Doomed To Repeat It
I was looking at profiles on the dating site recently and came across a young lady of Asian
(Korean?) ancestry. I don't have a problem with accents, non-native English speakers, or
Engrish but this woman's headline read "Must Love Dog." She's either a
movie-fan or a
foodie and, to be honest, I'm too afraid to find out.
You probably didn't notice my absence
(even though I thought about you the whole time) but I just got back from a ski trip to Breckenridge, CO. It's been 7 years since I last skied, so when the opportunity came up I jumped at it. I'm a solid-intermediate skier and it all came back to me, like riding a bike. I enjoyed the trip, except for the
altitude sickness that I got the first night there. Breck is at 9,600 feet and I had most of the symptoms
(shortness of breath, massive headache, nausea, chills, etc.) that only slightly lessened after I took an Imitrex. That first night really sucked and my headaches only went away when I was on the slopes. The weather was beautiful though, and there was lots of co-ed eye-candy, as it was spring break. By Monday, however, the crowds at the base of the mountain had built-up to the point that there was an hour wait for a lift. Mid-mountain and above wasn't that bad.
The other major crisis from the trip was my flight home. It's my fault, and I admit it, but I booked the wrong flight home. And boy did it cost me. I meant to take the 7pm flight from DEN-IAH, but I mistakenly selected an 11:30am flight and didn't notice until the morning of my return, at 10:30am when I was still in Breckenridge, 2 hours away from Denver. When I called the airline
(who will remain nameless, because Frontier Airlines fucking sucks and they screwed me balls-deep) they were understanding but unable to charge me less than $300 for my mistake. I may have been the one who clicked the wrong button, but I also blame you
(yes, you). Your senator and/or representative voted against the
Airline Passengers' Bill of Rights. Since you didn't hold him or her accountable for being in the pocket of the airlines, I blame you.
(and I feel a little better for getting that off my chest)
The title of this entry refers to a famous quotation attributable to
George Santayana. Normally this quotation would describe my academic career, but in keeping with the dating-theme I've been writing about, I've been corresponding with another
Vietnamese girl. This one is considerably more Western, however, as evidenced by the nickname by which she will henceforth be known: Tattoo-girl.
Anger Management
Is it still called 'road rage' if I want to ram my
own car into a concrete abutment?
The
G has been royally pissing me off as of late. Not the whole car, mind you, but specifically the bluetooth interface. In case you're not familiar, my car has a built-in speakerphone wired into the radio and a nifty little button on the steering wheel. To use it, you pair the phone to the speakerphone and it automatically mutes the radio when making or receiving a call. In theory, it's great. But the motherfucker refuses to pair.
(Ed. note: Not unlike the girls he's been dating recently.)I don't leave the bluetooth enabled on my phone unless I'm using it because it drains the battery faster. So if I plan on using it, I turn it on, then tell the phone to pair with the car. The indicator light on my car blinks a few times, but then goes out which should signal that it's not paired with my phone. Meanwhile, my phone displays a message that it's still searching for my car. If I close the clamshell on my phone, it stops the pairing process. However, even though both the car and the phone indicate that they're not paired, if I press the steering wheel button and try to place a call, it works.
WTF?!
The other problem, the one that really had me cursing at my car, was the voice recognition. The car doesn't have the ability to look at my phone's address book. Rather, it has it's own address book. But it takes too long to program all that shit, and it only allows one number per person. For example, I store "Beth" and the car asks me if that's her mobile number, so I say yes. I try to store Beth's home number and, rather than ask me if that's her home number it tells me that "Beth" sounds too much like another entry in the phone book, so I have to choose another name. So why the fuck did it ask me whether the first number was her mobile number!? Anyway,
fook that shiz, because I don't have time to be coming up with unique sounding names for everyone and every number in my phone. Instead, I can just say the digits that I want to dial.
(This is, however, a problem because I can only consistently remember my parents, my sister, and my own phone number without looking at what's stored in my phone's phonebook.)tinyhands: Dial, 7135551212.
Stupid G-bitch: Dial, 71355512122? Say 'dial' or 'correction.'th: Correction. Dial, 7135551212.
G: Dial, 7035551212. Say 'dial' or 'correction.'th: (muttering, 'goddammit') Correction. Dial, 7 1 3 5 5 5 1 2 1 2.
G: Dial, 7135558822. Say 'dial' or 'correction.'th: What the fuck? CORRECTION! DIAL, SEVEN, ONE, THREE, FIVE, FIVE, FIVE, ONE, TWO, ONE, TWO!
G: Dial, 71355512212. Say 'dial' or 'correction.'th: You've got to be kidding me. CORRECTION! DIAL. SEV-EN. WONNN. THREEEE. FIIIVE. FIIIVE. FIIIVE. WONNN. TOOOO. WONNN. TOOOO!
G: Dial, 7135051212. Say 'dial' or 'correction.'th: AAHHHH!!!!!
(pounds steering wheel button with fist, inadvertently honking at everyone within 500 yards)
