Blown Fuse

Brr.

Brr! It's windy and cold outside. I could barely light my cigarette.

You: Dumbfuck, go back inside where it's warm.
Me: Do you smoke?
You: No.
Me: So shut your piehole!

Anywho, had to get that out of my system since I seem to be saying it every two hours. I'm supposed to go out and clean the swingset sometime today. It was one of those things we inherited when we bought the house. We insisted that the sellers haul it away, and they promised they would. Ha! Then again, these are the same people that when we asked "Are you going to leave the lawnmower?" said yes, and left a yellow toy plastic lawnmower in the back yard instead. Hmph. What a sick sense of humor.

Anyhow, we placed a freebie ad in one of those local independent publications thinking that more than likely there wouldn't be any biters for it. We got three in two days. I guess "free" is always pretty when it comes to getting the kids Christmas gifts. Shit, they don't know that mom and pop didn't pay a dime for it. There it'll be outside on Christmas morn, clean and shiny with a big red bow around it. They'll think that it's just like the one they saw at Wal-Mart a couple of weeks ago, and'll actually behave for 3 days thinking Santa Claus really does exists because their wish came true.

If it's really going to be as cold tomorrow as I heard, there's no way I'm going out there with a bucket of soapy water. Sheesh, I must be more like my grandma than I thought. Here we are giving something away that's in great condition and I'm worried about how dirty the thing is. I need to be more worried about have fuckin' dirty my car is and give it a clean and wax before the frost really comes.

What's in my purse?

Geekgrrl wants to know what in our purses.

In my own defense, I usually have more than one of things because I'm batty and prematurely senile and think that I don't have it in there already. Besides that, I believe that the more something occurs in da purse, the more likely I am to find it while driving.

Expressions of Guilt

I've always hung on to a few "rednecks" as friends--no offense to any self-professed card-carriers out there. I've always recognized the difference between "redneck" and "racist." In fact, "redneck" is one of those linguistic oddities that I despise. My neck is red as anyone's after a few hours in the sun. Owe it all to my wonderful permatan and wrinkle-free genetic constitution.

In fourth grade there was a girl named Amanda whom I was friends with (she happened to mysteriously disappear after fifth grade...CPS?). She was a scraggly thing. She didn't wear clean keds sneakers or red camel tee shirts like the rest of us whose parents stalked the local Belk for the cutest matching Red Camel outfits for their kids.

She was the one kid in class who everybody would direct their snickering to when those hair lice checks were performed. People would take special interest to see if her socks matched on any given day, or if her hair had been washed.

But she was my friend.

She was the first to be friendly to me in class and nobody likes to be nice to the kid in school who was gone for two years only to return from New York having skipped a grade.

Unfortunately, I fell victim to a disease called "snobbery" once I was accepted by the cool kids in class. They didn't think I should associate with Amanda anymore, and I truly regret the fact that I abided by that edict. I hope she hasn't put me on some hit list like that stark raving looney dude from Billy Madison.

Stigmas suck. I should know--I've always been considered the white-chick black-chick. Why? I could state a few reasons, but it's pointless to get into. What's the point of questioning anyone's racial constitution, anyway? I could draw you a pie chart pointing out everything that I am, but what's the point? It's not going to help you determine how I'm supposed to behave, and it certainly won't tell you who my friends should be.

I like keeping a diverse circle of friends because difference is interesting. But so are those quirks that make us all the same.

Amanda, I'm sorry. I hope you have a better life and are still as openminded as you were in the 4th grade.

Wanna have a happy Thanksgiving? Skip the trip to Michael's and come get your holiday crafting supplies from my front yard.

Across the street, the spinsters must be preparing for Christmas. The front is all clear for a nativity scene and some florescent Santas. Next door looks like Easter. They still have green grass and are maintaining flowering plants in November. It looks very Thanksgivingy in my yard. There isn't an inch of grass that isn't covered by leaf material.

I remember the good ol' days of kindergarten when wll my time was spent creating arts 'n crafts, taking naps, peeing my pants, and eating snacks. For Thanksgiving, we took leaves that looked sufficiently enough like a turkey body, glued them to construction paper, and drew the turkey head and legs around it. We would then write "Hapy Thinksgiven" on the top, sprinkle it with macaroni and glitter, fold it up, and stick it in our backpacks until Christmas break when Mom cleaned the gooey monstrosities out.

There are enough leaves in my yard to create such cards--maybe enough for each North Carolinian kindergardener to make 5. So...like 150 katrillion leaves.

They're not fun leaves that you see in the comic strips in which the carefreee youngun's jump into them and Dad goes, "Ohhhh. Son. I just raked those. Now I have to rake them again." These are nasty, sharp, bug-infested wet, moldy leaves that make them extremely uncomfortable should someone fall on them. In fact, if there was a way for me to create some devious plan in which a certain ex-boyfriend could come in contact with said leaves, that would be okay.

Yes, I'm trying real hard to get someone else other than myself clean up the yard, as you can see from previous posts. The fact that if nay raking gets done it gets done by me is beginning to piss me off a tad. I guess hubby figures that since I'm home almost all day that I should do it. Whatthefuckever. Fair is fair and he's twice my size--could probably rake in less half the time with his huge stride and sweep.

He could at least not criticize my rake job when he gets home. Who the hell criticizes a rake job, anyway? It's like criticizing a blow job: as long as there are no teeth, you should be happy you're getting one.

Got on my push-up bra 'cause it's a good day.

Ah....birthdays. For the past several years, "birthday" has meant "crying by 6 p.m. with no sign of stopping." It's officially 5:03 p.m. and I haven't started crying yet. Yay!

Last year, grandma had a heart attack on my birthday.

The year before, no one seemed to remember my birthday.

The year before that was three funerals and a wedding year.

Right now, I'm cracking my knuckles and battening down for what's probably going to be a very boring night, and I'm hella cool with that. I'd rather be bored senseless than spouting saline out of my eyeballs all night. There's some leftover Becherovka in the cupboard that I might down. I hate the taste of it, but hell, after a few shots, I'm guaranteed a good night's sleep.

This past weekend's moving excursion did not go well. After the previous weekend's disaster of us driving the three hours from Durham to Chowan County only to find out that there were no trucks available anywhere near our location, we made sure to make reservations in plenty enough time to have one for the next weekend.

That said, I made a reservation last Tuesday for use on Saturday, and it was confirmed. Again, we drive the three hours to grandma's house, and then another hour and a half to friggin' Moyock because that was the only place that had a truck. Guess what? We drove all the way there to find out that they didn't want to take a check.

So you think, "Duh, Tiffany, you idiot. Most people in Podunk won't take checks."

Well...no. They took checks but wouldn't take one from my grandma. Why? Because grandma wasn't the one driving the truck and that whole third-party dealy wasn't very savory to them. What kinda bullshit is that? Do they really think that gramma with two houses and a Lexus is going to bounce a piddly $180 check? Give me a bleepin' break. Hasn't anyone ever heard of an "exception"--you know, the kind of thing where, "YOU BITCH! We drove 5 hours to get here with no other money than what we spent to put gas in our car and you won't take this woman's check?" That's a real good business practice--alienating customers.

Anyhow, we called the U-Haul regional office to ask them what we could do to drive off with a truck that day and they told us to use a credit card. Um...if we had a credit card, we wouldn't have that problem now would we? We didn't even have an ATM card on any of the three of us.

Then, I happened to notice on my reservation printout that "U-Haul takes your personal checks over the phone!". That turned out to be a damn lie. The 1800 number people were confused at the very idea of such an innovation and the lady at the regional office claimed that she had never seen the said website and was confused. Oh well.

So, now we have to drive out there for a third weekend in a row. Shit. Even when I was single and living in the dorms did I not go home that much. I love my grandma to death, mind you, but geez Louise, and then to have to go again for Thanksgiving. One could cry with the very thought of it.

Bob Villa don't have a damn thing on me...even WITH the beard.

I'm like "whoa." I can fix stuff all by myself without the assistance of how-to manuals, and especially advice from my husband.

See, I've installed a doorknob or two in my day--that's the benefit of growing up with grandma and being in charge of all the maintenance work around the house. It was either I did it or granny would have to break out the wallet and have some guy come out and overcharge us for his primate ability to grasp a screwdriver.

All but two of the doorknobs in the house had been rendered uncapable of locking by the previous homeowners. Apparently they had rugrats that liked to lock them out of rooms (the selfsame rugrats that liked to chew gnaw marks on the windowsills and cable wires).

The doorknobs look to be as old as the house, evident by the fact that when I disassembled one, there was green gunk growing inside. I figured that, as in all other locks I've encountered, there had to be some sort of switch on the inside that would enable one to prevent undesired locking (which is pointless if you ask me--they DO make doorknobs that don't have locks at all. Get with the times, people!)

Anyhow, sure enough, there was a screw on the shaft that merely needed to be reversed to allow proper usage of the locking mechanism.

So you think, "Well, that's all well and good, but who cares? You fixed a lock. F-ing yay!" Point is, my husband told me it couldn't be done--it was supposed to be that way. Then again, this is coming from the same person who told me that I didn't need to remove the screws to take the knob off...maybe what he was really saying was that I couldn't do it.

Mu wu ha ha ha!

I burned a $500 hole in my apartment's deck on move-out day.

My sister is cool. This past weekend she sent me 4 cigarettes wrapped in aluminum foil in a plastic toothbrush case and $3. See, that's what sisterhood's all about--not having shit, and yet still trying to give away what you do have.

Unfortunately, $3 in my gas tank is a mere tease--like Ramen Noodles for my car. I pull up to the pump and poor Accordia expects a full 17-gallon meal: something to sit right at the base of her rusting, empty stomach and fill her up right. But, no. I can't afford the $22 meal, so she gets the free breadsticks and water with lemon equivalent of $3, maybe $3.01 if I'm triggerhappy.

There's an ugly-ass cat that keeps walking in front of my window and scaring the living daylights out of me. I mean, the cat is so ugly that you can't even stare at it real long and LIE to yourself that it's cute. It's the most nondescript striped cat I've ever seen in my life...anyhow, the little bastard had the NERVE to shun me yesterday! It wasn't wearing a collar, and I always see it outside so surely it can't belong to someone. I think it lives in the wooded lot next door and eats the dog food my neighbors leave out for their brutes at night.

It kept turning around and looking at me like "Ha, I'm not afraid of you...see, I'm not running, am I?" I wanted to throw a rock at it just to prove that I could make it fear me, but it'd be just my luck that I'd be on Animal Precinct next season. Does the triangle even HAVE animal cruelty patrols? Anyway...I suspect the overgrown rodent will be back as it suspects that I will let it and all of its little flea friends into the house to keep me company during the. I'll just shoo it out the little doggy hatch when my husband gets home in the evening.

No kids rang our doorbell for Halloween. I'm glad. You see, our front yard is a safety hazard and it'd be just our luck that some poor shmuck and his idiot kid would come into the yard and break their back on the cracked cement. The yard light near the driveway is broken and looks like it hasn't worked since before "Beetlejuice" came out so its darker than a closed septic tank out there at night. Anywho, there's still a Christmas bow up on the garage light that the p.ho's left up there knowing that we probably wouldn't have a damn ladder for a few years and wouldn't be able to take it down. The kids probably thought we had skipped Halloween altogether and rushed straight to the winter holidays...even though its FREAKING 80 degrees outside right now!

I'm supposed to call the water people today. For some reason, the water pressure in this place is slower than piss and that's not very good for washing the car. Hubby's been trying to get me to call them for a week, but I don't feel like it. Maybe I'll call tomorrow....