With the support of toastcrumbs and bluemeany, I was able to make the important decision to turn my backwards shirt around while seated at my desk. I don't think anyone witnessed the event, not that it was exciting in any way, although I do sit beside a floor-to-ceiling pair of glass-paned French doors to the street, so it is possible that someone at the halfway house across the road saw my quick change. More power to them, and anyway, if they ask me about it, I'll chalk it up to their DTs and spray them with Mace.

The Keelhauler and I walked around and went to Thai Reminiscence for lunch, where he considered ordering the Spicy Paste with Celery lunch special but went with the jelly noodle shrimp instead. "Jerry noodly, shrimp," nodded the waitress, taking rapid notes.

At the next table sat two men, about fifty years of age, dressed in the aggressively tropical style popular in this town. Kind of a Jimmy Buffett faux-beachcomber look, affected solely by affluent older men. One of the men was bald and wearing a prominent, Asian-looking gold ring, arty glasses, and brown leather sandals with one loop over each big toe, and a series of angled straps around the rest of the foot. He was discussing condiments, and something he was devising that the other man, in a duck baseball cap and Hawaiian shirt, termed "off-the-wall." "I know," bald guy answered, "But it will sell BECAUSE it's off-the-wall."

The baseball cap guy was admiring the new custom license plates he'd just received: they read "AUDIOS" and the Keelhauler, solely to amuse me, commented, "Very nice!" to the guy, adding, "I'm guessing you own a car stereo shop." The guy nodded, accepting the "compliment," but said, no, he didn't own a stereo store. "I own an Audi," he said, "and live in a Hispanic town..." He trailed off, motioning with one hand as if to indicate, "so naturally, it is the next logical step to combine the type of car I drive with a Spanish word and order custom plates to show off my cleverness." As far as the "Hispanic town," I think he meant Santa Barbara, but it was hard to tell. The Keelhauler and I laughed secretly to ourselves, and the guy went back to his lunch, pouring a glass of Perrier with his pinky extended.

I attempted to explain an encounter I had this morning with a deeply irritating coworker, one who snorts and giggles and talks about things she loves (her dog, her car, other people's babies) in a chilling baby voice that makes me want to cry with horror. I was explaining my difficulty in spelling the way she pronounces the word "baby," which is less a word than an unintelligible honking sound. The closest I can come to describing it is to ask you to imagine Kermit the Frog gargling and singing at the same time. It's like, "brggggggggggggh-baaaaaaaaah" or something. Maybe there's a sheep in there as well. It disturbs me all the more because she'll segue into it in the middle of an otherwise normal sentence, like this: "I ran into Colleen on Thursday--she was out walking DA BRGGGGGGH-BAAAAAAAAAAAAH, ooo da luttle BRGGGGH-BAAAAAAAAAAAAH eergoooowogoweeeecgxxxxxxxxxxxxxx!" (This is the point at which I choke back tears of horror and dismay that I even know this person.) The Keelhauler, who has no tolerance for that sort of vocal pyrotechnics, felt that I should avoid trying to spell it, and focus instead on dissecting the various elements and describing them. Still, I managed to imitate the sound several times before he politely disengaged and changed the subject. I just wanted to get it right, you know?

When the two guys next to us got up to leave, the bald guy paused at the front door with his back to us and as if we couldn't see him, elaborately adjusted his shorts to alleviate the wedgie that had developed. The Keelhauler and I nodded at each other with resigned acknowledgement. AUDIOS, guys!

I got back to the office to learn that one of our company cars had been stolen, and that someone had found my site through searching for "Jimmy Buffett personalized plates."

On the upside, when I met the Keelhauler at lunch, and asked if I smelled nice, he had to lean in to sniff, thus proving that I have NOT over-perfumated myself, and leaving the rest of the afternoon free for multiple re-applications! There. I just spritzed myself again. Ahhhh, the sweet smell of passive-aggression.

Star of the day. . .Karen Blixen