Gunter glieben glauchen globen

Sister K has acquired a foreign exchange student from Germany, and he has already annexed her Norwegian heart.

Horror and disappointment

Attorney General Eric Holder announced recently that the Obama Administration is retaining the policy of rendition, which basically means torture.

I am horrified.

I cannot imagine what Obama is thinking.

Here's Obama some months ago, responding to Dick Cheney's assertion that torture is necessary to "keep America safe." I can't imagine what intelligence he's received that would change his mind.

We were all so looking forward to a government that had a conscience. What the hell happened?
he was accused by the right wing of being an "appeaser" during the election. And I think he is. Not in a Chamberlain-Nazi Germany kind of way, which is what the right wing was accusing him of, but more like a kid in high school who really really wants to be liked by everyone.

This isn't really much of a well thought out entry, but when I read about it I had to record my disappointment somewhere.

C'mon, man, you know better than this.

My mother and That Woman were in town this weekend, and we really need to get a drinking game together for their visits.

1. That woman says "Ich weiß nicht," take a sip.
2. That woman mentions the phrase "Shit, she's short" in reference to a marching band story from 22 years ago, take a sip.
3. Mother calls you by the wrong name, take a sip.
4. That woman says something racist, take a drink.
5. That woman appropriates a memory from your childhood that she was clearly not present for. take a drink.
6. That woman is rude to a cashier or a waitperson, take a drink.
7. That woman or Mother asks you a question where the answer is a lie, take a drink.
8. That woman or Mother asks why you don't have a blog, finish your drink and order another.

It's that last one that gets me. Every fucking time they see me, that woman has to declare her love for my writing and how it's such a shame I don't have a blog and why don't I have one. I suppose I could say that I do have one and that they can't read it, but then you have to get into the reasons why they can't read it and that's just too much talking. It's just easier to say I'm too busy.

Mom scared me a little by asking how one would find out who has a blog (because it's just that ignorance that lets me sleep at night), but K sort of mumbled Google and then said there really isn't a way because people tend not to post under their real names. I've already done a search and found that this doesn't come up when you Google my real name. Whew.

So, the drinking game. There are so many more to add-- feel free to add your own to comments. For those who haven't met her-- just make some up based on my stories. You'll probably be right.

Oh, sorry for not writing in so long. Quick update: I have three kidneys stones, my office has been moved to a different floor, Tbone is fine, I was on jury duty, and I spend most of my free computer time on Facebook now.

There, all caught up!

No no no no no no no no no no!!!

OK, I guess I'm back after a very long hiatus to rant here, in my wordy medical cabinet full of balls, because they're trying to kill me. An FDA recommendation to outlaw vicodin?!? I heard that and my immediate reaction was "Jesus Christ, it's a good thing I've already taken my meds for tonight so I don't fucking freak out and throw myself off a cliff."

Fucking FDA. If they want to take away my vicodin, they better supply the fucking heroin.

Who is backing this? I bet it's the Aleve motherfuckers. Gah!
Where do I picket?! Where are the petitions?!?! Where are the addresses of the people on this FDA panel???!??!

Maybe I shouldn't have said that last one. But still, who are these people? They haven't walked a mile in my fucked up hip moccasins. I dream of stuffing a stone in their collective kidney. Let us drill holes in their teeth too close to the nerves, then give them ice cream and no root canal. I want to put pure glucose in their IV and watch them scream.

I honestly don't know what I would do without my vicodin. It scares me. A lot.

If they do take away the only thing that helps me walk like normal person, the thing that allows me to sleep on my horribly fucked up hip bursae, the drug that keeps me from stabbing my legs repeatedly in an effort to somehow relieve the horrible aching of petrified muscles, the thing that keeps me from screaming and punching walls, I will explode. And write terrible run on sentences. If I thought becoming a survivalist and barricading myself in a one room cabin with hordes of prescriptions and paintball guns would work, I would do it.

But I realize that eventually I would run out of pills and paintballs.

MOTH.ER.FUCK.ER.TWO.POINT.TOO

[Edited to add: it was an error with the nurse who called it in to the pharmacy. They are remedying the situation now. Still, my righteous anger applies to other incidents in the past and, no doubt, in the future. This doctor is still not in the clear yet.]

Just once I would like to have one month without medical drama. No new family illness, no mysterious blood sugar episodes, no bizarre side effects, no prescription refill fuck ups.

Especially no prescription refill fuck ups.

You may not remember, but christ I sure fucking do, why I broke up with my former doctor. When I interviewed for my new doctor, I discussed the whole pain medication history: how I had been on the same doseages for 5 years, how well it has worked for me, how I just needed someone downtown to be my primary care doc so I could continue what was obviously a solid, time-tested pain management regimen. She agreed that I seemed stable and was clearly not a drug addict looking for a patsy to feed her habit. We agreed that I would come in once it came time for my prescription to be filled.

I saw her on Monday and brought in the bottle of my last refill. She made a note in my file and asked if I wanted the refill in hand or just faxed to the pharmacy.

(For future reference: ALWAYS GET THE SCRIP IN HAND.)

I got a call yesterday, saying the refill was ready. I took the bus that went by my pharmacy and picked it up. I didn't bother to check anything. Then I got home and noticed the much smaller bottle than usual.

She shorted me 10 days' worth of pills. And made the pharmacist note specially that I was to "make this last the full 30 days."

OK, maybe it was just a mistake. Still? FUCKING BITCH. I can't help but think this was deliberate, that somehow she thinks that maybe I'm exaggerating just a bit and I really only need six a day, rather than the eight I've been on for 5 motherfucking years. Even if it is a mistake, there'll be 50 million hoops to jump through to get the rest and I'll have to pay full price because the insurance won't pay for it.

Once again, I can't sleep because I've gotten myself all hepped up. It's just so frustrating. I feel like I am constantly having to prove to every doctor I see that I really am in pain and that I really do need this medication. For as much as I joke about how great Vicodin is and how I'm such an addict, this is a real medication for me, like Wellbutrin or Levoxyl or Insulin, and I need it to live my life.

This doctor has known me for all of 1.5 hours. I've known this pain for 20 years. If she gives me shit, I swear I will tell her that I'm not seeing her for her medical expertise. I have other, better doctors for that. She is my means to an end. She is the cheapest way to get the medicine I need.

This pain isn't something that's all in my head. And I've been through enough that I shouldn't have to wait for hours on hold, to beg and plead and justify to some judgmental nurse with no knowledge of my background just so I can talk to the doctor and squeeze out of her a prescription for something that is legitimate and necessary. It's demeaning and embarrassing.

You know, my therapist says that a large part of my depression is fed by my insomnia. I would literally feel better if only I didn't have to deal with all this shit. I swear these doctors will be the death of me.

Random as Chicken Tetrazini

I'm not drunk in this picture, I'm just trying to be cute. Obviously, that backfired.

I haven't written for so long. I don't have an excuse, I just thought I'd state the obvious.

I am so often not at my laptop. That doesn't mean I'm not at a computer, but work has gotten both busy and monitored. Because I don't have a portable device that lets me access any social networking sites (no iThing to tweet to or Blacksomething to upface), I have started carrying with me a small notepad I've labeled my ManuTwit.

Most of the things I write in it have lost their relevance by the time I've logged back in to wherever I want to update, I'm left with a tiny notebook filled with hastily scribbled one-liners. Here and now is the perfect place for me to type them up, because I really need to post another entry, but I have nothing pertinent to say (except, of course, how much I love Joel McHale, but my brain has been so fogged since Friday night that I cannot write about the show just yet). So here goes:

Emily thought she might have had a "pass it forward" moment at the airport when the guy in front of her at security grabbed two buckets for her. Then she went into the Hudson News and lost it due to a large number of small children underfoot and a conference of businessmen hogging the magazine racks.

Emily had just sat down in her aisle seat when a guy in a snazzy business suit walked by and farted.

Emily just watched an episode of Third Rock from the Sun written by Will Forte. Whhaaaaaat?

Emily just walked by a storefront with a sign that said "Art and Pie Gallery". Oh, N. Mississippi, you had me at "pie".

Emily was late to her doctor's appointment due to a lady in a Lark failing to parallel park on the bus.

Emily wondering at the Woodburn Outlet mall: Putting Lane Bryant and Petite Sophisticates
next to each other: marketing genius or just mean?

Emily thinks everyone's "fifteen minutes of fame" is turning into everyone's reality show slo-mo farewell montage.

The day before the day

I have been using these solo nights in hotel rooms to cry myself to sleep. It's an indulgence I can't take at home, with the husband who will try to comfort me when comfort isn't what I need, and the cats, who I can feel judging me. But tonight a combination of a friend's picture and a song by Dido just brought everything tumbling out.

I haven't had many business trips lately. I spent my last one sobbing about my dying cat, and I will sometimes lay in bed thinking about how much more crying I have to do over him, but I'm careful not to think about him too much. My therapist says the biggest issue I have is my inability to grieve appropriately. My eyes will begin to well up for almost any reason: a person near tears for losing weight on a reality show, or a story about someone doing something heroic, or even hearing about other people talking about crying. And I hate that I can't control my emotions about issues that I have no real stake in. My emotional reactions makes me feel weak.

I don't hold others to that standard, but somewhere I picked up this fucked up idea that crying-- just my crying-- is a nearly inexcusable character flaw. I had a horrible day at work a few weeks ago where I felt like my head was being ripped open by the MRSA infection entrenched in my left nostril that ended up with me going in to tell the boss that I wasn't feeling well and I ended up bursting into tears. It was horrible. I felt like the worst stereotype of a weakling girl who cries at the slightest stubbed toe or dropped ice cream cone.

I wasn't planning on sobbing tonight, here in my hotel room in Seattle, but I saw pictures of a friend of mine with his new baby. He was so happy just looking at the baby. He may not even have been aware a picture had been taken.

I realized I don't have any pictures of my dad and me like that. I have a few of us posing and his smile seems genuine enough, but I there aren't any like the picture of my friend and his son. Even worse, I'm starting to lose my memory of Dad altogether. I have a few real memories-- like the time at the campfire girl performance when I was six or seven. I was emceeing some sort of talent show where I had to pull a volunteer out of the audience and Dad just stood up, as if there was no one else who could do it (and he was right. I was planning on picking him).

I remember, sitting downstairs every day after preschool, keeping an eye on the polyester mustard curtains for his silhouette, and then running upstairs to jump into his arms. But I have very few of those memories I know I really experienced where it was just us two interacting. And even fewer that were happy.

My more specific memories are things like him yelling at me because he thought I stole his cigarettes and smoked them, when really I flushed them down the toilet because I knew they were bad for him. I remember him admonishing me for urine or blood tests with sugar levels that were too high. And I remember standing outside the sliding glass doors of his hospital room the day before he died, not allowed to go in because he was in ICU and I was only 12.

I do have one very vivid memory where the look on his face showed me that he really did love me. We were staying at my grandmother's house one night and during a particularly bad nightmare, I ended up sleepwalking down the street, waking up several blocks away from the house, on a street that was completely foreign to me. I was nine and it was dark. I sat on the curb and burst into tears. A man heard me and came out of his house and called my grandma's house after figuring out exactly where I should have been (not an easy thing when I only knew her as "Nonnie," which was not her given name and helped him not at all when he tried looking her up in the phonebook). He walked me out to his front porch and we watched as my entire family came running around the corner (I had only gotten a few blocks away). Probably the only look on my Dad's face I know I can remember accurately was the one he had at that moment. He was so worried and so happy to get me back. I don't remember if he carried me back to Nonnie's house, but he probably did.

I wish I had a picture of him to post for this entry, but as I mentioned earlier I am in a hotel room on a work laptop, and the single picture I have of him with me as a baby sits on my old desktop at home. Maybe I'll update it when I get back. Maybe this incident will have passed by then and I won't feel the need to be dramtically melancholy. I was supposed to go to bed an hour and a half ago, but that one Dido song made me get up to write this. It hasn't gone through much of a filter (I usually re-read each post 50 times before actually publishing), so I apologize for any run on sentences or incomplete thoughts.

And I'm sorry for getting you involved in this selfishly dramatic post. I'm posting this and going to bed without even reading it. I'm supposed to be at work at seven tomorrow.

Oh, I'll keep going with this until I die

More phrases:

• That's what I'M talkin' about

Lists

I have had so many things I could have written about in the past 2 weeks, but my brain has lost the ability to string together many sentences longer than up to 160 characters (140 if I twittered as much as the news shows claim I should).

Phrases that should be expunged from the English language

• You go, girl.
• Back in the day.
• And whatnot.
• Give (giving, gave) 110%.
• It's go time.
• (Anyone calling anybody) babe.

Things I have seen lately that shocked me, but not too much

• A bin of fedoras on sale at the local Walgreen's
• A business man trying to enter a building by choosing to go through the other door rather than open other door for the visibly disabled person exiting through the same set.
• The hat guy from the beer festival last year.
• The link on Yahoo from E! Online's newsfeed, posted under the main headline on Natasha Richardson's death, that read "Who Gets Invited to a Celebrity Funeral-- and How?"
  

I have other lists of things, like commercial personalities and jingles that I hate, but that will have to wait for another day.

Ever have one of those immune systems?

It lives on my nose, on the tip and back to the left. It has settled also in the bag underneath my eye, which dries out my eye enough for it to hang out there as well.

No, I'm not talking about an adorable tiny wombat named Benson (He moved to Newman's right ear. They get along pretty well, except for the fights about the phone bills). I'm talking about another MRSA blossom that, like all lumps worth their salt, hurts like a mothefucker and makes everything that happens throughout the day more irritating, more painful and more "I'm going to rip the head off the next person who makes eye contact with me".

I'm sure you've had days like that.

So I'm on honkin' antibiotics and taking 16 vicodin a day (what am I - an amateur?), and I have to stick a Q-tip covered with goop up my nose three times a day. As you might imagine, I am a joy to be around.

Oh, and I passed a kidney stone this morning.

So, I've been out of the office for the past two days, writhing in pain and cursing the day I was born, and I show up at work this morning and the boss expects me to prepare for the complicated training I'll be giving tomorrow, and get the handouts rewritten, and rewrite the curriculum. And answer the phones. And respond to emails. And babysit the douchbag coworker who I used to think might be useful until it became apparent that (a) he thinks he's smarter than everyone else [this is an IT guy, you're thinking, how shocking! Yeah, I know] and 2. he hates being told what to do by women.

Anyway, I think my boss is punishing me for being out sick 4 days out the past four weeks. We're all a little passive-aggressive in our loverly little group, but pulling this "get stuff that takes three days done in roughly 5 hours, so you can stand in front of a class of high-maintenence bone-headed computer users who want to learn more about downloading jebus quote screensavers and couldn't give a hooter's tip how Outlook works" thing is fucked up, even for her.

And? On top of that? She sends me an email and says "Oh, don't forget to wander around with a candy basket harrassing people into coming up with questions for you to answer." Sweet.

So today's been a pretty "everything is sucky" day for me. I hope you enjoyed my whining. Be sure to tune in next time for a one-woman play about missing the bus and the new shoes that don't fit.

The ache of blue anger

Ok, before I start, you need to watch this. I just saw it on TV and it made me laugh heartily:

I want my ringtone to be "THIS IS LIFE ALERT. YOU HAVE BEEN DETECTED. PLEASE GET OUT NOW!"

And now...

The Least Satisfying Break-up Ever

I was prepared. I had typed up a timeline, I had my arguments in bullet points. Sure, I was sitting there in my hospital gown with a paper blanket covering my naked legs, but I had righteousness on my side. I was ready to kick her perky Beaverton ass.

So of course she walks in and the first words out of her mouth are "You know, I really think you should try to find a doctor nearer to where you live."

She fucking broke up with me first! Argh!

I did make my point that partially filling my prescription for 5 days and then taking a fucking week vacation wasn't cool. And when she said she did that so I would make an appointment, I said I would have come in if she'd just left the message with the pharmacist. I'm not 13 (I added in my head). Then I asked her if she would have done that if I needed an insulin refill. And of course she answered "No". I frowned. When I told her the whole story I got an apology, but that left me almost as frustrated as I was last week. well, with slightly less murderous rage, but still. She psychically cock blocked me. All I could do was demand copies of my medical records and she just said "pick up the form at reception." Then came the speculum.

The paperwork said that I would only be getting a Cliff Notes version of the past two years of visits and x-rays and labs. Since the whole reason my doctor blackmailed me into making an appointment was because I hadn't been to see her in 2 years, this was clearly not going to work. Luckily, my attorney had supplied me with a letter that outlined what I was legally entitled to per HIPAA (basically, anything I wanted). I went downstairs to records and was all ready to fight, but when I told them I wanted everything, all the chick behind the counter said was "OK, but you know we'll be charging you for it, right?"

Yeah, I knew that.
An hour later I was at my rheumatologist's office (I took the whole day off so I could see two doctors and a vet) and told him my story. He listened to me with a ponderous look on his face and then moved on without comment. At least he took a copy of my incident time line, which was a little satisfying, but I don't think he knew what it was, exactly. His assistant, who was also his daughter, asked me a bunch of questions and then he came in and poked at my joints and moved my arms around and generally posed me (most respectfully) like a Barbie doll. Then he sat me down and updated me on my physical phailures:

++ Chronic myofascial pain due to poorly controlled blood glucose levels and vitamin D deficency.
++ Vitamin D deficiency.
++ Possible pinched nerve or nerve damage in my left neck and shoulder.
++ Possible anemia.
++ Chronic fatigue (not necessarily the syndrome kind, for all you attorneys who represent The Man in worker's comp cases. Yeah, I'm lookin' at you, Paul).
++ Fibromyalgia, or a close relative, that is contributing to all of the above.

That'll put the balls in your Medicine Balls.

At least I got a new prescription for Vicodin. I could fill it now and be practically swimming in pills, but I'll be a good patient and at least wait until I finish my first bottle. Maybe. It depends on how the next couple of weeks at work go.

Twitting away

After much thought, I have decided to not only resume Twitter, but to actually follow That Woman's posts. Why, you ask? How, you query? What in holy hell are you doing, you scream?

Well, for the entertainment factor, of course. I subscribed to her feed and have found she has only twitted thrice. Here, for you enjoyment, are those selfsame entries:

Posted: 2/15/09: Packing for the Seychelles!
Posted: 2/22/09: Leaving Wednesday!
Posted 2/23/08: Tired of the rain and ready for the sun.. very soon!

How intriguing and clever! I cannot wait to read more of her exploits.

---

I have also decided to Twitter again. For those of you who follow me, I must warn you that I won't be saying anything interesting. Here's my plan: I will pick the most boring things or phrases that come to mind-- or maybe good movie quotes or references-- translate them to Esperanto, then post them. Here is my first entry:

ĉirkaŭiris kaj distribu sukeraĵo(j). Mi vidas vin manĝis unu, Mi est-as?

Which translates into

Walked around and distributed candy. I see you ate one, am I?

Some may recognize that last phrase as being the inscrutable license plate of Tracy Jordan on 30 Rock. I look forward to supplying you with both her entries and mine.

MOTH.ER.FUCK.ER.

First off, I'm sorry I had to lock this shit down for a bit, but I foolishly put this URL in my Twitter profile, and That Woman has started to follow me. Because she's crazy nosy. I guess it's possible she didn't click on the link because she didn't know what URL meant, but there was a sharp increase in hits on the day she started to follow me.

I don't know why I'm so freaked about this, but I don't want her knowing stuff about me. I'm less concerned about her finding the stuff I wrote about her, but I really don't want her to give her fuel for her ridiculous snotty remarks about things like my stupid health or all the embarrassing moments I've been posting.

If it turns out I'm being paranoid, I'll reopen it. I just like thinking that she'll try to come back to read it and find that she's been locked out. It seems sufficiently passive-aggressive.

[ETA: Obviously, the lock has been lifted. Who the fuck really cares, I thought?)
======================================

Second off, and what I really need to talk about, is how much I despise my Primary Care physician (PCP) and everyone in her office. She decided that, because I haven't been to see her lately, that she would more or less cut me off from my vicodin until I made an appointment.

She filled a partial prescription that would last 5 days. That ran out smack dab in the middle of a three day weekend. Thanks for that, you jerk. I had to wait to refill my prescription until Tuesday, day 2 of having NO PAIN MEDICATION. That's so awesome since my leg and hip pain has gotten significantly worse and I have been officially diagnosed with Fibromyalgia.

I hate my PCP.

She couldn't have done this when she refilled my thyroid medicine the week before? Of course not. She could have had a lawsuit if she did this with my insulin, because that's good medicine. No insulin would kill me. No vicodin just makes everything extremely painful, thus punishing me for being on a drug that some people use recreationally.

I really hate my PCP.

I spent Tuesday on three marathon phone calls, telling my story to three different people who all gave me wrong information. Yes, the doctor is here-- have your drug store fax the info. Then? No, the doctor isn't here after all, but they see the info from the drug store and it's "In her queue". Lastly, I got an on call nurse, who told me there was nothing she could do and I'd have to wait until tomorrow, because even if I left a message for the on-call doctor, he wouldn't be filling any prescription for me. They don't do that sort of thing.

I really hate my PCP and her nurses and assistants.

I spent the night tossing and turning physically and mentally. I spent my sleep time angrily reliving the days interactions, adding even more to my stress and my anxiety.

My god, I hate my PCP.

I woke this morning determined to get this shit out of the way. I called at 10:00 AM and was told it "was in her queue" and she'd get to it in the afternoon, after she saw her patients. I asked that they try to expedite it, since this was day three of my not having my legitimate medicine for a legitimate disease. She reluctantly said she would.

I hate the nurses and assistants in Internal Medicine.

I called again at 3:00 PM to remind them again. It's in the queue, yeah yeah yeah. It was in the queue yesterday and we know how that worked out. I called again at five minutes before their office closed and was lectured that she would get to it.

I really really hate my PCP's office and everyone in it.

It's almost seven now, she is not in her office and there is no prescription at Walgreen's.

I will hitch a ride with my husband tomorrow to Beaverton so I can throttle every god damn person in Internal Medicine, grab my medical records-- built over 9 years and roughly the size of the OED-- and hightail it to my rheumatologist to take over everything. I swear I'll even get my pap smears from him.

That's how much I hate my PCP.

The Ack-Ack of Love

Once I realized I wasn't going to get any carnations during the Valentine's Day fund raisers in high school, I lost my interest in celebrating Valentine's Day. I'm not waiting breathlessly, cartoon hearts popping above my head, for chocolates and flowers and showers of diamonds.

But my dear The Husband wants to do something for Valentine's Day-- nothing fancy, maybe dinner and a movie-- so I thought I'd make my Valentine's entry today instead.

Why I Love My Husband and You Can't Have Him

* He once started a slap fight with me while waiting at a red light, which made a complete stranger--turning left at the time-- laugh. And this satisfies me.

* He argues with the cats as much as I do.

* He also loves Whoppers and Canada.

* He gets things down off too-high shelves for me.

* He puts ketchup on his macaroni and cheese

* He writes the funniest emails I've ever read.

* He tucks me in every night and directs the cats to their proper snuggling positions.

* He speaks-- and understands-- my gibberish.

* He is very quiet in public, which makes me feel special when he talks freely with me. Well, "freely".

* He mocks the same things I do.

* He lets me MST3K commercials, news and Access Hollywood.

* He recognizes my insulin reactions hours before I notice-- and he has in a very real way saved my life numerous times.

We exchange cards with cat pictures on them on Feb 14th and maybe go to dinner, but we don't need to wait for a day to say we love each other. We don't need a specific day to do something nice for each other.

That's a normal day for us, so suck on it Jared.

Se7en

I guess I've been tagged to write up seven things no one knows about me.

Well, you asked:

1. I invented the word "rummage".

2. In 1973 I had a choice between quarterbacking for the New York mets or continuing my life as a three year old. I chose the latter, but was fired right about the time I turned four.

3. My favorite color is gunmetal jones.

4. I look very much like Paul Lynde when I'm not wearing make up.

5. I really don't need any badges, stinking or no.

6. Some people don't think there is a six. Well, there is.

7. I often dress my cats in hand knitted vests, which is criminal. They much prefer capes.

If you're reading this, consider yourself tagged.

Leave him alone [Warning: contains sexual vulgarity]

Many people are demanding that Mayor Sam Adams step down because he lied about a relationship he had with an 18 year old legislative aide a couple years back. I wish I wish I wish everyone, especially the news, would just shut up and let him do his job.

Of course he lied about it; he's gay, he's a politician and it's sex.

How did this question even come up? How is it in any way relevant to the administration of the city? When did Portland suddenly become full of holier-than-thou prudes? His detractors have said it's not about the sex, it's about his lying. Really? Because no one has ever lied about sex before. And certainly no politician has ever lied to get into office. This situation is so unusual.

Seriously, here's a question for anyone who thinks the Mayor should step down:

What would you do if your mother asked you: Do you like a finger up your ass when you fuck?

Do you think, just maybe, you might lie about that? I mean, what business of it is hers? What if she asked you that at a press conference?

Feel free to leave your answer to that question in comments. I'll be happy to let your local paper know so they can update your mother.

Disappointed horse*

I try not to be high maintenance. I try to be nice to any food servers or customer service folks. I don't want to be one of those people.

But sometimes, when it's my birthday, and the waitperson is one of those too-friendly types that sit next to you to take your order, and call you 'hon' and spend 10 minutes racing around a nearly-empty restaurant giving other people who arrived later than you their bread while you sit, blood sugar plummeting, sometimes I just get grumpy. And that was my main emotion during my birthday dinner. 

When our waitperson finally came to take our order, I ordered what I thought was not a difficult option for an Italian restaurant: cheese ravioli and a salad. 10 minutes later, the salad was delivered (but none of the promised bread). We sat eating our salad, all the while watching the waitperson flit from table to table (3 others in all), handing out bread and pouring more water to all the other tables but ours.

By now I had drunk half the wine. The hypoglycemia and brand new old age and lack of bread were beginning to put me in a bad mood. Out of the corner of my eye, I see the waitperson start to approach us (without bread in hand). She kneels down next to me and puts her hands on our table. 

"So here's the bad news, honey,"  she said. "Apparently our cheese ravioli are bad. Just... bad. So we need to find you something else to eat."

I blinked at her. It had been 25 minutes since she took our order. How long did it take to determine a bad ravioli? I guess I appreciate that they didn't serve me putrid, salmonella laced pasta-- or whatever made the dish unservable-- but could they maybe have figured that out sooner? While I looked at the menu, she started yelling out other options-- all of which I didn't want. Sausage? No. Calamari? No no no. She sneered when I told her I didn't eat red meat or sea kittens, like I was purposely making her life more difficult.

She started pushing this butternut squash ravioli, which seems to have avoided the other ravioli calamity, with some sort of spiced cream sauce that didn't sound like my kind of meal. Instead I chose the chicken parmesan. She shook her head.

"Oh, honey. That takes 20 minutes to cook. You don't want to wait that long." I considered saying maybe I wouldn't mind if we maybe had some fucking bread, but I didn't want to be a bitch. Again she pushed the butternut johnsons. The Husband was ever so slightly rolling his eyes (he thinks I'm picky at restaurants, but honestly-- I don't try to be), so I gave in and ordered the dish, even though it was built without any individual ingredients I actually liked. I asked if we could please get some bread.

"It's coming up," she hissed, "It's about ready to come out of the oven."

The dinner finally arrived, and one bite later I knew I was not going to eat it. So now The Husband and I are both in bad moods, eating (or in my case, drinking) in silence. 

Later on, our waitperson came by and I requested a box to go. She looked at me sternly and said "Only if you liked it." 

OK - wait a fucking second. I didn't like it, but I let myself be talked into ordering it, so it's on my head. Why the hell would you care if I liked it or not? If I said no, would you have taken it off the bill? I thought not. 

If she'd brought the bread and cut back on the attitude, I would have chalked up this whole thing as a bad choice. But she doesn't get to judge me for that. I tried my best to be nice and unassuming. I didn't throw the dish on the floor in a tantrum. Maybe I should have.

So, I had a really crappy night. The next morning I called in sick to work, and not just because I had a sore throat (though I did, for a time). Mostly I was just depressed. That single experience, where I had the pleasure of paying $60 to leave a restaurant hungry and angry, ruined my birthday. I know part of it was my fault for thinking that just because it was my birthday everything should have been perfect, and it was also my fault for not sticking up for myself and maybe sending the dish back for something more suited to my apparently difficult taste buds. 

But goddamn it, she could have at least brought the bread in a timely fucking manner.

* To make sense of this entry's title, please click here. Please, please click. There.

On the eve of a certain age

This past Saturday while talking to my 7-year old niece , she referred to herself (for whatever reason) as "young monk". I don't know why; she's just an enigma smothered in silly sauce. Anyway, later on she referred to me as "old monk".

Nothing like a 7-year old to put everything in that really awesome "no really, you're ancient" perspective.

I turn 39 tomorrow, though luckily I'm not one of those women who feel the need to add "for the first time". I hope to never be so fearful of irrelevance that I start doing that.

I've been told that I look much younger than I should ('much' being relative, of course), but this just makes me embarrassed and a little suspicious. That still hasn't stopped me from buying all those schmancy creams and oils to fight wrinkles I don't have yet and bags under my eyes that I've had since grade school.

I don't remember ever trying to imagine what I would be like at thirty-nine. That seemed so far away, so impossibly remote that I must have assumed I would end up like all my teachers who were, of course, polyester-slacksters with a confounding lack of pop culture knowledge.

Well, my pants are pajamas and I'm nothing but pop culture references. So tomorrow is my birthday and I will answer truthfully when anyone asks my age, although I'm sure we will both leave the conversation disappointed.

Brand spankin' new embarrassment

This one is quick and terribly fresh. 

A new person started in the marketing department today and, as usual, he started his computer training this afternoon. While I oversee the training, I'm not doing most of it, now that my two "trainers in training" are taking over piece by piece.

I met the trainee before the class started. He looked like Paul Rubens and when he shook my hand he made eye contact and held my hand far too long. I don't consider myself overly sensitive, but this really creeped me out. 

So, before he came in for class, I shut the door and whispered to both newbie IT people that I had just met the new guy and he seemed to me to be a little creepy.

To which the boy newbie (who is creepy in his own right) said, "He's my best friend, you know".

Well, of course he is.

Keystone Kommute

An all-zone ticket for the Tri-met busses and Max lines costs $2.30. When I have certain doctors appointments, I have to leave work early and take a half-hour, multiple zone ride to Beaverton, then walk nearly a mile to the office. Since the husband occasionally has to take Max to his office in Beaverton, we maintain a cache of all-zone tickets.

Since I had an appointment after work today, I was pleased that I managed to remember to grab two tickets before I headed off to work.

"Look at me," I thought as I tucked them in my back pocket, "with the thinking ahead, etc."

I was nearly at the bus stop where I catch the bus every morning, ready to board as I usually do with my Zones 1 and 2 bus pass, when I reached into the pocket of my brand new awesome hoodie and did not find the wallet that I had tucked into it four blocks ago.

Well, poo.

A neighbor I had greeted as I left the house this morning found my wallet whilst walking her adorable pointy dog, and she met up with me as I was retracing my steps. Wallet back in hand (and NOT in pocket), I headed to another bus stop, this one for a different line that is usually busier than I like. I prefer not to stand or sit next to anyone when I am commuting, as I try to avoid interacting with anyone, at any time.

Well, the bus was full of snotty young whippersnappers storing their weirdly irony-free Strawberry Shortcake backpacks on the empty seats next to them, and so I stood with all the other worker bees who really didn't want to start a ruckus with the rude and mopey teens and I didn't really want to sit by the guy who smelled like dog shit, anyway.

Skip forward to lunch. I'm off to the place down the street for an egg salad. Nervous that I'd lose my wallet again, I check my various pockets for my accoutrements: phone, iPod, wallet, bus ticket.

Ticket? I stop and discover that there is only one all-zone ticket in my back pocket.

Crap. How does something fall out of a back pocket? It's not like I spend my days hanging upside down from a jungle gym.

Well, having experienced missing a train because the stupid machine wouldn't print the ticket fast enough, I thought I'd buy my replacement ticket in advance from the machine at the stop before I picked up my egg salad. I carefully tucked my purchase into one of my front pockets and headed off to the sandwich place. I spent the rest of the day suddenly wigging out and checking all my pockets in a panic. Everything seemed to be in order.

Work continued and finally let me go. As the train approached the stop at its appointed time, I reached into my front pocket and pulled out my ticket. And it was then I noticed the note at the bottom that read "EXPIRES AT 2:14 PM".

Shit. I'd forgotten that tickets bought in the machines, rather than at the Tri-met office, expired after two hours.

Well, I still had the one that survived the trip this morning, but not wanting to have to buy another ticket for the return trip, I risked getting caught by a traffic cop and boarded the train without buying another ticket. I managed to get to my stop without incident. Huzzah!

So, I walked to my appointment, whined to my therapist, scored some sleeping pills and started my trip home. As I walked past the bus stop half way to the station, I checked the arrival table and saw that there was one due in two minutes. Well, wasn't that handy? I watched the silhouette of the bus lumber toward me, I reached into my back pocket. My empty back pocket.

Fuckity fuckerson! What? Why? Argh!

I dug into my bag trying to find my wallet, which of course had settled underneath every single thing I had in it, simultaneously reliving my sandwich purchase, trying to remember how and how much I had paid for it. Did I pay cash? How much did I pay? Did I have any enough left to buy another goddamn ticket?

Well, turns out I bought the egg salad with my ATM card and I had exactly 3 dollars-- three soft and crumpled dollars that are difficult to stuff into the bus fareboxes. The machine finally took my fare, but its initial resistance allowed the driver to lecture me for wearing a black coat while waiting at a bus stop at night while she handed me my transfer.

I sat at the transit center waiting for the train that would finally get me home, clutching my transfer with both hands, and I wondered where my lost tickets ended up. I decided that if they weren't found by an indigent person desperate to get to Gresham, I imagined they were riding the wind in poetic circles like a plastic bag in nineties a movie.

'Tis a gift?

Every year at xmas, I start to get a feeling of excitement and dread. I like presents and I like my family, but xmas doesn't come with just family. It comes with That Woman. And what comes with That Woman at xmastime are creepy, horrible gifts.

There have been some doozies (The husband once got a book on county fairs, because everyone knows how fascinating county fairs are to the youngsters these days-- unlike those dirty state fairs; State fairs are Sodom and/or Gomorrah with ferris wheels!). She once gave my six year old nephew a figurine of a bear doing taxes. You can count on her giving at least one person something she's received as a free gift.

This year I was afraid she wouldn't live up to her reputation. And then I opened this:

That grey blob is a cat, and I suppose that's why she thought to give it to me, since any time you're at a loss for a gift you can always give a cat lady some sort of cat-related thingy.

This is creepy, right? I gotta say, when I saw this little clay faceless lady holding a blob-- the first thing I thought of was Dr. Who:

And everyone knows Dr. Who creations make great holiday stocking stuffers. Order yours today!

Night fever

Once again, I find myself up at nearly three in the morning, unable to sleep. It seems like it's always the same: I head off to bed between 11:00 PM and midnight, lay awake for two or three hours, then finally get up to waste another hour before heading back to bed and trying again.

I used to think I knew why I couldn't sleep, but after trying various combinations of drugs (2 of these kind, none of those, let's treble this one and halve the other, etc.) I'm left baffled and irritated.

And sleepy, but only at times where I don't want to be sleepy: at work, on the bus, in a planetarium.

[We interrupt this blog post to point out that the picture above is of the caption I added to the existing Shag cat tattoo on my left arm. I got it on New Year's day with Sisters J and K. Well, K was just a spectator, as were my niece and brother in law, but it was nice to have an outing with all my sisters-- it's been a very long time since we've been able to do that.]

I realize that posts about sleep deprivation aren't very exciting unless they are being written after many days of no sleep at all, so I'll recap how things have been during this holiday period:

Xmas: We were snowed in all week, so we didn't make the trip to the Bay Area. While I was bummed that I missed some of the family functions, I wasn't so upset about missing out on the airport experience. Flying during the holiday season is a pain in the ass no matter what the weather, but maneuvering through an airport flush with stranded passengers is not my idea of a merry xmas.

New Year's: I am well beyond the age where New Year's Eve means bushels of drink and dancing in a venue packed with drunks and dancers. The last time we went anywhere public for the changing of the years was the big '99 - '00 deathwatch down at Pioneer Courthouse Square. Once we found out the party would not be ringing in the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse and the Camel of ATM Failure, we headed home for microwave mac & cheese and bed after that. Anyway, this year we went to K's and played board games. It was really fun.

But the husband and I forgot to kiss at the stroke of midnight, so I'm not sure how that bodes for this new year.

Belated family xmas on 1/2/2009: After going out with the sisters for a quick tattoo, as mentioned above, we met again the next day to open all the presents from xmas that we missed while being marooned in the house the week previous. Because my birthday is just three weeks after xmas, I had more presents mixed in, to the point of embarrassment, really. I had six or seven more presents for everyone else, which made me feel like a gift glutton surrounded by piles of empty boxes and mountains of ripped wrappings. Counting the xmas gifts alone, we received far more than we gave. I really do feel like a cheap bastard who gamed the system of xmas gift giving.

Still though: we made out like bandits, although not on New Year's where one expects to make out.

Thanks, sisters. Thisters.