This is just what people like me (who hit the snooze button 17 times) need. If they eventually make a purple one, I must have it!!!

(Lyse told me about it once, and I probably didn’t comprehend exactly what she meant…but then someone else I know blogged about it, and I died laughing.)

In lovely Portland, Oregon today, we’ve run the gamut of weather… early this morning, it was sunny. Then it turned overcast & drizzly… then it got sunny again, and then it got cloudy again and started pouring down rain. The rain varied as the afternoon wore on, and just after an enchanting 20 minutes of watching the raccoons hunting for worms to eat in the neighbor’s backyard (I was 10 feet away from a wild raccoon! it was soooo cool!), it started hailing. Whee! I love Oregon. If you don’t like the weather, wait a while and it’ll change to suit you.

In other news, my feet are beginning to get used to the grind of the new job. But I have possibilities percolating…we’ll see how things work out.

CheatNeutral is a great little site, where people who cheat can offset their cheating by funding someone else to be faithful and NOT cheat. This neutralizes the pain and unhappy emotion caused by cheating, to leave you with a clear conscience. Those who cheat can even get a CheatNeutral Offset Certificate, so you can prove to your loved one that your playing away has been successfully offset

Of course, as a polyamorous person, I neither need to worry about offsetting my cheating (since I’m not doing any), nor can I take advantage of the option to become a project who receives funding from cheaters for being monogamous. But I still think it’s a spiffy site, and a great idea.*

And now for something completely TMI…

I can now say that I’ve been bitten by a dragon. (Okay, a bearded dragon lizard — but hey, lizards are the closest thing we’ve got to dragons on this Earth!)

Luckily Peyo is too small to have done any damage — in fact, Geoffrey & I were more worried that he would have broken off a tooth or two in my skin. The “puncture” (about 4 or 5 tooth marks) only went into the first or second layer of skin on my palm, and you can’t even see it except under very bright light when I angle my hand just so. By tomorrow morning, I’m sure it won’t be visible at all. He snagged the fleshy bit close to the edge of my palm, about halfway between the base of my index finger and the base of my thumb. The bite didn’t actually hurt since his teeth are absolutely teensy, but of course it startled me, and I was duly impressed by the pinch of his jaws! I was bitten by a boa constrictor when I was 17, on the outside edge of my hand, and it wasn’t nearly as firm a grip as this little lizard’s bite (although the boa’s teeth did break the skin, but my jerking away from the bite did more damage than the actual bite itself, since snake teeth are angled back).

It was so enchanting when Peyo first ate out of my hand about a week ago, that I forgot one of the most important rules of animal care — you want animals in captivity to learn that you provide them food (because, let’s face it, most animals only give a damn about you due to “cupboard love”…especially the less-intelligent species!), but you do not want them to associate your hand with food. That provokes biting.

Peyo seems to be smarter than I’d expected a small lizard would be — after he got up the nerve to try eating mealworms (dead ones, canned & packaged as lizard food/treats) out of my hand once, he started getting excited the very next time my hand went into the cage. So he’s been getting mealworms and bits of fresh veggies hand-fed to him daily. I had expected it would take more than just the once, but it didn’t. Either bearded dragon lizards are quite intelligent (for reptiles), or this particular one is a lizard Einstein!

And wow, he’s grown quite a bit, and gotten noticeably stockier, since just the last time I took pics of him, not even 3 weeks ago! I’ll have to get more pics when Anxiety gets back from her weekend camping trip, since she’s got my digital camera.

In a conversation this afternoon between Lyse & me, I noted the prevalence of Christian books that “warn parents about the dangers of witchcraft,” and how I found it so amusing that teens & young adults from devoutly Christian families seem to be awfully interested in Paganism despite the fact that Wiccans (and most other types of Pagans) don’t proselytize.

“Unlike the Christians (who preach at everyone’s kids), we’re not preaching to Christian kids, but they keep coming to us,” I said with a grin.

Lyse’s reply: “Maybe we’re just better at playing ‘Red Rover, Red Rover.’”

This is so true that it hurts. (It may also be part of why I haven’t dated anyone new in a while.)

That is all.

Something happened at work today that left me flabbergasted for most of the day. The restaurant I work at has a TriMet bus stop just outside its front door, and so we get more than a few TriMet drivers coming in to grab a bite to eat and/or use the facilities. One of my first customers today was one of these drivers, a black woman who appeared to be in her 40′s, and who asked me at least 20 questions about the various menu items. I didn’t mind that a bit, since it’s part of my job to answer such questions, and to help the undecided guests find something to order that will please them. She changed her mind about her order several times, but I didn’t mind that either, since it was early enough that we weren’t at all busy. I was actually happy that I could use my customer service skills more thoroughly than when we’re busy — when the best I can do is take the order correctly but hurriedly with a smile.

Then something happened that changed all that.

And now for something completely TMI…

OMGWTF, I totally want one of these!!!

(And every time I see it, I’ll think of Joey from Friends saying, “How you doin’?” *evil grin*)

Today was my fourth day at work — and for the most part, I like my new job! The atmosphere is pleasant, the supervisors are easy-going and upbeat, the customers don’t suck as much as at most places, and there’s a couple or three definite eye-candy boys amongst my co-workers. (They are, of course, far too young for me — and I don’t date co-workers anyway! But damn, they’re too young for me… *sigh*)

However, my feet hate me. Lots. The new (non-skid, required) shoes aren’t quite broken in yet, and the cheap-ass insoles I bought at Payless don’t seem to do squat. When I get my first paycheck, I’ll get those nice ones that Lyse recommended from her stint at Starbucks. Hell, I may try 2 or 3 different kinds!

And I’m definitely going to get the Band-Aid Blister Block Stick, since I’ve heard it’s fabulous. I accidentally bought shoes a half-size too big, and wides (when I normally don’t wear wide sizes), so I really need something other than just wearing extra-thick socks to help take up the slack. If the shoes get “too” broken in, and wind up being even looser, I’ll have to get another pair. But at least they’re inexpensive (and oh-so sexy…not!).

I think I need a bit of a vacation from the Internet…

There’s no one reason, really…several little things all piling up are pointing me in the direction of doing less online and doing more in real life. And real life is less exasperating anyway.