Scavenger hunt

Today I spent more than half an hour looking for my car in the wrong parking lot. The whole time, I had a creepy old guy following me because he wanted my parking space. He said I should just get in his car and we could look for my car together.

To all who say I look 12:

I tried to get a "youth" ticket at the San Francisco Zoo, which is for kids ages 11 to 17. Given that I'm often told I look 12, I figured 17 would be no problem. But the girl looked at me and asked, "How old are you?"
"17," I said.
"What's your birthday?" she asked.
"September 15, 19-eighty... fuck."
She made me pay the extra two dollars. Jerk.

Death

Today I went to pick up a letter at the post office, the woman asked for my ID, and then proceeded to scrutinize it the way very bored bouncers at bars do. She looked at the ID, looked at me, then back at the ID, back at me.

"How old are you?" she asked suspiciously.

"23," I said.

She then continued to scrutinize the ID and my face for another minute.

"You don't LOOK 23."

"OK," I said.

Then she laughed at me, because it was apparently very funny that I don't look 23, and she walked to the back room to get my letter.

15 minutes later, I asked the woman at the next counter if she could please check where the the woman who had been helping me 15 minutes ago had gone. She didn't see her in the back room, so she paged her on the intercom system.

A minute after that, the original woman came out and said the person who had the key to the registered mail had gone on break, and did I want to wait until she came back? Apparently, you-don't-look-23-lady was chillin' in the back room with her thumb up her ass for 15 minutes, while I was standing at the counter and the line had built to the door.

Seriously. Death.

Vagina

Yesterday I was running and a group of 14-year-old boys yelled "VAGINA!" at me repeatedly. I just turned 23 today. When will this stop?

Who says I have no life?

OK I was bored and got this idea from ex-roommate Ben.

Directions: Type "(your name) is" into google. Post your ten favorite responses.
(This is not an order of preference.., but progression)

Here's mine:
ericaiscool.com
This erica is confined to certain limited areas of the Riversdale and Albertinia
After Erica is found devouring a cat, Hayes gives her a transfusion and it's now
his belief that Yorga is an Old World vampire residing in California
Erica is an adorable twenty inch, Collector Doll
Erica is being romanced by Harry's doctor.
Erica is now known in Zimbabwe as a gwenyambira
Erica is an adorable eight year old girl with a spunky personality.
erica is the new Fish Kill champion!
Erica is not at all ashamed to be from Kentucky

Here's his:
ben is an insert within the notiziario dell'istituto superiore di sanità
Ben is what my grandmother used to call an old soul.
I am not the holy man; Ben is.
THE BEN IS MIGHTIER
Ben is in the world, but not of it.
Ben is determined to uncover the reason for the distance between himself...
Ben is someone whom I feel has been sent here to inspire
Ben is the best I've had -- hands down.
Ben is your ideal man.
Ben is also seven years old, and severely autistic.

Now wasn't that a fun time?

Language fun

I found a fun game. Go to the following Web site: http://www.freetranslation.com/
And play.

Here's my fun (it's in Norwegian):
Folk som finner ikke deres bukser ofte eter småkaker. Dette er fordi om de eter mange småkaker og blir fet, de enda ikke fallerer åpent setet av deres bukser (fordi de ikke har noen bukser). Selv om sjokoladebrun flissmåkaker er alle yndlings#, er snickerdoodles uforanderlig den beste småkaken i universet. Jeg er en trofast tilhenger av snickerdoodle, virkelig.

What will you do?

What am I??

I found this in a drawer at work and no one knows what it is. I've received the following guesses from various coworkers and ruled them all out: 1. seam ripper; 2. tweezers; 3. staple remover; 4. poker; 5. dentist's tool. Someone give me a guess that makes sense. I hate when I can't google something and figure it out. Note: The pen is next to it for size perspective.

Riddle of the day

Here is your riddle:
How do you get a girl to go out with you after she's already said no and claimed to be a lesbian?
What a guy last night thought was the answer:
Steal her cell phone.

I LOVE people.

Chitty chitty bang bang WHISTLE

I was in New York this weekend, and Obesity Girl and I met up Saturday night in our spot, which is in front of the Chitty Chitty Bang Bang theater in Times Square. Well, we were screeching and flailing our arms about in traditional Obesity Girl fashion, when all of a sudden we heard a whistle.

Both scared it was a cop and we were about to be arrested for public drunkeness or the like — which, incidentally would have been very impressive given that we were both 100 percent sober — we halted our antics and turned toward the sound of the whistle. Finally, looking down, I saw an old, old man, leaning crooked over a cane and wearing an oversized bright orange T-shirt. He was blowing a little plastic whistle at us.

When he got our attention, I was silent, dumbfounded, and Obesity Girl was laughing hysterically (I soon followed). Then, in a voice that sounded like drunken rambling (although I don't think he was drunk), he screamed "WHAT'S WRONNNNGGGG?" Shaking his finger at us, he continued, "WHAT ARE YOU DOOOOOOING?"

At this point I was keeled over in hysterical laughter and he was not pleased. He trudged away with his plastic whistle still hanging from his neck, muttering incoherently as he limped along.

Regrets, regrets

I was standing outside a bar talking to a friend from work around 2 a.m. last night, when a guy I've never seen before in my life approached us. He looked at me with a weird look, said, "Excuse me, I'm sorry to interrupt," then stepped directly in front of me (facing away) and addressed my friend, Mike.

"I'm sorry to interrupt," he said to Mike. "But she looks, like, 12."

Really I wanted to kick him, or at least come up with some intelligent thing to say and make him feel like the moron he is. Instead, all I did was explain to him you're not supposed to talk about someone in the third person when they're standing right next to you. Then I walked away and kicked myself instead for being so completely unoriginal.

If I was going to be unoriginal anyway, maybe I should have just punched him in the nose.

Optimism

So I'm getting worse and worse at updating this thing. But also, I'm not sure anyone's reading it anymore so we're even.

Anyway I've decided to compile a short list of things I dislike (and, for your benefit and for purposes of space, I'll leave out all things political).

1) Creepy guys who hit on me at the gas station.
2) Cute guys who don't hit on me at the animal shelter.
3) Track coaches who are forced into resignation and tell me with a straight face that they want to spend more time with their family.
4) Having a cold, even though it's 100+ degrees outside.
5) The fact that it's 100+ degrees outside.

And I'll leave it at that. And if you'll note, the "things I dislike" list is 100 percent shorter than the "things I like" list. That must make me an optimist.

Oh I forgot one more:
6) Being asked at every high school sporting event I cover if I wrote for the school paper. Or "Do you go to West High?" Once when I said no, very emphatically, the guy thought he got the idea and apologized: "Oh, I'm sorry," he said. "You go to Tracy?"

Bitter like a cookie

I was recently told by one of my loyal readers (haha) that if someone never spoke to me and only read this blog, they would likely assume that I am a bitter person. As that is not the impression I want to give off, I intend to make a list of happy things, things that I like, starting... now:
1. Cats.
2. Kittens.
3. Monkeys.
4. Looking at pretty men (but not talking to them because that generally ruins the illusion).
5. Multiples of 5.
6. Kicking Republicans in the shins.
7. Cookies.
8. When dumb people (namely Republicans, but there are dumb members of other political parties as well) inadvertently damage themselves, whether it's stubbing their toe or accidentally shooting themselves in the kneecap.
9. Spaghetti.
10. Poking.

If you still haven't gotten your fill of happiness for the day, take a gander at www.happynews.com. It's like the current administration likes to say -- you always hear about cars exploding in Iraq, but you never hear the good news about the cars that don't explode. Now you can.

Gizmo for president!

Go here: http://www.judysworld.net/kittens/ratethis/vote.php?tag=42da13de33ba5
and rate how cute Gizmo is on a scale of 1-10. (He's a 10). If he doesn't win the cute cat contest than I blame all of you. I'll know who didn't vote. And I'll deck you.

Oh and don't bother voting more than once — I voted 20 times before I realized it only registered once.

HARK. VOTE. 10.

Circle of life

The good news: Kibbles got adopted (Four more kittens and one Momma-cat to go).
The bad news: I'm gonna SOCK the mean lady at the shelter. I got there 15 minutes before closing time and she wouldn't let me go in and say hi to the kittens. I wonder if the kitten euthanasia drug she loves so much works on people?

Fuck guys. I'm going to marry a cookie.

I was at the mall today because I took my car in to Sears to get the tires rotated. They told me it would take four hours and I should bring it back the next day, but since I was already there at the mall, I decided to stay a little while to spend some leftover gift certificates from Christmas (this Christmas and last Christmas... I'm really bad at spending those things). Anyway after I settled on a bunch of underwear (did I mention I'm really bad at spending those things?), I went to Mrs. Fields to buy a cookie.

And I would just like to put it on the record that the little mini cinnamon-sugar cookies at Mrs. Fields are the best food in the ENTIRE world. In fact, I think I had an orgasm.

Kitties!

Look it's Fiver (left) and Eyes Wide Shut! This ran in the paper on Saturday — if they still don't get adopted then it's official: People are MORONS. Look how cute! Yay!

My Pulitzer Prize

Today I went to a pool hall to write a story about a 9-ball tournament, and not enough people showed up to have a 9-ball tournament, so instead I had to vomit out 650 words about the pool hall not having a 9-ball tournament.

Jockstrap memories

So have you ever had one of those random memories kick in for no good reason at all? You have? Me too!

I was at a Little League practice the other day and they were talking about how one of the kids needed to buy a jockstrap. Well that triggered the following memory from my City Sports days:

I was working at the register when a guy came up with an exchange. Now, since I had a very solid personal policy about not paying attention to customers, I didn't pay him much mind at first when he set two jockstraps down on the counter.
-"Umm... I need to exchange these," he said.
-OK.
-"Not for me. It's for my son... my... friend... I mean... it's not for me. For someone else I mean... I need to exchange these."

Now he had my attention. I looked at the two jockstraps.

He was exchanging an XL for a Small.

Crap and stuff...

So I brought back the last three kittens to the shelter yesterday. Fiver hit two pounds a couple of days ago, and I couldn't put it off any longer. Anyway I figured the smaller and cuter he is, the more likely he is to get adopted. But I miss him (and Jumper and Aunt Sister) anyway — it's weird only having two cats in the house again. Nice cause there's less to clean, but weird.

Anyway I miss my kittens, I'm annoyed that no one's adopting them, I'm annoyed that Sandra Day O'Connor resigned and I'm terrified that Bush will somehow slip a hardcore conservative in there to replace her ('specially in the light of the conservative groups protesting Alberto Gonzales, although in reality, Gonzales probably had some evil up his sleeve as well). Oh, and all I've been writing about is geriatric yoga, dumb little kids doing somersaults, little league, more little league and also little league.

And I'm sitting here eating croutons because that's pretty much all I have in my apartment and I'm broke till Tuesday.

All in all, a great week.

Pants and stomachaches

So I covered a Sacramento Monarchs game tonight, and about five minutes into the SECOND half, the Sacramento Bee writer walks in, sits next to me and says, "What'd I miss?"

He then proceeded to type everything I said to him.
-Wait, so Yolanda Griffith scored her 3,000th point? he asked.
-Yeah.
-Did she get a standing ovation?
-Yeah.
-You sure it was a standing one?
-Yep.
-How many other players in the WNBA have scored 3,000 points?
-Eight.
-You sure that's right?

I seriously should have started making things up:
Not only did she get a standing ovation, dude — her fan club all ran onto the court with no pants! Then they all started dancing the Macarena and Griffith took off her pants and joined in! You shoulda seen it, man — it was GREAT.

On another note, the media room had cookies, rice krispie treats and cake. My stomach hurts.