I'm not dead yet.

But I'm still homeless. And posting from the library.

Today I came in to check my email and research granite counter top edge styles. Yes, styles with an s. You can get Full bullnose, demi bullnose, eased edge, Ogee, you name it.

Who knew? Gee, in my other kitchens this kind of decision was made for me. And I preferred it that way. Because I'm not so good at making decisions.

Like the other day. Remember annoying Personal Trainer lady? Well (first bad decision) I agreed to talk to her again about using up the 12 personal trainer sessions I paid for and haven't managed to use (second bad decision). Because of being busy and homeless and caught up in this whole granite edge decision-making process.

I mean, just typing the details in is wearing me right the hell out.

So anyway. Next thing you know, I've signed on for six months of personal training. (third bad decision) Because? I need (I guess) to partake in a sprint Triathlon (fourth and I hope final bad decision).

So. You see what I mean about me and making decisions.

WHAT THE HELL WAS I THINKING?

And now I know why people find it hard to depart from the state of homelessness. It's because it's far too easy to become overwhelmed. Because here I am in the public library blogging about my bad decisions, and you know what? A park bench and a bottle of cheap hooch is sounding PRETTY DAMNED GOOD.

Homelessness

You know, being homeless isn't all that bad, except for the personal trainers.

See, I'm spending a lot of time at the gym. A lot. Like two or three hours a day.

The other day I was approached by the chief personal trainer, who introduced herself and asked whether I had thought about using a personal trainer.

I told I had, and in fact, had used one.

Then she wanted to know whether I would be interested in having my workouts be more efficient and effective.

I told her no, I wasn't.

"I'm only here because I'm homeless. The work outs are OK, but they're not as important to me as the showers. And the toilets."

For some reason she left before I could tell all about how I'm living in my car.

Three More Stupid Things I Love

1. The Insidious Dr. Fu Manchu

This is the version I got--the books-on-CD edition. It features a reproduction of the original cover, complete with the classic White Slavery/Yellow Peril color scheme.

It's really marvelously stupid. I mean, check out this peerless prose:

"I want to hear that knocking!" he rapped.

In case you weren't in my fifth grade English class, that, my friends, is a Tom Swifty. Now, if that Tom Swifty had been included deliberately, it would be the lowest possible form of humor. But I don't think Rohmer knew he had come up with one. And that, of course, makes it much funnier.

So far I've only described the idiotic writing. It's very bad, but combine the writing with the completely over-the-top racial stereotypes, and I'm ... speechless. Gobsmacked. I'm amused, bemused and confused.

I can't decide whether it's more terrible or more hilarious, but it's unbelievably stupid. And then, when it's a book on CD read by someone not very good? It adds a whole new level of stupid.

In short, The Insidious Dr. Fu Manchu deserves a total Mystification (a la MST3K) ... but since I mostly listen to it at the gym, and lumbering along on a treadmill, wearing my iPod, making sarcastic quips and cracking myself up isn't the route to universal popularity (which is my goal, or I wouldn't try so hard to keep you amused, Internet) I'll skip it.

But it's definitely stupid cubed.

2. My gym

Yeah, it's one of those big-box joints that Badger abhors. And for a while it was full of women who looked like personal trainers on The Biggest Loser, so while I didn't abhor it, it kind of got on my nerves. I think I was the only person who went there who actually needed to work out.

But now, there are lots of chubbs there. I even see really fat people.

This morning, I walked out of the room full of toilet stalls to wash my hands (because I am a good, hygienic person, and if you don't believe me, come over and lick my keyboard) and heading into the room with the toilet stalls, there was a woman who looked exactly like Jabba the Hutt. If Jabba was stark naked.

Which left me feeling just like Carrie Fischer. When she was young and looked hot in a bikini.


I am not and do not. But yay, stupid gym for making me feel that I am and do.

2. My minivan



When the construction workers take over her house, a girl moves into her car. And lives there for seven weeks. And counting.

Luckily for me, my car has room for my gym bag, my overstuffed purse, my office-in-a-bag containing all the construction information, my iPod, my cell phone, my commuter cup of tea, a few umbrellas, snacks, hand wipers, my children, their backpacks, a cello, The Insidious Dr. Fu Manchu, etc., etc., etc.

In short, I love it.

(Even though it looks like Jabba the Hutt. And makes the Passat feel like Carrie Fisher.)

Stupid Things I Love

1. My iPod

Specifically, the fact that I can download music videos. You know how some of us install elaborate home theater systems so we can watch silent movies? Well, I'm using 21st century technology to catch up with all those 80s videos I never really watched all that much back then because I had a full time job.

Because nothing keeps me moving on the treadmill more than Madonna singing Express Yourself.

And don't laugh at me, because the guy with no shirt on? Who apparently sleeps in a bunk bed in the shower when he's not lifting weights? Looks great. He hasn't aged a bit.

2. InStyle Magazine--the U.K. Edition

First of all, it tries to get me to buy shit at places like Smythson's and the TopShop, so I save a lot of money. But I also love it because it's really big. And the fashion layouts actually look like a fashion magazine. And they feature celebrities I've barely heard of, instead of showing me Mary Kate Olson again. And the interior decorating section featured a spread on Sonia Rykiel's apartment in Paris, instead of some bimbo's Malibu beach house.

3. Diet Books

I've bought so many diet books lately that if I glued them together, I could use them instead of a chinning bar. The advice is all over the map, and very often contradictory, but I lap it all up like the food I'm no longer eating.

This one is my favorite:



It's actually a good book. And I followed its advice to buy lots of other diet books. Now the other ones I bought are really pretty stupid, and one of them totally deserves a place in this list. Unfortunately, I can't remember its title. And while I could--in fact, did--spend some time looking for it on Amazon by searching for books with the word "thin" in the title, I'm not stupid enough to wade through the 23,793 hits that came up.

Badger hasn't cornered the market on impulse purchases

Between cell phone calls to my contractor and various suppliers, and all the fun I have on the treadmill at the gym, I managed to snag the following:

at the Japanese food store:
Giant box of Pocky
Bag of instant miso soup w/tofu

at Bed, Bath, and Beyond:
set of blue striped sheets for the boy's room
set of pink solid sheets for the girl's room

at Border's:
How the Rich Get Thin
Joining the Thin Club
Never be Fat Again
Eat Smart, Walk Strong
English Vogue
English InStyle
Tatler
Lucky
look me in the eye: my life with asperger's

I love ...

... the sofas in the living room. I'm currently on the shmancy one that came with five pillows. Fabulous when you're feeling feeble. And I am.

... being propped up by pillows, especially when I feel like a tubercular soprano in the third act of the opera.

... wireless DSL. On the sofa. With my feet up.

... tea. My fifth mug today, but who's counting?

... flowers. I have yellow roses in a low bowl on the dining room table and two dozen long-stemmed red roses in a vase in the living room. It doesn't bother me at all that there's a certain hospital room flavor to all these roses.

... that I didn't actually hurl at this morning's spin class. Even though it felt like I was going to.

And now, the Weird Al Yankovic meme

Badger's complaining that thanks to her son, she can't get Weird Al's "White and Nerdy" out of her head.

Speaking as the proud owner of a talking Ed Grimley doll, a hardback copy of The Official Preppy Handbook, a 33 RPM recording by Helen Gurley Brown that I've never listened to, and a massive number of Modern Priscilla magazines, the most important song in Weird Al's oeuvre--his heartbreaking work of staggering genius, if you will--isn't "White and Nerdy." Although "White and Nerdy" is, of course, a classic.

No, the Weird Al song is this beauty: