Category: kat

interesting

Someone told me today that they have hard time reconciling my real life good cheer with whatever the tone of the moment is in the ol’ Kat Box.  I’m cheerful to the point of being annoying most days, and often those same days, the postings in the Kat Box will be sad or serious or pissed.

I think the explanation is that I sort out all of the mayhem in my head right here for all the world to read so that when you deal with me in person (for the lucky few of you that get to bask in the glow of my glorious Katness), you get a fairly happy Kat most of the time.

It’s an interesting contrast to who I used to be, and who I used to be was a mess of exceptionally angry with huge doses of sad and fearful thrown in for good measure.  I was a raging out of control wreck for a long time with a menacing temper (for example, it’s been a few years since I’ve Walker-Texas-Ranger’ed a deadbolted door open with a swift kick).  

My temper is still fairly quick to heat up these days, but it’s just as quick to dispel.  I try not to hold grudges.  Sometimes I need some quiet to collect my wits, but I don’t like to argue anymore—arguing is not a sport that I want to medal in.  I’m not perfect, I still yell, but then I feel like a jackass, so I try not to do it often. 

I’ve learned to let it go, let it go, let it go…sounds so simple to type it out, but it took me years to get a handle on who I am (not who others want me to be, who someone manipulative might wish I was and try to push me to be). Once I got a grip on who I am at heart, then I started evaluating negative situations to determine if I could change anything about them or control any aspect of it.  If I couldn’t change the negative, then I had the choice to roll with it as it was or just walk away. 

I’ve walked away from a lot—not just the Mr. Kats, folks; over the years I’ve walked from friendships and business opportunities and the like because there was more negative than positive.  Walking away was rarely easy, but for the things I get to choose, I want to choose the good stuff, the happy stuff.  And I’ve also chosen to roll with some of the negative, just roll with it, not accept it all as my problem, just go with the flow.  Stampin’ T and I say almost every single day “It is what it is.”  We’re zen like that.

And when I get irked or sad or need to sort something out, I come here because every day isn’t rainbows and unicorns and Hallmark cards.  I type it out.  I make sense of it as I go.  Seldom do I blog about a problem and not feel at least a little better right away.  And then you have your Happy Kat back, the bouncing Tigger-like spaz that I am in person, ready to cheer you on and bake cakes and take calls and send 100 emails and sing songs and be a goofy goober.  I believe it was the wise Spongebob Squarepants who said, “We’re all goofy goobers.”  Find your inner goofy goober and nurture it!

My posts about wanting…

…were lost in the move from one site to another.  About how I want things I can’t have and a friend’s point that wanting what I can’t have is a deliberately destructive move on my part, where I then countered that it wasn’t deliberate, that sometimes you don’t know you want it until you catch a fleeting glimpse of something awesome…(damn I miss all those lost blogs!! curses!)

And I’ve pondered and reflected and mused a lot since then (because the fun park inside my head never closes, never stops spinning), and I decided that the Stones were right in the whole can’t always get what you want but ya get what ya need thing.  I am getting what I need right now, I am.  What works, what fits into my life and my schedule and my general fast paced insanity, it’s all good and I have it now.  So Kat admits publicly that all is well, all is good, amen.

Back to school

Maybe you know, maybe you don’t, that I’m going back to school.  I started my “freshman orientation” today, and I’m pretty excited.  I like goals and challenges and pushing onward at a ridiculous pace because I just don’t know how not to work, how to be still.   There’s someone to thank for unwittingly nudging me back into school—they know who they are, but thanks thanks thanks all the same for being an inspiration.

I have a couple 2 year degrees, and smushed up with my previous college experience drinking beer and dropping acid in the woods, I have nearly 7 years of college completed…but no 4 year degree.  So I’m chasing a Bachelor of Science degree in Information Technology for no other real reason other than self-satisfaction.  Sure, there are some jobs that will open up to me with the B.S. credential that I can’t even apply for now, but for me, it’s more out of personal necessity.  I will go after this degree because I can, because I want to, because there are 24 hours in a day. 

I think I’m a lot like my border collie as I seize the day and have to have a purpose and things to do, new challenges.  JulieBeans, the border collie, will jump the fence and run up and down the street if she gets bored. According to the What Kind of Dog Are You Quiz, I am a border collie: They are perfectionists with a permanent will to please, thriving on praise but not without sensitivity. Too intelligent to lay around the house all day, they become neurotic if left alone for long periods. If I get bored, well, I jump the fence and end up buying new cars and that’s not a good plan right now (apparently, I must also be kept away from motorcycle dealerships when I’m bored as that V-Rod was looking pretty freakin’ hot to me).

So!  During the work on my last degree in cyber crime,  I sort of disappeared to a lot of people.  I had to turn down a lot of invitations and hunker down with the books…and it may be much the same this go ’round.  It’s nothing personal, but as a compulsive overachiever channeling her inner border collie, I’ve gotta do it right or I can’t do it at all.  Just lettin’ ya know…and thanks for your support!

Good to say things out loud sometimes…

I’m a writer not a talker.

I type somewhere between 4 and 100 billion emails a day.  I talk on the phone maybe twice a day, maybeeeeee.  I am so addicted to blogging that in the less than 36 hours that the Kat Box was down in transition, I was pacing the floor and having what could only be described as a hissy fit.  Need to write, need to type.

But sometimes, you have to say things out loud.

And today, I did pretty good with that, I think.  In one of my blogs that disappeared into the ether in the transition, I talked about my friend with cancer–I don’t think he’d mind me using his name as long as I don’t give out any other personal info.  Kevin has stage four colon cancer with spots on his liver and his lungs right now.  This news is pretty fresh to me, just learned it in the past month, even though Kevin and his wife have been working through this nearly a year now.

Kevin was my first real boyfriend in high school and we are so close in age that the word “cancer” confuses me.  No one our age has cancer, right?? I’m still processing the information really.

Got to have a short visit with Kevin a couple weeks ago, and he said some good stuff to me, things that were good to hear, good for the heart and soul.  Got me all teary-eyed indeed, and I was pretty much speechless on the spot. 

So then I had to decide what I wanted him to know most, because there are so many things to say!  Think back to any single person in your life who was important to you; what would you want to tell them?  Do you thank them for passing on their love of crazy fast cars?  Do you thank them for spoiling the snot out of you so much that you now operate under ridiculously unreasonable expectations?  Do you thank them for class rings and passed notes and mixed tapes (god, I love mixed tapes/CDs, they are SUCH a gift!)??  What do you say?

I thought about it, and I decided what I most wanted to tell Kevin.  I went to see him this afternoon, and I basically told him this, which I don’t mind sharing because it’s so very true: Thank you for telling me I was a worthwhile person at a time when I really didn’t know it; thank you for telling me that I was a good, special, beautiful person even though I couldn’t always hear it back then, couldn’t accept it.  Kevin’s positive opinion of me made a difference that I’ve carried with me all this time; he pointed out to me back then that I was not broken, was not damaged goods, was perfect just as I was. 

And that’s a lesson that I’ve carried on through the years—-if you’ve ever been in a moment of personal crisis with me and you’re falling apart on me, you know I will tell you that you are perfect just as you are, that you are worthwhile and great, even if you are in transition, a work in progress, that you are perfect to me.  Only in comprehending Kevin’s cancer did I recognize that the lessons he taught me way back in high school I still carry with me and use every day—and isn’t that incredibly cool? 

I know it might sound cheesey, but we are all our life’s experiences mushed into the here and now…so who taught you what you know?  Who taught you to love ranch dressing on captain’s wafers?  Who introduced you to Slayer? Who took you mountain biking for the first time?  Maybe there’s someone you should thank, and if you’re feeling especially brave, maybe you should say it out loud.

Thanks, Kevin, and I wish you and your wife Brenda good things as you push through this, as you best the beast together.

Euro 2008

Did you see the match today?!?!  WOW!  Great fun as Germany and Spain faced off in the final game of the Euro 2008 tournament, and it was 1-0 for Spain with Torres’ goal in the first half being all Spain needed to take the game.  WOOHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

I watched the match in ample good company—present at my immediate right was my soccer teammate Martin from Germany who objected strongly to my calling the German team a bunch of “cheating fouling mofos.”  But as he finished his beer about 20 minutes into the game, I encouraged him to drink up, he’d need the alcoholic cushion to handle the blow of his team losing.

Good times, good company, good game!  And now I’m off to the last game of my season—wouldn’t it be sweet if I could pull off the Torres goal for us? (really, if that would’ve been me, I’d never have made that graceful leap over the German keeper on the ground, I would’ve fallen face first over him, splat).  Dream a little dream, and play on…

duh

So there’s this book out by an Asheville native and she’s making all the rounds of the book touring circuit and good for her for getting published and making money and yadda yadda, but I have to say the general premise of her book 365 Nights is a big honkin’ DUH, people, DUH!!  To me it’s so DUH! that I can’t believe people would buy it, but more power to them and the author if it helps them get a clue.

Ok, so here’s the premise: the author decides for her husband’s birthday that her gift to him will be sex every day for a year.  Her book documents this one year journey–not necessarily all the naughty bits, folks, but the emotional aspects of this effort to spend time together privately every day.  Good for her and him for doing this, but come ON!

This is where your Katster gets up on the soapbox…(wait for a sec while someone scoots the soapbox over my way…)

Ahem.  If you are in a commited relationship, you should be putting aside a window of time (almost) every dayto nurture your relationship.   Episodes of the stomach flu, death in the family and other such disasters might thwart the “every day” aspect, but as a general rule, you need to make that connection often.  And it doesn’t have to be sex, folks, but it needs to be a no bitching, no whining time of being the couple you are.  Why do you think it’s so awesome when you’re dating?  It’s great because you spend little windows of time together just enjoying the beejesus out of yourselves…getting freaky and most importantly of all, laughing.  And then eventually things get, well, ordinary.  You stop laughing, you stop making time…or you let complaints about who loaded the dishwasher last get in the way of what should be “your time.”

Your Kat does not believe that things everhave to get ordinary.  EVER.  I believe in the every-single-day-connection, even if it’s only 10 minutes of undivided attention at the very end of a long day when the younguns are finally asleep, as it is critical.  I can say the recent demise of my marriage was largely in part to Mr. Kat 2.0’s unwillingness to focus even 1 uninterrupted minute a day on us; every little thing falls apart if that connection’s not there, folks, and one partner can’t pull the weight alone, one partner can not do all the work, it’s painful and unrewarding to do it all.

A few years ago, maybe it was on Oprah, there was a relationship therapist that insisted that you take the time to kiss, reallllllllllllllllllllly kiss, at least once a day every single day of the week.  That counts, too.  This doesn’t have to be nasty bondage and feathers to work, friends, although that’s fine!  It doesn’t have to be deep heartfelt speeches every day either.  It’s simply happily acknowledging who you are together in the whirling swirling mayhem of parenthood, work and the rest of the real life stuff that closes in on us each day.

So buy the book if you want to ponder it further, or you can just take Kat’s word that you need to connect daily, really. 

The next Mr. Kat will be the right man for me if he knows that no matter what, we have to put the disagreements over who used the last of the peanut butter aside, put the grouchiness over wet bath towels on the bedroom floor aside, put the stress of hectic workdays aside, put it all aside for just a few minutes every day to just freakin’ appreciate each other just a little bit.  I believe in it.  I believe in giving the appreciation, I believe in receiving the appreciation, and if it gets all shagadelic, baby, that’s great, too.  Every day.  I’m serious.  Kat has spoken.  So be it.

that better be produce in your pocket

So it was a night of much rock.  I started my evening at the Orange Peel with local metal gods Ironside.  There was a great turnout, heads bangin’, fists in the air…and there were some younguns with perhaps the lamest mosh pit I’ve ever seen—they could only manage to throw themselves around for 15 seconds at a time before they had to stop.  Why, back when I was kid, we moshed for entire concerts non-stop!  Silly hooligans.  Anyhoooo, Ironside kicked ass as usual and they were a great start to the evening…and then it was off to Stella Blue for Southern Trespass, Blackheadz  and Crank County Daredevils.

Southern Trespass is a helluva lotta fun!! It’s just shame the audience wasn’t quite “loose” enough yet to give them the full enthusiasm they deserved.  You’ve gotta see Gordon from JFK’s Good People tattoo rockin’ out–with all that crazed energy, he was born to be onstage.

The Blackheadz from Atlanta, oh my gawd how I love them! I wish I’d known they were playing, I would’ve dragged out some newbies to introduce them to powerhouse rock punk funk soul insanity that they are.  They are freakin’ fantastic!  And I appreciated that they added in some old Johnny Prophet tunes (a previous incarnation of the band), particularly “I Like it Like That.”  Check out their myspace page and the tune “American Arrogance.”

And last but not least, the Daredevils…new guy on the drums, new songs in the lineup and just beer-spewing sweaty nasty rock, sweeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeet!  It’s been a long time since Crank County’s played their hometown, and the crowd was smashed up against the stage at Stella, body to body in a sweaty tangle, which in a lovely Jager-infused haze, I didn’t mind at all…until the verrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrry last song (an A+ cover of “Let It Bleed”), when one of the guys behind me pushed what better have been a squash from his garden into my backside, and shouted something about how he’d been “feelin’ me all night long.” BLAGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGH! ICK POO BARF!  I scrambled out of that tangle to enjoy the rest of the song from the side of the stage, feeling violated, repulsed and generally just gross.  Earlier in the evening, some chick had felt me up in what appeared to be her routine from Xcapades or something, and I let it slide without freaking out too badly because the whole slutty girl on girl dancing thing has become so common—but don’t do it on me, ok?  And don’t rub my cleavage, thanks.  But the girl quickly sensed my ick factor and moved on, whereas our produce wielding man friend was looking for me when the show dispersed, spotted me and headed my way—don’t know if I’ve ever split so quick from anywhere.

Anyway, God bless local rock, support your Asheville bands!  Rawk on…

i admitted…

…to reading Missed Connections on craigslist.  I also read the Casual Encounters posts, too, I admit it!  And I want to know, do people really “hook up,” if you know what I mean wink wink nudge nudge say no more, through these ads??

I won’t be answering these ads, but I would love to offer some guidelines for the men posting them:

OH MY GOD CHECK YOUR SPELLING!  You are not sticking anything of yours near anything of mine, clothed or unclothed, with spelling and grammar that bad.

Why in the hell would you post photos of your weenie on the Internet unless that in and of itself is your thrill?  I don’t know a single woman at all that bases how much play a potential suitor is going to get on the appearance of his weenie.  Put it away at least until you’re on a first name basis.

Please don’t describe yourself as “good looking and super fit.”  We know you aren’t, and we’re ok with that.  Regular people are far more attractive than arrogant assholes anyway, truly.

And what’s with “I’m looking for petite Asian women only” and similar posts?  This isn’t the drive thru at Burger King, there is no menu to pick from to have it your way.  If you’re that picky, just buy some porn or hunt down a brothel.  Your posts that rule out 99.99999999999% of the people reading it are narrowing your booty call chances significantly!

I’m just going to suggest a post here.  Again, I won’t be responding to these posts, I get my cheap thrills just reading them and trying to figure out who really posts these things!  But , here’s a sample “casual encounters” post:

“Regular guy seeks regular girl.  Only photos I have are of me leaving my high school prom, so subtract 80% of the hair and add 80% more weight to visualize me now.  I brush my teeth and shower daily, have gainful employment and don’t live with my mom.  I’d like some hot action–no stunts, no props, no fetishes–just the usual normal good stuff without having to buy you flowers or meet your family. Interested?”     I think that sort of post will up your chances of getting some random nookie tremendously.  Boasting is a turnoff, especially when we know you’re making it all up!!

I’ll go back to reading now…

Well, crap.

So I did everything Saturday that I said I would do (drove fast, got ink, rocked to the metal at the strip club) and woke up Sunday morning back to my normal rude, irritable self.  Grumbly, grouchy Kat was back!

Went to the roller derby that night and things were all good, whooping and hollering and smacking my brother…and then! And then! How do I tell you? How do I say it?  On the way out, I hugged someone!  No no, they didn’t go in for the hug first, I offered to hug them first! OH MY GOD WHAT’S HAPPENING TO ME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!???????

 And then today, before I even realized what I was doing, I sent out this nicey nice sincere heartfelt email to someone else offering to be, well, nice to them! NICE?! SINCERE?! HEARTFELT? WHAT?!

Since I am having issues keeping my normal wall up, the barrier between me and the universe, I need to actually build a real one.  I am going to build a giant brick wall to prevent me from hugging people or sharing niceynice thoughts and that way the jackals of humanity can’t dine on my vulnerable soul.  Sounds like a perfectly rational solution to me.