Playing catch-up

First, the random stuff: This blogger’s post about book burning made me remember how uncomfortable I am with the scene in Better Than Chocolate when one of the characters drops a bunch of books into a garbage can full of water and freezes the whole shebang. It’s an art piece that’s supposed to be reminiscent of the Ice Age and outdated thinking, etc. I like the statement but every time I see the movie, I weep a little inside for the ruined books.

The holiday weekend: Too much time off can just suck ass. I had nothing planned in lieu of my cancelled vacation other than plans to vigorously clean my house on Saturday, which so didn’t happen. I had the best intentions and I was going to stroll into the house and kick ass with Clorox and take names in Hefty sacks, but then … no. I didn’t end up leaving The Land of Housesitting until it was nearly time to meet a friend for lunch. I had just enough time to make it to the post office, the pottery place to pick up my freshly-fired mugs and saucers (one of which I dropped and chipped a few hours later) and the gas station (weeping… weeping…) before I headed for the interstate and … (oh no)

(oh shit) (fuck me I can’t turn around) … got stuck in holiday-related parade traffic.

Forty-five minutes after sitting behind view-blocking fire trucks and SUVs and watching scads of people stream down the sidewalks on the way to their cars to add to the clusterfuck and trying to gouge my eyes out with a spork, I made it to the interstate. Which had been about three blocks away from me most of the time. At one point, I thought I’d be smart and circle around the block and do some fancy maneuvering onto a southbound street. Uh … no. Every street was blocked off and when I rolled down the window and asked a cop if I could get onto XYZ Street, he replied, “Can’t!” with some kind of I-can-block-traffic-with-my-fancy-car smirk. Gosh. Thanks! That’s so helpful. The “…and serve” part of your fancy schmancy motto just went flying out the window, I think.

I finally made it to Starbucks and sat with my friend for awhile (after calling her from the car and few times and offering updates like “We’re moving! We’re moving! Wait. False alarm.”) before I circled back to the city and scurried into my house for some QT with the kitties.

So scarred -- and tired -- was I from The Traffic Jam of 2007 that I stayed in the city after lunch until it was time to hang out with some friends on Saturday night. We watched Heathers, which I love, during which one of the guests offered commentary on the symbolism of the colors used as he had written a paper on the subject. It was pretty cool because he pointed out some things I’d never noticed before, but he also said some of the funny lines before the characters did and I wanted to bean him in the head with a celery stick about halfway through the movie. But vegetable-related violence doesn't lead to future party invitations, so I resisted.

I watched some new-to-me movies over the weekend, including Adaptation, which was weird but awesome; Because I Said So, which was as awful as I imagined and I’m not sure why I watched it other than the fact that it was free and I got an unexpected little thrill from watching the ultra-cute Mandy Moore describe an orgasm; Big Fish, which was awesome and I’m sorry I avoided it for so long because I thought it was going to suck; and re-watching classics like Corpse Bride (AND the special features about the stop-motion animation process, which is SO cool but so much more anal than simply being detail-oriented that it made my eyes hurt).

And some more random stuff: Housesitting and playing fetch with a never-tiring puppy can get old real quick until someone discovers that the bottle of what appeared to just be margarita mix is actually pre-mixed margarita drinkins that requires only one (1) glass and some ice cubes to operate. Babysitting furry creatures just got a little more interesting.