12 August 2010

Bits and Pieces

I'm trying to avoid writing the "OMG BlogHer Squee" post, so this is what you get.

**********

A friend told me that his therapist thinks I should post more. He pays his therapist to advise a random woman whom she has never met how to post on her blog.

I have this to say to his therapist:

In other words, there is now a LOLcat for everything.

************
One Monday, I was getting all my crap out of my car for work. Laptop, lunch bag, big Mary Poppins purse, travel mug. I was standing on the curb and turned to walk into the building. Tripped and fell, twisting both ankles.

I laid there face down in the parking lot, watching my coffee flow into a puddle in front of me, thinking exactly this: "Ow. Ow. Ow."

Within two hours, one ankle had swollen to about 150% its usual size, while the other one merely hurt like hell.


In less than 48 hours, I would leave for BlogHer 2010, an event that requires as much walking as an Avon 3-Day Breast Cancer event. Impeccable timing. I haz it.

**********

On the Tuesday before BlogHer (I left on Wednesday), EmmieJ, one of the bloggers flying on the Virgin America party plane tweeted that she was sick with a cold. And that she was on her way to join us for our Wednesday flight.

I did not handle this news well.

I had what might charitably be called a freakout of epic proportions. I was going to be stuck on a plane for five hours in close proximity to Germ Girl. You KNOW how I feel about germs.

I tweeted a couple replies, the subtext of which was "WTF BITCH?? Are you trying to KILL ME???" I am nothing if not compassionate.

The beautiful irony was that she had had to move heaven and earth to get on the flight with us, as she was coming from Sacramento to LA and then to NYC, and Virgin wanted to do nothing more than fly her direct to the Big Apple.

I furiously tried to get on the Virgin America website to change my flight. They, meanwhile, were having a major sale. The page WOULD NOT load. I sat there staring at the screen and obsessively refreshing for an hour. I finally got the site to tell me I could fly a few hours later in the day than I had planned for only an additional $350. Uh, no. I'm a germaphobe, but I am also a cheap bastard germophobe.

Plan B: Aromatherapy. No joke. My aromatherapist, Bambi (NO, I am not making this up. I'm from California. Everyone in California has an aromatherapist named Bambi) has this Miracle Smell Juice that kills germs for yards around you, guaranteed. Ok, not guaranteed, exactly, but it got me through 4 cold and flu seasons in Cubicle Hell without getting sick, which makes it practically FDA approved, right?

But Bambi was out for the evening, so I went to the health food store, where I found something similar to Bambi's Miracle Juice in the aromatherapy aisle, but it needed to be diluted.

"Do you have any small bottles?" I asked. Yes, on the bottom shelf. Next to the giant bottles of patchouli oil. Which is my least favorite scent, by the way, right up there with lavender, cat crap and deviled eggs. Patchouli oil in giant GLASS bottles that are easily tipped over and shattered if an exceptionally clumsy person taps them just right...

Yes, I did. I caused a Toxic Airborne Event in my health food store. A two-foot wide pool of pure Hippie Stank Patchouli Oil spread out all over the linoleum, releasing its fumes from hell.

People were wheezing and coughing and covering their faces. All except for a little 8-year-old mini-Goth girl, who loved the stench. You gotta wonder about how that child is going to turn out.

And of course the health food store checkout line was long and it took forever and I was blanketed in a coating of Patchouli smell and I still had to go home and get up at 2:30 a.m. to get to the airport, so I stopped and got a burrito for dinner on the way home.

A vegetarian burrito with avocado WITH avocado (sometimes I splurge) and took it home to eat.

It was a meat burrito, not a vegetarian burrito. I do not eat meat. I think it was then that I tweeted "If I were the type of person to think God messed with people, I would think God was messing with me."

I drove the mile back to return the burrito and waited in line for 20 minutes to do so. Not exaggerating - it was 10 minutes to closing time and every stoned surfer in town was waiting for a grease bomb.

I got my burrito, got in my car and burst into tears. I was just...done.

But then I really WAS done. I decided to quit freaking out, to go home and pack my clothes and sleep for 3 hours and get up and be cheerful and have a great time. And that's what I did.

***********

EmmieJ was on the flight, feeling icky but sitting a row back and across the plane from me. Sitting in the seat directly in front of me was a four-year-old girl who was feverish, coughing, and sneezing loudly the whole flight.

Too late, God. Too late.

12 comments:

MFA Mama said...

Oh, man. That is the suck alright. I'm hoping you at least had fun at BlogHer; you're one of about three people I really wanted to meet but didn't :(

mames said...

I thought I smelled a whiff o patchouli whenever we met up at the conference. Now I know why.

Really glad you made it despite the lead up trials.

Rachel said...

So, don't leave us hanging. Did you end up getting sick...?

Kizz said...

But you did it, you made it here and you barely slept but I got to meet you so I, for one, am happy. That's what you were going for, right?

Great to meet you. Hope your trip home wasn't nearly so eventful.

Barnmaven said...

I just want to say that I'm really sorry and feel terribly guilty for sitting here and laughing my ass off at this post. :D

How's the ankle?

Blue House Studio World HQ said...

Gak, patchouli. Also one of my least favorite scents. Combine it with mugwort and I need an ambulance.

Hope the trip improved and will look forward to reading about it.

Magpie said...

You know - everyone I know who was at Blogher is now sick with a cold. Was it from your airplane?

EmmieJ said...

I'll have you know, not one person that I hung out with ended up with a cold. :D In all seriousness, Wednesday was the last day of it. I was peachy keen by Thursday morning. Sorry for freaking you out but I am awfully glad I got to hang out with you.

And just because karma is a bitch, I was surrounded by 5 sneezing people on my flight back.

Suzanne said...

I am so so glad that you made it, plane of germs and swollen ankles and all.

Jessica said...

I love patchouli stank, and I have just gotten a prescription - after 20 years of resisting it - for my germophobia. I'll let you know if it works.

Sugar Jones said...

Okay, before I read this, I thought it ----> "Everyone in California has an aromatherapist named Bambi."

Thanks for letting me break your stapler. You handled it really well. ;)

flurrious said...

I would rather be stuck on a plane sitting next to someone who smells like deviled eggs and cat crap than to have to smell patchouli for any length of time.

Back to top