I had a weird dream last night.

What happened.

Well I was playing baseball but it was different from regular baseball.

It was softball?

What? No. It wasn’t softball. It was baseball but when the batter came up to hit they got into an open aired space craft, like in the cartoons, and went up the air and the ball was pitched straight up and the hitter hit it  even higher. And on the field all the people run around the diamond getting lots of runs. And if your team caught the ball you could pitch it up in the air again the hitter in the aircraft could hit it again and you could get more runs. But then when it fell to the ground it turned into a donut and Britney Spears ate it and the game was over.

What? Did you parse about this?

No, why would I parse about this?

So they would know you take hallucinatory drugs.

As Husband is unemployed he decided to come with me to the grocery store this week. I did not make him come, he came of his own free will.

Why don’t you go over there and get bananas while I look for apples.

I get a look. Husband rolls around looking for bananas and then returns.

When I said I would come to the grocery store with you I meant to push the cart. I didn’t really want to do anything.

House Husband he is not, but he did buy me a cookie…which is good because who doesn’t love a cookie and bad because I didn’t need a cookie.

So I mentioned very briefly that Husband’s company is shutting down. I would tell you what kind of company but if I did then everyone searching for it would find my blog and my anonymity would be gone because there aren’t too many around. Anyway, the company is closed, furniture is being sold and Husband is searching for a job.

Fortunately, his schooling and experience mean that unlike 10% of the country suffering from unemployment, he should be able to find a job relatively quickly. Whether it is really what he wants to do is another question.

As far as I’m concerned if I don’t really care what he does as long as he likes it and it comes with a corporate relocation package. I’m so tired of packing up and moving.

We will probably also try to squeeze in a last minute vacation between moving and starting the new job (not a cruise if I have any say in the matter).  Not having the flexibility to take off whenever you want without having to request vacation time is definitely going to be the hardest thing about Husband moving back to a corporate job.  Random is currently in Australia…doesn’t Australia sound like the perfect last minute vacation?  I wonder if we can just get the cash for a corporate move, pack ourselves and use the left overs for Australia?  It’s the only way I’m going to be motivated to pack.

That was such a frugal Indian person thing to say…except if I really was a frugal Indian person the left over relocation money would go into something boring like our house fund not on a vacation.

So, on to the next thing, whatever that may be.

While on my flight to Chicago in August I was thumbing through the Delta magazine and found an ad for scanmyphoto.com, a website that (duh) scans all your old photos for pretty reasonable rates. When I was in Houston I told my mom that I wanted to go through all our old photos and get some of them scanned. All the photos from 1977 (the year my parents go married) to 1990 are in a big jumbled mess in two old cabinets from Hong Kong. So one evening my mom and went through all of them culling out things that I wanted to save digitally, including my parent’s wedding photos, that photo of me naked learning to use the toilet and all sorts of vacation photos.

What I discovered in all those photos was that the 80s truly were an awful decade for fashion.  I mean I knew about the big hair, acid washed jeans and leg warmers but seeing it on me brought home how truly awful the 80s were.  My (and the family’s) fashion faux pas are about to become your entertainment. Trust me when I post the photo of my dad wearing what can only be described as daisy dukes, you will be entertained.  And maybe horrified.

So without further ado, I bring you the first in a Parsingtime series.

This can only be titled what the hell were my parents thinking?   I think someone had probably been watching The Sound of Music a few too many times.

Do you love how the shoes match the apron/pinafore thing going on in front?

What’s hilarious is this photo was taken in Saudi Arabia during Christmas time. It was all of 80 degrees outside but that warranted long sleeves and a side ponytail. Also what is up with those bangs?

We’ve been trying to get together for dinner with some new friends here in Charlotte for several weeks now. It seems the weekends they are free we aren’t or vice versa. So Husband suggested that perhaps we try for a weeknight sometime.

The guys response?  We spend weeknights with our dog. He is home alone all day so we try to spend the evenings with him.

I understand loving your dog.  Some people even treat their dogs like kids. But if your dogs or kids are keeping you from going out on a weeknight forevermore, you have a problem.

In the last week or so I’ve somehow morphed from my regular self into an 80-year-old woman who carries a cane and hits people who are rude.  It is unclear if this is ongoing PMS or because there was a full moon last week or if I have just become stark raving mad.

I already told you about my airport pet peeve but what I didn’t tell you was that I gave a 40-year-old lady who was carrying on some serious Patagonia luggage (the kind of packs which look so hardcore that they make me think you have been camping in Patagonia and had to carry out your own dirty toilet tissue because you believe in leaving no trace behind) an evil look for having her two back packs on two separate seats. And after the stare down and I asked if anyone was sitting in those seats and made her move her damn backpack.  That backpack had probably just come from hiking Torres del Paine. It didn’t need the comfort of the seat.  What I didn’t do was kick her in the shins. But I did think about it.

Then yesterday, I was waiting for a parking spot at Trader Joe’s (which btw, I hope we don’t move somewhere without a Trader Joe’s. That would make me very sad. Where else would I get clementines this early in the season?) with my blinker on waiting for a lady with an empty shopping cart to pass in front of me.  She then proceeded to put her empty shopping cart in the middle of the space I was waiting for and then strolled back to her car.  The shopping cart rack was two spaces over. I was infuriated. Beyond what is normal, which is why I believe I’ve become a curmudgeonly old lady.  So I opened my window, looked over her and in a tone of voice that was completely mild but contained all the wrath I could muster, I told her that she was an extremely rude person. She looked shocked and then turned to look back at her cart and then went on to her car.

I really hate to admit this, but I don’t even feel bad. Not one little bit.  I was rude to a complete stranger (who will probably be the person who interviews me for my next job), Emily Post certainly would not approve and a day later all I can think is she was rude. She saw me waiting for that spot. There weren’t any other spots. If I had a cane I might have hit her car. But that might constitute battery to her property and with all my recent police issues I really don’t need to be arrested so I probably wouldn’t have done that.

But I would have thought about it.

In my defense I had just come from representing a friend in traffic court.  Traffic court in Gastonia County would be put anyone in a foul mood.

Can I just say I hate airports. People are unbelievably inconsiderate. For example I hate (HATE) when there is no seating and people have their briefcases and bags on the seat next to them. Bags can sit on the floor. My ass doesn’t think it should have to sit on the floor.  I also find that I am physically incapable of not showering after a flight. Planes are inherently dirty in my opinion.

I’m also not the best flier. It’s not that I don’t like flying but being cooped up for several hours in one location means I go stir crazy. I usually finish whatever book I’m reading in record time and still have several hours to kill.  My flight to Houston was one of those flights. I did the cross word puzzle and the three star Soduku and that killed oh, half an hour and then I was bored again. So I pulled out the Skymall Magazine. There is some stupid crap in that magazine.

First up is the marshmallow bazooka. When are you ever going to need to shoot marshmallows 40 feet?  Never, because it won’t hurt. If I’m going to buy something with bazooka in the name it better have a comic in the wrapper for me to read or it better cause damage and harm to the things I’m aiming at. This does neither. Fail.

Next, the Solafeet Foot Tanner. For people who get sock tans. It is $229! The ad says you can go from the golf course to the club house with confidence. No unsightly white lines or people gawking at your feet.  Who gawks at feet?  This is stupid and will probably make your feet look like the shade of orange that Joe Biden’s face is currently sporting.

A stainless steel wallet. I don’t even understand the point of this.

And these are just ridiculous. Who wants their neighbors to know they support the Yankees and that they think the tree things from the Lord of the Rings are cool? No one, that’s who.

And lastly, if you want to kill the mood and make sure your spouse never wants to sleep with you again, wear these.  Also going to the bathroom in the  middle of the night would be a complete disaster. Imagine how chilly you would be.

This week I saw the Homechicken get married and dance like there was no tomorrow. In ten years of knowing him I had no idea he liked to dance. You learn something new every day. Congrats, Homechicken and Aamrapali! Enjoy Thailand.  It was nice to hang out with friends in Austin as well. Husband and I miss that city.  We hit up Rudy’s, EZs (for milkshakes), Einsteins, Trudy’s, The COOP and Loop 360, which is Husband’s favorite drive. And we got to meet the lovely Ashley/Ashleigh from Taiwan.

I met with my old boss. It went really well. He has a potential new client for me. I just sent him my marketing materials to pass along to new company. He also had no idea that Lucius passive aggressively fired me. That made for some fun discussions as I believe Lucius’ biggest weakness is his inability to make a decision and old boss believes it is his inability to multi-task.  Both are terrible if you are going to be the general counsel to a Fortune 500 company.

I haven’t been blogging because I’ve been so busy hanging out with my family. It had been a lot of fun and hopefully it won’t be ten months before I see them again. It probably won’t since the big news of the last month has been that Husband’s company is shutting down. Yup, totally gone and not even existing as an entity anymore. Very sad. But the right decision in this economy. He is now looking for a job, which stresses him out a bit but it will all work out. Probably in 2010 since 2009 continues to mess with our lives in sick and twisted ways. More on that later.

I’m back in NC tonight, which means I have to do my own cooking and nobody will be spoiling me silly. Sad.

If you were wondering why eleven year olds shouldn’t have kids, here is the reason:

I used to play with my toys but now she is my new toy. She is so beautiful, I love her. Violeta is the child and I must grow up. I am not going back to school – I am a mother now.

I’m in Houston. It is 6:30 and I can’t sleep.  I’ve already run (with new shoes I bought yesterday, woo hoo) and I have nothing to do until 9. Things I’ve realized since being home?  Dinner tastes a million times better when someone else makes it.  Though perhaps that is because my mom is a million times better cook than I am. Speaking of my mom, I’ve lost 6-7 lbs since July (that colonoscopy really kick started things) and my mom totally did not notice. Her comment to me was, “you weren’t fat before.”  The point isn’t that I was fat before the point is that I lost weight and am way more excited about it than I should be. So you should be too.  I’m waiting to see my grandmother, she will notice the weight loss and make complaints about young people today and it will be awesome.

Drivers in Houston are crazy. I used to be one of them and now all that aggression and car honking is just annoying. I mean does it really matter if you get to your destination 30 seconds later than you had hoped? Yes, yes it does, in Houston at least. But I have lunch with a former co-worker today and she suggested Vietnamese and I almost cried because I haven’t had Vietnamese food since I was in NYC in 2008.  The driving sucks in Houston but the food can’t be beat.

I’m also meeting with my old boss today. It always makes me nervous. This is the man who hired me sight unseen in law school (based on a recommendation), gave me a job post law school and helped me start my business. I never feel like I’m living up to the potential he has always seen in me. For some reason, it is important to me that he is never disappointed in what I do work wise.  Fortunately, I have a killer outfit picked out and I look awesome in a business suit, despite not having worn one in probably a year.  It did mean an extra pair of shoes in the suitcase and given that I’m here for a wedding with those shoes on top of the ones I normally bring, I brought way too many shoes.

There have been complaints from a certain person in San Francisco ( I shall name this person Sunshine, because I find it amusing to give someone in a hardcore business a hippy dippy pseudonym.) that there hasn’t been anything substantive on the blog for a while. I would argue that there hasn’t been anything substantive since this blog started. Regardless, the semi regular blogs will return eventually, Sunshine.  I’ve hit a bit of a dry spell since Husband has put a gag order on the subject of his work. Once it has lifted we will return to our regularly scheduled programming.