cleolinda | Three stories

So here's what happened with my phone: that last picture of the teacup, the one with the blueberry-colored New Moon Red tea in it, was taken 0.85 seconds before the phone slipped out of my hands and plunged directly into the cup. I let out a great shriek and whipped it out so fast that it was like the phone simply fell in and bounced out ("FIVE SECOND RULE! FIVE SECOND RULE!!!!"). Sister Girl (who admits to heckling me right before it happened) put on a face of pure shocked :O, like someone had just been shot (she's lost a number of iPhones to the liquid element herself) and ducked behind the fridge door ("I CAN'T LOOK!"). So I dried the phone off in a panic and even tried to suck liquid out of the bottom of the phone, since it had fallen in straight down, which gave the whole procedure something of the air of CPR ("Stay with me! *huff huff* STAY WITH MEEEEEE").

And then it was totally fine. Texting worked, email worked, Twitter worked, Safari worked. Huh.

And then later that afternoon I tried to call

sweetdragon.

There was no sound on my phone.

Oh, there was a little sound, if I put the headphones in and ran the iPod. So I could tell it wasn't a problem with settings or mute--the out-loud sound was fried. I couldn't hear anyone on the other end of a call, either. And because I'd thought the phone was fine, I'd blithely been using it all afternoon--the bag of rice trick, was it too late for that?

Well, the battery was running down, so I plugged it up for the night and started looking for the $200 I don't have to buy a replacement.

This morning, the phone was fine. Sound and everything. Totally fine. I don't know if the heat of the phone jack dried out whichever component it was, but... totally fine. Well, I wouldn't be surprised if the battery is diminished ~~and later decides to go into the West~~ or if the phone randomly craps out at some later date, but I have at least bought myself enough time to tuck a little money away for iMergencies.

I would like to finish this anecdote by noting, however, that I made a cup of tea guaranteed "to bring out your wild, Bella-inspired side," and promptly dropped my phone into it. If I'd actually drunk the whole thing, I probably would have spent the afternoon falling on my face or up the stairs or off the deck or something.

ETA: I'm totally calling it the iBella from now on.

So this morning, the chimney guy (or a chimney guy, rather--a different one) came back to fix whatever something I don't even know. Our fireplace wasn't firing. Don't ask me. It's a business run by off-duty firefighters, so they're never sure who'll be available or when, but the--receptionist, I guess?--told my mother that a guy would be over at 8:30. My mother replied that her daughter (me) would be home to let him in.

RECEPTIONIST: "And don't worry, he won't hurt your daughter."

MY MOTHER: "Oh... my daughter is thirty...?"

RECEPTIONIST: "Well, he still won't hurt her."

MY MOTHER: "..."

RECEPTIONIST: "..."

MY MOTHER: "... what?"

So of course I was totally freaked out, because why would someone volunteer that reassurance? I'm still not sure why she felt compelled to say that, because the man who showed up, rather, had the most magnificently curled sandy-blond handlebar mustache I have ever seen. I'm talking full circles here. No one with such splendiferous plumage could possibly do me any harm, so I was immediately set at ease.

He opened the flue and fixed the crooked fireplace doors. No charge, the end.

At lunch-ish today, I decided I wanted to watch The Dark Knight because it was on cable and I pretty much can't not watch that movie if it's on but I forgot and then my mother came home for lunch, as she often does, and about an hour in I turned in on anyway because that's when all the really good stuff happens but also because my mother refuses to watch this movie and I am like, but I do not understand, it is only THE BEST MOVIE EVER. "But it's so... grim," she always says, to which my reply is NUH-UH, and also, HOW DO YOU KNOW IF YOU HAVEN'T SEEN IT, but she may also be referring to the whole Heath Ledger thing, which I am willing to concede. That said, I just cannot bring myself to feel any sadness or regret when I watch that movie. Ledger's performance is just such a selfless thing of joy--not as in "generous," but as in the self literally not being there. I honestly just do not see or hear him at all in the Joker, because he is that good, and as such, something that good cannot make me sad. So she played mah-jongg on her phone while the big car chase with the giant truck THAT IS SO AWESOME was on, and then the interrogation scene, but I caught her watching bits out of the corner of her eye. She had to leave before they blew up the hospital, though.

Also, I love how every time I watch The Dark Knight, I immediately get BECOME A NURSE spam in my email.

And finally, from

tasterainbows: Artist sued by manufacturer stealing his work, and if he runs out of funds to fight it, he'll lose by default?

(Zomg e-book! The Annotated Movies in Fifteen Minutes: Wizards!)