Wednesday, February 25, 2009

Ash And You Shall Receive

I was raised Catholic and I work at a Catholic hospital. I was working one Ash Wednesday and a Priest came by the unit and offered to anoint the staff with ashes. While I am not what you would call an observant Catholic, I decided to play along and got in line behind my co-workers. I waited patiently as each one of the nurses got a small smudge of ashes applied to their forehead, much like our Vice President, Joe Biden received today. When it was my turn, I stepped forward to get my mark and I noticed a little twinkle in the Priest's eye. I didn't get a little smudge. He took the mixture of oil and ash, smeared it from one eyebrow to the other and from my widow's peak to the bridge of my nose! I had a HUGE PLUS SIGN IN THE MIDDLE OF MY FOREHEAD. I didn't realize what he had done as I walked away. Sure, my co-workers were giggling, but we are an immature lot.

It wasn't until I walked back into my patient's room and her whole family started to snicker that I realized something was up. My patient told me to go look in the mirror. I looked. I blushed. I came back out to the patient's bedside. My patient's mother said something in Spanish and smiled. My patient chided her mother and then said to me, "My mother said the Priest, he must have know you needed some extra!"

I won't be getting ashes today.

Sunday, February 08, 2009

I Caught The Stupid.

Ever have one of those days where you have to remind yourself that you are not stupid? Where you have to constantly reaffirm in your head, "I am an intelligent person"? The kind of day that no matter how much you (or others) tell you that you are smart and capable, your actions prove you (them) wrong? Saturday was one of those days. I woke up before the alarm. I ate a little breakfast; I fed the pooches, cleared out some emails, played around on Facebook and Twitter and did two loads of laundry. All of this before 8am! Not 8pm, EIGHT AYEM.

Then I decided to get dressed and clean out my car. You see, Mr. Misha has been using my car occasionally, so it has become quite messy/dirty. He can't help it. If you were to strip Mr. Misha naked and stick him in an empty room and lock him up in there for 12 hours, when you came back you would find: crumpled burger wrappers, diet Pepsi® cans filled with cigarette butts (and possibly urine), empty pizza boxes, cigarette ashes, crumbs, dirty laundry (especially funky smelling socks), computer screws, every kind of electrical and computer cable you can think of, taco wrappers, No Carb Rock Star® cans, pumpkin seeds, compact and digital video discs and some pieces of RAM strew across the room. MR. MISHA SWEATS GARBAGE!

So I armed myself with a roll of paper towels, a toothbrush, some toothpicks, a couple of garbage bags, and bottles of Windex®, Armor All® and Febreze®. First I cleared out all of the clutter. Then I cleaned the leather, pleather, vinyl and plastic areas with Armor All®. I estimate that my spouse has spilled at least 5 different drinks since we got the car last year. Then I started with the windows. I cleaned the passenger's side front window just fine, but when I tried to do the driver's side, my boobs kept honking the horn. No matter how close I moved to the window, I could not prevent my hooters from honking the horn.

It was during this big clean out that I realized that I had been driving around without a copy of my registration or proof of insurance in my car. I trudged back into the house in search of the paperwork. I placed them by the door to make sure that I would not forget them when I left the house.

I made some coffee, talked with my friend Jessie and made arrangements to go to her apartment that night. The plan was for me to leave Napa at 2:30pm. At 2:31 pm, I loaded up the car and headed out. I stopped off to get some cash and grab a coffee. For some reason, the ATM would not accept my PIN number. After inputting it 3 times, the machine locked me out. I figured I would call my bank from the road and straighten it out. I went into the store and my card was declined for my purchase. Annoyed, I went out to the car and called my bank. Twenty minutes later, my card was reactivated, my PIN changed and cash and coffee in hand. I started to head out of town.

I had barely made it out the valley when I watched a CHP pull over a car. My stomach dropped. I had left my registration and proof of insurance at the house. CRAP! I turned around and retrieved them. While walking back to the car I noticed that my tags expired in January. FUCK!

That is when I realized I had caught The Stupid.