Ugly, Pretty and Special

I just finished the Uglies trilogy. (Yeah, it’s that young adult series. Seriously, you want to fight about it?)

Pretty smart trilogy. I’m sad it’s over, and sort of sad about the ending, although there was no other way for it to end. That happens a lot, I guess.

The series takes place in a utopian future where everyone is ugly until they turn 16, and then they have surgery to be pretty, and they also become rather mindless.

Last night, I fell asleep watching Dr. 90210 and there was this chick who wanted to have a diamond implanted in her wrist. She was a self-proclaimed plastic surgery addict…and let me tell you, her face was not pretty. I don’t mean that she was too perfect and therefore not pretty, I mean her features were unattractive. Poor thing.

Oh, it seems she’s a famous ex-porn star. I guess her eyes are ok…

Personifying my dog

Last night, Isis looked so sad. She had this expression on her face conveying, “No one will play with me.” We each played with her outside a little today, and her Smiley Bird face came back. I would have taken her to a dog park, but it’s raining again! Also, I meant to take her for a walk. Jeez, I’m a terrible parent.

As I explained it to her this morning, when she kept nagging me to take her out. “See, honey,” I said. “Mommy is very very lazy…” We did take her with us to the A&W drive-thru, but then she was all, “Waitasecond. This isn’t Dairy Queen. Where’s my ice cream?”

We got her this toy at PetSmart a few weeks ago on clearance. It was, like, $2.99. But it was perfect. Not much of a squeak and it was shaped like a fish. Appropriate because my work is all about fish now. I’m told it’s probably supposed to be a Rainbow Trout, not a Chinook Salmon, but whatever.

It had a label on it that said “1/2 ton of yankin’ fun,” which struck us as a little obscene, but the idea was that there was a cloth belt through the stuffed toy, making it indestructible.

Today, Isis tore the tail to shreds.

I haven’t been to PetSmart in weeks! I can’t believe it! Although I have to go soon, because we’re getting low on food.

Behavior problem

Isis had a sort of attitudinal day. I blame the rainy weather, because she didn’t get outside very much to play. And even though we were home, Rob and I didn’t pay too much attention to her. ‘Course that doesn’t justify her standing at my feet and barking at me. There was no good reason for that.

And let’s not even mention the 5-year-old girl who came over to visit, whose face Isis kissed with her teeth. I won’t mention it, because although the girl shrieked and cried, it didn’t leave a mark, and my mom is already afraid to come stay in the house with this dog. And my mom reads this blog.

Not guilty

I enjoy the “new music mix” on the new, ridiculously named Crave 95 radio station. But I object to the automated DJ introducing songs by calling them guilty pleasures.

“Dirrty” is a guilty pleasure. So is anything by Britney Spears. Animotion’s “Obsession” is not. (It’s an 80’s classic.) Neither is Lenny Kravitz’ “American Woman.”

What kind of marketing plan is it to tell listeners they should be embarrassed by the songs they like listening to?

A familiar lump in my throat

As a grammar/spelling Nazi, I cringe when I see errors in print. In my job, I copyedit the work of others. My copy is usually quite clean, if I do say so myself, so I’ve often wondered how something gets to me with misspelled words. Like they didn’t spellcheck it, or even glance at it before they gave it to me.

I’m reminded of the college interns at my last job, who had zeros where they meant to have “)” (look at your keyboard). Like the phone number would say (3600555-1212. How does that not totally jump out at you?

But I’ve been on the other side of the copydesk this week, as I put together a 20-page report in PageMaker, where it is much easier than I realized to overlook misspellings, missing spaces and other sorts of copy inconsistencies. I am very grateful to the woman who pointed all of my gaffes, although I think she felt like she was being a pest. Not at all. I just hope she doesn’t think I’m a moron for passing along something so imperfect.

It’s just a first draft! I want to tell her. I knew it would have mistakes, that’s why I sent it to you!

In the midst of all this I received a press release that I should have been consulted on, if not asked to write myself. Three blatant typos. Two of them in tribal names. I forwarded it to my boss with the note “This is what happens when I get cut out of the process.”

And then had a moment where I thought I might have hit reply instead of send. You know that dread-filled lump in your throat where you think you might actually die from the mistake? I had that.

Except I didn’t send it back to the author, just to my boss, who supported my inclination to send a friendly e-mail noting the errors. Which I did, causing the author to feel that same lump, no doubt.

Visits from dead pets

Last night I dreamed that I went to the house I lived in until I was almost 12. When I got out of the car, Isis was by my side, and inside was one of the calico cats we used to have. Her name was That. Barney was inside too and I knew he was supposed to be dead, so I picked him up and cuddled him. Two other Isises appeared by my side.

The front door had been left open and we worried that Millie had gotten out. Millie is my mother’s current dog.

That’s about as far as I got inside the house.

There’s a Tori Amos song that reminds me of Barney. I’m listening to it now, even though my brother recently reminded me that Barney preferred Cyndi Lauper.

Make a toast, a toast in your honor,
I hear you laugh and beg me not to dance
‘Cause on your right standing by is Mr. Bojangles
With a toast he’s telling me it’s time
To let you go
Let you go

Sniff. I used to call Barney Mr. Bojangles.

To cheer myself up, I shall list some of the names I like to call my darling Isis:
Princess Isis, Princess Beautifulness, Pretty Princess, Baby Boo, Babykins, Frito Feet, Isis Pisces, Fur Ball, Fleabag, Chewbacca, Chupacabra, Snapdragon, Smiley Bird…

Amoeba Eyes

They had a coupon in the paper yesterday for that recalled saline solution that we used to use. And liked, I might add.

After hearing about the recall, I threw it out and we started using the crap solution from Wal-Mart that Rob bought. And my eyes were killing me! So I bought a fancier, enhanced moisture brand and my eyes have been very happy since then.

Now Rob’s eyes are killing him. Wonder if it’s the Wal-Mart solution, allergies, or if he’s going blind from an amoeba infection.

R.I.P. Z.

What the hell? One of my two favorite Canadian radio stations has changed formats. Sort of. It has a new name and the on-air staff have disappeared.

Apparently they’re taking a few weeks to introduce their “music mix,” which, honestly, isn’t so different from the old music mix. And I guess the new staff will come after that.

I can’t link to the old site because any version of that URL leads to the new URL.

This is my fault, because I’ve been listening to audio books instead of the radio.

Home office

So I’m planting some marigolds when the cell phone rings. It’s my boss. I’m chatting with him about all the hard work I’ve been doing and I decide to take the dog with me to the end of the driveway and check the mail. En route, my boyfriend beeps in and I accidentally hang up on my boss and answer my boyfriend’s call.

I agree to bring a change of clothes when I pick my boyfriend up in a few minutes and I’m simultaneously getting the mail out of the box and calling my boss back.

“I have yet to successfully swap calls on this phone,” I tell him, as my dog approaches a pedestrian to sniff him.

Pedestrian recoils, looks horrified and says, “I’m not a fan of dogs.”

“Sorry about that,” I say, and walk with mail, cell phone and dog back up the driveway.

She didn’t even jump on him. I don’t think. I feel bad that my dog invaded his space, and I guess he had no way to walk around us. But it’s almost gratifying that someone is intimidated by my goofy dog, who ran shrieking from two great danes, a poodle and a big black dog at the lake yesterday. The black dog bit a woman a few minutes earlier, so I guess Isis was right to be afraid, but sheesh. Is there a way to train your dog to know that she is to be feared without ever doing anything fierce?

Interesting, I just looked up “fearsome,” which means both “Causing or capable of causing fear” and “Fearful; timid.” This would seem to be a contradiction, except that Isis is both. Question is, how can I use it if you won’t know which one I mean?