The ABIB

The ABIB

Thursday, November 25, 2010

I Can't Stand It Anymore?

Here's an idea that can't lose: create a chemical that can be aerosolized and dispersed across the entire nation and once it hits people renders them unable to phrase EACH AND EVERY FUCKING SENTENCE in the form of an interrogative. Something as simple as giving directions becomes an adventure in the misplaced question mark.

Now: So, you head north on Main Street?
Post Chemical Dispersal: You head north on Main Street.

Now: And then you make a right on Elm?
Post Chemical Dispersal: And then you make a right on Elm.

Now: It should take about 10 minutes on foot?
Post Chemical Dispersal: It should take about 10 minutes on foot.

When and fucking where was it decided that every moron in the country needed to sound like a retarded Valley Girl 24 hours a day? I hear it everywhere! At work, on the radio, on the TV and its driving me INSANE!! There is no verbal communication immune from this idiotic affectation. To wit:

I'm trying to take a shit? It's looking like I'm going to run out of toilet paper? I'll head over to the linen closet and take out a new roll? That way when I sit down to take that shit I mentioned I'll have sufficient toilet paper to clean up after said shit? Cause it's a drag? To run out? Of toilet paper? When you really need it?

Haven't we suffered enough? (That's an actual question, by the way.) Isn't it about time we regained our national, minimal IQ and stopped insisting that we all have to sound like high school mean girls? To these valid questions I say: YES! Not, Yes? So, ladies and gentlemen. Put down the question marks and slowly back away. It's for your own good, trust me on this. But of far greater importance: it's for MY OWN good! Break the insidious habit of the question mark, I beg you.

You'll be glad you did. I guarantee it?

Monday, November 22, 2010

Phaedra Parks: Woman on the Verge...of Overacting

Aaaight, Imma make this one brief: Phaedra Parks is now officially the WORST ho that's ever been on any Real Housewives series and that includes Danielle Staub. I mean, I LOVE me some Real Housewives of Atlanta, I actually want to hang out with Nene like 24/7, but this year's dumbass award has got to go, hands-down, to Phaedra "I AM A Lawyer" Parks. This week Phaedra's in the hospital having her gigantic baby, being induced at 7 months because it's just too big already. Huh? Well, finally tonight the doc weighs in (see how I did that?) and calls it true: this baby is TERM, motherfucker! We're talking 40 weeks! So Phaedra is, as Kim Zolciak would say: "a lying sack of shit." Apparently Mommy Parks who is some kind of...uh...clergyperson...doesn't approve of pregnancy out of wedlock. Uh...OK. Yo! Ma! Welcome to 2010, babe! Guess Phaedra was too busy eating her Lady Fingers with "Barbarian" Cream to clue you in to her...condition. Whatevs.

Anyway to get to the point, this week Ms. Thang had her baby taken out of her by way of tasteful (low incision, you'll still be able to wear a bikini) C-section. Now I've had an actual C-section and I'm here to tell you that you are numb brothers and sisters, numb as in, DO I STILL HAVE ANYTHING BELOW MY ELBOWS THAT IS ATTACHED TO MY BODY? But Ms. Phaedra, once drugged and on the table, commences to whining and crying and gets all: "Ow...Ow! Ooooch! Gasp!"

Phaedra, can we tawk? Time to focus girl. You got the chiseled ex-con husband. You got the borderline "celebrity" law practice (if you count Bobbie Brown and some chick who got kicked out of Destiny's Child before they became Destiny's Child), you've even had the Twilight Zone baby shower replete with ballerinas and...a bizzaro-world courtly dance with Dwight "The Man With No Face" and your gigantic pregnant belly. Time to invest in some acting classes. Heck, hook up with Sheree; she's all about the "work" this year, all about the "craft". Do whatever you have to do bitch, because when you start whining in "pain" during a C-fucking-section, you're poised to become the most ridiculous joke in a veritable SEA of ridiculous jokes. Shit, you're making Kim look normal. And BTW, who knew that Kim was a NURSE? Working a pole in a nurse's costume, by all means, YES, but a real, actual nurse!? Wow....OK, then, nuff said. I'll leave it at that, but stay tuned to this channel which may very well become a weekly comment on the wacky, wonderful, jiggly world that is The Real Housewives of Atlanta!

Tuesday, November 16, 2010

Does The ABIB Have to Go There?

Yes, The ABIB has to go there. And frankly it's probably overdue. So I'm reading about this whole "don't ask don't tell" issue that's got everyone's shorts up their crack and I gotta say: Ya'll are FUCKED UP!! Jeez O Man what is wrong with people? Isn't it enough that gay folks can't marry the person that they love in a ceremony of their choosing, in a place of their choosing and have that sanctified union recognized in EVERY FUCKING STATE IN OUR NATION?! And, oh, by the way? Have the same civil rights AS EVERY OTHER TAX PAYING CITIZEN WHO JUST HAPPENS TO FUCK A MEMBER OF THE OPPOSITE SEX! What is wrong with us? As a people? As a culture? Are we really that frightened and narrow and just plain bigoted? Really? Makes a bitch sad I gotta tell you.

So back to the military thingie. I think that every fucking asshole who thinks that gay people should have to serve in silence regarding their true selves, in, oh I don't know....Afghanistan, Iraq, anywhere our military serves on the whole globe, I think that those bigoted, messed-up and just plain confused assholes should have to personally take the fucking place of a hidden gay person serving in the sand of wherever those brave folks are serving. Just to shut them the fuck up. For real.

I keep waiting for us as a culture to do the minimally right thing and recognize folks' rights to live their lives as they choose. Within the law. ALL THE LAWS. To marry openly and be afforded ALL OF THE SAME RIGHTS as tax paying citizens that their heterosexual neighbors are afforded. To not have to hide who they are and who they love for fear of being passed over for a promotion or not being able to adopt a child who needs two loving parents. Regardless of their genders. LOVE IS LOVE, PEOPLE! This is the irony that the haters never seem to grasp: its all about being able to love and love openly and make choices that are right for you. No matter what.

The current rash of suicides among young gay people is the part of this awful story that is the worst. Our cultural inability to reign in bigoted hatred is poisoning the structure of our society at such an elemental level that young gay people are choosing death rather than going forward into a world that should be open to their bright youth, their hopeful enthusiasm and the fresh vibrancy that their souls are ready to bring into our world. This is the most painful outcome of all and I'll leave it at that.

Enough is enough.

I know The ABIB is normally all about the crazy shit but this stuff is serious and it is heartbreaking to me. So, please, do a bitch a favor and STOP IT. Open your hearts and open your minds and I promise you...if you do...you'll see that its right and that it makes you feel better. More connected. More human. And isn't that what's going to make or break us? Give a bitch a break and try acceptance for a change. I promise you it'll be bitchin'.

Sunday, November 14, 2010

Who's Got Parking Issues? The ABIB, That's Who!

What up? ABIB here with today's Gripe Du Jour: people who employ handicapped parking hang tags when their fat asses are more than capable of walking from a regular parking space. I mean, first of all, where the fuck are all of these handicapped hang tags coming from? Is there some vendor stand somewhere in Baltimore that sells these suckers to anyone with cash to spend? Don't you think that the whatever-the-fuck-agency that oversees such things would wonder: "hmmmm....there is an alarming increase in handicapped people in Baltimore based on the number of parking hang tags we're unloading here. Perhaps a study of the air and/or water is in order." Oh, but wait, I'm talking about your average John or Jane Q. Municipal Worker. No such analysis going on there, probably barely the basics of cognition are going on there. Or worse, they're printing the fucking things in their basement.

Anyway, it never fails, there I am at work, shopping, anywhere there's a parking lot and invariably some gigantic-ass SUV (they seem to especially proliferate among SUV drivers, another SUPER PET PEEVE of the ABIB as regular readers know) rolls into the right-next-to-the-fucking-door handicapped parking space and BINGO! there's the little blue and white hang tag. The door opens and out steps some gigantic-assed PERSON, however, and don't wring me out here over this its strictly observational: NORMALLY A FAT ASSED WOMAN or womyn, or woomin or whatever the newest gender-normative spelling is. Yes, I'm here to say it out loud: mostly I see big, fat women lumbering out of their giant, gas guzzling SUVs and parking a mere few steps from the door of whatever retail or office emporium they have chosen to visit. A MERE FEW STEPS. Shit, most of these big berthas could REALLY use the fucking exercise it takes to WALK the normally relatively short distance from any other parking space to the front door.

They lumber their big asses out the door and shuffle on in to...wherever. I'm seething, of course, because, let's face it, I AM the ABIB, after all and just about anything makes me seethe. And when I seethe I seem to amost always imagine...imagine...imagine what could happen...

"Ma'am! Excuse me: MA'AM?!"
"Huh?"
"Ma'am I'm going to have to ask you to step away from the vehicle."
"Wha?"
"Step your ass away from your vehicle, is what I'm asking."
"Who are you?"
"I'm someone who has been appointed to verify the validity of your handicapped parking hang tag and, if deemed invalid, to CONFISCATE IT AND MAKE YOU PARK OUT IN THE LOT WITH THE REST OF US NON-SCOFFLAWS and...oh, I don't know...WALK?!"

I can see her startled, slightly annoyed expression and of course, being The ABIB, it fills me with unbridled glee, but I press on with the bust making her prove WHO she has to haul around that is ACTUALLY HANDICAPPED. Is it your Grandmother, your Mother, your Father, your Auntie Ruth? Who is the actually crippled person whose inabilty to WALK has afforded you that golden parking pass?
Of course I would expect that answer to be in the negatory and then I would get to CONFISCATE IT! Bwhaahahahahahahahahahaha!

Plus I could offer some healthy eating suggestions (lay off the Doritos and lace up the sneaks, sister) to go with her newfound WALKING REGIMEN! HAH! Now, don't get all whackjob on me here, I know that there have to be SOME GIANT GAS GUZZLING SUVs that haul handicapped Gramma to the mall but I'm guessing that that number is somewhere right around three...out of the whole lot of them. But ABIB you ask, how can you just pull a random number like that out of your ass? To that I say, and it's strictly anecdotal observation here, I admit it, but of all the GIANT SUVs sporting handicapped hang tags I've seen in how many cases have I watched an actual handicapped person emerge from the vehicle? Um....exactly ZERO! So my estimation of three is pretty darned generous.

So there you have it, ABIB's Gripe Du Jour and tiny little revenge fantasy all in one post. Can it be that this will be the new format? That I bitch about some asshole doing something moronic and then I get to picture the inevitable ABIB-delivered course correction? Me likey the sound of that! Stay tuned, folks, I'm already mentally plotting the denouement of hapless suckers everywhere.

Thursday, November 11, 2010

This Just In...

Rolling Stone reports that singer Phil Collins said in an interview that he has contemplated suicide. Hmmmmm...well Phil, I'm pretty sure many others did too after having to listen to your shitty music.

Asshole told his wife he wanted a divorce via fax. What a wanker.

Friday, October 29, 2010

Guys, (and Frighteningly, Some Gals) Can We Tawk?

OK, I've begun this post by specifically CHOOSING to be gender biased. This blog post is almost exclusively aimed at da mens among us. Although I reference gals in the title of this post, I have to say here and now that if you are indeed a female and you suffer from the topic of this post it may be time to just go ahead and have that X/Y matchup done. Fer real, yo.

So, guys, can we tawk (as the title inquires) about a scourge to humanity that is almost (I say ALMOST for a reason) as repulsive as the dreaded skidmark? I'm talking here about...GAG....fucking EAR HAIR!! Yes, you know what I mean...those sickening tufts of...is it really hair?...that are poking out of your ear canal? For the love of everything that is sacred can you...PLEASE...JUST...DEAL...WITH...IT?!?!

I mean, what's up with this mess? You get up in the AM, you shower (prayerfully), you brush your teeth (beseeching you all to do this AT LEAST daily, if not for your own oral hygiene then for those that have to deal with the resulting death breath of not brushing) AND FLOSSING WHILE WE'RE AT IT, and you...oh, I don't know...SHAVE? Comb your hair? What I'm getting at here guys, the common thread that's uniting the beginning of this tirade, is that you have ample MIRROR TIME EVERY FUCKING DAY!!

As in, you're gazing at your own reflection and not recoiling in horror once you get a good, solid look. So, you're in front of a mirror and in spite of every decent opportunity you fucking don't notice the incipient thatch of wheat emerging from your ear canal. WHEAT MOTHERFUCKERS!! And sometimes that wheat is holding onto some absolutely terrifying...I can't say it...earwax? So, um, it's the equivalent of ignoring a giant zit or a coldsore or a WEN in the middle of your fucking mug. All together now: eeeeeeewwwwwwwwww!

I mean, what's the deal with ear hair anyway? Is this some long lost holdover from the pleistocene era when gnats the size of tissue boxes were divebombing our heads? Was the purpose of those ear tufts to keep those fuckers out? Or was it to keep the ol' ear canal warm during those long, cold winters spent inventing fire and the wheel? If so, CLUE UP BITCHES! Them days is long gone! We've had Mr. Schick and Mr. Gillette and Mr. Ronson around for fucking DECADES! They have been creating products to take care of this problem since who knows when? I mean, really, exactly how long has human civilization had the razor? A long, long, loooooooooooooong time, my friends. A long ass time.

So come on, guys...help a bitch out wouldja? Trim that unsightly troll-ass looking forest from your ears and spare all of us the indignity of having to openly avert our eyes whenever we're stuck having to look at your sorry ass. Those tissue box gnats have been gone for millions of years but your ears are still stuck in that earwax-laden, follicularly challenged past. Really? Grab a set of shears and DO WHAT HAS TO BE DONE! The ABIB has spoken; don't make me come at you with a hedgetrimmer!

Friday, August 13, 2010

Did Something Last Night...

that I'm not particularly proud of. I...I...watched an entire movie on THE LIFETIME CHANNEL!!! Cue scary music and that slicing sound when the crazy dude went off on the chick in the shower scene in Psycho. I can't believe I'm admitting this to anyone let alone blogging about it. Jesus it was just like eating something really fattening but that isn't all that great but you just keep eating it anyway because its brainless and repetitive.

I won't go so far as to divulge the name of the "movie", but since it was on Lifetime you can probably get pretty close just by guessing any title about surviving abusive spouses or surviving abusive parents or surviving abusive drug dealers/pimps. But that last one is only if the protagonist is a teenage girl. What someone SHOULD make is a movie about Lifetime Channel's abusive movies!

So anyway, I sat there on my couch and before I realized what had happened I was actually watching this thing and, well, kind of, wondering how it was going to turn out. In spite of myself. I get the same vaguely shame-filled feeling whenever I watch Ghost Hunters. Holy crap, the "hunters", eerily lighted by a greenish night-vision glow (as if ghosts will only EVER appear in total darkness..what do you mean, ghosts don't exist? philistine!) 'DID YOU SEE THAT??? IT WAS JUST OVER THERE A SPLIT SECOND AGO!!' The camera lamely swings in the direction of the "sighting" which of course is no longer visible but I continue watching all the same. And feel ridiculous yet weirdly powerless to stop. Sheesh.

So I figure that by watching an entire "movie" on the Lifetime Channel I have irrevocably taken that step firmly into post-menopausal middle age. How depressing. I thought I had insulated myself what with the repeated viewings of Family Guy, The Simpsons and South Park. Hey motherfuckers, I watch GLEE for crying out loud! And yet none of those youthful choices kept me safe when the channel changer brought me to the Lifetime Channel and left me there, foundering amongst all the bad dialogue and scenery-chewingly dreadful "acting", the bombastic music and the over-wrought camera work. At the end I felt like one, big bottle of something from Mary Kay. YUCK!!

All the purveyors of the 900 channel reality that is modern television offer parents the option to block what they deem to be inappropriate viewing for their children. Let me say, here and now, that said purveyors would do well to offer we baby boomers who like to think of ourselves as endlessly youthful and hip, (case in point: Old Farts on Facebook) a service that would warn us IN LOUD VOICES WITH LARGE LETTERS that HEY!!! YOU ARE ABOUT TO SWITCH TO A CHANNEL THAT WILL MAKE YOU, HEAVEN FORBID, FEEL YOUR ACTUAL CHRONOLOGIC AGE!!! BEWARE!!! UNLESS YOU WANT TO SPEND THE NEXT 90 MINUTES FEELING TERRIBLE ABOUT YOURSELF MOVE ALONG!!! MOVE ALONG!!!

Hells at least we'd be warned. At least we'd KNOWINGLY commit to bad, soporific old people television. I mean I'm actually scared. What's next: bedtime at 8:30, dinner at 4:00, anything on CBS!? Maybe I'll just hang out on YouTube for awhile, watch some stuff on Hulu, anything to keep me from helplessly turning toward that insidious siren call that I hear even now: Lifetime Channel Presents: The Devil's Teardrop, Bond of Silence or The Client List. Putting down the remote...backing away from the TV...suddenly wondering what's on the Early Bird Special today at Olde Country Buffet. Nooooooooooooooo!

Thursday, August 5, 2010

*****NEWSFLASH******

YO, BEEYOTCHES!!! The ABIB is immensely gratified and proud to report that she actually witnessed (with her own ears) the utilization of The Courtesy Flush in the bathroom at work today!!! This, my friends, is a HUGE step forward in the struggle against public bathroom miscreants who from this point forward shall be known as Stink Hoarders.

The ABIB is deeply touched ...wiping a tear from her eye...to learn that her tirades are actually making a difference. Not to mention, being read.

Trapped in the Slowly Moving Humor Free Zone Also Known as “The Elevator”

OMG!!! OMG!!! OMG!!! OMG!!! I’m finally free of the Elevator of Slow Death by Trite, Stupid Humorless “Jokes”. ABIB here in, as you may know by now, a federal workplace that I go to every day to do….whatever people do at work. So, sometimes I have to ride one of several elevators in my building, generally transiting from my cube to the cafeteria and back, a trip that traverses three floors. The elevators, as many in older buildings, are painfully slow. So when you get on in the basement and have to ride to the third floor you could possibly grow grey as the tiny space stops on floor 1, then on floor 2, and finally, BLESSEDLY, on floor 3 where I speedily exit into the processed, controlled air of the mauve-colored hallway. I generally hope for, and mightily try to achieve, being a lone elevator rider, as in NOT HAVING TO SHARE THAT TINY, AIRLESS SPACE WITH ANY OF THE SEVERAL THOUSAND NITWITS THAT CONSTITUTE MY COWORKER POPULATION.

Riding with others in silence, while not ideal (again, always shooting for that LONE ridership) is at least bearable, albeit a little awkward. Silent co-riders are surely almost palpably aware that they are not alone and are, in fact, in nearly obscene physical proximity to someone who is likely a total stranger. Can do. Even the multiple floor stops are livable especially since each floor means another person is going away.

Soooooo….today I found myself riding up to floor three from the lower lever, a.k.a. THE BASEMENT with not one, not two but FIVE other drones. But not just any five other drones, five of the most cretinous, repellent, downright scirry drones to occupy this particular federal facility. In other words, some fairly normal federal workers. I should have taken the worrisome cue as we all waited in the cold concrete floor, white cinderblock , bunker-ish reality that is THE BASEMENT. The worrisome cue was the “I can’t stand the sound of the normal silences that occupy the spaces between people who don’t know each other so I’m going to fill it with ENDLESS, HORRIFIC “FUNNY” GIBBERISH!!!” that began almost immediately after the moment one of us pushed the button to call the elevator. There I was, in a physical space that, again, most resembles a bomb shelter circa 1962, surrounded by a group of lamebrain idiots whose idea of “humor” is to make exceedingly moronic observations about what’s happening around them.

“Hey is there only ONE of these elevators working?” This barked out in front of the bank of two elevators in front of us.

“HAHAHAHAHA, Yeah! One’s the backup in case the other one doesn’t work!”

“Haven’t you heard about federal contracts going to the lowest bidder?! Welll, we only CONTRACTED for ONE of these to WORK at a TIME!!”

“Let’s make sure that we SAVE A TREE WHILE WE’RE AT IT!!”

The slow descent into hell has begun and although my ABIB-Senses tell me to FLEE MOTHERFUCKER!!!! FLEE FOR YOUR LIFE!!!! I instead stand there, already too numb to move. Within a brief period of a few seconds it was already too late to escape.

“Hey should we try a rain dance?”

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!

Now that one doesn’t even make sense in Stupid Fucker World! A rain dance? Here comes the bile, right on time, ready to spew forth onto this crowd of fucking ninnies if someone doesn’t strike them dumb. Or dumb-ER. Hee Hee.

Finally the ONE WORKING ELEVATOR arrives and everyone jovially piles in to begin the ride to: I see with dawning horror: ALL THREE FLOORS! The hilarity continues unabated once the door whooshes closed with an ominous hiss.

“Here we are; hope everyone put on their deodorant today!”

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Oh for fucks sake.

I begin to beam hate waves to every pinhead in the car now moving with agonizing slowness to the first of three stops and YES, mine is the last. SHUT UP SHUT UP SHUT UP SHUT UP SHUT THE MOTHERFUCK UP!!!! My silent powers of mind control are not working.

Ding! The electronic “female” talking elevator voice is now announcing for any blind person in the cab (it is after all a FEDERAL facility) Level One: Going Up! No-one moves.

“Hey did someone let a ghost on here?”

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

The thinnest thread now exists between my sanity and my self control. Two floors to go.

“Maybe that rain dance did it! Are we on some kind of Indian burial ground?! Cheap land, one working elevator. YEP! Lowest bidder!”

Pencil-necked geek DID NOT JUST DO A CALL-BACK and to some ignorant-ass shit that wasn’t even remotely funny the FIRST FUCKING TIME!

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Why do people laugh at shit that isn’t even remotely funny? I mean, COME ON, a rain dance? Ghosts? Indian burial grounds? What’s with the automatic, instantaneous hale and hearty, too loud laughter? I say: remain silent and maybe this corny-ass lame mother fucker will SHUT UP. And then I remember: same as always ABIB, it’s you against the world: all these morons actually find this crap comical.
Well the rest of the ride went by in a blurry haze as I’m convinced that all of my hate beams were backing up on me since none of the dipwads in that elevator from moronic bad joke hell were even remotely fazed, keeping up the hideous barrage of verbal mayhem:

“Here’s your floor! Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do!”

“OR ANYTHING YOU WOULD DO!!!”

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

until I escaped onto my floor. Plus I’m pretty sure I developed TMJ from the jaw grinding that began downstairs in the 60s air raid bunker.
If I wasn’t so fucking lazy I’d force myself to take the stairs. Maybe the solution is earplugs. Or MAYBE , just maybe, the solution is for moronic assholes who don’t have anything of any interest to say to just SHUT THE FUCK UP MOTHERFUCKER! The ABIB can dream, can’t she?

Monday, July 12, 2010

Directly From The Face Of The Sun

Hi kids; ABIB here. Yo, now that it's summer you might find yourself thinking, "Hey...I wonder what it's like on the face of the sun?" Well, I have the answer for you kiddos: Baltimore in July! Yes this post is coming to you directly from the fucking face of Old Sol himself, brought to earth for your sweltering pleasure and located directly WHERE I LIVE! Hateful motherfucking summer weather; the bane of my existence from roughly May until whenever global warming decides to release us from its gaping hellish maw. Round these parts that would generally be October at the very earliest. I hate to sweat, I hate the wall-to-wall, smothering humidity, I hate how everyone's tongue clicks when they're talking because they're constantly suffering from heat-induced dry mouth. Did I mention that I hate to sweat?
It reached a zenith here last week when we accrued the - what - 15th, 20th, 5,000th straight day of 90+ degrees? Yes, it topped out one day at a balmy 104 degrees. Combined with the 57% humidity it made every step outdoors akin to slogging your way through hot oatmeal. Even CNN reported on the heatwave plaguing the East Coast and darned if Baltimore wasn't ALWAYS the hottest temperature on the map from Maine to Florida. Also, weather people: STOP BEING SO FUCKING CHEERFUL ABOUT THE WEATHER!! "Hey folks, looks like another scorcher out there today with no real end in sight! Slather up on the SPF 50, grab some water bottles and head to the pool!" Um, what FUCKING POOL?! Don't most of us WORK for a living? So I'm reduced to dashing (except you can't dash in 104 degrees without seriously courting heatstroke) from one air-conditioned reality to the next. Car to work to car to house. Don't be so crabby, ABIB, at least you HAVE air conditioning. To that I say: hey, mofo, it's 2010, if you STILL don't have ready access to air conditioning why not hitch up that horse and buggy and get the fuck back to the 19th century? Folks, the heat brings out the worst in me and as you surely know by now, the BEST of me is pretty dicey.
I had to deviate from the car to work to car to house pattern last Thursday and let me tell you, it was not a pretty picture. Errands should be banned when the temperature rises above 85. But an errand I had so before I could escape into the no-shades-open-72-degree interior of my house (yes I keep it at 72 degrees and it's well worth the privations needed to achieve that blessed inside temperature - who needs food?) I had to make a stop at the local Walgreens.
Out of car - FULL BODY HOT OATMEAL SLAM: FUCK ITS HOT - into the Walgreens - where the PA system was positively BLASTING some random CD of oldies but at least it was cool in there. Got in line with - Christ Almighty - other people. Other people who have been outside in the boiling Sargasso Sea of weather called Baltimore in July and, well, to put it delicately: MANY OF THEM STUNK!!!
The ABIB prides herself on her pristine personal hygiene habits and is sadly often let down by the not-so-pristine personal hygiene habits of others. Which is why I try, as much as possible, to avoid public places once the temps hit, oh, about 80. Blasting muzak, the accursed dry-mouth, a line wait (which is hellish for the ABIB in the BEST of circumstances) and fellow sweating, odorous line waiters. As you can probably guess it didn't go well. By the time I was done with my errand I had reached the threshhold where being even remotely pleasant was a distant memory. A very distant memory. Paid up, gathered my stuff, pushed past the line of olfactory miscreants waiting behind me (FOLKS: IT'S CALLED DEODORANT! USE IT!) and exited the building. WHAM! Back into the muggy, hot wall of hideousness that is Ol' Sol's loving breath, into my now reheated car, whose AC will not have the oommph to blow cool enough to matter before I get home. The next person who cheerily states: "Well at least it's not SNOWING!" Is going to get a karate chop to the solar plexus.
Yes, folks, it's the ABIB in mid-July, cheerless and resentful as ever, posting from the face of the sun, aka Baltimore, MD.