A Busy Day

As compared to the last couple of days, this day was nuts. I was at work most of the day and we had a new resident move in and that's always crazy with lots of paperwork to do.

Plus when you work where I work, you have other stuff going on at the same you're doing said paperwork and have to keep up with the other residents as well. PLUS, if you work with whom I work, you have to deal with the crazy chaos that the bosses create as well. "Do this, oh and this. Yes, I know you're eating dinner after doing paperwork and work all day, but do this now please." And with one of our bosses, well, she is Chaos Incarnate. She is such a "do-er" that no sane human could possibly keep up but she expects you to.

So, all in all, it was extremely busy, constant paperwork, almost all day long, constant badgering by boss and residents. And, I'm wide awake as the night comes on... bah.

A Nest With a Face In It

Wow, I got up and went to staff meeting at work which is two hours. I came home and watched a little bit of TV and read and fell asleep face down in The Nest, for 7 hours, woke up at 8pm. Bah, my whole day "off" gone just like that.

I've been so tired lately and for some reason, I'm not sleeping. I usually have insomnia but this is above and beyond, wide awake until 4am kind of insomnia and my Ambien does not appear to be working.

So The Nest is where we have a futon (hauled off the curb from down the street, in pretty good condition, or it wouldn't have entered the house), leaned up against a bookcase (can't see in this photo), it's 90 degree angle to the other bookcases you can see that hold the videos and craft books. We watch TV there and recently, I've been curled up there, sleeping/napping as well.

So that's The Nest with a face in it. Mine, flat down. Passed out.

Nothing Day

Even more tired today, feeling quite blank with a bit of depression loitering around in the dark recesses of my mind.

So I had a nothing day today. Just poked around on the computer and watched TV. And slept.

That's all.

Crazy Day

Days always seem crazier when you're tired. And I was tired today when I got off work. Although aren't I always tired? Seems that way. I got home and waited for a call from one of our financial coaches who didn't call and then left to go take a bunch of e-trash to Green Citizen, a green oriented recycling depository for e-trash and we had a bunch. Tons of VHS tapes, old music cassette tapes, 5.2 and 3.5 floppy disks, a dead portal foot heater, my old and up to the point Marty pulled out a VHS tape quite violently, trusty Marantz VCR I had for years, and an old laptop.

On my way down to Green Citizen, I stopped by Radio Shack to give my new VCR/DVD recorder over for repair as the VCR never worked on it. They reported it was a replacement plan only so I had to take the thing downtown with me. You don't leave stuff in your car downtown. But off I went, grumbling that nothing is easy.

But I think I took the wrong route to get down there, driving down O'Farrell and into the Financial District, the cesspool of hoity-toity commercialism with some asshole in a big truck behind me who seemed to deem it necessary to blow his horn right when the light turned green and I wasn't rocketing from my stopped position. I was sorely tempted to give him the finger but I refrained. Praise me.

Once I got down there, parking was, as usual for that area, a bitch. And the whole time driving, it felt like I was going to run over someone, hit something or someone was going to hit me. Traffic just seemed strange and people seemed weird. I got back in the car and had to wait about ten minutes to pull into the turn lane and paused to let a guy go by in the crosswalk and he stops in the middle of the street, in the crosswalk to glare at me as if I had actually hit him. I wonder what he thought, looking at me, with my face all pinched up from the driving anxiety I was having and my concern about being slight inside the crosswalk. I saw the dude, I was not going to hit him in anyway. Apparently he thought so and wanted to make it clear to me that he thought I was being an asshole. I looked him in the eye but barely acknowledged him. I know my brows were in my hair, I was so scrunched up as if I had hit him.

Finally I got home and was feeling irritable and bitchy. But at least I did get some errands done.

Worms!!!

They make my hair itch.

So at work today, first day back after a week off, which is always hard coming back but eventually, my body quickly "forgets" all that nice time off as if it never happened. And as always, work has its "unique" challenges. Although this time, a different resident of our house than the usual.

I discovered that the house cat, our cute Nooby, has worms. I discovered this while he was sitting on my lap and he got up and jumped off and there was a white grain of rice on my hand that was moving upon closer inspection. Well, I've had dogs, I knew instantly what it was and I can tell you that my hair didn't stop itching for the rest of the night.

I did the research to find out how transferable it is to humans as I do have a house full of residents to consider. Most likely tapeworms, although I thought it might have been roundworms at first, which apparently are more transmittable than tapeworms, whew. But still... ICK!

I made sure I washed my hands. I made sure my co-worker Laura washed her hands. I made sure all the residents washed their hands! We warned them about not letting the cat on their beds and their laps for a while. And then, poor kitty, we locked him up in the laundry room for the night with his bed, food and water and litter box. Tomorrow (hopefully!!) he will go to the vet to receive de-worming treatment.

He was not happy about being locked in, since he normally gets to be a love pig and sleep with any resident of his kingly choice. Here I am with my uber 'biner house keys, comforting said pissed kitty before locking up his worm dropping ass for the night.

Scooters and Directions, Oh My!!

I take a couple of online courses at the City College of San Francisco, a fairly souped up version of a community college. Yes, I have a Master's Degree but I can now take classes in whatever I want.

So, this semester I'm taking Beginning French and Astronomy: the Solar System both online because I'm still trying to put an internship in somewhere. At some point. If I can ever find one that doesn't interfere with my work schedule. Ha. I see that happening.

In any case, some online classes have a mandatory on-campus orientation, some optional. My French class was optional but I decided to go and it was fun. My Astronomy orientation was mandatory and was today. So off I went to attend. I really like the teacher and wish I could take it face to face. It's also a very mathy course which I'm not looking forward to but should still be interesting. I'm not so attached to the grade in this or the other Astronomy course I took last semester by telecourse with the same teacher. I love teachers willing to swear in class. He's got a good sense of humor and I have always believed that humor makes learning more fun and also makes it stick.

When I came out of the orientation, I noticed I had three missed calls and one voicemail on my cell phone (I had it on silent). So I checked it and there's my husband: "Uhm, it looks like the scooter was stolen, I've made a police report, give me a call." My heart just dropped out of my chest so I called back howling, "What!! Oh my gods!!!" He went in for coffee, came out and it was gone. He wasn't sure if he'd left the lock on or not. I was so upset. Nice new scooter and my personal means of transportation (shared between us but he has the truck) and with the need for a new car on top of this and not knowing how my insurance worked with this kind of thing, I was near tears.

I know that the old, past trusty red scooter wouldn't make it to work as trustily as it used to and definitely not to the supervision group that I need to start going to in order to make up the MFT hours that I'm going to start losing on January 31, 2008. I mean, look at it, it's held together with red duct tape (to match, of course). It's smaller than the new scooter and feels and sounds like your riding a lawn mower. I don't know how I ever rode that poor thing. I don't know how I ever waited so long to get a new one.

The new scooter is very highway capable and could make the 45 minute to an hour drive down to the supervision meeting. Even after I dropped it, it's been trundling along without issue. In fact, it started up right after the accident, again without issue. It's bigger and more stable than the old one, with bigger wheels and engine. And, damnit, we practically just bought it. It doesn't have tape on it. We still owe Marty's mom a bunch of money for it, well, all the money for it. And to me, the thought of having to figure out another means of transportation as well as owing this money for a bike that might never be returned, being afraid that my insurance would not cover any of it (which it does, thankfully, a good reminder to know one's policy!!), and having to get a new vehicle for Marty... well, I was petrified.

But I tried to marshal myself as I drove home (I had the truck due to recent rain). I tried to come up with different ideas such as the city car share programs and I also had the thought to carefully ask my husband if he remembered properly where he parked it. It's not an off base question. There have been times, not often but they have happened, that we've come out of a restaurant or various venues and he's turned the wrong way to go off to whatever vehicle we had parked. So I was going over the question in my head, playing out different ways of asking it, because I know my mouth and energy get pissy even when I want to control it. "So, uhm, I'm only asking this as a 'be certain' kind of question, but are you sure you parked it where you thought it was taken from?" and etc.

So I get home and see my husband walking up towards the house with his motorcycle helmet with a sheepish look on his face, saying as I get out of the car, "Uhhh..." I say "You forgot where you parked it?" and he says yes, this is so. He apparently had called while I was driving home but my phone was still on silent. I burst into tears on the spot. It was a bit much to deal with.

So I drove him over to where he said he remembered he had parked it and there it was, sitting patiently, waiting for us, with the lock on. I think we both gazed upon it in intense relief. I know I certainly did. We drove home in convoy, parking and locking the bike at home. We were both wiped out by it all.

So that was the bike incident.

On another note, some folks asked me for directions while I was walking to the grocery store and I was able to point the way with ease. In my mind that means I'm a San Franciscan. My city that I know how to tell others to get around in. Woot!!

A Rainy Day In

Not much going on today.

Other than it's raining enough to make San Francisco float away. Just coming down constantly. Marty says it will stop Monday. Oh yay.

We went to couples therapy this morning; something we still after years although we only go twice a month these days. Rough session. But we made it through and started working our way back up to a semblance of civility for the rest of the day. We're getting much better at that.

I suggested on our way home that we pick up some movies so we didn't get home and go, "Oh, let's get some movies." and have to go back out again.

So we got Fantastic 4: Rise of the Silver Surfer and The Kingdom. I'd seen the sequel (Fantastic 4) in the theater but wanted to see it again and Marty, in his infinite and movie-judging wisdom, said, "That sounds like a good little piffle." See what I mean?

The Kingdom was pretty good if not quite intense. Story of an attack on an American contractor's compound in Saudi Arabia and the FBI team sent to investigate. I didn't even know that the FBI went international. But I guess it's technically American interest even if on foreign soil? It was well done and seemed to be making more commentary on the situation rather than just a shoot 'em up movie, which is what I was expecting. I recommend it.

Lollygag

I decided to call in sick from work today, due to the cold Marty gave me. Which means I had and have Monday morning to Sunday morning off this week and that's nice. Plus the cold seems to be running through fairly quickly although I have my doubts because no cold with me ever runs through quickly, usually they last a couple of weeks for me. But we'll see. Feel rotten today though. Mostly just sitting around playing WoW and Marty playing his new game Age of Empires, some turn based type strategy PC game.

Mostly just hanging. I think it's raining. Big surprise there.

Satisfaction

I like the song but when I first watched it....

For some reason, I found the first minute or so extremely creepy. I mean, she looks like some kind of gaunt zombie and with the very slow looking up.... Blearg!! Shivers!!

Heath Ledger

Today I found out Heather Ledger died. He was 28 and they still don't know what happened. Suicide or OD of some kind, or medical, unknown at this point.

Normally, these things don't really bug me. Well, unless it's an actor I like and even then, only faint strains of sympathy. But for the most part, I feel why should celebrities get all the "Oh no!! They died??!! That is SO SAD!!" when there are tons of people dying in this world PER DAY. And one person should get all the attention when they kick this mortal coil? Bah.

That said, this death bugged me a bit because I do like him as an actor. And because he was so young. And because there is no definable cause off the bat. Usually it's suicide or drugs or whatever people get themselves into. But he always seemed pretty on the level. Although Marty mentioned that he didn't seem a happy dude. Some sadness there. But still, a cute guy, a good career, a two year old daughter... but this has not stopped people before.

It's a sad thing when someone with a whole life ahead of them, be they celebrity or "regular", goes so young. So much potential snuffed out like a candle. That thread, thinking about the threads of Fate, has been cut, ended.

I hope he finds whatever he was looking for and if he wasn't, may he find something in the next life that satisfies him as much as this one did.

Germs Galore

Today when I got home from work around 12pm, I was pretty soaked. It was raining when I drove the scooter home and it was damned cold. We've been having a very cold winter, cold even for us. I know, I know. Don't laugh East Coasters, I know what you guys are going through. I used to live in the mountains of western North Carolina and I know cold. I lived in Maine from September to April and I really learned cold. But there is something weird about the chill out here in San Francisco. It seems colder than I remember NC or ME being. And it's been colder than usual. So it made the rain extremely cold as well, each droplet, many of them, feeling like ice needles until my skin went numb. But at one point, I just wanted to stop riding, get off and curl up. I felt like I just couldn't take it anymore. But I made it home in one piece, driving very slowly (considering the accident I had was in the rain).

I threw myself immediately into a hot shower and my hands and thighs were so cold, the water felt like it was scalding me. I ended up on the futon we use to sit and watch TV, face down with my head by the little useless foot heater and basically slept until 7:15pm. Marty came home somewhere in that time frame. He had a cold that came on suddenly yesterday and he napped with me a bit before Sitting and going off to see clients.

I guess I was doomed because when I woke up, I had a runny nose and felt tired and achy. Great. I had wanted to avoid this one if possible but alas, not to be.

FrankenPizza

So, as I have mentioned, the clients where I work learn to cook and all that. They have regular assigned nights, often with a cooking partner (two residents working together; we try to pair up one with little to no cooking knowledge with one who has some or a lot), and staff will help out.

The cooking schedule of partners shifted over the week and the new schedule was not posted (this is done in Menu Planning, a group which does exactly that) and none of the residents seemed clear on who was cooking when. So no one stated they were to cook today and thus had no official meal. The recreational counselor, a peer counselor (meaning she is a consumer herself of the mental health system) who is staff at Eucalyptus House, often helps out in the kitchen. So does my counterpart, Laura, who is a "day" counselor, meaning she stays for about seven hours, from 2pm to 9pm (with me on Thursday) or 11:30am to 8:30pm (on Sunday) and helps out with various tasks, from the bureaucratic to the clinical.

It's a good thing that Sarah and Laura work in the kitchen with the clients. I have a lot of patience in this job. You kind of have to. And I'm pretty good in a lot of areas except the kitchen. I have no tolerance for unskilled in the kitchen. Unkind? Probably. But I just really have a hard time not barking at people when they put the spoon they were using to stir the meal for 15 people (12 residents and three staff) into their mouths and then back into the pot again to stir. Okay, get my drift?

But Laura has tons of patience in this arena and thusly, I let her do the milieu kitchen stuff. Sarah helps out but has some strange ideas about cooking and thusly, I also stay out of the kitchen when she's cooking. I'm better at getting people to clean their rooms or do their house jobs (chores).

So Sarah steps up to get a couple of residents involved in cooking an impromptu dinner. They're lucky she was there because if a resident doesn't show up for their cooking night and hasn't made provisions to have someone else do it, and no one steps up to the plate, well, tough shit. I leave the kitchen and pantry open and they can make their own. I believe in community accountability. Oh, you want dinner? Go talk to the cook and tell them. Let them know you are not pleased when they get back home from wherever after missing making dinner for the house.

So she did manage to get a couple of people involved and eventually the call went out, "Dinner! Dinner's ready!" with the cooks going around the house like heralds, up and down the stairs, sometimes banging on bedroom doors. I wander into the kitchen and ask what had been made. A resident, one of our most functional-why-are-you-even-here clients, a really smart guy who I've had quite some interesting talks about the history of Indo-European language, says, "It's FrankenPizza." And upon seeing said dinner, exactly after the moment he said it, I burst out laughing, because indeed, it was so.

A couple of those store bought crusts they must have rustled up from the pantry, covered with straight out of the can tomato sauce and I don't mean sauce as in has other things in it like pasta sauce but really, just the old grungy tomato paste/sauce. Then browned and not even fully drained of the grease, ground turkey mashed on top in strange piles like weird hair tufts or something with a few stewed, canned tomatoes perched here and there. No cheese on one, slices of the individually sliced and packaged American "cheese" artfully draped over the other.

FrankenPizza indeed! I love this phrase. It's a keeper for sure and with so many possibilities. FrankenCasserole, FrankenCake, FrankenSoup, etc. But I have to say, FrankenPizza rolls off the tongue the best!!

Cancel or Allow?

You are facing the sad realization that you need a new car. Cancel or Allow?

Oh, how I wish I could say Cancel... Sigh.

Marty took the truck in yesterday for a tune up and some particular problems it's been having (strange squealing on start up, bucking like you've put it in the wrong gear in second, an obvious tune up needed, and the driver's side seat belt not working, probably among other things). The went over it and called today so we could give the go ahead/no go ahead for the work it needed. After finding out what would be needed to fix it, Marty walked into the bedroom where I was still snoozing and reported that we needed a new car. Apparently it's going to cost about $1200 to fix the truck and it already is twenty years old with a little more than two hundred thousand miles on it. It would be silly to put $1200 into it when that could be used for a down payment or used car. And apparently the state will give $600 for it. Poor truck. It has served quite well.

Marty and I may both have Masters Degrees and be fairly intelligent people but when it came to prospect of needing a new car, we just looked at each other in consternation. Ermm, so just how do we go about this, our looks said to each other and we both admitted having no idea. I mean, really. I can do my own taxes (for the most part), negotiate getting around on public transportation in a foreign country, probably even change the spark plugs in the truck but when it comes to buying a car, or a house for that matter, I am lost.

It's not like you get this training in school. Or even from your parents. These are the sort of things you have to learn by doing. Or a lot of research and reading the "For Dummies" series of books. Or you find someone who knows what they are doing. Either way, it's huge and scary. You want to get the right car for you. Do you get a used car, a new car? You don't want to get "taken" by a salesman, pay more than you should. And the big question, where does one find the money in their budget to pay for a new car or even a good used car.

It is such a looming subject; it feels overwhelming. Of course, I know me and I'll be staring at the screen for hours doing "How to buy a car" research. No, really, hours. I can't help it. I get taken over by the Father Ussery syndrome and I have to make sure I do it right. My father will get a new techie device and sit down to read the manual from front to back and probably order a couple of books and read those as well. He's well prepared. I seem to have picked that up in my older years because I certainly didn't do it when I was younger.

I imagine I'll be the one gathering the information. Marty will do the talking. Because as we know, the Aries shouldn't be allowed to speak in these situations. They get too mouthy.

I'll keep you updated on the whole affair.

Cloverfield

If you've seen a movie in the past several months, you've likely seen the trailer to Cloverfield, although I don't think it had that name several months ago (at least posted in the theater trailers). You know the one, with the big something attacking New York and the Statue of Liberty's head bouncing down the street, hand held camera film style. (Poor New York, they always seem to take the abuse in film and in real life).

So I saw Cloverfield today with Marty. And I have to say, it was a pretty effective thriller.

I never saw the Blair Witch Project or any other similar style film. But I was quite impressed, if not a bit nauseated, watching this filming style. It was pretty chaotic, considering the "camera man" is often running for his life and was just some guy given over the duty of taking testimonials for his friend at the party that the movie basically begins with. So the camera angles are what you would expect, shots of the ground, wild whipping to the side to look down a street, crazy bouncing around. It gets a bit hard to take considering the entire movie is filmed this way, but it is a very effective way to create the tension you feel watching the movie. You know as much as the little band of people running through the city. And these people aren't heroes, they are just regular folks, previously having a going away party for a friend. You know, because of the implicit set up limitations of the filming, the movie is going to likely end in one of two ways: they die, they escape. They aren't going to be the ones to kill the big something thrashing New York, or do anything amazing or fantastic in the scheme of grand scale. All in all, they do handle the situation pretty well. Well, PTSD is going to be a big factor later!!

There was definitely some intense footage, mostly in the beginning when you first see the explosion, the statue head rolling down the street and the Empire State Building crumpling in the distance. Again, I say, poor New York. Some reviewers have reacted to this part of the film, feeling that it plays on the tragedy of 2001, engaging in emotional manipulation, that the scenes are too close to home. Indeed, the people who come up to the top of the roof from the party to see if they can find out what's going on after the first rumble they feel, ask "Is it another terrorist attack?" Plus the building falling in the background. Sure, I can why folks might think that. I didn't get that sense though, that there was deliberate manipulation going on.

It could have been any city in the US, although yes, New York definitely has a history, so was this a "good" choice for setting of the film? I think I would challenge that. What, are we going to try to erase what happened by not filming in New York, by not filming awful things happening anywhere in the world? I was pretty irritated when I learned that the first Spiderman (I think it was the first one), had erased the Twin Towers from the movie because it had been filmed before they went down and and released after. The filmmakers felt it would be too traumatic to keep them in there. So they digitally removed them. Wow. But, it doesn't work that way. You don't get rid of trauma by just trying to erase it. It has to be processed.

Heh. Shut up, Marty. You see, I hate processing trauma.

But I do recognize that it has to be done. And the only way that you do it, is to face it, work with it, through it, not to erase it and try to pretend that it doesn't exist or avoid it by skipping over it. It might be hard to see New York under attack by a big something and seeing those buildings explode and fall in the movie but it's there, so deal with it. Don't get me wrong, it was an absolute horrible thing that happened there in 2001. And absolute horrible things happen all over the world, every day. I'm just saying...

Don't erase it. Be with it. It's the only way to heal it.

Heather Does Something Strange...

Mark your calendars!!!

I cleaned up a part of my already chronically messy room that is quite chronically messy. That's the main path from my door to my computer. I always pile lots of stuff right by the computer. I'm working on it!! That's why it's there. I'm "working" on it. That pile over there is the recycling, that one is shredding, that one is filing for credit cards, that one is filing for medical, etc. Sure.

So for some reason, I decided to clean this area along with a couple of drawers of my really jammed file cabinet. I don't really know why this desire came upon me. Maybe it was one of those once a decade kind of things. Maybe I'd just gotten tired of tripping over my own stuff. I don't mind if others are tripping over my stuff, as long as they don't break it. Selfish, but true. Some sort of defense mechanism. Takes you longer to get to me. Like putting cans on your doorknob or marbles on your entryway floor.

I put some music on, my computer and iTunes being right there at my desk, and thusly began my crazed cleaning jag.

There was a lot of random and violent gesticulating and leaping about shouting "Shit shit!" "I can't throw this away, I can't do it, no, no, no." There was lots of talking to myself, "It'll be okay...", soothing and patting my arms and shoulders.

But it ended up being a little easier as I went along. When I hit those moments described above, I used these two strategies to force myself to put the paper in the recycling bag.

1. Do you really need to keep an article on "How to drink enough water"? You KNOW that stuff already! Recycle it!!
2. Are you really going to read this?!?! NO, so recycle it!!

It worked pretty well. I guess it shouldn't have since a lot of hoarders will be able to justify keeping it. "I'll read it one day!!", "But I might forget what I know and will need this on hand!" But I was able to bypass this and actually fill a paper grocery bag and a half. And had a bunch of space to put all the paper piles from the floor into the filing cabinet to be processed again. Argg. But at least it is off the floor.

Another thing I have a hard time doing is not reading things or examining them before recycling or throwing them away. I went through every sheet of paper. Partly because I seem to have picked up this obsession about shredding any sort of identifying information on recycling, such as my full name, my address, etc. I think it started about a year or two ago. Probably with all the identity theft scare stuff. So I rip out the info, shred that, recycle the rest in the regular bin. And partly to examine the item and make the final decision, keep or toss? So I ran across all sorts of things. Such as Marty's old address scribbled on the back of an old fencing gear receipt. So that had to be back before I knew by heart where he lived. Long ago. Wow.

So, it's a start. I still have a long way to go. Here's some shots I took with my weenie phone camera.


Blearg.

Sweeney Todd!!

Marty and I saw the new Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street yesterday.

I had known the play of old when my step-mother let me listen to the soundtrack when I was younger. Quite younger actually. Hmm, maybe this explains my slight bent to the Dark Side.

But I loved the singing. I remember that the most about it. Never mind the gruesome content. I mean, we are talking about a barber that cuts the throats of his clientèle and then his counterpart cooking the flesh of his victims into pies that she then feeds to the public of London. Yeah, never mind that.

Sweeney Todd is indeed a story of revenge. Sweeney, once Benjamin Barker, having been sent away to prison (Australia maybe) when a corrupt judge coveted his woman, returns sixteen or so years later to find his wife dead and his child reared by said corrupt judge. He reopens his barber shop where he previously lived, now above a Mrs. Lovett's meat pie shop who sells "the worst pies in London" and soon, in order to get his slicing hand into shape, so that he might perfectly take his revenge on the judge, begins practicing on his current custom, the various men of London, taking care to choose those who will not be missed. His barbaric barber's chair, a monstrosity of machinery, is built to allow the bodies to slide directly from the chair down to Mrs. Lovett's baking basement where she processes them and turns them into meat pies, which of course, then become the best pies in London. Various characters swirl around these main two, Anthony, the young seaman Sweeney traveled home with who eventually falls in love with Johanna, Sweeney's now grown daughter, the Judge and his crony Beadle. And an old dirty beggar woman who is the only one that seems to know there is more going on in the basement that meets the eye. And Toby, a young boy who, once the servant boy for a rival barber in town, becomes the servant boy for Mrs. Lovett upon his master's... ahem, untimely disappearance.

I have seen the original Broadway version on DVD, which was where the soundtrack I had heard came from so long ago. I think this version is the one people think of when Sweeney Todd is mentioned, with a fabulous performance of Mrs. Lovett played by Angela Lansbury. I saw another, rather stark (as if the thing isn't stark and dark enough) in San Francisco last year. The stage set was spartan and all the actors also played the instruments as well. But it was good, if not an interesting take and version.

And now, the movie, with Johnny Depp playing the titular role. Helen Bonham Carter is Mrs. Lovett. It was directed by Tim Burton who has always been a Dark Sider himself. I think Johnny Depp was excellent as Todd and I wouldn't have expected any less of him. He doesn't have the biggest range on his voice, but he did fine with the singing. He brought his usual Depp intensity to the role and I found him right fine chilling as Sweeney Todd. Although, I have to say, this just adds another nail in Johnny Depp's coffin of being able to be recognized by me. I really have no idea what the man looks like in real life. When I think of Johnny Depp, Captain Jack Sparrow comes to mind instantly and now, the Sweeney Todd look. Sigh.

I thought Helen Bonham Carter was too young of a choice for Mrs. Lovett and I wasn't so impressed with her singing. The thing for me that made Angela Lansbury's Mrs. Lovett so creepy and great was her indefatigable cheeriness while Bonham Carter's Lovett is melancholy and depressed, full of wistfulness and sad dreams. Which in a way does make you feel for her Mrs. Lovett, differently than Lansbury's.

Todd is blinded by revenge, Mrs. Lovett by Todd and her wish for something "normal", such as love and a family. But she wants this in a completely blind way. Again, never mind the meat pies!! Because she is just as guilty as Sweeney Todd and his bloody swath of revenge.

And speaking of blood... Blood has always been one of the signatures of this play and no less in the film. Probably bloodier in the movie due to the ability for uber special effects. The blood on stage is often represented by red cloth or scarves or even fake stage blood and usually looks like blood. The blood in the movie was a strange red color and strangely thick almost like melted crayons. Really red. Not the dark red color of blood but the red color some bright red lipstick. It was inhuman, which maybe was the point. But it spurts and stains and creeps along the floor in various steams and pools. Ick. Another really gruesome point of effect was when the bodies left the chair to fall down to the basement. I won't get into it. You can scar yourself in the theater.

The musical part of Sweeney Todd has always been my favorite. Indeed, I think the actual story would be quite hard to take if it didn't have the barest levity of the music. The songs are great, they are great to sing (remember, I say this content aside!!) and really add to the overall effect of the story in my opinion. Such as the song when Sweeney begins to sing to his razor blades in obvious adoration and obsession "These are my friends, see how they glisten!" Or Mrs. Lovett and Sweeney singing about the various types of pies you might get at her shop, such as priest or vicar (I think you get the meaning of this). One of my favorites is the sweetly sung "Johanna" by Anthony underneath her window upon seeing her beauty for the first time. It's probably the most positive song in the whole thing and even it has an edge to it, "I'll steal you, Johanna. Do they think that walls can hide you? Even now I'm at your window... I am in the dark beside you, buried sweetly in your yellow hair!" Can anyone say "Stalker!!"?

I think they did a great job with Sweeney Todd and I do recommend it. I would recommend getting the Netflix copy as well, that is the DVD of the original with Angela Lansbury, get a different feel for it. Don't bring your kids.

Français!!

I went to the orientation meeting for my French class I'm taking this Spring Semester. I'm taking French 1A, a basic beginning French class and Astronomy 17, the Solar System. Both are online classes. I would rather take them in person but I need to leave space open for the ever elusive child internship.

The Astronomy course, although online, meets for orientation, the midterm and final exams. Three times on campus, all required. The class is merely for interest because I always have been interested in space, especially Mars. So, even though the course requires some knowledge in high school algebra, I'm just taking it to learn. Unfortunately, I have to take it for credit because none of the science courses can be taken for audit or non-credit. I say unfortunately because even though I have a Masters Degree, I can't do math to save my life. So I could end up getting a rather poor grade. And I am so very attached to grades. But in any case, it should still be fun to learn about our cool solar system. Mars, Mars, Mars!!

The French class had one optional orientation on campus, everything else is online even major tests. I prefer that, personally. I decided to attend the orientation on campus. I've taken online courses before and so have used CCSF's online system, called WebCT. But the French class has more to it than just reading some articles and taking some quizzes, like most online classes. I had wondered how a class that needs an audio component would be run online and when I examined all the components, it seemed a good idea to attend the orientation. I'm glad I did because it made sense of everything and we got to speak a little bit of French as well.

It's a pretty cool system, with voice chat and voice discussion boards, along with videos, articles, links to many resources. There's the online quizzes and exams and an online workbook as well.

Since from the beginning of deciding to take the course (I had five years of French in high school but that was 16 years ago!), I have been remembering more and more, little words in French popping up at random times, such as calling my husband a "pamplemousse" when I was thinking about grapefruit (which is the proper word, not that he is a grapefruit...). It's good to know that's it's all in there somewhere...

Viva la Francais!!

Something Fabulous

You know, I probably had something fabulous to report for Monday, but I really can't remember anything about my Monday.

I guess it was a normal sort of day, playing with my new laptop, napping... *shrug*

Sorry that something fabulous did not come your way.

But don't blink, you might miss something....

Mac Verus PC Commercials

These are so cute!

This is my favorite!! Twice a week, hahahaha!!



Apparently there are a large number of these so it would drive me crazy to post even a bunch of them so I just found this long string of clips. So funny!!



A fan's take on the battle through mouths of babes...

Laptop

Whoo!! I got a new laptop today!! Well, I should say I got my first new laptop. I've always had hand-me-downs that just never seem to work too well and basically would get to use them for a couple of days and then poof, no usuable laptop anymore. Bah. But now... *holds laptop up into a single ray of sunlight while angels sing "aaahhhhh!!"* Uber.

Let me rattle off its specs, which I imagine most of you won't even understand and half I don't even either(well, a little), but hey... still cool:

This is an Acer brand laptop with Intel Core 2 Duo processor T5250 (1.5 Ghz, 667 Mhz FSB, 2MB L2 cache), 2GB DDR2 memory, 250GB HDD, 1024MB NVIDIA GeForce 8400M GS Tubo Cache video card (which supposedly is good for gaming... better be), 17" WXGA+ Acer CrystalBrite LCD (screen), 802.11a/b/g/Draft-N WLAN wireless, a disk drive that can burn CD-ROM and DVD, as well as play CD-ROM, DVD and Blu-Ray (which apparently everyone thinks this is going to be the cornered market over HD-DVD), plus a built in web-cam with pretty good quality and of course, like everything installed these days, Windows Vista.

I basically walked in and said, "I need a laptop. And this is what its main functions need to provide... To process Adobe Photoshop well and to play World of Warcraft well. Oh, and to be able to do these two things at least fine at the same time." After being shown some nice computers by the nice Best Buy boy, I mentioned I needed it a little cheaper and he directed me to this one.

It was under $1000 but came to just a little over with the "idiot-proof" insurance/service warranty added on. Because, yeah, if I drop it in the bathtub...

The only problems I have with it so far is certain keys on the keyboard are too easy to hit when typing (such as the CAP lock key) and the touchpad.

Touchpads on laptops are the spawn of the devil. I'll be typing along, say in a blog post and suddenly I'm typing ten lines up, inside text I've already written; I guess because my hand brushed the touchpad and the computer registered it as me wanting to go where the cursor is currently hanging out. It is so extremely annoying, I can't even tell you. I don't like complications in my word processing. And I don't like having to hold my hands in a certain position so the side of my thumb doesn't brush the touchpad and upset it. You're too sensitive, go get some therapy, you dumb touchpad!!

I'm a mouse user. Mice are good. Touchpads are bad. So probably in settings where I'll be able to use a mouse (home, cafe, etc.), I'll use a mouse. On planes, etc, I'll suffer with the touchpad.

Another thing I don't like about my laptop is actually not about the laptop itself but what's on it. Windows Vista. I have Windows XP on my desktop. "Grew up" with DOS and Win95. Somehow thankfully managed to skip Windows 3.1, and continually upgraded, Win 97, somehow missing Windows 2000 as well. And NT. To XP. I'm fine with XP. But everything comes with Vista these days whether you like it or not. But hey, I didn't really know the difference between XP and Vista, and although I don't have anything major against Macs, I'm not buying one at this point, so I'm stuck with Vista.

And really, I don't see any major differences except looks. It's all sort of chrome-ish without being metallic. Sleek, modern looking icons and such. I'm not hugely fond with the looks but it might be partly getting used to the 17" widescreen monitor. One big difference though about Vista is the CONSTANT requests to Allow or Cancel various actions you might take throughout your usage of the program. It's very annoying.

So this perfectly (if not a little bit exaggerated) exemplifies my experience with Windows Vista thus far. It's one of those cute Mac vs PC commercials with the two guys standing side by side.



Sounds like from the commercial there is a way to turn it off. I must look look into this. It sounds like my very insanity depends upon it.

Marty/Heather Unit Attend a Baby

Today the Marty/Heather Unit went to babysit Benjamin, James' (Marty's best friend and best man at the wedding) and Robin's (James' wife unit) newborn (well, 7 months new, anyway). Marty has sat for Benjamin before but I had yet to be present for a sitting on... errr, of... the baby. I'd seen him about three hours after he was born. So cute! And I don't say that about babies, really. For the most part, I don't want to have much to do with them, but Benjamin is KEEYOOTE!! I'd seen him a couple of times after that, amazed by how exponential his growth seemed (especially as I was sick for almost two months after he was born and thus barred from his presence).

So Marty's first babysitting experience was of crying and upset but when we went over, he hardly made a peep. I was so tired from my night (at work) and the day, I slept a good deal, waking up when I heard occasional noises. Marty read and then I awoke to crochet some. Had I been alone, I would not have slept, but it was nice having back up in the form of Marty there. I imagine that if there had been some colicky upset that a tag team would be a nice approach. Oh don't want the female right now, here's a male presence and vice versa. Or "I really need a break from the crying, pass him off and back again...", probably makes a better babysitting experience than any one person alone.

So, it was a good first experience for me and I think it will be one that may become often since I'm interested in learning the violin again (well, ultimately the fiddle) and Robin just happens to be a master violinist. So a trade might be possible. Although for me to sit with Benjamin alone without Marty, I'll have to go through "Baby Boot Camp", to learn all about diapers and such. Yum.

A Post a Day...

A post a day keeps the ... what away?

Anyway, I want to do a post a day for this year. I realize this is a very challenging goal because I tend to be verbose and writing one post can take up some time. But I want to give it a shot. Plus I'm giving myself some leeway in when I actually post the entry. I'll have one per day at least but it might take a while to when I actually post it. But I'll always make sure I post in chronological order.

And since sometimes my life isn't that exciting, I might just provide you with some silliness to amuse you for the day.

Off I go!!! Enjoy the Year of the Blog!

You Can't Make Me

So I went to my Rosen body worker today. Currently, I see him twice a month. I also see my Chiropractor twice a month as well. Keeps me put together.

Rosen Method work is a type of body work (involving touch of course), that focuses on the relating to the body's allowances and resistances to engender therapeutic change. Well, actually, that's pretty broad. So, you can go here to learn more.

My Rosen worker is also a licensed psychotherapist so he is able to work with the issues that arise from the Rosen work in a psychotherapeutic way as well. Plus, he's got great hands.

Today I came in very anxious (a common state for me) and I could barely draw in a full breath. I could breathe but I couldn't get my body to draw in one of those nice, deep and full breaths after which you go "Ahh, that was nice." and my body was rigid, definitely not loose. As he began working on me, I could feel my body resisting each touch. It's rather hard to describe this without the reader having had some Rosen done on them in order to know what I'm talking about but I'll try my best. So he might press into a tense spot of muscle and he will "listen" to how my body might respond: does it tense more, does it shift and relax? and then go with that by either pressing in more or gentling his touch. It's a rather intuitive method, I gather. Sometimes images will arise in connection with this body touch. A wolf in a cave, guarding something. Usually symbollic in some way. Which then can be processed verbally, if desired. Steuart doesn't talk for generally the first half hour, just works with my body. Then the last part is still body work but with a verbal component. Often my body will react to things I'm saying by tensing or relaxing, indicating in some way areas to be worked or areas releasing.

So, my body was resisting, almost pushing back against his fingers in grumpy tension. Eventually I mentioned I was noticing this, which he acknowledged as well. A question he will often ask is, "What is the body voice that goes along with this?", meaning if this part of the body or this particular reaction of the body had a voice, what would it say? The body voice could be verbal, or could be an image, or even a feeling or sensation. Often, it is an imagine for me that I am able to describe quite clearly, along with a felt sense. Today, it was all three. I mentioned that I felt like a teenager in the corner with arms crossed, feeling grumpy and recalcitrant and saying "I don't wanna and you can't make me!!" He said, "Yes! That's the voice! I like that voice and I want to hear more from that voice!"

I talked about my sense of loss of control in my world and how I am able to control it (or believe I can control it) by shutting down and just saying "I don't wanna. And you can't make me." But really, control is an illusion. We don't have any control. But oh how we want to believe we can and try as hard as we can to create it. I am definitely one of those "we". I think surrender is the worst form of punishment to an already battered psyche. I notice how I really feel this body voice when getting into a common, "usual" argument with Marty, when I feel pushed by him in some way. And I feel pushed a lot because it's very hard for me to just take in something put out by another person. I don't trust one lick of it. I don't trust people as far as I could pick them up and toss them. Which is not at all. That comes from a long history of bullying by peers in school and such. Whole different series of entries... But if I set up that "You can't make me!", I'm safe. I'm going to be stubborn and not let you in.

Control, safety, fear... yes. So, one might think that seeing all these things might stress me out more and I was feeling a bit worried that I didn't really know what to do with this information. That is for another session... series of sessions, most likely. But at the end of this one, I was breathing fully again and my body was not as stiff as when I had first come in. So whatever came up shifted something in my body.

I love body work and I love my Rosen worker as well.

But... you still can't make me. Do Anything.

Paqrat

So, as you know, I play World of Warcraft. Not as obsessively as some people who have all the end-game epic gear and such, but a fair bit.

Today I noticed something about my play in World of Warcraft which actually came from my try at EverQuest2, another online multi-player role playing game like WoW.

A friend of mine let me use his second account to make a character and try out EQ2 since that is what he plays a lot and I on WoW. None the twain shall meet. So I made myself a cool little faerie wizard and started zipping around the world of EQ2. Very quickly I realized the immense factor of collection possibility in this game. As in running around the virtual world collecting "stuff". Stuff for main quests, stuff for side quests, and mostly stuff for crafting. Oh, so much stuff for crafting.

In WoW, you can take two major professions and all of the three secondary professions (cooking, fishing and first aid). Your two major professions can be one "creation" type (alchemy, blacksmithing, enchanting, engineering, jewel crafting, leather working, tailoring) and one "gathering" type (herbalism, mining, skinning), or two creation types or two gathering professions. Usually folks will choose a creation type with an appropriate gathering type, such as blacksmithing and mining or leather working and skinning. Now, in WoW, if you have mining, you can gather ore. If you have herbalism, you can pick flowers, etc. But you can't gather other types of "stuff". Unless you have herbalism and skinning, say. Then you can gather herbs and skins. But you can't gather ore. But in EQ2, you could gather EVERYTHING. Oh my gods, it seems that 80% of the game was running around picking shit up, at least for me, because I'm a hoarder.

In real life, I'm not as bad as clinically diagnosed hoarder who keeps everything. And I mean everything. I keep a lot stuff and I have a damn hard time throwing it away. Books, magazines, paper; mostly that sort of stuff. But, well, shells and keys and stuff like that too. So, I'm a pack rat. Yay.

I had to stop playing EQ2 because it felt like it could be way too obsessive for me, collecting so much junk. I mean, I do it in WoW too. But EQ2 felt above and beyond the pale. It had interesting bits of gameplay that I liked but ultimately, I like WoW better. I guess it's all in how one is "raised". Mac or Windows? That sort of thing.

But I realized today that, yes, I am a real life Pack Rat. And I'd rather not be. But, I know I have the tendency. So, since I have that leaning, and I like to play WoW, I figured maybe I could work on bringing my pack rat-ism to the digital-virtual world. Collect and save only there. It's a goal, I guess. Certainly less space to take up and more fun to organize. I can spend hours organizing files and folders. But for some reason, I hate organizing my real stuff. Harder to bend over and pick up something off the floor I guess and then to find some real, physical space for it.

So, let me describe my virtual pack rat-ism. You can have 10 characters per server. And there are tons of servers, so technically, you could have tons of characters for your account. But remember, servers can't play with each other (excepting in battlegrounds but that's a whole different story), so your 10 characters on Shadowsong are only there, your 10 characters on Hyjal are only there. If you have friends on both servers, you can't talk to the ones on the other one. So, most people choose a major server where they have their 10 major characters with smatterings on other servers.

So Hyjal is my main server and I have 10 characters there. Nine playable characters and one "bank alt". This configuration is quite popular since people don't want to use a main playing character to go back to the Auction House to sell stuff all the time, so they in-game mail it to their bank alts who are parked in a major city.

So meet Paqrat, my "bank alt" on WoW. A female gnome warrior, level one. Ain't she ugly? I was so amused by the hairdo and color, face and such when creating her, hitting random a few times, I kept it. (Click pic for a larger version.)


I collect stuff on my characters and send them to her. I have tons of crap in the bank and am always trying to upgrade my bags in order to store yet more stuff. Occasionally, I am forced to go through my bank and bags and sell stuff. Horrors.

But if I could narrow it down to the digital, I'd be doing pretty good. That's my aim for the year. Ack, another New Year's Intention/Goal!!

Knight Rider

Okay, yeah, I mentioned Knight Rider in my previous post as a show I'm interested in watching. It's starting up in February 2008.

Yes. I said it. Knight Rider. KNIGHT. RIDER.

And, yes, I used to watch the original. And YES, damnit, I had a crush on KITT. Hahaha, you thought I was going to say Michael Knight (David Hasselhoff), didn't you?!

Well, okay, maybe a little, but I think I did like KITT best.

Now I don't really like cars all that much. I think they are a nice way to get around; you don't get wet and all in the rain, it's faster than walking, it's safer than a scooter, motorcycle or bicycle, etc (I won't get into the negative bits like environmental impact and all right now). But I've never really understood the concept of the sports car or people ogling over cars in such an obsessed way. I think I "got" the point, at least about sports cars, when I started driving my ex-boyfriend's Dodge Talon. I'd been raised on hand-me downs and old Nissan pick up trucks as old as I was and was used to wrestling the steering wheel to get it to turn, etc. And I love to drive so I was doing it a lot, anywhere I wanted, along the Blue Ridge Parkway, up and down the mountain roads. I got in that car and was just floored. The slightest touch to the steering wheel and the car instantly responded. And for someone who loves to drive twisty mountain roads, it wasn't like anything I had ever experienced before. So excellent performance I can understand. But looks, for the most part, don't mean that much to me. I say for the most part because sometimes the sleek lines of a car may draw my attention. A little.

But, even I had to admit, KITT was a pretty cool car for "his" time; an extremely souped up customized version of a stock 1982 Pontiac Firebird Trans Am, in all black, complete with an AI "personality". I have to agree with the article on Wiki (link below), that KITT was probably more the star of the show than David Hasselhoff. With the bulletproof shell, speeds up to 300mph, turbo boost for jumping those pesky obstacles, self-driving, ability to print money!, and of course, add the cheeky attitude... well, you know wanted KITT for your own. And come on, that oh so cool red scanner light on the front... how could you possibly resist?

So, the TV moguls, in their infinite and sometimes, whacked, wisdom, decided we, the people, need a new version of Knight Rider. I put it on my "maybe I'll watch that" list because I had watched the original fairly consistently and sometimes remakes tend to be quite good (Battlestar Galactica, for example). But I put it on my "I will watch that" list because of one thing. I found out what car was going to play KITT. I have no idea who is playing Michael Knight, probably some hunky guy whose name I've probably never heard. KITT is going to be voiced by Will Arnett, who I recognize but can't remember what his voice sounds like. And I remember the old KITT's voice, played by William Daniels, quite clearly.

But KITT, the car, awesome-even-then KITT, is going to be "played" by a Ford Mustang Shelby GT500KR.

Now, remember, I couldn't really care less about cars or really how they look. But about a year ago, maybe more, can't remember, I really noticed a new car on the road. It was the newest model Mustang and I can't even tell you how impressed I was/am by the looks of that car. It has to be the cleverest car design I have ever seen. You see, they took the old muscle car look and made it modern and new. And wow, it really works. You can see the lines of the old in the new.

If cars can be sexy, which apparently they can because of the amount of people extolling the sexy virtues of their cars, plus those hot models draped all over the hood... but, anyway, if cars can be sexy, then this one is. I really like it in black but couldn't find a good pic in black of the regular version. Apparently, there are a ton of different "versions" of this car, but for the most part they look the same, aside from little differences like a racing stripe, etc. I'm not sure the differences of the Shelby GT500KR (KR does not stand for Knight Rider, it's something from the car industry), but all I can see are a hood intake and a stripe down the hood.



This is a photo of the GT back in 1968. See what I mean about echoes of the past living on. It's brilliant, I tell you, brilliant!!

But, welcome to the very new KITT.

Okay, that's sexy.

Check out this probably overdone and extensive Wiki entry on Knight Rider.

TV and Such

Okay, I admit it, I like TV. And movies. I like that genre of media in general.

And how I like these is often a bone of contention between my husband and I. I can like just about anything. Even if it's "bad", if there's one thing that I liked in the show/movie, I seem to be able to generalize it to the whole thing. We can come out of a (in his opinion) "bad" movie, say The Red Planet (remember that scientific silliness with Val Kilmer and Carrie-Anne Moss) and he's like, "Oh god, that was awful!!" and I'll say "I liked it!" (because it took place on Mars, that's the only reason, oh and Val Kilmer was cute). A huge argument ensues because of these quite different views.

So, there's a lot of stuff that I tend to watch that he does not join me. He also has no patience for serials either. Lost was driving him mad because he hates waiting a whole week for the next episode to come out. He'd rather just have the entire season of whatever show to consume at his leisure (usually if it's something he likes, at least two or three episodes a night). I don't mind waiting and I have so many shows that I watch, I just record them and end up watching several weeks worth at once anyway. I used to be very hooked into my shows and sometimes would get anxious about a character dying or a cliff hanger for the season end or the cancellation of a show. But now, I just sort of roll with it and hope the really good ones stay on. Which of course, doesn't often happen. Say with John From Cincinnati, because apparently America is too dumb to get it.

Anyway, here's my ever growing list of shows that I watch. I'm sure it's not complete but it's about as much as I can remember at this point.

For the sake of readability, I'm not going to be all proper English and underline or italicize these titles.

Here are some of the current TV shows that I'm watching:

24, America's Next Top Model (yes, now shut up), Battlestar Galactica, Beauty & the Geek, CSI (all three), Criminal Minds, Dexter, Dirty Sexy Money, Doctor Who, Flash Gordon (new), Heroes, House, Jericho, Kyle XY, Lost, Moonlight, Psych, Pushing Daisies, Reaper, Smallville, Star Gate: Atlantis, Supernatural

Here are some upcoming shows that I'm interested in, that are in production but haven't seen, or are starting up very soon (like next week) or in the next couple of months or so, or might even just be glimmers mentioned on vague rumor sites:

A.M.P.E.D., Californication, Caprica, Darkside, Dollhouse, Eli Stone, Fringe, Knight Rider, New Amsterdam, Terminator: Sarah Connor Chronicles, To Love and Die, Torchwood, True Blood, Warehouse 13, usually any vaguely interesting sci-fi/fantasy type show

Here are some shows I watched but have been canceled or ended:

Angel, Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Dead Zone, Deadwood, The Dresden Files, Earth2, Firefly (bring it back!!), John From Cincinnati (bring it back!!), Star Gate: SG-1, Star Trek (all versions), Surface, Threshhold, X-Files, Xena

Okay, don't laugh about my choices, damnit.

Sometimes I Think the World Is On Crack

I've had this song stuck in my head for sometime. I'd heard it a long time ago and for some reason the line "Great party! Where's Timmy? He's smoking crack with Billy!" keeps going through my head over and over. So I looked it up on youtube.com (natch, as they say) to find it because often I can get something out of my head if I hear it. And I found this..... crack-headed music video. Which I find funny but that still doesn't mean people aren't crazy.

This is from an Australian band (so blame them) in 1998 called Happyland, which apparently is made up of two people, each from different bands (Janet English of Spiderbait and Quan Yeomans of Regurgitator, neither of which I have heard of). Supposedly they chose Happyland over The Shits for their band name.
Really, I think the world is on crack sometimes when I see stuff like this.

I don't know if this is the official music video or not but for your viewing pleasure:

"Don't You Know Who I Am?" by Happyland

Storms

We don't get storms very often in San Francisco, not even really in the Bay Area. Sure, it rains and might rain pretty hard, and gets a little windy at times but rarely do we have what came through on Thursday night, Friday morning/day.

Last night I was at work and it was cloudy and rainy. A generally blah day for the residents as they were all hiding out in their rooms for most of the day. But the wind started picking up at night and you could hear it rattling the windows and at points, shaking the very foundation of the house. One resident came to me and asked if we were going to be okay, would the house blow away. I assured her we would be quite fine, that I had experienced this before, which I had. Once or twice. And we were fine, even kept our power on, except for about five or ten minutes.

The rest of the Bay Area did not fare so well. One and half million people were out of power from here to the Central Valley (which is Sacramento and the main growing valley for California, I do believe). Apparently trucks were flipped on the highway, trees were down on cars and houses. There was a huge amount of snowfall up north and west of here.

When I drove home this morning, fortunately I had the truck and not the scooter, it was still very blustery, shaking Eucalyptus House and pelting it hard with heavy rain. I am so thankful I had the truck. I recently had a scooter accident (well, maybe a month or so ago) when it was wet (hit some train tracks going about 30-35 mph, slipped and just went down). Skinned and bruised up my knees pretty badly (I have pictures somewhere of my poor knee but I ended up never doing a blog post on the accident). So I get a little nervous when riding the scooter in the rain after that. But even so, even not being nervous would have made a different here because the wind could have just blown me over.

So driving in the truck was fine, if not a little bit being blown around the road. There were tree limbs down, one on a house (not big but definitely lying on top of the roof), some had come down on a few cars parked along Golden Gate Park and there were branches, leaves and tons of pine needles all over the road, debris everywhere. It looked like the aftermath of a small hurricane. I made it home and noticed the old scooter (the trusty little red one, not the nice new spiffy blue one) was on its side, apparently have been blown over, the poor thing. So, after parking and running squealing to the house (still raining!!), I ran squealing over to the scooter to right it and zip back inside, wet despite my dashing efforts.

I turned on the heaters and huddled down, listening to the rain and wind, feeling the house shake. Our power was on and fine although many places throughout the Bay Area had to shut down for the day due to the power outages. I couldn't see my Rosen worker because his power was out and he couldn't run the heater built into the massage table and the small foot heater. And trust me, this is not a good thing and I was not fussed that he rescheduled because that office can be cold without those things, especially when your naked with only a sheet over you, and the nice warm table is... very nice, I love it. I wish my bed had that option!! And it has been so very damn cold this winter season. Not as cold as from where I used to live in western North Carolina in the mountains but some how this cold out here is much worse to me than ten below with a foot of snow. It seems to get down into the marrow of the bones. Wrong place to live I guess. Need tropical island.

So that's the storm story. We're fine, my work and personal houses are fine. Our power is on and the heaters are working. That's really all I care about, the roof could be gone but if I have my heater, I'm happy.

This Too Shall Pass

Well, if there's one thing I've learned... well, mostly learned... about various emotional states is that:

"This too shall pass."

I was in the slide this past month, more like two. Each year in November, I seem to hit a depression. The past couple of years, I had to go on meds to help with the slump, and would often stay on for a year or so until the next year's April and would go off, be okay and then, LO! November!!

This November was no different, same depression. Well, actually, it wasn't the same. Not as deep as it has been in the past. And considering the stress I've been through the past six months with work and what not, you'd think it would be the worst year yet. But maybe putting all that energy into the stress helped me skip the hard core depression this winter. Hah. New therapy strategy for therapists... stress your clients out so much they can't think of their original issue. Like pressing that accupressure point in your hand to get rid of a headache.

So this year, I didn't feel the need to go on meds but I did hit some low points where that fear always arises, "Oh gods, here it goes again. I can't get out of it." That feeling you think you're never going to get out of. You're stuck. In permanent cement. That it will never pass.

And of course, it usually does. Maybe not in a huge way and certainly not permanently. It can be as small as five minutes. It can be grand scale as well; that 'light bulb' of inspiration, insight and change.

And it did for me. After the holidays, it was like some dark cloud had lifted up and I could breathe again. Things are still dark on occasion but seem to shift faster in the past couple of days. I can even view things with some amount of humor.

But this is so hard to remember when inside a mood of whatever kind. It feels like forever, no change possible.

Change. The only permanence is impermanence. This too shall pass.

Music Is My Boyfriend

I know I've gone and waxed eloquent about music before, well, maybe not eloquently but I have before mentioned that I like music.

That I really, really like music. LOVE.

Well, in my last bit of work with my most recent talk-style therapist before ending to start focusing more on my work with my current body-style therapist (a fantastic Rosen worker who is also licensed as a MFT), I realized that music is a lot more important than I had originally thought. It is my greatest ally and THE most important thing in my life.

I like most forms/genres/kinds of music. I'm hard to put to say I "hate" some sorts of music but I definitely have my favorites, such as, well.... erm... Heh. Categories of music these days confuse me. Alternative versus house techno, versus punk, versus industrial techno... etc. So, I generally would say, "Okay, I like Peter Gabriel, Sting, etc...." but then I would have to take up an entire computer screen of names.

So, I'll just talk about music in general. So, as I said, I love music. It's groovy, you can sing to it, you can dance to it. And I can create various moods, deep and effecting, with it. I can't do that with all music. There's just some songs that you have to go "mmh" in that small noise of deeply effected satisfaction/pleasure/just "Oh my gods, that is so amazing". My husband makes this noise perfectly when he hears an excellent singer's voice or when reflecting on a favorite TV show (such as John From Cincinnati). These songs are the ones that my mood can shift almost instantly, make me melt in appreciation for the human creative spirit, for life itself.

And when you combine good music with another good thing, well, that's beyond fantastic. Like the American Beauty Soundtrack, haunting and amazing for such a haunting and amazing movie. Or like my current listening playlist, the soundtrack from the TV show John From Cincinnati, the combination of the music with the memory of the show... just has me drooling and if I could make that little noise as well as Marty, I'd be hoarse. Goosebumps are a regular experience for me, when I immerse myself in such a great combination of music and other media.

Currently I am melting over several songs from the JfC Soundtrack:

"Sun / Rise / Light / Flies" by Kasabian - A video of clips collected from the show, as this song was played during the closing of the first episode, "His Visit: Day One". (Well, it used to be until Youtube started going bonkers about removing everything in sight, now it's just the song with a static background).



"Tic" by Kava Kava - With the clip from JfC whence the song appeared, Episode One - "His Visit: Day Two", with Shawn Yost, the young surfer on the show, preparing for his first surfing competition.



"Time to Say Goodbye (Con te Partiro)" sung by Sarah Brightman - Well, I found the clip from the show but the song is in the background on the radio while the character Steady Freddy sits in the car (Episode Three - "His Visit: Day Two Continued"), and if you've watched Deadwood, well, you know Dayton Callie (who played Charlie Utter), and you know the monologue he's indulging in is full of more cocksuckers than you can shake a stick at. So, I'll give you this silly video of the song.

"Series of Dreams" by Bob Dylan - Again, I found the JfC clip that this song goes with but I can't put it on here because it's basically one of the last scenes of the show and gives far too much away so I don' t want to ruin it for people who haven't seen (and should see) John From Cincinnati.

Well, music is my boyfriend and how I love my music!!

Year of the Hair

Well, here it is, a New Year. 2008!! Marty said "How the hell did we get here?" and I think I have to agree. The world has been such a crazy place the past few years. It's amazing we're here and still in, mostly, one piece. But here we are.

So, if you've been keeping up with my blog from the beginning or so, or knew me personally, face to face, exactly a year ago, you know that I shaved my head. And I looked like this:


One of the reasons I shaved it was that I wanted to know how much my hair grows in one year. So I didn't cut or dye or do anything at all to my hair for the entire year. I had Marty measure it today.

7 Inches!!

I have no idea if that's an average of what hair grows per year or if it's different for others. But, that's how much my hair grows in one year, and, you know how hard it is to take a photo of yourself when not using your camera timer or remote... So now I look like this:

Yep, that is seven inches of hair. Seems like it should be longer. And now I can finally get a haircut and trim that stuff up. And do whatever else I want to it. I'm probably not going to shave it again but I did like that velvety stage when it was growing back in the first few weeks.

Hair Gone, Hair Today!