Death Duo

I was taunted by a fly today. He ended up dead.

The conditions were perfect to write which is not to say that that is an odd thing. There are many times conditions have been perfect it’s just that they are not always pounced upon by yours truly. Often I end up getting distracted by internet searches leading to further internet searches leading to even further searches and suddenly what had started out as a search for DMV locations has inexplicably driven me into a bog of random facts about tracheotomies and how to perform them. I’m licensed now, by the way.

So the conditions were perfect. Ty was out riding, Thea was flopped on the cool kitchen tile, and I had officially recovered from my hangover. I opened my laptop on the kitchen table and settled myself on the chair. Okay, time to write. But no—some peon of a creature, which I’m sure serves no other purpose than to incite madness and butcher peace, had decided that I would not be writing that night. I don’t normally feel this strongly about flies, just so you know. Normally I find them only mildly annoying and thoroughly ignorable. In fact there is a fly by me right now that is not even close to igniting the amount of incredulous rage brought about by the first. (You must all be wondering at this point, just what sort of sty I inhabit. It’s summertime folks. Doors stay open, flies fly in—manure or not.)

Anyway, back to the waste of space transient that decided to my push buttons. I was being circled. Around and around and around. Soft buzz, loud buzz, soft buzz, loud buzz, soft buzz, loud buzz. There was no way I could do anything other than try to dispose of this distraction. Swatting wildly around my head anytime the fly zipped by only made me look like a comical lunatic. Trying to chart its trajectory in hopes of a surprise ambush also proved unsuccessful, and getting Thea to chase it was out of the question. This dog don’t hunt.

For my next trick I tried opening the garage door and gently wafting it out of the kitchen. Thea went, the fly stayed. I was going bonkers, getting desperate and only inches away from busting out the chopsticks and blindfold. The whole fly-in-my-ear canal bit was getting reeeaaallly old. Then, in a last ditch little tweak of my opened door attempt, I turned off the kitchen light and turned on the garage light, hoping that the fly would be attracted to the glorious yellow hue reaching out to it. But no, I had to get the fly that likes white light which I soon discovered when the buzzing stopped and I looked back from my perch at the door. There was the fly all stretched out on my hot white Mac, probably flipping me off from the very tool that he was keeping me from using.

Maybe it was the image of my defiled laptop, maybe it was the smugness with which he sat there, maybe it was the both, but something inside of me burst out quicker than Neo’s bullet limbo and bitch slapped that fly right off my computer. Down it went, wriggling on the ground and at the complete and utter mercy of Thea the dog. This is something she could hunt. There was no mercy for this fly; the last thing its eyes probably saw was a big bubble gum tongue flipping it straight down the throat. Good-bye fly—hello fly guts on my LCD screen. Yeah, there was that. A small price to pay, I suppose, for a little freakin peace and quiet

So that’s how the demon fly died—a tag team effort by my dog and me. With my quickness and her appetite, the fly community better stay clear. This is one duo that doesn’t just kill you. We kill you and write about it.

Why I Am Insane

The definition of insanity is a person who keeps doing the same thing over and over, expecting a different result. The reason I know I am insane is because I keep getting manicures with the expectation of fun and beauty. The fact that past manicures have only brought about one titanic nuisance after another does not seem to faze me in this belief.

The whole process starts out innocently enough. Some Asian lady who doesn’t speak a lick of English takes your hands and begins to lather you up, plying and pulling at your fingers. The movement brings about a looming sense that milk is going to start secreting out from your cuticles. (Okay, so maybe it doesn’t start out so innocent. Lets continue anyway). Those cuticles—milk or not—are then cut and disposed of, instantly vaporizing the barrier between your nail and skin. It’s so sudden—so revealing. You’re left with a nail standing in front of a barrage of skin, asking only to be loved.

Next there is some sort of buffing process at which time your smooth pearly nail gets transformed into Shredded Wheat courtesy of The File. It is an odd undoing, but not to worry, renovation comes in the form of a freakishly small finger spa located at each nail station which offers an anecdotal soak to any weary traveler within its vicinity.

A quick dry and you’re ready for the polish—pick out some paint and hope to God the color on the outside of the bottle is a true mirror of what is about to grace your nails. With any luck it will be close and you’ll only be marginally unsatisfied. Soon the polish is draping over the ends of your fingers while your Asian lady continues to chat foreignly on about who knows what. Probably she hates the color you picked out.

You are almost done when she finishes the last stroke—now comes the waiting process when your nails are placed under strange purple lights which I assume help them dry faster. Skate world for nails—I hope they have fun. After a stretch of twenty hours or so you decide to prod ever so slightly at your coating just to test. The surface feels slightly Gumby-ish, but close enough. Besides, people are waiting for their turn and its couples skate in purple light land.

Now comes the acrobatic feat of taking out your keys and starting the car without smudging the sacred colors. This is a very fragile time. I hate this part. Being so careful with every little move you make is like a heightened game of Operation only instead of a heart stopping zap you get a ruined manicure and 25 bucks down the drain.

If all goes well you end up with what seems like beautiful colored glass at the end of each finger. This effect lasts for about three or four days, at which time you begin to see cracks appearing in your polish like a frozen pond thawing in spring, returning to its natural state. These cracks are the birthing pains for what will be a good month of chipping and scraping. It signifies the end of your classy fingers, the end of your put togetherness. Say goodbye to peace and say hello to a stack of days wrought with nimieties of tiny paint chips bouncing off your fingertips every second of every minute. Not by nature’s intent does this happen, but rather by your own accord because you will not be able to stop chipping until every last infinitesimal spot of color is gone. I promise.

And so it is that after all this, I still will wake up on some random morning and decide that a manicure sounds fun. That a manicure is worth it. That is why I am insane.