May 2012
79 posts
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Palm Tree, Palm Tree, Palm Tree: The Lady →
palmtreepalmtree:
I’ve been sitting here staring at a blank box for a while now. Usually, I’m pretty good with words, but sometimes I get too in my head and everything I try to say sounds cliche or disingenuous.
I want to tell you about the Lady and about how special she is. But it seems silly to try to describe…
What are friends if not the people who see our better selves? I’ve...
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helms-deep asked: Happiest of Happy Birthdays to YOUUUUU!! Hope you have an awesome day, my friend. I am so grateful to have gotten to know you better over this past year of your life. You deserve all of the good things that are happening to you right now (which I can't wait to hear the details of). May the Blessed Yak of Birthday Happiness leave you all of your favorite baked goods under your cupboard,...
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On Balance
For those of you playing along, last year was a less than stellar year for me. Okay, it was one of the most up and down years of my life. Thoroughly exhausting.
2012-2013 looks to be swinging ‘round my way. There is this rather annoying German-American/Protestant Work Ethic sort of belief that my family has long held, namely, that hard work eventually wins out and causes itself to be...
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Fidget Fidget Twitch Twitch
In which the above title describes my entire state of being. I don’t like being under prepared so I chronically over prepare, which does nothing to alleviate the twitchy feeling. What it generally means that I show up places, find out what I actually needed to know in order to be prepared, and wind up feeling exceedingly stupid. Ironic, I know.
Twitch. Twitch Twitch. Fidget.
If I had one...
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sigh.
I obviously need more coffee and cannot be allowed to manage two blogs.
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Hello, Sailor.
inothernews replied to your post: Battleship. (Or The Best Damned Comedy I’ve Seen in AGES)
How real did they make the red an white peg pieces work? Did they overlay graph paper on the screen during the battle scenes? And who got to yell the signature line? Finally, did they put the movie away in its original box when it was done? Thx!
Okay… here’s the thing, I’m not...
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Battleship. (Or The Best Damned Comedy I've Seen...
AVAST! THAR BE MINI SPOILERS AHEAD!
Saw Battleship. I have never laughed so hard in a movie that was not pitched as comedy. Tears rolling down my cheeks. Obviously I’ve busted something.
This is the MOST. AMERICAN. MOVIE. EVER. It’s so American it’s ‘Murikan. All you need to know is that at some point Thunderstruck starts playing (yes, I know they’re Aussies, but...
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The Ugly Truth
I am not at all together, and now there are witnesses to it.
It takes me no less than 15 tries to leave the house, and no, that’s not an exaggeration. There are now several people who can testify to this.
Neuroses requires that I compulsively check my email every 5 minutes because what if I’m missing the things that I need to respond to in order to MAKE ME APPEAR LIKE A G-DANGED...
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A Conversation.
“Are you hot? I’m totally melting. It’s gross. Don’t look at me I’m gross.”
“I’m gross too. It’s sticky. It’s not the heat it’s the sticky.”
“Yeah, it’s totally the sticky. Nothing can touch. Don’t let anything touch. Ew. No. I’m lying it’s the heat.”
“It’s the heat.”
...
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Machinations.
Something really nice has happened, the sort of thing I should call my family and tell them about. But it’s too early, so I’m here instead. Y’know, kind of bouncing up and down because I’m easily excitable.
But… things are good. I may have an exceedingly large amount of work ahead of me. We’ll see. But. Yay.
Vague post is vague and full of really positive...
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Question...
What age is too old to be dry humping in a bar at 7:30 p.m?
Answer: Any age. You, desperate middle-aged couple, are not appropriate. Yes, I see where your hands are. All of them. And your feet. Yep, shins too. No, that’s not titillating for anyone. Holy hell with the nipple tweaking, people! NO! Toes are not meant to be USED that way! It’s 7:30 for cryin’ out loud.
Other...
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The House Prepares For Guests.
The internet’s most popular Canadian Timeshare is about to spend a few days at The House. This requires preparation. Not because she’s picky or difficult or anything like that. Nope. We just live like… well… have you seen Hoarders?
So:
Clean floors. Crap. We have floors? Wait. There’s a floor under here somewhere. Perhaps it’s under that pile of—what...
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Intentions Inschmentions.
Things I intended to do today:
Finish that job.
Clean, so it doesn’t look like we live in squalor (we do).
Playtime with Widget.
Bake something impressive for company.
Gym, as my butt was attacked by pork butt last night.
Write lots.
Haul out the 2nd air conditioner
Figure out what vortex my passport vanished into.
Things I have done today:
Dragged butt to the gym (forgot my...
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SpaceX capsule captured by space station crew in... →
palmtreepalmtree:
I’m conflicted about the privatization of space exploration. On the one hand, I know that drastic budget cuts have caused a loss of momentum in space exploration that private industry can reverse. But on the other I worry that space will become just another unregulated frontier exploited by capitalists without concern for the potential detrimental effects.
That said, I still...
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Potential.
Scene: A small urban apartment. Our Hero and Heroine crouch down, examining a small, rather grumpy pet rabbit.
MR. OF THE HOUSE: Yep, those are definitely balls.
LADY OF THE HOUSE: Well, rabbit, I now know to expect significantly less from you.
MR. OF THE HOUSE: What?!
Balls: They’re their own warning label.
-TLOTH
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The Internet Walks Into A Bar....
Section9: “Let’s meet for drinks.”
TLOTH: “Heck yes.”
Cut to the entire east coast internet at a bar. Thanks for the warning, Will.
I finally put a face to the mysterious and adorable inothernews. A bizarre amount of tumblr folks were in one spot last night. Thus, I babbled incessantly, and eventually wound up playing a decent second fiddle to the husband-like...
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Bonding, or, A Tale Of Two Bunnies
I’m a rabbit person. Not a dog person, not a cat person, but a rabbit person. Rabbit people have lives that are just the tiniest bit more difficult than dog and cat people. I doubt that anyone has said to a dog person, “So when your dog dies, you can just get another one for, like, $30? Or make one really soft mitten out of the old one?” People don’t understand...
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How To Balance Writing and a Day Job
Or… my utter failure at all things.
Try to sleep. Don’t sleep because brain refuses to be quieted and is spinning all kinds of thoughts about things, e.g., what if my pet is trying to kill me?
Fall out of bed. Trip on bunny jingle chew toy thingy. Swear colorfully about possibly busted toe.
Remember the 3 hours of paying gig that’s due today. Oops.
Apply coffee.
Type...
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How to Know When Your Trial is Going South
JUDGY McJUDGERSON: After having just done several mock trials, this seems like one of the mock trial questions here.
MR. LAWYERPANTS: Is that bad?
Um, I’m going to go with yes. Dear Defendant, now may be the time to start seeking new counsel. Just sayin’.
-TLOTH
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Location, Location.
“Mind if you come to me?”
Getting together is always prefaced by this. Quite honestly, yes, on occasion I do mind. Where you are is at least an hour from where I am and the favor is never returned. The most anyone does is meet in the middle, which is just fine, as long as we’re consistent about it. An hour.
My neighborhood is not glamorous, but there’s great coffee here....
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In Which My Entire Writing Group Bailed
It has now become “TLOTH writes alone with a glass of pinot in a West Village Cafe” night.
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Bleeding Ears
About this job:
Do NOT unwrap your hard candy directly in front of the microphone.
Please, PLEASE check your mic positioning before you’re 5 hours into a hearing. What’s the point in a last 30 minutes of clear audio if FOUR AND A HALF HOURS are garbled?
A creole accent is cross-examining a creole accent.
The only competent lawyer in the room is the Judge, and she’s annoyed.
...
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(A one-sided conversation with an American...
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A Summary of My Teenage Years
helms-deep replied to your post: Estrogen Is a Temperamental Baggage
So what you’re trying to tell me is that, when the girls reach a certain age, my life as a father is going to become…rather challenging…for a long, long time?
Ahem….
Door slamming.
“If he doesn’t call me, I’m going to die. No, you don’t understand, I’ll literally die. Drop. Dead.”
...
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sallydoodle replied to your post: Estrogen Is a Temperamental Baggage
oh why in the hell did i not know what One Day was about? oooooh, this looks like a romantic comedy i can just switch my brain off for. i’ll watch a little bit. NO. I WATCHED THE WHOLE THING. STUPID ESTROGEN CREYES
And it’s not even a good movie!!! Seriously, the worst. But noooo, stupid...
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Estrogen Is a Temperamental Baggage
Like a cat in the night she comes to sit on my chest to steal not just my breath but my sanity.
Estrogen, of course, is why I just had a good solid cry about the state of my career or lack thereof.
Estrogen is why I imagine 48 creative ways of murdering the neighbor’s 4:00 a.m.-barking dog.
Estrogen is why I subjected myself to One Day. In my better, clearer, moments I know it’s a...
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On Mass Transit
I believe the subway should have a “NO MERCY” policy.
If you’re holding the doors, you’re gettin’ it. Hands down. No questions asked.
The Mr. Believes this means the doors should have guillotine blades on them.
I feel it means that the train just pulls the hell out—tunnels be damned—and lets door-holders fly off willy nilly, so that their carcasses can...
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A Thought.
It can take just as long to recover from a miracle as a tragedy.
This struck me while I was cleaning my toilet this morning. What, you don’t think about things while you’re wearing rubber gloves, dizzy from bleach fumes, and covered in dust? Pfft. You’re doing it wrong.
Cleaning product-induced light-headedness aside, this has been true for me. I sometimes catch myself...
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fragment.
I looked through six books of mug shots and a computer database of men, all glaring or glassy-eyed. I looked for hours until all the faces blended together, save for the ones with conspicuous deformities—a baseball-sized cyst on a cheek, a bulbous growth covering a nose. When the detective asked me again for my address, I was no longer sure where I lived, who I was, or what exactly had been...
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On Wisdom and Contemplating Life
There is nothing in the world more satisfying than Bacon Bourbon Truffles.
They contain:
Semi Sweet Chocolate
Heavy Cream
Candied Bacon
Bacon Infused Bourbon (Thanks, Rune!)
Unicorn Dreams
Here is a picture of candied bacon being chopped. It’s harder to do than you’d think—very gooey.
To those vegetarians out there, I apologize for this post. I get it, I totally do. I...
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Who ARE You People?!
I sometimes wonder who reads this thing.
Turns out it’s people looking to get a little tail from the office assistant. Excellent.
New in the running is “Hipster Landscape Photographer.” Nice.
Because what I do here is take pictures of scantily clad corporate drones whilst they pose ironically amidst fields of hops. Brilliant.
The only acceptable result thus far has been:
-TLOTH
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Grandma & Grandpa Do a Night on the Town
To quote Mr. Of The House, “If I told my 23-year-old self there would be a time in my life where I’d be drunk and done for the night by 9:30, he never would have believed me.”
We took ourselves out for fancy pants dinner last night. Here are some highlights from the evening:
Comical realization that after 8 years of not working in an office, I have lost all ability to walk...
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Fear.
I am off to the dentist.
It’s been [insert embarrassing amount of time here] since I’ve been. I used to love going to the dentist because I liked how clean my teeth felt afterward, and how much they used to praise me for my excellent oral hygiene.
Until…
I believe my last dentist tried to scam me. I won’t explain what happened, but my insurance is really good and once...
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The Great Eight
It has been one year since this post. It is our eighth anniversary.
To you Sir, for whom I have braved Palmetto Bugs,
Have I thanked you for getting my coffee ready in the morning? For only rolling your eyes when I’m not looking? For never questioning the amount I work or don’t? I’m fairly certain I’ve thanked you for the back rubs—that’s usually right up...
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How to Break A Few Eggs
section9 replied to your photo: Omelet of Destiny. Wherein my skills at making a…
Looks delicious, Teach me your skills oh great TLOTH.
Good quality butter. Very cold eggs, a teeny bit of milk, or an ice cube.
Burner of Scorching on high.
Melt 2 Tbsp Butter of Sexiness in pan.
While butter is getting sexier, (or just prior) lightly beat 2 very cold Eggs of Justice with 1 Tbsp. of Skim...
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Boring Little Suburban Dramas
The post I’m never going to write.
Lots of people blog and write openly about less than stellar childhoods, troubled relationships with their parents, abuse, the traumas that made them who they are, etc. I read those posts. Typically I come away with thoughts about how resilient people are. I’m often quite amazed by them. We’re all little memoirists seeking an audience,...
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My Mom.
I met my mom all over again this year, a strange experience considering I’ve known her my whole life. It would be easy to get overly saccharine or maudlin when thinking about the amount of time we have left together. Honestly, that would be wasting time. She’s coming in for lunch, so I’ve got better things to do. Instead, I’ll introduce you to my mom.
The short list:
...
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Things You Weren't Meant To See
“She walks in on her parents in the act of reverse copulation, removing themselves from each other in all ways two people can while seated at a kitchen table.”
A line I’d like to keep. In the long run it’ll make the narration slightly more difficult (for me), but having an outsider view allows for fun observations like this.
I’ll be spending the rest of the day...
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Apologies
I apologize for overwhelming tumblr with answer posts yesterday. I was going through a thing, or something.
I had an absolutely terrible writing day. I was doing lots of other things while thinking about moving plot around, structure and characterization. That means I got very few words down on the page, which always makes me feel like I’ve failed. It’s easy to forget that most of...
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helms-deep asked: One of your books is being turned into a film. Besides me, obviously, who would you want to direct it? Who would make up your dream cast? Would you want to write the screenplay or have someone adapt it with you having final say?
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myturtlespeedy asked: In regards to Three's Company; how am I supposed to believe three adults can be constantly barely able to afford the rent in a small apartment in the 80's? Rent was what, $100-$150? Minimum wage was $5/hr? 3 people? That shit dont add up. Where did all their money go?
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ajourneytomd asked: If you could have personally witnessed one event in history, what would you want to have seen?
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tracingben asked: Can you cook in Crocs? What would be the best dish to conjure up either wearing Crocs or in a Croc? Croc Pot Roast?
