Do Jellyfish Eat Oreos?

There’s a reason that there hasn’t been a running post on here in a while.  I’m not running anymore the only running you will see on this post from now on are run-on sentences.  As much as I loved it, my ankles, knees, and back did not.  I’ve had to face the fact that my riding accident ended joint pounding athletics for me.  Osteochondral lesions, potential surgery, months of physical therapy, and the thought of unattractive fashion choices among hospital gowns that leave my ass exposed are some of the things that have led me to this difficult decision.  And difficult it was.  For a while, I convinced myself that I could continue.  However, hobbling home after what should have been an easy three-mile run convinced me that grinding my joints to dust would not be in my best interests unless I wanted to spend my life as a jellyfish.  As appealing as floating around my apartment consuming everything within reach of my grasping fingers may be, I do not want to end up with my own TLC program, The Jellyfish Woman, sandwiched between showings of The Woman with the Talking Tumor and The Man with Three Brains.  That last show is fascinating. As we all know, men usually only have two thinking organs.

I can walk.  I can use the elliptical machine.  But no running. What has surprised me is how the news that my running days are over has affected me.  We’re talking depression, folks.  Woe is me and all that shit.  I have been cranky, moody, and weepy.  Ordinarily I run when the cRazY strikes.  But that is no longer an option.  So I go for a walk.  Well, dye my hair blue and call me Hazel!  All I need is a velour tracksuit and a few stories about my home in Boca and I’m all set.  As I power walk in the park, runners pass me and I wonder if they think I’m lazy or lack the mental toughness it takes to be a runner.  Because I am not lazy.  I am a procrastinator.  There’s a difference!  Laziness is sitting on the couch in the dark because you don’t feel like getting up to turn on the light.  Procrastination is . . . well, I’ll tell you later.

Ironically, since I’ve started walking as exercise I’ve lost four pounds.  Four pounds!  In one week!  What the hell?  When I was running it would take me weeks to lose four pounds.  I like to think that it has something to do with my awareness that consuming a Starbucks Luscious Lemon Tart has greater repercussions on the circumference of my hips now that I’m no longer doing five mile laps in the park.  Believe it or not, a pack of Oreos has been sitting in the kitchen sniffling and whining about loneliness for over a week.  But I resist, muttering protective spells and making the sign of the food pyramid.  Instead of reaching for the chocolaty double-stuffed goodness, I grab an apple. 

The Cougar was up visiting last week and helped me stock my kitchen with healthy food.  I’ve been cooking healthy meals but grazing snacking sabotages me.  I need things that can be prepared quickly and eaten on the go.  Or in front of the TV.  So The Cougar and I went grocery shopping. “Do you like bananas?” she asked, holding up a yellow crescent-moon shaped object.  “Ba-na-na?  What mean this thing ‘ba-na-na’?” She was not amused.  “Fruit, you need to eat more fruit,” she insisted.  Now, I’m no stranger to fruit, I eat the garnish on my frozen alcoholic beverages.  But fruit all on its own?  With no margarita to accompany it?  Who does such a thing?  I loaded my cart with apples, grapes, oranges, and berries but put the kibosh on unsweetened fruit cocktail.  My idea of a fruit cocktail is a gin soaked olive.  Anything else is just obscene. 

So, I’ve been walking and reaching for fruit and veggies, leaving the Oreos to whine plaintively on the shelf.  I miss running.  I miss the endorphins, I miss the zen of breath and body, and I miss the freak parade and my fellow runners , but I think I would miss my joints and cartilage more. 

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Washed Up

There’s a good reason for my unexpected blogging hiatus.  But I don’t want to bore you with tales of luxurious warm days flashing my six-pack abs in a HAWT white bikini on the Cote d’Azure or lull you to sleep with anecdotes of decadent nights hobnobbing with the Hollywood elite.  No, we’ll just pretend that I spent Spring Break conducting important science experiments about mass and inertia: 

How many Peeps can one consume before someone who hasn’t run in two weeks swells up to Violet Beauregard proportions?

I also pondered the great questions of math and logic:

How long does it take to grade 59 papers, 62 Mid-Terms, and 57 writing exercises when Real Housewives and The Millionaire Matchmaker have back to back marathons?

Then, there was the Great Dishwasher Debacle.  The email from Marian the Librarian was unexpected.  “We’re moving and we no longer need our portable dishwasher.  Do you want it?” I know if I were a good friend my first thoughts should have been, where are you moving to?  When?  Do you need help?  But no, my first thought was DISHWASHER!  Mr. Dingo was startled at the tears that sprang to my eyes.  He asked if I was okay and between sobs I informed him that we were getting a dishwasher.  I may have even jumped up and down and mimed spiking a football before propelling myself across the apartment in a Charlies Angel’s roll in celebration. 

I love, love, love a clean house.  Many a night when I can’t sleep I drool over the interior decorating porn on Apartment Therapy and Desire to Inspire.  The airy, bright living rooms, spotless tubs, the mystery of “where in the hell did they store all their clothes?” and the crisp, pet-hair free couches make me swoon.  I just don’t have the time to make the apartment look like those photos.  Sure, sometimes cleaning can be therapeutic.  Like when I finally move the couch to vacuum and find a wayward Oxycontin tablet.  Those turn out to be lovely afternoons.  Just me, the tingly feelings, and pretty colors. 

Anyway, the dishwasher was like winning the lotto.  It was beautiful.  I named her Bianca.  I also let the dishes pile up for days.  I would use one spoon to scoop the sugar into my tea and a different one to stir it.  When I was feeling wild and reckless I took plates from the cupboards and licked them thoroughly before placing them on the counter next to the sink — because I HAD A DISHWASHER!  The day finally came to let Bianca do what she was born to do.  I loaded the dishwasher, hit Start, and the gentle swishing of water fell upon my ears like the dulcet tones of angels.  And then it all went black.  Pitch black.  I called to Dingo Girl hoping she would act as a seeing eye dog and lead me to my bed where I could cry myself to sleep, but she cleared out when the first cries of “Shitfuckgoddamnmutherfucker!” bounced off the walls. 

Apparently, our apartment is a holdover from the Middle Ages and the fuses can’t cope with the demands made by a dishwasher.  Bianca requires more power than the gear and pulley system attached to the hamster wheel in the fuse box is able to muster.  So, this weekend, we listed Bianca on freecycle.com and placed her on the curb for some lucky person to pick up.  I taped a sign to her door:  WILL WORK FOR FUSE.

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Welcome to Crazytown

I have frizzy hair.  Please, please, you are too kind.  There is no need to protest in my hair’s defense.  I know I have frizzy hair.  The Hunch-Back Woman at the post-office told me so.  If anyone knows frizzy, it’s the Hunch-Back Woman with her I Dream of Jeannie couture, Sideshow Bob ‘do, and John Wayne Gacy clown make-up.

During a Starbucks Workday last week, I decided to take a brief study break and stop by the nearby post office to mail a package.  I pass this post office frequently and Hunch-Back Woman appears to be a permanent fixture. You can smell her before you see her — she’s fond of a particularly aromatic variety of maryjane.  In fact, if you stand downwind of her for a minute, you get just a little high.

Hunch-Back Woman usually stands at the door to the post office and opens it for the unsuspecting public like a mime playing a doorman except that the door is real.  And she is not silent.  I say “unsuspecting” because the last thing you expect as she holds the door open is to have her bellow the post office hours in your ear.  It’s a lovely customer service.  I don’t know why the post office didn’t think of it themselves.  It’s so much more convenient than having to review the hours plainly posted on the door.

What post office patrons could do without, however, is the colorful dressing down they receive if they ignore the nasty coffee-cup tip jar half filled with an unknown, grayish fluid she shakes in your face as you enter the building.  Hunch-Back Woman has quite a repertoire.  “Cheap bastard!” and “Dirty Whore” seem to be her favorites, but those epithets are usually reserved for the people who actually tip her.  Those who don’t tip her are often called much worse.  Her favorite — perhaps she is a fan of Mike Myers’s films — seems to be “Fat Bastard.” Every now and then I’ve heard her let loose with “Motherfucker!” but I think that special nickname is reserved for those who decide that facing off against Yucko the Hopheaded Clown is not on their Bucket List and decide to come back some other time.

On this particular day, I had already been tapped out of tips.  Figuring I would get a pass because I give Hunch-Back Woman change every time I see her, I offered a smile and a “Sorry.” Oh, yes, I was sorry.  Her pasted-on smile immediately transformed into one of Virgil’s Furies and I began to wonder if Hunch-Back Woman’s Wet & Wild Carnage Red lipstick was actually the bloody remnants of other non-tippers.  She sucked in enough air to demonstrate a lifetime of perfecting the art of inhalation before expelling a loud and vicious…

 
“FRIZZY!”
 

Um, what?  Frizzy?  Frizzy?!  I was stunned.  I was braced for “bitch” or worse, but not FRIZZY!  Is FRIZZY worse than Dirty Whore, Cheap Bastard, Twatwaffle, or all the other colorful euphemisms for men, women, sex acts, minorities, and homosexuals?  Because, believe me, I’ve heard her use almost all of them but I’ve never heard her use FRIZZY.  Self-consciously I reached up to touch my hair.  Had I forgotten to use my humidity resistant gel this morning?  I did switch conditioners, but this winter weather has really made.... 

Seeing my weakness she pounced on it. 

“Your hair is FRIZZY!  FRIZZY!  FRIZZY!  Hahahahah!  You have FRIZZY hair!”

I rushed past her into the post office lobby checking over my shoulder to make sure she wasn’t flying at me with VO5 and a hair net.  I seemed safe for the time being and the long lines at the post office almost assured me that she would be gone by the time I left.  And thank goodness, she was.

So, stamps in hand, my frizzy hair and I headed back to Starbucks.  About a block away, I felt a presence at my shoulder.  Oh, no, I thought.  I walked a little faster.  The shadow kept pace.  I slowed down.  So did the shadow.  I was trying to avoid a confrontation but apparently there was going to be one whether I liked it or not.  I quickly turned to face Hunch-Back Woman and was surprised to find that it wasn’t her.  My shadow was a thin, bespectacled, confused-looking man in colorful superhero tights and high-tops.  Thinking that maybe he was lost or needed some other assistance I asked, “Can I help you?” This man who two seconds before was walking close enough to give me a colonoscopy suddenly reared back and yelled, “YOU STINK!!”

What.

The.

Fuck?!

Surely he and Hunch-Back woman came from the same family shrub.  One root.  One branch.  Twice the crazy.  He repeated it again just in case I missed it at 180 decibels.  “YOU STINK!!”

This time I was ready. 

Me (in sweetest voice evah!):  Why thank you.  That’s the nicest thing anyone has said to me all day.

Shrub:  No!  I said, you STINK!

Me (very sweet):  I heard you.  Again, you are too kind.

Shrub (getting frustrated and welling up with tears):  No, no, no, no!  I said —

Me (making myself choke with my own sweetie sweetness):  I know.  And you really are a doll but I must be running now.  You have a nice day!

Shrub (crying):  crycrycrycrycry

I don’t know what the lesson is from all of this.  Do I need to pay more attention to my personal hygiene?  Do I need to find a Starbucks that is not in Crazytown?  Or maybe I should just tape twenty-dollar bills to my packages and avoid the post office.  My packages will still get to their destinations, right?

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