but it seemed like a good idea at the time.....

i was at a loss about what to write about this evening, but SO just wandered into my studio and informed me that since he'd written to his best friend (who, along with his wife, are kind enough to take us out hiking every time we come to arizona) and told him about the killer hike we took yesterday and casually mentioned that he should check my blog for details and pictures, i suppose i have to scrap this week's fashion gripe (because, you know, i'm so freaking fashionable) regarding chicks who wear tight t-shirts, seemingly unaware that cute little babydoll tees aren't so cute when rounded bellies strain against the fabric like billy idol's package against his leather pants....minus all possible hints of sex appeal, in favor of a quick summary of our hike (complete with visual aids, if you're lucky).

i'm a little suspicious that perhaps this was all a devious plan to ensure i'd post about him for once, but i think SO's still too worn out from the aforementioned hike to think clearly enough to concoct such a sly plan.

anyway, we hiked yesterday. a couple of hikes ago, i conned SO into buying me a couple of books on hiking in south carolina, and after yesterday's hike, i'm thinking he's beginning to regret indulging me.

since i'm going to have my five year old sidekick and her nine year old brother next saturday (their parents have a boring professional conference to attend), i figured we'd test out a new trail yesterday to see if it would be appropriate for the kids.

in a word: no.

the hike had potential. it was about 5 miles long, and we already knew how to get to the trailhead, since it's one of about five at the raven cliff falls parking lot, near cleveland, sc. my hiking book also had pictures of "el lieutenant", a large rock face resembling a smaller version of "el capitan"( hence the nickname), which i thought might impress the kids.

somehow i overlooked the part in the book about the hike being "strenuous" and "for experienced hikers only", until roughly the time we parked at the trailhead.

even at that, we didn't take the warnings seriously. after all, we've hiked to the bottom of the grand canyon- and even made it back out without the assistance of mules, helicopters, or a team of amateur bodybuilders.

naturally, we got our butts kicked.

the coldspring branch trail splits off of the bill kimball trail (or is it the other way around?), and then they rejoin a couple of miles later, forming a roughly 5 mile (from the parking lot) loop. the coldspring branch trail has a few minor changes in altitude, but nothing spending a week with the treadmill at a 15% incline can't prepare you for. thank goodness this was the way we came back to the parking lot.

the bill kimball trail, on the other hand, is most likely the reason why SO is shuffling around like a geriatric version of frankenstein's monster. even with the switchbacks, the ascent was steep enough that i considered just scooting down the trail on my butt. (i resisted, mostly because i'm almost out of shout at home....plus, the roots would have left me with all sorts of interesting bruises on my derriere, which wouldn't be good if, say, hugh hefner calls and wants me to do the centerfold shoot by the end of the week.) at one point along the trail, there was even a chain to cling to while attempting to descend (or ascend, if one takes the loop the opposite direction) along the rock face- always an encouraging sign on a hike, i assure you.

the trail started out innocently enough

i'm pretty sure there's a cream that can clear that up.

little did i know that i'd soon be clinging to a chain for dear life.

one of the impressive faces of "el lieutenant"

one of about twelve stream crossings on this hike. at some points, the trail has you squishing up the middle of the creek.

(i was going to include one more photo in this post, but SO refuses to let me take a picture of him shuffling around. i swear, some people are no fun whatsoever.)

i'm what? (in bed)

You Are Scooter

Brainy and knowledgable, you are the perfect sidekick. You're always willing to lend a helping hand. In any big event or party, you're the one who keeps things going. "15 seconds to showtime!"

The Muppet Personality Test

i love how no matter what, personality tests always get it half right- sort of like tarot cards, $5.95/minute readings from miss cleo the tv psychic, and SO's attempts to buy me gifts.

i'd say i have a better track record with fortune cookies, but quite frankly, the custom of adding "in bed" to the end of each fortune has drastically reduced the fulfillment rate of those little paper promises. (i'm still waiting on the one that promised i'd "soon meet a tall, dark stranger" (in bed)- mostly because clearly the mystical fortune cookie fortune writers are referring to matthew mcconaughey or johnny depp.)

i was all set with the above until i got to the part about keeping the show/party going. i'm afraid i've never been the one to pick up the mantle of "life of the party", except possibly the time i got astoundingly drunk on tequila jello shots in college (to this day, i cannot go near jello without feeling a bit queasy) or the night of the "frying pan incident", and since i've never heard or seen any evidence of such an improbable occurence, i'm guessing the consumption of large amounts of alcohol doesn't make me that outgoing.

i'm also a little concerned about the "brainy" allegation. do you have any idea how long/hard i've worked to be an underachiever? this will totally blow my rep.

then again, if tall, dark strangers are into brainy women, perhaps i can roll with it. (in bed)

sequins do not a formal flip flop make

i know i may sound like an old fuddy-duddy here (use of that phrase alone is probably enough), but when did it become socially acceptable to wear flip flops with one's evening dress?

while waiting in line at a restaurant last night, i counted no fewer than eight girls in prom dresses and flip flops. i'm all for comfort, but seriously- this was right up there with that girls' lacrosse team that wore flip flops for a photo op with the president a year or two ago.

"yes, folks, i am a trained professional"

flubbing on the air, while not necessarily inevitable, does happen. shortly after i moved to columbia, a coworker at the classic rock station, whom i looked up to (and still do, for that matter), made me feel infinitely better about myself and my skills.

the single most intimidating moment i've found while on the air is always that first time you turn on the microphone on a new (to you, at least) radio station. while i've gotten better with this over time, i can still vividly recall my first moments on the classic rock station.

i was sitting in the studio wth the aforementioned dj, and he turned the microphone on, pointed at me, and the first words out of my mouth were "hello columbia".

oh yes- i believe the fan club was started shortly thereafter. it was deep, it was profound, and it was way too perky for a classic rock station, i'm sure.

i have no clue what i said after that, but i'm sure the microphone was turned off (mercifully) very shortly thereafter.

anyway, back to the flub that wasn't mine:

maybe a month or two after i started working at the station, i was sitting in the drive thru at mc donald's, waiting to see how badly they could screw up my order, (let the records show that i'm a proud stockholder, though), listening to my favorite dj do his show, and suddenly, i was treated to a sort of remix of _______________ (insert random classic rock song, because i sure as heck don't remember what was playing six and a half years later), mixed with a phone call that he was recording for later use.

because of the delicate wirings of most control rooms, this sort of thing happens more often than one might think....well, assuming that the radio show isn't pre-recorded, which sadly, is also happening more often than one might think.

i told him later that i felt a little better knowing that, even after 20 years in the business, even he still makes mistakes. he just sort of shrugged it off and while he didn't verbalize it, i think his main view on the situation was something to the effect of "shit happens".

however, since my klutziness is not only physical, i managed to come up with an on-air flub as yet unrivaled.

at the classic rock station, we played our music on cds. we had several cd players, so you'd load in your next couple of cds, cue up the right track, and then you'd simply press a button when the time came to play the song. (for the record, i don't think anyone does this anymore.)

you know how your most embarrassing moments are not only etched in your memory, but they're in slow motion? this is the most slow-mo moment i have.

i was in the studio, chatting with both my boss and my boyfriend at the time (not the brightest spot on my dating resume, but he did give me a good excuse to buy my first (and only) formal dress). what we were talking about is of no real consequence, but i paused long enough to reach over and hit the button to set off the guns n'roses song i had cued up- a live version of "patience". i did it with finesse. i did it with flair. i did it in one smooth movement, with a little pirouette at the end.

unfortunately, i'd been too absorbed in the conversation to bother to double check to make sure the right song was cued up. so, instead of listening to axl rose whistle the intro to "patience", my listeners were treated to "hey all you f*n guns n f*n roses fans......"

i'm told the look on my face was priceless.

thank goodness that
~this was before the fcc crackdown and
~my boss had wound up in a similar situation years before and was therefore sympathetic.

anyway, i mention all this not because i'm too lazy to put it onto a postcard for postsecret, but because i just walked into the studio to find a music bed started roughly 30 seconds before i entered the room.

yes, folks, i am a trained professional.

go forth and read, my darlings!

i'm not feeling particularly entertaining at the moment, so go read this while you eagerly await my next brilliantly witty post.

(or maybe i mean "my first brilliantly witty post".)

argh! the purple pixie just won't shut up!

i started a new book last night- it's by norah somebody or other. so far, it's pretty good, though not good enough for me to be able to come up with the title at the moment.

funny- i thought i was a little too young (and sober) for short-term memory loss to rear its ugly head.

as i bang away at the keyboard this evening (waiting to watch 24- the bosses record it, and then we skip through the commercials- at least two of which, much to dismay, wind up featuring scantily-clad victoria's secret models strutting around. every time he realizes he's too late to stop and catch the ad, he groans. i haven't exactly worked out why he doesn't just rewind back to the beginning of the strutting, but i suspect it's because he figured she'd get upset by his ogling and smother him in his sleep or something.), i've got a cat in my lap and "1999" by prince in my head. i don't mind the former in the least, and ordinarily the latter wouldn't be a big deal, as i've always liked the song, but it's been on an endless loop since a coworker at the radio station made some comment about the purple pixie yesterday.

the last time i heard a song this many times in a row, interestingly enough, was back on new year's eve, 1998 (by which i mean december 31, 1998) when i was home for christmas break and the alternative station in kansas city played the song overandoverandover as a gimmick to draw attention to their upcoming change in format.*

i recall spending that new year's eve at a small gathering at tammy floyd's house (where, if memory serves, not only did i step on the hem of my silk dress (thank goodness for banana republic's outlet store), but i think i might have also smooched one of her younger brothers.) listening to 107.3** play "1999" followed by a remix that inretrospect seems like it was roughly the same length as "inna-gadda-da-vida" (the extended version with the drum solo that goes on for about ten minutes longer than it should), but probably was only a mere 5 or 6 minutes, compared to the 3 1/2 minute original version.

to this day, i wonder how/why we sat through such repetition for multiple hours. the only explanation i can possibly come up with is:

it was new years' eve, and we were too busy drinking (let's see- most of us were 20 in 1988....) grape juice and/or ginger ale (hey- the color's about right) to care.

now, what on earth was it i was going to sit down and write about this evening? for some reason, it escapes me......

*note to non-radio people: "format" = the type of music a radio station plays

**in another semi-interesting aside, i used to know a dj who worked there. i called him the night i wrote my senior paper, and after several phone conversations, actually wound up meeting him at the station a couple of times. theoretically, i was going to be his intern. however, it became clear pretty quickly that he wasn't interested in a "strictly professional business relationship". glad that didn't work out.

where's levar burton when i need him?

i'm afraid i don't have the time or inspiration to come up with something witty and entertaining this evening (hey- they can't all be winners), so instead, a few overdue recommendations:

books i've read lately, and think you'd like, too:

my first five husbands (and the ones who got away) by rue mcclanahan
(if you don't take me up on any of my other recommendations, at least give this one a shot)

welcome to the monkey house by kurt vonnegut

the lake of dead languages by carol goodman
(i read this from cover to cover today, rather than doing any actual work.)

and josh kilmer-purcell's memoir, the exact title of which escapes me, but i know i mentioned it somewhere in a past post.

and for your music collection:

continuum- john mayer

eagerly awaiting:

*the new maroon 5 cd (out may 22nd)
*the new laurie notaro book (out this week? next week? i really need to look into that while i'm online this evening.)
*the cirque du soleil show (saltimbanco, i think it's called) that's touring arenas, though nothing within an hour or two of columbia yet)

never again is what you swore the time before....

you'll never guess what was playing on my ipod as i got to work this morning.

depeche mode came up in the rotation (i might not know how to take advantage of many of the features on my nano, but i'm all over that "shuffle" setting) about halfway to work, and i spent the rest of the drive trying to work out how i could construct a brilliant post that fit that particular line (which, for the record, will undoubtedly be in my head for the remainder of the day- dave gahan's british accent and all).

as i hit the back door here it the radio station, it all became clear. (i know, i know- my topic was actually pretty obvious, but i had to roll out of bed a couple hours earlier than usual, and since i'd stayed up late reading the rue mcclanahan memoir- up to husband number two so far- as they say, "waking up is hard to do".)

five things i never want to do again*

1. practice flying down a flight of stairs
snow covered hills? yes. flying on an airplane? sure- though i am highly fond of road trips, too. going careening down stairs? been there, done that....twice, come to think of it.

2. lima beans
i will not eat them on a train. i will not eat them in a plane. i will not eat them in a box. i will not eat them with a fox. you can give me broccoli (with or without cheese sauce, which i think is more than reasonable) and brussels sprouts all day (i like to peel off the layers and eat them), but even at the tender age of "older than i look", if you give me a plate full of lima beans, i am far more likely to flick them at other people than i am to actually eat them.

3. hammer pants
oh, what an unfortunate trend that was, wasn't it? i didn't even have full-fledged hammer pants- just some poor teal-colored imitation i'd bought with my alowance at tj maxx for the princely sum of something under $5. (funny how i remember that- but that was sort of a big deal, since i got $3/week towards my clothing allowance, and therefore, those heinous pants were a steal at less than two weeks' pay.) was it on in living color that hammer was spoofed? it seems to me i saw tommy davidson do a twirl and get trapped in his own pants, but that could just be a figment of my imagination. perhaps i should buy the dvd set and check.

4. attend an 8 hour concert without applying a drop of sunscreen
not one of my wisest moves. i was fourteen and invincible, and quite frankly, just thinking about it makes my shoulders burn. (interesting piece of duff trivia- the headliner was jackyl, whom you have not likely heard of unless you were into metal and/or chainsaws in the early 90s. they were the band behind timeless classics like "the lumberjack song" and "she loves my cock", which my relatives should continue believing is an ode to a rooster.)

5. nuke easter candy**
though i've heard a rumor that peep-nuking can actually be quite entertaining. perhaps i'll have to try this out on a microwave i don't have to clean....

*not even if val kilmer asks me to.
**see post below

it burns! it burns!

sometimes i think i take klutziness to a whole new level. (though, if i'm ever feeling litigious, i will deny that i ever felt even the tiniest bit responsible for my injuries....remind me to adjust this post before filing any lawsuits down the road, ok?) even at a young age, i had the ability to injure myself in ways most other folks could never have conceived.

i went through two pairs of glasses in less than a week in elementary school. i don't remember many details, but i remember the red pair i really liked met its end quite prematurely- one whole day after purchase- because i apparently had problems with the whole "left foot, right foot" concept.

early in my high school career, i wound up with trampoline burn after an afternoon trying to flip and land on my feet at a friend's house. considering how much my nose hurt, i promptly rescinded any fantasies i ever had involving trampolines and gratuitous nudity with the opposite sex.

later in high school, i wiped out running down some stairs at a wrestling meet and wound up with thriteen stitches and a shattered tooth......but you've heard that story already, haven't you?

i'm trying to remember if i had any major college injuries. i'm sure i did, though i think i can attribute most of my minor trips, falls, and stumbles on the typical college student's beverage of choice.

about a year and a half ago, there was the infamous "unintended skylight incident", where yours truly, while retrieving a ream of paper from the bosses' attic, missed a stud (then again, don't most of us, at one time or another?) and somehow wound up with 98% of my body on the upper floor, and the other 2% dangling in midair.

i've actually been pretty smooth since then (except for wrenching my ankle on the trampoline last year), so i figure i was probably overdue for tonight's ridiculously stupid injury.

when i was at the hunky orthodontist's office yesterday, he decided to rearrange a few things on my braces. nothing too major, mind you, but as a result of the change, i have an extremely sore upper jaw, and a mildly sore lower one. however, this evening was a little bit of a bummer (nothing like finding out you wasted multiple hours doing paperwork that didn't need to be done), and minor discofort was not going to keep me from enjoying one of those 50% off cadbury creme eggs i picked up right after easter.

the hard, chocolatey exterior was no match for me and my brilliant plan. i figured fifteen seconds in the microwave would soften the chocolate up adequately, and then i could bite off the top f the egg and suck out the filling as usual.

note to self: never nuke a cadbury creme egg for more than ten seconds.....and then let someone else test it for edibility.

had i had a willing guinea pig available, perhaps i would not currently have to suck on ice cubes in an attempt to soothe my fried tastebuds. you see, while the hard chocolatey exterior remains both hard and chocolatey during nuking, that delicate creme center (and what the heck is that, besides water and sugar?) gets very, very, very hot.

i'm not sure who exactly is responsible for this phenomenon, but i think that, like on mc donald's coffee cups, some sort of warning should be printed. perhaps i should retain a lawyer for this matter. i'm thinking pain and suffering....and perhaps even a little consideration for my loss of work and the troubling flashbacks i think i might have every time i eat or drink something hot.

since i know these things can take a while, i suppose i have time to determine whether i'd prefer my settlement in cash, or caramel eggs...............

wham, bam

i'm afraid i'm only good for a quickie this evening. (that noise you just heard was my sweet, innocent little sister gasping at my choice of words.) you see, i'm not quite sleepy, but i really don' feel like dealing with the heap of avon products in my living room just yet, and i'm using the excuse that i don't have time to stay up and deal with avon, and yet here i am, sitting on my butt, pounding out a post and wondering

1. why thirteen people actually admit to reading this boring drivel and

2. how come i haven't had a new subscribe in almost a month?

guess that means i should write about something so incredibly entertaining* that my two and a half handfuls of readers will be unable to resist the urge to tell everyone they know about how brilliantly funny i am and it'll just snowball and pretty soon matthew mconaughey and val kilmer will show up at my front door, demanding that i run away with them and regale them with my amusing anecdotes for the rest of their lives.

ok- maybe not. maybe i just don't have it in me this evening. besides, i should probably get to bed before i start feeling guilty about ignoring the heap on makeup in the middle of my living room floor.

*to that end, just send them to one of my posts from the past month. i swear there are a few that are at least mildly amusing, yet none of them have very many comments.