I totally forgot that Stacy's bridal shower is next week. The actual wedding invitation arrived in the mail today and I was completely touched by the fact that it was addressed to "MaryAnn and Owen."

Idk. I was expecting a "MaryAnn + 1," you know? This silly little card makes me so stupidly happy just because it has our names in fancy print, like it's official that we are "Mary and Owen" and "Owen and Mary" and it's a package deal and not only does everyone know it, but they think it too.

I mean, they could have very easily sent us each our own invitation. It's an Adventureland wedding, so we know the bride and the groom equally well and vice versa. Owen used to work at the same ride as the groom, and I just kinda knew them both from being a pseudo-lifer, having worked in the park long enough to know pretty much everyone at least a little bit, and then the groom was my supervisor for a little while (no, it's not Gabe, but he's the best man) and the bride and I were both managers at the same time and tended to sit next to each other during manager meetings to talk smack on the Splash Zone and the Kiddieland teams because everyone hates them...except guests. So, every meeting was an endless parade of "GOLD STAR FOR THE RACCOON RACE TEAM" while the rest of us are like, "Fuck-off-and-die-violently."

Man, good times.

I'm really stoked for this wedding. An Adventureland wedding! It would have been more adorable if they were getting married at the park, but I mentioned it to the groom once in jest and he said he'd rather stab himself in the eye. But still, the wedding party, most of the guests...there's actually some concern that so many employees are going to need the day off that it's going to turn into Park Drama.

I love Park Drama. Especially when it's not my fault for once.

But aw, this invite, I keep looking at it and smiling and running my fingers over the ink. I sent Owen a picture and he said I was a dork.

So uh...I'm just gonna sit this here.

Katrina's mom took it yesterday.

So, I'm still going to stalk priceline and orbitz and all the other websites, but I've tried Amtrak and Megabus, had a brief flirtation with Greyhound, and even given the scary discount air carriers a shot and it looks like I'm going to drive. 

Megabus would have actually been sweet, but you can't go west from Pittsburgh. Why? Megabus, I think this is a pretty severe flaw in your network. Please to be fixing it? Because once I move to Kzoo, it would be really awesome to know that I can come home for the weekend for about fifteen bucks and totally spend that time vegetating on the internet on one of your sweet sweet double-decker buses. Just sayin'. 

Anyway, as soon as I mentioned to Owen, "I think I'm just going to drive," he says, "Ok. Oh. I should probably tell you that between taking the Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, and Michigan turnpikes...your tolls are going to be around sixty dollars."

Great. So, sixty dollars on top of the one-hundred-and-sixty for gas (assuming gas isn't $4/gallon by then) and suddenly that air fare looks more reasonable. 

Except I can work around tolls. I mean, I have a sad love affair with the Ohio and Pennsylvania turnpikes (I am quite the rest-stop connoisseur and no, I don't like the new shiny visitor centers, I liked the shitty old truck-stops with the rape!bathrooms because I felt like a badass every time I made a tinkle), and they are easily the most convenient ways to travel, but the tolls are pretty ridiculous. 

So, my new mission, is to plot out a toll-free route and my inner-fangirl wonders if this is what SAM 'N DEAN do. 

I could hear Owen facepalming through the phone. 

Googlemaps and I are BFFs right now. I pay alot of attention to my mile counter, the estimated travel-time, and, of course, the potential for sweet scenery. I decided I want to look at pretty things, so I'm following the coastline of Lake Erie pretty much the whole way across Ohio. 

This is Port Clinton, Ohio. It is on a peninsula in northwestern Ohio and as soon as I saw it's location on the map, I was like, "OHHHH I BET IT'S REALLY PRETTY THERE."

I wonder if Sam ever gives Dean longer-than-necessary directions just to look at cool shit?

*facepalm*

 

Five hours. That's how long I spent looking for decent air fare to see Owen. We decided on a June date because the school year would be over, and with it, the bulk of his job-duties. I decided on June 2-6...because, like we've established, I'm impatient.

When Owen first got the job in Kalamazoo, I jumped on the chance to fly for a visit. This was back in February, and I geeked out and stalked priceline.com for every combination of tickets, and I remember, back in February, finding round-trip fares in the $150-175 range depending on which airport I flew into. Assuming that gas prices don't leap (which is a pretty big and faulty assumption) it would take about $160 to fuel Lucy the Staypuft Marshmallow Car for a round trip roadtrip to Kalamazoo and back. So I didn't feel bad about splurging on air fare.

Back to those five hours of my life that are gone and missing and never to be seen again.

Fares have jumped in the month since I last looked. The cheapest I can find is $225 if I fly into Chicago at six in the morning. I called Owen and whined because at this point, it'll be cheaper to drive. But I don't want to drive. Not for this first time out. I'm going to have to drive every other time I visit because I won't have the (small) surplus of cash that my tax return afforded me and I'll be moving my stuff into his our apartment.

I just really enjoy flying, okay? Airline stewardess is actually one of my back-up career plans if the get-PhD-and-be-awesome track doesn't work out . I check job postings regularly.

The other day at the lunch table, the big topic of the day was air travel and how horrible it is. I brought it on myself by mentioning the upcoming visit with Owen, but I wasn't dumb enough to wax poetic in front of my co-workers, especially when the conversation turned into a massive bitch-fest. I just kinda smiled and nodded and played the "I'm-a-silly-noob-who-has-no-concept-of-what-air-travel-really-is." And okay, I don't. In all of my 24 years on Earth (as opposed to Mars) I've flown a handful of times. When I was 15, the marching band went to Disney World and we flew from Pittsburgh to Tampa. When I was a junior in college, I presented at a conference in Minneapolis, and last year I presented at a conference in St. Louis, so I'm fully aware that my mindset is still probably stuck in the "OOOH SHINY" mentality when it comes to flying.

There are also probably some unresolved daddy issues in there too. My dad was a pilot in the air force, then a mechanic when he got discharged. One of my most prized possessions is a model of a Lockheed C-141 in air force livery that his squadron gave me at his funeral. He loved flying. We lived close to the base that he worked at when I was a kid, close enough to watch the air shows from our front yard whenever they were held. On 9/11, we stood in the yard in the middle of the night watching planes and helicopters land. They flew low to avoid radar, and we could read the numbers off of their bellies, and my dad would tell me what kind of plane it was, what (or who) it was probably carrying. I feel like a slightly fucked up person to have a fond memory of 9/11, but he was dead three months later, so that was one of the last of the good ones. It's unfortunate that it was brought about by something so horrible, but it is what it is.

ANYWAY. I'm one of those irritating people that stares out the window the entire flight, wondering what all those little people downstairs are doing. I wonder if my dad did that. I take notes on what planes I like and what ones I don't and I wonder if he had a favorite. I have a mad love affair with United Airlines and their in-flight Starbucks. I wonder how he felt about United. I remember that he liked Pan Am.

So. I don't know what I'm going to do about booking a flight. I've tied myself up in so many mental knots in a vain attempt to find sweet fares, but they just aren't there anymore. Owen is willing to drive two-hours in any direction to pick me up. Flying directly into Kalamazoo was nixed from the beginning because the airport is being renovated, so fares are appalling from the get-go. We decided on a two-hour radius because anything further than that, we feel defeats the purpose of flying. I've looked at landing at Chicago, Grand Rapids, Detroit, Lansing, South Bend, and Manistee. I've tried leaving in the middle of the week. I've even looked into the scary discount carriers.

$225. I can't get any lower. And yeah, with my tax return, I can afford it, but I feel like, at that point, I'm being wasteful and stubborn and indulgent.

I can fly to San Diego and back for $120 and that's on the other side of the fucking country. I'm a little bitter over that, actually. Michigan needs more love, people.









TL:DR Air fare is stupidly expensive, so Radium Girl is probably going to drive. She is displeased by this.

 I generally fear my mailbox. I rarely get fun mail. The coupon bundle is the highlight of my week.  Seriously.

Today's mail? Today's mail was awesome.

Two things have been causing me angst lately: the impending verdict of my application for an income-based payment plan for my student loans and news of whether or not I was rehired by Adventureland for the 2011 season.

The student loan wait was reaching ulcer-levels of panic because I applied for the revised payment plan in January and my first payment was due at the end of this month and I wasn't going to have it. Or, rather, I would have the payment, but I'd find myself evicted from my apartment and facing repossession of my car.

But guess what? I was approved. \o/

The Adventureland dilemma wasn't as nauseating because it's not like I don't have a job, and I'm not quitting my temping gig to go back to the park full-time anyway because I practically double my hourly wage over at the Evil Empire, but it would have been nice to have the extra cash, right? Right.

I tend to bite my nails every year before the rehire letters go out because I've come to realize that I'm a rather divisive figure in park mythology. The people who love me love me and the people who hate me really fucking hate me and there are very few people who simply whatever me. And last year, in particular, I may have gotten a little cheeky towards the end of the season, under the impression that I would score a "real" job right out of college and have no need for summer work.

I mean, I didn't tell my boss to fuck off to his face and I didn't kill anyone (you laugh but you haven't met my charges from my last season as a ride manager...none of them were fit to tie their shoes, let alone operate heavy machinery) but I'd show up to work with a shorter-than-regulation skirt, or I'd prank call the switchboard operator and everyone does these things, but I tend to get caught, and flaunt it, because I'm a rockstar immature.

I even called Gabe because I was worried and he hangs out with the hiring manager and I wanted him to do some spywork for me. Gabe was like, "Of course you'll be hired back. You're one of the most experienced workers in the park and your teams love you every year."

"They love me because I don't enforce time limits on breaks and they think it's funny when I come to work hungover."

"Well...you never killed anyone."

Thanks, Gabe. You're a pal. And you have nice abs.

Whatever. I got hired back. Guest Services, bitches.



















Hey switchboard, is your refrigerator running?

Shamelessly stolen from raloria because she has all the good memes. 

( Baby, you're a firework )

Title: This Time and the Last Time
Genre: h/c, s6
Summary: A hellhound attack triggers a flashback for Sam.
Warnings: Mild gore. Angst. Dean's potty mouth.
Disclaimer: Not my sandbox, just visiting.
Author’s Note: Based on a prompt by emmram for the ohsam H/C commentfic meme. 


( Dean Winchester fucking hates hellhounds... )

This is Bo Burnham. He's offensive and I love him in a purely insincere way:



Owen's sister, Emily, goes to Kent State, you know, that school in Ohio that's pretty infamous for being the place where the National Guard blew away a bunch of (not) hippies during a Vietnam protest. It's probably in your history book. It was kind've a big deal. The first thing I said to Emily when I got out of Lucifer the Staypuft Marshmallow Car (after Emily, with her suckass sense of direction, navigated me down a one-way street in front of a cop) was "So, where'd those people get shot?" and she gleefully dragged me down a hill to point at a parking lot. Yup.

Anyway, Bo Burnham was there on Thursday for a show and Emily got tickets as a belated birthday present because I think he's hilarious and she wants to touch his danger zone.

It was a good show. We saw him last year when he was at IUP and I was slightly disappointed that there wasn't a deluge of new material, but at the same time, the new material that he did pull out was very good. Alot of it, like the song he performed for the encore below, was even, I would argue, "legit," in that I'm not entirely certain that it was meant to be funny. Actually, in the encore, Bo actually says that it's not a joke song, that he's in the process of branching out as an artist, etc.

I really hope it doesn't blow up in his face.

I'm thrilled that he's working on "serious" music. I think he's an immensely talented writer and performer. I generally don't like "musical" comedians because I usually don't like their songs. I'll listen to it once, laugh, and that's it. I'm not going to put it on my iPod and treat it like I would treat other music because musically, I don't find it all that great. But, when it comes to Bo Burnham, I actually do like the majority of his songs. He's totally on my iPod. Has been, from the very beginning. I think he's hilarious, and yes, alot of his lyrics are crass, but alot of them are thoughtful too. He performed a song at Kent that was supposed to mock mainstream love songs and how they're all pretty much the same song remixed...and his song was funny, yes, but I actually thought that it was sweet and if I had heard it on the radio, not knowing that it was a Bo Burnham song, I would have thought it was just a quirky, silly, pop song. In between songs, he freaking sits around quoting Shakespeare (well). Even when he is making dick jokes, he's points it out and recognizes it for the low-brow, "cheap" comedy that it is. I love the self-awareness so hard.

/rant.

So. I'm thrilled that Bo Burnham is writing big kid songs, quirky big kid songs, but big kid songs nonetheless. He performed a song from that upcoming supposedly semi-serious album for the encore and yes, yes, it's still vulgar in places, but I thought it was a very sweet, and a little bit sad, song. I'm excited for the new album. I'm just worried that it's going to turn people away if its too unfunny and then I will weep.

Also? I think I laughed harder at his Harry Potter comment here than anything else from the rest of the show.

I renewed my drivers license yesterday and ran into My-Mother-the-Convict at the G-burg DMV. There was a two-hour wait and I was having a nice conversation with another lady about how the job market sucks like whoa when Melinda wandered out of the ether all big smiles and "Hi, sweeties!"

She was getting her license renewed too. She showed me her photocard and it was actually, legitimately, a photocard.

When I was in high school, Melinda once got arrested when she went to renew her license because when they type your name into the computer, a notice pops up if there are warrants out for your arrest. I waited expectantly when her number was called, but all they did was take her picture.

I'm a little bit sorry to say that I was sorely disappointed. Not that I wanted her to get arrested, per se. It would have been awkward and she probably would have cried and I would have probably gotten dragged into calling the Surprise!Step-dad to come post bail or something.

I just sincerely felt like I was slapped in the face when she left the photo area all smiles, holding her license up at me like she was eighteen years old and it was her fucking high school diploma.

I tried to help her get her shit together for years.

I once begged her, right before the shit hit the fan and I left; I said that she was going down and taking my brother and I with her. She said that she was okay with that. I pressed the issue and got a chair and a vegetable knife thrown at me for the trouble. I spent the rest of the night and most of the next day in my room with a dresser shoved in front of the door.

So, excuse me for being a little bitter over the fact that she, somewhere, somehow, figured out how to be a (semi) functional human being.

Without me.

Owen is Catholic. I found this insanely attractive when we first started dating because it was exotic and he went to a private school and wore a blazer and kept a Saint Christopher medal in his car. He knows how to pray in Latin and he lights candles at church when people are sick and his grandparents have a picture of him in full altar boy attire on the wall above their sofa. He knows the differences between Benedictine and Jesuit monks and rolls his eyes when I ask him for the eight thousandth time to explain them because I find his big, sexy, Catholic brain to be big and sexy

Ok. So I have a Catholic kink. Whatever. I was raised Baptist and aside from the fact that we had a rock band lead the hymns every Sunday, it was pretty much a suckfest. Lots of fire and brimstone. By the time I was nine, I was sneaking up to the balcony so I could hide Goosebumps books in my hymnal without an old lady wacking me with a bible.

I usually "play Catholic" out of solidarity towards Owen and because it makes his family happy to think that I'm not a total heathen.

Totally forgot that it's Lent. I was going to make chicken n' dumplings for Supernatural-fest on Friday, was telling Owen all about it, invited him over for dinner because he's all about chicken n' dumplings.

A few years ago, when Owen was still in school in Cleveland, I visited for the weekend and refused to let him cheat on Lent and hit up a Wendy's before we went to a party at the Hamster Cage.

He is finding revenge to be sweet:

"Now who's the bad Catholic, huh?"

"WHATEVER. I'M NOT REALLY CATHOLIC. I COULD EAT CHICKEN ON FRIDAY AND JESUS WILL STILL LOVE ME."

"No he won't. Baptist. I mean, at least the Lutherans are like, distant cousins. You guys just ran completely off the reservation."

"What if I use tofu-chicken breasts? Does it still count because it tastes like chicken?"

"It's all fun and games until my little heathen wants to eat chicken on a Friday."