Monday, January 18, 2010

The First Step Is Admitting That You Have A Problem: But That's A Helluva Big Step, You Know?

How sad. I am completely bereft these days of anything valuable to say on any topic of Real Significance. This fact became all the more apparent after I had one martini on an empty stomach on Friday, grabbed Rick's PDA during dinner out, and jotted down what I thought would prove to be incredibly brilliant notes for a blogpost.

I'm still using them here. I'll leave it to all of you to decide if there should be a new organization called WADB: Writers Against Drunk Blogging.

*)(* People everywhere need to stop ordering and drinking White Zinfandel!! (Ed. Note: This was written after I noticed the waiter bringing a gargantuan bottle of White Zinfandel to the table next to us. They eschewed the waiter's suggestion of La Crema pinot noir or another lovely Chardonnay and instead got this two-liter of WZ.)
Rick: It's not even "white," it's a BLUSH.
Nance: Yes! True. And here's a shocking truth. I'm just putting it out there. I'M A SNOB.
(Ed. Note: I'm pretty sure I sat back with a sort of "so there, act surprised, but there it is!" expression on my face. I probably am a little bit snobby about a lot of things, but in all fairness, I don't think I'm really a snob. Completely. )
Rick: (laughs)
Nance: And I just want to take that huge bottle of white zinfandel and smash it on the ground. And then I want to take this purple crayon and write on this paper tablecloth: STOP DRINKING WHITE ZINFANDEL. FOREVER!! (Ed. Note: We were at a Macaroni Grill, hence the crayon and the paper overlay on the tablecloth. That chain still likes the cutesy idea of the waiter writing his name on the table. I don't get it, personally, but okay. By the way, their new appetizer--which I wish had arrived much earlier so I wasn't already half in the bag--of marinated olives and parmesan bread, is very nice.)

*)(* A Singing Waiter! What a lovely voice, but he only sang one time and then we never heard him again. Probably one reason why was because EVERYONE ELSE SIMPLY IGNORED HIM AND KEPT SHOVELLING FOOD INTO THEIR YAWS. HARDLY ANYONE EVEN LOOKED TOWARD HIM! Typical Ohio mentality: feed your yap and not your soul. (Ed. Note: He was not our waiter. He waited on the table behind us and a few tables over. At one point during his song ("If I Loved You"), one of the diners at the table harmonized with him, which was surprising and pleasant. Both Rick and I turned toward him; our waiter, who had arrived to take our orders, stopped and listened with us. We inquired politely about the young man, who we discovered is trained in opera. All in all, it was an unexpected pleasure which was largely unremarkable to most of the other patrons, it seemed.)

*)(* My Perfect Blackberry! It would be red or pink and less square and I'd call it a raspberry. NO KEYBOARD. I would speak clearly into it, and then I'd say "stop." I would be able to edit the message before sending it by SPEAKING THE CORRECTIONS into it. Then say, "Send to Rick" or "Send to whomever". Again, the most important thing is NO KEYBOARD. (Ed. Note: I am flexible on the Raspberry name. And the "roundish" aspect. But the idea of typing on a "phone" device is completely abhorrent to me. I detest the phone, and the idea of sending messages on the fly is appealing, but teensy-tiny typing is NOT.)

I know it seems horrifyingly impolite that I was taking all these notes during a nice dinner out with my husband. Let me assure you that it took only moments to record them because, as you can see, they are fluffy little bits of nothingness. And I was everso discreet. At least I think I was. After all, I was deep into a gorgeous vodka martini, up, slightly dirty. Isn't it just tragic how little it takes to get me...thinking? And about such deep, deep things, too! Sigh. Ah, well. Let someone else win Nobels.

12 comments:

  1. Ever wonder what would happen if your students read your blog? I love the idea of the Raspberry. You should patent it. Seriously!

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  2. I get so confused at Macaroni Grille. Should I clap after they sing? Weep? Clasp my hands to my heart and gasp? Or just ask them to get on with taking my order? And yes...blush drinkers make me nuts.

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  3. Right up next to you on the white zin thing. Does anyone remember the name of that blush wine everybody drank in the sixties and seventies...it started with a P (Petreus...nah. Down, dull brain!) and the bottle was a flattened oval? More deep thoughts. La Crema pinot is fabulous, but the price has sure shot up in the last five years! And blogging with a little buzz is the only way to go. I'm writing this in the morning before breakfast on coffee and you can clearly see it would have been better at 5:15 on a good NZ sauvignon blanc. Sigh. No Nobel here, either.

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  4. I don't know what it's going to take to get me thinking, but I promise not to try white zinfandel.

    And my son doesn't get why I refuse to text. Why would I want to type with my thumbs? I don't even like a laptop keyboard.

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  5. Sorry - cannot type meanigful response - laughing to the point of falling off typing chair.

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  6. MaryG--You are adorable, and I mean that. And not just because you are...CANADIAN!!! I always amuse you, you always tell me that I do, and I cannot resist that combination. I am so glad that you come by the Dept.

    V-Grrrl--I detest laptop keyboards, too, and Jared and Rick cannot understand why. They are lovely about constantly offering their machines to me so that I can simply compute from my perch on the couch (WITH MY SLANKET ON!), but I just cannot bear it. Plus, those dumb touchpads are hideously impossible to use. And, if you could see my thumbs--genetic wonders that they are, all stubby and toelike, you'd know why I can never send text messages. I also refuse to use the word "text" as a verb. EVER.

    The Other Nance--Now you are killing me with the wine name. I will have my brain on "Sort" for days, trying to come up with that wine. Are you sure it started with a "P"? And which SauvBlanc do you like? Jared prefers Sauvs when he drinks whites, and we've started to like those and Chenins when we don't want an oaky, vanilla-y Chard.

    apathy lounge--you know, we have only eaten at MG a couple of times and this is the FIRST TIME we ran into a singing waiter. it had never happened before, and i had never heard of anyone else saying that they had had one there or had that experience there. i got the idea that the couple at that table had requested him. i thought it was wonderful. i can see how it might be a bit uneasy, him being right there and all, if you hadn't requested it. but to have NO ONE ELSE even notice...awful. i enjoy rose wines in the summer, and we bought some nice ones in Canada. But not WZ. there is a very big difference.

    Melissa B.--Oh, hell. My students have NO IDEA that I have a blog. I am intensely private. Very few teachers in my district know I have this or my other ones. Some former students show up here, but they have a lot of class and discretion. I never use my full name, say where I live or teach, or any of that. The kids/school/my colleagues didn't ask for the attention, so I don't bring them any, you know? Yet, there's nothing here that I wouldn't talk about there, really. As Miss Maudie said of Atticus in "To Kill a Mockingbird, I'm the same here as I am in the public street! Now, as far as the Raspberry...thanks! But I bet the folks at Apple already have it in the works!

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  7. The Other Nance--Was it possibly Mateus? (Told you I put my brain on "Sort." Just thought of it at about 9:30 PM.)

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  8. Technology is moving along so quickly that your Raspberry may come sooner than you think. Here's a couple of technological advances that I've been marveling at lately:

    My friend's Google phone's GPS navigation: The most amusing part is how it tells you which exit to take when you're on the highway. I was really amused at the phone speaking out the same thing that was written on the sign on the highway. Then my friend told me that Google had their computers look at the images from Google Maps Street View, recognize what the street signs said, and have the phones speak the exits aloud. This is for every exit of every highway in the country. Insanity!

    Google Maps in India: The same friend who works at Google told me about this one. In India (and several other countries, including Ghana), people don't generally learn street names. People often give directions like "Turn left at the Arby's, then continue past the school and make a right at the temple." Well, apparently Google Maps gives directions this way in India. A random search shows directions that use landmarks.

    Live Updating Software: Google came out with an application called Wave, which is a way for people to have e-mail like conversations with each other that are hosted on their servers and visible on a website. The innovative thing is that anyone who can look at a wave can edit it, just like a wiki, but they can edit in in real time! So if two people are looking at a wave at the same time and one person edits it, the edits appear on the other person's computer literally one character at a time, as the person types. The most amusing thing to me is that my team for the Mystery Hunt had a program that did this before Google rolled out Wave. We only have it in spreadsheet form, but it's nice to be able to use live editable grids to work on solving puzzles.

    I just blogged in your comments. Sorry about that :-p

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  9. I don't know why people drink White Zin either, it bothers me. I think that people drink that when they want wine and don't know what to order/buy. You're not being a snob...it's just a reality. I actually get offended when I'm somewhere and someone offers me that garbage.

    What happened to the Maccaroni Grill? It used to be so nice and FULL of singing waiters.

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  10. Nina--Macaroni Grill is still a relatively nice restaurant, though I think it's pricey for what they offer. Again, I had no idea they EVER had singing waiter, but we don't usually go there and never did until a year or two ago. I think WZ is a "pop wine" in that it's sweet and mild and for people who "don't like wine" but want to drink some.

    Mikey--I would thrive in India because that is how I prefer directions. I am a Landmark Person. Also, the Wave thing sounds like the old chat feature on Delphi, an ISP I used to use ages ago. I had these epic chats with like 10-15 friends at a time, and as they would type in their chats, the letters would come up one at a time. our forums were the same thing. I remember your mystery hunts. they were always such fun! loved being part of those.
    and you can blog in my comments on any of my 3 blogs. esp. when it's such interesting stuff. hope you're well, and sorry to have missed you over break. hope we have a chance to get together one day soon.

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  11. Nancy Vanderbilt9:12 PM

    First, I want you to know that I am proud to be a SNOB.

    A Hepburn-Grant Main Line Bryn Mawr type of snob.

    I mention this because my wine of choice is White Zinfandel and I am proud to say that I have a box of it in my Fridge at this very moment....

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  12. Ms. Vanderbilt--hello. welcome to the Dept. Oh my. A...box...of WZ. Well...there you go.

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Oh, thank you for joining the fray!

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