I Go Straight For The Aardvark.

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At The Tone...

If you've been trying to reach me lately, I've been out of it.

Out of the state for a few days, and out of sorts since then.

I feel like I'm trying to figure a lot of stuff out, but I also feel like maybe I'm trying to think about stuff you aren't supposed to think about, just feel or endure or pass through.

I dunno.

It's so hard to talk, to write email, to communicate anything with meaning. Boredom and distraction are easily available, but not so much stuff that matters.

Can't really articulate it.

Maybe this is what it feels like to be cooked, transformed from one state to another.

Happy Birthday!

Happy Birthday

rmd !!!

Remembrance

My mother's father served in the Army during WWII. I don't remember him ever telling stories about it.

My mother's aunt Anne served in the Air Force for a long damn time. She has a secret smile she gets when I talk about the history of cryptography.

My Dad served in the Navy during Vietnam (he volunteered), but (fortunately) ended up on a European tour instead of in/near the jungle.

I am grateful to them, and I am grateful that they survived the experience.

I am grateful to all members of the armed forces.

I will not forget.

Wrenching Productivity From The Muck

It feels like slogging through hip-high mud to be productive.

BUT! I have gotten a few things done in the last week:

I FINALLY made biz cards out of the design I commissioned this summer (and that I've had since JULY). They arrived today! (This is for http://www.kjcedits.com - you can see the design at the Boston Area Small Press and Poetry Scene web site - it's a few ads down the page)
Made an appointment with the psychiatrist at her new location before my pills ran out
Got out of bed every day since last Tuesday (when I stayed in bed with back & neck pain) during the day time (by 2pm, in fact! Even by 11:30am on a few days! May be related to getting IN bed by midnight or 1am most nights.)
Notified all my active clients of an impending vacation (a very brief vacation)
Requested a pill refill (on another medication) BEFORE I ran out AND before we went away!
Two con-calls with one client
Started the ball rolling with another client
Wrote a summary of the October meeting of the Somerville Garden Club
Edited a bunch of articles for the SGC November newsletter
Sent a bunch of emails I've been meaning to send
Made a list of copy shops in Somerville & Cambridge (potential places to market my editing services)
Edited a letter I want to send to a certain set of folks to make them aware of my editing services! Also, ran the edits by a friend in the industry.
Bugged MYP Tony to pay me for October
Tracked down and fixed ALL bouncing email addresses on the SGC email list
Sent out a query about an outfit that sent me an unsolicited invitation to take a test (and see if I might be able to work with them) as to whether they're legit

Still REALLY need to get a few more things done:

Call local copy shops & get names of managers/owners
Sign & date contract & send back to new client
Finish necklace commission
Catch up on voicemail
Work on my damn marketing
Call potential new therapist
Call PC Doc
Finish SGC Writer's Group story tracking file & send to group members
Buy shampoo & conditioner
Craft day with muffyjo
Sign up for a couple of craft fairs before Christmas

Worst Year Yet!

We only got eleven kids this Halloween. ELEVEN! Twelve if you count the mini-pin whose owner insisted it was a really small, well-costumed child.

And me with my giant spiderweb, giant spider, egg sac, TWO strings of orange lights, rotating color lightbulb in the porch light, big skull, little skull (with creepy rag dress), window decorations, home-made clip-on bat, home-made rat with rat-hole, tombstone, FOG MACHINE, and, last (but not least) home-made Halloween 2009 MUSIC MIX! With creepy sound effects between each Halloween-themed song!

PLUS, I was dressed as a pirate lass! (Though I called myself The Pirate Queen. Yarrr.)

Jeez.

Ya just can't please some people.

(Yes, I had candy too. Sheesh. Like that's even a question.)

Foods I Don't Like: A List

I do not think these foods evil nor even morally deficient. I simply happen to not like them. So don't go all "WHAT'S WRONG WITH ONIONS?!" on me because there's nothing wrong with them, I just don't wanna eat 'em.

Also, I'm not posting this list so that you all will MAKE A NOTE OF IT or something. I'm quite capable of eating stuff I don't like to be polite or try a new version; I can even pick out bits I can't eat. It's just a common topic of discussion and I thought it would be interesting to put it in one place, especially in contrast to my previous post about "A dozen things I LOVE to eat".

Foods What I Don't Like (Roughly, Most Hated to Least):

Onions (including scallions, shallots, leeks, spring onions, or whatever the hell you want to call them)
Bell peppers (and, to a lesser extent, most peppers - there's an odd bitter tang in them for me; also, I'm a spice wimp)
Mushrooms (mainly, those floppy, drippy, slimy gray mushrooms you get in a can; I have eaten and enjoyed mushrooms, especially morels and portabella, but in general they do NOT agree with my digestion and enough of them taste vile to me that I view the majority of them with suspicion)
Beef (I have, in my life, enjoyed beef but it makes me feel oogy so I stopped eating it about 20 years ago; on that theme, I don't eat mammals, except the pig... the tasty, delicious, YUMMY pig)
Coffee (Smells OK, but I can't stand the taste; the only way I can drink it is drowned in cream and vanilla flavoring and sugar and even then, I don't really like it so much as I can not hate it)
Walnuts (actually, I don't mind them, though I've often found them to be bitter; however, they are a SURE FIRE way to give me a ton of lip blisters as they are high in the amino acid arginine, so I view them with a peculiar mental loathing)
Cooked fish (yes, I'm a big sushi fan, but I can't stand most cooked fish; we've found a couple of types of cod and tilapia from Stop & Shop and Trader Joe's that are mildly flavored with tasty coatings, so I like them; and I'll eat a mild fish stew, but I find the vast majority of cooked fish yucky.)
Raisins (I have deep-seated mixed feelings about raisins. I can enjoy them out of the box, but then HATE THEM in my bread pudding, then love them in some Indian dishes, then HATE THEM in other dishes, etc; it's mainly texture & mouth feel, but ALSO some aspects of flavor)
Eggplant (which I do sometimes like, but it makes my lips itchy and it's rarely well-prepared so I generally avoid it)
Peanuts (I love peanuts... LOVE THEM! But, like walnuts, they make me blister FAST so I avoid them.)

ALSO!

I FORGOT to say ALSO that being in pain for so long sufficiently stressed my body that I got a BIG HONKIN' BLISTER on my lip which also hurts.

Stupid hoomin body, always breakin down.

Swallow

Pills I've taken so far today:

1 thyroid replacement
1/2 my old anti-depressant
1 new anti-depressant
1 multi-vitamin
2 Tylenol

My neck is killing me. I think a vertebrae slipped out of alignment on Sunday or Monday (happens a couple times a year) and my right shoulder freaked out in compensation. Only got out of bed for a couple of hours yesterday, it hurt so much. Tylenol PM last night and a warm shower this afternoon have helped, but damn.

I HATE swallowing pills and I hurt.

I'm feeling very whiny today.

Recipe of the Day

It's SULFURIFIC! Yeah, I'm weird, whatever.

Ingredients:

Directions:

Toast two slices of bread. Microwave a tablespoon of butter. Mix a couple shakes of Paprika into butter, then use a pastry brush to apply it to the toast.

Slice an avocado in half, remove pit, and slice each side into at least 4 slices (if you slice it more than four times, you can do more layering).

Throw a pat of butter into a small frying pan and turn the heat to just above medium.

Thoroughly mix two eggs and a bunch of milk in a measuring cup (for easy pouring) until it's pale yellow. Wait til the butter stops complaining and pour the eggs into the frying pan. Stir gently and occasionally until you have fully-cooked but big floppy scrambled eggs.

Use a slotted spatula to mound eggs on avocado toast (also helps you to leave behind any liquid still in the pan). Season with salt. Eat with hands OR a knife & fork.

Granny Panties

I achieved another unwanted milestone in getting older last night...

I pulled a muscle chasing after a young hooligan.

(Some selfish little bitch thought it would be funny to kick the already-broken glass window of the MYP so that it broke some more.)

Sorry Sorry Sorry

I've been offline for days, in a sleeping daze, trying to switch back to sleeping during the night and being awake during the day.

Ugh.

I'm catching up on emails & voicemails & LJ & LinkedIn & Twitter & Facebook & whatever-the-hell else right now, but I'm also trying to get a couple of contracts done, so please be patient. Thanks.

Where The Wild Things Cry

Saw Where The Wild Things Are tonight with

rmd and

clauclauclaudia.

I liked it very much, but I cried a lot.

I think I cried because it reminded me that it's hard to accept that we will never be loved the way we truly want to be loved.

Or maybe that's just me.

Mental Spew & The Walking Meditation

Yes, I DO have some logorrhea goin' on.

Sorry, friends list!

I actually did a walking meditation on Friday morning. ( More... )

I drove to work on Sunday because it was so miserable out and I was terribly late. So I haven't tried another walking meditation yet, but I'll do it again. Maybe this Friday if not before.

Awake, With Eggs

I've switched my days & nights around really quite thoroughly this past week. ( More... )

I keep wondering if I'm rewiring my brain or if it just gets overloaded with the anti-depression drugs and the thinking and the body stuff and needs to cool off before agreeing to shift into gear.

Random Thoughts On Privilege

I always spell "privilege" wrong, dammit.

I am a 39-year-old Caucasian heterosexual female in a long-term, committed, monogamous relationship with a Caucasian male. We were each raised Catholic, although I would say I am lapsed to the point of welcoming excommunication, except that it would upset my Grandmother and my favorite aunt.

When people say bigoted things, or make bigoted jokes, I refute them (if I'm fairly sure it won't get me killed; although that doesn't always stop me). I have not always refuted them (there were a couple of incidents in college of which I am still ashamed) but I do now.

I do not consider myself prejudiced. I believe in accepting all people and all practices. I draw limits around hurting others non-consensually, especially hurting children. But these are practices I cannot accept to be around without taking action to prevent them or end them. I cannot reject out of hand people who have performed these actions in the past and repent them (religiously or irreligiously) now.

Supposedly, I have Caucasian heterosexual privilege, although (to be honest) I suspect it's offset by being a woman.

This may well be a bone-headed and rude thing to ask, but...

If you are a person of color, a lesbian, a gay man, a bisexual person, a transsexual or transgendered person, a practitioner of non-monogamy, a practitioner of BDSM, or some other "alternative" type of person (a stupid term, by which I clumsily mean someone who isn't a Caucasian, heterosexual, monogamous, Christian, and vanilla), is there something - anything - that I can do to help?

I can't afford to contribute financially to organizations that help ease the burdens or promote the rights of those who are not considered mainstream. Maybe my own "White Man's Burden/Straight Girl Burden" has just gotten too heavy lately, now that I can't offset my guilt with money, but I feel like I'm flapping my arms uselessly at the world, saying "Stop that! Leave those people alone! And let those folks get married, you selfish jerks!"

Is this imagined Caucasian heterosexual privilege worth anything?

I Love Stephen Fry

Honestly, I didn't know much about Stephen Fry before I started following him on Twitter. I'd heard of Fry & Laurie, of course, but mostly because of Laurie's newfound popularity on his own TV show. My sole exposure to British comedy as a child was Monty Python. The length and breadth of what's considered "British comedy" was lost on me for decades, honestly. And BBC America's appalling editing practices have only encouraged me to continue to keep my eyes shut to it.

I still follow Fry on Twitter, unlike many others whom I have unfollowed (and how long before "unfollowed" makes it into the dictionary? I'm willing to lay odds...), because he is articulate and funny. I do NOT follow him because I want him to think for me.

It turns out that nearly 900,000 people follow Fry, presumably for their own reasons, some of which may align with my own, while others clearly do not. And he's written an interesting essay about it, and about occasionally being an ass who speaks before he thinks.

http://www.stephenfry.com/2009/10/19/poles-politeness-and-politics-in-the-age-of-twitter/

Like Fry, my parents periodically lamented to me, "You don't THINK!" I suspect it offended my Mother all the MORE when I did stupid things because I was a smart and sensible youth. The subtext was, "You are better than that" and my response to this refrain has always been lacking.

In his essay, Fry explains something inappropriate that he said:

think

But I must say, that his analysis of his own issue is beautifully presented and I can think of no better way to explain my own lapses in judgment than with his comment:

[...] I cannot keep my mouth shut. If a joke or a neat phrase or an apparently convincing rhetorical trope or apt simile occur to me they will emerge from my mouth without passing Think. As Scalzi said when he linked to this essay (which is how I discovered it), "Yes. That."

I recommend reading the entire essay. It is worth the time. Quite thought-provoking.

Happy Birthday!

Happy Birthday

kimberlogic !!!
(So glad you survived to see this one!
Please stick around for many more!)

Stomping on Liberty?

This looks to me like a pretty clear-cut case of giant corporation trying to crush the little guy. Maybe you disagree?

Matt and "The Monster"
Rock Art Brewery vs. Monster Energy Drink

Matt's video-based explanation & commentary on the ridiculousness of this lawsuit can be found at the Rock Art Brewery site: http://rockartbrewery.com/

...or at YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kbG_woqXTeg

Upshot: The company that produces the Monster "energy drink" wants to enter the alcohol market, so they're looking to clear out the competition beforehand by forcing Rock Art Brewery to stop making their Vermonster beer. Seriously? Evil.