MFA Mama

well, yesterday sucked

*   I dropped Hotter in front of Local Teaching Hospital and circled around to find meter parking, because I hate the hospital valets. $5? SCREW YOU.

*   I got a $20 parking ticket, though, so I guess I didn't actually save any money. DAMMIT.

*   And it looks like someone rammed the back end of the MFA Minivan while it was street parked, and now the rear hatch doesn't open. Which since I don't currently have car insurance is now just going to be part of life. Fuuuuuck.

*   Hotter got two vaccines at his appointment (flu and pneumonia), and they were both killed virus shots so I don't think he's CAUGHT flu or pneumonia or anything, but he did get super-cranky, start shivering violently, spike a fever, and pretty much look like death when we got home. Whaaaaat?

*   Plus the creepy repairman? Pronounced our water heater to be an "odd size" and had to order the new one, which means that we still have an ongoing leak in the house and no hot water. SERIOUSLY?!?

*   I'm expecting Creepy Repairman back any moment with the new water heater, or rather he said to expect him back between nine and ten. I? Am not holding my breath.

*   In light of current world events and even current HOUSEhold events this is a very minor little first-world problem, but I upgraded to iOS 5 on The Precious and I don't love it. I got rid of that stupid little Newstand thing with The Coding Massacre's hack, but am unreasonably upset about Apple changing the little orange iPod icon to an orange box with a stupid music note inside it. I LIKED MY MOTHERFUCKING LITTLE ORANGE IPOD ICON, APPLE, AND THIS WILL NOT STAND. Oh, wait, I'm stuck with it? Well, I guess it WILL stand but I will NOT like it!

*   How are all of YOU? 

assorted items

*   Still no hot water here. Hotter is not taking it well, but I'm fairly philosophical as long as there's electricity and running water to be had, and took a cold washcloth-scrub and shower-rinse after my run today (it was very invigorating, thanks!) and heated water on the stove to wash up the necessary dishes to bottle tonight's batch of water kefir and get tomorrow's going in new room-temperature sugar-water. The landlord wasn't able to get a repairperson out today but a truly obnoxious one is coming tomorrow. I know he is obnoxious because I spoke to him over the phone, and in the space of a five-minute conversation he asked for my phone number in an innuendo-laden tone followed by "honey," also called me "baby," "sweetheart" and "dear," and then after I mentioned a morning appointment being no good tomorrow due to my HUSBAND having a doctor's appointment he started calling me "ma'am" and signed off with "God bless you!" Clearly someone has some Madonna/whore issues toward women and/or has seen too many pornos and I am not only offended on MANY levels but also skeeved out enough that if I was not married I'd probably ask the XY to come over rather than be alone with this asshole. Blech!

*   I went running again today, and did not die, which is pretty much the only criterion by which I judge a run a success or failure. I have this weird love/hate relationship with running; I love it but it hates me. Between the connective tissue disease, the exercise-triggered asthma, the deformed feet (nothing anyone would pay to see, they're just not quite right), and probably at least two other things I'm forgetting at the moment I have to be rather careful with running, but I'm trying to work on improving my general health and stress levels with the idea that blood pressure and blood sugar both influence glaucoma and obviously I want to do everything possible to save my eyesight and there's an app, so: RUNNING! WHOO! The main things I do to avoid hurting myself are mostly geared toward SLOWING THE EFF DOWN. That seems to be the number one piece of advice I get in life, be it from a family therapist, an academic advisor, teachers and coaches in everything from piano to public speaking...I seem to have two speeds, fast and off and neither of those serves me well in running without hurting myself, so here is what works for me in case you have this problem too:

1. Use something to keep time and alternate running and walking. RunKeeper is perfect for this because I don't have to watch a clock. It frustrates me, because the run intervals always end just as I'm hitting my stride, but it also keeps me from outrunning my lungs and/or joints.

2. Breath-counting. I breath in through my nose for a count of eight and out through my mouth for a count of eight. Each number is a footfall, and if I am struggling to get the full count of eight in then I know I'm going too damn fast and/or headed toward trouble with the lungs.

3. Listen to slow stuff. This is counterintuitive, because what is more fun than pounding around the track to some Guns N Roses? Very few things! But what is less fun than a stress fracture? EVEN FEWER! I run to chanting Benedictine monks a lot. If I'm in no mood for the monks then I try to stick to songs like At Last by Etta James or Satellite by DMB. Nothing any faster than that, which is a buzzkill but also keeps my legs in no more pieces than they should be.

4. Think about posture as you run. Keep your shoulders back and your chest open, hold your head up and make sure you're centered over your feet. If you're leaning forward? You're going too fast.

*   I was not my most fabulous self today. I was impatient with my children this morning and irritated with my husband right up until he sensibly threw me a make-up bang. I wasn't in a very good headspace due to being laid off; I had grown complacent with the idea of staying at that job for another month and building up a little nestegg "just in case." Fortunately it has stopped hurting to swallow unless it's a very large gulp and I'm hoping this means I've avoided the possibility of surgical intervention being necessary, but our minivan still isn't getting any younger and now I've got it in the back of my mind that I need to be ready to re-litigate custody and well, OY. I'm going to try not to be an angst-ridden shrew tomorrow but can't make any promises, because we're spending the morning at Local Teaching Hospital for Hotter's yearly Big Checkup with Transplant and, well. Y'all know how I feel about that place. But I'm still going to try to "go quietly amid the noise and haste," and we'll see what happens.

*   How are all of you?

et tu, Tuesday?

   So my in-laws have departed along with half the MFA Flock, and I am very relieved. My kids never saw my stepson awake (they peeked in on him sleeping before Hotter and I were up and all commented that he looks a lot like his dad but they either didn't notice the spools in his ears or didn't realize those things were IN his ears because they didn't comment on that, and the tattoos were covered) (WHEW!), there was only one screaming match between Hotter and The Wrath (which took place after the boys had gone to school), and nobody said anything unpleasant to me so I'm going to call that a victorious in-law experience.

   The landlord (who is generally a good one but whose spouse is occasionally...difficult...so it could have gone either way) is going to replace the water heater without making us wait several days as they have done for repairs in the past, so that's good.

   But apparently the people at my job noticed how little they need me (I called in today after a night of fitful, nightmares-about-stepson-repercussions filled sleep to supervise any potential meeting between the four stepbrothers, because honestly after last night I didn't trust Hotter not to TOTALLY FUCKING BUNGLE IT if they had questions about the tattoos, piercings, etc.) and I got a call from Temp Agency #1 a little while ago to let me know that I've been laid off effective immediately.

   Fuck.

the one with neither a wedding nor a funeral, but the potential for both (ETA further clarification)

*   I found out today via text message from Hotter who heard it from the boys that the XY proposed to CATHERINE! and she said yes.

*   Hotter's first words to me when I walked in the door from work were "BIG CHILD WANTS TO MOVE IN WITH THE XY AND CATHERINE!" I had carefully composed my face into a mask of gracious good cheer on the drive home but it shattered right then and there and I nearly started sobbing. Instead I did what I do when I'm furious or overwhelmed, which is become eerily (according to people who know me well) calm and pleasant (people who don't know me well are often soothed into stepping even FURTHER into it, which is...often problematic). "He does?" I asked, calmly."THAT'S WHAT HE SAID!" It turned out that yes, that is what Big Child SAID, but what Big Child MEANT, and CLARIFIED to Hotter immediately afterward, was "now we can stay at CATHERINE!'s house on Daddy weekends." But Hotter...well, let's just say he needed some prompting even then to drop his FUNNY, FUNNY JOKE because OMG HOW FUNNY?**

*   Show of hands: who thinks that was funny?

*   I started running again. I had actually planned to start running again before getting The Text Of Doom, because I found a really cool app that had inspired me. Good timing! I can now tell you that I ran exactly 1.8 miles and did not die. Win!

*   As I was doing that thing I do where I attempt to explain after a cooling-off period of several hours just how badly awry the joke had gone and Hotter was doing that thing where the nascient awareness of just how badly he's screwed up turns him surly and prone to accusing me of overreaction, my in-laws rolled up. My stepson, who had ALLEGEDLY been told how conservative I am about what I allow my children to be exposed to, was sporting some truly epic body piercings, a giant new tattoo, and a hickey. I'm sure my ex's lawyers will be TERRIBLY AMUSED.

*   Then my water heater exploded. 

*   I quit life.

 

**   This is the brain damage. It makes him sometimes lose track entirely of what is/isn't appropriate, funny, or hell, MINIMALLY ACCEPTABLE. I don't hold it against him because then I might as well get pissed at him for having a seizure, but I also don't particularly ENJOY it when Hotter stabs me in the heart with the edge of his brokenness. My marriage is not in trouble or anything. I just needed to vent.

****************************************EDITED TO ADD******************************************

   Okay, here is the thing with the piercings/tattoos and me going all finger-wagging grandma on you. I have nothing against piercings or tattoos or people who have them. Hell, back in the day when I was a whippersnapper I had some unconventional piercings of my own (okay, nothing THAT exciting, just a bunch of cartilage piercings in my ears) and if it weren't for my connective tissue disease and my shitty, MRSA-prone immune system I'd have my nose pierced . But the state I live in is SUPER-conservative. This is the bible belt, and statistically speaking there's a very good chance the judge who presides over custody decisions involving my family is a biblical literalist. People in this state, I am sad to say, have lost their kids PERMANENTLY just for being gay. My custody order has a MORALITY CLAUSE, for fuck's sake. And on the very day I found out the XY was marrying money the very last thing I needed was to have someone whose appearance would doubtless make our custody judge shit a brick, an anvil, and then an entire litter of kittens show up on my doorstep.

the one with the flu shot

  Y'know how you clean when you have in-laws coming? I know I'm not the only one who does this. I mean, not that we live in squalor or anything but our usual "lived-in, one person works fulltime-and-then-some and the other juggles three kids and various animals and also is technically kind of disabled" look, which normally doesn't bother me, starts to make my lower eyelid twitch when my mother-in-law (who don't get me wrong, I LOVE) is coming below the Mason-Dixon line. And then every sphincter in my body puckers up and I see a dust-bunny somewhere and...you know that scene from Downfall that's been parodied by everyone and their dog to the point that there's a parody where Hitler reacts to all of the parodies? Well, it's like that, but without my having the technical wherewithal to jury-rig some subtitles especially for this occasion.

   Poor Hotter.

   So naturally I decided, in all of my infinite wisdom, that this afternoon was a fine time to get my annual flu shot (and tweet my annual flu-shot tweet). Never mind that I already feel like ass because of the ongoing GI fiasco, no, what I clearly needed was A SORE ARM! 

   Oh well. When push comes to shove I need the flu like I need a hole in my head and I guess I don't regret getting the shot today, since I don't have a ton of time off in my future and flu season is upon us. I think Imma swallow my pride and take it easy tonight. How are all of YOU?

grumbling, assorted

*   My friend lives! I hadn't exactly planned to update the blog but I know y'all worry. She's feeling rather sluggish and "blah" but her gums aren't pale, her heartrate is within normal limits, and she isn't short of breath so while her H&H probably took a hit based on what she's seen, there's no reason to think she's in any great danger. Best of all, she's having less pain with swallowing than yesterday, so things appear to be healing in there. She's hoping she's dodged the bullet and that this will heal up nicely and not need any sort of intervention at all, but just getting through the weekend without an emergency is a wonderful thing in and of itself and she's grateful for that.

*   The poultry drama continues as Hotter and I make some tough calls on who stays and who goes. We're going to be limited to twelve birds, total, which means that Hotter's and my differences in how we view livestock (namely that they're more pets and individuals to him and more mouths to feed/utility critters to me) have gone from "amusing" to "causing some friction." The ducks in particular have become a bone of contention, in that I think keeping the pair that's bonded and sending the two extra girlducks (who seem to have more a relationship of necessity than a true pair bond, like prison-spouses) to The Wrath is reasonable and Hotter wants to keep them all. I wouldn't have a problem with that if it weren't for the twelve-bird limit, but we really don't use that many duck eggs, so...yeah. We're already keeping a lot of non-laying birds because of the turkeys and Hotter's beloved silver-laced Wyandottes (who don't yet lay). Ugh!

*   I read something on a blog the other day that really rankled me. I'm not going to say whose or give a link because I refuse to propagate blog-drama, but the general gist of it was that someone was blagging (using their blog to brag about their life) and, along with a lot of uber-materialistic hokum that didn't bother me a bit (I'm not a particularly covetous person when it comes to Things Material, although I do envy those of you who have Kitchen Aid mixers) they blagged at length about their children. The way they're able to afford to give their kids lots of things I can't give mine did smart a tiny bit, but the line that really stuck in my craw (ha! Like that pill! Oh haha!) was something to the effect of "my kids don't have special needs!" I'm kind of conflicted about getting my hackles up there, because if none of my children had any special needs I guess I might privately include that in the things about my life I was grateful for, but...well, I don't know that I'd blag about it openly. If your children don't have any special needs then hey, that's great for them and for you, but...it's not like that's a measure of your success in life. With the exception of things like FAS and prenatal drug exposure, a child's having special needs isn't usually indicative of their parents' mistakes or misdeeds. It just...is what it is. I'm not sure exactly why it bothered me so much to read that line in a blog that's in the "trainwrecks" section of my reader anyway (oh don't act like you don't have blogs you read solely because they make you feel better about your own life...I at least own my schadenfreude), and I certainly don't wish any special needs upon the blaggart-in-question's children or anything mean like that. But that line has stayed with me. I guess maybe I ought to take that one out of my reader...

*   This certainly has turned into a mishmash of pissing and moaning, hasn't it? To make up for that, at least in part, here is a picture that I am extremely proud of:

Figure One: Gobble gobble, motherfucker! At last I captured Loud and Crazy the turkey in action! Isn't he impressive?

the one where I'm worried about a friend

   So a few days ago a FRIEND got a pill stuck in her throat (or possibly in the pouch of her hiatal hernia--I know, it's like we were separated at birth!). Said friend has seen evidence of considerable upper GI bleeding (having been schooled by various GI doctors on how to tell the difference between upper and lower GI bleeding for someone else she was caring for at some point, and therefore being certain that that's what this is) but can't go to a doctor on a weekend without totally upsetting the delicate financial balance in her household and isn't really sure that's warranted at this point, anyway. A doctor would no doubt send my friend to the emergency room, where she would probably end up getting, at the very least, a 23-hour observation admit to let her stomach empty and then an EGD that would probably show the source of the bleeding, and then my friend would probably be sent home with some Nexium and orders to stick to a soft diet for a bit. My friend doesn't feel as though she's lost enough blood to be dangerously anemic (and she is well aware what THAT feels like), her gums aren't pale, and the pain in the area that said bleeding is most likely coming from is not getting any worse. So probably nothing needs to be cauterized and the only purpose in my friend spending the weekend and every penny to her family's name in the hospital would be in going "huh, yep, look at THAT!" when a) that wouldn't actually HELP my friend right now given that she already has access to Nexium and a soft diet and b) it would eat up all of the funds she may need to save against a LATER date in case strictures develop as this heals, at which point surgical intervention of some kind WOULD be necessary.

   So I don't think my friend is in any mortal danger or anything, but all of that said, she feels like crap and I'm worried about her.

good news: yay!

*   The poultry (at least most of the poultry) can stay! It turns out that we just have to file some paperwork and pay a $75 filing fee to have domestic fowl on less than three acres on an agricultural-zoned property in our locale. We'll be limited to a dozen birds, so we're still sending some to the Arctic Tundra with The Wrath (who is coming early next week to fetch them). The ones who go will include both roosters and the loudest cacklers among the hens, and hopefully that will pacify the neighbors (if in fact it was a neighbor and not Stalky who complained). With the number we keep we'll have plenty of eggs for our family (although we will have to stop giving dozens away to neighbors, which under the circumstances given that maybe it WAS one of them I will not feel bad about). Y'all, I did not want to admit how upset I would have been if we'd had to get rid of all of the birds; they're a large part of why we love living where we do and more than just a source of eggs, meat and feathers. They're FUN. SO happy about not having to get rid of them all!

*   I got word that I get to keep my current lovely job (which is through Temp Agency #1) until late November! They're cutting my hours, but only down to 8-5 Monday through Friday, which will be a welcome change as I'll get to have dinner with my family and do homework with the boys, as well as sleep an extra hour in the mornings. I have weekend work lined up for two coming weekends through Temp Agencies 2 and 3, which will be good as we're trying to save for an inexpensive second vehicle I can drive to and from work and such when we don't need the passenger capacity of the MFA Minivan to save on gas. Also, the day job through Temp Agency #1 lasting as long as it is means I'll be eligible for unemployment when it's over should I need it (I hope not to need it, but better to have it as an option and not need it than need it and not have it as an option, right?).

*   A fabulous reader informed me that I could change my signature in the iPhone so that now instead of "sent from my iPhone" it says "sent from The Precious." This tickles me to no end!

*   I do NOT have anything lined up through any temp agencies for THIS weekend, which means that I get to spend it entirely with my husband. We plan to give our mower a tuneup (new spark plug and air filter), mow the lawn, and spoon a lot. 

*   How are all of YOU? I do genuinely want to know when I ask. Talk to me!

:(

Well, yesterday didn't manage to be any WORSE than the day before, but it also wasn't any BETTER. I somehow got the last dose of Clindamycin stuck halfway down, or maybe it was lodged in the pouch of my hiatal hernia? I dunno, but it was awful. Seriously one of the top five most excruciating things I've ever felt, right up there with "open fracture" and "gallstones." I spent all of yesterday snowed on Benadryl and Vicodin, taking Zofran and trying to sleep through my misery, since I decided calling in sick was less foolhardy than trying to leave the house while desperately unwell and functioning on a night of zero sleep. Someone tell me a funny, please. I'm back at work today with what feels like the world's worst heartburn and a crummy attitude.

bumpity bumpity

   You know how stuff on the top shelf of a disorderly closet closed on a mess will all fall on your head if you open the door?

   My life is kind of doing that right now.

   Today we got a visit from the local zoning compliance officer. Even though Casa MFA is zoned agricultural, they still prosecute if you have chickens or other "farm animals" on a plot under three acres (I thought it was under ONE). Ours is 2.7 and therefore barring a very slim chance that we can get grandfathered all of the poultry have to go pretty much immediately. They can't reveal the identity of the complainer but the (shockingly nice and very apologetic) zoning guy said the complainer was really weird in the way they made the complaint and refused to give their name or callback number and he got the impression they weren't from around here. Oh, Stalky, that was so mean of you!

   Plenty of other things went wrong today, including something someone did absentmindedly that caused a chain-reaction of bank fees that will be one costly clusterfuck, my locking myself out of the MFA Minivan on my lunchbreak (with my wallet inside so that I could neither hire a locksmith nor prove ownership of the vehicle in order to get the police to help me out) while shocked by the awful poultry and financial news, which arrived together while I was in the ATM line, work announcing that while they want to try and keep me on until late November they'll be cutting my hours starting next week, and BUMPITY BUMPITY OUCH OH GOD DAMN IT ALL RIGHT STRAIGHT TO HELL SUDDENLY EVERY ANXIOUS THOUGHT I HAVE EVER HAD HAS COME HOME TO ROOST.

   I was literally scared to drive home from work because I was certain that between the way today was going and the rain I'd wreck the damn minivan; a coworker literally had to shoo me from my seat at my desk with assurances that whatever I was working on (which unbeknownst to them was pretty much JUST a small nervous breakdown at that point) could wait until tomorrow, and when the XY was late returning the MFA Children from dinner visitation I was certain he'd managed to wreck again with them in his car.

   Obviously I made it home safely, and so did the MFA Children or I would be in no fit state to post a thing, but it sure does feel like nothing will ever been good again. Hotter and I are both really upset (as are the children, but honestly I think the grownups are taking it harder) about our birds, and hating that we can't move to his hometown with them (my mother in law, who is a saint, is bringing a truck from several states away and taking the MFA Flock to her farm), and wondering if we'll ever stop getting nasty surprises from Stalky, whose ability to screw with my life I thought I'd eliminated by changing career fields. Now I wonder if I don't also need to change my damn name and move, and oh yeah maybe just get the hell off of the innernet permanently and stop sharing any little goddamn thing at all about my life with the general public (I hesitated even to talk about the poultry thing at all to try and avoid giving Stalky the satisfaction, but I think y'all would notice if I never mentioned the birds again).

   I doubt I'll do that, and I'm sure tomorrow will be better (although I will not tempt fate by doubting that it could possibly be worse), and I'll be fine because I always am, but...today can pretty much fuck right on off and die in a tire fire.