Sad or Hip?

Anaïs’ Little Sister and I are sitting next to each other, each with our laptop computers balanced on our laps.  A g-chat bubble pops up on my screen:

Anaïs’ Little Sister: Hey

There is a part of me that wants to roll my eyes,  but the larger part responds, typing away at my computer like the geek I really am.

my (so-called) glamourous job…

I’m writing this from a pizza place in downtown Berkeley, because my office isn’t finished yet. They’re laying carpet as we speak.

Some days I ask myself “What’s with Today, today?”

I’m in the Kafka universe.

Binary is fun…

01001000 01100101 01111000 00100000 01101001 01110011 00100000 01100110 01110101 01101110 01101110 01100101 01110010 00101110

62 61 73 65 36 34 20 68 61 73 20 74 68 65 6d 20 62 6f 74 68 20 62 65 61 74 2e

T2ggdG8gYmUgYSBnZWVrIGluIGxvdmUu

That is all.

Housing Observations (North Bay Memories)

The last time that I did a serious housing search was a few years ago in the North Bay. One of the rooms for rent I looked at was in the home of a fairly nice guy, youngish and clean-cut. We got along fairly well and as he was showing me out, I quipped, “As long as you don’t have a meth-lab in the bathroom, I think this will work out really well!”

There was a moment of silence, which I later identified to be stunned, as his face went through a series of contortions that anyone who isn’t epileptic (or doing theatrical warm-ups) should be having, finally settling on an expression of abject horror, along the lines of: how did she know??

I left then.

Housing Observations (East Bay)

The entirety of the ‘rooms-for-rent’ in the East Bay that are even vaguely appealing all appear to be owned by queer men.  I’m not sure if this says more about the housing situation or the roommates that appeal to me.

the marvels of planning …

I thought I would enthral you all with this snapshot I took with my camera phone on the way to work yesterday. This is the mall-esque affair just around the corner from my charming little place in the city (okay, too sarcastic.)

Yes, the glare from the building is a normal state of affairs. It’s covered in an almost tin-foil-like outer layer, which looks really cool up close, but seriously when the sun hits it it’s like staring at a light bulb… on crack. In and of itself, this doesn’t present too bad of a problem, until you realise (see, no zed) that just out of shot to the left is one of the largest motorways in the U.K. And when I say just out of shot I mean to say “there’s about fifty feet separating them” if even that.

Therefore, today’s award for idiocy of the higher calibre goes to whoever thought it would be just peachy keen to put a _giant reflective surface_ right next to six lanes of 70-80 mph traffic.

in my office

The only thing better than coffee?

A GTalk window.

I have a new addiction . . .

It consists of carbonated water, caramel colouring (spelled correctly), aspartame, phosphoric acid, potassium benzoate, citric acid and caffeine. Sweet, sweet caffeine.

Google says driving it would be 7,244 miles.

Google Maps will tell you how to get to Europe.

I especially love step number twenty-nine.

(Sooner or later one of the other kids will post on this damn thing.)

Hipster On The Go

I’m a sellout. I know this because, in addition to owning a colander, I’m sitting in SFO, typing furiously away at my laptop.  I’m wearing my artfully distressed British flag tee-shirt (most likely artfully distressed by three year olds in Indonesia), my men’s camo pants, and a black coat. At my feet is the laptop case that weighs more than the bag I checked.