Taking over the bandwidth

Knitters rule, man! We're slowly taking the world over, and we'll undoubtedly do so bearing handknitted socks for everyone. Go check out Lorna's new blog. Lorna is by far my most adept and prolific student to date, and is another casualty of Sarah's blog-beginning pesterings (we all succumb). Plus, if you read her blog, maybe she'll tell us more about Tole painting.

Turns out I know what Tole painting is, I just didn't know it had a name. And oddly enough, I've seen it at Lorna's house.

Well, firstly, the first move went brilliantly yesterday (#2 -Me and Maggie and a Jeep-full of stuff, Chi to NC, is in T-14 days; #3, all my real-life shit in a semi, NH to NC, is three days after that). I had everything unplugged and broken down and piled up and cordoned off by the time my friends got there, of course (and well before, because I'm what? Pathologically early). But they were freakishly fast and by FAR the longest amount of time was spent thusly: Me, driving a 14 foot U-Haul truck with the steering wheel permanently tilted 45 degrees (that can't be the sign of good things), 35 miles, in the rain, through the back roads, going the speed limit or under (do you know how that pained me with my lead foot?), trying desperately not to run over anything or anyone. I succeeded. It was fine. And Jeremy did a kickass job of following - stayed close enough that no one would cut in (although, why would they want to?) but far enough back so I could still see him, ran interference for me every time I needed to change lanes. Good show, my friend, good, good work. And then, of course, we unpacked the truck in - I'm not kidding - under 20 minutes. Freakishly fast. Also, not much stuff and not going far, but still. All in all it was a marvelous experience.

And I gained a whole new reverence for all those who regularly drive those behemoths. Seriously. I need to have a conversation with my favorite Man in Brown about this and how he is never, ever allowed to refer to himself as "just a truck driver" ever again.

We then went to this fabulous Mexican restaurant which was, of course, a very timely discovery for me, and then they talked me into seeing Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End with them. Which, well....I have to say, I did enjoy it. But a, I'd been up moving things since 13 hours prior to showtime, b, I'd had a margarita (just one, and I'm not a lightweight, but I was tired, and the combination of a+b=punchy), and c, I hadn't seen the first two. So, whatever, we're sitting there, and I'm following, and they're pirates, and I'm getting that there are probably relationships between the characters that I would better appreciate if I'd seen the previous ones, but, okay.

And then, suddenly, there's a man on the screen with tentacles on his face.

I...wait....um........

So I lean over to Brett, who's sitting next to me, poor bastard, and I said, "Who...what....dude! What the hell is that?!"

And he says, "Davey Jones."

I thought about this for a moment. At which point I blurted the only thing there was to say:

"The Monkey?!"

Which, no, no, not Davy Jones from the Monkees, not that Davy Jones at all! But at that point the movie just became uproariously trippy for me. Seriously. Especially when the lady turned into a giant pile of crabs, because, aside from the "she's got crabs" jokes that had to be made in the car ride home, I found that I suddenly had the "Crab People" song from South Park running through my head, which was about the funniest thing I could imagine just then ("Tastes like crab, looks like people!").

And, bless their hearts, they still like me. My friends, of course, not the Crab People.

Have I mentioned how much I love my friends?