random slashes of my thursday morning

- The first is simply a corollary to my post from Tuesday. We will call it texts I never wanted to receive. "You have to get here soon. {Client x} just told me she thinks she is gay and that she and {her best friend} are in love".
- When you are in mental health, you HAVE to keep your beliefs out of your work. For example, you may want to offer a congratulatory hug and words of how happy you are for your teen-aged client when she expresses her sexual identity as mentioned above. However, the fact that she was raised in a conservative religion and that she is completely emotionally dependent upon, yet barely tolerated by her family of origin even now causes a professional to reflect upon the grave professional responsibility (e.g. exactly how many ways bad therapy could fuck up her life right now) in handling this issue appropriately.
- I am sad that I still live in a world where it is not yet safe for a teen-aged girl to explore her sexual identity (and I mean this in terms of emotional soul searching and expressing her thoughts freely, as opposed to explore in the "my license says yes but my daddy says no" way).
- We have a Big Meeting today. I am skeert. I cannot sleep. I dreamt last night that I was homeless and sleeping in fields that had cow-poop everywhere. Apparently, Gill had left me and was trying to get custody of the kids so he could raise them with the help of my mother (who made one of her many inspiring cameos in the dream) and the cow-poop field sleeping was really detracting from my position. I did have a nice stable-like things for the kids to sleep in and I thought it might strengthen my case.
- The dream could have stemmed from the Turnip pooping on the living room carpet last night and the subsequent argument that ensued immediately afterwards. (Yes our carpet is getting quite the work-out this week). I have to say though folks, even retrospectly, I still firmly hold my position that when there is a naked baby in front of you and a pile of baby-shit on your carpet, blame-placing is petty and futile.
- The nails are rapidly deteriorating. I keep looking at my hands and thinking of the Agatha Christie novel "And Then There Were None".

Conversations I didn't want to have today

(directed to me)
Every sentence involving the videogame "art of persona" or anime, or anime conventions.

A vivid description of a show involving a tribe of folks who circumcise their boys at age five and force them to live apart from their mommies until the wounds heal nine weeks later.

A detailed list of all the ways a mother could die. A list so detailed that she forgot why she even brought the topic up. (needless to say, I did not remind her)

A recap of the episode of "intervention" where a lady let her two year old play with a pack of crystal meth.

(coming from me)

A weak and sad explanation as to why I tear you from your crib as you sleep, force you to ride "stuck" for twenty minutes and then leave you at the sitters.

A weak and defeated explanation as to why it takes more energy to scream that you are too tired to make nachos than it actually would take to make the nachos.

A four hour cycle of repeating the phrases "please stop stepping on me. Please don't climb on my head. Please stop irritating your brother. Please stop screaming. Please tell me what you want. Please. Please. Please."

Actually having to defend the presence of spaghetti on the living room floor which was so not fair since my position on babies and the grossness of mixing them with red sauced foods has been clearly documented for the past five years. (everyone knows babies are best mixed with cream based sauces!)

I will end with a realization I had tonight.
It finally occurred to me tonight that sometimes, when I think people are being nice, they are actually being kind of passive aggressive and mean but I don't even realize the shittiness of the act until years later. Which is disappointing on several levels not the least of which being that for several years Ive been giving undue credit in my mind for the nicety. I realize that probably shouldn't bother me but tonight it really really does.

Every Turkey Dies But Not Every Turkey Truly Lives

I did not sleep at all last night. At all. It is 603am. I waited until 6am to get out of bed. Because of the "death hour". Last post i discussed some of the non-trivial reasons Ive been away, so let's dedicate this post to something more familiar. Things that make a crse crazy in the night. Or another installment of "what goes on in the mind of a slightly off-balance insomniac in the dead of winter"

- Ill start with "the death hour". SCAREDY CAT WARNING: IF YOU DON'T LIKE THINGS THAT SCARE YOU GO STRAIGHT TO THE NEXT SLASH. You all know I love my boss Lonnie Manko. I am not at liberty to discuss why the show "paranormal state" drew her attention (well I probably am but this am I feel mysterious) but she shared it with us one day at work a few weeks ago. Those who know me well would not for a minute, nay- for even a mili-second think that I would watch this show. (Did I ever post about the "blair crse project?" remind me friends...) Still she innocently shared a piece of alarming information with me. Apparently the hour between three am and four am is the darkest time of the night for all things spooky. I refuse to elaborate more than that. Why? because I cannot leave my room/pee in my bathroom/look at the clock/emerge from a bastardized attempt at sight and sound-proofing through blankets during this hour. As well you can imagine, this is pure insomniacal hell. I am pretty sure Lonnie M. is not happy to know this either although she is somewhat braver than me.

-"what would you do if your son was at home cryin' all alone on the bedroom floor cuz he's hungry and the only way to feed him is to sleep with a man for a little bit of money" I HAVE to remember to not start singing that around Norm. Did we handle the Jamie Lynn Spears thing correctly? Man Im so glad we got the satellite radio. It's so awesome. I need to clean my car.

-The medical cycle. This goes something like "I need to find a dentist. I wonder if I have that gum disease that eats bones away and now I won't be able to get dentures. I really don't know how I feel about my new dr. I should switch before it goes any further between us. But Moe really likes her. And she did that blood test in her office. Should I get the boys tested for lead? I hate to put them through that. I still owe co-pays on Turnip's birthing bills."

-Needless to say, this leads to The financial cycle. "I need to call the student loan people. What will I tell them. I really don't feel obligated to pay the damn mafioso dentist. Will we ever get our finances straightened out? I really need to invest in another toothbrush. Maybe I will buy the mean green machine tomorrow. We need a larger george foreman grill. We are better than this."

- I wonder if Im bi-polar. Would my therapist tell me if I was? I think Im going to ask her.

- Could I redecorate the house in a completely low impact way? Do they sell "healthy" paint at lowe's?

- I think I need to cut my losses on the lost adderall prescription. I go for a med-check next Tuesday. I am going to try to eke by on day meds, old straterra and the 60 mgs I have left. (Im saving those for this thursday. We have a special meeting.)

-Man my hands were cold today. I really want the carpal tunnel surgery but what will I do with myself if I cant play video games or write?

- I wonder why the turnip never says he loves us. Did we do something to make him so emotionally unavailable or did something happen in his past life?

- I am worried Norm is getting a kind of goth streak. He is really into the mourning aspects of death (BTW we no longer have a gerbil)

- WillyWonka WillyWonka. Man I wish Norm liked that movie.

- How the hell could I miss Rambo's birthday? I talked about it for five solid days? Why must I suck?

- (Im leaving the mind ramble format to share here for a minute folks, I didn't know how to put this in mind ramble form)Here is the thing about my hair cut. I was feeling incredibly insecure about it but lately Im feeling better about it. Why? Well you would think it was because of the millions of people that i like and trust telling me they really like it and that it looks nice. But no. It's not because of that. I'm very very ashamed to admit this but it's because an older single bloated creepy guy who Im fairly certain was arrested (although not convicted) on sex charges in the late 90s who happens to work with us (Lonnie DID NOT hire him. I feel compelled to tell people this) told me it was "cute". Now why is this significant? I will tell you why. Because he is a lewd creepy guy, if he found it to be a non-descript soccer mom cut he would have called it "nice". Calling it cute made it sound well...fashionable. And I feel ashamed of myself friends. Especially in regards to my real-time friends who have also called it "cute" and "nice" and (in a little grateful shout-out to Spike) "a lot better". It's not that I didn't believe you all but there was something to having the creepy guy accept my hair that validated me in a way that nothing else did. I don't know what that says about me but it's probably not good. Well...Im pretty sure it's not good at all.

ok I think Im going to email rambo a birthday wish and do some work now. It's kind of good to be back.

Don't freak out with the whole two posts in one day thing!

So Ive been sick. Real sick. Pukin' my brains out sick. For 36 years hours. It was gross. Exhausting. Painful. But at the same time, I did catch up on some reading. And strangely, got my brain age down to 22 (?). I also had a lot of time to think. Between the puking of course. And Ive been thinking. I think I need to change the direction of my blog. Ive always prided myself on being trivial here. But lately, my life has taken a direction that has kept me away because Im getting involved in some way not trivial things. (Did I mention I was on a list to try to "adopt" a temporarily homeless gay college student over New Year's? He worked it out thankfully and was able to go back home) But I miss you folks. And I also feel like I need an outlet for the ideas that crop up in this sharp as a tack 22 year old mind (bay-beeeee)(yes that's sarcasm). And Im starting to think I need to say things just because they need to be said. And because Im getting more and more pissed off and i don't have too many other appropriate places to put my pissed offedness. So I might be getting more political here. Or maybe I should just say more vocal about my frustration or sense of impotence about the social injustices I am looking at these days. I will still try to make it fun for you though. And in between impulsive , incoherent, possibly ill-informed and most likely not well thought out rants, I will keep you posted about all things crse, such as the drama of my broken nail (Now i UNDERSTAND why they say people cry over a broken nail!) or how thanks to Lucy, I now proudly chair the Mint subcommittee in our church. (no it was mockery, not a real subcommittee, but the mints make me feel like our church shares a little hug with every partaker of candy)(Sega? Remember the tic-tac story? Its along those lines! Remind me to tell you the dog-poop story. I missed you at group BTW)

Still here? Well friends, like a good dog who won't leave the damn bone alone, I am back on the whole identification needed to vote gnaw jaw. It happened when I was rifling through papers the other day and I found my little voting reminder with the big blatant PAY TO VOTE (photo Id required) stamp across the front and friends, I physically reacted. I am not quite sure why of all the social injustices in the world this one PISSES me off so bad.

When I reflect upon it, I think it has something to do with my (possibly naive) need to believe that despite all the yuckiness surrounding our forefathers, there are indeed certain truths that NEED to be self-evident. And if the constitution does in fact enumerate these truths as rights guaranteed to all citizens of our country (i know don't waste your breath, I already said it was naive). Up until last November, all I needed to exercise my right to vote was a signature. I never thought much about it (well I actually did but that's a whole other post dealing with my fascination with record keeping books) until I realized it was gone. Looking back, I see it as a beautiful expression of democracy that I totally took for granted. Reflective of the inherent dignity of all citizens regardless of race or class status. By signing our names, we were saying that despite the fucked up electoral process and all the partisan bull-shit, all citizens who choose to vote are equals on election day. We all matter the same amount. One person. One signature. One vote. Delusional? well of course but dammit, it was something. And they took it away. For no good reason. Despite what the mindless soundbite-hungry morons will tell you, the photo-id crap was a direct result of reports released from a supposedly "non-partisan" organization that ultimately disbanded in early 2007, after pretending to find a bunch of information supporting exactly what karl rove wanted them to support. And what do we have now? Continued exploitation of the disenfranchised is NOT the answer.

So that there is my vent.

So did I tell you guys I joined a social action group? Yeah....im hoping it helps with this sort of thing....

update

Not dead yet. Have been sick and nursing a sick turnip. Is it wrong to find it completely adorable that when he pukes he says "I choke!" Heartbreaking but adorable. He was so sick he could only utter three words "mine" "no" and "stop". I thought at least he is in his happy place. Right now he is much better. He is beating Gill with a Wii game saying "I watch this daddy".

I beat guitar hero on easy. My new goal is to play all the songs on easy till I get five stars. Im just not ready to add the blue key yet.

I'd gotten my brain age down to 26. After the turnip's illness, it is back up to 34. I guess it's good it's out of the 40s.

I think I might be battling with clinical depression. Not the gun to your head kind. The "what the hell is the point of getting out of bed ever?" kind. I lost my adderall prescription which kind of complicates things.

Depression could also be complicated by the fact that Elmo's world, which used to be a source of comfort for my baby, now sends him into a flying rage that makes me fear for my safety.

You know it's a bad week when you are getting messages like "don't call me back if you are still sick...it's that bad." and yet you are giddy to go to work anyway.

Monday Musings

Sometimes a fifty cent bag of caramels seems like a much better deal than it actually turns out to be.

If you are in a long term relationship and you love your partner, you might want to think about the implied cruelty of telling them they have a big glop of chocolate candy on their left butt-cheek pant leg when they are getting up to give an announcement in church and are completely powerless to do anything about it.

White-out. I have never had a good relationship with white-out. I have hopes that it will turn out like cream cheese and the office supply version of the secret answer to 25 years of squishing the cream cheese out of the package in a time consuming, messy and largely unproductive manner will suddenly become evident. I need the white out secret answer.

"knock knock"
who's there?
"ketchup"
ketchup who?
I dont know!

there is something unspeakably profound to be discovered in the knock knock joke of a two year old.

So guitar hero turns out to be a dark mistress. I should have seen trouble coming during the prison show when i had the rock battle with slash from guns n roses. But after spending two frustrating days trying to figure out how to get past the creepy looking unwashed plumber guy who shamed me mercilessly in the first battle, my relatively quick success with slash lulled me into a false sense of confidence. Things started to go really badly in Japan (note: the Japanese guitar hero fans are much less forgiving and mannerly than the fellows at the prison when a song falls apart. I was appalled. I thought Japanese culture was more genteel than this!) At around 1am I found myself face to face with a battle for my soul. The worst part? The battle involves a song list that could easily been constructed in a personal nightmare. (you know the one....you cant find any pants and every where you go people are serving food you don't like for dinner.) At that point I went to bed. Ill keep you posted.

For the record, as Ive alluded to several times, I am also harboring an addiction to the nintendo game "brain age". I am currently obsessed with "virus busters" which appears to be a very low tech version of atari's space invaders (there are no stars...)

ok friends thats all I got. Gill is making me battle for my soul. He is certain I will lose as "I am not quite evil enough"

Good night and godspeed friends...

NO MORE EXCUSES

That's what i said to myself on Tuesday. I will admit that now it is definitely the wii. And nintendo brain age. And a somewhat clingy and destructive turnip. This too shall pass. Gill is blogging and I am not. All my neglected feeling bloggy friends? Im not reading his blog either. My own life partner. Soul mate. Etc. And I Don't Read His Blog.

I could make this how i suck or i can come back with a long overdue tag from everyone's blog darling Maggie May . I know ive probably shared every weird thing about me in general so Ill pop some recent ones on you folks for the "seven things people might not know about you" me-me.

1. I have fake nails right now. Some of you know this but most of you don't. Im fairly certain that regular readers understand that this is indeed a very odd thing to hear about me. All I can say is....Madame Fabu is involved. Oh and it's a french manicure.

2. I also have a Really Bad Haircut. Gill hates it. He keeps threatening to withhold intimacy and forcing me to drink milk. After being dry humped and propositioned several times per our usual routine, I feel safe in saying that the threat is unfounded. However, I cannot be fully certain that the nails have not been responsible for bringing me back into good graces.

3. Our new family past-time is this game called "boogie" for the wii. It's really lame but I sing off-key kereoke (sp?) and the boys all dance with controllers. Truly a sight to behold.

4. My friend Andy just introduced me to the bathroom reader institute series of books. (She gave me one for christmas)As most of you know, I seldom get to toilet alone so I had to bring it to bed. Friends, I could not put it down! This was one of my top gifts of the season.

5. My other top gift came from Lucy. The "Our Dumb World" Atlas by the Onion. (to help me explore the "soft science" of geography.) It has features like "how much does bono care about your country?" and such.

6. I just realized that you folks don't know about my recent foray into the wonderful world of candy making. I will offer more details later but I will tell you that it is indeed the sticky nightmare/wonderland adventure you might envision it to be. I also am trying to figure out how to use this newfound "skill" to fund....

7. Dodgeball! Yes friends, it is true. My town is starting a dodgeball league and yours truly is coming in on the ground floor. Oh the tales to be told...the adventures to be had...

Ok Ill offer some half-hearted promises and catch up soon!