Wow. I am way tired.

New temp job is going just fine. Decent pay, not terribly annoying. The person I’m filling in for is out on worker’s comp, so I’d say I have a fairly good chance of being there until the start of the school year. Woohoo!

I didn’t really have a chance to mention it before, but I did want to say that my heart goes out to all those affected by last week’s attack on London. I was in London once, for about a day and a half, with X and his family, which is what the above photo is from.

Random question of the day…if the convenience store advertises “any size fountain drink 89 cents!”, why does the clerk need to know what size it is to ring it out?

Anyway…hope everyone is having a great weekend!

ETA: Unkymoods is back up…it was down for a while, and I feared it was for good. But I was wrong. Hurrah! 🙂

Hilary tagged me with the lifetme meme:

10 years ago: That would have been the summer between my junior and senior years of college, so I was working a really boring summer job in the engineering department of the factory where my father worked. I had to file and inventory blueprints.

5 years ago: I moved to Buffalo.

1 year ago: I met an amazing man, turned 30, and started to feel very comfortable in my own skin.

Yesterday: I got really stressed out by the attorney at the office where I’m temping. Then I hung out with Rand and watched a movie and did some laundry.

Today: Working. Then trying like crazy to get ready to leave town on Friday.

Tomorrow: Starting a new temp assignment.

5 snacks I enjoy: Combos. Doritos (regular). Various fruits. Cheerios (either straight from the box or toasted with a bit of margarine). And, um…Cheese Nips.

5 bands that I know the lyrics of MOST of their songs: Lowest of the Low. Jackdaw. Carbon Leaf. Great Big Sea. Bon Jovi.

5 things I would do with $100,000,000: Pay off all my debt. Help out my parents and my brother. Invest some wisely. Buy some new toys (iPod, laptop, digital camera). Go on a fabulous vacation. (that’s a lot of money. There’s tons more stuff I would do with it!)

5 locations I�d like to run away to: Italy. Hawaii. Ireland. Australia. Toronto.

5 bad habits I have: Procrastinating. Eating junk food. Procrastinating. I used to pick at my fingernails when bored, but I seem to have stopped doing that. Saying “um”.

5 things I like doing: Reading. Going to concerts. Writing. Cuddling. Spending time with friends/family.

5 things I would never wear: Super high heels. Those trendy super-short frilly skirts I hate so much. Tube tops. Velour activewear. Anything with words written across my butt.

5 TV shows I like: The West Wing. Alias. Lost. Scrubs. Six Feet Under.

5 movies I like: The Princess Bride. Say Anything. When Harry Met Sally. The Shawshank Redemption. Back to the Future.

5 famous people I�d like to meet: JJ Abrams. Aaron Sorkin. Victor Garber. Stephen King. Ewan McGregor.

5 biggest joys at the moment: Being published! 🙂 Feeling loved. My family. My friends. Teaching.

5 favorite toys: (that I would like to have…heehee) Laptop. iPod. Digital camera. Tivo. Ummm…I’m at a loss. 🙂

As for tagging, I’m going to leave it relatively open. Stephanie always seems to enjoy doing these. 🙂 Consider yourself invited. Please post a link if you join in…

I have never liked chip dip.

For quite a while, people have been telling me I had to try Bison chip dip. But why, I wondered, when I don’t like chip dip?

But then I learned something new last week.

Most chip dips, it seems, are mayonnaise-based. This would explain my aversion to most chip dips. I hate mayonnaise. Loathe it. Mayonnaise is the reason I avoid most anything with the word “salad” aftr it. That is, unless said salad contains some sort of lettuce/greens or fruit. Macaroni, Potato, Tuna, Chicken. Egg. Blech. Mayo.

Bison chip dip, manufactured here in Buffalo, is sour cream based. So I decided to give it a shot. And LO! I liked it.

So yay for trying new things.

Since I’m on the subject of condiments…what condiments do you like or dislike? My favorite has become barbecue sauce. Mustard is ok, but I prefer a honey mustard or dark mustard to regular yellow. I have no particular aversion to ketchup, but I don’t really enjoy it either.

For salad dressings, Caesar and Raspberry Vinagrette are my favorites. I’m not crazy about Ranch or Bleu Cheese.

Ok, your turn. 🙂

With Rand and his seemingly endless collection of DVDs. 🙂

Finished Season 3 of Six Feet Under. Wow, what a killer of a season finale that was. It was so…horribly uncomfortable watching Nate spin completely out of control during those last few episodes. That’s good writing AND good acting. Fantastic.

Watched the first season of Futurama, which I absolutely loved.

Last night, I got to see Being John Malkovich for the first time, which was interesting and funny and disturbing and sad, and holy crap, was that ending creepy. (Side note…what the heck is Charlie Kaufman on?)

Let’s see…what else have I recently seen for the first time? Probably a whole bunch of stuff that I can’t remember. 🙂 Oh…at his friend’s place the other night, we watched a bootleg of Batman Begins that was missing about half an hour. Fortunately, Rand had already seen it and was able to fill in the gaps. I didn’t like Christian Bale’s Batman voice. I thought it seemed overly breathy, like he’d just run the mile. I also agreed with Rand that the fight scenes were unnecessarily confusing, what with all of the cuts and quick camera moves.

I think that’ll about do it. 🙂

A belated wish of good cheer for my friends on both sides of the border. 🙂

I, for one, had an utterly exhausting weekend of doing nothing…okay, that’s not true. How about lots of little somethings?

Friday night, Rand and I went off to a small gathering to send off his friend and coworker Nancy, who has moved out of town…a pleasant time, but a little bit sad, of course. I really appreciated getting to know Nancy, and wish I’d been able to get to know her better. The gathering happened at the most gorgeous house in East Aurora. Light and open, with a fantastic view, and the most wonderful little reading nook…big cozy chair, window, and a fireplace. I want one!

Saturday was meeting up with a couple of Rand’s friends, a quick dinner at Duff’s in Orchard Park, where Adam does caricatures. (he did one of us…I’ll try and post it later!) Then Jen and I went to see Jackdaw at the first Inner Harbor Music Festival. It’s been so long that they have new music I hadn’t heard yet! They were lots of fun, as always.

On Sunday, another friend of Rand’s invited us over for a little barbecue, which was very nice. then on Sunday, He found out that a couple of his high school friends were in town, so we headed out to have a visit with them. All fun, but exhausting! Plus with the heat yesterday, I just wanted to die…

I have about a million and one things to accomplish this week. ACK!

I know there were several little things that came up over the weekend that I wanted to write about, but they’re escaping me. I really need to carry a little tape recorder. Hey, I wonder if my cell phone has some sort of memo feature…

I’m going to throw up.

But in a good way. 😉

I am working at a silly temp job…filling in while someone is on vacation for a few days, working reception. I got here, logged on to check my emails. I have my primary account, and two gmail accounts. One gmail account is for blogstuff, the other for work/teaching related stuff.

In the second gmail account, I had this message from the fiction editor at Woman’s World:

I just got back an approval on your very touching romance, “A Mother Knows.” Congratulations!

I’ll get the contract in the mail today, but in the meantime, can you email me the text as soon as possible? I’m putting it in issue 37 (on-sale date September 6), which I’m working on this week and would like to get started on the story before the long weekend.

I keep reading it, over and over and over again. Is it real? I think it is. 🙂

Ohmygod.

[MICKEY:] Silvia…

[SILVIA:]Yes Mickey?

[MICKEY:]How do you call your loverboy?

[SILVIA:]C’mere loverboy!!

[MICKEY:]And if he doesnt answer?

[SILVIA:]Ohh loverboy!

[MICKEY:]And if he STILL doesnt answer?

[SILVIA:]I simply say
Baby,
Oohh baby
My sweet baby
You’re the one

Last week, Rand and I were eating somewhere (I believe it was someplace we stopped on our way to Jen and Mike’s party) and this song was on the radio. I was sort of singing along under my breath.

“What song is this?” Rand asked.

“Ummm…Love is Strange? Sylvia and Mickey?”

He asked me how I had this information…well, from Dirty Dancing, of course! 🙂

If you were anywhere near my age bracket and female in 1988, you probably saw Dirty Dancing multiple times in the theater. Then you got it on video and memorized lines, speeches, the Kellerman’s anthem, and tried to teach yourself the merengue.

Me? I’m scared of everything. I’m scared of what I saw, I’m scared of what I did, of who I am, and most of all I’m scared of walking out of this room and never feeling the rest of my whole life the way I feel when I’m with you.

I carried a watermelon.

and of course, the ever immortal:

Nobody puts Baby in a corner.

Jen and I were just talking about this, hence her post of earlier today.

Jen mentioned the Keds, but what I remember most is the resurgence of the knee-length cut off and rolled jean short. I definitely had those. 🙂

(not the image I wanted, but it’ll do)

But my most distinct memory about Dirty Dancing is this…when I was about to be a freshman in high school (I think…I feel like it was summer), this girl named Heather had a party. All my friends were invited except for me, Janel, and this girl Jen. I invited Jen and Janel to sleep over at my house, and we watched (of course) Dirty Dancing. We ate popcorn, quoted lines, and tried to learn the dances. It was great fun. 🙂

The survey was actually kinda fun. 🙂

It bugs me when people pronounce important as if it contained a D.

impordant

That is all. 🙂

So I’ve officially fulfilled my civic duty for the next eight years. Woohoo. 🙂

I don’t know if there are any litigators out there who would care to comment on this, but I get the distinct feeling that my level of education was an important factor in my not being chosen. (the other people in my group who had advanced degrees were also dismissed) That, and the fact that I know too many lawyers. (related to one, used to date one, living with someone who’s *almost* one)

As much as I joked about trying to get out of it, once there, I certainly wasn’t going to do or say anything untrue to try and get out of it. As I was leaving the courthouse yesterday, some guy who was in my group said something to the effect that there should be a special punishment for people who try and weasel out once they’re already sitting in the box.

One of the attorneys said something yesterday during the selection process that struck me. He asked the prospective jurors to put themselves in the place of the defendant. “Now ask yourself if you’re the type of person you would want sitting on your jury.”

Even though I wasn’t in the box at that time, I knew my answer.

Yes. Absolutely. I am exactly who I would want sitting on that jury.

Too bad that’s exactly why the lawyers don’t want me sitting on a jury. 😉

Duh, I almost forgot why I started this post.

Sitting in front of me was a woman who said, when asked if there was any reason we would be uncomfortable or unable to devote our full attention to the case, that being in the city made her feel “anxious”. Not the driving into the city part, but the actual being in the city part.

I’m from Small Town America. Believe me, it’s an entirely different world from city life. And it has not once occurred to me to be frightened of living (or being) in the city. I’m more cautious in some ways, yes, but I certainly don’t live my life in fear. I have a lot of friends who feel the same way. So it occurs to me that it’s not people from small towns who fear the city, it’s people from the suburbs who fear the city. I find it utterly mind-boggling.