No, Yesterday's Post Was Not A "Fool"

The canned air I own officially gave it's lase apoplectic fit last night when I tried using it between the keys to force the water out/channel it to an exit point... So I gave up, turned everything off, turned the keyboard upside down at an angle, and gave it my best, "go with god" look as I went to bed.

It's still kinda "damp" on the inside (if you call big droplets of water that I can see through the clear plastic back "damp," but I have space bar usage once more!

The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog

...all the letters seem to work

`1234567890-=123456789=/*-+.0

as do the number & numeric pad keys

I guess I'm back in business.
~~~~~

It must be my punishment for wanting to share what happened yesterday.

I'd blame it on scoring the wrong score on that "How Autistic Are You" quiz that's going around Facebook, but um, I know better. It was just my normal runaway-mean disease. It's happened before, with the same girl. (And yes, I think I'm using that particular label on her because maybe someday she will be all growed up, but her innocent hippie ways make me think of her as very very young...)

Okay, I can blame it a wee bit on the fact that I haven't shaken the poopie cold/cough/eunni/exhaustion that has seriously been plaguing me since my birthday week. I had this super silly notion that it being APRIL yesterday, it would all magically melt away...But it didn't/hasn't, only my patience has, it would seem, for self-righteous/hippie/stupid people.

To refresh everyone's memory, this is the girl who asked me, "Why don't you bike" as I was limping around on a leg swollen to twice its size sometime last year. I maybe got a little offended by her back then, but now I wonder if she'd bust out, "Look at the beautiful sunset!" to a blind person...she is that oblivious to the world...which makes what I said yesterday, with only the barest hint of sarcasm that even I almost didn't recognize in myself, SO MUCH BETTER.

See, she drove in to work yesterday. She looked ABSOLUTELY MISERABLE about not taking the bus or biking, "but it was cold, and raining, and I couldn't get out of bed, and I'd left my umbrella here..."

And I genuinely felt sorry for her and said something like, "Better than getting completely sopping wet trying to get here and getting even more sick." (She too has the office crud.) BUT...instead of agreeing or letting herself feel better, she then goes on to berate herself about how the bus stop is JUST OUTSIDE HER DOOR!

When asked what bus she takes I realized it was one that left you off blocks away from here and said so (again, she's sick and it was pouring) she actually looked at me as if I was an alien and said, "but that's only three blocks away! I could have easily walked that! I do! Every day!"

And right there was when I decided I needed to smack some sense into her mightier-than-thou attitude. So I said, "Yeah, you're right. What were you thinking?"

But it got better. We used to live in opposite ends of the same neighborhood so she asked where I was living now, "About three blocks South of here."

She got all excited, "Oh by the blah blah blah" (Artist lofts/more people fresh out of the peace core/hippie-wanna-bes like her.)

"No, that's North, I said South."

The look on her face was priceless. "But that's like, right next to downtown!"

"Yes. But it's better than right next to the freeway." (The blah blah blah she mentioned.)

"But there are no trees and just other buildings around you."

"We do have trees and grass, on the 8th floor, right next to the dog run."

"The 8th floor?!?" Again, another wonderful can't-believe-you-live-in-such-an-unsustainable-artificial-place-look. (My Xhusband used to get that look, I know it well, and realize he is why I must make this poor girl suffer.)

"Yep, and a pool, sauna, jacuzzi, and the whole building has air conditioning."

If you know me, really know me? You know this is not the way I've ever lived. Nor do I take advantage of the amenities here...I am the strange "country bumpkin" neighbor. I am the person who would live in shared housing with a million people. I was that girl. Had there not been a million people trying out for the "core" when I was her age, I'd have been her even more...so instead, I went off to teach the children of migrant workers the fundamentals of the English language and tried to make their world a better place because dammit, I wanted to save the world! I've mentioned this to the girl. We graduated from the same University, but I'm a decade older.

And tired and broken. And, I've said this a number of times, VERY jaded. And more than just a little mean. And I know I'm gonna burn because as I sit here, listening to the rain smash against my window, I'm wondering if that girl is going to take the bus and get sopping wet and sicker that she should get, just so she can prove (to herself more than anyone) that she is NOT becoming anything like me, ever. And it makes me smile.