I keep telling myself that things could be worse, and they sure as hell could. Have you even reached a point though, where a TON of small things pile up and up and up and up and suddenly one little thing just comes at the wrong time and you find yourself up in the middle of the night because your freaking BRAIN woke you up?
Haven't slept in about three nights now. I go to sleep for a couple hours and I wake up, mind racing and I can't seem to get it under control. How can I pay the bills? How can I buy groceries? How can I support all of these people on the lousy salary I make, why have I worked FIVE years to be told that, oh, sorry, too bad, now you have to work SIX years to get that extra week vacation, sorry, anything else I can help you with?
I sell Avon on the side, which no one buys because we're in the middle of a freaking DEPRESSION and, while it's cheaper (and better in many ways) than Lancome it's still an expense no one can afford. Hell, I'M out of foundation and can't afford to replace it.
Well, anyway, it started with my father-in-law who went in to have his gall bladder out and then died. This put me at the mercy of my remaining in-laws, most of whom have raised selfishness to an art form. The day after my FIL died I packed up the requisite food basket and hied myself to my MILs home. We all went and oh, how we were welcomed, how happy to see us, oh my, let's open a bottle and talk about "Papa". Yeah, well, SHE called him "Papa" and kept signing cards from "Papa", my kids called him "Grandpa" and the hubster called him "Dad" but yeah, whatever. It went well and I thought, okay, she finally got smacked upside the head for once in her petty, privileged life and her shit, as the say, is together.
THE BITCH SET ME UP.
Now, as I see it, when someone dies everything rises. Like cream. And, as Lew Harper observed, shit. My FIL, for all his good hale and hearty smiles and party atmosphere and jokes and sports and good company was, for all intents and purposes, a LOUSY father. This isn't something that has come to me in the last two weeks, I've always thought so. However, I kept it to myself. The hubster loved him (of COURSE, I would expect nothing else), liked him and blamed most of his failings on the second wife.
I had a pretty fair relationship with my MIL, one that got closer as she got sicker and I had other information regarding that, but again, I kept that to myself too. He was the hubsters FATHER for crissake and, well, hell, he's dead now, what's the point?
But I've stayed quiet these last few weeks, which really isn't like me. My FIL was friends with everyone and close to no one. He lapped up his simpering daughter's fawning and left everyone else in the dirt. Oh, my SIL knew how to get what she wanted. Always arms draped around "Daddy", always snuggling, always pushing everyone else out of her way and making sure "Daddy" was there for her and "her girls" and no one else.
"Daddy" had no problems with this. "Daddy" had a full social calendar at all times and, on the rare occasions the hubster (or any of the other boys) felt they needed the advice or time of their dad well, yeah, let's see when we can pencil that in, there were parties and trips and tee times that had to be honored.
I never ONCE saw that man drop anything for his son. He gave him NOTHING in life, not his time, his advice or anything else. You ever had to just stop what you were doing, or wanted to do, because your kids needed you? Not him. Not ever. I suppose I really do give my SIL props for demanding his time and affection, because, when it comes down to it. if she hadn't she wouldn't have been simpering about how was she going to survive without her daily dose of Daddy?
Anyway, we got to his funeral Mass...the one we were told about by E-Vite? On time. Right on time, traffic was abysmal but yeah, right on time. Three rows reserved for family up front. The hubster, always the optimist especially after the wonderful, warm welcome he was given right after his father's death, kept walking to the front. The hubster needs to get his eyes checked. I could see that the family section was full. He thought, no, or course there's room for us there. Ha. And may I say HA! There was SIL with "her girls". MIL, wearing off white and drawing all eyes in that see of black and navy blue, much like Bette Davis wearing the red dress to the cotillion in "Jezebel". And her brothers and her nieces and nephews and their kids and spouses and some neighbors and friends...
Did she allow room for the guys oldest SON? Not even hardly. I grabbed the hubster by the suit coat and got him into the first pew with room for 4 of us. There WERE 6 of us, but his stroll towards the front which, I admit, was justified if overly optimistic, sort of put us in a pickle as the service was now starting and we were going to have to turn around and go back which I frankly thought was just too embarrassing, even for me. We grabbed 4 on the end, my father and step mother right behind us and a cousin, the deceased's nephew in front...he had been TOLD about the reserved seating for family and told he was to sit there but he, too, was shut out. Have a mentioned my step MIL is a pretentious douche bag?
At least the witch TOLD him. Once we left the cheese ball at her home we never heard from her again. Never. An e-mail regarding the service was responded to with the answer "check the website". The website was password protected, btw, had to beg for that. Calls were not returned, by my step MIL OR my SIL, who, while her father lay dying, drunk dialed me in the middle of the night and I, fool that I was, spent 90 minutes on the phone buying into her damn "oh, I want to make sure you're in my life, oh, we're family, oh, we're doing a spa week-end, oh, I love you, Deb" BULLSHIT.
And I, sap that I am, momentarily bought into it. Because I'm a softie and I always buy into this crap.
We were sent an email telling us that the reception following the service was to begin, not at 2 as originally stated but at 2:30. That was, apparently, just for us. We got there at two to find that everyone else had been there for half an hour and we had to park a mile away and hike it, including my step mother with her cane. We RSVPd promptly as the RSVPs were, supposedly, to ensure there was room and seating for everyone. Not even hardly, my step-mother AND her cane, stood most of the time while the privileged class of the greater "we don't really live in Bel Air but we use the name in our community name so you poor folk will THINK we live in Bel Air" sat on their rich asses and watched her.
We finally found an abandoned table outside, in a corner, we pushed aside the uneaten food and half drunk beer glasses and got her seated. Every bee in Los Angeles attended. Open Mike night was being held inside the clubhouse but there was no room for us, nor did anyone ask about or even make room for the guy's SON to speak. There was a 20 minute slide show running, about 500 pictures of my FIL with my step-MILs relatives and my SIL and "her girls". There was exactly ONE picture with the hubster and my sons in it and a second picture taken at our wedding which did not include us.
MIL spoke not a word to us until we made it a point to say good bye. SIL acted in the same manner, said oh, so busy, sorry, like your hat. Come to Arizona an visit me, when I came here I'm way to busy to work you in so come to me. She actually said that.
Between that and the drunken cousin who came home with us the next day but didn't want to stay at our place and wouldn't LEAVE and I ended up driving him up to the Bel Air wannabe at 1:30 am, having been up since 5am, well, basically, I haven't slept. I can see why he was avoiding going back to MILs place, she woke him up on Sunday morning, told him to get dressed and drove him to the clubhouse where she hosted my FILs farewell reception and put a vacuum cleaner in his hand. Yep, she made him go over with her and CLEAN UP.
I assume this is why the little things have me ready to collapse. Not a joke, I'm actually kind of afraid of what's happening to me. Oddly enough though, this last debacle with these people (and I DO mean last) has angered me but not hurt me. I think I've spent too many years being hurt by these people, there two faced "promises" and their offers of family and friendship that are offered only because they want me to to something for them and they know that I'm suck a fucking SAP that I buy their bullshit every damn time. And then I feel bad and cry but what the hell do THEY care, they're on their way by now.
I feel bad because I DON'T feel all that bad. There's been stress and tiredness and frustration but, as it's all said and done now, I don't feel remorse, or even loss. They've taken advantage of me for the last time. I have no warm feelings for any of them. They publicly embarrassed my husband, shunned my kids and abused my tendencies to let bygones by bygones.
For all the friends and neighbors who could speak of little else except that he was fun at a party and hated USC, well, my MIL thought it was a wonderful tribute to a flawless man. But neither his sisters nor my brothers-in-law bothered to come to his funeral. I know why his sisters didn't come, there's no love lost there. The other sons? One said he didn't have the plane fare and the other one went to work. And we, basically, invited ourselves. I'm not sorry we did, it's the right thing to do. We dressed properly, my father and step mother were there with us. I spent most of Mass literally praying for the grace and dignity to act with a little class, I settled on just shutting up.
God, what a sad end. A lot of superficial friends filling up the spaces where one's family should have been but chose not to be. And the saps that DID show up were shut out, shoved to the back in favor of the more comely and overtly successful. I find myself wondering if she didn't hire dress extras to pad the crowd, which wasn't, btw, as big as I had been led to believe it would be.
We took our cousin to the airport yesterday morning and I realized that last night was the first night my step MIL had been without a house guest, the first night she had been alone in her home since her husbands death. I thought about calling her, seeing if she was okay because, in spite of everything, no one can ignore the fact that she really loved the guy. I thought about it and decided not to waste my time.
I've never really experienced schadenfreude until that moment.
I think I like it.
Tuesday, August 23, 2011
Monday, August 15, 2011
"Do not bring the dog."
I've spent a lot of time trying to figure out just what to wear to the "invitation only" funeral. It keeps me busy. I decided to go to my standby on most things, Mark Twain, who wrote, in a brief essay about proper funeral behavior, "Do not bring the dog." It's not helping much but they ARE words to live by and I fully intend to leave the dog at home. I don't actually HAVE a dog but if Twain had suggested I bring one I would have rented a pup.
I find myself getting increasingly nervous as this occasion approaches. In the first place, it's being held in a very snooty place. Very. It's SO snooty it's the only Catholic Church (possibly the only church period) in the State that never has to give the "We need money" sermon. They can keep running on the change that its congregation drops in the padded pews. They also have no parking. There's a lot which accommodates approximately 20 cars. I know this because we drove over there and scoped the place out last weekend. There's a possibility of valets, we're not sure yet. All the street parking is restricted so we'll most likely be using the public parking garage across the street from the Church and next to the Cartier's. You think I jest?
In anticipation of this, I went looking for appropriate funeral attire. Appropriate RICH people's funeral attire. Well, not really rich people. It's been my experience that most legitimately rich people are quite nice, very friendly, accepting of all your Payless Shoe Source-shod relatives, VERY generous with their gin and they usually think your car is really cool.
NO...this is a service for people who are well off, having become well off not by hard work but by throwing other people under the train, and think their crap doesn't stink. Ever been to a rich persons home for a meal? Hors d'oeuvres are plentiful, wine flows and food is wonderful. They actually invite you into their homes.
The pseudo rich book the club house at the gated community which is named as if it's a really, really tony area and hopes maybe you might confuse the two. Sorry, but calling your apartment complex the "Upper East Side lofts on the Hudson" won't negate the fact that it's a co-op in the Bronx. But the people who paid inflated prices for their living area THINK it's as good as, if not better than, the Upper East Side and they expect you to treat them with the appropriate reverence. They also tend to feel that you're too stupid to know the difference, being part of the unwashed masses that work for a living and live close enough to your office to walk.
What the "clubhouse" is, is a big, square room which will be punctuated with round tables, folding chairs and the contents of my step-MILs refrigerator which include the bleu cheese ball I made and brought over to her last week. I can picture it now, a small round table, a paper tablecloth and my cheese ball with a stack of napkins and a box of Ritz crackers.
Well, what does one wear to such a pretentious gathering? I bought a simple navy blue suit. On sale. BIGGGGG sale. One of those "Take 50% off the last marked price because we only have one left" sales. Sheath, matching jacket. I planned to pair it with a pair of black pumps, a black church-type hat and the tourssade of freshwater pearls the hubster gave me when our second son was born. Simple earrings and a nice pin for the jacket. The pin is the important part. It's an enamel pansy, obviously vintage. Vintage is a nice way of saying the paint is chipped off the edge. But this really IS old. There's a nice size real diamond in the center.
It's important to wear this pin. It was a gift from my mother-in-law. No, not the one who is planning this tacky event, my ACTUAL mother in law. The hubster's mother. The lady who married my FIL first. In the very church that's been chosen for the funeral.
It doesn't GET much better, does it?
But...I am on the horns of a dilemma. My step-MIL is the woman who wore a sailor suit to my mother's funeral. No, not like the kid on the Cracker Jack box, although all it needed was the hat. Blue and white striped slacks, a buttoned up sleeveless white vest with no shirt under it and wedge espadrilles. Because, as she kept saying to all of the black- and navy blue-clad people who were in attendance, no one wears black to funerals anymore.
I own a just above-the-knee length skirt in a jaunty print of white sailboats on navy blue which, I'm thinking, would look nice paired with my Bellagio Las Vegas souvenir t-shirt. The shirt is white, btw, with a big gold sun on the front which should enhance the overall regatta theme. I think that and a pair of flip flops might be in order. I'll even get a pedicure. I wouldn't want to be accused of appearing slovenly.
I'll end up in the navy suit I imagine. As the hubster said, given the choice of doing the appropriate thing and getting skewered for it or telling someone to go to hell I'll do the appropriate thing every time. Lesser of two evils and all that. I won't feel good about it, I will resent it and I will have been badly used in the process but every family needs a doormat and that's MY job. I also think I'll end up leaving off the pearls. I subscribe to Coco Chanel's advice on accessorizing. Less IS more. Besides, they might detract from the pin, and I'm so looking forward to saying "Thank you! I just love it, it belonged to the hubster's mother."
IF anyone asks, from what I gather my FILs children aren't "family", the widow's brothers, nieces, nephews, ex-wives and caddies are "family." Says so. Right there in the obit. He was loved, admired and adored by HER family, all of whom are named, along with their spouses, kids and trash collectors. He was "survived" by his four children and some assorted grandchildren, four, five, something like that. I don't really anticipate being seated anywhere close to the area the important people will be, I'm frankly surprised we're being allowed in at all. It took me a WEEK to find out where the funeral was, I kept asking and was told "just check the website or your e-mail." Really? You couldn't just SAY "The Church of What's Happening Now"? No, I have to wait for my invitation in the mail.
I'm reminded of the time my step-MIL threw a rehearsal dinner for one of her stepson's weddings. My niece had RSVP'd for herself and her significant other. At the last minute her significant other was bumped off his flight and couldn't come. My step-MIL loudly berated the girl, outside, in front of people, yelling at her that the dinner had already been PAID for and she couldn't get the MONEY BACK and how terrible this was and it was all my niece's fault for being rude and inconsiderate. Apparently both the airline and the National Weather Service should have given her guarantees of the boyfriend's availability for said dinner. She then followed this up with a lecture on manners via e-mail which my SIL, God love her, chose to share with me. That was 8 years ago, I still have the email.
We may be leaving early (depends on how long this soiree goes) because we're going to a wedding in Laguna. We had already said we would be there and they gave the head count to the caterer and then we had to say "Well, sorry, I could have told you this a week ago but no one would tell me where, or when the damn funeral was." They responded with heartfelt condolences and told us to come when we could, we would be welcome on-time or late, they would just be happy to see us and they would keep our dinner warm if at all possible.
For my money, that's the way REAL rich people act. And it has absolutely nothing to do with the balance in their checking account.
I find myself getting increasingly nervous as this occasion approaches. In the first place, it's being held in a very snooty place. Very. It's SO snooty it's the only Catholic Church (possibly the only church period) in the State that never has to give the "We need money" sermon. They can keep running on the change that its congregation drops in the padded pews. They also have no parking. There's a lot which accommodates approximately 20 cars. I know this because we drove over there and scoped the place out last weekend. There's a possibility of valets, we're not sure yet. All the street parking is restricted so we'll most likely be using the public parking garage across the street from the Church and next to the Cartier's. You think I jest?
In anticipation of this, I went looking for appropriate funeral attire. Appropriate RICH people's funeral attire. Well, not really rich people. It's been my experience that most legitimately rich people are quite nice, very friendly, accepting of all your Payless Shoe Source-shod relatives, VERY generous with their gin and they usually think your car is really cool.
NO...this is a service for people who are well off, having become well off not by hard work but by throwing other people under the train, and think their crap doesn't stink. Ever been to a rich persons home for a meal? Hors d'oeuvres are plentiful, wine flows and food is wonderful. They actually invite you into their homes.
The pseudo rich book the club house at the gated community which is named as if it's a really, really tony area and hopes maybe you might confuse the two. Sorry, but calling your apartment complex the "Upper East Side lofts on the Hudson" won't negate the fact that it's a co-op in the Bronx. But the people who paid inflated prices for their living area THINK it's as good as, if not better than, the Upper East Side and they expect you to treat them with the appropriate reverence. They also tend to feel that you're too stupid to know the difference, being part of the unwashed masses that work for a living and live close enough to your office to walk.
What the "clubhouse" is, is a big, square room which will be punctuated with round tables, folding chairs and the contents of my step-MILs refrigerator which include the bleu cheese ball I made and brought over to her last week. I can picture it now, a small round table, a paper tablecloth and my cheese ball with a stack of napkins and a box of Ritz crackers.
Well, what does one wear to such a pretentious gathering? I bought a simple navy blue suit. On sale. BIGGGGG sale. One of those "Take 50% off the last marked price because we only have one left" sales. Sheath, matching jacket. I planned to pair it with a pair of black pumps, a black church-type hat and the tourssade of freshwater pearls the hubster gave me when our second son was born. Simple earrings and a nice pin for the jacket. The pin is the important part. It's an enamel pansy, obviously vintage. Vintage is a nice way of saying the paint is chipped off the edge. But this really IS old. There's a nice size real diamond in the center.
It's important to wear this pin. It was a gift from my mother-in-law. No, not the one who is planning this tacky event, my ACTUAL mother in law. The hubster's mother. The lady who married my FIL first. In the very church that's been chosen for the funeral.
It doesn't GET much better, does it?
But...I am on the horns of a dilemma. My step-MIL is the woman who wore a sailor suit to my mother's funeral. No, not like the kid on the Cracker Jack box, although all it needed was the hat. Blue and white striped slacks, a buttoned up sleeveless white vest with no shirt under it and wedge espadrilles. Because, as she kept saying to all of the black- and navy blue-clad people who were in attendance, no one wears black to funerals anymore.
I own a just above-the-knee length skirt in a jaunty print of white sailboats on navy blue which, I'm thinking, would look nice paired with my Bellagio Las Vegas souvenir t-shirt. The shirt is white, btw, with a big gold sun on the front which should enhance the overall regatta theme. I think that and a pair of flip flops might be in order. I'll even get a pedicure. I wouldn't want to be accused of appearing slovenly.
I'll end up in the navy suit I imagine. As the hubster said, given the choice of doing the appropriate thing and getting skewered for it or telling someone to go to hell I'll do the appropriate thing every time. Lesser of two evils and all that. I won't feel good about it, I will resent it and I will have been badly used in the process but every family needs a doormat and that's MY job. I also think I'll end up leaving off the pearls. I subscribe to Coco Chanel's advice on accessorizing. Less IS more. Besides, they might detract from the pin, and I'm so looking forward to saying "Thank you! I just love it, it belonged to the hubster's mother."
IF anyone asks, from what I gather my FILs children aren't "family", the widow's brothers, nieces, nephews, ex-wives and caddies are "family." Says so. Right there in the obit. He was loved, admired and adored by HER family, all of whom are named, along with their spouses, kids and trash collectors. He was "survived" by his four children and some assorted grandchildren, four, five, something like that. I don't really anticipate being seated anywhere close to the area the important people will be, I'm frankly surprised we're being allowed in at all. It took me a WEEK to find out where the funeral was, I kept asking and was told "just check the website or your e-mail." Really? You couldn't just SAY "The Church of What's Happening Now"? No, I have to wait for my invitation in the mail.
I'm reminded of the time my step-MIL threw a rehearsal dinner for one of her stepson's weddings. My niece had RSVP'd for herself and her significant other. At the last minute her significant other was bumped off his flight and couldn't come. My step-MIL loudly berated the girl, outside, in front of people, yelling at her that the dinner had already been PAID for and she couldn't get the MONEY BACK and how terrible this was and it was all my niece's fault for being rude and inconsiderate. Apparently both the airline and the National Weather Service should have given her guarantees of the boyfriend's availability for said dinner. She then followed this up with a lecture on manners via e-mail which my SIL, God love her, chose to share with me. That was 8 years ago, I still have the email.
We may be leaving early (depends on how long this soiree goes) because we're going to a wedding in Laguna. We had already said we would be there and they gave the head count to the caterer and then we had to say "Well, sorry, I could have told you this a week ago but no one would tell me where, or when the damn funeral was." They responded with heartfelt condolences and told us to come when we could, we would be welcome on-time or late, they would just be happy to see us and they would keep our dinner warm if at all possible.
For my money, that's the way REAL rich people act. And it has absolutely nothing to do with the balance in their checking account.
Sunday, August 14, 2011
Life's a party. With place cards.
I've been doing a lot of thinking these last couple of weeks. They've been tough. The hubster's father went in for a routine laproscopic gall bladderectomy (I know, it's a cholecystectomy but face it, if I said he was going in for a cholecystectomy would you know what that was? I sure as hell wouldn't) and two weeks later he had died. Stop rolling your eyes, that's the way I am and always have been. I don't use the term "pass away". I think it's vague and, frankly, says absolutely nothing. It sounds harsh to a lot of people, but in my world, people die. We don't "pass in" to this world, we're born. Why is it so distasteful to say we leave it by death? It's what it is. Saying someone "passed away" isn't going to make it any easier and, frankly, saying someone died isn't going to increase the personal difficulty or change the situation for the better. But I digress...
It has been a tough few weeks. First off, there was the "drop everything and run to the hospital because I'm working in another state and don't want to leave until the week-end when it's convenient" call. Which we did. Two days vacation shot. Okay, I had the time coming but still...
FIL looked stronger than I was led to believe but it didn't last. He declined with dizzying speed, life support was employed and, after a week, removed, and that was that. The relationship between us has always been strained, if I hadn't given birth to his grandsons I doubt we would speak at all, he never liked me much although he was always a good host. I have a mouth and I open it. This is NOT what Italian men warm up to. He also didn't care for the way I raised my kids. Twenty plus years of NOT farming the boys out to housekeepers and babysitters so we could go to every party on the planet. Twenty plus years of staying home with my kids rather than accept every "adults only" invitation to their home. Seriously! When he turned 70 there was a big birthday party, we were invited. Oh, but no grandchildren. Their home wasn't childproofed and this really wasn't a kids event. A BIRTHDAY PARTY? Now granted, this was the doing of my step-mother-in-law, who spent the time she wasn't working and/or planning parties (that other people would end up paying for) making lists of what gifts she had received so she could change the tag on them and give them to someone else.
You think I'm kidding? She's given us gifts that had tags on them where the names had been obliterated with white-out. She used to do this at all dinners too, not re-gift, use the white out. Her name is an old Italian word translating to "pretentious and cheap at the same time." She would have the occasional family dinner. She would set out place cards. Place cards which were thick with that funny, rough too-white stripe that indicates Liquid Paper where she had painstakingly painted out the names of the previous guests and wrote in ours.
THAT we made fun of to her face. She eventually stopped.
My FIL's FUNERAL is by e-vite. No, that's not a joke, I RSVPd on Friday. It's at a church in the richest, most pretentious ZIP code she could find (and the one with the least free parking) and the traditional "let's go back to the house and eat" pot luck is being held at a country club clubhouse. I'm surprised and not surprised at the same time. She's locked it down as "private, family only" but needs a CLUBHOUSE? Hell, if she had let people into her own snooty (and Lord, is it ever) canyon town home they would have probably brought casseroles and such, thus cutting the catering bill down to pretty much nothing.
I come from a place where, as Harper Lee observed in "To Kill A Mockingbird" "Neighbors bring food with death and flowers with sickness and little things in between." I remember my grandmother's funeral. We came back to her house from the cemetery to find the neighbors there, the dining room table laden with all the casseroles and baked goods that had been brought over and pitchers of lemonade and iced tea and an urn full of coffee. And we all ended up, as always, in her big den, her six grandkids, all teenage now, congregated in the corner, sitting on the floor and on the steps up to the hallway where we had congregated our entire lives, her three sons and their families and their high school friends all eating, drinking (Jimmy had a bottle in his pocket and was spiking everyone's coffee) and laughing and reminiscing, leaving at dusk, tired and full and knowing that we had just done the thing my grandmother loved most in the world...we had gathered at her house and we had fun.
When we came back from my grandfather's funeral, 15 years or so later, the ladies of the church had done the same thing for us. And his six grandchildren, all in the same place again, catching up in the corner, on the floor and sitting on the steps, his three sons and their friends all together, one last time, in his home.
I miss those times. No, not the funerals. But the togetherness, the camaraderie, being with people who, like myself, were brought up with the idea and life is a circle and family is pi, the radius, the measure by which the circle is defined. There is no beginning, people join at various places. Births, deaths, marriages, christenings, graduations, school plays, baseball games, events both minor and major, all dropping onto the radius and expanding the area, the circle grows and shrinks but doesn't break. Everyone's in-laws were welcomed, there was always room at the table. There was NEVER a time marked "by invitation only." You could show up with your current boyfriend or your out of town guests. There was always enough food, there was always a card table to be set up on the end of the dining room table, always a place to sit and people to talk to.
The hubster claims this is a fantasy because I was an only child and don't understand sibling interactions. Bullshit. Both my father AND my mother were one of three. I watched them fight and squabble with each other. There were times they didn't speak, times they threw each other out of one another's homes while yelling "never darken my door again." One such battle was raging between my mother and her brother when my aunt, their older sister, was sent to the hospital for the last time in a long illness. I watched them drop the baggage of the fight where they stood and become family again, knowing full well that, when everything was said and done and that funeral was over, the luggage would be where they left it, and they could pick it up again or not as they chose.
My father-in-law was a great host, a raconteur, the type of person you were always glad to see. My step mother-in-law rolls over everyone she sees, revels in the trappings of wealth and power and has, at times, been absolutely malicious in her treatment of my FIL's family. She pulled him away from his own kids and grandkids and moved him into her world, and away from ours. But, when it comes down to it...he let her. A funeral that should be a time of acceptance and healing and camaraderie and moving forward has become a social event by invitation only. Not only that, it's being botched from start to finish. I feel bad about this for a couple of reasons. One...I've done this before. I've worked in the office of a cemetery/mortuary, I have an inkling of what needs to be done. I also used to write obituaries for the Los Angeles Times. Yes, I did, they called us "Miss (or Mr.) Black." Corny, no? I'm a commissioned Eucharistic Minister and there will be a funeral Mass. Will I be allowed to contribute?
Nope. Not good enough. Not only am I an in-law, I'm not a member of the widow's family and it's HER family that is now front and center. My father-in-law had FOUR children. Only his daughter now exists and that's only because she's his daughter in so many ways and bulls her way in whether she's invited or not. My Father-in-law had three sons and three grandsons and, although he was cremated, these people, at least to me, are the obvious "honorary" pallbearers. But, it appears, that honor is going to her brothers and nephews IF she deals with it at all.
My mother's funeral was amazing. Shortly after I had signed the papers at the cemetery I was phoned by a nun. I spent 12 years in Catholic school, I run from nuns every time I see one and for a few days after that. But I was raised to be polite so instead of screaming in terror, I listened. This was her ministry, helping the bereaved with funerals. And did she ever know her stuff. She got me the musician and helped coordinate the Mass. She asked me if my sons were altar boys, she was hoping they could serve their grandmother's Mass. They weren't, so we set them up to present the Eucharistic gifts. My mother's niece did the readings. I served as the Eucharistic Minister and distributed the communion. She helped me with the pall. She had to explain it to me too, I'd never seen this particular Catholic rite performed, it's optional.
As they brought my mother's casket into the small church, they stopped in the center, the place where the side aisle and the center aisle meet. The floral spray was removed and taken up front and Sr. Michelle produced a woven linen tablecloth like thing, which was blessed by the priest...a family friend, btw. I covered the coffin with the cloth and placed the crucifix on top. The priest then led us up to the aisle to the altar...the priest followed by my mother followed by me while singer with the keyboard sang "Here I Am, Lord" which, I have to admit, struck me funny. Even I was aware of the theatrics at the time. HAD to have looked amazing.
My point in retelling this ancient history is that, had it not been for Sr. Michelle this probably wouldn't have happened. I'd watched my mother handle many a funeral, I knew what needed to be done but what the nun brought to the table once the i's were dotted and the t's crossed was invaluable. I took her advice was glad I did.
My MIL, however, as well as my sister-in-law, are very much the "no, we don't need YOUR help" types and, in a crises, they rise to the "out of my way" part of their personalities. It soothes people to be of help, they deny people that comfort.
I'm fond of quoting Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol." One of my favorite quotes is towards the end, as Scrooge and the ghost of Christmas Future listen in on a conversation being held by several men after Scrooge's death and upcoming funeral. "I'll go if a luncheon is provided" says one of them. That's pretty much how it's going right now. Maybe, that, in it's way, is just another way of interpreting the life goes on philosophy.
But, for my money (and I haven't very much) it's just more pretentious bullshit. And it hurts.
It has been a tough few weeks. First off, there was the "drop everything and run to the hospital because I'm working in another state and don't want to leave until the week-end when it's convenient" call. Which we did. Two days vacation shot. Okay, I had the time coming but still...
FIL looked stronger than I was led to believe but it didn't last. He declined with dizzying speed, life support was employed and, after a week, removed, and that was that. The relationship between us has always been strained, if I hadn't given birth to his grandsons I doubt we would speak at all, he never liked me much although he was always a good host. I have a mouth and I open it. This is NOT what Italian men warm up to. He also didn't care for the way I raised my kids. Twenty plus years of NOT farming the boys out to housekeepers and babysitters so we could go to every party on the planet. Twenty plus years of staying home with my kids rather than accept every "adults only" invitation to their home. Seriously! When he turned 70 there was a big birthday party, we were invited. Oh, but no grandchildren. Their home wasn't childproofed and this really wasn't a kids event. A BIRTHDAY PARTY? Now granted, this was the doing of my step-mother-in-law, who spent the time she wasn't working and/or planning parties (that other people would end up paying for) making lists of what gifts she had received so she could change the tag on them and give them to someone else.
You think I'm kidding? She's given us gifts that had tags on them where the names had been obliterated with white-out. She used to do this at all dinners too, not re-gift, use the white out. Her name is an old Italian word translating to "pretentious and cheap at the same time." She would have the occasional family dinner. She would set out place cards. Place cards which were thick with that funny, rough too-white stripe that indicates Liquid Paper where she had painstakingly painted out the names of the previous guests and wrote in ours.
THAT we made fun of to her face. She eventually stopped.
My FIL's FUNERAL is by e-vite. No, that's not a joke, I RSVPd on Friday. It's at a church in the richest, most pretentious ZIP code she could find (and the one with the least free parking) and the traditional "let's go back to the house and eat" pot luck is being held at a country club clubhouse. I'm surprised and not surprised at the same time. She's locked it down as "private, family only" but needs a CLUBHOUSE? Hell, if she had let people into her own snooty (and Lord, is it ever) canyon town home they would have probably brought casseroles and such, thus cutting the catering bill down to pretty much nothing.
I come from a place where, as Harper Lee observed in "To Kill A Mockingbird" "Neighbors bring food with death and flowers with sickness and little things in between." I remember my grandmother's funeral. We came back to her house from the cemetery to find the neighbors there, the dining room table laden with all the casseroles and baked goods that had been brought over and pitchers of lemonade and iced tea and an urn full of coffee. And we all ended up, as always, in her big den, her six grandkids, all teenage now, congregated in the corner, sitting on the floor and on the steps up to the hallway where we had congregated our entire lives, her three sons and their families and their high school friends all eating, drinking (Jimmy had a bottle in his pocket and was spiking everyone's coffee) and laughing and reminiscing, leaving at dusk, tired and full and knowing that we had just done the thing my grandmother loved most in the world...we had gathered at her house and we had fun.
When we came back from my grandfather's funeral, 15 years or so later, the ladies of the church had done the same thing for us. And his six grandchildren, all in the same place again, catching up in the corner, on the floor and sitting on the steps, his three sons and their friends all together, one last time, in his home.
I miss those times. No, not the funerals. But the togetherness, the camaraderie, being with people who, like myself, were brought up with the idea and life is a circle and family is pi, the radius, the measure by which the circle is defined. There is no beginning, people join at various places. Births, deaths, marriages, christenings, graduations, school plays, baseball games, events both minor and major, all dropping onto the radius and expanding the area, the circle grows and shrinks but doesn't break. Everyone's in-laws were welcomed, there was always room at the table. There was NEVER a time marked "by invitation only." You could show up with your current boyfriend or your out of town guests. There was always enough food, there was always a card table to be set up on the end of the dining room table, always a place to sit and people to talk to.
The hubster claims this is a fantasy because I was an only child and don't understand sibling interactions. Bullshit. Both my father AND my mother were one of three. I watched them fight and squabble with each other. There were times they didn't speak, times they threw each other out of one another's homes while yelling "never darken my door again." One such battle was raging between my mother and her brother when my aunt, their older sister, was sent to the hospital for the last time in a long illness. I watched them drop the baggage of the fight where they stood and become family again, knowing full well that, when everything was said and done and that funeral was over, the luggage would be where they left it, and they could pick it up again or not as they chose.
My father-in-law was a great host, a raconteur, the type of person you were always glad to see. My step mother-in-law rolls over everyone she sees, revels in the trappings of wealth and power and has, at times, been absolutely malicious in her treatment of my FIL's family. She pulled him away from his own kids and grandkids and moved him into her world, and away from ours. But, when it comes down to it...he let her. A funeral that should be a time of acceptance and healing and camaraderie and moving forward has become a social event by invitation only. Not only that, it's being botched from start to finish. I feel bad about this for a couple of reasons. One...I've done this before. I've worked in the office of a cemetery/mortuary, I have an inkling of what needs to be done. I also used to write obituaries for the Los Angeles Times. Yes, I did, they called us "Miss (or Mr.) Black." Corny, no? I'm a commissioned Eucharistic Minister and there will be a funeral Mass. Will I be allowed to contribute?
Nope. Not good enough. Not only am I an in-law, I'm not a member of the widow's family and it's HER family that is now front and center. My father-in-law had FOUR children. Only his daughter now exists and that's only because she's his daughter in so many ways and bulls her way in whether she's invited or not. My Father-in-law had three sons and three grandsons and, although he was cremated, these people, at least to me, are the obvious "honorary" pallbearers. But, it appears, that honor is going to her brothers and nephews IF she deals with it at all.
My mother's funeral was amazing. Shortly after I had signed the papers at the cemetery I was phoned by a nun. I spent 12 years in Catholic school, I run from nuns every time I see one and for a few days after that. But I was raised to be polite so instead of screaming in terror, I listened. This was her ministry, helping the bereaved with funerals. And did she ever know her stuff. She got me the musician and helped coordinate the Mass. She asked me if my sons were altar boys, she was hoping they could serve their grandmother's Mass. They weren't, so we set them up to present the Eucharistic gifts. My mother's niece did the readings. I served as the Eucharistic Minister and distributed the communion. She helped me with the pall. She had to explain it to me too, I'd never seen this particular Catholic rite performed, it's optional.
As they brought my mother's casket into the small church, they stopped in the center, the place where the side aisle and the center aisle meet. The floral spray was removed and taken up front and Sr. Michelle produced a woven linen tablecloth like thing, which was blessed by the priest...a family friend, btw. I covered the coffin with the cloth and placed the crucifix on top. The priest then led us up to the aisle to the altar...the priest followed by my mother followed by me while singer with the keyboard sang "Here I Am, Lord" which, I have to admit, struck me funny. Even I was aware of the theatrics at the time. HAD to have looked amazing.
My point in retelling this ancient history is that, had it not been for Sr. Michelle this probably wouldn't have happened. I'd watched my mother handle many a funeral, I knew what needed to be done but what the nun brought to the table once the i's were dotted and the t's crossed was invaluable. I took her advice was glad I did.
My MIL, however, as well as my sister-in-law, are very much the "no, we don't need YOUR help" types and, in a crises, they rise to the "out of my way" part of their personalities. It soothes people to be of help, they deny people that comfort.
I'm fond of quoting Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol." One of my favorite quotes is towards the end, as Scrooge and the ghost of Christmas Future listen in on a conversation being held by several men after Scrooge's death and upcoming funeral. "I'll go if a luncheon is provided" says one of them. That's pretty much how it's going right now. Maybe, that, in it's way, is just another way of interpreting the life goes on philosophy.
But, for my money (and I haven't very much) it's just more pretentious bullshit. And it hurts.
Tuesday, July 26, 2011
Clothes Make The Man.
"I,(your name) do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter. So help me God."
That's the Congressional Oath of Office. I think it's time for an amendment to this. Does anyone know how to do that? I don't. However, I suggest that a 28th amendment be proposed. It would alter the Congressional Oath of Office to read "...that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter and, first and foremost, I WILL KEEP IT IN MY PANTS. So help me God."
I suppose that may be why Congressmen only serve two years at a time...makes it easier for them to quit after they're busted for lewd behavior. Hell, takes six YEARS to get rid of a Senator. Not that that happens that often, the Senate seems to be rather stodgy and up tight. Can you imagine Orrin Hatch in a sex scandal? Me neither.
At least make it mandatory for Congressional sex scandals to be entertaining. Wilbur Mills was hella entertaining. One old southern git and a stripper named Fannie in the Tidal Basin. Now THAT was news worth following.
But no, now it's just one stupid Congressman after another, resigning to take care of their families. In other words, they need to run from their wives. And, while we're at it, can just ONE congressional wife actually speak up and say what she actually feels instead of standing by her man, doe eyed, promising to believe in him? Come ON...just once can I hear some disgraced Congressman's wife tell a reporter "I'm sorry, I'm really too busy to talk to you. Would you mind helping me throw the Congressman's golf clubs into that wood chipper over there for me?"
No, it's just a long string of stupid men chasing increasingly younger women around and then saying "uh uh, wasn't me." Really? How stupid to you think we ARE?
And while we're at it, can we put in a rule about what ties you can wear when you KNOW you're going to be on camera? How am I supposed to really pay attention to that lying bag o' crap Bohner when I'm so repulsed by the bilious green tie he's chosen. Did he learn NOTHING from the Kennedy-Nixon debates and Kennedy's "Man Tan"? Although I suppose maybe that was his intention, he knew millions of people would look up at their HD TVs and recoil in horror at that tie, thus taking our minds off of comments like "bi-partisan vote" which, with the exception of 5 Democratic defectors, ran strictly down party lines. Or, even worse, he thinks that FIVE skunks in a den of 435 makes it bi-partisan. I'm not sure which disturbs me more, the tie, or the stupidity.
I also really enjoyed his comments about how, when he got to Washington D.C. he was surprised to find that the government didn't operate like businesses did. John? That's why they call it the "GOVERNMENT" instead of "I.B.M." It seems that Bohner just kind of pulls stuff out of his ass when he talks, from my research it's something he's done for quite a while now. So catching him in a lie is like shooting fish in a barrel. There are rumors of a Bohner sex scandal but I doubt it'll be any more interesting than the rest of his term has been. Although it would be AWESOME if there was one. Imagine...Bohner AND Weiner in the same year! I know, I know, it's pronounced "BAY-ner" and I usually pronounce it that way, because, well, calling him "boner" is just too easy. But it'll make for some really great punch lines.
I also hear rumors that Bohner drinks. To excess. This is always a good excuse for egregious lying and stomping out of the Oval Office while the President is still sitting in it. People will forgive anything if you check into Betty Ford.
It might also explain that tie.
That's the Congressional Oath of Office. I think it's time for an amendment to this. Does anyone know how to do that? I don't. However, I suggest that a 28th amendment be proposed. It would alter the Congressional Oath of Office to read "...that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter and, first and foremost, I WILL KEEP IT IN MY PANTS. So help me God."
I suppose that may be why Congressmen only serve two years at a time...makes it easier for them to quit after they're busted for lewd behavior. Hell, takes six YEARS to get rid of a Senator. Not that that happens that often, the Senate seems to be rather stodgy and up tight. Can you imagine Orrin Hatch in a sex scandal? Me neither.
At least make it mandatory for Congressional sex scandals to be entertaining. Wilbur Mills was hella entertaining. One old southern git and a stripper named Fannie in the Tidal Basin. Now THAT was news worth following.
But no, now it's just one stupid Congressman after another, resigning to take care of their families. In other words, they need to run from their wives. And, while we're at it, can just ONE congressional wife actually speak up and say what she actually feels instead of standing by her man, doe eyed, promising to believe in him? Come ON...just once can I hear some disgraced Congressman's wife tell a reporter "I'm sorry, I'm really too busy to talk to you. Would you mind helping me throw the Congressman's golf clubs into that wood chipper over there for me?"
No, it's just a long string of stupid men chasing increasingly younger women around and then saying "uh uh, wasn't me." Really? How stupid to you think we ARE?
And while we're at it, can we put in a rule about what ties you can wear when you KNOW you're going to be on camera? How am I supposed to really pay attention to that lying bag o' crap Bohner when I'm so repulsed by the bilious green tie he's chosen. Did he learn NOTHING from the Kennedy-Nixon debates and Kennedy's "Man Tan"? Although I suppose maybe that was his intention, he knew millions of people would look up at their HD TVs and recoil in horror at that tie, thus taking our minds off of comments like "bi-partisan vote" which, with the exception of 5 Democratic defectors, ran strictly down party lines. Or, even worse, he thinks that FIVE skunks in a den of 435 makes it bi-partisan. I'm not sure which disturbs me more, the tie, or the stupidity.
I also really enjoyed his comments about how, when he got to Washington D.C. he was surprised to find that the government didn't operate like businesses did. John? That's why they call it the "GOVERNMENT" instead of "I.B.M." It seems that Bohner just kind of pulls stuff out of his ass when he talks, from my research it's something he's done for quite a while now. So catching him in a lie is like shooting fish in a barrel. There are rumors of a Bohner sex scandal but I doubt it'll be any more interesting than the rest of his term has been. Although it would be AWESOME if there was one. Imagine...Bohner AND Weiner in the same year! I know, I know, it's pronounced "BAY-ner" and I usually pronounce it that way, because, well, calling him "boner" is just too easy. But it'll make for some really great punch lines.
I also hear rumors that Bohner drinks. To excess. This is always a good excuse for egregious lying and stomping out of the Oval Office while the President is still sitting in it. People will forgive anything if you check into Betty Ford.
It might also explain that tie.
Wednesday, July 20, 2011
Of socks and sci-fi
I took a couple of days off. I was at the "use 'em or lose 'em" stage and, when faced with the possibility of going to work or NOT going to work, my path seemed clear. Besides, there were a few things I wanted to do. I wanted to cut out and stitch together the tunic I bought the fabric for a week ago. It was promising to be hella hot and a nice, lightweight tunic was something I was looking forward to. I was going to drive to the beach and sit on the sand. Maybe take my older son. Four whole days (counting the week-end).
Well. Yeah, Now I had promised to drive my younger son and his girlfriend into Hollywood very early Tuesday morning. They are big science fiction fans. I like some Sci fi, not a bunch but this particular predilection of theirs is one I share and I have for a long, long time, in fact I introduced the kidlet to it. So...a local record store (yep, we have a few of those, although I agree, they sell mostly CDs and DVDs) was getting in the most currently pressed box set of DVDs from season whatever it was. The stars of the series were going to come to the store and SIGN. Yep. A signing. Now...suffice it to say that these people NEVER do this kind of thing. So it was BIG news.
BUT...the signing is limited to the first 200 people. The first 200 people who BUY the box set the instant it was available for sale. Thus the early hour. We lined up at something like 6:45am. When you bought the box, you got a slip that entitled you to entrance to the signing the week later.
Now, frankly, neither the kid, nor his girlfriend nor myself for that matter were chomping at the bit to buy this box set as it's only a HALF a season. But it was a chance to meet the guy and then put the box on eBay. You didn't have to get the DVD signed, they will sign ONE item, which, I assume includes everything from DVDS to memorabilia to your laundered tighty whities.
Well, to make a long story only slightly less long we got in line with about 50 places to spare until three large hoards of people joined the line at the last minute, because their friends were "saving their place" for them. As the four people in front of us got to the front door, the employee who had obviously drawn the short straw stopped them and said "there are no more tickets for the signing but you're welcome to come in and buy the DVD."
Okay, if they had WATCHED the damn line, or issued wristbands or something I wouldn't have wasted a day off down there, my kid wouldn't have been late to work and I wouldn't have spent THREE days in the sweltering heat scrubbing my apt on my hands and knees because my son invited his girlfriend to spend the night at our place because we live WAY closer to the music store than she does and she doesn't drive and, sorry, but the place has to be immaculate for a girlfriend. Not so much one of the guys. Besides, I'll admit...I'm the only one without a "y" chromosome in the place and I've become used to, well, let's call it "guy" housekeeping. A raised toilet seat is nothing to me anymore just to end up with a Jack In the Box breakfast as we headed on our way.
However...this also meant that the guy in line behind me wouldn't be at the signing either and, frankly, the fact that I wouldn't be at said signing with him looking for me sort of took the sting out of the entire debacle. Dave spent two and a half hours in line behind us. He had a book but never read it. He quickly learned all of our names and used them. Frequently. He told me all about how much he loved the show and how much he loved the cast of the show and how many fan boards he was on and what his favorite episode was.
He told me all about the gift he had purchased for the star of the show because he knew the guy's taste and what he collected and he was looking forward to giving him the gift (socks. I swear. Socks) at the signing. He wanted to know what time I would be arriving at the signing and would I take a picture of him giving the guy the socks.
Dave had actually heard the star of the show had been in town several weeks ago to conduct some business about a movie. Dave had reasoned out just what the star (and his girlfriend) would most likely do on a Sunday and he went to the area and walked around for 4 hours, waiting to run into the star and gift him with the socks. Alas, the hoped for rendezvous never came to pass and so there was Dave, in line right behind me.
My son and his girlfriend quickly wandered into a conversation between themselves leaving me to deal with Dave. I would periodically try and catch someone's eye in a pathetic non-verbal plea for rescue but no, it was just me and Dave. Because, in case you haven't guessed, Dave was by himself.
As the line started to move forward, Dave got ever more excited. He told me that he was planning on wearing a costume to the signing. But I shouldn't worry, it wasn't "weird or embarrassing." it was just clever and the stars of the show would understand it as soon at they saw him. Dave? You're older than I am. The very fact that you're planning on wearing a costume to a signing is already "weird or embarrassing." Just saying...
And as we trudged off in the heat and humidity, Dave right behind us headed for the same parking structure, we made small talk until, thankfully, he went to another section. We got in the car, fired up the A/C and unanimously decided that, given two hours with Dave, we were probably just as glad we were not confined in a space the size of a record store with 197 other Daves.
My son's girlfriend patted my arm sympathetically and assured me that, for a sci-fi fan, Dave wasn't all that abnormal and was, most likely, harmless. I'm still not so sure and, frankly, I'm grateful that neither myself, my kids, their friends nor the stars of the show will have to deal with Dave and his socks. I dunno, giving someone you've never met socks you found at a yard sale just seems off to me. Not to mention that Dave seems to know the celebrity collects odd socks. Where do people READ this stuff? I suppose the News of the World might have hacked the star's voice mail and discovered an affinity for socks which means that people like Dave actually READ that rag. I'm not sure which is more disturbing, the thought of Dave going to yard sales looking for queer socks or the thought that he bought and read the "News of the World" sometime within the last 30 years or so after it really went to hell.
It's times like this that I think trying to keep a lively mind and an active interest in what's going on in the world today is overrated.
Well. Yeah, Now I had promised to drive my younger son and his girlfriend into Hollywood very early Tuesday morning. They are big science fiction fans. I like some Sci fi, not a bunch but this particular predilection of theirs is one I share and I have for a long, long time, in fact I introduced the kidlet to it. So...a local record store (yep, we have a few of those, although I agree, they sell mostly CDs and DVDs) was getting in the most currently pressed box set of DVDs from season whatever it was. The stars of the series were going to come to the store and SIGN. Yep. A signing. Now...suffice it to say that these people NEVER do this kind of thing. So it was BIG news.
BUT...the signing is limited to the first 200 people. The first 200 people who BUY the box set the instant it was available for sale. Thus the early hour. We lined up at something like 6:45am. When you bought the box, you got a slip that entitled you to entrance to the signing the week later.
Now, frankly, neither the kid, nor his girlfriend nor myself for that matter were chomping at the bit to buy this box set as it's only a HALF a season. But it was a chance to meet the guy and then put the box on eBay. You didn't have to get the DVD signed, they will sign ONE item, which, I assume includes everything from DVDS to memorabilia to your laundered tighty whities.
Well, to make a long story only slightly less long we got in line with about 50 places to spare until three large hoards of people joined the line at the last minute, because their friends were "saving their place" for them. As the four people in front of us got to the front door, the employee who had obviously drawn the short straw stopped them and said "there are no more tickets for the signing but you're welcome to come in and buy the DVD."
Okay, if they had WATCHED the damn line, or issued wristbands or something I wouldn't have wasted a day off down there, my kid wouldn't have been late to work and I wouldn't have spent THREE days in the sweltering heat scrubbing my apt on my hands and knees because my son invited his girlfriend to spend the night at our place because we live WAY closer to the music store than she does and she doesn't drive and, sorry, but the place has to be immaculate for a girlfriend. Not so much one of the guys. Besides, I'll admit...I'm the only one without a "y" chromosome in the place and I've become used to, well, let's call it "guy" housekeeping. A raised toilet seat is nothing to me anymore just to end up with a Jack In the Box breakfast as we headed on our way.
However...this also meant that the guy in line behind me wouldn't be at the signing either and, frankly, the fact that I wouldn't be at said signing with him looking for me sort of took the sting out of the entire debacle. Dave spent two and a half hours in line behind us. He had a book but never read it. He quickly learned all of our names and used them. Frequently. He told me all about how much he loved the show and how much he loved the cast of the show and how many fan boards he was on and what his favorite episode was.
He told me all about the gift he had purchased for the star of the show because he knew the guy's taste and what he collected and he was looking forward to giving him the gift (socks. I swear. Socks) at the signing. He wanted to know what time I would be arriving at the signing and would I take a picture of him giving the guy the socks.
Dave had actually heard the star of the show had been in town several weeks ago to conduct some business about a movie. Dave had reasoned out just what the star (and his girlfriend) would most likely do on a Sunday and he went to the area and walked around for 4 hours, waiting to run into the star and gift him with the socks. Alas, the hoped for rendezvous never came to pass and so there was Dave, in line right behind me.
My son and his girlfriend quickly wandered into a conversation between themselves leaving me to deal with Dave. I would periodically try and catch someone's eye in a pathetic non-verbal plea for rescue but no, it was just me and Dave. Because, in case you haven't guessed, Dave was by himself.
As the line started to move forward, Dave got ever more excited. He told me that he was planning on wearing a costume to the signing. But I shouldn't worry, it wasn't "weird or embarrassing." it was just clever and the stars of the show would understand it as soon at they saw him. Dave? You're older than I am. The very fact that you're planning on wearing a costume to a signing is already "weird or embarrassing." Just saying...
And as we trudged off in the heat and humidity, Dave right behind us headed for the same parking structure, we made small talk until, thankfully, he went to another section. We got in the car, fired up the A/C and unanimously decided that, given two hours with Dave, we were probably just as glad we were not confined in a space the size of a record store with 197 other Daves.
My son's girlfriend patted my arm sympathetically and assured me that, for a sci-fi fan, Dave wasn't all that abnormal and was, most likely, harmless. I'm still not so sure and, frankly, I'm grateful that neither myself, my kids, their friends nor the stars of the show will have to deal with Dave and his socks. I dunno, giving someone you've never met socks you found at a yard sale just seems off to me. Not to mention that Dave seems to know the celebrity collects odd socks. Where do people READ this stuff? I suppose the News of the World might have hacked the star's voice mail and discovered an affinity for socks which means that people like Dave actually READ that rag. I'm not sure which is more disturbing, the thought of Dave going to yard sales looking for queer socks or the thought that he bought and read the "News of the World" sometime within the last 30 years or so after it really went to hell.
It's times like this that I think trying to keep a lively mind and an active interest in what's going on in the world today is overrated.
Sunday, July 17, 2011
If I could have pears in a bottle...
Well, today is July 17th. A date that lives in infamy. No, it does, look it up. Today is the anniversary of the day the fountain of youth was discovered. It's the day Disneyland first opened, Fifty-I dunnoquitehowmany years ago.
I've mentioned before how much I used to like Disneyland and how much I think it sucks now. Ticket prices jacked beyond comprehension in the middle of a recession, all backed by the Disney corporate mantra, which goes something like "if we're here they will come, even if they can't afford a jar of peanut butter." I used to work for the jerks, I know how they think.
The corporate idea is that people COME to Disneyland as if it's the shining Mecca of no interest rates. And it doesn't matter that it's a hundred bucks a head to go in, because you're going to go home to Lincoln, Nebraska and have this memory with you until the day you die. In other words, if you don't lose your house financing a trip to a Disney Theme Park your kids will be reported to child and family welfare because you're not properly caring for them and you, yourself, will wither and die a sad, lonely, miserable death somewhere in the Great Plains.
Problem is, most of the people who go to Disneyland all live in Los Angeles and/or Orange County. Only 80% of them actually HAVE kids, the rest have cats, and each other. The ones with kids have way more money than they need, enough, in fact, that they cough up something in the neighborhood of 500 bucks for every kid over the age of NINE so they can spend their idle, unfilled hours wandering around an overpriced amusement park.
They'll be out in force today and its one scary force, believe me. They charge their friends about 100 bucks a "team" for the privilege of participating in a semi-annual re-enactment of the Bataan Death March. I've often thought of mentioning this analogy to them, but then I would have to explain just WHAT, WHEN and WHERE said death march took place, as I doubt any of them have ever heard of it. If it doesn't exist to personally enrich them, it's not anything anyone needs to know about. Besides, it was before their time. Contrary to popular belief, the Stone Age was before MY time but I've heard of it. Anyway, the team who gets to the prison camp first is allowed to chose their heart's desire from a card table chock full of unsellable Lladro Mickey Mouse knock offs, courtesy of a local, overpriced "but we're in an architecturally designed Old Town" shoppe. Yes, shoppe. All stores of this nature are "shoppes," which enables them to add 250 bucks to the going rate of absolutely everything they sell, which, as we all know, is what it currently costs to buy a vowel. That extra "e" doesn't come cheap, you know.
I've been on several of these marches. There are hundreds of people, all paying to play a sort of scavenger hunt/Games Magazine tribute. If you know Donald Duck's middle name (and his birthday), you're not eligible. If you CARE what his middle name and his birthday are, well, then you've passed the second test for eligibility and hail fellow, well met. The first test is: Did your check clear?
I stopped going to these several years ago. In the first place, I found out that most of my entry fees were used to take the staff of the "adventure" to dinner at "Club 33", which is one of those "if you have to ask" places. In the second place, well, I got tired of paying people money to abuse my family and me. I sure as hell didn't want the crap they were offering as prizes thus allowing the "Shoppe" owner to write the unsellable crap off of her taxes.
I quit a LONG time before they started throwing my family and me out of public places, btw. After someone had apoplexy at the sight of the hubster, standing in a hotel lobby having used a public restroom, one of those "Oh, you're so smart, kick me again" people all staffs of any organization seem to attract sent me a letter telling me that I was unclean and so was my money and never, EVER attempt to give any of it to them. The fact that I hadn't shoveled a DIME into any of their coffers for the last three years was conveniently overlooked.
I enjoyed the letter immensely, just as I think someone's arrogance has reached its limits you hear about something like this...someone SO good, SO special, SO desirable that your money is deemed not good enough for them. You have NO idea how much I enjoyed that letter, and NO idea how far I spread it around, including posting it on my Facebook page. It's probably the apex of my illustrious life...my very existence in Southern California drove someone to write me and tell me my money isn’t good enough for them.
It doesn't get much better than that. But I digress...
Why did all of this pop into my head now? Well, the hubster watches Food TV non-stop on the weekend and, as I was crunching numbers, I heard a show about theme park food. An HOUR of theme park food. They actually FILLED an hour. Well, there was a Disney chef proudly showing off the Mickey Mouse shaped cucumbers and the Mickey Mouse shaped pumpkins. And isn't this a wonderful way to get kids to eat vegetables?
Okay, first off, he showed how to make cucumbers and pumpkins grow like rats' ears. You put a plastic mold around them and they grow into the shape easy-peasy, kind of like that field somewhere in France where all the pear trees look like they're growing liquor bottles.
Don't ask me about the worm in the tequila bottle, there are some things even I won't drink. Well, anyway, yeah, it's a corporate logo in a salad bar. But I started thinking, always a dangerous occupation. Instead of making cucumbers look like mouse heads, why not make them TASTE GOOD? I mean, maybe if the vegetables taste good your kids will actually EAT them and you don't need to go to all that plastic mold trouble.
For example: I HATE cucumbers. LOATHE them. Braised, raw, plated in gold or infused with gin. Doesn't matter. If they handed me a cucumber shaped like George Clooney, naked, I would pass it up. What makes people think kids are any different? If they don't LIKE the cucumber, they won't EAT it. Game over.
I intend to celebrate this holiest of days in my own way. "Carmageddon" is in full swing and has proved MOST entertaining. The subways and rapid buses that operate from the area of the 405 to Downtown L.A. are free all week-end AND operating on double time schedules. I intend to take the subway downtown, prowl the fabric district and feed my face a lamb dip from Philippe's, the place where the French Dip Sandwich was invented over 100 years ago. I figure the places I'll be marching through have probably seen their fair share of rats and mice and so it seems like a fitting way to celebrate the birthday of what a small group of fanatics have turned into the snottiest place on earth.
I also thought, speaking of theme park food, of celebrating by driving down to Knott's Berry Farm for their fried chicken dinner and a slice of Boysenberry pie. If you've never had Mrs. Knott's Fried Chicken, well, you've never eaten a chicken worth being called a chicken. And their biscuits, I'm sorry to say, are better than mine. All of their food is a hell of a lot better than the food a little farther down the freeway, you can go into the restaurant without even entering the park, thus saving one the price of a ticket and they're always happy to see you. Not to mention that the biscuits look like biscuits, not Walter Knott’s nose. Sounds kind of like what Walt Disney had in mind all along, no?
I've mentioned before how much I used to like Disneyland and how much I think it sucks now. Ticket prices jacked beyond comprehension in the middle of a recession, all backed by the Disney corporate mantra, which goes something like "if we're here they will come, even if they can't afford a jar of peanut butter." I used to work for the jerks, I know how they think.
The corporate idea is that people COME to Disneyland as if it's the shining Mecca of no interest rates. And it doesn't matter that it's a hundred bucks a head to go in, because you're going to go home to Lincoln, Nebraska and have this memory with you until the day you die. In other words, if you don't lose your house financing a trip to a Disney Theme Park your kids will be reported to child and family welfare because you're not properly caring for them and you, yourself, will wither and die a sad, lonely, miserable death somewhere in the Great Plains.
Problem is, most of the people who go to Disneyland all live in Los Angeles and/or Orange County. Only 80% of them actually HAVE kids, the rest have cats, and each other. The ones with kids have way more money than they need, enough, in fact, that they cough up something in the neighborhood of 500 bucks for every kid over the age of NINE so they can spend their idle, unfilled hours wandering around an overpriced amusement park.
They'll be out in force today and its one scary force, believe me. They charge their friends about 100 bucks a "team" for the privilege of participating in a semi-annual re-enactment of the Bataan Death March. I've often thought of mentioning this analogy to them, but then I would have to explain just WHAT, WHEN and WHERE said death march took place, as I doubt any of them have ever heard of it. If it doesn't exist to personally enrich them, it's not anything anyone needs to know about. Besides, it was before their time. Contrary to popular belief, the Stone Age was before MY time but I've heard of it. Anyway, the team who gets to the prison camp first is allowed to chose their heart's desire from a card table chock full of unsellable Lladro Mickey Mouse knock offs, courtesy of a local, overpriced "but we're in an architecturally designed Old Town" shoppe. Yes, shoppe. All stores of this nature are "shoppes," which enables them to add 250 bucks to the going rate of absolutely everything they sell, which, as we all know, is what it currently costs to buy a vowel. That extra "e" doesn't come cheap, you know.
I've been on several of these marches. There are hundreds of people, all paying to play a sort of scavenger hunt/Games Magazine tribute. If you know Donald Duck's middle name (and his birthday), you're not eligible. If you CARE what his middle name and his birthday are, well, then you've passed the second test for eligibility and hail fellow, well met. The first test is: Did your check clear?
I stopped going to these several years ago. In the first place, I found out that most of my entry fees were used to take the staff of the "adventure" to dinner at "Club 33", which is one of those "if you have to ask" places. In the second place, well, I got tired of paying people money to abuse my family and me. I sure as hell didn't want the crap they were offering as prizes thus allowing the "Shoppe" owner to write the unsellable crap off of her taxes.
I quit a LONG time before they started throwing my family and me out of public places, btw. After someone had apoplexy at the sight of the hubster, standing in a hotel lobby having used a public restroom, one of those "Oh, you're so smart, kick me again" people all staffs of any organization seem to attract sent me a letter telling me that I was unclean and so was my money and never, EVER attempt to give any of it to them. The fact that I hadn't shoveled a DIME into any of their coffers for the last three years was conveniently overlooked.
I enjoyed the letter immensely, just as I think someone's arrogance has reached its limits you hear about something like this...someone SO good, SO special, SO desirable that your money is deemed not good enough for them. You have NO idea how much I enjoyed that letter, and NO idea how far I spread it around, including posting it on my Facebook page. It's probably the apex of my illustrious life...my very existence in Southern California drove someone to write me and tell me my money isn’t good enough for them.
It doesn't get much better than that. But I digress...
Why did all of this pop into my head now? Well, the hubster watches Food TV non-stop on the weekend and, as I was crunching numbers, I heard a show about theme park food. An HOUR of theme park food. They actually FILLED an hour. Well, there was a Disney chef proudly showing off the Mickey Mouse shaped cucumbers and the Mickey Mouse shaped pumpkins. And isn't this a wonderful way to get kids to eat vegetables?
Okay, first off, he showed how to make cucumbers and pumpkins grow like rats' ears. You put a plastic mold around them and they grow into the shape easy-peasy, kind of like that field somewhere in France where all the pear trees look like they're growing liquor bottles.
Don't ask me about the worm in the tequila bottle, there are some things even I won't drink. Well, anyway, yeah, it's a corporate logo in a salad bar. But I started thinking, always a dangerous occupation. Instead of making cucumbers look like mouse heads, why not make them TASTE GOOD? I mean, maybe if the vegetables taste good your kids will actually EAT them and you don't need to go to all that plastic mold trouble.
For example: I HATE cucumbers. LOATHE them. Braised, raw, plated in gold or infused with gin. Doesn't matter. If they handed me a cucumber shaped like George Clooney, naked, I would pass it up. What makes people think kids are any different? If they don't LIKE the cucumber, they won't EAT it. Game over.
I intend to celebrate this holiest of days in my own way. "Carmageddon" is in full swing and has proved MOST entertaining. The subways and rapid buses that operate from the area of the 405 to Downtown L.A. are free all week-end AND operating on double time schedules. I intend to take the subway downtown, prowl the fabric district and feed my face a lamb dip from Philippe's, the place where the French Dip Sandwich was invented over 100 years ago. I figure the places I'll be marching through have probably seen their fair share of rats and mice and so it seems like a fitting way to celebrate the birthday of what a small group of fanatics have turned into the snottiest place on earth.
I also thought, speaking of theme park food, of celebrating by driving down to Knott's Berry Farm for their fried chicken dinner and a slice of Boysenberry pie. If you've never had Mrs. Knott's Fried Chicken, well, you've never eaten a chicken worth being called a chicken. And their biscuits, I'm sorry to say, are better than mine. All of their food is a hell of a lot better than the food a little farther down the freeway, you can go into the restaurant without even entering the park, thus saving one the price of a ticket and they're always happy to see you. Not to mention that the biscuits look like biscuits, not Walter Knott’s nose. Sounds kind of like what Walt Disney had in mind all along, no?
Friday, July 15, 2011
Worlds of pure imagination
I have this love/hate thing going with the Internet. I LOVE the handful of friends I've made via the web. However, I hate the fact that I also met a TON of asshats along the way. If it hadn't been for the Internet, I would still be able to go to Disneyland with the same sense of fun I used to, instead of turning green at the thought of the hateful, spiteful, arrogant people that consider Disneyland a place that not everyone is entitled to go, especially if you have kids. I was reading an argument recently on line among people who go to Disneyland. It costs a family of four over $400 just to get in the damn gate now. A DINK with an pass actually said that not everyone had the right to go to Disneyland, it wasn't a right, it was a privilege and if you can't afford the outrageous ticket prices and/or resent lining Bob Iger's pockets with your hard earned money well, then, you don't deserve to be there.
And this is why the thought of Disneyland makes me want to vomit, and I have the Internet to either blame or thank for that, depending on how one looks at it.
I LOVE the fact that, when some weird, completely unimportant question pops into my brain at 3am I can go fire up the computer and find the answer. There's not a 24 library in town. I HATE the fact that while I'm looking up whether or not humans can catch ear mites from their cat I will come across at least thirty seven rare and immediately fatal diseases, all of which I have symptoms of. Also, I never go out anymore, I don't have to. I can look it all up online. Hell, I can call up You Tube and go to a concert.
And THIS is what I really hate about the Internet.
It always seemed SO cool, I can see SO many wonderful performances on my monitor. Well, last night we were at the Hollywood Bowl again. Someone had four extra tickets and handed them to me. I came home from work, sweaty, tired and frustrated, and rather annoyed that the person who gave me the tickets would be there so I couldn't just blow it off and stay home, play Bejewelled, watch Wipeout and lie about how much I enjoyed the concert. I trudged out, family in tow.
I bowed to the hubsters desire to drive through Jack In The Box for dinner. I don't DISLIKE Jack's, I just have a desire to eat something that didn't come out of a deep fat fryer every now and then. I suggested several alternatives...grab something at the Bowl, pick up a bag of El Pollo Loco, go the local supermarket for some tri-tip sandwiches but he kept saying "how about Jack's?" At times like this it's best to acquiesce. I will grumble and eventually settle on a teriyaki bowl but it will pass a LOT quicker than his sulk if we don't end up at the drive thru de jour. Can you see my eyes rolling?
We plowed through terrible traffic, the clock ticking. It was getting later and later. The hubster said so what if we were late, we'd miss the National Anthem and the opening number. This annoys me to no end, but my in law's family crest bears the motto: "Che dà un accidenti se siamo tardi?" which translates roughly to "Who gives a crap if I'm late?" Well, I do. The "opening number" was the Los Angeles Philharmonic performing the Polovtsian Dances.
We made it, by the skin of our teeth. Dudamel raised his stick and the lyrical notes of the Borodin began. If you don't know the work but you've even seen "Kismet" or heard the standard "Stranger in Paradise" then you know the music. Halfway through I found myself seeing beautiful exotic Arabian dancers, all in whirling silks the violent colors of a desert sunset, there were tambourines and jingling gold and the smells of exotic spices. Not at the Bowl, and not on the stage or on a screen in the background, it was all in my head which could be worrisome, I'm not sure.
The sound of someone playing for you is intoxicating. I don't care how good your Bose is, it doesn't hold a candle to what you experience sitting under a full moon and hearing the music at the exact moment it leaves the musicians hands.
I HATE that the Internet is killing our imaginations. When last did any of us sit outside? When did we daydream? When did we let our minds and bodies open up and run wild with thoughts and sensory feelings and emotions? When last did any of us not watch the clock and allow ourselves to simply BE?
It could well be the reason we're all on the verge of nervous breakdowns, including myself.
The hubster brought us quickly down to earth after the performance by getting angry at a guy driving a car considerably better than the one I was driving, calling him names out the open window because the guy was trying to edge into the choked exit lanes so he could get to the freeway and then, after I motioned the driver in, sticking his hand out the window and flipping him off. Welcome to L.A.
Our car is modest and a base model but I figure the guy is probably making payments on his Mercedes (with the handicapped placard) and I'm not making car payments at all so I'm probably in the cat bird seat compared to him anyway. I was mellow and happy and perfectly willing to let the guy in, in spite of the fact that he could have made the same freeway by going straight instead of squeezing in. Hell, I had already held my ground against an Escalade which is why I was where I was, I was happy to return the favor. As I realized the hubster was literally employing half a piece sign at the guy I dived for the only luxury a base model car has...power windows. I would cheerfully have closed the window on his wrist at that point.
He beat the window inside and continued to berate the unfortunate owner of the Mercedes. Now...I figure, maybe the guy didn't know his way around the area and panicked at the thought of having to turn right or go straight when his GPS was telling him to TURN LEFT! He might have panicked when he saw the freeway on ramp on his left and not been aware that he could also get on the same freeway by going straight. He might have missed the "right turn only" signs on the side of the lane he was in and been caught by surprise. He might have been from out of town. He might have been terrified at the thought of ending up in the heart of Hollywood after dark(especially on Thursday, it's club night). And he might have just been an asshole. In the long run, I really didn't see that it was a big deal and certainly not worth the aggravation. I hissed "STOP it!" to the hubster and idly wondered if I should point out that he was acting on a par with the group of teenagers we were ranting about earlier in the week. All he needed was a beer cooler on his head. I decided to bite my tongue (literally, damn that hurt) and change the subject.
But anyway, the Bowl was so amazingly lovely that we're getting tickets for Turandot this week-end. I doubt it will sell out. In the first place, it's an opera and in the second place I'm anxiously awaiting Carmageddon, which starts this evening and will last through the week-end and will keep a lot of people from the west side ON the west side. More room for me.
I could actually buy tickets over the Internet, which I LOVE. On the other hand, if I go the box office I'll avoid the Internet service charge AND get out of the office. If it wasn't for the Internet I wouldn't know about this. Oh wait, I probably would. Before the Internet I actually READ my mail. I would have seen this on the schedule the Hollywood Bowl sends me ever year.
The guys from "Avenue Q" were right. The Internet IS for porn. Everything else? I think we need to go back to doing it in person.
And this is why the thought of Disneyland makes me want to vomit, and I have the Internet to either blame or thank for that, depending on how one looks at it.
I LOVE the fact that, when some weird, completely unimportant question pops into my brain at 3am I can go fire up the computer and find the answer. There's not a 24 library in town. I HATE the fact that while I'm looking up whether or not humans can catch ear mites from their cat I will come across at least thirty seven rare and immediately fatal diseases, all of which I have symptoms of. Also, I never go out anymore, I don't have to. I can look it all up online. Hell, I can call up You Tube and go to a concert.
And THIS is what I really hate about the Internet.
It always seemed SO cool, I can see SO many wonderful performances on my monitor. Well, last night we were at the Hollywood Bowl again. Someone had four extra tickets and handed them to me. I came home from work, sweaty, tired and frustrated, and rather annoyed that the person who gave me the tickets would be there so I couldn't just blow it off and stay home, play Bejewelled, watch Wipeout and lie about how much I enjoyed the concert. I trudged out, family in tow.
I bowed to the hubsters desire to drive through Jack In The Box for dinner. I don't DISLIKE Jack's, I just have a desire to eat something that didn't come out of a deep fat fryer every now and then. I suggested several alternatives...grab something at the Bowl, pick up a bag of El Pollo Loco, go the local supermarket for some tri-tip sandwiches but he kept saying "how about Jack's?" At times like this it's best to acquiesce. I will grumble and eventually settle on a teriyaki bowl but it will pass a LOT quicker than his sulk if we don't end up at the drive thru de jour. Can you see my eyes rolling?
We plowed through terrible traffic, the clock ticking. It was getting later and later. The hubster said so what if we were late, we'd miss the National Anthem and the opening number. This annoys me to no end, but my in law's family crest bears the motto: "Che dà un accidenti se siamo tardi?" which translates roughly to "Who gives a crap if I'm late?" Well, I do. The "opening number" was the Los Angeles Philharmonic performing the Polovtsian Dances.
We made it, by the skin of our teeth. Dudamel raised his stick and the lyrical notes of the Borodin began. If you don't know the work but you've even seen "Kismet" or heard the standard "Stranger in Paradise" then you know the music. Halfway through I found myself seeing beautiful exotic Arabian dancers, all in whirling silks the violent colors of a desert sunset, there were tambourines and jingling gold and the smells of exotic spices. Not at the Bowl, and not on the stage or on a screen in the background, it was all in my head which could be worrisome, I'm not sure.
The sound of someone playing for you is intoxicating. I don't care how good your Bose is, it doesn't hold a candle to what you experience sitting under a full moon and hearing the music at the exact moment it leaves the musicians hands.
I HATE that the Internet is killing our imaginations. When last did any of us sit outside? When did we daydream? When did we let our minds and bodies open up and run wild with thoughts and sensory feelings and emotions? When last did any of us not watch the clock and allow ourselves to simply BE?
It could well be the reason we're all on the verge of nervous breakdowns, including myself.
The hubster brought us quickly down to earth after the performance by getting angry at a guy driving a car considerably better than the one I was driving, calling him names out the open window because the guy was trying to edge into the choked exit lanes so he could get to the freeway and then, after I motioned the driver in, sticking his hand out the window and flipping him off. Welcome to L.A.
Our car is modest and a base model but I figure the guy is probably making payments on his Mercedes (with the handicapped placard) and I'm not making car payments at all so I'm probably in the cat bird seat compared to him anyway. I was mellow and happy and perfectly willing to let the guy in, in spite of the fact that he could have made the same freeway by going straight instead of squeezing in. Hell, I had already held my ground against an Escalade which is why I was where I was, I was happy to return the favor. As I realized the hubster was literally employing half a piece sign at the guy I dived for the only luxury a base model car has...power windows. I would cheerfully have closed the window on his wrist at that point.
He beat the window inside and continued to berate the unfortunate owner of the Mercedes. Now...I figure, maybe the guy didn't know his way around the area and panicked at the thought of having to turn right or go straight when his GPS was telling him to TURN LEFT! He might have panicked when he saw the freeway on ramp on his left and not been aware that he could also get on the same freeway by going straight. He might have missed the "right turn only" signs on the side of the lane he was in and been caught by surprise. He might have been from out of town. He might have been terrified at the thought of ending up in the heart of Hollywood after dark(especially on Thursday, it's club night). And he might have just been an asshole. In the long run, I really didn't see that it was a big deal and certainly not worth the aggravation. I hissed "STOP it!" to the hubster and idly wondered if I should point out that he was acting on a par with the group of teenagers we were ranting about earlier in the week. All he needed was a beer cooler on his head. I decided to bite my tongue (literally, damn that hurt) and change the subject.
But anyway, the Bowl was so amazingly lovely that we're getting tickets for Turandot this week-end. I doubt it will sell out. In the first place, it's an opera and in the second place I'm anxiously awaiting Carmageddon, which starts this evening and will last through the week-end and will keep a lot of people from the west side ON the west side. More room for me.
I could actually buy tickets over the Internet, which I LOVE. On the other hand, if I go the box office I'll avoid the Internet service charge AND get out of the office. If it wasn't for the Internet I wouldn't know about this. Oh wait, I probably would. Before the Internet I actually READ my mail. I would have seen this on the schedule the Hollywood Bowl sends me ever year.
The guys from "Avenue Q" were right. The Internet IS for porn. Everything else? I think we need to go back to doing it in person.
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