Bye Bye, Pie!

If I got yelled at, I'd be upbraided.

Sometimes it's like they're just begging to get on my blog. we not bee on blawg for millyun days, mom. dis kewt enuf? Do you like the nice sheet I have over the couch? I emulated Jackie Kennedy's sheet, from when she had four pets at the White House.

How is it other people have pets and manage to not have June's Furry House of Fur Now With Fur? Can you tell me that?

Do you really think my pets'd misspell "cute" that bad? It's really not that hard of a word.

Anyway, hi. Here I am again. I guess Ima tell you about my hair today. I know that's not like me. But recently Ned, who is kind of one of those no-nonsense boys, said, "You should go to my hair person. You'd like it there. It's girly and shit."

Ned goes to a girly hair person? This shocked me as much as it does you. I remember we had to schedule our first date around his hair, as he was getting it cut that week. I didn't know Ned was so into hair. You'd think he'd pick a woman with a less troublesome 'do, then. Because as we know, I got me some hair.

If I were a musical, I'd be Hair.

If I were a cult, I'd be a Hari Krishna.

If I were a body of water, I'd be a lock.

I told all of that to my pal Daniel Boone the other day, and he said, "If you were German, they'd call you Herr even though you're a girl."

Oh, I got a million of them. If I were on an island I'd be STRANDed.

So yeah. Hair. Which apparently Ned is sick of looking at, as he recommended his hair woman to get rid of mine. So I scheduled an appointment for cut AND color, because did I mention I am also gray?

If I were a TV show, I'd be Grey's Anatomy. If I were a book, it'd be 50 Shades of--oh you get my drift.

If I were a speaker, I'd be Spaulding Grey. Could not help self.

By the way, if you ever wonder do you spell it "grey" or "gray," if you're in America, it's "gray," and in England or one of those British-spelly places, it's "grey." You are welcome. I used to work at a place that put out two catalogs--one in the U.S. and one in Canada, and I'd have to proofread all the same things, but remember if it was the Canadian book or not, so it'd be colour/color, program/programme, gray/grey, and this is why I will never get Alzheimer's.

Anyway. It turns out Ned's hairdresser (do boys have hairdressers?) has a salon .0003 miles from my house, but naturally I got in my car and drove precisely the opposite way to get there, only to drive and drive and wonder why the numbers were getting lower and wondering when they'd pick back up again until finally I was on the EAST part of the street and not west anymore. Did I mention I hate everything and particularly directions? That if I were another TV show I'd be Lost? Did I mention that time Ned snapped at me in the car and I cried, it was because of directions? And hair?

Okay, we weren't remotely fighting about hair. But he said, "No, no, June, go this way" and I said, "No!" and we ended up in Tibet and he snapped.

If Ned were a restaurant, he'd be Snappy Lunch. Which is only funny to people who live in North Carolina and know what the Sam Hill Snappy Lunch is.

I finally got there, nine minutes late, and good gravy, she was BEAUTIFUL, Ned's hairdresser was. I linked to her again so you can look at her website and see a photo. It turns out she is Russian, and did not once say "Moose and Squirrel," and for that I am sad, but she was a model and lived in Paris and did I mention her beautifullness?

Dang.

Anyway, she took one look at my hair, which has gotten so large I am not pulling it back half the time. Here.

Here I am being lost on the way there, and I know it's extra safe to take your photo in the car. I was at a red light, though, judgy.

At any rate, we had a good time, Ned's hairdresser and me. She used to live in New York, and cut hair there on Madison Avenue, and we talked about New York and Los Angeles and Paris and men and relationships and oh, we had us a time. We did not talk about Ned a lot, which is good, because I'm more than willing to gossip about Ned with all of YOU, who don't know him, but it's different when you're with someone who knows your man and his hair.

Anyway, here is my hair now.

What do you think? Cute? I think it's cute. And the color is excellent. God, I hate my nose. If I were a predictor of the future, I'd be Nostradamus.

So in all, am glad I went to Ned's hair woman, and will see her again, and will try very hard to get her to say "Moose and Squirrel."

May 14, 1982 and also STORM WATCH! 2013!!!

We're having a big snowstorm--"big" for people in the South--and I smell a gas leak. So the gas co. very dramatically told me to EVACUATE the house and wait for them to come save me, but I've smelled this gas leak over by my stove before, and it's SNOWY out there. I.am.sure.

So I'm blogging to you and waiting to blow up. If this ends suddenly you'll know.

Am expecting warning-filled email from my father as soon as he reads this.

So, yeah. It snowed. Yes, folks, THIS has caused a two-hour delay of work, and I promise you school is closed, although I don't know for a fact. But having lived with schoolteacher Marvin and his home-all-the-time-in-winter self, I feel confident. Many children watching The Price is Right today. Is that what people still do on a snow day?

They had been PREDICTING and WARNING us all day, but I had a hair appointment yesterday after work, and Las Vegas kept calling me to star in their Ludwig van Beethoven/General Custer/Albert Einstein tribute show, so no three-to-seven-inches-of-precipitation was stopping ME from fixing this mess. Sadly, my hairdresser is in another town, and why can't anything ever be easy?

"Ooo, it's starting to snow!" she said as she snipped. They were big white beautiful flakes. Less than an hour later, as I paid, I noticed everything was already covered. "Dang!" I said, kind of worrying a little.

My hairdresser took a picture of me leaving her salon, which in my head I just pronounced SAAAlooon, like the guy in the Tres Semme commercials. I mean, for us, this is snow.

I had plans to see an old friend of mine, who lives in the town where I now get my hair cut. We'd worked together and had been in a book club and are both obsessed with Mad Men, and we were excited to reunite. Our plan was to meet at Starbucks, because we were in a rollicking town that wasn't gonna have much else open past 8:00. But when we got there?

Effing Starbucks. Closed. BECAUSE OF THE STORM! THE HORRID STORM!

Good gravy.

So we had decaf at his apartment, and on the drive over I called Ned to tell him about the change in plans, because somehow announcing ahead of time that I was partayying with my decaf at some guy's apartment seemed less unseemly than telling him after.

"This snow is great," said Ned. "I wish you were here." So who, like an idiot, schlepped over to Ned's after her coffee, risking life and limb just so she could watch Ned have a snow beer? ("Snow beer is the best kind of beer," Ned announced.) Oh my GOD, that drive was scary. The snow was coming at me so big-ly and dramatically that after awhile it seemed like giant spiders or fireworks were crashing at my car. Because giant spiders and fireworks hang out together a lot.

I sneaked in a photo of Ned headed to snow beer. He also kept throwing snowballs at things, which as a girl is something it never occurs to me to do.

There were NEWS CREWS out reporting on THE BIG STORM, and many snow beer bars were closed, a thing that stuck in my craw. This snow's a night in APRIL in Michigan. Grow a snowy pair, people. Jesus.

Did you see where some wisenheimer said, "At least Lance Armstrong had the ball to tell the truth"? Bah!

Anyway. After we sat on the second story of the one bar that was open, and watched the snow fall, I made it home okay, and the dogs couldn't care less about the whole damn thing. I thought maybe they'd lift it with their snouts and prance around, but mostly they're all, "we cowld, mom. to let in now."

But none of this is why I've gathered you all here today. If you read me yesterday, and why didn't you, DICK, I told you that Ned recently showed me a picture of him and his prom date in 1982, and I told him I had a picture of ME and my wedding date from that very same day. This led me to get all excited because it was a blogging opportunity, and basically I am very uninteresting.

So without further ado, because I just got my hair done yesterday, here are Ned's and my photos:

Have you fallen over dead yet? Are you too busy clasping your own hands to fall over dead?

Wait, here's another one of Ned from the same day. I mean, maybe it was a totally different day and they just slipped on these outfits again. I could be wrong.

I pointed out to Ned that he never brings me a wrist corsage.

Ned thinks he looks like a muppet in these photos, which by the way kills me, but you know he's cute. Look how, you know, sixteen he is. And I know his date, they are still friends to this day, and they stand around posed like this whenever they're together, and my point is, she doesn't look that different. She really doesn't.

Okay, now me.

The only clasping WE were doing was some hormone-filled clasping of each other. And I don't want you to get all excited, but on my hand is the infamous class ring you've heard so much about. I KNOW.

God, Cardinal looks six years old. Oh I used to think he was the shizzle.

Oh, thank god. The gas man is here. To take my blues away. Blow up at ya later.

How many of them hormones you been takin', honey?

I just thought of that line from Fried Green Tomatoes and I like it. In reality I am taking zero hormones. In the immortal words of my grandfather, "How do you make a hormone? Don't pay her."

Hello! I plan to make no sense today whatsoever. It's the hormones.

My grandfather also used to say, "Wish in one hand, shit in the other. See which gets filled up first." Basically he said a lot of things that I completely did not understand until I got older and sat there and parsed them.

My GRANDMOTHER, who was the QUEEN of stuff that made no sense, said, "You tell him your ass would make him a Sunday face," which I have told you all before and I believe it flummoxed you as well. See. My ass, which let's all sit around and think about that disaster for a minute. Okay. My ass, which apparently is not great, would make someone else a Sunday face. A Sunday face being as good as you can look. So the best you can look is to look like my ass.

Do you get it now? Good. Go take a hormone.

I got my hair colored last night. Ned paid for it. He didn't inTENtionally pay for it. For my birthday he got me a certificate to a spa, and since then I have gone there for a manicure and then for a massage, but I just found out from TinaDoris they do good hair there, so I got my color done and used his certificate. My colorist looks exactly like Maria Shriver only not devoid of fat in her face. I mean, my colorist looks like a young, fresh Maria Shriver.

Don't get me wrong. We all age and become less than fresh, I know. But those Kennedy women seem to do it so dramatically. BOOM! I'm an apple doll! They're kind of like Asian women. I look great! I look great! I'm 60 and I still look great! I'm--BOOM! Apple doll.

At least we white women fall apart spectacularly obviously with each year. I should do a photo essay of me each year from 20 to the present so we can see the decline. That sounds cheerful.

Anyway, here's my hair.

Here's old Puff Daddy in the bathroom at work, before I left for my hair appointment. I don't know why I'm even bothering to show you this, because you can't really even see the color.

And yay! Here are my NEW HIGHLIGHTS and base color. I am the one who is kind of dark blonde. The gray and white one is my cat. The gray and white one would be me if I didn't use Ned's gift cards to color my hair.

I like to, you know, NOT TALK at the hairdresser. I enjoy looking at an Elle (God, I love E. Jean, the advice columnist), drinking the water they give you like it's luxurious, and just all-around mellowing out. You know? But hairdressers, and I think particularly SOUTHERN hairdressers, think it's crucial to CHAT YOU UP while they're working.

What I was kind of hoping is she'd, you know, surmise that I wanted quiet time while I was there. I mean, I know some women will chat your ear off while you're working on them, but I am not that person. Shouldn't a hairdresser be able to glean, once your client grabs her an Elle, that she's not a chatter?

"So, you go anywhere for the holiday?"

"Yes." {flip, flip, flip pages.}

"...You going anywhere for Christmas?"

"Nope. {smile at E. Jean's brilliance}

I don't know. Maybe I should just say, "You are free to spend the next two hours thinking your thoughts while I read about why clashing eye shadow and lipstick are in."

Have you seen this? Have you seen the weird middle-of-your-eyelid eyeliner crap they're doing and so on? I am not choosing to embrace. When I was 20 I would have. I embraced everything. Thank heavens for penicillin.

See. I am kidding there. Am allergic to penicillin.

Tonight, even though I have another statistics book to proofread and I started it last night, I am going to make chicken soup for Ned. I already announced it to him heroically so now I can't back out. Am hoping it goes better than the pie I made for Ned. Oh, that was a disaster. Soup's not that hard, right? And stop throwing the word "stock" at me.

I guess that's all I have to tell you, other than Ned sounds like Harvey Fierstein, and I use that example EVERY time someone has a cold and I need new lines desperately. He keeps saying his cold is not that bad, and I had to talk him into not going for a bike ride in the cold rain last night. The cold November rain.

 

You are completely welcome.

Junela Davis. Your bad-ass blogger.

Dudes, I wasn't even gonna blog at you today, but this happened and we need to discuss.

Honest to GOD. With the afro already. Who am I, the white Angela Davis?
It's exciting that I'm blogging at you from this angle, isn't it? Did I tell you how moving my computer resulted in me accidentally banging my modem and hitting the reset button, which then meant I had no Internet and it took 40 minutes with AppleCare and half an hour with my cable company for us to figure that out?

Once, someone as horrible as me sent me a forwarded email. This guy's wife had died--and I KNOW I AM TERRIBLE, OKAY?--and he had sent this mass email saying he knew his wife was an angle in the sky. Over and over he said it. "She is now an angle. With God." God does a lot of trigonometry.

Okay, see? I actually don't know if trigonometry is the right math word to be using. That's how bad I am at math. Do you use angles or even angels in trigonometry?

Anyway. Oh, and here was my hair last night. JUST LAST NIGHT!
No, I didn't travel through a tornado in my sleep. It was calm when the night began!

The reason I happen to have a photo of me before I went to sleep with a paw is because I had been up listening to the rain and emailing with ...friend, and while I waited for his replies I took photos with my phone. Have I ever mentioned how if the house were burning I'd save the phone? I can get other pets.

Here are my rain pals, and as you can see Edsel is feigning interest in said rain, when really all he hopes is somehow Talu disappears so he can be right up on me.

Eventually his wish came true. i dreem of mom.

I emailed ...friend till I fell asleep, and let me assure you these were some deep, important emails. "Is it raining there?" "No." "How can that be? We're three miles apart." "I think we're four miles apart." I mean, this stuff had to be said right then and there. Anyway, I still had the phone when I woke up so I captured Talu's morning lips.

And my cats major and minor.

This morning, Iris got caught in that window leading from my kitchen to the back room. fran come bak from ded to show you window. oh and while you up, $#&#& you.

I was reading (Thorn Birds!) (our deep book club book if you didn't know) on the angry chair back there and she was pawing down at me, and I knew she wanted to leave the window, and my dilemma as a cat parent of a blind-ish kitty was, do I help her or see if she can solve it herself?

Oh, it broke your heart, her little white paw poking at the air. I know her depth perception is the worst part of her wonky eyes. Anyway after awhile she came crashing down on my shoulder, like a demented heavy parrot, scratching my clavicle to Tibet and back, but she did it. On her own.

I guess that's all I have to tell you. I have to go (wait for it) proofread statistics, but before I do, can I show you some vacation shots of a person you don't know? Good.

My friend Steve and I have known each other since, oh, 1986 or something. We met in Michigan but he moved to Seattle, so we got to be friends there, too. He is on a road trip and put up pictures on Facebook, and this made me want to get in the car and look at ludicrous things so bad I could spit on a mountain-climbing bear with good proportions.

Can you stand it? Can you stand it that you're in your cubicle right now, no windows in sight, and this is out here just for the looking at? Let's all get in the car right now. June's Spontaneous Road Trip!

It is impossible to take a bad picture of any outdoor plastic dinosaur. Marvin and I must have 80 of these in our photos, which I guess are probably split up now. Marvin, I better have PRECISELY 40 plastic dinosaur pictures. I'm countin'!

Your bad-ass server. Dying.

Really? Really? None of his loved ones said, "Maybe name it Eat & Run." No one? No one stepped in.

Steve has no idea I stole these, because it's like 7 a.m. in Seattle and I didn't want to be all coffee dialing him in the wee hours. So I hope he doesn't kick my ass.

And you don't need to leave the "I knew these weren't YOURS cause we could actually see the image!" comments. NO NEED. NO NEEEEEED. You know I'll get them anyway.

You are all angles in the sky, you big putzes.

Altered June at her altar

First of all, I have half a migraine, so the part where I make 20 errors and am dull as dishwater today is not my fault.

And let's talk about that anyway. I am a readist, not a typist. Sometimes I will make a typo even though I am a copy editor. OH CALL THE AUTHORITIES! JUNE MISSPELLED A WORD! Do I go on YOUR blog and tell you you made an error? Do I look at your COMMENT and tell you you made an error? I do not. If you said, "Here, June. Here's $100. Please look at my comment for spelling, punctuation or grammatical errors" I would then do so. Otherwise I don't. BECAUSE IT ISN'T NICE.

My head hurts. Did I mention that?

Today I had a phone interview for a place. Do you like how specific I am? A place. Anyway the job sounds IDEAL, and you can work from home a few days a week and oh! I want that job. But I am a long way from getting it. Plus my head hurt the whole time and I was kind of quiet. Maybe the interviewer thinks I'm the quiet nerdy type.

Which I totally am.

The other day ...friend mentioned Hemingway in an email, and the fact that he spelled "Hemingway" correctly made me like him more. God, I am boring. Some women are like, "What car does he drive?" and I'm all, "Give him a spelling test." And see if he says things like "I'm all." Because I never would.

Oh and speaking of me, and when aren't we, somehow my mother and I got into a discussion about snooping. If I asked you to come house-sit for me, or if any friend asked you to house-sit for them, would you snoop? My mother says most people wouldn't and I say most people would. Tell the truth.

Ima go put ice on my effing temple now, not that I have an altar to myself, although that's not a bad idea. Before I go, I have pictures from last night. Oh calm down. They aren't dirty.

Took dogs for their requisite walk last night, and here is an action shot of Edsel tormenting Kipper's Dick. You know what? Kipper's Dick is SO NOT SCARED of my dogs. She sidles up to me whenever I walk by without them, and when they ARE with me, she walks right up and arches her back at them. If Edsel would just BE COOL, she'd let me pet her with them right there. But guess who can't keep it in his pants? Guess.

At any rate, there we were, minding our own business (!!) when we saw my 97-year-old neighbor Paul. Whenever we see him, we go sit on his glider and talk. Well. I do. The dogs would be delighted to jump on the glider and pant pant pant with their hot stupid breath on Paul and me, but instead they sit on his deck. Paul's daughter always gives them water. They like her.

I tried to take a picture of Paul and me with my iPhone, and you can see I practically stole his soul, with the vast amount of Paul coverage I got there. How symbolic is this? ALL ME! IT'S ALL ME!!

Eventually his daughter took a photo of us, and how afraid of me must he be? HI! MY HAIR AND I ARE HERE! HI HI HIHI HIIII! HI SAYS MY HAIR! HAVE YOU MET MY HURR?

After I showed Paul my hair, and let's face it--I showed POPE JOHN Paul my hair, over in Rome. Who MISSED my hair, is more the question--I took a picture of the pretty sky.

Right after I did that, I saw one of the "HI LALOOLA, HI ETHEL!" kids, and for once she wasn't behind her cage in her yard, but rather out playing with another little girl, just like when we were kids and actually went outside and just randomly played and did not have our moms schedule an effing play date with Blackberries.

"Why did you take my picture?" she asked, as Ethel wound his leash around me 50 times to avoid her child-y hands. Oh Edsel finds children horrifying. He gets it from his mother.

And you know what? She flummoxed me. Why DID I take her picture, other than I take pictures of everything in order to report it on my blog. And could I tell her that? No. "I, um, just took a picture of the sky and..."

Really I had no answer. No answer for Awesome, up there.

You have no idea, once children figure out that Ethel is scared (and who wants to just legally change his name to Ethel? It's perfect for him.), how MUCH they want to pet him. I always tell them to leave him alone, because what if he fear bites? I mean, Ethel biting. I know. But do I want that on my hands if it happens? I do not. Why can't they be content to pet the dog who's fine with it?

Finally, I came home and moved the computer. Isn't this exciting? It's on the other side of the room now, and you can once again see the lemon labels. I like to mix it up here at House O'June. Marvin used to always tell me to move the lemon labels around to see if y'all'd notice. Maybe someday I will. See how I build the suspense?

Okay, gonna go lie down now for reals. Stupid head. Oh and answer the snooping Q. I know how you forget my Qs when they're buried in 90 feet of text. Or hurr.

Where had I left Sunday. They never make Sunday. Didn't I already title a post with this? Where had I left my originality.

That title is only funny if you know When Harry Met Sally by heart. To which I say, why on earth don't you know that movie by heart?

Yesterday I went to Hillsborough with ...friend, who I know I'm being super-not-obvious about, but just between you and me I kind of like him. I mean, I know it's impossible to tell. Because could 87 posts in the last month have been about ...friend? It'll be funnier when he starts to annoy me, but am currently in smitty-cat stage. Smitty-cat is totally a thing.

Anyway, we totally went to the old cemetery, because I like old cemeteries and fortunately so does ...friend. I was sad to see about Faithful Reader Paula H&B's demise, though.

While we were perusing the tombstones and wondering why all the women just had to get listed as" wife of" and "daughter of" instead of just, oh, being a person, this beautiful black cat came up to us, meowing. "Is a black cat in a cemetery a good sign?" wondered ...friend, who may or may not think as tragically as I do.

But oh, that kitty was nice. She had a collar, and there was a house right next to said cemetery, so really there was no excuse to steal her. ...friend has a white cat, and you know what'd look good with a white cat? Is a black cat. Just sayin'. And I wish I could tell you how bad the phrase "just sayin'" bugs me, and here I am using it. Okayyyyyyy? I just said, "Okayyyyy?" while bobbing my head around and snapping my fingers. Apparently goal today is to annoy own self.

Here is ...friend's cat. I took this with my cell phone a few weeks ago right after I gave my Using Super Extra Focus in Photography seminar.

Speaking of annoyed, I noted this tombstone with "Believe on the Lord" written on it. Now, I know I was a church secretary for six months, which should make me an expert, and I really feel like that should be "believe IN the Lord." Right? Okayyyyyy? {snap.}

"How awful would it be if your tombstone had a typo?" asked ...friend. "It's really more of a chisel-o," I pointed out, and if any of you are in charge of my tombstone could you PLEASE get a reputable proofer to look at the thing before it goes to print or whatever? Can you imagine me lying there for eternity with "June Gardens, Rest in Piece" on top of me?

Anyway, after communing with the dead, we had lunch, where I would like to announce ...friend had a giant hamburger. Am trying to drive home the part where HE IS NOT A VEGETARIAN. "What's a Kobe burger?" asked ...friend, who by the way takes 207 hours to decide what he wants on a menu. "Is that a burger made from Kobe Bryant?"

I had fried green tomatoes. And 86 of his fries. So I had fried and fried for lunch. Go, June! Rest in piece!

I do not know why I didn't take pictures after this, because we walked around and looked at old houses, and then we ended up on this mountain trail. There was a very--oh, you know why? Because I said, "Ima put my purse in the car if we're gonna walk around." That's why I took no pictures. You are going to have to pretend that you're Mary Ingalls, all blind, and I will paint you the story with my Laura Ingalls words.

So anyway, there was a very cranky Indian woman sitting on a bench right at the entrance to said mountain path. She had on a really pretty pink-and-pale-gray sari, and man she WAS sorry. What a sourpuss. "That woman makes me nervous," said ...friend, who did I mention is kind of tragic the way I am? Wouldn't it be better if I'd met a Mr. Blue Sky kind of person? But no. Death and destruction hover around every corner, in this case wearing a sari.

We left her in our dust as we traipsed this path, and I'd like to mention I had on silver flipflops with a sequin flower on them, which is the shoe of choice for many Mt. Everest climbers. So I was all set. "Oh, no, your SHOES," said ...friend. "Are you gonna be okay?"

He asked me that again 25 uphill minutes later, and believe it or not I really WAS okay.

Maybe 15 minutes after that, ...friend got out the handy map they had at the ready at the beginning of the trail. "Wasn't this supposed to me .4 miles?" he wondered, with his HIKING BOOTS. "How are your feet? Are you okay? I feel terrible that I dragged you out here in those."

But I was having fun. At this point we had seen three deer, and shot them all immediately, and OH! WE SAW A SNAKE! I mean, sort of. There was rustling in the leaves and GUESS WHAT ...FRIEND DID? GUESS! He got a STICK and POKED AROUND in the effing LEAVES and said, "Did you see it? I knew it was a black snake by the rustling sound it made."

Okay, Grizzly and your Sam Adams, am delighted you are so at one with nature, but could you NOT POKE THE SNAKES when I'm here? Possibly? Could you not?

Seventy-five minutes later, we were still on that trail. If ...friend had asked me about my feet one more time, he would have been wearing a sequin flower upside his head. Honest to god, my feet were FINE, but he was obsessed. Eventually we passed this huge guy, with the oldest most dilapidated Rottweiler you have ever seen. That Rottweiler looked at us like, "Whiskey Tango FOXTROT. Why I out heer?"

"Did you see that guy glare at me, the one who dug up his dead dog for the walk?" asked ...friend. He looked at me like, "Really, dude? You drag that poor woman out here in her silver flipflops?" Who was projecting, do you think? Because if I were that guy I'd be worried about how I was gonna get the dog out the woods when it inevitably keeled over like that mule Rhett commandeers in Gone With the Wind.

The sun was setting as we finally found the car again. I swear to you I am not making that up. THE SUN WAS SETTING. "You know that cranky Indian woman on the bench?" I asked. "When she entered this trail, she was 16. She was out there catching her breath, thinking about how she missed the whole prime of her life because she was on this endless trail."

Just as we got to the car, though, we saw one more deer. Oh, I love seeing deer. Especially when I get 'em right between the eyes.

In case you haven't gleaned this, I DON'T SEE HOW ANYONE COULD SHOOT A DEER.

Finally, we headed home, none the worse for wear despite the fact that ...friend was convinced I was going to have to go to Ready-Med to have my feet amputated. Actually I did find a little blood on one toe from where I must've hit a rock, but I was loathe to tell him.

Back in Greensboro, we got something to eat, and I ran into Anna, who I used to work with. She is the bomb. She attended my How to Shoot Pictures in Low Light seminar and told me she got a lot out of it.

Finally we went to this rooftop bar, where the world's most ludicrous and cannot-stop-watching-them bridal party was sitting directly behind us. The bride had lights in her hair, and I just need you to know I am so finding a way to put lights in my hair every day. I mean, the hair is noticeable enough, so I'm just gonna embrace it.

Okayyyyyy?

{snap.}

Hair-raising

I went to Raleigh today to get my roots done. And whoever suggested in the comments today (where I previously announced the riveting news that I was in Raleigh with my roots. Being Alex Haley. Rootin' around. Drinking root beer. Doing my Rudy from The Cosby Show impression. Etc.) that Raleigh is where Aunt Bea got HER hair done, y'all can kiss my pinafore. And my bouffant-y bun. And my wavery voice. "Ohhhh, Andy! Opie ate the pies!"

Good gravy. Was Aunt Bea supposed to be my age? Who suddenly got depressed? Whose pies just got eaten? So to speak.

So my point is, there I was, headed to the Raleigh, there, not a care in the world, when I saw a blue car on the freeway that looked like, yes, Daniel Boone's. In case you are too cool to click on my link, if you have link phobia (in which case I suggest you don't become a member of The Mod Squad) (bah!) (June. Referring to current shows since 2007), Daniel Boone was a person I used to date. Daniel Boone was a person who made me a shell of my usually pretty full-of-whatever-is-inside-a-shell self. I guess Daniel Boone sucked the oyster out of me. Which sounds incredibly dirty. As opposed to "whose pies just got eaten."

What I mean is, he was a guy I dated for awhile, and was crazy about, and every time I go to Raleigh I worry Ima run into him, except that on the INSIDE, where I am back to being fully oystered, I say, "Oh, June. You won't run into DANIEL BOONE. Don't be silly."

And yet today? Hello. There he was. Driving down the freeway. And you know I beeped and waved? I mean, come on. We can't beep and wave at each other?

Apparently we cannot. Because for THREE MILES he was next to me and would not look my way. I feel like he intentionally didn't look at me, that maybe he'd seen me earlier on the road (a yellow Bug with a Bee Gees sticker is sort of, you know, obviously a June car) and had decided to ignore my very existence.

Which is silly. But whatever.

I did the mature thing and got right on the phone to ...friend. "You'll never BELIEVE who's in the next lane," I hissed.

"Well, the good news is, this will never happen again. It's like buying the house that's already been struck by lightning."

...? Did he just make that up? Because it's a good one but I've never heard that before.

Anyway a few minutes later I called him back. And you know what I am? Fun to date. "Was it rude that I called you, of all people, with that announcement?"

"No!" said ...friend, who seems to be well-adjusted. Then he told me a story about seeing an old girlfriend on the freeway--THAT SAME FREEWAY! What is it, the Highway of Failed Romances?--and that he had on sunglasses but strained his eyeballs looking right without turning his head to see if it was her. And it was. He, however, did not beep and wave. Apparently that's my cool signature move.

So that's my news for today. I was gonna tell you a whole other story about this guy who's been at the bar 539 days in a row, but I will save that for tomorrow. The D Boone sighting trumps the drunk guy.

At least my hair looks good.

Kobayashi Maru

Last night I had drama with ...friend, but everything is okay now. I wish I could tell you all about it, but I feel like I'd need his permission to tell the story, and I similarly feel like he'd say, "You know what? No. It was bad enough living it in real life. Why rehash it on an Internet blog?" That's what he called my blog once, like he's 97 years old. My Internet blog.

The good news is, ...friend is the kind of person you can call, and you're all hysterical and possibly your hair is flying about twistily and your voice is all shaky, and five minutes later you have calmed down. Because he may or may not be the normal person in this scenario. I know that comes as a shock.

Here is an unretouched photo of my hair after my upsetty phone call to ...friend. Or, alternatively, here is a picture of my spiral perm and Persian cat in 1988. I have shown you this picture before but I feel like it bears repeating.

I loved that cat. His name was Confetti. I got him on New Year's Eve; hence the moniker. He was super floppy and slept on my head. He kind of looks like Gizmo from that one movie. What the hell was the movie? With Gizmo. That one.

WHY did no one stop me from getting a perm? Seriously. Why did no one step in?

In other news, Tallulah continues to wear her cone, and she coincidentally continues to hate me. But the second I feel bad and take that thing off, she lick lick licks her incision. Why can she not put two and two together?

I am also here at my temporary job, which I have been at for over a month now, and last pay period I did not get paid because there was some kind of waiting period, and now today I didn't get paid enough. I only got one week's worth of cash money. Fortunately they are straightening it out, which is good because I have seven dollars.

Also, the surgery center called to ask me a bunch of questions. Do I have sleep apnea? Am I a bleeder? Am I a breeder? How is my heart? Who is that guy with a sickle behind me?

So that was relaxing. Seeing as this is my THIRD operation to remove my effing fibroids, I am kind of familiar with the procedure. I could probably reach up there and do it myself. Anyway, Faithful Reader Laurie, we have to be there at 7:15 and that sounds delightful. Maybe they mean 7:15 p.m. and we can have cocktails first. What say you?

Oh! And before I go, I do have to tell you one more thing. Before I called ...friend with my upsettyness, I talked to my friend Sandy's husband. He is a genuinely nice guy, and I wanted a guy opinion that was not Hulk's. For once.

So I told him the story and he said, "What you've got here, June, is the Kobayashi Maru," he said.

The what, now?

"Yeah. It's a no-win situation. In Star Trek II and then Star Trek VI, Khan blooo de blooo bloo. And he bleep de beeee dee deeee, and he had Kobayahsi Maru. A no-win situation."

Will you remind me to stop asking men things?

Come to think of it, it was a man who gave me that spiral perm, too. June. Sensing a pattern. A swirly brown puffy pattern.

Hot air

Your comments yesterday about your least-favorite songs were the funniest ever. I was in tears laughing. Everyone go read yesterday's comments. I'd cull them, and you know how I like to use the word "cull," but my deadline IS TODAY and I have to scream on here, write something, GO MEDITATE AND BE SERENE, and get my work done.

Then tomorrow I head for the Outer Banks, which I just typed "pouter banks" and I hope I do not end up pouting when I am there.

For a long time now, in fact probably since we installed it--and by "we" I mean not me--the dryer has been a pain in my arse. You have to dry clothes for 200 minutes. That is not one of my exaggerated numbers. The most the timer would go is 100, and I'd ALWAYS have to turn the timer all the way to the end twice before I didn't have I-live-in-Seattle damp clothes.

My mother has always insisted this was, you know, bad, and that I should do something about it, but I was very busy adopting cats.

On Saturday, I was doing some laundry and I noticed a smell. A burning smell. Burning. From the dryer. Well, that seems like not a good sign, I thought cleverly.

So yesterday I called Lowe's, where the dryer was purchased, and I got a man with quite the personality on him. Remember that movie with Robin WIlliams where the people were in suspended animation for decades and Robin Williams was a doctor and he got them out of that state and then the drug didn't work and they went back to being unanimated?

This guy was clearly on his way back to being unanimated.

"lowe's," he said, with all the excitement of a tree sloth. I told him my tale.

"Whatyear'dyoubuyit," he intoned, and it was like he was asking how long he had to live. "April 19, 2008," I said, because I am weird with dates.

"model."

"Oh, no. I mean, I really like having my picture taken, and I have a blog so a lot of people see me. But model? Ha! No. No."

"what model's yer dryer, ma'am."

"Oh."

Anyway, as much as I wished he himself and all his sparkling charm would have been the one to come over, they sent some guy from Snappy Appliances or some similar name.

"HOW YOU DOIN' MA'AM!" Now this guy had some oomph. And he loved my dogs. And he was male, so you know how Edsel got. Is it possible for a dog to grin? Because Edsel was doing so manically.

I was emailing ...friend about this whole scenario, who was surprised that I had failed to mention to him about the dryer, you know, catching fire the other day. "I'm taking care of it," I told him. "Right now I'm putting on makeup so the dryer guy approves of me."

"Now, see, had this happened to me, the next day I'm out getting t-shirts: Ask Me About My House Fire. But I guess one person's major episode is another person's reason to put on makeup," he wrote.

While I was reading ...friend's email, the dryer guy says, "Oh, wow." I do not think he was appreciating my makeup.

"Ma'am?" he came into the computer room. "Your vent is completely clogged with hair."

I guess none of us should be surprised by that news. Of course it was right then that Here's-My-Fur Lily made an appearance, furthering this guy's impression that I literally had a house made of follicles.

It turned out I needed a whole 'nother person to come: a vent guy. The hair was so bad I had to get a whole new, you know, vent. And YES. I clean that lint thing each time. When you are Bernie on Room 222 with your hair, a few swipes in the lint tray are not gonna do it.

Honestly it's like these people must sit around waiting for good times such as these. Because Vent Guy was over before I could even put my afro pick back in my pocket.

"Oh, wow," he said, back near my vent.

"You know what you don't want to hear from your vent guy?" I wrote ...friend. 'Oh, wow.'"

In the meantime, Edsel had his bedazzler out to add a "V" to his collar, because he has changed his name to Edsel Vent. If you thought he loved the DRYER guy, Vent Guy was like Rhett Butler swooping in to usurp Ashley Wilkes. There was no comparison.

"Dees is a nice dug," Vent Guy said. He had some kind of accent. You know all my accents sound Finnish. Vent Guy was Mediterranean, maybe? Hispanic? I don't know. All I know is my dog is taking him to the courthouse for a nice civil ceremony this weekend. They're getting a place on Fire Island this summer.

"Come loooook at dees, ma'am," said Vent Guy. Why do they always want to SHOW and EXPLAIN to you what's wrong? If I wanted to know from my vents I'd have gone to vent school. Just get the 95 pounds of hair out my dryer and be off with you.

Anyway I have a whole new hole in my house with a fancy vent that opens and closes instead of that old-fashioned metal thing that kind of looks like C-3PO, and yesterday I did a load of towels that took 50 minutes to dry.

FIFTY MINUTES! I feel how Ma Ingalls must have felt when she got new clothespins. It's all so high-tech.

He also gave me this giant brush that I have to stick in the dryer every three weeks to, you know, fish out the...hair.

Today the dogs, cats and I are going to a sheep farm somewhere and getting shorn.

Madre de Dios

I gots no time to gab today. I just woke up (don't ask) (okay, I was out late with ...friend.) and now I have to scream off to Raleigh to get my hairs done at 12:30.

The only way I knew there were storms was because I just read the comments from last night. Everyone check in and let the rest of us know how you are doing, in the comments. You know how Faithful Reader Sadie worries.

Here. I found this picture in my archives of Edsel and TinaDoris' dog. We can have a caption contest. I have a brand-new, still-in-the-package tube of Cover Girl Lash Blast mascara that I hate. WHAT A PRIZE! Anyway, you know I'll never send it to you so CAPTION AWAY. Oh, and if a boy wins the contest, I will [not] send you inflatable toast.

I'll do comment of the week tomorrow. By the way, Hulk has been comment of the week all week. I sent him some mascara.