But It's a Dry Heat

Archive for the ‘Humor’ Category

Facebook Won’t Eat Your Kittens

Stuff you can count on. The swallows returning to Capistrano. Taxes. Death. And someone on Facebook having a meltdown over privacy controls.

OMG! Facebook has changed its settings again. Now, it can steal your children and sell them into slavery.”

To which, I shrug. See, this is why I don’t have children. I’m exactly the kind of twisted fiend, who, on tripping over yet another toy in the hallway, would gleefully sell my offspring into slavery.

Nonetheless, I go and check my privacy settings. And, sure enough, they are already set to “Don’t steal my children and sell them into slavery” mode. Much ado about nada.

Facebook sucks. But not because (more…)

I Feed My Muse True Blood

The only problem with watching True Blood via Netflix is that it leaves me feeling like the slow kid in class.  Everybody else has moved on to lesson four, while I’m still stuck in lesson three.  That is, I’m still watching season three, with no chance of seeing season four for months.

But I’m still not ponying up the cambio for cable tv, much less the premium channels. Besides, on DVD, I can watch certain scenes over and over. (Nekkid Eric!) Last night, however, it was my husband who was re-watching a scene. Surprisingly it didn’t involve nudie boobies.  It was the scene where Russell Edgington gleefully rips the spine out of an anchorman. (Given the quality of American journalism, it’s really a pity that vampires don’t exist.) Russell goes on a delightful rant about humans–our greedy and self-destructive nature–all while blithely gesturing with the bloody spine. My husband declared it, “The best episode, ever.”

Me, I’m just happy when Eric shows up wearing nothing at all.

Meanwhile, I’m spending a lot of time with my own obnoxious blond vampire, Breas Montrose. I’ve got a stack of edits from my Carina Press editor for The Canvas Thief. Breas describes his role in the story as:

“I’m a Gandalf. I hang around, full of powerful magic I never use, and make vague, important-sounding statements.”

***

Amusing side note. A search for Eric Northman in Google images turns up one very ordinary, somewhat pudgy, middle-management white guy. He sticks out like a sore thumb among the many images of smexy, blond vampires. Heh.

Who Is That Masked Horse?

“STOP DIGGING!”

What my neighbors hear every morning from May to October.

Summer and Fall are the seasons of flies.  This year, thanks (sort of) to a short and very unusual span of below zero temperatures, the fly hordes didn’t show up until June. Once in full force, they get down to making life miserable for the Wonder Horse.

By and large, horses are well designed to deal with flying pests. Along with long swishing tails and manes, they do this cool thing where they wiggle the flies right off their skin. (I wish I could do that.) But the flies’ favorite place to hang out, beside steaming piles of shit, is in the corners of a horse’s eyes.

You know those sad little starving children in Africa? Too weak to brush away the flies that cluster around their eyes?  Horses are kind of like that. To flies, eyes are like an Evian drinking fountain.  After just a few hours of this, the Wonder Horse’s eyes turn red and start leaking puss. Nasty.

So every morning, before breakfast, he gets his fly mask.  He knows the routine and stands by the gate waiting for me to come out of the barn with the mask and a few treats. (The routine has also morphed into an annoying game where he grabs the masks and shakes it. He won’t let me put it on until he does this.  As with any bad habit, the fault lies with the stupid human who thought the stupid horse trick was cute. At first.)

While I’m in the barn getting the mask, Mr. Impatient starts to paw. With enthusiasm. An 1100-pound animal can dig a large hole in just a few seconds.  Locating that hole by the gate is paramount to setting a booby-trap for any unsuspecting human. It has the added bonus of catching and tipping over wheelbarrows full of horseshit.

So when he starts digging I run out of the barn and yell, “No digging.” He stops and bangs on the gate with his hooves (my little drummer pony). I go back in the barn. Digging begins anew. I come out, yell, and you can see the smug satisfaction on his long face. “I’ve got her trained.”

Trouble is, he’s right.

Truth in Advertising

You know you’ve been at a job too long when the simple act of getting up, going outside and getting the mail becomes a kind of deliverance from the excruciating pain of ennui poisoning.*  I slog across the asphalt parking lot, collect my payload and return to the Chamber of Dull where I sort through the pile looking for anything interesting.  Today’s trip yielded this.**

The first thing that came to mind when I saw this sales flyer was the Joni Mitchell song, Big Yellow Taxi:

They paved paradise and put up a parking lot.

*I’ve probably worked there about three and a half years. An eternity for me.

**Actual business name photoshoped away because the world doesn’t need any more blacktop.

Will There Be Laundry Involved?

In a lovely change from the adverts for manroot fertilizer, I get this in my inbox. (It somehow sneaked past my spam filters.)

Doris wants a “true relationship and partner.”

Dear Doris,

As a rule i make a Point not To get involved wIth people who haven’t mastered the Fine art of Capitalization.  But in your case, I might make an exception.  (Because you called me “Dear” and added that cute little rose graphic.) That is, if  by “true relationship and partner,” you mean “washing the dog,” “cleaning house,” “mucking out the horse’s paddock” and “doing laundry.”  If so, please send your pics to ineedamaid@filthyhouse.com

If by relationship you mean…like sex? (/Kaylee from Serenity voice), then I’ll pass as my smexy steampunk zombie takes care of all my needs.

Cheers,

P. Kirby

Buy My Book, So I Can Afford Pest Control

A study in lunacy, Kirby-style.

Saturday morning and I’m staring at dirty dishes from breakfast and inventing excuses for not washing them– “It’s against my religion; dish soap causes cancer; dishes come cleaner if food is allowed to set.”

I hear a startled yelp from the bathroom and my husband emerges from our bedroom, toothbrush in hand.

“What wrong?” I ask.

“I was bending over to spit out the toothpaste; I spit, and a centipede came out of the drain.”

This, of course, would have been the end of the story for people in full possession of their sanity. At Casa de Kirby, however, we don’t kill beneficial insects.  Centipedes, who snack on house-destroying termites, fit the definition of “beneficial.”

I hand him a plastic food container. “This should be big enough.”  I scoop an envelope off the table and follow him. Operation Centipede Rescue is on.

In our bathroom, my husband is leaning over the sink. He positions the container, trying to get the centipede to climb in and be relocated.

The centipede putters around the sink, antennae tapping, like a blind, bewildered old man.  (Centipedes don’t have much in the way of eyes; more like a little cluster of nerves that sense light.) Despite being blind, it manages to avoid the container. I try to nudge it into the container with the envelope. Success! Its front end  heads in the right direction.

Now, halfway in the container, the centipede inspects the smooth plastic surface, and then turns around and heads back down the drain.

This is where saner people would have squished it.

Instead I get the long-handle brush that I use to clean the fish aquarium.  Justin and I poke at the obstinate bug and it marches farther down the drain.

This is where saner people would have turned on the water full blast and washed it down the drain.

Instead, Justin sighs and heads out to the workshop.  He returns with a wrench.  “Get me something to catch water,” he says. A minute later and he’s removed the drain trap. (I married McGuyver.)

The fucking centipede is still in the drain, its antennae wiggling inquisitively, but not budging, not even when pushed with the brush.  This goes on for a while until Justin finally gives the drain pipe a hard whack and the obstinate bug tumbles into the plastic bucket below. Soon after, the creepy-crawly is outside (and probably none-too-happy, as it hasn’t rained in six months and centipedes like moisture).

Why bother with all this? Especially for a creature, that by my own admission, is “skin crawling up and down my back” creepy?

Well, there’s plain old karma and mercy.  Then there’s the fact that a six-inch-centipede in a drain, may have originated from said drain, and so flushing it doesn’t exactly keep it from marching right back up the drain. I’d rather not revisit its creepy face when I’m brushing my teeth.

And this was a really big centipede, at least seven inches.  With our luck, it would have clogged the drain.

Besides, squashing big bugs is nasty business.  First there’s the chitinous crack, followed by a spray of gooey ichor.  Next, there’s the splattered bug parts, legs (ugh, hate bug’s legs) and other crunchy bits to remove.

Mercy is just a lot less messy.

Skyline

Recap, not a review, because it is so eye-rapingly bad.

Starts off okay.  Glowy, alien plasma zooms down into L.A. and starts giving all the beautiful people the worst case of varicose veins ever.

Several hours earlier…
Generic blond, Elaine, and hubby, Jarrod, are on a plane to L.A.  Jarrod is kind of cute. Too bad his acting sucks balls. They’re going to L.A. because Jarrod has a sketchbook full of ugly graffiti that his producer friend really likes.  (Or something … Seriously, I have no idea.)

In L.A., they meet Jarrod’s friend Terry–Hey, it’s Turk, from Scrubs! He’s living large in a penthouse with his blond wife.  Elaine and Jarrod admire the “view,” which must be L.A. for “smog.”  Husband and I both observe that wife is a bitch and “We want her to get eaten first.”

Terry has a party. Elaine confesses to Jarrod that she is pregnant. Jarrod says, stupidly, “Late? For what?” Jerry screws his assistant in the bathroom. Oh, the angst.

My husband grumbles, “This is supposed to (more…)

Of Aliens, Site Updates and Paper Books

The couple that’s in pain together …

So my beloved and I awoke this morning with the same kink our neck.  Neither one of us can turn our head to the left.

My husband, hearing that I had the same ailment, said, “I bet we were both kidnapped by aliens.”

“Kidnapped by aliens?” I said. “And all we got were stiff necks?  No sexual stuff?”

“No cheap thrills for us,” he said.

“I got kidnapped by aliens and all I got was a sore neck.”

And an excuse for lack of creativity on this blog.  I did, however, post Chapter Two of The Music of Chaos, and I made some minor changes to the site.  My plan is to post a few “*unpublishable” stories and some cut scenes from The Music of Chaos. I”ll get the new page(s) up sometime next week.

Speaking of The Music of Chaos, it looks a print version may be in the woyks. More details to come.

*Unpublishable meaning that they were fun to write, are fun to read, but don’t have much in the way of theme or anything that takes them beyond a backstory exercise.

Plastic Prince Marries Plastic Bride

The royal wedding and all things regarding the nuptials are a perfect substitute for Ambien.

Anyone who knows me, or who’s sniffed around this blog, shouldn’t be surprise by my utter disinterest in a multimillion dollar, faux, fairy tale wedding.

Yup. Faux.  As in “fake, fake …  fake, fake.” (Elaine Benes voice.)

But every girl dreams of meeting a (more…)

You Gorgeous, Golden-Eyed Bastard

As always, I’m late to the party.  Today is International Raistlin Majere Day!

Had I known, I would’ve donned my best red cloak for the morning dog walk with the greyhound.

And alas, this is Friday, my day off, so I can’t do this:

2. Laugh softly and menacingly throughout your performance review. When your supervisor brings up your problem with authority, whisper, “Bow only in reverence, never in subservience.”

Raistlin is the ultimate tortured hero. Mo’ betta than that whiny, sparkly, pretender, Edward Cullen.  Fans of a certain certain boring-ass, fantasy epic will no doubt call me vapid for loving the series, but many hours of my youth were spent reading and re-reading the Dragonlance series.  See, Raistlin was what Thomas the Unbelievably Boring could never be.  Likable.

(The last two sentence proving my point.  My hatred of a critically acclaimed book, is so totally about its fans.)

But Raistlin rocks.