Tidbits

As I was leaving work today it occurred to me that of our four male employees, three carry man-bags and only one is gay. Somehow my Timbuk2 has achieved Most Masculine Carrier status. I win.

Of late Jeremy and I have been spending an inordinate amount of time house hunting. This is due partly to our roommate/landlord's planned departure/house sale next summer, and partly to the fact that Houston housing is under-valued and the market here is not quite as eff-ed as it is everywhere else. It's almost as if the little Baby Jesus smiled down on me from heaven and said "You know what, I'm gonna reward you for all the shit luck you've had recently by making a two bedroom one bath cottage totally affordable for you." See, living in an entirely undesirable city really does pay off! And I'm not just talking about the killer breakfast tacos. Anyway, we're doing it the fun way, where you do some investigating of your own and let your imagination run wild to the world of possibilities all before actually talking to the bank. This dream-crushing conversation occurs this weekend. Will keep you posted.

Speaking of the roommate/landlord. He is driving me bat shit insane. Who applies to what, 20 (?) grad schools anyway? And then talks about that, and only that, constantly. If I remember correctly, I myself tired of the topic some time around November of 1999. Best quote: "It's so weird. For the past, like, three or four weeks everyone I talk to winds up talking to me about grad school. And I'm totally not the one bringing it up!" Umm, yes. Yes you are.

Also. I got a car alarm installed. In the subsequent five days my car has totally not been stolen. Woot! Probably since it's so uber-awesome and supa-sensitive. Meaning it goes off All The Time. Like if you walk your dog by it. Or breathe. Score!

My job is still going swimmingly and recently has primarily revolved around planning this enormous party. The theme is burlesque and there are gonna be girls on swings hanging from the ceiling getting naked. Envy me.

Our quest for a store that can even begin to rival C-Ville Market may be over, as Jeremy and I finally visited Canino's Produce and picked up about $15 worth of vegetables for $7. The selection is vast, they're open daily, and prices are rock bottom. Of course there's a huge open-air market behind the main building that seems to house all the best deals. Never before have I wished so badly that I retained more than a hint of my college Spanish. Good news is that any feeling of despondency is immediately erased upon visiting the Mexican bakery next door. Four enormous, delicious pastries for $1.90? Yes please.

The weather here is still oppressively hot and unfathomably humid. But guess what? Fall is coming and I'm gonna be warm, bitches.

Lately I've been:
Reading this. Inspired by Nate, I tried reading a book about salt, but couldn't get past the long (boringly-related) history. Now I'm reading about corn and, hello, tis fascinating!

Baking this. It was good, but probably not worth the three or four pounds I'm sure I put on as a result.

Listening to...oh wait, I've only been listening to my iPod, now seemingly filled solely with old songs I am SO SO sick of. The reason being twofold: still no CD player in the car, and Best Buy still has my old laptop. The one with my iTunes library on it. Or rather it was on there when I turned the thing in so they could fix the 'x' key. Then they erased my hard drive. No one can tell me if a back-up exists or not. Oh and my new computer doesn't want to talk to my iPod, and gives me the option of either deleting all my songs and starting afresh or, well, nothing. I've heard rumors that there's some program that let's you go from iTunes to iPod, rather than the reverse, and loads all your songs to your blank library. Is this true? Send it to me.

Overheard In Our Staff Meeting

Co-worker A: ...So I was talking to this woman and she's an art teacher for, can I say this?, retarded adults.

Co-worker B: Well we're the only ones here...

Co-worker A: Anyway, she's really excited about making an [Art Project] with them and was really pleased with the information I sent her.

Co-worker C: Don't we already have enough retarded [Art Project]s?

Christmas in August

Before my mother unearths this (second) blog of mine and I cease writing about her entirely, I figured I'd relay a mom-related anecdote from today. My mother, you see, has been remarkable in terms of regularly sending me letters, cards, magazines, books, and assorted knick knacks ever since I moved to Houston. Very 'care package at camp'-ish and only slightly less lovely. [Come on, you know getting a care package at camp was The Best Thing Ever and there's little that can top the feeling of superiority you experienced while retrieving your spoils from the distributing counselor distributing as your fellow mail-less campers looked on with dismay.] I am genuinely grateful for her generosity and thoughtfulness.

Because we live in a part of town where you cannot leave your automobile outside lest it be stolen, and since the postman is apparently aware of this, I received a card last week stating that there was a package awaiting me at the post office and no, they wouldn't leave it on my doorstep because, hello! someone is gonna steal that shit just like they did you car. And car stereo. So I trekked to the post office today at lunch to pick up my prize, and when the clerk returned from the back I was surprised to see such a large-ish box when I was expecting something more along the lines of an oversize envelope. Not only that, but I noted that it cost $8.20 to be mailed, so I knew it had to be something good [this is the part where I want to add "because hi, my mom currently has no job," but I don't (really) because I feel sorta bad about that.]

To prolong the ecstasy, I waited to open the box until I got home for lunch. Admittedly, I did pull off the tape while waiting at various stoplights on the drive back, so once I got inside it was easy to quickly remove out the packing paper and reveal my reward(s).

Inside I found this:

Attached to this:

Hurricane Season

Someone at the gym this morning smelled distinctly like maple syrup. I'm smelling syrup, so suffice to say no, I haven't drowned in Erin's wake, although the flooded roads did make me 15 minutes late for work--quite a feat considering my drive is 2.7 miles, but I am still largely clueless when it comes to the roads here, hence the delay. Yesterday we spent the hours of 9-3 "team-building" at work. With no internet and no network on account of the storm, I shot the shit with my boss and co-workers, listened to a bunch of music and hung posters in my office, played too much minesweeper and hearts, and, when I tired of that, I even wrote you all a lovely blog post, only to lose it all when the power went out briefly.

I also tried my first Whataburger, as that's where the only employee brave enough to face the rain was headed for lunch. It's one of those fast-food chains people rave about for no good reason. Sure one meal tasting of sawdust may be "fresher" and "more authentic"-seeming than another, but in the end it all still tastes like sawdust. My co-workers were so excited for me to experience this Southern phenomenon and kept asking how I felt about my grilled chicken sandwich. "Kind of disgusted with myself," I thought, but "oh, it's good" came out. I found it hard to expound on the lie while holding a lukewarm mass of fat that was dripping mayonnaise juice.

Anyway, the Erin damage in our area was minimal, but Dean is still en route. Over lunch today my co-workers were trading hurricane stories from Rita and Katrina. No one had suffered any losses, save for one girl who'll never get back the 18 hours she spent in the car evacuating to Austin (three hours away), only to turn on the TV upon arrival and see pictures of a road in her neighborhood where traffic cones arranged before she left still had yet to blow over. In fact, thankfully most of them actually enjoyed the time they spent riding out the storm, relaying stories of days spent drinking and playing cards, talking and eating.

I'm still operating under 'it won't happen to me' the pretense. We don't live in an evacuation area and I don't have any friends or family who have ever been impacted by severe weather. That said, I met with a guy from the Surviving Katrina and Rita organization today about an event we're hosting with them, and it was quite a wake up call for someone like me who is new to the area. While I'm certainly educating myself about his project at work, I prefer to remain blissfully unaware at home, save for vague 'we should plan on heading somewhere inland' emergency plans. So don't worry, wish me luck, and if worst comes to worst, send booze and food.

Houston is Like Charlottesville Because...

• I have a job I love (most of the time) and a great boss with awesome musical taste who wears band shirts to work
• Free soda at work
• I've been drunk during the work day
  
• Same Tuesday night trivia format (minus creative team names--The Rockets?! Come on people!)
  
• I still can't answer any of the trivia questions
  

The Worst Is Over...Maybe?

So they found my car. I know. WTF? I suppose I never recounted the story of it being stolen though. It went something like this: went to bed and car was there, woke up and it was not. Pretty anti-climactic, huh? At first we assumed it was the same person who took my stereo, but that individual was so well-versed in car stereo theft that s/he didn't even need to break the glass, whereas the eventual car thief did indeed do so--but what are the odds I'd be targeted by twice in eight days by two independent thieves? Actually? With my luck lately? Well we all know the answer to that.

It was funny, though (well not at the time), as my first thought was: "is someone gonna pay me for this?" I honestly had no idea that insurance even covered this because I never even conceived of my car being stolen (or read through the descriptions in my terms of service apparently). But Progressive has been lovely to me, and, prior to it's recovery, my co-workers even seemed convinced this was actually gonna be a great break for me what with getting the blue book value for the thing and all.

But I just wanted my car back. And to avoid the hassle of waiting 30 days for insurance to declare it a loss, and getting a loan, and wasting weekends finding a car, and blah blah blah. So I was ecstatic when I learned that it had not only been found, but was also fixable! I went and saw my car Thursday and it looked...sad, somehow seeming depressed in reasons to it's recent abuse and the resulting broken steering column and window (okay, okay, that was probably just my reaction).

Anyway, it's in the shop now being restored to its former glory[-ish-ness] and I am enjoying one less iota of stress as a result. Sure I'll owe the deductible, but I'll also claim that there wasn't the hint of a scratch on the thing before this and please repaint it all, thank you very much. Oh, and they're gonna cover a new stereo for me, which otherwise would've gone entirely unreported to the ole insurance. So in the end, yes, this has been huge pain in the ass, but way less of a disaster than it could have been. And just like I learned the random life lesson of always knowing where your water shut off is located by flooding the house, I'm not sure I'll ever own another car without adding an alarm. Or, as my dad suggested, "a Club with a gun."

In My Office There Are Many Things

Is it an office? Not as much as it's the front room of a house badly in need of a flip. Complete with:

• Christmas Lights
• A small plastic chandelier from the 70s
• A 'cotton'-scented candle
• A pinata of a Mexican man
• A small plastic Christmas tree, also probably from the 70s, unrelated to the lights
• Plastic ivy

Yes, I finally got a job, and I think I'm gonna like it.

I am still accepting vehicle donations, however.