Since I got to the airport nearly three hours early for my 6:50 p.m. flight, I thought I’d live blog O’Horror. For your pleasure (or terror!)

**** lalalalala****

I’m at the Fox Sports Grill - drinking a glass of wine - munching on some coconut shrimp - listening in on people’s conversations. Shush! You’re not shocked nor surprised, so don’t pretend you are.

The man and woman sitting at the table in front of me look like business travelers. After telling her a story about how much money he spent on his wife’s face lift (AND relating that he saved $1000 by going with a local anesthetic y’all! I’d kill Mr. Hot), he made some comment about also offering his wife a boob job (with the money he saved maybe?) . Then he started critiquing this woman’s face. Yes, the one he was sitting across from.

****lalalalala****

I’ve moved to find a seat in the gate area. After paying $37 for two glasses of wine and 5 coconut shrimp. I wonder if I could smuggle a bottle in my suitcase for my next trip. (Kidding, TSA. I swear I’m just kidding!)

A bleached blond is walking through the concourse with enough makeup to have made Tammy Faye Baker cringe. With BIG sunglasses and enough rhinestones to choke a horse.

**** lalalalala****

A business man in a checked shirt just sat down a few seats from me, and is talking to a cousin or a brother or something on his cell. He’s also waiting for the Detroit flight, although we’re not sitting at our actual gate…there’s simply too many people over there trying to get to Minneapolis - which is delayed.

He’s talking about dead relatives, and how he got “saved” four years ago. While he was driving to work, he passed a church and decided to stop the next Sunday and try it out. He found God that day, and ever since, he’s been a regular churchgoer.

But wait, y’all! He is telling whoever he’s on the phone with that he changed jobs recently. He used to work for Coors - but he moved over to Diageo Products. Diageo’s brands include Smirnoff, Cuervo, Bailey’s, Tanqueray, and that bad boy, Captain Morgan.

Excuse me while I go sit on his lap and stick my tongue in his ear.

**** lalalalala****

(A non-airport related thought. Well, kind of, because I’m in the airport having this thought, but it’s not related to the airport. Per se.)

I have this really sudden urge to take off my scarf and sit here blinding people with the fluorescent lights shining off of my bald head. Is this sick?!? I swear someday I’m going to do that. I am.

**** lalalalala****

Charlie Brown’s teacher (WAH WAH WAH. WAH WAH WAH WAH. WAH.) is talking on the speaker over at my gate across the hall.. I hope they’re not changing shit on me. Hold that thought, eh?!? I need to check.

Whew, okay. Our flight coming in is in transit - and so far the gate hasn’t changed, and so far we’re not delayed. This is very important when you have 48 minutes of battery power left and blogs to write and read. With no more liquor nearby to hold you over.

**** lalalalala ****

Okay, so I moved over to my gate now that all of these Minnesotans are on their plane. This way if CB’s teacher decides to wah wah wah at me again, I’ll be able to hear if I have to hoof it across the fuckin’ miles to another gate.

*** lalalalala ****

So, 24 has a boyfriend. Did I tell you that? We haven’t met him yet, but

Oh, wait, the guy sitting in the row of seats across from me just screamed into the phone, “Are you fucking kidding me!?!?!”. The mom and dad of the 8 or 9 month old baby, who happen to be sitting behind Mr. Screamer-Dude, just shot him all kinds of nasty looks into the back of his head. He’s oblivious.

Glad they can’t read over my shoulder.

****lalalalala****

And, the Minneapolis flight is gone - and my lovely plane is pulling up to the jet bridge. I’m going to proof read this post (quickly, don’t tell me it doesn’t make sense or there’s typos, please!) and hit publish so you can read it while I’m drinking free booze in first class flying home . But before I do, let me tell you about a giveaway happening over at Blissfully Domestic (where, by the way, I write a “Working from Home” humor advice column weekly.)

Amazingly enough, it’s not about white trash like the people I’m sitting here with (the woman in the white spandex pants and the thong sticking up over her waistband and her 300 lb. friend with the Bermuda shorts, belly-showing tank top and bright blue toenails) - it’s about the “shortcuts” women can take when they’re trying to do too much.

Go check it out and enter!

—- I know you’re going to ask me about 24’s boyfriend, but really, I don’t know anything about him yet. We haven’t met him - we don’t know how old he is or what he looks like - all we know is 24 frequently lets us know that he won’t be home that night - he’ll be at “My Friend C’s” house. I’ll keep you updated as more news breaks.—-

Sometimes, weird things happen in the Hotfessional household. This week, though, we had TWO (count ‘em, two!) episodes.

Weirdness #1

Mr. Hot’s cell phone rang with a number that he didn’t recognize. Usually, he ignores these calls, but for some reason, he answered. The disembodied voice on the other end of his “Hello” said, “Hel-lo. This.is.a.cour.tes.y.call.from.C.V.S.pharm.a.cy.” The voice went on to “kindly let us know that a prescription for Shortman Hotfessional was currently awaiting pickup.” “Hmmmmm”, though Mr. Hot, “Shortman doesn’t have any current prescriptions and certainly none that need to be picked up.”

Disembodied voice continued, “Your.nearest.C.V.S.pharmacy.is.at.3322.main.street.tallahassee.florida.”

So, y’all? Somehow, CVS confused OUR Shortman Hotfessional in Ann Arbor, Michigan with a Shortman Hotfessional awaiting a prescription in Tallahassee, Florida. Does this seem at all strange to you?

Weirdness #2

Mr. Hot brought his radio out to the porch to listen to the Detroit Tigers play the Chicago White Sox. I was supposed to be at last Wednesday’s game, but decided that I didn’t really want to travel waste corporate budget for a baseball game that we were sure to lose. When he sat down and tuned into the station (97.1-The Ticket), he ended up getting KLOV - 89.3 - a Christian radio station from…Winchester, Oregon.

Then he tried to explain radio skip to me. But y’all? Skipping 2,425 miles? Really? Or is someone trying to SAVE Mr. Hot?

And now the not-so-weird.

I went to MomandDad’s today to fix her computer (again) and stole liberated a bag full of old Polaroid pictures. I’ve decided to make Mondays “The Past in Polaroids” - a recurring subject post wherein I will pick a Polaroid at random, scan it in, and tell you a story about the picture. It may Rock! (especially when you get to laugh at the Hotfessional as a 13-year-old) or it may rock (as in sink to the bottom of the ocean).

—- Anyway, check back tomorrow for my first attempt at starting a new weekly feature. —-

Yesterday morning, Mr. Hot woke me up at 7:30. In the morning. On a Saturday. To go run at the track. (You’re either suitably impressed or thinking to yourself, “The Hotfessional has completely lost whatever little bit of sanity she had remaining.”) When we arrived, there was a man walking around with hand weights. We stretched and got ready to do our warm up lap, loving the slight breeze that was blowing.

Then we heard the Walker yelling. And saw him making all kinds of gestures. Pointing and shaking his index finger as if the invisible companion on his left needed straightening out. He was certainly upset, and I feared that he was going to drop dead of apoplexy, or do bodily harm to his partner (wherever that partner’s body was).

This went on for half a lap. Walker was quiet… walking along… but his body language showed continued agitation. Just as we rounded the turn to start running, we heard Walker again go off on his invisible companion. He was gesticulating wildly. Flailing his weight laden arms and shouting, “No, up! Up!”

Mr. Hot and I didn’t know if we should hang back in case we were to, y’know, run over Walker’s partner, or run like the devil was on our heels to get as far away from him as we could. But Walker was between us and the car. And we were only on lap 2.

As we got closer, I heard Mr. Hot whimper, “I’m scared.” I said, “Me, too. But we can take him.” “What about the guy he’s talking to?” We gave each other’s hands a quick squeeze and increased our pace slightly.

With each footfall, we got closer. Walker was still talking. He was still pointing and flapping his hands. It was obvious that whatever he wanted to go “up” was still having problems, but the rest of his words were mumbled and incoherent. Maybe he wouldn’t notice us with his attention focused elsewhere.

I just hoped that if the invisible companion decided to swerve into my lane (or was already in my lane) that I could go through him/her. It would be terrible if all of the ghost stories I’d read were wrong and they were transparent but solid as a brick wall. I could see myself bouncing backwards onto the hard asphalt and scraping up my ass. Which would have been a real shame because y’know, sitting on it to read blogs and drink vodka all weekend would be fuckin’ painful.

Closer. A glimpse at Mr. Hot. He lifted up his chin, whispered, “Let’s go” and kicked it up another notch. I nodded slightly. Closer. Oh mah holy hell y’all.

Closer. I adjusted my ballcap and vowed to keep my eyes straight ahead.

Closer. Deep breath and……

……then, of course, we saw it.

The bluetooth stuck in Walker’s ear.

—- This is why we should leave our glasses on when we run. —-

Oh mah holy hell y’all.

6:50 a.m. - Something is going “beeeeeep beeeeeep beeeeeep” in my ear. I crack my eyes open and reach for the alarm. Silly me, I committed to go to the track to run with Mr. Hot. What the fuck was I thinking? I can barely walk before coffee. I’m gonna run? Snort.

8:05 a.m. - Swigging water after our 12 revolutions of the track. Walk on the odd-numbers, run on the evens. We call it “old people’s interval training”. Today, though, we did 3/4 of the way around walking, 1 1/4 running. Yay us! And I never even fell over once! Shit - soccer destroyed my knees and my toes. (And did I mention? No coffee yet.)

8:30 a.m. - Shower. Breakfast. Grab some coffee.

9:00 a.m. - Attend a conference call covering “Career Planning”. Put phone on mute and say sarcastically to the presenter, “I already know what your career plan is for me. The freakin’ unemployment line! Bastard.”

9:50 a.m. - Flip the bird to the phone when the presenter uses that time worn phrase, “We finished early! I’m giving you 10 minutes of your life back!” Apparently we should all kiss his ass. The Hotfessional declines to do so and heads to the bathroom to pee.

9:51 a.m. - Begin working on my mid-year Performance Review. Go to get more coffee and figure out that the pot shut off and it’s lukewarm. Decide I’m too lazy to microwave a cup - and get a bottle of water instead. (Too lazy to microwave a cup of coffee. Obviously the whole running thing scrambled my flippin’ brain.)

10:00 a.m. - 5:45 p.m. - Participate in the Process call from Hell. Manage to get 3 bathroom breaks. Since the asshats decided that I was going to be the presenter, I had to have my laptop screen “shared” the entire time. No blog reading. No email reading. No fuckin’ Twittering. (I missed you!) I did manage, though, to finish the trim on a baby sweater and bonnet that I’m working on. And though I couldn’t tell them all how fucking stupid they were, I did stick my tongue out and make liberal use of my middle finger. On both hands.

5:45 p.m. - Hang up (until we reconvene tomorrow for round 183,276 283 17 4). Eat my ‘dinner’ of brown rice, green beans, and pine nuts. Feel like a squirrel.

6:30 p.m. - Sit on porch with Mr. Hot debating whether his 321 calorie glass of red wine (this is not a wine-glass glass, obviously) or my vodka/limeade (215.5 calories) is more satisfying. Of course, since I’m sure I won’t stop at one…it all depends on who has more willpower.

7:55 p.m. - Decide that I need (NEED) my internets fix and plop down on the couch to write this post.

8:06 p.m. - Remember that I left out a part. And I have to tell you all! Dudes!!!

While I was sitting there (around 5:00) trying not to stab my pen through my right eye (the left one was stabbed around 1:23 p.m. as near as I can tell), a car drove down the street. Light-greenish Subaru wagon with a cargo carrier on the top.

I saw this car yesterday while Mr. Hot was cutting grass. They stopped at the end of the driveway, as his back was turned to the street. I thought maybe they were trying to ask him directions. (Ohhhh, poor lost old people. If I wasn’t up on a phone call, I’d come help you!)

Since he wears earplugs when he cuts grass (and y’know, he was cutting.grass. With a loud.ass.mower), he couldn’t hear them, so they went on up the street. They turned around and went on back down the street. And - they were gone. (Bye bye!)

Sooooooooooo, annnnywayyyy, that was yesterday, right?

Today, the same car comes back! And stops. Right-the-fuck in front of my house! And they start taking pictures! Of the front of the house. Of the driveway. I’m completely dumbfounded by what I’m seeing. Stunned. Silent. (Shush. It does happen.)

Shortman was sitting next to me up in the office. I punch “Mute” on my phone and start pointing. And bouncing. “Get my binoculars, fast.” , I finally get my mouth to start working. (I’m going to take down this ass’s license plate number. WTF? Taking pictures of my house????) “Get ready to write this down.”

I try to follow the back end of this car. I bash my head on the window because of the angle I’m turning my head. The only way I could read the whole plate would be to punch out the screen and crawl onto the roof. Even though I considered it as an option, I figured I’d lose my cover if they came back by. (Or would they not notice a bald woman in a neon green tank top sitting on the roof spying on them?)

I can only get the first three numbers - I think they’re 096. I think it’s a Michigan plate. But then the new Michigan plates have the letters first. So maybe it’s not a Michigan plate. Or my binoculars are cheap…

Or I’m just freakin’ blind.

(I did stab that left eye earlier.)

So the car goes down the street and then turns around and drives REALLY slow back past my house. I have my useless-ass binoculars trained on the car. There’s a giant Lab in the backseat and a giant woman in the passenger side.

Annnnnnnd.

That’s it. They drove away. With pictures of my house!

Y’all? I have to say it again. What the fuck?

—-8:38 p.m. - I can’t figure it out. So I decide to go pour that second drink. Damn. I’m gonna have to run again in the morning. —-

The pretty new washer has been delivered. Funny thing though. After the Sears delivery guys were through carrying out the broken one and carrying in the improved version (and they hooked everything up, too!) - they handed Mr. Hot a bag of bolts.

Really big bolts.

They told him that they were the “stabilizing bolts” that should be used in case we ever need to move Washer Version 2.0.

Move? As in from one house to another? ……………… Huh.

Well fuck a duck and make him quack. No one gave us any bolts when we bought Version 1.0. in 2002. And we moved that sucker twice. Y’know what y’all? The bolts stabilize the washer drum. And it was the washer drum that broke last week. Hmmmmm. Methinks maybe the washer would have lasted longer if someone had given.us.the.stupid.bolts. the first time!

I’m smart that way. Cause and Effect. I see it.

I am not, however, all that intelligent in the way of volunteering for projects. Like the process development team I bitched about here? Last week, while I was in Chicago, I spent 12 hours over two days trapped in a conference room with these people. Face-to-face.

They didn’t even supply coffee or chocolate. Seriously. Like they expected me to be able to think?

We went through this process with a fine toothed comb. Turned it upside down and rightside out. We ripped it to pieces and put it back together. We made it black and white, then gray, then pretty pastel colors. (Puke. I changed it back to gray.)

Today, I got an email invitation to two more meetings with this group. The first is from 10 a-freakin’-m to 6 you’ve-got-to-be-shitting-me p.m. Tomorrow. The next one? Wednesday from 9:30 (yes!!!! in the morning) to 6. AGAIN.

I’m not going to Chicago for those though. I’m going to sit right here in my office (which you can check out at Blissfully Domestic in my “Working from Home” articles - Part 1 and Part 2) with my own coffee and chocolate stash. I’m going to put my phone on mute and make snide comments and rude sounds when someone says something I don’t like. I’ll probably repeatedly (and then again for good measure) flip them the bird.

Cause and effect? Volunteer = Work your ass off and get no chocolate. (for me) Cause and effect for them? Piss off Hotfessional = being blogged about in disparaging manner.

But right this very instant, I’m going to go get ready to meet Sonia Sunshine and Nancy for dinner. We’re going to make Nancy tell us all about BlogHer and hope that she doesn’t fall asleep in her hummus.

—- And if they talk me into it, you may get pictures of me pretending to be Demi Moore. —-