HOLY CRAP! WE BOUGHT A HOUSE TODAY!!!!!!!!!!!

Gigi came over last night and helped me drink a bottle of pinot and a few Goose Islands. I'm so grateful for Gigi, for her off-kilter way of interpreting the world, and the fact that when I off-handedly mentioned a favorite Sylvia Plath poem from my since dissipated days of teenaged darkeness, she knew exactly which one I was referring to, and why.

Gigi's a dream come true for most men. I say this because of the way Chris' eyes lit up when she started talking about string theory and m theory (I don't know what either of these things are). Because she has a wonderfully dry sense of humor, she's beautiful, and she also knows how to install hardwood floors. Because she lives by the advice that a woman should be a gourmet chef in the kitchen, a lady in the parlor, and a whore in the bedroom. Because she can drink most men under the table and can articulate, with no apologies, that not only is somebody a douche bag but exactly why this somebody is a douche bag. Very important. I'd be worried about the level of crushing that Chris might eventually have for my good friend Gigi if not for the fact that I know I have something that Gigi doesn't.

I don't know what it is I have that Gigi doesn't- but it's probably something good. Right?

I like when my friends inspire me and make me want to be and/or do something different. I only hope that I occasionally inspire my friends in return, that sometimes they stop and think that I have qualities that they respect to such a level that they almost aspire to obtain them for themselves. Or at least that they have nice things to sometimes say about me, such as "Jackie has a pretty sweet ass for somebody who doesn't work out and spends a lot of time sitting."

Over the past couple of months, Chris has become quite talented at making homemade pesto. This is despite all of my complaining about the rising costs of pine nuts. Anyhow, last night, he decided to make a pesto chicken pizza. Below, for your pleasure, is my approximation of the recipe.

Ingredients:

Homemade pesto: about a cup or so
Mayonnaise: little more than a teaspoon
Store bought pizza crust: who has time to make their own dough?
One good sized chicken breast: cubed
Sliced mushrooms: as many as you'd like, no less than a full cup
Eensy teensy bit of olive oil
Cheese: Mozzarella and Parmesan, no less than a cup
Seasonings: salt, garlic, basil

What you do:

1. Pre-heat oven to 350.
2. Sautee chicken cubes and mushroom slices in olive oil, seasoning with salt, garlic, and basil.
3. Mix mayonnaise in homemade pesto.
4. Spread pesto/ mayo mixture on pizza crust.
5. Top with cooked chicken and mushrooms.
6. Sprinkle heavily with cheese.
7. Bake for approximately ten to fifteen minutes.

Enjoy!

Best homemade pizza ever! I knew there was a reason that I kept Chris around.

After the pizza was made, Chris pressed the "clean" button on the oven. First time we've ever done this. We're eating our pizza in the computer room when I look behind me and see that the kitchen has filled with a dense white smoke. "Holy crap!" I yell, and I run out of the room. Kitchen, dining room, and living room are all filled with smoke, and I can barely see. My eyes are watering and my throat starts to hurt. The smoke detector starts going nuts, and I press the "cancel" button on the oven and start opening windows. Smoke detector will still not go off. Smoke does not dissipate for hours. Today, the whole place still smells like burning. Although, lo and behold, our oven appears to be clean.

Also watched "Elizabethtown" last night, which is not about a girl named Elizabeth (a la "Jackietown.") Worst movie ever. I wanted to strangle Kristen Dunst for her overdone "quirkiness." I'm tired of watching movies about way-too-quirky people. They just encourage our friends to become weird-for-the-sake-of-weird assholes. And that, I don't need.

Might have big news tomorrow. Might not.

I went out with my friend Patti last night, who I haven't seen in ages. She announced that she was in the midst of changing her life, and that I was capable of changing my life, too. "What is it you really want?" she asked, and for a moment I was in a living room with a bible salesmen instead of at some shitty bar in Wauconda. "No, really."

I told her what I wanted- after a few minutes of what can only be referred to as healthy, non-insulting banter. I want what anybody wants, and it's nothing insane.

"You can have that," Patti said. "I'll let you borrow the DVD."

"DVD?"

"It's called 'The Secret,'" Patti said, and it didnt' sound like much of a secret, especially considering that it's widely available on DVD for a nominal price. "It'll change your life. Watch it tomorrow."

She gave me the DVD. I didn't watch the whole thing tonight since Beth stopped over while I was in the middle of actually learning "The Secret," but I think I got the gist of it. Believe in good things happening to you, and they will. It's the power of positive thinking. It's the energy that you put out in the world. It's visualization and optimism. Apparently, according to "The Secret," I've been living life all wrong. I've been a pessimist when I should have believed in only happy endings. I've worried when I should have faith. I foresaw bills in the mail instead of checks.

And, I have to tell, I might be buying into it. Maybe a little belief in the universe would do me some good?

The DVD was incredibly cheesey. Whispered voices moaning the word "secret" over and over again. Esoteric sets and lit candles and quotes from great philosophers in fancy script across a darkened screen. Then the testimonials. A man who never had a date said that he put pictures of attractive women all over his house, and, suddenly, boom, he had too many dates to handle. A scene of a boy cutting out a picture of a bicycle, and believing that he already had the bicycle, and, hey, he gets the bicycle.

We create our own universe with our thoughts and feelings. Apparently this is an undisputed fact. So, it stands to reason, if our thoughts and feelings are always good, our universe will be good as well.

There are three steps to The Secret, which I am about to reveal as to save you, and other people like Patti, a few bucks.

1. Ask.
2. Believe.
3. Receive.

It's that easy!

Actually, though, I will watch this DVD again and try to view it without a critical eye. Fuck, what do I have to lose? Then I will work on envisioning what I want. Then, maybe, just maybe, I will get it.

It's a secret.

Patti's success story is a pretty decent one. She envisioned winning the lotto, and she's won a couple bucks off each scratch ticket that she's purchased. She envisioned losing weight, and she's at her target weight for the first time in a long time. She envisioned success in her new homespun career as a wedding planner, and, wow, she's been making more at wedding planning, with basically zero advertising, than she did at the bank (she quit a few months ago). And, despite this blog entry, she's not nuts. In fact, she's quite grounded. But she's bought into The Secret, and she's happy, so hell. It's been a while since I've been in a cult.

Also, and this should have been the first thing I wrote- but Tara had her baby!!! I can't wait to meet her, little Olivia. I hope Tara's not freaking out like I would be. Pregnancy is one thing, actually having the baby is another. But Tara's a lot stronger than I am. I wonder... does Tara know The Secret?

Ever try to follow somebody somewhere while getting the distinct impression that, while they know you are dependent on them to find this certain somewhere, they are trying to lose you. Trying to shake you from their trail. They're weaving in and out of traffic and going well over the posted speed limited, and just when they see you back behind them again, they really hit the gas and go flying down the street? And you think, "What a douchebag." Because you don't even want to go this place anyways, you have to just because they told you to. When you finally get to the location, they're already sitting inside the building nursing a cup of coffee that's had time to cool. And you hate him for it, for those six wrong turns. And you kind of want to ask, "What have I ever done to you to make you hate me so?"

Chris and I were looking at model homes yesterday. This particular community is just west of Bumblefuck, and nobody in a million years would ever visit us there. No worries- if we move, I plan on leading a very full and productive existence filled with building shit for local craft fairs. Like little wooden signs that say "Grandmas Are God's Way Of Saying Hey Everything Will Be Just Fine." Nonetheless, while driving through the community, I kept my eyes peeled for bars. Bars, pubs, restaurants that served alcohol, anything. Didn't really see anything, but it may be because of the route we took. Lot of lakes, though, in case I feel like getting a boat. Anyhow, it hit me that I may be an alcoholic, since my first instinct was not to look for grocery stores or hospitals, but bars. Then I thought, Why am I so worried? Worst case scenario, I'll just drink at home alone.

How to look busy at work while doing absolutely nothing:

Step One: Furrow eyebrows.

That's it.

Did you know that a goldfish has a memory span of three seconds? It's true! So if you ever feel like being verbally abusive to a pet, pick the goldfish over the dog. A goldfish, unlike a dog, is truly incapable of holding a grudge.

And that's news you can use!

Want to find out if your old friends from high school are married or getting married? Don't need to be a detective for that! Log onto any gift registery (Crate and Barrell, Macy's, Bed Bath and Beyond, etc), and simply type in your friend's name. Up comes the date of their wedding and... this is where it may get interesting... who they're getting hitched to! Then there's the added bonus of looking through their registry and making fun of it.

HOURS OF FUN.

If only I would use my powers for good. Ah, voyeurism, how I love thee!

I'm leaving for the airport in a little bit to pick up my cousin, who's visiting home this weekend. This visit is partially bittersweet, as it includes a trip to see my uncle, who's knee-deep, so to speak, in his chemo treatments. I called my mom today to tell her that Lisa was coming home and that- after tonight's booze-drenched activities- we were going to see him tomorrow.

"He doesn't want visitors," my mother said quickly. "He's sick, he's losing his hair, he can't stop throwing up."

"Well, Lisa called him, and we're going."

"I don't think that's a good idea."

"Why not?"

Pause on my mother's end of the line. You stupid bitch, I wanted to whisper. What's your agenda? I couldn't help but think that my mother was up to something, or trying to hide something. For a brief, shining moment, I thought that maybe the whole cancer thing was a ruse, something my mother had made up in order to have an excuse to expel her wise and wacky nuggets of wisdom, such as systematically listing all of the things that cause cancer and how I can avoid each and every one of these things, thus enabling myself to live a full and long life free of any fun. No smoking. No playing by the power lines. No cheese or standing in the sunlight for more than three minutes at a time. Who else was in on my mother's ruse? My aunt, obviously. My uncle, maybe because he thought it would be funny come jig's-up time. My dad and my sister just because it's easier to appease her whims rather than fight them.

Or it was the opposite. No ruse, not even close. He's a dying man already, after only two months of knowing. And I shouldn't go see that.

"Oh, so I should just avoid him until I see him in a casket?"

She seemed taken aback by my reply, and, okay, perhaps it was a little crass. But she started it. She led me there by telling me that it was not a good idea to visit a man who may or may not be at the end of his rope. And I hated her for that, because this avoidance shit that's so deeply ingrained in me is the reason why I have problems today with paranoia and confrontation and handling anything even remotely stressful.

Anyhow.

Our phone call ended with my mother telling me to be careful driving to "O'Hara." Which is funny for several reasons. One, I'm not sixteen on my first ten mile drive. Where does she think this "O'Hara" place is? Because, secondly, it's "O'Hare." Of course, she doesn't fly anywhere, so, hey, how's she supposed to know what the major airports are called? Thirdly, of all the things we had just discussed, the only thing she could think of saying was that I should be careful on a twenty minute drive. I can't take it sometimes. Other times, I can laugh. But most times, I just get a little crazy.

Because it runs in the blood.

Most embarrassing, this morning, when I took a big gulp of my coffee and proceeded to laugh and cough at the same time. Coffee spewed out of my mouth and splattered atop the following things:

Keyboard
Monitor
Telephone
Desk
Customer's file
Carpet
Chair
Pants

There was VP sitting behind me, another associate who faces me and saw the whole miserable occurence, and no less than four customers milling around in relatively close range. Now I'm at home on my lunch break, and I've changed my pants. I can't remember the last time I had to change my pants mid-day. I can't remember the last time somebody looked at me with pure disgust on their face as they said, "Jesus. What the fuck was THAT?"

Actually, the latter seems to happen more often than not. But the pants thing? Rare.

Couple media highlights of the week:

Sharp Objects, by Gillian Flynn. Couldn't put it down. This novel is a thriller with an ultra-creepy vibe. The protagonist is a reporter from Chicago who returns to her home town in Missouri to write a piece about a serial killer. The protagonist has her own bag of issues, including self-mutilation, a dead sister, a messed up attitude towards sex, and a very strained relationship with her mother. Returning home is clearly a can of worms, but investigating the serial killer, who's targeting young girls, opens the wound futher and adds a good dose of salt. This book has family secrets, heavy drinking, and gruesome discoveries. In short, it has it all. Highly recommended.

Kiss Kiss Bang Bang. I normally can't stand Robert Downey Jr, but he's hysterical in this movie. Also a bit of a thriller, I saw it as more of a dark comedy despite all of the dead people and car chases. It's all about Downey's narration (he's very humorously aware that he's in a movie talking to the audience) and the dialogue:

Harmony: Well, for starters, she's been fucked more times than she's had a hot meal.
Harry: Yeah, I heard about that. It was neck-and-neck and then she skipped lunch.

Plus, Val Kilmer as Gay Perry? Very well done.

That's it for now. More of my exciting life later!

One of my favorite TV scenes.

I finally pulled the trigger on my plan to sign up for Net-Flix. My first movie is scheduled to arrive tomorrow, and I couldn't be happier. Why didn't I do this years ago? At $8.99 for unlimited movies per month (one at a time, of course), how can I go wrong? Of course, I had to do the math. Reasonably, I can probably watch an average of 1.5 movies per week. 1.5 multiplied by 4 weeks in a month is 6. Nine divided by six is $1.50. Rentals at a $1.50 each are pretty good for new releases. However- maybe I should try to watch a full 2 movies per week to maximize my spending, huh?

Aside from the decent cost, I just love getting things in the mail.

I'm contemplating the two at a time plan for four bucks more. There's also a plan for eight movies at a time for $47.99. Fifty bucks a month! Who's signing up for THAT plan? Probably the morbidly obese, the kind of guys who can't leave the house without a forklift and two helicopters and therefore have the kind of schedule where they can put away three or four flicks a day.

My life, as you can, is ultra-exciting, considering that this entry is about Net-Flix and the one below is about Fuddruckers. And the one below THAT is about Super Nintendo. Jesus, I need to get out a little more. That, however, should be remedied shortly what with the warmer weather already on its way AND... (drumroll, please) Carole leaving NY and moving to Chicago in early April. Woo-hoo! Hopefully, she will swoop in like an eagle of excitement, grasp me in her claws of rowdiness, and save me from my relative boredom. If that fails, I do, of course, have Net-Flix and Super Nintendo. And, Chris, of course. Can't forget about him.

Fuddruckers: A Review

I took my first ever trip to Fuddruckers this weekend with The Cheese and his little sister, Beef. My first and last trip. I found the whole process a bit overwhelming. First you get in a line to order, but they don't make it clear that everybody orders from this one line. I was looking for waitresses. Then you order and sit down with a buzzer. Fine, all's well and good. When the buzzer goes off, you have to find your way up to retrieve your burger and then head over to the hamburger bar. This is when things start to go wrong.

The toppings for the burgers are what you might call lacking. Limp lettuce, pale tomatoes, and this cheese sauce that's basically the stuff you get in Kraft's Cheese and Macaroni. All I wanted was a mushroom burger. No mushrooms, of course no mushrooms. And you'd think there would be a selection of cheese- maybe some mozz, provolone, swiss, golden slices of cheddar. Nope, just the powdery sauce that comes out of a squeeze pump.

Fuddruckers advertises as having the world's greatest burger. How can you accomplish this when there's no guacomole to pile on top for a Tex-Mex burger? No ranch, no bacon, no fried eggs, no unique toppings at all. Nothing except the standard mustard-ketchup-onion shit that you can get at Wendy's for a fourth of the price.

Also, they gave me a coupon for a cookie. I had no idea where to go to redeem my coupon.

As if the lack of toppings, confusing lay out, and missing free cookie weren't bad enough, the hamburger bun was greasy. The Cheese thought that was the best thing about the Fuddrucker's burger experience. To which I say, "Ha! Laughable, man."

Endnote: Every time I tried to type "burger," I either typed, or almost typed, "berger." Maybe that seems to make sense to you, but me- well I guess it's the sign I needed that I finally getting used to my personal state of affairs.

Holy crap! And I have more games on the way!

Playing Super Nintendo makes me feel like I'm fourteen again. Only now I'm 26, and instead of my mother yelling about something or other in the next room, I've got Chris in the next room quietly playing his own games, which are way too sophisticated and complex for the likes of me. My accompanying music has also changed, but albeit not by much. "Linger" by The Cranberries shuffled up on my i-Pod last night, and I had to run to find a calendar just to make sure it wasn't 1994 again. Although I didn't have an i-Pod in 1994, so that should have been enough to have kept me calm.

Also, instead of breaking for, like, a popsicle or some shit, I'm breaking to get another beer and maybe a cigarette. Otherwise, I'm right back where I was so many years ago. Only this time, I have very little hope for the future. This is due to the fact that I'm living in it, and at fourteen I was certain that being 26 would be full of fancy grown up things, like publishing parties in my honor and casual sex with strangers in elevators. I guess being married is a fancy grown up thing. Yet, somehow, lounging around in my ketchup-stained robe and struggling with Super Mario World seems to negate the whole fancy grown up thing altogether.

Gosh, I haven't been on an elevator in forever!

We toasted ourselves tonight. Best work group ever. "Nobody has it as good as us," declared George, downing his shot. "Nobody has this."

But everybody does. You develop relationships with the people that you work with and you get lulled into believing that no matter where you go, what you do, you will never have this bond again. These people that you work with and drink with and hang out with, they can be found everywhere. I have had this before, I wanted to say. Years ago at the LC, I thought it was so unique and wonderful, in many ways like a high school clique I'd never really been part of. We were all best friends at the LC. We punched in, we punched out, and then our plans were circles that revolved around one other and looped into chains. There is nothing unique with being good friends with your co-workers, nothing at all.

No matter where I end up, I will have this, I wanted to say, partially to re-iterate, to myself, an existing truth. Instead, I raised my glass and clinked. Why ruin an otherwise wonderful evening?

I'm pretty sure that we left without paying our tab tonight. I know I didn't pay anything, and we seemed to agree, all at once, that it was time to go. We'd been heading in and out most of the night to sit by the outdoor bonfire and smoke, and the waitress was used to our comings and goings. But then we headed out one last time, and, in my garage with the car turned off, I realized that nobody had asked for a check or left any cash. This is not the first time I've done this, although I have yet to consciously do it on purpose. I get to drinking, I get tired of drinking, and then I just go home. I owe various bars hundreds of dollars. I try to write this off as the fault of the bars. Just ask for my credit card when I walk in. Take it, please. Otherwise, there's a good chance that I'm slipping out with the crowd, mostly unaware.

Ah well. Maybe I'll worry about it more tomorrow morning, or maybe I'll just avoid that particular place for a month or so until the waitress has had adequate time to forget my face.

FDA: Sleeping Pills Can Cause "Sleep Driving"

Wow, what a side effect. And I quite enjoy the full list of side-effects that these sleeping pills cause:

* sleep-driving, along with other less dangerous "complex sleep-related behaviors" -- like making phone calls, fixing and eating food, and having sex while still asleep.

Huh. Having sex while asleep doesn't seem to be a novelty. Maybe INITIATING sex while asleep....

Fixing and eating food. Making phone calls. Perhaps ordering a new cable package?

I'm ready to go home. Loooonnnnggg day at the desk.

This morning, my dentist told me that I was one of his coolest patients. Wow, I thought, looking at my hip, young dentist. This is pretty neat; I think my dentist is hitting on me. Then I took the blood-soaked wad of cotton out of my mouth and realized why he REALLY said I was cool.

In the coming years, I will singlehandedly fund his retirement.

Oh well. At least it felt good for a minute.

I spent most of today performing a deep clean that was a long time coming. The bedroom, the kitchen, the dining room, the living room, three closets, both bathrooms, and the entryway are now sparkling. The only room that remains untouched is the computer room. However, considering that this is mostly Chris' lair, there's really no point in doing anything more than a quick once over. I could spend days on the room getting it in perfect condition only to have it all undone in a matter of minutes. Chris shouldn't be "allowed" to eat or drink in this room. Or enter it. Or look at it. In fact, he shouldn't be allowed to enter the townhouse at all. After I cleaned the bathrooms, I told him that he'd have to use the restrooms at the gas station for the rest of today. I just need a few hours to enjoy the clean. Just a few, then we can get back to normal.

The amount of junk we accumulate always amazes me. I'd have a garage sale if the task didn't seem as daunting and time consuming as it does. As it stands, I have four big bags of clothes and shoes to give away to the highest bidder (I'll take three bucks for everything), and countless books, decorative pieces, unused office supplies, kitchen items (why do I have a hand-mixer and a deep-fryer? Why do I have two roasting pans when I don't even need one??), games, toys (yes, toys), and other things that I'd just as soon get rid of. Simplicity! My mother is a pack rat. She's like those people you see on the news that have magazines and cereal boxes from the '80s stacked and bundled in the living room and the bathtub. Thus, the only way I can mentally retaliate from the sickness is to throw everything out. Or at least throw everything out every six months or so.

I wish I didn't keep throwing out user manuals, though. I have no idea how to work most of the things I own.

The rest of the weekend was pretty quiet. I was exhausted on Friday after a drunken poker game on Thursday night, so that evening after work was spent watching TV and reading. Yesterday, the weather was wonderfully... cooperative... and so I went shopping, out to dinner, and then to the bar with a friend. This morning Chris and I went out to breakfast, and now I have the rest of the day left to lay around enjoying the breeze coming through the open windows. It's finally over, I think. Winter is on its way out.

Ah, how boring and mostly domestic my life has come. Except... except... for all of the upcoming plans. Some big, some small. The most immediate plan is the celebrating I plan on doing tomorrow after finally getting my "new tooth." I'm smiling like I've never smiled before. I'm drinking red wine without a straw! I'm biting into sandwiches and apples all over the town.

And, yeah, I'll probably be back in the dentist's office by noon on Tuesday. But, tomorrow- oh, tomorrow will be good.

A million uses for vinegar.

Here's what I don't understand about this list. Vinegar: you use it to kill weeds, polish your car chrome, fight dandruff- but you can also gargle and swallow it. Something's not adding up here.

My favorite is:

9. Keep chickens from pecking each other. Put a little in their drinking water.

Who figured this one out?!?! Although, hey, if this tip help solves my out-of-control chicken pecking problems, then that's totally rad.

I didn't win the lotto. :-(

Mega Millions Tonight

I have a good feeling about this drawing tonight. Seven co-workers and I split the cost of forty tickets, thus raising our odds to not 1 in 176 million but 40 in 176 million. But, wait, there's eight of us. How does that affect my odds? And, crap, I just realized that if we win, we have to share the cash. Dammit! Is $370 million divided by 8 still worth it?

I don't have access to our lucky numbers, so it's pointless to watch the drawing tonight. Also, the seven other people I'm splitting the tickets with don't have my phone number- so I guess I won't know if I'm a winner until tomorrow morning, when I'm the only person to show up to work.

I can't even imagine winning money like this. What would I buy, where would I go, how would I change? I'm getting stressed out just thinking about this. Maybe I should just get my five bucks back.

Chris' latest blog entry rings true on so many levels. Since I work in an institution that simply processes transactions, customers will often make the leap that we know everything about everything and then call and want to know K-Mart's return policy. What the sales tax in Tacoma is. Why their credit card from a different institution has already expired. The legalities of an I.O.U. written on a cocktail napkin. Jesus, people. And you know what really gets my goat? When people call me wanting to know the phone number to a different location. It's called 411. Stop wasting my time.

Two Things I've Learned 9-5

I don't take criticism well. At all. If you say something remotely unpleasant about me, my eyes will get watery and my voice will start shaking. The thing is, I won't defend myself, either, even though I may think you're a dickwad. Instead, I'll apologize and promise to do better. I'll be squeezing the pen in my hand so tightly that I'll break my own skin.

I don't like to write "Have a nice day!" in emails because I am afraid that it rings too falsely. As if the reader of my emails can tell that I couldn't really give a shit how their day actually goes and I'm just going through the motions. However, I've learned that my "Have a nice day!"s are not as transparent as I originally thought. And a little sugar can go a long way.

I'm starting a new blog. It's in its rough stages right now, but I'm hopefully going to use it as a portfolio piece for potentially finding some freelance work.

Extra Ketchup- Fast Food Culture

It's comprised of short blog entries involving fast food marketing, cultural responses to fast food, and general fast food news/stories. Again, it's all very rough.

I'd like to design a masthead for this blog- if anybody has any ideas on how I can use Photoshop to do this, help would be appreciated. Feedback in general is appreciated. This blog is not supposed to be earth-shatteringly interesting- it's mostly bland samples of writing/reporting.

Thanks, and good day.

Shameless plug for a friend's photo site:

Blue Channel Photo

I should ask him for some advice. My photos usually end up blurry. I'm pretty sure this has to do with my shaky hands. Maybe the only advice he can give me is to lay off the stimulants. Or maybe I can simply adjust my shutter speed.

Ugh. Dentist appointment this afternoon. The dentist chiseled my front tooth (top and center, baby) down to a little pointy stump, took an impression for my permanent crown, and then slapped in the temporary crown. This temporary crown- well, it looks like he popped a Chicklet in my mouth. The color is kind of a blinding white, the texture is rather un-toothlike, and the shape is, how do you say, not good. It's only for two weeks or so until my super perfect crown comes in (I sprung for the upgraded Cadillac of crowns), but I don't know if I can look like this for two weeks. Plus, he told me the following things.

1. Temporary crown has 50/50 chance of becoming loose and falling out.
2. I can't eat with it at all.
3. It stains easily, so I have to be careful with coffee (love it), red wine (love it), and colorful fruity/juicy drinks (so much for vodka and cranberry).
4. No flossing, very careful brushing, non-vigorous mouthwash swooshing.

What the heck. I thought I would be good to go after tonight. Instead, I'm some kind of monster with the super-powers of looking weird and not being able to do essentially anything with my mouth. I suppose a blow-job comment would be appropriate here.

On the plus side, two weeks isn't terribly long. On the minus side, by the time the permanent crown is back from the lab and inside my mouth, I'll have gone a whole season with my goofy teeth problems. A whole season. I think I'll write a short story about it called "A Winter Without Biting." Or, "My Winter Of Whining."

I was planning on having a Patio sub sandwich this weekend with a good friend as to celebrate what I thought would be the end of my miseries with my favorite sandwich in the whole world. I suppose I can still have the sandwich, but I'll have to bring a mama bird into the restaurant with me so she can chew the sandwich first and then regurgitate it directly into my throat. Mmm, tasty.