Everything will Work Out Right*

*Actual lyrics from "Safety Dance," 'member that one hit wonder?

But before all that...things had to get much, much, MUCH worse.

Last week I came as close as I care to admit to losing my mom.  When you sit there, listening her tell the story of the emergency room incident, knitting frantically and wondering if she realizes what she's saying, incredulous as she states, "And they were all speaking in English around me because they didn't think I could understand them, but I heard the young man, he seemed really far away, but I heard him say clearly, 'We're losing her!' before he swore!"

And it was the swearing she was concerned about.

So after Sr. Sister's funeral, my mom just didn't feel right.  I'd later learn she wasn't feeling right for an ENTIRE WEEK.  But that was after.  She was short of breath, dizzy, and her legs wouldn't work all that well.  It was her heart.  One whole section just kinda stopped working.  It is amazing how much blood the other half was able to pump around cuz the lady was STILL following her normal routine.  All I can hope is to be that strong when I'm her age.

My SIL insisted she go to the doctor to get checked.  While there they went through two blood pressure reading machines insisting they must both be broken because, um yeah, there was no measurable pressure...or heartbeat...well, it was there...30bps or something, and very weak.

So I got the first text when she was getting prepped for an emergency pacemaker operation.  There isn't much you can do 1,140 miles away from "home."  My brother said I could pray.  I started looking for flights to LA instead.  And writing emails requesting time off.  And figuring out how to get to the airport...

I arrived in time to release her from the hospital.  She was in so much pain her face just looked wrong.  Not a stroke, not a heart attack...77 years is simply a long time for a heart to go non-stop, it seems.  But dammit  she was not ready to go.  And that makes me glad.  I'm not ready for her to go either.  She's already said she's determined to look after my nieces four children (my niece is currently 10 and I will not let her make the same "married too young" mistake I made so there are decades to go here, at least).

Being home with her, helping her eat, comb her hair, get dressed?  It was almost too much.  And yet, not enough.  I could not do enough.  I baked banana bread.  Made her macaroni and cheese, hot dogs, anything and everything she felt like having (yep, not exactly the best diet to follow, but you know what?  That was not the point.)  And just when I thought I couldn't take any more?

HR calls.  I finally broke through the assistant ceiling and they're hiring me on in a very promoted position in a neighboring group at work.  To quote "Into the Woods," I'm excited and scared.  I start in a couple weeks and am wow, overwhelmed actually.  Because when it rains, it pours?  And I've hit my quote limit I think.

I'm back in Seattle now.  I'm not calling daily, but am making sure she's okay in every way I can.  She keeps getting stronger and feeling better and the pain is almost all gone and maybe I'll be able to start sleeping again?  Because my desk is COVERED in paper that has to get processed because I'll be moving desks soon and yeah.  My life is very full right now.  I am absolutely not complaining, just pointing it out for posterity's sake...oh, and listening to bad 80's music so I can stay in a positive mindset.  You just can't get too morose listening to Art of Noise (remember them?)

And...back to the game.

Without You...

I can't stop crying this morning.  And it's a combination of me being silly and way too much going on.

Or maybe not so silly, but I do have to wonder how I'm going to react when my parents go or my godmother, or someone who is in my day to day life...

A nun I've known, pretty much all my life (I was three when we met) passed away yesterday.  She was stern and and serious and she expected you do to exactly as she said, and as scared as I could be of her when I was little, and as frustrated and angry as she made me as a teenager, I sit here blubbering over her.  I haven't seen her for more than a decade.  But there was something about her always being there and now not, that is messing with my head.  There was always something to read about her in my high school newsletter - yes, I still get them.  And even more yes, I went to a high school that produces quarterly magazines.

And this realization is making me laugh.  Because if it hadn't been for her, I don't think my mom would have gotten the nerve up to have me even apply.  In so many peoples' eyes she was just "the help."  But not in Sr.'s.  And her children should have just as much a chance to make it in the world as anyones.  And that also boosts my heart (to bursting a little... And I'm also sure the waterworks will follow in just a bit...they're just giving me a chance to breathe, you know, so I can maybe wail a little bit.)

Sr. was my mom's boss for 18 years.  She was my principal.   She was what an adult in power should be and act like.  Those were some pretty big comfortable shoes to fill by subsequent leaders of the school.  I couldn't tell you if they succeeded; when I left I left for good, as it were.

And yet, my one forever-memory of her is what she told my mom when I up-ended my life and got myself on a sailboat to Mexico:  "How exciting."  Which was not what my mom expected to hear at all.  Sr. was proud (!) that I was having my adventures when I was young (in my twenties) and not waiting until later, because, well, what if there aren't any laters?  As I sit here with a battered hip and a messed up posterior tibialis tendon, a slipped disk, and really tired shoulder...NONE of which the sailboat gave me thankyouverymuch, I have to agree.  I don't think I could do the sailboat thing now, much less in my 50s or 60s as my fellow cruisers were.  Not with my battle scars.  (Or do they magically get better after you retire?  That would be awesome.) And it was her, ah, blessing on the matter that made my mom not exactly /like/ what I was doing, but bring her much closer to being okay with having a crazy-pants daughter.

When I opted to move to Tahoe instead of LA, totally okay.  Seattle?  Sounds like a plan.  I think in her head she thinks (and maybe I agree) that I'm still adventuring a little, because she never really got a chance to.   I promise to settle down some day, really.

So thank you Sr.  As mean and horrible as I thought you were (ah those teenaged years), I also loved and respected you so very much for everything you did for my mom, my dad, my brothers, and me.  And though we never moved beyond the Sr.-is-not-a friend relationship (do as your told!) And I KNOW I never hugged you, I will miss you so very much.

And now I need to go cry a little more so I can put on a braver face at work...I have an interview I need to be in a lot better shape for than I am right now.  Oh life, you are nothing if not challenging.

You Know You're In the Big Time if you have a Receptionist

I've officially hit old-fashioned-ville, population, me.

Or is it just me?  It's been several years since I sought a new doctor-type person all on my own...well, with the help of the insurance website to make sure they're part of the fold, as it were, but you know what I mean.  What I've gleaned from my needs and the wonder of this experience:

• Check the address posted against the google.  I joked with my coworker that I didn't want to end up with some back-alley quack...and dude...seriously, google maps? I give you props.  You kept me from signing on to one doc. who's address, you guessed it, apparently was accessed via a back alley.  Seeing as I need to go apres work?  Which means traipsing around Seattle after DARK.  Um, I can be naive, but man oh man, mami did not raise an idiot.
• If the address is in Seattle proper, I should not be dialing long-distance.  Funny thing here?  NOT the same person with the back alley address!
• And this is where I'm sure I'm putting on the old-fashioned/back-in-my-day-airs...if you want me as a patient, you must have a receptionist.  Even if it's you putting on your receptionist hat.  You're with a patient/don't like answering your phone/you really do just have a one-man office?  There are these things called answering services! With real, live people!  Call me (or rather, no, thank you, do not call me), set in my ways, but I will not leave my number on your voicemail, especially when your message is (names changed to protect the inane  "Hi, you've reached Jane, leave me a message and I'll call you back."  Really, Jane?  Cuz I'm calling your personal voicemail?  It harkens back to my dumfounded realization that people use their sexybunny@hotmail addresses on their resumes back when I was temping for HR.  HELLO?  You are trying to get a patient!  At least fake me out by saying I've reached the offices of Fictional Physical Therapy, Inc!

So um, yeah, I'm off to see a Physical Therapist on Monday.  Is my shoulder going to kill me again?  Actually it's doing a lot better.  I won't jinx it and say we are besties, but whatever manipulation + evil injections I put it through this past December and into January, I think I turned a corner!  No one expected me to be 100% cured, but there is a distinct lack of searing pain running from shoulder to finger tips when I find myself writing up the Purchase Order Invoices or inputting Journal Entries.  I ended my agressive treatment the last week or so of January...so far so good.  I'm still working out what my "upkeep" is going to be.  Basically I need to go in once a month....maybe once every 6 weeks, to keep things cracked loose!  To remind my shoulders they are actually NOT connected to my earlobes.  To relieve a little stress in my lower back when my shoulder muscles decide that actually, they are made of rock, not flesh, and are out to torture and possibly maim me.  We cannot all have awesome relationships with our bodies, I am living proof.

So no, PT for my shoulder!  Instead I need to see a man about a foot.  A bit of a twisted foot.  Or maybe it's impact damage...I'll know more Monday afternoon.

On Thursday I went to get my yearly physical done and shock and awe, everything seems to be okay!  Except for the swollen ankle that was perturbing both my doc and me.  I'd kinda stepped funny a couple weeks earlier and the swelling would go down and stay down so long as I iced and elevated, but the pain in my heel was constant.  Then I over did it the day before running all over the office and by Wednesday night felt like the skin from my knee to my ankle was just too tight...when I sat to elevate and put some heat on it, it did not look like my leg.  It looked like my 6'4" version of me's leg.  Especially when compared to my non-swollen one.  I didn't quite freak out, but I'd never been so happy to know I was going to the doctor's the next morning.  By then my calf was a more normal me size, but the ankle?  Pretty puffy.  An x-ray or three later and nothing is broken, but PT was highly recommended, so Friday I spent ALL DAY trying to find someone.  Well, between actually working.  Fourth time's the charm.  Which leads me to one more:

• If my issue is a twisted ankle, or really a twisted ANYTHING that is causing lots and lots of pain, and I explained this first thing, to make sure we were both on the same page, and you don't have an opening in the next few days, please don't waste my time by taking ALL OF MY INFORMATION and then offering me a spot in MARCH.

I know, I am just sooooo picky.

Is it Live, or is it Memorex?

There is currently a very high screeching sound going on somewhere outside my window.  A cross between a rubber hose being run across your more squeaky clean pain of glass...and a demented cat going ballistic in a mano-a-mano style take down (or would that be paw-to-paw...claw-to-claw?  Can you tell it's kinda early for me?).

And truly I can only describe it as above because I cannot, for the life of me, tell if this ghastly screech/squeak is coming from a mammal's throat or not.  As it's not driving any of the animals bizzaro-nutzo, I'm leaning toward "live."

No, I am no animal expert.  But if the noise is so nails-across-the-chalkboard irritating to my ears, it must be stun-educing to those poor animals whose decibel range exceeds our poor excuse for auditory conductivity.  As such, and having been a family member with various generations of dogs living in a city, I should hear howling.  This being Capitol Hill and there being an UNUSUALLY large amount of canines within the vicinity (or maybe it's just a whole lot of poop coming out of one dog and that's the real explanation for the unbelievable amount of sidewalk "obstructions" since the start plastic bag ban), I expect to hear a whole lotta howling to protest any man-made cat-fighting sounds. (Cat vs Seagull maybe?)  This goes above and beyond the loose-timing-belt-on-an-engine noise.  Oh my ears and whiskers, yes.

What's most surprising to me is just how damned loud it is.  I live blocks away from the freeway and the business core, not to mention the astounding amount of bars and restaurants and (of course) coffee shops.  And yet, it is so very quiet here usually that this ailing cat/80s-era Tercel, maybe, is drowning it all out.

Maybe it's the fog-ceiling that is causing it all to bounce back down to the ground and all over our apartment building?  I can buy that.  Sometimes I do wish I'd studied Science or another STEM major and WAS the Nuclear Physicist I imagined myself being when I was a kid.  (I also imagined myself as an Astronaut, a Fireman, a Librarian, a Secretary, a Farmer, a Policeman - briefly, then I realized I'd rather be Bo or Luke Duke as they had much more fun.)  Where was I?  Right. Trying not to lose my mind from the screeching and pull a Numb3rs jag and figure out, using MATH and number theory, just where the hell I should aim the sling-shot* to make it stop!

It's dying down now.  Either the fight has moved on, or the vehicle/person running the halyard line through the un-oiled block has given up (this, at least I know is not the case as there is neither a sailboat nor a flagpole - which has the same parts yet different names for those same parts - anywhere near here.)

The sounds of silence (well, the usual traffic hum and possibly a helicopter) are so very sweet in comparison.

Now, back to the game...

*Note to self, buy a sling-shot. 

Some Day I WILL have Normal Again

Hi!  Yeah, I know.  And I only have about ten minutes today.

The last two months have been a blur.  They included about 20 hours of overtime, so not the kind of blur induced by too many Vodka Tonics or anything as fun.

I've got a million things going on in my head as well.  It's times like these that a pensieve and/or a therapist would be super handy.  But as I have neither and would actually really prefer a device that I could download everything into to view as a third-party participant...well, there you have it.  The best I can do is scribble as fast as I can into a notebook and read and reread and try to decipher the information myself.  Why not do this with a therapist?  Cuz I would probably lie to them to make the situation not as bad as reality.  I am at least honest with myself about that.  And yeah, that's how bad it is right now.  And the only person I need to judge me, my actions, or those of the people involved?  Yeah, my own.  Because, again, I am being super honest with myself.  I can get loads of awesome and great advice from friends, but really and truly, will I take it?  Exactly.

I've also been seeing someone new for the recurring shoulder trauma/pain.  I feel a little awkward, like I'm cheating on my Osteopath, but ummm, yeah, see, it was a health faire and he was super friendly, plied me with a free back exam and one thing led to the next...and now I'm interacting with his Pain Management guy too.  Okay, I saw him the one time, my follow-up is Wednesday.  There were two needles involved.  I will not go into details because me and needles?  Not a good thing.  But there was a sonogram in the picture too.

Did it work?  Well, the firey burning sensation down my back and down to my fingertips has not happened since, not even after overusing my arm to make gift bag sacks for the craft fair.  Yes, there is still shoulder pain.  Yes, I still find myself waking up in awkward sleeping positions because of the pain.  But there is improvement.  And no, I will not slow down.  I will not do less than what I do.  This is not an option for me.  It sounds bassackwards but I want to heal while doing all the things that "hurt" me so I know that I still can after this treatment is done.

Nothing I do is all that strenuous.  Really.  Well, except for maybe that one time I picked someone up - bodily, not the "hey baby let me buy you a drink" pick up.  Even painting the bathroom ceiling at my mom's house was not something that should make me hurt the way it did.  In fact the only thing I have given up is the driving.

I can't drive for longer than about 1/2 hr at a time without wanting to rip my arm out of its socket.  Or rather, I couldn't.  I haven't tried since starting all this so who knows?!? Maybe that is no longer a "can't."

The bottom line is that I'm trying to keep positive.  Onwards and upwards...or whatnot, right?

Meanwhile, at the Bat Cave....

The best way to summarize the rest of July, August, and September is to say that nothing and everything happened.

I moved to new digs in a "cool" part of town.  Yes, I feel old and kinda wallflowery, but workmates are making me go out into the neighborhood and ignore the fact that everyone else is (or at least acts) 10 years younger than we do. And if one of them can do it while sporting yoga pants, anyone can!  Some day I will be more like her, I promise.  Until then I will sip on my tea while wasting waaaaay too many hours on facebooking/redditting/getting lost in the google stream as I listen to my rowdy neighbors laugh into the wee hours of the morning.  (Don't they work?  But I refuse to be the old lady yelling out my window for quiet.)  Or my upstairs neighbor POUND his way across his livingroom into the kitchen? Bathroom?  If I had to put money on this, I'm going to say the condo I'm renting is the same design all the way up and down.

This is my first place all on my own since that horrible MIL unit I rented in grad school.  I think I've definitely moved up in the world since that $400/mo piece of illegal architecture where the walls didn't all quite meet, there were raccoons in the attic/crawlspace that would make the whole place shake when they were getting it on, and if there was any kind of street work happening within a 10 mile radius, my shower (which was barely wide enough for my hips) would not drain.  I know, that is exactly the picture that is painted when I say I had a Stanford education.  I will admit, it is one of the many experiences that have made me the person I am today.

At the work front, we went from four to two.  Not because we downsized, oh no.  More like bad timing as the two lower level assistants fled to better positions.  I don't blame them, I didn't last very long in those same positions either, I just moved up instead of out.

In the middle of temps and hiring processes, I fled to Hawai'i for my older brother's 40th birthday.  10 days of no work was glorious.  He and my SIL had never been, so, childless, we got to know Oahu (I'd only ever been to the Convention Center for school stuff when I lived on the Big Is.) and they got to know the Big Island.  I got to see my friends and my Irish Rose...now with a new name...that was a little painful.

She had been stripped down to a bare hull by my ex, apparently, by the time she was sold...twice I think? But her new owner, a Peruvian, has made her beautiful again.  He and his wife are going to set sail any time now, and it fills my heart that my little baby is no longer stuck in a storage shed rotting away.  Because you already know me, you know I haven't gotten around to downloading any of my pictures from my trip.  So I am going to post a picture someone sent me of her:

My former Irish Rose, moored in Reeds Bay, Hilo, HI

A few years ago, when the hull was for sale, I almost bought her.  But it was going to be for purely sentimental reasons.  I knew I'd never be able to get her back in the water, not without bankrupting myself.  So for her to be sitting pretty in Reeds Bay again?  My hear swells with pride.  My little girl is all ready to go out and adventure again.  I'm so glad I got a chance to see her and wish her new owners much luck and many fair winds.

And now back to reality.

Yesterday marked my fifth year with my company.  I celebrated it at a going away party for the person in HR who I worked with when I was  temp at the same company.  Yes, double-amusing for me.  This is now officially the longest I've worked anywhere.  Before this was my four years with my undergrad college library; but can I say four years if I only worked 9 of the 12 months?  Meh, let's say yes or my resume looks super spotty.  Either someone in the right place is reading my blog, or I'm more transparent than I think I am.  Every time I'm ready to jump ship my job seems to change just enough to keep it interesting.  I hope that's a continuing trend as it just hasn't seemed like so much time has passed!

And now we're all caught up.  Sort of.  I only gave myself 30 minutes to think, sort, ramble, and proof this post, and I've run out of time.  But I'm still here!  If I can get back here more often I'll relay a tale or seven about Hawai'i.  Especially if I can get myself organized enough (don't laugh too hard) to get the pictures downloaded.  Until next time...

Mary, Destroyer of Keyboards...

The reality is I've got nothing.  Okay that is a GIGANTIC lie.  Let's just say I have nothing I am ready to expound about at this very moment as my life is now ridiculously so full that I am wondering when exactly I'm supposed to be able to breathe.

However, I'm going to use the excuse of YET ANOTHER KEYBOARD to write something up as I try my very hardest to get used to where all the keys are.

Does anyone else remember the standardization of keyboards?  Or was that just me + manual typewriters?  And then there were the slew of IBM Selectrics - or whatever they were called.  But all the keys were uniform!  Damnit! Somewhere along the way someone came up with the word ergonomic and everything went to pieces.  Or rather, keyboards did.  And just like my Kroger brand sugar jumping on the 4lb bag bandwagon -- I am not the only one to notice this right?  Sugar?  Used to come in 5 and 10 lb bags.  All of a sudden C & H is all about 4lb bags.  So screw it!  I went generic and bought 5lb bags at the same 4lb price.  Except yesterday?  I guess they finally ran out of the old bags...so now I get to buy 4 lbs of sugar for 5 lb prices.  This is almost as irritating as reading my baby brother's FB posts wherein he butchers the English language...

ANYWAY...They ran out of "new" keyboards in the IT dept., so I was asked to use an old-style not-quite-the big-white-one-with-the-clickety-keys, but slightly twisty with the bigger T Y G H B N keys...you know the style?  Which would work if I typed the way Ms. Miller wanted me to with the left hand on the "left side" keys and the right hand on the "right side" keys...but I don't.  I space bar with the wrong finger and it's my right hand that reaches across into left hand territory for my B's.  Which means I'm going to have strained tendons if I'm not careful.

Oh the fun times I have at work.  And if you're still reading?  Bless you.  You're sweet.

This is my third keyboard in as many months.  I'd think that would give someone a clue that maybe the ones they are giving us are poopie.  Or I'm being labeled as the destroyer of all things lettered...which would work except for the fact that the last one I handed to them I'd busted the number pad thingie...I am talented, oh yeah.

So Andy and I have been watching the "Vampire Diaries" on Netflix.  I know, this means I am less to you than before, bear with me.  It's a lark and a laugh and who else would watch that show with him if not me?  We do a lot of this, watching TV shows that no one else would watch, together.  It's a thing.  But seriously?  Is it really only Joss Whedon who put it out there that 100+ year old vampires shouldn't get together with 17 yr olds?  Cuz really, what do you have in common?

In college I remember having a conversation with my best friend, about certain connections that are absolutely necessary to have a good relationship.  And how we all have a "marker."  That one thing/rule/connection/whatever you want to call it, that tells you, yes, I can be with this person.  Some people aren't all that creative, they verify you were not born in the 90s and you're cool.  For others?  And here is where my point is coming in, they need a shared history, even if it's just by proxy.  The fellow we were talking about would find a way to work in the phrase, "Conjunction Junction" into the conversation.  If the beauty he was charming was not able to to fill in the blank (i.e. "What's your function,") it was game over, man.


18 years later, I'm still thinking about this as I watch Damon and Stephan Salvatore try to get it on with a 17 yr old CHILD.  Why do I keep watching?  It's kinda like a train wreck I guess.  I just can't not look!  But this is the same me who has now watched all of the original Star Trek, Enterprise, and maybe as much Miss Marple as can find its way onto Netflix.  I am not proud...

Okay, I'm going to go try to use this keyboard on actual data entry now.  Thank you for indulging me.

You Got to Put On that Party Dress...

Why is it that listening to Tom Petty's "Mary Jane's Last Dance" is the final push I needed to start writing this all up?  Oh the mind works in such mysterious ways.

Picture it, Los Angeles, 2012...(okay that's just such a Golden Girls/BladeRunner mash up I have to pause.)

Right.  Moving on.

I am now a firm believer in 20th high school reunions.  I didn't know this about myself until the end of the night when I was so very happy I'd gone.  20 years is a bloody long time.  A whole new human being can become an adult + in that time!  A person might have reinvented themselves at least three (maybe four) times since then!  Giggling school girls have transformed themselves into moms and teachers and lawyers and doctors and firefighters!  (YES!  One of my classmates is a firefighter!!!  Is that not the coolest?  And so telling about me that it's super way more impressive than the other occupations I listed.  Remember, I attended an all girls high school.)  And finally, FINALLY, we're all comfortable in our own skins.  Or at least really good at pretending we are.

It was in no way all bon bons and chocolate dipped strawberries.  I was so nervous I wasn't sure I was going to be able to keep myself together enough to do it.  Two nights before I was sort of lamenting not having planned a "spa day" the day before the event so I could totally look all super-awesome prepped and polished....then I remembered who I am and stated so to my dinner companions, "I'll be lucky if I remember to brush my hair before I go out the door."  Cuz, yeah, at the time I still didn't know which blouse I was going to wear.

OMG, if you were on the flight down to LA with me, I'm sorry if I took up more than my share of overhead bin.  I had NO IDEA I could pack that many clothes in my 9X14X22 carry-on -- technically it is the maximum volume allowed, but did you know canvas bulges?  I could NOT make that sucker fit in the "top out" configuration that lets at least two other bags fit in the same compartment.  Thanks to the adrenaline that fills my system whenever I fly, I was able to lift that sucker over my head with Amazonian ease to slide it into the bin, but yeah...the bulging, um tummy area of the bag, meant my bad boy only fit lengthwise.  I shut the bin, sat down, and was all la la la, not my bag....I'd feel worse about this but um, I also want to say it's payback for all the times I had to gate check my bag because everything was full by the time I got on the plane.  Yes, justifying this.  And I'm soooo glad I did.  All the different possible outfits I had shoved in there... and I ended up wearing a blouse my mom bought that was too big for her.  Yes, this is also how I roll.  I wore a top that a 76 yr old woman had bought for herself.  Stylin'.  But at least it had real short SLEEVES, not those fakey things that might as well be tank tops! (Damn you fashion world, I do not have the upper arms to pull off that fashion-no.)  And what with the LA weather LYING to me when I was in Seattle and selecting 3/4 sleeves and possibly a sweater, I would have MELTED.  You know, like my make-up was trying to do.

Yeah, I wore makeup.  Or at least tried to.  It didn't last long.  Especially not after the ugly cry I had.

Oh yeah.

The event included a mass.  (Yes, I went down to LA for my nephew's first communion as well as a mass/luncheon reunion.  This is indeed more religion in one weekend than I usually do ALL. YEAR. LONG.)  At the mass I was fully expecting to see the usual Sr. Suspects, you know, former principals and a teacher or two.  But I did not expect to see one of the nuns that used to watch my brother and I when we were super wee.  (My mom worked in my high school's maintenance department for 27 years.  During the summers my older brother and I used to go with her and hand out with a couple of nuns who tried to keep us out of trouble.)  When I saw her as I entered the chapel, I totally lost it.  I don't know if it was memories or nostalgia or just a little crazy that took control of me.  She's 91 years old now, head of fluffy white hair, and so very itty!  Like a hobbit, really.  I went from stunned to surprised to clinging, to bawling in a matter of seconds.  And like the trooper she's always been, she just held me.  Me, who was towering over her by at least two feet.  All I could choke out was, "I'm Mary, Anita's daughter," and she remembered (maybe it was my mom she remembered) but she stroked my hair and said soothing and nice things about my mom and my brother and me as a little girl until I chilled the fuck out.  I did say I lost it...in a room full of women and administrators there to celebrate all the alumni.  I know, I win all the awards here.

But really and truly?  After that?  I was totally fine!  The GINORMOUS ball of EVERYTHING BAD that I'd been carrying around since I boarded the plane was gone.  I know this is probably because hi!  There is no way this could in any way shape or form get any worse unless I, I dunno, pooped myself.

And it didn't.  And I didn't.  It actually got lots better.  I may have started crying a couple more times, but I definitely wasn't alone, my classmates were just as weepy as me, and for at least one of those instances, it was because we were laughing too hard, and that just made the whole thing awesome.

We gathered that evening at a non-school sanctioned event so we could chill and catch up in a more non-school atmosphere, and it was a blast.  Maybe even a little more fun than the official reunion.

Not living in LA, I didn't expect to come away with any new best friends.  But it was so awesome to sit and visit and share food and stories with people who were a part of my past.  Yes, my facebook friend list is a little longer, and a have a couple new numbers on my phone, so who knows, maybe I'll have a few more faces to see when I go down to LA to visit...maybe not.

So now I'm all preachy, if you have a chance to go to yours?  Do.  Just do.  Even if it's not the "official" one. 20 years!  And I'm not dead yet!  It's quite a milestone, I think.

Gerry!*

If you've ever had the need/want to type "grrr" using IOS 5 on your spiffy smartphone, you know you've texted this word more than once, at least.  And titling a post "Grrr" just well...I'll stop explaining.  But it made me giggle just now...and that made my life at least 1% less stressful....and every bit counts.

And the cottonwoods are blooming...and I think I might be allergic to the state of Washington...or moldy basements, who knows!

Bottom line?  I so want to note all the stuff that happend during my trip down to LA la land in May...cuz that was like almost a month ago now...or it will be in a few very short days...but my head wants to 'splode.  But soon!  Promise!

*So really it's more Andy and Lev's in-joke but I'm going to use it as it works for me today.

It's Been Twenty Years, Candy...

Just something I can reference when I'm in the middle of it all next week:

Why I am Going to My 20th High School Reunion

• Cuz I can. (i.e. I'm at a place in my life where even if I wasn't already in LA for another commitment, I could totally take a trip to LA JUST FOR THIS.  Even though I'm not, and am mostly doing it because I'm already in LA for another commitment.)
• Curiosity.  Facebook is one way of keeping tabs on people...if they post.  But I've never outright tried to friend everyone I've ever known, nor would I want to.  And as I'm finding out with HS contacts...not everyone wants to be on the face-place.
• The experience.  How many times can I say I've gone to a 20th HS reunion?  (This is especially so as I keep hanging out with HS drop-outs.  GED programs don't have reunions, do they?)
• As the daughter of two of the maintenance staff, I pretty much grew up at the place.  After 27 years, my mom retired, my dad is getting there...once he's gone, that's it, no real reason to visit except for uber nostalgia...which I love to bask in every once in a while, I won't lie.  But those kind of trips generally involve donations that I might laugh at outright.  So this is it.
• To visit with my former teachers - that is, if they're still there.  Do former teachers get invited to these shin-digs?  Now that would be cool.
• To check out the Blue Room.  Which was always my favorite.

What I am not there to do

• Show off.  Um, yeah, even if I were that kind of person, nothing to see here folks.
• Worry about my wrinkles (on my face or my clothes).  I escaped from LA for a reason.
• Finish unfinished business.  See above, 20 years.  Even I don't hold silly grudges that long.
• Help in the kitchen, no matter what Sr. Colette might say to me.

Tai Chi Latte Tired

Back when I worked at a bookstore, I got so good and figuring out what book or author someone was looking for that I could "name that tune" in three notes...My guess is that baristas are so used to dealing with sleepy/under-caffeinated folk that it becomes second nature to hear some garbled phrase and repeat back what they think you really meant.

Thank you barista for A) waiting for another time to giggle at my order, and B) using your barista-fu to get me a Chai Tea Latte, and C) giving me the realization that I now have a new phrase to describe just how tired I am.  I am counting it up there with "Michael-Douglas-Falling-Down-Mad."

Today's Tai-Chi-Tired day is brought to you by jumbled and awful dreams which included a WORKING A FULL DAY AT WORK dream that I think should count on my time card.  Really it should.

Remember back when I said I was ready for a change?  For something new?  I LIED. Really.  Make it all go away...it's like that Chinese proverb (or is it? Chinese I mean?) Be careful what you wish for?  Or the Terry Pratchett (which might also be Asian but hi, TIRED), "May you live in interesting times" curse/wish?

I am still in my same daily drudgery, but on top of that, I have been given more duties, temporarily, of course, until we figure out how to handle the new tasks among the folk that are here.  Or, gasp, pleeeaaase...they actually let us hire a new person.  Toss in the yearly audit and I'm done.  No, scratch that, beyond done.  I am the charred up piece that falls through the grill to the side of the coals to become that desiccated piece of  wasted thing.

Sorry, apparently I become a little hyperbolic when there is not enough rest in my life.

East + West Divided by two = Mid, Right?

I made some fingerless gloves, and I tried to either upload or embed the picture...but failed miserably when trying to use the fancy buttons I've been given in this lovely and updated blogger.

Good thing blogger hasn't completely given up on letting us have the html window.

So last year, I made a smoke ring out of some super soft Regia Silk sock yarn.  But I had some left over.  Just enough to make something matchy and girly and ship it to the middle of the country.  I used the same first part of the pattern, which I'm realizing I never actually articulated, bad blogger!  It is "Vent d'est vent d'ouest" by Marie Adeline Boyer; which translates into East Wind, West Wind, hence the post title.  And then tacked on a made-up fingerless glove pattern based on the different sites that helped me cobble together fingerless gloves that I made my niece and nephew...which I'm thinking I also never mentioned...okay, more on that later, then...

For now though, I wanted something my February birthday girl could wear under big bulky mittens as she waited out her kids' Spring sports practices, or walks outside, or treks to the grocery store for that matter, in the environs of the Midwest. Which is why I chose some hardier yarn, Dale of Norway "Falk" in a matchy gray for the tops of the knuckles and the thumb, as they'd get chafed by the mittens or gloves that would be pulled on over them.

It's hard for me to look at these and not be smug.  Yeah, I used an existing pattern for the cuff but wrist up? ALL ME!  Okay, just a tube with a thumb sticking out...but I figured out how to make the tube!  And make it three dimensional!!!  I feel like a little kid that just learned to button up all her buttons ALL. By. My. Self!  But even more so after going to the Madrona Fiber Festival Shopping area and seeing some pre-made fingerless gloves for sale and how they decided to shortcut their thumbs.  I did not get a picture cuz, well, I didn't think about it soon enough, but their construction was odd and would be comfortable only if you didn't actually plan to DO anything that involved opening your hand all the way while wearing them.  Okay, smuggy nature off.

For future referencing:  I used US #2s.  CO about 56 stitches and wound up with 44 at the end of the cuff, so I slowly added them back to make and add on the thumb.  It was a wonderful puzzle to solve, and kept me from getting bored.  I'm currently working on socks for my nephew and have reached the foot...and am soooooo le bored.  So much so I started another smoke ring, this time for me!  Out of some Socks that Rock Medium weight that I procured at the aforementioned fiber festival.  I'm going to try to take a picture and will post that as well...it is rather gray out, as the gloves above are proof, not the best picture-taking weather.

I need these more complicated things to keep my brain from wandering and wondering about my previous posts...and thus far all I can share is that I've gotten an email instead of a phone call.  But a good one.  Well, how about not a bad one.  Wait wait wait some more...le sigh.  Such is life.

I Need A Better Watch

I had to physically stop and take a deep breath and look back at my posting date a couple times this week.

Really, brain, it has only been one week.  One looooooooong and stressful, and achingly mind-scarring week.  One week that seems like a LIFETIME when all you can think of is "call me." "Call me." "DAMN IT, please call me..."  It's like I'm sixteen and dateless all over again.

Tie that together with the "close of year" (yes, in February) deadlines.  Or I should say DEADlines, no exceptions what so ever(!), and my sense of how much time has actually passed will grow or contract depending on what computer screen I'm looking at.

Sanity has come from a fellow coworker and the East coast sayings her mom is chock full off.  I love them in how positive and so not-Mexican-mom sounding they are.  I don't think I'll ever hear my own mom say something even remotely close to "Don't even take that class, girlfriend."  Like, ever.

So I made some fingerless gloves that I may have to put in the dryer if they're not ready to go by tomorrow AM...more on that, later.

Everything All At Once...Again

I'd like to blame the hormones.

Not necessarily my hormones, either.

How is it we can go weeks, months, possibly years (please, years is nice) with the same ole' same ole' and then all of a sudden, shot-in-the-dark-style, everything right is wrong again (to quote my favorite alternative 90's band.)

Maybe it is just me.  I am an ever-changing, adaptable, personable, professional (wait, that's the kind of stuff I put on cover letters, never mind...) But I have to admit, when I get this way, I look for new things.  It takes a LOT to get me to this point...I am in love with safe zones and comfort, maybe a little lazy at heart, easily amused, willing to let things slide off of me like juice off washable yarn...yet somehow?  It's happened.

NO!  Calm yourselves, it's not knitting that's brought me to this point.  That would be the exact opposite.  I know, I never post ANYTHING anymore, much less pictures of all the things that keep me from exploding.  Even the site that I joined that's wholly dedicated to all-things-yarn, well, it has my profile, but I'm just too quick at giving stuff away to document it.  Maybe what I need is a twitter for crafts?  Critter?  (OMG if I just came up with the next million-dollar social media site idea!!! Yeah, no. Way too many of those already.)  And it's not Seattle.  It's not friends, nor even family.  I know you're all intelligent stalkers/readers, so I'll not insult you and just keep going.

Anywho, parts of my life got ummm dull, and very soon started grating against me.  First extremely minor, but slowly building up into big whopping against the grain/nails on chalkboard/in the car with your sibling for way too long kind of ways.  And seriously I can't tell if it's me being overly sensitive, or if there really is a conspiracy going on against me!  You know, so I can be made an example.  Be shown "my place." At every-day-that-much-closer-to-forty*, I've learned I can't stand that BS.  I graduated high school So.Very.Long.Ago.  I do believe 2012 might actually be one of those "significant" years even.  Suffice to say?  I play very well with others, but I hate silly games.  Especially when people are only out to "prove something."  So I've officially taken steps.

As my mom said just yesterday when I let her in on what I needed praying for (What?  Doesn't everyone ask their religious-bent folken to intercede with their deities on their behalf at times when you think "A little more can't hurt?") we all have to keep moving forward.  Cuz, otherwise (thank you A.H. in whose little boy mid-west twang I will always hear this in my head)  you're stu-uck.  And now it's all about "hurry up and wait."  Either this will be a wake up call for them....or me.  It goes both ways.

I think I just need to know where I stand in the world.  Like I said, significant time has lapsed since I was fresh and young and had a whole life in front of me.  I refuse to become a bitter old mature woman.  I let a lot of things pass me by and sometimes do wallow in the "what could have beens" I will not lie to you, that would make all of this useless to me,  but you don't win the lottery by just watching the adverts.**  And I guess I just bought my first scratcher in four years. (Did that metaphor go to far?)

And thank you blog, for being here like an old friend so I can at least let that much out.  It's like taking an enormous cleansing breath.  I started you so I wouldn't make my housemates go stark raving mad about all the yarn and patterns and WIPs and FOs and rants like these...and I miss you.  And I'm trying to come back.  Again, taking steps...though some might be itty in comparison.


*I know, I know, I've got a couple years yet to go.  I think I hold forty as the new 25.  Or something. You know, that "age" that we used to make lists about?  "When I am 25 I will have a nice haircut."  Or is that something only I used to do?


**I have no idea where some of these sayings are coming from...I blame the creeping anxiety + maybe a little more coffee that I usually drink on a Saturday morning.

It Happened Again

Google is awesome, really they are, but if they keep changing Blogger from what seems like (to me and my bad posting ways) one day to the next, they're going to go too fast too far too soon for me to keep up.

I guess this is why it's a good thing that my blog is not a popular one.  Trying to figure out how to just get here to post was more difficult than I expected.  Is that the little old lady inside me trying to get out?  Damn technology!  Young whipper snappers!  Get off my land!  -- Oh wait, too far.

I'm probably not supposed to be typing right now so I will keep it short...or short for me.  2012 is the year of the shoulder for me.  As the blog as my witness, I'm getting the last bit of my August 25th 2008(? really? that year might change once I verify) "Bike vs F150 Pick Up Truck Accident" taken care of for reals this year.

I don't know if I already mentioned it here (it's just a bit too much for me to look, and rewriting it is way easier) but back a couple years ago my company was gifted free massages from a local massage/chiropractic office that wanted our business.  I opted not to sign up as I did not have the means to embark on a massage expense, even if if was just for a co-pay, times were tight.  However, my coworker couldn't attend hers so she asked if I could take her 15 min. session.  The guy was all smiles and instead of trying to sell me a package - I told him straight up I had no cash, just a hurty shoulder, he stopped being a salesman and just eased the lighting and fire than were ravaging my neck/shoulder/arm.  As he worked he noted that whatever was going on was part of a much bigger ache (I so wish I had this ability, touch a muscle and read it's historical woes....).  He advised that even if I did not come to his clinic, that I should look into it as it would not heal on it's own.

I tried, and failed, to get my act together enough to see my Osteopath and get some kind of treatment started/continued for the next two years.  I failed so badly that last October I was hit with intense soul-crushing muscle spasms that made me cry and voluntarily go to my regular doctor so she could give me lots of drugs.  Cyclobenzapreen (spelled differently I'm sure) is the bomb, but not what I want to be taking daily; nor was my increasingly daily use of Cake lyrics to describe the ache/pain in my shoulder (seriously, it really was "monster-truck force.")

Then we moved cubicles the last week of the year.  You know, the one I wrote about having to work?  The day we finished unpacking I was on the phone scheduling an appointment, which occurred today.  I might have to found the Church of the Blessed Osteopathy.  I went into my appointment not even knowing where to begin in how wretched my shoulder felt.  Typing today was an experiment in  masochism.  I could not raise my arm enough this morning to run a comb through my hair.

But now?  Well, right this second I HURT.  My arm feels like it was yanked from it's socket, given a good shaking, then shoved back in.  Which is kinda what an Osteopath does but with his fingers and pressing on just the right tendons/muscle groups.  More magic, I tell you.  But magic that left me feeling like I could pitch a no-hitter!  (I don't actually play baseball, so if that makes no sense, just pretend it does, I'm basing my knowledge on such educational films as Bull Durham and Major League.  I could try a fencing analogy, but aside from me?  No one would get it.)  My shoulder/neck/arm felt better than it has for...yeah, going on three months since the muscle spasms from hell.

But tomorrow!  Tomorrow should be a day of at lease 50% improvement, and I'm so looking forward to this.

December 25th...We Made It!

I know, it's like six days until the real year end, but I'm celebrating all the baby steps at this point.

2011

Besides, I work all next week, so it'll be new year's eve before I know it.

For this year's LBJ birthday-stravaganza I spent some cash at the local Daiso store. (Do you have Daiso?  It's the Japanese dollar (-fifty) store (unless otherwise marked).)  Oh yea baybee, this year's tree?  $1.50.  Or maybe a dollar...it was already on sale by the time I decided to update my Xmas decorations and not try to kill my "Charlie Brown Xmas Plant" that hates me enough already for Seattle NOT being the tropical weather it thrives in (I rescued it from being an office plant, where it was really dying; you just can't win).

Just a note for me for next year:  I need a better backdrop, maybe a cork board where I can pin all the awesome "Kid" xmas cards, which are all currently on the refrigerator...maybe dress up the make-shift "table" (which are currently discarded speakers...classy, I know) with a green cloth or something.

I used to think putting these kinds of hints for me was silly, but seeing as I just dug back into the blog to remind myself how to get the image details so I could post the above picture from iPhoto?  Not at all silly.  In fact, I feel like I should pepper my posts with more hints.  If I were better at knowing how to search the HTML after publishing, I'd document my code the way all my computer science friends did when they were in school!

As is usual (and preferable) for me, Xmas eve was spent calmly watching the 4 hour version of "The Sound of Music"on network teevee.  Yep, filled with commercials galore.  What better way to clean up the mess from the days'-worth of cooking?  See, I attempted tamales again.

The chicken mole part is fantabulous!

The masa?  Weeelll, the texture is good.  The flavor?  Kinda bland. I  followed the suggested proportions on the web and the bag of masa harina. Unlike previous years I did not follow my mom's... (you don't call them recipes...suggestions?  Hints?) letter describing how she makes 80-100 tamales (with no real measurements of course...).

I was aiming for 3 dozen at MOST.  I just don't have the capacity, nor the minions required to mass-produce the way my family did when we were kids.  Nor do I have the access to a fresh masa supplier...so I used the bag flour again - but a different version, one specifically ground for tamales!  Like I said, good texture.  But maybe the way it's processed leaves it missing something?  (Like taste?!?)  And also?  I didn't use lard.  (I KNOW! What was I thinking!!!)  In years past I've used a corn oil/butter mixture to get the needed fat in...but last year I used vegetable shortening and it worked...this year?  Different can/brand, different result.

It's like using a random ball of yarn instead of the suggested ones will not give you the object the pattern describes...I get that now.  Thankfully there is extra mole which can be drizzled on top for more flavor and/or this is why God had us invent salt shakers :).

But next time?  (Yep, another note.)  2 tsp of salt to 4 cups of masa harina is BS and was written by people who are watching their salt intake and/or using bullion cubes/canned stock instead of the homemade stuff I made.  LISTEN to the little voice that actually read the entire recipe and noted that they were using BULLION CUBES instead of blindly going forth!  And also?  Must get someone else to taste the masa. I am not a very good judge of how salted/seasoned something is after I've been cooking all day.  Palate = ruined.

However, still a successful endeavor as now there are tamales in the fridge-but not too many, and I've figured out how to make them better for next time!

On that note, Merry Christmas!

Incredulous

...but I'll touch/knock on wood, and toss some salt over my shoulder just to cover all my bases.

I left my yearly LA visit in November with the thought that I really really really need to get my act together and start looking for my niece and nephew's birthday-xmas-birthday (in that order) presents RIGHT NOW as Turkey day would be upon me before I knew it and I would find myself born upon the wave of too-many-shoppers and not enough parking spaces as I did last year.  (There is nothing more bizarre to me than being at at a crowded toy store at almost 11PM, I really didn't want to repeat that experience.)

I should have been more determined.

In the same WHHHHOOOOOSH that has been time this year, hello, really?  We last touched base in September and since then even Blogger's desktop has changed so radically I'm not sure how badly I'll mess up this post....it's DECEMBER.  Black Friday had come and gone and all my plans...well...not so much achieved.  I did manage to procure and wrap at least the bday gift before I boarded the plane for home...but in no way managed to even start the xmas shopping, for anyone...

Until last night.

I've known what I wanted to get my niece for xmas for a while, ever since a friend of mine posted about their existence on FB in...was it October...I will slyly link to their main page here with no picture preview or name because they keep SELLING OUT, possibly from the cuteness, if you are into dolls, that is, and toddler-aged looking ones especially, and I was actually finally defeated and wondering what my plan B would be, when I purchased the one I wanted the other night by sincere and happy accident.  I was lamenting to my supervisor that I was going to actually trudge my sorry self over a tolled bridge in order to try to procure, one last time, the item in question...he was intrigued, so I showed him the site and the doll, and it was IN STOCK.  To his astonishment, I logged in right then and there and put it in my "cart." (Yes, I even created an account just in case.) I couldn't whip out my credit card, even I have limits, but I was NOT going to just let it pass.  Could not. 

That just left my nephew, for whom I'd have to venture into stores, gulp, during the official maniacal xmas shopping period.  There is no link to his present.  Not because I'm being all secretive, mostly because I could not find any!  The goal was coloring book based.  Remember those?  Didn't we have a jillion of them?  You could get them anywhere and everywhere for all the characters of your commercially branded favorite cartoon/movie/heart's desire.  Not watercolor or activity or, dear god, really - STICKER books, but good, old fashioned COLORING books.  If this blog exists into a time where he is reading this, I hope it to be a little bit of evidence as to how much I love him.  Because added to that, this weekend in particular, beautiful and sunny (yet bitterly cold) as it is?  Is also experiencing a pretty bad "Air Stagnation" alert.  It's just smog, in a place where the winds generally dissipate it.  Imagine one of those tar boiling machines driving into your neighborhood...and stopping for a visit.  The smell isn't that bad, thanks to our 40-degree highs, but your eyes, throat, and lungs sense that there is a great disturbance in the force.  The air feels "thick" in places.

But out I did go, and I might have gone down streets I had not intended as the crowds of people was at times a little hard to wade through (up hill, in the snow, both ways!  I know, I sound like such a sufferer :).)  Suffice to say, people smell bad.  Downtown Seattle does not smell like roses right now.  Paint thinner and used sweat socks are a better description.  Despite all this?  I'm done.  And it's only the 4th. I have about 10 days to gather wrapping and shipping supplies, and maybe bake some cookies if I really get on the ball,  as I patiently wait for that one item to arrive so I can ship them all together, and it feels deliriously wonderful.  

I'm not trying to rub it in, really, I just wanted to share this feeling of bliss.  If it makes anyone feel any better, I'm only speaking of the little ones' gifts here.  I've only just purchased the yarn for one gift, and still have to figure out where to go to best obtain items for the adults on my list.  Nor have I achieved the gift buying for the January bday.  Like I said, I definitely need to be more determined next year.  If this whhhhooooshing trend continues, I won't have long to wait.

Dude! It Worked! And other Realizations

2 for $6.00.

There is no way to write that out without making my head hurt a little bit.  $3.00, each for a Whole Foods Avocado.  Cuz they are hand picked by virgins in the light of the full moon, right?  After a complex and apparently expensive Wicca ceremony?  But it was less than $5, which was my upper-end limit.  So I bought it.  I know it was a milllion years ago and the economy broke between then and now  but in my heydays of shopping the Mexican markets and getting 1 KILO of avocados for 7 pesos (that's 70 cents for 2.2 lbs in 'merican, or  32 cents/lb.) it still boggles the mind how much more I pay for one kinda small, but ripe enough, avocado, when I am desperate.

Were my father to read this he'd laugh as he went outside to pick me six or twelve of his home grown avos.  And today, unless I find a non-ovo-breaded chicken recipe I like, I'm going to have to pick up some eggs...which my mom would chuckle at as she'd point to the dozens she has in various buckets from her hens.  

Oh the things I took for granted growing up.  But this is the life I chose.  And I'm still okay with that, thankyouverymuch.  For now, at least.

And speaking about choosing?  I finally get it.  It's that old Lucy and Desi skit where she is correcting his reading English skillz, but for technologically advanced yet poorly educated (or maybe just lazy?) English speakers with no Lucy to correct them.

See, the Internet is awesome in so many ways (and yes, just as scary and full of porn, ying and yang). Coming at it as a former educator it fills my need for filling my brain with useless trivia or random knowledge.  For example, that old BBC show "Survivors" whose pilot I watched last night was based on a book written by Terry Nation (best known for the Dr. Who Daleks), and now I'm going to be on a hunt for it.  There are articles about what I can do for my high blood pressure that sure, include some old wives tales, but also suggest something as simple as Hibiscus drinks/Tea (which I drank gallons of when in Mexico and Hawaii and SURPRISE, never had an issue back then....again with the things we take for granted).  And yes, there are sometimes some copy editor mistakes that I chuckle at, but they are the same kind of oopsies you'll find in printed books/newspapers.  But that Face Place?  With the "your"s instead of "you're"s (as in your so not proofreading your posts? Cringe) or "loose" instead of "lose." 

I know, The Oatmeal has covered this, but now I get it.  You choose things but you lose things.  And I only know this because it was beaten into me via old school spelling tests (thank you Sister Julia).  But if I had not been so damaged - EDUCATED, I'd use my best guess, and if you CHOOSE things, obviously then you pronounce LOOSE the same way.  (I never said I was a QUICK former educator.  This totally came to me as I was commenting on a picture and knowing, just knowing that it was going to be misread because, yeah, it's Desi trying to read the children's book all over again.)

I stand sit here shaking both my head and fist at whomever put together the modern English language.  You make my brain hurt, sir.

It's Not Like I'm Asking for a Pony

Oh great and powerful deity that directs the Whole Foods Produce Buyer, I come before you, nay, grovel before you, if I could type at the same time I'd be on my hands and knees beseeching you with all my heart, please please please let there be an affordable, ripe avocado across the street when I get off of work today.

You see, I wouldn't be asking - nay groveling, if it weren't for the fact that every.single.time. I've gone into Whole Paycheck this ENTIRE summer, no matter what it was I was looking for?  They'd be out.  Be it cheese, baking yeast, fresh basil, bread, raisins, vitamin C, flax seed oil, toothpaste, that super yummy kettle corn I bought by accident that one time and have never seen again, hard cider (!  I know!), you name it, if I thought I'd just pop in on my way home so that I wouldn't have to drive 20 minutes to the next nearest (and way cheaper) grocery store?  HA! The universe/the other deities that take care of all those departments would bust a gut laughing so very hard at me.

So I'm taking a new tact, and if it weren't against the workplace code, I'd light a candle to you, really, I would. I just need one medium-sized avocado that isn't $5 a pop (or a lb.).  Take pity on me, just this one?  'K?

Thisaway & Thataway

I think the best way to begin this is to state, for the record, that my thoughts (and conversations at work prove this) are best mapped if you compare them to an episode of the Simpson's.

You might think that the main story line is going to be about selling chocolate at school, but in actuality it's all about how Abraham vanquished the Capital city bull...or something, and along the way you get to see Maggie doing something cute, Lisa doing something smart, and Bart being Bart.

Also, my brain never sleeps.

You see, I woke up wondering what is to become of "clockwise" and "counter-clockwise" when we've gone so far into the future that everything is digital. Oh laugh at me now, but back in 1999 I had to teach a student of mine how to read the analog clock in my classroom. I taught 7th grade. She was also not alone in believing/understanding how the 9 could possibly equal 45 minutes, just the only one to actually voice this out loud. It was both funny and disturbing. The class of 2004 (oh my, really? They're that old now?!) grew up only knowing digital clocks and watches. (I know I promptly went out and got my baby brother a Mickey Mouse ANALOG watch, just to hedge my bets a little.)

So...what's it to be then? I know, I know, there were ways of saying clockwise and counter-clockwise before clocks, but um, do they trip off your tongue? Or did you just google them the way I did? (Sunwise is a favorite, as is "deiseil." And "senestrel" or "weddershins" for the counter, which I should have known, it being in so very many Discworld novels (turnwise being it's opposite). I commented as much on Facebook when someone put up a link to this video - which is super informative on it's own. That's when the title of this post was brought up. Simple enough, really.

Which then led me to ponder the movie I saw last night. (I did warn you.)

So I got out! And watched Cowboys & Aliens. What can I say, the lure of Han Solo AND 007 (not that I've actually watched any of the new ones) in the same movie was too much of a temptation. And if you love rough men trying to out-gravely-voice one another? This is so your movie.

It's not getting very good reviews though, well, fair-middlin', but with the stars and the storyline? You'd think more people would like it. But there is just something in the film that keeps you just on "this side" of giving it that 4th star or the A-. I think I've figured out what that is: there are only black hats in the movie.

I thought at first that the incident with 007's hat was put in for comic effect. That man surely did love his ill-gained hat. A black hat, no less. But it hit me somewhere in my "weddershins" thoughts that that was the point. The western films and tee vee shows I grew up watching were ALWAYS the good, the bad, and the ugly. Or the cowboys vs the Indians. Or the black hats against the white hats. And there it is; you can always tell who the villains are because they wear the black hats! But here? The hero? He was very much not a nice man. Neither was Han, nor the aliens. Where, then, is the white hat that to whom can put our movie-audience-good-juju? It throws you off kilter. Just when you think you know who the "good guy" is, it turns out he's not, or he dies, or he gets lassoed by aliens, or his fingernails are just so icky-dirty that you hope the alien does get him!

It messes with your head.

But still, I liked the movie. Possibly because it messes with your head. It seems society doesn't get entertained by sappy/over-the top/happy endings anymore - there would be fewer talk shows/reality tv and more soap opera/princess movies if we did. So maybe that's what they were going for. Most cowboys weren't Roy Rodgers, and what good are aliens if they're not out to get us! Decades of Star Trek have taught us that! (I may be watching "Enterprise" for the first time ever, currently, but what little coolness points I've accumulated won't actually let me admit it.)

Happy Saturday!