Metaphor

About 45 minutes, I wrote a blogpost (on the memes blog). No big deal.

Except I just clicked back over to the Blogger tab and realized that I'd finished it but never published it. It was just sitting here in the window looking blank.

Welcome to my world, even worse than normal lately.

Weekend

May is the stupid-busiest month of the year for anyone with kids in school. I realized this about 7 years ago when I noticed all my mom-friends with multiple kids losing their minds by May 10. It doesn't help that May is also when the yard starts needing attention, several summer sports start up, and allergies kick in for those who suffer from pollen sensitivities. The good news is that April and its showers are over; the bad news is that the flowers and trees are ALL blooming.

[Aside: as someone who has year-round allergies to--as someone at work put it yesterday--"everything known to mankind," I have to say that people with seasonal allergies make me laugh, when I'm not rolling my eyes internally. Rolling them for real hurts right now. Yeah. Cry me a river, folks--this is my baseline, my starting position year-round.]

OK, bitchy aside over. I really haven't felt good all week. That's my excuse, and mostly my bitching has been internal or venting to two Very Specific People. But the allergy thing for me is kinda like me complaining about a headache to one of those people, or a backache to the other.

See how I get distracted?

I was going to talk about schedules in May. When Sparky was in Little League this was the middle of the 'season' and there were games 2-3 times each week. There always seems to be extra homework this month, and of course major projects are coming due. The end-of-year concerts, plays, and programs are in May. The pressure is on everywhere, which means time is at a premium.

There are, of course, non-kid-related activities that have to be fit in as well. The regular grind of appointments and schedules--cleaning, cooking, maintenance, etc. And, if you want to have a social life, that's always fun to try to fit in.

So this weekend, here's our schedule:

FRIDAY: I will be doing laundry all day, and tidying our Disaster Zone (i.e. house). Beast left at 7:30 to cover several appointments for himself and his dad, and he will be spending at least 2 hours in teleconferences later today. Sparky has school all day followed by football training--yeah, I haven't mentioned that heretofore, have I? We will pick him up from school and then head to a hotel for tonight. He is attending a manga/anime conference tonight and tomorrow morning and early on I volunteered to make it easier on him and get a room for us nearby so he doesn't lose so much time traveling back and forth. Beast and I will probably go see a movie (Star Trek?) tonight while Sparky is manga-ing.

SATURDAY: Conference-y stuff in the morning. We will check out late and snag him from the conference by 1:00 or so and head home, stopping for corsage pickup on the way. Sparky will shower out of his anime "persona"--I didn't mention the costume aspect, did I?--and pack up for his evening activities. There's a tux involved. And a swimsuit for later. He needs to be at his date's house by 3:30 for pictures, and then they will head to the high school to catch the bus at 5:00. They will be gone for approximately 12 hours, arriving back from post-prom about 4:45. A. M. Maybe Beast and I will go see another movie in the evening. I know we'll need to go to the grocery store at some point.

SUNDAY: One of us needs to pick up Sparky at o'dark-hundred and bring him home and pour him into bed. Maybe we'll get another hour or two as well, but Beast and I will need to be out of the house by about 11 because we have tickets to see the Broadway traveling show of Mary Poppins. We will be gone till close to 6 Sunday night. At some point during the day, Sparky will need to do his homework and get all his tux stuff back together. Oh. And it's Mother's Day.

Monday I will get back on the daily schedule stuff, but I need to take the tux back.

Sigh.

Next week is German Honor Society induction. There's another band concert on the horizon. We have fundraiser stuff we need to deliver. I need to schedule a physical for Sparky for football. Things are reaching crunch time for prep for our youth group mission trip and there is a TON of stuff to do for that. Oh, and there is a retirement party for someone at work, and the changes that will come when her replacement begins. And it seems like everyone I know over the age of 80 is ending up in the hospital and/or nursing care this spring. That could stop. Please.

So yeah. I may not be around here much.

[this took me almost two hours to write--but there is laundry in progress, and I've started to think through the rest of the day at home]

Not-bullets

1. Hey, it's poetry month! Hence the poems that have posted the past two days (oh, how I love post-dating!).



2. My Bloglines front page says I have "63 updated feeds" which include 367 unread posts. I also have 172 saved posts. I think this means I am officially buried.



3. I am caught up in tweets and Fb, though. Short Attention Span rules the day!



4. I am not loving Fb's 'update'. Just discovered that you can't do "less of/more of" individuals. People are either in your news feed, or not. That explains why I get RSS'd updates in Bloglines for Stephanie, Kyle, Kevin, et al., but never see 'em on Facebook; in the old incarnation they were "less of" but now they are invisible. Guess I'll create a 'group' of them so I can find them periodically. Stupid. How is this an upgrade, Fb??



5. Today I am meeting someone with whom I may be spending a great deal of time in the future, someone who may strongly influence my external happiness meter. Hope that goes well.



6. This weekend is crazy busy: local mission trip on Saturday (more on that, perhaps, later). On Sunday I'm playing in the bell choir at church which will be followed immediately by an Easter Egg hunt for the little kids. The youth group is going to hide the eggs, so as soon as worship is over, I have to go into supervision mode. Whee.



7. My mom's health is stable. That's all. I have not bought plane tickets. Not...quite...yet.



8. Found a shirt this morning in my closet I had forgotten about. It was with the summer shirts, but it's a long-sleeved T. Why, yes: I am wearing it today, as a matter of fact!



9. I'm nearly caught up in cataloging new materials at work, but suddenly feel absolutely swamped in projects. Graphic Novels, biogs, gifted videos and manga, calling STOOPUD publishers to cancel subscriptions (Dun&Bradsteet, you SUCK!) original cataloging, typos, fairy tales...the floodgates have opened.



10. Our system database manager at work needs to be punched in the face. This has nothing to do with anything else in this post. He just does. On principle.



11. Sparky has reverted to 100% teenager. Glad he's normal. Wish he'd pull his head out a little more often though.



12. The sun is out. This is a good thing, yo.

Rolling with the punches

The Plan:

- Get up a little later than usual
- Get Sparky on his way to school
- Check email/twitter/Fb/Bloglines after a long dry-spell last night where we had no access to the 'net
- Help Beast finish preparing for his week-long trip (which combines family stuff and work stuff and is pretty complicated)
- Wave goodbye to Beast
- Go to the grocery store
- Other projects and errands
- Meet extended family members for dinner

The Actuality, as it stands now:

- Get up later than I planned
- Get Sparky on his way to school
- Start checking the 'net stuff
- Beast finished packing after a night spent in the recliner (oops--never came to bed!)
- Phone call from FIL's place saying his blood sugar crashed and they called 911
- Now in the midst of multiple calls to all and sundry to see what impact this has on FIL's schedule (dialysis, etc.), and to make sure 911 has things under control
- ....[see post title]

Blurts

Wow, I was a complete slug this weekend. Maybe I was storing up for today's busy-ness? On the other hand, I did get some stuff done: most of my to-do list is crossed off. Today I'm having lunch with a friend and then later in the afternoon I'm doing some sort of presentation at work for a Girl Scout troop about library collections. This follows my usual two-hour busman's holiday at Sparky's school library this morning.

Beast has hit the road yet again this morning, so Sparky and I are on our own for a couple of days. Hopefully we won't kill each other. He's back to being the 'typical teenager', i.e. head up his butt 90% of the time. Things will cycle back to calm again at some point. However, I've just promised him that I will call the doctor--the 'real' doctor, not the pediatrician--for an appointment to chat about his inability to sleep past sunrise. It's making him sleep-deprived and can't be helping in the Head-Up-Butt Department.

The Oscars, at least the last half, were more entertaining than they have been for years, except for the multiple wins that "Slumdog Millionnaire" received. Look, I think it's great that a movie about another culture won, and I haven't seen the movie, but it sounds completely stupid and unrealistic and sappy...and all the other cliches about Hollywood movies. (OK, and Benjamin Button sounds MORE realistic?) But Danny Boyle seems to be a lot more fun than most directors out there, and he gave a good speech.

Am glad Kate and Sean won. Very glad. I love Kate, and I think Sean's movie was released at a critical point in history, and I loved his speech! That was the Sean we can appreciate so much more than his usual annoying, self-aggrandizing, mopey self.

In other news, after jokingly calling one of the youth group members on her language use on Facebook, she was able to dish it back at me in spades when I posted using a 'worse' word myself. Oops. They keep me honest. That's good.

I've finally gotten around to updating all of my reading stuff, both in terms of printing out the full list of what I read last year and also creating the cards. Yes, truly: I keep a card file of the books I've read since about 1992ish. It's not all that library-ish--I only file by main entry (usually author) with the date so that I can go back to the printouts and read what I thought about the book. Yes, I know I could put this all online. I like writing the cards up. Sorry, Tim Spalding. The serendipitous discoveries I make every year are so much fun. "That book was by the same author as that book that I read in 1996! Really!"

The drawer I used to file the cards--acid-free paper drawer, purchased at an office supply store--is nearly full, and yet I am considering adding a title card for each book. Don't worry, I'm not going the subject route. My notes on the books aren't complete enough to do that. Frequently, the notes are pretty useless or non-existent, especially pre-blog (though this year I had a patch of no-reviewing too).

So, that's the update. I'm gonna head to school now. Shelving awaits.

Busy busy

Mood: good
Hair: blown out and that's it so far
Eyes: sleepy
Listening to: the toaster ticking

This was a big weekend, one of those when there were at least two things going on at all times, choices to make about where to be and which option to choose.

Friday was my sister Ellen's 59th birthday. That can't be right, but it is. That means I'm the age now that she was when the cancer started growing in her. Signpost.

Saturday when I got to work, I found confirmation of some big news. No: HEE-YUUUUUGE news. 2009 is going to be...interesting. And I cataloged 100 books on the same day I was at the Reference desk for nearly half my day. Not that I did the cataloging at the Ref Desk...hell no! It was just a pleasantly quiet day; no drama, no freaking out. Some of the people at MPOW can function as adults when faced with upcoming change.

Yesterday was Church Activity Day Times a Billion. It was Music Sunday at our church, and there was a Congregational Meeting to confirm the nominations for next years' slate of Elders and Deacons, and it was the last Session meeting of the year, which traditionally is when the old and new Session members and Deacons mingle and eat together. As Clerk of Session, it was a big day for those last two reasons.

However, the Clerk wasn't there. At the time of the Congregational Meeting, the Clerk (with the Chair of the Nominating Committee and ten other people) was on a train with a lot of people wearing blue and orange and heavy winter clothing. At the time of the luncheon/meeting, we were exiting a Really Fancy Church and getting ready to hit the streets. Actually, most of us pretty much stuck around here, although some braver souls ventured to neighboring shopping emporia like Borders and the Hershey Store. By 3:30 we were on the bus back to the train, where we rode with some of the same blue- and orange-dressed people we'd seen in the morning.

This is an annual tradition for our church's youth group, one which we inherited from previous leaders. It's important because they (we) get to experience a worship service that is Presbyterian but wholly different in tone from our church. Many of the kids over the years have noted that they've never 1) ridden the train, 2) taken a city bus, 3) been to the Big City to the East...before this trip. These are high school kids--that boggles my mind. By the time I was in high school I was riding the bus in Denver, and had been all over the place outside my little area of the universe. I'd even ridden a train, though it was a tourist thing, not a commuter.

In any case, Beast and I spent the afternoon in the Borders cafe after purchasing puzzle books for each of us to work on. That's the extent of the shopping I did.

It was a fun day.

Coming up this week: printing off the dreaded Xmas letter and address labels, putting up the tree, etc., wrapping the presents I have and figuring out what I still need to buy (and maybe even shopping for 'em!), sending the parent letter out about the mission trip... Yeah, the fun just never stops around here.

---

Urban Word:

Mass Merchanditis: The hazy feeling one gets after spending too much time shopping at large chain stores including but not limited to Walmart, Home Depot, and Bed, Bath and Beyond. Characterized by a headache, dry eyes, blurred vision, blank stare, sore feet.

We were fortunate yesterday not to have the opportunity to experience mass merchanditis, though there was a small outbreak of "where's the exit?!" from one group trapped in Macy's.

(blank)

Mood: The usual
Hair: Funky pony
Eyes: Fine
Listening to: Beast typing on the other laptop, and MNF

That's me: blank. I sat here for two minutes staring at the screen trying to come up with a title for this post.

I woke up this morning about 3:30 with a scratchy throat. Time for the autumn cold, I guess. Whee. Never did get back to sleep all the way.

The best I can do for content is to say that it's Spirit Week (i.e. Homecoming) for Sparky. We drove 40 minutes in rush hour traffic looking for colored, washable hairspray for Wednesday. Yep. I spent about as much on gas driving to the nearest pop-up costume store as I did for the two cans of silver-colored dust.

FIL is more-or-less situated in his apartment, and seems to be loving it so far.

Beast has been wandering around for half an hour saying he's lost his mind. It's just never good when the reliable person is doing that!

Summation: I'm tired. Too tired to get excited about some of the Stupid People Tricks on display today (excluding family, although Sparky's on kind of a roll tonight).

---

WordSpy Word:

stay-at-work mom: n. A mother who returns to work soon after giving birth. Also: stay-at-work mother.

I am proud to say that, with the exception of about 18 months, I have always been a stay-at-work mom, following in my own mother's footsteps--though, granted, she was not able to go back to work till I was four, in 1967. Times change.

Sigh

Mood: OK
Hair: A little funky from yesterday's braid
Eyes: Tired
Listening to: Sparky doing his homework

In case that last line about homework doesn't give it away...this week is psycho. We are running pretty much non-stop.

I picked up Sparky directly from school yesterday. He and I stocked up the freezer by making 12 Dinner by Design meals. Then we went to Target for some more stuff from FIL--sheets, shower curtain, dishpan--and dishes to replace the Corelle we are giving to FIL to use. We ate...something...for dinner at home, but not one of the meals we just made. I worked on getting more of the embroidery done for FIL, but it's NOT going to be finished when he arrives.

Today, I think I'll be taking an emergency T.O. and coming home at 1:00 to clean up the house, make up the spare room, find the &!%*ing kitchen counter. Then I'll pick up Sparky again, along with our PK, take them to our new study group at church. We'll stay there long enough to eat, and then we'll head home to collect FIL's new TV and take all the stuff we've bought over to his apartment. At some point, I need to call parents about using their kids' labor for moving tomorrow after school.

BIL is staying with us for...awhile. I have no idea how long he's staying. I have no idea what the plan is for the weekend. This is really hard for me because I am very much a creature of habit and OCD planning. [This is also NOT a complaint!! It's just life right now.]

Gaaaah.

There are over 40 posts in Bloglines that I want to read, because they are by friends. If you are one of those people, just know that I have not fallen off the planet, and I will eventually come back and read and comment. Maybe next week.

Productive Day

Mood: Better'n last night!
Hair: Newly dyed, but looking purly-AWful
Eyes: ...grrr...
Listening to: Beast talking to his dad on the phone

Beast worked his 40-plus hours over the course of the rest of the week, so today was a free day today. So...

...he dropped me off at 9:20 for my aforementioned hair appointment
...he went to the bank and set up his dad's new account (part one) and I think did one other short errand
...we drove half an hour to the next biggest city to return his rental car and pick up our Honda
...we stopped at the nearest furniture store that sells LaZBoy and picked out a new recliner for FIL (it will not arrive until after he has moved in)
...we tried to eat at one place where Beast was called an "Asshole" by a woman driving a giant SUV and the line was 15 minutes long (ABORT!)
...we drove thru Wendy's where I got fries and Beast got a burger
...Beast dropped me at Starbucks back in the town where I work where I was meeting someone; meanwhile, he stopped at the bookstore next door to talk to someone who had left a message about running the sound/light board at church
...he went to talk to people at U-Haul
...I talked to a friend
...he picked me up
...we went to the grocery store and I went in and grabbed food for dinner while
...he stopped across the street at the post office to check our box
and then...we went home (arriving at 4 or so).

I had to run out and collect Sparky from school at 5, I made dinner (gasp! shock!), we all sorted laundry, Sparky cleaned up the dishes and brought up the recycling, Beast is paying bills, and I'm about to go take a bath and rest my eyes. I'm having a horrible time seeing the computer screen well enough to read, which is freaking me out a little.

Tomorrow I work. It will be MUCHO relaxing!

It's raining, and will be doing so for the forseeable future. There's another horrible hurricane in the Gulf. I don't want to drive to Houston with stuff again, so I hope people there evacuate sensibly.

Right. Going to bath and bed.

---

Urban Word:

hurrication: Evacuation from a major hurricane turned into a short holiday.

I hope all you Galvestonians are enjoying your hurrication and things aren't as bad as they sound after the storm passes.

Wow, I'm tired!

Mood: see title
Hair: it has been clean...last week
Eyes: red, itchy, tired
Listening to: Jim Leach

I've updated this month's reading list on my book blog, and in the sidebar here. That's my accomplishment for tonight. The fact that it was supposed to get accomplished last week...pah. It's done, that's all that matters, yo?

I'm tired.

We have company coming this week. Fortunately, he's pretty low-maintenance company. 'course, before he arrives, I have to clean the spare room up a bit, shop, attend a Session meeting at church, take Sparky to school for a quick word with his band teacher, pick up a $120 calculator (required for math class), and work. And sleep. Would be good not to bite people's heads off every three seconds.

---

Urban Word:

chairdrobe: The art of piling clothes on a chair to be used in place of a closet or dresser. If a chair is not available one can always defer to a floordrobe.

I think it's likely a very bad sign that I no longer have a chairdrobe in this house; everything is in piles: clean, dirty, and "question mark" piles.

Bleary

Mood: Tired but otherwise pretty stoked
Hair: Yanked up and butterfly-clipped in back
Eyes: Itchy
Listening to: What else? The Olympics. That Chinese gymnast who won on the parallel bars? So NOT 16!! If she is, they really need to feed her more than twice a week.

I spent 4 hours today on my meme, prepping for the next few months (surprise: I don't write all the entries the night before!). It takes a long time to deal with 100 different questions and 25 photos, but I'm set now till March. That's great, since I don't really foresee a lot of time this fall for anything much like this.

Can Michael Phelps PLEASE take time to see an orthodontist and a speech therapist?!

OK, sorry. I also sorted through the box of photos tonight. I thought it was mostly framed photos. It was not. I think there were less than a dozen frames; but the total items in the box ran to about 80 (I could go look, since--yes, here's a shock--I'm cataloging everything, but I'm inherently too lazy and whupped to open the file again).

I dusted the living room for the first time in awhile which explains some of my itchy eyes. The downstairs is very clean: vacuumed and dusted (half-assed, but better than nothing, yes?). I need to really attack the bedrooms soon.

Called and rescheduled a couple of cancelled doctor's appointments today. Also tried to connect with the school about Sparky's screwed up schedule, and talked to a couple of banks about safe deposit boxes. I now have reached Deep Antipathy with the bank that currently holds ALL our money as well as our mortgage. Time to change banks? I think.... Their customer service the last few times I've interacted with them has been frankly neither.

The plan for the next couple of weeks is for Beast to drive home tomorrow afternoon, leaving Sparky at Grandpa's. BIL will arrive on Wednesday at Grandpa's. I will drive out to Ohio Saturday to pick up Sparky and return home on Monday. My nephew Jesse is supposed to be here sometime next week (hence the bedroom-cleaning festivities--there is currently furniture stacked on both beds in the spare room), we will all go to a minor league baseball game on Friday where we will hand Jesse off to Katherine and Alan with whom he'll stay till the Tuesday after Labor Day. That Tuesday is Sparky's first day of school. Somewhere in there, we need to shop for school clothes and get his room completely sorted out, cleaned, tidied, and organized.

On or about September 5, I plan to drink myself into a deep, daylong sleep. Or collapse. I would welcome company for the former, if only to steer me to safe places.

Anyway. Good night. Or as my family used to say when I was a kid, "Good night!!"

---

Urban Word:

Bachelor breakfast: Eating breakfast (or any other meal really) while standing at your kitchen counter instead of sitting at your kitchen table.
I am proud to say that in the three days I've been home alone, I have yet to have eaten a bachelor breakfast (or lunch, or dinner). However, to be fair, I did eat breakfast in the car two of the three days.

Chores

Mood: Good
Hair: Pony
Eyes: Recuperating, again
Listening to: Ice Road Truckers

• My books are all caught up.
• I mopped a lot of floors--kitchen, living room, dining room, front hall.
• Roomba hates us.
• The stupid volunteer tree by the back door is chopped down.
• The garage is reorganized (not by me, but still).
• We have soap in both dispensers downstairs.
• Laundry is done for the weekend (again, I didn't do most of it, but still).
• I have most of Sparky's school registration paperwork finished and ready to take over tomorrow, pending a final question about the cost of yearbooks ($40, or $45??). If he were to start sports this year, it would push the registration/fees to well over $300. Straight up fees with nothing else are over $120. Crazy.
• Beer-boiled brats and chips for dinner.
• I love my boys.

---

Urban Word:

moneymoon: The time after your purchase of a good or service and before 'buyer's remorse' happens.

I think our moneymoon with Roomba is officially over.

Oh. My. God.

Mood: good
Hair: NOT in a ponytail, braid or knot! First time in a week!
Eyes: good
Listening to: ads (watching Password in spite of Regis

I just realized this afternoon that I'm leaving for the ALA conference on Friday. I thought I had another week before I left. OMG. I'm really nervous about the arrival Friday night, but after that I think it's going to be fine...mostly thanks to artcat, who is my roomie for the weekend (props to her--my lifesaver!).

So. I have a bunch of work I need to do before I leave.

Sparky starts Driver's Ed tomorrow. I am making 12 DinnerByDesign meals Tuesday. We are all getting haircuts on Wednesday. Beast is going to hang curtains this week; today he fixed the (almost completely GONE!) brakes in my truck.

Life is good. Except for the 194 posts in Bloglines related to library stuff...but I'll get through those eventually.

---

Urban Word:

earlybirditude: the (often annoying to others who don't share it) overly happy attitude of early birders - often associated with a great eagerness to call 7am committee meetings and to embark on sales-related shopping trips that mimic dawn raids on enemy encampments

OK, I'll admit I have tendencies toward earlybirditude in my work life. My apologies to the owls I know.

24

Although I have never watched his show, I'm feeling a little Jack Bauer-y today. No shooting, though. Too bad, really, cuz I had some very clear shots.

Last night at 12:45 I was brusquely shaken out of my semi-sleeping state--wherein I was doing my best not to obsess over something trip-related--by Beast shouting--he must have been shouting since I could hear him through the earplugs--"DOWNSTAIRS!" [I'm redefining "mad dashing" tonight, eh?] Actually, my first thought when I felt his hand on my back was, "Oh, he's having another bad dream and flailing in his sleep." I totally wasn't asleep, was I?

So, I staggered in to find Sparky, who had said he was going to be sleeping in his 'darkroom' behind his bedroom (long story). His fan was on, with the light off, so the switch by his door didn't turn on the light. Eventually, I found him in bed and shook him awake to grab a flashlight and move it.

It was a false alarm for everyone locally and we were back upstairs within half an hour. During our time in the basement, I found a message on my cell phone, which I'd grabbed on the way through the kitchen. The message was trip-related. By the time we got back upstairs, I was already prepping the list of things to think about instead of sleeping. I tried for 45 minutes or so but eventually came downstairs and attempted to sleep on the couch. By 4 I was soundly asleep, or as soundly as one can be on this couch.

Beast woke me up at 7 as he was preparing to leave for work. I managed to made it to work precisely on time. I cataloged, solved an ongoing problem for the 32nd time, cleared my desk off, staffed the Reference area for two-plus hours, and prepped paperwork for the short trip-related meeting at 5.

Then we went to dinner and I started drinking. I've had two cocktails since about 6, and I'm pretty close to non-functional. This goes to show that a) I don't drink much and/or often, and b) I'm way tired.

So. Up to bed. No alarm. I've listed the things that need to get done in the next 40 hours before leaving town, a list that encompasses everything from mowing the lawn to doing laundry to packing. Hopefully, the existence of that list will keep my middle-of-the-night "planning" at bay. The vodka I've had may help with that too, and I know the Benedryl I'm about to take will do the rest.

So good night and good luck. I'll be back before we leave Sunday afternoon, I hope.

---

Urban Word:

fauxtograph: A fauxtograph is a practical joke in which the video setting of a digital camera is used to trick the target into posing for a really long time for what isn't a picture at all. [It also seems to mean something along the lines of cleaning up a photo by digital enhancements to make something/someone look much better than reality.]

I'm wondering how many individual fauxtographs we can get this week from our group of kids. Is it bad that I want to waste battery power and disk space this way?

Killer

For the second time in two weeks, on the same stretch of road, Beast had a vehicle emergency around 3:30 this afternoon. This time he was in his own car, but the end result is that one vehicle is in the shop right now. He got a flat tire on a VERY busy road, managed to get to the side and get everything sorted to change the tire...and then a) broke off two lugnuts, b) slammed his right hand into the gravel when the second nut broke, and c) hyperextended his elbow at the same time.

Where was he headed? To the doctor about an injury he incurred about three weeks ago that just won't clear up--a ding in his nose from flying tool. So, he called me, I called the doctor's office and rescheduled that appointment, and then I called the local car-repair guy who towed Beast's Honda to the shop (over an hour round-trip), while Beast called the guy from whom he rents his business-trip cars. Repair Guy drove Beast to Avis and Beast made it on time to the barber shop where he and Sparky had haircuts scheduled at 5:00.

They got their haircuts, he went and moved all the stuff from his car into the rental, we met for dinner, and then we spent 45 minutes in a meeting about Sparky's new school. After the meeting, Sparky got a verbal commitment from a teacher to sponsor the anime club--the same teacher said he might start a video gaming club--I spoke to Sparky's gym teacher about some concerns, and we talked to a mom whose kids may be coming on the mission trip next month.

Beast was gone 5:15 a.m. - 8:30 p.m. straight; I left the house at 6 a.m. and returned at the same time.

Long day.

At least I didn't end up in jail for killing Schedule Nazi. She's still breathing. So far.

---

Urban Word:

California Car Pool: When each member of a group uses their own car to go to the same destination. Typically, describing the case where the group is together at the start or close enough to share rides.

Tonight was another one of those California Car Pool evenings for us: we took two cars from the barber shop to dinner, to the high school, and then home. Gas prices be damned..

A New Week

Mood: much better, thanks!
Hair: clean, needs color
Eyes: much improved; the doctor even says so
Listening to: the hum of the laptop, the chittering of the guinea pigs, and Sparky chewing

A much better week is in front of me (I hope). The weekend was fun, relaxing, separate from my life, and that was perfect.

Saturday, Sparky went to an anime thing with some friends. It was just far enough away for us not want to drive them there, come home and then go back (gas now having officially hit $4/gallon in our area). This was a serious meet-up, though: people in costume were ALL OVER THE PLACE near the hall. Freaks. ;-)

While they were at the meeting, Beast and I went for a walk through a nearby "park", met some very friendly deer (yes, there are pictures, no, they aren't uploaded), talked to AT&T about a family phone plan, had a great lunch outside with the accompaniment of blues music and "throttle-up" landing planes a couple of hundred feet above us, went to see "Speed Racer," and had a drink in a hotel bar. Lovely. The movie was surprisingly good, even for me who has seen the cartoon precisely once.

Sunday was ok. Church--which I wasn't excited about--then a youth meeting, which was pretty funny.

Yesterday I went to the eye dr. for a recheck (all clear, but keep using the drops during allergy season), wandered the mall (got Sparky some new earrings and bought some T-shirts for myself), grocery shopped, had lunch with Beast at the "no iceberg in my salad" place, came home, crashed in bed for an hour, and then met Beast at a nearby retirement/nursing/care home to interview them about FIL moving in a few months. Oh, and then we both went and gave blood. Usually it's no big deal but I had a newbie and I just about came off the table when she put the needle in. Nice little bruise today.

Today it's back to work. Maybe I'll get some cataloging done. ha ha ha

My usual laptop is dying again. Same problem: bad plug. I have developed hives, which is normal for when I get particularly stressed this time of year, but still really annoying. At least it is contained in one 4x6" area so far.

We are going to visit FIL and MIL this weekend, but between now and then, I have another care facility to visit with Beast, a meeting about Sparky's new school for all of us, three days of work, haircuts for all of us, and packing to do at some point. Yeah.

---

Urban Word:

spendy: expensive

Wow! Groceries have gotten really spendy all of a sudden!

Is it over?

The meeting wasn't all that bad this morning. I corrected a typo on one of his slides, a slide he has used in presentations all over the place at least 10 times. There was another typo later. Clearly the dude doesn't believe in SpellCheck--a man after my own heart, no? :-)

Stacie, my masseuse--how grandiose!!--hurt me today. Hurt me bad, for the purpose of doing me good. She worked on about 100 square inches of real estate on my upper back. I had to keep telling her to stop while I breathed out some of the pain. In the end, however, I can now turn my head, tip my head, nod my head...without pain. The pain I am feeling is more deep muscle soreness, like I actually did something for a change, rather than OMGWTF--I AM ATLAS!!

Then I came home, started laundry, cleaned, talked to Beast on the phone, watched last night's shows, tidied a little, mopped the kitchen/back hall/bathroom, finished the laundry, faffed about on teh 'tubes (including moving around and deleting several feeds in Bloglines--I'm down to 125. Hi Amy!), called Jenny...y'know, life. The good stuff. Yes, mopping = good stuff. I've lost my mind! I ate dinner too, by the way: fish. Yum.

Still need to put away about 2.5 weeks' worth of laundry tonight, finish the convo with Jen, and take a bath. The wind is whipping around outside, rain is falling, and I think there's a tornado watch for another few minutes. I love the smell of ozone. It's warm enough that I had to put on shorts, and I can hear people sitting in their garage across the street talking. Because the window, she be open.

N.B. : Regarding yesterday's rant about courtesy...before publishing the post, I deleted the line I had originally included that explained that I checked my site stats before writing it. If you have visited here anytime in the past month (or more), you are not involved. What I should have known about you guys (gals?) is that those of you who would take it to heart are those to whom I would cut miles of slack right now because of the shit in your personal lives. I'm sorry if I caused any of my good and true friends any angst. You all know who you are, dahlinks. Mwah.

Dear God, I've turned into Billy Crystal!

I'm going to go do that laundry thing, because I'm sure as soon as I start it, I'll be interrupted by a phone call, a good phone call.

---

Urban Word:

ice maker: The opposite of ice breaker. Something you do that makes it super awkward, right after meeting someone.

Doesn't it seem as if some weeks everything that comes out of your mouth when speaking in a group of people is an icemaker? Or is that just me?

More schedule

OK, I know this is getting repetitive. These things totally go in cycles, though.

I slept poorly last night due to ridiculously stupid television-watching before bed: a true crime show about a college girl, an hour of classifying various serial killers by their level of "evil", and an hour on the VA Tech shootings. And then off to bed.

It should come as no surprise then that today was not a good day. I spent ten minutes this morning doing a major PMS routine with Sparky. I yelled at coworkers--not that I haven't asked them dozens of times nicely about this issue--and then wasted over 4 hours working on the bloody demand order from last week. I got no forward-motion work done. The printer wouldn't work until I practically beat the shit out of it.

Left work at 3:15, stopped for pop for tonight's meeting, and thought my bad mood was lifting. Nope. Sparky and I arrived home at the same time and I picked up where I left off this morning. Eventually I settled down, but not before spending almost 15 minutes waiting for this laptop to boot up and then another 20 trying to get the documents for tonight's Session meeting to print.

I took a twenty-minute break, talked to Beast on the phone--he's on his way to Holland--had a brief convo with Sparky about tomorrow's schedule (see below) and left at 5:50 for the meeting.

My confirmand didn't show up. Bad sign. I shoulda left at that point. Tonight's the night the Session meets and welcomes the confirmands to the congregation. We had dinner with them, chatted, blahblahblah. Then they left and the actual meeting started.

HOLY     MARY     MOTHER  OF  GOD!!

I was clearly a bad person in a former life. This meeting was hell. We adjourned at 9:50. I yelled at people THREE TIMES to stop talking at once so I could fucking hear the wording of the actual motions being made. I was in tears by the end, put away the laptop, talked with a few people after I'd pulled myself together a bit, and stumbled out the car where I sobbed for a couple of minutes. Last, except the pastor, to leave. Fuck me sideways, I hate these meetings.

Tomorrow, up at 5:20 to shower and head off to Bible Study--which I NEED in a visceral way, especially this week. Sparky will head off to school on his own, and then come over to the library afterwards to do his homework. Once he's got that sorted out, we'll head to Amy's house (tee hee), stopping on the way for gas. Say goodbye to another $50.

Amy and I are doing a class together tomorrow night. During the class, Sparky will terrorize the world from the computers in the library where she works. Afterwards, we drive home...about an hour?

Thursday morning I have a massage at 9--gee, d'ya think I need one?--and then I work in the afternoon and evening.

Friday, I'm off work. It was tempting at tonight's meeting to say that I would be one of the Session reps going to the mediation meeting with a local government mafioso-in-his-own-mind....but no. The only reason that I'd want to be there is if I had a loaded pump-action shotgun for use on the aforementioned politico. He is s jerk. Instead, I'll probably clean the house up. Woohoo.

The upshot that I'm spending a lot of time, words, and space to say is that I'm not going to be home much this week.

Beast is on his road trip through Thursday (?) and then will head to his parents' house to see what he can do to help out there. He'll head home either Saturday or Sunday.


Good things:

Sparky still loves me (why, I have no idea)               kids are riding bikes in the neighborhood
   nothing in my body is actually causing me tremendous amounts of pain right now       
               I have a curtain in my kitchen window for the first time ever in this house
(and for the first time in any kitchen in a house in which I've lived in this state!)
magnolia trees are blooming                         friends--OMG, without friends I'd so be toast!
         there's a freezer full of dinners in my basement          I have earplugs and I'm not afraid to use 'em                   
   I know I'm not the only cranky person around (there were three of us at tonight's meeting)
                  CT didn't have a heart problem after all                    teenagers make me laugh
    I have a good book on CD in the car             a massage is coming very soon         
 seeing Amy          the weather is wonderful                I heard some good/loud headbanging music at work today 

---

Urban Word:

web shy: Unwillingness to expose one's thoughts, feelings or identity on the web, knowing that doing so means freaknobs from Baton Rouge to Bangladesh will know everything about you.

Judging by this post alone, I doubt very much I would ever be diagnosed as web shy.

Still around?

Yup. Busy. Yup. Synopsis:

FRIDAY:

Stayed home from work. Took drugs for my neck. Slept. I believe Beast was home for part of the day. Don't remember.

SATURDAY:

Our annual spring mission trip to the Big City to the West. Beast rewired a basement room with three or four others. I grouted about 3/4 of a bathroom and laid tile in a short, 8-food hallway. We actually only cemented half the hall. I worked with five or six others who were putting in a closet and drywalling a porch and (different) closet. All of us were in a halfway house where Beast has worked before (men just out of prison) in a neighborhood "in transition." Not sure which way the transition is going. There is a crack distribution house at the end of the block one way, hookers a couple of houses away, and families in three houses across the street. Links to previous mission trips.

By the time we left--10 hours after arriving--my knees and back were shot, and Beast's nose was cut by flying metal. He nearly injured his eye. And they have interesting toys in the office where he was working; interesting in a "Christian" office but necessary for their counseling of sex workers. Sparky has no idea what we were giggling at, and I told Beast he can explain.

My neck/shoulder obviously had improved, but I basically replaced that agony with the pain left from kneeling on ceramic tile for 8 hours. I will not be converting to Catholicism or any other religion requiring kneeling.

SUNDAY:

I went in to work at 11 to try to get a little caught up on last week's pile o' shit. It was my Sunday to work anyway, so that covered 1-4 on a beautiful day where we who were forced to be inside kept saying, "Why are all these people HERE??"

I came home, helped (a little) with kitchen cleanup. Beast has finished painting, so we can move all the stuff on the island back to where it belongs. I made the last DbD meal, and then spent the evening looking for typos in our library catalog and checking for Dewey Errors. I know what this means. If you don't, trust me when I say it's a clear sign that I'm beyond anal.

TODAY:

Another eye appointment; I passed. Grocery shopping. Then a stop at DbD to make 9 meals. It took me bloody forever (although I guess the new employee said to the supervisor, "She moves FAST!"), and by the time I got in the car with everything I wasn't sure I'd be able to get out of the car when I got home! My feet are killing me, still from crawling around hard floors on Saturday.

Once Sparky gets home, he and I will head to the shoe store to buy him some sandals...ones that aren't plastic this year! We'll probably also pick up some shorts for him. And I'll look at curtains for the kitchen and dining room windows. Maybe an office chair for me: the hydraulics on mine blew out last week. Thanks a bunch, Sparky. ahem

Tonight, I'm really hoping I can get the kitchen floor wet-mopped--there's still an awful lot of drywall dust on the floor--and talk to Amy about this class we're teaching in two days!

Howsomever, right now, while Sparky is still at school for another hour, I'm going to go lie down and try to loosen up my back a bit.

---

Urban Word:

acoustic shave: the act of shaving with razor; not an electric shave

The thought of anything but an acoustic shave on my pits is painful in the extreme! How does Norelco make ANY money?

I'm tired

I was awake this morning at 5 worrying about what kind of flowers to buy for the youth group. {eyeroll}

At 6 I got up and washed my hair and got everything packed for church and got dressed.

At 7:15 I hit the road to buy flowers and maybe donuts.

At 7:25 Beast called to say that Redneck Man was getting donuts, so I just got a dozen long-stemmed peach roses.

At 7:45 I arrived at church. Redneck Man and his daughter were there, but none of us had church keys. We waited for Beast.

At 7:55 I was prepping the flowers for after church.

At 8:10 we were still waiting for a couple of kids. I realized I'd left the final copy of the script at home.

At 8:15 I left the church parking lot for the 12 minute drive home.

At 8:35 I was back in church with the script. We were still missing one kid.

At 8:45 the final kid showed up...so much for rehearsing.

At 9:00 the first worship service started.

At 9:45, give or take, we were done. A few bumps, some minor and unnoticed errors, but all was good. Lots of kudos from people as they left. Some Big Strong Men were crying after the skit.

At 10:00 we removed the back row of chairs to force people to sit CLOSE rather than leaving three empty rows in front.

At 10:25 people refilled the back row because all the other seats were taken (except in the choir section. Whatever.)

At 10:30 we lined up to do the service again. This time, they rocked the whole service, start to finish. When I came in after the skit I saw three people leaving for the bathrooms. Two of them came back still crying hard. One of the youth group girls was even teared up: "Oh, no: we made the congregation cry!"

At 11:30 we were in the midst of hearing how wonderful we were. Not us, the kids. Not us, the kids. Not us, the kids.

At 11:45 we grabbed some lunch--salad, lasagna, pizza, and lots of cookies--and sat down for the informal meeting. At some point over the next hour we sat in on the meeting and cleaned up our stuff from worship.

At 12:55 we left church. Beast came home. Sparky and I headed to the library for a Special Event.

At 1:10 we arrived at the library. We nabbed one of the last spots in the lot. Sparky disappeared to check his email. I got my name tag and reported for duty after taking a couple of ibuprofen (My Brain Aches).

At 1:30 the program began with the girls chorus from the high school. I mentioned to Sparky that the Wii was set up in the meeting room. He disappeared into Guitar Hero.

At 2:00 I had a piece of cake with frosting, Sparky continued to channel some early '70s guitar legend or another, and I schmoozed with attendees.

At 2:55 we arrived home. I had been on my feet the entire time except for the 20 minutes I sat down to eat. Not 20 minutes in a row, mind you: 20 minutes for lunch plus the cake eating.

Beast got the ceiling painted in the kitchen. He had a meeting this afternoon. I tried to log on to my work computer to get some order cards done, but it didn't work. Again. So I slept while he was at his meeting. Sparky played The Sims. We ordered pizza for dinner at 6:30, ate at 7:30, and Sparky just went up to bed. If I hadn't slept from 4:30 till 6:15, I'd be in bed too. My feet are KILLING me.