nightmare

the other night i had a nightmare. 
not just any nightmare.
but the kind where you wake up screaming/crying.

i woke up and i knew it was a horrible one, but i couldn't remember what it was.
well, randomly, at work, it popped into my head, and this is what it was.

something felt funny in my nose, and so i looked in the mirror, i guess to see if it was a boogie or something.
well i looked up my nose, and i could see all the nasal conchae (i'm taking anatomy, so i have also been having a lot of anatomy dreams...but weird things.  like nasal conchae, and external occipital protruberance)

this is what i saw when i looked up my nose.  the nose part, that is.  i could see all those little scroll things in my nose. 
but i also saw something horrible.
more than horrible.
terrifying.  and hideous.  and horrifying.
a living.  breathing.  egg laying.  spider.
A SPIDER.
WAS UP MY NOSE.
just sitting on my superior nasal concha.
i started screaming in the mirror, and crying, and trying to snort it out.
i kept snorting it and snorting it but it wouldn't come out.
finally, after so much crying and crying, i snorted something out.  i looked, and it was some wings.
what?
some wings?  i thought a spider was up my nose!
and then i snorted again, and a scary dinosaur bug came out.  and when he bounced off the sink or whatever, he laughed at me.  because he knew the spider was never ever going to get snorted out of my nose.
that was when i woke up screaming.

this was the bug that laughed at me.  and the wings that came out.  i don't know what they were from.

i can't draw you the spider, because i'm too afraid, but it had a face and it laughed at me too, after i tried to snort it out.

symbolize this dream, you crazy dream analysts.

the work chronicles: how to use a radio

foremina is an expert radio user.  she knows exactly who to call about exactly the right issues. 
we all have been taking lessons from her.

lesson #1
foremina:  foremina to important guy
important guy:  go ahead.
foremina:  important guy, we have an issue here at the top of chute.  we are out of dry erase markers, and i really need you to come up here right away to replace them so i can write an obsolete message on the marker board.
important guy:  .......
foremina:  do you copy that, important guy???
important guy:  ....yes.


put into use:
(goggles loves to wear his goggles.  even when he is inside.  he's one of my favorites, because he likes to build igloos.)
goggles:  important guy, this is goggles
important guy:  go ahead
goggles:  ummmmmm, i just found a mouse in a bucket at the top of sundance, and i just wondered what you thought i should do with it.
important guy:  .....put it outside?
goggles:  well, i thought i should just put it outside.  do you agree that that is the best possible option?
important guy: ...yes
goggles:  copy that!  i'm going to just put the mouse that is in the bucket outside.

lesson #2
foremina:  foremina to top of chute
tope of chute:  go ahead
foremina:  i'm at the bottom of virginian and i can see shovel bumping chairs from the wrong side of the chair, and that's not very safe because he can't reach the stop button in case someone falls of the chair.
top of chute: .....ok...?
foremina:  so can you call the bottom of chute, which is where shovel is and tell him that he has to be on the right side of the chair to bump.
top of chute:  ......yes.

put into use:
me:  important guy, this is top of sundance
important guy:  yes?
me:  well, i'm closing at the top of sundance today and i have never closed before, so could you just verify that the way that you close the life is to turn the switch from "on" to "off"?
important guy:  ....that's correct.
me:  thank you!  and also, we have a serious issue.
important guy:  yes?
me:  the dry erase marker is dry and we need a replacement, stat!
important guy:  ....i'll get right on that...

us lifties have to band together and learn from everyone else's examples!

the work chronicles: goldfish and butter and the desperate housewife

and by desperate housewife, i mean desperate mom, but housewife sounded better for the title.

it's been so long since i said i was going to write about the insanity that is my winter job that i forgot all the names i gave everyone, so i had to decode my interpretations and hopefully pick all the right people.
if i'm wrong, i guess it's not like it really matters to anyone...

carpooling.
it's what we do.
sometimes i drive, when the weather is supposed to be nice, because lovely little fiona (that's her stand in name until i come up with something that suits her better) does not like the snow or ice.
one day i drove, and butter and goldfish wanted a ride home.  i don't know why, but i continue to feel this need to make sure everyone and everything is ok, so obviously i said yes, even though i didn't want to.

worst.
car ride.
ever.

butter and goldfish were sitting in the backseat going on about god knows what, because none of the rest of us have enough dead/empty brain cells to actually make sense of what they were saying.
i just know that "smoke a j", "pretty rainbows", and "killer monkeys" were mentioned multiple times.
finally, my lovely little ipod happened to play a song that butter was in love with.
"turn it up."
i turn in up.
"don't be shy, turn it up, i can barely hear it"
i turn it up some more.
"come on, claire. turn it up.  i want to feel it."
my car is about to vibrate off its wheels, but then:

yes, silence.

the song ends.
"claiiiirrree.  play it aggggaaaaaain."
repeat.

more silence.

this happened probably 5 times.

after they got out of the car, i was thinkin, "man, i felt like those desperate, crazed moms with screaming babies in the backseat that wil do anything to shut them the hell up.  i don't even care if i will be going deaf approximately 6 years sooner than i normally would have.  listening to the same song for 20 minutes straight was totally worth it.

this girl is spot on.

here is what she says:

It's never been more evident why some of the greatest writers have gone to the Caribbean to write their best pieces of work. Writing under a mountain of snow and ice is fucking hard.



I want to blog, guys. I do. But between long work days and this weather laden with high winds and rain and something called "wintry mix"* also known as the devil's fury my ability to be funny or even mildly amusing is flushed down the toilet along with Rocky Balboa's kitty litter poop.

i think rocky balboa is her cat?  i hope so...


anyways.  i completely feel the same.  my sense of humor kind of goes down the toilet in the winter. 
actually, i'm a self-diagnosed seasonal affective disorder sufferer.  look it up.

But never fear:  i just bought many supplements, one of them vitamin d, which should completely - ok, not completely, but should seriously start to reverse the effects of my disorder. 
i've taken them for two days. 
i'm expecting to feel full of sunshine and tanness any second.

* in regards to "wintery mix", please see this quite comprehensive definition

christmas tree

i got my very own christmas tree this year.  or last year, if you want to get technical.
i cut it down myself!
and it is still up.
because i didn't put it up until the day before christmas, which was like 2 weeks after our christmas, so i wanted to get my money's worth.
maybe i will take it down in february. 
or march.