and filet mignons.  Everything was delicious – and they know how I love vegetables.  Peter was saying how they stopped at roadside stands on the Eastern shore.  Brian said, “Well, the QUEEN was coming!!”  I thought it was very funny.  And true.


View from their balcony.

I love that condo.  It’s a palace in the sky, above the peasants of the city folk.  After the fireworks (where, btw, we got to see this WHOLE BEATIFUL SHOW .  If you don’t have time to watch, just skip to 18:14... IRONY? I THINK NOT) we just took the elevator upstairs and settled in our pajamas. 

Our dinner Star Spangled dinner table

Veronica: “Do you think Baltimore has calmed down yet?”

Brian: “Oh no, it’s a shit show.  We’re up here eating two kinds of cake, drinking tea, and playing the game of Life, and they’re out there poppin’ each other and fist fighting.” 

Pinkies up, ladies.  Or, down, as it were.


Some pictures from the Star Spangled Spectacular

View from my office: 


Blue Angels show - viewed from the 20th floor:






I would like to introduce you to my Maple Whiskey with OJ and Bacon brunch beverage.
It was magical.

Malory

This kid who sits near me, bless his heart, calls me Malory sometimes.  As in, Malory Archer, from the show Archer.  This would be due to my general cold-heartedness in daily human interactions, because, bless his heart, he has to hear every encounter I have.  So when this girl (who somehow has all of the time in the world, every day, to go around to several people and disclose all sorts of TMI no one asks for) comes up to me and starts telling me all about her new boyfriend, I send the boy an IM that said something like, “… did I even engage her in conversation?”  He responded with, “…She’s standing right in front of you.”  And I said, “And?...”  Then he called me Malory when she walked away, and JUST as she left, one of my managers came up and asked me for a notebook, or something to write on.  I asked him what kind of notebook he wanted, and he said, “eh, whatever makes it look like I am feigning interest in whatever the person is talking about in this meeting I’m about to go to.”  LOL perfect timing.  

THESE ARE MY KIND OF PEOPLE.   Bless his heart- this kid is just a temp, so he doesn’t have to deal with us non-feeling folk for much longer.  But he did hit the nail on the head with calling me Malory.  Not even sorry.




And this classic...



Scumbag Pandora

I pull out my headphones any time commercials come on my Pandora, but I have recently realized that they have been playing a lot of these commercials lately…  WHAT GIVES, PANDORA??  Rude stalker speaking-out-of-turn assholes.  Just because I am of a certain age, I don’t need the reminder.  And I certainly don’t want to end up like Jennifer Lopez in The Back-Up Plan (2010). 


Sarah McLachlan

If I’m not home enough, Smidgen and Cow will sometimes take to Facebook to start singing “In The Arms Of The Angel” in hopes that Sarah McLachlan will come see how abused and neglected they are.  They just want to be on TV.  They are attention whores.  I spend ONE WEEKEND AWAY and I’m getting Grandcatmother guilt.




I just looked at the bottle of this pill that I take every day.  I have complied with literally none of it.  Oops.  Pretty terrifying.  Ah, whatever.



Look at these shoes.  Look at them.


I would never EVER have an occasion to wear them, and they are $150, but just look at them. Lawd Jesus it's a fire.

IMPORTANT NEWS:  DANIELA HAD HER BABY!

He is gorgeous and so is she, and also he happens to weigh approximately 54 lbs.  Okay 9.9.

I do not even understand how she carried him in her womb.  I carried it for 5 minutes and I was done.  Even with my STRONG ARCHERY ARMS.





Actual quote from an e-mail I just received from Kate:

"You’re an asshole and an angel."

Seems accurate.


 I'll be in Seattle soon.  I'll tell you more about that later.

Laters, Babe.