Trapped like rats

Last night I was walking past the dining room and saw flashing lights and movement in front of the house. My first thought was that it was the police or fire department. I called up to Bob, "What's going on in the front of the house," as I went to peek out the blinds. He said, "Probably the road crew," and I saw that it was -- it was some kind of big truck with a flashing light on top that was driving slowly down the street, and just as I looked out, a man walked up to the front door and hung something on the doorknob.

They had resurfaced one side of the street yesterday, so they were coming back to tell us that they were going to resurface the other side (our side) today, and not to park on the street or drive on it from 8:00 this morning to 6:00 tonight.

I was just glad that I had noticed them; if I hadn't, we wouldn't have known and could theoretically have been trapped! Like rats!

We had gotten a letter earlier in the summer that they were going to be doing the work, and that they would give us advance warning so that we could move our cars out of the neighborhood; I don't really think 9:00 the night before could be considered "advance warning," but oh well.

I normally leave the house around 8:30, but I got going this morning early, and left about 7:55. Bob had already left, and when I walked past his office I saw his cell phone plugged in beside his chair. It was a dilemma -- do I leave it there? Do I take it with me? I couldn't exactly call him to ask. I was thinking, if I knew where he was, I could take it to him, but all I knew was that he was going to the bank, then he said he would probably go to Quik Trip, but I didn't have any confidence that I could find him. I knew he was playing golf in the afternoon.

So I left it there, and drove to work, and it wasn't until later that I realized that it wasn't like the street was quarantined -- he could park off the street and walk to the house.

Which he did, as I found out later when he called at around 11:00 to tell me that they hadn't started working on the street yet! So I coud have slept in. I wonder now if they'll even do anything today; we may have to go through the whole thing again tomorrow. Oh well. Not that big a deal.

It rained on me a little as I was driving to work, so I suppose rain might keep them from being able to do the work.

When I turned on the windshield wipers this morning, I looked up and saw that I have a crack in my windshield! My poor car. I washed the car on Sunday, so I know it wasn't cracked then; I guess it could have been dinged, and then the crack spread with the temperature change . . . All I know is, it's cracked. I need to call the insurance company and find out what to do. It's big enough that I imagine they'll have to replace the whole windshield. I'm not looking forward to that.

As I mentioned before, since I'm in between audio books, Los Lonely Boys are getting me to work in the morning. During the day, if I need to concentrate and there are too many things going on in the office, I put my headphones on. This week I've been listening to Adam Ant's album, Wonderful.

Driving home in the evenings, I don't need quite the level of energy that I need in the mornings, so I tend to listen to something quieter. Lately it's been Lowen & Navarro. Eric Lowen was recently diagnosed with ALS ("Lou Gehrig's Disease"), which he talks about in this article. It's things like this that really put your own problems in perspective.

I'm working on a lot of medical stuff at work now, and one of the guys who's helping me with it came in this morning to get a new article to work on. It happened to be one about rheumatoid arthritis, and we marveled at the pictures of the advanced disease and expressed hope that something like that would never happen to us. I don't think it will, but you never know.

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The right tool for the right job

Last night was, um, interesting.

At about 9:30, Bob suddenly got worried about the build-up of lint in the dryer--the lint that you can't get to by cleaning the lint filter. I bet you didn't know that there was other lint, did you? I didn't. He thought it might be keeping the dryer from working well; he said that there is a special tool, something like a bottle brush, that you can use to snake down into the dryer and pull out the lint.

We don't have one of those tools, however, of course, so he tried to use a spatula.

Which he dropped. Into the dryer, down in the hole where you stick the lint filter.

I suppose if we were talking about something like a toaster, he could have picked it up and shook it, and the spatula would have fallen out. However, we're talking about something just a little too large to pick up and shake. He actually handled it very well. I stayed out of the way except when he called me to come hold something, and I heard very little cursing. He just pretty calmly took the whole dryer apart until he could get to the spatula (which he subsequently flung across the room).

While the dryer was pulled out of the alcove, with the front of it taken off, and all the insides exposed, he went upstairs for something, and I heard some kind of a noise, like something hitting something metallic. I went out to investsigate, and didn't see anything untoward, although, as I said, the front of the dryer was off.

I peered inside, thinking maybe that one of the cats was exploring in there; there wasn't a lot of room, but I could easily see one of them getting inside (after all, Pyewacket once crawled into an open trash bag and got taken out to the curb, so anything's possible).

I could see Pyewacket in the living room, so if anyone was in the dryer, it was Dinah, so I just made a mental note to mention it before Bob put the front back on the dryer. When he came back downstairs, he had the same thought, apparently, because he said, "Where's Dinah?" I said I didn't know, and he said he just wondered whether she might be inside the dryer, and then we heard her cry.

"Dinah?" he said, and she answered, but we couldn't tell from where. "Dinah? Where are you?" Another cry. He said to me, "Call her," and I went out in the hall, but before I could say anything, he said, "She's up there," and pointed to the laundry room cabinet. The one above the washer. The "metallic" sound I'd heard must have been Dinah jumping up to the top of the cabinet from the washer.

She's done it before, but always before the dryer was there, too, and she could jump down onto the dryer. Now, though, there was nothing but empty space, and she didn't know what to do. She crawled out onto the clothesrod and stood there, but was unsteady, so she backed up back onto the top of the cabinet. I stepped into the laundry alcove and reached up to her, trying to get her to come down to me, but she wouldn't, and frankly, it's probably good that she didn't, because what was I going to do? Catch her in mid-air? Without losing an eye? Unlikely.

She kept crying piteously, obviously scared and unable to get down on her own (without breaking a leg), so Bob went and got an ottoman, and I stood on that and reached up and grabbed her and hauled her down. She immediately started purring.

By the time Bob got the dryer back together and put back in place, it was nearly midnight, and he was hungry. We made a midnight run to Taco Bell, the only place we could think of that would be open. Not your typical Saturday night, although with us, anything could happen.

Over the weekend I got the most wonderful box in the mail from Liora -- bubble bath, a back scratcher/massager, a couple of bottles of nail polish (purple and orangy-red), two books ("The Memory Keeper's Daughter" and "Shopgirl"), two bracelets with blue wooden beads . . . was that all? I can't remember, there was so much stuff. She sent a lovely card and said it sounded like I needed a little pick-me-up, and boy, did she provide it!

I tried out the bubble bath last night--Strawberry Margarita. Lovely.

I keep forgetting to mention that two author websites that I designed and built have gone live in the past month or so, one for Karyn Witmer (aka Elizabeth Grayson):

And the other for Suzanne MacPherson:

A couple of gratuitous cat pictures:

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But I'm not gay!

I heard (I guess I should say overheard) an interesting conversation at the beauty salon this morning. I went in to get my hair colored and cut, and while I was getting it cut, there was a guy sitting in the chair next to me having his hair cut. I didn't hear the first part of the conversation, because it apparently took place over at the shampoo station, but from what I heard, I deduced that he'd been out the previous night and some guy had hit on him. He was saying to the (gay) hairdresser, "But I'm not gay!"

He was saying that it wasn't the first time it had happened, and he didn't know why. He said he'd asked his sister, because she "knew a lot of gay guys" -- unfortunately, I didn't hear what his sister said. The hairdresser said, well, you're self-assured, and confident, and they feel comfortable approaching you -- which didn't make any sense at ALL to me. Just from his looks (and I know that's a snap judgement), I would have thought he was probably gay, too.

He was slender, wearing jeans and a tight black t-shirt, and when he spoke to the hairdresser, he leaned over close to him and covered his mouth with his hand and practically whispered in his ear.

He said to the hairdresser, "Did you think I was gay when you met me?" and the hairdresser said, "No, but I wished you were!" and they laughed, and I thought, yeah, right, you're not gay.

A few weeks ago I bought some instant green tea in individual servings (the ones that you pour into bottled water and shake up) at Target because they were on the clearance aisle. I thought it looked kind of intriguing, but frankly I was a little afraid to try it, so it just stayed up in the cabinet. I finally tried it, and I love it! It's Lipton Green Tea To Go -- I like the Mango Mandarin and the Cherry Blossom; I haven't tried the Lemon and Honey flavor. (I was afraid that it was on clearance because they'd stopped making it, which would be just my luck, but apparently it was because they've changed the box.)

I'm usually not crazy about iced tea, and I really don't like instant tea, but this is very light, slightly sweet, and really nice. I've been drinking a lot of it. Target had it on sale this weekend -- $1.99/box of ten, which probably isn't that great a deal if compared to brewing tea with a teabag, but not bad if you take the convenience factor into account.

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Disgust

At the gym last night I was walking on the treadmill and watching House; the woman on the treadmill next to me was watching Fear Factor, or that's what I assume it was. I was trying desperately not to look over at it. That's a hard thing to do, though. It's like telling someone not to think of an elephant--you just really can't help it. And I normally look around anyway, of course, just to see what's going on, particularly during commercials.

Not last night, though. I kept my eyes firmly on the television in front of me. How can people watch stuff like that? Why do they want to? It's a complete mystery to me; I'll never understand it. I don't even want to know about it.

Although I don't watch reality tv (except for What Not to Wear, which doesn't really count), I can sort of understand the trainwreck factor of some of them. They embarrass me and make me feel uncomfortable for the most part, and some of them are so stupid that if I happen across one, I turn it off in disgust, but Fear Factor takes disgust to a whole new level. How can that be enjoyable? Anyway . . .

And yes, I know that House can be disgusting sometimes, too, but it's in small increments, and I can look away (although not last night!). And of course, it's not that I really even care about the medical parts of it, strangely; it's the human relationships that interest me (I imagine that's a woman thing).

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Bridges

My drive to work now is so stressful.

Until last week I could just get on the highway, point the car north, and it was a straight shot all the way until I got off a couple of blocks from the office. Now I have to drive on three different highways, merge, change lanes, cross the river twice on scary bridges, figure out which lanes are exit only when I don't want to exit, and which ones aren't exit lanes when I do want to . . . And it's through a major industrial area, so even though there isn't a lot of traffic, what traffic there is is made up of huge trucks and cement mixers and tankers and all kinds of big equipment.

I'm sure in a week or two it'll be second nature and I won't even have to think about it, but right now I'm not enjoying it at all, to say the least. And the bridges! It's not as bad as it could be, these aren't the big suspension bridges that really scare me, these are big, but I can get into a center lane and try not to think about it or look around too much, and I'm okay.

I don't know what it is, exactly. I know, like most phobias, it's irrational. It's not a fear that the bridge is going to collapse, it feels more like I'm afraid that I'll suddenly spin the wheel and drive off the edge, lose control.

I guess I'm not the only one: Bridge Phobia

Gephyrophobia: An abnormal and persistent fear of crossing bridges. Sufferers of this phobia experience undue anxiety even though they realize their fear is irrational. Their fear may result partly from the fear of enclosure (claustrophobia) or the fear of heights (acrophobia). Phobic drivers may worry about being in an accident in busy traffic or losing control of their vehicles. High bridges over waterways and gorges can be especially intimidating, as can be very long or very narrow bridges.

Later . . .

I wrote that, I think, on Sunday night. On Monday, having finished my latest audio book and without anything else to start listening to, I filled up the car's CD changer with music. I merged onto the highway and hit the "play" button, and the first notes of Los Lonely Boys' Seniorita filled the air. That song just makes me grin, and I turned it up loud and sang along, and it really made me happy.

I'm not saying that my palms didn't start sweating when I saw that big scary bridge coming up--they did--but it wasn't as bad as I expected. I'll get used to it.

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