No Place Like Home

Started off another hot and sunny day with breakfast and Charlie & Lola. "I Want to Be Much More Bigger Like You," Lola tells Charlie. Charlie tries to explain how being big isn't easy by imagining they're switching places. She thinks she's ready to ride the super-fast roller coaster at the fair...until she actually sees how big and noisy it is. Compared to that, the slow "Cuddle Bugs" ride...and being small...doesn't seem so bad.

Called T-Mobile after breakfast. I accidentally paid my phone bill twice yesterday. I couldn't get someone last night to help me change it, but I did finally get someone today. I didn't end up changing it. For some reason, I couldn't get into my online account. It ended up being such a pain, I figured being paid for December too wasn't a bad thing. I have enough going on in that month trying to figure out the phone bill.

Worked on writing for a little while next. McLean Stevenson arrives next with his package for their gift exchange, grumbling because Brett's already gotten into the liquor. He's also wishing he could find his next show. Brett wonders why he doesn't try leading men again, but he says he's past being a soldier.

Broke at noon to get ready for work. I dashed out and made it just in time. We were off and on today...but when we were on, we had lines down the aisles. Huge families came through, yelling at their children and ordering them to bag the way they wanted them to, ordering each other around, dumping cold items where they would be sure to defrost instead of handing them to me, whining because they forgot their bags (again) and had to buy new ones, and questioning every price and every item. I spent a lot of my evening ready to tear out my hair. 

And of course, by 6:30, the only cashiers were me and the young woman in express, and we both had very long lines. It took so long for them to get the producer manager to come in for me, I was having anxiety attacks and almost late getting out. I hurried out the door in tears of frustration.

I needed dinner and Match Game '77 when I got in. The challenger proved to be "too smart for the room" as Brett put it when she was the only one who matched her on a question about what fever makes you bounce. There's also quite a few jokes about booze when "__ Gin" is the Audience Match, including the obscure cocktail the contestant mentioned she likes. Richard has an easier time with "Olivia __" on the Head-to-Head.

For some reason, the next episode skipped ahead to another panel. Richard found himself between Eva Gabor and Joyce Bulifant, who proved they aren't as dim as their reputation suggests. Gene tries to demonstrate kissing the Blarney Stone for Eva, while Charles makes cracks about him being a mime. (And the contestant keeps getting Charles and Richard mixed up.)

Finished the night on YouTube with some very 80's fare. Time Chasers is a later Mike Nelson Mystery Science Theater 3000 episode, and one of only two movies they did from the 90's. Well, sort of. Apparently, this sci-fi thriller came out in 1994 and was filmed in 1990, but frankly looks like it's from about 1983. Physics teacher and pilot Nick Miller (Matthew Brutch) reconfigured his Commodore 64 computer to make time travel possible. He takes reporter Lisa Henson (Bonnie Pritchard) and Matthew Paul (Peter Harrington), an executive of electronics company GenCorp, to 2041. The company's CEO JK Robertson (George Woodard) is so impressed, he offers Nick a contract. 

Nick thinks he has it made, until he and Bonnie end up in 2041 again and discover it's a dystopian wasteland. Apparently, GenCorp used his time travel machine as a weapon. He confronts JK, only to be told he'll handle it. JK orders them arrested. They escape, but JK and Matthew are hot on their trail in their own time-traveling plane. It comes down to a shoot-out in 1777 near a Revolutionary War battle that's...not all that exciting. 

No wonder the robots wanted to riff on this, despite its (then) recent pedigree. It couldn't scream "low-rent early 90's" harder if it tried. Filmed in and around Rutland, Vermont, with local actors, a small Citabria airplane for the time travel vehicle, a dull and nonsensical script, and hardware that was completely out of date by 1984, let alone 1990. Thanks to the Vermont locations, there is some very pretty scenery, and that's about it. Only for MS3K fans or the most ardent enthusiasts of campy sci-fi.

The Muppet Babies have their own fun with time travel in the original 1980's show. They go "Back to the Nursery" when first Fozzie spills hot chocolate on a photo in Nanny's yearbook, and then Animal vanishes. The kids travel through various periods of time to find their youngest member, then hit the 50's for a drag race and to recreate Nanny's photo. 

I'll Walk Alone

Began a cloudy morning with breakfast and Muppet Babies. Gonzo and Fozzie accidentally turn a painting Summer made for Nanny into "Summer's Disaster-Piece" when they splash it with paint. Gonzo distracts the others while Fozzie tries to fix the artwork, but he just makes it worse instead of better. It takes Summer's creative eye to find beauty in their mess. Fozzie thinks he has to say "Farewell, Statler and Waldorf" when he hears him say they're packing to leave. He tries to hide their suitcase while the kids find games to keep them at home.

Did a little bit of writing after I ate. Brett releases the other women, who are raring to go. Richard knows where they have Jack Narz and Gene's crew, but not Charles, who is being kept separately. He says he'll lead them to the hold, but Gene doesn't trust him after he betrayed him on the Marauder...

Broke to change and get ready for work around 11 and called Uber shortly after. I wanted to leave early to buy a new cell phone from the T-Mobile store in the shopping center behind the Acme. I know exactly what I wanted - a new Samsung phone that's basically an updated version of my old one. Thankfully, they'd just gotten a new batch of the smaller one in the day before. Buying that and a cover took longer than expected. I didn't have the chance to let him transfer all of my data to the new phone from the old one.

Work was pretty much the same as it's been the past week - mostly dead except during rush hours, when it picks up slightly. The sun came out around 2 and turned it into a beautiful, sunny day in the upper 40's, too nice for grocery shopping. Besides, most people are likely waiting for the holiday weekend to shop. I spent the entire day outside this time, gathering carts and what little trash needed to be done. I'm sore as all get out, but at least there were no major problems. Once again, I had plenty of help by the end of the night. 

I really should have let the guy switch my data over and just been a little late for work. I hadn't realized the man who set up my new phone threw away the ancient SIM card for the old phone. I had to get the password for Uber off my old phone so I could download it on the new one, and it took me longer than I care to admit to figure that out. And the old phone died again and I had to reset that. 

When I walked in the door at home, I realized I left the pink bag with the receipt and the box that held the instructions and charger at work. Now I couldn't charge a phone that was getting low or put it away. I was so angry with myself, Jodie ended up coming in when she heard me yelling. She did finally admit that she has no intention of selling the house anytime soon. According to her, it'll take anywhere from six months to a year to get her side of the house painted and re-carpeted enough to be presentable.  

She also told me Rose and her family are under quarantine. Her husband Craig started a second job with Amazon and came home with the virus. Thankfully, they caught it before it could spread to the rest of the family and he recovered quickly and well, but it means they can't go anywhere. Jodie's delivering food for them, too. 

Had a snack while watching Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood. "Daniel Waits for Show and Tell," but he really wants to show off the photo album he and his dad made. Teacher Harriet distracts him and the other kids by singing songs and playing games while they wait for their duck egg to hatch. Daniel and Katerina also use their imaginations to pass the time during "A Night Out at the Restaurant." 

Finished the night online with That's Entertainment, Part 2. I go further into the second documentary, this time featuring Fred Astaire and Gene Kelly dancing and hosting, at my Musical Dreams Movie Reviews blog.

Musical Documentaries - That's Entertainment, Part 2

Mad Monsters, Bizarre Cats, and Ducks South of the Border

Started off a sunny, chilly, blustery fall morning with the American Top 40. We went ahead into 1981 as country, New Wave, pop, and hard rock dominated the airwaves. Hits from mid-October of that year include "Stop Draggin' My Heart Around" by Stevie Nicks with Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, "I've Done Everything For You" by Rick Springfield, "Urgent" by Foreigner, "The Night Owls" by the Little River Band, "It's Hard To Say" by Dan Fogleburg, "Private Eyes" by Hall & Oates, and "Endless Love," by Diana Ross & Lionel Richie.

"Endless Love" had apparently been in the top spot for the past nine weeks. It took one of my favorite movie songs of the 80s to finally knock that slightly syrupy ballad to #2 - "The Best That You Can Do" by Christopher Cross, from the original Dudley Moore version of Arthur. 

Comcast called an hour or so after the American Top 40 ended. They said to fiddle with the modem and see if I could get it going; if I couldn't, they'd send someone around on Monday. I didn't until later in the day...and am embarrassed to discover I didn't have the phone jack plugged in the right place. It goes in the Comcast modem, not the house phone jack! (Just as well. I only have one phone jack in the entire apartment.) I'll call them tomorrow and tell them to cancel.

After that, I spent the morning working on new photos of my American Girl and Disney Animator's Collection dolls to replace the ones I accidentally erased a few days ago, plus some more. I remembered I have Molly's Scenes and Settings in the back room and made use of them. For a few years in the late 90s, American Girl made huge books of heavy cardboard settings as backdrops for a child's play. For instance, Molly's has her family's kitchen, her bedroom, her classroom, a drug store, and her summer camp. The realistic-looking classroom made a great backdrop for dolls and stuffed animals to be home-schooled. 

Life at the Riverside Rest

Spent the rest of the day baking Sugar n' Spice Bar Cookies and watching four rather surreal, unusual animated films. Donald Duck goes on a wild trip through Latin America in Saludos Amigos and the even stranger Three Caballeros. A typical nerd (Alan Swift) finds himself caught in the middle of a feud between moviedom's monsters and the curvaceous assistant (Gale Bennett) of Dr. Frankenstein (Boris Karloff) in the Rankin Bass matinee feature Mad Monster Party. And Felix the Cat stumbles into a bizarre kingdom in another dimension ruled by a Transformer-style tyrant who makes the Monster Party cast look normal by comparison in the hard-to-find Felix the Cat: The Movie. 

Dealing With Phone Companies Is Scary

Ugh. I got stuck spending most of the day playing phone tag again, this time with Comcast. They were supposed to have switched my land line from Verizon on the 9th. Today is the 12th, and there's still no dial tone on my phone. I checked - it's working fine. I called Verizon. My account is closed on their end. It's all on Comcast's side. I called them at least three times today, and they called me once to tell me to reset my modem. I did. I got cut off every time, including when they called me. Resetting the modem seems to have done nothing. I'm still not getting a dial tone. I hadn't heard from them by 5. If there's still no dial tone, I'll call them first thing on Monday.

I also called Dad while I was on the phone. I told him I wouldn't be able to be reached on the land line phone for a while. Also asked when I could go over there to do my laundry. I know there's still a lot going on with my uncle's death. He said they'd be just watching the Eagles-Lions game Sunday afternoon. I could go over then.

Ran the last one-disc Rick Steves set this morning and early in the afternoon. Rick moved into Austria, the French and Italian Alps, and Switzerland on this journey. Vienna and Saltzburg were absolutely gorgeous, with their incredible and tragic history and amazing architecture. Switzerland was fun, like a trip through a fairy tale book or illustrations from Heidi.

Got a few things done in the afternoon. I pulled all of the pots and pans out from under the sink while the Switzerland episodes were running this afternoon. I swept the bottom, pulled the top of a glass bowl I no longer owned, then put everything away in neater piles. When I finished and Rick Steves ended, I added the last of the Young Adult Fiction and Kids' Fiction books to the inventories, including the books Linda sent me on Tuesday.

Ran two spooky-oriented TV show episodes while having leftovers for dinner. Good Eats has done several Halloween-oriented episodes, mostly revolving around candy. "Oh My, Meat Pie" is a spoof of the Tim Burton Sweedny Todd that features Alton as his great-grandfather, showing the familiar owners of a certain infamous pie shop in London how to make shepherd's and mincemeat pies.

"Haunted House" is a goofier second-season episode of Laverne & Shirley. The title working girls need a new couch. The old Ramsdale Manor is about to be demolished, and with its furniture on sale, Laverne thinks it would be a great place for furniture deals. Shirley isn't as certain. She's heard a lot of urban myths about the Ramsdale Manor, most of them involving a hairy "thing." When they hear spooky noises and their guy friends Squiggy and Lenny disappear while looking at couches, even Laverne wonders if she could be right...until Shirley finds something that makes them question the hasty demolition.

Wonderful Copehagen

Not a lot going on today, and there won't be for a while. I'm even out of phone calls. The phone didn't sound like it was switched from Verizon to Comcast like it should have been. If it isn't fixed by tomorrow, I'll call them and see what the hold up is about.

I spent the morning messing around online. Ran the second Rick Steves disc during breakfast and lunch. This time, Steves took us into the fairy tale world of Germany and the Scandinavian countries. I made Cornmeal Mini-Baguettes during the Scandinavia episodes. Though I loved the German castles and those massive pretzels, my favorite Germany episode covered Berlin. I remember watching the Berlin Wall coming down as a child in 1989. It's interesting to see all the progress that's been made since then, including turning the remains of the wall into one long outdoor art exhibit.

The Danes were my favorites in Scandinavia. Coming from a small fishing town background myself, I can appreciate their sweet little island villages and laid-back way of life. I wish the US would adopt the awesome, efficient train and bike lines I keep seeing in these European shows. It would make things so much easier and greener.

I worked on inventories for a little while as the Baguettes rose. When they were done, I started Cornmeal-Battered Chicken Fingers, Cream of Spinach Soup, and boiled vegetables for dinner while watching Hans Christian Anderson. Danny Kaye is the title character in this fanciful version of the life of the famous Danish storyteller. This was the film debut of ballerina Jeanmarie, and there are four ballets that show off her talents. Kaye gets one of Frank Loesser's best film scores, including "Thumbelina," "Inchworm," "Anywhere I Wander," and "Wonderful Copenhagen."

Oh, and the Baguettes - the first bread I've made in months - came out amazing. It's perfectly soft and chewy. I baked them into four mini-loaves, which are much easier to handle than one big loaf.

Recovering from the Holiday

Slept in this morning after spending a lot of it trying to keep my nose from running all over the place. My allergies aren't as bad as Thursday, but they're still annoying. Other than that, I ate Blueberry Pancakes, worked on editing our latest Monkees role play, and listened to the Brunch With the Beatles show on WOGL. (Ringo Starr, whose birthday is Tuesday, was in the spotlight.)

I called Mom a bit later than usual. I hadn't realized until this morning that I left my cell phone in my purse all night and it had died. I let it charge and called her on my home phone instead. Mom was in a good mood. The big seafood party she and Dad had for their neighbors had gone well. The two of them and Keefe seemed to be in the midst of cleaning up after it; Mom was washing dishes when I called her.

Work was steady-to-dead, not nearly as bad as yesterday or as it usually is on a Sunday. There were a few mildly obnoxious customers. I messed up a check, putting it in as exact when the man wanted money back, which was a little embarrassing. My relief was late. Good thing I was just going straight home anyway.

Monday, Monday

Actually, there wasn't much to my Monday. I slept in, had cereal, bananas, and strawberries for breakfast, watched cartoons, and got the rent together for Miss Ellie. At least it's right on time this month.

I've been having trouble on and off with my Internet. The signal keeps dropping for anywhere from a minute to a half-hour. I don't know why. I've changed the filter, turned the modem on and off, taken the splitter out. Nothing works. I called Verizon High Speed Internet this morning. The Asian Indian man at the desk checked my signal. He wasn't able to get back to me until after work, but he said something to the effect that it might be a faulty land-line. Supposedly, someone will be coming around between 8 and 1 on Friday.

I'm not holding my breath.

Work, on the other hand, was no problem at all. It was steady-to-dead, with so much help, I spent at least two hours all together doing returns. No customer problems, either. Maybe everyone was out enjoying the gorgeous sunny, breezy, 70-degree day.

I had leftover chicken and tomatoes for dinner and boiled beets in a pan to make pickled beets. I'll finish them tomorrow.

Back In Business

The phone man showed up late this morning. (Good thing, because I was up VERY late last night looking at 80s cartoons and promos on YouTube!) Yes, he did fix my phone problems. As far as I can tell, both phone and internet are now running just fine, so anyone who has wanted to call me in the last week or so now can.

I had fun looking at those videos and promos. Lots of great memories there, from the old 70s "CBS Special Presentation" graphic that heralded the beginning of their holiday programming until well into the 80s to some of the cute Claymation "After these messages" buffers ABC did for it's Saturday Morning line-up in the late 80s and early 90s. There were some wonderful music videos of 80s and 90s cartoons, too. I especially liked two well done montages of 80s action cartoons done to the 1984 Bonnie Tyler hit "Holding Out For a Hero." (The longer montage included "credits" that mentioned the name and release year of all the cartoons used, some fairly obscure, to the tune of Genesis' 1986 "Land of Confusion.")

Work was, thankfully after yesterday, very busy but not a problem. We had a few obnoxious customers and one cashier never showed up and a bagger who just completed his cashiering class went in for me. I suspect the unusual-for-a-Wednesday lines came from how close we're getting to Memorial Day; many people who are expecting crowds by Friday are probably beginning their weekend shopping.

Trouble On The Line and at Work

Ok, first of all, while the phone is technically working and I can receive calls, it's very static-y. I can hear the speaker...just not very well. (In fact, for a brief moment when I picked up the phone this morning, I got the buzzing sound despite changing the DSL filter before the regular tone returned.) A man from Verizon apparently came around while I was at work. It would seem that the problem is on an outside box and he didn't have the right tools. According to the note he left, he'll be back tomorrow or Thursday.

(The Internet, on the other hand, is working just fine. Changing the DSL filter does seem to have solved that problem.)

Work was nothing but a pain today. I haven't worked 8 hours in over a month, the weather was lousy again (though I managed to dodge the storms coming and going), and people were cranky. One older man was being a pain, needling me about writing the price on his check because of his eye problem and leaning hard on the receipt/check printer. You really can't lean on that. It jams easily...and did so. I fixed it, but I was so annoyed that I slapped the top down too hard. When I tried to run his check, it jammed. I ended up with a broken receipt/check printer, three annoyed managers, one annoyed old man with no check, and having to move to another register.

I watched the first hour or so of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom this morning and this evening. I loved Temple of Doom as a kid, and as the first Indiana Jones movie we had on video (we taped it off of HBO sometime around 1986-87), it's the one we saw most and that I have the fondest memories of. Even so, watching it now as an adult, I see the problems and the reasons this is the least well-regarded of the original three Indy movies. Indy's lady Willie does nothing but whine and scream, almost all of the non-white or Chinese characters are treated either condescendingly or as villains, and some scenes (such as the sequence in the pit with the guy ripping out the heart) are so gross, I'm surprised this didn't get an R, much less a PG-13.

On the other hand, there's a lot of fun to be had here. There's a lot of great gags and jokes (many at prissy Willie's expense). Some of the action set pieces, from the opening musical number in the Shanghai nightclub to the famous mine train ride to the bridge finale, are still genuinely thrilling. The special effects are still well-done, especially once we get into the "Temple of Doom" itself.

Last Crusade is still my favorite, but Temple of Doom is fun if you can get around Willie and the Asian stereotypes.

Just Horsing Around

Ok, first of all, the phone's working again, at least as of this afternoon. My Internet's running three times as fast and hasn't gone down yet, either. When I went out to run my Economic Stimulus check and paycheck to the bank, I saw Verizon phone crews working on wires on Manor Street. In fact, Verizon seemed to be on every other block, especially on the White Horse Pike. I guess I wasn't the only one having phone problems. The rain and high winds over the weekend must have taken more of a toll than I thought.

It probably helped that I changed the gadget that filters the DSL signal on my phone when I got home on advice from one of the owners/operators of Doria's Deli, which I'd stopped at to get a diet soda and turkey for dinner at work.

Though still windy, cool, and on-and-off cloudy, I had some time before work and didn't feel like hanging around the house again, so I went for a walk down to the Willie the Woodsman Gift Shop on Pine Street in Audubon. (I discovered on my birthday last month that Willie's is one of the few small shops in the area that's opened on Mondays.) No, Willie's didn't have the Samoyed Dog or Lil'Kinz Chicken yet (and it sounds like they won't be getting the Dragon), but I did walk out with the Gray Arabian Stallion, the Brown Arabian Stallion, two packs of cards, and another bookmark.

Meet Amelia the Brown Stallion and Emerson the Gray Stallion! Both are named for Amelia and Radcliffe Emerson of Elizabeth Peters' wonderful Amelia Peabody mystery novel series. I got the idea when I saw a list of Arabian names on AdultKinz and one of them was Abdullah, another character in the Amelia series. I considered Abdullah before I decided to name them after the lead characters, who are often described riding Arabian horses and have adventures that are mostly set in Egypt and Arabia.

The wind made for quite a ride to work. I enjoyed the workout and arrived at the Acme feeling refreshed. Work was steady today, not really busy except during rush hour. I did pick up some extra hours tomorrow morning.

The Nostalgia Channel

First of all, allow me to repeat - the phone is STILL not working. I receive calls, but all I hear is static, and I can't hear people when I call them. Verizon had BETTER be here Tuesday morning to fix the problem. Until then, please do not attempt to call me. The Internet is working intermittently (it only went down once today, and that for a minute), so I would prefer if you sent e-mails or text messages until the problem is cleared up.

Spent a quiet morning online, listening to the Beatles show (B-sides of singles was the theme today) and looking around online. I went online mostly to e-mail Mom and tell her I wouldn't be able to call her today and make sure she wouldn't worry about me. I was at X-Entertainment, looking at Matt's collection of 80s TV ads, and enjoyed the Saturday Morning commercials so much I went to YouTube to look for more.

That lead me to several series of videos containing bumpers for The Disney Channel in the 1980s and 90s. We were one of the only families I knew with premium cable until well into the 80s. My stepfather is one of the great couch potatoes of the universe, and even the basic cable package wasn't enough for him. We watched The Disney Channel long before most kids did, when it still ran an ecelectic mix of Canadian dramas and action programs (Danger Bay, The Edison Twins, our much-loved early 90s favorite Road to Avonlea), made-for-the-Disney Channel movies, Disney animated features, classic non-Disney films (I saw a lot of my first old musicals on Disney), half-hour programs highlighting the animated shorts and featurettes (Good Morning, Mickey, Donald's Quack Attack), music videos made of sequences from Disney animated and live-action movies, foreign, syndicated, and (later) original Disney cartoon and live-action kids' series, and concerts and special events (the Going Home series, The American Teacher Awards).

Avonlea was probably our favorite of the Disney Channel Canadian series. My sisters and I were entranced by the Anne of Green Gables adaptation with Megan Follows that came out in the mid-80s and love this show just as much. I was always fondest of "The Story Girl"...for I loved to tell stories, too. I would often recall how the children on Avonlea reacted when the parents announced they were having a baby. They took it much better than my sisters and I did when Mom and Dad made a similar announcement in March 1992. (We didn't believe them. I was a month from turning 13!)

I remember Rose was crazy about Danger Bay and Five Mile Creek, the latter a western. I never got into them. Anny loved the adorable Under the Umbrella Tree, a toddler show about a young woman and her four funny puppet pals.

Mom may still have a few bits and pieces of the early Disney Channel at her house. We taped two Disney-Channel-only holiday specials, A Disney Channel Christmas and Disney's Halloween Treat, in 1988. (We also picked up two Disney Halloween specials that ran on Fox that year. Disney had other holiday-related specials made up almost entirely of sequences from the animated films and shorts. There was a Mother's Day special, a Valentine's Day special I remember quite fondly, and Goofy's Salute to Father, made up of Goofy's 50s Suburbian Everyman shorts. I think there was also one for the 4th of July.) Christmas includes the "Disney Night Time" bumper with the glass-like purple Disney Channel logo and the shiny effect. We taped a couple of Disney and non-Disney movies off the Disney Channel in the late 80s and early 90s as well. (Our only copy of Star Wars: A New Hope until 1997 was taped off The Disney Channel in 1990.)

One of the things I remember the most about the early Disney Channel was how they used to run things between the shows and movies when they ran short. These were usually classic shorts that related to whatever had just ended, but we'd occasionally see something more bizarre, like the Tim Burton short Vincent (I'm getting the willies just THINKING of that one), the 70s stop-motion short Mouse Mania, or a featurette like Donald In Mathematics Land or Ben and Me.

I also have fond memories of Walt Disney Presents, which ran episodes from the Disneyland and Walt Disney's World of Color 50s series. That's how we got to see all the great Disney anthology heroes. Rose was fondest of Elfago Baca and Zorro (she's loved all things Spanish and Mexican since she was little). I preferred Dr. Syn and Gallagher, the Newsboy. Anny's favorite was Texas John Slaughter. We could still get Daddy to join in when Davy Crockett was on. He and Mom loved the odd "Tomorrowland" sci-fi/science shorts, too. I liked the ads for Disney movies that were new when the show came out but could, by the late 80s, be seen on video. It was fascinating to see how many of these films and the theme parks came into being.

Oh yes, and work was steady today, nothing major. People may have been scared off by the on-and-off rain and thunder we had all day long. I rode to work in the rain (being unable to call for a ride), but thankfully managed to dodge another storm and make it home dry after a groceries run.

New Jersey Redmer and the Raiders Of the Lost Internet

First of all, for anyone nearby who reads this blog, please don't try to call me for a while. My phone just is not working. You'll have better luck e-mailing me if you need me, or if you live close enough, just coming over.

Once again, this is going to have to be quick, because my Internet is being screwy. I lost the signal for a half-hour. (Good thing Lauren is too busy unpacking after her move to do the role-play tonight.) I spent the morning and most of the afternoon at work. Work was steady, nothing major. We didn't even have too many cranky customers. A lot of people were either out enjoying the nice day or pre-Memorial Day festivities, or are waiting for closer to Memorial Day to do their major shopping (I'm surprised I didn't get more hours next weekend).

I bought strawberries, bananas, and broccoli, and then rode over to FYE and Staples to make the quick errands run I put off yesterday because of the weather. I picked up the new Indiana Jones DVD, a pack of WebKinz cards, and a used copy of the second season of The Greatest American Hero at FYE. (I wanted the original Indiana Jones set, which I did see at FYE last week, but they were out. Oh well. Extras aren't THAT important to me anyway, and it was on sale for about $39 with my FYE card.) I made an in-and-out stop at Staples for a new phone cord. The tab on one side of my old phone cord broke off and slips out.

I watched Raiders Of the Lost Ark during dinner. Like any true child of the 80s, I love Indy. This is my kind of action - escapes, chases, explosions when needed, a hero who's smart AND handy with weapons, a leading lady who is just as smart and skilled (and holds her liquor against men three times her size), great comic relief, hissable bad guys. As the first of the Indiana films, I didn't really see Raiders until Dad finally picked it up on video sometime in the late 80s, and I like it (and Marian) but it's not my favorite. (That would be Last Crusade.)

Oh, and if my internet behaves, I'm going to try to post the tag sequence for Monkees Magic Show tonight. Look for it at our Monkees role play site!

Water Bagels and Water Elsewhere

I'm going to do this while my Internet is behaving. The weather today was absolutely miserable, damp, dreary, and raining. It poured this morning...right when I had to go to my dentist appointment, of course. I showed up in Dr. Heider's office literally dripping wet. (And yes, I do own an umbrella. A very good one from the 70s that I got in a yard sale two years ago, shortly after moving here. I was even wearing my red sweater with the hood. The dentist office is just a few blocks from me and I saw no reason to ask for a ride.)

Today, I finally got that tooth I broke last year filled. I never did anything about it because it didn't hurt. Turns out that there was some decay in there, too. Other than the needle needed to numb my jaw (I HATE needles!) and the fact that one of the drills was so noisy, I had to resist looking to see if a herd of elephants were charging down the White Horse Pike. When all was said and done, the broken tooth was filled, and Dr. Heider says the other teeth appear to be on the mend, including the one with the really bad gums.

I spent the rest of the day at home, baking and doing yoga and stuff online. I'd originally planned to get my paycheck at the Acme, then run a few small errands in the Audubon Commons shopping center behind them, but I finally decided I've done enough running around in the rain. My remaining errands could wait. I e-mailed Verizon about my phone and Internet troubles (I was going to call them, but I wanted to borrow my landlady's phone, and by the time she came home, I didn't really feel like going out in the weather) right after I got in. The Internet went down three times, but never for more than a minute or two each time, so I'm hoping that bodes well for tonight.

I tried something a little different with my bread-baking this evening. Despite the disaster with my pretzels, I decided to try another popular bread snack. Bagels are surprisingly simple to make. They only need to rise for about 40 minutes all together, and you actually let them boil in water for a few minutes to give them their chewiness and shiny crust. Unlike my pretzels, they came out perfectly. I was running out of regular flour and made them with part-wheat flour, and that gave them a nice, nutty flavor and a deeper color.

Little Buddies

Yes, I'm back online. The phone was still off when Rose and I went shopping for our nephew Skylar's birthday around 10...and when we came back from the party around quarter of five, it was back on. Go figure. Turns out I wasn't the only one in the neighborhood who had phone problems, either. Uncle Ken and Dad, my older friend Erica's mom, and several of their neighbors had similar phone problems...and similar problems with the phone company. I hope Verizon's aware that a lot of their customers are not terribly happy with them at the moment. I'm glad they got the phone back on, but did they have to give us such a hard time about it?

Today was pleasant in other ways, too. I ended up having a nice time at Skylar's third birthday party. The party was at a shelter and grill at the Cape May County Park and Zoo - where else would you hold a birthday party for toddlers? Skylar himself was a bit of a pain. He screamed at the top of his lungs for no reason, punched people, ran his mother ragged, kept messing with the birthday cake when his nana repeatedly told him not to, and wouldn't share his new toys with his friends Ronnie and Kaylie.

Ronnie, for his part, couldn't get on the benches. He must have fallen off four times, once very hard on his back. Kaylie was the only one who wasn't really a problem, maybe because she was sort of shy and stuck to her mother and her favorite baby doll for much of the party.

I don't know who brought the water balloons...but my sister Anny (Skylar's mother) probably wasn't too happy with them. For some reason, when everyone started throwing balloons, they were all aimed at her. She was sopping wet by the time the mini-battle was over. Actually, I think Skylar inadvertently started it when he kept throwing the balloons at the ground and someone wanted to show him how to throw them at people...his mommy, of course.

I got some great shots of the battle with an instant camera I'd initially bought for
my vacation...and then joined in. Hey, they were already getting me wet while I took the pictures. I figured if I was going to get wet, I might as well do it with everyone else.

(I also got some nice shots of Skylar blowing a noisemaker over his Bob the Builder-themed cake and getting icing all over it, and Sky's later attempt to lick the icing off. Good thing we were about to eat the cake anyway at that point.)

I Wish I Was A Lineman For The County...

...Then I could fix this mess! X(

We had a massive thunderstorm yesterday afternoon, right before I went home from work. Though there were signs the electricity had been off, other than that, everything was fine when I arrived. The phone worked and the electricity was on (though I had to reset the clocks and air conditioner). There were no problems (and no more storms) for the rest of the afternoon. I even called my older friend Erica and told her I'd be able to volunteer on Thursday from 10 to 1, the first time I've volunteered in almost a month, thanks to my schedule. There was some static when Erica initially tried to call me, but she got through and I thought nothing of it.

Everything was fine until I tried to go online around 7:30PM. The computer kept saying it wasn't getting a dial tone, which couldn't be because everything was hooked up right. I checked three times. All the wires were fine. I finally put the wire for the house phone back (I use dial-up) and tried the house phone. Nothing. No dial tone. Just some weird buzzing. I went downstairs and called my landlady, and she said she'd call the phone company and get them to fix the problem.

I figured, that's that. This is a big area, and I'll bet they have plenty of people out, thanks to that storm. They'll be here later tonight. Well, I waited. I worked on stories. I cried. I screamed. I waited. Nothing. No phone company. No dial tone. Even the buzzing eventually stopped. Nothing. No phone. No internet.

I talked to Miss Ellie (my landlady) again this morning. She said she did call the phone company, and they were going to show...sometime Tuesday! How could that be? This big area, and they didn't have a hundred people dispatched to fix things after that huge storm?

And I couldn't do it Tuesday. I'm going down to Cape May County for my little nephew's third birthday party on Tuesday. We've planned it for weeks. I called the phone company from Miss Ellie's house. (HER phone is working just fine.) Not only did they say it was probably something in the basement (when Miss Ellie's phone was working and also comes from the basement) and would cost almost a 100 bucks, but they refused to reschedule Tuesday! I ended up getting someone to come on Wednesday morning...maybe.

I'm royally ticked off right now. I can't believe how stupid the phone company is. We live less than ten minutes from two of the largest cities in the United States of America, that storm yesterday was crazy enough and noisy enough to knock out everything within a hundred mile radius, and they STILL don't have enough people out? Why haven't they called every repair person they have? They're supposed to be doing their god-damn jobs!

I hate phone companies. I hate phones.

I'm not going to be online again until maybe Wednesday night at the earliest, which means there won't be any more updates to The Monkee Knight or this blog until then. I'm typing this at the tiny Oaklyn Library down the street from my apartment now, and I'll probably be kicked off any moment, since I've been on for almost an hour and it's busy.