My own (step-)father didn't remember my birthday, but my e-friends did!

The last couple of months have sucked. I won't go into detail, but suffice to say it is true. Still, I'm doing better than I thought I would be, even with the occasional Very Bad Day.

I didn't plan anything for my b-day except a shopping trip with my sister, and I didn't even buy anything. Still, I had a good day, and the start of it all was the florist-guy at the door with flowers from people who've only met me once. I can't believe you guys. Every one of you are amazing and I can't believe my luck. The smut chatters are the only ones who sent me flowers, that's how cool you are.

Thursday, when I don't have a dawn-to-bed plan, I'll e-mail each of you privately for huggles. Until then, know that I love you, even in the states where that might be illegal.

Mq.

P.S. Would Dana and Meredith e-mail me privately and reveal their super-secret screen names so I know who to thank? Thanks. :)

A postscript:

I've been going to the bar where the girlfriend works to watch Queer As Folk as I don't have Showtime. I've never liked going there, and am less up for it now than usual.

Is there anyone out there who lives in the US, gets Showtime, and wouldn't mind taping the rest of this season's eps and mailing the tape to me? There aren't very many new eps left, I think.

If I could know by 8:15 central time, I could skip going tonight, but I know this might not get seen before then.

Thanks in advance.

This is going to be a little difficult, but here we go.

I easily talk about very personal things, the sort of stuff that breaches people's TMI boundaries faster than I expect. But when it comes to things which are actually important to me, or hurt, I tend to not speak of at all.

The thing in my life that I've always been the most proud of is not turning into a statistic. My mother was divorced multiple times, married to a batch of abusive husbands and she was an addict of various substances. A few years ago I could -- and did -- proudly state that I was happy, healthy, married to a wonderful man who adored me, and owned home and a successful business. When things started to slip, I ignored the warning signs and clung to that image with every avoidance technique in the book.

It's time to come clean. I've been suffering from textbook depression for many years now. It's leached the happiness out of my life, whittled away my friends, damaged my business and my marriage.

A few weeks ago, I finally admitted I had a serious problem. I quit fucking around with my anti-depressants -- some of you might remember that my 'doctor' is actually a 'dealer' and will write me whatever I ask for. So instead of playing shot-in-the-dark with the meds, I called a good friend who's a psychologist, and spent a goodly time with her figuring out what my symptoms called for. Then I went in and asked for that. I also put myself into once-a-week therapy, which is god-awful expensive, but I simply can not afford to live without.

The impetus for all this is that ... wow, this is hard ... my husband and I are divorcing. A seventeen year relationship is ending, and it feels like an amputation.

Some of you will remember that we're polyamorous, and that his girlfriend lives with us. There's many sides to this story, many ways I could phrase this to win you all over to my side, but the truth is that it takes two people to make a relationship, and two people to break it. I've been very difficult to live with, and by contrast the relationship with the girlfriend is shiny and new. They have fun together, and he's happy with her in a way he hasn't been with me for years.

I asked him to go into couple's therapy with me, but he feels that he's lost years of his life to my illness, and doesn't want to lose any more. They want babies, soon, and he's afraid that he'll lose that chance if he spends a year, or even a half-year with me in therapy. Basically, he's tired of trying to fix us, so tired he can't find the energy to try even one more time.

It's been a while since I felt like posting, or responding to anything, or reading anything in fandom. It seems silly and wasteful, and I suspect it will for a while. I know some of you will want to write me consoling letters, and I'm not going to tell you not to, but I have a suggestion. It would make me happy if instead of taking the time to do that, you turn off the computer, and go spend time doing something with someone you love that you both enjoy. Or maybe you could spend some time alone thinking about one thing in your life that makes you unhappy, make a list of potential ways to fix it, and dedicate yourself to trying them until one works.

And I want to stress this: if you feel like you're unhappy for no reason, or that your entire life makes you unhappy, I urge you to start asking around for some kind of therapist. Do it before what you have slips irretrievably out of your fingers. I've read a lot of LJ's and list posts in which people talk about their lives with far more vitriol than I've felt, even now. Please, please stop living like that. I remember being happy when I woke up in the morning, and I know what I feel like now, and it's not even the same world. The things which keep you in the dark are excuses. Quit using them. Brave the light.

If your patterns don't work, change them. Figure out what you want and change what you need to keep it. Examine the relationships in your life, eradicate the ones that bring you down, and cherish, respect, and appreciate the ones that lift you up. Ask your loved ones what they need from you and whether or not they feel they're getting it.

As I told Spring once recently: this is your life, your only one. Don't fuck around with it. I'm going to start taking my own advice.

Originally, this was going to be a goodbye post, but I changed my mind. I still don't plan on being active or visible, but I'm not signing off just yet. If I do, I'll say goodbye. Otherwise, don't expect me to be around. If you send a message to my hotmail account, I'll get it...eventually.

Michelle -- I haven't forgotten your jewelry. I still need to switch items out with galleries. When I do, I'll get it to you.

Fra -- if you get a chance (after following my plea above about spending time with loved ones) I'd appreciate any tips you have for selling jewelry on Ebay. Paying the mortgage is going to be an issue pretty soon.

Michelle, Spring, Stacey, Kirstie, Ozy, Akire, Fra, Anais, Widget, DarthHelloKitty, LaDonna, and everyone else I've missed -- your friendship, love, and support for the last couple of years has meant more to me than you can know. In fact, I'm telling you this news before I've told any of the RL friends who live in town. Don't think because I'm not here I'm not thinking about you, or that I don't care, or that I think you're 'bad' for me. I just need to re-write habits until I settle into my new life.

Take care of each other. Take care of yourselves. Be happy.

Love,
Monique

Michelle? I've sent a couple of e-mails to your banbudge account -- it just occured to me that you might not check that anymore. So, um... go check it. :)

Generate your Anime Style by Jena-su
Name:
Hair:	Short and brightly coloured.
Clothes:	As revealing as you can legally get away with.
Powers:	Wind magic
Special Features:	Bunny ears and tail
Sidekick:	Small dragon.
Attitude:	Cheerful, but calm. The voice of reason.
Weapon:	Flamethrower
Created with the ORIGINAL MemeGen!

So what have we learned here? That no matter how late, or how hard a day, Apoc can pretty much always be sucked into inane internet toys.

But hey, Flamethrower. Cool.

Widget's friends have cool icons. Let's see if mine do, too. :)

Click Here

If you want to try this, copy and paste the URL with your LJ name in place of 'apocrypha_'.

Went to do a quiz and ended up doing this one instead:

Your Superhero Persona by couplandesque
Your Name
Superhero Name	The Nerd
Super Power	Severe Mood Swings
Enemy	The Ex-Girlfriend
Mode Of Transportation	Unicycle
Weapon	Vinyl Records
Created with the ORIGINAL MemeGen!

And now we know. Well, we knew most of that before, really -- the sign of a good on-line quiz. :)

I went to take the quiz and see what flavor I am. Like I suspected, it came up:

I am Vanilla Flavoured. I am one of the most popular flavours in the world. Subtle and smooth, I go reasonably with anyone, and rarely do anything to offend. I can be expected to be blending in in society. What Flavour Are You?

The odd thing is, it also said if I weren't vanilla, I would be:

Mmm, I am Lemon Flavoured. I am bitter and twisted. Expect from me acerbic humour and sharp commentary. While I may seem nasty at first, I'm actually quite good company if I like you, so long as you don't mind a bit of cutting to the chase. What Flavour Are You?

These are my two favorite flavors... but I have to wonder about this. Perhaps I just seem vanilla, but am filled with lemon custard. Or something.

In other news, I believe it's time to take a shower and head to bed.

Really, I must go to bed. But before I do...

Does anyone out there know anyone who knows anyone who might be able to find an LJ mood theme set taken from Firefly?

I've been meaning to post for forever, but wasn't planning on it tonight cause it's late. But I saw this silly thing and couldn't resist.

Instructions:
1. Copy and paste this: [font color=username][b]username[/b][/font] into your journal.
2. Replace [] with <>.

Apocrypha_

Purple. Cool. :)

Note: in the version I cut & pasted, there wasn't a '/' in front of the second b to turn off the bold font.

I subscribe to an on-line horoscope. It was eerily accurate for quite a while, then went into a period of just. plain. wrong. Today, it said this:

Your life has probably been a very confusing place to be lately -- but all that's set to change now. Show up wearing your favorite smile and your best suit, and expect to finally receive your due.

Well, no one offered me 'my due' today, but I'm still hoping that the check's been approved, is being signed, and will show up *any*day*now*.

Girl's gotta hope, right?

For those of you wondering, no, I haven't heard back from the anthology editor who's got my short story. When I do, and I finish the screaming-from-the-rooftops, I'll send you an e-mail.

Other drabble:

In Kansas, the license tags are all three letters-space-three numbers. The state went through and took out all the really cool combinations though, so you can't get FUK 069, etc. (They did leave 666 in the rotation, though, which amuses me. Apparently the tag people aren't fundies, just prudes.)

Anyway, this morning I was behind JLA 267, and I spent the morning wondering who I'd have to bribe to get JLA on my tag. How cool is that? And how unfair that I got 'RZL'?

I have now worked one day on my new 8-5 shift at the temp job. I realize there are a lot of you out there who work those hours all the time, but frankly, if I'd wanted to work at 8 fucking AM, I'd have gotten a real job a long time ago.

Maybe I shouldn't sell the comic store...

I think I'll do a little beading before I go to sleep. But really, I should just go to sleep. 7:00 will be here sooner than I want.

I'm a sucker for quizzes.


You're a Narrative writer!


What kind of writer are you?
brought to you by Quizilla

I'd like to say I'm surprised... but I'm not much of a liar.

RE: Queer As Folk, Season 4, episode 2 (tonight's ep)

I fucking love Brian Kinney

That is all. You may now return to your regularly scheduled lives, already in progross.

Does anyone out there have (or know of) any good Hathor icons? (From Stargate).

I love lightbulb jokes. It probably is evidence of a serious character issue, but I do. I got these in an e-mail today, and lucky you, I'm sharing.

Changing a Light Bulb the Christian Way

Question: How many Christians does it take to change a light bulb?

Charismatic : Only 1
Hands are already in the air.

Pentecostal : 10
One to change the bulb, and nine to pray against the spirit of darkness.

Presbyterians : None
Lights will go on and off at predestined times.

Roman Catholic : None
Candles only.

Baptists : At least 15.
One to change the light bulb, and three committees to approve the change and decide who brings the potato salad and fried chicken .

Episcopalians: 3
One to call the electrician, one to mix the drinks and one to talk about how much better the old one was.

Mormons : 5
One man to change the bulb, and four to store several cases of bulbs in case of shortage someday.

Unitarians :
We choose not to make a statement either in favor of or against the need for a light bulb. However, if in your own journey you have found that light bulbs work for you, you are invited to write a poem or compose a modern dance about your light bulb for the next Sunday service, in which we will explore a number of light bulb traditions, including incandescent, fluorescent, 3-way,long-life and tinted, all of which are equally valid paths to luminescence.

Methodists : Undetermined
Whether your light is bright, dull, or completely out, you are loved. You can be a light bulb, turnip bulb, or tulip bulb. Bring a bulb of your choice to the Sunday lighting service and a covered dish to pass.

Nazarene : 6
One woman to replace the bulb while five men review church lighting policy.

Lutherans: None
Lutherans don't believe in change.

Amish :
What's a light bulb?

No one was more surprised than I, but apparently Illyanna had a story to tell. Who knew? And I had no idea it would turn out so serious. Really, what do you expect from a story that starts out, "Trade you a blowjob for a foot massage"?

( Human Rules )

Went looking for Firefly icons, thought I'd share the joy.

http://www.wolfpupserenade.com/ffpics.html

http://www.swallowingshadows.nu/nefarious/ljicons.html
lots of other icons, too.

http://www.insomniac-supergirl.net/iconlove/firefly.html

http://www.born-d1fferent.com/gc/ljicons.htm

http://scream-ecstasy.sinfree.net/diesbloody/ljicons.html

http://even-in-death.com/icons/tvindex.htm

http://www.wiliqueen.com/icons/firefly.html

And for variety, some FF wallpapers: http://www.angelfire.com/art2/diesbloody2/Firefly.html

And that should be enough to play with. For now. ::eg::

I remember within the last few weeks, someone of my flist was squee'ing about their new CD Burner.

My CD Burner sucks. Firstly, it takes for-friggin'-ever to actually burn a CD, secondly, the CD player in my car doesn't read them well. Of course, all the other burned CD's I play in my car are fine, just not mine.

So. Can anyone reccomend to me either a) a brand of burner they've bought, used, and liked, or b) a website which reviews burners and can point me in the right direction?

Thanks muchly.

I was making noise at Hubby this morning (this morning? yesterday? day before?) about maybe signing up for LJ's paid account so I too could have all the icons I want (and waaaaay more than is strictly neccessary.)

Came home today and there's an e-mail telling me an anonymous someone has paid for six months. I go and thank the Hubby. He graciously accepts the praise, then admits he didn't do it.

So... that means probably Michelle, or possibly Stacey... or some sort of seriously friendly stranger...

Anyway, THANKS. I've blown the whole evening playing with styles, and colors, and icons, and it's been FUN. (And also took all the time I was going to spend answering e-mail.)

Now I'm going to go knit before my shoulder starts hurting.

::big huggles to 'anonymous'::

Sorry this is so late; it turned into a long day. However, here's the final piece of 'Snapshots'. I hope you all enjoyed it.

( Read more... )