I drank nothing but juice all weekend and didn't kill anybody. Yeah!

So I decided to try something.  A cleanse.  A cleanse of body and closet.

It was the perfect time, really.  The Princess was going to be with her dad all weekend.  I could lock myself away for a couple of days and see what happened.

Cleanse of body, you ask.  How would one do that?

JUICE!

Notice the kick-ass bendy straw.  

Yes, juice.  All juice.  Nothing but juice.  All weekend.

And not just any juice.  Juice with veggies and fruit and nuts other shit I'd just rather not know about.

About a week ago, as I lay on my couch with a box of Cheese Nips and a glass of wine, I decided that I needed to kick start some healthier living.  So I did some research online, ordered the Blueprint Cleanse for Friday delivery, poured another glass of wine and toasted my impending healthiness.

On Friday, I locked myself in and started.

The idea is that you get 6 juices to drink over the course of the day.  Just juice.  No food.  This gives your digestive system a chance to take a break and eventually curbs your craving for processed carbs and Cheese Nips.  Or that's the theory.

(I should note here that the Blueprint Cleanse people don't actually claim to curb cravings for Cheese Nips.  That's a claim that is just so fantastic that the FDA would most certainly want to regulate their juice as a drug.)

I also decided that this was also the perfect opportunity to cleanse my overstuffed closet.

My non-scientific findings...

Oh, who am I kidding.  I've got nothing interesting to write about.  I drank juice, I was a bitch to anybody who dared call me, I lost a few pounds, I tried to bribe a friend to bring me a steak, I took five bags of stuff to Goodwill and I found a Marc Jacobs bag in the back of my closet that I forgot about.

Also, I am happy to report that I have been back on solid-ish food for a whole day and have not yet had a Cheese Nip.

I give it a week.

Perfect attendance needs to die a sad, lonely, horrible, painful death

Perfect attendance sucks ass.

The Princess has perfect attendance.  Every day that school has been in session this year, the Princess has been in the classroom at her desk.

There have been mornings that she's felt horrible.  Every time I have asked her "Baby, do you want to stay home?" and every time she has said "No, Mommy, it would ruin my perfect attendance."  And so off to school she would go.

She was so proud of this achievement.  As we got closer and closer to the end of the year, she got more excited.  School ends on June 11th.  The last day is almost here.  And she will have PERFECT ATTENDANCE.

Or at least she thought she had perfect attendance.  And I thought she had perfect attendance. 

Turns out that perfect attendance is a slippery bitch.

The Ex stopped into the Principal's office today to find out if taking the Princess out of school an hour early tomorrow would affect her perfect attendance.  And the Principal said "She doesn't have perfect attendance."

Wha?

It turns out that because she was tardy a few times - on those mornings when she was dragging and not feeling well - she will be denied her perfect attendance.  She walked into the classroom 2 minutes after the bell rang and it was over.  She dragged her tired sick self to school and the FUCKING SCHOOL GOT PAID it's fucking 'per student per day' amount from the state the minute she showed up.  But because she was moving a little slow...no award, no certificate, no recognition.

We had to break the news to her today.  And she cried.  And my heart broke for her.

And now she's just sad.

And I'm just all kinds of hate right now.

PERFECT ATTENDANCE SHOULD DIE!

It is an unattainable standard that cannot POSSIBLY be met by anybody that isn't completely anal and inhuman.

I did a little digging on the school district's website to find out where it actually SAYS what this "perfect attendance" thing means.  It's not there.  BUT I did find out that if the Ex or I were to die in a horrible fiery airplane crash, the Princess would be allowed one excused absence day to attend the funeral.

One day.  Seriously.  I can't make this shit up.

Fuck it.  Next year I'm taking her out of school for a week to go to Disneyland.  And they can stick their truancy letter where the sun don't shine.

Fun and Phlegm

So what does one do when one is sick in bed for 3 days?

Here's a list of what I did.  Feel free to poach these ideas for yourself the next time you're sick...

• Sleep
• Create a Facebook page for your blog and then realize that that's just silly because only, like, 3 people know you have a blog - so really, what's the point
• Read 153 pages of a new book
• Realize Bloomingdales is having a huge shoe sale online and buy two pairs (and immediately realize that you loved those 2 pairs because they are identical to 2 pairs that you already own)
• Watch Season 5 of "Weeds"
• Give in to book whoredom and buy 2 Kindle books off of Amazon
• Immediately ditch previous half-finished book in favor of new Kindle book
• Watch "Avatar" - twice
• Try to lick elbow
• Watch at least 15 hours of back-to-back Law and Order episodes
• Sleep
• Think about brushing teeth but don't actually do it
• Read a few blogs
• Comment on said blogs
• Realize that your comments are incoherent but don't care
• Go back to sleep
• Check TMZ hourly to see if Lindsay has been arrested yet
• Realize the Princess is now sick and drag sad tired sick ass out of bed to take care of her

The Princess and I are now kind of back on our respective feet.  Leaving the darkness of the sick den this morning and walking outside into the sun for the first time in 3 days was a bit harsh...

We've spent most of the evening coughing at each other.  I have better quality of tone, but she can produce more phlegm...so she wins.

I'm going to go work on my phlegm.

Jane sick

Jane feel like somebody stabbing her throat with sharp knives.  Jane also delirious and talk in third person.

Milwaukee must be responsible.

Jane be back soon.

Random observations from Milwaukee

So I've just returned from a mildly interesting 3-day stay in Milwaukee.  And to tell you the truth, I'm not sure I know much more about it now than I did before I left.

Here are the highlights...

Milwaukee is a beautiful, bleak, sad place with great people and some fabulous buildings...

...and some buildings with lonely trees on top of them...

...and some buildings that are being attacked by large insects.

It has large wieners...

No. 3 has either just been kicked in his sausage delicates or really has to pee

...and some of the coolest freakin' jewelry I've seen in a long time!

All cut glass.  The colors are gorgeous but hard to see here.

I got a little carried away.  I had to buy some for BFFFFF K too. (I have a matching pair that didn't make it into the picture.)

We stayed at the Pfister Hotel, which is over 100 years old and rumored to be haunted.  Frankly, I was more concerned about the giant ladybugs down the street than the ghosts.

The Boy was suffering from a sinus infection all weekend and I got to enjoy several hours each day watching him try to 'pop' his ears.  Those are some fun faces, let me tell you.  Total turn on.

The Boy's sexy face.

I didn't come across any brown sauce.  Very disappointing.

I waved across the water in the general direction of RN Mama and gave Cathy a mental shout-out for telling me where to go (Third Ward is kinda small and awesome!).  

I left Sunday morning, but ended up spending another 4 hours at the airport bar because AirTran sucks ass.

I can now officially check Miller Park off of my stadium list and Milwaukee off of my "cities I never wanted to visit but went to anyway" list.  

All in all - a successful trip.

Super excited about putting brown sauce on my dog

I'm getting my bag ready for my trip to Milwaukee or Minnesota tomorrow.  Now that I know some stuff about Milwaukee and/or Minnesota, I'm pretty excited.

Here's what I've learned so far...

• Milwaukee may be near Canada.  We are still unclear as to whether or not Canada is a state.
• Milwaukee has many drinking establishments and cheese.  I'm not sure if you can actually drink cheese at said drinking establishments.
• There is water.
• There is an art museum and, therefore, "culture".  I think the art museum just houses the city's beer can collection.
• Milwaukee is clearly not the Morman place because it has booze and caffeine and its not warm enough to ride a bike year round.
• It's cold.
• Milwaukee has brown sauce.  Nobody really knows what brown sauce is but I'm told that people put it on their dogs.  I am assuming that this means hot dogs, but, given the part of the country that we're talking about, that may be an incorrect assumption.
• Milwaukee Ale House is THE place to go for booze, cheese and brown sauce.
• FabuLeslie wants to marry her cheese.  Don't judge.  Frankly, I think that she and her cheese will have to settle for a civil union.

Milwaukee = phallic meat, cheese and beer in elf cups.  Fabulous!

Candice - this sausage is totally your chainsaw dude

I'm ready!  I'll let you know what I find up there and if all of you are just full of shit.

On a completely unrelated note...

I have been totally delinquent in thanking somebody.  Elle over at "A" for Effort ("B" for Blog) graciously tried to give me an award a week or so ago.  I'm not really an award-y person, but I love Elle for doing it anyway and for saying that she was still cool if I didn't 'do' awards.  Thanks Elle!  Go check her out.  She's way sweet and has some very interesting stories to tell.

On another completely unrelated note...

C Bellabell has come up with an really interesting idea.  She has started a blog called "Dawn to Dusk: a day in the life".  The concept of this blog is for you to submit an accounting of one day in your life.  Through this site, you will be able to live a day in somebody else's shoes, somebody in a different culture, in a different income level, with a different job, with kids, without kids, and so on.  Given the breadth of bloggers and blogger experiences out there, I think this idea is fantastic and I can't wait to see how it develops.  For guidelines and instructions on how to submit, go to Dawn to Dusk.  And to top it all off, Cbella is donating all profits to Habitat for Humanity.

See you in Milwaukee...or Minnesota!

I'm kinda here, but I'm kinda not and will somebody please tell me where the hell Milwaukee is

I've been completely scattered.  The Princess is camping with her 5th grade class for the week - all week.  I ran into a friend yesterday and, in response to her comment that I looked stressed, happened to mention this whole camping thing and that I wouldn't be able to talk to my child all week and I was completely crazed by this concept.  This woman, who has 3 kids, looked at me like I was nuts, shrugged her shoulders and said "lucky".

I'm still scattered, but now at least I'm laughing and scattered.

Oh, yes...laughing.  I can't promise you anything like actual laugh-type sounds, but the Lafflady is letting me hang out with her on Tuesday at Laugh Out Loud.

Come say Hi...or not.  At least come say Hi to the Lafflady and read all the other posts.  They're funny. 

What was I talking about?

Oh, yes...Milwaukee.

So, since the Princess was going to be gone this week, the Boy said "Why don't you come see me in Milwaukee?" and I said "Say again?".

I thought about it and thought about it and decided what the hell, I'd never been to Minnesota.  

I leave on Thursday.  

Funny thing...when I told the Boy I had booked my trip to Minnesota, he said "You're coming to MILWAUKEE, right?!"

Of course, I said...Minnesota.

(It's a place that starts with "M" in the midwest...close enough.)

Regardless of where I end up on Thursday, I still don't know much of anything about this Milwaukee place.  Here is the extent of my knowledge on the subject:

• Laverne and Shirley live there.
• They make beer.
• Wayne and Garth went to see Alice Cooper there and Alice Cooper told them that "Milwaukee" is Algonquin for "the good land".
• They have baseball games.
• There are giant running sausages.

That's pretty much it.

A little help here...anything to add?

Oh yah, and go see the Lafflady.

To the Princess (warning: this is a snark free post)

Yesterday was the Princess's 11th Birthday.

When she was born - she cried.  And then she cried some more.  For 12 months this child cried.  I would walk in circles holding her in my arms while she cried and then I cried.  When I would try to put her down, she would cry louder.  The only time she stopped crying was when she was in the car.  She would sleep until the car would stop and start crying again.  I had to drop her off at daycare for the first time when she was only 6 weeks old.  I had no choice.  I left to the agonizing sound of her crying, ran back to my car and bawled.  And then I realized that I had forgotten to take in her diaper bag, so I had to go BACK into the daycare and torture us both all over again.  She had stopped crying - I had not.

When she was one - she stopped crying and started laughing.  This child had the world's greatest baby belly laugh and I would do just about anything to hear it.  She took her time learning to walk, but as I've learned over the years, she doesn't do anything until she is damn well good and ready to do it.  And when she decided to walk - she ran instead.

When she was two - she glided through the terribles with finesse and spitfire.  Her father and I were pretty much scared to death of this bundle of attitude.  It was during this time that we moved from Tennessee to Indianapolis.  We had a second story apartment, a toddler and a dog.  The Princess adjusted much better than the dog, and eventually the terribles were a thing of the past.

When she was three - we built a house in the burbs of Indianapolis and she discovered the joys of grass and swingsets and playing with chalk on concrete.

When she was four - she had a Princess and Pirate themed birthday party and she learned how to ride a bike.

When she was five - she started kindergarten.  The bus picked her up right at the end of our driveway, and I struggled to keep it together.  She wasn't afraid at all.  She loved every second.

When she was six - I was offered a job in California that could not be passed up.  I moved to California in February and went back and forth to Indy until she finished school in June.  We moved into a small cute rental home on a waterway.  The Princess loved California and the ducks who liked to hang out in our back yard.  She missed her friends at home but looked at it all as an adventure and never asked "why".

When she was seven - she warily started a new school and glided without incident through the 3rd grade.  And then her parents separated and divorced.  And her father moved to another state, that was nearby but still faraway.  I had to move out of the small cute house on the water and into an apartment on the other side of town.  The Princess was sad.  She asked a lot of difficult questions.  I never knew whether she accepted my answers, but she seemed satisfied.  There were several times when she would take my hand in hers and tell me to not be sad.

When she was eight - she started 4th grade in yet another new school (her 3rd in 3 years - my across-town move disqualified her from attending her old school).  She was terrified of once again being the 'new girl', but she gritted her teeth and did it.  She made friends.  She liked the new school.  She was tougher than she thought.  She also met the Boy for the first time.  We had been dating for months, but I wanted to wait until I was sure that he wasn't going anywhere before introducing her to him.  So one night, when his team was in town, I took her to a Giant's game and then took her down to the field where the Boy was throwing.  He came right over to her and gave her baseball.  Since he was in the team uniform, all the other kids were crazy jealous and looked at her like "what the hell?".  She sensed that she had just received special treatment and smiled shyly, said thank you, and nervously inched behind me.  After the game, I took her downstairs to see the Boy again.  He immediately realized her discomfort with the scale of the things around her.  He got on his knees in front of her and explained that the job that he had was nothing compared with the job that her daddy had, and he hoped to do something as important as her daddy did some day.  She smiled and they've been best buds ever since.

When she was nine - she heard some of her school friends making fun of a new girl at school and immediately shot them down with a "it's harder than it looks".  She invited the new girl to play tether ball with her during recess.  She began to hate the fact that she had to fly to see her father every other weekend.  She loved spending the summers with him but hated that she couldn't play team sports at all because of the custody schedule.  She started to look forward to the trips that we would take to see the Boy 'at work'.  Early in the spring of that year, I took her to New York and then Philadelphia.  The Boy arranged for both team mascots to surprise her in the stands.  This is just one of the many many reasons that we both love the Boy.

When she was ten - she started to give me glimpses of the teenager to come, and not all of it was bad.  There are the hormones and the temper.  There are the snarky text messages and the slamming of the bedroom door.  There is also the sweetness.  The handmade gifts.  The breakfast in bed she brought me this morning.  The insatiable need for knowledge.  The never-ending stream of questions.  The moments when she puts her head on my shoulder.

My 11-year old ham in San Francisco yesterday

Happy Birthday Princess.  I can't wait to see what's next.

Why yes, my 10-year old WOULD like a beer can necklace...thank you!

So yesterday was Cinco de Mayo.  The Princess had been doing Mexican-type things at school all day to celebrate (like learning how to carry identification papers and stuff like that), so when I went to pick her up, I thought it might be nice to take her out for dinner at the local Mexican restaurant/chain.

It was only 5:30.  "It's early", I thought..."we'll get in and get out before the party crowd shows up."

And I could get myself the "margarita as big as your head" that this place was known for.  Bonus.

There were still parking spots and we were seated right away and it was mostly families.  The revelers weren't there yet.  I'm a genius.

We order and we're just sitting and chatting about school when all of a sudden the Princess spouts off with an "OMG"  (no, not "Oh My God"...literally "O-M-G"), at which point I start looking around for our waiter because I think maybe she's just commenting on the size of the margarita I've just ordered.

She takes off across the restaurant and disappears for a few moments.  When she comes back, she's grinning from ear-to-ear and wearing some shiny gold beads.

"Look what they're giving away, Mommy!"

"Oh, cool.  Let me see."

She hands me the beads and I realize that I have failed to notice the blinking LED Corona beer bottle dangling from said beads.

"Wow.  That's entirely inappropriate."

"What is Mommy?"

"The beer bottle hanging from your neck, sweetie."

"But I like it!"

Before I can utter another word, she has darted back across the restaurant and disappeared again.  Thankfully, my ginormous margarita shows up and I nervously begin shoving chips down my throat.

It's during this pause that I start to look around.  And I notice now that there are indeed many families there in this Mexican restaurant enjoying Cinco de Mayo.  And I notice that their children are ALL wearing gold beads with blinky Corona bottles around their necks.  Teenagers, toddlers, tweens, babies...all of them.

Trippy.

I'm not quite sure this is what the Corona company had in mind when they sent their giveaways to the Mexican restaurants to distribute on Cinco de Mayo.  Or maybe they did.  Start 'em early!

At this point, the Princess reappears with a gift for me and I become the proud owner of a Dos Equis laser key chain, which when pointed in just the right light at just the right angle, shows a "XX" logo...kinda like the Bat Signal.  For my own sanity, I'm assuming that the "XX" stands for Dos Equis and not X-rated.

She's so excited about how cool this keychain thing is that she goes back and grabs one for herself.  I guess because she has super-secret invisible keys that need chaining.

I'm not really taking breaths between margarita sips now.  Chips are forgotten.  Straw in mouth, I'm internally debating my obligation to be a good parent and take this beer-labeled crap away or just let it go.  Or keep if for myself.

I compromise and tell her she can keep the beads as long as she doesn't wear them.  I'm starting to dig the keychain.  The "XX" is a lot funnier after half a ginormous margarita.

The restaurant host stops by our table.  "How is everything?"

"It's good, fine...everything is peachy."

And then he grins stupidly and hands us an "XX" branded maraca and something called a castania drum - also Dos Equis branded.

The Princess is ecstatic and immediately starts up with her own double-fisted percussion section.

Every kid in the place looks at her enviously and the stampede to the host begins.

I am now the proud owner of one string of gold beads with a blinky Corona, two laser "XX" keychains, one "XX" maraca (which the dog HATES) and a Dos Equis drum thingy (also not popular with the dog).

Yes, I know...the irony of "This is not a Toy" sticker has not gone unnoticed

I should know better than to try to do something wholesome on Cinco de Mayo.  It's like trying to take your kid to Vegas without running into hookers (I have a story about that too...don't judge).

Ironic headline of the week: Porn star f**ks the Ritz-Carlton

The Ritz-Carlton is horrified that it is in the news this week, and all because of a porn star.  Ironic, no?

Poor Ritz-Carlton.  They try so hard to distance themselves from the unsavory elements of proper society only to end up face-to-face with scorned porn star hate.

According to the New York Daily News and TMZ, Ms. Josyln James - porn star extraordinaire and ex-Tiger Woods mistress - traveled from LA to Charlotte for an appearance at a local strip club.  When she tried to check-in to the Ritz-Carlton in Charlotte, she was told essentially that there was "no room at the inn" and "oops, we cancelled your reservation but only because you're a media-whoring tramp".

Ms. James was PISSED and immediately called her attorney (because this is what everybody does when their hotel reservation doesn't work out...right?).

Ms. James' attorney, Gloria Allred, who has made her name of late as the "Tramps 'R Us" attorney (motto: You screw 'em and then I will!), quickly fired off a very business-like, official-looking letter to the Ritz-Carlton in the defense of her poor tired bedraggled porn star client - and then leaked it to TMZ...

Real letter...(with commentary, of course)...

*****

David Rothwell
General Manager
The Ritz-Carlton, Charlotte
201 East Trade Street
Charlotte, NC 28202
David.Rothwell@ritzcarlton.com (in case you want to email your love and supportive comments)

Dear Mr. Rothwell,

I represent Veronica Siwik-Daniels aka Joslyn James (I think she should've stuck with "Veronica").  It has come to my attention (i.e. she was screaming at my assistant on the phone) that a reservation was made several weeks ago for Ms. James to stay at The Ritz-Carlton, Charlotte, North Carolina for April 29, April 30 and May 1, 2010.

Ms. James is a well known celebrity (celebrity?) who was scheduled to appear and perform at a local nightclub (strip club) during her stay in Charlotte.  At the time that the reservation was made, the booking agent (part-time strip club manager) informed your staff that Ms. James was a high profile guest (is notorious the same as high profile?) and provided her name to your hotel in order to be sure that appropriate security (to protect her from screaming fans?) would be provided at the Ritz-Carlton, Charlotte, N.C.

(This is where I speculate what happened.  The strip club manager says to the Ritz "um, a Ms. Josyln James needs a reservation" and the Ritz says "ok" and the strip club manager says "she'll be needing 'security'" and the Ritz says "ok, yah, whatever" and then the conversation is over.  THEN for shits and giggles, the Ritz googles this Josyln James person and says "OH HELL NO".  Anyway...)

Ms. James is aware of the high-standards of the Ritz-Carlton (does she know that they won't show any of her porn?) and was very much looking forward to her stay (this is relevant...because...?).  She knew that by staying at the Ritz she would be able to experience the service and quality of hospitality that would help to prepare her for her performance (booze from room service, complimentary lotions, Disney channel).  Unfortunately, however, after a long and tiring journey from Los Angeles, Ms. James was shocked (SHOCKED!) to learn when she arrived at the airport in Charlotte that her reservations had been cancelled (shit...she didn't even have to go all the way to the hotel).  Alternative arrangements to stay elsewhere had to be made quickly (there's a Travel Lodge down the road, sister).  While this was disturbing (happens to us little people all the time - shrug), even more troublesome appeared to be the reason for the cancellation.

Your staff indicated that the reason for the cancellation was that she was a high profile guest (i.e. fame-whoring slut) and they were concerned about media attention (we have the text (Joslyn texts?  Get OUT!  Oh yah...) from your staff that proves this).  This made no sense, because we know that other high profile guests have been welcome at the Ritz-Carlton in the past.

(This is my favorite part.)

For example, I am a high profile lawyer (Oh Gloria, stop it!) who has stayed at the Ritz-Carlton (Bachelor Gulch) and I was permitted to do television interviews for the Today Show and other television shows inside the Ritz-Carlton, when I was a guest there.  (But Gloria...you're only a media whore...not a real whore.)

Our concern as to the real reason for the cancellation was heightened when we later (realized that we could get some free press?) learned that Tiger Woods was in Charlotte, N.C. and might (might?...lawyers never ever use the word "might") have been staying at the Ritz-Carlton, Charlotte, N.C. for the same weekend that Ms. James planned to be there.  The issue of whether or not Mr. Woods was staying at the Ritz was reportedly mentioned on the radio (96.1 The Beat) (so it MUST be true!).  As a result we are now forced to ask the question, "Was Josyln James cancelled at the Ritz-Carlton, because Tiger Woods was staying there or was expected to arrive?"  (Say it ain't so Ritz...)

If so, we are appalled to think that you might have chosen to accommodate a rich, famous golfer who admitted lying to his wife, his fans, his business associates and others over a woman whose (this is my second favorite part) heart he has broken, and whose only fault is that she fell madly in love with Tiger Woods. (It seems to me, again, that these are all words that should never EVER be used in a letter from an attorney.)

We believe that Joslyn is owed an explanation for this cancellation of a reservation.  (Explanation - Yo Biatch, the Ritz didn't want to be associated with you!)

No guest or potential guest deserves to be treated in this thoughtless manner.  If in fact you were trying to protect Mr. Woods, I have to question your decision.  As a now infamous golfer (as opposed to your now infamous porn star client?) who has been involved in scandal for many months, Mr. Woods certainly must have adequate security to protect himself (but apparently no condoms).  Also, Ms. James has no desire to see, speak to or be in the presence of the man who has deliberately hurt her in the way that Mr. Woods has (i.e. from heavy spanking).

On her behalf, I respectfully request that the Ritz-Carlton conduct a thorough investigation of this regrettable incident, and at it's conclusion we look forward to an appropriate remedy.  (Just send her some goddamn pens and maybe show her movies on pay-per-view.  Yeesh.)

Very truly yours,

Gloria Allred

*****

Actually, the only one that I'm judging in this whole incident is not the Ritz, or even Ms. James (who can strip or do porn or sell her story or release private text messages for fame to her heart's content...whatever).

The only real revelation here is that GLORIA ALLRED WRITES LIKE SHIT!  

WTF?!

Why it's really too bad that apartments don't have fences

I have an apartment that faces the San Francisco Bay.

If you step out onto my mini-balcony you can see this...

And this...

If you stand on your tippy-toes, you can see real live water!

But these are not the only views that I have.

"Get OUT, Jane!"...I'm sure you are saying right now.  "How could it get any better than that?!"

Well, if you stand on my mini-balcony and look down, you can also see this...

I have a mini-feud going with the woman in the apartment underneath me, of which this poop thing may or may not be a part.  I haven't quite figured out if there is bitchy passive-aggressive poop intent or whether it can all be attributed to sheer laziness.

Some background is required here...

When I moved in to this complex almost three years ago, the Princess was eight.  As many of you may know, eight-year olds, as a rule, don't walk anywhere - they run, gallop, skip, prance and cartwheel.  Within the first month of our being in this apartment, the woman below us had called the police on us TWICE for, get this, "running noises".

Let me add that the alleged running noises were reported at approximately 7:00 in the evening each time.  Prime after-dinner cartwheel time.

Each time a sheepish-looking police officer would show up at my door and explain the reason for his being there.  I, in turn, would explain that eight-year olds RUN and what would he, exactly, like me to do about this.  Never having a good answer to this question, he would blush and look totally embarrassed and mumble something to the effect of "maybe ask her to slow down?".

Both times, the Princess cowered behind me and was traumatized by the fact that the police had shown up at her apartment because, in her eight-year old mind, she had done something bad.

I'm a single-girl, so I don't generally go pounding on stranger's doors - but trust me when I say that I would have gone down there in a heartbeat with my pink baseball bat in hand if I didn't think that she would've immediately called the police on me.

After the second time, I went and had a long discussion with the complex manager about the rules surrounding noise restrictions and what exactly the concept of 'harassment' might look like.

In turn, the complex manager sent a very nice "yah, um, please shut the hell up because you're ALLOWED to run around your apartment as long as it's before 10:00" letter to the woman downstairs.

Turns out that the Princess and I can make as much damn noise as we please before 10:00 pm!  She can practice her violin or pound on the piano (which I am VERY supportive of - in the interest of artistic development, of course) and I can hold happy hour parties and fart loudly out the window if I am so inclined and it's before 10:00.

I haven't heard from her since.

So what, you ask, does this have to do with poop on the patio?

Well, it also turns out the woman downstairs has a very large dog who makes very large poop and she rarely takes this big power-pooping dog outside.

So it just shits all over her balcony.  This somewhat distracts from my pretty view.

I happened to mention this in passing to my leasing office buddy the other day.  He laughed and told me that, with all the rain we'd been having lately, the dog shit on this woman's balcony had drifted to the drain in the balcony and clogged it up.  So all of the rain water and dog poop, having nowhere else to go, flooded into her apartment.

Ah, karma.

Technorati is not speaking to me. A drama.

So last weekend, I explained how I was getting uncontrolled spam from Technorati to the tune of one email every 2 minutes for 3 days.

I posted my plea to Technorati to please stop sending me love spam on their "support" site which actually is only sort of associated with Technorati and is ironically called GetSatisfaction.com.

I would like to wrap up this little relationship melodrama by reporting that, alas, Technorati is giving me the silent treatment and behaving like a scorned ex-lover.

I've had some time to think through the tragic end to our relationship now and I think I know what happened.

OK...so after my first plea on GetSatisfaction.com, a girl tech-y type person, who goes by the name "juicypeanut", answered and said something to the effect of "I'M ON IT!".  That was Friday.

The emails kept coming.

On Saturday, this same peanut person came back and promised something to the effect of "OH YAH....we are SO on it...eventually!".

And the emails kept coming.

On Monday morning the emails stopped.

This ALL actually gels with my original theory that Technorati has been taken over by robots and this small girl tech-y type peanut person was being held in the Technorati dungeon with the sacrificial goats.

Stay with me here.

This peanut girl saw my plea and WANTED to help me.  I know this because she said so.

The stalker Technorati robots were obviously hurt when I spurned their stalker emails and forgot to send them a sacrificial goat when I asked them to claim my blog and took out their robot angst on peanut girl (who is obviously the last human being at Technorati) by throwing her in the dungeon.

But peanut girl KNEW that she needed to stop them!  She HAD to make it stop.  If only she could get to a computer...

So she asked the robot dungeon guard if she could pee.  The robot guard was confused by this "pee" thing and said "whatever" and let her out of the goat dungeon.  Peanut ran to the nearest computer and posted her promise to me that the EMAILS WERE GOING TO STOP and she...(I'm getting emotional now)...APOLOGIZED for the inconvenience.  So noble, this peanut girl.

Of course the robots discovered her clever ruse and threw her back in with the goats.

And that's when she saw it.  The emergency Stop Spam button... partially obscured on the wall outside of the dungeon.

All she knew was that she had to save Jane from the crazy stalker Technorati robot emails.  So early Monday morning, in the ultimate disregard for personal safety, she distracted the robot guard with the clever "hey, your fly is down" line and bolted for the Stop Spam button.

I didn't have room to draw the goats.

And then the spam stopped.

I haven't heard from juicypeanut girl since.

Or Technorati for that matter.

I think juicypeanut girl is probably dead and the Technorati robots have been scooped up by the Arizona police because they looked "foreign".

I clearly need to get something better to do on a Friday night.