Every school day we wake up early, get ready for school and then, with our neighbors from across the street, walk to school.  K and the boy across the street have been in the same class since their first year of pre-school so this had been a routine for about 4 years.  It’s a good thing.  We’re not driving that short distance to the school (a little less than half a mile).  We’re encouraging personal responsibility and we can reinforce safety learning as we all walk together.  As they run along the sidewalks we make sure that they’re stopping to check that cars aren’t backing out of driveways and they stop at every corner to cross with us.  We live in a pretty residential neighborhood but there are a few streets that have shops and restaurants all along them.

We have to cross one of those streets everyday.

At this street there are School Crossing signs on the corners and a well painted crosswalk, though there are no crossing lights.

This morning yet another in a long line of complete human garbage decided that getting across that intersection 5 seconds sooner while blabbing away on his cell phone was more important than my continued existence.  This would piss me off any day…  But I had K with me so I skipped right over angry and onto blood boiling righteous soul stomping anger.

This is what happened:  We got to the corner just like we do every School morning.  We stopped and looked all 4 ways (it is a 4 way intersection).  I’m trying to describe this and it’s getting hard… let’s draw a diagram…

See that guy I wrote nasty things about?  After everyone else stopped and waited for us to cross he was still down at the previous intersection.  We (K, her friend, his mom, his little brother and I) headed into the street smiling and nodding to the drivers who had stopped but keeping an eye on the cars all the way.  As we were about to leave the first lane we crossed I stopped to double check the second lane when I saw asshole deluxe guy on his cellphone looking right at us SPEED UP to cross the intersection before we finished crossing the street.  He came within 2 feet of us (as I had stopped and pulled K back).

What a charming piece of fucking shit.  You’ll forgive me, there were children present and I kept all obscenities inside, merely waving my gloved hand at the craptastic asswipe Caucasian male perp driving a white station wagon as he went along his merry non braking way.   When we got across moments later the woman who had been waiting for us to cross before she turned rolled her window down and commiserated with me, she congratulated me on muffling any foul words before they came out of my mouth.

And that was that.  I took K to school, got her into her classroom, walked home, crossed that same intersection very carefully, came home, got Mike’s coffee, water, vitamins and brief case into the car, told him what happened, called the police and then sat down to write this lovely post.

What, oh… yeah I totally called the police because this is SO not the first time this has happened. To others.  To me.  Hell, it wasn’t even the first time it’s happened in the last month.

I had to call their information line to get the right number (no I didn’t call 911).  If you’re in Portland and this kind of shit happens to you or someone you know give the police a call and report it.  This is the number for traffic crimes *503 823-7233 call and leave a message.

I was hoping this little rant would make me feel better, but eh… not so much.  Instead I’m just kind of hungry for breakfast, needing a cup of tea and really hoping that the traffic crimes department calls me back…

*not for traffic crimes in process… if you are in traffic and are experiencing a real emergency please dial 911… now I totally feel like the voivemail for the police or my doctor’s office

I am thrilled, absolutely thrilled with all the work I’ve put into the Strange Love Live site lately.  I went to WordCamPDX and soaked up information like a sponge.  I called on friends and acquaintances for info when I didn’t know how to do something difficult and technical (or even painfully simple).  I pressed through and I came out the other side with something I’m pretty darn happy with.  Nearing pride really.

This site?  it’s not bad but it has a few problems I need to work out.  I’ll probably change it soon… I want to be happy not only with the content I’m producing but the flow of the space that content is presented in.

I’m really working towards a space I can love and be proud of on both sites.  Something simple, easy to view, easy to maintain.  You know.  Easy.

And with all that work I’ve put into things this last month do you know what really, and I do mean reallllllly ticks my timer?

Half of the people that read this blog can’t even see it, or Strange Love Live.

Why?

Don’t know… but whatever the reason it has my husband sitting hunched over his computer at the table next to me checking packets and who knows what else while over in Vancouver Missburrow’s husband sits in front of his computer pinging things and tracing routes for us.

Why?  So those of you who can’t even read this blog post in the first place can look back later and see that we were trying to do something about it.

And by we?  I mean we.  Mike and Martin typing and staring with brows furrowed and me, eating ice cream and trying not to snicker when I hear the work packet. Hopefully this will all be sorted quickly, I can’t contain this burgeoning case of the giggles any longer.

xoxo- CamiKaos

and on a rather personal note: Happy Halfaversary Missburrows (who can’t even see this page to know how much I ♥ her).

Step right up, don’t be shy. Send them on in!

Runny nose, nasty cough, puked last night? Eh, we don’t mind we like them all… one rotten apple to spoil the bunch? Nonsense!

Kid has the shits? By all means bring them in. The other kids don’t mind, they’ll play and dance and even share snacks with your sick little monster that roams the halls touching every doorknob with their snot encrusted fingers…. fingers that they pressed into their crusty noses, popped into their tiny mouths and that they quite probably forgot to wash after they used the the toilet.

The kids don’t mind.

The school doesn’t mind.

Who cares, after all what is school for, it’s a germ factory right?

(sorry, this is what you get when you subject me to too many days helping at school, I get sick from of or 20 of the kids at school and then I get really really… well… like me).

Evil things are a foot.

Conspiracies and what not.

Sad horrible overly dramatic things.

And of course the weeping…

*sniff sniff*

I won’t let you see me cry.

(I’m gonna take a moment to compose myself).

…….

….

…

Okay, I’m back, I’m strong. I’m okay.

Life goes on right?

Even though *sigh* even though my co-hosting gig for the day is CANCELED.

You all heard Mr. Fabulous say he wanted to make me cry right? Yeah, so you’d assume it was his doing but… *sniff* it’s not.

BLOGTALKRADIO shuts down for maintenance or whatever at 6pm (3pm west coast) instead of 7. So I can not reach out my voice to all of you.

And I was gonna say some stuff.

My mom and daddy were gonna listen….

They were SO *sob* proud *sob* of their *sob* little girl……

But now they can just go see a movie instead. And I can sit and drink my cherry coke alone, in the echoing silence.

***

All joking aside Mr. Fab got really really (this morning) late notice that they would be shutting down at 6 instead of 7 so he won’t be doing a show this week. Maybe someday I will again attempt to co-host his show… but for today it is not to be.

I feel bad though, I was gonna put my voice out there for all to hear so instead I will try to do my first ever video post this week to make up for it… Then you can hear me and SEE me, oh the miracles of technology.

Much love, and I am really sorry for the last minute cancellation

-CamiKaos

It’s getting worse, not better.

As we move farther into the digital age where almost anything and everything can be done on line I get more and more and more junk mail in my mailbox.

I’m talking about the tree eating paper form of Spam people.

Sure it may not be asking me if I feel the need to increase the size of my penis but how many ads per week to I need for a new laptop, cheap pizza and photos of my kid. How many credit cards do we really need because I swear to you the week is not complete if we do not get a minimum of 3 credit card applications. Usually it’s more like 50.

Then there are the cable ads. From our own cable company. The telephone ads. The telephone service adds. Internet access too.

I am sick of spending my valuable time being pandered to. I am sick of the shredding and mountains of waste. I spent over an hour yesterday shredding junk mail. Wasted time. Wasted paper. Wasted irritated Cami.

Those are my 2 cents for today. Want an even angry 2 cents? Go say hello to my dad. He’s angry today too, and rightfully so.

Some days you’ve got to be able to just sit down and tell it like it is. Open your mouth and let the truth fly on into the world for all to deal with.

Today isn’t one of those days is it?

Maybe, maybe it is a day to say that I am tired, and frustrated and want satisfaction…

(I can’t get no, no no no)

So for one day only (yeah right) I will complain for the amusement of all of you.

The weekend was too short and I barely got to spend anytime with my husband.

Our babysitter moved away to be with her fiance and while we adore her and wish her the best WAHHHHHH our babysitter moved away. AND we didn’t get to say goodbye because when she called to stop by we were on our way out of the house and then we were just SO BUSY! AND AND….. OUR BABYSITTER MOVED AWAY!!!

I still, STILL have not computer of my own and while I adore Mr. Kaos’ extreme generosity in letting me use his, I feel like it is not my own. It doesn’t have all the slots and ports I value so much, its keys are not my own, it doesn’t like my mini mouse and it’s track pad hates my touch.

My cat in whining about SOMETHING and since I am not the cat whisperer I have no idea what.

My 5 year old (5 YEAR OLD) has a huge crush on one of her friends and while he is a very nice boy I AM NOT COOL WITH IT. She is heading down the path to love much. too. quickly.

Oh, and I can not read your blog Jo… I don’t have an account. And I can’t e-mail you to tell you this because your e-mail sends me an error. Are you going to be blogging there long? Should I just suck it up and make an account???

Woe. Is. Me.

and my petty little problems.

I promise (maybe) to be better (a little) tomorrow (or sometime)

I have a little personal problem. I problem I wish you all could help me with… But really the likelihood of that being possible, rather slim.

So instead of asking for help on this rather sad little chore I am going to do what I do best.

Complain about it. Bitch about it. Be pissy and snippy and snarky and cranky and pout that I don’t have my computer back

It was all going to work out quite perfectly. You see the vacation was already in place, we were on our way. The computer kind of couldn’t have gone pbbbbbbbbt at a better time… we took it in, we dropped it off, we ate some yummy food, we backed it up, they sent it off (several days late due to a fair bit of incompetence on the part of the people who should NOTE THINGS in files).

Then we waited. The waiting though, it was supposed to entirely coincide with vacationing. Entirely.

I was supposed to get home to a fully functioning laptop waiting for me to go pick up…

But oh, oh how that was not what occurred. Sunday just as I was readying to call the help desk to find out when I could pick up my darling little laptop my phone rang and it was the help desk. I reported a slightly marred version of the phone call to you all on Sunday… It wasn’t completely inaccurate.

What the really nice guy told me was that they had shipped my laptop to HP as they had said they would. And as HP was supposed to they replaced the Motherboard which had, after a mere 5 months of use, been completely fried. Then HP encountered an additional problem.

They were unable to keep my computer powered on. At all.

So they were “trying to fix it”

Ahem…

I would note that when Mr. Kaos went into the shop with our external hard drive for them to back my data up onto he saw another costumer come in with a laptop just like mine… and he seemed to be having the same problem I was… So now I am forced to wonder how much of a fluke can all this possibly be….

But today, oho today the story continues. I awoke to a phone with voicemail on it (I’ve been kind of sleeping in lately). The voicemail was from my trusty guy over at the fixmylaptop shop. He had just gotten off the phone with HP. This makes me wonder if they are somehow frightened of me or if they are just good with customer service because he keeps calling HP for updates… How nice right?

Grrrowl. My update today is that he was right about his suspicion that it won’t be ready on the 3rd… They are now saying it COULD be finished as early as the 7th, but that I actually qualify for a complete replacement if I would prefer.

How badly damaged was my freaking laptop?? Did I put it through some kind of unusually tough sumo wrestling tournament and forget about it?

Really now! What the hell?

I haven’t decided what to do, I don’t know what kind of a replacement is being offered, if it’s the same model then I don’t really want it, seems like it has too many issues, I kind of want something with the kinks worked out.

I am irritated. The ire of CamiKaos has been raised.

Hello?

Hello may I speak to CamiKaos?

This is CamiKaos

Oh hi there, this is myname at the tech department of thecompany. I just got off the phone with HP… they say ‘Ha ha… you’re puter is fucked up’

Oh, thanks…

Yeah, they said it should have an eta of the 3rd but I think they’re full it it. Sorry. Hope you see your puter again someday…

Umm yeah… so good to be home.

I remember saying I was gonna write a happy little post today. I joyful little jaunty tune maybe. Perhaps a naughty limerick would make its way to this page.

fuck that. None of that is to be had. NO LAUGHTER.

le sigh.

My computer. MY NEW COMPUTER

The computer that I loved and stuff.

I think it may be toast.

Bye bye little lappy top. At least little lappy top hard drive.

Fucker.

We will take it to the doctors office to get a recovery disc and see if it will do anything, anything at all, but we’re thinking not. so. much.

le sigh.

I am sure you will all get to hear how it goes. I am sure I will tell you. Frequently.

For now I am borrowing Mr. Kaos’ workhorse of a laptop. It is old. It is BIG. It It makes a lot of noise. It gets the job done.

The really bad news? I am not very good about remembering to back stuff up.

le sigh.

I am a sad girl. What can cheer me up? Sex? Art? The Blues? Shopping? I will try them out and see.

xoxox – CamiKaos