Crazy hilarious dream

I took an extremely refreshing nap this past Saturday afternoon.  One of the reasons it was so great was the ridiculously long and complex and hilarious dream that I had.  Here is the summary.  And yes, it was about as incoherent as described below.

I'm in some 3-bedroom apartment with two roommates (who are actually just good friends from college who live in San Francisco.)  We are talking with the old apartment owners about how to arrange the apartment, and all I can think about is where to mount my TV.

Then the three of us leave the apartment and decide to go to the casino.  We walk onto this ferry boat and see some young men and some kids breakdancing for money.  I ask one of the guys if he krunk dances, and he shows me some moves.  Then he launches into a tirade about how rappers have stolen a particular krunk move of his which is called Angry Angry Alligator.

Then this girl walks by, and I decided to do some sleight-of-hand magic for her.  But when I try to do my disappearing-napkin trick, she gets obsessed with my hands and won't let go of my hands.  She just won't stop staring at my hands.

Then she gives me a big kiss and disappears.  I then realize that there are all these security officers looking for her, and she had used the kiss to distract them and run away!  But then we spot her swimming away, but *she* is actually the Hamburglar!  (For some reason, this revelation did not seem unusual during the actual dream.)

The Hamburglar then climbs back on board and runs and jumps into an escape tube down into the depths of the ship.  I follow him down the tube, but then I get stuck standing up in a narrow sewage pipe, with Nickelodeon goop up to my neck.  Then the dream turns into a PBS documentary about how it's important to stay calm in these situations.

Then I realize the sewage pipe full of goop is actually the inside of a post-office mail room where everyone checks their mail.  So every few seconds, a little window opens up into the sewage pipe as someone checks their mail from the outside, but I'm never quick enough to call out to them to let me out of the pipe.  (I don't know if this description actually makes sense to anyone outside of my own brain, but it was a perfectly reasonable situation when I dreamed it.)

Anyway, then I woke up and laughed confusedly for about 20 minutes.

Correct change

A few weeks ago, I needed to do laundry, but I didn't have enough quarters for the job.  It was ~9 pm and freezing outside, so I didn't want to go outside to the drugstore to get change.  Instead, I scrounged around my apartment and found enough change for the laundry....but it was all nickels and dimes!  Not a single quarter!

But I'm desperate to do laundry (I was flying out to Buffalo, NY the next morning.)  So I decide to go across the hall of my apartment building and ask my neighbor for quarters.  Slight problem, though....I have never met my neighbor before.  I know he's married and has 2 young kids, but otherwise, I've never met him or spoken with him or anything.

Anyway, I grab all the nickels and dimes, cross the hall, and knock on his door.  He answers.  I explain the situation, and ask him if he has $1.50 in quarters in exchange for $1.50 in nickels and dimes.  He seems a bit rushed to put his kids to bed, but he says it's not a problem.  He has the quarters.  He goes back inside, comes out a minute later, takes my change, and drops a short stack of quarters into my hand.

I don't want to be rude and count the quarters in front of him, so I just say thank you a couple times and walk back to my apartment.  All set.  No problems, right?

Then I count the quarters....

He gave me one too many quarters!  I gave him $1.50 in change, but he gave me $1.75.  But because I didn't count it right away, I didn't realize his mistake until I was already back inside my apartment.

Now, if it had been the other way around and he had shortchanged me by a quarter, I would not have cared at all.  As long as I had enough for laundry, I was fine.  But how do I know what he thinks about his quarter?!  He probably doesn't care.....but what if he did care?!  I don't know the guy.  He doesn't know me.  But I don't want his first impression of me to be "that-Jewish-guy-across-the-hall-who-steals-quarters."  Seriously!

I consider knocking on his door again and giving him back the quarter, but I've already annoyed him once tonight, and I also don't want to make the impression that I'm that annoying guy with OCD across the hall who cares about every cent.  You should not annoy your neighbors.  Period.

So I'm standing in my apartment, quarters in hand, pondering what to do:

• If I don't give the quarter back, I would feel guilty and possibly get a bad rep from my neighbor.
• If I do give the quarter back, I risk annoying him and his family...and also getting a bad rep.

I'm stuck between a friggin' rock and hard place.  There is no good option here.

In the end, I decide to something to avoid any awkwardness.  However, in hindsight, it might possibly have been an even more awkward decision.

I decided to write a short note and tuck the quarter inside.

Note the strategic use of all-caps THANKS

and exclamation point for levity.  Well-played, David.

I walk back quietly to his apartment and slip the note and quarter under the door.  (Unfortunately, the quarter was not really affixed to the note, and I think it might have slipped out when I pushed the note under the door.  So it's possible that he will just find a note, with no quarter in it.  FML.)

And so ended another saga of WTF-edness.  (On a related note, if I owe you any sort of debt, please let me know.  I'm clearly not so organized about taking care of such things.)

Awkwardness on the plane

My team flew to Buffalo again this morning.  We got delayed on the tarmac, though, so I got a chance to chat up the nice flight attendant lady about the weather and whatnot.  After 30 minutes sitting on the plane, though, I start to get hungry, so I ask her if she is allowed to serve any of the snacks yet.  She says she doesn't know if she has enough for everyone, but she will look into it.

I'm literally sitting across the aisle from her little kitchenette, so I see her start shuffling through all these drawers trying to scrounge up bags of snacks.  She's ripping open cardboard boxes of various food items, packing and re-packing individual snack bags into all the shelves of her cart.  I start to feel bad.  I though that she had some peanuts easily available, but instead she is actually spending a significant amount of time looking for some snacks.  Her level of effort is not trivial.

Finally, she finds a small bag of trail mix and offers it to me.  I take the bag and thank her.

End of the story?  Unfortunately not.

As soon as she hands me the bag, I realize something.  The bag of trail mix is not kosher!  It is some sort of mixture of berries and nuts roasted in oil and whatnot, and it's not a mainstream brand that is typically kosher. So I can't eat it....

...but she just spent 10 minutes getting it for me!  And she is standing in her kitchenette about 2 feet away from me!  I can't hide!  What do I do?!!

All I can think of is to stare distractedly out the window, as if I've forgotten about the trail mix that I'm holding.  My mind is racing about what to do.  Do I let her see me put the trail mix in my backpack "for later"?  That wouldn't make sense because I had admitted to being hungry now.  Do I hide the bag when she isn't looking, pretending like I've already eaten it?  (For some reason, one idea that entered my mind for a brief moment was to reach over the seat in front of me, and drop the trail mix bag behind the back of the guy sitting there.  I don't know what that would have accomplished other than pissing off the guy in front of me and clearly bringing unwanted attention to me and my trail mix.)

I honestly did not know what to do.

After a few more tense minutes of internal dialogue, I suddenly discover a solution.  I notice that the flight attendant lady has pulled out another type of snack....and it's kosher!  (Nature Valley Granola Bars for the win!)  As she walks by me, I quickly put the trail mix back and take a granola bar.  The most satisfying granola bar of my life.

Success.

Drinking

Situation: I'm in my apartment.  I'm thirsty.  I want water.

Challenge: I only have small cups.  They simply don't quench my thirst unless I refill them 3-4 times.

Solution:

Plastic mixing bowl

Problem solved.

Hemp milk

(A few seconds after my roommate tries a sip of hemp milk)

Me: What does it taste like?

Him: I can taste so many colors!!

Me: Hilarious.

Him: Actually, it's like drinking a rope.

Chapstick

Thing I learned today:  If you are in the office and in need of chapstick, don't call the guy in charge of office supplies.  He does not stock chapstick in his supply closet (and he will also laugh at you.)

Late

We've all been late for the train or bus.  It happens.  But sometimes you get lucky and the train is also running late, so you actually end up catching the train.

But you know you're really running late when you still miss your train, even though it showed up 30 minutes late.

Headline on the internet

"The creator of MadLibs died yesterday. He was seventy-poop years old."

Realization

I should not be allowed to go clothes-shopping unsupervised because I'm an impulse buyer with bad fashion sense.

Shalom

I said "Shalom" to a random guy on the train this morning who I thought was wearing a yarmulke.  Turns out he just had a really bad comb-over.

In the airport

7:30 am, Thursday morning, Buffalo Niagara airport
So I'm sitting in the airport earlier this morning, waiting for my flight. There were a lot of people sitting in my designated gate, so I was sitting in one of the empty gates that wasn't being used. So there are only 1-2 people anywhere near me. It's early morning, and it's very quiet, very peaceful. There is gentle music playing over the speaker system overhead.
All of a sudden....

CHWWAAAAA kyooo!!  CCHHHAAAA kyooo!!

Breaking the silence is some guy hawking a lugee nearby. Really REALLY loudly.  He's really going to town.

CHHHHWWAAATT {spit} AACCHHHAHHHWHW!! {spit}

I turn around to see where this guy is, but surprisingly I don't see anyone nearby.

CHHHHWWAAATT {spit} AACCHHHAHHHWHW!! {spit} {cough, HACK, cough}

Then I realize that the guy is in the men's bathroom. He was that loud!  It literally sounded like he was right behind me, coughing up a lung, even though he was inside the bathroom.



Now, normally, you can't hear what's going on inside a bathroom. But this airport's restrooms have short tiled corridors that lead into the restroom (so that people with luggage can get in and out easily.) So this guy must be at the sink in the bathroom, coughing his brains out, and the curved corridor leading into the restroom IS AMPLIFYING THE SOUND TOWARDS THE SEATING AREA.


Seriously, it was REALLY loud.

CHHHHWWAAAAA!!!   CCHHHAHHHWHW!!

He must have been coughing, hacking, spitting for a good 60 seconds. (Probably some sort of small animal stuck in his throat.)



Of course, during this time, I'm trying to picture what this guy must look like. Based on the sound alone, I had pictured some overweight, unshaven construction worker, with a dirty workshirt, toolbelt, untied boots, and (of course) butt crack showing. (If you had been there and heard the same coughing that I heard, you would have come to the same conclusion.)



But then the guy walks out of the bathroom, and he's a skinny, 5-foot-tall Asian dude in a suit! I was dumbfounded! I have no idea how he possibly could cough that hard without killing himself. Such big sounds coming from such a small man. Miracle of miracles.


Anyway, that was my morning in the airport. Pretty typical I guess.

What the...??

I'm packing up my clothes in the hotel room last night, and as I'm folding (read: haphazardly rolling up) my few button-down shirts, I suddenly notice something I hadn't seen before. On the front bottom corner of the shirt, my last name is written in black ink.  Weird, right?


You are probably thinking that's not so weird.  A lot of people tag their clothes.  But in this case, this is quite weird.  For several reasons:

First, I definitely did not write my name on any of my shirts.
Second, it's not my handwriting.

And third....

my last name is not STIEVEL!!

Someone else clearly wrote my name (incorrectly) on my shirt (although I'm guessing it was not while I was wearing the shirt.)


Then I realize the same thing is written on ALL my button-down shirts!

What the hell??

I don't know if I'll ever figure out who did this, but my guess is that one of the dry cleaners I may have used recently decided to write my (wrong) name on my shirts.  How rude!

Another world record

FIVE mismatched socks from the laundry!  Madness!

How is this even possible?

(Note that I will still probably pair some of these up each other and wear them anyway.)

(Also note that this is not my first post about mis-matched socks,...and probably not my last.)

One of those days

Things I've spilled today:

• Cereal on the ground
• Milk on the counter
• Salad dressing on my pants
• Coffee on my shirt

I hope I don't try to hold my baby nephew tonight.  It might end badly.

Simple mental math fail

15*85 is not equal to 10*5*85

I think I need to send back my diploma.