Thursday, April 19, 2007

Things I've learned recently through trial and error

Things I've learned recently through trial and error


School is cool and all that shit, blah, blah, blah. We all sing its praises and secretly look down our noses at those who drop out, never to finish. But really, kids, what have you learned recently in school that you find so very useful in your every day tormented existence?


Me, I think that student enrollment in the the school of hard knocks: Trial and Error is about to have a renaissance. And I nominate me for it's latest band leader. In hopes of garnering all of your lovely votes, my friends, I leave you with a list of things I have learned recently through a fair amount of Trial and a huge amount of error.

Let's start with the trial portion. Everyone loves a good trial right?


I like onions. Okay, I LOVE onions. Ross says that I put them in nearly everything. He is afraid that I will one day find the perfect onion dessert. When that day arrives he has informed me that we will have to break up. And that it will be solely my fault. Onion dessert is just a line that he can not cross over and return from. I get this. Everyone has there limit, right? There proverbial line in the sand, if you will.


Okay, back to onions. I bet you thought I forgot! Yeah, I know I do that sometimes.


As much as I love to eat them, who likes cutting them? NOT ME! I cry like a Baptist church lady at a summer tent revival. You know, “Jesus, he loves you! He even forgives your shitty fashion sense!,” says the minister. “Blather, sob, sniffle, cry!, “ says the baptist church lady all the while sweating profusely through her taupe colored pantyhose and flowered tea length church dress. I call this waterfall of gastronomic onion tears “Church Lady Syndrome.” You get the idea.


As I have never been much a fan of the church lady wardrobe, I see it as a huge priority to end the suffering of Church Lady Syndrome Sufferers everywhere. So through much trial, I have learned two, yes count them, two entirely different yet equally brilliant ways of ending CLS for good. Okay, this is probably bizarre to picture but run with me on this one.


Technique 1

Ski Goggles! No, I am not joking. Yes, I know, it looks ridiculous. But when I take them off my mascara stills look fabulous! (Not like yours which is probably smeared all the way to your knees, you doubty poseurs!)

Technique 2

Candles! Lite a candle right next to the onion that you are cutting and cut away. I don't know why this works, but I assume that it's because the fire burns off the oniony tear making shit.


Why, you might ask, would anybody opt for the ski goggle technique that requires you to wander about your kitchen looking stupid when you can just light a pretty scented candle and save your dignity all at the same time? Well, for one, do you enjoy your kitchen reeking of the combined scents of French vanilla mixed with onion? Me, personally, I kind of like it (back to the oniony dessert idea, I guess), but those who know me know that I'm a little off. Most people find it kind of gross. Back to the ski goggles!


Moving on to Error

There are many many reasons why you should love jalapeño peppers. But, not so strangely, there are even more reason why you should not rub it into your eyes. Or your nose! Definitely not your nose!


Just this very week I have learned why people wear gloves when cutting jalapeños. When I saw them on TV programs I just thought that they were sissies. Now I know the truth: that they are immeasurably wise, and more than likely students of Trial and Error!


La, la, la. I'm singing in the kitchen on the top of my lungs. “It's De Lovely!!!!” Everyone loves Cole Porter, right? And I'm making veggie chili. Both are pretty normal occurrences in my kitchen. I sing I cook. It drives Ross nuts! So, I have these fancy jalapeños in the fridge and they are just screaming”Put me in your chili, oh fabulous, singing chef! Use me!” And I, being the beneficently, beautiful, bodacious, babe, ahem...I mean chef, but who can resist an adventurous alliteration...that I am, I grab those suckers out of the pit that is my ancient fridge and chop em up all nice and pretty and throw them in. The chili is cooking away steeping itself all up into its chili goodness and I'm reading a book trying to take my mind off of my growly belly. And do you know what happens? My eye begins to itch. And nobody like an itchy eye! So, of course I reach up to rub the itchies away.


Oh the sting! The horrible, horribly horrible sting! At present, there exist no words to acceptably even begin to convey the horror of this EYE STING!


So, the shock eventually wears off and look at that, .just in time to eat some of that yummy chili. I mean, really, is it the chilis fault that the jalapeño made such and eye sting? Why punish the chili, right? So I, being the rational entirely reasonable girl that you know me to be do what any other rational, reasonable and very hungry girl would do. I WASH MY HANDS THOUROUGHLEY! And I eat my chili. And all is right with the world. NOT!


About and hour passes. The chili is on its way to chili heaven, or if you're not overly religious like me, to wherever atheist chili eaters send there chili. And what happens? My NOSE itches! And, like itchy eyes, NOBODY likes an itchy nose! So, I think nothing of itching away the nose itchies.


URGH!!!! Nose Fire! I think that my nose is actually on fire! Burning!!!! Didn't I wash my hands and hour ago? Why is this happening! Does God HATE ME? Is this his way of telling me that he hates me?


You get the picture.


I hope you can learn from my trials and errors. Why make your own when you can live vicariously through mine, right?


You know, I originally wrote this as a allegorical cautionary tale for you, my favorite readers. But I have only now begun to realize that I, too, have learned ever so more than I thought possible. For instance, I have realized that I have an obsession with Church Ladies. This just can't be normal, or health. And also, my fridge has way, way, too many zucchinis in it. Just because they are on sale does not mean that you should buy all of them in the state!

Tuesday, April 03, 2007

I have lovely toes! They are perfect and painted pink. Not a barbie pink, nor are they a ballerina pink. They are, in fact, the perfect shade of Starburst Fruit Chew strawberry candy pink! Perfect, I tell you.

I have searched the world long and hard to find the perfect shade of Starburst Fruit Chew strawberry candy pink. In fact, I think that the quest might have played a much larger role than I earlier acknowledged in my becoming a flight attendant. Yes, it is true. Sir Lancelot has his Holy Grail, and I, erika m, have my perfect toes. Life is rather random that way, isn't it?

But somehow, I feel a little empty now. I am in Fort Lauderdale, FL alone with my perfect toes. By all rights I should be over the moon, ecstatic. Yet all is not well. You see, on those long lonely nights that lie ahead, I have nothing to strive for. Success comes to me so easily it's almost not worth trying. When the perfect shade of Starburst Fruit Chew strawberry candy pink nail polish that you have traveled to all ends of the earth suddenly finds you in a strip mall nail salon in an atlanta suburb, it just doesn't feel like true success.

You see, that same perfect shade of Starburst Fruit Chew strawberry candy pink nail polish eluded me in the Grand Bazzare in Istanbul, and it swam just out of reach on the shores of Guam. It Hula'd twisitily out of my grasp in Hawaii and sang me a polka safely tucked out of reach on a the balcony of a beer garden in Leipzig. Always I have searched valiantly! Allways I have failed dramatically.

Did it have to be a strip mall? I kind of feel cheated, you know?

e