Guests
by Laurie Notaro, December 30, 2005 11:39 AM
With this, my final installment for Powells.com, I'm taking the easy way out. It's the end of my blog and the end of the year. Therefore, I spent most of last night trying to decide which things I hated most about myself, and which areas I could feasibly improve that had a relatively high success rate without the aid of a laser hair removal technician. I had a great time writing the Powell's blog this week. It was like returning to my old job at the newspaper as a daily columnist, except that I didn't have to watch my boss pick the flaky, dry skin off his face and eat it in meetings ? and people at my house wash their hands after going to the bathroom. (I'm pretty sure we do, anyway.) Thank you for reading, and have a wonderful and safe New Year's
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Guests
by Laurie Notaro, December 29, 2005 11:43 AM
A month ago, my treadmill broke. Just stopped. Unbelievably, I was on it when it lapsed into such a deep coma that I couldn't get any life signals on it at all. It wouldn't beep, wouldn't turn on, the console and the display were dead. Nothing, complete silence. It had, however, been the day I was waiting for these last five years, the day that my investment would pay off. This dead treadmill was my dream, full and bountiful and golden, come to fruition to pay me handsomely for five years of patience and five hundred dollars' worth of Sears Home Electronics warranties, as well. As soon as the treadmill died (the miniscule amount of sweat on my brow hadn't even dried), I picked up the phone to call Sears to tell them that their treadmill was dead and that my warranty declared that someone come out and fix it. And if it couldn't be fixed, then a new one, a brand new treadmill, is delivered upon my doorstep as a reward for paying $100 a year for half a decade. I wanted a new treadmill. Have you seen them? They have built-in fans and cup holders and fluffy shock absorbers that make climbing at a six-percent incline like walking up the cottony steps of Heaven. They even have treadmills now that you can just stand on and burn calories. So when I called Sears to claim my prize, they told me a technician would come out to repair the problem ? in four weeks. By then, I assumed, I would gain enough weight to grow out of my fat clothes and take it as a personal attack when Kirstie Alley yelled from the TV during Jenny Craig commercials. "That's in a month!" I cried to the operator. "A month is not four weeks, ma'am," the operator scolded me. FOUR WEEKS. And then I looked at my old, dusty treadmill and agreed. I could wait for four weeks for a new treadmill. Four weeks and a brand new one, with built-in fans and the Stairway to Heaven belt, would be in its place. I waited patiently during those weeks, as I gained weight and went up a size. Had to buy new pants. Had to buy two pairs of new pants. Had to buy a skirt. And three shirts. Getting fatter. Waiting for the treadmill. Watchin' lots of TV. Started using safety pins to keep my shirts closed. "How fat do you plan on getting?" Kirstie Alley screamed at me. "Last night your ass grew a third cheek!" The days of the calendar finally peeled away to the day of reckoning; the day before, I started cleaning my office to get the piles of boxes and house overflow off the treadmill where they had accumulated for the past month while my body doubled and dimpled. I cleaned the dust off the treadmill belt, wiped it from the dead, lifeless console. I detailed that treadmill to show the technician how good I was to it. It took hours. Then the phone rang. It was Sears. The technician couldn't make it, so was tomorrow okay? Even though I ground my teeth (which had also gained weight) together, I wanted to appease the technician, to grease the gears, shall we say, and make him or her more favorable in granting me my precious treadmill dream. Sure, I said, I can wait one more day. Then the hallowed day arrived. It was yesterday. The technician was supposed to arrive between one and five p.m. It was 1:30. 2:30. 3:30. Four o'clock. 4:15. 4:37. The phone rang. "Yep, this is Ted," he said. "So you're treadmill is running slow, the report says." "NO!" I yelped, desperate that he might not fully comprehend the starkness of the situation. "It's not slow! It's just dead. It stopped when I was on it. And there's been nothing since." Ted was silent. "Nothing!" I cried again for emphasis. "Anything on the console?" Ted asked. "Does it light up, beep, make any noise?" "No," I replied. "It's just dead." Ted paused for a minute. "Do me a favor," he said. "Do you see where thee power cord connects to the treadmill?" "Yes," I said. "Now, next to it, there's a little switch," he instructed. "Push it twice." "Okay, hang on," I said with an exaggerated sigh, agitated that I had to crawl on the treadmill to push a stupid button that I knew wouldn't work. The treadmill was dead. There was no bringing it back. I just wanted him to do his job, get to my house and give me a new one. I crawled on the treadmill, found the button, and pushed it. Twice. BEEP. I heard from above me. BEEP. "I hear a BEEP!" Ted said. "That'll do you. If it happens again, hit that circuit breaker switch. I'm gonna get going, I'm running late." He hung up before I could even respond, before I could even start to cry. With my month-long dream dashed, I know one thing for sure. Not just because of my new third cheek, I'm going to walk that treadmill until one of us goes. I'm getting that free
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Guests
by Laurie Notaro, December 28, 2005 12:19 PM
When traveling from Phoenix into a small town like Eugene, Oregon, the planes get small. When you're traveling around holiday time, they get even smaller, I'm guessing because the "larger" (using the term as loosely as possible; we're talking a passenger capacity of 45 as opposed to 25) jets get re-routed during the busy season. Yesterday, when boarding our flight home, I had a feeling we'd be getting on one of the teeny planes, but I had no idea how small we were really talking until I saw open air at the end of the Jetway and a set of stairs leading down to the tarmac ? because our plane wasn't even tall enough to reach the walkway. We all crammed on, all of us Fat Christmas People on a tiny plane, and that was when the symphony began. The coughing. The sneezing. The sniffling. It didn't help matters that we were leaving Arizona, the state that is currently having the worst flu outbreak in the country ? so bad it was a top story on CNN's Headline News. Now, I know people have to travel and get home whether they're sick or well, and I can't argue with that. But I do take issue when the breathing cadaver in the seat behind me coughs and coughs and coughs hard enough that I felt his lung G force hit my head and it made MY HAIR MOVE. That cough had the wind tunnel action of a Dyson and was easily strong enough to push start us down the runway. And it was grotesquely apparent from the unmuffled sounds that the coughs had been released with reckless abandon ? there had clearly been no obstacle for their discharge into the world. The man behind me was an Open-Mouthed Cougher. No hand action to shield the rest of us from the germ cloud rushing from deep within his lungs, not even a Kleenex to provide a thin, flimsy barrier. To make matters worse, he wasn't the only one; the plane was full of them. And I don't get this. I mean, really, where are these people when Dr. Gupta says it again and again on every news show, "Wash your hands, cover your mouth, and stop blowing your nose on your Tommy Bahama shirt to help prevent the spread of disease"? Do they not get the Discovery Channel? Have they not seen the re-enactment that demonstrates how one cough is the same as spraying a garden hose full of viruses into the air? I've seen that Discovery Channel show, I remember the diagram, how the germs fell like rain and how they scramble to find your nose and then burrow all the way down into your throat. I didn't sleep for a week after I saw that and contemplated supergluing my nostrils shut. Who are these Open Mouth Coughers? In which dark corner of society do they live? These must be these the same people that leave pee on toilet seats and let gum simply fall out of their mouths onto the sidewalk. Being sick is not like a chain letter ? you don't need to spread it around to a hundred people in order to have the gods shine on you or get better. Keep your death rattle at home, I say, because I don't want it. In fact, I think making people stay at home when they're contagious should become a national policy. Being sick has the same properties looking at porn on the Internet. Keep it where it belongs, in private. No one wants to know your secret. For some people, however, that might not even be enough. For repeat offenders, all of those selfish people who continually cough and sneeze on others when they're sick, we need a quarantine unit set up. If you simply can't manage to raise your hand six inches to cover your gaping cavern of ill, go ahead. But it will be in a whole room of renegade nose-blowers and other Open Mouthed Coughers who can infect each other repeatedly instead of contaminating the healthy population. If you sneeze once or twice, well, that happens, but more than that, it's the sick room for you. And when you're quarantined, you're quarantined. There will be a special sick restroom, complete with receptacles to dispose of your snot rags properly, like a bonfire, and yes, pee on the seats. And, so they can eat, there will be a sick vending machine, outfitted with already contaminated buttons. I spent the rest of that flight with my napkin acting as my sad interpretation of a SARS mask, covering my nostrils as best it could from the germ shower being shot at the back of my head. And, just when I thought things couldn't get any worse, that bastard behind me farted. Oh, God, I thought as I held my breath. I've seen that Discovery Channel show,
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Guests
by Laurie Notaro, December 27, 2005 8:58 AM
There's nothing like going home for the holidays, especially if you're from Phoenix. The city is changing so quickly and growing so fast that not only is it a far cry from the place I grew up, it's a whole different organism from the last time I was here, six weeks ago. If you've never been to Phoenix, I've always said the closest comparison to the landscape was Iraq, but with more Starbucks. I now have to amend that statement to add that it's like Iraq, but with a sea of breast implants, more Hummers with better armor and complete assholes behind the wheel, and an occupying army of Republicans. It is SO HOT here. It may be 83 outside, but it's always 87 inside Nana's house, where we're staying. It is so hot in her house that if you were to rotate yourself continually, in five hours, you'd be a Costco rotisserie chicken. We tried to escape by driving in our air-conditioned rental car to Tempe for lunch. We were nearing one of our favorite Mexican restaurants, which is a block away from Mill Avenue ? if you've ever watched the Fiesta Bowl, you've seen Mill Avenue ? when we both noticed massive fiberglass guitars lining the street, all painted by different artists. I took it as a nod to Tempe's vibrant music history, and particularly Mill Avenue, where all of the bars were located that sprouted such bands as the Gin Blossoms, The Refreshments, Dead Hot Workshop and the Meat Puppets. That was a decade ago, during the heyday of Mill Avenue, when it was still a grungy strip of mom and pop places and before both Gap and Bath and Body Works saw it as a potential retail cash cow. A block further down the road, I suddenly heard the rumble of a huge backhoe and as I looked up, the air got sucked out of my lungs. As the giant backhoe arm raised up, then smashed back down and clawed at the ruins of a building on the corner of Mill and Seventh. It was nothing short of a nuclear powered blast of irony. The building being pummeled right down the street from the huge guitars was Long Wong's, the old dive bar where nearly every band in Tempe ? including the ones whose records went platinum ? got their start, their first show, and found an audience. I spent a lot of time at Wong's; it was my hangout, and it was the place where everyone I knew hung out. A hefty portion of the material for my first book came out of that place. I had been warned that Long Wong's was coming down this month, but I hardly expected to see it battered to dust before my eyes. "It's gone," I said to my husband, who had hung out there, too ? it was the site of our first date ? and I think we were both surprised to hear my voice crack. I was even more shocked to feel my eyes burn and quickly fill up. Leave it to Tempe, I thought, a town so hell-bent on "revitalization" and turning Mill Avenue into a retail Mecca that it had cannibalized the very thing the street was celebrating at the same moment. Wong's was the last bar and venue still standing from the time when Tempe's music history was being created; the other places had succumbed to a Hooters, a Philly cheese steak place, and another to a Borders (the area designated for author readings, amazingly, is where a parking lot across from Wong's used to be, on the very spot where tequila and I had a fight, tequila won, and I hurled then passed out hanging out of the backseat of my Toyota Camry). Now that Wong's was moments away from being leveled, the history of that street no longer had a physical reminder left, and the only references back to those days were the ones we were lucky enough to remember. It was a bar, after all. With another bang, the backhoe swung at Long Wong's again, resulting in a tumbling rain of old bricks, and the last of the building stood defenseless. No one else took notice, no one else stopped to watch, but I felt fortunate that sitting in an air-conditioned rental car with my eyes swelling and hot, I was there to see a place I loved so much take its last
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Guests
by Laurie Notaro, December 26, 2005 9:11 AM
I can't remember a Christmas moment that made me wish I had pursued a path other than the one I ended up following ? accounting, say, or pest extermination, or erotic dancing ? than when, one by one, my mother-in-law, Linda, and my sisters-in-law, Stephanie, Heather, and Jane, each ripped open the wrapping of their gift from my father-in-law, Larry. Revealed slowly from underneath the torn paper was a ghastly sight ? all of the gifts were my new book. Although I know it was a sweet gesture on Larry's part, I was ? in equal parts ? mortified and horrified. For me, it sent several messages, the biggest and most noisy being that my own negligent and lazy ass had obviously not sent my in-laws copies, therefore my father-in-law was forced to buy a stack and distribute them. I, however, hold tight to the philosophy that I refuse to be a book pusher. I have known and encountered (and received books from) authors that keep cartons of stock in the trunk of their cars just in case someone expresses a flicker, even a brief fleeting one, of interest, feigned or imagined. To me, that's equivalent of being a sample lady at Piggly Wiggly trying to force chunks of Hillshire Farms Sausage dangerously close to their FDA-imposed expiration date on unsuspecting shoppers. In my view, handing your book to someone when it's unrequested essentially says, "This is free, you know. Retail, this would set you back at least twenty bucks. In return, I expect an extensive and glowing review to feed my insatiable ego in five to seven working days, please." In addition, handing my book to a family member is like kicking sand in the face of a prisoner. It can't say anything aside from, "Thank you for being my victim. Your most embarrassing moment in life is on page 48." It's a maneuver straight from the Ted Bundy School of Grace playbook. While everyone sat flipping through the new book, trying to find which portions of their lives were now in print and required explanations to fellow co-workers, Flash, a wobbly, thick-waisted Nerf football of a dog, waddled over to Jane and made several odd coughing sounds. Seconds later, he was lapping up a ham and turkey meal (fed to him bit by bit by bit for hours by two rogue brothers-in-law who had broken into the ho ho ho booze a little early) that had returned from his digestive tract for a repeat performance. Jane, understanding that the fat, tiny dog was gobbling up his own sick, saw his lack of holiday decorum as a highly offensive one, and considering her mouthful of peanut butter pie, well, couldn't help but do a bit of retching of her own. "What can I say?" Jane's husband Justin said when Jane returned from her Christmas vomit in the bathroom. "I married a delicate flower." From below me, I heard a number of strange coughing sounds and looked down just in time to hear Jane gag again. There Flash was, busily licking up the barf he had just ejected onto the top of my cowboy boot. "I guess third time's a charm," I said as I let Flash finish his own business, and then took a big bite of my pecan pie.
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