insectual harassment.

for the past two days a giant fly has been buzzing around my office. if i worked in the zoo, i would find this tolerable. but i don't, and so i really don't know what its doing in here. i also don't know why this fly is so large - about the size of a fully-popped piece of popcorn, which i think is a bit too large for your general nyc fly - although i'm thinking it must be the air in this building that creates mutant bugs. (see: elevator ride from hell)

anyways, i suppose you're wondering why i'm complaining about a fly buzzing around my head, simply doing his little fly thing near the window looking for an exit, as flies usually do. well, this fly isn't doing that. this fly is randomly dive-bombing me as i try to do my work. this fly hangs out on my sudoku puzzle daily calendar watching me type. he'll occasionally fly over to the window, or out my office door, but shortly returns and is again buzzing right over my shoulder. he's shown up on the chair next to me and perching on my mousepad.

i know i should have managed to kill this thing by now, but for some reason i can't get it together and swat him in time. i think its a combination of his size - daunting for a novice bug-killer like myself - and his buzzing, which is excessively loud when he's so close to me and throws me off to the point where instead of grabbing a notepad and swatting him i'm instead doing an indoor-voice girly shriek (translation: an eek-like noise low enough that only the person in the office next door would think something is amiss. blessfully, he has been on vacation.) and jumping out of my chair away from him. its pathetic. and rather distracting - not just the swerving out of his way but also the constant worrying that he might nest in my hair, given its current state of "big + curly". i would hope i could feel him on my scalp if he attempted such a move. - and if he ever emerges from his current lair in my blinds i will have to buck up and destroy him. let's see if i can manage that.

but the good news is, even if i can't handle it, i'm leaving for a week-long vacation later today and having checked out the lifespan of a fly -- which for your average male is 10 days (i'm assuming he's a male due to his size and aggressive nature) -- i'm expecting him to perish naturally and be gone by the time i return.

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so yes, loveandcyanide is heading off on a little vacay for the 4th, so we won't be around for a bit. where are we going? Long Beach Island. go ahead, snicker and make your little jersey shore comments...but LBI is actually a rather nice and quiet little island off the coast of the j.shore and isn't very j.shore-like at all, as the fist-pumping fools that flock to the j.shore have not found their way there yet.

hopefully, my fly won't either.

road rage: 2-wheeler edition.

while waiting for a friend after work yesterday i witnessed a near-miss between a woman crossing the street and a delivery man on his bicycle. as the man screamed angrily at her as he whizzed past, i couldn't help but have a flashback to my own harrowing experience with an irate cyclist.

i had been in the midst of doing a walk to raise money for Multiple Sclerosis, crossing over the Brooklyn Bridge during the midway point of the walk. now i'll admit that i might have stepped from the pedestrian lane into the bike lane as i was walking, but the pedestrian lane is of a decent width, and it was only missy striding next to me, so at most i was maybe a hip's-worth into the bike path. not very much.

i suddenly felt something closing in behind me, and i heard a shout - "watch it!" as the biker flew past i sort of stumbled in to missy to move out of his way. and as he passed me he turned and screamed "rot in hell!"

rot. in. hell. was that really necessary? we were completely taken aback. i don't think anyone - exes, enemies, shouting homeless bums, anyone - ever told me to rot in hell. and to think, crazy cyclist even yelled this at me while i was wearing a pinny stating that i was there, only so slightly in his way, for a charitable cause. hmmph!

suffice to say i became a little wary of people on bikes after that. sure, i still am friends with people who bike (actually, two of the sweetest girls i know are avid cyclists) and i even attended the bicycle film festival (to see pee-wee's big adventure, of course), however i've seen one too many wrathful cyclist/pedestrian interactions to truly feel comfortable near anyone pedaling around on two wheels.

and so it goes.

i know. where have we been???

unfortunately, we didn't go anywhere. even more unfortunate, loveandcyanide took the break to mourn the death of our beloved little cat tigger, who after 17 years of ruling our roost, succumbed to throat cancer and diabetes (it makes me ridiculously sad when animals have human diseases). its been rather difficult - having never lost a pet before, i had no idea how hard the grieving process would be. i've probably cried more the past two weeks than i ever did for any relative that passed away, which i suppose is slightly disturbing and/or mean, but i've also never lost anyone who slept at the foot of my bed for 10 years. so in that respect i think all my carrying on is fitting. even when i was weepy in the produce aisle of shoprite and you made me wear my sunglasses, missy.

as is typical of my family, we've managed to turn tragedy into comedy to help cope, so currently there is much ado over what to do with the cat's ashes - father wants them to remain in the house, mother wants them buried in the yard in the hole father started digging weeks ago when he made a coffin (yes, coffin) for the cat. last i heard there were threats of father putting mother in the coffin and moving off to tahiti with the little urn. and here you thought i was exaggerating when i said that our cat was the most important member of the household.

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last week i also endured my first experience with layoffs. although there turned out to be only one - one very deserved one, if you ask me - there were office rumours afoot for days that there would be multiple ones, so we all sat in terror that we would be cut as well. not like being jobless in the summer would be the worst thing in the world...but thankfully things have returned to normal this week, and i can sit here writing instead of having to comfort tearful junior members of our staff in my office all day long.

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but things haven't been completely gloom+doom over here. there's been birthday parties (including an 'explosive' family one featuring a bbq grill fire), the acquisition of an awesome set of vinyl warrior bears, the nerve-wracking-yet-exciting start of a hunt for a new apartment, impending vacations, a new favorite snack (Tings), and a new addition to my list of favorite movies (stranger than fiction).

touching on the elements (sans fire).

i just finished reading a lengthy article in the NY Times real estate section that featured someone i graduated college with, which was a little bizarre to see. more bizarre is that the guy was a degenerate in school and is now about to become a father. most bizarre is that this is actually the second lengthy Times piece i've recently read that featured one of my classmates.

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the roosevelt island tram absolutely fascinates me. it always has - taking a ride on it has been on my daytrip to-do list forever - but now even more so as i have a great view of it from my office. so i get to stare at it all day long. which is nice, because watching a little tram float by every few minutes makes me feel like i'm in disneyworld as opposed to an office.

but notice how i said every few minutes. seriously, the tram must be the quickest mode of transportation in the city because its like the minute one arrives, the next one is already on its way in. we're in the midst of a seriously major downpour right now, and i just spotted one gliding across the sky. i guarantee the subway is screwed up due to this rain (or at the very least the N train is, since a mere snowflake sets that one off-schedule), and yet the city's sky transport is still going strong. amazing.

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speaking of amazing, we finally got around to watching the squid and the whale last night. SUCH a good movie. despite the rampant literary pretension - you would think working in publishing i'd be accepting of it. NO! it bothers me more than most other sorts of pretension - it was incredibly well-acted and just a really good story. and at less than 1.5 hours, it never dragged. then as the credits rolled we discovered that one of the leads was played by kevin kline's son. <3! we love kevin kline...

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and speaking of sea life, tomorrow is missy + bear's big day. (don't bother wishing them birthday greetings here since they won't see it. although i suppose you could wish me greetings for them, as our family used to buy both of us gifts on each other's birthday's so the non-birthday sister wouldn't feel left out...) what does that have to do with the ocean? a good third of missy's gift this year is related to the aquatic. why? as a tyke she went through a phase where she carried a dried seahorse around with her in her pocket at all times, and i just love taunting her about her peculiar little marine phase.

vacation, revisited.

the past few days have been rather overwhelming, due to a giant book expo and a 5-year college reunion. one of those events involved hoards of middle-aged women wielding giant tote bags, the other copious amounts of alcohol and a dorm sleepover. i'll let you guess which was which, and at which i had the most fun.

having finally recuperated, i'm ready to reveal, as promised last week, the reasons why i'd like to move to good ol' texas upon having visited it. (have no fear, i'm not actually going there unless something major necessitated it. my bangs could never handle the humidity and i'm not into driving trucks.)

1. THE BBQ - seriously, amazing. i literally wanted to snuggle in and take a nap in this batch of pulled pork i ate.

2. SONIC - the establishment taunts new york (or maybe just loveandcyanide) as its commercials play all the time here while the nearest one is in virginia. hours away! you cannot show us a banana creme pie shake featuring nilla wafers that we can't have. thankfully, texas had one about every 20 ft.

3. $850 RENT - not per person. per apartment. per gorgeous apartment my friends lived in that featured a fireplace, 2 bedrooms, 2 baths, and a community pool that looked like it was pulled from the caribbean. and what do i pay for my 750 sq. ft. box?

4. THEY SELL BACON BY THE STRIP! - oh, you don't believe me? behold the photographic evidence:


its a little fuzzy, but that whataburger sign states "bacon per slice - 0.35". we wound up at that drive-thru at about 1:30am, so you know the insane amount of willpower it took me to just snap photos and not pull away with a $2 handful of bacon.

chrissy: preschool style icon/remorseful commuter.

while flipping through a magazine today, i spotted a photo of maddox (jolie-pitt), in which he is wearing a tshirt that i have. have. not had, when i was five, you know, like he is.

do you have to retire your clothes when the kindergarten set starts turning up in the them?

*******

i hate to admit it, but i think i was a little overzealous in all the excitement over my new bus stop. similar to when i purchase shoes, it appears i might have valued aesthetics over sensibility.

as the sun bore down through the clear glass roofing the other day, i couldn't help but remember, wistfully, that i never used to sweat at the bus stop, as the old shelter provided shade. and as it poured yesterday morning and i got soaked stepping on the bus, i recalled the good old days when the bus shelter covering used to extend to the curb, so one could step dryly on to the bus.

damn you, pretty-but-useless phenomenon.

i guess this is why most people opt for souvenir tshirts.

hi y'all!

we're back from the lone star state. it was a terrific time, despite the crazy storms (figures i head south for memorial day weekend, and then its nicer in nyc...). on the plus side for the weather, while i didn't get to act out PW'sBA in the alamo, i did get to pretend i was in another fave film, Twister, whilst driving through a corn field in the pounding rain with a scarily dark sky above. oh if only philip seymour hoffman had been in the car with us...

but i digress. so i was going to celebrate loveandcyanide's big return with a listing of all the reasons why i want to move to texas - shocking! i know. but its a rather short list and 90% of the content has to do with cured meats, so really, not so shocking - but that one will have to wait, due to a ridiculously appropriate trip-related situation that ties in to the last comment we received from one of our dear readers.

so, i bet when chuckles wrote that he imagined me elbow-deep in bbq sauce he didn't envision it the result of an incompetent fool working for continental airlines.

but it's true -- my sauciest experience didn't occur in texas, but in my parents' living room, about an hour after landing in newark airport. i knew it was bad news when i pulled my suitcase off the conveyor belt and saw that it had been stamped "inspected". it actually should have been stamped "rearranged", since the two bottles of bbq sauce that i had brought home for my grill-happy father, that had been snugly packed in bags wrapped in clothing in opposite parts of the suitcase, were now next to each other. and of course, one of the bottles was broken, and had spilled all over a good 1/4 of my belongings.

and so there i was last night, elbow deep in my bbq sauce-covered suitcase. had it not been for the worry of ingesting glass shards, i most definitely would have had it all over my face as well.

happier bbq stories to come, kids. yeehaw!

nothing is certain but death and texas...

season 3 seems to be the kiss of death for all my favorite tv shows.

last night we said a sad farewell to Veronica Mars, which ended with such little closure that missy and i found ourselves in such a state of despair that we wound up persuaded into watching the end of Dancing with the Stars. while Bear cheered for joey fatone ("fat one, fat one", he chanted), we sat around in a mild state of shock that our favorite tv series had ended. just. like. that. thank goodness for dvds.

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loveandcyanide will be off the air - for a short while, don't worry - as well, as i'm taking a little vacation to...Texas! (houston and austin, to be exact. unfortunately not san antonio, news that shattered my dreams of acting out Pee Wee's Big Adventure.) although i need to use both hands and feet to count the number of countries i've visited, i have yet to travel beyond the east coast and see the rest of the US - weird, i know - so i'm sort of excited to see what the wild west has to offer me. i'm hoping for stagecoaches and a shootout at dawn...but will settle for a rodeo and some good bbq.

143 DOT.

i don't know what level of rock-bottom i'm hitting that the Department of Transportation is responsible for the excitement of my week.

it was announced last year that the city would be getting some snazzy new bus stop shelters. i recently spied one near my office, and was quite impressed - totally modern and sleek, made of metal and glass. and it could even fit more than 3 people under it. but i haven't noticed too many others throughout the city.

so imagine my surprise the other morning when i got to my bus stop, and the usual crappy old shelter was missing. in its place were some construction cones and a hole in the sidewalk. could it be??? i marveled. but i live in an outer borough!! i was probably the only person standing at the stop that day having a complete glee attack about the removal of our old covering/possibility of a new one.

so my hunch turned out to be correct - as missy and i sat on the bus home from the gym yesterday, we came to a stop further down the main avenue and there sat a shiny new shelter. a veritable work of modern art compared to the rest of the junk that sits on steinway street. missy managed to contain her elation, but i was beyond excited.

hopefully by monday my stop will be finished, and i'll be able to hang out in the new shelter. i might even take pictures for you guys! oh the anticipation..

really people, i'm still just a child myself.

there's been a disturbing new trend lately where i'm being mistaken as a parent. i suppose this is just a by-product of aging, but its still a little disconcerting.

about a month ago, i needed to make a drop off at the dry cleaners one morning. as i was running late, i opted not to put the clothes in a bag, and just clasped the pile to my chest. when i arrived in the cleaners and put the pile down on the counter, the woman started chuckling and saying something. i suppose i looked confused, so she pointed at my chest and said "baby! baby! haha, toys!" i looked down, wondering what the hell she was talking about, and there stuck to my sweater was a giraffe finger puppet**. i did a little embarrassed chuckle and plucked the giraffe off my shirt, shoving him in my pocket, while the woman continued to exclaim about a baby. so instead of trying to correct her - we have a pretty large language barrier between us when just counting the number of shirts i bring in, let alone trying to explain such a story - i just gave her a weary nod, like, yes, can you believe my kid stuck his toy to my shirt? kids. sigh.

so i left the cleaners thinking it was sort of amusing that this woman thinks i have a child, meanwhile the puppet belongs to two adults.

well, apparently she's been speaking to the National American Miss association, since yesterday i received in the mail a packet addressed to the daughter of chrissy. it was stunning to see. missy put it on the top of the mail stack and we both just sort of stared at it in horror. so i opened it, figuring it must be some sort of mistake on the envelope. but no - the letter inside started off with the line "we are so excited to notify you that your daughter has been chosen..."

why on earth would i receive such paraphernalia? don't these junk-mailing organizations take your info from some sort of national database? and in one, shouldn't i be listed as single? i didn't claim any dependants on my taxes. (i technically should, taking care of missy and bear as i do. although neither one of them are really pageant material.) i've never signed on the line above the word mother on a birth certificate. where did this new reputation come from?


**you may ask how a giraffe finger puppet found its way into my clothing pile. well, it was on the kitchen table, and when i put the pile down on the table, he somehow got tangled in it. why do we have finger puppets on our kitchen table? if you must ask such questions, you mustn't know us very well.

P.S.

having gotten so carried away with describing the questions i was asked during 'career day', i didn't reveal the important things that I took away from this experience:

1. an insight into what my mother goes through every day
2. that nice glowing feeling that you get after performing a good deed
3. strep throat

i'll find the irony in all this much more amusing once the pain in my throat subsides.

career day.

i got weaseled into participating in 'career day' at my mother's school today. while honored that my mother thinks that i actually have a career, i was rather nervous (read: had nightmares all wednesday night) about how i'd be able to pull off a speech about publicity that would appeal to a bunch of unruly inner-city 5th graders.

well i worried for absolutely nothing, since i forgot how much cachet being a teacher's child carries. from the moment i was introduced as mrs. x's daughter, i became a minor celebrity. kids shouted out what year she taught them, debated whether or not i resembled her, and begged me to reveal her age.

when i actually did get to speak about my career, i managed to engage at least two of three classes i spoke to (in the first one the kids seemed completely stoned, and oblivious to the fact i was even there. i pity their teacher.), and the kids had a ton of questions for me. some of the best:

• are you married?
• do you ever think about quitting your job?
• on your day off, do you just sit around your house? that's what my mom does on her day off.
• would you ever want to promote video games?
• can you order breakfast and eat it at your desk?
• can you leave your office for lunch?
• if you bring your lunch, how does it get warm? do you have an oven there?
• if there is another girl in the office with the same job as you, are you jealous of her?
• how much money do you make?

and my personal favorites:

are there signs in your office that say no running in the halls, no yelling, and no smoking?

and

is there anyone in your office who is really weird and no one likes them?

as you can tell, they were mostly preoccupied with my workplace eating habits. it was all sort of adorable, but i was quite happy to be able to come back to my peaceful office. maybe being an aunt is really all that i'm cut out for.

wednesday questions

why... does going to the dry cleaners make me feel more productive and fill me with a greater sense of accomplishment than almost anything else?

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when...did i become so health consciously inclined? i just had a phone fight with missy about how we had to go to the gym after work today instead of enjoying this beautiful balmy evening dining outdoors at our new favorite neighborhood joint. this is the first time ever that i've chosen exercise over wine + bbq'ed octopus. and i don't even regret it. scary.

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doesn't it...violate some sort of workplace code to shut off the water - thereby closing the restrooms - in an office for four hours during a workday, with the closest alternative being in another building across the street?

i should really have OSHA on speed dial.

entomology for beginners.

in case you didn't know, its spiderman week here in nyc. a whole week devoted to all things peter parker...the movies were alright, but i don't think any movie really needs an entire week's celebration devoted to it. we only get one day to celebrate our independence as a nation, don't we? one day to honor our births?

nevertheless, i checked out the week's website and there are seriously a billion events going on. i'm pleasantly surprised i've managed to avoid most of the them already, although i'm sort of curious about supercuts' "mary jane madness" deal -- would anyone really want their hair to look like hers?

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in further insect news, since the warm(er) weather has arrived, so has a giant swarm of flies in the lobby of the my office building. a serious swarm. they hang out near the radiator right by the door, and typically a handful of them will buzz around you while waiting for the elevator, and the whole lot of them surround you when you try to exit through the door. it's charming.

why do you work in such a dirty building are they there, you ask? i believe it has something to do with the dead mice that are supposedly in the ceiling, a rumor i didn't really believe until all these flies appeared. although, if the fly brigade is any indication, i'm guessing the deceased rodents are in the radiator, not the ceiling.

i'm really so curious about the people who actually live in this filth factory.

all love, no cyanide.

it is typically hard to maintain a general feeling of goodwill towards others in this town. whether its someone shoving you off the subway, a self-important corporate guy stealing the cab you've been patiently waiting for, or a slightly crazy fellow duane reade shopper holding up your transaction while complaining to the cashier that the quarter they were just given "is too thin to use in their laundromat, can they have a different one?" (really. i don't understand that either.), there is usually something occurring that makes you just kind of despise everyone around you.

but every once in awhile a magical little altruistic moment happens that restores your faith in humanity. i had one of them on saturday.

after a rather fun and eventful friday evening, i took a cab back to my apartment around 10am saturday morning. upon exiting the cab and coming in to my abode, i suddenly felt a pang of dread and wouldn't you know - for the first time ever i had lost my wallet. (well, my pouch, since i don't carry a wallet like most adults and prefer little change purses. i think i picked up this trait from my grandmother.)

i had dropped it in the cab and after a good two minutes of cursing myself and panicking, i started the motions of trying to get it back/canceling my credit cards/minimizing damages. i must say, nothing sobers you up faster than the realization that a majority of your valuable belongings are no longer in your possession. so suddenly hungover - and therefore even sadder - i pouted over my losses and attempted to be proactive.

amazingly, about 40 minutes later my phone rang...and it was a woman named lillian asking if i had lost something in a cab! she gave me her address and by a short time later i had my beloved pouch back, all items inside perfectly intact. i'm really still sort of blown away at how quickly and nicely the whole situation resolved itself, since i'm certain the odds of having one's wallet returned are generally pretty slim.

so thank you, lillian. i hope good karma comes back to you in spades.

sewer rats killed the internet star.

"aging cheddar becomes internet star"

i mean honestly, don't people have anything better to do than watch an online video of cheese ripening? although i guess my taking the time to bitch about the people watching the cheese ripen is almost as pathetic.

but, my favorite line of the article: "Watchers have tuned in from as far afield as Albania and New Zealand, although most are from the United States (ed note: of course) where a school has even sent in pictures of two crocodiles to guard the cheese."

why in the world would a crocodile be an appropriate sentry for a hunk of cheese?

i'm all about balance.

i believe it is a true testament to my piscean nature that the two highlights of my week thus far have been:

1. joining a gym
2. deep fried meatballs

those crazy little flakes.

unlike most people, i don't like milk in my cereal. i'd rather pick at dry cereal - i mean, really, aren't soggy flakes just SO gross to look at? - as though its a snack mix. this makes for a sometimes messy experience, especially when i'm breakfasting at my desk.

today was no exception - although my mess turned out to be quite exceptional.

while tearing through my mini-bowl of special K i dropped a few flakes on the floor, so i bent down and picked them up (seriously, its amazing i get any work at all done in the morning with the amount of time i spend on my hands and knees behind my desk, scouring the floor for bits of cereal). while transporting a final handful into my mouth, i felt one flake drop. so i again inspected the floor, my lap, my chair, but the little guy was no where to be found. after a few minutes of looking, i gave up, assuming i must have imagined the drop.

fast forward to 6pm. i'm leaving my office, and am waiting at the elevator. as i go to zip up the hoodie i have on under my jacket (thanks, abnormally cold april) i feel something in the fabric next to the zipper. i look down at the hem, and notice a little bump next to the zipper. upon touching the bump, i feel it crumble. there's no way....says a little incredulous voice in my head.

but oh yes, there was a way. somehow, that little special K flake managed to find an opening flap of extra fabric inside of my hoodie, fall inside it, and then tuck itself into the hem at the bottom. i was amazed.

and a crazy old flake.

there have been few disturbances in the halls of our building lately, but tonight the truce between "cuckoo" (old woman across the hall) and "junkie" (woman in the apt below us) - both names we've heard them call each other, we wouldn't come up with such nasty monikers for our neighbors - was broken.

while watching the rangers kick ass! whoo! this evening i heard a ruckus starting up in the hall almost as loud as the one going on in the Garden. i dashed to the peephole, and saw cuckoo's door open. i then heard her yelling from the stairwell. junkie was shouting back at her. cuckoo raised her voice (a boon to the girl huddled behind her fireproof door, listening intently) and let loose a stream of threats that ended with "if i ever hear you or see you again..." junkie cut her off, and suddenly junkie was cut off with the spraying sound of an aerosol can.

door slams, cuckoo comes back up to our floor. i think its safe to say the elderly woman across the hall maced a fellow purdy court resident with lysol.

goodness i'm going to miss this place when we move.

future goals.

after a particularly hellish meeting this afternoon, i've decided that if and when i ever run my own company, i'm outlawing tuna fish. i won't mind if my employees wear sweatpants to the office, call their friends every 15 minutes, and refuse participation in our office 'secret santa' - as long as they don't eat tunafish for lunch in our workspace.

especially not in the conference room, where a short time later, a fellow employee might have to sit for a meeting and keep her nose buried in her sleeve for a 1/2 hour lest she pass out from the lingering noxious fumes.