J-Smackdown!

"You're a pansy!" Beau exclaimed.

"No, I'm not!" I snapped back indignantly, "I'm a Pacifist! It's different!"
---------------------------------

The other night I was working at Shop-n-Smile, when I remembered I wanted to pick up some waxing stuff for my eyebrows which were once again growing into that "giant-caterpillar-on-face look" I get if I don't keep totally on top of them. I went to the aisle, checked out the products for about 30 seconds, then grabbed one that seemed good and went back to my area. I was in the horrid rug aisle folding my 11,000th rug that someone had unfurled, left on the floor, and then callously walked away from (sometimes I totally fucking hate people), when I heard the Security team page me over the loudspeaker. I called them up, and they asked me to come into their office.

"I can't fucking believe this," I thought to myself. I figured it was because I had previously been admonished for "shopping on the job," and that they'd been watching me and now were going to scold me for grabbing that box of hair remover. A manager had already told me that one employee is always being watched (nice), and that was the direct reason we "all" had been lectured not to a) have our cellphones on the floor (I always do, with a hidden bluetooth behind my hair), and b) stop shopping while working.

I always shop while working. It's probably the only reason I don't go totally frickin postal at that place and mow down a bunch of shit-for-brains customers. But it's not like I take a cart and leisurely peruse the aisles. Basically, WHILE working, if I come across something I like or is on a total clearance (like an entire set of Columbia sheets and pillowcases for $4.50-score! Or a lovely picture frame that was $19.99 and is now 79 cents - cha-ching!), I'll grab it and stick it in my cart. (You always have a cart with you while you work). This is why the bulk of my purchases are in the Domestics/Housewares area since that's where I work, and those are exactly the things we needed so desperately when we returned from New Zealand. But Security watches you and if you even pause to check something out, or scan it to see when it will go on sale soon *blush* then you're a bad bad employee.

I am a bad, bad employee.

As I was walking to the Security office, I was muttering to myself. If they were going to scold me like a little child, I was going to put my two weeks in. Tonight. This is of course, a gift. Beau and I always talk about how much we hate our respective retail jobs and how we are just WAITING for someone to do something that will "enable" us to quit. Otherwise, we can't justify doing it simply because it just sucks to work there right now. The money is still needed.

As I entered the office, the manager was there (great), and the ample-bodied Security woman, who basically looked like a college student with her perk ponytail and enormous UM sweatshirt. That's why they catch people, they never look like the typical cop. Barely looking over her shoulder at me, the Security woman (SW) said, "Okay, this is what we're going to do. See this woman there...?" She nodded toward the two TV screens in front of her and the two complicated-looking joysticks from which she was directing the cameras. They oriented on a young woman with Sinead-short white blonde hair and a baseball cap. "Yes," I said hesitantly.

"We're going to apprehend her. She's been stealing a ton of stuff. You're going to go with me since Ms. X can't." (The other SW had a cast on one leg).

"Oh." I didn't know what to say, but I inwardly panicked. Though I found these occasional smackdowns enormously entertaining, I had no interest in being a part of one. SW continued detailing to me how it would work. "We have to wait until she actually leaves the store, which she will be doing soon. As soon as she leaves the first set of doors, we RUN out of this office after her. I'll go first, you right behind me. We'll bust through the doors and come around to face her. Then we'll identify ourselves as security and ask her to step back inside. Hopefully, she'll go with us."

"Um, okay."

"If she pulls a knife or anything, just let her go."

"Err..."

At this point, I was like WTF?! SW was also eyeing the shoplifter's friend, who had not stolen anything, but who "looked really badass."

"Make sure you watch her friend, don't let her get behind you," said the SW.

"Shit shit shit!" went my brain, "What about Billy?" went my mouth.

"Bill isn't 18 yet, he can't do this."

"Um, okay, and Justin in Electronics?"

"He left already."

Fuck. I realized as I was standing there, that although this was a potentially exciting moment in my life, I wasn't interested. It kind of surprised me since I do like to do new, exhilarating things, but taking a shoplifter down did not appeal to me. At all. There had been a take-down just a few days before, where the enormously buff "truck guys" had wrestled a 6'4 man to ground, putting him in a headlock while yelling at him to "Calm down." At that point, the giant man had crapped his pants, and then led a trail of it from the doors to the Security office. Really. The thought of me having to wrestle ANYONE to the ground, or being shat on, made me want to vomit.

But I shrugged my shoulders and thought, "Oh well, no matter what happens, at least it'll be a good story," and I steeled myself for the encounter.

"Okay, get ready!" said SW, and with that, she leapt out of her chair and took off, with me right on her heels. For such a corpus woman, she was startlingly fast, as I sprinted full speed behind her. As we reached the automatic doors, parallel to ones where the shoplifter was now exiting, SW slammed through them like a fucking Tonka truck, which let out a bang that I thought might be the explosion of my heart. She burst through the second set with just as much drama, doing a sharp 180 to come face to face with the Sinead woman. In one fluid movement, SW identified herself as Security, grabbed the woman's arm, and while pushing her back inside, simultaneously grabbed the stupefied friend by her arm and commanded, "You can go," while pushing her out the exit. Basically, I just stood behind her the whole time, silent and amazed.

We took a few steps into the inner part between the two sets of doors where Sinead paused, her face contorted in fear. Then I heard it. Looking down, I saw a fast stream of pee exiting from both of her pant legs. A mixture of sympathy and revulsion swept over me. The whole time, SW kept ordering her to keep her hands out of her pockets, where Sinead kept attempting to put them. Though mute, I enthusiastically agreed. I don't want anyone to cut me!

After Sinead had finished wetting her pants, she was slowly led back into the store, where due to her condition, she walked as if she wore leg irons. Quickly, it was determined she didn't speak much English, which excited me somewhat. "Hey, maybe I can help with this!" Being a shoplifter's interpreter is much more my style than throwing some poor immigrant to the ground. But unfortunately, there aren't a lot of French, Swedish, or Thai-speaking shoplifters frequenting our stores. Not that I would have gotten very far with Swedish anyway. I could probably have entertained her with the playful child song of "Tycker du om mig?" (Do you want me?) or asked her if she drank milk or loved me.

Then the cranky, broken-leg other SW ordered me out of the room, and I left Sinead to their devices. Later they told me she was terrified...and Romanian. Oh well.

Mother-Daughter Conflict *Vent*

Sorry, venting time.

I don't talk about my family much on my blog because basically I'm not all that close to them. I don't hate them, but there's a lot of drama and bad blood and though I wish no one pain, I'd rather we just had a sort of distant, but polite truce. I know they'd be shocked to hear that, though deep down they'd know it to be true. Once in awhile I make some effort to visit/reconnect/whatever, but I usually end up angry or hurt in the end.

The truth is though, I'm not all that bothered by them 99% of the time, basically because there's always been so much emotional - and with all my moving around - physical distance between us. I don't think of them that often, and until I get some guilt-inducing call or email, have little contact. I know this sounds cold, especially for those lucky enough to have had a warm family life, but if you can just imagine a NOT-so-warm family life with a cast of characters that go beyond your after-school-special kind of dysfunctional, maybe you could understand.

The problem is that sometimes, that 1% of the time, they really get to me. REALLY get to me. I guess anyone could say that. And all mother-daughter relationships are complicated, even if they are "healthy." To give a quick re-cap, my mother had me in college (woops), and after a few years of child-rearing, which ranged from awkward to, at times, outright child endangerment, I was handed over to my grandparents, two people experienced at childcare, but for whom to this day, I still claim, are prime examples of a couple who should have remained childless. But then, there would be no me, would there? And how much bleaker would our society be without my endlessly depressing blog posts? Wait a minute.

Anyway, years later, my mother married and quickly had a child of her own, a girl. It was that time that she reconnected with me, and the yearly summer visits commenced until I went to college. The relationship has always been very civil, sometimes fun, but for the most part, strained, as you can imagine, and any therapist would have a heyday with my "abandonment issues." One thing that has contributed to the strain has been my (half-)sister. I know I've spoken of her before in the past, but I think it's been awhile. Basically, she grew up as an only child with my mother and step-father, and was denied nothing, despite their middle class incomes. This was often difficult for me to watch, since not only did I grow up rather poor with my grandparents (one retired for medical reasons, the other a high school cafeteria worker), but also because my sister was as many spoiled children are - loud, demanding, obnoxious, and ungrateful, which is simply a product of being spoiled, but which, in a circular way, makes the child seem unworthy of the spoiling. (I'm hurting my head now).

The other thing that strains it often, is that any time I ever talk to my mother by phone, or we have email exchanges, it is almost entirely about my sister (except for those rare, delicious emails that consist of 2-3 pages detailing how she's painting her kitchen. Fuck. Me.). To my mother, like many mothers, my sister is beautiful, smart, popular, talented, etc. I don't feel competitive with my sister for the most part, because there are so many years between us, we're in completely different worlds. And our personalities and interests are so completely different, that it's a bit bizarre. Her straight and shiny Asian hair (from her father), dark skin and eyes contrast against my Nordic genes of blue eyes, wavy blonde hair (color courtesy of a bottle nowadays), and fantastically pale skin. She is a dancer. I am, I dunno, a teacher who shuffles papers around most of the day. She is loud and attention-seeking. I am (for the most part), quiet and enjoy solitude or the company of one or two people.

But what makes it even MORE strained, is exactly how my mother talks to me about my sister. It isn't just the "Wonders of your Sister" show that I grit my teeth and try to endure politely, for the sake of not coming off as a spiteful bitch, but it's all that my mother lavishes on my sister and chooses, again and again, to detail to me.

Here's an example. My sister just graduated from college like five minutes ago. It was a private school out of state, so just imagine those bills for starters. My mother has taken out several "parent loans" for my sister that my mother will pay probably until she's dead. Additionally, my sister's rent, credit cards (she had 2-3), cellphone bill, and an additional $200 "food money" are paid for/to her each month. My mother is now deeply, and frighteningly in debt, which my sister seems totally oblivious too.

Yes, I'm jealous of this. No one has ever taken/given me a dime for my own education, if you don't count the federal government, who is hot on my tail at the moment trying to get it all back. Once in awhile my mother would give me a $20 bill for pizza or whatever, and unfortunately, my grandparents couldn't contribute anything. I have always paid for my rent (with the exception of generous Steve helping out in NYC), food, bills, etc. I can't even imagine having a credit card bill paid for me without giving someone a blowjob first.

But again, what makes me the most upset, is that my mother, on a very regular basis, calls me up to DETAIL this all to me. And for the life of me, I can't figure out what the fuck for. It really is torture. But if I ever try to broach the subject about it, I just come off as the bratty sister who doesn't want to hear about her younger sister. I am the distant bitch. My mother will laugh and say, "Oh your sister, tsk tsk, she went ahead and bought a whole outfit on that Gap credit card. *insert chuckle and shaking of head* What am I going to do with her? I called her up and told her, 'Now this is it. This is the last time I'm going to pay off this credit card!' But you know, she really did NEED those clothes. I mean, she needs to interview. But of course, she'll just have to pay her own bills from now on."

I've heard a version of that scenario a dozen times over the past few years. Sometimes it's the $400 cellphone bill. Or the late rent. Or a bounced check on my mother's joint account. And my mother always acts like now she's getting tough, she's putting her foot down, but it sounds so incredibly phony, I don't know if she expects me to believe it, and hopefully not to praise her (lack of) efforts. I doubt my sister has ever paid for anything beyond her own manicure (which my mother pays for when she's in town). And to hear this, again and again, when I am usually struggling to stay afloat all by myself (and now with the help of lovely Beau), is excrutiating. I try to "uh huh uh huh" as quickly and patiently as I can so the conversation can end. But it's never fast enough.

I don't want to alienate my mother, like I said, I'd just like us all to be friends - friends who live 2000 miles from each other and just occasionally call/email. And I don't know why she feels she has to do this to me over and over. My sister, who now has an infant son of her own (her own 'woops' her senior year of college), is gainfully employed with a good job, and is living with her boyfriend who is working THREE jobs, is still getting, as my mother called it, "her $120/month allowance."

Her allowance! She's 22!

I know I should let this go. I know that my mother didn't raise me and so does not have the same obligation to me. And I know I should not feel like such a victim for being so fucking poor FOREVER, especially since a lot of it in my adult life has to do with my gallivanting to foreign locales, but it still bothers me. A great fucking lot.

Thankfully, it's only once in awhile. And thankfully, Beau was there for me to secretly talk to through my bluetooth (conveniently hid by my thick, luxurious hair) , while working at Shop-n-Smile, and silently fuming while folding my 10,000th bath towel. I feel like I'm writing an endless letter to Dear Abby, but I guess it's cause I don't know what to do. All those advice columns that say, "Well, you have to sit down with your mother and patiently explain to her..." blah blah blah, "...she'll respect you..." is bullshit. My family takes EVERYTHING as a total insult and my mother will be pissed forever. There's a part of me that kind of doesn't care - it'd take care of that endless feeling of obligation toward a family I am not close to - but really, I just want to be a "good" person and keep the peace. You know?

"Unless You Bite Your Fork"

Back in NYC, I had this fantastic, if not bizarre, dentist. She had crazy curly hair, a bit of a lisp, and a thick Eastern European accent. Like many dentists, she was always trying to get me to do expensive procedures on my teeth, which I often brushed off since even with the 80-20% insurance pay, I still couldn't afford most of them. At first I was turned off by her, finding her too pushy, but I grew to really like her in the end.

Since I only just got braces at 19 years old, I'm pretty fond of and grateful for my smile. Pre-19 was not a pretty sight. But unfortunately, my teeth are made of butter. I have fillings in nearly every single one, and every time I go to the dentist, SOMETHING is wrong. Not to mention they've never been all that white, even when I was a child. "Some people just have naturally yellow teeth," dentists have told me. Wonderful. This means that most of the whitening stuff out there doesn't do shit, since I'm not REMOVING any wine/coffee/cigarette stains. That's just their lovely natural hue.

So, back in NYC, after fixing one of my front teeth AGAIN (did you know you can get a filling BETWEEN your teeth?!?!), she suggested getting porcelain veneers, which were thousands per tooth. Yeah, right. Finally, with a bit of old-world haggling going back and forth, we compromised. I would get crowns done on my four front teeth, and would pay just $75 per tooth, no matter what she really charged, or really, no matter what she was charging the insurance company. In addition, they would be a bit of a lighter color as well, though not Britney Spears-white. It wasn't supposed to actually clash with the rest of my teeth, but brighten them somewhat. I agreed to do this over a period of time, and ended up totally happy with the result. She even kind of reshaped my two front teeth, which were rather worn down. She gave me those Jessica Simpson bunny teeth, though not that exaggerated, which are apparently a dentist's trick to make you look younger.

Gazing at them in her hand mirror, I asked, "How long will these last for?" Expecting some "Ten or twenty years" answer, I almost fell out of the dental chair when she said, "Oh, assuming you take good care of them, about 2-4 years. That is, if you don't bite your fork or anything." Thinking about paying for and going through all this again in just a couple years was a bit scary, since I knew I wouldn't be in NYC forever, and who knew when I'd have ANY kind of dental insurance again (I haven't since then).

Though I am not, in fact, a fork-biter, I have been conscientious about my teeth since then, and have had the occasional vision of just ONE of these things falling off, revealing the less attractive real tooth behind, like the mask falling off the Phantom of the Opera. It's been a few years now, and I've been hoping to get as much wear out of these choppers as possible.

Well, time is ticking away, or maybe it's time for me to fit back in, in Missouri, the place where I didn't originally fit in for "having all" my teeth. It all started yesterday when I went to hang up a pair of Beau's slacks. I have this weird habit where I usually stick the top of the plastic hanger in my mouth while with my two hands, I button up the first couple buttons on a shirt. I know, hygienic. Well, this time it was a metal hanger, and a heavy one that holds multiple pairs of slacks. I put it in my mouth, using my two hands to put the pants on the hanger, and then took it out of my mouth and hung it up. As I was removing it, I felt a slight grit in my mouth. I spit some in my hand and looked at it. Disgusted that there may have been some dirt on the hanger, I rubbed it off and went on with my cleaning.

Hours later, I was sitting in my car in the Safeway parking lot, talking to my mother on the phone. At one point, I drew down the mirror on the visor, checking out my face (oh my GOD I need to pluck my massive eyebrows!) and smiled at my reflection, absentmindedly checking my teeth.

Wait a minute.

There, right on my front tooth, was a chip. A ragged, sharp, chip. If I wasn't talking to my mother, I probably would have cried. The irony? JUST the other day, Beau and I were talking about our lack of health coverage, and I said, "You know, I'd almost rather break a leg or get some awful illness than have a dental issue. You can get reasonable health care sometimes, but FORGET finding affordable dental care!" And I'm sure my chipped front tooth is considered cosmetic anyway. Great! How the hell do I get this fixed?

I thought of all the chipped, missing, and snarly teeth I'd seen in Smalltown, Missouri.

Oh god, now I'm a hick!

Crybaby

Last week were some pretty big events at the university. Our office had to staff one of them, a small one with mostly deans, faculty, and some administrators attending. A really nice guy in my office, we'll call him "Guy," was stationed at one point with me. We were basically acting as ushers at the entrance to a theater, and most of the people had already filed in. We were standing there chatting, when a small boy of about eight or nine years old started to climb the many steps up to where we were. I recognized him as some staff member's kid. She always seemed to bring him along on the free events hosted by the university. As he approached, we noticed in one of his hands teetered a rather full glass of orange juice, and in the other, he carried a cookie about the size of his head.

As he reached me, I smiled and said, "Oh, I'm sorry, you can't take that into the theater, they don't let anyone take food in. But go ahead and finish it here or downstairs if you like, then go on in." The boy stopped in mid-step and stared at us for a full 30 seconds or more. Guy and I kinda looked at each other, then shrugged it off. We continued to chat a little bit, but here and there I stole a glance at the boy, who was now looking off into the distance in an almost catatonic state. It was slightly unnerving, but I tried not to pay attention, because I figured he was embarrassed and I didn't want to make him feel more uncomfortable.

A couple minutes later, I looked over at the boy again, this time head tilted down as if in prayer over his orange juice, which along with the cookie, was still held aloft in mid-air. Suddenly, his shoulders began quivering. Then, as if from a dramatic movie scene, you could actually see teardrops begin plopping into his cup, splashing into the orange juice. Stunned, I turned and looked at Guy, who looked just as stunned.

"What's wrong?" I asked. Sniffling and snuffling loudly, the boy cried out, "You won't let me take this in!" Again, I looked at Guy, wide-eyed and perplexed. Wtf? The boy continued sobbing uncontrollably. We tried to offer words of consolation, but it was a bit ridiculous.

Being a teacher for three years, you get used to not only seeing kids cry, but actually MAKING them cry. The first time you do it can be a bit tough. You feel like the devil. But you get over it. Fast. Kids cry. Sometimes YOU make them cry, and usually, it's not anything insensitive or cruel that you did. The first time I made a kid cry, was on the very last day of classes when I caught EIGHT students had copied their homework after one (the class genius). I gave them all a zero on their homework. The class genius wept for 20 minutes. The other kids were nonplussed.

But this little boy was actually kinda pissing me off. So he couldn't bring his juice and big fat cookie into the theater. Big fucking deal. It's not like we snatched them out of his hands and threw them in the trash. If this was the biggest hardship he had to deal with in his life, then his mother REALLY had to get him out more. And if it was some kind of ploy to get us to acquiesce and let him enter the theater, then he was even more of a little brat than I thought. After a few more words of re-encouragement to go eat his cookie and have his juice or to instead rejoin his mother (he didn't), we gave up, and just ignored him. He then sat down on the stairs, folded his arms over his knees, bent his head over into his arms, and just sobbed. I eyed the orange juice, now perched on the step next him, with some apprehension.

Jesus.

Eventually, we went into the theater and left him there. I was wondering where his mother was the whole time, whom I imagined was inside waiting for him to return. Maybe I'm a cold bastard, but Guy works every weekend with kids in his church, and he had pretty much the same reaction. He just uses much nicer words. Beau has no such restrictions.

Later, when I told this story to Beau, he scowled and said, "If that was our son, and you'd raised him that way, I'd smack him so hard, YOU'D feel it."

Snorting, I said, "I wouldn't even raise a girl that way."

Then we continued on with a scathing review of other people's parenting, which is easy when you don't have kids, of course.

Shut Your Pie Hole!

I've never been accused of being a rumor-starter. Well, until last night. I should have known better.

Like with that disastrous job at the writers' non-profit, and during all the interesting changes at my non-profit job in NYC, I kinda prided myself on having developed the ability to put various tiny clues together to figure out things before others (i.e. like when someone is about to quit/be fired, etc.). This has never really failed me, though sometimes I haven't gotten all the details right, and it's typically something I keep to myself until it all comes out publicly.

Typically.

At Shop-n-Smile there are only two supervisors I really like to work with: Joe, an older, seemingly-gruff man who is actually pretty funny and nice, and Candy, who's about 10 years older than me, and also a lot of fun to work with. They take their jobs seriously and are both very competent, but are thankfully lacking that 'Shop-n-Smile disciple' gene that seems to be embedded within the other managers, and makes me want to projectile vomit.

Besides the dozen or so employees who have recently jumped ship, and made me impulsively want to quit each time it happens, now it seems Candy might be leaving also. This makes me very sad, since I find it so difficult to just tolerate working at Shop-n-Smile as it is, and having to close each night with one of the Mr. Intense Supervisors will just make it all the more teeth-gritting.

Then last weekend, one of the Mr. Intensity's called a "huddle" of all the employees. He was chatting and being his usual children's-show-upbeat self (which can turn into wrath is you say the wrong thing, a la Angie), and he blithely made a comment about Joe that went something like this: "Oh, well it won't matter anymore what Joe thinks after August 27." Mr. Intensity just kept right on talking, but a red flag went shooting up through the top of my head and began waving furiously. Was Joe leaving on the 27th?! I looked furtively around, but no one else seemed to catch it, or care.

I knew this was entirely possible, since in actuality, Joe is a career banker, but after moving to Missoula, was unable to get a good banking job (gee, startling), and ended up working for Shop-n-Smile. I knew if he could find a really good banking job, he'd probably nab it, and who could blame him?

Later that same day, Joe was handing me his wife's business card. She, too, is a banker. Joe is always trying to get Beau and I to move our banking services to that of his wife's bank. As I was looking at her card, Mr. Intensity was walking by. He suddenly yelled back, "Hey Joe! What are you trying to do? Poach J. away and take her to your place?" Again, red flag a'flyin! I thought to myself, "This confirms it, he's leaving to go work at a bank!"

A few days later, I was closing with Candy and she was telling me about her potential job offer at another place, which sounded great. I asked her, "Is it true that Joe is leaving too?" She paused and turned to me, mouth agape. "Is he leaving?!"

Uh oh.

Candy continued, "Really? I thought I heard something going around, but I wasn't sure. There have been signs." (This just seemed like further confirmation to me). "I'll have to call Bev and find out for sure," she said.

That was the last I'd heard of anything, until last night. I came into the store for my shift, and there was Joe, arms akimbo. "I want to talk to you," he said, curling his finger and gesturing me toward the office.

Uh oh.

Once inside his office, which has one of those giant "I can see you - you can't see me" windows, Joe unloaded. "What did you do? Rumor spreader! The whole store is talking about how I'm quitting! What did you say to people?"

After a few rapid blinks, I regained my ability to speak. "What? No! I only talked to Candy. What happened? Are you quitting?"

After informing me, that no, in fact he was NOT quitting, nor had any intention of quitting, he then began a story about how this "rumor" of his quitting had made it around the whole store, until it had finally reached the store manager who had called Joe into his office to have a serious talk, ask if he was really leaving, etc. Joe, unaware of any of this, and pretty fucking shocked, could only tell the manager the truth, he was staying put.

Joe then gave one of his gruff smiles. "It actually did help me out though."

"Oooh, did you get a raise?" I asked, full of hope. Wow, then he'd actually OWE me one for that!

"No, not that, but it helped things out a lot."

"Well, there you go! I did you a favor!" I triumphed.

Joe gave me the stink eye and said, "Nice job."

Of course at that point I apologized profusely. Idiot. You'd think I'd learn. About a month ago I had said, in passing, to Candy, "Damn, I'm gonna quit. I hate my schedule!" It was true, since my boss is continually fucking up my schedule and adding shifts after it's "finalized," which irks me to no end. But I say I'm going to quit all the time. Ask Beau - it's like the first thing out of my mouth when I come home cranky and tired each night.

Candy, taking this VERY seriously, brought it up in the managers' meeting, got my intense boss in a bunch of trouble, and then later, I had to suffer the pain-in-the-assness of having THREE different managers come up to me, including the store manager, asking me to stay and proclaiming how valued I was. Sheesh. I love Candy, but COME ON!

Okay, lesson learned. This time.

Umbrella

I'm actually a really big fan of Rihanna's "Umbrella" song, and was blown away when I saw her rock hard performance at the MTV Music awards. Then I just heard that Mandy Moore was covering "Umbrella," which sounded a bit weird, but I thought it came off really beautifully. In case you have the time...

Fancy Meeting You Here

As Beau was dropping me off at the university today after lunch (damn, those wings were good!), he pointed over to the sidewalk and said, "Look at that." Turning, I saw a lovely mule deer doe, just standing there, not looking frightened, but not looking all that alert or aware either. I got pretty close to her before taking this shot with my camera phone. Finally she languidly turned around, and clickety-clacketed down the sidewalk toward the Forestry building, which I thought was totally appropriate.

I walked back over to Beau. "Did you get close enough for a good shot?" he asked. "Yes!" I said, "though when I got real close she turned and left."

"Yeah, I was afraid you'd spook her and she'd jump into the street and get hit by a car and get killed."

I love my husband.