gripes from the grumpy girl

Sun, 20 Nov 2005 18:26:24 GMT

going to try this one final time... here is where i will be: http://gripesfromthegrumpygirl.blogspot.com/

Sat, 19 Nov 2005 23:26:01 GMT

the time has come... and i'm outta here. if you saw me now, i'd be flipping radio-userland the bird, but that's not a nice thing to do on my last day in my first home, right? nah, not nice. no bird... (ok, a little bird...)

so here's where i am: gripesfromthegrumpygirl.blogspot.com (i would have made this a hyperlink, but radio-userland's software, no matter how i configued it, wouldn't let me... so y'all will have to cut and paste. sorry!)

change your bookmarks and i'll see you over there.

bye!

(and for my last hurrah, please go buy my pottery!!!!!!!!!!!!!!-----www.alyssaettinger.com

Fri, 18 Nov 2005 03:32:50 GMT

where am i? packing up my things here at radio, moving slowly over to blogger. it's not ready over there, but i fear i'll have to move in before everything's up and going. this is where i'm going: will give you this address every day so you always know where i am! gripesfromthegrumpygirl.blogspot.com

Tue, 15 Nov 2005 14:46:01 GMT

apologies for not being here... when i've had blogging time, i've been working on the new gg website, which i'm so bad at it will likely look entirely generic by the time i'm launched, by the end of the week. yes, my final post here will be that soon. not to worry, it will give you a link to the new digs.

Thu, 10 Nov 2005 05:20:11 GMT

so, i'm thinking what might really cheer me up on this, my 40th birthday... take a gander over to my website and buy yourselves some gifts!------www.alyssaettinger.com as for me, i'm out of town for a couple of days. hiding. now that you know this information, please don't rob my apartment. i have a medeco lock, a ferocious cat, and most importantly, an alarm system. it would deeply SUCK to come home from my birthday vacation to find i've been looted. so be kind, and be big spenders.

Thu, 10 Nov 2005 04:45:24 GMT

tomorrow is the day and i am so completely freaked out i don't know what to do. i'm not even hungry, that's how freaked out i am.

Tue, 08 Nov 2005 14:12:59 GMT

so, not to sound like a broken record or wallow in self pity. but. i turn 40 in two days--and if you want to get all exacting on me, know that i was born across the date line so chronologically, i'm really 40 in about 15 hours. but let's not go there. my birth certificate says the 10th, so that's the date it is. and this gives me one more day in my 30s. it never, ever, occurred to me that my impending birthday would feel like a crushing weight against my collarbone. that the mere thought of it would turn my mood morose in barely a split second. and yes, i know, 40 is the new 30. look the hell at sheryl crow: she's a hottie, and she wears leather pants. ergo, i can wear leather pants if i ever wanted to. still, she has a fiance, and really that's what all of this hoohaa is about. www.alyssaettinger.com

Mon, 07 Nov 2005 15:23:38 GMT

just an FYI--in a week or so, grumpy girl will be moving to this address: http://gripesfromthegrumpygirl.blogspot.com/ still working on links and art (and any help would be greatly appreciated). in the meantime, i turn 40 on thursday... and this is not making me happy. till then, SHOP!: www.alyssaettinger.com

Fri, 04 Nov 2005 15:33:57 GMT

often, when i don't hear from friends i'm supposed to hear from after calling and emailing numerous times (or having them stand me up when we're meeting for dinner, or something), i constantly think they've met with peril. a car accident. a stroke. cholera. this "personality trait" has gotten me in all kinds of trouble in this lifetime, because of all the times this has happened, only once did something actually happen to the person who didn't show up. (he was in a bicycle accident. this was more than 20 years ago.) i've been known to scan obituaries, etc., to find out the plights of those who have vanished. and these days, i have a quandary: a friend who's "missing." (and it's wholly possible that this entry will bring the friend out of hiding. and he'll be mortified or feel shitty, which isn't the intention of this. hell, as i've said at least a hundred times to the people in my life over the years, "what if he's really dead?") then again, nobody has ever been dead. still, i wonder where he is. why he hasn't answered my "where are ya?" email. why he hasn't come to the site since august. and yes, i could call him. only he's married and i don't want it to look as though i'm intruding on sacred ground. he's someone i loved a long time ago, when i was a teenager. the kind of love you don't have as an adult, when you've been jaded by this world in which we live. perhaps, christmas. i'll send a holiday card at christmas. i have two fears: that he is dead (obviously a fear, i always wonder if people are dead), or that his marriage is such that he needed to cut off any sort of contact with me because that's the kind of relationship he has. that makes me sad. i'd hate to think he lives in a box, because thinking outside the box was one of the things that made me care for him so deeply so many years ago. because what he taught me about friendship has never been duplicated. because what he taught me about myself are things i need to remember more often. because what he taught me is what i do every day, in my studio. because i loved him once.

Wed, 02 Nov 2005 15:08:45 GMT

i am having a bit of a moral dilemma, as dr. phil would say, "do i want to be right or do i want to be happy?" in this case, i don't know. the mayoral race here in nyc is pretty much of a farce at this point. michael bloomburg, our republican mayor (formerly a democrat, i think. absolutely more of an independent) is clearly the better choice. it takes a lot for me to say this because a: i am morally opposed to thinking a republican would do a better job, and b: i have stood against him at every turn until recently. the other candidate, freddy ferrer, is a moron. he's sarcastic and dumb and basically useless. i have never voted for a republican in my life. ever. i pride myself in this. never. and his numbers at the polls pretty much show his popularity is some ridiculously high number. he'd have to be hit by a bus not to win... do i just not vote? www.alyssaettinger.com

Mon, 31 Oct 2005 04:36:29 GMT

i was incorrect... not including the phal in my studio, i have THREE spiking phals at home.

Sun, 30 Oct 2005 05:49:51 GMT

you can't say i'm a quitter: i've been trying to raise orchids for more than six years, and i've killed a whole bunch. (three gorgeous wild-catts were killed by george bush... i bought the around the time of his first election, and spent the last five years dying. not one rebloomed. in fact, of the three i think i have half of one left. i blame him.) i've a dendrobium, and a stack of phals--about 10--under grow-lights, and in all the time i've had them i've had a rebloom ONCE... and even then it was mutant flowers. but tonight, tonight i saw a shoot coming out of one... one is sending up a spike. ONE IS GOING TO BLOOM! now, i don't know which one, because they've all been dormant for so long the thing could be any size or color. i feel like i'm having a baby. the one at my studio has already rebloomed once, and is sending up another spike. (and the light there is really bad, so go figure... it's all a crap shoot.) my brother, of course, has one orchid. the most exquisite catt with apricot colored flowers that have magenta spots. it blooms all year, one spike after the other. because he only has one. i'm just saying. did i mention i saw a whole program on MSNBC about OC and hoarders? scared the shit out of me.

Fri, 28 Oct 2005 05:01:28 GMT

this is the 10th week of the diet/exercise program i did for the magazine whose name i won't yet mention. the results? i lost EIGHT pounds. FOUR inches in my waist, which apparently is unheard of... i was honest about my hatred for the yoga ball and exercise bands, but did admit that i loved the heart monitor and have learned to really, really like the race walking. so, a win all around. and i'm going to keep going to lose another 4 pounds. and i've yet to feel famished on this diet, ever. (and i think a huge diet secret is concord grapes. i know this is written nowhere, and nobody has ever told me this is the truth. but two quarts a day--yes, TWO--pushed me out of the plateau... i'm obsessed with the grapes.) so, yes, thinner. THINNER. and my butt looks good.

Wed, 26 Oct 2005 23:58:57 GMT

getting up at 3:45 in the morning can make a girl tired. and grumpy. thankfully daisy's diner is open 24/7 and i could get a giant cup of java to get me started as the car took me into manhattan. i've been made up my make-up artists before, but this woman was exceptional; i really couldn't believe it was me staring back from the other side of the mirror. being on tv? weird, especially when it's via satellite so i can't see whom i'm speaking to. came home by noon slept all day afterward. tomorrow's my weigh-in for the magazine project, and let's all clasp our hands and pray for good results, shall we? and by the way... buy pots!--------------------- www.alyssaettinger.com

Tue, 25 Oct 2005 05:39:46 GMT

wednesday i do an entire day of live TV interviews. they're satellite, in a studio here in NYC, and will be beamed out to xx stations across the country. the car service is coming to get me at 4 am. FOUR in the morning. i'm wondering perhaps if it might be best just to stay up the whole night?

Fri, 21 Oct 2005 14:50:23 GMT

more rain. two nice days, and more rain. nothing good is coming from this rain, and i'm getting crabbier by the second. when it's humid it takes the pots days and days (and days and days) to dry. (fans can make them crack.) harriet is yowling more than usual. running through the house more than usual. both signs of hyperthyroidism. how's this for a plea: if you buy pots, i can afford to get harriet the radioactive iodine treatment. (ok, that was kind of mean, but i will have to pull $$ out of savings, which i'm loathe to do because that account, too, is dwindling.) so... buy pots! later. www.alyssaettinger.com

Mon, 17 Oct 2005 04:32:39 GMT

i am a vegetarian about 98.5 perfect of the time: a couple times a year i have brisket at my mom's house, or the occasional treat at mcdonalds, a slice of turkey at thanksgiving. and once a year, when the weather gets cold and raw, i make a stew. with meat. with the wind and the rain this seemed like the right time. now, i make a damned good stew, and i decided to splurge on an extra-expensive ingredient... organic meat. let me warn you: do not eat organic meat. ever have meat in mexico? kind of like that. now, i know all about antibiotics and bovine growth hormones and all the stuff that they do to meat production in this country. and i'm all about eating food that's good for you. but when the organic meat is hard, never softens, and tastes like dead liver... this is pretty much a sign that organic meat was a very, very bad idea. so i had salad.

Fri, 14 Oct 2005 16:36:58 GMT

i went to the pathmark yesterday. i was obviously having some sort of brain lapse, or was feeling overwhelmed because i was running low on cat litter and it's the only local place one can buy it in 25 pound bags. yet each time i go to the gowanus pathmark something very annoying and obnoxious happens. this time was no exception. as always, the workers in the aisles, those placed around the store, were extremely helpful and friendly. they know where everything is, help you look for hard-to-find items. hell, another hellish trip there began with the manager hunting through as many places as he could for a mere can of sterno. but this is the evil pathmark's bait-and-switch: after you've filled your wagon you have to go to the checkout, and that's where the problems always begin. so, there i was with my cart. veggies, a stack of canned beans (they were on sale for 44 cents!), a 10 pound bag of cat food, and THREE large 25 pound bags of cat litter. i choose a register, the only one where the cashiers bag your groceries for you, got on line, then lifted all THREE large 25 pound bags of cat litter onto the conveyor, along with the 12 cans of beans. before i could get any of my veggies on the belt, the cashier told me that her line was closed, and that i should go to the next register over because that's where she was moving to. so, i moved all THREE large 25 pound bags of cat litter, and my 12 cans of beans, to the next register. no sooner had the third bag of litter been lifted, another cashier walked by and said, "who told you to come to this line? what are you doing on this line?" i said that the original cashier, and i pointed, had told me to go there. then the mean cashier looked at the original cashier and said, with a tone, "why are you moving people to the next line?" the original cashier told her why we were moving and the mean cashier walked away and opened up a new line. five minutes later, with my SEVENTY FIVE pounds of cat litter on the belt, the cashier is still scanning items for her last couple of customers. then she needed a price check. at this point, i hrealized that not only had been in the line that wasn't really a line for ten minutes, this was now a bag your own groceries line. i'd made friends withe people behind me, and i grumbled under my voice that there was no way in hell i was moving my THREE large 25 pound bags of cat litter one more time. and then i said something to the effect of `this is why never come to the pathmark, because it sucks here'. they concurred. finally, 'our' cashier came to the register, and she needed a manager to come help her unlock the place where the cash goes, so she could put the cash drawer in. then, just as she was about to turn on that conveyor belt, a weird little bad man said he needed to get by me on the line. i had to pull my fricking cart out, so he could slip through. i asked him what he was doing, and he said he was a pathmark employee (i guess i didn't see he was wearing one of those polyester pathmark pinneys) and was going to the cashier to cash his paycheck. seriously. finally, she started scanning. then she picked up a bag of cat litter and it broke and the litter spilled everywhere. she didn't know what to do, so she just stood there holding the leaking bag. she asked me if i still wanted it, and i said no. she asked the cashier at the register next to her what to do, and they had to call a manager to take away the litter because she had no place for it. then, because she had no broom, she started sweeping the cat litter off the scanner with a magazine. a few minutes later, all my groceries had moved to the bagging area, and both of my zucchinis had bits of litter on them. i then lifted my TWO 25-lb bags of cat litter and the cat food and then bagged all the beans, and ran the hell out of there. please remind me of this story next time i choose to go to the pathmark.

Thu, 13 Oct 2005 14:33:35 GMT

ok, what the hell is up with the facial hair? men, i mean, and their odd new fetish for "fashionable" facial hair. i started, i think, with a goatee. then the soul patch. now there's this weird patch on the chin, all by itself. and there are a large number of men out there with actual beards than there have been since the 60s. (at least this is preferable, in my opinion, but alas, i digress.) as far as i'm concerned, these men look like freaks; nothing worse than seeing what appears to be a cute guy across a crowded j crew store, only to find out when you get clsoser that he has some creepy chin hair thing. is it just NYC?

Wed, 12 Oct 2005 06:14:46 GMT

well. well well well. seems i'm ignoring the blog again. i'm wondering if this is because i'm thinking of winding down here. or because i'm so busy i can't even think about blogging. or because i can't write here about the things i really, really want to write about. for example, and this is in a nutshell: there's a man i see frequently--not `see' as in date, see as in run into--and he reminds me so much of a man i knew in college, when i was a freshman and he was a senior. he was older and warm and blond and and a sculptor, a kind man who spent the night with me when my grandfather died, with warm candles lit in his room, then shared his toothbrush with me in the morning. as i came home from my studio this evening, i talked aloud to myself, writing the story as i remembered it. but, again, there are those people who read GG and delight in my misfortune. they will delight in the fact that i never ended up with the sculptor, and that i won't likely end up with the man i run into because, for reasons i'm not offering right now, men like him don't date women like me. but again, too much information for the evil trolls. ergo, that's all the story you're getting. sorry. i'm having other issues as well, personal ones i'd normally share here. sorry, not sharing. you may have noticed that i no longer write about my dating adventures, except peripherally. same reasoning: spiteful trolls. someday, i will out the spiteful trolls. but not right now, because it's not prudent. so the fun and wild parts of my life, or many of them, are kept hidden inside my over-active brain. that's a treat. am working with my shrink to find a way to quiet my brain. no easy task. ever have an overactive brain? all the time? yeah, not so fun. i've succeeded, with the help of my trusty ipod, to work at the pottery wheel without too many brain interruptions. and my walking has helped some, though i don't tend to walk with the ipod when it's dark out... maybe if i join the Y, which i may. regardless, baby steps. when i said this to my therapist, something like "and i'm supposed to wear my ipod for the rest of my life?" she told me that i always do this, look at the bigger picture when i can start by refocusing on small things. this, i imagine, is why it's called cognitive behavioral therapy. the shrink is also a hypnotist... that could be curious. and i have a stack of remote TV experiences coming up; my dear and sassy friend sally, a fashion stylist, is taking me shopping so i don't look hopelessly unfashionable. they had better provide hair and make-up. then, the next day, the shoot for the magazine i'm doing the fitness program for. ack. those fat finding pinchy calipers had better show a difference. so, that's where i am. four weeks and one day shy of 40. stalled at five pounds. wondering where a dear friend who wrote occasionally and visited this site daily has gone (hey, pottery guy, are you out there? hmmmmmmmmm). and i've sold 8 pots. baby steps. time to get your holiday orders in, folks. i'm just saying.

Sun, 09 Oct 2005 17:24:03 GMT

this rain? enough to make a person want to scream. and it's damned cold. blech. the upshot on miss harriet: nothing dire. what could be early hyperthyroidism. (possibly why she's screaming like a banshee all day long, and drinking the aforementioned water from the aforementioned dish.) hyperthyroidism can be a: no biggie, b: a biggie that makes your cat hate you because you have to pill her several times a day, c: a biggie that can be cured with radioactive iodine, a period of isolation, and $1200. ergo, every time i see harriet-kitty drinking water, i start to cry. this is not normal.

Wed, 05 Oct 2005 21:03:18 GMT

i spent a bit of time today at the veterinary hospital: harriet-kitty, who usually isn't very thirsty and always drinks from the toilet bowl when she is, has been drinking from her water bowl. i've seen it. in person. i didn't even think she knew how. everyone has said: so she's thirsty! well, ok, duh. yeas, she's thirsty. but the question remains, why is she thirsty? because there are numerous very serious illnesses the symptoms of which are increased water comsumption. she was examined (and seemed fine), only attacked one person, and had blood drawn. they told me not to worry because they found little to worry about. still, i won't sleep much till i find out for sure.