A Life To Be Jealous Of... Yeah, Not Mine

I have three things to write about today:

1. First... one more babysitting story (sorry, but it's all I've got going for me right now):

In contrast to the perfect little K. who I wrote about yesterday, the 4-year old girl who I normally babysit (M.) continues to be, well, not always so tactful or sweet. When I arrived this morning, she ran to show me some photos of herself that were taken yesterday at a photo studio. As I was looking at them and appropriately "oohing" and "ahhhing" at how cute she looked, she grabbed them out of my hand and said, "Stop talking! I don't like your voice."

Isn't that precious?

Later on, when we were swimming in the pool, she was pretending to be a mermaid, and I decided to become a shark and attack her feet. She screamed at me, "You're not allowed to be a shark!" And I said, "Well, if you get to be what you want to be, then I can be what I want to be. And I want to be a shark." She then got out of the pool and said she'd wait until her mom got home because "she plays mermaid better than you do."

When I recounted this story later to Miguel on the telephone, he responded with something like, "You know, it's good to know you're working on those important job skills in preparation for your return to State. I'm sure your new boss will be seriously impressed with your summer resume."

Hell yeah!

2. This is why an ex-boyfriend from college called me "the absent-minded professor":

I was running a couple of errands two evenings ago. I needed to get some allergy medication because I'm, well, totally allergic to the state of Arizona. The pharmacy at Safeway has this non-prescription stuff that I like so I always go there to get it. Plus, Safeway is near the gym, where I also intended to go swim laps.

I debated on whether or not I should go to the gym first or Safeway first, but then I decided I'd rather go to Safeway before getting in the pool so that I wasn't a hideous, chlorinated, dry-skinned, uncombed, dampened goblin at the grocery store.

After I picked up my allergy pills, I remembered that I needed some milk and cheese and salad and fruit. So I dropped them on the conveyor belt in line, and was in the midst of paying, when I remembered that I still had to go to the gym.

I looked at the clerk and said, "Oh, shit!"

I couldn't leave the stuff in my car for 45 minutes because, yeah, Arizona is like 105 degrees right now, and my car was about 135 inside. Another option would have been that I could have driven back across town to drop the stuff off at my apartment (OK, it's only like two miles, but still...) then go back again to the gym. And I didn't want to do that.

So I told the clerk to put all the refrigerated items in one or two bags, which he did.

I then drove the three blocks to the gym, parked my car, took my grocery bags of refrigerator items with me into the gym (God, I felt like such a cretin... and wouldn't you know it, there was a huge line to get in the rec center, and I was sure everyone was staring straight at me, wondering why in the hell I was hauling all of my Safeway groceries into the building), then I proceeded straight to the locker room, where I stuffed my cheese & milk into a locker... I figured it would at least be air conditioned there... and then swam my laps.

Other than feeling like a total ass (again) hauling my groceries out of the rec center, it all worked out. Or at least I haven't died of ptomaine poisoning yet, anyway.

3. Finally, what else I have been doing lately:

I have been trolling for moving boxes because I am too cheap/frugal/economically savvy to pay for cardboard. This means that I am constantly on the look out near dumpsters and recycling bins.

In fact, I saw a large box laying on the sidewalk the other day in front of Zachary's Pizza on 6th Street, and I immediately pulled my car into the parking lot, ran to the box and grabbed it. Turns out it was a UA petri dish shipping container (empty, thankfully), which is now filled with my shit to move cross-country.

Furthermore, I have already figured out the Target warehouse schedule, and I have become a bit of a Wild Oats delivery door groupie. Today, Scott (my Wild Oats warehouse manager buddy) even showed me photos on his cell phone of a trick he played on the general manager (covering his whole car in plastic wrap... haha! Hilarity!). Then he gave me about 15 high quality boxes and had some poor lackey tote them to my car for me.

Indeed, my madcap life is something to envy.