Grown-up shopping

Yesterday I went shopping with the Man. I should probably make clear at this point that, despite my nickname, I am in fact a straight female and not unduly mannish. It's a long (and actually not very interesting) story.

Anyhoo.

Yes, so we went shopping. He wanted to buy a new suit, which of cause is enormously difficult and traumatic for boys as they are unpractised at the art of shopping and suddenly have to spend hundreds of pounds on something that actually looks exactly the same as all the others in the shop.

I was helping:

Me: Try this one!
Man: Too stripey.
Me: Er...this one?
Man: Too plain.
Me (picks up the first one again): This one?
Man: Too....shiny.

a while later...

Me: This one! THIS ONE THIS ONE THIS ONE!
Man: But it's brown.
Me: YES!
Man: And a bit stripey.
Me: Yes! It's perfect. This one. Buy this one.
Man: But I don't want a brown suit. I don't like brown suits.
Me: Buy this one. All the others are horrible. In fact, they are probably made out of poisonous fabric woven by evil elves in a factory of death and will give you leprosy just by wearing them.

A pause. Man regards the suit. Looks at me, back at the suit. A realisation dawns.

Man: Doctor Who wears a suit like this, doesn't he.
Me: Does he? Really, I hadn't noticed. Ahem.

Silence.

Me: We could get you some white converse sneakers to go with it...

We leave the shop.

*sigh*

Roger.

Oh, PS, he got his own back in the evening, when he took me to a drinks party - in order to illustrate this I need only quote two little snippets of conversation I overheard:

"This is [insert complicated professory name here], you've probably read his book on Europe"

and my special favourite:

"Of course I didn't start working there until after I was bored with the Aga Khan".

One. day. to. go.

I think I can speak for the both of us with this conversation.
The place: Roger & James' respective workplaces.
The time: All day today.

R&J: Wiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii!!!
ALL grown-ups: "...?"

*sigh*
Roger & James

I'm wearing tweed! Like a grown-up!

Today I am wearing a suit at work.

This would not be unusual for many people (by 'people', obviously I mean 'grown-ups'), however I usually schlep into work wearing whatever jeans and children's television-themed t-shirt I can find in the drawer that morning. So today, just getting from the front desk to my office, no less than 3 grown-ups commented, variously

"A bit smart, aren't we?"
"What's the occasion?"
and "Off to an interview this afternoon then?"

Now. What they don't know is that none of the above are true. The truth is, I have been out every night this week, and thusly have done no laundry whatsoever and am down to whatever I can find in the plastic dry-cleaning wrappers in the wardrobe. The suitage has nothing whatsoever to do with being a grown-up and everything to do with being too inept to fill my own
washing machine

Unless I get my arse in gear over the weekend the next logical step on Monday is going to be a choice between pyjamas and an evening gown. I know which would be more practical.

*sigh*

Roger.

Lunchtime (in)activist

A little off topic but I feel it needs to be said:

I hate Starbucks. I hate their nasty evil capitalist ways, their destruction of the high street, their multinational greed and those horrible, cynical new coffee loyalty cards they've just brought out. I hate the fact that I had to find a picture of a different sort of Starbuck (albeit a much cooler one) to put on this blog as if I used the logo they'd somehow find out then probably send armed baristas round to my house in the dead of night, bundle me into the Coffeemobile and lock me up in a small room being force-fed soya lattes for the remainder of my days.

I urge everyone reading this with any sense of decency to boycott these money-grabbing coffee-pushing Nazis and stand up for all that is fair and proper and decent.

Because if you all do...maybe it will make up for the fact that I just can't get enough of their Cheese & Marmite paninis.

*munch*.

Oh, and peppermint mochas. Hollow consumerism never tasted so good.

*sigh*

Roger.

I Want a Wii

I went to New York last week!
I spent two hours in the Nintendo Store playing Zelda...
Uh huh...

I then bought some Wii controllers (see very excited pic above) to use on my Wii that I will be purchasing on Dec 8th.

I have tried to explain this whole thing to SO MANY grownups...


The conversation tends goes like this:

Me: "LOOK!"

Them: "What?"

Me: "It's a Wii controller"

....que lots of shaking and waving of controllers and moving and leaping about shouting things like "YAH!" and "HAH!"

Them: "So....?"

Me: "DOH! SOOOOOOOO! If I want to draw my sword I just shake my left hand like this... (shakes left hand) and if I want to hit anyone with it I just hack at them with my right - LIKE THIS! (hacks and slashes) ITS JUST SO COOL! SEE?!"

Them: "Uh-huh..."


They just don't get it...

*Sigh*

James.

CSI Roger

Today it rained. A lot. And I don't know anything about boat-building so I was getting a bit worried about what I was going to do when the inevitable call from the big man came asking me to build an ark to put all the aminals in. But then I was distracted because bits of the roof all over the place spontaneously decided to start leaking and we had lots of floods and I forgot about where I was going to put all the pairs of ducks and things.

Aaaand my part in this was all terribly important and grown-up - I had to walk around with a great big camera and take pictures of the damage.

Like a crime scene investigator.

I took some awfully good pictures. For instance, this one, which I think shows a particularly nice bucket shot with a teasing tarpaulin overlay (easy tiger). Not as much fun as photographing murder scenes, I suppose, but it amused me.

I did ask if I could put police hazard tape all over the doors to the affected areas.

But apparently it wasn't "necessary". Pah.

*sigh*

Roger

Toys

Leading on from Roger's Starter for 10...

I have Toys.
On my desk.
As you can see.


Thing is - These were ALL gifts.

Namely:

Edward Scissorhands: A gift from Roger
Wolverine: A gift from Me
Edward's Dog: A gift from Roger
Skeletor: A gift from Big Poppa
Gibaffe: A gift from Wossage
Nintendo DS Lite: A gift from my previous work colleagues.

This is what we do.
We buy each other COOL things.

We do not spend our money on cushions.
Or cardigans.
Well - certainly not for our friends anyway.

Friends buy their friends cool stuff.


Growdups should do this too, but they don't.
They just don't get it...

*sigh*

James

Bless.

So my big sister has a new phone of which she is very proud. It does video, MP3, sings, dances, makes the tea, you name it. Problem is it doesn't come with a training course.

Sis: Can you have a look at my phone? I made a video but it only comes out in black and white and I don't know why.

Me: OK, well, I'm not all that technical but I'll have a look for you.

Sis: It's this one, the one of my cat (shows me)

4 and a half nanoseconds later

Me: Right, I see your problem. Um. What colour is the cat?

Sis: Black and white...

Realisation slowly dawns.

Yes, you are ahead of me. It was in fact a colour video of a black and white cat. For goodness' sake.

*sigh*

Roger.

YAAAAARRRRR!!!! It's International Talk Like A Pirate Day!

My pirate name is:

Black Mary Bonney

Like anyone confronted with the harshness of robbery on the high seas, you can be pessimistic at times. You can be a little bit unpredictable, but a pirate's life is far from full of certainties, so that fits in pretty well. Arr!

Get your own pirate name from piratequiz.com.
part of the fidius.org network

Of course, growdups wouldn't understand this.

*sigh*

Roger

Sometimes it's the simplest things....

"What's a PSP?"

One long and enthusiastic explanation - encompassing the myriad wonders of portable gaming, music and movies, and including the joy that is Loco Roco - later...

"Oh. Doesn't sound like something I'd be interested in then. Alright for kids I suppose."

Glad I didn't start trying to explain the DS....

*sigh*

Roger.

Even geeks don't understand...

So there I am in Richmond's number one comic book store: "They Walk Among Us", minding my own business, browsing the comics and I hear the Store Dude (SD) chatting to a Old Customer(OC)...

SD: Oh hello there...
OC: Hi!
SD: You'll be after some Xbox360 games won't you... have you played Dead Rising?
OC: Oh er... No. I don't think I've heard of it...
SD: Well! Its Bri...

(at this point there's a slight interuption)

ME: SO. MANY. ZOMBIES!

Silence

SD and OC both kind of pivot on the spot to stare at the random mutterings coming from the end of the store...

SD: Yes, well... there are a quite a few Zo...
ME: THOUSANDS OF THEM! IN THE SHOPPING CENTRE...
OC: Really?
ME: YES!!! And you can KILL THEM!
SD: Well of course..
ME: IN ALL SORTS OF WAYS! ZOMBIES! BRILLIANT! ZOMBIES!

Now I'm not sure if the OC bought himself a copy of Dead Rising or not...
But the SD started a conversation about Lego Star Wars so I kind of shut off after that...

Pah.

Zombies are awesome.
Killing them in new and inventive ways is also... Awesome.

But sometimes - even geeks don't understand.

*sigh*

James

Starter for 10

So I come in this morning and there in my pigeonhole is a parcel from Play containing my Shaun of the Dead figure, which I duly open and take up to the office. Two colleagues are in my office (Grownups 1 and 2) when I get there, following conversation ensues:

G1: So, what’s that then?
ME: It’s Shaun of the Dead (*duh*)
G2: Ahh, is it a present for someone?
G1: Or was it a freebie from somewhere?
ME: No, it’s mine.

Silence

ME: Look, it’s got a little bunch of flowers and a wee cricket bat and..and..EVERYTHING. (am baffled by how anybody can fail to be impressed by this)

More silence

G1: Riiiiight.

By this time I have turned on my computer and the screensaver – Chris the Ninja Pirate from Weebl and Bob, comes on.

G2: What on earth is that?
ME: It’s Chris.

Pause

ME: He’s a Ninja Pirate.

More baffled silence. Man, it’s hot in here.

ME: Look, you can tell because he has an eyepatch, see, and a little ninja sword, and he’s saying ‘Yaaarrrr’. Ninja Pirate. Yass.

They shake collective heads, give up and go away.

Sometimes I wonder what I’m doing in this place. I mean, really. *sigh*.

Roger.