Who are you REALLY appreciating?

I got this in an email. Subject field read: CUSTOMER APPRECIATION!






















So I, the actual customer that has been giving you money all this time, can't get the discounted massage. I have to give it away. How is this customer appreciation? I'd call this customer utilization.

Twilight

Forewarning -- SPOILERS TO FOLLOW!

A good friend of mine recommended that I read the Stephanie Meyer series, of which Twilight is the first installment. Since I do not live under a rock or on our former planet Pluto, I have heard of the books and was really not all that interested in reading them. I mean, I hated high school, why would I want to revisit it? I'm too old for these books, right?

My friend pointed out that I was a Harry Potter fan so I shouldn't rule the books out just because their target audience is an age group younger than my own children. *shudder* It is true that I am a Harry Potter fan. I started out reading the books because my kids were really into them. It gave us something in common; something to talk about and bond over. We would all read the books at or near the same time and discuss what we thought might happen next, like a book club.

I had been forewarned that the writing isn't stellar and it is not exactly a challenging read. Certainly, I have enjoyed books that are not astounding literary works. The Da Vinci Code comes to mind, riveting yet not exactly challenging. The Time Travelers Wife, a really fun read but it sort of fell into its own holes. I squelched my preconceived notions and bought a copy of Twilight.Here's what I think of the book.

Tense: I'm going to start by nit picking. Twilight is written in the first person tense which means it's all Bella's head all the time. I think Twilight could have been a better book had it been written in the third person omniscient tense. The reader was stuck with Bella the entire 498 pages. The ride would have been more fun and a bit more believable if we were to have an omniscient voice telling it. For example, are we really to believe that Bella remembers Edward sucking the venom out of her hand while she was laying there near death? Wouldn't it have been great to have a little more insight into Edwards troubled mind? The first person tense is tricky. If it's not done correctly all or most of the foil characters look flat as a pancake (Mike and Jess for example.) In comparison to the first Harry Potter Book, The Sorcerers Stone, we have a all seeing narrator that floats in and out of scenes and heads. Hermione and Ron are just as important to the story as Harry by the end of Sorcerers Stone and it made the book more interesting. Which brings me to my next point...

Characters: For the first 300 pages of this book I hated every character. Not kidding, every single one. Let's examine the characters...
Bella: What a whiny little bitch. I know that she is an unhappy kid and has it kinda rough but the way she treats people when she rolls into Forks is deplorable and made me dislike her greatly and immediately. Toward the end I had high hopes that she could redeem herself and she came close with her heroic acts, trying to save her mom and all. I nearly liked her for about 60 pages or so. Then she turned into the weak female character that I thought had been phased out in modern society. If I had a dime for every time she says "Don't leave me" I'd be able to buy a venti non fat latte.
Edward: Again, I totally get what the author is trying to do with Edward and Bella. She wants to show a transition. Bella goes from troubled girl in a bad situation to a hero and Edward goes from a dark foreboding character to...well...whatever it was he turned into. We'll call his new attitude "cheery living dead." I think that my problem here is that there was so much of the bad and so little of the good. Let's look at Edward if he was NOT a vampire. Edward is a condescending ego maniac. He treats Bella like total crap at first. His mood swings were insanely frustrating to the reader (not another one!) Not to mention that he's been watching our heroine as she sleeps. Creepy. He talks down to Bella. He laughs at her to her face. Now, I know what you're thinking, I'm missing the point. No, I'm not. How did Bella fall for this guy? Before she knew he was the walking dead she should have kicked this guy in the junk and sent him on his way. And how exactly is being a vampire a deal saver?

"Oh well you were kind of a jerk before, but now that I know that you're over 100 years old and we can never have sex and you're still kind of a jerk...well...yeah. I love you. Don't leave me."

The other characters aren't even really worth going into. I am sure they play a bigger role in future books but there is not much for me to latch onto so that I can proceed to the second book with much interest with the exception of Alice. She was the only foil character that had any depth. The entire "family" was somewhat intriguing, but Alice was the only one I really gave a crap about.

I could go on and on but I won't. I'll sum up.

Twilight was 498 pages. 300 of those pages were the same scene over and over, with dialog that made me want to jump off a bridge, supposedly furthering Edward and Bella's relationship. Edward saves Bella. Bella angers Edward. Edward has a mood swing. Bella worries about the relationship status. Honestly I don't think that 500 pages was necessary to tell this story. It was about at page 200 or so that I wanted to put the book down and never pick it up again. A skilled storyteller could have gotten the point across in far less pages. The book did pick up and become quite suspenseful once the chase was on, but it was too little too late for me, it couldn't redeem the 200+ pages of tedium I had to endure to get there. What Meyer has done to the vampire is interesting. Not only has she made them reluctant (which is not all that new or novel) but she has made them attractive to the point of swooning damsels. Vampires are supposed to be smelly vile creatures whose skin gets singed in the sun. Edward smelled good, despite being the living dead, and he sparkled in the sun. I must admit I rolled my eyes at that one. Sparkling vampires? Come on.

Did I like anything about Twilight? Yes. I liked the concept of the book. The flaws lie in the details. I really did like the storyline and the vampire family was a very interesting group of individuals. I really enjoyed the descriptions of the past where I would hope that the following books explore more of their past. The story of Carlisle was fascinating. I wanted more of that, the stories of the past. I also enjoyed the descriptions of the house the "family" lived in that the green of surrounding forest. It laid out for a nice setting and was vivid and beautiful.

I think I may just be done with the part of my life that would allow me to find this story romantic in any way. Maybe if I was 16...

The Itsy Bitsy Spider Went Into Julie's Bag

I think some of you know that our house has an inordinate amount of spiders. About a year ago I went to boil water for tea and three spiders came crawling out of the hinge on the spout. We have had several spider eggs hatch which resulted in about a thousand baby spiders on the wall; once when we arrived home at 2am after a night of carousing about town. I am sure if anyone was watching it was comical to watch two drunk people squish a thousand spiders with paper towels. For us, not so fun. Most recently I had a spider drop out of the tissue I was blowing my nose into.

Seriously horrifying stuff. Today I have added a new chapter to the spider chronicles.

I left the house this morning with the promise of a rainy commute home so I packed my rain boots and other goodies in a Whole Foods reusable bag and took off for the bus stop. The bag was pretty full. It held my aforementioned boots, a pair of shoes to change into in the office, a book, a yogurt and my purse. When I got on the bus it was pretty full but I managed to find a seat. I busted out the old lady reading glasses (which must be ultra hilarious to my fellow commuters to see me reading Twilight with old lady reading glasses) and my book and settled in for a crowded commute. As I took the book out of the bag I saw the spider on the book. The bus is packed at this point, someone sitting to my left someone standing in the aisle to my right. Freaking out was not an option. I transferred the spider from the book to the inside of my bag, where he stayed visible for about 3 seconds then scampered down into the depths of my bag.

Horrors.

The guy sitting to my left saw all of this go down and asked, "Are you OK? Do spiders freak you out?"
I said, "They freak me out enough to NOT want one sitting on my lap."
"Well if he comes back out I'll try to kill it for you."

There was no room to put the bag on the floor so there it sat, on my lap. I tried to read but I was distracted by my constant vigil, waiting for the evil little thing to resurface.

I got out of the bus and emptied all of my business out onto the sidewalk. Out came the yogurt, the boots the purse...no spider.

So now there is a spider somewhere in my purse or boots or bag. It's enough to drive one to madness, knowing it's there, waiting to pounce. It'll probably lay an egg in my purse.

Staycation

Yeah that's right I said it. Staycation.

We went away for 6 days but didn't fly, didn't leave the country we didn't even leave the state. We stayed!

I will say this about our trip, we have traveled far and wide and haven not encountered so much adversity and weirdness. Don't get me wrong, I had a hell of a time, but we really had a lot of obstacles to overcome and just flat out wacky stuff happen.

First off we had an uninvited guest. His name was Danny and he proceeded to piss all over us and our fun times. It rained our first 2 days of vacation and I'm sorry to say that, for some of our friends, this was the only time away they had. We tried to make the best of it but just ended up with soggy shoes and dampened spirits. We finally said F U mother nature and took the coolers, cornhole and chairs down the dune and sat in the drizzle on the beach. We used the beach umbrellas as...well...umbrellas and defied the elements for about an hour and a half before giving in and heading into the 'combah.

As usual we got beers, steamers and oyster shots. The Beachcomber is my happy place. I love it there and it was the only thing keeping me from being livid about the crappy weather. Usually we can get out of the bar without incurring any injuries, but alas the evening resulted in a swollen eye (I walked into a door. The bathroom doors at the comber are set up poorly and one opens in while the other opens out and I was stuck in the middle of it.) and a broken foot. The broken foot was not me it was poor Jenny who got stomped on by some dude on the dance floor.

Then on to Nantucket where we had beautiful weather and I was able to get in the last beach days of the season. Good sun was absorbed and I may actually keep the tan till October. The house we stayed in was beautiful and perfectly located (albeit jam packed with spiders) between town and Surfside beach. There was a tiny path that led to a nearly deserted beach and Michael and I decided to take said path via bicycle. Well...it was adventurous and really fun in an exhilarating sort of way, but I did fall off the bike and that has resulted in a decent case of poison ivy on my butt. Michael has it too on his wrists. I think from helping me up? I don't know. Whatever, we both have poison ivy and I'd much rather have it on my wrists than on my ass, thank you very much.

Anyway, we ate at two insanely good restaurants while there. Black Eyed Susan's is the home of the best linguine and clams ever. Yes, faithful readers, I have found my death row linguine and clams and they reside at Black Eyed Susan's in Nantucket. We went to LoLa 41 as well and that place was very impressive. I had the sesame chicken noodles (I love a good noodle, people) and it was delicious. When I inquired about the dish the waitress said, "it's a brothy dish." I said, "so it's soup?" She reluctantly agreed it was soup. What do Nantucketers have against soup that the waitress couldn't call a spade a spade?

Sigh...we are home now and even with all of the adversity, I'd rather be on vacation than sitting at work in my veal crate of a cubicle.

Bottles

If you read with any sort of regularity you are going to scratch your head on this post unless I do some splainin. This morning Michael and I were out for our Saturday morning walk and we stumbled upon a recycle bin full of these crazy old bottles. We were flummoxed as to why some one would just get rid of these things, some of them were really impressive! We started picking through and one of the neighbors came out and started picking through with us. As it turns out this woman and her husband had been caring for her next door neighbors through 20 years of sickness, including Alzhimers. "You see", she said, "we're trying to get into heaven." She gave a little chuckle and I told her she has a great running start, if kindness gets you there. The neighbors have finally died and she was hoping that they would throw the bottles out so she could have her pick of them. She took most of the bottles and invited Michael and me over for a glass of wine some day. They were about the sweetest old couple I have ever met. The pictures below was my pull from the bin. I am posting this because I am going to post the link on an antique bottle site message board to see if any of these are worth anything. Start from the bottom and go up when viewing.

Mung Sucks

Alright kids we're going to have a little lesson in New England beach attendance. Pay attention there may be a quiz later.

1) The water is cold. Even at its warmest it is still pretty effin cold. I have learned to adapt and swim when it's bone chillingly frigid, especially when you have to climb up a 50 foot dune to get to a bathroom. Which leads me to the next point...

2) The dune at Cahoon hollow is designed to break your spirit. You really don't get the full notion of what you're getting into on the way down. When you do arrive at the bottom of the dune and turn around it's really daunting. You know you have to climb back up there at some point. By the time you get back up to the top with all of your beach going crap you're hot and sweaty and any sort of refreshment achieved by aforementioned cold water is gone, baby, gone. Here's a tip; avoid Cahoon Hollow beach when Aunt Flo is in town or you're having any sort of tummy trouble or when the water is "munged in."

3) The stuff in the water is called mung. It's seaweed I suppose, but this particular brand of seaweed is called mung and it is pretty nasty. It happens all over the Cape and it's a roll of the dice where the oilslick like black mass of crap is going to strike next. When it's really thick the waves don't crash on the shore, they more land with an ugly thud. Like someone hitting a big plastic bag of water with a bat. It has a faint smell to it, nothing crazy, you can only really smell it if it's really thick. Hearty New Englanders will brave the soup and swim in it. One friend of ours has even suggested that the mung soaks up the sun's heat and makes the water warmer. Interesting theory. I mean it does make some sense.

Anyway.

People may wonder why we live in such a place. Deathly cold winters. Barely there summers. Beaches that you have to pack a defibrillator to get to and from only to find out that the water looks like escarole soup that has been sitting out or 3 days.

My answer comes in the form of another cape experience. We were sitting at the Combah (the only beach bar on the cape...no really I'm not kidding it's the only one) and there was a couple from Montreal that kept asking us questions about the cape. They were surprised, and I think a little disappointed, that the beach was not built up. I think they were looking for Miami beach and got turned around at some point. They were intrigued. What do you do here? There 's nothing on the beach You can't stay at a waterfront hotel! What do you DO here?

I pointed them in the direction of P-Town and told them to explore the town centers. There are tons of galleries, shops and restaurant there. Our beaches are as nature intended them to be, condo and hi-rise free and the most peaceful place on Earth. The wonderful thing about it is that there is nothing. There is only something if you want there to be. The galleries and shops are where they should be, in town. The beaches are free of the modern world.

I challenge you to find another 43,000 acres of undisturbed beach. That's why we love it. I can't imagine living anywhere else.