Photo Dump: Outgoing Blackberry Edition

We’re switching over to new Blackberries at work tomorrow (Holla) so I had to pull off the few photos that were saved onto my current device.  Its memory maxed out at, like, 7 of them so I’m hoping our upgrade might offer more storage in that department.  It’s very frustrating to not be able to photograph a magical, fleeting moment because of the darned “File System Full” error…

So without further a-doo-doo…

Big Choochin, spendin’ Gs, it’s just that jigga man Chooch and…. AHEM HEM I’m stopping I’m stopping. 

Chooch’s favorite activity is lounging on the bed and snatching things off our night stands when we’re distracted while getting ready in the mornings.  I actually think he is being belligerent because he knows showers+hair dryers+closets opening=Impending Abandonment.  Poor baby.  Breaks my heart.

Umm, see what I mean…

I probably should have stopped him here but I was too busy cracking up! love his little eyebrows stuck on the rim. 

This was me as “Panda Claws” at the Zoo back over Christmas…. a proud moment.

Oh hai…. Just reading a text book….. with my blinged out headphones….. Don’t hate the player hate the game. 

Where do you GET headphones like this!? I can only assume they are the result of these things mating…

OH and to make matters worse… I was standing immediately over this guy on the metro and of course was trying to discretely take this picture… I guess I had some stupid “loud” profile enabled, because when I pressed the button it made the little ker-CHUNK! fake shutter sound.  OMG I was mortified and thought this gangster was going to turn around, narrow his eyes, and take me down to Chinatown.  I mean normally you wouldn’t fear that from a gentleman of his demographic but WITH THOSE HEADPHONES WHO KNOWS.  Guy is NOT messing around.

OK one last dumb story that I just have to document for eternity.  UMM remember, like, yesterday when I acknowledged that it was probably irrational for me to fear the blender? (If I didn’t believe it to be irrational then, the act of typing in “…for me to fear the blender?” just sealed the deal).  Dudes I can’t help, the thing is so loud and powerful it sounds like a freaking Airbus in engine distress and all I can think is that it’s going to explode, or take off, or attack me, or just combust in some way.  So to make another Home Alone reference, blender=terrorizing, bullying furnace.  ANYWAY apparently it was not in fact irrational, and was actually a deep, subconscious self-defense mechanism, cause today…………JEFFREY EARMUFFS……….. I freaking turned the blender on WITH A SPOON IN IT.  I thought I was gonna die. 

I’m happy to report that all involved in the incident (appliance, utensil, and moronic human operator) survived unscathed.  A good fortune I most certainly do not deserve.

It’s Electric (Boogie Woogie Woogie!)

In the category of Dumb Stuff of Little Interest Happening in My Life, our car has turned on me for reasons unknown.  Hypotheses include: it’s sick of me starving it by putting off getting gas till the last possible minute, it’s not gotten over a minor scratch inflicted by me in a 2009 run-in with a parking garage pillar, it’s run out of subtle ways to tell me it hates the Delilah show and is embarrassed for both of us when I blubber into the steering wheel on the drive home from Target because our host picked the WRONG day in my cycle to read a letter from some 11-year-old with a father in the military.  Etc.

Regardless, our beloved little chariot has a habit lately of delivering a vicious electric shock every time I exit and close the door.  And yes, I know I am not the first human in the history of the western civilization to get shocked by a car door, but guys I am talking some serious wattage here, to the point where it’s really painful and I’m physically jolted.

So, think less of your garden variety doorknob shock and more like Alan riding the lightning…

Or Marv being on the business end of another one of Kevin McCallister’s extremely inventive booby traps (Marv when will you ever learn!?)

So, naturally, I asked Google WTF the story was here.  I was informed that it was just an excess of static, probably from a jacket or shoes or just something random.  And that I should instead put my hand on the glass to close the door.  (GENIUS, Google!).  (No I’m not being sarcastic, I probably should have thought of that). 

Except right below those very comforting responses was this little nugget:

“Be careful with static electricity when pumping gas.  The Petroleum Equipment Institute (PEI) has documented 129… [static gas pump fires]…since the early 1990s.”

OKAY!  As if the world isn’t already a terrifying enough place to run around in when you’ve got anxiety issues.  Now I’ve got to worry that static from my fleece is going to cause me to blow me up in a blaze of glory at the gas pump, like some mob boss or character in a John Grisham film.  And that is no way for a good man to go down.   

So this has thus been added to my list of irrational worries right between “Escalators: friend or foe?” and “Just to be on the safe side I’m going to step a few feet away from this blender when it’s on, which is totally what any reasonable person would do.” 

Awesome.

Please Tell Me I’m Not the Only One Who

Had to consult Wikipedia to assess if this guy from Black Swan…

Was the same actor as this guy from She’s All That…

They are NOT the same person, can you believe it!? What a disappointment…

Around Town

Today was a treasure trove of random sign hilarity.

Fig. A, from one of those emergency exit signs by the hotel elevator:

BAHAHAHAHA you guys.  I noticed this just as the elevator door was opening (with people on it of course).  I was too busy silently having a fit of cackling (and digging for my Blackberry to document the moment) that I didn’t even realize there were people standing there until they were like “Hi………Hello?…… Are you……..?” and I’m standing there holding the phone up and I’m like “OH HI THERE….. No….. You guys go ahead…. I’m….. no the sign just says ‘Whoop Whoop’ is all…. it’s….. OK nevermind thanks.”

Fig. B:

Now, I LOVE a good PSA but how about some basic freaking manners, Washington District of Columbia?! WTF gives?!

Let me rephrase this for you, since your communications team obviously is a bunch of inconsiderate dumbos: “Please shovel your sidewalk.  Please don’t but pedestrians in danger.  Please shovel your sidewalk within 24 hours after the storm ends.  Thank you. “  This leaves me in an infinitely better mood! 

At first I didn’t even notice that text in the bottom right and I thought the “Shovel your sidewalk” message was all there was to this.  Like, “Shovel your sidewalk, you ignorant sloths.  Thx.  The end.  Merry Christmas.  I hate you.  BYE.”

Loving/Hating

Loving:

 

Photo credit- thanks- I snarfed them down before I had the chance to photograph.

Oh.  Mah.  Gah.  Oh.  Mah.  Gah.  Try these things.  For real.  I don’t even know where to start.  I was prepared for disappointment when I begrudgingly chose this semi-healthy, low-carb, “reasonable” snack.  I was blown away.  They are still, you know, glazed… but the ingredients are surprisingly clean and, as mentioned, they freaking taste like Skittles.  Try them and come back here and tell me they don’t.  Starbucks glazed cashews=magical unicorn chow.

Hating (Well not really hating, but just mourning my unmet expectations): OXO hand chopper (AKA imitation slap chop).

 

Some background.  Occasionally I will meticulously deliberate dumb household purchases.  There are a few explanations behind this, the primary one being that I may or may not just have a smidgen of OCD in my genetic makeup, I am also big on simplified living and clutter gives me meltdowns (see previous remark), and our 800 square feet doesn’t afford a ton of storage space so combatting clutter is critical.  Does that little bit of alliteration make my story about The Mental Process That Led Me to Buy a Slap Chop more interesting? I sincerely hope so.  SO anyway I think hard about what value a new item adds, and I really have to prove to myself that it brings something unique to the table that something else in the house isn’t already doing. 

I wanted a slap chop because chopping multiple veggies and herbs on a cutting board is basically a 9 year committment, and my food processor makes me stabby because I can never figure out how to click all the pieces together, and afterwards I have 5 pieces to hand wash.  Annoying.  I thought this would really improve my life when it came to prepping multiple veggies.  OK I’ll shut up now before you all hurl yourselves in front of traffic from the pain/boredom of this explanation.  

I went through all this in my mind while we drove back from PA on Sunday, which is where I do most of my pondering of life’s great quandaries.  Poor Jeff is confined in the car with me and has to suffer through 3 hours worth of random, disjointed, stream-of-conscious thoughts from me. 

“Jeff?”
“Yea?”
“What would you think if I got a tattoo?”
“Umm, I don’t know.”
“Isn’t there a federal holiday next month?”
“President’s Day.”
“Mmm OK.  I think I want a slap chop.”
“Okay.  Is that the end of your question?”
“Yea.  I’ve been giving it some thought and I think I want one.”
“………Okay.”

So as soon as we got home I dropped my stuff and was like BRB GOING TO GET A SLAP CHOP and battled my way through heinous Bed Bath and Beyond parking in hot pursuit. 

The thing is an awful disappointment.  It has a million pieces I can’t figure out just like the stupid food processor, the blades would pop out and almost lob my digits off when I tried to dismantle it, it doesn’t chop herbs and only succeeded in putting zig-zag blade patterns in the leaves, instead of chopping veggies they just disappeared into the bowels of the device, and various other first world problems which I’ll quit with right now.  I’m holding onto this thing because unlike knives and bulky cutting boards and the food processor, HOME BOY GOES IN THE DISHWASHER! AWW YEA!

Forcing myself to end this train wreck of a post in 3…2…

Hell is Whole Foods on the Weekend

The Chez Becker Writing Nook

Since I’m still all writers-blocky this week I’m going to take this opportunity to give you a tour of my illustrious “home office.”  The proprietress over at I Pick Pretty (seriously this chick is full of awesome ideas) issued a prompt for people to show their writing spaces.  Fun!

Get ready, world….

Hold onto your hats, cats…

Yea, there’s not a lot to it.  The desk is a serious cheapo (think $45 from Office Max) and just barely survived our move into this house a year ago.  Occasionally I have to right it when it sort of starts to slide down the wall at dangerous angles, and the desk surface is separating from the legs and being desperately held on by Cams A and D.  I hate even moving the laptop on and off it because I worry the 2 pound weight transfer will send it crashing to its demise.  To the right lives the printer and Chooch’s basket of toys, which theoretically slides under the printer stand, but is usually out with its contents strewn about. 

Here’s a wider angle of the room…  

Aren’t these books cool? Textbook of Geology and History of Pennsylvania from my Grandfather’s collection.  So neat.  On the left is me and the Nationals Teddy mascot (WOO!) and over on the right is Jeff’s famous Snuggie picture.  And on the top ledge is homemade art by our niece! Love it.

 Yep! This is where the magic happens!

Loving/Hating

Sorry, one of these days I’ll get back to writing actual words and sentences and verbal-type stuff.  That day is not Monday. 

Thing I love right now:

I love, love, love me some tomato soup.  Lurve.  This soup is my BFF because 1) it’s a party in my mouth and 2) once the temperature heads south of 45, I start to look for weekday lunch solutions that don’t involve me going outside.  Also around that time of the year, my mind starts to be genuinely boggled at the idea that so many Americans electively live in places like Chicago and Minneapolis.  Like, millions of you! Again, I’m not just making idle chit chat, I consider this to be a truly boggling life conundrum. I can only assume that the early nomadic settlers arrived to these locations in, like, July.  But then they stuck around! Thank you sweet Lord that I was born in the mid-Atlantic and well after the advent of electricity, cause if that was me and November set in, I’d be like oh HELL no and huff it back down to Mexico and become an Aztec or something.  Cray cray Northern folk!

Thing I hate right now (and always):

Why won’t this broad leave! I hate to be a hater but geez this campaign has got to end.  I just read on Wikipedia that “Flo” is actually becoming known as, like, a hugely popular and iconic advertising character.  Am I the only one who has been supremely irritated by these commercials for years?! They haven’t even worked because when I went to Google that picture I typed in “Flo Nationwide” on my first pass.  Whoopsie.

Photo Dump: Farm Show Edition (Moo)

I finally made it home this year for the PA Farm Show… which is kind of a big deal for our state, and also happens to be the largest indoor agricultural event in the country.  Be impressed.  So big, that we have an entire 24 acre building dedicated to it, aptly named The Pennsylvania Farm Show Complex.  Our state’s crown jewel exposition venue=The Farm Show Complex.  You get invited to the Governor’s Inaugural Ball? It’s at the Farm Show Complex.  It smells like livestock year-round.

Here they were growing corn right in the exhibit hall…

Me and Mama testing the tractors!!!

Umm, did you know tractors cost $126,835?!

This exhibit was supposed to be state of the art animal housing but it kind of made me want to be a vegetarian

PEEGIES! Squee! They were born on Christmas.  (Don’t they look huge?!). The farmers assured us they were happy little pigs in there…. hrmmph…..

Chickies! Umm, ditto on the hugeness here.  The nice farmer man said “Yea, they’ll be five pounds in 30 days” and when my eyes got huge added “Yea it’s, like, just genetic”.  Gack….. genetically freaking modified maybe…. Gahh!!

Om nom nom I almost justified getting these… for the Dairymen’s Association! Support local ag! A good cause!

The milking demo was very conveniently broadcast for us while we waited in the milkshake line…

YUM… and I appreciated that I was allowed a half-and-half one! (Choosing between vanilla and chocolate=not possible).

Loved this guy with his sheep hat… Too funny!

Going on the last day always has its advantages…

Livestock Association… Respect…

Alpacas, suckahs!

Baby alpacas! These guys are a year… (the brunette in the preceding pic is Mom)

What is the difference between alpacas and llamas?!

“Inquire of me…. Now. Thanks”

The PA Cattlemen’s Assoc will judge you…

Yeeeeaaaa……

Hee

Emblazoned on the floor!

Butter sculpture! (We also heard someone get paged to report to the butter sculpture)

These sheepies had just been sheared and were rocking some sweaters! Too cute!

Well hi there!

Bah…

This guy killed me.  So funny…

Umm, dairy cows are huge…

I wanna be a farm kid.  This girl was like 11 and escorting this thousand pound cow around.  Jealous…

The end… smell ya later!

Air Florida Flight 90 Anniversary

Did you know today is the 30th anniversary of the commercial plane that crashed into DC’s 14th street bridge?

There was a feature in the commuter paper today which I ended up reading… Wow. I mean, this is a well known bit of local history that I was always sort of aware of, generally speaking, but it is actually more of a harrowing story than I even imagined.   The cockpit transcript is absolutely bone chilling, for one- but the crazy thing is that there were miraculously a tiny handful of survivors that treaded water in the iced-over Potomac for twenty nine minutes before helicopters were able to rescue them.

Wikipedia also describes bystanders and emergency responders crowded on the bridge and on the shore of the river just watching these survivors but unable to help them because of the weather and other conditions.  One CBO office assistant was the only one to strip down and jump into the iced water (and the crash site of a Boeing 737, and underneath a structurally compromised bridge) and pull to shore a woman who lost her grip trying to get to the helicopter.  Another one of the crash survivors died in the water after having twice passed the rescue line to others.

Wow.  At first my stupid reaction was “How did people just stand there!!!!!” I guess we’d all like to think that in a disaster, we’d be the sort of person to put aside our own safety to save a stranger, but…? I can’t say for sure I would have.  And not because I would want to protect my personal existence, but because I would feel a responsibility to stay alive for husband and parents and kids if I had them.  I guess my question is… If you make a family, don’t you sort of then have a moral obligation to do your best to stay safe for them?

What would you do? (And God willing may you never have to find out).

And for all those souls, prayers/comforting vibes/whatever this little corner of the internet is capable of doing.