Sprizee :: A simple girl replete with complications

For all those things you never even knew you needed.

A couple weeks ago I was sitting at home on a Saturday night, slightly groggy and a bit disoriented after waking up in a pile of my own drool from an unscheduled 3 hour nap.  With no prospect of anything thrilling to fill my time, I did what any other sane person, in my age bracket and with my amount of disposal income, would do.  I decided to renew my long ago expired Costco membership.  $300 later, after returning without any of the items I had renewed my memership to buy, I recalled why I let my membership expire in the first place.

That said, you have no idea how thrilled I was to find these last Friday.  I should clarify.  I don't mean find find.  I mean Costco find.  As in, go there for some danishes and juice.  Walk out with danishes, juice and a box full of other stuff I'd never even seen before (including gummy bear vitamins) but, damn it, I need!  I was thinking the Costo find thing only worked at the warehouse, but then I saw this online, and now I need that too.

Damn you Costco.  Why must you taunt me with your delicious $1 churros?

Tell me why I don't like Mondays.

Oh Monday.  How you make me sad.  Why can't you be more like your sister Saturday?  Saturday treated me to skiing in inches and inches of powdery dry snow.  Even when Saturday was annoying she was still cute.  Like when she made sure there was so much new snow up on Crystal that I ended up buried thigh high in snow drifts at least three times on every downhill run.  Sure it was more work than skiing on compact snow but Saturday has a dry sense of humor.  Dry.  Um, yeah.  File this post under Monday's fault.

You All Everybody

For the Lost fans in the crowd, have you discovered this or this or this yet?   I don't know about you but I can't get  "acting like you stupid people wearing expensive clothes" out of my head and what's worse is I don't want to.  I love me some quirky British pop music.  If you haven't discovered Lost yet, I'd recommend you take it out for spin.  Download the first episode from iTunes.  It's only $2.  And, trust me, it's money well spent.   

Speaking of money well spent, who wants to buy me this?

Ricoh Suave

I've been going to Greenwood PT for a few weeks now and I have to say it's been wonderful.  It's made me realize many things but pretty high up there is 1) realizing I don't have much upper body strength and 2) how easy it would be for a person 25 lbs. lighter and shorter than me to totally take me out, and that's saying something since I only weigh a buck and a quarter. 

Talking to my mom last week about my ongoing saga of back/muscle pains, she suggested that perhaps I should mention my dad's spine fused together years ago.  I didn't even really realize this had happened since my parents divorced at any early age and I only saw him infrequently.  Since the cause of his spine fusing was genetic, that means means there's a small possibility I could also have this.  I'm not trying to jinx myself or anything but I'm 99% sure I don't have it.  Still, wouldn't it suck if I did?  But I don't.  But maybe I do.  Nope, I don't.  But if I did... Yes, as you can see the amount of ways in which I could have fun playing the what if game with this one are endless. 

My physical therapist mentioned something about, "well even if you do happen to have it, you'd just need to be more aware of your posture and not do things like sleep in the fetal position otherwise your spine could fuse like that", which is awesome on just about every level because the only way I can fall asleep is if I'm laying on my side in the fetal position.  Rock on! But that's not all I've been up to lately.  There's more to tell.  But I haven't been on InternetS much lately checking out all my favorite sites because I've been busy with stuff. 

Stuff:

Friday morning at work the IT guy at my office delivered a brand new Ricoh laser COLOR! printer to my office.  Needless to say the IT guy at my office is officially my new best friend.  4 ever.  Later that night I went to see Bob Newhart at Benaroya Hall.  It was funny but Bob is starting to show his age and by starting to show his age I mean show that he grew up in a different generation that thinks jokes about Japanese people being short is comedy.  Don't get me wrong.  I love me some driving instructor.  Before the show Deron took The Dude and I out for dinner at Buenas Aires Grill.  After the show we drove around downtown, then ended up in SoDo on the hunt for some Krispy Kremes.  By 11pm we were home and asleep.  We live such a glamorous life.

Saturday was most spent in bed napping.  Yes, it was a waste of a day but I wouldn't have it any other way.

Sunday there was football to watch.  Sally, Tibadoh, Seth and The Dude all headed down to Nectar's in Fremont to watch the game.  Now, I'm no football fan that's for sure, but I can honestly say it was exciting to see the Seahawks will finally be going to the Superbowl.  I hope it's a good game and yes, that means I'm going to watch it, breasts or no breasts.

Monday I saw Rick Steves talk at a Seattle Chamber event in downtown.  I wanted to kiss him after he pointed out how our government is causing all this hysteria about terror attacks without directly saying W IS A TOTAL FUCKWAD.  He did a good job walking the line, and still getting his opinion across which I interpreted as W's whole backwards administration needs to go.  I think mentioning that the US government and the United Nations regularly disagree about most issues (like global warming, debt relief, the AIDS crisis) was a nice touch.  I almost audio recorded it with my new camera.  Now I'm kicking myself that I didn't.  Ricky was en fuego.

Tuesday, while at the office, I put together a bunch of Valentine gifts for clients (including the new adorable Starbucks gift cards) as a marketing ploy to 1) suck up to them 2) get them to read the letter I included and 3) buy more stuff...duh.  I'm crossing my fingers that it works, but either way putting Valentine packages together is always a good time.

Today after my appointment at Greenwood PT, I had to drop by Starbucks to pick up a few more gift cards for clients.  Since it was on my way I stopped by Egan's office and finally gave him the house warming gift that's been sitting in my trunk since before the house warming party that I couldn't attend.  It was good to see Egan, especially since I can't even recall when exactly the last time I saw him was.  My real agenda was to snatch his purple iPod sock but damn if he wasn't one step ahead of me and left it back at the office.

This has been your weekly stalking file.  Sponsored in part by Ricoh laser color printers, Rick Steves Europe Through the Backdoor, Starbucks Coffee Company and Moveon.org.  Thanks for playing.

I've got to concentrate, concentrate, concentrate.

Wilson Pickett died yesturday.  This is sad.  I've been in love with the songs of Wilson Pickett since I was very young.  But what is sadder is up until yesturday, upon hearing "Wilson Pickett died today at the age of 64" via NPR, I got throughly confused.  You see, I always assumed Wilson Pickett was the name of a band comprised of multiple people, not one person.  For a moment I sat in the car thinking, the whole band spontaneously died on the same day?  Wait, is Wilson Pickett just one guy?  How the hell did I get through 28 years of life without realzing that Wilson Pickett was just one guy?  I guess that means I'm still just as special as always.

One cliche after another.

Work?  I wish I could quit you.  Seriously, if my two recent trips to Greenwood Physical Therapy aren't reason enough then how about the appointment scheduled for next week? 

I've finally come to the conclusion that my body is rejecting my job like a kidney transplant gone majorily arye.  Because you know, sometimes the kidney takes.  Sometimes you only think the kidney has actually taken and then, years later, your body turns around and kicks it to the curb.  And sometimes, well...sometimes, no matter how many pills you pop or how much you try to suppress your immune system, your body's simply not having any of it. 

In my case, I'm not exactly sure how long my body has been rejecting my job but I've currently got a massive case of organ failure on my hands.  Of course, this might just be a unfortunate side effect of the commute.  But either way, I need a new drug.  One that won't make me sick.  One that won't make me crash my car, or make me feel three feet thick.  One that won't make me...sorry.

Clearly, that part about me being allergic to my job is still probably true, despite me being utterly unable to avoid quoting Huey Lewis lyrics.  I'd rather be in Thailand or San Franscico.  And if you have been there before, please send me your travel tips.  Because in February and March I'll be visiting both places.  Not at the same time.  Don't be silly. 

What's in it for you?  In return, I might send you a postcard, or a one way ticket to come join me.

Quick, into the burning building!

About a week ago a doorbell was installed on one of the back doors in our office which leads to an interior hallway.  Most people just go through the front, but sometimes, it's more convenient to sneak through the back.  The doorbell was installed because it creeped another coworker out when she didn't hear people coming and going.  Let's not focus the part where her office is no where near the front or back entrance and her complaint makes little to no sense, although, clearly...worth mentioning. 

So, I guess, the doorbell resolved her anxiety about people sneaking out of her side of the office without her knowing, but wouldn't you know it, it caused major problems for another coworker.  Namely, every other person on that side of the office that has to listen to the stupid doorbell chime every time someone decides to use that door.  Apparently one of these folks got fed up and decided the back door should be decreed an Emergency Exit Only.  Then they went ahead and printed out a sign that said as much and taped it to the door.  Because nothing says official like a flimsy white paper sign affixed with some cheap scotch tape.  (Speaking of Scotch, I'll take a double...on the rocks.)

The IT guy who installed the doorbell noticed the sign sometime late last week as he was about to step through the door, chuckled to himself, pulled the sign down, tossed it away and stepped through the door.  The next day the exact same sign once again mysteriously appeared.  Again, he took the sign down and stepped through the door.  But this time as he crossed through the threshold and arrived on the other side he noticed another sign, on the reverse side of the door.  It simply said Emergency Entrance Only.  Brilliant. 

If I Work With Fools had a contest, I'm pretty sure I'd end up with a big fat trophy and an even fatter check.  Or a trip to Hawaii.  Or all three.  Please?   

Why I Got Egan to Blog is Crazy.

Editor's note: Egan left a present in my site last night.  I had almost forgotten I gave him access.  His unedited version is in black.  My response Reality is in this color.

Egan is a cool (and humble, don't forget humble) former co-worker of mine that I never got to know all that well (when we both worked together in the same office and didn't know what the hell a blog was). 

Right before I left his current company I told him he better keep in touch or else (actually...I sent an email to all the people left at the company I didn't want to murder and shared my email so people could stay in touch). 

I even introduced him to Instant Messaging (if he says so) and then blogging (Damn straight.  I setup french word of the day and then added him as a contributor long before les singes was even a twinkle in his eye.  I think even after he started posting on the french site I still had to convince him setting up his own site would be a good idea). 

I had to pull out all the stops so I could stalk my favorite former co-worker. (Um, okay.  I don't know exactly what that means but it reminds me of a funny story.  At one point, Egan got totally paranoid and had this wild idea that Murphy and Sprizee were the same person.  Like I have time for TWO blogs, let alone writing about a city I've never seen before.  Um, anyways, moving on.)   

I had no idea what sort of monster I had created (well I had some idea which is why I encouraged him in the first place) when I suggested he start blogging (but what I didn't realize is that less than a year later Egan would be completely and utterly ADDICTED). 

Now he's getting an insane amount of comments on his blog. (Yes, even if you're smart enough to do the math and remove the 25-50% which are his, it's still a crap load of comments...unless you do the male/female ratio and well, nevermind.) 

Should I turn my back and ignore him forever?  (Will I ever give him his birthday card from his birthday last May?  Will I at least give it to him before his NEXT birthday?  All valid questions.) 

He rarely IMs me anymore because he very busy pimping his blog. (Tu mens!  He's still always still trying to distract me from The Man which is very much appreciated.) 

Well, I think he's too much fun (no such thing as too much) and I know he really cares about me.  (Word.  He's good people.) 

He wouldn't try to convince me to buy a new Passat if he didn't care.  (Or didn't work for Volkswagen.)

Sticking it

At least once a week my coworkers and I go out to lunch and end up having to split our bill four (or more) different ways.  Luckily one of my coworkers always keeps her purse stocked with mini Post-Its™.  Her innovation for splitting the bill is so simple it's almost not worth mentioning, except it's amazing how much the servers gush about us being organized (us? ha!) every single time we hand the check back with a big stack of credit cards.  It's simple.  We write the amount and stick it to our card.  That's it.  Nothing complicated.  But trust me, it makes life so much easier.

But, okay.  So you don't get it.  Or you don't want to get it.  Fine, be that way.  See if I care.  But here are some alternative reasons why you should always have a stack of Post-It notes handy in a pinch.

Post-It notes also make good __________.

• Bookmarks
• Eye patches
• Temporary band-aids
• Lint brushes
• Makeshift toilet paper
• Weapons  Just the threat of a paper cut is enough to get me listen to your each and every command.  Jump?  How high!
• In a pinch panty liners
• Flow charts  So your IT Department says they can't grant you a license for Visio?  Too expensive?  Not enough time to install the application on your machine?  Screw your IT Department!  Go old school. 
• TV screen viewing barriers  Like when you go to watch a "two hour special" of Lost and then 10 minute into the "two hour special" you realize it's really just going to be a one hour RECAP followed by a regular ol' new episode.  Covering the screen for the first hour will probably also have the added benefit of helping prevent you from hurling large objects at said TV.
• Random notes to leave on random cars of random people that you've never met like "Hi there, you don't know me but I think you're cute.  Give me a call sometime.  My number is [insert number of a friend] ".  Then place a note on your friend's car that say "I think you're really cute.  Your friend gave me your number.  I'm going to call you sometime.  I hope you don't mind [scribbled and therefore indecipherable name]".
• Name tags to stick of the foreheads of any new people you meet so that you don't experience any embarrassing episodes of forgetting people's names while talking with them.
• Blinking voice mail light blockers in the event that you're too lazy to actually check your office phone voice mail but you're completely annoyed by the blinking light.  (I confess.  I stole this one from a former coworker.  I'm lazy but I'm not that lazy.)

And I'm sure I'm forgetting a few.

Opportunity knocks

Looks like The Shire is looking for a new occupant.  Comes almost fully furnished with one adorable dog, Squid, and one really sweet guy, Seth, who can keep you entertained for hours talking to his dog, even when his dog isn't even in the next room, or the next town for that matter.  Some call his affliction cute.  Some just look at him funny.  I say he's simply got a chronic case of Dog Tourette Syndrome.  And secretly, just between you and me, I think it just makes him that much more endearing.  The dog, not Seth.  Wait, did you think I meant Seth?  Oh, lord no!  I mean, for Squid to put up with all that nonsense talking?  C'mon. 

Oh, me.  I kid, I kid.  Seth's a great guy.  Here's hoping his next roommate is cooler than the previous two put together, which would be physically impossible since they both ruled, but whatever.  Good luck finding a new roomie Seth!