Category Archives: AwkWORD (Humor)

July 29, 2010 · 3:00 AM

&$%*@# Renton!

I confirmed two things yesterday:

1.  My redheaded temper is still in top form.
2.  I have fully inherited my father, Warren’s, road rage (sorry, Pops!).

It all began innocently enough.  Mike and I agreed to house-sit in Kennydale (north of Renton), and so we drove there after work.  Correction: “we” didn’t drive there together.  Mike had to drop a friend at the airport first, so I suggested he go straight to Kennydale afterward.

That was my first mistake.

I didn’t do the math to realize that would leave me without a carpool buddy going south on I-405 at 4:45PM.  Was I delusional?  On bad drugs?  Had I just returned from the funny farm?

So there I sat in the parking lot of I-405, inching past Bellevue at a pace that would make a sloth bang his head against the wheel.

I’ll be the first to admit that about half the time I am in this scenario I take the carpool even though it is illegal.  My theory on this is that everyone wins:  I am flying down the freeway, and everyone in the slow lanes has one fewer car to sit behind.  See?  Winners!

But yesterday I didn’t have the cojones necessary for breaking the law, so I just sat in my slow lane.  I was mildly annoyed, but I wasn’t going insane about the traffic because at least I had AC, I told myself.

Then, about seven miles from my destination, my gas light turned on.  I am notorious for waiting until my gas light goes on before I get gas.  It aligns perfectly with my thriftiness; why spend money now when I can spend it later as my car forces me to?  To this day I’ve never run out.

I saw a Chevron sign on exit six, but decided to get off at my exit and then drive around until I found a station.  This was perfectly logical because my exit had an abundance of stores and marketplaces.  Surely there would be a gas station.

I got off at my exit and began driving through the town looking for a gas station.  I rounded the major mall area — nothing.  I headed straight into downtown — nothing.  I drove a little outside of town — nothing.  I felt the heat in my face start to rise as I went down what I like to call, “The Warren Trail of Logic.”  It goes as such: “Who would design a city off of a major interstate highway and not include a gas station within a five-mile radius?  What kind of idiots at the Shell Station looked at this city and said, ‘no, thanks, we’ll pass’?”

The trick about the Warren Trail of Logic is that it fills the user with such intellectual superiority that it becomes impossible not to be filled with an indignant rage at everyone else’s incompetency.

I couldn’t deny that none of this would normally bother me if it hadn’t taken me 40 minutes to go 15 miles.

At this point I decided someone else should be in misery with me.  You have one guess as to who received a phone call with an opening line like this:

“I need you to do WHATEVER it takes to find me a freaking gas station IN RENTON.”  Remember: Renton is the enemy.

Poor Mike scrambled to pull up a map on his phone, but alas, no signal.  Renton strikes again.

I looked at the gas light.  I looked at the stop light that hadn’t changed in three minutes.  I began mentally composing a scathing letter to the Renton city planners.

It occurred to me that I didn’t actually have anywhere to be, so why the anger?  But then I remembered the Warren Trail of Logic.  It shouldn’t matter that I am not on a schedule.  The gas station should still be there.

Mike advised me to cruise along the road parallel to the freeway, because that’s where most gas stations reside.  This sounded perfectly Logical, so I took his advice.

Except that I failed to remember:  if one is already employing the Trail of Logic and adds more logic to an illogical situation, disaster is sure to follow.

Or maybe just rage.  But usually disaster (see: Warren putting together falsely logical Christmas gifts).

There were no gas stations along the freeway.  Not for miles.  At this point it’s occurring to me how absurd it is that I don’t swear.  I really believe swearing is the most banal form of expression, but sitting in a car shouting “darn it” and “frickin'” just doesn’t have the same catharsis as…well, you know.

I decided for the sake of my blood pressure to concede, get back on the freeway and go back to the exit with the clearly marked Chevron sign.  But I didn’t go quietly (see previous paragraph, and use your imagination).

I called Mike to let him know his hysterical wife was still hysterical.  In the blur of road rage I managed to spit out, “I know it’s my fault for not filling it sooner, but HONESTLY this is AMERICA.  Where is the GAS?!”

I think I concluded by saying, “I just want to punch someone in the face and then drink myself to sleep!”  I told you that disaster was imminent.

To be fair, I didn’t find out I had cancer, I didn’t get in a fatal car accident, and I didn’t go blind.  In the scheme of things, this was not a bad day.  But FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THAT’S HOLY — ALL I WANTED WAS FUEL.

And thanks to the Warren Trail of Logic and a kind hubby, I got some.  Lesson learned.

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July 1, 2010 · 3:00 AM

The Double-Edged Sword Known as Craigslist

Few people can argue with the victorious feeling of finding the exact item on Craigslist for which one was searching.

In my case it was a black bookshelf, six feet tall, with five adjustable shelves.  Bingo.

Oh and the irresistable price tag of $20.  Double bingo.

That is more or less the end of the fun of Craigslist:  you find the item.  You email the owner.  You wait in anticipation for them to say they haven’t already sold it. 

Then the work begins.

Where do you live?  Where should we meet?  How am I going to cart a six-foot-tall bookshelf back to my house? 

The seller of this bookcase gave me her address and said to arrive around 6:30PM.  I had plans at 7PM on the other side of town, but as any Craigslist crawler knows, if you snooze, you lose.  I confirmed that I’d be there at 6:30PM.

“Oh and just a FYI,” she noted, “I don’t actually live there anymore.  I have renters in this house.  They said they’ll put my bookshelf in the backyard and you can just pick it up.”

Um.  OK.

“Oh, and one more thing,” she said.  “Can you pay me via PayPal?  Like right after you pick it up?  Since I won’t be there?” 

Clearly this is an exercise in trust.  We both know I could pick it up and disappear without paying her.  I know I wouldn’t do that, but she doesn’t know I wouldn’t do that.  Craigslist transactions are full of this kind of blind faith. 

It occurs to me shortly after making these arrangements that a six-foot tall bookshelf may not fit in our SUV.  I loathe the idea of borrowing someone’s truck, or worse, going there in our SUV only to find it won’t fit and we have to return with someone’s truck.

Mike suggests we buy some twine so we can tie down the hatch if the shelf won’t fit inside, so I stop by Home Depot on my way home from work.  Who knew there were 15 different kinds of twine?  I am not a twine expert, but suddenly I am comparing rope widths, impact resistance, and cotton versus poly.  A phone call to Mike in the middle of the twine aisle solves my problem, and I leave with something called Heavy Duty Jute.

Four hours later, after work, Mike and I hop in the car headed for Leschi. 

Everybody in Seattle knows the tricky thing about the affluent Leschi area — it classifies as Leschi immediately after you cross over Martin Luther King Jr Way.  Before crossing over, however, the neighborhood is notoriously sketchy, a combination of First Hill, the International District, Denny Blaine and Garfield High.  So when someone says they live in Leschi, you’re never sure if they have a two million dollar home or bars on their crack-house windows.

Guess which side of the tracks my bookcase was on?

Technically, it was one block east of MLK Jr Way, which put it in wealthy Leschi.  That doesn’t stop Mike from second-guessing the legitimacy of the deal I’ve arranged.

“This is the house?  The orange one with the porch falling off the front?”  he asks me, incredulous.

“Yes, that’s the address,” I reply. 

“Seriously?” he answers.  “This whole situation looks like an invitation to get robbed.  Didn’t you say she doesn’t live here and she wants us to pick something up in the backyard behind a fence?  Seriously?”

After a bit of back and forth, Mike decides to go look in the backyard and see if there is actually a bookshelf to be had. 

There isn’t. 

He comes back to the car with the biggest I-told-you-so face he’s ever sported.  I immediately call the owner.

“Oh, it’s not?” she asks.  “Did you check on the deck?  I bet she put it on the deck.  Call me back if it’s not there.”

“Did you look on the deck?” I ask Mike.  He stares at me with a less-than-enthusiastic expression.

I put his wallet and cellphone in my purse so there is nothing of value in the car (oh wait, I see his brand new golf clubs in the back…best not to mention).  We both approach the fence and push the door to the side to reveal piles upon piles of garbage.  There are boxes everywhere, sacks of trash, an old couch, several discarded chairs…but no bookshelf. 

After wading through the garbage, we get to the backyard and look up at the deck; it’s on the third floor. 

“You have to be KIDDING me,” Mike says as he stares up the three flights of rickety wooden stairs.

We walk to the top of the deck where, both a blessing and a curse, we find the bookshelf.  It’s in fine condition and it’s exactly what I wanted, so as if I had found a mangy dog that needed a home, I daintily ask, “Can we keep it?” 

Mike rolls his eyes and tells me to grab one side of the shelf.  We hoist it up and begin the arduous climb down three flights of stairs — beginning with Mike almost falling through the first one because it was rotted.

We huff and puff our way to the car and I have to laugh at what I am willing to put us through for a $20 bookcase.  I have no doubt that my husband is silently cursing my thrifty ways.

The miracle of the situation is that it fits in the back of our SUV without any need for my Heavy Duty Jute twine.  Nevermind that we have to move my seat so far forward that if we have a collision the air bag will kill me.  I don’t care; I have my $20 bookcase.

I read plenty of design and Do-it-Yourself blogs where the authors tout their garage-sale/thrift store/Craigslist victories as though the money saved came without a real cost.  Nobody ever mentions the backyard transactions or three flights of stairs. 

Nobody until now, that is.

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May 14, 2010 · 3:00 AM

Baby Face

In the last two weeks, I’ve had freakishly frequent comments from strangers about my age.  Or, more specifically, about what age they perceive me to be.

I haven’t shrunken six inches nor gotten a new haircut, and I don’t dress like I listen to Miley Cyrus.  So what gives?

Last Saturday my mother-in-love took me and my sister-in-loves for some manis/pedis.  As I sat down in the chair at Gene Juarez, a 60-year-old Russian woman stared back at me.  She had bleached hair, false eyelashes, and long acrylic nails.  That wasn’t charming, but her accent was: when she spoke, it sounded like, “I vant to luke at yore nals.”

Her first question for me: “Woo did you come here vith?”

“Oh, my mother-in-law, sitting right over there,” I said, pointing.  “She’s taking all her daughters out.”

“NO!” she gasped.  “No, no, no, dis is not posseebul.  You?  Mahhreed?  I thought you vere in high school.”

What do I say to that?  Am I insulted?  Flattered?

What people don’t realize is that when you’re in your twenties, you’re in a no-fly zone.  The air is still.  You’re not striving to be younger, you’re not striving to be older.  You just are where you are.

And I’m fully aware of the advantages of this position.  I know teens would kill to be in their twenties and those at middle-age would give up their 401Ks to revisit 25.

But there is another side to this position:  uncertainty.  I am not established.  At 26 I’m still trying to work in a professional career, attempting to be taken seriously.  I’m not searching for compliments on my wrinkle-free face.

In fact, the only reason I started wearing makeup was to be perceived as older, so those around me in cubicle-land wouldn’t treat me like their adolescent daughter.

Yesterday, as I was checking out of Trader Joes, the 70-year-old checker gave me my receipt, and then said, “Now, I didn’t check your ID for the wine you bought, but I just looked at you and realized I definitely should have.  But I see you’re wearing a wedding ring, so how young could you possibly be?  Basically what I’m saying is I have to know how old you are.”

Sigh.  This again.  The line of people behind me stared at attention.

“I’m 26,” I admitted.

“Well, miss, may I say you are doing 26 quite well,” he offered, as some sort of concession.

What does that even mean?  How can one not be looking well at 26?  If I were 46 and all this was happening, I’d be dancing my way across the parking lot with my groceries.

Which is why this bothers me, to some degree.  What people are basically trying to say is that I look like a teenager.  The worst example yet:

Last summer while on vacation with my family in Europe, Erin (older sister), Sam (younger sister) and Mike decided to go out to a club, which happened to be “18 and over.”  We didn’t bring our IDs because we didn’t think it was an issue.

As we’re all approaching the entrance, two bouncers look us up and down.  They wave Mike in.  Wave Erin in.  Wave Sam in.

They hold up their palms at me.  “Nope.  Sorry this is 18 and over,” one says to me.

I look behind him at my three stunned companions standing in the doorway.

“Are you serious?” I reply.  “I’m 25!  I’m MARRIED to that man.  It’s illegal in the states to be married unless you’re 18.”

“Unless you can show me ID, you can’t enter,” he says.

Sam is almost beside herself with joyful giggles that she, who is four years younger than me, is standing inside the club while I am outside getting harassed for looking 17.

He finally looks at me with pity.  He says, “Quick — what year were you born?!”

“1984!” I shout with an embarrassing amount of hope in my eyes.

“Fine,” he says, and waves me through.

I know, I know.  You’re going to bank this story and bring it up to me when I’m 45 and in the waiting room of the plastic surgery office.  Just promise me when you do, you’ll follow it up with “and you could STILL pass for 17.”  I won’t believe you, but post-op I’ll probably buy you a drink.

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