I had a bunch of drinks on Tuesday night. 2 mixed drinks, 3 beers. Over 4 hours. This is not insane; it’s not some wild bender. More than I’ve had in a long time, but not some college binge. I had a dinner of sushi, an apple and some crap rice cakes. I watched Lost with friends.

I was never drunk. But when I woke up Wednesday morning, I had a hangover from the gods. It was because I didn’t drink any water. Doh. As I’ve gotten older, my body has changed and things like hydration matter. I’m just sometimes slow to realize that I’ve aged and changed.

And so began my morning. This was followed by a sausage and egg sandwich at Starbucks. Then I made my own egg sandwich at work.

At this point, I’m expecting the egg and sausage to work the miracle hangover cure business. No such luck. And I’m craving a hotdog. I walk to the grocery store, a few blocks away. And buy hotdogs and buns.

And I eat — ready? — 5 hotdogs by 1030 am.

5.

To be fair, I skipped lunch. And yes, that cured the headache. But what kind of monster am I?

Seriously, I’m fairly mortified at the entire episode. Note to self: drink buckets of water. All the time.

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I’ve had two moments in the last 24 hours where I wished I had my camera handy. Because apparently dumb people make signs.

The first was one I wanted to send to Petunia for her online course. It read:

“Who” loves you …
God loves you

Right off the bat, there are at least three grammatical errors. Now, keep in mind that this sign was directly across the street from another wherein the name of the business was, for some reason I cannot fathom, also in quotation marks. As if to say, maybe this is the place you’re looking for, maybe it isn’t…

The other was a sign I saw today in the men’s room of a new Target store. As a father, I’m a bit peeved when there aren’t changing stations in the men’s room. So there, where the plastic changing station ideally should be, and where there was obviously space left on the architectural drawings for just such a facility, was a sign reading:

Diaper Changing Station is located in the family bathroom for your convenience.

Really? Wouldn’t it be more convenient for it to be … oh, I don’t know … right here? You know, the place where I’d conceivably be standing with the kid and the shitty diapers? Or perhaps this is a ploy of some sort so the dad can come out and say “Nope. No changing station in there. You take ‘im.” Frankly, I’m a tad flumoxed, because the tri-colored, laser-etched sign with stainless steel mounting hardware had to be almost as expensive as the changing station would have been.

It’s times like these when I realize why Ed Norton needed a fight club.

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For instance:
the person who is trying to set my old ripped up mattress on fire and wants to know to prevent the house from burning too?
or
the woman who is wondering about the glitch on her husband’s iphone where raunchy images randomly attach themselves to emails that were never sent even though they appear in the sent folder.

No?

Then how about the literal ‘Under the Bridge’ (not as good as the a-ha one, but better than the Tears for Fears):

Or an awesome Get Your War On cartoon:

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So, I’m sitting at home last night… alone. The baby just fell asleep, and I’m desperately trying to drudge through the second book of the Illuminatus! trilogy. There’s a knock at the door.

There’s a skinny black kid in the middle of my yard with his hands up in the air like I’m planning to shoot. “Hey man, I’m not here to rob you. I’m here as part of a program to help people like me get back on their feet.”

I asked him what he meant by “people like me”.

“Let me ask you something, sir. What do you consider the major problems of the inner city?”

I dunno. Aren’t most of their problems major ones?

“Tell me sir, do you believe in second chances?”

I must be a sucker, because the next thing I know, I’m handing him a check for more than $100 for magazine subscriptions. A hundred bucks! Am I just stupid or did I really think I was getting a deal, because he initially tried to charge me $250 and then told me it was his first day and wasn’t good with math when I protested? Seriously, I’m never opening my door after dark ever again.

The guy was a pretty good salesman, though. He played the part of recovering crackhead really well. Plus, I’m one of those people who really feels sorry for telemarketers and people who have to sell magazines door to door for a living. If it weren’t for my sudden relapse of common sense, I wouldn’t have cancelled the payment in time and my magazines (supposedly) would be off in some inner city shelter for battered women.

It’s not that I’m not altruistic or anything. I donate money to charity every year. But I got online after he left and this wasn’t a charity like the guy at my door told me it was. They just hire rehabilitated juvinile delinquents so people like me willthink they’re helping somebody out. Besides, I think that battered women would be just fine without a copy of Women’s Health magazine in the lobby every month. No matter how you look at it, it just wasn’t a good investment.

Christ. A hundred dollars is a lot of money. I’ll never let a stranger with white lips and crossed eyes into my house from this day forward. Oh, and I think I’ll buy a gun.

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Okay, I don’t know why no one else seems to have noticed this but:

Is it just me, or is Sarah Palin basically just George Bush with a vagina?

Seriously, I’m having flashbacks to the 2000 campaign. All this psuedo-folksy, rural drawl bullshit that falls out of Palin’s mouth is seemingly verbatim dim-wittedness from Bush. Apparently, people like that shit. Or, at least 51% of people, given our last two presidential elections. But, really, can this country take any more Bush/bush?

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i have demured, time and time again, from entering political discussion and worn my “i don’t do politics” button of ignorance for quite awhile.  i get uncomfortable in this arena and more often than not would rather take a nail gun to my eye than act as audience to any wanna-be politico’s over-enthusiasitc, spit-filled rant on just about anything.

sarah palin has changed all of this.

no,   i don’t want to state the obvious about how we need change and how the past 8 years in the white house can euphemistically be called a clusterfuck.  i don’t even want to shout obama’s name from the rooftops or extol the virtues of the democratic party.

i just want to hate sarah palin.  and keep hating sarah palin.  and then hate sarah palin some more.

and it’s so god damn easy.

it’s laughable, really.  SHE’S laughable.  a total joke -as much so as george W- but she takes herself SO SERIOUSLY.  bush knows he’s a dummy – really, i think at this point he’s kind of in on that joke.  but palin, this trifling, ludicrous hockey mom on ‘roids, thinks she can BS her way through serious questions and has NO FUCKING IDEA what she’s talking about.  she’s not humble, she’s not deserving, she’s not educated about the things that comprise the current political landscape outside the state of alaska.

robert schlesinger gets it right about 98 times more eloquently than i do over at the US news & world report.

but therein is a victory.  did you catch that?  did you observe that odd little detail, that, i, me, petunia the adament political abstainer, am reading US news & world report’s website just to feed my cracked-out, pathological disdain and loathing for this horrific, poofy-up-do’ed, bespectacled day-to-night barbie wannabe CUNT?

sarah palin, you make me care.

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I go to drawing class last Tuesday (which is actually an open studio, there is no instruction, so it’s a bit untrue to call it class) and am in the parking lot gathering up my supplies as a car pulls in, parking facing me. The driver gets out of the car, has a package under his arm and walks inside.

While leaving his car running.

I’m listening to the Clipse CD (wow, what a surprise) and watch. I suspect the gentleman will be running in, dropping off his stuff and leaving. But a couple of minutes pass and he doesn’t reappear. I get out and look in the car. the engine is running, the keys are in the car and there is no one else in the vehicle.

I walk inside and set down my art supplies. And think. And then walk out to see if the car is still there. Yup. I tell the receptionist and she walks out with me to see. Still there, still running.

There are several classes going on, so she says she will ask around. I return to class. I ask during a break what the resolution was. I am told:

“I found him, he was in the photography class. I asked if someone left their car running. He said ‘Oh, that’s mine.’ I ask if he would like to cut if off. He said ‘no.’” The receptionist now adds a flourish — a quized, cocked-head look, not unlike that of the dog/His Master’s Voice.

“Well,” she continued, “with the price of gas what is it is and all, I just thought you might want to turn it off.”
“No.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yeah, I’ll only be a minute.” (This is keeping in mind that it has been 10 minutes already at this point.)

The receptionist gave up and left.

Who does this? I can get maybe that the car is difficult to start. Maybe. But c’mon. Running, in the parking lot, with the key in the ignition? Oy, people.

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