…discussing the finer points of power usage

Ever since the big-D (and I don’t mean Dallas*), I have made it my own little personal mission to reduce my monthly bills (and save more money – mom and dad, are you proud at this moment?).  The majority of my bills don’t fluctuate every month; I can depend on my cable and phone bills to piss me off each and every time they hit my inbox.  But my power bill is different.  For about 3 or so years, the power bill was on a “flat-billing” rate, where the power company does some weird mathematics based on previous power usage and bills you a flat rate based on that usage.   Shortly after I kicked my ex-husband out on his ass my ex-husband went to live elsewhere, the power company notified me that it would no longer be billing based on the “flat rate.”  I panicked.  I could foresee outrageously high power bills.  So Mission: Power Usage Reduction went into full force.  All of a sudden, I became one of those people who ask “were you born in a barn?  CLOSE THE DOOR!  You’re letting all the cool air out!”   However, those questions were rhetorical, because it was just me.  Me and all of the lovely furnishings that I KEPT (and promptly got rid of and replaced) because I’m not a slimy bastard.  Oops…excuse me.  Didn’t mean to let that creep out there.

Anyway, I started becoming very conscious about leaving lights on, leaving the air conditioner turned down to 60, etc.  It finally dawned on me that leaving three lamps on while I was gone to work didn’t quite make sense, even if I wanted to come home to a “well-lit home” in the interest of my personal safety.  Each month, when my power bill arrives in my e-mail inbox, I cross my fingers and hope it’s the Lowest! One! Yet!.  Just look at my account history, people:

·        Dec. 07:  89.84

·        Jan. 08: 108.22

·        Feb. 08: 116.27

·        March 08:  82.36

·        April 08: 63.71

·        May 08:  54.72

·        June 08:  93.30

·        July 08:  79.92

Receiving this month’s bill this morning, I actually thought to myself “ooh…3^rd lowest bill yet.  SCORE!”  May I just add that for all the years ex-hubs and I lived in my condo, our “flat-bill” rate was $123.38.  I don’t know what I’m happier about, saving myself money or paying less than he ever had to.  Is it sad that this sort of thing excites me these days?

*I was so in love with George Strait as a kid. 

____________________________________________________________

Overheard by Hunter as we were having breakfast at Hardee’s this morning:

            Employee:  (calling out to the crowd)  Sausage biscuit?

            Customer:  That’s mine.

            Employee:  Here ya go.

            Customer:  Can I get some jelly?

            Employee:  Sure, what flavor?

            Customer:  Uh… *long pause, clearly racking his brain*…jelly?

Who knew “jelly” is a flavor on its own.  You can learn a lot from the manual laborers who eat at Hardee’s at 7:00 a.m.

…offering a little more proof that I’m losing my mind

While holding to speak with a live human being after calling AT&T’s customer service number, Mr. Computer Voice asks me a series of questions.  *Start Rant* Which apparently are pointless, because when the human eventually answers the phone, he or she asks all the same questions.  *End Rant *  After entering my phone number, my zip code, and the last four digits of my social (am I calling to ask a question about my service or am I applying for a  credit card, people?), Mr. Computer Voice asks “are you moving?”  I think to myself, why no, I’m sitting at my desk, still as can be.  How in the world would Mr. Voice KNOW THAT?  HOW CREEPY! Thankfully, about 15 seconds later, the part of my brain that survived the past 29 years kicked in and I realized Mr. Voice was asking me if I was moving my telephone services.    

…rambling

1.    I read somewhere recently that fabric softener has beef fat in it.  I performed very official research googled it, and found out that the liquid and most dryer sheets do have beef fat. !!!!  This has disturbed me for days now.  While I don’t use the liquid softener, I MUST use dryer sheets.  I have a bit of OCD when it comes to how my clothes smell (and with smells in general – I feel like the scent of someone’s home is a direct reflection on the kind of person they are, but I digress).  Dryer sheets are a big part of my scent-clothing-integration system.  But now, when I put on my t-shirt fresh out of the dryer, all I can think about is hot beef fat.  And that ain’t good, people.  Beef fat does not equal freshness. 

2.    About 6 months ago, the condo above mine sold to a young guy (I would guess early 20’s…and good lord that makes me feel old calling him a “young guy”).  Mr. Young Guy apparently now has a live-in girlfriend.  Mr. Young Guy is nice, but I very rarely see him as I am all OLD and have a job and have to get up before 10 a.m. and leave the house for the day.  In our little corner of the condo complex, we have a building with four condos.  Outside, there are eight parking spaces.  Let’s all do the math.  We have four condos and eight parking spaces.  There is only one designated parking space for each condo, so there are four left for “visitors” or “live-in girlfriends.”  All that is fine and dandy until, UNTIL, you live below the two most inept parkers (is that a word?) IN THE WHOLE WIDE WORLD.  First of all, both Mr. Young Guy and Ms. Live-In Girlfriend park in different places every time.  Notice that I didn’t say they park in “spaces.”  That’s because they just park willy-nilly all over the freaking place.  And what does that mean?  That means that they are eating up the very limited parking area that WE (the rest of the residents) have by taking up 2 spots.  That means that what should be four parking spaces turns into, at the most, three.  It has consumed me.  When I get home, I scoff and I roll my eyes and I mutter to myself EVERY SINGLE TIME. 

May I add that I just realized that this post (or better yet, my attitude) makes me sound like I am 82 years old and the only thing I have in my life is monitoring my condo complex and its residents. 

I need to get a pet or something.  And no, it will not be a cat.  I may be irrational, but there is no way I’m turning into the bitter old divorced lady downstairs with a bunch of cats.

Well, that’s all I have today.  Now excuse me while I go and pick up my package of Depends and container of Metamucil before eating my “blue plate” special this afternoon at 4:30.

…biting her ears off

I have a new sister.  No, not that kind.  THIS kind:

And goodNESS is she not precious?  Look at that smile (really – the cutie would actually stop what she was doing and “pose” when I was taking pictures)!  I could literally bite her ears off she is so cute.

Her name is Annie Banana  (okay, not really – I added the “Banana,” but I feel it is appropriate as she is SO FREAKING CUTE.  Did I mention that part?).  Annie came to be my sister by way of adoption on June 25.  She is slowly getting used to her home that is my parent’s house, which includes regular walks around the block, pieces of pork roast in her dog food, tennis balls and squeaky toys.  Pretty soon (at least my parents hope), this will not include jumping on people so much that she scratches you with her claws, drinking out of the toilet, and sneaking up on the beds to get a little afternoon nap.   

My parents thought long and hard about getting a new dog after sweet Rebel had to be put to sleep in December.  I had my reservations, too, but after Griffin was given back to his master the asshole, I had a huge hole where puppy love should be!  I knew that it would be especially hard to see another dog and not compare him or her to either Rebel or Griffin, for that matter.  We were looking, for sure (if you call “looking” me obsessively emailing pictures of tiny precious golden puppies to my dad on a semi-regular basis).  And then, out of the blue, came Annie.

Annie’s first owner apparently has a heart of stone, which will come in handy when he/she/it is sweeping ashes in hell, because he/she/it apparently kept Annie chained to a tree and beat her.  She was eventually rescued, thank goodness, by a nice lady named Amy.  Soon, Amy realized that it would be safer if she found Annie a permanent home with a family that loved her (one where she could not break out of the fence and run to Publix, where apparently the construction workers liked to feed her lunch scraps).  At the same time, by some exercise of fate or whatnot, Amy casually mentioned this to a friend of mine as they stood next to each other in line at Wal-Mart, who mentioned it to me and I mentioned it to mom and dad.  Before I knew it, my dad was heading to meet Annie.  Of course, it was hard not to fall in love with her at first sight. 

When my dad took her to the vet to have her checked out, the doc said everything looked great, but she did have a tendency to ignore the person talking to her and she was about 10 pounds overweight.  As my mom said, “isn’t that like all women?”  My dad has instituted the rigorous Operation: Annie Slim Down.  That has not stopped my mom from adding pork roast to her food because, as we all know “everyone needs their protein!”

I have a feeling that Annie knows she just hit the jackpot.

…committing murder weilding a warm can of diet coke

So. This afternoon. It’s 3:15 p.m. and I have been slaving away on important legal tasks all day (or something like that. whatever). It comes time for my daily diet coke.  So I go into the office kitchen that perpetually smells like hot pockets and barbecue sauce, open the refrigerator door, and for the SECOND TIME this week, there are no diet cokes.  None.  Now, for a minute when I started writing this, I thought to myself, “you know, this sort of sounds snobbish and stupid to whine about not having a [free] cold diet coke when it is diet coke time.”  And I replied to myself “shut the hell up.  It will make you feel better to write about it.  That way, you don’t curse the employee that is supposed to refill the refrigerator daily.”

This is my therapy.  Therapy that is supposed to keep me from losing it over not having the diet coke.  But I mean really, if one of your delegated job duties is to ensure that the refrigerator is full of cold drinks and the snack cabinet has enough granola bars and cheez-its, the least you can do is perform that job duty adequately. I’m just saying. 

What did I do when I saw the refrigerator empty of cold, delicious diet cokes?  I took FOUR of the unopened boxes (that were sitting within 3 feet of the refrigerator, mind you) and threw them in there.  And I just realized that I need to find out who this diet coke bandit is that keeps taking the last cold diet coke but doesn’t replace the empty box. 

I also threw a can into the freezer, so maybe, JUST MAYBE, I can enjoy my diet coke before I go home.  I did this about 3 weeks ago when this very same thing happened (hence my irrational anger about this subject), completely forgot about the can, and arrived at work the next morning to…er…a bit of an explosion in the freezer and the following email:

From: bossman@company.com
Date: Fri, 23 May 2008 09:33:50 -0400
Subject: freezer explosion
To: employees

Someone left a diet coke in the freezer.  if it was you, please clean up the result.  thanks, Bossman

So instead of trying to run and hide and act like I had no idea who would have done such a stupid thing in the first place, and then forgotten about it, I owned up to own my stupidity:

From: associateattorneydumbass@company.com
Date: Fri, 23 May 2008 09:42:03 -0400
Re: Subject: freezer explosion
To: employees

We now have an exceptionally clean freezer.

Sincerely, the boob who left a diet coke in the freezer.

Needless to say, I have learned my lesson.  FYI - cleaning out an office refrigerator is NOT fun.  It is even more NOT fun when you are trying to remove hardened, frozen diet coke spillage from the multiple boxes of hot pockets.  I can’t say I didn’t learn something, though:

That’s my diet coke reminder sticky! 

p.s.  Is it sad that I can’t remember things like putting a drink in the freezer?  This job is eating away at my brain, I do believe.

…being nostalgic (a whole week later)

A week ago today, I was looking at things like this:

and eating things that looked like this:

Today, I am looking at this:

Could this explain why, when I opened the office refrigerator’s door to see no (count them Z-E-R-O) diet cokes, I flew into a mid-afternoon rage which included hissing and cursing?  Maybe.  Or maybe I’m losing my mind.  The latter is even more likely if I DON’T HAVE A DIET COKE SOON!!!

…bragging on my dad

I  have heard most of my life how much I am like my mom. I’m going to let you in on a little secret, though. I am my Dad. No ifs, ands, or buts about it. And I am so thankful for that, each and every day. 

My dad and I have always been on the same wavelength, it seems. Growing up, I vividly remember sitting at the dinner table, eating a meal, and for whatever reason, we would exchange a glance and then burst into laughter. Why? We had NO idea. Often, my mom would get frustrated, which made us laugh even more. The more I would giggle, the more he would laugh. We never knew what we were laughing at - but had a hard time stopping. 

My dad always encouraged me to take risks. I can vividly recall being at the beach, me and my dad swimming out to the second sandbar, my mom worriedly looking on from the beach. I loved every minute of it, probably because I knew my dad was right beside me.  And just like those times in the ocean, anytime I wanted to try something new, my dad was right behind me each and every step of the way, cheering me on.  

My dad and I love scary movies. We both hate talking on the phone. We tell a joke the same way. We love the beach and saltwater fishing. We have a special place in our hearts for dogs (especially golden retrievers).  We have the same temper. We are both fiercely loyal. I could go on, and on, and on.   

So on this Father’s Day, I feel so blessed to have a lifetime of memories with my dad to remember, and so many more to come. After a year when so much of my trust has been put to the test, I can look at my dad and know that no matter who comes and goes, I will always have a wonderful man in my life.  

Thanks, dad, for the laughs at the dinner table, and everything in between.

…flying somewhere

In just under ten hours, I will be on a plane headed to Tampa (yay!). I have full bottles of face wash, shampoo, conditioner and brand new deodorant, so my toiletry anxiety should be nil. I have completely over-packed, which, am I really surprised? No. Who doesn’t need 6 different colors of tank tops, 4 pairs of white pants (all various lengths, of course), or 7 pairs of shoes…for a 5 day trip? The possibilities of places to go are ENDLESS, people! I NEED OPTIONS!

I’m about to go re-weigh my suitcase and count the number of outfits I have. At last count I was at 14, and I expect that number will grow with the foreseeable last-minute packing breakdown.

Ciao, ya’ll.

…taking inventory

Why is it, in preparation for a trip, I feel the need to buy all new products to take with me?  And when I say products, I mean things like eyeliner, shampoo, etc.  Here I am, less than 72 hours from boarding an airplane to head to Tampa (woo woo!), and I am second guessing my entire inventory of personal products.  There are thoughts swirling around in my head like, “what if I run out of blush while I’m in Tampa?? and, “what if my shampoo bottle becomes dangerously low?”  If you could hear the questions running rampant in my head, you would assume that I was taking off for a month-long excursion to the innards of some desert somewhere, never to see a CVS or Walgreen’s again.  But, people.  I’m going to be in Tampa.  For 5 days.  And even though I KNOW that I will not die if I run out of deodorant, I can’t quit thinking about it. 

So you know what I’m going to do?  I’m going to give in, and I’m going to go to Wal-Mart tonight and spend $30 on brand new products that I will not need for several weeks, I’m sure. 

Some call it preparation, others call it obsessive-compulsive disorder. 

On a related note, how excited am I to be heading to Tampa (despite my personal hygiene product fears)?  SO EXCITED!  I will have days to do absolutely nothing.  Days of basking in the sun.  Days of reading the [5 bazillion] books I bought during my book-buying bonanza.  And I couldn’t be happier about it.

**Update:  Shampoo crisis averted.  I have a brand new, full-to-the-brim bottle of my favorite (Aveda Color Conserve Shampoo).  While purchasing that, I talked myself into a brand new bottle of Aveda Sun Protector, too.  Because of all THE SUN!  And the DEADLY RAYS THAT WILL SURELY WRECK MY HIGHLIGHTS!!  Whew.  I’m glad I could avert that crisis. 

…revealing a few more of my quirks

Last night I exhibited another trait I inherited from my mother (other than detesting overhead lighting), and that is obsessive reading.  But let’s start at the beginning.  For my birthday, my brother gave me a gift card to Books-A-Million (which, if anybody out there is ever looking for a gift idea for me, a gift card to a book store is GREAT).  On top of that, I had a coupon for $10 off of a $50 purchase.  And on top of THAT, the store was having a gigantic sale, which meant you could buy 3 clearance books for the price of 2.  I have been looking forward to my book-buying bonanza for weeks now.  Maybe “looking forward to” is not a strong enough phrase – I was freaking so excited about buying a whole buncha books.  To each his own, right?  **Warning – if you don’t like books or reading, you’re going to read this post and think about how weird I am, but that’s okay.  It won’t be the first time or the last, for that matter.

On Saturday, Hunter and I were having a lazy day.  I had mentioned the idea of maybe going to the bookstore sometime that afternoon.  We decided to eat dinner at the new Billy’s in Liberty Park in preparation for the bonanza.  We filled up on fried olives (oh my gosh you have to try some) and chicken sandwiches with the white sauce (frankly, Billy’s wouldn’t be much without the white sauce).  After the meal, we went next door and each had a blizzard at Dairy Queen.  There’s a reason that Dairy Queen is still around – and that’s the Blizzard.  I went all out and had the cookie dough.   So good, but so sweet.  I couldn’t finish it.  I had to keep my energy up for the bonanza, right?!

We made it to Books-A-Million, with what felt like an extra 5 pounds, and walking in the door, I reminded myself to not get overwhelmed.  You know how some people have dreams of winning the lottery?  One of my dreams is to win a shopping spree at a book store (I say one of my dreams because of course I would love to win the lottery.  Then I would be all, “Sallie Mae, kiss my ass!”  But I digress.)  How I would love to have the chance to run through the store with a huge buggy and grab as many books as I could manage, without having to figure what the 25% discount would be on the hardbacks. 

This night, though, I didn’t have unlimited funds.  But I did have my gift card!  And my coupon!  I was armed and dangerous.  Hunter took off to look at his books (which, let me just interject something here.  It’s really nice to go to a bookstore with someone when they want to look at books, and not be all “I’m done looking at the magazines.  I’m bored.  Can we go?  This place is boring.”  I’m not mentioning any names, here).  I looked longingly at all the new, shiny hardbacks, knowing that I didn’t need to throw away my gift card and coupon on two measly books.  I headed straight for the bargain tables, which my goodness, there were miles of them.  I think I lost it there for a second when I saw the price tags — $4.97, $5.97 – FOR HARDBACKS!  And they were buy two get one free!!!!

From that point, I can’t recount what exactly happened.  I was in a discount-book-induced fog.  What I do know is, at some point, I came up for air and had a stack of about 8 books.  We finally made our way up to the cash register, and I passed by the table with the new hardbacks once again.  I gave in.  I couldn’t resist.  I recently read a review of “The Art of Racing in the Rain” by Garth Stein, and knew I had to buy this book.  There it was – in all its new hardback gloriousness.  So I grabbed it.  I had somehow, someway, calculated what I would owe to be about $15.00.  Apparently that math was performed during the fog, because I ended up owing $40.  Even after my gift card.  The jackass customer service technician wouldn’t let me use my $10 off coupon, either.  I didn’t even argue with him.  I think I was hungover from the discount book binge.

And here we arrive back at last night’s obsessive reading marathon.  I started “The Art of Racing in the Rain” last Sunday.  At the time, I was still finishing up my birthday hardback – “Change of Heart” by Jodi Picoult (excellent also, by the way).  As a general rule, I don’t like reading two books at once because I like to savor them one at a time (insert nerd comment here).  But I went against my own rule and started reading it anyway. 

The book is written entirely from a dog’s perspective – a labrador retriever named Enzo.  His health is failing, death is near, and he is looking back over his life.  His owner, Denny, is a wannabe racecar driver (hence the name).  I’m not in 4^th grade and I’m not going to do a full book report, but let me just say that if any of you out there have a love for dogs, then you must MUST read this book.  I frantically read over the past week, including reading during my lunch hour and reading while caught in traffic.  Last night, I had about 60 pages left.  I was up at 4 a.m. yesterday morning to be in Lafayette for work, and I was exhausted.  Thankfully, I had taken a nap earlier in the evening.  So when I got into bed and saw the book laying on the nightstand, I thought to myself, “well, maybe just a few pages.”  This is where the obsessive book reading always begins, but I somehow always manage to give in. 

Skip forward to an hour later, me lying in bed, crying like a baby while reading the last page of the book.  And I mean crying.  Like, wiping-my-face-on-the-sheet crying.  My emotions stemmed from my relationship with the best dog that ever lived, Rebel.  Rebel was a golden retriever I received for Christmas when I was 15, a dog that was my dad’s best friend, and a dog who meant the world to our family.  Just before Christmas, Rebel became very sick and had to be put to sleep.  I will leave a more thorough discussion of Rebel for another post or 10 – because he certainly deserves more than just a mention.  Although this book sounds like it would be sad, especially given the circumstance of recently losing a treasured pet, I can say without a doubt that my tears weren’t from sadness, but from realizing that Rebel led a wonderful life, and I know he appreciated every minute of it.   I hope that one day someone will tell me “Rebel says hello.”* 

If you read this blog, I’m going to require you to read this book.  It’s that good. 

*Read the book, and you’ll know I’m not crazy.