clickmom

TURKEY

I had a nice (despite matt-less) thanksgiving.  I kind of cancelled it because I'm feeling a tad overwhelmed and a bit bitchy on top, so I only invited pal and his husband.  (naturally)  For the first time ever I had everything prepared before hand and sat down around 2 o'clock to enjoy the appetizers before dinner when the phone rang.  It was my utopian neighbor calling to say that they saw our car in the driveway and wanted to wish us a happy thanksgiving before heading off to the local restaurant (where only the old people who remember that the place used to be a good place to eat and not the current dive it is now) go.  Remembering that someone, possibly the sentry, got food poisoning there last summer, and thinking that going to a restaurant alone that used to be a good place to eat 20 years ago was just about the saddest thing I had ever heard of I talked it over with the husband and called the neighbors back to insist that they come to our house for thanksgiving dinner.  It wasn't really an issue since I could have invited the Duggars had their bus had a flat outside my house because I cook like that whether I have 6 people or 36 coming over, so there was plenty food.

Also, the neighbor is movie theater discount ticket eligable and we all know how I feel about senior citizens.  Not being related to any living old people I like to find others to sit in and be around for the kids.  They need to learn to respect their elders! 

Typically the husband's brother deep fries a turkey so I figured I'd just use the over this year.  But Evan protested and I told him if he wanted a fried turkey he'd have to go to the store and buy a fryer.  Guess who owns a fryer now!  We got an indoor fryer and it was a beautiful thing.  I think we'll be enjoying fried turkey more often than once a year now.  We'll have it at least twice! 

Speaking of multiple turkey consumptions I had turkey leftovers for the third time for dinner tonight and am happy to say that the next turkey I will be eating will be the very fine left overs from the freezer which I packed up for some future dinner after the real Thansgiving dinner Thursday night.

I was going to make turkey nachos, but I got that idea after I had done most of my shopping and wasn't goign to shop any more.  Next year!

Tub

One of the many things I really do miss about my stepford house is my old bathtub. It was huge. And by huge I mean there was a short time when Josh was a little baby that I could climb in there with the three kids and it wasn't even crowded. By huge I mean we had a second hot water heater installed so we could fill the tub all the way. Yeah. That was an awesome tub. I could really use that tub right now. I made the critical mistake of buying a bag of potatoes at Costco and thinking is make zillions of latkes and freeze some for another day. Five hours of grating and frying later I still have more than enough potatoes left over to make mashed potatoes for tomorrow and the rest of the week too.

It was Chanukah tonight. Sad without Matt and kind of sucky that the kids have outgrown the thrill of it all. Personally, I'd prefer to just skip all gift giving holidays. I have a huge bag of gelt and we forgot to play dreidel. Whoops. Tomorrow I'll have the smallest Thanksgiving gathering since Evan had swine flu and we had to cancel. It rained all day and now the outside is a sheet of ice. I'm worried that I'm going to wipe out.

A flock of geese just flew over. Don't they know winter is here already? Go south, geese !!

faces

I finally skyped with Matt yesterday and got to see his face for the first time in over two months.  I've been posting adorable (but possibly embarrassing) photos of Matt on facebook threatening to find the nudies if he didn't manage to skype me.  He accused me of just having fun with the photos and he was right.  I'm not one for framing photos all around the house or even having organized photo albums but I sure did enjoy sifting through unorganized boxes of the old photos looking for that one shot of Matt in first grade when he came home with a paper "native american" loin cloth and head band when his class was talking about thanksgiving and promptly stripped off his 20th century american clothes to give us an authentic interpretation.  It's in there somewhere.  One of these days I'll get to it.

Another thing I discovered about myself during my skype with Matt is that I sure do have an ugly cry face.  Yes, I couldn't hold back the tears of happiness.  Even though, shockingly,  I look like an old haggard sharpei when I cry, I just had to let the tears flow.  I couldn't hold back.  They were happy tears.   Through my tears I just begged Matt to start talking, and truthfully, I didn't even care what he said I just wanted to see his face and hear his voice even though the not quite right timing of a skype from Russia makes your kid look like he's been voiced over by someone who sounds just like him.  I decided to never cry in front of people without cloaking my face again.  

I'm scheduled to donate blood tomorrow.  It's something that makes me feel like a secret hero because I like to imagine my blood going to a kid or an incredible human being/ beloved member of a huge family crying in gratitude in the waiting room and being saved the last pint of blood in the entire hospital, which was mine. (flair for the dramatic anyone?)  The American Red Cross auto dialed my cell phone to remind me of my appointment and at the end it said "Thank you for giving the gift of life."  What a stab in the heart!  And now all the people driving south bound on my street this morning got to see my sharpei face too. 

feeling groovy

I told my new friend Liz I'd go to a yoga class with her at the Y.  It was an 8:30 class, so it was a little bit of a rush getting there.  I had to dash up to the fields with bear bait as soon as the husband drove Ev to school and hope he remembered that it is his day to drive Josh too.  I gave bear bait her quickie walk and drove her eye watering stinky self to the dog groomer. Then I got to the Y, where the front desk ladies were not only refreshingly happy to see me, but keen on referring to me by first name thanks to the computer screen flashing my name when I scanned my Y card to get in.   I told the  front deskers I was goign to take my first yoga class with y friend Liz, who they reported had not come through the front entrance yet, and they told me where the yoga class room was.  I paused to text my friend Liz, and let her know I'd meet her in the room with two nice discreet back of the room spots saved for us.

Just then the front desk lady told me the yoga instructor had just walked in and she introduced us and we walked together to the room, where the yoga instructor commenced teaching her qigong class, I was kind of embarrassed to leave, and curious about qigong, so I stayed.

Now Liz was running super late on her end and she burst into the yoga room 15 minutes after it started and scanned the room confused as to why I wasn't in the corner saving her a discreet space, when the real yoga instructor told her to come and stand in the space right behind her.

We met up in the lobby afterwards and went to grab a coffee.  Poor Liz felt so bad she bought my coffee.  I'm not sure why , but I thanked her for the coffee anyway.  Then my dentist called and asked me to come in today instead of tomorrow.  But I had few mintes, so I went to Liz's house first and played with her new puppy a little.  

I was so happy by the time I got to the dentist that I entertained everyone with stories (yoga/qigong and more) even when I was biting down on the cotton for five minutes while my new crown cement set.  They loved me so much that the dentist said she had to hug me before I left and everyone called out for me to have great Thanksgiving on my way out the door.

Which is kind of a pity because I was thinking about finding a new dentist.  I'm just not convinced this dentist will make all the fake teeth in my future pretty enough.

Then I came home and got all alarmed when bear bait didn't greet me  at the door (she died!) all freaked out because I couldn't find her (someone locked her out of the house and she ran away!) and then I remembered I had left her at the groomer and was an hour late to pick her up.

I sped down to the groomer and crossed my fingers that bear bait would end up shaved or stubby tailed and much to my happy surprise she came out fresh smelling and perfectly coiffed! 

 

Whoo!

I feel like I might die if Matt doesn't come home soon.  He's been great about texting and emailing me but I need more of a multi sensory experience.  Like hugging and touching.  (And in the case of me, sobbing, crying and screaming because that's how happy I'm going to be to see him in December)

I participated in an American Cancer Society Prevention Study today.  I gave some blood and answered a boat load of questions and they are going to freeze my blood until a day that I tell them I have cancer and then they are going to defrost my blood and look for some kind of genetic markers for the kind of cancer I have.  I always feel pretty freaking healthy when I fill out those health questionnaires because I don't take any prescription medicine or have any conditions worse than allergies.  When they list the diseases and medicines I want to run and hide.  Hopefully that is not my future!  Gotta get back on the bike! I figure this round of testing won't help my generation but I have my fingers crossed for the kids.  I don't want cancer to happen to them.

My synesthetic self finds the new Toyota commercial where they keep shouting "WHOO!" (smells like a dark wet dripping with moisture stank stale urine filled tunnel, I grew up in NYC folks, I know that smell)  to be THE most annoying commercial in all of television land.  This commercial makes me want to drive my own personal Toyota into a field and light it on fire.  If they only knew.  I pray that commercial reverses sales and they take it off the air stat.  It's absolutely unbearable.

 

 

keister stuff

I couldn't figure out the exact sensation in my arse that is still lingering from the shiatsu marching squiggle toed lady.  Then it hit me, the feeling is BRUISED!  So I've been slathering my seat in arnica.  Hopefully I'll wake up without being tangled in the heating pad I've been using to sooth my bum and with a whole new perspective on the pleasures of sitting tomorrow morning.

I did brave the expresso bike today. Really the intial settle in period was ugly but once I began my ascent up the first hill all the pain was in my quads.  I was oblivious to my seat.

I did have a brilliant idea (not) during my trip to the weight lifting room.  I put a pad on the vibe plate and pretended to do some ab work but really was trying to vibrate the ache out of my caboose.  This was before I decided the feeling down there was bruise.  I look forward to the day when I don't think about my gluteus maximus every 15 seconds.

not into the woods

I'm starting to brew some serious nervousness about my next foray into grad school, which is coming up right after Thanksgiving.  My advisor, (Who I am so thankful I got for his directness and helpfulness and ease of talking to) is the new guy and the powers that be are not keeping him in the loop, so my group is not in the loop, and consequently we are all feeling rather un-directed in certain areas other than our immediate work and I suspect that THE director of the program, is not happy about not knowing what is going on in the new guy's group and now he has asked us to bring an unedited version of our work to the next session so he can see it all and possibly re-edit.  WTF???   I say, SERIOUSLY???  Because the thing is that our work is all in a drop box files that he could have dipped into any time he wanted and our crits are all skyped, which he could have listened in on or participated in if he had been concerned about his lack of input before the last second!  

PPPFFFTTTT.

My biggest goal between now and then is not get tied up in knots over this.  The last thing I need, ever, is get myself as anxious as I was going into our first session in August.  Seriously, the last thing.

The first thing I need however, is to win the lottery STAT because instead of printing this morning (which I had every intention of doing until I was not able to download the right driver for my new paper)  I've been drooling over medium format digital cameras on the B&H website.  I'd need about 40K to set myself up.  Hahaha.  A dollar and a dream, right? I'm in it to win it.  The day I win the lottery I am doing three things.  1. Go to the lottery office.  2. Go to B&H.  3. Make sweet image love with my new digital medium format camera.

In the mean time, my arse is so sore from being marched on yesterday that I have to hold it while walking around the house.  This should be an interesting day.  I did not walk bear bait this morning (or yesterday) because her mysterious limping came back.  I have guilt because she's been licking her paw for almost a week and I walked her anyway, even getting lost in the woods and walking her for an hour and half on Friday.  She just can't walk like she used to.  It's so hard that the fuzzy love balls age faster than we do.  I miss the girl who would go on a three hour walk with me, especially now that I've discovered the woods.  

did it for the toes

So, my friend suggested I try some shiatsu for my back problems which are lighting up my toe still.  It isn't as bad as it was because I've been to the newtown chiro three times this week, but he isn't the miracle worker my old chiro was and truthfully, I'm thinking of looking around for a new one again.  The one thing holding me back is that I found out that this less effective chiro has a huge bird attracting picture window AND a killer cat, AND that he took photos of pretty bird victims of either one, and would be willing to toss them into a bag and bring them to work for me to pick up!!  I can do a whole other series called "Cats kills!"  If only spring was closer! 

Anyways, back to shiatsu.  I didn't really know what it was and assumed it was just some other kind of massage.   I called and made an appointment, and went over there this morning.  The little lady led me to a room and I slid my clothes off and got inbetween the sheets on the strangely wide but nice and warm heated massage table.  I gazed up to wonder why there were parallel bars attached to the ceiling.  When the little lady reentered the room I asked what the bars were for and she told me they were for her to hold onto and instructed me to roll onto my front.  Then she got on the table and started to step on me.  Holy mother of all that is terrifying.  It was painful and frightening.  And I was trying to convince myself that I should relax myself and not tense up.   I tried to distract myself by imagining how I was going to describe the event, the gymnastic equipment on the ceiling,  the pain, the terror, the heat from the table reducing me to a sweaty blob and then the feeling of her toes digging into me like sharpened falcon  talons and then the worst thing happened.  I cracked myself up.  I just burst out laughing and I couldn't stop.  The little lady stopped and asked if I was okay but I could barely answer.  She waited me out and then started marching all over me again and then she did some Irish Clog Daancing on my butt and I supplied the music (horn section) you can use your imagination.  She said it was normal.  Then somewhere around her second trip up to my shoulders I lost it again and broke up into another giggle fit.  She waited again.

After she dismounted she said that it was not unusual for her clients have strong emotional reactions.  She said that they always cry though and that I was the only one ever to laugh.  She said she thought it was better to laugh, but I'm not sure if I heard the conviction in her voice.

I'm on the fence about wether to go back for another round or not. I have to wait to see what my toes think.

check in

Been in a serious funk today.  Spent an hour last night on the phone with my dear old friend Bab, who has stage 4 cancer and the chemo does not seem to be doing anything other than making him sick.  

Also, it's my Dad's birthdya and even though I keep mentioning that to the kids I'm not sure they understand how freaking sad that makes me.  I'm really sad.

I was a little worked up this morning because I had some kind of painful bump right near that spot of "irregular cells" (not cancer) I had removed back in 2007, and I was on my way to the dermatologist to have it looked at.  She declared my painful spot a cyst, (thankfully not "irregular cells" or straight out cancer) whom I shall name Cy, and proceded to give Cy an injection of steroids to make him (oh, this one is male for sure, hurts like an SOB) shrink.  She said sometimes they shrink for years and sometimes they come right back, which makes me wonder why I don't just have Cy removed.  I think I'd prefer to remove him now rather than a birthday or two from now since it seems to me like my pain threshold is lowering as fast as my courage, which is pretty damned fast.  I think Cy is subsiding.  I can't check right now because I'm sitting on the couch next to Evan and checking Cy might appear to be a lewd action.  No need to give my offspring another reason for psychotherapy! 

Luckily , since I left the skin doc's office stitch free I was able to go kick some button the expresso bike.  It's funny because every time I get on that bike I think I'm not refreshed and won't be able to give 100% and then I end up with a great time because I HAVE TO RUN DOWN EVERY BIKER ON THE COURSE.  I wonder if all that maniacal laughing is really staying in my head.  It seems like people turn to watch me leave the room when I'm done.  Hmmmm.

I didn't lift weights becuase I am a little unnerved by the stabbing toe pain.  I haven't had an episode since going to the chiro yesterday but I did get a pain stab (this had nothing to do with the dermatologist) in the opposite butt cheek while driving this morning.  I'm sure it's all coming from my back.  This morning's stab was vaguely reminiscent of sciatica which I haven't had the pleasure of in a long time and am very fine with that.

Then I had another advisor skype conference and I loved every thing he had to say, except I'm getitng to a point where the advice is less concrete and more theoretical, so I have to sit down with my notes and do some good thinking about how to keep on going with this domestic narrative because it is coming to the end.  sigh.  It was a very satisfying first project.  I'm proud of it.

 

 

still here

For one weird second tonight I thought bear bait had "left us" right in the middle of the family room floor.  You see we were eating and she wasn't right at our feet drooling and whining, which was refreshing and I am not comlaining by a long stretch,  but a nice peaceful dinner hasn't happened in our house in the last 9 years, so the absence of begging was quite frightening.  I turned around to see bear bait all curled into a ball on the rug and asked the family if anyone could see her breathing.  Thankfully, she snored and rolled over just then, much to my relief, and she really woke up about two minutes later just in time to lick up my last grains of rice from my plate.  Woa.  

Also, speaking of bear bait, her foot is bothering her again.  She isn't limping yet but she is licking and licking it until there is a big drooly wet puddle where ever she is laying.  I know it hurts her, but I don't know what to do about it.  I wish I was still in stepford so I could bring her to my old chiro.  I'm sure he could fix her.

Speaking of chiropractors, I went to the dude I occasionally use here because I have been experiencing this freaky jolt of sharp electrical 5 second pain in the middle toe of my left foot.  It doesn't sound like gout or Morton's Nueroma, (Hello doctor google) but it does sound like what other people experienced when their backs were out and they didn't realize it yet.  New chiro said my back was all "locked up" and also he yanked on my toes until they popped.  No middle toe lightning strikes since seeing him this afternoon.  Fingers crossed.  I'll be going back Wednesday and Friday, just to be sure.  It's embarrassing to cry out in pain in public.  It seriously hurt that much whenever it hurt.

Tomorrow I have another skype conference with my advisor.  I'm really looking forward to it.  I'm also looking forward to wrapping up the domestic narrative I've been working on , except for one problem, which is that I don't have any idea where I am going to go once this is done.  Also, we are doing another intensive 10 day class gathering session and I'd rather go into there with one big polished body of work and not two unfinished bodies of work, so I guess I will persevere for the next month (at least).  I would love to know what the other advisors think about my work.  I guess I'll find out next month.