why i love the lovely jess

... because she gives me birthday gifts like this:

I had a whirlwind weekend so I'm too pooped -- HA! Pooped! Get it? -- right now to go into detail but I'll regale with you tales of my party soon. In the meantime, thanks again for the birthday wishes! Much appreciated!

breaking [wind] news

The Gas Man is being moved. I repeat, The Gas Man is being moved. Apparently his intestinal onslaught was a bit too much for his cubicle mates and he and has stinky "musical" stylings will be banished to a corner, well out of ear- and nose-shot.

Even though it wasn't my doing to have him moved, victory is still mine.

the new pollution

As some of you may recall, I was recently downgraded from an office to a cubicle here at work. I did my best to suck up the disappointment and embarrassment because causing a scene is not really my style.

Um, usually.

Prior to the move, my office neighbor approached me and said, "If it wasn't shitty enough that you're losing your office, I hear that we'll both be flanked on either side by some obnoxious guy who's a real loud talker."

This was a troubling development but, again, I did my best to just suck it up and deal. However, after about five minutes of occupying my new seat, I discovered that the rumors were in fact true... and he was sitting right.next.to.me.

I believe this is what you call adding insult to injury, my friends. The situation is far from ideal. If he was at least friendly, I'd try to cut him some slack. But he's a complete douche. And an eyesore, to boot! He's all oily-looking and sounds winded whenever he talks.

He also visits the bathroom with alarming frequency. It's noticeable because he even walks to the john loudly. It's uncanny. Theories as to why he's in there so much range from chronic masturbation to coke addiction to frequent urination due to an enlarged prostate. Actually, those three are my theories and mine alone. I'm not sure anyone else has given it much thought.

Furthermore, he sniffles and clears his throat louder than I thought humanly possible. He fidgets and fusses at his desk and frequently peers over into my cube. I really don't care for this practice in particular. Since I can't really hang up curtains or some nice blinds, I think my only option is to aim a gun at him the next time he does it.

Picture it: He slowly rises into his creepy prairie dog pose and meeting him at nose-level is a double-barreled shot gun. You know, kind of like the one Elmer Fudd carried around when he was hunting wabbit.

Fear not, the gun would contain the same kind of ammunition used in cartoons where the only injury sustained is a blackened, gun powder-filled face and crispy, teased hair.

Or, on a day I was feeling rather cheeky, perhaps I could launch a preemptive strike and shoot him in the ass. Oh relax! It's not like he'd bleed out or anything. Cartoon ammo, remember? The only trauma he'd suffer is that his red-and-white polka-dotted underwear would be revealed through a blast-shaped hole in his pants. Again, just like in the funny pages. I'm not out to kill the man... just ruin his complexion and perhaps a nice pair of trousers.

Today he took his bad cubicle etiquette to a new level. I've come to expect the egregious use of speakerphone and his Chris Matthews-like manner of speaking, what with the ear-splitting volume and baffling inflection, but this is the day we entered into brand new territory.

Today, my friends, I was treated to a deluxe combo platter of burps and farts, with some productive nose-blowing thrown in for good measure. It was symphonic at times. At one point, he reached a crescendo which reminded me of that scene in Ferris Bueller's Day Off when Ferris had all the bodily function noises programmed into his keyboard and then proceeded to play "The Blue Danube" waltz. :: WOT WOT WOT WA. Cough cough. Sneeze sneeze. WOT WOT WOT WA. Cough cough. Sneeze sneeze.::

You get the idea...

A loud fart punctuated the gruesome medley, after which a palpable tension and discomfort filled the air. Mercifully, those elements did not rendezvous with a noxious smell. Thank God for small, odor-free mercies.

The quiet didn't last long because I began giggling uncontrollably. You know, because I'm five. My less-than-subtle sniggering made the woman to my right laugh loudly which then made me giggle even more.

It showed no signs of stopping so I thought it wise to walk away from the crime scene and get the giggle out of my system in a neutral zone.

Good plan, right? Wrong. Unfortunately, I timed my escape at precisely the same moment the gas man decided to haul (noisy) ass to the bathroom. Of course there was a near collision which set me off into another fit of giggles right in the poor man's face, which then caused the woman to my right to laugh even harder.

I disengaged from the awkward tangle and then staggered into the nearest open office still laughing, which unleashed an infectious wave of chuckling among two other women who didn't even know the details of the fart-fueled fracas. Once they found out, however, the laughter reached a fever pitch, which no doubt was overheard by the gas man who was hiding out in the men's room.

Ten bucks says he's doped up on Beano tomorrow. At least I hope he is.

curly and the amazing technicolor yawn

Do you know what's awesome? When a wave of nausea about as high and powerful as the one that kills Tea Leoni at the end of that otherwise forgettable movie about a cataclysmic comet or asteroid or some other crap like that (not to be confused with that other otherwise forgettable movie about a cataclysmic comet or asteroid or some other crap like that starring Bruce Willis) sweeps over you quickly and suddenly while at work. Oh yeah, good times.

I was clicking away on the computer today when out of nowhere I started to feel like ass warmed over. I had hot flashes and my gag reflex was working overtime. And making matters worse was the accompanying bout of I'm-about-to-puke panic I'm subject to every time I feel the need to chunder.

See, I don't know about the rest of y'all but I require privacy when things are going to violently shoot out of my orifices. As a result, I tend to work myself into a bit of a frenzy worrying if someone will dare enter the can while I'm in there depositing things in the toilet against my will. Anything other than pee that leaves my body during work hours is an unplanned and unwanted evacuation, believe you me. I can and will only vomit or take a dump under extreme duress.

Ridiculous shame issues and possible colon damage aside, it is also a desire to be considerate of others that contributes to this stage fright. When I yak, it's not a pretty sight. Or sound. I'm not quiet about it. I sound like a Marine with all my HOO-WAHS! Or do the Marines say HOO-RAH? Oh, who cares? My point is, I make lots of noise and if I'm going to suddenly have to talk to Ralph on the big white telephone and be sprawled out on the floor while whimpering and searching for the cool spot of tile, I'd prefer that my coworkers not be privy to this less-than-dignified display.

I gave my coworkers a polite explanation as to why I had to get the hell out of the office, sent a few IMs to my friends who would have been baffled/concerned by my sudden departure and got my ass in a cab as quickly as my jelly-like legs would take me.

Fortunately, my puke remained "on deck" while I was in the car. When I got home, I flung off my coat, opened up the bathroom door and let 'er ride. As a result of this fortuitous timing, I have a lot of favors to repay God because I did an awful lot of bargaining with him while I was in the taxi. I've pretty much signed over my entire income to charity, gave up cursing, took up macrame and swore off being a bitch in exchange for a puke-free ride with lots of green lights and no traffic on the Brooklyn Bridge.

Fear not, dear readers, I had my fingers crossed during the renunciation of my bitchy ways. I'll fork over the cash and cut down on the cursing but I make no guarantees about being nicer. God's going to need a good lawyer to make that taxi-cab confession stick. Translation: My blog will remain consistently nasty and shrill. I was serious about the macrame thing though. Potholders and doilies for everyone!

Another loophole in my contract with God is that it wasn't the speediest of cab rides. He had me sweating it out at some points. For example, I could have really used some divine intervention during one particularly brutal traffic snarl in Times Square.

Admittedly, I didn't ask my driver to step on it nor did I inform him of my sickly state because if there's one thing cabbies fear more than, say, a passenger with a loaded gun, it's a passenger on the brink of a good barf. I know this because I and my touchy gag reflex have been shooed out of cabs by drivers who don't want to deal with the possible "present" I'd leave on the seat, floor and, on days when my aim ain't all that good, the window.

So, in the interest of securing and keeping a cab, my driver was not made aware of what evil was lurking in my belly. If anything, he must have thought I was having contractions because anytime a pukey feeling hit, I busted out some Lamaze breathing. Not that I've ever gone to Lamaze classes, mind you, but I have watched enough sitcoms to know the whole "Hee hee! Hoo hoo! Hee hee!" routine. Alas, I did not have the other staples of all sitcom pregnancy plots at my disposal -- boiling water and clean white sheets -- to complete the scene.

Question: Why did the sheets always need to be white? Clean, yes, I get that. But why did the color matter? Would the baby not come out if patterned bedding was waiting on the other end? Did the thread count matter? Hmm... This might be something I need to explore in the next installment of The Alan Alda Sensitivity Project.

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm off to test the limits of my tummy with some tea and toast. Wish me luck.

ooh, ooh that smell

In case you haven't heard, New York City smelled like a big ol' fart this morning.

I will now pause for those of you who feel the need to make the obvious "How is today different from any other day?" joke...

Got that out of your system? Feel better now? Good, let's move on.

I know a lot of people were all concerned and inconvenienced by the mysterious stank but it kind of worked out well for me. I got to work from home! And have my cab ride to Brooklyn expensed! And I was able to put on elastic-waist pants and devour two Snickers Nutcrackers (mmm... 50% off all Christmas candy at Rite Aid) without any skinny bitches casting me disapproving glances!

Um, perhaps I've said too much...

Today's events also provided some amusement for people such as myself who enjoy the occasional bit of fart, poop and let's-blame-it-on-Jersey humor. I've been giggling all day long. For example, while watching NY-1's coverage, I actually heard our illustrious mayor utter the phrase "until this gas passes." I even rewound my DVR to make sure I wasn't imagining it. I wasn't! Even worse, he was reading from a prepared statement!

Uh, did anyone proofread that for you, Mike?

a rebuttal

According to a recent study 90% of women wash their hands after using the bathroom whereas only one in four men do. Over the past day or two, I've seen this study cited in numerous publications and newscasts and the headline is always the same: "Women are cleaner than men!"

Um, no they're not. Clearly they did not include corporate women in this study. Now I'm no fancy researcher or anything but I am a keen observer of people and I can say without hesitation that a lot of "professional" women are filthy bitches sorely lacking in basic manners and social skills.

The biggest offender of all was a former manager of mine. Not once did this woman wash her hands in my presence. In fact, on one occasion I saw her emerge from a bathroom stall EATING A PIECE OF PIZZA. I stared at her in disbelief but she was unfazed and just smiled, waved at me and kept on walking. No shame. No embarrassment. No soap and water. My coworker also saw her leaving the can with a half-eaten sandwich. Now, I admire those who can multi-task but there has to be a limit, you know?

Actually, there were several people at that job who had issues. Those of us who did wash our hands and you know, not eat lunch in the john, were forced to form a support network. We tipped each other off to the bad bathroom habits of our coworkers. We disseminated the information and maintained a stash of alcohol wipes and hand sanitizers in the event that we couldn't avoid direct contact with the guilty party or something he or she touched.

Those of us in-the-know abstained from eating the fruit salad at the holiday potluck when we discovered that a person guilty of the pee-and-run prepared it. It was all very, "Don't drink the milk! It's spoiled!" (Little Rascals, anyone? Anyone?)

Furthermore, Instant Messenger windows flared open on multiple desktops whenever a social taboo was spotted (i.e. "Don't touch the Fast Company in the common area. I just saw so-and-so come out of the bathroom with it!")

But gross bathroom behavior is not limited to hand washing and the defiling of shared periodicals. Far from it. I've worked in several different office buildings in my career and there's always one common element -- bombed-out stalls. Oh, and bad coffee too.

I've witnessed the same piss on the seats, clogged plumbing courtesy of tampons/pads, and the ubiquitous ring around the toilet comprised of half-dry, half-soggy toilet paper. I'm assuming these piles form when so-called "careful" bathroom users line the seat with TP before parking their asses on it. The result: Some of the paper "catches" after flushing and goes to its rightful destination. The rest either lingers on the seat or falls to the floor. While the culprits are trying to be all sanitary, all they're really doing is leaving a gross, disgusting mess for the next person. Since obviously it's their biggest fear, I cannot help but wish hemorrhoids on these people.

The pattern of piss on the toilet seats really blows my mind. Sometimes, it looks like the urine was deliberately and maliciously applied. The distribution is all scattered, swirling and angry-looking with pooling in certain areas. It looks like a fucking Pollock painting or something. For most of us, it's a toilet seat. For others, it's a blank canvas apparently.

If it's a light sprinkling concentrated in one area, that clearly means that the stream of pee became a tad unruly while the pisser was hovering over the bowl (as I do). An errant sprinkle of tinkle happens to us all. However, when normal people spot the misdirected flow, they reposition themselves accordingly. If not for the sake of the person who has to mop up at night, we do it for the sake of hygiene. Pee bounces, yo. Both porcelain and plastic are reflective surfaces and if you pee on them, they'll pee right back.

I could further belabor my point with examples of smells and people forgetting to courtesy flush (or just flush period) but it's all been said many times, many ways. In fact, I'll wrap this up right now with links to some suggested related reading:

:: The Sarcastic Journalist: If You Sprinkle When You Tinkle...
:: PoopyJoe.com: The Work Poop
:: PoopReport.com: Splatter Stopper
:: The Random Muse: Potty Politeness

Enjoy!

weirdo

I don't normally do the meme thang primarily because I just don't like that word. Meme. Not sure why but it bugs me. But I'll put aside my distaste because I found a rather fun one over at Sheila's. The task: Write down five of your own personal idiosyncrasies.

The hardest part of this was narrowing down my enormous list to just five. You see, I diligently foster and nurture my quirks much in the way others would dote on a ficus. Unlike the plants in my care, my hang-ups are lush and thriving. Case in point...

1. I despise the brown crunchy things in between layers of ice cream cake. I kinda don't care for ice cream cake all that much either. Well, if I'm being honest, ice cream in general doesn't really excite me... unless I'm in a bad mood. If that's the case, ice cream is the perfect remedy because you simply cannot lick an ice cream cone with a scowl on your face. Try it. You can't.

2. I have severe poop issues. Unless it's a DIRE emergency, I cannot poop at work or any place other than home. It's part of the reason I live alone. I found it to be very stressful when I had a roommate. I tried to time my poops after she went to bed or right before I went into the shower. Believe it or not, it worked about 90% of the time but there were a few occasions where I had to answer the call regardless of the roomie's whereabouts. It killed me to do it but I had no choice.

I think it's because I associate so much shame with my pooping that I also find poop and fart jokes riotously funny. I'm 31 years old yet I laugh like a 10-year-old boy at the first mention of poop. And I don't foresee me outgrowing this any time soon.

3. I'm a sucker for the one clap-two clap beat in a song. Even if I hate the song, I have to stop what I'm doing and clap once/clap twice/clap once in time with the music. It just has to be done.

4. My outer wardrobe is comprised of mostly dark solid colors -- brown, black, navy, maroon, that sort of thing. Despite my seemingly staid preferences, I have a rather outrageous underwear collection. The louder the colors and patterns the better. I haven't met a striped, polka-dotted, zig-zagged or leopard pattern I haven't liked. Cartoon characters are equally represented among my undies, namely Supergirl, Hello Kitty and Mickey Mouse.

5. Bumpy textures and folds FREAK me the fuck out. I'm positively horrified by close-ups of pock marks, cavities, crevices, fibers, etc. When I hear the term "nooks and crannies," I flinch. Stucco will never see the light of day in my home. Same goes for popcorn ceilings. Well, that's also because they're butt ugly. Furthermore, don't come near me with a cross-section of something unless your aim is to make me gag.

I once had a dream that my stomach looked like a moon crater and I tortured myself with the memory for months afterwards. I think I'm finally over the disgust. Actually, nope. Not true. If you'll excuse me, I need to go find me some ginger ale.

holy shit

I knew elephants were smart and very easily trained but I have to say, this photo nearly made me choke on my morning coffee:

Courtesy of The Star Online

Apparently, handlers are now potty training these creatures so that tourists don't have to look at/step around steaming piles of elephant pooh in the street.

Yup, it's official -- "Elephant on the Can" has just replaced "Chimp Wearing a Diaper" as my favorite poop-related animal photo EVER.

dingleberries by definition

I was just looking through some pictures from my sister's wedding and I came across one of a childhood friend who lived in our old neighborhood. We'll call her Tilly to make things easier on both reader and author. So years ago when Tilly was best pals with my recently-betrothed sister, I often hung out with Tilly's younger brother (let's call him Arnold).

Arnold and I could almost always be found playing with Star Wars action figures and Matchbox cars. Lest you think I was a total tomboy lesbo in-the-making, I'll have you know that I was playing with Barbies on alternate days. And for the record, the dolls were always impeccably dressed and not one of them ever played golf or worked for a non-profit. Oh, and when I did play with Matchbox cars, I always selected a Le Car (mustard yellow with an open-and-close hatchback) or a ragtop red Lincoln Continental. Make of that what you will, armchair psychologists.

ANYhoo, the mother of these neighbors was a stay-at-home mom who often passed the time with various crafty projects. One day we entered their backyard to find signs hung on the privacy fence around the pool. Because many neighborhood kids used to swim there and because she had the time to do it, the mother made her own signs similar to "Welcome to our ool. Notice there's no P in it. Let's keep it that way." Her homemade signs were neatly printed in blue ink on beveled wooden boards and were suspended from the fence by blue-and-white waxy clothesline rope. A few of her ground rules:

:: No running

:: No P'ing (I remember she made the "P" really big and thick)

:: Please don't pee in our pool. We don't swim in your toilet. (She obviously felt strongly about this)

:: No diving

:: No dingleberries

On the latter sign, the neighbor's mother drew three little circles in a triangular formation right next to the lettering. I remember questioning the meaning of the word dingleberry and was told by Arnold that it was another word for fart. So I gave the sign a closer look and surmised that the three little circles represented tell-tale air bubbles. I was on board with the whole no diving thing but I didn't think that farting in a pool warranted a whole rule devoted to it. It's not like it tore the lining, clogged the filter or caused permanent paralysis or anything like that. I felt it to be frivolous. Regardless, I was delighted with the new word I had learned and called everyone a dingleberry for months afterward.

Fast forward several years later to me in a car listening to The Howard Stern Show. As frequent listeners know, Howard often regales the audience with tales of his battles with post-pooping clean-up. In short, the man is the King of All Skidmarks. So in the course of the broadcast, the term dingleberry came up often and not in the context to which I was accustomed. I became confused and voiced my befuddlement to a friend. Luckily, she was able to fill me in on its actual meaning. Imagine my surprise in a later conversation when my 70-year-old uncle used the term properly. Well, he called it a "dangleberry" truth be told but at least he knew that it was a wee ball of poop in question and not a toot, if you will. Don't even ask why this was being discussed.

It then occurred to me that the put-down I used for years was a far more wicked and diabolical insult than I had realized. The looks of shock and hurt it registered now made much more sense. Some of those kids really deserved to be called a piece of shit dangling from one's ass. But not all of them did. In that moment, I felt victorious and remorseful in one fell swoop.

Now here's where it gets slightly Telephone Game-like -- was the neighbor's mother mistaken when she made the sign or did her son interpret it wrong? Because of Arnold, I taught other kids that dingleberry=fart. A wealth of misinformation sprung from that boy. But that's not to say that his mother was in the wrong. Maybe she knew the real meaning and those three little balls she drew didn't signify air bubbles at all. Perhaps she grew tired of skimming mini turds out of the pool and decided to lay down the law. What I do know is that between this incident and his insistence that we watch the likes of No Retreat, No Surrender and Raw Deal, Arnold gave me many a bum steer during our friendship. Bum. Hee hee hee.

the snowsuit

Frank was this really cool older guy from Jersey City who often hung around in my neighborhood. His girlfriend Donna lived around the corner from me and everyone in the neighborhood thought they were just the most awesome couple ever. She had mountains of teased curly hair on her head, caked-on makeup, fuck-me pumps and a fire-engine red Trans Am. I wanted to be Donna. All the younger kids often sat on Donna's front stoop and talked to her and Frank while we nursed our sexual and non-sexual crushes alike. My younger sister and I hung on Frank's every word. One day he told us a joke that we thought was the funniest thing ever. "Hey girls, how do you spell diarrhea?" We attempted to spell it and he stopped us and said, "No. It's D-I-dash-two-farts-and-a-splash!" I didn't think I'd ever stop laughing. I nearly gave myself a case of "the cha" from all that abdominal heaving.

The next day I went shopping with my younger sister, my cousin, my aunt and my mother. For some reason, the younger sister and I thought it would be cool to have full-length snowsuits. Yes, you read that right. I was about 11 and she was 9. I had no business wearing a snowsuit at that age. Yet, I wanted one. The cousin was seriously into hunting so he came along with my aunt to stock up on layered clothing at the factory outlet. I picked out a red snowsuit and the younger sister got an identical one in blue. There was a diamond-shaped patch on the left shoulder with an embroidered skier on it. I felt like Suzy Chapstick with my new ensemble. We were pleased with our purchases and left.

I don't remember why but my mother and aunt had to go back into the store. We were left alone in the car with the cousin who, I might add, could be a real prick when he wanted to be. But he was older and the younger sister and I were always in a bid to make our older siblings and cousins think we were cool. So the sister said to him, "Hey, do you know how to spell diarrhea?" I didn't want to be left out so I joined in and we squealed and laughed our way through the punchline. We saw the aunt and the mother approaching and quickly squelched the raucous giggling and swore the cousin to secrecy since our mother did not like that kind of talk. In our family, getting caught telling a joke with the word "fart" in it was just as damning as getting caught snorting a pound of coke. In my mother's eyes, the two crimes were equal in severity.

The car doors opened and the aunt and the mother immediately asked us what we were up to. The younger sister and I were as thick as thieves and were used to forming a united front. "Nothing!" we chimed in unison. I looked over towards the cousin and saw the evil glimmer in his eye. I knew we were doomed. He said through a wicked grin, "Guess what joke I just learned?" My sister and I looked panic-stricken. We begged and pleaded with our eyes for him to shut up. But with much pleasure and gusto, he repeated word-for-word our new favorite joke. My mother was incensed because not only were her two wee girls dealing in crude jokes, but she was made to look bad in front of her gossipy sister-in-law. She said, "I have a good mind to march you back into that store and return those snowsuits!" NOOOOOOOOOOOOO! We protested, apologized and groveled profusely and the mother soon relented. We did get a severe talking to when we got home though but the snowsuits were at least safe.

A few weeks later we had a significant snowfall. The younger sister and I were thrilled to put on our snowsuits and go out and play without getting all cold and soggy. We weren't out the door 10 minutes before someone made fun of our outfits. I wanted no part of mine anymore. After lunch I tried going out with my old jacket and pants but my mother ordered me back inside to put the snowsuit on. The younger sister was equally pissed to be wearing such an obvious target for ridicule. What were we thinking when we asked for these?!?! At least that time when we convinced the mother in the supermarket that we liked Kix, we were able pawn off the cereal on the two older sisters when we realized that it wasn't all sweet and sugary. Otherwise, what's the point of eating it? But we were stuck in this case. A snowsuit is not edible. We not only hounded our mother to buy these things but we even rescued them when they were nearly taken from us!!!

I don't know if there were two more miserable-looking kids out there on the snow piles. I had to wear it a few more times before I outgrew it but I did try repeatedly to ditch it. But the mother wouldn't allow it. It didn't occur to me then but the younger sister and I should have just banded together and said, "Hey ma! How do you spell diarrhea?"

no gas shortage here

So I replied to a woman through Craigslist this past week and she immediately wrote back and gave me her phone number. Truthfully, the immediacy of her response and the request to be called right away set off some alarms in my head but I ignored them. I proceeded because I haven't had much dating success lately and I'm making a concerted effort to be less of a fussy pants. So I called and left her a message. I didn't hear from her for a day or two and actually, I was glad. I received her picture after I called her and well, she's just not my type. She dresses like a suburban mom. I'm no fashion plate but even on my worst day, I could never be confused with someone who shot out three kids and regularly attends PTA meetings.

When I hadn't heard back from her, I thought I dodged a bullet. However, I returned home last night to find a message from her on the machine. D'oh! She rambled on for a good 10 minutes and left several phone numbers and spelled out her email address to ensure that I'd call or write back. Halfway through her blather, her voice sounded rather muffled. I thought it was the machine or a bad connection but then she said, "Excuuuuuuuuuse me! I just burped. Well, actually, burped is the polite word. Belched is more like it!" Um, is she TRYING to make me hate her?!?! If I'm in a love with a woman, she can fart and belch up a storm and I'll think it's charming. If a woman does that during the getting-to-know-you stage, she's finished. I was beyond grossed out.

A few years ago a woman contacted me through an online dating site. We emailed back and forth a bit and decided a phone call was in order. She sent me a picture on the day we had scheduled our chat. She was wearing a baseball cap and Tevas. I believe both should be worn for function, not fashion. If you're not on a beach or near a marina, take them sandals off before I strangle you with the Velcro straps. She was already at a disadvantage but I went through with the phone call anyway. The conversation was as dry as toast. Boooooring. Also, I don't know if she had recently consumed soda or what but she did quite a few of those barely audible burp-and-blows. I was horrified. "So I live on ::burp-whew!:: Long Island ::burp-whew!:: and I ::burp-whew!:: like to ::burp-whew!:: go the movies ::burp-whew!:: and watch ::burp-whew!:: Ally McBeal. What ::burp-whew!:: about ::burp-whew!:: you?" That girl is lucky the answer wasn't a dial tone.

I didn't think I'd have to say this, but to all potential suitors, if you're feeling a touch gassy, kindly press the mute button. If one does sneak out, as in the most recent case, just keep talking and don't even acknowledge it. I know I said I wanted to stop being so particular, but courtesy -- and an appropriate level of shame -- will forever remain mandatory.

the first in a long line of niece stories

I've got a 4-year-old niece. Even though she's the light of my life and the reason behind many a smile on my face, I will readily admit that the girl is a punk. She's quite cheeky and very spoiled. But she's also got almond-shaped green eyes, long eyelashes, strawberry blonde hair and an outrageous set of dimples. That little girl can infuriate me one moment and then completely melt me the next.

She sits on my lap facing me and tries to make sense of the curls sprouting from my scalp. She likes to pull on the corkscrew ones and say, "Boing!" when they spring back into shape. This cracks her up. Sometimes she messes around with my hair so much that she pulls the curl right out. This disappoints her and she asks me to make it curly again as if I can just wiggle my nose or snap my fingers to make it happen. She doesn't understand that I'd have to wash it, apply product, let it dry a bit, add more product, let it dry some more and then crunch some more product into it to get the spiraling effect. Passage of time and procedures make no sense to her.

The girl has quite a reputation for saying some howlingly funny things. We could tell from the smile that snuck across her infant face any time she peed in her diaper that she was going to be a character. Months later when she was of Zweiback-eating age, she was being videotaped by my oldest sister (the mother) as she munched on a cookie. Proud of her snack, she mashed it into a clenched fist and held it up to the camera. Thanks to slippery fingers and sheer physics, one finger popped out. Guess which one? There is actual footage of my niece flipping off my sister at a very early age. It's priceless.

The niece tends to pick up a phrase or a word and then, like most children, will run it into the ground. My younger sister (not the mother) often forgets about this and will inadvertently introduce slang or other inappropriate sayings into this child's vocabulary. I believe the younger sister playfully patted the niece's diapered bum a few years ago and said, "Look at this big booty."

It was on. The niece used it incessantly after that. She would even hunch over and wiggle her backside while singing, "Shake your booty! Shake your booty! Shake your booty!" It seemed harmless enough at first but she almost tripped a waitress in a restaurant when she sprang from her seat and began her floor show. Our fellow diners looked on with reactions ranging from amusement to concern to horror. Now that I think about it, that waitress got served. Ha ha ha.

On another occasion, the younger sister and my father were having a conversation in the dining room. The niece wanted attention so she began talking over them at full volume. The younger sister said to the niece, "We're going to get you a muzzle!" The niece then turned to my father and said, "Pop Pop, you need a muzzle!" There was laughter and prodding to go into the kitchen to tell Granny what Pop Pop needed. So the niece set forth to deliver this news to my mother. Everyone waited to hear the bit about the muzzle. The niece blurted out, "Pop Pop needs booty!" Oh dear. I don't even think my mother understood the context of it. She just thought my niece was being scatological once again. I laughed hysterically when I first heard the story and then I quickly sobered up and said, "Hey, how does Dad know what that means?" That was a bit disturbing. After some thought, we decided that he secretly watches MTV and other youth-oriented programming but quickly changes the channel when someone enters the room.

The niece is now hung up on poop -- as a noun, verb, adjective, you name it. Recently she went a bit retro and trotted out her old act. She was watching one of her videos and was perplexed at the mention of DNA. She asked her mother about its meaning. My sister punted the question to the younger sister who is in the medical field. The younger sister fielded it and began a kid-friendly explanation of DNA. She told the niece that it was the stuff inside of her that made her different from everyone else. It made her HER and all that jazz. The niece absorbed this information and said, "Oh, it's what makes your booty smell?"

Can I just say that it's really hard to discourage poopie talk when the lecture is delivered through stifled laughter, smirking and a shit-eating grin (pun intended)?!?! Fortunately I didn't have to handle that little episode. When it's my turn to be the disciplinarian, I try to do the right thing with my niece but it's hard. Is it wrong that I'm a little bit proud of her burgeoning inappropriate sense of humor?

the accused

Today for lunch I bought a nice, steaming large cup of cream of broccoli soup from Hale & Hearty. I heart H&H. I keep them in business. But the aroma of today's selection was quite pungent. I was transporting the soup back to my office and the smell immediately filled the confined space of the elevator in the short trip from the lobby to the 4th floor.

In other words, the elevator was a moving Dutch oven, so to speak.

A woman on the elevator looked at me disapprovingly because, I'm guessing, she thought the smell was coming from my nether regions as opposed to the bag I was holding.

What do you say? "I realize it smells like a fart in here but that was so NOT me. It's the broccoli, ma'am, the broccoli."

Had I been feeling a bit mischievous, I may very well have gotten into the whole "Whoever smelt it dealt it" debate but then again, she could have countered with, "Whoever denied it supplied it" and then where would I be? "Oh yeah, well whoever... um... uh... JUST SHUT UP!"

False accusations of farting are following me today. I just went to the ladies room to do my afternoon tinkle and as I was crouching, my sandal-clad foot slid forward on the tile.

These tiles are those small, slightly raised cubes with really grungy grout in between them. The bathroom is ancient and its acoustics lend for some unfortunate echoing. Luckily for me, I can't poop at work. I physically cannot do it. I rarely do it outside of my home. It's a hang up I have but not a bad one, I might add.

Other people's digestive schedules dictate that they visit the can during work hours and I feel sorry for them. I can feel the tension in the air when they're already mid-poop and others enter the bathroom. I know they're hoping we'll just hurry up and get the hell out so they can finish in peace and solitude. I respect that and try to accommodate them.

But my point is, any noises and sound effects that blare from my stall are fake. Like today's experience -- as I was saying, my sandal scooted forward on the tile making a rather unfortunate, flatulent noise. I was mortified. I wanted to yell, "It was my shoe!"

I even tried making the noise deliberately several more times in the hopes that my coworkers would realize that the noise was not man-made. There was a pooper several stalls down so she was probably relieved that someone deflected the attention from her drop off. I feel like I did her a favor or something. My good deed for the day is done.

somewhat instant karma

Perhaps I shouldn't have taken such pleasure in Cyndi Lauper getting nailed by a pigeon. I was basking in the sun at a barbecue today when all of a sudden... SPLAT! A bird zeroed in on me and dropped a bomb right on my hand. Thanks to the ricochet effect, my cute capri pants suffered secondary wounds. I wanted to choke the little fucker. It's not as awful as the deposit in Lauper's open mouth but it's still pretty heinous. I've dodged bird poop for 30 years with nary a near miss but mere days after publicly ridiculing another's misfortune, I was hit with a karmic boomerang. I could have done without the bird crap but it's still kinda neat that Fate actually reads my blog.

change of subject

I'm not easily scared nor an alarmist but watching the news tonight made my blood run cold. I don't get all hysterical when a new color-coded terror warning is issued or a diabolical plot revealed but I've completely reached my saturation point. So it was with great pleasure -- and equal amounts of disgust -- that I read the following tidbit in today's Rush & Molloy column in the NY Daily News. It was a somewhat welcome distraction. Um, enjoy!

Cyndi's airborne critic
Somewhere over Massachusetts is a sparrow who apparently doesn't care for '80s rock.

Cyndi Lauper was reaching for a high note during her opening number at Saturday's KISS-108-sponsored concert in Mansfield, Mass., when from the sky came a white glob of bird poop.

The fecal critique landed in her open mouth.

Showing more aplomb than Tippi Hedren ever displayed in "The Birds," the Brooklyn-born rocker wiped her tongue on her sleeve and kept rockin'.

The 50-year-old singer did kvetch backstage that a bird once plopped on her head while she was on stage.

"My grandmother says it's good luck, but I think it's disgusting," she moaned.

Maybe birds just want to have fun.

Say it with me now.... EWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW!!!