An End to My TV Drama

Apparently I have been a very good girl this year, as Santa brought me a new television!

Friends, if you have been following along you may remember my television has a mind of its own.  It had taken over complete control of what I was allowed to watch, even though no parental controls had ever been set on anything.

Finally, I can watch all of the channels again!

You have no idea how exciting an event this is for me.  It had gotten to the point where I started channel surfing the other night, just to see what I could and could not watch.

Teen Nick!!  My television had decided the f^&king Nickeloden was not acceptable viewing for me. I was becoming very afraid that I would shortly be relegated to viewing only Disney Jr. and Comedy Central.  Yeah, my television had some kind of love affair with Comedy Central.  I don't pretend to understand its logic, but any and all programming on Comedy Central was totally cool with my television.

That all ends now.  I've got a new television, and so many shows I have never been able to watch!

Behold!  The majestic beauty that is my television! Unfettered viewing is in my grasp!

My dear nephew (who is 7) has been on my case for the last two years to get a new television.  Each summer visit has brought its own special commentary.

This year:  

We were at a carnival, and they had a raffle to win a huge flat screen tv.  "You should enter that, Aunt Tammy.  You really need a bigger tv."

Last year:

"You should really get a flat screen, Aunt Tammy.  I have a flat screen in my room."

So, when said glorious event happened on Christmas morning, I had to text my brother so he could relay the news to my nephew.

That's right, I have joined the 21st century, buddy!

And there you have it, friends.  The end of my television drama.  

Now, if you will excuse me, I have to go play with my new television and experience the glory of watching any damn thing that I want.

And Now The Exciting Conclusion (Hopefully) of Our Drama

This is, I hope, the last installment of the Parental Power Outage Saga.  If you need the background details, scroll back a few posts.  Start here.

So around 6pm I checked the status report again, hoping to at least see an estimated time of restoration.  No such luck.  

A few minutes later my mother calls.  She had tried calling the house, and she got the answering machine!  The power must be back on!  She was pretty stoked, no lie.

I volunteered to go over and see if the power was really back.  They had already gotten the house as warm as they could, then headed out for the evening. I was also kind of hoping to see if the crew was still there, to thank them for the hard work, and to see if they were local or had traveled from afar to help.

No sign of the crew when I arrived.  Who knows how long the power might have been back before my mother tried calling the house.  There was definitely light, however.

The outside light is on!  

OMG the power is really back on!  I went in to turn up their heat a bit so it would be warm when they returned later, but also to make sure the furnace would start.  I also had to check and make sure the oven was off.  You see, my mother has been worried this entire time that because she had the oven on when the power went out (trying to cook Thanksgiving dinner), that it was going to come roaring back to life when the power was restored.  It did not, but I did call her to tell her that.

I'm not sure what exactly the problem was, but they had obviously done some work at the pole at some point.  All of the snow was neatly cleaned off.

Pretty clear pole, and the trees look sparkly with ice

I am so thankful that they got their power -- and more specifically their heat -- back and functioning! It is getting freaking cold out.  

Feel like 16!  And it is only going to get colder!

A great big, enormous thank you to whichever crew got the power back on!  I would buy you all coffee and hand warmers if I knew who you were!  I am so relieved that their power is back on before this super cold night.

And just for the record...

We are finally in agreement, Central Hudson. 

*I'd like to think this is because you realized there was an error in your system somewhere and made haste to correct it.  However, it is possible that it is because I was a bit pushy a giant bitch.  I'd apologize, but I'm really not sorry.  Nobody screws with my parents.*

And So It Continues -- Power Outage Part II: Electric Bugaloo

As you might be guessing, my parents still don't have power.  Not up to speed on this whole deal?  Check out my previous posts.

I went out for brunch and a bit of shopping (to the grocery store -- which is empty the day after Thanksgiving people!  Best time to shop!)  with my mother.  My father opted to stay home and keep the heat sources running in an attempt to keep the house at least a little warm.

It was exciting for a bit this afternoon.  A little before 3pm the status check said that their power had been restored.  Hurrah!!

So I called them on the landline.  They might not realize the power was fixed until they heard the phone ringing.  They didn't answer, and when the answering machine never kicked on I knew the power must not really be back.

So I called my mother on her cell.  The power was not fixed.

She called Central Hudson, and they informed her that it had been fixed last night.  No.

Fucking no.

My mother asked if they thought she and her neighbor would both still be running generators if it had been fixed last night.  Whomever she spoke to asked if she wanted to file another work order.  Seriously?  They have no power or heat, do you really have to ask if they would like to have that situation resolved?

And then she went next door, to tell her neighbor the exciting news.  As you can imagine, he was as delighted as she had been to discover that they supposedly had gotten their power restored last night.  He was also going to call Central Hudson to correct them.

And now, when you check the status, it is back to this:

You might be thinking, "It's annoying/inconvenient not to have power.  It will get fixed.  Calm down."

No, I'm not going to calm down.  We are possibly going to have record-setting low temperatures tonight.

I logged on to Facebook, and saw a post from Central Hudson giving themselves a big old pat-on-the-back for all of the hard work they have done, and how they have restored 95% of the power outages. They are closing the warming centers and the dry ice distribution because everything is awesome now!

That is when my residual "niceness" about the situation finally ran out.  I wondered how many of these people really got their power restored, and how many they were claiming had been restored but, like my parents and their neighbors, were actually still out?

So I decided, just for shits and giggles, to message Central Hudson on Facebook and see if I got a response.  I'm more than happy to give them credit where credit is due: whomever was answering their Facebook messages did they best they could with the information they were given.

I explained the whole situation, how the status check had said their power was restored when it obviously was not, how my mother had called and been told it was restored when it wasn't, and then had to file another work order.

The first answer I got was the standard explanation about how sometimes when they fix a bigger problem, they can't tell that there is still a smaller problem further down the line.

I can see how that could happen, but that obviously is not the case here.  I informed them that it was only ever the two houses -- there was no bigger issue.  They can see the twisted wires on the pole -- there is nothing visibly evident as "down" if you are looking at the ground. 

A while later they wrote back and asked if she had reported that, about the twisted wires.  I had to call my mother to consult.  She told me she had reported that when she initially spoke to them yesterday (she even knew the name of the person she spoke to), and her neighbor had told the person he had spoken to several times (he knew that name as well).  When my mother had called this afternoon to report that, in fact, the power had not been restored she did not get the person's name, nor did they ask for any information.  All they had asked was if she wanted to open another work order.

The last message I received was that there was an open work order for both addresses since "a few hours ago".  I just gave up and said thank you.  It's obviously a complete load of crap since "a few hours ago" they were under the misapprehension that the power had been restored.  No one even called them to file the new work order under a little after 3pm.  

And so the power outage continues.

I understand that communication problems can easily take place in a situation like this. I do not, however, enjoy having smoke blown up my ass.  You screwed up.  You cannot simultaneously believe the power was restored and have an open work order on it.  You marked a problem as fixed when it clearly was not.  My guess?  Someone drove by, saw that no tree branches or wires were down, and marked it as fixed on the assumption that another crew had already been there.

In Which My Parents Still Don't Have Power

As I mentioned in my last post, my parents lost power at their house yesterday morning.  It is just their house and their neighbors' house -- only the two of them on the entire street.  That never bodes well in terms of how quickly you are going to get repaired.

I checked the status on the Central Hudson website last night, and it gave an estimated time of restoration.  Huzzah!  According to the website, their power was due to be restored around 12:30 this morning.  Even if it was a little later, at least they were going to get power and heat back soon.

I cropped it somewhat.  You don't need to see their address.

The first thing I did when I woke up this morning was to check and see if my parents had their power back.  I had sent my mother a text last night telling her that her power should come back overnight.  She had replied this morning.  I was expecting to see a message that said that power had been restored.  I did this before I even had coffee, which was a mistake.  I'm not a "morning person", and those who know me know better than to piss me off before I've had my coffee.  Her message said they still did not have power -- and this was several hours after the "estimated restoration" time.

Now I'm was annoyed.

So I went back to Central Hudson's Storm Central, and this is what I see when I check their status:

Seriously?  You went from 12:30am to "We don't know"?

I made some coffee, before I got any more pissed off, and called my mother to tell her the news.  She had already called and spoken to a live person at Central Hudson, and they gave her an estimation of 4:30 this afternoon.  I told her that I hoped that was correct, as the online status check had no such news.

And then she told me the part that really just pissed me off.  It probably didn't help that as she was telling me the story I was checking Central Hudson's Facebook page to see them talking about how hard they are working.

Post by Central Hudson.

That's great.  Really, I appreciate all of these people who came to help, many of whom I sure left their families on Thanksgiving to be here.  I appreciate it, I honestly do.

However, this all could apparently have been avoided --or the possibility of a power outage could have been decreased.

Their neighbor -- the one other house that has no power -- had been keeping an eye on things.  He also lived through the last go-round when their houses had been without power for four days.  He had reported to Central Hudson several times over the past few months that it appeared to be a bare wire running from the main electric line to their post.  It didn't look to have the same thicker cover over it that went from the main line to the other connections.  He had been proactive and reported this to them several times trying to avoid this exact situation.  Did anyone listen?  No.  And here they are, with no power once again.

I really should not be that surprised that they ignored him.  There is a streetlight out on my road, and I have reported it multiple times.  Two and a half years later they still have never fixed it.  Might as well bang your head against a wall as report an issue that they consider unimportant.

We shall see how this progresses.  I'm still holding out hopes that the Canadians will save the day and get their power back on quickly.

Because -- Turkey!

I have many things to be thankful for: my family, friends, and good health being the most important.  Today I am also thankful for random acts of kindness and electricity.  That may seem a bit odd, but let me explain.

I woke up this morning fully prepared to have to do battle with the heavy,wet snow we got yesterday.  I hate shoveling, so I had parked my car at the bottom of my driveway with every intention of doing the bare minimum to shovel out around it and clear the front steps and sidewalk.  I got bundled up and went outside and discovered that some kind soul had already done my entire driveway and the front walk!  It's a Thanksgiving miracle!  I know it wasn't the neighbor who shares my driveway, as her half had been left untouched.  I think it was my other neighbor, and he is awesome.  I will have to buy him some Heineken as a gift (that's his beverage of choice),

Feeling pretty good about the day, I went back inside to call my parents and tell them of my good luck, and to see what time I should venture on over.  My mother was cooking Thanksgiving dinner, and in return I was going to play tech support for all things computer related.  It was at this same time that I noticed a lot of people on Facebook were mentioning they did not have power.  I was very grateful that I still had mine, as did my parents.

About half an hour later my phone rang.  It was my mother, and they had just lost power.  Not the whole street, just them and their next-door neighbors.  Apparently the neighbor had come over to tell them he had seen what happened, and had already called Central Hudson.  No estimate given for restoration, and they suggested he make alternate plans for Thanksgiving, and it might be the entire weekend before the power was back.  My mother was calling to tell me that she was giving it half an hour, and then she would let me know if the power was back on or whether Thanksgiving was now going to be at my house.  Thank goodness someone had cleared my entire driveway for me!

As I ran around like crazy, trying to clean and straighten as much as possible for the unexpected company, it struck me that this really shouldn't be a surprise.  Every time my mother cooks a turkey there is a pretty good chance that the power will go out.

Yeah.  You read that correctly.  Mom cooking turkey = high chance of a power outage.

This is definitely not the first time the power has gone out when she was trying to cook a turkey.  It happens with unusual regularity.  I distinctly remember one time -- it wasn't even a holiday -- when she had to finish cooking a turkey on the wood stove in the living room.  My grandparents even showed up, as they had been driving home from a deep-sea fishing trip and decided the weather was too bad to drive all the way home.  They mistakenly thought we would have power.  I remember we did eventually have the turkey, but we also got to drink the liquefied ice cream that my grandparents had thought they were going to put in our freezer. That part was pretty cool when you're a kid -- it was like getting milkshakes!

For today's mobile cooking extravaganza, my mother brought basically everything in the universe that she might need for Thanksgiving, because apparently she thinks I own nothing related to the culinary arts.  Most of it was pans and dishes she had already prepped things in that just needed to go in a functional oven.  There were a few odd things though:

--flour
--poultry seasoning
--potato masher
--a corkscrew

Seriously, Mom?  You honestly thought I would not have a corkscrew?  Do you think I just break the neck off my wine bottles?  I have all my bases covered for alcohol consumption, thanks.  The only thing on that list I did not have was the poultry seasoning.  I have spices, we could have created something.  Also, who had the turkey baster?  Yeah, that was me.  She did not remember to bring one.

The one thing I was sadly lacking was a meat thermometer.  I have never had the need to use one, and she did not bring hers.  It would have been helpful, as our turkey had a pop-up button thingy on it that never popped.  I'm sure it was done though.  No one has gotten sick so far.

The biggest problem is going to be the fact that my parents still don't have power, and as of now Central Hudson still has no restoration estimate for them.  They have ventured back home, although I told them they should stay here.  They have the fireplace, and little heaters, and swear they will be fine.  Plus, the cats need them to be home to run those heat sources.  Central Hudson has warming centers open, and crews coming from as far away as Canada to help.  Also, we apparently sent several crews to help in Buffalo last week, and they are on the way back now.

I'd like to thank the Canadians for always being there to help.  Why the Canadians, specifically, you might be wondering?  A few years ago this same situation played out during a big storm, when only my parents and their immediate neighbors lost power.  It took 4 days, in freezing weather, before they could get their power restored.  The crew that eventually showed up was Canadian -- I know because I spoke to them.  It literally took them about half an hour to fix the problem.  The guy in charge said they pretty much just had to flip a switch on the pole, and apologized for the delay.

I really hope my parents get their power back soon, although that is not looking likely. At least I still have power, and they know that they are always welcome.  Hopefully the Canadians get here quickly, as it might be up to them to bring back the power once again!

I wonder if it would it help if my mother swears she will never cook a turkey ever again?  This is like the fourth or fifth time (that I can remember) when the power has gone out while she was trying to cook one.  She might be jinxed.

Think You Are Out of Luck

One of our younger patrons came in to the library this afternoon, and he was all excited because he heard it was supposed to snow tonight.  The following conversation took place...

Boy: Do you know it is supposed to snow?

Me: Someone told me that earlier this afternoon, that we might get--

Boy: Could you check the weather report?  What does it say?  Are we getting snow?

Me:  Just a sec, I'm bringing it up now.  It says 70% chance of rain and snow, less than an inch of accumulation. 

Boy:  How much is an inch?  Do you think I'll get a snow day?

Me:  An inch is only like this much, dude. (I showed him with my fingers.)  Maybe you'll get a delay if you are really lucky. 

Boy:  I hope I get a snow day!

Me:  Well, you better go home and start doing the Snow Day Dance to try and make it happen!  Good luck!

Boy: Maybe I'll see you tomorrow -- after it snows!

Me: I'll be here!

And the patrons in line behind him thought he was so cute to be that excited about possibly getting an inch of snow. I did my part to help out his cause by not getting out my snow shovel. Maybe that will make Mother Nature bring enough snow to at least get the kid a two-hour delay. 

UPDATE:  Think my friend will be going to school unless the weather gets a lot worse overnight. Below is a picture of what the snow has amounted to so far. 

Sorry, little buddy!  Better luck next time!

Apparently I Am Beyond Saving

So, you may or may not remember that I have a particular religious group that likes to visit my house and attempt to "save" me on a fairly regular basis.

Tonight we had a very religious man -- you might say a zealot -- who was bent on trying to save my coworker.  Of the three of us working this evening, he picked the most religious of us to try and convert.  Apparently she was not Christian enough, or not the right kind of Christian.   He creeped her out, and she doesn't get creeped out easily.

He wanted to leave information for her, and then refused to give it to a coworker.  He wanted to wait to give it to her personally.  He did not get that opportunity, as Security got the pamphlet and asked him to leave.

I had seen them talking, but had no idea that he was being weird.  I walked right past him as I was headed out to the recycling.  He even held the door for me.

I got the whole story after he left, and I remarked that it was odd he chose my coworker to try to convert, as I usually was a very popular choice with people looking to "save" others.    Apparently he did make a remark about me, like I already belonged to the devil or some such nonsense.

I'm not really sure what to make of that.  On the one hand, I am totally okay if I have somehow managed to attain a vibe that says, "Don't even bother."  It's really just saving the "Savers" the hassle of trying to convert me to their particular brand of religion, and I don't have to pretend to be remotely interested.  On the other hand, I kind of wonder what it is that makes every uber-religious person think that I am the spawn of Satan.

I'm not anti-religion.  If you have found something that makes you happy, helps you find peace in life -- that's awesome!  Love it, celebrate it, enjoy.  I was raised Roman Catholic, although I don't go to church anymore.  That's my choice.  I have a problem with some of their views.  I'm not sure any one group has got it right.  I have a real problem believing that anyone's God would want people to kill in his/her name, for example.  I believe that if two people are lucky enough to fall in love it's a beautiful thing -- their gender or sexual orientation doesn't make a difference. I'm not a fan of people trying to push their religion onto others.  You do your thing, let everyone else do their thing.

Oh well.

If creepy guy shows up again I will just make sure he has to talk to me.  That ought to keep any interaction short, sweet, and to the point.

That Was Unsettling

I was at work this morning, and I got a call on my cell phone.  I didn't recognize the number, it wasn't a local call, so I had it send the message that I couldn't talk right now.  

Immediately I get  text back claiming that it is FedEx, and asking if I am home.  

This does not seem right, and it is kind of creepy.  

First, I have never had FedEx try to call me or ask if I am home for a delivery.  They either leave the item or leave a note saying they tried to deliver.  

Secondly, I am not expecting any deliveries.  I haven't ordered anything.  I also assume that anyone who was sending something so valuable that it needed a signature would have told me to expect it.

So I did a Google search of the phone number.  If it is legitimately Federal Express trying to contact me then it should be registered to them.  Nope.  Comes up as a mobile phone.

No way am I going to answer that text.  You can freaking wonder whether I am at home or not.  If it is really FedEx then they can leave the note that I missed my package.

I did, however, text my friend (and neighbor) who lives down the street to ask her to keep an eye on my house if she was home.  Coincidentally, my neighbor across the street also stopped into work, and I told her about the weird call as well.

You might be wondering why I got so freaked out over what appears to be either an innocent call or a phishing scam.

I was away on vacation last week, but I had various people stopping by the house to take care of the cats, and I had told my friend down the street that I would be away, just in case anything happened.  I was going to be gone during Halloween and Mischief Night -- better to be safe than sorry, in my opinion.

On Sunday, when I was home again, I noticed that a couple of the pumpkins I had left out as decorations were missing.  I didn't think anything of it.  A storm had blown through while I was gone, and they were just foam pumpkins, so I assumed they had just blown away.  It was a bummer, but not a tragic loss. 

On Monday, as I was getting ready to leave for work, I saw my friend down the street.  We stopped to chat and she told me that someone had broken into the house across the street from mine while I was on vacation.  Apparently they smashed a window in the middle of the day, brazen as anything.  The police had come around asking if anyone had seen or heard anything.

Now that you have the whole back-story, you can understand how getting a random message at work asking if I am at home might have freaked me out a bit.  For all I knew this person was sitting outside of my house, casing the place.  I think they would be mighty disappointed though, unless they are in the market for a big-ass, heavy as hell, standard television that won't let you watch many television shows.

My house is just fine, in case you are wondering. I'm home now, and if anyone starts acting creepy outside my house I will be calling the police.

An (Almost) Stinky End to the Week

It's been a very long, very busy, very problem-filled week -- especially for a short week that started out with a holiday on Monday.  I'll spare you the details, but this pretty much sums up how my week has gone:

And as I arrived home this evening, it almost came to a much stinkier end.

I pulled into my driveway after work this evening around 8:30pm or so.  It was dark out, is the main point.  As I'm getting out of the car I hear a squeak, like a kitten or a small cat.

I assumed that it was one of my little feral cat visitors.  This little one has been hanging out lately, and has taken to sleeping on my back steps in the evening.  I started leaving food out for the poor little thing, as you could see its ribs it was so skinny, and I put out a box with a blanket since it was getting down into the 40s at night.

Feral kitty friend

I didn't see the little cat on the steps, and I immediately started to panic that it had run into the driveway as I was pulling in and I had hit it.  I was already trying to think of the closest emergency vet that would be open as I started to slowly walk around the car, peeking underneath.

I was so focused on looking under the car that I was not paying attention to where I was walking.  I was almost to the back steps when I heard another little squeak. Well, that obviously did not come out from beneath the car.  

I looked up, and then I froze. 

There, sitting by the bottom of the steps, munching away on the dry cat food, was a skunk.  I don't know which of us was more surprised to see the other standing there.

I very slowly walked back around my car, as I did not want to startle my visitor in any way. Apparently Friskies Grillers is a delectable treat, as it went right back to munching away.

You just keep eating, buddy.  I'm going to slowly get the hell out of here.

Needless to say, I did NOT go in the back door.  

Thank you, little skunk, for not spraying me or the house.  Much appreciated.  Maybe my deer friend from the other day has spread the word amongst the fuzzy inhabitants of the neighborhood that I am a cool person, friend to the animals, and they should not mess with me.

Or maybe I should just thank Friskies for being a taste sensation for cats and skunks alike.  

Whatever the case may be, I'm just happy I am not taking a tomato juice bath this evening.

Oh Deer!

Perhaps you will recall (although more than likely you will not), my past failures in attempting to capture the creepy deer in the act of defiling my bird feeder.  It is an ongoing saga, and I have not come out the better in our past meetings.

Until tonight.  Tonight the tides began to turn in my favor.

I cannot claim a complete and total victory, but I did manage to capture photographic evidence of the culprit hanging out in my backyard like it was his own personal Garden of Eden.

Exhibit A

While I did not manage to photograph him in the act of ravaging the feeder, he is standing directly beneath it and eating something delectable from the ground.  Circumstantial evidence at best, but I know he is well aware of the seed supply dangling above his head.

Exhibit B

Apparently finished in that area, he is now on the move.  What would a deer possibly want after eating a nice dinner from my bird feeder and/or flower garden?

Exhibit C

He wants a drink, of course!  He just moseyed on over to the birdbath to get a refreshing drink. Didn't seem to phase him in the slightest that he was walking right up next to the house.  Brazen creature!

At that point he decided to walk toward the far end of the yard, and by the "far end" I mean maybe 15-20 feet from the house.  It's not a big yard.  I had been using my non-existent stealth skills to take the above pictures from inside the house.  I decided it was time to carefully go outside and see where he was headed.

I managed to ascertain from a vantage point on the back porch, aided by my stalwart  freaked-out cat,  that he was now eating dessert from my raspberry bush.  

Oh Hell no!  If anybody is going to eat the raspberries, it is going to be me, damn it!

So I went outside onto the back steps, thinking that perhaps he would be startled and run away because a Human was nearby.  I mean, he doesn't know that I am likely to go all Snow White, Friend of Forest Creatures, and try to talk to him.  I could be a scary hunter with a gun.  His self-preservation instincts should kick in and he should flee!

Except he didn't.  We kind of ended up in a staring contest.

Exhibit D

And once again, I lost.  He didn't budge.  He just stood there and stared.  I cracked, went back inside and got more birdseed, and threw it out onto the lawn to try to get him to come closer.  It didn't work.  He went right back to the berries.

I went back onto the porch where Jazz-kitty, worried that I was going to be eaten by the strange creature in the yard, had been acting as backup.  Eventually he ate his fill and sauntered off, gracefully jumping the fence into the neighbor's yard.

You win this round, deer.

Where he comes from and where he goes remains cloaked in mystery, but I know he will return. 

Following the Crowd (Or Not) -- Musings

**This didn't start out to be a rant, although in retrospect it does kind of sound that way.  Think of it more as thinking out loud, pondering the possibilities, if you will.**

I've been thinking about "followers" lately, especially on Twitter.  This has mainly come about because I seem to get one message a week offering to "sell" me followers.  I tried to get a picture of the last one just now, but it has mysteriously disappeared since last night.

I've long since come to terms with the fact that I am basically talking to myself on there, throwing my thoughts out into the universe and seeing what happens.  I refuse to participate in the "follows for follows" shenanigans, or to accept the many offers to buy followers.  It still amazes me when people favorite or re-tweet anything that I post.  I'm always a bit shocked anyone noticed it in the vastness of Twitter.

I really only have three qualifications for choosing the people that I follow:

1) They are people that I actually know, in real life.

2) Someone randomly followed me, and when I looked at their profile and recent tweets they seemed interesting.  I'll follow them back.  Many times I don't as they appear to be crappy spam accounts, posting the same ads over and over.

3) I also follow people whose work I admire, whether they be actors, musicians, writers, scientists, journalists, comedians -- it doesn't matter.  They have done something which I liked or admired, and I follow them to see what they've got going on.  Also, it would seem that the odds are pretty good that whatever they share -- be it a news story, a discovery, a new band -- it might be something that I would enjoy also.  Or maybe not.

Twitter is also unique in the immediacy with which you can interact with people.  I don't care who you are -- if someone you admire, be they a "celebrity" or not, responds to you in some way, you are going to have a bit of a fan-girl moment.  I'm not saying you will have a public freak-out, maybe more of a quiet "Holy shit!" moment.  Warms the cockles of your heart a bit.

The thing I truly do not understand is the "Follow Me!" phenomenon.  You've seen it at some point.  The seemingly endless parade of people begging others to "follow" them -- especially when it is to someone with thousands (or even millions) of people following them.  What are they hoping will happen?  Am I missing some secret part of Twitter where you score "cool points" by having someone with a lot of followers that follows you?

I'm trying to think of a plausible scenario where such an event might naturally happen...

Okay, let's assume that your favorite actor/musician/fill-in-a-celebrity here is stuck in an airport waiting forever for a delayed flight -- or maybe he/she is on an insanely long flight in the middle of the night, bored out of his/her mind, unable to sleep, and has nothing better to do than lurk on Twitter.

He (or she) sees all of the people begging to be followed.  In a benevolent, sleep-deprived mood they decide to check out some of these people and maybe follow them, knowing that a galactic shit-storm may be unleashed, inundating them with even more requests to "FOLLOW ME!!"

What does the "follow me" crowd imagine will happen at that point?  Are they just delighted to have scored a famous follower, thereby earning popularity in their little niche of the Twitterverse?  Do they think said person will be overwhelmed by the sheer awesomeness of their tweets and they will become best buddies?  Do they secretly (or not so secretly, in some cases) hope that said famous-type will suddenly realize that they have, in fact, found their soul mate, their missing piece, their one true love who has been cruelly kept from them all these years by fate and distance?  I mean, I suppose it could happen.  I'm not out to crush anyone's dreams here.  Who knows?  Maybe it has already happened -- I didn't actually do any research on this.  I'm just saying the odds of that happening are not in your favor.

Think about it.  Look at what you actually post on Twitter.

Based on my own account?  Probably not.  I post a lot of random crap.  I work in a public library, so some of it might be amusing to other library folk, but probably not to someone who travels the world playing concerts or shooting movies.  (Unless they are well and truly bored, and find the minutiae of life on a much smaller scale to be utterly fascinating.) My extensive foreign travels consist of several trips to Canada, our lovely neighbor to the North.  The only obvious connection the two of us would have would be that we are both human beings with Twitter accounts.  We've not got a lot of common ground to start from.  Just as I have no idea how filming a movie works, or how to deal with paparazzi in your face, they probably don't have that much experience dealing with a library patron passed out at a table and drooling puddles atop it. ( Is he just sleeping? Drunk? Dead? That's the fun game you get to play!)

For my part, I'd rather get "followers" by earning them.  We are either friends in real life, or they have seen what I have put out into the Twitterverse and they actually liked it.  I'm not going to beg, plead, or buy followers.  Maybe that makes me old-fashioned, or totally uncool because I don't want the cache of having thousands of followers in an instant.

And if for some reason I actually ever end up being followed by someone I admire (probably a lapse in judgement on their part), that's cool.  It's also cool if that never happens.  I am who I am, with 80-odd followers or thousands.  

I hope people realize they are greater than the number of "followers" they have.

Snippets

I have this habit of writing down bits and passages from books that strike me when I'm reading.  Sometimes it is just the way something is phrased, or it is funny, witty. Sometimes it strikes a deep chord of truth, even if wrapped in a joke. They aren't all from great works of literature, religion, or philosophy. The snippets aren't necessarily deep thoughts that bear reflection and change your view of the world, is what I'm saying.  For whatever reason, at that particular moment they seemed important and worth noting for future reference.

I've been doing this for years -- literally, years.  I have journals full of this stuff.  Being me, I also noted the title, author and page number of each one, like I was going to have to provide a citation in a paper at some point.  They are things I wanted to remember, and I have always remembered things better when I physically write them down.  I was the person in school who took a ridiculous amount of notes during class.

I was reorganizing things last night, and I was moving all of these journals again, and I took a peek through.  I thought I'd share some of them here. Maybe you'll like them too, or feel inspired to read the books they came from.  Maybe not.  Maybe I will unwittingly be giving you a peek into the deep inner workings of my psyche.  Who knows?

On to the snippets (and I will spare the you the page citations.)

Dreams Underfoot by Charles de Lint

He called them mythistories, those odd little tales of his.  They were the ghosts of fancies that he would track down from time to time and trap on paper.  Oddities.  Some charming, some grotesque.  All of them enchanting.  Foolishness, he liked to say, offered from one fool to others.

The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul by Douglas Adams

But it was the chance carelessness of it which particularly appealed to Dirk because words used carelessly, as if they did not matter in any serious way, often allowed otherwise well-guarded truths to seep through.

Horseradish: Bitter Truths You Can't Avoid by Lemony Snicket

Taking one's chances is like taking a bath, because sometimes you end up feeling comfortable and warm, and sometimes there is something terrible lurking around that you cannot see until it is too late and you can do nothing else but scream and cling to a plastic duck.

Shopgirl by Steve Martin

He doesn't understand the subtleties of slights and pains, that it is not the big events that hurt the most but rather the smallest questionable shift in tone at the end of a spoken word that can plow most deeply into a heart.

Personal Days by Ed Park

Jack II says that when you feel a tingling in your fingers, it means someone is Googling you.

I Was Told There'd Be Cake by Sloane Crosley

As most New Yorkers have done, I have given serious and generous thought to the state of my apartment should I get killed during the day.

Who Let the Blogs Out? by Biz Stone

The self-organizing power of a hyper-connected population is frightening to regimes that are used to the illusion that they have control over the information that citizens receive. When knowledge can spread virally anywhere in the world, we will be getting somewhere.

Plato and a Platypus Walk Into a Bar... by Thomas Cathcart

Without logic, reason is useless.  With it, you can win arguments and alienate multitudes.

Austenland by Shannon Hale

I wasn't aware until this precise and awkward moment that when startled in a strange place, my instincts would have me pretend to be a ninja.

A Man Without a Country by Kurt Vonnegut

The arts are not a way to make a living.  They are a very human way of making living more bearable.  Practicing an art, no matter how well or badly, is a way to make your soul grow, for heaven's sake.  Sing in the shower.  Dance to the radio.  Tell stories.  Write a poem to a friend, even a lousy poem.  Do it as well as you possibly can.  You will get an enormous reward.  You will have created something.

My Drunk Kitchen by Hannah Hart

You think that a delicious jelly snack is ever crippled by self-doubt?  Nope.  And you shouldn't be either.

Still Life by Louise Penny

The mixture of cafe-au-lait and impatience was producing an exquisite vibration.

The Bhagavad Gita (I believe this is the edition I read)

The mind that regulates itself by the undisciplined senses loses discernment, as the wind blows a ship from its course at sea.

The Between Boyfriends Book by Cindy Chupack

I believe in soul mates, although lately I've been wondering if mine might be agoraphobic.

See?  Told you they weren't all deep thoughts that would change the world.  I think I've prattled on long enough now.  You're busy.  You've got lots of things to do beside read my nonsense.

Arbitron

"Arbitron" has been calling my house multiple times a day for the last two weeks. Who the heck is Arbitron?

Tonight they called when I was actually at home. I answered since I want to know who keeps calling -- especially since it was now 9:45 pm. 

A guy says hello, then hangs up on me. WTF.  

 I am guessing, based on a quick Google search, this is some sort of survey.  

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nielsen_Audio

Apparently they would prefer to listen to my voicemail message rather than speak to an actual person.  

Good job with the data gathering, guys. Hope you are getting a lot of helpful information from my generic, preprogrammed voicemail recording. 

Poetry Time

I was up in the attic, starting the laborious process of unpacking the heavier winter clothes and storing way the summer ones.  As I was shifting boxes around, I found my memory box.  My mother kept all sorts of papers, art projects, etc. that my brother and I had done when we were in school.  A few years back she gave me my memory box, and I put it in my attic for safe keeping.

When I happened across the box this evening I stopped to take a look through it again.  What started out as a bit of procrastination turned into nostalgia.

Allow me to share with you one of the treasures I found this evening.  My poetry book, which I think was made when I was in fourth grade, judging by the date.

Like the artwork?  I do not know why the rabbit in the corner looks satanic.  The first poem in the book is entitled Easter, so I assume that is meant to be an Easter Bunny.  I think I might have read Bunnicula a few too many times before I drew that.  

And now, without further ado, my fourth grade masterpiece poem entitled Easter  (all grammar and punctuation from the original):

Eggs very brightly colored

Red, Orange and polkadot smothered

Baskets filled up with candy

Look just nice and dandy

The Easter Bunny hops around

To all the houses in the town

Who belong to good girls and boys

Sometimes he gives them toys

Time to wake up early

To see some candy looking nice and pearly

Time to go to church

Happily birds gaily perch

Can't wait until next year

Maybe I will get a gear

So that I can fix my plane

And fly all the way to Maine (to see my parents)

I've got no explanation for that last bit.  We have never lived in Maine, my parents are not divorced so it wasn't like I was going to visit one of them, I didn't go to boarding school, and I most certainly did not know how to fly a plane.  I'm not sure that I had ever been to Maine when I wrote this.  My best guess is that the poem had to be a certain length, and Maine was an easy word to rhyme.  

Barring the bizarre ending, it was a pretty good poem for a fourth grader.  Fourth grade and I was using the phrase "polka-dot smothered"?  Go me!

Binge-watching Netflix Can Lead To Disappointment

aka I'm Going To Whine About My Trivial Problem Now

As you may or may not recall, my television at some point became self-aware determined that it was going to have the final say on what programs I watched.  The tl;dr version for those who don't want to click the link: with no parental controls set of any kind, my television will randomly not allow me to watch shows -- even those rated PG or TV-14.  I cannot fix it.  Verizon cannot fix it.  Since my television still works fine (well...mostly fine), I refuse to buy a new one.

To give you a few recent examples of my television's fine viewing decisions:

South Park -- watch all you want

Saturday Night Live -- absolutely not

Sleepy Hollow --  go right ahead! No problem with this show!

The Mummy Returns -- a PG-13 movie, edited for television?  Nope.

So let's flashback a short time to when the first season of Twisted was airing.  I was actually able to watch the first couple of episodes, and I loved it.  I was hooked! Is Danny really a murderer?  I was vacillating back and forth.  

Turns out I would get to wonder for many, many months.  When the third episode aired, my television decided that I would no longer be allowed to watch that show.  I don't have a DVR, so no skirting the issue that way.  I tried to go in and watch the episodes "On Demand", but was still blocked.  

So imagine my joy when, a few nights ago, I discovered that Twisted was on Netflix.  YES!!  I have no idea how long it has been available on there.  It never even crossed my mind to check for it.  I had accepted my fate of never knowing whether Danny Desai was really a murderer. 

I watched the entire season in a couple of days.  Talk about a cliffhanger ending!  

I needed more!  I had become a Twisted junkie, and I needed my fix.

Maybe the second season is starting in the Fall?  I'll go somewhere else and watch it if my television is still misbehaving. I hit Google up for the answer.

Tragically, my search results told me that the show was cancelled.  Why, why are you doing this ABC Family?!  So now I am back to being bummed out over Twisted again. 

Silver lining: Avan Jogia will be playing Tut in a series/event to air on Spike next year.

 I am going to try very hard not to express any excitement about this, as I don't want to jinx it and/or him.  Maybe if the TV Gods do not think I have any interest in it whatsoever it will all go well, and my television will let me watch it when the time comes.

Ice Bucket Challenge!

Done, baby!  I also donated.  You can donate on the ALS website.  I will also be doing the local walk here on October 19th, and you can send  donation to my walk here.

10 Books That Have Stayed With You

So, I got tagged in a post on Facebook to list the 10 books that have stayed with me in some way.  I didn't want to try to do it in a status update for three reasons:

1) I will screw it up somehow, and then I will have to go back and edit it.
2) I will accidentally post it before I am finished.
3) Some of my choices might need a little explanation.  Rather than having people wonder WTF I was about, or asking in the comments, I figured I could explain here as I go, then post the whole delightful mess to Facebook and tag people.

Without further ado, here are the instructions:

Here's the idea: In your status, list 10 books that have stayed with you in some way. Don't take more than a few minutes and do not think too hard. They do not have to be the "right" books or great works of literature, just ones that have affected you in some way. Tag 10 friends including me so I can see your list:

1) Little House in the Big Woods by Laura Ingalls Wilder  -- All of the Little House books really, and the television show.  My best friend and I loved Little House so much that we used to play it in the back yard, pretending we were members of the Ingalls family.  We might have loved it a bit too much, as we got busted one time for starting a real fire in my friend's back yard to be our cooking fire, and were happily cooking vegetables from our parents' gardens to make soup for dinner.  Needless to say we were the only ones who thought it was totally fine -- our parents did not.  (Hey -- I was a Girl Scout for years!  I had cleared the area, made a stone circle around it so it wouldn't spread.  It was fine, I tell you!)

2) Nancy Drew books by Carolyn Keene.  I read all of them.  I'm only talking the old-school, pearl wearing, roadster driving series.  None of this updated and graphic novel-ized nonsense.  I also loved The Hardy Boys, The Bobbsey Twins, and Trixie Belden, but Nancy Drew was the best!

3) Harold and the Purple Crayon by Crockett Johnson  I remember doing a book report on this in school at one point.  Not sure how I managed to do it.  I still love using pens with purple ink.

4) Cujo by Stephen King.  This was such a bad choice for me!  I was way to young to be reading it when I did, and I already was not a fan of dogs. Our neighbor had a crazy German Shepherd named Schultz that bit the mailman and tore his pants on several occasions.  If we kicked a ball into his yard while playing kickball, one person would be chosen to run across the lawn for the ball while everyone danced around and distracted the dog to keep him from attacking the runner.  There was also a series of mean, super-strength Doberman Pinschers -- all named Rocko -- that lived between our house and the neighborhood park.  Those things would break free from freaking metal chains and terrorize the neighborhood kids walking and riding their bikes past its house.  So I didn't like dogs much.  I didn't get very far into Cujo.  The bit about his eyes glowing red did me in.  I had a chair in the closet of my bedroom, and the moonlight winking off the chair at night had me convinced that they were glowing eyes and Cujo was in my closet waiting to kill me.  

5) The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway.  Hated it!  Absolutely hated it.  It was assigned reading in high school.  I thought it was a colossal waste of time, and the old man should have cut the damn marlin loose sooner.  

6) Bunnicula by Deborah Howe.  A vampire bunny that drains the juice from vegetables?  This book probably started me on my lifetime love of vampire books.  (Except for the Twilight series -- I have no use for those, and only read them because patrons told me they were great.  I will no longer be taking suggestions from those patrons.)  Reading all about vampires at a young age is probably also the reason that -- for years -- I would sleep with a blanket wrapped around my neck.  Boiling hot outside and no air conditioner?  Didn't matter.  Every other piece of my body could be out from under the blankets, but there was at least going to be a sheet wrapped around my neck.  Why? Because in my tween/teen-age brain vampires could only bite you on the neck.  Arms and legs were safe, necks would get you killed by being too delicious.

7) The Sandman series by Neil Gaiman. I love this series so much. Dream and The Endless.  

8) Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen.  I've read it in every format -- even the graphic novel (it exists!) and Pride and Prejudice and Zombies.  I love all of Jane Austen's books, and have read a lot of the biographies written about her as well.  I will admit that after seeing the BBC version, Mr. Darcy will always and forever look like Colin Firth.

9) The Mistress of Spices by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni .  It's like a fable, colliding with the realities of life.  Magical.  

10) The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams.  I love this book.  I can read it over and over again.  The answer is 42, people.


I'm sure there are many, many other books that I should have mentioned.  I will probably think of something right after I post this and kick myself for not including it on the list.  Oh well.  For the time being, and based on my current mood, these are the first 10 books that came to mind which have had a lasting impression on me, for good or for ill.

Now I have to go tag friends on Facebook.

So That Just Happened

I just went to the gas station, which normally is not all that interesting an event --depressing, possibly, when seeing how much it is going to cost to fill up the car, but not interesting.  This trip was different.

I'm at the pump, filling up my car.  A dude in a big pickup truck with Georgia plates is queued up behind me.  I'm about halfway through my transaction when he gets out of his truck, walks over and asks me if I can do him a favor.

Shit.  I'm kind of trapped there pumping my gas, and I assume he is going to ask for money.  Not like I can say I don't have any since I'm obviously buying gas.  I could not have been more wrong.

In his charming Southern drawl, he asks me if I would mind saying something into his phone -- a voice memo only-- so that he can have it to use when he gets back home.  He even held out his phone so that I could see that it was just the voice memo screen.

Okay -- I'm intrigued.  I ask him what exactly it is he wants me to say.  If he says something creepy, or disgusting, or even vaguely threatening, then this deal is off.

Apparently he has a buddy named Joe, and they like to pull pranks and jokes on each other.  He wants me to say, "Hey Joe, Fuck off!" into his phone.

I must have given him a quizzical look.  He explained that it wasn't for anything bad, but it sounded more "official" when someone from "up here, ya know, near New York City" said it.

Sure thing, new friend.  I'm happy to tell your buddy Joe to go fuck himself -- because I'm "official" sounding.

He recorded the voice memo, played it back for me, shook my hand, and got back in his truck to wait for me to finish pumping my gas.  That was the entire encounter. I don't even know the guy's name, and he didn't ask mine.

I found it all amusing, if a bit odd.  In retrospect (all 15 minutes of it), I have some questions.

1) Why do weird things like this always seem to happen to me?

2) How did this dude know that I would be cool with dropping the f-bomb for him?  Do I exude some sort of aura that says I am comfortable with profanity?  He picks the wrong person and they are likely to tell the attendant he is harassing them, or smack him. I'm glad to know that I don't seem uptight, or look like such a question would get my knickers in a twist, but I'm still a little curious as to how he knew I would be cool with such a request.  Does he think everyone who lives here is just waiting for the opportunity to tell someone to fuck off?

3) I don't think I have much of an accent. Do I have that much of an accent?  Apparently I have enough to sound "official" to someone from Georgia.

4) This better only be for his buddy Joe.  I don't want to read about a bank robbery or something where the perpetrator used a recording of someone telling a guy named Joe to fuck off.


***On a totally unrelated note***


Look what was delivered to my house about a week ago:

Yes, because it has always been my lack of knowledge about your website that has kept me from joining you.

That makes 14 visits in just over 4 years, friends.  Just keeping you in the loop.