Chili Update: And The Winner Is...

WOOO! My chili was well-received by my colleagues! Though I did not win a ribbon, I did have the 4th highest number of votes.

That was some tough competition, let me tell you. The winner duped us all by LYING and telling us that his chili contained spicy pork sausage and ground beef. We all ooh'ed and aah'ed over the lively flavor of his chili, wondering aloud what ingredients he used to give it its sweetness and tangy zip. Once the winner was announced and Mr. Chili Liar was bedecked in his ribbon, he revealed the truth: that WASN'T sausage and ground beef in the chili.

It was wild boar and venison.

I pantomimed hurling into the nearest trash bin.

"I knew if I told you that it was venison, you wouldn't try it," he explained.

And he was right. We all feared Mr. Chili Liar, aka: Mr. Hunting Man, would try to slip some deer into our food and he knew it. Had we known that deer was in there, none of us would have eaten it. (I'm not all that bothered by the wild boar, as I consider that to be fancy bacon. With tusks.) So lie he did and win he did because venison and wild boar aside, that was some damn good chili.

And Now You're Telling Me You're All Out?

Today is my office's first-ever chili cook-off. The event is our effort to boost morale and give everyone a chance to show off their culinary skills. With everyone working their asses off like they have been, chili and cornbread are deserved.

My role in this, in addition to being a chili-cooker, was to create the awards and decor. Seeing as how we're chillin' in one of our conference rooms, there isn't much one can do about decor. There are only so many solutions one can provide in a room with flourescent lighting and furnished with a marbled formica conference table. But I did my best, ladies and gents, and in an hour my coworkers and I will sit down to 967,421 gallons of chili, 13 batches of cornbread, 6 tubs of sour cream, 37 bags of Tostitos, and 26 bags of cheddar cheese.

Mr. Mystery has already been informed that we are having chili for dinner tonight.

And for breakfast tomorrow.

And for the rest of our lives.

Some photos for you, my lovelies. I have to admit that I am particularly in love with my first, second, and third place ribbons (crafted with love and an ass-load of hot glue), and hope that I win one so that I get to hang it on my office wall and use it to mock the inferior chili-making skills of my colleagues.And here is my chili, contestant #2, all 4 gallons of it. My secret ingredients? Cumin and curry. Oh! And also sage-flavored sausage. No recipe is complete without sausage. Delicioso, mis amigos. Delicioso.

Shows Us What We Are

Greetings, my fine feathered friends. As you may have noticed, things have been rather dull over here in GreenCanary Land. I could give you some great excuses, like the End of the World or Bubonic Plague, but the truth is that I've been lacking creativity. Even now as I type this, I find the words to be coming out a bit mucky and thick, like tar or molasses. Tarlasses, if you will. But once again I started to worry about losing you, my lovelies, and also my lover-ly Kate of South Dakota sent me an email that was the virtual equivalent of a bitch slap delivered by kid gloves. In other words, a loving bitch slap, which I enjoyed more than I should have. Gave me a thrill *wink wink* So here I am, posting a butt-load of crap for your reading non-pleasure.

Hee hee... I said "butt-load of crap." *snort*

So anyhoo, I got all sick and shit and was out of work almost two weeks. Through a thick layer of phlegm and snot, I informed all and sundry that I had Swine Flu. I was pretty certain for I felt downright swine-ish. But the doctor informed me that I did not have Swine Flu. Hell, I didn't even have the REGULAR flu. What ailed me? Sickness. Yep, that was the diagnosis. Sick-to-the-ness. Let me tell you, when you're about to expel your lungs through your mouth by sheer force of will, the last person you want diagnosing you is a doctor with a proclivity for being vague.

So there I was, perched precariously on the papered exam table, working hard to keep my lungs from coughing, my nose from running, my chills from shaking, and my body from fevering, when the perky doctor sing-songed, "Good news! No flu! But you ARE sick."

*crickets chirping*

I waited for her to say something more but nothing else was forthcoming, so I caved and asked, "Whad?" (That's the stuffy nose equivalent of, "What?")

"You're sick," she repeated. "I don't know for certain what it is... maybe it's bacterial, maybe it's viral. You want some antibiotics?"

I politely declined the antibiotics unless, you know, she - THE DOCTOR - thought I needed them.

"Hard to say, hard to say..." she said. "They might work. They might not. You never know until you try, right?"

I had many answers to this question but lacking the will to live, I remained silent.

I took my Sick and went home where I hibernated in my bed for 6 days. On the 7th day I emerged from my bedroom and pretended to be a normal, functioning adult.

The next day I was right back in bed. Damn undiagnosable sickness.

The good news is that I'm now sorta better, though my general tolerance for people's crap is ultra low and my teary-eyed finger is trigger happy. (<-- That's my fancy way of telling you that I keep crying over stupid things, like commercials, The Biggest Loser, clipping Bixby's wings, and bad meetings with my boss. That last one was sort of legitimate in that it wasn't a happy-go-lucky discussion but rather a painful pick-apart of my department's shortcomings, though what she said didn't warrant the waterworks. Those I threw in for free. Because of the Sick. I blame the Sick.)

So there you have it, friends! Me, sick and crazy! Like always! Aren't you glad that you're protected by that there monitor? Goodness knows what sort of germs I could spread should we ever conversate face-to-face. Woo.

Beat Some Crap Out Of It And Demand Some Florida Oranges As Well

Oh lovely people, my lovely lovely people. Mah brain? It is on meltdown. Meltdown, with a capital M. It is convinced that my body is sick and thus is giving me a low-grade fever and an earache when the only thing *actually* wrong with me is that my head-med dosage has been reduced.* The reduction in head-meds has kicked my brain into a crap slump of epic proportions, the solution to which is just to muddle through. If I can make it through the Effexor withdrawals, I can do anything. I'm pretty sure. This will be my litmus test.

*Okay, I wrote that first paragraph days ago. Turns out that the Effexor withdrawal was just a wee part of my sickness. The earache turned into a full-blown ear infection and one of my glands became so swollen that you could actually see it protruding from my neck. I kid you not. It was gross. I regret not taking pictures for your viewing pleasure.

Sadly I must confess that I tried to drag Mr. Mystery into my epicly proportioned meltdown. Many months have gone by since I brought up the B word with him. Really, it's been a long while since I've even THOUGHT about the B word. But then my head went berserk and ran off naked into the fray. Suddenly I was all BABIES and EX-GIRLFRIENDS and DO YOU LOOOOOOOOOVE ME? and man! Can we just say, "C-c-c-crazy?!" because seriously, I went absolutely bonkers.

When my ass finally made its way to Mrs. Lady Doctor, it was tired from all of the self-kicking it had undergone. Because no meltdown is complete without the instaneous REGRET and DAMAGE CONTROL. You lose your mind and are then instantly, "I'M SORRY! I DIDN'T MEAN IT! PLEASE DON'T LEEEEEEEEEEEEEAVE MEEEEEEEEE!" One's ass gets tired from the self-flagellation.

Mrs. Lady Doctor took one look at my baggy, deadpan eyes and asked about my mental state. "Oh, um..." I hedged. "I'm good! Great, even. I'm all PERFECT and HAPPY!" She stared. I repeated, "PERFECT! And HAPPY!" She continued to stare and me until I crumbled under the weight of her gaze. I collapsed into a weepy sopping mess and told her about my naked fraying insanity. I tried to explain the craziness by saying that I was physically sick, that the ear infection was making me nuts, that the penicillan was the cause of my lunacy. I hem'ed and haw'ed until I had talked myself full circle and was forced to admit that my mental state was not the cause of therapeutic mold, but rather the lack of an anti-depressant. "God dammit," I muttered.

I God dammit'ed because here's the thing: I don't want to take anti-depressants to function normally. In the same way, I don't want to need an allergy medication to pet my cat. Or iron supplements because I'm iron deficient. I want to function optimally in an unaltered, unmedicated state. P.S. For me? This is impossible.

Upon receiving Mrs. Lady Doctor's call, the Harvard-Educated Psychiatrist put my medication dosage back to normal and things seem to be righting themselves. I haven't cried today, which I take to be a positive sign. I don't know if I'm completely back to normal because Mr. Mystery has been in Kansas so I haven't had the opportunity to go hog-wild crazy on his cute lil' tush. If upon his return I throw myself into his arms in glorious, rapturous adoration, we'll know I'm okay. If instead I slap him and demand that he procreate, we'll know that there's still some work to be done.

Only time will tell. Stay tuned.

My Heart is a Gypsy

So I started sleuthing around, all Nancy Drew-like. And what was I investigating, you, my lovely lovelies, ask? Why, my newest blog follower, of course. I couldn't help but be tickled by the names of his blogs. I am neither hot nor gay, so I rather enjoy having some hot gayness infused into my blog. Since I can't do that hot gay infusing myself, I gladly accept the hot gayness infusing from others. That being said, I got to sleuthing.

I clicked on the hot gayness and what did I discover? Girls. In compromising (and drafty) positions, performing various acts that are, by and large, hetero. Sure, there's an occasional lesbian kiss or canoodle, but not so much as to account for the DAILY in the name of Follower 15's blog.

Confused, I IM'ed Mr. Mystery: "One of my blog followers is a porn site. What does that say about me?" He answered kindly, "That you've got great bosoms?" (Only he didn't use the word bosoms.)

"But how would they know that?" I asked, wordlessly accepting Mr. Mystery's praise of my bosoms. He loquaciously replied, "Dunno."

"But is it weird that a porn site is my blog friend?" I continued, totally caught up in the fact that words like "twat" and "cum" are now forever tied to my virginally pure blog.

"Maybe they (meaning Hot Gayness) followed you home for the same reason I did: you're cute."

Aw. How sweet is that? My boyfriend told me that my cuteness (and great bosoms) caused a rathy extensive catalog of amateur porn to follow and befriend me. If that's not a compliment, then I don't know what is.

But questions remain. First, where is all of the daily hot gayness? There was barely enough gay to last a week, nevermind daily. Your blog is a misnomer, my newest blog follower. Second, are you even a real person? The suggestion has been made that you are, perhaps, a spam bot, sent here from the depths of outer space to glean page views from my readers. If this is true, oh evil spam bot, I hereby banish you from my blog. Begone! And you, my lovely readers, steer clear of Follower 15 and his blogs. Thou shalt not give fuel to the spam bot's fire and move him up Google's hit list.

But if you are a real person, Follower 15, then tell me this: how did you come about finding me, lil' ol' GreenCanary, in the great expanse of the Internets? Was it my love of the movie Striptease that enticed you? Or perhaps my lust for Cate Blanchett? Or maybe you were wrangled by my obsession with Willy Wonka, as performed by Gene Wilder. Because I know it isn't my off-key singing voice or poorly formed poetry that captured your fancy.

Porn follows my blog. I am followed by porn. I really don't know what to think about that. So for the time being, until answers are offered, I choose to believe it's because I'm sporting an impressive rack.

Fin.

The Cockroaches of the Ocean

A-goggling the shrimp at the Marian Koshland Science Museum of the National Academies. In addition to the a-goggling, you can also hypothetically kill hundreds of thousands of hypothetical patients who have hypothetically been infected with the hypothetical flu. Hypothetically, I enjoyed that part immensely.

Hopeful Analogies and Handsome, Dubious Eggs

My Evil Twin has been at it again, out and about wreaking havoc in her doppelgangerly world. I know this because her antics have spilled over into my Actual Life in the form of a super hot man that has asked to be my friend on Facebook.

It's not abnormal to get the random Friend Requests on Facebook. There are some people who troll around, looking for strangers that share some weak thread of commonality, and then ask them to be Friends. I've gotten these before and I've always responded to their request with this question, "Do I know you?"

Often they'll respond by saying, no, they don't actually know me, but they were looking for people in the D.C. metro that work in marketing and - lo and behold! - I came up in their list and did I know that they work in marketing too? Because we both work in the same industry we should be Friends and hold hands and braid eachother's hair!

No thank you, weird stalkery stranger-who-works-in-marketing. I have a hard enough time keeping tabs on my flesh-and-blood friends, the ones that have held back my hair from my vomiting mouth when I drank too much, and who held my hand when my heart got broken, or who have loaned me money when I overdrew my checking account. I have a PAST with these people and I still can't keep on top of the relationship. So Mr. Unknown Person on Facebook? I'll have to decline your Request because I DON'T KNOW YOU.

Also, your Request smacks of desperation and I don't do desperate.

But then the other day I got a Friend Request from some man with a strong Italian name and whose profile picture showed a chiseled body that belonged on a professional soccer field. Me-ow. After a moment of drooling and silent contemplation, I sent my standard response, "Do I know you?"

And instead of getting back a, "No, we don't actually *know* eachother but both of our last names end in an 'r' so we should be Friends," I got back this: "Yes, we met in the supermarket. Do you not remember?"

Uh... no. I do not remember.

Now people, let's be honest here, I may not have the best memory in the world but HOT DAMN! I WOULD have remembered Mr. Italian Soccer Player had we met in a supermarket. Most certainly. Which makes me think that he has me confused with someone else. Perhaps my Evil Twin. And if this is the case?...

...GOOD JOB, EVIL TWIN. You have my blessing. Please let me know how that works out for you. In detail.

How Truly Great Thoughts Are Created - Friday

PEOPLE, I wrote this entire post about my obsession with the Crownsville Hospital Center and then accidentally deleted it. I DELETED IT. How annoyed at myself am I? Super annoyed, that's how annoyed I am.

So here's the deal without any fanfare: I trespassed onto the grounds of the abandoned Crownsville Hospital Center so that I could get a better look at the dilapidated barn on their grounds. Here are pictures of that barn.

I said it much better before. I really did. It was a Pulitzer-worthy post. Deleted.

How Truly Great Thoughts Are Created - Sunday

It may come as a surprise that I do not like the National Zoo. And when I say "do not like," I really mean "hate with a passion that burns like a urinary tract infection." This hatred stems from two things. First, the National Zoo is built on the world's biggest hill - bigger even than Everest - which seems to run uphill in both directions. No matter where you're going, uphill or down, you're walking up a hellish hill, your calves are burning, your lungs are burning, your ire is burning and you find yourself willing to trade your urinary tract for some relief from the wretched National Zoo hill.

Second reason I hate the zoo: fences.

An animal lover like I am, one would think that the animal proximity the zoo affords would have me all a-dither. But this is just not the case. The animal proximity at the zoo is not enough for me. If I'm going to stand at a railing placed high on a hill, overlooking a trench filled with water and separated by electric fencing, across from which is another hill upon which is a cheetah, then I might as well be on that "another hill" a-pettin' the cheetah. As the crow flies, that cheetah is a mere 15' from me. I mean, seriously, when we're talking about a measly 15' of separation, who wants to look at a cheetah when petting said cheetah would be ever so much better?

My intense dislike of the zoo has kept Mr. Mystery and I from going there. He has suggested it several times throughout our one-year relationship, each time eliciting the following response from me, "What?! NO! Gah! The zoo sucks. I freakin' hate the zoo."

So how is it that we wound up there this Sunday? Walking uphill both ways? We ended up there because Mr. Mystery is a clever one and suggested we go to the children's petting zoo, after which we would go grab some lunch. Petting? I can PET the animals? And lunch? I can eat? SOLD. And away we went.

Turns out that there wasn't so much petting as there was standing behind fences and looking, but one tubby goat made it all worthwhile by coming close to the fence and allowing me to rub his goaty head with my excited fingers. That one goat was the catalyst for my willingness to troop throughout the rest of the zoo, hills be damned.

I'm proud to report that I only complained a little bit, and only got rude once or twice, and only once threatened to murder a stranger's hyperactive child. Fine fine, you got me. That last one was a lie. I threatened that woman's child twice, but in my defense it was the end of the day and I was super hungry and tired and the kid really was annoying the shit out of me AND being mean to the animals so he deserved it.

And then Mr. Mystery took me out to dinner and I ate my bodyweight in bread. The end.

How Truly Great Thoughts Are Created - Saturday

This weekend, Mr. Mystery and I rambled about D.C., taking in the sights and sounds of a city poised on the precipice of Fall.