Good Things Friday – Monkey Balls Edition

10 years ago today, Grommie dog was born
Best Dog Ever
I tell him all the time
It’s a beautiful day
The Veterans are out with their poppies
There’s a woman abusing herself with an eyelash curler a couple seats over on the train
Whatever gene it is that makes you wanna do extremely private stuff in public
I don’t have it
Thankfully
Well maybe I had it for a few indiscrete moments in college
But it was just a phase
Certainly not genetic
We’re having a Welcome to the Neighborhood Party
Tomorrow night
For our new neighbors Pam & Eric
We’ve invited a lot of neighbors that we don’t typically see
From all over the ‘hood
Should be fun
Ever walk into a store knowing you wanted something but not exactly what?
I got this small wallet phone holder thingie from Carson’s
It fits my phone perfectly
This is that something
The Hipstamatic camera app for my phone is fabulous and fun
I’m wearing the scarf I bought at Coldwater Creek
Shopping with Mom Mother’s Day weekend
I met with Adam yesterday
He’s the guy who built our web site
It’s going to be awesome
I haven’t been this happy about a new web site in 6 years
The content management system is called SilverStripe
And it’s fabulous
Way better than .Net Nuke
Which sucks hairy monkey balls
Yes
Hairy
Monkey-flavored
Ball sack
Anyhow
I bet when you woke up this morning
You didn’t expect to hear about hairy monkey balls
Did you?
The woman across from me (not the eyelash curler masochist)
Is wearing pink Converse tennis shoes
As cute as they are
Those shoes have never looked all that comfy to me
It’s Memorial Day weekend
All day yesterday it was “Are you coming in tomorrow?”
“Are you coming in tomorrow?”
“Are you coming in tomorrow?”
Hell yeah, I’m coming in tomorrow
I’d sure like to know when the day before a holiday weekend became part of the holiday
It never used to be that way
Our government is finally doing (sort of) the right thing
On Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell
If the most well-trained military organization on the planet
(The Israeli Army)
Doesn’t have a problem with it
Why should we?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I am listening to: All-American Rejects – Swing Swing
I am reading: Press release for Internet Retailer conference
And I am: Sunny with a chance of monkey balls

Crisis

"We are out of toilet paper."
"Does that mean I can't poop?"
"You can poop all you want. You just can't wipe."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I am listening to: The fan on the MacBook
I am reading: Eh nothing good, too much worky
And I am: Glad I keep a secret stash

Good Things Friday – Loading the Truck Edition

There’s a guy in a rented Bobcat
At the Aurora train station
Loading chunks of asphalt and concrete into a dump truck
It’s masterful
Jockeying the scoop under the pile to maximize the load
Carefully positioning it high over the truck bed
Followed by the drop and the quick flick to empty
Sometimes I wish for a job like that
Where at the end of the day I could say
I built this or
I moved that or
I loaded the truck
It’s date night
Me and Jim are going to dinner then IronMan 2
I can’t wait
Which after almost 20 years is pretty fucking cool
I know I say it a lot
Perhaps to the point of being irritating
But it is pretty fucking cool
Speaking of irritating
I finally got to drive myself to the train station today
After a long week of being shuttled by Jim because of car repairs
This made me extremely crabby
The good thing is
I realized my moods are directly related to
How often I work out
How much alone time I have
How much I have to rely on others
For anything
This is something to really think about as I get older
Celebrated Mr. You Know Who’s 50th birthday in Lake Geneva last weekend
Realized that all of my favorite bar moments involve Mr. YKW
“And the whore will have a Jack & Coke”
“You call your wife a whore?”
“Hell no, she’s not my wife”
AND
“Thank God you’re here, before you arrived the best looking broad in the joint was the one armed junkie whore sleeping on the bar”
We went to a special beer dinner with Mr. & Mrs. You Know Who and friends
Wednesday night
Sponsored by Leinenkugl
It was a fabulous gourmet meal that paired different beers with awesome crazy fun foods
We’re going to do it again next month for sure
There’s a car wash a block from our office
Fancy-schmancy cars in and out all day
Walking to lunch, someone was backing out post-wash
And I needed to wait on the sidewalk
For this small delay I got an amazingly open delightful grin
From an old gray-haired dude in a spanking new Mercedes
It was totally unexpected and made me smile right back
One of those fantastic, unplanned moments you share with a stranger
That stays with you
For days
I finally finally finally hired someone to do our web site
It’s what we do (build web sites for companies)
But I can never get our guys to do it for me
Which is good because we’re busy and profitable
But our web site really sucks ass
Which kills me
But not for too much longer
We got a new comforter set for our bed
It is awesome and soft and comfy
Plus it’s huge – I sleep better because now I’m not fighting for covers
If someone would invent a comforter to prevent snoring we’d be all set
The diner-type joint called Yolk at Wells & Chicago in River North
It’ll put you in a good mood no matter what
I bought a 2-terabyte drive on Amazon last night
To begin storing all the movies and TV shows I’m ripping
It’s such a fun project
Another fun project: Unsubscribing
In the past month I’ve unsubscribed from at least 50
Bullshit industry newsletters, email alerts and daily news bulletins
The ones I never read are gone
Which makes me more likely to read the ones that are truly valuable
“How many mee-nutes?”
That was the wrinkly old Italian dude waiting with me for the #11 bus yesterday
He saw me checking the schedule on my phone
It was cute how he smiled and asked
Then looking up and around, he said
“Chicago…is beautiful, yes?”
“Yes, it is. Are you visiting here?” I ask
“No, I live here 27 years. Beautiful,” he says
Yes it is
I wonder
How to make my job feel more like loading the truck
Simple
More meaningful
Because I realize it’s on me to do that
Every day it’s on me to look up and around
To find the beautiful
In what’s old and familiar
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I am listening to: World Exploded into Love - B. Schneider
I am reading: Nothing
And I am: Loading the truck

Good Things Friday - Glitter in the Air Edition

Pink - Glitter in the Air
My new favorite song right now
FANTASTIC, RELAXING, WONDERFUL time in Michigan for Mother's Day weekend
I love how talking to my Mom always brings clarity on a subject
Got my nails done tonight
It's such a simple, silly, girly thing but it makes me happy
I think it's mostly because at least one very small part of my existence feels 'done'
Ya know?
Watched the movie Elizabeth this week - it's really quite good
And it always rejuvenates my old crush on Joseph Fiennes
He's just plain old yummy
I appreciate the fact that we live in a neighborhood where I can leave a door open and be gone for more than an hour
There's a lovely cool breeze coming in through the doorwall
Gromit is snoring on the couch
And I'm ripping movies
Hoping to have all of our shit digitized by end of summer
I'm done beating myself up over silly mistakes
Spending the weekend in Lake Geneva with Mr. & Mrs. You Know Who to celebrate his 50th
It's going to be a blast
Any time I can play a semi-dirty word on Facebook Scrabble, I will, even if it means less points
Like 'anus'
Or 'tits'
The new iPhone comes out in June and I'm thinking I might be on it
The iPad is interesting - but I can't make calls from it and don't want another device to carry around
The ideal scenario: I'd be able to make calls from it and switch it with my iPhone whenever I don't feel like carrying the iPad around
Now that would be cool
The Logitech Universal Remote has saved our marriage
I'm dead serious
It is smarter than I am when it comes to getting our shit to do what I want it to do
"Is the DVD player on?"
"Did this help?"
It's amazing
I'm wearing my Obama 44 sweatshirt
It's very comfy
Although I always have reservations about wearing it in public
Like an angry teabagger will beat me up or something
I fantasize they'll say something like "Your shirt offends me"
And then I'll have the opportunity to say something like "Eat my ass, fucktard"
Or maybe I'll just smile and say "Your ignorance offends me, so let's call it even"
Something like that
Maybe
Maybe
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I am listening to: Gromit snoring and the traffic on Randall
I am reading: This blog, which has some very interesting stuff about the founder of Facebook
And I am: Okay

Flying Cars & Potato Chips

I use Google Reader on my iPhone.

Translation for non-geek types: Google (the search engine) also allows me to set up news preferences, automagically sending top stories from newspapers all over the world to my iPhone. This means I don’t have to visit every news site – I get it all in one place. It’s a quick, convenient way to get a snapshot of world news during my morning commute.

Anyhow. That’s not the point.

This morning I’m on the late train to work with Google reader, when I see this über-enticing item from the New York Times:

“The Moment You’ve Waited For”

OHHHHHHH.

Really? GREAT.

The flying car is finally here!
They’ve invented a potato chip that won’t make my ass fat(ter)!
They caught Osama Bin Laden!

These are the things that came to mind. In that order. Yep.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Hedy, Hedy, Hedy.

Flying cars and potato chips? Really?

No world peace? No end to hunger and other global strife?

What sort of left wing liberal whore are you?

The sort that really wants a flying car and a potato chip RIGHT NOW, goddammit.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“What could it be?” I thought. “This magical moment for which we’ve all been waiting.”

Am I part of the group ‘all’? And what makes this thing so universally momentous?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Nope. And nope. Turns out it's a cool story but certainly not the moment I'VE personally been waiting for, to my utter disappointment and disgust.

It’s a story about this very cool photography project called A Moment in Time. Here's the explanation.

So what's the Moment You've Waited For? First thing that pops into your head. Go.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I am listening to: A co-worker talking too much as usual
I am reading: Google Reader
And I am: Cold and damp

Good Things Friday - Detroit Edition

Drove to Michigan this morning
There is something about being on the road
No agenda
No deadlines
Nobody really knows where I am
Just me singing in the car
I am writing this from Mom & Da's computer
Per a request from Dave @ Rather Than Working
It's thundering out now
"I have a real problem with my hearing."
"What are you going to do about that?"
"Heh?"
Kisses from Rudy dog
Mom gave us a fashion show of all the clothes she bought for the big Hawaii trip in November
Everything was amazing-bursting-green on the way here, like nature exploded
I wrote another scene from my screenplay on the way here
Being on the road does that
I had a great week at work
Got so much done
And the owner/president/my boss says we're ahead of projections for the year
Which is so cool - I forgot what it's like to be part of a thriving, growing too-busy-for words company
The song "Closer to Fine" by the Indigo Girls
My Mom's home made potato salad
My Mom's home made Navy cake
The thunder is shaking the house
'Beerfart' as a term of endearment
Sleeping in my old room tonight; the dreams are always amazing
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I am listening to: The storm and humming Indigo Girls
I am reading: My own stuff for a change
And I am: Closer to fine