you go through rental listings that all have the same boring, non-descript titles like 3 bedroom ranch or 3bd/2ba on cul-de-sac... it's like these people don't want their houses to be rented and are striving for mediocrity. anyone with half a brain knows you have to have a hook to get people to click on YOUR ad and be willing to pay you every month for the privelage of living in YOUR pos house that you don't want anymore but can't sell so have decided to rent in the meantime... you click through them, trying to remember which description goes with what picture in your head and you inevitably end up looking at the same one about 30 times because you can't keep them all straight. well, to combat this we decided to give them our own, slightly more colorful titles like big yard, crappy driveway or almost perfect dammit or pirate rope with loft. this actually didn't help that much, but made the process a lot more enjoyable.
I also found out this past week that, despite the tired factor, driving to work at 630 am is actually nice. the sky is a very pretty color and the air smells fresh in the morning. in fact, I think i am a morning person... i'm just never up to enjoy them. i do think that mid-mornings suck... but that's because I'm not a brunch person and prefer lazy afternoons.
easter was sunday. we had a potluck type dinner out at my sisters house. oddly enough, everyone was in a good mood and seemed to get along alright. in fact, in was a perfectly normal, non-dysfunctional family gathering. and that's kinda weird I guess. we did have fun with some of the gag gifts that my nephew just got for his birthday. the first was the always popular fart bag. the pouch had some sort of powder and liquid in it and you squeezed it to make the liquid break so the two would mix. then you throw the fart bag somewhere inconspicuous (like under a chair) and it is supposed to discreetly release a foul smell. well, I'll agree that it smelled foul, but the bag made a loud hissing sound while it filled up and then literally popped like a balloon... not too discreet. in fact, I heard the hissing under my chair and immediately ran away from it... its one of those instinctual things I guess.
we also all tried the fish tasting candy which turned out to be a surprising mix of mint and licorice... not bad at all. my younger brother volunteered to wash his hands with the 'blood' soap and his hands got stained pink. that was kind of funny but not in the way the prank manufacturers had intended. more than one masturbation joke was thrown around. the most promising gift was a pack of gum that shocked you when you tird to pull out a piece of gum but those masochistic kids spent so much time shocking themselves they'd drained the battery. ah well... what kind of quality can you expect from something labelled as cherry chew gum?? crazy japanese manufacturers....
jay also found our perfect house. its belongs to some guy that just got divorced and is moving out of state. it has a 2 person tub in the master bath!! which I'm hoping means I can actually swim laps in it, cuz that would be awsome!! anyway, it has lots of other great things too like a good location, big fenced yard and garage. we're excited so I hope we get it... we're stiill waiting to hear back right now though... we have amused ourselves in the meantime by googling the guys email address and online handle. we found him on dating sites (more recently) and online altenative lifestyles pages (less recently) looking for swinger couples.... guess that didn't work out. we decided it would be best not to mention this to him.
so this week rocks because I get to have two days off in addition to sunday off. so that's three days off!! huge improvement over having one day off last week. oh... and i got less than 50% of my quota at work for march... ha ha ha ha ha!!!! oops. its only so funny because its so bad.
*blog*
posted by megs at 21:42
3.20.2005
thank god for science!!
i ask you, where would we be without science? luckily we have brilliant u.s. researchers to study things like malt liquor for us. what was their brilliant hypothesis? well, let me enlighten you.
Malt liquor, a type of beer that is higher in alcohol than other brews, is largely a drink of the homeless and unemployed, and is likely to be abused, U.S. researchers reported Monday.
it also baffles me that it took a study to find out that malt liquors were both higher in alcohol than other beers and tended to be sold in larger containers. what rock have these people been living under? you can walk down to a corner store and see that the malts come in 40s. what they didn't figure out is that they do this because these drinks taste like crap. they have to offer a lot more bang for the buck because it tastes like motoroil. at $2 tops for a 40, its of course going to appeal to the people with less money (i.e. homeless and unemployed). i don't think that drinking malt liquor leads to homelessness or unemployment... but being broke leads to malt liquor. duh.
the head genius leading the study goes on to say that "Advertising influences brand choice, and what young people drink in early years influences what they drink as adults." sounds to me like another 'tv and video games made me do it' kind of excuse. besides, 21 year olds are adults. if they are old enough to buy alcohol, they are old enough to make a responsible decision about what they are drinking without pointing the finger at anyone else but themselves.
now, i have only had one 40 in my entire life. and i think it was budweiser. and i only drank half because it got warm. i guess i'm just proving this study right. i'm not homeless or unemployed and therefore do not drink 40s. when i do quit my job i will be sure to rush right out and start brown bagging it though.
and finally they decided that larger studies should be done on the type of alcohol that people drink, advertising of the different types and their influence on behavior and crime. i'm guessing they are going to find that people who drink captain stand around with one leg propped up while anyone drinking out of beer cans will crush them on their head.
in the words of napoleon... idiots! gawh.... *blog*
posted by megs at 12:13
3.19.2005
you can buy everything on ebay... i could probably find you on here. --jenny (my sister)--
sometimes people just say the randomest stuff. i thought this was funny yesterday when she said this at my mom's house, but i was disappointed later that evening when my hours spent searching on ebay for a pair of boots left me empty handed. my coworker said he found a great pair of running shoes on there, but it seems that no one makes a megs style of boot anymore. and i am continuing to pointedly ignore huey's suggestion that it isn't boot season. in my opinion, it is always boot season. nowadays everything is square toed, flat toed, and slick soled. or worse, man-made materials, which is cleverly touted as vegan friendly. *sheesh* those are the pleather or plastic shoes that squeak when you walk.
all i ask for is a good sturdy ankle boot, with a lug sole and round bubbly toe. and black, not brown. and not with a 4 inch platform. anything touted as "biker" or "goth" is probably a little too much. and i do not for the life of me understand why boots have laces up the front, buckles on the side and then still zip up on inside of the ankle. how many fake closures do you need? on the other hand, spikes on boots, while seeming like a fun idea, are also rather impractical. but would come in very handy for a well placed kick on the next guy who pissed you off. anyway, so i've come up empty handed so far. but if anyone out there finds a pair of boots that matches the above description and isn't more than $75, pick up a size 9 for me. awesome, thanx.
*sigh* sitting here at work, it's depressing thinking that last year on this date i was walking around on a huge beach and staring at the pacific ocean. over time it seems less like i was there and more like i watched a tv show about it one time. at least the weather is gorgeous today. but just thinking about it still makes me want to be anywhere but where i am today...
oh yeah... i got this amazing but crazy message from a friend of mine yesterday.
Floppy the Moose: hey, I wanted to let you know Holly and I are getting married. catcha later Floppy the Moose signed off at 3:54 pm.
i mean, wtf! talk about random... and here all i had sent before this was a message about having a happy st. paddy's day! my message is lame in comparison to his. and then he was gone before i even had a chance for congrats or anything. it's amazing how a message like this can make you smile and just make the whole rest of your day awesome just because you are so happy for your friend. of course, its also very ambiguous. was he in the process of getting married when he wrote it? is that why he had to sign off? or did he just propose? did they just come to a mutual decision? is he hopping a plane to vegas? the possibilities are endless and my curiousity is at its peak!! i guess i'll just have to call him to figure it out. seems a lot of people are getting married. or at least there is a neverending parade of people getting married. and one day all of our friends will be married off. then where will we be? i guess next in line.
so i think the winner for the week was the woman who walked into my store demanding a car charger for her cell phone... when i located the item for her (because of course she was too important to actually look around and find it herself) i told her how much it was and her brilliant reply was... i have to pay for that? well, i'm not gonna do that...
and she walked out. i guess she was headed for the store that gives everything away for free.
i'm seriously worried about the future of our race.
*blog*
posted by megs at 10:01
3.17.2005
fuck you, i'm irish
very funny stuff... i saw this as a tshirt design on a website. nice spin on the kiss me i'm irish theme you usually see on buttons and tees. the only thing about this shirt is that it seems everyone becomes irish on st. paddy's day... and that is part of the appeal of it. this very american holiday gives us a chance to eat potatoes and cabbage while we drink green beer until we puke. i'm sure anyone who was truly irish would get a huge kick out of the spectacle it has becomes stateside.
either way, the shirt i saw tickled me and gave me an idea for a tshirt design. when i make it, i'll put up a picture.
i pinched huey good today. he was wearing this shirt that he swore up and down was green. it was an olive-brown, pea green mix that resembled some horrible baby diaper by-product more than a festive shamrock, kelly green. hey... even on a day where it is acceptable to be so drunk you see three of everything you gotta have standards. i am as greened out as i can be at work... green hair clips (with cats playing fiddle) and my green shamrock bellied care bear (whose name i can't remember... good luck bear?). i have no plans tonite. at least not anything interesting. and last year this holiday was a bust too. i was busy packing for my trip to LA last year and it seems the whole holiday just snuck right by.
there have been some good years though. my number one fav was the year we had people over to our apartment in sandy springs. we had corned beef and cabbage, green beer, green bread, and green cupcakes. it was awesome. we played charades on teams and had a blast. drunken fun was had by all. let's see... another great year was a year that i lovingly refer to as the little kids table st. paddy's day. it was before i was 21 and huey and all the other 21+ kids were going to buckhead. i, on the other hand, got stuck with melissa and steve going to our seedy neighborhood college bar that was nice enough to serve underagers such as ourselves. i remember i wore green glasses. well, black frames, but green lenses. we sat there and drank, got bored, and ended up sitting in the pink apt. watching something like biodome or the craft. it was like going to the movies and waiting for your parents to pick you up afterwards. melissa and i just sat in the dark waiting to get picked up. but it was one of my favorite years... for its simplicity i guess. good beer... good friends... i'm going to stop before i get sentimental.
well, apart from the obvious, i also spent a very successful hour at the local b&n. i don't know how much i can stress this... i need a library card. i'm going to put myself in the poor house with all the books i buy. another $100 down the drain. and now i'm actually trying to slow down my reading, or not read as much, just to make it last longer. i think the real trick with the place is that you get lost in the stacks for a long time, take time picking out your books very carefully (i'm always limited to 2 or 3, about $50 worth). and then you go to get in line and have to walk through the DISCOUNT SECTION. a cookbook about soups and stews... for only $6?? i have to have it!! oooh... celtic myth and mythology... $4.95!! on top of the stack it goes... its horrible. i know its going to get me everytime and yet i still fall for it. i never walk out with less than $100 in books. ridiculous... i know.
so this time i ended up with the complete narnia chronicles. i justify this purchase despite the fact that i already own the entire set because this is one book instead of seven. soooo... now i can get rid of the seven. streamlining you see... and then i got the screwtape letters, also a c.s. lewis favorite, and the three musketeers. a strange choice, but not when you consider my recent run on alexander dumas books. in the past month i read jane austen's complete novels (another great 7 in 1 i picked up), michael crichton's timeline, and the fourth installation in the bourne books, the bourne legacy, which happens to be written by someone who is not robert ludlum. but it was still good.
hmmm... well, i'll be off work soon, and need to start seriously focusing my attention on what i'm going to do this evening. i guess green beer will have to be enough for me this year. last year this time i was getting ready to get on a plane... i wish i could do that again. but i just got back from vacation. and i can't take a vacation every other week. what a pity... i'm so good at it.
*blog*
posted by megs at 17:44
3.16.2005
You may delay, but time will not --Benjamin Franklin-
time marches on, so it happens to be that time of year again... end of the lease. every single time that i move i swear up and down that i will never move again. that it is my least favorite activity in the world. that i would rather be force fed mashed meat and veggie baby food for a week (blech) than have to pack up, clean, and then leave the place i'd gotten so comfortable in.
i guess a part of all that is true. but, at the same time, i get this itch. to be somewhere else. in a different house. no, i'm not that big on change. but a little bit is good. i was the kid who used to rearrange my entire room--bed, dresser and all-- when i was little. and all by myself. i'd spend an entire day pushing and tugging crap around my room. i guess this is just a more mature, grown up way of doing it... except now i have a whole house full of stuff and am pushing and tugging around a city.
one of these years the next obvious step will be to expand this whole little board game i have to a national scale. eventually, i will move out of state and away from atlanta. when? and where? who knows... who cares. right now, i'm stressed enough about where to go in two months. and the more i think about it, two months just doesn't seem like enough time to pack everything, get it all settled, save up the money for a move. but at the same time... what's the point in putting it off? every time i move it becomes a heavier hit to my pocketbook. but i am, at least, moving up. besides, putting it off and pretending it isn't going to happen doesn't change the fact that our lease will end.. and we'll have to make some kind of decision.
now that huey and i've enjoyed the pleasures of a townhouse with garage for a year with five of us, we figured we'd give a real house a try. but with a two car garage. and we're only bringing one roommate with us to play "house" as our kid. okay, i take that back. if he read that he'd freak out. but really, it's almost what we are doing. we're just that much closer to being ready to get a house. but where to get it? and what size? and what can we afford? there is to much up in the air, and until at least one of us finish school we're just keeping it on hold.
geez, i really do feel like i'm in a board game. in fact, the game of Life used to be one of our favorites. that's me... except i hit that bad space at the beginning that makes you a $20k a year janitor instead of the $400k a year doctor, and am spinning the wheel like crazy hoping to get lucky before the end. one thing i never liked about that game is that it encouraged having kids so strongly.... you got more money at the end for however many kids you had in the car. stupid game.... brainwashing is all it was.
anyway, when we decide on a house and get approved, i'll put up a link to a picture. in the mean time, wish me happy hunting!
*blog*
posted by megs at 02:03
3.12.2005
attention... this is a test... this is only a test...
apparently you can blog from email. and that, to me, kind of rocks. that means, with the mobile power of my trusty sidekick and the ingenious of the blogger folks, i can now post to this thing at any time of the day or night whenever i have the smallest whim...
that is assuming, of course, that this works. and that my sidekick is working. and if its not, that i am near some kind of internet. and that i have something to say. or that i even remember to send the email after i type it out. but mostly that i have something to say. and internet. yeah... that's the most important one...
so... i'm sending this. because right now the only thing i can think about is whether or not it is going to work....
the tension is mounting...
*blog*
posted by megs at 04:21
3.10.2005
baseball is more fun in person than on tv... if you drink a lot of beer...
So here are some of the long overdue pictures from the braves games. It was so long ago, i don't really have any good explanations for the stupid things we did. all i can say is that a lot of beer and maybe a few jaeger shots were involved....
the infamous ticket... oooooooohhhh.... aaaaaaaaaahhhhh....
so here i am in front of turner field... not really a very interesting picture, but i think it is good proof of the fact that i was actually there... in front of the place...
Here are some of the fun and candid group shots that i took... i'm in a lot, not because i'm vain, but because this was my special night and i'm more important... and its my camera, duh.
here are some nice pictures of our view of the city from our seats... the top one has that blurry impressionist look i love so much from my phone... the bottom one is clearer except huey's big noggin got in the way. so no, his head is not bigger than the buildings.
and these are the stupid things i did after the game when i was drunk. mostly, i did them just because i could. first, i payed tribute to the budweiser wall for contributing to my current state of happy inebriation.
secondly, i saw a sculpture and decided it looked a lot to me like a clown nose. i think posing for stupid pictures in public while you are drunk is a great american pasttime... kind of like baseball!
and i don't know where this one came from, but it is funny anyway. i'm sure we thought we were being very clever...
and here is my pride and joy... my very own souvenir foam finger. i had it signed by everyone who was there with me. and whoever i ran into at my apartment afterwards. luckily i found this on the way out of the stadium, otherwise i probably would have a bunch of other silly pictures during the game of me doing silly but not very creative things with the foam finger....
all in all, it was a very good time. especially for a first baseball game. and especially since i don't really like baseball anyway. so now i've done wrestling, hockey, and baseball. i'm still missing football and basketball. one day, i will see all these professional sports. one day.
