I'm juicin

Creative juicing, that is.

I'm amping up for NaBloPoMo.

A whole month of posts! All in a row!

Are we ready, people?

Are we excited?

Are we going to kick Blogger's ass, if it refuses to post pictures for us, like it's doing today?

Are we possibly going to throw up, trying to come up with a post for every.single.day?

If you answered yes to one or more of the questions, then check back tomorrow (and the day after that, and the day after that...) to see what's going on here at NTE.

SPH: Safe

Grab the Scavenger Hunt code. Photo Theme. Join the blogroll. Visit participants.

Today's Saturday Photo Hunt theme is Safe...which is ironic.
Because after this post by the lovely Amalah, I'm feeling anything but about posting personal pictures.




So, here's who'll be guarding our house this week, keeping us safe...










Off to see who's keeping y'all safe this week...

Hello, all!

Well, my eye is recovering well, thank you for your concern &/or mockery. ;)

In other news, I'm going to have to figure out an escape plan. I am incredibly over-sensitive to smells, which in turn irritates both my asthma and the CFIDS, and yesterday the city decided to start repaving our street.

Um... Are you aware of just how badly tar smells, people?

Yeah. It's not good. So I'm trying to come up with an evacuation plan that seems plausible. They'll be back next week, which means I gotta get outta here. The only question is where to go:

Option #1 is up the street to visit with my grandmother. And, by 'visit,' I mean invade and take over her entire house for probably at least a week. The pluses to this plan are that there are people who live there (my grandmother, uncle, and youngest sister) who will help me (with eating and little things); that it's a short distance and Mum can come and go as she needs to without worrying that if I fall I would be stuck there until she came back; I'll be able to read, or watch TV or, pretty much whatever I would do here during the day; & they have Wi-Fi, so my pledge to post everyday in November will have a fighting chance at being true. The negatives (aside from the health setback that follows an evacuation, which I'm going to have no matter what option I take) include the fact that my grandmother isn't exactly well, and I (& Mum & Baby Girl) would be imposing (even if they said we aren't); that I'd be bunking on a couch/pull out bed; that there are three steps and a short walk into/out of her house, which I don't know if I am up for.

Option #2 is to bunk at my brother & soon-to-be-sister-in-law's empty condo, also down the street. It is also close, but has an elevator: no steps. It also has no TV or wifi or, really, anything other than an empty Refrigerator and a futon. Because they have moved their family back in with her mother, and nobody has bought the condo from them yet. I would still be close, but I would also be very alone, when Mum has to do what she has to do. (Which, hello, I am not going to focus on the very sad fact that, while I would love to be alone, I just am not physically up for it right now.)

I don't know if there's an option 3, really. I suppose I could go to a hotel, but how would that be different from the empty condo (except for that it would cost me $?) I could call my college-roommate/best friend, who would ... without a question... open her door to me, but she has a family & a job (not to mention a dog), and she lives... about an hour away. IDK, I can't think of other options right now. In the past, I've always chosen option #1, but I really don't know about those steps... hmm. Will be pondering this, I promise you.

ANY ways... before I wandered into my own little obsession, I was going to say that this:
is TOTALLY UNNECESSARY. Your cat does not need painted toenails. EVER.

Yesterday, I got deodorant in my eye

I kid you not.

File under: things that only happen to me.

So, I've explained before about my whole shower=coma thing... Showering takes so much energy, combined with the intense heat that my muscles require leaves me drained and zonked for a couple of hours.

So, yesterday, after my shower/coma, I started to get dressed again. This takes effort and energy, and I'm still running low on both. I have all the lotion and deodorant and clothes all set out beforehand, for easy assembling. I also have not put my glasses back on yet, because they are over.... there. And I am ... not.

I roll over, grab the deodorant. It's a gel kind, because the glands under my arms are often swollen and sensitive, and with this kind, I don't actually have to use much pressure. Usually, this is a very good thing. But yesterday, not so much.

Because I can't get the stupid cover off. And trying wears me out all over again, so by the time I finally do get the cover off, I have to lie down again.

Which I do. Then I click the little "give-me-more" clicky thing at the bottom, and deodorant comes flying out of the little hole and lands directly in my eyeball.

Holy Lord, the sting!

And, as it is stinging, I am not sure if I should scream or cry or laugh: I have DEODORANT in my EYEBALL! What the heck kind of crap is that?

So, I'm grabbing my eye and telling myself to blinkblinkblinkblinkblinkblink, because I know, from working with young children who love to get things in their eyeballs, that this is what you are supposed to do... Your eye's natural instinct is to rid itself of anything that doesn't belong there, hence tears will rush to wash it away. But telling a four-year-old with paint splashed in their eye to blink and making yourself blink while it feels like your eyeball may be on fire are two entirely different things.

I grab my bottle of water and use the little cap as an eye wash, letting the water drip all over the place, because I am still too damn tired to get up, but I have a stinging fire in my eye, so screw the sheets. My brain kicked in just enough to use the other eye to try and read the warnings on the back of the deodorant to see what they say about getting it in your eye.

Surprise, surprise, but there is no such eye warning on deodorant. Because even though the American public is too stupid not to know better than using a toaster in the bathtub, they are apparently smart enough to not get deodorant in their eyes.

Because this kind of shit only happens to me.

Today, my eye is raw looking and red. The kind of bloodshot that makes you not want to look at people ("Peanut, why won't you play with Auntie???") It's still a bit tender, but thankfully lacks the film that was freaking me out last night.

As I write this, all I can think are these two things: a) why am I telling the blogospher what a freak I am? & b)if somebody ever googles this entry, I am not sure if I would be afraid or glad.

So, blogosphere, what kind of crazy is happening in your world?

Since I am totally over feeling sorry for myself, let me just hit you with a couple of things that I think you should see.


First, I know everybody and their mother is already reading dooce, but seriously?
This entry? Way.Too.Funny.:

Normally I like to leave spaghetti noodles very long so that I can twirl them around my fork like people do in the movies. But lately I’ve been trying to make everything as appealing to Leta as possible, so this weekend I broke the entire box of noodles in half. That way she had at least a fighting chance of getting an entire noodle into her mouth without realizing just how slimy and oogly a cooked piece of pasta can be. It didn’t work, it never does, and instead of eating a single bite she spent the entire meal wiping pasta sauce off each noodle. With a wet wipe. Until every noodle in her bowl was clean. As if preparing her personal space for the triumphant return of the Lord.

Because I can totally see Leta sitting there, wiping off each noodle till it sparkles.

-----
Miss Zoot has a bit in her post about my new 'favoritest' show: Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip. People? Why are you not watching this show??? It is excellent: soaked in Sorkin-y goodness. Fast, witty dialogue; characters who care; sly, intelligent humor. If they cancel this show, I will be very upset with you all.

------
And Gina had a line that pretty much sums up how I feel about the people upstairs:

And really, if you are going to spend your whole life wishing you were somewhere else, do the rest of us a favor and go already.

Now if only I could find a way to get them to do it...

Happy Tuesday all...

Sick-a-versary

This post is for me: it's all the wallowing I am allowing myself for this, my 12-year Sick-a-versary. This year, I’ve decided that the only wallowing I can allow is in writing.

So I’ve gone back over all the stuff I’ve written, or read, about being sick over the past 12 years. It’s a lot of stuff, I’ll tell you. Mounds. So, in “honor” of my 12th sickaversary, I’m going to give you some snippets, little glimpses into my life, and what it’s been like during this long, hard, battle. Mostly so people won’t be worried about me, I’ll warn you that these aren’t always easy to read (even for me), and that I don’t necessarily still feel the same way about certain things as I did when I wrote them. But they were how I was feeling at that particular moment in time, and some of these things I haven’t even shared with those closest to me. (Gotta love the anonymity of the blogosphere for spilling-your-guts purposes.)
--------------------------------------------------
Today is my 12th sick-aversary

It is 12 years, exactly, since I was well.

On the 20th of October, 1994, I was decorating the homecoming float with my friends, then I taught my dance class (5 yr-olds) and got them ready for a halloween party.

On the 21st, I was so sick that, when I fell out of bed, I could neither call for help or get up on my own. I couldn't even roll over.

Over the course of 12 years, I have had a lot to say on this subject, and so have many others. So here it is:

“I can’t express my pain in a way that seems reasonable. If I say it is screaming, that doesn’t seem loud enough. If I say it is nagging, that doesn’t seem overwhelming enough. If I say it is constant, that makes it seem as if I could get used to it (and, sadly, at some point you do). Ache isn’t a big enough word; pain isn’t easily definable. I can’t explain the depth of this pain: how it swallows everything else. Everything I know about myself, everything I know about the world, and everything I think to be true. It becomes all I know, all I can feel, all I can ever remember feeling.” October 2004

“People talk about their chronic pain as if ratting on the other partner in an unhappy, toxic marriage. They fall out with their pain, they have screaming fights with it, they make up again. Or they try to run away with some attractive little analgesic. But pain has their cell-phone number and won’t let them escape. Living with chronic pain can be a grinding form of intimacy.” (Marni Jackson, Pain: the 5th Vital Sign, 2002, p 95)



“My body has become this traitor, this thing I can’t even recognize. I hate it… and it is me… what does that say? How does a person live in a body that they don’t understand and hate so much?” 10-3-04

“My tests were all negative; nothing could explain my illness except chronic fatigue syndrome. I called my parents. “I have good news and I have bad news,” I said. “And it’s the same news.” (Anne Ursu: You’ve Never been tired like this: Glamour Magazine, June 2005)


“I have had people – close to me and close enough – tell me that I am lazy, weak, depressed, not trying. I have been told more than once to “just start moving” or to “just keep it up till I feel better.” On my worst emotional days, I feel the guilt of being unable to do so, the fear that I am not really trying, the shame that I just keep failing.” 1/14/05

“There’s so much suffering, and so much of it is emotional and mental. You feel incredible guilt, you feel like you are the only one who has this. It’s the opposite of hysteria, which is supposedly caused by all the openness, all the media attention that makes everybody believe they have these things. This is the opposite, where you believe you came up with this on your own, you invented it. These drugs should be working, so you’re unresponsive. The alternative medicine should be working, so you’re not thinking positively enough or working hard enough.” (Paula Kamen, Head Case, salon.com, 10/05)


“I have thought about dying more than once – in a nonchalant sort of way that is terrifying. “If that bus hits me, I won’t really mind. At least it wouldn’t be this.” At my worst, my most painful, I prayed that a bus would drive through my room: jump the curb, onto the sidewalk, through the yard, crash straight through the wall into my bed. No one else is hurt, and I am hurt no more.” Sept 27, 2004

“It was the easy way out. No more trying to keep pace with others. No more pretending everything is ok. No more mind over matter. No more irrational fears. Better yet, no more rational ones. … After thinking through all my options for the past few weeks, I had come to the conclusion that I would not take the easy way out. … Dying sound fine, just for a little while at least, to get some relief – but suicide was too drastic. After all, the desire for self-destruction and the desire of wanting pain to end can be two different things.” (Paula Kamen, All in My Head; p257-260)



“In my fervor to not make my illness the center of everyone’s lives, it has erased it from them completely. Oh, they know that I am sore. They know that I am tired. But they don’t know what it is like to be me… what every day is like. What every failure is like. What every minute of waiting does to a person. Oh, every now and then they will ask, they will say “so, what’s new?” But really, all they want to know is that I am still trying, that I haven’t given up. That they won’t have to deal with me, like this, forever. They ask only because they are supposed to: and this is partly my fault, for having no progress to report is both daunting and discouraging and there are only so many times you want to give the same bad news.” February 2006

“I know what it is to be ill in the bosom of your family… Unless you want to behave like an abominable egotist, you have to avoid giving expression to your pain so as not to upset those around you. ….Our pain is always new to us, but becomes quite familiar to those around us. It soon wears out its welcome, even for those who love us the most. Compassion loses its edge.” (P76, Daudet, In the Land of Pain)

“Anybody who’s ever really been sick knows that the tolerance level for illness is low. Once the get-well roses begin to wilt, everything changes. Compassion and caretaking turn into burdens and vulnerability becomes weakness.” (Writing the Wrongs of Identity, Meri Nana-Ama Danquah; p176)


“I’m sick of reading about dying, injured, paralyzed, horribly ill people and hearing “And s/he never complained. Not once.” Or “she died with a smile on her face.” What kind of crap is this? What kind of people are these people?
How can anyone (Not just a sick person, but any person), live a life and not complain?

Are there actually people who never feel tired, or sad, or just plain, done? I don’t know those people. And I don’t think I want to know them. And I damn sure ain’t one of them.
Being me is HARD: Living is HARD. Living with a chronic illness that no one understands, no one cares enough about to research; no one wonders what it’s like to live like this, to be like this, to have all this pain all the time, this brain that doesn’t function, this body that argues with you over every little thing. How do you never have a complaint?
Real life is messy. It’s painful and complicated and confusing and frustrating and scary (and joyous and wonderful and sometimes almost perfect) and to keep all of that inside of you would only make it more so.
If I couldn’t write.
If Mom didn’t listen to me vent.
If Shannon wasn’t still an ear I can pour my soul directly into.
If all of these outlets were missing, I would be missing. I can promise you that.
If I had tried to make it through the past 10 years without complaining, all alone with my worries and concerns and upsets, then I wouldn’t have made it.
And there should be no need to keep it all to myself.
People who are sick shouldn’t feel compelled to think they’ve got to hide all their weak spots just because they’re sick.” 1/7/05

“Today, when alternative therapies are available in every mall in the country, the ill person is blamed not only for getting ill, but if the therapies fail, he is also blamed for not getting better (“he gave up too soon,” “he didn’t want to get well”).” (Susan Greehalgh, Under the Medical Gaze; 2001; p49)


“What kind of person wishes they were in a coma? Wakes up from a dream that they were in a coma and is actively disappointed? What does that say about where I am, who I am? I’ll tell you what I think: I think about how a coma, in the way TV or books portrays it, is a chance for your body to recuperate. A chance for your body to go back on its reserves and heal whatever is bothering it. To revive from something that you can’t deal with in any other way. So to dream about that chance – to sleep away all the time it’s taking for me to heal, all these false starts and relapses and horribly long periods of nothingness, of waiting. Well, that seems reasonable to me. Seems right. I wish that I could just sleep through it all, that one day, I’d just wake up, refreshed & feeling alive. Envying a coma… what kind of position is that to be in?” 1999

“The prisoner imagines freedom to be more wonderful than it is. The patient imagines good health to be a source of ineffable pleasure – which it isn’t. All that we lack is a sense of the divine.” (Daudet, In the land of Pain , p44)



“I am sick of playing guinea pig, but really, what other choices do I have? To ‘live’ like this forever? I don’t think so. But the more things I try that don’t work, the harder it is to believe that there is something out there that does… that will.”

“Until then, I’m tired. Exhausted. No reserves, no power left: plug me back in/charge my batteries tired. Not just physically, but mentally too. Tired of having to make do. Tired of waiting around. Tired of trying my hardest, putting all my effort into my every day and having no one see it. Tired of seeing the same four walls; hearing the same six songs; talking to the same five people. I’m tired of feeling sorry for myself. Tired of searching for answers that seem impossibly hidden, maybe even lost forever.” 8-15-04

“People who think dying is the worst thing, don’t know a thing about life.” Sue Kidd, Secret Life of Bees, p2)


“I just want it all to stop. I just want to be NORMAL. Just want to be able to live and feel and think about ordinary things. To not worry about tallying up today’s allotment of pain, or tomorrow’s allotment of pain pills. Or tallying today’s energy while worrying about the lack of stores left for tomorrow. It isn’t fair, and I hate it. I hate sitting here typing all this, feeling like the biggest whiner. Like someone who just can’t “get over it” already. But I’m not over it. I don’t know how to be over it. I don’t know how to get past this, if my body won’t let me.
I’m tired of having to decide. What’s right and what’s wrong. For myself, for my body. Which doctor to listen to, which ones to ignore. Which pills to try, which ones to stop taking. Which therapies are worth the time and effort and energy, and which ones aren’t. I just don’t know. And I don’t want to have to decide anymore.
I’m tired of having to suck it up. Of having to not cry. Of pretending that I am happy with my life the way it has turned out to be. Of not having the control I should have over my life. I’m tired of having to make nice to people just because I have no other place to go. I’m tired of biting my tongue about important things because I can’t make anybody mad, because I need them to help me. I’m just tired of it all. I’m so damn frustrated and angry and sick to death of the whole thing. It makes me want to cry. It makes me want to throw up. It makes me want to break something into a hundred tiny little pieces.” October 3, 2004

“When the shrink talked about how the disease would affect my personality, I talked about how my personality would affect the disease. I didn’t understand why nobody… I kept thinking, ‘I am me! I am still me!’” (Elizabeth Berg, We are all Welcome Here, p97, 2006)


------- & -------
That's it: The end of Wallow-Fest 2006.

We now return to our regularly scheduled programming.

Poetry Thursday

It's Thursday again, and I've decided that means poetry. Mostly because I've been reading it again, and I forgot just how good it can be. Just how much it can resonate with your soul.

So here's today's poem:

In Bed with a Book

Mona Van Duyn

In police procedurals they are dying all over town,
the life ripped out of them, by gun, bumper, knife,
hammer, dope, etcetera, and no clues at all.
All through the book the calls come in: body found
in bed, car, street, lake, park, garage, library,
and someone goes out to look and write it down.
Death begins life’s whole routine to-do
in these stories of our fellow citizens.

Nobody saw it happen, or everyone saw,
but can’t remember the car. What difference does it make
when the child will never fall in love, the girl will never
have a child, the man will never see a grandchild, the old maid
will never have another cup of hot cocoa at bedtime?
Like life, the dead are dead, their consciousness,
as dear to them as mine to me, snuffed out.
What has mind to do with this, when the earth is bereaved?

I lie, with my dear ones, holding a fictive umbrella,
While around us falls the real and acid rain.
The handle grows heavier and heavier in my hand.
Unlike life, tomorrow night under the bedlamp
by a quick link of thought someone will find out why,
and the policemen and their wives and I will feel better.
But all that’s toward the end of the book. Meantime, tonight,
without a clue I enter sleep’s little rehearsal.

-----------------------------------------------------

Again, for me, this poem boiled down to one line:
What difference does it make
when the child will never fall in love, the girl will never
have a child, the man will never see a grandchild, the old maid
will never have another cup of hot cocoa at bedtime?


Is there anything you can say to that? It is an ultimate truth.

So that's what I've got for you lucky people today, an ultimate truth, in poem form.

Enjoy.

Things I have to say today

• in random, bullet style:
  
  
  
  • Chicken Fingers should not be spicy.
  
  
  
  • Going to the dentist is scary, I don't care how old you are. (Even if the dentist is very sweet, probably younger than me & definitely better than last pervy guy dentist.)
  
  
  
  • Dear Channel 7 - Please stop with the alliteration. ("College Co-ed Caught and Kidnapped" and "Coffee Caper: a Horrific Holdup" is a bit much, don't you think??)



• Younger sisters need to stop traveling the world, buying new apartments, & going on blind dates (with pickle phobic strangers). I am feeling very left behind (except for the whole pickle thing). (And also, I should so stop beating up on myself for feeling totally jealous...ugh).



• Any commercial where people get hurt (Have you seen the new Corelle/model spot? LOL) will make my mother laugh. And I know it as soon as I see it... is there something wrong with us?



• I need to stop putting everything on the "when I get (even the tiniest bit) better" list. A lot of things I can't do until then, but I'm going to weed through it, find out what I can do now. There's gotta be some things...



• If the 1 against 100 questions don't get any harder, I might just sign up to play. Because I could probably get over all my "I hate being on cameras because I am fat and semi-broken" hang-ups if it meant I could win $1,00,000,000. Those questions are easy enough for my nephew (age 6). Are they going to get harder?




• I am too tired for family drama. Grown-ups need to stop acting like babies; sisters need to stop squabbling; everybody just needs to plain get in gear, here. I have spoken, so shall it be. (hahahahaha--- yeah right!)



• Must actually mail letters I have already written, instead of just letting them sit there on my desk.


I think that's it, but who really knows?

I'm off for double Jeopardy, which better be easy.

Saturday Photo Hunt: Lost

Grab the Scavenger Hunt code. Photo Theme. Join the blogroll. Visit participants.

Quick and cute for you today:

Here's BabyGirl, 4.5 months, searching diligently for the keys she lost



and... just so you won't worry all week about it, here's the found



Hope everybody has just that kind of luck all week long!

A poem for a Thursday

I'm totally frustrated with my family members right now (you know, the ones who say that we're going to be watching the baby and then never show up and never call???), so all my writing is rant rant ranty rant.

Instead of subjecting you all to that, I thought I'd post one of the poems I'm in love with from this amazing book.

(I'm pretty sure I can post it, so long as I include the author's name... the blogosphere is full of all these tricky situations, ain't it just?)


So, anyways, here's a poem for you, on this Thursday:


It Is Raining on the House of Anne Frank

by Linda Pastan

It is raining on the house
of Anne Frank
and on the tourists
herded together under the shadow
of their umbrellas,
on the perfectly silent
tourists who would rather be
somewhere else
but who wait here on stairs
so steep they must risee
to some occasion
high in the empty loft,
in the quaint toilet,
in the skeleton
of a kitchen
or on the map -
each of its arrows
a barb of wire -
with all the dates, the expulsions,
the forbidding shapes
of continents.
And across Masterdam it is raining
on the Van Gogh Museum
where we will hurry next
to see how someone else
could find the pure
center of light
within the dark circle
of his demons.

------------------------------

How amazing is that? For me, it was all about "on stairs /so steep they must rise/ to some occasion." It's a beautiful poem. Just amazing.

And the book , Good Poems for Hard Times by Garrison Keillor, is packed with little gems. I borrowed my copy from the library, got about 15 pages (and 8 sticky notes) into it before I put in a request for it over at Paperback Swap.

So, that's what's what for today. Will go read some more, refrain from writing nasty e-mails to careless loved-ones, and listen to the rain here in Massachusetts.

How was your day?

I have things to say about tonight's episode of Lost,
this discussion over at the Smart Bitches, and a whole bunch more. But for right now, let me just say:

Did anyone else see The Colbert Report tonight? With "George L."? Could it have been funnier? George trying to look sad when he didn't win, Stephen pretending not to laugh when he says "You really captured the look/feel of those movies?" or "How many times have you seen those movies? A couple?" (Those are not the exact quotes, I am sure...but still you get how funny they were.) Tonight's Colbert Report (which will be replayed 3x tomorrow on Comedy Central, so you can catch it if you missed it) was AWESOME. I bow to his highness.

:)

Just random.

Today, I wanted to buy a lottery ticket, but never left the house in order to do so. I have this very weird ability to pick the daily numbers three minutes or so before the numbers are called. :shrug: I don't get it, and it doesn't work at any other time ~ say, like when you might actually be able to BUY a ticket & win some money ~ but it's still interesting.

Today, I reread a Nora Roberts (one of my favorite authors) book for probably the sixth time. It isn't even my favorite of her books, which shows you how many times I have read her books. I got the newest, the second book in the Circle Trilogy (awesome: about magic and power, love and war; has vampires and vampire slayers, time travelers, witches, sorcerers and goddesses. Pick it up now!), on Monday, and it took me less than 2 hours to read the whole thing. Now I am upset that I have to wait a couple weeks for the finale.


Today, I ate all sorts of things I shouldn't have eaten. It was one of those things that you know is stupid, even as you are doing it. I don't really know why I do things sometimes. There was something about having the house all to myself for two days that made it seem like the thing to do. It's a little bit crazy, and I know that, but I still did it anyways.

Now I am off to watch the mindmaze that is Lost. Who knows what the heck will happen then.

Do you know how hard it is to come up with a good title?

Pretty dang hard.

This whole "long weekend thing" is screwing with my schedule: when you're home all the time, the days of the week are only recognizable by the schedules of the others in your home (and the shows on tv). My sister didn't go to work today; BabyGirl didn't show up. Wait...isn't it Monday??? I know I watched Brothers & Sisters last night, so it should be Monday.

Don't let them fool you: it is Monday. It's Monday in disguise.

Anyways, I got all my papers organized this weekend.
(I should keep a tally of how long that actually lasts: 2 days and counting.)

I lost an entire day yesterday trying to make a photobook on Shutterfly.
(Seriously, I am so anal about things like that... it would have been fine if I could just let things be!!)

On the plus side, I saw X-Men 3, which was very, very good. I was impressed, because I think all three of the movies have been utterly entertaining.
(My favorite shot was the one where Juggernaut threw Wolverine through the ceiling of one room and he came down through the ceiling in another... spectacular.)

Today, I'm hoping to get some scrapbooking done: I've done 3 out of 5 of my siblings, but these last two are the hardest, because their moms are not my mom, so I don't have as much stuff to add. They are very picture heavy.
(And need to be finished in a month... so I better pick up the pace.)

Also, I'm trying not to obsess about BigBrother, Sister-in-law, Punkin and Peanut (Youngest Nephew, only Niece) moving back down to where her parents live. It's about 45 minutes away, so Punkin had to switch schools. But BigBrother and Sister-in-law will still be working up here, so we'll still be watching Peanut during the day. Basically, these two siblings will be being raised independently of one another, and I don't think it's a good idea. Also, with longer commutes, BigBrother and S-I-L will be getting home later, seeing less of both their kids. All around, I think it is a bad idea, but they've made their decision, and now all I can do is try to help them work it out in the best way possible.
(See, this is why people need to listen to me: the number of things I could say "I told you so" about in this situation are M_A_N_Y; but I resist. Except for here... here I can tell you that they are wrong, and not thinking clearly, and rushing rushing rushing into a very important decision without thinking through the consequences again!!!)

It's a beautiful fall day outside, but my house is about 15-12 degrees cooler. So I'm cold, and everybody who walks by says "Oh, but it's soo nice outside!" This means nothing to me, because I am inside, and here, it is cold.
(You might as well say, "Oh, but in Kentucky, it's sooo nice!" I am not in Kentucky, therefore it doesn't matter to me.)

That's about all the two-sided conversations I am up to having with myself this morning... I'll try and come up with something interesting for the next time we talk.

Have a great (faux) Monday, everybody!

Return to the hunt...

Grab the Scavenger Hunt code. Photo Theme. Join the blogroll. Visit participants.

I'm back! And just in time for a theme I can really get on board with: Sleeping.

Sleeping pictures (according to my Picasa 2) are the second most popular theme of pictures in my house. (#1 being All Dressed Up, which includes over 60 pictures of people in hats...Which is just... Strange.) I had upwards of 125 pictures to choose from (some of which I'm saving for the future dreaming theme I saw on the list).

Here's what I wound up with:

First off, a two-fer: SisterCh and my dad, Christmas morning 1987. This was back when she was still cute and snuggly, and actually liked us. (Today, not so much.)


Then there's my BigBrother (also 1987) and his boy, Punkin (earlier this year).
How awesome is it that my 6-year-old nephew is less of a geek than his 11 year old father was? SisterJ saw that picture of Punkin and said he was "pimpin!"; his father, on the other hand, is definitely not.

























And I'll finish up with my mom's absolute favorite picture of me, sound asleep in busy Logan Airport, July 1979. She says that I slept through most of the very long flight to California, while my brother (then 3 1/2) got airsick almost before the plane was in the air. It's a really good shot, though... and just precious.



So, that's what I've got for you today: I'm off to make the rounds right now (hooray!), and am glad to be back & up for playing.

Photo Hunt Lists

Photo Hunt Theme List

Photo Hunt Blogroll

A meme kind of day

Courtesy of Diner Girl


TEN Random Things You May Not Know About Me:
1. My bookshelf is organized by author, genre and color (in that order).
2. I eat Snickers bars by taking a bite, then sucking all the chocolate off, then sucking on the caramel and peanuts.
3. I can move my pinky toe independently of the rest of my toes.
4. I hate mayonaise. And tunafish. And together? They are probably the most disgusting thing ever.
5. I believe in things a grown-up probaly shouldn't still believe in.
6. When there's a funeral at the church across the street, I sometimes cry just watching them all file in behind the casket.
7. When I was well, and a dancer, I could do splits easily and comfortably make my feet rest up behind my head.
8. I love to make lists, but don't always follow them.
9. My brother and I each have a chicken pox scar in the same exact place: over the arch of our left eyebrow.
10. I think poetry needs to be read aloud or else it's not interesting.

NINE Places I've Visited:
1. Kissimee, Florida (Where I saw it rain on one side of the street, with the sun shining on the other. Also where I saw my first rainbow.)
2. Point Sebago, Maine (I LOVED it... even though we were in a trailer)
3. NYC (In general, too loud for me, but I'd love to go and see a show, stay at the Plaza with Eloise, etc.)
4. Washington D.C. (History Day, 1993)
5. Wareham/Cape Cod, MA
6. North Conway, NH
7. Disney World
8. Newport, RI
9. San Diego, CA (although I was 2 months old, so I don't remember it)

EIGHT Ways to Win My Heart:
1. Love me for me: see past the broken down body enough to care about me as a person.
2. Be understanding.
3. Don't have pets. I like animals, but am allergic.
4. Love & be able to interact well with kids. (Not that goofy, totally fake crap that so many grown-ups do: really enjoy their company.)
5. Allow me to have the remote control more often.
6. Understand that reading is not a waste of time, but rather a necessity.
7. Stick up for me.
8. Get that talking to my mom or sisters about you [i] is [/i] going to happen. Deal.



SEVEN Things I Want to Do Before I Die:
1. Get Better.
2. Get Better.
3. Get Better.
4. Get Better.
5. Get Better.
6. Get Better.
7. Get Better. (Yes, there are other things I'd like to do, but if I could only get one, that'd be it.)

SIX Things I'm Afraid Of:
1. Outliving the people I love.
2. Never getting better.
3. Never finding my place in the world.
4. Losing my debit card.
5. That feeling when you know something is wrong but you can't figure out what it is.
6. That things will go from bad to worse.

FIVE Things I Don't Like:
1. Not being able to be nicer to myself.
2. Insensitive, rude, or just plain careless people.
3. Smells.
4. People who think reading romance novels equals being dumb. (Hey, I've read Tolstoy... I just didn't enjoy him as much as I enjoy Nora Roberts!)
5. When the UPS guy doesn't ring the bell. He was HERE, he stuck his little sticky note on the door that said we weren't home. I was HERE, so I know he never rang the bell. Wouldn't it be just as easy to give me my package as to stick the note up?

FOUR Ways to Turn Me Off:
1. Wearing a scent - again with the allergies.
2. Being rude to service people, strangers, or (God Forbid) your family.
3. Acting like you're right even when you know you're not. Just admit it already.
4. Suggesting that "everybody gets fatigued," or telling me about some "MIRACLE cure" you read about on the internet: I know my disease backwards, forwards and inside out. I stay current on research, treatments, new developments. I have tried everything my doctors can think of...if there were a cure, I would know about it. Thanks for thinking of me, but really, don't you think I do everything I can to not be like this? Perhaps you adding more pressure - kindly or otherwise - really isn't the greatest idea.


THREE Things I Do Every Day:
1. Read
2. Take my meds
3. Talk to someone I love

TWO Things that Make Me Happy:
1. My niece and nephews
2. Books

ONE Thing On My Mind Right Now:
1. I really need to get this site all spiffy. I need to get a new template, write and edit a new blogroll (as the old one still hasn't shown up completely), figure out what the heck blogger beta is. I don't know when I'll get any of this done, but it's on my mind.

(ETA: I do not know why my blog is yelling at you: I haven't screwed with the template at ALL. But I must.... hopefully, till I do, you can get past the shouting and read without getting a headache.)



Although I missed a bit of the month, there were still a ton of standouts up for this month's Perfect Post award (Via Lucinda and MommaK).


The runners up included:


Paper Napkin and her son, for an amusing game.


Dooce for making me rethink the definition of a picky eater.

And
Drunkbunny's
slightly older (ok, a year older & totally not eligble except that I just found it) post about Gay Marriage. That made me laugh, big time.



But I've decided to award September's Perfect Post to

WALL PAPER OF MY MIND, who's a recent addition to my blogs-I-must-read category. There's examples of why I like her so muchhere and here, but it was this post that I think is just perfect.
Because it reflects so much of what I feel is really, really good about the blogging community.

She writes:


"I came to love the comments on blogs. I am still realizing with each new blog I stumble-link to, in such a staggering ocean breadth of authors, that so many of them thrive on the feedback and the interaction it produces. Community is trans-morphing at a rapid pace for mothers. I not only read, but have met and become friends with the women I admire on-line. It has no precedent. "


I'm not, technically, a mommyblogger. Because I don't have any kids of my own. But I guess I am an Auntie Blogger, since the two beautiful souls that I am helping to raise are often fodder for my blog. And I love the amount of information and support and caring and fun that mommybloggers contribute to this strange new world we're all building here. So, I agree that it's something for them to be proud of, to claim.

So, WallPaper, you get to claim this prize, for standing up for Mommy Bloggers.