Memoirs Of An Evil Genius

Damn You, Facebook!

ULRICH AND I DID NOT BREAK UP. DO NOT BELIEVE FACEBOOK'S HYPE. AGAIN.

Zach Braff Needs To Stop Sending Me All These Subpoenas

I thought that might get your attention.  I know Zach and I have had a complicated history, but I haven't been accepting his mail for a while.  We are over, is what I'm saying.  Frankly, I know all these subpoenas aren't coming from him, but it makes me feel better to think that he's noticed I broke up with him back in 2004 or whatever, and that he's trying to get back at me.

Anyway, I've been getting, like, ALL these subpoenas lately!  You may remember all of this business, wherein I saw something horrible happen -- which led directly to this business, wherein I was told to appear in court and had visions of myself sobbing on the witness stand and making the jury swoon with compassion, only to watch those daydreams evaporate when they told me to just come on down to the middle of nowhere and give a deposition instead -- which ULTIMATELY ended in some kind of undisclosed result.  Well, I thought all that stuff was behind me, until six months ago when they called me in to give ANOTHER deposition -- wherein the two attorneys sniped at each other across a battle-scarred conference table while subtly trying to manipulate my emotions for one side or the other.  So THEN I thought it was all behind me for GOOD.  Until...last week.

Yes, folks, I have been served AGAIN.  This time it's an "on-call" subpoena, which means that I might have to appear in court after all, but only MAYBE, and they'll "let me know" in advance if this is so.  I should mention that the day they "might" need me?  IS TOMORROW.  Or Wednesday.  They're not sure.  They're not sure about a lot of things, actually, because not long after I got visited by the prosecutor's process server, I got a call from the defense asking me if I'd received a subpoena yet.  I said I had and he said, "Oh.  Well, I'm going to send you one too.  Where should I fax it?"

WHY DO I NEED TWO SUBPOENAS?  And why would you FAX it?  Listen, although I have now received three or so subpoenas, I am no expert.  But even I recognize this as overkill.  It's not like one extra court order is going to make much of a difference.  Like I'm sitting around, all, "See, I know I've been ordered to appear in court under penalty of law and everything, but Rachael Ray is on!  If they were serious about this, they'd have sent a whole stack of them, right?  I'm just going to turn off my phone and take my TV to the park where no one can find me."  Plus which, if you really think that an excess of subpoenae are going to make or break this deal, don't FAX it, dude.  Like I couldn't give you some bullshit fax number or something.

Incidentally, he did not fax it after all.  So I still only have the one.

Anyway, I called the district attorney this morning when no one called me yesterday, just to make sure I was reading the agreement right, and he informed me that this ought to be a short trial.  He also informed me that I AM THE KEY WITNESS because even the parties involved in the accident don't remember what happened.  But they MIGHT not need me, right?  Our legal system makes no kind of damn sense.  Every time I see The Practice I want to choke on my bitter laughter over how organized they all seem.

INCIDENTALLY.  All of this talk about breaking up with Zach Braff leads me to some important news.  ULRICH AND I ARE STILL TOGETHER.  A couple weeks ago I removed the "in a relationship" banner from my Facebook page, because I felt way too old to be waving my personal life around like a flag on the internet, and decided I wanted some privacy in case weird people from college that I didn't really want to talk to anymore started finding me and asking to be my friend.  Unfortunately, I didn't realize that this would send a notification to EVERYONE I EVER MET with an alarmist "broken heart" icon saying I'm single again suddenly, and I got a whole bunch of concerned e-mails asking "what had happened".

Oh, and to all of you who got in touch, thank you -- it's actually very nice to know that people were so genuinely concerned!  Sorry about the false alarm.  Well, not "sorry", per se, but...you know what I mean.

Anyway, I AM REMOVING IT AGAIN because of EXACTLY what I feared before.  I've started getting weird notices from people I used to know back in the day and I just want some extra privacy.  So I'm removing my "relationship" information tag, which means everyone I know will be getting a broken heart icon, and I want everyone to know that my relationship is FINE.

Okay, thank you.

Mo' Auto, Mo' Problems

Okay, I'm going to have to make this really, really quick because I have to leave work in about five minutes, but I have been so fucking busy all week that I didn't post anything.  SO, a quick update.

I bought a car last weekend.  Not that it was without The Drama.  Of course.  See, first off?  The car has...an odor.  Like, the guy I bought it from had this goshawful air "freshener" in the car, and it was so cloying it gave me a headache on the ride home.  It smelled like melted crayons and cheap, French whore.  So we put two boxes of baking soda in the car to soak up the stench.  So far, it's done wonders on the cheap, French whore!  Not so much on the melted crayons.

ALSO?  The tires needed to be replaced.  ALL of them.  So I did that on Monday, with much sturm und drang when they told me I needed the "wheel lock", but I'd thrown out the wheel lock (or else I'd salvaged it from the trash by putting it on the coffee table -- I did both things, but I couldn't remember which one came first.  Did I mention how busy I am?  It's like a David Lynch movie inside my brain), and they told me they were going to charge my ass $44 per tire to break the locks.  That's $176.  AMERICAN.  I said hell no, and they, worried they'd lose the insane sale of four tires, relented and broke them for free.  That's business for you.

Of course, the engine light has come on, and now I can't pass the smog test the guy who sold me the car was supposed to have gotten done before he sold it, and without that, I can't transfer ownership or register the car (the guy who sold it to me ALSO did not keep the registration current, imagine that), so I have to put it in the shop on Saturday.  Hooray for the "convenience" of personal automotive ownership, right?

Oh, ALSO also?  I came home Monday night to a letter from the bank informing me that, oh, by the way, they didn't cash the payout check I got from my insurance company for my total loss.  So I paid for my car and have been paying my bills with money I just barely had in the bank.  Like, by the time I found this out, I had $200 in the bank, and my rent check was still at large.  So I called them to yell at them about why I was just finding out about this now, via a letter, with no recourse, when the teller should have informed me there was a problem WHILE I WAS IN THE BANK DEPOSITING THE CHECK, and they should have CALLED ME to let me know that I might not want to start going all Paris Hilton with the spending when I didn't really have a dime to my name anymore.  I finally got things sorted out -- BARELY in the nick of time -- but BANK OF AMERICA has NOT HEARD THE LAST OF THIS.  I will be switching banking institutions, just as soon as all my latest checks have cleared.  Motherfuckers.

PS, I love how they try to subtly (or not-so) blame it all on you.  Like, they'll be all, "you're one of our most valued customers!" and then as soon as you have a complaint, it's like, "well, I'm sure it's your fault somehow.  We'll be sanctioning your account and charging you a ridiculous overdraft fee if anything goes wrong as a result of our incompetence."

Okay, now it is FINALLY the weekend, and I'm going to drink some wine.  Peace, y'all.

Urine Trouble Now!

A quick update on the whole peed couch situation: it seems, according to witnesses, that our houseguest was actually sleep-peeing when he defiled our sofa.  I did not know this was possible.  Apparently, he woke with no memory of the events, but was suitably contrite.  Is this another side-effect of Ambien?  All of these mitigating factors notwithstanding, no part of this vacation so far seems "normal" to me.

He's a nice guy, though.  Both of our guests are.  They wished me a hearty "peace out" this morning, while on my way to work.  Frankly, I'm a little sorry I'll be out of town this weekend and won't get to know them a little better.