Thinking of Seattle...

I won’t whine about the rain anymore. Granted, it’s raining again but I’ve convinced myself that this is what it’s like to live in Seattle and to celebrate, I drank a lot of coffee.

I’ve actually always quite fancied going to Seattle. It just seems like an interesting place. I think it might be because it’s supposed to be a lot like England but, also, it just seems to be pretty nifty. Plus, my good friend Saz was there on a business trip last week and she said they have an awesome market called Pikes’ Place Market where you can pretty much buy every ingredient known to man.

Also, I like coffee. Seattle has coffee. I think that means I should go there someday.

I used to travel a lot more when I was a bit younger. This is partly because I had a job as an International Market Research Analyst so I got to travel. I didn’t do too much international travel there. This was because when we had to do an international market research study, we’d figure out what country we needed to do our study in and then hire another market research company to do all the work. Then we’d slap our logo and label on the report and give it to our client. I did get to go to twice though. Since I was the token British person, my boss would send me. I liked that. I was supposed to go to Paris once because I’d sort of exaggerated the fact that I spoke French when I’d applied for that job. Fortunately, it fell through and I went to London instead. I was relived. I had been studying French by using tapes but I hadn’t progressed much past the “Where are the toilets?” and “Where is the wine?” stage of my education.

I also travelled a bit with my family. When I was in college, my dad went through a road warrior phase and bought an RV. My younger siblings and I would go with him and mum on trips down south. My older brother never went because he didn’t want to and my parents thought he was responsible enough to stay home alone. Since he was over 18 at this point, it made sense.

Still, I got to go. Mostly, it was quite fun at first. There was the time when we got stuck in an RV park in Alabama during a minor hurricane. That was a wee bit alarming because an RV isn’t exactly the most sturdy and weatherproof place to be. However, by the time we got to Alabama, we were told that it was too late to miss the hurricane so the best thing to do would be batten down the hatches and wait it out.

We did. It was very windy and rainy and loud. Fortunately, we didn’t blow away. I’m glad it was just a minor hurricane.

Then there was the time we went to Texas and didn’t get to the RV until after dark. When we woke up the next day and went outside, there were these sand dunes all over the place and lots of scorpions and scary spiders.

Then there was the time when I was interning in Maine during my college years and my family went camping in the RV to Florida without me. They went to Disneyworld. Naturally, I wasn’t there for that trip even though I had been wanting to go there for years. It’s ok mum, I’ve mostly forgiven you all for that. I mean just because when I went in the RV with you and the rest of the family, we went to Florida but didn’t go to Disney World, it’s ok.

Just kidding. I’m over it. Besides, I moved to L.A. and got to go to Disneyland a lot. It wasn’t quite the same but it did make up for it.

Then, of course, there was the time I actually did move to L.A. and my parents and I drove out there and then, when I came home, my friend and I drove back to Indiana. This means I saw a lot of the U.S. I had never seen before. Combined with my internships in Maine, one to which I drove rather than flew, I’ve pretty much seen most of the country.

Except Seattle. Which is the whole point of this blog today. Actually, I’ve never seen the Pacific Northwest at all. When I was actually working for the market research company, my friend Saz had to do a report on the Salmon of the Pacific Northwest for a legislative-y type of job she had and it inspired me to write a story about the Salmon of the Pacific Northwest but, well, that’s pretty much the closest I’ve come.

Although I’ve eaten plenty of salmon since then. I’m a big fan of salmon.

I also watch “Grey’s Anatomy” which is set in Seattle. However, watching “Grey’s” doesn’t exactly inspire you to live there because if you believed that show, it would be the single most important place for rare medical events ever. Just to name a few: trees growing in lungs, babies that grow in intestines without any fluid, men who eat doll heads, people who get little fishes that swim up their penises and live inside the human body, people who literally turn into fossilized trees and people who a) get impaled by a tree, b) fall out of trees or c) get knocked out of trees because they’re staging a protest. In the world of “Grey’s Anatomy,” trees are evil.

So, I’ll ignore the “Grey’s” take on Seattle and just keep it on my list of places to go to someday. After all, I’m experienced with rain and I drink coffee. I drink a lot of coffee.

Which, actually, you can probably tell from reading this blog. Note to Captain Monkeypants: Do not drink so much coffee when blogging, it inspires randomness.

However, at least I’m not complaining about the rain.

Still...maybe I do need more coffee.

Happy Wednesday!

The Limit of Zombies and Other Musings...

Today, it is Tuesday. This is significant because it means it is NOT Monday. Also, Tuesdays are always much kinder than Mondays.

My Tuesday began with a dream about zombies. It was a rather alarming dream in which I discovered that not only was there a zombie apocalypse out there but, also, I had been volunteered to join the fighters who were going to take them on. This lead to a rather alarming reunion with virtually every human being who’s played a role in my life that turned into a dance party. This, of course, was penetrated by the zombies and when I escaped to safety with all of the people I knew, it turned out we were actually already dead and we were to walk into the light together.

I blame this dream on a) my catching up on AMC’s “The Walking Dead” TV show. It has sat on my DVR for months. I’m finally watching it. It’s true zombie glory. If you like zombies. I do. I also blame it on b) the TV show “Lost” because at the end of “Lost”, the cast finds out they’re all dead and walks into the light.

I probably should have done the courteous ***SPOILER ALERT*** on the above paragraph just in case you haven’t seen “Lost” in its entirety yet and I’ve just ruined it. Yet, mean as it sounds, if you haven’t and still don’t want to be spoiled almost a YEAR after it aired, that’s not my problem. Also, it’s nothing that won’t have been spoiled by every entertainment magazine/website/blog out there.

Besides, I was talking about my dream which was an amalgamation of two TV shows as well as my own bizarrely twisted imagination. If you throw in the fact that the character of Bailey from “Grey’s Anatomy” was also in my dream and she joined us in the afterworld because she was killed by zombies while performing surgery, it’s an amalgamation of THREE TV shows. This goes to show a few things- a) How impressed you are that I used the word amalgamation without having to reach for a thesaurus to do so, (Ok, fine, I thought not), b) I let TV seep a little too much into my subconscious and c) even when you’re dreaming, thinking you and everyone you love is dead is a little scary.

By the way, I refuse to acknowledge that perhaps it also means I watch too much TV. I’d like to think I have a nice healthy balance of TV shows. On a week with no reruns, it’s probably six hours a week. Maybe seven if I watch the “Graham Norton Show” on BBC America on a Saturday evening. Given that each show has adverts and runs at approximately 42 minutes per show, even with Graham Norton, this means I really only watch 4.9 hours of TV. Really, in the grand scheme of things, that isn’t really very much when you consider how much I could be watching. Yes, I’m defensive. Also, I love TV, so there.

One more thing, Food Network doesn’t count as TV time. Now, if Bobby Flay had been one of the zombies in my dream or Mario Batali had his brain eating by a pack of zombies then you might argue that my TV time should be curtailed a little.

I digress. The fact is, I dreamed I was dead this morning. Being dead in a dream is fascinating because one part of you knows it’s a dream and the other is slightly freaked out when you wake up that you might actually be dead. Even when you awaken to the weight of a small dachshund sitting on your head and waiting to start licking your nose as soon as your eyes open, there’s still a slight moment of disorientation as to whether you’re still in the dream or not and are, in fact, still dead in the dream.

I’m glad I wasn’t really dead. Also, I’m glad that all my friends/family/acquaintances who moved on into the light with me in my dream are also not dead. That would be weird. Also, it would mean I was on a first name basis with Bailey from “Grey’s Anatomy” and considering she’s a fictional character, that would be rather peculiar and unrealistic.

Then there are the zombies. I’ve had a lot of dreams about zombies lately. This is actually what triggered me to actually watch “The Walking Dead” because I had a dream about zombies.

I like zombies. I like “The Walking Dead”. I think, however, it’s time to move onto another horror-creature that’s a little…less limited.

The thing with zombies is they really don’t do much but lurch and shuffle, look disgusting and eat brains, flesh or body parts. Sometimes, they grunt “BRAINS” a lot. Sometimes, they’re created by a virus. Sometimes they’re created by a supernatural occurrence. Sometimes, they’re just…created with no explanation given. Yet, really, there’s not much you can do with a zombie. They try to kill the non-zombie-still-humans. The non-zombie-still-humans form little groups to try to destroy the zombies. Yet, ultimately, when the world has experienced a zombie apocalypse, what’s the end result going to be, really? It’s the population of the world as zombies against a rag-tag bunch of survivors. Procreation can only do so much.

At least with werewolves and vampires, there’s still a human tie. They can think and feel and thus, have personalities. Granted, this is not always the case (see: Twilight) but the potential is there. Not so much with a zombie. If a zombie did have a personality, he probably wouldn’t be a zombie, would he? Because if zombies become reasoning, thinking things that live in a somewhat civilized manner, we’d call them a vampire. We already have a genre for that.

You might wonder why I’ve just spent 15 minutes randomly musing about dreams and zombies. The fact is…I have absolutely no idea. It’s Fat/Shrove Tuesday today (aka: Mardi Gras); I probably should have written about that or something else more meaningful.

Still, for today, you get one of my more random blogs. Feel free to chime in on your own thoughts about zombies. I’m happy to entertain the possibility that I’m wrong and they’re not nearly as limited as I think.

Besides, it might even mean another dream about zombies which you’ll get to hear about. Aren’t you lucky?

Thanks, as always for reading!

Happy Fat/Shrove Tuesday, happy Mardi Gras and watch out for those zombies (although it might be hard if you’re going to a true Mardi Gras celebration!)

Friday Ramblings: Philosophers, Brazen Bulls and (of course) Green Day...

I was robbed of my rainy day yesterday. I got out of work to discover the betrayal of the sun who had stolen the rainy day away and conquered. Currently, the sun is shining this morning even though the rain is supposed to move in later. We'll see. I think the only true way to predict the weather is to stick your head out the door and see what it's currently doing. Predicting any further than the current minute is a bit iffy.

Not to worry. It's Friday and it's sunny. I can't exactly complain about either of those two facts. As an added bonus, Green Day's new album has been released. If you haven't bought it/downloaded it, do it now. If your computer is anything like mine at home, if you start on iTunes now, you might have it by this evening. I was hoping to put the, uh, 'full' version of the album on my iPod instead of the sneakily obtained version I got last week. However, for now, I'll have to settle with that version. By this evening, I can put my pre-ordered iTunes version on my iPod along with the four bonus tracks. This is a good Friday.

As always, I'm glad it's Friday. It's been a rather long week for some reason. It's been TV season finale week for some of my shows which means as of next Monday after 24 finishes, I'm done with TV until Fall. I might watch some on DVD but since I dislike almost all reality-TV, I barely tune in for anything during the summer. It's rather liberating, actually. It means I can focus on getting my stuff packed up to move. It means I'll have more time to write. And yes, sadly, there are some nights where I'd rather watch TV than write.

Speaking of writing, I've noticed I'm not the only post in response to Nathan Bransford's blog. A lot of writers seem to be disagreeing with my point of view. I like that, actually. I still stand by my claim that writing is a craft, not a profession but it's interesting to hear other writers disagree. For the record, I also will claim 'blogger' as part of my identity. I don't get paid for that, either. I was thinking about that...where does the craft end and profession begin? What about philosophers? People are philosophers but...there aren't many professional philosopher jobs out there. Do you ever pull up Craigslist or Monster.com and see "Wanted: Philospher?" Does anyone ever want a philosopher? And yet....almost every university offers a degree in it. Interesting.

Sorry, I'm digressing. Well, actually I'm not sorry. It's a Friday post. I always digress and ramble on Fridays. I think it's because I stay up too late on Thursdays. Last night it was because of the stupid Grey's Anatomy season finale. Which, in my opinion, was pretty awful but I have a TV blog for ranting about that. I suppose its inevitable that even the good shows go downhill at some point but...I was hoping it wouldn't happen to Grey's which has suddenly decided it wants to be ER when it grows up.

Anyway, moving on...I've discussed philosophers, Green Day, TV and weather...I suppose I could throw politics in but I'll leave that to those that know more than me. I confess, I'm not terribly political. I want to make up stories for a living, would you really want to hear my opinions on politics?

I do keep hearing about waterboarding though. Apparently that's a hot topic along with the discussion of torture. I watch 24, waterboarding seems like a mild torture method after seeing Jack Bauer grab a hacksaw or use a hotel lamp and bowl of water to electrocute a suspect into talking. Also, I found an article on the website "How Stuff Works" the other day about ten brutal torture methods from the days of yore. Wow, people were cruel! The worst was this giant bronze bull, called the Brazen Bull, in which they'd trap their victim, lock him in and then heat the bull over a fire so the victim would roast to death, literally. When he screamed, his scream would be modulated so it sounded like the bull was roaring. There were others. I won't spoil your dinner with them but wow...when it comes to punishing people, we humans are creative. And brutal.

Ok, I think that might be enough random thoughts for one Friday. You might start thinking I'm a little dark and twisty since I seem to be fascinated with torture methods. Not that I support torture but I am fascinated by creativity in doing so.

Perhaps I ought to talk about something happy and bright like...butterflies and flowers. There are some lovely lilacs beside the entrance to my apartment building. They smell heavenly, even when it rains. There, you can have that as the image with which to finish reading my blog, not the giant bronze bull. That I just brought up again. Oops.

Have a great weekend!

Thursday Randomness

It snowed a little last night. It's very pretty but not icy which means I'm feeling poetical about snow again. Don't worry, I won't write about it today. I'll give it a couple more snowfalls before I start talking about the twirling, whirling flakes that create their buffer of peace for the world.

It's Thursday, as I'm sure you know. Unless you're one of those people who can't remember what day it is when you wake up and don't bother checking because knowing doesn't really alter your day all that much. I have a friend like that. I have a feeling he only knows it's the weekend because there are movies opening and he's got a radar for those things. I always know what day it is because I'm a regular TV viewer and I know what show is on that night. This time of year is a little tricky for that though because it's coming up on the winter hiatus and most of my shows are off the air now until January. I probably should just rely on a calendar. I love calendars.

This morning, I took my stray to campus again. He's getting sneaky. I went to leave my apartment and he was waiting outside the building. I'd started to leave a few minutes before but realized I forgot to turn my thermostat down. When I'd left then, he'd been coming down the stairs and I knew he was headed to my place. When I went outside to my car, there he was. He had his cell-phone out but wasn't dialing. He seemed surprised when I politely asked if he needed a ride but it was the type of surprise you feign when you're secretely hoping for something. Like when someone says "let's have lunch, my treat" and you're supposed to say, "Oh, really, are you sure? It doesn't have to be your treat" and then you hope they insist so that you get a nice free lunch. Of course, this backfires if they say, "Oh, alright then, we'll go dutch."

I didn't mind giving him a ride though. It's the last time since his class is over. Of course, had I know that he was stuck for a ride because his class was ICE SKATING, I might have been a little less generous. I mean, Ice-Skating? Seriously? Not that there is anything wrong with ice skating- I can fall on my bottom with the best of amateurs but I thought it was one of those " I stayed up all night to get ready for it and now I'm going to flunk because I can't make it to campus" classes. Ice skating wasn't what I imagined his crisis was. Oh well, glad I could help him become a better skater. Or something.

Anyway, being Thursday, it is The Office and 30 Rock night. Normally, it'd be "Grey's Anatomy" but that's done until January. This is actually a good thing. I used to love my Thursday night ritual of glass of wine and Grey's. Lately, as I've mentioned in my other blog, I'm a little worried about that show. The last three episodes have made me angry. I don't like being angry at Grey's. It's like having a fight with my best friend. It means I can't rely on it for escapism at the moment because the storylines have been making me want to escape from the show.

So, without Grey's, I think I'm going to get festive. I have Christmas cards to send and presents to wrap and some nice holiday movies to entertain me while I do so. My absolute favourite is "Love, Actually" because it's a fantastic film, I love everyone in it and it makes me extremely happy and hopeful that everyone can find love. I'm very susceptible to a good, non-sappy, romantic film like that. Also, I love British actors and it's rare that you find one film that has as many great British actors in it as that one. Except, maybe, Harry Potter but they're all split up. "Love, Actually" has Alan Rickman, Bill Nighy, Emma Thompson and Hugh Grant along with many others who I love. I won't watch that tonight though: "Love, Actually" deserves it's own evening, not to be spent multi-tasking. That's what "Elf" is for. I can feel my mother cringing as she reads that. She's not big on movies like "Elf." She also hates "The Santa Clause" which is my dad and my tradition for Christmas Eve. Sadly, I enjoy "The Santa Clause," mostly because it's syrupy and silly and a nice habit to have for the holidays.

I think I'm going to have to apologize for the randomness of my blogs this week. I haven't had a great week. I got myself into a nasty dark mood as I indicated earlier. It's better now but I hate getting into a funk like that. It makes me doubt myself which is definitely not a good thing. Self-delusion is so much less painful and makes the world all shiny and pretty. Like snow. Snow can be shiny. Snow is pretty. And there's still snow on the ground outside. But I promised to hold my lyrical musings on that for the day and so I'll honour my promise. For now.

Happy Thursday.

Random Rants

I'm in the mood to randomly babble and rant today. I have no idea why. Well, actually I do. I just woke up, I don't feel like being a morning person today and I'm drinking the vile office coffee.

On the plus side, I did manage to get rather a lot of good Halloween chocolate, lollipops and candy at CVS yesterday at 75% off so I brought it into the office. I have learned that one of the cardinal rules of getting your coworkers to like you is to give them a copious amount of sugary items. These items are best when in the form of chocolate. However for those smart sucker-uppers like me, you have learned that there's always someone in the office on a diet. Thus, you bring in lollipops (about 1 weightwatcher point each) and Twizzlers- low in fat, high in sugar. I have learned that basic dieters (not the hardcore ones who are truly following a diet) will look at the fact that something has no fat, decide that's a good thing and eat it. I confess that I do this. In my world, when a food is low calorie/no calorie and low fat/no fat, it is good to eat it because it is healthy.

Yes, I am aware that this does not really mean something is healthy. Nor does it mean it's not having a negative impact on my digestive system. There are a lot of other things in food I should be worried about like fiber, transfats, sodium...all that. And, oh yeah, those carbohydrate things. The problem with that is my favourite foods are all high in carbs. I love bread. I love potatoes. I love pasta. So, I've found away around the carbs-are-not-good-for-me-obstacle: I just ignore them and rationalize why I can eat foods anyway. Bread has grains which are good for me. Potatoes are a vegetable and thus, by the Rule of "Because it's a vegetable, it's always healthy", they are good for me. Pasta...well, I usually try to put a tomato-y sauce on my pasta and so I invoke the rule of "Because it's a vegetable" again. By adding a vegetable to pasta, it automatically cancels out the badness of the carbohydrates.

And yes, Captain Monkeypants is fully aware that she is under a self-imposed spell of delusion. Captain Monkeypants is also attempting to be a professional writer and thus, delusion is a necessary survival tool to have in her armory.

I was planning on ranting about Twilight again and why the poster for the movie makes me cringe. So I'm going to. Now. Not to Movie Promoter People: Edward looks like he's about to fall asleep. Also, his eyes do not look like "liquid amber" as described so frequently in the books. They look like he might have had a few too many psychotropic drugs. Also, I know he's supposed to be pale but he's also supposed to pass for a human because otherwise, how could he have been going to school for, like, two hundred years or whatever? The poster makes him look like he's a zombie. It also makes me wonder what he's looking at down on the floor. Did he drop something? Did he spot a particularly juicy spider that he's thinking about eating since he's a 'vegetarian' vampire (only drinks the blood of animals so take that, PETA!)? And Bella...well, actually, she looks as boring as expected. I never could understand how such a drip could get someone like Edward but I suppose that's the point- ordinary girls can find extraordinary men to love them. It's been the premise of every successful romance from Cinderella to today's Chick Lit avalanche so, clearly, it's a formula that works.

Since not everyone has read Twilight, I'll stop now.

Also, the ladybugs are back. Not the same ones since I did end up committing genocide and leaving the poor little buggers (HA!) in my vacuum bag. No, their friends are here. I could hear the flapping of their wings when I woke up in the night. I tried to ignore the fear in me that they would decide to swarm in retailian for the fact that I'd murdered their friends. I was also afraid they'd enlist more jumping spiders to join in the fight. They didn't but the fear was there anyway and so I didn't sleep that well. I'm going to try NOT to vacuum this batch up. But I'm telling you, one indication that they're forming a Gathering and those things are gone.

At least it's Thursday. Thursdays are good. I'm a fan of Grey's Anatomy. Although, I just found out that ABC ordered the show to fire Dr. Hahn....well, actually the actress who plays doctor Hahn who was the lady from Silence of the Lambs who had to put the lotion on (It's way more effective when Buffalo Bill says that in the movie). It's something to do with the fact that the network doesn't like the storyline she's involved in because her character just came out and admitted she's gay. The storyline wasn't that compelling but it was actually pretty natural. It wasn't some ratings stunt but an organic progression of two women who started as friends and grew much closer. I suppose the show did go into a fair amount of detail about the sex between the women but it's on at 9 p.m. It's not like they showed it. I think the show has bigger things to worry about, honestly. I mean, Izzie is still on it. I can't stand Izzie. She's a self-righteous whiner who gets on my nerves.

I'm digressing. I already have a TV blog so I won't go into any more detail. If anyone's interested, it's http://captaintv.blogspot.com/. It's very TV heavy but I love TV so that explains that.

Anyway, that's my ranting for the day. I'm going to go to work now and attempt to put myself in a better mood. Maybe I should have some of the Twizzlers I'm bringing in. They're fat free! This means they're good for me.

Happy Thursday.