Fun with Hawaiian Insurance

So, now that we're happily ensconced in a hotel here in Hawaii (we have no actual place to live as yet, but hopefully soon), I went to change my car registration from Virginia to Hawaii. Lo and behold, you need a safety inspection first. So I went to the safety inspection place and waited for thirty minutes in line, only to be told that my Virginia insurance isn't valid here; you must have Hawaiian insurance.

So off I went this morning to the State Farm office in my (apparently uninsured) car. The nice lady in the very big mu-mu (yes, some people actually wear those here) typed up all the necessary forms. While she was typing, we had the following conversation:

Insurance lady: [peering at a form] Does you or your husband have the birthdate of July 29, 1977 [not the actual date]?

Me: Oh, that's my birthday.

Lady: Oh, we're the same sign!

Me: [blank look. What sign?] Um, okay.

Lady: [leaning in and whispering conspiratorialy] We Leos really like to be the boss, don't we?

Me: Oh, um, yeah. I guess.

Lady: So, your husband's birthday is April 27?

Me: Yes.

Lady: Wow, that is so uncanny! My husband and I were just like that--he was an Aries and I was a Leo. Just like you guys!

Me: Oh, that's nice.

Lady: Of course, we're divorced now.

WT, Part 4: Alabama and Mississippi

They say that life moves more slowly in places like Alabama and Mississippi. I have discovered that this is because EVERY SINGLE ROAD IN THOSE STATES IS UNDER CONSTRUCTION. I am not kidding. We drove for five hundred miles on a four-lane highway that had been narrowed to two, so our nine-hour trip took twelve hours instead. We amused ourselves most of the way through Alabama by saying, "Greenbow, Alabama," and "Jenny: The most beautiful name in the whole world," in a Forrest Gump accent over and over again.

Mississippi is the same as Alabama, only with even worse roads. Also, the water is brown, and I don't mean the water in Old Man River. We stopped at a Hardees and the water was absolutely terrifying. I'm fairly sure that washing my hands in the bathroom actually made them dirtier.

WT, Part 3: Louisiana

Louisiana has more cows than one might expect. You'll be driving through a swamp, surrounded by brackish water sprouting trees thickly hung with Spanish moss and chock full of snakes and alligators, and all of a sudden, there will be a herd of cows, happily trodding through the water, getting cool in the shade and munching on pussywillows. It was quite odd.

We spent three days in New Orleans. They were wonderful days, and I was very happy to get to visit, and I was equally happy to get to leave. New Orleans is just too much of all the good stuff--too much good food, too much alcohol, too much river-and-weeping-willows-and-soft-jazz-playing-on-the-street. It was a little overwhelming. I did buy a very cool tee-shirt that says "Born Again Wiccan" on it, although I haven't been brave enough to wear it yet. I was seriously tempted to wear it in front of the King's family in Georgia, but I was afraid some of them would lynch me, particularly his cousin, who is a snake-handling, fundamentalist preacher as well as a world-champion, Olympic-level bow hunter. He can hit a deer at 500 yards, so he can sure as hell hit me.

If you happen to be going to New Orleans, I have only one recommendation--Mena's Palace. Of all the great food in that city, it's the best. It's a tiny hole in the wall, cash only please, next to a fabulous used bookstore in the Quarter. Get the shrimp po'boy. Trust me.

Why the Publishing Industry Is in Such Sorry Shape

I just got an e-mail from my agent to all her clients. She's got a buyer from a publishing company who is looking for five new authors who want to write a series of three books each, for print and audiobook publication. It's a big company with the potential for really decent sales.

The catch is, the buyer wants, and I quote, deeply serious literary work, "like Tom Clancy."

That's right, Tom Clancy. If the publishing industry now considers Tom Clancy's books to be serious literature, I might as well just stab myself in the eye with my pen and be done with it right now.

WT, Part 2: South Carolina

South Carolina: The State of Nothing Except Billboards for Things in Other States

Seriously, there's just not a lot there. We drove for like six freaking hours through South Carolina, and only saw four people. And seventeen million trees. We arrived at the King's father's house for an overnight visit. The King's dad took off when he was about six months old and never came back. They've only seen each other a handful of times in his entire life, and the King's dad remarried three times after divorcing his mom. Despite that, and despite the sheer excruciating boringness that is South Carolina, we had a good time. The King's dad was extremely welcoming and friendly, and I ate shrimp that had been pulled from the Charleston River only hours before, and the King and I stood on the banks of the river just as the sun went down, watching the shrimp boats sail in, and kissed. It was like a scene out of the Prince of Tides, only without the rape and violent physical abuse and stuff. Oh, and I ate my first boiled peanut.*

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* It was better than you'd think, really.

WT: Part 1a, More North Carolina

I left a few vital things out of my previous post on North Carolina. The first is that we stopped for dinner at a steakhouse that looked popular, in some tiny town in the middle of nowhere. The food was actually quite good, but my first clue that I definitely wasn't in familiar territory was that the King ordered the house special, which was meat with a side of meat. I'm not kidding--beef ribs and steak. My second clue was the somewhat offputting fact that there was a dead squirrel ON OUR TABLE. The entire restaurant was decorated in dead, stuffed animals. Yum.

Also, I discovered why the King and I are soulmates: When we order bacon cheese fries, I let him have all the bacony ones, and he lets me have all the cheesy ones.

Finally, there is a very special restaurant in North Carolina called the Risque Cafe. I haven't actually eaten there, but I'm sure it's something very unique. You see, it's a combination porn shop and eatery. That's right, stop in for a club sandwich and a side of fries, get a naked lady on your lap. It's just off I-95, so if you're ever down that way, do stop in and let me know if it's as terrifying inside as it appears to be from the outside, and if the naked ladies actually serve the food, or if that's against some sort of North Carolinian health code.

Internet Irony 2, Or, Why I Am an Idiot

Um, yeah, so now that I put up that last post, the one with the dirty, dirty word in it (in capital letters, no less!), this stupid hotel computer won't let me view my own blog. Yep, you'd think I would have thought of that earlier.

Internet Irony

In between attempting to post about my trip (next up: South Carolina!), I visited Grrl's blog, which I've been missing terribly. I read her latest post, no problem, and then went to comment on it. BEEP! The hotel computer I'm using threw up a big red box that said "PAGE BLOCKED!! This page contains material that may be harmful to children! The forbidden word is "FUCKED!"

So, um, I can't read Grrl's comments because there's a bad word in them, but you're perfectly happy to show me what that word is? So, like, if my hypothetical kid* were trying to get to a dirty page, she'd be blocked, but you'd be happy to tell her that the page includes "hot chocolate scat enema stories?"** Righto.

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* Ha! Hypothetical kid. Like that's ever going to happen. Ha ha.

** No doubt I'm going to get some very cool keyword hits off that last paragraph. For all of you that got here looking for enema stories, believe me, I like them as much as the next girl, but I just don't have anything for you.

Whirlwind Tour: Part 1

North Carolina: The Home of Cigarettes. Okay, technically that's not actually the state motto, but it might as well be. The picturesque forest that runs along I-95 through North Carolina is covered with cigarette factories, and everyone in the entire state either works there or uses the product. I think they kick you out of the state if you don't.

We saw a billboard that said, "North Carolina: We Support the Military More Than Any Other State." I immediately thought, "North Carolina: We Like to Kill People Too!" Perhaps that was uncharitable of me.

We drove through North Carolina quickly, stopping only once, to see the Girl Who Is Prettier Than Me. When I was in junior high and high school, I had two best friends, Caroline and Anne. Caroline was the pretty one, Anne was the daredevil, and I was the smart one. Every guy we ever met would have killed to get with Caroline, and she could have given a rat's ass about any of them--she just wasn't that interested. But for all that, she got knocked up when we were seventeen, and I lost track of her during college. I admit I was secretly a little happy when she got pregnant--she might be gorgeous, but at least I got to go to college.

So anyway, I hadn't seen her for ten years, and then about a month ago, Anne told me she had moved to North Carolina. I wrote her, and we arranged to get together for lunch. It was good to see her, but I was rather bitter by the end. You see, not only is she still the Girl Who's Prettier Than Me, but she is happily married and has not only one, but two beautiful daughters. Looks like I really did waste my fertile years getting an education. Damn it, and damn that pretty girl.

Checking In

I'm back! Sort of, anyway. I'm checking in to let you all know I'm still alive. To all the folks who have surprisingly been checking my blog while I've been away, thanks so much for not forgetting all about me!

The whirlwind tour is almost over, and I'll be back to my regularly scheduled posts in another week, it looks like. We are in California at my parents' house right now, and we should be flying to Hawaii in about seven days. The Navy hasn't yet given us our plane tickets, however, so that's sort of up for debate.

Nevertheless, I'll have tons of posts after we arrive--we drove through North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and Nevada before getting home. Whew! It was a big trip, and I promise to tell you all about it very soon!

Moving Day

Au revoir, Virginia! We're off on our whirlwind tour, but first I need to bid farewell to the Commonwealth of Virginia...

--Goodbye state-owned liquor stores that won't sell you a damned shot of vodka after 9 pm or on Sundays.

--Goodbye tourists asking where the Washington Monument is, even though the thing is 900 feet tall and visible from 50 miles away.

--Goodbye assholes who say loudly into their cell phones, "And the congressman was just telling me..." Congressmen are a dime a dozen around here, asshead. I ran three down with my car this morning.

--Goodbye drivers with diplomatic plates who don't know the rules of the road and wouldn't follow them if they did.

--Goodbye crazy fundamentalists who take up two seats reading full-size Bibles on the metro.

--Goodbye crack whore who asks me to buy her cigarettes every morning and has no underwear.

--Goodbye crazy boss who insists that I capitalize "State" in sentences, even though it's totally wrong, "for political reasons."

--Goodbye eager-eyed interns who come here all self-important and whose goals are to network their little hearts out, get laid by other interns after getting shitfaced at the Dubliner after work, and get elected president in 2028.

--Goodbye humidity so thick you need to take a shower after going outside to get the newspaper.

Goodbye, Virginia! You've been fun, except for the shitty rent, shitty weather, and shitty traffic. Next stop, North Carolina!!

Rotten Eggs Is Going on a Whirlwind Tour

By which I mean, of course, that I'm totally ditching you for the next five weeks whilst I take a fabulous cross-country trip with the King before moving to gorgeous, temperate, heavenly Honolulu where I will live for free on the taxpayer's dime and work for myself from a laptop on the beach.

No, I'm not kidding. Aren't you jealous?

Seriously, though, I'll try really, really hard to post at least once a week between now and May 6th, and I'm sure our jaunt across the highways and byways of America will lend itself to many good posts, especially as we're visiting both of my best friends from junior high school, neither of whom I have seen in ten years. And one of whom I used to hate because she said she would be my bridesmaid and then didn't show up to my wedding. She gave me two weeks' notice that she wasn't coming because she didn't want to have to be away from her husband for a whole two days to fly out to Georgia and be in my wedding.

Now she's trying to make it up to me. We'll see.

Anyway, I love you and I'll miss you all terribly! I'll get back on here as often as possible and tell you all about the glory of the Flying J Truck Stop and what it's like to hang out at the local gas station on Friday night in rural North Carolina. It'll be fun, I promise, so don't totally abandon me, okay?

Monday Morning Alarm: Haiku Trilogy

Holy crap, the beeps
Talk radio comes on loud
The sexy dream ends


I was having sex
With Angelina Jolie
Then the alarm comes


Alarm buzz shocking
Hand slapping, alarm falling
Shit, I broke the Bose

Fun with Crazies

There is a free newspaper in Washington, DC, the Examiner. The newspaper folks pay homeless and poor people a couple of bucks to stand around metro stations and pass out copies to people walking by. Two of them are exceptionally interesting:

The Muslim Cusser. This woman stands at the entrance to my train station in a full-length black chador, the very-conservative Muslim dress. She looks very pious and modest in her black headscarf, which carefully covers every hair. You'd think she was the most perfect conservative Muslim woman. Then she holds out a paper and says, "This weather is a fucking pisser, ain't it? Have a newspaper."

The Catatonic. At the Franconia-Springfield metro stop, there is a man who holds papers. He doesn't actually pass them out, because he is a catatonic. For real. The man is an actual catatonic. He stands perfectly still in the center of the doorway, his arms held out, with a pile of newspapers on them, and people take one off the stack as they walk by. He's obviously homeless, and I've never seen him move. It's a bit embarrassing to walk up to a stranger and take something out of their arms without them ever moving or making eye contact, much less speaking. He's like a human bookshelf. I often wonder if the newspaper people actually pay him, or if they just put him in place three months ago and just refill his arms with papers twice a day.

The Last Hurrah

I've got so much bursting out today that I actually sat down and made a list of all the posts I want to get on here, so refresh early and refresh often. But to start, today is my last day of work!!!

To celebrate my departure, the building fire alarm has gone off six times in two hours, thus ensuring that I get plenty of exercise before my move to Hawaii by walking down three flights of stairs, through a basement, up half a flight, and through the lobby to the outside, and then retracing my steps once they get the motherfucking alarm turned off. Wait twenty minutes and repeat. Six times.

Also, we're going to a bar this evening for happy hour. I intend to get very, very happy, and I intend for it to last more than an hour.

Because after 5 p.m., I am officially OUTTA HERE! Starting tomorrow, I will be officially self-employed, a freewheeling freelancer with nothing but the stars to hold me back. And the IRS, who wants my first estimated tax payment in three weeks. Before I've actually earned any money. Because they're just cool that way.

Awful Irony

I had promised myself I wasn't going to expose any of you to any more stories about Terry Schiavo, but I just can't help myself. I just found out (yes, I'm slow) that the reason she's in the vegetative state is because she was severely bulimic and was working on starving herself to death. Does anyone else find it bitterly funny that she might finally get what she wanted?

How Not to Publish a Book

Notes from an editor:

1. When you send the manuscript to a publisher, send it in a plain, ordinary envelope. Do not wrap the manuscript in plastic wrap, bubble wrap, duct tape, aluminum foil, or all of the above. This will make me think it is a bomb and will scare me a lot.

2. Follow the publisher’s directions. If our website says to send in four copies, send four copies. There is a reason for this. If I have to Xerox your manuscript three times to pass it out to our other editors, I will be very annoyed, and I will be almost infinitely more likely to throw your book in the trash.

3. Do not harass me. If you want to make sure we got your book, sent it return receipt requested. Do not call me every day. Do not leave long, rambling messages on my voicemail about how you were inspired to write this book by a little bird that crapped on your head one morning, thus teaching you that life is infinite struggle. Buddha already said it, and he did it better than you.

4. If you are writing a children’s book, do not tell me that I must publish it because your kids love it. Your kids love you, not your book. Your book almost certainly sucks.

5. If you are writing a children’s book, do not include illustrations of limbs detached from their bodies in an auto wreck, injured animals dripping blood and gore, or adult men in children’s darkened bedrooms. Trust me--if you include pictures of any of the above, we won’t be publishing your book.

And to that guy in prison who wants to write a kids book about how he really, REALLY loves his pretty, little 8-year-old niece, I’m calling the fucking cops.

You Found Me

I've been wanting to get some good search terms up here recently, and lo and behold, the Internet has provided...

I've gotten this one before. Seriously, how many people out there are interested in that part of her body?

A bitter, bitter bug student?

I know it's weird, but the addition of "pick" instead of just "axe" on this one made me laugh.

And really, what on earth were you looking for, dude? If you're reading this, I'd really like to know. Was it about President Bush? Neurology? A really odd porn fetish?

Infertili-versary

I was going to just combine this with the post below, but it seemed to really need its own blogspace:

Today is the 18-month anniversary of us trying to have a baby.

I will be celebrating by having chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, then drinking myself into oblivion. I think the King is worried about incipient alcoholism in me. I told him to worry about his goddamned "9% normal" morphology issues.

How did you celebrate your infertili-versary?

Going, Going...

...GONE! That's right, the whorehouse is sold! Some schmucks, er, nice couple, offered to give us $5,000 more than we asked for for our 20-year-old, beaten down house, for a total of $370,000. That is a 75% increase from what we paid for it three years ago, illustrating the COMPLETELY PSYCHOTICALLY INSANSE housing market in metro DC. It's madness. We put the house on the market last Friday and had our first contract in five hours. Three more rolled in over the weekend.

This is happy for us, because the King wants to start investing in real estate when we get to Hawaii. I don't want to, but he's managed to talk me into buying some sort of property we can rent out, ala a condo on the beach or something. I agreed because if the renters turn out to be for shit and leave us without paying, we can always go and live in it. Not so if we had gone with his other (more-beloved) idea, which was to buy an empty store in a strip mall and rent it out to a business. Although sleeping in an empty Baja Fresh might have been kind of cool.