Weekend Update

I went wild yesterday and took the whole day off to do things like eat leftover pizza and see Frost/Nixon (which was incredibly good and a lot funnier than I was expecting). I snuck in a Diet Coke and a box of sour fruit snacks and Daniel went all out with this hot, stinky Subway sandwich. Now we're huddled in this mod business building on Columbia's campus and taking advantage of the sweet, sweet internet.

My phone has been very disappointing lately -it's on its last legs and now when I open it I just get a blank white screen that takes a minute or two to go away. I went to the Verizon store and the laconic sales clerk told me that I can get a new one in April. Can it hold out until then? Probably not, but we'll see.

I'm almost finished with Dracula and am looking forward to my next book. I'm starting to view the bookstore as my own personal library. I'm not looking forward for the course rush to be over since I'll probably be kicked out of the back office and put back on the registers.

Signs and Things

When I was at the Goodwill in Pittsburgh, I saw this case that looked like some sort of makeup kit for a twelve-year-old. Looking closer, I noticed that it said:
















For those who do not want to click, it reads,

Outdoor life with love
Caravan
Great nature is now calling you for refreshing.
Let's go out for bathing in the glaring sun under the blue sky.
Have a pleasant meat time with your intimate friends.

Turns out, the kit was a picnic set full of plastic dishes and silverware. Had I any conceivable use for it I probably would have bought it. I'm not sure if 'pleasant meat time' refers to eating meat or is just a spelling error for 'meet'.

Also in Mt. Lebanon:

Wow! Dr. Tesla in our own hometown!







How have I passed this so many times and not noticed his name until now?






This, however, I notice every single time I pass the West Side Market. It's been up for weeks. Bluerries? Come on!





More in signs: Duane Reade is classing it up.







This was outside of some hardware store on 105th and Amsterdam. I think the sales associates had too much time on their hands.







Hee, this was funny. On the way home to New Jersey, Rob and I noticed that the driver (or someone) blacked out the last four digits of the "how's my driving?" number on the back of the truck. Smart!

Medical Study

I finally did get a chance to go grocery shopping, but here's a picture of my pathetic fridge the day before.





Note contents: yellow curry sauce, gravy, margarine spread, salsa, hummus, alfredo sauce, jelly, and a pie crust. Note absence of real food. Also, both Daniel and I share the fridge, so he was worse off than I was. He has to be wasting away.





Hot! From Trader Joe's.








Don't hold on to that tomato sauce for too long. Ew.







And here's me! Medical research! This happened last week when Ariel came up to visit. For this one, I had to lay in an MRI tube for about 45 minutes while I looked at graphic images and had to push buttons in this virtual-reality glove about whether or not I'd seen them already.

Let me just say, I loved the MRI tube. I could have fallen asleep. It was so relaxing and comfortable. When I laid down on the slab, one of the MRI tech guys wrapped all of these blankets around me because there's some tundra wind that circles around once you're inside.

Sadly, I was able to keep neither the scrubs nor the sterile booties. I was lucky that my socks matched.






Citizen Kane was the anesthesiologist again, and he is such a nice guy.

Except he kept trying to tell me exactly what he was doing when he put the IV in and I was like, "dude! Please! I can live my life without knowing what you're doing! I am going to look the other way and concentrate on my People magazine and forget that you are puncturing my veins."

My skin looked all old and wrinkly but that was just the tape.







Oooh, IV bag of possible anesthetic dooooom!







But nay! I beat the 2-to-1 odds of drugs to placebo and had nothing but saline. Yay!

Even still, I had to stay in the office for another two hours and just hang out. This time, rather than outdated reading material they set me up with a laptop and a bizarre selection of DVDs and let me go to town. Then they probably sat in the other room and rolled their eyes every time I laughed at Jerry Seinfeld's stand-up comedy routine.

Free Pom! In addition, I ordered the BLT bagel from Amish Market because it was one of the only lunch-related options on their breakfast menu (it was only 10:30 at the time). Tasty! It really was delicious.

Bookstore

Hello! Oh ew, the kitchen sink just made this weird "gluuugooo!" sound like it just cleared out. Ew again.

I've been working pretty much nonstop since the textbook rush is upon us. The law classes start this week coming up and regular classes the week afterward. I was pulled from cashiering to work with the course manager and help get all of the information entered in the computer. It involves data entry and alphabetizing, so I am happy in a really geek kind of way.

Now I am exhausted, since I had a mystery shoppe right after work with Server Matt and it was in Times Square and the lights and the traffic are fatiguing.

I don't even have any funny customer stories since I did so much shelving today. One woman was incredibly rude to me, but that was it. Not even funny rude, just hurried rude.

Oh OH! This morning, someone called and asked for the Personnel Manager, so I put David on the phone. Turns out, it was someone's mom trying to get their college age (!) daughter a job at the store. David had to dish out the tough love and say "it's probably not the best idea for you to be calling places for your daughter. She should probably be doing this herself. Sorry".

Visitation

Guess who's coming to New York tomorrow? Ariel is! He's taking the Chinatown bus up from Philadelphia and will be here by 5:30, which is convenient because I am off work at 6:00. My friend Jeremy sent an email reminding me about the air hockey tournament at Manitoba tomorrow, first of the year. We'll probably go to that, and since I was able to call off for Tuesday we should plan something fun for that day as well. However, I have my EKG/anesthesia study in the morning so hopefully I'm not too goofy after that.

But based on last time, we were done by 10:30 and they just kept me in the lab for an additional hour and a half for legal reasons to make sure that I didn't swoon on the bus ride home or something. Free lunch!

I've been worky worky lately, which is great considering the alternative. This week I have been placed in the main office with one of the managers, primarily focused on data entry for textbooks and the like. It's that season, after all. I hear that we're going to hire quite a few people temporarily, which is good because finally I'll feel more knowledged than someone else working there. Is it too much to ask that some guys be hired? It's nothing but girls, girls, girls except for this dude that only works Friday and Saturdays.

Recently, I downloaded Picasa to organize all of my pictures and get them online. I like it so much! Just being able to have all of them in one place is a relief. And good lord, I find that I have taken many more pictures than I thought originally.

Work tomorrow! Must sleep! I think I want to post my favorite pictures of 2008, since it would be so handy. But not now. I don't have time. Friday? Maybe?

Post-Holiday

2009! I generally dislike when years end in an odd number, but it's just something I have to put up with for the next three hundred and sixty-some days. I still haven't really been satisfied that I graduated in 2007 instead of 2008 (it would have worked out so perfectly, too: high school in 2004, college in 2008, grad school in 2010). Sigh.

Because I'm really lame, I went to the bookstore today even though I wasn't scheduled to work. To top it off with the cool points, I was pleased to finish not only The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants II (the second summer of the sisterhood) but also Girls in Pants: The Third Summer of the Sisterhood. They aren't bad! It's like a high school, much less risque version of Sex and the City. With pants.

Also, they had bagels and cream cheese and prosecco, even though I didn't drink any of it. The bagels were delicious.

I have that psychophysiological study tomorrow that involves goop on my head, so I have to wash my hair tonight and be sure not to apply any product or braid it. The cheap researchers won't even give me lunch and I have no idea if there's a microwave in the study area or not. It's early in the morning but I have to remember to bring basic stuff like shampoo and conditioner and a hair dryer so that I don't have to take the bus home with the gel still on my head. I wonder if they have towels. I work at 5:00 so I don't have a ton of time to shower at home.

Oh oh, I've been at the bookstore long enough for customers to start recognizing me. This is a bad, bad thing because of my terrible memory. Quite literally, as soon as they step away from the register I completely forget their name and everything about them. Sometimes people will buy something and then look at the magazines and come right back and I'm like, "Did you find everything you were looking for? Do you have a membership with us?". At this point, they roll their eyes and are like, you just asked me that.

Some cute guy teasingly berated me today at the store because he said I lured him in with brunch and he missed it. I'm like, "I told you it was from 11 - 1! You should have been here earlier!" This was a complete lie, because I have no idea who this guy was or if I specifically told him the brunch hours. Whatever.

And everybody was telling me "Happy New Year!" as they left the store yesterday. What luck that I happen to get friendly and personable customers, hm?

People have been asking if I have any resolutions. No. Well, I kind of resolve to get my laundry done because it's been weeks and weeks and thank god I have a lot of underwear.

Oh, how nice our totally-real-from-Pool-City tree looked!







The bears were being naughty behind the Church Punch. For shame...






Hooray for Pedi-Toes, or whatever they were called. I like how my toes look skeletal with them on.






The cat and I in bonding time, which is any time that she isn't biting me. The biting came about a minute after this picture.






This was from Grandma Wilm's apartment complex's bulletin board. I don't think this woman was thanking 'all'.

Back in Town

I have been so terrible at writing lately! Eek! Well, I've been home and back, fun times, and now I am all work and some play. Somehow I am not scheduled for New Year's Day, which is just meh because I didn't have anything planned anyway. The work Christmas (well, holiday) party is tonight and the best part of all is that I don't have to bring any food and embarrass myself.

The ride home with Rob was both boring and fun, equally. We went through Luzerne and Buttzville, but I didn't manage to get a picture of the sign. I had to stop and go to the bathroom three times, and Rob didn't go once. Amazing! We stopped by his apartment for a while before going to the train station, and I was like, "a basement! Three floors! Walk-in closet! Swoon!".

All right, now I have to get dressed. I can almost kinda promise some pictures soon.