Wednesday, March 30, 2005
falling in love all over again
I just went to a reading by Kathryn Davis (author of Labrador, The Girl Who Trod on a Loaf, Hell, The Walking Tour, and Versailles) and she was absolutely incredible. Her writing is just lovely--complex and vivid and so alive that you could see the characters take shape in front of your eyes as she read. I've only read The Girl Who Trod on a Loaf, so far--my gorgeous hardcover copy of which I could not find this evening so I couldn't bring it for her to sign!--but now that I've been reminded just how much I loved that book when I first read it years ago, I plan to start reading Davis' work again. I'm particularily looking forward to her new book, The Thin Place from which she read and which is coming out in January. I read so much for school that I sometimes forget the overwhelming pleasure of getting lost in a novel.
Saturday, March 26, 2005
heat wave
Okay, something's wrong with me. It's 40 degrees outside, but it feels positively balmy. No, really! I've gotten so used to living in the snow belt that my former Arizona/Virginia blood has increased in viscosity to the point that as long as it's above freezing and sunny I'm ready to run around in my bathing suit. Does this mean spring is really coming or is it yet another tease?
Thursday, March 17, 2005
reluctantly back
So I was recently in San Francisco and it's depressing as hell to return from 75 degree sunny weather to cold, grey skies and dirty snow. I'm ready to drop out of school and move to California and sit on the beach all day and live off of seaweed and mussels...okay, so not really but close.
As a welcome-home present, I drove through a pothole last night that was so deep that I bent the rim of my tire! Luckily, I remembered my dad's lessons on changing tires (and received some unsolicited, but friendly, help from my neighbor's handyman) and now my car seems to be okay again. Not to be only complaining: after a week alone together, my cats seem to be finally somewhat getting along (rather than the smaller one with claws beating up the sweet, fat one without claws whenever he even looks at her wrong) and Olive (the new addition, the clawed one) actually came into the living room and sat in a chair next to the couch while the dog was sitting on the couch with me. Very impressive since she usually spends all her time huddled on the kitchen counter when the dog's in the house.
By the way, have I mentioned that I'm loving Law and Order: Trail by Jury? It may just be that I've always liked Bebe Neuwirth and Amy Carlson is cute, but that's enough for me. :)
As a welcome-home present, I drove through a pothole last night that was so deep that I bent the rim of my tire! Luckily, I remembered my dad's lessons on changing tires (and received some unsolicited, but friendly, help from my neighbor's handyman) and now my car seems to be okay again. Not to be only complaining: after a week alone together, my cats seem to be finally somewhat getting along (rather than the smaller one with claws beating up the sweet, fat one without claws whenever he even looks at her wrong) and Olive (the new addition, the clawed one) actually came into the living room and sat in a chair next to the couch while the dog was sitting on the couch with me. Very impressive since she usually spends all her time huddled on the kitchen counter when the dog's in the house.
By the way, have I mentioned that I'm loving Law and Order: Trail by Jury? It may just be that I've always liked Bebe Neuwirth and Amy Carlson is cute, but that's enough for me. :)
Wednesday, March 02, 2005
a story about the axis of corporate evil
In case everyone in America didn't know it already, U-Haul is the axis of evil. Here's my lovely story, which I think might top many other U-Haul stories I've heard to date (wait for the big finish before you pass judgment).
Three weeks ago, I made a reservation (which is code in U-Haul-speak for "disposable") because, after 10 months of virtual co-habitation, my girlfriend, April, and I finally decided to go ahead and actually move all her furniture and stuff (mountains and mountains of it, it seems, as I survey the junk warehouse that has become our living space--she has more clothes and shoes than God, yes, more than me, but, boy, do I love her, so it's okay) into my house. This saves us driving across town all the time and, as graduate students, we do not have the means to have two separate residences!
Of course, come Sunday when we dutifully arrived at U-Haul at 8:55am to pick up our truck (note that they reserved us a truck at the location in town that is probably the farthest possible from both her apartment and my house) some idiot (I'm being nice) at the regional office had deleted our reservation the night before. Why? No one really knew. But luckily one of the assistant managers had seen it happen and, although she didn't try to stop it the night before when our name miraculously vanished from their computer ("Oh. That girl's truck just got deleted. Guess there's nothing I can do about it. Maybe they'll forget they needed it."), she was incredibly conciliatory and offered to find us a truck at 5pm that day for half the price.
Partially mollified, but frequently repeating "fuckers" under our breath, we returned home to move boxes with the help of some of our friends. Naturally, we had been very organized and all we had left to move was heavy furniture and unbreakable items all packed neatly in boxes and so we wasted countless hours driving back and forth across town with items that could have been easily packed and secured in the truck and driven over in one trip.
Anyway, eight hours later, we went back to U-Haul to pick up our truck—now that it was starting to get dark, the wind was picking up and an end-of-February chill was starting to set in. The helpful employee kindly offered to back up the truck for us in the crowded parking lot and we agreed because we felt she had more experience than both of us put together with maneuvering big vehicles around a small space. Not so. She starts to back up the truck…and backs it right into my girlfriend’s little SUV. I was waving my hands frantically at her to stop, to no avail, and we heard a loud crunch. After our day, the response was more one of dejection than the righteous fury we could have mustered had we not already been bone-tired and disillusioned:“Did she just hit my car?”“Yeah, she did. She fucking just hit your car.”
Suffice it to say, the car is fine save a gauge in the bumper, although we went through a lot of extra trouble getting U-Haul’s insurance information just in case the bumper falls up in the next weeks. Our move went without a hitch from that point forward, barring the fact that by the time we got everything moved into the house it was dark and very cold, some rooms had so much stuff in them that you had to walk on furniture to cross them, we were both so tired that we could hardly moved], and the animals were stumbling around the debris in complete bewilderment.
On a happier note, things are slowly returning to normal (although now I have a cold) and furniture is being sorted and arranged. I’m sure the end product will be a beautiful amalgam of our relationship together and look lovely, but I know neither of us will every forget how harrowing our moving experience was thanks to the negligence and, let’s face it, complete and utter idiocy of one company that, frankly, has a monopoly on the moving industry. Bah.
Three weeks ago, I made a reservation (which is code in U-Haul-speak for "disposable") because, after 10 months of virtual co-habitation, my girlfriend, April, and I finally decided to go ahead and actually move all her furniture and stuff (mountains and mountains of it, it seems, as I survey the junk warehouse that has become our living space--she has more clothes and shoes than God, yes, more than me, but, boy, do I love her, so it's okay) into my house. This saves us driving across town all the time and, as graduate students, we do not have the means to have two separate residences!
Of course, come Sunday when we dutifully arrived at U-Haul at 8:55am to pick up our truck (note that they reserved us a truck at the location in town that is probably the farthest possible from both her apartment and my house) some idiot (I'm being nice) at the regional office had deleted our reservation the night before. Why? No one really knew. But luckily one of the assistant managers had seen it happen and, although she didn't try to stop it the night before when our name miraculously vanished from their computer ("Oh. That girl's truck just got deleted. Guess there's nothing I can do about it. Maybe they'll forget they needed it."), she was incredibly conciliatory and offered to find us a truck at 5pm that day for half the price.
Partially mollified, but frequently repeating "fuckers" under our breath, we returned home to move boxes with the help of some of our friends. Naturally, we had been very organized and all we had left to move was heavy furniture and unbreakable items all packed neatly in boxes and so we wasted countless hours driving back and forth across town with items that could have been easily packed and secured in the truck and driven over in one trip.
Anyway, eight hours later, we went back to U-Haul to pick up our truck—now that it was starting to get dark, the wind was picking up and an end-of-February chill was starting to set in. The helpful employee kindly offered to back up the truck for us in the crowded parking lot and we agreed because we felt she had more experience than both of us put together with maneuvering big vehicles around a small space. Not so. She starts to back up the truck…and backs it right into my girlfriend’s little SUV. I was waving my hands frantically at her to stop, to no avail, and we heard a loud crunch. After our day, the response was more one of dejection than the righteous fury we could have mustered had we not already been bone-tired and disillusioned:“Did she just hit my car?”“Yeah, she did. She fucking just hit your car.”
Suffice it to say, the car is fine save a gauge in the bumper, although we went through a lot of extra trouble getting U-Haul’s insurance information just in case the bumper falls up in the next weeks. Our move went without a hitch from that point forward, barring the fact that by the time we got everything moved into the house it was dark and very cold, some rooms had so much stuff in them that you had to walk on furniture to cross them, we were both so tired that we could hardly moved], and the animals were stumbling around the debris in complete bewilderment.
On a happier note, things are slowly returning to normal (although now I have a cold) and furniture is being sorted and arranged. I’m sure the end product will be a beautiful amalgam of our relationship together and look lovely, but I know neither of us will every forget how harrowing our moving experience was thanks to the negligence and, let’s face it, complete and utter idiocy of one company that, frankly, has a monopoly on the moving industry. Bah.
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