Showing posts with label rant. Show all posts
Showing posts with label rant. Show all posts

Sassie

Monday, November 15, 2010 - Posted by Amanda Bast
Sweet Sassafras (aka Sassie) is our family dog. She is a two year old, cute, black and furry miniature Schnauzer. She wears a little coat and is spoiled, but not ridiculously so (no, we do not own one of these). She is also way too smart for her own good. I am extremely skeptical of peoples claims to have genius dogs. However, there are some things this dog does that I wouldn't believe unless I saw them with my own eyes. Here is a list:

1. She opens the front shutters so she can look outside. If she were to bat at them, they would flip around and close again. She opens them halfway so she can keep an eye on the neighbourhood.

2. She likes riding on the Seadoo with my father (the only excuse for this behaviour I will make is that it occurred before the birth of his first grandchild. Now, there are no excuses) and wears a tiny life jacket (again, no excuses). One time, as she watched my dad drive away from the dock on the 'doo, she ran downstairs. We heard rustling, then she came back upstairs WITH HER LIFE JACKET.

3. She has a tendency to leave toys in various places in the house. The next day, if you ask her where she put her (insert name of toy here) she will run away and return ALWAYS WITH THE CORRECT TOY.

4. She does not like to cuddle. However, when my sister-in-law was pregnant, she would lie on her tummy. Not really a big deal, but this summer, before my dear sister announced her second pregnancy, Sassie parked herself on Heather's tummy all weekend yet refused to cuddle with anyone else.

5. Likewise, when I am sick, she will cuddle. When I had Swine flu, she hardly moved from my chest for the whole month I was housebound.

My parents love her. My siblings and niece love her. Most people that meet her love her. My love for her is very conditional, as is hers for me. Here is a list of things that make me want to throw her out the window:

1. She once ate an entire Kinder Surprise Egg that she stole from a table. She even unwrapped the tinfoil without destroying it. It was kind of impressive, but still.

2. She likes to chew paper products. I often come home to find little bits of shredded toilet paper or kleenex strewn all over the basement floor. She chewed the contact info off of a business card today. Only the contact info.

3. Every morning I come up the stairs and she growls at me and then attacks my feet. Every. Morning.

4. When I put my coat on, she attacks the sleeves.

5. When I sit down to put shoes on, she bites the laces.

6. When I am eating, she pokes me with her nose and makes me spill things.

7. Her bark makes my ears bleed.

8. She steals socks and/or underwear out of laundry baskets and leaves them in the middle of the front entrance way. Doesn't chew them, just leaves them there.

9. She sleeps on top of sofas and chairs like a cat. When she stands up, she is high enough to stick her stinky face right in mine.

10. After she gets a bath, she tears around like an idiot. This is actually funny, but also supremely annoying.

11. If you have a cup of anything, she will jump up on the couch and drink out of the cup. Coffee, tea, water, anything.

12. If my parents leave when she doesn't think they should leave, she howls and yelps and cries. For hours on end.

13. If she wants something I won't give her, she will stare. Just stand and stare. It's unsettling.

14. She will lick books when you try to read them.

15. Before she lays down anywhere, she needs to dig. You can't dig the sofa, dog!

16. She attacks the drying rack/mop/vacuum/ironing board (Please see here)

16. Watch this video at 6:00 am. Enough said.

Excuse me. I need to go throw the dog out the window feed the dog.

things that kind of suck, but not really, and some helpful solutions

Wednesday, October 22, 2008 - Posted by Amanda Bast
Problem: Starbucks ran out of soy milk
Why it kind of sucks: Milk makes you wheezy and irritable.
Solution: Buy a tea and complain loudly so they give you a free beverage coupon.

Problem: not being able to wear your clogs because they are getting repaired.
Why it kind of sucks: you are stuck wearing ugly running shoes. Clogs are much more stylish.
Solution: Socks and sandals (seriously, this is more stylish than my running shoes).

Problem: your prof wants to meet with you at Second Cup to discuss your paper topic.
Why it kind of sucks: Just plain awkward because it seems date-like.
Solution: sign up for a time in between migrating Sean and Quiet Craig, so the awkwardness of meeting the prof is outweighed by the awkwardness of encountering both of these two outside of a classroom setting.

Problem: you wear a new angora sweater to school
Why it kind of sucks: you discover that you are more or less allergic to angora and you are stuck wearing it for at least nine more hours. Also, it sheds it's pink fur all over your black backpack like nobody's business.
Solution: only wear sweater outdoors. As soon as you get inside a building, remove sweater and itch arms for the entire length of the class.
Comments

A full campground, or, why planning ahead is a good life choice

Friday, August 1, 2008 - Posted by Amanda Bast
Today is the start of the long weekend, our busiest weekend of the summer. We're always booked up right to the brim on this weekend, and since I've never worked in the office before this year, I haven't realized how nutty it gets.

Loads of people are checking in and out, and seasonals are in and out with all sorts of silly questions. I think if anyone unreasonable and grumpy decides to raise a fuss, they do it on days like today. Kids are in and out renting or returning equipment. Emails are pouring into our inbox (most of them extremely dirty junk mail) and the phone is ringing off the hook. It is LOUD in the office, and the phones are quiet, so you spend half of your time asking people to repeat what they just said. 95% of my phone calls today were people looking for campsites for this weekend. We have been booked solid for about two weeks now, so I feel like a parrot telling them to look elsewhere for accommodations.

This is what I don't understand. The long weekend happens the same time every year, it's no secret, so WHY must people leave it until the DAY BEFORE and then act surprised when you have nothing for them? It boggles my mind. There are real living people north of Waterloo, believe it or not, and they go camping! Also, if I tell you I don't have anything available, asking fifteen more times in the same phone call will not change anything. NO, we don't have any campsites, NO we don't have any cottages, and NO we don't have any camping cabins! Seriously, NO MEANS NO!!!! BAH!!!

Ahem.

I am very much looking forward to school.

you're such a flake

Monday, February 4, 2008 - Posted by Amanda Bast
Dear dude that controls the weather,

You have not been impressing me lately. On Wednesday, I didn't drive to school because you made it snow. I missed class, and now I think Leon may be upset with me for not handing in part of my assignment. That was your first attempt at ruining my plans.

Friday night things got even worse. The universities closed, and I got to stay home. Good, right? Nope. I don't have class Fridays. My day was no different. And then...THEN they canceled the much anticipated wrestling show because of your nasty tricks. We had matching t-shirts to wear to the show. T-SHIRTS. THAT MATCH. Thus being your second attempt to ruin plans.

By Saturday morning, I was really not impressed with you and your weather choices. So instead of getting angry with you, I decided to do something...unconventional. I went outside and played in the snow. Look, I even have pictures to prove it:Look how HAPPY I am out in the snow. I had FUN and I LAUGHED and I SMILED. You do not have the power to make me angry. Snow is now my ally. We are friends. And do you know what snow said to me? You're not going to believe this, but it's totally true. Snow told me that he's sick of you bossing him around so much, telling him when he has to fall and everything. Being snow is such an under appreciated job, and you're not making it any better. How would you like to lie on streets and cause accidents and get run over and shoveled and blew all about? That's what I thought.

On behalf of Professor Peppergrape (my new snow friend) and snow himself, I would like to say stop being so dang mean, and ease up on the snow for awhile. Maybe you should go pick on hail. Or frogs. They haven't fallen from the sky in awhile.

Sincerely,

Mandie
President, SACTS (Society Against Cruelty Towards Snow)

F-to-the-Rustration

Sunday, December 2, 2007 - Posted by Amanda Bast
My blog is going to develop abandonment issues. I'm sorry little blogger, I do love you, but I've just been busy with school and other things. Mainly my knitting.

Here comes a knitting rant. Do read on, it will be informative and hopefully entertaining.

I had about 2 or 3 inches done of my hat when I came to a horrifying realization that it was twisted. Since I have been knitting in the round, twistage is a problem. It doesn't untwist. I would have gotten to the end of my hat, and it would have been a huge twisted mess. The only solution was to undo everything (I would guess at least 5 or 6 hours of work) and to start over.

That is Frustration with a capital F (or "fustration" if your last name is Funk). I'm not one to swear, but I think I may have let a few four-letters slip when I realized all my work was pointless. It wouldn't have been so bad if it was full of holes and the tension was off, but the hat was pretty close to perfect...my tension was dyno-mite, and there was not a gap in sight.

Dawn, my knitting guru, did the heartbreaking deed and unravled all my work. She re-cast on my stiches, and completed the first round of knitting. Then we realized it was twisted again. Being the expert knitter that she is, she started the thing on double pointed needles (this process scares me...here is a picture. See? It's scary) to insure there was no twistage, and then transferred it back on my circulars. Dang, yo, it was a lot of unnecessary work.

But that being said, the hat is looking fabulous already. Twist free, and pretty awesome. I've got about an inch done, and I like the brim on this one better than I did on the last one. It's tinier, and doesn't have as big of a roll. Quite nice. Hopefully I can finish it before the winter is over.

things that don't make sense

Tuesday, October 30, 2007 - Posted by Amanda Bast
People who post pictures on Facebook of themselves making out with their significant others. No one wants to see that. Just the logistics of the actual process don't make sense to me. Isn't it awkward taking a picture of yourself with your eyes closed? How many times did you have to kiss and click to get a good picture?

Why does a can of peanuts need to say "may contain traces of nuts" and why does a coffee cup have to say "caution, contents are hot"? Are we really this dumb, people?

Brett Favre is a football player. His last name is pronounced FAR-ve, even though the 'r' clearly follows the 'v'. Should it not be FAV-re?

It is illegal in Mexico to have a flag displayed anywhere. The only flags allowed are governmental.

Fergie, why do you spell in your songs? This is not Reader Rabbit, no one cares.

Adults who have Kitchener Rangers memorabilia and wear/bring it to games. These are skinny young teenage boys who play games on Friday nights folks. They are not superstars.

Celebrities - what's the big fuss? I just don't get it. I really don't. Also girls who leave comments on celebrity blogs. I just don't understand this. At all.

People who dress differently in order to be an "individual". There is a huge group of you "individuals" and you look quite similar to me.

Internet lingo, especially "ur". If you insist on using this, at least add a space. When I see "ur" I think "eeer" in my head. This is silly. It does not take much longer to type "you are" or "you're" or "your".

Oh, that reminds me. We learned the difference between "their", "there" and "they're" in ELEMENTARY SCHOOL. It boggles my mind that UNIVERSITY STUDENTS still cannot distinguish between the three. I admit that I don't always have perfect grammar, but at least my writing is somewhat correct.

My dear people, I have to tell you that you did not "seen" me. You saw me, perhaps, or you may have seen me, but you definitely did not seen me. That is impossible.

Malt has gluten in it. Maltol and maltitol do not. Rice Krispies have malt in them.

This will probably be amusing, because I am tired and frustrated

Sunday, September 23, 2007 - Posted by Amanda Bast
I should be doing homework, but I need to get this out first. I went to a wedding this weekend, and I was prepared for amazing gluten-free wedding food. It had been pre-arranged, and the bride assured me that the kitchen knew, the servers knew, and I would be eating safely. I was excited.

Well, here we have the play-by-play:

Round one: bread
Clearly, I wasn't expecting to eat this. I went to the washroom while everyone enjoyed their gluten. The waitress* came and informed the table that they knew about my "glucose" allergy.
Mom: "The waitress is clueless."
*note: only one waitress is involved in the following anecdote

Round two: Italian Wedding Soup
Me to waitress: "Umm, this has noodles in it, I can't eat it."
Waitress: "Really? This is what they gave me."
Me: "Um, I can't eat it."
Waitress: "Let me talk to the sous-chef." She leaves with gluteny soup, then returns with the same soup, but it appears to have the noodle-things taken out of it. "Here."
Me: "This is the same soup. Are you sure?"
Waitress: "No, let me check." She leaves with second bowl of gluteny soup. The rest of my table eats the green soup and is nearly finished before she returns. "This is a curry soup, they weren't sure about the other one, but this one is okay, right? That's what they said. THey had the menu switched with the other kitchen and they didn't know about it." WHAT? That doesn't even make sense. She sets down a bright RED soup.
My brother: "FREAK! RED SOUP FREAK!" Thank you for the comic relief, Matt.
The soup was good and spicey. I figured I wouldn't eat all of it, because I didn't want to fill up on soup (dumb move, #1).

Round three: Ceasar Salad
I knew this was going to be an issue right away.
Mom: "Oh boy, this is going to be interesting."
Waitress sets down salad with croutons in it in front of me. CLEARLY I CAN'T EAT THE BITS OF CRUNCHY BREAD.
Me: "Ummm, I can't eat this. There are croutons in it."
Waitress: "Oh? Really? You can't? Do you have allergies?"
ARE YOU FREAKING SERIOUS????????
Me: "Ummmm yeeeeees I do. I can't eat the croutons."
Waitress: "I didn't know." Leaves with gluteny salad, returns with a bowl full of lovely looking greens, tomatoes and cucumber. Awesome.
Mom: "That looks good. What kind of dressing is on it?"
Me: "Ummmmm there isn't any." I start digging through the salad looking for something hidden, but all I found were some onions. I try eating it dry. GAGGING OCCURS. It looks good, but tastes like EARWAX. Everyone at the table notices. I look around the table looking for dressing alternatives. Rum and coke. No. Beer. No. Horseradish. HECK no. Water. No. Orange punch. BINGO. "Heather, can I have some of your punch?" I proceed to spoon punch onto my salad. People from the table next to ours look at me like I'm an alien. I keep myself from flipping them off. The salad is now bearable, but still leaves much to be desired. At least I ate some of it. I want my soup back.
Josh: "Be nice to the waitress, she's hot."
Heather/Matt/Me/Mom: "NO SHE IS NOT."

Round four: Beef somethingorother
Mom: "I wouldn't get my hopes up, if I were you."
Me: "Don't worry, they've been successfully squashed."
Waitress brings out the beef. It looks SO good. I sit and watch everyone eat their meal. She brings out a plate, with a bun, gravy and something else gluteny on it.
Me: "I can't eat that. I'm allergic to bread."
Waitress: "Ohhhh really? Ok, I'll go get that other one for the person with the allergy."
Me: "Wheat, I'm allergic to wheat."
Waitress: blank stare. She doesn't know what WHEAT is. She leaves with gluteny food, and returns with my food. A HUUUGE slab of beef. It's red. I am not even kidding you, there was blood on the plate. The vegetables underneath were good (praise the Lord) but oh gosh, the meat was plain and the same colour as my soup. Ohhh I wish I had my soup.
Everyone else: "Oh man, this food is amazing!"
Mom: (whisper) "Don't worry, I think it's gross."

Round five: mousse cake
Waitress: "Can you eat this? They told me to ask you if you can eat this."
Me: "It's cake?"
Waitress: "Yes."
Me: "I'm allergic to wheat."
Waitress: "Um, ok. So you can't eat this?"
Me: "No, cake has wheat in it."
Waitress: "So do you like, want like, fruit on a plate? Like, or what?"
(I am pissed off/wanting to cry/HUNGRY by this point.)
Me: "Sure." She leaves with gluteny cake and returns with fruit. Unripe, gross, hard fruit. I ate the strawberries. Dad and Mom had left, and returned to find dessert. It had nuts in it, and Dad is allergic. He tells the waitress.
Waitress: "oohh my gosh, I'm sooo sorry. Do you want like, fruit, or like pudding, or some other kind of cake or anything? I'm sure we have something without nuts. I'll go ask." She leaves with nutty cake and returns with mousse. CHOCOLATE GLUTEN FREE MOUSSE. I stare in disbelief.
Me: "where did you get that?" Dad shrugs. I want to cry. She is gone before I can say anything. Dad eats his mousse. I get a spoonful. I am eating hard canteloupe. Cute and probably COMPETANT waiter comes to our table and offers me wine. He probably saw that I looked like I wanted to murder someone (and then cook them up, gluten free) so I guess he thought his services would be helpful. My initial response: "HAND IT OVER. JUST GIVE ME THE ENTIRE BOTTLE, AND THEN MAYBE WE CAN MAKE OUT." Actual response: "No thank you." Small smile.

Round Six: Denny's
It's time for breakfast! Food I can eat! Yay!
I'm slightly wary of Denny's, only because of Wally's "My sister ate spaghetti and parmesean cheese at Denny's when she was three and puked all over the car because Denny's is disgusting" story, but I decide to enjoy it anyway.

The waitress was somewhat helpful, but I find that I can only eat scrambled eggs. I order an ommelette. A NINE DOLLAR OMMELETTE. It better be good.
I think they used an entire onion in my ommelette alone. I didn't eat about a quarter of it, but there was a LARGE pile of onion on my plate. It is 6:00pm and I still taste onion from breakfast. I wish I was kidding.

Round seven: lunch
Or not. I am still munching on onions from breakfast

Round eight: dinner
The desire to not eat has never been stronger. I don't lose my appetite. It just doesn't happen. I tried to eat some, but failed. It also didn't help that Diana was eating rice with ketchup, salsa, peas, sausage and BANANA on the other side of the table. Holy POO I want to puke. There are large bags of candy beside me that I have no desire to eat.

You've probably heard me say that being Celiac isn't that bad, because it isn't. I'm not one to complain about it. But holy mother of all things gluten, it was bad this weekend.