Bless their little hearts

Someone told me that here in West Texas, if you say those words, it negates anything negative that precedes it. For example, "Lubbock is the land of inbred crack babies, bless their little hearts." To me, it doesn't really work, but I'm gonna use it for the title of this post anyway.

I quit making New Years Resolutions years ago and just started naming them after body parts (The year of the boobs, the year of Don Eduardo, etc.). Anyway, the reason I don't make resolutions is because I tend to evaluate my life continually and because my resolutions tend to be the same: stop living balls out forward toward the future and embrace the present, try to enjoy the place you are living right now, etc. And today I tried. I tried to live in the present and embrace the city of Lubbock. I got dressed up and took myself out on a date. This date was planned to be dinner, a leisurely stroll through the bookstore for a few hours, and perhaps a stop to rent an artsy movie (no, I don't have netflix--though I may invest in it now). Instead, here is what happened.

I won't go into dinner but suffice it to say I ended up at a chain restaurant amidst a cacophony of people one might see in the merry old land of Oz. The food gave me heartburn, but I trudged on. Ah, the bookstore. You see, there are a few indigenous bookstores here in Lubbock but they close early and are very cramped, so browsing ends pretty quickly there. One actually has a sci fi reading room complete with action figures, which is awesome, but I digress. Anyway, tonight I went to the new Barnes and Noble. This thing is double decker, which is cool, one would think. Oh but in true Lubbock fashion, it so was not.

The place was crawling, infested with yokels and pubescent junior high kids making out in the stacks (the kids, not the yokels, thank god). It was like a roach motel for the inbred crack babies of Lubbock! But I, dear readers, pulled myself into a zenlike stupor and focused on the books. Now normally, I cannot leave a bookstore without spending around 50-75 bucks. I just can't. Call me stupid, but I can't. It's an addiction I have no desire to heal from. And time stops in a bookstore. I'm there for a min of about 3 hours. Tonight, 20 min.

The bottom floor was filled with games and calendars and a nice cafe, actually. I think the business section was there, and the music section, as well. Plus there were the multitudes of endcaps filled with bargain books and features. To my dismay, these were horrid. The bargain books were all democratic party biographies (JFK, Obama), whereas the featured book section involved rows and rows of books written by Mike Huckabee!!! I ran upstairs. They have a giant kid and teen section and half of the upstairs is taken up with a homeschooling resource center! Then the other half contains 2 shelving units of test prep, 4 shelving units of fiction and literature(of which Stephen King and Dean Koontz are a part), one shelf of "Spirituality" which is anything non-Christian, and the rest Christian literature.

It was insane. 4 bookshelves of fiction and literature??? I thought I was seeing things. I actually walked around again to make sure I wasn't hallucinating. This is our bookstore??? This is our fantabulous 2 story bookstore? Oh god. They've closed down all the libraries in town (except 1 which has limited hours), and this is our bookstore!?

So I left to hit Blockbuster which has everything in boxes because they are closing. They won't rent anything, so I bought Sunshine Cleaning. I hope it's good.

God help me. Bless their little hearts.

Forget part 3

I'm too Cranky to write part 3 to the Escape, so suffice it to say that we expected to stay in a posh resort and ended up in a bug filled A framed metal cabintent overlooking the slime ridden Comal river.

Here's today's bitch. The first part of this happened last week.

***LAST WEEK***WTF is wrong with people? That crazy place I worked last summer still hasn’t sent my 1099 because every f’in time I give them my ssn, they lose it. So I wrote them and asked for their accountant’s phone #. He doesn’t have voicemail, so I called him last week(during my 10 min lunch), and his secretary, a syrupy sweet woman with a crackly emphysema voice answered. I ask for mr. effi…she interrupts me and says, “he’s walking out the door and won’t be back until 4.” I asked if I could leave a message for him, thinking it would be voicemail. She said, “you shore can.” So I wait and she says, “you shore can.” I said, “oh, with you. Ok. “ and give her the info. With everybit of the info, she acts (in a sugary sweet way) like it is such a pain in the ass to write it down, so after I finish, I say, and can you have him call me to confirm that it is in the mai…she interrupts again, “and that number is…” still sugary. I give it to her, and I say that he should just leave a messa…she interrupts again, “I will give him every single “wittle” bit of the information you gave me, I promise. You have a nice da…she interrupts herself by hanging up on me.

It was everything within my power not to call back and tell her to march her wittle ass to hell, but she has all my info, so I won’t. Instead, I will email the nutjobs and tell them that I gave the secretary the info and ask if they will follow up to make sure I get the information.

***TODAY*** I check my work email from home (on spring break). The nutjobs fwded my email to the accountant who replied saying that he never got my information and doesn't know what happened since his secretary is usually good about giving him messages. BITCH didn't give him the message just to spite me! WTF???

SEE? SEE why I’m cranky? I mean, why do people act like that? I was polite, respectful…I don’t get it. I really don’t get it. I SWEAR TO GOD I GAVE THAT WOMAN NO REASON TO BE SPITEFUL! WHAT THE HELL????!!!

I am surrounded by inbred crack babies

University of Houston--What a ridiculous institution! I haven’t gotten my parking permit. It’s 3 weeks into the semester for the class for the job that I'm leaving. I’ve called to change my address with them and changed it online 4 times. They still send things to my old address.

Anyway, I haven’t gotten my permit, so I’ve called several times to complain, and they keep sending the permit to my old address. I keep getting $40 tickets, and when I call to dispute it, they say that I have to come down in person Monday or Tuesday before 4 to dispute it at “court,” and after that, they have 21 days to make a decision. In the meantime, starting today, Chuck has to leave work early to drop me off because if I get another ticket, I get booted or towed. If I get booted, I’ll have to wait until the next Monday between 8 and 4 to dispute the boot in court.

The thing I don’t understand is that they have record that THEY made the mistake, and they are still racking me up with tickets.

So I go today and wait in line. On the UH website, they have an online form for appeals for parking tickets. I had filled out the form to save time, but when I got up there, the woman grabs my online form and walks off. I waited 5 min for her return and finally asked some woman in the back wtf was happening. She says, "Oh, you were supposed to fill out the form in that box." Well the form in the box was the same form as online but in triplicate. The woman, apparently, had gone off to make triplicate copies of my form but got into an "intellectual" conversation about the movie "Slyah." Her friends hadn't heard of the movie Slyah, so they all said "Slyah. I ain't never heard of no Slyah." and her retort was, "Slyah. You know. Slyah." This banter went on for another 4 minutes until some lightbulb balloon said, "OHHHHH SLYYYAHHH!" Then somehow it was deemed that Slyahh meant Sly and the Family Stone.

At that point, she decided to come back to the counter and hand me my copy of the triplicate and then go back to banter. I said, "Um...so do you need the copies of my receipt showing that I paid for my permit in December?" She said, "Well, if ya want to attach 'em." I said, "Yup, I wanta attach 'em, puleez." She said, "Oh, now you're speaking my fucking language so I'll be fucking nice to you because since earlier you spoke like a normal human, I didn't understand you and thought you were a fucking foreigner, and since I'm from Texas, I hate foreigners..." [paraphrased].

So then I made the mistake of asking her how long it would take for my appeal to go to "court" and then be given a decision, and she said that it would be best for me to pay my ticket because if I don't pay my ticket in 21 days, they will boot my car the next time they see it, parking permit or not. Um...where is the logic in this? I say, "well do I get a new parking permit at least?"

Then she pulls out my parking permit. It's in a fucking USPS box with 1400 other ones, still in the envelope sent to my old address with a big yellow USPS sticker on it that says return to sender no forwarding address. She hands it to me, and I have to laugh.

Now my other crack baby story. Those of you who have been following my blog since the beginning might remember me telling the story of the crack baby school I worked for in the summer. Well, I got a call two weeks ago from them saying that their accountant needs my social security number for the tax forms to send me. (Um...why don't they have my ssn?). Anyway, I call them back and talk to the owner of the school. I give him my ssn and my new address; plus, I follow up with an email sending my new address and saying that I gave the owner the ssn. So today, I send them an email because i haven't received my W-whatever, and they send one back saying that the called their accountant today and need my ssn. Um...hello...crackbabies...what the hell? I sent an email back and said that 2 weeks ago I spoke to the owner (the writer of the email) and gave him the ssn and the address and followed up with an email. I'm waiting to hear back.

WTF? I mean, am I nuts? Please validate that I'm surrounded by inbred crack babies or I am going to have to commit myself.

BTW, anyone up for Memphis at the beginning of March?