samaria shmamaria!

bossman out of town for the rest of the week so i decided to bring little to work after school today. i picked her up from school and we headed home for her to change clothes and pick up the laptop and get something to eat. no worries, all was good. little dragged her feet a bit, but i was ok with it. at around 2:30p we were heading out and in the lobby near the garage door was the little dog of one of my neighbors, unattended. so of course i scooped up the dog, dropped my stuff in the car and proceeded to look for my neighbor. walked around the building, couldn't find the owner. went to her door and knocked, no answer. went to my place to get a leash. called the owners phone number listed on the tag, no answer, so i left a message. i needed to actually get back to my office, so i decided to keep her dog at my place in eml's bathroom & hallway, and keep my fingers crossed that my 85 lb. beast luna would be ok with it and not somehow find a way to open two doors to eat the neighbor dog like a snack. i wrote a note to leave on the owner's door, headed to tape it to her door and then go back to work. with that plan in order, of course as soon as i taped my note to the owner's door she opened it. she didnt even know the dog was out. so i headed back to my place to get the dog and of course the owner (an older russian lady -- really really nice) just wanted to thank us profusely, gush about how much she loves the dog and how it's her whole life, and thank us profusely again. finally we escaped the owner's grip, got out of there and headed for work. here i am, an hour and a half late getting back to the office, and all i wanna do is nap. as payment for my good deed, i think i deserve to nap for the rest of the afternoon... don't you think?

starting the week out dumb...

- knock knock.
-- who's there?
- Isabelle
-- Isabelle who?
- Isabelle essential on a fire truck?

*rimshot*

[curtain]

when the moon hits your eye...

last week we went out for a casual early dinner for 4 at 6p da pasquale in b.h. -- 3 adults and one 4 year old (not my little, but the youngest of my friend L). we picked our venue knowing we would have no problem accommodating our youngest dining companion, and also because it's an easy breezy little italian cafe that doesn't have the after work bar scene going on so it's a little more family friendly. between the salad and pasta portions of our meal, my friend L's phone buzzed when she got a phone call from her mate on her cell phone. she took the call at the table while we entertained her youngest with jokes and tales of field trips to disneyland and the zoo. after she completed her call, she filled us in on how her mate was bummed he couldn't join us for dinner because he got delayed at work, and she also let us know she was expecting some news about her most recent test results and that she was anticipating good news. no worries, all was good, and our pasta was just coming out to the table.

let me back up a bit and add that while my friend was on the phone, though, i noticed the female portion of an older couple next to us lay out a big grimace on her face and overheard her rudely comment about cell phone use at the dinner table. i'm sure the fact that we had a 4 year old off-leash and in a restaurant was what started it rolling for this cranky biatch, and just a little bit earlier we giggled when we overheard this same woman comment to her husband "you know what i like best about this pasta? it's that there's no goddamn red sauce on it". clearly, she was on a roll, but i would have preferred someone to shove one in her mouth to shut her up.

cranky-old-broad was so bothered by this occurrence that after paying for dinner, on her way out she made a special visit to the manager where i could clearly see and hear her talking to him complaining about cell phone use and suggesting that they ban cell phones from the restaurant. he seemed to listen graciously to this customer (perhaps a regular), he pointed to his watch and around the room at the other families eating dinner and said how it's not likely they can make such a request of their other patrons. at the same time i looked around and i saw a young woman dining alone, and she talked on her cell phone briefly as she munched her antipasto.

my friend L is a quiet individual and it's not like she was blabbing loudly on the phone, and her talking (whether on the phone or to me) is not really the business of anyone seated at another table -- talking is talking, and it shouldn't matter if the conversation being had is with another person seated at that table, or if it's on the phone. so, really, while i understand that cell phone use is not particularly appropriate when at the dining table, in this case at the very most my friend L would only potentially have been disrespecting her immediate dining companions (US)... and none of US seemed to mind, so i don't see why someone at the next table has the nerve to mind.

makes me wish i knew when cranky-broad was going back so i could take a whole party of kids for dinner and equip them all with cell phones and just have them all call eachother on the phone instead of talking directly to eachother.

sweet nectar...

we had dinner at the marmalade cafe over the weekend and had the most wonderfully affected waiter who suggested we try one of the drinks from the cocktail specials menu. we were most pleased, so much so that we had 2 each and missed the movie we planned on seeing.

introducing: the strawberry lemonade martini


1oz stoli strawberry vodka
1oz triple sec
2 tablespoons or 1 1/2 oz strawberry puree
3/4 oz lemonade

'tini tiny pleasures such as these should come more often.

persona non grata...

the little was off from school today due to an "in service" day for the teachers, so i brought her to the office with me for a few hours. i have a smaller desk set up for her in my office, so for the most part having her here consists of her noshing on snacks, drawing pictures or doing equations on the large dry erase board (she loves numbers), playing games or watching movies on the laptop, and making artwork and signs to tape around my office.

today the little insisted that my office door remain closed after she taped this sign to it:

the little league goes big time....

remember walter mathau's character in bad news bears? the other day i saw a guy driving around helLA that looked like an ex-hippie or ex-biker - though it was not clear which. he was racing through the market parking lot in a brown, mid-70's convertible - like a Cutlas, or an Electra, or a Skylark, or maybe a GranVille... whatever it was, the top was down, of course because this is SoCal, but moreso because it probably no longer goes back up or it's so weather worn that it would act more as a skylight rather than a shelter from the elements. the license plate on the car was "P WEA PR". so i'm guessing that the driver is more than likely among the ranks of the managers and/or agents that represent child actors... but just who are his clients? are they the straight-laced fresh shining faces we see on the most recent juice box commercials? are they the wrong-side-of-the-tracks kids in after school specials about saying no to drugs? i think it would be funny if he was an agent/manager for potential child actors in the 70's that never got their big break, and now he's still got a handful or more of these same has-been or never-been clients that still kinda are dorky looking like kids but are now all grown up and still waiting for their big break... with fingers crossed that someday they can land a role and they'll be the next 35 year old high school freshman.

pinch and a punch....

... for the first of the month.

try and fool me today and i will punch you in the nose.

actually fool me today and get a donkey kick to the crotch as thanks.

>:-}