Friday, March 30, 2007

Blogger, Blogger, who's got the blogger?

Well, really! I finally caved in to coercion and pressure and switched over to the NEW blogger that is powered by Google instead of whatever powered it before; Wheaties, methane, cyber nano-bots.

And then I could not access my account for many days! Many days in the desert with things to say, and all the while thirsting for my blog of old! As the sands of thought slowly sifted away on the parched wind.

How the hell am I supposed to remember what name I registered under? It's not like I use my REAL name! This is why I have an anonymous blog! So I can use one of the many fun identities that I made up! Miss Pinks! Miss Pink Butler! Miss Pink Ponsonby!

I suppose I could write all this stuff DOWN, but with the new Google-managed Blogger, I have to register at Google under a gmail account and in a fit of hurry-up-and-get-this-done-ness, I signed up under an entirely different name which I've now forgotten.

Which leads me to the conclusion that whoever runs Blogger and Google are in the under-30 crowd. Where memories line up like little soldiers with sabers drawn, ready to throw themselves into the battle fray of serious cognitive achievements.

But I'm 50! My thoughts list about in drunken fashion, their sabers left behind at the dinner table stuck into day-old moldy bread. None of my thoughts line up because they are on Furlough, dammit! Drunken and Disorderly Conduct Detention! Dishonorably discharged for sloth and no longer considered fit for active duty.

And now I've misplaced all of the thoughts that were earmarked for the blog posts I wished to write. So I'll just have to make up something.

Which leads me to a rant about PHONES. And phone construction. What idiot-savant decided it was a good thing to put all the dial buttons and the hang-up button and the flash button on the inside of the handset portion of the phone?

Don't they know I need to lean my FACE on that part? I can't tell you how many times I've hung up on someone or worse yet caused sudden deafness and toothache when I hit some number button with my cheekbone, causing a loud piercing BEEP!

Whoever thought up the design for most modern phones obviously never rested the phone between face and shoulder while they fixed tea, opened their bills, cut up day old moldy bread with their sabers.

I would like a removable dial-pad on my phone. Or some bulby protruberance on the top of the handset that would contain the buttons and keep them far removed from my cheek and chin. I don't know! Hopefully my friends are not aware of just how much of their scintillating conversation I miss entirely because I've accidentally pressed the 'flash' button and switched over to an empty phone line for a moment. Oops.

Monday, March 26, 2007

Another Sofa Done Gone

Another one bites the dust!
Another one bites the dust!
And another one gone, another one gone, another one bites the
dust!

~~irritating hard rock lyric

Well, it's true. My short lived rapture over my new-used sofa a few months ago quickly dissolved in a pool of damp nicotine. Whoever owned that sofa before smoked it like a Hormel Turkey, and the stench was unbearable.

So yesterday I went from this:

To This:

And I couldn't be happier. Yes, it's my old twin bed from my second bedroom, now full of boxes. So why not bring it out and make it into sort of a daybed for me? I spend most of my time reclining anyway, these days.

Thursday, March 22, 2007

fibromiasma

Well, I had all kinds of clever things to say today but when I logged into my account I was forced into an upgrade. That took all my energy and wiped out my memory banks so that I lost all my data. That's not unusual these days, actually.

I'm sorry I haven't written much. Last night a pack of frightened, rioting villagers bearing lit torches and various sharp pointy farm implements stormed my keep and said that if I didn't write a blog update soon they were going to Parole me to Jesus, and right now, too. So I promised to at least post a small update, with or without photos.

As I've been saying for some time now, my health sucks and my memory vacuums, and it's taken nearly 4 months just to get in to see a neurologist. Although my MD thinks I have multiple sclerosis, the neurologist says fibromyalgia. Although the two are radically different as to treatment and even the mode of diagnosis, so far nobody has convinced me which is which and which is the which that I have.

But this is why I can barely shuffle through my days, much less sit and be witty on a blog. But I miss it, and I miss all of you, so I am going to try posting, even if it is about awful medical things for a while. Soon, soon, I hope to be in new digs, with a new diagnosis, and new meds to fix me right up, and then I can write about decorating and how Mackie likes or dislikes his new surroundings and all that. So hang in there with me, if you DARE.

Kindly,
Miss Pink Ponsonby

Thursday, March 01, 2007

IKEA-Breakfast of Hip, Trendy, Cutting Edge Death

I had the dubious treat of eating breakfast at IKEA yesterday. Now, those of you who have heard of IKEA will think, "What? IKEA is a hip, trendy, cutting edge, contemporary Swedish Conceptual Full-Immersion Furniture Shopping Experience. Where does breakfast enter into that scenario?"

All I can tell you is that it does. Somehow. The Sacramento IKEA has a full-immersion, cutting edge, hip, trendy, conceptual restaurant, along the lines of the old automats from the 50's. Think School Cafeteria meets George Jetson and you've just about got the design concept.

Think McDonalds meets B&S Truck Stop on Old Route 3 and you've got the food quality concept.

Except that the B&S Truck Stop would have scorned using reconstituted yolk powder. They used those old fashioned things called EGGS instead.

Oh, Sure, The IKEA restaurant is neat and upscale with space-age doctor's office waiting room tables and chairs, and a lovely view of the Huge Parking Lot and the Mega-Wal-Mart being built next door, but somehow that just doesn't compensate for the fact that you are eating steam table food that was first soaked for a long, long, long, long, long, long, long, long time in bacon-tinted axle grease and then left to cool and coagulate until the molecular structure of the food has somehow taken on a new, hip, trendy, cutting edge level of rancidity.

It was either that or the high octane sludge with the little gritty bits of grounds floating in it that passed for coffee that sent my stomach into a very cutting edge case of Delhi Belly for the rest of the day.

Breakfast should never be eaten at room temperature no matter how climate-controlled the room!

As we were leaving the food area, one of the nice waitress ladies reminded us that tomorrow the breakfast is free. Not even for free would I again subject myself to that kind of lard laced lanquidity.

But it wasn't all bad! IKEA itself is an amazing maze of very fun, cool and hip stuff that you really think you can't live without. Just a few moments stroll through the pathway in the showroom and you are determined to throw out every stick of antique, mission style, Victorian, Shaker, Ethan Allen furniture you own and replace it with sleek laminate and leather sofas with no backs on them. You will want to yank out your kitchen and remodel it with stainless steel from wall to wall, and have your utensils stored on a giant industrial metal cart on oversized roller wheels.

You will even want to run out and join the resistance movement to smuggle deprived Swedish War Orphans into the country so you can adopt some and have an excuse to buy a room full of IKEA KIDS furniture. Those miniature beds! Those wee little play kitchens all made of stainless steel ! With industrial kitchen carts on roller wheels! Filled with darling IKEA KIDS pots and pans! The fully conceptualized Tot-to-Teen convertable furniture! I want it ALL.

But the kicker for me, the one thing that totally sold me forever on being in love with IKEA in spite of the food, was the little area called 592 SQUARE FEET. You pop your head into this little showroom to find yourself in a completely furnished, perfect little 2 bedroom one bathroom home with a full kitchen, dining room, living room and entertainment center, all of it taking up no more than 592 square feet!

Barely an imprint in the sand! It was the most wonderful space I've ever seen and Patrick and I sat down on the sofas a while just to enjoy it. Until of course the fact that IKEA sofas are more like Freudian Analysis couches made of tufted dark brown leather on stainless steel legs rather than traditional sofas that have a BACK on them, and we got tired of sitting upright and/or lounging on one elbow and moved on.

I don't know how IKEA can make 592 square feet feel like a spacious, desirable, must-have, full-immersion, hip, trendy living environment, but they do. And seeing such a small amount of space made so liveable helped reconcile me to moving back to Indiana where they are no stranger to the concept of living in 592 square feet of total living space. It's just that back there, they call it a HOUSE TRAILER.

For further amusement, and more insight into the world of IKEA, check out this archived link from the NonExpert. He writes a 'gamer's walkthrough' of the IKEA experience that tickles me each time I read it.

The Non-Expert IKEA