beyond the pale

Until 9/12. In honor of the 5th anniversary of 9/11: All who were lost and all who sacrificed.

Please go here for a moving, detailed, ongoing 9/11 Remembrance. Scroll down the page to the beginning; it’s SO worth it.

God help us all.

Check out the progress of Tonia and her family after Week 1 of “30 Days of Nothing.”

Inspiring.

Somehow, I’ve found myself utterly charmed by this new blog I’ve discovered. The author is a displaced Californian who, a dozen years years ago, abandoned her fast-paced life and plopped herself down on a “280-acre, 140-year-old farm in the middle of nowhere.”

Sounds kinda nice to me, somehow.

Check her out. And her daily farm photos. Whenever I visit there, I swear my heart rate slows down. So peaceful; so charming.

It’s a thing we sometimes do. We are on the bed. We are fully clothed. We are stressed or tired or happy or anything ….. and we just start wrassling. I am 5-foot-4 (and a half!). He is 6-foot-3 and a half. Still, we roll and wrassle and we chat, you see. And this will make no sense, mostly, because it’s so entirely random. So why not post it?? Whatevs, peeps …..

Oh, noo. Jeez! You’re freakishly fast. Ooof.

(someone is now sitting on top of someone else)

Remember when you used to love me?

Um, no.

Haha.

Remember when we used to have fun …. long before we ever met each other?

Hahaha.

(wrassling in earnest — some weak-minded cheater occasionally resorts to biting or tickling)

What are you DOING with those freaky monkey feet??

Get offa me with your suffocating hugeness!!

Don’t touch me with those gross Feetos! Seriously! Get away NOW!

(We retire to our corners. Discussion Theme: People are impossible bastards.)

Hey, look, I love you more than all the other impossible bastards in the world.

Oh, nice. So I’m an impossible bastard in this scenario?

But I love you.

Woo. Thanks.

(grab-tussle-block)

I could totally take you. Remember all those times I flipped you?

I remember you grabbed my arm and pulled.

In my mind I flipped you.

Impressive.

Don’t you understand that sometimes I just need to beat you up?

You are history’s worst monster.

I thought it was “history’s worst nightmare.”

NO! We’ve had this discussion. That doesn’t make any sense!

Okay. Sheesh. Calm down, Linus. You are history’s worst nightmare.

(head butts employed)

Later:

Singing a random tune: “My guitar wants to kill your mamaaa ….”

“What is Monkey Tar?”

“Monkey Tar? What’s that??”

“You said ‘Monkey Tar’.”

“No, I said ‘my guitar’.”

“Oh, hmm. I like Monkey Tar better.”

(meadering discussion about “Monkey Tar” and whether one of us is going deaf or stupid)

(Quiz:) Okay. Which of my thumbs has the long scar?

Um, the right one?

No!

Um, the left?

Ha.

Okay. Which of my knees has the scar from when I fell on the stupid carpet and ripped it open when I was 7?

The right.

No, try again.

(someone scurries to hide knees)

THE RIGHT.

NO, try again.

The left?

No. Try again.

It’s the right, you jerk. I knew it.

Are you hungry? I’m hungry.

Me too.

Let’s go.

Yeah, we’re done here.

First, New Girl at Work, gimme a break. Your name is Alexandra. Good name. Fine name. Whatever. Your nickname could be “Alex” or “Lexie,” even “Allie,” I guess. There ARE reasonable choices you could be called. You don’t have to resort to some gimmicky name that degrades you and me and everyone who hears it or dares to even breathe it.

That being said, New Girl at Work, I will NOT be calling you “Aquarius.”

I am now an apron-wearing, coffee-sloshing, milk-stained barista, but I still have my standards. My dignity. My sense of right and wrong. And this is just WRONG. Wrongwrongwrong. WRA-ONNNG.

Just …. oh, seriously. Slap yourself so I don’t have to. How ’bout I call you “Ack” for short? “Ack” is good. Ack. Just … ACK.

Or, really, I’m not going to bother to call you much of anything for this very reason:

Customer to ACK: What are you brewing right now?

ACK: Um …. (looking at labels, then looking at me) …. I don’t ….. uh … how do you say this one?

ME: Um, CO-LUM-BEE-YA.

ACK (pointing): What about this one?

ME: That’s ZIM-BOB-WAY, hon.

Customer to ME: I’ll just take the French Roast.

Two weeks tops, Ack. Buh-bye. SIGH-A-NAR-A.

stacy
warren
valerie
toby
robbie
carlyn
dale
gary
ken
punch girl
dog boy
reyn
james
janet
michelle
tim
dougie
diablo
spook
mrs. p

(See your name here? We might need to talk.)

I know this list isn’t even complete, but it’s been kind of cathartic.

Please … feel free to join in: Name the bullies you’ve known in your life.

Mr. AK-47 ambled into the store on Saturday morning sporting his cool sunglasses and his blatant psychosis. He stood in front of me, grinning. I stood there and stared at him, arranging my mouth into what I’m pretty sure was a very tight, very aloof, straight line. This was his first visit to our fine establishment since his loud reference the other day to automatic weapon usage as the appropriate response to life’s minor disappointments.

He was just grinning so …. irritatingly. He’s so sure that he is charming and “winning” and clever, when really he is a psychotic, annoying ass. And the more he thinks he’s charming, the more ENRAGED I become. Try as I might, I cannot help it. I felt my mouth line tighten.

See, I have ZERO tolerance for asses who actually think they’re charming. If you’re an ass and then ADMIT you’re an ass, that’s almost kind of charming. But if you’re an ass with NO self-awareness of your assiness, then there is no hope for you. I’m sorry. Jesus may love you and that’s what Jesus is for. BUT, Jesus was not the manager on duty right then.

I was.

Too bad for you, dude. Because sometimes, I have problems controlling my tongue, mmkay?

He just KEPT grinning. I found it intolerable, that GRIN. I wasn’t going to speak until he did. I was weighing my options. The most appealing option involved an AK-47.

Finally he said in this cutesy whisper, “I’m not really here, okay?”

“Oh. Okay.” I stood there for a second, then just took him at his word and turned away busying myself with … anything else, frankly. Several seconds ticked by. I turned back. Rats. There he was. My mouth was now so tight, it was starting to hurt.

MEANWHILE, HE WAS STILL GRINNING AND I JUST COULD NOT TAKE IT ANYMORE!!!

So ….

“Do you remember the other day when you came in and we didn’t have your favorite coffee and you made reference to bringing an AK-47 next time you came in?”

There was a customer behind him now. I did not care. He stopped grinning. Didn’t say anything. I was going to make him acknowledge it.

“So, do you remember that?”

“Uh, yeahh.”

“Well, I’m sure you were probably joking and all, but I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask you not to joke about things like that anymore.”

“What?? I was only kidding.”

“Yeah, well, I’m sure you thought you were, but people were a little …. freaked out by it.”

“You’re kidding?”

“No. No, actually, I’m not. You know, it’s kind of like not talking about bombs in an airport. It’s probably not the best idea — these days — to come into a store and talk about using weapons. Some people don’t find that funny.”

“I can’t believe people freaked out about it. Jeez.”

I wanted to kill him. Seriously. I stared solidly into the dark of his sunglasses.

“Well, they did. And — ”

My voice changed and kinda scared me, actually. Because he wasn’t really accepting what I was saying and because he’d started grinning — SO irritatingly! — all over again.

“– I’m asking you as the manager on duty to make sure that doesn’t ever happen again.” Each word of those last four was its own sentence.

Grin gone.

“Um — okay.”

No apology, of course, because he’s charming, remember? Psychosis is always adorable.

He looked over my shoulder at the coffees we were brewing. Before he could spiral down into an all-out hissy, I said, “And we don’t have your coffee right now. I know that’s traumatic for you. What else can we get you?”

I actually said that. Because I was shaking with rage at this guy. Guess who’s gonna get shot first?

“Well,” he whined, “it IS traumatic. I’m in therapy, you know.”

Wow. Ya think??

Thank you SO much for the link about h*t girls k*ssing.

I really hate it when ugly girls k*ss.

Here’s what I learned today:

A donkey is the father of a mule. A mare is the mother of a mule. Mules are sterile.

Well, hee-HAW.