The Dangers of Nostalgia

Welcome to the jungle
It gets worse here everyday
Ya learn ta live like an animal
In the jungle where we play
If you got a hunger for what you see
You'll take it eventually
You can have anything you want
But you better not take it from me Guns N' Roses

I graduated from high school in 1988, just as hair bands were fading away and grunge was getting its foot in the door. There was a presidential election (ah, Dukkakis, with your lovely monobrow*) and we hadn't yet seen the Berlin wall fall.

My senior year was filled, as all of ours probably are, with moments that the old folks told us were "MOMENTS". The prom (which for me was really lame) graduation. Senior this, senior that. A senior trip, senior "breakfast," senior-itis. Senior skip-day (which coincided with the day the local recruiters came to school to deliver the ASVAB-- which I still question.... why the heck were we required to be there to take a military entrance exam? Hmmmm? Which I eventually took anyway, but that's another story). We filled out forms for our yearbook's "moments." Class Leader, Most Likely to Succeed... Class Poet**. The one I actually remember best was Class Song.

My friends and I organized a campaign to write-in "Grab it Like You Want It" by L'Trimm as the song. I mean, it has its moments, its inspirational lyrics, right?

You say you want to push it but your pushing is through
girl let's push you aside and show you what to do
you've got to grab it
grab it like you want it

You do have to grab it like you want it. Grab life by the balls, go out and get it. Much less pessimistic and much less sappy than the other "choices" we had. (Note that we very cleverly anticipated the "what is is" conversation of later years.) What is "it?" In the song, I guess "it" has something to do with sex, which was why I'm sure even if we got more than the three or four votes our friends managed to write in, the officials would never have let it fly. But if you define "IT" as the marrow of life, the substance of being everything that is within your potential-- well. Then of course you have to GRAB IT.

One of the "official" choices was "Welcome to the Jungle" by Guns N' Roses. The other, (which won because I apparently went to high school with a bunch of sentimental saps who thought "Nobody puts Baby in the corner" was a helluva great bit of writing but missed wholly the sleezy sexuality of "And you're a very sexy girl/That's very hard to please. . .Feel my, my, my serpentine) was "I've Had the Time of My Life." (Frankly, high school was far from the time of my life, so that would never have gotten my vote, but there you have it.)

This morning, painting my fingernails and watching VH-1's "other" channel, where they actually still play videos instead of having reality TV & "I Love the "insert decade"" series, they played a Guns N' Roses "twofer" including "Welcome to the Jungle." Axl Rose arrives on the bus to the "big city" where women wear seamed pantyhose and high patent leather "f"-me stiletto pumps, and young, naive Axl is shown with a hay-stem in his mouth, baseball cap, flannel shirt wrapped around his be-jeaned waist. He is The Innocent: naive, young, fresh faced and falling into the trap of the sleezy guy with too much hair gel. He transforms to wacky hair Axl moments later to scream into the microphone, and we nod knowingly, alerted by the transformation of his hair from longhaired, sweet farmboy to a man with entirely too much hair product*** that yes, yes, the Jungle got him. He's jaded, no longer the peach-faced innocent from (presumably) the Midwest. Ah, the jungle is rough, I tell ya! One minute, you're on Casey Casem, the next it's some sneery guy from Seattle bitching about how miserable he is and selling millions of records about not selling out. Sigh. It's a cruel world.

I hated Guns N' Roses back then. I wasn't really IN to any music, other than perhaps punk-ish bands like the Dead Milkmen, the Dead Kennedys, Violent Femmes, and the like. But even that stretches the idea of being "in" to music. I liked stuff that sounded good, but other than Prince, I can't recall owning any other albums that really really meant anything to me. (Except for maybe Corey Hart. But that's for a different reason entirely unrelated to this post.)

But this morning, almost 20 years later (ugh! don't say that again) I found myself waxing nostalgic about Axl's little song. Thinking of how much closer to reality that song really is.

Welcome to the jungle
We take it day by day
If you want it you're gonna bleed
But it's the price you pay

See? That part of the song gets it.... if you want it, you've got to sacrifice something. You're gonna bleed, one way or the other-- spiritually, or through hard work, or literally. It is a jungle out there, with survival of the fittest still happening and the guy with the(loosely defined) best hair getting the hottest supermodels (at least for a while).

So yes, I've indulged myself this morning in thinking about my youth, the days when I wasn't exactly sure how I was gonna manage it, but knew somehow I'd succeed. When I was a bit stupid about love, but a bit jaded about other things, and figured by the time I was the age I am now (35, thank you for asking) I would be in an entirely different world. And I am.

But nostalgia, making me think fondly of Axl & Guns N' Roses? Ah, that is, my friends, dangerous. Who knows, next thing you know I'll be wistfully crooning along with that lame-ass song from Dirty Dancing.

**********

*Two words: eyebrow waxing. That's all... just think about it. How could we ever have thought about electing him; he so did not have Presidential Hair.
**which I'm still bitter over; don't discuss it with me, please. :)
***Most likely Aussie Scrunch Spray-- remember how big that was in the day? Mmm. And it smelled like what, grapes? I forget, but it smelled yummy and I can still remember it warring with the scent of cigarettes in the girls' bathroom.

Okay, Grumpies Over

That was a grumpy post yesterday. I didn't really mean it to seem as grumpy as it did. I could tell this morning how grumpy it was cause it made my sister call... not that she doesn't otherwise call, but she wanted to check on me since that was a little out of character.

I'm not really THAT upset about it; if any of my friends have speculated, I'm not mad or anything. I just was venting. I'm over it mostly. I still don't want them to come early, or anything, but I'm not sitting here plotting my nefarious revenge or something. I mean, it's hard not to be a little bit grumpy when your feet have gotten to be almost as wide as they are long. (That's a bit of exagerration, but I have normally squatty short feet, and they are swollen a whole lot right now. It's amazing!!)

This weekend is filled with sitting at the computer working on Andrew's scheme 'o the moment. I'm doing a new website design, learning Macromedia Dreamweaver & CSS. I've been doing webpages for years but with simple HTML and a program called Adobe Page Mill.... so it's new stuff applied to old layers of stuff. You'll all eventually see it. And probably some of it will make its way to the blog, perhaps even with a cool new design layout. I'm getting a little tired of the one I have now, so that could happen.

Anyways. Off to the salt mines.

Half-Baked

If you should wonder whether you ought to speculate on how early a pregnant chick is going to "pop," having her babies come before their due date, and look at her because she's getting fairly large and your own realm of experience is completely outside of that arena, then take it from me.

• I don't care how uncomfortable I look.
• I don't care how "big as a house" I get.
• Yes, my feet are swollen.
• Yes, I weigh much more than my husband.

BUT

• I still sincerely and with all my heart wish for my babies to be born as close to their due date as possible. That is not today.
• I do not wish away a single day of the close to a month that I have left till they are "done."
• I am prepared to suffer any and all discomforts that will come my way as a result.
• I don't wish they'd come now. In fact, if they were born on my due date exactly, I would be fine with that.

BECAUSE

• They are not done "baking" yet.
• The longer they stay in, the better their health will be.
• Babies born prematurely have more respiratory distress, possible ADD issues, problems nursing, more childhood illnesses. Etc. It is better they stay in there longer.
• Depending on how "early" they are, they will have to stay in the hospital, in a NICU unit where I cannot have them with me and hold them and love them every day for up to the amount of time "left" till my due date.
• It is not "good news" to me that it's possible they will come early. Seriously.

I know I've said in the past that it's possible they will come early. Yes, that is certainly possible. On average, twins come about 3.5 weeks early. HOWEVER I do NOT wish for this to happen.

Please don't wish it on me, or give me "that look" when I say I would prefer they stay in there. Or say "Oh yeah, of course, but...." My power of positive thinking is working hard, here. I believe in fairies, (clap clap clap) and the ability of my wide-child-bearing-hips to hang on as long as necessary.

I hope very much that my babies "bake" as long as possible. They are still "gooey" in the center, like cookies taken out too soon. They would mature fine, and they would do fine if born now. But I don't want that to happen, at all.

It is entirely possible for twins to go "to term"-- all the way to their due date. So if you were wondering how I feel about these particular questions, now you know.

Not to be grumpy about it, but while I don't mind talking about my pregnancy, and don't care if you want to touch my belly and will encourage you to if they're being active and you could feel something fun, I am getting fed up with everyone and their uncle offering me advice about how I should "be careful, twins tend to come early" (as the random waiter at the restaurant said to me last night, as I was walking by on the way to the bathroom). Duh! I had no idea! Really? It's a good thing you told me that, Random Stranger who I didn't even initiate a conversation with, cause my doctors and/or I really had not reviewed the literature on prematurity and twins, and if I hadn't have chosen to eat here tonight, it would have been a surprise. (Okay. Sorry. That's getting a little too sarcastic. But really!)

So far I haven't been grumpy about most of the well-meaning people who have asked me questions which were not really their business, after all. But this is, just to set the record straight, how I feel about them "coming any day now." I'm glad to wait. They. will. be. worth. every. minute.

Overheard in Dressing Room

At Target, trying on maternity pants (a lost cause!!) I overheard the following conversation between a young teen & her mom(?)

Teen: Yeah, Katie's dad died of brain cancer.
Mom: (concerned voice) Oh? Really? How did you hear that?
Teen: Um, yeah, cause he had skin cancer,....... and they had to remove his ear, ......and then there was this hole in his head, and the sun, um........got in there to his brain. And that was what killed him. (rustling noises of changing clothes)
Mom: (same voice) Did Katie tell you that?

Me, in other room: (trying hard not to laugh out loud)

Oh yeah, and rejecting pants. Are you KIDDING me? White linen is SO not twin pregnancy ready.

Do you think that the girl was making this up, or had a really really bad understanding of anatomy, or did her friend Katie really say this (and/or was Katie making it up)? Do you really think anyone there believed that the sun "getting to his brain" through his ear hole would happen? There are all kinds of things about this conversation that made me want to laugh out loud. The credulity of the mom's voice, the teen's description (which sounded very much like she was reaching-- therefore, making me think she was making it up). The fact that the mom didn't explain that it was FREAKIN' IMPOSSIBLE for that to happen.

Did you ever see Joe Vs the Volcano*? How the doctor said he had a Brain Cloud? That's what this reminded me of. A Brain Cloud. Somewhere near the end of the movie, one of the characters played by Meg Ryan says something like "You didn't get a second opinion on something called a brain cloud?"

But you know, the sun getting in there could clear that brain cloud right up. Dry up the precipitates and everything. Too bad he didn't have one before the old hole in the ear thing.

*a sorely under-rated, odd little movie.

Near Miss: A Texas Parable

Robotnik's post on "connections" had me thinking of my own life's experience with fate, connections we don't always see, the plan, the gods, etc. So here it is, another post about my sweetie.

I met Andrew about a year before I "met" him. At the time, living in Pensacola where my good friend Jenni & I worked at a frame shop & liked to go out dancing at Seville Quarter, I was, to my way of thinking, still "attached" to the evil ex. Evil ex lived in another town, was barely there for me (for a sec I typed barefly-- so close to barfly that it's a definite Freudian slip!) and was dating other women, without officially informing me of said fact. So really, I ought to have been having fun. I was just under 21, it was summer in Florida, and we were hot young chicks. Jenni knew this girl named Rachel, who was the daughter of one of the base commanders on Pensacola N.A.S., and dating a guy who was in the military (der!) Jenni & Rachel were going out, so I got invited to go too. Before we headed to the bar, we stopped at Rachel's house to pick her up. Here's where the Andrew connection comes in.

Rachel lived with this military guy, and three other roommates-- all guys. Well, one of them was married and his wife lived there too, but mostly it was military guy home. We had to wait for Rachel. I sat on the edge of the brick fireplace while these three typical military guys sat on the Salvation Army style couch across the room. A kitten moseyed her way over to me to say hello-- rolling on the carpet, swatting at my hand with sharp little needle-claws. I rolled her around on the carpet and indulged her kittenly-wrath.

After a few minutes, this nice-looking guy with those wire-rimmed glasses military fellas wear came over and also played with the kitty, calling it a "Little Gato." He didn't really come on to me or anything, but I remembered him being nice, and thought it was cool that some guy was friendly without getting anything out of it. I thought he was cute and all, but he really just wasn't my type, so I didn't pursue anything. In retrospect, I can see the "fates" who tried to line up that moment smacking themselves on the forehead going "doh! it didn't work! Now what?" It took them a while to arrange another sequence of events so that we would meet. Poor things; they had their work cut out for them.

We three hot young babes went out, danced it up, had a good time. I continued to date the evil ex for a while, to somewhat disastrous consequences which I will not go into here.

About a year later, finally quit of the bad seed from high school boyfriend, I was free free free!! I got a new job at Zapata's Mexican restaurant, and kept running into Texas symbolism. In the year past, Jenni had gotten a job for an airline and lived in Houston, and I was seriously considering moving there with her, going to school there, just getting out of Florida. I figured all the Texas things were because of that. My workplace had dozens of "Don't Mess with Texas" signs & I won a "DMWT" coffee mug in a work contest. One night while out, I met a guy from Texas (an Aggie through & through, chewing tobacco & playing pool) in a bar and flirted/chatted with him (I think he had a girlfriend and was quite gentlemanly). A couple of my co-workers were from Texas. Texas seemed everywhere. It seemed to be calling me, and I thought seriously about answering, even before I met my real reason for being here now.

I met Andrew. He was from Texas and was such a nice guy and I liked dating him. We were going for a "no-ties" sort of dating fun, and it was working pretty well for a while (till he tricked me into saying I loved him first, that wanker... but that's another story). At Zapata's restaurant, I also worked with Rachel, and we occasionally had a shift together. One day, she smirk-i-ly asked me if I was indeed dating Andrew. Yes, well, we were having fun. She told me that she had been his room-mate, and wondered what happened to Debbie, Andrew's ex. I told her I didn't really know, I hadn't been too prying. But that's when the connection became pretty clear.

Andrew had to have been the nice guy I "met" at Rachel's place a year before. None of the other roommates were the type to use "Gato" in a sentence-- they were from Alabama and other parts east of the Mississippi. The casual Spanish use of Texans was not part of their deal. I asked Andrew about it and he said "Ah, Rachel was always bringing hot girls back to the house". He didn't specifically remember me, but I'm quite certain of the fact that we "met" before our fated first meeting. It was sort of a trial run, I guess. If I had been smarter, and flirted and decided I wasn't into the evil ex, I would have averted the disaster of a year I had with him. I'm sure, given the right encouragement, Andrew would have then gone with us to our dancing thing, or at the least, asked for my number. We would have met sooner. But the gods were dangling my perfect man in front of me and I was not paying attention. Fate. Karma. Whatever you want to call it.

Who I am is the sum of the good AND bad experiences of my life, and I'm fine with that. Even the heartbreak and life-issues that happened in the intervening year make me who I am, and make me a stronger person. But man, would it not have been nice to have a nice guy around sooner?

I always tell women and men who are having successive bad relationships, dating essentially "the same person" over and over again to think about dating someone else who they are not attracted to initially. Who they think is attractive, but is "not their type." Because we get stuck in these self-destructive patterns and sometimes don't even realize it. So far, not very many people have listened to my wise advice. I thank god, the goddess, the fates, the great divine donut hole of the universe, whatever deity you want to give credit to, that I finally wised up and found myself smack in the middle of those "connections" that someone had lined up for me.

Holy Paintgun Batman!

This is terrible! I was looking at my message board, where I always get pop ups that the pop up blaster can't seem to zap (how do they get around the pop up protection sometimes?) and I spotted this little number, which tells you to "splat" the co-worker. You are represented in front, and while the "gun" does appear to be a paintgun, it still shows you basically going "postal" on your office environment, with men in suits & women in heels running willy nilly back & forth in front of you.


And for the record, if you do "splat" them, they fall over. If they just got a splat of paint on their clothes, I might not think it's so bad, but clearly, these are some pretty forceful "paint" pellets.

Now I can remember some co-workers I wouldn't have minded being able to do something awful to. But I don't think this is funny, do you? I know someone will say "lighten up it's a joke" but I don't think jokes about killing people ought to be tolerated as advertising. (Sex as advertising, on the other hand, is fine with me, as long as it's even-handed, which it rarely is. Show Paris Hilton slutting it up over a hamburger, I want me a hot-bodied young male tramp doing the same thing in a second commercial. I'll vote maybe Orlando Bloom. Or perhaps The Rock. Work those soap suds baby.)

Yoda I am....

Which Revenge of the Sith Character are you?
created with QuizFarm.com

I figured I'd get Padme cause there were all these options like "you are pregnant" and "you are a girl" but heck if I didn't get the little wiseman(frog).

Hee hee. via Nada Mas Respira

Letting it Be

When I find myself in times of trouble,
mother Mary comes to me,
speaking words of wisdom, let it be. The Beatles....

It's fitting that in this song it is "Mother Mary" who says to "let it be." Just let things go, don't worry about them so much, this, too, will pass. She is a "Mother"-- and once you get to be that, your world changes.

One of the things that pregnancy does is prepare you for being a mom. In spite of everyone wishing me a happy Mother's Day (very sweetly) I'm still not quite a mom yet. I'm still in a liminal* phase between being the singular person who was free to up and go to Paris on a whim, or drink an entire bottle of champagne by myself, to being someone actually responsible for other human beings' well-being. It's a big step, a big change, and there are some things that you go through while being pregnant that prepare you for it.

I've never been seriously modest about my naked self around doctors. I learned in February with my first massage that I didn't mind being naked in front of a massage-lady (obviously there was a sheet, too). In spite of some caution the very first time it ever came up with "flashing my boobs" in New Orleans, I don't really have any reserve where that comes either-- who the heck cares? I know anyone who hasn't seen boobs before will just be excited to see them the first time, and anyone who has seen them won't find mine unusual. According to some quizzes I took, that makes me ready to breastfeed. If other folks have problems, well, they can just leave the room. I refuse to hunker down in public toilets while breastfeeding; I've seen women do that and I find that personally offensive. It's what boobs are for, folks, and even here in the South where it's a bit on the conservative side, you need to get over it. So that's one adjustment-- the fear of public exposure: Gone. Let it be.

Discomfort? I'm not exactly easy to be around at night when it's time for bed. I'm hot, and need the air conditioner turned down so much that my hubby, who usually is the one in shorts and no t-shirt, is all bundled up. I flop from one side to the other depending on which side is going numb at the moment. My hair is entirely too long, gets sweaty and in the way, and I have frequent fond fantasies of cutting it all off, boy short, again. I accidentally spill water on myself (and sometimes Andrew too) in the middle of the night while trying a sip from my re-filled Evian bottle which sits on my bedside table. (They have the best shape for mid-night sipping while lying down... but I'm clumsy). My pajamas are XL MEN'S pjs. And still a little tight around the area I'll call a "waist." But so what? I will get my figure back. Let it be.

I had heard about how complete strangers would want to touch my pregnant belly. Usually from people who were shocked and/or offended by this practice. You know what? Not only do I not really mind, but I find it kind of cute. This last weekend, shoe shopping (cause man are my feet swollen!!) this lady who spoke mostly Spanish came up to me in Payless. She was so excited and happy to see my belly. She said "Oh look at your belly" (mira su panza!) I told her, in my bad Spanish, that I had "Two babies, one boy, one girl" (Dos bebes--and since I couldn't remember boy/girl in Spanish I said that part in English). Maybe she needed to have more things going on in her life but I swear, she was so excited for me that it was kind of fun. People (especially women) give me this "look" lately-- it's a combination of happy smile and sympathetic "glad it's not me". Crowds will literally part in front of me as I walk (waddle) regally through. Freaked out by the sudden lack of personal space? Let it be.

I know that when the babies come, I will be reduced to, as I've said before, the bridesmaid as opposed to the bride. I'm the one who will fade into the background, holding their stuff. The babies will be the stars of the show then. That's fine with me-- they'll deserve it. I may bristle more if people try to touch my babies without permission-- but as long as it seems like genuine happiness and not creepy, I'll tolerate most things. I also don't think that happens so much. I think people know there are boundaries about these things. Plus, I'm sure Maia and Sean, as cute as they will be, will have ways of handling too much attention (baby spit, anyone?)

Only one person has ever sort of creeped me out about my pregnancy. In a bookstore in Louisiana, this guy made a comment about my belly (about two months ago, when it was big, but not nearly as big as it is now.) Just something about this odd single guy's comment, and the tone and attitude, just made me feel uncomfortable. Like he had some sort of pregnant woman fetish, and somehow that vibe came through on his voice. He said nothing untoward, it just set my spider senses tingling. I smiled and nodded and checked to make sure I wasn't in a quiet section of the book store where no one would hear me kick his ass if he tried anything. And didn't encourage him to talk to me any more, moving back towards the coffee shop area and more people.

But in all, I've had a pretty good run so far-- one creepy guy to all the nice, excited folks who make me feel a bit like a celebrity when I go out in public. If I don't feel like doing something (going to the family's lakehouse this weekend to do "summer cleaning" for example) I just don't do it. No excuses-- being this pregnant is excuse enough!

Let it be. No guilt, no worries. Check with me later, thanks. I have ice cream to eat and feet to put up on pillows.

**liminal. A term favoured particularly by post-colonial critics, and which refers to the thresholds, boundaries and borderlines of binary constructions (black/white, masculine/feminine, Englishness/Irishness). These oppositions are often false, producing blurring and gaps which might be exploited in order to deconstruct these oppositions.

Basketball Whine-eries

Here's something that pisses me off. We just watched The Basketball Diaries, which I'll grant you was basically a well-made movie. DiCaprio acted the part of the kid who goes from basketball golden-boy to strung out, herpes-faced junkie pretty well.

But this is what pissed me off. I grew up in some pretty hard times. I've already mentioned this, and it's not something I mean to use as an "awww poor me" or even a "me too" sort of complaint. It's just a fact, which I mention because I've been there-- at the bottom of the ladder.

There were times in my childhood where we didn't have any food to eat; there were many times we were evicted from a place we lived, and my mom had to borrow money from my grandma to keep us from freezing to death somewhere. Once, some drug dealers shot up my sister's apartment three doors down from our house, bullets barely missing the pillow where her head was lying--you could see the bullet holes in the wall behind her--and I spent the night sleeping in a porcelain bathtub with a little foam cushion on the bottom of it cause my mom figured the bathtub would keep bullets from hitting me. I've seen people so drunk or stoned they couldn't control their bodily functions, and I've seen people so close to dying you could hear the crows circling overhead. And I had plenty of opportunity to hide out in drugs if I'd have wanted to do that. But that, my friends, was the easy way out. It's a helluva lot more of a test of your soul to resist that shit than to wallow for a while and come out of it because a few people care about you and pull your ass out of the shit you get yourself into.

But some spoiled punk who is poor, yes, but who has a place to live and a mom who works pretty hard to take care of him goes off and starts doing drugs, gets involved in criminal behavior, sees his best friend (another poor whiner-shit) kill somebody, has men pay him to perform sexual favors, and because he gets his ass arrested and manages while in prison to clean up, suddenly becomes this poet writer "star". Everyone lines up to kiss his ass and publish his work. Whatever. OOHHH he is a sad genius, look at him and weep at the beauty of his tortured soul. Puke.

I don't buy the idea that he was soooo tortured he just couldn't help himself, that he deserves to be applauded for being able to write a bit about his life after he almost ruins it--of his own choice! HE FUCKED UP HIS OWN LIFE. No one did it for him. And to be able to passably write about a life you fucked up yourself, to me, does not make you a freakin' literary genius. At the end, we're supposed to feel good for him when he meets his loser friend who is still using, he's all cleaned up and using art to save his soul. We're supposed to see him as admirable-- See, he cleaned up, and he could be there with his loser buddy doing drugs in the alley, but instead, through the power of literature, he is the star of the show, entering through the stage door.... ah, isn't it grand? See him with his hippie haircut and his beatnik turtleneck sweater? Let's give him a standing ovation cause he's soooooo great.

It sort of pisses me off. Here I, and many other people, have rough lives and struggle through some tough shit. At about the age this guy started doing drugs and acting like a complete ass I got myself a goddamn JOB. Does anyone want to buy my book of poetry about lugging people's dirty margarita glasses on a tray back to the kitchen? How about a poem about how the cheap asses ran my butt off for the free crap all night-- Waitress, can I have some more of these (free) hush puppies/ bread/ crackers/ tortillas and make it snappy-- and then didn't leave me a freakin' tip? Cause you know, they didn't believe in tipping? Wanna hear a poem about the guy who spit on the sneeze guard at the sleezy Subway and was clearly on his way to a mental ward somewhere? Or maybe about the time the gang bangers left some crack in the bathroom I had to clean up and then I had to figure out how the hell to get rid of the stuff without people thinking it was mine? Or maybe a nice song about being in the bathroom, doing my job, cleaning up after people who threw paper towels all over the floor and I was scolded by some woman customer, who hoity-toitily said "Your mother wouldn't want you to do this?" when my mother was a freakin' maid who paid the bills by doing this? You think someone will cut me a movie deal for that story? Yeah. I didn't think so.

Plenty of people have faced worse things that were out of their control-- without resorting to shooting drugs into your body and letting perverts do you in a nasty bathroom in the subway. And then, oh isn't it a miracle you can get over it and write so well about it. Look at the power of literature to save lives. Isn't it admirable? Did I mention: Puke?

Everyone falls all over themselves to give the guy a movie, for chrissakes. And don't tell me that it shows the dirty side of the world, the "street kids" who society screws over, gritty reality turned moral exemplum.

You want an exemplum? Someone who deserves to be admired and a "respected" poet? They were working poor, sure. But you see in the movie the example of the one kid who actually recognizes a line that doesn't get crossed between teenagery crazy behavior, and gets himself a basketball scholarship, the example of a kid who doesn't get his own starring role, who is an "also starred" as far as Hollywood goes, who doesn't write great poetry but pulls his ass out of the gutter. That, to me, is a fucking genius. Not the reformed junkie who writes merely passable prose and poetry. Whine away. Someone will buy it. But it's not great literature. It's not even art.

This was worth a huge belly laugh

Should I repunctuate that to HUGE belly laugh or
HUGE BELLY laugh?

Anyway. In the process of working on Andrew's Cockamamie-make-us-a-billion-dollars-quick scheme of the moment*, I randomly surfed into this site about Romance Novel covers. HEEEEL-arious. Check them out. It's even funnier if you recognize any of the covers (I recognize one of them, which I have read, and it's not really a romance novel....but it is close.)

*And don't try to guess how this website got randomly surfed into in a Real Estate billion-dollar overnight scheme.... it's a very complex question to answer. :)

FYI

I know that some readers will be concerned should I not post for a couple of days that I might be in the hospital having Maia & Sean. I already have a fairly long list of email addresses to be mailed a notification should we go into the hospital... but, if you would like to get your email address included on said email (which I'm sure will be very short & sweet, (and possibly misspelled) since Andrew will be writing it) then let me know, either in the comments or via email.

This will take some pressure off me since I feel really guilty should I not post for a day-- I know that you're all thinking....hey, could she? and if it gets longer than a day, you might even worry a bit. I think I'll also get someone to blog an entry here when I go into the hospital, for those who wish to be enlightened, but I'm not sure who yet. A "guest blogger" sort of thing, but only for a short time (cause I'll be home in three days from the date of delivery!) And while I am sure I will not be blogging long detailed entries during that time, I can't imagine not being inspired to write something.

Anyway. I may post something else later today but maybe not. I have a big project of Andrew's to work on, and I'm not feeling particularly inspired to heights of creative fancy today, either.

Maia has the hiccups. It's cute, but they get them so often it gets a little uncomfortable! :)

AI:? not so much

Surfing blogrolls on other blogs, I found this 20 questions "AI." I won at pretty much every one of the 20 Q "games" I thought of. The last one, I would argue, I was very close to winning. I was thinking of a yellow rose, and it said "a flower" so technically it was right, but it was not very specific. It has this list of "contradictions" at the end where it looks at what you answered to a specific question and gives its answer for it. One of the questions it asked me was, "do you know any songs about it?" because it was a yellow rose, I do, in fact, know "The Yellow Rose of Texas." But I'm sure there have to be plenty of other songs about roses and/or flowers. The "AI" said that it was doubtful I knew songs about it. Well Mr. Snobby-bad guesser, a lot you know!!

The trouble with the computerized version of things like this is that really, it's random knowledge strings. It's not really intelligence that you're finding, although I can imagine a program that does, eventually, develop the ability to see grey areas. A number of the answers to the questions were best seen in shades of grey-- and they did have the option to say "maybe" or "sometimes" about some questions, but there are some things that are just situationally dependent that an "either/or" binary question cannot, and will not, be able to reason.

But it was still sort of fun to play. I picked some fairly random items that are on my desk. It really got thrown by my brass Kuan Yin statue... it kept guessing things like "stapler" or "hole puncher". Hah! No sirree bob. Another thing that made me laugh was the question "Will it burn" about my Wonder Woman Barbie. Well I said "Yes." Of course it will burn-- it's not made of asbestos or something. It's not a natural property of it to burn, but if I lit it on fire, it would quite certainly burn. It "argued" with me on that one, saying that it thought the answer to that question was "no." Well, I wouldn't want to burn it; I love my Wonder Woman Barbie. But when I was a five year old girl, the neighbor boy set his back yard and shed on fire burning toys-- he was crashing toy trains together. So toys will certainly burn, and if you have a deviant kid with a little time on his hands, it isn't unlikely that they will think of that option. Beevises of America, unite! :)

Anyway. So much for Saturday diversions. Watched the last half of Love Actually for the 20th time (I love that silly little movie). Ate breakfast. As of now, I'm still in my PJs (almost past noon! woooo hoooo!). Once again, my hubby is out of town till Sunday. He's such a good hard working boy, trying to get all his summer military obligations out of the way before the babies come so that we can spend weekends together once we double in size, family-wise. So maybe a little "girl time" playing later this afternoon. Maybe I should go shopping or something. (What I really should do is work on the Buffy chapter, but it's the weekend!!) So the AI diverted my attention for about ten minutes, altogether.

Now, perhaps sometime productive. But perhaps not.

Mouses in the Hizzouse

The other night, Tituba caught herself a live mouse. She's never really been a great huntress, but lately she's been practicing a lot apparently. Did you know that a mouse, when being tormented by a cat who isn't particularly vicious but bad enough, makes a sound JUST LIKE a squeak toy? Me neither. I walked past the bathroom and heard "squeek squeek squEEEk" and thought "Where did Tituba get a squeeky toy?" Then I spotted the little brown mouse in her mouth.

It had a long tail, and was racing back behind the basket where we keep the spare TP. Tituba usually announces to us when she has caught something-- "mreow mewwoo" can be heard from all over the house (generally at about 2 am). But this time she was in "stealth mode." I yelled at Andrew to come get it (cause no matter how much of a feminist I am, it's still the man's job to get the vermin. It just IS. Centuries of patriarchal oppression have granted them that right.)

Because of a childhood filled will books like Stuart Little and The Great Christmas Kidnapping Caper (by Jean Van Leeuwen) I cannot, although I know they are diseased little things that will one day kill us all, kill mice outright. So Andrew trapped the mouse in a see-through glass and the dust-sweeper thing (what the hell are those things called again?!). It stood on its little hind paws, with the front ones up high in placation, little chest heaving, wide eyes begging for its life. Andrew carried it down the street for it to be let go to take its chances with other (tougher) neighborhood cats and the rat snake. It didn't appear to be too damaged by Tituba's efforts to catch and play with it, but boy was she pissed that Andrew "bogarted" her mouse. For hours she stalked around the closet area where the mouse was caught, sniffing and looking for it to be there, an "It was here the last time I saw it; where the hell did I leave it?" look on her face.

It made me remember once, when I was about 13, and we had doberman pinchers. I was in the big field out behind our trailer, and I heard this faint squeeking noise. The dog (Angel) heard it too and was very intrigued. I narrowed down the location, picked up a tuft of dried dead grass and saw a little nest of about five pink, blind, hairless, baby mice squirming away from the sudden chill and light my investigations had exposed them to. AWWWW, I said, and went to place the tuft of nest-grass back over the mice when Angel swooped in behind me and vacuumed them up into her mouth with a single soft whoofing sound. Didn't even chew. I felt soooo guilty. Perhaps she would have found them by herself, but my help certainly hastened their untimely mouseocaust.

Poor little mouses. They need to stay outside, and away from those who would eat them. But aren't they cute when they ride a motorcycle?

To witch....

This e-mail contains information directly related to your account with us, other services to witch you have subscribed,

Phishing schemes get me. I see them and I seriously want to go at them with my red grammar pen. People. People!! I know you're criminals, trying to get me to naively and stupidly give you my bank account info, or my credit card info. I know you'd like me to log into your little webpage and sign away my identity and all. I know it's urgent-- that my account may be suspended in 48 hours if I don't do something (even if I don't HAVE an account at the Bank of Oklahoma, I really should be concerned, cause you know, security breaches and all). Yadda yadda yadda. And in spite of the fact that your email never addresses me by name, never has any specific phone numbers or people to call because of this extremely urgent situation, I'm supposed to trust you. Oh, but I do. I'm just dying to have you help me out of this jam I've apparently gotten myself into, this unauthorized ATM transaction on my non-existent bank account. Oh please, save me!

Use a spell-checker, people. And/or grammar check. And/or just get into another line of work. If I wouldn't give my students an "A" on this document, do you really, really, REALLY think I'm going to sign away my credit card number to you? Please.

Well. Maybe I would if you COULD SPELL!!!!!! Or had a slight grasp of grammar concepts like the HOMONYM. "To witch?" To witch! This, apparently, is a special kind of bank account, for people who wear black, consort with fuzzy tailed black cats, and know where to find a good dose of powdered eye of newt.

Hey. Wait a sec. Maybe that does sort of apply to me.

I think of it sort of like the Renaissance trait, in plays/drama etc, of the "murder will out" theory. This is the belief that people who are evil-doers will just somehow incriminate themselves. They can't help it. They may not use it, but they have a conscience, and that little angel in white on the right shoulder (the devil would be on the left, by the way, the sinister left) makes them screw something up that, if you're paying attention, will give it away. I think psychology supports this in modern times too... it's why people like Ted Bundy, speeding along the Florida highway, are caught. If you didn't go above the speed limit, perhaps your killing spree could have continued, but you just couldn't help yourself, and you were busted. Evil is as evil does. You know. So if you read some of these phishing scams, you'll often see the "murder will out" moment in them. That's actually why I sometimes read, instead of deleting, them. I used to always forward them to the security department of whatever company was being phished with, but it's a sisyphean effort.

But still. To witch? Sigh. If you can't do fourth grade grammar, perhaps you ought to go into another line of business. Why not try grabbing old ladies' purses as they walk by? You don't have to know the difference between to which and to witch in that case. You just have to outrun the old bags as they scream for their black patent purse you've grabbed. You're probably more likely to get money that way. Of course, some of those old ladies might very well know the difference between to which and to witch, and might have some of that eye of newt handy.

And yet, some people apparently fall for this crap. It's enough to make a person give up on the criminal genius. And/or genius at all. But hey, it's all good-- at least they probably know who is going to win on The Apprentice!

Man-Hater (Don't Be A)

It may be hard to believe (/sarcasm) but when I was in college, at a very liberal small university in the Northwest, I once got tagged with the nickname (unbeknownst to me at the time) man-hater. It's a funny thing, really, because while I was very aggressive in classroom discussion, it wasn't particularly aimed at men. Just stupid people.

This happened around the time I was in a Post-Colonial lit class, taught by a woman who herself was pretty radical. We read some pretty radical books about oppression of various sorts from countries like Africa, India, the Caribbean. One of the books we read was a collection of stories by women writers in India, and in one of the stories, there was this beautiful but very poor Indian girl who was being given "gifts" by local older men-- it supposedly was to help her sick younger sister. But this girl's mother was worried... what would these gifts obligate the young girl for? It was a story about the dowry system, and the way the girl's virtue/virginity was her only real wealth. The fear her mother had was that the young, naive, beautiful girl would be required (because of these gifts) to "put out" eventually, and that would lead her to a life of prostitution and untouchable-like status. In the story, one of the men who was giving the young girl "gifts" was a doctor.

This guy in the class insisted the teacher was making too much of the story. He said "But this guy's a doctor; he wouldn't risk his livelihood on something like that." Which to me was abso-fuckinglutely ridiculous. I raised my hand and smote the idiot. "Look, first of all, even in THIS country, where we have laws against it, doctors "risk their livelihood" for less (ever heard of Doctor Love?) Second, we're talking about India. You cannot apply the same standards & customs of the U.S. to a very different country, about which you know nothing." says I. Man he was such an idiot, and I know I was NOT kind or demure in my down-dressing of his stupidity.

I'm pretty sure that class, and perhaps even that moment, was what got me the label man-hater.

Look, at that point, it wasn't about him being male (although he had a sort of male-privilege, like white-privilege, that had made him never have to think about "the other side" in his privledged white-boy life). It was about him completely missing the point of the story, and completely missing what the teacher was saying. And he was just this arrogant, smug little blond fucker who wanted to argue with the teacher, as though he were the god of the world and his opinion was right above all others. And he was soooooo wrong.

So I smacked his ass down. Popped a cap in it, linguistically speaking.

About a year later, talking to one of the girls who had also been in that class, I learned that some of the people from that class (including this other guy who I'll bet was the one who began calling me Man-hater) used to call me that. She was telling me that I was different than she had thought-- we were getting to know each other better outside the classroom (I think we were having coffee because we were on a group project in another class.) I was surprised, and laughed, but a little non-plussed. Me? A man-hater? Hmmmmmmmmm. It bore thinking about.

I'll admit that I went through a period at that time of being really into goddess worship. I had read Barbara Walker's Women's Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets and I felt pretty outraged and radical about the oppression of womyn by the patriarchy. But reallly, I was married to a wonderful man (a military guy, no less-- the fascist industrial-military complex was paying my tuition, and for me to get my teeth fixed, and for the cover-price of Walker's radical feminist text etc, etc.--for which I was and still am very grateful!)

I loved (still do) men!!

But I grew up so poor, and completely ignored by my own father, and had become aware of the (some say) 9 million European women who died in the witch burnings over the years. And I was a bit on the radically pissed off side. But not about men, in general, just about everything. You know how you are in college-- and if you don't then you missed out on a fun sort of passion. I will admit, I had some issues. I was also about 23 years old. That's when you're supposed to have issues.

I was feeling a bit pissed, to say the least.

But it wasn't actually about man-hating. It was more about woman loving. Putting value on a sex I had grown up being told was inferior, that I happened to be a member of. There is a bit of a difference, really. To value the feminine does NOT mean having to revile the masculine.* It's not a closed-system where if you pay attention to one sex, you're never going to have room in your life for the other. It's NOT about reversing existing inequalities to put "woman on top" and man scrubbing floors and taking little blue pills to make it through an empty, mindless day. It's about equality, fairness, and simply recognizing each gender's strengths, as well as weaknesses.

I laugh now. Man-hater. Oh boy far from it! In fact, in "gender tests" online, I often come up, based on my answers, as a man. I think it's because I am aggressive, I speak my mind, I don't mince words, I think about things other than so-called "feminine" issues (although I'm really into the feminine, too). I won't let someone cow me because they think they're right when I'm clearly the one who is actually right. :) Apparently, those traits in a young woman get you labeled man-hater.

It's not about hating men. It's about hating people who ignore all evidence that is slightly contrary to their narrow view of the world, evidence that there has been an imbalance that ought to be corrected, and that feminism is one place that the corrections are being actively sought.

In my mind, I hear my friend George teasing me "Don't be a hater, Kim" with a cute little mocking smile. This is the guy who once, without irony, said "I'm against closed-minded people no matter what they think!!" Hah!

Hate, like greed, is sometimes good. It fires the belly, puts passion in our dreams. It doesn't have to mean that you act on that hate, that you don't then put your self in their shoes, that you don't overcome that hate. You do. And then you work together to change things. Don't hate people, no, that's really unproductive. But to hate the system which runs people into the ground? Which supports a status-quo that gets fat off the work of others? To try, therefore, to dismantle such a corrupt system for the benefit of everyone? Yes. I'll take that label.

**********
*And don't bring up Andrea Dworkin, again, please. She didn't speak for everyone. And even she grew less pissed as the years went by. And Valerie Solanas? She was just nuts. But still, sort of cool. :)

Writing Poems: Like to Hear It?; Here it Go.....

in·spi·ra·tion n. Stimulation of the mind or emotions to a high level of feeling or activity. The condition of being so stimulated. An agency, such as a person or work of art, that moves the intellect or emotions or prompts action or invention. Something, such as a sudden creative act or idea, that is inspired. The quality of inspiring or exalting: a painting full of inspiration. Divine guidance or influence exerted directly on the mind and soul of humankind.

my addition to the definition: the breath of the gods

I think I started writing poetry when I was in junior high. I know I remember writing my first short story in elementary school. It was called "Christmas in a Cave"-- very topical-- about a temporarily homeless family who had to live in a (gasp) cave for Christmas. Of course, as part of the Christmas miracle, dad got a job which would save them all right after the magically lovely Christmas they had..... This sentimental bit of crap got me noticed, labelled a creative genius. I basked in the newfound glory of something I could do that others couldn't. I, my friends, was a writer!

But I don't think poetry came into my heart till a little later.

I think most readers probably write poetry (usually bad) when they're in high school, tormented by adolescent hormones and feelings of outsider-ness and terrible, unrequited crushes. That's what most of my poems were about, at least. Some of them were, for an untrained silly girl, pretty darn good. I had a bout of writing like ee cummings-- with no caps or punctuation or titles. I did this till, in college, a professor mentioned that not having a title was like a headless body. Good image. Your poem's "head" sets the stage.... sometimes, now, I agonize over the title. Does it give too much away? Not enough? Is it stoooopid?

I was terribly offended my senior year of high school that I got second place in the schoolwide poetry contest to a girl whose poem I considered severely inferior to mine (or was it third? memory eludes me... I think it might have been third, but I didn't mind the other poet who beat me out; her work I deemed worthy of being called better...) In the way that these things always happen, at my ten year high school reunion, two girls who I had known peripherally thought I was that girl and called me by her name-- the one whose poem got first place while I suffered in obscurity in (yes, I think it was) third place. Oh the agony! The terrible angst! I should have written a poem about it.

I wrote a lot of poems about my high school boyfriend (the evil ex.) He was a jerk, and since I was generally dreadfully unhappy, I wrote some pretty good misery poetry. I remember he asked me once if I ever wrote happy poems. (Every poet has been asked a question like this. If we were the gods we deserve to be, we could smite the people who ask this question with some sort of weeping, purulent boils). After evil ex and I broke up, I wrote a funny poem about our love dying, and no one noticing "until summer came and it started to smell." I read that at a poetry reading in my freshman year of college, and got quite a laugh out of the gathered crowd. Serves him right; people were laughing not with him but at him. :) Sweet Revenge.

I've written poems for people at their weddings, at their breakups, for the hell of it. I wrote this really cool one, once, about Judas & "the kiss," and gave it to a friend who later disappeared from my life, of her choosing (without any understanding of why on my part). I wish I still had that poem. Perhaps the lost poem is better because we remember it as better than it was. If you've been with me a while, you've read the two poems I wrote for my babies which I think might be some of my best work ever. I've written stuff, of course, for Andrew... but our relationship defies poetry, in so many ways, because it is, in itself, a poem of sublime beauty.

I've studied a lot of poets over the years, from Old English poems to slam poets and their little conventional rebellions. My favorites are probably now Emily Dickinson (who I hated in high school cause we read the over-sentimentalized, edited for Victorian readers versions-- you gotta read the originals before you find out how radical she actually was.) Anne Sexton--goddess of the love & death poem (this glorious poem which I read to him when we were dating, is the reason our Waterford champagne glasses are all the wheat pattern-- a moment my wonderful hubby still gets major props for initiating). I like Carolyn Forche for some postmodern influence. Gary Snyder, although sometimes I get bogged down in the longer poems. I would probably have to say that for some reason, a lot of William Carlos Williams and Wallace Stevens has crept in there over the last few years. Not a bad thing, really, but not expected. I still do love ee cummings, although his playing with the line & conventions of English sort of can get a little old, once you get the joke. And then what person who has studied him doesn't hold a soft spot for the old guy in a floppy hat-- Walt Whitman?

Poetry is such an important part of my life, yet I often go days, weeks, months, without reading a new poem or even exploring an old favorite. I need to fix this absence in my life. When I read a lot of poetry by other people, it tends to inspire me to write my own. My brain gets wired to the patterns of
the poetic line, the
strategic break.
When reading poetry a lot, I think differentLY. (I hate it that apple leaves the LY off. It's an adverb, people. Not a clever marketing trick.)

There have been too many sad poems written in my own life; I need to teach myself to write about the sublime things more often, and turn off my inner critic who throws poems away because she thinks she knows better than me. (She's quite the snob.) I get (as all poets probably do) a little too self-reflexive, and write poetry about writing poetry (which is like literary self-pleasure activities*.... fun to do, but not very fulfilling for others. You can do it in a room with a locked door, or with the door open, the thrill of getting caught part of the pleasure..... but it's still all about you you you. I I I. (Aye yi yi: Ricky Ricardo).

Poetry, I like to tell my students, is the bullion of language. It's condensed, a dense, salty cube of language; if you bite into a chunk of it, it can(should) be painful, overwhelming. Water it down and you can get some pretty good prose (soup!) but water it down too much and you get colored water that doesn't sustain anyone. Substantial poetry is a gift from the divine. It can feed your soul in a way that no other thing can.

*you know what word I mean here... I won't write it cause I'll get all kinds of freaks googled in here with that word as a search term. :)

More on Student Doctors + Childbirth + Playlists

All of us were ordinary, compared to cynthia rose
She always stood at the back of the line
A smile beneath her nose
Her favorite number was 20 and every single day
If u asked her what she had 4 breakfast
This is what she?d say
"Starfish and coffee
Maple syrup and jam
Butterscotch clouds, a tangerine
And a side order of ham
If u set your mind free, baby, Maybe you?d understand" Prince, "Starfish & Coffee"

I really, really do not mind being the subject of student doctors' learning. I have no problem with them being shown how to do something by a more learned doc, and then trying it out on me. I actually find it kind of cute, for some odd reason. And they have to learn somewhere. I do have a bit of a problem with the long wait it managed to get me for them to get in to do the sonogram that I had today (to measure "pockets" in my amniotic sac.... I'll have to look up why that's important because they seem very interested in big pockets.)

Sitting in a hospital, no matter what my initial intent is, seems to inspire a state of almost sleep. I can be wide awake, just having had breakfast (more chocolate croissants, thank you!) and then just sit there for a few minutes with some sort of heart-rate monitor on and I get sleepy. It's just the hospital vibe, I guess. But not really sleepy enough to fall asleep. Just to sit there with a slightly dazed feeling, listening to the "thumps" on the fetal monitor when Maia or Sean move. Knock Knock, Who's There? An entire morning pretty much used up in sitting in a quiet dark hospital room listening to baby heartbeats. Not a waste, really, just not very productive.

I feel very physically oriented--like Molly Bloom in Ulysses-- everything is about my body lately. Even people with whom I could normally hold conversations other than about pregnancy or babies end up asking me questions and holding long conversations about that. Politics? Religion? Philosophy? Ethics? Nope. No point in talking about any of that. I have a brain, yes, but it happens to be attached to this body which is swelling noticeably into regions previously reserved for hot air balloons. What is my brain for, then?

I had more written but dammit had some sort of odd glitch and it was deleted. Most likely it was blather anyway. There was something about how it used to annoy me when pregnant or recently mommied women would only talk about just babies, but apparently it's inevitable, some sort of curse that if you were ever the childless woman who rolled her eyes at a bunch of mommies in a room talking about diaper rash, you then will become that woman no matter what kind of brain you had before. Just give in, I guess.

I got a short tour of the birthing center* where I'll have the babies. Saw a room and everything. They are really quite nice-- yellow pine wood floors, a comfy looking bed, a nice reclining chair for the hubby to sleep in when he wants to stay the night. TV, with video (DVD? I'm not sure) a CD player... all standard options. Little stations where someone can get ice chips, hot water for tea, a tiny fridge to put your snacks in. Not so bad. Especially considering with a cesarean I'll be there at least three days. The babies will "Room In" with me, so it'll be our little bonding area.

So anyway. The last bit was to say that I'm soliciting suggestions for my "birthin' babies" playlist. Remember that I will be having a cesarean, so there's no need for inspirational "Push It Out" songs. Mellow/cool songs I think are best. What I have so far are several songs that are important to me for whatever reason: India.Arie's song "Talk To Her", Peter Gabriel's "In Your Eyes", the Simple Minds "Don't You Forget About Me". I need a Prince song; I'm thinking "Starfish & Coffee"-- a little known song from the Sign o' the Times album (underrated, IMHO). I had links to the lyrics of all of those back in the first edition of this post but I am not looking them up again. They're easy to get if you just google the song title.

So what do you suggest-- what are cool songs that, if it were the moment they took a baby out, kicking and screaming and ready to pound the world with tiny fists of fury? Songs that I can tell them, one day, were the song playing when they were born? I plan to publish the list of both songs I pick & songs people suggest here at a later date, so suggest away.

**********
*If you really are dying to see it too, there's a tour link on this page... look to the bottom where it says "Hauth Birthing Center Virtual Tour." When you click the link, it will download a gigantic .mpeg file that you can watch to see a woman "take a tour" of the center. It lasts about 9 minutes total, and includes more than what I got today (but you know. If you're really really bored.)

"Victory is Mine" She Crowed

I know this is probably only exciting to me and about four other people, but I have sent the revised draft of my current chapter to my committee chair just this last minute ago. Woo hooooo! There were intense moments of severe anxiety as I realized that the changes I had made a few days ago to the draft on computer had for some reason disappeared in their entirety leaving me with a draft from last week, and significant changes NOT THERE.

HOWEVER smart cookie that I am, I had printed up a hard draft of the entire changed version and went through and re-did the changes that had been lost in both the original AND the backup versions of my chapter. I lost probably about an hour's worth of revision, but boy oh boy oh boy am I ever glad that I had that hard copy!!!!!!! I always lecture my students on doing just such a thing, and I love it when I'm right. Now to make a fifteenth or so CD burned backup of all the files completed this far.

If I can get this version approved by my chair & sent off to the rest of the committee before the babies come, then I will be pretty happy. While I'm waiting to hear from her (it usually takes about 2 weeks) I will work on the Buffy chapter, which is about 3/4 of the way done already. But I am almost content. I wanted to get an entire draft of the whole damn dissertation done before the babies came. But more than half of it done is okay by me too. I figure the whole summer will be a wash-- a haze of diapers and sleepless nights-- but as long as the babies cooperate in the Fall, my goal of being a Dr. by NEXT summer will be well in hand. If they don't cooperate in the fall, we may resort to the radical notion of babysitting a few hours a day. I gotta get this done, come hell, high water, or diaper rash.

Anyway. Now to spend the rest of the Saturday afternoon in frivolous, mindless fun of some sort.

Chocolate Croissants for Breakfast

MMMM. These are very yummy, and very easy to do. You just take a regular can of the croissants you can buy in the store, (I bought the "now 50% larger" version this time, and it's going to work out perfectly) and roll a piece of semisweet chocolate into the long end as you roll it up into croissant shape. Then, you mix one egg yolk, one TB of milk, 2 TB sugar, and brush each croissant with the mixture. Cook according to the croissant can's instructions.

After 16-19 minutes of impatient blogging & email reading while waiting for your yummies to cook, sit down with:
--one steaming latte (decaf for me right now, but one day, I will return to caffeine's loveliness)
--one big naval orange, peeled
--any other breakfast items you so desire-- for me, a bowl of Heart to Heart oat cereal

And have a fabulous Saturday morning. Just because your sweetie isn't there to enjoy it with you, doesn't mean you shouldn't do it anyway. (He'll be back tomorrow, by the way). I got babies to feed. They like chocolate.

The Devil Went Down to Georgia

I don't exactly know why, but man, I love this stupid song. I even don't mind that apparently it's a big deal at Coyote Ugly's (and I don't have anything against them, but you know how when something gets to be "a thing" and you can't stand it anymore?)

There was a Muppet Show I remember where they did this song, with "a band of" muppet demons.

It really rocks. And it's playing on the radio RIGHT NOW.

It makes me want to learn to play the fiddle. No, not the violin. The fiddle. :)

Meanwhile, Back at the Fort

Another obscure/odd post title. Hah! I'm waiting to reveal what yesterday's was just in case some of the late-afternoon checkers get there and guess. I guess it's not as obvious as I thought it would be! :)

I think that the things you do at the end of your pregnancy just prepare you for the fact that you're never going to be able to get things done after the baby (babies) are born ever again. I had a "fetal stress test" this morning-- which sounds creepy, but is just where they put monitors on you, check the babies' heart rates, look for them to spike and go back to normal twice (they spike, apparently, when babies are active) and once that's happened you go home. They also monitor my tummy for contractions, of which I don't think there were any to speak of during the hour I sat there. Maia was apparently having a sleep-in-- we went at an ungodly (for us) hour of 8 am and she, unlike her brother who takes after her dad in this already and kicks me from 5 am on-- was still very still and her heart rate slower than his. They had to use this gadget that administered a little BUZZ like an alarm clock (complete with a vibration) on my tummy, down low, where Maia is. To wake her. She was clearly NOT amused (nor was Sean, but he was awake anyway). Both of their heart rates spiked up, and Maia butted my cervix with her head several times after. Poor little thing-- I HATE alarm clocks, and she now has a pre-birth trauma to push her right along the path of that too.

But after the test, I got to go stand in line at the pharmacy with all the retirees (the military base in the A.M. is always packed with retirees picking up medical supplies and making random left turns in front of you). Then home. The drive to our hospital is at best 40 minutes; today because of some odd traffic issue right at the gate, it took an hour. So almost four hours gone, and I got home, and needed, desperately, a nap. From which I just woke up and feel like the entire day is already gone. And now I have to start this fetal heart monitoring twice a week. So there goes any remote bit of productivity on any of those days.

I've been trying to get my current dissertation chapter-in-progress done and to my committee before the babies come, and then I figure any other work before then is gravy.... I don't think anything else will happen on the dissertation till the babies are settled and sleeping regularly-- later in the fall. Summer is a wash, on writing, I am sure. But these tests have made me worry that now my summer-no-work period is beginning sooner than I anticipated. Augh!

Anyway. Now I'm being poked and kicked by both babies, one of whom has the hiccups, and one who just likes to make my stomach look like the scene in Alien where the first alien pops out of the guy's chest.

So that's my big news of the day; a bit blah and mundane, but alls I gots. Fun with hospitals!! Be grateful if you don't have to play this game yourself.

So there I was, inverted.....*

In the light of yesterday's vaguely disturbing blog post, today, I am going to slack off and give you a meme. Hah! No you can't stop me, no one can stop me!! Mwah ha hahahahahaha!

Why Blog? A Quiz from various sources, including Lauren (sort of) & Weirdsmobile And remember, be honest. This is for posterity... (assuming posterity can find my computer files amidst the burning wreckage of a world devoured by ants!!)
1) Why do you keep your weblog/blog/online writing thingie: for fun, for fame, for money, for popularity, or for another more obscure reason? What about the weblog gives you what you want? Hey wait-- this is two questions.... you oughta not do that. :) Okay, I keep my blog for fun mostly, and to make sure I write every day. There is a certain element of extra fun in there because other people read it, some kind of ego stroking that I apparently need. I found that I had missed the journalling that I used to do back when I was a disturbed young woman, and despite buying several pretty blank books, I just wasn't keeping up with any journal-style writing anymore. But once I got the hang of the blog, after my friend J. kicked in my "contrary-gene" by saying if I wasn't writing in it I ought to get rid of it, (around October 03) I found I had lots to say. What gives me what I want is that I now have a fairly good group of folks who comment regularly, and we get into conversations about the oddest things sometimes. It was cool when just my family & a few friends read, but it's even cooler now that for some strange reason, perfect strangers come here to see what I think about things. How is that for weird?!
2) Imagine that your weblog becomes wildly popular: your hit counter skyrockets, your comments are overflowing, and everyone is emailing you about everything you post. Name 3 positive things that could come of this, and 3 negative things. 3 positive things: World peace, equality between the sexes, lots of cash being sent my way. (Hey, it didn't say they had to be probable things). 3 negative things: trolls attacking my comment box, no time to answer any questions hurled my way thus leaving me procrastinating even worse and never ever getting done with my dissertation, a nasty sprained ankle. (I don't know how the ankle will happen as a result of this, I writes what the tea leaves tell me to).
3) What's the worst possible result you can imagine (short of being electrocuted or having your computer take over your brain, and who says it hasn't already?) from keeping a weblog?
Hmmm. That perhaps some troll from my distant past will find it and use it as a way of trying to get back in touch with me. Or that some students will read it and I'll get fired from my currently nonexistent (but future hoped for) job because I'm not being professional enough.
4) What do you do to prevent that worst possible result from happening? Nothing, really. For the past person, they wouldn't know my married name, but they would most likely recognize me in pictures. For the students-- I do try not to mention any names and/or specifics, or things too too embarrassing or inappropriate. But then I forget sometimes. I'm doomed!!
5) List 5 reasons that would make you stop keeping your weblog for a period of 6 months to a year. 1. Sean & Maia 2. Winning the lottery & moving to a faraway tropical island with no internet access 3. Giant radioactive ants 4. Actually managing to write one of my novels 5. The voices! The terrible voices!!
6) List 5 reasons that would make you stop forever. Hmmm. I think really the radioactive ants covers it. You know, cause they'd eat out the infrastructure making it possible to blog, and they would have us all working in the sugar mines. I think that's enough, don't you?
7) Describe your definition of a "successful weblog." Something that makes the writer happy.
8) Is yours successful by your definition? Yes
9) What pisses you off most in other weblogs? What pleases you most? I get annoyed when other webloggers disappear for days and days or months and make no posts. Or when they only post about daily boring mundane things. (today we went to the park and played frisbee. I ate a sandwich. ) I like to hear some mundane things-- personal stories make it more interesting but I want some other content now and then too. I guess I'm just impossible to please. What pleases me is a lively conversation, an interesting point, a well-turned phrase or two.
10) Make a list of 10 weblogs/journal style websites that you wish your weblog/website/writing site was like. I don't like question number ten so I'm not answering it. It leads to a competitiveness and a feeling of favoring one over the other. Plus, it's just too hard. And I'm being lazy today (hence the quiz answering and no need for real thinking on my part.) Plus, I really like the style my blog is like. It fits me. I wouldn't want to be anyone else. I do really like the blogs that are in my blogroll, and admire all of them, but I don't think I could pull of Robotnik's quirky crumudgeonliness, Brando's poetic teen-idol inspiring groupie pleasing genius, Lauren's political savvy, etc, etc, etc. And see? Cause I only mention three, I'm feeling guilty and like I should now go down the list of all the blogs and say what I like about them..... which would be a major time-suckage. NOOOOOOOooooooooooooooooooooooo!

**********
*Bonus: I will answer one extra probing and personal question from the first person who correctly guesses in the comments where that title comes from, and guesses why I think it even remotely applies to my blog. Creativity on part two of the question counts for extra. Think of your question too, if you think you'll be first.

The Quick, The Lazy, and the Small Deaths

The Quick: I got nothin' but a title with no examples of quick to share. But I can't think of a better title, so let's just move on, noting my metaphor's lameness.

The Lazy: This morning, armed by my resolve to get this damn chapter ready to send off to the committee before Andrew gets home on Sunday night, I spent all morning working on it. I found a reference to a Bloom County cartoon that I had saved, (to read it, click the link) and delightedly added it to the definitions of media depictions of feminism. Now w/ graphics!

So now it's lunchtime. I've gotten a lot of work done and am proud of myself today. I always am when I get work done-- and on days when I work well, I ask myself why I don't do this everyday; it makes me feel so good to get some of the work done but I just can't help myself but to be lazy.

Small Deaths: But to add one of those moments of tiny tragedy that happen in life, last night, alerted by her intense and excited "meowl"s of having caught something, I found Tituba hovering over a tiny fledgling bird who had fallen out of a nest. Tituba definitely had to have found said bird after it fell-- she is not athletic and would not have found this bird in its nest. But she victoriously claimed it. The little blind thing, feathers still wet, could barely hold its head up and was opening its beak soundlessly. I scooped it up and hid it outside under some leaves. Too cowardly to put it out of its misery, but at least it wasn't tortured by a cat's intense desire to smack at something weaker and wiggly. This morning, I saw the momma and pappa cardinals that live nearby flitting about my back yard, whistling one high pitched note over and over again. Clearly looking for something. I know I'm anthropomorphizing the birds. They may very well have been searching for bugs to eat, and not their lost nestling.

I felt so guilty at not being able to do something about the little bird, but its proverbial goose was cooked as soon as it fell out of its nest. I don't even know where the nest was, but even if I did, putting it back in wouldn't have helped-- it surely reeked of cat and human habitation. It made me contemplate omens, and push any thought of omens resolutely out of mind as silly and superstitious crap. But lurking just behind the couch like the boogeyman ready to jump out and say "BOO!"

Nature's a bitch, man. And when I'm NOT working, I have entirely too much time on my hands to think about it.

Virgin Vanilla

Posting a comment about Vanilla Bean ice cream made me think of this post I've been meaning to write for a while now.

I have this thing for the Virgin de Guadalupe. She's the Mexicanized version of the Virgin Mary, but more than that as well, and she's very big here in Texas. I covet a cool necklace with her on it, and I have a glow-in-the-dark Virgin that I bought at a pop culture conference two years ago who sits on my jewelry box in the bedroom. I've bought other Virgin paraphanelia over the years, but my favorite is this bottle I got at the HEB grocery store.

It's clear glass, and has a white plastic "crown" as a lid. I think the intent is to put holy water in it, for when you need holy water. (Which is when? I'm not Catholic, and definitely don't mean to mock, but do you need daily doses of holy water easily available? Is there a big vampire problem around here I'm not aware of?) Over a year ago I bought the bottle, brought her home and stuck her on a cabinet in my kitchen for a while. She sat empty until I was inspired.

I make home-made vanilla extract. You take good vodka, pour it into a container, then buy vanilla beans at a gourmet shop (World Market has them too) and scrape the beans and pods and put them into the vodka. Then you let it sit in a not too hot place for a month or two and you get the purest, best vanilla extract you have ever tasted. The stuff in the stores is watered down, has extra coloring that it doesn't need, and tastes icky to me now after my years of making my own. Even the good Mexican vanilla you can buy at the market in town isn't as good as my homemade stuff.

One morning, preparing to make my vanilla, I spied the Virgin bottle, empty vessel for my vanilla seeds. (Again, I'm not mocking at all, although for some reason that tone keeps creeping in... Stop it tone!) Inspiration=breath of the gods!

I filled my bottle, and had been using the vanilla from my Virgin of Guadalupe container for about six months in daily latte drinks and cooking when I got pregnant. Not really trying that hard, but also 34 years old and had been on the pill forever so one would think it would have been a little more difficult. And then it turned out that not only was I knocked up, but super-pregnant with two glorious babies. (As you know if you read regularly).

It occurred to me not long ago that the Virgin al a my vanilla container might have had something to do with my easy pregnancy. Even aside from her strong Catholic connotations, The Virgin has to be a version of the Virgin aspect of the Triple Goddess, and very concerned as such with pregnancy and babies. (Well, her Mother aspect would be more so, but in the triple goddess context, Virgin doesn't mean have to never having had sex; it means not married). (Often the same, but not necessarily so.)

I suspect that if you had to think about it, you might say that the Virgin is probably a Catholicized version of an Aztec or Mayan goddess. Maybe Ixchel, maybe Coatlicue. I'm not a traditionally religious person, and used to joke that I was a "born again pagan." But I do believe in a higher power, and I like to pray to a female god because it makes me feel more connected. Hence my fondness for a local goddess like Guadalupe. (Again, I mean no disrespect at all, here, just a different take on it.)

I am very fond of my Virgin Vanilla, although nowadays with the whole no liquor thing I only put it in cooking where the alcohol has a chance to bake out. But I can't help but be a bit of a miracle-believer as a result of my inadvertent pleas being answered.

Big Old Babies

I went to the Doctor today for another baby "growth scan." The babies were very wiggly and adorable on the sonogram. I got to see them suck their hands, and Sean opened his mouth wide in what looked like a yawn. They are "butt to head" which I'm sure is big fun for them! Little Maia has her head firmly wedged into position, determined to be FIRST. I asked how they would do that in the cesarean that I'm going to have to have-- will they take the first presenting baby first, or what? The sonogram tech said she was pretty sure they'd take her out first since they'll do the incision very low, and she'll be first there. I'm sure she would be very disappointed to be all lined up to be able to crow that she's the oldest and then they screwed it up by intervening. NO CUTS-IES!!!

Anyway, the big news is that Maia weighs (according to the measurements) 4 lb 7 oz and Sean weighs 5 lb 7 oz. Amazing!! The average for twins at this gestational age is only 4 lb 4 oz, so both of them are bigger than average for twins. I'm also at 32 weeks, which is considered the place where everything is "downhill" from here. If I were to go into labor and have the babies, they would be in excellent condition-- even if they weren't as big as they are already! Andrew apparently came 2 weeks early and was just barely 6 lbs, so his little boy is almost there already. I, on the other hand, weighed almost 8.5 pounds, so they're maybe going to take after me. :) I even got the coveted "third trimester OB" parking pass. This means I can park in the space right next to the handicapped spaces at the hospital, rather than trudge a million miles for the regular parking. It's been a bonus day.

I'm in a fabulous mood because of this! I went to the store to buy my necessity of oranges (I have to eat one almost every day!) and I was so happy and smiley that people can't help but smile back at me. I get lots of looks-- I'm sure people are thinking "Whew! Look at how huge she is!" According to the tape measure, my belly is as big as a woman who is normally at 40 weeks. So you can see why people keep saying "not very long now, huh?" When I tell them it's actually almost 2 mos still, they tend to be shocked. It's sort of funny. I keep joking that I ought to start pretending to be going into labor-- freak people out. Say "Ummmm.... do you have any boiled water or towels?" while gripping my tummy as though in pain. People tend to panic anyway, and it might be sort of funny. Hee hee.

Andrew is out of town now till late Sunday night. So he's working, and I haven't gotten in touch with him about the babies' weight yet. But he'll be very happy, too. It's obvious they're getting bigger cause my belly is so huge, but it's nice to know it's actually baby in there and not ice cream. :)

Kim Procrastinates Elsewhere Too

You've most likely read this blog post already cause it appeared here back in January. But, like most pregnant internet-addicts, I lurk pregnancy websites & message boards. Last week, one of them sent an email looking for "guest writers" for their magazine's blog. I sent my article and they published in last Friday. I missed the news of it Friday cause my spam filter caught the email notifying me about it (why was it that the filter let the first two emails from the publisher through but not the third?!) Anyway. It's kind of cool to be published somewhere other than your own little site, to have someone say "Yes, that is cool, we like it, we'll use it." Even if it's not The New Yorker, it's still fun. So I wanted to tell you all about it. They added the "bold" text to some of my paragraphs, and that's okay. It was a little weird at first to look at someone else's revision of my work, but that's a tiny thing. No big. It's not like I'm ee cummings and they capitalized all my words for me. (Which actually happened to him in his first published book, ya' know.)

And now, I really should go do some work and stop procrastinating.

* one of my favorite ee cummings poems

Well....

My first "Mother's Day" was fun-- a bunch of family & friends went out of their way (including ya'll) to wish me a "happy"... it was kind of cool, cause when I am a mother, I won't get nearly that many calls. :) But we went to Andrew's parent's house and had a very nice family dinner, and other than that it was a very restful day, which I seriously needed after a busy four or so days with the bake sale & everything. Lots of rest was had yesterday.

Did I mention to you all that yesterday was also Andrew & My Anniversary? We've been married 12 years! It doesn't seem like that long, but then again it seems like forever. I guess it's that soul mate thing-- we're so comfortable that it just gets hard to remember what it was like to not have each other around.

12 years ago today we started out on our Honeymoon. I had planned it from ads in some bridal magazine; we went to this little hotel in Dalhonega Georgia to this little group of cabins out in the foothills. We saw a smallish waterfall, did some wandering about in an antique area of the local town. We were near the "Cabbage Patch Kids" Babyland General hospital-- you could take tours to see the CPKs being "born"-- which we passed on. The first night we were there we got in very late after driving from Pensacola, where our wedding was, to Dalhonega. On the freeway near Atlanta, in a bunch of traffic, a dog wandered out a few cars ahead of us and after being hit by the cars ahead of us, was pushed under our car. Maybe because of that, maybe something else, we had a serious flat tire a bit later after stopping for lunch at a Denny's. After a few hours (Sunday at a Freeway pitstop!! We were lucky to get anyone!) we were on the road again. The little honeymoon cabin had lace canopy beds and its own private jacuzzi. There was a little living room area with board games and a little journal that honeymooners had signed over the years. We got a little fruit basket with a special bottle of champagne with our names and the date on it-- I saved that bottle for years.

The day after our arrival we had to move to another cabin cause the honeymoon one had been booked before I called-- but the cabin we moved to was bigger, and had a kitchen. It was much less romantic and more the family-type cabin with several bedrooms & a sort of "Uncle Buck" feel to it. What was really funny about it was that at a cabin just down the road (we couldn't see it through the trees but could hear it!) there was a church group staying that had nightly "firewalking" events. They would bang drums and play guitar and whoop loudly like Indians. We joked about making sure the doors were well-locked and "circled the wagons."

In retrospect, I could have planned a better honeymoon trip. This was a fairly inexpensive one, and not spectacular. I'm sure it's lovely under the best of conditions, but the year we were there, the resort had suffered from a winter storm and the pool was closed, the tennis court in very shabby condition. The horses we rode were surly; mine farted every step it took. I got my sunscreen in my eyes and had to turn back before the trail ride really got started. The town nearby was not really our thing. But really, as far as honeymooners go, you just want to be alone together anyway, and it doesn't really matter where you are. We saw it as a funny experience, and did not let the things that didn't work make us any less than happy. This has been a trend our whole marriage-- we don't let the small stuff get us down.

We were happy, and in love, and the problems really were minor. Since we've been married, we've gone on several trips that are more what people expect on a honeymoon-- three weeks in London, a long weekend in Hawaii over the fourth of July and fireworks, a long weekend in Anchorage AK last year where we took a scenic train ride and had a great time. I don't feel I've been shortchanged at all. I'd much rather spend the time with the two of us lying in the hammock in our green, cool-breeze filled back yard, with my cat wandering around in the grass hunting for lizards and us drinking two cool margaritas.

Soon, we'll have two little ones racing around eating bugs, terrorizing the cat (serves her right for all those years of lizard torturing) and needing to be rescued from mishaps, but the change is welcome. It's been a great twelve years, and I look forward to the next twelve!

Bake Sale, Snake-- Etc.

It went splendidly. All my individually wrapped products sold out, and made a good deal of money. We also made homemade lemonade (this recipe is excellent if you like lemonade not too sweet or too sour). The whole cakes didn't sell by the time I left there, but the "hosts" of the garage sale can have them if they didn't make it by the time they closed up shop. I got tired and needed to come home for a nap about an hour before the sale was officially over.

I got my very first mother's day card from my sister-in-law, and she actually found a twin card. Very clever! I'll put it in the baby book. Yes, some folks are saying Happy Mother's Day, some have labeled me a "mother-elect". Considering how much heartburn they give me, I think I qualify as a mom now. :)

OOH! We had a "Texas Rat Snake*" in our trees in the back yard earlier! The cat came running in, a bit freaked out, and then we heard two blue jays kicking up quite a ruckus. We looked and saw the pretty Cardinal that lives a few yards away, and a couple of finches all "aflutter" too. So I figured there was either another more hunterly cat out there, or a snake. Sure enough-- 3 feet long,ish, and curled up looked a bit out of sorts with the bird attacks. I don't blame the birds-- they were trying to protect their nests. But I would way rather have a rat snake in the yard than the six rats we spotted along the fence line on my baby shower night, so I was torn. What to do? I didn't want to kill it, but I didn't really want it around. Called wildlife rescue, but it's a weekend.....so no rescue. I thought my mother in law, who digs things like that, might want to catch it and keep it, but no. So the problem was eventually "solved" cause he disappeared into the brush. But now I'm a bit creeped out by the idea of "clumsy snakes in trees." They aren't at all poisonous, so no real threat to anyone but the birds & rats, but I still don't want one falling on me when I'm lying in my hammock.

That was our big excitement for the day. :)

Tomorrow's plans: rest, rest, and more rest. Then dinner.

*And our visitor looked JUST LIKE the one in the picture. When I first saw the diamondback-y pattern, I was a bit freaked, but I don't think rattlesnakes climb trees.