I'm not funny anymore

Oh man oh man. I�m sure I�ve mentioned before that my alarm is set to radio an d NPR is the station I have it set to. It takes some serious doing to get me the hell up in the morning, usually a dope slap from someone upside my head or someone grabbing my leg and shaking it around (remember, Nina?). Right, so when I hear voices coming from a strange location rather than making me jump up out of bed and immediately positioning myself in the crane position a la Karate Kid, I tend to weave these voices into dreams and whoever is being talked about makes a guest appearance in my mind. These politically charged discussions on NPR suddenly turn into a David Lynch film in my mind. Example: yesterday I woke up thinking that I had just gone sky diving with Colin Powell for his 80th birthday. It could happen. He seemed to be having a good time. I waited a while before jumping because I didn�t want to fly into him mid-air. I�m nice like that.

I�m a firm believer that my cell phone is a piece of crap wrapped in a fun yellow case. I�ve had my phone for 15 months. Recently the battery has decided that it has had enough and doesn�t really want to hold much juice anymore. I realized that I was having to charge it everyday and on Sunday decided it was time for an upgrade. Best Buy here I come. I get in the car, toot my way over to the magically blue and yellow building set to get my new phone. I had one all picked out with my credit card in hand ready to get this party started�or so I thought. Apparently since I have not had my phone plan for 18 months yet I am not eligible for an upgrade. Swing and a miss, strike one. I was told that I could still purchase the phone but instead of paying 99 dollars, I would be paying 250 dollars. Swing and a miss, strike two. I said screw this; just give me a new battery for my phone so I can actually use it. �Sorry sir, we don�t carry those batteries anymore.� So my phone is not old enough for an upgrade, but old enough so that the stores don�t carry batteries for them. Way to go.

So tonight I�m going to be braver than brave and head into the District knowing good and well that the hotels are overbooked, roads will be closed and everyone and their Mom will be in trying to catch a glimpse of a decrepit old body in a casket going .2 miles an hour. I smell an adventure.

I finally plugged in my boombox under my desk and have been enjoying the light �at work� sounds of 97.1 WASH FM. I love, love, love the �at work� radio stations. I had a favorite one when I worked in Annapolis, but that was based in Baltimore and now I have my Washington equivalent. The bonus about the station in Baltimore was that it was called Lite 102 and at night when I heard it in the car the host or hostess would always say �thanks for keeping the Nite Lite on.� Super. It was like having a living breathing Thomas Kinkaid painting. There�s a CD player as well however I don�t want to scare my boss right away. I have to ease this mother in so to me, having him hear me jamming out to �Jump� by the Pointer Sisters is one thing; seeing me do pantomime to �Absolutely Not� by Deborah Cox is quite another. Either way I have music now. It makes those few moments in the day when I�m not bogged down with crap that much more manageable.

Duty calls and soap smells, I gotta get crackin.

e.