Viva la Irritation

I am having an awful day. Couple of days. Week really. But this afternoon was the fall that broke the old person's hip.

Screw you Florida. It's too hot. It's humid. The traffic lights are too long and old people drive slow. Apparently old people in Florida are extra rude too. They're a paradox of pushy and slow at the same time.

I was viciously attacked by a tiny lizard and then laughed at by a homeless man. Yeah, heeheehee all the way...oh right. Sorry dude. Keep laughing.

The front desk clerk has asked for my phone number twice. I'm unavailable. Oh, so can I get your number? Yes, since last night everything changed and I want to stay forever with you in this airport Hyatt. Or...no.

It took the guy at Publix 15 minutes to make a sandwich. An old lady spilled cranberry sauce on me and then blamed me for "surprising her like that" with my just standing there behind her. It's a line. That's how it works.

Now, I smell like Thanksgiving.

The cashier asked me if Tibet was a country and if I was from it. Better settle in buddy, you'll be working here forever. And yes, I am. Tell your friends.

But the kicker ladies and gentlemen is that the Latin Chamber of Commerce is having a fiesta at my hotel. It sounds like the Mexican restaurant version of a W Hotel down there. I now have a serious craving for nachos. And quiet.

I tried turning my TV up but my front desk boyfriend called and said my neighbor complained. Really?? There's a fucking Mexican revolution going on outside our window but my TV is bothering you?? Maybe my neighbor is stupid and thinks I'm watching Univision at a ridiculous volume.

I cannot wait to go home. In fact, if it wasn't nearly $200 in change fees, I'd be on my way back now.

A Poem

I didn't right a fucking poem.

Face-Mauling Monster Seeks Forever Home

Capone is a 2 year old pit bull, no shots, blood thirsty and probably rabid. He is a very energetic boy with the cutest, almost demonic, tendencies.  He loves walks almost as much as mysteriously escaping his pen and chewing the chubby cheeks off of the neighbors' children. You don't have to worry about innocent bystanders, innocently strolling by your house - Capone will fucking murder them. Sure to win your heart by barking constantly, digging and chewing old tires. Not even a hefty choke chain can stop this little lock jaw. Capone is also housebroken, crate trained, on parole and also RAP sheet registered.

Sorry everyone, some stereotypes are just true. Black people tip poorly. White women are needlessly stuck up, Asian people are smart, old people are useless, children are loud and frequently illegitimate. Lesbians wear plaid. The sky is blue and pit bulls are dangerous.

If you want to own a pit bull you should be subject to the same so-many-feet-from restrictions as sex offenders. In fact - the exact same. That way pit bulls can maul sex offenders and children will be safe, unmolested and remain whatever the opposite of disfigured and traumatized is. Oh right - normal.

Pit bulls should be shot. Not like Old Yeller/To Kill A Mockingbird (but actually only kill a dog) shot. They should be shot from a 1986 Caprice Classic in a drive by with a tommy gun. His name is Capone after all...

No, that isn't historically accurate but Al Capone wasn't a dog either so you and your exact facts can suck it. Suck it through that feeding tube you're now forced to use since the neighbor's pit bull went for the jugular. He has rights and extensive knowledge of human anotomy.

What if we substituted "pit bull" with "child molester" or "rapist" every time you talk about how the breed has been vilified by the actions of a few. And then go fuck yourselves because it is, after all, just a dog. Stop having meetings about how I need to uphold your dog's right to disfigure my child. Let it eat you. 

Please Indicate Gender

Today was hideously uneventful. By noon, I'd given up on anything noteworthy happening in the office and resigned to having a boring Monday. Thankfully, I can always count on Atlanta traffic for spice.

So I'm making that right onto Lenox from Phipps Drive to get onto 400. You know the light that controls the intersection of like 8 roads, including the mall parking garage but it's timed horribly and makes traffic worse. So I'm sitting there, waiting to make my right turn, watching the lady in front of me dump a handful of pretzels out of her window and wondering why anyone has a handful of pretzels in the first place. The light turns green, we all begin to more forward when completely out of no where a car comes flying up, trying to get in front of me.

I really didn't see this car coming at all. I blame how fast it was obviously going and the pretzels. Anyway, I have to slam on my breaks. Slam like make your purse fly out of the seat onto the floor slam. Or slam like whatever guys keep on their passenger seat (porn? baseball cards?) slam. Lip gloss will be rolling out from under my seat for weeks.

WHAT THE FUCK LADY?!?!?


It was one of those moments where you're not really talking loudly but it comes out all loud. I was not shouting at the lady. But at the moment I said it, the entire intersection got really quiet and with my windows down and her in a convertible, I was easily heard.

Except, dude just looks like a lady...

HAHAHA! Yeah, it made me laugh. Out loud. Also easily heard thanks to the sudden universal silence. Maybe it was the periwinkle convertible. Or the bouncy, full-bodied curly locks; albeit shortly cropped. Whatever it was, that dude heard me call him "Lady" and then laugh about it.

Worse, I then said, "Oh, I mean 'What the fuck sir.' Sorry."


And then proceed to laugh all over again at how insulting the whole thing was for him and that I corrected my insult to be gender specific. Poor guy. Trying to be flashy in his purply car with his goldilocks and cut me off all manly-like. Even his angry scowl didn't stop me from laughing all the way through the toll.

While You Were Out

First of all, if this person habitually calls you every single flipping day, 5 minutes before lunch ends, perhaps you can stop acting surprised that they just called you by exclaiming "DID YOU JUST CALL ME!?!?" Of course they just called you. They always have just called you. Every single day. All of them. Same time. Same shock and awe from you.

Perhaps you could also take your cell phone and its God-awful ringtone with you to lunch so you can scream your conversation at this person elsewhere. Or remind them that lunch ends at 12:45. Or sneak into their house and set all of their clocks 5 minutes later. Or stop yelling. I vote that.

Whoever that person is, they cannot hear. Perhaps it's because you've been screaming at them over the phone and they've suffered hearing loss. Or perhaps they are actually deaf and you just can't accept it. Silence is deafening. Cope.

PLEASE STOP YELLING AT THEM! Great, apparently yelling is contagious.

Why do you insist on talking to them everyday if they make you so angry? On top of yelling because they can't hear, you're yelling at them in frustration about how they can't hear. It's a circular reference wrapped up into a vicious cycle. And then they're obviously very annoying because after you're once again over the initial surprise that they have made their scheduled call to you, you moved right into fussing at them for doing something you don't like.

"NOW WHY WOULD YOU GO AND DO A THING LIKE THAT?!??!?"

This person is always doing things like that apparently. They go and do it every day. Then they call to tell you about it 5 minutes before you get back from lunch. And somehow you are continuously surprised that they 1) called and 2) did that thing or something like it.

Let's put the call on speaker so I can yell at both of you about how it's not polite to yell.

The Humblest of Sundays

Lillian wakes me up at 6:00 am on Sunday morning with, "Mommy...are you sleeping? Wake up Mommy. Are you sleeping?"

I was sleeping. In fact, I think I was actually comatose. Unresponsive. Dead to the world, save several little finger pokes to the cheek.

Why is Lillian up at 6 am on a Sunday morning? This kid can sleep until almost 9! Yet here she is all bright-eyed, bushy tailed and in my face! Let the dammits begin...

Dammit -  is when I sit up and realize that I may still be drunk from Saturday night. Maybe I shouldn't have driven home...

"Mommy, can we go to church? I love church. I want to go to church."

Dammit! Good one God...good one. I really didn't see that one coming. We aren't church regulars. And certainly not the morning after a night out drinking. Save that for devote Catholics.

BUT WHAT THE HECK AM I SUPPOSED TO SAY?

Sorry honey, Mommy is too hungover to take you to church.

That's a low feeling. I'm not proud. Then or now. I share because we're all falliable as parents. I don't need your condemnation, I'm full up on my own; making more daily. Mommy pressure is only understood by other mommies but they'll never admit to it. They'll sit around drinking wine from their coffee thermos on Monday morning's playdate and say things like, "Didn't you hear? She was too hungover to take her daughter to church. That poor child."

I wasn't planning on going to church anyway. Take that drunken stay-at-home mommies! Sit in your plastic playground kingdom of judgement. Make sure your Toyota Sienna maintains its lane before you start casting judgement into mine.

And yet...those imaginary bitches are right...dammit.

Dammit - I just remembered I have a research paper to write. Why did I think Intro to Criminal Justice would be a good class to take? Oh irony of all damn ironies - it's about crime in your community. What's the biggest problem your local law enforcement is facing today? Haha, me apparently. Sad comedy. Sad, sad comedy.

Dammit - I hit my own bike with my car! Apparently I really shouldn't have been driving.

Oh and look dammit! A bird is stuck in the gooey bug trap the exterminator put in the garage. And yes dammit, it's still alive!

Wow God, you really are omnipotent. This truely is an all-powerful bunch of bullshit right here. Touche.

So I'm feeling like a horrible parent, an irresponsible motorist, an avian torturer and a bad student by 9:00 Sunday morning.

I'm going to have to give a big thank you to John for 1) taking Lillian to church, 2) whatever he did with the bird and 3) not once calling me out on it. And of course, dammit - John is a bigger person.

Dammit - I'm too dizzy to read crime stats on the internet. Dammit - no I didn't remember it like that but now, thanks, I do. Dammit - bread makes me feel better but now I feel fat instead of nauseous. Dammit - the Braves game was awful. And finally, dammit - Amazing Race was delayed.

It didn't end there because dammit - I overslept Monday morning.

Blue Ridge Scenic Parkway of Awesomeness

My trip to Kingsport, TN was fantastic. Seriously fantastic, not sarcastic fantastic. I was dreading it even before I didn't get the news I wanted from the doctor and found out my company car smells like poop. So I was pleasantly surprised at each and every bit of awesomeness that happened along the way. Thanks Universe. Apparently the secret to The Secret is that you don't have to read or care about the book for good things to happen.

So the car smells like poop. I'll just roll the windows down until I get to North Georgia and the outside smells like poop. Chicken houses smell worse than anything else. End of story. I alternate between open windows, closed windows and considering buying air freshener for a car that isn't mine.

My first stop...is at a BP just before entering the Tallulah State Park. In the bathroom there is a sign that says, "Please just throw your toilet paper into the trash can." Ummm...well, that's gross. And it was gross. That bathroom smelled like poop. Just like outside. Just like my car.

I'll just stop at the next place to pee.

The second stop...was in Raburn. I turn into the gas station and ALMOST HIT A DONKEY. Yes, a real donkey. He was little, and brown and donkey-ish. Wearing a little saddle. Hmmm...well, that's weird since, you know - donkeys don't take gas. Where is his owner? I don't see any monkeys wearing vests and little hats. Seriously, why is there a donkey at the gas station?? And he's blocking the driveway. I honk. He's a donkey though, so he doesn't move. Stupid donkey. I have to back up and find somewhere else.

Thankfully there's finally a rest stop. So inside I go and run into a woman wearing a bathrobe. Like a moomoo? No, no - a bathrobe. A cream colored, velour bathrobe. That's not ok. I don't know how short of a distance you need to be traveling in order to say a bathrobe is appropriate to wear but I'm fairly sure it doesn't include a rest stop. And like any person wearing a bathrobe at a rest stop, she is unhappy and unfortunate looking.

I passed the Confederate Fever store. They're having a sale on racism.

As I'm driving to Waynesville I realize that I'm close to where I lived when I was little, before my parents divorced. I decided instead of wondering if I could find it, I would just try and actually find it. Who doesn't remember where they lived when they were 3 even though they hadn't been back in 20+ years?

Thankfully there's only like 8 building in Cruso, NC and 7 of them haven't changed a bit. The 8th; however, did change and unfortunately that was the one I lived in. The proximity to the river was familiar but someone put a McMansion on it. That was a little sad but I still managed to get my mom a picture of her favorite place so no worries.

From there I get lost and end up on the scenic route (scenic means long and awful). And there are no gas stations so I'm cursing a donkey whilst driving in the Appalachian Foothills. I'm supposed to get off at exit 4. I pass exit 9...then exit 3...well, crap. Turn around; drive back and...3 and then 9. This is the donkey's fault too. Turn back around. Past 9. up the side of the mountain; listening to the company car struggle up a 7% grade.  Past 3...screw it. Let's go for 2.

Turns out I was right. After 2, then 1 the numbers start all over again at 58. 3895 feet later (or lower), I finally get to exit 4. It's the Bermuda Triangle or Erwin, NC.

So Kingsport, TN smells like a crappy casino but thankfully not like poop. The hotel lists Wendy's and a liquor store as "Local Dining." Yum but I'll drive a little farther for something better. 10 miles later and all I find - an Applebee's. Whatever. I'll take it. There's nothing in this town but a giant chemical plant on the river. Good thing I have that association after I drink tap water. Gross.

The only thing that could possibly be cooler than a drive from GA to TN is a drive from TN to KY. I'll let you know...