Twinkle Little Star

Bouncy Bitchy Bullet Blogging

• Ebbs and Flows. The first six months of parenting were torture, the next year and a half was relatively smooth sailing, the last six months have sucked ass, but I think the tide is receding and it is getting fun (and slightly less messy) again. I have a feeling this will be the pattern for the next 20 years.
• His and Hers surgeries. D and I are both up for surgeries in the near future. D is having his next Tuesday. He is getting his medtronic infusion pump replaced before he starts beeping (literally, it beeps after seven years and if you don't replace it, you just have a beep emanating from your stomach. It is a little hard to explain to airport security.) I have the return of my friend, the kidney stone. The same one they couldn't get to seven years ago (seven again. A pattern?). They removed the big ping pong ball one and said to come back when this one reached ping pong ball sized. I think we are on the verge. The challenge? Can I figure out what to do with my kids before I keel over in pain? Right now the pain is livable and comes and goes, but it is increasing. The race is on! But I hope to make it until after Christmas. Who wants to come stay with my kids for a week? Anyone? Anyone? I have a fast Internet connection and cable! And I promise you'll probably only have to clean up two or three disastrous messes in any given week. Huh? The Northwest in January? The cold and stormy gray Pacific? Doesn't that sound inviting?
• Belated Trick or Treat. I forgot to blog about Halloween. We had a fun week. Naim was a Thomas Train (or was it Aaron?) and the other one? was a firetruck. We went to two Halloween parties that were okay, but trick-or-treating was really fun. I didn't think they would get into it and I thought they'd be shy, but after they figured out the pattern (pattern = talking to strangers will get you candy) they loved it. Naim talked up a storm to every one we met. We only went to about 10 houses before I lost my motivation to walk at twin speed and they had enough candy, but next year I'm sure we will be able to go longer.
• Antecedent ->Behavior->Consequence. If I could figure out how to do it, I would give D a big box of foresight for Christmas...because he has none. None. No ability to estimate how long something might take, what contingencies may occur, and what consequences will happen when you choose to do Choice A as opposed to Choice B or C. It is seriously like that part of your brain that monitors time is missing. And that part of your brain that can foresee what will happen next? Gone. I don't know what happened to it. Was it ever there? Did it get knocked out of him in the accident? He will seriously sit there and tell me at 4:30 that yes, he is coming over at 5:30 after he makes three phone calls, puts up a sale on ebay, has his bath aide come over and help him shower, feeds the cat, charge his wheelchair, and waits for his dad to drop something off. Like in all seriousness. He seems to have no clue that he just promised to do 3 and a half hours worth of stuff in under an hour. He seems to have no means to guide him to reality in what he can actually commit to. And don't get me started on the pictures. The professional pictures he wanted to take this summer, but when I made the appointment (for two weeks later) he seemed startled that I had done it when it came upon him, before he got his hair cut, got new glasses, and cleaned up his wheelchair. So we went by ourselves and I got pictures of the kids. He wanted to try again, so I said, ok, made the appointment again. Got mine and the kids' hair cut, gave everyone baths and washed the nice matching clothes for everyone. Including D. I asked him 2 weeks ago if the pants he was going to wear fit over his prosthetic leg. Yes. You've worn them? Yes. Do you want me to help you try them on? No. They are big enough, he says. Until 15 minutes until we are supposed to leave. He calls me. Uh, they don't fit. He is stuck in them and can't get them off and has no other pairs clean to wear. We end up having to cancel. After I got everyone up early and bathed and cleaned and shiny and even (gasp!) straightened my hair and put on make-up. Made sure the kids didn't get food or god knows what on their clothes. Does he know how hard it is to get the stars and planets to align to make that happen? And can he align a few stars for himself? Not a clue.
• That's way too long of a bullet point. So I'll say it again. Foresight. Is that bottled somewhere? Can I get it at Walmart? Amazon? Really. How does one live without it? Okay, I'm done with that, now.
• More than being a man in a skirt.When I was young, my mother used to use the line, "just wait until you have children..." And she was right. I do understand a lot of things better now that I have children. And one of the things I am discovering is that 75% of what I learned from her about women's issues and feminism is entirely false. Not in a "She was so wrong" way. More in a "Our understanding of how the patriarchy works has evolved a lot from back then when she was forced to "pass" to get a shot at a career." But that is a post I've got percolating in my head that won't take to bullet points.
• Points. Points. Points. Here I come. I blew WW for the last several weeks. I've started again.
• Dioramaggedon. My webuddy, John Scalzi, is killing me this week with a funny post about the Creation Museum. Several months ago, someone dared him to go visit it because it is a few hours drive from where he lives. He didn't want to go. So people offered to pay him. Then he said he'd go but only if people donated a collective total of $500 to an organization that supported separation of church and state. He ended up getting over $5000 in donations. (He has just a few more readers than I do, I'm sure.) So he went, and made a slide show and a post about it, but best of all...now he is having a lolcat photo captioning contest about it that is just cracking D and I up. Go check it out if you're bored.
• I Could Respond If My Head Weren't Exploding. This is not directed at anyone here or online, but I just have to get this off my chest. If you are going to compare homeschoolers joking around about snarky comments they dream of saying to strangers who make judgmental drive-by comments about homeschooling with being white and not having a safe place to make black jokes? Even if it was "just a metaphor" and not what you truly believe? Then I cannot even form words to even respond to that it is so asinine. The stupid? It burns.
• Big Misogyny, Small.... And another thing that has to escape my mind into the ether that is not directed at anyone here. If you are going to mock some courageous and hard-working women who you saw training in Marine boot camp on TV, imitating their high-pitched hoorahs and how funny their little delicate bodies look while they hold their big, manly guns? Well, then I don't think you really understand the principles on which this country is founded that your precious marines purport to defend. And the follow-up with the backhanded compliment about how now that there is a woman space shuttle pilot so we can't make fun of women drivers anymore? I know you mean well, but just give yourself a little nudge, a teeny weeny push into the 21st century. Read a book by a woman instead of misogynistic overzealous military generals. Look around and see that women have been basically kicking the asses of men for the last 20 years in education, salary increases, upward mobility, etc. while still being forced to raise the next generation and clean up after the menz. You should be on your knees, thanking those women marines for being willing to serve and basically volunteer to help clean up this mess that all the rich white dudes created. That is all.
• Noodlebugs. God! Blogs are for Bitchin' aren't they? I'm just spewing all over the place here. I need a bucket and a mop! That wasn't my intention. My intention was to say, hey! Despite these annoyances, things are better! The kids are happy and fun and doing great. I do feel like we are perhaps moving into a bit of an easier patch where we have a good routine down and have balanced my changing the environment to them following the rules. The work is exhausting still and I am still perpetually behind, but I really enjoy my kids every day. They are so funny! Every morning, Naim has to get his sillies out. He runs all over and wriggles around like a nutball and then he suddenly freezes. I have to ask him, "Are you all out of sillies? I think I see some more!" This causes him to wiggle into a fit of giggles and start running around and wiggling all over again. We have to do that about 10 times. Aaron is all into space shuttles and space ships and rockets and UFOs. Anything, and I mean ANYTHING, turns into a rocket that has to count down and be blasted off. They say rockets and dinosaurs and vehicles are the gateway drugs to science careers. He obsesses over all three so perhaps he will really get into science. We'll see. He is getting so fun to talk to, now. He even is telling me things that I don't know. Today he told me he played with dominoes with Jose. This was from the gym daycare. He told me a thing that happened in the past, while I wasn't there. I didn't even know he knew what dominoes are. We don't have any here. When I went to pick them up, they were both in full conversation mode with the daycare folks. Just chatting about all kinds of things. I think it is so cool that they have relationships outside of me. They are expanding their world.
• No white, english speaking, middle class, christian, average-acheiving male Child Left Behind. I read an article in US News about NCLB. It was the stupidest article ever. It was like, with a straight journalisticy reporty face, all "gee, kids who don't speak native English are not doing well on English standardized tests. All the schools with  a predominant ESL population are not meeting the NCLB standards. What SHOOOOOUUUUULD be done? Oh, perhaps punishing the schools and teachers with more negative consequences will help. Yeah! Lets take their funding, their special programs for ESL kids, and their autonomy away and replace it with a standardized English/eurocentric national curriculum. That will teach those ESL kids to do better on those English Anglo-Saxon luvin' standardized tests!" That article was like reading about how to fix your air conditioning by bludgeoning it repeatedly with a sledgehammer, then when that doesn't work--your next big idea is to go turn up your furnace.
• ¿Lengua materna? ¿Sabe usted Cherokee? Okay, now I quickly reverted to bitchy-spewy mode, didn't I? But that reminds me of another thing. A couple of weeks ago D got one of those stupid forwarded email things from the Relative-Who-Shall-Remain-Nameless-But-Who-Has-Violently-Different-Views-than-He-Does. The email itself was praising some jackass that was having a hissy fit because some Mexican restaurant owner had a flag-pole and dared to put the Mexican Flag above the American one. Well, that was bad enough, but what really got me wasn't the main gist of the email, it was the senders forwarding comment. It said something to the effect of, "This reminds me of how annoyed I get when I have to push "1" on the ATM for English (as opposed to Spanish)." I shouldn't be shocked about this kind of stuff, but I always am. Someone is such a hater, such a petty person, such a small-minded individual that pushing "1" for English is bothersome? Really? Is it so hard? Is it such an affront to your white American ass? I had never, ever thought about ATMs having Spanish and pushing 1 for English except to say, cool. Spanish for Spanish speakers. You know, the Latinos that have been here since before the 1400s? The ones who were here before the Europeans? The ones who owned Most of Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and California before we destroyed them? And their progeny who come up here and who work their asses off doing all of our crap work? Yeah, those people shouldn't be able to deposit their paycheck. uh uh. Again, the stupid? It burns and burns and burns.
• Welbutrin: $50, Psychotherapy: $150, Surgery to reconstruct imploding head: $500,000, Blogging: Priceless. Okay, so there seems to be a theme here. Which is, in between surgeries and having fun with my kids and totally loving homeschooling and laughing my ass off at the creation museum and all the other fun stuff we are doing...I've dealt with several incidences of assholery this week. But the good news is, I didn't even go off on them and lose my temper and tact! I just politely stated my opinion or in some instances, just left the situation. And thought to myself, oh! but this is all gettin' blogged. That's the only way I can pull off nice sometimes, is to blog it later on. I know, I should pay all of you a therapy fee for reading this.

I'm probably the only one who thinks this is funny.

Someday I will go off on my rant about how the study of "Economics" as a "Science" at the University level is a total crock of fascist shit that  has the singular goal of turning young accounting majors into cult capitalist Stepford drones. But for now, I present to you what I found when doing a search for "training pants" on Amazon:

The 2007-2012 Outlook for Toilet Training Pants in Greater China (Paperback)
by Philip M. Parker

Our Price: $495
Number of pages: 139

Book Description
This study covers the latent demand outlook for toilet training pants across the regions of Greater China, including provinces, autonomous regions (Guangxi, Nei Mongol, Ningxia, Xinjiang, Xizang - Tibet), municipalities (Beijing, Chongqing, Shanghai, and Tianjin), special administrative regions (Hong Kong and Macau), and Taiwan (all hereafter referred to as “regions”). Latent demand (in millions of U.S. dollars), or potential industry earnings (P.I.E.) estimates are given across some 1,100 cities in Greater China. For each major city in question, the percent share the city is of the region and of Greater China is reported. Each major city is defined as an area of “economic population”, as opposed to the demographic population within a legal geographic boundary. For many cities, the economic population is much larger that the population within the city limits; this is especially true for the cities of the Western regions. For the coastal regions, cities which are close to other major cities or which represent, by themselves, a high percent of the regional population, actual city-level population is closer to the economic population (e.g. in Beijing). Based on this “economic” definition of population, comparative benchmarks allow the reader to quickly gauge a city’s marketing and distribution value vis-à-vis others. This exercise is quite useful for persons setting up distribution centers or sales force strategies. Using econometric models which project fundamental economic dynamics within each region and city of influence, latent demand estimates are created for toilet training pants. This report does not discuss the specific players in the market serving the latent demand, nor specific details at the product level. The study also does not consider short-term cyclicalities that might affect realized sales. The study, therefore, is strategic in nature, taking an aggregate and long-run view, irrespective of the players or products involved.

A Post To Tide You Over...Now with EXTRA Nostalgia!

I probably won't be writing much for another week or so because I'm getting ready for a big neighborhood garage sale that I organized and am participating in. I am going through the house and getting rid of stuff. Mostly it is baby stuff, and it is really hard to do. I knew when I had these kids that all of their firsts would also be my lasts. Even if I adopt, I very much doubt I will adopt a newborn or infant. With twins, you have to get doubles of so much stuff, and I just don't have room for it if I am to get their big boy beds in (which is coming up soon.) Every thing I pick up brings back memories that were just two years ago but seems so far away. Like I can't remember how small they were. Yet I pick up these little preemie things and remember how they drowned in them. How they fit in my hand. And I found Naim's Haberman Bottle, and remembered the constant torture that feeding him was, and now he eats and eats and eats. But it must go. I hope to earn a little money for it and then what is left over is going to foster care.

Incidentally, if you are local and are interested in coming out to a neighborhood sale with a lot of people that are much richer than me who need to get rid of the crap they bought with all that disposable income,  email me and I will give you the details. There should be some good stuff there.

So, Retired Waif, who incidentally has a really good blog that I didn't pay enough attention to until recently, has tagged me for a meme. Now I think I've been tagged for this 8 Facts meme a few times before, but I drew a blank when coming up with 8 quirky facts about me. And also, wasn't it six? This is what I get for not doing it when it was six and I had the chance. Now it is up to eight. Ugh.

So, I don't know, lets see:

1. I once sat next to Kareem Abdul Jabbar on a plane trip where we were bumped to first class.
2. In college, I had a friend who worked at Victoria's Secret and got me good discounts and so all of my bras and panties matched for a couple of years.
3. I've been to 48 states. I have not been to Alaska or North Dakota.
4. In college, I once paid a girl 20 bucks to go out and jump in puddles and dance in pouring down rain with me. She had so much fun, she gave me my money back.
5. Along those weird lines, D once dared me to run naked down to the lake that was several hundred feet behind his parents house and back. It was like, 3 in the morning and there was no one around so I did it, but I didn't quite make it all the way to the lake because I couldn't see anything and got disoriented and so just ran back.
6. I have a tattoo of a white winged dove on my lower back. The guy who gave it to me had a shop where he sold elaborately painted coffins.
7. I've been to 6 Stevie Nicks/Fleetwood Mac Concerts. I never get good seats though. Incidentally, the best seats I ever had for a concert I got when I was 12 years old and my sister and I camped out at 6am to get Rick Springfield tickets. Yeah, but he was hot! Tee Hee. We got 2nd row-center. It was great. I think he dripped some sweat on me.
8. I hardly learned anything in any math class I ever took and I had to find someone to teach me long division as an adult because I had to teach it to fourth graders the next day. Which I did. But I think I forgot it right away and still don't know how to do long division the paper and pencil way, though I can figure out a lot of that stuff in my head.

Okay, so is that what I'm supposed to do? I'm not going to tag anyone though because I can't remember who has tagged me for this and I also am too lazy to go link to all of your URLs.

Also wanted to note that someone asked me a while back to write about 'cultural competencies' for people in the medical field to have when dealing with disabled patients. I have not forgotten this. I've been thinking on it and asking around about it. So it is still in my head to write about.

Oh! Lastly, Susan emailed me with the "How much can you see?" question. I occasionally get this from time to time. It is here. I probably need a little side bar of posts that answer FAQs. I'll get right on that...someday.

Okay, back to garage salin'...

ETA:
Bwahahahahahahahahahaha!!!!! Hell yes! I've seen this before! But not for years and years.

This was e-ed to me by buddy, S. who doesn't realize that circa 1982, I analyzed every frame of this video about 4 billion times and even remember that it was the second video played in an HBO video show after Billy Joel and before Supertramp. He had my body dancing tango in 3/4 time!?!? Um, yeah. And yeah, I'd forgotten about the half-shirt! Enjoy.

EETA:

Okay now S. and I are just wasting the night away trading 80's videos that we used to push pause on. (Hey, I'm folding towels and toddler clothes at 1:00am, this is as good as it gets right now.) Which reminded me of this one, my favorite Duran Duran song. (She paused on John Taylor, I paused on Simon leBon)

Oh, remember "Save a Prayer"? I used to use that song to practice Moves-in-the-Field in figure skating. It has such an interesting rhythm line. Yes, I will go to bed soon.

Note to my IRL readers

Update: Okay, still no phone service. This is beyond me needing to bring in a set of eyes. So maybe all of you on the internets can help me. I have the internet (obviously) set up with the vonage router thingy just fine. But I can't get the phone service going, I think, because you are supposed to power down your DSL modem for 10 minutes to reset it so it will recognize the vonage device, and I don't have a DSL modem. Per se. I have fiber optic hard-wired DSL to the house. So there is no modem that I can turn off and on. There is just fiber optic cable that runs from my computer to the wall, and then outside of the house is a big box thing that has something to do with something and I can't figure out how you can "reset" this. I've even tried to turn it off by disconnecting the power, but it has a backup battery in it somewhere. Anyone have this or know anything about it? I can't deal with contacting tech support tonight. So, till tomorrow...still no phone.

All is well here. I just have no phone service period, I guess. I did not know that vonage would cut off my regular phone service before I had the vonage stuff hooked up. It is more visual than I thought and I can't do it easily without a pair of eyes so I don't know when I will get my phone service working. I will try to  find someone to help me in the next couple of days. (D could do it, I'm sure, but all the router stuff is upstairs. He may be able to talk me through it, though.) If all else fails, I'll just sit down when I have some time tonight and play cable eenie meenie miney mo until it starts working.

So, email works and is probably your best option. I will plug in my cell phone for emergencies, but I can't hear on the damned thing so don't count on me answering it.

As to Why I Like These, It's Because I'm a Dork.

And, obviously, so is D.

*be sure to check out the alt text.

A visual description:

The first picture is a three frame comic strip. In each panel is a simply drawn stick person with a quote above him. In the first panel, he says, "Staring at the ceiling, she asked me what I was thinking about." In the second panel he says, "I should have made something up." In the final panel he says, "The Bellman-Ford Algorithm makes terrible pillow talk."

The second picture is of a single panel comic strip. It looks like a diagram of an area with the footprints of a couple of L-shaped buildings. One is in the upper left and the other is in the lower left. Each is labeled "building." Next to the upper building is a stick person with an arrow pointing off the top of the picture and labeled, "My apartment." There are three different dashed lines that represent his walking path from where he is standing to the bottom building. Each is labeled with the time it would take him to get to the building using each different route. One path, that follows a sidewalk around a right angle is labeled "60 seconds." Another path cuts diagonally and then follows a sidewalk. It is labeled "48.2  seconds." The final path is the straightest path between the stick person and the lower destination building. It is labeled "44.7 seconds." Along the side are several algebraic equations, supposedly the math he has worked out to chart his quickest route. The caption reads, "When I'm walking, I worry a lot about the efficiency of my path."

Okay, and finally, my favorite. Last one, I swear:

And for Sarah, and whoever else, here we go with the visual discription:

(inhales deeply)

A comic with six panels. In the first, a standing stick person says to another stick person who is seated inf front of a computer, "You should be more careful about what you write. You never know when a future employer might read it." In the second panel, the seated person replies, "When did we forget our dreams?" The standing person asks, "What?"

In the third very large panel, the stick computer person delivers the following monologue: "The infinite possibility each day holds should stagger the mind. The sheer number of experiences I could have is uncountable, breathtaking. And I'm sitting here refreshing my inbox. We live trapped in loops, reliving a few days over and over, and we envision only a handful of paths laid out ahead of us. We see the same things each day, we respond the same way, we think the same thoughts, each day a slight variation on the last. Every moment gently following the curves of societal norms. We act like if we just get through today, tomorrow our dreams will come back to us.

And no, I don't have all the answers. I don't know how to jolt myself into seeing what each moment could become. But I do know one thing, the solutions doesn't involve watering down my every little idea and creative impulse for the sake of someday easing my fit into a mold.  It doesn't involve tempering my life to fit someones expectations. It doesn't involve constantly holding back for fear of someday shaking things up. This is very important, so I want to say it as clearly as I can..."

The next three panels have the stick person saying just one very large bold word per panel, each punctuated with a period. The words are FUCK. THAT. SHIT.

Open Plea to All Grocery Shoppers

(sigh)

1. If you only have one child with you, could you please think twice before using the shopping carts that hold two children? I know that they are fun and look like cars and whatnot, and maybe on slow weekday mornings when there are a lot available, go ahead. But some of us with two small children CAN'T SHOP without those carts. Does this occur to you when you are comfortably pushing your little darling in a two seater and you see me struggling to juggle my children and a shopping cart? And to the lady who had one of those with NO CHILDREN and was just carting some plants in the cart part, so um, what was up with that?
2. When you are done shopping, could you manage to walk a few extra feet and either a) take the empty cart back to the store; or b) walk it to one of the designated cart corrals specifically designed so you do not have to walk all the way back to the store? Disabled parking is NOT the place to put your shopping carts. Not in the spaces, nor on the cross lines between the spaces. Why? Because disabled people can't park anywhere else and get out of their car and they can't always get out of their car to move the carts that are blocking their ability to park and/or get out of their car. Because, you know, they are DISABLED.
3. And while we are on the subject...you know those lined spaces between two disabled parking spaces? Those are NOT PARKING SPACES! No. Not even for "just 5 minutes." Because we don't know, when we are looking for spaces or wanting to leave a space that you will be just 5, 10, or 15 minutes. Too Also, if we added up all the accumulated time that we have hunted down or waited for people to remove their car from the lined space so we could even get in our car, about 5 years would be wasted from our lives. Do you want people wasting 5 years of your life because they can't park 50 feet away? I didn't think so. So to review: Painted lines next to or between disabled parking = NOT PARKING SPACES!

Thank you. You may now go back to your regularly scheduled Saturday.

For Battlestar Galactica Nerds (Such as myself)

Apropos to my previous post, I was having a little conversation with another self-proclaimed BSG dorkface regarding Helo and Athena's domestic scene in the last episode. To which she says:

"Also, how come Helo wasn't helping with the laundry? Jayzus, She freakin' betrays her own people, has his baby and sits in a cell for 2 seasons, almost gets raped and tortured by his colleagues, gets her baby stoled by his CO, goes through a cloud of radiation, dies, gets downloaded, rescues their child alone and STILL has to fold the fucking clothes?"

I about fell off my chair laughing at that. Apparently domestic gender equity issues categorically suck ass throughout the universe.

Random Thoughts

I've been dealing with some health issues for the past month or so. Nothing that will kill me off, but annoying just the same. So I haven't been posting much as I have been dealing with some new medications that have caused weird insomnia and nausea and other goodies. I think it is getting better though. I'll fill you in later. Here is some randomness:

• Aaron calls D's new wheelchair that tilts slowly back, a dump truck. They both go "Beep Beep Beep" when he tilts it.
• They also count everything now. All the time. Up to ten. With varying degrees of accuracy.
• My father is here for the next two months. He didn't bring the dog (who, I will say again, I like. But she needs supervision, by someone other than me all the time.) So it hasn't been so bad with him here.
• But he's gotten caught up in the Arthur Murray Dance Studio thing. Which I've decided is a cult. I don't mind him dancing...but I don't understand why they are handing him this $7000 dixie cup of kool-aid. Nor why he is drinking it. I mean, unless you are a professional doing world competitions, dance lessons shouldn't cost more than your average college tuition. I keep telling him if he just wants pretty young girls to flirt with him professionally, he could get that at Hooters for a lot better price, or, hell, the Mustang Ranch for more bang for his buck. Okay. I kid. But GAWD, he's sunk into this shit deep. I see dance classes all the time around town for $30 bucks if its dancing he wants. I wonder what percentage of their customers are recent widow/ers?
• In light of Arthur Murray turning out to be a cult--isn't it funny how anything can be a cult for like, 10% of the population? Be it religion or Amway or Oprah or Montessori or Weight Watchers or the Marines or GWB's ventriliquism about needing to give up our freedoms for the war on "terrah" or what have you...there is a percentage of the population who needs to buy into something hook, line, and sinker in exchange for their brains. Scary.
• Hopefully, not ironically along those lines, I've been invited to join a "covenant group" at church. I don't know what the hell that is, but I decided, "what the hey?" Then D tells me it is a small group formed to discuss deep feelings about your spirituality. And that people may cry. Oh, wonderful. Its not that there is anything wrong with that, its just that right now I am so divorced from my spirituality due to the fact that it has been pushed back to some deep cobwebbed corner in the attic to make room for more practical matters such as medicine, food, clothing, childcare, and shelter, that I'm a 'feared I will do something completely inappropriate like burst out laughing. (Oh, its not all that dramatic, but I do blame Maslow a bit for my inability to contemplate spirituality right now.) But I'll give it a shot.
• The interim minister (who is quite nice) wants to visit me about membership. Actually I initiated the meeting a long time ago. But now I'm too chicken shit to follow through due to the whole last encounter with the last interim minister who had me convinced I was an alien. I need to grow a pair.
• Dealing with the clusterfuck that is Blue Cross Blue Shield of Oregon has made me realize that there is very little difference between paying for private health insurance and being on Medicaid. It just takes a few more steps for my tax bill to pay my Medicaid premiums. It is official. The government and corporations are now one and the same. Think health care isn't rationed in this country? Think pigs fly? The only difference between the U.S. and socialized health care is that here it isn't rationed fairly.
• My insomnia has driven me to a spree of late-night "My So-Called Life" watching. I don't know what it is with me this year and teen drama. (I spent the summer watching "Degrassi: The Next Generation.) I'm either mourning my misspent youth or doing some early prep work for parenting teenage boys. Or maybe its just because I let the kids watch Noggin sometimes, so when I turn on the TV later, its always on The N, Noggins late night answer to teen angst. At least I'm not desperate enough for (shudder) "Dawson" yet.
• I watched a few of My So Called Lives when it originally aired like, 15 years ago, and my take on it this time is totally different. Then I was all "That Jordan Catalano is SO HAWT!!" End of story. Now, I'm all, yeah, Jordan Catalano is a pretty boy, but I'd totally do Brian Krakow. I mean if I were 15. I mean if we were both 18, cuz I probably wouldn't have done him or anyone at 15. And of course he's have to agree to do something with that hair. Does this mean I've matured?
• Also, I didn't remember thinking anything about Patty (Angela's mother), but now I'm completely freaked out by her because she reminds me of all the stuff I couldn't stand about my mother. Which I hadn't thought much about because you tend to forget the bad stuff when someone dies. I love my mother and she was not exactly like Patty. No one in my family really does passive aggressive; we do plain ole' aggressive instead. Waaay more efficient. My theory on this is that D's family had previously sucked all the passive aggressiveness out of the entire Great Plains and maybe even part of the Rockies so there was none left for my mother to  pass on to us when we came around. But it is just the uptightness. Patty, I mean. The fingernails grating on chalkboard, bug up your ass, everything is for show and presentation, uptightness. And the triangle face she makes when she is so over dramatically uptight over something stupid. And the fake smile in public. Again, I love my mother, but I wanted to stab Patty repeatedly for reminding me of that.
• As an anecdote to that, my father gave me a bunch of DVDs of home movies from 8mms taken of us when we were growing up. My mom was SO, So, so young when we were small. And pretty. And despite the above bullet point, relaxed on vacations and stuff. Much more than I remember. And my sister and I were such dorks. I may ask D if he can grab a snippet off of them to post here so you can all laugh at my long skinny legged, glasses with bangs having, lots of matching terry cloth short outfits wearing, tongue out at the camera sticking, uncoordinated self.
• My kids recognize my father on camera even though he was in his 20s. They don't recognize me, of course, but when they were asked, "Where's mommy?" They picked my mother. I'm telling myself that this is sweet and that they just mean she is a momma in general. Not that I've turned into her. Cause that would be scary and then I may just have to turn to watching 90210 marathons to escape that reality.
• Aaron is being a real pill lately. Terrible Twos have begun, I think. Sometimes it is just funny, though. Everything is "NO!" Are you finished eating? NO! Do you want some more to eat? NO! Do you want to get down and play? NO! Do you just want to sit there, then? NO! Do you know that you are out of options? NO! I'm working hard to avoid the yes/no questions and make option A/option B statements. Works pretty good, but sometimes I forget.
• Still, having kids is fun. You get to do all the fun things you wished you could do. Know what I did today that I haven't done in probably 25 years? I got to go into one of those big inflatable things that you jump around in? You know what I mean? Naim hated it, but I forgot how hard those things are to walk in with just your socks. We mostly sat while some other kids made us bounce. And watched Aaron push a scooter around from out the window.
• My kids played with basketballs mostly (during their gymnasium time called "Little Feet Fridays" at my gym.) Aaron got all the balls down from a rack while Naim simultaneously put them all back. I think that may potentially develop into a recurring theme in their lives.
• Finally, a weird bit of YouTubery for you. (Not a bad pop song this time.) This is a sort of geeky-artsy, slightly abstract animation that was shown to me in a workshop I took several years ago on oppression psychology. It must have had some effect on me because I always remembered it and just randomly looked it up on you tube and found it. It is about 8 minutes long, and kind of an interesting take on labor vs. lords or what have you. I suppose it could be anything. It is called "Shaft of Light" by Bill Tomlinson and I guess it won a bunch of awards.

I promise to write a more coherent post soon. Thanks for all of your comments below. Especially those who commented that you like the long posts. If I were a better writer, I could develop more word economy and still get my point across. But until I do, that takes the pressure off a bit.

Spacefiller

Getting over illness, lots and lots of illness (me, kids are mostly fine), and blackouts, lots and lots of blackouts. (How many times can I explain to 2 year olds that I can't put the lights to half the city back on?) More soon.

P.S. See, dad? This means that a ton of lightbulbs burnt out. I have proof now that this is not always me leaving the lights on, we actually do have a lot of blackouts here that cause the lightbulbs to blow. Totally more often than we ever had in the midwest. What's up with that?

Meme

I've had the worst computer Karma in history for the past two years. It may very well be because the entire contents of my computer theoretically, hypothetically speaking of course, may be counterfeit. But if that were to be true, it is completely outside my knowledge. I've been offline for a week or so and am just getting everything fixed up again. So, here is a wacky little meme I stole from Baggage so that I don't have to come up with a real post:

1. When you looked at yourself in the mirror today, what was the first thing you thought?
Life as I know it will never be the same again. Aaron had just climbed (fell?) out of his crib for the first time and had scared the bajeezus out of me by unexpectedly running into my leg.

2. How much cash do you have on you?
$0. Maybe some loose change.

3. Whats a word that rhymes with “DOOR?”

Floor

4. Favorite planet?
I always thought it would be cool if you could live on a ringed planet like Saturn. Seems like the sunsets would be awesome.

5. Who is the 4th person on your missed call list on your cell phone?
Private Caller. I don't answer those unless they leave a message.

6. What is your favorite ring tone on your phone?
Brrrrrrrrrrrring!!! I don't have ring tones. But the lights go on and off and my bed vibrates when my phone rings...how many people can say that?

7. What shirt are you wearing?
A Tom Collins Champions on Ice Tour T-shirt.

8. Do you “label” yourself?
Heh. I spend my life getting in trouble for not fitting neatly into any label anyone wants to shove me into, so...no. Not so much.

9. Name the brand of your shoes you're currently wearing?
I'm not wearing shoes right now. But since I repeatedly injured my feet in figure skating, I wear New Balance with custom molded insoles most of the time.

10. Bright or Dark Room?
Bright, I have retinal disease, which means I'm night blind.

11. What do you think about the person who took this survey before you?
She is a smart, gutsy and funny woman who also only fits into her own unique category.

12. What does your watch look like?
I wear a boring, standard Braille watch most of the time. But I also have a really pretty Brighton watch that my mom bought me before she died and my sister also gave me my mom's Bulova(?) gold watch after she died.

13. What were you doing at midnight last night?
Talking to Nik on the phone while pushing F12 a bunch of times trying to fix my computer.

14. What did your last text message you received on your cell say?
I don't have a text message phone.

15. Where is your nearest 7-11?
I'm not sure, but I did buy D snacks a lot at one that was across the street from his nursing home last Spring.

16. Whats a word that you say a lot?
"Sort of" as a completely unnecessary adjective.

17. Who told you he/she loved you last?
Aaron

18. Last furry thing you touched?
Scrapper, our cat.

19. How many drugs have you done in the last three days?
I take 5-htp and a multivitamin every morning. Other than that--none.

20. How many rolls of film do you need developed?
I don't have a film camera. I do, however, have an overwhelmingly large number of pictures on shutterfly just waiting to have a life outside the computer.

21. Favorite age you have been so far?
Geez. I don't know. I had a lot of fun in my early twenties. But I am much saner now. I like 36.

22. Your worst enemy?
I don't know that I have a real person that I would consider an "enemy." On a broader scale...name a neocon.

23. What is your current desktop picture?
Since I just reinstalled, I have the lovely default microsoft meadow.

24. What was the last thing you said to someone?
"Don't put the garage door down because I have to take out the trash." (To D as he left my house...I haven't told you yet that he got out of the hospital last week. So he was over at my house tonight.)

25. If you had to choose between a million bucks or to be able to fly what would it be?
Am I still blind when I fly? Cuz that might be scary. Personally, I want to be able to BEAM. I can fly in my dreams, so I guess I'd take the million bucks.

26. Do you like someone?
I'm 36, isn't this a question for middle school kids? Hard as it may be to believe...underneath my bitchy, cynical persona, I actually do like a lot of people.

27. The last song you listened to?
Bob the Builder theme song, I'm afraid.

28. What time of day were you born?
3 something in the afternoon.

29. Whats your favorite number?
One

30. Where did you live in 1987?
I was 17. I lived with my parents in Nebraska.

31. Are you jealous of anyone?
Currently I'm jealous of all the families who walk around my neighborhood that contain two parents and a mere single child in a single stroller. What do they do with all their time?

32. Is anyone jealous of you?
I'm sure there are in a general sense. I have a lot to be grateful for and am fortunate in many ways. Almost anyone living in the US is. Specifically, I'm not so sure. Many people don't think that it is possible for disabled people to lead happy, fulfilled lives. I think they think we sit around lamenting our lack of physical prowess while either waiting for a cure or for Jack Kevorkian to come along or something. I don't know if many people think it is kosher to be jealous of a disabled person for some reason. I think I'm worthy of some envy, though! What a weird thing that is to say!

33. Where were you when 9/11 happened?
Sleeping. My alarm was about to go off at 6:30am (pacific time) when Nik called me at 6:28 from Canada to get a reaction from "someone from the states." I had no idea what had happened yet.

34. What do you do when vending machines steal your money?
Swear at them under my breath.

35. Do you consider yourself kind?
I think I have kind intentions but I am often oblivious to the little social protocols that are expected of you to show it properly.

36. If you had to get a tattoo, where would it be?
I have a tattoo. Its on my lower back. I'm not going to get any more. I think about sometimes making the one I have more colorful, but I doubt I'll ever bother.

37. If you could be fluent in any other language, what would it be?

Spanish. It is really the unofficial second language in the U.S. and would be very useful in my neck of the woods. I think more people in the US should know Spanish.

38. Would you move for the person you loved?
I've been in this situation before and have declined to move. I would if the location had something to offer me as well. Note to blind people out there: When a sighted guy asks you to move with him to a city with little or no public transportation because he will just drive you around? It sounds nice but it won't work out unless you are REAL comfortable with that level of dependence, which obviously I'm not.

39. Are you touchy feely?
With the right person.

40. Whats your life motto?
"Focus on what you CAN do."

41. Name three things that you have on you at all times?
my hearing aids, my white cane, my kids

42. Whats your favorite town/city?
Besides where I live, I really like DC and San Francisco.

43. What was the last thing you paid for with cash?
I think I donated a couple of bucks to my Church's capital campaign for a building that will probably benefit D and I more than most other people due to accessibility stuff. People are pledging thousands of dollars and I have made a commitment to give some of my spare change instead, cuz I'm poor. I think in a year I've given $17, so I'm sure they'll name a brick after me.

44. When was the last time you wrote a letter to someone on paper and mailed it?
Does the Social Security office count? No? Then, probably my fake grandmother, Jo, who does not have a computer so I occasionally send her pics of the kids.

45. Can you change the oil on a car?
Yes. I can also pump gas, change a tire, and I think I still remember how to change a spark plug. I dated a mechanic once, and now I drive often with a quadriplegic, so I didn't get out of the car maintenance like every other blind person does.

46. Your first love: what is the last thing you heard about him/her?
He was the aforementioned mechanic. We still talk on occasion. He has a wife and a kid.

47. How far back do you know about your ancestry?
My father has done a lot of this on his side. I don't personally know it because I don't remember all that he told me, but I think he knows about as far as the 1600s. I don't know much of anything on my mother's side.

48. The last time you dressed fancy, what did you wear and why did you dress fancy?
Oooooh, this is sad. I don't want to admit this. It's been a while. I went to a black tie thing on New Year's Eve in 1999. Then we ditched it and ran downtown and got soaking wet while they played John Lennon's "Imagine" at midnight. (Only in the liberal west coast did we not hear Auld Lang Sine). I'm not the dress fancy type, so maybe it will take another millenium change to get me there.

49. Does anything hurt on your body right now?
My back always hurts. Lately my left wrist has been bothering me.

50. Have you been burned by love?
Who hasn't?