Man Versus Coke Bottle

 *Yesterday was a bad day for me and food. I got up early (which I NEVER do) had a protein shake (because I wasn't REALLY hungry yet) and proceeded to spend the next four hours at work engaged in relentless physical labor.

"Poo! Poo!" you say. "What kind of hard labor could you possibly be doing in a library?"

Well, I pulled over 2,300 books off their shelves, in groups of three, and replaced them. And I'll tell you what: no bid deal doing that with a couple hundred books, but by the end of approximately the 2,000th book, my lower arms and hands were shaking a little bit. In the spirit of making a long story short, I'll just say that I spent more calories than I was inputting. I got home, promptly informed everyone that they could not expect a coherent conversation with me until I had fed my brain, and stuffed my face. (Travis has coined a phrase for this state of mind: "Grungry.")

I have a small stomach and a fast metabolism. It's a curse. And don't throw any of that, "But you're so skinny!" crap at me. I could write volumes about how difficult this aspect of my life is. But I will forbear for now. Anyway...I starved, and then I ate. And I thought that was that.

But no.

Later that day, I found myself sitting in a movie theater, about to watch the hotness that is Tom Cruise in the eagerly-awaited fourth installment of Mission: Impossible, but (for reasons I will not go into) I had not had time to eat dinner. "Erin, Erin, Erin..." you tsk tsk, "You just don't take care of yourself."

Shut up. It was out of my control.

It was a poor substitute for real food, but I happened to have smuggled a bottle of coke into the theater. My blood sugar level was plummeting (once again) to starvation levels, and a headache seemed imminent...so, I thought, if I could only get into that coke...those measly 150 calories just might help...

What Travis and I failed to reckon with, however, was the stubbornness of the Mexican bottle cap. It would not be twisted off; it would not be keyed off; a belt buckle proved utterly useless; SHEER FORCE OF WILL had no effect whatsoever. That sucker was not coming off! At last, I leaned over to Travis--though it pained me to do so--and told him it was no use. As if he didn't know.

It's silly now, but I thought I would cry.

I didn't. And eventually I got home and ate something. But I guess, in closing, I will just say (as if it weren't obvious to anyone reading) that Mexican Coke bottle caps are real sons of b------, and they have messed with me for the last time.

*By the time I'm posting this, this will not have happened "yesterday." However, the trauma, I have no doubt, will live on and on.

Maybe we've been playing too much Fruit Ninja on the iPad

I lie in bed and begin the nightly process of silencing my conscious brain. I was not gifted with the ability to sleep on command.

My dear, sweet Travis, on the other hand, is. In general, the instant his head touches the pillow, he's on his way out.

Many moons ago (like...maybe a year) I discovered that when Travis falls asleep, he doesn't go all the way under all at once, but remains for a while in a kind of limbo where he is both dreaming and able to respond to me if I talk to him. When we were dating--and sleepiness signaled the time for me to go home--it was a skill that served him well when he used to try to disguise the fact that he was falling asleep.

It was no use, though. Trav's entrance into the limbo-like state is always accompanied by lots of little twitches.

I confess that I am malicious enough to have made a game out of talking to Travis while he is in Limbo. Like I said, he's responsive. So sometimes, when I feel him begin to twitch, I roll over with an evil glint in my eye (not that anyone could see it, but, trust me--it's there) and whisper quietly in his ear, "What are you doing?" and he'll whisper back, "I'm trying out for the Olympics," or, "I'm running away from the cops," or, "I'm waiting for my kid to be born--don't freak out." (Personal favorite.)

Now that we're married, and I'm usually trying to fall asleep alongside my husband, I don't whisper, "What are you doing?" nearly as often as I used to. But every now and then, when Trav twitches so hard I worry he's had a seizure, I ask him.

So, I'm lying in bed, beginning the nightly process of silencing my conscious brain, when Trav--having been horizontal a total of one minute--twitches violently.

I can't resist. "What are you doing?" I ask.

"Mm!" he whimpers, as if dragging himself just enough awake to mutter a response.

*long pause*

"... Fighting a ninja apple."

(New favorite.)

You need to see this--the world needs to know!

Rare intelligence.

Two cellphones and three years later...

...I finally learned how to use predictive text, today! This revolutionizes the whole way i think about AND use the text messaging mechanism on my cellular phone! I have been living in the Stone Age! I've been in Darkness! Positively Medeaval have been my texting ways!

But now...

Now! I need no longer fear receiving or responding to text messages! No longer need I fear the small beep of an incoming text message! No longer need I dread the 7 and 9 keys for having four letters! No lngr nd I wrt lke ths! ltrs wer nevr so wndrfl! Indeed! The dread of responding has been lifted from my shoulders! Lifted, I say!

Life! i have been given life! Now, my text messaging takes flight!

Ahem. The stars have something REALLY important to say...

If you want to laugh (hard), type "wacky web tales" into google, and go to the site. it's like Mad Libs. But SO much funnier. These horoscopes are brought to you by Christina, Sofie and me courtesy Wacky Web Tales:

Aries — Ram (March 21-April 19)
Someone you know may be feeling friendly. Stay out of the way!

Taurus — Bull (April 20-May 20)
Don't feel in public. It could prove embarrassing.

Gemini — Twins (May 21-June 20)
Control the urge to lather. tap instead.

Cancer — Crab (June 21-July 22)
marauding too many worms will leave you exhausted!

Leo — Lion (July 23-August 22)
A loved one thinks you are pointless. Do not be taken in by flattery.

Virgo — Virgin (August 23-September 22)
stroll in private when possible. It's difficult to concentrate when people are watching.

Libra— Scales (September 23-October 22)
Avoid snorkling noses.

Scorpio — Scorpion (October 23-November 21)
Never loan money to american mudskippers! They are poor credit risks.

Sagittarius — Archer (November 22-December 21)
Today is a good day to stink a(n) mud.

Capricorn — Goat (December 22-January 19)
You may receive some banana stands from a secret admirer! Water them every day, and they will last a long time.

Aquarius — Water Bearer (January 20-February 18)
Unless you organize your mustaches better, you won't get anything done.

Pisces — Fish (February 19-March 20)
A good friend will give you $1000 to buy new hard candys. Be sure to thank your friend.

(Mine is Leo.)

My Morning Tai Chi (are you ready for this?)

After my shower this morning, i didn't bother getting into clothes right away, but slipped into my extremely soft, pink bathrobe and did some wandering around the house. i ate a spoonful of peanut butter and some crackers, and then i decided to practice singing.


I turned on the piano, propped open my book and began the unflattering warm ups that singers are forced to do. And then I began to warble for real. ("Warbling" really IS the only name I can give the quality of my voice. My instructor operates under the delusion that i am a soprano. I've tried several times, merely by singing, to disabuse him of this notion, but alas...) Feeling the usual frustration mounting, I suddenly remembered something i'd been shown two days ago by my instructor. "You're gonna think this is super weird," he'd said, "But trust me on this. Have you ever seen anyone doing tai chi?..." The idea was to sink down in your legs and shape the music as you sang it. To literally move slowly and evenly with the phrases, and to shape the rises and falls with your hands. Ted did it with me and then accompanied me on the piano. To be totally honest, I didn't find it strange at all! Being a dancer, this kind of thing resonated with me. And heaven knows it takes A LOT more than something like that to weird me out.

So, this afternoon, wearing nothing more than a pink bathrobe, I did tai chi to the sound of my own voice as the snow fell quietly outside my window. i stopped worrying about how poor my breath control was or how hard it is to sing a high D. it didn't matter.

Yes, i laughed at myself. And yes, I looked like a goon.

And yes. it felt great.

Being Boaz

The number of people staying at the Thomas household this holiday season necessitated some unusual sleeping arrangements. John and Mary had to sleep with Finnegan in their room, which meant a lot of interrupted sleep. The four other older kids all crammed their skinny little bodies into another room. And since the two rooms upstairs (formerly bedrooms) have been turned into studies, that left the smallest bedroom in the house to be split between three adult girls. Hmm...

The bed is a trundle bed; that took care of two people. So, at the foot of the bed, into the like two square feet of floor space that was left over once the trundle bed was rolled out, we pinched and squeezed and squished one more green pad to accommodate a third party.

And thus we slept: Christina on the main bed (because she was there first), me on the trundle (which is a little hard, but reasonably comfortable) and poor Sue relegated to the poor pinched, squeezed and squished green pad at the foot of our beds. On Christmas Eve, when the three of us found ourselves for the first time in this, shall we say, inelegant arrangement, it was hard not to draw biblical allusions. "You're just like Ruth," I tell Sue as she lays herself down on the pad at my feet. "Well, goodnight, Boaz," she says.

(I decided not to remind her that by ancient Israel's standards, she was actually proposing marriage.)

A Collaborative Effort

L, A, K and I (that's me), having decided that facts have not been reported as they ought, have collaborated in an ongoing project of writing and propagating revisionist history. We feel that Mad Libs is the most professional vehicle for our project. Here are the first installments.

#1
Paul Revere was born in Boston, Louisiana, in 1735. His father taught him to work with metals, and he soon became a pithy dragonfly. He was a soldier in the French and Czech War and was at the famous Boston Carpet Party when Americans dressed up as Indians dumped tons of liquid snow (i.e. water) into the ocean. On April 18, 1775, Paul Revere waited in the North Pole for a signal light from a church tower. The signal was to be one if by beer bottle, two if by dollar. When he got the message, he mounted his faithful bumblebee and rode off serendipitously. On his way, he kept yelling, “The cocoas are coming! The cocoas are coming!” This was the beginning of the American War for Independence from King Gerard Way.

#2
Although he was Emperor of France, Napoleon Bonaparte was actually a Corsican, born on a small guitar in the Mediterranean Sea. When he was just ten years old, Napoleon was sent to a military Hogwarts school in France, where his sparkly stature earned him the nickname of “The Drunken Corporal.” At 24, he was made a nervous General and married Josephine, the daughter of a well-known Parisian conch. Soon after that, he defeated the Italians at the battle of Arivederci (sp?) and in 1804 was named Emperor of all the impressions. But he made a secret mistake and attacked Russia. He reached Moscow, but the imps had burned all their invisibility cloaks and his men got frozen games. In 1914, he was farded (this means to put make-up on while driving) and sent to Elba. But a year later he came back to France and for 100 days was again the Wizard. However, he was defeated at Waterloo and imprisoned on the island of St. Helena, a primitive place which resembled the Goblin City.

Somebody More Like You

i stole this from Marissa's blog. (I hope she is flattered.) I'm tired of the complaints that I never write anything. The truth of the matter is that I have nothing interesting to write about these days.

So...I decided to write something interesting about nothing. Here goes...

RULES:
1. Put Your iTunes/Windows Media Player/ETC on Shuffle.
2. For each question, press the next button to get your answer.
3. YOU MUST WRITE THAT SONG NAME DOWN NO MATTER HOW SILLY IT SOUNDS.
4. Put any comments in brackets after the song name.
5. Put this on your journal.

1. If somebody says, "Is this okay?" you say:
"Your Hands are Cold" (An indirect way of saying, "I choose not to answer that question.")

2. How would you describe yourself?
"Eden" (a.k.a "Pearadise." I like this.)

3. What do you like in a girl/guy?
"Amor e assim" (How romantic! The Portuguese is a nice touch.)

4. How do you feel today?
"Sitting, Waiting, Wishing" (almost fell out of my chair when this came up. scarily accurate.)

5. What is your life's purpose?
"Grieg: Last Spring op. 34 No 2 from Two Elegiac Melodies" (By George! Somebody get me an orchestra. Quick!)

6. What is your motto?
"The Model" (Truly, truly inspiring. The model!)

7. What do your friends think of you?
"Mambo" (Sweet. I dig it.)

8. What do you think of your parents?
"Cath..." (As in... cathhhh...eter? Thanks for that one, Death Cab. You're fired. My parents aren't that old.)

9. What do you think about very often?
"The Very Thought of You" (Weird coincidence.)

10. What is 2+2?
"Philosophy" (iTunes attempt at sarcasm?)

11. What do you think of your best friend?
"Unforgettable" (Totally, totally true.)

12. What do you think of the person you like?
"Peer Pressure" (This made me chuckle. doesn't make sense.)

13. What is your life story?
"Am I Missing" (Seriously. Am I missing something?)

14. What do you want to be when you grow up?
"Hope" (Shanelle: i'm gonna be a dentist! Mike: I'm gonna be a doctor! Daniel: i'm gonna be a mad scientist/physicist! Pear, intrepidly: I'm gonna be hope!)

15. What do you think of when you see the person you like?
"Seven Years" (Geez. That's bleak.)

16. What will you dance to at your wedding?
"Cigarettes and Chocolate Milk" (Chocolate milk is a definite possibility.)

17. What will they play at your funeral?
"Unsaid" (appropriate.)

18. What is your hobby/interest?
"Closing" (Whatie?? Gosh guys! I just LUV to close, don't you?!)

19. What is your biggest fear?
"Aberdeen." (That freaky old city in Scotland. Say the word and I shudder.)

20. What is your biggest secret?
"He Woke Me Up Again" (oh...i don't even know what to say about this.)

21. What do you think of your friends?
"Changes" ("turn and face the strange ch-ch-changes!")

22. What song would you play during your first kiss?
"New Year's Day" (New years eve would be more appropriate.)

23. What will you post this as?
"Somebody More Like You" (bo-o-oring. Thanks for the buggy-ride, iTunes.)

Without further ado...the latest parody

Down with introspection! We want laughter! We want gaiety! We want a ha cha cha! The only times I am morose are when I am inside my own head, and when I happen to be transcribing what is in my head. No more! I want to stop living in the past! Start living in the present! Which brings me to a funny parody I made up. I love parodies, as some of you know. Like puns, they show a superior intellect--but, unlike puns, they show good taste. Just kidding. Anyway, here is my parody, which is actually a conflation of two songs, the first being Yellow Submarine by the Beatles, and the second is from veggie-tales "The Water Buffalo Song." Larry the Cucumber sings it. The parody is sung to the tune of the water buffalo song, and the words go like this:

Larry:
Everybody's got a yellow submarine.
Yours is blue but mine is green.
Where we got them I don't know but
Everybody's got a yellow submariIIIIIIIIIIIIiiiiiiine

Archibald Asparagus:
Wait a minute! not everybody's got a yellow submarine!
We're going to get nasty letters saying,
"Where's MY yellow submarine? Why don't I have a yellow submarine? And why is yours blue and mine GREEN?!"

Yes. Brilliant, I know! i'm trying really hard not to pat myself on the back. If any of you are unfamiliar with the water buffalo song from Silly Songs with Larry, familiarize yourselves right now.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a08A7lDjTFE

Until next time, this has been Silly Songs with Peary, the part of the blog where Peary comes out and "sings" a silly song. (Don't forget the squash song I posted a few months back.)

An exchange in the kitchen...

I came up the stairs tonight after reading Stephenie Meyer for a while, trying to unwind, and plopped myself onto a stool in the kitchen. Christina sat at the bar typing at her computer in the semi-darkness.

"What happens," I say, interrupting her thoughts, "when a dream you've had for a long time dies and nothing comes to take its place?"

Biddy (that's Christina for those who don't know) looks up pensively from her laptop and offers this profound insight, "I don't know about that. I've never had a recurring dream before. I always forget my dreams anyway."

I stared at her blankly for a good three or four seconds before crumpling into laughter. I've decided it was the perfect response: a) it was an extremely funny, and b)it helped me take myself less seriously.

And c)it only fed my theory that most people who sound like they know what they're talking about, usually don't.