Sunday, November 11, 2007

Who doesn't love weekends?

Here are some cool things about this weekend:

1. Since I'm counting Thursday night as part of the weekend, I'll start here. I got to see Melancholy Play at the Bryant Lake Bowl with Alexis, Amanda and Whitney and it was GREAT! I'm lucky to have friends that get me out to see excellent plays (even better, including ones they are in!).

2. Friday night Chester and I vegged and caught up on a few of our favorite shows (The Office, Ugly Betty and 30 Rock [bonus: they played a snippet of Werewolf Bar Mitzvah in this episode, and if you don't know what I'm talking about...too bad so sad]). For free! I won't spoil this by dwelling on the fact that the WGA strike, while needed, will make me sad. I will dwell instead on the fact that the (hopefully temporary) ceasement of some of my favorite shows will free up some of my time for blogging.

3. Saturday I geeked out and graduated to a level 2 half-orc barbarian. Plus I got to eat brownies. Then we went and saw Electric Apricot: Quest for Festeroo, which I barely stayed awake due to the fact that I woke up, excited as I used to get for Christmas but this time for a bike ride that has been long-anticipated, at 8:00 am. Sadly, bike ride did not happen Saturday....

4. ....but it DID happen today! Eight miles, no less! We rode up the West River Parkway in Minneapolis, crossed the Lake Street bridge into St. Paul and rode down the arguably more affluent East River Parkway. We enjoyed being sandwiched with views of the Mississippi (afforded us by the lack of leaves) and giant mansions. The weather couldn't have been better.

5. I skipped ahead a bit. Our friends Carl and Mel stopped by this morning with their most excellent dogs, Izzy and Lucy, and we went to the Triple Rock for breakfast. It doesn't get much better than good company, sugar that's in the pour-containers (you know, versus having to tear open teaspoon-sized packages when your sugar allotment is measured in tablespoons) and good people-watching.

6. I fixed Chester's bike! He had tried to raise his handlebars a week or so ago and couldn't get them to tighten back down. I tipped his bike upside down, extracted a loose piece, and not only fixed what was thought to be a lost cause, but managed to raise his handlebars in the process. Not the biggest accomplishment, but I'll take what I can get.

7. Meet the Robinsons and Aladdin, mix with pizza, rinse and repeat. I think Kingdom Hearts has put us in the mood for Disney.

Hope your weekends were just as good!

Monday, November 05, 2007

Spooky, Scary or Oh, Life in the City!

Exciting happenings here at work—although the word "exciting" is misleading because it often implies something positive.

I was attending to the happy business of relieving a client’s file of non-necessities, due his recent obtaining of a patent, when one of the other secretaries asked if I got the "spooky e-mail". I replied that I had not, but was understandably intrigued and promptly opened said e-mail. I was met with an unpleasant surprise when I discovered that an attorney was apprising us of a situation where he met with someone this morning, and the person turned out to be Not of Stable Mind. This guy apparently was full of delusions, including his belief that he was owed money by Paris Hilton and The Mafia, and set warning bells off with his general threat to "pull a Matrix", which he clarified as gunning down his enemies. Also disturbing was the fact that the guy believed he had a meeting with a certain famous pro-wrestling chairman scheduled in our office at 1:00 today.

Afflicted as I was at that moment with my caffeine-induced jangling nerves and already vivid imagination when it comes to such things (not to mention the vivid imaginations of the other secretaries encouraging mine), this information was not well received. Not helping much was the mixture of caffeine and copious amounts of water requiring a trip outside the office into suddenly-unknown and possibly-containing-crazy-person space. I was standing, perplexed and motionless, next to the door going out of our office and into the hallway (and not far beyond, the land of the bathroom) when the receptionist asked if I would accompany her to the second floor to see if we could discreetly spot Mr. Not Stable. We bravely scoped out the area and, upon not finding him, returned to the office feeling a bit more secure.

No worries: we had a quick staff meeting in the conference room and were informed that building security would be turning our elevators on lockdown (where you have to enter a code in the elevator to even get on our floor) and keeping an eye out for this fellow. Things are pretty much back to business as usual, but then again, it’s nearly 1:00…