Petty annoyance

It irritates me when someone pronounces asterisk as astrick.

(I told you it was petty.)

The "maladies" of our times

You've seen the commercials. Poor Brooke Shields and Claire Danes. Two beautiful actresses who have seemingly perfect lives except for one. horrible. problem.

Their eyelashes were too short.

What a shame. They could have had it all. 

But wait! Luckily, there's a new mysterious chemical you can spread on your eyelids that stimulates your cells (!) and makes your lashes grow and grow! Sure, there are side effects (eye redness, eye irritation, permanent darkening of iris pigmentation), but just look at that beautiful fringe!

As long as you're spreading chemicals on your eyelids, you might as well shoot botulism right into your forehead to get rid of those gawd-awful forehead wrinkles.


And if you're cursed with thin lips, you can have chemicals or the fat of your own ass injected into them to plump 'em up!
 

You can bet that women are lining up to ask their doctors about these procedures without batting an eye (yep, had to go there). And their doctors are whipping out the needles and prescription pads to dole out the appropriate treatments.

There's just one thing everyone has forgotten in this medical quest for beauty: short eyelashes, forehead wrinkles, and thin lips are not medical problems.


They are the genetic cards we're dealt. They are what set us apart from others. We're not all supposed to look alike. Who says that having short eyelashes is bad?

Where is it written that women must all have line-free skin, long lashes, plump lips, and thighs that don't touch? That men must have washboard abs, 1% body fat, a full head of hair, and erections not lasting more than four hours? 


WHO SAYS?

Ugh. When is it ever going to be enough?

There's a special place in hell

for That Guy who zooms to the front of the line and cuts in when the rest of us have merged and waited patiently as two lanes merge down to one in a construction zone.

I loathe That Guy.

I am a television marketing GENIUS

Here's THE IDEA of all ideas for a new reality show:

Lock Mel Gibson and Lindsay Lohan in a windowless room, turn on the cameras, and let the magic begin.

Call it Celebrity Trainwreck Deathmatch! (And totally use the exclamation point. So few television shows use exclamation points in their titles. Lost!, Seinfeld!, and 60 Minutes! would be so much more entertaining than their expressionless counterparts.)

I'm not old but...

This morning I remembered that on my senior-year T-shirt in high school, our mascot was wearing Hammer pants and the phrase was "Class of '91. You can't touch us."

One of those things I hate myself for laughing at

But I do. Every time.

Garage-door update

The door is unstuck, but damaged.

A formal assessment of the damages happens on Friday.

Sigh.

At least I get to park in my garage. 

(Oh, and my door is the ONLY ONE in the entire neighborhood that got glued to the ground.)

One of the many annoyances of my HOA

They hire the keystone cops to do any and all maintenance work.

Last night, I came home after a long day, ready to bake Dad's birthday treat (that's become The Thing: I make my folks any dessert they want on Father's/Mother's Day, holidays, and birthdays). I drove into the alley, hit the garage-door opener, and... nothing.

I pushed it again. Nothing.

Hmmmm.

Well, maybe the electricity is out and that's why the garage-door opener won't work. I got out of the car. Phew! What is that awful smell? Tar. They've repaved the alley.

I went inside, hit the garage-door opener and saw the door struggle to open and give up.

It was stuck.

Or perhaps glued is a more adequate word.

The geniuses who paved the alley let tar pool under my garage door, effectively sealing it against all of the elements (including my car). I pushed and pulled with all of my might (and jacked up my shoulder in the process). It wouldn't budge.

Dad came over with two crowbars. No dice.

Sigh.

Muthaf....

Now I have to track down the company and get them to fix the sticky situation. I'll keep you posted.

I've never read anything of James Patterson's

But I have to assume that if you need to take out ads on TV to promote your own book, it simply can't be that good.

Ran across these babies over the weekend

You'll be SHOCKED to know that they were 60% off!

While I was out shopping with Mom (owner/operater of the plaid legs pictured above), I tried on multiple shirts because Mom was determined to buy me a new T-shirt for the 4th (we like to be bedecked in new finery during the holidays--don't ask). In the dressing room, we're both very honest about whether or not something looks good. I'm sure many folks have been shocked to overhear me telling her that something ages her or her telling me that something I've put on does nothing to camouflage my problem areas. But if your family isn't going to tell you, who is?

But even I was a little taken aback by her reaction to one shirt (it looked really pretty on the hanger; it turned into visual poison once I put it on). She took one look and screeched: Ew ew! Get it off! Get. It. Off!!

Thanks, Mom. :)