Entries from November 2005 ↓

The boyfriend was charged more than eight times for a phone that costs more than $200. He’s called Amazon.com 16 times in attempts to rectify their mistake. Here are some of the things he has said to various (idiot) Amazon.com associates:

• Oh my God, you suck at your job. May I please be transferred to someone else? Yes, seriously. Anybody but you.
• You are basically saying I should trust you when you have done nothing but proven to me that you cannot do what you say you will do.
• You guys are fucking this up so hard at every turn, at every opportunity. I really don’t know how I can handle this any differently.
• No see, that is what I have done sixteen times, and I keep getting a different answer. In the meantime I am unable to use my checking account, I can’t buy groceries, you haven’t shipped my item and I haven’t gotten the same the same answer twice.
• I just want my phone, ya know? That’s it. And I couldn’t have imagined how this could have gone more poorly, unless I were to get hung up on, which has happened twice tonight. Yes, really…Well, you didn’t know I called this morning, so that doesn’t exactly surprise me.
• You mean you know I’ve called sixteen times, but there isn’t a single note about the conversations that were had? I mean, what the fuck?

It is currently 2:30 am. My dog is chewing on a bottle of Aloe Vera lotion at my feet. She woke me up over an hour ago by sitting on my back and chewing on my face.

Just now she went to the closed door of our bedroom and began clawing. The boyfriend has to be up in just over two hours. I got up and closed the bedroom door after she woke me. She barked and scratched and howled and whined until I got up and took her outside.

We couldn’t take her for her 4th walk of the day because it was, as they say, comin’ a tornado outside. Our little herding dog requires four to five walks a day. If I take her running with me we can whittle off two or three of those walks. Maybe. But if she isn’t properly exercised Tootie will lose her shit.

She bites. She leaps. She flips around on the couch and digs at the cushions like a freak thing on speed.

So we went outside in the backyard and ran around. At 1:30 in the morning I chased her around the yard throwing an empty two-liter bottle around for her to catch and carry. It is her favorite toy. We ran around outside in the wind and cold for twenty minutes, me chasing her as she tore ass in circles around me. It still wasn’t enough.

-wait-

Oh yay, she’s eating now. Thank God. Eating usually calms her happy ass down.

The dog tricked me, you know. I thought I was getting this docile, chilled out pet who liked to lay around as much as I do. The dog fucking outsmarted me, because she’s not lazy, she’d just had a total hysterectomy a day and half prior to us taking her home. And I had no idea until we got her up to the front to adopt her.

Not that I would have changed my mind, but I laugh now when I think about the boyfriend saying she must be broken. On those first few days we’d take her for a walk and she’d just lie down in the middle of the street, unwilling to go on. Now our walks are much like live action video games, with squirrels by the dozen at every turn and a neighbor cat always hiding in the bushes. Tootie crabs along on her leash, heaving and panting at the smorgasbord of rodents and felines before her. I really should be armed with some kind of stun gun.

Anyway, I’m going to try to go talk the dog to sleep, rub her belly until she snores and makes her dog lips flap. This "practice baby" thing is much harder than I anticipated, but so much more rewarding. (Except for the picking up poop at the park, I still can’t get into that.)

Our house was broken into yesterday while I was at work. While the
boyfriend was at work. During the broad daylight hours some punk jumped
the fence, busted out the back bedroom window and stole our stuff.
Granted, they stole some pretty lame stuff. Here is what the thief got
away with:

-the boyfriend’s cell phone
-1/2 a bottle of $10 shiraz
-3/4 of a bottle of Jose Cuervo tequila
-2 spare keys
-3 Red Bulls (embarrassing, but true–I have a caffeine habit)
-Tootie’s leash (which we recovered)

The burglar jumped through the broken window and ransacked our
bedroom, the door of which was closed. He tossed our mattress and
pulled open dressers, we assume looking for guns. The entire time our dog Tootie was
on the other side of that door, undoubtedly barking and making all
sorts of horrific noises. Once they were through thrashing our room
(which was covered in glass, all surfaces), they opened the door and
grabbed the items I listed above. Except for the leash, which they
snagged on the way in, we think. I just find it odd that the thief
would look in the fridge, where the energy drinks were. All of the
things taken, and all of the things that weren’t (computers, speakers,
DVDs and player, TVs), lead us to believe that whoever did this was a
kid.

The boyfriend called me at work yesterday when he came home to
discover what had happened. I left immediately, but didn’t arrive home
for half an hour thanks to rush hour traffic. A police officer was
already in the driveway by the time I got there, filling out a report
and calling for assistance. A couple of neighbors gathered on our lawn.
I made my way into the house only to be hit with a terrible stench.
Poor Tootie was so frightened that she crapped in the floor. Twice. It
makes me so sad to think about how scared she must have been. And I
can’t even think about if he might have hit or kicked her.

But we think that she may be the reason why they didn’t get away
with more stuff. She had to have been going berserk. I sat with her on
the couch last night and rubbed her tummy while she slept. I could feel
it grinding away anxiously. She hasn’t eaten in a while.

Because they took our spare house keys we had to trek to Lowe’s to
buy new deadbolts for both the doors. Naturally, the boyfriend was the
one to put them in. We both cleaned up the glass, but he really got the
brunt of this deal. When he discovered we’d been robbed his first
thought was, "I’m going to have to tell Brittney that they shot
Tootie." So we all three sat on the couch and cuddled last night until
it was time for bed.

We’ve only been in that house for approximately three months. It is
on a quiet street in Inglewood near Shelby Park, and as far as we know
we are the only rental on the street. None of our neighbors, people who
have been living there for decades, have ever had anyone break in. Or
even try. Funny that they picked the poorest people on the street to
burglarize–we don’t have any diamonds or cash or guns.

People who live outside our neighborhood seem none too surprised
that our house was broken into. But they people who actually live there
are stunned, and can’t figure out why they targeted us. We have a
fence, which often means there is a dog. Our neighbor also wasn’t home,
but he has no fence. And no dog. And better stuff.

I won’t tell you about how I lost my keys this morning in the leaves
while walking the dog. I was just going up the street, but I locked the
door anyway. In being extra careful I locked myself out. I won’t get
into how I had to use the neighbor’s phone to get the boyfriend to bail
me out. Because then I’d have to tell you about how the dog got out and
began terrorizing every squirrel within a 100 foot radius. And this
post is too long already.

So, I had lunch with Sam Donaldson yesterday. I sat right beside him in a booth at The Palm. He ordered tomato juice and a tomato and feta (I think) salad. He wanted lemonade, but they didn’t have it.

Why, you might ask, did I eat lunch with Sam Donaldson? It is a more than valid question, but the answer is that I don’t really know. I came to work yesterday, just like most every day, and a few minutes after the morning editorial meeting I see Sam Donaldson walk into the newsroom. He shook hands with a few of my co-workers, his voice booming and strangely soothing. He took the office of the managing editor briefly to do a telephone interview. He spoke very loudly and clearly, rarely stopping. The managing editor’s office was open and just ten feet from my desk. When he hung up from his phone interview he looked at me and said, "Don’t look at me like that. It’s a living."

Later the general manager introduced me to him before he went before the cameras to tape a new show he is doing. We spoke briefly about blogging and Dan Rather and all that, and I felt pretty lucky to have met him.

Ten minutes later I’m back at my desk when the phone rings. The GM asked if I wanted to go along with one of the assignment editors to lunch with Mr. Donaldson. I thought of my bean soup and cornbread in the stinky break room fridge and immediately said yes.

Lunch was totally surreal. We all just peppered him with questions about history and politics and media, when we got a chance to, that is. Sam Donaldson has the astounding ability to talk at great length on a wealth of subjects. This may lead you to believe he was boring or self-indulgent or annoying, but he was fascinating. Oh, the stories he told. The man confessed that he had a big mouth, and so those stories are not stories I can publish here. But it is safe to say the topics spanned from Hillary in ‘08 to the Civil War. Only occasionally would there be a lull in the conversation, but every time there was I expected him to say, "Diane…"

Before we left, after two hours of conversation, he shook my hand and said I was his "favorite blog queen." If that is not a pull quote, then I don’t know what is.