Friday, October 13, 2006

This Week So Far

At the State Fair!



Monday: The whole purpose of having My Sweetie take a half day off work during a weekday to go to the Texas State Fair is to AVOID THE CROWDS. Apparently Columbus Day is a major holiday in Texas and by major holiday I mean the day EVERYONE GOES TO THE FAIR. It was bedlam and chaos. My Sweetie was VERY proud of me that I didn't have a panic attack right away and want to leave. Actually it became a game to me to find bathrooms with no lines which I did every time after the first time - and that was near the entrance so I had no choice. We still had a good time and did most of the stuff we usually do. The Marilyn Monroe exhibit was very good and THAT bathroom was empty. The best part was the "Guess Your Age" guy guessed me at 39. The worst part was we didn't get to see the sheep dog exhibit, although I'm pretty sure it would have been the same as last year. And the year before that. And all the other times we've seen it.

Tuesday: We had to do the yearly Community Watch meeting out in the cul-de-sac. That's the type of thing I dread more than almost anything except maybe sitting in a large flourescent-lit waiting room. The good news was it got dark pretty quickly after we went out there. I'm cool beans in the dark. It was over pretty quickly and we thanked the police officer for his talk, snatched up our chairs and practically ran up the yard. I was jealous of the people that didn't come, but we live RIGHT NEXT DOOR to the sweet old WWII vet that organizes it.

Wednesday: Meals on Wheels added ANOTHER person to my route. I had only around 6 people all summer and now I have 11. I don't mind, but if they keep going at this rate I'll have 20 people by next month. I've mentioned before that we have "regular" clients and "diet" clients. The "diet" in this case does not refer to calories or fat grams but is diabetes/sugar related. The way my route is now, my first eight clients are regular and my last 3 are diet. I didn't realize until I got to the first diet house that I had 3 regular cookies left or I would have given out the extras. So I brought them home. This morning I dreamed that Meals on Wheels called me and asked if I had had extra cookies on Wednesday. I said "Yes, I brought them home." They said, "Well we need those back. You'll have to bring them in." I have the weirdest dreams.

Thursday: (Daytime Talk Shows Edition) I used to watch Dr. Phil every day at 3:00. At the beginning of the season last year I just couldn't take it any more. I found it very depressing that The Dr. Phil show was able to find an endless assortment of mean ignorant callous bullies. If you think about it that's what most of his guests are. Or pathetic doormat "victims." Yuck. Has the U.S. produced THAT MANY of these people? Again, yuck. So I started watching The Ellen Degeneres Show (or "Ellen" as most people call it). I thought it was a great show. Good stand-up at the beginning and lots of interesting guests and goofy skits (only the dancing part was kinda creepy). I was happy to have something fun to have on while I did my chores. Well, I don't know what happened but this year is terrible. Ellen seemed so full of joy last year, like she was genuinely having a good time. This year she seems to have a hard edge. She doesn't seem to be having fun at all and it feels like she is just going through the motions (or phoning it in). I hope she doesn't win the emmy again because she seems to be making no effort whatsoever. Oprah, on the other hand, seems more relaxed than ever. I'm grooving on the Tuesday road-trip episodes. Unless a guest I really like is on, Tuesday is about the only day I actually sit down and watch the whole show. Or if the topic is interesting. Lastly, I used to be a Rachel Ray fan. Now I know why "30 Minutes Meals" and "$40 a Day" were shows with just Rachel and a camera. I saw ONE episode of her new show and it was terrible. Okay maybe not terrible. More like horrible. She was manic and rude. She talked over (shouted over) anyone she was speaking to and running around like the set was on fire. I actually watched the episode that Oprah was on. Oprah is practically the owner of the show and she seemed subdued and shocked. I felt like I could see her thinking, "What the hell was I thinking? This is worse than Beloved."

On the other hand, I dedicated 4 hours today to a wonderful, savory beef stew. My daughter dropped by and decided to stay for dinner. She picked a good day. I'm looking forward to my leftovers for lunch tomorrow!

2 comments:

Jammie J. said...

Even though the fair was crowded, I'm glad you had a good time. Especially glad that you didn't have a panic attack, that would NOT have been a good time.

I'm also glad the neighborhood meeting was tolerable, I know you wrote how you were kind of dreading that.

I've heard a lot of good things about the road trip on Oprah -- it's almost over, isn't it? I've not watched it, Tony saw one episode though. I wanted to TIVO the episode about N. Korea, but something got messed up and I missed it. (sigh)

All I can say about savory beef stew is "mmmmm."

Ian Lidster said...

The beef stew sounds better than a dozen Oprah's or ego-inflated and arrogant Dr. Phils. Actually, I used to like listening to him abusing the shit out of some of the morons on the show. But then I thought, that's really too much like shooting fish in a barrel. I think it would be good if he would focus on sufferers of megalomania sometime. I'd be interested in his findings, especially if he looked in the mirror at the time.
I liked your day-by-day account of your week.
Cheers,
Ian