Happy Birthday Critical Mass

Today marks 15 years of bike riding through the streets. San Francisco is the only place I've ever seen it, though critical mass is supposedly done in over 300 places.

I think it's partially about bike-riders being able to share the roads with cars and also about reducing pollution. Both things I support in theory, though not in practice by riding a bike. One thing I don't like is that Critical Mass is not held to traffic laws. They get to ride through the streets, but don't have to stop at red lights.

To pedestrians such as myself, this sucks, as it causes people walking to have to wait over ten minutes to cross a street while hundreds of bike riders ignore red lights (with the police - on bikes themselves - looking on). Right now the city is working on creating traffic lanes that are designated for bikes. Maybe their next bike-related project will be encouraging bike-riders to adhere to traffic laws.

A girl can dream.

So Little Time, So Much To Bitch About and Share

1. E-mails - to everyone I send e-mails to, I'm sorry. There's something wrong with my e-mail program that causes a question mark to be inserted at the end of every sentence. Remember on Party of Five when Charlie went to a parent-teacher conference at Owen's school and he accidentally made fun of the teacher who claimed she had "upspeak"? Yeah, I don't have that. I'm really not that indecisive.

2. (Not) Dancing With the Stars - no shock that Josie went home. But can we just discuss how much I hate fluff shows like tonight's was? Just bang out the results in the first segment, break for commercial, and then just bring out Dolly Parton's boobs and Savion Glover for the rest of the show. Stop talking so fucking much! NOBODY cares what that dork is talking about!

3. Customer Service - I'm a huge fan of good customer service. Let's talk about the good and bad customer service I've received this week.
3a. Burke Williams Spa - I decided yesterday that I "needed" to get my eyebrows waxed and it was the first place I thought of to try, not having any personal waxing experience in this city. You should go, you should ask for Robin. She just moved here from LA, and was great. And not only because she gave me a slew of free samples to shove in my pocket.

3b. Whole Paycheck - Though I am not a foodie, there are specific foods I like better than others, and DeBoles spinach fettucini is one of them. Whole Foods will order it by the box for me, and sell it wholesale. Me likey. The other day I went to pick up my box of pasta, and the guy told me there'd been a terrible accident. Somebody opened up the box they were holding for me and SOLD one of the boxes of pasta! He told me to go pick out any pasta off the shelf that I wanted, they'd give me that for free, and still sell me my big box of pasta wholesale.

3c - Safeway Delivery - they were scheduled to arrive last night between 7 and 9 p.m. At 8:41 p.m. I called Safeway to ask when I should expect the dude to arrive. They told me to call them if he didn't arrive before 9 p.m. I asked how that would work since they close then too. The guy gave a big sigh, saying, "I suppose I *could* call the driver on his phone..." to which I replied, "Thanks! I'll hold!" He came back saying the driver was running late and would be arriving between 10 and 10:30 p.m. That pissed me off. I'd specifically not started dinner because I didn't want to have food all over the counters when the delivery guy arrived. So I asked when somebody was planning to tell me the driver would be arriving late. Dude on the phone didn't know. The driver arrived at 9:22 p.m., and never apologized for being late. Despite my anger, I did tell the driver to be careful of the stove, which was hot, as by that point I was cooking dinner.

4. Loose Earlobe Lady - yeah I know, you thought there'd be no more LEL stories. SURPRISE! I was at an interview the other day, and the HR woman looked at the last firm I worked at, and told me she'd interviewed Loose from my firm, did I know her? Why yes, in fact we sat next to each other. Say Green, why did you leave Last Firm? Because they moved my department to the East Bay and I live in the city and didn't want to commute so far. Ohh, that makes sense. So does Loose live in the city also? Nope, she lives in the East Bay. Was her last day the same as your last day? No, she left about three weeks or a month before I did. I just left it there. If I said anything else it'd have been rude. I had a second interview with the firm today, and the attorney liked me a lot, but wants to interview more people. In telling a friend about it, I confessed to being worried. "What if he interviews someone else and finds someone better than me to hire?" Her response was perfect. "He won't. Look who's out there - Loose Earlobe!"

5. Bank of America - Trixie is away on a long trip (party at my house!) and left me the rent check for October before she went. She forgot to sign it. I brought it to the bank today, and the guy deposited it without blinking or saying a word to me. That SUCKS. To know my bank is that lax in their procedures? Horrible! Bank of America, for SHAME!

As annoying as all this is, I realize it could be worse. How's your customer service been lately?

Nicole, Are You Watching?!?!??!

There should be a show involving dance on a major network at all times of the year. That's my idea of heaven. Now, let's begin.

- Jennie - I have to be honest, Kelly Taylor was always my favorite of Donna, Brenda, Andrea and Kelly on 90210. So I'm rooting for her. But yeah, I know she wasn't that great.

- Josie - she forgot to say she's also known for being the exgirlfriend of David Blaine. Josie not only couldn't dance, but clearly didn't feel comfortable in her dress.

- Sabrina - I don't know shit about the Cheetah Girls - they struck me as something for eight year old girls who want to pretend to be sluttily dressed. But this bitch can DANCE! Yes, too much hip-hop. I'm impressed. She was really tight.

- Marie - She's dancing at a distinct advantage over people like Kelly. I mean Jennie. Marie is comfortable in front of a live audience. She's in her element. I thought she was graceful despite the lack of technical difficulty. I would not be surprised if Marie had given herself the advice to, "Keep it simple, Stupid" because that's exactly what she did, and it worked for her.

- Mel B - is she the one who just gave birth to Eddie Murphy's baby? I'll say it again - the people with live audience experience really have a much stronger stage presence than those who don't. Mel lost her timing a couple of times when the eight-counts changed. Just eh. I wasn't as impressed with her performance as the judges were.

- Jane Seymour - Oh my god, I want to be her when I grow up (accent and all)! Her performance was simply lovely. No other adjective describes it better. I'd give her an 8.5.

Crying ... Somewhere

In high school I was friends with a girl who said crying was a sign of weakness. I'm one of those people who will consider every view, and after considering hers, I dismissed it as being wrong. Sometimes you need to immerse yourself in the sadness in order to move through it. There are studies that have concluded that crying is cathartic.

I'm a big fan of visualization. Like yoga, it sounds corny, but I can't argue with the results, so I'm forced to believe in it. I can move pain from one part of my body to another. When I was a little girl, sitting on the living room steps, my mom told me about a psychology class she took in college, where a professor told the class about moving headaches from one part of the head to another. And if you can move the headache within your head, why not move it OUT of your head? That's stuck with me. I love psychology. And when I have a headache so bad that it sends me to bed, I lay there and try to smooth out the pain, the same way you'd try to smooth out a sharp nail using a nail file.

There's a lot of construction going on near my house lately, and having walked past it four times my eyes are very dry and itchy this afternoon. I lent my eyedrops to a friend the other day, and have been visualizing hydrated eyes today. Water hasn't really helped, and saline only helped a little bit. Crying would probably help, but I don't need to cry today.

When I lived in Florida there were a lot of sunshowers. After the rain, there'd sometimes be a rainbow, and Florida is where I was when first seeing one in person. If you've never seen one, it's much more awesome in person than when looking at a postcard. One day I was walking to the leasing office, and a guy was walking towards me. He pointed up and in an excited tone said, "Look, a rainbow!" and I looked up. It was beautiful, and we both paused in the parking lot to gaze at the rainbow for a few seconds. Then I thanked him and we both walked on.

That happened four or five years ago, but every time I think of that, I'm touched by his sharing it with me. I'm sure he promptly forgot about me before reaching his apartment, but he made my day. It kind of makes my day all over again any time I remember it.

All afternoon I've been pouring saline in my eyes the way junkies use Visine trying to hide their drug habits, and my eyes are hurting less now. But if I were going to make myself cry, I'd do it by listening to this song. And just like I can make the pain move, this song can make the tears come.

Nicest Roommates EVER

Trixie: Is my music interfering with your tv-watching?
Me: No. Is my tv-watching interfering with your music-listening?
Trixie: No.
Me: We're the most considerate roommates ever!
Trixie, who was crouching on the floor looking through her shoe-closet-thingie kept in the living room, falls over laughing.