What you do when you're on vacation

For my family, when you're visiting from out of town, you eat. Three meals a day. Sometimes more. Take Friday: I cooked breakfast, had Japanese for lunch with mom and dad, then had Italian for dinner with the grandparents.

Today, I cooked myself breakfast, then we had lunch with a friend (well, I had a big-ass waffle) and then had Chinese for dinner. Tomorrow is the wedding, so I'm sure there will be all kinds of food associated with that. There's all kinds of leftovers in the fridge from the rehearsal dinner (grandparents went) and I can't even think about food right now. I mean, I think about food and I feel full. I'm definitely not having breakfast... despite the fact there's some really awesome bacon and turkey sausage in the fridge. Not gonna do it...

The other thing that happens when you don't see people for awhile is you go shopping. It's not like there aren't places to shop in Idaho, it's just you can't find a lot of the same things there. Like origami paper, Japanese seasonings, that sorta thing. So between mom being here from Iowa and me from the Land of Potatoes, we ended up doing quite a bit of shopping.

Friday, we started out on Telegraph Avenue... it had been several years since we'd been up there to check out the vendors. It's quite a bit cleaner than I remember, which is a good thing. Still feels like Berkeley and there's still plenty of quirky stuff to be bought. Found several t-shirts I'd love to have but knew they wouldn't be appreciated by all up in Idaho. So I held back. Most of the ones I wanted were anti-Dubya and anti-war. One vendor I liked had a web site, so there's still a chance I could end up with something I wanted.

Later that night, we tried to shop in Emeryville at the extremely popular Bay Street area. No place to park, so we gave up and headed to Powell Street and Ross. We got there about an hour before they closed, and the place was a disaster area. Merchandise all over the place, screaming kids everywhere... a real nightmare.

[We interrupt these musings for the following rant.]

There are a lot of behaviors that are learned. Cleanliness requires a little work, but it takes energy to be a pig as well. It doesn't take a lot of effort to hang up items you don't want. Or to pick up something you knocked over. Or to throw paper towels in the trash instead of a corner in the rest room. A person chooses to be messy. You choose not to throw those paper towels in the trash. You choose to throw those shoes on the floor, just like you choose to throw that shirt on top of the rack. I'd hate to see what your house looks like.

You choose to be ignorant and try to take my place in line because you have one item. Bitch, I stood in line longer than you and I've got one item too. You will wait your turn and take your false sense of entitlement and shove it up your fat ass. Funny how those at higher incomes and lower incomes think people behind the counter owe them something. Here's what you're owed: A nice middle finger salute.

Don't stand in the middle of the aisle. This isn't *your* store. Make up your mind and get the hell out of the way. And keep your kids in check. If they continue to run circles around me, I will trip them and make them cry. Prove I did it on purpose. And if you need to get around me, say excuse me. Don't look at me like a confused cow in the middle of the road. I don't read minds.

[/end mini rant]

The other thing I've noticed is living in Idaho has made me soft. I don't shop at the mall and generally prefer to avoid people when I'm trying to make my purchases. I don't know if that's necessarily a bad thing. I think it's probably better for the population at large.

Anyway, I guess I've beat this one to death, at least for now.