December 05, 2003 - 10:08 a.m.

Just For Fun

I had a terrible day yesterday, despite nothing at all serious going wrong. I bunch of little things just got all bungled and left me in a foul mood by the end of the day!

First I went to buy some dice for our weekly roleplaying sessions in the morning. I arrived at the store around 10:15 and it was closed, despite a posted opening time of 10AM. I was annoyed because the store was out of the way of anything else I needed to do that day, and I would have to come back if I wanted to have the dice for the session that night. Luckily, when I went back an hour later, the store was open. I had to restrain myself from giving the guy there a piece of my mind about opening well after one's stated hours...

The next few hours were pretty uneventful. B and I did go swimming for a bit in the afternoon. Then, through the local nanny network, I heard about a tree lighting taking place that afternoon in a nearby town. The details were fuzzy, but there was supposed to be music, hot cocoa, pretty lights, etc. I thought it would be a fun way to start getting in the holiday spirit for the kids, so we met the girls at the bus stop and headed over to the town's center, where I figured the festivities would be held. No dice. I continues to drive around for about half an hour with no luck finding the activities or anyone who could direct us there. Argh! By then I was grumpy, the kids were grumpy, and we were slowed in going home in defeat by the beginnings of after work traffic. The kids were actually pretty understanding, but I still felt really bad about dragging them around for nothing.

So, we went home and I got out a simple project I had been saving that I thought would be fun and make up for my bungle a bit. I had gotten a few of those tape runner dispensers with the colorful metallic tape at a discount store, and set the kids up to make designs with them. Unfortunately, the things would not stay loaded properly, so I pretty much continuously had to open them up and fix them. Just another little snafu, but by this point in the day I think a hangnail would have been almost more than I could bear.

I was relieved when it was time to leave for the day, though I wasn't entirely in the mood to go to the roleplaying session. I just wanted to curl up and read or go to bed early. But off I went anyway, since I had to. I got about 15 minutes down the road and stopped for gas, only to realize I didn't have my wallet. I had to turn around and go back home to get it (luckily, as I suspected it had just fallen out of my purse when I was in the Sequoia earlier in the day). Now I really wanted to just stay home. But I resisted the urge to lie to my friends and tell them I had lost the wallet or something. Going to the session turned out to be a good thing. I got to have homemade macaroni and cheese, which is one of my favorite comfort foods, and as usual we laughed a lot, so my mood improved immensely. Good thing, too, since my character ended the session having just regained consciousness after a bite from a man-sized spider and a serious wound from a dagger that struck while hanging in mid-air. She was pretty wary of this magic thing before this incident... It will be fun to roleplay her attitudes now that she's been nearly killed by it, and the responsible mage got away!

So, after all that craziness yesterday, I need something frivolous and fun, and after reading about it in all its boring length, you probably do to. I got this little quiz from my friend Barbara. For anyone who cares, my answers are influenced by having lived the first 8 years of my life in Missouri, the next 10 in northwest Georgia and southeast Tennessee, and since then in Massachusetts. And my parents and relatives are from Wisconsin.

WHAT DO YOU CALL:

1. A body of water, smaller than a river, contained within relatively narrow banks?

a stream

2. The thing you push around the grocery store?

a cart

3. A metal container to carry a meal in?

lunchbox

4. The thing that you cook bacon and eggs in?

skillet

5. The piece of furniture that seats three people?

couch

6. The device on the outside of the house that carries rain off the roof?

gutter

7. The covered area outside a house where people sit in the evening?

porch

8. Carbonated, sweetened, non-alcoholic beverages?

soda (though for a while when I lived in the south, I succumbed to the bizarre custom of referring to ANY soda as Coke whether cola or not and regardless of brand)

9. A flat, round breakfast food served with syrup?

pancake

10. A long sandwich designed to be a whole meal in itself?

sub

11. The piece of clothing worn by men at the beach?

swimming trunks

12. Shoes worn for sports?

I used to call them tennis shoes, but now usually sneakers.

13. Putting a room in order?

cleaning up

14. A flying insect that glows in the dark?

lightning bug

15. The little insect that curls up into a ball?

roly-poly

16. The children's playground equipment where one kid sits on one side and goes up while the other sits on the other side and goes down?

teeter-totter when I was little, seesaw now.

17. How do you eat your pizza?

point first, with hands. I've been known to fold it if it's a really big, floppy piece.

18. What's it called when private citizens put up signs and sell their used stuff?

yard sale. I still can't bring myself to call them tag sales even though I have lived in New England for 10 years, and that's what they call them here usually.

19. What's the evening meal?

dinner

20. The thing under a house where the furnace and perhaps a rec room are?

basement

Extras:

An unusually heavy rain which does not last long.

downpour

A window covering on rollers that pulls down.

a shade

A new, limited access, multi-lane road.

highway

Heavy garments worn for work.

overalls

A few of these puzzle me... What else would someone call a downpour or a gutter? I am surprised that Barbara and I had nearly identical answers as well, since she grew up entirely in the South, whereas my formative vocabulary years were spent in the Midwest.

today's project: getting my hair highlighted an co-hosting game night with my brother

musing about : whether we'll really get the predicted foot + of snow they're predicting for tonight.

�

flutter back - fly ahead