apropos of anything

I picked them up this afternoon. My new glasses.

It’s different.

I haven’t worn glasses since I got my first pair of contacts in the tenth grade. The change is… disconcerting. I miss my peripheral vision. Also, I’m having some problems, like stumbling down the stairs because I didn’t (couldn’t) see that I’d already gone as far as I could go, stairs-wise. And dizziness, when I look from one place to another. Is that common? Do glasses-wearing eyes normally take a few seconds to adjust when you swing your head in another direction? I can’t remember.

I don’t plan to wear them all the time, but the doctor thinks my corneas aren’t being oxygenated enough and I need to give them some relief from contact lenses (Saran wrap for your eyes, he says) whenever I can. It would have been so nice to have had them on my hajj trip earlier this year; dust, dryness, and irregular sleep schedules wreaked havoc on my contacts.

On another note, I took down the “Murky waters” post (as is my perogative, even if some people might think it’s selfish, and no, I’m not getting over that anytime soon) because things down in the Gulf are pretty wretched and heartbreaking, and it doesn’t matter exactly where on the “wretched and heartbreaking” scale they fall.

Donations, anyone?

Some days you oversleep and narrowly avoid missing a deadline with a tough client and there’s a hurricane and you have to go to the store in the pouring rain to buy milk and some ingredients for the dinner you’ll be eating sometime around nine-thirty.

And some days you come home a little early because traffic is unbelievably good and you zip through the kitchen and you take out the trash and you stumble over an unexpected box from Amazon on your doorstep and it contains two books you’ve been wanting, one that you came very close to buying that afternoon because you realized it just came out in paperback and Borders sent you a thirty percent off coupon via email. It’s from someone you love, and of course it’s from her because she has an incredible knack for sending just the right note at just the right moment. You haven’t seen in over a year, not since she moved to California, but you don’t need to see her every day to be friends with her because that’s the kind of friendship you have, the kind that endures.

Some days you know you’ve got it really, really good.

Long time, no post. Well, except for the one I deleted because I felt like it. (More on that in a moment.) It’s just that not much has happened, exactly, but I do have a few quick items for you:

Let’s start with the Saddest, Most Pathetic Thing EVER: At lunch today, Ken was talking about an anniversary party he went to this weekend, and how he was asking the couple questions about each other, a la the Newlywed Game

Ken: I learned pretty quickly not to ask her anything.
Huda: …because she had all the answers?
Ken: YES! She knew everything! I think she bought his clothes for him too because I asked her how tall he was and she didn’t even have to guess.
Huda: Well, the women typically do have all the answers. Did he know things about her?
Ivan: He probably did.
Huda: Do you know your wife’s sizes?
Ivan: I don’t even know my own pants size!
Ken and Huda: …
Ken and Huda: (snickering madly)
Ivan: She buys my clothes!
Ken: When was the last time you knew your pants size?
Ivan: …1993?

And move on to the whiniest thing ever: The amazing getupgrrl over at is taking some “maternity leave” from blogging now that Gefilte has finally arrived, partly to enjoy spending time with him, and partly because it’s not a house of miscarriage anymore. She may be back, or she may not; she hasn’t decided yet.The surprising part of this decision is how many people feel personally insulted that she’s decided to take down her archives to protect them from being reprinted without her permission or byline, as they have in the past.I didn’t realize it was selfish to do what you please with your own property. Thank goodness there are people around in cyberspace to educate me.

Wrapping up with… something a little different: I finally caved and hired a maid service to come out on Thursday afternoon — before all the weekend guests arrive, one in particular — but I am not sure if I have a confirmed appointment. I perused dozens of Web sites and interviewed several companies. One of them I really liked but they were quoting me as much as $400 for the initial cleaning. A second one I didn’t like at all, and a third I liked very much, services and cost both. It’s the third one that I ended up choosing; they were supposed to call this week to confirm the Thursday appointment, but I haven’t heard anything yet. If they flake out, life as I know it will be over. My place is not remotely clean, and there’s no way I’m going to be able to bring it up to scratch in the short amount of time I have left.I am about two hours away from devolving into rabid project manager mode and sending a short, polite email requesting a meeting or conference call.I think that may be a sign that I need a vacation.

You’ll never guess what I did today.

I went to a rally (you might even call it a pep rally) at Centennial Olympic Park to support the bid to get the NASCAR Hall of Fame built in Atlanta instead of Charlotte.

Yes, yes, I did. It was not by choice, but I did go.

	Tony Stewart’s Home Depot car from last fall’s race week NASCAR promotional thing

I have no pictures (of this event) for you because my camera is at home and Ken’s camera mysteriously disappeared. Perhaps it was hiding from all the revving engines. Atlanta mayor Shirley Franklin was there, and some NASCAR drivers, and a couple of cars. I recognized Tony Stewart’s (he drives the Home Depot car, and yes, I know some truly valuable piece of information had to be deleted from my brain for me to know that, but I didn’t want to know it!), and Ivan pointed out Kyle Petty’s trailer.

There were lots of checkered flags, and cheering, and NASCAR trivia. I dared Ken to go running through the Olympic fountain, but he wouldn’t do it… something about not wanting to go back to the office dripping wet. Ivan led Ken off to stalk some of the drivers while I hid behind Pete and looked at the cars because they’re actually quite fun.

Last fall, before the season started, NASCAR brought several of the cars and drivers around for a “fan fest” type of thing, and we went because Ivan wanted to and Ken and I didn’t have the heart to say no. I actually took pictures then to show y’all, but that post never actually wrote itself. I’ll update this post later tonight with a link if you want to see them.

I think NASCAR will make the official announcement sometime next month, so until then we’re all sitting around waiting with baited breath to see if we lose out to Charlotte.

I wonder if it would have helped if I’d worn my NASCAR hat.

Empirical evidence from the last few months leads me to believe that my body responds to lack of sleep by expunging all the contents of my stomach in a violent and frequent manner. It may actually explain part of why I was sick at the end of my hajj trip; I didn’t exactly get much sleep the two days before we left.

If my theory is correct, I should start puking any minute now.

The interior of the Midtown Flying Biscuit, even though we ate outside

Sumaiya was in town this week. We went to the Midtown location of the Flying Biscuit Cafe for lunch on Wednesday because she would have to work later in the evening. I talked her into trying their fried green tomatoes, but she wouldn’t take a chance on the grits; I guess their reputation has spread even to Chicago. We sat outside, on the 10th St. side, swatting flies and feebly attempting to people-watch in a city where there are few people and many cars. When she dropped me back at work, I was sure I reeked, in a sat-outside-on-a-hot-day kind of way, but no matter how much I sniffed myself, I couldn’t exactly place the smell. I hid out in my cube the rest of the afternoon anyway, as it’s not particularly professional to spread the (possibly nonexistent) stink.

That night was the quesadilla incident, the details of which involve Drano and vomit, so I’m going to spare y’all. Let’s just say y’all have heard it before. Just imagine in the fuzzy parts and know that I was up later than I should have been.

Thursday I met her and her friend Mohasin, who I actually met ten years ago at Governor’s Honors, at the Borders on Ponce before we headed over to the Virginia Highlands for dinner. I wanted to make my way through my ever-increasing list of books to buy (the ever-increasing part courtesy of the Chicklit forums), and they needed an easily accessible place to meet me, so there you go. As we were getting into the car, a panhandler came up asking for money for his three kids and blah blah blah. I’m not fond of panhandlers, but I also have a hard time saying no to them… but I didn’t actually have anything other than twenties, so Sumaiya and Mohasin, who have no qualms at all about ignoring panhandlers, had to cover me. There are times when I could give even Joey Potter lessons in spinelessness.

	Mmmmmmmmmmm.

I picked the Highlands because it’s a fun part of town, and we could walk around until we found a restaurant to our liking. Eventually we settled on Pad Thai, where the food was not actually very good, but the atmosphere was nice and the restaurant not crowded. It’s next door to Paulo’s Gelato, and how do you skip lemon and cinnamon gelato shaped like Mickey Mouse or a sailboat? You don’t, obviously, although we opted for green apple and papaya, sans mouse ears. The waitress narrowly avoided dropping our ice cream (because she was doubled over in laughter) when I insisted on paying because Sumaiya had already bought dinner and “paid for the man.” The panhandler man, I meant. Out of context, within spitting distance of the Clarimont Hotel… yeah, I should have known better.

As we always do, Sumaiya and I were up late Thursday night, catching up. Day (or is that night?) two.

Tonight was Khurram and Ferheen’s wedding… in Greenville. Because we caught the beginnings of Friday-afternoon rush-hour traffic, the drive there took just under three hours, destroying my carefully crafted plans for a cat nap before the wedding. We had just enough time to dress and rush over to the reception hall to join the baraat as it came in. Fatima and I left around eleven so we wouldn’t get home too late. Also because we were both fading fast, and we had a two-hour drive ahead of us. We were actually fading so fast I’m a little surprised we made it back safely, particularly after I tried to make a u-turn over what I thought was a gore but actually was a grassy median.

And now here we are. Late, and I’m blogging, despite running on very little sleep over the course of three days. Very tired and also worried about the whole no sleep equals ….bad ramifications thing. If I’d any sense at all, I’d be asleep right now, but… have y’all read the Drano entries?

Imagine, if you will, being in the men’s room at a Wendy’s somewhere between West Palm Beach and Atlanta. You’re… taking care of business when in walks an unaccompanied four-year old who appears to be scouting the stalls. You watch as he looks around for something neither of you see.

Then someone wearing a Wendy’s uniform comes in, and the four-year old lights up. “Hey,” he says. “HEY! Do you work here?”

The Wendy’s employee says he does.

“Well, that’s good, ’cause I need someone to wipe my bum.”

…betcha didn’t think that was in the Wendy’s job description.

…but at least they’ll think it’s extremely funny:

I had to resize the image to fit, so click on it if you want the original one. And in case you can’t decipher the text, W. is reading Successful War on Iraq for Dummies by G. Bush Sr…. although I’m not entirely sure what the brooms from “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice” have to do with anything…

At first, I thought all of the cucumber-milk mixture that was the beginnings of my soup would fit into my food processor. I was in the midst of congratulating myself on managing to move the entire contents of my saucepan into the bowl of the food processor without splattering or spilling — a heretofore unmanageable feat for me, Mistress of Spill — when the milky part began leaking out the bottom of the bowl. Rapidly, even.

There was a period of about thirty seconds where my brain simply refused to function. I stood there, frozen, watching as the liquid began to spread towards the edges of the countertop.

And then I wailed, to nobody in particular as the kitchen was empty, “I don’t know what to do!”

In fact, I did know what to do. It’s what any good five-year-old would do when confronted with a quickly moving spill: grab some paper towels and start mopping. It’s what I did when all my receptors clicked back into the “on” position and I could actually move my hands and feet again.

Mansoor was upstairs praying, as I should have been except that I was wiping up spilled milk (of sorts) in a desperate attempt to move my chilled shrimp cucumber soup towards some state of doneness, particularly as it was almost 9:00 and my dinner was nowhere near the table. Then, because I was worried about texture and a cucumber/milk balance, I heated up some extra milk with the intention of adding it to what remained in the food processor after those remains had been pureed. And then I worried some more.

I’m grateful that Aamir did not come to dinner as planned because then I’d have him to worry about in addition to myself and Mansoor, and I’m particularly grateful that Mansoor did not utter one word about dinner being late, except to say, “Um, I think you missed a spot,” when he noticed the original version of the soup had dripped into my silverware drawer, unbeknownst to me.

I’m also grateful that my chilled shrimp cucumber soup, despite being late and malformed and not “chilled” so much as “lukewarm”, looks exactly like the picture, and tastes decent as well, once you pick out all the dill. (I’m not exactly a fan of dill, although I love how artistic the thin green strands look floating on top of creamy soup.)

And finally, I am grateful that despite the spill, there wasn’t too large a mess in my kitchen, and I was able to clean it easily… because then my mother, Mistress of Clean, arrived.

I’m delighted to see we have such informed, compassionate people, who have nothing but respect for faiths other than their own, running our country.