Friday Links: Cold Weather and Blue Skin Edition

Posted on by thepoelog

sheryll princess

The spelling of my first name is pretty unique. I’ve never in my 41 years ever come across anybody else who spelled it the same way. It was actually really annoying when I was a kid and could never find anything personalized at those end-of-the-aisle displays at the truck stop.

But a coworker was at a birthday party in New York last weekend, and she saw a yacht with the same unusual spelling (she supplied the picture above). Sure enough: they have a whole website where you can rent a Sheryll Princess party boat! Having a personalized yacht is way better than some janky ol’ keychain with your name on it.

While I go and scheme on ways to repo my yacht (do you think I can just show them my license and make the case that the boat is indeed registered to my [first] name?), check out these links.

  • As a child of the 1980s, this is beyond awesome. Rufus Starlight. “We Are Brothers.” There just aren’t enough synthesizers and silver unitards at weddings these days. You really need to hang in there till the 4:55 minute mark.
  • Speaking of music videos, one of my Facebook friends dug up this ode (?) to Stonehenge from our favorite Norwegian variety show brothers. I love how they rhyme “so high” with “technolog—iiii” Also, the 1.50 minute mark? What the what?? Oh wait….Stonehenge rising. OK, I get it.
  • Dang. I only know fat, slutty, tatooed, single mom, Halle Berry look-a-likes. Guess I won’t get that finder’s fee from Sleepless in Austin, a wedding photographer/musician looking for a girlfriend. Good luck with that, jerk.
  • Greatest headline ever: Why do people want to eat babies? Also: I must be missing those reward censors they talk about. To me, babies smell like old milk (and sometimes poop), so, no, I do not have impulses to do anything with babies, let alone bite them.
  • This, quite predictably, cracked me up for the entire week, particularly the food bowl emergency. But I’ve also had a cat supervise me while I’m on my hands and knees in my work clothes retrieving cat toys from under sofas. We even have a stretched out wire hanger that we keep on hand for that task. The things we do…..
  • This news is over a month old, but I’m still angry about it. And fearful. Better figure out this whole layering business real fast. Because this winter is going to be cold, wet and white, according to the Farmer’s Almanac.
  • And yes, I still believe in the forecasting accuracy of Farmer’s Almanac. It’s far more reliable than listening to the forecasts from these two dueling weathermen. They got into a parking lot brawl over whether or not it was going to rain last weekend. OR DID THEY??
  • One more thing to freak out about: There are people out there with blue skin. Blue. Skin. Not just one person. More than one. Multiple people.  And not makeup. Like, real blue skin. It gives me the heebies even  thinking about it. I just know I would not stop staring.
blues
None of these guys are who I’m talking about. But man, there are a lot of blue people out there.
abc blue man
I’m talking about this guy. Yikes. Scary. And sad.

 

 

Don’t Be That Girl: Fall Fail

Posted on by thepoelog

I know you can barely see her blurry image in the top right hand of this cell phone picture I snapped yesterday evening on my way home, but trust me on this: this girl in this picture is hella excited for fall.

FALL

She’s got her green striped sweater on. She’s wrestled her way into a pair of thick, dark brown tights. And she’s brought her brown knee high boots out of their long summer retirement.

She’s been buying pumpkin beer, and has already had her first Starbucks pumpkin spice latte of the season. In fact, if I could have gotten closer to her, I’m fairly certain she would have smelled like pumpkin. Or hot apple cider, of which she’s already been drinking gallons.

Her October weekends are completely booked with every OktoberFest in the greater Virginia-DC-Maryland region. She’s lurking in bushes, trying to find even one hint of a leaf changing from green to red or even orange.

She’s got her football jerseys all laid out and pressed and has been chopping wood to feed her fireplace. She’s already stopped shaving her legs, envisioning all the flannel and tweed and corduroy work pants she’ll be wearing.

This chick is mother-foilage-flipping, pumpkin-scented-pee-in-her-tights pumped about fall.

The only problem is: I snapped this picture on September 4, at 6 p.m. and the temperature was a not-so-crisp 84 degrees.

That, by the way, was the above-ground temperature. But as you can maybe discern, she’s entering a DC metro station (which explains my quick and blurry picture – I was afraid she’d get away). Fun fact: DC metro stations (though underground) are generally at least five degrees warmer than outside. Not to mention the metro train, which has probably already stopped running its air conditioning and will be a nice, crowded and toasty 110 degrees and humid.

So enjoy your fall day, dear female lumberjack. And keep working on those arm muscles for all the leaves you’ll have to rake in the coming months. I’m going to continue to wear flip flops, and drink gin and tonics, and use deodorant a little while longer.

fall excitement

A Few Reason Autumn Blows (Including Blowing Leaves)

Posted on by thepoelog

I know I’m in the minority on this one, but I do not like Fall, also known as the Season of Death and Decay, which precedes the Season of White Hell and Hibernation (snow). Here is a non-exhaustive list of things I hate about Fall (which just means there could be a part two at some point).

Tights – Fall brings on the advent of the tights. In theory, tights are cute and very necessary. I actually like the way they look and the warmth they provide. I like the fact that very opaque ones allow me to wear short skirts to work with my knee high boots.

However, I do not enjoy putting them on. It takes a lot of hopping around and contorting to get them on, and invariably, one leg gets twisted around, usually right at the top of the thigh. The toe seams never run along the toes.  And the butt seam always does its own thing. By noon, the knees are saggy, which is so interesting considering the fact that the waistband is tight enough to cut me in half, leaving marks and creating a very unflattering line under my clothes. And being encased in nylon/lycra/torture material for an entire 9 hours makes me itchy by the end of the day. I basically rip them off the moment I get home.

This is basically what it looks like when I’m trying to put on tights in the morning.

Leaves – Remember all those beautiful red and orange leaves on the trees? Yeah, those things fall to the ground. And then they need to be dealt with. Like, raked and wrassled into a big black bag. Which is like, work. Unpaid work. Mind you, they’re usually all gray and soggy by that point, another unpleasant reality. We don’t even have a single tree on our property and yet, I have leaves all over my front garden and back yard. And they just keep coming. Every damn weekend.

We don’t even own any trees.

Pumpkins – The pumpkin cult goes full blast this time of year. People lose their ever-loving minds over pumpkin everything. “ERMAGAHD, Starbucks pumpkin spice lattes are out!!!” — Y’all do know that pumpkin is available other times of the year, right? I’ve seen canned pumpkin on the shelves of Trader Joe’s pretty much year round (unlike their fondue, which is only a seasonal thing – a fact that I think is abhorrent). I’ve also had a pumpkin flavored muffin in the spring, if you can imagine such a thing. I’ve even had pumpkin stuffed ravioli in summer!

And, everybody goes out and buys (or even more of a cliche, goes to a farm and picks) a pumpkin and puts it on their doorstep. You know what happens when you leave a piece of fruit or vegetable sitting outside for weeks, exposed to the elements? Nothing nice, let me tell you. And walking past all those rotting pumpkins on my way to work does not make me want a damn pumpkin latte.

Layering – I cannot grasp the concept of layering. Here’s the deal with me and layering: If I’m wearing a sweater over a blouse, that blouse probably has something wrong with it. Maybe I didn’t iron it, or maybe the buttons pull or gap, or maybe I spilled something on it, but wanted to wear it anyway. With layering, you’re supposed to take off layers as you get warmer, but as you can see, my under layers probably aren’t appropriate and should not be worn on their own.

And, let’s just suppose, that in fact, all my layers are in perfect order and proportion to whatever I’m wearing on the bottom. It warms up a tad bit and I’m ready to shed a trench, and blazer, and sweater, and a scarf, or whatever. What are you supposed to do with the layers you’ve taken off? You’re required to carry them around all damn day. That’s annoying. I cannot keep up with all those clothes.

Blake probably has someone to carry all her discarded layers.

Lethargy – I don’t know if it’s the shorter days or if I have some sort of seasonal disorder or what, but I have ZERO motivation to do anything other than sit on the couch, light tons of overpriced candles, and eat pasta and bread topped with copious amounts of cheese, butter, and cream and baked until it’s scalding hot. Getting to the gym is almost impossible. Why would I leave the nice warm house? Don’t even think about asking me to go to happy hour. I’ve got to scurry home and put on my yoga pants and slippers and ratty house sweater. I can’t even get excited about going shopping, which is pretty much sacrilegious. I need to shop. I live to shop. And there’s all those layers that must be procured.

So there you have it. My top five reasons I hate Fall. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to put on some layers, including tights, and emerge from my groundhog’s hole to go get a pumpkin spice latte. I think it will go quite nicely with my baked pumpkin macaroni and cheese.