Marley decided to share a random and somewhat friendly reminder to not bury her in an animal cemetery placed mysteriously over ancient tribal burial grounds.

Quote of the Day

(After I share my air conditioning heat wave woes)

Jordan: "Little girl who cried A.C."

Amir and Jake

Yeah, that's right. I switched it up a bit. Jake and Amir are my idols of office life. So, I went down to The Cake Shop last night to see them, but so did a few too many other people. Yesterday, the day of record breaking highs and the basement with no circulation. How I wanted to love you! I wasn't able to stick it out down there, and sticky it was. Body odor wafting around, the odiferous bathroom wafts coming my direction. I can only last so long, and probably not as long as most. But I was able to get pictures with the two of them. Love.

Quote of the Day

Alex: "Yup, she's not slick, she's just Aly."

**I do not remember what this was in reference to, but I wholeheartedly agree.

Crazy Aunt Pearl

In my awkward online stumblings, I ran into this site: Crazy Aunt Purl.  It's cute, if you don't appreciate her tagline that includes "Because nothing is sexier than a divorced woman with four cats," then I am afraid, we cannot be friends. Or at least, you have never been a woman with irrational long term fears of commitment leaving you stranded in a situation you never thought you would find yourself in, and equally important, with a package you created with no intention of ever trying to market it. But I digress...

So, the title of her blog, and the title alone, brought back such amazing memories of my own crazy Great-Aunt Pearl, I thought I would share some of her highlights.  I will attempt to paint her picture, as I have no photos offhand. 

Aunt Pearl lived with her husband in a condo in Hollywood, Fla. And they lived with her sister, and her husband. Originally. Eventually, though, it was just Aunt Pearl living it up. 

This woman would literally cheer me on and clap and videotape me performing such hit classics as "The Itsy Bitsy Spider" and the well cherished "Alphabet Song." Her face would light up, just as if I were Ed McMahon ringing her doorbell with a huge check. (I am assuming that would be her absolute end-all.) She never ate dinner past 4:30 pm, because why would anyone miss the chance to partake in the Early Bird Special? And her favorite place to "dine" was: Sizzler's! It may not have been the greasy cheese/garlic bread concoction. It was most certainly not the proteins, which she so happily skipped over. It did, however, have something to do with her previously unawakened love of theft. No matter how much we explained that "All You Can Eat" infers that it is while the person is at the restaurant. 

Now, had she been one of those eccentric old ladies shoving her half-eaten dinner roll in her purse so as not to see it go to waste, fine. If she had been an enormously nutty woman scooping in pasta salad into Ziploc bags, a security guard would have felt pity. But she can with not one, but two, empty tote bags. And she filled them with bananas. I am not sure why she ate s many bananas, or if she felt that they were overpriced in the supermarket. I know for sure my grandmother offered to buy her bushels of bananas just to get her to stop. But she wanted "free" bananas. And she would walk with such purpose up to the fruit counter, and walk back double fisting them. Sit, endure a minute of our moans and groans, and then get up and do it again. 

We eventually stopped entertaining her and switched the options up. She could take handfuls of fortune cookies, but that was where the line was drawn. She worked in a hair salon, leaving her house every morning at 5:30 am to catch the right bus, to wash hair up until the month she died. She did not need the money, but just loved being busy and chatting with people. And if you are done with all of your meals halfway before the afternoon, maybe catching a 5:30 am bus isn't so daunting. 

She started giving her furniture away, as her fears of robbery increased. Her high rise was safe, and she was high up off of the ground, but she was still sure people wanted her furniture. So, ready for this? Instead of letting people take her things, she gave them away. It made me sad that by the time she died, she had a single twin bed, two dressers, and folding chairs in her house. But it made her feel accomplished, so who can argue?

When I helped clean her apartment out, which she had obviously given us a hand with, her bathroom cabinets with filled with full Benadryl packages. And not a few. She may or may not have ripped off a delivery man once. There was at least sixty full and unopened Benadryl boxes. A hundred-ish rolls of toilet paper. Minimal clothing and jewelry, the plastic furniture. And the strangest find: every one of her dresser drawers was filled with Lottery tickets. She bought at least 20 a week that we knew of, apparently, it had been more. And she never won. We joked how many millions she could have won by investing it. We joked that we should all be thankful she was nowhere near Atlantic City or Vegas.

Hopefully, everyone can have someone like Pearl sprinkled into their lives. She, even in her memory, is color and life and comedy and love.  

And I hope that on whatever cloud she is perched on, there are bananas and Benadryl and more.

Snapshot

He looks so sweet until you realize how much force I am using to hold him down for the slightest reprieve in pouncing on my neck for a minute.

My Name Made Me Smart!

I always wondered why A's came so easily to me in school. And the answer is: Aly!

Everything explained.

"...students whose names begin with letters associated with poorer performance (C and D) achieve lower grade point averages (GPAs) than do students whose names begin with A and B."

Quote of the Day

A.H.: "You're not ghetto fabulous, you're ghetto efficient. Just remember that."

Snapshot

How cute? A small Jersey diner tries to pull itself out of the depths of mediocrity and adds vertical dimensions to their salad? Bravo!

Quote of the Day

Alex: "Don't be upset that I know everything. Just be happy that you know someone who knows everything. I'm an asset to you."

Snapshot

               Somehow, Marley's scary angry face always fails to work.

Quote of the Day

Me: "I really hate the wheelchair guy in my building." (After finding out he has been writing to the governor of New Jersey every week for over the past five years to have a closer spot to the building. Even though his spot is insanely close and double the size of anyone else's, while he is also guaranteed a spot when nobody else is. So now, they are digging up the front yard of grass in front of the lobby in my building and making him his own spot. Who does that?!? I need out.)

Julia: "He's as lame as his legs. Oooh, too soon."


*Side note: Maybe if you spent a tenth of that psychotic and persistent time spent being proactive with your life or stocks, you could be buying a house of your own instead of ruining the only patch of grass your entire apartment building gathers around. I hope this spot fills the chasm in your chest where a heart is supposed to be.

**Additional side note: If anyone wants to do something ridiculous, absurd, and socially unacceptable, write the governor of New Jersey every single week until the office grants you whatever you desire.

Bye Bye Mattie

On Hell's Kitchen, there has been a candidate even more ridiculous than the idea of giving a stranger who you yell at for six weeks $250,000 and an executive chef's position at a new restaurant.

Dear Matt, Mattie, Full-Metal-Jacket-Man,

Maybe now that you are gone, I can take the competition more seriously, because to be quite honest, each day you were not eliminated, I imagined Chef Ramsey getting a stipend check for keeping you on another week by producers who think the audience is too stupid to know this is all a hoax. You are sexist, even though despite your neanderthal physical appearance, you seem to have been afflicted with a whiny female inside. You whimpered incessantly, couldn't lift bags of ice that women were lifting no problem, you perked up at the idea of a manicure, you were afflicted with migraines, and I am assuming, menstrual cramps. It disturbed me that you thought you had a slight chance to win the competition. It scares me that one day, you could be even sweeping the floors in the same building I should be eating in. I hope this entire show was an act for you. That you don't find anything you said on the show to be amusing, true, or normal. Mostly, I hope that when you get back to your mother's house, she tucks you in to your straight jacket immediately.

Consequence

There's something about stepping in urine dead smack in the middle of your hallway that magically makes you impervious to the puppy dog eyes. Cute? I don't think so.

Snapshot

Juxtapositions are my favorite things in the world.

Quote of the Day

Alex: "Just because God did everything doesn't mean that God has to do everything. Remember that."

The J's

Jordan, Joseph, Daniel, Eric, and Jonathan. (Missing were: Jillian, Jessica, Jared, Janice, and Joshua.) We like the J's.

Red Ball Of Fire

If only I had known ages ago how much a hollow mushy red rubber ball could entertain them. 

Quote of the Day

Julia: "Question: How would you describe your relationship? Answer: Epileptic seizures... and the foaming of zee mouth."

Mach Man

Mach 10. You may not be able to achieve even a Mach 1 sitting on the couch, but it's Mojo's talent. Not Macho- Mach.