When the hen has fun with the rooster

Sometimes I take my friend's teenage sons out on the town (no, not really, just usually to lunch or the mall. I hate the mall, I only take them because they enjoy it and they don't drive yet.) I call them Thing 1 and Thing 2. They are about the same age as one of my little brothers and I told them I am adopting them as such. They seem fine with this.

Today, the Things and I went to Mexican food and Thing 1 started grilling me about why I am a vegetarian. (Thing 2 told him, "She can eat whatever she wants!" but I don't mind answering questions.)

I told them I don't eat anything that used to have a face. So questions came around to eggs. 

This is a squishy bit where I am probably a bit of a hypocrite. Ideally, I'd like to not eat any animal products at all (mind you, I don't police other people about what they eat, have your bacon cheeseburger anytime), but I love cheese enchiladas and I love omelettes. Now, I don't want to eat anything that theoretically *could* become a chicken, so I eat unfertilized eggs.

Try explaining this to a 16-year-old who is stuffing his face with chips.

Thing 1: "What's the difference between a fertilized egg and an unfertilized egg? Don't they taste the same?"

Me: "Hens will lay eggs no matter what. The fertilized ones are ones from when the hen has fun with the rooster."

At this point our waiter, whose family owns the restaurant and whom my friends and I know pretty well, bursts out laughing.

"The hen has fun with the rooster?" he asked.

"I have to do the PG rated version," I said.

I shouldn't have bothered. After hearing about some of the things they had seen on YouTube, I felt REALLY old and out of it.

"Don't you have parental controls?" I naively asked.

"NO!" they said, adding, "The internet is a really scary place sometimes!"

If that wasn't enough to make me feel old, I had to confiscate the green sucker (the restaurant always gives you suckers with the check) at the end so they wouldn't fight over it.

Yes, I am at the age where teenagers can't question my authority. Scary shit. I'm going to go do something really immature now so I don't feel my age.

Things I like Thursday (take this, Mikey!)

I have been waiting almost two years for this!! I love superheroes. As a kid I played with action figures rather than dolls. I still collect action figures and LOVE comic book movies (except lame remakes that come out just a few years after that last comic book movie, hint hint Spiderman.)

Things you might not know will happen...

...when your wisdom teeth leave this world. (Nellie Vaughn, this is for you.)


Now mind you, my dentist is awesome. Not only did she and her assistant make sure I was super numb and comfortable, but they told me how well I did. I felt like I was in kindergarten, gold star for me!

A bit of shameless self-congrats here: the teeth were loose, but I only had numbing. No sedation, no nitrus, and haven't taken any of the prescribed Vicodin. I am a fucking rock star.

Anyhow, my dentist was very good about going over things and then gave me a piece of paper with all of those things printed on it so I did not have to scribble. However, here are a few things that you might want to know about if you happen to have this surgery done in the future, that will not be anticipated for you by any dental professional.

1. Drinking will be a challenge at first. Read: you will get water all over your face, and you will slurp. That's right! Normally elegant, graceful you will need to hydrate yourself, but the numbing from your procedure will in fact take HOURS to wear off. Hence, be prepared to be not so graceful.

2. You will look like a vampire. You may be told that the places your teeth used to live are "forming blood clots" during the first 24 hours and "you may bleed a little." Translation: little drops of blood will make their way to your face, right near your lips. It looks like you got hungry and maybe attacked a farm animal on the way home.

3. Soup cans are the enemy. If you are like me, you like to make your own soup from scratch (or better, have someone make it for you.) If you have a very kind spouse/partner/friend who gets lots of soup from the store for you, make sure s/he gets the kind that can be opened with a can opener while said spouse is at work. Because those ones with a pulley thing...well, the pulley thing can pop off. Then they won't be opened with a can opener, because they don't fucking feel like it. This is CRUEL for a hungry person who can only have liquids. I am going to complain to the people at Progresso. Tip for the uninitiated: if this happens to you, carefully use a table knife to get it the rest of the way open. That way your fingers remain intact.

4. There are, unfortunately, some people will not give a flying fuck that you are basically under ibuprofen sedation/tired as fucking hell from having teeth yanked out of your mouth. These people will text you the day after your afternoon surgery, not to ask how you are doing, but to ask if you are at work and when you are going to proofread something for them, or to see if you are coming to the volunteer meeting the next night. Your answer: FUCK NO!

5. Say your very kind spouse/partner/friend, who well deserves to be sick of your sick person shit by now, as well as his role as errand runner/drink fetcher/back rubber is still in a good enough mood to take you to dinner. When you finally feel un-dopey enough to venture into the outside world, you will want to eat EVERYTHING sharp and pointy that you are not supposed to eat - just because you can't. You will want chips at the Mexican restaurant, and you will only be saved from yourself by said partner, who will whisk away the basket from your outstretched hand and say, "NO! YOU WILL CRY!" and then offer to stop eating chips as a gesture of solidarity. You will, of course, decline his gesture and then drool over every salsa-laden chip he eats.

Then your good friend will come over with chocolate-covered walnuts. Then you will start craving popcorn. You'll be surprised that you have not cried yet because you can't have these things.

Yes...all of this really happened. And yes, Mr. RK is a fucking saint. I probably owe him a cruise at this point.

So know you know what to expect that is not in the postsurgery fine print.

You're welcome ;)

Fishnets and stilettos

Mr. RK came home today and said, "I have a funny story for you." I need laughter like I need water, especially after having been sick, so I said, "Yes?"

It turns out there was a training at Mr. RK's work today for his group. The trainer, he tells me, was a dead ringer for Ginger from Gilligan's Island (or, so I am told, live porn for those who like her look.) Or at least how she looked when the show was on. I am not sure where Ginger is now.

Anyhow.

Ginger is some higher-up at the company. She has worked there for 12 years. What did she wear to the training?

Fishnet stockings.

Six-inch stiletto heels.

And a dress that barely covered her rump.

"And apparently," Mr. RK says, "she has always dressed that way."

So put aside the rampant unprofessionalism of this, put aside your questions (OK, my questions), such as, "Why has HR never told her this is not appropriate work attire?" (Why should they have to?)

Just picture a group of nerds that usually sit in the back of the room, all in the front row.

That must be even better than getting a Victoria's Secret postcard in the mail. Those things royally piss me off. If I am the target market, why do I want a close-up of someone's butt and a look that says, "Come fuck me"?

Mr. RK says, "You're probably not their target market. 'Come fuck me' is probably their target market."

It just pisses me off. Particularly because the most recent ad I saw said "SALE" right over her ass.

Meanwhile, I won't be asking for her to come train anyone in my office. They'd just drop like flies.

A visit from Mr. Yuck

Sorry I haven't been on your blogs, I have had a visit from Mr. Yuck and am not doing much. The fact that I am upright is good!

Mr. RK is a saint. He has been like a whirling dervish with grocery store trips, chores, blanket and cat-fetching, etc.

I hope to visit before my wisdom teeth leave this world (Tuesday) and catch up.

You know you live in (or near) Portland when...

...you see the following headline, and you're reading your local paper, and not The Onion:

Vegan strip club and its Southeast Portland neighbors are asked by the OLCC to work out their differences

OLCC = Oregon Liquor Control Commission.

Now, mind you, regardless of how you feel about strip clubs, this story fails, in my opinion, to address the question that we all really want to know the answer to: what, exactly, is a vegan strip club? Are the strippers vegan? Or are they serving vegan food?

I imagine their business slogan will be along the lines of, "Here, only the women are treated like meat!"

Or, perhaps, "We may be misogynists, but at least we're vegan!"

Alternately, "Girls and broccoli!" Because I have driven by more than one strip club that advertises "Girls and Steaks!"

Mr. RK wants to know: does T&A now stand for tofu and asparagus?

Inquiring minds want to know.

Things I like Thursday

I like the fact that this is not me!

There is a hilarious link with more pictures like this that you must check out.

PS Thanks to all of you who sent good thoughts my way...the speech went well. I got a standing ovation, people said I made them cry, and then handed me checks. Yahoo!

Now (eep!) I have been invited to speak in two other places. But that is OK.

People said I was brave to go up and talk about living with mental illness, but I don't think it's so brave - my point was that no one should be embarrassed. And apparently, the point was made. Yay!