the ocean

How Are We Celebrating Halloween?

-- Sitting in the living room with the lights out, hiding from trick or treaters.
-- Murdering a series of sexy teens.
-- Realizing we don't really like Snickers bars very much.
-- Channeling the spirits of the dead; defrosting refrigerator.
-- Being upset that no one gets our "sexy Nietzsche" costume.
-- Developing diabetes.
-- Wondering if Sarah Jessica Parker was really just playing herself in Hocus Pocus.
-- Enjoying the Christmas displays at Macy's.
-- Having weird fantasies about the Wolfman.
-- Digging ground-up candy corn out of our rug.
-- Engaging in attention-seeking behaviors.
-- Being mistaken for a prostitute.

Hallow's Eve

In keeping with my recent tradition of being too old and tired for things that are fun, I am not planning anything special for Halloween. I'm going to come home from work, go to the gym, and come back and eat dinner in the dark in case any trick or treaters come by our building. (Hands off my mini Snickers, bitches.) If I'm feeling really crazy, I may flip on the TV and see if there are any Halloween-themed Lifetime movies on. Last night I saw one where one of the minor players from Buffy the Vampire Slayer was having disturbing visions of her dead father. I found it difficult to sleep afterwards, but probably not as difficult as the lady from Buffy the Vampire Slayer does. Or Sarah Michelle Gellar, for that matter. Ringer, we hardly knew thee.

We did go to a Halloween party this past weekend, but we had to be somewhere else right afterwards, so we didn't wear costumes. I can't tell you how amazing it was to be repeatedly asked why I wasn't dressed up. Apparently people don't view "because I'm 34" as an acceptable answer.

I have had some pretty amazing costumes in the past, if I do say so myself. I went as Harry Potter --before we'd even had the movies to show us exactly what a Wal-mart brand Harry Potter must look like -- and as Janet Reno and Hillary Clinton in two very sexy successive years. I went as Richard Simmons and as Screech from Saved by the Bell. (Wigs played a very significant role in many of these costumes.) But I don't think I'll ever top when I went as Pac Man in grade school; people thought I just had jaundice, but man I knew I was the shit.

Anyway, I'm looking forward to just having a casual night. Frankly, drinking excessively and wearing slutty clothes are more Tuesday night things.

Men at Work

It's been more than five months now since I left my firm job. There have been many benefits to this, such as the fact that I can now make social plans without warning friends and family that they are wholly subject to last minute cancellation with or without warning. Also, I am no longer insane, or at least not as insane. My crying jags have dwindled to almost none and I now very rarely throw electronic devices in a momentary rage. No one has come by to complain about me shouting into my phone. It has, in fact, been so long since I had a manic or depressive episode that I'm starting to doubt that they were real. I mean, I could not possibly have lived my life as Lindsay Lohan portraying Elizabeth Taylor, could I?

I do have to say, however, that having such an all-encompassing job did make an excellent excuse for all of the other failings in my life, however. You see, the only reason I had not written the Great American Novel (likely about someone overcoming something, such as adversity) was because I worked too much and did not have time. Now it is clear that my failures in the regard are due mainly to the fact that I find Lifetime movies endlessly interesting. Previously, I could blame my occasional crankiness with friends and relatives on the demands of my job; now everyone knows it's just because I'm kind of an asshole. I also no longer really have a great excuse for skipping church, even though I really, really want to, since it is election season and Catholic God seems to be pretty much full time fixated on matters of lady parts. I'm pretty sure it's from the Gospel of Luke somewhere; he's the pervy one, right?

Anyway, it's Sunday and I've got a whole day ahead of me to accomplish something with my life. Or to import CDs I haven't listened to since junior high into my iTunes. One or the other.

Pastimes

It's been a busy few days. Wednesday night I had kickboxing and core and then went to Target for Halloween costume shopping, before deciding that I didn't want to deal with Halloween costume shopping and that I would just repeat a costume from years ago, needlessly buying a bunch of Target microwave appetizers instead, and going home. Thursday I had a work happy hour, which was more like two hours of mild boredom, following by Nashville Night in America at my sister's house. I'm honestly not sure how much I'm really going to be able to do that show. I don't really like the brokedown Kirsten Dunst character or the constant singing. I kind of wish they'd turn it into a zany comedy centered on Hayden Panettiere's crazy drug-addicted mom. Now she brings the fun.

Last night was a friend's birthday party at Whirlyball. As usual, I enjoyed smashing into people in bumper cars very much, although my car kept getting stuck in reverse with hilarious consequences. Also I kept forgetting that there was an actual goal to the proceedings, namely getting the stupid whiffle ball into the hoop. And then there were the bruises, the marvelous bruises that I incurred from my seat belt and/or accidentally jamming the steering lever into my thigh. These are the prices that you pay for being a world class athlete.

Oral Fixation

This morning I had yet another appointment with my oral surgeon. He likes to have me come in about every six weeks so he can berate his nurses in front of me and give me guilt trips about tartar. This morning I had the added attraction of getting a CAT scan, which requires me to crouch in a giant machine behind the receptionist's desk and bite down on a piece of cotton while the nurse chatters at me about the weather. Meanwhile, the extraction was six months ago and I still have a big hole where one of my molars should be.

The good news, though, is that I have now been cleared to get a dental implant in three weeks. (There was some issue about whether I would have enough bone growth to support the implant by then, but today my bone growth was elaborately praised. I accepted all the compliments, as I have been wholeheartedly focused on growing bone.) I was hoping that it would be some sort of bionic tooth that plays smooth jazz and emits occasional puffs of Binaca, but it turns out it's just kind of a regular tooth. It's not even diamond studded.

Apparently the implant procedure is not as difficult as the extraction and I won't even need anaesthesia. Which means no hallucinations or crying, I fear. They told me I may even be able to go back to work the next day. Yay? I'm stocking up on pudding and soup just in case.

Returns, Triumphant

Last night marked my first trip back to the movie theater since my semi-freakout at The Dark Knight Rises. As much as it pained me to miss the gritty realism and heavy social content of such recent hot hits as Sparkle and Dredd, I'm pretty sure that teenaged theater managers all over the greater Chicagoland area were gratified to not have me repeatedly checking their fire exits and demanding that creepy loners' bags be searched. And I carefully planned my return, such that it was at a theater and for a movie that seemed to be pretty low risk. Psychotic maniacs could frankly do a lot better than The Master in its fifth week of limited release.

So the good news is that I didn't act like a crazy person; the bad news is that I may not be a smart person either. I liked The Master just fine but I don't really think I "got" it. Frankly, I was too busy wondering if Joaquin Phoenix had permanently fucked up his posture in real life by stooping with his hands behind his back for months of shooting. And what was going on with his face. (A lady in the elevator afterwards said that she read he used some sort of device in his mouth to keep one half of it still. But that doesn't explain the eyes, oh, the eyes.) As a general matter, though, I enjoyed the performances (but would it kill Amy Adams to play an unpleasant person at some point in her life?) and thought it was all beautifully shot and put together. I just didn't know what it meant. Could this be a case where humping a lady made of sand on the beach is just humping a lady made of sand on the beach?

Anyway, I'm back in the game, such as it is. Next up I'm thinking about catching Argo at the month-old mark. Yes, I know, I am a wild man.

Potential "October Surprises"

-- October cancelled; just going straight to November this year.
-- Mitt Romney was the one who came up with the idea to give Dane Cook a TV show.
-- Barack Obama secretly replaced the regular White House coffee with Folger's Crystals.
-- Americans decide to actually give a shit about the democratic process.
-- Bob Schieffer loses it during the third debate and tries to make out with a cardboard bald eagle.
-- Paul Ryan enjoys feasting on the souls of virgins.
-- Full frontal Joe Biden.
-- Sarah Palin has actually not held or run for any public office in more than three years.
-- Skinnygirl margaritas for everyone!
-- Barack Obama thought Battleship "wasn't all that bad."
-- Mitt Romney's tax returns reveal what happened to Amelia Earhart.
-- Pantless Tuesdays.
-- Strong write-in candidacy from Bonnie, the lady on the Segway from the CVS commercials.
-- Wolf Blitzer changes his hairstyle.
-- Congress disbands; legislative function now to be performed by surviving members of TLC.

A Little Bit Country

So as I'm sure everyone in the world knows, the Reba program has moved to CMT. This means that if I want to get my daily dose of half-hearted puns and enormous facial expressions, I must pursue it on a network that, prior to now, I did not know I got. (At least until Reba's new sitcom, Malibu Country, premieres on ABC and, most likely, lasts a total of three weeks.) It does seem like a good home for my Reba, as everyone seems to have big hair and farcical accents. But it's also like a whole world I never knew existed.

They have a show called "World's Strictest Parents." I actually watched a bit of it tonight while I was folding my laundry. The parents involved don't really seem to be the world's strictest per se. Their strictness seems to mainly take the form of forcing children to do manual labor; if that's the standard, then I think that China is technically the world's strictest parent. But to be fair, the kids involved don't seem all that screwed up, either. Mainly they just smoke and wear their pants too low; if that's the standard, most of Wicker Park should be on the show. There are a lot of heart to hearts and lessons are learned. The lesson I learned was to find something else to watch while folding my laundry.

There are also shows called Bayou Billionaires and Redneck Rehab. Frankly, I just can't.

I have seen portions of their cheerleading-related shows. Why they felt cheerleading was a good match for their redneck brand, I'm not sure, but... oh wait, yeah, I do get it. Anyway, there seems to be a lot of yelling, a lot of makeup, and a lot of eyes popping out of people's heads. If it weren't for the occasional acrobatics, it could just be Real Housewives.

I'm going to turn off my television now, perhaps permanently.

Arts & Leisure

Last night I went to see Yo-Yo Ma and the Silk Road Ensemble at Symphony Center. This was not something I'd planned on doing before yesterday morning, when my friend called and said he had an extra ticket that could be mine free of charge. I was a little skeptical, honestly, because I took world musics in college, and got little more out of it than a wide variety of tension headaches and an A-. But as a general matter, I do not turn down free tickets, whether they be for a Taylor Swift concert or an Auto-da-fe (but I repeat myself). So despite my natural inclination to put on sweatpants and watch Halloween-themed Lifetime movies on a Saturday night, I had an extra Diet Coke with dinner and subjected myself to the sights and smells of the Red Line.

And I was glad I did! The group was really amazing and full of awesomely-named instruments like the Kamancheh and the Shakuhachi. There was this fantastic lady with green-tipped hair who could wail on a Gaita like nobody's business. (And it is nobody's business, really.) And they played lots of recent compositions with really interesting tonality and complex rhythms, which kind of made me want to take of my pants in the middle of Orchestra Hall. My only quibble was that they turned the lights off in the second half so they could show some (admittedly amazing) projections, which played a little to heavily into my narcoleptic tendencies. Luckily I mastered the use of self-abuse to maintain consciousness in first period biology way back in the ninth grade.

Telephone Time

It's fascinating working in my new(ish) office, and not just because there's a dead body in almost every case I work on now. My office is on a hallway with about nine other offices and, when people leave their doors open, I can hear every single one of their telephone conversations. As a result, I have learned the following things:

-- One of my coworkers has gout. But that hasn't kept him from leading a full, active life. Just last week he went to see the Batman movie.

-- Another coworker has a cat that she has to bathe with special shampoo twice a week. The shampoo is very difficult to get and requires calls to multiple pet stores all around the nation. Calls that often devolve into shouting or crying.

-- Yet another coworker has a child who continually poops his pants. This is an actual medical condition. Or at least they have found a doctor who claims it is.

-- Two of my coworkers call each other all the time even though their offices are literally next door to one another. No more than two feet apart. They could just talk to each other through the wall.

-- Yet another coworker is a very crusty old man. We're talking Wilford Brimley levels of crust here.

I just thought you all had a right to know. Looking out for your interests, as always.

News at 11

I forgot to mention that I saw Newsies while I was in New York. And by "forgot to mention," I mean "deliberately withheld so that I would have something left to write about on another day." But anyway, it was pretty good. It certainly is not giving Sondheim a run for the money in the intellectual content or musical complexity departments, but it's high energy and a lot of fun. The choreography is quite incredible, most notably in a sequence that involves people sliding around on sheets of newsprint without killing themselves. And the songs are really, really catchy, to the point that I'm starting to fear I'll be taking them with me to my grave. On the other hand, the female lead is pretty clearly a role they just kind of made up and stuck in there so they could have a girl onstage for at least some of the time, and the accents sounds like the New Yawk accents that people do in junior high drama club (which may or not be a comment on their accuracy -- I was sadly not alive to hear the real thing). And there is a character named "crutchie" who, believe it or not, walks with a crutch. This is the kind of subtlety that made Newsies the movie the kind of ginormous flop that absolutely screams for a multimillion dollar stage adaptation. Strange that Christian Bale has not been involved.

But anyway, I enjoyed it! There's nothing like an crazily upbeat, apologetically pro-union song and dance extravaganza brought to you by a giant, multinational corporation with a history of somewhat questionable labor practices. I thought about waiting around to get autographs afterwards, but then I realized I'm not a thirteen-year-old girl and I actually don't know who any of these people are. So I decided to roam the streets hoping to get hit by Amanda Bynes' car instead. But of course it's New York, so even she probably takes public transit.

Hot Times in the City

Very good, very quick trip to New York this weekend. Stayed in Hell's Kitchen in what was actually the tiniest hotel room I've ever seen. It was so small that the bed went pretty much went all the way from one wall to the other one. In fact, if you pushed a button, the bed folded up in half and turned into a couch so you could move about the room during the day. Also, the bathroom wasn't a "room" so much as a glass cubicle with a curtain. But it was perfect for what we wanted, which was to be close to everything but rarely in the room. Also, they had a robot in the lobby instead of a concierge. Of course, I ended up getting in a fight with it, but you know me -- if there's a robot, I'll find a way to fight with it. That's why things ended so badly between me and Small Wonder.

Mainly I wanted to see some friends on this trip, but I also saw some parts of the city I'd never visited before. We checked out the High Line, which is great if you enjoy trees and staring into other people's windows, which of course I do. We went down to the World Trade Center area, which was so covered in people from Oklahoma wearing These Colors Don't Run t-shirts that there was no way we were getting into the actual memorial, but it was interesting just to see. And we went down to the South Seaport, which is sort of like Navy Pier but with an Express store instead of a Ferris Wheel. I think it's safe to say that I learned important lessons about life, love, and man's place in the universe.

Start Spreading the News

I'm headed to New York for the weekend. It's my first New York trip that's not for work or a wedding in more than seven years, so I'm kind of excited. I think it will be nice to see the city without the fear of being screamed at. (Well, at least not planned screaming, like at a deposition or wedding rehearsal. There's always freelance screaming. But we have that in Chicago, too.) I'll actually be able to enjoy a nice meal somewhere (read: Times Square Olive Garden) because my stomach won't be tied up in knots from stress. And maybe I'll even take in a show. Is Miss Saigon still playing?

Actually, one of the best parts of this trip is that I don't really have an intense agenda for it. The worst part, meanwhile, is the weird flights I've selected. Departing at 8:30 PM on the way there and the way back? What was I thinking? The LaGuardia Sbarro won't even be open. And I'll totally be too tired to watch Revenge when I get back.

But regardless, there will likely be a programming interruption while I'm gone. Not that that's really that notable these days. I suggest you read Maureen Dowd instead while I'm gone; we're basically the same person.

Just Shoot Me

I got my flu shot today. I'm a big believer in flu shots because I don't care for vomiting unless I've had some sort of fun to cause it. Also because I think the government is using them to control our minds, which I'm completely in favor of.

Anyway, my new job gives us flu shots for free, which is somewhat odd given that they now won't even spring for paper towels in the bathrooms, but go figure. As a result, I think, when I got down there the line was about 80 people deep. You would have thought that they were giving away nude pictures of Whoopi Goldberg, and that this was the line to avoid receiving one of those pictures. It ended up being about a half hour of wait, but who minds when you know you're going to get stuck with a giant needle at the end of it?

I was lucky enough to get stuck twice, in fact. I had not learned this in more than a decade of experience with flu shots, but apparently they are subject to "user error." The lady stuck me, felt she had somehow done it wrong, and told me we had to do it again. She actually seemed way more broken up about it than I was, though, so I thought it would be uncharitable to complain. Plus she gave me a Disney band-aid, which more than makes up for just about anything, up to and including genocide.