a tragedy averted, and a question

[constance]

I had dinner once with Richard Leakey as part of a programs committee event at my university, and he told our group, after the student sitting next to him ordered a Coke, that they sometimes soaked their especially filthy digging instruments in Coke before washing them, because Coke was so famously corrosive, and they'd never been able to find a made-for-the-purpose dissolving agent so cheap and effective.

It was a little rude of him to put his fellow diner off her drink of choice in that way, wasn't it? But his story has left me with a residual frisson about Coke. I do still drink it, and more than I should, but I sometimes wonder as I'm drinking it what exactly it's doing to my inner workings.

And it's not altogether surprising that the frisson developed into a fully-fledged Episode yesterday when I was putting together a new weed-eater and through a series of events now hazy in my mind managed to tip a Coke straight into my laptop.

I took the entire thing apart as quickly as I could, patted each piece dry, and put it all back together again, and nothing; and I had visions of the Coke eating away at my computer until it just dissolved completely into a puddle of useless goo. But I guess all it needed was a little time to dry out, because it's been gradually coming back: first the power supply, then the monitor, the hard drive. Last night before bed I got the beginnings of the operating system but not all of it, and this morning I reset the clock and was back in business. Thank fuck.

Not that I'm not making absolutely sure to get current backups. The puddle of goo is still floating around in my brain. But I'm a lucky girl to be typing this, this morning, and boy do I know it.

:::

Also, on Friday, one of my coworkers made some crack about my baby-blue eyes over the phone, and when I informed him that my eyes are not, in fact, blue, he had to come downstairs to take a look for himself before he would believe me. "Huh," he said to me. "I guess you just strike me as the kind of person who ought to have blue eyes."

And ever since then, I've been wondering: what sort of person ought to have blue eyes? Have you ever felt that someone's eyes should be a certain color, regardless of what color their eyes actually are?

Comments

[amelia-eve.livejournal.com]

Well the Leakeys are considered quasi-charlatans by many anthropologists, so I wouldn't be too worried about what they say about Coca-Cola. Snopes has a whole section devoted to Coke myths, and most of them don't amount to much. If anything, it's the fizzing action. Also, your computer is not organic, so it's not going to respond the same way as a bunch of old bones. But, all in all, whew!

I don't think anyone has ever thought I should have eyes of a different color than what I've got. My coloring is basically Mediterranean, so nothing but brown would really go. Though my brother's eyes are hazel and my sister's are gray. They take after the WASP side more.

[tofty.livejournal.com]

Well, my head knows that dropping my whole laptop into a huge vat o'Coke would short the electrical system and nothing more -- and that my big worries ought to've been that (1) my power supply would be ruined and (2) that individual components would be kept from communicating by sticky residue that I couldn't get to without prying pieces apart. But la cœur (névrotique) a ses raisons que la raison ne connaît point, you know? :D Hey, I never said I wasn't crazy.

I have my father's Irish coloring, to a degree, but my red hair is auburn. And I inherited his rabbity pale lashes, but not, alas, his grape-green eyes. My brother, whose coloring is beachy, has that light-brown hair that bleaches to white at the ends in summer, and skin which turns a lovely toffee-brown. He got the light eyes.

[ellen-fremedon.livejournal.com]

No one's ever told me what color my eyes ought to be. Hair's another story. About half the people who meet me online before meeting me in RL say I look exactly the way they pictured me. The other half, pretty much unanimously, say they expected me to have curly dark brown hair. (It's straight, fine, and toffee-colored.)

[laurelwood.livejournal.com]

I've only seen pictures of you, but I'm in the "You look exactly the way I'd pictured you" camp. It was almost eerie how perfectly you matched up with my mental image of you. I'd love to know how the brain comes up with material to furnish a face for someone it's never met. Why sometimes is it right on, and sometimes, as in my case with dementordelta, is it so way off as to be ridiculous? (My mind's eye gave her long, black curly hair and a dark complexion.)

[tofty.livejournal.com]

I was in the "Ellen has dark curly hair" camp, but I totally agree with you about dementordelta. I still cannot get over the fact that she's a blonde!

[tofty.livejournal.com]

Ha! Until I saw a picture of you (on a con report, I think?), I was in the dark-curly-hair camp, I admit. I never thought as far as your eye color, at least not consciously, but I suspect that if I'd been asked, pre-picture, I'd have said dark brown. (But they're light, aren't they?) I'm not sure, though, that I'd have thought that you ought to have dark eyes. :-?

[laurelwood.livejournal.com]

Aieee! I will take this averted tragedy as the One True Reason I Shouldn't Have a Laptop, because I would have beCoked it ages ago. I'm glad your computer is okay!

I've heard lots of evil things about Coke, too, although I keep forgetting to do the "baby tooth overnight in a glass of coke" experiment (if you want to do it, too, I have a goodly supply of baby teeth and can mail you one! :D ) to show the girls how corrosive and nasty it can be on one's chompers and innards. What I want to know is, why is it supposed to be root beer and not coke that you pour on battery connector/node thingies to clean off crusty residue? Dennis swears it HAS to be root beer- no other carbonated beverage will do!

As for eyes, interesting question! When Zoe used to be blonder, I'd get a lot of comments about how unusual it was for a light-haired child to have such dark brown eyes. I guess people just expect blondes to be blue-eyed. Beyond that, though, I've never really thought of it beyond not being attracted to blue-eyed men.

[tofty.livejournal.com]

I cannot even describe to you the relief I feel at my laptop's hardiness. (I keep reminding myself that laptops are actually a pretty hardy breed, but still, it's not something I'll want to test EVER AGAIN.) Not only am I very, very fond of this laptop, but I really cannot afford to buy another computer, laptop or no, right now, and if I were to lose mine at this juncture, I'd just have to live without for a while and subsist on beans and rice to save up for a new one.

I did not know that root beer could serve as a battery cleaner! I will have to research this matter more thoroughly. And I would take you up on the offer of a baby tooth so I could perform a Coke experiment, but, I mean, is it even legal to ship baby teeth across state lines? :D

And! Yet another thing we share as regards our taste in men! In fact, I'm beginning to think that the Venn diagram of our taste in men isn't so much a Venn diagram as it is just a single circle.

[laurelwood.livejournal.com]

Such is my fascination with thrift and home economics that now I'm fumbling for an equation that would tell me how many months of beans-n-rice = a new laptop.

And you're right. I'd forgotten about teeth being a class A forbidden substance. And how could I, when the guy at the post office always rattles off that litany, "Does this package contain any substance that's fragile, liquid, explosive, or is the rightful property of the tooth fairy?"

Hahahaha- it really IS just a single circle with the taste in men. Tall, dark-haired, thin and big-nosed, right? With an optional side order of spectacles?

Reposted for careless math mistake *facepalms*

[tofty.livejournal.com]

Okay, let's see.

A typical meal would cost an average of about $5.00 in my house, since I eat out much more than I should. And a pot of beans-and-rice would cost about $1.50 to make (the rice is free, because I got ten pounds of the stuff for Christmas, and the rest is the beans and onion and various spices) and would serve about six meals, so about $0.25 per meal. Which gives me a savings of approximately $4.75 per meal. And I generally eat two meals a day, which is bad for me I know but it is my habit so let's be honest here; so an average savings of $9.50 per day.

Now to the computer. I'd probably research my brands and models and then buy my laptop on ebay, because they're cheaper as long as you know what you're looking for and what to look for in the product description. But prices on ebay fluctuate, and so for convenience's sake, I just found the least expensive laptop that fits my needs on the Best Buy site, which is $649.99. If I add say $75.00 for a memory upgrade and figure in the 7% tax for my city, then the total cost would be $775.74.

Divide $775.74 by $9.50, and you get 81.65. So almost three months to save for a laptop, assuming I ate pretty much nothing but beans and rice during that time.

God, it's a good thing I love beans and rice, and bean soup, so much. :D

:::

Hahahaha, I hope to hear my postal clerk ask me about the Tooth Fairy one day!

And yes about the men. That is exactly it.

[bowdlerized.livejournal.com]

Yeep! I'm so glad the laptop seems to have survived. Recently my laptop fell from my rather tall bed onto my hardwood floor because of sheer carelessness (bedspread wasn't straight and I stupidly yanked it), but its vital signs seem stable now.

While I've never thought that someone ought to have eyes of a particular color based on personality, I guess I'd associate baby-blue eyes with youth/purity of spirit, owing to the fact that babies have them.

...I want a sandwich.

[tofty.livejournal.com]

I'm glad your laptop survived as well! It's a good thing they're as sturdy as they are, considering the bashings we give them.

*makes you a grilled cheese sandwich*

:::

A couple of things. (1) Paperback Swap is STILL FABULOUS. In the past week I've found homes for half a dozen books or so. (2) I reread Tithe yesterday for purposes of comparison, and liked it better the second time around. (3) I forgot to ask you about your guitar! Are you still playing?

[bowdlerized.livejournal.com]

*claws at screen* Grilled cheese is my favorite!

(1) Yay, I'm so glad you like it. Nothing pleases me more than getting rid of something I don't want and receiving something I do want in return, with nothing going to waste. Have you checked out the maps feature yet? It's one of my favorites--you're able to see where in the US your books are going/coming from. It makes me love getting something from an "exotic" state like Wyoming.

(3) I am, but not as often as when I first got it. I got caught up in grad school angst, I guess, and got out of the habit. I really need to buckle down, though--I will not become one of those people whose musical instruments gather dust in the corner! I will not!

(4) Yum! Please send one over with the grilled cheese. ;)

I'm emailing you right now--I am BOILING MAD about something and could use an opinion!

[tofty.livejournal.com]

*waits!*

[tofty.livejournal.com]

(4) I saw a recipe for a banana-caramel milkshake this morning and thought of you.

[lindyhoppr.livejournal.com]

Man, I love reading your journal, I am always learning new things!

I have just joined up on paperback swap.

I have to say, even after two years, I am surprised that CPT Cohn's eyes are brown; not blue. But I get pretty vivid preconcieved notions of what people look like, and it is often hard for me to reconcile the truth with the way I want people to look.

I still am mad about Garrison Keilor and the Car Talk guys.

[tofty.livejournal.com]

I still am mad about Garrison Keilor and the Car Talk guys.

hahahahahahaha, too sadly true! I definitely have preconceived notions of what online and radio people look like -- but not so much people in real life.

I can't take credit for Paperback Swap -- bowdlerized is the one who first mentioned it to me when I was moaning about not having a good place to bring my surplus books. But isn't it fabulous?? I am all excited about the new books I'm getting, and (oddly) even more excited about the ones that are leaving me.