elastic waste band

I sing the praises of the elastic waste band:

• beer expansion
• miniature cheeseburger expansion
• miniature Moon Pie expansion
• Zubaz pants... expansion in all quarters. hells yes.
• Sweatpants! Thank you no, I haven't given up on life, KFR.

one visit, one almost visit

Guest #2 arrives shortly. My abode is turning into a veritable hotel... or veritable Bed & Breakfast... or veritable Hostel... or I suppose the repeated use of "veritable" might diminish the meaning just a tad... but hey, who's counting? Incidentally, this also may be a veritable post of ellipses.... Err, I apologize.

The one visit: Trust in Steel will be here this evening, one stopping point on his move into the depths of hell better known as the L to the A. There are some visits, some food, and some billiards on the agenda.

The one almost visit: Ms. Naturally is once again on US soil. I believe much of her 24 hours in country were spent on sleeping, an appropriate and highly understandable response. This response, however, had an unfortunate side effect; she slept through our lunch. No problem, she'll be back down soon enough and I can entertain myself (read: eavesdrop on other customers of the eating establishment).

Enjoy the rest of your week.

Over and out.

market of the farmers

Bee.

Carrots.


Mushrooms.

in numbers: 7 days

• 1 moderately awkward dinner= 3 normal people + 1 talker = 3.5 hours/2 gin & tonics
• 850 miles in 19 hours of driving... averaging the staggering speed of 45 mph due to traffic and driving conditions, but well worth it. Woohoo!
• 2 states
• 3 (wee) snakes
  
• 2 tamales
  
• 5 beautiful people
• 1 missed funeral. bad.
• 1 Easy Cheese Tower contest (picture at right)
  
• 1 cuban cigar... more like a half, or 1/3
  
• 22 hours worked in two days. Double Woohoo!
• 1 trip to a government office = 2 new plates = 1 hour
• omnipresent threat of bears... for some anyway, and particularly at night. Gasp!... yes, I'm including omnipresent as a number and I don't care what anyone says... I've worked way too many hours this week to care one hoot.
  

treadmill, a random rant

Treadmills. They're devilish machines; a special kind of torture, methinks. When in the home, they're hidden away in rooms people don't use or covered with dirty clothes while in gyms they're lined up, displayed for all the world to see like a student of torture proudly displaying his tools of the trade. Yeah. Mostly I just find them inane and boring. If I ever had one in my home it would be in a room filled with boxes and TV from 1972. At gyms I rarely, if ever, use them. Run outside. Even better, run to the gym rather than drive your car. This is all a very long-winded way of saying I ran on a treadmill yesterday for the first time in years. I think the only reason I got on was due solely to the fact that a considerable amount of time had passed since my last go. Ugh. Are you kidding me? Running in place and getting nowhere? At least make it entertaining... I'm thinking something akin to the running wheel in a hamster's cage.

There is, I must admit, one entertaining side effect to running in place and getting nowhere. After a certain point of spinning your wheels, your workout done, you disembark. When you walk away from the machine is when the fun starts... not because you're no longer running, but because you feel like you're walking at warp speed. You might as well be standing on the deck of the Enterprise. Twenty minutes of running and not moving makes the motion (at least the view) of walking appear ridiculously fast. Try it sometime, then wait a few years and try it again. I promise you'll find it as entertaining as I did.

In other news, Lauren flies in tomorrow! C. and I shall retrieve her from the big city for the weekend. Huzzah! Now, I'm not psychic, but I see Easy Cheese in the future. Additionally, my old pal from the Cave (serendipitously, we had the same start day as Faces of the Basement) has got herself a shiny new blog -cough- never mind that 4 post drivel from a year ago -cough- . Give Teddy Jean a read.

From the Archives: Police Blotter

Cleaning out the guest room in preparation for our very own Hebrew National consuming, history studying, endlessly analyzing fly-by-night camper Smurf This, I found another example of the wonders of Ellensburg's police blotter. This one is about 5 years old:

• Patio furniture was taken from a 14th Avenue location.
• A car was reported stolen from a Cle Elum car lot.
• A Nelson Siding Road woman reported that she need two deputies because she believed her husband has been trying to kill her over the past 14 years with lasers he had installed in the walls of the residence.
• A vehicle versus bicycle accident was reported on Third Avenue.
• A Reecer Creek Road resident reported hearing sirens, then saw what look like a ball of fire fall from an airplane.
• A motorcycle versus tree accident was reported on Bullfrog Road.
• A man was laying face down in the center of Berry Road.

The choice of favorite is a difficult one. Lasers, balls of fire, trees getting into accidents.... Madness!

Today Was A Good Day

Out on a walk this afternoon I saw one of the Goodyear blimps. All I could think of was Ice Cube...

Small note on rappers, not that I listen to that much rap or have anything to say worth hearing: I miss the female rappers of the 90s. Salt n' Peppa, Queen Latifa, TLC.

Your assignment, should you choose...

... to accept it, is to write your own "welcome to the company" email. Errr, write my own welcome email that details my many workplace achievements as well as past employers that serve to mark me as qualified or worthy? Welcome. Email.

It will be short.

This is all a way of saying that I was finally converted to a full-time employee, no more of this contractor-no-vacation-or-sick-days riff-raff. So, Huzzah! This has been in the works for almost a month or so and since I technically start my new position on Monday I thought I could now write about it. Didn't want to, you know, jinx it and stuff... *twisting toe back and forth on ground*

Among the firsts in this process was the salary negotiation. That was interesting. The HR person really gave me the hard sell, detailing my many inadequacies. This was all, of course, an attempt on their part to get me to accept the low first offer. Little did they know that I prepared for such tactics by having people heap ridiculous amounts of praise on me while simultaneously figuring out my mental negotiating outfit: dark pin-stripe suit complimented by some worn in and well used cowboy boots.... there may have been a broom handle stuffed up the back of the suit as well. Of course, I don't own a dark pin-stripe suit and I didn't walk around with a broom handle stuffed up the back of my shirt. No matter. These little mental images and ego boosters from friends did the trick. I performed beautifully, parrying every snide comment on my lack of experience or location with a skill that both surprised and delighted me. Somehow I don't think they want achievements such as this detailed in the Welcome Email.

ps. I'm now open to suggestions for my task. I was thinking of something along the lines of, "_______, a Sagittarius with strong undercurrents of Scorpio, loves food and travel... particularly when the two are combined." As you can now plainly see, I got nuttin'.