January 16
Right off the bat, I need to wish my Grandmother a happy birthday. Not that she's reading me or anything, but I'm just putting it out here. She deserves all the good birthday juju the world can muster up. My aunt has been staying with them for almost 2 weeks. It's been great for me, in that I've been let off the hook a little bit about being THERE all the time, but it's been really weird not seeing them, I must confess. For example, last Friday, Nick and I met them over at Ivy Noodle, a delightful soup place downtown. When I saw them stagger (they're falling apart so they don't do a lot of sauntering, meandering or, um, whatever. They stagger) up, I got a little choked up when I hugged them. I guess they've been living action-packed days, though, much moreso than usual because my aunt is what you'd call a doer. She doesn't sit still. In the time she's been here, she's gotten Angelo enrolled in some kind of day care program (saying that he's in DAY CARE makes me feel all squirmy inside) two days a week. They've been to the VA to try and get him some...well, stuff. I have no idea what they were doing at the VA. She brought my grandmother to the cardiologist, (which I fully intended to do, had she not been here) they've been to the mall for...again, stuff, I have no idea. Most astonishingly, and I about fell over when I heard about this, they went out and had Angelo fitted for hearing aids.
Me: You are SHITTING me. You DID NOT. He didn't go!!
Eleanor: I am NOT shitting you!! He DID!! Not just ONE, but TWO! They made molds and everything!!
Me: When does he get them??
Eleanor: They said it'd take about three weeks.
Me: Wait, wait. This means we won't be able to talk about him in front of him anymore!
Eleanor: Yes, it does. We'll have to go into another ROOM to talk about him.
Me: Good plan.
I know my grandmother very well. I know that she's exhausted by the constant activity, and I know more than anything else that the one thing she wanted to do while my aunt was here, she didn't get to do. Obviously, you know what I'm talking about. The woman wanted a ride up to the casino. Heh. Fortunately, (or unfortunately, depending on how tired she is of company) right after my aunt leaves tomorrow, my mother is coming up, and my mother's sole intention while she's here is to take her mother to the casino. Better than hearing aides or a million trips to the VA: one really good day at the casino. We have our priorities straight.
(Please note: I'm going to the casino Sunday night, entirely seperate of my grandparents. When I spoke with her on the phone yesterday, she asked what I was doing this weekend. I said "Um. Well. I have some plans. With Nicole." She shrieked "I KNOW WHAT THAT MEANS!!!!YOU'RE GOING TO THE CASINO!! AAAAAHHH! HOW COULD YOU!?!?")
[for the curious: I got her a subscription to STRICTLY SLOTS magazine for her birthday. I can't say "Strictly Slots" without thinking of the Beavis and Butthead movie: "Oh, yes boys! There are slots as far as the eye can see!" "Woah! SLUTS!!")
Always Check The Feedback:
I've become recently obsessed with buying old magazines from Ebay (by old, I mean 50s-70s. The ones from the 70s are as old in the same way that I am old. Which is fairly old.) because the recipes and the advertisements crack me up: "FLATTERING FASHIONS FOR THE STOUT WOMAN: WRITE FOR THE LANE BRYANT CATALOGUE!" I bid the most when I'm bored at work, so the week before last was particularly bad. I bid on, and won, about 6 auctions at exactly the same time, and was inundated with mail with alarmingly similar subjects: "EBAY! LOT OF MAGAZINES FROM THE 1960S!!! GOOD CONDITION!!" Half of them were picked up as spam by SPAM ASSASSIN, (Which to me is utterly useless. It filters everything as spam. Mail from friends with numbers in their email address? SPAM! Mail from companies I actually want to hear from? SPAM!! Practically every useful correspondence from Ebay? Spam! Sadly, all of the "LEARN THE SECRETS of MAKING A MILLION DOLALRS ON EBAY!" is never, ever marked as spam, nor is any of the "grow a giant monster cock in a week!" mail. Clearly, I am missing some fine point to the program's basic workings. Or, it sucks.)
Any of the auctions accepting Paypal, I paid right away. The others, I requested totals from, after digging the tagged as spam but not really spam ebay mail out of the trash (Why does it move SOME mail to the trash, and other mail not? It is indeed a mystery). I waited a few days. Nothing. I write again, requesting a total. My email is extremely polite. I am answered with:
"WHAT ARE YOU STUPID?? I SENT THIS TO YOU TWICE!! IM GETTING RELLY SICK OF PEOPLE WHO THROW AWAY THERE MAIL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
This is never the way to get on my good side.
I reply:
"If you send your mail out in all capital letters, it was undoubtedly tagged as spam and thrown away."
Him:
"LIER!!!! I DONT SEND OUT MAIL ALL IN CAPS!!! YOU ARE A STUPID FOOL!!!!"
Me:
"Do you need to go back on your meds or something? I'm sending you a check, now don't write to me anymore."
Him:
"YOU ARE STUPID!!! THAT IS CRAP!!!!!!USE YOUR HEAD IF YOU HAVE ONE!!!!!LOL!!!"
Me:
"Why don't you take your magazines and cram them up your ass, if there's room"
That ended our warm email exchange. I reported him to Ebay, and so far, there's no answer. However, in the time it took me to stop being pissed off about the whole thing, I went and took a look at the guy's other auctions. You can too.
I got a clearer idea of who I was dealing with. A crazy old man, selling dusty, smoke-impregnated shit out of his basement. Did he kill his wife so he could sell HER shit, too? Did she leave him because he wouldn't throw anything away and the neighbors were starting to talk and she couldn't even get any credit down at the Meat Nooke? Did he drive her away with his erratic behavior, being sweet and wonderful until Antique Road Show came on the picture box, turning him into a screaming, hitting ranting madman? Had she come upon him one too many times fast asleep in front of the computer, head back, cigarette burned all the way to the filter, giant ash trembling gently at the top?
What the fuck is this guy's problem??
For shits and grins, go read his feedback--even the good feeback is kind of bad, and heed my advice, friendly readers: always check the feedback before you bid on something. Crazy can be fun, but only when it's your friend you only see sometimes, the kind of crazy that blows into town, stays at a hotel, invites you out and gets you drunk and lets you crash on their floor, but then leaves two days later. Crazy email from a stranger? Not so much so.
the other day - home - email - tomorrow