Rainy Day Blog

Know why I'm actually blogging for the first time in about a month? Because it's freaking raining outside and there's nothing else to do.

Yesterday was one of those days where I reaffirmed my ingrained belief that life is about experience. After work, which was not exactly thrilling, I came home to relax.

We went to dinner at Bushido (look out for it on Man vs. Food... and yes, we do know if he completed the challenge or not) a little later and because we're such a big happy family, somebody had to sit in the back. I'm telling you all, if your group of friends has too many people for one car but too few for two cars and somebody's gonna be banished to the back, you should make sure that somebody is you! It's so fun.

So right around dusk, we set out and I sit backwards because sitting sideways involved too many vibrations from the speakers. Sitting backwards allows you to watch things as they pass but not before you pass them. Sounds stupid, but is actually quite interesting.

Coming home from dinner was better, though. In an attempt to stargaze, I decided to lay down and look out the windows. Stargazing in the suburbs is a little difficult, but I did get to see the streetlights and the trees as they weaved in and out of one another. And after leaving Gene's, that was just great. Going over the bridge was perfect. The clouds and the sky were about two shades different from one another and I knew that it would be impossible to capture something like that on a camera. Makes you think the human eye (even a flawed one like mine) is something pretty amazing. The moon's not quite full yet, but on Sunday I plan to go back outside and see how things look then.

Today is less about experience and more about maintenance. Paying my phone bill, cleaning up the house a bit, doing the dreaded laundry. I don't mind these things but they sure as hell do make me want more of those days where I'm out in the world...

Rain, rain, go away!

Just an FYI

I'm graduating from college today.

Something's rotten...

Notice anything different about my blog? How about the fact that I'm signing my posts "Hammy". Don't worry, still me. Just writing a Hamlet blog, too, and can't sign his "Moira".

When did I get to be suuuuuuuuch a nerd?

Dear Tom Robbins

Just when I think that maybe you are getting over the hill, you come at me again with something to knock my socks off. I apologize for the things I said about Villa Incognito and I even feel kind of bad that many of the stories found in Wild Ducks Flying Backwards failed to catch my attention. The publication of your newest novel seriously makes me want to move back to my parents home in Washington and see if perhaps I can't just get a glimpse of you in your natural habitat. Creepy? Maybe. But you bring it on yourself when you write childrens books. They're my weakness. (So is beer.)

B is for Beer

Ode to Socks

Dear Pile of Mens Socks,

From where have you come? Today as Laurie and I cleaned our house we noticed you've grown. Seriously, how? There are a lot of you now. You gross me out so much that I actually put you in with my laundry so that I wouldn't have to look at a pile of dirty mens socks all day. Now some of you rest in your happy little home on our coffee table.



And some of you sit in the dryer upstairs with more of my laundry. And yet more of you are in the laundry that has yet to make it to the machine because just when I thought I'd gotten rid of you all, more popped up.

Stop the insanity! It has been a while since we've even had any boys in this house. Where on earth do you keep coming from and how do you keep finding your way into our home? I am particularly disturbed by exhibit b. I think it is cool that a sock is actually as long as my arm, but I find this to be extremely superfluous. Who needs a sock that long. And what does one do with a sock that long?



And just so you know, mens socks, you better stay away from my socks. They are vibrantly colored because I got them from some silly race or they are super old because I never buy socks. Either way, they do not want any business with you. To be frank, they find you a bit offputting.

On Being a Cool Kid

Blogging is, undoubtedly, one of the nerdier things that I do with myself. Now, that doesn't mean that in the interim time between my last blog and now (far too long, I know, I am severely neglectful) that I have become any cooler than I ever was. I have not. I am still a nerd. Not blogging has not improved my cool-factor in any noticeable way.

I have been doing much of the same lately. Going to class. Going to work. Watching tv online. The things that, to be honest, I've been doing for 4 years now. Oh, I've also been having minor freak-out sessions every time I realize that I've been in college for 4 years now and come May 9, I will have walked across the Cistern Yard and will be one of them thar college graduates.

But this is not one of those posts about that. This is a post about me being cooler! I know, I did say that I hadn't gotten any cooler in any noticeable way since not blogging. But I have gotten cooler since about 20 minutes ago. You know why?

I got a SIGG water bottle. And trust me, I know that makes me cooler. I first noticed this particular brand of water bottle last year when one of my hipper/more-environmentally-conscious-and-thus-way-more-vogue than I professors carried it around. And then this semester another professor. And then students. And then one was even brought into our home.

I've been wondering all the time where these beauties (they're not really that beautiful...) were bought and if, upon buying one, you got admittance into some secret society meeting on how to make other people feel like they are less-environmentally-conscious-and-thus-way-less-vogue than you are without saying so out loud.

With the $21 dollar price tag, I figured I'd paid my membership dues. So when's the first meeting? You know what, I don't even need to attend the meeting. My bottle is meeting enough. That's the joy of it. Because I didn't want to have the same bottles as my professors and because I didn't want to get one of the little baby sized ones, I settled for a white one that says in obnoxiously large letters "SIMPLY ECOLOGICAL." It may as well say "I'M SIMPLY WAY MORE AWESOME THAN YOU ARE." But it doesn't. Explicitly. I will have you know that there were even more elitist ones that said "YOU ARE WHAT YOU DRINK, DON'T BE PLASTIC."

I feel confident in my non-assholeness because I opted not to get the one that hit you right over the head with its eco-dogmatism.

Wry toast

I think it is exceedingly clear that the person who is now writing the weather updates on weather.com was an English major. They are probably also a blogger. I know I am not the only person who has noticed the "abundant sunshine" description, Kelly has noted it before in conversation.

But today I got a new one. "Considerably cloudy." Alliteration! Is that you? Oh my dear old friend, how good it feels to be reunited. It's as if a long-lost literary love has leaped back into my longing limbs (how you like them apples?).

Seriously, though. I salute you, new-ish writer for the Weather Channel. I apologize that it seems your degree has lead you to very sad and lonely path. Or at least a stormy one... ha! Get it? Even I know that was bad, don't worry. Look on the bright side (I will let you all know that I resisted the urge to write "sunny" side), at least you have a job. And I bet it pays decent wages.

So, at long last, I raise my proverbial glass in a toast to you, overexpressive weatherperson. You're an inspiration to us all.