and all i wanted was a BB gun

My holiday story involved my laptop. I know, how spiritual. About two or three months ago the left-side of the my MacBook experienced what we call white wine v. power cord connection-hole-area. The initial symptom was not good: no power at all - dead, dead computer with no battery nor AC operation. After a day or so the juice managed to sort itself out and it finally powered up but only worked via AC power; no battery charging. I took it to the Apple store about a week later; they popped it open, and then called me at work to tell me that it appeared exposure to liquid had occurred and it wasn't covered under the one-year warranty (I'll admit that the wine issue was not revealed at initial drop-off). But, for a one-time fee of $750 they could send it back to the plant and get it repaired. Awesome! A one-time $750 fee. That's really nice...only charging me once. I declined and decided to ride it out a bit longer before finally calling a computer repair place in Arlington that we'd used in the past for X's Vaio. I dropped it off a few weeks ago, alerting him to the liquid and the overall problems, paid the $100 up front for labor, and was told he'd order the module power/battery thingy and see if swapping it out would fix the problem. If that worked I'd pay another $125 and have a laptop with a future. After a week he called and said that, unfortunately, the new module hadn't fixed the issue so I was out the door for $100 in labor which was fine by me. Over the last few days I've been using the MacBook with the power cord and rueing the brilliant/not brilliant magnetic connection that pops right off if the cord or computer gets tugged. It's brilliant in that it would protect your computer crashing to a floor; it's not brilliant when any little nudge immediately powers down the unit. The final bit of this saga is what happened last night. With the boys out of the house we were sitting around doing what we do - X reading a fashion mag, me typing something or other on the computer - when I glanced up to the corner of the screen and instead of seeing an "x" declaring no battery power, charge, or connection, I see a 58% charged number. What the what? After another 20 minutes the battery was fully charged and everything is completely operational now. It's a truly miraculous story; I think I have a regenerative, living, computer. What are the odds? I must have passed along some karma over the last week or so; maybe paying all my local merchants in cash and saving them credit/debit card fees has come back to me full circle. Maybe not.

We've had rain and 40+ degrees over the last 24 hours and it's melted away most of the snow that was piled about the area. I'll push off the remaining slush from the driveway this afternoon.

We're doing roasted chicken, mashed, brussel sprouts (on the panini grill), turnip soup, and gravy for second Christmas tomorrow night. If you're in the neighborhood, stop by.

t

extra credit; "am!", "am not!" argument

I was at the Verizon Center “red out” for last night’s Caps victory over the Canes. I was wearing black.

The real story of the day was the realization after the first period that I’d either lost my wallet or had it stolen. In reality, my ‘wallet’ is a flip-top metal container that holds my IDs, ATM cards, and CCs. This was not a good feeling. I recreated the last time I’d used it (the record store at DuPont, about 5:30pm) and tried to sort out if it could have been stolen – unlikely. My man-bag has at least five things that look and feel like said ID holder so some pick-pocket would have to be freaky good to get the right mystery container. Unless, of course, it was David Blaine! I couldn’t call the record store until this morning – and I was certain they’d have it – but alas, no luck. I cancelled and then ordered a new check card (two days) and blocked one credit card before I deciding to check my cell to see if the record shop had called back. Lo and behold, I have a message from Bank of America notifying me that a woman called them last night (I should have answered my phone!) and told them she had found my case. (Hear choir singing and horns a-plenty!) They passed along her number and I’m awaiting a call back as I type. Call it a disaster averted – and I owe her a gift when I wander over to pick it up. Any ideas?

The extra credit bit – read, karma – was something I proclaimed to X last night when I got home. It was only last week that I called my cell phone company to alert them that they’d double-credited $525 to my account. The service agent on the phone made no bones about the fact that they probably never would have caught the error and that she was truly amazed at my honest behavior. Made me feel good but certainly wasn’t anything I needed; seemed like the right thing to do. The events of the last sixteen hours at least give me hope that the universe is in operational order.

This link was sent to torment me: stuff white people like. I’d like an opportunity to respond, and cry, at the near clinical dissection of my life:

#93 Music Piracy – No way. That’s only suburban kids!
#92 Book Deals – I like books.
#91 San Francisco – Completely in love with S.F.
#90 Dinner Parties – Are they looking through my window?
#89 St. Patrick’s Day – Not so much.
#87 Outdoor Performance Clothes – I’m an REI member.
#86 Shorts – Often. Sometimes with sweaters – crazy.
#85 The Wire – My favorite show.
#84 T-Shirts – Damn, they got me.
#83 Bad Memories of High School - Nope
#82 Hating Corporations - Yep
#81 Graduate School – Funny.
#80 The Idea of Soccer – I actually like football.
#79 Modern Furniture – Hate it.
#78 Multilingual Children – I have none. “Idea of…”
#77 Musical Comedy – I don’t think so.
#76 Bottles of Water – No bottles; refillables. Plastic Bags we hate.
#75 Threatening to Move to Canada – or Europe.
#74 Oscar Parties – Ha ha ha.
#73 Gentrification – What?
#72 Study Abroad – Live abroad.
#71 Being the only white person around – I like the fish market.
#70 Difficult Breakups – What? Me? Marriage?
#69 Mos Def – he was excellent in Crash.
#68 Michel Gondry – Don’t even know him.
#67 Standing Still at Concerts – Fuck me; they are watching!
#66 Divorce – See #70 above.
#65 Co-Ed Sports – Ultimate last summer?
#64 Recycling – Seriously, doesn’t everyone?
#63 Expensive Sandwiches – I’m a Panini maker. I have a maker.
#62 Knowing What’s Best for Poor People – I do.
#61 Bicycles – Now they’re just laughing at me.
#60 Toyota Prius – Laughing at me even more.
#59 Natural Medicine – That’s X’s niche.
#58 Japan – or China.
#57 Juno – Loved it.
#56 Lawyers – Love one.
#55 Apologies – I’m so so on this. Maybe #70 and #66 help.
#54 Kitchen Gadgets – Shut up.
#53 Dogs – Hate cats, love dogs.
#52 Sarah Silverman – I’m Fu*^%ing Sarah Silverman.
#51 Living by the Water – I like Portland x 2 and Seattle. What?
#50 Irony – I think I used irony a few entries ago.
#49 Vintage – Classic.
#48 Whole Foods and Grocery Co-ops – Off Whole Foods. Love co-ops.
#47 Arts Degrees – Fancy education ain’t my thing. Museums?
#46 The Sunday New York Times – Crap.
#45 Asian Fusion Food – Double Crap.
#44 Public Radio – Member of two stations (D.C. and Minneapolis)
#43 Plays – Went to two last week.
#42 Sushi – Maybe. Who wants to know?
#41 Indie Music – Aren’t we funny?
#40 Apple Products – iMac and two iPods.
#39 Netflix – Forty movies in my queue.
#38 Arrested Development – Never saw it.
#37 Renovations – Can’t but would.
#36 Breakfast Places – Barcelona anyone? Pneumatic? Deux Gros Nez?
#35 The Daily Show/Colbert Report – Online every weekend.
#34 Architecture – Ah, not so much.
#33 Marijuana – Never did it.
#32 Vegan/Vegetarianism – Love one. Sorta one.
#31 Snowboarding – Too tall.
#30 Wrigley Field – Blame my parents, I vacationed in Chicago.
#29 80s Night – I AM the 80s. Doing the Safety Dance!
#28 Not having a TV – Hooked-up? Or actual TV?
#27 Marathons – No way I’d do it but I think about them.
#26 Manhattan (now Brooklyn too!) – Never been. Going in two weeks.
#25 David Sedaris – I do love my Sedaris.
#24 Wine – Clearly the PATRIOT Act was involved in this list.
#23 Microbreweries – I tour them. I drink them.
#22 Having Two Last Names – Love one.
#21 Writers Workshops – Can’t write; too stuffy.
#20 Being an expert on YOUR culture – Have you seen this list?
#19 Traveling – Shit.
#18 Awareness – Does my current events trivia count?
#17 Hating their Parents – I love my parents.
#16 Gifted Children – All my children are gifted.
#15 Yoga – Love one.
#14 Having Black Friends – Had some around here somewhere.
#13 Tea – We have a freakish amount of tea in our commune.
#12 Non-Profit Organizations – What ACLU? Amnesty? Theatre? Oops.
#11 Asian Girls – I’m spoken for.
#10 Wes Anderson Movies – It's a Netflix one on our bookshelf.
#9 Making you feel bad about not going outside – Don’t feel bad
#8 Barack Obama – No comment.
#7 Diversity – Why would this be bad?
#6 Organic Food – Get out of my kitchen.
#5 Farmer’s Markets – Get out of my kitchen.
#4 Assists – It’s because we aren’t scorers.
#3 Film Festivals – Never did much for me.
#2 Religions their parents don’t belong to – Not really. Just not.
#1 Coffee – I’ve never sought out coffee and coffee accessories.

I'll got get a baseball hat to wear backwards; wally.

T.