harrumph

So here we are.

Here are some Things That Should Be:

1. People should be decent.
2. People should be compassionate.
3. People should find hobbies other than the pure, unadulterated pursuit of power.
4. People should realize when they’ve made enough money.
5. Kids should be just adorable and precocious enough so that you don’t get sick of them.
6. Kids should never know how adorable and precocious they are. It leads to problems and Punky Brewster.
7. YouTube should filter its submissions so only the truly cutest puppy videos make the cut and my time is not wasted on lesser puppies.
8. There should be no such thing as lesser puppies.
9. Life should be fair, complete with instantaneous karma and smiting to those who maliciously break hearts and spirits.
10. The quest for deliciousness should have a higher priority.

Here are some Sad Truths:

sorry, what?

So here we are, a few days ago:

Wait a minute... did I just see the word “Duran” on that webpage? Twice in succession? That can’t be possible. I’m not on AOL News. I’m reading the New York Times site while it’s still free. It’s an Associated Press story. These guys are serious journalists. They wouldn’t use an antiquated word like “Duran” unless it’s an article about 80s nostalgia. That must be it. It must be a story about the 80s. 

Wow. No. No, it’s not. Hmm. Wait a minute, what?

It’s a review?

You’re telling me Duran Duran has a new album out? Oh, now you’re joking. This must be April Fool’s Day. You’re playing a gag on me. That’s what it is.

tra la

So here we are.

Spring is finally, officially here. Not that you’d know it from looking outside my window. 

Of course, I shouldn’t be surprised. I came to New York via Chicago via Pittsburgh, all lovely cities with lovely denizens who openly recognize the colossal joke that is the vernal equinox. It’s an annual charade on the local 6 o’clock news: the anchors come back after their second commercial break with a big First Day of Spring story, accompanied by cute little flower graphics, only to turn it over to the weather guy who chuckles during his ridiculously dismal forecast of cold and snow and gray and wind while pointing to a map with a giant L and that cold front line with the blue triangles hovering over the tri-state area. And every year he says the same thing:

Sure doesn’t seem like Spring right now, does it?

subway monologue

So here we are.

They say you shouldn’t eavesdrop. But they don’t say what you should do when someone is so loud that you can’t help but overhear. And they also don’t say what you should do when that person is clearly wanting everyone around her to overhear.

So I’m choosing to craft it into a very short one-woman play. Here it is, courtesy of the Q train. Enjoy.

nonstick

So here we are. 

It gives one pause when one hears that the coast of Japan moved 8 feet in a single day due to the devastating earthquake that led to the devastating tsunami that led to the almost-maybe-devastating-nuclear-blast. 

And not only do I feel horrible about this latest disaster-upon-disaster, one in an ominous long line of them in recent months and years, but I also feel horrible about my science brain.

For you see, my science brain -- a term I just now made up that refers to that small cluster of brain cells devoted to retaining information relating to all things science -- is coated with Teflon. Stuff just slides right off of it. That would be all well and good if one needed to cook an egg on my science brain, but of course even I know that this is not what a science brain is for.

lenten rehab

So here we are.

Apparently, Lent is almost upon us. All of those pancake commercials should have tipped me off, but I had no idea it was this week until I had a conversation with someone far more pious than myself. (Yes, I am the tale of yet another lapsed Catholic. Oh, shut up.) 

This is not to say that I am entirely un-pious. I am, in fact, painfully square. While it is not the same as being pious, it’s close. But suffice it to say that there are things I have done in life that I am sorry for, and there are things I have done in life that I am not sorry for, and it’s some of those things that I am not sorry for that make it impossible for me and the Pope to get along, hang out, and break wafer together.

But back to the pancakes.

from the vault: "legitimate reasons"

So here we are.

I have not been visited by the blog muse in recent days. No blogspiration from Carelessius, the Bloggoddess of Mundane Observations. And while this is “a blog that’s not a blog,” it’s still a blog in spite of its not being a blog by its very nature of being on Blogspot.

(No, that was not a challenge to see how many times I could use the word “blog” in a sentence.)

So I present to you a rerun of sorts, a humor piece posted on my website in its pre-blog days. Enjoy.

I CANNOT ANSWER MY CELL OR REPLY TO YOUR TEXT AT THIS VERY MOMENT, BECAUSE: