"dispatch from (way, way, way) down south"

things i learned yesterday, at my hotel:
1. several rooms here are named for celebrities, including rita hayworth and gloria swanson. mine is currently unnamed. i like to think it's because they're waiting for me to become famous.
2. the sewage system is not as robust as on the mainland. after you realize this (the hard way), $1 is enough to coax the housekeeper into remedying the situation.
3. toilets here flush counterclockwise. (of course i checked.)
4. sometimes you aren't the only one who thinks a shell is really neat. (didn't learn that one until after walking all the way back, emptying my pockets, and realizing one of the shells was on the move.)
...and while walking from pago pago harbor to just past flowerpot rock and back:
1. litter is a HUGE problem here. if you know me well, you know this drives me bonkers. (the lack of recycling here also makes me twitchy.)
2. that said, at least the bags they use are biodegradable- corn based, i think.
3. as long as you get your package to the post office by thursday, it'll go out on friday's flight.
4. our sister hotel, sadie's by the sea, offers all amenities (pool, snorkeling, kayak rental) with a room key, even on sundays, which is a day of religion and family on the island.
5. that's good news, because my plan the fly over to western samoa to celebrate my birthday today (and then come back here tonight so i could celebrate again tomorrow) was thwarted by the fact that return flights are booked solid through tuesday.
6. part of the reason you don't see many thin samoans (from what i can tell anyway)- huge portions and lots of cheap carbs.
my midday meal was a vat of hot and sour soup as big as my sink (i ate about a third of it), and enough lo mein that i ate three servings and still brought home a full takeout container.
also, i picked up a pack of 6 cinnamon rolls for $1.80.
(myfitnesspal probably won't approve. it can bite me. i'm on vacation.)
oh- and at mcdonalds, you can get the "island-style breakfast". i'll pass on the eggs and rice, but spam doesn't sound half bad.....
speaking of spam, never have i seen such variety! i'm thinking about shipping the "spam with cheese" back to my dad.
now, if you'll excuse me, i'm going to pack up my snorkeling gear, figure out which bikini i'm wearing today, and get ready to head over to sadie's by the sea.
(first, however, i should probably try one of these cinnamon rolls- just to see if they're any good.)

all in a name

oh, lordy- it's happened again.

i just had a caller spell her child's name with a "hyphen at the top".***

the next celebrity recording a psa for nbc seriously needs to tackle this issue.

i can see it now:

(scene opens on george clooney, standing in the delivery room, dressed as a doctor. behind him, a nurse (renee zellweger, dressed as nurse betty) hands the new mother her freshly swaddled baby, portrayed by the baby from "who framed roger rabbit".*)

george: "new baby? congratulations!"

"pretty soon, you're going to need to think of a name for your little bundle of joy."

(cut to gene simmons, standing in front of a classroom. the students are busily trying to copy their names, which are written on tags spanning their desks.**)

gene: "yes- congratulations."

"when choosing a name, please think about your child's future."

(in the background, persephone quattlebaum-washington clearly grows frustrated, nearly erasing a hole in her paper, while ann sims, waving around a piece of paper on which she's written her name about a hundred times, says, "mr. simmons? mr. simmons! i'm all done. now what, mr. simmons?")

"please try to come up with something your child can spell easily..."

(persephone quattlebaum-washington erases so hard that her paper tears. both it and the pencil are sent flying as she screams and bursts into tears. gene simmons nonchalantly sticks a hand out and catches the pointy projectile in mid-air, saying, "happens all the time with that one.")

"...and please, parents, if you're going to use punctuation, make sure you know which punctuation you're using."

(child runs up, flashing paper at the camera. his name consists of nothing but random punctuation- a different combination is written on each line of the paper. gene looks at camera and sighs.)



*the fact that i cannot recall the baby's name right now is a clear indication that it's been far too long since i watched the movie.

**in the case of "persephone quattlebaum-washington", the tag takes up the extra space along the top of that of her neighbor, "ann sims".

***in case you're still wondering, yes, i enlightened her on the difference between hyphens and apostrophes.

spring has sprung (and someone's feeling a little blue)

ah, spring.

here in south carolina, we're getting april showers (...and hail....and maybe a tornado or two later today), flowers are blooming, temperatures are on the rise (and fall, depending on which week/day/hour it is), and love is in the air.

(smart alecks in the crowd would say, "no- that's pollen", but those of us who paid attention in biology class know that pollen is best described as "plant lust dust".)

anyway, apparently it's not just the birds and the bees feeling frisky these days.

no, sirree...

as you may know, my full time job involves answering the phones overnight for a wide variety of accounts, most of which are medical in nature.

before last night, it had been months since my last call involving little blue pills. (months, I tell you!)

that streak ended with a call that sounded like the er patient had planned to have a heck of a party, but didn't count on a medically necessary change of venue. (i'm not quite sure whether he was actually inviting other people to this party, or if he consumed all 6 little blue party favors on behalf of his imaginary friends. either way, i would assume that his next soiree will involve a much smaller guest list, real or imagined.)

had that call not come from out of town (in fact, i think it was even out of state), i might have suspected that the gentleman who just called in for an urgent prescription refill might have been the injured party, stocking up for the next grand affair.

fortunately, he took it pretty well when i told him that, while i'm not a nurse, i was pretty certain that viagra was not on the list of "emergency medications" that i could page the doctor for at 4 in the morning, and that he'd need to call back when the office was open.

hopefully, if the prescription is really that important to him, he'll heed my advice and make the call right when they open up. with the nasty storm headed our way, there's talk of some of the offices closing early.

making a list, checking it twice.....

no, no- not that list.

several years ago, as i was nearing 30, i realized that i hadn't really done many memorable things, especially on my birthdays. thus, the "30 before 30" list was born.

then, on the other side of 30, i decided to create the "40 before 40" list which, technically, is still under construction. (there are a couple of blanks on it still, including the one that opened up recently when "see chuck berry perform in st. louis" became completely impossible.)

well, fast forward more years than i care to admit, and i still have a lot left to cross off, and under two years in which to do it.

now, there is an awful lot of (cost prohibitive) travel on that list, but i have picked out seven things i'd like to accomplish by the end of 2017:

     *visit 3 of the 5 territories (2/3 complete- just need one in the pacific before i can cross this off)
     *save enough dum dum wrappers to order something (trickier, since they changed the rules)
     *visit a nude beach (i see many workouts in my near future)
     *drive as much of route 66 as possible
     *cross country road trip (can you tell i was raised in a "road trip" family?)
     *see total eclipse (thankfully, one is coming to my doorstep in august)
     *run a 1/2 marathon in under 2 1/2 hours (i got frustratingly close last time)

unless i get my dum dum wrappers corralled beforehand, it looks like the first item that i'll be able to make progress on will be (hopefully) the fourth on the list.

i have already begun plotting. 😎

not to spit in the face of chariot-y, but....

my new chariot is at the dealership to take care of some basic maintenance issues the previous owner apparently wasn't too worried about- an oil change, tune up, and new timing belt.*

though i told the dealership i had access to another car, as long as their shuttle could get me to it, they insisted on giving me a loaner or, in the event one was not available, a free rental car.

next time, i think i will either insist on a loaner from the mazda lot (granted, i am not impressed with the looks of the new miatas), or simply insist on just getting a ride.

it took half an hour, a cash deposit (i got strange looks when i told them my only debit card stays in a safe deposit box in another state, for my own good, and that i do not carry my credit card, as i am paying it down), three emergency contacts (if they start heckling my three, next time i'm giving numbers from bathroom walls), and my email address (next time, it'll be the one i don't check) to line up a temporary chariot.

then, i was asked what i drive.

"a mazda miata," i answered because, while i have driven the miata all of four times since bringing it home, "my dad's mercury land yacht"....well....as i said last winter, when he and i swapped cars and i kept getting asked if his was mine:

"i am young and sexy and so is my car."**

anyway, after the comment observing that i was "clearly used to a sporty compact car", i was offered the largest vehicle on the lot...***

let me digress (again) for a moment, and confess that, after the deal of zamboni, when my dad said i needed an suv for my adventurous lifestyle, i did consider one specific kind- even going so far as to "build" one on a manufacturer's website. (my serious college boyfriend had one, and he let me drive it once. memories of the handling being the exact opposite of a miata, as well as a discovery of gas efficiency (or lack thereof), added to the price of my masterpiece, led to abandonment of that little fantasy and my original backup plan (2008 miata in ice blue) was reinstated as my "well, if i can't find another one just like zamboni...." plan.

still, i'd be highly unlikely to turn down a free manual transmission wrangler as a second vehicle.

i can give you almost absolute assurance, however, that after hamilton (also named for an ability to glide across ice, as was his predecessor, though for not just the reference you have in mind) comes home and i turn "batman"**** back in, i am extremely unlikely to ever drive such a beast by my own choice again.

in the meantime, while i eagerly await hamilton's return, "batman"'s sole duty is making sure my designated parking spot is safe and secure, mostly because that car has more blind spots than stevie wonder. (perhaps one of his buttons sets of some sort of sonar. i've yet to find it.)

*plus whatever else they find, which i sincerely hope isn't much. i mean, i want it to be road trip-worthy, but i've only got so much money to spend at the moment, here.

**i can almost say it with a completely straight face. the car definitely has me beat on the "sexy" part.

***.....that wasn't a "panel"/pedophile van

****"bat" for "big-ass transport" and "man" because it looks pretty masculine to me