Yet again.

Last night before hitting the old waterbed, I looked at my night stand and sighed. I'm finally losing it. There sat not one, not two, but three devices set to wake me tomorrow morning.

I wasn't always this bad. Back in the day, one clock radio was sufficient. Then hubby started working weird hours so I bought a clock that had two alarm settings. Of course just my luck, the radio on it sucked. Sucked hard. Think static with an irritating tinny undertone. But it was the only model I could find that had the double alarm option. So I kept it AND the older clock radio with the better speakers.

Okay. So I had two clock radios. It seemed a tad like overkill, but it worked.

Then last week I awoke to my stereophonic blast as usual, only to have both radios cut out two minutes later. Since I was still lying in bed reviewing my options for not getting up my wardrobe for the day, I jumped up and found both clocks were also black. No power.

Crap.

I turned on the bedroom light... hmmm. Power there. Then, in a successful attempt to scare the sh** outta me, both radios blasted on again and the clocks began flashing 12:00. Okaaaaay. Must have been a temporary power outage. So I reset both clocks to the proper time and reprogrammed the alarm settings too.

A minute later it happened again. Both clock radios go dead.

Crap! Crap!

But my bedroom light reamined on. What the hell??? Then suddenly the possessed machines returned to life again... grumbling, I go through the aggravating process of resetting them both once more.

The third time it happened in less than ten minutes, I began to swear profusely, causing one of our cats to shoot out from behind my bed. Grrrr... the mischievous feline had been sleeping on the power bar both radios were plugged into and must have been pressing the on/off switch.

I moved the bar, but just to be sure nothing like that happened again, I started leaving my Blackberry on the night stand as a backup alarm.

Yup. THREE devices to wake me up at 5:30 each morning.

I nearly came to my senses last night and turned off the Blackberry... really, Maureen this was getting ridiculous, I told myself. But myself was tired and left it there for one more night.

Good thing too. Because this morning I was awakened to the ringtone of Bach's Fugue in D Minor on the old Smartphone.

Strangley, no music was streaming from either clock radio. The clocks were working, but no sound of my usual morning show could be heard.

Now what???

Forty-five minutes later, the station finally kicked in, with the DJ apologizing for the outage; their main antenna had been knocked out. So I guess my OCD saved the day after all.

But now it's got me thinking; what if my Blackberry battery runs low...

Anybody know where I can pick this up?

Cheap?

On our roadtrip to daughter's idea of Nirvana the Mall of America a few weeks back, I just HAD to find out something.

Something that had been nagging at my subconscious.

Something bothering me since our previous two ventures last August and this past March.

If you haven't read about those, erm, "incidents", you can catch up here:

August 2008 See Maureen Vacation

March 2009 trip wherein I found out that I Killed Christmas

Yes, it's all true, sad to admit...

But I just couldn't ignore that pesky little voice in my head as we arrived at the huge mall for the third time in less than a year:

• Did the site of the former Christmas Store still stand empty and devoid of life?
• Was the Holiday Spirit permanently lost and forgotten?
• Had anyone picked up the shattered shards of the business and opened their holly-jolly doors once again?

I steeled myself against the possibility of the worst and screwed up enough courage to take a peek as we ascended the escalator...

And found

Whoo Hoo! It was open again! Well, this time it was called "Seasonal Living", but at least it was a holiday store once more.


The frail glass decor was back.


The gossamer porcelain knick-knacks were back.


The Christmas trees heavily laden with uber-delicate hand-blown ornaments were back.










Even the hard stone slate floor was ...

still there.












So, apparently I *DIDN'T* kill Christmas after all!

And what happened then? Well, in Mallville they say that Maureen's small heart grew three sizes that day. And then - the true meaning of Christmas came through, and Maureen found the strength of *ten* shoppers, plus two! *


After I regaled the three women working there of my previous unfortunate encounters at this very same location, they laughed - albeit nervously. Then to my surprise they took special care to guide me through their fragile stock, generously offering to retrieve anything my little heart desired.

I didn't have to touch a thing. All I had to do was point from a safe distance and they brought the items TO me.

Gosh. They were SO nice to escort me around their new store and out the door like that...


* With the sincerest of apologies to Dr. Seuss

I wasn't particularly surprised with the phone call I received a few weeks back. I've had similar ones many times before. It was yet another request to participate in.... A Survey.

I must be on some kind of "list" (although I am scared to find out exactly what list that could possibly be), as I am often solicited for opinion polls. From phone surveys to in-person conferences, I've done them all.

So I didn't mind. As a matter of fact, I was somewhat honoured this time around: Audience Studies Inc. of Cincinnati, Ohio wanted to know what I thought about an actual TV sitcom pilot!

Coolness! Visions of a Seinfeld-esque episode flashed through my head.

An official looking package was delivered via UPS with a DVD and instructions asking me to watch it on a specific date so they could interview me the following day.

Oh Boy!

The big day arrived and I watched the show as instructed. On my TV (not on a computer), all in one sitting (no stopping), only once, no notes (um, wha?) and no fast-forwarding through the commercials (Commercials??? On a pilot?? Oh well, what did I know...) I was also asked to fill in a seven - question survey immediately following the viewing:

1) Overall, how would you rate the progam?
2) How would you rate the storyline?
3) Which character did you like best?
4) Which character did you like least?
5) Should there be equal amounts of comedy and drama in the show?
6) What parts of the show should be changed or updated?
7) If it were developed into a half-hour comedy series, would you watch?

So, like a good "select member of their preview audience", I dutifully followed the albeit strange, rules.

But soon after it began, I realized something wasn't right. This was an OLD show. With OLD commericals.

WTF? The Rocky LaPorte Show? It was bad. Really, really, bad.

Did I mention it was bad? Cause it was.

After cringing through 22 minutes, the credits, thank the Gods, finally rolled. And before I did anything else I GOOGLED it... because more than just the acting stunk. Something was fishy about this whole thing.

It was the best decision I made all day.

You see, *sniff* .... they didn't want my opinion on the show after all. It was a market research company tricking me (and many others over the past few years) to watch THE COMMERCIALS.

Bastards.

So I was ready when the "interviewer" called me the next day.

"Is this a good time to ask you a few quesions?" she sweetly asked.

"Sure." I stayed calm.

"Did you watch the DVD?"

"Yup. But I'm not answering any questions about the commercials. I was told I was going to be asked about the TV show. After watching it, I Googled it and found many blog posts about how this is NOT a survey about the show. It is a marketing scheme about the commercials that were in it."

She didn't like that. "Well, you should have told us that before we sent you the DVD."

I got defensive with her snarky attitude now. "I didn't know until I GOT the DVD what it was. Since this is not a survey about the show itself, I'm not interested in participating. Thank you."

Well, at least I am smart enough to save myself an hour of interview questions.

And here I thought I was sooooo special.

I feel so, so....

used.

I've been stretching the limits of my imagination this past week or so.

You see, a week ago Tuesday, I fiercely pretended that my throat was NOT becoming more painfully raw with every swallow.

I forcibly denied that my voice was NOT going hoarse; it was dry air... not a virus.

Wednesday I vehemently ignored the waves of nausea creeping up on me. I simply sequesterd myself in my office away from co-workers for the previous two days because I was busy... not "sick". Oh no.

That night I made grand excuses for the sudden hacking cough fits keeping me awake until I witnessed the sunrise. A 'tickle' is all it was... the Tylenol and Gravol I was popping were just precautionary.

Thursday I called in to work "for just a day" to rest and catch up on the hours of sleep that evaded me the night before; after all, it was quiet at work anyway.

Because I wasn't sick.

By Friday I pretended that dammit, I was NOT coming down with the flu daughter had the week before, but stayed home only because hospital guidelines had been distributed to any staff with "flu-like symptoms". My sinuses were NOT inflamed; my nose bleeds weren't THAT bad, neither were the neck and shoulder aches or lethargy.

I wasn't sick.

I spent most of Saturday and Sunday in bed, but that was NOT a fever I had off and on... I was simply, erm, overdressed. Yeah, that's why.

I wasn't sick.

By Monday, the inability to lay down without inducing continuous coughing spasms were getting difficult to ignore every friggin' night. Up. Down. Up. Down. Criminy, TV sucks at 3 am...

But I wasn't sick.

I refused to take my temperature. I avoided all articles, news reports or discussions about Swine Flu. I would NOT go to the doctor's office.

Didn't have to -- I wasn't sick after all.

Tuesday and Wednesday the pattern of sleep and awake were totally screwed up. Every night I went to bed propped up with four pillows, only to return an hour later to my chair in the living room to nod off and on sitting up, splitting awake time between surfing on my laptop and reading "Twilight" in two days flat.

But I'm not sick.

I've dropped 12 pounds, but that's just from an all-liquid diet I've preferred to partake of lately, is all. I mean, water and fruit juice is good for you, right?

But I'm not sick.

At least last night for the first time in over a week, I finally got six hours sleep in a row. I returned to work to get back to a normal life again, because, boy

I am so sick of denying I'm NOT sick.

Not three strips of bacon (although.... that DOES sound yummy right about now come to think of it....)

No. No. No! Focus, Maureen.

This is about the actor Kevin Bacon.

About fifteen years ago, the phenomenon known as "The Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon" first surfaced.

After Bacon was quoted saying "he had worked with everybody in Hollywood or someone who's worked with them", a group of college students postulated that any actor can be linked to actor Kevin Bacon within six steps.

Of course, being college students, it started out as a trivia party game. Someone would name a celebrity, and the person to link them to Kevin Bacon by the lowest number won. It then expanded to include anyone, not just celebrities.

Mr. Bacon himself has referenced the game in commercials and guest appearances on television. There's a book and board game too.

Then today while watching TV it suddenly struck me.

Holy crap. I have a Bacon number of THREE.

You see when I was young, I went to school with and lived down the same street from the Vardalos kids. I even remember playing in the home of the huge, rambunctious Greek family. Little did I know then, that Nia would go on to fame and fortune by writing and starring in "My Big Fat Greek Wedding". A movie produced by Tom Hanks.

And since next week will be the 40th anniversary of Apollo 13, History Television has been running ads for the movie... and low and behold, there is Tom with, of course, Kevin Bacon.

Making my "Bacon Number" 3.

It's pretty cool, I guess.

The only problem is, now I have an irresistible craving for some crispy, salted pork.

Is it too much to ask that after a long hard day at work, for an event-free smooth drive home?

I mean really...

Not only do I have to slalom through a multitude of bright orange cones and ridiculously lengthy detours so prevalent in the few short weeks formerly known as Summer (these days it is more aptly named "Construction Season").

Now I have to deal with traffic congestion - even in the Suburbs.

The line up of cars at a standstill in BOTH lanes.

And the honking.

Oh, the incessant honking!

Geez.

Come on!

Move it! Move it! Move it!

I just want to get home.

Damn slowpokes.

Crossing in the middle of the street like they just don't care.


They think they own the road just because they're cute AND Canadian.

Or perhaps ever again.

While visiting the West Acres Mall in Fargo last week, I came across a kiosk called "The Old 52 General Store". It was a smaller version of a local emporium just south of Moorhead that stocks "mock vintage" toys, candy and soda pop.

Because I am both a cat owner and blogger, I just couldn't pass up purchasing the following:

The ingredients are as follows:

Pineapple and Orange flavor.

Carbonated water, pure cane sugar, natural and artificial flavors and colors, citric acid and sodium benzoate (a preservative).

The only thing that worries me....

I'm afraid to discover what the hell those "natural" flavors could possibly be.

... while waiting at the Walk In Clinic.

It wasn't bad enough that Daughter had to come down with the flu a few days back whilst we were in Minneapolis.

Oh no.

Today, she awoke to the lovely sight of Pink Eye. Well, the lovely single-eyed sight of Pink Eye, for one was glued shut with Pink Eye Goo. (Was that TMI? Apologies.)

So, because Fate decrees that these things never happen on a weekday during regular office hours, we were off to the nearest Walk In Clinic to endure a few hours sitting amongst other sickos and screaming kids.

Except for one little sweetie with bouncy blond curls who arrived with her mom shortly after us. She must have been about four; in a pink frilly frock and matching pink sandals. It wasn't long before she asked her mom to read her something, so the tiny girl headed over to the bookshelf and raised herself on tiptoes to carefully pick out a magazine.

She returned to her seat in the row in front of us, proudly presenting her find by slapping it upon her mother's lap with the high-pitched request to "please read to me Momma".

I couldn't help but snicker as I noted the "magazine" she had chosen:

As the child climbed up on her lap for reading time, the mom turned her head and rolled her eyes with a wide smile back at me. We both cringed at what lie ahead. It started out well, with a comic strip Mom could bluff her way through.

But then the bluffing became increasingly harder.







"What's dat?" she innocently enquired.

"Booze." Mom responded and quickly turned the page.















"What's dat?" she asked again.

"Cigarettes." Mom answered.















"What's dat?"

"Ummmmm. I don't know." Mom blubbered.





I couldn't hold it in any longer... I had to let out a gaffaw as Mom turned back at me with a laugh and a shrug.

That was enough Fake Story Time for her. "Why don't you go pick out another book honey?"

And with that, the little girl jumped down, skipped across the room and came back with a new offering. Her tiny hands now clasped a Health and Lifestyle periodical. As they flipped through the pages, a tiny hand stopped on an ad for Dukoral.

Here we go again. "Why dat man sweating Momma?"

"He's hot sweetheart." Bravo... dodged another one.

I do believe it's high time the Walk In Clinic invested in some REAL children's books.