Something strange is afoot on I-74

On the way to work this morning, I saw a semi bearing the logo for York Casket Company barrelling down the highway. This is like the fourth casket truck I've seen in less than a week. They've all been heading east. They've all been driving fast. What's your theory?

p.s. I don't know yet how to put photos on here but, in trying to find something relevent, I found funeraldepot.com. Check it out. Also the button at the bottom of my computer screen says,
"caskets - Yahoo!"

Boundaries

People who annoy the crap out of me because they share their personal stuff with the whole world despite its inappropriate content or mind-numbing boringness, or said person's obnoxious voice or the fact that the whole world is not interested and is doing other things:

• grocery store bag boy chatting with another bag boy about some chick they hate
• toothless lady on her cell phone at Goodwill
• loud people on the bus
• large girl planning her wedding at Borders Cafe hyped up on bridal magazines and coffee
• bad parents giving out parenting advice in our waiting room
• recently hired co-worker sharing the woes of dating a guy with a micropenis
• anyone who wants to tell me about their love of NASCAR
• Britney Spears

My 19-yr old son has warned me not to become a "blog ho." Is that one who will read anyone's blog indiscriminately or one who writes a lot? I am discriminating when it comes to reading them. There's so much to choose from, why waste my time on people's boring online journals and blather? Writing a lot myself? We'll see. . .

Sitting here watching the Oscars. Love the comedians' lament, Forrest Whitaker's speech, and Gwyneth Paltrow's dress. Ellen rocks by the way. Helen Mirren is beautiful and Clooney is freakin' hot. Can we just retire Jack Nicholson? Why is he there handing out the Oscar for Best Picture? He must have dirt on a bunch of people. Diane Keaton sure looks good though. "Bout time Pilobolus got on TV! Gawd, remember when Debbie Allen used to choreograph those tired dance numbers to all the nominated songs? We've come a long way baby.

The 15 yr old wants to go to NYU film school. That's before she heard it mentioned on the show tonight too. I think it would be awesome. She promised to thank me when she wins her own statuette. You heard it here.

more about names

I am kind of obsessed with names actually. My husband is a crazy list-maker and I am not. But here are some lists I wish I had been making all along, since these topics have been a recurring theme in my life for literally years:
Names for my:

• race horse, should I ever own one
• rock band, should I ever be in one
• family estate, should ever live in one
• soft drink, should I ever invent one
• boat/camper, should I ever get one
• memoirs, should I ever write them

Examples of each will be forthcoming ...

Naming my Blog

During a 6th grade sleepover with one my best friends, we were musing in the dark about our futures. Silly things became hilarious, as they do in the wee hours (or earlier hours if you're under the influence), and we speculated on the reasons people try to come up with unusual, funky, grand or pseudo-ethnic sounding names. Perhaps their parents thought that these names portent success or fame or whatnot (great chapter in Steven Levitt's Freakonomics about this). And how we thought the kids with those names would suffer in school because their names are, in fact, stupid. I won't give any examples 'cuz sure enough, some random person named Dimple or Senator will stumble upon this blog and get irate. Anyway, we decided that we would give our children mundane names that won't build up anyone's expectations or give false hope, and might actually reflect the dull lives our children were likely to actually live. Names like ... Shovel. And Plug. As in Shovel Rathberger and Plug Garcia. We had others, they just aren't coming to me at this time. Seemed hilarious then.

This friend and I got together a year or so ago - decades have gone by - between us we have four children, none of them named after garden utensils or electrical outlets. No Dimples or Senators either. We reminisced about our ideas concerning the naming our kids and ... still hilarious. To us anyway.

P.S. It may have been seventh grade.