I have purchased many pairs of jeans in my life. They are, after all, one of my favorite things to wear. They go with anything, they’re relatively comfortable and occasionally, I even like the way I look in them.
About a month and a half ago I was vacationing in Charleston with some friends whose idea of “shopping” is kind of like a sport. It was like three days of hard core, shop to shop, checking out every last bit of available merchandise in the Charleston metropolitan area. I should have known there was a problem when on the second night of a trip we were sitting in a Bed, Bath and Beyond at 10 p.m. That is some serious shopping.
However, on that trip, I experienced one of those rare, elusive moments during which I was just casually rifling through a stack of jeans and decided to try on a pair that was on sale—and it fit. Perfectly. No tugging, stretching, belting etc needed. Just nice fitting jeans. I bought a pair and so did one of my friends.
Tonight, that pair of jeans pretty much disintegrated in my hands. I have worn them fairly frequently since my purchase. But, I mean, considering I only purchased them six weeks ago, there’s only so many times I could have worn them. And that number is definitely not enough to excuse what happened to those pants.
It started three days ago. I put them on to wear out to dinner and noticed that there were some odd worn patches on the left thigh. Then, yesterday, I put them on again and the worn patches were larger. Tonight, when I put them on, I squatted down to get something and two large holes ripped across the top of my leg. When I got into the car tonight after dinner, I heard a rather distinct ripping sound as a massive hole occurred across the back. (I cannot express how happy I am that did not happen earlier in the evening) I then decided to see just what kind of material we were dealing with here. By the time my friend dropped me at my condo, they were in shreds. I was pretty much wearing cutoffs in February. There are photos, but they will not be shared here because me wearing cutoffs in February is just as pretty as you might imagine.
The truly ironic part about the total destruction of the jeans is that this very evening, I had gone out with a friend in search of the same jeans. I couldn’t find another pair in my size. She, on the other hand, bought three pair. In one sense, that’s a little depressing since there is clearly an issue with the fabric. In another sense, with three, I figure she’s got a good 18 weeks ahead of her of wearing some of the most comfortable jeans I ever owned. And I’m a little envious.
Saturday, February 9, 2008
Friday, February 8, 2008
The View
A good deal of my days are spent sitting at my desk in my office. And while I’m supposed to be focused entirely on what’s going on on the computer screen in front of me or the magazine proofs all over my desk, I occasionally (always) become rather distracted by what’s going on outside my window.
I’m on the 14th floor facing several other buildings so you wouldn’t think I’d get to see a lot of actual human activity, it’s kind of amazing all that I have seen in my time here. In the Sovreign, the massive building being built to the left of my window, two construction workers fell down an elevator shaft and died one day. For hours we watched emergency crews, ambulances and eventually the coroner arrive. In the parking lot of the building directly across from my window a drunk driver drove his car directly off the 7th floor of the parking garage where it was suspended by the cables until firemen scaled the wall and got him out of the car. I didn’t get to see all that as it happened in the middle of the night, but I did get to see all of the investigative work the following day. One evening, around 6ish, I saw two cars drive up to the very top of the parking deck across from me where no cars ever go. There was an exchange of two black suitcases by two men who kept their heads down the entire time and were never out of their cars at the same time. I’m pretty sure that was something I wasn’t meant to see.
The thing is, when my time at this desk is over, I will miss the daily drama that unfolds outside my window. What I will not miss however, is the pool that is in my direct line of vision – even when I’m trying to look at my computer! It is blue, tempting and looks oh-so-relaxing. And in the summer, it is packed. All day long. People splashing, laughing, laying out, reading books, floating around and just generally seeming to have a fantastic time.
Where do these people work?!? I want the job that ends with me living in a nice condo and lounging by my pool all day. And so, because my job actually involves me having to watch this display of happiness and not be a part of it, I think it’s best that I’ll be gone from my window post before the warm weather arrives. Because I think it might have been awkward when I snuck away from my desk and my co-workers noticed me soaking up the sun on a float in that pool. Which is exactly what I had planned to do come April.
I’m on the 14th floor facing several other buildings so you wouldn’t think I’d get to see a lot of actual human activity, it’s kind of amazing all that I have seen in my time here. In the Sovreign, the massive building being built to the left of my window, two construction workers fell down an elevator shaft and died one day. For hours we watched emergency crews, ambulances and eventually the coroner arrive. In the parking lot of the building directly across from my window a drunk driver drove his car directly off the 7th floor of the parking garage where it was suspended by the cables until firemen scaled the wall and got him out of the car. I didn’t get to see all that as it happened in the middle of the night, but I did get to see all of the investigative work the following day. One evening, around 6ish, I saw two cars drive up to the very top of the parking deck across from me where no cars ever go. There was an exchange of two black suitcases by two men who kept their heads down the entire time and were never out of their cars at the same time. I’m pretty sure that was something I wasn’t meant to see.
The thing is, when my time at this desk is over, I will miss the daily drama that unfolds outside my window. What I will not miss however, is the pool that is in my direct line of vision – even when I’m trying to look at my computer! It is blue, tempting and looks oh-so-relaxing. And in the summer, it is packed. All day long. People splashing, laughing, laying out, reading books, floating around and just generally seeming to have a fantastic time.
Where do these people work?!? I want the job that ends with me living in a nice condo and lounging by my pool all day. And so, because my job actually involves me having to watch this display of happiness and not be a part of it, I think it’s best that I’ll be gone from my window post before the warm weather arrives. Because I think it might have been awkward when I snuck away from my desk and my co-workers noticed me soaking up the sun on a float in that pool. Which is exactly what I had planned to do come April.
Wednesday, February 6, 2008
Sawyer and Kate 4ever
Tonight I intend to watch the finale of season three and the premier of season four of Lost online. If I do this, I will be completely caught up to watch it in real time with the rest of the world tomorrow night. I’m not sure if I can explain how excited that makes me. But I can explain what that means as far as where my time has been spent the last several weeks.
I started watching January 7th. Then I went to London, where they don’t allow access to the streaming version of Lost online (what?!?!), January 19th through the 27th. This means I’ve had a total of 22 Lost viewing days. There have been 72 episodes. This means I’ve been watching more than three episodes per day on average. Each episode is approximately 43 minutes long.
I think this might indicate that I’m just as lame as my brother who has been in town for the last three days keeps telling me I am. This, and the fact that I’ve watched 90% of these episodes lying on my stomach in bed with my dachshund chewing rawhide on my back.
Tuesday, February 5, 2008
Awesome.
Monday, February 4, 2008
My Bro
My brother Everett and I get along pretty well. This hasn’t always been the case. In fact, most of our lives were spent with me attempting to kill him on a daily basis. I don’t really know why. It just seemed like the right thing to do. I guess I had a lot of pent of frustrations for various reasons and he was a little bit smaller than me, definitely less of a fighter than me and in general susceptible to me luring him into fights I always knew I could win.
I wish I could say this ended when I was in middle school, or even high school really. But, if we’re going to be honest, sometimes when I would come home from college, we’d still get into all out fights which usually ended with me screaming for Boots, my parents’ dachshund to “kill” Everett and cackling as she charged into the room and latched on to his ankle.
The fights definitely slowed though as he grew much bigger than me. I remember the first time I provoked him and he won. He actually hit me in the jaw so hard I had a bruise for days. I remember thinking that I’d hesitate the next time I went into his room with the sole intention of beating him.
With a history like this, it’s no small miracle that we can even stand to be in the same room with each other. But, now that he’s a good 6 inches taller than me and significantly stronger, I don’t really challenge him physically too often. And when I do, I’m shut down pretty quickly. And for some reason he’s decided to forgive me for a good 16 years of beatings and, after considerable thought, I’ve decided to forgive him for that bruise to my jaw.
So, we’re going to travel together for seven weeks. That’s right. Seven weeks. Seven weeks of making choices that directly affect the other. Seven weeks of all day, every day.
When I first broached this idea to Everett, his response was, “Sarah, I love you, and I’d love to hang out with you for two… three… four… five……….minutes. But seven weeks?” After a little convincing though, he’s come around. But I think he’s a little apprehensive.
Right now, he’s visiting Atlanta for a few days and tonight we decided to go for a walk in the park near my condo. Immediately there were several disputes. His total inability to understand Rosie’s leash, left me screaming at him not to kill my dachshund. Then, all of two minutes after we’d entered the park, which is in the middle of a neighborhood and has a golf course in the middle, he proceeds to tell me that he needs to relieve himself and then walks across the golf green to go pee on the other side. Seriously? I’m supposed to deal with a public urinater for seven weeks?
As we walked, we talked about the trip. I voiced my thoughts and he argued with them. By the time we’d made it the two miles around, Everett had pretty much established that he was going to just drink his way through the trip because that was the only way he could get through it. As we climbed into my car, he kept saying over and over again that he was just going to think of it as a party. He actually kept muttering this under his breath as if he was saying it to himself as a mantra to comfort himself. I thought he was going to need a paper bag to breath into just to calm him down.
I think we’ll do fine though. My friend Laura will be with us and chances are, Everett won’t murder me in front of another person. In fact, he’s already emailed Laura, who has never met him, to tell her that it’s good she’s coming because otherwise “I would literally kill my sister.” So I’m kind of banking on that. That, and the hope that public urination isn’t illegal in some countries.
I wish I could say this ended when I was in middle school, or even high school really. But, if we’re going to be honest, sometimes when I would come home from college, we’d still get into all out fights which usually ended with me screaming for Boots, my parents’ dachshund to “kill” Everett and cackling as she charged into the room and latched on to his ankle.
The fights definitely slowed though as he grew much bigger than me. I remember the first time I provoked him and he won. He actually hit me in the jaw so hard I had a bruise for days. I remember thinking that I’d hesitate the next time I went into his room with the sole intention of beating him.
With a history like this, it’s no small miracle that we can even stand to be in the same room with each other. But, now that he’s a good 6 inches taller than me and significantly stronger, I don’t really challenge him physically too often. And when I do, I’m shut down pretty quickly. And for some reason he’s decided to forgive me for a good 16 years of beatings and, after considerable thought, I’ve decided to forgive him for that bruise to my jaw.
So, we’re going to travel together for seven weeks. That’s right. Seven weeks. Seven weeks of making choices that directly affect the other. Seven weeks of all day, every day.
When I first broached this idea to Everett, his response was, “Sarah, I love you, and I’d love to hang out with you for two… three… four… five……….minutes. But seven weeks?” After a little convincing though, he’s come around. But I think he’s a little apprehensive.
Right now, he’s visiting Atlanta for a few days and tonight we decided to go for a walk in the park near my condo. Immediately there were several disputes. His total inability to understand Rosie’s leash, left me screaming at him not to kill my dachshund. Then, all of two minutes after we’d entered the park, which is in the middle of a neighborhood and has a golf course in the middle, he proceeds to tell me that he needs to relieve himself and then walks across the golf green to go pee on the other side. Seriously? I’m supposed to deal with a public urinater for seven weeks?
As we walked, we talked about the trip. I voiced my thoughts and he argued with them. By the time we’d made it the two miles around, Everett had pretty much established that he was going to just drink his way through the trip because that was the only way he could get through it. As we climbed into my car, he kept saying over and over again that he was just going to think of it as a party. He actually kept muttering this under his breath as if he was saying it to himself as a mantra to comfort himself. I thought he was going to need a paper bag to breath into just to calm him down.
I think we’ll do fine though. My friend Laura will be with us and chances are, Everett won’t murder me in front of another person. In fact, he’s already emailed Laura, who has never met him, to tell her that it’s good she’s coming because otherwise “I would literally kill my sister.” So I’m kind of banking on that. That, and the hope that public urination isn’t illegal in some countries.
Sunday, February 3, 2008
Chew this Over
Friday morning started just like any other day.
I arrived at work, threw my purse down next to my desk, walked over to chat with friends about what we’d done in the last 12 hours since we’d last seen each other, came back to my desk, pulled my window shade down to shield me from the bright morning sun, took my blueberry flavored Nutri Grain bar and Diet Sprite out of my bag, ate my “breakfast” while I checked my email and flipped through a copy of WWD. Typical Friday morning.
Until, I reached back into my bag and pulled out my pack of Orbitz spearmint gum. (Seen above) I was on my last piece.
I popped it out of the packaging, put it in my mouth and clicked over to read a few celebrity gossip blogs.
And this is where things got strange.
The gum was not spearmint. It was, without a doubt, original Bubble Gum flavored. It was delicious. It was refreshing. But it was definitely not what every other piece of gum in the spearmint labeled pack had been.
How does this happen?
I felt that I should share with others in my office, but no one seemed to have a good explanation of how the bubble gum made its way into the spearmint pack. I mean, in my mind, at the Orbitz plant, these gums are manufactured in totally separate rooms. Maybe even different buildings. And yet that one little piece was all sealed up in there, masquerading as spearmint.
I think is probably one of the great mysteries of our time. I know it’s something that will baffle me for years to come.
Friday, February 1, 2008
D
Tonight I shared with my friends my plan in future weeks to write haikus at the start of each blog entry as I travel around the world. None of them seems sure where I’m going. Some seem to think I’ll be traveling in Europe. Others seem determined that I’ll be in Eastern Europe. Still others think that we’ll be visiting the “world’s biggest intersection.” Whatever the case, wherever I am in the coming weeks, I have a goal to write haiku poems at the start of each entry. I don’t really have a reason for this. I didn’t even know totally what that meant until tonight, but it seems like a hippie thing to do and since I’m going on a “find yourself” kind of trip, I figure it’s only natural that I smoke a lot of pot and write a lot of ancient far eastern poetry. Right? (Just kidding about that pot smoking part)
Anyway, as I was sharing my big poetry penning plans, there was some insistence that I share with all the world (or the two of you who read my blog – thanks Mom and Rosie!) what my friends and I were up to this evening. And so I will.
Today was my friend Daryn’s last day of work at the magazine where I spend the majority of my days. And I am really going to miss her. Somewhere along the way, Daryn became not only one of my closest friends at the magazine, but also one of my favorite people in Atlanta. And so tonight we celebrated her departure. There were tears. There was reminiscing. But mostly there was a lot of laughing because with that group, there always is.
So now, in my ode to Daryn, I will share the things I will miss most - sorry Mom and Rosie, you won’t totally get these.
I will miss the way Daryn calls herself a Grandma like every other day even though she’s easily one of my hottest, most vibrant friends and is only like 2 years older than me.
I’ll miss her blunt fashion sense. “I’m sorry, I like all your other shoes, but not those boots.”
I’ll miss her adoration of Malcolm-ish, small furry dogs.
I’ll miss her imitations of a certain person in our office. They were uncanny in their similarity. And hilarious.
I’ll miss her ghetto dancing. And her rummaging through “the beauty box.”
And her ability to eat things like mayonnaise and French fries and still be the size of my pinky finger. (Well, I’ll only miss this a little.)
There are lots of things about Daryn I’m going to miss around the office and especially in the small group of us who have become close friends at the magazine, but I guess really what I’ll miss most is that group itself. Because it won’t be the same without Daryn. And because that group of five is what has made my time in Atlanta the gift that it has been for me. While I’m happy for Daryn and know that she is taking advantage of an incredible opportunity, I am a little sad too because tonight was the end of an era. And I guess that’s always a little sad. So, in an effort not to end on a depressing note, I will write my first official haiku:
daryn is awesome
she loves gucci and doodoo
she will be much missed
Anyway, as I was sharing my big poetry penning plans, there was some insistence that I share with all the world (or the two of you who read my blog – thanks Mom and Rosie!) what my friends and I were up to this evening. And so I will.
Today was my friend Daryn’s last day of work at the magazine where I spend the majority of my days. And I am really going to miss her. Somewhere along the way, Daryn became not only one of my closest friends at the magazine, but also one of my favorite people in Atlanta. And so tonight we celebrated her departure. There were tears. There was reminiscing. But mostly there was a lot of laughing because with that group, there always is.
So now, in my ode to Daryn, I will share the things I will miss most - sorry Mom and Rosie, you won’t totally get these.
I will miss the way Daryn calls herself a Grandma like every other day even though she’s easily one of my hottest, most vibrant friends and is only like 2 years older than me.
I’ll miss her blunt fashion sense. “I’m sorry, I like all your other shoes, but not those boots.”
I’ll miss her adoration of Malcolm-ish, small furry dogs.
I’ll miss her imitations of a certain person in our office. They were uncanny in their similarity. And hilarious.
I’ll miss her ghetto dancing. And her rummaging through “the beauty box.”
And her ability to eat things like mayonnaise and French fries and still be the size of my pinky finger. (Well, I’ll only miss this a little.)
There are lots of things about Daryn I’m going to miss around the office and especially in the small group of us who have become close friends at the magazine, but I guess really what I’ll miss most is that group itself. Because it won’t be the same without Daryn. And because that group of five is what has made my time in Atlanta the gift that it has been for me. While I’m happy for Daryn and know that she is taking advantage of an incredible opportunity, I am a little sad too because tonight was the end of an era. And I guess that’s always a little sad. So, in an effort not to end on a depressing note, I will write my first official haiku:
daryn is awesome
she loves gucci and doodoo
she will be much missed
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)