Badger bag - messy, surly, full of books

Friday, January 30, 2004 There's no such thing as too much information The uterus piñata: a large balloon in a plastic bag with paper towel tubes duct taped to it. Ovaries are bunched up newspaper. The plastic bag is crucial, as you can't very well duct tape things to a balloon. Then, paper mache over it with newspaper, water, and flour. Don't forget to embed a string, rope, or duct tape handle into the paper mache. Let it dry at least 1 day. Last time everyone made fun of me for putting like 3 layers on it and we could barely break it open. This time there is only 1 layer. We'll see how it goes! Nolly has her doubts about the whole proceeding. Don't let her fool you; she has also had plenty of wine and some ideas about a "splat the sperm on the egg" game. Rook is a bit perturbed by the frilly crepe paper. You must get the kind that is crinkly and comes in a roll. Without unrolling it, cut it into fringe (about 1/2 of the way through, and the closer-space the fringe, the better.) Minnie and Nolly are very serious, hard workers! We thought of a red jello placenta sealed in several layers of ziploc bag, but realized there were things more disgusting than jello placentas --- and less likely to burst open on the floor. What if it burst open and ruined all the good candy in there? But will anyone want to eat the candy after seeing the other stuffing of the pinata? Oh, I can think of someone who would eat the candy! We discovered it's best to use nail polish rather than paint. It dries faster and is way more glisteny. Also, it looks more realistic if you use red, then put some big purple blobs and some brown is also good. Okay, "good" is maybe not the right word. Around and around and around with the rolls of crepe paper and the tape. Maybe I got a little crazy, and bossy, wanting it to look just perfect, with my insisting on taping it about 6 times every round? Sorry, I got out of control, it was the inspiration of the moment. Besides, it is especially poignant and meaningful if the object to be bashed with baseball bats and ruined in 5 minutes is constructed with loving care. Note the way Minnie made the long fringy bits at the end of the fallopian tubes overlap the ovaries! Lovely! All four of us are now piñata-making professionals! posted by badgerbag 1/30/2004 10:53:00 PM comment undersea I have just come from an underwater paradise having helped to create a kelp forests in Jo's dining room aka the "computer and art room". I also wish to add that as soon as she left the house for a few moments, one of her darling offspring began asking ominous questions about "those two things you mix together an then they sort of, like, explode, and that makes helium? Can we put it in the balloons? It would be like a scientific experiment." Being who I am, I know that she is thinking of mixing baking soda and vinegar and is feeling hopeful about separating water into O2 and H2... I leave the room to check on other screaming kids (Moomin and Sophie) and send them to their corners... back into kitchen where vinegar has been found and there is something happening with a jar and a balloon... This not a good time to create more chaos and we must return to taping kelp streamers to the ceiling. I go back to the other guys. Sophie has somewhere obtained a sharp, tetanusy object that is sort of like a miniature Sophie sized ripsaw. You could murder someone with it. I remove the object... Then all was quiet and there was no more nonsense for the next half hour. Go, me! I was impressed with Eliz.'s analytical and persuasive powers. I had drawn a diagram of my plan for kelp-stringing on a paper, and she drew a completely legible counter-drawing of HER plan and coherently explained the plan to me. I have a mad yearning to go to radio shack and buy some crap and do the hydrolysis experiment with upside down test tubes. maybe my dad will send me my old voltmeter thingie... if they still have it? posted by badgerbag 1/30/2004 06:30:00 PM comment The Perils of Pristeen A great archive of cunt sprays and douches. I can't decide which one is my favorite! They're all so persuasive. Maybe the Lysol one. On further browsing about this is a museum of menstruation and it's really great! posted by badgerbag 1/30/2004 08:42:00 AM comment Thursday, January 29, 2004 and another thing I know it's pointless to carp on this book, but I couldn't help thinking during the stupid "men have ritual sex with women so that the men get a direct line to god" speech in Davinci Code, well, what do the women do? and why do the women care - if they are so in fucking touch with god, why do they bother to play telephone line (telephone hole?) for the men? Very stupid. "Intercourse was the revered union of the two halves of the human spirit - male and female - through which the male could find spiritual wholeness and communion with God." Oh please, what crap! It is beginning to drive me crazy - the thought that anyone would think that they just learned something profound from this book... a bit like the horribleness of the book "J0nathan L1vingston Seagull" which is one of my most hated books ever. posted by badgerbag 1/29/2004 11:44:00 PM comment a firm hand We signed a bazillion mysterious house papers today. I think we should get the keys and all next Tues, Wed. or thursday but it's up in the air which day. I have procured 2 fabulous sounding strippers for the baby shower and they said they are excited about participating in something so strange. I am minorly worried that the boys of our crowd will not behave properly. I will lecture them. After the way the girls showered cash (properly so) upon the greazy dude for the bachelorette party a year ago, I think it will go well. Our fabulous baby shower strippers offered to be completely nude but I opted for "keep the thongs on" mode. Dr. Maxstinger the allergist yelled at me for even thinking for a second about ripping up the carpet in the new house. "Don't even think about going near the house while the day laborers that you will hire and drop off there do all the work and haul it away." He actually shook his finger at me. Then he lectured me some more about dust masks and gave me the fistful of assorted steroids that I requested. apparently my blood oxy was not all it should be. i like the powdery inhalers much better than the aerosol ones. Allerg1sts and dent1sts! They get so pissed off at us for not flossing and for owning cats. Druidsquirrel's sister seems to have the same thing I had with the Xtreme headache and stiff neck and strep together etc.... ow!! I hope she will be okay. posted by badgerbag 1/29/2004 11:06:00 PM comment gringismos fue a mi clase de español... pues soy gringa estupida o mis orejas comprendan todo pero mi boca está demasiado ...lenta? Se me olvidó las palabras... se me olvidó las conjugaciones etc. Que raro es que puedo leer y traducir de español a ingles, pero no puedo hablar normalmente en español. Que verguenza tengo.... Voy a blogear en el espanglish de vez en cuando para mejorarme. Pues en la clase anoche fui timida para unos momentos y entonces fue contestando las preguntas del profe facilmente. entonces sentí mucho mejor. Ayyyyyy,.... y los putamadre mujeres muy yuppi (?) acerca de mi que nunca, nunca se callaron.... siempre estaban hablando blah blah blah unas a otras cuando hablaba el profesor. Me haces loca! No voy a consultar mis diccionarios para ese blogging, debo escribo cualquier cosa que está en mi cabeza... solamente palabras y gramatica (muy mal!) que recuerdo, como si en conversación. coño! que inglespañol! posted by badgerbag 1/29/2004 09:49:00 PM comment I am a geek Well, duh. Mildly amusing though heterosexist... You are 59% geek You are a geek. Good for you! Considering the endless complexity of the universe, as well as whatever discipline you happen to be most interested in, you'll never be bored as long as you have a good book store, a net connection, and thousands of dollars worth of expensive equipment. Assuming you're a technical geek, you'll be able to afford it, too. If you're not a technical geek, you're geek enough to mate with a technical geek and thereby get the needed dough. Dating tip: Don't date a geek of the same persuasion as you. You'll constantly try to out-geek the other. Take the Polygeek Quiz at Thudfactor.com posted by badgerbag 1/29/2004 09:48:00 PM comment russian roulette for kids Okay... Dear Japan... please... no more! kaba-kick posted by badgerbag 1/29/2004 05:27:00 PM comment notorious As we were looking for strippers for this baby shower... especially lingering on Miss Muffy... Moomin came up. "What are you looking at Auntie Minnie? What are you looking at Mommy?" "Um... pictures of sexy ladies, dear." "Oh." *wanders off* Oh dear.... heh heh heh... posted by badgerbag 1/29/2004 10:22:00 AM comment new social thing I am fascinated with Orkut, the "new improved friendster". If nothing else it has led me to an interesting new blog: Just Kristin. I can't link to my blog from Orkut as I use my real name. If only they'll take my suggestion and add the "slam book" capability... so that I could check a box to allow or even request for people to make negative comments about me! Maybe no one would have the nerve, and anonymous comments would lead to pointless mean spamming. but, like, what if all my friends were secretly, all of them, thinking, "for god's sake, woman, brush your teeth more often! And sit up straight! Quit picking your nose! Get something done! Quit spinning yer wheels you narcissistic dorkwad!" Maybe then I'd quit picking my nose. It would be a useful thing! Or I could just hang out with my mom more often and invite her to nag me. Hrmm. I guess the outcome would be the same. I would ignore it. posted by badgerbag 1/29/2004 12:23:00 AM comment Wednesday, January 28, 2004 the secret Dav1nci code is enjoyable if you are a connoisseur of trashiness. I am on chapter 30 or something like that. There is indeed a templar-like society and there are the Bad Catholic Conservative Sexists and the Good Liberal Catholics including the (fictional, post-current) pope. Again, the geniuslike super-advanced cryptographer demonstrates her genius by solving a retardo-level anagram. I ask you. Again, the genius-like "history of thought" prof proves himself by knowing something rather mundane, like what a pentacle is. If the deep, dark, world-shattering secret that the secret society is trying to protect turns out to be something on the order of "Jesus was a girl", I will scream with laughter. Doesn't anyone read science fiction? Why doesn't anyone read The Crying of Lot 49 anymore? It was a funny, sarcastic, gemlike book with all the required elements of a conspiracy. Just because I'm making fun of this book doesn't mean I'm not eating it up. Because Jo was right, I don't want to put it down! Oh, the style. It has all the literary sophistication of a Nancy Drew novel. posted by badgerbag 1/28/2004 11:35:00 PM comment running around An exhausting day of running about campus trying to get everything together. Office of one dept. Filling out of forms. Office of 2nd dept. Where is the La Raza dept? No, there is no La Raza dept any more. Office of 3rd dept. I bolted a sandwich. Office of 4th dept (trying to track down some other form and they kept sending me on to other places). Prof's office for signature. He wasn't there. Back to Office 4 to check his office hours. An hour and a half to kill. to the library! Rummaging in the stacks. Note-taking. Line-standing. Book-checking out, but wait! I lost my student ID. Nice librarian bucks the rules to hold the books behind the counter for me. Back up to prof's office to wait.... la la la. He never comes. To the ID-making place. Waiting in line. Back to the library. My registration hasn't registered. Nice student worker lets me use computer to log in and prove I'm registered. It is a virtuous act to refuse to enforce the rules of a bureacracy. My mom says and thinks it is not fair that I always manage to bend the rules - How? why do I think I am entitled? Because I am an elemental force that exists to tear down institutions and build new ones - the bureacratic cogs can sense it, and give way, guiltily, before my certainty. I have my books. Hurrah! I then drove rather randomly around SF trying to get the best way to the strip club near City Lights and failing to find it. got there. miracle parking spot right in front. But no, they will not work parties! I like their T-shirt, "Under Nude Ownership". Home, James. Piñata making was prolonged and silly. I can't reveal the crowning touch until after Sunday. It is amazingly revolting! S.N. and Minnie and Rook did a lot of work on it. I am most certainly not better from meningitis because near the end of each day I fall completely apart and my head aches mercilessly and I want to cry. I long for peace and darkness, or peace and a quiet book. All other people are jarring to me for no reason. posted by badgerbag 1/28/2004 11:13:00 PM comment me, cryptographer I wear no cream colored irish cable knit sweater nor does my burgundy hair swing softly on my shoulders. and I am not a French cryptography police expert. However I know a fibonacci sequence when i see it and I see through one of the clues immediately. And I have an inkling of what it means. Psssh! Or maybe that's just what they LITERALLY want me to think. Encylopedia Langdon shall fear me, for I am a mentally anarchic punk Sally who could kick his ass across the Louvre just by reciting the alphabet backwards. Take that, Bugsy! posted by badgerbag 1/28/2004 12:42:00 AM comment Tuesday, January 27, 2004 hilarious Jo and Ep are making me read The Davinci Code. I've heard it slammed by so many people that I got curious. what's going on? It's pretty cheezy... Literally, it would annoy the literal hell out of Minnie by misusing a certain word. And I mean that literally! The main guy and the other characters and the omniscient narrator say "As you probably already know, Bob..." every other sentence. Gawd help us. And I mean that literally. As I'm sure you are already aware, Paris is a country in France, where, literally, people behave all French, and stuff, and they're all, like, literally gazing at famous French things a lot, but in case you don't know, I'll let on that they're famous French things. hahaha. It's so bad! I understand now why my friend Chris was particularly annoyed since he writes about the history of occult philosophy. Literally. Unlike Chris and the book's other slammers, I'm enjoying it so far. I also enjoy eating nachos made with Velveeta. posted by badgerbag 1/27/2004 11:38:00 PM comment impeach Bush I don't understand why the Democrats aren't howling for blood. Impeach the fucker! He obviously lied, lied, lied. I hope some of those fucking hypocrite republicans who led the whole Impeach Clinton for Consensual Sex thing will WAKE UP. posted by badgerbag 1/27/2004 10:58:00 PM comment spiritual counsel and relief I have turned, tonight, not to Marcus Aurelius and Seneca, but to my other deities: those who play loud punk rock music, ska, and grrlness. Tell it Joan Jett! Tell it Roxanne Shante! Exalt my soul, Skasmopolitan! Waft me away o Raincoats. Bratmobile, make me whole. It is not a night for the quiet blues or the false nostalgia of llanero cuatro y arpa. A bit of Ministry would not go amiss. "Don't Be Mean" is one of the best songs ever. Its lush complexity. I am drinking cheap port and filling out change of address forms. Thank god Rook is home now. My nice computer speakers are plugged into my laptop. I am in bed. I feel a surly teenagerish satisfaction in my blasting obnoxious music. posted by badgerbag 1/27/2004 07:59:00 PM comment bite in the ass Jesus fucking christ. My advisor just emailed me that I should be sure to bring the giant packet of papers she lent me last semester. The what? I dimly remember that while I was on vicodin throwing away papers last week I came across a big packet of stuff. I stared at it dimly for a while and since I had no idea what it was or where it came from, I exercised my will and forcefully like a hero, threw that fucker away into the giant bags of recycling. I am now going to have to spend my evening going through wet, smelly bags of paper that have been rained on for a week under some pizza boxes. Maybe I will find it and maybe it won't be ruined or I'll be able to xerox a copy of it. Remind me never to borrow anything ever again. This is all rather a blow to my noble effort to stop being a filthy pack rat. See? See!? I knew there was a good reason to keep everything. Next my bank from 5 years and 4 moves ago will call me to tell me that if I hadn't just thrown away all those bank statements I would now be able to prove my rights to an unexpected million dollars in interest. posted by badgerbag 1/27/2004 07:45:00 PM comment Just when you think you know your child Moomin in the truck as we listen to Chopin preludes: Mama, I wike this music. Me: Me too. It makes me think of beautiful things. Moomin: Yeah. Wike swans walking on the piano keys. Me: *choking up at the thought that my son is a tiny little proto-poet* Yes, honey, it is rather like swans walking gracefully on the piano keys. Moomin: (dreamily) Yeah. (pause) And I would FIGHT them with my sword, fight fight fight, and I would tell those swans GET OFF DA PIANO, pshoo, pshoo, PSHOO! *fires imaginary laser blaster in wild excitement* Me: Um... heh. I can see where this is going. In preschool he will be get up to "share" during circle time. Teacher: Moomin, do you have something to tell the class for sharing time? Imaginary Moomin: *bashfully* I wike kittens. Teacher: Oh really? That's nice. What do you like about them? Imaginary Moomin: *whispering* I wike dem. Teacher: Speak up please, we can't hear you. Imaginary Moomin in loud demon-growl voice: I WIKE TO DWINK DEYR BWOOD! posted by badgerbag 1/27/2004 05:51:00 PM comment more on squalor I remain sort of emotionally devastated and full of self-loathing. I almost just gave up on school and decided not to re-register in my feeling of helplessly being overwhelmed and losing my grip on what should be done. I feel that failing to get my shit together to run my own classes and schedule for the next few months is very likely. I've never managed it before. On the other hand I had never gotten good grades in college either and now I have a 3.85 (two As and two A minuses). Yes, I berate myself for the minuses. I had to make myself drive up to C@ñada college and register for the conversation class. Drove around for a hwile looking for parking. started driving off thinking "Oh well, here is where i just flake out and fuck off, I won't do it after all". I drove around the circle thing but decided not to leave and came back and looked again for a spot. There was no spot. Then I was trapped by the one-way street and would have had to go roundabout again. I just pulled over for a minute and felt hopeless. I had forgotten my jacket and it was pouring rain, all cold and foggy and windy up on the hill. I looked behind the seat thinking there might be an extra jacket or hat... then was just revolted by all the crap back there and the mold growing on the floor of the truck in the carpet where the leaky a/c drips its water. At that point I forced myself to drive off, but then on impulse crammed my truck into a partly illegal spot, went in and registered. This is so unlike me. Usually I am fairly sanguine and feel like I know what I'm doing. I'm unlikely to become frustrated by some minor thing like parking or rain and flounce off in a petulant huff, quitting. It doesn't happen. But it almost just did. I am making myself a tight schedule for the rest of the week. This afternoon, change of address cards and thank you notes to parents. Tonight, the throwing away of at least one more bag of junk. tomorrow, SFSU and registering and returning of library books. Thursday, working for McCoot, allergist appt, signing of title company papers for house. Friday, I have already forgotten. By Monday, I must have gone to Kinko's and prepared and printed a detailed syllabus for my 2 independent study classes and I will email it to both profs. Tuesday we might very well have keys to new house! Our landlord here is being a dick. I thought that by avoiding confrontation with him it woudl turn out okay, but apparently not. I am going to have to write a letter threatening to sue him and list all the things wrong with the house and formally break the contract. JUST what I wanted. But you know, nearly every landlord ever has screwed me over and it STOPS HERE. I should be getting my shots right now and I'm fucking off. Maybe they will shoot me up on thursday when I have the yearly evaluation...? I hope they aren't jerks about it. I also need some steroid inhalers and leukotrines for the next month or 2 with all the moving dust. I wish there were just 1 thing at a time to do. while I was considering the "oh fuck it all " option it was a tempting thought that I could just get a permanent half-time secretary job at Stanfnord by shmoozing around the comp sci dept. if I gave up on school. It's a day for dreary despairing thoughts, somehow. why am I like this? what is going on? I just want to lie in bed and cry. Everything is irritating me and Moomin seems absolutely repulsive with his snotty crusty nose, general ice cream induced stickiness, snuffling, shrill repetitive questions, and constant leaning on me or else running about injuring himself. I started lecturing him in the car as I felt I was going to scream if he continued lisping like a baby. He is almost 4 and should be able to say the letter "L" by now. Why? Why am I insane today? I am never like this! It's horrible. I don't feel like me. posted by badgerbag 1/27/2004 04:38:00 PM comment Monday, January 26, 2004 thrown away just now Well, put out on the porch, really. I'll load them into the truck tomorrow. I don't care how many trips to the dump are about to happen. three old pairs of converse hi-tops with holes. INCLUDING my red and black plaid ones. I don't know if I can recover from that one. I mean, they may have holes but they look so cool and I'll never, ever find another pair. I feel deep pangs of regret Two broken black suitcases on wheels that I have been using though they have been broken for years. the aforementioned three broken ink-jet printers A bag of useless clothes for donation. Note to self, quit buying sexy trashy sleazy clothes for private wearing as housedresses. You have ENOUGH. There is no need for more. No black lacy shirts, no little plaid miniskirts, no more skin tight velvet tanktops, no weird pink see through bedjackets discarded long ago at garage sales by dead or dying old ladies who wore them in the 40s. No more hot pants for wearing under miniskirts for the 5 times a year I wear a miniskirt. Just stop it, Badger U. Hemulen. Until the existing lingerie has been torn off my body by brutal pirates, space alien slavers, and my own struggling victims, I shall not buy more. Many socks with holes. Boxers with holes. Shoebox full of pens, pencils and colored pencils for donation. No, I do not possess the strength of will to throw them away. jeans with giant holes in them. Three half-empty large plastic boxes of generic diaper wipes from over a year ago. Random bits of paper. I don't even know what-all. A lot. Things that I can't bear to part with: Black ginger-rogersy danskin high heeled strappy tap shoes, with taps, that fit me perfectly. Acquired for 2 bucks at garage sale. Never worn except to admire myself in them, grinning foolishly and vainly at my feet while doing totally fake, unbelievably klutzy tap dancing in secret. a bunch of business cards of people I am not even sure who the heck they are anymore but maybe they were once important. (WTF?) The nicer pens and pencils. the size 14 and 16 jeans that I might once again be fat enough for. A very large amount of cool t-shirts that I don't really wear, but like. Maybe I should set myself some goal of amount of trash bags filled and disposed of, and then I get to buy myself these or these. Converse, why do you know so well how to fill me with vague yearnings? posted by badgerbag 1/26/2004 11:23:00 PM comment I am a squaloholic Wow cool, a 12 step program for people like me: Squalor Survivors. I used to just kick a new path through the knee-deep junk, a few years ago. And I didn't have any furniture except a bed and bookshelves. I now have furniture, but it very, very rapidly becomes extra surface area for squalor, which I now read is evil and dangerous. And I thought it was kind of nice to be providing homes for all those roaches and rats! Damn! I'm doing great if it's just papers and books with no dirty dishes mixed in. I hope Rook appreciates this... or he might secretly be a member of the Mates of Messies support group? When other people's houses are squalid, I feel comfortable... perhaps I am a rat. Seriously. The glass jars have got to go. I do have kind of a problem. I'm cleaning up a pile of papers and things and can't bring myself to throw away even a paper clip or a stray screw or button. It must go into a special box or bin of "things that belong somewhere else" that in theory I will sort through later. Later most often never comes and in my garage I have boxes and boxes from former moves and cleaning frenzies full of "things too important to be thrown away but I don't have time to put them away". At this moment after: 1 full truckload taken to the dump 1 giant trash bin full of trash and now overflowing and several weeks of excess paper recycling from all my sorting-out 1 giant garage sale A half-truckload taken to the family shelter to donate A half-truckload taken to goodwill My house is still full of crap unsorted and un-thrown. 3 broken ink jet printers. A milk crate full of cables (this is how you can tell I'm doing way better than I used to: there IS a place for the cables and I do put them there) There is still stuff in my truck, and stuff in my driveway. I feel about the disgusting end table (that's warped and has been out in the rain for 2 winters, and was ugly in the first place) just the same as I would feel for an unfortunately diseased or crippled stray kitten. When I see a piece of furniture out on the curb, I feel sad for it. I want to put it in my truck and rescue it, and find it a home. Inspired by the squalor survivors site I have just filled a large trash bag with stuff from the kitchen. It took me less than 5 minutes. This plastic egg, that will be so useful for Moomin's birthday egg hunt in 2 months, if only I could find the other plastic eggs I've been saving since last year, and could then on the appropriate date find them again? How could I toss it? This wicker thing? Ugh. Why do I have it? Where did I get it? I don't know. This box that checkbooks come in, so useful as a drawer organizer or countless other things? This moldy hummingbird feeder? This bottle of pedialyte formula that I bought 3 years ago when Moomin had a cold? These cookie tins? I will not mention the bits of kleenex and trash and stuff that I found. the trash bag now holds most of the contents of the shelves and milk crates under the kitchen counter. I build them for a specific purpose, so that Moomin could have his dishes down there and some food and could get at them by himself, and within a week I filled it up with crap. Serious resolution time here. I am throwing away screws, paper clips, etc. Then I find a really nice purply qu@hog shell... and a whole book of stamps... A stapler (probably the 10th stapler in the house, but where are they?). Some binder clips. Um. Well. I just now put those things into a box to be sorted out later. God forbid I should throw away a stapler. I really want to change how I am about things like this. Then I will have more room for books. posted by badgerbag 1/26/2004 08:08:00 PM comment oh the trauma! I forgot to say that while we were playing our Sunday night rpg, Moomin watched Snow White for the first time. I monitored the beginning bits and sat with him for the scary parts. He hid under his blanket for the "lost in the forest" scene. But... I forgot the end of the movie was snow white DYING and everyone being sad at her funeral. Major Moomin Meltdown!!! posted by badgerbag 1/26/2004 08:01:00 AM comment Sunday, January 25, 2004 things not thrown away I now wish I'd catalogued the junk for future amusement. There were things I couldn't bear to throw away. They were given a last-minute reprieve. - A horrible large photo of some 70s looking pop star who I've been told is Neil Sedaka, but I wouldn't know, in a clunky wooden frame. - A pop-up infant toy with farm animals that got left outside and is all dirty; the kind where you turn dial or flip a switch and an animal pops up. Attractively non-electronic. - A whole box of books on learning chinese, russian, danish, japanese, and french (spoils from my pack-rat boss's home office) - A "voice of the world" shortwave radio (also from cleaning out boss's office) Thrown away, with regrets: - a lot of Mac floppy disks carefully organized in a disk box - my ugly comfy white flannel nightgown that's all ripped - some of the wrapping paper Sold: - panda bear in convict uniform - non-working miniature tape recorder - possibly non-working dustbuster - "What Einstein Told His Cook" aka The Book of Evil Incarnate - "Once Upon a Potty" ("Everyone Poops" is way better if you want a potty training book) Still in driveway: - slightly warped large computer desk (Free!) - large bookshelf with only 3 shelves - lots of books on russia. some science fiction - A small white rolling TV cart with useful slots for dvd and vcr (come! take it!) - an ergonomic chair Gazed at fondly and preserved or filed: - giant suitcase full of art and craft supplies, lost in garage for 2 years and newly found - bad poems written by my Grandma Hemulen Actually I must preserve one of those poems for all time. A "Do It Yourself" I looked in the mirror and what did I see? I couldn't believe that it really was "me". I'd spent all the morning dying my hair, Testing, and mixing, and daubing with care. At the results, I was truly appalled. Instead of red tresses: Good Grief! I was bald! Note: I just looked up Neil Sedaka but he seems to have left out the photos of himself with long fake-afroed hair, an unbuttoned shirt, and dark, hollow-looking raccoon eyes. Perhaps he prefers to forget the 70s. I can't tell for sure if it's him. posted by badgerbag 1/25/2004 11:29:00 PM comment junk in my trunk I did too much today and my head is hurting a little. But it was a good day. I got rid of a lot of stuff at the garage sale and made 180 bucks. At the end someone came to get all the leftover kids' books for donation. I hauled a load to the family shelter... mostly clothes... Moomin helped me. People were still driving up and taking the free stuff out of my driveway when I got home. I enjoyed talking to people. Some were obvious garage sale addicts and would try to bond with me by complimenting the quality of my junk. I heard some interesting stories and was often mystified by their choices (an ugly painting in a wooden frame, a book on Hitler, a stuffed animal, and a 10 year old two volume set of Who's Who: mysterious!) the first to arrive were NOT the retired hoarders that I expected. Instead I had a professional book buyer who was trying to hide that that's what he was, and a parade of Homies. I am totally serious. The Homies came to my driveway in their monster custom trucks, low rider pants, chunky gold jewelry, prison tattoos, gomina-ed hair and/or knit caps, and their nonchalant pimp walks; in succession they bought all the actually valuable electronics and then a guilt present for their non-custodial children. At least that was my interpretation. My inglespañol was tested out and not found wanting. Then the Homie would sidle nervously up to the part of the driveway with the baby clothes and toys and look at it in bewilderment, picking up tatty stuffed animals and putting them down again like hot potatoes and finally settling on something at random. Absolutely radiating bewilderment and, touchingly, hope. As I was packing the back of my truck, my customer #1 from 10am came back. "I called my sister and she said my nephew would go crazy for that dino-phone and I was an idiot for not buying it." I got it out of the back of the truck explaining that I was just going to donate it anyway so he could have it, but if he wanted to give me a dollar that's cool. He scuffed his feet and gave me a ten! Kind of nice. Unfortunately Moomin saw this transaction and we drove off in my truck to the sound of "That man tooked my dinosaur! " Oh fuck! He seemed to accept it but was morose. I lamely said that the dinosaur was going to have adventures. Then I apologized. We dropped off the truckload and I asked where he would like to go. "The Farm!" He used to request this destination a lot; not a real place but an archetype with a red barn and one of each kind of animal as seen in picture books. So I took him to the run-down Stanffford ranch. Miracle, the kid who owns the little white pony that we always pet there was THERE and spontaneously invited us into the pony corral to pet the beast and feed it. She was 6. I felt that she was definitely pitying us as we stared, starving, through the bars at her. Last night Ms. D. asked me a funny question as we were talking: "Do you always analyze everything you do at this level?" This made me laugh. Unfortunately for me and everyone directly around me, yes... kind of... I mean I enjoy sitting in my chair at the suburban garage sale thinking about junk and its meanings... And at other sales I go to I always think of the person who just died, if it's an estate sale. I like to try to figure out what kind of person they were from what kind of glass tchatchkas they collected. My great-grandma left very few things and I was with my grandma as she basicallly went through her mom's underwear drawers. I took all the long black slips and wore them for sleazy lingerie for years. I still have some. Also some silk scarves and some of the lacy triangular widow shawl thingies she always wore on her hair: two black ones and a white one. Buried in all the widow granny clothes was this mysterious thing: a sort of gleaming multicolored spangled rhinestoned thing that I can only call a gypsy hat or headscarf or maybe a turban. My grandma was completely taken aback and said she had never seen it before. But it was clearly a sentimental thing, a memento my nana saved to the end of her life. When she started to get alzheimers the first year she gave me some stuff, a china teacup and some sort of other china object and a china praying hands thingie. I like to keep the gypsy hat where I can see it. It's not like I was close to her or anything, but that is the point. I just like to try to imagine what it might have meant to her. Her tiny apartment before she succumbed to the Alzheimers and was in a nursing home was full of junk that made me like her; those china things, and a wall that was all postcards from all over the world. From who? I do not know. posted by badgerbag 1/25/2004 09:22:00 PM comment Saturday, January 24, 2004 weasel A crazed weasel has taken over my body and used it to clean houses all day. Instead of drudgery it feels like pleasant healthy invigorating exercise. It's less boring than staying in bed! The living room still has the horrible smell. I now think it's the heating vent. Covered heating vent, opened window - time will tell. We began construction of the uterus piñata... it looks magnificent. posted by badgerbag 1/24/2004 09:01:00 PM comment never again It feels good to be physically active. However. I will never ever leave a bunch of crap out in the back yard to get rained on in the rainy season so that it gets all ruined. And so that anything concave fills up with leaves and garbage and water and ferments into slimy fetid swamp water. posted by badgerbag 1/24/2004 01:46:00 PM comment planets and 70s hippie books Moomin: "Where do you live?" Me: Um, here in this house. Moomin: No, what PLANET. Me: Oh! The planet Earth. Moomin: Me too! But sometimes I live on the Wump World. Me: Cool. *reading mortgage contract* Moomin: The Wumps are my friends. They were scared and they runned away from the pot-bellied monsters. They were hiding. I was not scared. I am brave. I will fight them! Ho, ha, ho, ha! Fight fight fight! *waves plastic sword* Me: Ah... you would protect the Wumps, huh? Moomin: *more crazed fighting of imaginary polluting corporate aliens* Me: *mildly perturbed* Um... that's nice. I think the Wumps don't know how to fight. That's why they had to hide in the cave. They're gentle and peaceful. Moomin: Yeah! They're my friends! I will save them! And my friends are Sophie, and Merlin, and Iz, and Pierre, and Sonora. The Pollutions and the pot-bellied monsters are NOT my friends. They are like a different kind of dragon. Me: Yeah. They're space ships. The Pollutians are like litterbugs who throw their trash on the ground. My son... future hippie and eco-terrorist... The funniest part of that book is the flag of the Pollutians, which on first glance is just some stripes but on second glance is smokestacks with dirty smoke billowing out to make the horizonal stripes... posted by badgerbag 1/24/2004 11:09:00 AM comment Friday, January 23, 2004 getting there On the bright side: I feel much better today! A little grumpy. Snappish. A little headachy. But alive. How the Universe Got Its Spots by Janna Levin is very good, well written, soothing, stimulating. It's right at my level of reasonably intelligent non-scientistness, that is to say, in places over my head but never obnoxious about it. I'm not scared of a few equations as long as there is English in between. It's lovely! I recommend it. Scientific American used to be nicely at this level (though rarely this poetic) in the mid-80s before they got all stupid and forgot that they aren't Discover magazine. Thanks Janna! posted by badgerbag 1/23/2004 11:42:00 PM comment culture of fear I don't want to write this but here goes. At night when alone I am subject to irrational terrors. If Rook were in the kitchen I would be fine. But alone in the house, even on the 22nd story of my old high rise with security and a doorman, I felt the fear. I am sure you people know what I am talking about. I would be going about my regular business happy and safe and unsuspecting and then some irrational madman would leap out from hiding and get me. They would have been watching me like a stalker. I have trouble going to sleep until someone else is home and it's tough to do something like take a bath as then every little noise freaks me out, the cats running about or something, or the water's running and Rook comes home but I don't hear the door open and suddenly there is just a looming in the door or a footstep in the living room and I wig out. It is much worse to come home when the house is dark and feel the nasty feeling that someone could be in my closet or hidden in my bed under the blankets. I have to be steeling myself and reminding myself to be rational every minute, or lose myself in a book as much as possible. Another bad one is that in the night in my well lit room suddenly [ugh, i can barely stand to write these words] up against the window glass, A HIDEOUS FACE might appear. Then it would disappear so that I'd doubt my sanity. I believe this is straight out of a Sherlock Holmes story. I always skip that one when I read the collected Holmes, and the one called "The Speckled Band". I have almost never lived alone because of this. At the same time, I need a lot of space and like privacy. Also, it's not like anyone I've ever lived with could have driven off an intruder; pansies, geeks, marshmallow butches, bookworm femmes, bourgeois and non-pistol-packing, non-punch-throwing to the core. So it's not really about physical safety. It never happens during the daytime. It's only at night that my haven of home is vulnerable. I've thought about this before but just now it burst on me with mind-blowing clarity. Like with tidal waves, I plan my escape route, which is now made more complicated by the question of whether to detour bravely for Moomin or to leave him to the mercies of the madman as I sprint to the front or back door clutching my cell phone. posted by badgerbag 1/23/2004 11:18:00 PM comment More mysteries Abuse of Power - by Nancy Taylor Rosenberg. Nauseatingly bad. I couldn't take it, and just skipped to the end, which was stupider and worse than I had predicted. Nasty! Irritating! Maddening! Rapesploitation! Who lent me this book? throw it away immediately. The Nature of the Beast - Frances Fyfield. Looks bad from the blurb. I'll give it a chance, but one more power-hungry beautiful rich bitch and sociopathic alcoholic man and I'll fling the book across the room unless it's a work of fabulous genius. Various by Patricia Cornwell - No. I just can't handle the cornball "oh I'm so cutesy let's be all southern wad-chewing fuckfaces" flavor. What dreck. Good god. Back into the bag it goes. I feel soiled and never want to read anything from the 20th century ever again. Worse than awful fantasy novels recently encountered - way worse. Worse than mary sues. Worse than those godawful sciencefictiony fan books that everyone thinks are so funny, but aren't. From page 1 of "Isle of Dogs": "Unique was a petite eighteen-year-old with long, shimmering hair that was as black as ebony, and her skin was translucent like milk glass, her lips full and pink." Um. It's not like that's the worst of it, but... right on page one! Oh lordie lordie lordie. That reminds me. I have to go out on the porch and give a certain book a brief reprieve from garage sale execution just so I can quote something amazingly poisonous. *** What Einstein Told His Cook: Kitchen Science Explained. by Robert L. Wolke. With Recipes. For fuck's sake man. Just bitch slap me, throw me on the floor and fuck me. Remove my shoes, knock me up, and give me that lobotomy, so that I can bear to read a whole book where page one paragraph two is as follows: (You'll be seeing the word molecule frequently throughout this book. Don't panic. All you need to know is that a molecule is, in the words of a first-grader of my acquaintance, "one of those eentsy-weentsy things that stuff is made of." That definition, plus the corollary that different stuff is different because it's made of different kinds of molecules, will stand you in good stead.) How can any self respecting human being continue after that little gem of condescension? The whole book is like that. "Yo! moronic housewife, ye who are my target audience! I'm going to use big words, but don't be alarmed! You don't need to understand them! It's all about COOKING, which you understand instinctively! Just as long as you remember that I'm superior! And I have a Masters' Degree... in SCIENCE!" It goes all big wordy and then gets all falsely jovial and folksy, like the most horrible of fluff pieces from "Parenting" magazine. Yo Einstein, cook this up your ass! I love a useless bit of trivia as well as the next person. I _would_ like to know the latest research on juicing limes. But not at the expense of my IMMORTAL SOUL. posted by badgerbag 1/23/2004 07:57:00 PM comment My dog has no nose. How does he smell? Awful! What is the horrible smell in here?? What? It's in every room. Did a raccoon die under the house? It smells of decay, and cat shit... maybe the cats have poop stuck to their butts, and are always next to me? *checking cats under their tails* Nope. It's not me, I just had a shower! *** Now there is a strong smell of pot smoke. Maybe it's the hole in the window. posted by badgerbag 1/23/2004 07:00:00 PM comment sudden housewifely brainwave A peculiar insight that came to me as I was cleaning out a closet just now and fretting that I save wrapping paper to re-use. Can't help it. Pack rat. Useless substance yet somewhat required in life and so, recycle it. The brainwave was: Keep the bits of wrapping paper with the xmas ornaments in their box. Then when xmas rolls around again and I need wrapping paper and bows and ribbons, it will be there when I take out the box... I'll be signing up for my lobotomy any minute now, because i was impressed with myself for figuring this out. I don't think I can claim any longer to be an intellectual and a scholar. Next, I will be removing stains with vinegar instead of just throwing away the crappy shirt from goodwill. posted by badgerbag 1/23/2004 01:50:00 PM comment shipwrecked Day 9 on my island. I've begun marking notches with a stick. Rook has written rather a brilliant essay and I am proud! This hot pillow has been saving my life... it's the pillow shaped like a horse collar. can go over eyes, over whole top of head, around the back of my neck. And can go on both ears at once. Or if I am on my side I pile it like a heavy snake on top of the up-facing ear. 3 minutes in the microwave refreshes it. If only it did not stink of lavendar, it would be perfect. Polished off several mystery novels: Cry Dance by Kirk Mitchell. Okay. Bureau of Indian Affairs guy. Southwest flavor with native american-ness. middle aged guy and younger woman petite, tough but naive who gets rescued. Long black hair. Partner in Crime by J.A.Jance. Southwestern flavor. Girly sheriff, petite and tough. Long red hair. Older guy who must be her cop partner. Do I sense a theme here? Dead Midnight by Marcia Muller. What a random title! San Francisco flavor. Clearly the author had a great time writing this as every other scene is set in a fancy SF restaurant; she must have done plenty of "background research". Tough, non-petite detective Sharon knows everyone useful as if she had +10 contacts in some mystery novel role playing system: people who can tell her who to pick locks or disable alarms over the phone, people who know how to recover deleted material from a hard drive, people who can give her secret info about everything, comic relief gay people. Bonus points to Muller, as I don't remember the hair, eye color, or weight of her detective. Detective's boyfriend travels a lot, sends roses, very neatly disposed of. Track of the Cat by Nevada Barr. Southwestern flavor. 40-ish park ranger detective with nice but visibly aging body (examined and described while she is in the bathtub). Hair in ponytail or braids, worn "down" and brushed during non-hiking moments. There is much tough as nails hiking and surviving in desert and muscley grunting as she falls off cliffs and rescues herself and breaks bones and stuff. Lonely grief over dead husband, attractive boytoy lover, sudden strong crush on a super femmy southern girl (mad points to Barr for realistic treatment of their relationship, the detective's dealing with the attraction). The boytoy lover was rather hilarious as he was a virile, heartbreakingly handsome ecoterrorist and southwestern interior decorator who wants to have sex with her every second and who begs her to marry him, but you know perfectly well that she would never. This book, though the shortest of the lot, was the best for the protagonist's character development and general intelligence. Independence and competence combined with loneliness and realizing she wants to care about other people again after long grief. Also, it was great simply because there was no old wrinkly veteran daddy cop calling the shots as a foil for the young tough petite perky-breasted chip-on-shoulder spunky proving-herself fuckable feminist girl cop and then they have sex. Thank god as there is just enough of that crap in the movies and everywhere else. I no longer remember which of these books are Jo's and which are Ep's. I should have marked them! Most of them displayed something new in cheesy novels - a vague awareness of computers that wasn't done completely wrong. There is usually a (younger) bright hotshot or secretary or junior assistant detective who "looks it up on the Internet". Very good! Welcome, mystery writers, to the real world! posted by badgerbag 1/23/2004 08:56:00 AM comment Thursday, January 22, 2004 notes michael j. vaughn novelist, poet posted by badgerbag 1/22/2004 11:11:00 AM comment Wednesday, January 21, 2004 Dear virii, Welcome! Why don't y'all just settle right in. The lining of my brain is very comfortable about this time of year. I hear the dura mater in particular is cosy and warm. My inner and middle ears, as well, are known far and wide as amusing playgrounds. If you would care to invade my sinuses, they seem to be unoccupied and I'm sure would love to have you. Come on in! Make yourselves at home! Signed, Badger Hemulen posted by badgerbag 1/21/2004 10:20:00 PM comment resting but awake This whole meningitis thing has gotten me using IM chat. I hate the phone, and it still hurts to hear too much noise, even talking on the phone. Even hearing myself talk. I'm using AIM so... ping me at badgerbag8... a bit lonely and bored and discouraged at not being better yet. I'm in this state where I'm just waiting for people to update their blogs. (Hurryupandblogifornia?) Back to my book now. posted by badgerbag 1/21/2004 09:24:00 PM comment mild activity Puttered around house today. Rested. Sorted papers. "Don't push it," warns Rook. I went outside. I moved a few flowerpots, picked flowers with Moomin, and did some laundry. I even cooked dinner. "Don't do too much Badger. Are you listening?" "Oh let me just take out this one last bag of recycling." Then suddenly found myself standing in the living room feeling very odd, having forgotten what I had been about to do. I must have looked peculiar because: "Badger. Go to bed. Now! Go! Go lie down!" Rook told me sternly as if talking to a dog who'd just peed on the floor. I went. Suddenly my head is all pounding again and my brain feels like a yolk rattling around in a very bruised egg. Rook very competent... I could just not be here and he would manage everything... adaptable fellow. Not the best dog trainer, but hey. posted by badgerbag 1/21/2004 08:46:00 PM comment so strange! Moomin is the most strangely virtuous child. Me: "I think it's your bedtime, Moomin!" Moomin: "Yaaaaay!" *hops into bed* ??? It's true, he now defies us occasionally, but still.. on the whole... Has he been reading Confucius? Seriously now. Sneaking into my philosophy section and boning up on filial piety. posted by badgerbag 1/21/2004 08:41:00 PM comment Oh man The beauty of this imaginary girlfriend thing is that one could just accept all the auctions in some clever way and send them the same letters. Hmmm. And could use any imaginary picture. I like the t-shirts! Wow, I could so, so, easily do the imaginary girlfriend thing. Love letters? no problem! Skimpy thong dropped into the mail? Hell, you can get them 3 for 5 bucks in the Macy's sale bin. (And annie sprinkle used to do this - mailorder (used) underwear.) Imaginary breakup? Oh, that would be the fun part. It would be more interesting to do no thong, and the "strictly wholesome" girlfriend. The brilliant thing would be to photoshop me and the guy into a picture together. Then his friends would believe it! I'd have to use a photo of me from some years ago when I had long hair, I guess. On 2nd thought I could market it as "your imaginary geek girlfriend"... posted by badgerbag 1/21/2004 02:31:00 PM comment status At this point I just feel a bit raw and fragile, as if I had a hangover. But my ears feel weird. A little painful, and just... weird. Mild vertigo comes and goes without warning - and the feeling like when you've been in the ocean too long and the wind is whooshing across your ears and then about 2 hours later, water runs out of an ear onto your beach towel. WTF mate? I'm only on antibiotics that could clear a giant kenya-sized petri dish of elephants. This ear thing only just started last night. How? How? Why? and What? Today: a little mild laundry doing and garage-bustling. Moomin-tending. I don't know about my tolerance for noise. Rook might have to take over at some point. Tomorrow: driving? posted by badgerbag 1/21/2004 02:25:00 PM comment future me I really like the future me site. I've written letters to my future self before, and in a way everything I write especially in private journals is a letter to my future self. I am somewhat obsessed with the thought that I don't want to forget who I was, because I might betray my past self or selves and her/their ideals. posted by badgerbag 1/21/2004 12:54:00 PM comment Seen at Fairyland in downtown Oakland You have to have a small child with you in order to get into this place. posted by badgerbag 1/21/2004 12:43:00 PM comment baby got front Damn. I thought it would be really easy to find a pregnant exotic dancer. But Noooooooo. No responses from craigslist, not even pervy fake ones! I'll try the women seeking women category. Maybe that will bear fruit. posted by badgerbag 1/21/2004 11:23:00 AM comment what I can see This might be mildly amusing. The books that happen to be on the shelf next to my bed. Take Care of Yourself - a cheesy health care book Zen Flesh, Zen Bones Samuel Taylor Coleridge Marcus Aurelius Another Marcus Aurelius translation Nicanor Parra, Poems and Antipoems Ways of the Hand - a book about piano playing and improvisation. awesome! Another translation of Marcus Aurelius Canaima Anima Poetae - Coleridge Amo, Amas, Amat - a handbook of Latin phrases Ben Jonson's aphorisms ("Timber") The Anatomy of Melancholy - 3 vols. Water Birds of California (Minnie's?) Baudelaire Antologia de la poesia peruana Apuellius The golden ass the Bhagavad gita Wittig - The Lesbian Body Wittig - Across the Acheron Lyra's Oxford Wittig- the Straight Mind Wittig - Les Guerilleres " in french Collected Poems of Yeats MLA handbook 6th ed. Tao te ching Cicero - On the Good Life Leather Rogues Lust in Leather (Oh, blush) Seneca- Moral Essays vol. II The Odyssey Arms and the Women (unread) A fish dinner in memison (half read) Comp. Lit. in a multicultural age Extended Sexual Orgasm (a book on how to have hour long orgasms) Agni 58 Polit1cs, Persuasion, and Pr@gmatism The Faerie Queene With Fire and Sword (half read) The Encyclopedia of Amazons Von Humboldt - Personal Narrative Aristotle, Horace, Longinus - Classical Lit Crit Learn to Crochet Loteria de mi tierra (boxed) Stories of Vikramaditya Parkman - vol. II Obras Completas - J. de Ibar 90 degrees south The Little Drummer Girl Two Little Women Microworlds Tabaré Pippa Mediaslargas Salam Pax book Gloria Anzaldua, Borderlands/La Frontera Fountain and tomb - Mahfouz The bijak of Kabir book of children's poetry Yeats George and Martha The Penguin Atlas of Women in the World (good!) Introducing Barthes american favorite ballads Crit. terms for Liter. Study Ariel - Rodó Levi-Strauss (overdue!!!) Maudie The Pretty Women of Paris Venus in India Two Flappers in Paris the Whippingham Papers (oh dear) Teleny (so good!) 2 shelves of my own binders and journals posted by badgerbag 1/21/2004 10:26:00 AM comment beaterz It's just too good. When Trekkies go insane. It doesn't seem insane to me... maybe insanely attractive. Oh, to go cruising in the shuttlecraft! Or just to sit in it! I wonder if the inside is all fixed up? Thanks to essays and effluvia for the link. And the fabulous link to beaterz.com posted by badgerbag 1/21/2004 09:24:00 AM comment Tuesday, January 20, 2004 enough! You know, sometimes I am overjoyed that information is right here at my fingertips. I was just wondering, "What is a uvula for? I mean, other than being a funny word, and useful to grab onto if one is being swallowed by a giant animal in a horror movie?" Well. I give you the results of this dangerous wondering. Imagine for a moment that we are in a happy garden, and I am Eve, and naked, and offering you the luscious fruit of knowledge. It might not be a good idea to click here. Don't say I didn't warn you. Don't look here either. Did I just say "swallowed"? That was unfortunate. Or here. "flopping around on my tongue like a beached whale..." Finally! posted by badgerbag 1/20/2004 10:14:00 PM comment warts and all If you were the Mars Rover, where would the Sorting Hat put you? Why? posted by badgerbag 1/20/2004 09:09:00 PM comment reading This afternoon I read 3 of the "Ladies' Detective Agency" books. Fluffy like cotton candy. I also sorted through a lot of papers and put them in the correct folders and binders. Perhaps the garage sale can be this Saturday. Things are looking up! I haven't finished the Mars Rover Mary Sue story yet. Maybe I'll do that tonight. posted by badgerbag 1/20/2004 08:13:00 PM comment notes chandrasutra's blog very intelligent and lovely posts gotta get blogroll back up and running soon... and organize my sidebar. posted by badgerbag 1/20/2004 01:22:00 PM comment notes from fire and sword notes from a while back - messy and disorganized but useful. to be fixed up later and for now just transcribed. Am still in the middle of the book. *** fire and sword pan yan (Skshetuski) works for prince Yeremi - princess, two young princesses zbaraskie (lubei castle) volodyovski - loves Anna princess zbaraska nice of prince yeremi. Hemelnitski (outlaw) ran off with the starosta’s wife Main bad guy of rebellion. in cahoots with Tugai Bey Pan Longin - tall guy. Podbipienta (3 heads with one blow guy) shield of Zervikaptur Lithuanian Pan Zagloba - sort of the comic relief Wallachian embassador Pan Rozvan Ursu starosta Chaplinski - gets humiliated in bar at Rozlogi: Princess Helena Princess widow of Prince constantine kurtsefich bulyga elder vassily kurtsevich prince - confident of late pricne michael sons - simeon, Yury, Andrei, Nikolai, and (oldest) eyes put out adopted Bogun (el Bad Guy). *** posted by badgerbag 1/20/2004 12:48:00 PM comment my wish To be right now with my face half burrowed into the warm sunny coarse yellow sand of B0nn3t Sh0res in R.I. peeking out from under my arm (as Minnie added, with eyes half open half closed so that you get the cool effect of sand on eyelashes in the sunlight) smelling the delicious seaweediness and hearing far-off sounding seagulls and happy shrieky children through the waves. When I am 90 or so, keep this in mind. Ideally I would die at will, quietly, like the chick in that movie "Antonia's Line" but I'd be lying in the warm sunny sand. posted by badgerbag 1/20/2004 11:40:00 AM comment Monday, January 19, 2004 ah, lip sharpie, i thought I knew ye lip sharpie ink thing works GREAT to make other body parts look all rosy and maidenly rather than the sprawling matronly udders they have become. i am on drugs again. can I manage to photo the right one (maidenly, with nip stain) and the left (cafe au lait) one separately? yet tastefully? Never give this woman makeup in bed... Possible full body henna-ing may follow. posted by badgerbag 1/19/2004 10:49:00 PM comment of interest I didn't know that wich in English place-names means "salt works". Cool! Look for The Discourse on Salt and Iron, chinese symposium on statecraft. posted by badgerbag 1/19/2004 06:37:00 PM comment irritating! Dr. appt. completely pointless: New doctor spent waaay too long snarking on my purple hair. for fuck's sake. get over it. HIS hair was ugly and funny looking too but you don't see me being rude about it. Doctor B.'s attitude: Why are you here? you are getting better. Me: But why is this happening? Do I really have strep or am I just a carrier? What is going on? Why the headache? Connected to the strep or not? Doctor: I dont know, I don't know, I don't know, etc. Come back when you are completely better and we'll see if you are still a strep carrier. Maybe you should see a neurologist. Me: Um..... *do not cry in doctors office, do not, do not, do not* Doctor: So, go home and go to bed. Maybe you just have a headache from having a sore throat. Me: Um, this was and is so far beyond "a headache"... Doctor: Maybe it's migraines that are triggered when you get sick. Maybe it's viral mening1tis. Maybe you don't have strep at all, and never did. Maybe it's cluster headaches. Have you been depressed? Me: No, never! Not until I got a headache that made me vomit and not be able to open my eyes for 3 days. Doctor: Come back when you feel better and we'll run some tests. *Giant Waves of You Are a Hypochondriac Hysteric Emanate From Doctor* Me: *leaves, feeling pointless* ??? posted by badgerbag 1/19/2004 05:03:00 PM comment a lot better Am feeling significantly better... Dr. appt. ina little while... reduced codeine intake a little bit... I can't wait to get off the codeine. I HATE IT and how it makes me feel... all glazed over and la-la and thick, with thoughts floating in and out of each other even more vaguely than usual, and unstoppable, so that sleep and waking seem closer to each other than they should be. finished "paladin" and half way through "Salt: A World History". Interesting but it's a bit fluffy. It bugs me sometimes when things are dumbed down. I was wondering about the whole "Tyrian purple is not purple, but more like red" issue. Is that true? It's not like I know, but I've read it enough places to wonder when Kurlansky in the Salt Book talks about purple dye without going into the question. *** Page on Tyrian purple, but still no visual sample of what the color is. Apparently more reddish-purple when you're testing your dye on a fleece?! And this from an eloquent guy who feels it's okay to take things from museums as long as they fall on the floor... This page on tekhelet is interesting. It's much bluer than I would think the reddish tyrian purple would be. posted by badgerbag 1/19/2004 01:14:00 PM comment Sunday, January 18, 2004 the curse of the paladin Am reading Paladin of Souls Funny, I like it much better than I liked the first book's hobbling stuttering prose. Or is the codeine talking? Anyway I'm enjoying it! Super cheez! But also way better feminism. Ista is pretty cool so far, despite my not being able to forget that she is a peninsula and a weyr. I passed out earlier tonight. It doesn't feel like I'm getting any better. Have applied "Urb@n Decay" stuff, the sharpie marker for your lips, about once every 20 minutes, preening coyly for myself in front of hand mirror and digicam. Soon, I will also douche, spray, shave my pits with pink flowered razors, and wear one of those mattress-sized maxi pads while dancing around in a white gauze dress in a field of flowers with vaseline smeared all over the camera lens. Isn't that what happens when one starts down the slippery slope of makeup? However I must say that I look divinely haggard wearing this lip sharpie stuff. posted by badgerbag 1/18/2004 10:52:00 PM comment nearly to death You think it's not possible to be irritated to death in under 1 minute? Get sick and let my mom call you. Me cago en la puta madre que me.. no, wait. I can't say that! "Do you think you might have gotten a little HEADACHE from the STRESS of BUYING a HOUSE?" whinges my mom in a weird fakey baby-talk voice. FUCK! During the effort not to make a mean, snarky, bitchy, obscene reply to this amazingly offensive ignorant question I nearly exploded. It's time for my 15 minutes of silence and darkness, but I am putting it off until I cool down from that horrible phone call. Did the woman not read my giant email explaining everything? Apparently not. posted by badgerbag 1/18/2004 04:01:00 PM comment never underestimate granny Oh, fucking hell I don't quite remember what all this means. I'm on "Round 2" and remembered to flip the damn thing over and finally grokked what the fuck "work the corner" means, yah! but then what? huh? posted by badgerbag 1/18/2004 03:40:00 PM comment enforced relaxation New regimen is to lie still in bed with eyes closed doing NOTHING for 15 minutes out of every hour, hoping to fall asleep. This is very boring, but I do feel rested as I've been doing it since around noon. suddenly am wondering if smoking pot is good for one's headache. Or would I just start experiencing the headache all the more intensely? Am considering a bit of granny square crocheting as a reading alternative to pass some time. posted by badgerbag 1/18/2004 03:15:00 PM comment fmi (for my info...) headaches posted by badgerbag 1/18/2004 03:15:00 PM comment mystery Wow... that's a lot of mystery novels. thank you my friends! thank you for the duck pate, the pan levain, the Pan Yan, the taking of my kid to the playground, the books, the crayons, the coloring book and the Urban Dec@y Naked Lip Stain. Applying it, I feel a pleased girlish I'm so pretty in my sickbed feeling, rather like Mrs. Chilton when Pollyanna does her hair. Several phone calls out and a lot of waffling. Rook's dad helpfully offered the thought that headaches can be psychosomatic. Gracias mi suegro cariño, lo necesito ese psicoanalisis gratis como necesito a hole in the head. Y me cago en la boca de la madre de Freud!!! Rook's mom is much more sane and helpful. Though it is torture to talk to her becuase she shouts. Some other dr. from my group, I think Ar0n, gave me a callback and he was incredibly intelligent seeming. I will be switching to him. He said he would be worrying about the same things i am worryignj about, ie, what if there is even a 1% chance it is bacterial (since there has been no lumb@r puncture) being masked by the antibiotics I'm taking, but unless I start feeling actually worse, ER probably not necessary. I can see him tomorrow, they are not on holiday. he lectured me that I am expecting to get better too fast, that it takes a while, and I must actually rest and not keep getting up and stop jostling my brain around in there by walking about unecessarily. Also, to take advil to make inflammation go down. This, and Rook, persuaded me not to go to the ER. I had expected to be better by today. Yesterday during any time I was not actually half dead, I was cleaning things in a crippled and limp sort of way. I got a big pile of papers and crap from the top of my bureau and the bookshelf near my bed, and sorted through it. result: one file folder full of interesting papers, one small box full of business cards to be transmitted to computer file of addresses, one large box of Things to Be Put Elsewhere, one grocery bag full of paper trash. Also cleaned out my night table drawer and dusted everything within reach of my bed and folded the laundry and went through all my drawers pulling out clothes to get rid of. I'm bored! In retrospect, none of that should have happened. I should have been lying here with my eyes closed quietly trying to sleep. With fibromyalgia one of the main principles is to push yourself into activity even when you feel like shit. Otherwise, you never get better. Also, if you have any sort of chronic pain you better get used to functioning while in pain. HOWEVER. I tend to forget that with normal illness one RESTS even if feeling a litle better, KEEP RESTING. If I feel capable I want to get up and prove to the world that I'm not a slacker, a faker, a hypochondriac, a psychosomatic whiner. Deeply underlaid with the conviction that under it all I really AM a liar, a whiner, a faker etc. Minnie has come over and she and Rook are now cleaning the house. This makes me feel amazingly better. It's not like i usually care. But when sick I suddenly do and i feel really out of control of everyting and like everything's going to hell. Any order that can be imposed, I wish it to be imposed. Neurotics R Us! posted by badgerbag 1/18/2004 12:50:00 PM comment Saturday, January 17, 2004 reassured strangely reassured by Minnie being here, and Squid's mom the nurse talking with me for a bit. I think my panicked linking to that site on viral meningitis was pretty much a panic - it is not necessarily the most credible of sites, on second look. My giant Harrison's principles of internal medicine seemed happily optimistic about viral not having aftereffects. Though it can recur. Also bounced ideas around with Minnie and (from bed) started writing the pottersue I threatened to write. Yes, the M@rsj R0ver is going to Hogwarts. Oh, it's damn funny. Look for it soon. I am about 1/4 done. The daughter of some JPL engineers has a wild magical power to meld with machines and she merges with the R0ver (oh, just GUESS what her name is... it's so perfect!) and wheels about on mars. No, she'd have to figure something out on her own. In the meantime, there were pictures to take, data to transmit. She flexed her solar panels a little, exulting in the knowledge that her dream had come true. She was the first person to stand on the surface of Mars. Even if she stood on wheels, not feet! hahaha I am truly demented! she will kiss hermione! and she will struggle with the problems of getting around the staircase-filled Hogw@rts on her wheels! could there be a better mary sue for me? I think not. signing out now to try to sleep. my head throbbing like harry's lightning bolt scar when voldemort thinks of him. at least i have been royally entertained all evening by this fun story. posted by badgerbag 1/17/2004 11:20:00 PM comment reciting poems When bored and in pain it is good to have a store of poetry to repeat. If I were ever captured as a spy and locked in a sensory deprivation chamber as a form of psychological torture, it will come in handy. It's also good to imagine one is a captured spy when lying in bed in the dark and trying not to worry about things. I don't know very many poems by heart. Mostly I repeat bits of M@rcus Aurelius and this poem, The Two Trees, which I learned when I was about 17. I normally edit out the stupid lines about the fairies or cupids or whatever they are. The rest is good. "Gaze no more in the bitter glass The demons, with their subtle guile, Lift up before us when they pass, Or only gaze a little while;" I can do many other Yeats poems - I liked him a lot, and then I went to this school (which used to be a month long) and had a surfeit of Yeats. Oh, more yeats than you could shake a hazel wand at. Jesus fucking christ. "And Now, Yeats's cousin's great-nephew, dressed inexplicably in a kilt, will play the harp, while the Mayor of Sligo over-emotes I went out to the hazel wood... ONE MORE TIME!" the hazel wood poem, the innisfree one, etc. were all beat into the ground. I am fond of the one about Fergus and the Druid. "Take if you must this little bag of dreams/unloose the cord, and they will wrap you round" (that's the druid, then fergus says:) I see my life go dripping like a stream/from change to change - I have been many things,/A green drop on the surge, a gleam of light/upon a sword, a fir-tree on a hill, (mmmsomething else???) and all these things were wonderful and great, but now I have grown nothing, being all, and the whole world weighs down upon my heart, Ah! Druid! Druid! what great webs of sorrow / lay hidden in the small slate-colored thing!" The other one I can do all of is The Ecstasy. I can't remember when I learned it. It is hard to get the verses in the right order. Often I get lost and have to start over completely, like with an imperfectly memorized piano piece. The Ecstasy is still one of my favorite poems. At some point I decided it was the only good love poem and I refused to write any more love poetry, which is mostly really threat poetry, possession poetry, or just objectifyingly nasty. (the vivisection ones always gross me out, where they catalogue all the body parts!) Can also do the first 10 lines or so of Canterbury Tales in authentic-as-possible accent. it comes out sounding very germanic. "Whaaahn een Aaaapreel weeth hees shoor-es so-teh, Tha drucht aahf Maarch haath per-ced toh thah ro-teh". I took a class in the history of english and we learned how to pronounce it all. posted by badgerbag 1/17/2004 08:57:00 PM comment loving margaret Perhaps the next kid could be eleanor margaret. as long as it has the same initials as me. What they don't realize is that I am untouchable, because I have been hurt so much in my life, nothing hurts me anymore. I have been so rejected that I have come to expect it. I have learned to love that which is meant to harm me, so that I can stand in the way of those who are less strong. I can take the bullets for those who aren't able to. I am a warrior, hard as fuck. If I had a boy it could be Cyrus Margareto or something? Or I could work the "Cho" into its korean name. Moomin has a korean middle name so they could match. As long as Min-cho doesn't mean something just silly. I will be sure to check. posted by badgerbag 1/17/2004 07:54:00 PM comment a bit unnerved Well this has left me quite unnerved. Recovering from meningitis The gist of it is, while viral meningitis you don't die like with the bacterial kind, the aftereffects are the same. How 'bout that "1 in 10 suffer hearing loss or deafness" thing. I'm glad my SENILE FUCKHEAD DOCTOR mentioned that part. I will for sure be following up on Monday first thing. posted by badgerbag 1/17/2004 04:22:00 PM comment bored... visit me! Damn I'm bored. anyone who wants to come visit me, please do... bring trashy mystery novels or children's books to loan me! I'm all alone, as Rook and Moomin have gone to Iz's party. Later they will be gone again all evening at a LOTR game. So it's a great opportunity eh? Of course, any adultery will have to be committed very, very, very carefully, or in our imaginations, so as not to jar my neck and "The Object Formerly Known as Badger's Brain". Today light is no longer my enemy. I have the blinds up and the camellias are incredibly beautiful in full blossom and exploded all over the deck. When we moved in here, as always I thought about "and what will my view be as I convalesce from the inevitable boring sicknesses?" and set it up just for this occasion. Just before we move, here I am reaping the benefits of this foresight. I used to not like camellias, feeling they were too showy and easily bruised. Ever since my moment of enlightenment at Filoli, I have loved them for their abundance and fearlessness. The whole bush, or tree, blooms at once and the flowers fall to the ground, abandoned and reckless. They are beautifully impermanent and fragile. posted by badgerbag 1/17/2004 02:57:00 PM comment during a war A long excerpt from a great blog: A Family in Baghdad. Mostly written by Faiza who I think is Raed's mom. I admire her. I like what she says but honestly don't think I would have the courage: We have a flat in Amman/Jordan. Before the war, whilst we were on holiday, my husband suggested that the kids and I spend the duration of the war in the flat. I was flabbergasted and completely rejected the idea and returned to Baghdad hurriedly fearing the outbreak of the war whilst am still outside Iraq. It is a question of principle. Many people have ridiculed me for my attitudes, to the point that my sisters consider me a foolish romanticist, but I’ve stuck to my points of view and have not regretted it. I said to them “I wasn’t here during any of the past wars and I feel guilty”. My thoughts were that this would be the final war and I did not want to rue the chance of sharing the experience of a close war with my family, friends and neighbours, so I decided on staying in Baghdad and not leaving regardless. Otherwise what is the point in life if they died and I stayed alive? What will I do? It’ll be dull and boring. A person who is present during and experiences a war has a higher/stronger morale than one who lives outside the country and has to hear of the war in the news, then that person is mortified psychologically wondering about the fate of their loved ones. I lived this experience during the first Gulf War as I was living in Amman and I felt impotent and used to cry daily worried about my family and loved ones back in Iraq. But to be present with everyone during the war is a Mercy in the sense that each of us consoles one another and we laugh about what is happening and hoping that we can live to tell our tale. posted by badgerbag 1/17/2004 12:20:00 PM comment combat ready Oh, this is funny... photo sent to me from rj from a long ago paintball game. 1994 maybe. posted by badgerbag 1/17/2004 11:10:00 AM comment Sort of Well, actually, I've had love affairs that started this way. 1984: "C'mon, you know you want to show me how to work the buttons for Flood Control Gate No. 3...*bites earlobe*" 1986: "Log me in again.... No, it's MY turn..." 1990: "Wait, what do I type after chmod?" posted by badgerbag 1/17/2004 12:30:00 AM comment Friday, January 16, 2004 cello bach cello suites are perfect for a headache. nearly all other sounds instantly trigger pain. it is something about the slow attack waveform (?) (vaguely remembering wave shapes from some ancient commodore 64 program in 1982 or 83) I tried some harp music but no way - each note seemed to dig directly into my skull. the cello slides in with no punch to it. i continue picturing myself as a WWI soldier in a muddy foxhole and how miserable that would be and how happy I am really to be here in my soft cushiony bed with my nice family. go, cello! tell me all about it. I'm really bored with my own brain. the thing in there i used to call a brain and now think of as a painfully pulsating gelatinous mass. visit me... knit by the side of my bed... okay well maybe the other side ... wait, on the other side you might find Rook's victoria's secret catalogs or something. How about you knit soothingly at the foot of the bed and toss chocolate at me and amuse me with anecdotes... *** Ah, here is something on attack and decay. posted by badgerbag 1/16/2004 11:46:00 PM comment find proust This would be a great time to finish the first third of remembrance of things past if I could FIND THE BOOK. It's somewhere in here, I was just reading it a few days ago. Could someone come put away all the books in my house so that I can find it?! posted by badgerbag 1/16/2004 08:53:00 PM comment update The doctor called back and went on about the okay CAT scan. "Probably viral meningitis, plus coincidentally strep throat" is our oh so not very reassuring diagnosis. It's better than "probable brain tumor" or "let's run some more neurological tests so we can see if you have MS" which is my real fear. "Keep taking your antibiotics for the strep and just in case it's bacterial." Um? If it could be bacterial, and if there's any doubt, shouldn't I have been in the hospital having that lumbar puncture earlier today? Somehow, all I can feel about the MS thing is a rather vicodined "Oh well, worrying about it doesn't help." WTF, if I didn't worry about everything who would I be? I already went through a giant "fearing I have MS" phase and have imagined my life turning out that way. It would suck in its own unique ways and I would cope, or not, and then would die at whatever point 20 or 25 years from now, which could happen anyway. OH WELL. You know? In the meantime I'll get over my headache and enjoy life once the headache gone. I regret the parties I will be missing this weekend: Iz's 5th birthday, Rob's b-day with many poets, Pascua's baby shower, and the Proust Support Group (Tom Purdue). I do resolve anew to exercise more, drink less soda, eat a few more vegetables. I was doing okay for about a week on the exercise biking every morning. Must go back to it as soon as I am better! posted by badgerbag 1/16/2004 06:10:00 PM comment geek check Ya know, I don't usuallly have the hots for Sedalina at all, at all, she's not my type, but after I read this: So Gandalf has gotta be a Level 21 magic user or something, hey? But he can't even manage a single Magic Missile in ROTK! Instead he's thwacking platemailed orcs with a 1d4 staff. All. Movie. Long. I felt all hot and bothered. Hose me down! That's geek mating talk there! But then she keeps saying "Aragon" and I lose my erection. Dammit! It's "Aragorn"! posted by badgerbag 1/16/2004 05:57:00 PM comment Rat Race ahhh.... i feel the mortgage settling down around my shoulders... but it's locked in at 5.125% just so that everyone knows every gory detail of my life I will go ahead and say the house is (get ready to faint) $725K but that is between 2 families, so 313K each. For living in the bay area in a 3 bedroom house with a yard, 313K is quite amazing - we couldn't even buy a double wide next to the landfill for that much. Co-housing! Long may it live! Our rent was 2250 but Minnie was paying us 500 for the "shack" in the back yard (20 x 20 studio) Once she moved out our landlord lowered the rent to 1950. Now, our new mortgage payments will be under 1600... sounds good... plus property taxes but then minus whatever tax break we get. Plus insurance and earthquake insurance. I feel that I have just gone up to "High Society" in the game of Rat Race. No one I know has ever played this game... though lots have played Careers, my other favorite board game. In Rat Race you start out in the Lower Class which goes all the way around the edge of the board. You get $200 when you pass Go. You must buy or somehow obtain 3 Lower Class Status Symbols which you buy from the other players' businesses... Playing the racetrack is a good way to make money. Once you get a high school diploma and a certain amount of money, you go up to the Middle Class, which is a smaller ring nested inside the outer one. It takes less time to go around the loop and collect your paycheck which is now 1000 bucks. BUT you have the risk of landing on "Divorce" or "Taxes Due" which can really screw all your money out of you. "Divorce" always sends you back to Lower Class. Of course, you must sell off your Lower Class status symbols and buy three new Middle Class status symbols. With your 10,000 and your new university diploma and your status symbols you are ready to move up to High Society where you very quickly collect your 10K paychecks and play the stock market, which is nearly always the way to win the game (first to get 100K wins). I used to love this game, but did not realize how damned funny it was until maybe 10 years ago... why my parents would giggle insanely and why it was their favorite game too. We played it up with high drama especially during those tense stock market moments. posted by badgerbag 1/16/2004 04:52:00 PM comment books lately As I have plenty of time to contemplate my bedside... where the books and used kleenexes are piled... The Marlows and the Traitor by Antonia Forest -- the lighthouse one The Cricket Term by Antonia Forest -- Nicola tries for a scholarship, Lawrie wants to play Caliban The Attic Term by Antonia Forest -- Ginty freaks the hell out and turns into a bad teenager Peter's Room by Antonia Forest -- they all play a sort of RPG based on learning about the Brontes and Gondal/Angria All the above transcend the usual children's book. Possibly the best I've read. I continue thinking about them. Gets into the character's heads incredibly well. Incidentally lovely in language and situations too. I keep comparing myself to the characters and thinking about ways I am like them or unlike them or have behaved or thought in similar ways in the past. Heavy on the personal moral choices and the importance of small incidents. I got a little confused about dates, as it's 1949 or something in the Traitor one and then it seems to jump forward a bit (?) to the 60s or 70s by the time of "Attic Term". I noticed the word "huha" used a lot in Attic Term. It's usually spelled "hooha" in the U.S. and I think it comes from Yiddish. I remember it from the Yiddish Dictionary which I read long ago. Just FYI. The Yiddish Dictionary made great reading. A Mortal Bane by Roberta Gellis -- sucks but not completely unbearable. Whores (one a fallen noblewoman, one blind, one mute, and one retarded, with a deaf servant to round it all out) in medieval England solve a mystery, sort of. Apparently to keep one's house and clothes perfect one only needs a part-time old woman, a little light dusting, and some mending on sundays. The thought of all their laundry! The scrubbing and water-fetching! Sheesh. They're always having sumptuous repasts. Even Pepys and his wife always had a hell of a time doing basic housekeeping. Overexplains and repeats and hammers every point of the "mystery" in case you're a freaking idiot. However this was the most readable of the lot. Never After by Rebecca Lickiss -- sucks nearly unbearably but I read it anyway. Twee princes, princess, witch, wizards, enchanted castle, references to every fairy tale. Overexplains nearly everything. Worst names ever. Yes, naming the witch Urticacea was momentarily funny for those of us that just happen to know it's like, the latin name for stinging nettles, but it's just not that funny. Should make Gail Carson Levine spin madly in her grave, if she dies. Green Rider by Kristen Britain -- I plunged through this (womfully, not manfully) but just had to stop. I couldn't take the awful, awful, clunky writing. Have feeling that J. liked it for its magic system, which could be studied and used as the basis of some novel RPG system. Can't remember the other fantasy book with the stupid as fuck bastard princess and the enslaved ailora. I read it, but with more pain than could have been caused by a headache. At least I could read it all the way through. Rivals by Jilly Cooper. I couldn't take it. Too sexist and dull, dull, dull. Also the britishisms made me itch. Making the american, what do you call her, the fantasy 80s ballbuster hard as nails businesswoman happy to suck cock to get an executive position, in her shoulderpadded power suit inexplicably also a slinky sexy dress, with her flinty sexy anger oh so objectified, very irritating. Um. My point was that the americans keep saying things like "I got sacked from my job. And my job was driving a lorry that delivers nappies." or whatever. things no american would ever, ever in a million years say. The G1ant Horse of Oz - Ruth Plumly thompson. Great, great, great! Very wacky. Yes twee, yes silly, yes very stupid names, yes you know all along that some deus ex machina will rush in, but manages to transcend and in fact parody the whole Oz thing. I also read about 5 other of thompson's Oz books in the last week and they were all funny. *** If you are a kid who happened upon this blog searching on 0z books, or you are easily traumatized, then don't read any further. *** Lust in Leather Just to be brutally honest, here is my favorite bedside book, a bit tatttered and worn, but oh so loved. It has the best stories about hot ranch hands, policemen, prisoners, sailors, and just plain leather scene guys all getting it on brutally in a well-written and well-hung way. Oh yeah! The best one is about a hot guy wearing jeans and no shirt riding some sort of giant stallion around in the rain while smoking a cigarette and admiring the lovely scenery and then he sucks his own dick and realizes he is being watched by some other incredibly hot guy on an opposite-colored sexy stallion, who lassoes him and spanks him. In the rain. How could it be any better? *** Hate to give bad reviews of books that other people kindly sent me! (thanks J. and Iris!) I was greatly, greatly entertained in my hour of need. Honesty will either get me better books, or make them throw up their hands at my ingratitude and not send me anything... posted by badgerbag 1/16/2004 10:56:00 AM comment birdwatching In my dream this morning I was about 6 feet from a giant gnarled oak tree. Pileated woodpeckers were on it, hammering, right next to me. I had no binoculars but if I made fake binoculars with my hands, I could see better. In the grass under the trees a small flock of lazuli buntings was doing a strange mating dance. I called Minnie and told her all about it, "You are never going to believe this, but I'm standing just a few feet from three pileated woodpeckers!" Moomin just brought me a stuffed animal to help me feel better.. Our real estate agent was in the dream too. She kept dragging me around a big city and showing me flats in skyscrapers and getting me to visit her friends to watch TV and have sandwiches. nausea is way less than it was. I look forward to a little coffee. i need more "medicine" as my back all up and down is aching as if somoene had been kicking me all night. Perhaps there is a pea under my 100th mattress. posted by badgerbag 1/16/2004 08:30:00 AM comment Thursday, January 15, 2004 pain very troublesome ate some miso took another half vicodin laying here in dark for a long time pain is very throbby and bad and head swimmy. i even think a little of returning to emerg. room. but ugh! ugh! ugh! for sure i would be cold, and miserable, and incoherent, and they would do a lumbar puncture on me... no... i can't face it... am remembering the delirium of not being able to come out of anesthesia that one time with the shoulder surgery. I had some kind of bad reaction and coming around took me hours and hours. vomiting and intensely miserable sometimes seeing minnie and s.k. for a minute then passing out halfway again. repeating endlessly. trying to talk and not being able to. saying something desperate about wishing someone would turn off the blaring radio rock beats with commercials. finally someone stuck a scopalamine patch behind my ear and it brought me round. I imagine that dying, at its worst, or near its worst, would be that way. If I am dying, please put some soothing headphone music on me okay? Surely it would be better that way than hearing loud hospital staff discuss their Tah0e vacations. i think my head actually feels worse when i am lying down flat. at intervals tongiht i have felt that with a little effort of will i could just make myself be normal. i get up and ghost waiflike into the hallway and stare at rook and moomin. As far as someone of my shape can be waiflike I suppose. "Get in bed!" rook admonishes. I wisp around wishing for things then realize i keep forgetting what i am doing. gingerale? soup? a book? back to bed and the dark. it is comforting to write all this. posted by badgerbag 1/15/2004 11:25:00 PM comment strep Welp... the ham-handed Bulgarian just called me to report lab tests. I have strep again (3rd time recently) They don't know about the other tests yet. Just realized I never replaced all our toothbrushes after having it last time. These people never, ever, think I am sick when I come to their offices... as I get things like strep and don't run a fever. Hardly ever. Plus I think my normal temp is like 97.3 (dimly recalled from those ovulation-tracking days). I'm phasing in and out of functioning over here - 10 minutes on (reading trashy novels J. sent me, or obsessively browsing medline) and then I must turn out all lights and just lie here bored as hell. posted by badgerbag 1/15/2004 09:08:00 PM comment drugs (sing to O Tannenbaum) O Vicodin, O Vicodin! Thy powers are so mighty! O Vicodin, O Vicodin! Thy powers are so mighty! You are a cure for every ill, Oh white and legal happy pill, O Vicodin, O Vicodin! Thy powers are so mighty. The smoothness of your guiltless high, sings me a restful lullaby... Okay I'll stop that now. Pain is now down from oh, around 8.5 to maybe 6.5 on the ever useful Mankoski Pain Scale. I might have whimpered a little from the effort not to vomit in the hospital but actually I thought I was quite brave. And I was not keening! I did cry a whole bunch with relief when I got to lie down on that gurney and the room stopped spinning and the nurse gently laid warmed blankets on top of me. Being wheeled about was making me want to hurl but at least I could think only about not vomiting instead of (with walking) not vomiting plus not falling over. I have no idea what the inside of that hospital looks like as both times I've been there I kept my eyes firmly closed. Light is still hurting my eyes. When I close them my head throbs with weird rings of light that keep coming at me much like a bad animation of going into hyperspace. Am very tired of these unwanted "visuals" Immensely comforting to have someone there with me in the hospital so i was not at the mercy of indifferent staff. the anti nausea pills work wonders. I liked the random dr. I got but he might be on crack. He did all these semi cheesy neuro tests on me, squeeze fingers, push, pull, eyes, etc He seemed to think possibilities are migraine with random odd giant throat infection "which may have infected your nervous system" (huh? I think he meant "meningitis" but was avoiding big words) Or, "you can get migraines from having a virus" or "you have all the classic symptoms of an aneurysm" I can't believe he said that, was I hallucinating? Plus, I think aneurysm would be super sudden and I'd like, keel over and it would be really obvoius...I mentioned that, but he still insisted on the cat scan and made hm hmming noises about year-ago bout of vertigo. Am also on some sort of horse pill of an antibiotic for the throat thing. I wonder if I have strep again? Also, does "having a stiff neck" mean that, like, it's unmovable, as if you had developed rigor mortis? Or just that it feels stiff and painful to move? And how sudden is "sudden onset"? I argued with the Dr. that I felt crappy for a whole day and then the headache developed over an afternoon. He kept saying "the sudden onset is particularly disturbing" Also asked me about 6 times if I had been feeling dizzy. Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, and yes, I have been and am extremely dizzy. Also, why did no one take my blood pressure? dosen't that seem fucking stupid? Curiously I feel no panic or aneurysms or MS, but a certainty that I will be haunted by yet another random chronic hysteria-type illness, ie migraines, that is merely incredibly annoying and will make me spend days in bed moaning with wet facecloths on my head At least with the drugs I can open my eyes and read a bit. Computer screen on super-dim. I was happy to hear that in E.'s "history book on the 1980s" there was mention of the movie "Back to the future 3". Oh, crucial! Tried to explain to her what meninges are. As I didn't really know myself, I don't think I was too successful. posted by badgerbag 1/15/2004 04:57:00 PM comment

Ranting, complaining, speculating, confessing from Badgerbag in an extended Crossing the Line ceremony. Past current