Hello Everybody!!!!!!

I’m in a bizarrely good mood right now – not sure why, but let’s go with it. I’ve been having some thoughts on life, me, and whatnot lately. Yeah...so...:

-Computers hate me. No seriously, they turn on me every chance they get. Most recent example: I got a virus on my work computer last week, and it started to attack my company’s mainframe. The person I called in IT (I speak to her almost every other day as it is) could not stop laughing at me. Our computers are supposed to be very difficult to infect – or so they say. I didn't find it difficult at all; the one I picked up (somewhere, we’re not sure where) took them 2 DAYS to clear out. What can I say, I’m gifted.

-Boys are weird. So I went on a date Saturday night, and the guy spent an abnormally long time discussing my hands. And my fingers. I…wasn’t aware this was a fetish people had. I knew about the whole foot thing, but hands? Yeah, I finally had to kind of blurt out ‘Can we stop talking about my extremities?’ Which doesn’t make for a great date, but hey, the herbed French fries at the restaurant well made up for any awkwardness I had to endure.

-I’m completely out of Christmas gift ideas for my parents. What do you get people who already have everything? I’m running out of time here people! Help me!

-I may very well be attempting to eat my body weight in chocolate this holiday season – I’ll keep you all updated on my progress as I’m sure you want to know how that goes.

-I just bought a pair of 5 inch heeled Mary Jane’s. Now I ask you people, what does a woman who’s already 5’8" need with a pair of shoes that high? Am I trying to do my best impersonation of an Amazon? I’m starting to wonder if I truly do enjoy scaring men away. (Oh who am I kidding – of course I love scaring men.)

-I’m currently looking to buy an apartment – I figure hey, let’s jump in and take advantage of the current economic carnage. Having said that, I a) hate looking at apartments – that’s about as much fun to me as getting stabbed in the eye, and b) I feel a wave of nausea hit me every time I do the math on what the down payment would have to be on one of those places. Guh – maybe I’ll keep throwing my money away and renting.

-Christmas parties are the shit. I love open bars.

-So I think I’m being set up with a cop for New Year’s. What are the odds that I’ll say or do something during the course of the night that will get me arrested? Do cops often try to arrest the stupid/obnoxious girls they get fixed up with? This is kind of a departure from my usual type (lawyers, finance guys, and the occasional bartender for variety), but I’m sort of excited actually. Anyone have tips on what we can talk about? Besides the obvious of course: Want to show me your handcuffs?

-I was babysitting my nephews on Friday night, and the inevitable happened – I had to change a diaper. So there I was changing the diaper on the younger one, and his older brother was standing around waiting for me to finish. Now admittedly, my technique is not what it could be (I am intentionally out of practice), but I will say I was a little embarrassed when P (the older nephew), took one look at my handiwork and said, ‘You may want to use two Aunt Redhead. That one isn’t going to make it through the night.’ Schooled by a 3 year old. Story of my life.

-So it took me all of a week to lose the holder thingee that came with my new Blackberry. This means that instead of being safely ensconced in a protective shell, my Blackberry now spends its time bouncing around my purse being abused. It also means that sometimes the darn thing ends up calling people without my knowledge. (Note: I hate when people do this to me *cough, MOM, cough*.) Anyway, so apparently this happened to my sister yesterday. She got a call from my cell phone, answered, and instead of hearing my voice she got to listen to…I don’t know, the muffled sounds of the inside of my purse I guess.

Now as someone who’s gotten these annoying calls before, I realize there’s often a brief moment where you think ‘Either this moron called me without realizing it, or this person has been abducted and is calling me to save them.’ I normally decide it’s option 1 pretty quickly, but I am paranoid enough to always call the person back to make sure. My sister…well, not so much. I got a phone call at 9 last night that went a little something like this:

Sister: I’m just calling to make sure you’re alive.
Redhead: Yup, I’m alive. Why? Did you put a hit out on me?
Sister: Nope, I just got a muffled phone call from you at around 5. I figured you’d called by accident, but I just wanted to make sure.
Redhead: So you called 4 hours later?
Sister: Uh huh.
Redhead: Remind me never to call you if I’m stuffed in the trunk of a car.
Sister: Well I hope you’d call the police if you were stuffed in the trunk of a car.
Redhead: Fair point. So what’s up?

-Dog story of the post: We got S when I was 6 years old. T had passed away right before we moved into a new house, and my father had been VERY clear that he didn’t want to get a new puppy right away. We had just carpeted the whole place after all.

My mother listened…um, not at all. She essentially waited until my father had finished speaking, nodded her head that she understood, and left the room to make some phone calls about a litter of boxer puppies one town over. She then took me with her to pick out the new baby in the family.

S was so fucking cute. Just all gangly and drooly with her brindle fur, black face, and big brown eyes. Oh, and she had this bottom tooth that stuck out over her lip – it stayed that way throughout her life (no braces for her!). I loved her at first sight.

So my mother gathered up S and brought her home. When my father walked in the door after work that day, he saw my mother sitting there with a puppy in her arms. She had blatantly ignored him! And he was pissed for...roughly 30 seconds – that’s the amount of time it took for my mother to stand up, walk over, and place the new puppy in his arms. After that it was over; he was in love. Who can deny a boxer puppy after all?

More stories about S to come.