Right or Wrong, growing up I felt like Roald Dahl’s character, Matilda.  Naturally, I don’t think my mother and father would be pleased with that assessment.  I suppose lots of children feel misunderstood.  I always knew my parents loved me, in their way.  It just felt like a bad fit…like the reason it didn’t work was that I was the wrong person for the position.  If you’ve read the book or seen the movie, you’ll understand when I say that I had my fair share of Miss Honeys.  I also had a few Trunchbulls.

I guess what seems Wrong can really be the Right thing.  Matilda would never have developed her powers if she’d been born to Miss Honey, and in the end, they were that much happier, that much richer, for having been pushed to fullfil their potential.

I don’t know what exactly I would call this week.  It’s been odd.  It’s been intense, but nothing I can’t handle.  It’s been very internal.

We spent friday night at my in-laws, arriving late, too late for dinner, in order to accomodate my afternoon therapy session.  That was a good call, I must say, therapy.  So really, there wasn’t that much time to fill up before I could decently flake off and get to bed.  And yet, there was plenty of time for my mother-in-law to bemoan the poor treatment of rush limbaugh, offer a gift of that “brilliant bill o’reilly”s book, offer the kids twinkies and juice HOURS after their bedtimes, and make a myriad of racist and truly bizarre remarks, completely out of context.  I stayed rather calm actually.  I said no way to the twinkies and juice, and just stared vaquely at her during the rest of her diatribe.

Saturday we stopped for coffee, flowers and magazines before heading up to the hospital.  I saw my high school newspaper advisor at the coffee shop.  I gave him a big hug, which he wasn’t really prepared for, and which isn’t generally my “thing”, but I just wanted to. 

I spent the next twelve hours with my completely befuddled post-surgical grandmother.  I have extreme issues with her to begin with, and alzheimers doesn’t help the matter.  She can be a total and utter bitch, with this amazing veneer of sweet old lady.  I got to see all facets during my visit, but I was prepared for that.

After another lovely evening with the in-laws, I got to go back and do it all over again…with the exception of leaving blessedly early in the afternoon.

NEXT…oh boy, COURT!

the way kids write today…
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

aw, can it. we wrote like utter morons on purpose too.
I still find it funny.

I took a hacksaw to the hasp on my memories box.  it took all of thirty seconds to break in.  It’s been a fun morning looking through lots of notes and a few pictures.

can you read this note?

One of the collier twins wrote it, twin #2 as he referred to himself in the note.

Last month silvermoon wished me a happy birthday so I scratched my head like an ape and said, “it’s not my birthday!”  It would appear I was wrong.  It was my xangabirthday, in this incarnation anyway.  Thank you, silvermoon!  Sometimes I am just too thick.  I may be slow, but eventually I do catch up.

Here I am on my 18th birthday.  My friend Jenifer made me that pinafore, pale aqua, which I was wearing over a mens pink oxford.  On my feet were soft pink loafers.  That basket I’m holding, ended up in use as my toiletries hamper the next year in state university.  Less than two weeks earlier, I’d had my first abortion.  I am living proof (as if any were needed) that you can get pregnant the first time you have sex.

On finding Osama Bin Laden in Central Asia:
“We’re going to hunt them down one at a time. . . it doesn’t matter where they hide, as we work with our friends we will find them and bring them to justice.”
–President George W. Bush, 11/22/02

On finding Saddam Hussein in the Mideast:
“We are continuing the pursuit and it’s a matter of time before [Saddam] is found and brought to justice.”
–White House spokesman McClellan, 9/17/03

On finding the leaker in the close confines of the White House:
“I don’t know if we’re going to find out the senior administration official. I don’t have any idea.”
–President George W. Bush, 10/7/03

source:  an email from moveon.org

I’m also listening to Erykah Badu’s Worldwide Underground.
I love how she brings in phrasing or concepts from previous albums and expands apon them.  I also love her hazel eyes.

She’s just so elegant.

So anyway, I’ve decided to experiment with capitalization again, and limit my elipse usage for a while.  I need to remind myself to write more correctly, if just for a time.  Use it or lose it?  Let’s hope that maxim has a few loopholes.

My grandmother’s in the hospital, recovering from emergency surgery.  Yesterday afternoon they removed most of her bowel.  She’ll have an ostemy bag.  It doesn’t sound like my mother really understands the gravity of of the aftermath.  Either that, or she’s keeping it to herself, pretending everything’s going to be all right.  In any case, I think she needs to have something removed from her own backside, her head.

So, that was just backstory to what I really wanted to vent about.  I think I’ve got my familial feelings in some semblance of order, at least as far as to how I’m going to present the subject in therapy.  The true object of my frustration seems quite mild in comparison, really.  There’s a xangite with a grudge against me who calls at 2am, with great regularity.  Just one ring.  It’s usually tuesday nights, but can be more often  It doesn’t show up on caller ID if it’s only one ring, therefore, the easy avenues of taking care of it, blocking, simple phone company shit, don’t apply. 

Normally I just put the phone in the kitchen before I go to bed.  I’m a light sleeper, and that type of awakening JUMPS my heart.  Sometimes I forget, and it sucks.  Sometimes I have a sick child in my bed when I forget, and that makes me angry.  This time, I had the phone near me in case something went further wrong with my grandmother…honestly, people die from infected, impacted bowel obstruction, and they die quickly.

Why don’t I just change my number?  Well, for a myriad of valid reasons that I don’t care to get into, and the fact that the new number wouldn’t be all that difficult for her to get again.

I guess I’m going to have to needle the phone company some more.  This is untenable.  If nothing else, I wish to be rid of that  PsychicVampire for good.  It bothers me, seeing her comments on your pages.  Maybe I should be done here.  Maybe that will close the link for good.

evade the essence of vain longing
capture not her bounty’s flag
though winging night impairs her vision
howlies yet pursue the trail

evanescant as the moonlight
should you touch her fleeting soul
bow before her as your master
if in your suit you would prevail

beware the ides of mars…

I am a know-it-all…is this ameliorated or worsened by the fact that I know I am? (it’s probably not a good idea for anyone to try to answer that…if you know what I mean)

It’s just a fact of life
That no one cares to mention
She wasn’t good
But she had good intentions …lyle lovett

I just spent about an hour on the internet figuring out why it smells like something DIED in my tailpipe [edited to add:  NO, NOT THAT TAILPIPE!]…also, peripherally what the deal with octane is.  did you know that in some areas they mix in oxygenators like ethanol during the winter?  I did not know this, but now I do.

so now I know WHY the rotten egg smell.  there’s too much sulpher in the gas…well, too much for my particular car’s catalytic converter, though the cv is probably not faulty.  what I’m going to DO with that information is another thing altogether.  it’s likely I’ll just learn to live with rotten egg smell, since I don’t really want to change gas stations, which may not help anyway.

but I was thinking…these are the kinds of things that make people raise their eyebrows at me.   now if someone starts talking about gasoline or whathaveyou, I’ll feel the need to inform them about how the different components create the different gasses under certain conditions.  and then I’ll get the inevitable glazed over, or what-the-fuck-is-wrong-with-you look. 

I have trouble remembering people’s names…what day it is…how old I was in the fifth grade…but I can remember how a neuron works.

what the fuck is wrong with me?  don’t answer that either.