Suddenly, A BLOG

Yeah, yeah, it's been a week. Whatever. We've been busy. Doing what? Well ...

This, for one thing. Getting our picture taken with Santa. That takes up almost a whole half hour of a Saturday afternoon, sometimes. And this, also.

Because, you know, posing in front of the mall Santaland decorations takes up a whole 'nother maybe two minutes and ten seconds. Plus there was this.

Which was, incidentally, accompanied by a visit to both a visit to the urgent care center and a follow-up visit to the pediatrician because someone -- and I am not naming names here, but perhaps it might have been Shae -- got sick again. And also this happened.

Yeah, I know you don't really care about pictures that don't involve my kid, but I put that arrangement together and I am very proud of it. Shut up. Oh, and!

We found a Christmas dress. This outfit also features a pair of killer black suede knee-high boots that look make Shae look really awesome and also VERY MUCH LIKE A GROWN UP OH MY GOD MAKE IT STOP. Although watching her attempt to figure out how to work fingerless gloves -- and what the point of them is -- was highly comical.

Oh, and there was also that whole thing about apply and then actually getting into graduate school, because I have gone completely around the bend.

So, yeah, we've been busy.

Desperation Samba

It is a truth universally acknowledged that the week before the week before vacation is the worst week of the entire year. I can't put my clothes in the suitcase, because I haven't changed my mind about what I want to pack enough times yet. I can't really switch to autopilot at work, because there are still projects and deadlines that need to be met before I go. And I can't really go grocery shopping, because if I do, and we don't eat every. single. thing. in the house before we leave, then you just know that while we're away we'll have a major electrical storm and my house will be without power for 4 days and the basement will flood and the toilet will overflow and everything in the fridge and the freezer will spoil and we'll get rats and bugs and squatters and looting and our home will be condemned and we'll have to live in our cars or even worse -- WE'LL NEED TO MOVE IN WITH MY MOTHER.

So this week we're doing what I like to call the "desperation samba," a very carefully choreographed dance that involves cleaning out the current provisions and making meals out what basically amounts to random crap in my freezer and cupboards. Mysterious baggies of ground meat. Baked beans of unverifiable provenance. Canned soup out the wazoo. Cereal and PB&J for supper, with sides of creamed corn and freezer-burned lima beans. I mean, yes, we'll go to the store for absolute essentials, like milk and bread and the occasional fruit or vegetable, but my husband is under very strict orders should that unfortunate eventuality occur: quarts of milk only, smallest loaves of bread you can find, only three ears of corn. Our biggest splurge in the last two weeks was buying two pounds on strawberries last Sunday, and we did that only because, hey, we really like strawberries in our house, and I knew they'd get eaten.

I will say this much: doing this? Living like complete savages? It takes a lot of cojones, and confidence in your own cooking abilities. I like to think of myself as a better-than-average home cook, and I pride myself on my ability to make a meal out of basically anything, provided that I have access to basic herbs, spices, and bouillon cubes. But making meals out of scavenged foodstuffs is part skill, part alchemy, part divination, part illusion, and part faith, with a big heaping swig of ballsiness thrown in: "Oh, yes, you WILL eat what I am feeding you."

This is the kind of wackaloony stuff I've served to my actual family this week for dinner:

• Browned loose sweet Italian sausage with chopped onions and canned diced tomatoes, served over elbow macaroni that was tossed with butter and Parmesan cheese
• Thawed package of pre-cooked chicken with a sell-by date of November 2009, with some kind of noodly stuff
• Zucchini gratin -- sliced zucchini sauteed with olive oil and Italian seasoning, with toasted breadcrumbs and Parmesan cheese added
• Frosted mini-wheats cereal

I mean, yeah, this is totally a first-world problem -- "oh, poor poor pitiful me, I am serving my family food that we bought maybe two weeks ago but that we had to properly store in the refrigerator or freezer until we got around to using it" -- and it's more than partly my own fault since I'm such a cheapskate, but still. When was the last time you served chicken to your kid that had been in the freezer for 8 months? I just don't want to waste money on stuff that will just sit around while I am laughing it up at the beach, and I don't want to take two chicken breasts if I don't have enough to share with everyone.

Now do you see why I worry about drinking?

Dangerously Clever

It's been kind of boring up in this joint lately, what with the winter and the weather and the whatever. So we're getting creative. Improvising. Just the other day Shae decided to do a little treasure hunting, wherein she basically emptied her toybox ...

... and decided to make herself a boat.

Sorry, excuse me, it was a "yacht." I don't know why my 3-year-old even knows the word "yacht," let alone that there is a difference between a yacht and a really big boat, but she does. I blame global warming, public television, and cheese.

We are finding her toys in the weirdest places, like her pants pockets and, for some reason, the bathtub. I mean, there's nothing wrong with Mrs. Godzilla taking a bath once in a while, but who looks at a pink plastic dinosaur and says, "Hey, excellent idea, let's take this in the tub!"

It's even stranger to watch her in the tub "making dinner" for this dinosaur out of bubbles and water, and trying to feed it with a measuring spoon. Yes, I think plastic measuring spoons make perfectly reasonable tub toys. Don't you judge me. (We practice our colors.)

She's also decided to do a little redecorating by moving her little papasan chair so she can get a better view of the TV.

It was a very busy weekend, don't you think?

2009: The Obligatory Navel-Gazing Year In Review

Apparently it's part of the Union Rules for Bloggers to do one of these here look-back post thingies. And so I perused my 2009 archives for something to write about or some way to encapsulate everything that happened, and I basically keep coming back to this line from The Princess Bride: "Let me explain. No, there is too much. Let me sum up." Ha ha! Get it? Because I never shut up?

Anyway. Originally I asked my husband to poke through my archives for the past year and pick out one post from each month that he thought was pretty good so I can do up a Year-In-Review-Kind-Of-Something, but that did not work out as I had hoped, which is to say AT ALL, so basically you're stuck with this self-edited list of "My Best of 2009" and as you know if you read my blog every day or at all -- I am not very good at the whole self-editing thing.

• January -- 25 Things
• February -- Snowbird
• March -- Three Little Words 
• April -- (tie) Wordless Wednesday: Hallelujah and Just Like Starting Over
• May -- Sweet Caroline 
• June -- (tie) White Hot Spotlight and A River Runs Through It
• July -- Sisters Are Doin' It For Themselves 
• August -- Who-ly McWhat? 
• September -- WTF!? Friday: September Already?
• October -- A Very Merry Un-Birthday 
• November -- A Week of Thanks: Day 7 
• December -- Brown Paper Packages Tied Up With Strings 

So. Sorry that I can't count to 12, but I guess you can count those two extra links as "bonus material" on the special edition DVD that was the past year. That's 2009, in a nutshell. Our year didn't suck as much as it did for many other people -- in fact, it was pretty damned good. The adoption was final, we celebrated our 10-year anniversary, and I somehow managed to turn 35 without having myself committed over it. Sure, we had our share of crud, like my husband losing his job and being out of work for 6+ months and the ongoing intermittent bouts of self-doubt, but really, we are luckier than a whole lot of people, because we have each other. And if you don't have each other, what's the point, really?

Coming up in 2010: The First Family Wedding Of The New Decade! More Pictures! A Kind Of Hybrid Project 365 Kind Of Thing If I Ever Get Around To Starting It! Still More Pictures! Possibly A Book Club Which Might End Up Related To My Hybrid Project365 Thing That I Haven't Decided Whether Or Not I'm Going To Start! Even More Pictures! Naps! And Yet More Pictures!

Please stay tuned.

Hot for Teacher

(Oh God, this one of those stupid walls of text: sorry.)

Photo from Panoramio.

That's a picture of Cottingham Stadium, "Home of the Red Rovers." This was supposed to be a "WTF!? Friday" about high school football. But while I was looking for pictures of the stadium, and then my high school, and then people I went to high school with, somewhere along the way I took a very sharp left turn and ended up discovering through my awesome Google-fu (and also patience, as this information was buried several pages deep in the links) that one of my very favorite teachers from high school is now a visiting faculty member at Wilkes University.

This doesn't surprise me in the least -- when I think back on his class (which was actually 8th grade, not technically high school, and perhaps that makes this story better, in a way), I always remember how much smarter he always seemed than any of my other teachers. Although I could not have possibly known it at the time, having never seen the movie (because I was a good girl and also I don't think we had a VCR, and I know for sure that we didn't have HBO), this teacher was very much Donald-Sutherland-in-Animal-House, albeit without the drugs ... I think. He certainly never encouraged me to use any, for whatever that is worth.

One thing I remember is how he loved shaking up the "establishment" of Enriched kids. This teacher used to change his seating chart every 5 weeks, based on your placement in the class. Students with better grades ended up in the back of the room, and the ones who needed more help were in the front. I transferred into his class two weeks into the marking period, so I ended up in the front by default, which is where all these "gifted" kids who had known each other since elementary school thought I belonged. I was practically a foreigner to them, and they all thought I was beneath them (especially the girl who would eventually become the Salutatorian of our class, who quite frankly I never thought was anything less than a bitch, anyway -- funny how the uber-religious turn out like that, isn't it?).

Anyway. I was only in class for three weeks before the seating change. Other students in the class used to snigger at me when I had to diagram sentences on the chalkboard, because rather than just do what I was asked, I always had follow-up questions: what if there is a semi-colon? what if that "if" is changed to "when"? wouldn't it just make more sense to turn this mess into two separate sentences, instead of this compound-complex monstrosity with passive voice and verb tense problems? The other kids hated it -- secretly I think most of the time they had NO IDEA what I was talking about -- but I know my teacher loved it.

Which is why he made a Very Big Deal out of the fact that, when he did the first classroom re-org in October, I ended up in the far back corner, the seat reserved for "Patient Zero," as he called me. I stayed in that seat for the entire rest of the school year, which just about pissed everyone right off.

That was the point at which I decided that these people might have more money than me, and they might be prettier than me, and they might have more friends and fancier pedigrees and maybe they might even actually be better than me, but by God: I was fucking smarter than all these bitches.

So I suppose you can see why I haven't been to a high school reunion yet. Been out of high school for 17 years, and I am still bitter.

Oh, what did I learn in that class? Don't remember. We read Great Expectations and Jonathan Livingston Seagull and wrote papers on the meaning of life (mine was "live well, laugh often, love much"). Mostly I recall this teacher very fondly because he was the first adult who treated me, even at 13 years old, like a Person with Potential and not just some punk kid. He empowered me, demanded that I work harder and be smarter and think different, and even though I can't always put an exact finger on what he taught me, I still can tell you exactly what his greatest lesson was:

Girl? You are fucking awesome, and don't ever let anyone tell you otherwise, because you and I? We know the Truth.

And when I have those days when I want to quit my crappy cubicle job, when I get disgusted because my scratch-and-win early retirement plan isn't working, and when I think about what I want to do "when I grow up," when I am ready to have a job that my daughter and my husband can be proud of me for?

On those days, I want to be an 8th grade English teacher, just like Mr. Grier. Because he stepped in and saved me before it was too late, and I can't think of any better want to repay the favor than to be just like him.

Pigheaded

This just in from the CDC and the WHO: we're fucked.

Stories about the swine flu are everywhere, of course, what with half the world suddenly dropping dead all around us, and the other half developing a bizarre and inexplicable unquenchable zombie-like hunger for baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaacon!

I don't really watch the news any more, but I do listen to NPR on my way into work, and Morning Edition spent a good chunk of today's broadcast covering the developing pandemic; on their homepage there are eight different stories about it, covering everything from school shutdowns, Kathleen Sebelius and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, and an uptick in crime in relation to the outbreak.

So in case you've been living under a rock, I reiterate: we're fucking fucked.

As a hypochondriac, this is possibly my worst nightmare. Do you know what the symptoms of swine flu are? According to a handy webpage from the CDC cheerfully entitled "Swine Influenza and You," like they're trying to sell you on the benefits of a new deep freezer or something:

What are the signs and symptoms of swine flu in people?
The symptoms of swine flu in people are similar to the symptoms of regular human flu and include fever, cough, sore throat, body aches, headache, chills and fatigue. Some people have reported diarrhea and vomiting associated with swine flu. In the past, severe illness (pneumonia and respiratory failure) and deaths have been reported with swine flu infection in people. Like seasonal flu, swine flu may cause a worsening of underlying chronic medical conditions.

Let me repeat that for emphasis: "The symptoms of swine flu in people are similar to the symptoms of regular human flu." So, basically, that plague I had for the past week or so? The coughing, congestion, upset stomach, tiredness, and general malaise? SWINE FLU. I could be dead in a week. I hope my life insurance is paid up.

That's what makes the combination of hypochondria and internet access so dangerous. I made joking references last week to possibly having emphysema and West Nile virus and Legionnaire's disease and asbestosis and an aortic aneurysm, knowing full well that I didn't actually have these things. What I had, I thought, was a bad cold.

Until I found out that I actually have the fucking swine flu. I don't know how I got it -- I haven't been to Mexico lately, I haven't been around anyone who's been to Mexico lately, and I don't even think I've been around many Mexicans. Well, my husband, but unless he's been doing something he isn't supposed to have been doing, he didn't give it to me. Maybe it's been dormant since we visited Tulum? Back in 2006?

In any case: I just want you all to know how much I love you. Please make sure that Shae is well-provided for; the insurance money should more than cover her tuition at Berkeley in 16 more years if it is invested well. My favorite flowers are peace roses, purple irises, and Gerbera daisies (especially pinks, peaches, and yellows). Bury me in red, and play lots of loud and inappropriate music at my funeral.

Until then, if you need me, I'll be over here in my hole, whimpering and eating BLT's.

Free Advice

Let's just say, hypothetically, not that any of this actually happened to anyone we know or anything like that, but let's just suppose it's a rainy Monday, and you are feeling some vague sense of ennui, and maybe perhaps also an inexplicably strong urge to spring clean. Not your house, of course, because nothing short of a nuclear air strike is going to help that disaster area.

But maybe you find yourself thinking: "Hey, I've heard good things about XX blogging platform, so maybe I'll randomly decide at like 2:00 in the afternoon to take three years or so worth of content and just switch over to there," even though there is absolutely nothing wrong with the blog you already have except for maybe you're a little bored with the background color.

I'm going to repeat that, for emphasis: THERE IS NOTHING WRONG WITH WHAT YOU'RE ALREADY DOING. It's fine, just ... meh. And you're insane, have we mentioned that part yet?

You know that old cliché about how if it ain't broke, then don't fix it? Yeah. There's a reason why it's a hackneyed old adage, and that is because it is damned fine advice. If you read my tweets you'll see that I rather quickly came to the conclusion that "blogging like a grown-up" is not fucking worth the hassle. Christ on a whole-grain cracker.

So anyway ... I'm going to be sprucing a few things up around here. As soon as I commit to a new background, I'll change it, and I'm going update the "Cupcake Cam" over there in the sidebar, but despite my intentions to the contrary, I'm not going anywhere. Except crazy, but we already knew that.

PS -- In case you were wondering: I didn't tell anybody I was thinking about this, because I wasn't, not really. It was totally a last-minute game-time decision that seemed like it might have been a good idea in the moment. Which, as it turns out, it was NOT. Epic fail. So anyway, if this brief flirtation with another blog host is news to you, you're not alone. I'm a nutbar. Just ignore me.

PPS -- Added at 8:57 AM -- Apparently I managed to break something in Flickr and some of my pictures are not showing correctly now. Sorry about that. It's a long story that I don't really have time to get into now. And to be honest, I'm not really sure that I could explain it anyway. Hello, me = Luddite, haven't we already had this conversation? If a picture is borked, you can still click on it and see it in my photostream, but to see them in my blog directly, I'm going to have to fix something, and ... I don't know how, exactly, yet. Working on it.

PPPS -- Added at 9:08 AM -- Jumping Jesus on a pogo stick. Every one of the fixes needs to be done manually. FUCKING MANUALLY. !!!!! Next time you even SUSPECT that I might be thinking about touching my blog or my Flickr settings, smack me in the goddamn head.

Afterglow

Snow day today. I had a scheduled day off anyway -- it's my "bonus" for working 30 hours of unpaid overtime during the year-end close -- so I am unfazed by the 2" of snow we got overnight, followed by sleet right now, eventually turning into rain later in the day. I'm keeping the Cupcake home with me and we're going to watch cartoons and play video games and eat junk food all day long, as God intended.

We're trying something new today -- Playhouse Disney. Normally we watch "Dora" and "Blue's Clues" and "Jack's Big Music Show" and "Gabba" and "Sesame Street" and one of our new favorites, "Ni Hao, Kai-Lan." But today we are watching (or at least for now we are watching) whatever is on Playhouse Disney. "Little Einsteins" and "My Friends Tigger and Pooh" so far. Not bad, although I will always and forever prefer the Ernest Shepard illustrations of the Hundred Acre Wood characters to any newfangled versions.

So, yeah. Not much going on today. AWESOME. Further bulletins as events warrant. Hopefully we'll be able to get in some photo ops.

iPhone iFirst iPhoto

Sad but true fact: this is one of the first pictures I took with my Christmas present, an iPhone. Less than two seconds, with no special light settings or enhancements or anything. I think that, for a throwaway snapshot, this one is pretty damn good.

Which means either (1) my regular camera is junk or (2) I am a terrible photographer or (3) how in the holy hell did I live without this thing for so long? (The iPhone, not the tree.)

News at Eleven

I really have nothing going on right now. Seriously. It's weird. Normally on a day absent drama I can manufacture some, but I just don't have the energy or the wherewithal right now. Perhaps that is news, or perhaps not. I don't know.

I mean, everything is the same and nothing is different. My job still bores me to tears many days even though I love it. World of Warcraft still holds more of my attention than it ought. The holiday shopping is still not done, although I am getting little things here and there, in fits and spurts, but I'm surprisingly Zen about it this year. Like, whatever, it will get done when it gets done. We had snow flurries earlier today, and they are calling for a chance of snow showers for tomorrow.

If I didn't know better I would say that I am right about to hit the Holiday Funk, and that it would be time to bust open the recreational pharmaceuticals (by which I mean Claritin, Tylenol PM, and some old Prozac that I never finished and which is probably expired anyway), but this?

This makes me so, so happy to be alive.

Epic Fail

So, I've given up on "winning" NaNoWriMo this year. Or maybe any year, but mostly this year. You may have noticed that the little picture is missing from the sidebar, or maybe you haven't. I don't particularly care one way or the other, which is kind of how I got myself into this mess.

I thought it would be a good idea -- and I still totally do, only it's not a good idea for me. For other people, definitely. In the beginning I thought there was some hope. The purpose of NaNoWriMo is to write 50,000 words in 30 days, which comes out to about a 175-page novel. Not necessarily supposed to be good, just complete.

For the first three days I was very diligent, and I got to 5,208 words, or roughly 10% of the way through. About what you'd expect. And ... then the election happened, and then something else, and then I dinged 70 on my Mage, and then I got caught up in that one episode of that show with the thing, and then I realized I was bored, and then I got to this point, which is where I give the hell up, call myself a loser, and never think of this again.

On the plus side: now nobody is ever going to have to read my novel where a character based more or less loosely on myself drives a car into the "Weston-Peterborough" bonfire and almost burns down the high school. Because believe me: it was going to be stupid. No sex, no good drugs, and very little rock and roll.

... Now What?

I have the day off and I'm not sure what to do with myself. Seriously. And it's weird.

I mean, there are things I need to do today, and some of them are already getting done. Took Cupcake to school because they are making grass skirts out of sheets, and they were supposed to have a magician, although when I left they said that there was actually going to be a clown instead. Good luck with that, guys! Clowns creep me right the fuck out, and I couldn't get out of the building fast enough.

Already ran the dishwasher, and as soon as it's done drying I'll empty it and fill it back up again. Load #1 of approximately 838 is in the washer now. The first 75 loads or so are going to be sheets, blankets, and towels, because one or more of the cats is being bitchy lately, and they've peed on the bed like three times in the last two weeks. We are literally out of clean sheets -- the ones on the bed now are it. Last night we used this Garfield (!!!) comforter that I believe was G's when he was like 9 years old.

There are about eleventy metric tons of clean laundry upstairs to be folded and put away, and I'll get some of that done, but we are pretty much out of closet space as it is, so not everything is going to find a home. Not sure exactly what I'm going to do about that. I have to go through Cupcake's clothes, too, and start boxing up stuff that I know doesn't fit her any more. We'll hold on to the good stuff for my sister, in case Boba turns out to be Bobette, and the rest of the stuff will get donated.

But ... then what? It's only 9:30 and already I am bored. The house is so quiet it's bizarre. It's a cool day so I turned off the air conditioner and opened the window, and there is no rattle and hum of major appliances. Since Cupcake's at school there is no giggling or screaming of shrieking of Muppets. Even the cats are quiet. I'll spend at least a few hours blowing some shit up, but I can't imagine doing that until 4:00 when G and the baby get home.

I ... miss my reality television.

Little Person Update

... and this time, it's not about the baby. Last time I updated anyone on my WoW main, she was a level 28, just a weensy little thing trying to find her way in the world. Now, she is a level 56, practically an old salt, with powers the likes of which you cannot hardly believe. In some areas, I have the ability to kill creatures with my bare hands. My herbalism and alchemy skills are as high as they can get without going to Outland, which will be happening soon -- I just need to get a little bit higher level. I spend a lot of time exploring the map on the back of "Gilda the Robochicken," a/k/a my [Red Mechanostrider]. I speak in "code" so that I know what it means when stuff is in square brackets with blue lettering, and I have not only become an Officer in my Guild, but I am also the Webmaster.

Or, in short, I have become an even bigger nerdo than ever, thanks for asking. And if not for the baby, I'd be a level 70 already: so thanks, kiddo, for saving Mommy some grief.

Progress Report

I don't know when this turned into my officially-unofficial World of Warcraft blog, but since that's pretty much my only hobby these days (goddamned writers' strike!), there you go. According to Xfire, I've spent 22 hours in the past 7 days playing WoW, which is horrifying in so many ways. But I'll be the first to admit that I just love vaporizing giant creepy spiders. Again: surprisingly therapeutic.

At this point I am a Level 28 Gnome Mage. Since my last report, I have joined a guild -- well, actually, two of them. My first guild ("The Yummy Muffins," tee hee) was absorbed by a newer, bigger guild ("Beguile") with more high-level players. My guild leader played "Pimp My Mage" with me yesterday and outfitted me with a whole bunch of improved armor. Of course, I still have 3x as much mana as health, but things are slowly improving.

Oh, and now I have a crown. So I am happy.

Yeah, I pretty much have no life any more, but I am OK with it, for a change. Although I still can't use Flamestrike in real life, which continues to be a gigantic disappointment.

PS -- Yeah, that's a mage with a sword. Because I am that much awesome. Mai skillz, let me sho u dem.

Phenomenal Cosmic Powers

So, I've been playing a lot of World of Warcraft lately, which explains why I haven't been blogging much: I've been too busy dying a multitude of horrid miserable deaths in far-off imaginary lands at the hands of a host of assorted gruesome creatures, including giant hairy spiders, tunnel rat vermin, these things called "troggs" that look awfully like some of the salespeople I support, and squirrels. (Well, OK, technically the squirrels haven't killed me, but I know they want to. Squirrels are evil and I hate them. They have too damn much power.)

Even though I heckled G for years about his on-line gaming, I've found it very easy to get sucked into WoW. This is probably primarily because of the character I've created, who is -- let's just face it -- so many kinds of awesome. She's a gnome mage, which means she's about 3' tall with purple pigtail puffs and she's totally action-packed with magical superpowers. No leprechaun, this chick: she could completely kick your ass while you were telling her how cute she is and patting her on the head.

Of course, one of the reasons I like playing with this character so much is because I envy and admire her. She is still a "baby" in relative game terms (Level 16, out of 70, and with hardly anything fully learned yet, although I am becoming quite the virtual bassmistress, thankyouverymuch), but she has skills and abilities that I really wish I could have in real life. I mean, it's hard enough to be fighting against the forces of evil, asshattery, and stupidity every day -- and not necessarily in that order, either -- and while it would not automatically be any easier to fight the good fight with magic, it would certainly be more interesting. To wit:

Flamestrike. A spell my mage has that does damage to all enemies within a certain radius. I would love to use this on those days when everything converges on me at once -- emails, phone calls, retarded questions that I have already answered 847,000 times, lame jokes from my cube neighbor, etc. When I hit my breaking point, I could just channel the spell, scorch the earth around me, lay waste to everything in my path, and then go have a cigarette and some Spiced Wolf Meat and regenerate.

Frostbolt. Another spell, which causes enemies to slow down, giving you time to cast additional damaging spells before the bad guys can hit you. I like to think of it as a sort of forced "stop and think" -- like, when I have people arguing with me about why they think something is wrong even when I know it isn't, I could stun them with this spell and then use the slowdown period to hit them with a massive logic bomb and explain why they're giant flaming moron assholes and I am right and they should shut the hell up already.

Polymorph. Oh my ears and whiskers, one of my very favorite spells, even though I don't use it quite as much any more, now that I am levelling up and getting more health and magic powers. This spell is kind of ... ultra-extreme evasive maneuvers for total chickenshits, which lets you turn enemies into sheep for a short time so you can run away (screaming optional). I already know on whom I would use this spell most frequently: my "favorite" salesperson who insists on referring to me by my initials and never by my name oh my heavens such HAAAAATE. (And I can make a very cozy home in the janitor's closet.)

Of course, knowing these fantastic powers exist in WoW and not IRL certainly makes it more difficult for me to get through most days. I have replaced my sincere desire to stab people in the head with a mechanical pencil and make off with their wallets with the sincere desire to Fireball the hell out of them and then loot them for copper and quest items, which is progress of a sort, I guess, but it still suggests that I need to wait a little longer for the mood stabilizers to take full effect.

And also: all the Gnomeregan engineering in the world cannot gerryrig my company's systems into working correctly.

Miscellaneous Memory: Inspired by "Lay Your Hands on Me" by Bon Jovi

In October of 1988, when I was in 8th grade at Shawnee Intermediate School in Easton, Pa., I got caught passing a stack of papers to Christy Miller after French class. It was our French teacher, Mrs. Shelosky -- she of the freaky rutabaga obsession and the "vim, vigor, vitality, Geritol" cathchphrase -- who snagged us. We were on our way out of the room, on our way to wherever we were going next, when she stopped us.

Christy had the papers in her hand. We were asked what it was and we both stammered. I don't remember what we said we were doing, but I know we had a French vocab test coming up, and I'm sure that Shelosky thought we were trying to cheat somehow. We weren't, of course -- I didn't become Queen of the Nerds under false pretenses or through subterfuge. But we couldn't exactly own up to anything, either, because ...

... well, what I had given Christy was about 20 handwritten pages for a "book" that we were working on. And by "working on," I mean that I was writing it, and she was the editor, or whatever you call the person who makes you do all the heavy lifting and then stands back and admires your handiwork. At any rate, we were both terrified, because this "book" that we were "working on," what Mrs. Shelosky had intercepted, was: SMUT.

There's no other way to put it, really. Long ago and far away, back before I ever had a boyfriend unless Bill Sauerhauffer counts -- and I don't think he does because our entire "relationship" was limited to passing notes during 7th grade study hall and once (!!) sitting next to each other in the auditorium during play practice when neither of us was on stage -- before I ever kissed a boy or held his hand or anything else, I was attempting to become the next Catherine Coulter.

For the record, I don't think there's anything wrong with bodice-rippers. I mean, they're not real or anything, but they're certainly a better way to pass the time than, say, trying to have a séance in the rec room and almost setting the entire house on fire, or cooking meth in the basement, or anything like that. And they're definitely amusing, because where else are you going to learn clever euphemisms like "quivering turgid manhood"?

Back then, in 8th grade, when I was bored senseless all the time and so I was reading everything in the house including the backs of cereal boxes and of course every single book my mother brought into the house -- well, Jackie Collins novels were not exactly on the list of recommended reading for school, but that didn't stop me. I had made my way through practically the entire "historical romance" section of the Palmer Library, since even then I did not have a life of which to speak.

But of course having my parents' permission to read that stuff did not mean that they ever expected me to write it. Certainly not because I was a good Catholic girl. And most certainly not at that age. Not that they would have had anything to worry about at that point, because even though I was writing amateur soft-core porn, it was terrible amateur soft-core porn, and anyway, my character wasn't the slutty one. (Yes, even in fiction, I was still a virgin.)

I actually stopped writing for a little while after getting caught, because I spent 24 hours worrying about what kind of trouble Christy and I were going to be in, and while I figured I could reconcile what I did with my parents -- "Look, it's only a book, it's not real" -- I had no idea how I was going to explain myself to the 8th grade principal, Mr. Kish. I didn't have to worry about that, though, because instead of reporting us to anybody, Mrs. Shelosky just asked when she was going to get the next chapter.

Eww.

One of my super-secret mental illnesses, one of the so very many I have but definitely one of the less visible, is my absolute love -- LOVE! -- for wrapping presents.

Yes, really.

No, I am not making this up.

Although I've never talked to a therapist about it (because, let's face it, the fact that I am a Type-A paranoid borderline schizophrenic with half an Electra complex, inappropriate rage issues and an obsession with LOLspeek tends to take up a lot of lot of time on the couch), I believe this is part of the reason why I start shopping for Christmas presents so early, and why I buy so many.

It might be part of the reason why I became a retail terrorist, hunting high and low for the absolute best bargains anywhere, so I can get the most things for the least amount of money, so there are more things to adorn with shiny paper, curling ribbon, gift tags, and 47 metric tons of Scotch tape. (When the Grinch looks down on Who-ville and notices that Christmas "came without packages, boxes, and bags?" I always think, deep down in my heart, that this is bullshit, because while I believe that World Peace is a beautiful thing, I am also smart enough to know that it's even more beautiful with a little bit of sequins and a gift tag.)

And if you know me even in passing, you're probably vaguely aware that I am something of a grown-up Garanimal: everything must match. So it will come as a surprise to approximately no one that I spent more than a hour in a T.J. Maxx store back in October, trying to find three rolls of gift wrap that matched this year's wrapping theme. (Note also that I was doing this in a store where I wouldn't have to pay full retail.)

When I'm shopping, I am often drawn to gifts that come in weird, strange, odd, or oversize packages, so that I can challenge myself when I wrap them. Wrapping is not an obligation to me, a traditional formality; I believe that it is the thought that counts, and I want the thought to be: "I care enough about you to fold this paper with hospital corners and match the patterns and tape every single seam and make you earn this present, dammit."

Of course, the problem with this is that I go through something that is maybe like postpartum depression when people open their stuff. I watch them tear into everything that I took such time and care to prepare. Not because I am afraid that they won't like their gifts -- sometimes I honestly believe I might not even care about that. But because I put a lot of work into wrapping those things, and I want my family and friends to stop for a second and say, "Hey, wow, this really looks too pretty to open." Admire my craftsmanship. Call me an artist.

And then: gimme gimme gimme. Pass the loot. Because even crazy people like presents, you know?

This Mid-Life Crisis Moment is being brought to you by the letters E, A, H, and S, and by the numbers 92 and 15.

So ... 15 years, 4 months, and 11 days ago, I graduated from high school. I was 18 at the time, which makes me 33 years old now. (Remember that for the next time you hear someone ask me how old I am, because odds are I won't be telling that person the truth. Usually, I round up and say I am "almost 40," so people will tell me how good I look -- "ohmigod, you don't look 40!" To which I humbly but nonetheless knowingly reply, "Thanks." Because I am vain and selfish and I will get my compliments however I can; I don't look like I'm almost 40. Because I am not. It's a weird ethical calculus, I guess, but in my head it makes sense. Yes, I know I am kind of a jerk that way, but being smart and being jerky are not binary conditions. But I am digressing.)

I have been poking around, and it doesn't look like my class has a reunion scheduled before the end of the year. Those people suck. For some reason, this comes as a great disappointment to me. To be perfectly frank, the odds of my voluntarily attending my high school reunion are approximately equal to the odds of me getting myself sperminated by Josh Beckett anyone who isn't my husband. Which is to say, about (∞-1)ⁿ against. (Definitely take the under on that one, boys and girls.) I know I am fifteen years removed from the alleged so-called end of my adolescence, but let's face it: I am still bitter. High school sucked hard, and I don't like remembering it if I don't have to.

Just the same, I am disappointed that there doesn't appear to be anything going on. Paranoid schizophrenic sociopath that I am, I can't help but wonder if this is some kind of personal affront. I didn't go to the last reunion either -- I was even more bitter and crazy then than I am now. What if I missed out on a crucial memo or something? What if all the cocktail napkins had some top-secret password on them that I am supposed to enter into a special website where I can download all the specs of the mission? How am I supposed to know what is going on?

These feelings are weird, even to me, because I am not really all that interested in what everyone else is doing. I went through that not that long ago (OK, wow, a year ago already?), and it took me to a very ugly and unpleasant place that I am not particularly interested in visiting right now. But when I have to think about high-school-related events that I plan to avoid, it makes me think about high-school-related events that I would like to relive, and it makes me kind of sad to realize that there really aren't that many of them.

Essentially -- and I mean zero disrespect to anyone who actually knew me in high school -- my entire highlight reel of high school looks like this:

Greece. 1992. April, I think. In this picture are, left to right, Ellyson Stout, Analia Regina, me, and Vivian Schoeppner. (Not pictured is the 100 lbs. or so that I have gained since then, but don't worry -- it's mostly boobs and anyway, I carry it well. Shut up.) In the background is the Acropolis. That is one of the bluest skies that I have ever seen, before or since. Even with all the smog, the noise and the pollution and the zillions of people, I can't remember anything ever smelling so sweet. Freedom. The whole wide world, laid out in front of me, and I was going to take it on, guns blazing. I was going to be a sportscaster, dammit! I was going to do play-by-play on Monday Night Football, ferchrissakes.

Wait ... I was pissed because those people suck? Hmm. Guess I'm the sucker.

THIS PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT IS BEING BROUGHT TO YOU BY THE LETTERS "ABC," "CBS," "NBC," "FOX," "USA," "CW," "E!," and "TiVo"

Dear friends, family, Romans, countrymen, etc.:

It is television premiere season, and for the next month or so, on Monday through Friday nights, between the hours of 8 and 11 pm ET, I will be mostly unavailable because I will be (choose one of the options below) —

[__] Checking out the season premieres of my old favorite TV shows
[__] Checking out the series premieres of my new favorite TV shows
[__] Geeking out over the awesomeness of the new TV season
[__] Snarking about the complete crapitude of the new TV season
[__] Trying to figure out how the holy hell to set up my DVR
[__] Mulling over my multitude of unresolvable DVR conflicts
[__] Attending 12-step program meetings for my television addiction

Should you need to contact me during this hectic time, please (choose one of the options below) —

[__] Send me an email
[__] Send me a text
[__] Send me an Instant Message of some kind
[__] Send me a bribe
[__] Send me another TiVo

I appreciate your patience and understanding. See you all at Thanksgiving, if I live that long!
♥xo♥xo,
rockle.


PS - Think I'm kidding? Here is my personal programming grid — see why I am losing my ever-loving mind? And please note that this does not even include the "bonus" programs on the cable channels. "Slacker Cats" is missing, and "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia," and "Lil Bush," and etc. And everything will change again in January, when "Jericho," "Lost," "American Idol," and OMG "The Amazing Race" make it back into the starting rotation. I think I need to lie down now ...