Oh, doctor

Dan, teaching Megan how to do heel and toe turns on the snowboard: You’re not trying! You’re being a chicken. You need to really wipe out. Then I’ll know you’re trying.

[Megan makes a few successful turns and then wipes out hard. Cries.]

Medic: Are you OK? Need a lift?

Dan: Nah, she’s fine. [Medic drives away. Turns to Megan.] Do you need a doctor?

[Megan cries.]

Dan: Guess I shouldn’t have told you to wipe out. But good job!

The truth is, I thought I’d be a lot better at this. And I suppose I have the technical stuff down. But breaking your bum really takes a toll on the ‘ol confidence. Forget pride; I lost that taking a dive off the ski lift.

Nonetheless, and you wouldn’t have been able to tell 20 minutes ago, but this is the best vacation I’ve ever taken. And I still can’t forsee going back to skis. But damn, skiing came easier..

According to my calculations, I burned nearly 1,700 calories yesterday. I need to man up and take a few more runs in order to earn the irish car bomb that’s waiting for me in two hours. Oh, doctor.

Labor Day Crab Crackin’

Well, I’ve managed to finally contract that nasty summer cold that I’ve spent weeks avoiding. And right before starting my new job. Hopefully a little Dayquil will do the trick and I’ll sail through this week without incident.

We stayed in DC this Labor Day weekend, hanging out with friends and doing something most of us have never done before: Eating crabs.

If I weren’t nearing a snotted zombie-like state, I might go into great detail about how unclean and gross it was. Instead, I’ll direct you to this Flickr set, where you can see it in all its Old Bay-covered, don’t-forget-to scoop-out-the-guts glory. To get you started, here are a couple of photos:

Our three pounds of crabs

Me and my first (crab)

It was alive 10 minutes ago

Crab penis. (Male genitals are shaped like the Washington Monument; females are shaped like the Capitol.) You have to pry off the penis to get inside to the meat. I know, I know. Completely vile.

After crab cracking, we headed to a nearby pub to watch more college football (how about them Hawkeyes!) and spent the rest of the weekend winding down.

What did you all do with your long weekend?

Life in a Sublease: Part One

One of the best things about subleasing an apartment from a 60-year old who has lived in it for nearly 30 years is that there is no shortage of oddities.

I make it a point to study each of these things, from knickknacks lying around the house, to segmented catalogs and direct mail.

Today, I wish to share with you some of my favorites from a recent catalog called, Home Trends: Practical Products For Practical People. Home Trends is a division of QCL Direct and is apparently skilled at selling old people shit they don’t need under the guise of, “Buying this will actually save you money!”

I looked through the entire catalog and thought I’d share some of my favorites with you.

From the pest prevention section:

These vomit-inducing bug traps claim to rid your house and yard of flying insects. Yours for $11.99 and $15.99 respectively. I don’t even know where to start with this one, except to say that I had to put off fixing lunch until these photos were posted. Verrrrpt.

Now, where I come from, you ooh and ahh when deer wander into your yard. But I suppose if you become one of those angry shut-ins, seeing a fawn in your yard is almost as bad as seeing the neighbor kid cross that invisible property line onto your just-fertilized lawn. Which means this might be for you:

You’ll note that the deer finds this quite appalling, judging from his twisted face and gagging motion. Yours for $29.99.

Moving on to health & personal wellness:

Morning Roundup: Friday the 13th Edition

“Megan, you have to call in sick to work. You can’t go in like that.”

This is the conversation D and I were having at 7:55 this morning.

This was after I had woken up from a bad dream (getting kidnapped by Mexican slave drivers after being falsely accused of shoplifting a pastry from their cover-up business) which roused me from sleep at 7:40—over an hour later than my normal wake time.

This was also after I sprinted into the shower and crushed the sensitive part of the elbow on a senseless metal bar/washcloth rack that lives on my shower wall.

What’s that you say? An incredibly late start and a sore elbow aren’t reason enough to call in sick to your new job?

Of course not!

The bigger problem is that last night, D jokingly tried to give me a hickey. This morning, much to our horror, the big joke had morphed into a massive, bing cherry-colored catastrophe.

“I’m not calling in sick! I can’t!”
“Then you have to wear a turtleneck.”
“It’s the middle of summer. And a turtleneck would be totally obvious.”
“Oh, man. I’m canceling our plans tonight. We can’t hang out with our friends like this.”
“We? It’s my neck!”
“Then you have to wear your hair down today!”
“I have five minutes to get ready—it’s going up.”

This went on for some time, until I pulled a fitted jacket with a high collar out of my closet and found that it was just high enough to cover the unsightly blemish. I looked at D for approval.

“Oh yeah, that’ll do. You’ll have to wear that tonight, too.”

It’s not my best outfit ever, but so far I don’t think anyone has noticed. I try to keep everyone on the right of me, which makes me feel a lot like Mariah Carey. And no, I’m not wearing this god-forsaken jacket over the weekend. Friends, you all will have to deal with my unsightly monster hickey.

On a totally unrelated note—black cat Ella Bean wishes you all a happy and very lucky Friday the 13th!

Oh, my. Lots of gems today. And Chris Glass is right…a photo like this is made better by its total lack of context.

Of course, if you’ve got ideas or photo captions you’d like to share, please fire away via comments.

[Jam of the Day]: She and Him, You Really Got A Hold On Me

41 Hilarious Science Fair Projects

Oh, it hurts.

Check ‘em out, people.

[via]

I’ll Chance It

This is still, like, the single most annoying study ever.

But P.S., regularly taking the birth control pill for five-plus years is proven to cut your chances of ovarian cancer in half. Get with that oxymoron.

[UPDATE] Bag of Butts: Smart Glass Denver

The Smart Glass Denver story continues to roll. Kristi was interviewed by the Westword this week. You can peep the article here. Pretty amazing stuff.

Now remember, kids: Don’t screw with people who know how to use the intarwebs.

Virginia’s Weird: No Sangria Allowed

On the way home last night, I popped in some Warren G and the Doveshack and, despite the frigid temps, started daydreaming about summer. Which, for me, usually includes a healthy dose of Sangria (you know, because it’s so gangster).

As it turns out, if I’m going to enjoy any summer Sangria, I won’t be able to do so in the state of Virginia. At least not yet.  Turns out that a 74-year old law prohibits mixing wine and liquor, as well as storing booze outside of its original container. A House committee is working on it; you can read the weird story here.

Bag of Butts: Smart Glass Denver

What would you do if you were a woman in a dark parking garage and saw this stuck to your side mirror?

You’d probably get out, walk around and check for damage, and you’d probably have your guard down.

This is pretty much what my friend Kristi did today, before dialing the number and learning that some crackhead at Smart Glass Denver was merely trying to get her business. Not only is it intrusive, uncool marketing—it’s straight up unsafe, too. So Kristi and her fiancé James (alias Marketing Punk) have set out to destroy them via the intarwebs:

If you have a blog, and you would be so kind, please make a post (it can be super short) that talks about what Smart Glass did to Kristi and use the words Smart Glass Denver in the post title. Then, put a link to this blog post from your blog using the linking text “Smart Glass Denver”. Hopefully in a couple of weeks anyone who types Smart Auto into a search engine will see all of our posts on the first page.

If you’d like to voice your dissatisfaction directly, you can reach Smart Glass by calling 303-296-0809.

So far so good. Just type in ‘Smart Glass Denver’ into Google and see what comes up first.

[UPDATE]: Looks like the Consumerist has taken aim at Smart Glass Denver. Go get ‘em!