Tags: nature, snakes

blackwidow04, a photo by fleegan.com on Flickr.

Uh mah gah. Lookit that thing. All thinking she’s gonna eat a roach.

It was by my front steps. But now? She dead.

Tags: nature

The description of the story and the cover of the book led me to believe that this novel was going to be kinda creepy, maybe spooky.

Emily Stewart is the girl who claims to stand between the living and the dead. During the quiet summer of 1925, she and her brother, Michael, are thirteen-year-old twins-privileged, precocious, wandering aimlessly around their family’s estate. One day, Emily discovers that she can secretly crack her ankle in such a way that a sound appears to burst through the stillness of midair. Emily and Michael gather the neighborhood children to fool them with these “spirit knockings.”

Soon, however, this game of contacting the dead creeps into a world of adults still reeling from World War I. When the twins find themselves dabbling in the uncertain territory of human grief and family secrets- knock, knock-everything spins wildly out of control.

See? Maybe they start playing with Ouija boards and a bunch of demons take over? Maybe they really talk to a ghost? Perhaps they become possessed and kill all the adults?

No. Nothing. Nothing creepy, nothing spooky, nothing. Total letdown.

The book starts out strong. It’s summer vacation, we all remember how boring it could be at times. Too old to play with toys, too young to actually drive somewhere. The author does a great job with the kids and describing their summertime melancholia.

The middle of the book was strong as well, the kids are fooling not only other kids with their spirit knocking, but also some adults. Things start to get kind of interesting, but also things start to fall apart.

There are far too many family secrets going on. Old secrets, one newish secret. The old secrets are vague and boring. All of the ancestors are too similar. They got confusing; hard to keep them straight, and there didn’t seem to be a payoff at the end for knowing their secrets anyway.

And the denouement? Had more to do with the next door neighbor’s family than with the main characters’ family. Then the story went on a bit longer after that when really it should have ended with summer vacation ending and not stretched on to the new school year and then 20 or so years into the future.

Like I said, it started out really strong, and I was hoping this would be a kind of New England rich kids version of To Kill a Mockingbird, and don’t look at me that way, you can’t write/read a coming of age story about a brother and sister during summer vacation and not think of To Kill a Mockingbird.

Strong start, pretty strong middle, too many uninteresting, unproductive ancestral flashbacks, flat ending.

So this older lady comes up to the desk to check out something and I tell her that she has an old $2.00 fine on her card. She says, “Oh okay.”

Then she puts her hand down INTO HER BRA, PULLS OUT AN OLD LOOKING BANK ENVELOPE, SELECTS TWO ONE BUCKS, AND HANDS THEM TO ME AS IF IT IS NO BIG DEAL THAT

A. SHE KEEPS MONEY BETWIXED HER BOOBS AND

B. THAT IT IS COMPLETELY OKAY TO PAY FOR THINGS WITH MONEY THAT YOU KEEP BETWIXED YOUR BOOBS.

And I know that the sentence I just typed doesn’t actually make sense but I’m going to blame it not on my lazy editing skills, but on the fact that my brain has melted because I had to take money that had been nestled in someone’s boobular region. This should NEVER happen in real life because we now have the technological advancement of clothing with POCKETS as well as a plethora of purse choices. In point of fact, you could buy a purse with the money you stash in your boobs, and then you could keep your money in the purse you just bought.
EVERYONE WINS. (Except the cashier. Cashier, you just took one for the team, be proud.)

I am sexist and age-ist and I’m not alone:
If she had been a hot chick? I would have called everyone I know and told them, “DOOD. A stripper just paid a library fine in BOOB MONEY.”

“Say what?”

“She reached into The Vault and paid me in singles that were probably covered in cocaine.”

“Lucky day!”

“Right?”

But no, since she was an old, warthog-faced hag? Imma read her for not using a fucking pants pocket like the rest of us. There is nothing glamorous about your limp, tit-sweat-soaked dollars, ma’am. FOR THE LOVE OF LOVE.

Tags: library

bugbite4, a photo by fleegan.com on Flickr.

It has dried out a lot since Shreddy killed it on Sunday. The big red swollen part is fading. It doesn’t hurt as much and it barely stings when I clean it out. Definitely on the mend!

Tags: nature

bugbite3, a photo by fleegan.com on Flickr.

Yes. It is gross. This is day 5 of mystery bite.

On day 3 I went to the doctor and he gave me antibiotics to take and told me to scrub the bite with a toothbrush 3 times a day. I brush it, and it bleeds. It is gross and hurts, but it’s not that bad, and it would be a lot better if it wasn’t also covered up with poison ivy. I AM SO GOOD AT YARDWORK.

Today Flippy said that I had not cleaned out the wound good enough. Shreddy agreed. I told them that I couldn’t get all the brown/black stuff out because it is under the skin and it’s not like the doctor would want me to break my skin open to get it out. The doc just said to scrub it with a toothbrush 3 times a day.

“Jaimie, that’s exactly what he’d want you to do!”

“With what? I scrub it with a toothbrush!”

“How hard?”

“REALLY hard.”

“Do you bleed?”

“Yes!”

“Well it’s not good enough. Do you have any tequila?”

“Wha- yeah, you wanna do a shot?”

“No, but you do a shot and I’ll clean it out.”

So I got some soap, toothbrush, washcloth, and I slugged down some tequila straight out of the bottle, like a pro. I don’t recommend that you try this at home. I’d recommend that you not get bit by an evil bug.

Shreddy is an office manager at a doctor’s office, so she’s the most qualified to scrub out a wound (hurt me.) And that she did.

By the time she had cleaned it out I had an even bigger hole in my arm and I was sweating bullets. Throughout the process I yelled at her a lot and also laughed (probably from the tequila), but I have to admit, it looks better even if it is constantly oozing. I’m not sure what the black thing that came out of the bite was, but I’m telling people it was a snake fang.

Tags: nature

tossers01, a photo by fleegan.com on Flickr.

At the park where I walk and take pictures of snakes, there is a discgolf course strewn about. It is more popular than I thought it would be. We, the dog and I, call the frisbee hippies tossers. Yes, I know that tosser is british slang, that’s part of the fun. Most of the tossers are okay. There is one group I don’t like because the one tosser brings his ugly-ass bulldog and lets said bulldog off of it’s leash. I don’t care that the dog is a bulldog, but I do care that it’s not on the leash and that it comes running up to me (and Roxie) growling like it intends to eat my face off.

I realize most dogs growl for show and will more than likely stand down. And if it was just me walking then I’d pick up a stick and yell, “I’M SORRY YOUR OWNER IS A DILDO, GIT!” but since I’ve got Roxie in one hand and a camera in the other, it’s not like I’ve got time to find a stick AND hold onto my dog, who is responding in kind to the bulldog.
The tosser with the dog calls his dog off, but never apologizes for being a dick who won’t leash his dog.

When I see that group of tossers’ cars in the parking lot I get grumbly. “Ugh, tossers.”

Today there were only two tossers at the park. They managed to be so loud that even though you couldn’t see them, you knew where they were. I know, I sound like an old person. But for serious, the one guy was constantly yelling. It was beyond obnoxious. The way he was yelling should only be reserved for emergencies (Snake! Yeti! Elvis!) and NOT for reasons such as your frisbee hitting a damn tree. Grow up, you tosser.

I think playing discgolf at the park is insane because they don’t keep the course mowed/cleared up, and most of the “holes” are in the snakiest places in the park. I see loads of snakes there and even I don’t go close to the “holes.”
Tossers be crazy.

Tags: Tossers

So today started the 2012 season. The Cards whipped the Marlins, which, of course, and yet, I’ve sort of fallen in love with the Marlins during spring training. I don’t normally follow much of the NL but I think this year I’ll be watching more of those games because the Marlins, while having THE WORST revamped logo and uniforms, have the most entertaining coach in Ozzie Guillen, PLUS they have the Disney-est stadium.

I am sad about their M logo though. It is terrible.

I don’t hate the stylized fish, that part is fine. It’s the M that sucks. It’s too big. It’s one letter and somehow it is 5 colors? Come on Miami, take a note from Milwaukee:

See? See how that fits on a hat? Yours… doesn’t.

Still, baseball is here! Go baseball!

Tags: baseball, Marlins

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