Laughter can be dreadful

Remember the song in Mary Poppins about laughing? I can't figure out how to post this video, so here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gx7lz5X2vKk I know a person with many annoying laughs. Let's call her Jane. Jane sometimes hisses like a snake. ssssssssssssssssssssss Other times, Jane wheezes like she's going to have a heart attack. Which gives me a heart attack, because I naturally assume I'm about to see someone clutch their chest and fall over. Frightening. She will even cackle on occasion. I don't think I've ever cackled. What can come over a person to make them cackle? I don't understand that emotion. Why is laughter, a positive thing, sometimes so annoying?!

To launder or to pack?

I realized just a few minutes ago that I would actually rather pack than do laundry. Packing is awful! Why would anyone in their right mind rather pack up all of their belongings three whole weeks before they're moving than do a load or two of whites? I'll show you why.

Here is the UGLY laundry room I have:

All of that mess on the wall is because there was a leak last month and the maintenance peeps said they would let it dry out and make sure there was no more leaky ... wall or whatever ... and then they'd come spackle and paint. (I'm not sure if spackle is the correct term here; I just like to say "spackle".) You can see the wall for yourself, so there's the end of that story.

Here is the inside of my washer:

As you can see, only about two towels and maybe a sock will fit in there. Then, during the spin cycle, the lid will bounce up and down and the entire tower of washer/dryer machinery will dance about. I feel sorry for my neighbors. I never hear their machines boogying. I want this:

What girl doesn't deserve this glossy duo from Samsung? That's laundry heaven, right there. I'll take the laundry room, too. Thanks.

Define "fat"

Breaking news - are you ready? Americans are overweight. I know, shocking. A government-funded study predicts that everyone will be fat within 40 years.

Let's take this with a grain of salt, please.

#1. This study was published in a medical journal called "Obesity". Clearly, they're a little obsessed and probably prone to exaggerate. Maybe they should go for a walk and clear their heads.

#2. Dr. Liang acknowledges that this is "really intended as a wake-up call". She admits that it's a scare tactic? Nice.

In other food news, en la France, taxes will likely be imposed on fatty foods. Now that's just not nice. All of French food is fatty! What will they eat?

How can the above two stories be newsworthy when we've got a story about how cancer chemicals are being REDUCED in chips and fries?! Pardon? I guess there's this chemical, acrylamide, that naturally occurs when you fry a starchy food. It causes cancer in lab rats. Check out this nice quote:

"Everybody's trying to figure out how to lower levels (of acrylamide) without significantly, adversely affecting taste," said Michele Corish, an attorney for Lance, which produces Cape Cod chips.

Oh, so what ... cancer tastes yummy? Couldn't we just nix the cancer altogether and just be done with it? I'm pretty sure that would make us all happier. I can't imagine that acrylamide makes a potato taste more like a potato, which is what we all expect when we eat a potato, no?

What I really want to know now is this: is this cancer story intended as a wake-up call, too? We should all stop eating potatoes in any fried form?

I guess it's one small step to save us from our impending communal fatness - no, I mean obesity.

"Crazy"

As I occasionally do, I did some dusting off in my iTunes library this morning. Sometimes, you just need to look at the songs with a zero play count and delete those bad boys. (free singles of the week you didn't like, stuff you swiped from a friend but hated - you know what I mean) Unfortunately, when I got a new laptop, all of my old songs transferred over with a clean slate, so everything started again with a zero play count. Consequently, I have a lot of zeroes.

Today, I ran across Patsy Cline. I only have a few songs, so she's easily lost in the 10 gigabytes of music, and I guess I forgot all about her. I was surprised when I saw her in there, and I decided to Google the girl. As it turns out, she grew up (and is buried) in nearby Winchester, VA. I've lived here nine years and I never knew that. More importantly, I had NO idea she died in a plane crash when she was 30 years old! Anyone who knows me knows how much I HATE HATE HATE flying. Just add Patsy Cline to the list of reasons I do. Ritchie Valens, Buddy Holly & the Big Bopper are on that list, too. (Need I say more?) You always hear those stories about people who knew they were about to die. Patsy Cline supposedly knew she was going to die soon. She started giving her things away, just how old people do when they think their time is up. She wrote out her will, and asked friends to take care of her children if anything happened to her. She even referred to her latest album as her "last". Spooky. I don't think I'll forget about Patsy Cline again. All of her songs are out of the zeroes now. Here's to Patsy.