Well yes, it's been awhile. Not too much in the way of news, except that the swinger couple broke up in dramatic fashion, which was fairly predictable. She was a diabetic who would have weird, blood sugar related outbursts flinging wild accusations of physical and sexual misconduct and vile profanity. The swinger gentleman decided that the opportunity to stick his dick in a cage containing the volatile creature was probably not worth the potential of having it bitten off. In jail.
Other than that, things are going well. That's good for me, but obviously terrible for the blogging.
But as Jethro says, "I've got a beautiful wife, adorable children, a great house, a great career, my dream car, and Gears of War 3 is coming out next week. Can't ask for more than that."
And should I be content? Yes. I should. But as usual, I'm not. I'm trying to take credit for my kids who are quite lovely, but they were pretty much just born like that so I want a career of some kind to take credit for and make a little scratch at. Yes, I help Jethro at the clinic, and yes, I do graphic design on the side, but I really would like to make either of them just slightly more lucrative. What's that you say? The economy is shit? All the more reason to suck it up and do something. I am ambitious for both of us, but I don't know how to take the first step in really launching either of us. It's annoying. But enough of that. This is boring.
So what else is new? Oh yeah. Jethro bought a car. A blue 2008 Audi A5. We can't afford it, but we did it anyway because he was driving a beater and it didn't make him look successful. Or competent. Or sane. So we will continue our diet of beans and gruel cooked on an increasingly hostile stove for a little while longer. Not that we're that poor. We just have a lot of debt that we would like to pay off sooner rather than later.
In other, not so pleasant news, both of Jethro's parents have suffered strokes. His mom had one over a year ago and refused to get diagnosed for over 6 months. Now she is continuing to refuse to go to physical therapy, so she is getting weaker and weaker and there is nothing we can do with her unrelenting stubbornness. It sucks. Jethro's father is almost as bad, but fortunately his stroke, while not as serious, had more obvious side effects so he went to the hospital and got treatment. Unfortunately, while there, they discovered his platelets are low and his white cell count is high, so they are trying to figure out what unknown condition he has on top of having had a stroke. And it would not be an exaggeration to say that he is a reluctant participant in his own healthcare.
Jethro, confronted with the genetic red flags of stroke, has begun a rigorous exercise regimen and I offer him thoughtful and well-timed encouragement from the couch while drinking a nice red wine with cocoa undertones and eating Dryers French Silk ice cream. I'm nice like that.
Now for anyone who has read me for a long time, this is going to blow your mind. My eldest is 12 years old. She was 4 when I started this horror show. She is everything a 12 year old should be. Insecure, awkward, sassy, and beautiful. So much of a child still, thank God, but darting towards a womanhood she greatly anticipates and utterly fears. Boys are complete mysteries to her, but she knows she kind of likes them. Her heart is kind. Dogs and babies love and obey her with complete devotion. She geeks out on anime, but loves playing basketball. I look at her all the time and still can't quite believe that this spunky, delicate little creature is mine to love with all my heart.
Friday, September 16, 2011
Thursday, June 02, 2011
Love Wins The Day
A military friend I've flirted, argued with, and defended for years in the comments section of Blonde Sagacity, lost a friend of his who had served two tours in Iraq to suicide a few weeks ago. I can't adequately describe how good his writing is on the subject, so I'm just going to link it.
This is real life. It's not a screenplay. It's not politics. This is the ugliness we all fight to keep at bay. It's why we stay up until 3 am playing video games. It's why we inject poison into our faces. It's why we email pictures of our junk to 21 year olds. Sometimes we're stupid. Sometimes the ugliness wins. But we fight on. We mourn the ones who make it real and we fight desperately on.
When Charles died, I thought the ugliness had won again. It had snatched the best of us. Someone brave and strong and joyful and good. I felt the same way after my father died. But I was weak then and young and stupid. Too much responsibility and no skills for it. Circumstance after circumstance seemed to set me back more and more until finally I met a nice guy named Jethro and made a couple of babies.
When Charles died, I found myself pounding the stairs in anticipation of that great and terrible pain that was sure to follow. I ran out the door and into the street because I knew what that pain was and how much it was going to hurt. I tried to cry and get it out of the way before that searing, tearing agony reached my lungs. Dry sobs that felt like the desert. The ugliness.
Then I found Jethro. Again. I stopped and the pain came. But gently this time. We held each other. We still loved each other. We went to see our friends. The barrier our love created for the two of us expanded. We still loved our friends. They still loved us. We beat back the ugliness. We beat it away from each other. We beat it away from our memories of Charles. We held onto each other and wouldn't let the ugliness in.
I remember once when we were freshmen in college. It was the end of our first year and we were all gathered in Charles' dorm room to drink the horrible wine made by the chemistry majors for one of their projects. 20 people in a little bitty dorm room is not going to go unnoticed by the powers that be and we were interrupted in pretty short order by the glorified hall monitors. We'd had a small practice drill at Charles' urging and we collectively managed to hide the bottles on our persons so that they could not be found. The glorified hall monitors searched every place they were allowed to and found a small bottle of Everclear and 2 cans of beer in the tiny little dorm fridge. Everyone stayed completely mute and let Charles do the talking, since it was his room. After they left with their sad little confiscations, we were exuberant. Giddy, even. We still had the goods. Charles looked admiringly at the group of us and complimented everyone on their presence of mind and coolness under pressure. I like to think he would have felt the same way if he could have seen all of us at the funeral and other events that have taken place since. Not that we were cool, exactly, but we stuck together. We wouldn't let the ugliness take our wine, and we wouldn't let the ugliness take our love.
And this was the great difference. When my father died, I had no one except histrionic relatives, younger sisters who believed our father would come back to life, and a mother who had just had her world destroyed. The ugliness had easy targets.
But love is the bayonet and we all became stronger.
Things are better now in my family simply because we love each other and it's amazing. I never thought it would be good again, but it is. It was a struggle, but we all kept bayonetting and now things are beautiful. Imperfect as always, but beautiful.
Things are better now in my family simply because we love each other and it's amazing. I never thought it would be good again, but it is. It was a struggle, but we all kept bayonetting and now things are beautiful. Imperfect as always, but beautiful.
Sunday, May 01, 2011
Swinger Weekend
I have had an interesting weekend. A friend of mine from Houston came to visit with his girlfriend. They are swingers.
It seems we had a miscommunication somewhere. When I say I'm open minded, that means I'm not going to judge you too harshly to your face about anything short of child-molestation. That doesn't mean I want to make out with your girlfriend or watch you feel her up or see a picture of her clitoral piercing, much less a live view.
And when we discuss your swinging lifestyle and I say "The only way I would do that is if I paid someone," that literally means I WOULD ONLY DO THAT IF I PAID SOMEONE. That does NOT mean I am toying with the idea of having fun sexy times with people I actually know. When discussing the idea with Jethro (and I do this only to string him along the rocky trail of holy matrimony), it is always with the understanding that I am not interested in some broke, schizophrenic college student with daddy issues. I want a professional who will do whatever I say, in a place so far away that I would never have to make small talk with them while having flashbacks to their sex noises if they cough in a funny way.
Yeah, I know I can talk, but that is all it is. I am ALL TALK. No action. Never have been, never will be. Most people understand this and humor me as long as I amuse them.
Now I'm not really mad at my friend. They're new at it, and it's very very exciting to them. I wasn't interested, but if I had been, I really would have needed some warning. Because my bedroom was nowhere near orgy-ready. And I was on my period - something I did not plan on announcing.
But I am loathe to make people uncomfortable in my own home, so I found myself politely commenting on the photographs of the clitoral piercing, the cage in which girlfriend was stripping awkwardly with the friend's penis thrust encouragingly through the bars...
I smiled and yawned when girlfriend asked me to come lay down by her so she could play with my hair, which was actually tempting because I love to have my hair played with. Fuck, I have no balls.
It seems we had a miscommunication somewhere. When I say I'm open minded, that means I'm not going to judge you too harshly to your face about anything short of child-molestation. That doesn't mean I want to make out with your girlfriend or watch you feel her up or see a picture of her clitoral piercing, much less a live view.
And when we discuss your swinging lifestyle and I say "The only way I would do that is if I paid someone," that literally means I WOULD ONLY DO THAT IF I PAID SOMEONE. That does NOT mean I am toying with the idea of having fun sexy times with people I actually know. When discussing the idea with Jethro (and I do this only to string him along the rocky trail of holy matrimony), it is always with the understanding that I am not interested in some broke, schizophrenic college student with daddy issues. I want a professional who will do whatever I say, in a place so far away that I would never have to make small talk with them while having flashbacks to their sex noises if they cough in a funny way.
Yeah, I know I can talk, but that is all it is. I am ALL TALK. No action. Never have been, never will be. Most people understand this and humor me as long as I amuse them.
Now I'm not really mad at my friend. They're new at it, and it's very very exciting to them. I wasn't interested, but if I had been, I really would have needed some warning. Because my bedroom was nowhere near orgy-ready. And I was on my period - something I did not plan on announcing.
But I am loathe to make people uncomfortable in my own home, so I found myself politely commenting on the photographs of the clitoral piercing, the cage in which girlfriend was stripping awkwardly with the friend's penis thrust encouragingly through the bars...
I smiled and yawned when girlfriend asked me to come lay down by her so she could play with my hair, which was actually tempting because I love to have my hair played with. Fuck, I have no balls.
Tuesday, April 19, 2011
Some Movies
I tried to watch an old movie on Netflix called "Those Redheads from Seattle."
My family has a thing for old movies, probably because we only had a VCR growing up (no tv) and our mom would rent old, silly movies so as not to warp our morals. Fat lot of good. But in spite of us now practicing all manner of heathenry, she did manage to instill in us a love for old, cheesy films and their accompanying soundtracks.
The description was mildly intriguing:
Determined to reunite her scattered family, Mrs. Edmonds moves her daughters north to the Yukon to be with their father. But the man's been murdered, and now the penniless women must make ends meet while finding the killer.
It sounded a little noir-ish with the twist of a mainly female cast. But it's a damn musical. And it's horrid. They are going to find their father's killer and do a very modest can-can, exclaiming all the while about how daring they are to let anyone catch a glimpse of their bulky pantalettes. I haven't finished the movie, and I doubt I will, but I have no doubt the killer will be drawn in some way to those bulky pantalettes. They always are, you know.
Which brings me to another movie I watched earlier today. It was a very stupid French film called "Emmanuelle." I'd never heard of it, but I feel certain it is well known among connoisseurs of early 70s erotica.
Not being a connoisseur of early 70s or any other kind of erotica, I'm not sure what I was thinking. I thought it would be stylish, I guess. But it wasn't. It was about a wealthy, hedonistic band of white people upholding the dignity of their respective countries by screwing around Thailand; and Emmanuelle, the nice French girl they wanted to corrupt for their own gratification. For a film which contained a sex act in nearly every scene, including a young girl masturbating to a picture of Paul Newman, and a flexible Asian chick lighting a cigarette with another cigarette from the part of her anatomy you'd expect her to light it with if you were in Thailand, it was boring as hell.
The last quarter of the movie had Emmanuelle, at the insistence of the hedonists, being escorted around Bangkok by a patriarchal old pervert attempting to rid her of her inhibitions and convince her to accept the tenants of eroticism by making her smoke opium, having her forcibly taken by natives in the opium den, offering her as the prize to the winner of a very lame Thai boxing match (which the winner, remarkably free of bruises or cuts, gleefully accepted on all fours in front of the entire gathered assembly), and then giving her a new dress. All the while, the pervert remained clothed in a dark, somber suit, and lectured constantly as to what she should be thinking. It was like being raped to a sermon.
I guess it was supposed to do something for you, or at least make you uncomfortably sure that you'd be heaped with scorn by the sexual sophisticates for thinking Emmanuelle looked kind of silly with her skirt over her head for most of the film. Mostly what I took away is that hedonists are just as humorless about sex as puritans.
My family has a thing for old movies, probably because we only had a VCR growing up (no tv) and our mom would rent old, silly movies so as not to warp our morals. Fat lot of good. But in spite of us now practicing all manner of heathenry, she did manage to instill in us a love for old, cheesy films and their accompanying soundtracks.
The description was mildly intriguing:
Determined to reunite her scattered family, Mrs. Edmonds moves her daughters north to the Yukon to be with their father. But the man's been murdered, and now the penniless women must make ends meet while finding the killer.
It sounded a little noir-ish with the twist of a mainly female cast. But it's a damn musical. And it's horrid. They are going to find their father's killer and do a very modest can-can, exclaiming all the while about how daring they are to let anyone catch a glimpse of their bulky pantalettes. I haven't finished the movie, and I doubt I will, but I have no doubt the killer will be drawn in some way to those bulky pantalettes. They always are, you know.
Which brings me to another movie I watched earlier today. It was a very stupid French film called "Emmanuelle." I'd never heard of it, but I feel certain it is well known among connoisseurs of early 70s erotica.
Not being a connoisseur of early 70s or any other kind of erotica, I'm not sure what I was thinking. I thought it would be stylish, I guess. But it wasn't. It was about a wealthy, hedonistic band of white people upholding the dignity of their respective countries by screwing around Thailand; and Emmanuelle, the nice French girl they wanted to corrupt for their own gratification. For a film which contained a sex act in nearly every scene, including a young girl masturbating to a picture of Paul Newman, and a flexible Asian chick lighting a cigarette with another cigarette from the part of her anatomy you'd expect her to light it with if you were in Thailand, it was boring as hell.
The last quarter of the movie had Emmanuelle, at the insistence of the hedonists, being escorted around Bangkok by a patriarchal old pervert attempting to rid her of her inhibitions and convince her to accept the tenants of eroticism by making her smoke opium, having her forcibly taken by natives in the opium den, offering her as the prize to the winner of a very lame Thai boxing match (which the winner, remarkably free of bruises or cuts, gleefully accepted on all fours in front of the entire gathered assembly), and then giving her a new dress. All the while, the pervert remained clothed in a dark, somber suit, and lectured constantly as to what she should be thinking. It was like being raped to a sermon.
I guess it was supposed to do something for you, or at least make you uncomfortably sure that you'd be heaped with scorn by the sexual sophisticates for thinking Emmanuelle looked kind of silly with her skirt over her head for most of the film. Mostly what I took away is that hedonists are just as humorless about sex as puritans.
Friday, April 15, 2011
Oh For The Love Of...
I visited the eye doctor yesterday and got the spankiest new pair of eyeglasses.
I also found out I have something called Pigment Dispersion Syndrome, which is where the pigment in the colored part of your eye flakes off into the fluid which can clog in the drainage ducts of your eye which increases pressure and can lead to glaucoma.
Now of course, the second I get the news, my hypochondria kicks into hyperdrive and I'm convinced I have blind spots and I feel like my eyeballs are about to pop out of my head.
And even more pathetically, I'm worried slightly less about the glaucoma and possible blindness than I am about having a milky eye. I don't want a milky eye. I may not win the blue ribbon at the county fair, but I'm a little vain about not having a milky eye.
I just don't know how I'd handle being introduced to people and having them not look at my milky eye. I'd probably do something awkward like say, "Hi, my name is Zelda. I have a milky eye, and I'm totally fine if you want to stare at it. Or not. I'm cool. Just because I have a milky eye doesn't mean I'm not cool. Fucker. You try living with a milky eye and see how you like it."
But it might be totally worth it if I get to look at Jethro seductively through a colored contact and ask "with or without?" That poor man. I'll have him up to his eyeballs in midgets and glue (and chocolate for me) yet.
And to top it all off, doing anything that jiggles your eyeballs around can cause more pigment to dislodge, so I was told that I am not supposed to exercise. I have been waiting all my life to hear those words, but of course they come just after I find an absolutely flipping fantastic sports bra
and began draggin' my wagin around the block so I can do a Warrior Dash in November. It really is almost epically bad timing.
Monday, April 11, 2011
Ok so the new blog was short-lived. It gave no more incentive than the old one, so back to the devil I know.
It seems Chris Noth has some stern, meaty thighs. NSFW in case the adjectives weren't enough of a clue.
So how is everyone else doing? Anyone out there?
It seems Chris Noth has some stern, meaty thighs. NSFW in case the adjectives weren't enough of a clue.
So how is everyone else doing? Anyone out there?
Tuesday, February 22, 2011
Fresh Start
I think I need a new start. I'll still post here, but I must have something completely narcissistic to write quickly. Like facebook. But not.
Things I Won't Say On Facebook
Things I Won't Say On Facebook
Thursday, December 09, 2010
Goldigger
I have this friend - well not friend exactly - but a friend of friends who I liked well enough in the past along with her husband. They are now divorced along with the friends who knew them in the first place. Do you now have anger towards me because I confused you?
Anyway, this chick divorced her husband - a nice enough fellow - and married an older man with what appears to be enough money to support the lifestyle she craved desperately, but couldn't have with her much younger ex.
Now having an thoroughly developed sense of justice, I think it's only right to hate her. I feel morally obligated to hate her. And yet I don't. I don't know why and it has been bothering me ever since she friended me on facebook and I accepted. I can't stand gold digging. On the ladder of contempt, I find it to be a rung lower than prostitution.
And I liked this girl's husband. He had a decent desk job with plenty of room to move up and quite comparable to other guys his age. He was a bit dorky, but endearingly so, and he was a good father to their two kids.
She, on the other hand, was a profligate spender. Back when credit was easy, she racked up over half a mil in bills. They bought a house they absolutely could not afford, she decorated it within an inch of it's life, and she bought a horse so she could travel the rodeo circuit giving exhibitions with a bunch of other cute girl riders. And I'm pretty sure this is what led to the downfall of her marriage. I don't think they could buy one more thing with their utterly destroyed credit, and her ex couldn't support the debt they had. So she divorced him, stuck him with the house (a $300,000 debt) and some of the credit cards, and found herself a sugar daddy.
Sounds horrible right? So why can't I hate her?
Firstly, she has personality. And I'm a sucker for charm. Male, female, canine... make with the laughs and the good times and I'm in, however unwillingly.
Secondly, she was no good for her ex. And there is no way on earth she was ever going to change. As sucky as it is for him, and I'm sure he's bitter, he's better off. He might even have gotten off lucky. But I'm sure it isn't fun to be in love with someone who is no good. My sympathies lie with him, certainly. If I was a judge (and I'm imagining myself to be an older male judge who smokes a pipe and thinks up interesting sentences for juvenile offenders for some reason), I would saddle her with all the debt, but then after it was over, I'd ask to be her escort for an evening of steak and big band at the Elks Club.
Thirdly, she has gotten what she wants out of life. Rotten as she is, I have a sneaking respect for shredding your reputation and dignity, and risking everything for a chance at getting what you want. No, it isn't fair to her nice ex. But she did it and seems happy with the outcome. Also, her new husband seems happy with the outcome. And maybe he deserves it even if she doesn't.
I think the last one gives me the most satisfaction with my odd feelings. I don't know that her new husband is miserable and until I do, I don't think I can judge her as harshly as I would like.
Anyway, this chick divorced her husband - a nice enough fellow - and married an older man with what appears to be enough money to support the lifestyle she craved desperately, but couldn't have with her much younger ex.
Now having an thoroughly developed sense of justice, I think it's only right to hate her. I feel morally obligated to hate her. And yet I don't. I don't know why and it has been bothering me ever since she friended me on facebook and I accepted. I can't stand gold digging. On the ladder of contempt, I find it to be a rung lower than prostitution.
And I liked this girl's husband. He had a decent desk job with plenty of room to move up and quite comparable to other guys his age. He was a bit dorky, but endearingly so, and he was a good father to their two kids.
She, on the other hand, was a profligate spender. Back when credit was easy, she racked up over half a mil in bills. They bought a house they absolutely could not afford, she decorated it within an inch of it's life, and she bought a horse so she could travel the rodeo circuit giving exhibitions with a bunch of other cute girl riders. And I'm pretty sure this is what led to the downfall of her marriage. I don't think they could buy one more thing with their utterly destroyed credit, and her ex couldn't support the debt they had. So she divorced him, stuck him with the house (a $300,000 debt) and some of the credit cards, and found herself a sugar daddy.
Sounds horrible right? So why can't I hate her?
Firstly, she has personality. And I'm a sucker for charm. Male, female, canine... make with the laughs and the good times and I'm in, however unwillingly.
Secondly, she was no good for her ex. And there is no way on earth she was ever going to change. As sucky as it is for him, and I'm sure he's bitter, he's better off. He might even have gotten off lucky. But I'm sure it isn't fun to be in love with someone who is no good. My sympathies lie with him, certainly. If I was a judge (and I'm imagining myself to be an older male judge who smokes a pipe and thinks up interesting sentences for juvenile offenders for some reason), I would saddle her with all the debt, but then after it was over, I'd ask to be her escort for an evening of steak and big band at the Elks Club.
Thirdly, she has gotten what she wants out of life. Rotten as she is, I have a sneaking respect for shredding your reputation and dignity, and risking everything for a chance at getting what you want. No, it isn't fair to her nice ex. But she did it and seems happy with the outcome. Also, her new husband seems happy with the outcome. And maybe he deserves it even if she doesn't.
I think the last one gives me the most satisfaction with my odd feelings. I don't know that her new husband is miserable and until I do, I don't think I can judge her as harshly as I would like.
Wednesday, October 13, 2010
A Little Trip and a Little Nephew
I'm so busy. Like a little worker-bee buzzing, buzzing, buzzing except that while he is part of a well-organized colony of like-minded individuals, working at maximum efficiency until he dies, I am more like one who has had his head bitten partially off and been unceremoniously booted out of the collective.
But I did want to blog a little. It's fun. It helps me get organized. No, not really.
But we went on a mini vacation this past weekend, and it was so great I just have to tell. We went to Port Aransas, TX, which was so flipping fun. The day we got there, we just threw on our swimsuits and went down to the Gulf. Jethro and I had some nice drinks and watched Gwen and Em play in the surf. They love the beach, but we haven't been for a long time. And when we used to go, it was down in Galveston, which is a little yucky. Port A was much nicer. I'm not sure if it was just the time of year, but the water was clear and not brown, and the beaches were white and gorgeous. It was the most relaxing thing we have done in years.
Gwen and Em woke us up early on Sunday, begging to go back down to the beach. We did, and managed to cram a whole lot of interesting stuff into 3 hours. The tide was crawling back out leaving tide pools and sandbars all over. We watched little crabs swimming around, saved a minnow from death on a sandbar, Gwennie found a shark's tooth, and we saw a water spout far out over the water. In spite of the fact that 90% of my nightmares involve tornadoes or snakes, I was not frightened. It was pretty far away.
It was over too quickly and I want to go back. And I think I might want to live there one day when I'm old. I guess we'll have to see.
And now for a slight change of subject. I don't know if I've mentioned it here, but after years of being the only producer of offspring in both our families, Jethro and I are now the proud Aunt and Uncle to 3 nephews. Here is one of them, just to make your day a little brighter. Tell me he is not adorable. Please. I'm just dying to prove someone wrong today.
But I did want to blog a little. It's fun. It helps me get organized. No, not really.
But we went on a mini vacation this past weekend, and it was so great I just have to tell. We went to Port Aransas, TX, which was so flipping fun. The day we got there, we just threw on our swimsuits and went down to the Gulf. Jethro and I had some nice drinks and watched Gwen and Em play in the surf. They love the beach, but we haven't been for a long time. And when we used to go, it was down in Galveston, which is a little yucky. Port A was much nicer. I'm not sure if it was just the time of year, but the water was clear and not brown, and the beaches were white and gorgeous. It was the most relaxing thing we have done in years.
Gwen and Em woke us up early on Sunday, begging to go back down to the beach. We did, and managed to cram a whole lot of interesting stuff into 3 hours. The tide was crawling back out leaving tide pools and sandbars all over. We watched little crabs swimming around, saved a minnow from death on a sandbar, Gwennie found a shark's tooth, and we saw a water spout far out over the water. In spite of the fact that 90% of my nightmares involve tornadoes or snakes, I was not frightened. It was pretty far away.
It was over too quickly and I want to go back. And I think I might want to live there one day when I'm old. I guess we'll have to see.
And now for a slight change of subject. I don't know if I've mentioned it here, but after years of being the only producer of offspring in both our families, Jethro and I are now the proud Aunt and Uncle to 3 nephews. Here is one of them, just to make your day a little brighter. Tell me he is not adorable. Please. I'm just dying to prove someone wrong today.
Wednesday, October 06, 2010
I Accidentally Touched A Man's Penis The Other Day
The odd event took place at Emma's school. I was walking in, and there was a man right behind me whom I never saw. I was opening the school door and in a way that can only make sense to me but that I couldn't accurately explain in a million years, my arm swung behind me and my hand gently touched the front of his pants where I felt his penis. I think he was trying to open the door for me. Do you think I thanked him properly? A little excessive, maybe?
Monday, September 13, 2010
Thoughts on Current Affairs
Just some thoughts on the battle of the extremists in the Muslim world and ours.
We are embroiled today in the weirdest of controversies. Muslims want to build a mosque uncomfortably close to Ground Zero, in a building 2 blocks away, but close enough to where a piece of one of the hijacked planes tore through it (which, as far as I'm concerned, makes it Ground Zero). And they do this in the name of tolerance and peace, which it would seem, yet again, must come from the side of non-Muslims. They want to build a 13 story monument to their religion which inspired the murders of 3,000 innocents. For us. To tolerate. No really. It's generous.
The man behind the project did an interview on Larry King and threatened us with the unleashing of more radicals if the mosque was not built. I'm beginning to see how this goes. Muslims will do whatever they goddamn want, and non-Muslims will tolerate it - with their buttocks spread helpfully apart - or Muslim basket cases will start killing people. Again. So there you go. A cup of infidels causing problems for a Muslim investor, a quiet teaspoon of threat, a dash of spittle-flecked Islamic insanity and voila: Instant Tolerance.
Meanwhile, back at the ranch... we have a whackjob preacher in Florida who wanted to burn Korans as a symbolic...I don't know. Something. This irritates me to no end. Burning something - anything - in a symbolic gesture is the way of those who lack the ability to argue. They're slow of speech and slow of tongue, so they burn things. It's like monkey sign language instead of human speech - impressive the first time you see it, but in the long run, what? We know monkeys don't like poo in their food without them making hand gestures. And in this case, we know whackjob preacher and his miniscule congregation have problems with Islam. So they want to burn something.
It's not a rational argument. It's not even original pointlessness. It's been done to death. And what is setting the Koran on fire really saying? You burned our towers and killed 3,000 people, so we're going to burn your book? If you're going to compare the two in terms of shock value, the deranged Muslim primitives fucking win. They've flung their poo the farthest.
And if I may digress somewhat, how about reading the Koran? I promise you won't be swayed by the text to become a Muslim. Parts of it are pretty, like the bible, but basically, it's the 10,000 extremely confusing commandments plus bonus war manual and additional revisionist history. I don't think it would be terribly inspiring unless you live in a backward, superstitious culture. Maybe that's harsh, but as a member of the most advanced culture on the planet, and having been forced to observe large bits and small chunks of almost every Western religion, I simply can't see the appeal of Islam. It's cruel. And it's especially cruel (and worse - arbitrary) when it becomes the law. So read the Koran. We live in a free country. It isn't a banned book. If you've gotten some nutty urge to engage Muslims on the subject of their religion, at least know what it says and use that knowledge to your advantage.
But that was a digression. Back to the point. I think.
The whackjob preacher, at the gentle yet insistent request of our Dear Leader (who can expound with eloquent, pointless redundancy on the legality of building of a mosque at Ground Zero by a bunch of foreign investors, but not so easily defend the right of a citizen to be an idiot), eventually decided against burning the Korans, saying his point has been made. The Muslim investors did not decide against building a mosque at Ground Zero and instead, Muslims in Afghanistan, upon hearing the rumor of the Koran burning, went insane for the seventeenth time in an hour and ended up burning American flags in a highly agitated, monkey sign-language protest. So, in the battle of the extremists, what do you know? The whackjob preacher actually made a point by keeping his poo where it belonged. Lesson? Probably not.
Tuesday, August 17, 2010
I Am Not Dead. Again.
Yeah, I know. I don't want to talk about it. To be fair, I'm trying to do too many things at once which ends up being nothing at all, and earn money from not doing them. You know how it goes.
It's been an interesting summer. I spent two weeks in Houston which were so nearly insufferable that I went again for another week; Jethro nearly murdered my sister and one of the pale, slender youths she's sleeping with, and I discovered that I am a 15 year fugitive from justice.
I will just say because the red tape has had that long to entwine itself around my out-of-state warrant, you can imagine how supremely difficult it is to refrain from saying swear words to people who could extradite me. I'm trying not to let it get me down, but the way I found out caused an almost out of body experience of humiliation. Here goes:
I tried to renew my drivers license online, but discovered I could not. All it said was that I wasn't eligible. Fair enough. I've changed my address plenty of times and renewed it once online before, so it seemed reasonable that I'd have to go to the DMV so they could make sure I hadn't lost an eye or something.
So knowing the state of most DMVs, I decided not to go to the one in the city but opted instead to make a slightly further drive to a small town DMV where hopefully the lines would be shorter and the establishment cleaner. I knew I was taking a chance since the likelihood of a DMV being a DMV regardless of location is very high, but in this case my instinct was quite happily justified. While it wasn't the most stellar model of efficiency, it was clean and there were places to sit. I struck up a conversation with a friendly older gentleman sitting beside me, never letting on that I wasn't the most upstanding and wholesome example of wife/mother/small business owner.
Finally my name was called and I daintily trotted up with my unusually organized folder of personal information. This must have deceived them because they never guessed for even a second that anything might be wrong. They looked at my birth certificate and my old drivers license, administered the eye test and took my picture while I grinned like a vapid, aging debutante. I had just handed over my cash for the fee when the DMV employee took a second look at a paper that had printed up. She looked at it, blinked, moved it further from her eyes and squinted. "Have you ever been to the state of New Hampshire?" she asked confusedly.
Now right there, the wee demon who is currently renovating his hip urban loft on my shoulder gave me a sharp poke with his little pitchfork and said "LIE. IF YOU HAVE EVEN THE MOST PRIMITIVE BRAINSTEM AND AREN'T THE MOST USELESS CREATURE TO EVER WADDLE THE EARTH, YOU WILL LIE."
I figured he probably had good reason, but before I could get a good, firm bite on it, my morally over-trained tongue blurted out the truth.
"Yes. I went to college there," I said while mentally grabbing the invisible pitchfork and aiming it at my eye.
"Hmmm. It says here that you have some kind of restriction on your license in New Hampshire."
"But I never had a license in New Hampshire," I pleaded uselessly.
"Well, I'm not sure what the problem is, but it says here that you are ineligible to drive in the state of New Hampshire, and Texas has reciprocity with all 50 states."
"But I've renewed my license before and I've never had any problems. I haven't been in New Hampshire in 15 years." I was whining a little, mostly because the devil was slapping me in the face with his dick.
"I'm sorry. We'll give you your money back," she said appeasingly.
"Will you? Oh will you? Oh thank you for letting me keep my money. No really, you are too kind," I said sarcastically in the vain hope of cobbling together a few shreds of dignity. Not my finest hour.
Long story short, I'm still driving (carefully) with an expired license and have talked to the police prosecutor who said the warrant (which stemmed from a citation for possession of alcohol as a minor) expired in '96, but had somehow never been cleared off the books. She seemed to think this explained things perfectly, but it doesn't help me at all.
Hopefully I won't be so long in posting again. I'll whore for comments and see if I can't stimulate a blog recovery.
It's been an interesting summer. I spent two weeks in Houston which were so nearly insufferable that I went again for another week; Jethro nearly murdered my sister and one of the pale, slender youths she's sleeping with, and I discovered that I am a 15 year fugitive from justice.
I will just say because the red tape has had that long to entwine itself around my out-of-state warrant, you can imagine how supremely difficult it is to refrain from saying swear words to people who could extradite me. I'm trying not to let it get me down, but the way I found out caused an almost out of body experience of humiliation. Here goes:
I tried to renew my drivers license online, but discovered I could not. All it said was that I wasn't eligible. Fair enough. I've changed my address plenty of times and renewed it once online before, so it seemed reasonable that I'd have to go to the DMV so they could make sure I hadn't lost an eye or something.
So knowing the state of most DMVs, I decided not to go to the one in the city but opted instead to make a slightly further drive to a small town DMV where hopefully the lines would be shorter and the establishment cleaner. I knew I was taking a chance since the likelihood of a DMV being a DMV regardless of location is very high, but in this case my instinct was quite happily justified. While it wasn't the most stellar model of efficiency, it was clean and there were places to sit. I struck up a conversation with a friendly older gentleman sitting beside me, never letting on that I wasn't the most upstanding and wholesome example of wife/mother/small business owner.
Finally my name was called and I daintily trotted up with my unusually organized folder of personal information. This must have deceived them because they never guessed for even a second that anything might be wrong. They looked at my birth certificate and my old drivers license, administered the eye test and took my picture while I grinned like a vapid, aging debutante. I had just handed over my cash for the fee when the DMV employee took a second look at a paper that had printed up. She looked at it, blinked, moved it further from her eyes and squinted. "Have you ever been to the state of New Hampshire?" she asked confusedly.
Now right there, the wee demon who is currently renovating his hip urban loft on my shoulder gave me a sharp poke with his little pitchfork and said "LIE. IF YOU HAVE EVEN THE MOST PRIMITIVE BRAINSTEM AND AREN'T THE MOST USELESS CREATURE TO EVER WADDLE THE EARTH, YOU WILL LIE."
I figured he probably had good reason, but before I could get a good, firm bite on it, my morally over-trained tongue blurted out the truth.
"Yes. I went to college there," I said while mentally grabbing the invisible pitchfork and aiming it at my eye.
"Hmmm. It says here that you have some kind of restriction on your license in New Hampshire."
"But I never had a license in New Hampshire," I pleaded uselessly.
"Well, I'm not sure what the problem is, but it says here that you are ineligible to drive in the state of New Hampshire, and Texas has reciprocity with all 50 states."
"But I've renewed my license before and I've never had any problems. I haven't been in New Hampshire in 15 years." I was whining a little, mostly because the devil was slapping me in the face with his dick.
"I'm sorry. We'll give you your money back," she said appeasingly.
"Will you? Oh will you? Oh thank you for letting me keep my money. No really, you are too kind," I said sarcastically in the vain hope of cobbling together a few shreds of dignity. Not my finest hour.
Long story short, I'm still driving (carefully) with an expired license and have talked to the police prosecutor who said the warrant (which stemmed from a citation for possession of alcohol as a minor) expired in '96, but had somehow never been cleared off the books. She seemed to think this explained things perfectly, but it doesn't help me at all.
Hopefully I won't be so long in posting again. I'll whore for comments and see if I can't stimulate a blog recovery.
Sunday, June 13, 2010
I Am Not Dead
I'm just horribly busy. I'm trying to organize my house which anyone who knows me knows requires herculean effort on my part. Plus we've been back and forth to Houston for various family events like weddings (down to 6 5
And Jethro and I have decided to get us some business coaching so we can make some money, and my mind is full of things like "Stop Making Excuses" and "Why are you telling people what insurance you take when you should be telling them they need what you are selling?" All good things to have in your head if you are trying to run a clinic, but very bad for blogging.
Plus, I have been crippled with envy of Jack and tinyhands who are visiting or have just visited amazing countries with significant others or mysterious companions.
I am looking forward to two weeks in Houston without my significant other. I'll probably take up reading and calisthenics.
But I hope everyone else is having a nice summer, and I mean that far less bitterly than it reads.
And Jethro and I have decided to get us some business coaching so we can make some money, and my mind is full of things like "Stop Making Excuses" and "Why are you telling people what insurance you take when you should be telling them they need what you are selling?" All good things to have in your head if you are trying to run a clinic, but very bad for blogging.
Plus, I have been crippled with envy of Jack and tinyhands who are visiting or have just visited amazing countries with significant others or mysterious companions.
I am looking forward to two weeks in Houston without my significant other. I'll probably take up reading and calisthenics.
But I hope everyone else is having a nice summer, and I mean that far less bitterly than it reads.
Monday, April 12, 2010
Mounting the Ever Increasing Crescendo of Crazy
The A/C puffed out it's last wheezy breath just as the weather turned warm enough to need it. So I'm drinking a cold beer and doing a little blogging. It's too hot to do much else. It's too hot to do this, but I will anyway.
My temper tantrum over Obamacare has abated and now it's just business. It's a silly bill. Obama has no idea what he's doing.
My massage classes are almost done, but due to more tardies than I care to detail, I have about a month's worth of hours to make up. I don't care. Once the class is done, I can make up hours any time I want and they will just happen to coincide with the times when the Round Instructor is not there. I have so dreaded his class that I am chronically late. It's usually almost half an hour into it before I can psych myself up enough to go. Suddenly anything becomes more interesting - washing the windows, scratching that impossible spot between one's shoulder blades, seeing how far one's spit can dangle before one loses control of it...
Some funny things have happened in class, though. We were doing some role playing the other day (shut up, pervs) because at some point we're going to have to massage the general public and we need to be able to tell them to take off all their clothes without laughing or throwing up - two actions to which I am quite susceptible. I'm nervous around naked, unattractive people. Or even attractive people. So I muddled through my lines without too much trouble, but the same could not be said for one of my classmates.
What you are supposed to say is, "Please disrobe to the level you feel most comfortable. Down to your underpants is best for us, but we will work with whatever is most comfortable for you." Or something to that effect. This poor girl was so flustered, she blurted out, "Please take off everything from your underpants down." My partner and I had to hold onto each other we were laughing so hard.
And Round Instructor has continued to make a fool of himself. You can tell he's very insecure and unsure of himself by the way he brags of things he can do that cannot be proven, such as channelling the healing power of Christ into the bodies of people he touches. He tries to refer to himself as a 'conduit' but when he says it, it comes out 'condit.' It causes me to doubt. Of course one wonders why the healing energy he channels can't dissolve the vast, quivering amounts of fat from his own body, but I guess he doesn't think anyone would be indelicate enough to raise the question. And I'm not. Yet.
But things are degenerating quickly. His crush on one of my classmates reached a crisis when he corrected her Spanish. She is Mexican. Spanish is her first language. He is white. He can barely speak English. Don't ask me what he was trying to prove. Maybe he thought she liked assertive men and has no idea how to be assertive. Honestly, he's the type to leave a dozen roses and a picture of himself whacking off to a picture of you on your car while you're at the grocery store or some place that he would have had to have followed you to in order to know you were there.
But his crush was understandably offended, and she let him know it in spite of her very sweet nature. He turned about 40 shades of purple and began apologizing (and sweating) profusely, which only made it worse. Finally one of my other classmates told him to shut up and he did. But it made him aware that 5 people had witnessed his humiliation and he decided he doesn't like us anymore, especially his former crush, which really is unfair. All she did was not love him.
So he is trying to make the last few classes a nightmare and it's a testament to his chronic failure as a human being, that no one cares in the least. He is openly mocked by my classmates and he has no skills to wage a good comeback. And while it's somewhat awkward, it's better than squirming through his tasteless jokes and mispronunciations in silence for fear that he'll take it out on only you. He can't fail all of us.
I know I sound like I'm complaining, and I am a little bit, but it is actually really funny. I'm trying to think of an actor who he's similar to. Maybe Ned Beatty in Deliverance right after the squealing scene and if he'd had his balls cut off. Not great, but that's the best I got.
My temper tantrum over Obamacare has abated and now it's just business. It's a silly bill. Obama has no idea what he's doing.
My massage classes are almost done, but due to more tardies than I care to detail, I have about a month's worth of hours to make up. I don't care. Once the class is done, I can make up hours any time I want and they will just happen to coincide with the times when the Round Instructor is not there. I have so dreaded his class that I am chronically late. It's usually almost half an hour into it before I can psych myself up enough to go. Suddenly anything becomes more interesting - washing the windows, scratching that impossible spot between one's shoulder blades, seeing how far one's spit can dangle before one loses control of it...
Some funny things have happened in class, though. We were doing some role playing the other day (shut up, pervs) because at some point we're going to have to massage the general public and we need to be able to tell them to take off all their clothes without laughing or throwing up - two actions to which I am quite susceptible. I'm nervous around naked, unattractive people. Or even attractive people. So I muddled through my lines without too much trouble, but the same could not be said for one of my classmates.
What you are supposed to say is, "Please disrobe to the level you feel most comfortable. Down to your underpants is best for us, but we will work with whatever is most comfortable for you." Or something to that effect. This poor girl was so flustered, she blurted out, "Please take off everything from your underpants down." My partner and I had to hold onto each other we were laughing so hard.
And Round Instructor has continued to make a fool of himself. You can tell he's very insecure and unsure of himself by the way he brags of things he can do that cannot be proven, such as channelling the healing power of Christ into the bodies of people he touches. He tries to refer to himself as a 'conduit' but when he says it, it comes out 'condit.' It causes me to doubt. Of course one wonders why the healing energy he channels can't dissolve the vast, quivering amounts of fat from his own body, but I guess he doesn't think anyone would be indelicate enough to raise the question. And I'm not. Yet.
But things are degenerating quickly. His crush on one of my classmates reached a crisis when he corrected her Spanish. She is Mexican. Spanish is her first language. He is white. He can barely speak English. Don't ask me what he was trying to prove. Maybe he thought she liked assertive men and has no idea how to be assertive. Honestly, he's the type to leave a dozen roses and a picture of himself whacking off to a picture of you on your car while you're at the grocery store or some place that he would have had to have followed you to in order to know you were there.
But his crush was understandably offended, and she let him know it in spite of her very sweet nature. He turned about 40 shades of purple and began apologizing (and sweating) profusely, which only made it worse. Finally one of my other classmates told him to shut up and he did. But it made him aware that 5 people had witnessed his humiliation and he decided he doesn't like us anymore, especially his former crush, which really is unfair. All she did was not love him.
So he is trying to make the last few classes a nightmare and it's a testament to his chronic failure as a human being, that no one cares in the least. He is openly mocked by my classmates and he has no skills to wage a good comeback. And while it's somewhat awkward, it's better than squirming through his tasteless jokes and mispronunciations in silence for fear that he'll take it out on only you. He can't fail all of us.
I know I sound like I'm complaining, and I am a little bit, but it is actually really funny. I'm trying to think of an actor who he's similar to. Maybe Ned Beatty in Deliverance right after the squealing scene and if he'd had his balls cut off. Not great, but that's the best I got.
Sunday, March 21, 2010
Embracing the Suck
I'm not going to lie. I hope this healthcare bill passes. I'm ready to embrace the suck just for the pure, evil pleasure of reveling in the agony of the blighted morons who voted for Obama, and the lazy-eyed douchebags who stayed home because McCain wasn't "conservative" enough. I'm going to enjoy watching your suffering, and you will suffer.
In a loosely structured order, here's what's going to happen:
1.) Nothing. For 8 years, nothing at all is going to happen, at least not in terms of tangible benefits. That's because the government is going to tax you like you've never dreamed, in ways you have never dreamed, before anyone will receive any benefit at all.
2.) In the meantime, the cost of private insurance will rise dramatically. If insurance companies are going to be forced to cover those with pre-existing conditions, you will pay mightily. Then you're going to waste all kinds of time trying to get government coverage that doesn't even exist. Then the feelings of dread will set in when you realize how utterly fucked you are.
3.) This monstrosity cannot be funded no matter how much they tax. The profits of every insurance company, including bonuses for their bigshots will fund this massive abortion of a plan for about 30 seconds. And if there are no profits, there are no insurance companies. So after paying exorbitantly for years, say good-bye to your private insurance. And in an economy that will continue to suffer, don't look to other businesses to take on the burden. And if there are no businesses to tax, say good-bye to the government plan. Get ready to be taxed for nothing, and then to pay out of pocket for your medical care.
4.) You will never qualify for the government plan. If they decide you can afford private insurance, you will not be able to get government insurance in 8 years. You're going to pay for it, but you will never benefit.
5.) Doctors will leave general practices for fields of specialty. There is no money in general practice. They already can't afford to take Medicare/Medicaid. No matter what insurance you have, you will have to wait months for an initial diagnosis and only then will you be allowed to see a specialist. God forbid you have cancer. You have my full sympathy unless you voted for Obama or stayed home. Then I hope you don't ask me to care.
So there it is. You can make your O faces and scream "Yes We Can" while you whack off to the Dear Leader's picture, or you can prance around with your conspicuously displayed firearms declaring you're gonna take back your country from fucking pussies like McCain. Meantime, I'm going to sit back and enjoy the ass-pounding you all are going to give each other.
In a loosely structured order, here's what's going to happen:
1.) Nothing. For 8 years, nothing at all is going to happen, at least not in terms of tangible benefits. That's because the government is going to tax you like you've never dreamed, in ways you have never dreamed, before anyone will receive any benefit at all.
2.) In the meantime, the cost of private insurance will rise dramatically. If insurance companies are going to be forced to cover those with pre-existing conditions, you will pay mightily. Then you're going to waste all kinds of time trying to get government coverage that doesn't even exist. Then the feelings of dread will set in when you realize how utterly fucked you are.
3.) This monstrosity cannot be funded no matter how much they tax. The profits of every insurance company, including bonuses for their bigshots will fund this massive abortion of a plan for about 30 seconds. And if there are no profits, there are no insurance companies. So after paying exorbitantly for years, say good-bye to your private insurance. And in an economy that will continue to suffer, don't look to other businesses to take on the burden. And if there are no businesses to tax, say good-bye to the government plan. Get ready to be taxed for nothing, and then to pay out of pocket for your medical care.
4.) You will never qualify for the government plan. If they decide you can afford private insurance, you will not be able to get government insurance in 8 years. You're going to pay for it, but you will never benefit.
5.) Doctors will leave general practices for fields of specialty. There is no money in general practice. They already can't afford to take Medicare/Medicaid. No matter what insurance you have, you will have to wait months for an initial diagnosis and only then will you be allowed to see a specialist. God forbid you have cancer. You have my full sympathy unless you voted for Obama or stayed home. Then I hope you don't ask me to care.
So there it is. You can make your O faces and scream "Yes We Can" while you whack off to the Dear Leader's picture, or you can prance around with your conspicuously displayed firearms declaring you're gonna take back your country from fucking pussies like McCain. Meantime, I'm going to sit back and enjoy the ass-pounding you all are going to give each other.
Tuesday, March 09, 2010
Jack's Back...
and he's responding to comments! Bloggyworld just got a little more interesting. Again.
School is still occupying my time, but I'm almost done, at least with the classroom portion. In the continuing, dimwitted saga, the round instructor's wife is leaving him, which is no surprise to me, but might account for the Inappropriate, which increases with regularity as does his lack of grooming. His head is shaved now and he looks like an escaped convict-monk. He's coming on to one of the ladies in my class with such zealous desperation and lack of skill that I am constantly reduced to a cringing mass of unwilling sympathy. I can't even look him in the eye anymore, although I did the other night when he suspended class so we could all have the opportunity to consult with his 12 year old psychic. I was furious, but held my temper in check so at least I could leave early.
On the plus side, I'm designing all my classmate's business cards. I'm doing it for free as a graduation gift, but hopefully they'll tell people about me. And it's fun. I'm having more fun with that than I am with massage.
But I did get to utilize my massage skills on Jethro's and my eleventh anniversary. We booked a hotel room and spent a lovely evening together. We brought the portable massage table we use at the clinic, and I did all the naughty things that massage therapists are never supposed to do. I don't like to brag, but Jethro said my $5,000 tuition was totally worth it.
So that's what's going on here. Not too much. But if anyone still reads this blog, go leave a comment on Jack's. He's in Iraq, so you're doing it for your country.
School is still occupying my time, but I'm almost done, at least with the classroom portion. In the continuing, dimwitted saga, the round instructor's wife is leaving him, which is no surprise to me, but might account for the Inappropriate, which increases with regularity as does his lack of grooming. His head is shaved now and he looks like an escaped convict-monk. He's coming on to one of the ladies in my class with such zealous desperation and lack of skill that I am constantly reduced to a cringing mass of unwilling sympathy. I can't even look him in the eye anymore, although I did the other night when he suspended class so we could all have the opportunity to consult with his 12 year old psychic. I was furious, but held my temper in check so at least I could leave early.
On the plus side, I'm designing all my classmate's business cards. I'm doing it for free as a graduation gift, but hopefully they'll tell people about me. And it's fun. I'm having more fun with that than I am with massage.
But I did get to utilize my massage skills on Jethro's and my eleventh anniversary. We booked a hotel room and spent a lovely evening together. We brought the portable massage table we use at the clinic, and I did all the naughty things that massage therapists are never supposed to do. I don't like to brag, but Jethro said my $5,000 tuition was totally worth it.
So that's what's going on here. Not too much. But if anyone still reads this blog, go leave a comment on Jack's. He's in Iraq, so you're doing it for your country.
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
Snowboarder Complains About Peers' Pants
That headline just looked really odd. You can click on it for a link to the story.
And this video has nothing to do with it, but was too funny not to post. (NSFW)
Just a side note, this wasn't at the Olympics. It took place a couple of weeks ago.
And this video has nothing to do with it, but was too funny not to post. (NSFW)
Just a side note, this wasn't at the Olympics. It took place a couple of weeks ago.
Wednesday, February 10, 2010
PWN'D!!! (Or However They're Spelling It These Days)
Zelda: "My vertigo seems to be gone. Sorry you had to take the kids in yesterday."
Jethro: "And I'm sorry I was so grouchy. Don't take it personally, I'm just not a morning person."
Zelda: "I understand...."
Zelda: "Of course, you don't accept that PMS makes me grouchy, so I'm surprised at you using your aversion to mornings as an excuse ...."
Jethro: "Well I'll try to control it."
Zelda: "That wouldn't be good enough if I were saying it. Somehow you're allowed to be grouchy and I'm not?"
Jethro: "Yes. Because I'm the man."
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Zelda: "That's not what your mother said."
I love myself sometimes.
Jethro: "And I'm sorry I was so grouchy. Don't take it personally, I'm just not a morning person."
Zelda: "I understand...."
Zelda: "Of course, you don't accept that PMS makes me grouchy, so I'm surprised at you using your aversion to mornings as an excuse ...."
Jethro: "Well I'll try to control it."
Zelda: "That wouldn't be good enough if I were saying it. Somehow you're allowed to be grouchy and I'm not?"
Jethro: "Yes. Because I'm the man."
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Zelda: "That's not what your mother said."
I love myself sometimes.
Tuesday, February 02, 2010
Many Thanks, Mr. Salinger
I wasn't exactly sad to hear of JD Salinger's death because if you've had the desire to hang on until the age of 91, you've probably lived a pretty good and fulfilling life. But I felt an immediate sense of apprehension because I love Salinger and I've always felt protective of him. His reclusiveness never bothered me, having the occasional desire myself, and I always felt resentful on his behalf whenever anyone talked of it disparagingly.
Catcher in the Rye is one of my favorite books. I read it when I was one year older than Holden and out on my own for the first time. But I can't say I related to Holden exactly. I didn't have anywhere near enough sense of self to judge anyone else a "phony." But it also never occurred to me that exposing the phonies was the point of the book.
It seems that it's popular to dismiss Holden Caulfield as a spoiled upper class brat or an unrealistic purist. Even the compliments reduce him to a rebel without a cause in the silly, over-glorification of teen angst, à la The Breakfast Club.
I never saw him as any of that and patiently waited to find out the cause of his disenchantment, which it seems was death of his little brother. Of all the things that were causing him to despair, that one was the one thing he couldn't just leave. Moving to that cabin in the woods would take him away from all the phonies, but it wouldn't take him away from that great pain.
An event like that would cause anyone angst, not just a sensitive teenager, so by the end of the book, it seemed that Holden was simply trying to find beauty and truth in a world that was so relentlessly unsparing as to no longer contain someone who had been so dearly loved, and the agonizing search was paid for with his sanity and to an extent, his freedom. Whether he found enough beauty to redeem the world is irrelevant; it would seem that he hadn't by the book's end. I think he showed it to us, but hadn't found it himself. Truthfully, I don't think it was that important. I think it was more important just to hear what he had to say while he was looking. There's no reason to demand the character reach the same conclusions we have.
I also think it was important for Holden to be a teenager in the story because it's unforgivable for a rational adult to go 'round the twist like that. A teenager is old enough to not need his hand held as he roams the city, and we are able to examine the intricacies of grief and despair and the psychological trauma surrounding them without having them filtered through the complications of adult responsibilities which easily stunt such an examination. If Holden was an adult, inevitably we would have to see how his grief affected those with whom he was forced to interact, and we'd judge him harshly for not controlling himself for the sake of others. But with Holden being a teenager, we can see that grief and the accompanying vulnerability as the intensely personal thing that it is.
But Catcher, even though it's one of my favorite books, isn't even my favorite Salinger book. That would be Franny and Zooey. This was the book I related to. Franny and Zooey are the youngest of 7 gifted and talented siblings. One of the main themes of the book is confronting ego. Too deep an analysis will not make a good blog post, but the request to "do it for the Fat Lady" made me want to cry. My love for this book is only heightened by the fact that I consider Franny to be a female literary creation on par with Brett Ashley from Hemingway's The Sun Also Rises. I know I'm being enigmatic, but I don't want to rehash the plot, and would really just enjoy discussing it with someone who has read it.
I'm probably going overboard in the way breathless fans do, but it bothers me not. I guess I'm too old to pretend to be unaffected by that which I genuinely love.
I'd welcome a literary discussion if anyone is up to it. If not, I'm sure I'll have sex soon or find myself in an awkward situation. I'm very much aware that literary criticism is not my true talent...
Catcher in the Rye is one of my favorite books. I read it when I was one year older than Holden and out on my own for the first time. But I can't say I related to Holden exactly. I didn't have anywhere near enough sense of self to judge anyone else a "phony." But it also never occurred to me that exposing the phonies was the point of the book.
It seems that it's popular to dismiss Holden Caulfield as a spoiled upper class brat or an unrealistic purist. Even the compliments reduce him to a rebel without a cause in the silly, over-glorification of teen angst, à la The Breakfast Club.
I never saw him as any of that and patiently waited to find out the cause of his disenchantment, which it seems was death of his little brother. Of all the things that were causing him to despair, that one was the one thing he couldn't just leave. Moving to that cabin in the woods would take him away from all the phonies, but it wouldn't take him away from that great pain.
An event like that would cause anyone angst, not just a sensitive teenager, so by the end of the book, it seemed that Holden was simply trying to find beauty and truth in a world that was so relentlessly unsparing as to no longer contain someone who had been so dearly loved, and the agonizing search was paid for with his sanity and to an extent, his freedom. Whether he found enough beauty to redeem the world is irrelevant; it would seem that he hadn't by the book's end. I think he showed it to us, but hadn't found it himself. Truthfully, I don't think it was that important. I think it was more important just to hear what he had to say while he was looking. There's no reason to demand the character reach the same conclusions we have.
I also think it was important for Holden to be a teenager in the story because it's unforgivable for a rational adult to go 'round the twist like that. A teenager is old enough to not need his hand held as he roams the city, and we are able to examine the intricacies of grief and despair and the psychological trauma surrounding them without having them filtered through the complications of adult responsibilities which easily stunt such an examination. If Holden was an adult, inevitably we would have to see how his grief affected those with whom he was forced to interact, and we'd judge him harshly for not controlling himself for the sake of others. But with Holden being a teenager, we can see that grief and the accompanying vulnerability as the intensely personal thing that it is.
But Catcher, even though it's one of my favorite books, isn't even my favorite Salinger book. That would be Franny and Zooey. This was the book I related to. Franny and Zooey are the youngest of 7 gifted and talented siblings. One of the main themes of the book is confronting ego. Too deep an analysis will not make a good blog post, but the request to "do it for the Fat Lady" made me want to cry. My love for this book is only heightened by the fact that I consider Franny to be a female literary creation on par with Brett Ashley from Hemingway's The Sun Also Rises. I know I'm being enigmatic, but I don't want to rehash the plot, and would really just enjoy discussing it with someone who has read it.
I'm probably going overboard in the way breathless fans do, but it bothers me not. I guess I'm too old to pretend to be unaffected by that which I genuinely love.
I'd welcome a literary discussion if anyone is up to it. If not, I'm sure I'll have sex soon or find myself in an awkward situation. I'm very much aware that literary criticism is not my true talent...
Friday, January 29, 2010
For Sale: One Asian Doctor Husband. Cheap.
Jethro's killing me. I suffer from hypochondria. It's genetic. So when I become afflicted with an ailment, it is the perfect time to take advantage of me. Case it point.
I have vertigo. Right now. I think it's inner-ear related, but that doesn't mean I couldn't have had some kind of head trauma in my sleep. Shut up. So I go to my husband - a doctor - for reassurance. This is his purpose in life. He solemnly conducts several tests and then says he's going to test my gag reflex. I dutifully open my mouth and he unzips his zipper and laughs at me.
And a couple weeks ago, I asked him to work on my arm. He stood behind me to the right and kept pumping my arm up and down and telling me to relax. I tried for about 5 minutes before I realized he was rubbing my hand vigorously against his crotch.
He's killing me.
I have vertigo. Right now. I think it's inner-ear related, but that doesn't mean I couldn't have had some kind of head trauma in my sleep. Shut up. So I go to my husband - a doctor - for reassurance. This is his purpose in life. He solemnly conducts several tests and then says he's going to test my gag reflex. I dutifully open my mouth and he unzips his zipper and laughs at me.
And a couple weeks ago, I asked him to work on my arm. He stood behind me to the right and kept pumping my arm up and down and telling me to relax. I tried for about 5 minutes before I realized he was rubbing my hand vigorously against his crotch.
He's killing me.
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