what makes twinkly happy (hint, hint, the holidays are coming!)

If that doesn’t tickle your fancy, perhaps this will; or perhaps could be put to some practical use?

http://www.tamponcrafts.com/gun.html

 

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Daniel Day Lewis, where is your loin cloth?

I just saw Speilberg’s Lincoln with the whole family.

Yes, Daniel Day Lewis is great as usual, but what’s with all the clothes?

I never once heard him say no matter where you go, I will find you

It’s quite a turnaround from statements like there are times when I look at people and I see nothing worth liking, let alone anything like this iconic American speech

This is not a man, this is a king.

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anniversary

25 years ago at Thanksgiving dinner at our family friends’ house in a suburb of Detroit, I took my last drink of alcohol. I’m sure I had a glass of wine at least. More than one glass? A beer? That I don’t know. I was never picky. I loved all alcohol. If the occasion called for wine, that’s what I’d be drinking.

I remember driving north, probably on I-75, then I-94, to their house. I have no idea what suburb. Was it still Southfield where they lived or had they moved on? I remember the barren fields, the low winter sun, the flat landscape on the highway. Did we pass the huge tire on the side of the highway, did we pass one of the first super-flashy moving digitized billboards I’d ever seen in my life?

My mother lived in Farmington Hills, Michigan at the time. Paul and I would drive up on the weekends and visit her, stay in her ranch condo, rent about a dozen movies from the arty-farty video store a mile away, lock ourselves in the den and watch movies all weekend. Sometimes we would fight, inevitably we would have sex, sometimes we’d go out to eat, even if just for lunch, sometimes take a walk in the sterile “neighborhood” that was like all of the other hundreds of condo neighborhoods in the suburb I grew up in for a few years when I was still in elementary school. The condos and sprawl came later, after my family moved away to a suburb of Toledo.

I had skirted around AA for about a year, hanging out at Adult Children of Alcoholics meetings with another friend of mine from college. After the meetings, we’d go out and get drunk at one or two of my favorite townie bars in Kent.

When I finally went to my first AA meeting, after being invitied by a woman who I banquet waitressed with at a sprawling restaurant in Hudson, Ohio, I felt happy and at-home right away; not like I felt when I was around the dragged-down energy of the people in the ACoA meetings. The alcoholics were a happy, gregarious lot; the codependents were pissed off and low.

It only took me a month to know why I was so comfortable in the AA meetings. These were my people.

Last drink, Thanksgiving Day, November 1987.

And that’s all she wrote.

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Thanksgiving, inch by inch

Not to dissuade you from my earlier Thanksgiving post, but I was just reminded of this fabulous video due to a Facebook thread….

It seems to me that I used to post sometimes twice in a day. I’d be so eager to share things. Especially back when I did regular Music Mondays and Thankful Thursdays. The obligatory would inspire the spontaneous.

Have I posted this before? I sure hope so. If you have never watched this, here’s your chance.

Alan Cumming exudes sexy like a turkey in the oven at Thanksgiving (fill-in-the-blank).

From an Alexander Technique perspective, he has got it going on. The beautiful poise of his head, neck, back relationship, his amazing presence throughout the entire song. I could watch this all day.

Yes, his voice is shot, but who cares? He is a thing of beauty to behold. Sexy motherfucker.

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Thankful Thursday–ain’t no thing

Happy Thanksgiving to all of my loves!

 

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scale

When I was a little girl in the ’70s, I did not have a scale like the one pictured above.

We seemed to have had the one same bathroom scale forever. It was green, rectangular, and the numbers sort of looked like the ones above, but their little window was rectangular, not ovoid (oval?). But maybe that is wrong. The scale was made of metal. I am sure it didn’t work with any accuracy for at least the last 20 years that my mother had it.

After my father died, my mother moved from a place they had in Toledo to a condo in a suburb of Detroit. After she lived there for about 8 years, she moved again to a condo near us in Stow, Ohio. All this time, she still had that crazy green scale. The mucilaged laminate-covering was starting to peel off at the edges.

It was completely wonky, but I would still get on it every time I used the upstairs bathroom in her condo. I loved the sound it made when I got on it, metal and weights, mechanical movement. I loved the way the numbers took their time going around and finally came to center and I loved the way it was completely wrong. I don’t remember what I weighed on it, but it was not correct. I weighed between 138 and 142 my whole adult life after college and before kids. That’s what I do remember. Maybe my mom’s scale read 135. Maybe it read 155. Who knows, who remembers these things, and why?

I know I had a scale in Kent because that is where I had my pregnancies and babies and I know I weighed myself a lot at that time. I just don’t know what scale we had. Did it break? Did we move it to Massachusetts with us? Did I throw it out, donate it?

Right now, we don’t own a scale. We had one that I really liked, a sort of minimalist glass thing with digital numbers. According to Paul, the thing never worked. I must have bought it at Target, but was it here in Massachusetts or back in Ohio?

it wasn’t this model, but you get the idea

I had to ask the company to send some part for it because it didn’t work right. I think I did that twice. It needed a little watch battery in order to function and I replaced it often, or as often as I thought I should according to the fact that Paul said it didn’t work.

The great thing about the scale not being accurate is that it measured low. So I always thought I weighed less than I really did. What a shock to get to the doctor’s office and weigh around 5 pounds more than I did at home. I always attributed this to being clothed, but we know clothes only weigh about 2 or 3 pounds, maybe 4 in the winter, at least for someone around 5′ 5″ like me.

In each of my pregnancies, I gained 25 pounds. Textbook. I noticed that the very tiniest women gained the most weight. I knew one gal who gained 80 pounds. But that stuff comes right off on those teeny gals.

I took all of my pregnancy weight off after Violet in one week. That is because I was very dehydrated. I slowly gained 8 pounds back and eventually took it off again.

After Annie, I gained a lot of new fat. So even though I eventually weighed 142 again, I had fat on my hips and thighs that remains today. I have never liked it.

Eventually, I got my flat belly back, even after Annie. Until I became anemic in 2006. That was the end of my youthful belly.

When I was anemic and I was seeing my old acupuncturist, she told me that the Chinese say a woman should gain 10 pounds after the age of 40. Is this something I wanted to hear or not? I think about it often. She also said you should never try to lose weight after the age of 40 because you need it as you age and start to waste. This is exactly what Susun Weed says. I saw it happen to my grandmother and I have seen it happen to my mother.

My acupuncturist at that time also told me that in Traditional Chinese Medicine, you don’t weigh yourself. Your weight is none of your business.

I think the point is to use food as medicine and to live a healthy life full of natural movement, warmth, and fresh air. Oh, and sex. I don’t think I’ve ever been to an acupuncturist who didn’t ask me if I was having regular sex.

I know it’s creepy to post this image after talking about sex. My job is not to keep you comfortable.

tres moderne, n’est-ce pas?

The thing that was creepiest about other people’s bathrooms when I was growing up was if their bathroom toilet had a semi-circle of shag carpet on the floor in front of it. Then, a matching toilet seat cover and a matching scale cover. Usually, these were a very dark green. You know of what I speak.

This was the same time that Harvest Gold, Avocado, and Burnt Orange were the most popular kitchen colors.

Now correct me if I’m wrong, but since pee tends to splatter to some degree in any bathroom, weren’t those shag fibers simply pee-absorbers? And why wouldn’t you do the German thing and wash your bathroom once a week on your hands and knees with a bucket of soapy water and rags instead?

I don’t know why I am being so confessional and nostalgic, but all week, I have been thinking about that green scale.

This may be the scale that comes closest to the one in my memory. I probably would have killed for a pink one.

All the scales I find at Target in the last 6 years or so are crap. Made in China of crap, by crappy companies who don’t know anything about Traditional Chinese Medicine anyway. I know I’d have to order a doctor’s scale for about a hundred and fifty bucks if I wanted an accurate scale. But even the doctor’s office nowadays has given up the beauty of metal weights for digitized numbers. You even have to plug the thing in.

I found photos of a neon pink scale on google images. And I found lots of photos of naked pregnant women and let me tell you, that is a wild ride.

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a circuitous Music Monday by way of another So Cal post

magnolia pods

beautiful horsetail (an ancient plant, reproduces by spores like ferns do) hedges landscaped into a rock-and-water garden in front of a (multi) million-dollar ocean-front home

jade hedges; rosemary hedges; bougainvillea spilling out over garages and porches and clay-tile roofs; hummingbirds; shore birds; harbor seals; cormorants and the white streaks of their excrement all over the rocky cliffs on the beaches in La Jolla; the black-crowned night heron fishing off of the ropes at the Maritime Museum; the beautiful black-and-white spotted feather with a bright-orange rachis that I brought home with me but still haven’t identified (anybody?)

ship’s ropes

I got all fancy-schmancy and used the digital switch-over function for b & w, something to which I’ve always been quite resistant. With my old Retina camera, b & w was de rigeur, but with digital, it always feels like cheating. What is wrong with me? Am I so pretentious that only 35mm b & w photography is good enough? Yeesh.

dummies in the ship museum (who still uses these guys? CREEPY and his hand looks bloodied!)

same dragon, different angle:

You know I’ve said I think boy pee has a stronger odor than girl pee, due to the testosterone and all. That was before I visited one of the San Diego airport’s women’s bathrooms at 9 pm on a Saturday and one of the Atlanta airport’s women’s bathrooms at 6 am on a Sunday. These loos smelled very strongly of pee, BOY pee. YIKES!!! Maybe our hormones are equal to and/or greater than theirs? (I’m baiting you, you know).

if this were a b & w photo, you might be confused as to who should use this john

They may talk big in the South about manners and all, but let me tell you, they don’t seem to know how to clean a bathroom.

Today’s song has nothing to do with So Cal except that our pal George sort of half-played it for us and we sort of half-sang along (as if we could it at all because the Feelies don’t really sing their lyrics, they sort of mumble them)

In Coronado, an uber-white, wealthy (or just wanna-be wealthy, for the clueless tourists?), tacky, less-cultured-than-La Jolla (if that’s even possible), gazillions-of-SUVs type community, there are a few places on the sidewalks and at the curbs where quarters are glued to the pavement, I kid you not.

First, it’s illegal (not to mention un-American) to deface American coins. How is it that in one of the most Republican counties in the US, this is allowed?

Second, it’s cruel. What, Coronado, you have so much money, you sit around on your xeriscaped patios watching the lowly plebians try to pick up quarters all day? What about the little barefoot ragamuffin getting run over in the street as he tries to pick up that coin he needs to buy a can of beans for his family’s supper? Have you no mercy?

So, Coronado Beach, keep your money glued to the sidewalks. We don’t need your stinkin’ quarters.

Look what this little New England street urchin found, not glued to the sidewalk:

Look what I saw when I came home:

I know this is not a great photo, but at least I didn’t make it b & w, right? I never saw a sunset like this in So Cal. Chalk one up for New England!

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Once in a while Wednesday: tough stough/tuff stuff

A recent photo of me on our trip to San Diego. As adorable, sexy, beautiful, and fascinating as I am, I hope you can still tell I’m saying don’t fuck with me.

I will tell you the sordid detail now, why I am bleeding and won’t stop, why I bled last year for 67 days out of 90, why why why and why I didn’t know the full story of my own blood loss.

2 days after my ER visit in January, I had an in-office vaginal ultrasound (hey, buck up readers, did you think I wasn’t gonna mention my vagina?) by none other than the OB/GYN who had me in the stirrups in the ER.

Fast-forward to about 6 weeks ago when I went to the OB/GYN’s office, yet again, due to menstrual flooding (refusing to see the Offending Doctor, of course). When I was in the office talking to yet another doctor, thankfully not in stirrups, what did I find out? That back in January, on that very ultrasound, a 3+ cm fibroid tumor was found at the back of my uterus, embedded in the lining in such a way that I WILL ALWAYS END UP FLOODING WITHOUT CESSATION until I am on the other side of menopause and it goes away or until some hormonal or surgical intervention takes place.

Why my body was able to not bleed for almost 6 months (completely off of progesterone but under the loving care of my acupuncturist), I do not know. But once I started, I haven’t stopped. I’ve been able to cut back the progesterone to a more reasonable and less interfering dose, but I can’t go off of it until I undergo one of 4 options, each of which is fairly traumatic in scope to me.

It took me a while of reeling from the information (appx 3 weeks) that the OB/GYN, the office staff, the nursing staff, the radiology department (does that about cover it?) NEVER told me I have a tumor (fibroids are benign btw) before I could conceive of a plan. I have been under my acupuncturist’s care, but I was not in a place where I trusted the gynecologic practice I was with. The impending week away to California also meant that I had to wait until our return to deal with the fibroid.

I spoke with an MD in the same practice at 5:30 am a few Sundays ago and was very pleased with his attention, information, ability to listen and answer questions, and apparent intelligence. I will be seeing this MD on Monday and I will be discussing a few different options so I can make a decision and get off the progesterone and see what my body does in response to whatever choice I make.

I am scared and tired and sad and I got really sad news about my mother yesterday as well. Her health problems are myriad and long-standing, but she has been in a dramatic memory decline for several months. So, I am dealing with that as well, her only daughter and her primary caretaker.

It’s hard. Harder than I could ever have imagined. And I thought having babies was tough stuff. I don’t remember this part being explained to me. The sandwich years of my generation. Can I get a witness?

someone would like you to believe this is what women look like when they need to use the toilet

this is not what I look like

ever

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Tuesday tidbit

I just changed yesterday’s post‘s title.

C’est tout. Au revior!

twinkly

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Music Monday, long time no see

a beautiful sunset at Coronado Beach 11/10/12

Back from California which feels good. To run on one’s own neighborhood’s sidewalk, to hike in one’s familiar woods, to cook one’s own food, to eat one’s own mother’s famous spaghetti sauce, to sleep in one’s own bed, to see one’s own children in the flesh.

It is my father’s birthday today. He would have been a whopping 91 years old. Yeesh. What does that make me? Still a girl who lost her father too young is what.

I liked La Jolla, somewhat, especially the ocean and the pretty architecture and being able to ride bikes around and the beautiful plants, flowers, and trees and the birds one doesn’t find in the Eastern US and the art outside the museum and the food, some of the food anyway. I loved our B and B and Margaret, the innkeeper and chef. I liked some of the food in San Diego. I did not like Coronado, but I did like the pretty beach. It was so windy, the sand whipped at our feet and the stainless steel public toilet made our ass skin very cold.

Who says ass skin? Nobody, nobody but me. Try it, though. It is not as easy as it seems. It is practically a tongue twister. And I’ll stop right there lest you get ideas and think of any double-entendres.

Long ago, I thought I would chronicle my travels, no matter how humble and close-to-home, by taking photos of myself in the facilities (the “loo” in other words) of places I visited. Probably due to my restless nature, I did not stick with the plan, though on occasion, I do remember to take a picture (if I’m lucky enough to have remembered my camera).

I do not have a photo of the stainless steel toilets from the public restrooms at either La Jolla or Coronado, but when I searched google images, I found a lot of photos of fancy, $1200 stainless steel toilets, presumably for the asses of Romney-type voters (Koch, Bush, Rove, but let’s watch those double-entendres, plz).

We had the pleasure of yet more friends coming to visit us from further north in California, this time a couple who we already know. You may recall we met Ms. Coldiron for the first time earlier in the week.

We went to a little park just a block from the sea and we sat on a bench and we sang songs to a guitar and a banjo. It had been a long, long time. Seven years maybe, gasp.

When we were singing in the little park, freezing our buns off, a little wedding was going on. Sometimes I sang a little bit loud, what one might describe as enthusiastically, I think, and when we all realized a wedding going on (because we weren’t quite sure at first), we tried to be a little quieter. The amazing thing is that the wedding people never asked us to stop. It was all so groovy, but it didn’t really feel hippy groovy or California groovy like you’d think, but it was groovy nonetheless.

The song I most remember grooving to was this one. We sounded pretty good, but I think Susan and George’s fingers must have been about frozen. Amen.

Here is a photo of the handle in the bathroom on the Star of India at the Maritime Museum in San Diego

Of course it is not me peeing, but it is what I was looking at as I sat. The ship originally did not have modern toilets as it was an old ship, but even these “modern” pieces of hardware are more beautiful and solid than most of what one finds nowadays.

One thinks of other things one can describe as solid brass.

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