Shut up, already

Last night after hours at my mother’s house, I went home exhausted, crawled into bed and watched three hours of reality TV – America’s Next Top Model, followed by The Apprentice and Wife Swap. These shows all shared a commonality – yelling. Yelling because this black girl acts too white, yelling because this lady is a horrible project manager, yelling because not everyone lives in a multimillion-dollar apartment with four nannies, a housekeeper, cook, and driver. Yelling, yelling, yelling.

The funny thing is that I had endured my own three hours of yelling – at my mom’s house. Being the oldest kid sucks big time in my family. The responsibility heaped on my shoulders for the well being of my family is at times overwhelming. I normally enjoy running things, event planning, and bossing people around and am really quite good at it, which is why my talents are completely wasted in this nothing, slavish job, but lately my family has piled the role of matriarch on me and it is driving me to exhaustion. I am seriously considering moving elsewhere – back to the land of sunshine and happiness, perhaps.

As I have said repeatedly, I have been ill, and in the meantime my mother is moving for the first time in 7 years – a huge feat for our family – and requires much assistance from her children, but when they don’t come through – guess who has to hear about it…why, me of course. I have received about 20 phone calls since the weekend from her complaining about the lack of help she is getting from her four children, one of who is an hour away starting his freshman year in college. Only one still lives with her, and she is practically only good for staying out all night and sleeping the day away. The other has had it up to here with my mother’s irrational yelling sprees, so who does that leave? Me, the sick one, no less.

But that is okay, I love my mother and always want to help her when she needs it, but I can’t take the yelling. To be subjected to it with my mother and then to turn on the television - my mode for escape since my scattered brain hasn’t been able to focus on a book since the divorce – and find more yelling was annoying, but the crime dramas were definitely not a good alternative for me last night – would only provide new and interesting fantasies for offing my mother.*

So yelling stresses me out, so I slept terribly, so now I have a terrible crick in my neck, so I haven’t yet heard about the apartment – it’s okay. I will be okay. It will all be over soon, and my mom will go back to normal. There is such a thing as normal, right?


*Disclaimer – will never actually whack my mom, so if she ever does show up dead…it wasn’t me.

By Ax or By Chainsaw

Still sick – but out of the misery stage and just in the annoying stage where the symptoms are just reluctant to take the hint and leave – y’know, the kinda stuffy nose, the half-hearted cough, the sneezes that just don’t come. My focus now goes back to my fungus-infested fingernail. I still haven’t taken care of it, and I suppose I should because it is still swollen and goes through painful stages, and to top it off X’s Girl2 passed along a belief that I could have the same thing that nearly led to the loss of Paula Abdul’s thumb, so I really should get on it.

Go to WebMD though and research the fingernail nastiness and the cure almost seems worse than the disease. I am always leery of taking drugs with frightening side effects, but the fingernail is embarrassing, the pain not so fun either.

Speaking of pictures, wouldn’t life be so much easier if one could just e-mail a photo and/or description of one’s malady to one’s doctor, and s/he could reply with a prescription and instructions?

Stuffy, Sneezing, Achy and Longing For a Smith & Wesson

Like I said, I hate being sick. Perhaps that is why I am still sick. The gods of sickness could sense my distaste for their gifted malady and have decided to extend my misery. So nice of them.

Friday after work I picked up Bella, drove straight home and fell into bed. Except for one crawled trip to the facilities, I didn’t move the entire night. Poor Bella. I couldn’t be bothered to get up to feed the dear, so she rustled herself up a nice dinner of carrots and yogurt. I can’t tell you how much I love that she can open the refrigerator on her own now. That is truly a blessing for the ill.

As the poor, neglected child (she will be three in November) wandered around the house, mostly playing Legos and talking to her dolls, I lay in bed dying. Well, not literally dying, just tossing and turning in miserable miserableness. I had piles of tissue surrounding me on the bed all of which were soaked to the core with the nastiness that spewed from my nasal regions. My head throbbed, and the pressure was so great that the entire row of my top teeth ached like they haven’t ached since I was a teenager in braces. So I wasn’t dying, but I sure wanted to die. I kept imagining ways to put myself out of my misery. My personal favorite was the chainsaw I would have used to cut away my teeth, thus removing the most aggravating of my pains. I couldn’t watch television because my eyes hurt, which also precluded reading; I couldn’t listen to music because of my headache, so I just lay there for hours in my state of wretchedness.

If I had been smart, I would have found a mallet to knock myself out with, or at least found a pill to do the trick from my basket o’ medicine, but all I could think of was the misery and the violent ways I could treat myself rather than the rational FDA-approved solution.

I was supposed to be at my mother’s house helping her unload the truck into her new apartment. Before I left work I called her to tell her that it was a “no can do,” so when she called me, why would I expect anything other than sympathy from her phone call? No, no. Sometimes I require much too too much from my mother dearest. When I answered the phone it was to a barrage of angry words. Apparently my sister had abandoned her for a camping trip to the Gorge in George, WA to see Jack Johnson in concert (sorry, I get such a kick out of the fact that there is a place on this planet name George, Washington), Big took off for a b-day dinner with Coco and her sister, and I called in sick. Most upsetting to me was that she didn’t even believe I was sick. She thought I had a date or something. I said, "stop yelling at me, stop yelling at me, stop yelling at me," when she didn’t, I hung up sobbing with frustration. Poor Bubba came in and asked who had been yelling at me. I couldn’t tell her it was her beloved Grandma, but I did let her hug and comfort me. I always feel so guilty taking comfort from a two year-old, but I think that as sick and upset as I was, it’ll be okay, just that once.

X came in, as I was still wiping the tears, to save the day as usual. I had called him on my way home to beg him to come over when he was off work to put Bella to bed, because I knew I would not have the strength, and here he was. He listened to me sob over my mom’s mistreatment of me, and handed me the quarter-pounder meal he brought as a surprise. I hadn’t eaten since lunch, and the McDonald’s sounded good in theory, but my stomach didn’t seem to agree, and the fries I did attempt to eat were barely swallowed. Apparently, and I never noticed this before, when you swallow you puff out a bit of air at the end. If your nose is completely stopped up, swallowing with food is a completely miserable experience to pile on top of the fact that there ain’t no air passing through your nose. I couldn’t even taste the fries in the first place. They were chilled and felt like wet, tasteless mush in my mouth. After a few sips of Diet Coke, I abandoned the idea of sustenance, accepted the Tylenol Sinus PM X rustled up for me, and heard a loud tssssssss coming from my forehead when X lay a cool, damp cloth there. There was probably some steam as well, uh huh. See, I was dying. I had a fever, so there.

But then I started to cry again. I was so upset that I had to rely on my ex-husband to come take care of me. I felt horrible about it, and then of course I got upset again about my mother and began ranting about that. X calmed me down, reminding me that we are friends and he would do this for me even if we had never been married, and that my mother wasn’t upset with me, just freaked out about the move and upset about the other kids. Ten minutes later, I was asleep.

The next morning, I dragged myself out of bed and to my mother’s house to do what I could in my deathlike state. She apologized for yelling at me, and only let me work for a few minutes before sending me on my way for the weekend. She didn’t want to get sick, and apparently X called her upon leaving my place to say that I really was sick and she wasn't very nice to treat me so horribly in my nearly putrid state.

So I spent the rest of the weekend sniffing and hacking and “ugh”ing a lot. I also got in trouble with my ex-sister-in-law, but that is a story for another blog entirely.

And today I am sniffing and hacking and “ugh”ing a lot, but I am not going to bed after work. I get to look at apartments.

As many times as I have moved in my life, and I do mean many (I am now in my 36th abode – give or take a few), I still look forward to getting settled into a new place and getting to know a different neighborhood. My current place of residence is the first one that I will have lived in for a full year in a looooooooong time. I thought that as a grown-up I would stick my roots and never leave once I had a say, but I think that restless quality was passed down to me from my father. Once Bella starts school, I think I will be able to quash that feeling. There was nothing worse when I was a child than going home at the start of Christmas Break and finding out that we were moving yet again and would be gone before the start back of school, so no goodbyes – again. No finishing the school year in one school - again. No going back for my prized Trapper Keeper - again.

But this was supposed to be about my sick weekend.

Oh Happy Day!

I hate being sick.

I hate the feeling that my head is stuffed with cotton balls, my nose with slime, and my chest with marbles.

I hate trying to hold my head up at work for eight hours straight while I do nothing better than reading the archives of other people's blogs, which in the case of Blonde Champagne is actually a treat.

I hate that we are having an absolutely beautiful day (one of the last before the mist and the daily 44 high/42 low settle in) and all I want to do is crawl into my comforter-clad bed and live there for the weekend.

I hate that X has next weekend off instead of this one.

I hate that...well, I hate everything right now. Including you.


*Update* Okay, so I don't actually hate you, though I am not too fond of Joe and Brit right now for reasons they are aware of and you all would probably approve of.

Uh, Sir?

My boss has a big brown stain on his rear.

It wasn't there before.

Since my job includes all of the other mundane and at times humiliating tasks the head honchos can contrive - does it also fall to me to tell him about the mishap on his ass?

Wouldn't you want to know?

It's Like She Had ESPN or Something

Note to annoying people who incessantly call my place of work: No, I don't know how long the meeting will last, and I haven't a clue when the conference call will be over. Your guess is as good as mine. Just leave him/her a voice mail and wait for his/her happy ass to get back to you.

Thanks.

If You Aren't Going to Take It, LEAVE IT ALONE!

Yesterday morning I went out to my Durango and discovered that the night before I had left my window open a crack. I inwardly admonished myself, and was prepared to think no more of it. But then I tried to start my truck – nothing. I tried again – nothing. I looked around the vehicle…I hadn’t left anything on – I never do. But then I noticed that things weren’t as I left them. It looked as if someone had rummaged around in there. I couldn’t believe that – there was nothing but a car seat and some kid’s shoes in the back seat. I didn’t even have my cd’s in the truck. I tried starting the Durango one more time and gave up. I got out of the car and hit the lock button on my remote entry pad, but nothing happened, then I tried the unlock button, again no reaction. Then I realized that it must not have worked when I used it to access my door first thing – my door was already unlocked. I went back inside, called work to let them know I would be late and then X to ask for him assistance.

It sucks that even though we are divorced, I still have to call on X to help me out. I feel like the helpless dame waiting for the big man to come take her troubles away.

Being the nice guy that he is, X was busy with another of my family members. My cousin, Stone, just moved up from CA and needed a job, so X took him in to his old place of work and got him hooked up with a position. Whatta guy. He agreed to meet me after he was done with Stone. I was actually happy with the opportunity to do nothing for a while. I played the piano for the next hour and a half.

When X arrived, he pushed the truck out of its spot and spent the next 45 minutes fruitlessly trying to charge the battery. He discovered that some wires had been messed with and decided that someone had unlocked the door through the window and then when the security system reacted, they pulled at the wires and only succeeded in ruining my battery. X ran out, bought me a new battery, installed it and admonished me for leaving the window open in the first place.

Note to the criminals: If you are going to mess with my Durango, can you at least have the decency to take it? I even have two keys hidden on the vehicle itself. That way I can get the insurance money, pay it off, and get a nice, sensible hybrid. Thanks.

80 Degrees and Sunny Every Day

Wednesday marks the first day of fall, and I must say that I am not pleased about that - not one little bit. Seeing my breath in the morning is growing in frequency and will soon be an everyday occurrence, the windows on my car are covered with condensation, which I hate to wipe off because I am usually running late, so therefore create a rolling hazard wagon since I can’t see out my windows worth a darn, and I finally had to turn on the heat in my bedroom.

I haven’t relished using the heat, but after a shivering night wherein I woke up so cold that my feet felt like ice and I had to get up to throw on some socks and an extra blanket, I decided that it was time. I usually sleep in my birthday suit – more comfy that way during the summer and suited to keeping me from getting overheated in the winter. It is kind of a bad habit because every now and again I will be in bed and remember that I forgot to lock the door or switch out a light, so I have to go traipsing through the house sans robe, because it is usually in the bathroom on a hook. Sometimes there is a shade or curtain open and I always hope to goodness that no one just happens to look up into that window right at the moment that I am rambling by, which I usually do in the dark if I can or hunched over in a run or just straight up with a devil may care attitude. Pretty stupid, now that I am living alone – I always imagined that whoever caught me walking around would be some surprised old lady who just shook her head and went back to her business. And there is always the possibility that some dude might see and be like “wow, there’s a naked chick up there” and also just return to his business. But the more sinister possibility that one of those freaky guys, whose first step into sexual deviance is a stint as a peeping tom, catches me in my nude dash across the apartment is frightening and especially so since I am all by my lonesome without my knight in shining armor to protect me.

So now that fall is here, my first as I have said in a long time without a bedmate, I suppose I should go buy some PJs, some nice plaid, flannel, boring ones and be done with it. It’s just for a few months, right? Summer will be here again before I know it.

But the temptation to move to the land of perpetual summers is oh so great.

Quote of the Day

"You were all the things I thought I knew
And I thought we could be

You were everything, everything that I wanted
We were meant to be, supposed to be, but we lost it
And all of the memories, so close to me, just fade away
All this time you were pretending
So much for my happy ending"

-Avril Lavigne

Quote of the Day

Very few desserts are more delicious to eat and to look at. A classic finale to a meal, crème brulee can be served slightly warm or chilled.

-What's Cooking America

It All Comes Full Circle

Kids are cute, right? Yeah, they are cute, right up until the age when they start embarrassing you in public.

The other day I made a trip to the grocery store, which I usually try to do when Bella is with X, but I couldn’t avoid it any longer, so we were there together. She sat in the cart in the freezer section, as I tried to choose between frozen pizzas, and announced, “Look, Mommy, there’s Santa Claus.” I looked down the aisle to where she pointed at a larger man with a full, curly, dark brown beard and longish brown, curly hair – he actually resembled Rupert from Survivor more closely than Santa Claus. I stifled a giggle and urged her to quiet. Do children even listen to such pleadings? Mine merely said in a louder voice, “See, he’s Santa, Mommy.”

“Shhh, I see him,” I whispered.

“He has water, Mommy. Santa has water.” Probably leaving the holder of the water no doubt to whom she was referring, and then she puffed out her cheeks, pushed out her belly, and caressed the newly created girth with her hands. “And he does this, Mommy.”

And with that, I decided against the pizzas and hurried out of the aisle as she continued to puff, push out, point and yell about Santa. I continued through my shopping list, but my daughter spotted someone else. “Uh oh, Mommy,” she said loudly while pointing to a large woman. “She does this.” And with that announcement, puffed and pushed out again, but this time with more gusto. “Why does she do this?”

I hushed her and practically ran away from the poor woman and the shocked expression on her face.

The funny thing is that as embarrassed as I was by her announcements and gesticulations, I know that in ten years time I will be the one causing her cheek flaming embarrassment, just by being myself, her mom, in public. I can hear it now, “Shhhh, MOOOMMM, you’re embarrassing me!”

Quote of the Day

"I've been rich and I've been poor; rich is better."

-Sophie Tucker

52 Cents in My Bank Account

For a girl who loves clothes and shoes even more, a life where the bank account is drained by rent, one stop to the grocery store ($40) and one gas tank deposit ($20) isn’t the rosiest. I am making it, but only by the skin of my teeth (which haven’t seen the dentist in a while because I can’t afford the cavities). My daughter’s pants are turning into high waters (thank God she is skinny because otherwise I would be dressing her in pillow sheets, and I only have five of those). I don’t have cable TV; I have the cheapest Internet service possible, but I drive an SUV, a gas-guzzling SUV – with leather interior. If there ever was a car that didn’t match one’s lifestyle, this would be it. X and I bought it when things were going well financially, but I am now stuck with a vehicle that is worth less than what is owed on it – never a good situation, so selling it wouldn’t even work. But I don’t even make payments on the thing – X does. So besides the rare manicure and the nominal bid on eBay, I have very few expenses that I could shuck as an effort to downsize and afford more fun stuff or in the cases of clothing my daughter and fixing what may be a cavity on my upper right back tooth, not so fun stuff.

So last night X came over to pick Bella up; we sat and talked for a while and I showed him the disgustingness of the middle finger on my right hand. It has swollen up due to what I believe is a fungus in the fingernail contracted by the horrible experience at the manicure shop (NEVER AGAIN will I step foot into such a place). The pain in the finger woke me up during the night. He asked me why I hadn’t gone to the doctor. I told him that not only can I not afford the deductible on my insurance, but I can’t afford the cost for the co-pay required for the year long course of nail fungus medication as well. Shuddering from the brown that has taken over my nail, X told me to get myself to the doctor and he would help me all he could.

Then I remarked about how much this sucked. I hate being poor and complained about my inability to buy new clothes for the fall, not for Bella and not for me. He said that I should just grin and bear it or move in with my mom, there aren’t any expenses I can get rid of other than rent, so that is my only other option – well marrying a millionaire, winning the lottery, and finding a job that pays more than slave wages are possibilities, but that is beside the point. Sure I can do that – I can move in with my mom - if you want me to slit my wrists. Death is preferable to living with that woman. I love her to death, but I have had enough of living with her to last me a lifetime. I will just go on wearing my rags, thank you.

Rise and Shine!

This morning I woke up exhausted. I still haven't recovered from my sleepless weekend and sleepless week, but nevertheless I awoke with a smile on my face. It was as if I had awaken to the most beautiful spring morning and the sun was shining down upon me. It was a beautiful day despite the clouds and the mist and the cold. I was happy.

Never Wake Up

Jerking awake to escape the ostrich that kept attacking me while I picked Jelly Belly beans in a poppy field, I realized that my alarm failed to go off due to a power outage or something during the night. Leaping out of bed, I threw on clothes, red lipstick, heels and was out the door. As I ran to my car, I got really pissed off because I could see my breath. For the first time in months, there it was. My breath. Right in front of me. It sucked. I don't want summer to go away. I love the summer. Argh.

But you wanna know what really sucked? I found out when I opened my car door. The lovely stench of puke wafted, rather, overwhelmed me. Turns out that last night, in my concern for my puke-covered daughter, I had forgotten to come back outside to clean up the mess on her carseat.

Lacking time to do anything about it, I left for Larry's Market where I was to pick up the birthday goodies for a co-worker (yet another fun task that falls to the last one in line). I raced around the store getting the necessary foodstuffs, then back at my car realized the clerk had not given me my change. Loading my truck, I struggled with the overstuffed plastic bags of 2 liter soda bottles, as I tried to prevent the cart from slipping away with my heel-clad foot. The really fun part came when I grabbed the huge and ultra-heavy cake. Packaged in an awkward box, and somewhat off balance, the cake dropped from my hands right as the cart freed itself from my foot. With one eye on the crashing cake and the other on the cart's Jaguar-bound descent, I decided to forget the cake and lunged, instead, for the cart, which was lucky because a very prissy woman sat inside eyeing me over her black-rimmed glasses. Breathing a sigh of relief, I tossed the rumpled cake on the front seat, ran the cart back inside and drove to work completely forgetting to ask that clerk for my change.

Hauling everything into the office was exciting, especially when the door was locked and I had to juggle the heavy bags while digging through my purse for the keys, all while one of our researchers stood on the other side of the door making faces at me. Ooh, if we weren't already short on PhDs...

But the coup de grace came when I made the birthday boy's card on our ultra-handy greeting card software. Aren't we cheap? It wasn't until several people had signed the card, that one of them came up to me, "Uh, Blythe...Who is Slick?

"Why do you ask?"

"Because the card is printed, 'Happy Birthday, Slick'."

Reprinting a new card with the correct name and explaining to the already signed-its why they had to do it again was a real cheek burner.

Ever since, my day has just been one of those that make you wish that you never woke up from your ostrich nightmare.

Thank God it's Friday, that's all I can say.

Note to Self:

Never click the "Next Blog" tab while at work. Someone just might walk by right as "My Nude and Naughty Blog" pops up on your screen thus causing your cheeks to flame and that someone to avert eyes in your presence for the rest of the day. How to explain that you didn't really want to see that? The button is a crap shoot.

The Cleaning Ladies

Saturday night after our trip to Slick's house, Brit and I, along with Joe, my other brother Red and my aunt congregated at my mom's house for salmon and family time. No red wine for me this time, I stuck with diet Coke. My sister Kiki was working, so I didn't feel bad when I headed to her room to hunt down a CD she borrowed from me. What I found there was shocking! I went back to the living room and quietly called Brit to follow me. Opening the door for her, I revealed a certified disaster area. I am not sure that even Hurricane Francis could have generated as much damage. Taking it all in again, I shook my head over and over in disbelief. I looked at Brit, she stood mutely, jaw to chest. We were more than a little awestruck. The talent it takes to get a room to the state of this one...the time, the dedication.

Rejoining the group, Brit and I whispered plans of an intervention.

The next morning, I called my mom and offered my services to help her go through the basement to get things ready for her impending garage sale and move. Noting that work would be complicated because I would have Bella with me, she politely turned me down. I went to play the piano for a while, but couldn't let the matter rest. I called Brit and we decided to take matters into our own hands.

One hour later, we found ourselves in the war zone. To describe the room is almost beyond words, and I am so afraid of embarrassing my sister, but since she doesn't even know of the blog's existence, I suppose I am safe. And we were safe from her wrath - she had a double shift and was staying the night at a friend's house after, so we were free to do what we wanted sans intervention. So with the blink of an eye, Brit and I turned into crew from Clean Sweep and took inventory of the task at hand.

The door opens to a wide dresser, which she used as a room divider. Behind this dresser is a table on which she had placed the iMac I gave her as payment for a summer's worth of babysitting - I am a little upset to find the mouse ruined and several buttons missing from the keyboard. There is a highboy and a bed and two tables. Where the floor used to be is a layer over a foot deep of debris made up of garbage and every single item of clothing she owns or borrowed. The 13 drawers at her disposal contained not a sock, nor a skirt, some were even empty. The walk-in closet was only different in that it held 2 feet of debris and a couple of empty hangers. I would have sat down on the bed as my knees weakened at the enormity of the task before us had the bed not also been covered with an array of purses, broken personal CD players and other sundry items.

At this point, my mom noticed that we were in the Forbidden Zone. She looked at us both and shook her head “Okay, but I had nothing to do with it.”

We gathered laundry baskets and industrial size trash bags and got to work. First order of business was to rid the room of clothes. We filled three large baskets and half of a fourth over the course of half an hour. Separating the clothing from the garbage was more difficult than we anticipated – some of the clothing we even deemed garbage (ew!). We giggled as we came across some horrifying stuff and wondered what underwear the girl was wearing. Coming across tens of pairs scattered all over the room, we decided that she merely went to Victoria’s Secret every time she needed a new supply. After we finally got all of the clothing out of the room and lugged the overflowing baskets down to the basement’s laundry area, we began the even more overwhelming task of clearing and sorting the debris covering the floor, dressers, tables, bed, closet shelves and flowing out of the dresser drawers.

We sneezed continuously and came across some very sinister looking spiders, and though our bodies were growing more exhausted as we went through, tossed out and stifled our gag reflexes, we pushed on as quickly as we could, motivated by the fear that something might bring Kiki home for a forgotten item and we would be caught. We cleared the floor then filled it again with other items to be gone through, and worked and toiled, until 5 hours after we started the room was ready.

We were so proud of ourselves and marveled at the 10 man-hours it took to complete the daunting task. When we collapsed on the sofa in my mom’s living room to Coronas, bread and brie (not a good combo, if you are wondering), Dan’s friends came over to pick him up. Brit and I shared a good laugh when he passed Kiki’s room off as his own because her room looked so much better than his own.

Tossing back the rest of the beer, (and shuddering as it clashed with the remnants of brie in my mouth) I sighed with satisfaction.

Mission accomplished!

Quote of the Day

"Heaven has no rage like love to hatred turned,
Nor hell a fury like a woman scorned."

-William Congreve (1670–1729)
The Mourning Bride. Act iii. Sc. 8.

Quote of the Day

"Exercise alone provides psychological and physical benefits. However, if you also adopt a strategy that engages your mind while you exercise, you can get a whole host of psychological benefits fairly quickly. "

-James Rippe, M.D.

At the Top of My Lungs

Realizing that instead of hauling over the great divide (Lake Washington) to get my exercise at Green Lake, I can get in my three miles on a daily basis by just jaunting over to the Downtown Bellevue Park where 1 loop equals 1/2 mile. For the mathematically challenged that means that I have to do 6 laps. Staying focused and disciplined enough to force myself around that park 6 whole times takes a lot more stamina than I expected. Walking on that dusty trail again and again is just plain BORING! There are only about 5 other people going around and around, so you get to see them over and over - definitely not meeting up with the tens of interesting people that you encounter ONCE when you walk around Green Lake ONCE to get in that three miles.

I was so bored that I became totally absorbed by the music playing on my discman - the CD I am listening to everywhere - Rufus Wainwright's Want One. I adore the CD truly, madly, deeply, but usually the songs are a pleasant background to the people I am watching as I walk around Green Lake. At the Bellevue Park, the music is the main stage. I actually found myself doing the air guitar to my favorite part of "Go or Go Ahead" and had to clench my jaw together to prevent myself singing along to the crescendo with all the fervor it arouses.

I wonder how people (the five there were) would have reacted to the SINGING, AIR GUITAR PLAYING, jogger in the hot pink shorts. Would they have smiled at my exuberant abandon, called the state hospital, or ignored me, pegging me as just another crazy?

Quote of the Day

"Choice of attention - to pay attention to this and ignore that - is to the inner life what choice of action is to the outer. In both cases, a man is responsible for his choice and must accept the consequences, whatever they may be."

-W. H. Auden, A Certain World

Quote of the Day

"It is never too late to be what you might have been."

-George Elliot

Quote of the Day

"An insincere and evil friend is more to be feared than a wild beast; a wild beast may wound your body, but an evil friend will wound your mind."

-Buddha

Quote of the Day

"The perfect love affair is one which is conducted entirely by post."

-George Bernard Shaw (1856 - 1950)

Quote of the Day

No one but you can make you happy.

SunMaid Raisins box

Quote of the Day

"Solitude is the profoundest fact of the human condition. Man is the only being who knows he is alone."

-Octavio Paz, The Labyrinth of Solitude, 1950

The Emptiness Beside Me

Ending my marriage meant that I was creating an empty spot in my bed for the first time in four years. At first going to bed was wonderful - I slept in the middle with my legs spread far and wide, I slept on the left and I slept on the right. It was my bed and I could sleep where I wanted and all of the pillows were mine - no more risk of them being stolen and drooled upon. I could sleep confident that any drool that happened upon my pillows is mine and only mine, which is, in itself, a pretty nice feeling.

But over the past few months my enjoyment of bedtime freedom has faded, and I have parked myself on the left side of the bed and resumed sleeping in the fetal position. I have taken to using only two of the four pillows on my bed - the remaining pillows fluffed, propped and ready for someone to make them his own. In the morning, and sometimes during the night, I wake up, turn over and look at the unrumpled covers and emptiness beside me and feel an emptiness inside me. It isn't of course that side of the bed that bothers me but the absence it represents. Gone are the sounds of breathing, the warmth, the security, the companionship created when another human shares your sleeping space. In their place longing tugs at my heart and fills the room.

There is just something about going to bed alone every night - in a completely empty apartment on those nights when my daughter is with X- that just reeks of loneliness. Waking up every morning without a friendly face beside yours, no warm body to cuddle close to, just you and you only is harder than I supposed it would be to grow accustomed to.

I used to feel lonely while I was married to X. And now I am lonely though with Mr. Slick.

What is this hole that I can't seem to fill?

Quote of the Day

"Fear less, hope more;
Whine less, breathe more;
Talk less, say more;
Hate less, love more;
And all good things are yours."

Swedish Proverb

Or Somethin'

My boss (a 59 year-old man) just walked up to me and asked if I thought he looked like Eminem today. I looked him up and down taking in his baggy blue sweater and loose-fitting dark blue jeans and white sneakers and said "that's funny."

He said, "What's funny? I'm hip."

That's when I realized he was serious.

Quote of the Day

"To laugh often and much; to win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children; to earn the appreciation of honest critics and endure the betrayal of false friends; to appreciate beauty, to find the best in others; to leave the world a little better; whether by a healthy child, a garden patch or a redeemed social condition; to know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived. This is the meaning of success."

-Ralph Waldo Emerson

Quote of the Day

We learn wisdom from failure much more than from success.

Samuel Smiles(1816–1904)

Blader Envy

I have always admired Rollerbladers. They seem to effortlessly glide around the lake as I huff and puff through my jog or brisk walk. I wanted to be them. I wanted to effortlessly glide around the lake. So one day as I was perusing eBay (my semi-new sick obsession) I decided to become one of them. I hightailed it to the Rollerblade auctions, placed my bid and had a nice, new, used pair of Rollerblades post haste. It wasn’t until yesterday, though, that I gathered the courage to use the things. I felt so nervous as I put them on, hoping they would fit right, hoping that all the time I spent on roller skates in middle school would translate into a current skill in Rollerblading, hoping that I wouldn’t fall and break my wrist because I wasn’t willing to spring for the proper safety gear until I knew for sure that I enjoy the whole Rollerblading experience.

My first challenge was to make it from my brother’s apartment building to Green Lake – two blocks and two busy streets lay between them. It being rush hour, my first humiliation was crossing the street. It seemed like I couldn’t remember how to launch off into a smooth stride. Instead I appeared to be walking across the street as fifty cars waited for me and of course I tripped right as I made it to the curb. I was able to drag myself out of the street and shakily regain my footing. I slowly pushed myself forward with one blade and then the next. I seemed to be getting the hang of it. I was so proud. I held my head up high and tried to channel all of the hot chic Rollerbladers I had ever seen in a movie. There must have been something wrong with the connection.

I arrived at Green Lake and plodded across the grass field that lay between the street and the paved path around the lake. I was getting excited. This was going to be fun. I was going to get some exercise, go around the lake a couple of times, and hey maybe even meet a cute blader. I quickly lost my enthusiasm. Once I got to the path, I realized that Rollerblading business isn’t as effortless as it appears. My second challenge was a mini-hill that I had never noticed while walking (of course I usually go clockwise around the lake against the Rollerbladers so it was downhill), but all of the sudden I felt like I had reached Mount Everest. I grunted and pushed and somehow managed to make it to the top. Winded and extremely exhausted, I looked back longingly at the grass field from which I had come, but I kept on. Soon my chest started to burn and my face started to pound. I didn’t understand it – I wasn’t even going fast. Every single other Rollerblader passed me, joggers passed me, and, saddest of all, speed walkers passed me. Try as I might, I couldn’t get myself into a smooth rhythm. About a quarter of a mile around I could take it no longer, I had to sit on a bench. I was so confused. Rollerblading looked so easy – besides I wasn’t that out of shape, this should have been a piece of cake. I watched more rollerbladers pass by and I squelched the desire to ask them to tell me what I was doing wrong – why, when my legs were going at the same speed as theirs was I incapable of achieving the same speed. I didn’t want to carry on. I was frustrated, depressed and extremely disappointed in myself – but rollerbladers can’t go back – they can only go forward on the path. I wanted to cry, but I stood up and onto the path and prepared to pass again all of the slow walkers. I didn’t want them to see me again – I looked ridiculous, but I had no choice, I couldn’t turn back. I didn’t even have my cell phone so calling my brother to rescue me was out of the question.

When I had gone 2 miles and after 5 more breaks, I could take it no longer. I sat down on the grass, removed the offenders and walked the final mile in my bare feet. I HATED those Rollerblades. I considered leaving them by a tree, hoping that by chance some girl with a size 10 foot would pick them up and take to the activity with far more gusto than had I, but I kept a hold on them. The worst part of the whole experience is that as I trudged through the cool grass all of my frustration with my rollerblades and with Slick combined to make me very emotional. I spent the entire walk choking back tears and just being utterly pathetic.

When I arrived at Joe’s house, I could no longer hold it in – after greeting Joe and Brit as they sat smoking in the garage, I excused myself to get some water and sobbed in the kitchen. I couldn’t understand what I was feeling at the time. I played it off as PMS to Joe and Brit when they asked about it, but it wasn’t that. I am beginning to think that the divorce, single momhood, and this whole Mr. Slick thing are all starting to take a serious toll on me.

Quote of the Day

My phone's on vibrate for you
But still I never ever feel from you
Pinocchio's now a boy who wants to turn
Back into a toy
So call me, call me in the morning
Call me in the night, so call me
Call me anytime you like
My phone's on vibrate for you, for you

Rufus Wainwright
Want One (2003) "Vibrate"

Quote of the Day

Ay me, how weak a thing
The heart of woman is!

William Shakespeare

Totally Not Worth a Memory Cell

Today X called me. "Happy fourth", he said.

"Fourth what?"

"Anniversary."

"Of what?"

"Our marriage..."

Oh, that. Who cares anymore? Obviously not me since I didn't remember the darn thing. Once the divorce is final, do you keep counting? Here marks the day when we would have been married for four years? I don't think so. August 5th no longer has that meaning for me. I just told him that I had forgotten. I hope his feelings weren't hurt.

Quote of the Day

It is not difficult to deceive the first time, for the deceived possesses no antibodies; unvaccinated by suspicion, she overlooks latenesses, accepts absurd excuses, permits the flimsiest patchings to repair great rents in the quotidian.

John Updike (b. 1932)

Quote of the Day

Reunion after long separation is even better than one’s wedding night.

Chinese proverb

Quote of the Day

How can one learn to know oneself? Never by introspection, rather by action. Try to do your duty, and you will know right away what you are like.

Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe (1749–1832)

The Re-Evaluation of Self

There must come a time at the end of every relationship when you take a second look at the person you are no longer with. I have been so consumed with my new relationship and having the custody agreement formulated the way I wanted it that I allowed myself to see new and terrible things in X that weren't there. It is amazing how consumed by one's self a person can become. From the beginning I have been a very selfish person - - and as a result I have pushed away a person with whom I hoped to maintain a friendly and civil relationship. After we split X seemed like such a stranger - a completely new and undesirable person. But I am beginning to see that it was in fact I who became a stranger. I emerged as an individual who didn't give a damn about the person she spent four years with, a person who became the evil and reviled ex-wife (I could be exaggerating, but I am sure that X would agree with me to some degree).

Throughout this time that S has been gone, I have been thinking a lot about my relationship with him and the one that just ended with X. I am beginning to wonder why I am so quick to jump into another marriage. Why can't I just be alone for a while? Am I so afraid of being single? Could it be that I don't want to be a single mom - that I am afraid to raise a child by myself? Could I be afraid that I will have a hard time finding someone who will want to be a father to my child without already being a father himself and that in itself defines S's attractiveness to me? Nothing will ever bring me back together with X, but why I am so anxious to be with S so completely so soon is beginning to be of concern.

I am so happy when S is here with me, but when he is gone doubts and fears and questions creep into my heart and mind and I am not quite sure what to do with them. One thing I do know is that I will no longer treat X like crap. It's the least I could do.

But the questions linger - will I remain with S? Will the problems be resolved? Will I discover that life can be just as fulfilling alone and that being a single mother isn't the end of the world?

Stay tuned for the next posting of....

just kidding.

A Little Jealousy Never Hurt

Slick went to New York on personal business on Tuesday night and though he emphatically promised to call Wed morning to say he arrived safely, there was not a call until Thursday night. That means he missed the opportunity to wish me a Happy Divorce (WA and OR residents - these people rock.) I understood that he was busy, but it was the day we had been looking forward to the entire time of our togetherness. I was already disappointed that he was to be out of town for the big day, so the fact that he didn't call me really burned me. So when I was at Green Lake (do I go anywhere else?) on Wednesday night (DDay), I was pretty excited when a hot rollerblader approached me while I sat on a bench retying my trainers. He said he was new in the area and asked if I would like to have a drink with him, perhaps show him around the town. That was pretty lame- he found Green Lake didn't he? I respectfully turned him down - said that my boyfriend probably wouldn't like that, but got a pretty nice boost to my ego from the whole experience. So when Slick called me late last night (Thurs) we talked for a while before he finally said:

"So your divorce is final isn't it?"

"Mm hmm."

"That means you are a free woman, doesn't it? I better get home before some man tries to snap you up."

"Actually some guy tried to pick me up last night."

Silence.

"Where were you?"

"Green Lake - he was a rollerblader."

Silence.

"I am a jealous man, you know."

"I know - I respectfully declined, of course."

"If you have a thing for rollerbladers I can get a nice pair of spandex - bright green ones, and I can wear the helmet and wrist guards to bed."

I told him he was so silly and to just get his ass home. I don't know why I got so much satisfaction about creating that twinge of jealousy. Perhaps I was put off by the fact that it took him so long to call me. Perhaps it was a part of me that wanted him to know that if he doesn't shape up I have other options.

But I don't want other options- I only want Slick.

D-Day

It's final today - I am officially a divorcee - Lucky me! I have had four people including X, excluding Slick, call and congratulate me on my divorce. It's nice but really depressing that so far more people have called me today about that than called me on my birthday. I guess people are just genuinely happy for me that I have made it to Splitsville. How sad is it when you tell people you are getting a divorce and their first words are - I don't see why you married him in the first place... He was always... Or I saw better things for you...It's about time... why did you ever marry him... I never saw you two as a match... I told you you were too young... And so on. I mean I know I made a mistake - hence the divorce. So rubbing it in - really not that necessary.

My Cheeks Were Red

Yesterday was another beautiful day in Seattle. As I have said - how typical - sweltering 100 degrees Saturday, overcast and frigid Sunday and a beautifully perfect sunny 80 degree Monday. So after work I headed to Green Lake. This time I was walked around the lake sans Discman mais avec mon frere and his live-in girlfriend. They have become the shoulders I lean on in this time of transition. I can talk to them about anything, although my brother pushes his fingers into his ears and goes LA LA LA loudly anytime I get remotely near talking about anything close to sex - understandable since I wouldn't want to hear him talk about it either. But it is nice to have a couple to confide in about anything. My other friends (read: my conservative Baptist pals from the South) were shocked and dismayed at the news of my impending divorce and even more amazed at my rapid leap into the arms of another man such that the nature of our friendships has been irreparably altered.

The friends X and I shared here in Seattle were all his friends and their wives from long before we met, so with the split he inherited the friends leaving me with a very small social circle consisting of family and Slick (boyfriend). Yes, the urge to inhale large doses of Ben and Jerry's does creep up on me on those evenings when X has Bella and Slick and family are unavailable leaving me with a night to entertain myself by myself, but I am happy and have come to cherish my evenings alone - typically I spend hours playing the piano annoying my neighbors as I stumble through Moonlight Sonata or The Swan. Being self-taught leaves me far from Carnegie Hall-ready and I am sure a source of many an ear plug purchase, but it fulfills me. It was a life-long dream to own and play the piano, and there has been nothing better than realizing that dream.

But I digress....So we were walking around Green Lake in my typical counter-clockwise fashion and a couple of very attractive men went by on roller blades. I all of the sudden found myself wondering what it would be like to ask out or be asked out by one of them (it wasn't that I was interested just curious). I asked my co-walkers if they had ever tried to pick up a perfect stranger. Both admitted to the negative and inquired if I had either tried to pick up or had an attempted pick up by a stranger. I was about to say no but I remembered an occasion from a few years ago.

I said "Well, there was this one time that I was working at Crab Co (local restaurant) as a hostess and a very handsome man came in. He gave me his takeout order. When I returned with his food, he paid, leaving a sizeable tip - and his business car. He said 'I think you are just absolutely beautiful and I would love to take you out some time. Here is my card, give me a call sometime.' From his card, he was an investment banker and, by the looks of his suit and car, a very successful one too.

Joe (my brother) said "Did you ever call him?"'

"No," I said, "he was just too short for me."

Brit (his girlfriend) said, "What's wrong with that?"

I said, "I just had and have a standard that a guy has to be taller. The guy is supposed to be taller. I need to be able to wear high heels and still be shorter and at 5' 10" that is a tall (no pun intended) order." And just as I uttered those words I noticed the man walking in front of us, close enough to hear all I was saying. He was short, around 5' 5". He looked back at me to see who was so unacceptable of the shorter man and perhaps to see how tall I was. He smiled at me and shook his head. Immediately I felt mortified.

He said, "geez, no wonder-I'll never find anybody."

I tried to apologize, but the foot was firmly stuffed in my mouth, so I dug my grave a little deeper by trying to illustrate how it would never work by bending my knees until I was shorter than he. I was almost completely kneeling down - it wasn't my finest moment and probably did nothing to make the poor guy feel any better. He was cute and young too, just short, and to make matters worse, Brit is shorter than he and Joe is 6'5"(another short girl snapped up by a tall guy and a tall guy hogged by a short girl - disgusting to all of the short guys and tall girls who find such mismatches mortifying and unfair to the proper balance of the circle of life). I decided to speed up my walk a little bit and take my red cheeks with me and hope that the poor guy finds love - and soon.

Beginnings: Part II, The End is Near

Tomorrow, tomorrow. I love you tomorrow. You're only a day away!

Yes folks, tomorrow marks the day - Divorce Final Day. Tomorrow some judge in some courtroom is going to put an end to my marriage. If I feel great today, tomorrow I am sure that I will feel even better - relieved, excited, weightless, on top of the world. Or maybe I won't feel any different. Maybe it will feel the same way as turning 25 did. I already feel like I am divorced and have felt that way since I made him pack his bags, but at the same time tomorrow marks the day when the strings are officially cut. He can no longer call me his wife without putting an X in front of it, and that is wonderful in and of itself.

No regrets here, though I am jealous that my boyfriend (I hate, hate, hate that word) is working hard so that when his divorce is final, he will never have to see or hear from the Itch (wicked witch of the north [my affectionate name for his X]) again. Unfortunately I am bound to my X by a child. Now I understand how things can turn ugly with custody battles and the like. When you divorce someone it is because you no longer want to be with them and in some cases you never want to see them again. When you have a child you have to see X and talk to X, because there will always be something to deal with. Some days I just want to take my daughter and flee to Europe. But my daughter is my first priority and taking a daughter from a father who has caused no harm would be the worst possible thing I could do. All I am saying is that I can relate to the desire to do something of that nature, but you can relax, I would never do something that nutso no matter how tempting.

So even though the divorce is almost final and that provides a freedom much anticipated, I will always be bound by the ties of parenthood to X.

So I made my flight. You can figure out for yourself what made it narcissistic. I am ready to come in for a landing. My wings are clipped and I have gone as far as I can go. I have found the man of my dreams and though I will walk through the rest of my life and any subsequent relationships with the Ghost of Husband Past tied to my ankle, tomorrow marks an ending and a beginning - a new chapter (apt description no matter how hackneyed). The first half of my twenties have been so eventful - a wedding, 2 cross-country moves, graduation from college, birth of a child, a divorce, etc., etc. I have married, had a child (and no the child wasn't the reason for the marriage - she was born a year and a half into it) and divorced before most of my high school and college buddies have even thought about getting engaged. (I guess that is why so many wise people advise against young people marrying). I can't imagine what the next 5 years will bring but I am looking forward to them and whatever life changing events that come my way. I look forward to getting married again, but it scares me that I will have the same result. I don't want to be a serial marry-er a la J Lo or Ross (from Friends). But to marry once at 21 and then again at 25 (I hope)... Could I entering some weird cycle?

Whining Isn't Cool

A heat wave in Seattle - 100 degrees of miserable miserableness. Saturday was one of those days when you envy the Southerners that, even though they endure 90 degree weather and 99 percent humidity, are blessed with air conditioning in every home, and for the most part it is central air, so there is no looking at those ugly AC window boxes that enjoy stupendous sales here over weekends like the last. It was too hot to even go to the lake and swim. But alas, sans AC most homes were stifling with no respite in sight, so I decided to avoid both my house and outdoors by heading to my local grocer's freezer section. Aaah, sweet relief - and it was even a little too cold - dressed in a tank and shorts, I left frozen to the core and even enjoyed the heat of the sun when I stepped back outside, but that ended the second I got back in my SUV, which was a regular sauna. I made it through the day somehow, though and that night I slept on the floor in my living room by the open screen door because it was the only semi-cool place in the house. When I woke the next morning I decided to make use of the hot day and this time go swimming - why not endure the heat and car ride for some splashing fun? I got myself dressed in my bikini, board shorts and tank and dressed Bubba, (a nickname for my 2.5 y/o daughter [yes a product of unhappy marriage- yes one of many contributors to soap opera current state of life, which I've touched upon and may expand on later]) in her suit and terry cover-up, slathered us with sunscreen, gathered snacks, towels and a magazine pour moi. I made sure Bubba went potty and loaded myself up and went outside only to discover that it was overcast and frigid.

Typical.

Promenade

Yesterday was a beautiful day in Seattle – the kind of day that makes people forget about the 360 cloudy days of the year and remember why they moved here in the first place. The kind of day that you can’t experience in any other city in the country – okay maybe I am biased- the mountains were out (even on some sunny days the mountains can remain hidden in a far off haze), Mount Rainier was unfettered and the Seattle skyscrapers and the Space Needle all made for the picture perfect day – especially for the tourists. So because it was such a beautiful day I, and hundreds of other Seattleites descended upon Seattle’s Green Lake, a pond really, at three miles in diameter. People come to walk, jog, run, bike, roller blade, or skateboard around the lake for exercise, conversation, or just to enjoy the day. There are soccer players, volley ball enthusiasts, basket ballers, filled tennis courts and even a little rapier academy that sets up on nice days. There are families galore picnicking, playing Frisbee or catch, enjoying the wading pool or even fishing. I was just there to exercise via speed walking (not nerdily, just at a brisk pace) as I listened to the music provided by my apparently obsolete Discman (everyone is carrying the ultra-hip iPod now) and people-watch of course. I love to see the people that come out on a lovely day to walk around Green Lake. It is more varied than your average cloudy, drizzly day, when the park is populated by hard-core sporties (one of which I will be someday, I just know it). So I embarked on my walk – I always go clock-wise around the lake because the people on wheels all have to go counter-clockwise, so by going the opposite, I have double the people to see face on. I set myself a nice pace and began to look around me at the people I passed or approached. I would smile at the cute little puppies, ugly dogs and old people, I would pretend that I didn’t see the hot guys jogging sans shirt (but try not to appear snobbish by maintaining a half-smile), I would try to check out other girls’ bodies as I walked by to compare mine to theirs (it is amazing how much more eager I was to check them out than I was the guys –granted I do have an incredibly gorgeous boyfriend already, so why check any others out because they won’t compare – but I guess I wanted to see if her stomach was flatter than mine, her hips more shapely, I already know that her boobs are bigger, so I don’t even bother with those). I felt almost like a man trying to gawk without gawking. I felt the girls looking at me in the same way I looked at them and realized that we were all scrutinizing each other. Here we are trying to get in shape for ourselves and we are all sucking in our stomachs so the next girl will be jealous. I think that maybe girls are a lot harsher critics when it comes to bodies than guys will ever be and it is not that I am critiquing their bodies but rather making a comparison with mine when she is in better shape than I am because I want to have a six pack and I want my calf muscles to ripple when I jog (yeah right). But I digress, I wasn’t just checking out the girls, I was admiring the babies in strollers, the old men and their old wives, the young studs with their girlfriends, the couples linked arm-in-arm so obviously in love walking at a snail’s pace as they gaze into each other’s eyes and coo lovingly at each other (these were my favorite people because that was me and S just a few days ago).

So as I progressed I felt utterly content...that is until a bug flew in my eye. I could feel it in there and wanted to throw up. I pulled to the side and tried as hard as I could to get it out – the acrylics were no help. I couldn’t get it, so I resumed walking with the knowledge that I had a bug in my eye – a phrase that kept repeating over and over in my head. My eyes were tearing, my face distorted and I was no longer getting the looks of approval from the men that I encountered on bike or roller blade but rather of avoidance. They would glance then look away quickly. But I didn’t care about that, embarrassment was nothing compared to the most disgusting feeling (well having a roach crawl across my face in the middle of the night it, but that is a different story) of having a bug in my eye, so I sped up to a jog and made it to one of the conveniently placed restrooms and prayed there would be a mirror...there was! I rushed over and pushed my eye up close to it and pulled the bottom lid down, and there he was tucked neatly down in the bottom corner of my lid. I shuddered as I pried him out knowing that my early attempts to remove him were responsible for lodging him so deeply in my eye socket.

So trauma over, I resumed my walk. I now walked with my head tilted down slightly hoping that the brim of my hat would prevent any other such invasions of self and I tried to calculate the odds of such a thing happening again. I tried to figure out the number of gnats (millions), adding in my height (5’ 10”), rate of speed (10-15 minute mile) and thanked God I didn’t try to be a mathematician (there is a reason that word sound so close to magician) cause all those numbers meant nothing to me when added together. So I just decided that I had never had a bug in my eye before when walking around Green Lake, so maybe this experience would last me for a few more years and concentrated on my people watching and walking again. I found myself passing a woman who was walking at the same rate as I was but the length of my legs allowed me to cover a greater distance in the same amount of time, and I have tucked her into the back of my mind with all the other people that I pass had she not sped up her walk into a sort of walk/jog combo and passed me. I was in no mood to compete but part of me wondered if she was. I forgot about her for the moment as a young guy jogging through the grass with a puppy who was only a few weeks old (no more than 12) distracted me. It was such an adorable site because the puppy followed his master so adoringly, but the puppy was of the killer dog variety (which I despise, why not have a nice golden retriever if you want a big dog) so I lost myself in the vision of the dog biting some child’s arm off in a couple of years and the cuteness of the scene was lost on me as I found myself passing that woman for a second time. She seemed to speed up in attempt to thwart my passing her as she looked back out of the corner of her eye at me, but I passed her anyway. Then a few minutes later she super speed-walked past me (nerdily) and then I passed her and she passed me and I was getting so fed up with that game that I was glad when my walk was over. I never once changed my pace, but the fact that she seemed so determined to stay in front of me was infuriating and that she wore overly-tight spandex that I was more than glad to leave behind on my first passing just didn’t help matters much.

Can't it wait until you're done?

Today returning from an errand, I entered my work’s office building and saw a man about to come out of one of the other offices that share our building. I watched him go to the door, then pause, look down at the magazines sitting on a nearby table and select one. Please don’t follow me, I thought to myself. But he did, and the unfortunate thing and reason for my hope is that the only place for him to be going, if he followed me, was the bathroom- we are the only other office in that direction. So as I got to our door, I did a little half-turn (why? Morbid curiosity, I suppose) and saw him entering the bathroom with said magazine folded under his arm. I couldn't help but laugh as I walked in. I wanted to tell co-workers but feared that the humor in the idea of a man reading a magazine in a public restroom stall would be lost on them. Maybe I am the only one who doesn't understand it.

Will someone please explain to me, who in his right mind would find the idea of reading in a public restroom pleasing? Hello! I just want to get in, do my business and move on to other things, but he seemed like he was ready to settle in there and maybe have a siesta if the mood struck. I know that people all over the country enjoy reading while on the “throne,” but I was not aware of those that do so publicly. Now I will admit to reading All in a Day’s Work from an 8 year old issue of that Reader’s Digest that’s on the back of everyone’s toilet now and again, but I will only do so in the comfort of a home, where there is no possibility of other people coming in to do their business at the same time. I don’t know why I pick up that magazine, sometimes the urge just hits me. But the idea of just hanging out in a stall at work reading that same article seems a bit absurd.

I don’t know about you, but I don’t have an appreciation for doing my business with other people around and I certainly don’t enjoy serving as their audience (if only from an auditory perspective), so why would I want to elongate the process?

Why is it that people feel the need to read in the bathroom in the first place? Is it really an activity that necessitates outside entertainment? My little brother used to spend hours reading his books in there. My mom would take the Sunday papers with her. What about number two makes people desire mental stimulation? And why can’t it wait for us to be done. Why do people linger? Really, why hang out?

I would love to know what people get from the "reading on the toilet" experience.

It's My Party

I just celebrated with my co-workers - they went all out, beer, wine, chips, dips, cheese and cheesecake, usually the birthday person just gets a cake. Maybe they feel guilty for all of the phone calls they pass along to me that they don't want to make themselves - such as the one to the CEO of a company to make sure that it is in fact his direct line (what was I supposed to say - uh is this you, k just checking). It must be nice to be able to pass stuff off to the little guy. I am the end of the line. I don't get to pass off the annoying, backbone testing chores to some poor, underworked, bored administrative assistant who resents that the only work passed her way is the stupid stuff that no one else wants to do because that poor soul is me.

I have never had a job on my birthday before. I went to school - had summers off, had a baby and didn't work till she turned one, then got fired in June and didn't work till last September. I have never even worked through a summer before, so you can gather that I have never had a job for more than a year. This will be my first - if I can stick it out - but argh! the boredom is killing me. Hence the blog. I have been reading them for months, figured I like to write meaningless so and so like the best of them, and have forty hours a week to burn through so why not?

So needless to say, this was my first daytime co-worker birthday party. It was great. I stuffed myself on cheesecake and Minute Maid Lemonade while listening to shopper insight talk (I work for a marketing research firm) and frequent flyer perk conversations. I wasn't much of a contributor. It is so awkward to sit in a room with all of those people and try to be social. I am the Honey-do member of the team, so I don't get to hang around with them too much during the day - I am relegated to my post, whereas the rest of them wander freely, stopping by his or her desk for a little chat about the baby or the hockey game. I just get to see them as they go to and come back from the bathroom - and that just isn't a chatty time for most people.

Just as I thought

This morning I watched the sunrise on my 25th birthday and realized that 25 feels no different from 24, in fact it feels suspiciously like 24 - could it be a conspiracy?

Relax, it's a manicure

Since when did pampering yourself become sheer torture? I know that some routes to beauty are supposed to be painful – waxing, plucking, facelifts – but a manicure? Since when is getting your nails done supposed to involve an hour of torment? Perhaps doing so in one of those strip mall shanties is just asking for it. I liken my experience to going to the dentist after not flossing for a really long time. The hygienist gets to dig at my gums with a sharp metal thing scraping away at my teeth in theory, but in reality more just torturing me. You would think they would try to avoid the gums, but no, they just poke that metal thing right down there and jab away – torture. But it is also torture that I have come to expect from going to the dentist. If I flossed like I was supposed to, I wouldn’t have to endure such agony, so I deserve the punishment and the resultant abused and bleeding gums. But I know that I didn’t do anything wrong to deserve the beating my fingers endured last night. See the whole reason I went to get my nails done was to have a fun, little outing with my sister (we don’t do stuff just the two of us too often – it’s an oil and water thing), so naturally I wasn’t expecting pain and misery when I stepped into the little shop. Now for those of you rich people who can afford going to one of those ritzy joints that offer you tea and soothing music, let me tell you this wasn't it. We walk in and there are two people lounging in front of a television blaring a baseball game. They look over at us, but make no move to welcome us or even stand up. It wasn't until sister reminded them that we had an appointment that they made any movement to treat us like customers (so much for the "walk-ins welcome" sign. Fortunately for me, they didn’t speak English well, so any questions resulted in a nodded head from my side and a puzzled look from theirs. Maybe the torture was a punishment for my inability to understand. The woman who sat in front of me at the nail station looked innocent enough, but deep down inside she must have some traces of evil, or maybe not deep down inside because she seemed to take pleasure in the pain I was clearly experiencing, each time I winced or flinched and my hand jerked to escape the pain, she merely cooed and smiled to herself. She first took a lovely sander with which to rough up the nails in readiness for the acrylics and was nice enough to rough up the cuticles for me as well. Very kind lady. That is where the dentist comparison comes in. The scrapey thing is fine and dandy on the teeth, but watch out if they start going to town on the gums, and so goes with the sander- heaven help me and my poor nail beds. So I flinched and winced my way through the sanding process and thought it was done as she attached the tips and applied that mystery stuff that turns into hard nails, but then came the buffing process. She took a little 4-d rectangle that was covered in sandpaper and set about attacking each nail. Oh the pain! She banged down on each nail with this lovely devise of torture as if with a hammer while sweeping to the side to polish – so it was bang, sweep, bang sweep (kind of like a hard smash then drag the nail to the side - try it on your nails a couple of times- push down really hard on your nail and then push it to the side and imagine that happening again and again without reprieve for your already tortured nails) in rapid succession again and again on each nail. It seems like it would never end. It wasn’t even so much this new pain of the bang and sweep that bothered me, but the fact that it accompanied the old pain from the sander, because she was nice enough to include my cuticles in the bang and sweep process – sandpapering away at the raw sores that I had hoped were to be left alone for the rest of the evening. When the torture was over – after another go with the electric sander, which this time wore the cloth buffer (didn’t make it any less painful), I paid up and gave the lady a five dollar tip. What was I thinking? I have never paid for pain in my life, and here I give a 20% tip to this, this spawn of Satan. My fingers were swollen from the bang and sweep, my cuticles were bleeding, and to top it off there were bubbles and a speck of dirt in the acrylics – just lovely, and here I go and give 5 of my hard-earned dollars away. I began to think that maybe that was all a part of her plan. Torture, instill fear, reap money from the weak – as easy as 1, 2, 3.

Beginning: Part 1

Did you ever get the suspicion that your life has taken on a certain soap opera quality? Okay so I haven’t just discovered that my husband was actually my long lost twin or anything freakish like that, but for a girl who thought her life was somewhat normal, the truth is creeping in – Okay well I never really believed that my life was normal. I just wanted other people to think it was. And hey, if I can convince people that I had a happy childhood or a great marriage, then really I should be President of the United States of America, or at least work for him (or someday her?) [isn’t that what politicians and their trusty sidekicks do – take the bad and twist it so "hey everything looks great doesn’t it?"]. I am great at giving the impression that things are a lot rosier than the darkness and despair (read: bad dad and bad sex {don’t combine the two, people!}) that truly lingers (oh c’mon it wasn’t that bad). Read on.

Tomorrow is my 25th birthday. I’m sure I won’t feel different, does anyone ever? I am hoping to be proposed to tomorrow, and the funny thing is – I am still married and feeling a little like J-Lo or more appropriately her other half oh I can never remember his name – he always reminds me of a rat for some reason – he is so skinny and little. I just don’t get that he has sex appeal, he certainly doesn't appeal to me. Anyway he had to wait for his divorce to be final before he could get married again – he even hurried it up by traipsing down to some Caribbean courthouse, and here I am the conservative Baptist who doesn’t believe that divorce is right (but wait there’s more!) tapping her watch in anticipation of an approaching end of marriage decree from some judge who must get a little burned out ending so many marriages. Or maybe you don’t get burned out, maybe the knowledge that you are ending someone’s misery is satisfying. I can’t decide.

I am convinced that if I were the/a divorce-signing judge I would have the hardest time not turning into the GOSSIP QUEEN of the UNIVERSE. Take that scandal with Jeri Ryan and her senator wannabe husband (why can’t I remember men’s names today?. I'm sitting there in my mahogany clad office reading reports of a scumball dragging his wife to odd sex clubs and wanting public intercourse and all that, how could I keep it quiet? Sealed, my ass. I’d be taking it down to Access Hollywood. Reason #1 that Blythe is not a judge (maybe I will explore that later because I am certainly judgmental, so you’d think that there might be a few reasons why I should become a judge (or is that just stupid? No need, I already know)).

Not everyday will be like today.