Thursday, November 6, 2008

Caught Cat Handed


So its been approximately 10,000 years since I posted anything, sorry. Since I changed jobs (back in December of last year), its been exceedingly hard to gather the mental energy to put together a coherent blog entry that I am satisfied with.

I actually have a slew of half written entries saved as email drafts. At my old place of employment, I could comfortably compose and post at work directly onto blogger. At my new job that is not the case, due to the fact that I actually work now, and that work is done on a government monitored computer. I'm forced to draft blog entries masquerading as "emails" that will inevitably never get posted, either because I don't have the time to finish them, or because after reading them a second time through in the evening or over my lunch break, I decide they are crap, and am too ashamed to post something I'm not satisfied with.

Anyways, a small incident this morning prompted me to write something. It actually started as an email to Hurricane, but then I thought "whoa, wait, why not share with my starved blogging fans." (if there are any of you left).

There are three websites I visit all. the. time. Not a day passes when I do not grace the pages of these websites with my presence. Whenever I'm in between tasks, I rifle through these sites, checking for updates. They are:

DailyMail.co.uk (British tabloid website...it offers a certain uncensored trashy twist on celebrity news)
Mugglenet.com (Harry Potter fansite...yes I'm a huge nerd)
ICanHasCheezburger.com (cats, cats, and more cats...and some hilarious captions...and probably the site I visit most often)

After a personal analysis of the websites I visit most often, you can safely say that I'm obviously a huge nerdy creep that likes cats and British smut.

Of course, I am mortified to have shared all this information with you, but its crucial to the story. Also, please do not assume that those are the ONLY websites I visit. I'm a fairly normal, intelligent girl. I do read the regular news websites, among other things.

Anyways...

From where I sit near the end of my cube line, there is only one person that walks by my desk on a regular basis with a clear shot of my computer screen. This gentleman is on a different team than I, so I've never shared more than a passing "hello" with him, let alone my affinity for felines. I can usually hear him coming before he walks by (he carries a pocket full of jangly-ass keys), so I always make sure to Alt+Tab to another window before he gets within eyesight of my computer screen.

Therefore, I was shocked this morning when he stopped at my desk and said "I saw this cartoon this morning in the paper and thought of you" and promptly slapped a cartoon about a cat on my desk. My jaw dropped and he continued walking back to his own cube.

I have never once told this man that I like cats. He must see me staring at pictures of cats all day long whenever he walks by, and thinks I'm a cat loving freak. Obviously I need to reposition the angle of my computer screen.

Sunday, June 29, 2008

The Weekend Review


This weekend I fully took advantage of a smattering of DC metro area delights.  I stumbled into a variety of events without really making plans, and it turned out to be a great weekend.

It started off with a Friday night of live music at the State Theater in Falls Church.  A variety of bands performed, including 
NUMA, Everyone but Pete, and Blind Rhetoric, but the real highlight of the evening was the headlining band, Sematic.  With a sound similar to the early nineties era of rock (think modern day version of Alice in Chains meets Sound Garden meets Stone Temple Pilots) Sematic lit up the stage and set the crowd wild...including myself.  The lead singer Tim Gilbert (who is new to the group), did a phenomenal job.  He worked the crowd like a seasoned pro.  I'm not one to get caught up in the local music scene, but Sematic is a band I will be trying to see again.


Moving on to Saturday, I had the chance to see some of the US trials for the Homeless World Cup.  I saw teams from all over the country competing for the chance to participate in the 2008 Homeless World Cup taking place in Melbourne, Australia.  It was absolutely fascinating to me, and actually inspired me to go see the documentary, Kicking It, at the E Street Cinemas.  The documentary follows players from around the wor
ld, and their struggles as homeless people in their own countries, and the motivation and hope that soccer gives them.  It made me want to go out and buy a soccer ball...and also understand homelessness a little better.



And Saturday evening, I enjoyed my first taste of Ethiopian cuisine at Dukem.  It was delicious.  I had been trying to convince StuD to go to an Ethiopian restaurant with me for about a year now.  Finally, once he moved to the U St. neighborhood, he says "Let's go to this Ethiopian place and try it out!" as if it had been his idea all along.  Whatever, I was just happy to go.  Since it was our first time, the waitress was extremely helpful and explained the menu, and gave us some "beginner" suggestions.  Top notch, top notch.

Ok, enough raving about my good, deep, and insightful weekend and back to being bitter and salty for a Monday morning at work.  Gross.

Tuesday, June 24, 2008

Ladies and gentlemen of the class of 2003



eff you.


Everyone else, listen to this load of poop...

This year marks my fifth year since graduating from high school.  As is tradition, the leaders of my graduating class decided to set a date for our 5-year reunion.  Being the considerate folks that they are (yeah, I'm talking about you, Pretty), the set the date approximately three months out, giving our 112-person graduating class PLENTY of time to clear their calendars and make arrangements.  The reunion was set to take place at Put-In-Bay, a two by four mile island in the sparkling waters of Lake Erie.

"Oh, what fun this will be!  I'm sure everyone is just DYING to get together for our reunion!  Gee whiz, I can't wait!"  I thought naively to myself when I cleared my own calendar and requested a half-day off work.

I then proceeded to book a three-bedroom hotel suite on the island and shot out an email letting EVERYONE know that "I've booked some rooms, who wants in?!" assuming that my fellow classmates would just be FLOCKING to get a spot in my set of rooms.

I'm a total naive moron.



The grand total of people attending my high school reunion:  4

And that's including myself.  Way to go graduating class of 2003.  I'm canceling my friggin' hotel suite first thing tomorrow.