If you want the whole story, you'll have to buy the book. Once I get around to writing it.
-hopping onto the back of a stranger's motorcycle at night in Athens, Greece, and riding until we found a crepes place
-watching President Barack Obama's inauguration from the National Mall in Washington, DC
-making snow angels in the front yard of the Kenyon College chapel at 1am on the way home from the bar
-belting out all the words to Falco's "Vienna Calling" to the amazement of native Viennese while riding in a car through--you guessed it--Vienna on a Saturday night
-dancing on stage in a packed Bourbon Street, New Orleans jazz club to the entirety of "Baby Got Back"
-earning so many beads on Bourbon Street that I filled up a second suitcase
-collecting more beads than anyone on Mardi Gras in a gay bar in DC, without actually doing anything
-dear God-- so much crap in Vienna
Showing posts with label absurdity. Show all posts
Showing posts with label absurdity. Show all posts
Saturday, December 19, 2009
This is why I'm weird.
1) Whenever I am near a wooded area or body of water, I wonder how many dead bodies there are in there.
2) I have a habit of throwing away fortune cookies without opening them. Nothing superstitious, I just don’t care to see what’s inside. Plus, they taste like sugar-coated cardboard.
3) When I was younger, I dreamed of being a figure skating choreographer. I would make up intricate partner routines using moves I learned about on televised competitions and then make my brother practice them with me on rollerblades in our basement.
4) I have sinus issues and often while eating rice, pineapple, or certain types of pasta, pieces get lodged inside my sinus cavity and I have to blow them out. Gross, and it hurts like a mofo.
5) I experience deep feelings of what I believe to be empathy for inanimate objects. For instance, if I see a wet leaf on the sidewalk that’s all by itself, I feel really sad for it. For one because it’s wet, and also because it doesn’t have any of its leaf friends alongside it.
6) I’ve been in Munich two years during Oktoberfest but have yet to actually go to Oktoberfest.
7) I spent my formative years wanting desperately to be Topanga from Boy Meets World.
2) I have a habit of throwing away fortune cookies without opening them. Nothing superstitious, I just don’t care to see what’s inside. Plus, they taste like sugar-coated cardboard.
3) When I was younger, I dreamed of being a figure skating choreographer. I would make up intricate partner routines using moves I learned about on televised competitions and then make my brother practice them with me on rollerblades in our basement.
4) I have sinus issues and often while eating rice, pineapple, or certain types of pasta, pieces get lodged inside my sinus cavity and I have to blow them out. Gross, and it hurts like a mofo.
5) I experience deep feelings of what I believe to be empathy for inanimate objects. For instance, if I see a wet leaf on the sidewalk that’s all by itself, I feel really sad for it. For one because it’s wet, and also because it doesn’t have any of its leaf friends alongside it.
6) I’ve been in Munich two years during Oktoberfest but have yet to actually go to Oktoberfest.
7) I spent my formative years wanting desperately to be Topanga from Boy Meets World.
Top However-Many-I-Come-Up-With: Worst Places to Propose
1) a funeral
2) from the bed of the person you just got caught cheating with
3) the free clinic after your tests came back positive
4) anywhere within 20 feet of a port-a-potty, or the stench of one
5) the morgue
6) at an AshleeSimpson/HilaryDuff/RyanCabrera concert. because seriously, why would you ever go to any of those?
7) on Twitter
8) inside Planned Parenthood
9) on a Bachelor/Bachelorette reunion episode
10) inside the chalk outline of a murder scene
11) at an exorcism
12) at a speed-dating event
2) from the bed of the person you just got caught cheating with
3) the free clinic after your tests came back positive
4) anywhere within 20 feet of a port-a-potty, or the stench of one
5) the morgue
6) at an AshleeSimpson/HilaryDuff/RyanCabrera concert. because seriously, why would you ever go to any of those?
7) on Twitter
8) inside Planned Parenthood
9) on a Bachelor/Bachelorette reunion episode
10) inside the chalk outline of a murder scene
11) at an exorcism
12) at a speed-dating event
Tuesday, June 16, 2009
Why stop there? Why not get a boat? Oh wait...
Today I'm going to introduce a character who will no doubt make multiple appearances on this page, because, what's a good blog without a crazy mother figure? My mother tries...and she does have her moments of being nurturing and, well, motherly. However, her moments of absurd, wtf-did-you-really-just-do-that behavior seem to outnumber them. Sometimes vastly.
So my parents got divorced two and a half years ago. Conveniently for my mom, she quickly married the guy she cheated on my dad with (and had been living with since...well since before they even split, unbeknownst to anyone else). A ready-made new life to fall into, with none of the hassle of pesky transitions--what better? Beyond just the physical logistics of it all (a new car to drive!, the new guy's double military and police force pensions!, a nice house just five minutes down the road from work!), my mother inherited a whole lifestyle, complete with new interests, beliefs, and activities just waiting for her to absorb as her own.
I won't detail it all here. I prefer to spread out the crazy a bit, dropping it when least expected. I will say, though, that my mother immediately snapped into a different version of herself and adopted all the likes, dislikes, and hobbies of her new dude. For about a year there were flying lessons and ever-increasing mentions of becoming a licensed pilot and buying a plane (a photo of a private turbo prop even landed a spot as the computer desktop in their "library" for several months). Then, out of thin air, all of this ended. During this fascination and after, there was much talk of a variety of new ventures: scuba-diving certification, renting an apartment and backpacking through Spain, sailing lessons, buying a boat, mountain climbing expeditions, adopting two purebred yorkie poo puppies--and the list goes on, but again, I'd like to reserve some of the mania.
The last time I was in Ohio visiting family, we were sitting down at the dinner table and Tony (my mom's dude) got to asking me about what my plans for the near future were--if I would settle down, where I might settle down, etc. I stressed the necessity of living in a city with excellent public transportation, as I do not have a car. He said--quite to my surprise, but not really because I find him making random, grandiose offers like this rather often (undoubtedly a contributing factor to his and my mom's ever-changing large-scale plans)--that they were getting a second Honda soon and that when they had it, I could have my mother's Buick. Not only that; he was absolutely insistent on it. Having seen his words go unrealized too many times, I knew not to count on a car, but at the very least, I thought there was a chance I would see a few bucks come my way in a couple of months.
Months did indeed pass, and I was moving into a new place (the fifth in ten months, yay subletting). With moving of course comes scrounging up first month's rent and an equivalent security deposit. Having just started a job and waiting for my first paycheck, I delicately asked my mother if there was any possible way I could borrow $100-$150 to help cover some of the expense, promising to pay it back in ten days when I got paid. Her response? "I really wish I could help you, but I can't swing it." Well, it was worth a shot.
Except I didn't believe she honestly couldn't help out. Afterall, I heard almost non-stop about the purchases of new clothes, nail appointments, trips to nice, out-of-town restaurants, deck painting, countless new landscaping elements, and more of the usual ridiculousness. I asked a couple more times over the next week. No can do was the response.
Finally, crunch time came and I tried my luck once more, this time begging. She told me she would ask for permission from Tony and see what could be done. He had no problem with it and even told me not to pay the money back. Not unusual behavior for him.
A few days later my mother and I talked on the phone and I could tell he was in the room. Her voice takes on a saccharine sweetness when he's nearby and I told her, "You sound different--you sound younger." A weird phenomenon, I think. Yet another indication of the fantasy world quality of that whole situation.
I asked what she'd been up to. She mentioned something about making the final payment on the new Honda. I was unaware that they had already bought a new car, but I figured it was the one they had discussed months earlier. And again, a car. So I asked, "Oh, what did you get?" Her answer: the newest SUV on the market. Knowing that Tony is a retiree who spends most of his time reading and napping at home--and given the fact that my mother works at the library a mere five minutes down the street--I questioned, "What do you need an SUV for?"
Her answer was, of course, perfectly logical. "We needed something to put the kayaks in."
So my parents got divorced two and a half years ago. Conveniently for my mom, she quickly married the guy she cheated on my dad with (and had been living with since...well since before they even split, unbeknownst to anyone else). A ready-made new life to fall into, with none of the hassle of pesky transitions--what better? Beyond just the physical logistics of it all (a new car to drive!, the new guy's double military and police force pensions!, a nice house just five minutes down the road from work!), my mother inherited a whole lifestyle, complete with new interests, beliefs, and activities just waiting for her to absorb as her own.
I won't detail it all here. I prefer to spread out the crazy a bit, dropping it when least expected. I will say, though, that my mother immediately snapped into a different version of herself and adopted all the likes, dislikes, and hobbies of her new dude. For about a year there were flying lessons and ever-increasing mentions of becoming a licensed pilot and buying a plane (a photo of a private turbo prop even landed a spot as the computer desktop in their "library" for several months). Then, out of thin air, all of this ended. During this fascination and after, there was much talk of a variety of new ventures: scuba-diving certification, renting an apartment and backpacking through Spain, sailing lessons, buying a boat, mountain climbing expeditions, adopting two purebred yorkie poo puppies--and the list goes on, but again, I'd like to reserve some of the mania.
The last time I was in Ohio visiting family, we were sitting down at the dinner table and Tony (my mom's dude) got to asking me about what my plans for the near future were--if I would settle down, where I might settle down, etc. I stressed the necessity of living in a city with excellent public transportation, as I do not have a car. He said--quite to my surprise, but not really because I find him making random, grandiose offers like this rather often (undoubtedly a contributing factor to his and my mom's ever-changing large-scale plans)--that they were getting a second Honda soon and that when they had it, I could have my mother's Buick. Not only that; he was absolutely insistent on it. Having seen his words go unrealized too many times, I knew not to count on a car, but at the very least, I thought there was a chance I would see a few bucks come my way in a couple of months.
Months did indeed pass, and I was moving into a new place (the fifth in ten months, yay subletting). With moving of course comes scrounging up first month's rent and an equivalent security deposit. Having just started a job and waiting for my first paycheck, I delicately asked my mother if there was any possible way I could borrow $100-$150 to help cover some of the expense, promising to pay it back in ten days when I got paid. Her response? "I really wish I could help you, but I can't swing it." Well, it was worth a shot.
Except I didn't believe she honestly couldn't help out. Afterall, I heard almost non-stop about the purchases of new clothes, nail appointments, trips to nice, out-of-town restaurants, deck painting, countless new landscaping elements, and more of the usual ridiculousness. I asked a couple more times over the next week. No can do was the response.
Finally, crunch time came and I tried my luck once more, this time begging. She told me she would ask for permission from Tony and see what could be done. He had no problem with it and even told me not to pay the money back. Not unusual behavior for him.
A few days later my mother and I talked on the phone and I could tell he was in the room. Her voice takes on a saccharine sweetness when he's nearby and I told her, "You sound different--you sound younger." A weird phenomenon, I think. Yet another indication of the fantasy world quality of that whole situation.
I asked what she'd been up to. She mentioned something about making the final payment on the new Honda. I was unaware that they had already bought a new car, but I figured it was the one they had discussed months earlier. And again, a car. So I asked, "Oh, what did you get?" Her answer: the newest SUV on the market. Knowing that Tony is a retiree who spends most of his time reading and napping at home--and given the fact that my mother works at the library a mere five minutes down the street--I questioned, "What do you need an SUV for?"
Her answer was, of course, perfectly logical. "We needed something to put the kayaks in."
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