I swear to god the only thing I'm on at the moment is coffee. Cold coffee.

Thursday night, when my car was snatched (very politely and by a guy who looked a little like Santa, and with minimal tears on my part), I found myself in a bit of a tailspin.

Friday was a tough day for my ego, and then I realized that I needed help. Help was offered. And I, the endlessly prideful dumb ass that I am, turned down the help. For real.

I've always liked the idea of not needing monetary help from anyone, and went most of my adult life without asking for much of it, but I did get a loan from a loved one to help buy my house. This house is the best place I've found so far, and I don't mean house-wise exactly, because it needs a lot of work, but this is where I belong for some reason. I don't ever want to leave this property, and I'm going to do my damnedest to make that reality.

Unless I change my mind, but you know...I'm impulsive like that.

After my tough day on Friday, Daylow and I made our semi-regular trek to out little dive bar in town, and we talked quite a bit, as we are wont to do, and I noticed a very interesting pattern unravelling.

The situations when I've desperately needed help from other people, thus far, were difficult to swallow, but when I finally prostrated my ego enough to accept offered help, those debts resulted in some of the best things that have ever happened to me.

The loan for my house started a huge snowball of life-changing events that brought me here.

Where's here?

Home. Finally home.
In the place where I broke my skull and knocked every spec of responsibility out of my fibers.
This is the place I love most in the state despite all of the painful things that have happened here.
Finally accepting help from someone gave me a home.

The snowball blew through 2011 and knocked everyone aside, including Gray, and along the way, that snowball brought people into my life that made other changes explode like really grizzly fireworks. Half was a good show, half was like a slap in the face with a stray limb.

I've never been more alone than I am right now. I've never been more financially desperate than I am right now. I have never been more scared than I am. Right now.

But that fucking snowball, despite all the carnage it scattered through my world, also brought me Daylow. He's the best, most unexpected present I've ever received*.

Along with Daylow came months of unemployment, and not the "I deserve a tiny violin" kind of unemployment, but the "holy fuck, that chick is retarded" kind of unemployment.

Unemployment brought be the most fun, least profitable job I've ever had, and it also made an odd network connection (courtesy of meeting one of those limb-in-the-face people from the snowball) that resulted in me finding my new job. The job that I love. With a company I can dig. And a paycheck that will allow me to pay for my home. And my vodka.

All of the mistakes that I've made recently, all of the ways that I've fallen into a very deep hole, the fact that I'm pretty much scraping rock bottom in every way right now...these things brought me the happiest Minnesota winter I've ever survived.

Well, those mistakes and the fact that it's been warm and snowless all year.

Now I'm seeing the pattern repeat, because I desperately need help to crawl out of my self-fashioned hole, and also because someone has again offered to help.

I realized that I had to change my RSVP from "thank you for the offer, but I'm too proud to accept your help" to "FUCK YEAH, thank you very much."

It might just bring another good thing my way.


*Thanks Dale. And Pat. And the futon.

Because the idea of being "left out" makes my skin crawl almost as much as Percocet

Speaking of which, anyone have any Percocet?

Because apparently brain injury + concussion = migraines which arrive out of nowhere and are vomit-in-the-shower-crippling, and are also virtually unaffected by anything known to man (except an illegal substance of which I certainly have never partaken, I'm just assuming since weed is used medicinally for migraines, it must actually work. Which reminds me, I need to move to California, because I could get an Rx for weed for any number of my ridonk ailments, from migraines to anxiety to depression to boredom. What, boredom is TOTALLY a medical condition.)

What was I saying?

Ah yes, it's time for me to hop on the band wagon and write a year-end wrap-up post because we're about to begin The Year the Mayans Got Bored with Making Calendars.

I'm pretty sure they just ran out of weed, but when they called their dealer, his voice mail said he wasn't available to sell  because he was busy getting sacrificed on an alter or some shit.

There's something else we can thank weed for: Postponing the end of the world until 2012.

Anyway, I'm sitting here in my bedroom, surfing the interwebnet because I don't want to watch the UFC fight that's on my TV because EEW, blood is grody, and I'm thinking about how crazy this year has been in almost every way.

2011 was supposed to be my first full year of marriage to my best friend, and while *technically* that's true because no court papers have been filed, I'm pretty sure everyone would have an opinion on just exactly how "married" I am. Not only are we not really married, not really living together, and certainly not best friends any longer, I'm hard pressed to get Gray to speak to me these days.

It's completely understandable, of course, but sucks just the same.

So I lost our beloved Bampa, as well as my husband and friend, not to mention all the brutal alienation such a split inevitably causes. So many of our friends are mutual, and most of those have no interest in my life at this time (I assume) out of loyalty to my husband, which again is understandable, and again, sucks.

The few friends I called my own, mostly from work, I lost touch with when I quit my job, but I think really they were relieved because I was proving to be more exhausting than awesome to them. Also understandable, when our lunch chats morphed from my wedding plans to my dating plans.

I'm an acquired taste at my very best, so throw in a few impulsive mistakes, a few irrational behaviors, and more than a few drunk texts...folks seem to appreciate some space.

So, New Years.

I'm not so naive to believe that January 1st is some kind of magical date. It's not a re-set button. It's nothing but the end of a calendar year, a calendar which was determined thousands of years ago by people WHO SLAUGHTERED OTHER PEOPLE IN THE NAME OF GOD.

So, really, they were a lot like we are now.

But this is what we do, we Americans. We talk about our kids and our ailments and our jobs and our wardrobes, and then we speculate on how those things may change in the next 52 weeks. We make predictions, we make grand statements about our intentions, we set unattainable goals, we thank everyone for believing in our ability to attain those goals, and then we get hammered and watch an electric comet plummet into Times Square, half-way hoping something will go horribly wrong and the ball will go rolling down the sidewalk, taking out every single one of those paper hat-wearing revelers, half-way relieved when it doesn't happen.

And so, I'll jump on that train because it's what I do.

In 2012, I intend to Get My Shit Together, Financially Speaking. I'm starting a really wicked new job on the 9th, and it should more than be enough for me to catch up with my medical bills, et al. I hope to find a second roommate to rent out the other bedroom upstairs, which will help financially as well. I plan to keep my part-time job and work nights and weekends, depositing that chump change into a separate account that I will use for "fun money," leaving the rest of my accounts untouched except for necessities. I plan to start over with a 401K because retirement sounds better every moment I'm alive.

I'd like to grow a tail, but that one is up in the air.

I plan to quit smoking, preferably forEVER this time.

I also intend to train Ramsey and Lucky to bring me beer in bed, and possibly to clean the toilet.

As far as relationships go, I plan to get back in touch with many of my friends. I'd like to make new ones. And I want to be sure that my partnership with Daylow doesn't grow stagnant, predictable, or co-dependent. I have a history of all of those things, and they don't bode well for Happily Ever After.

I'd like to drink less.

I want to camp more.

Daylow and I are going to plant a big garden this year, hopefully saving a small fortune on vegetables and herbs.

I want to see my family more than I got to this year.

Finally, I plan to win the lottery. Sadly, this may be the most likely of all of my goals, although if I do win the lottery, I'll be able to buy toilet-cleaning rats and pay people to be my friends, so it would kill several birds all at once.

Erm.

So it's kind of late for dinner, but Daylow* is outside grilling the most bizarre, delicious looking chicken I've ever seen.

It's chicken breasts stuffed full of crushed pistachios wrapped in an entire package of bacon. The sides are just about every vegetable known to man, slathered in butter and grilled in tin foil.

He's a culinary pot head. This is either going to be completely devoured in less than five minutes, or it's going to be an epic, totally inedible FAIL.

Based on prior experiments of his, my money's on YUM YUM GIMME SOME.

And because we roll like this, our rats are hanging out on the kitchen counter while we prep the food. Super duper sanitary, I'm sure, but they fucking LOVE the pistachios and got dirty on them like it was their last meal.

We're kind of celebrating Daylow's decision to leave a super abusive job behind, an we're also stoked about my highly successful job interview this morning, which (PLEASE DEAR GOD) may land me the best job I've ever had with a company I am really digging so far working with people who were cool enough that I'd hang with them voluntarily, and hopefully will.

I quit my job with Canterbury Park in October, partly out of laziness, mostly out of frustration. Ever had a job where you get paid to do nothing? It sounds fucking sweet, right? And it totally was...for the first two years. After that, I decided I was being treated like a wasted commodity, and with no hope of change, I gave my dad (and most of my friends) a stroke when I quit with no alternate position lined up.

There are only so many videos of baby monkeys riding on tiny pigs, you know?

Why would anyone think I'm nuts for ending my marriage, getting three new tattoos (one of which is a GIANT profanity, stamped across my upper back), quitting my job, ripping out my bathroom floor, adopting (then un-adopting) a third dog, and falling in love right away?

It all seems perfectly rational to me.

Which is why I'm not allowed in 23 of the United States without supervision.

And now I'm off to eat some really bizarre food with my new love and probably practice some clicker training with the rats (we found a new home for Rachel Ray) and then maybe watch the first installment of Bag of Bones on demand.

I'll probably also drink a liter of Jag and remove a few of my ribs with my jumbo toenail clipper.

You know...for self-sufficiency reasons.

If you don't hear from me soon, I'm either dead from eating weird food, or I'm unable to type because I accidentally removed my hand instead of my ribs.

*In case you're wondering the extent to which my life has changed in he last four months, Daylow is the man I am engaged to marry, but not until after Gray and I are no longer married, which (in my [sadly] extensive experience) will take quite a while.

Now with 100% more rodent incest

Well, I'm back and I can honestly tell you that I don't have a fucking clue where to start.

I've wrestled back and forth for months now about how to approach the future of this blog, in light of the face that when I began writing here in 2008, I was blissfully pregnant and madly in love with Gray; but now, about three years later, I'm not pregnant (nor am I a mother), Gray and I are in the process of ending our marriage, I have two completely new men living in my house, I quit my job, I lost many, many friends, and I worried the hell out of almost everyone who knows me.

So what to do?

Speak the balls-deep truth about my failed marriage and risk hurting Gray even more than I already have?

Pussy-foot around the truth and kind of...phase my new life into the blog and just hope nobody notices?

Start over with a completely new blog?

Seriously complex first-world problem, right? Boo to the hoo and suck a toe, right? More specifically, CAT, suck on the infected toe of reality and find something more important than this stupid online journal to worry about, like keeping your house and not being psychotic?

Here's the thing though: This stupid online journal is part of what keeps me from going psychotic. It's like therapy. Really, really unethically based therapy. And I'm starting to need this therapy again. It's mid-December in Minnesota, and snow or no snow (currently, it's looking like a shit-stain Christmas), I have my annual SAD flaring up, otherwise known as My Perilous Grasp on Sanity, or My Single-handed Funding of Kleenex Factories World-wide.

I need this blog to survive another life or death battle with my personal Interloper.

But using this blog as an anti-depressant isn't going to do a damn thing, I've decided, if I don't continue writing my real story. The things nobody wants to hear me say. The truth.

Plus, when I look back into my archives, I realize I don't remember 99% of the stories I tell you, which means that in the last few months I've spent on hiatus, I've forgotten at LEAST fourteen separate instances of drinking myself stupid, seven of my Epic Shits, and many other small, ridiculous fluffery that I consider far too closely and then write about here.

Like the tampon vs. the chapstick. WHAT THE FUCK IS UP WITH THAT?

Thank christ I wrote it down.

So here I am, Lolita Razzle Dazzle, resuming my life's work of offending and humiliating other people.

And it feels so good to be home.

PS: I now have two fancy hooded rats named Lucky and Rachel Ray, and they're going to fuck each other soon if I don't separate them. We thought Lucky was a girl, and so we bought a female from Lucky's litter to be a companion, but then giant testicles appeared on Lucky, and Rachel Ray is most definitely rocking a vagina, and they're almost old enough to mate. But I can't justify two separate cages because WHAT WOULD THAT SAY ABOUT ME, plus the ball python Raven is already irritated that she didn't get a chance to eat Lucky and Rachel Ray, and I don't like pissing off snakes if I can help it.

So either one of the rats becomes snake food (which I cannot do, no fucking way, they're my bayyyybeeeeees), we split them up and get two completely different companion rats that they cannot fuck (unless they swing that way), or we allow these little bastards to have incestuous rat sex and produce up to fourteen separate baby rats, which would then need to be hand fed because Rachel Ray is too young to nurse her babies properly, and then I'll end up living in a house full of rodents because all the babies are my grandchildren and I am insane.

So here: Have some cute rats

Pity Party!

Hi kids. It's me: The MIA Nutjob.

Since last we met, my life has been demolished like a really ugly skyscraper on the Vegas strip. It was exciting to watch this giant, solid structure implode and collapse, and my mind whirled with the possibilities for that vacant lot and what I might make of it.

And then I started cleaning up the debris. FUCK. The debris. It is everyfuckingwhere. And it's heavy. And it's seemingly endless, because I'll hoist a big fucking cement chunk up on my tiny little shoulders and crawl over to the dumpster with it, spend an eternity trying to raise it up high enough to tumble into the roll-off container, and then turn around to crawl back for another chunk, all the while hoping my legs won't collapse and leave me in a puddle of urine. When I get back to the clean up site, there is no visible difference in the amount of debris. The piles of broken walls and the throat-closing dust haven't shifted. Haven't shrunken. I feel like I'm shoveling and endless pile of steaming horse shit.

Granted, it was my idea to demolish that building on the strip. It is my dreams that made the mess. I chose to end my second marriage. I chose to quit my job. I chose to work in an environment that is such that I fell AGAIN and cracked my skull AGAIN and am now on two weeks bed rest. AGAIN. It was me who decided to adopt a third dog, and also me who broke down into a sobbing, screaming puddle when I realized I don't have the strength in my legs to make that situation work.

All of this was my idea.

So I guess it's time to buck the fuck up and just make it work. Keep shovelling the shit, even when I'm so exhausted that it hurts to open my eyes (thank you concussion). I will not lose my house. I will live without cable and internet. I will not eat out. I will sell every damn thing I own that is of any value. I will not sink. I will not sink. I WILL NOT SINK.

I keep trying to imagine myself as a Phoenix bird - the beast who dies in a fiery mess of debris, but then returns, stronger and more beautiful than before.

I'm trying.

Ode to what once was

I'm remodeling four or five rooms in my house. At the same time. Technically by myself. With almost no first-hand knowledge of what I'm doing and a hell of a lot of tools I can't ever find.

HAS ANYONE SEEN MY PHILIPS HEAD DRILL BIT?!?!?!

I figure I've watched enough This Old House, DIY Network, Bath Crashers and Design Star to have a PhD in Remodelology, including installing new door hardware (which is simple, right?! WRONG. Try installing 2011 lock hardware in three separate 1915 doors and you tell me how simple it turns out to be. Fucking non-standard widths and original hardware that left the core of the doors empty.)((IT WAS HAIR-RIPPING MADNESS).

So my porch is done, and two bedrooms, and my bathroom is down to plywood subfloor.

My ONLY bathroom has been reduced to plywood and screws and sharp tile shreds.

Oh the panic: I have until November 1st to replace the vanity with a pedestal sink, have the toilet moved, repair the subfloor (because some DUMBASS laid tile directly on top of plywood and used CEMENT to adhere it, so it was no shocker when the tile came up and the subfloor under the toilet is rotting and discolored, SO SO WET), install a new toilet over the new plumbing, move an electrical outlet from over the sink (still not sure if I *need* to do that or not), install an exhaust fan and figure out if it can be recessed between the joists of the ceiling or if I need to build a soffit, lay waterproof barrier down and install a new floor. Oh, and paint everything. And cut/install floorboards and trim. And reinforce the heating vent, which is basically just floating over a huge hole because it's not attached to any kind of stud or wall support.

I CAN HAZ LOTS OF SHIT TO DO, YA'LL.

But this huge Fail of a project honestly isn't the biggest change happening right now. Our families have been more or less updated now, so it's relatively safe to tell all you Interweb strangers.

Gray and I decided that we make better friends than spouses. We decided to make a split, and he has moved out of the house.

Divorce #2 by the age of twenty-eight! If it weren't for Brittany Spears, I'd have the world record of Really Big, Expensive, Hurtful Mistakes.

It's a much, MUCH longer story than I'm going to share here, mostly because it's a private matter (you know I don't consider much sacred here, so I must mean business) and I have no desire to rumor monger when it comes to one of the best men I've ever known in my life. He didn't do anything wrong to cause any of this.

As it is, Gray and I aren't angry with each other. We're not fighting, nor are we blaming each other, nor pushing our friends and family into choosing sides. Gray and I will always be very, very good friends. He will always be Uncle Jeremy to Angel Butt. I'll always call his mother Mama. Our mutual friends (and there are MANY) will always be mutual friends. Our dogs will always belong to us both.

It's just that I've learned (via therapy and an excruciating trial and error process) that I am not the type of woman who is cut out for marriage. Or monogamy, for that matter. So we're reverting back to our original status of really good friends.

And I'm praying to gods I don't believe in that I won't ever be stupid enough to make the same mistakes a third time. It's okay to hurt myself, but not other people.

They must have a Divorcers Anonymous somewhere, no?

So to Gray, my best friend and the man who has been there with me, by my side every day, for more than four years as a partner, and before that as a rock-steady confidant and friend, through months in the hospital, through more changes of address than I can remember, through our miscarriage, our family dramas, through my staggering, life-shattering bouts with depression and anxiety and suicidal thoughts.

Thank you Jeremy for everything you've done for me, all of the memories we built together, and all of the ways you helped me to find who I really am.

You taught me to be my true self, even if I don't know who exactly she is. You're taught me how to search for her.

I love you and I'll never regret any of our time together, not for a second. You stepped back from something you love so that I could be free to follow my own path, one that was hurtful and doesn't include you in the same capacity that you'd hoped. You selflessly gave me back parts of my life that I've never truly had: independence and the promise/fear of an uncertain future.

I hope more than anything we still have decades of memories to build together. We will always be family. You'll always be my lobsta.

And I hope that you find the happiness that you are so over-qualified to enjoy. You are the best thing that's ever happened to me in so many ways.

I'll never be able to thank you sufficiently for that.

And so we're off to start new chapters of our lives, embarking on some not-necessarily-welcomed adventures of our own, and altering our world views to include a future that doesn't involve growing old together as husband and wife.

It's terrifying and sad. It's also hopeful and liberating, at least for me.

There will be a long period of adjustment for us both, as well as our friends and family who know us as happy and well-suited for each other. In the end, I believe we've made the best decision for us both.

And that, ya'll, is really all we can do.

The party you are trying to reach is playing with unicorns

I'm here, I'm here.

It's just...well...it's probably good that I'm not in school this year because it turns out I have a lot of shit going on.

Since last weekend:

• Somebody gave me a dog. Another one. No joke.
• Somebody else gave me a flooded basement. Twice.
• Somebody tormented me with pictures of SPIDERS RIDING ON SNAKES, and gave me a stroke. I have to say, if I'm going to see any animal riding on any other animal, it has to be baby monkey. That video? Never gets old.
• Somebody gave me a new tattoo. More on that later. Fair warning, Dad. YOU WILL HATE IT.
• Somebody else gave me a unicorn. A Webkinz unicorn. I don't know what that means, but my mother-type friend says that means it's alive. I named her Galdalf because I'm reading The Hobbit for the millionth time.
• Somebody gave me the keys to her house. And permission to carry her dogs in my pocket.
• Somebody else gave me Halloween Dots that look like black licorice flavor but are really blood orange flavor, and I know this BECAUSE I CAN FEEL CITRUS. Winning.
• Somebody gave Klout perks, which I don't understand exactly, but they are sending me things in the mail, so I don't really care. Unless I open the box and it turns out to be a cobra. Then I'll probably file a Klout Komplaint.

In addition to all of these new acquisitions, I'm also trying to edit a bunch of videos of me playing Beatles Rock Band - POORLY, I might add - for a really ridonk vlog to post here. Because there isn't enough ridonk in the world.

So as you can see, it's been a busy week. In fact, I missed my 3rd Blogaversary on Sunday. This time, I didn't even post about how I didn't post about it.

(My first real post in 2008. My first blogiversary post in 2009. My second blogiversary post in 2010.)

Clearly, I'm regressing back to my teenage years. When you see my new tattoo, you'll agree. I'm about 14. And I'm a boy.

I'll be back here when I feel like it.

Change of plans

I may have mentioned that I'm lazy.

It's not that I don't enjoy projects, work, staying busy, et al. It's just that I like doing those things because I WANT to do them rather than because I have to. I spent a lot of my life doing things I have to do, and now I enjoy doing things because they're fun.

Laundry is a bit behind, for obvious reasons.

I drove to St Paul for my children's writing class on Thursday. I sat in the parking lot studying, and by "studying," I mean "looking at picture books and reading the accompanying text book about why picture books are important." I finished brushing up on everything necessary for my class, and I still had 45 minutes to sit around.

I wondered, then, if I wanted to spend 12 hours a week thinking about, writing, and analyzing books for young children, or if I'd prefer to spend those 12 hours at home with my family, out with friends, drinking beer and working up the courage to rip out the cabinets in my bathroom.

I realized this class was going to suck.

I got in my car and drove home.

On the way, I called Gray and said, "Yeah, so I just dropped out of school."

His response? "You went back to school because you wanted to. Because it was fun for you. You were doing this for YOU. If it's no longer something you enjoy, then you don't need to be there."

EUREKA! Higher education is all about me, especially in my case, because I don't intend on using my English degree for work, nor do I plan to continue on towards a graduate degree. Gray is right: I returned to school because it was interesting to me, and because I wanted the tuition money.

I'm at the point now where I'd prefer to spend my time in other ways, and so rather than continue to rack up student loan debt, I've decided to throw in the proverbial towel. At least for now.

I partly blame my brain pain. That semi-near-death experience made me view everything in my life differently, from my relationships with Gray and friends and family, to the way I approach my life. That stupid fall down the stairs changed my life, both in good ways and in bad. And I'm starting to take to heart what my husband has been trying to teach me for years: "Do you."

He's been telling me (for as long as I know him) that I spent enough of my life taking care of other people.

He's been trying to show me how to put myself first.

He's been giving myself to me.

So, in summary, now that you've vomited all over your keyboard from the sappy shit above, I'm not going back to school this fall. Instead, I'm going to read for pleasure. I'm going to write because I have something I want to say. I'm going to make plans on Thursday nights and not worry about making excuses to my professor. I'm going to travel. In fact, I'm hoping to visit my BlogHer '10 bitches in Salt Lake City this fall.

I'm going to do me.

I can haz a new addiktion

Seriously, I cannot get enough of these two songs.

I want to snort these songs and then blow my nose and then swallow the mucus and then puke it back up and then mix it into a bathtub of hot water and then soak in it and then filter out the chunks and put them in a blender and then inject them into one of my many arm veins.

And then lick the wound.





Gray is going to kill my ass if I make him listen to these agian.

Well, I'm home now. Most of me, anyway.

I left a lot of blood in San Diego between the tattoos and the fact that an escalator at the San Diego airport tried to eat me.

Human flesh. OMM NOM NOM.

I am officially banned from using stairs of any kind for any reason at any time, including the self-propelled variety.

I won't say that I had a horrible time on this trip because I actually had a lot of fun. It was just a different kind of fun. My cousin is a total freakshow, which is probably why we get along so well. Best voice impersonations EVER, wears a beanie when it's 80 degrees outside, and dances. A lot. It was pretty awesome getting to hang out with him for the first time in my adult life.

I did meet some interesting people, got a lot of surprises, and ate a lot of really good tacos. Oh, and I tried Thai food finally. So there's that.

I am, however, so so so so so happy to be home. My bed, it was magical. Sleeping beside my husband was something I missed for a long time. The Scary dog flung herself onto me and refused to detach, sleeping all night long ON MY FACE. I was even looking forward to work today, although typing without three fingers is kinda tricky.

I can't wait to unpack and do laundry. Go grocery shopping. LAY AROUND ON THE COUCH. I have so much planting to do in the yard now that our windows have been installed. Millions of putzy little projects and I am so excited to be home so that I can sit around thinking about them for so long that I never actually get around to doing them.

I'm also happy I don't have to get on a flying death trap for a long, long time.

Time. Flying. And also not. I don't know, I'm fucking JETLAGGED. Cut me some, okay?

Remember that time I said that life is weird? TOTALLY LEGIT, ya'll.

So first of all, I voluntarily hung out at the airport on Monday from like 9:15 a.m. until my flight boarded at 3 p.m. Mostly because that's when Gray could take me and I'm too cheap to pay for long-term parking. But also because airport bars are like the nirvana of the traveling man. 

Early morning booze is totally acceptable. 

So I caught a buzz by 11 and then I took a nap. Loudly and with loudlyness. Except I was wearing headphones and listening to  Mastodon. Because yes, sleeping is better if you're slightly paranoid.

And also I didn't want to know if I A) farted or B) snored. 

Another reason airports rock: anonymity is almost guaranteed, if you ignore the guy who pretends to feel your boobs for explosives.

Yeah, in your pants, Mr. TSA.

Anyway, so on the flight I sat directly behind a guy I'd been eyeing all morning in between sleeping it off. So at first I was like BUMMER but then I realized I was sandwiched behind Jock Man and Super...Something Man, and both were cute. And, I was reasonably sure, of drool-legal age.

HI HENRY! HI BLAKE! Although I'm pretty sure you burned my business cards during a seance to rid your soul of toxic contact.

So we all totally napped for takeoff like every sane person does and then we realized they were serving food.

DID YOU HEAR ME? EDIBLE STUFFS ON AN AIRPLANE. I think Blake said he was having a flashback to the 90s or something. So true.

So then I decided to order a cocktail and Henry agreed, so then I knew for sure he was legal, except we didn't get carded, so apparently airplane rules are different that Safely On The Ground Rules. 

Then we ate the totally free food and Henry and I got to chatting, then I started interrupting Blake while he was totally studying some very intricate drawings of the human anatomy (Jack the Ripper, for sure) so I basically inserted myself into his head, too, then before we landed, we were all laughing (I with glee, them with uncomfortable fear) and then the end. 

It was the best plane ride in memory.

***

On another note, here's a pic of me at my dad's Mac. And, can I say, WHY THE FUCK DON'T THE BROWSER WINDOWS COVER THE WHOLE SCREEN? I cannot stand to see desktop behind it, my mind is literally twitching right now.

And here's me at my dad's same Mac in 2007. 

Holy shit, can you say DIVORCE PLUS WEDDING PLUS PLUS DOGS PLUS TWO LAYOFFS PLUS MORTGAGE PLUS BRAIN INJURY = GRUMPY OLD FACE?

Anyone know how to get 24 back? I'd love to know.

***

About one day to BlogHer and I'm still not ready for the sea of vaginas, but I'm trying. 

Good thing I can't smell.

What. The. Hell.

Where have I been, you ask?

Wait, you didn't ask? Good thing I don't give a flying V, eh?

Let's see, I...

• Went to the shrink to learn that I'm not bipolar. I'm just really, really wacked overall. So there's that. Lots of therapy lies ahead of me.
• Then I got laid off. Excuse me, I got "temporarily furloughed," and so did Gray.ON THE SAME DAY. So it's going to be just *that* much more difficult to pay for said therapy.
• Then I helped one of my very best friends start packing because she is moving WAY FAR AWAY.
• While I was helping her move, I slipped down the stairs and broke my big toe in two places. No joke, the fracture is "L" shaped. And no, I wasn't drunk. I wasn't even drinking. Except coffee, but it wasn't laced absinthe with or anything. I AM JUST THAT FUCKING CLUMSY.
• Then Angel Butt and Five Head came to visit and we've been alternating between subsequent, ridonkulous video game challenges issued from Gray to Five Head (some kind of odd 35 year old to 12 year old bonding thing, no? They have more in common than Gray and I do.) and sleep overs with 4-year-old girls. Did you know that children don't push themselves on the swing? That you have to do it FOR them? It's all very exhausting. 
• Then, thanks to the no-jobs thing, we ran out of booze. And painkillers. Did I mention I broke my toe? And then Angel Butt accidentally stamped on it just when it was starting to fit into a regular shoe again?
• NO JOB THING.

So I'm a bit stressed. Turns out polishing up my resume is about the exact opposite of fun. Or exciting. Or bearable.

And applying for unemployment is almost impossible, did you know that? There are all these...forms and...questions and...OUCHIE BRAIN.

Did I mention I've done all of this sober?

I don't write about work here, for obvious reasons (if they find the bag of body parts in my office drawer, I am totally fucked) so I have had very little to divulge except "ouch" and "ouch" and, oh: OW MOTHERFUCKER.

July is awesome so far.

See? Told you

She IS the devil. The very, very stoned devil.



Look at the white flap over her right eye! WHAT IS THAT? The screams of the dead, that's what. 

Her surgery went off without a hitch, at least as far as I could decipher the vet's crazy-in-depth jargon regarding "interesting" fat layers between "subcutaneous" and blah blah blah. I was like, "Dude. Clearly Gray didn't slip you enough caysh to ensure this demon dog had an unfortunate accident, so just shut the fuck up and let me get out of here. I want to try her Rimadyl."

But oh no, this vet used to hunt raccoons and so he had a particular fondness for Lily and her breed, which is Treeing Walker Coonhound, if you care. I don't. Never heard such a ridiculous breed name in my life, in fact.

But he did confirm what we suspected: Lily may be the devil, but it's her breeding and treatment running the flames. Apparently, coonhounds are not pets. Did you know that? He said they're livestock. LIVESTOCK. My pweshy-weshy licky bear bear stretchy-bean butter sticks princess is NOT a cow. Actually, if I could milk it, I might trade her for one. But seriously? Cattle?

SHE IS A DOG. A pet. A HUMAN BEEEEEEEEEING.

Or she should be, at least. She most definitely acts like every rich emo kid I've ever known. But apparently these dogs are considered valuable only for their tracking/treeing abilities, and once they stop performing or the hunter takes a financial hit of some kind, these dogs are considered "overhead." Which is almost certainly why Lily was found running around the fields of Iowa - she was sent out on her own to either find some help or die.

Did you know that wild raccoons can grow to be, like, 8,000lbs?!?! Or more like 35-40lbs with very! sharp! teeth! The vet confirmed Lily's scars and split ear were all coon-inflicted. Injured in the line of duty. She should have won a medal. Instead, she got the boot. And according to the vet's explaination of the hunting process, it's usually the hunter's error that causes such injuries - a poorly aimed shot will send the pissed of coon down to attack the dog, sometimes dragging them underwater TO DROWN.

She was also bred at least once, and he said that some of the puppies (of champion stock) can pull in $2,000 for a female. Un. Fucking. Real. I mean, wouldn't it be cheaper to, like, but a camcorder and figure out where the raccoons hang out and then go sneak up on them all ninja-style? Why the fuss? Why the pageantry? WHY DO YOU THINK FOR A SECOND WE WANT TO WEAR RACCOON FUR?

I am curious what they taste like, though. Except I'll never know.  

Here, have bonus Scary.



The Devil Wears Coonhound

Lily.

She is the devil.

She lulled us into a false sense of Nice Doggy after a few months of terror, so we let our guard down. Then she pooped on the dining room floor. Twice. In one day. WITH MALICE. Then because we'd learned to keep all food stuffs off the counter in an effort to squash her counter-surfing habit, she decided to take up a career in garbage can tipping and I came home to find disgusting bits of lettuce, coffee grounds, chicken packaging and DOOM strewn all over the kitchen, dining and living rooms. Twice. In two days. Then I bought one of those child-safety locks for an oven door and attached it to the now-thoroughly-dented-in-the-shape-of-dog-paws-garbage-can to prevent her from dumpster diving. Then she decided to counter surf again anyway, and she discovered a really old jar of fish food. A jar of fish food SO OLD that it had turned into a putrid, grayish brown liquid, which she chewed up and smeared all over her dog bed. After I took her for a walk. After she'd eaten dinner. WHILE I WAS SITTING IN THE OTHER ROOM. I cleaned it up as best I could, but when Gray came home, he discovered what he described as, "The most disgusting, rotten odor I've ever smelled in my entire life." Windows were opened. Cans of air freshener were emptied. The dog bed was thrown away. The garbage can which held the ruined goldfish food jar was taken outside and doused with the flames of hell.

He says the smell is ::almost:: gone now.

Today, we will be avenged.

The uterus of the devil is being removed. Is it wrong that I kind of hope they use a dull knife? And a weak anesthetic?

Aww, look how cute I am! Come closer, let me STAB YOU WITH MY PITCH FORK.

Only I

So I hazarded my first attempt at a top secret "friend of the family" recipe called Hot Chicken. I really wish I'd learned to make this BEFORE I lost the ability to know if something is seasoned correctly or, instead, tastes like an old shoe. Because seriously, I cannot tell the difference.

Unfortunately, I became privy to this recipe a few months ago which, in Cat's Terms of Memory, may as well have been fourteen thousand years and a few dozen liters of vodka ago. Because all I remembered were most of the ingredients and that the end result is yummy. So I faked it the best I could and reasoned that if nothing else, this would be spicy, and spicy is just about all I have left in this world.

12 jalapenos and 2 habaneras later 1 habanera later, I decided, after I tasted one with the tip of my tongue and it was blissfully painful, ought to have been enough to make this truly "HOT" chicken.

But it wasn't. It was more...mildly intolerable chicken.

To me, it was "meh."

But on Saturday, I prepped everything and shoved it into the crock pot and then headed out on foot (thanks to a flat bike tire) to find a quiet spot to get some writing done. We're a few blocks away from the Minnesota River, which happens to be one of my favorite places for walking, crying and brooding, so I figured it might work for writing, too. That I've never tested the theory goes to show you just how long I've been out of commission.

I was armed with a notebook full of helpful man thoughts from a crew of (apparently) drunken comrades, and I was curious to give these ideas a shot. I'm still working on that, but as it turns out, I am TERRIBLE at being a man.

A bug flew directly into my eyeball, and though I saw it coming and reacted by slamming shut my eyelid, it was too late. It was unfortunate for me that I stuck my jalapeno and habenera fingers in after the bug to fish it out. Let's just say I was blind for several minutes and considered turning around and heading home.

Once at the river, I started along the path (because who would ever do such a thing as walk in the grass?) and I stumbled upon a scruffy middle-aged man who, from a distance, appeared to be sporting a shirt pocket of cigarettes and a fist full of some hideous, silver-canned beer. Turns out it was only a travel mug of what I presume was coffee, but this guy was a character, I could tell just by glancing.

He had with him a dog who was off leash and well behaved, and he paid no attention to me as I approached. The dog was busy tramping through the water and weeds, looking for anything that moved.

As I am wont to do, I asked the man what kind of dog he had, and he answered that it was "hard to say," or something the like. Again, with my memory. I noted that the dog looked like he had tiger markings, and the man commented that was his brindle. Happily ready to prove that I am a Dog Person, I noted that Gray once had a boxer named Tyson who shared the same tiger-looking brindle as this dog, and the man exclaimed, "Yes, exactly!"

We started walking together, dog talking, of course, and he asked if I was just out hiking.

Ha, exercise. Not likely.

I told him I was trying to find a quiet spot to write, that our neighbors were installing a fence and there was a jack hammer involved, that there are kids all over the park by the river, so that I was following the trail looking for a better spot.

"Come with me."

Normally, I don't go around following strange men who say "come with me," but this guy wasn't setting off any alarms and plus, he had a dog.

I am powerless against the charms of the canine species.

Turns out to be a lucky thing I followed the guy because he led me to a marina and then out onto a secluded peninsula so near the river, and so level with its surface, that I felt I was sliding right along with it. He pulled up a chair for me and one for him, we smoked a bit, and then he left me to my writing, but not before we became friends.

I told him I considered this an open invitation to return and he didn't disapprove, so now I have a new place that is perfectly peaceful and serene where I can retreat in just a few short minutes whenever I need to write, which (apparently) should be all the damn time.

Next time, remind me to take the bug spray. I'm half-mosquito today.

Booze baby, burning blood

Okay, so @NamelessFriend didn't get a tattoo after all and she didn't even BOTHER to run it by me first. I haven't actually spoken to her yet, so I don't know if she totally changed her mind or if she just had to postpone the ink because she was too drunk, but either way, I am reporting her for underage consumption.

Why? Because, Christine...you are turning twenty...your eyes are getting heavy...when I snap my fingers, you will bestow upon my your (what do most kids drink these days?) Mike's Hard Lemonade (which I will spike with actual alcohol when I get home) and you won't remember a thing...oh, and throw in those white heels while you're at it...

I spent my weekend in the sun so I'm a bit pink today, which is awesome because, at least with my skin, the burn kind of sneaks up like a cat stalking a sparrow, which is to say that I don't hear the burn coming until it's too late, and when I wake up decapitated in heaven, it feels like the sun tossed me around and then bit me a little bit. The feeling gets stronger as the color of my skin changes, so now that it's been a full 12ish hours since I retreated inside, my thighs may as well be on fire.

Right vicinity, wrong unit.

I did have to take a break from skin-cancering myself to drive all the way to a non-puppy-selling pet store to pick up more fucking DIAPERS for Lily, who is still "in heat" which means that if she is non-diapered for any moment of time, then she leaves a trail of bloody drips behind her. It's easier to find her, sure, but THERE IS DOGGY UTERUS ON MY FLOOR and also Gray says she smells like a fat lady, which I know from experience is not a good thing.

Um, and the other morning, Gray and I may have been baby-making (is it odd that my dog and I are ovulating together?) and I glanced down to see Lily sitting at attention, big grin on her face, tail slapping the wall like my head into the headboard. I'm pretty sure she was rooting for Gray, but part of me wonders if she thought she'd be next.

I would pay to see those puppies.

She also sits on the deck or at the door and instead of whining softly at the appearance of a person, she moans and howls loudly at the appearance of ABSOLUTELY NOTHING, which translated from dog language means FUCK ME, BOYS.

Tell me something...are diapers for humans this expensive? Because if so, I *maybe* just decided that I don't want kids after all.

Yin and yang and ooh, pretty, shiny!

So I kind of forgot that we're trying to get pregnant because I'm all distracted by shiny things, like a raccoon.

Except "shiny things" are bi-sexual black boys and Craigslist and giant, inflatable elephants. And stuff.

This is a perfect example of my self-diagnosed ADD, really, because one minute I'm obsessed - OBFUCKINGSESSED - with cervical mucus and ovulation windows and birthing plans...but then I get my period and so I have a cocktail and that reminds me I need to groom Scary's fur which reminds me I'm growing a mullet which reminds me I need to transplant my vegetable seedlings so they can grow which reminds me I need to call the hot weed guy to kill our dandelions which reminds me of a house cat I saw that looks like a cross between a lion and a bush baby which reminds me to trim my cooter hair which reminds me I haven't masturbated in a week which reminds me my vibrator needs batteries which reminds me I need to fix the power to the air conditioner which reminds me we have company coming tomorrow which results in a frantic, last-minute search for beds which actually FIT into our tiny, vintage home, which reminds me we need to get quotes for replacement windows, which reminds me I need a second job because WE ARE BUYING THIRTY REPLACEMENT WINDOWS which reminds me I forgot to google my next baby window.

Oh yeah, we're trying to get pregnant.

Gray is ADD in an entirely different way. Like rent-a-jack-hammer-and-bust-up-the-concrete-in-one-of-the-two-former-clothes-line-post-holes-then-return-the-jack-hammer-because-he-forgot-the-second-clothes-line-post-hole-full-of-concrete. That kind of way.

He also didn't notice the giant purple and yellow dinosaur sand box in our yard (despite several trips from the garage to the house and back) until I pointed it out to him.

It's like I'm a meth head and he's a burnout. Which might lead to some very incompatible sex. Which reminds me, we're trying to get pregnant.

I wonder if he noticed?


PS - It really does look like a tiger/bush baby hybrid!

It feels exactly the same so I'm pretty sure my reproductive organs are staging a bloody coup

Well I'm not pregnant, so that baby bump musta-could-be attributed to the burrito I ate.

I'm most upset because that blows my "burritos are slimming" theory all to hell.

In a grand gesture of Impatience, I went to the doctor and had them perform a blood test to confirm what I already suspected - that Gray's little swimmers aren't so much "swimming" as they are "wearing water wings and splashing each other" - but the results of that blood test proved to be the difference between one margarita with dinner and three margaritas with each course of dinner, so it turned out to be well worth the trouble.

Then OF COURSE I started bleeding like a stuck pig in the middle of that night.

I guess when my uterus realized I was onto its mind games, it decided to wave the red flag and go back to business as usual. Which is fine with me because I've been dying to use those PH balanced tampons ever since BlogHer last year, but I kept forgetting I had them because the package looks like my box of Sponge Bob band aids, and while I've been tempted to use Sponge Bob on my vag before (excuse me, but aren't band aids MADE for things that are bleeding?)...I never did.

I remembered my PH balanced tampons this time because I'm hyper-conscious of my vagina's emotional state this week, but also because I abstained from buying regular old imbalanced tampons in the hopes I wouldn't need them for a while, and so when the blood gushed, it was either 1) Wear the PH balanced tampons or 2) Shove in an old wine cork and hope I don't need the corkscrew to get it out. Then I realized my wine comes with screw tops these days, and that option seemed like unnecessary vaginal torture.

We're trying to make amends, my vag and me.

It wouldn't be a normal "time of the month" if I didn't experience some of the horrifying "chunks down the shower drain, holy god, did my uterus maul a small rodent, what the fuck WAS that?" and then I decided it must have been my remaining shreds of dignity that plopped out.

I'd been looking for those.

No news is...super confusing

So I'm not pregnant. Except that I'm also not-NOT pregnant.

I'm exactly where I've been for the past two weeks which is the frustrating space of not knowing if I'm between Ovulation and Conception or Ovulation and Shedding Uterus, depending on how the whole Operation: Baby strike went the first go-round.

What I'm trying to say that is I still have no fucking clue what is going on.

On Friday, I was completely convinced that I am not pregnant and I was happily resigned to knowing we'd have to try again this month. When we have out of state visitor's sleeping 10 feet away. When I'm tired from hosting out of state visitors.

On Saturday, when my period declined it's standard invitation (VERY UNUSUAL FOR ME), my happy resignation turned into frantic peeing on sticks, but all the pee tests are negative (even the early detection tests taken two days after my period was due), so basically my body is messing with me for shoots and googles, and it serves me right for obsessing, right?

This is exactly like not being able to buy Season 6 of How I Met Your Mother - even though I'm dying to watch it - because Season 6 is, like, not over yet, and stuff.

The other minor symptoms I'm experiencing could be early pregnancy symptoms OR they could be in my head and NOT ACTUALLY HAPPENING AT ALL.

I've been talking to my uterus all weekend, saying stuff like, "Either be pregnant or be empty. It's your call, but fucking pick one already," and "BLEED, MOTHERFUCKER!"

The lack of finality is making me all question-y , and the only other explanation I can come up with for my late period is stress, which seems like a given when you've met me before, but I'm not actually very stressed out right now. I'm ready to know if I'm pregnant, I'm ready to BE pregnant, but I'm also enjoying my time at home with the dogs and the hubby and watching our very own fat robin who is nesting next door and plotting the deaths of the legion of dandelions in our yard and replacing worn out breaker switches and hosting dinner parties. I'm busy, but it's all very FUN, lazy business.

So is my insomnia + shingles outbreak + late period all a sign of my secret stress?

Or am I knocked up with the world's strangest spawn?

Is my giant, flappy labia involved in this mess? Do my boobs hurt because I keep squeezing them to see if they hurt? Or do they just hurt when I squeeze them because they hurt?

It's all very confusing.


Oh, and also - Lily wants to live in the trunk of my car. Or underneath the deck. I haven't decided which she'd prefer, but she's almost gotten locked in/stuck in both places this week, so it's kind of a toss up.

All kinds of disturbing

When tearing out the hideous landscaping rock, I dug up giant clumps of roots that were halting our shovels' progress. I may have screamed at them, "I don't know what you think you are, plant, but I didn't give you permission to grow here so you've GOT TO GO."

We left a big bunch of them growing by the deck because they weren't hurting anything there and I was curious what they were. Turns out I killed a bunch of bleeding hearts. Threw them away. In the garbage. With a smile on my face.

We bought a new TV (OUR VERY FIRST FLAT SCREEN!) from a friend who is moving and didn't need this one in his bedroom anymore. I just realized I should have dunked it in Purell. Don't tell Gray.

Did I mention it's a 46" flat screen? And that we have it? In our house? Cause we do!

Things are just starting to grow here.

If you're lucky enough to live in a state in which spring began prior to May 7th, then I fucking hate you.

Kylie and I garage-saled our asses off on Saturday. She made me stop buying when there was no longer room in my car for another item. She wouldn't let me tie her to the hood. I love Kylie, but she can be really selfish sometimes. You should have seen how crowded my trunk hostages were.

I don't know what this thing is, but I want one for my very own self.

I haven't had a pedicure in a long time, but I wanted to wear open-toed shoes this morning, so I'm such a genius that my solution what to paint a non-matching color over the existing, comically-grown out polish. The result was a horrible mash up that part melted crayon, part gangrene. It didn't occur to me that I could, oh, you know, REMOVE THE GODDAMN POLISH FROM THE TIP OF MY BIG TOE.

And then I realized you can see my non-painted third toes, anyway.

Here's a word of advice to all you ass hats on Facebook whose only photos are of themselves posing shirtless in front of a builder-grade bathroom mirror with their camera phones: Not only do we not wish to see fourteen *slightly* varied poses of your jaw line, but next time you might want to include a friend in your photo. So we think you have friends. Hell, even a stuffed abominable snowman is better that what you've got.

And oh yeah: I have shingles.

Don't the graphics make them look like more fun? Because in reality, they feel like a semi ran over my shoulder, then it backed up over the other side of my shoulder, and also the semi's eighteen wheels were made from rubberized spider poison and the hounds of hell.

And because I've only read of youngish people getting shingles, and because I don't have the time/inclination to make my very own Shingle Tribute video, may I present to you Heather's:

SHINGLES! from dooce on Vimeo.