August 24, 2001
me me me!
I love the Firecracker. She's one of my favorite people; one of the reasons I go into work every day. For some unfathomable reason, she persists in acting like I'm the repository for all knowledge in the universe. No matter how idiotic the question, how unlikely it is that I would know the answer, or how much more qualified everybody else in the group is to answer, she always seems to come to me first.
"YUHRI? HOW YOU DO REGULAR EXPRESSION IN SHELL?"
"YUHRI? HOW I FIND DOCTOR FOR KAISER?"
"YUHRI? HOW I FIX CAR?"
"YUHRI? THESE PANTS LOOK FUNNY?"
She caught me on the way out of the office today at lunch to tell me the latest entry in her ongoing allergy saga. A while back she started breaking out in little rashes across her body for no apparent reason; she went in to Kaiser to get them looked at, and they gave her some random medication which just ran out.
"I HAVE WORST DOCTOR IN WORLD TODAY," she told me in her usual exclamation point conversational style. "I TELL HIM, I HAVE RASH, IT ALLERGY, DOING TESTING MORE AND I OUT MEDICINE, I ASK HIM, MEDICINE NO WORKING AND HE SAY IT NO CURING. I TELL HIM, I NOT WANT TO BE LIKE MOTHER, LIKE RELATIVE FOR 20 YEAR THEY HAVE RASH IT NEVER GO AWAY AND HE SAY I TELL YOU TWO TIMES IT NO CURE HE DOESN'T WANT TO TALK ABOUT IT. AND HE SAY HE DOESN'T WANT TO TALK ABOUT IT AND HE LEAVE."
She ended on a note of righteous indignation, and I couldn't help but laugh. Poor Firecracker. She's really suffering, but she's so funny too. I love this woman. I just want to squish her.
....and now the Firecracker is convinced that we're all out to get her. "Just because you think there's a conspiracy against you, doesn't mean you're wrong," I assured her.
I adore her. Also, I'm a little frightened of her. She may only be four-foot two, but she's feisty, by gum. If she ever reads this journal, I'm a dead woman.
I promised the Guy I would write about the kegger in my kitchen, but I haven't had the energy. Also, it's my birthday, so I'm going to do what I want to do.
Hey, guess what! I was making fish faces at him in the car and looking at his bald spot, and I named it. "Skid Row." How's that? A little touch of Seattle, a little play on words....it's a bald spot on his jaw, by the way, not his head. There's a little patch of skin on his right jaw that doesn't have any hair follicles on it, so when he shaves, the razor just "skids" right off of it, see? Damn, I'm clever. His nose can be the Space Needle. It's so nice having a boyfriend with a three-dimensional face.
I'm also old. My driver's license says I'm 28. How did that happen? Just yesterday I was a blithe, happy, roly-poly 27-year-old dancing through the halls of life wearing a blue propeller beanie, and now I'm a blithe, happy, roly-poly 28-year-old skipping through the halls of life wearing a blue propeller beanie.
I stole a peach from the Guy. "They're not like this in England," he said when he bought it. "Food's expensive there, and the fruit is scrawny. Not like the fruit in the US. It's double the size and half the price."
"It's also genetically engineered," I reminded him.
"Let's hear it for genetically engineered fruit!"
"Is it ripe?" I asked him when I stole it.
"It's firm, but it's actually good. It's just like you."
I poked the peach. It was almost a perfect sphere. "Are you calling me fat?" I asked, suspiciously.
"Not at all. It's full-bodied and good, just like you," he declared.
It never ceases to entertain me, how he manages to steer clear of the word 'fat'. He's a wily one. I cackled.
I walked in to work today and found that one of my co-workers had put up a Winnie-The-Pooh chain of letters in my cube reading 'H-A-P-P-Y-B-I-R-T-H-D-A-Y.' I squeaked emotionally at her and squashed her mercilessly.
"I got you a balloon too," she said apologetically, rubbing her bruises, "but I was trying to put it in the car and it got away."
A giant box sitting on my chair turned out to be from Alex in Bryn Mawr; my teammates gathered around, devoured with curiosity, and ooh-ed and aah-ed at the spiffy present. He sent me a really neat kaleidoscope made of glass and shiny sparkly bits. Everybody demanded to have a look, which I very generously permitted, and I wasn't dancing around in anxiety that it would get dropped and broken, oh no. His card from the previous year is still sitting in splendor atop my shelf at work. Binky sent me a happy birthday email; two messages were waiting for me on the phone, one of Tara and her husband singing happy birthday -- a vaguely painful experience, since they're both moderately tone-deaf, but charming nonetheless -- and another of my sister and her boyfriend yelling the same from their work. My manager came around the corner to wish me happy birthday, and stayed to eat my cereal.
I feel Loved. Hurrah!
Okay. The Firecracker is tremendously excited about my kaleidoscope. "I WANT ONE! I GOING TO GET ONE. WHERE YOU GET?" she yelled over my cubicle wall, and then engaged me in a massive dialogue over the fact that I never seem to get 'normal' presents. "I GET NORMAL THING FOR BIRTHDAY, DINNER, FLOWERS, PERFUME, ALWAYS SAME. IS VERY BORING. YOU GET DIFFERENT THING, ALWAYS INTERESTING. YOUR FRIEND KNOW, YOU LIKE THING NOT SAME LIKE EVERYBODY ELSE."
Well, yeah, I have cool friends. There was the time my Mom gave me a dirt turtle, for instance. (For those of you who are wondering, this isn't a breed. This is, quite literally, a turtle made out of dirt.) She'd decided that I was collecting turtles. Then there was the time a friend gave me half a chess set. That is to say, all the black pieces. No board. And then there was the spiffy lucite ball I got from my sister last year, and the devil duckies and the sadistic rubiks nightmare Flamingo gave me, and the silk dying kit that Binky gave me, and the two little eggs with flat feet that Tara gave me that stick to things and spill salt and pepper. I get cool shit, yo. I don't think anybody has ever given me perfume, and I'd like to keep it that way. Don't buy me feminine crap. I'm not good at being feminine. Buy me shiny things, colorful things, things that fly or roll or bounce or twist, things I can play with that'll make me laugh and other people swear.
Overwhelmed with compassion for the poor Firecracker, I interrupted her as she complained about never being able to get out anymore to volunteer to babysit for her round-headed baby. She became quite giddy with delight. Also, very loud. My roommate will be ecstatic. She loves babies.
Incidentally, I hate my birth stone. Peridot. Peri-dot. It's bile-green. Whoever thought that was a good idea?
Broadband Network Management Solutions, Monitor Development
Weekly Project Status Report, 8/24.
Accomplished: blah, blah, blah, blah... Turned 28. I'm a grown-up, yay!
Next Week Goals: blah, blah, blah, blah... Grow to be five feet two inches tall.