Holy @*%#

I think I felt sorry for Brett Favre today. I don't not like him, he has just never been my favorite player. He has always been fun to watch though, for his sheer love of the game. You can always tell when he is having fun. Even when he gets intercepted or takes a hit, he has that "aw, shucks, it was worth a try" grin on his face when he gets up. Now, he gets up more slowly and sometimes appears to be trying to figure out where he is. Yeah dude, you're still playing football.

Until today, I didn't feel real bad for him. I figured he sort of brought it on himself, staying in the game as long as he has. He has to know that every defensive player is hoping to be the guy who took him out of the game with a clean, legal play. Like most exceptional athletes, he wants to end his career at his best, on his terms. Like most athletes, he has committed to the team and the season and the fans doesn't want to let anyone down. Those are admirable traits, but the truth is that he is letting people, or at least this person, down.

He is not fun to watch anymore, because he most certainly does not look like he is having fun at all. More and more, he looks like the pervy old guy who hangs around looking for a school yard game of smear the queer, only those kids are wise to him.

Ellie and Bubba J - Chapter 1

I met him in college. I was 18. He was a couple of years older. I really don't remember "meeting" him, just that I sort of became aware of him and he seemed like someone I would like to know better. For some reason I was hanging around his suite when he and some friends were discussing spring break. A suggestion turned into a plan, and a friend and I ended up going to California with him and a couple of other people.

After spring break, my friend started a new job, my room mate moved in with her boyfriend, and it seemed like everyone was preoccupied with finals and summer plans. Then my grandma passed away. My parents called about me taking a bus home for the funeral, and I went to retrieve my atlas from him so I could look at the route. I remember him laughing when I asked for it, probably thinking it was an excuse of some kind. Afterward, I sort of started coming around again until one night I just didn't leave. Then we just hung out all the time. I blew off friends, and whatever classes I could so I wouldn't miss a chance to spend time with him before the semester ended. The day he left, I cried like the biggest baby ever. I wrote him once, and moped over him for awhile. The next fall, I fished around a bit for info, but knew he had moved on and so did I.

I thought about him off and on for the next 20+ years, until about six months ago when I thought to look him up on Facebook. There he was looking very much like I remembered. I sent him an email, and was surprised to hear back from him right away. Within a pretty short time, we were emailing and chatting back and forth, and spending almost as much time together as we had when we were actually a thing. Then it sort of turned into a thing again.

to be continued...

Lazy Way Out

I was working on a new post in my head when I heard this song. Yeah, I know it's taking the lazy way out, but that post had too much self-pity and too many curse words. This will work just fine:

Guilty "Pleasures"

Minds out of the gutter people :)

I have not slept well the last two nights. I am pretty sure that two nights ago it was because of the weather, but I am not sure what the problem was last night. I know it wasn't caffeine, because I didn't have any after lunch either day. Whatever it was, I had plenty of time to lie there thinking random thoughts. What I actually came up with was a list of "guilty pleasures" - things I like but don't feel the need to discuss or defend:

Jon Bon Jovi screen saver
Hawaii Five-O
instant mashed potatoes and gravy from a package
the dollar store
chick lit
Big Mac
my new designer knock off bag
Shaun the Sheep
singing along to cheesy pop music from the 70s and 80s
Steven Segal movies

And yeah, that too. You know, just to see if I could relax enough to fall asleep ;)

OK, A Little Lower Than Level

A Bad Carnival Analogy

The last couple of months have been a rollercoaster of sorts. I have been crazy busy with work, school, family, church - life. Things have leveled off finally, which is nice.

I used to love rollercoaster rides. In fact, if nothing was happening, I might lament being at loose ends, and then promptly go out of my way to make something happen. Today, a merry-go-round is OK. It might not be as thrilling as other rides, and I know I am going to wind up right back where I started, but at least I don't feel the need to hurl.

This feeling will last as long as it takes to catch my breath and get bored again. The next rollercoaster leaves just in time for the holidays.

I Dreamt of Corn

I have been enjoying a fantastic fall, and glaring at anyone who says it should not be this warm for October. Fall is my favorite time, and I would love for it to last for a whole season like I grew up with instead of the typical two weeks we usually get here.

Headaches persist, but I have been sleeping well. Last night I had a dream that I was hiking. I took a wrong turn, then had to backtrack. I was annoyed because I was supposed to be meeting someone and didn't have time to get lost. Right after I got headed the right way, a huge tree fell right where I had just been. Then the terrain turned from a gravel trail to steep gullies filled with rocks, with everything rushing towards a roaring river. I fell in at one point, and promptly climbed right back out. I seemed determined to get where I was going, wherever that was. The weirdest thing about this dream, besides the fact that falling in the water did not wake me was that there was no sound - no water rushing, no tree crashing, no conversation in the community center through which I took a short cut. I am sure there is some comment I could make about the tree falling in the forest, but I've got nothin'. I am however still trying to make sense of the dream from a couple of nights ago. It featured a prominently displayed plate of creamed corn!?!

Also, mulling over a tongue-in-cheek invitation to compare sexual experiences with an acquaintance from college. I was pretty inexperienced, and probably wouldn't make for much of a comparison. But what precipitated the conversation was the admission that we had an, uhm, mutual (but not exactly similar) experience. I have mostly decent memories of that time in my life, and think I would prefer to remain stubbornly ignorant in case someone else remembers it differently.

Kharma

I did a good deed today. Yeah, don't ask. I don't know what got into me either.

Anyways, any good kharma I may have earned was probably wiped out when I cursed the girl in the Chevy Aveo. I don't know how it could have taken her more than one try to parallel park that thing but it did. And I cursed her every time she backed up and pulled forward until she managed to angle it into the space. It took her four tries.

So much for kharma.

A Whole Lot of Space to Breathe In

All day, I have had the chorus of a song in my head. I was going to post the video of the band, but the whole song didn't really fit my mood. I decided just to stick with the phrase that had got me thinking.

Turns out that was more the mood of the day, just time and space to do nothing but watch too much football (Texans and Steelers-yay, Broncos and Redskins-nay, Saints-not even fun to watch that kind of a blowout, Vikings like a highway accident - gruesome and sad but you can't keep from looking) and poke fun at my neighbors with the five year old that likes to disappear and the 14 year old who just had a baby.

The five year old came into our yard and tried to elude his mom and his big sister. Their dog followed. The mom retrieved the five year old and was headed home, then asked C if she had Jacques (the dog). I had just come around the corner in time to hear C say "He's over here". I asked who she was looking for and she answered "the dog". "Oh, cool" I said. "I thought you lost the new kid already."

I also had time to read my favorite weekly paper, where I found this gem:

If we outlaw masturbation, then only outlaws will masturbate.

Ha Ha. It was a good day, even if the Broncos lost and it only had a mediocre soundtrack.

FGMS

For some reason, he has been on my mind lately. I was 22 when I met him. He was 38. He had just left a publishing career in Chicago to move to Denver. We worked together, drank together and found ourselves alone together one too many times. He was Italian and very attractive - tall, dark hair, dark eyes, dark side. He drank way too much. He carried a gun. He went commando. It was not about being together so much as not being alone as we each tried to make our new lives in a new place. We eventually went our separate ways. I hope he found what he was looking for.

Randomly Accessed Memories

Due to a general lack of inspiration and few promising suggestions for a new obsession (43 things, maybe. Take up tae kwon do, seriously?), I will be writing about random memories and people I know until I think of something better. For today, it's going to be as simple as tattoos and piercings.

I left for college with the standard two pierced ears. At some point during the first semester of my freshman year, I woke up with my left ear throbbing. When I felt it, I discovered my basic gold post missing, and a new hole with a tiny diamond earring right above. A little while later, I ran into a friend wearing what appeared to be my earring. Turns out, at some point the night before I had agreed to trade with him and pierced a new hole.

Number four, third on the left side? Not a clue when or how it got there.

Number five, I remember well. It had become a running joke that every time I came home to visit, I had a new piercing. I was headed home the summer after my sophomore year with no piercing to show. So completely sober, in the light of the afternoon, I held a piece of ice to the back side of my right ear until the place where the cartilage begins was numb, and then I poked an earring into place. It hurt like crazy, but I liked the way it balanced out the three in a row on the other side

My senior year, I was thinking about a tattoo. I was living in a place where tattoo parlors were illegal, but I worked with a guy who had learned to ink in prison. I talked to him about it, and was working up the nerve when he suddenly quit coming to work and that was the end of that.

Since then, I have let all of the piercings except the original two close, and I have been grateful many times that I did not pursue the idea of a tattoo.

Blue Eyes

The quality of this version is terrible, but the tune is catchy.
I have had it in my head ALL day.

Epiphany

I had a really hard time today. Could NOT stop thinking about Him and it is starting to piss me off. I have started writing about Him several times and scrapped it because I can't seem to organize my thoughts, or I edit myself, trying to be more philosophical about the whole thing. Why not just say what is on my mind? Truth is I could write about Him all day without much trouble. Problem is I keep trying to spin it so that I don't look like a self-centered nut job and I am not buying my own BS.

Song Lyrics

Two bits of lyrics left in my head from yesterday:

I'm not in love, but the sex is good (The Sex is Good, Saving Abel)
If it wasn't for you I'd be happy (If It Wasn't for Bad, Elton John and Leon Russell)

Monday

And just like that, Mondays are awesome again:

L is officially on contract with Enterprise
Most of the people/things that have been making me crazy are going away
An acquaintance from college and I met up on Facebook and I am quite looking forward to getting reconnected

And it's only 8 o'clock in the morning!

Letter to a Ballsy Guy

I saw you today on the way to church. You were driving a flatbed truck with a small truckster on the back. There was nothing remarkable about you, or the truck, or the truckster. In fact, I barely registered your presence until one of my children asked what that red thing was.

You had a lovely pair of imitation testicles in bright red rubber dangling from the hitch of the truckster. I snickered to myself and glanced at my 10-year-old, who also had a knowing smirk on his face. I answered that yes, those were what they appeared to be, and no, I had no idea why men thought they were funny/cool/necessary.

As for the two three-year-olds at eye level with your set-up, I couldn't even begin to explain the situation to their satisfaction. Instead, I got to spend the rest of the drive trying to change the subject so that it would not be on their minds when we got to church.

So thanks for the laugh. I did appreciate the irony and the sly sense of humor. The evidence of your complex hanging in the face of two kids with a lot of curiosity and a still-developing sense of appropriate subject matter, not so much.

Signed,
A fellow driver with issues that are better left unexamined

P.S. I guess if you have to have them, red is better than blue!

Me, Me, Me

The purpose of this blog was originally to be an outlet for all of the random junk that clutters up my mind: memories or reflections that don't mean anything to other people, things I wish I had said but didn't, strange thoughts that don't exactly lend themselves to conversation, and so on. I kept it private partly because I didn't imagine anyone else being interested, and partly because I liked the idea of being able to express things someplace when no other place seemed right.

Along the way I realized that what is missing is the person or persons who would be interested in my rambling. Some one who didn't already know my every quirk and flaw, someone who was interested in getting to know me better, another person who shared my curiosity about the world, had my sarcastic sense of humor, understood my frustration with life sometimes, or otherwise had something in common with me.

Also along the way I have picked up a couple of occasional readers that I know of, and shared the blog link with a few others. At the same time, blogger added the new page feature. So, in an effort not to have to explain everything to people, I am practicing my blog design skills by adding a page. The page is still just a collection of random thoughts, but they are things that might be helpful to know before jumping into the rest of the blog.

Panic Attack

I was chatting with an acquaintance tonight and she mentioned that she was impressed that I could get up in front of 600 people to talk without panicking. She said that she has to take a Xanax and get a priesthood blessing just to give a talk in church. She is not the only person I have heard say something like that. I feel bad for those people, but I do not understand what it feels like to be them in that situation. I get nervous, and I worry about things, and I have a brain that jumps all over the place as it tries to keep up with my mouth, but I am not really prone to all out panic. 

The other night I woke up with what I imagine a panic attack might feel like. I was gasping, and getting very upset that I could not seem to get a deep breath, or get control of the situation. When I quit freaking out, my chest hurt and the bed was destroyed. I remembered that I fell asleep thinking about someone I used to know and a possible post I have been wanting to write. I looked at the clock and saw that only about 30 minutes had passed since I went to bed so it hadn't been long enough to be in a deep sleep. If anything, I must have arrived at the edge of the place where reality and dreaming sort of blurred together.

Was it a panic attack? Having never had one, I can't really say. And it's not like I am going to ask anyone. Then I would be comparing myself to someone who had a legitimate, medically-recognized condition shared by millions of people world wide. I am just stupid. And while I definitely know stupid when I see it, it's not the same as diagnosable. So why is it that the idea of speaking to a crowd of 600 people makes me only slightly nervous, but the thought of never seeing or talking to Him again is enough to generate the kind of fit that would wake me from a dead sleep with the whole center of my being feeling like I had been run over?

Letter to Day Care

Dear Day Care -

I pay you a lot of money to take care of my children. In fact, I pay you more than I pay my mortgage company. That's OK, because they like you, and they seem to be learning everything the average three year-old should know. Every once in a while they learn something I don't think they should know. That's probably to be expected, since they spend more time with you in a day than they do with me.

When you call and tell me my child is misbehaving, I appreciate that you seem to want to work together to discipline him in a way that is both helpful and in keeping with what our family feels is appropriate. I do not appreciate it when the conversation ends up like this:

You: Can you talk to him about this at home tonight so it won't happen again?
Me: Absolutely
You: If he was my kid, he wouldn't be able to sit down for a few days, but that's up to you

Yes, it is up to me, and I don't like what you are suggesting. If we are going to give each other advice, then the next time you call me, expect the conversation to go more like this:

You: He sat there and pulled up a whole section of the carpet
Me: Wasn't someone watching him?
You: We asked him to stop, but he just got a hold of it and had it all pulled up before we could stop him
Me: If he pulled up a section of carpet that easy with someone watching him, then maybe you should have sprung for better carpet

It's probably a good idea if we just stick with our current business arrangement, and refrain from giving each other unwanted advice.

Signed,
The customer who pays the salaries of two people

Four F's and the Broom Principle

I am not the one who left the broom on the roof. I could get the broom off the roof if I had a...broom. I could buy a new broom, but then I wouldn't need the old one. Actually, I could just use the ladder that was also borrowed and not returned, but it's the principle of the matter. I am not the one who left the broom on the roof.

There is a reason I keep moving your email over next to those from Viagra and the Nigerian ambassador. I do not want to buy a used forklift.

F***ing hormones and F***ing headaches. Fall is nice though.