I got a picture message on my Blackberry today. Now for some unbeknownst (I like that word, don’t think I have ever used it) reason, whether it’s simply my technological inadequacy or my phone’s piece of shit-ness…I can’t view picture mail on my phone. So I have to go to the Verizon website to check the message and blah blah blah. Now this was not that big of a deal several months ago, back when having a Blackberry was considered socially “neat”…and since I only get picture mail maybe once every 7 weeks, I don’t have to go through the pains of this process that often. So I go to the website -- which has completely transformed each of the last two times I have used it -- and I am directed to a login landing page where I seemingly have to disclose my phone number, cup size, SSN, AmEx + expiration, date of last period and current Facebook status. Then I am told that a PIN number has been texted to my phone. That’s cool…sounds official…I’m important. So I wait…
When the PIN number finally comes through to my inbox, I can almost hear Verizon getting 10 cents richer. Tricky monkeys. The cryptic message includes details about how to purchase something for $9.99 a month, which I gracefully dodge…and a PIN number. (I just noticed that I have said PIN NUMBER every time I mention the…PIN NUMBER…and I fear that the N in PIN stands for number, so I am being redundant. Sorry.) Anyway, I enter the PIN NUMBER and at this point I have almost completely forgotten that I even have a picture message. At this point, I am just a Verizon puppet. Verizon: 1. Cassy: 0. The next page looks like it was designed by a third grader whose dad’s ex-girlfriend’s brother in law is a web designer who presented on career day (breath) and it says:
Activation success…if your browser doesn’t automatically redirect, click here.
Clearly it doesn’t redirect…why would it? That would be too easy.
So then after all that, I get another text message…on my phone – because clearly parallel universes communicate with one another and aliens not only exist but have cocktails every Friday with Santa Claus -- that says my handset does not support downloadable content. AWESOME assholes.
Had I even possessed enough patience to continue on with this mystery picture hunt, I probably would have ended up on a page with a laughing black skull/crossbones that said: “Sorry loser, your internet connection has gone fishing. We invite you to start over as soon as you get a new credit card number and a bigger cup size.”
So here I am…still wondering what the picture was and who sent it. With my luck, it was a message from God that includes hints to the winning lottery numbers for the next 87 years. No big whoop.
(If you sent me a picture today, can you maybe email me or poke me on Facebook or call my office line that I don’t answer or send a scanned version overnight via FedEx - but not through their website…don’t go there.)
All I am left with is the warming comfort that someone out there, over the rainbow, saw something that they wanted to share with me. Someone who actually has a camera phone…let’s not go there either. Thanks, whoever you are. I am truly touched.
The internet is taking over the world. Exhibit A: BLOGSPOT. These days you can do just about anything online…but first you have to jump through hoops and snort shards of glass. You can cyber-wink at strangers like a creep, you can chat with people in your underwear, you can shop with other people’s money, you can get a pedicure or even pet a tiger…radical stuff, the internet.
Google, for example, gets something like $4 in advertising revenue for every time you enter a search. FOUR DOLLARS. I search on Google like 9,876 times a day. For STUPID shit. Do I get a commission check? No. Makes me want to retire and pursue a career as a professional Googler. Someday, the richest man in the world is going to have that as a title…a Googler…a titty tickler…a wanker. And he will probably have a picture phone.
So, I guess the moral of my story is…don’t do drugs.
And whoever sent the picture, again, thank you.
Thursday, July 16, 2009
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
No, I will NOT do my own laundry...
Last week I discovered Fluff and Fold laundry services. I can see my mom shaking her head in disappointment now. This could turn out to be a major defining moment in my life as it is quite possible (see also: probable) that I will never do my own laundry again. Ever. And don’t kid yourself – it’s not like I have done much of it to date anyway. I’m still psychologically stunned by the fact that I dumped six loads of laundry into the hands of an innocent, unexpecting fluff n’ folder to return two short hours later post-bronzing session at the beach to swipe my overly-used debit card for just over $28 in exchange for several neatly stacked, saran-wrapped piles of my clothing.
Seriously though, you should have seen how it was all folded. It would have taken me 18 hours minimum to fold one t-shirt like that and even then there’d only be a 50/50 chance that I turned it right side out first. I was afraid to break the seal on the plastic wrapping for fear of losing the immaculate shape and organization of it all. Pants all together, t-shirts, shorts, tank tops…all of it bunched in perfect little groups. And clean! I don’t remember the last time I had clean laundry that was folded…or folded laundry that was clean. It did take me a few minutes to find my “delicates” though, which were all modestly hidden in the middle of the tank top pile. The only thing they didn’t do was color-code everything, which is probably best seeing how I have spent a good percentage of my life making fun of my sister for having a color-coded closet. Now that I think about it…I was most likely just jealous that her clothes somehow made their way onto hangers at all. And she would always know if I had "borrowed" something because I had the audacity to return (dirty, duh) black tops to the middle of the white section, undoubtedly making her eyes bleed. Freak. (Just kidding Linds…kinda.)
I’m officially rebelling against the idea of domesticity. I can’t do it. Or won’t. Or don’t want to…or whatever. Please note that I still have not put said laundry away and that, just as expected, the piles erupted immediately upon breaking the seal. My room is like the Natural Museum of Thrifty Shit. It’s a massive collection of strewn crap in its natural state of un-elegance…in my mind, the way it belongs. I wouldn’t be able to find anything if I were organized, I’m sure of it. And I have tried turning over a new leaf, believe you me…I have spent as much money on unused laundry baskets as I have on the empty journals I mentioned in my first post. It’s embarrassing.
I think it’s important to point out that I haven’t had the luxury of laundry machines in my home since college, and even then I managed to turn my living space into a piercing cry for help. I did have a laundry…thing…while playing volleyball in Greece a couple years ago, though I’m not sure I ever knew how to use it correctly. There were like 15 different numbered slots for soap, softener, champagne…things of that sort, and I generally just picked at random which to use. There was a plastic tube connected to the side of the machine that you were supposed to place in the toilet – conveniently located next to the washer – to drain. But my machine, as fate would have it, used to start shaking so violently at times that the tube would displace itself and drain all over the bathroom and hallway…if it drained at all. Sometimes I would have sopping wet clothes hanging outside to dry in the dusty Athenian air for days and despite my admirable intentions using fabric softener (I think), my clothes would…harden…still stained and often come out in totally different colors altogether. There is nothing quite like wearing cardboard spandex. Nothing.
Me and laundry go together like me and cooking…a promised future tale that involves me, wine and very little cooking. As far my darks and whites go, for now I think it best that I take full advantage of my newfound friendly laundry service and save my quarters and sanity for more realistic investments…like gumball machines.
Seriously though, you should have seen how it was all folded. It would have taken me 18 hours minimum to fold one t-shirt like that and even then there’d only be a 50/50 chance that I turned it right side out first. I was afraid to break the seal on the plastic wrapping for fear of losing the immaculate shape and organization of it all. Pants all together, t-shirts, shorts, tank tops…all of it bunched in perfect little groups. And clean! I don’t remember the last time I had clean laundry that was folded…or folded laundry that was clean. It did take me a few minutes to find my “delicates” though, which were all modestly hidden in the middle of the tank top pile. The only thing they didn’t do was color-code everything, which is probably best seeing how I have spent a good percentage of my life making fun of my sister for having a color-coded closet. Now that I think about it…I was most likely just jealous that her clothes somehow made their way onto hangers at all. And she would always know if I had "borrowed" something because I had the audacity to return (dirty, duh) black tops to the middle of the white section, undoubtedly making her eyes bleed. Freak. (Just kidding Linds…kinda.)
I’m officially rebelling against the idea of domesticity. I can’t do it. Or won’t. Or don’t want to…or whatever. Please note that I still have not put said laundry away and that, just as expected, the piles erupted immediately upon breaking the seal. My room is like the Natural Museum of Thrifty Shit. It’s a massive collection of strewn crap in its natural state of un-elegance…in my mind, the way it belongs. I wouldn’t be able to find anything if I were organized, I’m sure of it. And I have tried turning over a new leaf, believe you me…I have spent as much money on unused laundry baskets as I have on the empty journals I mentioned in my first post. It’s embarrassing.
I think it’s important to point out that I haven’t had the luxury of laundry machines in my home since college, and even then I managed to turn my living space into a piercing cry for help. I did have a laundry…thing…while playing volleyball in Greece a couple years ago, though I’m not sure I ever knew how to use it correctly. There were like 15 different numbered slots for soap, softener, champagne…things of that sort, and I generally just picked at random which to use. There was a plastic tube connected to the side of the machine that you were supposed to place in the toilet – conveniently located next to the washer – to drain. But my machine, as fate would have it, used to start shaking so violently at times that the tube would displace itself and drain all over the bathroom and hallway…if it drained at all. Sometimes I would have sopping wet clothes hanging outside to dry in the dusty Athenian air for days and despite my admirable intentions using fabric softener (I think), my clothes would…harden…still stained and often come out in totally different colors altogether. There is nothing quite like wearing cardboard spandex. Nothing.
Me and laundry go together like me and cooking…a promised future tale that involves me, wine and very little cooking. As far my darks and whites go, for now I think it best that I take full advantage of my newfound friendly laundry service and save my quarters and sanity for more realistic investments…like gumball machines.
Friday, June 19, 2009
".............................."
I have always been fascinated with blogs...much like I was once fascinated with journals. Blank pages just waiting to be filled with brilliant, interesting, memorable, funny, sad...stuff. I have a beautiful collection of journals and I was in love with each of them for about five hours before feeling like I had absolutely nothing to say that was worth permanently recording on paper.
After careful selection of which color pen I wanted to use, whether or not I wanted to write in print or cursive or all capital letters like my dad did...I would try to begin writing on the first page of an overwhelmingly empty journal. I would write until I messed up or misspelled a word or became disenchanted with the topic...and I would tear it out.
Page two.
Maybe I'd switch to writing in cursive so it would look prettier, but then realize that my cursive was only pretty in fifth grade when I had a dotted guide down the middle of each line.
Page three.
Then I'd have nothing brilliant left to say and I would set aside my empty masterpiece for a later time.
I'm sad to say I never filled a journal cover to cover...hell, cover to page five. I never made something so untouchable and invaluable that someone generations from now could read and feel like they knew me.
I recently went home to Colorado and spent an entire day looking at pictures and things I wrote in grade school, from short stories and poems to letters or "journals" that were nothing more than recycled notebook paper bound with yarn. Ugly things. Terrible spelling written in crayon or colored pencils with certain places scribbled over. I never kept those...I'm so thankful my mom did. To read what I wrote when writing wasn't about being brilliant or clean or even sensible finally gave me the BALLS to start something I have been wanting to for so long. Luckily with blogs, I have neat "handwriting" and there's always the backspace button...just in case.
Life is beautifully imperfect and should be remembered that way.
So here's to the brilliant, interesting, memorable, funny, sad...stuff that I didn't know how to bring to life with words in ways that were as special as the stories themselves. Here's to imperfection...
After careful selection of which color pen I wanted to use, whether or not I wanted to write in print or cursive or all capital letters like my dad did...I would try to begin writing on the first page of an overwhelmingly empty journal. I would write until I messed up or misspelled a word or became disenchanted with the topic...and I would tear it out.
Page two.
Maybe I'd switch to writing in cursive so it would look prettier, but then realize that my cursive was only pretty in fifth grade when I had a dotted guide down the middle of each line.
Page three.
Then I'd have nothing brilliant left to say and I would set aside my empty masterpiece for a later time.
I'm sad to say I never filled a journal cover to cover...hell, cover to page five. I never made something so untouchable and invaluable that someone generations from now could read and feel like they knew me.
I recently went home to Colorado and spent an entire day looking at pictures and things I wrote in grade school, from short stories and poems to letters or "journals" that were nothing more than recycled notebook paper bound with yarn. Ugly things. Terrible spelling written in crayon or colored pencils with certain places scribbled over. I never kept those...I'm so thankful my mom did. To read what I wrote when writing wasn't about being brilliant or clean or even sensible finally gave me the BALLS to start something I have been wanting to for so long. Luckily with blogs, I have neat "handwriting" and there's always the backspace button...just in case.
Life is beautifully imperfect and should be remembered that way.
So here's to the brilliant, interesting, memorable, funny, sad...stuff that I didn't know how to bring to life with words in ways that were as special as the stories themselves. Here's to imperfection...
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