Momentum

Momentum

I spent this last weekend at Cedar Point in Ohio. The self-proclaimed Roller Coaster Capital of the World! Awesome? Absolutely.

This wasn’t my first trip there. Last October, Katy and I adventured from their home in Gambier up to Sandusky for an afternoon of screaming and eating. Despite the all-day rain and two-thirds of the rides being closed, we had an amazing time. The pictures look like a scene out of Zombieland. The place was nearly deserted. At the time, Katy was taking her Physics pre-rec and had been advised by her professor to use the roller coaster visit as an opportunity to explain the concept and application of Momentum. Needless to say, we spent more time galloping around and putting on funny hats than we did having an in-depth discussion of motion…but as I’ve been digesting this past week, month, year, and decade the idea of momentum seems strangely relevant.

To review: In classical mechanics, momentum is the product of the mass and velocity of an object. Like velocity, momentum is a vector quantity, possessing a direction as well as a magnitude.

There are all kinds of qualifications, additions, and subsequent applications to momentum as it applies to related principals, but for now we’ll leave it at that very simplified level. More so for me than for all you smarties reading this going, “Harumph! What a pansy explanation you wuss!”

Below, as some kind of culmination, are three thoughts on momentum.

MOMENTUM 1:

Relating to Mass and Velocity:

A) The heavier the object, the stronger the force.

B) The steeper the angle, the faster the fall. Or, it is better to have loved and lost/lossed.

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A) One of the most stomach wrenching moments of my 20’s was losing my Grandmother. I went through what I can only call a “blank” period, where life kept going, but it felt like I was riding along the surface, glossing over everyone and everything. Love “lossed.”

She and I were very, very close. Few relationships in my life have compared to the simple openness and unconditional love that we had for each other. She was not always an easy woman. I know I am similar in this way. We shared a knack for showing our affection rather than talking about it, for creating new traditions even days before she died. Outside of my immediate family (meaning my Mom, Dad, and Sister) she knew the most about me. In a way, more than they did, because she was just outside enough that I could confide in her, seek her guidance, her perspective, and her blunt honesty (which was never mean spirited or cruel).

After she died, part of me wished we had never been that close. Part of me wanted to shut all those doors because it would have been easier than feeling that void. That part of me was so very wrong.

While it has taken years to unpack, the force that relationship had on my life was incredible. To know that kind of love was out there, was real, and wasn’t gone forever gave me a kind of steel courage. In losing her, I gained a part of me. It pushed me up higher, it pulled me down harder, but I didn’t shatter. I thought I might. Maybe I did…but in the reassembly, all the parts of her that I loved the most became a part of me. My mass increased. My heart wept.

B) I was too blind to see what an impossibly steep peak we’d climbed. I was too sluggish and tired to understand what happened to get us there. I was too deceived to feel my way back down. The only way out must have been to fall. Love lost.

All. The. Way. Down.

When I was little, I was terrified of the high dive. I remember climbing the ladder unsteadily and clinging to the railings. Creeping out to the edge of the aqua board and looking at the water mixed with sky. I don’t actually remember jumping, but I do remember the landing. Flat on my back. Smacking the water and knocking the wind out of myself. Kicking to the surface and finding the edge of the diving pool, holding on and waiting. Waiting for the sting to go away…thinking I’d never do that again…

Fastforward twenty minutes: the webbed toes begin their climb again. Increased velocity had me hooked. I spent the rest of that summer on the high dive.

This winter, I landed in the grey Chicago cold. Flat on my back. Knocking the wind out of myself. Hanging on to anyone who would let me, waiting.

Fastforward six months: I am intrepid. I am sleek. I am nimble. I am electric. I am velocity. I am ready.

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MOMENTUM 2:

Perfectly Inelastic Collisions: Stick, don’t bounce.

Something has happened. A good, great thing.

In a paradigm where I am so used to bouncing up against the expectations and desires of another person, I have suddenly found myself sticking…

To contextualize the image, Wikipedia (yay!) does a nice job of simply explaining Inelastic Collisions using the visual metaphor of two snowballs hitting each other. They “stick” or, the collision absorbs all the momentum (transfers, physics blah blah) and ball 1 and ball 2 become, essentially non-ball 3. An elastic collision is something similar to pool balls clacking against each other. Momentum is transferred from ball 1 to ball 2. Matter is not moved, etc.

So. Sticking. Non-ball 3. A new and precious thing.

It’s awesome.

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MOMENTUM 3:

Conservation of Linear Momentum: Galilean Cannon, rebound higher.

I’ve been trying to find the least trite way to bring this blog to a close. I’ve already decided that I’m going to keep writing (Come visit me at Miss Bossy Blue Eyes, http://missbossyblueeyes.blogspot.com/) so we’re in no danger of me attempting to sum up more that is required.

Way back at the start of this project, I imagined an entirely different summation! I was going to have this year of new tricks and skills. Hilarious videos of me trying to folk dance, or pictures of some crafty new thing I did. Well. Instead you all got to look inside my brain while I unpacked and repacked one of the most bizarre years of my life.

Here’s the great part. I’d do it again in a second. Not that I WANT any of this to happen again (to anyone, ever) but the girl I am now, the freshly minted 30-year-old, is a better person for it.

Thanks, in an enormous part, to the love of my amazing friends, tolerant and inspiring co-workers, and my incredible family. Oh, and my cat. Of course.

Shout outs also go to:

Bloody mary’s

Wine

Pickles

Singing in the car

Theatre

Credit cards

FaceTime

Cheese

Kismet

Margaritas

For this portion of my reflection, I found the Galilean Cannon to be pretty damn apt. The principal here is rebound. Not “rebound” in that awful rom-com “I just need Mr. Right Now” sense. I mean the actual term describing motion transfer.

Imagine a stack of bouncy balls of ascending sizes (biggest on the bottom, smallest on top). When dropped to the ground--and of course assuming that you drop them so that they don’t go all over the floor--the smallest ball will rebound far higher than the initial drop height. You can actually try this with two balls, basketball/tennis ball say (I’m so blatantly ripping off Wikipedia right now) and see the motion transfer there too.

How fabulous is that! The ball doesn’t just bounce, it bounces HIGHER! It seems like it shouldn’t make sense, but the momentum is conserved and sent back up to the smaller ball.

Guys. I’m the smaller ball. I get to bounce off all of that. Bounce off the last 30 years. Bounce off the last 6 months. Bounce off the great. Bounce off the awful.

Bounce higher. Risk the falling.

Bounce faster. Risk the landing.

Bounce heavier. Risk the height.

As the deer in Milo and Otis puts it, “Bound and leap. Bound and leap! Let your heart lead and your feet will follow.”

Away we go then. Away we go!

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Tangent Class

Welcome to Tangent Class. I've decided, in honor of my beloved high school students, to write this blog in the format of my class last semester, where we basically just rode out every conversational tangent we could, until we learned things about theatre. Ta-da!
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Question: Do High Maintenance Women Snag Better Mates?

Before anyone wonders what bad crack I've been smoking, I will clarify that this is not MY question. In fact, this isn't really something I'd ever thought about before. Until EHarmony sent me an email with THAT as the subject.

Golly. I don't know. Define "better" please, oh Dating Gods.

Tangent: I don't actually say "golly" in real life.

Tangent: 9 times out of 10, even when I try to avoid swearing when talking to my students, by using a word like golly or heck, I will then swear in the following sentence. Such as, "Okay guys, I don't know what the heck you think you are doing. The dressing room is not the place to be loud and fuck around." Ooops. Thank goodness I teach high school(ish).

Tangent: I don't teach in a curricular high school. This is a plus for many reasons, not the least of which is the occasional swear.

Okay.

Define "better." Is "better" someone who is also seeking a high maintenance person, because that, for me, would be "worse." I spent a good deal of time in previous relationships trying to be seen as legitimately low-maintenance, when they really wanted the opposite.

Tangent: A lot of the men I see with extremely high maintenance women (I'm being generic and going with the women who you KNOW take 2 hours to get ready to go to the 7-11) do NOT seem like the prize picks. These men seem alternately terrified of and angry at their ladies.

Tangent: This may or may not have to do with the odd coincidence that I never seem to see ugly people yelling at each other outside of bars. I know it happens. I just seem to keep catching the really drunk, really made-up girl shouting at the really drunk, really gelled hair guy.

Tangent: I don't know how readily this can be interpreted as any kind of fact. I think I've been out at bar closing time exactly three times in the last eight years.

Tangent: That's a lie. If I check my bank statements for ATM transactions at the Golden Nugget on Lincoln I'm sure I could manage a more accurate late-night count.

Tangent: The Golden Nugget is a chain of amazing, wonderful diners. Their food is best when you are pre-soaked in booze.

Back to the high maintenance. And, the article. It doesn't (as I was hoping) provide examples that we mid-maintenance ladies can use to up our maintenance level. This is the best I could come up with:

Can I change my own windshield wiper blades?

Definitely.

Tangent: I'm nearly 30. If I couldn't do that by now, I'd be up shit creek.

Tangent: I have recently heard this expression as "Shit's creek." I have no idea which version is accurate. Was it a family property with a creek bearing the family surname? Because, yikes.

Tangent: Now a family called the Shits makes me think about Robin Hood, Men in Tights, when Latrine makes the joke about changing the family's name in the 1500's from Shithouse to Latrine...

Tangent: The other day my Dad used an expression that I hadn't heard in years. When describing a very large and terrifying woman at the airport he said she was, "Built like a brick shithouse." It was not an untrue statement.

ANYWAY.

Can I change my own windshield wiper blades? Absolutely.

Wouldn't it be nice for a man to do it, especially in the god damn freezing cold? YES!

Unfortunately, I don't think this makes me "high maintenance" enough...

EHarmony suggests that I focus on my "Mate Value" (I swear to jeebus I am not making this up) instead of contemplating ways to be more high maintenance. It also mentions that I need to be aware that if I want to attract someone with a High Mate Value, that being high maintenance is a strong strategy.

Pause.

FTW?

Tangent: My sister and I recently discovered that FTW did not mean what we thought it did. It really means "For The Win." We both thought it was "Fuck the Whaaaaat?" So, I mean FTW in that context. Fuck. The. What.

Suddenly this dating website has gone from matching me with the most nonsensical array of men in the history of time, to telling me that if I want to date a 10, I need to ACT like a 10. Sure. That sounds awesome. Let me spend my evenings carefully grooming myself for the perfect man to come and scrutinize my Mate Value!

I'd rather listen to my Spice Girls Pandora station and make a wall decoration out of old keys I found.

Tangent: That is a thing that I did.

Back to overly strategic grooming and dressing. After all that, the article has a caveat...but now that you are a 10...and you've attracted your Highest Value Mate that Tolerates Your Non-Make-up Face, what happens next?

Well. It says that if you have found yourself as the mate with the lower value in the pair, you will have to work very hard to keep your mate from wandering.

Tangent: I teach "status" a lot as an acting teacher. In one game, the students all draw playing cards (face down) and hold them up on their foreheads, face out. The idea being that the students themselves can't see their own number, but must discern their number by the way they are treated by the others who CAN see their number.

Tangent: Once, on a high school work trip, I am fairly certain we played a game called "Indian Poker" that had a similar idea...only I can't remember the rest of it. It also sounds monstrously racially insensitive.

Tangent: Back to status. The ones at the far ends of the spectrum figure it out pretty fast. The face cards are all treated well, and over in a corner someone is using the two of clubs as a footrest.

What was I actually talking about? AH! Yes. Mate-Value-Dynamics. What an utterly terrifying prospect. I can also tell you that being the person with the "higher value" guarantees you absolutely nothing. AND, you get to be a dick for walking around going "Doot de do, I'm the higher valued person!"

Tangent: I'm not just talking about ladies on this one. I see plenty of guys crap all over amazing women because they have simply devalued them. While I might be pissed at the EHarmony phrasing and tactics, the concept of value in a relationship is important.

Tangent: I got really good at spelling maintenance correctly on the first try while working at Blue Man. When you manage a show that hadn't changed in 12 years, that's a lot of maintenance!

Tangent: But they changed the show this year! Yay! Go see it! Or, don't! Whatever!

So, where does this leave us? Me, particularly? I have no idea.

That's not true. I do have an idea. I admit to coloring and flat ironing my hair, to indulging in a fake-bake from time to time. I admit that I like my eyelashes better when they have mascara on them, to painting my toe nails, and to thinking carefully about what I put on...but that isn't because I'm thinking about my Mate Value. It's because I like to do it, and I feel great when I do.

Tangent: My hair is naturally brown and very wavy. Some might call it curly, but only half of it will curl on any given day, and that look is not great. All I wanted when I was growing up was to have straight, blond hair. When I got old enough to buy it, I bought it. So there.

Tangent: Did that raise my maintenance value!? How about my Mate Value.

Tangent: Does anyone else thing Mate Value sounds like some kind of hardware store where they sell erotic toys?

Blah blah, right. I'm glad I read the damn thing, because it did make me stop and think about where I fall on the spectrum, and what kind of guy will ultimately click with whatever nonsense I've got goin' on. Moreover, it made me glad that I canceled my subscription.

Tangent: I literally JUST got another email from them, this one with the subject: "It Will All Be Worth It When You Find True Love." What will be worth it? All this awkward posturing or the monthly subscription fees?

Sugar, if it's "true love," we'll be well past Mate Value and into the Douglas Adams quotes before you can say, "Fuck the Whaaaaaaat?"

Shower of Possibilities

This year has been jam packed with major life events for friends of mine. More so than in previous years. Everyone keeps saying, "Well, you ARE at that age."

No! I'm not. Wait. Yes I am. Crap.

Anyway.

Engagements, marriages, first babies, SECOND BABIES, new homes, new lives getting underway. To say that I am excited for them all would be an understatement. These friends of mine are lighting the way, showing me that not only can they take these big steps, but that overall its also a lot of fun. For those of you who know me well, my general opinion of my own matrimony can be summed up in the theme of my statistically likely wedding: When the Earth Collides with The Sun.

Fortunately for me, I won't have to worry about that for a while. Instead, I just returned from standing up in two weddings within seven days, across the country from each other. The usual events occurred in the usual way. The brides were gorgeous and radiant, the grooms dashing and adorable. The families were happy and kind to each other, the food delicious and the dancing hilarious.

In the wind up to the big day (both of them) I found myself looking forward to the same thing. Something I've realized I enjoy outside of the wedding context...

The "getting ready" shower.

It is a shower with a special purpose. To emerge pink, smooth, clean, and a blank slate. Ever since I was in middle school, getting ready to go to a dance, this has been a favorite ritual, because it is the moment when EVERYTHING is possible.

I find myself standing under the water, thinking about how I'll eventually do my make-up, how my dress will look, about how maybe this time they won't make my hair all crazytown. Maybe I'll get to dance with a cute fella. Maybe I'll be able to keep my heels on the whole time. So many of these musings are exactly what 13 year old me was thinking about!

True, I'm not generally this girly about getting ready to go out, but I really love to let my mind wander in those instances. In the most recent past, it also acted as a sort of self-preservation. Shielding my loneliness with a hopeful bubble. Creating a diversion for my brain!

Of course, things don't exactly happen in the way I lay them out. I hadn't anticipated the awkward conversation during wedding #2....

(Scene opens with LD sitting at the family table during the reception, watching everyone's purses and drinking a mimosa)

GUY (swaggering over and sitting down): Hey.

LD: Hi.

GUY: I'm Dude (name changed for hilariousness).

LD: Hi, Dude. I'm Laura how do--

GUY: Just so you know, I'm like the only single guy here. I heard you were the single bridesmaid.

LD: What? Uh, who is going around telling people that?

GUY (laughs into his drink): So. How do you know these guys?

LD: Sarah has been one of my best friends since seventh grade. You?

GUY: I live down the street. So, are you her sister?

LD:.....what?

GUY: Sarah. Are you one of Sarah's sisters?

LD: No...we met in seventh grade....

GUY: Oh! right. Sorry, I'm kind of distracted. I'm worried about my son.

LD: What's wrong?

GUY: I don't know. He might be in the hospital...I don't really know though...

LD: Wait, you don't know if your son is in the hospital?

GUY: Well, he's visiting his Mom in Arizona and she really wants him to go. He's got severe strep throat or something.

LD: How old is he?

GUY: Eighteen.

(long pause)

GUY: Yeah, I really want him to be a windmill mechanic but I'm not sure.....

And, there we have it. After the shower of possibility, I have an empty glass and the moniker "the single bridesmaid." Oh, and I have Dude. Who is now talking about the merits of vocational training.

Wedding #1 yielded slightly better results, but I unfortunately reverted into my low-functioning flirt mode (see the previous post regarding a giant bear chasing boys up into trees) and after 500 glasses of wine probably laid it on a little thick...including making a lovely fella pinky promise to dance with me, and then later informing him that my pinky had CALLED me, wondering what was going on with the whole dancing situation. Bless his heart, he placated my continual demands with a dance to Styx. Awesome.

Also, getting covered in rain water and bug body parts while hustling with my fellow bridesmaids to pull the tent flaps down when the rain finally showed up in Ohio. Spending a solid 5 minutes with another woman's hand on my butt keeping me from sliding off a folding chair while I try not to pop out of my strapless dress mid-tent-flap-pull was NOT in my shower matrix of things to be hopeful about. It was, however, hysterical.

After two weeks of weddingness, two of my closest gals are now Mrs. Pacheco and Mrs. Viccellio. They are literally showered with possibilities now, the bright futures they have with their new families, and I am so happy for them both.

Meanwhile I'm still Miss Dieli, and if anyone needs me, I'll be in the shower, dreaming.

Weird-Awesome

Perhaps I am not doing myself any huge favors by admitting the following:

I just serenaded my cat with a charming rendition of Don McLean's "And I Love You So" while washing the dishes. I thought it was charming. The cat is still on the fence about it. The lesson here requires a little context...

About halfway through, I had the self-conscious "oh god, I'm THAT cat lady" moment. I paused for a second while the song kept going on my iPod, and I realized that not only was I that cat lady, but OF COURSE I was that cat lady.

For those of you who haven't known me long enough to remember my childhood (life-long?) cat addiction, let me fill you in.

In my early elementary school years, I was convinced I was half-cat. I've explained this before as being similar to ethnic heritage. Some people in my grade were half-Polish. I was half-cat. It makes total sense. Made total sense...

I had a whole backstory worked up in my mind. I'll spare you the fine details that I crafted over time and give you the snapshot. I was born a cat. I lived in a forest. One day a magical fairy came down and turned me into a person, and sent me to live with my current parents.

Looking back, this seems like a hybrid between Little Bunny Foo-Foo and all that Stork business they try to tell you about.

At any rate. There I was, a half cat. I had cat instincts. I communed with the cats. I loved everything that was shaped like a cat, had a cat on it, had a cat in it, or generally related to cats! My Mom has an original cast recording of CATS! that she and I would listen to, and dance around the house. My life was cat covered and cat centric. I loved it.

I don't exactly remember how old I was, but there were two defining events in my half-cat journey that ultimately made me lose faith in my belief that I really was part cat. The first was when I told the principal of my elementary school the long version of my "origin story." In front of my entire class. Needless to say my already questionable social status was reduced from "nice, but odd" to "hahahahahawhaaaat?" I remember something about the Principal either talking to my parents or to my teacher, who attempted to straighten me out.

The second was when I tried to eat cat crunchies. Let's just say I wrote that one off, assuming that my tastes had simply changed from cat food to people food in the magical transformation. While it didn't ruin the illusion, the realization that I might be more human than cat was enough to start unraveling the entire myth.

There was no melt down, so crisis of catness. I slowly started to let go. I know it happened gradually because I still find tiny doodles of cats, flying cats, sleeping cats, cats with their tails curled around them, on most of my notebooks from those years in elementary school (I still doodle cats, who am I fooling). Carefully drawn pictures of our family cat, Boo, hung on the fridge. My favorite earrings were cats. They were also the craziest looking earrings ever, but that is unrelated. I didn't just abandon my love as soon as it made me look like a dork. It was a part of who I was then. Moreover, it is a part of who I am now.

So, here's the lesson...taking the long way around.

Everyone is weird, and I am no exception.

We like to pretend we're less-weird by finding the weakness in others, or what makes them more different. I can cite examples of this throughout my whole life simply using stories regarding the webbed toes on my left foot and/or two-different-sized feet and women who feel compelled to call me a "freak" while smiling and laughing.

My head always goes immediately to, "Oh, I'm totally a freak, but not because of that...last night I drank half a bottle of wine, sang to my cat, and danced around in my pajamas and a pair of gold heels."

Every time I have engaged people on the topic of their particular weirdness, I have learned volumes. Things I never would have guessed, stories and moments that make them who they are, and each amazing in their own way. While sometimes it is easy to go in for the kill, to snark, to be snide, I invite you to think about what makes you weird-awesome, and how I bet it is one of your favorite traits. I know it is one of mine.

How I didn't set anything on fire.

Despite all my attempts to completely ignore the reason I created this blog, I actually crossed something off my list! I learned to weld, thanks to the patient instruction of Mr. Ray Vlcek.

For those of you who have not yet done this, let me tell you the most important thing.

It makes you feel like a goddamn bad ass.

Getting hit repeatedly in the teeth with the welding mask is, at best, an acquired taste, but suiting up and getting ready to JOIN TWO PIECES OF STEEL is pretty rad. Standing there with the welder, the sparks, and the satisfying "bbbzzzzzzt...bzzzzzzzzzzzzttt" sound was an excellent way to spend an afternoon during Porgy previews. AND! I didn't set myself or anyone else on fire (accidentally or on purpose). Double bonus.

There I was, all psyched from my welding time, when I set about assembling a new chair for the greenroom in the lobby of the theatre while rehearsal was happening. Never in my life have so many male actors tried to tell me how to do something. Perhaps I'm spoiled at Court in that most of the people there have a healthy automatic respect for the assumed talents of the people that work there.

That was not the case in this instance. You would have thought I was assembling a car engine, or disarming a nuclear bomb. Those fellas, bless their hearts, were convinced that I was going to do it completely wrong. I'm all for helpful suggestion, and did genuinely need a second pair of hands to keep the whole operation going, but IT'S A CHAIR. A CHAIR! I just avoided setting the scene shop on fire with tools far more sophisticated than these oddly sized hex keys! I can do it!

I wish there was some kind of amazing hilarious turn where I set the chair on fire. I didn't. I assembled the chair after gently swatting my "helpers" away. It took me proving that I knew how to use my Gerber (think Swiss army knife) and a screwdriver at the same time. High. Tech.

There was, in an earlier draft of this post, a scene between the Gerber and the Hex keys. They all had accents. But, it didn't make any sense. I'll let you imagine that instead. The Gerber was southern and the Hex keys were German (because I couldn't sort out how to write a Swiss accent). By the end, victory was mine, and the chair was completed.

In real life, too, the chair is done! And, when people sit in it, the whole thing DOES NOT collapse. Yet....

Pity Party

My favorite thing to do these days is to act like a tough guy. Somehow the phrase, "I'll punch you in the face" has worked it way into regular usage. Fortunately my friends and co-workers have taken all of my quirky habits in stride and this will likely not yield 1) any actual face punching and 2) and long term issues. But, since I am currently locked in permanent introspection mode, of course I started asking myself what was going on.

Ever since the end of January, when everything got all crazy, I've basically been wearing my "toughness" like a helmet, or one of those awesome neoprene Survival Suits from the Deadliest Catch. Trying not to let anything out. Unintentionally try not to let anything in. Generally, this has been working fine enough. I've been able to keep plodding along and mostly keeping it together. Sort of.

Recently though, I've been falling into these little mental whirlpools that I've started calling Pity Parties because I sincerely feel ridiculous both having them, and then talking about them. My attempts to give myself perspective have been dismal failures. My brain knows that things really aren't that bad. My health, my friends and family, my job, it's all fine. I've been through plenty of situations that have been worse, or at least more appropriate to be sad about.

Losing my Grandmother, losing my job, continual and unexplainable bronchitis for the better part of 18 months, getting the back of my car slammed into at 55 mph and the ensuing 2 years of on and off physical therapy. IT COULD BE WORSE! Because I seem to be better at explaining the root of things by anthropomorphising my internal organs...here goes...the Pity Party...

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(BRAIN and HEART are sitting in a booth at the Golden Nugget)

BRAIN: It could be worse.

HEART: But...but...but...I'm saaaaaaad.

BRAIN: It's okay. But stop being sad. What are you sad about, anyway.

HEART: I don't know. Everything. I'm just saaaad. Let's be sad. Let's be sad and --

STOMACH (slides in next to HEART, puts her arm around HEART): -- EAT! Let's be sad and eat. That was not so terrible? Let's go to Trader Joe's and pick out some cheese and drink Bloody Mary's! I think that sounds awesome.

HEART: Do you really think so? We do love cheese...

STOMACH: Yeah! Remember that time we drank half a bottle of wine and put on all our jewelry! That was totally not sad. We can stop at McDonalds!

JEANS (the pants not DNA) (From under the table): NOOOOOOO!!!! We can't take any more of this eating! We're already dealing with serious seam-structure situations and you don't want to know what BUTT has been threatening! Getting bigger!!!

BUTT (slides into the booth, but on the same side as HEART and STOMACH, making everyone have to squish in. BRAIN sits alone on the opposite side): Um. I totally heard you talking about me. Jeans. Frankly, I'm more interested in what Stomach was saying about getting some cheese. And, fries! Or, fried chicken! OR ALL THREE!

HEART: That does sound good...

BRAIN: I don't know, guys.

BUTT: Shut. Up. Everyone knows that I'm only getting bigger and that means I'm in charge. I make the calls.

THIGHS (in unison, outside the window, waving): What about us? We're helping!

BUTT: Pipe down, get-away sticks. No one cares.

HEART: Okay, okay. Stop. All this arguing isn't making me feel better. I'm still just sad. Can we just sit in the dark and think about being sad and listen to sad music and think sad things? That's really all I want to do.

STOMACH: Wouldn't it be better with a chocolate shake...in the dark...with the music...

BUTT: Seriously.

JEANS: For the love of god, no!

BUTT: Really, Jeans? Who even invited you?

LIVER (drunkenly flops down next to BRAIN) : Heeeeeeyguys. I heard werehavingbloodymarysagain. Yeees! (Hiccup) (lays down on the floor)

BRAIN: No. We're not. We're not having drinks and we're not having cheese.

HEART (starts to cry): But....but...now I'm more sad because I want to have those things...and now you're telling me no. Why don't I have things? Why don't I have someone who will call me just to tell me something nice. Why don't I have someone who thinks I'm the prettiest? Why don't I have a person to bring to parties, instead of walking around like a dork? I HATE GETTING MY OWN DRINKS AT BARS!!! AUGH!! This SUCKS. Someone go get the iPod...

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You can imagine how such internal (har har) struggle can get not only irritating, but makes me feel like a sap. Hence, the toughness-helmet.

What I think bothers me the most, more than just feeling strange, is that it genuinely seems like time is the best repairman here. Similarly to how I wanted somehow to be the person who exacted the consequences on X for his hurtful and vile behavior, I want to be the person that fixes this for myself.

Don't get me wrong, though. What I'm taking about "fixing" is simply my way of saying that I'd love for things to not feel so abnormal. I'd just like to go back to feeling like myself, rather than this sort of self. I can already tell things are far better, and that I'm really feeling lonely more than feeling sad about the end of my relationship...but how easy to conflate the two...

At any rate. We've all been to these personal Pity Parties. Thanks for reading mine.

BUTT: What were you saying about me? Because I totally heard you. Don't make me punch you in the face!

Yep, Nope! Or: Directions.

Through an amazing stroke of friendship, my Mom and I were lucky enough to attend the Oprah Surprise Spectacular at the United Center on Tuesday. Being in an enclosed space with 22,000 other women is not something I'll forget. This isn't about all the celebs that showed up, or what a cool lady Oprah is (and I genuinely think she's an incredible person), this is about the fans. And, the two categories of people that made themselves clear.

The people who can follow directions.

The people who cannot.

Without spoiling the surprises for those who actually want to be surprised, I'll explain what I mean.

There were three moments of "choreographed" audience participation, and we're not talking group Electric Slide. We're talking "hold this thing up when I say hold this thing up."

First, there were the books. Part of the surprise for Oprah was a book donation made by each audience member, and as a symbol of that donation, at the right moment everyone was to:

1. Take your book out of the black plastic bag.
2. Stand up and wave it around like you just won a challenge on DoubleDare.

Sounds easy, yes? No. Here are things that happened, just during "rehearsal."

------
EMCEE: Okay! Everyone ready!

Handful of people: (JUMPING SCREAMING, WAVING BOOKS)

EMCEE: No! Not yet, not until I say, "Cue the Audience!"

Handful of people: (JUMPING SCREAMING, WAVING BOOKS)

EMCEE: ....Okay....."Cue the Audience"

Everyone else: (JUMPING SCREAMING, WAVING BOOKS)

Other handful of people: (JUMPING SCREAMING, WAVING BLACK PLASTIC BAGS)

EMCEE: Remember to take your book out of the bag!
-----

Awesome. Good. These are the people who drive away from the gas station with the nozzle still in their car.

So, my Mom and I thought, well...they are just excited. No problem. They'll do better next time...then came the Finger Lights. Little adorable LED lights that fit onto your finger like a ring. On/Off switch located on the top. The instructions were to put the lights onto your fingers but leave them switched off until FamousMusicPerson came walking down the long runway on stage. Then everyone turn them on, dance, go nuts.

Here's what happened.

-----
FamousIntroducingPerson: And now! FamousMusicPerson!!

handful of people: ZOMG!!! It's FAMOUSMUSICPERSON! I am turning my finger lights on RIGHT F-ING NOW. (lights begin to appear around the stadium)

larger group of people: Wait...FamousMusicPerson is here, but she hasn't walked down the runway yet, but those people already did it! No! I'm late! Oprah will be so angry! (more lights appear)

30 seconds later

everyone else: Yay! FamousMusicPerson! Oooh! She's walking down the runway (finger lights on).

------

The most ridiculous part is that they shot this segment TWICE. The Emcee came out and reminded everyone about not turning them on, blah blah. But, when we taped the second time...it happened EXACTLY the same way.

Perhaps there is a link between these people and the folks who "forget" to "pay your parking ticket here before exiting the facility" and then jam up the exit for 15 minutes.

The final, and unfortunately most blatant, example of this was the "card stunt." You've seen this all over the place. A section of the audience are given white cards to hold up over their heads and form either a picture or, in this case, a projection surface.

The Emcee tried to front load the instructions...but, well...

-----

EMCEE: Okay! Card sections! Are you ready to practice!

CARD SECTION: YEAH!

EMCEE: Great! Put your card on your lap, instructions facing you!

CARD SECTIONS: (PEOPLE HOLD CARDS IN FRONT OF THEIR FACES)

EMCEE: Nope! Not yet. Just put it on your lap!

CARD SECTION: (PEOPLE HOLD CARDS IN FRONT OF THEIR FACES, UPSIDE DOWN)

EMCEE: The eye holes are for your eyes! But don't hold them up yet! Put them on your lap!

CARD SECTION: (MOST PEOPLE PUT THE CARDS DOWN. SOME FLIP THEM AROUND)

EMCEE: Yep, nope! Instructions should be facing YOU, not out, but don't put the cards up yet!....Okay! Let's practice....1, 2, 3, GO!

CARD SECTION: (2/3rds OF THE CARDS GO UP. HALF ARE UPSIDE DOWN, SEVERAL PEOPLE JUST SIT WITH THEIR CARD IN THEIR LAP, LOOKING AT THE OTHER CARDS, AND A HANDFUL OF PEOPLE ARE HOLDING THEIR BOOKS IN FRONT OF THEIR CARDS)

EMCEE:........Good! Okay. Yeah...
------

Bless that Emcee, she did a great job, and fortunately during the taping the card section did much better...but holy cow! These are the people flying home who leave their shoes on in security and try to take full bottles of wine through the checkpoint.

Maybe I'm a little harsh here, but I take a great deal of pride in being able to follow instructions. I'm not a robot (or am I!) but there are certain things where doing what you are told makes things not only easier, but safer/faster/cleaner, etc. Anyone who has ever attempted to put a piece of IKEA furniture together knows this.

Overall, the taping was a phenomenal experience and our section (303! woo!) took great pride in identifying the continuing missteps of the "Card Section" and trying to coach them from afar. We got out around midnight, at which point I had to basically eat all my judgey feelings about the card section because I accidentally left my headlights on...and the battery died.

In semi-fairness to me, the "dinger" that says, "Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Lights! Lights! Lights!" when I get out of the car, is broken . I recently purchased my own set of jumper cables specifically because of the broken (and apparently unfixable) dinger.

We flagged down two lovely ladies to see if they would be kind enough to let me jump my battery from their car. Here's how it went down.

-----

LD: I'm so sorry to bother you, but my battery is dead.

Lady 1: Oh no! Do you need a jump?

LD: I do, would you mind? I have my own cables here and everything, it'll only take a second.

Lady 1: Do you need to call your husband?

LD:.....?

Lady 1: To tell you how to do it? I can call my husband if you need me to.

LD: Oh! No, I don't have a husband, and I know how to jump a car. It's okay, but thank you so much for the offer.

Lady 1: Are you sure? It's okay...

LD: Really, we're good. I promise.

(the two ladies arrive a few moments later driving a gorgeous Mercedes)

LD: Thank you! Thank you!

(a few moments pass)

Lady 2: Um...I don't know how to open the hood.

LD: On your car?

Lady 2: Yeah! I've never had to open it...let me look though...

Lady 1: Usually our husbands do all the car things! I'll call him and ask.

(meanwhile, Mom has spotted a parking lot attendant and asked him to come bring his truck over, which he has started doing)

LD: It's okay, really. I think we found another one.

Lady 2: What if it's like my gas tank? If I just push on it really hard, will it pop open?

LD: I doubt it, and you don't want to dent the hood.

Lady 2: (she begins shoving the hood) Maybe I'll just try it...

LD: No! Really. Don't. It's okay. Look! Here comes the guy!

Lady 1: We're really sorry...I can't believe we don't know how to open it...

LD: Please, you are so kind to even offer. No worries at all! Have a good night!
-----

Before I go on let me just say that I am so grateful that they even offered to stop and help. I mean them no ill-will by sharing the experience, but it did make me wonder how many people are walking around who have no idea how to pop their own hood. I can understand being wary of jumping your own car, but the hood!

Anyway. I felt simultaneously like WonderGirl, person who does man-type things in a skirt, and like some strange unmarried alien person waving around two jumper cables going "No husband, only electrical knowledge."

The parking lot man was very helpful, and we were on our way in a matter of minutes. Despite my own directional hiccup we got home fairly quickly. Even though I'd been forced to look my own judgements of the others in the audience, I slept like a log, content in the knowledge that even if I left my lights on, at least I took my book out of the black plastic bag.

Flirt Shmirt. Let's talk about how I feel like an idiot all the time.

Okay guys. I've dipped a toe into the dating pool. I do not like it.

Rephrase. I'm not good at the "toe dipping" part. I believe this is because I am incapable of successfully flirting with people. I have a lot of amazing lady friends who can wrap a fella around their little finger in a matter of seconds. That is not me.

Here is how I feel:
------
Picturesque forest. Sunshine, breezes blowing. And, a giant bear has run a handsome boy up a tree and is frantically jumping around at the bottom of it "shouting" and drooling.
------

Not only do I frequently feel like I can't control the volume of my own voice (probably all the time) when I'm trying to chat with someone who has caught my eye, but I generally feel like I'm the bear ripping all the bark off the bottom of the tree trying to scramble up.

This goes hand in hand with a conversation I had with my sister about the concept of "being sexy." When I was little, I thought "being sexy" meant moving really slowly. So, whenever my barbies were trying to catch Ken's eye, they would SLOOOOOOOWLY raise their pointed-toe-leg while laying in their beach chair in their best ball gown. This approach does not work well in real life. If it did, I would bring a beach chair and a gown everywhere I went, ever.

As I got older, the girls who "knew how to be sexy" seemed to have it all locked up. They could swoop into your conversation, just before you'd be trying to slooowly do something, and steal your potential guy with a little brush of the shoulder or a well placed giggle and boob wobble.

I bet they didn't call it a boob wobble. There isn't much sexy going on with that turn of phrase at all.

Anyway. Part of me has come to understand that a good deal of "being sexy" is being comfortable with yourself. WHAT!? That is SO much harder than just learning how to whisper something adorably into someone's ear, or to magically get a guy to ask YOU out instead of the other way around...

True story. Outside of ONE dance in high school, I did the asking. Including prom. I have chosen to look at this as an early life example of how I am a take-charge gal, but it doesn't really give me much confidence that I have the patience or the skill to get someone to ask me to do something fun.

I am also categorically bad at strategy and game-playing. I don't have the head for it. I'm an empath, with is probably why I feel so badly for the guys I'm trying to flirt with. I can sense that they are either no longer enjoying the conversation or that I have accidentally started shouting at them. I don't have the energy to discern if someone has stopped talking to me because they are "leaving me wanting more" or just actually leaving. I generally assume the latter.

Sometimes, I try to get up the nerve to say something cute and/or potentially sort of sexy. Then this happens. This is an actual quote from yesterday:

lovely gentleman: Can I take a pizza home?

LD: Sure. We have plenty left over, and there's pizza tomorrow too. It's a pizza explosion...hahaha...

lovely gentleman: Great! Thanks.

LD: You can figure out a way to pay me back somehow. I can be easily purchased with a cherry coke.

Aaaaaaand scene. I came within inches of just putting my head down on the stack of pizza boxes in embarrassment. "I can be easily purchased"!?!?!?! As my old neighbor used to say, Lord love a duck! NO! Why did I say that? I mean, it happens to be true, but JESUS! And how in the F do you respond to that, if it was even worth responding to. At least I didn't use an inappropriately large word. That happens too. I recently attempted to use the words "inordinate", "schism", and "flummoxed" in conversation with a fella. He didn't seem to appreciate them, and frankly those aren't even that large. Though, that was also the guy who told me that karma was "stupid" so I'm not that upset about trotting out some sophomore honors English vocab.

My friends who are in relationships have been incredibly supportive, letting me 3rd wheel with them (and never making me feel like one), and helping me brainstorm people who I might be able to start this terrifying flirting process with. But, they all look back so fondly on the flirting phase. The grass is always greener, I suppose. I can't wait to not feel completely ridiculous all the time!

So, when you are having dinner with your significant other, enjoying the comfort of an established relationship. Think of me. Somewhere in Chicago, there is a petite blond girl shouting big words up at a cute boy in a tree.

Melancholy and Cat Medicine

PART 1. Cat Medicine.

My cat and I have been struggling, recently. Physically struggling. Me, attempting to pop a quarter of a pill into his mouth, and he attempting to squeeze his tiny jaws closed as tightly as possible.

It goes without saying that I am larger, but his will is far stronger and the whole exercise leaves us both feeling pretty crappy. I'd say that I have a roughly 70% success rate...or a 30% intimidated by a 14lb animal rate, depending on which one of us you ask. So, I did the adult thing and called the vet. I learned several things from the delightful people at Treehouse.

1. Most cat medicines are available in a liquid form.
2. Those medicines are derived from crushed up museum artifacts.
3. Because they cost more than all of my bills, combined.

It appears that Treehouse is familiar with this problem of only making cat-pleasing medicine from the bones of extinct species of birds, so they pointed me to a few places that only cost roughly half as much.

I found it amusing that this company is called RoadRunner. For some reason I imagined Wiley Coyote, covered in bandages, trying to give his cat a pill and the Road Runner scooting by, pleasantly feeding his cat chicken-flavored-Rembrandt-canvas medicine. Figures, right?

In spite of the unfortunate expense portion, I am thrilled to have another option for getting Picasso the hydroxizine he needs to take twice a day. You can bet he is thrilled too...he's smiling, but you can tell he's clenching his teeth.

PART 2. Melancholy.

Because a sad (terrible) short play is better than a sad (terrible) poem...
------

(lights up on a heart--the organ, not the symbol--sitting on a pretty windowsill. the room is full of unopened mail. An orchid enters, gracefully.)

ORCHID: Now, now. That's no way to spend such a fine afternoon.

HEART: I disagree.

ORCHID: Come, come. Wasting your time looking out that window and sulking. Wishing? Wishing for what? You're better off. What else is there to be done? Staying put just makes you sad. It's no way to spend a nice day.

HEART: That's not what I meant. (heart gestures out the window)

(it begins to rain).

-------

In which I learn that I am a crazy person.

I have massive reservations about publishing this post. BUT. I think it is important to address. Maybe someone will read this and think I'm some lunatic fear-spreading monster, but what I want to do here is, actually, the opposite.

I freaked myself out today on an airplane. Because I am a crazy person.

I didn't freak myself out because the ride was very choppy and turbulence makes me bust out in a cold sweat. I didn't freak out because the weather was super foggy going up. I didn't freak out because I was forced to watch Cash Cab.

I freaked out because...well. It started with the rocking and mumbling...

We boarded on time in New York, and it was a full flight. No surprises there. I had the window seat (unexpected benefit of traveling as a single girl! No more giving up the window seat!) and as the rest of the folks boarded, a very sweaty and nervous looking man sat down in the middle set next to me, held out his boarding pass, pointed to the number and said, "Yes?" in what my early morning brain decided to classify as "some kind" of accent from "somewhere" like Pakistan.

I confirmed that he was in the right place, and he nodded. Then he put his head into his hands and rocked and mumbled for the first 30 minutes we were in the air. The man in the aisle seat in our row asked him at one point if he was okay. He nodded and batted the man away from him.

When I went into my purse a little while later, I pulled out my advil and offered him the bottle. He looked at me, but did not acknowledge my offer. No big deal. But when our eyes met, something happened to my brain stem. It TOOK OVER. It was like some totally insane part of me woke up and said, "I am afraid of this guy." I imagine the conversation between the parts of my brain went something like this...

STEM: GUYS!! GUYS GUYS GUYS GUYS GUYS GUYS!

LOGIC: Jesus, Stem. What's wrong?

COMPASSION: Take a deep breath stem!

STEM: DID YOU SEE THAT GUY'S EYES! GUYS! THIS GUY IS NOT RIGHT! LETS JUMP OUT THE WINDOW!

LOGIC: Stem. We're cruising, albeit in rather choppy air, at 36,000 feet. Clearly we can't jump out the window.

COMPASSION: It's fine, Stem. I bet this guy just doesn't like to fly. I imagine we look pretty cra..

STEM: SHUT UP! I'M TAKING OVER. IF YOU DON'T THINK THIS IS SERIOUS THEN I AM SHUTTING YOU DOWN. MANUAL OVERRIDE, BITCHES!

LOGIC/COMPASSION: (in slow motion, as if melting)Nooooooooooooooooo....

And it was on. The brain stem. The part of me that has seen one too many episodes of one too many crime shows. The part of me that is only interested in survival. The part of me that freely engages in completely unacceptable racial profiling.

And apparently, turbulence makes it WAY worse...

If the brain stem had published its notes from the following five minutes, they probably would have looked like this.


SSSSSSHHHHHHHIIIIIITTTTTTTTT. SHIT SHIT SHIT SHIT. THIS GUY. THIS GUY IS NOT FROM AMERICA. THIS GUY HAS "SOME KIND" OF ACCENT. SHIT SHIT SHIT. THIS GUY KEEPS LOOKING AROUND THE PLANE WITH HIS CRAZY EYES. WHY SO SWEATY? WHY SO NERVOUS? THIS GUY SMELLS DIFFERENT THAN I DO. ARE HIS CLOTHES NEW? IS HE WEARING A COSTUME TO BLEND IN? WHY ARE HIS SHOE LACES SO WHITE? SHIT SHIT SHIT. THIS GUY...THIS GUY IS CHECKING HIS WATCH ALL THE TIME...WAIT...SHIT! SHIT! RED ALERT!!!!

Red alert because then, in the choppy, floppy, crazytown airspace, he pulled out his cell phone and turned it on.

STEM: CELL PHONE BOMB. HE'S GOING TO BLOW UP THE PLANE. OBVIOUSLY.

I sat there for a minute and looked at his phone out of the corner of my eye...was it in airplane mode...IT WAS NOT! Was he paging down to his "preferred numbers"? YES!

STEM: OF COURSE. THE NUMBER IS PRE PROGRAMMED BEFOREHAND SO ALL HE HAS TO DO IS HIT SEND. WE SAW THIS ON CSI OR BONES OR DATELINE OR FOX NEWS OR MYTHBUSTERS OR SOME SHIT HE IS CLEARLY GOING TO BLOW UP THE PLANE AND I HAVE TO SAVE EVERYONE.

The man had indeed pulled up a number and had his thumb poised on the green "call" key. If logic was there, it probably would have said this:

LOGIC: You know what. I bet he's not a frequent flier. I bet he didn't quite understand the whole off versus airplane mode announcement. He's probably looking to make sure he has the number of the person who is meeting him at the airport. Also, stop being insane.

Compassion probably would have said this:

COMPASSION: Poor guy. I bet he's super bored. He doesn't have anything with him to read or do. And to have a headache too. Ick. Also, we're acting a little silly, yes?

But as we previously established, those two were unavailable for comment. So my Rambo-Brain-Stem continues to run the show...

STEM: OKAY. WE HAVE TO FIX THIS WE HAVE TO GET HIM TO NOT BLOW UP THE PLANE. HOLY. FUCK. I CAN'T BELIEVE THIS IS HAPPENING. WHAT DO I DO? I CAN'T HIT THE CALL BUTTON BECAUSE HIS FINGER IS ON THE KEY! THE SEND KEY! GOD DAMN IT! I HATE FLYING. HOW DO I SAVE EVERYONE? FORGET EVERYONE, HOW DO I SAVE ME? OH MY GOD OH MY GOD. OKAY. CALM DOWN. LETS TALK TO THE GUY. LETS JUST TALK TO HIM. SHOW HIM THAT I AM A REAL PERSON WHO WILL NOT BE EXPLODED TODAY THEN MAYBE I CAN MAKE HIM TURN THE PHONE OFF...

So, in some kind of conversation bravado, I decide to start talking to this man. Really, I start monologing at this man. About Chicago. About family. About New York. About the sky. About the lake (which we were crossing). About headaches. About my cat. I showed the man 97 pictures of my cat on my iPhone.

STEM: NICE PEOPLE WHO HAVE CATS ARE ON THIS PLANE!!!

Finally. I couldn't take it anymore. I looked out the window, took a deep breath hoping that I would not end up on the 5pm news, turned back around and said,

Laura: "You can't have that cell phone on. You have to turn it all the way off."

Guy: "Off off?"

Laura: "Off off off. All the way. Just, shut it off. They don't like it when people have phones on."

Guy: "Okay. Thank you. (pause) My uncle lives in New York. I like it. Big city."

LOGIC/COMPASSION come busting in my brain-basement like the swat team and wrassle the brain stem back into the breathing and blinking stabilization cage.

STEM: HE'S STILL HOLDING THE PHONE!!!! WE COULD STILL BLOW--

COMPASSION: Okay. Enough. Enough. This is beyond insulting to this poor man.

It was insulting. It was insulting to him. It was insulting to my own intelligence. I'm sure THAT guy was sitting there wondering who let this insane woman with all the cat pictures have so much coffee before she flies back to her treatment center on a ranch somewhere.

Clearly we landed without incident. Turns out he had a connecting flight to South Bend and I helped him figure out his next gate since it was clear that he didn't really trust what he was reading on the departures board. He waved at me when we parted ways. I waved back.

I have never felt like such a dick in my whole life. I immediately confessed myself to my Dad, who was kind enough to pick me up, to my Mom, my sister, and three of my co-workers. I felt like Liz Lemon in the episode of 30 Rock where she turns her neighbor in to Homeland Security because he's acting "suspicious" when he's actually just making an audition tape for the Amazing Race.

I laughed at that situation when I saw it on TV because I assumed I was better than that. I live in a big city. I have so many amazing friends and colleagues from every corner of our incredible planet. Truth is though, I was just like she was in that moment. Warped. Freaked out. Goaded into thinking the absolute worst because it seems like the "normal" thing to do. I literally gave myself hives. HIVES!

I am a crazy person, sometimes. I do not like this.

Startling and terrifying to learn, yes. But, I think it is better to learn that I still have those pieces of me than to go on pretending as if I don't. Cliche to say that knowledge is power, but my hope in writing this is that to acknowledge is power. The power to start to change.

32 Weeks: A Synopsis in dialogue.

Eight months after starting this blog with only TWO posts to my name, and not much to show for my "great idea."

BUT I'm gearing back up, and I've decided to look at the 32 weeks between when I started this blog and today.

I suppose it would be more "blog-like" to make an enumerated, chronological list. I started to do that and it seemed WAY too irritating for me to continue writing it, much less ask anyone else to read it.

Instead, here are some snippets of dialogue that led to their own lessons, in one way or another. Maybe that will be less boring...so, in no particular order...the most bizarre, wonderful, terrible, hilarious, heart breaking, and frightfully mundane 32 weeks of my adult life...

1.
LD (me): "Wait...that van battery has posts coming out of the top. This one doesn't."
Rupert: "Huh. Yep. That's a problem."
LD: "Okay then."

2.
Lois (yelling into the phone): "My GPS is dead and I have no idea where I am and I need you to tell me how to get to the apartment."
LD: "Can you see any street signs?"
Lois: "It's a very WIDE street. It doesn't have a name."
LD: "But you just got off the highway, right?"
Lois: "Right."
LD: "In Chicago....?"

3.
LD: "Okay. Show me how this works. I've never actually done this before."
Evan (who is 6): "You've NEVER lit a firework before!? Wow!"

4.
Tay: "I think we need to have it catered. For 75 people."
LD: "For tomorrow morning..."
Tay: "Yes."
LD: "Okay. Great. Um...Good. I guess I should call them, then."

5.
Dad: "What's wrong?"
LD: "I need you to help me fix something."
Dad: "What's up?"
LD: "He won't give me my car key back."
Dad: "Done. I'll take care of it. What's his number?"
3 days later
Dad: "Here's the envelope with the keys."
LD: "Thanks, Dad. Really. Thank you."

6.
My students: "Wait, you don't know how to Dougie!?!?!?"
LD: "Who is Dougie?"
My students: (raucous laughter) "Its not a person, it's, like a dance. You really don't know what that is!?!?!"
LD: "Are you saying 'Dougie' or 'Doggie'?"
My students: (additional raucous laughter) "Dougie!! What's how to doggie!?!?"
LD: ".....nothing. nothing. So show me this 'Dougie' then..."

7.
LD: "I think the apple pie sounds good."
Waiter: "You won't be disappointed. It is THE best apple pie ON THE PLANET."
LD: "Ooh great!"
Waiter returns with pie-shaped food, LD and Katy both take a bite.
LD: "Augh! Is that pepper!?"
Katy: "I think so...mine tastes like potatoes."
LD: "This isn't just not the best pie, this is basically the worst pie ever."

8.
Ray: "Okay, so you put this part down first, and hammer it a few times"
(BANG BANG BAG)
Ray: "And then you take this part and put it underneath, put this part on top, then this ring goes on and you stick this in the middle. Then you hammer it a few more times."
(BANG BANG BANG BANG BANG BANG BANG BANG BANG)
Ray: "And there's your grommet."
LD: "How many of these do we need to do..."
Alex: "About 200."

9.
Amber: "Are you sure you want to do this? Are you mentally ready for what it means if you see something you don't like?"
LD: "Yes. Something is wrong."

10.
Lara: "I. Sachs on Roosevelt is where I get our leather dye. Should work fine!"

11.
Marc: "So, all you do is basically go to whatever page you'd normally go to, then copy the address into the 'create subscription' box on the google reader page. There you go!"
LD: "Oh my god. I'm never getting any work done ever again. Ahh! There are already 10 updates on Cake Wrecks!"

12.
Nice Cat Lady: "Would you be willing to meet the FIV positive kitties? They tend to have more special needs, or need daily medication, but otherwise they are just like normal cats."
LD: "Sure. I have a long, strange history with giving medicine to animals. Particularly rabbits."
Nice Cat Lady: "Great, just come in and wash your hands."

13.
Steve: "I don't know why no one thought to build a soundproof dog house."

14.
Marc C.: "I swear, its the best thing ever. Now whenever I first start to feel like I'm getting sick, I get it out. Works like a charm."
LD: "Is it gross?"
Marc C. "I mean, yeah. It's gross but the cool thing about the netty pot is you can see it all come back out...so kinda, yeah."

15.
LD: "Tell me when it started. Tell me right now."
Nameless (name omitted for privacy): "I don't remember, I don't..."
LD: "You don't REMEMBER? Tell me right now."
Nameless: "It was a month...I don't..."
LD: "A month? WHAT month?"
Nameless: "October, okay. It started in October. We went out for drinks after work, we got drunk, and slept together."
LD: "And then you just kept doing it????"
Nameless: "...yes."

16.
Amber: "I ran into X (name omitted for privacy) at Noah's birthday party this weekend. Apparently Nameless confessed himself to X right after everything happened. Just plopped himself down in his office. I didn't ask him anything other than to tell me when Nameless told HIM it started. I said he'd been telling you October. He sort of laughed and said, 'October? It started this summer...'"

17.
LD: "I can't get the flapper to respond to the board...I have it patched into the right universe and everything, and its getting signal..."
Ben: "Wait...its running on DMX right?"
LD: "Yeah so it should....oh...wait...I bet it needs a power supply..."

18.
Lois: "Oh, come up, won't you. Have some tequila and cheese. We'll visit. It'll be divine."

19.
Mom: "Thank you for doing everything, for setting it all up, making sure things went okay."
LD: "Of course. I learned how to do it from you!"

20.
Lovely Cleaning Lady on the Phone: "Yes! We clean units in Hyde Park!"

21.
LD: "That was worse than the year with the interpretive dancing."
Sarah: "Oh god...that's right!"
LD: "And everything was all out of order, and we sang the wrong song at the end..."
Sarah: "Maybe next year we should just skip church..."

22.
LD: "I am so deeply moved by the continual offerings of knee-cap breaking and face punching."
Room full of Co-Workers: "Yeah! Hey, anytime! Just call! Totally. We're there!"

23.
Amber: "I have good news that is also terrible news. They just opened a Papa John's on Lincoln, in the old Quizno's space."
LD: "OH MY GOD WHY ARE WE NOT EATING THERE RIGHT NOW!?"
Amber: "I know!! And we're in the delivery zone!!!!!"

24.
Panda: "now we can facetime!"
LD: "facetime, yay! okay. Call me back."
(phone rings, as facetime, LD answers, video engages)
LD and Panda:"FACETIME! YAY!"

25.
Panda: "CAKE IS THE ONLY THING THAT MATTERS."

26.
LD: "I guess I just can't get past feeling mad all the time..."
Counselor: "And you think that you don't deserve to be mad? I mean, I'm mad for you..."
LD: "I'm just not a mad person. It makes me feel crazy."
Counselor: "Fair enough. But, you have every right to be mad. Don't forget that."

27.
LD: "oooh! What baby-fruit week are you at now?"
Heidi: (consults her iphone) "Oh my gosh its Thursday and I haven't even looked yet. I'm falling behind here."
LD: "tsk tsk."
Heidi: "Okay...huh. Corn."
LD: "Corn?"
Zac: "Corn!?"
Heidi: Recently it was spaghetti squash, now its corn.
LD: "Are they going by volume?"

28.
INSERT PICTURE OF MY MOM'S FAMILY TREE, AS EXPLAINED TO ME CAREFULLY BY MY AUNT TAY AND HAND DRAWN BY ME ON A SHEET OF YELLOW PAPER.

29.
LD: "Those are Texas style mashed potatoes on top."
Erica: "What makes them Texas style?"
LD: "The brick of cream cheese."

30.
Mom: "Oooh good here comes the food."
LD and Panda: "Oh wow, that's really big...wait..it stacks?"
Dad: "It's a seafood scaffold!"
All: drool

31.
LD: "Can you stay in the car with the cat while I run in and buy a litter box?"
Amber: "(laughing) totally."
LD: "I really didn't think I was going to get one today..."
Amber: "I had a feeling you might..."

32.
Panda: "Have you heard any of the new Florence and the Machine album? I'll send you a grooveshark playlist."
LD: "I just accidentally typed Grooveshart. That is not the same thing."

So here we are. I hope, as Miss Florence says, "The dog days are over/the dog days are done/Can you hear the horses/Cuz here they come."