Showing color

Oh the basketball playoffs. Will they ever be over?
So I can have the TV on occasion.
I decided yesterday that the Boston Celtics are going to be my team. It makes it a little more interesting if you’re rooting for a team and Boston seemed like a good choice. I always pick north over south (they were playing Miami) and also, I’ve always liked the word Massachusetts.
So there you have it.
I never said I was a hardcore fan or anything… but I’m sure they’ll have me.
After proclaiming my loyalty to the Celtics, I though about doing the same for all the other major sports, you know, pick a team and stick with it. But then I’ve already committed to the Vikings. And the Sounders, sort of. And baseball I don’t consider a sport, more like a complicated lawn game.
So I guess I’ll stick basketball for now. Go Celtics!     

We watched a movie called Hysteria last night. Based on a true story, it’s about the guy who invented the first vibrator.
No joke.
And it was… pretty good. Actually really funny and yeah… it was good.
I’d recommend it.
You can’t really go wrong with sex toys combined with British accents though, I guess.  

winds of change

Suddenly Dylan is looking up smart phones. I don’t know what brought on this sudden change of heart, he used to be so set on NO, we don’t need smart phones. And while I can’t argue that we necessarily need them…. I want one.
Not so I can be on facebook non stop, but mainly so I can snap pictures and send them to my friends and family without having to deal with the camera cord and uploading to them computer and all that… and I never remember to bring the camera anywhere in the first place.
Also, GPS would be nice. Now, I don’t know if this sudden interest will last, but I hope so…

This just in...

Sweden won the Eurovision Song Contest! I can guarantee that nobody in Pocatello cares about this. At all. It matters very little on a global scale in general and even less on a local Idaho scale in particular.
But still. We won. Yay!

Friday Night....fun

We’re going bowling when I get off of work today. I have a very regular bowling form. Although it may appear spasmic and like I don’t know what I’m doing… there is actually a pattern behind my less impressive form.
And it goes like this…
I start of shaky (which is code for embarrassingly terrible) cause it’s normally been anywhere from 6 months to 3 years since last I bowled.
Then I get a hang of it, normally get a few spares, an occasional strike and people are like “Oh, you’re too awful after all…” all surprised.
Then my arm gets tired and it’s all downhill from there. I normally finish right where I started, in the gutter.
I still think it’s fun though. Sometimes. Or for that middle section where I actually get some points. But…I like to think that I’m not a competitive person, that only Dylan is, and that he sort of brings out this competitive demon in me…
I don’t know if that’s true. But I do know that I will be angry with him. And everyone else bowling. And possible the world in general. At some point tonight. Cause that’s how it goes.

Gah...the world is moving backwards

So… let me just get this straight, if a guy wears a shirt to the gym that says “Women R Strippers” you should realize that he might not actually believe that all women are strippers. He might even have a mother and a sister who are not strippers. He might be like a really nice guy, and that’s just an old frat shirt he happened to grab when we woke up at 6:30 to head to the gym.
So you should give him a break.
Cause it’s just a shirt.

If a girl, on the other hand, wears a shirt to the gym that says “Men are Pigs” she is definitely a man hating feminist lesbian who never shaves and wants all men dead. She probably even printed that shirt herself with her lesbo friends at an independent hippie commune in Portland.

So she’s definitely making a political statement.   He’s just working out.  You know, whatever.

it's so much harder when you're old

I wish we had some couple friends here in town. We joke sometimes about putting an add on craigslist, looking for a no-mo-mo , normal couple to hang out, go camping, skiing, have game nights, cook dinners, all that stuff with.
But there is something about that that just seems creepy and crazy.
Right?
Yeah. I think so.
I just looked at the strictly platonic section and well…. Some people seem normal, seem… normal. Others seem nuts.
And I don’t want friends who are nuts. I have that already.  

That’s officially too many “whow…I hope she’s ok” and “I’m lucky it’s not me” before I’d even had my coffee.
Rough morning for some people. Sending love and cyber-hugs to those with broken hearts and broken bones.
It really is sad we tend to need misery to happen to other people in order to appreciate that it didn’t happen to us.
I’m going to try to be a little more thankful.
At least today.

Monday life

Update: Allergra helps. Also, knowing that it helps… also helps. Makes me freak out less.
It’s Monday and all, but a countdown to a long weekend, good coffee and nice people all make it easier to handle.   

McMorning

I walk by McDonald’s on 5^th Avenue every day. There are always, always cars in line for the drive-through. It not only grosses me out, but just baffles me. What are people getting at McDonald’s at 6:30am? Or 9am? 10:45pm?
Every minute of every day.
And no, I’m not dead against McDonald’s or anything, I go there too every once in a while. It’s just… I guess my main issue is with the drive-through. It’s something about it that just screams
“I am sooo lazy! I already walked to the mailbox today, so my physical activity quota is full. Now bring me that super-duper sized McFlubbo while I sit here with my engine running and pollute the planet. Oh, and make sure to throw some extra plastic and paper in that bag, would ya?”  

I’ve always despised drive-throughs, and after working in restaurants that have them, I despise them, and everyone who goes through them, even more. There are two, and only two occasions in my book on which it may be acceptable to use an intercom to order your food from a person less than 30 yards away from you because you just can’t be bothered to move.
1) the place is closed except for the drive-through, it is the only way you can place an order.
2) you have a herd of screaming kids in the backseat and unbuckling all of them, dragging them into the restaurant and manage to carry out food without losing your mind, a few kids and most of your coffee simply seems impossible.

There you have it. The kids in scenario 2 may also be replaced with a cranky and immobile grandmother or something similar.

I’m having a less sunny morning. First of all the sun’s not shining, and second of all, the neighborhood dogs were just going nuts all night.
McMutt anyone?

Blah, summer, whatever

I would just rather be somewhere else right now. Not even feeling that picky.
Coeur d’Alene would be nice.
Holmsund would be amazing.
Stockholm would be fabulous.
Heck, even Buhl, I’d take Buhl.
Right now, I’d just rather not be right here.
Also, since talking about swimming holes yesterday it now seems I have to ask myself whether being able to cool off close to my house is worth the risk of having an arm growing out of my head… and, I just don’t quite know yet.

Talk about what you know...

She asked me: when will it feel better?
I said: eh…
Her face said: that’s not helpful
I said: later… when you look back at it and it doesn’t feel like you’re breaking all over again anymore?

I don’t know, of course. I don’t know when she’s going to feel better.
I hope soon. I hope she eventually finds somebody who makes her happy without playing stupid games while doing it. I hope the guys she’s been dating aren’t a true representation of the actual dating pool that’s out there.
For her sake. And for all women (and gay men’s) sake.
I understand being shy. I understand avoiding confrontation. I understand not wanting to have the talk. But I don’t understand this. It’s like I said in the locker room (this is me at my deepest, I should probably have gone into counselling...)
“It’s not even like that. No, it’s more like he asked you to move to Ice-cream Ville with him and when you got there he told you he was actually lactose intolerant and didn't want any. Yeah, that’s what it’s like!”

Now, how’s that for drawing from your own experiences?

Expertimentful

Felt a little confident there. Like maybe this whole lactose business somehow disappeared and I could really eat ice-cream if I wanted. No pills or nothing.
So I tried.
Home alone on a Sunday night, which is a good time for these kinds of experiments.

Theory: I’m not actually lactose intolerant, maybe I was but it went away.

Method: Eat a large bowl of ice-cream.
Result: I’ll spare you the details…
Conclusion: Nope, didn’t go anywhere.

I wish every day was Adventure Day

Tiffany and I had an adventure day yesterday. It was great. My inner girl grew from a few inches to my full 5,3 frame. If you don’t know what an adventure day entails, let me tell you. It means you have a full day ahead of you with no other plans than to have fun and absolutely no (this is key) homework, lab work, work of any kind clouding your sky.
It was perfectly lovely.
We started out with a 4 mile hike. Followed that with a trip to Kiwi Loco where we would have scored free treats had we lied and said we had kids since they had a mother’s day special. I didn’t know and answered honestly. Tiffany knew and still answered honestly.
Then we went shopping and spend almost two hours trying on stuff at TJ Maxx. We left with identical white summer tops, shirts, she got a dress.
Next stop, Tiffany’s apartment where she had left a dough to rise before the hike (what a woman, I know!) and within the hour we feasted on home made bread, a marinara made from scratch, salads and ravioli noodles that to be honest didn’t turn out too great, but that made no difference since we had so much other good stuff.
A bottle of wine.
Jack Johnson on the iPod.
Conversation.
A little Netflix to round the evening off and I fell asleep with a smile on my face.

Running into trouble

Sunny skies and cold winds. Thinking of hitting the City Creek Trail when I get off work. I haven’t been up there since September when I saw a warning sign for an Extremely Angry Moose.
That had me turn right around and then turned me off from that place for a long time. But I really love it up there, and besides, how long can it take for an extremely angry moose to get extremely tired of being angry at the same place….?
You’d think by now he’s found a new place to be mad at, right?
If not, you know where to look for me.

I left the door locked, cat inside. Came home to a locked door. Cat outside. Open window. A long way down. But it’s either that or she can walk through walls. Which would be cool. But my guess is she fell out.


Getting up at 5:30 tomorrow to drive Sasha to the shuttle. Last year that was me. Going home. And Mark drove me to the shuttle and I had to sit next to a lady who was really weird and talked the whole way to Salt Lake and lived in Las Vegas and smelled like old lady soap.
I wish I could go home this summer too.

When you live in a town with more than one doctor. You don't have to go to one you don't like. You could actually go to one that's nice and not judging you. One that listens to you and wants to work with you. I wish someone would have told me this sooner.

Getting tired of this...literally

Ok, for reals now. I hate that I don’t have an insurance that actually covers anything.
I really think I’m allergic to something…
And I know that the next easiest thing to actually go have a medical professional prick my arm with stuff, is to keep a log of everything I eat, every lotion, soap, etc. I put on my skin and any other allergen I might expose myself to and then try to figure out when it’s extra bad and what I ate, or sprayed myself with, or where I happened to go for a walk, that particular day.

But seriously, I don’t think I have the commitment it takes to do that.

The problem, in a nutshell, is that most of the time, about 80% of my waking hours, I feel like I can’t catch a full breath. This tends to be especially noticeable after I eat or drink something… but does not seem to be related to weather I eat an apple or a big meal. But as a result I get tired, dizzy and have to yawn a lot.

People at the gym most think I’m nuts cause I get on the machine and almost immediately start yawning like a mad person, cause it’s the only way I can get enough air in my lungs. I’m not wheezing or coughing though, like I imagine people with asthma would. That’s why I’m guessing allergies.

But seriously, I have no idea where to start guessing and I’m just really sick of constantly feeling so damn winded.  Also, my skin itches, especially in the morning. I have a little bit of a bloody nose every morning and a lot of the time I just feel kind of crummy, but I blame that all on the breathing issues.  

So, the floor is open… any guess is as good as mine. Nuts, soap, grass, pollen?

Work?

I bet it’s work actually….

Uneasy

I hate this feeling. Even though he could get hit by a car walking home from campus or get hit by a coconut falling randomly from the sky, this is worse. And I hate just sitting here not knowing how it’s going or what is going on or where this is all going on.
Hate it.
And it makes it hard to focus on entering mind numbingly boring data.
Happy summer.

Graduation and Sinco de Mayo fell on the same Saturday night. How convenient. Most all of everybody were out last night. I had a mostly good time. Old faces and new. Babies and dogs. Food. Rootbeer schnapps that had the texture of pancake syrup and was dangerously tasty.


Now were off to a BBQ at Newman’s. He said he was getting sushi too, from Fred Meyer’s.
Freakin yum on a slightly hung over Sunday.

The heart wants what it wants

Some things you just never stop wanting for. I have always, for as long as I can remember, wanted one of those humongous stuffed animals you can win at fairs and carnivals. When I was little, I would make space for it in the corner of my room before going to the fair, thinking this would somehow better my odds.
I wanted so badly to have that giant teddy bear watch over me when I slept and be able to curl up on its fluffy, cotton filled belly.
I wanted to be the girl at the fair who walked away with the grand prize, a stuffed animal three times her own size. I pictured it taking up almost the entire back seat as we drove home and my parents sighing in disbelif, "I can't belive she won".

As I got older, I no longer wanted to, or would be able to, sit on a teddy bear's lap. I didn’t have a spot in my room designated for my friend who always failed me.

But I still wanted one.

I wanted to win one, and even more, I wanted somebody else to win one and give it to me. And I would say things like “you’re crazy, you can’t give this to me” and “jeez, what am I going to do with a ginormous teddy bear?” and people would look at us and I would be the girl who was given the grand prize because her boy was just so darn cute.

And now whenever I go to fairs, which I rarely do, I even more rarely buy lottery tickets. And I have no idea what I would do with a stuffed animal the size of my refrigerator, it’d be terribly inconvenient, were I actually to win one.

But still, still I really want one.

And just like I thought clearing a spot for my furry friend would better my odds, which they didn’t, I now think telling myself I really don’t want one, will up my chances.

Someday though, I feel like it’s written in the starts, someday it will be me winning that 7 foot teddy bear and people will look at me and say
“What does an 80 year old need a stuffed animal for? She should really give that to a child!”

But the hell I will.   

And also...

I wonder what it all means. If we do this, does it mean we promise to stay?

Does buying land mean committing to land?

When the officer scans my fingers and tells me I’m good, is that a good thing?

Is that the kind of good I want to be?

What does homesickness mean?

That I should go home or that I should get over it?

It’s like I have this voice inside that’s constantly reminding me, sometimes in whispers, sometimes in mirror shattering screams, that I don’t really live here.

Just so I won’t forget.  

Deep

Wow, another semester of grad school coming to an end.
Is this what I want to do?
No.
Will it get me to a brighter end of the tunnel?
Hopefully.
Is it all bad?
No, definitely not.
Ok, that’s good enough for now I suppose. Enough soul searching.
What I really need to figure out is what the hell I want to eat for lunch.

Boise

Drove 3,5 hours only to have my finger prints scanned and be done with my super important appointment in less than 5 minutes.
Seemed kind of ridiculous.
But now I should be set for the next decade.
Staying in Boise tonight, couch surfing in the U S. for the first time. Ate at Boise Fry. Delicious, if you're ever in the area, do try it. Excellent vegan burger, like 15 kinds of ketchups and fry sauces and an amazing selection of fries.