True Life: God Laughs at Me

(Disclaimer: this is a long one...)

If I were to describe my life in a single sentence it would be: “My life is comprised of emergencies connected by awkward pauses.” Often times, I think that said emergencies are scripted for an episode of MTV’s True Life. Yes, just think of me as MTV’s next rising reality star, who made her debut on “True Life: God Laughs at Me.” I am this year’s Trek and/or Melissa Rycroft.

Last night was an example of a script worthy set of emergencies. See potential script below.

Scene 1: Happy Go Lucky
(Set scene: 4:37PM, pouring rain, clouded sky, thunder (okay, the thunder is a minor over dramatization.) Enter Kristin, in [cute] work outfit, [non waterproofed] rain jacket, alertly running to car in an event to avoid racoon.)

I left work today feeling powerful. Despite feeling as though my head might fall off and that my eardrums might pop, I successfully launched my first true solo project at work. I beat the corporate monster while feeling completely miserable! Very productive day at work; job well done!

(Pan to devil hiding in corner, who proceeds to laugh evilly, foreshadowing the events to come. Pan back to Kristin who is unaware of her impending doom.)

Scene 2: The Realization
(Set scene: 4:45PM, Kristin driving in almost pure silence to nurse her headache away. Heat blaring, rain continuing to fall heavily. Kristin’s interest perks when she hairs a noise coming from the back of her car.)

As I am sitting in my car, listening to nothing but the throbbing shooting from my ears, I begin to hear a low roar coming from the back of my car. I turn down the blazing heat and the small lull of the radio to most astutely listen to the lurking noise. I break, and as I do so the noise dies. I speed up, it builds. My first thought? “If it is that mother-effing tire, I swear to God I will leave you right here and never look back,” obviously speaking to Sass.

I pull over. Get out of the car, and slyly walk to the back passenger side of my car, you know, incase the tire doesn’t know I am coming, and magically re-inflates when no one is looking. What do I find? The flat, just as she was, if not 14 days ago. Insert swearing, stomping, and a new dog friend watching my throw my tantrum.

Scene 3: The Phonecall(s)
(Set scene: Kristin, defeated, sitting back inside the car. Raining heavier than before.)

After calming myself down, I realized the tire wasn’t going to change itself. I first call Sullivan Tire to inquire whether my new, brand spanking new, tire had any kind of service warrantee on it; I was thinking something like a “damsel in distress” package. No dice. The next call was to AAA, where I was politely told my wait time was 90-160 minutes. The next phone call was to speed dial #4: home. Here enter tears.

Scene 4: The Fix
(Set scene: Kristin, now completely drenched with mascara running down face is now standing outside attempting to change tire. Here enter Dad, my port in a storm…literally.)

After lifting the car, somehow extracting the flat, and putting on the new wheel- all while being on hold with AAA to cancel my service request, my trusty AAA service man pulls up, flashing lights and all. After realizing his arrival was a day late and a buck short, Stunad looks over the replacement wheel, compliments our change, apologized for the wait, and offers to lift the flat into the trunk of my vehicle. Gee, thanks.

Scene 5:The Flood
(Set scene: mid tire change, Kristin and Bob are in the ever building storm. The dog, we have now affectionately named Muffy, is sitting in the front yard, watching.)

Whilst my dad and I battle the elements to change my tire, essentially serving as human rain sponges, Mom calls. I answer mid spare-tire-hand-off, assuming it was to confirm the arrival of my father, but the true reasoning was anything but that, and instead I hear: “Where’s the tube for the Shop Vak, Uncle Dave is going under!” To all you non flood zoners out there, the previous sentence in normal language roughly translates as: “Uncle Dave’s basement is flooding fast. Where is the machine that rapidly sucks water out of a location, and when will you be home so we can go over to help them?” Add a dash of yelling, and a pinch of panic: and Voila, you have our conversation. Still in shock over the fact that I am getting this news while standing mid-tire change on the side of the road in the pouring rain, I panic and hang up. Looks like my real life Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride won’t be ending anytime soon.

Scene 6: Pizza?!
(Set scene: Kristin, now carrying pizzas into Uncle Dave’s house, is garmented in duck boots, rolled up jeans, a sweatshirt, and damp raincoat. Eye makeup has found a home anywhere on her face, but her eyes. House is filled with 8 people, all Shop Vaking and carrying buckets full of flood water out of basement. It is the North Pole for flood victims)

This is when I realized that God’s source of entertainment is my continuing bad luck. I am sucking basement flood water (complete with floating creatures and treasures) into an archaic Shop Vak which houses several holes. After brainstorming with my cousin (my future partner on The Amazing Race), we realized that transporting water our of the basement will either replicate a physical challenge on Double Dare or will require multiple bucket transfers in an attempt to remove the water. Ultimately we settle on the latter, and spend a majority of the night “ShopVak, transfer, move out, repeat”ing until the team realized that we weren’t making any progress. My herniated/ruptured disk(s) surely appreciated the exercise.

Scene 7: Bed
(Set scene: Kristin now showered, is pouring herself into bed.)

After rinsing myself of cat litter infused flood water, I prepped for bed when I realized that I no longer have a bed frame, but rather just a lone mattress dwelling in the middle of my room. Very friendly, if you ask me. While there has been no physical furniture in my room, besides the bed, for almost 4 months now, the frame has now joined its comrades, and has been removed from my room. As I lay on my mattress, not three inches off the ground, I can’t help but wonder when they are going to pad the walls and lock me in. That will make for an interesting blog entry.

Easter's Top 5

Top 5 Things I like about Easter:

1. Cadbury Mini Eggs: God’s personal way of reminding me that he loves me and wants me to be happy. Being that Easter is the only time of year where Cadbury produces these little oval miracles, it makes for an obvious reasoning behind my excitement for Easter. I am not talking about the regular, subpar Cadbury eggs with the white, creamy filling (vomit,) but rather the thumbnail size, pure Cadbury chocolate delicacies encased in a crisp shell. These heavenly minis melt in my mouth, soothe my soul, and trigger my smile, (too bad no boyfriend can do that! Sigh.) At any rate, Cadbury Mini Eggs are my favorite part of Easter.
2. My very Italian, slightly overbearing, but extremely loving and inclusive family. I love Easter because it is yet another reason (as if we need one) to gather the people that love each other most into one room. Complete with yummy food, (come on, we’re Italian!) fun laughs, and an intense egg cracking competition (See #4), any D’Orlando gathering proves to be entertaining.
3. Hymn #322: “Up From the Grave He Arose!:” To many, this is an average, slow moving, but slightly building hymn. To my family, this hymn serves as yet another inappropriate moment for us to all look at each other and laugh. This is my grandfather’s favorite hymn; his gospel travels right from his lips to God’s ears, and he sings it as though it does. In his Easter suit, he stands proudly with our family, prominently displaying his Italian offspring, builds his strength up through his knees and into his chest for a complete, deep, strong, hearty tone. He has done this since I can remember, and will continue to do so for years to come. “Up From the Grave He Arose!” is another reminder that my family will never be normal, and I am perfectly content with that.
4. The Annual D’Orlando Egg Bashing Fight! What is that, you may ask? Well, my grandmother meticulously hollows out ordinary eggs, and fills them with confetti. The end result? An oval shaped weapon, perfect for whacking, pelting, or noogy-ing into an adoring, yet equally vicious cousin and/or sibling. All cousins are sent outside, each armed with two eggs each, and encouraged to plot and terrorize each other. No rules, just revenge. Yet another indicator that my future children have little to no chance of ever being normal.
5. Easter dresses! One of the best parts of Easter is seeing the little girls prancing around in their floral Easter dress, white tights, and white patton leather shoes. God, I lived for those days as a seven year old, where I could prance my cute self around, parading my spring look. Granted, it wasn’t so fun when we had to wear our pretty party dresses under snow suits, but it was still an entrance nonetheless. I have high hopes for this year’s six year olds, as the weatherman is predicting 75 and sunny.

Oh, and obviously the resurrection of Jesus Christ is another highlight to my Easter. I mean, without his miracle, none of the aforementioned things would be possible, not to mention we wouldn’t have been freed from our sins. Christ has risen! (Christ has risen, indeed!)

Awe Crikey!

Attention all untamed animals, 3 Speen Street has officially become Framingham’s own Wildlife Refuge. Open all four seasons.

Having survived almost two years of our office building’s wildlife and meteorological cycle, I have learned that with each season comes a new animal for all those animal peeping enthusiasts.

Beginning and end of winter brings roaming birds who are travelling for the change in season. While usually I am a fan of any kind of bird in the winter, as it signifies warm weather and spring, I do not enjoy the gifts they leave all over my car. If I had wanted Sassy to be black with white polka dots, I would have bought her as such, but thank you for the kind sentiment, Tweety.

Summer brings the overzealous and overweight squirrel. 3 Speen Street enjoys fostering these little hand puppets by leaving a buffet of delicious squirrel delicacies in stocked trash cans, not 20 feet from the front door, and not 5 from our multi-functioning picnic/bbq area. Being that my alma mater was home to the world's most obese and agressive squirrels, I am somewhat unbothered by these trash can diggers, however, many of my co-workers have yet to cohabitate with them as well as I can. Bright side? I now have a reason to use the one word I managed to learn and retain while Steffi, our German coworker, visited from Munich. Pronounced "Esch-orn-schen" in German, squirrel is a German word that will no doubt be utilized in the coming months.

Fall brings the turkey, but not just one turkey…usually its an entire 5-8 fowl contingency. The turkeys change our tranquil office wildlife sanctuary to a tense migration ground. While they move in slowly, their stealth moving turkey coup-d'etat astutely organize small revolutions against our office building, eventually prominently perching outside a large glass window by our main entrance. Last season’s turkey highlights include: a turkey barricade at the front door, complete with spitfest to threaten any professional daring enough to challenge them in a turf battle (um, I will go in the side entrance, thank you very much,) as well as their green initiative, where turkeys sat on top and protested the use of employee cars, thereby reducing our building’s carbon omitting gases (we can most likely thank Al Gore for that mishap.) Oddly enough, said birds always mysteriously disappear just prior to Thanksgiving. Coincidence? I think not.

Spring is usually a transition month, where I can leave the office in peace without worrying about a surprise attack from a turkey, squirrel, or flying bird poop. This spring, however, the good word has spread, and we now welcome a new member to the 3 Speen Street Wildlife Sanctuary. As I was walking out of my office today, ready to battle the elements (yet another wall of rain,) I saw a warning sign posted on the front door of our building: “Warning. Raccoon has been spotted in this area. Proceed with caution.” I do not like raccoons, the obvious exception being Rocky, my childhood stuffed animal a la raccoon. I especially dislike raccoons when they are seemingly disoriented in broad daylight. Unless my relationship with said animals is going to be anything comparable to a typical Disney movie, (think Cinderella’s bird friends gone maid, or mice friends gone seamstresses) I do not foresee that I will enjoy the newest addition to our workplace family.

Here is to another “run from the office to the car” season, and a hope that the raccoon doesn’t hide under my car to rabie-fy me as I step into my car…and don’t act like you are surprised that I would actually worry about something like that.

My Friday Commute: a la Masshole

This morning’s commute was an eye-opening experience for me. I have become a true Masshole commuter. Sigh.

The moment of realization was at 7:41 this morning; yes 7:41 exactly. How do I know this? Being the anxiety-fused, worry wart, punctual Patti that I am, I have meticulously calculated key milestones within my commute and their corresponding times to ensure that I am aware of my time constraints. If I get to my Route 16 exit anytime after 7:36AM, I will hit secondary road/school bus traffic (thanks, Newton private schools), which will further increase my commute time by about 9 minutes. If I get to Route 16 prior to 7:27, which has happened once in my entire time of commuting, then I have time to stop for a Starbucks treat (but only if I have a gift card, naturally.)

Regardless, I know the exact time of my realization because I was only exiting the pike at 7:41, and I was prepping to be late and/or drive aggressively to make up the extra five minutes (I arrived at work today at 8:05, better to arrive late, than never at all- right, Mom?)

Just as I began to my veer toward my exit, it happened. The person in front of me put on their blinker. Not only did the act of putting on the blinker send me into a complete state of confusion, but it also led me to slip directly into defensive driver mode. The person in front of me correctly used their signal to signify their safe exit off the turnpike (who does that?!) and I mistakenly read her signal as: “I am going to aggressively pull over into the breakdown lane, and cut you off. This is an emergency!”

Instead of calmly noting that the white minivan in front of me was also exiting off the pike safely, I preventatively swerved around the car into the second “exit only” lane so that she would be able to stop her vehicle for said emergency without forcing me to a) slam on breaks and honk, or b) swerve even more aggressively.

I continued my commute slightly defeated and heavier hearted. While I continued to follow the minivan I realized that I have evolved as a driver; I haven’t necessarily become aggressive, but I have become overly defensive. No longer does the safe use of a signal signify what it should.

Upon reflecting on further details of my commute, I realized that I also committed three additional tell-tale mass hole crimes. I managed to weave around a clueless, “I drive with my left blinker permanently on,” out-of-state Toyota to make a short light (the one that delays my commute by 4 minutes almost everyday, but who’s counting?) I also found a new short cut to avoid waiting at a pointless light, and even lightly laughed when pulling into my office lot and seeing the bumper to bumper traffic headed onto the pike.

I like to think I am not a Masshole, but rather that I have astutely trained myself to co-exist with them on a daily basis. Lets go with it; I feel better about myself that way.

is this why short people are grumpy?

Why I miss my long hair.

1. I miss having a ponytail that doesn’t resemble a “nub.” A low ponytail can only look cute for so long, especially if it is nothing more than a nort on the back of my head. Trying for a high ponytail? I don’t think so, as any attempt in a ponytail higher than my ears results the “half up, half down” look, cool circa 1995.
2. I miss being able to wear my hair up…period. I miss the knot that I used to casually fold my hair into when putzing to the store, around the house, or when driving with the windows down. The previously effortless pull up has now become a strategic pull back in an effort to avoid stray whispies.
3. I miss going to the gym and not needing to wear a headband to prevent whispies from matting to my forehead and the back of my neck. Yes, I sweat at the gym. I admit it, but it was a lot easier to hide when I had blonde locks to cover the neck area. Now, my intense glow is visible to all gym rats; so far for meeting Mr. Right at my gym. Don’t get me wrong, I love my sweepaway bangs (which are now overgrown,) but not when I look like a giant greaseball. (I promise I am not an excessive sweater, Mr. Totally Hunky Gym Beefcake!)
4. I miss being able to sleep on my hair and not have to restraighten it. I know this sounds neurotic (if only just slightly,) but I miss being able to shower at night, sleep on my hair and wake up without looking like I went through a minor perm procedure whilst sleeping. My hair is not thinning, nor is its thickness/consistency changing at a rapid rate, therefore the only changing variable that could constitute this change would be my mane’s length.
5. I miss the perfected beach tousled look. You know, the “I am not trying to make my hair look curly, but the slight wave/curl puts me smack in the middle of the Anthropologie magazine” look. I had perfected that look, and was beginning to utilize well, particularly during the warm months. I have tried to recreate the vibe, but often my slightly sloppy, yet trendy tendrils is mistaken for bad bed head, or forced gel curls. Fail.
6. I miss the side braid. Um, hello? How am I supposed to pull of the summer-boho-cowboy-chic image I go for every year if I can’t sport the side braid? It is practically impossible to successfully achieve. Yes, I most certainly can attempt a braid, but ultimately my wannabe braid looks more like a twisted messy knot than anything resembling the proper look. In order for said braid to remain intact, I need to twist it like I am tying a corset to my head. End result? A four inch braid sticking straight out the back of my head. Attractive? I don’t think so.
7. I miss people saying: "Millions of women pay to have your hair." Call me vain, call me superficial, but I miss getting compliments on how beautiful my hair was/is. Now, my hair is just the ugly duckling of blondes everywhere.
8. I miss rock band head bang. It doesn't happen often, but when it should, I can't. Sigh.
9. I miss people playing with my hair; not in a creepy kind of way, but I love the feeling of someone else brushing through my hair. Apparently short hair sends out the "don't touch me" vibe.
10. I miss being able to go underwater, come to the surface, and not look like a tad pole. This is a privilege you have that you are completely unaware of. Yes, I look like a tadpole when I emerge from a body of water; my short, wet, blonde hair mats to my head and creates a recipe for tad pole/swimming cap disaster. Its my problem, not yours.

I. Want. My. Long. Hair. Back. Its been a year and a half since I chopped it off in the name of charity, and I think it is due time for my locks to grow back to their original length. Summer will not be the same without long blonde hair to wrestle with the wind.

I remember telling my adolescent brother that his facial hair would grow faster if he pushed really hard, you know what I mean. I wonder if that would also work for my mane…?

TGIT

TGIT: Sunday’s al fresco lunch, made by ever improving Chefs Kristin and Diane

I never thought I would be one to blog about a delicious meal I have made, mostly because:
a) I rarely cook anything picture worthy, nevermind blog worthy
b) I follow my fellow delta’s "Two Sisters, Two Suppers" blog and could never imagine comparing to some of the mouth watering delicacies that grace her food stage. (If you are a foodie, need a good recipe, or just want to drool at delicious looking food, you should check it out!)

Nevertheless, here enter Hawaiian Chicken with a Pineapple and Mango Chutney:
(you can save the "oohs" and "ahhs")

Good: it was a quick make!
Great: it was delicious, and tasted just as yummy reheated for dinner
TGIT: no one was harmed in the production of this meal. Dacey women cooking a new recipe together usually results in screaming/yelling/emergency calls to my grandmother on how to rescue a simple frosting recipe.

All in all, a culinary success!

two tags=a crowd

Alright, itchy tag on the inside of my shirt, its either you or me today, and I am not prepared to walk around my office shirtless because of your inability to relax.

I have to say I am a bit disappointed in you. I’ve already gone after your lengthy fibers with scissors and shortened you to a manageable length, but even after your new due, your pestering is still incessant.

Why is it that you exist anyways? Is one tag not suitable enough for one shirt? Tags are made to display very few things, and all of them can fit on one tag:

1. The size: further reminding me that bikini season is right around the corner
2. the genetic fiber make up of my shirt: so that when my shirts no longer fit, I can explain it away with: “don’t worry, self, the shirt is 94% cotton…she shrunk”
3. washing instructions: so that if I ever were to want to properly wash my clothes one day, I could.
4. "Made in China:” this is here to remind us that everything we own is exported, very important.
5. The “inspected by #456” sticker: so I know exactly who to blame when I find that my shirt is faulty. Thanks a lot, #456!

All of this very important information can be found on the primary tag of the shirt. There is no additional need for another tag, if only to serve as a nagging itch for me.

Further, who was it that decided that the best place to put a tag is on the side seem above my hip bone. Everyone is ticklish and/or sensitive there, and it is faulty product quality to implant a stiff side tag into an otherwise “relaxed cotton tee” (and yes, the shirt is actually called that!)

I feel anything but relaxed thanks, in part, to you. Lets try to get along for a majority of the day…otherwise I have no problem cutting a whole in the seem of my shirt to remove you completely, as my tee is only used for layering.

Put that in your pipe and smoke it, itchy tag.