This Story is Called: I Try to Buy Some Pants

by Orooni

Today, as I pulled into the plaza I visit often for the fabric store and bookstore/cafe, I drove past both of those places because I was heading for Old Navy, where I had heard they sell cheap, lightweight pants. As I've been wearing around corduroys all summer, my khakis having died a painful, humiliating (for all of us) death a few months ago*, I could use some cheap, lightweight pants.

So, I followed a car similar to my own in turning down a parking lot aisle, and pulled into the first open space on the right, which was only the second space. Then I noticed that the car in front of me had stopped and all of its occupants were glaring at me. Uhm, I thought. What?

Well! Soon enough I found out, because as I got out of my car, the driver of the other car, as she steered backwards into the third space in the row shared: "I WAS GONNA PARK THERE! HEY LADY, YOU TOOK MY SPACE!!"

Have you ever been screamed at by a stranger in a parking lot? Because I don't recommend it. I chose in that split second to pretend that there wasn't a lady screaming at me as I walked into Old Navy, because arguing with a stranger in a parking lot seemed worse than being screamed at by a stranger in a parking lot. As I tried on sixteen-dollar pants, I pondered how I was supposed to have known that Crazy Screaming Lady intended to back into the parking space she'd just driven past, absent potentially obvious clues like a turn signal, or reverse lights.

Then as I was purchasing my sixteen-dollar pants, I saw that Crazy Screaming Lady had abandoned the space she'd backed into next to my car and instead was parked in the very first space outside of the Old Navy in which I could now consider myself trapped.

After all my best fencing moves were defeated and I had unwillingly learned ALL about the benefits of applying for an Old Navy card, CSL was still there. My last line of defense was my cell phone, which I think she referenced in her last bout of screaming at me (HEY YOU ON THE CELL PHONE THAT'S RIGHT, etc.).

I'm holed up at Borders right now, praying that my car has the same amount of damage now as it did when I woke up this morning.


*NB: that un-strategically placed hole might not be noticeable this morning, but the inherent nature of the un-strategically placed hole is to expand. Manifest destiny.

I'm in ur rainforest... photographin ur wildlife

just don't tell me how book 7 ends

I'm off. Need to be in the shower in three minutes. Probably won't make it, but it's okay, don't have to be at the airport until 4:30 tomorrow morning.

I'll be back next Friday.

Like I needed another reason to dislike Jimmy Falon.

In high school, my friend and I would assign each other essays to write. Persuasive essays on why we ought to see this or that movie, 700 words on freewill, that kind of thing. That must have been the beginning of my love affair with writing prompts. Brrrawrr.

In that tradition, I give you:

Why I will never see The Big Lebowski
by, Orooni

When I was in high school, The Big Lebowski came out. Boys in my grade who everyone thought were popular but who nobody actually liked liked The Big Lebowski. They quoted it liberally. I had gathered that it was about bowling, which I'm not really into. Many people told me I should watch it, and given the choice between watching it an a poke in the eye, I would have watched it. But I'm not a big movie person, and was never offered the choice between watching it and a poke in the eye, so I never saw it.

Then Kingpin came out, and over time became conflated with The Big Lebowski in my head. I still wasn't terribly interested in seeing it.

Occasionally, it would come up, and when I'd say I'd never seen it, people would act surprised and say to me that I should definitely see it. I would say, okay.

Then one day, the subject came up when I was with a bunch of friends, and they said you really need to see The Big Lebowski! And I said, alright. And they said, no really! We will drink white russians and watch The Big Lebowski! And I said, I like white russians. And they said, come over Saturday and bring some vodka, and so I did.

And at this point I should tell you that while I'll drink a wee bit here and there socially, I generally hate the taste of alcohol and would much rather spend money I don't have on yarn or fabric. But, two times in my life, I have been with a group of people and decided that it would be great to drink a whole lot! Bad decisions, these were. It is not great to drink a whole lot, even to get your sock money's worth out of that vodka.

So, we made white russians and settled in for an evening with The Big Lebowski. And by the time they were driving somewhere in a car, I had fallen asleep and woken up a few times and thought everything was hilarious even though I couldn't quite tell what was going on and was still wondering when Woody Harrelson was going to show up.

I will tell you, though, that that scene with John Turturro in the purple bowling jumpsuit doing whatever magical thing he did, which I think was rewound multiple times and imitated to perfection by every male in the room, was enough to penetrate the disgustingly chocolatey haze of my drunkness.

The evening did not end with me finally having taken in The Big Lebowski. I do not really want to think about how it did end.

So, flash forward many months, and Other brings home The Big Lebowski from the public library. Eventually we both feel like watching it, and pop it in. And the VHS copy of The Big Lebowski beeps.

We meet The Dude and it beeps a little bit, as if the tape is rubbing the wrong way against the inside of the VCR.

Other says, "Is The Big Lebowski beeping?" and I say "noooo..." because I know if it is beeping, we will not be able to watch it. Unfortunately I had already said, when we were in the process of discovering that the previous library patron had not been kind, rewind-ed, "WHAT THE HELL IS THAT BEEPING?" because I thought the beeping was coming from the kitchen. So my denial was recognized for the disengenuous attempt at a Jedi-There-Is-No-Beeping-Just-Watch-the-Movie Mind Trick it was. The force is strong with Other, and that particular copy of The Big Lebowski went back to the public library.

We checked our local horrible movie rental place and it was not due back until the 10th. We checked the slick new DVD-spitting kiosk in the grocery store, and it did not have The Big Lebowski.

I priced The Big Lebowski at Borders, and it was either $12.99 or $14.99, depending on which copy you picked up, though the copies looked exactly the same in every other respect. I could not deal with the ambiguity and did not purchase it.

The 10th rolled around, and we found ourselves at the grocery store, and Other went in to the horrible movie rental place and they said yes, it's in! And Other said (or rather, thought to himself because he is cool and collected) Woohoo! And went to look for it.

I took the groceries back to the car and wondered whether Other had gone to the movie rental place to look for The Big Lebowski, because it was the 11th. Eventually I figured that the ice cream in the back seat was liquid enough to investigate the whereabouts of Other, and found him frowning in the "L" section. The Big Lebowski was on the premises enough to have been checked in, but was not in the "B" section. He and a movie renter were scouring the store. I helped by looking in the video game section and the new releases section.

After exacting multiple promises from the movie renter that she would call us later that evening when The Big Lebowski was found, we went home.

She did not call. Other called and was told that it hadn't turned up.

When we went back this evening, we found that it was checked out.

And that is how I know that the Universe is preventing me from watching The Big Lebowski.

perhaps, because you are stabbing them?

A foot-high pile of organic snacks on my craft table can only mean one thing: I'm leaving the country again. This time for Costa Rica, for 9 days, in less than a week.
Whereas most people seem to regard travel as fun and interesting and worth doing, I am not really one of them, and am approaching this with some kind of grim determination to get on the plane, traipse around the rainforest, have awesome experiences, and come home. I agreed to go, couldn't really say no, but yikes. Give me art camp over leaving town any day of the week.

I know I'm coming in late on this, but if King George pardoned I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby because he has nothing left to lose, and when he actually did have something to lose, he started and unprovoked war thereby destabilizing the Middle East for years to come, flouted the constitution publicly through signing statements and privately through secret, extra-court spying programs (and only God knows what else), politicized every branch of government that was heretofore unpoliticized, including the judiciary, gutted environmental legislation, made sex education programs here and abroad nearly worthless by hinging funding on ridiculous abstinence propaganda, and fucked education sideways with No Child Left Behind, well then it stands to reason that the next two years are going to be absolutely terrifying.

down to my soul

a random thought as I was drifting off to sleep last night: we think in water like we think in base 10.

Lou is so tired that he fell asleep standing up. But apparently it's hard to stay standing up when you're sleeping, so then he kind of fell over a bit. He's tottering around like Lucille Bluth, and all because he prefers to lay on his tummy, but just had a fatty tumor removed from his tummy and every time he tries to lay on it, it hurts, and he sits back up. Start to lay down, jerk back up; fall asleep standing up, wake up and reorient; repeat. This is Lou's evening. Of course, he could lay on his side but every time I try to explain that to him, he says balderdash! and then falls asleep standing up.

Today was the first day of Art Camp (yay!!), and I'm off work for a week, with the understanding that I'll keep up on the day-to-day stuff through e-mail. So I just now checked my work e-mail, and there is an e-mail from an old friend saying hey! This e-mail address is going away! Use these instead! And, um, we haven't spoken for years and years. Didn't fall out or anything, more like fell apart, and so... what? Do you... want me to use that e-mail address? Or... just in case of emergencies like... uhm... God... another of our old friends' lives hangs on whether she can remember what she said when she first tasted gin?