Oh dear....

I was asked out by a 57 year old man two days ago at work. He was sporting a ketchup-stained tight Cubs t-shirt and baseball cap. We were going to go "dancing." I tried convincing him that I was a lost cause, when it comes to the dancing. Which is entirely true. But it felt like a lie because it was purely to make him go away. He came back last night (when I was not working) and he apparently looked all around the restaurant for ME, his amor. I was no where to be found, sadface.

Apparently, the way I open a bottle of Miller Lite is VERY attractive.

Quick Note

Um, I have a pet peeve. People who cannot spell "tie dye." Tie Die/tye dye/die tye or WHATEVER is wrong. As in "incorrect." I don't why it bothers me this much, enough to emerge from blogger one-week obscurity and rant a little. Maybe, oh, I don't know:

a) you're using the phrase tie dye in a sentence. You're probably this guy, braggin about his jaunty new shirt:






What's next, a sentence about MACRAME?? Outrageous!














b) I don't understand the confusion. Granted, I always have trouble with the past tense of "to blow dry." Is it "blew drew"? "blow dried"? "blew dry"? I DO NOT KNOW. But no, tie dye is easy. How do you make a fashionable t-shirt with all the colors of the rainbow?? You tie the shirt and then you dye the shirt. Easy! Fun! Quick!

And now you know!

I keep humming that song from The Talented Mr. Ripley

The parents are going to Italy for all of July. To help myself with the wallowing in self-pity (as I am NOT invited) I have been cooking Italian food in the four hours in between my internship and my waitressing shift the past few weeks. Today has been brought to you by:

Lemon & Pistachio Biscotti with Dark Chocolate
The recipe really only said "Pistachio!" Biscotti - but I had lemons that were going bad and, in the grand scheme of things, adding chocolate to something is usually a sure-fire means of SUCCESS (Miss Marie may or may not have rubbed off on me a tad this past year). So, friends, witness, the deliciousness that is:
Mmhmmm....now all I need is some good coffee and I'll be set!

Banana Pants

People, people, I'm in big trouble here. I was rehashing the ol' resume and realized that I had NOTHING to put under the "interests" section. No, really, I have no interests that would be proper for a resume.

Either they are inappropriate:
1. Blog-writing. I loves me some blog!
2. Gossip. "He got married to Not Me? Outrageous!"
3. Shamrock Shakes and Baked Crunchy Cheetos

Untrue:
1. Sky-diving
2. Poetry
3. Macrame

True, but just too common:
1. Cooking
2. Reading
3. Swimming

So, like I said, I am in Big Trouble. What will my (hopefully) future employers talk to me about in two months? "Ahhh, I see. You went to undergrad for four years in a non-descript town in New York, graduated with the two most common majors for law students, came straight to law school, you were a member of several "____ Law Students' Association" (Insert "Women's" or "Italian-American" or "Very Awesome," etc). TELL ME MORE! I'm so excited I might burst" No, that sort of exchange will never happen.

So, the plan of attack is - during the Summer of the Banana - to find a gosh darn original hobby or interest. Make a boring banana














Into AWESOME BANANA













Soooo, here goes nothing. I'm going to try nabbling in some jewlery making and other craft-type tihngs. ANY OTHER IDEAS???

Oh my word, I can't wait.

Another movie clip. What's wrong with me.

But this is a link to the BORAT MOVIE TRAILER. I know - awesome, huh? It comes out this fall - Emily, I expect to be seeing this with you asap!

http://www.collegehumor.com/movies/1695039/

And watching this clip is worth it just to hear Borat say "good bye"
http://www.collegehumor.com/movies/1636429/

I swear this isn't becoming a YouTube blog

I like my bears like I like my boobies; limp and bouncy. This is the funniest thing I've seen in a while.

El Presidente

George Bush loves to make fun of blind reporters.

An Important Note

If you are, in fact, allergic to peanuts, do not remember said fact only when I bring the peanut crusted appetizer to your plate, billed as "Peanut Crusted". A more opportune time to remember such a thing would be prior to ordering the appetizer in the first place.

AND PS: Guess what I am using to type this oh-so-great-blog-post?? My LAPTOP - now, with less grapefruit!! And a new hard drive, keyboard and motherboard. Score.

An Open Letter to the B*tches at Table Six

I get it. You are 40-something hot mamas out for a NIGHT ON THE TOWN! (jazz hands). No night on the town is complete with lots and lots of 6-dollar-a-glass cheap chardonnay. MMHMM!! OAKY!!

So I was taken out of the rotation to help do my boss's accounting. Because, apparently, law school = accounting school = getting paid 3 bucks an hour to enter year-old receipts into an arcaane computer application. Score. Anyway, so I had NO tables. And I was ready just to be done with work, call it a night, and go home with my 0 dollars of tips. But then YOU four walked in. And the hostess just KNEW --- THIS TABLE IS FOR BANANA.

So you all ordered your shit wine and your salads and your salmon and it was great and delicious. And all I wanted to do was to go home. I try to bus your salmon plates, counting than I could slip out soon because I actually had PLANS and wanted to booze it up myself.

"Oh no, we're still picking at it!!!" TEHEEHEHEHEHEHEE, the table erupts in slightly-drunk, peroxide-blonde, midwest-housewife giggles. I dealt with you folks at the country club. NO MORE.

It is now ten minutes later, 7:30PM.

I try for the plates again, offer some coffee (no dessert was offered, because I wanted to leave. I know, I'm horrible).

"Oh, no coffee for us, just some more wine!!" TEHEHEHHEHEHEH.

Gawd, hilarious, ladies, HILARIOUS.

So another round of gross chardonnay and I drop the check "Here's the check for you ladies, any time you're ready." LIKE NOW! NOW WOULD BE GREAT!!

It's now 7:50. Fifteen minutes should be enough to finish up conversations and take a look at the bill. "Have you gotten a chance to peek at the check?"

"OH NO!!! We haven't even TOUCHED it!!" HEHEHEHEHTHEHEHEH. Again, with the hilarity.

And it's really bloody adorable to make your waitress wait twenty minutes to close out your check. Charming.

So, it's 8:15. I was supposed to be meeting my friend at 8. Awesome. I go over to the table, the checkbook not having been touched. I bus EVERYTHING off their table. There is nothing on their table. It is white and clean except for the check and glasses of water. Which they haven't touched. Because of the wine.

8:20. Still nothing. I go over there and refill the water glasses. Which aren't so much empty except for maybe they forgot that there is a waitress who needs to be paid at some point and it would be great if, fifty minutes later, paying bill would be an option. I don't honestly care how long they stay. Just pay the bill so I can close out my credit cards and GO HOME.

8.30. The bus boy has done the ol' accidentally-grab-the-check,-feign-not-speaking-English-Oh-We-Still-Haven't-Looked-At-It-Giggle, Still no dice. LISTEN UP LADIES. I do NOT care if you want to DISH DISH DISH the whole night away. I really don't. But you CANNOT just sit there with an unpaid check on your table. Just pay the check, and let the waitstaff do their thing. But an hour is TOO LONG to fish your credit card out of your purses and hand it over to me. I don't care if you tip me 10%. I just need you to pay your BILL so I can pay my BOSS the money for your chardonnay. That's it. JUST LET ME GO HOME.

Unfortunately, they did not let me go home and I ended up just having one of the other waiters deal with them whenever they decided to leave. Apparently, the waiter stopped by around 8:45 to let them know that their waitress left a little while ago and they laughed like it's SO HILARIOUS to make the waitress wait around for their sweet asses to decide to pay the bill.

Angry fist!

The DMV in Chicago smells like feet and cabbage

So Anna "Why Do I Need A License Because OTHER People Can Drive ME and Isn't That Just Better?" Banana will be getting her DRIVER'S PERMIT tomorrow morning, bright and early. I'm printing out the "Rules of the Road" so I can be sure to pass. It's my second time through (and yes, I did pass it, six years ago) so hopefully my old, haggard brain WON'T BAIL ON ME NOW!!!

Questions you should not ask me:
"Why haven't you gotten your license yet, dumbass?"
"Hey, dumbass, why haven't you gotten your license?"
and
"You don't know how to DRIVE?!?!?"

To answer question number tres (spanish for "three") --- I DO know how to drive. In theory. And I beat Alex on some racing game a few weeks ago AND I think I was sorority champion junior year in Mario Kart SO GIVE ME MY DAMN LICENSE ALREADY!

Why Doesn't Anyone Name Their Children Damien Anymore?

My little brother came home from school today wearing all white. It was June 6, 2006 - or 6.6.[0]6 as all the expectant mothers who induced over the last few days know. The Day of the El Diablo and all sorts of other things. So Binky Barnes [nickname for the little guy, because although I've resigned myself to perhaps losing my job because of the blog, my little bro needn't ruin his jr. high career just yet] - Barnes comes home wearing all white and a crucifix. Apparently, he knew there was going to be trouble today because he hit SO MANY foul balls during baseball - and he usually doesn't do that.

Also, some of the other 5th graders wore RED and BLACK (egads!) in order to be "bad-ass," I suppose. Barnes asked them all "Why do you even try to tempt fate?" He's so serious about so many things.

Apparently, during "clean out your desk day" at school - some of the other kids (who were obviously the ones wearing red and black) got their fingers SHASHED in the DESKS. And "a lot fo kids were really clumsy."

I wanted to go into the whole statistical concept that the only reason you feel like people are more clumsy is simply because you were looking out for it --- I'm sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but elementary students are, as a general rule, clumsy little rugrats. But I decided to keep mum lest he lose the fear of God TOO early.

Either way, he was being cute. And I gues I'm glad that I'm not working at the restaurant tonight - last summer's "exorcism" - complete with priest - was a little much for me - and I can only imagine the antics that are happening on today's most un-holy day.

As an aside, if I HAD to give birth to a child today, you better believe his name would be "Christian Mark Luke John Matthew Jesus Gabriel Joesph Banana" or, if a girl "Mary Margaret Magdalene Faith Chastity Hope Grace Banana." Suckers on the playground, but NOT possessed by the devil.

Imagine that!

So I decided, you know, maybe I should POST IN THE BLOG. At least something besides (a) I hate work. Which I really do. New definition of "hate." I do risk management for a hospital. This means that I have no clients - at least in the sense of "this person is coming for my help." Instead, the whole goal is the PREVENTION of acquiring clients. So I create forms no one wants to fill out, organize meetings no one wants to attend and generally make people do things they don't want to do. I've become a MICRO-MANAGER. It's horrible, and I hate myself.

At least there's the restaurant, right?

It's better in a lot of ways. I work with fun people and I get to talk and banter and drink on the job, every now and then. All good things. And I walk out with a delicious wad of cash. Even better. Of course, there are people who come in who make Other People Who Won't Be Mentioned for Fear of Being Fired From My Unpaid Internship seem same and delightful. But such is life, there will be stories forthcoming, no doubt.

Right now, I'm just hating on the restaurant because I. Never. Leave. And it's only been four days and I feel that way. I was there Friday night, then had to be right back at there at 5am Saturday morning. And then I got to go home for three hours and then work until 10pm. Lame. Too much food-serving. The one good thing is, of course, that the more food I serve, the closer I become to getting a non-grapefruited laptop. A GOOD THING INDEED.

I do have other things to say, outside of me complaining about work. Because I bet that can only turn out two ways. I maintain my vaguenes and it's just becomes boring and annoying. Or I finally tell you the truth and then I lose my job. Both are outcomes that are "not good" so I'll spare you.

I read the book Pledged about how sororities are evil and ruin lives. Or something to that effect. I'll have a more nuanced review of it in the upcoming days. And there are other things to talk about, too - so don't worry, there will soon be "content" in this blog. In DUE TIME.