Travel

i needed some johnlock lovin’

OK. So.

I’ve been reading some pretty NSFW fan fic during my lunch breaks. (Oh my phone! I’m not completely moronic.) And this one piece, is… WOW! I can’t go into a lot of detail because then you’ll really lock me away in the funny farm, but anything that involves Sherlock falling off a coffee table multiple times (before deducing that if he can’t see the coffee table, he can’t fall off of it), and a thousand mentions of hedgehogs, will make me snicker.

I laughed so hard, I choked on my lunch. I laughed so hard I cried. I laughed so hard my boss had to come on and check on me.

I had no idea what to tell him. I mean, I’m not at the point where I could say to him, “Hey! I’m reading this ridiculously dirty piece of Sherlock BBC fan fiction and Sherlock keeps falling off the coffee table while trying to get buggered by John.” (And that’s the BARELY safe for work version.)

——

My car wasn’t nearly as bad as it could have been. Apparently, a loose gas cap was the cause of the check engine light. The sad thing is, we tested that theory about six times. Both of us. I’m not sure what the probability of both J and I leaving the gas cap too lose is, but we both loosened and tightened the damn thing.

Oh well. They fixed the weird idling issue, gave me new brakes… and I am ready to go to Weedstock tomorrow night!

It’s been too long since I’ve seen Black Mountain Symphony and if I had to, I’d fucking walk there this weekend.

——

I came home to five Cabin Pressure themed t-shirts (because the hubby of wonder is wonderful), and… THIS!

 

I have been not able to use words of more than one sound since I saw this the first time.

Oh. My. God. Mind. Blown. Feels. Explode. Can’t. Wait. Bee Cee’s Face! So. Cute. John’s. Face. Hair. Bad.

——

In other news… the hotel I work in was home to a meth lab. Some guy came in last year, rented some rooms and set up a one pot lab. Blew shit up, too. They’ve caught him and I guess he’s going to court or whatever, but MY HOTEL WAS HOME TO A METH LAB. How fucking cool is that?

What? You can’t tell me anything that cool has happened in your offices.

i love the bbc for bringing matt smith into my life

The BBC gets it…

They’re simulcasting the 50th Anniversary episode of Doctor Who. They’re doing it because they don’t want to deal with spoilers and other social media nightmares.

It was bad enough a few days ago when there was a huge uproar about there being a specific Comic-Con only airing of a DW 50th trailer. I know that shit happens - that’s the entire point of Comic-Con - but I was still cranky about all the stories coming out from San Diego whether it was about Supernatural, Sherlock or Doctor Who. I suppose it’s only human nature. We don’t like to be excluded from things that mean a lot to us.

——

Last night traffic was terrible coming home from work. It was due to mostly tourists, but then there was an accident at possibly the worst place ever to have one - right at the end of a bridge.

I wanted to lose my temper so badly when I realized that some asshole tourist (Quebec plate was a dead giveaway… we get a lot of them around here.) was the cause of it.

And then I remembered…

A few years ago, there was some really bad weather (I think snow, but I can’t remember) which made it almost impossible to drive, I had a completely shitty day at work and all I wanted to do was get home. There was a huge traffic jam and we sat, and sat, and sat, and sat, and sat, and sat. Stop and go, in a stick, is barely tolerable, but this was worse. Much worse.

I completely lost my shit and, in a moment of complete frustration, yelled something along the lines of “I hope the fucker who caused this accident died.”

No. I am not proud of that at all.

Not. One. Bit.

Because they did.

Three times a week, on my way home from my workout, I pass their roadside memorial.

It’s a pine tree, and it’s always decorated.

Last week, or the week before, it was their birthday. 

I bring this up only because there were a bunch of us with our windows down while we sat, and sat, and sat, and sat, and sat.

I played “Yellow Car”, sang along to some of my favorite songs (my poor iPod’s fast forward function will never forgive me), and generally cracked myself up. It didn’t go unnoticed by a passenger in the car next to me and they said something snarky about it.

I decided to ignore it and turned my radio up louder.

I can’t get angry about idiots causing accidents any more, if only because I’m afraid of the end results.

I learned my lesson. The hard way.

I just hope others don’t have to.

see? moffat! (i think sue won the interwebs with that tweet…)

I hate when I get like this… it’s anger flavored mania. It doesn’t happen often, but when it does?

Look. The. Fuck. Out.

I had to go out today, against my better judgement. Of course, “ya cahn’t get theyah frum heeah” is never more true than in the summer. (I think I just slaughtered my grandmother’s Maine accent…)

I had to go to Rite Aid and pick up a prescription and some other stuff. While I’m waiting in line to pay, the woman in front of me is buying almost $200 worth of shit. AT A RITE AID. (It’s a pharmacy/convenience store… they’re not made for huge grocery purchases, you know?)

It’s obvious she’s a tourist. Everything about her screams it. Everything.

So she finally pays and leaves the store. The cashier looks at me and apologizes. Because, of course, they’re short-staffed today. Why not?

I couldn’t help myself and with my snark on full-blast, I said “It’s the price we pay for living here. All we do is wait for tourists to get out of our way on 95, Route 1 or the local Rite-Aid.”

The guy behind me choked back a laugh and the woman behind him (I think) said, “Amen!”

I know, I know…

I CHOSE to live here, but when there’s really only two ways to get from point A to point B and they’re full of moron tourists, it gets really hard for me to keep my shit together.

Then again, moments like watching the douchebag from Nova Scotia bottom out in a parking lot and break his trailer hitch almost made it worth being cut off by him…

how is it possible for him to be so perfect?

OK.

So.

Remember those notes I took at the Matt Nathanson concert?

Particularly the note that said “look back at life, regret punches you in the face”?

I figured it out.

Took me forfuckingever, though.

I put the note right after the song title “Sky High Honey”, but since it was off of his new album, I didn’t have access to the song right away.

After listening to the song a few times, I heard these lines and…

LIGHTBULB!

I bet you’re laughing at some joke he told you. With his arm around your sunburnt shoulders. I spent the morning with my face against the window seat Looking down at all the things that got the best of me…

You know those moments when you look back at your life and regret punches you in the face? Yep.

I try not to regret the majority of things I’ve done/will do. Regret doesn’t do anything but make you feel like shit. It’s done. It’s over. Move on.

That said, I do regret a few things. But they’re important and I don’t want to delete them.

I regret not getting to know the woman my father loved so much.

I regret not going home when he was in the hospital - even though I was forbidden to. (You didn’t want to fuck with my father when he pulled rank. Remember when I talked about the games of “You Lose”?)

That’s it.

Mostly.

At least, it’s all I’m going to admit to right now…

Anyhoo, to get back on track:

I was doing OK until I heard… You wait too long, you never leave

That line, though? That fucking line?

Absolutely killed me. (Kicked me right in the feels, for you tumblr folk.)

If you don’t know why go spend some time in the archives.

I made a very conscious decision not to look for work at international companies unless the position was perfect. It wasn’t worth suffering at a shitty job hoping to hell they’d sponsor me to move overseas… and of course, because I inherited the Nelson Black Cloud of Doom (trademark pending), the companies I would have killed to work for passed me over because of…

wait for it…

THE COMMUTE INTO BOSTON.

Well, fuck you, too.

(Why do you think I got so pissy every. single. time. it came up in an interview?)

I don’t quite regret the decision to apply for jobs at local companies. It’s better knowing I don’t have a chance in hell to get sponsored by my employer instead of killing time only to find out it will never happen.

Is it stupid logic?

Probably.

All it means in the long run is that the move to London just became that much more difficult logistically.

Financially, we’re getting (back) to a position where we might be able to cross the pond more often than not. If I stay at the hotel chain, I get a really good rate at any brand under their corporate umbrella, even the international properties. Of course, worst case scenario, I have friends who would probably be more than willing to let us crash at their house if need be for a week. (This constant vacationing in the UK assumes that we don’t want to go anywhere else. Germany’s been brought up and tabled in favor of another trip to London. A few times.)

More importantly, if we can figure out how to do it, there’s always the option to use the 6 month visitor visa.

Consistently.

Why not pack up and move every six months or so? Snowbirds do it. Why can’t we?

——

Unrelated. Kinda.

I’m the end of a Hitchcock movie: A little dark and a lot confusing. I’m the last of the worst pretenders. So lost, so lost…

(Since I’m listening to Matt and this song came on, I figured why the hell not? “Mission Bells” is my favorite song. This week.)

matt nathanson :: ll bean, freeport, me :: 07.04.2013

OK… let me preface this by saying HOLY. MOTHER. OF. FUCK.

L.L. Bean does free concerts over the summer and they’ve had some pretty big names. This year, I was clued into the fact that Matt Nathanson was playing there on the 4th. I’m not a die hard fan, but I have a few of his albums and I really like them. They’re good background music because they’re kind of slow and chill. But, yeah, nothing I’m going to know 100%, as opposed to, I don’t know, like R.E.M. (I will always think of that guy in Cleveland who was so impressed that I knew every single song R.E.M. performed that night.)

Not only is Matt an incredible musician, he’s pretty hilarious in between songs. (I took notes! I don’t know why, but I’m mostly glad I did. You’ll see why I say ‘mostly’.)

Before he sang “Run”, he pointed out that it’s normally sung as a duet and that it’s about “an aggressive game of scrabble - the kind where you lock yourself in a hotel room and don’t come out for three days.” However, when he sings it by himself, it’s more like playing solitaire. (I think the family friendly version was a bazillionty million times better than what he could have said!) I will never be able to look at a game of Scrabble the same way again.

I was trying to use the notes app on my iPhone to keep track of the set list and make some notes. I was more successful with some notes than others. I *think* one note is supposed to say “look back at life, regret punches you in the face”... but I have no idea what that means, or what the point of it was. It must have seemed really deep at that particular moment.

While talking about “Room @ the End of the World”, he said that L.L. Bean was definitely where you wanted to be for the zombie apocalypse. He’s not wrong.

Another WTF note: “jello underpants”.

note to self: CONTEXT!

——

It was also an amazing day because after 10+ years of “knowing” her online, I finally got to meet E in person.

It’s so weird to see someone in person for the first time and fall into conversation easily because you’ve followed their life over the years, and vice versa.

I don’t think that feeling will ever get old.

Dog bless teh interwebs. Srsly.

——

Sound check:
Faster
Car Crash
Under Pressure
Wedding Dress
To the Beat of Our Noisy Hearts

Setlist:
Mission Bells
Mercy
To the Beat of Our Noisy Hearts
Modern Love
Run
Laid
Still
Detroit Waves (featuring The Doors’ “Break on Through”, Rolling Stones’ “Paint It Black”, and “Amazing Grace”)
Sky High Honey
Room @ the End of the World (featuring Whitney Houston’s “I Wanna Dance with Somebody”)
The Boxer (Simon and Garfunkle cover)
Car Crash (featuring U2’s “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For”)
Wedding Dress
Faster
Under Pressure (Queen/David Bowie cover)
Come On Get Higher