And don't call me Shirley either!

I get this e-mail this morning. How wrong is it? Let me count the ways . . .

First, it's not my birthday.

Second, I don't celebrate my birthday.

Third, even if I did, I couldn't afford to celebrate at Mi Piaci.

Fourth, my NAME'S NOT SUSIE!

Frankly, I was about to send out a blistering e-mail to the people at Mi Piaci about the evils of sending out spam to innocent people who wouldn't celebrate their birthday at their miserable restaurant, even if they did celebrate birthdays. And by the way, if you are going to send out spam, shouldn't you at least make sure you've got the name right? When I go to a restaurant, I want to be where everybody knows my name. Not where everybody thinks my name is Susie!

Then I had a "Oh. Wait a minute." moment. At restaurants, I do occasionally give the name Susie Derkins. Just because I really hate it when they yell "Julie, party of 4!" Do a bunch of people at a restaurant really need to know my name? (Okay. Yes. That's paranoid. But I'm willing to own my neuroses.) What? Are they going to ask me for ID? And besides, it makes me laugh.

So, okay. Possibly, my bad. There may be some way that a restaurant might think my name was Susie. Though I'm sure I've never eaten at Mi Piaci. And I don't remember ever putting my e-mail address down at any restaurant. And I definitely wouldn't tell a restaurant my birthday. Even a fake one. The chance that I might have gang of happy-clapping waitstaff surrounding me and chanting some rhythmic message of birthday glee at me is just really more than I could bear. Even if it was my real birthday. Which it's not.

But, the Susie point just took the wind out of my sails. Mi Piaci's marketing staff is safe from receiving a blistering e-mail from me. This time.

Canadian Severed Foot Watch

http://www.cnn.com/2008/CRIME/06/18/canada.feet/index.html

The total count of severed feet now stands at 6. Righties still out number lefties by 5 to 1. Police call it "a little mysterious".

Oh. I see.

http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/06/18/chevron.blitzer/index.html

Sometimes I look at people (mainly in politics and big business) and think "Just how stupid do you think we are?" And looking at this interview, this is it. Right here. This is just how dumb they think the American public is. Because, you see, we should have figured out that the rise in gas prices is all. Our. Fault. The oil companies have nothing to do with it. They aren't sure why they're racking up record profits. Just lucky, I guess. Shoot. I guess they were just at the right place at the right time. And it's just a coincidence that this meteoric rise in gas prices comes up when they can make a case for opening up offshore drilling areas that they've wanted access to for years. Ain't it funny how sometimes things will just happen at the same time? Shucks. Thank you, Mr. Chevron Man for explaining "supply and demand" to me. You make it sound so simple. I feel lots better now. And here I thought I was getting screwed.

It Blows

http://www.slate.com/id/2193740/?y=1/

On the old green issue, I saw this article that talks about whether those hand dryers in the bathroom are more eco-friendly than paper towels. Their conclusion is that the blowers are the lesser of two evils. Dang. Not what I wanted to hear.

Cause let's face it - those things are just sick. It's not happy, fresh outside air that the dryer is blowing on your hands, it's bathroom air. All the whatever that's floating in the bathrooms is being sucked into that little box to be moderately heated and blown straight onto your own two little mitts. Which I should point out, you will be taking with you when you leave the bathroom. (I'll pause while we all picture a rubber bracelet-bangled 80s-style Madonna blasting her face and pits in germ air in Desperately Seeking Susan - oh ugh.) And considering that the bathroom cootie blaster has been around for a million years, I doubt there's some sort of ultra-violet light built in that sanitizes the air about to blow the hands that you were trying to get clean just 2-seconds ago in the sink. Self-defeating, no?

I saw that the guy who built the Dyson (uhm, Mr. Dyson?) vacuum cleaner had invented a super sucker to replace the cootie blower. Sucks the water right off your hands. I have yet to see one of those babies in action, though. I think that's some technology that needs to filter into the population pretty freaking quickly. Save the trees. Kill the cooties.

Clutter

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1812048,00.html

This is something that I've been thinking about for awhile. I don't know if I could ever truly get into the simplicity movement. I've thought about it. It sounds good. But I think possibly simple might drive me stark staring nuts.

The truth is: I'm a clutter bug. I like clutter. I look at those uber-neat danish modern homes, and I feel the need to take off my socks and throw them on the floor, just to have something to look at. I know there are people who like clean lines and every thing in it's place. Bless them. I can't take it. Clutter says "home" to me. My favorite college textbooks give a little extra height to a lamp. The vase I made in jr. high is still around. Little bits of my life are lying all around my house.

Of course, the danger of clutter is that it can reach the tipping point and become chaos. Or worse, just plain dirty. So the challenge for me would be to become as uncluttered as I could personally stand. Whittle it down. Step away from the edge of chaos. Do I really need the map of the London underground that I used in 1996? Probably not. But I like it. That was a good trip. It would hurt to throw it away. Not a lot. But definitely a little. And I'd feel sad for a minute. But it's the kind of edit I really should bite the bullet and make.

On the other hand, my grandmother's two (not one, count 'em, two!) sets of depression glass dessert bowls take up an enormous amount of space in my tiny kitchen. But I have no intention of getting rid of them. Yes, they're old. No, they aren't worth anything. I just like them. They sit on my shelf and remind me of my grandma. And I use them. They've held dessert. But they've also held shrimp cocktails and hummus and olives and all sorts of other party stuff. The only way they leave my house is through attrition. It is me. I'll break them eventually. But I'll have had a lot of use and joy out of them before then. And, to me, that's just not clutter.