Now that I have something close to a real job, albeit temp, part time, and flexibly houred, I am sort of amazed at several things, like how even a walk-n-bus tunnel commute takes so much time, and how easy it is to drop about $10 a day on coffee and Real Change and occasional bus fare and a snack. Something that I really don't like but still amazes me is how often a clean-appearing elevator smells strongly of mustard. Is it one mustard-loving person in the building? Is someone feeding the elevator sandwiches, but not providing a mint? Is there a mustard-scented cleaning product?

I was greeted by a piece of mail that read "Million Dollar Pork Sale". The next piece was labeled "What You Need To Know About The Tax Cut". Is this funny, or is it just my lack of candy for lunch that is making me think this is funny?

3.22.04 Terms
I need to calm down about the condo.

Do pets need acceptance of their size? Lately I have really be struck with the enormity of my Gordo Gato. Especially struck when he insists on sitting on my lap while I type, and I can barely reach the keyboard and provide him with the space he needs to not be crushed. Am I enabling him with food, or do I tell him about fat being a feminist issue?

3.19.04 Hobbled
Home Depot did in 90 minutes what working 11 days in a row didn't do: messed up my back. Someone who is so easily taken out of the game should look where she's going in the planter department. I'm eating extra pills and working at home; hopefully will be better by tomorrow. Until then, I will lay around being amazed at the price of countertops. $90 per square foot? (Or "sqwoot" as I have taken to abrieviating it.) It's going to be cut and burned and stained, for jeebis' sake.

We have pigeons nesting on our deck. I do not have the heart to move them. Plus, Smarter Cat spends all day watching them, which certainly cuts down on his annoyance factor.

The downtown library closes April 1st, reopening May 23rd. Have you seen it? I hope it's usable inside; I sure do like the outside.

3.16.04 Shock and AWWW
Yesterday, I saw a pigeon perched on the meaty remains of a T-bone, ripping away at the shreds with his beak, freaking out at any other pigeons that came within a foot of him. I try to avoid even thinking about living-in-the-city sort of metaphors, but jeez.

MayDay brings the cutest event ever to Seattle: PugFest. Note the races. Note the costumes. Note the talent show.

I am not functioning super well with the condo purchasing. We can afford it, it has everything I want in a home, and we have a whole month to prepare for moving, so why am I still flipping out every single day? Stress means never having to say you're sorry. Or in my case, stress means having to apologize constantly and then get stressed about the amount I'm apologizing.

Things were more under control before I talked to My Fabulous Doctor, who said, "you cannot help with the moving" while staring me in the eyes without blinking. Hard to find much wiggle room there, but oh, how I'm trying.

After watching Wrestlmania, I decided that John Kerry needs to choose Jesse "The Body" Ventura as his running mate. Might lose Minnesota, but clearly no one really cares about accomplishments when you've got a celebrity running.

I love my Citysearch job. The only bad thing is that since I spend so many hours thinking about food now, I end up being undecided for my meals and just eating a cookie. My body now responds to protein the way most people respond to sugar: I get freakishly giddy. Just ask Sweetie: steak makes me babble incoherently. Cheese makes me do a softshoe down the hallway. But perhaps cheese makes everyone do that.

3.9.4 No Title
Thanks to No Logo, not only am I now compulsively checking the place of origin on everything I own, I am fretting about all the people I know (damn near everyone) with a "creative" job. While Ms. Klein doesn't go into that angle of it much, she does write about how the corporate shift from manufacturing good products to ignoring the product and focusing on the brand has resulted in steady slashes in the bucks spent on making things and steady increases in the bucks spent on selling things. And so many of us write or design items that help to sell these products--me included. So when I freak out about export processing zones and awful labor conditions around the world and yet I benefit from these same low-cost situations, am I not being just as hypocritical as Team Republican? Albeit in a smaller way.

And according to my take on Miss Mary, (note the link to Sweetie's folks' store!) Christianity is really just a big misunderstanding anyway. Everyone should be working on personal enlightenment and finding God within themselves and that sort of thing. A couple of the more uptight disciples seem to be responsible for the whole current mess. Someone get me a time machine and I'll go fix it.

Since I'm typing while holding a 20-pound cat on my lap, I've been thinking about my old typing class teachers. After a little web search that turned up no very interesting pages, I've learned that those classes have been moved to elementary school. My first teacher (in VA) was also a preacher for a local Baptist church, and when she would say "A-S-D-F! J-K-L-SEMI!" I would want to praise Jeebis and clap my hands. She once told a couple Danish exchange students in the class that they were Asian, as they were white but not born in this country. I got kicked out of class for laughing, as she thought I was laughing at the kids. Her comment about being black was "if you're black, you know it". I thought it was funny at the time, but boy, it was more accurate than I realized. I doubt she was actually making a comment on the endemic racism of this country, but one never knows, does one?

3.6.04 Tea for Three
I had tea at the Queen Mary for the first time. It was lovely, plus I had a tea called "Golden Monkey". It wasn't much like gold or monkeys, but it was good. And I do love a cucumber sammich.

We have basically jumped through all necessary hoops for the condo purchase, and I realized about an hour ago that all that's left to do now is wait to move. That seems extremely anticlimactic. Guess that means I should get back to working normally. I feel a little concern for the sellers, as they must pack up and move to Ireland in the next few weeks. Seems much more difficult than moving a few blocks.

In case you were wondering when the warmer season actually starts, it started today. All of the cats' winter coats fell off in gigantic clumps, and mainly landed on my pants. Every year it seems like they'll just end up bald, while my pants appear to grow an extra layer of fur sometime in March. Why hasn't someone invented a laminating process that can be used on live creatures? This is not a substitute, although it's the first google hit for "pet laminating".

Sean spent the morning with wooden sticks jammed up his nose. Hopefully, he did not also grow a mustache and will not have too much trouble with "crusting". Also hopefully, he can explain to me why there is a "limitation on lifting" for a few weeks. Have I been lifting incorrectly all these years? Is it all about the nose, not the knees? No wonder things hurt.

3.4.4 Round Three
The condo purchase progresses. I just compared this particular purchase to adopting a lovable stray with a bad behavioral problem. With love and kibble, we shall rehabilitate this home and make it a Good Citizen.

Probably the strangest thing about such a large purchase is how quickly acceptable amounts to spend adjust. Normally, I can fret over a hundred bucks. Now, I'm tossing around figurative thousands with aplomb. Of course, this aplomb is resulting in me offering dog food to my future home, so perhaps "denial" is a better word. Perhaps "overexcited kookiness". Perhaps "happy tension".

I think this is a really good idea. Hurrah salmon, salmon ho!

I can't decide whether this restaurant is a good thing or a bad thing. On the one hand: local purveyors and better food for people. On the other hand, it's like a cheap print of a beautiful oil painting. Mass produced is not the same as art.

And gee, do you suppose this announcement from that Scottish place has anything to do with the movie I'm so excited about? Oh wait, it's actually that they really do care about all of us. How nice of them.

Another change I am quite happy to see is a reintroduction of half-sized soda cans at the grocery store. So far, it appears to only be Pepsi that has the six-ounce cans of my hydrated childhood currently available. No longer will I have to buy a 32-ounce bottle and drink it in four or five sittings. It's the little things in life that make it good, you know? Like more choice in soda sizes. And fewer choices in fry sizes.

3.3.4 Your Roofies on Fire
Sweetie and I are attempting to buy this condo. If it wasn't for the Mighty Ambien, I would not have slept since last Friday. The idea of having a pantry is happily stressful. The idea of having to deal with the removal of nine years' worth of sticky tobacco smoke from the whole interior is unhappily stressful. The generally annoying thing is just how much of my brain is being taken up with all the details. I have work to do, dammit. And it's extremely difficult to review a book about menopause when all you can think about is interest rates and remodeling quotes. So please, brain, just get back to normal. I hear denial is a useful tool. So is tequila. Surprisingly, muffins are not. I had some for breakfast, and they didn't help one little bit.

Remember, What doesn't kill you makes you stronger. For Easter, I will be wearing one of these made with lavender chicks and lemonade Mike-n-Ikes. And be running around all day saying, "if [fill in the blank], I'll eat my hat!