When even rainbow socks don't work

I wore rainbow socks yesterday.

They didn't help.

The morning kicked off with a bang with another assessment in prison to cover for my continually absent coworker, who, by my count, has missed 3 of her 4 weekly shifts in a row. This time, I had the luck of spending three hours of my morning with a sexist inmate, who, amongst other things, dissed my shoes.

Yes--my shoes.

A man in an orange jumpsuit dissed my black suede boots.

How does one even respond to that?

Once I returned to the clinic, I received a series of frantic phone calls on my cell from my soon-to-be landlady.

A little background... 

The Duke and I are taking the cohabitation plunge. After wasting much time looking at darkness infused suites or slowly backing away from crazy racist landladies trying to convince us to move in, we found a seemingly great place this weekend-- bright, large, big balcony, in-suite laundry, fireplace. The landlady seemed to really connect with us, and called us that evening to offer us the apartment. 

That was when the problems started. We tried no less than three days in a row to meet to sign the lease, with her pulling tricks like canceling our meeting midday, then frantically calling our cells repeatedly an hour later saying she could make it after all.

Cue Wednesday... I ignore her first few calls, since, you know, I'm working, as it is 2:30pm on a weekday. I finally answer. She now tells me that her realtor has called, and she is thinking of selling the place.

Yes, selling-- three days after she offered a year lease to us.

The kicker was that she hadn't made up her mind yet, so didn't want us to back out of the deal. She asked if we could wait another month to move in, and would sign a contract with us saying that she would give us $40 if she decided to sell instead.

Forty goddamn dollars.

And she had the nerve to act offended and tell me how many other people had wanted to move in when I told her that she had inconvenience us.

Needless to say, we are back at square one, without an apartment.

Oh, and did I mention it is end of class week madness?

And that I paid an excruciatingly exorbitant price for hockey tickets for the last game of the year, for my team vs. the Duke's team for his birthday? And now, two days before the game, my team is officially out of the playoffs (which was seemingly out of the question when I bought them), so people are now selling the tickets I paid 3-4 times the value of for below cost?

Desperate times call for desperate measures.

And so I provide you with a list of ridiculous things that make me smile.

(Seriously, writing the list was one of the only things to make me smile today-- so at least it worked!)

Platypuses. Because you know evolution was laughing when it created these suckers.

Driving through car washes. But only if they have the giant rollers and lots of suds.

Stepping on frozen puddles.

The foam on root beer floats.

Waking up, looking blurry-eyed at the alarm clock, and realizing you still have two more hours of delicious sleep left.

Pickled asparagus or green beans in my caesar.

Chia pets.

When people smell better than expected-- like the scruffy looking guy who squeezed past me in a bus line and smelled like Tang.

How, when eating almonds or edamame, they split in half so perfectly and smoothly in your mouth.

Swing sets. Particularly hopping on them despite completely inappropriate footwear, and pumping your legs so wholeheartedly that you get the giddy nervous stomach rush.

Ferris wheels.

Sidewalk chalk drawings.

Old character homes with unnecessary light switches and random nooks.

Umbrella trees. This is what I call any tree you can hide beneath.

Tidal pools.

Digging through the fresh dirt to find earthworms.

Tree houses.

My mom singing the opening riff to "Smoke on the Water" by going "Do do do, do do DO do"

Wiener dogs.

Playing peek-a-boo on the bus with the child sitting in front of you.

Rediscovering an amazing song you'd forgotten by putting iTunes on random.

Neighbourhood cats who follow me home.