A Day of Hallelujah & A Bit of Worry

On Monday's episode of House, I swear a scene has Hope Sandoval and The Warm Inventions playing in the background. I'm watching House for a bit of relaxation and background noise for futzing around on the laptop.

However, the holiday commercials are seriously paining me.

Tonight I spent a bit over 3 hours in the garage. It is getting cold here in Texas--or what I think of as cold, which is anything under 60 degrees. I believe it is supposed to get in to the 40s tonight. So being in the garage is a serious effort for me. But I had a GOAL. And after a day of moving furniture, setting up people's computers and digital phones, then spending 3 hours listening to James (skipping the "sad" songs), I did it. I fucking did it.



Huzzah! My back is killing me, and I have dirt boogers in my nose that a dung beetle would be shit happy to roll. And I'm not even complaining, I'm just stating some facts here about the ordeals I went through just to make this day happen.

FIFTEEN DAYS! That is amazing. I do still need to fill in a few tiny holes here and there, and grout, but the hard work is done. In plenty of time. Now I can concentrate on NaNoWriMo, which I am so incredibly, pathetically behind. Fink-Nottle has hit 25,000. Give him a round of applause. His parents are coming in to town, so I have a chance to catch up while he is entertaining more company (first me, then parents, perfect sabotage).

Ok, I promised to rant about the new federal guidelines on mammograms, but I'm exhausted. I have tomorrow off from work for the silliest reason ever, but it is paid by them (meaning it's not coming from my vacation or sick accruals); so I have time to rant tomorrow. I'm having lunch with a good friend, and then training at 4pm.

I'm hoping the DPS has a little gift ready for me tomorrow. Perhaps I breakfast with The Boy. Should be a good day.

Now, for the worry. My dear Orange Lover is not having a good day. I know I am a total paranoid mother, and it may not be anything, but he has me near tears. This morning he had a very hard time waking up, wasn't interested in food, and took me over 30 minutes of hardcore loving to get him to purr. Usually he purrs just looking at me. The Boy said Orange Lover had a bit of a lethargic day, but seemed ok. However, watching him tonight, he is losing his balance and isn't using his feet when standing, but is kind of sitting on the back of his legs. Hard to explain but it is obviously not right. And as he is sitting in this odd position, his body starts to collapse and his legs start to spread wider as his weight heaves downward. I don't think any of that is a GOOD SIGN. His ears feel warm to me, so I researched cat fevers, but there is nothing about warm ears, but plenty about rectal thermometers. I feel a 19-year-old cat should not be subjected to my clumsy temperature technique.

This may be nothing at all, just a bad day for a senior citizen. But I'm really trying to at least recognize the reality, so I won't be as devastated when IT happens. I can't spend forever in denial. He is so special but I can't force him to stay forever just because I feel like I would die with him. I love you little guy.

A Serious Man

Yesterday I ended up being too busy to post anything. I am filled with guilt and self-loathing over it. I may have been able to post if I had remembered to bring home my power cord to my laptop. Which I forgot because as I was packing up to go home, Ex-cop called me wanting to know what versions of "UH-doe-beeee ACK-RO-bat REEE-duhr" he has. I am not going to even go in to the details of how the conversation went downhill from that, and ended with him saying, "Grumples, I am who I am, and I don't know where I put that document." I ran out of here in a blind fury, leaving my power cord plugged in the to power strip. Sad.

However, it was a bit of a good thing, in that I was not able to waste a few hours on the computer, and I was forced to start on a new project in the garage. I swear it is not cutting people up and making art with their body parts. Just my own. Things sometimes do get a bit bloody when I'm working. Mostly just my fingers, and occasionally a cheek or arm. It's a huge project, and I'll have to work on it every day to get it completed by my deadline of December 1st. I'll post pictures of it along the way, but not yet. I worked two hours yesterday, but it is still too early to really have anything to show for it.

Immediately when I came in side, I had to do my best to wipe away the glass grit in my hairline and go pick up Wikus. We had a lovely evening at the record store then viewing the new Coen Bros. movie. It was raining a bit, and there was a terrifying moment in the parking lot where I couldn't see a damn thing but bright sparkly lights in total darkness. Yeah night blindness. Wikus basically had to do the seeing for me and guide me around curbs and cars. I did not cry, but I felt like it.

I picked up four CDs: House of Love Live at the BBC, the new http://www.theraveonettes.com/, the new Hope Sandoval and the Warm Inventions, and the new Noah and the Whale. I'm listening to the House of Love right now. I love these guys. I want to slice my body up on Guy Chadwick's cheeks. Wikus got the new Raveonettes as well, and then some synthesizer album and something else. Honestly, I didn't pay much attention. It was some kind of new day with me buying more CDs than him. He can spend HOURS in a record store. I more or less blank out and my brain forgets it even likes music and feels so overwhelmed it wants to run away. The fact I came away with four and didn't even have a list, is something I'm a bit too proud of.

"A Serious Man" was pretty good. Better than "Burn Before Reading," but not nearly as good as "No Country for Old Men." I think I'm too goy to understand their latest movie. I have spent most of my life in Texas, and without having been in Boston for 5 years, I probably would have understood even less. I hate the Texas school system and how much it has crippled me. Good think I am able to educate myself, when I'm not feeling too lazy and watching How I Met Your Mother and America's Next Top Model instead. My priorities may need to be looked at. The movie is in a word, fatalistic. So right up Wikus' alley. My drugs may be working too good now to really enjoy something so depressing. I mean, you might as well show me a movie of my own life. I don't need to have it totally rubbed in by watching someone who is just as unlucky as me go through his day. There were plenty of jokes, but it wasn't enough to get me through the horribleness of it all. So, yes, a good movie, because it was too realistic. "No Country for Old Men" is depressing in a totally different way, one that I found absolutely riveting. But this one, damn, just kill the guy already, he has been through enough already. Even if some of it is obviously a farce, it was still painful to watch. I'm one of those people who will cover my eyes when something embarrassing is about to happen to a character--I feel what these people are going through, because chances are I have been there, too. Oy vey!

I used the last remaining juice of my laptop battery to upload the CDs in to iTunes, and even then I couldn't get them on to my iPod until I got to work late this morning (oh the humanity of rains and winds and my sinuses). I now have to work late, and it has turned in to such a beautiful day. And so my life goes.

Slowly Eroding My Hearing in Various Ways

Finally a weekend that I did not spend making sweet sleepy love to the couch. I feel like I barely sat down on it, much less caressed its lumps and drooled on its stained cover. The cats probably missed me. We did watch a couple of movies (finally got Wikus to see A Very Long Engagement, which is this amazingly bittersweet, tender movie that I adore), and at long last my hair is dyed.

The weather was gorgeous. Highs in the 70s, blue sky and wisps of white clouds. A nice breeze ruffled my dark curls, and dried the occasional sweaty upper lip. Sunday I kidnapped my friend's dog, Emma, and took her with me to the AIDS walk.



Our group of 4 had 2 dogs, and both of them were borrowed. It is very important to have a dog when you walk with a gazillion strangers. It gives you something to focus on, and you always feel loved. Especially when you are sharing your fries.



Diego really knew how to tongue a bottle. I bet he is totally the best kisser on the block. Emma didn't bother to get to know the front end of Diego. She was more interested in what was under his doorknob of a docked tail. I mean, he was obviously OPEN FOR BUSINESS. Yet, if she had been watching the way he can drink from a bottle, I think she should have been more open about investigating his mouth.

The only low point to the day was how long our dearest gaysian had to wait for his Frito Pie. I'm talking almost an hour for serving up a bag of Frito's, some melted cheese and obviously pre-cooked pulled pork. The best moment came when an employee approached us, went straight for Guamaniac:

Employee: Give me your card. We're really sorry about the wait. It is in the oven now.

G: Ok.

Five minutes later, still no Frito pie.

G: Do you think that guy took my card to refund it?
Grumples: I can't believe you gave your card over without even asking if that is what he was doing.
G: (shrug)

Ten minutes later, STILL NO FUCKING PIE. Othe people who showed up way after us got their food, including that couple with the two yelping mini-dacshunds. Those dogs permanently deafened the higher levels of my hearing register. If I was able to record the ungodly being-raped sounds they were making, I'd totally play it on a never-ending loop when ever someone rang our doorbell. This will surely keep the Mormons from standing their for five minutes ringing and hoping I will finally answer the door and save me from my one-Coke-a-day habit. And living in sin. That too.

We finished our day at the Hope Sandoval and the Warm Inventions show. She has such a magical voice, that I am not going to spend the next hour griping about how horribly organized the show was, and the agonizing wait. Or why her backing band had some long-hair hippie creed. I do wish she had stepped out of the shadows, so I could lust after her more easily; but, I guess, even at 43 she just can't shake those stage-fright blues.

There was a truly drunk couple behind us, who obviously loved Hope and her band, even though they looked better suited for a White Zombie concert. They were so drunk that I'm pretty sure they forgot that they were in a theater with tons of other people. They obviously thought they were on their couch, and couldn't figure out why it was suddenly so damn hard to get to the kitchen to get another beer. They were practically yelling their mundane conversation:

Drunk Girl: But BABY, I WANT another BEEEEEEEE-EEEEER.
Drunk Guy: Sweetie, just a minute.
Drunk Girl: Oh. My. God. It's Hope! She's so BYOOO-TIFUL!
Drunk Guy: I LOVE YOU HO-OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOPE!
Drunk Girl: It's in my BAG. The SECOND BAG. Are you getting more BEEE-EEEER, BAA-BEEE?
Drunk Guy: Oh man, YEAH, but after this SONG. SHIT YES.
(Drunk girl passes out for last 20 minutes of show. I guess waiting for a beer, was too much for her body to handle. Completely had her head buried in the mounds of fat pillows on her chest.)
ENCORE
Drunk Girl: I think I need to go home.
Drunk Guy: Now? I was going to get another beer.
Drunk Girl: NOW! Baaaaaaa-beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee.

Much groaning and stumbling. I swore my night was going to end with puke down my neck from those two. The encore was the best song, and the drunks weren't even there to enjoy it. Suckers.