Stimulate me, oh stimulate me Mighty Caffeine, Your texture, creamy Your complexion, dark Your temperature, hot - all the way down - Woods and Adventure, you invoke Wild Dreams and Sleepless Nights I drown in your warm embrace, Thy name is Coffee, and I yield to thee.
So, I got my French Press.
And a grinder.
And a pound of coffee called "Deadhead".
Ahhh, tranquility.
It was a different woman in the shop this time, and I think she must be the owner, because a song came on and she said, "Oops, hold on one minute, this is my son's music, I just want to skip this song."
She was also very knowledgeable in the coffee department. She asked me how many cups I drink, and whether I often had company, and how dark do I like my coffee, etc. And, armed with my answers, she proceeded to set me up with my ideal coffee friends. She was adorable, and very happy that I was spending money in her little local shop. She also had a slight Scottish accent. I particularly noticed it when she said, "It has a nice little whir to it," when talking about the grinder.
Adorable.
I held off on the Flake and Crunchie, figuring I would have another chance when I came back to replenish my bean supply.
Mmmm
I even got crack for the occasion. (For those of you who don't know, crack is what I call the liquid Coffee Mate. It's like crack in that it is horribly addicting, and makes you feel oh-so-good. Don't do crack, though, kids. Real crack, that is. It's no good. There was a time when I was putting crack (Coffee Mate) in my oatmeal. Now THAT is dangerously good. Like buttered poptarts. Mmmm, I haven't had a buttered poptart in years....)
(Insert segue to new topic here)
I SURRENDER! I'll watch the show already!
HA! YES! I have converted someone!
Wait.
You don't count, you're already a nerd.
Oh well, at least I'll have someone to talk to about my passion. And really, THANK GOODNESS I have you, because otherwise I would go mad.
I am beginning to feel like a true resident of my new neighborhood. Today (and by 'today' I mean yesterday because I'm not going to post this until tomorr-...erm...Tuesday), I got up early (and by 'early' I mean 10 am, which is rather early when you consider I went to bed at 3 am) went down to a diner near my place to eat breakfast (and by 'breakfast' I mean lunch, because it was nearly noon by the time I left since I had spent a great deal of the morning writing blog posts) and have a cup of coffee (and by 'a cup' I actually mean 3 cups. And by '3 cups' I really mean 4.) After that I went down to the bank to deposit some cash (and by 'some cash' I mean a whole lotta cash because I have just worked 12 days in a row) and then to the post office for flat-rate boxes with which to send very belated birthday gifts which have been sitting in my apartment staring at me expectantly and somewhat exasperatedly. By which I mean precisely what I said. I think the gifts are planning a revolt if I do not send them to their intended recipients right quick. By which I mean, I'm sorry I haven't sent them yet, Mom/Elizabeth. I am a bad daughter/sister.
I headed back up the hill to my apartment (carefully avoiding the comic book shop because I am ashamed to show my face there until I can afford to buy all the comics I have missed these past two months) and came upon a little shop which seemed to sell coffee and tea and the accoutrements which go with these two delightful beverages. I waffled for a bit just outside the shop, then went in. The smell of coffee awoke a primal force in my brain as my eyes were greeted with several bags of coffee beans just out there in the open, waiting to be plucked up, ground down, and transformed into that divine liquid I crave night and day. Not only that, there were also several French presses for sale, something I have considered for some time. And coffee grinders. And then my eyes fell on two large glass jars, one of which held several Cadbury Flakes and the other Crunchie bars. Paroxysms of delight!
I bought a Flake (and for those of you who have never tried either of these fantastic treats, I pity you) because it was all I could handle at the moment, and went away thinking about what size French Press I should get, and whether or not I really needed a grinder. Fresh ground coffee is delightful, but I'm not sure I NEED it...who am I kidding? Of course I NEED it!
And, I'll be supporting a local business and not Target, which is where I was thinking I would have to go for a French Press.
What a true Park Slopian I am!
Now, I am going to post this tomorrow (Tuesday) because I do not want to overburden you with posts. Hopefully I will have more adventures Tuesday (today, from your perspective), which is my first official day off since July 15.
I think I'll save the Flake for later. By which I mean I am going to eat it now.
You do have ultimate veto power though...you could just never accept any friend requests.
You may have a point, oh wise one. But then what is the point of being on Facebook at all? Surprisingly, I'm kind of a wuss when it comes to turning down friend requests. I'm also curious, and we all know what that did to Catwoman. (Please, did you really think I wasn't going to embrace my nerdishness after having declared it impossible for me to write posts without it? Deal with it.)
Anyway, I have to wonder why, after all this time, these boys seem to think they STILL want to date me. Aren't they over me yet? Keep in mind that these are boys I was nice to and friends with, who then developed major complexes over me (or thought they did). I'm not really sure I want to encourage that sort of behavior again.
This is all sounding massively egotistical. Remember that I said these are guys I DIDN'T date, and therefore don't realize they aren't missing anything. I'm just a what-if to them.
Ahh, the power of what-if. We all indulge in it. I know I do on a regular basis. But too much dwelling in the past and the what-might-have-been can be dangerous. Why can we not live in the here and now? Accept our fates, and move on. It seems a part of human nature to always be wondering, even when things have turned out exactly the way you hoped. (Which they never do.)
Also, I'm in need of a new bra...can you help me?
*Snork* Yes, indeed I can. Schedule an appointment with my secretary, and I'll see if I can fit you in.
Oh how I laugh.
On a serious note, HI KARI! I forgot to reply to your previous comment, which is why I am devoting so much time to you now. Also, I hear from Jenna that congratulations are in order.
CONGRATULATIONS!
I wish you a safe delivery for a healthy, beautiful baby.
Oooh, I've just popped over to Kari's blog and I see that she is expecting at the end of August.
Yay Kari! I am thrilled for you!
Now I feel all warm and fuzzy, and cannot possibly continue in my normal cynical blogging way. I shall have to leave you 'till another day.
A woman came into the store a few days ago (I happened to be working alone because the girls were in Florida) with a strange problem. She told me she had bought a bra in our store (she pulled down the front of her dress to show me the bra in question) and she loved it, but she couldn't understand how to adjust the straps.
"Do you pull forward or backward? I can't seem to get them tighter," she explained. She pulled down more of her dress and turned around so that I could access the offending straps. With a smile, I adjusted them for her saying, "You pull the plastic piece forward."
"Oh," she said, pulling her dress back into place. "Thank you."
Before you ask, this is not a newfangled type of bra. The straps are exactly the same as you would find on any other. OK, fine. Perhaps she has never worn a bra before despite the fact that she is very clearly older than I am. Hey, we get a lot of granola-munching hippies in Park Slope, it could happen. What I find harder to believe is that she couldn't ask a girlfriend/sister/mother/female yoga instructor, but instead had to come all the way back to the store where she bought the confounding device and ask me, a complete stranger. And if all else fails, don't you think she could have figured out that if she pushes the plastic bit one direction and it makes the straps looser, logically, pushing it in the other direction would make it tighter?
Of course, I do this all day long. Well, ok, generally I adjust the straps BEFORE the bra is bought, but still... I spend a great deal of time fitting bras. Sometimes the buyer is shy, which I understand, and will only let me see them when they have the bra on and want to be certain it fits correctly. Others are...umm...how do I put this delicately?...less than shy. Like the woman who never once closed the fitting room curtain while she tried one bra after another, and would not let me leave her side for more than a second, whether I wanted to see her naked bosom or not.
The weird thing is: I really don't care. Maybe the first time I was a little shocked, but after two years, it just doesn't faze me.
Which is why I thought nothing of it when a woman came in and asked me to adjust her bra straps in the middle of the store.
Am I jaded? Living in NYC can dull the sharp edge of shock and awe, I just didn't expect it to happen quite so soon. Can anything still surprise me?
And then I saw this. Watch it at your own risk, the song will get stuck in your head for days. But it's funny as hell. Not that Hell is all that funny...
As to my calling Riker "beard guy", I could have said "smug git" but I wasn't sure you would know to whom I was referring. Oh, I kid, Riker's not that bad. But he looks considerably more like a smug git with that beard than without.
This post has gone to a very nerdy place. I swear, I always start with the best of intentions, but pretty soon it's comic books this, and Star Trek that. It's true what they say, "You can take the nerd out of the blog, but then you don't get any posts."
Once again, I digress. There was so much I wanted to say, and I've wasted it on twaddle!
I was going to welcome Jenna back (Welcome back Jenna!), and tell her about going back to New Orleans, and how surreal it felt because it at first appeared to have been mostly untouched, but the harder I looked, the more I found that it was deeply scarred. Or maybe I'm the one who's changed...who can say? I was also going to talk about a recent Facebook debacle. I wrote a great deal of it in an e-mail to my mother whose only response was "Oh, Jules..." Which is, perhaps, why I am discouraged. Also, I really don't know who reads this blog. NOTHING IS SAFE ANYMORE!
Oh, this just sounds worse all the time, I should explain before you think I did something heinous.
The problem with joining Facebook is that certain, erm, people can find you. Specifically, ex-boyfriends and ex-wanna-be-boyfriends. The latter have proven a little more resourceful and perseverent (is that a word, or did I just make something up?). Perhaps because they never got the chance to, er, sample the actual product, and therefore don't understand they ain't missin' much.
Now I've gone to a dirty place, and I really didn't mean to. Believe me, I tried several different phrases all of which were worse than "sample the actual product" so let me again clear this up and tell you that by "sample" I mean "date."
I should really quit while I'm (relatively) ahead before this post goes any further awry.
I could have done my laundry last Tuesday when it was sunny and I wasn't working. But that would have been easy. Me no likey 'easy'. So, instead, I did it today when it was pouring rain and I worked from 12-7.
Which means I was up at 7 am this morning, just to be sure I had enough time. It turns out I had plenty of time, but I don't like getting ready for work in a rush, so I was glad I took the precaution.
Anyway, I guess this means I'm really moved in, because I have now done my laundry at my new laundromat. It took a while to find a suitable laundromat, there seem to be a wealth of places which will do your laundry for you, but I'm rather anal about doing my own laundry. I don't know why, but I am very specific about what can be washed with what, and how things are to be dried. It's as though my clothes are actually representatives from several different countries which don't particularly get along, and must therefore be carefully divided and kept separate during negotiations.
Hmm. I've been watching too much Star Trek.
Yes, it has happened: I have become the Ultimate Nerd.
I am now making my was through Star Trek: The Next Generation. I'm not even through season 1, and I'm already obsessed.
Now I remember why I didn't let myself watch an episode sooner. I knew this would happen, and that it would cost me a great deal of time and money. Ah well, I couldn't resist the growing tide forever, it was bound to sweep me up.
Which brings me to something I would like to share with you. I absolutely must share it with someone, and what good is a blog but for sharing things with people I love?
It's only 36 seconds long, so just watch it, even if you are currently rolling your eyes at me. Strike that. Finish rolling your eyes, then watch it.
A few points first: I haven't even reached the episode from which this little snippet is taken, I just happened to find it on youtube and have watched it about a dozen times. I have laughed every time. Also, I love Data. He is far and away my favorite character. He is an android who cannot feel emotion, so, yeah. My affection for emotionally-stunted men continues unbroken. This one doesn't have pointy ears though.
Okay, roll tape!
Tee hee! Doesn't it make you smile? Even chuckle? The best part is Riker's (beard-guy) reaction.
The second day there, I went out shopping. It was around 10 am and sunny when I stepped into a store. When I stepped back out, the sky had opened up, and it was pouring. Luckily, it only lasted about 15 minutes. But after the downpour, the temperature and humidity skyrocketed.
Above: Jackson Square and the famous St. Louis Cathedral.
Below: Between Jackson Square and the cathedral is a courtyard where local artists sell their art. Also, near the evening, this place fills up with palm readers, psychics, tarot readers, etc.
Joan of Arc
This is Pirates Alley, about which many myths and legends have been told. For instance, that dueling ghosts appear there late at night or in the early morning fog.
Apparently the ghosts don't appear when the alley is full of tourists. I can't say I blame them.
This is Napoleon House which is believed to have been intended for Napoleon himself, should he escape exile, as a refuge. However, he died without ever having set foot in it.
Rob Gorman escorts his daughter, Kathleen, down the aisle.
At the reception, Kathleen is glowing!
The happy couple, Mr. and Mrs. Westfall, share the first dance.
I finally have Internet in my new apartment. Yay! Do the dance of joy!
Of course, this means I have no excuse for not blogging. Or e-mailing. Or looking at Facebook. Hmmm, maybe I should rethink this...
At the very least, I shouldn't be announcing that I'm online again.
Truth be told, I was able to steal a signal from one or several of my neighbors, so I haven't really been as cut off as I pretend. But I tried not to stay online too long that way, because I felt bad for hacking someone else's signal. But now I'm paying for it, so I can stay connected 24 hours a day. Again, perhaps I have made a fatal error...
They actually had to send someone out here to get my internet up and running. His name was Curtis and he was very nice. First he came up to my apartment to see what was what, then he went outside to trace the wire from my phone jack. Like a little detective, he was. He was gone for a long while, and as I sat waiting, I hoped that this meant it was something he could fix, and was doing so. It was. He told me that it had been so long since someone had used a DSL line in this place, that another technician had pilfered my line for another customer.
"It's more common than you might think," he said, and I had this image of a technician walking past my line nonchalantly, a whistle on his lips as he yanked out the cord and strolled over to wherever he needed it.
Regardless, it's working now. And I couldn't be more thrilled!
Farewell for now, dear readers. Next up will be pictures from my trip to New Orleans!
