Nothing To Blame But Blame Itself

We got a new guy in today, too. The boss was parading him around the office to introduce him to everyone. I had met him earlier. I asked if he remembered my name. He hadn't. I reminded him. The boss then told him that he would remember my name because I am the office clown. I feigned feeling hurt for about 1 second and then realized that I was wearing my Heelys and the shirts that caused another coworker to give me the nickname Nephew because I remind her of her 12 year old nephew.

I have only myself to blame for this reputation.

I'd been hemming and hawing about buying a travel mug from Starbucks. I drink a lot of coffee and a friend of mine pointed out how much waste I'm generating by throwing those cups out all the time. My morning Starbucks had these really fun little travel mugs up by the register. They were all bright and colourful with shiny monkeys on. I really liked the blue one.

"You don't have those in any larger size, do you?" I asked.

Nope. The ones by the register were the only ones they had. I complained to my friend T that I really liked this mug but it only came in tiny, so I wasn't sure about it. She said I should probably get it anyway. Finally yesterday I broke down and got it. I love it. I took it into my afternoon Starbucks and with great pomp and ceremony put it down on the counter and asked them to fill it with the mild. That coffee tasted better than ever out of my new monkey mug.

I took the mug to show T last night. "So cute!" she exclaimed upon laying eyes on it for the first time.

After a brief pause she kind of crooked her eyebrow and said, "You do realize that this only comes in small because it's for children?"

The Taste of Primer

I've been going pretty strong lately. Living at the speed of life, as it were. So this weekend I decided to take it slow. How's that workin' out for me?

Friday night I got off early for the first time in God-knows-when. I met up with E at the Eaton's Centre and then he and I wandered around a bit. He had dinner plans at 6 so we parted ways then. I got home and saw that E's roommate, S, was on MSN. I asked what she was up to. She said she was going to the Bloor Cinema later to watch the Found Footage Festival and no one would go with her. So much for Friday night in. The Found Footage Festival was, incidentally, hilarious.

You will recall from my last entry that I had to go rescue my patio furniture from Waterloo. I left it in Mississauga with my aunt and uncle. I drove my Camaro out to their place Saturday morning. I could swear that when I moved the patio furniture to Waterloo in the first place that I did so in my car. After several minutes and a lot of swearing I decided that I must not have moved the patio furniture in my car and asked my uncle if I could borrow his truck. I think he likes it when I do that cuz he gets to cruise around in my Camaro all day.

So the reason I had to move the patio furniture is that my friends T and J just bought a house. With a yard. So my patio furniture has a home for this summer. They've promised to take good care of it. We set up the patio furniture. I had to go buy allen keys to put it together. I really like their neighborhood hardware store. It does my heart good to know that they are well taken care of in that department now. We also put together and subsequently used their new BBQ. For some reason they refuse to put the side shelf on so there is a side burner but no side shelf. It's so asymmetrical. It sort of flops around the deck like a pigeon with a broken wing. It does make a mean burger, though, shelflessness not withstanding.

They are also painting about every last square inch of the house in the week before they move in. It turns out that, of all the people helping them paint, I am the tallest. It therefore fell to me to paint all the high and awkward spots. It ALSO turns out that, of all the people helping them paint, I am the biggest slob. Have you ever had one of those moments where time slows down and you can watch something really stupid happen to yourself in slow motion, from outside your body? I watched this huge glob of primer drip off my brush and into my mouth. It was fantastic. It tasted a little bit like bitter rubbing alcohol. H, T and J's toxocologist friend said I'd be fine.

After painting all afternoon and then driving the truck back to Mississauga, I had to return a movie. It turns out my friendly neighborhood video store has replaced their counter with a gelatto freezer. What? This does not bode well for our hero. I think they should change the name from "The Little Video Store" to "Diabetes Corner" or perhaps "Sit On Your Ass And Gorge".

This morning I woke up to go paint some more. I decided that the painting crew might like breakfast, so I whipped up French toast and fruit salad. This required going into the market as, with the exception of milk, I had NONE of the makings of French toast OR fruit salad. I threw it all together as quickly as I could and then put the hot French toast and cold fruit salad in my car. It took me 10 minutes longer than it should have to get there because this month's Direction Of The Month is South. For the whole month of May it will be damned-near impossible to drive South. It is exceedingly difficult to reach the highway or Lakeshore without going South from my house. Fortunately I found a street they forgot to block. Suckers.

I wound up having to park way down the street from the new house. T said I probably made them the envy of the whole block as I had to walk by everyone's house carrying breakfast. We painted, ate (not primer, this time) and then painted some more. Then I rushed home to meet up with my little brother and his girlfriend who were in town for a wedding last night. We sat in my apartment and caught up. It was nice.

Then the Usual Suspects called about dim sum, which has become something of a Sunday tradition. When I arrived not everyone was there. We had to request a table for 8 plus a baby. And before you ask, no, they weren't talking about me. R and I had their baby with them.

After dim sum we lost a few people and the rest of us hit Starbucks and sat around being all urban. Then we walked down to the gelatto store, which is a long way from Chinatown, but well worth the walk, especially on an awesome day like today. I suppose I could have just gone to my video store which is a lot closer, but they have some pretty exotic flavours at the place we went to. I had blackberry and ferrero rocher, which, when combined, taste exactly like a peanut butter and jam sandwich. Comfort gelatto.

After that, little more wandering and some light window shopping. By the time I arrived home and it was about 6:00. All-in-all, not bad for a lazy weekend.

Except I can't figure out why, after such a lazy weekend, I'm so exhausted.

Light-Roasted, Full-Bodied, Bitter Enemies

I seem to have a knack for making enemies at coffee shops. Like the girl at Second Cup who seems to think my name is "Crazy".

I spend most of my coffee time at the Starbucks near where I work. I think the first enemy I made there was the French guy who is always trying to poison me. One day, my friend and coworker M was ordering and I asked the guy behind the counter to put a bit of poison in his coffee. Without missing a beat, he called out "short Komodo Dragon with poison" to the person pouring the coffees. He put it on the counter. I said, "are you sure you put enough poison in?" He said, "Oh, is very high quality poison. You only need a little." Ever since then he tells me there is poison in my coffee. Except on Fridays. I don't do poison on Fridays. Incidentally, he recently had a new baby. Congratulations! :*)

After that came the guy who I think is the manager there. I was in one day in September, I think, and I saw pumpkin cookies out. In my usual style, I went off about how it wasn't even October yet and they already had Hallowe'en cookies out. Honestly. It's like the time I was at the Bay in the Eaton's Centre and there was a woman putting up Christmas decorations in her Hallowe'en costume. She was dressed as the Devil. I wish I'd had a camera at that exact moment. Anyway, I tend to be rather loud and boistrous in public environments like that. Aparently this guy doesn't so much like people ruining the ambiance of his Starbucks like that.

So I'm ranting at my coworkers about how it's not even October yet. By the time I get to the counter, I've started my rebuttle, "dissirregardless... uh, yeah, I'll have a short mild, please" to which the guy from the previous paragraph responds "irregardless is not a word." Now, first of all, I said DISirregardless. And second of all, I have been led to believe that irregardless is now in the dictionary with a usage note to the effect that it's only a word because lots of dumb people use it to sound smart, which does mean that it's a word, irregardless (take THAT) of how much it wasn't a word 50 years ago or how stupid a word it may be. Not that I would ever use it seriously. The important thing is that this guy doesn't like me very much.

A few weeks ago I was in line and there were new cupcakes in the case; chocolate and vanilla. I asked the barrista which flavour I wanted. The girl behind me in line, who was a barrista on break said, "chocolate. You want chocolate." Well, the chocolate was a bit "meh". Not a terrible cupcake, but, y'know, not a great one either. This, of course, meant war. Next time I was in, the girl who recommended chocolate was running the till and I ordered a vanilla cupcake with extreme prejudice and wasted no time telling her how disappointed I was with the chocolate one.

Every time we see each other now we shoot each other dirty looks.

Except yesterday we slipped up and smiled at each other.

I guess I'm not as good at having bitter enemies as I thought.