Wednesday, February 28, 2007

Day 40: Obsessions

I guess this was bond to come naturally. After discussing addictions, I found myself observing other people's obsessions, because, again, all of us so called "rational beings" are burdened with maniatic, compulsive and obsessive behavior.

All of this started when the Principal Financial Administrator (who also happens to be co-owner of the company I'm currently working for) started to worry about the restroom keys. Each employee is suppossed to have his or her personal key, and there's another one in a special keychain for visitors only. All of a sudden, it became my responsibility to prevent anyone from taking that key. In consecuence, she started nagging me just because it is more comfortable for everyone to take the public keychain instead of carrying their own The top of it came when, at 9 a.m., when we never have any visitors, the damned keychain was not on the counter and she started wondering out loud, "what would happen if we had a customer". Immediatly, I showed her the especially-kept-for-emergencies extra pair I had been hiding for months. And then, she gave me this kind of angry look and said "Anyway, the keychain has to be here!" Worst of it, she's been asking every single day, as she passes by my desk, where the damn keychain is! Now that's what I call an obsession.

Personally, I believe that being obsessed is not always a bad thing. In my case, I'm obsessed with keeping my working space clean and neat, since it helps me to reduce my stress levels. Another obsession is punctuality. People who make me waste the only asset I cannot replace really drive me crazy. Personal space and boundaries are another thing that would deserve a post on its own, since I really go mad when people mess around with my personal stuff. But there are other obsessions that can even destroy the balance of daily life, like the "having the last word" obsession exemplified before, which prevents this people from cutting a win-win deal with a lot of people, thus making her lose a lot of opportunities.

I wonder how many obsessions my hypothetical readers may have.

Tuesday, February 20, 2007

Day 39: Addictions

Sadly, my post on Danny Phantom didn’t turn out to be as interesting as I thought it would be. Pity. But I got me into thinking about why I let myself become hooked on things. My own answer was ADDICTIONS!

Everybody has an addiction. Some people (like me) are addicted to tobacco. That’s pretty common. Others (unlike me) are addicted to booze or drugs. That’s kind of common as well. But I have also discovered some people (like me again) are addicted to other totally different things. Some of my uncommon addictions include:

1. Books: My day is not complete at all if I don’t get to read at least 3 pages from a new book, especially before I go to bed. You can imagine the tantrums I throw every time I finish a book without having a new one right at hand. Going to Book Fairs without money represents one of the finest forms of torture I may suffer, given the fact I hate to look without getting. Life without books (whatever form of literature you choose) would be like hell to me.

2. Tobacco: I know this one is already killing me, but the more people insist I quit, the more I fix the cigarette to my mouth. Funny thing is my husband doesn’t smoke, but he’s never said a word about it. Probably that’s why I smoke less around him: ‘cause he’s shown a lot of respect on my habits, so I tend to respect his breathing space.

3. Adrenaline: Who needs drugs to get high when you can experience the delight of flirting with death? By this I don’t mean going into suicide, but taking into extreme sports. Abseiling, rafting, climbing, delta-flying (sorry for my lack of vocabulary) can give you all the emotions you may need to recharge your batteries. On the other hand, once you have managed to accomplish something difficult and survive the experience,you are to gain tons of self-confidence, believe me.

4. Strong emotions: Again, why taking drugs when you can let yourself go with a good movie or cartoon? Sadness, anger, anguish, happiness, excitement, all of them are just a good movie/cartoon away. And that’s why I never watch videos at home. I get so deep into things that I start making funny faces, or frowning, or crying, and people start staring at me and jiggling. It’s a lot easier at the movies, where the dark conceals my gestures, and I don’t feel that ridiculous.

5. Learning: There’s nothing more challenging and exciting than using my brain to learn something new. Whether it is Japanese culture, technical vocabulary, movie-industry know-how... you name it. The idea is to put my brains up to something new that is not easy.

6. Food: This is another killer, and that’s why I just went on a diet. (I’m fulfilling my new year’s resolutions). It’s extremely difficult to control what you eat when the experience of new, undiscovered flavors reaches your tongue. I bet only sex is more pleasant than the explosion of different tastes in your mouth. Sushi, Italian food, desserts, Chinese food, Mexican food... there’s no ending to the pleasures of the table (except the grave, maybe).

OK. In conclusion, I would say this would sufficiently explain why I became madly fascinated with the young half ghost. Emotions really took the best of my rationality. And I loved it!

Monday, February 19, 2007

Day 38: Late as Usual, Hooked as Usual




I always get late to big stuff. Maybe that’s due to my allergy to t.v., since I’m not regularly able to watch more than 1 or 2 hours in a row without getting bored, start zapping and end up grabbing a book.

But now I would like to page homage to my latest t.v. addiction: Danny Phantom!

Since Jetix was outcasted by Cablevision, I lost track of the series for a while, until I was able to find it again at Nickelodeon (You can tell I don’t watch the telly by that), and I was lucky enough to catch the movie “The Ultimate Enemy” and get totally hooked.

Now, why should a cartoon without the wonderful animation style I love from anime happen to catch my attention? Because of The Stories. Once I was told by literature coach Pepe Rojo (God bless him) that the best stories are the ones focused on the “realistic methapore”, that is, a normal situation turned or depicted as a fantastic one. In other words, using the fantastic elements to convey and reinforce the message about a daily life situation, and Danny Phantom is full of that.

I perfectly know that the matter of a teenager dealing with supervillians while trying to keep his own life in one piece has been dealt with before, but taking into account the moronic language currently used by many cartoons to refer to the old matters of self-acceptance, peer pressure and school grades, it certainly makes this series a bit refreshing, as long with the simple, non-pretentious design that favors concentration on the story rather than on the flamboyant drawings (as frequently happens with anime).

On the other hand, I must confess that I have some sort of ‘crush’ or ‘fatal attraction’ with heroes that actually have problems (which happened to be one of the main crisis in comic book streams many years ago). Living daily life is troublesome sometimes; dealing with several matters at the same time can get really hectic. Just add up some fantastic action and you’ve got me.

If you are not familiar with the series, you must know that, according to Wikipedia, “Danny Fenton is a nervous, clumsy, and sometimes superficial 14-year-old boy who tries to fit in with his peers. But he is also able to transform into his ghost form (his transformation words are normally "I'm going ghost!"). Upon transformation, his normally black hair turns white, his eyes change from sky blue to ectoplasmic green, his skin changes from light to dark, and his normal attire becomes a black hazmat suit - with white boots, gloves, belt, and starting from the second season, a "D" emblem on his chest, becoming "Danny Phantom".”

Unfortunately, it has been announced that the series is going to be cancelled (if it hasn’t already been by now), which happens to be a pity. We don’t get to see well thought cartoons a lot these days. Sob.

PS: You can notice I'm not good at this posting images stuff. Sorry.

Friday, February 16, 2007

Day 36: Something unusual at the usual stuff

Now this was really surprising: did you happen to know that the plant ‘tomacco’, mentioned as a core part of the plot in "The Simpsons'" 'E-I-E-I (Annoyed Grunt)' episode, has actually been created?

According to Wikipedia, “A tomacco is originally a fictional hybrid fruit that is half tomato and half tobacco, from the 1999 episode "E-I-E-I-(Annoyed Grunt)" of The Simpsons; the method used to create the tomacco in the episode is fictional. The tomacco became real when it was allegedly produced in 2003. The tomacco is one of the few made-up words in The Simpsons that resulted in real life application.” Also, it is noted that: “In the Simpsons' episode, the tomacco was accidentally created by Homer Simpson when he "planted a little bit of everything" and fertilized his tomato and tobacco fields with plutonium. The result is a tomato that apparently has a dried, gray tobacco center, and, although being described as tasting terrible by many characters (Ralph Wiggum: "Eww, Daddy, this tastes like Grandma!"), is also immediately and powerfully addictive. The creation is promptly labeled "Tomacco" by Homer and sold in large quantities to unsuspecting passers by.”

The interesting thing starts when “In 2003, inspired by The Simpsons, Rob Baur of Lake Oswego, Oregon successfully grafted a tomato plant onto the roots of a tobacco plant, which was possible because both plants come from the same family, Solanaceae or nightshade, and furthermore both plants are dicotyledons. (It is not possible to graft monocotyledons, because the xylem and the phloem are distributed in bundles throughout the stem, and therefore it is impossible to align the vascular tissues of the two plants.)
The plant produced fruit that looked like a normal tomato, but Baur suspected that it contained a lethal amount of nicotine and thus would be inedible. Testing later proved that the leaves of the plant contained some nicotine. The world's first tomacco fruit, destroyed in the testing process, contained no nicotine. The second tomacco fruit was given to a Simpsons writer. The third was sold on eBay and the fourth was eaten by a Xerox engineer who suffered no apparent ill effects from the fruit. The Tomacco plant bore fruit until it died in October due to weather-related causes at the ripe age of 18 months, having spent the previous winter indoors.”

Obviously, you can learn more about this in the following address: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomacco, where this information was taken from.

I don’t usually copy for my blog, but I found this hilariously interesting. You can also check some really interesting stuff about avocado and chocolate. Did you know they may result harmful to pets? Check it up and have some fun!

P.S. We don’t intend to infringe any copyright laws, and we hope we haven't.

Friday, February 09, 2007

Day 35: How stupid can it get?

OK, here I am, about to return to my creepy office work after some wonderful, blissful and lazy days, during which I went totally blank and served my poor brain some 8 to 12 hours of TV a day. (So long for a person who doesn't like TV, eh?)

Unfortunately, right as I foresaw, someone from the office had to ruin it, adding it up to my own stupidity for answering the phone.

But let's get down to this in order, right? 'Cause I'm quite sure this has happened to every single person on the planet: facing complete and absolute stupidity, which leaves you wondering how these morons have made it to survive to be thirty.

Case no. 1 is plain and simple. Remember this lady I mentioned before? The one who trusts boss's criteria? Regretfuly, she was assigned to cover my post while I was out. (And I bet you can see it coming...) Well, here I am, enjoying my glorious and well deserved break from the office chaos, when my cell phone rings. Stupidly, I must confess, I took the call, just to find myself answering her the stupidest question about the simple location of a simple document. I mean, how come she is able to rumage through my desk in front of my nose while I'm there and she wasn't able to look for it when I wasn't? I was already boiling by then, but the top of it came when, with a very friendly, loving and tender tone she uttered the damned words; 'Oh, we miss you so much around here. There are piles of work here!'.

Doooooh? And what the hell do I care?! That's your assignment now, you a*****e!! You must be thinking I'm taking it too personally, but I do think you need to be brain damaged to tell anyone on vacation such a poisonus, putrid and mean thing! (Of course, the second option is that she is just a... bad... mean... awful... Well, you know what I mean).

Case no. 2 can only be found in Mexico, where regulations are beautiful books destined to collect dust through decades without any conection to reality. And by this I mean the Neighboring Regulation. How stupid, stubborn and maleficent do neighbors need to be in order to slam the w.c. seat cover at 2 in the morning, knowing that the sound is going to spread all over the damn building and that your neighbors downstairs - that's us- wake up at 4 a.m. every day to get to work? And that's just an isolated example. I could write kilometers on these guys' wrongdoings, not to mention the rest of the tennants, specially those with kids.

Case no. 3 is universal, and I mention it because this one hit the news just yesterday. Can you explain to me what parents in the right minds would give a 'Magic Oven' to a 3-year-old child to let her sustain 2nd. degree burns on her fingers? Aaaahhh!! But it was the producers fault, wasn't it? Because they only indicated 'for ages 3 up' on the box, right? Did he forget to stamp the 'Requires Adult Supervision' legend on it? No! It was the stupid parents who forgot to read!! How are they suppossed to be raising a child if they are not even able to pay attention to such tiny details?. It's funny that in some countries you need a license to own a dog, but any idiot can be a parent.

(Sigh) Well, I guess this is the end of my vacation. The only good thing is that I might (please pray to the Powers, my brothers) have a chance to change to a better job soon, where there's no room for this kind of, as we say in Mexico, "burros" (asses=donkeys). No foul language if I can help it, ok? Jajajajajaja.

Friday, February 02, 2007

Day 34: Things to be happy about

February seems to bring good things with its winds. Some things that are making me happy after the awful end of the Christmas season.

1. HOUSE: Finally Universal Channel for Cable in Mexico has announced the release of the third season of 'House'. I've been in love with this guy since the first episode I saw, right in the middle of season 2. I can hardly wait to laugh with his acid remarks and suffer with his new problems.

2. LONG WEEKEND: Next Monday we're taking a long weekend due to the anniversary of the Mexican Constitution. Very welcome because of...

3. VACATIONS: Taking advantage of the long weekend, I scheduled my 5 days of vacation to run from Feb. 6th to Feb 12th, thus taking 10 days off. For goodness' sake I need this break.

4. MOVIES: I'm not a crazy moviegoer, but it's been a while since the last time. My hubby and I are already scheduling 'The Perfume' and 'Hollywoodland' with my dear, handsome, Ben Affleck. He might not be the best actor ever, but I do like his tender puppy eyes. (jajajaja)

5. TAMALES: Today it is Candlemas Day in México, or 'Día de la Candelaria' (DEE-ah -deh- lah- kan-deh-LAH-ree-ah), so we're having tamales for breakfast at the office this morning, for free. Well, free for my co-workers, 'cause I got 'el mono' last January the 6th, and I had to invite part of the tamales, but anyway is good to get away from routine once in a while.

So I hope the wind season brings some positive things to everybody as well.