My Mom

My mom drives me crazy. No, she doesn't, she's wonderful. It's just that she's 78 now and I think she should no longer be allowed to read the newspaper. Every time I see her or she calls she has another completely bizarre story to tell me that's purportedly from the paper. She looks at a picture and comes up with an entire story to go along with it that has nothing to do with the actual picture or article. Or she reads an article and somehow processes it upside down and backwards in her head until it comes out, well, different. For some reason (and I know I should be more patient and understanding, age comes to us all, there too will I be and sooner than I think, etc., etc.,) this makes me go completely berserk. Internally, of course. I don't actually put on a bear skin shirt and take after her with an axe. However much I might like to.

Last Wednesday I went with her and her charming if completely gaga friend Jill to see Ladies in Lavender. I hated it, btw, it was so slow that I couldn't stand it and I spent the entire long, long, long movie trying to figure out how I could just leave. "Uh. . parking meter? Bathroom?" I calculated how long it would take me to quietly gnaw through the wall and I counted the little lights along the path. Then we went out to dinner after I, seeing my pal D though the window, had dashed in to the New New with a completely random story to my mom of urgent computer confabs (she is afraid of computers) and slugged back some Makers Mark fast. At dinner she told me at some length about the new underwater movie theatre that had just opened in my neighborhood. This was all based on one picture of the Dive In Movie that they do monthly at the Malvern Hills Pool. I tried to explain this; it took a while.

This morning she called me all excited about this article about ebiblio, the rare books finding company. Turns out it's based in Asheville. My mother was convinced that the article said they were hiring and she wanted to get this important information to my brother right away. She also thought they were doing the same thing as the old dotcom startup ebrary that my brother worked for back in the dotcom days. It took me forever to explain to her what the article was really about, how companies like this actually work, how they make money & etc., & etc. God.

Then I felt guilty as hell for not just letting her run with it - wtf is my problem anyway? Why can't I let her get all excited and ignore the "truth" behind the article. It doesn't matter at all. I should just shut the fuck up. STFU, Fliss! Bitch that you are. I don't know why it bugs me so much when she does this. I can't understand this stupid need I have to correct her, make sure she gets it right. It just makes her feel bad and then I feel worse. Gah. Gods save us from the complicated geometry of parents and children.

I got all worried about M last night and then dreamt that I was with him, his father, and his father's stepfather John Kefover the painter. They were "restoring" old books by rubbing this silver leaf stuff over the covers to fill in the cracks and I knew that they were then going to sell them as valuable antiques. I was trying to tell them that they would destroy any value the old books actually had but then I figured it was pointless. John gave me a set of Chinese paintbrushes and I was very touched. M called this morning and he is totally happy and cheerful - I miss him terribly.

My dog is eating a dog training book right now. I wonder if it will all sink in?

John Hiatt at Bele Chere

John Hiatt at Bele Chere
Originally uploaded by mygothlaundry.

This is the clearest picture but I couldn't quite get the way the sky behind him was striped pink and orange. I love John Hiatt - I'd been looking forward to this concert for months. But I forgot it was Bele Chere and the yahoos would be out in force. I had to leave after 5 songs - can't handle crowds like that. Still it was great - he is so wonderful in concert.

Drunk and Blogging

Okay, I'm drunk. I freely admit it. And now I'm going to treat us all to a lot of drunken meandering about my evening and what it all means.

I was sick all day with that odd hangover-like thing I get sometimes about 10 days before my period. Nausea, sore throat, dizziness, low fever. Fuck that shit, I went on downtown to Bele Chere: because my man, or one of my men, John Hiatt was playing. It was really great and I got some good pictures and tried desperately to audio blog but it's damn near impossible if you can't hear the prompts and well, whatever. I love the man and he played Cry Love, which is the song that got me through my divorce from M's father, and then the crowds got to be too much for me (I can't handle it if I can't see an exit that I can clearly get to, and that counts for outdoor festivals too, thanks) so I left.

And then all was golden, and I met my friend D at the VIP tent and hung out there drinking free beer, leaning over the fence and counting mullets, teen mothers and white dreads for a while. Left that, got some red curry at the Doc Cheys tent and walked through the festival eating my curry with chopsticks and feeling really terrifyingly cool. Drove on over to the Westville. Got a beer at the bar, sauntered out and saw

G, the guy I had a one night stand with on St. Patrick's Day. Sitting with another G, this artist I know from the museum. I was still very cool so I sat down - they were all happy to see me and shit, yeah real happy - and then other friends showed up. So we drank a bunch of beer. Well, me and my friends did, because after that, G didn't acknowledge my existence all night.

So okay. It was good mostly and jesus, fucking awful also. I ran into this guy I know a little, who I see about twice or maybe three times a year, and we always get into these massive intellectual new age oddity conversations. He made a bit of a play for me a while back and I politely put him off. Tonight, ignored completely by G the ONS boy I said, "hey, why don't you call me sometime?" And he politely but firmly said, "No." Well he said some things about, well, we see each other enough here at the bar and I'm very busy and well, honey, no."

Great. Jesus, it's fucking impossible, you know?

So I sat back down with my friends and G-one-night-stand-boy who has this whole time ignored me in favor of an extremely drunken and increasingly senseless argument about the virtues of the self taught artist versus the trained variety. I tried to talk to them and that was an exercise in complete futility. They were very drunk but also G-one-night-stand-boy really wouldn't hear me. It was like I just wasn't there. At least the other G acknowledged my existence.

I don't really think it's asking too much for someone you've slept with to acknowledge your existence. Maybe I'm old fashioned. Maybe I'm a fucking fool.

So instead I talked to D about the weird feeling that you get when you go back to your ancestral lands. We've both been to Ireland and he's soon taking his son there - we know that odd, unsettling click that your soul or DNA makes when it hits that previously unknown home ground. We tried to explain it to J. Now if I ever get a million dollars I know one thing: I'm taking J to Poland. So she will know. Which is worthy of it's own entire blog post, becuase it is strange and beautiful.

Meanwhile, you know, what the fuck? I slept with this guy and we had what I thought was a meaningful encounter? Okay, more than once. Like, four times. And all good.

And let's face it. I just dumped somebody after date #1 because I saw huge trouble ahead, and because, I guess, I'm not interested in guys who are interested in me. All three of them. It hurts sometimes to be so goddamn alone. I walked all night through Bele Chere alone, I got there alone, I left alone, I went alone to the pub, I left alone, I do everything alone. Which is okay, I like being alone. I do alone well. I'm happy there - I don't even like having people around that much.

But I would like to try again, someday, having somebody around.

down by the river drawing

down by the river drawing
Originally uploaded by mygothlaundry.

I actually got my shit together enough to do a drawing. And here it is. I kind of like it actually. Hopefully too it's the start of me going back to making art - it's time. Too many years of doing fuck all. Meanwhile, art historians please not that this marks the debut of Jackson as the dog in my paintings - used to be Toby, sigh.

James McMurtry

is as a god. You may have gathered that I hold this opinion from certain other posts on this blog. He's right up there with Nicolas Cage & RB Morris on my personal stuck on a desert island with list. Here is his new protest song: We Can't Make It Here Anymore. Play it. As usual I love it, agree with it, and it is most awesome, although not, well, uplifting. Hee. But then who wants uplifting? Also, this site has downloads of more of his recent music. Check it out. Than go buy the CD when it comes out. Hell, go buy all his CDs, support great music, brilliant songwriting and dark humor. This is my fangirl rant for the day - I love love love James McMurtry. I even have his picture in my bedroom: because I am at heart a 13 year old. Which you may have already guessed.

However, surfing along through the various fan comments on his site I was surprised at how many ranting right wing dittoheads were complaining about his politics. James (may I call you James? Thank you. Shaken, not stirred.) has never, to me at least, come across as either apolitical or a right wing moron apologist and it seems kind of remarkable to me that he would count a bunch of them among his fans. OTOH, I can see where it must be tough to be a Republican who likes music. Good music isn't made by the right wing - creativity, talent & brains don't seem to be a natural fit with the Bush administration, after all. If they want music, or art, or movies, they have to listen to us, hee hee, but then they complain bitterly about getting politics mixed in with their music. God save us from content, I guess. Let's not have any content in our entertainment. Please let's never think. Let's leave the content up to Karl Rove & his ilk: content should come direct from the Diktator, otherwise it's disloyal. Sometimes I hate this century. And no, we can't make it here anymore.

Bankrupt & Unemployed: Actually, It's Pretty Cool

I went to bankruptcy court today. I was nervous as hell so I made sure to go out last night and drink a little too much so that I'd be all, you know, pale and shaky and hungover. I wanted to look & feel my best in preparation for the Group W bench, or, in my case, the Chapter 7 Bench.

Aside: This is why I love my city. Last night I went with my best friend J to the 48 Hour Film Project showing at Asheville Pizza & Brewing Company. She & her coworkers had made a film that was in the project. The films were all great (really. Seriously. And I was dreading it, because I was sure they would suck. I mean, you know, 12 7 minute films made by amateurs in 48 hours? Sounds godawful.) and then I went over to the Grey Eagle to see RB Morris, (who currently has the half of my heart that isn't devoted to James McMurtry) Sean Mullins and Tyler Ramsay. Free. All free, except for the beer. In what other town could you do all that on a Tuesday night and also run into some old friends you haven't seen for a while and hear new gossip and just generally have a great time? There is no other town like this. Also, PBR draft is only like $2.50 everywhere. Cigarettes are cheap as well. It's a good town to be bad in.

Return to main post: At any rate, I found the courthouse and went inside. I was running a little late and I had never read the papers my lawyer sent me (bad Fliss! Bad bad Fliss!) so I tried to skim them at red lights (more badness! augh!) but there was nothing in there I hadn't seen before. Fortunately. The security guards made me take off my shoes and walk barefoot through the metal detector (mental note: don't wear Danskos to fly; apparently they have metal in the soles) and assured me that the digital flash card in my purse would be okay. They were older and came over all fatherly, which is an effect I have on men of a certain generation. I think it has to do with being scared of authority or something. Or maybe it's my ancestral peat bog pallor. Anyway they were very sweet and gave me lots of helpful advice and directions and didn't even look scornful or shocked when I said I needed to go to bankruptcy court.

Than I sat in the courtroom and listened to all the other people going bankrupt, and there were a lot of them. I am not alone in my hideous mismanagement of money. In fact, there was a local business owner there, hmmm. Who I happen to know is holding some paintings of a friend of mine on consignment. That was a little worrisome. There were two people who didn't have lawyers: the judge found problems with their papers and sent them away. I had no problems; apparently I am completely eligible to be bankrupt and in fact my sad status elicited sighs of pity and wishes for good luck to me from the judge. I was up in front of him for less than 10 minutes and that was it: all over and I'm officially bankrupt.

It was all very undramatic. I was expecting more shame, more opprobrium, more wailing and gnashing of teeth. At the very least I thought I would be firmly scolded by the judge. But no, nothing like that. And no wigs, of course, no robes, no pageantry of any kind unless you count the ritual removal of the shoes at the entrance. It's too bad, in a way: I think court should be more like church, more like medieval church even, not modern church. The lights should be dim, there should be hooded acolytes and lots of latin. We should all be properly awed. Alas, however, this is the modern age. I did have to put my left hand on the bible & hold up my right hand and swear that I was telling the truth, just like a thousand thousand movies and TV shows. That felt strange; I think I'd rather swear on the Encyclopaedia Britannica or some book that means a bit more to me. Maybe Faulkner; I can kind of see swearing on Absalom, Absalom.

So, it's really hot and I'm bankrupt & unemployed. I think I'll make cucumber yogurt soup for dinner. Things are okay!

Lovely Timewasters

Planarity. Untangle the strings. I can only go through level four, because after that I get frustrated, but levels one through four are just so oddly satisfying.
Jigzone. I specialize in landscapes, 80 piece classic cut. I blame my carpal tunnel issues on this site.
The bubble game. Soothingly simple, goes on for hours, I can almost always win it. Ahhhh.
Alchemy. I'm kind of over this one, I did it to the nth degree a few years ago.

Ahhhhhhhh lovely. Timewasting games. Brain soothers. Enjoy!

Me yesterday

fliss beer july 05
Originally uploaded by mygothlaundry.

Me today is kind of hungover. My friends C & S were in town from Baltimore; S took this with his camera phone. We went to the Southern Highlands Craft Guild show (note the glamourous new earrings I can't afford but god, they're so beautiful) and then to Asheville Pizza & Brewing's new brewery tasting room. Good beer, fun place, etc - and then we came home & grilled & drank mojitos. Today I haven't been much use. Still it was great to see them!

craggy wilbur

craggy wilbur
Originally uploaded by mygothlaundry.

This is Wilbur, the pig who was being walked by his family up on the Parkway this afternoon. I'm glad they let me take a picture, because otherwise noone, including me, would have believed it.

Joblessness is Underrated

Unemployment is the shit, man. This is awesome. I am having the best day. I know that soon the novelty will fade and the poverty will start to be irksome, but in the meantime, it is absolutely incredible to wake up on a beautiful morning and not have to go be trapped miserable in an office for 8 or more hours.

It's beautiful today, the nicest day all summer, not humid & hot & horrible, miraculously not raining (so far but it's about to kick in) - just sunny & breezy & about 82 degrees. So I took Theo up on the parkway to Craggy Gardens. It was absolutely lovely up there and it just felt so right to be back out in the woods by myself. I've been a little low on solitude lately. On the way up we stopped at the scenic overlooks and at one of them was this great Asheville character: the Shofar Man. At least that's how I think of him. He's an older black guy, very nice, who goes around to various scenic spots and blows on this incredible long rams horn. I used to see him at the river park early in the mornings; he used to drive a cab (or maybe he still does) and he would stop at about 7:00 am to blow his shofar over the river as the sun rose. It was beautiful and eerie. So there he was today, without his cab, blowing the shofar over the scenic overlooks on the Parkway.

The hike up to the top of Craggy Gardens was gorgeous; I took many pictures and Theo had a wonderful bouncing time. There were rabbits to smell and lots of nice friendly people. Craggy is crowded, yes, but less so on a Wednesday than on the weekends - and anyway, the crowded spots off the parkway have less bears, which I like in a trail. We came back down to the parking lot and some people were emerging from another trailhead with. . . the ugliest dog in the world. Or so I thought at first. Then I thought, that's a baby rhino! They have a baby rhino! But no, they had a pig. On a leash. With a harness. A big pig. Named, of course, Wilbur. "That isn't a dog." I said to them. "No," said the guy, "It's a wild boar we just found." They were very nice and let me take a picture of Wilbur which I will post here momentarily. They said they were going to go home and give Wilbur a bath, since he kept wanting to root in all the mud. It was adorable.

And to cap it all off, there was an extremely cute park ranger type guy there who was watching the pig, than turned to watch me, gave me a big smile and said hello. Then James McMurtry came on the radio as I left and everything was really good. I like this feeling.

Unemployment: The Reality Show and the New Harry Potter

Unemployment is going to give me almost $300 a week!! Whoot! I am all, like, happy now! Except for the panicky feeling, that is. But really, that's nearly what I was making and now I don't have to go to work. So I am thinking I will do all these really great wonderful things: write a book, make art, go camping by myself and possibly even go on some kind of half assed vision quest - you know, the whole thing. Self realization & creativity, hooray!

That was yesterday. To complete my vision quest yesterday I went and bought some new underwear and rented two more discs from the first season of Angel. Yeah vision. They're really cute underwear from Victoria's Secret. Since I have no job and no boyfriend, I need such things. Hmmm. Perhaps this isn't going so well after all.

Then I dreamt last night that I was a vampire, and not a nice one like Angel either. I was your basic total evil vampire (albeit much sexier than that picture) and perfectly happy about it. Actually it was fun. Now I'm worried that perhaps this forebodes some appearance of total evil in my soul, or, I've been evil all along and just haven't noticed! Bwah ha ha ha ha ha. Although then you would think I'd be rich with a castle and tank full of sharks and all the other beautiful accoutrements of evil.

Maybe that's what I'll do with my spare time - create an evil empire of doom. As opposed to lying on my bed reading bad sci fi novels. I read the new Harry Potter in about 6 hours on Sunday: we are not amused. No, we are not amused at all. If I was weirder than I in fact am, I would be tempted to rewrite it on the internet. Or actually I'd go back and start rewriting with the last book, since Sirius Black is the first fictional character I've been desperately in love with since Zonker Harris, and when Sirius died I was heartbroken. My feelings for Zonker, on the other hand, have just kind of faded over time. I grew and he didn't. Or something. But at any rate, JK Rowling, who I admire desperately, being as that I am also a poor single mother with a tendency to type a lot, has, in her last book, set herself up to write a whole bunch more Harry Potter books and they keep getting further apart, and, sorry, worse. She's a bazillionaire now, why try to extend the franchise? Unless she's in love with her characters, but given that she keeps killing off the most interesting ones, I find that difficult to believe. So, JK, I am peeved. Not only wasn't the book that good, there wasn't enough of it!

Holy Shit - Impoverished Lady of Leisure

I've been laid off. As of 45 minutes ago. My position has been discontinued. This isn't really a shock - I've kind of been expecting it for two months. Wait, what am I saying? FUCK YEAH IT'S A SHOCK! I'm freaking out - quietly. I've never been laid off before. Now I have to go apply for unemployment. Holy, holy shit. Now I HAVE to find a new job and fast. Now. . now things are different. Now I have a theme for my party on Saturday: it's called the Felicity's Been Laid Off Party. Holy jesus fuck, sweet mary & all the blessed saints. Or something. Whoa. Instant poverty, just add weirdness.

To top the strangeness of it all, today my boss had me go pick up his kids & drive them to the pediatrician's office. And then I was thinking I would quit. And then I got laid off. And then my boss and I got into a terminally strange conversation about relationships. But I didn't wig out, I just came home. I have to go back in tomorrow & get all my stuff & tie up loose ends & then that's it. It's all over.

I knew I should never have gone back into restaurants. But, you know, he could have been an asshole about it and fired me - some evil bosses would have. There is no recourse when that happens. Instead he nicely terminated the position and laid me off so I'm eligible for unemployment. I should be thankful. I am thankful. I am FREAKING OUT.

Gross Post on Menstrual Misadventures

You have been warned. This is gonna get graphic.

Last night I went on a date. It was the first date I have been on since April 2003 and so I was nervous. I was also nervous because, while I genuinely like this guy, I don't really feel those sort of jittery I'm-going-to-fall-in-love emotions about him. I feel kind of guilty for going out on a date with him, if you want the actual and literal truth. He's really nice & we had a good time. However. I was nervous, also slightly hungover because I had gone out & drunk a bunch of beer the night before, being as I was so nervous and all, and then I got my period, so I was crampy and cranky too. A charming concatenation of circumstances, really. Leading to me being at my best as you can well imagine.

We went to Carrabbas, which is a chain Italian restaurant; it was actually pretty good. After we had a drink & an appetizer, I went to the ladies room. It was almost too late. I looked down at the floor in the ladies' room and there were four quarter sized puddles of blood. Oh yeah! So I started cleaning myself up, hoping against hope that my long walk to the ladies' room had not been marked by a bloody trail. Toilet paper is completely inadequate for this task, because it just gets all scrumply and then turns into little beads. Before the bead stage it smears the blood around, making the whole thing worse. It was beyond gross - the stall soon began to look like I had slaughtered a goat or something. Which, you know, is the sort of thing that can happen at any time in the ladies room at Carrabbas, where they feature an endless tape of Italian to British language lesson. I don't think I'll ever need to say "I'll have those trousers!" in Italian. At least I hope not - but if I do, I know how now. Although new trousers would have been handy, if difficult to explain, last night. I was wearing a black sundress, thank god, since I almost wore a white one. There was blood on my legs and probably on the back of the dress, but fortunately I don't think it was visible.

You'd think that by my age I'd be immune to menstrual mishaps like these, but alas they get even worse as you get older. Gah. I walked back to the table watching the floor all the way: it was miraculously clean and nobody pointed at me and shouted, "There she is! The bleeder!" The rest of the evening was uneventful, more or less. Just as long as I didn't bleed in his car - now that would be gross, and I'm sure, since he's a gentleman, he would never mention it. Although he'd be squicked out about me forevermore.

Big Fun in Little Asheville

Or something. Actually fun is stretching it a bit. My ex husband the loony was in town. He brought M back for his doctor's appointment and ended up staying for a couple of days. We're all very civilized and hippie around here after all. My x is sober now and even more of a conspiracy theorist than he used to be. He's still a monologuist; he hasn't changed, I haven't changed - or have we? Maybe we've intensified. Maybe we're more us, and completely antithetical. He's single again now too - before I saw him again I toyed (extremely briefly!) with the idea that maybe we could be one of those couples who get back together 10 years later. The minute I saw him that idea was out the window, forever. Not because he's unattractive, because he's still a good looking bastard, but because seeing him makes me remember just how bad it was. And it was very bad, oh very bad, very bad indeed.

So last night we had dinner at home together, which was eerie and surreal, then went to see Being There at the Walk In Theatre. It wasn't a very good choice for walk in theater: it was crowded and the sound was all blurry. We sat behind a couple in their early thirties: they were very affectionate and she was expecting. It made me feel weird - as if they were us 14 years ago, in love, pregnant with M. And I didn't want to curse them or anything by being so utterly divorced - so utterly that it's hard if not impossible for me to even remember what I ever, ever saw in the X.

M & the X left early; A & I went to the Westville & drank beer & smoked cigarettes and discussed how much we didn't want to go home. But eventually we did, and then he & M left for West Virginia today, and M will have to figure out his relationship with his father on his own.

Poor A's friends have all deserted her somehow and she is relying on me for companionship. Leaving entirely aside the question of whether it's healthy to go out drinking & smoking with your 22 year old daughter on a regular basis (I think maybe it's not), I'm starting to feel like we're dating. For one thing, I have to buy everything since she doesn't have a job, and then we've taken to going out almost every night. Tonight we had dinner at Taqueria Fast & then went to a ball game. You can't smoke at the ballpark anymore - suckage!! - and the first place we went to sit we were chased off by an extremely nasty Xtian man who told us officiously that this was the FAMILY area with NO alcohol allowed. The ball game was fun, but not worth that. Than A wanted to go out again but I said no, I can't afford it - which I can't - and then I felt guilty, like I was letting my SO down. This is nuts.

GOD I'M BORED AND IT'S RAINING AGAIN!

That is all.

Wait, no, actually, that isn't all. If that's all I will just have to throw myself out the window into the endless & eternal rain. I swear though - if I spend any more time on the internets I will throw myself out a window. And yet I can't look away. So here are some random paragraph-ettes.

I have nothing to do. If I ask my boss for something to do he will tell me to do something like mop an already mopped floor or something completely insane like go to his house, pick up his laundry and do it. I wish I was kidding - he's crazy like that. Or he's just plain crazy, you pick.

I just put ads for Jackson up all over every single damn adopt/rescue dog site I could find. That, and reading the coon hunting sites, kept me busy for a while. Whoot coon hunting! Rah! Actually catch & release coon hunting sounds kind of like fun - although, come to think of it, the last time I chased Jackson through the night woods I was not too happy about it.

There's a hurricane coming. Great & terrific. M & his father are supposed to be driving down here through the worst of it tomorrow or tonight. And then there's another one coming in a week or two, just like last September, which was supposed to be so weird and once in a century and all. Go global warming! Rock on!

My friend A who moved to Illinois last fall is in town & the arrangements to go get a drink with her & some other friends have involved too many phone calls. Why is it never easy? But it will all be worth it to see her except that it will bring up the painful truth that she doesn't live here anymore.

And I think I want a basset hound.

DOES ANYONE EVER READ THIS THING? LEAVE ME A COMMENT, DAMN YOU!

Baltimore Fugue

I went to Baltimore for four days. I lived there for about 12 years, all told, with a two year break in the middle where I lived in the East Village and tried to be a famous artist. My son was born in Baltimore; I was married and divorced there; I still have many close forever friends there. I moved away five years ago and I hardly ever go back - time, and money, and jesus, who wants to go to Baltimore in the summer anyway? Or any time - I miss the people but I have managed not to miss the city. Hearing my friends say, "well, we don't watch the fireworks from N's roof anymore because the random gunfire has gotten so out of control" and seeing the bloodstains on the sidewalk in front of N's house from a stabbing Friday night - well, Baltimore is just a bit much for me. I'm a wimp these days.

It was weird and lovely, both at the same time. I drove in through the harbor and went across Pratt Street to Butcher's Hill where most of my friends live and I got dizzy and felt high; a dream of brick rowhouses, an overwhelming sink of memory and time. I don't know if place hits other people this hard; I suspect it doesn't, but going anywhere I used to be throws me into this strange state. Smell and light and color and sound - it's almost overpowering and I begin to forget who I am. I get disoriented and a little lost in time as well as space. I think I root myself too much in places; comes from a peripatetic childhood.

So I was there and I saw a lot of old friends and a couple of ex lovers, which went mostly well. I got drunk the first night and subsequently had about the worst hangover of my life: embarrassing, throwing up all day in N's top floor - thank the gods for A & his handily installed toilet in the bedroom. I thought I was dying of heatstroke and hangover, but I survived. I took a lot of pictures from rooftops, which you can see by clicking on the friendly flickr link on the right hand side. I had a crab cake sub at the Sip N' Bite and mussels at John Stevens and a soft crab sandwich on thick terrifyingly white bread at J. Patricks. I bought a dress at Value Village in Highlandtown. I walked through Patterson Park. I drove by my old house. I walked around Fells Point. I saw a lot of my old art, and that was disorienting - my art is hanging in my friends' houses and every time I rounded a corner I was confronted with it, from paintings & drawings to coffee mugs I decorated, photos I took. I have forgotten that I used to be an artist. But I was, and there was proof all over the place.

Now I'm home. It's a 9 hour drive, up 26 to 81 to 70 to get there, reversing it on the way back with the half remembered shortcut through Leakin Park to get to 70. I am dizzy again and I'm not quite sure who or where I am. My house smells & is disgusting; I have to go to work in the morning; I have a dog to get rid of and a life to pick up. But it feels now like half of me is still in Baltimore; part of me hasn't caught up yet. Or maybe part of me is always there, the part that's an artist.

fliss painting mid 90s

fliss painting mid 90s
Originally uploaded by mygothlaundry.

My friend N had this in her living room, stacked behind other paintings. I had forgotten about it altogether, but here it is, complete with Felicity's customary themes: buildings without windows, a dog, a mask. All that's missing is a car and a tree. I have forgotten what it was ever called - the Rise of Communism over Baltimore maybe?

Road Trip

I'm going to Baltimore. For a party. On Friday night. Than I'm coming home.

Well. If the lord is willin' and the creek don't rise. I refuse to plan on trips anymore since every time I do something atrocious happens and I don't get to go. Therefore I'm just going along my daily life, knowing that I'm not going while in the back of my mind I'm actually planning to go thus fooling the trip wrecking demons! Ha! Oh no, I probably shouldn't have written this. . .

Actually I'm ambivalent about the damn trip. It's such a long drive to be there only for a couple days; I can't afford it; it's always weird to be there; I can't afford it; I haven't lost 20 pounds which I had intended to do before I ever saw any of my exes again and did I mention that I can't afford it? My ex husband the psychopath is going to be there and also my ex nice boyfriend. And about a bazillion other people - this is a big big do, a retirement/moving party being thrown by C, one of my closest friends in the whole world, who is moving to the wilds of farthest Colorado, where they probably have cowboys and Indians and covered wagons. I've seen Deadwood; I know about this West stuff. Everyone swears a lot. She had better be careful or they'll feed her to the pigs.

My exhusband is supposed to send me $500 so I can go (is that deeply weird or what?) because I am bringing M up to him so he can go to West Virginia for a 4th of July party and then they will drive back down here so M can go to the doctor and get his cast off and then they will go back to WV. Crazy. The whole thing is crazy but, I guess, what the hell. So Friday I drive, then I party, then I recover, than I drive back. Big fun in a 98 Saturn.

storm sky and wires west on patton

storm sky and wires west on patton
Originally uploaded by mygothlaundry.

It rains every day. . . I like the lines of the wires here but it isn't doing justice to the view which is usually one of the best in Asheville, oddly enough, as it's from one of the more hellish intersections, going from Patton to the Smoky Park Highway bridge, the terrifying merge of 19/23 & 26/40 bound traffic. It would have been better if I had the nerve to shoot while driving.

baltimore night landscape

baltimore night landscape
Originally uploaded by mygothlaundry.

A painting/drawing I did oh, about seven or eight years ago? It's about 4 feet or so square and is currently hanging on the outside of my garden shed. I like to look at it as I come out of the house - it's oil on masonite. I think.

Life on the Hellmouth

My phone calls between home and office are getting increasingly, um, entertaining. Yesterday's went like this:
M: "Mom? There's something in your room."
Me: "What? What do you mean something?"
M: "Some kind of, um, entrails. Sort of organs, you know?"
Me: "What the hell? What do you mean organs?"
M: "Like, it might be a heart or something. Or maybe a stomach?"
Me: "Holy fuck. How big is it? Is this like something the evil Angel would do? Is it a human heart or what?"
M: "Well, there are two of them and they're kind of big, we don't know."
Me: "Jesus H. Christ. Put your sister on the phone."
A: "Hi Mom"
Me: "What the hell is going on? Do we have vampires in the house or what?"
A: "We don't know. We don't even know what they are but we're not going back in there."
Me: "Are they, like, as big as a cow? Or tiny like a mouse?"
A: "Like maybe a rabbit - a big rabbit - how big are a rabbit's organs?"
Me: "Pretty small, I think. How would I know that? Do you think it's possible that by watching so much Buffy we have summoned the evil undead?"

When I got home there were indeed completely unidentifiable organ like sort of furry fist sized somethings, possibly of alien origin, in my room. There was one on each dog bed. There was also a dead mouse in the kitchen, half a dead field mouse in the patch of dead lawn where I planted sunflower seeds and a full dead field mouse by the shed. And something on the rug, possibly a leg. Of something. Something small and dead, which led M to shout: "Get rid of that leg! You're not leaving me here alone with a leg on the rug!"

Today's phone call o' fun:
A: "Mom, there's a bird in the house." Shrieking from background, frenzied barking.
Me: "Are you sure it's not a rabbit? Because I think it was a rabbit this morning."
A: "WHAT? What do you mean it was a rabbit this morning? How do I get the bird out of the house?"
Me, frantically googling: "I don't know. Lock the dogs out in the backyard and prop open the front door and sort of shoo it out."
A: "How did it get in here? And what about the rabbit?!?"
Me: "Barbieri brought it in. He's on a roll. This morning I was getting ready to go to work when I saw that he had a rabbit or something. Something as big as he was."
in actual fact, whatever it was wasn't quite dead. Barbieri (the cat) and Jackson (the hellhound) were working together to get it out from under the shelves in the dining room and when Barbieri emerged with it in his mouth I couldn't tell if it was a rabbit, a squirrel, a rat or possibly another alien being, but it was kicking. Total coward that I am, I seized that moment to grab my purse and flee to work.
A: "And you just left us here!?!"
Me: "Um, sorry about that. I was late for work."
Fifteen Minutes Later. . .
M: "Mom! How do I get a bird out of the house?"
Me: "I don't know. Where's your sister?"
M: "Out in the yard with the dogs. She says I have to do it."
Me: "Try shooing it out - just shoo it out."
M: "I don't even know if it can fly. What I'm going to do is I'm going to throw a black cloth over it because that will instantly calm it down and then I'm going to carry it outside but what do I do then?"
Me: "I don't think I would pick it up - can't you just shoo it?"
M: "If it bites me I am going to the hospital and you can't stop me."
Me: "No, no, that would be fine, yes, perfectly appropriate, you should go to the hospital."
A: Frenzied screaming from a distance, barely audible threats, dogs howling
Me: "Well?"
M: "Can I get some moral support here? Like some encouragement?"
Me: "Oh! Okay, um, good luck! It'll all be fine! You can do it!"

And the phone hasn't rung again. . . yet.

Things Like This Don't Happen to Normal People (Part 2)

To (finally, hee) begin our story, Mr. Bill, our nearly feral cat, came home sick or injured or something on Sunday. He was crying desolately in the jungle backyard, the part which I fenced off last Monday (I'm good with a sledgehammer now, yo. Especially after it rains for 24 hours. That helps A LOT.) So I set up chairs and climbed over the fence in my clogs and picked him up and carried him back into the house. I couldn't figure out what was wrong with him - he had an appetite, nose was cold, eyes clear - but he was very very thin and weak. And affectionate, which is not like Mr. Bill at all. I was reminded of the time my insane cat Andy Warhol of blessed memory managed to break his pelvis during a short jump in the basement. After $300 of vet bills I was told to take him home & keep him quiet for 6 weeks. I do not at the moment have $300 so I decided to take a similar approach with Mr. Bill, especially keeping him away from the hellhound who is bound & determined to chase him. I set him up in the living room with a fancy new cat bed and a new litter box with high tech space age blue litter and a bowl of canned cat food. Mr. Bill, secure in his invalid status, has made known his disdain for kibble.

The smell of the catfood and the sound of Mr. Bill's piteous wails for more catfood sent Jackson over the edge and no combination of gates could keep him out of the living room. This had been a losing battle for some time: the hell hound naturally wanted to be there watching Buffy with us anyway. Yesterday, while I was at work, Jackson got through every gate and security device either I or M could devise. He won't listen to M at all - we've covered that before - so poor M was calling me every 10 minutes to tell me about something else awful that Jackson had done. He ate all the catfood (of course) and the turds out of the cat box, and spread the weird blue litter all over the floor. Then there was a huge thunderstorm, which scared all of them, including Mr. Bill, who was now trapped beneath the couch without canned cat food and didn't like it much. It was a rough day for M.

I got home and decided that rather than go to the grocery store, I would make a tuna casserole and watch more Buffy. I started sauteing vegetables and turned on the oven. The BOG OF ETERNAL STENCH, the HELLMOUTH OF ODOR opened in the kitchen and there was no turning back. It was unbearable, unbelievable: like nothing anyone has ever smelled before. Our eyes were watering. I turned off the oven and set up fans but we had to leave the kitchen. Not the hell hound. He got up on the stove and overturned the sauteing vegetables and ate my last remaining plastic spatula and generally wreaked more havoc. Meanwhile, M. soaked a washcloth in diluted toothpaste and held it over his nose. Being more organically minded, I went out in the garden and smoked a cigarette and shoved beebalm and artemisia up my nose. All was dismal and sad.

So we drove away. We sat in the car behind Pastabilities for a long time, laughing hysterically, trying to get hungry again. M voted for never returning or at least spending the night at Grandmas, but preferably just hitting the road and not looking back. Or burning the house down and moving into the yard. While I agreed with these solutions in theory, also proposing to take off and nuke the place from orbit, I knew we would have to go back. M made up a song about our fear of smell and the total horror of the stench, coupled with the horror of the hellhound. I wish I had recorded it because it was utterly brilliant and it made me have to pee really badly.

The rest is anticlimax. We ate dinner & went to Ingles & bought massive amounts of cleaning supplies, including two pairs of rubber gloves, a gleepy little air freshener with a battery operated fan and a humongous can of foaming bubbles. When we got home, the smell, although somewhat dissipated, was still there. So we pulled the stove away from the wall and cleaned out all the mouse nests & cleaned everything in the broiler pan and left that out in the rain full of foaming bubbles, and, while we were at it, we pulled everything out of the lower cabinets and cleaned up a completely disgusting and just wrong years worth of mouse shit & pee. Beyond, beyond gross.

So now, on top of everything that has been pulled down by Jackson, and all the plates that are now on the counters because everything on the counters had to be put in the cabinets where the plates used to go, all the canned food and liquor and bottles of vinegar and mysterious things like wasabi powder and evaporated milk are now in coolers and boxes and bins all around the kitchen and dining room and Jackson is having a field day chewing them up and taking off the lids and shredding them. Meanwhile, of my two mouse killers, Mr. Bill is incapacitated (and currently howling away in A's room, since she's at the beach, lucky girl, she always misses all the fun) and Barbieri is too busy clearing the garden of voles & shrews to be bothered with the kitchen. Which is probably why the mice have moved inside en masse like this.

And I still don't know what the source of the smell was, but I suspect that the mice have moved into the insulation of the oven, which means that the oven will have to be replaced, which I can't afford, and I can't call my landlord, because then he will come over and be witness to the hell which the hellhound hath wrought on my once lovely home and then he will kick me out and we will all have to go live in a cardboard box on the side of the road and even that won't work for very long, since the hellhound will promptly shred it around our ears.

See? These things DON'T happen to normal people. I swear I am moving to Sunnydale.

Things Like This Don't Happen to Normal People: Part 1

My life is out of control again. Big shock, huh? Let me begin at the beginning as I delineate this tale of terror and woe. As backstory you must understand that my addictive personality evil twin has resurfaced and her drug of choice is Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Yes. Buffy. Hours and hours and hours of Buffy. I have drawn my helpless innocent son M into this addiction and he too is a slave to Buffy. Every weekend we watch episode after episode, hour after hour. Roughly 14 hours this weekend, in fact. So we are very attuned to the special properties of living on the Hellmouth. We are honorary citizens of Sunnydale.

And that's probably why we weren't all that surprised when hell opened in the kitchen. After all, we've had the hell hound in our lives for seven long weeks now. Seven weeks in which nothing is safe, seven weeks with the trash can attractively placed on top of the dining room table, seven weeks with ever increasing barriers of dog gates and doors and chairs and tables piled in a heap in a desperate attempt to keep the dog out of some small area of the house. Seven long weeks when anything left on any surface lower than 7 feet high is considered fair game, seven weeks of a dog who will snarl at you over, yes, a bag of celery. I never knew dogs even liked celery. And seven weeks of wading through our house, ankle deep in shredded plastic, dog bed, foam, stuffed animals, cardboard, clothing - you name it, it's shredded and on our floor.

Sometimes Things Suck

I have to get rid of Jackson the hell hound. This is just not working out. I feel like such a shit; I have no tolerance or compassion for people who adopt animals and then give them up, but here I am about to do it. Well, I mean, I'm going to find him a home. A better home than mine, one that has no cats in it and no kids and an adult who is willing to be there working with him 24/7. Because that is what this dog needs, and I can't provide it. While I'm looking for this wonderful home, I'm going to try to get the guy who gave him to me to take him back. I can't have him in the house anymore.

First, there was the day he had M cornered in his room for two hours. Than there is the ceaseless night trauma: the waking up all night long, barking, waking me up. I haven't had an uninterrupted nights sleep in seven weeks. I feel like I have a newborn. Then, there is the way he refuses to ever give up what he's doing, whether it's trying to get through the gates into the living room, getting into M's room, or whatever. He is the most persistent fucking dog on the planet. And the way he swings his face at you if you try to make him move like you would a normal dog is scary.

But he's getting better! I think. But not better enough and not fast enough. I bit off more than I can chew and on Saturday, while I was piling chairs and tables in front of the dining room door in a mad attempt to keep the howling dog at bay, I realized that this has just gone too far. I can't relax at home, I can't have fun, all I can do is obsess over this goddamn dog. So it must come to an end.

Which means, in a nutshell, that I suck. I have failed recently on many levels - my job situation, which is awful, my relationship situation, which is completely nonexistent, my parenting, which consists of turning my son into a Buffy the Vampire Slayer addict like me. And I can't even keep up with the weeds in the fucking garden; I didn't go out on Saturday to see my friend J's band like I promised I would, and in general I am feeling like a complete and total useless loser at the moment. Damn. Damn damn damn damn. Anyone want a blind hound dog?

Not as Bad as I was Afraid it Would Be

Weird capitalization in that there title there hon. Hmm. Well, never mind. I took Jackson to obedience class last night and it was not as bad as I thought it might be. He didn't bite anyone or run away or go into a complete frenzy. Sure, he was the worst dog in the class, but he was still better than he could have been. Even though in the car on the way over and on the way back he kept climbing into the front seat & sitting on my lap: unsafe at any speed. I have to put more about this on his blog, we cannot have this kind of subject overlap. This two blog thing is kind of a pain in the ass, truth be told, although I haven't given up my dreams of being, like, the one dog James Herriot of my generation. Except that I might have to give the damn dog away before it drives us all insane. That would be kind of a bummer ending, huh?

Diminished expectations - that's the name of the game. Maybe I can turn my whole life into a darkly comic novel of despair. Actually, to be hideously honest, I'm over the PMS and I'm feeling quite cheerful and optimistic and even, dare I say it, bubbly. I'm going to Downtown After Five and I am wearing a really cute black dress with pink polka dots which hopefully distracts attention away from the horror which is currently my hair. It is now time to drink beer - I am gone.

General Musings and Metafilter Crushes

I am alone at home. For the first time in a month. It's quite, um, odd. I'm not sure exactly how to act or what to do. I made dinner - but that was when I still thought the kids were coming home, and now I know they're not. Dag. Now what? Besides, I mean, eating half of it (and it was good too, son) and, well, drinking. Actually I did that right after work, at work in fact. That invention of demons, the shift drink - thank the gods. Then I dragged my friend J over to the brewery to check out the cute new bartender. I had a crush on the old cute bartender, but it was quite a silent one: he had a girlfriend. This bartender is new territory and extremely cute with a wicked glint in his eye that it's quite possible I'm just imagining. He probably has a girlfriend. They mostly do.

Having crushes on bartenders or rock stars is a fairly painless way of pretending I have a social life. They're too busy to really be bothered with me but they have to be polite and I can build that into a relationship in my head. Nobody gets hurt or rejected - it's right up there with my mostly silent internet crushes. At the moment I have crushes on 4 guys on metafilter (if the link doesn't work try again later. It's mostly down these days.) and they know nothing about it. Very sweet and painless. Except one of them wrote a serious askme the other day and I didn't dare to answer it - well, I also had no answer. Damn.

So I have a new philosophy of life: if the signs all point in one direction, it feels like the fates are steering you somewhere and your instincts say YES - run the fuck away as fast as you can. The malevolent gods are toying with you again. They want to watch you squirm. Trust me on this one. I've gone with my instincts twice in the last six months: 1)job, 2)dog - and both times may well have been two of the more horrendous mistakes of my life.

The tenses are wrong somehow in that previous sentence but I can't be bothered to fix them. A is home. Back to the madness!

Must . . Leave. . My . . Job

The ellipses in the title signify true spiritual anguish, or that you should say that out loud in a kind of tortured Frankenstein's monster way. However you say it, it is true, I have made the decision to quit this job in four to six weeks whether i have another job or not. That is very very scary, but the prospect of staying here is far scarier. I simply cannot do this anymore. This job is impossible and it's starting to erode my soul. However, I have to keep it until all M's post operative doctor's appointments etc. have taken place, so that Blue Cross will pay for some of them at least.

The reasons why this job is impossible are so numerous that it's hard to enumerate them. For the record, I genuinely like and admire all the people who work here, including my bosses. However, it's just not a good fit for me; I'm not happy, I'm not accomplishing much of anything, and this is all just NOT GOOD.

This kind of thing is why you should always stick by the vows you make when you're in your late teens and early twenties. At one point I made a solemn vow never to work in food & bev again and I was right. I am just not cool enough - or driven enough - or whatever enough - for this lifestyle.

So I have to find another job or two jobs or some form of income. Why oh why is it so fucking hard to just find a Monday - Friday job, with insurance, vacation, sick leave & reasonable holidays (like Memorial Day, July 4, that kind of thing) that pays a semi living wage? Keep in mind that I make less than $35,000 a year - I'm not demanding a lot. And I'm smart, educated, experienced & get along with coworkers. God I wish I was independently wealthy.

I Pitched a Fit Last Night

Deep in the throes of PMS I threw a fine and inspiring tantrum. My boss wanted me to come back to work at 10 pm so I could participate in the noise test of dancing upstairs and, while I wasn't happy about it at 6:00 pm when I was leaving, by 8:30 pm I was positively hysterical. So I decided not to go, which pissed off my daughter A, who had come home for the express purpose of giving me the car so I could go dance at work. Her comments on the matter then led me to express my extreme dissatisfaction with life, the universe and the dog, in no uncertain terms. Finally my daughter screamed, "Just what is it you want me to do?!?!" And I said, "I want you to fight with me, obviously!!"

Somehow this made us all feel better.

I tell you what though, I can't handle much more of that dog shredding things and leaving the fragments all over the floor. It's driving me insane, as is my job.

More Hilarious Zany Fun with Ovens

melted dogfood bowl in oven
Originally uploaded by mygothlaundry.

This is what happens when you put the bowl full of dogfood that your dog won't eat into the oven first thing in the morning so your other, psycho, dog won't eat it. Then, when you come home & start to preheat the oven before making dinner, presto changeo, and it's a good goddamn thing you never got around to changing the batteries in the smoke detector because otherwise the police would be here by now.

back of my car june 05

back of my car june 05
Originally uploaded by mygothlaundry.

Yes, this is my car. Now everyone knows what a freak I really am. Heh. As if there was any doubt. The strange thing is that living in Asheville, this passes for normal, like tattoos and dreads. When I go to other places and people look at me funny, I'm always surprised.

p.s. NO I don't have dreads. Just tattoos & bumperstickers.

The Quiz Post & Miniature Golf

The personality defect quiz post is annoying; it's too long, and every time I try to edit it down to a reasonable length it gives me HTML errors. So I might just delete it. Or not. It was a good quiz. Edited note: I tried to change it & apparently somehow I screwed up the sidebar. It's now down at the bottom of the page. Fuck. New edited note: I deleted it. FWIW, I am a starving artist & if you want to take the quiz yourself, you can find it here.

In other news, in a weekend of family fun my children and I went to play putt-putt on Saturday afternoon. I love miniature golf courses; I think I've come up with a lifetime goal (that's a first) to go & play at every single one in Ocean City, Maryland. There are like 2 million mini golf courses in Ocean City so this is a lofty goal of high ambition. My other goal would be to transform my backyard into a mini golf course, or just to live on one that's already constructed. They're so crazy and beautiful and kind of heart rending in a very strange vanished american dream way. I tried researching them once (our trip to Gatlinburg a year & a half ago got me going on them again; we played one inside a big warehouse with a mysterious yet enchanting Egyptian Gods Meet Pirates theme) because I've always wondered where they came from. It seems like such a peculiar idea: build a putting green and surround it with. . anything, really; giant plaster flamingo? Check. Pirate ship? Check. Dinosaur, rocket ship and huge spider? Check - anything goes in the landscape of the miniature golf course. The histories I found were academic and boring, and, although it's hard to believe, there doesn't seem to be a glossy coffee table book on miniature golf. A niche market waiting for me to fill it. I would also like to revive the commercials that used to air in South Carolina with the oddly compelling jingle: Putt putt for the fun of it, putt putt for the fun of it, putt putt for the fun of it! My teenage boyfriend used to sing fuck fuck for the fun of it! which was, obviously, extremely daring and bad boy-ish of him, and also oddly compelling.

M can't extend his elbow and I'm worried; the doctor is supposed to call me tomorrow. If the doctor screwed up & did something wrong during the surgery I will roast him over a slow fire; after, that is, I sue him, the hospital and possibly the universe for A MILLION DOLLARS. At least. Hey malpractice suits! If the Bush administration wants them to go away, they must be good!

tropic island mini golf asheville

tropic island mini golf asheville
Originally uploaded by mygothlaundry.

In all its glory, looking out over Patton Avenue.

mr bill in the garden

mr bill in the garden
Originally uploaded by mygothlaundry.

This is probably the best picture I have ever taken. Mr. Bill & I don't really speak anymore. He has decided to go feral - it's his choice; there's nothing I can do. So I see him rarely, he comes inside about once a week to eat some cat food and then he's gone again, elusive. He's terrified of all humans (he barely tolerates me), most dogs, thunder, cars, and, well, pretty much everything. Mr. Bill. He's a basket case, but this is a great photograph.

My Kids Are Amazing

No, really, they are. They were so nice to me yesterday that I don't know how to behave. I guess I should stop beating & duct taping them to chairs. (for the record & the humor impaired, I have never even hit my children. Well maybe once. And I did run over M's toes that time on a road trip but it was a complete accident brought on by nicotine withdrawal and I wish they would stop bringing it up. Besides his toes were fine and if his sister hadn't screamed he might not even have known that they were being run over.)

My children, as we know, were not here on my birthday or mother's day, since they were away at college and boarding school, respectively. So they celebrated it with me yesterday, by going to 4 of my favorite restaurants, ordering something from each one, and bringing it all home and spreading it out on the table. It was marvelous and it even all tasted good together, which is kind of strange since you wouldn't ordinarily order tandoori, tofu & veg with peanut sauce, godzilla roll and crab cakes on one plate.

Then there were presents. M gave me the large google eyed frog garden ornament which I had been eyeing and dropping heavy hints about from Bi-Lo and A spent all her money and bought me a most wonderful chiminea. Now I have to have a real party outside so everyone can admire my lovely garden decor and we can sit around the chiminea drinking heavily and being all trendalicious like a photo shoot for Bon Appetit.

My kids are wonderful. I don't deserve this but I am really proud of them and glad they have turned out so well, against all odds I guess, given their insane mother. Also, I love my frog and chiminea. And Godzilla Roll!

Well Enough To Be Obnoxious

M is getting better. It's been a long road, but he's definitely getting better. Now, he's bored, cranky and obnoxious. Thank the gods. I've never enjoyed being snapped at peevishly so much before. We're ramping down from the pain killers, bit by bit, and soon (not a fucking minute too) this week of hell will be a memory. He said, "Mom - I wish you were more organized." Damn.

A is home. She has graduated from college and returned home, full of. . a shining fervor to make the world a better place? Well, kind of. She's talking about getting a job with a pension plan and health insurance. Switched at birth? Go figure. I keep telling her to join the Peace Corps or get a job on a cruise ship or backpack around Europe - she wants health insurance. I'm really proud of her. Kind of flabbergasted, but proud. Mostly, though, true to her self, she's sleeping and watching movies. She has washed the dishes like 3 times - I think the pod people probably got her at college.

So my empty nest thing is over. A arrived home with boxes and boxes of stuff; I took M up to Celo to get his things yesterday. They both set off immediately to transform their rooms. M took down his dragon posters and his Lord of the Rings poster, threw out his dragon kite (I rescued it and am flying it from the flagpole in front of the house) and announced that all the bookshelves in his room had to go. "Mom" he said, "I'm never going to read these books and I'm 13 years old." So I have to find another home for all 12 volumes of the Wizard of Oz and Road Building in Pictures. Damn. M wants a mini fridge in his room; A's microwave is sitting in hers, and suddenly we have 5 televisions. I think I liked it better when they decorated in spilled cereal and stuffed animals.

This is rough.

M is having a lot of trouble. He woke up this morning in terrible pain, so I gave him 2 Lortabs. That finally worked, but then it made him sick to his stomach, and he threw up. I've spoken to the nurse at the surgeon's office twice now; she's phoned in a prescription for Phenergan suppositories (I heartily approve of phenergan; it's the best drug on the planet & will even make your really bad hangover go away, not that I would ever endorse using any drug for any such lighthearted purpose) but now he's asleep and I don't want to leave him, so I'm waiting for my mom to come over before I can go get it.

The nurse says, this is normal. The nurse says, there will be a lot of pain. The nurse says, it will take a week for the swelling to go down. I'm slowly coming to the realization that this was major, major surgery and it is going to take a long time for him to recover. A really long time. I'm so used to this kid bouncing back from anything in about 12 hours that it seems worse, I think. This is the kid who tore off his whole fingernail skateboarding and was fine after a couple stitches, back on his board 4 hours later. This is the kid who broke his arm 3 times and barely complained. This is the kid who routinely comes home bloody & scraped & completely unfazed. This is the kid who pretty much never gets sick, never throws up, never runs a fever - and having him weak and almost crying and on the couch is more than I can take.

So I asked Metafilter about it, and they have been very helpful, but still, oh gods, this is rough. I feel helpless; I wish I could just take the pain myself and leave him free, I hate seeing him like this, and there's nothing more that I can do other than what I am doing, but what I am doing - sitting on the computer, delivering saltines and coke, rubbing his feet, setting up a fan, running back & forth to the video store - doesn't seem like enough at all.

Also, you know I'm desperate when I actually invite my mom over. I love her to death and all but she freaks out about how disgustingly messy my house is (it really isn't that bad, just cluttered & you can't eat off every surface in my house the way you can in hers but christ on a crutch, I don't have the time, energy or desire to bleach my baseboards once a week) and that always bums me out, since she will then call me like 12 times over the next few days to tell me how horribly I live. This I do not, at this moment, need.

It's times like these I wish someone would hurry up & invent a suspended animation tank. I wish we could just check out for a few days and let time heal his arm with no pain & no misery & then we could wake up in a week or so & it would all be better. No grocery & drugstore bills for a week would be helpful too.

Small Angry Rant

I would just like to note, for the record, that M's father did not attempt to contact him at all, in any way, during this whole ordeal. We found out that he needed surgery last Wednesday; I made M call his other grandmother to tell her and to get her to tell his dad (we have no way to contact him.) I know he did it because I listened in. So he knew, or at least she knew, but do you think there has been a phone call or a fucking get well card or any fucking thing at all to tell this child who just went through a major operation that his father, his fucking biological father or his insane grandmother who's always going on about how I don't let her precious grandson visit cared or were thinking about him in any way?

NO THERE WAS FUCKING NOT AND I AM PISSED.

Even though this is SO FUCKING TYPICAL. ASSHOLE. WHAT AN ASSHOLE.

Hospital Hangover

Yesterday, M had surgery and the doctor put a plate in his radius, held in with 7 screws. Surgery which looked almost exactly, in fact, like this. Which I found on Monday and which helped, I hope, get M through the whole thing.

Surgery is rough. I have never had it - I had two kids natural childbirth, in and out of the hospital - and until yesterday I had no familiarity with any of this pre-op, recovery, post-op, IVs, & etc type stuff. I wish I still didn't. Part of me is wildly second guessing the whole thing, but it's too late now. Poor M is still in a lot of pain, still groggy - it's been more than 24 hours and he's still feeling really rough.

I was going to blog the whole thing, minute by minute, from the tropical fish in the waiting room, to the scariness of the recovery room, to the wearisome waiting, waiting, waiting, to the white bread and american processed pasteurized cheese food of the cafeteria but I don't think I have the energy. It was an ordeal in the truest sense of the word. I was naive going in; I got my ideas from TV; I thought M would wake up from anesthesia and we would joke and share a pizza and I would go home, leaving him briefly in the loving, attentive care of kind and beautiful nurses. It took him hours to wake up and when he did he was in terrible pain and very sick and I was horrified. The nurses were kind but distant and overworked; I held his head when he threw up at 3 am; I followed him in and out of the bathroom with the IV. I "slept" all night on a cranky "reclining" chair that kept trying to swallow me; it was cold and the pillow was slippery plastic underneath its cotton case. All the sheets were stamped Industrial Laundry in big blue letters and small lights flickered, things beeped, and when you called the nurse it took her 10 minutes or more to come.

I thought a lot about how lucky I am to have reached age 42 with two kids and no familiarity with hospital routines; I thought about what it must be like to bring a child into the hospital again and again, to stay there for days, to shiver every day at 4 am under the thin cotton blanket on the vinyl chair. I need to stop bitching - things are not so bad in my life.

It's going to be a long slow road for M to recovery - the doctor doesn't think he should go to camp; he'll be 3 weeks with this splint & huge foam sling, then into a cast, but he will have to be careful all the time. His hand is all swollen and he feels like hell. It's awful and they gave me hydrocodone to give him, which scares me, but his pain is worse. And me? I feel like I have a hangover, even though I haven't had a drop to drink. God what a loathesome couple of days.

Arm & Car & Neurosis Update

M needs surgery, which will happen on Tuesday at 6:30 p.m. The doctor will put a plate in his arm which will remain there forevermore.

My car needed $1400 worth of repairs, not $700, which is hardly surprising, but kind of a bummer since the trade in value on it is $1200.

I'm not going to NY to see A graduate from college or to go to MOMA or anything; I'm not going anywhere. But I do get to work all weekend! Yeah!

I would like to state for the record that 666 people have now visited this site and I'm really wondering if that is what is jinxing my life right now. Something sure as fuck is.

The Laundromat, The Vole - It's All Too Much

I went to the laundromat tonight with my piles of soaked and muddy bedding from Saturday's exciting Hot Springs camping excursion. Barfing up slightly used barbecue & Rolling Rock into the French Broad River at 8 am in the pouring rain and mud is an experience I highly recommend, but that's another story. This story is about stress and the laundromat.

I am stressed. I am having job issues. I am supposed to leave on a big ole road trip to NEW YORK CITY and other points, including a brief visit to an ex boyfriend (Jesus! I didn't lose 20 pounds yet! Oh holy shit!) on Friday night. However, this is all depending on what the bone doctor says about M's arm tomorrow morning at 10:30. And on how my car does: I discovered yesterday that my car needs a new clutch. I mean, I knew it needed a new clutch, has for a while, but having it confirmed by an actual mechanic was a big blow. A $700 blow to be exact. So now my car is going to the dealership in the morning to get a new clutch even though it isn't really broken. This sucks and flies against a certain kind of poverty stricken hippie common sense (it ain't broke, don't fix it!) but on the other hand I always get panic attacks on the highway and if I know the clutch might be going out that will give them something to feed on. Argh.

So. . the dog. . . the son's arm. . . the job. . . the clutch. And then I got home and there was a dead vole in the hallway. M cleaned it up. I tried to clean up the vole blood, but it wouldn't come up. It's like a permanent stain, like a psychic stain in a haunted British castle or something, like this was Queen Elizabeth I of the Vole Kingdom, and now it's going to haunt us. I suggested this to M and said - "that would rock, not."
"Not," he said, "not at all, that would really suck having a vole ghost around."
"It would be cool for like 5 minutes," I said, "and then it would get old."
"No," he said, "it would be okay for about 15 minutes and then it would be bad." There followed some discussion about the nature of ghosts in general - they can't, like, actually kill you with an axe or anything, they have to use your own mind against you, which in the case of a vole might be interesting.
"That's funny," I said, becoming hysterical, "I think I'll blog it."
"Jesus Christ Mom," he said. "You need help."

On googling, we discover it was not a vole. It was a shrew. Yuck. Whatever.

Oh and there was this guy in the laundromat who was really drunk and talking about how they caught the guy who raped his 85 year old grandmother. "He ain't never gonna rape nobody agin!" he said, with fervor. "That dude is sick, man! And he's born n' bred Madison County, just like me."

The Birds

So I watched The Birds again tonight. It was on behind the Westville, our community monthly walk in theatre. It was cold, and lightning flashed occasionally, and M kept leaving me alone with the lesbians in their deck chairs, and I was terrified. The first time I saw The Birds I think I was about 11; I watched it on TV with my mom. I was so scared I dreamt about it for weeks.

Now I am, for all intents and purposes, a grown up, and The Birds, which is older than I am (okay, only by a few months) should be laughable. M found it hysterical. It scared the piss out of me yet again. I had, in fact, to leave. I had to walk back to the bar and toss back a beer or two to calm myself down. The entire time, though, I was thinking about how badly Tippi Hedron and whoever that extremely cute guy was were handling the whole thing. I mean, did they have no basements in that town? M says, no flamethrowers?

When we got home I had a brief anti-bird, zombie, vampire attack drill, because it struck me that defending your home against all these things is essentially similar. M thinks I'm crazy and barricaded himself in his room with his cel phone, where I heard him explaining the madness of his mother. He'll thank me when the zombies come, no doubt. I shouted this through his bedroom door, but I don't think it helped. He didn't want to participate in the anti-bird/zombie drill. The fool.

We will have to use A’s room, because the basement is too scary and depressing in the best of times, and if you were down there because of a zombie or bird or vampire attack, well, you would quickly become suicidal and let them in. Probably take about 5 minutes. So, A’s room. It only has 2 windows and one exterior wall, so it’s the easiest to defend. There’s plywood by the front of the house (being white trash is so handy sometimes!) and we could quickly nail that up over the windows. Jackson, Theo and Barbieri have been mobilized to watch for suspicious bird actions. We can pile up quilts and stuffed animals against the interior walls, and drag the badminton racquets and baseball bats in from the shed. There’s canned beans and a bottle of Key Lime juice in the pantry, easily transportable across the hall to A’s room. We can live on that indefinitely, no doubt.

We’re ready.

The Broken Arm

So, it's Tuesday. I go to work for an hour, than pick up M and go to the orthopedic clinic. We wait there for 3 hours; the first two in the big crowded waiting room and the last one in the "cast room", which we share, first with a young couple who talk incessantly on their cel phones, rarely to each other, then with a family of serious rednecks who at least are entertaining. The nurse keeps saying that it should only be 20 more minutes. It isn't. During the first hour, I have to leave and go get the X rays from radiology. It has not occurred to any of the various doctors that the orthopedist might need them, so I drive over there and get the films. This actually happens faster than they say it is going to, and I am so grateful I almost cry. M reads Sports Illustrated, I read the April 2004 Vanity Fair and my mother, who has joined us there, reads Birds and Blooms.

I forgot my cigarettes & as a consequence I get nastier and nastier - also, hungrier & hungrier. Finally I drive to a store for cigs and then to Subway where I get takeout & bring it back to the cast room. This, naturally, summons the doctor at last.

He doesn't apologize for our over 3 hour wait, but he is otherwise nice. M has really done it this time: the break is bad; the bone is misaligned. The X-rays make me wince; the jagged edge of bone angled past the other half is really awful and makes me want to pass out or drink brandy or something else Victorian. Given M's advanced age (13.5) there are several treatment options; we opt for the middle one, which is to put it in a full cast and watch it carefully, hoping it realigns itself. If it doesn't, there will have to be surgery, a pin will be put in, or plates and a pin. The doctor suggests we get a second opinion and calls a pediatric orthopedic specialist. Then they put a cast on M. He is terrifyingly brave as they try to realign the bone; I have to leave the room. The cast is pink and black: very 80s London, I tell him comfortingly. Very retro cool.

Finally, 4 or so hours after we got there, we can leave. We pay them nothing - it will all come in giant bills eventually, especially since he now has to come back once a week for more X-rays.

The pediatric orthopedist's office is barren and cold. It's pouring outside now, and we gobbled our Subway sandwiches in the few blocks between orthopedist's offices. M reads Highlights, I read Parenting. We break down and analyze Goofus and Gallant; it makes no sense. M suggests a strongly worded letter to the editor. Children with serious problems come and go in the waiting room; I feel sad. Then we are taken to this doctor's cast room to wait some more: he offers plaster in camouflage, flowers, stars and bars, and a strange pastel pattern of random stripey things, and M is jealous. Finally we see the doctor, who is pleasant and concurs with our decision to wait and see. He talks a lot about how the bone in M's arm should be "as God made it." I want to say, Hey! God had nothing to do with it! I made that arm myself! but I'm too smart - and exhausted - to say anything.

M asked the doctor casually if it was still okay for him to go canoeing in Florida for 8 days, leaving on Thursday. The doctor starts to laugh and I like him more than I did. No way, he tells Miles. Absolutely not. And not much fun this summer either. So much for camp, I think. What is he going to do? He can't even play video games.

I asked both doctors: why does he keep breaking this arm? Is there a bone density issue? Does he need calcium? What's going on here? Bad luck, they told me. High energy and bad luck - there's nothing really wrong with him and his bones are fine.

Great. Poor M. Poor me. This had better be the last time, I tell him, or I'll cut that damn arm off myself.

The American Medical System is BROKEN.

So, M. broke his arm again. Yup. Third time in two years, same bat arm, same bat place. This is convenient, since, as we know, I'm going through bankruptcy, I'm kind of between health insurance plans, and several doctors offices in WNC do not like me now. However, the kid called yesterday and said he thought his arm was broken again, so home he came and today we embarked on a journey into the wonderful world of American middle class health care circa 2005.

Our journey begins at the family practitioner's office, where the scary office drones are perturbed by the fact that my insurance has changed and that I went there instead of the emergency room. I do have insurance (as of a week ago) but I'm not in the Blue Cross/Blue Shield computer yet. I have the plan number. I can't go to the emergency room; I can't afford it. I was hoping that the family doctor would tell me his arm was okay. Nope. Go get it xrayed, he said. Meanwhile, the office drones tell me I will have to pay for this visit in full, then when I get an actual insurance card I must bring it to them, they will xerox it, and then they will apply to get paid from Blue Cross, and then when they get paid, they will pay me back. Goodbye $55. They call the xray place for me and tell me to get on over there.

At this office we read Highlights, Parenting, National Geographic and Reader's Digest.

Off to the giant radiology clinic. The radiology clinic is full of old people, and, no surprise, they have M in the computer right there from the last two breaks. I go into my spiel about the insurance and they say, fine, we'll bill your old insurance. You can't do that, I say. Sure we can, they say, the old insurance will send it back and by then you'll have your new insurance and can bring it in and we'll bill the new insurance. If I had no insurance at all? I wouldn't be allowed through the door, I guess. So this is very nice of them. We're there for about 2 hours. M gets xrayed, then we sit and sit and sit, reading Car and Driver and Southern Living. Finally someone shows up to read the xrays. I crane my ears and overhear the word fracture, then there is a phone conference with the family doctor to which I am not invited, then they finally put me on the phone. Well it's broken, he says. You need to go to an orthopedist. Do I find one? I ask, or do you? He hems and haws and then allows that his staff will find one and call me.

By this time we're both starving, it's like 1:30. We get in the car, there is a brief flurry of phone calls; we go to the orthopedist we went to before. I still owe them money. We are flagged in the computer; the receptionist reacts to our presence with horror. I am eventually ushered in to see the financial manager. She is pretty nice while she tells me, no, I cannot come here ever again. She whispers a recommendation of another orthopedist.

I call the family practitioner again; his office staff are tired of me; they do not want to make more phone calls. I make them do it. They make an appointment at a big orthopedic clinic for tomorrow at 10:45. I go back to work, exhausted.

Mad New Age Mysticism Skillz & the Rebound Dog

What I am about to write is the kind of thing that, if somebody else told it to me, I would back away slowly, speaking in a reassuring tone of voice and looking for the exit. Then I might start laughing and throwing sticks at them. Nevertheless, I am going to go out on the proverbial limb here and let the proverbial shit hit the proverbial fan:

I believe fate and my dead dog had something to do with bringing Jackson into my life. I think this is destiny at work.

*ducks, dodges sticks, laughs hysterically, slugs whiskey, listens to the Ramones*

No, really, seriously, I do. Although I am very scared about writing this down, because I'm afraid I'm cursing myself. My experience with gifts from the gods is that they usually tend to have more in common with the Monkey's Paw than with perfect Christmas presents from your favorite wealthy relative. Alas, but there you go. Also, every time I fall madly in love really quickly, it's doomed. It's also doomed when I fall in love slowly, but we won't invoke that example here. For our purposes, that example is not relevant. So I was terrified all day that I would get home and Jackson would have disappeared. He didn't, he hasn't, and I'm still in love with him. I think I needed him. I think Toby sent him. I think the gods took a hand and my guardian angel (okay, yeah, I know, but I kind of believe in them, not really, but kind of, just a little, I know it's ridiculous, but I swear to you I saw mine, when I was 8, and it was a big black dog. Naturally my guardian angel would take the form often ascribed to Satan - that's kind of why I still believe) but at any rate, my work life is sucking at kind of an all time low, I'm stressed, I'm not having sex, I miss my dog - and it would be just like Toby to bargain his way around heaven & make them send me another dog.

Which leads me to ask, is this my rebound dog? You know how when you break up with a lover, and the only thing you want in the world is another lover, so you find one, and he's actually some kind of horrifying troglodyte, but you can't see it, no, you fall in love overnight? Or maybe that's just me. So anyway, I lost Toby, as we know, and I've been devastated, and now I have a new dog. Is Jackson my rebound dog? Will I wake up horribly disillusioned some time in the next six months? That would suck. I'm enjoying this being in love feeling.

Never Post Quizzes

Heh.

I am: -9% Republican.

"You're a damn Commie! Where's Tailgunner Joe when we need him?"

Are You A Republican?

fliss may 05 bdwys

fliss may 05 bdwys
Originally uploaded by mygothlaundry.

I am vain - fat, yes, that too - and vain. So here is the picture J took of me three days before my birthday, before I dyed my hair. And this is my ultra fab glamourously daring fashionable new shirt, sleazy polyester from the Cheap Slut Store, aka Ross Dress for Less. Taken at Broadways, everyone's favorite dive-y bar.

jackson

jackson
Originally uploaded by mygothlaundry.

Well, here he is. He seems to pretty much be settling in, although the cats are being really horrible to him, and Theo is ambivalent. But I adore him - he's so smart and he puts his head back and bays and my heart just melts. Big dog for 8 months, isn't he? He just ate all the cat food and he wants to sleep in my bed.

Birthday Update

Okay, so I'm now the proud owner of a blind hound dog puppy, once named Tracker, soon to be named Jackson (as in Pollack, for the various splotches on his lovely white hide.)

Okay, okay, I said I wouldn't do it. I told everyone I met all day about how I wouldn't do it, while I told them the whole strange and miraculous story, about finding this puppy on my birthday, two weeks to the day since my old dog died, etc., etc. And. . .

well, of course I adopted him. I mean, for god's sake. Of course I did. And he is too cute for words. Here we are. I swore I wouldn't get another dog. Well, yet again I learn: never say never. Damn.

And as for the rest of the day, it was gruesome until I decided to just quit worrying about being pathetic and start telling every single passerby that it was MY BIRTHDAY BY GOD and then things started getting really fun. Went out drinking with my friends D. and J. (a different entirely D & J than on Saturday night, lo) and had a hamburger & fries & all is pretty much good in my world. Plus I am the richer by one adorable blind hound dog puppy. This is a good thing.

Happy Birthday to Me. . .

Well, so far I'm having a wonderful birthday. Seriously. I mean, I actually am. Note that it is 8:23 am - things could still go to hell - but so far this has been a great birthday. Last night I dyed my hair purple, well auburn with purplish streaks, and I can already tell that it was a very good move. I wanted to go get another tattoo too (I was depressed last night) but I chickened out. It's possible that I already have enough tattoos, and even though the one I was going to get wasn't a new one so much as it was an addition to an old one, still. It gets ridiculous.

So. I am 42 today. According to the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy that's the meaning of the universe. So, I should get really wise right around now - or something - and also, it is a multiple of seven. Things move in sevens (she said cheerfully, putting on the tinfoil hat that is really always only a few inches away from her head. She can't help it. Conspiracy theorists run in her family. As, apparently, does speaking about oneself in the third person.) and seven years make a life cycle during which all your cells change over. I think. According to my mom one time when I was like 10, anyway, and she probably read it in the New York Times, so it must be true. And thus, today marks the beginning of a whole new life for me.

It's two weeks since Toby died (I got a damn letter from the vet yesterday, a 800th generation xerox of that sappy Rainbow Bridge poem; stupid thing looked like it had been used as a handkerchief before it was xeroxed; damn you nice people; I cried like a baby.) and he was 14, which is of course two sevens, and his death did mark the end of a whole era of my life. M will be 14 this year, and finish middle school, A will come home - in 3 weeks. She'll be moving in. Goodbye to me pretending to be 35 or so and not have a 22 year old daughter. Hello giant hot water bill.

Anyway. This morning I woke up, or Theo woke me up, as he likes to do. M pointed out last weekend that Theo barks at you when you don't obey his secret mind control waves. He stands there and thinks wake up, human!! at you and if that doesn't work (it actually often does; it's unnerving to be stared at like that) then he starts barking and trying to herd you into the kitchen. This morning he had both cats as accomplices. So I got up, really early, took out the trash and took Theo to the park. Where, mirabile dictu, there was not another living soul, so I could let him run, and I walked, and it was beautiful, if chilly (coldest spring I ever remember); there was mist on the water and birds abounding; it was utterly lovely and I'm very glad I went.

Then we got home and there was a little lost hound dog in the street. So we rescued him - he was a total sweetie, although he didn't seem to see very well. I brought him inside and then saw A, my adorably cute neighbor walking down the street with a leash in his hand. So I yelled, "Hey are you looking for a dog?" and he was - and this little dog, who is blind, is up for adoption. A. dogsits and walks dogs and volunteers for dog rescue organizations, etc. He is also a really talented painter and gorgeous, did I mention gorgeous? Also he has a motorcycle. And a girlfriend - of course. And I am NOT, not, not going to adopt that blind hound dog. No. No I'm not. Don't let me. Stop me someone. I am not that stupid. I have a dog and two cats. And two kids. Stop me before I adopt that blind hound dog, someone, please!

So this is my birthday morning and I am really happy that I managed to rescue that sweet little blind dog, that I went to the park, that the park was deserted (that's my own personal birthday present from the gods) and that I have purple hair. And I don't have to take a shower this morning since I took a long one last night! Wahooooo!