Squeeze it already!

No, I'm not dead.  Or, I'm not physically dead.  My brain has been in a bumbling deathlike stupor.  That once useful organ has knitted it's own shroud out of dryer lint and cat hair.  No...knit is too strong a word...any part of my brain that could once claim to be creative has turned it's back, dropped it's drawers, and shown me exactly where I could kiss it.

I don't think I've been this depressed since I was 14 years old.  That was a low year.  People then knew that I was sad and eventually I worked it through.  People today probably can guess that I've been sad and I think I'm working it through.  Unfortunately that means I've laid low for a month.

It also may mean that I need to make an appointment with a doctor that doesn't practice in my tiny town.  Something is wrong with my body and it is nothing I can point a finger on exactly.   As is usual my hormones are all over the place with all the associated symptoms.  It's an evil cycle...the hormones make me sad and anxious and then I grow a beard...then the hormones ease up and I'm sad and anxious because I've grown a beard...then I shave the beard and I'm sad and anxious because I get ingrown beard hairs...then hello PMS!

I'm unsure of why it's all bubbled up at this particular time in my life but right at this moment I'm working  through the sad, anxious beard growing by stuffing my gob with white chocolate truffles.  As long as I don't eat the whole package I don't have to layer guilt onto my anxiety.  I stopped at my serving size and I won't be too full to take my B vitamins and my probiotic.  Acidophilus is an excellent poop enhancer.  Constipation would make this whole mess only that much worse.

Part of how I worked through being sad in my teen years was just to throw myself in things to do.  Last night I was compelled to look through boxes of family photos for my son's high school graduation slide show and found my teenaged albums.  It looks like most of what I found to do was groping boys but there were also photos of activities that didn't require saliva.  I scanned a bunch of those, posted them to my Facebook and I was happy.

Memories are nice.

But then I found something to do in watching zit popping videos on YouTube and my happy descended into this weird ecstatic nausea.

That feeling is better than sad and anxious.  I'll take it.

Raspeduch, strudel!

Before I met my husband, and fed my husband all kinds of good food which has expanded his figure, Justin was a grunt in the US Army.  He's a Desert Storm veteran.  He wore sand colored BDU's and a wine colored beret which he didn't earn but bought at an Army surplus store because he liked it.  When you meet a man wearing a beret, a Bob Dylan Tshirt, and combat boots, you know that your dates will be filled with intellectual movie rentals and saliva.

Check out this photo of Justin taking a whiz on a bush in Bad Kissingen Germany, near where he was stationed.

One of his platoon-mates took this photo.  They must have liked each other a lot.  I don't ask questions.

Someday Justin would like to take me back to Germany so he can repeat the pose, pee in a bush and I can watch...I kid...He wants to take me back so I can see buildings and eat food.

Until then, I've ordered Justin a just because present.  Just because I needed to round up my order for Mirabell MozartKugeln Chocolate up over $25.

Check out Justin's sausages:

Premium German wursts...as premium as unmentionable minced and aged pig parts gets...made with German love.

Ich lieben Pepto Bismol.

You skipped the meat parts because I mentioned chocolate didn't you?  It's been difficult to find the specific Mozart Kugel I used to buy at a department store that's long gone out of business.   I used to pay a dollar a piece for these chocolates back when I could buy a gallon of milk for a buck thirty.

I don't know why they photo shopped the center to be that baby-poop green.  Sure, it's pistachio marzipan in the middle but in real life it looks edible.  Anyhow, BEST CHOCOLATE EVER.

Rest assured that German grill fest night will consist of plenty of meat, mustard, cabbage, excellent chocolate, a copy of Doctor Strangelove and saliva.

Justin lost his beret at a VA hospital...sigh.

I'm voting for the best candidate in the Swinger's Party.

Never ever EVER go googling for a photo of Ron Jeremy to illustrate a post on the Iowa Caucus.

I feel dirty.

Like greasy dirty.

A little intrigued but still, dirty, and somewhat nauseated.

I can guess that every single citizen in Iowa feels similarly today.  Greasy.  Put upon.  Harangued.  Sick and tired.  In need of a towel to wipe off with or a long shower.  What with all the ads upon ads upon ads and more unwanted phone calls and door to door solicitors than they can count.  Iowans probably woke up in this morning, stumbled to their bathrooms to pee, and found ads printed on their rolls of toilet paper.

After all that, why would any reasonable person go out and vote?  Politicos have harassed people into a stupor.

Keyword is reasonable.  Unreasonable people will still go vote.  Whackadoodles are hitting the polling places this very second and happily tapping the screen* to vote for Newt, Michelle, Dr. Paul or Pretty Witty Mitty.  This whole GOP presidential run has been whackadoodle.  It's only going to continue in this great tornado of crazy until it goes full out Wizard of Oz in November.

...and I just thought about dressing Ron Jeremy as a representative of the Lollipop Guild.

Happy to share that image with you.

Happy to share my bottle of Maalox too.

* Reader A.R. tells me that Iowans aren't caucusing with any sort of touch screen involved.  They are caucusing in their schools and homes and whatnot, trying to lure each other into groups for their preferred candidate.  I replied that this only helps with my Ron Jeremy imagery.  

My astronomer needs an enema.

I'm not in the practice of making New Years resolutions at this time of year.  For me the resolutions are usually made in late August and failed at by September.  Goes along with the start of the school year when my husband and kids go back to the grind and I get to poop with my bathroom door open once again.  Once I resolved to find inner peace by the way of yoga.  DO I SEEM PEACEFUL TO YOU, DAMMIT?  Yeah, yoga fail even as much as openly pooping may improve my mood.

For 2012, however, along with the presidential election, I'm also facing my 20 year high school reunion around September.  That's the reunion where all the dentists gather in one corner, lawyers in another, investment bankers in a third, computer programmers in the fourth and housewives in the far back behind the caterer's table next to the spent Sterno cans and we all discuss who went bald and who got fat.

It's not just a party though.  It's tradition at my high school that the class in it's 20th year plan a bunch of events for homecoming.  The class of 1993, old fogies smelling like teen spirit, has to spend a week entertaining the class of 2013 with their Katy Perry teenaged dreams.  We walked to school uphill both ways WITHOUT texting anyone on the way.  Hours upon hours of not being able reach out to your friends with the random auto corrected greeting.

Shoot me for thinking it, but I'd like to attend my reunion without my saddle bags.  I can let my hair go grey and show off my new crow's feet, but my new and unimproved pear shape has got to go.  Even if the extra weight has provided me with the boobs I never had in high school.  I don't care at all about showing off my knockers but to be accused of stuffing my pants...the horror!

To help me in not embarrassing myself at the reunion, which I really am excited to go to, Yahoo has provided me with a horoscope for the next year:

Scorpio, 2012 is your year of reckoning! You worked yourself to the bone in 2011, and now you've hit a major impasse. You've got until October to continue experimenting with what you want out of life; after that, big decisions must be made. Saturn is about to take up residence in your constellation for the first time in nearly 30 years. This planet rules karma, time and integrity, so each of these will be key themes throughout the year. Your values will be tested during the last quarter of the year, so get all your ducks in a row by then to avoid the stress of Saturn's inquisition. The good news is that a weight is about to be lifted from your consciousness, and all the background melancholy you may have felt over the past few years should lighten up.

A major eclipse pattern takes hold of your stars in autumn 2012. November's total solar eclipse in Scorpio is sure to rock the very foundation of your life, so get ready for some major shifts in your relationships. Your life will definitely not be the same by the time 2013 rolls around. You're a butterfly and a phoenix - expect to shed some major skin this year.

This could also be one of the most socially driven years you've ever seen. With Mars activating your house of friendship and goals in the sign of Virgo, expect a majority of your energy to be engaged with a barrage of social situations. It's all for a good cause, however, and will translate into your bigger life goals; in fact, a good portion of the parties you attend will have some sort of work component behind them. And with glamorous Neptune moving back into your pleasure sector in February, life will suddenly become very art-house cinema for you.

Saturn up in my business?  Major eclipse pattern?  Glamorous Neptune art-house social situations?

...and here I thought they discontinued selling Zima in the United States.

Okay...I can get with all this change but I admit I'm disappointed.  This fortune cookie is telling me that I'm not getting rid of my saddle bags until after the reunion!

I ate fish and salad for dinner for nothing.

I want a donut.

2011 - We hardly knew ye

Happy New Year folks.  Here's to hoping the world won't be ending in 2012 but if it does, I will not be wearing underwear, clean or otherwise.  Underwear is so 2011.  If the world goes I go taking out exactly what I took in...my bare butt and a sense of humor.

As is usual for my first post in the year, quotes uttered by my family during the Christmas visit, or as close as I can remember.  I wrote a bunch down and the paper got misplaced putting everything away at home.  If I misquote anyone, I apologize.  It wasn't intentional and if it was, it was only to make me appear smarter than I am.

Here we go:

"You people..."
"Those people..."
"These people..."
"You idiots..."
- How my family addresses each other and refers to our quirks on Christmas day.

"I'm full of durp."
- Ben, my niece Jenni's husband, explaining why he could never solve a simple rubik's cube much less the more complicated puzzle cubes my son was solving at the table.  Check out my son's lastest YouTube solving some cube I don't remember the name of.  You see me in the background briefly.

"We call our softball team 'the straps' because, you know, we're all lesbians."
- Tonya, my sister Lisa's partner in life and evil, with loud whispery emphasis on the word 'lesbians'.  It's a community league conspiracy.

"I know why Lori didn't come home.  She done got her ass sat down."
- Gary, my sister Lori's husband, who upon missing his wife found her at our parent's house.  They all live on the 'family compound' in Utah and everyone knows if you aren't home you have your ass sat down just across the way.

"You really need to brush your teeth."
- Me, The Absent Minded Housewife, during a conversation with my teenager.  Not an odd thing to say to the kid but then he tells me that it's not his breath.  He'd farted.

"Bone..Bones...Boner....Boners!"
- My twelve year old son Alec, who found these choice words in a family game of boggle.  The same board I also found 'weiner' and 'weiners'.  He's not related to me at all.

"Your tender timer popped!  You're fully cooked and juicy!"
- Me again, to my sister Lisa, who was walking around with one very pronounced erect nipple despite her bra.  This is not the first time any of us sisters have said this to one another.  Or the first time we've joke about each other's boobs.  My boobs are especially jokeworthy.

"I am the God of Meatloaf!"
- Ryan, my six year old son, who really said this during Thanksgiving but since I can't recall any more quotes I'm going to sneak it in.  Like I could get this child to eat meatloaf.


Here's to hoping 2012 is good for everyone and if the world ends for you, it ends on a high note, with your underwear off doing something fun or interesting.

Fa La La La La! Part V

Ode to Soy Nog



Soy to the world! the Nog is come;
Let earth receive it's treat;
Let every cup prepare it room,
and vegans and the lactose intolerant drink,
and vegans and the lactose intolerant drink,
and vegans, and vegans and the lactose intolerant drink.

Parts 1,  2,  3 and 4.



Let's make cookies!

Today I looked at the grout in my kitchen and became depressed.

Three years ago I looked at my kitchen floor, which was then covered in impractical white linoleum, became depressed, and then I did this to it:

That's a banana sticker to the lower left.  I left it on my floor because it had personality.

Two years ago, after slowly removing all my impractical white linoleum and living on a concrete floor, I put down tile all by myself and it was beautiful and I was proud:

That's grout dust left on the floor.  I chose grout the same color as the tile and sealed the grout like a good handywoman should.  Grout sealing smells lovely and after sniffing it for as long as the directions suggested I should leave it to dry, I felt an urge to invite transgendered unicorns to tea and bake sugar cookies shaped like genitalia.

So, today, my grout looked like the wrong end of a Tijuana donkey show, which struck me as sad.  Not sad because I've never seen a donkey show but sad because my kitchen floor, as much as I cared for it, looks like what I'm assuming the cheap seats at a donkey show would reveal.

I mean, one day you have a new floor.  A shiny floor.  A floor you could roll sugar cookie dough on it if you were inclined to.  The next day you've got sticky greasy donkey residue all lurking in the cracks.  Nothing stays the same.  What you put value into doesn't last.

The novelty of new wears off.  That's when you're on your hands and knees with an industrial sized toothbrush and a can of cleanser with bleach which also has a delightful scent.  Do you have a pony?  Does it like chamomile?  If you have a donkey it's not invited.  I'm making snickerdoodles.

It's after the tea cools that you remember that you're lucky to live in a house with a roof and a floor.  Lucky to have access to household cleaners.  Lucky for fresh water coming right out of the tap on a whim.  Lucky to have the two dollars to purchase a brush which is only used to scrub grout.  Lucky to have a body that can do the work.

My grout is beautiful now.

...and a thankless chore, which ultimately no one will notice, has cleared my head, which isn't lucky...

It's wonderful.