[I feel like this should go on Overheard in Philly, which is one of my favorite blogs. But I didn't really overhear it — it happened to me. Unfortunately. I'm going to pretend it happened to someone else.]

Crazy Guy leans out of his car to slurrily yell at Parking Authority lady: "I'm glad you're smiling even though you make people's lives MISERABLE!!!"

Late 20's girl in black raincoat walking by smiles at this outburst, thinking about Parking Wars and feeling her first nudge of sympathy for Parking Authority workers. Crazy Guy notices, leans out the window and yells: "I see you smiling! You're beautiful!"

Raincoat Girl looks around, confused.

Crazy Guy continues to follow Raincoat Girl for the next several blocks, leaning out his car window and shouting at top volume: "I love you! We were made for each other! You're not being fair to yourself! Give me a chance! I love you! I LOOOOOOVVVEEE YOU!!!!!!!"

Raincoat Girl contemplates going inside one of the fine establishments she is walking by, but she doesn't have a problem with her gas bill or require a new washing machine, so she decides to hold firm, try her best to ignore Crazy Guy and continue on her way.

Finally, Crazy Guy is forced by the honks of the drivers behind him to go through a green light and leave Raincoat Girl stopped at the intersection. He continues to yell at Raincoat Girl as he drives away: "I STILL LOVE YOU!!!!!"

Embarrassed, Raincoat Girl looks around frantically, hoping her fellow pedestrians are casting sympathetic glances her way. A fellow pedestrian makes eye contact with her. Raincoat Girl feels relieved that there is at least one friendly person on the street.

Fellow Pedestrian says creepily: "I think I love you, too."

12th and Chestnut
Overheard by Raincoat Girl

This is one of the oddest juxtapositions I have seen (at least since I saw Jon Stewart talk about the CNN pic of the Saddam Hussein's sons' dead bodies with the crawl underneath saying, "Beyonce doesn't like the word 'bootylicious'" . . .)

On The Huffington Post this morning, I saw these headlines: "Congo: Africa's Other Holocaust" (complete with a pic of a child soldier), immediately followed by "StyleSLIDESHOW: Luxury Stays For Less This Winter Holiday" (with a pic of an oceanfront hotel patio). My brain is having a hard time processing.

I love how you always cheer me up.
I love how I can tell you anything.
I love how you don’t mind all my fantasy boyfriends.
I love how you cook for me.
I love how you explain what happened in movies when I wasn’t paying attention.
I hate that you can be so confrontational but I love that you speak truth to power.
I love that you know everything about everything but I wish you didn’t spend so much time on the computer.
I love how brave you are.
I love that you would run into a burning building to save people when I would probably run away and cry.
I love that you don’t judge me for running away and crying.
I hate that you never throw anything away and that you always bring in stuff from the side of the road.
I love your style but I wish you didn’t have such an irrational aversion to sweaters.
I love that you are so committed to local and sustainable things.
I love that you picked all the labels off your clothes.
I love that you don’t care what anyone else thinks but I wish you would act a little friendlier sometimes.
I love that you drive me around and that you are the best parallel parker I have ever seen but I wish we liked more of the same music so we didn’t have to listen to the same 5 CDs on every road trip.
I hate that you always try to have conversations with me when I am asleep because you know I will say something crazy.
I love that you live day-to-day and take everything in stride but I wish that you would engage in discussions about hypothetical things with me.
I wish you would play Death is Not an Option with me.
I love that you always kindly capture the bugs in the house and take them outside.
I love how you always bring home treats and otherwise incorporate treats into everyday activities.
I love how I never have to do a dish with you in my life.
I love how you love all animals (except teeny tiny dogs).
I love how you can recite the entirety of every Chris Rock special with me.
I love how you can take a picture of a piece of trash and turn it into a beautiful work of art.
I love how you are such a hard worker and problem solver.
I love how you are such a loyal friend.

As you know (or maybe not — I have no idea who reads this), I have been employed on a grant-funded project for the past year. I was hired for a two-year position doing some really interesting media research. Last year, our office manager quit and I ended up doing almost twice the work I was hired for. I asked for a teensy raise to compensate all the extra stuff I was doing and that paperwork finally made its way through the university system last month. Hooray. Except yesterday, my boss called to tell me that she had been distracted and had not been paying attention to the budget and that basically she made a promise to me she couldn't keep and could no longer afford to pay me. This is ironic, since I had been talking so much about how the bad economy didn't really affect me because money had been set aside in the grant budget — OR SO I THOUGHT — for my salary for the next year.

So clearly, this sucks for me. I am feeling a really awful combination of sad, scared and angry. It is no secret that I have enormous school loans and no money. It is also no secret that I need health insurance. I have no idea what I am going to do with the economy as it is. I know I am really lucky to have my housing situation and such a great partner (who is happy to support me but who also has big loans and no money) and of course, my family and all my wonderful friends, old and new, including the coworker who just ended up listening to me unexpectedly break down over the phone and offered to drop everything to come cheer me up. I really do know a lot of cheerful people.

In any case, I want to publicly announce that I am looking for a new job. I know there are few jobs to be had, especially for over-educated media researchers, but who knows, perhaps some rich benefactor will read this. I really am adaptable, organized and full of surprising talents. In the meantime, I will probably be looking for here-and-there gigs if anyone needs anything edited or organized or babysat or anything.

On the plus side, I guess I will be blogging a lot more. . .

I like warm weather as much as the next person, but these freakishly-warm-yet-wet conditions have contributed to something terrible (you know, besides the polar icecaps melting and all): crazy mutant mosquitoes hanging around in my house. Last night, Albert killed the biggest mosquito either of us has ever seen. But unfortunately, he didn't kill it before it bit me 10 times! Seven of these bites span a really small area from my left forearm to my left index finger (finger bites are the worst!!!) Four of them are on my FACE. WTF, mosquito! Thankfully, this mosquito was considerate enough to bite me three times on the underside of my chin so it doesn't look like I have advanced acne, but I've just found out that under-chin bites are as uncomfortable as finger bites. The worst news of all: I think I just saw another mosquito, but she got away!!! GRRRRR.

Me: Oh my God, I had a dream I hooked up with this really cute guy from high school!

Albert: Must be Thursday. . .

These ladies are almost as cool as my Grandma. And that is a feat!

Via.

ETA: Grandma's reaction to Margaret and Helen: "Kate my girl, Those are a couple of wild old broads. But they have it right, she [Palin] is a bitch and McCain is senile." As Margaret and Helen say, "Old ladies speak their mind. Deal with it."

I wonder how long I will have to wait for the financial crisis to trickle down to me. I am really sad so many people lost so much money, but the good thing about living below the radar with nothing to lose is . . . well, that you've got nothing to lose.

I could have written this article. Especially this part:

Like most people I know in their 20s and 30s, it takes a stretch of the imagination to understand that I have a stake in the national economy. In terms of day-to-day life, my only ties to large financial institutions are a Bank of America checking account, a single low-limit high-fee Visa card, and a Kilimanjaro of student debt, which I have come to accept as something I will die with, not from, like a benign but grapefruit-size tumor or peaceable parasite dwelling in my large intestine. When people use scary terms like "unchartered territory" and "total meltdown," my first thought is, "Would an economic cataclysm wipe out my student debt? If so, then let's press reset and start the whole damn thing over! Burn it clean!"

I'm sorry to admit that my first reaction was similarly selfish: "Maybe my student loan will disappear!" My second thought was just as selfish: "Why doesn't the government bail out all my loans while they are at it?" Yup, totally selfish. That is what living below the radar will do to you. But maybe I have a point — why is the housing market so much more important than the education market? There is all kinds of predatory lending going in the world of student loans, as well. Just something to think about.

Like, I know there are really important things going on in the world and no one cares about my freaking teeth, but I have to interrupt my regular schedule of not blogging to announce how happy I am to have (partially) unsheathed teeth again! (I will continue to have bottom braces for another 3-4 months, but whatevs, I can deal with that.) Behold, the difference between my smile yesterday at 11 a.m. and yesterday at 1 p.m. Hallelujah!

Tonight: Raising the Bar. I love formulaic lawyer shows. I think I have seen every episode of Law & Order during the Jerry Orbach years, twice. Zack Morris as an angsty lawyer in what is probably a crappier version of every other show Steven Bochco has ever done? Sign me up.

Tomorrow: The new 90210. This goes without saying. I just hope they don't focus too much on the actual teenagers, the way the new Degrassi did. Keep true to the original fans! Brenda vs. Kelly, round 2. I'm there.

On weekends when I am lounging around and MTV repeats all their programming: My Super Sweet 16 Presents: Exiled. I can't stress enough how much I can't stand My Super Sweet 16. Why would anyone want to watch spoiled rotten teenagers demanding to be the center of attention and their wimpy parents indulging their every ridiculous demand, resulting in $300,000 birthday parties with $80,000 cars for presents? I can't even flip by this show without cringing. So imagine my joy when I happened to flip by at the very moment one of those overindulgent parents informed his daughter that she would be sent to reform her selfish ways by living with a remote African tribe. Of course, there is the chance that this show will objectify the tribal people and make the teenagers look sympathetic — I hope not. This will be surely be my schadenfreude-inspiring guilty pleasure of the season.