Upcoming Publication

My short story "The Situation" will appear in the June issue of Lily, up June 1st.

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I've gotten alot of e-mails today, which has been nice for a Monday, especially a cold, dreary one. Someone also called, a client, and I took a few rings to answer it because I always forget where I put the phone. For the upteemth time, I was asked by the caller whether he/she had awoken me. This was after lunch, mind you. I don't know whether it's because I don't answer the phone on the first ring or because I probably sounded sleepy, but I'm guessing it's the latter. I hate talking on the phone, and I know it shows. Whenever I answer, it's with a strange combination of sleepiness, ennui, and suspision. No one I want to talk to ever calls me, with the exception of K, and I am terrible at talking on the phone. There's no visual cues from the other person, and I'm not as polished a speaker as I am writer. Everything about the phone fills me with dread, from making an appointment to calling a family member to wish them a happy birthday. I'm not a superfluous cell phone talker, either. Unless I've broken down on the road or am going to be late, I see no reason to call someone while I'm in the car, store, at someone's house, at a restaurant, in the middle of a movie, well, you get the picture.

I've read you should place the receiver on your left ear and not your right because then you can pick up emotional cues from the caller, so maybe I'll try that in the future. I should also condition myself to pretend it's Publisher's Sweepstakes Clearing House every time the phone rings. But then I'd just get filled with dread about what to do with all that money.

The Loot

K took me to Ixia for dinner, a place I've always wanted to try. Ixia used to be Louie's Bookstore Cafe, but the owner of the Papermoon Diner bought the space and transformed it into an upscale urban restaurant, no jeans or t-shirts allowed. K had a couple of tiny mango martinis while I drank water like a good girl because of my cold (although I did get some complimentary champagne, it being my birthday). Our appetizer was a pan-seared sushi-grade ahi tuna. K got the filet mignon for dinner, and I ordered some crab cakes shaped like the cleaning tablets you drop into the dishwasher. (They actually tasted much better than that.) All in all, I was pleased with the selection and the ambiance, and our waitress was super-friendly.

I also got a used slide projector and a collection of slides from the 1967 Rosebowl parade. It is my dream to host slideshows once we get our basement refinished. My big present was a ghosthunting trip to Gettysburg in June. We're staying at the superhaunted Farnsworth House Inn. Apparently U.S. Confederate sharpshooters occupied the house during the battle of Gettysburg, where they used to fire at Union soldiers.

Some of you have asked what you can get me for my birthday, so I have take the liberty of writing down a few things here. For starters, I would much enjoy The World's Largest French Fry. It even has bean juice on it, for an added punch of fiber. Next, this Suitcase thrown from a limo into the river looks mysterious. Of course, who could pass up the unique opportunity of writing on this guy's nuts. Finally, in the vein of my ghost obsession, Hideous Doll Found in Creek is Tormenting My Family would do the trick.

It's My Birthday and I Can Opine if I Want to

Happy birthday to me,
Happy birthday to me,
At least I'm not forty,
But it sucks to be thirty-three.

I got a cold (my first one this year) and my period for my birthday. Thanks, self! On a brighter note, someone is taking me out to dinner tonight, and a surprise weekend getaway is in my near future. When I asked about the restaurant, K said the dress is "business casual." What on earth is that? Since I work at home, my business causal on most days is pajamas until 11:30, then gym clothes. Should I wear some mix-n-match Ann Taylor separates? I guess it just means no jeans, no shorts, huh?

I don't particularly need anything for my birthday, so I just wanted to rattle off a list of things I'm thankful of having: a good partner, a long relationship, pets, interesting, fun friends, more work than I can handle, some stories to be published this year, a supportive family, and my health. Although I suppose it wouldn't hurt to have some new headphones for my mp3 player.

On an unrelated note, I was in KMart yesterday looking for one of those slinky-like garden hoses when I noticed a sign in one of the aisles: "For the benefit of our patrons, we request that you refrain from smoking in this store." Have things gone downhill that fast that we as a society don't realize that retail stores generally are nonsmoking environments? It's not as if this KMart had a cafeteria or anything that would even remotely encourage one to light up. I just don't get it. Maybe that's something I want for my birthday, for people to begin minding their manners again.

Blood Bitch

I'm waiting for K to come home from class so we can go over to my grandmother's and weed her garden. It's a beautiful day, and I'm looking forward to getting outside, although I'm a little tired now. I went for my quarterly bloodletting this morning at the Red Cross. I warned the plebotomist that my veins are hard to find well, because, I like to be helpful and I like to avoid unnecessary resticking.

"I don't think they're hard to find," she grumbled, pressing on the crook of my elbow. "They're just deep, and some people don't like to go in and find the deep veins."

I mistakingly took her cockiness for ambition and was glad she was up to the challenge. A moment later, she stuck the needle in, and I felt the most excruciating pain ever. Determined not to scare the other donors off, I made a face and softly whispered "ouch."

"Your vein rolled," she observed, digging around in my arm with the needle and causing me even greater distress. "You tensed up and the vein moved."

Well, gee, I'm sorry if I didn't sit like a freaking stone during the worst stick of my life. And the nerve of her to blame it on me. Unfortunately, these sort of know-it-all plebotomists are in no short supply at my donor center. Once I watched someone mess up a guy's stick so bad he couldn't donate at all that day. And then she blamed her poor stick on him. He vowed never to come back, and I don't blame him.

Of course, I will go back, because we all have are pet causes, and blood happens to be one of mine. Next time, I will be on the lookout for scowling, cocky blood bitches. And if they stick me so cavalierly again, I will howl loud enough to scare the entire waiting room away.

I went on the Avenue afterward and got a few birthday cards and a new pair of running shoes. I usually buy last year's New Balance model on sale at JCPenney or whatever, but this time I wanted to buy an actual pair of running shoes because I've stuck with it for a year and now I can call myself a "runner" without feeling like a phony. Apparently part of this prize is the priviledge of plunking down $100 for a pair of shoes that probably will feel the same a pair of crosstrainers. Remember the old running shoes, the Tigers that Phil Knight used to sell before he started Nike? They looked like a banana peel with shoelaces. How on earth did those stave off shin splints?

I finally downloaded last year's release by Sonic Youth, Sonic Nurse. I'd kind of weaned myself off of them, particularly since the period of suckiness spanning Experimental Jet Set through NYC. Sonic Nurse sounds like the child of 2003's surprisingly mellow Murray Street and the low-key Sister. In other words, it's okay in my book.

Tonight we have to put up our deck lights for the party next week. I'm really looking forward to it, but I'm nervous we'll run out of food or alcohol or that there'll be too many people for everyone to relax comfortably. Plus, since I'll turn 34 next week, another half hour will inexplicably be shaved from my bedtime and I'll begin to feel tired to 9:30 instead of the incredibly early 10:00 pm. Pretty soon I'll be going to bed the same time as my grandmother, at 8:00!

The Mother of All Disappointments

I hope everyone had a nice mother's day. The weather was beautifulthis weekend, and I visited my family on the Eastern shore. Although I had a good time seeing my family, for some reason, I was unable to keep my anger in check. Well, I didn't come out and yell at anyone, but I just felt angry inside the whole time. I guess I forget that living in the city is different than living in the country, or even the suburbs. Somehow, seeing box store after box store clogging up what was once beautiful country vistas, churches sprouting up in old strip mall stores (ah, the irony there), people driving the same trucks and SUVs and wearing the same assembly-line mall clothes, eating the same junk from Applebee's and Bob Evans as fat as houses really made me mad. How can people consider this enlightenment? I know I shouldn't worry about others, but just amazes me how many people buy into the materialistic happiness thing. I understand it here, in a neighborhood full of yuppies, but what about all those modest, churchgoing people? It was perhaps more disconcerting than my mother's recent obsession with Nancy Grace.

Anyway, I cooked the family breakfast and then Scott and I planted flowers and stuff in my mom's garden. Then I came home, secretly glad to be back. Usually I look forward to the quietness, the trees, the breeze in Salisbury, but it's quickly becoming a little sucky suburb. Will every small town the same fate? It always enrages me to have a brochure for a vacation town, like say somewhere in New England or the southeastern coast, with all of these beautiful pictures, and you get there and half the place, with its Old Navy, its Applebee's, its cineplex, is like being at home.

Thought of the day: when you have a dream about masturbation, aren't you kind of setting your sights low?

The Gore Tour

I'm excited; the senior class at Hopkins has chosen Al Gore to be this year's graduation speaker. David, can you get me some tics? I hope big Al hits the treadmill before he comes, though. Being cheated out of the presidency seems to put some weight on you.

X

Hard to believe that K and I will be celebrating our tenth anniversary tomorrow! We've agreed just to have a nice dinner somewhere, since K is wrapping up her finals this week and we'll both be out of town for mother's day. Any restaurant suggestions? It seems we've been everywhere in this crazy town after ten years. We want something quiet, eclectic, and casual. We eat all types of ethnic food, except for Ethiopian (I just can't get behind the bread), and we've been to Martick's recently, so we're out of ideas.

Acceptance

My short satire piece, "The Movie Version of My Life," has been accepted by Failbetter.com for either their Summer or Fall issue. Yay! I had been very frustrated recently because this piece has been sitting on my desk for much longer than some of my more-recent pubs, and I was running out of ideas as to who might like it. But that is the great thing about publishing, namely that there will always be someone who likes what you've written—the only hard part is finding them sometimes.

Fewer is Less

We checked out the newly opened Tenpachi on Eastern Avenue in Fells Point and were seriously underwhelmed. Tenpachi is like an urban Hair Cuttery; no gimmicks; $11 haircuts (raised from $10 by the new management, sort of defeating the purpose of the name Tenpachi). What Tenpachi doesn't tell you upfront is that cheap haircuts mean keeping overhead down. What does keeping overhead down mean for a salon? It means putting no product in your hair, not even to style it. It means charging you to blowdry your hair. It means stylists who are freshly out of stylist school or just aren't that good. Like stylists who yack a lot about themselves and then take two hours to do a one-hour cut and color (and not on my giganta hair even; we're talking pixie-cut K here).

I don't know; maybe the Charles Village Tenpachi is light years better. After all, they did win the City Paper's Best Haircut or something a couple years back, but we know that's all politics. Our former stylist got that a couple years in a row and what did that get us? Her never returnig our phone calls. Alexander Payne seems to have had the same underwhelming experience. Next time, it's back to Clip Art in Federal Hill for us. Liz will serve you a beer or a coke while you wait, and you can make faces at the overpriced Phillip Michael Salon patrons across the street.

Thankfully, the rest of the weekend was full of goodness. Phillygirl made us a mean shrimp risotto Saturday night and sent us home with some leftovers. Phillygirl has some serious kitchen equipment: $120 knives, cheese grinders, a garlic press that looks like an oversized Ball-Peen hammer. I lamented that I did have such impressive tools, but then K chided me for declining to buy a set of Henkel knives at the QVC outlet for $60. Yes, I know; I'm cheap and sometimes it comes back to bite me.

Today I hosted L's book club at our house. Ironically, I spent a lot of time cleaning upstairs yesterday (puke stains on rug from hairball cat, tub ring, mildewy shower curtain) and nobody from the book group used the bathroom or took a shower. The nerve of them. We discussed What's the Matter With Kansas? How Conservatives Won the Heart of America, an interesting look on why blue-collar America votes against their economic interests by voting Republican, but we were largely unfulfilled. It's one thing to point out how it was done, but there were no solutions on how to fix it. I've decided to do my part. For months I have battled with managment over them playing FoxNews at the gym. For the past four months they have played CNN, which I also hate, but they've slowly moved back to Fox. Instead of arguing about the lesser of the two evils, I'm going to demand they play Comedy Central on one of the TVs instead. The Daily Show from the previous evening replays every night at 7 pm, which is peak gym time. Maybe now everyone will get to watch one news show that tells the truth. I mean, satire show. And Jon's much easier on the eye that those weird alien-eye people at Fox. What is wrong with their bug eyes?