The best thing about working from home is the part where you get to, you know, work from home. The worst thing about working from home is the part where all of the sudden you realize that spending so much time alone has made you really fucking weird.

Maybe it’s a “chicken or the egg” thing. Maybe it’s not that working from home makes you weird, maybe it’s that people who are already weird are drawn to working from home. Either way, we’ve reached the point where I have to confess that I’ve started eating vegetables in the bathtub in the middle of the day.

This is when I’d love to be able to interject and tell you that it’s not what it sounds like, but really? It’s exactly what it sounds like.

It started as an exercise in time management and efficiency. I was really cold (HOW IS IT ALWAYS SO COLD IN THIS APARTMENT? AREN’T WE IN LOS ANGELES?), and all morning while working I kept thinking that the best way for me to finally get warm would be to take a bath. A few hours passed, and no matter what additional clothes I put on, I couldn’t get warm. I started to feel like the only way I’d ever be warm again EVER would be to submerge my entire body in super hot water, so I gave in and started running a bath. While running the bath, I realized that in addition to being The Coldest, I was also The Hungriest. “Okay,” I thought. “Maybe I can eat first, and then take a bath.” But my crazybrain was like, “YOU’RE TOO COLD FOR THAT.” And then I was all, “Well, maybe I can take a bath first and then have a snack.” But my crazybrain was like, “YOU’RE TOO HUNGRY FOR THAT.” Which is when I decided that that only possible solution was to eat a plate of baby carrots in the bathtub.

As I was doing it, I knew it was totally fucking weird. I kept thinking, “IT’S 3PM. YOU’RE EATING CARROTS IN THE BATHTUB. YOU’RE THE ONLY PERSON IN THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD TO DO THIS.” But I mean, hey, I got out of the bathtub about twenty minutes later and I was both warm and not-starving, so overall I’d have to say it was a win.

That afternoon, I figured the Bathtub-Vegetable Situation would be a one time thing. But then, a few days later when I was putting on socks and a sweatshirt and wrapping myself up in a blanket at my desk, I remembered how warm it felt to be in the bath. “Oh, what the hell,” I thought. “I’ll just take one more bath.” As the water was running, I found myself absentmindedly cutting up some cucumbers to take in there with me. “GOD, YOU’RE SO FUCKING WEIRD,” I thought. “THIS ISN’T ANY LESS WEIRD THE SECOND TIME AROUND.” But, whatever man, I was hungry and cold.

And so it went, different combinations of bath + vegetables, until one weekend afternoon when I realized that the only thing missing from my warm, wet, relaxing snack time was TV. Which is how I wound up laying in the bathtub, eating truffle oil green beans, and watching Friday Night Lights on a laptop perched on top of the toilet. Do you hear that, Mom? Your adult daughter’s new hobby is preparing fancy green beans and eating them in the mother effing BATHTUB while watching high school kids play football on Netflix Instant. Also, while we’re on the subject, how did I just start watching Friday Night Lights?! I’m only about halfway through season 2* but I’m already obsessed. I mean, THIS SHOW! Honestly, I’m legitimately proud of the fact that, since starting the show, I’ve still managed to complete my work, go outside, interact with three dimensional people, and do other seemingly normal activities, because ALL I WANT TO DO IS WATCH TIM RIGGINS PUSH HIS HAIR OUT OF HIS EYES FOREVER AND EVER, AMEN.

*NO SPOILERS. IF YOU TELL ME ANYTHING ABOUT WHAT HAPPENS I’LL COMPLETELY LOSE MY MIND AND HAVE TO PROGRESS TO EATING CHICKEN PARM IN THE BATHTUB FOR COMFORT. DO YOU WANT TO BE RESPONSIBLE FOR A TRAGEDY LIKE THAT?!

Let’s take a poll. Do you think it’s racist to make declarative statements about a certain group of people even if the statement you’re making is a nice thing?

If your answer is yes, you should definitely stop reading this post because it’s racist as shit. If your answer is no, then OH MY GOD WHY ARE ASIAN BABIES SO MUCH CUTER THAN ALL THE OTHER BABIES?*

Whenever we see a baby like this out in public, I always tell James Bond that I’m going to put it in my purse. He thinks I’m kidding, but the truth is that at any given moment in my life I’m approximately 7 seconds away from going all Angelina Jolie on these super cute Asian babies, taking them home with me, and tattooing their birth coordinates all over my body.

(Don’t look at me like that. Of course I know that stealing other people’s babies on the 3rd Street Promenade in Santa Monica isn’t the same thing as adopting needy children from other countries. BUT STILL.)

Anyway, the other night when Drea was over I started a Pinterest board dedicated solely to pinning photos of cute Asian babies, an activity that has now replaced “sleep” and “water” and “real life three-dimensional friends” on my list of important things to do.

When I first showed Drea the big-glasses-small-Asian-child photo, I made her close her eyes. I’m all, “No seriously, close your eyes, I have to show you something SO AMAZING.” So she closes her eyes but then she’s like, “Dude, this is really weird. Don’t put anything near my face. What’s near my face?!” because I have the computer screen really close to her so that as soon as she opens her eyes it’s all CUTE ASIAN BABY, right fucking there, but I’m laughing so hard at being the kind of creepy motherfucker who makes her friend CLOSE HER EYES prior to being shown a close-up photo of someone else’s child from the internet that I’m basically wetting my pants. So she opens her eyes and looks from the photo of the baby to the tears streaming down my face to me crossing my legs so the pee won’t come out and then she starts laughing hysterically and we’re both collapsing on the couch in our almost-pee laughter tears and James Bond is looking at us and shaking his head like, “WHAT IS MY LIFE” and then we clicked over to the page that shows you all of the photos that have been added to Pinterest from the same website as the photo you’re looking at, but instead of finding a collection of photos that included our cute Asian baby photo, we found page after page of people who had all pinned THIS EXACT SAME PHOTO, which made me realize that, overall, the world is a very good place.

Except wait, actually, a little later that night we also found an online shop that sells “life-like baby replicas” and hey, guess what, on a scale from one to that super cute baby with the glasses, these dolls are like a negative eleventy billion.

SEE?!

Like, what the fuck? WHO’S BUYING THOSE? Especially because they’re priced at like two thousand dollars on Ebay.

TWO THOUSAND DOLLARS.

FOR A SCARY FAKE BABY.

FROM FUCKING EBAY.

I mean, if people are seriously spending that much money on dolls from the internet, we’re all in the wrong business. Especially because they don’t have any cute Asian ones, which would clearly be worth so much more.

*Non-Asian mothers of the internet, please don’t yell at me. I’m not saying that your baby isn’t cute. I mean, I guess I might be saying that because not all babies are cute (WHAT? THEY’RE NOT), but yours probably is. It’s just not as cute as this baby. Or this baby. Unless, of course, the baby in either of those two photos actually is your child, in which case, CAN I PLEASE COME OVER AND FUCKING BABYSIT FOREVER?!?

Listen, I’m a low maintenance girl. I don’t need a lot of specific shit to be happy, and I only have two rules for the people in my life: no jail, and no hospital. That’s it. Do whatever you want, be whoever you are, just don’t wind up in jail and don’t wind up in the hospital. Unless you’re like giving birth or some shit, then by all means go to the hospital. Or, if you’re anything like some of the girls I went to high school with, just have your baby at home in an inflatable pool and post graphic pictures of your placenta on Facebook.

(Thanks for making that available to me, Mark Zuckerberg. Thanks a lot.)

Other than pushing a human being out of your vagina, though, there will be absolutely no hospital. And definitely no jail. Easy, right? YOU’D THINK. And yet, there I was yesterday, only a few slight degrees of separation away from both jail and the hospital. I also met Hugh Jackman, but that’s an entirely different story.

Wait, let’s back up for a second. Have you ever been to Bay to Breakers? If not, and if you haven’t heard of it, it’s basically an all-out crazy fest that happens in San Francisco every May under the guise of a 12K race. I mean, the 12K race actually does happen, but the serious runners are overshadowed by the thousands of costume-wearing drunk people who wander along the race route in a substance-induced parade. I don’t know how you go from one of the healthiest activities (running) to such a shitshow (THIS) during the same event, but yesterday was the 100th anniversary of said event so apparently people in this madhouse city are all about making it happen.

This was my second year at Bay to Breakers, but it was my first year doing it sober, and as a result my biggest piece of advice to you is that if you ever have the opportunity to soberly attend an event where people are a) completely naked, b) falling down drunk in the streets, c) dressed in full head-to-toe costume, or d) all of the above, take it. You have no idea the things you miss when you’re part of the drunken masses.

I mean, if Amber and I weren’t sober, how would we have managed to keep track of the number of naked old man penises we saw? (15) Also, while we’re on the subject, how is it possible that cops were stopping people to pour out their open beers, yet it was entirely fine for FULL GROWN MEN to wander the streets wearing nothing but a pink sparkly cowboy hat and furry boots? Isn’t it illegal to run around naked in public once you’re over the age of, like, 3? James Bond says it’s legal in San Francisco as long as you’re not obstructing traffic, but I’m not entirely sure his opinion counts since he drunkenly somersaulted over a fence yesterday and cut his effing face open. And also, do I even want to question why my boyfriend knows the rules about what naked adult men are allowed to do in public in the city of San Francisco?

Probably best to just leave that one alone.

Anyway, after he almost broke the “no hospital” rule by destroying his face, and after Amber almost broke the “no jail” rule by getting her car impounded for being parked too close to the parade route, I met Hugh Jackman. He was signing autographs outside a theatre a few blocks from my apartment, and apparently he’s been performing there for the past few weeks. To be honest, I have absolutely no idea what Hugh Jackman does in a solo show involving him and a seventeen piece orchestra, but I’m going to pretend it involves his delicious Australian accent, the Wolverine claws, some soothing classical music, and a lot of gyrating in the general direction of my apartment.

So, to recap: James Bond is missing a part of his nose and a lot of his forehead, it costs $400 to get your car out of the impound if you do it the same day, men can walk naked through the streets of San Francisco as long as they properly adhere to traffic signals, and all of this is probably just a preview of what I’ll witness in Vegas later this week.

Huzzah!

Oh hey, did you notice that Gmail has recently become a creepy stalker mcstalkerson and now asks you, with every single email you write, if you’d like to cc the email to a suggested list of contacts? I first noticed it this morning, when I was writing Jamie one of our many frantic and completely irreverent emails, and I looked up and saw that Gmail was all, “Would you also like to include any of these people {link link link} on your email?” And I was like, “What the fuck?” and then later I was typing an email to my mom and Gmail was all, “How about now? Would you like to also send your email to this person and this person and this person?” and I was like, “Seriously?? Stop it, Gmail. YOU’RE MAKING ME CRAZY.”

Like, what the hell? What is Gmail doing? Theoretically, I’m sure this feature is supposed to make my life easier by guessing who I’d like to send emails to based on past group email activity, but in reality? It’s freaking me out. Also, it’s totally inaccurate. I mean, why would I want to send links to hilariously offensive things to Jamie and my father? HAVE I EVER DONE THAT BEFORE, GMAIL? And why would I want to forward photos of my nieces to my CPA? And why would I want to notify my former boss about the winner of my most recent sex toy giveaway?

IT DOESN’T MAKE ANY SENSE.

Someone at Google is clearly trying to fuck with me. Also, here’s an interesting thing: regardless of who I’m writing the initial email to, Gmail always suggests three add-on people and one of them is always Derek. No matter what. HI DEREK, GMAIL WANTS YOU IN ON AN INFINITE COMBINATION OF EMAIL THREEWAYS WITH ME AND MY MOTHER.

Wait, maybe Derek is the one fucking with me. WHO DO YOU KNOW AT GOOGLE, DEREK? THESE EMAILS AREN’T FOR YOU.

And that’s the problem. What if I accidentally send an email to the wrong person?? I’m already compulsive about triple checking airline purchases (what if I book a ticket for the wrong date??) and DMs (what if I make this a public tweet instead of a private message??), and of course the easy answer is to not ever say anything to anyone that I wouldn’t want my mother and my CPA and my former boss to read, but HELLO, THAT’S THE WORST AND MOST BORING AND ALSO MOST IMPOSSIBLE TO FOLLOW ADVICE EVER.

So now I live in fear of my email. Which feels good, people, it feels really good. The only upside is that I’ve found a new hobby: typing everyone I can think of into the email address field and seeing who Gmail thinks would be involved in our electronic message orgy. Although the hobby sucks a little bit, BECAUSE IT’S ALWAYS DEREK.

Sigh.

TOO MUCH TECHNOLOGY.

Friends: I’m sorry in advance if you get an invitation to my grandpa’s 89th birthday.

Grandpa: I’m sorry in advance if you get an email telling you that you’ve won a frisbee shaped vibrator from Babeland.

Mom: I’m just sorry in advance. You know, in general.

I don’t understand how the human brain works. Granted, I don’t understand how a lot of things work (AIRPLANES ARE TOO HEAVY TO FLY), but the human brain? Complete mystery. How can the same organ (is the brain an organ?) that’s capable of learning the specifics of quantum physics be simultaneously incapable of remembering the name of that famous person from that movie I saw with that guy that one time during that thing.

WHERE DO DETAILS LIKE THIS GO?!

Take French music, for example. I’ve started to listen to French music pretty regularly because a) I’m convinced that the French know something we don’t know and 2) Since I don’t understand a fucking word of what French people are singing about*, their songs don’t distract me during the work day.

Recently, my French phase has lead me to download a lot of songs by Edith Piaf, and my favorite song of hers is called Milord. I can’t really explain why it’s my favorite, other than the fact that every single time it comes on I feel as though I’m supposed to be dancing naked at a cabaret somewhere, surrounded by buttery croissants and very thick accents.

(Hey look! Even though I’ve been to France, I still seem to think that it’s just one big giant accent-filled sex bakery!)

But wait, here’s the thing with Edith Piaf, or at least, here’s the thing with her song Milord: I know it from somewhere. I know I’ve heard this song before, in some other context, and yet I can’t place it.  In a movie, maybe? Or a play? Or a TV show? Or like, fuck, I don’t know exactly, but I’ve definitely heard it. Has that ever happened to you? A song comes on and you know you’re familiar with it, but your impossibly complicated, never-works-the-way-you-need-it-work brain won’t make the connection for you?

IT’S INFURIATING.

At first though, not knowing where I’d heard the song wasn’t too bad. I was all, “Oh, it’ll come to me!” Then, a few hours later I was like, “Wow, that’s weird, I still can’t figure it out.” Then, a few hours after that, I was all, “COME ON, BRAIN. YOU KNOW THIS SONG.” Then, by day three, I was an inch away from having a hot mess breakdown over why in the hell I could remember all of the words to every Christmas song ever, but I couldn’t shake my brain into summoning forth the one tiny little piece of information that was keeping me awake at night, humming Milord incessantly to myself while small fragments of my soul hardened and chipped away with despair.

Finally, I sat down to Google it. “Okay,” I thought, “this is it, Google will have the answer” and I started typing every possible combination of “Edith Piaf” and “Milord” and “soundtrack” and “where the effing eff eff eff do I know that eff eff song from?!?” which didn’t bring me any closer to solving my torturous mystery but did bring me to a Tumblr called Eff This Diet where some girl in Southern California who has a severe foot phobia writes about how she’s trying to lose 120 lbs.

NOT HELPFUL.

Also, just so you know, this is the part of the story where I lie and tell you that I didn’t actually spend multiple hours over the course of an entire week trying to Google myself to brain-lock freedom. Nope. DIDN’T DO IT.

Also also, guess what? It turns out that finding where I’ve heard that Edith Piaf song is the one thing that Google can’t do. Do you know what that means? It either means that I’ve never actually heard the song Milord before and that something deep inside my brain (AGAIN, WHAT IS THE HUMAN BRAIN!!!) is tormenting me until I slowly go insane, or my brain is so large and complicated that even Google can’t handle it.

Which is to say, in all seriousness, that if anyone can figure out where the belligerent fuck I’ve heard this song before, I’ll send you $20 worth of whatever you want -  bubble gum, condoms, hair elastics, salt, whatever you want.

JUST. HELP. ME.

*Actually, that’s a lie. I know three French words: poissons, which means fish, merde, which means shit, and merci, which means thank you. But unless someone is singing “thank you shit fish” over and over again, French music is a pretty distraction-free experience for me. UNLESS I HAPPEN TO KNOW SAID FRENCH SONG FROM SOME LONG-LOST MYSTERIOUS FORMER LIFE THAT NOT EVEN GOOGLE CAN FIND.

::cries::

On the flight home from Austin last night, I decided that my new life goal is to be famous enough that someone will use their free time to create a website that’s entirely comprised of photos of me riding random things, a la Paula Deen and PaulaDeenRidingThings.com.

I just don’t think anything screams, “FAMOUS!” quite like someone superimposing an image of you onto a photo of The Beatles in such a way that it appears that your crazy ass is riding all four of them at the same time. God, Paula Deen is so unbelievably lucky. Not just for getting to ride all that cool shit, but for being famous for the overuse of butter. I mean, is there anything more incredible than being famous for excessive butter usage? Fuck riding The Beatles, being synonymous with artery clogging food should be my new new goal.

To start, I should probably move to Austin. Do you have any idea how many grossly delicious things there are to eat in Austin? I’m actually pretty pissed that no one warned me about it, because I went into this little vacation completely unprepared and then had to spend three and a half days running around the city trying to taste as much of it as possible. I was all, “Pork belly buns! And red velvet cupcakes! And braised short rib and burrata pizza! And blue cheese creme brulee! And deep fried avocado tacos!”

Hold on for a second though, I’m actually going to stop myself right there and tell you that the takeaway message from this post – actually no, the takeaway message from this entire blog – is that no matter what you’re doing, you should pause and immediately go deep fry some avocado slices. Then, put them on EVERYTHING. Then, move to Austin with me and help me start a fried avocado food truck where each item on the menu involves fried avocado. Then, we’ll get famous for something artery clogging that’s even more creative than butter and even has the added benefit of being the good kind of fat that’s probably not that good but still makes you feel better about yourself when you eat shit like deep fried avocados. Then, Paula Deen will be so proud that she’ll invite us over to ride The Beatles with her while we sit at a big picnic table eating fried avocado slices and rubbing butter all over our naked bodies.

Maybe that’s what heaven is like. Although if it’s heaven, the picnic table needs to be surrounded by mirrors so that no matter where we sit, we all get to be in that prime spot directly in front of the mirror that lets us pretend we’re not watching ourselves eat the entire time even though we’re totally watching ourselves eat the entire time. Don’t even try to say that you don’t do that. We all do that. And heaven wouldn’t be heaven if we weren’t allowed to indulge our maniacally egotistical side for all eternity.

PS – It now occurs to me that since we’ll be simultaneously eating fried avocado slices while rubbing butter all over our naked bodies, we won’t just be watching ourselves eat, we’ll be watching our naked selves eat, which in real life might be kind of horrifying but in heaven is totally fine because I’m told that in heaven, we all have Brooklyn Decker’s body no matter how many deep fried avocado slice we eat.

PPS – The men don’t have Brooklyn Decker’s body. That would be weird. Or awesome, because wait, maybe being in girl-heaven means that all of the boys finally have to experience what it’s like dealing with periods and pregnancy. Not that they could get pregnant if heaven is just a bunch of Brooklyn Deckers running around. Except maybe in heaven all the people are Brooklyn Deckers and all the Brooklyn Deckers are lesbians and all the lesbian Brooklyn Deckers have the ability to impregnate each other.

PPPS- I’M HAVING PAULA DEEN’S BABY IN HEAVEN!!!!!

UPDATE: Jamie just made this photo for me and I think I’m now the happiest I’ve ever been ever ever. NICOLE RIDING THINGS!

So, the other day my mom called while I was in the middle of doing laundry. Which, sidenote, what the fuck is wrong with people in communal laundry rooms? What are people doing that’s SO IMPORTANT that they put their clothes in the washing machine and then just don’t come back for them for like, hours. I can’t understand this. You put the laundry in and you set a timer. When the timer goes off, you go back up and, oh, I don’t know, get your fucking clothes out of everyone else’s way. And if you don’t, the fine print of being an Adult Person is that someone else has the right to move your clothes into an empty dryer. Not to start the dryer, but to get your shit out of the washing machine so they can put their own shit in there. Right? Right?! This is just how it is. The problem, though, is what to do if someone forgets their clothes during the dryer portion of the laundry adventure. Like, the clothes are fully dry, sitting in the dryer, but NO ONE IS CLAIMING THEM. This infuriates me. Because like, I’m not going to put them on the floor. And I’m not going to put them back in the washing machine (although, really, I should), so then I’m the one stuck in the middle of the laundry room with soaking wet clothes that can’t be dried because some asshat decided to wash all the sheets and towels in the world, put them in the dryer at the exact same time, and then leave to go on safari in Kenya or some shit.

So yeah, my mom called during that, and I’m all, “I’m going to need to call you back later” and she’s like, “No, Nicole, this is important, we need to discuss my funeral plans” and I’m all, “Seriously?!” and she’s like, “Remember how my will states that you have to take my ashes to Lapland and release them off the back of a snow mobile so that I can enjoy eternal Christmas?” and I’m all, “WHO COULD EVER FORGET SOMETHING LIKE THAT?!” and she’s like, “I’m concerned that getting to and from Lapland and staying in an ice hotel is going to be cost prohibitive for you” and I’m all, “I have to stay in an ice hotel? Your will really says that?” and she’s like, “Well no, but have you seen pictures of those ice hotels! Why would you not stay there?!” and I’m all, “Listen, if you want me to be the creepy person on a Lapland-bound flight who’s holding her mother’s ashes and terrifying children by telling them that a dead mother’s ashes will be all over the snow in Lapland and that the snow will melt and turn into water and that Santa’s reindeer will drink that water and then fly the dead mother around in their reindeer bellies next Christmas, I’m happy to oblige.”

There was a long pause after that, and then she was all, “I can’t believe you’d say that to kids. What’s the matter with you?? I’m going to change my will to specifically indicate that you can’t use my ashes to scare children under the age of 10.” And I’m like, “CAN I PLEASE HAVE THE LAST FIVE MINUTES OF MY LIFE BACK?!?”

After the call, though, (and after I was finally able to put my clothes in the fucking dryer), I started thinking about death. More specifically, I started thinking about where I’d like my ashes sprinkled, because I realized that there’s just NO WAY I’m going to let me mother win the family title for Weirdest Place to Make Your Child Take Your Cremated Body. Fuck that noise, my kids are going to have to release my ashes into the ocean off the coast of Bali while riding a blind camel at full speed, belting out John Mayer, and spraying gin all over everything with a giant Super Soaker.

Take that, Santa.

When I was 22, I spent 19 hours stuck in the Cancun airport due to insane flooding back in New York City. Because of that, every time my flight is delayed even a little bit I start freaking out about what would happen if I ever got stuck in an airport for that amount of time ever again, and I tell myself over and over that no matter what, I won’t get so belligerently drunk that I wind up lost, on the wrong side of security, accidentally taking $200 in Mexican money out of an ATM with an outrageous service fee and carrying beers back and forth until I get stopped and questioned in a language that I’m only proficient in if “proficient” means being able to properly translate the words “cow” and “orange.”

This time around, my delay has only been about two hours so far and everything seems to be more or less in English, so I’d say it’s a considerable step up. Also, I got to witness an incredibly obnoxious family who had never flown before lose their shit when the TSA people confiscated their over-sized bottles of hairspray and FEMININE DEODORIZER LIQUID and I was also able to take a hilarious photo of a long line of old ladies in wheelchairs whose flights were all delayed and who were therefore just waiting to be pushed around by someone and I know I’m sick and that this isn’t funny to normal people but I texted the picture to Jamie and she thought it was funny and really that’s all the validation I ever need. Well, that and the fact that there’s someone at this airport who has clearly been here much, much longer than me who has chosen to pass the time by paging TV show doctors like Mark Sloane and April Kepner and Gregory House to various parts of the Phoenix airport, which has got to be the best ever use of airport delay time I could ever imagine or even the best use of any time ever. These fake doctor paging shenanigans are enough to make me almost want to share the giant beer I’m having with whoever is doing that. Or like, it’s enough to make me want to buy them their own beer because I just spent a week at home with my mother and now I’m stuck at an airport where men are wearing cowboy hats and huge belt buckles and boots with SPURS and they’re not even being ironic about it at all and so therefore at this exact moment I can’t say that I like anyone enough to share my giant beer. Also, sharing is for suckas.

Wait, hang on, I just got a text from Southwest Airlines that’s telling me that they’re now moving us back to our original gate after moving us twice already to other gates throughout the terminal. Whoever was paging fake doctors is obviously now running the gate posting machine. (Is it one big machine?) (How do these things work?) (How do planes fly?) (Do airports rig the delays so that we won’t mind as much that they’re charging us $1billion.14 for beer?) (Woah, wait, Southwest can text me?)

God, I’m going to be so drunk before this flight ever even boards. Happy almost 2011 to me! And to you! Are you being nice to yourself tonight? You fucking should be. I mean, you’re delicious. Treat yourself accordingly.

A few weeks ago, I woke up at 5:40am to the sound of someone from one of the upstairs apartments peeing into the ball pit on my patio. The problem, aside from the obvious fact that there was someone’s disgusting drunk urine in there (no one pees in a ball pit sober), was that I couldn’t do anything about it because I wasn’t sure which of the upstairs neighbors was responsible. I thought about going door-to-door and asking, but really, who would ever admit to that?

I thought about exaggerating the whole thing, tearfully telling them that the ball pit belongs to my young daughter and that she’s disabled and that the ball pit is her favorite toy and that she was out there playing when it happened and that she was open-mouth laughing from the sheer delight of having a ball pit and that someone peed in her fucking mouth and that we had to rush her to the hospital because she ingested urine that was 90% vodka – but those shenanigans seemed like a) too much effort and b) something even I’m not dramatic enough to pull off.

Frustrated, I decided to report it to the building manager, but I stopped myself after realizing that a ball pit would definitely fall under one of the eleventy thousand categories of prohibited patio items that make me wonder why they even built patios for this building in the first place (WHY GIVE ME A PATIO IF I CAN’T USE IT??) and that admitting to having such a “hazardous” item would probably get me in more trouble than the mysterious urinators who poisoned my fake disabled daughter. Not worth it.

Also, my building manager people are never actually in their building manager office during normal building managing hours, a fact I learned a week after the ball pit incident when I went to ask questions about the guy two doors down from me whose apartment had been broken into, in the middle of the day, and who was now missing all of his valuable shit.

I mean, whaaaaat??

So, to recap, I’m paying exorbitant amounts of rent money to live alone in an apartment building where thieves break into your living room via your patio and yet the building doesn’t allow you to have anything on the patio to create an obstacle course for the thieves because it’s against the goddamn safety code and then even if you do decide to put things on your patio anyway, people fucking pee all over it.

Alright Antoine Dodson, you’re up.

My biggest pet peeve used to be people who spit while they talked. My new biggest pet peeve – although it’s less of a pet peeve and more of a thing that makes me feel overwhelming and all encompassing rage – is the fact that whoever casts actors to play small parts on Grey’s Anatomy thinks it’s totally okay to use those SAME ACTORS to play completely unrelated parts on Private Practice.

It’s not like Grey’s and Private Practice are different shows that just happen to be on the same network. They’re basically THE SAME SHOW. Private Practice is a mother punching spin-off of Grey’s. The plots intertwine! The characters from both shows still intermingle with each other! All the time! And they sleep together! And they fight! And and and there just cannot be that kind of crossover. Like, the girl on Grey’s whose husband was getting a sex change? She can’t all of the sudden be on Private Practice as an entirely different character who is married to a man who plans to stay a man. And she can’t just suddenly be molesting the son she has with this man. Sex change? Child molestation? THESE ARE MEMORABLE STORY LINES. Do they seriously think I’m not going to recognize that woman?! And, oh my GOD, that man? Her husband? The one she’s supposedly married to on Private Practice? HE WAS ON GREY’S TOO. He was the guy whose wife shot him in the head because he cheated on her, the guy who lied to the doctors and said he shot himself by accident while cleaning his gun. It just. No. NO. You can’t hire people to act believably on one show and then get so fucking lazy that instead of oh, I don’t know, hiring different actors to act on the spin-off show, you just recycle the same actors and finger crossie hope that no one is going to notice.

WE NOTICE.

These actors were good in their original parts. So good, in fact, that I remember that they played those parts. I REMEMBER. And, fuck, it’s not just that they’re repeating the actors who play the tiny parts. They’re also repeating actresses like Amanda Foreman who played the crazy chick who attacked Violet and cut her baby out of her body. That storyline JUST happened! IT WAS A MAJOR EVENT IN THE WORLD OF PRIVATE PRACTICE. Amanda Foreman can’t then be playing the sweet little wife of a man with no arms on Grey’s Anatomy. She can’t sit there and be all, “Oh, I adore my husband. We’ll be so lucky if he can get an arm transplant!”

IT JUST CAN’T HAPPEN

HOW STUPID DO THEY THINK WE ARE?

WHO APPROVED THIS CASTING?!

WHY DON’T I HAVE ANYTHING BETTER TO DO WITH MY TIME THAN FEEL INORDINATE AMOUNTS OF STRESS ABOUT ABC DRAMAS AND THEIR ASSOCIATED CASTING CHOICES??

WHO THE FUCK GETS AN *ARM* TRANSPLANT?!