Wednesday, February 25, 2009

How is Cruella's Dating?



That picture kinda says it all, I go on a date and then they look in person like that.

Well, this marks - a bit over a year since Life Without Trey . It has been difficult, but let me tell you-

Oh, you know how you go to a foreign country and you see some word in their language that means something nasty/funny in our language? I finally figured out one for German, Mist, you know how your car has a "mist" setting on the wipers? In German that means manure.

Ha! Ha! Ha.

Well, Cruella, if you tell jokes like this, no wonder you have trouble.

Too bad, I have another one for you. Today for Bar/Bri I noticed we had candy, and some of the candy had Hello Kitty wrappers.

This made me happy. Ooh! Hello Kitty Candy! I said, it's Hello Kitty Flavoured!

Mechelle asked, "What does Hello Kitty taste like?'

LisaMarie objected loudly- you know you cannot go there with Cruella! she said! Do not even try it!

I coulda said, I love cats, but can't stand the fishy taste.

No, I only try to open my mouth at- let us say, opportune moments?

Anyway, I mean, I have been all busy with law school and what not, so I haven't really been Dating as much as I should have, besides, I think I want to see how this Robin thing goes, I am not as much of a trick as some people would like to think!

Yah, like they sit around and invent my bad reputation, no, I think my bad reputation is entirely of my own making.

But this is my problem. For one thing, I don't really go anywhere to meet people. As y'all know, my life consists of school, family activities, Sam's and Autozone.

No there are no cute gay guys at the Autozone I go to, so perhaps I should reconsider and go far afield. I will give you reports from each and every autozone. O! And in terms of Autozone, I made an IMPORTANT DISCOVERY.

Did you know that DIFFERENT Autozones have DIFFERENT prices for the SAME items?

Really! I discovered this because I decided to go and retrieve Moby Dick from Memorial Auto. It has been there for something like 6 weeks? I do not know why. I just wanted the A/C charged.

When I got there, it was smoking. Rick claimed this was because the heater control valve was broken.

Fine, I said, I will go fetch one. I went to Autozone on Columbia.

They did not have one but called round until they found one on Covington highway. Since I have a pathetically low threshold of boredom, I wandered around and looked at things, like what to clean the seats in Moby Dick with, and some kind of oil to put in the Park Avenue so we can sell it and it will not leak out of the valve covers. Said oil was 9.99 at Columbia Autozone.

I go to Covington highway to retrieve part.

"That's not a heater control valve," I said. And it wasn't, it didn't have the- words escaped me at the time and still do- mechanisms on top!

The man looked at it and said he didn't think it was either, but that's what the computer insisted so it was. Anyway, I discovered that the same oil at this Autozone cost $10.99! So the Autozone lady said, different Autozones charged different prices, which- I had no idea.

Anyway, I do not go to bars because I have recently been reminded that for the rest of my life I can either a) drink or b) drive but not both and y'all know how I feel about MARTA. Chittam regularly sends me reports of what smells bad on Marta. Also, there are poor people on Marta.

Not drinking and driving would seem to be a fairly obvious conclusion but you always think, o, I'll just have one, or two, and - no, this is one of those impossibilities. And let me tell you, bars are not a lot of fun, even if you are drinking, and to sit around a bar and not drink? I might as well go to the gym.

Then sometimes I might go somewhere or I might go online. In these instances, the guys that hit on me- y'all I am not looking for supermodel, 'cos I had that, although that would be nice! But they tell you they're 35- and they put up a picture- and they look fine in the picture! Then in person, see above, and you think, was that picture taken with- what, a steam-powered giant camera with the hoods and flash powder? Did they even make colour film then? Because if you are 35- you must be calculating your age in metric. Or perhaps you have been drinking embalming fluid with Keith Richards 'cos y'all both have that nasty leathery look.

Then there are the morbidly obese, which y'all know I am fascinated by fat people. I think it's some kind of asian thing. Unfortunately, they are also fascinated by me, and in a different way than I am fascinated by them, and I somehow have failed to appreciate the appeal of large amounts of pasty white sweaty blubber. No. Lolruses do not equal hot.

And then I went on this one date with one dude - like, a LONG time ago, even before Rick at Memorial auto got his hands on Moby Dick, and I liked the chap and all but he had three smelly dogs (all dogs are smelly, if you ask me) and I thought, if I sleep with him, then the dogs are likely to want to sleep with us too and that would be gross. And I thought, if this progresses, I am likely to have to put up with dogs, and he was not THAT cute. Now I have a passion for cars the way some people have a passion for dogs, but only Alex's car manages to smell bad.

So yah! The whole dating thing. I am liking Robin very much, and will tell you in great detail, and hopefully interpretive dance, about the kinds of things that we did/do, like last time he shot rubber bands at me - which hurt more than you would expect, and he put ice on me, and I made mustard.

That is the kind of excitement Cruella has on Spring Break. other people went to Puerto Vallarta and got married, or went to the Bahamas, and I went to Nashville and made and canned mustard. Also listen to what else I made:

Tacos
Pork tenderloin stuffed with blue cheese and olive tapenade
Shrimp scampi
pasta with creamy pesto sauce, green beans and potatoes
that stir-fry thing I make
two chocolate cheesecakes
Chex mix
pork with camembert sauce
French potato salad (meaning, mustard and no mayonnaise, and it shoulda had capers in it)

And I went to his thrift store and got a pair of trousers Alex is just going to HATE.
HATE. SO. MUCH.

But he lives in Nashville, which is full of - actually, not a whole lot. It's apparently wonderful if you like country music, and I should like country music, because it's like, opera themes, you know! I lost my wife, she went off and married some dude, I'm going to drink whisky- no, whisky drinking is not much part of opera. And country music has pickup trucks, which I hate, and dogs, which I strongly dislike, and not so much in the way of good singing and outfits. Except for Dolly Parton.

We are trying to figure out when we can see each other again. He was supposed to come down, but then something has come up, and now I am in the stressful part of the semester, so it may wait until finals are done and before I go to Rio.

But we had a discussion the last time I was there and it is kinda looking like - we are a committed couple- see above for the reminder of why I had to go to Nashville- and then he said perhaps this time next year he will leave (where he works) and come here. So then.

I still do miss Trey, but then I talk to him every so often and I am reminded of why I do NOT miss him. He is too much work to deal with and will never really be able to help me out. But I miss my mans.

O and I met missdoxie AND Cookie, of "Cookie and the Geese" which TOTALLY distracted me from paying attention to what they were telling us about labour and employment law. I was all like, omg! I know her! That's Miss Doxie! And she hasn't updated her website and given me anything funny to read in ages!

Tuesday, February 10, 2009

Yes, I Would Like Some Cheese With My Whine

I'm in Professional Responsibility, but rather than- actually pay attention- I'm going to talk to y'all! 'Cos I feel like it, how about that! Yaaarrr!

Well it has been BEAUTIFUL weather recently, all sunny and warm, which makes up for the 7 degree weather a few weeks ago. So that is all the nice things I can say for a while.

Anyway, what has Cruella been doing recently?

Mainly Cruella's various cars have been stupid. Don't ever have more than one car, or they will all cause problems all at once. Well, two of them are not causing trouble, but they are being Maintained/Improved.

So those of y'all who are not interested in Long Boring Car discussions can skip forward to Whine about MTM.

Lady Thatcher has been out of commission since August, she allegedly needed an ignition module so I bought the ignition module and then got busy (with Robin, among other things- but) and then never did anything with her, thinking, "I'll get around to it" and then of course, it's bad weather, I have to drink all the alcohol in the house so that Robin will move here, there are [redacted] to be [redacted], I have to commit IIED on my brother, with dead squirrel tails," and of course so finally I broke down and paid someone $45 to replace the ignition module. I did go get the battery charged myself. Then she was sluggish and uncooperative, so I took her to Vintage Mustangs to get fixed, because someone there works on Grand Nationals, and I always feel inadequate around Rob Irle. So now after having the coil packs re-replaced, and a few other things done, which should further another goal of mine (eat all the food in the house before buying any more) Lady Thatcher should be fixed sometime this week, also I got the A/C properly working, on the "while it is there" theory- after JD botched it. Lady Thatcher does not have a tag so will have to be emissioned and then tagged, and washed and so forth.

Anyway who cares about the old model code? All I care about is what's on the MPRE!
I hate law classes that want to show you the old stuff, I do not care.

Then Moby Dick- well, he did not have heat or A/C so I thought, while I have the Caravan, I will take him and get heat and while he is getting heat, he can get A/C. Another one of those "I'll get around to it" things to be fixed- but never did, see aforementioned reasons. So Moby Dick went to go get heat and A/C. Now- to get heat, they had to replace the blower motor, and also something which they showed me called a "blower motor module" or something similar, which cost ! 300! It must be made of unicorn bits and gryphon teeth! The whole ENGINE for that car wouldn't cost a whole lot more. What is it made out of? Do you think there's anyone who can repair it? Anyway they got one out of the junkyard but I am still waiting on a condenser for Moby Dick. Some lady put up an ad on Craigslist wanting to part hers, named Eleanor- that is the car, not the lady's name- but then after I fetched the mechanic

Then the Caravan. So I took it to get an oil change, and- this was MTM's birthday so nice possibility of whine segue here- and they took all damn day first about changing the oil- like they had to kill the damn dinosaurs to make the oil to put in the car! By the way there was some man there painting "Employee pricing plus" in those big letters on the front of the dealer- did you know he was going to get paid $1600 for this? And he had one of those JLG lifts so no ladders were involved. Really! Hmmm!

Then they have the car in little bits- the intake was off and some other parts- and they said the transmission was leaking, which I thoroughly disbelieved- but they showed me the fluid on it- and I am thinking, I am quite car-hypochondriac. I would have noticed if it had been leaking. I have experience with cars with iffy transmissions. Y'all- thank GOD for extended warranty coverage. Anyway they claimed later that the rack and pinion was also leaking and claimed to have replaced both.

Please note my extreme disbelief. But the Caravan now has been recovered.

At any rate, I cannot remember how long ago I wrote this, but after much further difficulty, Lady Thatcher was recovered, tagged, and is now sitting grumpily (hopefully) at home while I am in Nashville. Moby Dick is still in the shop, because when They (being Memorial Auto, including Rick, all of whom I would still recommend highly) tried to charge him, the A/c hose burst.

I took the A/C hose to AutoAirPlus on Lawrenceville Highway, where Lady Thatcher had been. For reasons unclear to me, they could not repair the hose, claiming, If I did it, it would suck, and as the hose in question was a suction hose, I thought this was a pretty good pun.

I go to Autozone. They do not have said hose. They can, however, order said hose for a '92, but it will not arrive until the next week. Napa does not have it. O'reilly's can get it the next day.

O'reilly's does get it the next day but it is the wrong hose, as in, the part that they claimed was correct does not fit.

I give up and leave it to Rick to fix and go home and think about making mustard when I go to Nashville.

O- and- I finally broke down and bought a new computer, because Ian put bootleg Windows on the old computer post-crash and it has been grumpy and resentful ever since. Windows KNOWS when it is bootleg and sends me messages every time I boot the computer up (why do we say that anyway? Boot up the computer?) basically, you are stealing Windows, you jerk! Buy the software now or we will stop working at any time! Also the old computer was 7 years old and I thought- sooner or later, it is going to kerflooey. And then I will lose years of exciting files - like- bootleg Eurythmics! That would be bad.

I bought a computer from pacificgeek.com, because it was ! cheap! and I bought a new fuck-off size monitor to go with it, and then the computer gets here and Robin came to set it up and it would not work.
I always feel gratified when I try to do something, fail, and then the expert can't do it either. There should be a German word for this feeling. The-expert-you-consulted-after-you-tried-and-failed-couldn't-do-it-either-freude.

Well then that got fixed, after consulting with the pacificgeek folks- who are apparently based in Nevada? That's a little far from the Pacific if you ask me.

But now I have to transfer all the files from the old computer to the new one. Cruella, you say! You have that external hard drive thing, that should work!

For reasons too boring to get into, it does not. Robin can't figure it out either- did I mention that I brought to Nashville:

3 computers

2 boxes of canning jars

1 food processor

3 heads of lettuce, among other groceries

I don't want to count how many outfits, only 2 of which I am actually likely to wear

I don't want to count how many underwears

many, many movies

- basically, I stuffed the van full, and this is for one person who intends to spend most of his time inside the house working on a paper. Y'all, I packed for Nashville like I am going to the polar regions or something. And I am fully aware of where the Wal-Mart is here, in fact, I went yesterday and bought a lot of food.

I do not understand why I have to take my entire house with me when I go somewhere. I certainly will never manage to be one of those backpacker type people.

I had promised y'all more MTM related whine, so here you are:

So we went out for her birthday, which- let's just say this, it was a MILESTONE birthday, and this was the same day the Caravan was - being pulled into little bits. You know, you think, I have been friends with this person for 11 years, and my car is dead, or in serious trouble, you would get a little sympathy.

No, I do not get any sympathy, I get the demand, are you still coming?

I suppose that if I had absolutely no concern for anyone else's feelings but my own, and my own trivial wants and needs, I would not wonder why I was still single. Also it does not help that you are only interested in people who are, or should be, absolutely unavailable.

I proceeded to then get her very drunk at that awful place she likes to go. Her son dropped me home and we had a very long discussion, about, among other things, the nature of God and good and evil. This is because he is a philosophy student.

And then the following day we went to Leon's which was having a 'soft opening,' meaning, apparently, the food and drinks were free. Unsurprisingly, I was underwhelmed. There was very little food and what there was of it was mediocre, and it would have been astonishingly expensive.

Then we went to the opera Saturday the 28th and saw Il Trovatore, which was fabulous, except she had 5 glasses of wine at dinner and slept through the opera.

I don't think I will do that again! The opera was very exciting. It had one of these- everything but the kitchen sink plots.

Don't believe me? Look and see, It had:

A civil war

Two brothers, separated at birth

By, a daughter seeking revenge because her mother was burnt at the stake for being an alleged witch

one woman both of the brothers were in love with

The brothers did not know they were brothers

Suicide

two executions

Etc, etc., and this made me think, "Macbeth" would make a GREAT opera.