so strange....

Was examining a bottle just now and wiki'd him.....

update. please read the really brief history section. kills me.

weight watchers

When I was pregnant, (yes, almost 2 yrs ago), I made the tragic mistake of thinking I could eat whatever I wanted. I ate like an animal. I grew, my feet and face grew, everything ballooned. I have suffered from it. My feet got something called Plantar Fasciitis , which still makes running (and even long-time walking), nearly prohibitive. So a few months ago, I decided to do weight-watchers online. I could not commit to meetings, time is too scarce. I gotta say, the shit reallllly works, if you stick to it. I do part-time ww, as I cannot omit beer and general tso's completely from my world. If I sticked to it, I'd be skinny. Half-time, I'm getting there. but got a long way to go.

All's wall that ends wall

Today was the last day of the massacre at maujer street. The guys are finally done. All told, I didn't really lose as many plants as I had thought I would. Had to amend soil, and plants are puny due to my having to cut them all back, but with time they will flourish again. Really I guess it was mostly time that was lost.

But the icing on the cake? The neighbor came over today with an envelope for me. He said, " a little something for your troubles". I came inside figuring it would be a token gift certificate or something. $300 and a note saying, happy plant shopping! Plus we also got some firewood from the tree he cut down in back of his place.

Sometimes people can be really good neighbors. I wish this guy could rub off on the bastard on the other side of us.

.

update: on my way to work today, i noticed that inside his building, in a corner to the right is an altar with a small buddha and some christmas lights around him. also, lit candles at his feet. I love that.

Dream # 2

Got an unexpected nap from 5 to 6-30 today. Had weird dream that this fat hispanic woman was taking care of Gilly who was laughing his brains out. She kept trying to keep him away from me, but he still kept laughing. His laughs started turning into bubbles, and she and I started to compete to swallow them. She hated me, and was trying lie on top of him to keep him away from me. We were both determined to eat all the laugh bubbles, but i was more determined, and i ate more of the laugh bubbles, and had the laughter just running out of me, it was like i was tripping on some hallucinatory drug that i have never tried before. And so beautiful, and perfect.

Got wood?

This is my new gift to myself. Cannot wait to christen it with friends soon. Now, where to get ample supplies of firewood in Brooklyn? Will already told me that my plan of loading the car with firewood from VA won't work, with car already full of dog, us, boy and stuff. Already checked craigslist without much luck. As nutty as I am, I don't envision myself splitting logs for hours, but duraflames, won't cut it for the blazing this crazy-pyro plans on doing.

salt on wounds

I grew up with animals, in the garden/yard/fields/woods in dirt and filth and every allergen imaginable. Now, when I'm already dealing with getting fat and ugly, I now have to contend with pollen? How strong do I have to be? I really would have preferred my physical challenges to have come at an earlier date, when i was way stronger. I don't remember losing this bet.

dream interpretation #1

I have always been a really vivid dreamer. And I have kind of, pretty semi-regularly written them down. So, I will start new thread, so that you can truly 100% conclude that I am bananas and you should not be keeping company with me.

Two nights ago, I dreamed that I lived in a house adjacent to a lake, or some kind of body of water. It was a darkish woodland-set house, with lots of trees overhanging and very shady. It starts with me driving down the sandy road to the house and I see a huge SUV, like a hummer at the end. A swarthy man is at the wheel. I ask him if he needs help, assuming his car was broken down. He glares at me, curses and pulls out.

Cut to the house. It had many, many entrances, and seemed older. like maybe built in the 50's or 60's or something. I was sitting at a type writer in a room off of the garage. (Think the woman in clockwork orange for setting). Suddenly a tow-headed boy pops his head through the door and asks if I want to buy some candy to support his school. i say, "No, you don't belong here, but good luck" and swoosh him out the door. Another boy, and then another, pops heads through. They swell in. I am trying to scoot them all out. They seem harmless at first. They start grabbing at things around me, like pens, paper pads, chair cushions, ipod, etc.

I run upstairs and see that there are tons of kids trying to get in every entrance. It becomes like "the birds" except with boys. And some of the people in the house are friends....Kate G was there, Julia was there. And Will was there, as were about 5 people I work with. We started hammering wood up on doors and lighting fires in the fireplaces, hitting the kids in the head with frying pans, just straight out clobbering them.

I start to make the connection that the guy in the driveway was related, and this was his band of gypsy-boys he was sending to rob us. We seem to successfully have them all at bey. Until one of my teachers assistants comes to me holding one of her socks. In the sock was a little webby coccoon, and in the middle of the cocoon was something that looked like a centipede/half boy like thing.

you won't believe this one....aka PETA be damned

Going to bed last night. As usual, Loretta and I head up to "the big girl bed" and I set to brushing my teeth and, and, and...i guess that's the extent of my beauty regime. Walk around corner and instead of her usual red-eyed, hang dawg glance in my direction, Loretta is actually scampering back and forth across the room. "Shit, effing cat must have gotten up here", I think. So I stick my face under the rocker where she is sniffing, about to grab what I think is my grey cat and send her back downstairs, when WHATTHEFUCK?????!!!!!!!! A fucking rat bares it's teeth and makes a slight lunge toward my nose. I mean my nose, (which is not huge or long) is one fucking inch from this disgusting, angry beast. I almost have a stroke, shit my pants and I'm coming elizabeth all at once. I fall back on the bed, like an overweight scarlett, and call gihyb on the celly to make this go away. ( I then sleep on couch with blankets formed into tents resembling Tompkins square circa '89)

Now, bear in mind, I am not a girly-girl who is inherently afraid of bugs or vermin. I handle worms and bugs regularly, and as a science teacher had rodents in cages (where they belong if they do actually belong anywhere) and as new york city resident for almost 20 years, rodents have been an on/off (albeit mostly off) part of my living experience. However, there are rules to be followed, just like all ghosts and the devil and dolls who come alive at night, must follow. (evil things rule: you cannot harm me if a light, even a tiny light somewhere in the house is on.)

Gross living things rule: Rodents can ONLY live in the basement (until i kill them). They may TRy to attempt the kitchen, (but then I will kill you even more quickly). Under NO circumstances are you allowed above the first floor. THOSE ARE THE RULES! This is the first time you broke the rule. Ergo, you are now dead. I wanted to post the picture but thought some of you might actually feel sorry for the rule-breaking-almost-nose-biting-bastard. Greg extracted the dead beast for me today, thanks. Manny's wear so many hats.

Anyway, for mothers day this weekend, I want gihyb to buy me 100 traps so I can set them everywhere so I can squeal in ecstasy at every snap, and every dead thing I can find. (yes, it's akin to the rosebud bath).

BTW, To be fair to the dead bastard, I don't think he knew the rules. They just knocked down another shitty building on our shitty block and the dead guy and his friends and family were homeless. Sorry, fucker. Snap, snap, snappity snap to all your friends and family. HAppy Mothers day!

alternate life

Most people I know live in the suburbs. I prefer to shop for stuff in the suburbs. I occasionally fantasize about living in a nice, big house in the suburbs for the same price of my lousy-block hovel. I worry though. I have such good friends, so near, and so available. I can walk anywhere I need to go, for anything I need. What if we make the move and become so isolated that we never have drop-by visitors, no sense of community, et al, for 1K more living space? Not to mention that I don't think I could find a friend because I am too weird to have normal friends. I guess I just answered my own question. But it does offer some appeal.

buzzkiller

I am the accidental queen of blowing surprises. Which is no surprise, as I hate surprises. but I have never done it intentionally. Few yrs back, cindy softball having a surprise birthday party for boyfriend, asks me to invite team. I send out invite, forgetting HE is on my team and on list. duh. Surprise 30th for Will's cousin. He comes up for a visit. Invite on fridge. duh. Mamalizza surprise shower. Invite on fridge. duh.

If any of you are planning a surprise for anyone, don't invite me until the 11th hour. Too many visitors, too much duh.

a good day....

what started off as a slightly rough one...(going from not drinking at all to drinking 10ish beers is a tough one to shake off...brrr) turned out to be a lovely day. Went to not-a-surprise-anymore-baby-shower-thanks-to-me for mamalizza and had a really nice time, especially talking to S, who I am sure I would be good friends with if the planets had aligned an inch to the left some years back. Came home, gardened for a few hours, which cleared my head and my spirits (pun intended). And then went to SK's annual derby party.

At both parties, I was primarily with people that I don't know that well, and that is good for me. I rarely attempt to go out of my way to make new friends, as I feel badly enough that I can't devote enough time to my dear ones already. Also, I think that most people find me to be a bit weird (because I am), and so why bother? But this is rude to them and unhealthy for me.

But shortly after the sadly, disturbing race, I was out in SK's backyard playing two-step with Gil, I was casually perusing the crowd from afar and thinking about the day and the growth of Sk's yard and of the slow and constant progression of all things living. I was not really thinking about any of it individually, kind of like all at the same time. And while not the deepest of thoughts, I felt so incredibly rich and so happy to be alive.

growing pains

Just as my clematis plants are almost 4 feet tall and ready to bloom, and my more tender, and established perennials are starting to poke out of the ground, I have to now tear out 1/3 of my garden so that the neighbors can stucco the brick wall that backs my garden, due to leaks. I cried when I realized just how many plants I am probably going to lose. Friends and family scoffed at me, laughing that I was getting so upset, and suggesting that the neighbor can simply replace them. However, I have gotten very attached to THESE particular plants, and like pets, they don't get replaced without mourning.

one flew over the cuckoos nest

Just finished watching this movie, and hadn't seen it in quite awhile. Jacks performance is the best of his career, 'cept maybe for the Shining. It is a slow moving film and so utterly depressing. Perhaps more for me as it rings a little too close to home, as my maternal grandmother (Babci, rip) had been hospitilized many times for schitzophrenia. As kids, Sean and I had to visit her in the hospital on more than one occasion and it was always a terrifying experience.

But, even more terrifying was that when my parents were having "problems" (which was more often than not) they often left us with our grandparents for days. That was the real terror. The food was always expired or weird and the glasses and dishes were dirty. My brother and I were super skinny kids, and these 'vacations' didn't help us at all, as we never ate or drank while there, except from the garden hose or our hands.

My grandfather was a drunk, but stopped drinking after his 2nd open heart surgery when I was about 11.

I remember a fishing trip when I was around 7 years old which ended at the 8-acres tavern with me eating the semi-regular maraschino cherry lunch. I learned how to tie a cherry stem into a knot with my tongue at around 6-7 yrs old, The bad thing about this trip is that we started home and cars were blaring horns at us like crazy. My grandfather had entered an exit ramp onto a parkway and was going in the wrong direction down an open highway. To make it worse, when he found out that he was going the wrong way, he slammed on the brakes and his toy poodle "topo" fell out of his open window onto the highway, so he had to lumber out onto the highway to retrieve his dog.

Many times at drop off, I'd go into the house and I would hear topo barking and my Babci singing. I couldn't figure out where the dog was as it sounded 'echo-y'. My grandmother had once again, put the dog in the oven (off) because she couldn't take his barking anymore.

I may not be 100%, but it's surprising that I have one iota of sanity. J. Walls and A Burroughs only have a little leg up on me.

still got it....?

This morning, I stopped to get an egg sandwich. Parked car in front of a facility that is a work site for mentally retarded adults. As I step out, one of the men approaches me. "Hey lady? You sexy."

Idol

Tonight: Brooke goes.
Last four: CArly, David C., David A., Syesha
LAst three: CArly, David C., David A
Last two: Carly, David C
Winner: David C.

Alternate Prediction:
Tonight: Brooke goes.
Last four: CArly, David C., David A., Syesha
LAst three: CArly, David C., David A
Last two: David A, David C
Winner: David C.

In summary: Tonight: Brooke goes, then dreads, then syesha, then (either carly or david a). Winner: David C.

guess what I did today?

wrong.
wrong.
not even close.
bingo!
I went to a broadway show!
But not just ANY broadway show......
I went to see WICKED!
This was of course, not by choice. In fact, it was a real act of strength and consideration for others that dragged my fat behind to times square, a place I will usually avoid more fervently than a root canal.
Moms birthday. Sean and I ask what she wants. "To spend time with her kids, maybe see a show?" Next thing I know it, she's here for 3 nights and I have to see WICKED. Wha-wha-wha?
Middle of 1st act, I look over, fucking brother is sound asleep.
To be honest, I didn't absolutely despise it. It was w-a-y too long and the lyrics to the songs were brain-damaging, but the voices of the two leads were great and the sets are always pretty impressive. It was like a combination of all the modern 'my fair lady' rip-offs, carrie, and all those songs on the radio that i don't know.
After show, dinner and drinks. Sean gets to cruise after 3 beers. I got 3 nights? ah well. happy birthday.

American Idol Prediction

I predict that ALL of them will go on to further the creation of crappy music. As far as who gets kicked off this week? ............................Kristy? All I know, is that I recognized like maybe 2 or 3 songs off the entire show.

Mariah Carey has surpassed Elvis Presley in #1 singles? Well, cut off my legs and call me shorty.

regret, maybe?

I did something the other night that i am not proud of today. We live on a horrible commercial block, trucking, and bullshit all day long. I get really angry about the disregard that they have about those of us who live here. I get really pissed, really, really pissed.. I hate them, they think i'm laughable. but they are really wrong.

There was a huge truck parked in front of our house for two days (blocking sun from my plants, blocking sun from our windows, getting my irish up).

So, i decide that it would be really good retaliation to creep out in the night and cover all the truck seats with ketchup. Despite GIHYB discouraging from doing it, I did it anyway. 24 oz of heinz.(and i also have a john-heinz-related sex-story)-later (sorry all you tomatos that died for this act). I was quite pleased about my stunt, until today, whereby they all stomped around in the ketchup that they had thrown onto my sidewalk and then poured turpentine (or something toxic)into my planters kiling many of my daffodils and tulips.

I'm feeling a little defeated. They are bigger and stronger than me. I call 311 on them all the time, but rumor is that they are mobbed. I need help in my fight. Ideas?

drunk mom

Drew a night off of kid free card tonight. Which only works if you also draw the next am off of kid card too, BINGO! So, I go out with friends tonight and have great time. No real antics, just chatty fun, i love you J & S and SL. But now, here I am. Slightly, kinda, pretty drunk. Time to break out the vinyl with Will, play records all night and have a blast..............past life.

Now.....poppa has to swim with noodle at 9. So no fun, for drinky-momma tonight. Really torn about records all over the floor alone....not as fun.

lord of the flies

I know this is posting is of one of the most sensationalized news stories right now, but jeezus, have we become we THIS fucked up? Cause, if so, maybe it might be time to stock the medicine cabinets with cyanide.

I HATED my 3rd grade teacher, Ms Powell. (see previous post, will be a future one as well) but I only once, boldly told her to "buzz off" (and I was trembling and squirting as I did it). It never once crossed my mind to kill her. Even in high school when I continued to regularly egg her house whilst drinking night train, I never once thought about murdering her.

An aside, these kids were special ed kids in georgia. Luckily, my kids lack sorely in organizational skills.

Shaking head.