I have to figure out what to wear for my birthday party.

Ummm...


Eeep.

A little about me, from A to Z. :)

A - Age: 10 days away from 40
B - Bed size: Queen
C - Chore you hate: Mopping, with dishes in a close second
D – Domestic Animals names: none
E - Essential start to your day item(s): toothbrush, glasses, snuggles
F - Favorite color: Pink
G - Gold or Silver: silver
H - Height: 5'8"-ish
I - Instruments you play(ed): bohdran, recorder, and a mean kazoo
J - Job title: Professional dilletante
K - Kisses or hugs: Embrace the power of and.
L - Living arrangements: A 2 bedroom colony of weird.
M - Mood: peaceful
N - Nicknames: Al, AliMarie, Sock Monkey
O - Overnight hospital stays other than birth: as a patient, I've only stayed overnight when I was having the boys. Otherwise, I have spent overnight in too many waiting rooms or by bedsides than I care to talk about.
P - Pet Peeves: People who say/write "myriad of." Cheap tippers. People on the bus who think their backpack deserves a seat when people 3 times their age are standing.
Q - Quote from a movie: "It's social. Demented and sad, but social." The Breakfast Club.
R - Right or left handed: Right
S - Siblings: By birth, one younger sister. I am also lucky enough to have a number of chosen brothers and sisters.
T - Time you wake up: somewhere between 4am and 7am
U - Underwear: Not if I can avoid it. Otherwise, it depends who is going to see it. I like lacy boy shorts and cute cotton low rise panties with cartoon characters if I must.
V - Vegetable you dislike: eggplant
W - Ways you run late: trying to find my keys and wallet. Otherwise, I tend to be disgustingly early
X - X-rays you've had: dental, pelvic, spine, wrist
Y - Yummy food you make: soup beans and cornbread
Z - Zoo favorite: penguins

Y'all better get in my good graces now, since I am spending the afternoon babysitting Mars Maximus, Destroyer of Worlds.

Yes, that is his real name (okay, aside from the last part). His mom needed a well-deserved break, and TinFoilHatBoy is out of town this week, so I volunteered. I know what it is like with your first kid, and this is the first time she has been out by herself since....er...February?

And...baby??? Okay! (Shut up, uterus. You're done)

Keep in mind that I have 2 half-grown kids and almost 28 years of babysitting under my belt. The list J left me is hysterical until you realize that she's a first time mom. Leaving your child with someone else for the first time is freaking scary. The fact that she's an older mom probably doesn't help.

However, I can't help but chuckle that she left the number for 911. While I miss those days, I don't miss that level of being neurotic. Why would I? There are so many other things to be neurotic about.

I was warned that he probably won't nap. And that he's been colicky (I'm trying to figure out a delicate way to suggest she lay off the pepper-cabbage-provolone sandwiches she's so fond of. That might help).

Guess who is snoozing in his cradle next to me after three good burps and two rounds of quietly crooning "Walking After Midnight"?


I don't think I'll tell her that.  Are  babies on a  personal crusade to make their mothers insane?  Liam and Ashe did the same damn thing to me.  I think I'l lie and say he fussed right up until she got home.

Meet our future evil overlord.  He's already got me covering for him.

(...or how I embraced my childhood religious upbringing and drove my roommate insane)

To shamelessly rip off Forrest Gump, roommates are like a box of chocolates. You never know which ones are nuts.

I was unbearably excited to start college, to be on my own a whopping 27 miles from my hometown in a town known primarily for the three thriving cattle farms surrounding the school. Buoyed by the stories I grew up hearing from my mother's college friends, I was ready to jump headlong into the world of the academic elite, with the traditional detours into political activism and sexual experimentation.

I was also looking forward to meeting my roommate. We'd all had to fill out forms that looked like a cross between an application for a dating service and a psychological evaluation, so I was feeling pretty positive. I was expecting someone bookish, a little on the hippie side, a non-smoker. I was expecting a best friend; no, a surrogate, less annoying sister.

Instead, I got Nina. A chain-smoking, death metal fan. And a militant atheist.

Gamely, I offered not to burn incense in the room if she didn't smoke. She gave me a slow once over and said, "What are you? Some kind of witch?"

I floundered for a moment. "No, actually, I'm kind of a Catholic hippie." I rolled my eyes and tried to chuckle a little. "My family even switched parishes so they can drag me to Mass every Sunday. So dumb, huh?"

"You actually believe in God?" She said it like I'd admitted that I still believed in the Tooth Fairy. I nodded mutely. She grabbed her package of Marlboro Reds off the desk. "I'm going out for a smoke."

As she sailed off, slamming the door behind her, I was haunted by the words of our resident advisor at the house meeting that morning.

No room assignment changes for the first six weeks.

Clearly, I was going to have to suck it up and make the best of it. I loved the room too much: a corner room, bright and sunny, with a view of the duck pond. I could hear the chapel bells during the day and the lonely rumble of the trains that passed by every night. We'd get used to each other. Besides, I was in college to learn new things, right?

And, oh, did I learn. I learned that there are no headphones sophisticated enough to block out the melodious strains of bands like Carcass. I learned that the no-smoking rule was pointless when Nina left her clothes in piles on the floor. I learned that World War 3 can be waged when one person wants the doors and windows opened (the better to disperse at least some of the distinctly dive bar odor our room was rapidly acquiring) and one wants them closed and the shades drawn at all times.

And I learned that talking out loud to God is not considered normal.

I grew up in a family of women who talk about the saints like they just had them over yesterday for coffee and cinammon rolls, so my relationship with the Divine has always been casual. And occasionally, well, conversational.

Wrestling to put a new ribbon in my fancy new electric typewriter (and silently cursing myself for being talked out of taking my trusty Oliver the Olivetti with me to college), I said "Okay, Lord. I've got a deadline and this thing is not cooperating. Little help here?"

"Do you honestly think that's going to work?" I didn't have to look up to hear the sneer.

"Not really. But it makes me feel better and...oh, yeah! Hallelujah! Let the typing commence!"

"I'm going out for a smoke. And close the damn windows."

Nina was gone for hours, and I breathed in the crisp fall air flowing through the windows. The sunset on the duckpond mirrored the colors of trees. The chapel bells chimed 5 o'clock.

If I requested a transfer, I would be giving all this up to be shuffled who knows where. Clearly, I knew what I had to do. And I had God (and Mary, and the saints) on my side.

In the next few weeks, I prayed more than I had since I was in third grade and was convinced I was on the fast track to sainthood. Everything was fair game: pop quizzes, the weather, auditions, for our illegal toaster oven to not burn my bagel...again.

Every time, without fail, Nina would huff out with her cigarettes and I would breathe a sigh of relief.

Her attempts to paint me in a bad light were stunningly unsuccessful.  While my being Catholic was considered a bit of an anomaly on a Methodist campus, complaining that your roommate is a religious whackjob while wearing a Slayer tshirt isn't going to win over many people.  If anything, said roommate starts getting a lot of sympathy.

The residence advisor knocked on my door on the first day of room reassignments. Nina's parents were renting her an apartment off campus because I was "clearly mentally unstable." I filled out the forms, signing that I would pay extra to have the room as a single.


As she left, the advisor paused. "You're not fooling me for a second, you know."

"Did my halo slip?"

"No, your horns are holding it up quite nicely." She moved to shut the door.

"Leave it open, please. Think I'm just gonna chill out for a while."

I lit a stick of nag champa and leaned back in my desk chair.  Only when I could no longer hear her footsteps did I allow myself a low, evil chuckle.

This is my intersection with maneless.  Y'all can check out her entry here: http://maneless.livejournal.com/1025.html </i>

Got to play "find the lost overdue audiobook" game today (under the chair. As always. I'm starting to think he does it on purpose). After I retrieved it, Santa Pete and I were off to grocery shop.

The first stop was Whole Foods. The pre-made meals (he's going to a monthly potluck with the gossipy ladies in his building) are not as expensive as I thought. However, I am going to start cooking for him next month. Jeez...even if it isn't all that expensive, I can still do better for half. Or less.

I was noodling around while Santa Pete agonized over his entree choice and the heavens opened.

A make your own trail mix bar? Seriously? Where have you been all my life?

I rapidly recalculated my grocery budget (with my inner hippie screaming "YOU MUST HAVE ALL THE THINGS!!!!!") and started putting itty bitty bits of my own custom trail mix in a paper bag. Dried craberries and almonds and pumpkin seeds and dates and bananna chips and carob chips and and and.
This is the best. Thing. Ever.

I know it sounds dumb. Hell, I'm unemployed, right? However, Fridays come as a bit of a relief for me because a) I don't have to deal with that fucking chirpy little bastard we call an alarm clock (for those of y'all who are aware that I've been awake of my own volition since 5:30...shut up), b) no scrambling to find chef's whites and c) two days off from endless hours of job hunting.

I/we were supposed to go see Iron Man 3 for the SiL's boyfriend's birthday, but that seems to have morphed into a poker party instead. I'm trying to squash my guilt for begging off, but we can't really afford it....and, frankly, the idea of being in a large group of people I mostly don't know leaves me feeling slightly queasy. My social anxiety is running rampant and I feel like one long, exposed, raw nerve right now. I did suggest that maybe the 4 of us could do something mid-month as a kind of joint birthday celebration for John and me.

I hate feeling like this.

It's going to be a good day, though. I'm going over to Santa Pete's for another entertaining round of "Find the Overdue Audiobook" (and I KNOW it's under his chair. He ALWAYS loses them under his chair. I'm starting to think he does this on purpose), then we're going grocery shopping.

Yes, I realize this is a ploy to get me out of the house and out of my head. And frankly, I don't care. Besides, we're dangerously low on toilet paper and yogurt here, so I have to go anyway.

And he'll help navigate me through all of the Mother's Day landmines, so it's win-win.

Happy Friday, y'all!

I have known eeyore_grrl for a long time. If internet years are like dog years...well, let's just say "Pass the Geritol."

I know she is amazingly honest, supportive, and open. I know her empathy. I know her amazing taste in music. I know I love reading what she has to say in other forums. I know I love her honesty. I love when she is goofy and it shows in her work. I know I love when she talks about the hard stuff and it shows in her work. I know I am awed by her strength and it shows in her work.

What I didn't know is what an amazing poet she is. Not until Exhibit A.

It takes guts to approach this challenge and write primarily poetry. Writing poetry is hard. Writing poetry with a specific prompt and a deadline is brutal.

eeyore_grrl makes it looks effortless. She spins words and images around the the topic until you are dizzy. But always amazed at her deft hand with words and images.

Her voice is strong and true.

Or possibly just temporarily insane.

I was doing my weekly perusal of job openings at UNC (I figure if I keep hammering at the door, eventually they'll let me back in). There are several interesting options, so I pretty much resume-spammed them.

Including a position tutoring....ahem..."student athletes."

Anyone wanna place any bets that THAT'S the job I'll get?

Clearly, I have lost my mind.

*thud*

Made it through my divorcery and missing Liam's 16th birthday without him answering repeated calls.

Now if I can just get through this week without throwing something through the television (I swear, one more Mother's Day commercial....) and not having a complete meltdown on Sunday, I'll probably call May a win.

Because the rest of May is going to be amazing. I am going to get to see my darling girl, there is a party and cake involved, the weather is going to (eventually) get better and I....well...I just needed to say this to get through the next week.

I swore to myself I was NOT going to this.

However, if someone can sponsor me, I'm in.

I must be insane. But the previous season and Exhibit A have pushed me, ad I want to be pushed some more.

I am probably going to be anti-people for the next two weeks, and I am apologizing in advance.

May 1st is Beltane. Yay! That's the best part.
May 4th is the anniversary of my divorce being finalized. I'd requested to not have it be on Liam's birthday. So, the ever thoughtful people at Camp Replogle arranged for it to be the day before (thank you Derk, Wendy and bitch lawyer from hell)
May 5th....my baby turns 16. I'll call and he won't respond.
Mother's Day. No card, no brunch, no goofy present, no flowers. Might as well have no kids. Rosemarie will drive me to tears by holding me hostage on the phone about not seeing her kids while Geralyn is getting the kind of day I never got to have with MY children.

So if I don't reach out or shut you down, it isn't personal. But my level of cope is about to hit an epic low.

Yup, it's inspection time again at Santa Pete's building. So I'm going over later this morning to help straighten up, and will be parking my butt there tomorrow for as long as it takes for them to do the inspection...which I can't help but notice gets expontentially shorter and more perfunctory every time the powers the be come in and find me curled up in the recliner, sipping tea with Santa Pete and smiling.

You don't fuck with the people I love. And protip? The more cloyingly sweet my smile is, the closer I am to ripping your throat out with my teeth.

We ended up at Lucha Tigre to blow through the gift certificate he won when the ladies dragged him to bingo night. I'd already eaten (rats!), but was willing to trundle along to have a drink and steal half of his chips and salsa. His entree was too big for him to eat, so he insisted I try some.

It was a revelation, my friends. For years, I thought I didn't like duck. Now I realize that I don't like the greasy, overcooked version of Peking duck that my sister ordered at every birthday dinner between the ages of 5 and 10 (kid always had gravitated to the most expensive menu item. I kind of blame her for the fact that I'm really twitchy if I can't order last at a restaurant, especially if someone else is paying). This, however, was amazing. There is no way I could eat the entire entree (it's HUGE! And very, very rich), but....yum!

Of course, it could be split three or four ways and considered an appetizer with drinks. Hmmmm...

I've unofficially declared this year the year I revisit foods I think I don't like and give them a second chance. Except eggs. No chance of that ever happening. I'm obviously not allergic (I can eat them *in* things), but the last time I tried--and I was well into my 20s at that point, so I think it counts--I ended up clutching a port-a-john at the antique car show in Hershey, PA, barfing up most of my internal organs. NOT a pleasant experience, and one I choose not to replicate.

Cheese is the next step. Yes, yes, yes...I know. I'm a freak. I love Brie. I really like Monteray Jack. Other than that, I'm a bit cheese-phobic. I've decided that the next time finances permit, I'm going to try some local chevre.

Or I'll just wait for the next gallery opening at FRANK and try it for free while I schmooze with the artists. ;) What can I say? I'm a gallery opening slut. And all Sudie does is encourage me.

Okay....time to suit up, grab the inhaler (WHY do these women think Febreeze is a cure-all? UGH) and my iced tea and cause a scandal.

Everyone wins. Santa Pete's apartment will pass inspection, the biddies in the sunroom will have some new gossip to chew over (I am SO TEMPTED to show up in short shorts and a tank top) and I get first crack at the old concert tshirts he's going to donate to PTA thrift otherwise.

Pete says he thinks he has one from when he roadied for Journey. Oh, please, Universe. PLEASEPLEASEPLEASE.

...have been lovingly recorded in my paper journal (sorry, corwin77. Suffice to say, it was lovely. But someone REALLY needs to invent a D-hopper so trips aren't so bloody expensive, spaced so far apart and I can avoid the complimentary TSA patdown.

I've noticed it only seems to happen when I wear tights and a skirt. Not entirely sure what that means. However, I *do* have some really cool tights.

Maybe they just want a closer look. ;)

Some highlights in no particular order:

* spending time with some of my most favoritest people on earth (okay, so that was a given)

* being informed by a flight attendant that, after 9 years on the job, I was the first person he'd ever seen voluntarily sit next to an infant

* the Charis concert. I've always been a choir geek, and their level of talent blew me away

* when I had a total meltdown during the concert (that second act needed to come with a warning label), actually being able to let go and cry. And feel safe

* carrot cake for breakfast! (Hey, it's healthy if you serve it with fruit, right?)

* when I got up to get some more iced tea and said "Does anyone need anything while I'm up?" and realized I felt at home enough to ask that question

* my first pedicure!

* watching Fi unwrap presents

* reading kids' books late at night

* dinner at Matthew's and the chef/owner coming over to ask us how our meal was (wonderful, btw)

* learning that the correct term is now "nerd," not "geek." Apparently, it's a generational thing

* just the sheer goofiness of it all

Anyone local willing to pick me up 10pm-ish next Monday?

[this space reserved for cartwheels and handsprings that I have no business attempting]

I am the luckiest girl in the world. And now I should go pack.

"You run this wild, weird path. Then grab someone by the hand and drag them merrily along, helping them and smiling when he can barely catch his breath. I think I should say thank you. Or something."

I might be Loki at heart.

In one of the empty newspaper boxes on Franklin St. is a sign that says "Dowtown Free Library. Take a book, leave a book."

I was stoked when I first saw it. I scored a Philippa Gregory novel and returned later that day with ten paperbacks. In the last few weeks, I have brought a handful of books and taken a few.

Last week, I rounded up a bunch of blank spiral notebooks and pens that my inner klepto seems to always have on hand. I wrote "Write your story" in silver Sharpie on each cover.

So this morning, I went to return the books I'd taken. And leave a few, although I wonder if The Elric Saga wouldn't be better as compost.

There was a notebook. Purple cover, the words "READ" inscribed in nothing short of anger in ballpoint pen.

I'm a little scared of this. Wish me luck, pease.

If by "quiet" you can discount the spousebeast's snoring. Yup, I fixed him brunch and he promptly lapsed into a food coma. During the week, I'm lucky if I can get him to grab a granola bar with his coffee when he dashes out the door. On the weekends, I think he tries to make up for the week's lack of breakfast and sleep in one go.

In other news, I'm on the mend. Finally did go to the doctor and there's nothing dire that time and letting people carry heavy stuff for me won't fix. And a bunch of Ace bandages. Oh, and rest, which I've done a lot of this week.

I'm still a bit fuzzy-headed and, well, everything hurts. However, I'm now cagey enough that I want to do stuff, even if it's uncomfortable. I've even re-organized the pantry (if the zombie invasion ever comes and you can get here, I assure you we have rice for the next 100 years) and organized my crochet hooks (note to self: you never need to buy a J, G, or F hook again). The only annoying thing is that I can't find my larger hooks. It was a set in clear acrylic and...grrr.

See? If I am not slightly sleep deprived, I get like this.

I actually did end up coloring eggs. The homeless shelter wouldn't take them (which didn't really surprise me, TBH), so I passed them out around here. And I saved back 3 to make deviled eggs for Kent tomorrow. Everyone wins!

ANNNND I was given a very nifty gift from one of the spousebeast's new cow-orkers. She used to run an online business to supplement het part time job, and is now on the road to management and has no time for the business. She was bitching to Kent about all of the leftover inventory she's just going to give away and she had a ton of white sage and....

"My wife would love that. She uses that pretty often."

*thud* Was that my ass getting inadvertantly kicked out of the broom closet? Not that I'm exactly in, but...oy. I try to be circumspect (tuck my pentacle under my shirt) when I go to his work.

ANYWAY, she brought a small bag for Kent yesterday yesterday and a big one for me. She gifted me with the aforementioned white sage, Dragon's Blood resin, and 3 different herb tea blends (one of which has red clover and nettle, which should help with the hotflash issues). Kent's had various experiments she's been doing with smoked black pepper and a small bag of the pink volcanic salt.

So sweet. I have to figure out how to say thank you. Lemon cupcakes? Apple pie? Offer Kent in exchange for more tea?

Uh, that was my outside voice, wasn't it?

Easter continues to be hard for me. That is the one holiday for my family that doesn't have all that much baggage. It goes thusly: baskets, Mass, "Richard, don't eat all those jellybeans!" dinner, the adults fall asleep. After my divorce, once the "adults" fell asleep, I would grab a couple of Cadbury Eggs and the copy of 'Jesus Christ Superstar' and a plate of leftovers and sneak off to my room. But it was still pretty much the same drill.

Kent's mom has been leaving her whiny "WHHHHHYYYY can't you be up here? I'll be allll alonnnne" messages this week. I decided that ignoring her phone calls was probably the best for me but.....jeebus. She gets every Thanksgiving (Kent's missed one. In the almost 53 years since he's been born). I do have a mother and grandparents. And Kent has The Patriarch.

It kind of scares me that I would actually prefer a weekend being The Patriarch's sous chef and lectured about how I am not living up to my full potential than dealing with Rosemarie. Of course, if I snap at The Patriarch, he doesn't cry. He just makes me pit olives and melt gelatin sheets for the amuse bouche.

I'm thinking since we can't get past going to see Rosemarie for Thanksgiving, we need to give my family Easter. And Lars gets two days before Dragon*Con.

I now need a job that will help me fund this. Among other visits. ;)

I want to dye Easter eggs.

Like really, really want to. And I don't even eat eggs.

When Steph and I were little, mom would buy the PAAS coloring kits when they went on sale after Easter. Come midsummer, when she had exhausted every distraction to keep my sister from killing me by a constant need for attention, she'd invite the kids on the block over and we'd color eggs. Those afternoons in Santa Ana heat, downing glass after glass of Koolaid sweetened with Sweet N' Low (ick. Chemicals much?) and glaring at Anthony Sessa when he'd try to hold my hand were some of the happiest in what was a pretty crap childhood.

I think this desire to color eggs might have deeper roots than just the holiday. :/

I've been having intensely vivid dreams about my family. I've been dreaming about my sister as an adult, which I NEVER do (although she's still incredibly annoying in the dreams, even as an adult). I've also had dreams about my great-grandma K that were so real I've managed to wake myself up talking to her.

That freaked Kent out a bit. Apparently, I sat straight up in bed and started talking to the wall last night. In Polish.

I didn't know I still remember how to speak Polish. Apparently, I do in my sleep.

Right after great-granma K died (coming up on 34 years ago. Yeesh), I would wake up to my sister sitting in a corner, talking to the wall, talking to her. I thought she was making it up (like her Guardian Puppy Angel. Starting to wonder about that now, too). Now I'm not so sure.

Maybe I should just buy a dozen eggs and dye the damned things. Kent likes devilled eggs, after all.

I hate Chapel Hill Transit. Specifically the NS.

All those jokes I make about the bus that hit me? Remind me to quit making them, because yesterday one almost did.

I was three quarters of the way through the crosswalk when this asshole bus driver comes barrelling down MLK. I had to dive out of the way and kissed pavement. Skinned my knee, both palms, bruises all over, my ribs hurt and I'm not entirely sure my wrists or left shoulder will be talking to me any time soon.

Yes, I filed a report.

And I think CHT owes me for a bottle of cheap chardonnay (did I mention glass shards in my hip?), a dozen eggs and a loaf of squished bread.

And....OW?