When a cotton string mop gets dirty, don't run it through the washer.

One ends up with a cotton gordian knot.

And once again, I'm missing meeting today. I actually got as far as getting dressed and getting my shoes on before I just couldn't follow through.

I don't know why I've had such trouble these past few months. I'll be perfectly fine, and then either I'll get nauseated, or crampy, or just plain overheating, my mind will set off, and I just won't want to go.

And it gets compounded. I miss one meeting because of a legitimate illness. Then I know at the next one, someone will comment, "Oh, we missed you last time." And I hate that. I don't want to be noticed, and since I know someone will notice, I won't want to go. And then that just raises exponentially with every meeting I miss. I won't want to go because someone will comment, but that just means it'll be worse at the next one.

In general, I LIKE meetings. I like the talks, I like the studies, I like hearing the comments. But I just don't want to be noticed. I want to have a giant "Don't Touch Me, Don't Talk To Me" sign.

Witnesses, especially the sisters, are huggers. It's a way they show the familial love we feel in the congregation. I wasn't raised in a hugging family. I feel uncomfortable with hugs. I never know when to initiate them, and just sort of go stiffly through them when someone else initiates. But when I've been gone a while, I don't want to be hugged.

I scared myself today. I actually thought, "I almost wish I was disfellowshipped, because then no one WOULD talk to me or touch me." But it didn't scare me enough to get me off the toilet and on to meeting.

I don't like feeling this way. I know I have to go to meeting. Hebrews 10:24-25 says "And let us consider one another to incite to love and fine works, not forsaking the gathering of ourselves together, as some have the custom, but encouraging one another, and all the more so as YOU behold the day drawing near." Yet no matter how often I repeat that, I just can't seem to gather myself together and get to the Hall.

I keep saying, "I'll make the next one." But when the time comes, either I'm tired, or upset, or just plain not wanting to leave the house. I don't know if this is the gluten allergy acting up, or something else. Something more serious. I didn't like the antidepressants I was on; they made me woozy and not much less depressed. But I know I need to see a doctor soon for other reasons. Maybe once I get my body straightened out, the mind will follow.

Yesterday at the store, Matt and I saw one of those wooden puzzles for kids, you know, the kind that's more a "match the shape to the hole" than "make a pretty picture," with the little red knob-handles on the pieces. The theme was vehicles....and it MADE NOISE. I looked at it for a long time, wishing the store'd had one on display, so I could hear how loud it was. I mean, it had police cars and fire trucks!

Not knowing the volume level, I didn't get the puzzle. I mean, I can only buy noisy toys for my nephew on the other side of the country if they're sufficiently loud enough to annoy his daddy (my younger brother).

Then again, knowing my brother, the "loud, noisy toy from Aunt Jen" would get left at Grandma's house, to annoy my mother to no end.

I woke up this morning to the sound of ceramic breaking.

Matt was cold. He'd gotten up to spread the comforter back over the bed for the few minutes we had before we absolutely had to get up. As he flung the blanket over the bed, I'm not sure exactly what happened. I heard the crash, and suddenly smelled plumeria a lot stronger. The small reed diffuser I had atop the television on the dresser had crashed to the bare concrete floor and shattered. I'm guessing either the corner of the blanket caught on one of the reeds or the sudden gust of wind knocked it off. Either way, I'm out a $5 diffuser (no big deal). Plus, Matt got to start the morning in a pissy mood because of it. Not only did he not get the extra ten to fifteen minutes of under-blanket warm-cuddle, but he then had to clean up broken ceramic and spilled oil.

Collateral damage: the diffuser hit my electric razor on the way down and broke it, too. So I'm out a $5 diffuser and a $20 razor.

One of my best friends from college, sapphirerose24, got married this past weekend. Because of plane fare, hotel fare, car fare and gas costs, I couldn't afford to go back to Ohio to see her get married. She posted pictures, and later sent me a small rant.

You see, she didn't just get married. She had A Wedding. Yes, A Wedding, capitalized. Venue, caterer, dress, photographer, the whole nine yards. Except for a wedding coordinator. She did all the arrangements herself.

Now, here's where her rant comes in. Because she shouldered all the responsibility for The Wedding, she also had all The Stress. Apparently, people kept telling her, "It'll all be worth it when you walk down the aisle and see your groom's face when he sees you for the first time." So she was seriously looking forward to that. She wanted The Moment That Would Make It Worth It.

She didn't get it. She's somewhat short, so when her aunt and the groom's father were, from what I understand, basically blocking the aisle trying to take pictures of her, she couldn't see her groom until she was practically right next to him. And for her, because she didn't get The Moment, she didn't enjoy The Wedding.

-------------------------------------------

Okay. Now, for my thoughts.

I didn't have A Wedding. I Got Married. I didn't get "The Moment" she was looking forward to, because for one, there was no aisle. Matt and I got married at a restaurant, where we and the eight people attending had lunch afterwards before Matt and I left for our one-night honeymoon. No catering; we all ordered off the menu. The cake was a simple sheet cake ordered at the grocery store the night before. Since college, I always said I wasn't going to have A Wedding, because of The Stress and The Cost. Because truthfully? While A Wedding might be a nice memory, pretty pictures, and fulfill a deeply-ingrained female need to be a princess for a day, The Wedding isn't what's important. What IS important?

The Marriage.

The years and decades that come AFTER The Wedding. The dress will sit in the back of the closet, most likely never to be worn again. The pictures will fade, the food will be forgotten, but day in, day out, you have your spouse, the tangible evidence of what truly lasts. You have The Marriage.

99% of the time, I don't regret not having A Wedding. When I worked at OfficeMax, and stressed-out brides, grooms, parents of the brides, etc, would come in, freaking out about invitations, announcements, programs, favors, I would look at them, and feel a renewed sense of thankfulness that Matt and I just Got Married. No worrying about colors, finicky paper sizes, ribbons, drilling, all that jazz. My invites were a grand total of two phone calls. I found my dress in a consignment store three days before the ceremony for $30. We paid the judge $50. Matt bought a tuxedo at Value City for $70 (and yes, he's worn it again, on the cruise we took last year).

You want to know the only thing I regret about not having A Wedding? I didn't get the chance to create a registry or have a "real" bridal shower. We got engaged in July 2004 and married in September 2004. Not long after I told my mother I was getting married, she organized a "card shower." So, almost all of our wedding "gifts" were money and gift cards. It turned out to be beneficial, keeping us fed the two months we were out of work in NC, but still, it would have been nice to play with the scan gun and create a list of things we truly wanted or needed. I didn't have any close female friends in Youngstown to throw me a "real" shower. Maybe that sounds a little...I can't get the word, capitalistic isn't really the one I want. But it's more than "I wanted stuff, dangit!" It's more, "I wanted the time and thought put into a gift," rather than "Here's fifty bucks on a WalMart card." And I feel guilty for wanting that, because as I mentioned, those WalMart gift cards kept us in groceries the two months it took for us to find work.

Bees. I like what they do for us, pollinating fruits and vegetables, creating honey. I don't like them around my house or myself.

That said, I found out this morning that I'm still not allergic to bees. Nothing like getting stung on the arm at 4:30 in the morning. :-P

Dodge has an all-electric concept car called....Zeo.

I want.

Okay, this past week illustrated just how much I need to get back on bcps. My period decided to kick in three weeks late (hey, the fact that it came AT ALL when I haven't been on bcps for months is a plus). I've decided it likes holidays; this time, it was Cinco de Mayo, last time, it started on St. Patricks Day. :-P

Anyway. Sunday and Monday, I had a very, very bad episode. It was about as bad as when I was on wheat all the time; Matt and I kept going back over what I'd eaten to see if there was any way wheat got in. Nothing. I had to leave meeting early on Sunday because I was trying to scratch the skin off my arm, and I couldn't handle a medium-sized gathering of friends. Just wasn't working. Monday, I actually had to leave work early because I could NOT get my arms to behave and get my hands to do what I needed them to. I kept clawing at my skin, pulling at my hair, and just felt myself spiralling out of control. I don't like those episodes; they scare the living daylights out of me because I know that is NOT normal.

The reasoning was made evident to me around midnight Monday/Tuesday, when an invisible sadistic clown invaded the house and used my uterus to make balloon animals. "I had cramps" is the understatement of the year. I lived on Advil Tuesday, when I wasn't falling victim to the practical jokes of my digestive system (when I have my period, the rest of my body decides not to work right). Every five to ten minutes, it'd tell me, "You've gotta go, NOW!" So I'd get to the bathroom, and "Hmm, nope, just kidding! Nothing, not even gas! Ha ha!!" Wait ten minutes, repeat. But can't ignore it, just in case it's not a joke this time. At least this job doesn't track my bathroom time.

Wednesday, still cramping.

Thursday, the hormone headache hit. Three aspirin, two Excedrin Migrane, and it at least took the edge off the pain so I could work.

Finally, it started easing up yesterday. But the damage was done, and I am wiped out from this week.

But still, I kept reminding myself, as much as I hate having my period, I'd hate most of the alternatives more.

Okay. If you like odd, conflicted, twisting stories involving death, life, afterlife, confused vampires and other supernatural/preternatural creatures, you HAVE to check out blogofstench aka ModernWizard's digital soap/comic "Love Has Fangs." You can find it in a number of places:

1) The main site, http://oddpla.net/lhf/
2) The RSS LJ feed, http://lovehasfangs.livejournal.com/
3) deviantArt, modernwizard.deviantart.com

Right now, MW's working on a reboot. The strip started as one-off comics, using mixed-scale action figures and dolls. It grew into using primarily sixth-scale action figure photography, but MW was never quite satisfied with the medium. It got difficult, and expensive, and could never quite portray things the exact way she wanted them to look.

Then she discovered DazStudio. And suddenly, things started to click. She could manipulate the digital people into the exact poses she wanted, without the action figures' limitations of physical articulation. Facial expressions could be tweaked. And Love Has Fangs started to come back to life (or undeath).

I'm fairly excited to see what new stories she'll be telling. The current posts are familiarizing us with the new look of the old characters, and I believe, IIRC, new stories are supposed to start tomorrow?

Give it a look.

Okay, so....back when I worked at OMax, the CompUSA in the same plaza closed, and I picked up City of Heroes for about $5.  Almost a year ago, I think.  I've yet to install it.

Today, Matt picked up City of Villans at Big Lots for $10 (deluxe version with cards and figures and other miscellaneous stuff).  

We'd been looking for another MMO we could play together, but...we're down to one computer.  We'd been playing Voyage Century Online, since it's free, but the lag's been painful, and well, it was a lot a lot a lot of grinding.  I mean, I would set my character to mining, come back in ten minutes, move her to another ore stack, and start over.  And hope there were no "locusts," ie, swarms of guild alts all doing the same thing, exhausing the resources in no time flat.  Kind of took all the fun out of the game.

But, he wants another RPG.  He even reinstalled Once Upon a Knight, because he's always enjoyed it, and has yet to reach the level where you can catapult cows.  

So, some questions, directed primarily at <lj user="alessar">.  Are they completely separate games, or do they intermingle (ie, can a Villans chara meet up with a Heroes chara)?  Actually, that's the only question he had.  :-P

I'm going to go watch a movie now.

 

Okay. So, Wednesday the ninth, my parents came out for a week. Here's the recap:

Plane was about an hour late coming in, so instead of them arriving just before I could get out of work, they arrived about 20 min after I got out of work. Picked them up at Sky Harbor, then went to Ajo Al's in Scottsdale for dinner. Home, early bed, because....

Thursday, we got up around 4 am, to get on the road between 5 and 5:30, to get to Williams, AZ by 8 am. What's in Williams, AZ? The Train. The Grand Canyon Railway.  On the drive up to Williams, we could see Mount Humpries in the distance, and watched the ambient temperature drop from the mid-sixties in Phoenix to the low thirties as we climbed in altitude.  
The train is neat; all restored historic cars.  We could only afford coach/Budd class, since the Pullmans don't run this time of year.   There was a little "wild west" show beforehand (really little, and fairly silly, and VERY cold), and I picked up a copy of the train guide.  It was okay, with milepost markings, telling you points of interest along the way.  

Okay.  So, we get to the Canyon at noon.  It was COLD and WINDY.  We can't check into our room (Maswik Lodge) until 4.  So, we had lunch at the Maswik cafeteria (not a lot of choices for someone gluten-intolerant).  I had the pork chop (dry), Matt had taco salad, Dad had a hamburger, and Mom had the chili in a bread bowl.  Finished eating, around 1 pm, Dad decided to check if the room might possibly be ready (since checkout's at 11, and Mom had the bag she brought on the train with her knitting).  No go.  Okay, so we walked along the Rim Trail for a bit.  Got back to the lodge at 3:30  Room still not ready.  We were tired, having been up since 4 (3 in my case), so we just sat in the cafeteria until 4, when finally, they said the room was ready.  We had an hour before the sunset tour: no time to get dinner, just enough time to put our bags down, use the restroom, and rest for a little bit.  Sunset tour, still very cold.  Getting in and out of the bus, in the cold/warm/cold/warm, was making me sick to my stomach, so the last few stops, I just sat in the bus.  Especially since around stop 3, the camera died.

We'd decided to have dinner at the Bright Angel Restaurant, since we'd already eaten at the Maswik Cafeteria and it didn't look like the menu changed for dinner.   After again determining there wasn't much on the menu I could eat (especially since I was COLD and didn't want a cold salad), I ordered the South Rim Spinach Artichoke Dip.  Technically an appetizer, but the only thing I could eat that was hot and sounded appetizing.  Matt got the Trailblazing Fajitas, Mom got the Sunset Sour Cream Chicken (and gave me one of the pieces of chicken), and Dad got the Canyon's Favorite Natural Roast Porkloin.  Now, here's where I mention the fact that we got the slowest waiter on the planet.  It was bad enough that a table that came in half an hour after we had (and we'd ordered, but not received anything) went to the host stand to ask for service.  Mind you, I read Waiter Rant.  I understand the concept of being in the weeds, having worked in a timing-oriented service field myself.  Matt understands, having worked at Papa John's as long as he did.  We're understanding of certain things.  But, when people who've come in after us have been served and LEFT before we got our food?  Refills were slow, if they came at all.   My food was slightly burnt on one edge.  The waiter, when he _did_ stop, never let us finish what we wanted to ask or request, and it would be twenty minutes before we saw him again.  I almost felt like I was a guest at a restaurant on Kitchen Nightmares BEFORE Gordon Ramsay knocked sense into the owners.

Either way, it was almost eleven before we got back to the room.  This is where Matt realized the camera charging-only-dock and the printer dock require different power supplies, and he'd brought the wrong one.  No charging the camera that night.

And still, I woke up around 3:30 am.  Lucky for me, Matt was mostly awake, too, and we went to have a shower together since the parents were still sleeping and hey, we're still newlyweds.  :-P  Managed to doze off a little after that, and when the Weather Channel read NINETEEN DEGREES outside, we figured we could stay in the room a little longer.  SciFi was running a Doctor Who marathon, reminding me that I'd never set the DVR to tape Sarah Jane (and still haven't!!  argh!!).  Finally, around 9 am, we decided to brave the cold.  Hiked down to El Tovar for breakfast.

Ever since Matt and I started dating, all I've heard about when it comes to hot chocolate is the hot chocolate at El Tovar.  How rich, how creamy, how wonderful it is.  So of course, we had to get the hot chocolate.  For food, Mom and Dad split a cinnamon roll as big as a dinner plate, and still had a breakfast entree.  Dad got the pancake trio (buttermilk, blue corn and buckwheat) with prickly pear syrup and honey pine nut butter.  Matt got Sonoran Style Eggs with Chicken and Chorizo.  Mom got the special, which isn't on the online menu.  :-P  And I got the Hickory Smoked Bacon, Gouda and Chive Three-Egg Omelette.  Again, not much on there for the gluten-intolerant.

Well, the hot chocolate was okay, but I didn't think it anything special.  Matt agreed that it wasn't what he remembered.  Then again, it was seven years ago when he had it last.  

Back to the room, to get the stuff together so we could check out.  Again, checkout's at 11, the train doesn't leave until 4.  I think that was the biggest annoyance on the trip.  We had to figure out what we wanted to carry for five hours.  Water bottle (I got a nifty clip so I could hang my water bottle off my belt loop), hat, jacket, wallet, keys.  Everything else went into the bag, which would be checked on the train by the staff.  We took the shuttle down to the other side of the South Rim, down to the end of that section of Rim Trail, then hiked back along the Canyon to where we'd gotten on the bus.  I was fairly wiped out by then (at 7000 feet, the air's a little thin, and I admit it, I'm out of shape), so we took the shuttle back to the El Tovar area.  We checked out Hopi House, and another gift shop, got some lunch at the Bright Angel Luncheonette (hot dog, no bun, chips, ice cream), and by then, the train was boarding.

Loot/Souveniers:
water bottle clip
hat/shirt combo (I needed the hat)
patch for my collection
poster of lightening over the Canyon
gift for Matt's mom
gift for Matt's dad

So, train back to Williams, where I picked up a Grand Canyon Railway patch for my collection, then all back into the car for the trip down to Kirkland Junction and dinner.

Mapquest lies on times.  It took an hour longer than quoted to get there, but at least my parents really enjoyed it.  Mom loved their fries.  If it had flopped, we'd have been more upset about the time to get there.  Matt and I love their steaks, but we were nervous.  

Got home a little after midnight.  

Saturday, it was time for the 25th Annual Glendale Jazz and Blues Festival.  Mom doesn't like jazz, so Matt and Dad went and listened to the bands.  Mom and I walked around the vendors (nothing we could afford), then the Bead Museum (only two rooms...I thought it would be bigger), and a few little shops in downtown Glendale.  Met back with Matt and Dad at three.  Again, I was beat, so we decided to head up to Fuddruckers.  This is because of Matt's "free 1/2 pound burger a week for a year" card.  Use it or lose it.  Did minor grocery shopping, then back home.  

Sunday, Matt and I went to meeting, then we just sort of hung out at home.  Played mexican train dominoes, canadian cribbage, and golf (the card game).  Had mesquite grilled chicken for dinner.

Monday, we went to the Desert Botanical Gardens.  Very pretty.  Very hot.  Very tiring.  I think I walked more that week than I have in a long time.  I ended up skipping the desert wildflower trail, just heading for the gift shop.   That's where Mom found a lot of things she was looking for, like prickly pear jelly, and pure habanero hot sauce for Jeff.  We came home, had leftovers for lunch, and we all took naps.  At least, Matt, Dad and I did.  Don't know if Mom napped or if she just sat on the back porch and read.  Ron and Omera came over for a bit and visited, then it was bedtime.

Tuesday, Matt and I were back on our normal 4 am wake time, took parents to the airport, then off to work.  If I'd been smart, I'd have requested Tuesday off, too, since I was falling asleep all day at work.

And I think that's what I'm going to do now.  Go back to bed.  

Back a while ago, I listed things I wanted to have done by April:

Things to do before April (when we get our next houseguests):

--paint the master bedroom, closet, and two bathrooms (colors are now picked out)
--get a bedframe and new bedding for the master bedroom
--take down the shutters and put up curtains in the master bedroom
--get ceiling fans/lights installed in the bedrooms
--curtains in the guest bedroom
--finish pulling up the linoleum in the kitchen, paint the kitchen floor


Well....

Bedroom and bathrooms are painted. We skipped the closet.
We have a bedframe and bedding.
Shutters are down, curtains are up.
Ceiling fans/lights: not yet, but working on it.
Guest bedroom curtains: no
Kitchen linoleum: as good as it gets. Painted even.

Three out of five? Not bad. The only major thing we didn't get done was the ceiling fans, and that's because we didn't call our electrician in time.

I went to "the big hole in the ground up north" last week. Longer post will follow once I'm recovered fully from my vacation.

Quick points: camera battery died on day one. We brought the charger, but the wrong power supply. So, no more pictures the rest of the vacation. Means we gotta go back sometime.

I always have a rough time sleeping Sunday nights. I don't know why, maybe it's because the weekend's over and I go back to work on Monday, maybe it's because Matt doesn't work Mondays, so he's up all night, and my schedule is thrown off. Tuesday through Friday, my schedule is up at 4 am, ride into work with Matt, then sleep in the back of the car for a few more hours until my shift starts at 8 am. Mondays, though, since he doesn't work, I'm reliant on my alarm at 5:50. Maybe it goes back to being afraid the durn thing won't go off and I'll end up seriously late. I don't know. All I know is I woke up at 1:30 when Matt came to bed. Then I started noticing things, like, "I gotta pee." "I kinda have heartburn." "My whole right arm assembly is aching." So I get up, use the bathroom, take a Pepcid Complete and a few ibuprofin, go back to bed. Toss, turn, toss, turn, can't get back to sleep. Give up, come out to the computer, check the Monday morning webcomic updates, check the e-mail, LJ, etc. It's now 2:30, and I'm a little tired again, so maybe I can get back to sleep. Three hours until the alarm goes off.

Trader Joe's sparkling sake.

Taste good.

Goes down easy, like champagne.

Hits the head a little harder.

330ml. All gone.

I think I'm a little spinny.

Whooo.

We went to McDonalds' tonight so I could have a sundae. And what did my wondering eye behold on the menu board?

SHAMROCK SHAKES!!!

Glee!!

I am content.

It's 82 degrees outside right now; the sun's on its way down, Matt's got burgers on the grill and potatoes in the fryer. There's a big bean bag chair on the back porch, and the weeds are nice and tall, making the backyard look like a jungle from that vantage point.

I'm going back outside. :)

It's sad that whenever I hear "Free Ride" or Red Hot Chili Peppers' "Higher Ground," the first thing I think of is the first Power Rangers movie.

Matt was watching tv in the other room, and I heard "Higher Ground," and had to wander out to see what he was watching. Of course, it wasn't MMPR:TM, it was, I think, Walking Tall. The Rock was playing football; six teenage color-coded superheroes weren't sky-diving.

It's sad that I watched that movie so much, I damn near wore out the VHS tape (and I was in college at the time). And when I found the DVD for $5, I snapped it up (even got the Turbo movie, even though I didn't like it as well).

MMPR: my first serious fandom. Soap operas don't count; it's too damn hard to write fanfic for them, because canon, continuity, and characters change too often.

Billy: my second serious fan-crush. I lose all geek-cred when I admit my first. It's too bad David Yost didn't age well (at all!).

I was checking the stats for my site tonight, and one of the main ones I check is "recent keywords." One of the recent ones was "zedden," which of course, leads to a few stories, since Ellen and I have been writing about Jamie since 1994. I was curious to see what else would come up with that, so I did a search myself.

What I found was surprising. Two different sites, both with a home domain page advertising MMO credits, one for Eve Online and one for FFXI, with sub-pages containing snippets of fanfics. Ellen confirmed that some of them were bits from her Trial Arc, but others weren't.

The sites are http://www.ffxigilstore.com and http://www.eveonlineiskstore.com If you wait for it to load, then use "select all," you'll see a line of itty-bitty numbers under the main image, links to the sub-pages. ffxigilstore has at least 50 sub pages.

It's somewhat surreal...for one thing, advertising gold farming with no way to contact or order. Also, the whole snippets of mixed fics on sub-pages. Trying to fill a domain? Any ideas?

This just weirds me out.

x-posted to oxymoron_inc