Thursday, October 29, 2009

Random Observations

  • My parents bought a Smart Car. It is essentially a rollerskate with an engine. It is tiny. And it shifts oddly. It has a manual transmission but you don’t have to manually change gears. I don’t understand. Anyway, it’s tiny and sort of go-cart-like, but it’s great for them, since my dad has a nearly 40 mile commute into work and this car gets about 45 miles to a gallon. Still, rollerskate.
  • Today, faced with yet another gray, rainy day (seriously, there has been one sunny day in the entire month of October), I couldn’t stomach the idea of having cold, wet feet again. So I put on my Wellies. There are black with pink trim and multicolor polka-dots. MJ got them for me. I love them. But apparently other people have a hard time reconciling my late-20s lawyer persona with my goofy polka-dot rain boots. I got a lot of strange looks.
  • My job entails working in a call center helping other lawyers with their research questions. It’s not difficult work and the days actually fly by since I’m so constantly busy. The call center takes calls from across the country (the world, actually, but I really only get calls from the U.S.). In my short time here I have learned that people from New York are really kind of rude. Well, they come off as rude to my Midwestern sensibilities, but, I guess they are really just more abrupt and less patient. And a couple of them have taken a little too much pleasure in rubbing in the Yankees win over the Twins. I told them all I was looking forward to watching the Yanks lose the Series.
  • I also learned that I have the cutest little accent ever. I guess I sound like an extra from Fargo. And here I thought I was pretty accent neutral, other than my pronunciation of the word “bagel” which doesn’t come up all that often during research calls.
  • I have to wear an ID badge at work, but today I’m wearing a sweater dress and I have nowhere to clip the thing unless I hang it from the hem of my dress, which would force my ID badge to dangle rather unbecomingly below my knees.
  • I have what I call a zombie zit. It won’t die. It disappears for a little while, but it always comes back, bigger and badder. I was complaining about it to my mom, who goes, “Oh, well, not to worry you, but that’s how your dad’s skin cancer started.”
    Not to worry me?! My dad had basal cell carcinoma, which, if you have to have skin cancer, is the way to go, but they took a CHUNK out of his NOSE and it was CANCER. I’ve already had pieces of “questionable” skin dug out of my shoulders, some of which exhibited some pre-cancerous growth. I am not messing around.
    So I tried to get a dermatology appointment, but, haha, they’re booked through May. I got in to see a regular doctor, who looked at the zombie zit and wrote me two prescriptions to try to make it go away. When she found out about my dad’s skin cancer and my own issues, she gave me strict instructions to come back in 6 weeks if the zombie zit hasn’t gone away. So far, with just one day of the prescriptions, the zombie zit is looking a bit better.
  • I got new glasses from zennioptical.com. They were $25, including shipping, anti-reflective coating, a case and a microfiber cleaning cloth. And I LOVE them. They are cute, nice and lightweight, and they fit well. I was worried that because I was buying glasses at 1/10 the price I’d pay for them in a store they would suck, but they are just as nice as the ones I’ve purchased at the optometrist’s office or glasses stores. The shipping was superfast, the customer service rep I talked to when I thought my order hadn’t gone through was very helpful, and the whole experience was awesome. Highly recommend it.
  • I got an iphone. Or, more accurately, the mister bought one for me as a belated birthday gift. It is awesome.

4 comments:

sarah said...

You need a lanyard for your badge! I have to wear a security badge for work, and wearing a lanyard is much better than always trying to find a place to clip that stupid thing (although you can't really wear a necklace at the same time without starting to get the early Madonna/layered jewelry look).

Pickles and Dimes said...

I see those Smart Cars all the time, and all I want to do is ram into them bumper car-style.

This October is depressing. Rain? Check. Colder than average temps? Check. Leaves that don't really change color but just fall off the trees anyway, leaving no satisfactory crunching noises when you step on them? Check.

I read a study somewhere that talked about cultural personality differences. It related a story about rude NY traffic controllers and one plane's pilot and copilot who were too intimidated to relay the urgency of their emergency (low fuel), and instead of insisting they land first, kept circling and circling (per the abrasive traffic controller's orders) and eventually ran out of fuel and crashed. (Also, I effing hate the g-damn Yankees so freaking much. Go Phillies!)

That glasses website sounds awesome! Did you just have to send them your prescription? I might try that next time I go to the eye doctor in a few months.

MOLLY said...

I agree - I want to ram Smart cars too. Maybe too much "Grand Theft Auto" playing for this girl? :)

How does the precription information work on that glasses website? And how did you convince your eye doctor to give you your prescription?

Buster said...

I just asked my eye doctor for my prescription. If I remember right, under MN law they are REQUIRED to give you a copy of it if you ask, but mine didn't give me a hard time at all. And, in my humble opinion, if they give you shit about it, it's time to find a new doctor.

The prescription will have all the information you need and you just input it in the correct boxes once you pick out your glasses. My one suggestion is to have your eye doctor measure your pupillary distance (the distance between your pupils). I did not do this, I had the mister do it, and because he is a perfectionist, it took 45 minutes and a scary tool from the garage before he was done.