So my stint of productive Sundays ended when I celebrated Cinco de Mayo on Cuatro de Mayo and knocked myself out of commission until Seis de Mayo. Not much to blog about other than the usual antics, and thus a week of barren nothingness.
Slug sex is almost as good as seahorse sex, but I can't find a decent, linkable video of that. (Decent = not recorded with a camera phone at an aquarium with a thousand screaming kids in the background.) So here's to being second best. Enjoy!
I haven't had (or really needed) a full-on Life Improvement Sunday Workshop lately, but my recent barrel o' Sundays have been quite productive and enjoyable nonetheless. Most of them involve cooking, tex-pats, music, and trippy screenings of films from yesteryear. This Sunday was a little different, in that I had a wild hair up my butt to bake something, which happens once every year-and-a-half or so.
Everyone knows my favorite food is bacon, but another fun Kat-factoid is that I love chocolate chip cookies. Real original, huh? I am pleased that other people share my love for these two foods and see the potential in mixing them together. With my knowledge of baking being zero, I've been patiently waiting for someone to invent a method for doing such a thing.
The results weren't what I expected, but the cookies still taste pretty good. They're better than they look anyway, especially considering this is a camera phone pic:
I started with three pounds of bacon, and kind of burned the first batch on the stove since I wasn't familiar with Joe's kitchen and equipment. Since wasting edible bacon is a crime, I gave it a good home in my belly while I put the next load in the oven.
I used dark chocolate chips only (no white), and I think I may have used a few too many, which made the cookies more chocolatey than baconey. I also may have eaten some bacon from the oven too. My memory is a little hazy from all the smoke. The recipe calls for crispy bacon to mix into the cookies, and not all of it came out that way. The consistency of the bacon inside the cookies tasted fine once baked, I just wish there had been more of it. I think using larger pieces (Junior Mint-size instead of M&M-size) would have helped too.
The glaze wasn't that important to me, so we just threw together some stuff that Joe had in his kitchen. We only had a little over a cup of powdered sugar, so we used corn syrup for the remaining cup. We didn't have maple extract (who keeps that shit around?), so I made a similar (?) concoction with some remaining almond extract and pure maple syrup. I also mixed in a few stray bacon pieces, hoping the salty juices would add a little flavor. The jury's out on that one, but the glaze was still a lot better than I thought it would be. If you just dump it on the cookies, you'll make a royal mess, so I recommend using the glaze as dippin' sauce. And instead of crumbling more bacon on top, just wrap the cookie in a strip of bacon. Like all things, it will taste better when wrapped in bacon.
Thus concludes my yearly attempt to mix more than three ingredients together and heat them. Joe's kitchen is still intact and no one died. People even ate these things and liked them. Like Thanksgiving in September, I made cooking history in my own little world and got to eat afterward.
Just in case this quasi-annual baking jaunt ever takes off, we've already formed a marketing campaign. "Kat's Cookies: They taste better than cigarettes."
If I ever find myself in a high-speed police chase, I will have the appropriate music, composed by none other than Miss April at her stylin' new organ.
Icanhascheezburger is looking for moderators here in Seattle. If I could work here, I'd be teh MOSTest happay! My LOLcoverletter:
Hai,
I lurves the lolcats so much, I maek mahself teh honorary lolKat in picturz attachd. I liek teh kittehs, but no can has aminals in mah parment.
I can has flexibul schedul and extra-moar good werk ethik (evn tho ah sitt all day an look at an maek teh lolcats). Iz a reel writr/editr in reel lief and Iz verrah techniclee savee. Also iz intristd in teh viral innernetz lexikahn. Iz lookin fer part-time werk to kombain wit othr werker-human activahteez.
Also throw in a Kerbey Lane-ish breakfast, monkey party shopping, reuben sandwiches, Pee-Wee Herman jokes, and homemade carrot cake, and I gotta say it was a good day.
Believe it or not, there's such a thing as public transportation etiquette. Even though no one practices it 100 percent of the time (myself included), it's good to know the rules. Similar to my partial listing of the Gym Rules They Don't Post, here are some idiocy-inspired guidelines for a calm, uneventful journey. (Note: The Gym Rules They Don't Post are also applicable to the bus, and pretty much anywhere members of the public congregate.)
Find a seat promptly. Now is a good time to practice thinking on your feet. It is likely that there are people behind you who are also attempting to board the bus and find a seat, and they'd rather not stand behind you while you perform a cost/benefit analysis of whether it's best to share a seat up front, or find an empty row near the back.
Hold on tight. Now is not a good time to relish in your vertigo. Move to the first row of seats quickly so you can make use of the handles at the back of each chair and steady yourself so as not to slam into those around you when the bus lurches forward. You may be taken by surprise, but remember, the bus isn't doing anything wrong. It's moving like it's supposed to. If you're flailing about due to this undiscovered revelation, you're just a jackass with no self-control.
Don't ask questions. If you're already on the bus and it's moving, it's fine to ask the driver for clarification on the stops he makes. But if you're some tool on the street who didn't map a route to his destination before leaving the house, the bus driver is not obligated to do it for you on the fly. In fact, you can call Metro's Rider Information Phone System and talk to someone who's job it is to answer your questions. So pick up a phone and quit wasting everyone's time.
Shut the fuck up. This rule applies mostly to commuter buses. These types of buses transport regular working people like me to our place of business. We make use of our time on the bus to catch up on e-mail, read books, and mentally prepare for the day ahead (or relax after a full day's work). While it must be super to work on a rotating schedule, please spare the rest of us of your boisterous ramblings as the result of your fabulous mid-week bender of drinking paint thinner and sniffing glue.
Avoid using your cell phone. See previous rule, "Shut the fuck up." Sometimes it is necessary to make or take a call in order to inform your boss, coworkers, or family of your whereabouts and ETA. However, it is not appropriate to engage in a long emphatic conversation in your shrill native tongue with an entire bus full of people as your captive audience. We also don't need to hear your flight plans for next month, how good your mom's casserole recipe is, or whether you think it's going to rain tomorrow. (FYI: Yes, it's going to rain tomorrow, and the day after that.)
Don't sit by me. I'd prefer this to be a no-exceptions rule, but when the bus is crowded, go ahead. (No fatties.) Nothing irks me more than some asshat who gets in my space when there are a million empty seats to choose from. Even when one person occupies each row of two seats, I hate being the first to give up my spare seat. It makes sense that a seat by me would be preferred; I'm female, so I'm generally smaller and I smell better. I don't partially commute by bike, so I'm not hauling around a gunny sack of shit everywhere. Still, the extra three inches of room doesn't mean it is my destiny to be rubbing thighs with you for the next hour. But speaking of commuting cyclists...
Rack your bike right. I can't give specific directions on this because I don't ride a bike and then change my mind part-way through and decide to take the bus. If you do this, learn how to use the bike racks at the front of the bus properly to avoid long interruptions that inconvenience the driver and his passengers. If you must "learn by doing," start practicing on a bus that isn't en route at rush hour with a zillion commuters on it.
Pay quickly and disembark. Many buses in Seattle are pay-as-you-leave. If you happen to work for one of the handful of companies in the city that don't offer a Flex Pass, have your money out and ready to deposit when you reach the front of the line. It goes without saying that the driver can't make change, so don't ask. Once you've paid, swiftly exit the bus and stay the hell out of my way. Thanks!
1. Wildfires killed three people in Ordway, Colorado, which is located in one of the counties I supported when I was working at Hart. Having spent countless hours at the County Clerk's office, I got to know some of the ladies there pretty well, and I hope they're all okay. I feel silly admitting this, but I kind of want to call them, just to see how they are and tell them they're in my thoughts. Nice as it sounds, it may also be really inappropriate. I don't even work for Hart anymore, and neither do most of the people who were there when I left. In fact, at the rate it's being run into the ground, it's quite possible that Hart no longer exists, and the folks in Ordway forgot all about us anyway. So it might be a bit odd to receive a phone call from me, some old hired hand who hung around and made sure their election equipment didn't fail. Okay, it's settled then. No phone call.
2. BluWater is the place in Kirkland with the good carrot cake, which I've dragged many a poor soul around the K-land waterfront desperately seeking. I discovered the true location of the notorious carrot cake by accident yesterday. Funny how downing six glasses of wine during one's first time in a city can cloud the memory. Anyway, once seated, I quickly learned that carrot cake is a seasonal item at this establishment, and they don't have it right now. So I guess I'll just have to wait until carrots (?) are back in season.
Fifteen days sober, and at least 15 more to go. I was scared that I'd be spending every evening in my tiny apartment, watching movies, reading books, and engaging in other spinster-like activities. But no, I've been just as busy as I was when I drank every night, and then some.
So the good news is that nothing has changed. The bad news, however, is also that nothing has changed.
I thought that by now I would experience some dramatically beautiful awakening where I realize how good I feel and how wonderful everything is. (My stomach never hurts! My skin is clearer! I'm 10 pounds lighter! The sun is shining! Birds are singing! All that shit!) But sadly, my life still is what it is. And I guess the most noticeable difference is my credit card bill so far this month.
Drinking is just one piece of the puzzle, I'm finding. I think another Master Cleanse is in my future, perhaps longer and harder than ever before.
Heh heh, longer and harder. Glad I've managed to hang onto my depraved sense of humor.
The weather has been so extremely gorgeous or extremely shitty lately (mostly shitty), that I struggle to develop a coherent series of words and ideas to constitute a readable blog post. More random thoughts, directed at people I don't know:
It's going to rain any second. Why the fuck are you wearing sunglasses? Sure, you can do whatever you want, it's not hurting me. But still, I humbly beseech you, what drives a person to don a pair of shades as they walk through the Microsoft campus on a murky Seattle morning? Do you think you're cool? Because you're not.
Could your myspace page use an edit? Don't answer that. Of course it could. Please send me a message or leave me a comment for a list of services. You may be able to find the latest viral video mocking Paris Hilton, and your glittery animated "Thanx for the add" gifs are unmatched by any other, but imagine being one of the elite myspacers who know the difference between "your" and "you're"! For just pennies per word, you could give friends, acquaintances, and total strangers the impression that you've read a book once in your life, or could if you had to!
You could be my soul mate, a Rhodes scholar, a close relative of Brad Pitt, or an heir to the Gates estate—If we serendipitously met and hit it off, but you didn't ask for my name and number, I am not going to feverishly read the Missed Connections section of Craigslist for weeks in hopes of finding you. I don't care how widely accepted a practice it is here, it's a colossal waste of my time when you consider how long it takes to say, "It was nice meeting you. Here's my number. Can I have yours?" But if you're content with accepting huge social losses under the guise of being shy, that's fine. We'll always have that spectacular moment! Just remember, you're dead to me.
Thanks, QFC-in-store-music-selector, for Friday's late-night Rickroll. I think I wet my pants a little.
When you've been playing cards for five hours, and it's late at night, and everyone wants to go home but you, AND your opponent outstacks you 2-to-1, AND he offers to split the remaining prize money 50/50... just go all-in with your next shitty hand so he can stick a fork in your ass before he motors out with $400 and the only attractive girl within a two-mile radius.
I walked a half-mile to the nearest convenience store to buy cigarettes, and smoked one on the half-mile walk back. Since I walked one mile more than I would have in a normal day, getting cigarettes wasn't so unhealthy, was it?
Those little town blues were melting away. I was going to make a brand-new start of it in old New York. But I couldn't make it there. Does that mean I can't make it anywhere?
It is seemingly possible but not probable that I have a problematic lesion on my back that requires either a biopsy for further investigation or an excision which will rid me of concern for good (or at least the time being) but leave me with a big long scar. If I continue to waffle on this issue, which concerns not only my appearance but my health, should I give up on the idea of ever getting my beautiful seahorse tattoo altogether?
I had the chicken shawarma for lunch. But since shawarma is commonly made with lamb, would my shawarma have been tastier with that instead?
If someone ends their relationship with someone else by saying they want one thing when they really want something else, what argument can I make to assume things will be different when they say they want to end their relationship with me?
Certain forms of abuse turn me on, and when I get Rickrolled, I like it. Do both of these things make me a sexual deviant?
The perfect job for me is out there, I'm sure. Will I ever save enough money to allow myself to stop taking work in my current field in order to pursue it?
The NL Hold'em (No Rebuys) tourney is at 6:30. The buses run every half-hour after 8. Blinds increase every half-hour. If I'm short-stacked at the beginning of the fourth round, should I go all-in and save myself the mess of coloring up and waiting around during the break? (I already know the answer to this. I'm just making shit up now.)
I decided not to drink this month and it was a very good idea. Yes, it was.
Last Sunday, I was playing dominoes with Jessica and a couple of friends at the Satellite. Jessica, who is infinitely socially graceful, is very good about casually "reintroducing me" to her friends who frequent the place, since I just moved to the area and am constantly meeting new people.
At one point in the evening, a young man I recognized sat down at our table. Without missing a beat, Jessica said, "Kat, you remember Brett, the filmmaker? Brett, you remember Kat, right?"
Brett and I had met at a mutual friend's art show earlier that month. We spoke briefly, but nothing memorable came of it. Therefore, I didn't mind that he'd forgotten who I was when we met again at the Satellite a couple of weeks later. Jessica reintroduced us, and he made sure to inform me that he knows someone else named Kat, but she lives in San Francisco. As you may have guessed, I found this news thrilling and wish to this day I had informed him that I had a crush on a boy named Brett when I was in the fifth grade, but we lived in Illinois at the time. This type of information is incredibly useful when getting to know someone, and should always be exchanged. What my name is short for also matters very much, since "Kat" is not a real name unless you know the complete history and background of it, and how one could call themselves something so blatantly preposterous.
After I delicately navigated that social trainwreck of a conversation, we ended up having a semi-interesting talk about his independent film projects, and every now and then I was able to get a word in edgewise. I'd say the conversation exceeded 30 minutes and took place well before midnight. He and I were each lucid and acting within reasonable zones of sobriety throughout our encounter.
We saw each other several days later in the company of Jessica, at the Satellite yet again. It was Easter Sunday, so no one was doing so hot, but I remember that he was there and that we'd spoken briefly about something, or at least tried to.
So, fast-forward to Brett's invasion of our perfectly nice domino game and Jessica's spot-on reintroduction. Not only did he forget my name, he didn't even pretend to recognize me. To boot, after Jessica told him my name, he went through the same spiel as our second meeting.
"Kat like the feline?" he asked with slightly overdramatic incredulousness.
"Yes," I replied, "And I believe we went over this when we met before."
He replied matter-of-factly, "You just insulted me."
Funny that he should be insulted when he blatantly disregarded having met me three other times, one of which included a lengthy conversation all about himself. I guess he was so wrapped up in discussing his latest film project that he forgot he was talking to an actual person and not into a tape recorder or microphone. Then instead of humbly apologizing for his bad memory (something I've had to do more than once, no doubt), he had to get all stupid about my not-so-unique name... again.
Everyone at the table was quiet. What do you say to that anyway? "It's your choice to feel insulted" is probably too much reality for a person who doesn't claim to know me, and "I'm sorry" would have been a lie. So, when in doubt, silence works best. He left pretty soon after that anyway.
I know this g00b is used to seeing things from behind the camera, but he could stand to brush up on his acting skills and at least pretend to be interested in someone other than himself.
Although the Valentine's Day season is long-gone, Seattle is still rife with g00bs of all shapes and sizes! April submitted her run-in with one of Seattle's finest g00bs, and you know the party hasn't stopped on my end. Let's get g00bin'!
I was outside of a venue in Ballard during a show when a sexy musician from the opening band approached me and struck up a really great conversation. We discussed our current projects and we were getting a little flirty—shuffling feet and standing closer and closer together. So promising was this encounter that he invited me to his next show in two weeks. I pulled my phone out of my pocket, saying something to the effect of "Hey, let me put that in my calendar."
And then... something, uh, happened...? He replied, "Look, don't get the wrong idea! I'm not asking for your number, okay?"
"Uh, hey... I'm just putting your show in my calendar so i don't forget...? I really want to check it out!"
"Yeah, well, don't get the wrong idea... I just want you to come to my show, nothing else. I'm not trying to get your number or anything."
I laughed because I thought he must be joking, trying to be "West Coast ironic" or something. No, he then backed away from me like I was diseased, terrible-smelling, and/or carrying a gun.
What the HELL was that, PlatKat? Is it because of my pretentious iPhone?! HALP!
Addendum: No April, I can almost guarantee that the type of phone you carry is not the problem here.
G00b Don't Have to Go Home Tonight (Wait, Yes You Do)
Awhile back, I went to a local pub called Six Arms on a Friday night by myself. They had an internet connection and food, and I needed both. They also had beer, which is probably the reason for my encounter with the following g00b.
While I chatted online and played poker for a few hours, fielding the occassional question as to whether I was playing for real money and if I was "winning," I enjoyed one of the pub's signature brown ales five or six times. The beer helped relieve the fishbowl effect I was feeling from online gaming in a public place, which is still taboo despite its popularity. It could have been just me, but some people looked at me as if I were a heroin junkie, so comfortable with my addiction that I had the audacity to shoot up right in front of everyone.
When I finished my game, I left my table and headed to the bar to get a sandwich. I had a decent conversation with a guy sitting next to me at the bar. He wasn't much to look at, but kept me entertained while I scarfed down a reuben sandwich that cost significantly less than $18 (ahem, Pike Place Brewery).
He was a lifelong musician, about ten years older than me. He was in a band, and also worked in a record store to offset the cost of being a lifelong musician with few other marketable skills. However, if talking like a pseudo-intellectual were a marketable skill... man, this guy would be so money.
I enjoyed another brown ale, at least twice, and then it was closing time. My new one-dollar-word-using musical-instrument-player (what, I'm supposed to remember his name and what he played?) companion and I learned that we lived within blocks of each other and headed home. I felt like drinking more, so I invited him up for a beer.
He told me about his music, and I told him a little about what I was doing in town, how long I'd been here, and some of the events that brought me here. He said, "I'm sorry," a little too emphatically... and repeatedly... when I spoke of my recent breakup. I know he wanted to sound nice, but it came out sounding patronizing. I may have fucked up several (thousand) times too many, but he was still in no position to feel sorry for me.
I finished my beer and announced that I was tired and planned to go to bed. He informed me that he'd be happy to stay the night. While I'm sure that was not a lie, I had no interest in any further relations with this guy, particularly when he wanted to exchange numbers and then flinched when I whipped out my Sidekick as if I'd drawn a gun.
After dictating his number to me, he said, "We don't have to have sex. We can just lie down together."
Great, so instead of meaningless sex with someone I'm not even slightly attracted to, I can share a bed with someone I'm not even fucking. Super. I declined once more and led him to the door.
As I opened the door and he walked through, he turned to look deep into my eyes and say the following: "You don't have to sleep alone tonight."
I replied, "I am newly single in a new city. I sleep alone by design. Good-bye."
And that's how you get downgraded from possible drinking buddy to not-a-chance-in-hell-ever g00b.
I'm pretty sure I've been drinking every night since the Fark party. I know I've definitely had drinks every night in the last two weeks. Overall, I had a lot of fun last month, but the alcohol consumption is just getting stupid. And I'm getting fat. So thanks, everyone, for the advance support. I hope that if I tell enough people, I'll feel accountable enough to ensure an alcohol-free April.
In other news, my April Fools Day was weird: -I listened to Kruder & Dorfmeister and reread one of my favorite books, Cat's Cradle. (LGT the partial text of my favorite chapter) -My best friend here said she was moving back to Austin, which is so plausible it actually fooled me. -I got Rickrolled like 40 times. -I tried to perform a social activity in Redmond (in this case, lunch) without acknowledging the squeaky suburban awkwardness that surrounded me. Oops. -I got a voicemail from someone with a Jamaican accent and an Alaskan phone number. -There's a new person on our team at work and he's sharing a cube with someone else on our team; I am very worried that this will set an uncomfortable precedent. -I tried to perform a functional activity in Issaquah (in this case, grocery shopping) without acknowledging the squeaky suburban awkwardness that surrounded me. Oops again. -Serious cat is very serious.
Being on the phone with credit card companies for what feels like hours causes me to draw marching ants and tropical fruit on the conference room dry-erase board.
Some other boring activity causes someone else to draw razor-toothed monsters eating them on the conference room dry-erase board.
Back when I lived in Austin (the first time), Flash Mobs were somewhat prevalent. I hadn't seen or heard of a successful one happening for awhile (then again, it's hard to have an ear to the ground when your head is in the clouds), so I was happy when news of the pillow fight in Pike Place Market hit my inbox. I didn't participate, but I took a few pictures, which you may enjoy as part of Kat's fourth installment of a flickr account:
Today it snowed very hard. It was a big surprise, as evidenced by all of my coworkers unnaturally conversing about the snow, all of my friends asking me about the snow, the TotalFark thread about the snow, and random people I saw throughout the day reacting moronically to the snow. Snow, snow, snow.
Snow.
In light of this natural phenomenon, it was only fitting that I save myself the grueling walk to the cafeteria in another building 100 miles away and instead walk to my friend's car 10 feet out the door and go get sushi. After we finished our lunch and I made a football out of my chopsticks wrapper which I erroneously flicked over my friend's head and onto the table of a couple seated near us, we quickly escaped to the Asian market next door. There, I purchased three items: /$!3@#s^&, Hello Panda, and Choco Digestive.
/$!3@#s^& Oh /$!3@#s^&... what are you, /$!3@#s^&? Your package is a mystery wrapped in a riddle, and can be used as a short strand of oversized anal beads. The only indication of its contents is a strawberry at the top. But upon opening my sex toy candy, I found there was much more than met the eye: In addition to strawberry flavored gummy candy slightly resembling fun-fruits, there were little balls of chocolate mixed in. Score!
Hello Panda Well! Hello yourself, little guy--Ah shit, it's gonna maul me to death! Take cover! Whew. Now that we're safe, Hello Pandas are chocolate-filled chocolate cookies that tasted exactly like the discontinued Koala Yummies of yesteryear, which can now be obtained under the moniker, Koala March.
Choco Digestive This is perhaps the boldest purchase of the three. Though its package is unassuming, the name was too curious to ignore. It has always been a given that I digest my chocolate after I've eaten it, but this product seemed intent on driving the point home. Would these cookies help me digest food better? Would they give me indigestion? Would they accelerate the digestion process? What is going to happen when I eat these?? So far, nothing. I ate at least four of them, but they seem to be moving through my digestive tract with the same ease as regular cookies. The day isn't over yet, so if I end up shitting rainbows (instead of the usual rose petals), I'll post a follow-up.
At the suggestion of a very wise person, I joined the poker group here at work. As I mentioned before, there are no buses that go directly from Seattle to the casinos nearby and I haven't been able to find a live game in town through word of mouth. Naturally, I was overly giddy to find that they hold tournaments in the cafeterias four times a week.
I correctly assumed that the MSFT games would match the demographic of the NI home games I used to hold/attend: Almost all male, twenties and thirties, maybe a few older guys in the mix, almost all engineers, and everyone knows each other. I was on the fence about going (the natural nervousness that comes with the idea of attending a function by yourself, knowing that you won't know anyone there), but decided that I could totally do this. So I did.
Everyone was incredibly nice, but there was no escaping the inevitable. I got called out for being the young white chick at the poker table.
This happens so much that I'm pretty well used to it. It happened as early as my first trip to Vegas ("Smile, honey.") and Garden City ("Tell your boyfriend to give you some money so you can go play pai gow.") through my assimilation process at Bay 101 and my stints at various casinos in AC. Some guy always has to say something that he obviously wouldn't say to anyone else at the table.
Last night, it was an innocuous "Are you here with someone?"
Just to be clear, I'm not offended because I know that the question came so naturally to the guy that he didn't mean it as an offense. Also, I know that he was not trying to hit on me, as we'd been discussing a trip he and his wife took to Texas prior to his question. The guy was not a gregarious "player" type, just an average dude. If he were simply trying to hit on me, this blog post would cease to be.
I believe his intent was to find out whose wife I was in order to properly gauge the amount of shit-talking he could get away with. Well, that's why I would have asked the question anyway.
What he implied though, was that in order for a young lady like me to join a poker game, I must have been "brought." Poker is not a game for women, and while they are generally accepted in most games, it is rare for them to seek opportunities to play.
Such is not the case with me, and since I tend to be a little audacious, I laughingly replied, "I work here. I rode a bus here this morning, saw that there was a game tonight, and decided to play. I know I'm just a woman, but somehow I managed it."
As I'm saying this, other guys at the table quipped, "You joined the autogroup, right?" and other comments that nodded to the fact that my being there alone was perfectly fine. (Unnecessary, but it feels nice to be accepted.)
So this put him on the major defensive. He didn't mean it like that, blah blah blah... I just laughed through it all. I think he was more worried about looking like a dick in front of the other guys than upsetting me.
Anyway, I write all this because I think it's funny how a pair tits and a snatch changes a question like, "I haven't seen you here before; did you just start at Microsoft?" to "Are you here with someone?"
Addendum: The game was a $20 NL tourney with no rebuys. Around 20 people showed up. I think I played alright, but I didn't finish in the money. I started off fairly strong, but the blinds went up more rapidly than I could catch a good all-in hand and a caller. To defend myself further, I haven't played tournament style in a loooong time, as I usually play online where limit games are more lucrative for me.
"No, I don't have a follow-up scheduled right now. How about you concentrate on doing everything you were supposed to do a month ago and I'll make another appointment when you get your shit together."
"Social Quicktip #35: Stop acting like an awkward dweeb every time you are confronted with another human being! And get out of my way!"
"I'd like a taco salad. Oh wait, no I wouldn't... because I already know it's going to taste fucking horrible. The salsa is going to have no flavor, the guacamole is going to be littered with extra ingredients, and you're going to put it in the stalest, driest taco shell that can possibly be obtained from anywhere on this earth."
"Your status message says you're away. Where are you?"
"The writers aren't being difficult because they just received a lot of poorly-kept documents to fix. They're being difficult because they're complete social mongoloids who need to learn how to do their jobs better. And since none of them are here right now, you're wasting an hour of my day talking about this because no one in this room can even begin to take steps toward correcting this problem."
"TAKE IT OFFLINE."
"Oh, you're thinking about leveraging the new editing tool so we can use XML for its intended purposes? Smashing idea, Johnson!"
"You simultaneously creep me out and bug the shit out of me more and more every day. Did you take a fucking class to obtain this skill?"
"Trying to get food when you're not hungry is like shopping for clothes after gaining weight. Can I hang out at the desk with you for awhile?"
2. Awaiting the arrival of a human-sized white rabbit who may or may not be my mother.
3. Circling a large, overcrowded building for over an hour in search of parking.
4. Occupying a large, overcrowded building for over an hour in search of self-validation.
5. Worshipping Jesus as the Christ our Lord.
6. Inviting extended family of my own and/or my significant other to eat dinner in my home so I can spend the day in mild discomfort and the evening talking trash about them once they've left.
7. Visiting extended family of my own and/or my significant other to eat dinner in their home so I can spend the day in somewhat greater discomfort and the evening wondering if they're talking trash about me after I've left.
8. My significant other. (NULL)
9. Hijacking the family of someone I just met to share/avoid the above experiences.
