"h"

My cousin lives in Ireland and informed me that there, they pronounce the letter "h" with an "h". Like, huh, huh, "haych". I giggled, but it really makes a lot of sense, upon further thought. I think they also pronounce the "h" in herbs and spices. Which is great synergy, because that "h", it adds a little something extra, you know?

windfall

On rare occasions I'm actually a doer, rather than dreamer. Case in point: I am one of those people who, if suddenly a recipient of a huge windfall, would stand up on my cubicle desk, gyrate with double birdies held high, taunting, 'Yeeeeeah, b**ches!!' In fact, I may have done so with an employer already, without the windfall (unless you count the really tasty doughnut I was excited about).

choppers

I witnessed my grandmother eating an apple and chowing down on some peanuts this Christmas. (The peanuts for sure, anyway, I may have dreamed the apple.) And I winced when watching. Why? It's not like I was standing close enough to get apple spittle in the eye or anything. I guess I just expected her teeth to come flying out, or slide out as a whole group. Nope. She's got some serious choppers, that one. Crunch crunch crunch. I wanted to ask her who did her bridge (great work!!), but I'm sure the dentist probably retired before '89.

advice

Hey, if you happen to get in a car accident and the police accuse you of texting while driving, don't explain it away by saying, "no no, I wasn't texting, I was just looking straight down." They laugh, but they still ticket you.

comments

I decided pretty early on that I didn't want a published comments section for my blog, but only because it has an open-access URL. There's got to be some angry dude in the Yukon called WolfTracker414 who's dying to tell me how much I effin' suck. Perhaps he'll still manage to do so, but no one else should have to be privy to my secret pain.

towel

I get out of the shower and reach for my bath towel, and of course the first thing I do is pat my face dry. And unfortunately take in a huge breath. The towel totally smells like, for lack of a better term, lunch. I know what you're thinking, ok... gross. But it happens. After consulting with a friend on the phone, I change out the towel for a new one.

Why the hesitation, you ask? Because what I really want to know is... where were the stages?? Isn't it supposed to vaguely smell like, say, milk first? Or breakfast? Why did it go straight from "day after the last of the fabric softener smell wore off" to "lunch"? Not fair, really.

parked car

I always feel so self-conscious when I'm sitting in a parked car in a parking lot, especially when the car's not running. People stare. They worry. All of a sudden I'm a suspect and they are trying to get a better look at my face in case I'm on reruns of "America's Most Wanted" (o.m.g. wait, is that still on!?! It is!!) I start racking my brain myself, to figure out what I probably did.

I did see a master the other day. I was the one walking into the building and he was sitting in his parked car. Staring suspiciously at me. Genius!

break-up

Some of my friends have told me after their long-term break-up, "Well, I for one will be so glad to have my whole bed back so I can stretch out. I never really liked sharing a bed anyway. And I won't have to listen to all that snoring anymore." (These would be women friends, obviously - you can tell by the italics. Do dudes say these things? Probably not - at least not the snoring part. But you never know.)

Guess what? I don't believe you. Having another warm body in bed is just plain nice. Know what I would believe? If you were excited about the extra garage space. "Now I don't have to park so close to the dang wall and bump into my garbage bins. I can park in the middle - or crooked!" Now that's the high life.

janitors

Ever since Good Will Hunting, I try to notice the janitorial staff around me. I hypothesize that they are secret geniuses, but after initial study I conclude I'm wrong. Not because they are sticking the wrong end of the mop into the bucket or anything, but... they usually don't look like they are pondering finite math either. Hey, call me classist, but isn't it really the fault of the movie?

oh dear

Why church elders are perhaps, too sheltered.

Taken around Thanksgiving, 2008.

chik'n nuggets

Although a proud carnivore, I now prefer Quorn chik'n nuggets to actual chicken nuggets. For those of you who don't know, Quorn is one of those meatless food brands geared for vegetarians in your grocer's freezer section. (Wait - who actually says "your grocer's freezer section"?) These nuggets are made of ground mushroom fibers or something. Anyway, knowing myself, I believe the new preference has more to do with my fascination for science novelties rather than true taste superiority.

Apparently if you bastardize the word "chicken" it doesn't have to be made out of it.

I've yet to try p'rk.

see also mycoprotein

Hudson crash

So, a US Airways plane crashed into the Hudson River yesterday. Reminds me of a flight I was on recently. Because of the horror she effected, I distinctly remember the flight attendant saying exactly this: "in the unlikely event of a water landing"... I think it would be super refreshing to ride on a plane where the flight attendant goes, "Hey, you know what? Absolutely nothing on this plane floats or is flame retardant. Know why? Because we land normally. YEAH."

I also think it's funny that they spend 10 seconds showing you the simple task of how to buckle a seat belt but just kind of tap the safety instructions with their finger when referring to almost every other complex task you'd need to do in an emergency - like popping out a window or inflating a 30-foot slide. Not that it'd be time or cost effective to show all that. But they could just tap an illustration of seat buckling as well.

6-yr-old cat

My cat is almost 6 years old, meaning that she's in about the same position in her life cycle as I am. One day I brought up a discussion about traditional IRA's versus Roth IRA's. No response. So I dumbed it down in case I did my math wrong and asked her if my Mii resembled me at all. No real interest. I could try colonoscopies next.

... or I could join a social organization of some kind.

yayoo

Sometimes my mistypings give me ideas. I was writing out my email address and wrote "yayoo" by accident. What if there were a new search engine provider called Yayoo.com? That would confuse the dickens out of old people.

Oh, PS
I typed "www.thegoogle.com" in my web browser just to see if Google was on the ball. They aren't.

Worry #1

I worry that I'm screwing up my one year old's psyche when I constantly change the volume of the stereo in the car. Up, down, up... she probably wonders if her hearing is going. Or she's going to turn out like that control-group dog who couldn't shut off the electric shocks in his cage and eventually refused to move out of despair.

HGTV

I like to flip on HGTV and listen to them discuss the benefits of hardwood versus a thick, full carpet.

Sat. daycare

I assume there will be a day when I accidentally attempt to drop off my daughter at daycare on a Saturday. I really hope I come off as absent-minded rather than responsibility avoidant. Should I practice what to say now?

total baloney

I spent a good half-hour trying to come up with the name of my blog. That's a long time for me to be thinking about the same thing.

PS
I'm typing the words I thought I'd never type. "Check out my blog." Yuck. Only internet douche bags say that (unless it's your blog... heh heh).