Self-Indulgent Ramblings

Okay… this year I’m trying to do all this stuff to improve myself.  I’m reading more.  I’m working out.  And this morning I tried Crest Whitestrips for the first time.  And here’s what I have to say so far: they’re weird.

Half an hour seems a lot longer when you’ve got celophane wrapped around your teeth.  And your tongue is working overtime, like when you’re in the dentist’s chair.  "Gee, there’s something unusual in here.  I’d better touch it."  

You drool and your gums tingle a bit, and when you finally do get to remove the strip, you have to figure out how to get rid of all the extra gel.  See… they don’t tell you in the directions what you’re supposed to do at that point.  You just have to assume that, well, I’m not supposed to swallow the flouride treatment the dentist gives me… so I’m going to guess I should probably spit this out.  But that’s a strange thing to leave up to chance… knowing the average moron’s capacity for reasoning.

Anyway, now I’m sitting here at my computer, wondering if all this is really worth it. 

Okay… so in the latest of what seems like an endless string of travel security regulations… just as we got our cigarette lighters back (not that you need to carry them on, what with the no smoking, but whatever)… big blocks of cheese are now banned.  Now, I’ll grant that probably most people wouldn’t be carrying on big blocks of cheese, but coming back from Switzerland or France they might.  And now… they’ll be turning those puppies over to the TSA people… who also have probably managed to confiscate a pretty nice bottle of wine or two while they were at it.  And definitely a corkscrew to open the bottle and a knife to cut the big block of cheese.  I see the pattern.  The TSA is hungry!  I get it!  So, the next time I need to travel with a big block of cheese, I’ll be sure to bring enough to share.

Apparently the Norwegians released a study this week that seems to suggest that eldest children have higher IQs than other birth order children.

As if there were ever any doubt. I present one of my brothers (the middle child, of course) as exhibit A:

As of 10:00 this morning I had already worked 40 hours this week. This is not an unusual occurrence for me or for one of my coworkers.

Another important detail to note is that there are 12 people out of the office today… and a couple more out this afternoon at appointments or meetings or whatnot.

So my aforementioned friend and I decided we needed a bit of a mental health moment. And that today was as good a time as any to take one.

So we took a 3 hour lunch and went to see Harry Potter and The Order of the Phoenix.

She and I are those kids who never cut classes. We always work long hours. We never take a comp day.

And today we played hooky for a little while. And it felt great.

Okay… I’ve posted before about annoying banner ads… but this one just doesn’t make any sense. If you have Yahoo mail, you’ve probably seen it. Heck, you’ve probably seen it anyway. Just a little icon with a message about your credit score, and every time you refresh, the icon changes. Well… more often than not… I tend to see this icon:

What in tarnation does that have to do with my credit score?

And here’s something else that’s weird. At my gym, there’s one of those classic gym rat guys - you know, bald, buff but not too buff, dressed all in black… that guy. Well, then he started working out with another guy who was bald, buff-but-not-too-buff, dressed all in black… there were two of them.

Today there were four.

Where are they all coming from?

And here’s something else. I have a smoke detector that runs on electricity… but it also has a battery backup. A few weeks ago, the battery started dying, so the smoke alarm would let out these intermittent chirps (usually at 3:00 in the morning) to register its displeasure. Finally, after one particularly frustrating night, I found the battery and just pulled it out. I actually have my replacement battery at my desk… so don’t worry. BUT… last night there were scattered storms and outages all over the place. Apparently my power went out at some point in the middle of the night. Fine. So I woke up at 3:00ish in the morning to discover that all my power was off. What awakened me? THE CHIRP! Yes, my frickin’ smoke alarm still managed to chirp even though there was no electricity and the dead battery was in the trash can by my bed.

The thing’s possessed.

And, on a not so weird note - my {gulp} boyfriend called today (well, texted… you notice how it takes three times longer to do anything via text message than it does to, say, just call?) to take me out to lunch. Lovely!