My Daily Rants

July 24, 2007-Observations yet again... selfish ones, rife with whining

Meaning that this entry is all about self-reflection, my journey, and all that 'stuff' that hits me hard when I look in the mirror.

As each year passes, I find myself faced more and more with the fact that I have become that much less sophisticated, that much less sure of what I say, who I am, what I do... because I'm much more aware of the reality around me, and much less able to embrace it because I'm more and more aware that I can't control it. Believe it or not, there is goodness in this.

On the panic attack front, as I grow more comfortable with having this condition, admit it to others, I've become full-blown dumbfounded at how many respond by telling me that they've either had them, too, knew someone who did, or admit other mental illnesses with just as debilitating, sometimes worse, consequences. And though I feel less 'abnormal' and not nearly as alone after hearing their confessions, it still makes me wonder what in the fuck is going on in this world that so many of us are dealing with the absolute shit our brains are capable of dishing out. Has this always existed, masses upon masses dealing with brain chemistry problems, only the social theme of whatever passed era dictated it be hidden? Or has something in our environment, perhaps, maybe in our diets, our air, our DNA, or any vector'ish' reason resulted in this way-too-massive number of victims suffering happiness interrupted? I don't know, but I hope we all one day will. Don't even get me started on how many different kinds of pills the people I know are taking.

Family... ever since going through hell and back to help my mom find a house, help my brothers get out of losing their house, help their animals to stay with them instead of getting dumped, after going out once and visiting them overnight, I haven't really heard from any of them since, with the exception of the Jordan Incident. Eric and I have called a couple of times, me getting no answer, Eric having Mom pick up, in the middle of the day, yet half asleep, telling him she'd call back later, after which she never called back.

Conclusions drawn from this are many, guessed, and no matter what, sad. And of all the reasons why my family has stayed so distant lately, I have three top runners when it comes to explanations. Possibility one, Mom read my last diary entry about how I don't think she or my brothers are really the best candidates to take in, much less change my nephew Jordan's life, and if this is indeed the reason, then I can live with that. Why? It's the truth. And as harsh as harsh can get, if my being close to any member of my family, much less all of them, is only possible if I enable rather than talk about what's so unbelievably honest, then this alienation is actually my preference.

Conclusion number two... my mother and brothers are so extremely selfish that they relied on, communicated with, and leaned on me because they needed help, and now that they no longer need it, they no longer need me. If this ends up being the case, see above. I'll pray and send vibes, but I won't feel a second's more grief than that, knowing it just outright ain't my fault.

Conclusion number three... They've just been too busy to call me or return my calls. If this should be the reason, then I will not only ask you to see the last two paragraphs, but I'll also ask the powers that be in complete wonder how it is that I'm the only family member who either loves enough or is stupid enough to contact people when something's not in it for me. Seriously, how did I become that way? Why do I still think of others, as selfish as I am in so many ways, and still manage to worry about them, knowing not more than an ounce or two of my concern will ever be requited?

I am by far no prize, but I know that. It's because I know that so well that I constantly try to compensate for it. I love my family, all the time knowing down deep that none of them love me to the same degree, and though that sucks, it doesn't ruin me. It should, but it doesn't, and it never will.

Of all my blood relations, my mother has failed me regularly, despite trying quasi hard all of her life not to, my brothers have loved me, made sure I knew it, yet still couldn't quite be there when I needed them, my sister has never ceased to assure me that our relationship is completely one-sided, my father went out of his way to try to be a good dad, but when it came down to the bare emotional necessities, he was more guarded than nurturing, and my stepmother I know without a doubt married my dad with me as an afterthought she felt she could handle, a condition she'd have to deal with as a side effect of snagging my father. In other words, not a single person in my life as a child ever loved me more than they did themselves. It sounds like I'm whining, sounds like I hate everyone, sounds like I'm seeking pity.

Truth is, this all pisses me off. It makes one part of me want to beat the living shit out of all of them with the most painful of either verbal or physical weapon. It breaks my heart in some ways, but it makes it stronger in others. In truth, I will fail in my life, but it will never be because these people failed me. I love them all, fully. I love them because I see them, know them, all the good and bad, and rather than spend my life blaming them for all that's dysfunctional about me, reality shows me constantly that my identity, my future, my purpose, could be great if they were all there in the right way, but that my future and my purpose doesn't rely on them. They've made their marks, and what I do with it now holds all the power, all the resonance, all the meaning. I'm not saying the thought of what I should've gotten doesn't hurt; I'm saying that what I did get I can work with;)

Flaws and all, age and all, expectations, fears, failures, successes, and all that cliché life-search bullshit... I'll be okay:)

July 19, 2007- The Stuff of Nothingness and Substance

Not sixty seconds ago, one of my cats, Rhoda Lee, projectile vomited from the highest step on my staircase the hugest amount of semi-digested Purina Indoor Formula cat food, not on the step, but over its side, the once compacted and contained mass of wetted nuggets and stomach fluid hitting the laminate floor below with the kind of splat reminiscent of a really fat guy jumping to his death from a fifth-floor balcony.

What did I do? Did I freak over having just Swiffered an hour earlier? No. Did I yell at my neurotic tuxedo feline for not focusing her bullimia to the single staircase step instead of the wide bullseye area I now have to re-clean? No.

I marveled. I marveled at the splat, that gigantic splat, and I stared momentarily in awe at the distances in which a cat's stomach contents traveled, thanks to physics. As we speak, the plop of puke remains on my oak laminate. I'll get to it.

A couple of days ago, I woke up, as I usually do (duh), lazily stumbled into my bathroom, plopped down on the toilet, did my organic thing, rose, sleep still embedded fully in every tissue, flushed... then looked.

As the water's swirling, my sleepy eye wakes more as it sees a black squiggly thing fighting the current. Before reality hits, 'Hey! I didn't poop!' flashes through my mind-to-mind dialogue, and in seconds, I realize that I indeed did not poop, and that what I was seeing was, yes, a snake.

Isn't this the stuff of Urban Legend? How in hell did this thing get in my porcelain god????

While wondering all of this, my hand is instinctively delving into the depths of toilet madness, drenching themselves in not-clean-enough toilet bowl water in hopes of catching a baby snake, who, no matter how hard I tried, kept evading me by wiggling up into places I couldn't reach.

Long story short, I did the unspeakable... for just about every state but Alabama, that is... I peed in my bathtub the rest of the day, hoping to avoid flushing this little creature into the hell I'm pretty sure he'd just come from, hoping he'd appear again in my bowl and allow me the chance to catch him and release him into a world less tainted by chlorine and crap. In the end, he finally appeared again, only to escape my grasp, make a beeline for the drain and disappear. I peed once more in the bathtub before I finally gave in and flushed, saying a little prayer while doing so.

The internet, local folks, and other information since the infamous snake incident all have me concluding that maybe it's a good thing that I didn't actually catch this guy. Grass snakes don't swim in water, and the only snake around here known to swim in sewer systems, much less swim in any kind of water, are water Moccasins, a.k.a. Cottonmouths. For those of you who've never heard of them, they're poisonous... very. Panic attacks aside, maybe the powers that be don't really want me to die soon like I'm so often convinced... maybe they just want me to be freaked out forever over my bathroom habits;)

I recently met up with yet another high school classmate, and was pleasantly amazed to see that she's also a published writer. Temple's produced a few, and I'm happy to see it. Her name then was Francis Nunley. It's Frances Berndt now, and though the name is changed, looking back, I can say a lot about her that I have about Brian Floca. She and I knew each other best freshman year, and even though the only class we shared was JV swimming, I got to know her enough to recognize the artist in her. She had a thespian way of relating... outgoing, out there, fluid, extroverted, and unashamed... a true performer in speech and action, so in the long run, I'm happy yet not as surprised as I could be to know that she's a writer, also an actress, is published, and VP's a writer's group in her area. She'll do well, as if she already hasn't:)

And you know, looking back (and this is me getting back to my bitchiness), there really is only one person in high school that I honestly could say I borderline despised, enough for her to be the one person I don't think I could hug and say 'Great to see you again' to. And the winner is...

Karen H (and yes, this has been edited. Her full name once listed here, but I decided that even I wasn't that mean).

She's Karen H. V. now, has probably changed quite a bit, has probably made good and buried a lot of her nastiness, but even still, I to this day wish upon her a curse of any combination of venereal diseases.

Karen, at least in my eyes, was the quintessential bitch in high school. And I'm not talking about the good kind of bitch, the strong bitch with harsh yet strong views on life, the hooker with the heart of gold kind of bitch. Nope, Karen was just mean. She was hard in appearance, kind of what I'd call 'trailerish', but managed to still be pretty in that hard way. Bruised is what I'd call her, though nobody really knew why. Despite the rough edges, Karen was a good dancer, a great gymnast, and had a close circle of loyal friends.

I first met her when I made the drill team my sophomore year, still new to town, thrilled to make the team, and eager to make friends. Karen not only didn't want to be my friend, she instead thought it'd be more entertaining to pick on me that entire year, judging, condescening, and grabbing every opportunity to let me know that I, for whatever reason, was someone she despised. It shouldn't have bothered me. I had plenty of other friends, wasn't an outcast, didn't suffer the slings and arrows of any other mis-directed discontent other than hers, but still... the mystery of why she hated me so much was never solved. Nobody knew why, especially me, and though I went from being hurt over the 'why's' to basically just having to keep myself from flattening her skull with a Louisville Slugger, I never have understood why this particular gal had it in for me so badly.

And as mean as I can be now, back then, I never fought back. I let her do her thing, let her torture me. Maybe I believed in karma more then than I realized, because my vengeance came a year later, when we drill team girls who wanted to have more of a part in the group dared to try out for officer.

There were a lot of us who wanted to audition for an officer position, a lot. Karen was one of the ones trying out for officer. So was I. The audition involved several steps... an interview with the previous officers, an interview with the current drill team, an individually choreographed dance performed solo in front of a HUGE number of people, and a popular vote.

At the end of Freshman year, and the end of officer tryouts, my name was announced as an officer. Karen's wasn't. And even when my friends were hugging me not ten feet away from where a sobbing Karen was being consoled by her small circle, I didn't gloat... at least not on the outside.

And after that, her attempts to bully me were cut short. Real fucking quick. They still never stopped, though. This woman, to this day, has been the one and only real bully I could never forgive, because I could never see her point. And though so many of you readers are either going to say directly to me or at least think that I should meet her again and resolve this, I can just as fervently tell you that I don't need to. I didn't like her then, don't really need to like her now, but I'm still grateful in that way only those of us grown enough can like someone like Karen Henning after the fact. She, for whatever reason, awakened something in me that has helped me survive as well as I have, something that you'd think would merit thanks to a degree, but in reality, I think I only owe her recognition... my kind of recognition. If she saves the world tomorrow, that'll be great, I'll send her tons of kudos, but she'll always be an instrument in my life far more than she'll be an heirloom.

Finally...

I was in the bathtub last night, soaking in scorching sudsy water, letting the heat sweat my toxins out, easing my mind by reading Lisey's Story, Stephen King's fictional tribute to his wife, and while I'm reading, my mind keeps wandering to more personal things. I guess the hormones are taking over, because I'm thinking of all the wrong things in my life, the people I've failed, the occasions I haven't yet risen to, and quite possibly will never rise to. By the time the bath water has lowered to meet my body's temp, I'm just about to say out loud 'Paula, you're the biggest fucking loser'.

And then I saw it.

An ant, a tiny, tiny ant... wandered up onto the rim of the tub, inspecting its path so diligently, purpose and intent far surpassing his knowledge that a shitload of dangerous water, not to mention a human, are within crushing distance of him.

With the same purpose, the little fella then crawled up the side of my book, along the page ends, and as I'm watching him, I see something that floors me.

He cast a shadow.

Have you ever seen an ant cast a shadow? Until then, I hadn't. I didn't know they could.

It was a good one, too, darkening the stark white of the bathtub ledge significantly with his tiny shaded profile, proudly letting me know that he was there, goddamit. He was there.

I left Lisey's Story on page 89, got out of the tub carefully, for fear of disturbing this little insect, who so effortlessly let me know he was there...

And didn't question shit the rest of the night.

July 15, 2007- Rock, Paper, Scissors with a hint of Romy and Michelle

My brain is this cyclone of 'stuff', thanks to the time passed since my last entry.

Eric and I went to our nephew Cooper's birthday party, something I at first dreaded, but ended up being happy about attending. I love seeing all the kids, but the thought of all those in-laws in my face, asking me when I was going to spew out a puppy or two frankly grated at me. I was wrong, though. It ended up being a great visit with good people, and not a single person pressured me to get knocked up anytime soon;) Then again, maybe they're just thinking that I'm too old to bother anymore;)

My 20-year reunion is coming up, and I can't go. Funny thing is that I've, until recently, been glad that I can't go;) I didn't like my high school years, popular or not, was so unsure of myself, but more so, there were only a handful of people from that time in my life I'd like to see, and the one I miss the most, Kati James, passed away a few years ago. I've had no desire to revisit those times, those people, much less glorify it like I know so many attendees will do. In my mind, I've always felt that there were two main types of people who shit a brick of excitement (painful visual), when faced with a high school reunion... one, the 'god' or 'goddess' of the high school halls who comes back to the reunion in an effort to relive the glory days, 'cause life since then hasn't been nearly as flattering, and two, the picked on, made fun of, insecure and tortured angsty young soul whose days since high school are immensely better, both in lifestyle and appearance, yet they haven't been able to live down the hell they once went through, therefore they feel they have to make that reunion in an effort to 'show them all', a la Romy and Michelle. I realize that there are people who go to these things for completely different reasons... too bad I haven't met any of 'em;)

In any case, I'm not either, and sorry, but I just had no real desire to go. Then I RSVP'd my no on our school's website one day, checked my email a couple of days later.

I have to say that I've really enjoyed hearing from old classmates who've emailed me, hearing about their lives now, their memories of 'then', realizing that these are real people, not the people I remember and didn't really want to see again. I've learned so much from corresponding with them lately, heard interesting updates, and pleasant surprises, not to mention juicy gossip;)

The coolest piece of news I got recently was that a 'hidden crush' I had during my Junior and Senior year turned out to be a huge success in his later life. His name is Brian Floca, and in high school, he was well-liked, but skinny, nerdy in a sexy way, and unbelievably intelligent, not to mention one hell of an artist. I shared a couple of honors classes with him, and though I had a steady boyfriend those two years, I'd watch him more than a taken girl should watch a guy, never spoke about how cute I thought he was to my friends because I simply wasn't ballsy enough then to not care about what other people think.

Anyway, while catching up with a fellow drill team officer a few days ago, I found out that Brian is a highly revered author and illustrator of Children's books. When I say highly, I mean highly, and you know, though it's cool news, it's not surprising:) I think we all knew Brian was going to do well.

So, though I still have two must-attend events that keep me from attending my 20 year reunion, I'm actually now a little sad about not being able to make it. Maybe I was wrong in thinking the people I didn't connect with then would merit the same disconnection now. Maybe I'm more the snob, the critic, the bigot, and the judge than anyone from my pom pom and varsity days ever was.

I'll leave on a final, cute note that exemplifies the bond I share with my husband better than anything else I could write-

Yesterday, we were channel-flipping, and we ended up on MTV, of all channels, laughing our asses off at a show called Rob and Big, a reality show that follows two friends, their bulldog, and their miniature horse around, capturing with cameras odd yet hilarious moments in their lives together. Anyway, during one episode, the two were playing Rock, Paper, Scissors, and while the game on screen was taking place, Eric looked at me, befuddled, and finally admitted that he'd never played the game, didn't understand it. After my WTF reaction, I tried to explain it to him, couldn't find the words, then decided just to show him. Teaching him the hand-signals for rock, paper, and scissors, I started the game..

One... two... three! We both made rock.

One... two... three! We both did scissors.

One... two... three! We both did rock again.

One... Two... three! We both did paper.

One... Two... three! We both did rock again.

One... Two... Three! (and by this point, we're freaking out and laughing) We both do paper.

... This went on, and on, and on, and on, and on until finally, he did paper, and I did scissors. But here's the thing... I knew he was going to do paper, LOL!

The point of this, the example it brought home to us both is that we are just fuckin' connected, and I mean fuckin' connected. In my entire dysfunctional existence of learning by massive screw-up, I somehow managed to find the kind of mate I happily meld with enough to fully know and love in and out, and in the process, realize all the acceptance vice versa is capable of.

One... Two... Three!

Life's good:)

July 05, 2007- Dr. Schultze, and a world of other stuff, if I can fit it in;)

Doc Schultze was a good man, a great vet, and I'm fully going to miss him. I remember the first time I visited his office, back in 1993. I was unimpressed with the rinky dink little place, but walked out of there with a healthier dog, and a resolve to make this nice man my regular vet.

Over the years, Dr. Schultze was a blessing, treating so many of my animals for so many things, never charging me full price, and often times completely waiving any bill I might've had. He always offered to let me pay any bill off if I didn't have the money, and though I never chose that option and paid him in full, I always appreciated the offer more than I think he ever knew. He always had a cat-themed Christmas present for me when December rolled around, and whenever any visit came during any time of the year, he always had a handful of amusing printouts for me, cute little things he'd saved from his computer he thought would give me a laugh.

He was a great vet, but didn't always have the resources me and my pets needed, yet I always felt as if I were 'cheating' on him when I'd visit the other vets in the area.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that this man was always there for my critters, and for me, and I am going to miss him beyond belief. And as good as other vets in the area are, they're just not going to measure up to him.

Other news, comments, and observations...

Holloman Road... I'll just say that I have now been there, looked up quite a bit of its history, and am thickly in the middle of efforts to preserve it. However, I'm not going to write more about it here. Unfortunately, the one entry I wrote has resulted in a few thrill-seekers contacting me about the road, then going there for 'spooky time' after I wrote back and urged them not to disrespect that road. Sad thing is that I can't do much about it. The road, though closed off to cars, isn't closed off to those on foot, and unless someone's on that road doing something illegal, they aren't particularly banned from going down it. All I do have the right to ask any future folks reading this and wanting to go down Holloman Road is this... respect it, please! Don't desecrate, litter, get drunk, or pseudo ghost hunt. I've contacted the Mesquite police department, and if things do get out of hand, will continue to do so until they have a regular patrol down that road.

In other areas of life, I had to quickly say 'thank you!' to the new group of readers at fiction press who've emailed me and left reviews. It still boggles my mind that Accidental Muse (especially this version, raw and in major need of tweakage) and Average are still getting read so much, not to mention reviewed so positively. I thank you for continuing to read, taking the time to review, and forgiving me sooooo much, LOL! I literally gasped when I checked my stats today. Y'all simply rock:)

Oh, something I've been meaning to talk about for awhile... Jasmine, the dog next door with the puppies.... around a month and a half ago, I went outside one morning and the puppies were gone. Turns out the real 'owner' of Jasmine came and got them, took them away to finish raising, and you just know they're all either going to be sold to idiots. In any case, I'm still looking out for Jasmine and her 'boyfriend', the meaner fella on the other side of the yard, still lecturing the neighbors about them, and so far, both are doing okay. Jasmine's gained weight, looks better, feels better, and loves company:) The boy even doesn't mind my presence anymore:)

Oh, and my family... Donna's out of Timberlawn now, though nobody's contacted me about whether or not Jordan's been sent back home with her or not. If you ask me, I don't think he should go back home. I think, as much as I bitched previously about my mom and brothers, he's better off there for the summer, at least. Let's face it, my sister went in to beat addiction, yet was released and went back to the same apartment, in the same crack neighborhood, with the same crack-smoking friends. I wish I could be more upbeat, but I just don't see her staying 'off the pipe', and as a result, I don't see my nephew being okay back with her. Lesser of evils, I keep saying, and it's a term I'm continuously growing to loathe more and more. Incidentally, Donna's called a couple of times... to hint that she really wants me to order her more cigarettes online. Ugh.

No major panic attacks in awhile, therefore I haven't taken Xanax much, not unless I felt something might be coming on:) I filled the prescription on June 1, a prescription for 15 pills, the lowest dosage, and as of today, I still have 3 pills left. Go me! I like the idea of having this small dosage handy, not having to take it every day, but knowing it's there if I need it. Gives me a kind of peace I didn't have before.

The veggie garden is out of control. I've been cooking tomato based recipes for the last two weeks, green beans, peppers, and even had to dig up and give a few plants away, just to make more room in the garden for everything else to grow. If you've ever considered taking up vegetable gardening, do it!!!! There is nothing more rewarding than growing, nurturing, then harvesting and cooking, not to mention eating, what you've grown. It tastes better, it's better for you, and it's all around skippy;)

Friends who emailed me lately... I'm so sorry I didn't write you back yet, but I've saved your emails, will write you back, and despite my rudeness, please know I love the crap out of you:)

Eric got a new haircut, and it both turns me on yet makes me sick. It turns me on because he looks really good with it, but it pisses me off because it also makes him look 25. This shouldn't regularly suck, but when we're out in public, me looking every single fucking seconds' worth of 38, standing next to Eric, I end up feeling 60.

Annabella, who was down to just a couple of pounds while fighting for her life during her illness not long ago, has gained massive pounds at this point, not to mention a shitload of energy:) I am proud and giddy when it comes to what a survivor this little shit of a mutt is:)

My 13^th anniversary is coming up this month. Jesus Christ, I've actually been married to a man for that long???? What in hells' wrong with me? This is how fucked up I am... I still like him. Even worse, I still look forward to him coming home. I need some massive help;)

There's so much more to write, as usual, but for now, I've got to go and rescue puppies from outdoors, as the rain's kicked in again, let them run around and chew up everything in the house for awhile, then convince my husband that there are other channels on cable besides CNN;)

I wish you all good health, good times, and even better luck:)

June 27, 2007- Amazon.com... ROCKS

Not a long entry today. In essence, life's good, all aspects, minus the flooding rain we've been having, so I'll spare the usual bitch today.

I went out to my mailbox today to find pure heaven. Yes, that's right... I ordered and received two eagerly awaited CD's today.

The first only the coolest of you will celebrate along with me. Xanadu, the soundtrack. Used to have it on vinyl, lost it in my college years, but thanks to Amazon.com, I now have the sounds back, and at the moment, I'm listening to Gene Kelly and Olivia Newton John croon 'Whenever you're away from me'. Big band music spliced brilliantly with early 80's music... I could orgasm right now (if I had a water buffalo and some Carmex). Seriously... the movie was so completely panned, but to this day, I know damned near every single word to every song in this movie. The soundtrack's a classic, pure and simple.

The second CD most of you have never heard, and at that assumption, I implore that you all make sure you don't stay in that category long.

Jeffrey Gaines' 'Always Be'... earthy, soulful voice that the stuff of American Idol will never really know (with the exception of the still under-utilized Taylor Hicks), and the kind of emotion relayed via that voice that brings me to both goosebumps and tears. His rendition of Peter Gabriel's 'In Your Eyes' alone is enough to make you hook on some corner for about ten minutes (if you're really good; a little longer if you aren't) just to earn the money to buy this CD. Ok, that was pushing it, but needless to say, I only just discovered this artist by complete accident, and as a result, am more convinced than ever that accidents are by far the best means of finding true beauty. In particular, check out the live track of 'In Your Eyes' and 'The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face'. Talent, pure talent, and a blessing to all who have working eardrums.

Oh, also, heard a song in the movie 'The Girl in the Cafe', and in the ending of the movie I talked about here before, 'I am David'. I think the song is called 'Cold Water', and it induces in me the same kind of emotion the previous two CD's do, so if any of you know anything about who wrote/performed this song, which CD it's on, let me know. I could look it up, but I'll see if any of you have the skinny first.

Gotta go, hope you all are well, and though I know this is short, I am here, especially when you need me:) I'll leave you with the above picture of Annabella Wagadoo, who has become yet another miracle animal I've had the pleasure of knowing in my days. Eric wants to keep her, and though I know we have more than enough animals, I tend to agree with him:)

June 23, 2007- A Smattering of Thoughts I've Had Lately, Uncensored

Scottish people are just cool. Even if you just judge them by their accent, they still rank, at least in my mind, as being the coolest group of people ever.
Lady in the Water (which I watched again on Cinemax the other night) took a lot of flack from critics, and I don't understand why. I loved that movie, its message, and hey, can Paul Giammati do any movie and not make it enjoyable? I think not, naysayers. I think not.
I'm proud of myself for trying to go more and more green every day. I've begun recycling to a new degree, I'm buying those special light bulbs, and I'm even looking for a new hybrid car to lease next when this Jeep's lease is up. Even though that's not nearly close to making me ecologically/environmentally cool, it's a start.
My thighs are scaring me. They spread out when I sit down, and look up at me with this 'Ain't we huge, you lazy bitch?' look. I feel as if they're missing their purpose here in Dallas when they could be in Alaska right now, being set on fire and warming some Eskimo family.
My last recovering Parvo puppy took her first normal crap yesterday... on the floor in front of me instead of on her housebreaking pad. Only you animal lovers will understand how wonderful it is to see a normal brown cheeto-looking turd on your parquet flooring. Only you animal lovers will know this is heaven, and not insanity;)
I'm worried about one of my vets, Dr. Schultze. I haven't been to his office in awhile, called him a few days ago, only to have his phone ring, the answering machine not pick up. That's just not a good thing, as Doc Schultze always has that answering machine ready, not to mention caller ID (and if he sees my number on it, he always calls back, until now). I haven't been to him in awhile, going to other vets with more progressive therapy, and I wonder if something awful hasn't happened to him in the meantime. I have his home number and his email address, but I'm afraid to use either, fearing that I might hear awful news. Donald Schultze, I pray you're okay.
I've heard twice in the last week that Icelandic people overwhelmingly believe in elves and gnomes. How cool is that? Here, if I can stick an eraser end of my pencil up a little plastic made-in-China gnome's butt, that's as real as it gets for me, no magic involved. What I wouldn't give to have the kind of faith in magick Bjork's people so wonderfully have;)
I don't know what I like more... Paris Hilton's whole jail fiasco, or the public's reaction to it. It's just nice for a change to see mediocrity with money get blasted by the majority instead of made rich. Who am I kidding? She'll make millions off of this, despite how sick of her everyone seems to be saying they are now. BTW, please tell me she won't take over the Hilton empire when the time comes... 'cause I can see it now; hot pink suites with disco balls for lighting, and large spa-style bathrooms with penis-shaped faucets, towels in every size hanging from the racks, from large 'I'm so hot' size, to 'dry my teacup poodle' size. In other words, I have no sympathy for Paris. Mark my words... in time, she'll be the equivalent to what you'd come up with if you spliced Charro and the Gabor sisters' genes together. Too uppity for a county fair sideshow, yet too shallow for much better. Paris, you shoulda just done another sex tape.
I was looking at my areolas the other day, and wondering why they're so pink, and so big. Not dinner-plate big, National Geographic big, but still not as tiny as I've encountered. I've seen my share of other gals' boobs, so I think I can safely say that my nipples are a testament to my feminity, as well as a mystery of it. My mother's are tiny, my sister's are tiny, most of the gals I've either showered with, changed with, or seen onstage while I was bartending at a topless club had tiny 'breast toppers'. I read somewhere that pregnancy can change the nipples from pink to brown, etc. Still doesn't explain why the most similar looking tit to mine I've ever seen belongs to my father, and it still doesn't make me feel better when Eric constantly focuses on my paternally similar hooters. Ugh.
My online buddy/email flirter, Gordon Keith, has a local TV show now, and though I've known about it for awhile, I hate to admit I haven't watched it until last week. When I finally did, I ended up being pissed off at his producers for not giving him a better format to do his stuff from. He's funny as hell, brilliant beyond hell, yet the way the show works, they just don't 'sell' him the way they should. The lack of studio reactive audience leaves things flat, amongst other things, and I just think that Gordo isn't really getting treated the way he needs to be. Gordypooh, please tell me you have a plan in mind when it comes to this show... please?

That's it for now, folks. I'm amazed I wrote this much!

June 20, 2007- Quick update, which I wish was more uplifting

Been awhile, and believe me, if I weren't so entirely wasted energy wise, I'd have updated sooner.

The first update belongs to my grandpuppies, and besides me being too tired to re-tell the story, it's just not pleasant to do so, therefore I'll just paste an email I sent to my catbroads:

I'll keep this short, at least I hope, because I'm too exhausted, but I lost three puppies this week. Nigella, whose symptoms weren't severe the last time I emailed you, died that night while I was napping with her beside me. I woke up and found her there, right beside me, passed away, and I can't even describe the shock. I didn't even have time to mourn, because when I woke up and found her, I also found that Dorie June and Ruphus had started to crash and burn, fluids, Parvaid, antibiotics... nothing... was working. A few hours and 600 dollars later, Ruphus died. Dorie June died an hour after her brother. I buried them by their grandad, Wolf, and when Eric came home, he planted a little mimosa tree over the three.

I still haven't mourned yet, because Annabella, Elphine, and Mary Agnes started crashing in succession, just as severe, not responsive to subcut or IV fluids, Parvaid, anti-emetics, antibiotics. I ran out of the Parvaid late at night, the feed store I get it from was obviously closed (plus at this point, I doubt it really works), and I remembered that when this same sort of thing happened when Nigel had parvo, I made my own version of Parvaid, and it worked. So, I made my own 'Parvo tea' yesterday morning, started giving it to all three instead of fluids, Parvaid, etc.

Today, Mary Agnes and Elphine Starkadder, other than sleeping more than usual, are pretty much back to what they were before they crashed. And Annabelle, who was by far the sickest, is still weak, but she's finally eating, keeping her food down, and her bowel movements have gone from bloody dysentery to plain old diarrhea that doesn't have that god awful trademark Parvo smell.

Anyway, since my last email to you guys, I've slept a total of six hours, all in 30-45 minute segments at most. I've eaten one salad, and made myself drink a six pack of Ensure, which I made Eric go out and buy for me, just so I'd have energy to keep going. I've smoked about three cartons of cigarettes, and haven't bathed, though I have changed my clothes twice. I've washed ten towels four times and gone through a six pack of paper towels cleaning up vomit and bloody diarrhea. My head hurts, my brain is fried, but none of that compares to what I know these puppies went through, and still are going through to a degree, thanks to me.

Talk about bittersweet. So much tragedy here, but my GOD, how my non-existant energy came back when the surviving three stopped vomiting, started to perk up and actually give me hope that I wouldn't be digging any new graves soon. When these three have officially turned the corner and I know they're okay, that's when I think I can finally mourn, then finally sleep, then eternally question why I didn't do the 'tea' I'd made for Nigel the second I saw his daughter Nigella start to act sick, then wonder if I'd still have six beautiful and wonderful little puppies instead of three.

So much for keeping it short, huh? In any case, I'm sorry I couldn't give better news, but I'm glad I so far haven't had to give worse.

Finally, Sue... do you ever get rescue emails about Parvo puppies? If so, I have a recipe and directions that, at least in my experience, have saved four out of four Parvo pups who've taken it, with no ill side effects. It has most of what Parvaid has, plus Vitamin C, Lysine, and a couple of other things, so if you ever get any kind of Parvo email from any rescuers, please feel free to either send them my email address, or I can type out the recipe and instructions and send them to you so you can send them directly. I honestly know that this is what saved these remaining three puppies, not to mention their father.

Ok, time to go. I have tea with the puppies here in about two minutes.

Last night, I finally got eight hours sleep... because little Annabella, who'd been extremely weak even after her two sisters recovered completely, finally turned the corner earlier that day and told me with every ounce of her that she wasn't going to die. She's got a little ways to go, but soon, she'll catch up to her surviving sisters, and soon, I'll finally be able to mourn fully, then work on forgiving myself for so much.

Next update- My sister is in the psychiatric ward of Timberlawn yet again, and she's not doing so hot. Even worse, she called to let me know that she was checking herself in, and that she was leaving her son with her friend Rana, I thought everything was okay, until I get a call two days ago that Jordan, my nephew, had been kicked out of summer school for being disruptive, that Rana, who in fact was NOT letting him stay at her house, but leaving him alone in Donna's apartment, checking on him now and then, didn't want to keep that eye on him anymore, and that Jordan now was headed out to Mineola on the next Amtrak to stay with my mother for the summer.

At best, this is a least of many evils. Don't get me wrong; you've read here many positive things I've said about my mom, along with my many complaints, but this boy is now about to go from one world of denial and selfishness only capable of nurturing to a certain extent (not nearly the level required), to another. He'll go from one addictive world into another one, and since my mother and brothers' world seems more stable, though is completely alcoholic, I just don't see my nephew surviving anything his near future holds.

And here's where I really bitchslap myself, and where you're fully allowed to do the slapping yourselves. Why don't I take him, you ask? I'll tell you.

Jordan is big, he can be violent, he's not used to rules, gets unbelievably hard to deal with when they're enforced, he's currently untreated for the worst form of bipolar disease, he tried to start a fire in my house once when he was here, and every other time he's been here, he's done something that made me end up having to watch him like a hawk. I simply don't possess the ability to stick with him in my home, because if I do stick with him here, too many things I care about will suffer as a result. Shitty thing to say, but it's the truth. I did not make my nephew this way, and I promise you, I won't be able to change his life. I've tried before, and failed miserably. I can be there for him in so many other ways, and I will... but I have to protect myself and those here I love, too. Hey, and let's also consider the fact that my house is full of animals, I have panic attacks, and my husband is working so much, he's gone too much for me to feel comfortable cracking the whip when it comes to my nephew's discipline.

Mom seems to think that all Jordan needs is for someone to listen. You have no idea how much I pray she's right, and that she can, by listening, simply undo all the damage done to him all these years. But at the moment, my personal opinion is that she's naive at best, somehow thinking that she can erase his raising, erase his mental illness, mend his wounds while gulping down her mixed drinks and spewing psycho-babble in her buzz. I also hope that my two brothers, full of their own addictions, can somehow teach Jordan to draw on his inner strength, when all the two of them do is avoid their inner strength by either downing beer after beer or hitting the bong.

This is a cruel and horrible truth, but my nephew, at the moment, is fucked. He really is. The kind of role model he needs is completely absent from his existence, and I swear to God, if I could give up my life in exchange for him having the absolute best life possible, I would. But he's beyond anything I can do, other than love him, and tell him so. He needs more from everyone. He needs example, and I'm sorry, but I just don't think my in-denial mother or my brothers are going to provide that, even though him being there now beats the shit out of where he has been lately.

And my sister? Since checking into Timberlawn, she's called me constantly to ask me to bring things to her, and I have. Clothes, cigarettes, books, etc.

The one thing she's absolutely not asked about during her frequent phone calls to me is Jordan. She's more full of conversation and interest about how crazy the people in her ward are, when my next cigarette delivery will occur, and how her crack friends are calling her and telling her about their recent hits (which tempt her beyond belief), than she'll ever be about whether or not her son is being taken care of.

This is just sad, y'all. It's just sad, yet it tends to cement my not mourning too much over not having been able to conceive a child with Eric. If the selfishness that flows through my maternal family line isn't reason enough to not ever have a child, then I don't know what is.

Long story short, I am tired of caring for, taking care of, and supporting genetically driven causes who not only will never appreciate it, but who will more importantly never appreciate themselves. Blood isn't always thicker than water. Sometimes, it's anemic, and sometimes, that anemia is caused by toxins. And sometimes, the only way you can survive it is to cut those toxins out, no matter how much you think you need or are obligated to ingest them.

I'm done. I deserve more, my husband deserves more, and the life we have together warrants more than spill-over shit from messed up family members who neither want to heal nor realize that somebody actually loves them.

I have good in my life that I continue to push aside because I think I need to help people in pain more. I have a recovering little puppy whose fight to cling to life has resulted in miraculous events. I have other family who stop by to simply check up on us, invite us to things, no favors asked. I have friends who ask me how I'm doing, and listen with interest when I tell them, because they know the world doesn't revolve around them, and because they care.

Knowing the previous paragraph is what keeps me going. It's what keeps me helping, and it's what keeps me, panic attacks aside, sane.

As for the rest, friends, I know I haven't answered emails. You now know why. Also, I haven't made it to Holloman Road, but you also know why. I still think of you all, despite my 'stuff', and I'm still here, still adore you, and hope that you all know that!

June 5, 2007- Just when you think all things psychic are gone

In my life, I have had two places psychically call to me... The Buck Mansion in Vacaville, California, and the Baker Hotel in Mineral Wells, TX. I am still attached to those places, my soul still connected to both as thickly as the blood running between relatives' veins.

And now, there's a third, a somewhat accidental third.

Recently, Eric and I have found ourselves immersed in local history. It started with my driving down Military Parkway to the store, and all of a sudden seeing something I hadn't seen before in my way-over-a-decade of living here. It was a cemetery gate, very old looking and somewhat hidden between two churches, and when Eric and I took the .25 mile or whatever drive over there one lazy day to check it out, we not only found a historical marker for the W.W. Glover cemetery, we walked inside and found some of the oldest headstones this county has, belonging to some of Dallas' oldest and most important settlers.

I couldn't believe after all this time living in this run down neighborhood that such history existed, I went online, did some research, and BOOM, turns out our little area of far East Dallas was choc full of history.

The next couple of weekends involved visiting historical markers we'd lived around all these years but never knew about, from the secret meeting place of Belle Starr and the Jesse James gang on Scyene Road to the small and neglected Beeman cemetery off of slum-street Dolphin Road, where some of our city's earliest founders lie in the ground, their headstones neglected, the grass overgrown, yet still beautiful.

Anyway, I'm getting to the psychic stuff, and believe me, I'm so freaked out, I don't even know how I'm going to write it.

This last weekend, I was back online, looking for historic spots to visit when on a whim, I thought it might be fun to see if my area has any haunted spots Eric and I could drive by. Thanks to the Shadowlands website, I found a HUGE list of spots, very interesting to go through, read some and think they'd be interesting to visit, might be legit, but then most of my area's haunted places are ones that sound more like urban legends than anything that might really have spirit, pardon the pun. I continue to scroll down, see the list of places in Mesquite, Texas, which my area of Dallas borders, scroll down a little more, and am drawn to one particular entry:

Mesquite - Old Holloman's Road - Hollomans Road is a small dirt road that curves between Lawson Rd. and Bruton Rd. There is a solitary home that has sat for many years abandoned on this small street. It is the only structure on the road. Brave teenagers have tried to walk the street at night only to disappear never to be seen again. The road became such a danger that the city closed the road off. Witnesses become overwhelmed by a sense of dread and of being watched, even in broad daylight. In the 80s, a Dallas man killed a young woman and her young son and dumped their bodies on that dark and brooding road (this is easily checked, as the case was just solved in the last year or so).

I know, it sounds like an urban legend, like the chupacabra, the goat man of whatever hick country area that boasts such, or any other fireside made up tale, told not from experience, but for scream value. I read this description, laughed at the disappearing and never to be seen again line, then felt a twinge at reading of the infamous murders involving that road. I read the 'easily checked' line, decided to do just that, and didn't find anything in my Googling.

Still, this Sunday, Eric wanted to go driving again, preferrably in the country, my mind went back to this Shadowlands entry, so I told him about it, suggested we go up the road to Bruton, hang a left, and follow it down until we could find the 'super spooky' Old Holloman's Road. He was game, and we were off in the car in minutes, and minutes after that, we were cruising down a load of run down apartment complexes, convenience stores, which slowly puttered out in frequency as our Jeep went further, the section 8 stuff suddenly replaced by rural plots of land on one side, sprinklings of overpriced new housing on the other. Bruton Road was going on forever, and I wasn't seeing 'Old Holloman's Road' anywhere, nor Lawson Road, and a couple of miles further, though I'd been feeling completely fine before, started to feel anxiety, really sudden and serious anxiety, an impending panic attack, I assumed, gave in and took a Xanax, looking up as I swigged it down with mineral water only to see that the street we were now on was Cartwright Street.

WTF?????

When did Bruton Rd. turn into Cartwright? Eric and I spent the next hour backtracking, winding through country roads, ending up in Seagoville before giving up and driving back home, seeing nothing more than a lot of country, crops, and a turtle almost run over in Hutchins, TX (we stopped and braved the traffic to grab the little guy and carry him across to the creek he was trying to reach).

Anyway, the rest of the night was nice. We grilled steak and had one hell of a fancy meal, played with puppies, engaged in a game or two of Trivial Pursuit before we both conked out, neither one of us really regretting not finding the infamous Old Holloman's Road...

Until I fell asleep.

That night, every hour on the hour, I dreamed that Eric and I were trying to find that road, that it was absolutely imperative that we found that road. In the last couple of dreams before giving up on good sleep and getting up for the day, we'd found it, but it was blocked by a brick wall. In the last two dreams, we got out of the Jeep, tried to find a way around the wall, but couldn't. In the second to last dream, we found a pile of childrens' lincoln logs by the wall (they were green, which I thought was odd on waking) and could hear a child's laughter on the other side, followed by a woman humming with a country kind of twang. The final dream had no lincoln logs, no child's sounds, but in it, Eric and I were standing there at the wall, and though we were terrified, we were both trying like hell to climb it, but nothing worked. It's not the action in the dream that disturbed me; it was the absolute feeling of having to get down that road that bothered me the most, enough to get up and stay up.

I told Eric about the dreams, he suggested we go back and try again, I told him 'no', and we went about a normal Monday, working around the house instead of going out and driving, but that goddamned road was never far from my thoughts.

When Eric went to work last night, I finally made it back on line, concentrated just on this dream, this silly little blurb on a paranormal webpage, trying to figure out why it's calling to me like it is, and now I'm freaking out at every documented fact I've actually found since last night.

In 1981, on a cold December night, Roxann Jo Jeeves and her 5 year old son Kristopher were abducted, driven out to a desolate and lonely road, Holloman Road, in Mesquite, where Kristopher was shot at close range in the forehead, and where Roxann was raped before being given the same close range death. It was Kristopher's birthday.

The case remained unsolved for 25 years... until recently, when their killer was convicted by DNA evidence, a killer already serving an 80 year sentence for a similar crime.

Oh, and I found out yesterday that Holloman Road is not off of Bruton Road. It's off of Cartwright Road, which Bruton turns into, and that if we'd gone just a little further before turning around, we'd have hit Lawson Road. And my sudden anxiety???? I pulled up aerial photos of Cartwright last night...

The entrance to Holloman's Road, I shit you, shit you, shit you not, was maybe forty feet ahead. Said anxiety attacked dissipated as we turned and drove away. I thanked Xanax then. I don't now.

And the clincher, happening today...

Found an article I hadn't found before, and this is a blurb taken from it:

She lived with her son, Kristopher, in a second-story apartment, No. 234, at a complex called The Sussex Place on Larmanda St. in northeast Dallas.

In 1988, my brother Tommy lived on Larmanda St., in a second floor apartment, number 2 hundred something, and at this point, I'm just waiting for him to drive home from work to his house in Mineola so that I can call him and beg him to remember the name of the apartment complex he lived in then, or at least the address, tell me his apartment number, etc.

I swear to God on a Hot Pocket, I couldn't make this up if I tried.

This little blurb of what seemed like impossible urban ghost legend, a blurb I'd be soooooooo unlikely to ever believe, I now find myself drawn to as much, if not more in some ways, than any other. Call me insane (like I'm not used to it), but there's something there on that old dirt road that I'm supposed to go see, something I'm supposed to help with, I think, and if I don't go back there, I don't think these dreams will stop.

I haven't been been back down there since retrieving aerial photos, news clippings, and the like, and Eric's been asleep today, so he has no idea about the whole apartment on Larmanda connection, but I'm telling y'all.... crazy or not... I'm going back.

I'm going to search the tax appraisal site for Dallas county first, then contact the city, see if I need permission before walking down that winding road, but I hate to say that even if I don't get it, I have to go down that road. I have to.

I saw recently the movie Silent Hill, and loved it at the time, but never connected to it quite the way I have now. Sometimes places call to you, and sometimes, the only thing you can do is answer.

The second I know more, you will, too. In the meantime, sorry for not writing about other stuff. I still have happy animals, happy family, a great marriage, still am annoyed by so much, hate most fanfiction but bless the few who do it right, and as soon as this obsession of mine starts to work itself out, I'll get back to all of that;)

For now, I've got a mystery here that I couldn't avoid if I tried.

May 24, 2007- A little observation potpourri

-Well, color me wrong... Jordin's the new Idol. Never would've guessed that until Melinda went home. I lost interest in this season, watched bits and pieces instead of full episodes like I did for Taylor, and once Melinda went home (btw, I'd begun to like her less through the season, always appreciating her voice, but increasingly thinking that this gal was more of an Anita Baker than a pop idol), and it was between Blake and Jordin (or is it Jordan? Dunno), my vote was solidly for Blake. Not to knock J, she's gorgeous, voluptuous, can sing the ingredients on an ExLax package and make it sound fabulous, but I have to admit that over the season, the times I did watch the show, Blake continually grew on me. I like that boy, and I have no doubt he'll go far:) That's a talented young man!

-Remember the neighbors who brought in the two pit bulls, one of which recently got loose and terrorized the neighborhood? Not long ago, the female, who didn't get loose, gave birth to six girls and one boy, the father being the previously loose hellion of a pit (apparently they mated them on purpose), and for the last several days, I find myself not only feeding my hoard of animals, but I'm also going over next door and taking care of Jasmine the pit and her seven pit puppies.

Why?

Because she's painfully skinny, and when I check on her every morning, she's out of water, out of food, nobody's given her any new stuff (they apparently feed her in the evening, and don't check on her until the next evening), the food they do give her is poor quality (Ol Roy, need I say more?), her puppies squirm out of their doghouse and end up yards away, out of her chain's reach, causing me to find at least two of 'em and move them back to their shelter every single morning, and to boot, biting flies for some reason have decided to live in this yard, first feeding off Jasmine enough to cause bloody scabs on her head and ears, then progressing at this point to biting the puppies.

I had a talk with the Lady of the house a couple of times since then, telling them what they're not doing, what they need to do, and not much has changed, so until I figure out what the best thing to do is, I'm going to concentrate on the now and just keep a neighborly eye out for Jasmine and her pups. In the long run, I don't know what's going to happen. My gut tells me that these idiots are going to sell these babies to people who fight pit bulls, and my brain knows that in the near future, I'm going to have to do something... something probably very drastic. But honestly, I have puppies of my own, handicapped, old, and 'normal' cats and dogs who need me more, so for now, I'm just watching over this surprisingly nice animal I once feared, and her babies, who she lets me handle every day. For now, I just want to help her put some weight on, her puppies stay healthy, and once that's done, I'll figure out the rest. For now, a term I'm getting way too used to, it's nice to walk next door every morning after all my pets are fed and see this momma dog wag until I think she's going to seize, happy to see me checking up on her, giving her water, hand feeding her a pet tab or two, and putting down a good bowl of canned puppy food mixed with dry, checking the puppies, rounding up the ones who've wiggled out of her reach and returning them to her doghouse while she eats. Even the mean 'daddy' pit, who, thank GOD, is on a chain and out of reach of my path to Jasmine, wags his tail now when he sees me, but only for a second before he starts snarling at me;)

-No panic attacks today, no hint of one, therefore no Xanax, something I've been warned by friends/readers here can cause massive dependency. Don't worry, guys... I'm only taking this stuff when the worst of the worst happens. I don't like addiction, have enough of them I'm trying to break now without adding yet another. Since my ER visit Friday, I am proud to say that I haven't had a single dose of any kind of caffeine, apparently a huge panic attack trigger for me. This hurts, I'm feeling the withdrawal, and holy shit, decaf just ain't giving me the oomph I need to get going each day. Still, I'm sticking to it. Cigarettes are next, and that is REALLY going to hurt. If I have any serious addiction, it's cigarettes. I will need the willpower of a thousand gods to never light up again, so wish me luck once the official 'quitting' day comes.

-Saw the infamous 'duke out' between Rosie and Elizabeth (is that her name? I rarely notice her) on The View, split screen and all, and sorry, but that was some of the best TV I've seen in ages. I relate, if I can be so bold, with Rosie in that she'll say what she thinks, knowing she's going to be hung out to dry, yet it never changes her. I think the best way I can put my respect for her in words is to say that she just never rides that fence. She doesn't want to lose favor with anyone, but if given the choice between saying what she thinks, thus losing fans, and saying what keeps peace in order to stay liked, she has enough respect for herself and those around her to let loose and spill what's really on her mind, regardless of who judges her. I don't think it's about ratings or attention; I think it's about a woman in a judgmental world standing up to it when she honestly disagrees with it, regardless of consequences, because the surrendering alternative is by far too horrible to even consider. That's noble, that is strength, and that is what I've so often referred to as being the Shepard rather than the sheep. I don't always agree with Rosie, but Goddammit, I respect her.

-I was going to write so much more, but my typing today sucks, and I have to run up to the Mart and grab a good brisket, prepare it, marinate it, and get all the sides I need to take to Mineola this weekend.

May 23, 2007-hell of an update, but glad to be here

The crux of this rant stems from this last Friday, the single worst Friday I've ever experienced. It began with me waking up, feeling fine, taking care of animals, who all were also feeling fine, calling the husband to see when he'd be home, and was happy to hear that he was feeling fine, not to mention coming home soon, walked out to the veggie garden to see that it was doing more than fine, came back inside, made myself a cup of coffee, then sat down to watch a little morning talk show whilst enjoying the java.

About thirty minutes later, things began to become not so fine.

The buzzing in my brain started, followed by the shortness of breath, and before I could tell myself that this was just a panic attack, my left arm starts to ache, the pain spreads to my shoulder, back, then to my neck, and the adrenalin starts mercilessly shooting through me. I still try desperately to tell myself that this is not my heart giving out, that this is just another of those whopper panic attacks, take a couple of Benedryl, which usually do the trick, call Eric, tell him what's going on, and wait patiently for him to come home.

I try everything I can to fight this one off, and it just ain't having it. By the time Eric gets home, I'm curled up over a pillow on the couch, afraid to move because I just know any new movement will actually make my heart stop, make my brain explode. Eric wants to call an ambulance, and that alone sends me into new waves of terror. Thoughts flood my mind of being dragged out on a gurney while the neighbors watch, my hair dirty, my bare feet not pedicured, my clothing nothing less than white trash chic. Then as he continues to argue with me, I think further and freak over who's going to empty TeeTee, my cat whose bladder and colon don't work, who's going to feed the special needs critters their particular meals while the ambulance whisks me away to the hospital, who I know is just going to tell me I'm dying, and that I'll never see home again.

We go on like this for about an hour before I finally agree to a compromise... I agree to go down the street to the local firehouse, let them check me out, but only after I've emptied TeeTee, made Eric watch and learn, washed myself a bit, changed my clothes, and wrote down/showed Eric the things he'd need to do after I'm dead. And while my brain is buzzing and my heart is pounding through all this, I'm somehow up and moving, though my legs feel like jelly and my mind's eye sees nothing good in my near future. On the car ride that two couple of blocks down the street to the fire house, I think I told Eric how sorry I was, and how much I love him, a hundred times minimum.

The men at the fire station were fabulous, took us into their quarters, sat me down, took my BP, measured my heart rate, smiled and tried to relax me while asking me questions left and right, and by the time they were done, I was assured that I was okay, having a panic attack, and that they'd take me in if I wanted to go, but that it might be better to go home, have a nap, reset my brain, then follow up with a routine doctor's visit as soon as I could, that maybe it was time for me to start taking prescription meds. In any case, I left there feeling better, Eric feeling better, and me knowing more than ever that these men and women just don't get paid enough. God Bless 'em, even though my calm didn't last.

Eric was able to get me to go to sleep, but I woke up an hour later due to a massive wave of adrenalin shooting through me, seizing at my lungs and chest, and having me so scared, I couldn't even scream. I had to actually pick up our home phone downstairs by me and call his cellphone upstairs on the end table by the bed.

I'm dying, I just know it. I'm too young, there's too much that'll fall apart here if I die, and this is just NOT the way I want to go out. This isn't a panic attack at all, I'm convinced at this point. This is my heart. I smoke too much, and now I'm going to pay for it by dying at the ripe old age of 38. The flood of these thoughts makes it all worse, and by the time Eric is downstairs and grabbing the keys, I am finally, finally admitting out loud that we need to go to the ER (and anyone who knows me knows what a huge thing this was for me to agree to. If I ever agree to go to any kind of doctor, things are bad).

By the time we got there, I was already calming down. I think it was just knowing that they had paddles there that could shock the shit out of me when my all-morning failing heart finally fully failed. In fact, by the time they got to me, I was calm enough to explain my history of these panic attacks, what happens when they're going on, how I'm convinced it's my heart, what my vitals do, and before they even go to test my heart, they're telling me that they doubt my heart's going to be the problem. I wanted to kiss the nurse, the PA, and the doctors. Hell, I'd have frenched the janitor if there'd been one around.

Anyway, hours later, when my thought processes were back to normal, no longer influenced by adrenalin and God knows what other inappropriate amounts of body chemistry were flowing through me, I am told officially that my heart is good, my lungs are good, my urine is good, and that I have one thing to blame... Generalized Anxiety Disorder, and that it's time for me to give in and start taking prescription anxiety medication. I stress that I don't want to become addicted to anything, and these people, angels that they are, give me Xanax, the lowest dosage possible, and stress to me that I only have to take it when I feel an attack coming on.

And as I feel for the first time since that first attack that I really might be able to live a truly normal life again, I look over at my husband, who's been right beside me the whole time, a whopping hour's worth of sleep he got in the last 30 or so hours not nearly exhausting him as much as the relief I could see in his face that I wasn't dying, and for the first time in ages, I really really started to see a light at the end of the tunnel.

Saturday and Sunday were special days, celebrated by us both like a couple of inmates wrongly imprisoned, set free finally by irrefutable DNA evidence. Other problems I'd worried about didn't matter anymore, and though I know that'll probably fade, I'm just grateful for that absolutely shitty Friday, as contradictory as that sounds.

I've got to make a couple of appointments, one with a PCP to test a few things the ER didn't test, rule out as being the cause of these attacks, and one with a psychiatrist, to see what else I can do towards fixing this officially nutty brain of mine;) And for the first time, I'm looking forward to it:)

There's just something about really thinking you're dying, then having caring people whisk you away from that state of being and give you new hope... Jesus Christ with a Bedazzler, it just overwhelms you in the best kind of way.

Anyway, I can take this Xanax every six hours as needed, and so far, I've only needed to take it three times. I think I might just stick with this so far, it's effects on anxiety are so fast, and so effective.

In other news, I'll be heading over to Mineola with Eric this weekend to visit Mom and the brothers, possibly spending the night since Mom told me to bring any and every critter with me that I need to in order to make spending the night possible. I'm looking forward to what they've done with the house, looking forward to cooking out, talking, bonding, all that kind of stuff:)

For those of you almost afraid that I may never bitch again, now that I'm medicated, don't worry, 'cause that's not going to happen;) In fact, in the last couple of days, I've had a few things well worth bitching about, but right now, I'm still just dancing a jig at the wonders of medical science. It'll pass, so don't worry;)

Finally, friends, I'm still reading your journals, am SO proud of you, the puppies are doing great (I haven't even gotten to write yet about the Parvo scare we had a little while ago), and since I'm now pooped to the gills (yes, rednecks have gills; we just cover them up with our mullets), I'll leave you with this one picture and its backstory:

A few days ago, post ER incident, Eric got up one day to come downstairs in his underwear. He plopped down on the couch, was instantly freezing because I had the AC on full blast. He knew I wasn't going to turn it off, was too lazy to get up and put on some clothes, so he grabbed the nearest piece of clothing he could find, and put it on, inside out... my dress. I took his picture, it cracked me up so fully, and he didn't only not care that I did so, but didn't mind me sharing this pic on my rant page. Now, this is either the most sexually secure straight man I've ever known, or this is the most sexually secure gay man I ever even thought about marrying;) Either way, I love him, but I think he should've shaved his pits before donning such a revealing gown;)

May 14, 2007- Loose ends tied, brain cells fried

First and foremost, the mange puppy I left the oh-so-depressing rant over is now safe and sound, and doesn't have mange after all. I spent the next few days after leaving this rant going back up to the parking lot, where the puppy reappeared, leaving him food (he wasn't having any of the safe trap), water, working on getting him to trust me, forming allies in the businesses in this little strip mall who promised to help keep an eye on this dog, and I'm happy to report that a couple of nights ago, one of the store managers won the puppy's full trust, she was able to catch him, and after a vet visit (where the full report is that he didn't have mange, but a bad case of flea allergy dermatitis and some worms, both easily treatable), he is now in a new home not too far from me, with a fenced yard, food and water, a nice dog house, and a whole bunch of love. There is a God, and I'm sorry for ever thinking that I was the only one who cared. I may have helped a bit, but other people I didn't think would so much as lift a finger did a world more than I did in the long run, and that's just, for lack of a better phrase, cooler than shit:)

As for my grandpuppies, who I haven't written about enough, I'm happy to say they're doing fine, though I've renamed a couple. The six Wagadoo puppies are now Nigella, Mary Agnes, Ruphus Nyx, Dorie June, Annabella, and Elphine Starkadder Wagadoo. Ruphus and Dorie's names were changed in honor of two friends' passed dogs, and Elphine, who used to be Chubs McGinty, had her named changed because Elphine Starkadder Wagadoo just fits better than Chubs McGinty... if you can imagine such a thing;) Anyway, the little shits are growing like weeds. Five weeks old, acting more like five months old. They've been on a homeopathic Parvo preventative since last week, and in a week, the vaccinations begin, so please, if you can spare 'em, throw me some prayers/vibes/energy, that these six little monsters stay little monsters;)

Mom and my brothers are amazingly happy so far in their Mineola house:) As a result, I'm even happier! We're going out for a visit next weekend, and I'm looking forward to it. My Dad and stepmom Judy are doing just as great:) Dad's still doing part time legal contract work for different clients, but is spending the majority of his time scuba diving and fishing via trips with his buddies off the coast of Florida as often as he can. Judy's still doing hypnotherapy, working for a nearby university, and when she's not hanging out with Dad on his coastal trips, she's in New Mexico or anywhere else, attending any New Age kind of event she can.

The MIL's in D.C. As we speak, with a panel of Hyperbaric experts, talking with military officials in an effort to get Hyberbaric chambers instituted as a regular course of treatment for wounded soldiers. She'll be back Wednesday... I hope with excellent news!

... And you know the happy news about relatives has to end somewhere, right? Consider this the spot.

My sister... sigh... My sister just recently called us all to tell us her most recent dilemma, excitement dripping from every syllable. Seems her boyfriend, the ex-con she met in rehab and has been taking care of in her two room apartment in the seediest part of town for a couple of years now, stole her foodstamps recently and tried to sell them for crack. According to Donna, when she found out he'd done that, she confronted him, and he beat her up enough for her to spend several hours in the Parkland Hospital ER, getting stitches, stitches she's now wearing the way someone would wear the newest Prada. She swears she's getting a restraining order on the jerk, swears she's done with him, swears a whole bunch of things, but trust me; if I go to take her something two weeks from now, and don't walk into her hovel of an apartment to find aforementioned asshole boyfriend there, I'll shave my head, staple my bra to my ribcage, and have 'I LOVE DUBYA' tattooed on my forehead.

I know it sounds as if I am entirely non-supportive of my sister. Ok, I am, and I'm sorry, but as thick as blood runs, I simply can't sit back and support anyone whose life goal is to constantly create negative energy, constantly create drama, and constantly crave attention in order to make it through a day, especially when that person has so much more in her, DNA link or not. Bipolar disease is not an excuse. I know enough people with bipolar disorder who function, contribute, and benefit society to know that my sister, if anything, uses the dx as a crutch/excuse to support her behavior. Hell, beyond that, I've personally been through enough brain chemistry hell to know that my sister doesn't want to get better as much as she wants to exploit getting worse.

The older I get, the more I realize that my family, both sides, are choc fucking full of loony tunes, yet the majority of us seem to swim our way through the seas of life without draining the people around us. If you ask me, I'd say I don't care how messed up you are, whether you like to spend your Friday evenings naked and spread-eagled on your front lawn, barking like a dog while spreading fish entrail juices along your inner thighs, or if you prefer dressing up like Marie Antoinette before going out to buy the week's groceries, hanging out at the Dolly Madison display and chirping 'Let them eat cake' to every blue-haired septuagenarian who wheels by. Jesus, do whatever the hell you need to do to get you through the day, just as long as what makes you happy doesn't involve sucking the life from those around you.

In a nutshell, as much as I bitch, the entire rant part of this entry about my sister is written now because more than anything I simply pray that one day she'll really get it! As much as she loves to try to draw attention from carefully constructed dramas in her life, I'm hoping that one day, she'll realize that gravity doesn't exist solely because she's going through this or that vividly dramatic thing.

But even more so? I keep guarded, keep my distance when with her, yet still keep hoping for this one soul because I love the hell out of her. This is my big sister, the pretty, raven-haired Goddess I grew up idolizing for her intelligence, her unashamed and extroverted personality, her unbelievable talent at so many things, her beauty, her savvy.... just her. It's all still there, I think... all the things I idolized. I see hints of it all every time she and I get together. It's not lost, what makes my sister my sister, it didn't leave her, I don't think it ever will. She buries her strengths because, for some reason, her weaknesses have served her better, and for a little sister to see such... it's just tragic.

In the future, my dream wish concerning my sis doesn't involve miracles, really. In the future, if I can just write here that Donna is doing something... anything benefiting other souls more than her own, I can pretty much guarantee that I'll end up crying in happiness until my tear ducts shut down from overuse, not from crying at the witnessing of a miracle, but from crying at witnessing someone tapping into a brilliant part of themselves previously not utilized. If there were ever good tears I wanted to feel run down my ever-fattening cheeks, this kind would be it.

Ariane, got your email, and honey, it's good to hear from you:) I'll answer your fanfic questions in private email, but wanted to tell you here that I just love ya and am glad you're okay:) Independent, you are, and a survivor, you're even more:) I could take lessons from you! In other words, my Finland friend, keep writing... your stories, and your emails to me!;)

The rest of you, if I weren't entirely spent at this point, I'd list you all out and send you hugs and vibes. But I am spent, real life and its stuff spending me like a Vegas gambler, so please just trust that I know who you are, you know who you are, I love ya fully, and I am always here for you, whenever, if ever, and however you need me:)

May 8, 2007- perspective with a kick

I've spent the last few days in a perpetual kind of funk, in a 'woe is me' kind of niche I've grown entirely too comfortable with lately. Hell, who am I kidding? Lately? Try like clockwork.

Overall, I haven't been super happily doodly fond of this fuckstick of a world lately, and that fact slapped me hard in the face today, an outright view through a world's window most of us like to keep the blinds down over.

Leaving a store today, my trek to the car was halted by the sight of a puppy...

Homeless, mange-covered, hungry, and wary of everyone around him. People walked past me, both to and from the store's doors as this puppy hovered a safe number of feet from them, old enough to associate humans with food, way too young to keep this kind of distance. And as the people came and went, the best any of them could do was to say 'What an ugly dog!', more concerned with discount footwear and garden supplies than the balding mangy little life so in need.

Typical.

My bags quickly got thrown in the Jeep, save three cans of the puppy food I'd just bought, which went with me back towards this tragic little dog, who retreated four feet from me to every two feet I advanced. I stopped at the back of the store, where the parking lot was empty and the puppy cowered by a garbage bin, watching me in interest, staying put in fear. I spoke to him soothingly as I emptied all three cans in a pile on the sidewalk before backing away ten feet and waiting to see if he'd move forward. His little head bobbed up and down, obviously smelling the Pedigree Puppy food, yet not moving an inch. I back up another five feet, he continues to sniff, yet stays put. Another five feet, then another ten, still no movement, so I resolve myself to sit in the Jeep and watch.

Ten minutes later, the sight of a balding and crusty-skinned little 'should be cute' puppy wolfing down canned and processed puppy food like it was raw steak induced me to tears.

I tried for an hour after that to win over this puppy's trust, showing him the fourth can I held in my hand, pleading with him gently to trust me enough to come up and eat with me here, let me touch him, pick him up, put him in the Jeep and just try to make things better. How, I didn't really know, but when you see something like what I was seeing, you don't really jump far enough ahead to figure out the 'how'.

In any case, he wasn't having it. As long as I was out of the car and in sight, the dumpster was where this little mutt glued himself.

Way too long story a little shorter, I left this fella where he was, drove to one feed store to get a safe trap, hoping I could bait it and catch him that way, the store had none, but found success at the next place, signed a trap out, and headed straight back to that parking lot.

And when I got back to puppy's dumpster...he was gone. My heart had already broken plenty this morning. At that moment, it shattered.

It shattered because I didn't do enough, fast enough. It shattered because I couldn't do enough, fast enough. It shattered because a part of me felt relief that I'd now been excused of doing enough, fast enough, thanks to puppy's departure. You can't save them all, they love to tell me. And sometimes I actually listen to them, the assholes.

Oh, and to anyone who at this point asks 'Why didn't you just call the pound?'... go to hell. Go to your local animal shelter, look at the sickliest animals cowering in their cages during their last days, and if you still wonder why I didn't just call them and forget about things, give me your IP so that I can block you from this page forever, ok?

By a dumpster now sits a safe trap, baited with pedigree puppy dog food, and when I leave and check the trap as soon as I finish this entry, my heart will still be broken, whether the cage contains a mangy puppy or not. Hell, knowing this area, I'll probably go back and find no trap at all, some idiot having stolen it for scrap metal salvage.

This really is a fuckstick of a world sometimes, and how the majority of our homosapien brethren can ever be chipper about it is beyond me. While American Idol and Dancing with the Stars have us all happily rooting for this or that person, while sitcoms and their canned laughter lead us into an equally shallow 2 minutes of marketing strategy aimed at us buying something made of plastic that's guaranteed to make our lives better, we all tend to close those blinds on the world's window, blocking things like Darfur, suicide bombers, global warming, hunger, diamond-mining induced slavery and violence in South Africa, the AIDS pandemic, abuse, neglect, and indifference abound, to name just a few ever-occurring tragedies we'd all love to be able to deny.

This all hit me smack dab in the face today in the guise of a single little harmless puppy who needed help, and got the bare minimum of it from me today. This little animal should never have been ill, should never have been in this parking lot, should never have been in any position other than that of a nice fenced yard, with a nice bowl of food and water by his dog house's side. His tail should be wagging instead of being held stiff and firm between his legs, and his sleep should be deep and free of nightmares. He should know love and trust instead of hunger and fear.

What's saddest about all of this is that even though Nature did its thing with this little puppy, it's the human response, or the lack of it, that really locked in this animal's life thus far. Anyone at anytime could've stepped in by now and done something, but they didn't. If they had, I'd have loaded groceries today and driven home, and you wouldn't now be reading such a bummed out rant.

I think I understand now why some people become addicted to some substances. If it numbs you, if it drops those blinds to the world's window, if it makes you not get pissed off at hearing 'you can't save them all', then hell, give me a double shot of it! But only until they, the infamous 'they', come up with a shot of whatever makes you able to fix every wrong you see.

Anyway, have to drive back up and check a trap, then mourn one way or the other, then find it in myself to cook a nutritious meal for myself and the hubster. If I'm lucky, I'll find a trap with a mangy mutt in it, if I'm luckier, I'll wake up and realize that this was all just a dream;)

April 30, 2007- Neighbors and my continual lack of faith in humanity

Today should've been one of those 'get up and go, take care of chores, love life, and thank God for coolness' days. Instead, it downright sucked and swallowed.

It started when I went outside to feed the feral strays today, only to find that the neighbor's pit bull had broken free of his lead/leash, and was now running around my yard and terrorizing my cats. The only way to keep this dog out of my yard, and my stray buddies safe was to stand there in the yard, broom in hand, grunting and charging every time the little bastard came around. Oh, and while this is happening, his owners are home, but not answering the door when I pound on it, and believe me, I pounded on it several times today.

Anyway, about an hour into guarding my yard (when I really needed to be out shopping, at the bank, doing other chores), my already hefty anxiety quickly escalates into panic as all of a sudden, a toddler child rounds the fence corner to the yard the dog's currently in, no parent to this child anywhere in sight, and the dog starts to charge this little two foot tall baby. I freak, scream and run while shouting at the dog, broom in hand and waving wildly, and nearly release my bladder in relief when the dog stops just short of the baby, and retreats. Oh, and meanwhile, two of my neighbors across the street are on their porch, watching it all, neither one even lifting a buttcheek from their chairs, even to let a fart loose.

As I start to go up to the baby, who at this point is standing in the street, when her mother finally appears, three houses down, and walks briskly (notice I didn't say she ran) towards her child, fetching the little girl while I'm standing in front of my pit bull neighbor with my broomstick and herding him towards his backyard again.

At this point, I'm disgusted with everyone I've dealt with thus far, not thinking that my 'ugh' meter could register any higher... when I start to hear gunshots coming from directly across the street. Long story short, me and my broomstick go to the yard it's coming from, walk around the side, and see yet another idiot neighbor in his backyard, a teenager gangsta wanna be, complete with huge jeans a centimeter away from falling from his buttcheeks , complimented so fully by his nearly fully shaved head, the hair at the nape the only tresses allowed to keep growing... really long. He stood there in his La Mafia glory, firing a handgun into a phone book.

I screamed at him all the things you'd imagine I'd scream, went back in to grab the phone and call the police, then went back outside, phone in hand, to wait for them...

to find the postal carrier being accosted by the loose pitbull.

I run towards them with my broom, but our postal carrier has the wherewithal to pull her pepper spray out and hit aforementioned pit bull straight in the eyes, he freaks, stops everything, paws at his eyes, then slinks back to his front porch. I ask her if she's okay, she smiles, not nearly as exasperated as I am, and keeps going on her route.

Long story short, the gun-toting teen took off, the police never came, the pit bull's owner finally came outside and hooked him back up to his lead in the backyard, the two neighbors on the porch who watched all this go down never left their seats, and by the time all of this came to an end, my entire day was wasted.

What in the hell happened to basic consideration???? What's happening to mankind? How in hell does a barely-able-to-toddle baby end up getting three house lengths away before her mother even knows she's gone??? How do neighbors who don't have a fully enclosed fence think it's okay to go and get two pit bulls, mean pit bulls, and not make any real effort to keep them contained???? How does a teenage aspiring thug fire off a gun repeatedly in his backyard, not caring for a second that there's a daycare backing up to his property, how does he even have a gun, and why wasn't he in school???? How in hell is it that called in report of shots fired doesn't merit the speedy arrival of the DPD.

All of this just pisses me off, drains my hope, even induces nausea, but here's the question that really breaks my heart-

Why was I the only one who even attempted to do the right thing?????????

Don't even get me started on the fact that all but one of the people I'm bitching about were illegal immigrants. Sorry, but it's true.

The entire time I was posted out front, confronting, protecting, reporting, and all those other 'ings', there were the two idiot neighbors across the street, spreading asses spreading more on their Family Dollar plastic lawnchairs, one woman next door to them taking out trash and sweeping her porch, and as the gunshots were going off, three other houses nearby had their doors open, heads peek out to see what was going on, ultimately retreating and shutting their doors again, where I can guarantee you not a one of them called and reported this.

Is it really that hard to treat others as you would yourself? Is it really such a torture to actually think about how your actions might affect others before you go and do a thing... any thing???? And when you see a wrong, especially a dangerous wrong, in the making, is it really such a dreadful thing to stand up to it??????

I saw a landmark amount of selfishness, cowardice, disregard, disrespect, and unadulterated wrong take place today, and I'm willing to bet that because I 'bitched' about it, did anything in reaction to it, my status as 'Crazy Gringa' on this block will go up uberfold when I should be considered the one neighbor who actually cares. God it's hard not to completely give up, and Jesus friggin' Christ, it's getting even harder to care anymore.

We went out to my Mom's house in Mineola this weekend, helped transport some of my brother's pets, and as we were there, some six cars drove by while we were in the yard, every single person waving at us... we all freaked a pleasant kind of freak at this simple act of amity, a bittersweet freak, the kind of freak that has you both happy that hospitality isn't entirely dead, and depressed because we knew we had to return to Dallas, to the kind of society whose hand waves with strangers usually involve the middle finger and road rage.

Please, folks, tell me I'm preaching to the choir here. Tell me, by all means tell me, that you know your neighbors, check in on them, know their kids, their pets... tell me that if and when you hear/ever hear gunfire, you call the police, tell me that you don't boost your car bass at any time of the day, oblivious to whose walls that bass penetrates. Tell me that you never turn your head to any unpleasant activity you experience on your street because you just don't want trouble. Tell me that if a wrong is plopped smack dab down in front of you, you'll address it, fix it, and if you can't fix it, you'll find someone who can. Tell me that the big city is still worth living in, that the human condition is still worth being proud of:)

Final note I want to fire off real quick... Ariane... you okay?????? Worried about you! Update me when you can, okay? Even if it's just an email saying 'I'm okay':)

To the rest of you, If I haven't already answered your emails or talked to you in person or on the phone, you'll hear from me in the next couple of days, I promise:)

Quick note for my DFW friends...

The Hyperbaric taping my MIL was involved with will finally air April 29th at 1 PM on KERA on 'McCuistion'. Here's the 'Blurb' email I got about it:

#1611 Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy: Why The Controversy?

2903

Hyperbaric Oxygen therapy is fast becoming a new application of an old treatment, dating back 178 years and one originally used for divers’ brain decompression illness. McGill University studies show that H.O.T. is 400-500% more effective than any other therapeutic approach in producing a measurable change in gross and fine motor function for children with neurological injury.

Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy is a series of therapeutic procedures in which high doses of oxygen are delivered to tissues in critical need. Patients are placed in a sealed chamber , treatment pressure established and the patient breathes 100% oxygen. This allows for greater amounts of oxygen to be available to parts of the body that may be injured.

While H.O.T. seems to demonstrate impressive results in many conditions, from stroke, to autism, cerebral palsy, among others, there is still much controversy regarding this form of therapy .One objection is that free radical damage will be increased … What does present research indicate?

Guests:

Paul G. Harch M.D.

Director: LSU School of Medicine

Author:

The Oxygen Revolution

Ernesto C. Sanchez M.D.

Medical Director

Hospital del Pedregal

Mexico City, Mexico

James F. Toole M.D.

Director of Stroke Research Center

Wake Forest University School of Medicine

If you're not in the DFW area and want to see this show aired, by all means, contact your local PBS affiliate and request a showing of this program!

April 12, 2007- I suck, but I need your prayers, anyway

Why? Because, in a nutshell, I have but one male animal with testes on this property (Nigel, my goofy mutt), thought I'd separated him from the one intact female dog here in plenty of time (forgot to mention here that I was retarded enough to EVER allow these two to be together for any amount of time), about eight weeks passed since that separation before Eric and I noticed that Fuzzy Wagadoo was gaining weight, then on the 10^th of this month, without Fuzzy showing any real signs of pregnancy other than gaining a little weight, surprised us.

Yes, that's right. Fuzzy had gained weight recently, I'd checked her as a result, found nothing remarkable, couldn't palpate her uterine horns, found nothing there, no nipple change (then again, before I'd rescued her, she'd had a previous litter, resulting in really big boobies that never really went away), no obvious abdominal distention, etc., and decided that the recent diet change was the culprit... until we went to walk her two days ago and she didn't come running when we opened the gate to her kennel area (Fuzzy is always up for coming out and running around). Eric went in first to see what was taking her so long, and before I could get in close enough behind him, he was turning and looking at me with panicked eyes, telling me that there were weird noises coming from Fuzzy's dog house, at which point we both simultaneously said 'Oh, shit!'. Literally, y'all... this dog got 'that' pregnant that fast. I liken it to those stories you see on talk shows where a woman goes to the ER in massive pain, sure her appendix has burst, then instead finds out she's not dying from infection, but living just fine, only in 8 pound baby-producing labor, not having a clue that a baby'd been growing in her the last nine months.

On that same kind of fucked up linear note, I now have five puppy granddaughters and one puppy grandson, and though I already love those little fluffy bastards, am proud as hell of them, I still want to just put a bullet straight through my cranium.

I should've separated these dogs sooner (as in way before Nigel's balls dropped). I should've done a million things differently than I did, because as you all know from previous entries, this is a property that's taken in and nursed several parvo virus survivors, two of which are these puppies' mother and father. What that means is that the virus is in this environment, and I am now solely responsible for bringing six beautiful little vulnerable lives into a dangerously infectious world because I was too busy with 'human' family stuff to spay and neuter soon enough. I do indeed suck. If a single one of these little creatures dies, it'll be my fault, completely my fault.

With that said, what's done is done, as much as I suck, so it's time to stop crying over spilled milk and instead concentrate on the protection that milk offers.

The pups are fine for now; Fuzzy's milk is plenty, the pups are healthy, and she's giving them plenty of protection against Parvo for now via antibodies. I've had two days total to figure out how to best up these puppies' odds, and after talking to a few pros today, homeopathic and traditional, and I think I have the best plan set out.

The dog run area where Fuzzy is now doesn't have any known Parvo infection. I've been told that surviving dogs are NOT carriers of the disease, but still, I'm going to have both Nigel and Fuzzy's stool tested for the virus, just to make sure. Eric and I are going to treat the dog run area this weekend with a bleach and water solution (including the dog house), which should kill off any virus anywhere near the area. Fuzzy and the babies will be relocated to the guest bedroom at that point. After that, we're going to remove the top three inches of soil along the dog run and replace it with new soil, put fresh bedding in the doghouse, then return mom and our grandpups to the area we think they'll be safest in.

The next step, after treating the pups' environment, is to concentrate on making the puppies stronger, immune wise. Thanks to a couple of wonderful vets in the area, I'll be picking up a homeopathic Parvo preventative (a nosode/system booster) in two weeks, administering it to these little heathens daily until they're old enough for traditional vaccination.

There's more involved in this desperate plan to keep my unexpected grandpuppies safe from suffering, but you get the point.

Still, this won't be good enough for some who read here (and you know who you are). It's still not good enough for me. Every day that passes with these new puppies will involve my worrying, my blaming myself for not following Bob Barker's advice soon enough with these two new parent dogs, my loving these little things more and more each day, fearing just as much that they'll still become sick, no matter what I do, and the ultimate... seeing all efforts still result in tragedy.

In essence, folks, SPAY AND NEUTER your pets, ALL of them, ASAP. Though I don't regret the little lives squirming so happily on the other side of the wall I type from this moment, I just as fervently hope that none of you ever experience what I'm experiencing now. Preparation or not, it's bittersweet at best.

April 5, 2007

Damn, it's nippy out there! Days of warm weather, teasingly pleasant sunshine washing my soul as I've been out and about.... then BOOM! Chilly outright meteorological crap hits the metroplex, and I'm scrambling to find all the sweats and fuzzy socks I'd just packed away for what I thought would be several months. Still, beats the hell out of the laminated-in-funk humid triple digit days I know I'm going to be bitching about come mid-June.

Now that I've talked about the weather....

Eric and I started a garden, and thank God, nothing's died yet. Tomatoes, Bell Peppers, banana peppers, serrano peppers, green beans, spinach, oregano, lavender, dill, and basil.... I can hardly wait to harvest this stuff, provided my mother's green thumb ended up in my DNA:) We'll see:)

I've been having a hard time lately in that I find myself being judged a little more than deserved by a few people I wouldn't have expected to judge me so much. Normally, this doesn't bug me that much; hell, this journal alone has produced more than a few Paula Haters, their displeasure with me stabbing at my soul with about as much depth as a plastic Masters of the Universe sword. Partially, because I know they're angry with my take on them, and I can't begrudge them that emotion, but mainly because what they think of me just doesn't play a major role in my life, as I'm sure I don't in theirs.

This new couple of folks, however, are really stumping me. I haven't done the usual Paula stuff that gets panties in a wad, in fact have been supportive of these folks for a long time now, always saw them as friends, yet can't help but feel as if I'm walking on eggshells around them, really sharp eggshells, can't help but just know in my gut that someone's trying to do some redneck dirt-digging, can't help but be awash in distrust whenever there's any contact with them, know without a doubt that private emails between them re: me fly like illegal immigrants from the Border Patrol. I really don't care about the dirt-digging... I doubt there's anything too juicy to dig up (Jesus, I already know I'm fucked up. Thrashing me with evidence of it is going to be about as thought-provoking as Paris Hilton explaining why stonewashed denim mini-skirts aren't cool anymore). I don't care about gossip-laden emails. What I do care about can be summed up into a one-word question... 'Why?' Seriously... why are these people messing with me? I've tended to usually understand my critics, live in some sort of dysfunctional definition of peace with them. But these couple of 'friends' I've never done anything but be myself around? Totally puzzling, entirely bewildering, and slowly-but-surely angering.

Anyway, I realize that this all sounds paranoid, dark, and uberly negative, so I'll move on.

My friend Allison talked about The Tudors, the new Showtime series about Henry the Eighth in his younger years, on her journal recently, and I have to agree with her... excellent series!!!!!! That's saying a lot for me, being that I cringe at the sight of Jonathan Rhys Meyers (that's my problem, though; he reminds me so much of an ex-boyfriend, I just naturally despise the guy's image). Anyway, the show is fascinating, does an excellent job of interpreting history without blatantly fudging it, and though I know what historically happened during this king's reign, I can't wait to 'see what happens' next;) Showtime's come a long way, if you ask me. It used to be HBO, hands down, who ruled the cable television original series terrain, but with series like 'Dexter', 'The L Word', and now the 'Tudors'... HBO execs should have reason to gnaw those manicured fingernails down to bloody stubs.

Finally saw 'Borat'. Laughed my ass off, though I have a feeling the folks who saw the movie without previously watching Borat on HBO laughed harder. Though Sascha Baron Cohen definitely is a confrontation-based comedic genius in my eyes, there were times during the movie in which I felt as if I were just re-watching 'The Ali G Show'. Still, this is a great movie, its underlying message about bigotry alone making it worth watching.

Final note, and excuse me for not shouting out to individual buddies this time (Sorry, but I'm getting pooped)...

Sanjaya... be a man, I implore you. Do you really want to win this way, knowing that Howard Stern (not the dorky Anna Nicole stalker/lawyer, but the dorky radio personality) and other unfriendly AI-hating sources are pushing the masses to vote for you as a joke? You know you don't deserve to win, you know that your astounding success this year is nothing but a 'butt', so I beg of you... drop the Tiger Beat mentality, stop fooling yourself, and gracefully bow out of the competition... now. You have a choice at this point... you can be a glorified William Hung, or you can be a man who cares more about his karma than his bank account. Either way, I can promise you I'll buy Don Ho's greatest hits, then fuck a Leprechaun before I'll buy anything you record. And Howard Stern? I'm beyond pissed off at you for making me feel as if I have to defend a show like American Idol. I should've seen from the get-go that you'd attack any show that rivaled yours when it came to shallow entertainment.

Ok, gotta go. I have to go pluck the 'suckers' off of my tomato plants now that the sun's out enough to let me:)

Marie, my thoughts and prayers go out to you and your sister right now. Expect a package from a redneck soon, ok?

April 3- Long time, no see!

I'm alive, busy, but still here and the kind of 'good' busy that makes one not mind being so preoccupied.

My Mom found a house! Eric and I took her over to Mineola a few weeks ago, drove around the neighborhood she liked, saw this gorgeous house, and if it were up to Mom and I, we would've never gotten out of the car and looked. It was too big, therefore probably wayyyyyyyy too expensive. However, Eric was at the helm, insisted we went and looked, Mom fell in love with the place, we called the realtor, shit a brick when they told us it was only listed in the 80's, put in an offer, the offer was accepted, and now my mom's in the final phases of buying a house, headed straight for a closing date at the end of this month.

This house is gorgeous!!!!! It's just a couple of blocks from the charming downtown area, is in a wonderfully quiet neighborhood, and as for the house itself, it's amazing!! Hardwood floors, eclectically quaint (and HUGE) backyard... AND it has a garage apartment/garage at the back of the property. The house itself is divided into two living areas, which brings me to my next paragraph.

My brothers have been miserable here, worrying about losing their house, the payments have become so high, and life in general here for them has become so bad, I'm actually worrying as much for them as they are for themselves. Anyway, long story short, my brothers are going to move to Mineola with my mother. One brother will take the garage apartment, one brother will take one half of the main house, and Mom will take the other half. The extreme bonus on this... Mom is putting down nearly 40 percent on the house, and as a result, all three will share a 518.34 mortgage payment. Not bad at all, I have to say. Oh, AND... my brother got a transfer from his job here to another store near Mineola. He won't lose his benefits, won't have to look for another job, won't have to worry about anything but selling the house he's in now.

And to be selfish, this is a huge bonus for me. My worry level line on my soul's dipstick will drop to such the tolerable level. No more worrying about Mom living alone, and no more worrying about my borderline socially retarded brothers surviving, either. Yeah, that noise you just heard was me cabbage-patching around my living room;)

Onto other stuff...

The last entry I deleted- Most of you read it, according to the emails I got, so since you have, I'll just update by saying that I'm still wary, though less hurt, still don't trust a couple of people, still just know in my gut they're up to only the most dysfunctional no good, but am leaving it alone for now... for now. After all, this is my rant page, and trust me; there will rarely be a day here when I don't unleash hell on someone I think is treating me less than fairly. In other words, look here in the future for a re-publishing of that rant, along with an additional little bit of 'you suck and should be ashamed of yourself' vibe vividly painted throughout the rant by yours truly.

Fan fiction... haven't had time to read it, haven't really had time to care, I'm afraid. However, it's nice to hear from former fanfic friends now and then, which has happened a lot lately. Good to hear from you gals!!!!! It's nice to see that some of you have escaped Medjai land, but then again, for you still hopelessly lost in it, keep writing it as well as you do, and I promise I won't lecture;)

Other genre writers- no, I haven't written anything lately. Haven't had time or desire, but then again, I was gonna ask you all the same thing!;) I know of at least five of you who have huge projects in the works. I'd better see some new stuff soon from you before I completely snap, climb a tower, and start picking off passers by with a scoped slingshot;) Richard, you're excused. I got your attachment last week.... I'm still sighing in satisfaction. Superb ending!!!!!!!! How in the hell did you do that???

Moving on, had my first Baker Hotel dream in ages, and it was weird. A Buick (looked like some 60's model) was parked in the lobby, and three women in yellow chiffon dresses were standing around it, draping their arms towards it while smiling the kinds of gleaming smiles only Vaseline can produce. Suddenly, from the Mezzanine, a scream erupts, I, along with the rest of the lobby wanderers, look up and see a heavy set man grasping the arm of a fourth yellow-chiffon wearing woman with one hand while the other is clamped just as hard around the nape of her neck, forcing her to look down onto the lobby floor. As I'm standing there, I find myself frozen. I try to scream up at the bastard to let the woman go, but my vocal chords, as well as my entire body, turns to that shaky kind of weak that reminds me of what Ghandi must've sounded and felt like towards the end of one of his hunger strikes. In other words, I just can't protest loudly... it's as if I'm not allowed to by some force around the scene who's more in control. And just when I'm feeling my most hopeless, someone nudges me gently on my upper arm. I turn my head and see a man with a white shock of hair and an equally white beard. He smiles as if everything's okay, and says 'Don't fret; they'll be around awhile.'

What?

As if that's not weird enough, to my right, string music erupts, and I look over to see that the Brazos Club is having a beauty contest, women in debutante gowns lined up outside its doors, one by one taking their entry in single file up to the room's stage. I immediately think to myself 'they're almost all brunettes!'. That's about my only clear thought before waking up and wondering what in the hell that dream meant;)

I think that sometimes I tend to be watching a 'recording' more than I am dreaming, and I equally tend to think that this particular dream was the perfect example of this. Me desiring sex with Doug Henning? That's a dream, at least I PRAY it's a dream. Me watching insignificant little moments in a now-abandoned hotel a few miles west of me? I tend to think that someone, don't know who, is using my sleeping brain as an organic VCR/DVD player. Not sure the sights I retain ever really mean anything more than they're just confirmation of things past, but in any case, I'm not about to start bitching about this particular thing now. Whoever you are, show me what you want, whenever you want... use me as much as you desire, just let me remember it;)

Okay, that's it, other than to shout out real quick to Allison... 'Get back to the doc!!!!!'.

Friends, family, readers, naysayers, buttheads, the oddly curious, and the rest of you... I know you're here, wonder why you always come back, and wish you nothing but everything you could ever need to complete your journeys. Man, that sounded too new-age-ish, yoga'y', and Opra-like. I apologize; what I meant was-

Rock on, ya pukes!

March 14, 2007-Crack, the other white meat

I'm exhausted, the MIL's in Washington, driving politicians nuts by now with her ADD, I forgot my dad's birthday... again, and I can tell that my brothers are getting tired of having Mom stay with them. My husband's job is starting to offer him better routes now, which is making me breathe easier, so at least on that front, things are less stressful.

I was at Family Dollar store the other day, dressed to the nines in my WalMart jeans, thrift store shirt, and trademark kabuki hairdo (where I throw all my hair up on top of my head, twist it around and throw a clip on it so that this long half-tail thing sticks up from the top of my head), and on the way out, this 40 something man walks up to me with an 'excuse me, Ma'am'. First of all, I don't have any money for you, Bubba or Lester or whatever your name is. Secondly... Ma'am??? Since when did I become anything other than a Miss? I am soooooo close to slitting my neck with a jigsaw.

Anyway, the guy, who's wearing the dorkiest pink gingham Wrangler brand shirt, starts to tell me that he has a daughter who just got out of rehab for addiction to crack, that he'd loaned her his pickup truck to go to the dollar store hours ago, and that she hadn't returned yet. He was due at work already, without his truck, her children, his grandkids, were stranded back at his house, etc., etc.

I was about two seconds away from feeling total sympathy for this man, despite the fact that I kept saying to myself 'What does this have to do with me?', when things turned more south than they already were.

Finally, this woe-as-me redneck trucker pink gingham-shirted stranger comes to the point... by saying that he knew that his daughter had to be at a crack house around somewhere, and asking me if I could tell him where all the local crackhouses were.

Ehhhh.....

My first thought was 'Do I LOOK like a crack addict?'. Then I remembered what I looked like, and one of those piece of shit epiphanies (as opposed to the really beneficial epiphanies) hit me like an Ike Turner back-handed slap.

-I need a makeover, a new wardrobe, and possibly some plastic surgery;)

As much as I couldn't blame the guy, I still drove off pissed.... but only after telling him that I didn't know anything about crack houses in the area, but that if he wanted a good deal on a dime bag of Jamaican, I was his bitch. Ok, I'm kidding.

Still, ugh. NO wonder I'm having dreams about Doug Henning.

Anyway, back to Mom. We've found some houses in Mineola, all a little higher than she'd hoped for, but she thinks she can swing it. As for the brothers having extra stress over Mom staying with them, I think Eric and I are going to take her to Caddo Lake for a weekend, give the brothers a break, and let Mom see what Eric and I talk about all the time.

As for Dad, I've got to buy him something quick, something good! I'll redeem myself somehow.

Allison, just had to add here that I read your latest blog entry, and honey, I know this is your journal, but the last entry about your closet is, in my opinion, one of the best things I've read of yours. God, I felt what you were feeling, and I just downright loved that entry!

Oh, and American Idol... my picks for this year. Melinda Doolittle will win, Lakeisha will be either second or third, and other than those two, this year will probably end up being the most disappointing season in AI history. And if Sanjaya survives another week, I'm digging out my old Donny Osmond doll with the purple disco outfit, tanning it a little, and selling it on Ebay as a one of a kind Sanjaya action figure.

Gotta go, but one of these days, I'll get deeper. I have to, 'cause I have so much to bitch about, but for now, let me just end this by wishing you all health, happiness, and the ability to never be mistaken for a crack addict;)

March 7, 2007- To Rear an Ugly Head

Unconditional love... we all need it so much in order to keep going, and sometimes, we get it. I think that's how you separate the true friends from the rest of the masses, the family members who nurture your soul from the ones you wish you weren't related to. I listen to radio, watch T.V., talk to people, and while doing that, the conditional world becomes so apparent to me, so prevalent, and so sadly implanted in the things we do. But then again, the 'this sucks' feeling I get also gets pushed aside when I realize how lucky I am to be so unconditionally loved by so many.

I just wanted to take a minute and pay massive tribute to the people in my life who love me no matter what. With them, I can rear my ugliest of heads and still know I'm loved. My parents, step and biological, my siblings, my real life and online friends... you are all forever in my heart. To read and listen to the things I say and survive them, listen to them, forgive me when I need it, forget it when you didn't have to, and ultimately still want me in your lives... well, hell. I love you all, and you know who you are:)

Mainly, though, I have to bow the most fully to my husband. This man knows, sees, hears, smells, and experiences the worst my being has to offer to all of his senses. He sees the ugliest of my reared heads on regular occasions, sides of me nobody's had the displeasure of seeing but him, yet still wants to be married to me, still loves me, trusts me, and somehow miraculously manages to really like me. My breasts could be replaced by putrid abscesses, my teeth by pointy shards of decaying enamel, coarse pig hair could sprout up all over my body and emit a smell like a cross between stale Fritos and catfish bait, and though I don't think he'd want sex from me nearly as much (much less take me out as often), the man would still want to be married to me. Utterly, freakishly, yet warmingly amazing. That's unconditional love, and Jesus, is it ever one of the most valuable experiences anyone in this world could hope to know.

Anyway, no particular reason for the above observations... It just dawned on me lately that I have experienced the wonder of acceptance and total love from more people than I realized, so I had to say something.

Oh, and to anyone in my life who doesn't fit into the above observations? I don't blame you, don't hate you, don't want to hurt you, but if you could kiss my ass and call it a love story, that'd be great, too;)

Mom's stay here so far has been unbelievably good, we've been getting a lot done, and nobody's fought with anyone at all so far;) We're heading back up to Mineola, and Mom's going up again after that to stay by herself for a few days, see if she can meet some people, make some more solid future plans. She wants to work there part time, plus do some volunteer work, and hopes that an extended visit up there will help her get all that started. We're still having trouble finding just what she wants to buy house wise, but I think what I'm going to end up doing is write out a long classified ad on her behalf and put it in the local newspaper, letting the folks in Mineola know that a brilliant and hard-working woman loves their city, wants to move there, benefit their community, and is looking for either a garage apartment to rent, or a small house to buy. I'll take out a full page ad if I have to... whatever it takes:)

Switching thoughts, and minor rant here, I had time a couple of days ago to go and read a few things written by some writers I know, catch up on some missed reading. Anyway, as I was reading, the whole beta thing came up in my head again. To catch some of you new readers up to speed, I used to beta for a few people, never claimed I was a master at it, yet with one particular person I beta'd for, I ended up paying dearly for my services (free services, btw) in that she single-handedly burned me out on betaing, and when I got burned out, she tarnished my reputation by complaining to anyone and everyone who'd listen, all behind my back, mind you. She had some valid complaints, but let's just say that overall, I gave way more than I got back. And I got back more crap than I deserved.

Back to beta work... reading some of the things I've read lately, from writers who supposedly have stellar betas and seeing massive flaws throughout in mechanics and less tangible areas, its become crystal clear to me that betas are about as necessary to an online writer's work as a polyp is to your average 65 year old's colon. A writer needs a creative consultant, an experienced one, an editor, just as experienced, and sorry, but most betas I've seen out there are neither, including me.

What sucks about this is that I still do what can be called 'beta' work for a couple of folks, so I guess I'm a hypocrite. However, if and when I suggest changes to their work, I never tell them they have to, never claim I know my suggestions will make things better. I leave it up to them to decide. I officially do not consider myself a beta any longer, thinking about it. I'm, at best, a reviewer. Also, I no longer review or consult with writers who are in it for the wrong reasons, wrong payback, wrong inspiration. Anyway, after being subjected to the idiotic and judgmental rules out there on 'how to be a beta', it just struck me dumb while reading 'good beta' work and seeing the mountain of errors I saw the last couple of days.

If I can offer any advice here to you online folks who write, if you really think you need a beta, do a few things for me:

Pick someone who really gets your work, where you want to go with it, etc.
Preferrably, pick two... One who can concentrate on your storyline, narrative thread, etc., and one to concentrate on the grammar, punctuation, etc.
Don't send your 'beta' piles of chapters at a time or a chapter on Tuesday, the next chapter on Friday. If you write that much that quickly, trust me... it's going to be too much for any beta to handle, and too thin in quality for you to have ever dared to submit to anyone.
If your feedback after publishing a piece doesn't get rave reviews, point the finger at yourself long before you start bitching about having a bad beta. If you suck, your beta, at worst, will just fail to make you not suck as much.
If a beta's advice goes strongly against anything you want to do, choose to follow your gut. You're writing for you, after all. It's your story, not anyone else's, and whether it's well received or not, tell it.

I could go on, but I won't. Whether I'm right or not, you get the point.

Finally, CONGRATULATIONS to a great friend and master candlemaker, Sue. Sue just welcomed her newest grandchild, Bryan, into the world. He's a big boy, healthy, happy, and is destined to know the best the word 'family' has to offer as he grows:) So, to a fabulous friend, writer, entrepreneur, mom, grandmom, and overall person, I want to wish a million good things, all payable now:)

Okay, gotta go, but wish all you good folks all the good things your tookuses can handle today:)

March 2, 2007

Mom's here, arrived safely Monday, and I gotta say, things have been smooth and pleasant since she got here. We spent Tuesday moving her things over here, storing the trailer she bought in our driveway, and making a list of properties she could afford in the Mineola, TX area (where she really wants to move), and planning a trip to the same city on Wednesday.

We spent Wednesday driving around Mineola, Holly Lake Ranch, and Tyler, TX, getting a feel for the area, and though most of the properties we saw in Mom's price range were pieces of shit, we at least came away with knowing that Mom fell in love with Mineola. I have to admit, I kinda did, too, as did Eric. It's a charming little town in East Texas, full of history, a to die for downtown area, and loads of friendly people, so though we didn't find a property right off the bat that Mom wanted or could afford, it's pretty much decided that Mineola is where she's going to end up. And if I end up having to blow homeless people in real time on a newly created web porn site for the money, or write pathetically slash'ish' horny astronaut satellite sex stories for money, I'm determined... my mother will move to a nice place in Mineola, Texas.

In the meantime, it's been nice having her here. I've had a few issues with my mother over the years, but it's funny how a death can make you forget and forgive, much more importantly, move on. Not to say I won't post major bitches here in the future about family things, but for now, I'm just happy that my mom is here, with her children, and not alone. I know so many families, not to mention the whole Anna Nicole thing lately, ending up in constant bickering when a family member dies. In this case, though it started out rough, me carrying way too many people, I have to say that I'm feeling pleasantly wrong in seeing my family come together now when we could all be engaging more in ego than what's right.

And we also decided to do a huge 'thing' for St. Patrick's day. Jim loved Saint Paddy's day, he and mom always celebrated that date more than anything, so Mom and I are set on getting everyone together, cooking up some serious Irish cuisine, dying some beer green, and having one hell of a time being together. Jim would've loved that, and we will, too.

Onto other news, less pleasant news, I just found out that my SIL Cindy was robbed at gunpoint in a trendy area of Dallas last night. She had a couple of clients with her, trying to close a deal, when on their way back to the car, they were all mugged. Cindy's freaked the fuck out about it, and I don't blame her. Besides having a gun shoved in her face, she also lost her purse with all her cash, ID, credit cards, and car keys in it, probably has lost the deal with the clients, who also got robbed, and spent last night and today having new keys made to her car, canceling cards, checks, etc., not to mention filling out police reports. Ultimately, she's grateful she still has her life, and she's a better woman than I am. I literally would be dead at this point if it'd been me last night instead of Cindy. I'd have focused way too much on how pissed off I was at these asshole robbers, fought them, and eaten a bullet. Not smart.

American Idol... OMG, Doolittle and her 'Funny Valentine' performance. Jesus Christ on a moped... could she have been more PERFECT? That was a goosebump performance. I like this girl, think she'll go far, but even still, I hate to say Idol this year just ain't grabbing at me. That's okay, 'cause I really don't feel the need to hit my phone's redial over and over again trying to cast a vote for anyone like I did last year with Taylor.

The neighbors with the pitbulls actually came over yesterday to let us know that these two dogs are not staying there permanently. Seems a relative is moving, needs a place to keep his dogs for awhile, and that we should be somewhat worry free soon. Still, we're not taking chances. Eric just finished putting up a six foot reed fence all along our huge backyard, just so we can walk our dogs without worrying about the pit bulls next door. Nobody can climb this new fence, and despite its Gilligan's Islandish feel, it's really an organically pleasant kind of new look our backyard really needed.

Well, hell, that's it... a boring it, but hey, it's an update;) Trust me; I have plenty of juicy shit to shoot soon; my hormones are just too happy at the moment to allow it;)

Feb. 26^th, 2007-more thoughts in broken form

-As some of you know, yesterday was my birthday, and it was great:) I had tons of sushi, some Japanese beer, and outright relaxed the entire day. I haven't been able to do that in ages, so my 38 year old self ate that stuff up like the average mistreated animal on my block wolfs up the food I give them when they show up in my yard;) Eric pampered me, and as a result, I picked on him much less that day;) At this point, I'm just amazed I made it to 38, and if I make it to 40, I'll do a jig.

-I did some looking online yesterday, and Aurora, aren't you writing anymore? I may feel a lot of things about where our friendship went and why it went, may feel and say a lot of things, but believe it or not, I'd hate to find out you're not still pursuing your passion. Past things not forgotten, I'd still like to think you're writing somewhere.

-The Oscars were BORING!!!!!!! I normally love this ceremony, but this time, I found myself so bored, I spent the four hours of Oscars clipping my toenails, worming the cats, and rearranging my laundry room.

-I had a dream last night that Eric and I finally had a child, a boy, and we named him Dabney. Dabney's not exactly a cool name, but for some reason, I really like it.

-Because things are slow at Eric's job, he took a week of his vacation, starting today. The underwear fashion show and farting demonstrations I have a feeling are going to result in new heights of annoyance this week. Pray for me.

-One of my cats, Evelyn, got up into the attic a couple of days ago, then fell through the ceiling sheetrock, down into the room my two meanest dogs were sleeping in. I found this out because sounds of outright murder suddenly came from that room, I shot in there, freaked when I saw Hyanna and Ike going at Evelyn, grabbed them by the necks and dragged them outside, then ran to the corner of the room where Evelyn still lay there, me hyperventilating and going into cardiac arrhythmia. I pick up Evelyn, who's covered in dog spit, blood, and who is surprisingly still, and I start to freak out even more, running her into the bathroom, where my first aid cat stuff is, convinced I have a dying cat on my hands.

But as I look past the spit, feel her body for broken bones, inspect her skin for tears and lacerations, I'm shocked to find none. Where the hell is she bleeding from? There was blood everywhere... why can't I find a wound on her?

I offer Evelyn a can of cat food, which she wolfs down... yeah, this cat isn't hurt. What the hell? SO, I go outside to check the dogs, and find the source, or should I say sources, of the blood. Ike's face is covered in bleeding scratch marks, and Hyanna's ear is sliced wide open and gushing plenty of the red stuff. Unbelievable; my 6 pound cat fell into the angry muzzles of my cat-hating 70 pound mutt and 90 pound Husky, and apparently kicked their asses!!! I literally spent an hour cleaning up and soothing these two huge animals while tiny little Evelyn sat in the living room and groomed the dog spit off her silver gray coat, needing not an ounce of care from me other than petting her and telling her that she was a bad ass. Needless to say, Saturday was spent closing up the area of ceiling where Evelyn got into the attic in the first place. I don't want to find out if she'd fare as well a second time.

-Mom's arriving tonight, so I may be scarce awhile. We've got about five properties to drive to this week, and I just pray that one of them will be something Mom will want to live in. She's ready to start a new life without Jim, has accepted a lot of things in this short time, and I'm eager to see her start her next phase of life soon.

Okay, that's it for now. Boring, but I'm posting this anyway;) Friends, my thoughts are always with you, my wishes are always good when it comes to you, and I hope today treats you as well as any good day possibly could!:)

Feb. 24, 2007-Mini updates and weird thoughts

-I'm overwhelmed with the OCD urge to beat the living shit out of Anna Nicole's mom, Virgie. Thanks to her, we have a body in Florida deteriorating in unrest for two more weeks minimum while her lawyers appeal the decision to bury Anna in the Bahamas, and a shitload more dysfunction taking up precious time on my regularly-watched CNN and Headline News channels. Anna Nicole was a train wreck of a celebrity, but she was SO right about her mother.

-The latest stats from the fiction web site I have so many problems with:

Users Online

1 Guest, 0 Users

Most Online Today: 4. Most Online Ever: 13 (February 01, 2007, 06:37:06 pm)

... and like I said before, I'm the guest. Not so much gloating this time, no matter how much fun it can be to watch bullies crash. At this point, I'm just starting to hope that all the cool people I knew there are all doing okay. I'm even wondering what happened to some of other folks I didn't like so much.

-The brother made it to Mom's house okay, and the two are loading up a trailer at the moment, getting ready to head on up here.

-My neighbors, who have a partially fenced in yard, just decided to get two pit bulls. This pretty much translates into 'Paula's about to make some new enemies real fucking soon'. Not the dogs, it's not their fault, but their fucking idiot owners who somehow think they can keep these two animals from not terrorizing my yard, my animals, and the rest of the neighborhood. By the way, these are the people I took Nigel from. Yay. People suck.

-The PBS taping went well, so now I'm just waiting for the hyperbaric geniuses at my MIL's association to work on getting air dates and times put together, then I'll post them here, as well as on the hyperbaric site.

-The hubby's new job position has him home more, and as a result, I'm more often tempted to kick him in the balls. I'll get over it. I should read my friend Allison's journal more and remember what it was like when my husband was on the road and away from me for longer periods of time. It might make my kicking toe shrivel a little bit;) I missed him then, wished he was home more, loved it when he was here longer than usual. Be careful what you wish for, 'cause it may end up involving the urge to pierce a nutsack with a toothpick because that nutsack's owner has walked around in his underwear and farted while bitching about cats (but only after asking you for sex while you're scooping a particularly liquid turd out of the litterbox) for roughly four days in a row. I think in some countries, that exonerates you from any assault charge, right? Ok, I'm kidding... I think.

Okay, moving away from updates and towards abstract yet psycho thoughts...

-I am often convinced that Jennifer Love Hewitt is an extraterrestrial. I usually talk myself back into sense again, but when I do, 'I Still Know What You Did Last Summer' always pops up onto cable. Interesting.

-American Idol this year.... Sorry, but I've watched the last two episodes involving the top 12 males, top 12 females. If this is the best AI has this year, this show's doomed. I only have two who half-way entertained me so far, the Jack Osborne look alike and the girl who sang the Effie White Dreamgirls song. I'm guessing either of them will go far, if not all the way, but even if and when they do, I'm just not feeling it this year. I'd actually rather watch Nashville Star, and for me, that's about as bad as a straight male meth addict standing on a corner and saying something to himself like 'I need the money. It doesn't make me gay'.

-Hey, Obama... thanks for fucking up my dream of seeing Hilary Clinton as the first female president. Oh, and thanks, Hilary, for helping Obama's popularity out by acting more like the sleazy politicians I dread seeing. I'm damned near ready to Green Party my way into the next few years. And though I was once guilty of just what I'm about to bitch about, I'm going to say it anyway: It's pretty much disgusting me that the top two Democratic presidential hopefuls are being considered more now for being either a woman or a black man than they are over the issues. I want to hear more than what either's going to do beyond getting our troops out of Iraq, more than what either doesn't like about the other, much less the Republican party. Maybe I'm dreaming, but I'd like to hear either answer a single hard question with more than side-stepping double talk. Apparently, my expectations are high. Maybe I should prepare myself for a Donkey-version Dubya in '08 instead. At this point, I think we're better off as a country if we just go back to the Greek Senate system, minus the Ceasar.

-Rick Perry and his executive order to make school girls receive the HPV vaccine... Perry, you're a megalomaniac bastard, borderline communist, transparently pathetic capitalist hiding behind good intention, and my clitoris shrivels every time I see your painfully 'out of touch with your constituents' image plastered across my TV screen. And by the way, am I the only one who looks at him and is convinced he missed his calling? This guy, at least I think, should be on page 167 of a 1980's two-inch thick Sears catalog, modeling thermal underwear in some stiffly dorked out pose. Hey, Ricky... maybe you should stop ordering us around and perhaps shop for hair products beyond VO5 and Vitalis instead. Oh, and by the way, The Love Boat was canceled decades ago... realize it, accept it, find peace with the fact that you'll never score a part on it, and move on. Gopher has.

-Was watching a stand-up routine by Sarah Silverman the other day, and heard her say the funniest thing I've heard in ages... 'I was licking jelly off my boyfriend's penis the other day when suddenly, it dawned on me; I am becoming so much like my mother!'. I'm sorry, but I leaked urine when I heard her say that! This girl is funny, and as un-pc as this is to say, I just don't think female comedians tend to be as funny as male comedians are. Whether I'm right or not, Sarah Silverman is fucking funny!

-I had a dream the other day that convinced me I'm beyond any kind of available psychiatric help. In it, I was wearing a tie-dyed tee-shirt and acid-washed jeans, and was in a garage in some subdivision of some major city, just standing there. Suddenly, Doug Henning (I'm almost hoping most of you don't know who this 70's magician nerd is) walks in through the door from the kitchen, wearing a pastel unitard, grabs a huge garage door remote and presses the button on it to close the door. He smiles at me through his waxed and twirled mustache, then tells me basically that he wants me. Now here's where it really gets fucked up.... I actually scramble to undo my acid-washed jeans! More messed up, the jeans seem to lock onto me, the button and zipper refusing to be undone, and I'm actually upset about it. Here I am, offered magician dork sex, and my jeans won't let me have it. OH, and almost forgot to mention, the whole time, there's a strangely obese little person sitting on a fold out chair by the garage door, watching us and clapping at the whole fucked up scene in glee. I wake up, find Eric already awake and downstairs, tell him about it, and he laughs, tells me in his confidence not to worry, that the dream couldn't have meant that I'm really hot for Doug Henning, takes a sip of coffee, then farts a kind of sound that made my dog T.C., who was sleeping on the couch at the time, pop her head up and look around the room, one ear raised. I find it difficult at that point to decide whether or not to stay awake and start the day or go back to my dream world;)

Ok, that's about it for now. I'm out of time, got stuff to do, and if any of you ever come back here again, I will be not just thankful, but amazed;)

Feb. 20, 2007

Just a quick note... the taping at KERA/PBS studios here in Dallas is about two hours away from happening, so wish us luck! Please! All the panel are in studio now, and at the moment, the MIL is filling out name tags for all the audience members, so things are looking good. Let's hope the taping gets picked up and carried on more than just our local PBS affiliate!

On another front, my Mom's moving here this weekend. I'm flying my brother down on Friday morning to meet her, help her load up her trailer, and help her drive up here, at which point Eric and I take over and spend the next few weeks driving Mom all over the East Texas area (where she wants to move) until we find her the right home to buy.

Additionally, I was recently offered a part-time job by a marketing firm that requires I 'as honestly and bluntly as I can' review some of their represented products. It doesn't pay great, but it does pay, so considering the fact that Eric's newest job change freaks me out financially, I've decided to do it for now. I started today, and it was boring. God, give me strength.

In other news, I'm thinking about also making extra income by producing and marketing shirts that say 'I'm Dannielynn's real father'. Hell, I'm thinking about making just one for myself and wearing it out in public, if anything. Sorry, but it's funny, and I think Anna herself would laugh at it.

Speaking of the whole Anna Nicole thing, is this judge in charge of deciding where she's buried an idiot? Or am I just painfully overconfident in our judicial system? I watched CNN as this media-addicted man said things like 'I have this baby on ice(referring to Anna's body at the ME's office). It's not going anywhere, etc.'. If you saw this exchange, you'll get just how inappropo this man is. I know people who barely got their GED who could do a better job than this idiot's doing. If you ask me, the only right thing to do at this point is to bury her body in the Bahamas, next to her son, give custody to the person who's least profited from all of this fiasco ( I suspect that would be Larry Burkhead), and whoever gets custody, the Marshall family should set aside at least a few million in a guarded trust fund for Dannielynn's care, future court cases be damned. Howard K. Stern should get nothing, Anna's mom should get nothing, and both should never ask for more. That's just me, though.

Britney Spears shaving her head... If the woman claims so often that she just wants people to leave her alone, then why shave your head, go pantiless, or do any other number of retarded things knowing cameras all have you in their lens' ranges? Maybe this pop star is really melting down mentally, maybe she's got a bigger plan in the works that involves these kinds of media-grabbing gags coming to fruition later... I dunno. What I do know is that I don't particularly give a shit.

Not a lot of time left to rant today, but if I can find time for one more thing, it'd be to bitch about Romney running for office. I hate to be the bigot here, but I just can't find it in me to ever vote for any Mormon. Mormons just scratch at every sensitive and easily offended spot in my soul's core. I realize that not all of them degrade women, engage in polygamy, or any other of the religion's extremes, but still.. MORMONS!!!!! Ewwwww!!!!!!!! If you don't get why I'm 'ewwing', then do a little research on how this religion got started, on what its founders claimed to have heard from their Lord, and if you still think it's a legitimate religion, email me, tell me why, I'll email you back and tell you why I want to help you;) Needless to say, if good old Mitt should pull a Mormon miracle and make president, you can bet your ass I'm either going to kill myself or move to Canada.

That's it for today. Too much to do, too many people to call, and not nearly enough extra time to enjoy!

Feb. 17, 2007

Okay, that last rant was harsh, and I realize that I've bitched more than usual lately. Sorry, but I'm just a woman who's been way too tired of way too much happening to way too many people for way too long, and because of that, I bitch. This last rant, it happened to be fan fiction people I ranted for, and next week it may be my animal rescuer friends, the next week involving some other faction of good people getting less than what they deserve. It just still astounds me that this world is so very full of the kinds of people who do everything for themselves. Or maybe I should really say that I'm disappointed that this world seems to be lacking the numbers of people who did the right thing, numbers I think I might have over-projected;) Regardless, I'll live.

I know this is short, but I just don't have time to leave more, other than to say that the hubby's doing good, the pets are good, I'm good, and life is good, despite how much I nitpick here. My friends are good, too, thank GOD! Hey, one of them even got to hang a bit with Emmit Smith a few days ago! I always liked that guy, and I hope he realizes he was in true greatness when he and Allison met up the other day;)

Big piece of news... I've been busy the last few days updating information on the MIL's website. Seems she's finally somehow wrangled a PBS taping on hyper baric medicine, and on the 20^th, she and a panel of doctors, an audience of believers, will tape a segment on the advantages of hyperbaric medicine in treating neurological conditions. My schedule lately has sucked as a result, but if I could ever not mind my schedule sucking, it would be in this instance, praying the taped segment gets picked up and carried on as many PBS channels as possible. If it does, I'll post here immediately and let you all know the air times.

Fiction press visitors, I need to thank you... so much! I bow before you:)

Okay, that's it for today. Short, but I hope somewhat sweet. I'd write more if it weren't for a huge platter of barbecue chicken I need to finish grilling. Eric's been banned from doing the BBQ thing. The arsonist in him prevents him from grilling anything edible lately, so I simply gotta go!

Friends, I love you.

Feb. 16, 2007- Mind if I gloat a second?

I've gone on and on here before about a fan-fiction group I had the fortune and misfortune of experiencing during a time in my life I really should've never experienced, but put myself through, anyway... probably out of my already imbedded self-destructive behavior. All in all, I didn't walk away totally screwed. I met some truly good people, found that supporting their hopes and dreams far surpassed dealing with the Stancies and Fancie types in the same space who lived to feel better about themselves by politely picking on the rest.

I got an email today with a link in it... to the message board I'd been refused by, and I almost didn't click on it. So when I gloat now, it's because I was immature enough to actually visit the link.

Mind you, this site once boasted hundreds of visitors, as many contributors, and threefold as many lurkers. Its message board always had several visitors on it at a single time, and its posts had to be kept up with rather than yawned at.

Today, I look at the new version of this place, and here's a paste of what I saw:

Users Online 1 Guest, 1 User

Most Online Today: 5. Most Online Ever: 13 (February 01, 2007, 06:37:06 pm)

Hey, and I'm the guest!

Okay, granted, the same message board site contains an announcement claiming that the previous version of the site and message board crashed awhile ago, and that they're just 're-doing' things. Maybe that's really what's happened, and that these folks are about to boast much stronger numbers any day now, but if I rely on what folks have told me, I think the world of insecure writers who use and abuse this genre are slowly dying out. It is sincerely my most fervent hope that half the writers I saw so frequently on the previous site have found better, moved on, and that the ones who remain soon reach the same kind of mental place, that mental place being a Shangri-La of writing freedom, completely unbound by the requirements of some Ardeth Bay dysfunctional freaks who dare to impose their problematic requirements on others.

Point blank, you women who ran these/this site/sites I once was stupid enough to take part in... it's just an affirmation of Karma for me to see that you're fading faster than many people you once picked on.

Stancie, Fancie, if you can learn from this and move on to any thing that actually does the world some good, I'll leave you alone. Hell, I look forward to a day where your husband finally knows what you really do online, when Fancie finally grows enough balls to stop using her 'I'm childless' status to gain sympathy and starts treating people around her in an honest way that requires no playing of any 'ace' card. And by the way, neither of you were ever the best writers on your site, sorry to tell you. I believe the overwhelming majority of people, when asked, will tell you that a 'petite' gal, amongst a few others, stole your thunder a long time ago. And when I say that, I am in no way including me here, though I am including a few women you so obviously took time to treat less than right. You just weren't as good as you'd hoped you were, and that's just fact, ladies. Deal with it.

Anyway, these people have pissed me off for a long time now, picking on people with honest intentions, and it seems I can never re-visit this enough. And sorry, but to re-visit them via emailer's link and see that they're struggling... the rescuer in me wants to pity them. However, the advocate in me, the one who respects me and every single other writer I met while at this site, the ones who deserved a million, yet got shit, doesn't just not pity them, but is looking forward to the next time I decide to visit the link that was sent to me today, and sees a 'Not Found' message, but only after having visited the successful sites of all the writers who once submitted there first because they didn't yet realize that they could do SO much better.

And if I'm wrong? If I'm wrong, if I one day actually do check your site again and see that you're once again strong... I'll pray for the people who think you're great and waste their time at your site to get a backbone and break free before they're eternally damned;} Then again, that's just my opinion, as much as I'm cabbage-patching right now.

I'm sorry, but you couple of women were just mean, hurtful, and bitches to many when you really didn't have to be, and though I can be a bitch, too, I can't help but smile a little when I see that Karma just might be cashing in with you. Okay, I smile a lot, but my teeth need the air.

Feb. 14, 2007

Gotta say immediately that I am so entirely sorry about the 'unloading' of the last rant, particularly the part where I reamed Eric. Blame it on estrogen, lack of caffeine, whatever... I woke up today and did one of those things you normally see hung over chicks do when they wake up and find themselves on a fold-out sofa bed in a strange place, next to a strange guy; I slapped my forehead and grunted out 'Paula, what were you thinking?'. I freaked out way too much when it comes to Eric and his newest position, and from Monday until this morning, I made his life a living hell with my tirades.

And if I felt shitty on waking up, I really felt shitty when he got home and walked in to the living room with a big kiss for me, followed by a 'Happy Valentine's Day, Baby!', then a card with a poem on it he'd written (which I promised not to share with the world), the whole guilt trip ending in him lugging in a cat tower I actually freaked out over as much as the cats did;)

I apologized for my bitchiness the last 40 or so hours, he instantly forgave me, I fed him, then sent him upstairs to bed so that I could go out and try to buy him something... a shopping trip I'd delayed since becoming the Tasmanian Devil Bitch on Monday.

After driving around and searching awhile, I ended up at Walgreen's of all places, and as I'm going through and finding all kinds of things I know Eric'll cream over, I notice that this employee, a young girl of around 20, blonde and what I'll call 'Springerish', is trailing me. OMG, this girl thinks I'm a potential shoplifter!!!! This can't be, can it? I mean yeah, my hair is stringy and in a kabuki-styled bun cradling the top of my head (the only way I can best hide how badly I need to wash it), my Capri pants cradle my ever-growing thighs in stark contrast to my overly-huge thrift-store FUBU jersey with the permanent grease stains on the belly section (hey, it was the only somewhat clean shirt I had downstairs, and I was too tired to walk upstairs). And yeah, I'm circling around the store over and over again, pushing my cart, yet not putting anything in it yet, etc. Okay, maybe there's reason to suspect me, but as I continue to try to shop, she continues to follow me to the point of distraction, and as a result, I get annoyed.

At this point, I'm in the Walgreen's aisle containing all the 'As Seen On TV' stuff Eric usually freaks over, trying to decide whether to get him the no-battery combination flashlight/radio or the six pack of tap-lights, and 'Springerish' gal is pretending to be busy further down the aisle. This is a big decision, I don't need her presence messing with me, so I finally just look at her and say 'Excuse me, Miss. I'm about to steal a whole bunch of stuff here. Can you go and pretend to be interested in detergent or something?'.

Springerish gal does not react as I'd expected. No shock, no rude defense... she laughs. Totally cool, but she laughs and says 'Okay, but I get 20 percent'.

I like this girl!!!!!

And she ended up helping me during the rest of the shopping trip, then ringing me up. Thanks to her, Eric is getting a whole bunch of As Seen on TV stuff I know he's going to love, but I'm going to end up selling in a garage sale by summer once he's bored with it. Regardless, what an experience!

Anna Nicole... totally disgusting that in death, she's still being taken advantage of as much as she was in life. So far, it seems to me that the only person who cared enough about her or the baby is the only one not plastering themselves across our TV screens on every news/entertainment news program, Larry Birkhead. This guy either really is the father and really cares, or he has PR people and attorneys who are really good. At this point, anything's possible; Lord knows, enough people are popping out of the woodwork now, claiming to be the father when they were silent a few months ago, when child support loomed far more than the possibility of becoming a trustee to major money.

Anyone who's ever worked in the topless industry knows right off the bat that Howard K. Stern is as much this baby's father as Elmer Fudd is the father of oratory speaking. He was nothing more than just short of a stalker, around and tolerated because he was more valuable near her than excommunicated from her. This man's penis has never known a single square inch of Anna Nicole's exterior skin, much less her vagina.

Her mother, her 'lovers', her 'friends', and anyone who ever knew her yet disrespected her just can't seem to keep themselves from piranha-feeding at the media pool. I'm sure there are already at least six book deals in the works being negotiated, once private video and picture collections being either secretly auctioned off to TV programs or openly whored out at Ebay, and all along, nobody seems to be going out of their way to scream 'LEAVE THIS WOMAN ALONE!'.

She said several times in interviews while she was alive that she couldn't trust anyone. If she ever proved herself right, she has now in death. It not only makes the way she was while breathing more understandable to someone like me, it also makes me mourn her a little less, knowing that where she is now is the kind of unconditional place she wanted so badly here, yet never found. Live it up now, Anna, like they'd never let you before:)

Feb. 13, 2007

Happy Early Valentine's day! Mine's gonna suck. Hope yours is better!;)

Mine's gonna suck because I am mad as hell at my husband, and I don't know if explaining why is going to make much sense, but I'll try, anyway.

See, at Eric's job (he drives a truck), the drivers all do what they call a 'bid' once a year, where they basically sign up for a route (a regular run they'll do every night for the next year). This Sunday was the big Bid time, and Eric signed up for a position that doesn't have a regular run, will probably pay less, and didn't really ask my opinion before he did this. Last night, when he was supposed to start his new position, as opposed to the old one, they had no work for him, so he didn't run, and nobody who lives under this roof got paid. If he'd taken the position he's had for the last two years, he'd have had a route to run. He tells me he chose this new position because he was ready for a change, and that I should be happy that he's choosing a position that'll make him happier, as if I'm worried about the money. Ok, I am worried about the money, but that's okay. I can pick up the slack; not a problem. What is a problem is multi-fold... one, he didn't really ask my opinion first, two, he fails to see that in this case, him trying to find change is going to involve me taking on more stress, more responsibility just so he can 'feel' the change he needs, and three, this man I married had this same job position before a couple of years ago, hated it, bitched about it nightly, yet has developed massive 'dork' amnesia when it came time to choose this year's 'route'. Oh, and let's move on to four...his bitching about this particular job he's now re-chosen involved me suffering at knowing he was unhappy, five, every night is uncertain in that he may not drive at all that night while the next night might involve him being gone for days on a team trip to Minneapolis or Chicago. And six? Six involves all of this just sucking, along with the fact that once he really realizes I'm right, he'll still have to wait a year before he can correct this massive fuck up.

So yeah, I'm mad at my husband. He actually gave himself what I consider a demotion, didn't consult me first, and defends himself now by saying he thinks it'll be better when he was miserable working this position in the past, yet can't remember it being that way when you remind him now. Yeah, I'm mad at him, and Cupid's going to have to kiss my ass. I don't care if Eric brings home a huge platter of Sushi and a housekeeper tomorrow... his chances of getting smooched on, much less laid, by me are about as good as the odds of 'Cheaters' winning an Emmy.

In other equally stressful news, I am finding myself fighting like hell to remain neck up in a world of quicksand the rest of my family has created. If I'm not posting ads for my mother's property in McAllen, I'm scouring real estate sites, newspapers, and talking to Realtors via phone looking for a new property for her to buy, and if I'm not doing that, I'm making travel arrangements for other family members to go down and help her move up here, making insignificant yet timely changes to my mother-in-law's website that she begs me to make, loaning her money because her car's broken down, and the rest of the family decided that we'd all chip in to help her fix it, without asking first, researching things for other friends and family who say their lives depend on it, all the while trying to keep my own daily things in balance. It just gets tiring, it gets old, and it gets depressing, knowing that most of these people probably won't have minute one for me when/if I should ever need it. I'm sorry, but I'm serious.

I literally don't ever do anything for anyone expecting a payback. I do things for people because that's what you should do. I don't ever expect to be put on a pedestal for my efforts or donations, don't do anything nice for anyone because I think of it as an investment I can get a big return on. But what does piss me off is when my generosity is mistaken for naivety, this 'take' on things resulting in people trying to milk a situation rather than learn any kind of lesson from it. It just seems that lately, Life's decided to throw me more leeches than people I really should help out, so to a few of you, I end this really bitchy page with a few messages:

Siblings... buy your own fucking tickets next time, and hey, maybe you'll also find it in you to help Mom without me having to beg you to.

MIL- The next change you want in your web space should be made by the person you actually pay to keep it going. But in the meantime, since I'm the one who's keeping this site going for you, paying for it, buying new domains, and maintaining/updating it, it sure would be nice to not hear constantly that you're gossiping about me. I realize that you gossip about everyone and can't help it, but in the future, I'd rather know I'm not actually paying you to shoot the gaudy shit regarding me.

A, find your own fucking deadbeat dad. I found the information, and if you took the time to stop partying and look yourself, you would have, too. J, if you want dirt on your message board rival, find it yourself, and btw, how dare you try and hint that I put my own stuff aside and 'look quicker' for you. If all you are is offended at this, then I am SO glad I'm saying this now rather than later. S, you're lucky you have cats, 'cause otherwise, I wouldn't have put up with you as long as I have. Stop using them to gain pity, and maybe I'll help you again. And C, kissing up to me isn't going to make you a better writer. If I feel sorry for anyone in this paragraph, it's you for thinking I somehow can help you.

I'm done, having left out a few names of people I responded to personally via email today. I'm never going to stop supporting people I believe in, but what I sure as hell will never do is continue to help fuck ups be fucked up, especially if that's their major.

To the rest of you, Geez, did I meet this page's requirement or what? The only good news is that the massive majority of you are good, non-agenda'ish' people, and I know you'll forgive me this one rant needed to clean a little house. To those of you addressed today either in rant or email, I hope you get the message and realize that life is not lived by titty dancer mentality. I also hope it dawns on you some day that there's a huge planet of a place we call home here, and you have absolute zero to do with its gravitation, but that how you treat the world has everything to do with how pleasantly those around you experience the same pull.

Feb. 10, 2007

Anna Nicole... I liked her, said it before here, felt a kind of kinship with the fellow Texan from Mexia (a nearby town from where I spent my high school years in Temple, TX), and though I've never really reached the degree of train wreck'ishness' she did in her life, I still related to her, and more so admired her for not trying so hard to give us all the pc version of her, as most of us tend to do. She had bigger balls than most of us, and when Vicki Hogan fucked up, she didn't particularly care about trying to hide it from anyone. She knew what she was and never did the disservice of not sharing that with us. I only wish that during her life, she'd have learned to appreciate the parts of herself she so easily displayed.

I think the fascination with her death, with her life, centers around the fact that those of us who ever found her interesting did so because we related in one way, two ways, or every way. We knew that if we weren't just like her, we were only a few circumstances away from being her, and to watch her go through each drama was really more like us watching what our lives would've been like had we not done a couple of things differently.

Fluffy, pop'ish', dysfunctional, insecure, garbled, self-destructive... always confronted with demons, sometimes fighting them, sometimes joining them, but always acknowledging them. As superficial as most of the world viewed her, I always liked that broad, and I'll miss her, even though a part of me is amazed she lived this long.

Moving on-

I ended up crying most of this morning as I drank my daily allowance of coffee (one cup is all I can have a day; any more, and I'm shaking like a rehab alcoholic with the dt's). See, when I first turned on the T.V., the ending of The Color Purple was on... the scene where Nettie returns from Africa with Adam and Olivia, Celie's children. OMG, if anyone in this world watches this scene and doesn't feel some sort of profound emotion, then I guarantee you they've either had a lobotomy or have a long string of dead prostitutes or drifter victims they need to confess to killing over the years.

Anyway, I wipe my tears as the credits to Color Purple start rolling, switch the channels, and find the final few minutes of the movie 'I Am David'.

Jesus Christ, there aren't enough Kleenex in this house.

If you haven't seen I Am David, it's about a young boy who's arrested in Bulgaria along with his parents for anti-Communist activities, his father is killed in front of him, and his mother is carted off to be killed while David is thrown into a Bulgarian labor camp. He escapes, and throughout the movie, he makes his way towards Denmark, where he's told he'll finally be safe. He's full of distrust, fear, and a degree of weight on his shoulders no child should know, but as he continues on his travels and meets more people, he begins to realize that there's more to life than surviving, and thanks to the role of Sofia, played brilliantly by one of the acting world's best, Joan Plowright, David's long and lost journey comes to a beautiful end. I can't give away the ending, but I'll just say that I never fail to bawl my eyes out while watching it.

Getting back on track here, I've watched two movie endings that I'm still crying over, Eric comes home, sees my face, and asks me which cat died;)

Men... amazing how their sudden bursts of testosterone-driven conversation can be just what's needed to make your estrogen levels balance again;)

And in other news-

Hubby and I were watching tv together when a commercial popped up for Vermont Teddy Bear, Inc., urging men with no time on their hands to pick up the phone real quick, order from them, and they'll send your woman a teddy bear that'll have her gushing in delight at how thoughtful you are. I looked at the screen first in disgust, then transferred that same look to Eric's face, followed by the words 'If you send me one of those, I won't yell at you and I won't beat you. But you can bet your ass that on your birthday, you're getting a tie'.

I said that because I'm just not like what sitcoms, society, and anything media claim I should be like. I hate jewelry, don't get impressed by bouquets or chocolates, and damned near vomit at the thought of being told I'm loved via anything ultra materialistic. I don't orgasm over manicures or massages, salons or sables, perfumes or Prada, Beluga or balloons.

Anyone who wants to really make my day can't do it with any of the above. If you want to give me a gift I'll genuinely freak over, take me to a thrift store, drive me to Central Market and put me in front of the olive bar, then tell me to 'go wild'. Give me toys for my cats, treats for my dogs. Bless me with a good CD, a great book, a kick ass bottle of wine. Write me a poem, draw me a picture, or just call/email and say 'Hey, bitch, Happy Birthday' with a smiley face or joking tone of voice ending the message.

In other words, when it comes to any occasion in which I'm a recipient, it means a hell of a lot more to me to really be thought about rather than given to, and the more commonly acceptable gifts society sanctions tend to tell me anything but that.

Finally...

Ariane, I'm still waiting, my friend;) Please tell me you're writing!

Allison, I read your newest entry, love your Anna theory, and you know, I really kinda hope you're right! I also hope you're using this newly-experienced emotion to write some stuff you'll send to me!

CatBroads, I'm sorry I've been so scarce, but something tells me that I don't even really need to apologize.

My Fan fic writer friends, thinking of you all, and hope to hear some updates from some of you gals I haven't heard from in awhile!

My other-genre writer friends, I'm thinking of you, too!!! And to 'the group', that workshop sounds fabulous!!!!!!! Thanks for inviting me, too, but I need to stay here and take care of some family things. C and D, this is too cool, but the day I sent out C's signed copy, I also picked up the package sent by D, her signed copy!!!! Too weird yet too cool, and I hope I was vague enough to not jinx you;)

My Dallas friends- if I don't see you tonight, I'll see you soon:) To those I'm going to see tonight, let's go to Lee Harvey's! I'll drive!

To everyone else, Booyakasha, translated from Ali G to English... 'Love ya, like ya, long to hear from you that all in your life is being kept real;)

Feb. 6, 2007

Right off the bat, to those of you who have so fully defended Sylvia Browne to me, please stop trying. If you want to believe in her, by all means, do it! But if you want me to ultimately change my mind and praise the woman, I'm not going to. I'm sorry, but I have met real psychics in my life, and she's just not one I'd add to that small list. I have friends who adore the woman, and I've kept my opinions to myself for the most part when it comes to them, all because I know they believe, and because I know that preaching about the fact that I don't believe isn't going to change a thing. But hey, all of you who share with me the opinion that Sylvia Browne's far more interested in fame than actually helping anyone, thank you SO much for your support!

Onto other stuff, have you ever suddenly realized that someone you once thought was a friend really wasn't? I'm sure you have, but here's the twist; when you realized they weren't, it wasn't because of something awful they'd done lately to you. It recently dawned on me that a person I've called a friend for a good while now really isn't one, and it hit me because I finally realized that I've never really liked this person on my own terms; I convinced myself that I liked her because my friends all liked her. I look back, and though there's a lot about this person I respect, I also realize that my first experiences when meeting her involved her deliberately picking on me, and that the good times since then, the times in which I mistakenly took her for a friend, are only because she was too busy to mess with me. As much as I have admired a lot of her actions, in the long run, I just don't trust her, nor do I think she likes me as much as she's just waiting to pounce on me when she feels she can. And all in all, that's not a friend. Shitty realization to reach, and there's not a whole lot I'm going to do about it other than to ignore her, but hey, I'll live:) I have extended a lot to this person, and whether it was sincerely returned or not, I don't regret my once-outstretched arm. Honestly, I am so tired of being who I am and having to explain it to anyone who doesn't get it, so to 'anyone', I say that if you don't appreciate more of the good me than you appreciate what there is to bitch about, do us both a favor and stop pretending. If you can't manage that, then how 'bout you go to hell? That'd work with my schedule.

Hey, on a happier note, I do have a wealth more real friends, and at last check, they were all doing well:) I'm meeting up with two buds this weekend for a fancy dinner and celebration (one of these buds just got engaged to her boyfriend), and in two weeks, I'm meeting an online buddy for the first time. She's going to be in town for a night on business, so I figure I'll pick her up and treat her to a really good, really authentic Mexican food dinner, something I doubt she's ever experienced.

Also, Eric's log-cabin building class is coming up, and he's hyper as hell about attending it. He's also been adamant about playing his drumset, something I thought he'd have lost interest in awhile ago. He's been playing like crazy, and honestly, after having tried a million and one times to get him back into some sort of extracurricular activity with no success, I'm happily shitting dayglo frisbees over hearing thump thump de dump de dump thump thump thump ding! or any such combination over and over again from the upstairs bedroom;) I don't know if it's cool or not to gush over a husband of this many years, but even if it isn't, I just have a damned good one, I love him beyond so much, know without a doubt that he adores the hell out of me in return, and gushy or not, I'm just glad, in this world of me bitching so much, to have a partner/best friend who's brilliant enough to see past all I bitch about and still believe he's with his soulmate;)

Okay, that's it for today; that's all I had on my mind. Sylvia Browners, I don't hate you, don't even hate your mentor as much as I wish you'd direct the energy put into her into yourselves instead. Friends, I know who you are, I love you, I will always have your back should you need it, and Husband, the same loyalty plus infinity applies to you:) Boring entry, I know, but trust me, I'll have plenty to bitch about in future entries, from politics, to fan fiction, to life, to friends, to pets, to every other angle of life mine continually hits.

Feb. 01, 2007- Disorganized, obscure, and basically meaningless thoughts, oh, and some Sylvia Browne bashing;)

Why did women (and some men) ever find Julio Iglesias sexy? Back when the Latin Lothario was in his heyday, I'd look at him and think one thing...Combover, Miami Vice suit, red rose, Willie Nelson... Hey, Dad, is it okay if I never give you grandchildren? I may have had my ovaries permanently shriveled from hearing 'Tew all de girells I've luhved beeforeh' too many times in the 80's.

I often wonder what frenching a rapper's 'grill' would feel like. I suspect strange. Who am I to judge, though? Maybe once you go cyborg, you never go back. Or maybe a chunk of that gold, silver, or a diamond will fall off into your mouth, and you can hide it under your tongue until you get to the closest pawn shop.
Sascha Cohen (a.k.a. Ali G) and Will Ferrell... two of the funniest men on earth, yet I want to stomp on their balls with spiked heels for ever agreeing to make Talladega Nights; the Legend of Ricky Bobby. Hell, I'm still mad at Will for doing 'Bewitched'.
Britney Spears... Why do I have the feeling that she's already got a plan in the works to construct the world's first-ever million dollar doublewide, and why am I so gut-certain that she exercises daily to the complete Girls Gone Wild DVD collection?

And now, my friends, in my extreme and total salute to the great and all-knowing Saint Sylvia Browne, I'd like to make a few predictions I think she'll make for the year to come:

A great and respected celebrity will stop breathing.
A breakthrough in modern medicine will occur this year.
Montel Williams will have Sylvia on his show more often than not.
Sylvia will publish her 893 ½ th new assembly line self-help book/200 dollar set of tapes.
A natural disaster will make the news this spring.
A celebrity disaster will make the news several times a week all year.
A great leader will cause scandal.
A terrorist plot will be foiled... somewhere in the, surprise, middle east.
An abducted child Sylvia once predicted was killed by his kidnapper will rise from the grave and return home to his parents. (if you don't know about Shawn Hornbeck, read up)
Sylvia Browne will make another six figures as a result.

As you can tell, I don't particularly like Sylvia Browne. I think she takes advantage of things one should never take advantage of, and I think she's basically as full of shit as my litterboxes would be if I didn't scoop them continually for a week. And just to see if I'm right, I'd like to make my own predictions for the next several months, get far more specific, and see just who ends up more correct.

My predictions for 2007:

A new, fairly huge, scandal about Hilary Clinton's past will be 'leaked' by this December, the media will go nuts with it, but as soon as the next dysfunctional story gets leaked, we'll all forget about it. Watch out, Obama, you're next.
The Greg Behrendt show will be canceled... and celebration, as a result, will reign throughout the land.
Next month, and the month after that, and the month after that, and so on... George Bush will fuck up at just about everything he does.
Sylvia Browne will appear on Montel's talk show, and tell a woman in the audience who just wants to know if her father, who passed recently, is okay on the Other Side, nothing about her father, but that she should have her back checked out.
This fourth of July, countless numbers of illegal aliens will flock out into their front yards and shoot off guns into the air in some universal attempt to irritate everyone.
By November, Pat Robertson will once again impale his foot in his mouth by saying something extremely non-Christian.
By December, the Catholic Church's newest pope will once again do nothing extraordinary.
Next week, someone in a chicken suit is going to pop up on some local news program... surprise... for doing something weird.
By December, an entirely pointless hearing will be held in Washington D.C., reaching no real conclusion at the cost of serious taxpayer dollars.
A new, even funnier Geico caveman commercial will air by summer.

Now, here are predictions I'd love to make, and see come true:

George Bush is impeached, then forced to live in squalor in a Crawford Section 8 apartment complex, dodging the kind of urban bullets and danger the soldiers he's not really thinking about dodge now in the Middle East.
Jennifer Anniston does an exclusive interview on Entertainment Tonight, and tells the world that Brad Pitt was both a premature ejaculator, and had a small dick, and supplies both Polaroids and video to prove it.
Condoleeza Rice is caught in the White House men's room, standing up at the urinal and shaking the dew off.
Sylvia Browne is caught on tape, instructing her underlings on how to best con 'a mark'.
Kelly Ripa one day discovers a bump on her scalp, digs at it with a nail file, and finally removes the 'goofy and cheerful' happy chip that was implanted there way too long ago.
All pit bulls bred to be mean and fight turn on their owners/breeders, eating them whole and turning sweet and adoptable afterwards.
Aliens finally make official contact with our planet, and offer us cures to all horrific diseases in exchange for being allowed to take all our asshole neighbors with booming bass stereos back to their planet.
Billy Bob Thornton finally regains his ability to make a good movie.
A vile and nasty virus develops, affecting all people who look at and find too-skinny women appealing. This virus will make these people puke lung matter and lose a tooth every time they gaze upon a stick chick and find the sight appealing in any way.
The term 'Politically Correct' becomes illegal, and those caught practicing it above being honest pay with hard jail time.

As usual, I'm out of speed, so that's all for today's rant. I feel better.

Jan. 28, 2007- an apology to Jay Bakker, and other stuff

Some of my fondest memories of life growing up with Dad were of watching the PTL club back in the 80's. Any of you remember good old Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker and their evangelical TV show? Remember Heritage USA, the Christian themed amusement park these two built, and ultimately went bankrupt because of? Or maybe you just remember the whole Jessica Hahn scandal.

I remember all of that, but what I remember the most is Dad and me tuning in to Jim and Tammy Faye and laughing our asses off. We'd make bets on which one would start bawling in front of the cameras first, bets on how many times either would ask for donations, not to mention bets on how far down Tammy Faye's face the mascara would run before she'd dab the trail of Revlon and tear away with a Kleenex. But the most laughter from the two of us would come when Jim and Tammy pulled their two kids on stage. Just something about little chubby Jay Bakker and his sister Tammy Sue being offered to the TV Church Gods would send us rolling into the kind of belly laugh that makes you either want to pee or puke.

In a nutshell, Dad and I likened the entire PTL viewing experience to professional wrestling... fake, bizarre, tacky, yet fully entertaining. And for years, I guess I've always thought that..

Until Sundance Channel aired a new series.

It's called One Punk Under God, and it's about Jay Bakker's life after PTL, a life that was bumpy at first, including a younger Jay dropping out of school, using drugs, losing direction in life. But the prodigal son of the great Jim and Tammy Faye found himself again, and now heads a church called Revolution, as far a cry from anything Praise the Lord could ever have brilliantly imagined.

It's not a large church. The congregation meets in a bar, and as a heavily tattooed and pierced Jay sits on a bar stool and 'talks' with his parishioners far more than he gives sermons, his equally tattooed and pierced audience listen intently. He doesn't preach about what anyone's doing wrong, doesn't give detailed instructions on how to be perfect, doesn't ask for money, and is the first to tell you he doesn't have many answers. His message is simple... love yourself, love your neighbor, no matter what.

The cameras follow him about town as he pastes stickers on utility poles and such, the lens zooming in on the words these stickers hold:

...” As Christians, we're sorry for being self-righteous judgmental bastards."

Hallelujah! I was wrong about this kid. I really was. And as I have continued to watch the show, I've seen sides of both Tammy Faye, who is waging one hell of a battle against cancer at the moment, and of Jim that make my gut twinge a little with guilt at having laughed so much at those two in the 80's. But the bulk of my remorse has to do with Jay. If you haven't seen this show, see it. This punk preacher, who could have come out of the entire TV evangelist thing with a world of baggage making his and everyone around him's life a living hell has instead come through all of the scandal with a huge heart, an honest tongue, and a bravely nonjudgmental spirit. I literally, for the first time in decades, actually see a church that I think I could attend and believe in, and for me, that's saying a hell of a lot.

Anyway, watch the show. One Punk Under God on the Sundance Channel. You won't regret it.

In other news-

My mother's starting to really feel the effects of being alone now, without Jim. I've had a rough week, didn't call her for a few days, and I paid for it. In my mailbox a couple of days ago, the ultimate textbook case of mother's mastery of guilt pops up, an email telling me that nobody cares about her, that she's all alone, doesn't know if she's ever going to get any help moving up here, etc., etc. And though I felt for her, I also called her and told her I wasn't going to respond to that kind of guilt-out technique the way she'd like me to. I have a life, too, a tough one at times, but even when it's tough and I can't call her for a few days, I'm still busting my ass to set up things here. I let her know that she wasn't forgotten, was very much loved, but that I also wasn't going to take undeserved complaints. Over all, though, I know she's having a hard time, and beyond being annoyed, I more so just wish she knew she really wasn't alone. Man, don't you all just wish that the Cleavers and the Huxtables were the norm? Actually, I think if my family were more like either, I'd have ended up in a plaza clock tower, sniping innocent passers by below like crazy, instead of just being this degree of weird. Maybe that's just me, though;)

Here's an example of how weird I can be... I was watching TV the other day with Eric, nothing in particular on the screen, when I got this vision in my head that sent me into the kind of laughter that had Eric wishing he had a wooden spoon to stick in my mouth so I wouldn't bite my tongue. Out of the blue, I'd thought about Jesus and the whole DaVinci code thing, then started to think 'What if there really is a huge conspiracy out there, being hidden by the Catholic Church? What if, down in the Vatican catacombs, there's proof somewhere that Jesus did indeed marry, and that he had a daughter he and Mary Magdalene named Taffy Lynne or Amber Roxanne, who rebelled all her life, got caught skipping school, dropped out, and ultimately chose not to follow in her father's footsteps, but instead chose to dance in skimpy veils in the town's seedier side for horny camel drivers who threw drachmas at her in their frenzied states? I could see her in my head, counting all her coins at the end of the day, changing into her fishnet and metallic purple robe and heading out to catch a late unleavened burger at the all-night diner/donkey stall before heading home to her manger.

Or what if, somewhere, there exists a secret Masonic temple that keeps a highly-guarded and well-hidden tablet that contains the story of Jesus' son, Bubba Christ, who at the age of thirteen, decided that he would become Bubbelah, Jerusalem Diva, who could dress better than any schicksa and sing a show tune like there's no tomorrow? Him, I can see just as clearly as Taffy/Amber in my head, standing on a stone stage in the town plaza, strutting out before the audience in his feathers and sequins, bouffant wig with the tiny gem-studded turban on top, belting out an Ethel Merman (yeah, I suspect she was around then) number while the crowd goes wild.

What would be so wrong about that?;) Why have all this knightly and noble, hush-hush code of secrecy stuff in place all these centuries to protect such secrets? Hell, I'd become a lot more religious if I knew something like either had happened.

The batch of images that popped up in my head were just funny, so let me burn in hell, I guess. Still, when I told Eric what I was thinking, he started laughing, too, adding his own scenarios about Jesus' offspring driving monster Camels and being jailed for child porn, so at least I won't be the only one feeling the flames.

Ok, gotta go. It's Sunday, it's early, I have stuff to do, I'm sure you do, too, so I'm off. Ariane, I got your e, and I'm waiting for the new stuff, friend:) I'm also sending you lots of positive vibes. If you need any help, personally or web-wise, please don't be afraid to ask, ok?

Allison, beware do-gooders, unless they're do-gooder bitches like me;) I.E.- anyone who tries to condescendingly tell you to be something better than what you are deserves a swift kick in the she-nads. Be who you are, bitch about what you want to bitch about, and praise what you want to praise. There are a lot of us out there who get it, and appreciate it:)

Everyone else, I hope all is well today, and that you woke up to find a better day than yesterday was:) If you have critters, kiss 'em for me, if you have children, do the same, if you have husbands/partners, don't kiss 'em for me, but tell 'em I said they'd better treat you right, and if you don't have any of those, hug yourself for me, then go out and adopt an animal from your local shelter, you lazy punks;)

January 20, 2007

For the average Dallasite, the local weather has been inconvenient at best, affecting their commutes, complicating their daily chores. For me, the cold mixed with rain, then sleet, then ice, has been a kind of intrusion into my comfort zone that only those who bravely choose to not just love, but share their homes with many animals will understand.

This last week sucked. Dogs in one room, dogs in another room, all out of the cold and needing to be walked separately, cats coming out at certain times, then going into their official room for longer time periods so that the dogs could come out into the rest of the house, then the dogs going back up so the special needs cats could come back out of the cats' room and get their special feedings, treatments, etc. It's definitely been a Noah's Ark kind of experience, and I'm happy as hell to say that finally... finally... the weather's warm enough that I can let the dogs back out, go back to my old routine again. Empty rooms once again abound, and I'm no longer juggling animals and schedules.

And by the way, I've already slapped myself. I know that my inconvenience means nothing to the people who've gone without power during this latest icy blast, not to mention the people across this globe who've died at the hands of Mother Nature. Still, I'm a bitchy person, so let me bitch at least a little.

Speaking of the weather, I've officially (by 'officially', I mean 'in my head', which I realize is anything but official) re-named all our local news stations 'The Weather Whores'. Why? Because if we get even the slightest bit of snow flurry, sleet, etc., or even the 'possibility of it', all other news, global, national, and local, disappears from channel 4, 5, and 11's newscast, and what we get in its place is a bunch of apocalyptic small news segments consisting of reporters stationed all over the Dallas/Fort Worth area, talking about nothing really. For example.... we hear that possible sleet might arrive soon, some does, and by the next news broadcast, we North Texans get to watch one reporter standing by an overpass, bundled up in winter gear, pointing excitedly at a small chunk of 'might be snow' on the ground. The next segment takes us across the Metroplex, where another reporter, just as bundled, points just as excitedly at the traffic moving slowly as a sanding truck moves ahead of them. God forbid, a car actually slides at the whopping 2 miles an hour its doing, loses control on the snow/sleet, and the camera catches it; 'cause I guarantee you, that's the single video shot our local news channel will play, replay, re-replay, and then play again as if we just witnessed a meteor the size of Sacramento crashing down into our happy little spot in Texas.

Anyway, after that segment, we'll get to see yet another reporter at another section of town, freaking out over nothing, convincing all of us that to even step outside means certain death, followed by yet another end of the world'ish reporter at yet another spot, pointing to an icicle hanging from a Crepe Myrtle branch.

Oh, and meanwhile, the bottom of the TV screen is flooded with listings of which churches, schools, and businesses will be closed, all because they haven't learned yet that our local media are retarded, and that all this lost revenue just made WalMart, who's always open, that much richer.

Man, I hope I'm not the only one who realizes that any and everyone living up North either laughs at us and how we shut down at the mere mention of freezing precipitation, or they pity us and say a prayer for us as they're shoveling the foot of snow from their driveway so that they can drive to work in the blizzards they're so entirely used to.

We Texans are tough in many ways, but man, when it comes to a little wintry weather, we might as well be Liberace in a boxing ring.

Moving on-

I'm being bugged right now to write something I really don't want to write, for people I really don't want to write for. In perspective, if what they want me to write were a baby I'd just given birth to, I'd probably eat that baby along with its placenta (ok, not really... maybe... yeah, nevermind. I probably would eat it). When they first asked me, I was polite in my refusal, sure they'd get the point. They didn't, have bugged me nonstop the last few days until earlier today, when I pretty turned Lucifer on them. And although I felt guilt at having to be that way, a deeper part of me actually felt really good about going so ballistic.

Why is it that we're taught so much by our family, friends, media, everyone that we should try to kill any evil that's in us and only exhibit the good? We all have been taught this, all spread the same message, but if you think about it, or at least when I think about it, what would happen if any one of us truly extinguished that evil little flame that exists in us? I don't know about you, but I think we'd die if that happened. We are so busy worrying about what's imperfect about us, what makes us less appealing to others, how to change it. We diet, read self-help books, give therapists way too much credit, clean things because we're 'supposed to', do things we're 'supposed to', say things we're 'supposed to', and all in this life long search for some blissful state of being that will make us as free from judgment as possible, as if achieving that state will answer every question, fill every void, validate who we are.

That's why people go to church, that's why animal rescuers rescue, that's why volunteers volunteer. It's why celebrities use their fame to pursue causes, it's why some writers (especially fan fiction writers) show their works to the public and get hooked on feedback, and it's why the rest of us feel like complete losers when we hear about someone who's done this great thing or that thing, openly applauding them, secretly wracking ourselves for not having done something similar.

All this striving to be good. I'm not knocking it, really. It's just that maybe, just maybe, a lot of us haven't learned yet that the bad in us just might be as valuable as the good, that maybe to be looked down upon sometimes may be just as worthy as being put up on a pedestal. Maybe we shouldn't try so hard to quash the less pleasant in us as much as embrace it, weave it into our goals. Seriously, and I've said this before, I have learned just as much in my life, sometimes more, by being a bitch or by being around a bitch as I have around the purely positive person. Honestly, super positive and inspirational people tend to make my skin crawl, not to mention heighten the desire in me to grab their necks with both hands and twist until they spit out their super duperly happy vocal chords.

The coolest people I've ever known, the ones who have really benefited my life on any major level, have been people who were both sinners and saints, openly both. The serial killers and the megalomaniacs repel me, the Oprahs, Tony Robbins, and religious zealots make me cringe just as fully, but in-between... in a tiny little space on the spectrum in between the two extremes, there exists a kind of state of being most deserving of all the attention, yet entirely content to never get it. That's where I wanna be. Don't know if I'll ever get there, but as long as I know it's there...

Started on January 11, 2007, finished today, the 13th

Whoopdee doo, cabbage patch, and kiss my cousin, this year is definitely starting out on such the good note.

First and foremost, two days ago, I lost one of my ten-year old cats, Clancy Delancey, who was healthy one minute, dying the next. It turns out he'd had cancer, two growths in his abdomen that had displayed no forewarning symptoms until just days before his death. I know I have to get used to this. I have many animals, love them fiercely, protect them with passion, but I also should know that as time goes on, these older pets are all going to leave me sooner or later, far more often than the average person who has one or two furkids. I should be used to this by now, shouldn't grieve so much when one of the many passes, but then again, maybe the fact that I haven't gotten used to it is a good thing.

Also, it was fresh into this new year that my two dogs who fight occasionally, T.C. Wagadoo and Hyanna Banana, decided to commit a mutual act of murder on each other, fortunately Eric and I both were home, and were able to break up the fight, but not before Eric's thumb got bitten by Hyanna, who thought she was biting T.C., and my forearm got hammered by T.C., who thought she was biting Hyanna.

Eric's thumb swelled to twice its size (ever seen a cartoon where a character hits his thumb with a hammer and in the next frame, you see them holding up this hugely out of proportion and throbbing 'thing' that looks like it'd come in really handy when hitchhiking?), but it's fine now. I, however, started out with a single puncture wound on the fleshy underside of my forearm that, over the last few days, morphed into zombie flesh (this rant's picture, and I apologize for how gross it is). Fortunately, it doesn't hurt, is healing well, as bad as it looks.

Oh, and Hyanna, my older than dirt mutt with the heart problem, suffered a ripped out canine tooth as a result of this fight, yet she's at the moment flitting around the courtyard like a third-grade ADD kid after drinking two bottles of pancake syrup. The stuff I could learn from mongrels, not to mention the stuff I could bottle and addict today's youth on, making me filthy filthy rich;)

Final note on the dog front before I move on- Hyanna and T.C. are now permanently separated. This time was the charm, and I'm not about to risk anything like that last fight again.

Bush's latest speech. Hey, Dubya... expect a gift from me in the near future. I got you a gift certificate at Miracle Ear, good for whatever device that will finally make you listen to the legal majority of citizens you're supposed to represent! Did I say that loud enough, or do I need to pull a Helen Keller on your Crawford redneck ass, arrange a Deliverance gang bang until you finally agree that you are not only such a bitch, but that any soldiers in Iraq, much less more of them, is the kind of idea that needs either scooping or flushing? George W. Bush, you are retarded, beyond 'Corky' retarded, and fastly delving into new areas of the mentally challenged world that have until now, been undiscovered. You literally are, in my eyes, the ultimate example of 'special needs'. Your policies, your speeches, not to mention your actual speech, all convince me that you should've been a headlining cast member in 'The Ringer'.

If you were just retarded, I'd leave you alone, not nearly hate you as much as want to help you weave whatever basket I know you're currently working on, but it goes further than that.

In your extreme state of redneck power cyborg retardation, you insult me most by thinking that the majority of this country consists of even more retarded people than you, people who are so devoid of common sense, they couldn't possibly see how painfully empty your speeches are, how transparently what you say tells those of us who actually don't drool regularly what you really mean.

Dubya, it's about time we called A&E and scheduled an intervention for you before we lose another soldier to a misrepresented cause or another family's foreclosed home to a misrepresented economy.

Oh, and to the ever faithful, sadly partisan Bush supporters... do me a favor. Take any one of your many guns from your survivalist arsenal and in the very least, blow your nuts off so that the rest of this world will be spared that much less bullshit when the 2032 (that's the right year, right?) elections roll around. It is my fervent hope that by that year, more than just blindly patriotic trailer hoppers will be obsolete. Yup, I'm shooting for 2032 to involve a time in which CMT/GAC is a channel long-forgotten, the word 'Republican' no longer has strong affiliation with the words 'organized religion', and Democrats are really democratic. If that's not on the menu for the future, then Lord, please let a downtown bus flatten me while I'm wandering around the neighborhood in diapers and my bathrobe;)

Fan fiction- since 'divorcing' myself from the genre, and especially lately not writing as much about it, it still amazes me that I still get emails about it. Innocent people who thought they'd dare to try it out still seem to be getting outright shit from 'seniors' who think they rule whatever branch of fanfic they write in.

I swear to God, if I could, I'd don my cyber sword and go after every little sad bully bitch that existed in fan fiction. I'd slice their hypocritical little lonely arachnid humps down to insignificant dust in seconds, but the truth is that for every bully in fanfic who's taken down, three pop up in their place. Hey, don't get me wrong; I'm still gonna swing that symbolic sword as hard and as often as I can (no matter how much trouble it gets me in), but when it comes to Fancies (a.k.a. Insecure bullies who write fan fiction they hope is stellar and intimidate other writers as a result... just to be sure), Stancies (a.k.a. Administrators of said bully websites who don't just look the other way, but participate in bullying ), and Pantsies ( the people who know the Fancies and Stancies are fucked up, bitch about it behind backs to everyone, yet still pretend to adore them because 'not adoring' them resolves in less praise), I find that swinging my proverbial sword would just about equal that of a really flat fart. The few really good writers in that field I know, adore, still get along with, and honestly, if they ever farted in front of me, it'd at least have enough 'oomph' to not be flat, to instead make a big sound and a bigger smell;) Tasteful comparison, huh?

Weather wise, our local news meteorologists are shitting bricks over the impending ice storm about to hit the DFW area. Most of the time, these same meterologists are full of shit, but this time, I'm not taking chances, so all outside animals are now inside, and I am now finding myself relating and sympathizing with Noah. I may not have two of every kind of creature, but holy shit, every room in my house right now has either a cat or dog in it, and Eric and I are lucky just to have a place to sleep right now. Still, even though our sleeping areas involve a crappy couch and and even crappier loveseat, I don't mind so much sleeping upright with a crick in my neck if doing such involves waking up often to see that all my four-legged monsters are all sleeping soundly, not a single one out in the cold. Hell, even my strays have heating pads and blankets hooked up out in the garage. All I need now is a horse trotting up to my front door, and in that case, I do have one dining room that's available, not to mention a huge shovel;)

Hey, by the way! LaMama theater and I have been talking, and they're more than happy to work with me on setting up a memorial for Jim:) Also, my mother actually SOLD her house in McAllen, TX, and will be moving back up here, a reality that I am both happy about and ready for. She's my mother, she's alone now, and she needs to be closer to her kids, no matter how fucked up we all are;)

One of my Catbroads has welcomed another child into this world. Renee is now a proud mom to new son Trevor, and we Broads are proud as hell. We arranged for a photographer to come out to her house and take pictures of the new family, and when I get copies, I'll post them here:) In any case, CONGRATULATIONS, RENEE!!!!!!!!!!

I have a million other things to talk about, people to acknowledge, from Allison to the rest of my Catbroads, to Sue, Ariane, Marie, Danica, Richard, Carol, Arla, Todd, Cindy, Mary/Marie, Ellen, Joseph, Guy, Alan, Stacy, Lauren, Ally, Toots (yes, that's his name), Chloe, Laura, Tammy, Sid, and Diane, all of which (with the exception of the Catbroads) I'm sure will forgive me for not emailing them back yet;)

Regarding the rest of you, I hope your days are nice, your nights are warm, your dreams are never as good as your waking world, and that I continue to see you here:)

January 5, 2007

Not a whole lot of time today, so I'm going to leave another sample of quiz questions I came up with awhile ago. Btw, message wise, Ari, I got your email, sorry I haven't responded yet, but hey, I'm giving you a new deadline... you have exactly three weeks. I think that gives you just enough room to play, and just 'not enough' room for you to squirm enough;)

As soon as I have more than a half hour to spend online, I'll be back to post more, but in the meantime, here's a quiz/survey I wrote awhile ago, the kinds of questions whose answers I'd really like to hear a hell of a lot more than what your favorite color or restaurant is;) If I have time, I'll change some of the questions to make them more current:

The 'Humor Me' Quiz

Ever used a racial slur? In private, in public, in your head? If you have, when and where, what circumstances (if you've done it many times, overcome the P.C., and pick one to write about), and did you really mean it? Oh, and most importantly, why?
Do you think it's better to mostly tell people what you think they want to hear (keep the peace) or what you feel the truth is, despite the reaction it gets? When giving your answer, give an example of a time in which you chose one or the other, why you chose it.
Masturbation- are you ashamed of it, openly accepting of it, or think that it's downright a sin? If you ever walked in on a loved one going at the 'self-love', what would your honest reaction be right there and then? What would you say to that loved one? Would you admit/have you ever admitted to anyone that you've done your own share of 'love thyself'?
Have you ever done anything you could entirely consider 'sleazy'? Hell, elaborate for pure entertainment value alone!!!!
Describe your sluttiest moment-
Describe your most chaste moment (as an adult)-
Regarding questions 5 and 6, what did you learn from both moments?
Most unselfishess and generous moment you've ever had-
Of all these people... Michael Jackson, Saddam Hussein, Anna Nicole Smith, Paris Hilton, Britney Spears, Osama Bin Ladin, Lindsay Lohan, George Bush, Kevin Federline, and Pervez Mushareff.... who do you sympathize with most?
What profession on our planet do you think is by far the most overpaid? On another note, which profession do you think is the most underpaid?
What do you know about Darfur? Have you, or do you plan to do anything one way or the other in reaction to it?
Best looking lover you ever had... details, including whether or not the looks were matched by performance..;
Worst performing lover you ever had... just like before, we want details...
When asked if you think all people residing in the U.S. should both be able to understand and speak English, do you answer with a 'yes', 'hell yes', 'no', 'hell no', or 'I don't know'? Explain your answer.
Of all the politicians, local and national, you're aware of, who, in your opinion, would you say is the most crooked?
Have you ever 'peeped' on a neighbor? I.E.- you saw them doing something, them totally not aware that you were seeing it, yet you kept watching secretively out of morbid, odd, or downright curious fascination? If so, you'll be a massive bitch for not telling us all about it;)
Ever hit anyone? If so, who? Why?
Biggest untruth about you that you think is widely circulated, yet nearly 100 percent incorrect.
Ever stolen something from a friend or loved one? If so, what?
In your entire life, hypothesizing that in the next hour after reading this, your life here in this realm ended, regardless of what the always complimentary newspaper obit would say, what would you like those closest to you to remember about you? Be specific here, don't be humble, and don't be afraid... be honest. Name the people, and name what you'd like them to remember you for.

January 3, 2006 Simple Observations

Is it just me, or am I not the only one sick of looking at both Gerald Ford and James Brown's caskets nonstop on network news? These two have had more tour dates in the last week than your average boy band, and I find myself morbidly wondering just how much more each body smelled at each location.

James Brown was not the Godfather of Soul. Not to say he wasn't a great influence on the genre, but at the same time, I'm sorry, but any man who either has Al Sharpton crying at his funeral or has a reputation for both mumbling beyond comprehension and toting serious firearms is not the kind of person I believe deserves the media frenzy I saw delivered, nor is he the godfather of anything but a couple of kids his friends had. And if you disagree, too bad... 'cause I feel GOOD, dah dah dah dah dah dah dah.... and I'm Livin' in America!!!!!! Bitchslaps are so totally allowed here, btw;)

And Gerald Ford? WTF??????? He should be a skeleton by now, he's been flown to so many places, viewed in them, and if there is a God, he was actually put to 'real' rest today. Reagan didn't even get this much boring coverage, and he was in office for EIGHT years!!!!!! And what did Ford do in office that grabbed more news other than pardoning Nixon and being clumsy enough to help Chevy Chase's career get started? I am forever convinced that most of today's news channel programmers are all indebted graduates of the Betty Ford Clinic, which to me makes things even weirder, since I don't think I could watch all the media coverage of Ford's casket just lying there for hours without at least two or three really strong shots of anything containing massive alcohol.

OH, and Saddam... Sigh. Even before the infamous cell phone video came out, I still thought his execution was wrong. Don't mistake me; the guy's a menace to humankind, not even a turd, but the maggots feeding on it. Still, I just can't understand how all these religious and so-called spiritual people can call for such an execution when their collective religions all believe that true justice, not to mention vengeance, is really up to the God they worship. In other words, If I were in charge of what happened to Saddam, I wouldn't have killed him. I'd have sentenced him to 80 years hard time in a Turkish prison (second choice would be Reikers), his uniform consisting of fish net stockings, cherry red lipstick, ice blue eyeshadow, and a sequined tube whore dress, bunking with a guy named Clyde. I honestly believe that 'Thou Shalt Not Kill' is a valid belief, applying to both people and governments. Thou Shalt Not Kill, I say... instead, just put really bad people in really bad situations, then let karma/God/whatever take care of the rest. It involves a hell of a lot less politics and guilt, and a whole bunch more entertainment value. Think about it.... One Saddam hanging vs. months or years of hearing about how he's now gotten a boob job and married fellow inmate Ahmad Ibin Ladin, a.k.a. 'the penetrator', complete with bootleg internet video... hell, which would you choose?

Bush is just lucky the death toll isn't as high on his end... though it appears he's really working on it.

OH, and hey, anyone even remember Osama Bin Ladin? I'm kinda thinking, especially with the hoopla over Saddam's death, that Bush is hoping most of you don't.

Man, I was going to go on, but I'm worn out now. In a nutshell, things here are much better, I hope things with all of you are even better than much better, and I'll be back soon to bitch about the oh SO many other things I want to bitch about.

Dec. 29, 2006

Christmas for me this year was only slightly more enjoyable than sticking several large fish hooks in my nostrils.

First of all, my MIL freaked over the fact that we weren't coming out for Christmas, called and berated Eric, which sent me in some postal frenzy, so I called her and unleashed 'the bad side' on her. Everything ended up on a much better note, but it took me a full day to recover from my tirade.

Then, on Christmas day, after a nice evening of paying tribute to Jim, Eric and I go to the Cowboy's game, deal with impossibly long lines at the women's bathroom, ATM, and concession stands, only to watch the Boys brain fart their way through the game.

After the game, the crappiness continues... and BOY does it continue.

We go to my brothers' house aftewards, where things seem to be going well... until my two brothers get into a huge fight (completely NOT like them), one brother lunges at the other, the other brother throws a punch in defense, it lands on the lunging brother, who then loses his balance, falls, and splits his head open on the kitchen table. By the way, I was already home when this happened, but the second Eric came home and told me what he just saw, I was in the car and over there in seconds, physically throwing myself in between two uberly pissed off brothers, simultaneously trying to keep any more punches from being thrown and freaking out over the blood covering one side of my brother's face. I swear, a part of me in those heated, dreamlike moments kept waiting for Jerry Springer to lead us into a commerical break for a few minutes.

The remainder of my Christmas night was spent taking one brother to stay at my house to cool off, then driving back to clean up the other brother's blood-soaked head and calm him down.

By the way, while this unbelievably dysfunctional moment is going on, Mom is outside in her RV, entirely oblivious, so I at least think that maybe in the morning we can explain away the cut on my brother's head and keep Mom from finding out about what I'll forever refer to as 'the fight'.

Didn't happen.

Early Tuesday, I get up from a piss poor hour's worth of sleep and go back over to my brother's house to check on him, walk in the front door, and my brother's standing there with my Mom, dried blood still on part of his face, my mother's face a combination of 100 percent pure unhappiness at having just been told the full story by my brother.

And here's the clincher.... Mom loses it completely, starts yelling at my brother, who in turn yells back, I try and calm it down, can't, and Mom ends up storming out to her RV and leaving to head back home.

Man, I've said that my family was dysfunctional, but this Christmas? This Christmas surpassed any nightmare I could ever have thought up... and that's saying a lot, considering how twisted I am;)

This is just something I never thought I'd have ever seen with my family. Never.

On a good note, though, my brothers have worked out their differences, are getting along famously now, and I just heard from my mother, who just got home after stopping in Austin to visit relatives. She's much more calm now, thank God.

Now maybe I can take a break from mediation and actually relax for a little bit.

Chevy Chase, you and your Griswolds don't have shit on the Bruces. Lightweights;)

The picture above I took yesterday. I don't know this dog's name, but what I do know is that he belongs to one of my neighbors, a family we've had a lot of problems with on this street. This dog chose just recently to come close enough for me to pet him, close enough for me to see the mountain of fleas on him, scabs and sores on his body from itching and scratching non stop, cuts and tears on his head and ears from being attacked by other dogs. This is such a neglected dog, and what makes it all the more heartbreaking is that this goofy young dog, despite the obvious lack of affection he's received, showered me with tons of affection, didn't fight me once while I doctored his wounds, washed him up, put some Frontline on him, and fed him literally a TON of food, which he wolfed down in record time.

As my heart went out to this dog, my urge to bury foot in ass went out to his owners. I honestly don't have room for this sweet guy, am awfully hesitant to take him in, but I had to do something, sooooooooo....

When this fella wandered home last night, he wandered back over there with a signed note taped to his collar, saying 'This dog deserves better, and if he doesn't get it immediately, the next time he wanders into my yard looking the way he did today, he won't be your dog anymore'.

I woke up today to find a happy little dog on my front porch, waiting for me to come out and feed him and love on him... and his tapeless, noteless collar.

Get ready, y'all. I'm about to have a new dog:)

Friends, I hope your holidays were much better than mine. I'm thinking they had to be, LOL! I'm also hoping to hear how yours went, so if you haven't emailed me or written about it in your journals yet, snap to it, dammit!!!!!!!;)