Hi to all of my blogdrive friends! I don't know if anyone is still listening out there, but I have an update! I am heading to Antarctica to live and work for six months! I am going to be a sexy snow janitor! And maybe I will even get to hug some penguins! Ha! (Not really. I believe I could be deported if I actually did that.)

Anyway, would love to hear from you all -- you can look me up under my email at myspace and facebook too! And I will be setting up a new and improved blog for this trip!

OK, you must check this out. Funny. I'll let Leeroy speak for himself.

http://vidfan.com/media/57/Leeroy_Jenkins.html

Hey readers and friends! Let's try something new here -- I'm joining the Gen Y or the Gen @ or the Gen-whatever-is-one-generation-younger-than-I, and have hooked up on myspace. Not saying I'm closing down the blogdrive or anything right now, but I am going to try the whole myspace thing out for awhile. So hop on over to www.myspace.com/kerileespace and tell me what you think!

I'm Bozeman-bound -- heading off to ski in Montana this week. When I hit mountains, I don't so much ski them -- more like slide down slowly and observe pretty scenery. But I'm heading there nonetheless. Friends Brian, Scott and Colleen are already there, having survived a near-aborted roadtrip in which Brian's car broke down. I'm flying in the AM, so yee-haw!

The Olympics (which I am addicted to) are over, but in the midst, with too much time on my hands, I did invent a new game for my cats, in which I dangle a cat toy between two of them and see who can get to it first. Is this cruel? I don't know, but I think it's pretty damn funny. Yes, the day I invented that game was a productive day.

Finally, yesterday I got to do two of the things I hate most in life -- visit the dentist, and shop for a swimsuit. Both genders can sympathize with the dentist aversion, but only women, I think, can feel the pain of the swimsuit shopping trip. By the way, my dentist tells me I have to have my wisdom teeth removed, which I swear I already had done when I was in 9th grade. So who knows -- maybe I'm just extra-wise.

That's all for now!

So Brian's looking for a front-loading washer, and me, being a bored roommate-type, took part a shopping excursion with him the other night, which took me to many a furniture store. I say this not to introduce the subject of high-tech, energy-efficient washing machines, (a subject on which Brian can wax poetic, but I cannot) but instead, to tell you why I was recently at several furniture stores, and can now relate this story to you.

Anyway, as I have no interest at all in looking at appliances, I amused myself in these stores by looking at furniture sets -- picking out my favorite couches, tables, vases, etc., while waiting for Brian to check out washing machines. If you've ever been in a furniture store, you know that typically, the furniture is laid out in little groupings of various furniture types -- one bedroom set in a little group here, and another style of bedroom set there, and over here, a living room set with purple velour covering, and over there, a living room set with hideous pink and green plaid covering, etc. You get the idea. It's a charming furniture maze - you know you've seen it before. Anyway, as I was considering the relative merits (and potential customer base) of a charming couch covered with a Green Bay Packer-themed weave, I noticed a salesperson honing in on me from my right.

Now, with absolutely no value judgements on the talents and personalities of individual sales-folk, I will say as a generalization, I do not like salespeople. I avoid them assiduously.  I do not want to talk to them. I do not want sales pitches from them. I do not want to talk about zero-percent down financing with them.

So, with a salesperson (a salesman in this case) bearing down hard on the starboard side, I naturally went to the left. And this is where I became very aware of the valuable aspects of the furniture maze. If I went left around the Green Bay Packer piece-of-crap couch, I could avoid the gentleman coming in from the right. A quick turn around the press-board dinette set, and he was trapped behind a mauve leather sectional, and I could make my escape straight ahead.

Trouble. Out of the corner of my eye, I see a saleswoman moving in fast from the left. She's further away, but she's got an angle on me. Quick two steps ahead, and then right, past the twin-sized race car bed and into the "dream nursery." She gets tangled up at the ugly plaid couch. Safe for now, but both are still headed for me, visions of commissions dancing in their heads, I suppose.

As I spot the third salesguy closing in from electronics straight ahead, a familiar, but strangely out-of-context sound starts echoing through my head ... wokka wokka wokka ... what's that? Wokka wokka wokka...It's getting louder... WOKKA WOKKA WOKKA.

Oh yes, I know that sound. That's Pac-Man.

There I am, Ms. Keri Pac-Man, wokka-wokka-ing my way through the furniture maze, trying to avoid all of those salespeople. Eventually, they do catch up with me. And in my mind, I hear that little "zhherewerw" noise Pac-Man makes when the ghosts finally catch him. Game over, man, game over.

Anyway, I thought it was kind of funny. I don't think the guy who eventually caught up with me and handed me his card really knew why I was laughing. On a completely unrelated subject, the trivia team took sixth this year -- which is not as fun as taking second, but better than the 12th place we were in for most of the contest, so we'll be happy about that.

OK, home stretch of trivia this year -- not nearly as impressive as last year,  but we're in the Top Ten for now, although that could change in a hurry. I've been holding down the fort on the overnights (which is eerily like my work schedule, now that I think about it). We at one time had only three people playing, which is pretty slim pickings.

But it is, as always, a very good time. Not as good as some other teams, who are apparently currently in various states of drunkeness, or have smoked the reefer a bit. But a good time nonetheless.

So fingers crossed for the team this year ... I'll update on the final results!

Well, the skull is not as squadron-like so far -- hovering in the marginal range at best in this little trivia contest. My sole contribution so far has been knowing that green jello is typically served at Lutheran church basement potlucks -- knowledge I have squirreled away from attending many a Lutheran potluck in my time, although I actually remember more red jello than green, and often that red jello had gross stuff floating in it, such that you really did not want to have to wade through the celery and cranberries and other crap someone tossed in it, even if you really wanted the jello.

Anyhoo, I've caught a bit of sleep on the floor here, and am well-fueled with Twizzlers and ELFudge cookies (the best damn cookies ever. If you have to go to a casual party, and know that everyone else is bringing Doritos as their lame-ass contribution, bring ELFudge instead. I guarantee you'll be a hit.)

I'm being very random right now, and apparently writing in run-on sentences, which I will blame on sleep-deprivation. I think I'll draw the overnight shift again tonight, so more time to rant later.

 

OK boyz and girlz -- thanks to all who have inquired, lo, these many months, as to whether I'm alive, well and as lazy as usual. The answer -- lazy as usual. Yes the, ahem, usual excitement that always surrounds my life has gone on unabted (Ha!) and I've just neglected to let y'all in on it. Sorry. Actually, you haven't missed much.

So why are you hearing from me now? Well, it's that time of year again -- trivia time! That means I'm sitting in front of a computer screen in a smelly basement in Kaukauna, WI, and I'm here for 50 hours. And I get bored. And when I get bored, I talk. So that means you may actually hear from me more than once! Goody for you!

If you're interested in listening/playing along, here's the website: http://www.lawrence.edu/sorg/trivia/. I'll be on Yahoo Messenger, so you can IM me with answers! Please do! We're way short on people this year. We've come in second place the last few years, and we'll be hard-pressed to place this year. So help!

Meanwhile, I'll be filling you in on what's been up with me since -- yeesh, October! I guess that's the last time I posted.  Until then, have a happy and a healthy! 

So smartass boyfriend Bill apparently is the programmer of my haunted microwave, but I'll do him one better. My computer timer has been mysteriously programmed now too. So I still think someone is fucking with me.

Well, I find myself in a situation I swore I would never put myself in again, and that is the magical, wonderful world of long distance relationships. Bill has moved on to another campaign in Minneapolis, and despite my best judgement, and because I love the guy, and he does a pretty good job of loving me, we're going to keep the wheels turning on this thing. At least this is about a thousand miles closer than the last time around.

But it does leave me as somewhat of a single girl again. Instead of spending lots of free time hanging out with a boy, I'm re-embracing independence. It occurs to me how little time I've had with myself over the last few months, and I gotta say, I kinda like it.

In other news, as far as this blog goes, sans boyfriend, I'm spending much more time listening to all the little voices in my head now, so I'll probably be checking in here a lot more. Let's be frank, this blog has fallen victim to some serious hand-holding and making out, (along with a spot of laziness and lack of adventures in my life.)

A couple of other notes -- though the kids who book shows at the highly-desired venue of the UWO student union are suicidal over this, I had a pretty good Thursday night. A little concert of Martha Wainwright's (sister of Rufus, although I'm sure she'd prefer to have Rufus called a brother of hers) and an Australian Bjork-esque chica named Sarah Blasko. Net attendence? About 30 people. Nada. For acts that have performed for considerably more people on the rest of their tour, which includes stops at the Double Door in Chi-town, and the Bowery Ballroom in NYC. Pretty humiliating for everyone involved in booking and performing, but a kick for those of us who showed up. Turned out, about a third of the audience (that's right, about 10 people), ended up hanging out at a little Oshkosh bar with the bands and the roadies and all else involved. It ended with me having a random discussion about the Canadian health care system with the headliner herself. So good times. Nice people.