When Betty Cracked Bobs to the Surface

The office gets treats today

Cinnamon biscuits with homemade powdered sugar frosting.

(One pan down, one to go, and I swear I’m not taking any home)

I’ve been in a definite “Betty Cracked” mood, lately, feeling the urge to bake, but with no one to bake for.

And I sure as hell don’t need those sweet, baked, gooey, usually chocolate…calories, for myself.

So, today the ladies at the office get the fruits of my baked brain.

My depression is still there, and I had a flare-up of extra-heated irritation at work today. I’m still clenching my teeth, and honing for a cigarette, but I’m working on it.

Head down, nose to myself, music on…leave me to figure it out.

I need to go home, clean the house, turn the music. Up LOUD!! And bake something else.

But, again, I don’t need the results.

Maybe my kids need to come home & relieve me of the cookies I don’t need, that I know are going to get put in that damned jar on the counter within the next couple days.

Fuggghhh….

Dusy Bay

There’s a lot to today.

It’s Imbolc. For us Pagans out there, it’s a big holiday, a sort of “kickoff” for the year, bringing the light back to the world, & life back to nature. (The first flowers started to bloom, calves & lambs start being born, yada yada)

This, for me, is a sort of Pagan anniversary, as this was when I dedicated myself to my Path, 21 years ago. I celebrate, quietly, on my own, every year.

It’s also my blogging anniversary here at WordPress, I guess? I received this today…

So there’s that.

And…

I quit smoking on Jan. 31. That was the day I had my very last cigarette, at 7:40 am… And, yes, I’m about ready to put my head through a wall.

But I won’t.

So February is the beginning of a lot of things for me.

Let’s hope this is the beginning of more good things.

There’s a Road That Takes Me Home

I have P!nk’s song stuck in my head…

There’s a road that takes me home

Take me fast

Or take me slow

Throw my head out the window

Feel the wind

Make me whole…

I don’t mind…I love her new CD, Beautiful Trauma, & have all the songs downloaded to my mp3 player so I can listen to them while I’m at work, mixed in with all my other music. 

It’s just that hook…on a loop, though…

Oh well

At least it’s not Christmas music.

Speaking of Christmas…

SadHeart 💙 is coming to visit for Christmas. 

I’ve been doing a lot of thinking, a lot of emailing with him, & some introverted soul-searching.

And, I’ve cone to the conclusion that – I’m 47. I’m not going to find love by conventional methods, because I’m not a conventional woman (stop laughing, yahoos), so I’m going to explore the opportunity that has been presented to me.

💙 has been generous enough to offer to fly here from the state & city he lives in, just to meet me. This was one of the major problems I had with E – getting him to actually show up after all the promises he made, & 💙 has not only come up with this on his own, it was not a promise, simply a “I want to meet you, so I’m going to do this”.

I need to meet that kind of courage and strength of character with my own courage, & not shy away from the possibility that he might be just what I’m looking for. I’ll never know if I don’t try, right?

So, company’s coming for the holidays.

Time to get out the decorations, I guess.

Healing, Energy, & Love (or Why I Spent My Morning Stoned)

OhmyGoddess today was so much Fun!

Fun-sized Coworker, Betty, (not her real name, but a nickname she’ll recognize)  and I went to a holistic healing & psychic fair at a hotel here in town today! And it was a BLAST! 

There were vendors there who ran the gamut from tarot reading to auric photography, to energy healing, to essential oils, and yes, my personal favorite and Achilles heel… STONES.

Ahmigad…

STOOONNNEES…..

I’m such a rock nerd.

I bounced back & forth between the 2 different stone vendors, who set up on opposite ends of the venue, & wanted to buy out the lot. My fingers twitched every time I got near the tables, my ears tingled, my brain melted, & I fought the urge to spend every last cent I had on me on pretty pretty precious…..

I did end up with a stone chip necklace, a stone pendant, & a loose stone, all different types, & restrained myself from emptying the coffers further, oh…but the willpower it took… Oof.

We also attended 3 of the lectures they had there, which were all really interesting, & I wish we could have had more time with each of the speakers. Half an hour per session simply flew by!

I’ll tell you, whatever was going on there? It was all positive, because I felt wonderful all morning. Strong, and yes…dare I say it? Freakishly normal. 

OK. Here’s what I mean by that statement.

My anxiety has been bad for the last few months. I’ve had to add an additional dose to my morning routine on an everyday basis for about the last 6 months, bringing my total dosage up to 2&1/2 pills total throughout the day (I break them in half & take a half every 2 to 4 hours)

My dosage schedule on a normal day is as follows: 8, 10, 2, 6, 10. (Yes, mornings are harder than afternoons -why? Not a morning person. That’s why.)

Today?

I took my 1st morning dose…and promptly forgot about the damn things till I got back from grocery shopping… A full HOUR after leaving the healing fair, which means I skipped at least 2 other doses without noticing.

Now – on a regular day? I would be a shaking, tense, choking mess, with a heart rate of about 250, & a visible vibration going on under my skin. My skin would be flushed & hot, & I would have broken out in blisters at this point.

Today? 

I didn’t notice till I got home, & started to feel the drag on my nerves. I took my next dose, & I’m fine, but that’s not my point.

The energy at this fair was wild.

And, I remembered how much I missed it. Energy work. I’m going to be getting back into that, bet your sweet bippy on that one.

Another thing I learned today… Was about clearing your Karma from past lives & from this life. But I think I’ll save that for another post, as it’s going to take more room…and significantly more willingness on my part to actually do it. Feh. 

All in all…today was a HUUUGE day of lessons, and was exactly where I needed to be. I’ve got a lot to think about now, a lot to learn, to research & read…

And a whole hell of a lot of soul searching and self-ego-burning to do.

I cannot let myself fall into Gollum’s trap of greed & selfishness. I have to learn to truly let go, in order to free myself.

And that’s going to fucking hurt.

Monster Man

Papa’s a Monster Man.

That’s my dad.

He “rescues” monsters from under beds, detangles them from closets, and saves them from the horrors of dark, drafty basements, then returns them to their natural habitat – The Dump.

Haven’t you ever seen Nickelodeon’s classic cartoon “AAAHH!!! Real Monsters!” ??

When EldestDaughter was little, she adored this show, & lived its tenets religiously. Monsters lived at the dump, and went to school there. They only came to human homes to practice their scares, and if they were still there by daylight – well – they had to be rescued – of course.

When EldestDaughter ended up with one caught under her bed… She knew.

Time to call Papa.

And of course, he came right over. Because what else do Papas do when their granddaughters call? I ask you?

So, he “rescued” the monster, stuffing it deep in his pocket (so the daylight wouldn’t hurt its eyes…duh…), and EldestDaughter then announced that she simply had to go with him to the Dump to make sure the monster was properly released.

Uh… Ok… 

Well, he took her, anyway, & they released the monster, which promptly scurried off into its proper hole to get back to “class”. 

Or so EldestDaughter informed me when she got home. I’m trusting her imagination on that one.

But the tale doesn’t end there…

Papa’s reputation as a Monster Man was solidified when EldestDaughter retold the story to one of her friends.

Cut to a couple of years later….

Papa gets a phone call from said little girl’s mother. 

(By this time all the kids in town called my dad Papa because EldestDaughter called him that. It stuck for many years until he retired from his janitorial position at the local school)

*Mother of Girl*: “Papa? I need you to come to the house”

Papa: “Oh, MoG? What’s the problem?”

*MoG: “Seems there’s a monster in the basement, and Girl says you’re the only one who can rescue it. I can’t get her to go down to the basement -at all. Please?”

Papa: (laughing) “Sure, MoG, I’ll be right over.”

When he got to the house, he had Girl stand at the top of the basement stairs with a laundry basket.

Papa: “Now, Girl, don’t you move. You stay right here at the top of the stairs. I’m going down there, and I’m gonna catch this monster…but if it gets away from me and runs up here – you be quick and catch it with this laundry basket…OK? But whatever you do…don’t come downstairs!”

Girl: “Ok, Papa. I’ll wait for you!” 

So, Dad clomped down the stairs, banged around some, hollering & clanking things together for a few minutes…putting up a fight, you know.

And when he came upstairs…lo and behold, there was a suspicious lump in his coat pocket, which he kept confined with his hand, telling it to “settle down & behave” because he was “taking it home”.

Girl was all smiles, & made sure to watch as Dad drove away in his pickup – and HE made sure to drive in the direction of the dump, and stay away from their house for a little while before returning. (They were close neighbors, had to make the timeline believable!)

Another satisfied customer of the Monster Man.

But the story still isn’t over…

The Dump closed a couple of years ago.

And Girl is now a grownup…who recently got married & lives out of state.

And my dad likes a website called ThinkGeek.

Ever hear of the Eviltron?

Well, its a tiny, magnetic speaker. That makes various, creepy noises.

Dad built a small box, & attached this doohickey to a rare-earth magnet inside the box.

And mailed it to the unsuspecting new, young bride.

After turning it on…of course.

He included a note telling her that, since the Dump had been closed, SHE WAS GOING TO HAVE TO BE ONCE AGAIN RESPONSIBLE FOR HER MONSTER – SO HE WAS MAILING IT BACK TO HER.

Is 20 years a long enough time to dedicate to a joke?

My father received a beautiful thank you note in the mail later, telling him that this was the single most memorable and original wedding present ever received.

And she would be opening it far…far…

Far…from the house.

Thank you very much.

Signed – Girl, and her Boy.

I am now in possession of the last of my Dad’s eviltrons, and having used it on all of my coworkers, successfully…

I think it’s time to return it to Dad.

Seriously – I think he needs to build one more monster box – for EldestDaughter.

The originator who gave the Monster Man his reputation to begin with.

Get her, Papa. She’ll love it.

Whooo, doggies…

Sunday I spent the day doing yard work. 

It was about time, as I’d let things pile up, weeds were starting to seed out, the hedges were towering WAY over my head, and my lawn was finally starting to green up & grow, since we’d gotten a little bit of rain.

So, I plugged my ear buds in, pulled on my garden gloves, & got to work.

After mowing the front lawn, & a little of the back (my battery-powered mower’s battery gave out), I plugged the battery into the charger, hoisted my hedge trimmer, & decided to tackle the beast-mode hedges, starting from the back end near OnlySon’s bedroom.

Well…until the hornets decided they didn’t want me messing with their nest.

$&#%@%5#6$64-&#+%(#(#+%$!#!+%-#&@

Drop the hedge trimmer in my tracks & hightail it to the house, making sure the damned hell beasts don’t follow me inside, I raced for the bathroom to ice down my wounded self with cold water.

I’ve never run so fast in my ever-lovin’ life as I did after that first sting!

Holy Mother of Gods!

Luckily, the little winged bastard only nailed me through my glove, on my knuckle, so he really didn’t get me all that bad, but Holy Cheezits, it stung like a muther.

Yeah, I stayed inside the house for a while, laugh it up, Chuckles. I watched that front screen door like the NSA, waiting for those little pricks to stop swarming my porch, knowing they were there, mocking me, jeering & marking my front door with their angry little pheromones.

Screw them.

After getting a drink of water, & wiping the fear-stink off…

I went back outside to retrieve my property.

My hedge trimmer lay there in the grass like a lost orphan…

So I gingerly tiptoed over & gently pucked that poor baby up & cradled it in my arms.

Went to the other end of the hedge & started hacking.

Damn straight.

Of course, I only got halfway down the hedge before I started seeing the hazardous, little, yellow bouncers dancing gleefully in the leaves again.

Assholes.

Ok.

So…

To the backyard.

Plenty of trimming to do back there, too.

And, as I’m happily zipping along, cutting through the Queen Anne bush next to OnlySon’s bedroom window…

ZAP! FLASH!

Aw, shit.

I sliced halfway through my old extension cord, that someone had tossed into the bush.

*many, many bad words inserted here as the outlet goes dead*

Ok…Lucky for me, I’m a well grounded kind of gal.

No electrocution.

Yay me.

And, I have a backup extension cord that reaches around to the driveway outlet, which allows me to finish up, not only trimming the wayward bushes in the backyard, but use my electric chainsaw to get through a piece of the neighbor’s hedge that has made its way through my fence & is too big for the hedge trimmer.

And what do I find while trimming? 

A rogue plum tree… With plums hanging from it.

Wtf?

We used to have a plum tree, but it died years ago, & we cut it down, to the ground. This…has to be from one of the plums that fell off at some point, or got dropped by one of the kids, or some other weird coincidence. 

Anyway… I have a plum tree? I guess?

Okey dokey…

Oh yeah, Sunday bitch-slapped me, hard. 

Yes, indeed.

But, like the badass mofo that I am, I bounced back & kept right on diggin’ til I’d had my fill.

And that was right about the time I went in the house & realized that by cutting that extension cord, I’d blown a fuse in the house, cutting power to the kitchen, the living room, and the hallway…

*sigh*

No Lightning…But Kinda Pissed

First off – let me say that most of today was just fine. That’s why I’m only kinda pissed.

I went to my hometown during the all-school reunion festivities today, & made my first stop my parent’s house. Because, of course, I did! I’m a good daughter!

Dad was out of town, so it was just Mom and me, & we ended up wandering the town to look for Dwight Knuth, the gentleman who wrote his autobiography, & featured one of my blog posts in it. We met up with him at the school, & talked to him for a bit. It was really, very nice & he had to have a hug from us both when we parted.

Then.

We went in search of the shadow box my dad built for the school which holds my sculpture of Horton & the book, Horton Hatches an Egg, which I mentioned features my hometown in it.

See the teeny little plaque at the bottom?

Know what it says?

“Donated by the Class of 2015”.

#&#%@$@%$+$+%((#!@!!?#-#-@!

WHAT!?!

Nothing, and I repeat…Nothing about how my DAD built that wooden box FROM SCRATCH… Nothing about how a member of the Class of 1988 created the sculpture.

Nothing about the hours of time it took my dad to handcraft each piece of this shadow box. The measuring, sanding, staining -painstaking work that he put into this piece, making sure that each shelf fit perfectly into the enclosure, and would hold up over the years. 

This is not a “company-made” piece…this is a hand made, one-of-a-kind piece of artwork. 

But no one knows that, because my dad is too humble to ever push himself forward in that manner. He’ll never tell anyone about the work he put into it.

Just that the Class of 2015 Donated it.

Ungrateful little shits.

Pisses me right the hell off.

Did I get a thank you?

From my Dad, yes.

From the Class of 2015? I got fuck all.

Anyway…

After that, Mom & I blew that popsicle stand & went downtown to have lunch, retreating back to their place afterwards.

I did stick around long enough to hit the “street dance” too… (Nobody was really dancing, more like milling around the street, drinking & listening to a band play really loudly)

I did end up running into some classmates, & had fun talking to them, catching up with where they are, what they’ve been doing, how old we’re all feeling anymore…

And before I knew it, it was almost 11pm, & I had to get the hell out of Dodge. I hate driving the highways so late at night, after hitting a deer a few years back – it makes you a bit jumpy & skittish while driving alone.

So, I’m home, safe. I didn’t smite the town with lightning…although I’d like to smack some little ungrateful wretches from the Class of 2015…

And I scored some homemade strawberry jam out of Mom’s freezer…so…definite win.

So, no lightning, but still kinda pissed.

Going Back…

This weekend I’m taking a little trip down memory lane. Just a small jaunt, mind you.

You see…

My high school is having their 100-year anniversary this weekend, so it’s supposed to be some kind of big blowout weekend all-school reunion.

(Blink too long driving down the highway, and you’ve missed it…I don’t think it’s a whole lot bigger than this photo above suggests)

I’m not going to make a weekend out of it, but I am going to stop in and take a gander at a couple of things that interest me.

First and foremost… There is going to be a gentleman there who wrote an autobiography about his life, part of which took place in my hometown, so he’s going to be signing books at the city hall for part of the time. He used my blog post about Dr. Hordinsky in his book, so I’d like to meet him, face to face, and shake his hand. Talk to him a little & let him know that I did actually read his book and enjoyed it, even the stuff I didn’t write!

I’d also like to stop in at the school & see the shadow box my dad built that now houses one of my sculptures. He asked me to make him a sculpture of Horton the Elephant to go with a copy of the Dr. Seuss book, Horton Hatches an Egg, which has the name of my hometown in it. 

Here’s the sculpture, but I’d like a picture of the finished product!

So, this shindig kicks off on Friday…but, that’s the busiest day of the month for my business, & we’re going to swamped that day, so there’s zero chance of getting that day off. Plus, by the time I get off work…I’m going to be completely brain-fried…

So, I’m going down on Saturday. I figure that’ll give me time to see what I want to see, do what I want to do, and skedaddle out of there before any shenanigans get too crazy. 

…I…don’t have a lot of really fond memories from high school. It was pretty much hell for me there, and I escaped to other towns as often as possible…so, it’s not like this is abnormal behavior to me.

I’ll be in and out like lightning…maybe a couple small scorch marks left behind…no big…

So if Sunday’s paper reads “Lightning Strikes Small Town North Dakota”… 

It wasn’t me…I was home all night…I swear…just ask the cat…

Opposable #FlashFiction

“You’ll write what I want you to write, and that’s that, goddammit!”

Moira flinched as a meaty hand slammed the table in front of her, punctuating the sentence with a slap.

“No,” she breathed firmly, “I won’t. I’m not a smut writer, and I won’t start just because you’re threatening me. I write what I want, and kidnapping me won’t matter, you fucktard. You’ll never get what you want from me. Sick bastard.”

Moira could hear him grinding his teeth as he growled under his breath at her refusal, but she refused to cave in to his sicko demands.

She’d been here for just over 3 nights now, or 4 days…she couldn’t really tell. She knew she was underground in some kind of bomb shelter, since she could smell the musty, mildewy smell of old water on concrete, but he’d fixed the place up…almost nice.

Creepily so.

The walls were covered with faux wood panels, that had pictures and paintings hanging from them, to add some semblance of “windows”, even to having curtains hung around a few. It was – homey – and macabre, all at the same time.

The table at which she was now seated was real wood, a deep butcher’s block kitchen- style surface, ready to seat at least 6 people, but currently only holding her and an old manual typewriter, a fresh ream of paper, & a cup full of freshly sharpened Number 2 pencils.

Exactly like she’d told Author’s Gazette last month when she’d done that article about her writing habits, & her quirks about liking to have pencils on hand for the odd note-taking, twirling, putting up her hair in a bun when really getting serious, & chewing on the erasers when she got stuck on plot points.

“Alright. Well, you’ll stay here until you write what I want, then.”

************

“Are you going to write it yet?”

“No, go to hell, asshole.”

“Supper’s on the table.”

“Carrots and cheese sticks again?”

“Bologna tomorrow. You know you get meat once a week.”

“Fuck off”

“Write it.”

“Die.”

****************

“Maybe…maybe if I just… No, I can’t.  But…then he’d let me leave, right? Yeah, sure, after all this time…he’d just let me go. What, it’s been how long? How many weeks, months…ohh…god…so long…he’s never going to let me go…”

***********************

“Write it”

“Never”

“WRITE IT!! I’LL FUCKING KILL YOU!”

“THEN JUST DO IT ALREADY!”

“no”

“Then die”

“You first”

*************************

“Crunch…crunch….crunch…..”

“carrots all gone…hehe hehe…”

********

“OH GOD! What did you do!!”

The blood dripped from the table, smeared along the walls, spelling out “Never” before slumping into an indecipherable scrawl near the bed where the dead woman lay. All her fingers bitten off, strewn about on the floor and tabletop.

“No, dammit! I never got my story!”

He flipped her over onto her back, furious, noticing as he did so, that she was smiling, with her own thumb, firmly wedged in her own mouth and throat.

Well…it was an opposable thumb, after all.

Exit Strategy

Graduation approaches swiftly, & I’m heavily in planning mode.

OnlySon has his cap & gown, & is eagerly awaiting the day he can kick high school to the curb.

He has requested Texas chocolate cake (a much-beloved recipe of our family’s) for his graduation party, which will be held at my house after the ceremony.

And…it’s going to be a joint party for my son…with his father, my ex-husband.

I know the ex really only wants to do a joint party because he doesn’t want to be bothered with having to plan a party, buy the supplies, host the damned thing, clean up afterwards, yadda, yadda, yadda… It’s always been his MO, to make me do all the work when it came to this sort of thing, while taking a share of the credit. Asshat. 

He says he’s bringing a second cake (he works as a baker at a grocery store here in town, so OnlySon requesting a homemade scratch recipe has wounded his pride, I’m sure), but I know his family… I’m making 2 of my cakes, just to make sure there’s some left for my family.

All the while, my anxiety has me in heavy emergency exit-strategy mode.

Except…

How do you get away from someone when they’re at your home? And they bring their family with them? Their very loud, very confrontational, very Greek, family? (If you’re picturing My Big Fat Greek Wedding in your head…Yep, you’re seeing the right people).

If anyone gets up in my face, I’m going to have a tough time holding my cool.  I will try, for my son’s sake…

But, as I’m passing out pieces of cake, I might be tempted…