I have no clue what that means, but it sounds good to me for today and tomorrow.

Things are bizzy around the Fink warren. I’ve been up since 6, paying bills, calling my vision insurance company (funny how it falls to the customer to solve the problems between insurance and doctors), making a grocery list and getting ready to dig into the JECO website for the first time to do some much-needed updating. I need to order my fall bulbs, get in the shower, do the errands and get ready for Drago’s 6-day visit with us, while BFF Kay and Bob are in Pennsylvania. Should be a hoot, having a puppy in the house along with Old Granddad Rousseau.

So, all that and a bag of chips. Monday it’s all day at school, then Tuesday the insanity officially begins. Again: my life is one big party.

What about you? I hope you’ve planned something relaxing and fun for the weekend. Do tell.

Today I am Rattus norvegicus insomniatus, mistress of sleep deprivation. OK I just made that up. But why have I been awake since 2:30 a.m.? Well, it goes down like this every mid-August. I know I’m coming up on the last week before school starts, and the hyperdrive brain functions kick back in. Infuriating. Pavlovian, even. My hours of sleep time will now be inversely proportional to the number of commitments I have the following day. Tell ya what, it just makes me mad.

But hey, enough complaining. I am beyond fortunate to even have a job I can lose sleep over. After what BoomR and others have been through, I should be nothing but grateful, which I am. Just not today.

What do you do when you can’t shut off your brain? I’ve tried:

1. visualizing being on the beach at night, listening to a calm sea
2. silently counting backwards from 1000
3. self-talk (“relax, go to sleep, it can all wait”)

As much as I want it to work, it never does. And reading or a glass of warm milk (eewwwww) doesn’t cut it, either. Once I’m up, I’m up. Can’t take any over-the-counter sleep meds because they give me restless legs.

So what — am I just out of luck here? Fortunately it doesn’t happen every night; rather, just once a week or so. Indeed, we throw the term “insomnia” around pretty casually, when in fact, it’s a serious chronic disorder, unlike occasional sleeplessness, which is what I suffer from. Still, it throws a huge pipe wrench into the following day. I mean, I know we’re supposed to sleep less as we get older, but criminetly…

Upside: I get to have breakfast with Bando this morning. That’s worth staying up for all by itself. Not so sure about the Cowboys and Aliens matinee with the Thriller this afternoon, though. ZzzZzzzzzZZZzz….

This is one of those “do NOT go there” sites, especially if you provide some kind of contracted service for people. This particular site is populated by graphic and web designers, and they share their true stories from the battlefield. I couldn’t stop reading; it was like watching a wreck, except funny. Some personal favorites:

CLIENT: We want a website that looks minimalist and fresh, like [a local department store]’s.

ME: That’s a great starting point

CLIENT: The most important feature is professionalism. Clean lines, lots of white space, so our customers know we mean business.

ME: Sounds great! Any other fundamentals?

CLIENT: Have you seen the website for Chiquita Banana?

ME: I – no, I’ll have to check it out. What do you like about the site?

CLIENT: It has these cute bananas with sunglasses that walk around and dance and stuff. We want something like that.

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CLIENT: This website is about GOOD wholesome music! No Lady googoo, or the Mr Cisco thong song, or, uh, Ozzy Osmund. Just good wholesome music.”

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CLIENT: We need to submit our app to the store before it closes for the weekend—what time does the app store close on Friday nights?

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At the grocery:

CLIENT: “Aren’t you supposed to be designing my brochure?”

ME: “It’s Sunday morning. I’m just buying milk because I ran out.”

CLIENT: “Oh, you did? Well, what should we do then if we run out of time for the project, huh? Just leave the last two pages blank and write ‘sorry, ran out of milk’ on them?”

ME: “I don’t know why you’re getting so upset over this.”

CLIENT: “I don’t know why you can’t just eat your cereal dry.”

ME: “What!?”

CLIENT: “I just… Okay, sorry I snapped. I just came from church. That place leaves me feeling so angry for some reason.”

========

CLIENT: Last night I dreamed that the site was made out of roast pork and corn juice. I know it sounds strange, but I really like the essence of the idea. Can you do something with that, with the essence of the idea?

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CLIENT: … And whenever anyone refreshes the page, the opening of “The Circle of Life” will play as loud as possible. Does anyone own rights to that song?”

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CLIENT: “Oh and by the way, we don’t want you to draw udders on the cows.”

ME: “Why not?”

CLIENT: “It’s too suggestive.”

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And the best one, especially for musicians…

CLIENT: What do you mean, ‘payment?’ You told me you were freelancing!”

Haaaa

Just when I think I’ve heard the strangest things ever, working in public education…

Off to have coffee with Meg. Happy Monday, if there is such a thing.

DISCLAIMER: I know there are exceptions to every rule. Please preface each of my reasons with a silent, mental “In many cases in the Fink’s experience…” In other words, I do not hate your cat. It ain’t personal. [And Chevy, the Famous American Cat, always gets a pass. I’ve met Cocoa from a distance, and she passes muster, too.] I know that dogs have their “issues” as well, so, yeah.

Here, in as honest and fair a manner as I can convey, are the reasons I do not like cats.

1.  They like to dig their claws into furniture, carpets, drapes, walls, and you. I know it’s supposed to be an important part of a cat’s happy life (scratching on surfaces to groom its claws, and climbing up things to feed its arboreal nature), but it doesn’t make me happy. If I want to be a pin cushion, I’ll get the needles out of my sewing kit and have at it. Ever try to pull a cat off your shoulder when it has its talons planted a quarter inch deep into your flesh? Hey, that’s fun! I’ll have one of those! Even if the cat is declawed, that fth, fth, fth motion it makes with its feet (phantom clawing) is a bit creepish to me.
2. If I read or hear one more time that “my cat allows me to live in his house, tee hee!” I am going to bash heads. Widely known in the Fink house: ain’t nobody Mama’s boss. I adore Rousseau and spoil him rotten with love, but he will by crackie mind me, and come when he’s called. And if I’m brushing his hair or gently combing out a mat or bathing him or anything else he doesn’t particularly enjoy, he will sit still and endure it without hissing, scratching, biting or running away.
3. The indifferent prissiness is not cute. If I wanted a pet that couldn’t care less about me, I’d get a…well…a cat.
4. Pets need to potty outside. Ew. And don’t even get me STARTED on the fact that there is a leash law in my city to prevent dogs from running loose, and a scooper law forbidding them to poop in people’s yards, but the law does not apply to cats. They’re flippin’ Elsa, born free, and they can roam wherever they like. Fine. Then I should be able to get a rifle and shoot them at will when they use my yard like a new container of Fresh Step, or when they attempt to claw the cover off my grandsons’ sandbox. Where are the fines for cat owners? (I know this isn’t a “cat” issue, but a human one. Still.)
5. I just prefer a dog’s nature. Rousseau is a creature of unconditional love. He wants nothing more than to please us, and that makes us love him all the more. He doesn’t need “alone time,” and he’s never unpredictable or aloof or snotty. He always wants to be petted and fussed over. I can reach down to pet him a hundred thousand times, and never once end up scratched or bleeding.

…which is why I will never own a cat, although I certainly do not begrudge my family and friends from owning one. Vive la difference!

I was reading the NYT during my quiet time this morning (which is still going on, by the way, since the Js wore themselves — and me — out last night), and came across something that made me giggle. You ever have those moments? In this entertaining op-ed, there were several.

The writer’s father is Russian. She remembers drinking only room-temperature beverages as a child, so she called up Dad in Ukraine to ask him why he hated ice. His response:

‘Ice? I don’t hate ice,’ he began. ‘It’s just that when these Americans hand you a can from the freezer, and it is already so cold that just touching it practically turns your hand into a claw, I don’t really see the need to add ice.'”

You know, he’s got a point there.

It got me to thinking, too…what other uniquely American traits drive people nuts, and what about other cultures makes us crazy? And please — I’m not talking about the US’s gross disregard for our planet or a failed political system or infamous American capitalism and greed. Save those more serious opinions for Usenet, or Facebook, or whatever. Please and thank you.

Rather, I refer to idiosyncrasies that make us decidedly different from our non-North American counterparts. Like the “we put ice in everything, even if it’s already freezing cold” thing. Although I have not been to a non-European country outside the US, I have noticed (or have been informed of) several differences that made me smile, cringe, or scratch my head:

1. Europeans seem far less worried about “personal space.” Ride a city bus in Rome and you’ll see what I mean.
2. Americans seem much more preoccupied with time management, and not having enough time. In Europe, no one is in a hurry.
3. Teenage years are not “celebrated” with dances, proms and sports as much in Europe as they are here. I think someone from France would ask, “What’s a pep rally??”
4. When a teacher walks into an American student center lounge, no one notices. When it happens in Korea, students stop what they’re doing, put out their cigarettes, and stand up to greet her.
5. Even if the choices are not popular, America has a fascination with all things European/Asian, and the reverse is true as well. I guess the grass is greener and all that…

I know many who read RtB are well traveled. What have you noticed?