Hurricane Frances in Ohio
Why oh why do they name hurricanes after people? Here is the current list of names in hurricane rotation. Looks like our next tropical storm will be called "Gaston." Good to know.
This morning I brought an umbrella to work. Wish I'd brought a jacket. This is not a summer rain. It is cold, windy, first-day-of-school-when-you-were-a-kid rain. You know the ones where you are more tired than you have ever been, it's dark outside and the faint smell of freshly sharpened pencils reminds you that you have all new school supplies and your new clothes are kinda itchy. Do you remember that? Come on, you know you remember that!
Anyways, I got plastered with rain the instant I set foot outside. At the bus stop I waited twenty minutes for a bus. Marty was there, the good-looking jock kid who won't talk to me unless I say something first. Sometimes I just let him feel uncomfortable in the silence. I wonder why he never starts a conversation. I bet somebody told him once he was only good for looking at so he decided to keep his mouth shut. He's not clever. But he is cute. So maybe they were right. At any rate. Marty and I chatted (I brought him up to speed on the whole jam incident) until the bus came.
And here I am, at work, with my heater on and my fingers cold trying to act like I'm working when I'm actually blogging. Blogging about weather. And new pencils. And Marty.
Not much to talk about. Maybe you all have things you want to say. On your blogs maybe or even here on mine. Go ahead and say it. I'm listening.
This morning I brought an umbrella to work. Wish I'd brought a jacket. This is not a summer rain. It is cold, windy, first-day-of-school-when-you-were-a-kid rain. You know the ones where you are more tired than you have ever been, it's dark outside and the faint smell of freshly sharpened pencils reminds you that you have all new school supplies and your new clothes are kinda itchy. Do you remember that? Come on, you know you remember that!
Anyways, I got plastered with rain the instant I set foot outside. At the bus stop I waited twenty minutes for a bus. Marty was there, the good-looking jock kid who won't talk to me unless I say something first. Sometimes I just let him feel uncomfortable in the silence. I wonder why he never starts a conversation. I bet somebody told him once he was only good for looking at so he decided to keep his mouth shut. He's not clever. But he is cute. So maybe they were right. At any rate. Marty and I chatted (I brought him up to speed on the whole jam incident) until the bus came.
And here I am, at work, with my heater on and my fingers cold trying to act like I'm working when I'm actually blogging. Blogging about weather. And new pencils. And Marty.
Not much to talk about. Maybe you all have things you want to say. On your blogs maybe or even here on mine. Go ahead and say it. I'm listening.
Labels: blogging, cleveland, disaster, earth facts, interactive, story, trivia
posted by k_sra at 9/08/2004 08:51:00 AM
15 Comments:
The rainy season on the west coast doen't start for another month or two, so I don't have that exact memory. Here's the only rain happening in Seattle right now: *Too bad you told him about the jam thing, I think you should try the jam pickup approach sometime - maybe there's something we're missing.
So what you're saying is that Seattle won't have rain for a little while yet, you grew up on the West Coast so school days started with sunny weather and that I should ask Marty for a date. Interesting. Go on...
Quick question. How is the smell of sharpened pencils related to the first day of school? I usually had to sharpen them throughout the year. Is it because you hadn't smelled it all summer? Or perhaps the combined result of several pencils all freshly sharpened? Ok, that was three questions. Or possibly one question with two of three multiple choice answers (the third being "other, please describe") set up in question format.
Aw, Tara, thanks for remembering the smell of new school supplies with me! It's nice to think I can share that memory with someone. And yes, World, I think it has something to do with the end of summer and sharpening several pencils all at the same time and placing them neatly in a fresh new pencil box. I always got a little rush to the head when I stepped onto the school supply aisle at Walmart. Still do. All those lovely pens and spiral notebooks and erasers and washable markers! Love em!
Stationary stores have become my favorite addiction. Just the smell of expensive paper and leather binding makes me tipsy.
I hear you on the nap, Tara. I would take one here, under my desk... not so much because I'm tired, more because it sounds like a fun way to get fired.
I thought I was the only one. Yes, my name is chopper and I am recovering school-supply-aholic.
Every time I visit the grocery store, without fail, I end up standing wistfully in front of the school supplies aisle. Sometimes I buy pens, sometimes graph paper, occasionally a ruler or protractor, or, often enough, I just stand there, dumbly transfixed, taking it all in with wonder.
There's a sadness to it, also. I usually cannot bring myself to buy anything because it's all a sham; I'm not in school anymore, and although I feel an intense attraction, no relief is offered by the prospect of ownership. It would be like buying a gift for a deceased friend. Nothing can come of it; I can't even fool myself into believing it for a second, and yet I cannot walk on.
Ah yes. No money was as sweetly spent as on fresh supplies for the coming school year. I think perhaps we ought to organize some sort of internet community that requires the regular use of said protractors, binders and spray-can pens. Hmmm. Thinking, thinking...
I got it!
A weblog community that must regularly demonstrate its ability to use said products in the adult phase of life (notice, I only call it a phase). Like those pages that tell you a hundred ways to get chocolate stains out of your carpet using house hold products, this will be a hundred ways to use a trapper-keeper in the workplace without drawing stares.
I think this could work!
Getting to buy school supplies every year is one of the many benefits of having children. I argue endlessly with my son about the best materials, and of course he wants the TK with Spiderman or some such on it. I lean more toward the Strawberry Shortcake version, and considered buying it for my engineering class, but decided I've got enough to prove being the only non-butch woman in the class without toting about a girly Trapper Keeper.
Another benefit of having children is that when they get old enough, they can be slaves! Remember when you were a kid and you had to do chores? I used to look forward to having my own children so that I would never have to lift a finger again. Now that I do, it doesn't quite work out that way as I have to lift 10 fingers, 5 days a week, in order to afford to buy them school supplies. But at least now I can say "Hey, Ike. Will you go get the mail? Oh, and bring me a drink on your way back. Don't forget to take the trash on your way out, and give the sauce a stir while you're in the kitchen. I'm busy trying to beat this [Tomb Raider VI] level. Thanks, you're a gem darling."
Oh yeah, definitely go with the Strawberry Shortcake! That will make the rest of the kids wild with jealousy and confusion. Especially when you pull top scores. Do it! I dare ya!
(Oh and good on ya, too!)
Oh, I MISS that slave! I never have a kitten's chance in hell of keeping up with his energy level, but I adore him. Also, Lydio, I feel ya on the Strawberry Shortcake, but maybe you could substitute a "Hello, Kitty" TPK instead. That cat has become a feminist icon for some reason. (Why,dear God? Why?) (Okay, I mock, but I like to say it- "Hello, Kitty"- over and over again. Try it. It's fun.) Also, I understand what y'all crazy people are saying about the rush from new supplies. Sometimes I wonder if I only attended fashion design school so that I would "have" to spend thousands of dollars on supplies for projects. (If that was wrong, I don't want to be right. I am a firm believer in "You can never have too many art supplies". That and "Food is love.")
Also, I suppose now's as good a time as any to say a welcoming and nonjudgemental "Hi, Chopper", but I'm not sure why I'm even at this meeting, 'cuz I NEVER want to recover.
For me it was never the school supplies themselves. It was just newness, lots of it, and order. Everything. Just. So. I even had lefty scissors for the one or two mutants in my class, and Elmer's for those ar-tards who inexplicably liked to eat glue. What the heck was their malfunction? All I ever did with glue was paint it on my arm while the teacher was blathering about some crap, wait for it to dry, then SO SATISFYINGLY peel it off. Awesome.
And yes, the new clothes. Brand spankin new Trans-Am and Camaro shirts (this was 1984 in rural Indiana after all), with 3/4 sleeves. For some reason, the arm-clam-diggers (I wanted to say Koo-Lahts, but I couldn't think for the life of me how to spell it) were the rage, and I just bought into it all the way. And tennis shoes! YES! It was a major status symbol in grade school to have the pimpest shoes. And one year, I did. I had a pair of light grey Kangaroos, right when they first came out, and they had, get this, zippers with pockets on the sides! You could keep stuff in there! Unprecidented. I was the envy of every boy in my class, right up until Joe Jones got something cooler, as he always did, the rat-bastard. He was also the only boy in my class who was faster than I, making me always first loser out to the kickball field.
Before I shut up, does anyone out there remember what I think were called Friendship Pins? Generic safety pins with stupid little multi-colored beads strung on them. Kids would wear like 200 on their shoes and pant-legs at my school. What asshat thought that up? I had some, of course.
My sister used to make those friendship pins. What was even stranger though, was that phase where kids sucked on pacifier shaped candy. What was that about?
honest, thank you. You've reminded me of a satisfying replacement for school supplies-- acrylic paints. I tried my hand at painting a year ago, and had so much fun that I come back to it occasionally. I absolutely love the dizzy feeling I get just thinking about mixing those thick pigments.
I remember everybody else had friendship pins and I didn't. Just like everybody else had pogo balls and I didn't. But there was that one time when Carly in the fourth grade got tired of her pogo ball and let me use it. I stayed on the damn thing all through recess, back up the stairs, to the bathroom and into class. Come to think of it, I think I did that for several days. Until Carly stopped bringing it to school. I wonder now if she was just too shy to ask for it back. People are taller on a pogoball. Our teacher eventually asked me to put it somewhere other than between my feet.
Those were the wild years.
That was me. Damn this anonymous button!
first day of school, remembered as such: waiting at the end of the gravel drive, butterflies in my stomach, listening to the cars in the distance, and waiting eternally for the sound of a stubby yellow rocket, closing my eyes and realising that i still had a picture of the entire route(.)
Wow, you have a good memory. I have blocked out large hunks of childhood for some reason. (Probably sheer laziness) Our dad drove us to school in a school bus for a while because our family had no car. It sure was fun picking your seat when you knew you'd only be five passengers that day or any.
We took the "short bus." hehe.
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