One Day Blog Silence

Interview Redux

Remember those 655 boxes awaiting unpacking on my third floor? (Of course I'm being facetious. It's probably only 155.) They're still waiting. I was actually all ready to tackle it today, but I'm expecting the plumber sometime between now & the twelfth of never & there's no way I would hear him (or her - let's not make sexist assumptions here) while I'm up there. So . . . here I am. Waiting. Have I mentioned that I am pretty much the Least Patient Person of All Time? Truly. I could be waiting to get my gums scraped and I'd still be anxious to get started. Fortunately, the hysterically funny Metalia (this post never fails to crack me up, no matter how many times I read it) offered up another five questions, which gives me something to do other than stare out the window and wonder if the plumber will be satisfied with all of the money I have in the world or if I will have to sell a kidney and promise my firstborn child as well.

What is your favorite book of all time AND what is the absolute worst book you've ever read?
This is such a difficult question to answer since I read constantly. Among my favorites (the ones I love and have reread countless times) are Gone With the Wind, The Sun Also Rises, The Great Gatsby, To Kill a Mockingbird & A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. I also like almost anything by James Lee Burke, Augusten Burroughs, Jodi Picoult & Anna Quindlen. As for the worst . . . I don't know if it's the absolute worst, but I really, really wanted to like Wicked and I really, really didn't. That's the only book in recent memory that I didn't finish once I started it.

What's your most irrational fear?
When I am driving, I am fine as long as no one else is on the road (which, you know, doesn't happen very often), but as soon as a car is coming towards me or driving alongside me, I am absolutely certain it is going to hit me. This is only the case when I am driving. Which is why I don't. I also believe that those big crunchy spiders (you know which ones I mean) have the ability to catapult themselves across the room and land on my head.

If you were invisible for one day, who would you spy on?
Oh, the Shrub, definitely. I would love to know if he is (Heaven help us) as clueless as he appears. And if Laura ever turns to him and says, "Seriously, what the hell is wrong with you?"

What was the first CD you ever bought?
Hmmmm. Thinking back over my music collection (because God forbid I ever throw any of it away), it was probably Counting Crows' August & Everything After or the soundtrack from Boomerang. I am just that edgy and hip.

Okay, so you're the queen of Bourbon Slush, but if you have to do a shot, what's your alcohol of choice?
Tequila, definitely. And, yes, I require the accessories. (Metalia, I know you like tequila - are you a lemon-and-salt girl too?)

Edited to add: Good news! The plumbers showed up at 1:30 and did not require the GNP of Bulgaria to fix the whirlpool. The bad news is, that's because it is apparently not a plumbing problem, but an electrical one. I am fairly certain that, if I ever actually find an electrician (are there NO electricians in this city that can work on whirlpool pumps? really?), it will be something else entirely. At least now I have the whole afternoon to devote to the third floor. Yippee.

Five Questions: The Interview

Speaking of clever & lovely, have I told you about Whoorl, lipgloss connoisseur & mother to what is clearly one of the most scrumptious babies in blogdom? She also has ridiculously shiny hair & lives by the beach. (Bitch.) But she's so entertaining, you will like her anyway. And she was nice enough to interview me, saving me from tackling the horrific chaos known as my third floor. For that (and this), I will love her forever.

What is your favorite state fair-type food?
Fries, gyro, caramel or candy apple, Italian ice, homemade ice cream, elephant ear, funnel cake, lemon shake, orange shake, virtually anything fried or on a stick. If it's fried and on a stick? Look out. Oh, wait. Did you mean just one thing?

What is the last thing you do before getting into bed at night?
Turn off the light. More accurately - forget to turn off the light, sigh, grumble, try to get my husband to get up & turn off the light, disregard his argument that I was the last person in bed and also the light switch is on my side of the room, grumble some more, get out of bed, walk two steps, turn off the light & get back in bed, still grumbling.

Window or aisle seat?
Aisle. I like to be able to make a quick getaway.

How many states/countries have you lived in? What was your favorite?
Just two states, Pennsylvania & Ohio. I definitely prefer Pennsylvania.

What kind of cheese do you like on your burger, if any?
Mmmmm, cheese. I had a burger yesterday with bourbon sauce & gorgonzola cheese & it was to die for. I like almost any kind of cheese, except Swiss. Unless it's Jarlsberg & then only in this fabulous dip that I can, quite literally, eat an entire bowl of, all by myself. Which gives me an idea for lunch . . .

Want to play? Here's how it works:

• Leave me a comment requesting an interview.
• I will email you five questions. I get to pick the questions. If you ask nicely & shower me with compliments, they may even make sense. Maybe. (Don't bet on it.)
• You will update your blog with the answers to the questions.
• You will include this explanation (or a reasonable variation) and an offer to interview someone else in the same post.
• When others comment asking to be interviewed, you will ask them five questions.

Come on, it will be fun! And I won't have to deal with the third floor for at least another few hours.

Edited to add: check out Mary, Kimmy, Nicole & Teacher Lady for their amusing answers to my less-than-inspired questions. And also Mrs. T, who expanded the meme by tagging herself to answer Metalia's questions.

Sunday-ish

Thank God for the clever & lovely Melissa, who saved me from coherent thought once again.

One Word Sarcomical Sunday #8

• Your Shirt: wrinkled
• To Your Right: windows
• To Your Left: mirror
• The Most Recently-Placed Object On Your Desk: phone
• You Detest: intolerance
• Have Been Thinking About: work
• Would Like To Buy: laptop
• Will Never Buy: gun
• Your Upcoming Week's Biggest Negative: cleaning
• Your Upcoming Week's Greatest Plus: weekend
• Part Of Your Last Meal: asiago
• Something You Won't Tolerate: lying
• Something You Can't Turn Down: pastry
• Your Mind: busy
• Your Preferred Flavor of Toothpaste: mint
• The Location of Your First Kiss: forgettable
• Your Favorite Part of a Picnic: sunshine
• A Favorite Type of Tree: magnolia
• The Last Thing You Completed: book
• You'd Love To Be Invisible For One Day In a Room With: Dubya

The Infamous Music Meme

I've been tagged by Kimmy & Teacher Lady for this meme: List seven songs you are into right now. No matter what they are. They must be songs you are presently enjoying. Then tag seven other people to see what they're listening to.

Oh, this is bad. I rarely listen to the radio & truly have no idea what is hot right now. I've already told you that I have no idea who half the people in Rolling Stone are. The last CD I bought was . . . hmm, I actually have no idea. The last CD that was bought for me was Justin Timberlake's FutureSex / LoveSounds & I have to admit that I am strangely addicted to it. (Although, seriously, JT, it is time to get over that whole infidelity thing. Lord.) Okay, I am probably going to embarrass myself terribly, but here are the last seven songs I listened to on Napster & that are in pretty much constant rotation lately:

• Bill Withers, "Ain't No Sunshine"
• Janis Joplin, "Cry Baby"
• Jeff Buckley, "Hallelujah"
• Augustana, "Boston"
• Damien Rice, "The Blower's Daughter"
• Mary J. Blige, "Be Without You"
• Nelly Furtado, "Say It Right"

And of course, I always, always, always loooooooooove Dave Matthews. (Tickets are going on sale on the 21st, who's coming to the concert with me??) I'm not tagging anyone because I think there are only about six people left in the blogosphere who haven't already participated in this meme. If you are one of those six & want to jump on the bandwagon with me, leave me a note in the comments so I can check out your list. God knows I could use some new music recommendations!

Advice Requested

I believe I may have mentioned once or twice or a million times just how thoroughly horrible my last work environment was. As is so often the case, even I didn't realize quite how bad it was until I was free of it. Suddenly, miraculously, I am now sleeping through the night, my daily headaches are a distant memory & I don't even know where the bottle of Tums is, much less need one on every floor for immediate access. Glorious!

The problem is (you knew there was a problem, right? I can turn anything into an issue, trust me), having found myself blissfully free of the weight of job-related stress, I am not exactly anxious to jump right back into the work force. Which is an issue since Chris & I are perhaps over-fond of things like eating and electricity and other luxuries like that. And then, of course, there's my Coach / Tiffany / Sephora / shoes of any kind habits. So, yeah, I'm going to have to get a job. And while I don't know exactly what I want to do (it seems that all of the heiress positions have been filled), I do know that I don't want to spend 40+ hours a week thoroughly miserable, overworked & underpaid, with my sole purpose being to make a multi-millionaire even more wealthy. I would like to get some sense of satisfaction and purpose from my job. Which leads me to the point of this post (and yes, there is one).

I recently applied for a marketing position at a non-profit organization. This job is PERFECT for me in virtually every way. The organization is one that I wholeheartedly support and would be thrilled to be involved with. I have been training for this position for all of my adult life. In spite of my rediscovered love for sleeping in & watching bad daytime television, I really, really want this job. And today I found out that I progressed to the next step in the interview process, an applicant questionnaire that includes questions like "why are you interested in marketing and development?" and "where do you see yourself in five years?". Oh, hell. I hate questions like that. I hated them as an interviewer and I hate them even more as an interviewee. They're crap questions with absolutely no good answers and they tell you nothing about the candidate. And yet somehow I have to answer them in a way that makes a complete stranger think that I would be an asset to her organization. That I am, in fact, the best person on the planet for this position. Sadly, the only semi-coherent thought (if we're judging loosely) swirling through my head is "please hire me, oh please oh please oh please, I am a marketing genius and I will totally rock this position and you will love me so much and I will bring you candy every day and did I tell you how pretty you are?". And you can see how the only thing this will get me is banned from the building.

Any suggestions? Please?

Question

Last night, I had no less than four different men buy me drinks. (Which totally explains the last post. I mean, I could hardly refuse a drink once it had been bought for me, could I? That would've been bad manners, & my mama raised me right.) Several of them (obviously brilliant, discerning individuals) spent the better part of the evening telling me how fabulous, charming & gorgeous I am. I should mention that one of these men is over seventy & another is of questionable sexual orientation. And I don't know what I should be more upset about - the fact that this is now the demographic that I appeal to, or that over the course of the evening my husband repeatedly asked what I did / said to these men to make them so taken with me. I may be a lush, but doesn't that sound like an insult to you?

Helpful Information

It seems that I only need to drink four Lynchburg Lemonades (perfectly made by my new BFFs, Curtis & John at the PAA) to be loooooaaaaaded.

Unfortunately, last night I drank six.

Head. Hurts.

Stupid Jack Daniels.

Looking for Answers

I'm sure you've all been wondering what exactly I've been doing with myself now that I am officially unemployed. Some of you (those of you how either don't know me very well or have generously given me the benefit of the doubt) may have assumed that I'm busy unpacking / cleaning / cooking a lovely dinner for my wonderful husband / looking for a new job in order to support my Coach habit. And of course, I am doing all of those things. Or, um, I've done some of those things. Occasionally. I've also taken lots of bubble baths in my glorious new whirlpool tub, checked out my local library & discovered that daytime television is dismal. In short, I've had lots of time to ponder the Great Mysteries of Life, to wit:

• Does ESPN not have a stylist of any kind for their anchors?
• Don't any of those men at least have wives / girlfriends / significant others to help them out? Sean Salisbury & Barry Melrose, I'm talking to you!
• Am I the only one who cares about this? My husband is surprisingly unconcerned about their wardrobe & hairstyle choices.
• Am I the only one who has noticed that Sandra Lee is a lush? Seriously, I am all about the cocktails, and I do appreciate the fact that every single episode of her show includes a cocktail recipe, but she gets much too elated about cooking sherry. Also, "tablescape" is not a word & no one should be that enthralled over napkin rings & teacup favors.
• In real life, does anyone actually have favors for their dinner guests?
• Seriously, do they? Have I been committing a horrible entertaining faux pas all these years?
• Why does everyone on the planet eat a piece of pie &/or pizza starting at the point?
• When did "chocolate" become a muffin flavor, just like blueberry or banana nut?
• Isn't a chocolate muffin just a cupcake without frosting?
• Does calling it a muffin somehow make it healthier?
• Since I assume it does not, isn't eating a cupcake a lot more fun than eating a muffin? Because I would rather have one cupcake than a whole basket of muffins.
• Does anyone actually like that lingonberry stuff at IKEA?
• How is it possible that you can put together an entire IKEA wood TV stand with one tiny hex key (included in the box), but the little cardboard storage boxes require a screwdriver and a wrench and the towel bars don't even come with screws?
• How is it possible that, knowing that, I still get sucked in to the Swedish quagmire that is IKEA every time?
• Even more confounding is how did I get sucked into American Idol this year, which leads to the most baffling question of all time - How is Sanjaya Malakar still on American Idol? The boy cannot sing & his stage presence is so awkward, it's physically painful. I am saying little prayers that this is his last week.
• Am I the only person who thinks that Tony Bennett's sole accomplishment is outliving his contemporaries? Although I will say that I went to an exhibit of his paintings once, and they were surprisingly good.
• Speaking of people that can't sing, why does Fergie have to spell at least one word in all of her songs?
• And if she must spell some random word in each song, why wouldn't she make sure that the word is spelled correctly? FYI, T-A-S-T-E-Y is not how you spell tasty.

I have also discovered this week (in case you could not have guessed) that I am terminally unhip. I have no idea who at least 60% of the "celebrities" in the last issue of Rolling Stone were. (Danger Mouse? The Arcade Fire? Who are these people?) Soon I'm going to be one of Those People who bitches about "kids today" & the horrible music they listen to & how they can't spell or hold an actual conversation & have no sense of personal responsibility & Lord God almighty, must all of the girls dress like tarts? Oh, wait. I am That Person.

I think I need to start looking for a job.