Category: Humor

Humor, Shabby Apple, Shopping

Dream. Vacation.

“When abroad in hot climates she wore a great many white dresses, said very little, and all the men in the hotel fell in love with her.”
– Stella Gibbons, Cold Comfort Farm

Naturally, just after I wrote a post yesterday praising Spring, we were graced with a snow flurry/rainstorm.  And even more naturally it had all cleared off by 5pm and I walked to my car beneath blue skies and a crisp breeze.  Living in the West subjects one to the most schizophrenic weather…

But snow flurry or no, I’m  still doing my best to force the issue of Spring.  Yesterday I wore a tangerine cardigan in defiance, and I came very close to actually working out for the first time in weeks – didn’t quite make it, but I will!  No, honestly!  Stop rolling your eyes.

In the meantime, I’m indulging my shopping bug by sticking to internet browsing and wishlisting – my birthday’s in two and a half months after all.  Especially Shabby Apple’s new line “Roamin’ Holiday.”  Shall we look at some pretty?

I wish I had (respectively) the figure and the aplomb/height to pull these beauties off!  For some reason vivid greens like the top of the Gondola dress are calling to me these days (and paired with stripes!), and everyone needs the opportunity to wear a red Gypsy-esque dress like the Rosso at least once in their lives.

I am actually longing for someone to get married, pick me to be a bridesmaid and obligingly order me to wear this cream and coco appliqued Spanish Steps dress.  And I’m belying my winter-imposed hatred of neutrals by admitting to being very fond of this cream jersey SPQR frock.

Isn’t this white Palatine Hill dress perfect for summer in the office?  Growing up I remember getting a new Easter dress and hat to wear to church every Easter Sunday, and I’m thinking about resurrecting (pun?  Or too sacrilegious?) the tradition in my old age, and this purples La Vita E’ Bella pretty might just suit the bill!

Honestly, the whole line is making me want to go on vacation.  I’m getting stir crazy in this office!  If I could, I’d snatch up that daring red Rosso frock, grab J. and gallop off to the Cinque Terre region of Italy to lay in the sun, eat good food, and go sailing to all the terra cotta colored villages tucked into the coast.

How about you, ducklings?  You suddenly inherit a small fortune with the proviso that you go on holiday at once, where do you go?

Fashion, Humor, Shopping, Weekend

March. Hare.

“Spring is nature’s way of saying, ‘Let’s party!'”
~Robin Williams

After months of self-imposed austerity, the fashion gods decided to toss temptation my way…and I threw up my hands in defeat.

In my defense, it wasn’t a fair fight!  J. Crew sent me one of their promo cards for 20% off and Gap Inc. did their 30%-off-and-5%-goes-to-charity sale, so what was I to do?  J. needed new jeans and khaki trousers, and I needed a couple of summer work shirts.  So Saturday I headed into the City and indulged before returning home and atoning by doing massive piles of laundry and watching the NCAA tournament.

Of course, this faint whiff has revved my appetite and I can’t help noticing that cute new clothes are popping up like daisies.  And to make it worse, the weather has started feeling like Spring too – prompting the desire for vivid skirts, glaring cardigans, and cute sandals.

Calm down, C.! You know your winter-fogged brain can't handle this overload!

Spring always makes me go a little crazy, and not just with clothes.  I want to rip anything I own in black, navy, or gray to shreds because I’m sick of neutral and sensible.  I want to eat tons of vegetables and fruit in chilled pastas and smoothies and never see a pot roast again.  Hearing birds after months of silence makes me giddy (starlings and sparrows roost in our building’s roof, J. hates waking up to them, but I love it).  Seeing the grass slowly, teasingly turn green thrills me.  And, freak that I am, Daylight Savings Time makes me happy.  I’m no longer driving home in the dark – which makes me want to curl up on the couch under a blanket, snack on junk food, and refuse to make dinner.  Instead I get home with at least an hour of light, which makes laundry feel doable as opposed to a drudgery.

Autumn is still my favorite season, but Spring always wakes me up and I love it when it comes.

Humor

Bracketology

“There are really only two plays:  Romeo and Juliet, and put the darn ball in the basket.”
~Abe Lemons

Remember the tale my  conversion to American football?  Well, much to J.’s annoyance, this love never really spread to basketball – and while he likes football just fine, the boy loves basketball.  It’s his mistress.  This is an accepted facet of our relationship and we got on just fine, the three of us.  But come March, good grief!

This year J. made me fill out a bracket, largely against my will, and was pretty amused by my picks.  And granted, the science behind it wasn’t very sound.  If I’d never heard of the school before, it lost.  If I knew of both the schools, it came down to which mascot would win in a fight.  A couple of times I closed my eyes and pointed.

No one s more surprised than me that every one of my picks hasn’t failed mightily.  Want to share your wisdom or picks with the group?

Health, Humor

This is Your C. on Drugs

“Like everybody else, when I don’t know what else to do, I seem to go in for catching colds.”
~ George Jean Nathan

Kittens!  I am so sick of being sick!  In desperation I went to the doctor yesterday (which since I’m normally a pretty healthy person, is highly unusual) and in order to calm my swollen throat I was prescribed antihistamines.

The trouble is, antihistamines have a very peculiar effect on me.  About half an hour after taking them I turn into a hyperactive cross between a more than usually destructive two year old and a terrier.  Everything is funny and the only way to live is running around in circles until you drop from exhaustion.  It’s the pharmaceutical equivalent of watching Monty Python and the Holy Grail at two in the morning.  After this high comes the crash and I drop into a comatose state from which not even the zombie apocalypse could wake me.

Even after I do manage to wake up (a dozen or so hours later), the lingering traces of chemicals in my blood stream mean that throughout the next day I will get waves of intense tiredness.  Quite suddenly my head will drop or my vision will blur and I feel like I just need to lie down for a few hours.

Unfortunately this last bit is where I am now and it’s making work more difficult.  I’ve already scattered a package of dried oatmeal all over the floor and caught my fingers in my keyboard and it’s not even 11am.  I’m afraid I’ll do myself an injury long before 5pm.

Humor, Money, School

Top Score

“Creditor. One of a tribe of savages dwelling beyond the Financial Straits and dreaded for their desolating incursions.”
– Ambrose Bierce

As J. and I contemplate and plot for grad school, by far the biggest question we have is, “How in Pluto’s dark depths are we going to pay for this?!”  The response is, of course, financial aid and debt.  Out of curiosity and as a way to start looking into loans, we decided to get our credit scores.

Both are excellent…but mine is four points higher!

C. – 1
J. – 0

Friends, Humor, Weekend

Another One? But We Just Revolted 50 Years Ago!

“No, I won’t do it!  I’m revolting!’
“…I know what you’re trying to say, but you should know that’s not how it’s coming out.”
– Georgie and C.

Once a month J. and I get together with Angel and Hotty.  Hotty and J. are both from the City and were in Korea together at about the same time, although their paths didn’t really cross until they married Angel and I (respectively), but now we’re the coolest foursome of Couple Friends you ever did see.  We watch movies, treat each other to our favorite restaurants, and generally pal around.  Every once in a while one of us scores a deal and we all get to partake.

Last Friday, for instance when Angel got four tickets to the musical A Tale of Two Cities.  A night out at the theatre, good company, but no I wasn’t entirely transported.

Let's face it. It's hard to make this sort of thing enjoyable.

Why?  Because while I was sick with the plague I watched Les Miserables in concert for its 25th anniversary, and had just listed to the soundtrack of The Scarlet Pimpernel a couple of days earlier.  I like my French revolutions with either A) delicious foppery, or B) soul wrenching redemption.  You simply can’t beat the humor of The Scarlet Pimpernel, or the power of Les Miserables – fun family fact, Les Mis is the only musical to ever have made me cry.  Kiri and I watched it at the Queen’s Theatre in the West End and wept.  Buckets!

J. played along although he isn’t as big a fan of musical theatre as I am and made stereotypical American comments stereotyping the French.  Although I will grant him, they really never got their whole revolutionary act together (any sort of cultural event that gets lovingly nicknamed the Reign of Terror can probably be labeled a failure).

In any event, it was too like Les Mis for me, despite the totally different revolutions.  The downtrodden rise up, and it ends badly.  The most standout characters are villainous (In LM the Thénardiers, in ToTC a graverobber and his cronies).  Main character is a man who has changed his name to escape his past and is continuously running from it.  In both plays the characters are driven to their various acts of self-sacrifice for the love of a little girl.  Etc., etc., etc..  Oh I enjoyed it, but like I said, not entirely transported.

Probably because I strongly dislike Dickens…

Holidays, Humor

Lenten. Fast.

“I get a little behind during Lent, but it comes out even at Christmas.”
– Frank Butler

Anyone engaging in self denial this Spring, or are you throwing yourself into unabashed hedonism and indulgence?  I tried to think of something to give up this year but found myself at a loss.  I’ve already given up junk food, I’ve been too sick to indulge any other bad habits lately, and I swore off shopping long ago with the advent of J.’s grad school decision.  I’m a paragon of virtue these days, kittens.  And let me tell you, it’s dull as tombs!

Ergo, some irreverent humor for you, care of someecards.com.  Psst!  The last one’s my favorite!

Health, Humor, Weekend, Work

Walking. Wounded.

“Let us rise up and be thankful, for if we didn’t learn a lot today, at least we learned a little, and if we didn’t learn a little, at least we didn’t get sick, and if we got sick, at least we didn’t die; so, let us all be thankful.”
– The Buddha

Chinchillas!  I’ve just emerged from a four day bout with a sinus infection/cold/fever and things are still a bit woozy at chez Small Dog.

J. got it first, poor guy, and just when he was struggling free of it, bam!  I woke up Saturday morning with a fever and chills and it all went south from there.  No amount of vitamin C could put a crack in this thing and I ended up taking both Monday and Tuesday off of work – an unprecedented event.

Anyway, I may still not have hearing in my left ear, my throat may be clogged with gunk, and every time I stand up I may feel dizzy, but you should have seen the pile of work on my desk when I got in this morning!  I really couldn’t have left it another day.  Also, most daytime television is pretty terrible and I didn’t think I had it in me to watch The Price is Right one more time.

Small Dog’s Tips for Curing the Plague:

  1. Airborne.  I don’t care what anybody says, my clan swears by this stuff.
  2. Per Mum’s strict training, drink a large glass of water or orange juice every hour, on the hour to keep you hydrated and to clear out the grossness.
  3. Watch Jane Austen movies, or old black and white classics (my preference?  The Women – the 1939 version, avoid the 2008 remake like the very plague you are trying to expel).
  4. Ricolaaaaaaaaa cough drops.
  5. Chicken soup, not just for the soul.

Hope your weekend was a little more perky than mine.  What did you do?  Share and cheer me up a bit?

Food, Humor, Office, Work

Some Perfidious Fiend…

“We should start a witch-hunt!’
– Daisy

Currently wailing in sackcloth over this thing...

…stole my favorite kitchen implement ever, my orange peeler!  The niftiest thing ever invented for a consummate citrus lover.  I left it with an orange to chill in our (fortified and limited access) dispatch room’s refrigerator and when I returned a couple hours later, it, my orange, several salad dressing packagers, and a bag of carrot sticks had been snatched.

In spite of the jokes and sitcom stories of this sort of thing, this is my first incident of food being stolen in nearly 3 years of office work.  Also, what sort of ruffian steals healthy food from the office fridge?  Aren’t the soda cans labeled “Property of T-Dawg” and the “secret” candy bars in the freezer usually the first to go?

So, orange peeler thief, you’re on notice.  Either return it unharmed and be spared, or suffer the vicious voodoo curse I am prepared to unleash on you!

Angst, Education, Humor, Money, University

Financial. Aid.

If you think education is expensive, try ignorance.
~ Andy McIntyre

Woof, ducklings!  I thought the application process for J.’s grad school was grueling and soul destroying…but it is as nothing compared to working out how to pay for it!

Where will we live?
How much can we contribute ourselves?
How much, then, will we need in loans?
Federal, private, or both?
and most importantly…
Will we have to sell any kidneys and/or future children to pull this off?

We must write such moving personal statements that the entire selection committe will be moved to tears/frenzy/generosity. See photo for desired effect.

Last night we stayed up past 1am writing (another!) personal statement, this time for a scholarship application.  Let me just say here, that between J.’s experience and my editing, we have streamlined this sort of midnight activity to a science.  In fact reading the earliest application essays and comparing them to the last one we put together was hilarious – especially considering that earliest and probably least polished piece of work is the one that got him into the school we’re most excited about.  Who can fathom the ways of grad school selection committees?

Naturally staying up that late working on something that will only decide the course of our destiny is not conducive to stress free and happy Small Dogs.  I was frighteningly stressed and humorless about it all, I’m afraid, but J. seems to find this sort of angst in me amusing – granted I was especially klutzy last night and after midnight all sorts of incoherent things start coming out of my mouth, so maybe I’m better company than I thought.

So far this work is paying off, though.  J. has one fabulous scholarship offer to school A and now we’re just waiting to see what school B will throw at us (we’re dreadful tarts, you see, money buys our affections).  We’ve callously kicked schools C and D to the curb.

We’ll be making a final decision sometime in the near future.  Now if you’ll excuse me, I simply have to go breathe into a paper bag just thinking about it…