What a bunch of asterisks!

You! Let’s try this thing again (again). I’ll go first. I moved to northern Virginia last weekend. After spending two months touring the Great Lakes region (Milwaukee! Chicago! Ann Arbor! Buffalo!) I now live in the greater DC area.

So far, outside of work, the only people I really interact with are mechanics and rental car associates, because of course I spend all of my free time getting my car to and from the mechanic. We have been to the mechanic twice. Tomorrow I will have lived here SEVEN days.*

So anyway, one of my pals in the rental car industry, a native of northern VA, told me that people from around here have a reputation for being unfriendly. I didn’t know that people from the greater DC area had a reputation for anything except for sitting in traffic and wearing suits, but now everyone seems impatient and irritated.** They are visibly disinterested in the second half of my sentences. Sometimes they answer their phones instead. So thanks for coloring my perception of this place with a fat black crayon, Doug from Enterprise. I am impressionable. Yes I will consider buying a used rental car from you. This pitch you are making sounds quite reasonable.***

*This car is ruining my life and holding me hostage but I don’t want to go into the details because I know you’re just going to turn on me for staying in this abusive relationship so long, when what I really need is a hug and three cold beers.

**I want to tell you about an exception: my new personal Armenian banker with the sculpted face manages to be both heartbreakingly earnest and super hot. Each time we bank, he says “I hope I have provided you with five star service” and I know if I asked him to take off his shirt he would do it. Everyone please send me small, shady-looking personal checks that I will have to enter the bank to cash.

***However, I will have to consult my personal Armenian banker first.

I miss you.

Let’s spend a little time together. I’ve had some posts planned in my head that just haven’t materialized. One is titled “Jealous?” and I show you a picture of my new red ten-speed resting on its kickstand in the sun and I tag it “You want to ride my bicycle. You want to ride my bike.” It might still happen.

What have I been up to lately besides wearing sweaters and not blogging about it? I’m overwhelmed. I don’t know where to start. I touched Seelander again. I attended Ms. Stanifer’s class. I went to Florida, saw some weird birds and found one shark tooth.

Let’s just start with today. I didn’t like it.

When I woke up at 7 I knew I had to give a 45 minute presentation to a class of library students, and all of my demo code was broken because I spent all day Sunday breaking it. I made coffee and started working on it. I broke more than I fixed. Including my toilet, for no reason. I tried to flush a smooshed bug and it started to overflow. It was sleeting outside but I had to walk to work. Then my umbrella broke, too. I struggled to hold a door for someone with my stupid umbrella and a mug of coffee in my hands and he scooted in behind me, rather than touch the germy door (I HATE that) and I almost broke him.

I worked on my presentation through lunch but I finished it on time! It was titled The Metadata Magic Show, and it included a live rendering of these two static webpages (from the same xml file using XSL and rudimentary css). The instructor loved it. Two students (out of eight) nodded off and two updated their Facebook status – one of the updates, twenty minutes into my show-and-tell: “Today sucks.” Awesome.

Part of this presentation was a plug for this class I’m supposed to teach this summer but based on the interest level, I’m guessing no one is going to sign up for it and it will be cancelled. Who will pay my rent?

When I got home, I tried to reflush the partially smooshed bug floating in my toilet and I realized it was still (barely) alive, kicking his broken little legs. I’m sorry! I deserved a shitty day!

Search terms!

It’s been a while since I’ve looked through the search terms that land people here. A few gems.

Clearly that pancake business is the man himself trying to get back to this post.

Viewer’s Choice

These shoes are hot off the delivery truck from zappos, intended to replace my tired 5000ms. The speedcats are perhaps too sleek and make my feet look as long and skinny as they are, but I am a sucker for suede. As I am for any fabric with a nap. The speeders remind me of lemurs. Their names suggest that both pairs are equally fast. I can keep one or return them both. What should I do?

Refresh your browser.

Come out of your reader to see my new header. Yes it is Friday night. I’ve had a long day in a long week. This is how I kick back with a box of wine.