What this house does to me....

Today I stubbed my toe on the heel of my other foot.

A few minutes later I accidentally cut the skin on my one thumb with my other thumb's nail.

I was always remarkably clumsy, but it seems my parent's house makes the problem worse.

An unpleasant realization

In my first or second year of high school, these guys I had tiny crushes on were discussing the girls they knew. One of my friends told me they said: "The only reason anyone will ever like her is because of two round reasons."

A short while later while on a trip with my youth group, the youth pastor wasn't happy that I was having a cute little summer relationship with a guy from California. The youth pastor said, "Matt only liked you the day you were wearing your tight shirt."

Although I know it's stupid, I just realized today that I still kind of believe what they said. Maybe it's because I've really never received any evidence to the contrary, but I should be too old to be this dumb.

A twist of irony

I just got back to my parents' house with a van and a car full of stuff. I came back a day early because I'm doing a little work as an extra in a true-crimes T.V. movie and we're shooting tomorrow.

I didn't know what my character would be or if I would just be in a crowd scene until a few minutes ago when I got an e-mail from the casting director. I'm playing a reporter. How weird is that?

I'm a little disappointed that I never get picked to play drug addicts, homeless bums or any of the other crass exciting roles. The last time I worked for this production company, I played an off-duty police officer. I guess I must look wholesome.

**************

Filming was mostly boring because we were doing a lot of waiting, but the parts we were actually filming were fun. I was playing a T.V. reporter, so I had a camera man with me and was pretending to do a live hit in front of a court room.

I dressed for the part and was very glad I had. The other female reporter had to change into a hideous flowered dress with shoulder pads.

!

Happy last day to me!

My parents are coming tonight to help me move all my stuff and I'm so happy to escape this opressive environment where no one is able to communicate properly.

Besides being my last day, today is also payday and I just got a cheque for $400 more than I was expecting.

I promise my blog will soon be filled with all kinds of pictures, scanned images and less complaining.

Censorship

The police officer who tells court the evidence about all the ticket cases (ie. speeding and underage drinking) asked me for a favour. He wanted me to write a story about how a crazy woman* sneakily managed to convince the police to drop the charges against her.

I told the officer that while I think the story is news, I'm not sure it's a wise idea to write it. If I do, I'll have to explain what she did to get the charges dropped and I don't think it's in the public's best interest for law breakers to know a way to get out of their cases.

It's not my job as a journalist to censor the news; I should be opposed to that at all costs. But at the same time as I'm considering censoring this story, I like reporting because I'm uncovering the dark parts of things and (hopefully) encouraging change.

I already told the officer I didn't want to do the story, but now I'm not so sure.

My dilemma reminds me of a story I read about young girls taking crystal meth. The story was almost like an add for the drug, saying it helps people lose weight, have lots of energy, not need to sleep and not need to eat. Oh, and the story also mentioned how cheap meth is. There was only a tiny section on the dangers of taking meth. It made me angry that a reporter could write that without considering the social costs of the story.

Am I right that the cost to society is reason enough to refuse to write this story?

(I would ask the editor and the staff here, but they would think something like this: "If criminals knew there was a way to get their charges dropped, they would by the paper to find out how. There are a lot of law breakers in town, so we would make a lot of money. Let's put the story on the front page with a step-by-step guide to being cleared." So that's why I would really value some cyber-opinions.)

* This is the same woman who was charged with hitting a firefighter with a stick.

An angry rant (which may discuss semi-colons)

We're getting the paper ready to go to press right now. We're supposed to be editing it to make sure no mistakes get printed, but I can't handle it anymore.

There are mistakes in everything. They're all over the place. In one story I changed manor to manner because the reporter wasn't talking about a mansion and I fixed all kinds of comma errors. You'd think if you work at a newspaper, you'd know that you can't attach two sentences by adding a comma. And you'd think you'd know that shorter sentences are most often the way to go.

Also, they use the wrong big words because they don't know what they mean. For example, I had to change causality (something that makes something happen) to casualty because the writer was talking about soldiers dying.

But the thing that makes me too angry to do any more editing is the way people here use semi-colons. Not only do they think semi-colons can be used in place of any commas or colons, they use them because they think randomly plopping semi-colons into their work make them look smart. So I quit fixing their messes.

Good thing Friday is my last day.

An angry rant (which may discuss semi-colons)

We're getting the paper ready to go to press right now. We're supposed to be editing it to make sure no mistakes get printed, but I can't handle it anymore.

There are mistakes in everything. They're all over the place. In one story I changed manor to manner because the reporter wasn't talking about a mansion and I fixed all kinds of comma errors. You'd think if you work at a newspaper, you'd know that you can't attach two sentences by adding a comma. And you'd think you'd know that shorter sentences are most often the way to go.

Also, they use the wrong big words because they don't know what they mean. For example, I had to change causality (something that makes something happen) to casualty because the writer was talking about soldiers dying.

But the thing that makes me too angry to do any more editing is the way people here use semi-colons. Not only do they think semi-colons can be used in place of any commas or colons, they use them because they think randomly plopping semi-colons into their work make them look smart. So I quit fixing their messes.

Good thing Friday is my last day.

What makes a yoga class crappy?

1. ...when the instructor's teeth are a distracting death-like shade of grey.

2. ...when no one tells you that you'll need your on mat, so you have to stretch out on the stinky sweaty carpet.

3. ...when the instructor farts loudly during one of the poses, then calmly says, "This pose promotes digestion and helps air trapped in the body to escape."

4. ...when you've been looking forward to it for months and it's too easy.

But I shouldn't complain. Afterall, I did get paid $40* to go.

* Because I covered the class for work, I got paid for my time. And because I was writing about it, I got to take the class for free.

"May we live long and die out"

The above quote is the Voluntary Human Extinction Movement's motto.

I agree with the group and its socially-responsibile position and decided quite a while ago that I don't want to have my own genetic children. If you'll recall, I do have very long toes and an extra vertebrae in my neck.

I don't want all of humanity to become extinct, but I agree with the movement to stop overpopulation and to treat the already-existing people and the earth a chance to be healthy and well.

The group's website is http://www.vhemt.org/.

Why my car was blushing

You know it's time to wash your car ... when you discover that someone's used the dusty hood of your car as a canvas on which to draw a gigantic male appendage.

I had gone around the back of my car and almost didn't see the new addition before going to cover a fancy event for the paper. I'm so glad I noticed the artwork and had time to give my car a paper-towel bath before heading out.

I have learned my lesson and will go to the car wash tomorrow.

Healthy choices

At the grocery store the other day I had a hard time picking a bluberry muffin mix over a chocolate chip one, but blueberry ended up winning since it appeared to be the healthier choice. But when I was making the muffins, I discovered that the blueberries were actually "blueberry-flavored nuggets."

From now on, I'm going with chocolate chip muffins.

True story:

A guy was charged with being in the driver's seat of a vehicle while intoxicated even though everyone agreed he hadn't been driving.

Apparently police came across a vehicle parked in the middle of a gravel road with the engine on late on night. When police got closer, they saw a male sleeping in the driver's seat and female asleep in the passenger's seat, both completely naked.

The guy's defence argued that the female had driven and parked and that "because of the activities that occurred inside the vehicle, the accused found himself in the driver's seat."

Even though he hadn't been driving, he was fined $1,000 for being drunk and in the driver's seat. In Canada, police are allowed to assume a drunk person intends to drive if he or she is in the driver's seat of a vehicle.

Though the boring and serious stuff going on the rest of the day, I kept trying not to laugh at the idea of this poor broad-shouldered naked drunk guy.

Still alive

I survived the election debate and the pile of interviews that followed, went back to the office and worked like mad. I didn't leave until 1:45 a.m..

Everything I was working on is done and ready to be printed. The only crisis now is trying to edit out and mistakes others might accidentally put into my stories.

Thus ends the peak of my job. Now on to the denoument.

Question:

If you were a 6'2" woman and your husband was 5'11", would your shoe collection consist only of heels?

Mine wouldn't. I'm around 5'7" (maybe 5'8" because of yoga) and wear mostly flats so as not to dwarf shorter people. Even though I'm not short, my neck was getting sore looking up at this ridiculously-tall woman.

Finally, a challenge

This may be The Busiest Day of my Career, but I'm not stressed yet.

I'm covering the local elections for the paper and things are hectic and exciting. There's a big meeting tonight, where all the candidates will speak about why they should be elected and then there will be a big debate.

The meeting will end around 10 pm and everything I'm writing for this issue is due, at the latest, by noon tomorrow. I may be in the office all night, since this is huge news and I'm giving it all the space it deserves. I've actually been practicing stating up late the past few nights, so I should be mostly coherent no matter how late I have to stay.

I'm finally doing something Important here and I love it.

A confession and a boast

I like watching Jeopardy. I know it's kind of an embarrassing thing to admit because everyone knows Jeopardy is for old people, but I am still a little fan.

Well, the Final Jeopardy Question yesterday was remarkably easy. It was:

"In Act One, this Shakespearean character said: 'The funeral baked meats did quickly furnish the marriage table.' "

No one got it right. But in my living room/bedroom I sure knew the answer. It's Hamlet. He was upset that soon after his dad died his mom married his uncle.

So I felt very smart for a few minutes, even though the question was too easy.

Of court and social gatherings

A kind-of-cute guy I met on the weekend was in court this week.

His situation, although under the Highway Traffic Act and not the Criminal Code, is interesting enough to go in the paper so I'm putting it in.

It won't make it into the paper until next week and I'm probably going to see him at an event I'm covering this weekend.

Here's how the conversation will go:

Him: Hi.

Me: Hi. So I uh saw you in court. Too bad about the charge.

Him: Yeah.

Me: So it was nice to meet you and I still think you're not too bad to look at, but could you maybe not pick up a copy of the paper this week?

Him: Vague mumbled threats.

Ahh, words

Funny things have been happening around here lately.

At the town council meeting I was at a little while ago, all kinds of big words were being thrown around. I heard several mentions to "frontage" and "flankage," which are ways of measuring people's yards.

Then I heard a man who was trying to sound impressive say "irregardless," which just so happens to not be a word. He meant to say regardless and the mayor gave a little smirk when he said that.

Nearing the end of the meeting when there was only one thing left to discuss, the mayor was reading from his briefing papers and said something that sounded like this, "blah, blah, blah in camera blah, blah...".

When I didn't get up to leave, the town administrator explained that "in camera" means closed to the public and that I, the only member of the public at the meeting, would have to leave. I find it almost too funny that I was dismissed in Latin.

Today I discovered mistakes in a story I had written about a family where I referred to them by their last name, but with an "s" added to show I was talking about both family members.

It was edited to have an apostrophe before the "s" because "it just looks better." (Even though an apostrophe after a name means that something belongs to that person - ie. the Jones' cat.) I'm getting to be quite good at undoing the mistakes people put into my stories.

Also today I was editing someone else's work for the paper and saw that the word "contentious" was used where the word should have been "conscientious." I'm actually disappointed with myself for fixing it.

After my many observations, here is the conclusion I have come to: pompous words sound stupid whether or not they are used properly.

At least a little thankful

One of my favorite people was planning to come for a visit this weekend.

She was going to take the bus, but apparently it isn't going to be running on it's regular schedule since it's Thanksgiving weekend and Greyhound doesn't want to cart people home for the holidays.

My friend could drive, but her car is a huge polluting beast and burns crazy amounts of gas.

So I will try to remind myself to be thankful for pumpkin pie, for a freshly-cleaned apartment and for more time to hang out with myself.

I'll also be thankful that I'll be moving home at the end of the month and we'll be able to spend heaps of time together.

Happy Thanksgiving.

You probably shouldn't read this

I had another not-normal dream.

I dreamt that I had cashews sticking out of my eyes and I kept pulling them out. I ended up with a handful of them and my parents said we should eat them. I thought that was a strange idea, but I shared the eye cashews and we all ate them.

Gross.

A darling proposal

One of my sisters (thelonelyphotographer.blogspot.com) just got engaged!!!!!!!!!!!!

They got all dressed up for dinner last night and there was a huge bouquet of roses on their table. He told her the things he likes about her and asked if she would marry him.

Somewhat in shock, she said, "uh, sure." Then she was too excited to eat, so he ate her food and his.

Isn't that cute?

I had to spill this much, but the rest of the details are for her to tell. They have no date set yet, but I'm going to have an engagement party for them on October 14.

Congratulations dear. I wish you all the best and hundreds of pink roses.

Can I take the pictures at your wedding?!? (You know I had to ask.)

A mystery

Can anyone explain to me how cell phones can call home phones and how home phones can call cell phones? I don't get it.

It sounds logical enough that one cell phones' frequency bounces off a tower to connect with another cell phone. And it seems easy enough for a landline to call another through the telephone wires that connect them.

But how do cell phone calls hop off of a tower and into a phone line? And how does a call that starts inside a landline end up a frequency that bounces off a tower and makes a cell phone ring?

If you know the secrets of technology, please explain this to me. I get rather agitated when I know I don't know something that's knowable.

I'm famous (in a town with less than 5,000 residents)

Lately strangers have been coming up to me and asking if I'm the girl who works at the paper or asking what I'm working on for my column.

When I say yes, they seem a little awed, which is kind of confusing because the paper is kind of crappy. (I have to do a whole pile of editing just to make sure the stuff that goes in is actually in sentences.*)

So I just had to let you know I'm like totally a celebrity here. I should start autographing copies of the paper :)


*This reminds me of a third-year English class Faunty and I took together last year. The prof was getting irritated with how little some of the students seemed to know about what was expected from an essay she had assigned.

One of the students, seeming quite worried about the essay, asked, "What kind of format would you like us to use?"

The prof answered, "I would like it to be written in sentences and paragraphs."

The "lying contest"

I have a date with justice today.

A case about a drunk driver who crashed and gave his passenger some brutal injuries is going to trial today. I've been following his case since July and am curious to see what will happen next. He's pretty much guaranteed to go to jail and could face up to 10 years in prison.

He had pled guilty before, but I think he got scared when he realized how bad the consequences could be. I read somewhere that the fight for justice is really only a lying contest. So I guess I'll soon find out who the better liar is.

I think he'll be found guilty but might only recieve a year or two in jail.

Update: So the case has been postponed again. It's not going to happen until January 11. Maybe I'll come back to town to cover it if the paper pays for my gas.

Delicious and nutritious

I heard somewhere that buying socially-responsible products is kind of like voting with your money. Since I heard that, I've been buying things that may cost more but are better for me and the environment.

I bought some groceries on my lunch break and fell in love with organic blueberry jam. It has 100% more flavour than regular jam. Yum!

I read this one ad that said, "oranges were candy before candy was candy." That's why I try to carry an organic orange in my purse at all times.

Priorities

What's more important: a retired teacher being thanked by the school (when she'd already had a story about her career a few months ago), a fishing tournament, a woman writing about her cat, or a news story about how the mayor just won his spot back by acclamation and there are 6 candidates fighting over 5 town council spots?

Clearly in a local paper with a local focus town elections don't matter. Afterall, who would want to read that?

I seriously had to argue for the elections story to go in.

If I hadn't already given my notice...

Heuey, Dewey and Louie

My two-year-old nephew is the cutest kid ever. We were playing floor hockey on the weekend and he hit me (lightly) with his stick.

I asked why he did that and he said, "I hit you with my stick because I love you."

Then he went back to hitting the puck.

His brothers are 11-month-old twins and they were in a baby race this weekend. While they didn't come close to winning, it was fun to watch them try.

You know you're in a small town when...

...you hear a commercial on the radio about the "fancy suspenders" for sale at a men's wear shop.

"More fun than Chucky Cheese"

My littlest sister and I have all kinds of fun adventures. This time we made a world-class bubble bath.



You can't really tell from the picture, but the bubbles are almost to the ceiling.