badgerbag: messy, surly, full of books

hot geek guys

Rook's regular expressions are so long! and so hard! and so fast! and he types them so spontanously on the command line! I swoon as I watch him code on my project.

international comment week

I would really love some reading and commentary over at my blog of thoughts for that W1ttig project. Thoughts, stories, reactions, whatever. It would be helpful to me at this stage of thinking to have some response.

essays stabbed at

That feels MUCH better. It doesn't have to be brilliant but I must write these drafts. They are like armatures. I put them up on the W1ttig page. Whew!!!

to lunch with Squid. to bring crutches to Minnie and her sprained ankle. I shall bring my work and add some name definitions or else if she would rather i leave I could come back home and squeeze in a little more before picking up moomin.

must not forget to get my allergy shots tomorrow.

actually. My advisor's house is near hwy 92. after I meet with her i could jaunt off to the beach. and work from the beach. YES!!!!!

as usual

As usual I feel much better in the morning though with a sinking feeling that today will be the same and no progress will be made on my "real work" and I will spend all day waiting for the plumber, wiping up crumbs, shopping for beaded lampshades, applying duct tape, and tootling around on the piano while overcome with a fierce disappointment that it doesn't sound like lovely crystal but instead like a plonking mae west movie from 1932.

The thing to do is to work on the Real Project whatever that is, first so I can feel the instant relief.

I had the possible plan of going to the beach and lying there like a seal, but now I think that won't make me feel better but just more anxious that things aren't being done.

new plan:
1) wait for plumber while working on Feminary essay
2) lunch w/ friends
3) beach? probably not. Instead, more Feminary definition entries.
4) tonight: persuade Rook to help me with coding for Feminary

from my soc sec. statement

what i earned over the table since age 15

1985: $1331
1986: $766 (not counting all the money I embezzled from that dry cle@ners)
1987: $1497
1988: $2531
1989: $4055
1990: $5544 (steady rise of more and better library jobs throughout college)
1991: $1616 (when my health went to crap, chronic bronchitis)
1992: $17,318 (temp jobs out the ass. was crushed under weight of paltry $5000 debt of student loan and med. bills put on credit cards. finally bailed out by parents in 1994 or so.)
1993: $12,241 (brief disastrous stint for "friends" in The Realassholes Group who all became millionaires)
1994: 0 (health really went to crap for real. thanks, unemployment, disability, and rent help of S.K.)
1995: $8,317 (tutoring, temping, desperate attempt to get back into working world)
1996: $17,006 (countless miserable temp jobs)
1997: $27,872 (thank you, UC L@b School guy who let me claw my way into a decent job doing tech support)
1998: $24,523 (no job for... 2-3 months when moved to Irv1ne)
1999: $36,710 (decent paying job for 1 whole year! "programmer analyst" fakitude! plus tech support.)
2000: $20,847 (no job june thru november: had baby. went crazy with loneliness.)
2001: $48,383 (3/4 of a year of best-paying job of my entire life. Over half went to Moomin's nanny)
2002: $2,084 (crap typing jobs)
2003: Not recorded on statement but in my taxes I think it's like $4000 from old Eggcite paycheck finally coming, and crap typing jobs, and working for McCoot.

Thanks, O boyfriends and girlfriends and husbands who hauled my ass back into the middle class time and time again and kept bailing me out. thanks parents. Thanks, government, you fuckers, for the tiny amount of money you pissed on and sent my way when i was desperately crippled.

Right now I assess my earning capacity if I worked full time at around $40,000. I think Stanffford offered me $43K for that dept. secretary job. but I would have had to be there at 8:30am sharp and leave at 5:00 and work late during unspecified "crunch times". Moomin would have had to be in day care from 9-6 and I would have loathed life itself to be the classssics "assistant dept. secretary" to the dragon lady from hell and a bazillion profs with horrid stuck up attitudes. I turned it down.

After I lost my job when Eggcite went bankrupt I thought that I would maybe get another search engine job or at least something working on the back end of some big nasty database as part of R and D of New Things. I was not bad at it and survived 3 rounds of layoffs at Eggcite. They hired me at 72K only because of dot com boom; really I was probably worth more like 55K as a kinda junior programmer. Though I got better at it and in fact, automated the whole process of the spidering rather neatly JUST before they laid off everyone "not essential to operations" and kept the 2 complete monkeys who just typed in a unix command every few hours and then played videogames or ripped music while the spider ran. The other R and D guy was their friend from high school and "telecommuted" so he was only there one day a week. He didn't want me to automate his 2 buddies out of their jobs so he kept raising objections and obstacles to my project. Since all it took was one master script and peppering the existing code with some halfway decent and informative die statements that pinged our cell phones, I was more than capable of doing this "complex automation" that Other R and D guy kept claiming in meetings would take careful planning and Architecting and maybe we would all really have to learn Java and make it all object oriented. He was so full of crap. In retrospect I hate him more and more and consider him a Truly Evil Person. What does evil look like, if not like this? Evil is not all about violence.

After the bankruptcy Rook warned me I should focus on keeping up my perl skills but it seemed hopeless after a couple of months. We talked about doing various projects for this purpose but I flaked on them all and honestly, never understood them or what to do next.

4 months later I started applying for tech support jobs. Oh sorry your skills are 2 years out of date and it sounds like you are really a programmer now so you'd obviously leave once a better job comes along. A year later my programming skills were all out of date and still no jobs. I applied for all the secretary jobs and got a million interviews and some job offers, all more horrible than I could face full time. I figured part time secretary would be tolerable. Typing jobs began. I burned through all our cash reserves in 2002 by keeping Moomin's nanny till August so I could write poetry and fuck off. Though it helped my writing enormously and i was happier than i have ever been in my life, it was selfish and horrid of me. Then I stuck Moomin in the Montessori that would change diapers and went back to school Jan. 2003.

I wonder what the rest of my life will look like on this statement. Next 5-6 years after I graduate crappy part time community college jobs, if I'm LUCKY. Probably continued crap secretarying or typing. Rook trapped in Baby Trap especially if we have another one. I will just be scrambling to support some level of daycare so that I won't go crazy. In my mind, magically after this 6 year mark, hypothetical kid number 2 is in public school which saves us most of the cost of daycare.

Oh rook I feel horrible. it is like your only hope is some magic job offer where you get a couple of months off. I am so sorry. what can I do. if I had kept up with my perl... would it have changed things... when will you get your time off to write? will it happen?

doing everything

You know, ever since January I have been washing everything and taking out all the trash and cleaning and organizing and folding and putting away and grocery shopping and bill-paying and calling contractors and making appointments. I am losing it here. My attempts to do things like keep the kitchen table cleared off morning and evening are failing miserably.

And I haven't unpacked everything yet and can't find my books and haven't done any school work in a WEEK. I look at it around 9:30pm and just can't handle it and must find something byzantine or geological to read. I can't find my proust book and it sucked anyway. Everything seems like drudgery. my brain is wading through molasses. I could not make the joropo transcription for piano come out right. I am good for nothing but housework tonight so i have been forcing myself to drearily do things like clean the catbox and fold up the cardboard boxes for recycling. everything still a mess though. it was clean on sunday morning.

I look around and try to identify why it is so messy. What the fuck. the table was clean quite recently. 1 phone book. my own phone book. a magazine of moomin's. A book for my bilingual project, listlessly got out and thumbed through a little. a slip of paper where moomin wrote the numbers 1-10. a flyer from the City of Deadwood Shitty. A paper with the song "los pollitos dicen"- Moomin's. A phone bill I didn't understand - is it a bill? a piece of crucial info? An ad? leftover birthday cake on a plate with a bowl on top. a roll of painter's masking tape. 5 limes. a half-full water bottle. the nearly empty bottle of ketchuup left out by rook. a spiral notebook, moomin's. Some dishes, all Moomin's. A dr. seuss book. My social security statement. our bank statement. the oxford book of christian names (for w1ttig project). six pens. my keys. My tear-stained glasses. three dirty kleenex. a paper with rook's trip itenerary to L.A. the telephone. the recycling stickers. sugar. pepper. three jackets of mine. an apron. dishtowels. my laptop. My elbows.

everything must go.

some sort of hard work should make me feel better but i can't figure out what. after this weekend I swore no "nightcap" for a while as I kept drinking these 11pm giant rum and fruit juice drinks because of being so stressed. I have to fucking cope.

I have not been to my usual poetry things for MONTHS and i really need them I think.

what the fuck is my problem... life is good... why am i flying apart?

PMS-ily,

Me

moody and needing something

I think I'm PMS-ing. despair and irritation overwhelm me.

sheet music

no classical piano sheet music at the Miraculously Fabulous Music Store in my town. Alas. Maybe the library and xeroxing?

I can't take any editing rigiht now after working all morning for McCoot. Parts of our conversation were interesting but then he has to start in on some sort of crap. Obvious gambits to provoke me so he can flog his anti-feminist crap, as clearly his ex wife and current totally non present mythical wife won't put up with it. F@lse memory syndrome indeed. what unsavory thing will he wish to discuss next? I put some commas into the f@n fiction sample he gave me and I gave him some general advice on writing fiction and some exercises to try. but I will not discuss the actual goodness or badness of the work with someone who is supposedly paying me 20 bucks an hour to file his papers.... I got barely any filing done and feel sort of weird about being paid to just sit and chat. I enjoy hearing and talking about @rtificial INT and n@rratives and r0bot emotions, that is fun, but I am pretty ignorant of such things and don't know formal logic, or the history of the whole discipline, so what good am I. Also, he can be very hilarious, if ponderous and repetitive (how many times has he asked me if I've read t. pr@tchett? nearly every week. Finally, I have.) I feel sad for his loneliness. Aren't there any other crusty old libertarian guys around for him to kvetch with? What gives? Why fixate on me? As a secretary I totally suck as my handwriting is unreadable and I am v. flaky.

I am reminded of what Mary Daly has to say about men's necrophilia. I'll go into this later.

As usual when around him, I felt that everything i say and every move I make is grossly re-interpreted through the @simovian/heinlenian filter of "feisty" or perhaps the unholy trinity of pert, perky, and petulant. If not heinous-len, then sort of like the wholesome married chick named "Cherry" who vacuums the house for Miss Marple. Stomach-turning!

Yet - again with the yet - there is a kind of pleasant way that our minds work alike in a jumping-around, flaky, intuitive way. If he were not an MCP and reactionary conservative it would be fine.

But for now I'm off to do something soul cleansing and non-wordy. I want to transcribe some joropo music for piano. I can do the notes okay with a tape recorder and lots of rewinding. but the rhythm defeats me. i think it is syncopated and 6/8 and so I am freaking confused. I can PLAY it. I kinda need advice on WRITING it.

***
--- ooo - free downloadable sheet music!

music combinations

I am wishing oddly to combine this one aria from Satyagraha with "Sister Ray" by the Velvet underground. I can hear how it would be very glorious with the controlled orgasmic cacophony going on underneath and the soaring aria arching over it all.

someday I will make it so.

what artist

This from Eric Maisel's wonderfully intelligent essay on narcissism.

Hamilton (1988) makes the following observation: "People with narcissistic disorders are often talented, charming, and successful. Yet their poor integration of the grandiose and devalued aspects of themselves bring about preoccupation with extravagant success fantasies and expletive behavior accompanied by underlying feelings of meaninglessness and emptiness." But isn't healthy narcissism also likely to breed extravagant success fantasies? What is "unhealthy" about wanting a lot? And why shouldn't just good reality-testing and a keen intelligence provoke feelings of meaninglessness and emptiness? 

Go, Maisel! Good reality-testing, indeed. I have often tried to say that last sentence quoted above, and failed to get the point across. (because when I say it, it sounds more like I'm waving my pom-poms for nihilism.)

"High self-esteem is no sweet, light affair: it necessarily casts a shadow on the world, because mattering is a demanding, confrontational state of being."

neighbor search

Wow. look at who on your block donated to which political party.

jazzed and bummed

Jazzed:
did reasonable amount of work on the Cuts book this morning, and paper editing.

Bummed:
didn't write any essays. didn't get to beach. No beach visible on near time horizon because of busyness.

Jazzed: writing group of grad students full of amazing praise for my poetry that I handed out last time. I mean. They laid it on thick. We spent about an hour discussing 2 other people's papers and then everyone was like "Yeah. That wild poetry. We knew her when. you know when k@nt talks about genius and originality, that is Badger's poetry, she is a big fat genius. We are a study group but rreally, we are also the Badger Hemulen Fan Club and we shall come to all your readings and worship you, starry eyed. That thing you said here... and that other thing... and the way everything is all new and never thought of and all the words are put together all different so that they seem like whole new words."

I had to blush a lot and I think that when i surreptitiously touched my finger to my arm, I burned myself, I was so smokin'. That should keep my ego fueled up for about the next 6 months, or maybe half an hour. Music to my ears! Actually v. nice as I know none of them are trying to get into my pants or anything, and also, they have read lots of poetry and are more or less on the same page for experimentalness of literature and feminism and etc.

It embarrasses me greatly that praise like this affects me. But there you go. It does. There was also an odd feeling of guilt along with it. I don't have much analysis of this. Praise. Guilt. Feeling unworthy. Feeling that I will be ruined or big-headed from praise. Feeling that other people will hate me. Fearing the exposure of my need or vulnerability? A good stoic would not need any sort of praise or props. However I am not a good stoic and you could dump mt. everest into my narcissistic woundedness and not fill it up.

Also Jazzed: my dept. is indeed funding my conference trip last fall. so I get 500 bucks falling out of the sky. Well no. It doesn't just fall. I applied for it specially.

Bummed: Truck seemed sluggish going up hills.

Jazzed: Moomin writing whole bunch of new words at school.

Bummed: Visiting Moomin's little friend Spam, and realizing the desperate nanny IS live-in, and has no privacy and the parents have no boundaries and everything is chaos and tension for her. I am bummed for her. the parents were just always in her hair so she could never really do anything effectively.

Jazzed: They played nicely together.

Bummed: RPG book plans looking iffy. how can my friend and the other guy I was writing emails with forget, just absolutely forget, that I wrote them and talked with them in dec/january about the book idea and then now suddenly they announce t hey are doing their own book? I am a bit hurt to be left out and forgotten and unacknowledged. I quote the Other Guy's email to me in early Feb:

The book idea sounds hot. I would definitely love to be a part of that. And I
have some suggestions of other theorists who'd be interested in submitting to
such a project (including Rook and C.L.)

You know, wtf. it's not like i own the idea of making a book but since I was talking about it and suggested it, how about not forgetting that you said "I'd love to be a part of it" and also not forgetting that I exist completely? Arrr. What gives with C.L. my friend who I had such good conversations with and from our 3 nights of staying up all night talking he sat down and wrote 50 pages? I'm not saying my name goes on the 50 pages, far from it. Just that, then don't fricking suddenly proclaim yourself the editor of the book I was about to edit. I must call him and just ask what the heck.

See, I told you that a roomful of people saying "Badger you are a damn genius and we bow to you!" only lasts a few minutes and then I go right back into my private hell. Why should this be so?

***
I feel much better after calling my friend C. and him saying he did not know about the plans and didn't have serious plans with Other Guy and that he didn't meant to diss me and would never. C. sent me giant email outlining possible book structure. I could argue with him for about a decade, in a good way, on what goes in etc. I also liked his idea that long-term, he and Rook should write a super-theory book, with his super-pomposity academianess cuddling up with Rook's encyclopediac and in-depth knowledge of all games. And that this near term one would be a more general book. He had good ideas and also specific people in mind to write specific bits. I would be more waffly about my chapters or divisions rather than cramming it into an outline frame. Then we agreed that it would be super fun to have as the serious core, the head to head pissing match of GN$ vs. 3fold, Rook vs. Edron. He went on about @nime cultures from what his wife Rahsa writes about, and the occult which is HIS t hing, and I nattered about the serious lack of good theory about online games but then remembered Aarseth's book which was excellent and passed it on to him. this means I have to get cracking with some pissing of my own, i.e. coming up with different models and frames of "what the book looks like". Actually I am glad that C. is all into it, rather than just saying (as I half expected) "I'm too busy but I'll write some sort of article."

That all made me feel way better and more chipper about everything. Oh to be less fragile about such things. The odd thing is: compared to many people I don't think I really am very fragile, in fact this lack of fragility is probably one of my more annoying qualities.

riveting

It is probably wrong of anyone to trust me with a rivet gun for even a second, but it sounds pretty neat.

up early

the good news is we got up at 8 as usual. And I was only 15 minutes late getting Moomin to school!

The bad news was that Rook, who slept on the couch with the alarm clock so he could get up at like 5am and go to the airport, set the clock an hour forward either by accident or thinking it was "spring forward". This is actually good news, as Moomin was 45 min. early, and I have lots of time to work on writing and book stuff before my study group!

Maybe I can nip by Ocean Beach on the way to SFU, if I finish early. I desperately want to lie in the warm sand and close my eyes and hear the waves.

My mom left a r3gency romance novel behind, as always. Oh, the shame of it! But they are so funny, I can't resist if they happen to be lying around the house. I want to go and read To the Resurrection Station all over again as an antidote - it's a great sf/romance parody. Its heroine Belinda falls swooningly in love with the most unlikely people creatures beings.

International Blog Commenting Week!

Leave a comment everywhere you look this week! (meme from Spanglemonkey)

It's like eyeball footprints!

editing work

I was thinking the other day about all my pissant little magazines ever since I was 15 or so. I was casting my mind back to HS lit mag, where I fought so hard to say that all sorts of people wrote, and it was not good technique to just go to the honors classes and ask them for some stories and poems. I went to the stoners and punks and to all sorts of people and spread the word and got a ton of really oddball stuff, song lyrics, etc. I remember the difficulty of winning the trust of the headbangers and guys from metal shop. Then fought like a tiger to put it into the mag along with the rhyming crapola about sunsets that had official approval. All very trivial in the grand scheme of things but it was important to me.

My next effort after my newspaper articles were censored was an underground newspaper. As I thought this over I began giggling at the sophomoric things in there. Some cartoon about anarchy or something. A caricature of Mr. Worthlessnessington in the bathroom, peeing, with dead rats and trash all over and little arrows labelling everything ("Dead Rat"---> that had obviously died from eating "Cafeteria Food"---->) Anyway.

The point is that I realized that THE WORK IS STILL THE SAME. I am actually doing the same exact work. Nothing changes about it really because it's semi-legitimate or costs more money or I'm 20 years older or the writers are a (tiny) bit more famous and the writing is better. I was doing the same work then of a lot of talking with the writers and going over the writing and typing and editing and thinking about what I want and what I don't want in the magazine or the book and talking about that basic idea with whoever else is editing the book.

It was like how Minnie and i used to talk about how girls and boys approach skateboarding or being in bands, in jr. high and high school. In junior high the girls are thinking about the social relationships between each other and they are judging the guys and liking the guys and actually, laughing at the rather childish looking guys as they try like assholes to skate up some half pipe or to play their guitar and they look like fools and they can only play 2 chords badly. The girls don't want to look like fools like that and they laugh at the way the boys seem to take it seriously. Because the boys are bad at it, rotten, sucky, and what they do is juvenile. then fast forward to age 17. Since they have been doing it since age 12, the boys can now play the guitar semi-decently and the girls... well... how come they can't play? Damn that sucks. The girls develop into full blown Bettys who hang around watching the boys doing things that become more and more like Real Things. (And the girls thinking at age 22....'hey wait a minute. what happened? Hmm, maybe I will learn to play the guitar.") I wrote a booklet called "The Grrrl Guide to Starting a Band" where I analyzed this whole thing.

So with being a writer, it's also like this. What I was practicing was not just writing itself (and believe me, I was writing like a maniac from 14 onward) but taking control of the whole arena of stuff surrounding writing - editing and publishing. Taking control of the means of production.

When i look at writers I respect most the ones who bring their fellow writers with them.

It is wrong to think of the "baby steps" of first doing something as pointless or as juvenile - it is so important to be out there - in a group - and be "playing" halfassedly even when the work seems not the way you can picture it according to your ideals.

day of editing

- edit Margon's paper for writing group
- edit Amhar's paper for writing group
- edit 2 papers for midnight deadline for SFU magazine *DONE*
- create call for subs for rpg book
- work on w1ttig essay
- type Genell's poems for Cuts bookd
- download, import Witter's poems for Cuts *DONE*
- call car insur. to change address *DONE*
- find original receipts for last nov. conference (YES! I got my travel funding!) *DONE*
- find Genell's old poems *DONE*

I like all this work! somehow I thought I'd be able to do it with my parents here, but it didn't happen. I was always feeding them or fetching things for them. That is okay... I should have been more realistic about it... Also I wanted to see them and hang out with them, not necessarily sneak off all the time and write.

Moomin has been quietly lite-briting for nearly 40 minutes. I think he is filling up every hole in the litebrite but I am afraid to look in the room. I played c@stle and animals around 7:30 to 9 this morning. My parents showed up at 9:30 and I have been cranking on all this work and shlepping around gathering all the papers and folders and materials and files.

However I could be persuaded to throw it all aside as it is a lovely day and the zoo beckons just a tiny bit. As long as I edit the 2 papers by midnight, that is enough for the day!

fun

I had fun and it seemed like the kids did too! I am curious what Moomin will talk about or remember. I kind of missed much of the fun of it as I ran around fetching limes and plates and scarves and safety pins and keeping track of everything. I thought of R. who is a DJ and some past discussions with him about the moods of parties. Keeping track of everything is its own kind of fun.

Kids all darling in pr1ncess costumes... one full-fur puppy one... one superhero... two r0bin ho0ds... cute cute cute! early arriving ones I gave stickers and made them decorate the castle ceilings, as they were feeling shy and awkward. this worked.

at the very last minute the castle seemed a little drab. I spiffed it up with some rugs and all the alligators and dragons and lizard toys I could find. There were a lot of them.

The Acrobat came in with long stilts (3 and half feet high - he could see over the roof) and walked about. He had offered to do this but I didn't really have any idea what it would be. I thought, "Oh, okay, stilts, he'll walk around and it'll be kinda neat and that will be that." But not at all. Kids were first stunned into a much-needed silent calm, then went wild. Stuffed animals were juggled, then thrown everywhere, kids tossing them up for him to catch. W@ter balloons juggled as well. *splat* I should have figured... extrovert, a bazillion years of cl0wn camp, used to be freaking camp counselor... DUH this equals "great entertainer of kids". "Guy on stilts" v. different from "fabulous entertainment". And fabulous entertainment was achieved. Acro came back on his boingy kangaroo stilts and played ogre to the castle. All party dads bug-eyed with mad desire to have boingy stilts. Even my dad has been going around all night enthusiastically muttering, "Boing. Heh heh. _I_ could do that!"

Moomin was full of serious intent to save little Petaluma from the monster and bravely darted out like a tiny mouse to whack with his sword at the giant wooden or metal legs. I thought he was terrified but still having fun and proud of himself for being brave. For about 5 min. after Acro left the scene Moomin was still on the alert, back to the wall, eyes roving, sword up, ready to defend us all. Actually mouse is right. He was like Reepicheep, tiny and taking it all very seriously about Honor!

(Ever since I took squid's advice and asked him what kind of party he wanted, he often at random moments goes all dreamy... like in bed, patting my arm and saying suddenly, "Petaluma will be a princess at my party right Mommy?" He also named his new princess figurine "Sophie" I think because she has straight blond hair. Fey also comes in for a dreamy comment or two but mostly it's all about Petaluma.)

My parents were amazingly useful and fun too. Dad cleaned up everything. I made a stab at it, but the kitchen is all sparkly and all the stuff is put away from outside and all the trash trashed. Whoa! I thought it was going to take up all of tomorrow! Yay parents. (Also, they had costumes, and did I mention they know how to act silly?)

Sweet and funny girls who live on our old block came. They brought us our g1rl scout cookies and I invited them and their mom because I always liked saying hi to them on the street though I didn't know them. The older girl Trixie hilariously made her crown (art project with gold posterboard and sticker) tell a whole fairy tale story across its gluey and stapley expanse. I also like her because she (while delivering the cookies) was carrying a large milk carton cut across halfway with moss and pebbles and dirt and some bizarre furnishings I can't remember but some kind of doll furniture. The resident of this house was a dead, dried up worm curled into a pathetic blackened spiral. You can imagine this made me love Trixie instantly and also realize that her mom must be One of the Good Ones not to mind the kid carrying around a Dead Worm House. I held the worm and petted it. Alas, I forgot to ask its name.

Like a miracle no one had any screaming temper tantrums or hit each other. At least not that I saw. Moomin cried a couple of times from general overload. I was worried he would cry when the dr@gon was killed but he knew it had candy in it so was all cool with it. now what to do with all these presents? dang. a lot of stuff. I like the cards that the kids drew- they are now mostly all big enough to do that!

In retrospect I had kinda too much stuff, maybe! I could never live up to it again!

minor plaints

Someone, disgusted by the bathroom that I ajaxed and mopped and towelled on Thursday afternoon, has scrubbed the whole bathroom in preparation for Moomin's party. Because you know, a troop of twelve 4 year old kid really are gonna notice a couple of hairs on the white tile floor.

We had a great breakfast at the cr3pe place....

In the car on the way there I learned that black people being teachers is one of the main thing wrong with our country. Because, they teach, incorrect, grammar. "STOP! just stop. Don't even say anything else. Just stop talking about that please. STOP! I'm fixin' to jump out of this here car. Did you hear me say stop? Safeword! Safeword!" It all started slow with the discussion of annoying word use (or should I say people who UTILIZE somewhat annoying words) and led into the whole super ugly display of racism. It's bad enough on its own but in front of Moomin? good god. I nearly cried in my dismay.

***
I had a nightmare where everyone came to his party at like 9am instead of 3. And my grandparents were also there, uninvited, looking super impossibly old - just like that episode where kirk, spock, and mccoy become very aged and gnarled and have brown spotted scalps and are all trembly. They looked sort of like Yoda but made out of some crumbling substance like cement with too much sand in it, so that it looked like you touched them they would fall apart - horror movie zombies.

It was very, very comforting to wake up and realize it was all a dream!

***

Moomin v. happy with t3e ball set, knights, bouncy ball, and shield. In bed this morning he quietly sang happy birthd@y to himself and smiled beatifically.

mar1a l10nza

Another cool thing today was that while we were talking about tap1rs, Dad was like "In the center of downtown C@racas when I was growing up was a really weird statue of an 1ndian princess riding a t@pir. There was some story about her and she did something heroic and there was a sort of voodoo like cult around her and people would leave stuff there. Then they moved it to some basically inaccessible highway median and there was a big fuss about it but people still leave flowers and wreathes and money and letters. Maybe there was some mountain or something associated with her. Now for some weird reason Cháv3z wants to move it somewhere else and it's a giant political fight but I don't know why. Poor people, sorta low class. "

This is the sort of weird story that I love. Instantly I looked it up and yeah he was right about everything. A lot of the facts in this article are oddly wrong. Like "african t@pir". Um, no such thing! Like the name of "p3dro jimenez" which is actually Marcos P3rez J1menez. But according to my dad, who remembers everything, most of the rest of it is right. From other articles it was clear that her cult is very strong not only in Venez. but in other countries as well.

Here is a photo of her statue. I have found others and she is naked and very muscular. Here is that same page with Google translation.

Apparently the cult (which has no centralized authority) endorsed him widely and enthusiastically when he first came to power. They declared him to be a reincarnation of S1món Bolivar. But then a couple of years ago they took it all back and said that Mar1a Lionz@ no longer approved of him, as he was not really improving things for the poor.

enter the dr@gon

The dr@gon piñata looks super funny and dorky.

The thing is, I remember all my piñatas vividly. after I was about 5 i was able to help my mom and dad make them but even the ones before it were exciting in the creating process and a very strange experience when whacked. They are festive... I hope Moomin remembers this one. It is humonguous. I will take a picture tomorrow morning when Rook and i finish putting on the spikes and green paper.

It is hard to make flames but I did a good job of it! It looks sort of like a fat little din0saur, in fact a lot like Gon, if anyone remembers that wordless comic book. (I wish I had those, actually! Moomin would dig them!)

Minnie saved my butt this afternoon by taking me to the craft store. Sure I could have gone alone but it was jollier with her as she becomes a greedy fiend in that store. She bought a fake bird - very jaunty - to wear on her head. then we whooshed into the Rosss Undress for Less and got the best t-shirts ever. Hers: "Slinky" with drawing of it. Mine: one of those battered looking fake-ancient tshirts with retro fonts. So poetic! "Golden Honey Brand / HOTCAKES Mix / Super Fresh and Fluffy /QUICK & EASY / GREAT WAY TO START A DAY" with stack of pancakes. On the back: "STACKED HIGH / Watch them fly!" I am wildly intrigued. Could this have been really the copy on some 50s box of pancake mix? Or is it all some 23 year old t-shirt designer's mad fantasy? $6.99 and it's mine all mine. I shall feel fresh and fluffy every time I wear it.

it doesn't matter

It just doesn't matter how hard I work or how much I do. It is never the right thing and never enough done. I am so tired of explaining everything 500 times. I wish my mom would just get off my ass. My technique of giving instructions is not working because there is a fucking herd of people involved and I can't predict exactly what Rook, Minnie, and T. are going to do at any moment in time.

Nor can I predict the weather. If my mom acidly mentions how I told her it was warm here one more time, I will burst into tears. "Well I _WOULD_ have packed whatever, but BADGER told me it was hot out." Uhhhh. Why? Why? Why? After the pre-visit 4+ phone calls and emails about packing and the weather? What information am I supposed to have other than having lived here a while, being here, and having access to the exact same internet we@ather reports as she does?

I declared I needed to chill out for 15 min or so in total peace. Apparently someone's idea of total peace is to torment me about the brand, size, and location of the garbage bags; the way the garbage can smells when you sniff it up close; the need (repeated every visit) to get a screwdriver and screw in the handles of my pots and pans a little tighter; the location of the dust mop (accompanied by a small refresher course in the proper kind of dust mop to have, and how they don't have them in E@ston, M@ryland a few years ago when she tried to buy one for my grandma Hemulen; the location of the dustpan and commentary on where it should go instead; the desire to take Moomin to the playground; Moomin's refusal to go to the playground; and my dad's disgustingly high rate of consumption of g1rl scout cookies. All really good reasons to bust into my "15 minutes of total peace".

Satan, if you are reading my blog, take note, for you can get some great pointers on how to torment me in hell when I'm thrown into the fiery pit.

2 more days.

The morning was super fun as we all flounced about the fancy victorian mansion garden with stuffed animals, cameras and funny hats.

Why can't we just have fun like that all the time? what can I do? why must I be tortured? Can't she appreciate that I more or less leave Moomin to her completely and let her do whatever she wishes? I did request "no baby talk" as he is just starting to say his Ls and THs and Rs and so I don't want her pronouncing everything all wrong because she thinks it's cute how he talks. I think it's cute too but... that was my one request... okay.. and the no nursery rhymes all the time in front of me.

born to the purple

Badgeria Porphyrogenita, Empress of the Holy Roman Empire, reigns supreme this morning.

We are off, soon, to the amazing gardens. I hope we see some deer as I have promised them to Moomin. Deer, are you listening?

Mom playing happily with Moomin teaching him about mazes and labyrinths. Goody! Dad on couch determined to plow through arryHay otterPay number 5. He reads very slowly but never forgets anything he reads. I don't think he will finish. But he is going into it like a juggernaut caught by the loafular force field that is our van-sized brown corduroy couch.

All is peaceful. I have eaten the last l3mon square. I have lounged in bed petting cats and reading C1nderella out loud while drinking my coffee with a cuddly cold-toed Moomin. We had our spanish lesson in bed. "Un dedo, dos dedos, tres dedos... " Because they say that the best place to learn another language is in bed. I think They had something else in mind. Rook, are you listening, you with your red hot lunch buddy from Marketing who makes you want to habla español?

update

I just realized that I forgot to wash my sheets and they ae all chocolatey.

Dinner was good. Whenever I make that I just want to keep eating it until I fall over dead.

Everything rather smooth. Groceries were shopped. Mom restrained herself from most comments though many things were deemed gay. I could tell actually she was at a loss what to talk about as she was self-censoring most of the usual topics on purpose to try to tiptoe around me. Hmmm. I mean that's not good in many ways, but it was good in the way that I was immensely relieved not to hear it.

Also, I kicked her out of the kitchen, saying that I was just thinking how peaceful it was all alone in there while she so wonderfully amused Moomin. That helped because I was trying to time everything to be done at the same time and also frying and can't hear while I'm frying something. "Where do I put this? And where do I put this? How do you usually put these bowls in here? And where are the napkins?" "Mom, I'll do it. Go ask Moomin about his br0ntosaurus. I beg of you." This worked, for once. Joy!

I was thinking about times she has been at past jobs and complained that there was no training and no one showed her anything. She would like a complete tour of my kitchen and for me to explain everything like a tour guide. I open the drawer: here is where I keep the napkins. etc. Then she would feel comfortable. I mean this for everything in general in our relationship - not just the kitchen drawers. I would be gnawing off my own arm to get away if someone was explaining their silverware arrangement to me. Most people keep their silverware in a drawer and there usually aren't very many drawers to check. For example it is common for people to sort of act like they don't know where your water glasses are. "Can I have a glass of water?" Sure. "Oh... um... where do you keep your glasses?" *feigned reluctance to open cupboard door* I can see this is politeness... but also... most of the time it is not hard to guess where the glasses are going to be... usually near the sink...

So fundamentally i have this half-assed philosophy of "guess. if you are wrong, it's usually not that bad of consequences" and my mom has the "must know exactly where everything is and the rules etc. before touching anything" one. I act all superior about it irritatingly. But clearly there is no superiorness about it. I would make a bad helicopter pilot or air traffic controller. "Oh pretty much just push any of those little buttons. It'll probably work out. Aaaaaah! *BOOM*" Vs. my mom who would be a most excellent astronaut or precision chemist, or libr@rian, or behavoir m0dification psychologist, with a system that is always stuck to and a lot of procedures and locations that are precisely memorized.

The problem is she is not an astronaut. She really should have been. it is talent somewhat wasted upon the meticulous ajaxing of the crud that forms between the sink and the metal ring of the garbage disposal. She would make an excellent soldier - assembling machine guns or something.... machining some ticky little parts of something... happily maintaining an engine...

Without that map of what to do and what is the right way she is uncomfortable and anxious as if suddenly blinded. With such a map and such rules I am uncomfortable and rebellious and all I can think about is pushing whatever boundaries are on that map.

We had a tense moment as we brought the groceries in from the car. It seemed like she was mad at me but I had no idea why. Then she said "USUALLY when your DAD and I do this we have a whole SYSTEM. We always do it the same way. One of us brings the stuff in from the car and sets it down and while they are going back to get the rest, the OTHER person is starting to put the stuff away." I remarked that while we shared much genetic material, we do not actually have a telepathic link. Nor do I usually ever grocery shop with another person, so it had not occurred to me that such a thing was possible. This made us both laugh, tension defused. I think for a minute she was fuming and then she realized that obsessive compulsive habits have to be explained to new people.

I have got to remember that she is really kinda O/C and try to respect that. how to do it? I can't become a whole diff. person for her. but maybe I can for example make up some fakey system of how i do things and explain it to her and then she will feel less anxious. I realized just now while typing this, that probably half of our conversations today went like this:

"How do you do this with the coffee?"
"Um, whatever, just put some coffee in it, and push the handle down not too fast."
"But how many scoops do you put in?"
"I just kinda pour it in. Um, about *this* much."
I get up and pour some coffee in. She flinches visibly.
"But how many SCOOPS is that. Why don't you measure it."
"I just don't. it's always about the same."
"The pot says to do one scoop per cup."
"Hmm."
"but it doesn't say how bit a scoop is. Do you HAVE the scoop that came with it? "
"well no."
"Why, did you get it at a garage sale?"
"no. if there was a scoop I probably threw it away."
"the pot also says to STIR it with a spoon before you push it down."
"Oh well... go ahead... I never do... but.. whatever... it gets mixed up enough."
"But it SAYS to stir it."
"yeah okay."
"Why don't you do what it says?"
"I've had coffeepots like that for... oh... 10 years... it always tastes okay..."
*she presses lips together tightly and looks like she's going to strangle me or throw up or both*

***
"Where do you put your napkins."
"There isn't really a place yet... um.. just throw them over there..."
*flinch* *twitch*
"But you have to keep them SOMEWHERE." *uncomfortable giggle*
"there might be some other napkins in that drawer down there... or in the cabinet... I dunno..."
*exasperated sigh from both of us*

***
"Is that where Moomin keeps his jacket?"
*Um... no... I don't have a place for it... we did just move in... I could make him a place. I was thinking maybe in his room somewhere."
"Well he put it there just like it was the usual place. Is it where he usually puts it?"
"I just got that shelf yesterday. So it isn't."
"then where does he put it?"
"Uh, wherever. Sometmies I forget to bring it in from the car. I guess I try to put it in his room somewhere if it isn't already there."

***
It's not like I was being sarcastic or obnoxious or anything, I was just answering the questions honestly...I am not exaggerating the way these conversations draw out into infinity... if anything, I'm cutting them short. If I'm being sweet and patient I just keep answering. If I've just HAD IT then I snap "WHATEVER" and huff off or turn to my book and look ignoringish and turn into a surly teenager.

But in each of these snippets transcribed above, I am completely misunderstanding her deal. It is not (well maybe some of it is) really criticism of me. It is like a fundamental inability to get that there could be a universe in which there is not a rule about where to put the small bowls and the large bowls. She doesn't want to hear me say "There is no one right way to make the fr3nch pr3ss coffee. I do it differently every time. You do it whatever way you want and I will continue to do it my way." It does not compute. What I should do is to just give her exact instructions. "Put exactly one tablespoon per cup of not quite boiling water. Follow the instructions on the pot. Do it exactly that way or it will EXPLODE." I don't get why on earth she would look to me for instructions about anything. Why? Why? Why? I do feel part of it is her desperate attempt to make me see that her way is better and why, god, why, has she failed as a parent in that I have not yet learned how to have a place for everything and everything in its place? Maybe I will finally understand THIS time. She told me many times last visit that she hoped and prayed that having my own house would make me "keep it nice" and "get rid of clutter" and "have a place for everything" and "learn to be a grownup". It is touching that she cherishes these tender illusions. But it ain't happening.

so: tomorrow I shall try making up precise instructions and answering the "real" question which is NOT 'how do YOU do this" but is instead "how should _I_ do this unfamiliar thing". It must also be her way of politely acknowledging that it is my space and I must have my own way of doing things. Which frankly I often do. I like my particular coffee mug and I like to sit in the same spot.

(That reminds me of a thing I like about my mom in law, the Hurricane. When we first met I think she was visiting me and Rook in Ch1cago. And I was alone with her in the afternoon or something in the apartment that Rook had just kind of halfway moved into or maybe he was already moved all the way in, but it was the one-room apartment I was subletting. I offered coffee. She accepted. I made the coffee. We sat down and chatted about nothing for aminute. then she looked at me very knowingly and funnily and winked and said, "This is where YOU sit. You put me sitting here so I get the nice view and the comfortable chair. But you don't usually sit where you're sitting now, looking at the wall and only a teensy bit of the nice view." It was true. This made me like her very much because it was true and because she had noticed that I had done a small thoughtful hospitable thing, but also because it seemed that she was laughing at me that I probably normally hog the nice stuff and made Rook sit in the yukky seat, yet she approved, oddly.)

I wonder if I became a half-assed, no-map-necessary experimenter and pusher of random buttons in helicopters partly because of the intensity of Mom's rules when I was a child and the obvious arbitrary compulsiveness of them? It was always impossible to stick to the rules even if you tried. Sometimes it was impossible to figure out what the hell the rules were. Partly that and partly temperament I guess.

Faced with a strange new coffeepot, I have never, ever been fazed. Faced with an ALIEN coffeepott on another planet I would not be fazed. But then I would push down and realize it was not really a coffeepot, it was a mining device. *BOOM* Isn't it okay to be one of the pusher-downers of alien coffeepot handles? Doesn't the universe need me too? why must it always offend my mom? It is my main talent and my only survival skill.

Overanalysis, over and out!

in the clear light of morning

I am suddenly excited to see my parents. Maybe they will weed the yard with me in a companionable fashion and help me get stuff to make the compost heap start cookin'. Mostly it just needs more STUFF on top. It needs to be at least 3 feet high.

Someone a while ago was talking about soil test kits but I need them not. I know that the soil is acidic from the kind of weeds that were growing on it and the pine mulch on top of it. the plants will flourish. I will talk about geology of california with my dad and all will be well. Mom shall ajax things and organize the cabinets (I told her she could. Just realized that there is no hope, as our dishwasher is hopelessly "gay") and tell me about the new horse she is in love with. I think she might be going to switch riding places and will learn "cavalry style" where they go charging across the landscape and then do endurance rides. How cool would that be?

I feel that it is inevitable they will buy a ranch and go live there. When I was around 11 my dad decided maybe we would have a working ranch and fern farm. It was discussed in detail. I was all for it, picturing some really great My Fr1end Flicka moments as I tenderly cared for the horse that only loved ME. "Would you get up at 5:30 am like Almanzo every morning to feed the animals and do the chores and muck out the barn and do the milking, little Badger? " "Um... would I get to eat apple pie and pancakes every morning? " "No." "Probably not. 5:30! Ugh!" My mom must have talked him around. Probably she was wildly against it from the beginning but kept her mouth shut, figuring it would blow over as so many of my dad's enthusiasms did. (Teaching me Latin, German, etc. we were going to all speak entirely in Latin. Sometimes we did Spanish but my mom wouldn't do it.)

A little later on there was a new scheme of how we were going to live on a houseboat. I dragged my feet on that one too. "Where would I put my books? Aren't the bayous all polluted and stuff?"

A little wackiness in the home improvement department, my parents are looking fun this morning.

incontinence

I was worried for a second when I woke up but then I realized I had gone to bed with chocolate in hand but fell asleep drunkenly before I could eat it. The little foil-wrapped chocolate eggs that I'd cleverly tucked under my belly for a few minutes to make them more warm and succulent - a little bit melted, eh? - were smeared all over... I think they might even be in my hair.

New plan. Clean up a little. Take out the compost and turn the compost heap.

Then I'll shave the back of my head and repurple the exotic tropical crest that is my silly looking forelock. That ought to cheer me up.

I need another load of horseshit and some leaves for the top of the compost - it has flies.

one more fun fact

Horta is the Etruscan goddess of agriculture. I leave you to imagine what she looks like.

I would like to invent some kind of casserole that I would name "The Horta".

shockelat

I am cheered by Rook's goofy obsession with the sw3dish chef. We are now in heated giggly arguments about whether he says "shokelat" or "chokolate" for the chocolate moose. I think he makes most CHs into SHs and in fact if saying "Watch" he would say "Waash".

going slowly mad, drinking rum and juice

Why do I have to go into this tailspin? Why can't I be more forgiving and synthesizing, like Margaret Cho or something? I was even pointlessly and guiltily hating my poor parents this afternoon as Acrobat nattered on about his ac@demic decathlon triumphs as I bitterly mulled over how they yanked me out of that same year's decathlon because I *gasp* had had sex with my boyfriend.

I never complain about my dad but that is because that whole time was too horrible to think about. It is horrible when a seemingly mild mannered and kind person that you worship, who has seemed like a rock of stability all your life, goes absolutely psycho on you. Iron bars on the windows were discussed and I think even priced, in all seriousness. I maintained that it was illegal and unsafe to lock me in my room because of fire codes. I was slapped and shoved around and called a dirty fucking filthy whore and fucking cunt. Screams were screamed. Spit flew out onto my face. The Constitution of the United States, Women's Lib, and the Sexual Revolution were invoked. I was told that I would be forced to have an abortion. I refused. I wasn't even pregnant. I was forced onto birth control pills but forbidden to own condoms. All extracurricular things were cancelled. I began failing out of high school. I was told that I was no longer their daughter and that they didn't care what I did with my life and if I ended up as some kind of cosmetologist (?!) it would serve me right.

At all times except for those times my dad has been pretty decent.

My mom when she alludes to that time either blames me for my bad behavior and provoking my father and "nearly ruining her marriage", or she blames her sisters for giving her bad advice on how to be a parent.

Needless to say, I found every opportunity to escape from there and screw the whole math club (AND the chess club and everyone in computer science) of Cyprus Creek High. I should really get some kind of medal for deflowering the most geekly virgins of all time. Northwest H0uston, I am your queen. And you have my herpes.

Oh well!

It all turned out okay, right?

I was saying to minnie earlier today how I guiltily loathe and yet accept the $200 housewarming gift certificate to Home Despot that my mom's sister sent. I kind of wish that I had put my foot down and just told all those people not to contact me ever again. Mom called me yesterday to say that her sister was worried that I might not have gotten it and could I just write her an email thank you note so that she knows I got it okay? Nevermind that the woman has my number and has my email. Why doesn't she ask me herself if she is so worried? why do I take her hundred bucks at xmas every year when she doesn't want to speak to me or see me or have any relationship with me? And I don't like her anyway for pretending to be so cool when I was little, but really being some kind of incarnation of Helen Gurley Brown's bastard love child? "She sends the check to say she thinks of me or cares about me on some level, even though she can't bear to have any other contact with me," I mused. "Of course!' Minnie berates me. "Just take it and write the thank you note goddamn it."

Taking the check feels yukky and guilty and I hate her...and hating her makes me feel even more guilty... it's like... how could I pass up just a free hundred bucks here and there? But I do loathe her. And the confessions from my mom (which, granted, who can trust them?) as to exactly which of her horrible actions during my childhood were due to that "child psychologist" sister's bad advice?

If i make any sort of hissy about anythng it will make my mom lose face. And I hate to think of my GPs rotting away, with their children the dumbass sisters dithering around not being helpful. They need me to kick their asses a little bit. However that is an illusion too as they leave me out of the loop and I am sure that for example when my GP dies no one will tell me until after the funeral as they envision me making some kind of Scene. There is no need for me to make that particular Scene as I can write some sort of giant monumental poem that will get published in some book someday 20 years from now and then they can all blow me.

*deep drink of rum*

I will be nice... I will be nice... I will appreciate all the good things of my parents and box up all the bad things... I will bend over and take it in the ass about my slatternly housekeeping... They are nice... they are fun...they will play with my kid in many great ways that will be incredibly fun... they will both know exactly how to play "castle" to his taste... I will make them take him to the park and they'll teach him new things and I will stay home and work on w1ttig project and furtively ajax things...

I guess it comes down to this: I love them and on some level I forgave them long ago for all those high school era (and before) things. But whenever they hurt my feelings about anything I realize i haven't really forgiven them and it all boils up to the surface of my mind. It doesn't ever seem to be on the surface of their minds.

If someone would bring me some kind of pot cookies or magic bong hits this weekend I would be eternally grateful. I am going to need it.

what I need right now

Random factoid of the day discovered during researches: Ueuecoyotl, God of fornication and irresponsible merrymaking. I could use a little of that.

Parents coming tomorrow. I am in denial. Have done nothing to prepare except give the bathroom floor a perfunctory wipe with a towel. Everything nasty, unswept, unscrubbed, unwiped, unarranged.

Except the oh so strigiled backs of my arms.

Dude, Minnie, don't even read this if you are gonna get mad at me for ragging on our mom but she is driving me mad already and is not even here. Maybe you should let her buy you some furniture at the Hoot.

In the grocery store two days ago I tried to think of things that would impress my mom. I thought of them: the expensive kind of plastic wrap, and B0unty paper towels. A canteloupe, as she likes to eat them, and will witness Moomin eating it and thus be reassured he does eat something other than mac and cheese. How many times have I had the paper towel lecture - as if it were divine revelation. I got the heavy duty plastic wrap but forgot the paper towels.

Tomorrow morning: work on research desperately? Or run arond scrubbing everything and buying the non-"gay" paper towels? (If you are not hip to this use of the word "gay", let me clue you in that in TX in the 80s junior high school kids used "gay" as a synonym for "massively uncool". Even though I thought of myself as gay or bi or whatever, I said that things were gay, totally gay, gaywad city, etc. Now quite embarrassing to think about, or to witness in my own mom as she tells me that my paper towels are so gay.)

4th phone call of the week was this afternoon: same subjects. What I am doing wrong in my house and how I should be organizing it and how it's not really so hard to get it all unpacked and organized. How I should Get Rid of Clutter. How it is really easy to sweep the floor every morning if only you have the correct kind of dust mop (I have it, she bought it for me two years ago after the umpteenth lecture about it.) How Moomin's room should be. What is the weather? Exactly what should she pack? Does this outfit sound okay? How about this one? What shoes would good with it, or would that be too gay? Maybe just jeans? What if it doesn't fit in the suitcase? I am honestly clueless about how to reply. Guy-like, I say that jeans and tshirts and one sweater will be fine. Whatever shoes will be fine. even more guy-like, I try to figure out what to say that will make her shut up about it the quickest.

Maybe I can set them making the piñata.. send them to michaels for craft supplies... Maybe she will focus all her energies on yelling at my dad for eating too much. That always gets me off the hook for a while.

After complaining about preschooler aggression I have managed to create a theme party in which there are weapons everywhere (water balloons, swords, maybe some nerf arrows?) and a castle which probably they will knock down instantly. Mom has also told me how to do the party, because I have organized it all wrong, and to make them play pin the tail on the donkey. "You kids always loved it even though it was TOTALLY GAY." Hrmm. I was thinking of having them all make crowns. Will they condescend to do it? Is it enough just to provide castle and cake and possibly somewhat too small patio and horde of children?

Next year, if she coming out here for his bday, I shall provide her with addresses and she can plan, organize, invite party all by herself, the correct non-gay way.

I always try to get her to eitiher give me a list of what groceries she wants, or, I try to give her my truck to go buy them. But she always acts like she is scared to drive in a strange city by herself, even if the store is 2 blocks away.

I think what makes me crazy is I know what is coming but can do absolutely nothing to stop it. I resolve not to let it bother me, but it does, and no matter what I say it doesn't stop.

We had a horrid conversation where she started going into nursery rhymes. "Mom he's 4. He won't even watch ses@me street anymore as it is babyish. And I personally, really, really, hate nursery rhymes to the point of phobia." "Oh! I had no IDEA!" yes she does as I have said it SO MANY TIMES. Rook even yelled at her over it once I think. I explained it carefully multiple times and, in tears, asked her just not to do it around me. But then what happens is, two hours later she will be in the car with me and start going "this little .." uh, I just started to cry as I typed it and couldn't make myself finish. ugh. ugh. it makes my stomach turn. Okay, next time someone wigs out about a spider, I will not roll my eyes, I will respect their phobia, for I feel the fear and loathing. Anyway what happens is that on purpose she will start doing on one Moomin and then go in a really fakey way "OH! I almost FORGOT! BADGER doesn't LIKE nursery rhymes! for SOME REASON!" and then snort in an injured way.

Ueuecoyotl, save me!

Whiskey? Rum? anyone? Can I run out and go to Shooters, or The Saddle Room?

demon ladies!

Plastic grinning demon ladies just took over my yard for AN HOUR. Hello. I have one bbq grill, 2 small bags of clothes, one small box of books and a file cabinet to sell or give away. Just take the stuff! But no, it was seen as a great opportunity to check me out, check out my yard, and have an impromptu playgroup with grody little mini-vegans Areola and Branwell and Colewad during the time I was going to keep working. Hrmmm.

Not to mention the nastiness I just had to endure which I'm sure all my friends have endured many a time. "At IRON GATE they just run around and FREE PLAY. There is no PRESSURE and none of this whole COMPETITIVE thing. No READING. They don't need to start learning things so early. Blah blah blah."

Aaaagh! I bristled up like a roly poly 5 foot 3 hedgehog in jeans. I mean my "chi" was flying out my ears in sharp, cruel spikes to form my prickly exterior. I protested that not all kids maybe WANT to run around freely all the time. Maybe they have FUN reading. Maybe they LIKE to sit quietly and draw and make letters. This met with frozen horror and a silent doubletake that was eerily similar to "The Cyprus Creek sneer" that me and Minnnie know all too well - the way that rich girls would look you from head to toe and then kind of flounce their petite noses at you.

Eeek! Finally the wenches left. Thank god.

If anyone wants a small bbq grill... I can't face any more selling of stuff. I thought it would be better this way than through cra1gslist but apparently not.

I'm sure the competitive ones exist. But am I seen as one of them? Gross.

news flash - strigil found

I have a crucial bit of info that must be imparted to the world before midnight. You know how... well maybe you don't but... I have the sort of greasy skin that I can scrub it with a facecloth, and exfoliate it with some sort of scrubby stuff with bits of sandpaper and apricot pit in it, and then loofah it with an extra brillo-like loofah, and it is still nasty. Because after doing all that on, say, my arms, I can still scrape across my arm with my fingernail and get this instant curd of grey, sludgy, dead skin. It just doesn't come off. Is it just me?

The point is, for lo these many years I have longed desperately for a strigil. This is some kind of scrapy thing, and I don't know what it looks like really but imagined it to be very much like an untoothed saw blade, the kind they loop around and put into a handle and use to curry horses, and ancient greek guys and I'm sure mostly young ancient greek guys would smear each other with olive oil and then scrape each other with them - in order to scrape off the dead skin and the sweat after, you know, arguing about philosophy and doing a pankration or two after a hot day at the palestra or the agora or something.... you know, a strigil...

Well I was in Blood Bath and Beyond and saw this small plastic implement at the checkout stand - fits in the palm of your hand and called some dumb name like "The Perfect Pot Scraper" with an illustration of someone using it to scrape out some gunk from the bottom of a frying pan. It is a thin stiff tapered sheet of plastic, like a small spatula with no handle.

"There is my strigil!" I thought excitedly. "For 99 cents!"

I have just tried it. Yes! It works! I am strigiled, smooth, and glowing! I am truly exfoliated, Socratic style!

I used soap not olive oil, but there is always tomorrow.

excelsior!

Hung out w/Minnie, then Jo, then built a giant castle out of fridge boxes, tape, grey spray paint. It looms over the backyard.

In case I forget the book I was talking about as so great is Flow, by some guy named something like mihali czechszentmihali. some horrid spelling - which I type just to test myself. Now looking it up. Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience by Mihali Czikszentmihalyi. Damn! Anyway it's a great book. Me and S.K. used to talk about it a lot.

I invited the 13 year old boy, Tapir, who lives down the block to help. We used to live next door to him and his mom and grandma in his apt. building two years ago. He was quiet, shy, and bookish and I used to borrow books when I was sick or on crutches. He told me he still has my D'Aula1re's Gr3ek Mythology. So THAT's where it went! Heh. It is well disposed of - I wouldn't take it back now. He also remembered the Naus1caa books I lent him (it's like eyeball flypaper for any reasonably bookish child from oh, around 6 to 13 - they read it over and over in deadly fascination).

He seemed the same, only even more scarily observant and mysterious. I told him to come anytime and he said that sometimes he "just needs to get out and away". Of course it would be like one of the giant dreams of my life to provide, even for a moment, a haven for a bookish and lonely teenager who is barely allowed to do anything or go anywhere. His mom and grandma perfectly nice (Sufis, or something, I think, as they go to a m0sque and he chose a sufi name a while back) but a bit stifling, I think, especially in a tiny 2 bedroom apartment. His old playmates from skateboarding on the corner seem to be in another world - slangy, street-hanging-out, girl-watching puberty. Since he goes to school in Sanjo he doesn't have much in the way of local friends though he seems to still be a b0y sc0ut.

Must not project self into other person, but here is a thought: If he turns out to be secretly writing poetry or short stories or something I might have to do some ritual to turn away evil, as things will just be too good.

I played a curiously satisfying clem3nti sonatina all the way through. Yes - I make the same mistakes as I used to. I want to play it all with expression and the right tempo even though I don't know it yet and so it comes out with 3 measures all brilliant and perfect and then a halting whoops and a stumble and repeat and then all lovely again. Not only do I feel my old piano teacher rapping my knuckles with a pencil (LIFT - what are you doing wrong? That's right - that's a REST - you are not in SYRUP, Badgerabelle! LIFT the fingers. PHRASING. GOOD." Sometimes I also hear my mom exasperatedly " you always make the SAME MISTAKES. DON'T LEARN MISTAKES." Unfortunately my fingers have retained the physical memory of those mistakes. She was right. It is just like her prediction about "If you read while you're eating, then whenever you read you'll want to eat, and since you read all the time you will be FAT." Somewhat true, but when it comes down to it I really don't care and prefer to shove ritz crackers with cream cheese into my mouth as my mind devours more trivia about byzantine emperors or the geology of pennsylvania roadcuts.

I like it when people use my whole name sometimes and call me Badgerabelle. Or Dr. Badge-ardo or other nicknames. Now I only get Badgerabelled from old people or doctors, alas.

I shall buy a metronome tomorrow, at the damned incredible music store just down the street. Oh lord. This is tempting. However I think it is more important that I get some physical exercise - tramp0line and 1ce skating it shall be.

Anyway to have my fingers re-learn or remember how to go blindly from middle C to 2 octaves lower G - the lovely certainty - it makes me very happy. My brain almost completely shuts up during this. (Other than the occasional ghost of my 23 year old mom or my dead victorian relic piano teacher). My brain shutting up is rare and good and to be savored.

Squid and Iz came over for pancakes and playtime and all was well. Moomin didn't humph her too much and Iz didn't ignore him (as no one else more mature and interesting was around).

byzantine rulers of today

God. Take a look at this (via squid) Bush allows gays to be fired for being gay. Who said the culture wars are over?

waving arms

Aaaahhhh! Sorry, people, for my reflexive public processing of everything. what is private and what is public, I have never been good at it and I can be a rude and insensitive bastard.

the things people say to each other in private.. why must I shout them? I think it has its good and bad effects... If you properly set me up, you can point me like a shaped charge and prime me at some issue and then I will always go off in the same way, injuring everyone in my path. 8-(

Well here I am with my coffee and the sound of the neighborhood woodpecker throwing his head at some tree or telephone pole - using his head as a hammer at 50 miles an hour. I hope there are some bugs in there.

My general unstated rule, I think, has been to blog whatever's on my mind. Stuff that keeps me awake or that I can't stop thinking about - stuff that swings my pendulum one way or another, joy or sadness. If the pendulum isn't moving, then it turns into lists of things to do, vague worries, etc. Occasionally I have one of those mental swings or focuses (foci) that I consciously think, Oooh, I can't blog that. And I worry that that makes my blog actually dishonest because I am self-censoring. Now what those things I censor tend to be: personal sexual obsessions and crushes on people who might hear about it as gossip; my actual sex life; minor peeves of marriage such as Rook leaving up the toilet seat (he doesn't ever, actually, but that is a good example of the minorness of my peeves which shall remain unsaid).

Possibly a good rule would be, don't post stuff that is possibly negative involving people who I know actually read this. Is that a good rule? Or is it somehow dishonest? If I crossed the line hugely by whinging about the Lord of the Flies Playgroup, I have to figure out how to change so that I don't do it. For example I rant on and on about the Sanjo Nonprofit, and i know that some people actually know who I am talking about or could easily find out and that could disseminate as gossip. In fact Pastiche who is part of that group (a non-evil part) at one point I think I gave him my blog address, though I don't think he read it or remembers that he had it. And yet I still rant. I don't want to always be blogging sweetness and light over here.

"Don't say anything bad about anyone ever" would be my dad's rule. He liked to un-ironically give me all of Polonius's speeches. "Neither a borrower nor a lender be." etc. I think somewhere in there Polonius recommends never saying anything bad about anything or anyone.

I am lost here, as always, and don't know how to behave. At this point in life maybe it is disingenuous of me to say I am lost when clearly it is my constant choice to behave like a bull in a china shop or a bomb going off. Aren't I nice really? Are my motivations pure? Look how I quietly dropped out of Vidal's tolkien game without throwing my usual hissy where I exposed his sexism etc. etc. as I usually would insist upon doing. Is this wise and prudent or is it a lack of courage from becoming middle aged?

bratz

Kids all horrible at playgroup - including my own. I still can't figure out if he actually hit Merlin in the head, or if he was just waving a stick at him. I was furious when I thought he had hit him - and then furiouser when it seemed like Moomin was lying - but then I realized that he kept saying "I didn't do anything" and "I didn't hit him" during my giant boring lecture about What You Did Wrong and How I Am Very Disappointed and Grieved. Moomin was up in a tree and Merlin was trying to come up and grab him, apparently. My interpretation is that Moomin was scared (not unreasonable) and thus menaced Merlin with this stick (actually a plastic hoe). Now, I would also believe that he hit him, and this would strangely be a relief as it would mean he was not weaseling and lying to me, though of course it is bad that he hit him just in itself. Though Merlin was laughing and running about, exactly 2 seconds later. But if Moomin didn't hit him, I was monstrously unjust. I don't care if I sould say this or not but it was rather horrible listening to Moomin guiltily stage whispering "I HATE YOU MERLIN I HATE YOU MERLIN IS MEAN TO ME" all the way home in the car. "What?" *silence* *pause* *whisper: MERLIN IS BAD TO ME AND HURTS ME AND I HATE HIM" I actually started crying while hearing this and I told Moomin that he can pick anyone from school and we can call them on the phone and invite them over to play and he does not have to go back to the playgroup. I thought of all the times I have said "Merlin IS your friend. He is just learning how (not to grab/be nice/not hit/kick people)". That seemed reasonable when they were... 3 and 2 but now they are 5 and 4.

Anyway I nearly took Moomin home after thinking he had hit someone. The only reason I didn't is that I didn't see it, no one seemed to have seen it, and I couldn't tell what had really happened.

The other kids all behaved like hideous cruel barbarians as well. I don't care what I say about this. They all behaved rudely, spoiled, greedy, screaming, name-calling, taunting, hitting, grabbing, etc. and I will not take Moomin back into that madhouse atmosphere and tell him that it is "friendship". I have probably fucked him up for life already by having acted like "these are your friends, how come you are not trying to play with them?" for the last few months.

Last rant on this subject yanked as everyone told me it would offend all the others. Screw it. This one not getting deleted. The thought of me as a stern disciplinarian is laughable. What is going on?

Anyway they are all nice kids when taken one or two at a time. Maybe it's just some sort of wolf pack lord of the flies mentality that develops amongs them. Moomin not fit for being in this wolf pack, somehow. and I am for sure not fit to teach him how to be in it.

I said I wouldn't delete but i just deleted a whole bunch of boring rude ranting. arrrgh. i am off the deep end.

emperors

I was poking around in 14 Byzantine Rulers and got sucked into reading it again. It is so great! I forgot that Psellus was a thaumaturge and scientist. I like the parts where he digresses from the actual history (a lot of frothing at the mouth incompetent assholes burning out the eyes of all their close relatives with red-hot irons) and starts nattering on about his own obsessions with philosophy, math, and rhetoric.

I say this in all sincerity and without boastfulness: if any man should feel constrained to praise my literary works, I would beg him not to commend my researches in the field of religion, not to extol my extensive reading (I am not deluded by a false impression of my own importance, nor am I ignorant of my own limitations: my capacity is very small when compared with the ability of the orators and philosophers who have surpassed me).

This sort of thing always makes me giggle fondly. A kindred spirit - a felllow total pompous asshole!

cat on keyboard!

Limply, haltingly, I just sight read through the entire Clementi book and the Burgmuller book. (The former owner gave me a few cheesy beginner books...) I felt inordinately proud that I could still do this after... 20 years? almost. new piano is kind of sucky, but more or less in tune. One could wish for more control over the loud and softness of the keys. But it was relatively cheap and nothing big is wrong with it so ... here it is! A piano for Moomin! But really for me to drive the neighbors crazy with.

The cats like it.

I need the bach 2 part inventions book, and more bach, and a metronome, and a lamp that the cats won't immediately destroy. Some chopin for maximal moodiness.

Till then i shall dorkily practice my prissy little Clementi sonatinas and my scales.

It's good! Like a whole part of my brain just woke up from a coma and breathed a sigh of relief.

Let me just complain for a moment. What I have always longed for is an easiness, a facility with the piano that would let me breezily accompany other people in duets or singing some popular song and also the ability to play boogie woogie and blues songs in an improvisey way. Instead I am only capable of playing either prissy little waltzes or sloppy, moody things that one would play as an early high school level player like debussy and chopin. Arrr!

Despite this complaint, playing makes me strangely happy.

It is the dear wish of my heart to hear Moomin poncing out the Minuet in G while dressed in a tiny little conductor's outfit or liberace style jacket...

invisible things

I like it when Moomin hands me invisible things. A frog that he found in a box, a treasure with gold and jewels, a bag of seeds.

the creative energy surges

I was also going to say that last night was very cool as Bara was over for me to record her for the CD that will go with the book. I was going to make her dinner but Amelie came to invite us! Oh joy!

Amelie just got out of pastry/bread making chef school in V@ncouver and is going to live with the pilot and the acrobat for a while until she gets a job etc. She gets here at 9pm one night with her suitcases, and the very next day is out printing resumes, interviewing for jobs, driving all over town to find all the gourmet groceries and farmers markets and then came home to cook a fabulous dinner for 6 people and also incidentally she and Pilot cut out and sewed a pair of pants. She had previously (I hope -- I hope and pray that she didn't do this at 6am the same day-- ) knit herself a blue fuzzy yarn halter top shaped like a butterfly. Haltertop, pants, and inch long false eyelashes were worn Out as she went trotting merrily off to an all-night rave sort of thing. It makes one feel very old and sedentary.

Anyway as 4 of us devoured the dinner ("oh AND there is freshly made lemon curd made from the lemons in the garden..." *swoon*) I felt that suddenly there we were 4 rather groovy women all round the table seamstresses and culinary artists and poets having a strangely unreal moment and being all California-y and arty and womanly and for a moment life appeared to be rather grander than it usually appears. Everything went all vaseline-over-the-lens for me in that moment as I licked lemon curd off my fingers and felt the co-opy magic working properly all around me.

Bara remarked on it and she is the sort of person who has a house full of interesting objects from all over the world arranged like wonderful shrines that have personal significance and is some kind of genius of making everything seem perfect and carelessly effortlessly perfect. So, it mattered less that my kitchen smelled funny and had garbage everywhere as the 4 of us and our brains (not counting Moomin) were really better decorations than anything else.

It was like when some holiday is going well and everything is actually jolly and the family is gathered around the table and no one hates each other or is weirdly tense. In a way it was possibly the calm before the storm as very soon there will be a squalling baby and no one will have any sleep for quite a while and the brave Pilot will face many a challenge. They are going to be great parents and I hope that little Garret will be like a fabulous sister for Moomin and he will learn to be nice to her even when she is in her boring larval stage.

Is this happy-happy la-la thing just what happens when you have been to tramp class?

yowza!

I went to tramp class with Minnie. Oh wow! It was exciting and fun and unboring. Exercise often bores me to tears or else it hurts. Bouncing and trying to remember all the things to do at once was great fun! I felt (like with boogie boarding) that there was a chance I might be halfway competent at an athletic thing - a rare feeling!

I am completely out of shape and my neck, back and shoulders are a little sore. I chickened on the back flip not because I am chicken really but because I could feel that my neck was getting tweaked at all the bouncing. My back goes out just tying my shoes. So... a little getting in shape first.. maybe a little bouncing on RJ's trampoline...

The one bad thing was just as I feared. With every bounce I was.. um... well.. let's just say I've had a baby and leave it at that. Next time there will be maxi-pads, or Depends. Ugh! Like the chain-sneezing episodes weren't enough, I go and treat my bladder like I'm banging on the end of a ketchup bottle... it did NOT thank me. It's not as bad as it was just post-birth... NO ONE MENTIONS THIS before you get pregnant, eh? They should teach it in 5th grade sex ed. "All your moms basically wet their pants all the time. Kegels are a big lie."

Minnie looked like supergirl as she flew up from the surface and flung her body out straight - horizontal to the ground - looking forward with a strange mixture of determination, concentration, and naked terror. She was good at all of it.

I got home and whisked off immediately to take Moomin to the crazy M0ms club gymnastics day. Oh it was fine and wonderful! 60 or more kids bouncing off the walls. The floors were bouncy too - padding and underneath everywhere I think there were springs. A warehouse-sized springboard! With foam things everywhere and giant pits full of foam blocks and trapezes and trampolines that went all the way across the room! It was fantastic. It was chaotic. Moomin remained unfazed and ran about like a wild thing, which made me very happy.

My neck hurts but as long as I don't screw it up by doing something else insanely athletic I should be okay...

pet bed

Cats apparently like to sit on the desk near me while I am working. It is hard to type when a cat has its ass in your face. And yes, I already fed them so it's just social behavior. Little sluts! I am considering decorating the desk with a little round pet bed, but will first try a cardboard box lined with a corduroy dress. I love it when 2 cats squash themselves into a tiny box and pooch out over the top like a two headed cat tao-symbol muffin.

Siamese cats and venetian blinds don't mix. They almost instantly ruin them by climbing around in there and bending them all up.

***
They're in the dishtub together as I envisioned. No need to buy pet bed. Dishtub is perfect! The same one Moomin used to take a bath in.

movin' right along

Today:

Work on Wittig essays.
Read and comment on Buccita's translations. (done)
Home Despot - get trellis and nail it up
get a park bench or two. adirondack chair for Rook?
Clean up patio a little more
type some poems up for the Cuts book (done)

Despite the freakout part, counteracted neatly by a triple rum and fruit juice, fresh lemon and a late night viewing of Jackie Chan's "Project A", I feel settled and calmed by yesterday's slacking. I finished doing all the French names for the database. Go, me!

I resolve to balance house-unpacking and intellectual labors in neat symmetry. Moomin doomed (?) to 9-4 school for at least one more week. Then it will be my goal to pick him up at 2 for at least 2 days in the week. I hope this is okay and I am not really dooming him. Maybe in the summer when I don't have school hanging over me I won't do the 9-4 thing.

great book

Garnethill - by Denise Mina. Fucking brilliant! Perfectly normal human being-type of woman detective. I would like to see her slapping that cunt Kinsey Milhone. Best mystery novel EVER! Even if it is sort of making me have bad flashbacks.

It's too hot to wear several pairs of pajama pants, which is my usual defense against such things.

I'm a little bit freaked.

slacking

I only slacked for an hour or so by reading in bed this morning but I felt especially guilty as Rook was here to see it. The cost of my free time is only $33 per day but I still feel like I should be madly working to appreciate it and make good use of it.

School never lets up the feeling that I should always be working, and I have all these other projects, and Moomin's birthday party to clean up the patio for (it's currently covered with junk) and bookshelves to arrange, boxes to unpack. And I want to buy a piano (used) and get someone to move it in here.

Life is good, I should let up a little on myself. I mean. How odd is that, it's been a couple of months since I blew an entire morning reading in bed. Not counting when I was sick.

Perhaps a little gardening and patio-cleanup as a break from writing and the typing of all these French names into my feminist database.

I went and tried to figure out the sprinker system in the front yard, but it doesn't work. The daisies are blooming, those purple potato vines are ideal, all perky and frothy and blooming, and the compost heap is looking good with its load of horseshit. However. The actual gardening part should be like the reward after I do the dreary part of clearing things off the patio and throwing things away and recycling boxes.

I could also buy a bench or two for the patio - as my reward? or right now as an incentive ? Nooo... I think as a reward.

Last night was intense as my poet friend Pastiche and I stayed up till midnight at his house planning the "Cuts" book and CD which we must produce very quickly (for May 15 I think is our production deadline). I got home all amped up and wrote for another 2 hours a sort of essay thing and a goofy-ass poem. I was all feeling that I will never be as damn free as G.H. and Nettlebeck and Wanda C0leman. Free! Free! Go! Absolutely Free!

I need a copy of some page layout program - either quark or In Design.

scropier

Me and my "scropier" are developing a cosy relationship today.

I take it all back

Ah... clearly I was riding the horse of extreme crankiness this morning because all the little kids had a blast at their party. Moomin is on cloud 9 and keeps talking about his Birthday. He liked his balloon and he also seemed to grok the concept of going to t0ys r us with the gift certificate.

We went straight there and he is now the proud owner of a realistic sword, a foam baseball bat and a pink and purple radio controlled pony that whinnies and walks around when you push the button.

Also, I realized that I was so blowing hot air the other day thinking that what if Moomin is bored stiff by going to the same preschool next year? They seem to do all the same things over and over about the continents etc. But... actually... it was pretty stupid to say that about a small person who likes to read green eggs and ham for the 10 billionth time, then flip the book over and start again right away.

I have to keep in mind. It is ME that gets bored. He likes things the same actually.

censure? IMPEACH.

I am gaping in disbelief that congress is going (?) to pass some resolution to congratulate bush. What the Fuck. Impeach that bastard. I called Eshoo's phone number below... for all the good that will do...

Congress' responsibility is to hold President Bush and his administration
accountable for this pattern of deception -- that's why we have the
Constitution. But instead, Congress today will debate a resolution
congratulating Bush, for (they claim) making the world safer.

We must demand, at a minimum, that Congress censure the President. It's
our Representatives' duty to formally reprimand him for misleading us. And
we've got to demand it today, while they're debating their anniversary
resolution.

Please call your Representative now, at:

Congresswoman Anna G. Eshoo
DC Phone: 202-225-8104

Make it clear that you are a constituent, then let the staffers know you
expect nothing less than Censure.

escalation of the arms race

As I grumped around safeway in my new butt-ruffle "overclocked" miniskirt and birkenstocks... grumpy because I am ticked at the nursery school for making us all cough up 10-15 bucks extra a month for this crappy "birthday party" day... then now that it's my turn for the month not only do I throw $15 into the pot but I have to spend another $25 buying peanut butter and jelly and bread for 40 kids. This already was bad enough. I am a spoilsport. But while in line another birthday party mom caught me there and told me the real story: Some of the rich kids' moms were making a hoo-ha on their own kid's birthday ie, not just bring cupcakes but like, make a big deal sort of thing. And the other kids "felt left out."

Well tough shit! Feel left out then, for you are not rich! And your parents already pay $800 a month for your school, and do "community service" every month of dreary shelf-washing and laundry-doing. BECAUSE SOMEHOW the (minimum of) $360,000 that school rakes in per year is not enough to pay someone to come and windex the shelves once a week. Christ.

So this whole irritating plan is to "make everyone feel special". Can they not, you know, staple some paper plates together and sprinkle some glitter on it? Can we not feel special without a birthday layout of... let's see, I'll make it $200 a year for 40 kids... EIGHT THOUSAND DOLLARS being spent on your 4 year old specialitude?

For fucks' sake.

sleeping on it

Be careful what you talk about and read before bedtime- it creeps into your dreams. I was at a bake sale... and bought a guatemalan apple pie and was eating it hungrily with my hands... I had a wistful and tense conversation with an ex-boyfriend and then, conversation unresolved, we rolled around on an enormous bed and onto the floor, wrestling... I roamed through the empty rooms of a giant house, unable to secure the doors, worrying that some kind of paramilitary death squad was lurking outside...