Google (The Wise & Powerful)

I was in the middle of doing laundry tonight when I noticed one of my white shirts - despite having been bleached repeatedly - was still not looking quite as white as I would like it to. Being the resourceful perfectionist that I am, I immediately consulted the all-knowing Google.

Oh wise and powerful Google, the 2000's version of www.askjeeves.com, the modern-day magic 8 ball of all knowledge replacing vague, obtuse answers such as "ask again later" or "outlook not so good" with millions of answers of every colour, shape and size conveniently categorized into "results". But you are not only a provider of knowledge, oh no...you also add joy to already joyous holidays by presenting a lovely custom Google graphic logo. I always know when it's Halloween because when I google something on October 31st, I see the letter G is lookin' mighty smug in its witches hat, and those two little o's are lookin' mighty uncomfortable stewing in that cauldron. Although, I must say, even on an average day, just seeing those primary colours (plus that sneaky non-primary-coloured green 'l') softly dance around the curves of the Google letters makes me feel happy. I think because those colours subconsciously remind me of crayons. And, really, who doesn't like the thought of crayons?

So laundry...right. I log on to google (the wise and powerful), type the first three words of "how to get your shirts their whitest" and see google (the wise and powerful) - like an over-zealous student that sits at the front of the class and yips "OOOHHH OHHH! PICK ME, I KNOW, I KNOW!" while nearly falling out of his chair from pushing his hand so far in the air in an effort to answer the question before the teacher has even finished asking it - present me with its top ten guesses for what I am hoping to learn how to get. Here is the list:

Let's take a moment to examine the top ten things that people have googled "how to get".

• "How to get rid of fruit flies" is second ONLY to "How to get pregnant". We hate them so much that as soon as we conquer that challenging and highly emotional conception problem, the most prominent issue in our minds is dealing with those damn fruit flies.
• 50% of the listed items are cosmetic.
• People desperately want to know how to get a guy to like them, but not as desperately as wanting to know how to get a girl to like them.
• 'Bed bugs', despite being used for ages as a seemingly cute bedtime rhyme for children ("Goodnight...sleep tight...don't let the bed bugs bite...") actually DO exist, and, coming in at number 8, are much more prevalent than we might have thought. (Although, not as prevalent as fruit flies.)

On a google (the wise and powerful) sub-topic, have you ever googled yourself? I just did. Just now. Just for funsies. Check it out:

1,210,000 results! Google (the wise and powerful) loves me THAT much. I knew the feeling was mutual.

Cards For Coworkers

This email from Nikki, my fellow stuck-behind-a-desk-all-day friend, totally made my Friday afternoon:

K, so get this! I just got a card thrown at me to sign, and I assumed it was a birthday card because we celebrate EVERYONE'S birthday. Anyway, I signed it saying "Happy Birthday” and it turns out it was a Going Away card.

“You’ll be missed!”
“Good luck!”
“Happy Birthday!”

Oops.

I know I'm going to hell for saying this, but the only thing that could have possibly made this funnier was if it was a bereavement card:

"I'm so sorry for your loss."
"You're in our thoughts and prayers."
"Happy Birthday!"

New Methods For That Caffeine Fix

via text messages:

Nolan: Pumped for another exciting day at work?

Me: I was thinking about injecting coffee directly into my veins.

Nolan: Oh yeah? Weird...I was going to grind it and snort it.

Chasing The Apocalypse

I feared for my life a little bit last night. Just a little bit.

My friend Peter and I were taking a stroll around the plaza where we got our ice cream (CHEESECAKE flavoured ice cream...how long has this been around and why did nobody tell me sooner?!) when we looked up at the sky and saw a huge storm front moving in complete with suspicious looking green clouds.  Peter made a comment about how he felt like we should be in Independence Day, and I agreed. I stared up at the sky and waited for some gigantic alien ship to emerge through the clouds.

We'd already changed our plans because of the weather. We were going to head down to Ed Fest to see The Arkells and Pilot Speed when the thunder made us change our minds. This was probably a good thing because apparently, according to the Sonic 102.9 twitter feed, the stage blew over, and garbage cans were flying through the air.  Not wanting to be blown over OR hit with garbage cans, Peter and I did the next most logical thing. Got food and went tornado chasing.  

Although I had my smaller, lesser quality camera with me, I still wanted to go home and grab my "good" camera, which took us in the same direction as the ominous dark clouds.  I've got my head out the window while snapping pictures with one hand and steering with the other, and Peter is torn between staring at the clouds and making sure I don't crash my car.  We came to a stop light where I could finally take some non-blurry pictures, and noted that we just may be witnessing the apocalypse.

Earlier in the evening, Peter had rolled down my passenger side window not knowing it was broken, and naturally, it refused to go back up.  This wasn't that much of a problem until a huge cloud of dust and debris came tumbling down the road at us. Peter is now manually holding my window up, and the wind decides to take some rocks - not stones, but rocks - and attack my car, leaving a nice crack in my windshield. You know, because the broken window just wasn't enough. *growl*.

We turned into my parking lot, and the street lights, as well as the lights in my building, are flickering on and off. Peter had been kind enough to hold on to the cup of my leftover ice cream until he had to put it on the dashboard to hold up the window, but since I'm driving like a maniac, it went flying through the air and landed in his lap.  I start laughing. He is not too pleased, but figures it's an equal trade off for the broken window. 

Up in my condo, Peter cleans up while I grab my camera, a few garbage bags and some packing tape.  We go back down to my car and notice that it has decided to start raining.  We frantically try to tape up my window but keep losing the end of the packing tape. Okay, *I* kept losing the end of the packing tape.  I can't do things when there is a storm to distract me!  I get all giddy and excited and ridiculous.

Peter uses the light inside my car to search for the impossible to find end of the packing tape

We finally get it taped up as much as possible and try to drive off to find a good place to watch the storm. Except for one little problem. With the passenger side window now completely covered in black garbage bags, I can't see any traffic coming from the right, and therefore cannot make any left hand turns.  So, four right hand turns later, and we'd settled in a little parking lot near my condo building. And, after years of trying, I was finally able to photograph some lightning:

This one flickered for a good few seconds and Peter said "You HAD to have gotten that!" Yes Peter...yes I did.

I call this one "Nature Doing The Splits"

Sheet lightning making my condo building look like the entrance to the abyss

We eventually decided to head back to my condo and watch the rest of the storm from my balcony.  Of course we did this when it was raining its heaviest, my parking lot was a massive river, and it was hailing.  I thought it would be a good idea to take a video of the mad dash from the car to the condo. You can't see much in the middle of the video, (it's mostly my high pitched giggles), but it was the most fun I've had in a long time.