Tag Archives: stupidity

Lame Adventure 312: Read My Mind

Posted on May 31, 2012 | 54 comments

Flaunting my small spender status, I recently went to my go-to Upper West Side market, Fairway, and purchased this single 69¢ dinner roll, called Three Seed.

69¢ Three Seed roll or two for $1.38.

The trio of seeds is poppy, sesame, and for the third one, I’ll take an educated guess and call it bird.  Possibly one of my seven loyal readers, and I am certain that all of you minored in Seedology in college, will be compelled to enlighten me with the correct identification of this particular seed should my guess be in error.  The clerk looked at the roll, then looked at me, and asked me:

Clerk:  Is this a bagel?

Guess what I said:

  1. After I shellac it, it’s going to be a conversation piece about various ways I waste my time to avoid doing anything of worth with my life.
  1. Good question.  I was wondering the same thing.  I was sure you’d know.  Guess I need to find myself a new roll Sherpa.
  1. No.  Bagels have holes [inaudible muttering] like the one that’s expanding in my head right now.  Who the hell works in a grocery store in New York and doesn’t know a bagel?

54 Comments

Posted in Humor, new york city

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Lame Adventure 307: Dental Floss Hunting

Posted on May 14, 2012 | 35 comments

I spent my Mother’s Day breaking out in a drenching sweat worthy of birthing a litter as I combed the entire Upper West Side in search of Johnson & Johnson’s elusive Reach Woven Dental Floss.

The Cadillac of dental floss.

It was very warm on Sunday with the temperature topping 80 degrees.  Had I known I was going to reenact the Bataan Death March hunting for my preferred variety of tooth twine, I would have ignored my horror at flaunting my pasty white limbs and worn shorts.

Pasty white forearm dotted with freckles, liver spots and melanoma(?).

Yet, I was not anticipating any difficulty locating this product that has been reliably available for over a decade at my local Price Wise Discount store that is a short walk from my sanctum sanctorum.  Granted, Price Wise is the only store in all of Manhattan where I have ever seen this floss, but it never occurred to me that a day would come when they would no longer carry it. Upon reflection, in my youth I never thought that Pillsbury would cease making my favorite after school snack, the chalk-flavored Space Food Sticks, so from a tender age I have been familiar with retail-world disappointment.

I questioned the Price Wise manager about my floss.  He said that it was not in their most recent shipment of Reach products.  In fact, he was unsure if they would ever carry it again.  Upon hearing that, I felt stabbed.

Yet, I remained upright and I hotfooted into countless Duane Reades, two CVS’s, and some stand-alone pharmacies including one on 72nd Street where a woman that appeared to be a direct descendant of Lurch stalked me.  Three times she made an overt point to walk in front of me to coo:

Daughter of Lurch:  Pardon me.

How I regretted not carrying a mallet.

I left without my floss, crestfallen with the futility of my effort.  How could this tragedy happen?  Western civilization as I knew it, albeit predominantly from a steady diet of watching and reading cartoons, was in freefall.

I prefer gentle gum care products.  I’m a fan of soft bristle toothbrushes, but I’ll resist rhapsodizing poetically about the merits of those because they don’t require I don a pith helmet and hire a search party to find.  Regular waxed dental floss is punishing.  It makes me feel like I’m sliding stiff cable between my teeth without the benefit of accessing HBO.

Mint. Waxed. Nasty.

I returned home, floss-less, frustrated and sweaty.  As I quaffed a quart of iced tea, I searched for my missing floss online.  My usual go-to source, Amazon, had a 50-yard dispenser for $12.95 from an off-site seller that doubles as an extortionist.  Or, if I wanted to invest $89.95 and another $19.99 in shipping, I could be the proud owner of a case of 144 5-yard packets from BuyNowDirect.

CountMeOut

Next, I went on Reach’s web site, just to torture myself further for I was expecting to learn that the product has been discontinued.  Much to my surprise, it not only still exists but Reach referred me to Drugstore.com where it’s available for $3.29 per 50-yard packet. Drugstore.com claims that it is temporarily out of stock, but it will ship in a week or two, probably because I’m the first person that has ordered it all year.  Orders exceeding $25 qualify for free shipping.  Therefore, I’ve ordered eight 50-yard packs.  According to my abacus, four-football-fields-worth of woven floss should last me 800 days.  That translates into two years, two months and ten days if I use the recommended 18 inches of floss per day.  And I will do exactly that even if every tooth in my head falls out between now and then.  In that case, I’ll just use it between my toes and behind my ears.

35 Comments

Posted in Humor, new york city

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Lame Adventure 294: Trees and Trash

Posted on March 26, 2012 | 19 comments

New York City takes countless punches for being too expensive, too crowded, too loud, too rude, too dirty, too etc., etc., but as I was recently strolling in my Upper West Side neighborhood at magic hour and I saw this majestic Dogwood Tree in full bloom in front of me I thought:

Me (thinking):  This is why I love my city!  It is the best!

The kind of tree I'd want to date and bring home to my family -- if their homes had higher ceilings.

Then, I just happened to turn away from this gorgeous blast of nature in the heart of Gotham when I got smacked upside the head by a tree behind me that was blooming in its own Big Apple snarky-style way.  A way that played into the typically negative New York City stereotype.

The fugly rude tree.

The casual observer might look at this image and think:

Casual Observer (thinking):  Are you smoking crack?  There’s nothing blooming on that tree!

I say:

Me: Take a closer look.

Are those barren branches decorated with trash?

Do you see? Here, take an even closer look.

An original way to pursue ad space: hang your ad off these branches?

Yes, this tree’s branches are blooming with trash bags.  One with the message, “Thank you,” and the other is from my go-to grocery store, Fairway.  Why these bags are hanging from these branches is a mystery to me.  Considering that the population of Manhattan Island is 1,585,873 (2011 data) and there are 69,467.5 persons per square mile, odds are good that on a land mass so dense with humanity, undoubtedly including many slobs, the naked eye is going to see a lot of crazy stuff – including shopping bags that somehow end up tangled in tree branches.

Possibly an exuberant sanitation worker overshot his garbage truck twice and these bags got caught in the branches or maybe a pigeon ate a steroid and dropped these bags to show off?  Does anyone else have an opinion about how they got there?  I suspect these shopping bags are going to be hanging around throughout spring and well into summer.  That’s okay with me. When I need to avoid ogling suspended litter, I’ll just focus west on that  Dogwood Tree — until it sets off my allergies, makes me sneeze my head off and I revise my thinking about how wonderful it is.

19 Comments

Posted in Humor, new york city

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Lame Adventure 288: Monday Morning’s Mayhem

Posted on March 7, 2012 | 22 comments

Following the tradition of reliable unpleasantness that is every Monday morning, this past Monday was no different.  I was back at the workplace bleary-eyed and draggy-tailed doing what I had not anticipated doing first thing that particularly crummy Monday morning, struggling to open a carton of skim milk at my desk.  I had just poured the remainder of the previous week’s carton of milk-flavored water on my cereal, a cup of lightly sweetened organic flakes high in fiberboard.  I was intending to add additional milk but this week’s carton proposed battle.

Semi-milked cup of flakes.

It refused to follow the natural law of packaging* of opening to the simple touch.  It was clear to me that if this carton possessed a middle digit, it would be aimed in an upward direction at my grimacing face.

The Devil's Milk Carton ... possible horror film premise?

*I am purposely excluding products held hostage inside hard plastic stroke-inducing packaging and pills ensconced in allegedly child-proof bottles with adult-proof tops, more inventions courtesy of Satan.

The clock was ticking and the countdown was underway within the 90 second to two-minute window dividing crispy from soggy cereal.  As my blood pressure began rising to a life-threatening level, my colleague, (not) Under Ling (anymore), noticed my frustration as well as the fact that I was multi-tasking.  I was also photographing my struggle to open the obstinate carton.  Coincidentally, she had just finished reading my previous post about our unscientific experiment where we soaked Twinkies in Coca-Cola.  In a blasé tone she asked:

(not) Under Ling (anymore): Why are you photographing your milk cartons? [light bulb] Do you have Twinkies in there?

Twinkies on the (not) Under Ling (anymore) mind.

Me (through clenched teeth):  Tune into Wednesday’s Lame for the answer.

One of the minor mysteries of life is why is it that every so often, one draws the short straw and encounters that inner freshness bag that refuses to surrender, the potato chip bag sealed with glue so impenetrable, it requires the intervention of a scissors or a higher power (I’m thinking weapons grade explosive) to open, and lately, paper milk cartons closed tighter than a maximum security prison?

Twin cartons -- easy-to-open conformist on left, open-resistant mope on right.

Why is this necessary?  Is there something about operating a package sealing apparatus that is catnip to types suffering Borderline Personality Disorder looking for outlets for their hostility?  Where is the quality control to prevent defective product packaging?  At the very least consumers should be awarded complimentary Valium for brand loyalty when they’re forced to wrestle with these beasts.  By the time I was able to tear open that disagreeable milk carton, my cereal was reduced to soggy mush welcoming me to a new week at The Grind.

If this milk carton could talk, what might it say? Talking Milk Carton: F.U.

22 Comments

Posted in Humor

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Lame Adventure 287: Playing with Food

Posted on March 5, 2012 | 26 comments

I wear many hats in my department aside from my actual job as Minister of Tile Labeling.  I am also Minister of Printer Repair, Minister of Replacing the Copier Paper, Minister of Unjamming the Fax Machine, Minister of Kleenex and Tylenol Replacement, Minister of Paper Recycling, Minister of Picking Up Crap on the Rug that No One Else Will Do On Their Own Volition, to name just some of my many illustrious ministries.  In fairness to my sidekick, Greg, he is Minister of Band-aid replacement, Minister of Door Jamb Control, Minister of Freezer Defrosting and Minister of Coffee Brewing.  Recently, my superior, Elsbeth, has added Minister of Morale to my ever-growing list of ministries.  She has requested that as spiritual leader of our department I set forth an example of worker-pride that will have my colleagues, Greg and (not) Under Ling (anymore), merrily follow like lambs to the slaughter.  She did not suggest how I accomplish this feat so I have been left to my own devices.

Recently, Greg mentioned that he heard that if a steak were soaked in Coca-Cola, this elixir’s corrosive properties would cause the meat to dissolve.  This idea captivated (not) Under Ling (anymore).  In reality Coke has been trying for years to dispel this myth along with others and they address rumors about their product on their web site.  In 1950 a Cornell University professor, Clive McCay, testified before the U.S. House of Representatives that the combination of sugar and phosphoric acid in Coke destroys teeth.  He  observed that over the course of 48 hours, Coke can completely dissolve a tooth.  Coke countered that no one has ever held Coke in their mouth for 48 hours straight and that saliva neutralizes the acids in Coke and other acidic foods such as orange juice, something equally corrosive (just ask my gastroenterologist who will not let me and my weak guts anywhere near a three block radius of o.j.).  Back in the day, the president of Coca Cola, Bill Robinson, was so defensive about his product not promoting tooth decay in children he claimed, “The only way our product could harm children would be for a case of Coke to fall out a window and hit them.”

This conversation prompted Someone That Sounds a Lot Like Me to bleat:

Someone That Sounds a Lot Like Me:  What a ridiculous waste of a steak! Who thinks up this crap?

Undaunted, the discussion continued and someone, possibly Someone That Sounds a Lot Like Me, suggested:

Someone That Sounds a Lot Like Me:  It kind of makes you wonder what would happen if a Twinkie was soaked in Coke.

Greg:  Yeah!

(not) Under Ling (anymore):  We should do that and find out!

Seizing this opportunity to open the passageway to heightened morale I invested $3.59 in a package of Twinkies  and two cans of Coca Cola, one regular and the other, diet.

Ready, set ...

(not) Under Ling (anymore) immediately announced that she wanted to soak her Twinkie in regular Coke.  Always the gentleman, Greg announced:

Greg:  Go for it.

Go! (not) Under Ling (anymore) takes a Twinkie.

Illustrated below is a completely unscientific experiment conducted over the course of 6 ½ hours.  (not) Under Ling (anymore) chose to pour her can of regular Coke into the glass first.  Then, she dunked her Twinkie into the brew.

Regular Coke dunk.

We've got a floater!

Greg chose to place his Twinkie in the glass first and then he poured his can of Diet Coke over it, saturating it from the get-go.

Greg's Twinkie in glass.

Greg pouring his can of Diet Coke over his Twinkie.

Submerged Twinkie bobbed straight to the top, floating in Diet Coke.

Both Twinkies were immediately saturated with Coke to the touch, and Greg, who licked his finger announced (in response to the Twinkie in Diet Coke):

Greg:  Tastes like mint.

Me:  Really, not like chicken?

(not) Under Ling (anymore):  No way am I tasting that!

We changed locations should any uninvited guests enter the premises and ask  questions.

An hour later: Twinkie floating in regular Coke bubbling. Note: smells like a Twinkie and Coca-Cola.

An hour later: Twinkie floating in Diet Coke bubbling less. Note: smells like a Twinkie floating in a more chemically smelling Coke.

We resisted inhaling from this point on.

3 hours later: Twinkie in regular Coke leaking filling and sinking.

3 hours later: Twinkie in Diet Coke leaking filling and floating

4 hours later: semi-sunk Twinkie floating in regular Coke.

Side view partially dissolved Twinkie semi-sunk in battery acid, oops, regular Coke.

4 hours later: Twinkie in Diet Coke nesting in bed of leaked filling aka "gross root beer float stage".

6 1/2 hours later: Greg piercing surface of Twinkie semi-submerged in Diet Coke noting that the crust has hardened.

Greg blending mashed Twinkie in Diet Coke.

Greg blending Twinkie in regular Coke.

Chunks of Twinkie in regular Coke. The key word is, "Gnarly."

Results at day's end.

Overhead view with a little Diet Coke spillage.

In conclusion, both sponge cakes remained only partially submerged throughout the 6 1/2 hours, never entirely sinking until Greg mixed them at the end of the day.  This proved to us that they were more sponge than cake, but not nearly as appetizing as a sponge.  The end result is that worker curiosity was satisfied and  worker morale was easily uplifted an entire millimeter.

26 Comments

Posted in Humor

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Lame Adventure 286: Foiled!

Posted on March 1, 2012 | 18 comments

In recent weeks I have been stalking a particular townhouse in my Upper West Side neighborhood.  As February inched closer to March, I became more and more obsessed with this dwelling.  Why?  Take a look.

Christmas in January and February townhouse.

Inside my head I had written and rewritten this post several times.  I considered calling it March Madness because who in their right mind continues to hang a holiday wreath into the month that kicks off spring?  Actually about fifteen years ago I happened to have had a next-door neighbor, a rather pleasant woman named Tiffany, Kay or Zales … Okay, I completely forget her name, but I clearly recall that it sounded like jewelry and she was a nice person.  Tiffany, Kay or Zales  kept one hanging outside her door until June. She did not strike me as demented in the least, just someone suffering an acute case of holiday wreath blindness.  Perversely, every time my visitors and I looked at that heavily shedding eyesore we saw it in 3D. To this day, I’m still finding pine needles inside my humble abode.  Back to the present, could this townhouse dweller have been  blind to his wreath as my former neighbor was to her contribution to blight?

Then, the unforeseeable happened this March 1st morning.

March 1st. Hey, where did it go?

Upon closer inspection, still missing.

First, I wondered:

Me: Did it fall off?

Then, I thought:

Me:  If it fell off, could I get arrested if I happened to re-hang it for my blog?

I resisted that temptation, followed the sane, responsible course and walked on.  Coincidentally I could not locate that wreath.  Frustrating.

18 Comments

Posted in christmas, holiday, Humor, new york city

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Lame Adventure 282: Slight Heart Attack Time

Posted on February 21, 2012 | 52 comments

Possibly I’m deluding myself, but I like to think that I’m not too squeamish nor am I a wimp.  I will admit that I don’t do well with the dead.  Residing anywhere for any length of time one will encounter road kill.  That’s a fact of life.  Here in New York, the unpleasant sight of a flattened pigeon or rodent is common.

Splat the pigeon.

Whenever I encounter the downside of nature, I make a mental note of where not to look and what street I will side step for the next few days.  Every time I do stumble upon some creature’s untimely demise, it is always a bit jarring to me.  I am never truly relaxed when I glimpse a mangled form of what was once very likely earlier that same day a living critter.  This does not imply that for the rest of that day that image will haunt me.  It is an isolated shock in the moment, but then I move on, forget about it and resume whatever it is I am doing.  I don’t dwell on the frozen lifeless cat put out with the trash.  Okay, that dead cat I saw nearly twenty years ago was exceptional.  It has remained stored in my memory bank  forever, but usually, I delete these images almost as quickly as I see them, unless, of course I photograph them.  Hey, you never know when you might need a picture of pigeon splat.

On a recent rainy afternoon I had to run an errand near my office in Tribeca.  Sheltered under my umbrella, I was moving at a brisk pace, focused on getting to where I was going when my eye caught that simultaneously familiar and shocking sight of a limp heap lying atop the corner of a tree planter.  I thought the usual:

Me:  Yuck.

Then, I did the usual.  I looked away and walked past.  I assumed it was a dead blackbird, similar to the kind of bird featured in Alfred Hitchcock’s film, The Birds.  As I raced away, I was uncharacteristically still thinking about that bird.  I felt disturbed.  Birds do not normally drop dead atop tree planters.  Some cruel creep had to have harmed that poor defenseless creature.  I felt outrage.  I wondered:

Me: Was it poisoned or shot?

Scene of the crime.

People, their inhumanity and their lack of respect for the living infuriate me.  I write a blog, I have a voice, and on a good day I have seven readers (if my friends and sister check in).  I am obligated to be a spokeswoman about this sort of mindless animal cruelty.  Therefore, I reversed course and marched back to that tree planter, if only to show my compassion for …

A glove with a soggy, furry cuff that a considerate soul in a random act of kindness placed here.

Maybe there is a shred of hope for the human race after all.  It might also behoove me to get my eyes examined.

52 Comments

Posted in Humor, new york city

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Lame Adventure 270: That’s the Way the Cork Crumbles

Posted on January 17, 2012 | 16 comments

I had recently discovered buried deep in my cupboard a bottle of 1996 Celebrity Cellars Bob Dylan Collector’s Edition One Reserve red table wine from Manteca, California.  This wine was given to me at holiday-time in 2000 by my former network news armpit division supervisor, the multi-talented Zimmerman.  Zimmerman’s multi-talents were two-fold – his head was a vast storehouse of knowledge of all things Bob Dylan and he was also a walking encyclopedia about the TV series, The Odd Couple.  He knew every word of every episode by heart and could recite each episode upon request.  Zimmerman was truly the Laurence Olivier of the junk food TV of my youth.  I will always remember him both fondly and ridiculously.

The Dylan vino, horribly photographed.

I held off drinking it for I recalled Zimmerman’s advice:

Zimmerman: Don’t drink it right away.

I am sure that Zimmerman did not intend that I should hold off drinking it for almost twelve years and spend the vast majority of those years completely forgetting about it.  He also gifted my former colleague and dear friend, Martini Max, with a bottle.  While sharing beverages with Max at the Emerald Inn, our favorite Upper West Side no-nonsense watering hole, I asked Max if he could recall what he did with his bottle.

Me:  Max, did you take Zimmerman’s advice and hold off drinking it?

Max:  I probably quaffed it in one sitting as soon as I got home.

Me:  I researched it online and discovered that it’s now worth $149.56.

Max winced as if he got hit in the head with an oak barrel.  Later, I called Coco.

Me:  Hey Coke, it seems like I’ve had a $150 bottle of wine sitting in my cupboard for almost a dozen years.  Do you think it’s any good?

Coco:  There’s only one way to find out!

That weekend we decided to guzzle this possible nectar of the Gods.  I hightailed downtown to Coco’s lair.  She had a backup bottle of Wyatt Pinot Noir on hand just in case our nectar tasted more akin to swill.

2009 Wyatt aka backup reserve.

Pictured below are the results of our taste test.

Whenever you chow at Coco's, you chow in style.

Holiday wrapped!

Holy crap, is that cork?

"Yes, it's cork. Nurse, hand me the knife."

"Let's try the old coffee filter trick."

"At this rate we'll have a glass by next Christmas."

"Maybe the flour sifter is a better way to go?"

"Much better way to go!"

First glass about to go down the hatch!

"This tastes like ammonia! Is my tongue stained?"

"Are you sure this is meant for tongue stains and when did you drink ammonia -- high school or NYUseless?"

Wyatt to the rescue!

Obedient Wyatt cork.

Happy Coco guzzling Wyatt!

I would like to conclude with two observations.  I recently discovered that a bottle of this Bob Dylan wine that was removed “from a temperature and humidity controlled wine cellar” unlike my cupboard that was completely lacking both temperature and humidity control over the past twelve years — sold at auction on January 12th of this year for $5.  The second observation is that Coco, even after an hour of floor scrubbing and vacuuming is continuing to step on pieces of cork.

The cork bits that refuse to leave until they're all completely embedded in Coco's foot.

16 Comments

Posted in Humor

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