MFA Mama

in which the weekend is ruined

   Well, I wrote an entire post earlier and sent it to the blog via e-mail, but it's not here, and maybe it's more than I should've said on the innernet anyway. The essence of it was: Hotter done fucked up. PROBABLY I will forgive him, but what he did was about the worst thing he COULD have done in the context of our relationship, outside of actual violence or infidelity, and I am very, very sad (and freaked out) about the whole thing. This is something that's happened once before, and that time it took a couple of weeks, counseling, and him getting very ill and needing surgery before I fully forgave him. I keep telling myself that I got past it once, and can do it again, but...I dunno. It's bad, y'all, and he really should've known better. Needless to say, this pretty much ruined the holiday weekend, and I'm wishing the children were here, or that I was at work, because I'm feeling really lonely.

slump

   I have missed a LOT of work over this latest oral surgery drama of Hotter's. This whole "easily could have gone septic and died" thing hit me like a ton of bricks and I just want to make sure he's breathing, OKAY PEOPLE? Also I have some kind of lung lurgy and my entire back is seized up and OH MY GOD MONEY and...I dunno. I feel like I could sleep for a week. At least.

   How do YOU break out of a slump?

today was a lot like my ex-husband...

...in that all it did was kick my ass, spend my money, and waste my fucking time.

   *rimshot*

   Seriously though, the ER did a CT scan of Hotter's head and some bloodwork, said everything looked good and they had NO idea why he was so ill, and discharged him with instructions to follow up with...TRANSPLANT. So it's like a giant medical circlejerk with my husband in the middle (barfing, most likely), and this is why Hotter usually isn't allowed to go to the doctor without me. Because I probably would've cut Transplant off at the knees when they sent him to the goddamn ER, or at the very least put the kibosh on the ER being all "your brain and blood are normal so have fun throwing up and passing out at home, sucka!" Since he's been hypotensive for the past week I'm thinking SOMEbody probably needs to scale back one or more of his BP meds, which only Transplant can really do (they manage those, plus nobody else will alter a transplant patient's meds). Either that or Hotter just needs to sack up and quit being such a wussy about having a BP in the 90s over 60s, because I walk around like that every goddamn day and you don't see ME retiring to my fainting couch over it.

   The MFA Children and I were actually on our way to go and get our bees when Hotter called to say he'd been discharged. So everybody got to go along for the ride! I was kind of worried because I have the kind of veil that goes over a hat (that is the cheapest kind) and my feral children destroyed my straw gardening hat (which I'd been planning to use with the veil) doing some kind of Mexican hat dance on the thing, but then I realized that their plastic Bob the Builder hard hat would a) fit me and b) have enough of a brim all the way around it to hold the veil. So I swiped that to use (really, it's the least those rotten kids could do!), and my beekeeping instructor at least had the courtesy to go and laugh at me in private. And now we have bees!

    Man, I hope I'm well enough to go to work tomorrow.

OH (the "only at my house" edition)

Hotter (bringing in a tray of seedlings): These look like mushrooms!
MFA Mama (turning to look): Which?
Hotter: These. The tall ones (jiggles the tray so that some canteloupe sprouts that are getting leggy wave back and forth).
MFA Mama: I...they're green. I don't see how those look ANYTHING like mushrooms.
Hotter: They're tall and skinny! Like straw mushrooms, you know, tall and skinny with weird little heads?
MFA Mama: Ohhhh like Chris Brown's dick! 
Hotter: WHAT!
MFA Mama: You haven't seen that picture of him, on the innernet? It's all long and skinny...with a weird little head.
Hotter: How is it that there are genitals on the innernet that you've seen and I haven't? He's not even your type!
MFA Mama: Eh. That's what happens when you remodel a Soulless Corporate Megalith store on the graveyard shift. Everybody gets tired and someone compares a long, skinny shelf bracket that just hit someone to Chris Brown's dick and everyone but you laughs and then they're all shocked you haven't seen it and tell you to go home and Google it.
Hotter: Huh. I guess you learn something new every day. 

crowdsourcing, because I really don't even know what to do with this

   So. I didn"t go to work, which should tell you everything you need to know about how my back is. I got up when the alarm went off, and shuffled to the bathroom, holding onto the hallway wall all the way, and then in transferring into the bathroom, proper, almost fell flat because my right leg twitched out and then buckled at the knee. I caught myself on the vanity (my arms are okay--it hurts to move them, but only because that pulls on my trunk; whatever this is is down at L5, which I know because that is where I broke my back and it is ALWAYS L5), and took a moment to get my shit together and think. Seeing as it's my right leg that's the most wonky (and given that I have nerve damage in my left leg from the break twenty-one years ago that alone is pretty alarming), that was one strike against going to work anyway. Because that's my pedal-pushing leg, obviously, and while the MFA Minivan has cruise control, braking in a timely manner is essential to safe driving. The whole "not able to walk/balance worth a shit without holding onto things" scenario was strike two, obviously. I mean, I do possess a Rollator, but all concerns of personal dignity aside (I pretty much got over those when I had to use the thing to get around for months and months a few years ago), the idea of lifting it in and out of the MFA Minivan seemed tremendously optimistic at best (and downright idiotic at worst) (in the Rollator's defense it is VERY lightweight, but it weighs more than string cheese. So). Strike three was the fact that I had an hour-long anxiety attack* in the wee hours of the morning after sternly telling myself I NEEDED to sleep to go to work and that it was mind over motherfucking matter, and I looked and felt like someone operating on three hours' nightmare-riddled sleep following an hour's helpless tears.

   I so totally can't even afford this, y'all.

   But since my body doesn't seem to give a shit about what I can and cannot afford or tolerate, I have to decide what to do about this, and since I cannot, even with unpacking and examining my reasons for liking or disliking any one option, discern what the best way to handle this would be, I'm crowdsourcing it and giving y'all a chance to weigh in.

Option One: Do nothing, by which I mean continue to take NSAIDs and Tylenol-laced narcotics, ice my lower back, and move as little as possible up until VERY CAREFULLY stretching, applying heat, and gradually ramping my level of activity back up is feasible. This is what I've been doing so far. Pros include not costing anything, not having to leave the house, and the fact that historically this always turns out to have been the wisest course of action in cases like this. Cons include possibly running out of leftover dentist pills before the pain is less terrifying, the possibility of overlooking something like a disc issue, and the fact that seeking some medical attention MIGHT have me back in fighting (or at least white-collar working) form sooner than this.

Option Two: Drag my sorry ass to Urgent Care (my GP, in addition to being on my shit list, doesn't have an x-ray suite in her office). Pros include ruling disc issues in or out via x-ray and neuro exam, documentation to show my boss (who doesn't care about such things and kind of rolls his eyes when I present him with doctor's notes after absences, but I like to demonstrate accountability), and possibly obtaining better pain relief in the form of steroids and/or more narcotics. Cons include costing money,having to leave the house, and  the fact that realistically and based on precedent this won't actually make me feel any better any sooner than waiting it out.

   What say ye? At this point I could argue either side, and Hotter is the KING of "whatever you want to do about it, baby," so I'm interested to see what other people think.

 

*   Which...what the fuck? All self-deprecating hyperbole aside, I haven't had a genuine anxiety attack like that in YEARS, like, probably at least three of them. And yet there I was having a conversation with myself in the wee hours that went something like "There is absolutely no reason to hurt yourself rolling over to make sure nobody is standing at the end of the bed, because the dogs would've gone nuts if someone had broken in and ZOMBIES ARE NOT REAL YOU ARE JUST BEING STUPID ABOUT THE ZOMBIES, THIS IS NOT AT ALL LIKE YOU WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK, ANYWAY I MEAN ZOMBIES, SERIOUSLY???" And then I finally went to sleep and had nightmares about my maternal progenitor until the alarm went off.

in which I have a mostly good weekend and clearly it angers the gods

*   Friday night Hotter came down with Middle Child's most recent GI bug.

*   Undaunted, and fortified with Immodium and a fabulous purse filled with snacks, we sallied forth on Saturday and saw The Hunger Games with those movie vouchers. It was excellent.

*   Sunday I mowed, edged, trimmed, and weeded ALL THE THINGS. Which is good, because it rained all damn day Saturday and rained again today and the plants (the grass included) are all growing like mofos.

*   Today was Big Child's birthday. In preparation for that I went into work an hour and fifteen minutes early, left early, ran to Trader Joe's with my rubber checkbook, and got groceries (we were out of EVERYTHING). Then I headed straight home, brought the groceries into the house, and...threw my back ALL THE WAY OUT reaching to put a package of organic string cheese away in the fridge.

*   Yeah. I can dig three-foot trenches, throw sixty-pound bags of potting soil around, hell, I can dead-lift my HUSBAND and carry him on a triumphant lap around our living room just to be a dick prove a point, but a one-pound bag of cheese sticks? Dropped me in my tracks today like I'd been pole-axed.

*   This is the worst back pain I have ever experienced, I think. Including the time I broke my goddamn back. I have taken a liver-damaging amount of Tylenol-laced narcotics and a hefty dose of naproxen (FUCK MY CLOTTING TIME! IN THE ASS! WITH EVERY DICK THAT EVER THERE WAS, THIS IS THAT BAD) and I still can't move any of my limbs without yelping. Also, my legs aren't working very well. Nobody panic, this isn't all that unusual for me when my back is acting up, it's just never been THIS BAD before. I like to think I have a pretty robust pain threshold, but this has me whimpering like a little bitch. If I don't wake up tomorrow miraculously improved I don't have any idea what I'll do.

*   Well, that's a damn lie. Unless I lose the ability to walk I will go to work anyway and be fucking MISERABLE all day, is what I'll do. But right now I don't see how I'll manage. Of course, I didn't see how I'd bake the requested triple-coconut/vanilla layer cake earlier, either, and I still did that, so I guess I'll do what I have to do and even smile during if need be. I'm just not particularly looking forward to it.

*   How are all of YOU?

poverty shaming, the 261-calorie lunch, and Hotter has oral surgery

I.   So I think maybe I'm still a little raw from the incident with the Old Biddy Neighbor. Today I am off work, because I had to go to traffic court over one of the expired registration tickets I got when I couldn't afford to update the MFA Minivan's registration and got ticketed (the case was dismissed when I showed the judge my registration and I was out the door in ten minutes), and also Hotter had oral surgery (which I scheduled for a day I knew I'd have to miss work anyway, because I am efficient like that) and I had to drive him to and from that and take care of him afterward. I was also thinking that maybe if Hotter was feeling up to it, we could use a movie ticket voucher I've had kicking around for a while and go to see The Hunger Games. Here is an update I wrote on the Facespace earlier today:

Figure One: Yeah, I didn't match the shade on the name-text very well, but use your imaginations.

   Here is the comment addendum I added to the first status (I had already covered this on the Twitter, then forgot I hadn't told the facespace about the ticket voucher and panicked a little), and what a couple of friends had to say about it:

Figure Two: This time I didn't even try. Y'all can tell which one I am, right?

   And now it is kind of bothering me because I wonder if I'm not being a jerk here. My friends are easier on me than I am about pretty much everything, I think out of affection, but...am I being a jerk? Goodness knows I am against poverty-shaming. Poor folks have enough to worry about without judgment from others, and I hate to read about this kind of thing, because I've been judged in the grocery line before and it doesn't feel good (like okay, with Food Stamps? They give you WAY MORE to spend on food each month than I do when I am buying our groceries out of pocket, and when my family received Food Stamps I often used to buy fresh organic berries with them because fresh berries used to be one of the only things Little Child would eat by mouth and with the way he used to be allergic to so many things I wanted to make sure he didn't react to some pesticide or herbicide on the berries and cause us to think he couldn't have the berries themSELVES...more than once I had a cashier look at me like "SERIOUSLY?" and it's not like the g-tube showed when Little Child had clothes on)...but then I see some folks talking about how poor they are but going out to eat frequently, going on vacations where they spend a lot on travel costs and hotel rooms, seeing movies several times per month, and it irks me. Because while I don't doubt that those people FEEL like they're poor, in my reality if I did those things we'd have to go without something really important, like my health insurance coverage (the MFA Children are on the XY's policy), or car insurance (which we did go without for a while, and which I got roasted for openly in the comments one time and remedied as soon as I was able to), or, you know, FOOD or MEDICINE or something. It's been over a year since I saw a movie in the theater. The last time I went on vacation was BlogHer '10 and we've NEVER been on a family vacation. We don't eat out, PERIOD (I think the last time we ate out as a family was Big Child's birthday last year, and when we did that it was because a generous friend had given us a gift card to Red Robin...and Big Child's birthday is coming up AGAIN in a week and a half,* so...yeah. It's been a while. The last time before THAT was over a year previous, too.). Maybe our definition of "poor" and other people's definition of "poor" differ? Or maybe I should feel badly for the folks who are crying poor and still doing all of those things, because maybe it indicates an inability to be realistic about their situation and make smart choices? I don't know. I might be wired a little different in that I've NEVER really had the money to do those kinds of things, and therefore don't miss them--maybe some folks really DO feel like life isn't worth living without seeing movies, eating out, and going on trips (although personally I think if I was feeling that way I'd be more tempted to break the bank on a co-payment to talk to my psychiatrist about it, if anything)? Something about this whole thing isn't sitting right with me, and I can't quite put my finger on it. Ideas?

II. I mentioned on the Twitter that I'd made myself a 261-calorie lunch and it was delicious and filled my belly, and someone asked me to blog about it, so here goes. You will need:

a pat of butter
a splash of milk
five eggs
1 ounce Trader Joe's light feta cheese (most "light" cheese isn't worth eating, but this stuff is a delightful exception--I actually prefer it to the regular variety taste-wise!) 
2 cups baby spinach
a slice of onion
Texas Pete
salt and pepper to taste 

   Dice the onion up and saute it in the butter. Break the eggs into a bowl, separating out all but one of the yolks (discard the four other yolks, or feed them to your pets, or whatever), then add the splash of milk, a few sprinkles of Texas Pete (which adds an excellent flavor and also colors the egg so that it doesn't have that unappetizing white-y look you get when using just or mostly eggwhites), and your spices. Whisk it together. When the onions have clarified, add the spinach, and when the spinach has wilted, add the egg mixture to the pan. Cook until the eggs are the way you like them (I like mine hard-cooked, because runny eggs squick me out). Dish that up, crumble the feta on top, and enjoy. According to Myfitnesspal this has 261 calories.

III. Hotter had oral surgery today. Our dentist did it in his office, but it was kind of gory (Hotter had a tooth that was broken off below the gumline except for one lone splinter that stuck up a little...I couldn't even look at it without gagging and don't know how he stood it, although he said it didn't really bother him). While we were there I went ahead and scheduled the next round of work for the end of May (when my NEXT traffic court date for the expired registration is) (that's the last one though!)...it will be $360. I don't know how I am going to pay for that, but I said that about this month's work and last month's, and I guess I'll think of something. I will be SO GLAD when every month doesn't include a bunch of dental work for Hotter, y'all, you don't even KNOW. In the post-op instructions they said Hotter wasn't allowed to suck on anything because it could cause dry sockets. I turned to him and said "WELL THAT IS JUST GREAT, HOW ARE YOU GOING TO RAISE THE MONEY TO PAY ME BACK NOW?" because I am awesome like that. Also, here are some things I tweeted while I was waiting that people seemed to find amusing:

Figure Three: He doesn't actually have a third nipple. But then I DO NOT ACTUALLY FART IN MY SLEEP, so we're even!

*   And I don't EVEN want to think about it, because a) I haven't gotten him anything and b) he has mentioned several times that he wants to go to Red Robin again this year because he enjoyed it so much last year, but um, NOT GONNA HAPPEN. Crap. 

some happy things

*   Thanks to a generous friend, last night I was able to go out and get bread, milk, and butter (and also? APPLE JUICE! And there was great rejoicing amongst the MFA Children).

*   I am the queen of frugality, but I did not know about this. Of course I'd just BOUGHT milk when I saw it this morning, but we will absolutely try it next time and report back on our results! Thanks, Anissa!

*   I have been sick since yesterday with GI symptoms, which sucks, but Isis gives the best snuggles when I'm not feeling well. It's like she knows:

Figure One: Behold, the vishiss killr pitbull!

*   Hotter told me a funny that I'd never heard before, and it had me howling. It's a new-to-me term: "rodeo fuck." 

Rodeo fuck (n.) - When you're doing your girl, and call her by your ex's name then try to hold on for seven seconds.

daily reminder: don't be a jerk

   I am LIVID, so please excuse any typos.

   My old biddy neighbor (yes, the same one who called our landlord and complained about the length of our lawn a couple of summers ago while Hotter was in Club Med fighting for his life) just called me over to the fence between our yards to give me a ration of shit because she wants us to buy a trashcan that matches hers.

   I'll give you a moment to let that sink in.

   Now, I realize that letting a garbage bag sit in the side-yard now and again until I can take it to the nearest unguarded dumpster is not ideal, and that you can pay companies to come and take your garbage away on a weekly basis, but here is the thing: we're poor. We're not the only ones, either. A lot of folks are struggling right now and currently something like half the children in America (my own included) have received Food Stamps at some point in their lives (we do not currently qualify because I "make too much money," although "too much money" evaporates with a quickness when you're buying transplant meds and trying to get dental work done on your transplant-recipient spouse to keep him from developing a life-threatening infection before Something Happens to your job). Nobody talks about it, because it's Not Nice, but you know what? Maybe more of us should.

   So I stood up straight, looked her in the eye, and said "Mrs. Neighbor, we are out of bread, milk, and butter, we have $0.21 in the bank right now, and I don't get paid until Tuesday. Therefore I. Am. Not. Worrying. About. A. Trashcan."

   Go easy on your fellow humans, y'all. If their lawn is unsightly, maybe they have a loved one in the hospital and can't afford gas for the mower. And maybe if they're not worrying about their trashcan matching yours, it's because they're about to go and make some biscuits with coconut oil despite the one child hating the flavor and try to make their kids think that Everything Is Just Fine. Sure, maybe it's just that they're a lazy slob, but give them the benefit of the doubt, okay?

by popular demand...

...the story of how I gave up shampoo, probably forever!

   Going no-shampoo is apparently quite A Thing lately. Like as in all the cool kids are trying it! When I decided to give it a whirl I wasn't thinking "trendy" though so much as "green" and more importantly "cheap." We already make our own laundry detergent, and have even started making our own automatic dishwasher detergent (I'm still tweaking the recipe on that), but in my quest to shrink our household's carbon footprint (and hopefully grow our bank account), one of the very LAST things I considered going dirty-hippie with was hair product. Because, see, here is the thing: I am super-vain about my hair. It's stupid-long, and I love it, and my husband loves it, and I am guilty of spending upward of twenty bucks per bottle on things to wash, condition, and gloss it with, but clearly that had to stop with our finances being what they are.

   So I Googled around, and landed on A Sonoma Garden, and pretty much did exactly what she said. A tablespoon of baking soda to a cup of water, and let it age a bit before using (two weeks seems to be the magic number--I put a batch of baking soda and water in a Mason jar to sit while I finished the shampoo I was using, then rinsed the bottle out and poured my baking soda-water into that) (and once I saw the kind of results I get from this stuff I refilled the Mason jar so I'd have more when I finished what was in the bottle). After I've wet my hair through I shake the bottle vigorously and squeeze a generous amount onto the top of my head, then massage it in really well, using my fingertips to scrub my scalp. Then I rinse, use a TINY bit of conditioner (seriously, the baking soda mixture doesn't strip your hair the way shampoo does so you don't need as much), rinse again, and dry (by which I mean towel-turban that shit up, then use a little glossing cream and a wide-toothed comb and let it air-dry the rest of the way, although if you want to fry your hair with a blowdryer then by all means). That's it, y'all. 

   As to the results...well. Hotter read on here that I was going to give the shampoo-free thing a whirl and tried to dissuade me. "I don't like the smell of dirty hairrrr..." he whined. Hotter is very sensitive to smells. He's like a hormonal pregnant woman, except his belly is from peritoneal dialysis instead of a baby and he has boy-junk. But other than that EXACTLY THE SAME. "Okay honey," I said, "I don't have to give up shampoo."

   And then I did it anyway and just didn't tell him. I think it helped that I kept my mixture in a shampoo bottle (Hotter uses manly shampoo from a different bottle). In any case, I never had a "greasy phase" or anything; the mixture worked like a charm and my hair actually looks BETTER than it did when I was paying through the nose to strip it with toxic chemicals. I finally fessed up a couple of weeks into the experiment after Hotter complimented me on my hair looking especially nice (which? It really really does--it's soft and shiny and has more body than it did before!), and he laughed and said he hadn't noticed anything amiss. WIN!

Figure One: Do not adjust your monitors; I actually *am* that pale. But look how shiny my hair is! Incidentally if you ever want to a) look absolutely douche-tastic and b) reduce yourself to tears over the wrinkled state of your forehead, try taking a picture of your hair without any of the rest of your face in it sometime and have a gander at the outtakes. You see what I put myself through for you people?!?