The Most Complicated Evil Plot I Have Yet Devised

I think I've figured out how to land myself a job interview next Friday.

This theory came to me as I was waiting for my Chinese food for an hour and 15 minutes. I really had to pee, but I just KNEW the guy was going to come while I was in the bathroom.

Sure enough, I said "Oh the hell with this, I'm not waiting any longer," and the guy came while I was in the bathroom.

This always happens to me: I wait and wait for what's supposed to happen to happen, and then when it doesn't, I start doing something else, and THEN what was supposed to happen happens.

Working from this trend, I've come up with a plan to have at the very least, a job interview by the end of next week.

My job finishes this Friday, and I had been planning (barring a sudden settlement with SAG) to try and leave town next Thursday for about a week and a half to visit my dad up in Idaho. I'll be driving, so I'll be stopping in Vegas on the way up next Thursday if all goes to plan.

I knew Dark Knight was coming out next Friday, and I really want to see it in IMAX, since they actually shot some of it in IMAX and I hear it's brain-meltingly awesome.

So of course, I got online to see if there are tickets to the midnight IMAX screening in Vegas (and I'd like to pause here to note that IMAX tickets in Vegas are cheaper than regular movie tickets here), and there were.

So now, my evil plot: I bought my ticket to that midnight Thursday showing in Vegas.

By purchasing that ticket, I have close to guaranteed that something will come up in L.A. and I won't be able to leave until Friday or Saturday, maybe not even at all.

Clearly, as I'm packing my shit into the car to leave on Thursday morning, I will get a phone call from someone who wants to interview me Friday morning, maybe even for a job that starts Monday.

And if my frustrating luck does not continue to hold...Well, I'll get to see the Dark Knight in IMAX on opening night then spend a week in Idaho with my dad. It's pretty much a win-win.

To Keep You Entertained While I Work Another Six Day Week

Please enjoy these photos of my father and stepmother's tour of the "Five 'Stans": Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, and Tajikistan.

Dad's still figuring out how Flickr works, so his captions (which contain a fair bit of historical context for what you're looking at) are actually posted as comments. Although some of the comments, like this one, are courtesy of Ray Ann.

Vacation, All I Ever Wanted

Now that Memorial Day weekend has passed, can we please, please, please agree to abandon the term "Stay-cation"?

The media have grown awfully fond of this term in the last few weeks, as a way to describe people who are putting off vacation plans and staying at home because it's so ridiculously fucking expensive to go anywhere.

But really, of all the people who didn't go anywhere, how many of them were like me: Never had any plans to go anywhere in the first place, and just cherished the chance to get a little more sleep?

I don't know why the term annoys me so, but I feel like spending an extra day sitting on the couch and not getting nearly as much done as I should is not really something that deserves its own dippy term.

In Bruges

In honor of the movie that's recently come out (which I have not yet seen, but Tim, of course, has), I wanted to remind people that I have, in fact, actually been to Bruges.

I even have photographic evidence of this fact. I even have evidence that Mark was there with me, and that he was way taller than the people the brewery designed to accomodate.

My personal favorite picture is not any of the carefully preserved 1600's architecture that Bruges is so famous for, but the following piece of propaganda from their chocolate museum (click to enlarge):


Come on, just eat things in moderation and you won't get fat! It's just that easy!

I Am My Father's Daughter

So I'm posting this from my Crackberry, waiting to board my flight that was supposed to take off at 10pm.

I had decided to take the bus to the airport, since I have a lot more time than money at the moment. A cab is $35ish, the Super Shuttle is $21, and the bus was $1.25. The bus won out

(A side note; The flight at the gate next to me as I type this is flight 1492 to Columbus, Ohio. I smile every time they make a boarding announcement)

I had no idea how long the bus was going to take, and since I knew there were 3 buses involved, I figured anywhere from an hour and. a half to 3 hours.

Living by my father's "Never ever ever be later than an hour early for a flight," I figured, okay, my flight's at ten, if I leave at 6, even worst-case-scenario, I'll still be okay.

Joke was on me repeatedly; All three buses combined took exactly one hour, and the only people in front of me at security were the entire Old Dominion University women's basketball team.

I got to my gate at 7:20. As I type this, it's now almost 10:40, and our pilots just got here after being stuck in LA traffic for 2 hours.

That's still not even the holdup: The flight attendants were coming in from Salt Lake City, where there is currently a fairly large snowstorm. Between the snow and the de-icing, they're still 15 minutes from even getting to our gate, let alone being ready to have the boarding process begin.

The other issue is that, to try and tire myself out so I could sleep on the plane, I woke up super-early today. Now, as the plane should be somewhere over Nevada, I'm practically falling asleep in the astoundingly uncomfortable airport chair.

The waiting lounge is filling with passengers for the next flight scheduled for this gate (going to Guatemala City), and everyone's getting just a liiiiittle cranky.

I just want to get to Connecticut so I can commence complaining about how goddamn cold it is.

Ich Bin Ein Photographer

Cameron's post about her selection by the fine folks of Schmap.com reminded me to post this.

For some reason, they selected my photo of a weird-ass duck for inclusion in their guide to Berlin.

Fleeing The Scene

And now, I'm going to San Diego, where instead of arguing with friends over the merits and possible length of the writers' strike, I'm going to go hang out with my mother for a day.

Whee!

Back to Life, Back to Reality

Chicago was awesome. The game was ridiculous. Reuniafest was everything I'd hoped for and then some. I didn't get to see everyone I wanted to see since I was only in town for two and a half days, but I got to see a decent number of y'all, which was great.

I didn't want to come back, and I so do not want to go back to work tomorrow. Stupid reality.

Anyway, a few odds and ends from the weekend:

- Nate and I stayed with Mark, and that led to my favorite Inappropriate Joke of the weekend, which was that we were off having threesomes, but they were the worst threesomes ever because absolutely no one was getting what they wanted.

- [whining]I hate my foot. Hate hate hate hate hate. It hurt all weekend, I kept having to sit on barstools instead of actually standing to talk to people, I repeatedly had to leave early because it hurt, and I blew about $50 on cabs I probably wouldn't have blown if I could walk more than a few blocks without feeling like my leg was going to fall off. This horseshit better end soon.[/whining]

- Man, I've gotten spoiled living in California where you basically can't smoke anywhere indoors. My throat is still killing me from trying to shout over the music in several smoke-filled bars, and all my clothes smell like they spent the weekend at the bottom of an ashtray. You guys will love life when the ban goes into effect at the beginning of the year.

- So for those of you who heard me panicking about the potential writers' strike, here's a fairly good summary of why TV people in particular are panicking about this.

- On the flight back, as we were coming in for a landing, I got some sort of air bubble in my sinuses, leading to some of the most excruciating pain I've felt in several years. And I include everything involved in my foot ridiculousness in that. Fortunately, it managed to dissipate by the time we landed, but I'm still feeling residual pain. Ow.

I Need To Get Out More

Specifically, out of North America:

create your own visited countries map

I should at least hit up some big countries like Australia, Russia, and China. Minimal effort, maximum map-filling.

There's also a way to make a map of the states you've visited, but I fear mine might be a bit boring.

Thanks to Cameron and Tim for passing this along

Note To Self

Next time you go on a giant trip, try not to take two years to label all 1100 pictures, because you might not remember much by the time you try to finally do it.

In related news, I'm back to putting up more of my 400ish best photos from my trip to Europe with Mark two years ago. I've gotten up through the Netherlands, I hope to have Denmark and at least part of Germany up in the next few days.

Cute Overload: Antarctic Edition

My dad and Ray Ann went to Antarctica in January, and since Ray Ann refuses to go digital, they just got their Picture CD back and passed along photos I can actually share.

And they have some awesome pictures, most of which were taken by Ray Ann (click to see full size versions):

My dad and a penguin having a staring contest



My dad and Ray Ann in front of 100,000 penguins



A very cool set of icebergs



3 Emperor Penguins



Ridiculously adorable baby seals



Penguins re-enacting 2001: A Space Odyssey on an iceberg

Maaaark, Why Do I Do This To Myself?

Redeye flights are a tool of the Devil sent straight from the deepest, darkest bowels of the seventh circle of Hell.

I make that statement every time I take one, but then the next time I'm booking eastbound flights, I look at how much time I lose with a daytime flight and think, "Fuck it, maybe it won't be so bad this time."

Hahahaha.

Yes, four hours of very light, fitful sleep, constantly interrupted by turbulence, screaming babies, and the woman in the seat next to me deciding to sing along with her music is clearly a brilliant idea.

Speaking of brilliant ideas, now I'm waiting for my checked baggage to show up. I hope it does, because otherwise I'm going to be going to this wedding in jeans and an Onion Softball shirt.

D'oh!

One of the brides in the wedding I'm going to in Chicago this weekend (lesbians, not polygamists) emailed all their out of town guests to warn us about the current Transportation Fun Zone that's been declared in the South Loop.

This should be fun.

At Last, Honesty From An Airline

It comes, in a very NSFW fashion, from RyanAir's page on New Airport Security Procedures.

Courtesy Consumerist.

This Is Not My Week

First, there was the whole issue of the bad timing of my trip to Atlanta. Then when I came back, the cat decided I was a chew toy.

Now, we have the trifecta: Disease!

All my Atlanta-based relatives came over for brunch on Sunday afternoon, and I got to hold Elias, my 5-month old nephew, who I hadn't yet met.

Elias was kind enough to sneeze directly in my face, covering me in baby spit. I asked if he's been sick lately and his parents chose that point to tell me "Oh...uh, yeah, he's got a cold."

I thought I'd managed to avoid Sneezing Baby Disease when I felt fine all day Sunday and all day yesterday. I woke up this morning feeling shittier than usual, but shrugged it off.

Then when I got to work, I got into a steep downward spiral, rapidly losing energy and the ability to even hold myself upright.

I couldn't even finish half of my lunch. Anyone who knows me (or has seen my Wide Load ass) knows that's a big old red flag. I decided to go home.

I emailed my parents to let them know, and pointed out to my dad the potential red flag of Elias sneezing on me.

I got an email back within 20 minutes: Max, Elias' older brother, had just tested positive for strep throat. I immediately went to the bathroom mirror and looked at my tonsils, which were huge.

So I called the doctor to try and set up an appointment to get a strep test, and after a long and ridiculous argument trying to get myself in to get tested today, they gave me the first appointment tomorrow.

Of course, given the way this week has been going, I'll probably turn out to have malaria instead.

Scenes From My Three Hours At LAX

The Hilarious

I got to the airport three hours before my flight, as directed, a feat accomplished by literally sprinting out of work, then doing a flight-of-the-bumblebee at home of grabbing my stuff and feeding my cat and almost grabbing my cat instead of my laptop when the cab came.

I'd printed out my boarding pass earlier in the day to speed things along, but when I got to the top of the escalator to the security lines, I burst out laughing.

There were eight people in the three running metal detector lines. I got through in under five minutes, including the time it took to remove and replace my belt and shoes.

The Ironic

I waited longer in line for CPK than I did for security. Like, three to four times longer.

The Triumphant

After almost six months of trying to get my computer to cooperate and use my Swiss Army Phone as a modem, I finally got it working. It's slow as shit and kills the batteries on both the phone and my laptop, but if you're reading this, it works.

Also, I found a power outlet at CPK, so my bringing you this update doesn't totally kill my battery and I can still watch Pinky and the Brain on the plane if I don't immediately pass out upon taking my seat.