In celebration of our third year wedding anniversary (which technically isn't until tomorrow) Adam and I made a two day trip over to Seaside, Oregon for some sand, seafood, shopping, and other S word stuff. It was a great couple of days and I'm a little sad to be back and at work. Our mini vacation made me realize that we haven't taken a vacation since we were married in Maui three years ago. Hawaii is greatly missed.

In our short time at Seaside we, ate an extravagant seafood dinner by candlelight at a table with a beach front view, drank champagne and splashed about in our in-room jacuzzi, took a tour of Seaside's adorable little "museum", visited the local Aquarium where I was able to feed some seals (and was fiercely splashed by a mean-spirited bully seal) and saw an octopus up close and personal, rode in bumper cars which turned out to be insanely fun, browsed shops, rode a carousel, bought taffy and fudge, took a long walk on the beach, drank afternoon cocktails, and ate more seafood. Life being Mrs. Alexander is awesome.

Pictures are here.

I work in a very small store located in one of the major (tourist) shopping districts in downtown Portland. As a result of this location, and perhaps also as a result of the store being small and cozy and generally not bustling with activity, I receive a million stupid questions a day from people off of the street, like I'm a fucking tour guide. The majority of the people who come in to ask me these questions are not customers of this store. Instead they are simply a passerby who thought it wise and not rude at all to walk into my store to ask me where this other store is, where that restaurant is located, or that park, don't I know the one? I am not familiar with the Pearl District at all. In fact, other than it being a peaceful and clean place to work, I really don't like the neighborhood all that much. Too many collared shirts and tennis bracelets, not enough tattoos and black clothing. So, in turn I don't spend my spare time in this neighborhood. I don't know where all the restaurants are located, I have no idea where the art galleries are, and I've never even heard of that store you're asking me about. When I politely tell the rude-fucking-tourist that I'm not very familiar with the Pearl District and I'm sorry but I'm unable to direct them, some of them act ... snooty! As though I'm not doing my job properly because I can't suggest a good place to grab lunch. Other times they barely mutter a thank you before they're turning on their heels and heading out of the store. Never do they browse or buy anything, never do they apologize for the imposition. Then there are those who come in and ask for meter change. Seriously? Do I have the word Teller on my shirt (hi Nat!)? I go to the bank for change very rarely so no, you cannot have four quarters, maybe you should try, um, I don't know, a fucking bank? And, do I know how to operate the parking meter? Can I show them? Do I know of a hotel they can stay at? Can I tell them what time the grocery store on the corner closes? What's the weather supposed to be like tomorrow? And excuse me but can you please tell me the square root of pi?

Now granted, some of these people are customers, and I happily use my Internet power to find answers and give directions to those people, I even print shit out for them occasionally. And while I don't mind it as much as I mind the people who walk in for the sole purpose of asking me something, it's still getting pretty damn annoying. When I travel I go prepared with lists and maps and printouts and telephone numbers and directions and hours of operations and weather forecasts and it all gets sorted and stapled together and put into a binder and placed into a bag alongside of at least two small tour guide books. Do I expect others to be as awesome as myself? Clearly that's hardly possible, even I find it difficult to maintain my awesomeness on such a level at all times, but I manage, and no I don't expect others to, I guess. But my god people, at least use good sense enough to ask your dumb questions in a place that has a Customer Information booth, like Powell's! Which is literally around the block! And is probably why you're in this dumb neighborhood anyways!

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I was going to blog about work, about how I had to spend an entire morning/afternoon interviewing people and how I found the entire process odd, unsavory, and extremely satisfying. Now I finally understand what He-Man was boasting about all those years, power is... well, intoxicating. But that's all boring compared to the news my mother told me yesterday. She said to me five magic words, "I shipped your Barbie stuff." My heart transformed into a jack rabbit and my voice was suddenly five octaves higher. "You did?!" I squealed, "You really did?! Oh thank you thank you thank you!" It was some time ago that I'd asked my mother to ship my Barbie collection to me, now that we have the space to accommodate the two large boxes worth of my childhood Mattel obsession I felt that our reunion, Barbie and mine, was long overdue.

I don't think I qualified as your average Barbie player. Rarely did she and Ken go on dates, she definitely was never married, nor did she play mother. Instead I pretty much copied the adventures that were so dear to me in cinema. She hunted treasure in the jungle like Joan Wilder in Romancing the Stone. We lived on 28 acres of land, most of it being woods, so Barbie would pack up her Jeep and we'd go back to the stream where she'd ride the rapids and get separated from Michael Douglas (Ken). "You've got the stone!" she'd cry. "Well you've got the map!" he'd retort. I even made a small treasure map to fold and slip into her backpack, and the famous stone was a plastic gem I extracted from some costume jewelry.

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Apparently I don't appear to be the marrying type. Maybe I look too young (hello gray hair, oh look, you brought friends), or maybe my soul-sucking stare (hi Greg!) lets people know I won't take their shit, but whatever it is people can't seem to get it right and Adam remains my boyfriend in the eyes of the world. It happened again just this morning while I'm laying on my stomach at the chiropractors office, black pantied ass poking through the fabric gown that opens at the back, the chiropractor's assistant asked me something about my boyfriend. Perhaps I corrected her a little too quickly, "He's my husband", because she immediately apologized and corrected herself. Thing is, she's done it before. So has the chiropractor. So have two of my bosses. People at the comic shop. And multiple friends. I correct them and they apologize and correct themselves and rinse repeat. I don't know why it bothers me so much, maybe it's because I don't feel like people are paying attention and the words that I speak end up sounding like Charlie Brown's teacher, "Mwah Mwah Mwah Mwah". Or maybe those cold words that someone once spoke to me, "You will die alone..." still elicit an inward flinch. I think I'll just make some business cards that say, "He's my husband" and hand them out randomly, start the buzz going, so when I run into people at the super market they'll just say "Word on the street is, he's your husband" and I'll wink and pat them on the ass and say, "Yeah, but I'm still open for business." Hm, no wonder people get it wrong all the time. I'm kind of inappropriate.

A hilarious blog post for coffee lovers everywhere. I only wish I had written it.

http://www.tremble.com/000735.html

Air conditioning. Why people? WHY? Is it too much to ask that we enjoy what few days we have of actual heat? But here I sit, inside my coolant hell while I spy all of the passersby out in the 90 degree heat and I ENVY THEM. I've been waiting all summer for the kind of weather that would make me sweat. And now that it's here I remain untouched by its scorching beauty. I like being hot. I would live in Hawaii if I could. Scantily dressed and glistening with perspiration 24 hours a day. The gentle breeze of a fan to cool me. The enveloping pleasures of a pool to soothe me. Never having to wear pants again, only strapy sandals and skirts for the rest of my life! I'm totally moving to Florida when I'm old. It's plastic pink flamingos and stucco housing for me, baby! The bitch of it all however is that I don't like the sun all too much. It hurts my eyes and gives me headaches and cancer. Is there an overcast, rainy, unbelievably hot place? I need to go there.