Grumpy Old Bitches

Check out the orbs around and in my house

2010-06-10T19:36:00.002+01:00

Somebody slept through dinner

2008-05-30T00:39:00.002+01:00

SOMEBODY slept through dinner.

Dad: I found the asparagus and the stuffing in the fridge, but I can't find the porkchops.

Stepmom: Why are you looking for them?

Dad: Son's up and I was going to reheat dinner for him.

Stepmom: Why were you going to do that?

Dad: Is there a reason I shouldn't?

Stepmom: He knew dinner was at six and he slept through it. Let him reheat it himself.

Dad: I'm just getting him started.

Stepmom: Yeah, right.

SOMEBODY'S not cookin' tomorrow.

So there.

Remote

2008-05-29T00:17:00.002+01:00

In order to unwind from an unusually busy several days, I thought I'd watch a little TV Tuesday night. Clicked on the set, then clicked the satellite remote.

Nothing.

Tried resetting the thing.

Nothing.

Figured it was the batteries, so went downstairs to look for fresh batteries. Husband asks, "What's going on?"

"Trying to watch TV, but it appears the batteries in the remote are dead."

"Oh, yeah. I noticed that on Sunday."

"And you didn't change the batteries?"

"Didn't know we had any fresh ones."

"Didn't bother to ask?"

"Figured I'd just surf the Internet instead."

"Instead of putting the remote to rights, for the next person?"

"What?"

"Never mind."

"Is there anything I can do to help?"

"If you're going out, could you pick up batteries?"

"I'm not going out."

"Of course not."

"What?"

"Never mind."

"I think I'll walk the dog."

"Damn straight you'll walk the dog."

"What?"

"Never mind."

He walked the dog and I figured out that the batteries were fine, but that a cable had come loose in the back of the receiver.

Then I watched TV.

For hours.

Because there is no way in hell that the selfish jackass who finds something not working and fails to do anything about it is going to get laid four consecutive nights.

An Issue of Fairness

2007-10-10T11:58:00.000+01:00

I, for one, do not think it is fair that pain medication causes constipation.

Who is in charge of this?

Dove Onslaught

2007-10-01T18:17:00.000+01:00

This one hits home. I have two daughters. They are strikingly beautiful, which I take no credit for, since they were adopted. Princess is ten, but could pass for fifteen if you didn’t know how short she is. She wears a size eight pants, but must wear a belt or have her waist taken in. And she thinks she is fat because she is not as skinny as her little sister (who would look anorexic if she were white). If the prettiest girl in the school thinks she is fat, what chance do any of our kids have in this culture?

What's happening to me?

2007-09-07T03:42:00.000+01:00

What in the hell was God/Goddess thinking?

I mean really?

My ass has dropped and spread, while at the same time managed to crawl up my back.

My arms flop and sway, and HANG.

My thighs, hrumph, I wont go there.

My stomach, don't worry I wont even go there either.

And now, now I find myself slamming into periods of intense heat, heat where I feel as if my blood is boiling from the belly button up. Sweat drips and rolls off me, my face flushes, and it's not from good sex.

Sex? Who wants sex? What is sex? Does anyone have sex anymore? Shit, don't tell me if you do, the knowing that someone else IS having sex, and probably enjoying it, will no doubt piss me off.....more.

So, yeah, the hot flashes, flashes hell, that last fifteen minutes, at least, that's not a fxcking flash, that's a spell, that's a good long damn time, it is.

And then, then I find myself freezing, freezing cold, clammy looking for the same things I just ripped/stripped off.

What the hell were you thinking God/Goddess? Times like these I think you gotta be a man, man. And I feel like I'm turning into a man. (No disrespect intended, you know just in case you might be a little menopausal ya self.)

Is this the price for carrying life?

Oh and the moods? Did I mention the mood swings, do I need to? Swings hell I've got fXcking Sybil living in here. And I thought being semi bi polar was a bitch...

Can I get an amen? A holla? Something?

You cannot eat off my floors

2007-09-05T07:31:00.000+01:00

Perhaps the most pathetic thing about the state of my floors is that I desperately want to blog about it every single time I clean them. I don't mean every time I sweep the hardwoods or vacuum the carpets, which I do perhaps every week or two, depending on my tolerance for disgusting and the amount of cat hair and kitty litter tracked around. Rather, I mean that I want to blog about it every time I mop the floors. It is that much of an event in my life.

This urge is clearly so pathetic that I manage to restrain myself most of the time-- which amounts to the perhaps 2 other times this calendar year that I have had this urge. I think that's about it, though I honestly cannot recall the last time I did the task, so I can't be entirely sure.

I do sweep the kitchen pretty often, and I try to clean up spills as they happen (if of course I am present when they happen, which is not always the case). When I spill water, especially, I can be counted on to grab the dish drying towel to sop it up, then I will use the wet dishtowel to make a general swipe at any particularly repulsive areas, especially anything sticky. I think that this forestalls the need to actually mop, which is obviously delusional to anyone with actual standards about such things, but for the genuinely slovenly it works well enough.

For the bathroom, I sweep the kitty litter almost daily. There is a dust pan and brush in there for just that purpose. With the bathroom approximately the size of a very small broom closet and a small child and a small sink from which it is remarkably easy to spill water, well, the kitty litter simply cannot sit on the floor, ever, because it is mostly under the small overflow-prone sink. Let the clumping kitty litter get wet and it becomes an aggregation of concrete on the floor, and then it's just work work work.

However, I am imperfect, and no one else in the house seems to be capable of using the dustpan in the bathroom. The elves refuse to help (though I suspect that the rest of the family believe that they are the main sweepers of all the floors, really). Add to this that there appears to be a leak somewhere between the shower/ toilet/ wall containing the plumbing that feeds them both. This leak seems to get better and worse fairly randomly, which is disturbing in and of itself, and when it is particularly bad, the kitty litter ends out soaked and clumped onto the floor and the situation becomes intolerable.

At least to me.

Everyone else in the house seems fully able to ignore it, frankly. The elves refuse to clean, and I have not yet proved able to see what it takes to wait out my spouse or daughter on this one. Even I cannot manage that, and if you have not already figured this out, my standards are lower than those of perhaps everyone you know except for any people you know who live in fraternity houses.

So today was a banner day: both the bathroom and kitchen floors got cleaned. Swept, mopped, scrubbed, relieved of at least the topmost layer of disgusting crap that covers them.

I would not recommend eating off my floors, even now, but at least I think no one will call the health department on arrival in our home. Sad but true, but this is the best my housekeeping can hope for.

Good News Week!

2007-08-27T16:32:00.000+01:00

My rebellious nature has stood me in good stead. Just as well I didn't listen to the surgeon's 'the tumour hasn't shifted, you should think about immediate surgery' less than two months ago. My visit to Bristol, all the emotional 'work' I did there with various therapies and the change of diet have resulted in a very positive step forward.

The tumour has reduced in size by one whole third!!! As it was quite big, that's no mean feat.

Howzat(as British cricketers are victoriously wont to declare)!!?!

Of course, I didn't bother to tell the consultant why and how come - leave them to their little self-serving victories. I know what made the difference. And I'm not tilting at windmills any more - not fighting fights I have no need to fight. I no longer need to 'change the world' or feel my integrity is a risk if I'm not 'making things better' for those who are yet to come. I'll find other ways that don't bring me into hopeless clashes with other people who believe what THEY want to believe, come what may.

Oh, here's the grumpy bit - the last time I saw the consultant (after three and a half months of hormone therapy) there was the urgency for surgery, resultant 'disfigurement' so wouldn't it be lovely for me to have breast reduction on the NHS, etc. This time, the same consultant is saying we give hormone therapy for a MINIMUM of six months and AND the tumour has been steadily reducing all the way through! Yerwot? Yes, he even stated the tumour had reduced by 3mm last time. (But last time he told me it hadn't budged!)

How can the same CONSULTANT give you totally different news each time???? It hasn't changed/it had already started changing; surgery now/surgery not immediately needed...He just fudges the facts to fit his opinion. I thought SCIENCE looked at the facts first. Just as well I knew more than he did, wasn't it??! (I remembered the oncologist saying 'minimum of six months and I wasn't going to give up my chance of going to Bristol!)

I didn't KNOW that Bristol and the change of diet would have this effect. I did know, however, that if the surgeon removed the tumour and I didn't remove the reason for it to be there, that it wouldn't make any difference. And I was right. I've even come across other people saying the same thing now, so it's not that outrageous. Louise Hay has a meditation tape for people with cancer - she says the same thing about her own cancer : if she hadn't sorted out her 'issues', the surgeons would have cut a piece of Louise out and then had to cut another and another until there'd be no Louise left. That certainly resonated with me.

I must admit that living with hubby has returned me to hysterical frustration again - even without the stress of wondering every day if I'm closer to dying or closer to getting better. I am trying to wiggle my way out of this relationship but there's always a surprise waiting for me no matter which door I open. I guess he wants and needs this relationship more than he or I ever realised. I feel defeated right now but I promise you it won't last. Everything takes its own time.

I just wanted to let you guys know the good news.

With love and light!!

He did it again!

2007-08-06T09:48:00.001+01:00

My son phoned yesterday for a friend to come round. Will Dad pick him up at 10am? Yes, of course.

So this morning, Dad leaves with plenty of time to pick up said friend (much earlier than necessary) and I discover he's left son to eat a late (hot) breakfast alone. I asked, surprised, "Has Dad left without you?" "Yes, I said he should go while I eat breakfast so I can take my time eating it." Son had decided on soup for breakfast!

I'm furious with my husband for allowing this kind of thing to happen. Said friend doesn't get son's company in the car, hubby has to deal with child (20-30 minute car ride). It's just not appropriate and it's not teaching our young teenager to take responsibility - as usual. Son didn't get up in time (actually he did - they could have managed that situation!); hubby HAS to get everywhere far too early (picking up time is NOT an appointment; he's going to arrive about 20 minutes before time!).

Scream! I'm furious. I worked hard with son over the past few days while hubby was away. He was learning to take responsibility. He WANTS to gain some independence and do things for himself. He wants us to go away so he CAN! But hubby constantly undermines him, just as he does me. And I know by now that there's no point in reasoning or in saying anything AT ALL! It just causes bad vibes, bad mummy, me at screaming point through the sheer frustration of not getting through, son gets conflicting messages from us, husband feeling unappreciated and (probably) confused...bloody hopeless.

AAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

PS Having vented my spleen here, I successfully negotiated my frustration and dealt with things in a positive way by tackling son and explaining that he needs actively to take more responsibility because his father can't help him do that because of all his own issues. That must sound like a terrible betrayal of hubby and a negative burden on my son but I'm in a new place and my fear of shaming others, and the inevitability of my taking the blame on their behalf, being the fall guy, is over.

PPS By the end of the day, the coals had been heaped so high by my husband's inability to 'be the adult', 'be the parent' that, when I learned he'd let someone down in a way that put it at my door again (back to being the fall guy), I 'blew' and the day's frustrations all came out. He has acknowledged his immaturity in being able to respond and this has put things on a different footing but I'm back to tears of frustrated, angry hopelessness (if there can be such a thing!).

A second opinion...

2007-07-29T18:44:00.001+01:00

I've been busy with my new nutrition regime. I've cooked quinoa and fresh mackerel, investigated shiitake mushrooms, created the most amazingly inventive nutritious organic dairy-free meat-free meals, chopped and sprouted and crushed and creatively substituted good stuff for bad stuff and been kind and patient with myself when I have not quite made the grade (haven't quite managed the juicing yet)...

Still not quite there with the meditation and relaxation yet - family stresses are not helping - tho I actually got to sleep before midnight last night which may be a first for several years...?!?!

It was also suggested to me that I ask for a second opinion. Not easy - don't want to upset any apple carts. I have a letter prepared but it's taken me a while and I'm not quite sure why I might be seeking a second opinion. I guess there aren't many choices out there - you just hope your surgeon has a good eye and a steady hand, and that the oncologist knows a bit about chemistry! ;-)

But in the process of scouring the web for organic delights, I came across this US website and their comments about getting a second opinion. They are of course selling their wares - but now I know why I'm seeking a 'second opinion'. And I'm feeling good and mad...

[Our] breast cancer experts practice integrative medicine — a unique care philosophy that combines technologically advanced conventional treatments with supportive and nurturing complementary breast cancer therapies—all under one roof. We work with you to build an individualized treatment plan around your needs instead of applying a standard treatment formula for everyone. You may not be getting the comprehensive, nutritional therapies you need, guidance and support for you and for your family, or you may be suffering from side effects of your treatment.

They talk about the importance of the team and being in the driving seat. Hey, I was just grateful my 'team' didn't throw me immediately into chemotherapy with the hope that I might not have to face it afterwards either. I pray for that. But I don't even know if the meds are working or not any more as the surgeon decided (as I was being difficult by not leaping at the opportunity of surgery after three and a half months of meds instead of waiting for the full six as the oncologist had anticipated) that he wouldn't keep an eye on how things were doing (is it reducing, staying the same or getting bigger?) until the six month mark - shithead).

But, oh my goodness - that website has lanced a boil of rage.

Integrative medecine : My very first thought after the diagnosis was to find out what Bristol could teach me. Where else would one find such an 'alternative' approach. They have a lot to say about diet and a healthy lifestyle, about a holistic approach. When I've asked at the hospital about diet, they've had absolutely nothing to say. Shitheads. When I talk about stress being a factor, I'm laughed at. Shitheads2.

And now I learn that the Bristol approach is everywhere in something officially called 'integrative medecine'. Of course, putting it all into context, what I knew about Bristol comes from the early 80s - it WAS pretty avant garde back then, pretty controversial, but things have moved on in the last 30 years or so. Der! It's almost mainstream now...and I *could* have expected a different approach from my 'team'. I haven't even had the minimum of continuity with a named nurse. Hell, I haven't even had continuity of anything. Just a bucketful of 'misleading information' (putting it kindly). Lying toerags. Hell, sometimes nobody turns up to see me.

And they care so little about side effects of the drugs that nobody ever bothered to ask me if I had any...And the people on this website actually offer naturopathic remedies. It's all right up my alternative street. The fact that I cried solid for days as a side effect is an irrelevance to them as well as screaming at my husband when the marriage was already in difficulties and it's the last thing an Aspie can cope with - and anyway, I'm used to misery and being ignored (know your place, dear, out of the way and be quiet). Having been brought up in an Aspie household, I'm a great candidate for the traditional approach. Shitheads. Oh, sorry, am I repeating myself. I would have thought that, with the Aspergers 'n' all that, we were a family crying out for some additional emotional and medicinal support. Ignorant toerags.

But I'm not quite sure what a second opinion could offer me. Just knowing that, if I lived somewhere else, I could have (had) a better experience doesn't quite do it for me somehow. Hmmm! How I hate living at the back of beyond with the sea on one side and meandering lanes on the other, a main road coming from the south, going north, leading nowhere except more sea either way and a two hour journey out of the county. Not even a plane to anywhere except...Aberdeen! (I wonder...) ;-)

I'm back!

2007-07-15T18:55:00.000+01:00

Me and my cancer went to Bristol to visit the Penny Brohn Centre. I am a changed woman! Brainwashed, after a week's stay, into a vegan, organic, meditative, relaxed lifestyle. I've slowed down so much, I'm floating...on the sea of tears I shed while I was there.

There's work to do if you have cancer - undoing the stresses and stressors that led to the cancer in the first place. Spirit, body, mind, emotion.

It was easy to do 'the work' in that place. I welcomed it all. Bodywork, groupwork, spiritual healing. Art therapy, music therapy, wholefoods and 'You are what you eat'. Talks and videos and entertainment. Meet the GP, meet the nutritionist. They actually take you seriously. You don't often find that in the NHS. But towards the end of the week, I looked at one woman and suddenly knew she would die. You have to be prepared to lose your dignity to survive - admit that you need help, ask for it, live through the emotional pain. Humble pie. Humility. Serenity.

But, oh dear, the minute my husband came to pick me up, it was all downhill. His terror [of me] is escalating all the time. On the other hand, I was so chilled out, it was easy to see how we had ended up in such a bad place. It's difficult for anyone to live with the uncertainty and frustration of autism - whether you've 'got it' or are just partnered by it. Placid or not, I found it difficult to withstand his efforts to make sure I was just as stressed as he was by the end of the two hours it took us to drive home.

OK, he doesn't TRY to make me stressed, but it's hard to believe he's not working at it when you consider what he says and does - and to see the patterns repeated over and over. And if I point it out, he's stressed almost beyond coping...I refuse to feel badly for simply stating my case.

I sat quietly on the patio when we got home, and pointed out the pretty, frilly poppy which was growing all alone in the middle of the patio, frail but strong. As he walked away he kicked out at it.

!

I know he didn't intend to do it, but the fact is that he did it. And how symbolic. Me, returning frail but strong; him kicking out at it. I know that 'kicking out'; it's part of his way of getting around in the world - I think it's an autistic trait and enables him to know where the boundaries lie - like a blind man feeling his way in the world. I can feel compassion but I have to put my own psychological boundaries in place to protect myself - and that means simply ignoring him rather than hating him or feeling hurt.

How sad.

I have returned with some new 'rules of this house'. Hubby and son have to be out of the house together between 2pm and 5pm so I can get some rest at my 'dip' time. It can be leisure (eg bowling or cinema), physical activity (eg swimming or cycling) or (home) educational. So far it is working well as they are motivated to think of things to do instead of hanging around watching TV. It gets their engines revving and I think hubby has been having....(shock, horror!) FUN! (I'm jealous!!) And I'm not wholly and totally responsible ALL the time for everything that happens, especially son's home ed.

And (shock, horror 2!) I am sleeping alone. Space, quiet, light on and off when I want, music when I want, reading in the middle of the night in comfort if I wake up. And gradually I hope to get back into some sane sleeping habits, going to bed at a civilised time. Have I been going to bed later and later just to avoid him? It's possible. The thought often occurs to me.

I am hoping that, by not sleeping next to a man who is the essence of fear, I can maintain some kind of calm throughout the night and not wake up with my teeth clenched.

But I am jarred by them both almost constantly - physically, mentally and emotionally.

I hate my life - I'm sick of crying and struggling and feeling exhausted - but I did learn in Bristol that the part of me that hates my life really is only a part of me - the greater 'I' is in charge of what I decide to do about it. And I can overcome the cancer if I can overcome this impasse of needing to leave (= survival) but still wanting to find ways through to a better life together (= security).

Fuck the cancer. It's been a wake up call which has pointed the way yet also made the transition that much harder because of the physical incapacity which lies in its wake. F..., f..., f....

At least I'm communicating with the rest of the world again. Hi!!!

Why Women Eat Their Young

2007-04-24T12:00:00.000+01:00

There are five hung over people in my basement.

One is son.

Two are son's friends.

Two are son's friends' girlfriends.

It's okay to be hung over in my basement.

It is not okay to wake me up in the wee hours while you are striving for the hangover.

It is not okay to spill your beer on my sofa. No, not even if you're that pity-inducing sort of girl whose eye-black looks more NFL than Avril Lavigne because you got a little weepy after you puked noisily in my bathroom and came out at three in the morning to be asked, "Who the hell are you and why are you puking in my bathroom?"

It's not okay to slam the door between cigarettes smoked under my bedroom window. In fact, under my bedroom window, it's not okay to joke and laugh or do anything but silently smoke and contemplate how the hell you're going to create a future for yourself that provides you with your very own private home in which to party 'til dawn.

It's not okay to litter your butts on my lawn.

It's not okay to spill your beer on my upholstery. It's not okay to spill your beer on my upholstery. It's not okay to spill your beer on my upholstery.

Thank you for turning your motherfucking "motherfucker music" down after I asked you to. Common sense and courtesy means I should not have had to ask.

All things considered, I'm only a little sorry that I just can't scrub my kitchen floor this morning without playing George Thorogood and the Destroyers's version of "Willie and the Hand Jive" on maximum volume, over and over and over and over, perhaps until my ears bleed.

issing Letters

2007-04-23T14:28:00.000+01:00

I had soe stories to tell, bt that will have to wait. y oldest daghter spilled soda pop on y keyboard. I rinsed it ot, bt its not dry enogh to fnction yet. So I got y old keyboard ot, and it sees to be issing a cople of crcial letters. This pts a crap in y blogging activities, which is y ain sorce of incoe right now. I a nder deadlines! So I have been painstakingly copying and pasting the issing letters for iportant proects, bt that is really slowing e down. Does anyone have advice on getting y ain keyboard to dry ot faster (safely)? Or is there a way to goose this old one into operating properly? Please excse typos. Thanks.

Disappointed Visitors

2007-04-12T11:21:00.000+01:00

UPDATE

Wow, we have a magical disappearing picture! It would seem that Photobucket has applied sanctions to the shot of Matt Lucas dressed in a huge latex bodysuit to represent the entirely fictitious Bubbles DeVere.

I have emailed them to ask why, of course, however if this was a breach of copyright then I can't understand why nobody would have informed us directly, on top of which the picture originates on a high profile, high traffic site that hasn't even been bothered to disable right-click. It is now thoroughly and irreversibly in the public domain.

So.
Whats left?

I guess the sorry (and rather wonderful) truth must be that somebody complained to Photobucket about this being an inappropriate, pornographic image. I've got to tell you, that just makes my day!

On that basis then, here it is again, hosted by blogger.
Enjoy.
But don't get horny.
(Not unless you really really like your fake women to have their latex on the outside. Like ExoPamelas. Or something.)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Original post:

People seem to keep turning up at this blog in the search for Matt Lucas as Bubbles, thus:

It would perhaps be in their best interest to go directly to the BBC Little Britain page for Bubbles DeVere.

Sadly most of the other search terms that bring unwanted strangers very briefly to our door are rather more predictable;

Granny bitches
Old bitches
Granny sex
Bitch sex
Bitches [doing things to*] bitches (*insert misspelled reference to sexually dominating practice of choice).

Yawn frapping yawn! I am pleased to add yet another page to their fruitless searches.

I guess that qualifies me for a Ha-flapping-ha, too, then.

Nyuk nyuk nyuk

2007-04-09T11:28:00.000+01:00

I was washing up after Easter Dinner when it occurred to me to ask Moe when Shemp would come around with her truck. Of course, I had to interrump a critical point in the Masters to ask. I didn't really care.

"Oh," he says. "She's not bringing it. I have to go over to get it as soon as the match is over."

Isn't it just lovely the way people who put you out so frequently will lend you their truck and their hand-truck and call it even for another six month's of answering to their needs? Oh, yes. I think so, too.

After I've washed up I decide the rest of the day is for me to get some of what everyone else has been getting: rest and amusement. I plopped onto the sofa, snuggled under the throw, and started to get over another day of servitude. Eventually, Moe and Larry left to get Shemp's truck.

Having been the one to move the old refrigerator across the kitchen and into the dining room, I remembered how heavy and unwieldy the thing is, and I thought of the stairs -- the stairs out of the house and the stairs up to the office. Larry and Moe were going to need Curly. I got up to tap son's shoulder. He owed me thirty-five bucks and this would be a fine pay-back.

In come Moe and Larry with the hand truck. They can barely slide it under the fridge. I've set the fridge on the dining room floor, mind you, which, although oak, is not immune to scratches. I'm cringing, just a little. Finally they get the fridge mounted and tilted back and begin guiding it through the threshold into the kitchen. As he nears the back door, Moe says, "Shit. It's not going to fit."

Nyuk nyuk nyuk.

"Oh, I forgot to tell you; you'll probably have to remove the doors from the fridge and remove the hardware from the screen door. Did you measure?" Moe does that thing where you measure with both hands but your arms don't stay in the same place as you walk from the object to the opening. Worth a chuckle after a long day in the kitchen. He decides that I'm right and he goes into the garage to search through his disorganized, mismatched assortment of rusting tools.

I call after him, "You'll need a Phillips and a socket wrench and six-point sockets." Then I retrieve my handy, all-inclusive case of shiny, clean tools from the kitchen cupboard, grab my socket wrench and start removing the hinges from the fridge. He walks in as I'm lifting the first door off the hinges. He is holding a #14 crescent wrench and a box of twelve-point sockets, but no socket wrench.

Nyuk nyuk nyuk.

He's annoyed that I'm getting the job done, so he grabs my wrench. I get my Phillips and start to work on the screen door hardware and finish that in short order. I play a round of solitaire on the computer. Larry has gone into hiding.

Finally, Moe's ready to slide the fridge back onto the hand truck. I'm thinking, "heavy: hernia; stairs, wheels, snow: squashed Moe, oh no..." I tell Husband he's got the wrong man on the heavy side of the operation.

Not that I want Curly squashed. It's just nice to see him do something useful with 200 pounds of muscle on occasion.

So they get the fridge down the steps with a minimum of thumping and crashing, and wheel it out to the driveway. I have no reason to follow them, but I'm actually smiling at this point, so I do.

The bed of the truck is full of snow. By full, I mean there is a four inch dip along the right side of the bed, and a six inch drift on the left, and the warmer temperature has caused what was once fluffy and light snow to become compact and heavy snow. Moe's first scoop with the snow shovel reveals that the bed of the truck is also full of tools and extension cords and scrap lumber.

Nyuk nyuk nyuk.

It occurs to me that in spite of Shemp being a lesbian, she and Moe were fairly well suited to each other.

After Moe shovels out the bed of the truck and shoves the melange of tools and cords and scraps to one side, he and Curly manage to load the fridge and the doors. Curly then gives me the "I've got a date; do I really have to go all the way across town right now?" look. I nod. There is no way in hell Moe and Larry are going to get the fridge up the office stairs without help, and it's only going to take an hour or so, and Curly owes me thirty-five bucks until I say he doesn't. For some reason Moe starts calling for Larry. I guess it's just not a project without three bodies present, even if one body is quite surly and, accustomed to doing nothing more than gaming in front of the computer or lounging in front of the tube or polishing off nine of twelve servings of Easter dessert intended for the entire family, relatively useless.

Off they go.

On my way back to the couch I see that Moe's managed to leave every tool and every piece of refrigerator hardware on the kitchen floor. I take the Phillips and the screen door hinge from the counter, reinstall the hinge, put away all of my tools, and leave everything else the way it was left.

With any luck Moe will trip over the hardware on his way out the door this morning and remember to take it with him.

Nyuk nyuk nyuk.

My tools are safely, neatly hidden.

It's Easter, Damn it.

2007-04-08T20:28:00.000+01:00

I'm not religious.

Still.

When the phone rings at 11:00 Easter morning and I see by the caller ID that it's that chauvanistic marketing guy who entertains magazine writers and the like in strip clubs so Mr. Marketing can claim that he's helped someone build a lucrative business by drinking and getting hard-ons on someone else's dime, I'm suddenly not feeling very Eastery. I'm feeling like not answering the call.

I answer it anyway.

"Husband is out on the patio shoveling a path for the dog. I'll get him for you."

"No, no, that's okay. Happy Easter. Are you watching the Masters?"

"Um, no?"

I'm not into golf.

"You're kidding! It's wild! ... blah blah blah watching the Masters yada yada so incredible blah blah blah and so and so did such and whatever yadayada beef it up ramble blither-blather whatever yada very difficult yammeryammeryammer can't believe these guys..." ad nauseum until finally Husband comes in and I roll my eyes, purse my lips, and snort as I hand the phone to him without a goodbye to Mister Marketing. After all, he isn't my business associate.

Why do I hate this guy?

One reason: He once looked me square in the eye and uttered the words, "I don't objectify women. I just happen to like to watch the game on a big screen TV while topless women dance in the background."

To which I responded, "You're a self-contradictory asshole."

To which he responded, "No, really, I'm a nice guy."

Whatever.

So.

I start dressing the turkey, because, as all women know, all holidays are about slaving in the kitchen until a grand meal is on the table for all the family members who've sat on their asses doing nothing all day. The phone rings again. I see by the caller ID that it's Husband's ex.

During the call he asks me what time dinner will be served. I tell him, "Between 5:00 and 5:30, depending on the turkey." After he hangs up I ask him, "What was that about?" He says, "She's agreed to bring her truck over and help me move the refrigerator to the office right after dinner."

"On Easter Sunday?"

"I figured you'd be glad to get it out of here as soon as possible."

Seems I'll be washing up alone.

Pffft.

An unexpected move

2007-04-08T18:55:00.000+01:00

Your kiss, so swift, so light, a brush of lips
Was there and gone before the day could sigh.
My heart rejoices, hungers now, and skips
For all the fire that once was you and I.

I know not how defences dropped, or mixed
When love, it seemed, had run its cruel course
And, like opposing planets, orbits fixed,
We'd spiralled ever further from our source.

Why did we just engage in this last dance
of tender meaning, all too small, too late?
What was the fear I saw in your brief glance,
Does hope still seek to contradict our fate?

Oh, for your arms, my warm and musky nest
Where Earth and Heaven mingled in the past.
Its been so long since there was peace, or rest;
Dear God, I wish the die had not been cast.

The Presumption of Pretty

2007-04-03T22:15:00.000+01:00

There really is a difference between genuinely beautiful people and, well, the rest of us. I'm not fishing for compliments and I'm not even being bitter, but I am realizing more and more that there is a difference.

To illustrate, a story:

today, I had in my office a simply beautiful 11 year old girl (ok, almost 12). I have known her for 7 years now, as I was the midwife in attendance when her brother was born almost 7 years ago. She has always been a neat kid: smart, kind, gentle with her brother, nice to her parents, respectful without being smarmy, not in the least self-centered (though I am not her parent, of course)... she's just a terrific kid and anyone should be proud to have her as their daughter (and her parents certainly are).

At 11, she is stunning. Poised. Pretty-- really genuinely lovely. Gorgeous eyes. Beautiful hair (that she apparently wants to dye black! Bah!). Lovely skin. Tall. Slender. Graceful. And best of all, she does not appear to be overly aware of it-- she is one of those wonderful pretty girls who doesn't seem to know exactly how pretty she is. Or to care-- though she is well put-together, so I know she does care as most 11 year old girls do. Anyway, she's terrific.

I also had a student in the office today. Another extremely beautiful young woman, probably in her mid to late 20s. Exotic, pleasant, smiles easily, and genuinely a beautiful woman. As we were chatting about the girl, I said something to the effect of "she is just stunning" and my student responded "yes, she is.... but then, we were all that pretty when we were 11." I said "I wasn't" and that was that.

Well, it's true, I wasn't particularly pretty. I was gawky. I was a bit overweight (but I didn't have anything on what I am now, sigh). My hair was frizzy and I tried to keep it straight, a ridiculous thing to even try, and it made my already thin hair look even thinner. I had thick glasses, hiding the blue eyes that are undoubtedly my best facial feature. While some of these have been remedied and I don't think I am ugly, I also realized that I really would not ever expect to be described as pretty. I just don't think of myself that way, and I never have. There have been times when this has been a considerable source of misery, but I think they are pretty much long over at this point.

Still, it is interesting to realize that for some of us there is the Presumption of Pretty-- the absolute conviction that we were at one time pretty, even if that time has passed. It is startling to think that my student might even begin to put herself in this camp, since she is still extremely beautiful and would turn heads just about anywhere, I suspect.

I have never had the Presumption of Pretty. Never. It simply does not form any part of my world view. I wonder what life would be like, to believe that you are or at least once were genuinely pretty, even to complete strangers?

What is it like, to know that you are pretty?

Personal Update

2007-03-28T17:32:00.000+01:00

I'm sorry I haven't posted here in quite a while. Instead of thinking of something wonderfully funny and interesting to grump about, I've been dealing with many small but real life difficulties.

I've been blogging for money lately. When I got offered compensation for "providing content," I was in hog heaven. But you know what they say, if you make your hobby into a job, then you've lost a hobby. Dealing with promotion and deadlines makes it much less fun. It doesn't replace the income of a real job, but it keeps the wolf away from the door. But it is very time-consuming. While I surf for material, I tend to get distracted: Oh, Scott Adams has an opinion on something! Oh, there's a squabble between blogger x and blogger y! Oh, a new episode of The Daily Show! (which happens every day, duh) So what should take a few minutes takes an hour. When I really need to use the time to look for a real job.

Then the transmission went out on my van. The good news is that it was only a blown seal. The bad news is, they had to remove the tranny to fix it ($$$). And it took a week at the shop for my mechanic to get around to it. Meanwhile, I drove a borrowed Cadillac, which cost more in gas than my van cost in constant tranmission fluid transfusions.

The CPA finished my income tax forms. Federal was OK, but the state of Kentucky wants thousands of dollars, a fine for underestimating my income last year, and quarterly payments 500% above last year for 2007! Well, 2006 was an unusually good year, but if my income stays steady for this year, the state will be withholding 50% of my income. I have to figure out some way to get out of that. My best bet would be to move out of state. If I can afford to!

Then my youngest got sick. She said she had never been this weak in her life. With no health insurance, it cost me $200 to determine that she has the flu. She was excused from school for an entire week, which would be followed by ten days of Spring Break. With the help of the good Lord and Tamiflu, she is back at school today to give me a little break before their vacation.

Today I am sorting our possessions preparing for a yard sale on Good Friday. Yes, I could use the money, but the main point is to get rid of this ton of furniture and stuff before a possible move. Wish me luck!

Maslow

2007-03-23T10:17:00.000Z

Everyone should know about Maslow's heirarchy of human needs. Doctors should know about it, husbands should know about it. It would make life so much easier. We should know about it.

Sometimes it seems to me that only two sorts know about it, same as only two sorts really ever study human frailty through counselling or NLP or any other framework:

1. Those who would help you to soothe your wounds and provide for your needs and insecurities (counsellor, healer types who you never get to see unless you've already flipped and had a meltdown)

2. Those who would manipulate you by creating needs and insecurities and then prodding you in the wounds. That would be the evil antithesis and the dark side as represented by, *ahem*, arseholes, torturers and salesmen.

I don't know if I see the triangle the way Maslow saw it (or the way others see Maslow) because I haven't gone reading. Just looking at the darn thing, it all seems pretty obvious.

You need to be completely satisfied in a lower layer to be able to put your attention to a higher one. Its that simple. You need to not be in a panic about whether people even like you before you can think about projects to attract applause. You need to be secure that you have enough air to breathe (not suffocating) before you can be arsed to worry about anything else at all like whether you have something nice for tea.

As you grow up you build layers (compare the bottom three to ages zero, five and ten). At any point in life, damage to any layer will force you to sideline anything above that and rebuild. This is where salesmen come in on the baddy side, because their whole focus is to turn a product into a desire and turn your desire into a percieved need. If you only want something then you may or may not treat yourself. If you can feel that you need it then the sale is as good as made. Their task is to make you percieve a deficiency in your safety, your sense of belonging or your ego and chance to shine.

Some people cite apparent exceptions to the triangle; heroic types who can function at the top, altrusitic level, without material possessions or even *enough* food/water/air, even with death impending.

The funny thing is, however, that we allow ourselves to assume our pyramids are all of roughly the same dimensions and this is a big mistake. We can go through an entire, comfortable life, assuming that we 'need' this or that and for many the distinction between the bottom two levels never needs considering. They, we, get completely mixed up with the minimum requirements for survival (empirical fact) and our much more subjective and individual requirements to feel safe and comfortable.

This is the dreaded comfort zone and the one where addictions attack. Shopaholic, chocaholic, workaholic, alcoholic, name your poison; it sits here and tells you you HAVE to have it, so that if you go without you lose the ability to focus on anything else.

Some people have wide, wide bases to their emotional structures snd need everything 'just so'. Some who seemingly dwell constantly in the self actualisation peak of achievement would have genuine panic attacks at the loss of things they categorise as basic human rights, such as waterproof shoes, or three meals a day, or at least one holiday a year. Going without these things would before long become distracting or even disabling for them. Cheer up. Look at superstars - the types who have apoplectic fits because the wrong colour smarties were delivered to the hotel room. There but for the grace of God.

Others find to their surprise that although they always assumed they were normal; under this unwitting facade they find they have the slimmest, tallest pyramids; more like needles. When these people are attacked then as far as the world is concerned, more and more is seen to be taken from the base of the structure in a way that ought to cause a total cave in, but in reality its all just breeze block and not the supporting wall.

You can never tell how sleek and minimalist each level of your true pyramid happens to be, until someone takes a chunk out of it. You never know whats going to go beyond being challenging to breathtakingly unbearable, until it does.

What Maslow doesnt seem to approach is the concept that on balance, personal survival is not always essential, or rather, once you are high enough up the pyramid you can reorganise the foundations and overcome animal instinct. If this theory holds water then the bottom level named 'physiological' should really be named 'principles'. Your principles are what really matter to you and in an undeveloped state physiological needs (obviously) come first. There is, however, room to insert a kind of basement level here - to consciously decide that there are morals and standards that matter even more than physiological comfort or survival. Instantly this relegates physical requirements to desires rather than needs and they function as a sublayer of safety and security. To put it another way they simply cease to be the bottom line.

If you believe in the pre-existence of the eternal soul then you may like to call this life path or soul purpose; some predetermined state of self that was there all along and needed only to be seen. In that case when I say there is room to insert a lower level, you would say there is the capability (only if it is your path) to discover a lower level that was hiding there all along. Either way its not for everybody.

Its only a concept. Perhaps at the final moment the only thought crossing the mind of an apparent hero is not "I did it my way" but "Oh shit".

God only knows, and thats not blasphemous as you would have to be everybody ever, or at least be with them, to have a clue.

Enough waffling. We are not all heroes; most of us far from it. If, however, someone is being unreasonable, if you are tempted to bite their head off, then before you do, compare their behaviour to the triangle. It may just be that against their best intentions, you are not their main focus.

I have cancer

2007-03-08T16:16:00.000Z

Finally, I'm one of those people you raise funds for at coffee mornings and on long walks. If you were one of those people who did the raising, I tell you - I really am grateful for those 'recent advances in cancer treatment'. No, really! But that's about all I'm grateful for.

At my first diagnostic hospital appointment, the consultant said 'I am so certain that it's cancer that if the biopsy turns out negative, I'll make them do it again'. And then he went on holiday.

Really scientific, I thought. And bad timing.

I noticed that he shook my husband's hand before he turned to me, both on arrival and departure. Sexist issues, too. Maybe.

That afternoon, I had been dumped in a small cell-like treatment room for over 40 minutes, and left twiddling my thumbs instead of being given the expected prone tour of the diagnostic rooms. They later said I should've brought a book. (The fact that I had a bag full of them in the main waiting room and a husband who could have kept me company seemed to have passed them by.)

Anyway, finally giving up, I had marched out of the treatment room in my little diagnostic cape (neat little red riding hood affair), ready to march off home. It was five o'clock and the other people in my life had need of my presence back home. I hadn't banked on a nurses' station almost immediately outside which kinda halted me in my tracks.

To their credit, they did then start to get everything in motion but by the time everything was done and dusted the hospital appointment system had closed for the night so they couldn't even finish the day's work by setting up the next series of diagnostic appointments.

After the biopsy ('You're not a bleeder, then' - quote of the week by a nurse as she jammed her fists into my roly poly flesh like she was turning dough for some homemade bread), they had taken me to 'the quiet room' which had comfortable chairs and the offer of a cup of tea. It was pretty obvious what was coming except it wasn't to me as I didn't know consultants diagnosed ahead of the results of the tests they ask for. But there you go. My expectations are always dashed.

Oh, bless...the apogee of that day was his question to me as I sat there waiting for him to speak. "Do you know what is going on?"

How the fuck should I know what's going on? Nobody had bothered to keep me informed so far. However, I did manage to provide a polite version of 'Well, I'm here for a range of tests and you're going to let me know the results when you have them at my next appointment, unless you're such a smart arse that you think you know already'. Of course, he did and he was.

My next appointment - to confirm the diagnosis *officially* - took place in one of those little weather stations where the little man comes out for the good weather and the little lady comes out when it's fine. Oh - actually it was the same cell-like room as before but I think the doctor and the nurse were auditioning to become a double act in a weather vane. The only consistent was an observer from another hospital. We became quite good friends while the others dashed in and out. I haven't seen her since of course because she actually works, did I say? in another hospital.

Finally the Oncologist turned up. The weather settled for a while - everyone just on a quiet rev while decisions were made as to whether it would be wet or fine. But then the Oncologist spoke the unexpected and the weather vane started again in earnest. Pieces of paper were hurriedly taken out of the folder they had just newly given me, additional labels were required, people flitted in and out and I was told I wasn't going for various tests after all (except I had no idea I was going for them in the first place as I hadn't taken very much in so far).

I had been shaken, rattled and rolled by the stand-in consultant to a point of oblivion. (Keep clear of Associate Specialists whatever you do!) He had entered the room without so much as the merest eye contact, keeping his gaze on the paperwork in front of him. And then he had pursued his various points. Whenever I muttered 'yes' or grunted an acknowledgement of what he said, he'd look up briefly and then quickly took his attention back to the safety of the printed page.

He was completely oblivious to the fact that at one point he had lost me. I had disconnected from the conversation. I was devastated by something he had said. The nurse had managed to stay in the dry weather section for a while and asked me a couple of times if I wanted to ask something but I didn't have a question. I knew I had emotional things to say and I just wanted him OUT so I could talk about my feelings. But it wasn't to be. And finally I had to start talking and then I couldn't stop.

I am embarrassed to say that, from that point, every time the stand-in consultant started to talk to me, I turned to the nurse to give my answer. Finally he escaped from the room and came back with the Oncologist.

Later he congratulated the Oncologist for having calmed things down. He seems to have missed the fact that all the emotional work went on while he was out of the room.

In the meantime, having been reassured that none of the tests would be 'invasive', I received an appointment for a scan which involved very invasive treatment. He lied to me and had the lie confirmed by a nurse. Yeah, I know he didn't actually intend to lie. But he 'misinformed' me. Who was more scared that day, I wonder, him or me?!

And yesterday I went back in and asked for a copy of the letter I should have received a fortnight ago with the details of my treatment - my GP hadn't had a copy either. And when I read it, I saw they had decided that I should return to see the consultant for a scan of a hitherto unexplored part of my body. WOT?

We have since established that I am in fact going back for another scan of the affected part - so that's all right then. BUT in the process, we discovered that they had given me another appointment on that same day for a small operation similar to a biopsy - only there's never anybody there to do that job on that particular day of the week. I settle myself down - only to get thoroughly rattled again as my world, like a kaleidoscope, takes off again in a different direction.

If they take the wrong leg off, I won't be surprised. And it's even not a leg I'm expecting them to operate on.

Since then, they've had me travel an hour there and an hour back for a stomach scan. The scan took precisely three minutes during which time my husband had disappeared to put more money in the meter in the hospital grounds. I was hanging around for him to come back for much longer than I was lying on the investigation table. I'm glad he didn't decide to go for a coffee on the way back.

Then they had me travel an hour there and an hour back for a body scan. That was more worth while - that one took six hours.

Always a life of extremes.

I wonder sometimes if it's a plot to make you look forward to oblivion as an escape from the chaos of an earthly life.

Anyway, I have blogged my spleen. I am no longer a GOB Virgin.

So much to say (and no way to say it)

2007-03-05T13:23:00.000Z

Of course, I check this blog regularly along with a bunch of others. I love to read, and of course, being a talker in general in any and all formats, I love to comment. I love feedback, and I love to give feedback. For the last couple of weeks, however, I have been feeling very thwarted.

I read a blog entry about "experts" telling people-- including people with adopted kids, kids who may well have some level of attachment issues- that any parent who sleeps with their kid simply doesn't know how to say no. That they are letting the kid run the house, and basically that they need to learn to toughen up and be the grownup. I seethe, and burn to give all the "experts" a swift kick in the pants. I head to the comments section where I write my usual long diatribe... only to have blogger refuse my comment.

I check another blog, where there is a thought-provoking post about whether or not you can make your kid eat specific foods that you choose. I go to add to the discussion, making a comment about kids eating what they like or what their parents tell them to eat. About how damaging it can be in so many ways to force your children to eat things they don't like. About how people do not grow up damaged by being fed a small collection of healthful foods that they do like and yet not eating vegetables for, say, 15 years straight. That they grow up damaged by being forced to eat things they hate, by being dominated and yelled and and force fed. Insightful comments. Brilliant comments. All refused by blogger.

This very blog had such an interesting discussion about how this society chooses to care for (or not) our most vulnerable members. I went back over and over again, trying to make comments. Comments about healthcare for all and the government that will never allow such a socialist (too close to communist, you know) thing to happen, no matter that it is the right thing to do, to take care of the poor and vulnerable, to make sure that every member of a society has access to basic health care. Again, brilliant, witty, scathing comments. Insightful pollitical commentary. All refused by blogger.

"Wrong password" it likes to tell me, if it feels like telling me anything. Sometimes, it just keeps bouncing back to the top of the comment section, refusing to indicate my transgression.

The same password that gets me to the dashboard, that allowed me to write this very (annoyed) post, will not allow me to post comments on any blogger blog. Posting without logging in to blogger doesn't work, either (though I have not tried to post anonymously, which I suppose will be my only choice). It just doesn't want to hear from me. It's like blogger has its hands over its ears, saying "blah blah blah I can't hear you, I'm not listening to you!"

Does this mean I talk too much?

The Telephone Man

2007-03-02T04:04:00.000Z

So many people are getting rid of their land lines, I had considered it. But I just never got around to it. My cell number is on my resume. It rang one day, and my MIL told me my house phone just rang and rang. I checked -the line was dead. Another phone, another jack, yes, all dead.

So I called the phone company Wednesday and a computer talked to me. By following all the menu options over the span of fifteen minutes, they let me know something was wrong with the line and they would schedule someone to come fix it. Wait a minute! How much is this going to cost me? That question wasn’t a menu option. So I frantically punched zero, and got a real live person on the line, who told me that since I didn’t have the maintenance plan, it would depend on whether the trouble was inside the house or outside. So I cancelled the work order. I can’t afford that.

The next day, I made my decision. I called the business line and asked that my account be terminated. She wanted to know why, so I explained that I couldn’t afford to have the wiring fixed, if that was the problem. I could put you on the maintenance plan today. But that wouldn’t cover a pre-existing condition, would it? Yes, I will put in a waiver so it would cover this problem. Oh, I don’t know. I’m afraid that a repairman will get here, fix it, then tell me I’ll have to pay. No, that won’t happen if I put in a waiver. Are you sure? This kind of thing has happened to me before. Ma’am, we are AT&T/Bell South. We don’t do that to people. I stifled my laugh and said OK, we’ll try that. She told me someone would be there by Friday.

Have you ever heard of retroactive insurance? Me neither. This is the kind of deal you can ONLY get if you ask to have your service terminated. Notice this was never offered Wednesday.

That was Thursday morning. Early Thursday afternoon, the repairman showed up. He listened to all the phones and said, Yes, they’re dead. Now, since you don’t have a maintenance plan, the cost to repair will depend on whether the problem is inside or outside the house. Sigh. Why was I not surprised? OK, don’t fix it; I’ll just have the service disconnected. Then I explained what the woman on the phone told me this morning. No, I don’t have any record of that. We can try it, and if it shows up on your bill, you can have it taken off. Yeah, right. I’ll believe that when pigs fly. Let me take a look, if its something small and easy, I won’t charge you.

So he checks all the phone jacks. The he checks the big part of the basement, where all the spaghetti wiring of several DIY homeowners make him blink. Then he checked the crawl space under the new part of the house, which is a real acrobatic feat. Moe, Larry, and Curly didn’t leave much of an opening in the foundation, and the “door” was a nailed-on piece of paneling. Its a feat for me to get in there, much less a normal-sized man. He ended up back at the phone box. Replaced some parts, and still hadn’t isolated the problem. He took down the wire. Then he climbed the phone pole.

Thats when he discovered his diagnostic equipment was not working. After an hour’s work, he had to start over with a new testing phone. All the jacks, the spaghetti, the crawl space... and he found the problem. It was in the crawl space, a legacy of Moe, Larry, and Curly’s adventures in building my addition. Just another in the long line of repairs to their work.

But then a miracle happened. He said, Since most of the time I spent here was my fault, I won’t charge you for this. The heavens opened. The angels sang.

But I still won’t believe it til I see my next phone bill.

Our playground in danger

2007-02-25T17:40:00.001Z

If this scenario ever comes to pass, the biggest part of the internet, the part with regular people who don't control media empires, will dry up and disappear.

Please pass this video along, however you can. For more information, go to Save the Internet.

For Our Kids

2007-02-15T14:56:00.000Z

A society is ultimately judged by how it treats it weakest members.

A recent UNICEF report shows the the Unites States and the United Kingdom are at the bottom of the list for child welfare among rich countries. This is disgraceful. While we can spend billions of dollars on a pre-emptive war, while ignoring the hunt for Osama bin Laden, funding for children’s programs are being cut left and right.

What to do? If we end the war and restore funding to children’s health, safety, and educational programs, will everything turn out alright? No. The countries at the top of the list spend less money on such programs, and even poorer countries have higher scores than the US and Britain. Money is a component, but if we are to rise to the top of the list, maybe we should also take a look at what other countries are doing right.

One of the key things is that the role of government is important, but the entire society must have at its heart the idea of improving child well-being.

The Netherlands spends a smaller percentage of their GDP on health care than the US, but as a culture they focus on quality of life ahead of profit.

Sweden has the strongest welfare system in the world. Although their taxes are high, the citizens support such a system because the benefits to the overall quality of life are worth it.

We can take lessons from smaller countries, if we ever decide to value quality of life for all over profits for the individual. That almost sounds communist, doesn’t it? The problem with communism in the real world is the emphasis on the system at the expense of the people involved. It seems like an intelligent society could find a way to help the vulnerable without abridging individual rights. Maybe countries like the Netherlands and Sweden have ways worth examining. What do you think?

boys

2007-02-14T17:01:00.000Z

Can I rant about boys please?

Not generic, smelly, slightly goofy teenage boys, but twenty-two year old chaps who one employs in ones company.

Chaps who are very, very good at the creative and technical side of what they do, but are GOD AWFUL CRAP at communicating what they've actually done or what they are actually doing during the course of a day working at home.

Chaps who seem perfectly prepared to speak to your co-director stroke co-manager stroke husband about stuff; but who seem to think that it is fine to ignore your own emails or text messages or voicemails.

I am starting to think that it's because of the gender thing.

That perhaps I am less worthy of respect because I don't go out and lift boxes and load and unload trucks but do more of the organisational back-room stuff that isn't that obvious.

Stuff that could, perhaps, be undervalued by a recent graduate who has never actually worked in an office situation or for a proper company and doesn't understand all the ramifications of team-work.

A chap who gives off a vague feeling of resentment when I ask him politely, for the umpteenth time, to acknowledge my communications.

Perhaps he thinks that I don't really do anything very much. That my husband is the driving force behind the company. Maybe he thinks that because I am pregnant (I haven't mentioned that here by the way, although I have on my own blog - yay!), my brain has suddenly turned to mush and I am no longer part of the company.

Anyway.

I am ticked off.

And I need to have a conversation with him about it - but it's kind of difficult, as we are running a virtual office situation and he is at one end of the country when he is not out on jobs and I am at the other. And it's the kind of conversation that you need to have face to face.

So. How informal can you be in this kind of work situation with young men? How do you make them realise that although it's a relaxed working environment, it's still a deadly serious business? And how do I get him to take me seriously without a) sounding like a hysteric and b) putting his back up - if it isn't up already?

Gah.

Etiquette Questions

2007-02-06T05:54:00.000Z

Some things I've been wondering about lately.

If a family member gives your child a gift-- say an article of especially ghastly clothing-- are you obligated to have your child wear it? Do you have to take pictures to show to said relative? Is this just pandering, trying to make said relative feel appreciated? Or is it trying to teach your child good manners by showing that you appreciate all gifts, and you can't say "yucky" to an otherwise appropriate gift that just happens to be, um, yucky?

If the answer is yes to the first 2 questions above (wearing and photographing the wearing), do you have to do it more than once, just so you don't show them 5 pics of the darling creature in the ghastly outfit, all obviously taken on the same day? I mean, are you obligated to make said relative feel all that appreciated?

What if the gift is a toy that you child does not appreciate, enjoy, or use? You wouldn't feel obligated to show the relative pictures of the child playing with it, would you? Why is this different from the hideous garment?

What if it was a toy that you did not like? Are you obligated to let the kid even have it? Well, you are the parent, you can choose, right? But it was a gift, given freely and not given to you, dear parent.

Can you go through gifts ahead of time, for example if a big Christmas box arrives in mid-December? Say you are not consulted, as some families are kind enough to do, but instead your family chooses to send gifts that they think your kid will like, without consideration of whether or not you allow certain types of dolls or weapons or glitter or especially noxious arts and crafts in your home? Can you go through and veto, in advance, any toys that do not meet your standards of social acceptability?

If you can and do cull the herd ahead of time, do you have to replace the toy in question before the event? If your mother sends a gruesome item for your child, and you toss it into the Goodwill pile and replace it with something wholesome and good and filled with light, what do you do about the thank-you note? How do you coach little Kumbaya to write a good thank-you note without mentioning the lovely gun that grandma gave her? It's not like you can replace it with a kinder, gentler gun, so either you replace it with another gun and she can write "thank you for the gun" or you replace it with a knit-your-own-peace-sign kit and all the child can say is "thank you for the present" which is sure to get grandma's hackles up. She wasn't born yesterday, you know.

Finally, what do you do with ghastly objects that are given to your child in person? They are always thoughtfully chosen and of the sort that children dearly love, by which I mean they always have lots of lights and sounds and repetition of songs that make you want to rip your ears off your head before the evening is over. Your child adores it, your relatives know that your child adores it, because they saw her play with it nonstop and with such glee for hours on end. After you have removed the batteries, dismantled the speaker, and otherwise rendered it impotent, how do you deal with both the child and the relative? Especially next time they are all in your home, expecting to have a happy reunion, relative, child, and hellacious toy all.

And just for the record: no, these are actually not my personal issues for the most part (though we have gotten a few noisy toys that have subsequently entered the witness protection program, one of which prompted a call to the sending friend to ask what I had done to make her mad at me). These are mostly things I've heard other people gripe about and which are knocking about in my head tonight. Really. I promise.

I imagine this is all eclipsed in the teen years, when it is your child's friends that you can't stand. That seems a mite more complicated.

I Got Those Beta Blogger Blues

2007-01-31T06:41:00.000Z

I woke up this morning
Blog posts in my head
Signed on for my Blogger
And found Beta here instead...

I am no good at this lyrics malarky, but you get the drift I hope. Please add your own imaginary sour guitar chords and subtle background noises that involve acquiescent, tired people (a few dark 'uhuh's or 'amen's as you wish) and the essential ' this is real blues' sounds of a large, bare room with old wooden flooring; be that scuffs or a slight echo to the vocals.
Or not.

Anyhow perhaps its happened to all of us, but this is now a Beta blog. The little matter of choice was removed. Lovely.

Cold Monday Morning

2007-01-29T13:27:00.000Z

I am apparently the only one around here who knows how to plan ahead. The forecast said it would be cold Sunday and Monday. I bought weather stripping and insulation last week. I installed it Saturday, when the weather was nice. Sunday was cold, and getting colder. I gathered kindling, hauled logs to the porch, got my grocery shopping done before dark, stoked the fire til 2AM, and turned on the electric blanket an hour before getting into bed. I washed the kids’ heavy coats, and gave them an extra few minutes in the dryer just before leaving this morning. I started the car 15 minutes early to warm it up. I found two matching sets of gloves.

Monday was an “out of dress code” day, which is special. I told the kids to bring me all their dirty laundry all weekend. I told them to get their outfits ready the night before. Several times.

This morning, I found Princess in a sleeveless shirt. NO! Its 14 degrees out there! She couldn’t find ANY long sleeved shirt that wasn’t dress code. So I looked. I could think of 6 nice long sleeved shirts, not a one to be found. Turns out one was under the bed, dirty. Two were in the car, dirty. Two were left at Grandma’s house. And the other was on her sister’s back.

Gothgrrl neglected to bathe on Sunday. And Saturday. So I stoked the water heater and nagged her through a quick shower, while packing lunches and preparing breakfast. I dried her hair while she ate.

After putting in what amounted to an entire day’s work getting them ready, we left for school on time. The parking lot was empty! Yes, I had checked the roads, no snow, no ice. But the public schools in the area had called off school today for some reason, so the parochial school delayed class one hour as a precaution. All that hurrying this morning was for naught. Of course, I left them there anyway. They behave better for the nuns than for me.

But now that I’ve vented, I can enjoy some peace and another cup of coffee. Thank you.

In Your Face

2007-01-27T13:25:00.000Z

I have a toothbrush holder I bought six years ago. I love this toothbrush holder, it's chrome and white porcelain, done up in a turn of the century design, very compact and aesthetically pleasing to the eye. I've kept it next to my sink all these years, fondly recalling the happiness I felt when I first spotted it sitting all by itself on the shelf at Target.

Problem is, the good folks at Colgate and Crest who design toothbrushes have conspired to see to it that no toothbrush in existence will fit into my pretty holders' neatly arranged slots.

My bathroom counter is riddled with evaporated pools of foamy toothpaste residue, white chalky mess from fat-handled toothbrushes commingle with hairballs from recently cleaned hairbrushes and my daughter's array of makeup and glitter sprays.

I threw that bastard toothbrush holder right in the fucking garbage can today. I admit defeat, I'm done trying to find skinny brushes, done picking everything up to wash the counters, finished with longing to see that holder full and functional. All you marketing geniuses...Go fuck yourselves.

Fiasco

2007-01-26T14:53:00.000Z

This afternoon, I had to take my car to the mechanic. Nothing big, just a lot of little stuff. I discussed it with my daughter in the morning (oh, she of the 4 years and afraid to do show and tell). She decided that she wanted to bring her bicycle and ride it home from the mechanic. They are about 1- 1.5 miles away, simple, easy. Her choices had been bike or tricycle (which is really too small) and she chose the bike. She chose it, dammit.

All morning, she asked to ride her bike. When I picked her up from daycare, she wanted to ride her bike. When we got to the mechanic, she wanted to ride her bike. Begged to.

You can all see this coming, can't you? Well, I couldn't. I am an idiot.

We get the fucking bike out of the car, get her helmet on, and she melts. Won't get on. It's too scary.

I, being far from the mother of the year, yell at her. I make her get on the bike, where she starts to sob. I let her get off and we cross the street, her sobbing and me fuming.

She wants to walk. I tell her that we are not putting the bike back in the car, that she can walk it all the way home. Which I proceed to make her do. I help her at the streets, but that is it. She pushes the bike the whole way, with me fuming by her side. I would not help her and I would definitely not carry her-- which, to her credit, she knew enough not to ask for.

We moved at a snail's pace. She whined that she was tired. I told her that we would get home 4 times faster and with her using about half the energy if she'd get on and ride. She kept saying it was scary. I kept telling her that I would help her stay upright (it has training wheels, it's not likely that she'll fall) and that she is a good rider, that she did it so well at home. I tried to be pleasant and tell her good things about herself, while I seethed about her unwillingness to get on the bike.

She is afraid she will fall. This from the kid who rode around our block about 6 times (it's a double block, too) the first time she went out on the bike. This from the kid who was begging to ride it. Suddenly, it's scary and she's afraid she will fall.

She should be afraid that I will clobber her, because I really wanted to. I didn't, of course, but holy moley I was so annoyed that I wanted to.

I know that age 4 is the age of imaginary fears, and clearly on her part, whininess beyond measure. I know it, but that doesn't mean I have to like it.

I really understand why some mammals eat their young.

Why show-and-tell is no longer optional

2007-01-26T06:00:00.000Z

I am clearly tired of teaching. I have done it for 9 years now. I usually enjoy it, with the occasional desire to dope slap a student here and there.

That is, until this term, when the "occasional desire" seems to overtake me every minute... or at least every time I have to interact with my students.

I have only one class (2 sections) right now. It's pretty much a simple, easy class for them. All they have to do is:
show up
do their research
present their research
do their final (following instructions, turning it in, all that jazz)

Should they manage to complete these pretty damned simple tasks, they will pass. They are first year medical students and thus in my opinion should not require much babysitting.

I am so so terribly wrong about this, apparently. Somehow, this term, I have the whiniest group of students imaginable.

First, not one single class has passed this term without at least one email from a student explaining that they will not be in class the next day. For whatever reason-- and some are legit, like the woman whose grandmother just died, though they must be a bunch of young'uns to still have grandmothers to die-- this particular group of students has a lot going on, and many of them see it as reason not to attend my class. I find it annoying.

Second, and this is a real doozie, there is one student who I am ready to slap silly. As I said, the class is basically a research class where students collect info and present it to the group. Nothing major, just 15 people around a table, presentations are very informal and take perhaps as much as 5 minutes. The students are responsible for jumping in when the time is right, I try not to direct too much, and the students are responsible for how they present the information. Oh, and they also get to choose what they research and they can work alone or in small groups, so really they aren't on the spot for all that much.

So this one student, she says she can't do it. Research, yes, but she cannot present information to her class when she is "required" to do so. Like she has some panic disorder that only kicks in when something is required of her-- since she insists that she can speak well in one-on-one situations and in groups if she feels "passionate" about what she is speaking about.

What the fuck? You can only speak in a group if you feel passionate about what you are saying and if no one is requiring you to do it? Are you kidding me?

I would love to say to her "do you feel passionate about passing your fucking classes?"

I would love to say to her "stop being such a fucking prima donna, you whiny little bitch"

I would love to say to her "sometimes grown ups have to do things when they are told to, not just when they want to. Time to grow up"

I would love to say to her "I am so sorry that you were raised and apparently educated by people who never taught you that sometimes you have to do what other people tell you and when they tell you. That you have to meet other people's expectations. That you can't always do just what you want when you want.These moments are often called deadlines, and they are a reality of adulthood."

I would love to say to her "stop whining or I will fail you"

And I would love to talk to her parents, to give them an ear full about never having taught her this unpleasant little life lesson.

Which brings me to show and tell. My kid never wants to bring anything for show and tell. Never. I asked her why, and she says that she does not like to talk in front of the class.

Well, not on my watch, baby. You are not going to grow up thinking that this sort of spoiled brat behaviour is acceptable. You are almost 4 and a half, it is time for some cold hard reality, my friend, and I see it as my job to deliver it to you. I may adore you, but I see it as my damned job to make sure you are a functional human being, and it is not too soon to start as far as I am concerned.

Suffice it to say, life has been a bit tougher for my kid this week. Her father and I have told her, in no uncertain terms, that we expect her to toe the line at preschool. Stop refusing to perform, stop telling the teachers that she doesn't want to answer questions. Next week, my kid is doing show and tell, dammit, if I have anything to say about it. Show and tell is no longer optional.

It's never too early to learn that the world is a hard, hard place.

About Membership

2007-01-25T20:08:00.000Z

Any current members wanting to suspend membership to upgrade to beta, please let me know.

Of course if I decide to upgrade, then I'll let you all know, as it will involve suspending the whole list.

Anyone who is not a member, particularly opinionated women 'of a certain age' ready to set the world to rights and/or looking for a place to let off steam, well, do leave a comment or email if you'd like to be considered.

My Fine Is.....

2007-01-16T09:28:00.000Z

This meme and its title have been lifted from the irrepressibly warped fuzzbox. OK he can be witty too, of course, but that would have detracted from my attempt to share the name joke with absolutely everybody.

Still don't get it? See me after class. Bring fruit.

Below is a list of *ahem* activities, each awarded a penalty in dollars. You don't have to confess your answers, just the amount of your fine.

Smoked pot -- $10
Did acid -- $5
Ever had sex at church -- $25
Woke up in the morning and did not know the person who was next to you -- $40
Had sex with someone on MySpace -- $25
Had sex for money -- $100
Vandalized something -- $20
Had sex on your parents' bed -- $10
Beat up someone -- $20
Been jumped -- $10
Crossed dressed -- $10
Given money to stripper -- $25
Been in love with a stripper -- $20
Kissed some one who's name you didn't know -- $0.10
Hit on some one of the same sex while at work -- $15
Ever drive drunk -- $20
Ever got drunk at work, or went to work while still drunk -- $50
Used toys while having sex -- $30
Got drunk, passed out and don't remember the night before -- $20
Went skinny dipping -- $5
Had sex in a pool -- $20
Kissed someone of the same sex -- $10
Had sex with someone of the same sex -- $20
Cheated on your significant other -- $10
Masturbated -- $10
Cheated on your significant other with their relative or close friend -- $20
Done oral -- $5
Got oral -- $5
Done / got oral in a car while it was moving -- $25
Stole something -- $10
Had sex with someone in jail -- $25
Made a nasty home video -- $15
Had a threesome -- $50
Had sex in the wild -- $20
Been in the same room while someone was having sex -- $25
Stole something worth over more than a hundred dollars -- $20
Had sex with someone 10 years older -- $20
Had sex with someone under 21 and you are over 27 -- $25
Been in love with two people or more at the same time -- $50
Said you love someone but didn't mean it -- $25
Went streaking -- $5
Went streaking in broad daylight -- $15
Been arrested -- $5
Spent time in jail -- $15
Peed in the pool -- $0.50
Played spin the bottle -- $5
Done something you regret -- $20
Had sex with your best friend -- $20
Had sex with someone you work with at work -- $25
Had anal sex -- $80
Lied to your mate -- $5
Lied to your mate about the sex being good -- $25

My fine is: $305 and change. Not a total pervert then, but not as boring as I thought.

You?

I tag all of you, of course.

Shopping Online

2007-01-03T16:06:00.000Z

The writers on one of my other blogs were discussing doing a group podcast, so I mentioned that I didn’t have a USB microphone headset. Since I don’t have a Radio Shack in my town, the webmaster suggested I order one online. OK. This was Friday evening. I went to the Radio Shack site and placed my order, paying extra for two-day delivery. I figured it would be shipped Saturday, which means I would received my headset on Monday.

Ooops. Monday was New year’s Day. No mail service. So I’ll get it on Tuesday. Paying for two-day shipping and getting it in three days is actually normal procedure with most orders.

But then I hear that Tuesday was a federal day of mourning for President Ford. No mail service. So I’ll get my headset on Wednesday. I’ll look for it. Four days for two-day shipping.

Then last night (Tuesday night) about 11PM, I received a notice that my headset had been shipped! What?? So I went to the website and read the fine print on the shipping policy. Radio Shack’s online store is only open 8AM to 5PM Monday through Friday! They didn’t even know I’d placed an order til Tuesday! Yeah, they all go home at 5PM, but somehow I didn’t get an email notification til 11PM. Sometimes I think businesses do that just so I can’t call and complain.

So as it stands now, the earliest I will receive my order will be Thursday. Six days for two-day shipping. Somehow, that extra ten bucks seems like a lot of money to pay to get a $15 item. If I had known, I’d have just jumped in the car on Saturday and drove an hour or so to find a Radio Shack thats OPEN on Saturday.

You know what? I wouldn’t be surprised if it doesn’t arrive til Friday. Or Saturday. Not surprised, but not happy, either.

I’m an idiot.

The Bitch is Back. Again.

2006-12-30T03:55:00.000Z

My Husband's Peculiar Aristocratic Title is:
His Highness Mr Z the Sonorous of Goosnargh on the Carpet
Get your Peculiar Aristocratic Title

I assume "Goosnargh" is Middle English for "stinky, wet, dog towels."

Naked old ladies?

2006-12-25T11:11:00.000Z

Okay, not to detract from Miss C's GOB Christmas card, dear Lord if you haven't seen it you absolutely must, it's a hoot in a half, just what I needed this Christmas for sure, (thank you C!) I especially liked it when she was screaming like a banshee while licking and making ready her Christmas cards...heh heh, her upper lip sort of vibrates...squeeeeeeeee!

but, I've been a little under the weather and haven't been able to get out so when I've not been whining, or participating in a drug induced sleep I've been on this machine even more so than usual and I happened to go into our STATS meter thingy here, and OH DEAR LORD, you will NOT believe one of the searches that led some unsuspecting weirdo, cuckoo, cornflake, perverto to our site.

Are you ready for this?

Google search words: NAKED OLD LADIES. (The bastard.)

Are we up to it girls? Will we be taking our clothes off as part of our New Years post? A little full Monty for all the cuckoo clocks out there?

I know it's been done but we could do a naked calendar for charity.

Okay, maybe not. heh.

GOB Christmas Card

2006-12-25T04:02:00.000Z

(click on image)

Naked and confused, what else is new?

2006-12-24T13:51:00.000Z

This is one grumpy old bitch who owes her family an apology, maybe?

There I’ve said it, no need to fear it anymore, right?

Ya see? I have this prevailing feeling of doom right about now, and I’m not sure what to make of it, so I figure I’ll just type my way through it.
Some things are scaring me, I woke with a start, fevered, sweating on the couch and I thought that the day was already new, and it was time to take my medicine. But it’s not, it’s 12:53 am, and I have this general, invasive, overwhelming feeling of doom.

I have the urge to urinate, but I just did, and it didn’t prove very fruitful, oh I went, but feel like I need to go more, I fear it but want it too. Fear the pain of it, the feeling of nausea and infected radiation that is caused when the poison in one’s system is not being flushed thou rally, properly, and it leaves the body pulsating with pain and longing all the way into the palms of the hands and other extremities too. The bodies reverberated longing to rid itself of poison. (Too many antibiotics killing off the good germs too I‘m thinking.)

I tell myself it just takes time. Time for the medicine to kick in, time for the massive amounts of water that I have been drinking to be absorbed and start doing their job of flushing. Time for my body to heal. And yet I fear the time, because with every moment that passes I think that something even more fluky may be happening inside of my body, and nothing can be done, until after Christmas to stop it.

That’s it, I don’t trust my body anymore. Today is the day before Christmas and I don’t trust my body to take care of it’s functioning anymore.

And today I couldn’t run hiding anywhere to get away from them, them, who I ruined Christmas for. Still a runner. “She’s a runner Logan, kill her.” (Aka had Mouse this year for the 23rd and the 24th so our Christmas was happening on the 23rd.)

They all look to me, the matriarch, to make Christmas happen, I think, anyway.

Them, they, my family. Yeah, them, I made them uncomfortable because I am sick, scared and not making Christmas.

Yeah, there’s them. I‘m ashamed because I couldn’t pretend that I felt fine, I’d let it go too far for that, I couldn’t put on a mature happy face and sing tra la f-ing la, all is right with the world, and I‘ll just reverberate in pain and silence so as not to make you feel uncomfortable on this special day.

I tried, I couldn’t. I couldn’t seem to remove myself from being the one who makes everyone’s Christmas, Christmas, either.

But why the hell not? Why couldn’t I be sick at Christmas? Am I that irreplaceable? (That’s me, always the drama queen.) Or at least if it ever happens again, could you guys please ignore me and let me snivel in peace, like a sick dog wrapped up in a blanket over by the fire where it’s warm? Free to lick, snap and whine at myself.

Specifically I think it was the questions that got me, though who can be sure?

Why couldn’t you let me cry here without asking me questions?

Questions that I couldn’t answer, like,

“Are we going to eat dinner or what, and if so, when are you going to cook it?” (Um, hey, remember me? I had the oral surgery with you last week, and yeah, you feel better, you’re twenty four, I’m a hundred and I’m still pretty messed up from all of that, and hungry? Honey I’m hungrier than a shit house rat right about now, feel free to make yourself and ME a bowl of soup, I would be most grateful and appreciative…) But instead of saying that I felt guilty and I cried, and you felt guilty and you told yourself that I suck, and I probably do, but not all of the time, and neither do you.

And I understand, you see I would have loved to make dinner for you today, and to make things special for you, but today I just couldn’t.

Today I was hurting and sick and I couldn’t hide it today. And today you wanted to make a special day for your little one and you needed me to help you do that. I’m sorry, and I know you are too, because I know you to your core.

And,

“Where are your keys to your truck mom?” (I mean really, did you look at me? I’d have been hard pressed to find my ass with both hands right then, and you were asking me to find the keys to my truck? Hell, I couldn’t even remember the last time I drove my truck, oh wait it was yesterday when I drove myself eighty miles to get my damned tooth packed so I could stop crying long enough to, I don’t know, maybe take a breath of air without excruciating pain. I am such a martyr sometimes and I really hate that!) So again, instead of saying, “Please don’t expect me to get up and find anything for you right now, even if it is mine, even if I am the one who last had it, even if period. I can’t handle finding anything right now.” Yeah, instead I cried and shook and embarrassed myself with my poor behavior, I do that when I’m sick.

And,

“Where’s the receipt to this thing a ma jiggy that you got me that I don’t really want and intend to return?”(See above…) But, instead of saying the above, I scrounged around finding my billfold, then scrounged around inside it looking for the receipt that I have somehow lost, and I cried, again because I couldn’t find the damned thing and now you are going to have to take a store credit instead of cash, boo f-ing hoo. (I also get a little sarcastic when I’m sick.)

Oh and,

“We know you’re sick, will you just lighten up and give us a break already? Stop crying for God’s sake, you’re freaking us out, and making Christmas a royal suck fest.”

When I know in your heart you were thinking, “We don‘t know how to make you feel better momma; we just don‘t know how to make the pain go away for you, so please stop being visibly sick, okay? It hurts us to see you hurt. ” (I tried, really I did, and I know my maturity level right about then was as close to null as it gets, I do that when I’ve been feeling sick for awhile, I revert back to the age of four, and I’m not pleasant to be around. I’m sorry.)

And there’s the question posed, and assurance given from a small child who happened to follow me into the bathroom, that I wouldn’t have missed for the world, except for not letting myself be seen in that way, maybe,

“Nanny, you alright? We will get you medicine little buddy, we will make you better, you’ll see, you’ll be feeling better soon.” All said to me as she rubbed my face while I awkwardly sat on the toilet stool. God/Goddess
bless small children…

And there’s the deep caring and love from one sister to another when Becky called me to see if she needed to come down here and take care of me, I’m guessing her boy had told her he overheard me crying when he was talking to Samps earlier on the phone, and she let me cry to her ad nauseum while she chanted soothing things to reassure me and told me she loved me.

Then there were the things that just happen in any family, sure they do, right?

Like little George opening her mommas one special gift, unbeknownst to everyone, a small pair of diamond earrings, and giving them to the dog.

“What the hell has Moses got mom? It looks sort of sparkly, um in a small box, or what was a small box…?” Whoops, Merry Christmas Anny, I’m sure if you follow that dog around for a couple of days, you know checking his excrement, you just might find that other earring…no need to thank me, merry Christmas hon….

And the Christmas clothes that I ordered for the kids guaranteed to be in on the 21st, still not here, so the meager amount of shopping that my money could afford, and that I actually felt like doing, looks even more pitiful, for lack of those ding danged clothes to show up.

In honesty though, I did the best that I could.

For real, not all that I would have liked to do, but the best that I could do in the situation given. And my behavior? Sucky at best, but the best that I could muster today, I’m afraid.

They will forgive me, that’s what families do, we forgive each other because we know each other deep down, where it’s important, and we love each other because of what we know, and sometimes despite of what we know, you know?

For gifts this year, I had already told the older two that I was not going into massive credit card debt, and they agreed, neither were they, so this is how it played out.

My older two, each got one item that they needed and couldn’t afford to buy themselves, a good pair of shoes and a warm quilt. One item that was special and they would never have been able to justify buying for themselves, an mp 3 player, and what was a small pair of diamond earrings, heh. A few items of clothing--please let them arrive before new years--and some smelly good stuff, because, like their momma, they too have a smell chemistry thing going on.

Little Samps, he’s getting one of those ridiculously over priced 360 x box machines, because all he asked for was an old x box machine so he and his brother could trade games, and of course you
CAN’T find one of THEM to be bought. I thought about getting him a Ps, something or other, it was only 130 dollars, but then we’d have to buy all new games, gads!

He did mention that he would love to have world of war craft if Santa couldn’t find an old x box, so aka got him that. I think Samps will probably pass out completely from the sheer surprise of all of that gaming fun, and I’ll just make that credit card payment and not worry about it, I’m thinking of it as an investment in his hand and eye coordination, and damn it it’s Christmas…

(I had put aside some money for Christmas this year from my career ladder moneys that I get at the end of the summer for the extra work that I do tutoring and making signs and stuff during the school year, but when dad got sick most of that was spent going back and forth to take care of him. I don’t begrudge that one bit and I am thankful that I had it to fall back on for sure, but it sort of set me short for Christmas, you know? Sure you know, all of us feel the financial pinch around this time of year. Sure we do, and we do the best we can and we go on from there.)

The little ones, were tickled with their gifts, they always are. A new baby doll for Georgie and an Elafun game, and a John Deer collectable tractor, and an incredible edible for Mousey, that was named something else, but I can’t remember. Oh, and some clothes too, not here yet, ding danged old Navy, you suck balls at Christmas time for telling me they would be here guaranteed…

So really despite my feeling like a heap of dung that has been ever so slightly set a fire in order that I might not offend anyone with my odious aroma, after writing this diatribe on being sick at Christmas, I feel relieved, the feeling of doom has lifted and I just went to the bathroom and oh my God/Goddess I was able to go without pulsating and withering, and yes Virginia, there really is a Santa Clause….

Why did I write this incredibly unattractive post? I’m not sure really, maybe I just felt like I should stand here naked in front of everyone in all of my shame so that I could be really thankful for all that I have, because despite how things may seem sometimes I really do have so much to be thankful for.

Maybe I wanted some sympathy? Probably, but most likely not too much because I feel so much better now.

And maybe, just maybe I wondered if you have ever felt this way yourself, you know, felt like if you don’t do it, it wont get done, and sometimes I want to run from the responsibility of making everything better for the people who I love, and just wallow in my own dysfunction.

You too?

I don’t know. I’m not even sure that this makes sense.

So now I just have to apologize to my family for being a grumpy old sick bitch yesterday and move forward towards the light, it IS a new day, almost now.

Office Scrooges

2006-12-22T14:48:00.000Z

Think your boss is cheap? Slate Magazine asked its readers to submit reports of horrible office Christmas parties, gifts, and bonuses. Of nearly 200 tales, they’ve chosen The Corporate Scrooge Contest Results. From the story:

A former employee of the firm that produces the Great Dickens Christmas Fair in San Francisco reports that the company departed from its tradition of giving modest cash bonuses and instead gave out white painters' caps with the words "Bah Humbug" stenciled in red.

Sometimes, unemployment doesn't seem all that bad. But I’ve had my share of weird and grinchy Christmas office fiascos in years past. Most radio stations for whom I have worked didn’t give out any bonuses or gifts, and very few had a Christmas party, besides the standard potluck the disc jockeys put together while we worked on Christmas Day. Often, listeners would send homemade goodies, but we had to be careful who to trust since listeners who were that fanatic were usually pretty strange people.

One year, we got a gift from the boss- a small box of chocolate covered almonds. Nice, but the expiration date had passed. Those were gifts originally purchased to give to advertising clients, but they couldn’t give away expired candy now, could they? At least not to anyone they cared about.

Then there was that one terrible year. Management came up with this wonderful plan that most disc jockeys could take Thanksgiving, Christmas Day, or New Year’s day off. The three summer holidays were included, too. The catch was that one of us would have to volunteer to work all day alone on one holiday per year. See, this way, the company wouldn’t have to expend any extra funds to cover our days off. This seemed like a workable plan until Christmas Eve, when they fired an announcer. Who happened to be the deejay who had volunteered to work Christmas Day. Rethinking the plan, management decided all four radio stations in our company could run on automation, with a manager on call for emergencies. Said manager wouldn’t know what to do if something went wrong, but he’d be responsible for monitoring and calling some disc jockey if there was a problem. Oh goody.

However, we didn’t have any Christmas music recorded to computer for an automated program. We’d been playing all our Christmas songs manually off CD for a month. Looks like someone would have to record enough to cover all stations in a hurry. And that person happened to be the one who was on duty alone the afternoon of Christmas Eve.... me. So I worked a couple hours past my normal quitting time on Christmas Eve desperately recording all kinds of Christmas music for an oldies station, a pop station, and a country station, plus running live shows simultaneously on two of those stations.

In the middle of all this frenzy, the station owner calls me to complain that the live shows were not up to snuff. He said if I couldn’t do the job, he’d find someone who could. I said great, I could use the help.

Maybe he’s found someone like that by now, but I doubt it.

Merry Christmas!

PS, what’s the worst Christmas party, gift, or bonus you ever received from your job? I’d like to hear your stories!

PPS for something way more heartwarming, watch Its A Wonderful Life today at my site.

Cooking Fats

2006-12-19T18:03:00.000Z

Okay, okay so I'm not really here. I am off dealing with things in the real world, resting up, clearing the decks (deck, singular; its a bungalow).

Except.

Except for two weeks of cooking fats. If they werent cooking they were creating, loudly, to establish when it might be their turn. Over the last few days our adopted trollope 'fat' and her shyly chosen beau have been regularly 'cooking' at all times of the day and night, on the front room carpet.

Across homework, school shoes and the hoover cable.
In front of the childrens' television.
In front of the stunned guinea pigs.
In front of my ten and twelve year olds who insisted on finding the camera to produce proof, thus:

Yes I've heard the rumours about the feline penis; all that stuff about backward spikes or the like. I must admit neither I nor my giggling children saw any on this particular male's conical accoutrements when he decided to stick one leg in the air and give them a quick spruce mid-courtship.

The problem is that all the toms around here seem to have impeccable manners, so that our young hussy is rolling and roiling like some hypnotised starlet until her beau gets down to business, then promptly changing her mind like a librarian with PMT and a large knife.

After every good start there is about thirty seconds of hope and heaving enthusiasm before she decides it hurts too much, twists from his grasp and takes chunks out of his face. Said tom will promptly back off, and stare at her admiringly and patiently as if she were some goddess, waiting for the next chance to be allowed to bite the back of her neck. Poor, pitiful boys, they are. After 14 days then, she is still not pregnant, ergo her body is still giving off the 'come-hither' like some sort of radar signal and the peace is still not restored.

There are, it seems, only so many days that a sensible tom can take this abuse whilst camping out without food or water, so the two best offers have departed, at last. I have no idea whether they limped home to nurse wounded pride and equally wounded flesh, or whether they have simply gone up the road to the latest siren call. I suppose that somewhere, some tom is a serial shagger who only turns up at his real home for food, before barrelling back out of the door.

Mercifully, for the moment, there is only one offer left, one that she has already steadfastly avoided by balancing precariously on the top of the compost bin for hours at an end (or anything small enough to stop him getting on a level). It seems he is very local and pops back home over the fence for his tea and then, like Monty Python's Spanish Inquisition, tries (again and again) for the element of surprise. At one point I saw him sunning himself atop the guinea pig cages, with her, wild eyed and worried, backed in under the wheelbarrow, in the wet grass.

He has a lovely singing voice and almost speaks. He reminds me of Leeloo in The Fifth Element, that moment when she first falls from the sky into Korben's taxi and learns to say "Pah-lee-azz", all teary eyed and desperate. Piercing, that's the word.

Its amazing, but somehow what's adorable at 3 in the afternoon takes on a whole different mood at 3 am.

At least he hasn't made it indoors yet, unlike the other two. At least he hasn't got to third base and suffered the physical and mental scars involved in our Milly's displeasure.

At least we don't face the twice nightly sound of cats screaming and everything being knocked off the table or window ledge.

He's just sitting there, singing.
And singing.

And..... and if anyone knows how to board up a cat flap in an external upvc door?

Anyone? *whimper*

Help, I've Lost My Inner GOB!

2006-12-17T13:56:00.000Z

I've noticed that while it's still possible to become grumpy and bitchy, it's getting more and more difficult to maintain this state. For me, that is. I'm thinking of starting a spin-off blog and calling it "Bland Resignation." I mean, what fun is a woman who can't maintain a state of agitation for longer than fifteen seconds?

I've tried everything. Jet lag has had no negative effect on my mood. Abstaining from caffeine long enough to acquire a blinding headache failed to bring on the usual piss and vinegar. Even quitting ciggies didn't help me to snap out of this dreadfully sweet, generally accepting, cream-puffy state, so I started smoking again. My period is due in a week -- I should be shooting first and asking questions later.

Even yesterday, when Mr Z had is panties all in a twist over his ex, because she'd essentially treated him like a doormat again (and he allowed it again), and he tried to take it out on me by whining and sniping and being generally disagreeable, I was unreactive -- completely unphased. He had spoken to me in a way that used to be good for at least a three-day bitchy resentment bender, and all I could cough up for him was a simple: Hey, let's remember I'm not the enemy here. Change your tone if you need to speak to me, or kindly shut up. And then I continued loading the dishwasher, feeling happy as a clam, as if I had found my true life's purpose.

What the fuck is that?

Could it be hormonal? I can't possible be lacking in testosterone, as that nasty little whisker that sprouts from a slightly protruding mole on my otherwise divinely perfect chin, has grown back five days after I last plucked it. Could some other hormone be involved?

Will my bitch ever come back?

What the hell is the matter with me?

Riffin on Rosie

2006-12-17T12:35:00.000Z

Have you noticed that the people who have the biggest problem with “political correctness” are white? PC was coined as a derogatory term on par with “thought police” and “language nazis”. Its terrible when you have to stop and think before you speak! Its so awful that the right to make fun of everyone else is being infringed upon! Oh my goodness, do you really expect me to become aware of how the other three-quarters of the world feels?

Newsflash: If "PC" is the worst thing anyone has ever called you, you are white. By now, I’m sure you have seen clips of Rosie O’Donnell imitating a Chinese newscast on the TV show The View.

When you are the only Asian kid in the third grade, you’ve heard this quite a bit already, along with the stretched eye thing, and the joke begins to sound like this.

OK, you can link through the YouTube logo on the lower right and see the comments attached to this (and the other) videos. Its really easy pick out the ones that were left by white people.

“What she said wasn’t racist at all”

“clearly no malice intended”

“In China, that is how they talk.”

“if u cant take a joke then don't.”

“People need to stop being so sensitive over EVERYTHING.”

These reactions were found all over the Blogosphere, too. Here’s a summary of them. Mostly they come down to “Hey, if her intentions are good, its OK.” Which means that the effect these words have on their target is completely discounted, unimportant, ignored. Which is how those words make people feel. Real people. People who for so long have been afraid to say anything about it. Little children.

Rosie’s apology was "I'm sorry for those people who felt hurt," which is an expression of sympathy, not an apology. Thats something I could say, because, yes, I am sorry for those people who got hurt. And all the children who ever got hurt by being singled out on the playground because of their race, or religion, or family status, or disability, or gender orientation.

Ha! There are two Asian women in the audience, and they thought it was funny! I guess that means its OK! Even though they went out of their way to get tickets to The View weeks ago, they must represent all Asians! And all minorities! And all people who care about Asians and other minorities!

It all comes down to putting yourself in another person’s place. Walk a mile in their moccasins. Thats the main reason I am looking for a job in an urban area, so my kids can learn how to deal with racism from people who have really been there, because what I know of it is a pale imitation. Meanwhile, I’m learning how difficult it really is to put myself in someone else’s shoes. But I’m trying.

potatoes and string

2006-12-11T23:31:00.000Z

Can we talk about Post Offices? They're a Grumpy Old Bitch topic, aren't they? As we cluster around the slightly odd smelling counter at the back of the dimly lit shop, next to the bag of potatoes and the string, waiting in the queue to collect our old age pension we should be able to get a discussion going about this.

Personally, I think we should shut them all.

Who are these rural people, these elderly people, these people without cars in marginal communities who think they are REAL members of society?

Who the hell do they think they are?

They're not important.

What's important is money.

Is youth.

Is whether you'll vote for someone in a smart suit.

Is power.

What's important is towns.

Rural communities are irrelevant. Not enough population to be worth courting for votes. People earning below the National Average Wage are insignificiant. They contribute to society hardly at all. Why the hell should they expect their life to be subsidised if they can't afford a car, or a courier for their parcels?

So what if they live miles away from a town with a bank to withdraw their money? Fuck 'em, that's what I say! Their voice isn't even worth listening to.

What we need is more centralisation. We need to preserve the countryside and villages in aspic. It's no co-incidence that local people can't afford houses in villages - if they weren't lazy SOBs, they'd get off their arses and get real, high paying jobs. In the meantime, we can herd them in to council estates on the edges of rural towns and they'll just have to make the best of it.

Those pretty village houses should be lived in by REAL people. People with 4x4s and REAL jobs, in advertising, the media and politics. They don't need services in the villages - they'll shop at Sainsbury's and Tesco's on the way home from work or on a Friday before they leave their little Pied a Terre in town on the way down to the cottage.

Post Offices, rural shops and services. Waste of space.

Close them down. All of them.

(Blogger finally let me finish this long windy passage.) Picken' Rocks, Wild Woman, Witches and Other Folk Lore In My Head

2006-12-10T17:46:00.001Z

My dad, he gave me a broken Nordic Track over thanksgiving break, if that's even what it's called, it's most likely a knock off of some kind, a left over from one of his wives, she took it with her when she left my dad, along with everything else that wasn't tied down or attached to his house in some way, then when she broke it, she brought it back and left it in his basement. An old broken treadmill, just what every basement needs.

(My man, he spent about two weeks tinkering with the broken treadmill, it works right as rain now, my dad had a hunch that the man could get it to workin', and he's not of a mind to throw things away that can be fixed, or to keep things he has no mind to use. He's taught me so much in this life, even with few words.)

Now I'm not sayin' she was a bad person, just that she needed things, and my dad, not so much, no. Everything THING that my dad has, apart from his house, truck and classic car, a thirty year old Riviera that he just can't seem to let go of, could be stored in a fifteen by eight foot storage facility.

For real, he has a bed and dresser, he has a kitchen table and chairs, he has a sofa, small chair and TV--that takes like twenty minutes to warm up since he blew out the Instamatic setting on it fifteen years ago, but, well, he's a patient man--he has a coffee table and two end tables, he has a beautiful old library table, he bought a spare bed for me and mine, for when we come to visit. He has a collection of light houses, six in all, and three mirrors on his walls. He has a few towels, pans, washer and dryer, radio, and his clothes.

He had an expensive sweeper--dad's kind of a freak about cleanliness--but crazy lady took that with her while he was laid up in the hospital.

Not many people can list all of their worldly possessions in two paragraphs, my dad can. He's never been into things. He likes his home sparsely furnished and clean. He likes his life clean, uncomplicated by things, and sometimes people too.

Why am I listing all of his shit? I'll tell ya, lately, since he's been sick, every time I go to visit him he tries to give me some of his things, and it's really beginning to wear on me, because I know, that he knows that he doesn't HAVE much longer.

Oh hell, okay, so nobody really knows how long they have, but it's almost like he's trying to prepare me, trying to force me to face it, accept it, and be alright with it. He's trying to wake up in me the wild woman who snuffles and smells the air, who knows and accepts that we are born, we live and we die. (WTH? I published this thing twice and it's not finished...)

But I don't want to face it, think about it, see it, or smell it even. I turn off my inner voice; I refuse to hear/see. I play in my land of make believe where my dad is always strong, always good, and always there for me if I need him, not that I would actually call him if I needed him, but I could, you know? Yes, I could.

And so, what if, what if every time I go to see him he stopped giving me things? He stopped giving me broken treadmills and little boxes of trinkets that he purchased via readers digest, wrapped in old news paper, clutter he never really wanted but bought for some woman who happened to leave it behind? What if, would he be lasting longer then?

Please stop dad, please stop giving me things, I can't face what it eventually means. Please. He was, is, my safety net. He was, is my connection to what is good and right in this world. He is my half of the world that wasn't messed up. I am not willing to let that go.

I can't.

That easy smile, that uncomplicated, gentle nature, that unspoken comfort and knowing that exists there, between us, we who have very little words to communicate to each other, but me, who knows he was sent here to this place to see to it that I came out alright. To see to me.

My safety net, my refuge, my human who taught me to cope. Not directly mind you, that would have required words, but by his actions, by his presence, by his wisdom and few words.

Snooks, maybe you just need to pick a few rocks, turn it over in your mind, I could tell you what to do, but it wouldn't be the same. You're strong, you're a good soul, go pick some rocks and make it better. I know you can.

Something happened to me when I would begin to bend to pick those rocks, I would smell the earth, smell the air, pick a rock, toss it in the bucket and begin to hear the right voice in my own head. Faintly at first but , with every muscle that moved, the voice within me grew stronger, until I could hear what was right, and would know what I needed to do.

I can't lose that connection, even now, but in listening to that voice I know, I must face what I know to be true.

There is a wild woman in all of us, she lives and breathes depending on how we feed her. She is NOT always nice, she is NOT always compliant, she is NOT always awake, but she is there when we need her, and even there when we refuse to hear her, waiting until we feed her, until we listen to her, or let her speak, until we realize that she is the only one who can save us,

and he gave me that.

He gently saw to it that I knew she was there, and now he is forcing me to call on her to see what I must accept.

And I am fighting her.

We all fight her, we push her down and away when she tells us that we are in danger of losing someone, or being hurt, or both. We tell ourselves that that feeling we have is irrational, and sometimes it is if your cyclothymic like me, but sometimes it's the wild woman telling us to trust our instincts, trust what is innate, trust what we know in our soul to be true.

I'm still looking for that balance, that balance that allows me to nurture her and accept the things I cannot change, to accept this life as it is, the dark and the light, just as the mother wolf instinctively accepts what is, and goes on in this life, and to change the things I can.

I'm grappling, I'm fighting because I know that to deny her is to deny myself, to lose her would be to lose what he gave me; myself, completely and yet to keep her I must face losing him.

So, as usual, I am a fruit loop, without the milk today, yet soggy from the tears that pour from my psyche.

This forum is a place called grumpy old bitches, and I fit that description when I allow my inner voice to be heard; and when I listen to my inner voice. You see when I really listen to that voice I hear about a lot of things in this life that call to be changed, and I hear things that call for resigned acceptance.

It is in separating the two that we as human creatures shine and change the things that need to be changing, and accept that things that we must.

Do I believe that grumpy old bitches is a negative connotation? Oh hell no. See if there's one thing I've learned, that I often forget though, is that we all need to head that voice within us, it is the gnarling, flesh eating, raw, instinctual catalyst that brings about great change, and forces us to accept what cannot be changed and IT knows the difference.

I fight to embrace the wild woman; witch; grumpy old bitch within me, and I live to smell another day, even though I know I must let him go, or I bury her entirely, risk losing myself and what he gave me.

My kid is in preschool. Couple of weeks ago, we got a red envelope with a birthday party invitation from one of her classmates. It has caused me a ridiculous amount of angst and worry. Ridiculous.

My first thought was that the (clearly insane) parents had obviously invited all 19 kids to the party. We have never had a play date with the kid; she's almost a year older than HM and they do not seem to play together more than any other kids when I see them after school. It simply did not occur to me that this child-- a perfectly OK kid with genuinely lovely parents-- would have chosen my child specially.

This is not to say that I do not think my child is likable. In fact, I think she is fabulous and wonderful company and by far the only kid I want to spend any extended time with. I know she is lovely, for sure. Still, it would never occur to me that she would be invited to a party unless it was a particularly close friend or the whole class was invited.

On the day we got the invite, I was ridiculously unsure about what to do. A good friend came over to pick up her child (X)-- who is in the same class-- and I wondered if I should mention it. I did, sort of obliquely, and I was so relieved that her kid was invited too. I was so glad I didn't have to make it a secret between the girls, which would have been ghastly. Of course, I only mentioned it because I assumed that the whole class was invited. X's mom was not at all sure that everyone was invited. At that point, it hadn't even occurred to me that they might not have invited everyone.

Am I thinking about this too much yet? Can you imagine what a mess I was in jr high? Feel free to begin mocking me now. As if you haven't already.

A few days later I was shopping with X's mom and another mom (B) while the kids were at school. In order to entirely avoid mentioning the kid's name, in case B's kid wasn't invited, I found myself saying things like:
"oh, I need to buy a present for, um, a princess party this weekend. This would be perfect!"

I expected B to chime in that they were going, too, but she didn't. I was puzzled. Her kid seems much more likely to be popular than my kid does. Or is it that B seems more likely to be popular than I do?

Am I going to worry like this the whole time my kid is in school? I think DH would smother me with a pillow if he knew I was thinking things like this, and really, who could blame him?

Then Friday evening, another mom called to see if we could get our kids together Saturday. I said we could, in the morning, because we had a birthday party to go to in the afternoon. Again, no snap of recognition from the other parent. Again, I was surprised. And glad I was remembering not to mention names.

I feel completely awkward and uncomfortable in these situations. I feel embarrassingly pleased that my kid got picked, but also I feel very self-conscious about it.

To say that I feel like a freak for even thinking about it this much is a bit of an understatement, but here I am, sort of wondering if it means anything that my kid got invited when someone else's kid didn't. It turned out to be a small party (I told you she had sensible parents) and HM and X were in fact the only kids from the class invited.

I can't imagine that other parents give a damn if their kids are invited, and here I am thinking about it all the time, being half proud that my kid was chosen and sort of feeling like it means something, which it does not. It's just that it would have meant a lot to me as a kid, once I was old enough to understand that not everyone gets invited. Which my kid is not. Old enough, I mean.

I need to get over this. I can't relive my childhood angst about being chosen-- or not-- every time one of my kid's classmates has a birthday. Right?

And don't get me started on what I was like when HM and I were discussing who would be invited to her party. I was a wreck over that, too.

I am pathetic, aren't I? You can tell me the truth.

Uphill both ways!

2006-12-08T15:13:00.000Z

I am turning into my father. I now understand his impatience with clueless spoiled kids.

My two daughters were snuggled under the covers this morning on the sofabed watching a DVD of cartoons. The same cartoons I watched when I was a kid. One kid starts to complain that she didn’t want to watch this cartoon, and her remote control doesn’t work. Mind you, this was only her remote control. Her sister, less than three feet away, had another just like it.

“You know, when I was a kid, we didn’t have DVDs, or VCRs even.”

You didn’t watch any cartoons? they asked.

“Yes, we did, we watched these same cartoons. Those are about 70 years old. But we watched them on broadcast TV. We couldn’t pick which one we watched. The TV station played them, and we watched.”

So you didn’t have a remote control? You couldn’t switch them?

“No, we didn’t have any remote control! We got up and walked to the TV set* and changed the channel! We only had two channels, so you had a choice of whatever one was showing, or the other. When the weather was good.”

You couldn’t pick out which cartoon you wanted?

“Duh, haven’t you been listening to me? No. And you could only watch cartoons right after school. Or on Saturday morning. Thats all.”

Wow! Did they have fireplaces back then?

I had to laugh. “I’m not that old! But no, my family didn’t have one. We just had to freeze to death.”

Was I like that when I was a kid? Did I take our two TV channels and phonograph for granted? I would ask my mother, but I know what she’d say....

“Oh I don’t remember, that was so long ago!”

Thanks, Mom.

*Uphill both ways.

Prayer

2006-12-07T19:53:00.000Z

Dear God

I need a job. No not any job, something dignified and easy and purpose built, thats going to land in my lap and involve just being me, and lots of cash.
I need it so that I can buy half the beauty treatments that city women of my age shell out for - less than a tenth of whats been done to Madonna and the like over the years, I would guess. I don't even want a personal trainer, honestly.
Just a little bit of underpinning.
A little shoring up.
A teensy refurb.
A miracle or two, especially around the eyes.
See, I need these things because its winter and I've gone pale and the lines and shadows are more pronounced and I'm getting older and it shows. I need them because I look in the mirror and I see Dali's clocks. It feels like its too late. It feels like I blew it good and proper when I wasnt even looking. Probably when I was separating warring kids, or clearing up cat vomit, or somesuch.

Please don't make me look at my time so far and judge which bits were a waste.

Dear God,
I just need a temporary life. Just enough of one to pay for what it takes to fool myself that I've still got plenty of time to go find a real one.

Oh Shit.

Redneck Advent Calendar

2006-12-07T15:38:00.000Z

Lizard had some problems finding an advent calendar for her child. No such problems for rednecks like me!

One Pair of Scissors, Two Sets of Keys, and a Uterus Transplant Please

2006-12-07T13:39:00.000Z

I did not lose the car keys; however, they do seem to have disappeared, and they seem to have disappeared some time while I was responsible for them. On Friday, after leaving Mr Z at the airport, I got into the driver's seat, and sometime between the moment I got into the driver's seat and the time he returned on Sunday, the keys, his set of keys, the set of keys that includes the key that unlocks his office door, just vanished.

I don't lose things. There's a very good reason why I don't lose things, too. I don't lose things because not losing things allows me to assume an air of superiority when Mr Z loses something. He loses things on a daily basis. I never lose things. Ever.

Mr. Z has learned, over the years, that nothing gets my eyeballs rolling and my ears smoking like the phrase, "Have you seen my __________?" Perhaps if he were organized, and only lost an item occasionally, I wouldn't get so steamed; but, it's a daily occurrence.

Yesterday he lost the scissors. Mr Z was wrapping a Christmas gift on the kitchen counter (it was not a gift for me). The scissors were on the counter, inches from his right hand, in plain view, and he says, "Oh, I need scissors. Have you seen the scissors?" I handed him the scissors. Our eyes met. I gave him The Look. I said, "Are you ready for the tape, because the tape's just as difficult to find, and I really should be starting dinner soon."

This morning, while I was trying to avoid getting out of bed (not because I'm depressed, but because if I stay in bed I won't be tempted to nip out back for a cigarette, so staying in bed has become a big part of my smoking cessation plan. Really, I'm not depressed), Mr Z came in, clearly exasperated, because he couldn't find the second set of car keys and he was already five minutes late for taking Beanpole to school.

He was using a tone. The tone seemed to imply that if I hadn't "lost" the first set of keys (I did not lose them; they disappeared. How can he not know the difference?), he would not have lost the second set of keys. The truth is, he had already lost the second set of keys, back when the second set of keys was the first set. I found the first set one day while doing laundry. I pocketed the new second set without telling him, thinking it would make him more careful with what he should have believed to be the only set of keys. I was warm, and dozy, and naked under the comforter, and he was using a tone that implied that since I caused this sudden outbreak of losing keys, I should get my lazy ass out of bed and help him search.

I said, "Either lose the tone, or I'm not getting up."

While he was in his closet looking through the pockets of yesterday's trousers (why don't men wear their pants more than once before laundering them? He's not digging ditches or cleaning sewers; he's sitting behind a desk, so why can't he wear his trousers two or three times before laundering them? Isn't that why underwear was invented?), I lept out of bed and grabbed the Top Secret Third Key. It's a valet key that only operates the ignition and the door lock. It's useless for the trunk. If the valet wants to steal something from the trunk, he pretty much has to drive off with the entire car. Anyway, naked and glaring, I held out the valet key and told him, "If you lose this, I will kill you."

The former Mrs Mr Z had the same problem with Mr Z losing things. She claims that the uterus is actually a homing device, capable of finding all manner of lost objects. While I did not lose the keys, I can't seem to find them, either set, which leads me to believe I need a uterus transplant.

What I did this evening (or, why I am grumpy today)

2006-12-07T06:18:00.000Z

Back story: yesterday, I went to get my 4 year old (hereafter known as HM) from her friend's house. The friend had a package that had arrived, probably for her very recent birthday. Her mother was, sensibly, trying to keep her from opening it while we were there.

The girls discovered it and wanted to open it (of course) and we moms (idiots, both) said OK. It contained not a birthday present, but an advent calendar. You know, the kind with 24 little doors and a chocolate treat behind each one. They opened four doors, each of us ate a piece of (extremely waxy) chocolate. All was OK.

HM said she wanted a calendar, just like her friend. We were headed to a store that usually has them, so I said we'd look. Of course, it being December 5, they were out already. HM was sad, and asked if we could find her one somewhere else. I told her I'd look the next day.

This evening:

I get home from work just before 7 pm. First thing she asks me is "did you find one for me, just like X's?" No, I say, I looked (um... I forgot.. but she doesn't need to know that) but I couldn't find one. She is heartbroken. Really and truly heartbroken. Not her usual 4-year-old-drama-queen sort of heartbroken, but achingly sad. Tears slowly leaking from her eyes. Just sad sad sad.

I had some other errands I wanted to run, so I told her that after she went to bed, I'd go on a hunt. She was clearly insanely tired and almost falling asleep at 7, so I thought I'd get her down early (around 8) and would head out to do some no-crowds, all alone, shopping.

She keeps leaking tears. She is quiet and sad and occasionally just sort of leaks a tear or two and asks me to find her a calendar like her friend's. I finally agree to leave before she is asleep, leaving her father to put her to bed.

[insert ominous music here]

I leave at about 8:15. Fill gas tank. Try craft store, no luck. Get to mall. Target is open until 11, other stores close at 9. It is 8:47. Head to Cost Plus. Look everywhere, finally ask actual store employee. No, he says, we sold our last one last night.

Target. They have some strange thing that claims to be an advent garland. I have no idea what that is, but it contains chocolate and has the numbers 1-24 on it, so I decide that I will buy it (for the outrageous sum of $9.99). If need be, I will fit the front with a piece of cardboard, I will cut doors, I will stick on decoratey-things I can cut from magazines and Christmas wrapping paper. She will never see the difference.

Clearly, by this time I am getting delusional.

As I am getting to my car, my cell phone rings. It is DH calling. I think: "he had best be calling to tell me that she is asleep, because she was insanely tired at 8 pm and it is now 9:30."

He is not calling to tell me that. He is calling to tell me that she is still awake, and to see how I am doing on this lunatic quest. HM gets on the phone and asks if I have found anything. Thinking that the looney craft idea just might not work out, I tell her I have not. I tell her she should be asleep. I tell her to go to sleep. She says OK. I tell DH that she should have been asleep an hour ago, at least. He says he tried, but (and I quote) "she is keeping me awake." I hang up and imagine ways to kill DH in his sleep.

I head to a local store called Fred Meyer. They have everything--- sort of like Wal Mart, maybe, but without the slave labor and driving all other local businesses out of town. They do not, however, have any more advent calendars. As I am leaving, I see Walgreens across the street. Walgreens is still open, and they have a lot of Christmas stuff. I head to Walgreens. I walk every aisle of Christmas stuff and I am about to give up when I see, on the top shelf, a box of advent calendars. Right size. Right kind of doors. Picture of Santa. $1.99.

I am in love with Walgreens. I hand them the last $2 in my wallet and head home.

Walk in front door. Put down bags. Pee (which I have needed to do for at least 3 stores). Then I hear HM call to me, asking if I found it.

Holy crap. At this point, it is after 10 pm and she is still awake. I go upstairs to find her (no surprise) in bed with her father. Which is how she can be keeping him awake, as he sees it.

I tell her that I will show her the damned calendar in her room. She runs to her room. I let her open one window. I do not let her eat the chocolate. I tell her to go to sleep. She says she will try.

DH says that he tried everything: reading to her, lying down with her, yelling at her. Nothing worked. I tell him that it isn't all that difficult, and that he had best start to figure out how to get her to go to sleep (a task I can accomplish in less than 10 minutes most every night). He is miffed. I am livid. HM is still awake, asking for a story.

I read her half a story, then tell her I am done and she needs to go to sleep. 10 minutes later, she calls out that she needs to pee. Down to the toilet, then back up. 5 minutes after that I sneeze and she calls out "bless you!" and I think that I just might scream. DH is, of course, fast asleep at this point.

At least the chocolate in the advent garland isn't too waxy. Not too waxy at all.

What You Should Know About Canada

2006-12-04T23:03:00.000Z

This is in honour of Sidhe, (because her local moose have been lurking and are obviously planning something).

Its also rather ancient.

Its also proof that I can sit on an old funny for years, but then so is the state of my marriage.

Anyway:

These questions about Canada were posted on an International Tourism Website. ...............

Q: I have never seen it warm on Canadian TV, so how do the plants grow? (UK)
A: We import all plants fully grown and then just sit around and watch them die.

Q: Will I be able to see Polar Bears in the street? (USA)
A: Depends how much you've been drinking.

Q: I want to walk from Vancouver to Toronto - can I follow the railroad tracks? (Sweden)
A: Sure, it's only Four thousand miles, take lots of water. . .

Q: Is it safe to run around in the bushes in Canada? (Sweden)
A: So its true what they say about Swedes.

Q: It is imperative that I find the names and addresses of places to contact for a stuffed Beaver. (Italy)
A: Let's not touch this one.

Q: Are there any ATMs (cash machines) in Canada? Can you send me a list of them in Toronto, Vancouver, Edmonton and Halifax? (UK)
A: What did your last slave die of?

Q: Can you give me some information about hippo racing in Canada? (USA)
A: A-fri-ca is the big triangle shaped continent south of Europe. Ca-na-da is that big country to your North . . . oh forget it. Sure, the hippo racing is every Tuesday night in Calgary. Come naked.

Q: Which direction is North in Canada? (USA)
A: Face south and then turn 90 degrees. Contact us when you get here and we'll send the rest of the directions.

Q: Can I bring cutlery into Canada? (UK)
A: Why? Just use your fingers like we do.

Q: Can you send me the Vienna Boys' Choir schedule? (USA)
A: Aus-tri-a is that quaint little country bordering Ger-man-y, which is... oh forget it. Sure, the Vienna Boys Choir plays every Tuesday night in Vancouver and in Calgary, straight after the hippo races. Come naked.

Q: Do you have perfume in Canada? (Germany)
A: No, WE don't stink.

Q: I have developed a new product that is the fountain of youth. Can you tell me where I can sell it in Canada? (USA)
A: Anywhere significant numbers of Americans gather.

Q: Can I wear high heels in Canada? (UK)
A: You are an American politician, right?

Q: Can you tell me the regions on British Columbia where the female population is smaller than the male population? (Italy)
A: Yes, gay nightclubs.

Q: Do you celebrate Thanksgiving in Canada? (USA)
A: Only at Thanksgiving.

Q: Are there supermarkets in Toronto and is milk available all year round?(Germany)
A: No, we are a peaceful civilization of Vegan hunter/gatherers. Milk is illegal.

Q: Please send a list of all doctors in Canada who can dispense rattlesnake serum. (USA)
A: All Canadian rattle snakes are perfectly harmless, and can be safely handled and make good pets.

Q: I have a question about a famous animal in Canada, but I forget its name. It's a kind of big horse with horns.(USA)
A: It's called a Moose. They are tall and very violent, eating the brains of anyone walking close to them. You can scare them off by spraying yourself with human urine before you go out walking.

Q: I was in Canada in 1969 on R+R, and I want to contact the girl I dated while I was staying in Surrey, BC. Can you help? (USA)
A: Yes, and you will still have to pay her by the hour.

Q: Will I be able to speak English most places I go? (USA)
A: Yes, but you will have to learn it first.

On the Road to a Happy Hysterectomy

2006-12-03T17:51:00.000Z

You want to know what grinds my gears, chaps my ass, and burns my britches? Watch out, this grumpy old bitch is going to blow.

I had to go and see a psychiatrist and a counselor to stay off work for an extra three weeks while my hormones leveled out (via Hormone Replacement Therapy HRT) after a complete hysterectomy. I was experiencing, panic attacks, hot flashes, night sweats, sleeping problems, lack of libido, mood changes, diarrhea, and memory problems. I would forget words. While conversing, it was like playing charades trying to get the other person to figure out what word I was trying to convey. How frustrating!

No, it wasn't a medical disability, it was considered a mental one. My male gynecologist came to that conclusion. You see, after a hysterectomy, it is common that a women can experience depression. He went on to explain to me how I may wonder why I'm feeling this way when I have nothing to be depressed about. Then he went where he shouldn't have. He wanted to prescribe me antidepressants. He started describing to me how the brain works and what a chemical imbalance is.

I stopped him dead in his tracks. I told him, “I studied Psychology in college. I know what a chemical imbalance is. I don't think removing your ovaries causes a chemical imbalance in your brain.” I asked, “Don't you think it could be a hormonal imbalance instead, that maybe I have been thrust into menopause at an overwhelming and alarming rate of speed?” Honestly, he acted as if he didn't know what I was talking about. He said he didn't specialize in hormones. Wouldn't you think a gynecologist would know a little about the subject? I felt as if had been thrown back into time and Freud was diagnosing me with hysteria.

Besides antidepressants, gynecologists also have prescribed Premarin and Provera. These are synthetic hormones that are a sad substitution at best. Provera is a synthetic progesterone and it is not nearly as safe as natural progesterone. Premarin is derived from pregnant mares urine, hence the name. Ladies, we should be sick of this horse piss!

At my insistence he referred me to an endocrinologist. He prescribed bioidentical hormones, which is truly hormone replacement therapy. Bioidentical hormones have the exact molecular structure of the hormones a woman produces naturally. In other words these hormones are no different from what a woman makes from age 12-51. Bioidentical hormones are more effective at eliminating symptoms of menopause and are likely safer as well. In this day and age it is shocking that doctors would rather prescribe horse hormones instead of the hormones a woman's body is familiar with. Just say no to horse piss. (Imagine hearing a horse whinny here.)

My endocrinologist obtained blood levels to see what my baseline hormone levels were. An individual blend of hormones (estrogen, progesterone, and testosterone) were prescribed and were filled at a compounding pharmacy. It comes in a cream form that I rub onto my inner wrists. (You know, like perfume.) This allows the hormones to be absorbed directly into my bloodstream at a slow rate. This reduces fewer peaks and valleys of hormone levels. Much more normal than pill form which has to absorbed by the stomach and taken directly to the liver.

I noticed subtle changes within 3 days and significant changes at two weeks. It has been three weeks now. My panic attacks are almost nonexistent. My libido has returned, no night sweats, no sleeping problems, and I have much more energy. I have an occasional hot flash, some memory problems, and I'm still moody. But hey, I've always been moody. I mean, come on, I'm a grumpy old bitch.

I will go back to my endocrinologist in two days and we will tweak what ever we need to according to my current blood levels. Not everyone is a candidate for HRT due to current medical problems. I strongly suggest this alternative to be considered by all woman who are experiencing what I have. If you experiencing these problems due to a hysterectomy or even menopause and your gyno is jerking you around, seek an endocrinologist's opinion. I can't even tell you how much I feel like my old self again. It's wonderful!

Just a couple of things

2006-12-03T00:12:00.000Z

Cataclysmic warning=I'm dangerous.

If one more kid so much as utters the words douche and bag in the same sentence in reference to another kid, while within a fifteen foot radius of my head, well, I think I’ll run right out and buy a REAL douche bag, load it all up with vinegar and water, take it to school and just start hosing kids down with it in the hallways.

Douche bags.

If one more kid leaves the airbrush full of paint, the cabinets loaded with paint, the lids off the paint, the paintbrushes in the sink, pencil shavings on the floor, clay unwrapped, water buckets un dumped, well I’m going to bust them down to using nothing but crayons. So there.

Pigs.

If one more kid in my intensive drawing class, looks at me and whines these four words, “Buuuuutttt, I can’t draw.” I’m going to look them square in the eyes and say, “Then why the HELL did YOU take an ADVANCED drawing class?

You read the class description, it said,

Advanced drawing: This class is intended for students who are extremely interested in art and want to FURTHER their drawing SKILLS.”

It did not say, “Take this class if Ms. P is the only teacher on the faculty who can put up with your sorry, no trying, delinquent ass!”

And, it did not say, “Take this class if you can't draw a straight line with a ruler."

(Although at this point I wouldn’t mind kids who at least WANTED to learn to draw, THEY might be willing to put forth some kind of effort!)

Just do the damned drawing, struggle through it, I did, hell nobody can learn to draw for you, and it takes practice to draw proficiently, and there aint no frappin’ amount of whining going to get you to proficient.

Jeeze o peety weety.

And NO I will NOT draw it for you, I FRAPPIN’ KNOW I CAN DRAW!

Lazy butts.

Oh here’s another winner for ya, If one more kid shows me his/her paper and asks the question, “Is this good enough?” I’m going to say, “Well, that depends on what you intend to do with it,

line a bird cage? Maybe.

Look kid, if you have to ask whether it is good enough, chances are, it isn’t, and you know it. Chances are it’s just plain ol’ crap and you’re just trying to see if I’ll let you get by with turning in a piece of plain ol’ of crap.

Am I right, or am I right?”

Just enough to get bys.

And you, drummer boy, yeah you, if you so much as drum another finger, paintbrush, pencil, or any other thing that you can manage to create a rum pa pum pum sound with, I am breaking what ever it is that you are drumming in half, and then I’m going shove it right up your pimply A-hole.

Drummer than dirt.

Thank you grown ups very much for your time,

and you kids....yeah, you're right I am a grumpy old bitch lately.

Merry freakin Christmas.

Words that make me puke

2006-12-02T13:54:00.000Z

Ever heard of health, or 'healthy'?

Me too.

So what the fuck is all this with 'wellness' and 'healthful'?

Eh?

Maybe they are real words in America although God knows why, but here in the UK they are pointless flim-flam. Oh they might convey a meaning, but then so did Slithy Toves after C S Lewis was done with them. I mean to say, I could go for a bit of gimbling myself, when the temperature's right. Who needs a borogrove?

If anyone knows the difference between healthful and healthy, please tell me because I don't get it and now the former makes me shudder every time I hear it. Thats just the way it is.

But it gets worse.

You'd imagine that 'wellness' meant 'health', wouldn't you?

Not exactly so.

At least it does in the general way of things, but not in the specifics. Legally, technically, 'wellness' is not equated to health.

This is why people (say, for arguments' sake, Herbalife reps) can accost you at, ooh, lets see, your daughter's School Christmas fair and pester to be able to give you a 'Wellness Check'.
In other words, people who would be in serious trouble for giving you an unqualified, uninsured health check can legally 'give' you this other thing instead.

They don't even get hauled up for misleading people into buying vitamins, although many must wrongly assume that wellness = health and I imagine that many reps bank on just that.

For 'wellness' I no longer simply cringe at the word, but also at the potential to hear it. In the same way that refusing to look at a cat will have said feline approach you double fast, so I find that blanching to a greeny grey at the sight of a 'wellness' salesperson will have them hone in on you as a sure thing faster than you can say "Oh shit".

It's hell. You know those people you hear about but never see, who supposedly lost the plot in the middle of the local supermarket and went from mild mannered nobody to straightjacket customer? One day;......... one day someone is going to smilingly suggest I purchase the latest health drink - donkey urine and dolphin snot, say, and it wont matter to me one jot that they are off their tree. If they try, however, to tell me it would have a healthful effect on my wellness, I may very well end up rocking in some padded corner for years and years to come. As to their survival rate; I don't pretend to make any guarantees.

just testing

2006-12-01T13:30:00.000Z

yip yap yup doobledy dooblie doo
garumph tinka bumph tinky doo
winkle wonkle flip flop

The New Widget

2006-11-30T10:55:00.000Z

To explain the new widget on the right -

One of our contributors very rightly asked whether there was any way for us all to get email notification of new posts, to save popping in here several times a day!

The FeedBlitz dooda doesn't email you when there are new comments, but it does half the job.

Its there for the contributoes, in other words, although anyone else who can't be bothered with an online feedreader is perfectly welcome to sign up.

Yes, I know its going to fry the visitor numbers here if everyone reads remotely, but Gee I guess I'm just a real nice girl.

No, honestly, I am.

Look, just don't push it, OK?

:-)

UPDATE. Not that impressed. I just got a copy of this post in my inbox, courtesy of said gizmo, 27 hours after the fact. Right.

where the heart is

2006-11-29T16:28:00.000Z

I have a personal rant, if I may?

When we lived in The Town From Which We Have Recently Moved, we had what I would describe as quite a close-knit circle of friends.

Since we have moved to The Village In The Country, they have been conspicuous by their absence.

Don't get me wrong, I know that everyone has busy lives, things to do, places to go, family. But a quick text to ask how we were getting on now and then wouldn't kill, would it? Or an email? Or even a response to my own emails. Or a comment on my blog - I know some of them read it. I'm not expecting them to make the hour-each-way journey to visit.

Just to keep in touch now and again. They are people my OH was AT SCHOOL WITH for goodness sake. He sees them as his best friends. Or he did.

Other people have managed it - people we see pretty irregularly.

I suppose you never know how good friends are until you are both in a situation where reality bites.

But I am REALLY grumpy about this, less on my own behalf than his.

That is all.

Slow Thinker

2006-11-27T08:59:00.000Z

Well we are a success, it seems, having already attracted our first serious antagonist.

'Sir'. You are not responsible for my reflex actions, but I have to share that I find one of your comments particularly repulsive and offensive.

How can you say you have spent time in Afghanistan and then say these things?

Afghanistan, where women are sold as brides like cattle, have no rights, no access to education, no access to medical care (because women may not be touched or looked at by a strange male doctor, nor may women become doctors themselves.)

How can you spend time in a country where some women are under total subjugation, where there is vivid testimony to the work of male domination allowed to run riot, and yet say "The woman made the choice when she opened her legs"?

WHAT?

Think about what you said. If you truly believe it then you also truly believe that we are stronger than the men, that we cannot be coerced, seduced, cornered or forced, neither emotionally nor physically; that we have everything in our physical and mental arsenal from puberty onward to see right through you boys, despise you and ignore you. Thats bullshit, isnt it.

God forbid, what if you had been maimed or killed in Afghanistan? What if someone was just as unsympathetic to your wife - no pension, no help, no funeral with honours, because "The jerk made the choice when he signed up"?

They'd have more right to do that, however abominable it sounds - after all, no-one bigger and stronger came along and drugged you or forcibly opened your legs to shove a conscription up your arse. Now do you begin to see how frustratingly offensive your words are?

I really think, if you have any respect at all or any idea of manners, that it would be best if you didn't comment here for a good while.

Thank you.

Oh and by the way, trying to make this about abortion instead of contraception is just pathetic.

aHERM

2006-11-26T22:55:00.000Z

Is that how you would spell it, if you were really, really feeling obnoxious and you needed all people within a 12,500 miles radius to hear you clearing your throat?

aHERM, then.

Dear Mr Z:

Please note that the last two times (and the only two times) I have attempted to watch television this month, you have had some sort of personal crisis or near nervous breakdown (over the teensy-weensiest of matters), and my viewing pleasure was immediately disrupted.

Please note also, that you're currently sitting in front of the television which is broadcasting some sort of event involving men wearing helmets and very tight pants, and I am not even close to having any sort of personal crisis or near nervous breakdown.

What does that say about you?

What does that say about me?

Pffft; not even close, buddy. Not even close!

Sincere "think-about-its" from your very capable and grumpy wife,

Zilla

Birth Control

2006-11-25T15:02:00.000Z

Dr. Eric Keroack has been appointed by President Bush to head up the Office of Family Planning. Keroack currently is medical director of A Woman's Concern, a Christian nonprofit. The group’s purpose is to discourage pregnant women from having an abortion. Now, some feel abortion is murder, and some feel what a woman does with her own body should not be subject to government intervention. That argument will go on forever. But this group goes way beyond that.

From the San Francisco Chronicle:

The Keroack appointment angered many family planning advocates, who noted that A Woman's Concern supports sexual abstinence until marriage, opposes contraception and does not distribute information promoting birth control at its six pregnancy-service centers in Massachusetts.

"A Woman's Concern is persuaded that the crass commercialization and distribution of birth control is demeaning to women, degrading of human sexuality and adverse to human health and happiness," the group's Web site says.

The mission statement can be found here. The contraceptive policy is the only section in a PDF format.

Birth control demeaning to women? Why? Because it encourages premarital or extramarital sex? Thats just like a man, to think that the purpose of birth control is to enjoy free sex. A woman looks at the purpose of birth control and thinks about her life. Face it, the vast majority of women of childbearing age are married. Maybe we take it for granted today, but when birth control was not widely available, life was quite different. Women didn’t want to die in their 30s and 40s from birthing their 10th, 11th, or 12th child. They didn’t want to have to divide the family’s resources fifteen ways, which left no one with adequate nourishment and nurturing. From The History of Birth Control, we learn what impelled Margaret Sanger to campaign for birth control.

BORN Sept. 14, 1879, in Corning, N.Y.
Born into an Irish working-class family, Margaret witnessed her mother's slow death, worn out after 18 pregnancies and 11 live births.
While working as a nurse and midwife in the poorest neighborhoods of New York City in the years before World War I, she saw women deprived of their health, sexuality and ability to care for children already born.

Its no coincidence that the number of families with six children or more dropped like a stone after The Pill became available in the early 60s. This is far from just an issue of teenage pregnancy. This issue goes to the very core of how women are viewed by the entire culture. We cannot let modern-day value judments send us back to the Victorian Age, or the Stone Age. I’m not all het up on this because I depend on birth control. I don’t. I’ve never been pregnant. But I have daughters, and even if I had sons instead, I would be concerned for the women they eventually love. In the same way, this is not just a woman’s issue because it affects a man’s life, too, as well as the lives of his mother, wife, sisters, and daughters.

Prophecy

2006-11-25T07:53:00.000Z

I bet that in less than 20 years the next generation, our current pre-schoolers, will be openly resentful and disgusted towards us for global warming. I reckon that this will focus on ostentatious displays of carbon emissions and general power gluttony.

Christmas trees and exterior lights being a prime example.

After looking at a 'festive' photo on another blog today; after trying to imagine how many small towns there are in the Western World, how many High Streets, how many malls, how many light bulbs 'up for Christmas' already; I find I plan to be a subversive granny.

Once the kids have flown the nest and I am free to contemplate a jail sentence, I will be sorely tried to avoid slashing the tyres of 4x4s and gas guzzlers used in town 'for show'. There are groups doing that in other countries already, and I wouldn't be starting anything new. So what about Christmas tree toppling?

Christmas Trees are entirely pagan, which may suit some in the pro-consumerism, anti-Christian mood of this decade, (who I am sure will turn a blind eye to the concept of Paganism being a religion in its own right.)

However, just as the image of Jesus Christ the little brown Jewish/Egyptian baby has been bastardised into Johnny Blonde in fake snow (Hitler would be so proud); so the sacred evergreen tree, the symbol in our snowbound past that life continues, has been chopped off at the roots and bedecked in trashy sparkles.

Never mind the title here - those are two examples of what I call profane behaviour.

Tags: Global Warming, Christmas Trees, 4x4, Profanity

Fuck This, aka a review of BlogExplosion

2006-11-24T19:58:00.000Z

Having checked this site out in record time and refused it on the grounds of profanity in the title, the team at Blog Explosion have performed a second review just as quickly, this time rejecting us for not having quite enough posts, nor being in existence for at least a week.

None of this is explained on the page where you claim a second blog and I am gobsmacked that they couldnt even be bothered to build a bit of standard text into the first email and save all this fucking about.

If they are upping the speed of response to appear professional, they have lost the plot. Explaining things and not messing people about (ie the quality of response) is infinitely more important.

Graa. Bitches we are and bitches we remain.

Pfffffft.

Bitches no more

2006-11-24T15:33:00.000Z

Now we are Bats.

It would seem that in some small area of a rather large (and to me, foreign) country known as the USA, the term 'bitches' is not simply vulgar, or inappropriate, but profane.

You can't join blog explosion, if, by their definition (and lets face it, its all subjective and relies entirely on where you live), your title contains 'profanity'. I always thought profanity was an insult to God or the sacred. Perhaps the implication is that we are really Goddesses, or at least sacred cows.

I want to join blog explosion, and thats all there is to it, so we are no longer domesticated wolves or foxes, but instead we are blood sucking furballs; dark creatures of the night that hang upside down and quietly shit on you from a great height.

Sounds good to me.

Went For a Job Interview

2006-11-23T23:32:00.000Z

..... last week.

The post was one of two at a satellite office and was admin; foil to the swish, plummy sales woman.

Her assistant had left; moved on. There are six similar jobs going within the company, and she confessed to a fairly high turnover for that post. Few handle the pressure of being Miss Moneypenny to would-be James Bonds with a sex change and PMT, it seems.

A youngster from the larger Kent office had driven in to help with the interviews. A lovely girl, she looked about 19 and definitely gave the appearance that, like school uniform, she was planning to grow into her suit.

It became increasingly apparent that they both saw me as over the hill, at 45.

When, at the end of the interview I was asked why I should be hired, I gave up, put on a croaky voice and said, jokingly "Because I'm old, so I won't leave".

My interviewer's eyes lit up.

"Thats a very good point." she said.

What Happened in the Green Kitchen?

2006-11-23T17:35:00.000Z

Everything was fine except that I was tired from being on my feet for hours, so I took a load off. Eena was channel surfing and happened upon a movie I hadn't seen in 30 years, so I suggested we watch t.

That was the first mistake.

We have this teeny TV sitting so far away in the corner that from the couch I can't read the graphic in the corner of the screen that tells which inning itof the ball game is being played. Also, if there's any other noise in the house, I have to turn the volume up pretty high in order to hear.

There's always noise in this house. Always. I rarely watch TV partly because I can't see it, partly because I can't hear it, and partly because every time I do, something bad happens -- somebody ends up getting mad at me for watching, because if I'm watching, I'm doing nothing to meet anyone's needs except my own, and we can't have that, can we?

No, we can't.

Anyway, just as the movie is getting interesting, the noise level in the house starts to escalate. I nudge up the volume. I clench my teeth and wait for the noise to pass, but it doesn't. Suddenly, Charlie is insisting on jumping into my lap. Myrtle comes in wanting someone to chat with. I increase the volume again. The Eena's are discussing what's happening in the movie, Beanpole wants to borrow my camera cable because he's lost his father's, and I hear Mr Z giving Fido commands:

Sit.

Sit!

Sit!

Down.

Down!

Down!

Roll over.

Roll over!

Fido, dammit, roll over!

I should know what's going on with the dog, but it doesn't register. Finally, an exasperated Mr Z shouts at me, "Could you turn the volume down?"

I say, using a tone, "Sure, if everyone would be quiet enough so that I could hear the movie." That was my second mistake.

He spews, "Fine. I'll just get the hell out of here!"

I didn't hear him drive off -- I was still trying to figure out what was said between the time the Mozart ended and Cornelia placed her call to Dr. Lazarus. Really, I was oblvious to anything else going on in the house.

The movie ended and I started to help the Eenas get organized to return to their dad's house. Suddenly, I realized I had no car. That's when I figured out that Mr Z had stormed out in a huff.

On the return drive from my ex's house I started to think about all of those childhood Thanksgivings that were utterly spoiled because my parents never matured to the degree that they could set their baggage down for one day and not engage in some ugly pre- or post-feast argument about how shitty or not shitty my grandparents were.

My grandparents, whom I loved, whom I should have been free to love without considering loyalties, without ever stopping to wonder for a minute if one parent or the other was right about them. My feelings about my grandparents took a backseat to my parents' petty need to indulge their own feelings of insecurity by arguing about my grandparents.

This happens in countless families, I know, and it just pisses me off that on a holiday adults allow themselves to behave childishly at the expense of their kids.

Mr. Therapist used to say that we (most people) unwittingly recreate the emotional atmosphere of the home in which we were raised. I thought about that during my forty-five minutes in the car. When I got home from returning the girls, I apologized to Mr Z about the volume, and said that if I had realized he was trying to give the dog his injection, I would not have snapped at him, but perhaps I would have calmly suggested he take the dog into an upstairs bedroom with fewer distractions so the dog might cooperate better. Third mistake!

Perhaps it wasn't the best apology ever. Perhaps I should have saved the part about injecting the dog for a later time, when he was in a more receptive mood. I didn't, though, because I'm lame-brained and emotionally crippled and expect everyone to get over their own personal nonsense as quickly as I do.

I washed the day's dishes then joined Mr Z at the table and told him that all I want is a happy Thanksgiving, and I felt like things were already falling apart. He was quiet and clenched, giving me a look.

I sat there thinking about the cheesecake his ex-wife had brought by earlier. She'd said, "I have cheesecake for you!" My immediate reaction was not gratitude, but resentment, because I've been assigned Pie Duty for Thanksgiving, and while I'm a confident pie-maker, her cheesecake is good enough to steal my thunder. Mr Z and Beanpole will both prefer her cheesecake.

She makes a fabulous chocolate cheesecake, they say. It's so delicious that whenever she sends one over, Beanpole does his best to dole out a meager slice to anyone who wants some, but then he hides the rest for himself.

She said, "Well, I made it for Beanpole, really, but I'm sure he can't possibly eat all of it!"

Because it's Thanksgiving, and they won't be together, she wanted to make her kid a cheesecake. There is nothing wrong with that -- in fact, it's very sweet of her. I smiled and thanked her and then I forgot about it until I was sittting at the table trying to figure out what bug had crawled up Mr Z's ass.

Finally, I said to Mr Z, "You know, it's not like you to get so frustrated over injecting the dog. Was something else bothering you?" I was thinking, finally, that it might be the cheesecake. I was thinking he saw the cheesecake and was worried Beanpole's mother would end up in the hospital for Thanksgiving again, comatose, because her blood sugar was out of control. I was truly surprised when he said it was the movie -- that at one time Beanpole's mother suspected she had multiple personalities, and she had had a thing for that particular movie, and therefore the movie was freaking him out.

I feel sometimes like my life is one big booby-trap and I should not even move because whatever I do might trigger anxiety and fear left over from his previous marriage. I suggested we live in the present. He gave me a look.

I've worked hard not to create the emotional atmosphere of the home in which I was raised, and for me that has meant ackowledging and forgiving the past, and living in the present. For others, it might mean going as far as cutting family ties. I feel grateful that I haven't had to do that. I wish Mr Z would get on the stick and get over the crap that happened in his first marriage.

He gave me the look, and then went off about how awkward Thanksgiving is going to be for him because he doesn't consider my friends to be family, even if I do. So now I've ruined his Thanksgiving. I said, "You know, BLP invited all of us, and she really likes you and she wants you to come, but if you're going to choose to be miserable, I'd just as soon you take Beanpole to Cracker Barrel for dinner."

That shut him up.

I've had so much reassuring to do over the last six or seven years: I do not have an eating disorder, I am not an alcholic, I do not suffer from clinical depression, I do not have obsessive compusive disorder, I am not bipolar, I am not carrying on with the handyman, and I'm sure as hell not a lesbian!

I am not obsessed with the movie, "Sybil," and I do not I fear I suffer from multiple pesonality disorder or paranoid schizophrenia. I was trying to watch any bloody movie at all because my feet ached and my back was tired and I'm so goddamned sick and tired of fielding everybody else's emotional bullshit!

I went to bed at midnight and he stayed up 'til God knows when. I was up at seven to start the pies and to google around trying to learn how far in advance it's okay to whip the cream. He came in around nine.

"We need to leave here by 4:30 for dinner?"

"Mmhmmm."

"Do you have anything planned between now and then?"

"Just going to finish the pies, clean the kitchen and take a shower, why?"

"I thought I'd go play golf. We'll met you at the party at five."

"Oh, okay. Well, I guess I'll hitch a ride with one of the kids."

So he's off playing golf and we'll arrive at the party separately.

The house is quiet.

Even the green kitchen.

Addendum:

Okay, after a glass of wine, the truth:

I asked him when he thought he might stop bringing his previous marital issues between us.

He said, "Oh, like you don't do the same thing?"

"What are you talking about?"

"What about those people in my basement?"

"Those people in your basement are my daughter and my grandson. I'd never thought of them as a previous marital issue."

Does anyone else ever feel like saying, "Oh, fuck it?"

Looking For Contributors

2006-11-23T10:01:00.000Z

Love the idea of F.O.A.D. but can't keep chaos to a Thursday?

Are you a wonderful, broad shouldered woman who wouldn't soil her own, balanced blog with the unstable ravings that, like steam under pressure, demand release only once in a blue moon?

Are you just really, truly fucked off with life, the universe and everything, but like safety in numbers?

Are you a GOB?

Do I know you from fucking Adam?

This blog could use your dramas and furies - I need you. Spitting fire is no fun unless it triggers someone else off and lets you laugh.

Hellooooooooooo? Anybody out there?