Post vacation, I’m finding little to write about. I mean I always have ideas but sometimes they get stuck in my head like a ball of hair in a toothpaste glorped drain.
So it’s up to you, dear reader, to advise me on my next venture. Choose wisely!
[poll id=”5″]Tron Legacy! Ska-WEEEEEEEEEE!!
How many of you actually watched the Oscars and how many of you Tweeted the Oscars? Raise your bloody stumps of hands with ex-fingers on the ends of them.
I thought so.
In all seriousness I found the Twitter comments much more engaging than the show, but I doubt I could have hit refresh, taken in the comments and watched the show at the same time.
Of the 60 some odd Twerps I follow (how can some of you follow 100? 300? A thousand?!) I would say that 90% of you were busy commenting on people’s outfits, eye rolling caught on camera’s cutaways or just basic tomfoolery (or lack there of). Best comment I read summed up the entire evening: From James Urbaniak: “Tyler Perry’s Tyler Perry!”
CB’s comment regarding the oddest dance sequence I’ve ever seen on an Oscar’s broadcast was spot on: “Where the fuck is Debbie Allen when you need her?”
But addinfulleffect summed up my feelings towards last night show: “These may be the worst oscars since the letterman uma oprah debaucle”
So underwhelmed. And was expecting so much more from Steve Martin/Alec Baldwin. Now, if you excuse me I’m going to light a candle for Bea Aurthur and Farrah Fawcett Majors.
SharkBoy is on his hands and knees cleaning out all the old VHS tapes from the floor of the office.
I’m doing two hockey bags of laundry across the street and at the same time, trying to set up my niece’s new blog/magazine database.
In 10 minutes I have to go back to the laudromat and pull the two bags from the dryer, come home and fold it.
in about 30 min I want to clean up the living room from the massive chip and movie feeding frenzy we had last night.
In 1.5 hours I need to go get ingredients for a 6 hour slow cooker chili recipe. In 2 hours I have to dump all these ingredients into the slow cooker.
When that’s in the crock pot, I need to set up my salads/lunches/veggie snacks for the week.
In 4 hours I want to play an hour of BioShock2.
In 5 hours we have to go over to Da’s to set up his new TV stand.
In 7 hours, Da is coming over for dinner.
“Sunday is the day of rest” my ass.
I think I’m going to push a shopping cart through someone’s colon.
Please hold all your Dufferin Mall jokes. I’m sure they’ve heard them all before.
Via Torontoist.
At the far end of our 12 person table was a family of three: Roseanne (mom), David (pop), and Angelina (precocious imp of a girl). We didn’t talk that much from dinner to dinner but would see them out and about the ship and chat them up then. From Connecticut, Rosanne had her own business as a hairdresser so SharkBoy and her made a small connection there (didn’t you know? SB was a scissor jockey way back when). Dave was a golf fan and opted to play the course on Antigua while we all went to Prickly Pear Island. Angelina was a chatty tween who reminded me a lot of my niece, Emma, when she was her age. Bright and eager to engage in conversation.
While on the island we discovered two things: Angelina had brought her precious cats with her. Not unlike SharkBoy’s stowaway of Patches. And Roseanne was in her fifties. My mouth hit the floor when I heard that. She looked like she could have passed for upper thirties, real early fourties, easy.
By the third dinner, I wanted to sit by them so I could get to know them better but alas I had to babysit Rudy for the most part.
I hope Angelina is keeping up the stage classes! Knock ’em dead kid!
Remember how I decided I wanted one acknowledgment of my 6+ years of blogging? That site tanked pretty fast right after I announced that, didn’t it? After being on the web for over 12 years now (Christ on a toboggan… the internet IS for porn!) I find these kind of award sites either way up on the long tail (meaning they serve only to highlight 1million hits-a-day blogs) or they’re a group of friends who act like those mean girls at lunch hour out by the parking lot who use to point at my dandruff and bad skin…
There’s a Canadian version out now and the LGBT section is a bit lacking in content (no offense to the people who are there). Of the 6 listed, two are written by Americans living in Canada, one is living in Ireland. Why not nominate moi? That’s deadrobot at gmail end the dot com thing.
When we arrived at the port on our first day, we got behind some poor lady who’s scooter back tire had given up the ghost.
What the hell does that mean, “Given up the ghost”?
Anyway. She was trudging along in front of us and we felt sorry for her as she barked orders at her husband and daughter. It can’t be good to start out a vacation with a flat tire.
To our surprise, she and her family were placed at our table. They were from Philly so conversation came easy for them. Especially her, Sue. The thing about Sue wasn’t how easy she could command a conversation (never a dull quiet moment with her – thankfully the content was interesting) but how much she resembled Mrs Puff from Spongebob Squarepants. (Bad video, but the voice and general body size is there)
They were a nice family and I did enjoy their company. She didn’t ask us if we were “brothers” and I suspect she sussed us out within minutes, however she didn’t ask about our relationship until day 10 or so. No matter, she had some doozey stories about drinking, children, cats, food, the army, various family members in the army, their grandson (who didn’t take is face out of his portable gamething all dinner long), hunting, you get the picture. If it happened, she could relate. But she wasn’t one-uppity with her stories.
On the last night of our cruise we all talked about packing and getting to our various homes and such. Depressing conversation about going back to the real world. At the end of the meal, we all stood and said our goodbyes, hugged our waiter and assistant waiter and gave each other hearty handshakes…
…except Sue and her family literally took off. One minute they were there, the next… Poof! No good bye, no nods, no eye contact, no nothing. Gone.
I’m convinced that it wasn’t Mrs Puff we were dining with but the actual Large Marge from Pee Wee’s Big Adventure:
Enter with me now as we glide past the heavy glass and oak doors of the main dining room entrance. We’re greeted by 4-5 waiters with wide smiles. The expanse of a three story atrium dining room is breathtaking, considering we’re on a ship in the middle of the ocean. Gold, brass, wood and gilded plaster adorn every crevasse and corner. The lighting is perfect. The setting sun streaming through the windows just adds to the rich calm and beautiful atmosphere as we’re seated at our ornately dressed table. The waiter flips the cloth napkin sitting on your plate with a flourish and drops it onto our laps. It’s truly an exceptional–
“I was in WWII and we had these Japs come out of the forest and we shot two and then had to bury them right there.”
Huh?
“One grave was a bit short and the Jap’s knees stuck out!”
Pause.
“Can you believe it? We laughed. This poor bastards knees sticking out of the ground!”
Welcome to dining aboard the Explorer of the Seas.
I sat most of the trip beside a tiny 83 year old man by the name of Rudy from (shock horror) New Jersey, who was for the most part entertaining and a great time to talk to. The above exchange was one of our first conversations. I shrugged it off due to his age. But after day 7 he started to repeat himself unabashedly, prefaced with “I think I told you this…” and would still recant the story I heard a couple days before. Rudy spoke as if I knew his family intimately. His first story I learned of how his grandson’s neighbour’s son had come over and cleaned out his driveway with an old snow blower that he borrowed from someone and then the next snowfall Rudy offered the kid $40 (by the end of the cruise it was up to $60) to do it again but then Rudy went and got out the old snowblower in the garage that hadn’t been turned on in years and it started on one go. One go! And then he gave the kid the snow blower. Or something.
You get the gist of the thread of Rudy’s conversations.
He would start each conversation the same: leaning in to get your attention (he was nearly deaf on my side) and with hand to mouth as if to tell you a secret, Rudy would impart some beautiful gem of wisdom. Though the fingers by his mouth were splayed open, killing any hope of audio directional help or audio privacy, he kept his hand up by his mouth. It was a weird gesture but funny none the less. After he made his statement he would make a “Feh!” tip of his hand which today would be misconstrued as a symbol for gayness but to him it was a non verbal “Fuggedaboutit”. It was cute.
But Rudy had his set ways and seemed to be trapped in a post-war patriotic dream. One night we were discussing trips to Hawaii and the subject of the sunken memorial of the Arizona came up. A dinner guest mentioned that even today, a Japanese couple were ostracized during the sub ride down to the wreckage. Rudy went off on that:
“You have to watch what teachers are telling our kids. One time my daughter, who was I think 15 at the time, came home and said ‘what a horrible thing it was that we dropped the bomb on Japan’. I was so mad! I told her that if we didn’t kill those Japs, she wouldn’t be here today. I mean really! What are teachers telling kids today, huh? I’m glad that couple were treated that way, what with all those dead kids down there in the wreckage.”
I looked down at my napkin and I think I was wringing it so hard I nearly tore it in two. I didn’t say another word to him that night. I couldn’t. I think due to my silence he sensed that he stepped over some sort of conversational line and didn’t speak the rest of the dinner. The next night he was his old self again and the last night’s faux pas was forgotten. The rest of the cruise he was civil and the final memorable exchange was this:
Rudy: (leaning in) You know what’s a killer?
Me: No. What?
Rudy: Sugar! (Fugeddaboutit hand gesture). You know with all these medicines we’re living longer. I swear we’re living longer.
Me: We’re living in a modern world, Rudy.
Rudy: (Pause) Then again… (leans in closer, faux hand secret over mouth with splayed fingers) I haven’t had an erection for years.
Me: I think there’s pills for that.
Rudy: (Laughs)
Rudy’s wife was a pip. Even though she sat on his right and we never really spoke that much I could tell that she was sharp as a tack. SharkBoy told her that she had exact hair as Rita from Coronation Street. but she didn’t know the show.
(Fugeddaboutit hand gesture)