I hate it when this happens: in a fit of sexual ennui, I read a Weasley twincest story, only to discover that now that flames have been ignited, so to speak, it was the only good story in the entire sub-fandom. Bah.
I've been thinking a lot about Harry Potter recently, as I am much too fickle to last an entire summer with Clark and Lex only on reruns. I feel rather fondly toward the books--I was aware of them a bit earlier than much of the US, as I had to help HB buy the first two for a friend when we were in England in 1999. I remember that I wasn't terribly impressed by the blurbs on the jackets, and didn't actually end up reading the books until...just before the fourth one came out, I think. By that time the hype was pretty big, but I was entertained enough by Years One and Two to not care that they were kind of shallow. By Year Four I had cottoned on to the part where the worldview got progressively more complex as the kids got older, which I still think is fantastically cool, and, okay, I like the increased levels of violence. Dammit, my favorite part about these books is that the kids could really get killed. I spent my entire childhood terrified of burglers, vampires, and knives; it's downright comforting to see a kids' book where fear is taken seriously.
Seems like I had a point there beyond that I kind of like Harry Potter. Sadly, it's gone.
No big news on the job front, if you're keeping track. The school district position is out--the speech therapist rescinded her resignation. I got an enthusiastic message from GG's boss at the home health agency, but have been playing phone tag with her ever since. I saw GG yesterday, though, and he assured me that this is standard for his boss and not to be concerned. "I told her you were nothing but great, man," he said, which made me miss him all over again.
Things I did today: get to work 15 minutes late, which is highly unusual for me. Play in the sand tray with my client SM and his older sister. Play in the ball pit. Close the door to the service coordinator's office and spend ten minutes yelling about how maybe if SM's parents didn't use him as the focus of their personal battles and occasionally told him he was a good kid, he might not be such the behavior problem, and for God's sake if she has to refer them somewhere, how about a behavior specialist and a family counselor instead of a known drug-'em-up-and-ship-'em-out psychiatrist. Eat lunch. Evaluate a crazy cool woman with a laryngectomy and a stunningly awful voice prosthesis. Crack outrageously inappropriate jokes with her and her chain-smoking, back-country, middle-aged daughter. Stare in lust-tinged awe at the daughter's forearms, which my jailbird sister-in-law would describe as "prison arms." (Dude, she was ripped). Hang out. See some more kids. Listen to Arabic pop in the car. Google "Weasley twincest," thus giving the government one more reason to shove me against the wall when the revolution comes. Go to bed.
I decided today that I'm going to quit my job. I've gone back and forth on this for about a year now, and today, after a particularly tumultous afternoon, I realized that I was no longer unsettled at the prospect of leaving. I thought about saying goodbye to this facility and starting someplace new, and I was calm. I don't think the signals get any clearer than that.
Possible leads: home health agency where KH and GG work, and an elementary school in the sweeeet district northeast of town. I'm gonna fix up my resume as soon as I post this and then start faxing people tomorrow.
Something I like to do when I'm trying to make a decision is to internally assume a potential state to see how it feels--try on an idea or a belief for size, so to speak. I find this works remarkable well most times, although once shortly after I met GG I tried on Jehovah's Witness, just to dip into his head for a moment, and after ten seconds I was chilled to the core. But tonight I'm thinking merely of blogger vs. livejournal, so I'm trying on lj. The title of this post is Redneck Sushi.
We went out last night with A and A, a couple recently introduced to us by CMJ and her husband. We'd all six hung out last weekend, sort of a going-away party for C and M, who are moving to Oklahoma in a few weeks. Leaving the party, A and A approached us and said that it would be a shame if we lost track after C and M moved, and invited us to dinner a few days later in a show of good faith. So last night we went to a brand new sushi joint near downtown, in a trendy little red-and-taupe building that used to be a French restaurant. It was...well. The food was great, and I had wonderful strong coffee afterwards, sipping and watching stolen fragments of A's ice cream melting in my saucer. The atmosphere--well, really, the atmosphere was quite charming, with lovely attention to detail, right down to the polished river rocks as chopstick rests.
The weird part, really, was the combination of the rather self-consciously hip and trendy restaurant staff and us. Here was this waiter--young, blond, dressed in skinny black clothes, and desperate to show off how well-versed he was in haut cuisine--and here were the four of us. The Hubster and myself, in baggy jeans and tee shirts, are what my buddy JT calls "high crass": we can fake it pretty well in polite society, but we're also the ones staring at the bean dip and muttering, "Oooooo, you hear that siren? That's the ass police, baby, and they're coming for you."
And then there were A and A. A1, female, is a psychology grad student from Serbia who recently celebrated her first Fourth of July as a citizen. Her husband, A2, is a rock-n-roll guitarist from Maine who drives a gas truck to pay the bills. They are the strangest couple ever. A2 in particular defies description--when thinking of him, I struggle for words that are not candy metaphors. "Crunchy on the outside, but with a soft, sweet center!" "Chock full o' nuts!" That sort of thing. He looks and moves like a redneck--braided ponytail, upper arm tattoo, overbite, swagger--but he loaned me Into Thin Air. He drinks beer in the passenger seat and his guitar room is covered with 80's skull paraphenalia, but he proudly displays his knowledge of Serbian verb structure. He gave the waiter hell last night--"Nah, we don't want that expensive shit. Just bring us some--you know that cheap-ass sake you get at Chinese restaurants? Bring us some of that,"--but he was good-natured, relaxed, and tipped him well at the end of the night. I don't quite know what to think about him.
There was a girl behind me at belly dancing tonight with the most amazing hips--heavy and loose and beautiful. When she shimmied she made my head spin.
I bought multi-vitamins today. As soon as I finish up the prescription for antidepressants next month--boom chaka laka, baby. The Hubster is watching me with fear and impending fatherhood in his eyes.
Taboule with tomatoes and artichoke hearts
Banana bread
Chicken with basmati rice
Marinated portobello mushrooms with sauteed peppers, onions, and tomatoes with polenta
Smoothies with bananas, strawberries, and vanilla yogurt
Chocolate chip oatmeal brownies (with SMW)
Improv eggplant and portobello parmigiana
Chocolate cherry crumble with crack COCAINE please somebody make me stop EATING it
Not to mention I bought cherries, peaches, and the world's four most perfect nectarines. I am reduced to saying things like, "Come in! Eat some produce!" as I usher people into the house. This appears to be Love Week in the love-hate relationship I have with my kitchen.
Subconscious turmoil update: had heartrending nightmare in which I witnessed a plane crash. Had prolonged, unpleasant dream where I was pursued by Dementors. Had dream with six or seven of my real life clients where my clinical incompetence featured prominently. Had dream about giant poisonous desert lizards. Had dream where if I was unable to solve a case of insurance fraud I would be killed. Had dream where I was unable to stop some woman that I liked very much from finding out, moments before the altar, that her fiance was cheating on her. Had dream where I accidently drove my car off a bridge. Gah.
CMJ, the social worker at work, said there were prominent "loss of control" themes in many of these. I feel so Freudian.
I'm sort of thinking about either getting or switching over to livejournal. Pros: people will stop asking me about it. I might meet interesting folks. Cons: it's like the Borg. I find the "friends page" feature overwhelming.
If you read this blog, have strong feelings one way or the other in the matter, and have not already expressed these feeling repeatedly (Shell, I'm a-talkin' to you), I'd appreciate it if you'd drop me either an email or a comment. I think in this decision majority will rule.
Spent last night in thrall to horrific nightmares. The good part of the dream was when my former neighbor caught the guy attacking me and chainsawed him apart. Gah.
I called in sick and then spent the entire day on the couch reading Harry Potter. Now I am going to bed, where I will please please not have Voldemort dreams.
In a surprising 180 degree turn from this morning, I had a pleasant, relaxing afternoon. This morning...wow. It's not that anything bad happened, but you know how sometimes you wake up and find yourself completely incapable of making a decision?
So, I had to be at work by 9am, but I didn't actually have clients until 10:30. At 7:40am I prop my eyelids open and muzzily wonder if I can get away with staying home. Convince myself that would be unethical and rude. Lie in bed until just on 8am, at which point I must get out of bed if I intend to get to midtown by 9am. Stand stark naked at the bathroom counter and contemplate my toothbrush. Instead of using the toothbrush, decide to flop on the floor and pet Mr. Sinatra, who's lying on his back waving his feet around and purring. Think about staying home. In an effort to humor myself by breaking routine, decide to go check my email and see if there's any more Altville. There isn't. Journal-surf. Realize that--glory hallelujah!--Punk M. has posted her new SV story. Spend 40 or so stark naked minutes reading. Wonder if I should include the stark naked part in my feedback (hey! I was so engaged that I forgot to get dressed!), or if that would be the kind of comment that sends an author fleeing for nonfiction. Stare at the clock. Sigh. Head back to the bedroom with the intent of showering. Instead, collapse on the bed and try desperately to think of a reason to stay home that would be both A). true, and B). acceptable to the new hard-ass boss. Waffle. Think about how wonderful it would be to stay home and read Harry Potter all day. Get up and put contacts in, hoping for insight. Pick up the phone and dial work, fully intending to invent a stomach virus. Hear the receptionist pick up. Hear my own voice say that I'm running late and will be in shortly. Sigh.
I got a little kick out of Shell'sdue South snippet, a Ray Kowalski SOAP note, because it reminded me that once upon a time I wrote a voice evaluation on Blair Sandburg. My Sentinel phase coincided with my endless last year of grad school, when I took Voice Disorders. We had to write a mock evaluation on a client with some type of vocal pathology, and I, thinking I was the funniest thing on two wheels, used Sandburg. I got to write sentences like, "Maximum phonation time on /a/ was 13 seconds, well below the average range (20-25 seconds) for males in Mr. Sandburg's age range," and, "Dr. Megan Connor, an otolaryngologist with UTSHC, performed indirect laryngoscopy using a flexible endoscope inserted nasally." I thought I was way cool. But, beyond just the chance to toot my own horn, I liked Shell's snippet and would encourage y'all to rush right over there and read it.
Overall...I've been having a nice week. I've been experimenting with the "Don't Eat Crap All the Damn Time" diet and have been liking the results. Have fallen in love with belly dancing, to the point where I come home, strip down to my skivvies, and practice. (Pick yourselves up off the floor, now). Met the new department boss this week, and, while I don't like her very much, she does seem to be quite good at the job. On Friday I went to a counseling session with LG, where I blew her co-dependent little mind by saying that I was done being her therapist and we needed to revamp our relationship. She's confused and upset by this, but I feel great--I've been needing to say that for so long, and I feel like now we can either start developing a real, adult friendship, or I can let her go. I referred a kid for a modified barium swallow study, something I've never done before. Yesterday I fell asleep on a couch at the yacht club in the middle of the afternoon, and woke up sweaty and relaxed. Sat in the yacht club pool and gazed drowsily at the centerboard regatta participants (Hubster included) as they tooled around the lake waiting for the wind to pick up enough to actually race. Hung out with sailors and made myself homemade Radler--lemonade, Sprite, and Coors Light--and thought about Germany. Did not have a breakdown, like I did last weekend when the Hubster and I discussed our dwindling chances of moving. Bought Harry Potter and the Order of Magnitude Longer Than the Last Book. Got invited to see Hulk with my beloved client EM for his seventh birthday, although I declined. Ate tomato pie at a local diner. Ate an avocado just now.
I went to dinner with SMW this evening, and while I was in the restaurant bathroom I overheard the kind of painfully cute conversation between a mother and her very young daughter that makes a person quiver with the urge to reproduce. They were in the stall next to mine, and had heard but not seen me come in, so the little girl was afire with curiousity. "Somebody in there?" she says.
"Yes, sweetie, somebody's in that potty," says mom.
"Who is it?"
"I don't know, sweetie."
"Cinderella?"
Me, cackling, "No, it's not Cinderella."
"Mommy, can I see?"
"No, we don't look under the stall doors."
"Wude?"
"Yes, it's rude."
I was dying. The girl sounded very young, but when I saw them at the sinks she looked around three, possibly a little under. As always, I was struck by how very much she talked; normal development never ceases to amaze me.
Another reason I need to have some kids already: got all slitty-eyed angry at the new part-time physical therapist today because she provoked a screaming, crying, hyperventilating fit in my client IV. Okay, I don't actually know that she provoked him--he's a little fussy with strangers in general--but in over a year I've never seen him freak out that badly, and I got protective. Plus she was kind of talking down to him, which made me want to scream, "He's nonverbal, not stupid!" And BT and I were both upset because, when we hustled in to investigate the horrifying screaming coming from the big gym, the physical therapist said something about how IV had grabbed her hair and then, "I asked him, but he wouldn't let go." Okay, I'm a speech therapist, and even I still know that a kid with spastic quadriplegia probably doesn't have good hand control. Give me a break, lady, he's not letting go because he can't open his hand voluntarily. That's why he needs therapy. Argh.
You know what I'm really surprised about? Maybe I just hang out at the wrong places, but I'm really surprised that I have yet to see an icon from the SV episode "Rush" with Lollipop!Chloe and the caption "cunning linguist." Is that too obvious or something? It was practically the first thought that popped into my mind when that scene aired, and I expected to see icons all over the place the next day. And yet, here it is two or three months later and no one's done it. Am I that far removed from the fannish hive mind?
Aaaiiiieeee!! Finally! Blogger has been screwing with me the past couple of days, and I've been unpleasantly confronted by just how much of an exhibitionistic hobby this is. "Oh, I can just write it down for myself! It's okay if I can't post!" Shhyeah, whatever. I about rented a billboard.
I got curious and took an online version of the Meyer-Briggs the other day, which--well, frankly, that's a pretty boring test. But it turns out I'm an ISFJ, a "protector guardian." Huh. Good times, good times. Am now tempted to go back and take the test as the Evil Overlord CEO, just to see what would happen.
So last night the Hubster and I went, among other places, to the university theater to see The Good Old Naughty Days, a collection of French porn shorts from the 20's and 30's that was incredibly non-erotic, and left one with the deep, burning question: what's with all the nuns? Gag. Me. But it was more or less worth it for the raunchy cartoon at the end.
I'm not all that big on internet quizzes, but I thought I'd post this one because A). it came out almost exactly the same as the first brain usage test I ever took, way back in sixth grade, and B). the description is absolutely spot on. There's none of the usual, "Oh, this part sounds like me, but this part is off," waffling--that's me in a nutshell. (No, this is me in a nutshell: "Help! How'd I get in this nutshell?!" Ah hah hah hah hah haaaaa Austin Powers eat your heart out).
Your Brain Usage Profile
Auditory : 47%
Visual : 52%
Left : 66%
Right : 33%
Sara, you are somewhat left-hemisphere dominant with a balanced preference for auditory and visual inputs. Because of your "centrist" tendencies, the distinctions between various types of brain usage are somewhat blurred.
Your tendency to be organized and logical and attend to details is reasonably well-established which should afford you success regardless of your chosen field of endeavor, unless it requires total spontaneity and ability to improvise, your weaker traits. However, you are far from rigid or overcontrolled. You possess a degree of individuality, perceptiveness, and trust in your intuition to function at much more sophisticated levels than most.
Having given sufficient attention to detail, you can readily perceive the larger aspects and implications of a situation or of learning. You are functional and practical, but can blend abstraction and theory into your framework readily.
The equivalence of your auditory and visual learning orientation gives you two equally effective sensory input systems, each with distinctive features. You can process both unidimensionally and multidimen- sionally with equal facility. When needed, you sequence material while at other times you "intake it all" and store it for processing later.
Your natural ability to use your senses is also synthesized in your way of learning. You can be reflective in your approach, absorbing material in a non-aggressive manner, and at other times voracious in seeking out stimulation and experience.
Overall you tend to be somewhat more critical of yourself than is necessary and avoid enjoying life too much because of a sense of duty. You feel somewhat constrained and tend to sometimes restrict your expressiveness. In any given situation, you will opt for the rational, and learning of almost any type should be easy for you. You might need certain ideas explained to you in order to fit them into your scheme of things, but you're at least open to that!
Big news: I took a belly dancing class. Two, actually. They were great.
Rusty had been talking up this belly business for quite some time, and if one were to trace the evolution of my reactions to her, it would look something like, "Over my cold, dead--hey, could I pretend I was that chick from Bring It On?" So after I got over the internal whiplash, we dropped in on a Beginner level class at the Arabic Bazaar, and holy shit I think I've found my true calling.
Well. Not quite. But I'm so phenomenally thrilled to find a complex motor pattern that I don't intuitively suck at that I'm beyond enthusiastic. And the instructor is mouth-watering. And there seems to be a large overlap between girls who take belly dancing and girls who have tattoos, and I always like to look at people's tattoos. Yay!
The other night I dreamed I had this total buddhist throwdown with Shell, starting with her dissing a security guard at a hockey game and ending with me getting up in her face and yelling, "Have you even read the Five Mindfulness Trainings?!" and then stalking off in a huff. No, Shell, I don't know why.
Slept poorly last night, with the Hubster back in the country and snoring like a wild animal. Now I'm brooding over the summer Smallville hiatus and thinking of napping.
There is an embarassingly large possibility that I am hung over. After two beers. Fucking antidepressants.
There's a chance that I'm legitimately sick, but my tolerance for alcohol has been rapidly declining in the past couple of months--as in, drinking one glass of wine now makes me queasy--so I'm inclined to think it's the beer. Dammit, I wasn't ready to stop drinking just yet. I could see that day coming, sometime down the road, but I wasn't ready. And when I get pushed into changes I get resentful. I really resent my body right now.
On a happy note, the Hubster's back from Germany! I picked him up about two hours ago, and he's chillin' and marveling at the size of our American refrigerator.
Wow. I had a beer or two when I got home, because when I left work I was having what was either a mild anxiety or blood sugar crisis, and obviously the best way to handle either of those situations would be by dousing them in alcohol. And so now I'm tempted to give this post one of those lame taglines, like, "Major Random Lovage!" or something.
The point: all of my kids were bizarrely affectionate today. SM, he of the hot pink boob incident, leaned into the crook of my elbow throughout our session, forgetting that he's usually standoffish. AR, who's nine, climbed on my lap and wrapped her arm around my neck during book reading. And my beloved EM, who tends to be touchy-feely in the way that relaxed, self-confident little boys can be, but is not generally overtly loving, leaned over and planted a smacker on my lips while I was tying his shoes. I was quite startled--he's a huggy little boy, but in over two years I've never seen him kiss anybody before. I don't know what vibe I was sending today, but apparently my kids were receiving it loud and clear.
Best line I heard today: I talked to EP, who had heard--through a complicated series of relationships--that I was kind of cranky with LH, the new speech therapist, this week, and she relayed her conversation with the woman who spread the gossip: "Whoa! You caught Sara when she was that mad? Dude! I've seen her steaming, but I never lifted the lid!"
SMW: the mystery prankster (someone changed my work screensaver to scrolling text: "Ask Sara about her days as a cowgirl waitress...") turned out to be CMJ, the social worker.
Today in the waiting room while I was returning my client, RJ, to his mother, I spotted my other client JD and his brother V, who is fast becoming infamous around these parts. So V's clowning around, making JD wave to me and such, and then lifts his own hand in my direction, and I about fall on the floor laughing. Drawn on his palm in black pen is a perfect octagon with Kryptonian symbols around the edges. It's Clark's spaceship's key, straight out of "Calling." I lunge at him and grab his palm to examine it closely, all the while frantically signing/pantomiming, "Oh my God you are a dork, but squeeeeee!" Meanwhile, his mom is rolling her eyes at both of us, perhaps wondering if she should turn us over for deprogramming.
I asked V later what he thought of "Exodus," but he said he didn't watch it. I asked why, but I didn't understand what he signed in response, and his mom was talking to another therapist and couldn't translate. There was a time earlier in the year when he was, uh, grounded, so maybe that happened again. And then I thought really hard about the implications of that, and then I thought brightly, "Well! At least I'm a total pervert who appreciates V's taste in body art!"
Damn. I wish I wasn't such a complete sucker for guys who like my TV shows. I mean, what's the protocol here? Should I ask his mom when he'll be legal? Maybe consider electroshock? Oy. The WB is destroying my morals.
I made it back, barely. The trip was uneventful, and not really all that painful until the flight from Atlanta back to Texas, where I desperately wanted to sleep, but couldn't due to a bad case of the leg-jerks. After that the trip was painful, even more so when I arrived at the baggage claim and realized nobody was there to meet me. C and S thought my flight came in later, a perfectly valid excuse, but I was still pretty unhappy.
Dreamed last night that I was attacked on a street corner, and offered to blow the guy to avoid being raped. Woke up with my mouth tasting like spunk.
GG's last day at work is tomorrow. Apparently he gave his two weeks' notice Monday, then Tuesday got a recommendation from the "transition team" that he was not to say goodbye to his clients, and if they already knew he was not to tell them any information about why he was leaving beyond that he was "moving on." He told PB, "You know I can't agree to that, right?" PB said of course she knew, and understood. But the transition team didn't understand, and said if he didn't feel he could comply with the recommendations they would rescind his two weeks' notice and he should get out by Friday.
That's tomorrow. I think tomorrow will be a bad day.
More German phrases that would have been useful to know prior to arrival:
"Please bring me a beverage that is not a diuretic, stat!"
"Okay, grandmotherly woman on the late-night naked phone sex commercial channel! Thank you for bringing my cultural biases regarding age and sexuality into stark relief! Now for God's sake, will you put those away!"
Yesterday was actually kind of miserable. I had many, many minor mishaps (great name for a band) that piled up and up until I broke, like, "Argh! Germany thwarts me!" Today hasn't really started off all that much better, but I'm gonna find some caffeine and go to a museum, so that should be good.
So, Germany. A whole lot of exercise. So far I--motherfucker! The keyboards are different over here!
Okay. I'm spending a lot of time with absolutely no idea where I am, so there's been a lot of walking. Like yesterday, we wanted to go see this art exhibit with some guy who's basically taken a bunch of bodies, freeze-dried them, and arranged them artistically. So we spent about 45 minutes traipsing all over the Olympic Park looking for the exhibit, walking and walking and walking and with neither of us speaking any useful German phrases, like, "Excuse me! Which way to the freeze-dried body art, please!" But we did eventually find it, although I honestly thought it was kind of boring after all that.
Munich is beautiful in a way. And yesterday I saw a few minutes of German Smallville! It was a first season episode, dubbed, which the Hubster really enjoyed. "So right there Lex is saying 'I'm a little girly-man!' No, he really is. I've been learning lots of German while you were back home holding down a job!"
Leaving for Germany tomorrow. Like all the hot German chicks, I will be sporting a facial blemish the size of a plum on my chin. Seriously, this thing makes me look like a freaking krypto-mutant, like maybe my special powers include super pus production. Whee! Won't the Hubster be glad to see me!
Nah, really, I can't wait to see him. And Germany.
Professional crisis of the day: V, my client's deaf brother who loves Smallville, had a question for me today. Where could he find pictures of Lex on the internet? I hemmed and hawed a little and finally told him through his mom that I'd write some URLs down. All during his brother's therapy session, I was like, crap. What sites can I give him that will be any good at all, and yet won't lead him directly to the gay porn? I ended up giving him MR and TW's official sites and kryptonsite, and then just telling him key words to put into google. While he was reading the paper and not lipreading me, I told his mom to make sure he used his discretion with the google search. She's a pretty relaxed lady, but I'd rather not find out what would happen if I sent her underage kid to a bunch of slash archives.
I can't stand it: so I had this party on Saturday, and I've reached the duration of time in a city where you know a lot of people from several different circles, so there were about ten or eleven completely random people at my house all evening. And there was this guy, a friend of a friend, and I can't think about him without cracking up, because he was such the quintessential country boy. Boots! Jeans! Plaid shirt! Cowboy hat! Swagger! Drawl! The party was a crawfish boil, and I kid you not, an actual crawfish-related sentence that came out of this guy's mouth was: "Yeah, crawfish are okay, but you ever been crabbin'? Now crabbin', that's gooooood fun."
Oh, Mr. Crabbin'GoodFun. You made my evening. Now get the hell out of my head.
For KH, because I told her I would write it down: the one at the base of my skull is for strength, for perseverance, for freedom. For remembering that anxiety is not my determining characteristic. A small part of it is for escape: escape from depression, from grad school, from an entire year where I got out of bed for Alex Krycek and no one else. For Missy, who said it was a cool idea, lo these many years ago.
The one on my hip is for...October. For the change of the seasons, the dying of the year. For the inevitable turn of the tide. For the passage of time, the passage of days from the blue skies and crisp golden air of fall to the greys and mists of winter. For the elves, passing away over the sea to the Undying Lands. For the Pure Land, for a vessel on the sea of suffering. For the Vikings, for all seafarers, for the sight of a tall dark ship appearing out of the gloom.
Try explaining this to a stranger, or a casual acquaintance. Try explaining this to a friend, even.
*I got the go-ahead for Germany and bought my ticket yesterday. Week in Munich! Yay!
*A bunch of people from work are coming to my house on Saturday for a pre-Second Annual Crawfish Boil crawfish boil (the official one is a couple weeks away at PB's house). SMW, I forgot to tell you but you're invited.
*I went to this informal running class yesterday and did a lot of speed drills, which usually kick my ass, and yet today I am still ambulatory! My hip flexors are sore, but hell, I'm walking.
*I had bread for dinner. Bread! Bread and soymilk!
Bad News:
*KH is about 90% certain she's going to quit. I have--I wouldn't characterize it as a crush, really, but you know that feeling when you're just a little bit beyond the boundaries of friendly admiration and it's really important that the other person think you're cool? I like KH. I respect her. She's the only person I work with who I'd even consider giving my blog URL to, and...that's big.
*GG and KH are kind of a matched set--if one goes, the other's almost certain to leave as well.
*We got email from the Evil Overlord today with the name of the person who I think has been appointed to PB's position. I'm currently in a frantic state of annoyance, because I don't like her! But she could be extremely competent! But she's taking PB's position, and PB got canned under highly unprofessional circumstances! But she might be competent enough to make us solvent! But I still don't like her!
*There was also some business in the email about appointing a "transition team" to help my department (read: us therapists) deal with the changes that are occurring. Because we are all five-year-olds, and need hand-holding when we get a new boss. Fuck. We don't need "peer support," we need a boss who's going to advocate for us when the Evil Overlord says, "Our camp director's not available this year? Well, KH can do all the planning for three one-week day camps during her cancellation times, and then GG can run them. What? They have scheduled clients during the weeks of camp? Oh, that's okay, they can cover each other's caseload. No no, it's perfectly ethical to have one therapist handle twenty clients a day, even if our average is nine. Running camps isn't in their job description? Change the description."
*They're also phasing out our transportation program, which means a good chunk of my caseload will have no way to get to therapy. Bye, AV. Bye, EM and AS.
*I do not wish for Lex to get married, and yet I do not wish for Helen to bite the big one. Is there a happy medium?
*The damn loan people keep calling and yelling into my voicemail about how rates are dropping by as much as a whole point and don't we want to refinance and why haven't I faxed them the mortgage note yet?
*I should be looking for the mortgage note right now.
Why I even went to work today I don't know, because the whole day was, like, "Clark's naked ass! T-12 hours and counting!" And yes, there it was, flaming and fine. Huzzah.
But seriously, the best part of the episode? I got to watch it with GG. I never thought this would happen, ever, because he has these freaky Witness policies about levels of fraternization that he can participate in with people outside his religion, and also his semi-girlfriend is a jealous whacko. But tonight, through a complicated series of events, I ended up at EP's place for dinner and she, who is very close to GG in a non-Witnessy way, invited him over so we could all watch it together. I thought I had died and gone to heaven. I about bust a gut during the credits alone: "Watch this! No no no, right there! See Bo Duke right there--no, there! Omar says that's where he looks like he's 'breaking especially pleasing wind!'" We berated Chloe together when she was throwing ultimatums around like door prizes. GG said, "Clark, you are so gay," about four times. When Lionel strode into the ruined Torch office and up into Chloe's face, we simultaneously flung our hands out defensively and yelled, "Personal space!" and then laughed and knocked fists in solidarity. Man, it was good.
GG has been especially fucked over in his past dealings with the Evil Overlord. Now that PB has resigned, he's sending his resume out to other facilities and seriously contemplating applying with the fire department. I can't even think about how much I'll miss him when he goes. This is why I think about my work situation and want to kick somebody.
I had a lovely, relaxing day until the caffeine caught up with me. I thought that the two cups of coffee from the cafe where I sat and read most of the afternoon were out of my system by dinner time, but it turns out they were merely lying dormant, waiting for me to pour two mugs of remarkably potent tea in on top of them. By nine o'clock? Holy fuck, I thought I was having a seizure. SMW and I had eaten wonderful Indian food at a place near the crappy midtown mall, so my plan was to run by the movie theater and see if I could catch Burning Down the House, but of course it wasn't playing until 10pm. So, violently over-caffeinated, I went to Foley's and wandered twitchily through their shoe section. Thankfully I didn't see anybody I knew, because, knees trembling, hands clenching spasmodically, head spinning, I both looked and felt like a junkie. And then, yea, I saw the movie, and it sucked mightily, but I have now seen Michael Rosenbaum snap flashily and say, "Jungle fevah!" and to that I say hallelujah, amen.
I replaced a fuse in my tail light today. Whee! I am so competent and self-reliant!
Okay, so JT from work showed me how to get into the tail light and told me what I needed to buy, but I bought the fuse and replaced it and put everything back together. It was actually really easy, but I still feel cool.
I talked to my jailbird sister-in-law, who sounded peppy. She's still scheduled for release in 2011 if she's good, and 2017 if she's bad. It's weird--on the surface the power imbalances between us are hugely tilted in my favor, but it's still the old inequities that matter. She's never going to have the kind of normal life that I can, but...I'm never going to be as cool as she is. You'd think that wouldn't bother me by now, almost eight years post arrest, but it still rankles.
Spent most of the day thinking about how I'd get home and read Thamiris's new story. Me: "Cons: It's 180K. There will be mythology. And probably poetry that I will hate. None of the references will be familiar to me, as I have not taken an English class since high school and I am deeply uncultured. But but but...pros: hot naked sex!" And of course the story was good, although I continue to find the fruit thing kind of squicky.
Watering my seeds of compassion and understanding by listening to Kid Rock scream about bitches and 40's. Aaaaaahhhh...
Circumstances are no less dire today--people are jumping ship left and right and my chances of getting to Germany are looking less likely by the minute--but I'm at least feeling more upbeat. My three o'clock kid brought his mom and other mom with him today--first time I've met other mom--so it looks like they got back together. I'm glad, because I like mom a lot, and she seemed so proud to be able to show off her partner.
I might possibly have a little crush on Kid Rock. Don't shoot me. I can't help it if I like internal rhyme.
Clouds everywhere...My program director, PB, turned in her resignation today after she saw her position advertised in the weekend classifieds. No, she wasn't informed of her impending dismissal prior to her discovery of the ad. I don't know what this means for our agency and our team, but I'm deeply pessimistic. PB, despite her flaws as a manager, listened to our input, worked with the clients in mind, and stood up for us to the Evil Overlord CEO. She was a buffer between us and the mean-spirited bullshit that comes down from the top of the organization.
We went to dinner as a team to discuss and mourn. We love PB, and we are scared of what's to come with her resignation. GG, who has been there longer than anyone and who has seen two other program directors fall to the Evil Overlord, says he's gone as soon as he can find another position. CMJ is moving to Oklahoma in a month or two anyway. BT is on vacation, but she hates the Evil Overlord and is hot-headed enough that quitting is a strong possibility for her. KH and I talked, and we just don't know. I love my kids, but every day I leave a little more tired, a little less motivated to work for them. I feel myself burning out, and I don't know what to do. I want to leave, but the thought of starting anew in home health care or something is overwhelming, when what I really want is to get pregnant. I don't know.
Even the sight of Clark's ass in the previews for next week left me shivery and teary-eyed. If GG goes, who will I talk Smallville with?
Today was a low-grade variety of bad--nothing overtly awful happened, but I spent most of it feeling tired and edgy. Woke up to nail the cats with the squirt bottle around 5:30 am--they've developed this hellacious habit of scratching the bedroom door at all hours of the night, stopping only when someone either throws them in the computer room or drenches them. The Hubster, more easily annoyed than I, has been doing most of the work for the past several weeks in terms of cat discipline, so I told him that for his anniversary present I'd try to break them of the scratching habit while he's out of the country. They seem to be responding well to the squirt bottle so far, but after I fell back asleep I had muddled, restless dreams full of scratching and yowling, and woke groggy and annoyed.
Was headachey and tired all day; what I think of as "hormone headache," except that seems unlikely. The brightest spot this afternoon was EM flopped like a sack of potatoes in my lap, heavy buzz-cut head on my shoulder. It was pure animal comfort, an odd sense to glean from a six-year-old, but I've had EM since he was four and communicating in single words. We have history.
Since practically the first episode of Smallville, I have been in love with the huge sweeping epic tragedy of it all. I know it's going to end badly, and that knowledge is shredding my fluffy little soul, but yo, I've seen the comics. I get where we're going with the whole "turning evil" thing. And Sarah T. just nails my frustration when she says, "You know, if you're disgruntled, feeling cheated, and unable to cope because your favorite character acts in morally questionable and creepy ways, then PERHAPS YOU SHOULD NOT HAVE PICKED A FANDOM WHERE YOU KNOW IN ADVANCE THAT THAT CHARACTER IS GOING TO GROW UP INTO THE MOST EVIL MAN ON THE PLANET."
She's got a point there. Not that I won't be weeping and wailing when the time comes, but I do know that it's coming.
Hung out with SMW and went shopping last night, which was fun, although I often get overwhelmed in clothing stores. Especially with these trends emphasizing bright colors and capri pants--my body is not compatible with capri pants. SMW and I discussed how someday soon these things will probably be medical diagnoses: you'll be able to find me in the DSM-IV under "Lowrider Ass."
The Hubster made it safely to Munich. I am in negotiations with the new speech therapist, LW, to subvert the vacation freeze so I can visit him for a week in May. Wish me luck.
You know, I don't really love Lex like a brother. Or maybe I do--Luthorcest style.
Okay, eww. But I was very pleased to see discussion of the Lex/Helen relationship in a couple of places, because I couldn't decide last night if I thought Lex was playing her or if he was honestly underestimating the amount of crap he could get away with with her. It hadn't really occurred to me to wonder if Helen had an agenda, but I think LaT sold me. Huh. Cool.
I am procrastinating right now. I am supposed to be returning a phone call to LG to have some sort of deep emotional discussion about the boundaries of our friendship, yet I am feeling kind of icky about that whole subject just now. I set some limits with her via an email discussion earlier in the week ("Having other friends doesn't mean I like you less. Get the fuck over it." Except in a nice way), but she wants to talk about it. I don't. I want to go lie face down on the bathroom floor or something equally antisocial. Bleh.
The new speech therapist starts tomorrow. Hopefully she'll be cool--my main impression of her from her interview was that she was very, very short, and moderately intimidated by me, which is I need to keep an eye on. I have a rather nasty tendancy to poke around for soft spots when someone seems scared of me, and I need to reign that in. Carpe jugulum: no!
I sound like a real bastard tonight. Maybe I'd better go to bed.
Okay, Dr. Bryce? Helen? I really kind of like you as a character, and I think you add a welcome adult presence to Smallville, but after tonight's episode? I'm telling you this as a friend--run. Pack your bags, fire up the engine, and run away. Lex is not "eccentric," he's a crazy person. Crazy like if you switched from regular Coke to diet without telling him, he'd have you dissected. You need to get out. Now.
I love him like the bald little brother I never had, and I was freaked out by Lex in this episode.
I saw The Faculty the other night--great movie, really a fabulous addition to the cheesy teen horror ouevre--and I was raving about it at work today when KH brought me up short. "You don't really think that's a good movie, right?" she says. Well. No. But I've been coming to terms with my approach to cinema consumption recently, and the fact is, I watch movies for a highly specific purpose: brainless entertainment. Period.
Of course there are exceptions--I'm not completely without class or intellect. I still hear the music from The Fast Runner in my head sometimes. Memento was a thrill. But as a rule, I just do not see movies with serious themes. A friend was recently describing The Piano, talking about the cinematography and the brilliant acting and the way the director kept the tension building throughout the duration, and I'm saying, "Holocaust? Huh, sounds interesting," while mentally moving the conversation file to the Forget Immediately folder.
Really, it's pretty easy to tell if I'm going to be interested in a movie: "Moving and emotionally wrenching?" No. "A brilliant meditation on the human condition?" No. "Sweeping historical epic with clear parallels to the challenges of our times?" No. Fart humor? Count me in!
I feel kind of guilty about this. I mean, I like to think I have culture, and more than that, I feel rather crass when I catch myself automatically rejecting a movie because there's a high probability of an original piano score. I guess...this sounds like rationalization, but I think it's true: I absorb and handle the vast majority of my emotions internally and in relative isolation. When I come out of that isolation, the last thing I'm going to be looking for is another big dollop of emotion--I want a break. I want some freaking potty humor. And, well...movies aren't medicine. I'm not going to see it "because I should." For a truly breathtaking movie, I want respectful intentions and an honest reaction. Really, that's all a good movie deserves.
It was a beautiful warm day outside, so naturally the Hubster and I spent it crouched over an industrial stove fixing chili and baked potatos for eighty people. No, really--today I fed eighty people. The Hubster volunteered us to do the buffet after the series race at the yacht club (shut up), so I bought about 200 pounds of food at Sam's yesterday and we made chili and potatos and salad. As a pleasant surprise, the proportions turned out just about perfectly, which was good because for a while there it looked like we were going to have several gallons of chili left over, and while I have a kick-ass recipe, nobody needs that much food in the freezer. We also got many compliments on the chili, including a few from native Texans who liked it in spite of the high bean content. This bean vs. no bean thing is apparently a big deal around here, so I was pleased even though as a rule I do not participate in food wars.
A word to the wise: chili for eighty requires a hell of a lot of chopped onions. Your hands will smell. Your refrigerator will smell. Your house will smell. If you transport the uncooked onions in your car, your car will smell. Your tupperware will positively reek. Baking soda is your friend.
In other news, my dad had a good visit and recovered well from the Sushi Pimp Incident. The night after we took him out for Tex-Mex, and thank the good Lord it wasn't Tuesday Strip Night or anything, so he did at least have a positive dining experience while in Texas.
Some of you may soon be in a position where, as polite host, you wish to entertain older family members by feting them at your city's fine dining establishments. Upon entering the restaurant of your choice, family and gentle friends in tow, you may discover that Mondays are in fact "karaoke night." The restaurant owner and karaoke director may greet your arrival with such words as, "So, karaoke nights are kinda wild and rowdy. That gonna be okay?"
The proper etiquette under these circumstances is to inquire as to the exact parameters of "rowdy." Some useful sample questions may include:
"I notice, sir, that you are dressed as a 70's style pimp. Will you be referring to any woman present as your ho?"
"Are you firmly attached to the idea that sake is the soul of wit?"
"Will you be encouraging patrons to cheer and shout, 'Sake bomb!' at regular intervals?"
"Is the word 'assfuck' a part of your working vocabulary?"
"Will you, at any point in the evening, be simulating anal sex with the patrons?"
"Have you ever, under any circumstances, uttered the phrase, 'I'm gonna tear your tight ass up,' in a group setting?"
"Will you be making any references whatsoever to the size of your penis?"
If the answer to any of these questions is "yes," then you, gentle reader, may wish to shepherd your family elsewhere. Otherwise, seated with your loving father in the center of a crowd of drunken, bellowing karaoke fans, you may find yourself pondering the answer to one final question: "Is it possible to commit ritual suicide using only a set of disposable wooden chopsticks?"
So last night at dinner the Hubster was talking about joining a gym this summer, and my dad sort of nods approvingly and looks at me, and I say, "I'm not joining a gym this summer because I hope to be knocked up by then."
By the way, "knocked up?" Is not one of those phrases that facilitates smooth conversational flow. I'm just glad nobody had to do CPR. But my dad seemed very pleased, and so did my mom when I talked to her later, although that conversation went about like this:
My mom: "Really? Oh Sara, that's so exciting! Oh God, your sister's throwing up again. Gotta go! click"
All in all, visit progressing smoothly.
So, Connexions (or however the hell you spell it) sounds like fun. Shell did my trial run for me, so I hope you all were nice to her. Heh.
Must go pick up my father in a few minutes. He's been in Houston at some conference on metabolic disorders--fun times, fun times--so he's going to come out and kick it for a few days. I'm looking forward to it. Whatever issues I may have about having been raised by him, my dad makes for good company. Plus, he's never seen our house, and he's only been out to my city once in the almost five years I've lived here, and that was for my wedding, so I get to play tourist board. Woo!
*We saw the Battlefield Band again Wednesday night, in the same cozy, dark cafe we've been twice before. The shows run together in my memory--a haze of dark beer, bagpipes, and the ache of longing for a history not my own. The old fiddle player, the one who made me think "Leaving Friday Harbor" was the most beautiful song I'd ever heard, has left the band and moved on to a solo career. The new fiddle guy is a prodigiously talented kid of 19 or so from the island of Lewis in the Outer Hebrides, but he reminded me of nothing so much as a very tall hobbit. He looked like Sam Gamgee after growth hormones, and this combined with the late hour gave the show a surreal air as, half-drugged with fatigue, I began to see mystical significance in the looping after-images his pale bow hand traced on the red velvet stage curtain.
*Driving home from the show I was overcome with melancholy, thinking of all the little warm bodies I've held as a therapist, and all the kids who've gone their separate ways. I thought particularly of the two I remember most from my early childhood practicum: little blond autistic B, who followed my nonsense turn-taking game right into my lap with squeals of joy, while his mother stared in astonishment. The other one I saw only once, but I still think of him--a brown-haired boy with an articulation delay who held a toy up to me and said, "E da dudai adi do." I took a deep breath, stared hard at the toy, and beamed, "Yeah! He's got a butterfly on his nose!" His face flooded with relief, he curled into my lap and rocked, saying, "Your baby, be your baby now."
*I got some sort of leadership award at work, which pleases me very much. Thing is, I'm not exactly sure why I got it--I attended the meeting where it was given out, but the presenters always like to make like Hercule Poirot and give away the identity as a climactic finale, reading the description of the accomplishments first. I was starving and exhausted--my first client of that day had required a take-down and restraint to keep his tantrum in check--and engaged in a private amusement called, "How Many Forkfuls of Thai Leftovers Can Fit in My Mouth at One Time?" Next thing I know, it's a classic double-take: somebody's calling my name, people are clapping, and I'm staring around dumbly with noodles hanging out of my mouth.
*The cell phone call from Shell in Baltimore saying, "I've got somebody here who wants to talk to you!" and the voice on the other line saying, "Hi Sara, this is LaT."
Me: "Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee--"
LaT: "So we're just getting ready to go to dinner, and--"
Me: "--eeeeeeeeeeeeeeee--"
LaT: "This con is fun for just hanging out and meeting folks, and--"
Me: "--eeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!"
Okay, I may have made some light conversation in there somewhere, but that was the extent of my internal monologue. Squealing fangirl I am.
*That phone call set me up well for the rest of the evening--thinking about zillions of women chatting slash was a bit of a trigger.
The Hubster: "After the movie we need to run by Lowe's and pick up some caulk for the guest bathroom."
Me: "Heh. Caulk."
The Hubster: "I need to seal that space between the tub and the floor tile."
Me: "I need a lot of caulk."
The Hubster: "We could try Walmart, but I think Lowe's will have a better selection and they're probably cheaper too."
Me: "'Friday night I went out and picked up some cheap caulk.'"
The Hubster: "What is wrong with you?"
*Now have killer headache and dry, hacking cough. It's probably SARS. Dammit.
Huh. I've been...bored, these past couple of weeks. Trying to decide if it's a symptom of something larger; results inconclusive. On the one hand, I've been completely unmotivated to do anything other than alternate between "unconscious" and "over-caffeinated," which is often my first clue that the unexamined life isn't working out so well. But on the other hand, I don't, you know, feel bad. Just bored.
The high point of my day today was expanding my somewhat unorthodox relationship with V, my client JD's older brother. (I hesitate to use both his initials, as they are VD). V is an enormously tall, stick skinny high school junior who is hearing impaired. In my experience, he's quite charming, but since he doesn't use spoken English and my sign vocabulary is limited to the really important words (mine, stop, play, bathroom, cracker), our interaction so far has consisted mainly of gestures, interpretations from his mom, and frantic facial expressions. The key here, though, is that V loves Smallville, particularly Lex. There was apparently an incident earlier in the year where he cue-balled his head in homage, and you know, I respect that sort of devotion in a fan. So I never miss an opportunity to chat with him (V's mom: "V wants to know if you liked the red kryptonite." Me, leaping around wildly and massacreing my attempts to finger spell: "Yes! It was cool!").
Anyway, I always bring him back to the office and show off whenever I put up a new Lex background on my laptop, and according to mom I've scored big points for that. Well, today V stops mom as she was releasing little brother JD into my tender care, and the gist of the conversation turns out to be, "How come you don't have a picture of Lex with the bloody eye?" Me, chortling with glee: "Oh, I will get you a picture..." So just before the session ends I call V back, and show him my new background, and you would not believe how much nonverbal appreciation of Lex's coolness took place. Hee. Mom said he was very impressed.
The low point of my day was hearing that EP, the occupational therapist and a friend, has been admitted to the hospital with a possible kidney infection. She's two or three months pregnant, so the whole situation is kind of scary. I--well. I love EP, and I know a small fraction of how much she wants this new baby, so I did the best thing I could: I let VC know. VC is another one of our moms, from a Saved family, and a more beautiful person you may never meet. And that woman gets everything she prays for. So I talked to her, and she said, "Oh honey, I get together with a group of sisters once or twice a week to pray, and we will take EP and we will be lifting her up." And I thanked her, because when VC lifts you up, you are gonna get lifted. So when I talk to EP tomorrow I'll tell her not to worry, because VC's on the case. But your thoughts are appreciated too.
So recently I've been feeling kind of burnt out and lethargic at work, the kind of feeling that leads to thoughts like, "Maybe everybody on my schedule will cancel today!" and then vague clouds of guilt. This state is recurrent but fairly short-lived, so I hadn't been paying a lot of attention to it until my boss passed around a list of our core hours today. "Add these up and make sure you've got forty hours a week, plus half an hour per day for lunch on top of that," she says. So I add. Then I stare at the sum. Then I add again. And again. And then I face the fact that for the last who the hell knows how long, I've been scheduled to be at work for FORTY-SIX HOURS A WEEK.
Forty-six. Dammit. Even with what I thought was a massive amount of breaks, I was still scheduled for forty-three hours a week. I mean, sheeee-it. No wonder I felt like I was spending my whole life at work--I was. And I know some of you with tech jobs are laughing your little butts off right now, but dude, I work for a non-profit and it's one of those "inch or a mile" situations. I have no idea how this got past me. But today I got to chop the hell out of my schedule, which made me very happy indeed.
And I said, "Did you know that it's Shelly's birthday?"
She said, "I think I remember the date,"
"As I recall," I said, "we both kinda liked her,"
"Well then," she said, "that's one thing we've got."
She's catching a baby--
What a wonderful way to say, 'Happy birthday!"
Happiness is here and now
I have dropped my worries
Nowhere to go, nothing to do
Except celebrate Shelly's birthday.
Okay, enough of that. Have a great day, hon. I myself am having some kind of pants emergency (I swear I stopped washing them in hot water, and yet I cannot breathe), but I'll try to hang on.
It's a good thing you're a real sweet guy and say things like, "Have a good day, mija," and "Thank you for helping my son," because your son? Was painting his handprint on a vase that's going to become a very charming symbol of our facility and remind everybody of the individual beauty of the kids we serve, and you know how we use acrylic paint for this project? And how acrylic paint doesn't come out of fabric? Well, your son did a wonderful job following directions up until the point where we were walking into the bathroom to wash his hands, and he turns to me and says, "Nyah ha," and HONKS MY LEFT BOOB. And then I had to walk around with a hot pink handprint on my chest for the rest of the day.
We had an accidental breakfast with our across-the-street neighbors this morning--the Hubster and I had just been seated at the little nearby cafe that we like so much when W&B walked in, prompting much humor along the lines of, "Augh! We're being followed!" "Ha ha! Yes, we saw you heading out and figured you must be going someplace good!" "Is this why the previous owners moved out? You stalked them?" and so on.
W&B are great neighbors. They're a super-mega-cute retirement age gay couple who love to stand around in the street and yuk it up, which is my kind of social get-together. Probably the only downfall they provide is the persistent lawn-induced guilt--the Hubster and I are constantly getting home from work in the evening and standing around in the driveway saying things like, "So, W&B are trimming those front hedges. Our hedges could really use some work." "...yeah. Wanna order a pizza?"
It's been approximately eight months since we moved into this house, and our yard is starting to look noticeably scruffy. This may be a direct result of management style. I prefer the "tough love" school of yard work--"You'll bloom and you'll thank me for it!"--whereas the Hubster prefers to let the yard make its own life decisions. Recently, the yard has been making some rather poor choices. I'm thinking we may need to step in.
Wow. I drank a lot of coffee at breakfast, at break-neck speed, and I think I'm starting to come down. I probably ought to go attack the housework before I crash completely.
1. Not taking that apiculture (beekeeping) class when I had the chance. So what if it would have been a completely useless way to earn biology credits?
2. Never punching anybody when I was young and rash enough to get away with it.
3. Not standing up at the dinner table and screaming, "I am not deaf or stupid!" at the top of my lungs at any point in my adolescence.
4. The way I handled most of the guys I met between ages 18 and 22.
5. Not going that one time that guy in my French class invited me to a "Haitian party."
6. Not lying and saying I wanted to be a French teacher during my interview at Congres my senior year in high school. I sincerely believe I would have won a month-long trip to France instead of two crummy tickets to Wild Waters if I had lied about my career plans.
7. Not quitting the french horn until I was well and truly burned out.
8. Not being more judicious in my choice of teachers to approach that time in grad school when I realized that I was trying unsuccessfully to manage my mood swings with Coke.
9. Not finishing the pigeon story while I was still in XF fandom. I still like that one, and I would have dedicated it to Vehemently, who inspired my first-ever fandom dream.
10. Not thanking the owner of that shop in Skagway, Alaska when, during a vigorous game of "Guess My Accent," he seemed genuinely surprised to learn that I was not from Eastern Canada.
I didn't particularly want to do the "100 Things about Me" meme, but my brain started plotting it out when I wasn't looking. So, read and learn. I can't do cut tags--I apologize.
1. I was 6 weeks premature, delivered by C-section because I was "in distress." The first picture we have of me, I have tubes up my nose.
2. I am four and a half years older than my younger sister. Apparently, there were several lost pregnancies between us.
3. My beloved sister M does not have a formal diagnosis, but my professional opinion is that she fits plenty well under Pervasive Developmental Delay-Not Otherwise Specified (PDD-NOS). This is still a broad diagnosis under the huge range that is the autism spectrum, but I find that if I classify her as PDD/autistic, she is considerably less likely to drive me nuts.
4. The majority of my sister's obsessive characteristics are mine, magnified.
5. I can remember being breast-fed. For a long time, I attributed my relatively strong immune system to the length of time I received breast milk.
6. One of my favorite books as a young child was our household medical encyclopedia of childhood diseases. I read it compulsively, and still recall much of the information. In second grade, I diagnosed myself--correctly--with a common parasite.
7. Actually, I read a lot of stuff compulsively. I had certain comfort books that I took everywhere with me for weeks at a time, reading and re-reading without boredom. Some of these included Harriet the Spy, A Little Princess, and I think The Secret Garden.
8. I was not a particularly precocious child. I learned to read in kindergarten or first grade, right along with the middle of the bell curve.
9. My second grade teacher thought that a good way to entertain his students was by making up long, rambling stories in which members of our class got turned into vampires. These stories scared the hell out of me, and prompted my present inability to fall asleep without the covers wrapped around my head and neck, mummy style.
10. To protect myself, I also made up a long list of rules governing vampire behavior. These included things like: Dracula can only leave his castle for one second at midnight, and he moves as slow as a turtle, so he can't get to your house.
11. I continued to have a lot of trouble sleeping as a child. Memo to Mr. Russell: you suck.
12. I hit puberty around eight. It wasn't so cool.
13. I took a lot of acne medication around that time, not because I ever had particularly bad acne, but rather because any acne at all is pretty damn striking on a third grader.
14. Third grade was also when I got glasses. I still laugh when I think about the school screening: I'm standing part way up the aisle in the auditorium, ostensibly so I can read the letters off the eye chart. The screener says, "What's the smallest letter you can read?" Me: "Where's the chart?"
15. I'm pretty near-sighted. I know you don't believe me, because every single person who wears corrective lenses claims to be blind as a bat, but without my contacts I have approximately eight inches of clear vision. It's genetic.
16. I have great teeth. I've never needed braces, and I have hardly any fillings.
17. I've got the two top wisdom teeth, but the bottom ones never developed. Evolutionarily speaking, this means I am more highly evolved than those of you with all four wisdom teeth.
18. As a nine or ten-year-old, I was so passionately attached to a couple of kid humor novels that I hid them in the bed with me for months. The books were Sizzle and Splat and Second Fiddle by Ronald Kidd, and I used to find it comforting to wake up and feel the scratchy library binding pressing into my calves.
19. A fair number of my important sexual crushes have been on women. I'm probably bisexual to some degree, but since I'm married and have no practical experience whatsoever with other women, it seems rather presumptuous to claim it.
20. I go with "functionally straight."
21. Like many future fans, I created a great number of Mary Sue-esque characters for my favorite books and series. One of my favorites was the younger sister who accompanied Hal and Roger Hunt (of the Willard Price animal adventure books, which were highly formulaic and had names like Whale Adventure, Safari Adventure, Volcano Adventure, and so on) on their travels. She was 13 to Roger's 14 and Hal's 19, and if I had to guess her name was probably Sara Hunt. I was pretty blatant about my Mary Sue-ing.
22. I made the ship from Whale Adventure out of a Styrofoam egg carton. There were also two tiny little Styrofoam boys with ballpoint ink faces, and I kept them for ages.
23. I grew up in a relatively liberal Catholic university parish, and thus escaped the animosity toward the Catholic Church that so many seem to have. Intellectually, I get the problems, but emotionally I don't, because my experiences with Catholicism have been primarily positive.
24. I still more or less identify as Catholic, although the outlines are blurred.
25. For instance, the other day I bowed to the Buddha in a Chinese restaurant.
26. My confirmation name is Christopher. I chose him because he is the patron saint of travelers, and also because he figures prominently in an L.M. Boston book that I loved when I was little.
27. Of the three sports trophies I've earned, two of them say, "Most Improved Player."
28. As a youth basketball player, I averaged two points a season.
29. I was a terrible softball player. Despite intensive coaching from several people over two seasons, I could not (and cannot) throw the damn ball farther than about thirty feet. To illustrate, that means that as a catcher, I could not return the ball to the pitcher without standing up, flinging my entire weight into the throw, and then watching the pitcher lunge forward off the mound to retrieve the ball.
30. I did have occasional flashes of brilliance, though, such as one spectacular out where I materialized under a ball in right field. I don't remember much about the catch except knocking my cap off and running. Ah, the glory days.
31. My motor planning skills are below average, although they seem to be integrating as I get older. I still can't trust my body to copy any kind of complex movement, though.
32. Not surprisingly, I can't dance worth shit.
33. I desperately wanted a twin brother when I was younger. I had an imaginary one, either Jonah or Jonas, I can't remember which, who stayed with me until I was at least eleven.
34. I'm now married to a twin.
35. I used to narrate my daily adventures in my head, in a semi-conscious fashion. I caught myself one day by following up some comment with, "...said Sara."
36. When I was learning to touch type in high school, I spent a couple of weeks compulsively typing out conversations and lectures on a keyboard in my head. It was quite the cognitive drain, but I couldn't turn it off.
37. I got my period the summer after fourth grade. Elementary schools do not have sanitary napkin disposal bins in the bathroom stalls.
38. I actually met my husband at a mutual acquaintance's birthday party before we started sixth grade. He was fighting with his twin sister and I wanted him to shut up.
39. I met him for real the week before ninth grade band camp started. I liked him that time.
40. I have a certain amount of innate musical talent, but I don't like to practice and I have a tendency to freeze up in performance situations. You can more or less compensate for this on the violin, but on wind instruments such as the French horn where breath support is everything, it's the kiss of death.
41. Although I can technically read music, I have difficulties that I liken to dyslexia when it comes down to it. I am more or less unable to read rhythm unless it's quite simple, and I often found that when confronted with a sheet of music, even familiar music, it was meaningless to me until somebody started playing. I play primarily by ear, so once I had a tune I could follow along, but I couldn't do much decoding on my own. I suspect, though, that if I were to ask around this might be a pretty common problem.
42. I won a lot of academic awards in high school. Two years in a row I got "Best Student in English" out of my fancy-dancy accelerated program, and I got a bunch of prizes for French too.
43. The accelerated program was the International Baccalaureate program, a fairly prestigious deal where you take a lot of internationally standardized exams. When I was there, my high school IB program was one of the top-performing in the world.
44. Although I loved the challenge of the program, I'm not at all happy with the intellectual elitism and sheer snobbery that was bred into us there.
45. Some of my bitterness comes from the fact that the magnet program was two hundred middle-class white kids getting bused to a poor black high school in the South. Gee, do you think racial tensions were kind of high?
46. My public school education, surrounded almost exclusively by other "gifted" kids, meant that it took me a long time to grok the fact that A). most people do not test as high on the Stanford-Binet as I do, and B). I am still way at the bottom of the heap when it comes to practical knowledge.
47. My high school French teacher, who taught in the IB program and had about twenty years of experience, said I was one of the best students she'd ever had.
48. I got an unprecedented high score on my IB French exam (and the AP one, too), but right now I could maybe get myself a hotel room in French if you put a gun to my head. I'd like to think that it's dormant, rather than gone.
49. As part of the foreign language exam, we had to interview with a native French examiner. My senior year, I did an independent study sort of thing since I'd already finished the standard course with the aforementioned high score as a junior. For part of it, I had to pick a topic--either the politics or the environment, both of which made me want to yak--to discuss with the examiner. During the interview, my French teacher, sitting in the waiting room providing moral support while I was in with the examiner, freaked out when she heard raucous laughter coming from the exam room. I'd provoked it with the following exchange: French dude, subtitled: So, the environment, it is an interest of yours? Me: No.
50. Because of my exam scores, I got a year of college credit and a free ride through undergrad.
51. Good thing, because I hated my life when I was in college, and having to have paid for that experience would have really pissed me off.
52. Between high school and college, I spent seven years in marching bands playing mellophone.
53. I cared nothing about football, but I liked playing and I liked getting shipped around the country to support the team.
54. Some of the places I went with various bands included: San Francisco, CA; Tempe, AZ for the National Championship; Baton Rouge and New Orleans, LA; whatever the big football school is in Alabama; some horrible place in Mississippi where I ate at a fried chicken joint and then almost puked on the bus during the video of Braveheart; Atlanta, GA; and Memphis, Tennessee. And lots of places in Florida.
55. My first job was as a dishwasher and mouse care provider in my dad's lab.
56. One of the post-docs there was this guy J, who used to give me long, incomprehensible spiels on financial planning and the stock market, which is not information that should ever be forced on a person trapped behind a three-foot pile of used petri dishes. In spite of this, I enjoyed his company, and consider myself forever in his debt because he made me a tape containing the first X-Files episode I ever watched.
57. That episode was "One Breath." I think much of the reason that XF grabbed, held, and ultimately shattered me was because my first impression of Mulder was that of the broken man, hunched over sobbing in the doorway of his darkened apartment.
58. I have never loved a bad guy the way I loved Alex Krycek. Lex, you're my one and only now, but you live forever in his shadow.
59. I love fruitcake. Apparently this is unusual.
60. I'm double-jointed, and I can also do this thing where I wiggle the tendons in my thumbs that nobody I've met has ever seen before. It really grosses people out.
61. I ran a marathon last February. It took me just over six hours.
62. I am very, very good with shy toddlers. I cannot count the number of times I've heard, "He's talking to you? He never talks to strangers!"
63. I've never broken any bones, although I did once chip a tooth trying to wakeboard.
64. To my great surprise, the first time I soloed in a Sunfish I was told I was a natural sailor. Unfortunately, I've only soloed once more in the year and a half since then.
65. As a child, I hated boats. I didn't get seasick, but I was terrified of the rocking.
66. My dad's side of the family, the one I know most about, is Greek. There is an apocryphal story of a paternal great-grandmother meeting a maternal great-grandmother and accusing her line of being descended from Macedonian hill bandits.
67. The summer of 1999, I drove all over Lewis and Harris, the two largest islands in the Outer Hebrides, Scotland, with my best friend HB. Not long after we returned, I learned that some of my mother's cousins had found record of the birth of my great-(possibly great-great-)grandfather, Angus McExtremelyScottishSurname on Barra, a tiny island south of Harris.
68. I spent a night in the Yukon on my honeymoon.
69. For a high school English assignment--something to do with a character study--I wrote the "Femme Fatale," two pages brimming with such loaded erotic imagery that my English teacher refused to finish reading it out loud to the class.
70. That was about the extent of my adolescent rebellion.
71. I know how to catch, dry, and mount butterflies.
72. I used to be able to classify insects by Order, as well as make and maintain a kill jar.
73. I've never for one minute considered not having children. Even when my main goal in life was to live someplace overseas and garden a lot, I always pictured having little boys.
74. I'm considerably more afraid of raising a daughter than I am of raising a son.
75. My mom's history of difficult pregnancies troubles me deeply. I worry that I will either have problems conceiving, thus rendering many years of fussing over birth control pointless, or problems carrying a pregnancy to term.
76. When I was four, we lived in Boston for a year while my dad was on sabbatical. I was obsessed both with sculpting tiny families of birds out of playdoh and with the door frames in our married student housing apartment. For some reason, the hole where the doorknob fixture-thing slotted into wasn't just a notch, but was an empty pit hollowed out in the frame. I lost a great deal of playdoh sending the birds to "roost" in the walls.
77. That was also the year when I taped pieces of thread to the lower backs of everyone in the house to simulate tails.
78. Between four and five I was fixated on a half-hour nature program--it may have been called Wild Kingdom, although I think that was a different show, the one with Marty Stouffer--but the first show I remember being fannish about was GIJoe. I was heavily invested in the Flint/Lady Jay relationship.
79. I have met Red Green, shaken his hand, and entered a duct tape chandelier in a contest held in his honor. This means there are only two degrees of separation between myself and Paul Gross, and three degrees between me and CKR.
80. I've also met and shaken hands with Omar of televisionwithoutpity fame. He was very polite, and I felt like a huge dork.
81. I've had my hair cut in the style of two separate characters on The X-Files: early-series Scully, where she had the shoulder length cut that was longer in back than in front, and Krycek from the "Anasazi/Blessing Way/Paperclip" trilogy.
82. Three different people have told me I write like Ray Bradbury.
83. A guy once told me I was sexually boring when I said I thought mud wrestling was disgusting.
84. I once had to get my cartilage piercing replaced because I got kicked in the head. The girl at the piercing place thought I was really fucking cool until I let it slip that the kicker was a six year old.
85. I paid good American dollars to stand in line for an autograph from Ray Park (Darth Maul and Toad from X-Men). I have a bookmark with gold glitter pen reading "feel the force!" but I had to look up his name just now.
86. Sorry, but I don't get the big deal about vibrators. Yes, I have one. Yes, I know how to turn it on.
87. I have great auditory memory, and terrible loudness perception.
88. My best friend and love interest from ages 3 to 6 or so was a boy named TE, a brilliant child who is now a top-notch kite designer in Australia. I have a dim memory of stooping in the dirt of the crawl space under his house, conducting an "experiment" where we somehow shocked each other using a spoon and a piece of twine. There must have been more to it, because it worked, but that was my comprehension at the time.
89. Sometime mid-graduate school, when the only things that made me happy were Krycek slash and Coke, I gave up collecting. I used to spend a lot of energy hunting down pictures and articles and action figures and random celebrity TV appearances, and then, abruptly, I decided that knowing that I would never find all of them, that I simply couldn't keep up with someone else's whole life, hurt too much. So I quit.
90. The more time I spend around drooling kids, the more tolerant I get of dogs.
91. In high school I used to sew complex, whimsical, stuffed animals--"soft art," I believe they call it--as gifts for friends. I pulled the patterns out of thin air, and the majority of them came out fabulously. However, I have no practical abilities with a sewing machine, and resort to hand-mending or paying for alterations whenever necessary.
92. If I were one of the Seven Deadly Sins, I would be Sloth.
93. I have threatening dreams nearly every night. The most frequently recurring theme is that of blindness--having partial sight, having only peripheral vision, having my eyes covered, losing my contacts or glasses, visual obstructions of all sorts. Being pursued is a close second.
94. I have a tattoo of wings at the base of my skull. It's partially under my hairline, so unless you were looking you probably wouldn't notice it.
95. I am not a stutterer per se--if you met and talked with me you would assume that I was a typically fluent person. However, when tired enough, stressed enough, under enough pressure and cognitive drain, I will produce noticeable sound and word repetitions and blocks. Fluency is a continuum, yo.
96. I vividly remember the first time I was conscious of blocking: standing in one of my undergrad professor's offices, asking her some mostly unnecessary question about grad school. I completely froze up on a laryngeal block, and had a blistering flash of empathy for every person who lives with stuttering on a daily basis.
97. At an outdoor festival, I once had a very persuasive older gentleman sit down next to me and spend the better part of an hour explaining why I should return with him to Mexico to meet his son.
98. For some reason, I have an absolutely terrible time learning how to play games of any type--board games, card games, computer games, anything involving strategy--and consequently dislike and avoid them. When it comes to playing any game more complex than Candyland with my speech kids, I just make up rules wildly in hopes that they won't ask me to read and interpret the instructions.
99. The most backhanded compliment I ever received was from my mother. I overheard her speaking with a friend about me--the friend said something about how I seemed mature and self-possessed for my age, and my mom, in a highly dubious tone of voice, said, "Well...she's certainly never been swayed by peer pressure." I suspect that this, innate independence versus the need to be part of a community, is the crux of many matters for me. How to be a little more interested in others, how to be a little less of my own person and a little more of a friend, how it's occasionally necessary to go along with my friends because they're my friends, even when I don't give a good goddamn about martinis or painting pottery or Homicide or whatever. Remembering to engage.
100. I like having secrets.
Snow days are the coolest thing ever. I spent yesterday lying around the house in my pajamas, reading, drinking coffee, and occasionally calling in to work just to listen to the sweet, sweet sound of the answering machine: "Our offices are closed today due to icy road conditions." Ha! Aha ha ha! Eeeeeee!
I'm from Florida, remember. This is all new to me! New and wondrous!
Played the violin for about an hour tonight, something I haven't done in roughly ten years. It went fairly well, considering. It was--God, I know I have musical talent, but I'd forgotten how much more intuitive the violin is after so many years with the french horn. I could feel the intervals, I could find notes without thinking, without working so damn hard.
I'd have a lot of bad habits to adjust if I were to get back into it. I bow at an angle, for instance--watching in the mirror it was obvious how much I was sliding around, instead of cutting a clean line across the strings. My bow grip has never been right--something about the amount of tension I use, which I think is probably a function of weak hand and forearm muscles. My left wrist was breaking a little, a beginner's mistake. And I never learned vibrato, which is more or less why I quit in the first place. But I have an ear with the violin, and good strong tone, something I never had with the horn. I haven't missed playing these past ten years, but I might like to try again.
I'd like to comment on "Prodigal," but somewhere between Lex in jeans with a pitchfork and Lex and Lucas fighting dirty in the gym, I swooned and missed the rest of the episode. Fuck, that was hot.
You know those columns in magazines like Woman and Redbook that are always called things like, "Can This Marriage Be Saved?!," where first the woman tells her side of the story, then the man, and then the shrink tells them both to stop acting like morons and maybe get help with the daddy issues? That's my life.
This weekend: Sara attends peaceful, contemplative retreat where she meditates on how to protect her mind, body and the world from toxins. The Hubster stays up all night snarfing Girl Scout cookies and playing a video game based on killing zombies with a board with nails sticking out.
Picture this: it's somewhere between 5 and 6 o'clock in the morning. I'm asleep, in that restless state where any unexpected noise or movement is enough to yank you back to consciousness. In my dream, I'm in possession of the Ring of Power. I'm small, a hobbit or possibly a dwarf. As is typical of most of my dreams, I am pursued. Gollum attacks me and we wrestle for control of the ring, which I have slid onto my index finger ala Elijah Wood. In an attempt to trick me, Gollum tries to pry off my wedding ring instead. Since, to my knowledge, I have never removed my wedding ring since it was put on during the wedding ceremony (this is true), I become unnerved and panic. I escape Gollum and run, suddenly invisible. Gollum and his little helper, a small rubbery creature with fangs, follow. I alternate confusedly between wearing the ring and not, invisible but not see-through, more like a blur in the air or James Bond's invisible car in Die Another Day. We're in a great hall of some kind, decorated for Christmas with pine trees and huge red and green draperies. I climb to the top of a fifteen foot window and stand petrified on the sill, knowing Gollum has seen me block out the background and can place my movements. He and Little Helper begin to climb the stone walls toward the sill, whispering and coughing (gollum) back and forth to each other. They are almost upon me, and it will go badly with their teeth and claws. I time it carefully, and the moment before they close in on me I leap, clearing ten or fifteen feet of stone floor and Christmas parade to grab the draperies and slide down to the floor. I duck under the draperies and run, invisible.
My first amorphous thought upon waking is extreme displeasure at having possession of the One Ring. "Why do I always have to be the Ringbearer?" I snit, lying there with the covers up to my nose and the Hubster snoring away next to me. "Fuckin' elves."
Temperatures in Key West are at a record low, I have a cold, and the Hubster is recovering from what was either a 24-hour bug or the conch sandwich of doom. Must be a vacation.
They called the race early yesterday because of the weather, but our boat had shredded a spinaker and decided to come in early anyway. Today the wind was such that it would have been more a test of survival skills than a test of sailing experience, so only a few boats actually raced.
We're leaving tomorrow for the drive back to Texas, which I plan to spend unconscious if possible.
A note on free internet access: this is not the place to a). conduct important international business deals, b). finish your dissertation, or c). experience the wonder of the internet for the first time. Please.
Turned twenty-six without much incident yesterday, other than public, mildly drunken watching of Smallville:
Crazy drunk older people we're sharing the condo with: Sara! Here's a cake! Happy birth--
Me, flinging palms in air: Don't talk to me when Lex is onscreen!
The temperature has risen, the wind has dropped, and the sailors are doing pretty well. All is satisfactory.
Free internet access! Free rum! Free goldfish crackers! Woo!
Today was the first day of racing, which I watched from one of the tenders (power boats who cater to the needs of sailing vessels). If you've never attended a regatta, here's the rundown:
Because saying it thusly to her face would be in very poor judgement:
Jesus fuck, woman, take the damn medication! You're clinically depressed! It's not going away by itself! You say you want help, and I think you really do, but right this second I want to kick you in the teeth rather than sit with you in your goddamn suffering, because I am sick to death of this passive-aggressive bullshit about how if you get better nobody will care about you anymore. What the hell do you think I've been doing for the past three years?! I'm not in it for the light conversation, that's for damn sure.
You want help? Talk to the doctor. You were right there this afternoon and you chose not to ask, and I DON'T WANT TO HEAR about how you're feeling even worse this evening. You can be scared all you need, and I will support you in "scared," but I am not going to support you in manipulating the fuck out of me in an effort to make sure I'll still care.
I want to help you, and I want to be your friend. Start acting like one.
I didn't actually have much of a critical reaction to "Visage." Mostly, it was me clutching a couch pillow to my bosom and warbling, "Lex! How I have longed for thee!"
That, and during the long shot of Lex and Helen disappearing down the hospital corridor, Lex in solid black and Helen in stark white, it was more like, "Symbolism! Burning! My eyes!" But yeah, it was good to see everybody again.
So Friday I'm leaving for about nine days of frolicking in Key West while the Hubster crews in a regatta. Although I'm from Florida, I've never been that far south, so I'm looking forward to it. I'm also looking forward to not losing the Hubster in a tragic jib accident, so keep us in mind.
Operation Shape the Future is running at full throttle, and all signs point to success at this juncture. Thank God, because this shadow business is tiring. As CW, the student, is bright and gives off such the air of quiet confidence, I keep forgetting that she's not actually even a speech undergrad yet. I'm continually brought up short by her questions, which, while appropriate and frequently quite insightful, tend to be on the level of, "So what exactly is autism?" I'm explaining as much as I can, but I still get the feeling that much of it's flying right over her head.
And the explaining! Aieeee! I've spent the last two days justifying my every move:
CW, bright-eyed: So what are you working on here?
Me, wearing the professional hat: Answering "when" and "why" questions in the context of a pretend play activity.
CW: And here?
Me: Monitoring usage of directional prepositions.
CW: And what about now?
Me: Uh, now we're rolling around on the floor playing WWF cage match. Wanna be the ref?
Well. She seems to like what she's seen so far. I mean, I play with little kids all day. What's not to like?
Tomorrow I have a shadow. A very poised, attractive, and personable young women from the local community college is job-shadowing me for the next three days, and oh hell I have to act like a professional. Fuck, I could be shaping young lives here. I should probably wear a clean shirt.
