June’s electric weekend

I tried to stay close to home this weekend. These at-home jokes never get old.

For some reason, work kicked my arse to Topeka and back last week, which isn’t good because I’m supposed to shelter in—what the heck does “shelter in place” mean, anyway? It makes me think of freeze tag, which by the way was always a stupid game.

Anyway.

Work kicked my arse, and I worked a little late Friday, or as I like to call it, Friyay. That too never gets old. “I’m shutting down my computer and not THINKING about work till Monday,” I said to Edsel, who was not only looking forward to Friyay but also Caturday.

The moment I closed my laptop I got a headache.

This is a common migraine-y thing, that the pain comes AFTER the stress. I don’t know why. I also don’t know why there’s no sun up in the sky. Stormy weather. Since that migraine and I got together.

So my head summed up both Friyay and Caturday.

My faithful companions joined me on the bed, and it was totally 100% for sure because they cared and not at all because I was a large warm area on the bed. But at one point in my agony I looked over and saw Lily shooting me daggers.

• 

  Fek mom hed

That was comforting.

Then on Sunday—or Sunday Funday, there’s nothing I like better than when people write that. On Sunday Funday I got up all my courage and drove down to the post office to mail my StitchFix bag.

When you subscribe to StitchFix, they send you a box of clothes, and a bag to mail them back in if you don’t keep them all. I have never kept them all, I don’t think. And now, in the time of our plague, I had to mail the bag back. I in fact kept ZERO clothes this time, as none of them wowed me enough. Let’s say “Wow factor” since we’re saying all the words I love today.

• 

  Eh factor

Anyway, I drove to the post office with my bag and my baggage; I had my mask and my gloves and my hazmat suit and my immune system all ready to get the nerve to touch the handle on the mailbox there at the post office, and when I got there?

Slots. Teensy slots. There was no way to mail my bag without GOING INTO THE LOBBY.

Oh my god.

I’ve literally been nowhere since this whole business started. Nowhere. And now I had to go into the post office lobby, where germ people probably lick all surfaces just to vex me.

I suited up in my hazmat men-from-E.T. outfit and got to the door. Inside was an old man. There’s an old man standing next to me, making love to his tonic and germ.

I didn’t go in, as the lobby isn’t what you’d call roomy in the hips, Clarice, so I stood outside in my jaunty mask.

You’ve never seen an old man take his sweet time longer than this motherfuckin’ heifer. Jesus Katie Christ. I don’t even know what he was DOING in there after he stopped making love to his tonic and germ. I kept peering in there and he was OBLIVIOUS. Was he drawing stamps?

Finally, after six hours and 49 types of virus floated at me in the air, he walked out, and when he saw me he LEAPED back like I had the red prongs of corona sticking directly out of me. Oh, NOW he’s got the fire down below. Sure.

As I mailed the damn bag, it occurred to me that last month all I did was stick the bag in my door, at home, where my mail slot is, and Bernie my mailman took it.

Ding-dang it.

So now I await all the symptoms, because I ventured out, and I will alert you forthwith via my dry cough.

Also, last night, on Sunnight Funnight, I opened my fridge door for a change, and?

No light.

Hunh, I thought, opening the freezer.

No light.

Goddammit.

I checked my extremely modern fuse box, and even replaced the fuses with each other, but ’twasn’t the fuse. After much hemming and hawing, I plugged a lamp into the outlet where the fridge is plugged in?

And?

Outlet isn’t working.

Did I mention this is an extremely new and cutting-edge house?

So I spent my Funnight in the shed, where I’m certain eleventy snakes riddled with coronavirus don’t reside or anything, digging through my Christmas boxes till I found an extension cord. And?

Current situation. Look, at least my refrigerator’s running, so you can go ahead and prank call me now.

I really don’t want anyone IN here fixing anything, but I did text my ridiculous handyman, Alf, who as you may recall sends me the world’s most annoying texts back, where I swear he TRIES to make it impossible to discern his meaning.

Oh my god. What.

So that about sums me up, and tells you all about Friyay through Funday, and I personally hate everything and all germs and also electricity. The whole kit and kaboodle pisses me off. I miss normal life. I miss my electric youth.

In a Whirlpool of emotions,
June

Morning coat at 8 p.m.

Oh my gawd, this day is a WASH.

Is a wash a bad thing? or is it just an even-ing out? What I mean is this day can suck it.

First of all, note I’m here 12 hours late. When we last spoke, swearing we’d stay together forever and exchanging class rings (isn’t mine nice?), I was on the horns of a dilemma re what my new hours at work would be.

I decided on 8 to 5. I get a lot of “Can you do this today?!” requests at, like, 4:00, which is relaxing, so planning on an earlier departure would be for naught.

So, the new schedule started November 1, and in case you aren’t being kept abreast of the dates because you’re in a tower somewhere, like let’s say you’re Rapunzel, or a prisoner of war, or a sex slave or something, this is November 2, so I had to start my new hours forthwith. (Also, you may have bigger fish to fry beyond, “What day is this” and “Which hours did June select for work?”)

The point is, that alarm went off this morning at what felt like 2 a.m. and I wanted to die. Oh, I felt out of it. I was foggy, I was without personality, I had no will to live.

It was 30 minutes earlier than my usual wakeup. Thank god for daylight savings this weekend.

Anyway, I did not blog. Because personality, where is it. Searching for Bloggy Fisher.

I worked from home today, as I was expecting a delivery and also my handyman who is not Alf came over.

Once, a few weeks ago, Alf couldn’t help me out, so I cheated on him, and I found a distinctly NOT ridiculous handyman who is straightforward and dependable, and I am sorry he is not as fun to hear about as Alf, but he put up two light fixtures for me today, to replace a brown-and-brass ceiling fan

Ceiling fan, fmr.

Light, crnt.

 

and also a fluorescent light, because nothing says Home Sweet Home like an office light.

Fluorescent light in den, fmr.

Light in den, crnt.

 

We didn’t know what we’d find when we removed the old lights, but now he has to come back and

fill

my

holes

and paint over the discolored rectangle up on m’ceiling. He comes back Monday. See, that would have taken 49 nonsensical texts with Alf to arrange.

Anyway, while all that was going on today I had WORK OUT MY ASS, and I was work work working as hard as I could, I was ROCK-HARD working, I was RAM-STRAIGHT HARD working, and then I hope you’re sitting down but I got a “Can you do this today?!?” email at 4:00 and I ended up working 8:00 TO 5:30, and Lu totally resent.

Mostly I resent because for MONTHS, YEARS, even, ALL MY LIFE, pretty much, I’ve been so, so, so looking forward to today, which is November 2, Rapunzel the Sex Slave, because as you know it’s the day the Freddie Mercury movie premieres and ALL I WANTED was to type in all caps a lot but then also GO TO THAT MOVIE and it started at 5:50 and please see above re working till 5:30, and I still had to slop all the hogs and I looked like shit so I thought, oh, I’ll just go to the 7:00 showing and guess who fell asleep and missed it by five minutes.

This day is a wash.

Tomorrow I take Milhous to the vet, although he is now eating, but he still needs shot boosters. He’ll deign to eat some adult cat food in a can. That’s it. Not that he personally sits in a can, but speaking of which, he FELL into the toilet today and I am so glad I was home. I was all, What sounds barf and it was a kitten plunking into the toilet, and if you ever need a barf sound effect, turns out that’ll do, pig.

Also, speaking of barfing, tomorrow I head off to Peg’s funeral. Cel-e-brate good times, come on!

Did I tell you Peg, my neighbor, fmr., died? Peg was the best. She really was. It’s sad. Everything is sad, honey.

My grandmother said that to me once, when I was in high school. Why so atypically depressed, June?

And after the vet and the funeral, Ima paint. See? I’m finally getting to the paint portion of our blog.

Careful readers will note that most of this house is painted kind of a coffee with cream color. My problem is, this house is way too tasteful. Fortunately for me, I still have a can of Sleepy Blue like I had in my old bedroom, which will go in my …new bedroom. And I have a can of Quietude, which goes in the den. Ned once said I speak of Quietude the way other people speak of the home run they hit in 1979.

But this weekend, I’m painting the living room a color called Alabaster, and I am doing so because a woman whose house I admire said to paint it that color and I’m all, okay. I will do whatever you say. Because your house. I admire.

Also, I am painting my dresser a pinky rose.

Shut up. I don’t care.

dresser say, where my dignitee go?

I’ve wanted to paint the dresser for awhile. Last weekend, I was at the never-busy Lowe’s paint department, waiting while every woman on god’s earth ordered a light green, a Quietude, if you will, for her walls. They sell furniture paint there that you get a can of and have them make it into a color from their brochure. That’s how my nightstand became seafoam. Don’t it make my nightstand, don’t it make my nightstand, don’t it make my brown nightstand bluuuuee (-green.)

I was planning to have them mix up for me the white-ish color of furniture paint, Kid Glove, but I’ve been walking around with a fabric sample from my new chair in my purse, like that’s just what you do, and since I was there

for

fucking

ever,

I matched the fabric of my chair to the paint colors available in their furniture paint,

and by the time it was finally my fucking turn at bat, I said, “Mix me up soma that Morning Coat, and be lively with ya, m’lad.”

Then the guy at Lowe’s cockpunched me.

Don’t you like me better at the end of the day, after a nap and maybe a snort of the hootch? I know I do.

And look here, Miss Beige-y Basic Bitch of the Beige. I don’t CARE that a pink dresser isn’t your taste, and you want me to be tasteful, and do a taste-y freeze on my choices. I just don’t care. This is the joy of being single. You get to paint your dresser Morning Coat, whatever that is.

Edz: wat wrong wif beyge? Milhous: wat dat spot on flor?

So that sums me up, I think, and I’ll report back to you post vet/funeral/tape/patch/paint/ooo, pink!

Going into the weekend like:
June

Why Sussex

Why does everyone bug you when you’re busy?

Have you ever noticed that? If you’re bored stiff, your social world is a desert. But if you’ve got shit to do, people are crawling out from every damn crack in the wall. Waving their antennae.

I had a busy week at work last week, but when I got back from lunch on Friday, there wasn’t anything to do. So I emailed a few people. “Do you have any work for me?”

At work, we publish blog posts, but they’re not fun blog posts like mine are. Aren’t you having the time of your life right now, for example? Aren’t I a carnival ride? Anyway, the person who’s in charge of all that said, “Well, I was tryina write a blog post for next week and it isn’t gelling. Do you want to try?”

Do I want to try? Hmph! I am the blog-post master! I’ve written 5,000 posts in 11 years! Gimme dat.

Except the thing is, they aren’t fun blog posts, did I mention that? Did I mention that every time I’ve written “post” today I’ve typed it “pist” and I’m getting pist?

So I had to think of a deep, work-related topic. Then I hadda do research to back it up. The next thing you know, old Jed’s a millionaire, and also I’m knee-deep in this blog post.

When I got to work Monday, I was still working on it. “Hey, you gonna have that today?” the Person in Charge of Blogs (PiCoB) wanted to know.

Am I gonna HAVE that TODAY? Good lord! Maybe I could have asked more questions before I undertook this endeavor, and I know that shocks you. I know you’re aware of how carefully I think things out before I plunge into them. Oh, sure, I’ll be the astronaut who flies to Pluto. What I gotta do? Is it just wear this dome hat? Cause okay.

Because of course Monday I actually got work to do. For clients. So I had to “prioritize” that, and you know what annoys me? Prioritizing when I’m into something else.

So not only was I tryina “prioritize,” like that’s a real thing, but also there was the part where there are people in the world.

“Hey, how was your weekend?” 394,330,930400,003 coworkers wanted to know.

HOOOO CARE how my weekend was? And do people not recognize body language? If someone is bent half an inch from their screen, not looking at you when you walk by HORRIFIC OPEN FLOOR PLAN WHERE PEOPLE WALK BY EVERY SECOND, why do you think that someone looks amenable to coming up and chatting?

And it was particularly bad yesterday, because royal wedding. Although I do have to say, the straight married guy who got into the wedding thanks to my enthusiasm was cute to see. Did I tell you about him? Through the months, me being into it made HIM into it. He read way more about the intricacies of the wedding than I did, as he has always been a thorough person, and would probably not volunteer to write a work blog post in one working day. He wanted to know why they’re the duke and duchess of Sussex, and how the hell should I know?

“I thought you know all about this wedding,” he said, and then I felt guilty that I don’t know the ins and outs of why Sussex.

But aside from The Straight Guy Who Now Likes Royal Weddings, I pretty much wanted to kill everyone else.

And my phone. Y’all.

I’m sorry. But do you have a full-time job, and also friends who do NOT work a full-time job? Because holy cats yesterday. Ten-foot-long texts. Follow-up texts wondering why I wasn’t texting.

800-minute-long voice mails. About nothing.

Four-hundred emails. Ned–NED!!!–emailed 26 times. That is not an exaggeration. Twenty-six times. And he called me at lunch. Except I wasn’t at lunch. Because working.

People tagging me on things. People messaging me things. I mean, it was endless. And I feel like if you don’t respond IMMEDIATELY, people get insulted. So I’d just like to say to everyone in my life:

I

HAVE

A

JOB.

I am there Monday through Friday. All day. That’s what I’m doing when you email me the song lyrics from Magnet and Steel and wonder why I don’t reply with the next line.

You’re a woman who’s lost to your song. OoooOOOooo…

That really is an excellent song. I hate to be your grandma, but why does Stevie Nicks always have her hair in her face?

“What art and charts are you including with your blog post?” PiCoB wanted to know.

WHAT?

CHARTS?!

You know what I ought to do? Is ask more questions before I plunge into things. Things like, When is this due? How much effort will it require? Will you be needing charts and images? If you’re 46, why have you never married?

Things like that.

Anyway, I got the damn blog post done, and I got my work for clients done, AND…AND!! I got some last-minute freelance work done that came yesterday and that they wanted back yesterday, for my old workplace in LA. I did that after work, because I felt so fresh.

Then I went home and no one called, texted or emailed me all night.

Now I told you so you oughta know. Oooooo,
Joan

Andy Voltaire

Google Photos likes to show me what I’ve been up to in other years. Three years ago today, mom came to visit me in my Year Abroad house. Tallulah was happy to see her gramma.

Oh, Talu.

Someone mentioned in the comments the other day that they wondered if my more curls/less Voltaire hair was a result of doing Curly Girl, and yes.

I’m Mike Voltaire. I got June hair. [Disclaimer: I have no idea what Voltaire’s first name is.]

Chuck Voltaire liked him some layers.

I have been reticent to do a How To Do Curly Girl tutorial because I didn’t want to steal from the person who actually WROTE the book The Curly Girl Method

(here’s a link to it on Amazon) who is trying to sell a book and so on.

But everyone and their curlies has put online how to do this method, so if you want me to, I will, too. It varies by person, which products work and which methods, but for me almost all of the stuff they tell me to do in the book works.

I just won’t plop. I refuse to plop. If you want me to do a tutorial you will learn what plopping is and why plopping can suck it.

Not that every day is a perfect hair day for me, but this above was second-day hair, meaning I didn’t co-wash it and start all over again with products. But it was also a rainy day, and trust me, my hair could look a lot worse than this. It’s like my cleaning lady Alicia’s best comment to me: There are a lot of people who look a lot worse than you.

Also, hey, June, why don’t you try to turn your camera OFF sometimes rather than take 29 accidental selfies a day.

Day THREE hair, which, really, I was pushing it at that point. Also, rain. Can you tell it rained? Why is my head a weather vane?

Anyway, please let me know in the comments or through telepathy if you’d like that. A tutorial. I mean.

Selfie I DID mean to take. My little eyeless kitty girl. I love her so.

Anyway, I’m tryina think of what’s new, over here. I’ve been busy at work, but the good kind of busy, where there’s a lot to do but you aren’t OH MY GOD WHO CAN DO ALL THIS. There’s a new-ish but not Jewish copy editor who sits behind me now, and maybe if you asked her she’d say I sit behind her.

The point is, we’ve become a little bit of a team. We work on a whole bunch of accounts–which differs from how I used to work. I used to be dedicated to just one client. Now I’m spreading my talents all over town, like my college roommate.

So, they pretty much assign everything to both of us, and we dive on it like jackals. Or, alternatively, we both shy away from it like my kittens are doing with the dry, less-expensive kitten food. Oh my god they won’t eat that damn Kitten Chow. I leave it there overnight and when I get up, most of it’s gone, but they don’t mean it. It’s just to tide those motherfuckers over till the eleventy cans arrive.

ware fud?

Does anyone else follow Love and Hisses? Did you ever notice her kitten room is pristine? Believe it or not, that floor is swept and I Shark it often, but that floor looks a mess.

When the kittens DO go back to the shelter, I AM GETTING THAT FLOOR REDONE. I’ve got a little freelance work to do this month, and that’s where my big dollahs are going. Toward a real floor. How long have you known me to hate that floor? Six centuries?

Does anyone remember in 2014, when our president didn’t tweet and I was preparing to rent my home out for my Year Abroad? I scraped and prepared and painted that floor with alleged paint that was JUST for concrete, then I sealed it and died of exhaustion?

Does anyone remember that?

July, 2014. DON’T DO IT, JUNE! DON’T MOVE! Stay and enjoy your floor!

Yeah. That lasted. The floor lasted as long as my relationship.

I want old-looking linoleum, which I may have mentioned, but even if I haven’t I can’t imagine you’d be shocked at this info. June likes old stuff? June likes it vintage? She always struck me as sleek and minimal.

Alf my ridiculous handyman says I’m not allowed to measure or purchase tiles without his participation, and I am down with that plan. Because maths. “Alf, the room is 38484 by 31. I need one tile.”

I guess that pretty much sums it up, although technically I’ve told you nothing.

I had a guest over last night, to try to socialize the shy kittens, but they’re really effing shy. Do you recall a month or so ago when I was offered a job by the company I freelance for? I’ve gotten friendly with the person who offered me the job, and she stopped by last night to drop off m’freelance (under/over on how long June stares at her freelance work and doesn’t start till she’s panicked?) and meet the kittens.

She’s allergic to kittens, incidentally. And even though Ben and MaryEllen and Donald Trump barely let her touch them before dashing off hysterically to hide under the chair (I have no patience for shy anything), she still broke out in welts.

“I knew I would. But I don’t care! KITTENS!” she said. For she is my people. There really is something incredibly rewarding about touching their little walnut heads. Even when their walnut heads are shy and you have to drag them out from under a bus to pet them.

Other than that, I finally got a pedicure…

June comes to the realization that she painted her toes the same damn color blue she chooses for everything. June’s next BF will be from The Blue Man Group. She will never see him perform.

…and tonight I was gonna go to the cat cafe, because I don’t see enough cats, and then maybe the hookah bar with Wedding Alex, where I planned to ask her, “Whooooo are youuuuu?” but now she has to work, so I will come home and look at my freelance and put it off till I’m panicked.

And that’s the way it is, Wednesday, May something, 2018.

Love,
June Voltaire

Coming down with a case of LaCroix

Tell me if this is universal or it’s just me.

You’re extra full of things to do for a few days, and you think okay. I can deal with this. I’m all right. In fact, for me, it’s more fun when work is busy rather than: do this assignment. Wait a bit. Now do THIS assignment. Wait a bit. I like a steady pace that’s just on the edge of being scary but not actually scary.

So.

But, to be specific, I’ve had a very busy time at work, PLUS seven kittens, four adult cats and a touched-in-the-head dog as well. And a strict diet that requires preparing food. Which in case you just got here is not my bailiwick. ‘Tisn’t in m’wheelhouse. Not my forte.

So, I kept thinking yesterday that if I just did this next thing, I could relax for the first time in several days. That’s what was dangling in front of me like a donkey with a carrot. My couch and the TV and a little LaCroix were danglin’.

I created a to-do list by speaking into my phone as I drove home, as my mind was abuzz with the shit I had to do. Once the list was done, I could relax.

• Get your food and put it away.
• Take care of the animals.
• Go to the grocery store.
• Then? LaCROIX THROWDOWN.

I’d ordered a buncha keto food delivered, and it was to arrive Wednesday in a box with ice like I’m Elvis ordering banana sandwiches. UPS kept telling me it was on its way, and I wanted to get it into the refridge, which is one of those things someone says wrong and then you start saying it wrong and in this case that someone was Ned.

Go to the grocery store, the list told me, as you are 100% out of dog and adult cat food (it’s cat food that talks dirty) (the each little nibble is man-bit shaped) (when my three cats eat it, instant three-way) (they wash it down with MILF) (okay, I’m done).

I was also 100% out of paper towels, and I wonder why. Is it because ONE of those kittens does not always get to the box? I see most of them going like good cats. But one. One is a rebel. He’s number two. He tries harder. To go on the floor.

So I’d dashed home from work hoping Elvis keto would be on my porch but no.

Since the food wasn’t there, I went inside, let Edsel out, scooped litter boxes–quelle surprise–threw out the bag of cat wastey bits including old Rebel with Orange Paws’s wayward bits, fed everyone, swept the kitten-room floor, tried to get the Donald Trump kitten to be nice, and then boom. UPS finally arrived.

Covfefe

(There’s one big cute orange kitten who used to be called JimBob, but he’s huge and orange-headed and I’ve taken to calling him Donald Trump. He HATES being petted. He shirks down. “No one is going to adopt you if you’re an asshole,” I keep telling him. He doesn’t care. My suspicion is that he’s the pooper but I swear I’ve seen his giant orange head in the box.)

When the keto delivery came, I got the scissors and opened it, then opened the many many many bags inside, put them all away, recycled the original box out at the bin, and finally got to leave for the store.

I got huge bags of cat food and even bigger bags of dog food, giant heavy litter and a case of LaCroix. I’m comin’ down with a case of LaCroix.

And, see, I PLAN to order pet supplies through Chewy again, but I wanted to keep track of how often I run out of everything so I’d know when to renew my order, and now I know. I went from April 18 to May 9, so apparently I need to order cat and dog food and fucking litter (it was in the adult cat food section) every three damn weeks and WHY SO BROKE JUNE OH MY GOD.

Sweatily, I lugged all the enormous shit into my house of enormous shits. The only time I regret being single is grocery-unloading time.

I had to rip open the food bags and dump the food into tins, change the real-cats’ litter boxes using fresh litter, and MY POINT IS…

When you’re this busy, and you keep thinking, one more thing. I just gotta do one more thing. When you do that, and you think you’re done, and it’s ALMOST TEN O’CLOCK, and you realize

GOD

DAMMIT

you also have to take out the trash,

is that when you lose it?

Or is that just me?

I mean, normally you go about your evening, and you see oh. The trash needs to go out. And it’s like, well, shit.

But not me. Not me last night when I’d not stopped moving for 16 hours and I JUST WANTED COUCH AND LACROIX and there was ONE MORE THING TO DO and SON OF A BITCH.

Is that everyone? Or it that me?

P.S. While I was telling you this story, the lawn guys came and thank god because Shoeless Joe Jackson kept wandering out of my tall grass to tell me to build a baseball diamond. But the noises my lawn guys make scare the

CRAP

out of Cora, the mom cat. So when they came, she began howling, and I went in there to pet her and talk to her.

And do you know that Donald Trump kitty crawled up on her back to make her feel better? I’ve never seen any of them do that to her at any other time, crawl on top of her.

So see? Everyone has a sweet side. Even poop-on-the-floor-orange-headed-don’t-pet-me Donald Trump kitten.

I gotta go. I’ve got stuff to do.

Keto My Heart

Because I don’t have enough going on, today I’m starting the keto diet.

You know it’s a good sign when you don’t get to the grocery store to BUY your keto food till 9 p.m. Which is what I did yesterday. Look, I have a lot of kittening and catting and dog-walking to do after work.

I guess now is a good time to throw in the obligatory kitten pictures. Yesterday afternoon, when I got home from work, which haven’t I said that like 14 times now? Okay, June, we understand you came home from work.

So I got home from work, heh, and when I opened the kitten-room door, all seven kittens were using the three litter boxes. They were having a little litter box party. As you do. Tonight we’re gonna potty like it’s 1999.

You’re welcome.

They’re so much more adept at the box than those last four kittens, and for that? I am grateful.

i yewse da box

What cat fur on my black pants? Say, June, here’s an idea… How ’bout you ixnay the black ants-pay?

we frowneee

RUNT!

I had trouble getting a photo of her actually sitting still. I’ve already washed that blanket once, I shook it out 394934043 times, and I’m washing it right now as we speak.

cleen crums, fostir mama. it dispiccccible in heer.

While I was sitting here selecting from the 294839403 kitten photos I took yesterday, I also made my keto coffee, which consists of regularly scheduled coffee (use a french press! they say. fuck off! I say.) with some coconut oil blended in it. It’s kind of delicious but makes my throat hurt. Why does it make my throat hurt?

…I just Google fuckinged it, and it happens to other people, too, though no one can say why. Thanks, world. Helpful.

Hah! I forgot I had this one. Runty is very screechy, and I love her so bad.

That delightfully clean blanket just stopped washing, so I’d better get it in the dryer so they can have it back and soil it as soon as possible, and then I’d better get to work. Then you know what I’ll do?

I’ll come home from work.

I know this was a short and shortie post, but I’m doing a lot. I’m doing it all. I’m every woman, it’s all in me.

And by all, I mean a fat layer.

Talk to you tomorrow, when I will give a full First Day of Keto Report, which I am certain places you at the edge of your seat.

I will leave you with this final, petty annoyance, which should really be the slogan of this non-blog. I was watching Parenthood the other night and got annoyed by how DAMN MANY producers there are on the show. The credits were distracting, there were so many.

Watch and grow annoyed with me, won’t you? Also, why do they think people talking at the same time is fun to sit through?

Annoyedly,
Joop

Keptly,
Goddammit…Autocorrect ruins my life.

KETOLY,
Joom

Next to the astronaut

Eds won’t stop acting the fool this morning. “Come sit and chew Blu and be a nice dog,” I just commanded him.

Edz ALWEEZ nice dog.

Really, I should put off covering that chair for longer. It’s not disgusting enough. I guess if I recover that chair, putting it by the back door again is out, right? I need, like, a mud chair back here. Or, hey, a dog bed. Look at me. The ideas just keep coming. I’m like Ben Franklin.

Anyway, I’m tryina think of things that’re new that I can actually tell you about.

On Tuesday, Ned went to Taco Bell. As you do. When you’re Ned.

One of the old movies was on at my old theater, and seeing as how we’re old, Ned and I decided to go. “I have to get my hair cut first,” said Ned.

My first date with Ned was January 19, 2012. You’ll recall that was a Thursday.

The reason we went out on a Thursday was because when he asked me out for the first time on a Monday and we were tryina make a plan, he was getting his hair cut on Tuesday, so Tuesday was out. I was having dinner with The Other June on Wednesday. So Thursday it was. I do not know why I remember all this.

My point is, Ned always gets his hair cut on Tuesdays. Every sixth Tuesday. I get my hair done whenever I have money and/or my gray roots are so absurd that I look like Shirley Maclaine when Deborah Winger is dying in Terms of Endearment. I know I always use that line,  but it’s so accurate.

I’m lying here next to the astronaut.

So, Ned gets his hair done, a phrase he adores, right near my house on every sixth Tuesday. He’s done around 6:00, and the old-people movie starts at 7:00, so we didn’t have loads of time, and I said, “You wanna go to Taco Bell?” and when he said yes, I fell over dead and I’m writing this while lying in the silk. Next to the astronaut.

He got a taco and a glass of water, which did not annoy me in the slightest.

Who even knew water was available at Taco Bell?

The movie we saw was Raiders of the Lost Ark, and what amuuuuused me was I got home after, and pretty much every coworker I have posted something from Raiders of the Lost Ark on the social media, there.

One guy took a picture of the organist playing beforehand. “Raiders of the Lost Ark on the big screen? Shut up and take my money,” he wrote.

I did not post to any social media about my movie. I’m just taking 450 words to tell you here.

Yesterday I came home for lunch and noticed Edsel’s tooth was loose. That fangy one hanging out. He’s like a 6-year-old human with a loose tooth. Except he’s an 8-year-old dog, and are dogs supposed to have loose teeth? I think not.

So I took him to the vet, which he enjoys 100% of. Even though he shakes once he sees the building, it ends almost immediately once we’re inside. People talk to him and give him treats, he can glare at other dogs who have the nerve to inhabit the planet. Then he gets a restorative treat after. The whole setup works for the Edz.

Ooo, we goin’ to bets!

That crumpled thing back there is a dress I keep meaning to take to dry cleaning. Ask me how that’s going.

Oooo, we at bets! BEST TING EBER!!

MARRGLPH, marrrglph. Hush puppeee after bets! Marrrgulph.

Anyway, $78 later, it turns out he has a very loose tooth, and that it’ll fall out on his own very soon. He needed a rabies shot, anyway, so he got that yesterday, and we refilled his Sentinel. As he is a stoic sentinel.

The vet said as dogs age, those bottom teeth get loose. I know Lu lost one down there too. They asked if he liked to chew, and that is when I got to tell them all about Blu.

Turns out, m’vet’s Corgie also enjoys toys from the company that makes Blu. This would be a good time to add one of my Amazon links I never remember to add.

Edsel has destroyed every “Can’t be destroyed” toy out there, till one of you–and who was that?–sent Edsel Blu. He’s on Blus #3 and #4 now (he has two, so when one goes missing in the yard or cushions, there’s a backup so he doesn’t get the shakes). It took him years to ruin Blu #1, and we left Blu #2 in Uncle Ned’s yard when we lived there, I think.

Anyway, that company makes other toys, too, and if you click that photo, above, you can of course go on Amazon and shop for whatever you want. As long as you click over there by using the image or my seaglass image that’s on every page of this not blog, I will become rich.

Also, this is how I’ve been writing you. With this weasel strewn across me. I just write around her. If you knew how often I just write around a cat.

Last night, I went BACK to the old theater and saw Gillian Welch, which was good, except she said one weird thing.

“I had an interesting experience in your city today,” she began, strumming her guitar. Everyone cheered, all WOOOO! Greensboro!

“I saw what’s left of Proximity and Revolution,” she began.

Okay. What was she talking about? I’ve lived here for 10 years. Proximity is the nice hotel I like to drink at. It’s lovely. The only Revolution I know is that cool mill where I get my hair done NOT every sixth Tuesday. It’s thriving. New apartments have gone in there, and new restaurants and stores. It’s humming with activity. What was she…?

Did she just DISS our city?

The whole audience was stonily silent. I have no idea what she was talking about, but it seemed …not kind. Pretty much everyone I know who lives here likes living here. People always talk about how there’s “enough to do” and that it’s affordable and nearly everything is 10 minutes away. Downtown is booming.

Anyway, it made me mad, although I’m still not clear on where she meant, anyway.

I’d better get to the work, and do the work, like I’m RuPaul or whatever.

Current references-ly,
June

Gettin’ our Stitch Fix. See what I did, there?

My boss, fmr., got her new StitchFix for April. Let’s judge!

I ran into her office and watched her open her box like it was Xmas morning. X-Files morning. Like a morning with my ex.

I was a big fan of this shirt with birds, as I enjoy a bird on anything. Except perhaps on my esophagus. A bird on one’s esophagus would blow.

“Should I put on the blouse with the jeans that came in the box, too?” she asked.

Yes.

Also, I had no time for this. I proofread so hard yesterday that my contacts were prunes by 5:00.

“These jeans actually fit!” she said. “Mail-order jeans that fit!”

So let’s vote.

Can we vote on whether adding polls is a pain in my ASS?

“This coat is oddly…wintery for an April shipment.”

“My mom would tell me to buy this for winter, so I’ll have it.”

Survey says…

“I like the color, but it’d need to be ironed.”

And finally, we have an accessory. Bracelet yourselves…

“It says it’s adjustable but I don’t know if it really is.”

Please vote early and often. Why do people say that? Anyway, vote before I blog again. Stop her, before she blogs again!

Fixedly,
Juan

A whole post literally about nothing

Hang on. I’m strappin’ on Laila Ali.

Girl, you hot

Do you think every time I say I’m strapping on Laila Ali that the real Laila Ali gets a little thrill and doesn’t know why? “Ooo, what is that? Always happens around 8 a.m. Eastern.”

Plus also, do you think the fine folks at The Green Bean coffeehouse will give me cash money for product placement?

Just now, when I linked to the coffeeshop, JUST NOW, after living here TEN YEARS, did I get the name. All this time, I just thought I meant they roasted the beans there or something, and so the beans were green when they got there, but it’s because Greensboro. Right?

Because Greensboro.

Nothing gets past me. If you give me 10 years.

It’s been almost 10 years to the day that I bought this house, and I know I have a really cute picture of me with puppy Tallulah, with her pink leash and leopard collar, standing in front of this house the day we decided to buy it, and I’d like to frame it, but can I find it? I cannot. I KNOW IT EXISTS.

This is also a picture from that same day. Oh, THIS boring picture, I can find. Sure.

My iPhotos allegedly have a search feature, but here’s what all I got when I searched “puppy.”

Violet the puppy, chewing Talu. Also, this was before I had a good iPhone camera.

Not a puppy. A GOOF, but not a puppy.

Lu with a 12-year-old-looking Ned

Did I tell you about Ned’s crisis during the Academy Awards? I can’t recall.

Youthful Ned

Youthful Mark Hamill

Apparently, when Ned was young–way way back when Ned was young–people told him he looked like Luke Skywalker all the time. So for some reason, Mark Hamill was all over the ding-dang Oscars the other night, and does anyone really know why? He wasn’t nominated, was he?

May the aging be with you.

When Mark Hamill appeared on the Academy Awards, Ned was all, “OH MY GOD, THAT’S WHAT I LOOK LIKE.”

“It’s really not, really. Not exact–”

“IT IS! I LOOK TERRIBLE! Oh my god. I look like aging Mark Hamill.”

I mean, a little. Okay, a tad. But not really. There was no telling Ned this, however.

“Oh, god, there he is AGAIN. Oh my god I look TERRIBLE.” Ned acted like he was looking in a mirror every time he saw Mark Hamill.

And speaking of which, as you know from your Big Book of June Events, about a month ago, an electrician came by and fixed the fan in my bathroom. For 10 years (see above) I been livin’ with a bathroom that has no fan, and as a result it got steamy in there when I showered, and as a result the ceiling paint was peeling, and as a result Alf my ridiculous handyman got mad at me and said CALL THE ELECTRICIAN.

So I did. And it was easy to fix. Then Alf my ridiculous handyman chipped and sanded and painted my ceiling, which I’ll bet was a good time.

The point is, for the first time in 10 years (see above), when I get out the shower, I can see myself in the steam-free bathroom mirror, emerging from the tub.

Remember that scene in The Shining?

Aging is not for the faint of heart, man. Sometimes I cackle at myself just to add to the effect. Jack Nicholson’s reaction to this old lady is probably his reaction to any woman over 30 who hits on him.

Fucking men.

I see I’ve talked for 600 words now about precisely nothing, so let’s call it a day and look at whatever pictures I took yesterday. See if there’s anything worth mentioning.

Ah, yes. While I’ve no idea who “Karen Sommerfeld” is, and that joke never gets old, I created a poll yesterday to ask about Edsel’s looks. It would appear “goof” is winning out over “handsome.”

Eds resent.

Also, my feet were so freezing at work yesterday that I finally just put my mittens on my feet. I figured THAT would be the moment the owner of our company wanted to come to my desk and talk to me, but that did not happen. A shit-ton of regular, nonowner people wanted to discuss what the eff was up with m’feet though. Whatever. Get to work.

I had a harrowing day, work-wise, with people asking if I was busy, me saying yes and them saying, “Well, here are six articles, all due tomorrow” RYAN, so why ask me if I’m busy since that didn’t matter RYAN.

My point is, as soon as work was done I screamed to a coffeeshop named Geeksboro–and see, I get that name, because Greensboro, and they have video games there or whatever you geeky kids call them now–and the point is I met someone there and we had intense talks till pretty late, and then I had to scream home and feed all the pets who hated me for being late, and when I finally got to bed I noticed in my Shining mirror how hagged out and exhausted I looked.

Don’t fuck with me, fella

I swear I was smoking zero gange. I had also had zero alcohol. I guess those are proofreader eyes. THIS IS WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU WORK ME TOO HARD, RYAN.

Next dating profile pic

I leave you with photos I just took of The Needy Committee, and you see how Edsel is staring into my soul? That’s every minute of every day. When I’m at work, I’ll bet he stares in the general direction of work. No one finds me more riveting than Edsel. In fact, no one FINDS me riveting except Edsel.

Seeing as that’s true, I will go now.

Rivetingly,

Juan

How to Have a Migraine: A Step-By-Step Guide

Yesterday morning, after I’d gotten up early and stressed own self over adding polls to this here not-blog (good participation, by the way!), I got an email.

“Can you knock this out this morning?”

I wasn’t even at work yet, and already I was anxious. It’s this big, several-tabbed Excel document that I copy edit every month, and of course copy editing is what I do, but this is several rows long, like sometimes 20 rows, and if you know from Excel, it extends all the way to the letter M.

Some squares I have to copy edit. Some I don’t. Some I have to count characters. Some I don’t. And it’s so big that I can’t see it all at once and actually proofread the words in it at the same time, so I have to blow it up and then clunk around on the thing, wondering, “Did I already read that? Did I count characters for this one?”

And always they need it in like two hours.

I keep saying, “Ideally, I’d like five hours to do this thing” but there never are five hours to be spared.

So that makes me tense every month, and there it was, the dreaded spreadsheet. And did I mention I wasn’t even at work yet?

As I was in the middle of that, someone ran up to me. “Can you look at this real fast?” It was a magazine cover. You screw that up, and you cost the company hundreds of thousands of dollars to reprint.

So I stopped the scary thing to look at another scary thing, and as I was doing that, my boss’s boss, fmr., came over. “Come back in 20,” I groused, and just as I was getting that cranky sentence out, the phone rang.

“CAN I CALL YOU BACK.”

Then I finished my scary magazine cover, and my horrifyingly clunky spreadsheet, and addressed the request of my boss’s boss, fmr., and called back the poor person who’d phoned me (I explained to her all that was going on at my desk when she’d called. “You were surprisingly polite, with all that going on,” she said) and boom.

I got an email from a woman I used to work with. “I was hoping we could get a glass of wine or some coffee or something,” she said, and seeing as no one likes me (see above) I agreed immediately. “We can meet somewhere, but also I have four foster kittens at my house, if that’s a thing you’d enjoy.”

I mean, you come to my house right now, you’re gonna be covered in kittens. For some, that is paradise. We’re knocking on heaven’s door. And for others, it sucks. I don’t understand those “others,” either.

Anyway, she agreed that my pad was the place to be.

Meanwhile, I got an immediate-turnaround, emergency article, and it was all financial info that I didn’t understand, and unfortunately for me, there seemed to be a par-tayyy going on at another desk, with everyone talking and laughing, and I was totally Cinderella with her headphones on, tryina concentrate and sweep the hearth.

At 1:00, I finally got done, and headed home for lunch. I’d had one piece of toast all day, and I was feeling decidedly peckish.

But you know how your house seems okay until you know someone is coming over? “Aw, man, I should change the throw rug in the bathroom. Man, I should sweep this floor.”

Next thing you know, almost an hour had passed, and I STILL HAD MY COAT ON, and was taking out the recycling and scrubbing the stove top and oh my god.

I was already late for returning to work when I realized I couldn’t find two of the kittens.

I was missing goddamn Lexi.

And motherfucking Vicki, the tortoiseshell. Hey, June, why don’t you recover that chair.

Anyway, having had cats m’whole life, I wasn’t too worried. I looked under chairs, under desks, behind squeezy things.

No cats.

Matt the tabby and Trixie the black one were in their room, being good cats.

me supeer yer

mee 2

MY COAT STILL ON, I started shining a flashlight under things, and by the way, did you ever have your lights off and shine a flashlight on your hardwoods?

MOTHER OF GOD with the fur everywhere. I mean, maybe it’s because lately I’ve had nine fricking animals here, but good lord.

I wrote my boss. Current. “Minor emergency, working from home.” And then, even though I’d gotten everything done that was due, I did work. I figured maybe if I sat still, they’d come out.

Then I started having dreadful thoughts. What if I’d washed them with Edsel’s bed? What if I’d taken them out with the trash? I actually went out and searched the trash.

By the end of the day, I was exhausted and worried. “Ima get a migraine,” I thought, because I also hadn’t eaten, and I know the kind of day I had was like a poster: How To Get a Migraine.

Right at 5:00, I heard a mew. I’d been sitting on the couch, proofreading things, and when I get to work today, Ima be bored stiff, I got so far ahead of self. Really, you get a lot more work done at home.

Anyway, “mew!”

Where was it? Where was I hearing it? Was it outside? Oh, no, was it?

“mew!”

Those mother

FUCKERS

were under the sink. And then of course I had to worry they ate poison, but if they did they seem to be thriving on it, so.

My chins and me carrying Lexi back to her room. Fucking adventure cat.

Later, my pal from work came by, and enjoyed her some kittens and an indifferent Iris. Or was appalled by them. Also, I did not ask her if I could put her in said not-blog, so I hope she does not kick my ass.

It’s possible she was more appalled than happy.

Right as she was leaving, I felt the first twinge. It ended up being a two-pill migraine, and I went to bed about 9:00. Felt dreadful.

As I was drifting to sleep spooning Steely Dan (don’t tell anyone), I heard a

“meep!”

Fucking adventure tortie, seen here with her good pal and biggest fan, Edsel, had escaped the room, despite the 47 pillows I’ve crammed in the space. Like a day in the sink wasn’t fun enough. Now she has to creep about in the night.

So that was my day, and am sincerely hoping today is more copasetic, especially given that I have a migraine hangover.

Searchingly,

June