Month: April 2011

Prior to stopping at Oreggano’s for wine and conversation, MiniMe expressed an interest in eating. Instead of going out to eat or getting a cheap drive-thru value meal, MiniMe wanted to go to the world’s largest retailer of natural and organic foods. I wasn’t so keen on this request and attempted to persuade her to go to a local small retailer of natural and organic foods, where we could get less – less expensive food and less pretentious patrons. My attempt was not successful.

Diggler was in agreement with my retail preference, but we both opted to give MiniMe’s suggestion a try. After paying over $20 for hummus, pita, and buffet to-go food, Diggler made an observation, “No wonder they (the yuppy hippies) dress so poorly, they can’t afford good clothes after paying this much for food.” Diggler was right, however, it probably isn’t just the food that sets their budgets back, the money spent on digestives to treat butt and heartburn most likely puts a dent in their finances.

In addition to the cost and side effects, the food was not very good. MiniMe, still a fan, was defensive, “I told you to get the other hummus. Everyone in the hummus world knows the other brand is the best.” “Hummus world?” I asked. “Yes, hummus world,” she boldly replied. “I’m not sure I want to be part of that world,” I informed her. “Me neither,” said Oreggano and Diggler in unison.

In addition to being part of the corporate world, Diggler has been working in the hospitality world as a part-time server. “I love serving,” he told us. “The people are great and so is the money. Speaking of money, the other day one of the cooks went to jail because he was arrested for dealing cocaine.” “That’s never good,” Oreggano commented. “Right,” Diggler agreed, “But he returned to work the next day with gold teeth.” “There’s good money in the cocaine business,” Oreggano stated and asked, “Did he by chance have new rims as well?” “Oh yeah,” said Diggler, “the ride was tricked out. But I don’t understand it. I mean, he is supposed to be deported and he comes back to work with all this bling.” “Deported?” I asked. “Where to? Hummus world?”

As most know, I am a huge fan of the public library. This week, I was pleased to learn that Mad Men Season Four was on the hold shelf awaiting my retrieval. I wasted no time collecting the DVD set and immediately began watching it. Being an avid skier and a professional (both are lies), my time has been limited, so I typically end up watching the series late at night. Last night, after viewing six episodes, I decided to go to sleep. Or, as Tree refers to it, ‘nap.’

A few hours later, I woke up with a desire to style my hair like that of Joan P. Harris – the saucy and voluptuous office manager. So, I pulled out the bobby pins and french twisted my hair like nobody’s business. I then grabbed a mirror to check it out and was blown away by what I saw. First and foremost, my french twist was superb. Second, I was not keen on my profile. In fact, if I had to weigh the pros and cons, I definitely had a confile, not a profile, there was nothing positive about that side shot.

While eating lunch with Sleepless and Q, I shared my recent observation. “From this day forward, I am only going to look at people square on – so they won’t see my confile.” “I’ve never noticed your profile,” said Q. “Well, that’s because I’ve not french twisted until now,” I replied and continued on with my ranting. “They shouldn’t call them mug shots at the jail – they should call them what they are, confile shots. Just a bunch of bad side shots of, not ironic, convicts. And forget about profiling, call it what it is, confiling – looking for the bad or the cons in people.”

I was on a roll and, while looking them square on, continued still, “Grade school photos are to blame, they completely had me fooled. For years – most of which were long before Photoshop – my mom bought the silhouette student photo package. You know the package. Looks like a regular picture with a faded side shot floating to the left of your face.” Both Sleepless and Q nodded their heads as if to say yes. “Well, my confile looked good then, cute even. Now, not so much. Very deceiving. For once in my life, I know how Barbra Streisand feels.”

Sometimes, I like to sit at my dining room table and eat breakfast while looking through the window at the activity outside. Lately, I have had the pleasure of watching the return of last year’s tealight penthouse tenants, the Carpodacus Mexicanus family. The mother recently laid a clutch of eggs and while I enjoyed my breakfast and anticipated the birth of the female babies and fledglings (the female babies are just ‘female babies’ – male babies, they get fancy names), I couldn’t help but think, “It seems a bit contradictory to anxiously await the birth of those babies while eating an egg-filled breakfast burrito.” Then I finished off my burrito and got on with my day.

 

What also seems contradictory is to be on vacation and not watch television. While at the condo, Little Sleep was watching one of her favorite channels, Animal Planet. Not being one to watch television, this was the first time I had watched this channel and, surprisingly, I learned a lot. Sadly, they didn’t air any shows about birds. Fortunately, Cats 101 was particularly informative and I found the various tips provided were applicable for both humans and felines. For example, a domestic longhair requires frequent bathing and brushing. If groomed correctly, the end result is a genuine, glamour puss every time. “Who doesn’t want a genuine, glamour puss?” I asked Sleepless. “This is some really good stuff,” she replied.

 

As I continued to watch, and learn, I was reminded of  Mrs. Slocombe from the PBS classic, Are You Being Served?. Mrs. Slocombe was always ranting about her award winning pussy and, one day while at work, phoned her neighbor with a favor, “Would you go to my front door, bend down and look through the litter box and if you can see my pussy, would you drop a sardine on the mat?” Whether looking through the window or the litter box, what we see and what we think are often two different things entirely.

Nothing beats a lazy Sunday morning. While enjoying our footials, and just before heading out to ski, Sleepless received a text from Progressive saying he had more free ski tickets for us to use. We immediately started texting friends and continually received this immediate response, “You ski?” Yes, we ski. Luckily, One And Done and Thermostat didn’t ask questions, rather, just responded that they were on their way.

Before we even hit the slopes we could tell it might be chilly out – all we had to do was look at Thermostat’s tank top. Even though the temperature appeared to warm up every now and again, a jacket was advised – especially for Thermostat.

Although One and Done and Thermostat opted to experience other trails, Sleepless, Little Sleep and I stayed on First Time the entire time. While riding up First Time for the third or fourth time (for the record, the resort crew thought we were certified ski school instructors), Sleepless and I were discussing difficulty levels and the color system. “I don’t see color,” I told her. “Well, you might want to see color here,” she responded and added, “You really don’t want to end up on a double black diamond.”

Sleepless was right and, because I’m environmentally friendly, I stuck with the Green trail. After skiing, we attempted to pay for the rental of Little Sleep’s skis. The sales associate quoted one price, but after some persuading, we paid a slightly lower price.

A few minutes after that, while waiting for the others to use the loo, Sleepless and I  saw a $2 kamakazi special – sold! After this, we headed to dinner. We made our menu selections within no time and then waited. And waited. Somehow, our order hadn’t made it to the kitchen right away, so,we received a discount and free dessert. “I can’t believe all the great deals today,” said One And Done, “Free skiing, discounted rentals, and now a discounted meal.” “It’s official,” I replied, “Today is Dealdo Sunday!” “Year of the rabbit,” Sleepless added.

 

I’m pretty independent. I live on my own, have a power drill, and I buy my own shoes – a lot like Destiny’s Child. Today, however, when I was in my back lot fixing my fence, I wished I wasn’t so independent. Every now and again, I wouldn’t mind someone else taking care of things like this and doing the dishes for me. By ‘doing the dishes,’ I mean taking them in and out of the magic cabinet.

After a day of yard work, it was a relief to have Sleepless and Little Sleep pick me up and take me to a little resort town just East of my humble abode. Last week, Progressive and Iced Tea invited us to go skiing.  I haven’t been skiing for at least 11 years, maybe 25. Sleepless went last year, but before that, it had been about 15 years. So, when they made the offer, we were all over it. As I told MyFace, “I want to make sure to get one ski day in before the end of the season.” She was laughing so hard she couldn’t respond; actually, now that I think about it, that was her response.

Iced Tea was kind enough to offer his condo to us for the night and we were polite enough to accept his gracious invitation. We arrived to find an incredible condo, just blocks away from the ski resort, equipped with cable television, an entire closet of ski equipment (which we would also be using), and a fully stocked bar (two mini bottles of vodka in the freezer).

The condo had two bedrooms and Sleepless had advised Little Sleep to pick a room. While Little Sleep was doing so, Sleepless whispered to me, “Do you mind if we sleep together? She kicks in her sleep and I don’t want to get kicked.” Having shared a bed with Sleepless on more than one occasion, I didn’t mind.

Just before going to bed we received an extremely entertaining phone call from S-Unit who was completely buzzed in Turks & Caicos. Poor thing was stuck in a luxury suite with mosquito bites all over legs and nothing but antibiotics and a red flag to alert the cabana boy that she needed another drink.

Once we made it to bed we were discussing our great amenities. “Only one or two things could make it better,” I told her, “A red flag and a cabana boy.” “That would be nice,” said Sleepless and added, “I could really get used to this kind of living.” “Yeah,” I said, “It’s not bad.” “No, really, I could be a kept woman,” she told me. “Me too,” I told her and added, “Why do you think I took Italian?” “I don’t know,” she responded. “Me neither, but the instructor told us there are a lot of kept women in Italy. So, I’m halfway there – I’m a woman.”

Oreggano and I were supposed to get facials last week, or so we incorrectly thought. Our appointments were actually for this week and, sadly, Oreggano had to work so I was going by myself.

I am not at all opposed to doing things by myself. In fact, I’ve had some of my best times by myself – wink, wink, nod, nod. As That’s Not Chinese and I once learned at an event sponsored by Dr. BJ, “You are your own best entertainment.” Is it true? Yes it is.

So, this morning as I was getting ready for my facial, I attempted to apply lotion to my body. The tube of lotion was new and appeared to have a thin seal across the top. I couldn’t seem to remove the seal and decided I would attempt to force it off. I grabbed the bottom of the tube and squeezed it as hard as I could so as to force enough air to the top of the tube that the seal would give. Give it did.

Like a fool, I was looking directly at the top of the tube to see if this trick would work. As a result, my face was covered with lotion, as was my hair. I looked like I had just walked off a porn set. The facial before the facial. After cleaning off my face I assessed the rest of the bathroom. I definitely could have reported to authorities that a spank bank had been robbed. Lotion was everywhere – on the walls, the shower curtain, the floor, my bathrobe – literally everywhere.

As The Leaver might say, “this wasn’t my first rodeo,” so I grabbed a couple of paper towels and cleaned up aisle 9.

If you ever have the opportunity to have your name in lights on the marquee, you should probably attend that karaoke theme night. Which is exactly what Sleepless and I did when we saw “Old Fogie Oke Presented by……” on the marquee of our favorite dive bar.

I’ve got a lot of stuff in my box (note to MissInformation: I do prefer to pick what I put in my box), but I don’t have any clothing for mature adults. Thus, a shopping excursion was in order. We found everything we needed for this glorious event. Seersucker casual Dior, plaid polyester leisure suit, snap front house dresses, velcro sandals, glasses, wigs, rain bonnets, Depends and canes. Being that we had a conference the day of the event, we also found a karaoke must-have: colleagues.

Calling The Dog had reserved a suite at the hotel, so we met there for pre-drinks. She had come prepared with two bottles of wine and three bottles of beer. Legal Barista and I decided to contribute to the open bar and purchased two more bottles of wine. Being that the suite was only prepped for two, we had to bring our own glasses, which was easy since we were at a hotel. We stocked up on wine glasses from the conference tables (thank God my purse is big) and were ready for a baker’s dozen.

As we were imbibing and sharing work stories, we started talking about from where we all hailed. The question soon came my way, “Where do you come from?” Feeling a bit spirited, I responded, “My vagina.” It’s funny how quickly you learn that you all have something in common.

Although not all of my colleagues had originally planned on attending karaoke, by the time we could see the bottom of the bottles, most of them had decided to join us. By this time I had contacted my personal driver, Mohamed Ali, and he had agreed to retrieve us from my home. Like a convoy, with designated drivers (yes, even we’re responsible), we headed to my house to dress-up for the event.

Never Had One provided me a safe ride home and, to show thanks, Sleepless and I let her have her choice of clothing from our fine collection. The others soon arrived and  selected something to compliment their already saucy attire – a house dress or Depends for Women seemed to be the preferred accent. Just as we were finishing donning our mature attire, Mohamed Ali arrived and joined us in the parlor.

Being the most responsible and designated driver, Mohamed Ali lead the convoy – even pulling over to allow the others time to catch up. At one point, I started counting my money. $5. Sleepless informed me she had some cash, $5. We were several miles away from the bar and, according to the meter and my superb math, we were about two dollars away from not being able to pay. “You might have to drop us off at $8,” I told Mohamed Ali. “Why?” he asked. “We only have $10 and I want to be able to tip you,” I humbly replied. “No, it is OK. I take you all the way and you not worry about it,” he replied. “Ah, the circle of love,” Sleepless commented from the back seat, “You’re in the circle.”

I was in the circle of love. Mohamed Ali happily accepted our measly payment and I promised to make it up to him next time. The marquee was lit and blazing bright. Plus, I arrived to find D-Dog, Passed The Sniff Test, P-Dub, Drop Zone and Giddy Up ready and waiting for us. Sleepless and I took the stage, in full glory – sans canes, short-term memory loss caused us to forget them – and belted out some of our best tunes surrounded by some of the most Dependsable friends ever.

Scot-tea has been very busy – texting donations and catching up on Toy Story 3 – so it has been several months since we last saw him. Missing us a bit, he invited us to dinner.

Sleepless and I were very excited to see him and catch up on his latest shenanigans. He was filling us in on various aspects of his life when he mentioned that he and a friend had been working on a script. “The idea was similar to Night Court,” he told us and continued to discuss the details of a show based on a legal defender in love with a prosecutor.

“I would love to see the script,” I told him. “Well, we really only got through one and a half scripts,” he told us with dismay. “What happened?” asked Sleepless. “We started working on it one Tuesday night at our favorite Italian bar and had made plans to to meet every Tuesday and Thursday to finish it out.” He then paused, took a sip of his drink and looked into space as if looking back in time. “Anyway, he had worked on the second script and gave it to me for editing. I got about halfway through it and wrote ‘TRITE’ across it. I couldn’t do it – he had one brief joke after the other. Way too trite. We really haven’t hung out much since then.”

Sleepless, both familiar with the law and one to console, comforted Scot-tea,”Oh, that is too bad, I’m sorry.” “Me too,” I said, briefly paused and then added, “However, I must admit, I’m glad your time with him was brief.”

 

The Leaver and QuQueen have been remodeling for the last couple of months and, now that their remodel is complete, they decided to have a housewarming of sorts.

In addition to showing off their new wares, they chose to have a boutique of sorts and sell some of their recently acquired wears. While the guests were snacking on cashew clusters and trying on clothing, The Leaver was hanging out in the porta-shed and I was texting Sleepless. The Leaver isn’t a fan of crowds, so the porta-shed was a good getaway for her – much like Pooh’s thinking spot. Sleepless had originally planned on arriving with me, but got waylaid. A few minutes after sending me a text letting me know she was on her way, she sent another text, “Get the camera ready:)” This was some of the best advice she has ever provided me this past week.

True to her word, the camera was needed upon her arrival. What for most would have been a walk of shame, Sleepless made a walk of fame. She was proudly donning a pair of two inches too big Converse No Lace  All-Star Slip-Ons, over-sized cargo shorts and a t-shirt that read “Big Happens.” The only thing missing from this ensemble was Oreggano and the Infront.

“Wow,” The Leaver expressed in complete awe. “I don’t even know what to say. I can’t even look at you.” “Why not?” asked Sleepless. “You are dressed like me. I’m going to have to change my look,” said The Leaver and then went straight to redemption mode. “Not because you look bad, but because it’s just not stylish. No more t-shirts and shorts for me.” The Leaver really struggled with looking at Sleepless in this attire and, when she would accidentally catch sight, she would tell people, “Wow, wow. She really doesn’t normally dress this way. Usually she wears things that show cleavage. She does not usually dress like me. I’ve got to go check on something.”

This last comment was code for ‘going to smoke in the porta-shed.’ While at the porta-shed she seemed to, like Sleepless, have gotten waylaid, because when she finally returned most of the guests had departed.

Sleepless and I were sitting in the front room chatting with QuQueen about the success of their sales and The Leaver,  finally able to look in the mirror, aka, look at Sleepless, joined us. “It feels so good to have our house done. I can’t wait to start cooking in the kitchen again.” “I didn’t know you liked to cook,” I commented. “Oh, yeah, I love it,” she responded. “What do you cook?” asked Sleepless. “Well, Greek spaghetti is the only thing I know how to cook, but I also like to make tea.”

I have a feeling we’ll be sipping tea and eating Greek spaghetti and Sleepless’ Lucky Charms in no time.

Oreggano and It’s The Eyes have had the privilege of getting together for planned activities twice in the past month. The most recent event being very important in that they were celebrating their birthdays. Always up for a celebration and an opportunity to dress up, Sleepless, That’s Not Chinese and I pulled out our best dresses, applied our fake eyelashes, threw some saucy headbands in our hair and stepped out into the inclement weather for this much anticipated doubleheader.

As we were deep in the throws of festivities, Sleepless was looking deep into the bowels of the crowded venue. That’s Not Chinese noticed her intent yet distant look, thus, Sleepless provided an explanation,  “Sometimes, I’m such a bitch. I don’t mean to be, but sometimes I’m a real bitch in my head.” “Me too, girl. Me too,” That’s Not Chinese consoled her. “Just remember,” she added, “We’re the head sisters.” Although we know this is a reference to our headbands, the waiter – who had walked up just in time to her this declaration – may have a different interpretation.

It’s The Eyes was sipping on a glass of grigio – courtesy of me, of course – when she made an announcement, “I like my wine with Sprite. What can I say? I’m trailer trash, I’m picky like that.” This comment conjured up great memories for That’s Not Chinese, “I remember when I was making fun of people living in trailers and Oreggano told me she lived in a trailer. I was so proud to tell her my mom was on welfare.”

Around this time a side comment was made, “It’s always a treat to have extremes of socioeconomic levels at the same table.” This comment came as a bit of a shock to all of us and, as many people do when they’re not sure what to do, we laughed. Oreggano, unbeknownst to her, took care of this awkward moment by returning to the table with an announcement, “We’re gonna have an exclusive party at the next venue.” “Id like to point out that our exclusive party looks like two parties,” said Patty Melt.

Our exclusive two parties then headed to the next venue where we joined up with a bachelorette party. “Every time we come here we are greeted by girls with penis straws,” Oreggano observed and asked, “What is up with that?” “We’re the head sisters,” quipped That’s Not Chinese. Home run….or is that third base?