Oh, good loward, people, with the gross bug and mouse stories. I think if I found a mouse or a giant bug in my food-making devices, I'd have to move.

In general I approve and even enjoy the co-opting of words for other purposes, but I sigh that we can no longer use the word "gay" in its original meaning without someone giggling like an adolescent. (Okay, sometimes it is me.)

I'm eating a salad. Willingly, even. I'm not exercising as much now because it's too cold to walk outside, and then there was that awful week sitting with my mom at the nursing home that still casts its pall of misery over my life, and so naturally I've gained about seven pounds, all in my belly of course, undoing most of the weight-loss work I did this summer, and now none of my winter clothes fit. I am distressed over this enough to eat... leaves. Leaves.

I swear, every time I hit post I find a typo.

Because the inventor invented them to clean the ears of his baby daughter, who was named Gay.

Ahhh. They mentioned that he invented them when he saw his wife using cotton wool wrapped around a toothpick to clean the baby's ears, but they left out the bit about her name. That makes sense.

Gross food story (whitefonted) - it happened to a customer at a restaurant a friend worked at.

Customer gets a cup of coffee with her food. She stays for hours - each time she almost finishes the coffee my friend fills her cup. Finally she gets ready to go and for the first time finishes the cup. A roach had been steeping in the coffee the whole time....

Nuthin' they could do to get that customer to ever come back....

What Condition 1 weather in Antarctica is like: [link] (video)

I love the woman's laughing.

Okay! So our carbon monoxide detector went off, and we decided not to call 911 but to air out the apartment first. Then we discovered that the neighbor's carbon monoxide detector was also going off, on the same floor as ours. So we decided perhaps it was better not to risk death by poisoning and called 911.

That was kind of a hilarious and horrible experience, but at least we know that we're not dying and that carbon monoxide detectors apparently need to be aired out sometimes to get rid of the... wait for it, carbon monoxide build up.

I thought I hears somewhere that the carbon monoxide detectors (mandated by the City of Chicago) were too sensitive and went off when they shouldn't.

Um... I forget where I heard that. So don't ignore a carbon monoxide warning because of me....

I don't even know. We just had around nine firefighters tromping around the apartment, occasionally yelling at us, and one nice guy quietly explaining what we needed to do, and then they all had to go because there was a fire.

My life. Kind of weird sometimes.

Were any of the firefighters hot, shrift?

Our neighbor gave me a chocolate chip cookie and we're all probably not going to die in our sleep tonight, so I guess that makes today a win.

Were any of the firefighters hot, shrift?

It was hard to notice while I was wrangling the cat and jumping out of their way and explaining where stuff was. Nice guy was kind of cute?

I, of course, am looking like a Sunday slob. I am just lucky I didn't have any foodstains on my shirt.