Saturday, September 24, 2016

Mike and Rick's Excellent Gay Agenda--er, Adventure

Ah, my 900th Post. A milestone, to be sure, but we'll save the party for the 1,000 entry.

The veins in my temples are trying not to pop out in warning of internal angst, but it's getting more and more difficult to keep things in control. My tongue spurts blood with the biting that goes on when listening (or, reading) things of which lead me incredulous. But, now.... now things have gone too far. My veins shall bulge no more. My tongue shall no longer bleed.

If you someone who: 
...says this election is picking the lesser of two evils; or,
...says you're not voting because both candidates are [insert your word here]; or,
...believes the rhetoric (from either) as posted on social media; or,
...only rely on social media to get your political information; or,
...don't think your vote matters....
...this blog is for you.

I ask you to think of me, your believed princess in the Addiverse. I ask you to think of my long term relationship. I ask you to consider my efforts to be a productive, tax-paying citizen of this great nation. I ask you to take a walk into my Doc Marten boots.

I suppose readers in the Addiverse don't need this post. After all, you've pretty much know by now that I don't have a gay agenda (whatever that might be).
But, what if you stumbled in here without knowing where you had landed?
What if you suddenly thought the gays really do have a gay agenda?
What if you, a long time reader, fell on your head recently and have been spewing Tea Party propaganda?
What if you have suddenly begun to believe all memes posted in your electronic world?
What if heard that the gays are coming to get your guns, your children, your freedom to choose heterosexuality???
What if you really don't think it matters to vote because of the choices you face?

Let's just ignore the top two candidates for a moment. For the sake of this blog, let's leave those two candidates out of the conversation. Let's focus on this:

Rick Santorum + Mike Pence = me scared shitless.

You might think that two guys in Ol' Big Hair's political machine aren't much to worry about.
After all, how much power can two nimrods actually have?
You might even be wondering who these two fellas are.
You might not think the Vice President or some advisor don't have much political clout.
You might be chuckling about Rick's frothiness. (That's worth an Urban Legend Google. Trust me.)

But, me? I think they are something to worry about.  Ol' Big Hair has hand-picked two of the most anti-gay persons on the planet to be at the top of his food chain.

If you don't approve of Gay Marriage, I can accept this. I won't agree with you but I will respect you. If you don't agree with the "gay lifestyle" (sigh), I can accept that, too but I will never agree, which is fine. What I can't accept is watching the Tea Party Darlings licking their chops as they prepare to crush LGBT rights.

Mike and RIck pine for the good old days, when it was legal to discriminate due to sexual orientation--this on the job, in housing, in the market. They have their eyes and money on passing an amendment making sure gay marriage can't ever happen ever again. They oogle the chance to end income tax equality. They are giddy with thoughts of repealing "Don't Ask/Don't Tell." Heck, they'd like to go back to punishment in regards to gays serving in the military.

I don't know about you, but I do not want go "back" to legally being told I'm "too gay" by an employer (whatever that means--you'd have to ask my previous employer).
Did that, don't want to do that again.

Think I'm kidding? Feel free to research stuff about these guys but please stay far away from the sites that are obviously slanted to one side or the other... don't rely on memes...  avoid Wikipedia... and, for Pete's Sake, don't believe social media!


Rick equates same sex relationships to bigamy, incest and adultery. He does not support civil unions. He has made it a passionate crusade to insist gay marriage be illegal. (Thankfully, I'm glad he has publicly stated he would never attend a same-sex wedding. We wouldn't want him there. He can keep his sweater-vest homophobia to himself.) He is in favor of conversion therapy; after all, sexual orientation is a choice.

I don't know about you, but I've never had a hankerin' to have sex with my sister, marry three other gays or cheat repeatedly on the wife. And no, gay marriage didn't make me want to marry my dog. I promise you I have never wanted to convert your children to homosexuality. It's okay to trust me alone in a room with a youngster.

As for Mike, he's quite the hater. He made it A-okay for businesses in Indiana to discriminate against those with other than heterosexual orientation. (Dang, we should stop showing our gay license at the door. No one would know we're gay if we'd just not tell anyone.) He's the darling of many anti-gay groups. Damn gays have led to "societal collapse." He believes in conversion therapy. He signed legislation that A FELONY for gay couples to apply for a marriage license.

...A FELONY for just applying.

Um, don't we have a lot bigger things to worry about in America than whether a person who happens to be gay wants to buy a cake?

Well..... since global warming doesn't exist (no need to worry about that), the NRA is making sure Obama doesn't take our guns (one less thing to think about) and that David Duke is addressing all those dang blacks who think they are equal to white folk, I guess there really isn't a lot more on which to focus besides gay sex.

Anyone else concerned about why Mike and Rick spend so much time thinking about gay sex?

Voting this election DOES matter.
Don't stay home.
Do some research.
Ask questions.
Consider what is at stake.
Think of those you love.
We don't have to make America great again.
America is great right now.
We don't have to accept the hate, the ignorance, the discrimination.
Don't make that vein pop out of my temple.


Please do some research. If you are not scared, you should do even more research.

If you do some research, I promise I won't confront you when you say, "He's just saying what we all want to say" or "he's just saying what I'm thinking." I don't say anything of those things. I'm not thinking any of those things. I hope you are not, either.

Whatever the case, you do the research; I'll send out vibes to the Universe wishing you well.

You do the research and I'll stay away from converting your children to my hedonistic ways. That's a campaign promise I can keep.
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Monday, September 19, 2016

Guests of the Bugs

I wrote about bed bugs in 2012. Every word of that post is still true to this day. You should take a gander (link is at end of this post). Of course, read this blog first and THEN take a gander. I'd hate for you to miss one single word of my babbling. If you are too lazy/distracted/uninterested/buttever to read the 2012 post, here's a snippet so you may best understand today's post:

"So you know, you need to be careful when staying in any hotel. I'm terrified when staying in a hotel. Just ask the wife.  I have a lot of "staying in a hotel rules." Don't ever put your suitcase or clothes on the bed, on the floor or in the drawers.  Never.  Keep your suitcase on the suitcase rack (usually a metal, fold up thing), as bed bugs can't crawl up metal (well, at least not very well).  Keep your stuff in the suitcase on the suitcase rack. Better yet, leave your stuff in the trunk of your car.  Me? I leave my shoes on when in a hotel room. Don't even get me started about the carpeting. (Shoes are a great mode of transportation for bed bugs so you best check your shoes before putting them in your stuff--it'd be awesome if you could put your shoes in the freezer for two weeks but you probably don't have time to do that on vacation.) Before getting into bed, take a gander at the sheets and mattress cover. Go ahead, don't be afraid.  If you see any little red dots or suspicious brown specs--especially in the corners--leave. (Well, unless you are European--then, you can think, "hey, this is a really clean bed--looks much better than mine at home.")"
No offense to the Europeans. I just know you're not as freaked out about bed bugs as I am. I see this is a sign of strength.

We stayed at a downtown Chicago hotel this weekend, as part of a jubilant celebration better known as the wife's birthday. Securing a hotel is very traumatic for me, as I have to consider the potential of a bed bug infestation. Yes, I research this before booking a place to stay; in fact, I probably do more research about a hotel room than I did when writing my thesis. Research does not guarantee a bed bug free experience, but it brings a wee bit of comfort and confidence. I like the Bed Bug Registry. It's easy to navigate and full of information.

After seeing the price of hotel rooms for this particular weekend, I decided to live large and go with the search engine that finds you great hotel deals... but, you don't know what hotel you are "getting" until you've paid. It's a gamble. (It's the same website that got me an amazing airline deal for our Chicago-to-San Diego trip... via Cincinnati. Sigh.) They've never done me wrong, so I threw caution to the wind and gave it a shot. I got a great price and hoped the savings didn't include any new little friends.

Staying somewhere like Chicago, the bed bug capitol of the US, is frightful to me. (Yes, Chicago is currently #1. Poor NYC lost its way.) I love Chicago. I love being downtown. I love the hustle and bustle, the activities, the view, the lights, the shopping, the tourist-y things, the food. But, I do not like staying in Windy City hotels because of the dreaded little red bugs. I don't want to take that kind of souvenir home with me. I don't need the gift that keeps on giving.

The wife is used to my bed bug inspections upon arrival at every hotel. It's become a work of art, poetry in motion. I've now taken to putting the suitcase in the bathroom until the inspection is complete. I read that somewhere and thought that was a grand idea. Of course, the suitcase can't be on the floor--rather, it gets placed on the counter or in the bathtub (with the stopper in place). I then destroy the bed, pulling back sheets and mattress decorative things (what the hell are those called?), inspecting the piping of the mattresses, taking a gander at the bed frame, looking at the headboard. I use a cell phone as flashlight so I can take a closer look. I stop short of looking behind picture frames near the bed but that is a concern. (Note to hotels: stop putting pictures over the bed. Those critters love hiding there.)

As I was performing my search, the wife asked me what I would do if I found a bed bug or signs that bed bugs were in the vicinity. I stopped my search and contemplated this. My first thought is that I would probably freak out and become hysterical. I then recalled the results of research and knew my answer would be this:

I would go to the front desk, alert them of the issue and ask for a room at least two floors away, on a different wing of the hotel.

Of course, that might not be possible and then I'd have problems. After all, this was a pre-paid room. It's not easy to say I'm leaving and going to find another hotel when you've already paid a handsome fee for a Chicago room. There is no guarantee the next hotel would be bed-bug free. That would really suck. So, I would probably just go back home, sleep in the car or weep softly all night.

Thankfully, no bugs were located so I gave the "all clear" to the wife and allowed her to breathe a big sigh of relief. It was a bigger-than-usual sigh of relief, seeing as this was her birthday outing.

I wish I didn't have this terror because it really does make it a bit more difficult to travel. However, lest I be diagnosed with some form of disorder (on top of the ones I have already earned), I will keep staying in hotels and doing the best I can to do so in the least stressful manner. I will continue my crusade to remain bed bug free.

If you would like a demonstration of how to look for bed bugs, how to use the registry or what products to try when traveling (in an effort to repel those critters from your belongings), I'm yer gal. If you'd like to travel with us, I suggest you don't stay in the same room because you'll have to deal with this nonsense if you try to crash our party. If you'd like to learn more about bed bugs from the Addiverse's point of you, click on the link. If I've ruined you from staying in hotels, I apologize. You'll thank me later. Until then, sleep tight and don't let the....

....oh, you know the rest.



https://addiwp.blogspot.com/2012/07/bugged.html





Friday, September 09, 2016

Magically Baked

After checking the statute of limitations a dozen times and because it's been over three and a half decades, I've decided to break the silence. I shall write about something of which I have never spoken. Parental units, sit down because I am going to tell the story of....

...the Great Magic Brownie Incident of the Early College Era.

Let's be clear. This story does NOT involve the wife, as I had yet to meet her. She would be mortified if any of you thought this tale had anything to do with her. So, leave her out of it and let's move along.

A college friend of mine wanted to try "magic brownies." (This, a friend of whom I have no contact with and does not know of this bloggly existence, so we can leave her identity out of this story. You can ask but I won't tell. My lips are sealed. Besides, none of you know her.) Now, I had never come across a magic brownie during my short tenure on the planet, so I had no idea what she wanted to do or how to proceed. Being a good friend, I wanted to support her effort and agreed to involve myself with this experiment.

To say we were uneducated is an understatement. Neither of us were well-versed in baking and we certainly were the blind-leading-the-blind when it came to this pleasant herb of the earlier generations. (To be sure, I would NEVER do this today. God knows what would be included with the pot of today. Rat poison would be the least of my concerns. Nieces and nephews: just say no to pot brownies. The brain cells you might kill are NOT worth it.)

How she got the ingredients, I do not know. I was in charge of getting the brownie mix. That was enough stress for me.

The mission was complicated by several factors. Since we lived in a dorm, we had to use the floor's community oven. Seriously. So, we would have to figure out a way to bake our brownies without raising suspicion. (Um, either of us baking should have raised many an eyebrow.) The second factor was that I had no brownie ingredients except the box of brownie mix. I didn't realize we would need eggs or oil or anything besides the content of the box. The third complicating factor was...well....

...we had this baggie of twigs and seeds and what-not and had no idea what to do with it. We kinda just stared at each other and shrugged shoulders. We figured this was how "this" was supposed to look.

We waited for the perfect morning. Of how we determined this, I do not remember. I just know that we decided one day to put our plan into action. I know it was a weekday. Why we didn't do this on a weekend is beyond me. I'm guessing it was a Wednesday, as based on the class we were supposed to attend, but this is a stab in the dark. (Hey, this was almost four decades ago. Gimme a break.) We decided to bake the brownies in the early morning, as most peers would still be sound asleep. To keep ourselves out of "trouble," we'd try the brownies for breakfast.

I found something in which to mix the brownies, pre-heated the oven, found a baking pan (thanks to whoever left that pan near the stove) and headed to her room. Giggling in a most very nervous manner, I held the bowl of brownie batter in front of her. She proceeded to dump the entire baggie of the seeds/sticks/pot into the mix.

Yup. Everything. Right.into.the.batter.

It never occurred to us this was weird or wrong or disgusting. We were novices, newbies, virgins. The lumpy mix gave us pause but nothing more. The lumpy, gross-looking Magic brownie mix was poured into the ungreased pan and shoved into the oven.

We were a nervous wreck while those things baked. Basket cases. What if someone woke up? What if someone asked what we were baking? What if someone asked us why the hell were baking a 6 AM? What if someone asked to share our brownies? What if we set off the fire alarm? We were so nervous that I couldn't stand to bake the brownies one second longer than deemed appropriate on the box. Although they still looked a wee bit soupy in the middle, I took them out and turned off the oven, retreating to her room before anyone was the wiser.

We were smart enough to know we couldn't carry around a pan of brownies... everyone would see us and want them. This was a secret mission. We couldn't share. A search around her room found a cardboard box from her Lipton tea bags. We dumped the tea and plopped the brownies into the now empty box.

Plopped is the perfect word. We couldn't cut them because (1) we didn't have a knife to cut them, and (2) they really were kinda mushy and weren't holding together. They looked disgusting. I mean, there were seeds and sticks poking out of the bakery item. I don't know if we thought the seeds and sticks would disintegrate while baking, but they did not. It looked like we had placed a tree branch in our brownies. I looked at her, she looked at me. Again, we shrugged shoulders.

It was then we realized we would need milk to wash these puppies down so we did what any college moron would do--we went to the cafeteria, brownies in hand, so we would have an unlimited supply of milk.

Unfortunately, several of our friends were morning persons who actually went to the cafeteria to eat breakfast and so, there they were. If we didn't sit with them, it would be weird... we always sat with them. So, we got our milk, sat down and put the box of soupy brownies in front of us.

For the record, I am sweating while typing this. 

Seated at the table, my friend and I opened the box and started shoveling brownies in like there was no tomorrow. I'm guessing nervousness spend up our consumption. It looked like we were eating dirt. Someone asked what the hell we were eating and I muttered how we had tried to bake brownies for breakfast, adding that they were disgusting and we were too embarrassed to share. In our nervousness, she and I ate the entire batch of brownies.

The.entire.batch. Seeds. Sticks. Dirt-like magic mix.

I gotta say, I felt pretty sick after eating a half pan of brownies. It didn't matter what was or was not in that batch--it was the volume of brownies (and, level of terror) that led to my feeling a bit green in the gills. We threw away the tea box and visited with our friends, who were still eyeing us in a most suspicious manner. Hell, wouldn't you be suspicious if you just saw two friends eat an entire batch of homemade soupy brownies for breakfast?

I don't know what we thought would happen... but, nothing happened. I guess we though we would become instantly high (I told you, we had no idea what we were doing) but that was not the case. All we were was sick from eating too many brownies.

Sad and disappointed, we walked to class, wondering aloud why our experiment had failed. 

Fast forward to a bit later in the day. Seated next to each other in another class, we remained disappointed. Why did people eat magic brownies? It made no sense to us. What a waste of time and money and....

...WHAM! 

With no warning, I am telling you those magic brownies sprung into action and knocked us on our asses. I think I might have slid out of my chair, right in the middle of that class. I can't really recall. I do know is that we both started laughing.... and laughing... and laughing....

Our professor looked quite irritated. After all, we were snorting with laughter, unable to stop, interrupting the entire class. We were absolutely stoned. That's the only word I can use to describe our state of being. (Looking back decades later, I cannot believe what we did, as we really were good students who paid attention in class.) Too stoned--baked??!!--to stay seated in that little stuffy classroom with that old guy babbling about something or another, we stood up and walked out of class, right in the middle of class, laughing the entire way. I left my book and belongings behind, making our departure even that much weirder. We fell out the door and started down the sidewalk, no plan of what we were doing or where we were going.

So, where did we go? We went to the ceramics room.... and, laid on the floor. Laughing.

Have you ever been in a ceramics studio? It's not clean. There is clay everywhere, especially on the floor. Since we were sprawled out on the floor, still lost in laughter, we were quickly covered in clay dust.

I'm sure we were a sight to behold. Two stoned girls, covered in clay dust, laying on the floor, laughing without seeming reason. People walked by. Lots of people walked by. We didn't care.

Cheech and Chong would have been proud.

Once bored with clay dust, we worked our way back to the cafeteria for lunch. Probably a bad idea, considering how crowded the cafeteria is at lunch time and considering we looked like the ceramics studio had blown up. Seated with our friends, we couldn't stop laughing. We could barely hold our heads up. Everyone just stared at us, which made us laugh even harder.

I honestly can't recall what we did for the rest of the day. I assume we had a good time and that we continued laughing and that we eventually took a nap or communed with nature or went back to the ceramics studio. The only thing I do remember is saying that I NEVER wanted to make or eat magic brownies again.

Ever.

She agreed. No more magic brownies. Ever.

I am pleased to say that I've held true to my word. No more magic brownies have come into my life. I think I might run screaming away if they did. I'd bet dollars to donuts that she has steered far away from anything of the kind, too. The only brownies I am eating these days are gluten free and far from harvesting any plants. The brownies of my world today are probably smothered in some form of gluten free ice cream, not in seeds and sticks.

Magically baked, indeed. No more magic for me.

I'm glad camera phones didn't exist back in the day.
Hell, I'm glad digital anything didn't exist.
I'm glad that we stayed on campus and didn't get ignorant enough to do anything but stay on campus.
I'm glad we walked out of that class.
I'm glad we didn't flunk that class.
I'm sad we perpetuated the belief that art majors are stoners.
I'm glad we went to the art department and not the Dean's Office.
I'm super glad none of our friends at the breakfast table demanded any brownies.
I'm glad that we tried the experiment and that we lived to tell about it without killing too many brain cells.
I'm glad that the effects wore off with nary an incident. 
I'm glad this happened decades ago, not in today's era.
I'm glad I have avoided magic brownies since that day.
I'm profoundly relieved that the statute of limitations is long gone, so I can share this story without incident. Well, besides potential judgment and a whole lot of laughter.
I'm sad that I suck at baking but I'm really glad that I'm good at not being baked.

Gluten free brownie, anyone? No magic, no gluten, no laughter involved...guaranteed.
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