"We have to go. I'm almost happy here."

[sarea]

I didn't get to see Marian Keyes yesterday. Online mapping failed me and I ended up going way far north, when I should have been going way far south. It doesn't help that I have NO sense of direction whatsoever (when someone says "go north on such-and-such" it's completely meaningless to me). By the time I figured out I was going the wrong way (actually Jade figured it out since I was on the phone with her and she was consulting maps), it was too late, I wouldn't have made it in a reasonable amount of time, and corianderstem would have missed most of the talk. I was really bummed about that, and frustrated, because f*ck you, online maps!

It wasn't a complete loss, however. I was right near the Market, so I took the opportunity to buy cheese. They have the BEST handmade cheese shop there, Beecher's, that ropo and her sister discovered the last time she visited. Their Flagship cheese is the best cheese ever. Amazingly enough, there was a parking space right nearby (virtually unheard of), but it was on the lefthand side of the street and I had to parallel park. There was much sweating until a kind passerby helped me with how close I was getting to the car behind me. Anyway, at Beecher's I also bought a 16 oz container of macaroni & cheese (except ... it wasn't macaroni, it was penne), which was good but STILL not as good as Stouffer's (I know, I'm so wrong), a wedge of Flagship, and 1/4lb of fresh cheese curds. Now, I had never even heard of cheese curds until corianderstem mentioned them awhile back, and I am delighted to report that they DO, in fact, squeak in your mouth when you eat them! And they're good. Hee!

+++

The white-button mushroom patch that I ordered? Apparently not going to be arriving until June. Just to make it more challenging for me or what?? They have a money-back guarantee though, so if I don't harvest 4lbs of mushrooms they'll be hearing from me. >< Not shipping until June, honestly.

+++

So I'm about halfway through Speaker for the Dead now, and I'm enjoying it a lot. Not the same way I enjoyed Ender's Game, but that's a pretty high bar. Could Ender and Valentine be more incesty? What is causing the piggies to kill, when they kill? Will I ever like Novinha? Should the Hive Queen/buggers really be given another opportunity? Are we sure they're harmless? Is it possible for anyone to not love Ender?

+++

My office has a bunch of no-good food stealers. Remember the incident a few months back, in which someone took my leftovers? That was disturbing, but I chalked it up to misidentification -- after all, a lot of take-out containers look very alike. However, two days ago I was in the cafeteria buying lunch when a coworker gave me one of those "unlimited spend" cards and told me to abuse it. I got my entree, plus a bowl of soup and two of those fancy boxed ice cream sandwiches (biscotti cookies, with strawberry and vanilla ice cream). I ate one of them that day and stuck the other one in the freezer. When I went to retrieve it yesterday? You guessed it. Ice cream sandwich GONE. No misunderstanding possible -- it was individually boxed and was the only one of its kind. Someone basically saw it, knew it wasn't theirs, and took it anyway. WTF. The people around here make a lot of money. They can't afford to buy their own f*cking ice cream sandwiches instead of STEALING it?! Could they possibly have wanted it THAT badly? What the hell is WRONG with people. And now I have no choice but to conclude that the leftovers incident wasn't a mistake, but was deliberate also. Ugh. I hate people.

Comments

[romanticalgirl.livejournal.com]

I LOVE Ender's Game, but Speaker for the Dead KILLS me (hee). It makes me sobby like nobody's business. I read SftD and decided I didn't want to write anymore because I'd never be able to write like THAT.

Of course, it didn't hold. *g*

[sarea-okelani.livejournal.com]

I totally feel that way whenever I'm reading OSC. I'm like, this man is a freaking genius, why am I even bothering? Oh no, crying ... thanks for the warning, I'll keep some Kleenex on hand. :/ But don't tell me what made you cry! If I don't cry, I'll have to guess which part makes you sobby. :D

[ceilidh]

People suck. We have no good food stealers at my school and it pisses me off. Last week I had a party for my little afterschool ensemble, and someone took the books of popsicles I had in the freezer in the teacher's lounge. I just put them in there the day before! I guess they took and gave them to their class or something but hi, I bought them for MY kids, not theirs. ugh.

[ropo.livejournal.com]

Oy at the food stealers. There's nothing worse than looking forward to your ice cream and then having it be GONE.

Oh, that CHEESE STORE... yummm. I like the flagship cheese but there was one I liked even better, I remember. Of course, I can't remember which kind of cheese. Probably cheddar or something. But man alive, all that cheese was gooood. And Michele and I totally got rock star parking there too! We had to keep checking to see if we'd gotten a ticket because we spent more time than allowed, but we didn't want to give up that space!

[jade-okelani.livejournal.com]

Mmmmm, cheeeeeeeeese. *covets your cheese*

What makes that whole leftovers incident so disturbing is something we actually brought up at the time -- that someone was so desperate/stupid/hungry that they actually wanted to eat someone's *half eaten food*. At least this is a pre-wrapped ice cream sandwich -- it makes the crime no less heinous, but it is far less disgusting than devouring a half eaten bowl of pasta that someone's done God knows what to.

[gianfared.livejournal.com]

I just noticed in our teacher's lounge today that there is a sign posted on the refrigerator stating, "Please replace two diet Cokes and one Sprite!!!"

I thought that was bad, but your story is awful. I can't imagine anyone being so audacious! Ugg, indeed. :-/

[selinakyle47.livejournal.com]

You could try putting out some chocolate chip cookies flavored with a not-so-tasty spice.

[lissannej.livejournal.com]

Stealing other people's food is just scummy. Pond scum.

[romanticalgirl.livejournal.com]

It's really only EG and SftD of his stuff that really impacts me. Xenocide and his other series never got to me in the way those two did, and Ender's Shadow seemed...well, a shadow of EG. Hee, and I've not read any of the other books in his "parallel" series.

You know, I'm never sure if it's just the book or if it's the power of the writing as well that hits me so hard, if that makes sense; but, I'll be keen to hear your reaction to it.

[sarea-okelani.livejournal.com]

That is so heinous. O.o I mean, wtf? Stealing from another teacher? Clearly those were for a class, purchased by someone else -- what makes you think it's OKAY to take?! Next time I'm going to try labelling food and see if that makes any difference. But I shouldn't have to. They should know what food they put in the fridge and what they take out! Damn thieves!