CLASSES & JOBS

In middle school my friends used to joke that I thought they all smelled bad. They said this because one year I gave pretty much all my friends soap for gifts. I got all the soaps from a bath and body store, which was fun to shop at and had everything I needed. I didn’t really mean to do it, I just kept finding really fun types of soap for different people.

At this bath and body store, there was confetti soap, soap crayons for drawing on the shower, soap that smelled good, etc. It became a running joke and still to this day whenever I see any type of soap that different or interesting I send it to a friend from middle school. It’s fun to try different kinds of soap and body wash because some smell amazing, some wake you up, and some calm you down. It’s a simple thing that we use every day, but it can be made a bit more fun with some variation.

I’ll admit it: I am a pen thief. Of all office supplies, pens are my weakness. I will start my day at the office with one pen, which is usually the pen I stole from the clerk at Starbucks when I signed my receipt. By the end of the day I have one pen behind each ear, one in my shirt pocket, another clenched between my teeth and I’m twirling one in my hand. I’m a pen thief, but I don’t mean to be. It just happens.

Unfortunately, at the end of every week someone is complaining that we don’t have any pens anywhere in the office. You see, when I inadvertently steal pens from every co-workers’ desk, they end up in a drawer in my apartment. You would think I have the common sense to clean out that drawer and return the stolen office supplies to their rightful owners, but the truth is I’m a bit embarrassed to show up one morning with a garbage sack full of pens. Then again, maybe I found everyone’s Christmas gift for this year.

Music and politics have long been bedfellows. For centuries, music was used in protest or praise of a leader. Oftentimes composers or their works were banned for political reasons. In 1930 Stravinsky stated in a Roman newspaper, “I don’t believe anyone venerates Mussolini more than I.” His music was soon banned by Nazi Germany.

More recently, rock groups have banned together to promote political participation by their listeners. Groups like Rock the Vote have strived to educate a younger generation as to their value in the political process. R&B artists are even getting involved. Sean “Puffy” Combs led the “Vote or Die” campaign in 2004. His aim was to register overlooked racial minorities and all 18-29 year olds.

This week it seems the planets are aligned, my Chi was centered and the heavens were smiling down on me. How else can I explain my stumbling onto the wonderful world of strangenewproducts.com? If you’ve never been to the site, go there now.

It’s the most frustrating site I’ve been to in a while because as I stroll through the list of products I think to myself, why didn’t I come up with that? Take for example the company Throx that sells socks in pairs of three, thus solving the lost sock phenomena. Or how about Kidz-Med Inc., who have developed a non-contact thermometer? The company claims the device can read the infrared heat radiating from a person’s forehead and provide accurate results…so accurate it may be the next new thing!

With the holidays just around the corner, I’ve been trying to decide what to get some of the important people on my list.

The iPhone has been one of the more popular products on the market for the past few months, and though it seems expensive, and is, I think it’s a good buy, especially as a gift for a loved one in your life. The iPhone has so many useful features, from navigation to games to music space to a touch screen, I feel that it has it all. Furthermore, Apple is one of the best companies around when it comes to being helpful and replacing broken products under warranty.

One of the specific reasons I like the iPhone is that it is a phone and carries all the capabilities of an iPod as well. You get both in one device. This is awesome because if you are shopping for an iPod and a phone you can get both at the same time. When looking at my own iPod and phone, I realized that I had spent more on both items combined than I would have if I had just gotten an iPod. So, next time you’re out shopping, stop by an Apple store and check out the latest iPhones.

Recently, I watched Saturday Night Live where they had a skit featuring Andy Samberg pretending to be celebrity movie star Mark Wahlberg, where Andy walks around talking to animals. It was hilarious if you are a fan of Mark Wahlberg. What was even more funny though was when Mark Wahlberg showed up the next week and poked fun at the skit, telling Andy is was not like him at all, yet Mark talks to a goat during the middle of their conversation.

I know this is just acting, yet little things like showing up on SNL or making a joke at an interview really make me grow fond of certain celebrities. The fact that they can make fun of themselves and show us that some celebrities are not elitist or “too cool,” really goes along way. Another example is Peyton Manning. I have never been a Colts fan, but I will always be a Peyton Manning fan. He has done numerous commercials and appeared on SNL as well, and after viewing all of those it is hard not to cheer for him. Celebrities who can make fun of themselves will always be my favorite.

At any given grocery store there is an entire portion dedicated to hair care and hair dye. I have never bought anything more than the generic, coconut smelling shampoo and conditioner. I never thought it made a difference, but clearly it does as I have begun to find out. I dyed my hair black for Halloween, which is not that bad for your hair. However, when I wanted to dye it back, I was told that it would kill my hair if I went blond.

By bleaching your hair, it sucks all the nutrients out of it. This is a reason a lot of girls do not dye their hair platinum blonde. In order to not have split ends and frail, course hair, you have to buy special shampoo for blonde hair. All of those commercials showing vitamins and minerals being sucked in by your hair actually are legitimate. But here is the catch: special shampoo is very expensive. I am not willing to spend more than about five dollars for a bottle of shampoo, so I do not want to dye my hair back to being blonde. So instead of dying it back, I am going to just wait for it to grow back enough that I can just cut my hair and save the money and hair damage.

This presidential election has been a very long, intense, brutal campaign. Watching the news for months and following polls and statistics made me wish that the campaign was much shorter than it is. What is especially difficult is getting different types of news from different sources, despite the fact that news organizations are supposed to be objective and aren’t supposed to pick sides. On one channel, journalists give certain bits of information while on another channel, the news is different. What journalists choose to say and not say is often very interesting, and it does reveal their inner beliefs and motivations.

I don’t feel like campaigns should be allowed to last that long because, inevitably, some candidate turns to smear tactics and the whole thing becomes a big joke. It gets to the point where Americans are turning off the news when political updates are on instead of tuning in. Maybe if there were laws in place that prevent candidates from campaigning more than a few months, Americans would be much more likely to stay informed and practice their rights of civic engagement.

There once was a bug in the bathroom. I named it Hippity Hop. It was some kind of grasshopper. It scared the living heebee-geebies out of me! I was at work, went to the restroom, went in one of two stalls and there was Hippity Hop, in all his black and evil glory, perched right beside the garbage can! I swear he was looking right into my eyes!

So since he was sitting right next to the garbage can (and I knew this garbage can had a bit of space underneath the round can, don’t ask me how I know), I quickly picked up the can and he slid right under it!! Perfect!

The rest of the day and the entire next day, I kept a watchful eye to see if he had gotten loose from his cage. Well, two days later, I went to use the same restroom and when I was at the sink washing hands, I could see a slight movement from the corner of my eye -down on the floor next to the larger wastebasket in the restroom. So I peered down and, sure enough, there he was! He had been moving his itty-bitty antennae around for me to notice him. So what do you think I did? For the second time this week, I picked up this larger trash can to make him sit underneath it! I’m thinking the restroom isn’t big enough for the both of us. I showed him who’s boss! And I hope to never see Mr. Hippity Hop ever again. The End.

Sometimes I swear I am mildly O.C.D. and I have these little rituals that I do. It is an uncontrollable urge and I think about it over and over until it gets done. I haven’t gone to the doctor for Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (nor am I making fun of people who really have been diagnosed with this disease). I just notice that sometimes I do weird things that my friends and family laugh at, so here they are:

• I constantly tug down on the bottom of my shirts. I buy long shirts, so this is pointless.
• Different foods can never touch on a plate. If they do, the parts that touch can’t be eaten.
• Shoes go through a morning “spider check”. I found a dead spider in my shoe one day after I took it off. Never got over it.
• The volume on my radio has to be on an even number.
• I rarely, if ever, open a soda can all the way (liken this to the spider story, except for this bug was almost swallowed).
• I have to repeatedly pet an animal on the bridge of the nose.
• I tug on my earrings and necklaces while I am thinking. I actually did this during an interview!
• I always have to wipe my hands on my pants after every bite. Note to self: This isn’t pretty when you’re eating greasy food and wearing white pants.
• I can’t help but touch something if someone tells me not to (fresh paint, wet floors, hot pans).
• I have to pick the second item of everything. So the second cup out of the dispenser, the second candy bar…you get the gist.
• Every poor animal that I deem “cute” has to go through my love tap torture…This consists of nine (yes, I’ve counted) consecutive fast little taps I give to their lovely little rear.

Anyway, these are some, but not all of the little quirks that make me well, me! So now it’s time to ask you, what are some of your bad little traits?