When you are married and it is raining and your wife does not want to wear anything that is not sweat pants, you may find yourself staying home on a Friday night. You may flip from movie channel to movie channel and you may eat ice cream straight from the container as a sort of FUCK YOU to the South Beach Diet, and you may find yourself inventing one of those goofy little games that couples invent on vacations and car rides and rainy weekends to keep themselves amused. Chances are the game will not involve removing items of clothing.
We stayed in Friday night and played the iTunes game. There are two stages to this game:
First, I click through our library and say LISTEN TO THIS SONG ARE YOU LISTENING TO ME I LOVE THIS SONG DON�T YOU LIKE IT WHY ARE YOU WATCHING THE BASEBALL GAME and then download an album or two.
Second, my husband pushes me away from the computer under the guise of �needing to check email� and commandeers iTunes. His portion of the game involves stalking celebrities via their playlists and trying to determine who is his Musical Soulmate. Last night we discovered that Kent�s Musical Soulmate is the director Robert Rodriguez. What clinched the discovery was when Kent suddenly exclaimed, I JUST downloaded this song three days ago! and then played �Kickstart My Heart� by Motley Crue for me, which apparently Robert Rodriguez downloaded and played for his sons (ages 5 & 9) with the introduction, This is the greatest rock song EVER. I think I want to have boys, Kent said. You downloaded a Motley Crue song three days ago? I asked.
Then we took the game to the next level. The next level is fantastic because I get to lie on the couch and read magazines while playing. The next level of the iTunes Game is when Kent browses celebrity playlists, picks one and plays me the songs from the playlist. I then have to create a profile of the celebrity, trying to guess who the celebrity is based on the songs being played. I am a savant at the next level.
I got very, very close to identifying David Duchovny by his playlist. I determined the celebrity was a mid-40�s male who once played a cop and who is married with two kids, who is sometimes in magazines but never really on the cover, and who thinks he is cool but is probably a bit of a tool, albeit a fun one. Kent was impressed.
I had some misses, however. One celebrity playlist included K.D. Lang, Indigo Girls, David Bowie, Kate Bush, Del Amitri and Marvin Gaye. I guessed it was a twenty-something female who stars on the WB. My backup guess was that girl who married Melissa Ethridge. It was Russell Crowe.
Nicole Kidman�s choices were surprising. Jennifer Garner was easy to identify. I got close to identifying Jared Leto, narrowing it down to an early thirty-something guy with messy hair. His was easy as it basically contained all the songs I listened to in college. I�m still trying to identify my musical soulmate but have it narrowed down to Kyra Sedgwick, John Mayer and the Scissor Sisters.
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Overheard on the street as I walked the dog:
Teenage punk-goth band dude #1 says to teenage punk-goth dude #2, My idea of heaven would be like, me laying on a bed roman style with three greased up chicks feeding me friend chicken while I play San Andreas. Teenage punk-goth band dude #2 asks, What music is playing? Teenage punk-goth band dude #1 answers, SLAYER. He answers with enthusiasm.
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On Saturday night I jumped out of my chair and yelled and screamed and WHOO HOOO�d on account of a sports game, and as far as I knew, I didn�t like either football or USC. But a college football game just got me leaping from my chair. Notre Dame, I am pretty sure Jesus hates you. USC, I want to do dirty things with your quarterback.
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Some craigslist real estate postings confuse me. When the listing indicates that there is a picture, I do expect to open the link and see pictures of the actual real estate agent. That does not count. Neither do pictures of the New York skyline or pictures of the real estate firm�s logo. Those are not the kind of pictures I want, fuckers. When the listing indicates that there is a picture, I also do not expect to open the link and see pictures of apartments with dirty laundry strewn about or unmade beds. If you are trying to sell your apartment, please tidy up before taking pictures and posting them to the world at large. I know it is a seller�s market and New Yorkers regularly bend over and say SURE ASS RAPE ME HARD $700,000 IS REASONABLE FOR TWO BEDROOMS, but still, clean your damn shit up before you plan on hosting an open house. Also, put all of the stuffed animals away, because I am quite sure that your one-bedroom apartment in Battery Park does NOT have a crib or second, small bed in it, yet I can clearly see several stuffed pandas and teddy bears, just below the part where you ask for $549,000 for 650 square feet.
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Um, USC, thinking about real estate got me all riled up, so send your quarterback my way, seriously, because I may be married but I�m not dead.
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On Sunday, I went to eight open houses. Eight is too many for one day. Eight is painful. Eight makes you look at a walk-in closet and think, Yeah, that could be a nursery. Eight makes you think a dishwasher is a luxury item and that you could totally sell half your furniture in order to fit self and husband and dog into an apartment. Eight means you end up looking at a duplex apartment that has an oven too small to fit cookie sheets and that you eat two chocolate sourdough twists on the way home because dammit, you earned it, especially in that last apartment which featured a prominent birdcage housing four birds.
I wouldn�t normally troll from open house to open house in that manner, but my husband has midterms this week and has made our own apartment a NO FUN NO NOISE LEAVE ME ALONE zone, so I have tried to stay the hell out of his way and spend as much time as possible wandering the streets in search of an affordable two-bedroom apartment and the perfect pair of flat brown boots.
I came home with shampoo, conditioner, and the aforementioned chocolate sourdough twists, so you see how well my search is going.
