Scale of Importance (All Values Measured in Shakes of a Fat Rat’s Ass)

Lose crappy expensive cell phone in a cab (phone stayed shut only with a rubber band or hair elastic and had only one week left on the contract, anyway) – 1

Secretary in the next cubicle promoted to Assistant Office Manager – 2

Older sister gets Mom’s charm bracelet – 5

Ex-boyfriend goes out with the redheaded waitress at Bar Sinister – 8

World Peace – 400+

A Journey of Science

Good news: I just got back from some time travel!

One of my old roommates built an awesome time machine and wanted to know if I was busy this past weekend and if not I could come up and visit and BY THE WAY have a go at changing the past – which they tell you never to do, but COME ON people.

This is 2007 and you’d think we’d have learned that our history, both individually and as a nation, has plenty of spotty areas that (1) no one will miss; (2) you’re not proud of; (3) ended up in a crappy, crappy way. If you take a minute to think about things instead of letting your knee-jerk Sesame Street I'm-a-very- special-person reaction sub in for a true gut feeling, you will see that the past should be tampered with as much as possible. Smallpox blankets, Hutus versus Tutsis, WMDs -- nothing in there you’d like to revise?

So I went by Richard’s lab at MIT and he hooked me up for a spin in his machine. Let me tell you, it was awesome! If this is what we are doing in our space program, I sure would have used all my power to hide any diaper-and-drive impulses I had so I could join up with NASA. It is a rush you never thought possible to be belted into a whirring contraption and know you are experiencing the reversal of all natural laws and treading a territory you thought belonged only to others and would never happen to you! So, yes, I guess in a small way it made me understand where some people come up with this urge to seek power (see smallpox blankets, Hutus v. Tutsis), or at least it made me understand the desire to make comparisons to historically important experiences like walking on the moon or finding the source of the Nile or discovering radiation and then dying from it like Madame Curie so then THEY NAME IT AFTER YOU until your journal reads like bad erotica without the constant references to sex, temperature, and machinery.

Just as Richard said would happen, I stepped out right in front of Saks Fifth Avenue and it was ten days ago. I went straight up to that second floor counter and, instead of buying Mango I opted for the Aubergine Moisture Rich Creme lipstick – no matter what the saleswoman said, no matter if she did look better in that white lab coat than Richard did. Under the florescent light, it did look good, but let me tell you, in daylight, in real life, it made my teeth as yellow as candy corn.

When I got back to Richard’s lab, he said I had been gone for no time at all. We Google’d as insurance and, although several pedestrians had seen the capsule outside of Saks, there was no evidence that the past had been wildly altered but hello can you hear me -- do I look sallow to you in this lipstick or is the past wicked altered? That’s a scientist for you!

Misfortune Cookies

You will trip on your laces.
Lucky Number: 0

You will not win the lottery.
Lucky Number: 13

You will hate your next haircut.
Lucky Number: 666

You will lose your keys and then find them in a place you could swear you already looked.
Lucky Number: 3.14