cave dwelling hermit, moi?

OK, so, there was no intervention Saturday.

Yeah, I'm shocked too.

I think my mom was so grateful that I fixed her damn tv (bad component cord), watched synchronized swimming on tv with her and peeled 14 quarts worth of tomatoes without complaint that she didn't dare ruin the good vibes. However, I know she will be keeping an eagle eye on me from now on. Good thing I don't usually get hung over.

I know I link to it a lot, and some of you who read this know I talk about it a lot but I just absolutely love jezebel.com. My favorite contributor is Tracie, aka Slut Machine who is just an amazingly honest writer who also looks fabulous and is one of those people who seem like she'd be a blast to hang out with. She and Rich (four four blog linked at right) do the "Pot Psychology" video every week on Jezebel and I never miss it. It's absolutely hilarious and informative and awesome every time. I have now found that Tracie also has her own personal blog, One D at a Time, which I've linked to over on the right and I have to say, I might as well forget about going to bed at a decent hour tonight too as I'll be up late reading.

Last night I was up until nearly 3:30 finishing the second book in the Twilight series. I'm also reading Vanity Fair. I don't know what's gotten into me lately but it's like one book at a time isn't enough!

I'm strongly considering a trip to Chicago in October to see Gomez play at the Vic Theater. At first I thought I would drive there, but gas prices are insane and, frankly, I've never driven in Chicago and I know I would get helplessly lost in a matter of moments. Then, I was thinking the bus, but now I'm considering the train. The only difficult and expensive part of the trip is hotel accomodations. That and the whole travelling alone thing.

I'm nervous about going because I've never been to a strange city in the U.S. alone and I really don't know anyone who is going to be there as well as I would like. I mean, we all share a love of the band and all, but there are some on the board with whom I talk to outside the board and they have really gotten to know me on a deeper level and vice versa. None of those people can be there, and that really sucks because I'd love to meet them in person and also if I knew one (or all) of them was going to be there, I could just chill the fuck out. I'm also really not sure how accepting some people will be of me, to be honest.

On the other hand, it is Gomez and what an amazing full-circle to see them for the first time in the Vic Theater considering the MSN concert was filmed there and I completely fell head over heels in love with the band after seeing that concert!

My parents are going to be upset, but I'm pretty much using my strike fund to go to this. Yay for not being on strike. (Well, technically, we could be as the vote on the new contract is due Sept 30, but the chances of that are pretty slim.)

I can see how agoraphobics become agoraphobic. It's a slow process but if I let myself be scared of all new situations, I'll never experience anything. So I'm about 85% there right now. Which is huge for me.

But my cave is awful warm and comfy all the same.

true beauty?

Have you seen that Foundation for a Better Life commercial where the girl with Down Syndrome is elected Homecoming Queen and all the beautiful people at the dance are all cheering her on? How patronizing. I mean, seriously, did the people who wrote this ad/form this organization not go to high school? Ugh, the ad just pisses me off. I can't even articulate how insulting it is to those of us who never had the option of being Homecoming Queen in real life.

It's not that I resent the girl with Down's Syndrome being elected Homecoming Queen (which if the website is to be believed really happened some place), but it's just that this sort of thing doesn't happen in real life. And how many of the "normal" students are truly friends with the girl they elected Queen? By electing her, suddenly they feel like they have done a good deed, but how many of them think of her as a real person with real feelings? Or was this more about being seen as being kind? I don't mean that it's right to ignore those who are different, but to single this girl out because she's different and pretend that she's suddenly the most popular girl in school, well, it just reminds me too much of the movie Carrie.

You want to be seen as a good person? Be a good person. Grand gestures are just that, empty gestures. Get to know that person who is generally shunned by society. Treat everyone as if they are a human being and worthy of respect and love. Don't be cruel, either by action or inaction. Don't be fake. Be a real friend.

Don't give the outcast a moment in the sun and have her find out later that it wasn't real. That's crueler than just keeping the status quo. At least with the status quo the person knows where they belong.

I refuse to link to the website, I have no idea what this foundation is, but their commercials in general just scream some hidden agenda and I just don't even want to explore it further. I just don't want to know.

this oughtta be fun

So something screwy happened to my parent's television this week. And I get to fix it. Tomorrow morning. Because I am the "expert." Whatevs. My mom is fighting with her sister so tomorrow after I fix the tv, I get to help her can tomatoes. Not that big a deal, but I made her promise to leave me the hell alone Sunday.

Then, my mom called me tonight and asked me to bring my dad's cell phone over, he had left it accidentally in the car and will need it tomorrow. And could I also please stop and get her some milk and some other stuff, and by the way the car needs gas.

Not a big deal if I hadn't started drinking fifteen seconds after she left my house tonight. I had to tell her I really wasn't in a state to drive.

Silence

Oh? she says. Since when do you drink?

Uh, mom, I'm 30, I've been drinking alcohol legally for nearly 10 years now.

Oh. Silence Well, I'll just come over and get it then.

WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH THIS WOMAN?

So, I'll probably be undergoing an intervention tomorrow.

FAAAAAAAAAAAAAAABULOUS.

Nevermind that I get really drunk MAYBE once a month and I never drive while drunk. The worst I do is post online drunk or drunk text people.

It is just never ending with that woman. She'll want to know WHY I'm drinking, and why I'm drinking alone, and when did I buy the alcohol and on and on and on and on and on. And of course, I must have a PROBLEM because only losers drink alone. There will be much wailing and gnashing of teeth on my part because I am NOT going to want to have this discussion.

I swear, she thinks I'm still in high school. I have GRAY HAIR for god's sake. LET GO, WOMAN!

She was cooler about me drinking in high school than she is now.

I gotta get out of here.

good recipe

Take one disillusioned heart....

Fill a glass with ice, pour vodka and triple sec until the glass is 3/4 full or so. Add lemonade and maraschino cherries.

Drink.

Repeat.

Cry.

i was born in a small town

Can't embed the video, but you all know the song "Small Town" by John Mellencamp, right? That's the theme song of this post. There is no other song in my head right now.

I had a routine doctor appointment this morning. It lasted less than 20 minutes. I need to take a prescription daily. I will need to for the rest of my life. Part of my brain (the really stupid part, obviously) thinks this is dumb and rebels. I haven't taken this prescription regularly EVER and this time I haven't really had any of it for close to a year. Obviously, I don't die quickly without it, but I would eventually die if I don't take this stupid tiny pill. Side effects of not taking it include: irritability, mood swings, muscle weakness, fatigue, blurry vision, diminished hearing. So I turn into a moodly sloth who has to squint to see the TV. Yeah, not fun. Eventually, I get inspired to start taking it again, and I go to my doctor and she tells me, again, that I need to keep taking it. So, today was my mea culpa day. Again. In a few days, I will have a ton more energy and I will get back up on that damn treadmill more frequently. I can honestly say that I hadn't completely stopped using the treadmill. But less often than once a weak is not exactly a regular routine either. When it's an effort to pick up a bag weighing less than 10 pounds, you know you have extreme muscle fatigue.

So, anyway, after leaving the doctor's office, I pointed my car west towards home. It was a beautiful, sunny morning and I had the iPod plugged into the car stereo and was enjoying the drive. I don't own a car, I was driving my mom's car. She has to work today so I have my own use of the car all to myself today. I was driving along, thinking of the stuff I need to do at home this afternoon before picking the dog up at the vet and singing along with whatever song came up on random shuffle. Nothing in particular made me do it, but when I approached the exit for my house, I didn't move the car over to the right. I kept going. The day was beautiful and I really like to drive. One of the things I miss about being in high school in a small town and college in a small town was having my own car and the freedom to drive anywhere I wanted to go (sometimes this was a necessity to have to drive long distances just to find something to DO). Living in the city, having an 8-minute commute to work, having no friends and therefore no social life, I don't get out much. There's just something about the open road, the stereo cranked and not having a place to be (or a nagging mother wanting to know WHERE you are going) that is so...liberating.

In no time at all (they don't call them the Twin Cities for nothing), I found myself nearing Minneapolis. I kept driving and eventually decided to exit the interstate in downtown. I have never actually driven, even accompanied by someone who knows it, in downtown Minneapolis. The last time I had ever even BEEN in downtown Minneapolis was 8 YEARS ago when I started my job. I had my test/orientation at the HR offices there. I was born in St. Paul and am most comfortable here. But, again, because I don't get out much I mostly know how to get from point A to point B. I don't really know the city that well either, but I have a general idea of where things are.

So, I exit the interstate and start driving around. Being a typical downtown, there's a gazillion one way streets and I have no idea how much of the downtown area I actually saw, but I drove around for nearly an hour. By 40 minutes into my "adventure" I was trying to figure out how to get OUT. Unfortunately, only morons decide to have an adventure randomly driving around downtown areas, so there were no signs advising me where to go. I didn't have to stop and ask for directions, though. I eventually found myself leaving downtown, heading south, so I had to turn around and go north to go east again to come back home.

I felt like country mouse. And all this time, I thought I was a city mouse.

This doesn't mean I won't do this again. I really should. I rely too much on my parents. I had an argument with my younger brother a few weeks ago. He's going to be 30 this year and he still does not have a driver's license. He relys on my parents (or me) to drive him to and pick him up from work five days a week and I resent having to do it when I am asked. I resent my parents having to do it. It's expensive for them and time-consuming. And when they're gone, it will be left up to me if he continues to refuse to get a license. My younger brother has some developmental delays, but he would be capable of handling a car to and from work. He's just scared (though he won't admit it). I was really tired one night and my mom asked me to take him (which meant I had to delay getting home two hours) and I basically ripped my brother a new asshole the whole way to work over it. We still haven't really made up over it. And a lot of what I said to him rings true for me. I can't live the rest of my life relying on my parents to get me through.

So, that means I need to get my health in order and figure out how to navigate those scary city streets alone. Whether my mom wants to let me do so is a whole other matter for another post. I have to do this whole "becoming independent" thing in secret because my mom is so co-dependent, she would view this as if I don't love her any more.

Well, tough shit.

On the other hand, coming to Minnesota any time soon? You might want to drive. I can navigate...with a map.

random rantings

So the puppy goes to the vet tomorrow all day. They want to monitor him and check to see if we need to give him more or less insulin. This takes all day and costs over $200. And we get to do it again and again over the next month. Same cost each time.

When I go over to my parents' house, I notice that he is a lot less energetic than the other dog, choosing to lay in his bed or on the couch rather than hang out with people. He has his moments of energy, but they are few and far between. Poor puppy. I know how he feels.

I love it when I go over there and both dogs are so happy to see me and they both want to be held and petted like mad. They may weigh under 20 pounds each, but they are very persistant in demanding affection if you make the mistake of not greeting them right away when you walk in the door. Harry gives in to the other dog, Rudy, every time, lets him go first in the receiving of affection. Then he (kind of shyly) will cuddle up to me with an attitude like "I know you love Rudy best [NOT TRUE], but do you think you could give me a belly rub too? If it's not too much trouble."

Yes, my dog has low self-esteem. We were obviously made for each other.

In other news, I have been calling for the ouster of Clay Buchholz for the past month and FINALLY Terry Francona has heard me. Tonight's Red Sox loss to Baltimore was ridiculous. I feel bad for the guy, I really hope that the no-hitter he pitched last year is not the peak of his professional career, he's too immature yet. Compare him to Jon Lester and you see who is the pro baseball player and who is not.

Not like the Red Sox can afford to lose any more pitchers. Beckett is resting, he has something going on with his hand, Tim Wakefield and Bartolo Colon are both on the disabled list, Lester and Dice-K are the only ones keeping it together lately. As for the relief staff, tonight Timlin threw over 60 pitches for the first time in SIX YEARS but that was in only TWO INNINGS, Del Carmen and Okajima are either perfect or all over the place, Papelbon is just not being his usual ice-cold strike-throwing machine....it's like the shit has hit the fan since the all-star break. The only really good relief pitching I've seen in the past 10 days has been Justin Masterson and they're hardly using him! The whole pitching staff seems to be in a tail-spin. I think this is going to require some band practice (just ignore the Manny Ramirez part of that article, he IS dead to me, after all).

And don't get me started about Mike Lowell getting injured and the revolving door that is first base over the past few games. GET WELL SOON MIKEY!

Also, congrats to Jason Varitek on his two-game home run hitting streak. Thanks a lot, Terry, for giving him the NIGHT OFF tonight. Sheesh!

I have resigned myself to the idea that the Red Sox will probably not make the playoffs. I hope to be pleasantly proven wrong.

ok, I'll play

The wikipedia band name/album/song tracks game. Random article #1 is band name, #2 is album title and next 15 random article titles are your songs. My friend vanillagrrl (Travels in my backyard blog) did it. And I can't think of anything to blog right now.

Also, I'm a bit tipsy and not quite ready to go to bed. :) I'm cheating though and not including actual people names unless they're awesome names/people.

Band Name: Northwest Science Fiction Society
Album Title: Oval Butterflyfish
Songs: Juaneño
Lyve from Steel Town {a "lyve" lynard skynard album}
Schwarz Weiss
Fashion Designer: Style Icon
DYMK-FM
The Los Pobladores
Father Pandosy {omitted word Mission from this one as I like the idea of a song called Father Pandosy}
Igarapava
Ho-Ho-Kus {omitted comma New Jersey}
Bobobo-bo Bo-bobo {not to be confused with Bobobo-bobo Bo bobo-bo, apparently}
Goodnight Opus
Askar
Indie Game Jam
Akhara
Deal or No Deal (Middle East)

I wish I wrote songs.

c-o-n-t-r-a-c-t spells relief

Thankfully my company and my union have reached a tentative agreement. It was announced at 3 am this morning. I had finally gone to sleep around 2 but it was not a peaceful night of sleep. I was exhausted but so worried. I was so relieved to find that message this morning that there is an agreement. You have no idea.

Now I can go to work in peace and struggle to keep my eyes open all day. Yay!

Since the work issue is out of the way, I suppose I have to start worrying about my beloved Red Sox and their embarrassing losses to the Blue Jays the past two days. God, those were horrible.

buyer's remorse

OK, yeah, so those $5 flowers from yesterday? The flowers I took a picture of are still in good shape. The other ones? Not so much. THIS is why I should never get live flowers.

I've always known this about myself. Instead of a green thumb, I have a brown thumb. I kill plants. I am a murderer of plants.

This is so annoying. They were so pretty yesterday.

ONE FREAKING DAY!

In other news, I still have a job. But my union is currently working without a contract and I'm nervous. I don't want to go on strike. I don't know how many days I could afford to go without pay. Not that I would cross the picket line, ever. But the great unknown is pretty scary. I have been on pins and needles all day, I am longing to go to work with every fiber of my being at this point. I didn't feel this way at the last contract negotiation three years ago. Then, I was hoping for some time off. This time the prospect of missing even one day of work makes me very distressed. I hate that feeling. The only person I have to talk to about it is my mom, and she's hoping for time off. The one person I want to talk to about it, well, I don't have any way to contact outside of work. So, you see, I HAVE to go to work. This person, with whom I want to talk to about the contract issues, he has a way of calming me. I don't know how he does it, but he does.

Here's hoping a contract is negotiated!

I am distracting myself with television. Currently I'm watching last week's episode of Weeds. This show is amazing. I had only ever seen a few parts of episodes before this season, but for some reason I've actually paid attention this year and it is just brilliant. I highly (ha ha) recommend it, no matter where you fall in the debate over legalizing drugs. It is just extremely funny in a very off-beat sort of way.

It's really not distracting me as much as I want it to.....dammit.

you can bring me flowers

Five dollars at the farmer's market today. HUGE bouquet of flowers. I had to fill two vases with the flowers. The one at left is the prettier of the two arrangements. My home smells of real flowers, the scent is almost overpowering, in fact.

I've never been given flowers by a person for romantic reasons. My parents bought me roses when I turned 18. That's it. When I dated guys, it was in college and who has money for flowers in college? Not that it would have necessarily occurred to either one of my college boyfriends to buy me flowers anyway.

So I've come to the conclusion, now at the age of thirty that if no one's going to buy me flowers, if I want flowers I'll just have to buy them myself.

Five dollars is not too much for a little bit of nature.

Call me sentimental, but I still would rather have someone bring me flowers. In a romantic sort of way, that is.