Happy Halloween

They were so pretty I almost didn't want to carve them up.

But I did.

Come fly with me

Well, technically, I should say come fly with me and my husband, since we'd need him to actually pilot the plane.

Maybe now you're thinking:

OMG you have a PLANE!  That is so totally awesome.  You must be like, rich, or something!  OMG a PLANE!

And while I absolutely love our plane and am very thankful to have it in our lives... I must mention a few things first.  It is not a fancy corporate jet, in fact, it is not a jet at all.  It is a single-engine prop plane.  It travels at about 130 knots on average.  (1 knot = 1.15 mph... thank you Orange County Chopper for that handy piece of knowledge)  Which in plane speed goes something like "weeeennnnnhhhhhh" rather than "woooosh".  Oh, and, also, it was built in 1957.

But we love the plane.  And since I don't think I've ever posted a picture of our plane on here: 

Pretty.

And since I'm sharing, here's what the beautiful blue sky with puffy white clouds looks like from 9,500 feet:

 

Four Favorites Friday

In no particular order, here are my four favorites of the day:

1) Favorite customer service rep:  The lady at the speedy checkout line at Wal-Mart who actually knew the definition of the word "speedy."  AND she was super nice.
2) Favorite commercial:  The Snickers "Grocery Store Lady" Halloween ad
3) Favorite new artist: The Maine
4) Favorite pet moment: When I feed the cat and she is so absolutely ecstatic about dinnertime that she is literally purring while she is eating.

And there you have it.

Instructions FAIL

It really should say, "Read this BEFORE adjusting your Equa 2 chair."

I mean, wouldn't it be a bit awkward to try and read something attached to the bottom of the chair while sitting on the top of it?

The Great Banana Mystery

It first happened in 2003.  I had just graduated college, picked up stakes and moved to Los Angeles to "live the dream."  (I never did make it as a Hollywood actress, but I guess you actually have to go to auditions to make that happen).

Anyway, on my fairly limited budget (did I mention that I did not have a job lined up when I moved?) I bought some groceries, including a small bunch of bananas.

After putting away the groceries and making myself a light dinner, I went to bed.

The next morning, I woke up and decided that a banana would make an excellent breakfast food.  But when I looked at the bananas, sitting innocently on the counter where I had left them, they had developed what appeared to be dozens of little brown spots all over.  In a word - Eww.

This was very mysterious.  I wondered if perhaps Los Angeles had some aggressive breed of nocturnal fruit fly?  I threw away the bananas and went to the store to buy a can of Raid.

It took me four months and two apartments before I finally discovered the real cause of the mysterious overnight banana disease.

It was my cat.

(I know, I bet you thought it really was the enormous night-feeding fruit flies).

Seriously, though, bananas are to my cat what cocaine is to a drug-sniffing dog.  She has some sort of impressive "banana-radar".  She is drawn to the scent of an unopened banana the way that most cats are drawn to catnip.

Of course, she doesn't actually want to actually eat the banana. Just munch on the outside for a bit.  And it is quite specific to bananas, not any other kind of fruit.

My bananas have to go straight from my car to the microwave or the pantry. If I try hiding the bananas (for example, on top of the fridge behind the stacks of recipe books where I have never seen her go) she finds them. If I even walk in to the kitchen with a dozen grocery bags and set them down for a second, she will hone in unerringly on the one bag that has the bananas.

The strange part isn't that she won't eat the bananas. That's actually pretty normal for a cat. Fruit is, after all, basically sugars. Cats have a genetic deficiency that prevents their brains from liking sugar (and before you go thinking I'm all smart, I looked it up on the internets). The strange part is that her banana fetish serves absolutely no purpose.

Then again, neither does chewing on flip-flops, pawing at glass cabinet doors, rolling in dirty socks, or licking vertical blind slats. I guess I will never understand.

Weirder than leaving my keys in the fridge

I do sometimes make fun of my husband in this blog.  But I try to keep it a little bit balanced, like when I told about how I leave my keys in the fridge.... intentionally.  Since I figure I am a bit overdue for some self-ridicule, I thought to share this story.

The other day, I stopped by the house on my lunch break.  Since I work about 5 minutes from where I live, this is easily accomplished within my allotted lunch break. I made myself a sandwich, then sat down on the couch to enjoy my lunch.  I had my phone nearby so that I could be available for any important work phone calls or emails.  After some time, I had finished my lunch and went to gather up my things and leave.

I couldn't find my phone.

The logical conclusion was that it had fallen between the couch cushions.  I tore the couch apart (twice), searched the entire house, tried retracing my steps - all to no avail.  Since I had no spare phone with which I could call myself, I finally gave up with the thought that I would look for it later that evening when I was off work.

I got off work, and went in to the kitchen to pour myself a glass of water.  After I was done drinking, I walked over to the dishwasher to put load the dirty glass.

I opened the dishwasher.  And there was my phone.

Yes, it's true.  In a moment of absentmindedness, apparently, I put my phone away in the dishwasher.  My. phone. was. in. the. dishwasher.

*EDIT*
As I sit here writing this post, my husband is looking over my shoulder.  "What is that you're typing?" he asks.  "All that < ahref > stuff?  What's with all the a's?"

"It's just html code.  For inserting links and stuff."

"Ohhhhh.... YOU'RE A NERD!"

"You take that back!  I was going to write a nice blog post where I didn't make fun of you but now you ruined it!"

"I don't care," he said, "you make fun of me anyway."

"Well," I exclaimed, "it's just basic computer stuff!"

"NERDY NERDY NERDY!" and then, mimicking me in an unflattering manner, "It's just basic html code... It's just basic NERDINESS."

So, just for that, I am going to make fun of him in the very next post.  And that's a promise.

The Hangover

I don't know whether it was pager-friendly, but the hotel that we stayed at in Vegas did have an actual telephone bank:

Okay, so I don't know what's up with the, like, 2 phones.  But nonetheless the sign declares it a telephone bank!!!

Cats and Dogs are friends

 

Look at how far they've come.  They can almost tolerate sitting next to each other.