Today is what we call a clusterfuck of epic proportions. (Firefox’s spell checker has flagged clusterfuck, but I don’t care.) This weekend we were helping a friend move down from New York to DC. To live in our house, actually, until he finds a place of his own. Which I’m not happy about, but at least he’s going to find a place of his own, and damn soon if I have anything to say about it. Two boarders was too many already; fortunately we’re still living at the in-laws’ for the time being. Anyway, today was a giant mess.

This morning we started working at around 8:00 or 8:30; he guessed we’d be out of there by noon. Half an hour later, he was standing around doing nothing. I said “do you need something to do?” He said no, and continued standing around doing nothing. So a few minutes later, A asked him if he was waiting for something. He said yes, he was waiting for us to get off the rug so he could vacuum it. A pointed out that things did not have to be done in a particular order, and there was lots more he could do meanwhile. (See, he wasn’t actually ready to go. He had left a lot of things undone. We suspect he spent his time masturbating, smoking weed, and playing video games instead. Normally these are pursuits I would approve of, but not when there are things to be done.) He got all huffy and ordered us to get out and go home, he’d do it all himself. Needless to say this was ridiculous and pissed off A and I quite a lot. She locked herself in the bathroom to cool off, and I went back to packing up his computer. Damn, I wish we’d left when he said to.

He did most of the carrying to the U-Haul while she and I cleaned the place. A lot of the carrying (down two flights of stairs) was done on Saturday, when we had hired two guys to come and help us out with the furniture…but there was still a lot left to be carried. So A and I cleaned and scrubbed…the bathroom, the refrigerator, the stove, the fingerprints from all the light switches and doorknobs, etc. I was working on the very dirty inside of a kitchen cabinet and A was working next to me at the sink when he stopped behind us and commented, “you guys are such good little scrubbers!” I turned around and gave him The Look of Death. He said something to the effect of “I wouldn’t have done that if you guys hadn’t been here” and A turned around and said “So…this doesn’t need to be done?” He said: no, not really. We immediately dropped our sponges and got ready to leave - bags gathered, coats on - and he said “are you leaving TOWN now? There’s so much left to do!” I was about to smack him in the mouth, I swear.

I went and got our car, which we’d parked a couple of blocks away on Friday night. I came back and brought my book for Sex & Gender class and sat with the U-Haul for a couple of hours, because that way he wouldn’t have to keep pulling the back gate up and down and locking and unlocking the padlock. (That’s what I did on Saturday instead of carrying anything - I was the truck guard and A did stuff upstairs.) I sat out there freezing my ass off - it was about 40 degrees both days, with no sun because of all the buildings. Finally it was time to go. At 3:10pm, that is. More than three hours later than he’d predicted, and five hours from when I wish we’d left, when he told us to.

We realized at the last minute that we couldn’t take the regular route to the Holland Tunnel, we had to take the truck route. He was behind us, and I called him and said “did you see we have to follow the truck route?” He said “oh, no! I didn’t see that.” So we led him through it. I don’t know why, but we stuck with him the whole way back to our house. After the final toll on the New Jersey Turnpike, which we breezed through with E-Z Pass, we sat on the shoulder and waited for half an hour until he came through. Half an hour. Wait, I remember why we stuck with him: because he’s a moron who can’t handle himself. He called up after the toll in Delaware and said “uh…do you have any cash? I’m running out of cash.” Apparently he didn’t have enough for tolls - they were costing him more than normal because he’s driving a truck, but he didn’t think to have LOTS of extra cash on hand. So fine, we pulled over on the shoulder together and I ran back with $40 cash. At the Fort McHenry toll, we went through a regular lane because there’s nowhere to pull over and wait after that one. Of course he managed to be so far behind us that we didn’t see him, but we figured he’d catch up. Nope: he’s still a moron.

We were around Catonsville when he called and said this priceless gem: “I took 695 East. Was that wrong?” Instant *headdesk* on my part. I said “Yes.” He said “I gotta go, bye” and hung up. So we had absolutely no idea what happened, what he was doing, or where he would end up. We drove another 8 miles to a rest area just past Route 32, and called him up again. Turns out he was still on 695 because he figured he could just loop around, and he said to go home, he’d find his way somehow. A pointed out that 695 is the Baltimore Beltway. So we told him we were waiting at the rest stop past Route 32, because obviously he needed help getting home. Fortunately that rest area was part of Maryland’s free wi-fi rest stop program, so I got on the computer and started typing this entry. (I’m still typing it, duh - we’re about to cross the American Legion bridge into Virginia.) He finally caught up and we set off…still guiding him…because he’s a moron.

This probably doesn’t sound too bad to most of you, but the guy was already on my shit list to begin with for various other stupidities. A wanted to help him move, so of course I came too. And I didn’t mind it, until today, when he became a complete idiot. God damn, he pissed me off so bad.

Can we please stop fighting over the 9/11 stuff now? Specifically I’m talking about the conspiracy theories. Through random surfing, I found my way to another one of those sites that is full of hue and cry about buildings being brought down deliberately, whether the hole in the Pentagon could have been made by a plane, etc. My response to all of that now is: Shut the hell up. It doesn’t matter.

Seriously, why does it matter if the government was lying to us? Is that going to change anything that happened? Newsflash: the government is elected in the United States. If you don’t like the government, if you think they lied, vote them out of office and change it! Let me know if that brings back the 2800 people who died that day.

The question should not be “what happened then?” The question should be “what do we do now?”

I got home about 1:00am and found that :MK: - my wife’s sister, who lives with us, in case you haven’t heard me mention that a million times before - had parked down the driveway. Now, normally A and I park down the driveway, and MK&R park on the street. During splatter-berry season, they park on the cross-street, because there is nowhere to park on the street where their cars will not be pummeled with messy sticky berries. On Friday night I had to park on the street because :MK: had allowed utility people to park on our driveway because she didn’t know I would be coming home so early. (It happens that they were there until after I would have normally been home, so being early didn’t actually have anything to do with it.) But my white car got all splatted up, and I need to find a car wash at some point.

Anyway, I pulled down the driveway and blocked her car and A’s car in because I was too damn tired and my feet hurt too damn much to park on the street or the cross-street. I went in and checked :MK:’s work schedule…she had to work Sunday morning. And she leaves at 5:30am. I started to write a note asking her to please move my car when she had to leave, but I didn’t want it parked on the street, so could she also move mine back down after she had moved hers up, etc. I decided that was too complicated and I should just do it myself. But I didn’t want to do the complicated stuff, so I got the brilliant idea into my head that I would move my car onto the lawn, back hers up a bit, and then move mine into its normal spot.

Yeah, that whole “onto the lawn thing” I just mentioned? Not very bright. Because, you see, I could not then get my car OFF the lawn. I ended up ripping giant holes in our lawn and the neighbors’ lawn, because I was desperately seeking a way back onto a paved surface. It was 1:00am, I was exhausted, my feet hurt, and I was really pissed that :MK: had parked down the driveway on a day when she’d have to leave for work at 5:30am. Once the cars had finally switched places - and as I came in I could see huge gashes in the lawns - I left her a note saying please do not park down the driveway unless I am out of town. Because, really, it is my parking space. If she has to bring in something heavy, I don’t mind if she pulls down the driveway to bring it in and then backs out again. But for her to park down the driveway because she is too goddamn lazy is just not okay with me. I woke up A and she agreed that it’s my parking space. (See, she owns the house, and I am her partner, and MK&R are tenants. Hence me getting the good parking space.)

Anyway, I was just absolutely furious, and I had to take one of A’s Ativan so I could calm down enough to get to sleep. Fortunately I was very tired, so I managed to fall asleep pretty quickly. Unfortunately I had a crummy day on Sunday because :MK: and I were upset with each other all day, and I’m having another crummy day today because tonight I have to go over to the neighbors’ house and apologize and offer to reseed their lawn, which I don’t know how to do. (Yes, I’ve printed instructions off the internet.) So I generally had a bad weekend, you could say.

Am I the only one who finds Sean Paul’s “Temperature” video offensive? It’s not the bouncing boobs, it’s not the freak dancing, it’s not even the dancing kiddies (much) - it’s the stepping on women. Literally. I don’t consider myself extremely feminist, but this video is the most sexist thing I’ve seen on TV. There are a couple of spots during the video in which a trio of men literally step on a trio of women, physically pushing them down. (I’m not sure the link above is the full video, but it has at least one clip of this.) It’s horrible, and yet I couldn’t find much online about this. Now Verizon is using the song in one of their commercials; they’re not using the video but every time I hear the song it makes me mad.

I just sent the following to PayPal, using up all but a few of my alloted 1000 characters.

I am a longtime PayPal member since its early days. I seem to remember that when tiered accounts were introduced I was upgraded to a Premier account for free - this was probably a few years ago. I do not receive payments very often and so I never realized that I was being charged a special fee. Today I received $400 and I was charged $11.90. This large fee prompted me to look into it and realize I was a Premier member. I do not appreciate being “upgraded” for free and then being charged additional fees. I have downgraded my account but I was told the $11.90 could not be refunded. I would like to appeal this decision based on the fact that I was not told about these fees when I upgraded. Payments I have received between then and now had a very small fee deducted and I thought it was standard - had I known that ONLY Premier members were charged fees, I would have downgraded long ago. I would appreciate a refund of my $11.90. Thank you.

I am really annoyed by this. It was a long time ago, back when they introduced tiered accounts, that they offered to upgrade me for free. I’m not even sure they charged separate fees for Premier accounts when the tiers first started. I’m not going to ask for retroactive refunds, but it would be nice to get my $11.90 back since I just now realized it. I’m not holding my breath, though. Fuckers.
Added: Well, that was quick - five minutes or less. Here’s what they said:
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I get my medications - there are a lot of them - by mail-order pharmacy. At the beginning of the year, my insurance company switched from using Express Scripts for that service to using Medco Health. All of my prescriptions transferred properly, except one: fexofenadine, the generic for Allegra. Due to complete incompetence on the part of Express Scripts, I am now down to a week remaining of that medication and I have to jump through very twisted hoops to get it. Here’s the e-mail I just sent to my physician:
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Well, I’m annoyed. We had brought a shopping bag from Lord and Taylor in the trunk of the car. In the bag was a wrapped present and two bottles of meds, and a giant koosh ball we bought today. And when a certain guy who lives with us went to the car to bring in the present, he brought the whole bag. When we got out to the car at the end of the reception, A noticed the shopping bag was missing. So we spent 45 minutes trying to track them down, and we ended up giving up. The father of the bride suggested we call the happy couple (who was staying at a different hotel), but of course we’re not going to bug them on their wedding night.

I am actually really annoyed, probably more than I should be. I should just calm down, but I’m all angry about it. Ah well, that’s what writing in here is for.

Okay, now I remember why I hate makeup. I have never been a habitual makeup wearer, but lately I figured I’d try to look a little more adult and wear some lipstick and so forth. In my purse I have a few different lipsticks, two concealer sticks, and some various eye stuff as well as a nail file, clippers, and tweezers. This morning I discovered that one of my concealer sticks had come uncapped while in my purse, painting all my other makeup and the inside of the makeup pocket in my purse (which is not removable).

I have washed everything the best I could, but there’s still concealer all over the inside of my purse. I also had a tiny beanbag turtle in there that I got in St. Thomas; A got a similar octopus and so I carried my turtle around as a memory of that trip. The concealer has also not come off my turtle particularly well; I guess fabric in general is doomed when this kind of thing happens. I don’t even want to look at the purse anymore, I’m tempted to just put the damn thing up on Freecycle even though it was something like $50+ (it’s a nice purse).

Ugh, I am just so pissed off. This is not a good way to start a Monday.
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Some things that have been annoying me in the past day -

• A’s MP3 player, which we bought in early April, has apparently died. It gives an error about the hard disk and refuses to start. When I plug it into the computer, XP knows it’s found a new disk drive but then doesn’t display it as a removable drive. It turns out that the PDP-602, also known as the GoDot M7170, is a piece of crap. I spent close to an hour trying to fix it to no avail, so tomorrow I’m going to contact the manufacturer to see about a replacement.
• It turns out that RollerCoaster Tycoon 3, which I received yesterday, has a majorly steep learning curve. It might as well be a completely different game from RCT2. It’s fun but challenging.
• People at work need to stop asking me about the goddamn office printer and fax machine. Yes, I know they’re in my cube, but you don’t need to ask my permission to use them. Yes, I know you have to step into my personal space - within about a foot and a half from me - to use the fax machine, but that doesn’t mean I want to talk to you. No, I don’t know why your fax didn’t go through, and I don’t care that you’re using up all “my” paper.
• I tried to install WebCalNG at least twice and I can’t get it to work. Of course I am getting the super-enigmatic 500 error, so I have no idea what’s wrong. This is especially annoying because WebCalNG seems to do exactly what I’m looking for in a web calendar.
• I am too weak to say no to people who come to the door selling things, and now I have a one-year subscription to Games magazine. I only paid $5 over the Amazon.com price for the subscription, and I guess it’s nice to be charitable, and I do like that magazine - but I didn’t need the subscription!

And so ends the bullet-pointed whining.