Oh, It's a Perfect Day

Secret Agent Fred and I stumbled in to a little place we know for dinner tonight and while we were tucking in, a wheezy three piece combo in the room next door struck up.  I was willing to ignore them until I realized they were covering (or attempting to do so) Pink Floyd's Money.

From there on, it was just down hill, of course.  A Beatle's medley; something Fred claimed was from The Smiths (for which I took his word, since I hate all things Morrisey;) and finally the smooth jazz sound of Perfect Day.

I like Perfect Day very much, the mismatch between the song's cheery bubble of lalalalala and Lou Reed's kind of atonal drone.  I have always assumed it was something of a sneer on his part against the very sunny type of music it parodies so spot on.  And yet, it also seems to be his sincere appreciation of what a perfect day is: simple, unstructured but full, happy.  With you.

So to then hear it ground out by the very kind of band the underlying mockery is aiming at was not just ironic, but thought provoking.  Three hacks plodding through their set, stuck in a barful of people who wouldn't pay them any attention if their combined hair (which wasn't much) was on fire.  Did the band get the joke?  Is that why they were playing it?  Or had some snarky hipster requested it and then gone off to snicker at his musical wit.

You know there's that old joke that not that many people bought the Velvet Underground's music, but they all went right out and started their own band.  Maybe that's the drummer's story and he insisted on including it.  Maybe it's one twelve songs the keyboardist knows.  There are many possibilities.

Then when I was looking for a video to illustrate this post, I ran across this promo one from the BBC in 1997.  Again, it largely seems to miss out on the sarcasm I've always heard in the song, so maybe I'm just imagining it, bitter old queen that I am.  Still, that's my story and I'm sticking with it.

The cast is certainly star-studded.  Of course, Bono makes an appearance.  Is there  ever one of these kind of things he misses out on?  But also, David Bowie, in an earring that, were he not a Big Star or if he had had a friend on hand, surely he would have been talked out of.

Also, (look quick or you'll miss them) Suzanne Vega, Doctor John (!), Emmylou Harris, sounding swell, and Tom Jones, who is not identified.  Did the BBC assume everyone would know who he is?  Maybe they were right.  Not to mention, Mrs. Lou Reed, Laurie Anderson, pixie-ish as ever.

I hope you enjoy it.  Try not to get stuck on Bowie's ear-bob.

mrpeenee, Vampire Koala

ohmygosh, you guys, it turns out I have morphed into a koala bear.  Koalas sleep more than 20 hours a day, just like me, and are adorable.  Ditto.

Random koala or mrpeenee?  You decide.

Tragically, most certainly not mrpeenee.

The only difference is that the bears get lots of fresh air, what with being relegated to the outdoors, and exercise from falling out of eucalyptus trees and I, on the other hand, refuse to leave the house.  I'm sort of a shut-in koala, existing on cinnamon rolls and chocolate milk.  THIS HAS GOT TO STOP.  Mostly because I just finished off the last of the cinnamon rolls.

Also, I'm not sure how most koalas feel about mormon boy porn, but I am still all for it.

In Which mrpeenee Struggles with the World of Internet Commerce

You are now connected to Amazon from Amazon.com

Me:On August 26, I had a chat session about the whirlpool bathtub I ordered. The person I chatted with claimed someone from "large purchases" would get back to me in 24 hours. It's been a week, no contact, so a) what's with that and b) where's my bathtub?

Amazon:Hello Gary, my name is Natally and I'm so sorry to hear that we where supposed to contact you and we didn't and the fact that you don't have your bathtub, let me see how i can help you

Me:great

Amazon:just to verify the address we are supposed to send this bathtub is blah blah blah

right?

Me:yes

Amazon:thank you, Gary please wait for me just a moment while i review your account really quick

Ok Gary, thank you for your patience, I actually need to connect you with one of my colleagues from the concierge dept because of the price of this bathtub, please hold while I connect you.

Gary are you there?

Me:yeah, it's not like I'm going to take a bath or anything.

Amazon:Thank you Gary just a moment

A Customer Service Associate will be with you in a moment.

You are now connected to Ben from Amazon.com

Ben:Hello!

Me:hi

Ben:I'm sorry that you have not gotten your bathtub yet, let me pull this order up and we'll see what's going on.

It looks like we are still working on acquiring the inventory to ship it out to you.

Me:what does that mean? I ordered this on July 19. When is the tub getting here.

Ben:We currently do not know. We're working on getting the inventory. It looks like it was out of stock when ordered and we've not been able to get another one quite yet. I'm sorry.

Me:It took amazon a month and a half to realize it was out of stock, I contacted you once already, and you're just now getting around to mentioning this?

Ben:I'm very sorry, from what I'm seeing on the details of the order, this was out of stock when you ordered it.

We did send you an update shortly after the order with an expected time that we could get this out to you. That was between August 18th and September 11th. I know that's a very long window, but when we're not sure when we're going to actually get them in, that does tend to happen.

Me:I'd like to point out Sept. 11 is nine days away. Are you saying the tub will be here then?

Ben:I cannot guarantee that, as it does not look like we've found a supplier yet, but it is not outside of the realm of possibilities. To be very honest, I doubt it.

Me:So, to summarize: Amazon's customer guarantees are worthless.

Ben:Not typically, but unfortunately in this case, it looks like we might actually not be able to make that date.

I can happily look into what's going on and why it's taking so long.

Of course, if you would like to cancel the order and go somewhere else, I'd completely understand.

Me:"Looking into it and finding out why it's taking so long" would be swell. In fact, many customers would assume that is what you would be already doing.

Ben:On the customer service end, that's not something that we generally handle. That's taken care of by our vendor managers and others in the procurement teams. But since I want to help you, I will do what I can to get you an answer, since they have not updated you.

Me:I'm in New Orleans. I can get a voodoo doll with "Procurement team" written on it without breaking a sweat and I suspect it would be just about as much help.

Ben:If that's what you feel you want to do, you're perfectly welcome to. I, on the other hand, am going to actually try to be helpful, if that's ok with you.

Me:Go to it. And reel in the snark while you're at it.

Ben:Honestly sir, I could say the exact same to you, but I did not mean to be snarky, so I apologize.

I'm typing up an email to the vendor manager in charge of that department.

Me:I look forward to hearing what you discover.

Ben:Would you prefer email or phone?

Me:email is fine. My address is mrpeenee@yahoo.com.

Ben:Awesome. I'll reach out to you as soon as I hear anything. I'm sorry that this is taking so long to get to you.

Me:Thank you and good day.

In Which mrpeenee Raises a Stink

Grisly remains.  RIP, dear little rice pot.

O dear god, I just got distracted (not by porn, oddly enough.) and burned a pot of rice, the stench of which is so bad I'm considering abandoning ship.  The whole sad affair brought to mind the only kitchen tip I was ever handed before I moved of my parents'  home for life on my own.  Of course, it was not produced by my mother, who assumed I would have some little wifey to handle all that domestic stuff and thus didn't need to be equipped with any.  Hilarious.  Instead, the mother of a friend came across with this:

If you're cooking something in a pot with a lid and you smell it burning, do not take the lid off. Instead, fill the sink with cold water as fast as possible and carefully put the pot in.

The pot will make this terrific and scary hissing noisy, but if you're lucky, you can often salvage the contents.  Not tonight, since what I have is some kind of carbohydrate-based charcoal now, but sometimes.  Also, pay attention to the part about "do not take the lid off."  Your first reaction to the stink is to think "Is that burning?" and want to look to check.  Do not fall for that.  If you can smell the smoke, it's burning.

I can't tell you how many times that little gem has come in handy, although possibly more handy would be the one that goes "Do not leave the fucking kitchen when you've got a pot on the stove, idiot."

Super Seven

What do you mean it's August?  The hell?   How do these things happen?

It's true I've been rather distracted lately by hosting guests for their own wedding and visiting New Orleans on a retail spree and competing with the cats to see who can sleep the most in one day, but that doesn't excuse missing two important (to me, and who else counts?) anniversaries in July.

The first was Saki, the Evil and Adorable cat's birthday, his seventh, on July 7.  Yes, 7/7/07 and now it's number seven, so maybe this year will be lucky for him.  Having ripped up both white leather chairs in the living room, he is now turning his attention to converting the back guest room into a spare cat box, so he's probably going to need all the luck he can get if I catch him pooping in there one more time.

And my blog, this title piece of heaven, also turned seven a few days ago, but again, I was sleeping, so, oops.  In case you wondering, here is the first post, from all those long years ago:

But who is mrpeenee?
I’m a nice guy, that’s who. I hide it successfully under a mask of brittle bitterness, but I would be happy to save orphan kittys and old ladies from burning buildings if I just weren’t so darn busy downloading porn and staring out the window. My long suffering lover, R Man, and I live in San Francisco where I work for the federal government making wildly inaccurate statements to the press and running the training program for entrepreneurs for the SBA here. I am occasionally surprised to realize how respectable I am.

I grew up in Texas, but never understood what white trash I am until I left. How was I supposed to know nice people didn’t put mayonnaise on their French fries?

I gotta go.

So seven years later and all I've learned is how to include photos of muscly young men.  Hmm.

Wedding Belles, Part Two

What a gay, romantic week it's been here at the old chez peenee.  Two of our oldest friends, Cow Queen and K, popped into town to get married and stayed here with me.  It was their thirty-something anniversary, and after a very tastefully small ceremony at City Hall, we had a lovely lunch at one of my favorite Italian restaurants downtown.

And then, a slightly less romantic trip to the emergency room for Cow Queen.  After we got home from all the wedding festivities (no bouquet toss since the majority of the party was composed of widow ladies) Cow admitted as to how his leg was aching and reminded me that he had been in the hospital a few years ago with MRSA, the drug resistant staph infection, and that his doctor he'd been at pains to warn him how easy it was for it to come back.  He also revealed a big hole in his shin that he had won falling down a ladder at work last week.

He was reluctant to go to the emergency room, but a lifetime with R Man had taught me how to overcome such moronic protests.  Why is it when the words "infection" or "blood loss" or "chest pains" hang heavy in the air, I am the one who thinks how attractive the local hospitals are?  The idea that I am the responsible one in the room should make everyone a little less comfortable.

So I stuffed his protesting ass in the car and wheeled off to my favorite E.R.  A lifetime with R Man has also equipped me with a connoisseur's knowledge of them.

It wasn't bad, less than three hours, mostly spent discussing the wedding and the lunch and then we were back home.  So it wasn't the ideal honeymoon.  At least he scored a bunch of oxycontin and that has to count for something.

In Which Cash is Dropped

Crepe myrtles, one of my favorite Southern flowers, in bloom

Attention, People of Earth:

So anyway, I got a charming postcard from an old friend (isn't that quaint?)  which reminded me I needed to attend to my own quaint writing medium and now here we all are.  Welcome back.

New Orleans?  Fabulous, darlings.  I swept through thrift stores,  junk malls, and Good Antique Shoppes with equal abandon, flinging the bucks like a drunk sailor in a cathouse.  mrpeenee's credit card has a new, possibly permanent dent in it, but it was worth it.

I found a beautiful big dining table with a huge dark green marble top, a pair of charming antique armchairs, reupholstered in a lovely grey and white stripe,  a couple of chest of drawers, a very pretty chandelier that will be much improved by having some of its fussier crystals removed, lamps and a vase.  I also met with the cabinet maker who's doing the kitchen and picked out the marble and tiles for the baths and the kitchen and the bricks for the patio.

Also, I got to see for the first time the couch I bought online.    Sweet.

Ooh, also, a lovely little drop leaf desk.  We must have seen fifty of them, or more.  Where on earth could they all have come from suddenly?

Chandelier in a box.  I rather like the minimalist implications, but I think I might hang it without the cardboard, what the hell.

My talent for arbitrary decisions stood me in good stead; I chose the bricks in under five minutes.  It probably took us longer to park.  I just don't see the point of dithering, especially over something like patio flooring.  I've discovered it seems so overwhelming when you're standing in the middle of eleventy million options, but then once they're installed you never critically look at them again.  After all, they're just bricks, or light fixtures, or faucets.  You see something you like, take it.  Perfection is not achievable, says the buddha.  Or mrpeenee.  One of us, anyway.

Quiet, please.  Can't you see tattoo buddha is taking a nap?

But that's only in person. I came home to nail down the bathtubs and sinks and stoves and whatnot online and once again the internet with its vast universe of choices reduced me to a blob of indecision.  Until, that is, I recalled how effective cutting myself off from porn until I at least picked out a goddam tub had been.

And it's a good thing naked muscly men are such an effective driver for me since renovation on the house has suddenly shifted into some kind of warp speed.  When I left there, all the interior walls had been ripped out and the floors in the bathrooms were nonexistent.  Now word reaches us framing has finished and walls are going up.  Hoo hoo!  Walls!  Floors! All kinds of cool house stuff.