various misadventures
Dec. 2nd, 2003 12:26 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
fearlesstempi.
Saturday night I went to the grocery store with my brother to pick up a few things, including this massive glass bottle of wine vinegar, which my brother wanted to buy for his growing stash of winemaking supplies. This led to a long, Abbot-and-Costello esque conversation regarding said wine vinegar.
Me: That's a lot of wine vinegar.
Jim: Yeah.
Me: I didn't know they used vinegar to make wine.
Jim: They don't.
Me: But it's called wine vinegar?
Jim: They get the vinegar from the wine. I think.
Me: But...you're making wine.
Jim: Yeah.
Me: Why are you buying something that comes from wine if you're trying to make wine?
Jim: Retard, I'm buying it for the bottle. It's huge. And it's only three bucks.
Me: You're so weird.
Since my brother's previous bottle-gathering method had been driving around picking up empty bottles off the road (I swear, it sounds like we raised him out of a cardboard box, or that we're hillbillies or something, and I swear we're not), I decided this was a step up. I picked the huge bottle of wine vinegar out of the cart to put it in my car and, of course, dropped it. On the pavement. Where it shattered and splashed wine vinegar all over our clothes.
Jim: You IDIOT--
Me: (already walking toward the supermarket to alert cleanup crew) Shut up! I know!
I walked into the store with the top of the bottle dangling from one of my fingers (I'd reached down to pick up part of the bottle before leaving the parking spot for some reason), and held it up like it were a live weapon before the customer service desk, where they not only booked it out there to clean up, but also let me have another whole thing of wine vinegar free! Even though it was my fault the other one was destroyed! Part of me thinks they just wanted me out of the store and away from them because of the whole being-drenched-in-vinegar-and-stinking-to-high-heaven thing, but still, it was pretty cool.
ii.
So I made the mistake of letting it slip that I'd been walking long distances to and fro class Monday nights, and my parents promptly freaked out.
Mom: You know, a girl disappeared just last week from a mall in, well, I don't know where exactly, but she just VANISHED and she was on her cell phone and the last thing her boyfriend heard on the other end was her saying "Oh my God" -- and you know, you can never be too --
Dad: Jessica. Why haven't you gotten a parking pass? You shouldn't be parking all the way across campus. That's stupid.
Mom: Did you forget to go? You forgot, didn't you. When can you go?
Dad: Maybe she should get some mace.
Mom: That's a good idea.
Dad: But what she really needs is a parking pass.
Mom: That's right. You know if you're kidnapped that the most important thing is --
Jess: Not to let them take you to the second location, I know.
Mom: I mean, if they're going to shoot you, they're going to shoot you, so they may as well do it right there.
Jess: There's a happy thought.
Anyway. So it was resolved, eventually, that I was to park illegally at the restricted lot right by my class so that no one would kidnap me. I know it sounds like my whole family is insane (and they/we are), but the truth is, a girl my age did disappear while walking across this very campus five years or so ago and she's never been found. Kind of creepy. Anyway, I agreed to park illegally partly to make them feel better and mostly because they said they'd pay the fine if I was caught, and due to my (lack of) luck with anything car-related, I wasn't putting much faith in my ability to avoid the law.
This was a good plan, an excellent plan, except for the fact that I had no idea where the parking lot next to my classroom was. It's a good-sized campus, the bulk of which was built at the same time and consists of four quads with identical high-rise buildings set at the four corners of campus. I cannot express to you how alike these quads look, especially at night.
So, short version: I got totally, totally lost, which led to me wandering alone, lost, and confused for a good forty minutes (including some time spent driving the car to different parking lots seeking out the correct building) instead of the usual four minutes I spent booking it across campus with my most confident stride. The correct quad was, of course, the first one I went to (I walked in the opposite side I usually do and got all discombobulated!), and I actually walked RIGHT BY my classroom while bitching into someone's voicemail about how confused and lost I was and how it was all the CAMPUS'S fault because it was so CONFUSING. Am such a tard.
Found class eventually! And got out of presentation for this week. Will have to go first next week. More time to prepare, which is good.
iii.
Speaking of my presentation, I must include this here because it must be documented for posterity. Conversation between me and my grandfather yesterday, after I'd dropped off some of his groceries.
Me: Well, I've gotta go. I have a project to work on.
Grandpa: Really? What are you studying?
Me: Women in the Temperance Movement.
Grandpa: [Spouts of impressive amount of facts about the Temperance Movement.]
Me: Wow, yeah. That's right.
Grandpa: And its leaders and members, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Frances Willard -- ALL Pro-Life.
Me: Grandpa.
Grandpa: I know, I know, you don't want to hear it--
Me: You're right, I --
Grandpa: It's inavoidable! The most important matter of our day! THOUSANDS of innocent babies are dying EVERY DAY! It's INESCAPABLE!
Me: Sure it is! If we stop talking about it, I've escaped it.
Grandpa: [Isn't amused.]
Me: Okay, I really have to --
Grandpa: You can't hide from it. The Democratic Party, the party of abortion and homosexuality--
Me: Okay, gotta run! Love you! Bye!
That's become my way of knowing when to exit the room, the second the phrase "The Democratic Party, the party of abortion and homosexuality" hits the air. And yes, it does so at every gathering, and other places. Last week I came down to eat breakfast and my parents pointed me towards the Opinion section of our local newspaper, the Sound Off section in particular, where people can call in and voice their opinions to the Editorial staff's answering machine. One comment read (I'm paraphrasing from memory):
"The article of [insert date] about Eliot Spitzer clearly failed to mention his alleigance to the party of abortion and homosexuality."
I almost choked on my orange juice. He's everywhere!
Saturday night I went to the grocery store with my brother to pick up a few things, including this massive glass bottle of wine vinegar, which my brother wanted to buy for his growing stash of winemaking supplies. This led to a long, Abbot-and-Costello esque conversation regarding said wine vinegar.
Me: That's a lot of wine vinegar.
Jim: Yeah.
Me: I didn't know they used vinegar to make wine.
Jim: They don't.
Me: But it's called wine vinegar?
Jim: They get the vinegar from the wine. I think.
Me: But...you're making wine.
Jim: Yeah.
Me: Why are you buying something that comes from wine if you're trying to make wine?
Jim: Retard, I'm buying it for the bottle. It's huge. And it's only three bucks.
Me: You're so weird.
Since my brother's previous bottle-gathering method had been driving around picking up empty bottles off the road (I swear, it sounds like we raised him out of a cardboard box, or that we're hillbillies or something, and I swear we're not), I decided this was a step up. I picked the huge bottle of wine vinegar out of the cart to put it in my car and, of course, dropped it. On the pavement. Where it shattered and splashed wine vinegar all over our clothes.
Jim: You IDIOT--
Me: (already walking toward the supermarket to alert cleanup crew) Shut up! I know!
I walked into the store with the top of the bottle dangling from one of my fingers (I'd reached down to pick up part of the bottle before leaving the parking spot for some reason), and held it up like it were a live weapon before the customer service desk, where they not only booked it out there to clean up, but also let me have another whole thing of wine vinegar free! Even though it was my fault the other one was destroyed! Part of me thinks they just wanted me out of the store and away from them because of the whole being-drenched-in-vinegar-and-stinking-to-high-heaven thing, but still, it was pretty cool.
ii.
So I made the mistake of letting it slip that I'd been walking long distances to and fro class Monday nights, and my parents promptly freaked out.
Mom: You know, a girl disappeared just last week from a mall in, well, I don't know where exactly, but she just VANISHED and she was on her cell phone and the last thing her boyfriend heard on the other end was her saying "Oh my God" -- and you know, you can never be too --
Dad: Jessica. Why haven't you gotten a parking pass? You shouldn't be parking all the way across campus. That's stupid.
Mom: Did you forget to go? You forgot, didn't you. When can you go?
Dad: Maybe she should get some mace.
Mom: That's a good idea.
Dad: But what she really needs is a parking pass.
Mom: That's right. You know if you're kidnapped that the most important thing is --
Jess: Not to let them take you to the second location, I know.
Mom: I mean, if they're going to shoot you, they're going to shoot you, so they may as well do it right there.
Jess: There's a happy thought.
Anyway. So it was resolved, eventually, that I was to park illegally at the restricted lot right by my class so that no one would kidnap me. I know it sounds like my whole family is insane (and they/we are), but the truth is, a girl my age did disappear while walking across this very campus five years or so ago and she's never been found. Kind of creepy. Anyway, I agreed to park illegally partly to make them feel better and mostly because they said they'd pay the fine if I was caught, and due to my (lack of) luck with anything car-related, I wasn't putting much faith in my ability to avoid the law.
This was a good plan, an excellent plan, except for the fact that I had no idea where the parking lot next to my classroom was. It's a good-sized campus, the bulk of which was built at the same time and consists of four quads with identical high-rise buildings set at the four corners of campus. I cannot express to you how alike these quads look, especially at night.
So, short version: I got totally, totally lost, which led to me wandering alone, lost, and confused for a good forty minutes (including some time spent driving the car to different parking lots seeking out the correct building) instead of the usual four minutes I spent booking it across campus with my most confident stride. The correct quad was, of course, the first one I went to (I walked in the opposite side I usually do and got all discombobulated!), and I actually walked RIGHT BY my classroom while bitching into someone's voicemail about how confused and lost I was and how it was all the CAMPUS'S fault because it was so CONFUSING. Am such a tard.
Found class eventually! And got out of presentation for this week. Will have to go first next week. More time to prepare, which is good.
iii.
Speaking of my presentation, I must include this here because it must be documented for posterity. Conversation between me and my grandfather yesterday, after I'd dropped off some of his groceries.
Me: Well, I've gotta go. I have a project to work on.
Grandpa: Really? What are you studying?
Me: Women in the Temperance Movement.
Grandpa: [Spouts of impressive amount of facts about the Temperance Movement.]
Me: Wow, yeah. That's right.
Grandpa: And its leaders and members, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Frances Willard -- ALL Pro-Life.
Me: Grandpa.
Grandpa: I know, I know, you don't want to hear it--
Me: You're right, I --
Grandpa: It's inavoidable! The most important matter of our day! THOUSANDS of innocent babies are dying EVERY DAY! It's INESCAPABLE!
Me: Sure it is! If we stop talking about it, I've escaped it.
Grandpa: [Isn't amused.]
Me: Okay, I really have to --
Grandpa: You can't hide from it. The Democratic Party, the party of abortion and homosexuality--
Me: Okay, gotta run! Love you! Bye!
That's become my way of knowing when to exit the room, the second the phrase "The Democratic Party, the party of abortion and homosexuality" hits the air. And yes, it does so at every gathering, and other places. Last week I came down to eat breakfast and my parents pointed me towards the Opinion section of our local newspaper, the Sound Off section in particular, where people can call in and voice their opinions to the Editorial staff's answering machine. One comment read (I'm paraphrasing from memory):
"The article of [insert date] about Eliot Spitzer clearly failed to mention his alleigance to the party of abortion and homosexuality."
I almost choked on my orange juice. He's everywhere!
