Tag: freakinasheville

what happened, and what the hell did i say?!?!

What happened on Sunday: In slow motion instant replay, I nudge the ball away from the opposing player in a ninja-like move, but so quickly he doesn’t realize the ball is gone, so he kicks the ball for a goal, only it’s not the ball, it’s the inside of my left ankle!!  And my whole left foot goes out from under me in a direction one’s foot shouldn’t go!  Awful.  On the bright side, if I’d known how many sweaty strong men would volunteer to carry me around, I’d have taken a fall ages ago, a single girl’s dream come true, except for the agonizing pain part that had me so delirious I almost threw up.  I was shaking all over from the pain, trembling, trying to breathe but it was horrible, an ache that started somewhere inside my foot and went up to my brain.
 
Went to one of the local urgent care places to make sure nothing was broken.  Got to ride in a wheelchair, wheeeeee!  First thing the nurse did was drive my foot and ankle into a chair in the lobby, no joke.  Thought I might black out!  So then I became uncooperative (their word, not mine) and didn’t want to take my cleat off because it hurt so much after being shoved into the lobby chair, I told the nurse I was pretty freakin’ sure they could xray my ankle through my sock and shoe given that it was an xray machine and all!  A second nurse had to talk me into giving up my shoe and sock and shinguard.  Xrays came out ok, thank goodness, but then the nurse who drove me into the chair assured me I would wish it was broken instead of a severe sprain because a break would heal faster, nice, obviously tops in the tact class at nursing school in addition to the how to drive a wheelchair class.  They wrapped me up, put me on crutches, told me to take drugs and be nicer to woodland creatures.  Maybe I’m making up the woodland creatures part, but the crutches are hard to contend with given that I’m sort of a spaz on a normal day, nevermind on a gimpy day.  I can’t get a shoe on my left foot and of course it was snowing this morning. Today my ankle is swollen,  turning blue, purple and green.  Minime tells me it looks “lumpy.”
What’s interesting is all the emails I’ve gotten from teammates and the opposing team…someone was asking me about something I said, a conversation I don’t recall at all.  Apparently, when I checked out mentally while I was sprawled on the other team’s bench trying hard not to puke (I’m a pain and stress barfer—huge emotional distress or extreme physical discomfort make me want to hurl), I kept talking. I have no recollection of talking to anyone about anything…I was out of there, Elvis has left the building, but according to several folks, I was rambling on about all kinds of nonsense including my astrological sign.  The only moment I can really remember is one of my own players, one who seldom speaks and keeps very much to himself, kneeling down beside me to cover me up with a jacket (I was shaking and cold, shock maybe?) and then I closed my eyes…and that’s it really for clear memories until I got to the urgent care place.  I recall bits of things, but nothing that makes much sense…so…sorry if I overshared about being a Virgo?!? and who knows what else.
I’m on the mend already, just trying to take it easy.  Thanks for the good thoughts, and I’ll be back to it in when the spring soccer season rolls around!

Hanging My Head Out the Car Window

Generally speaking, I can drink vast, huge, ridiculous amounts of alcohol without getting sick or hungover.  This is not bragging, it just is one of those things.  Consider what I drank for my birthday this year for example–wasn’t sick the next day, was up and at ’em quite bright and early in fact.  Was chatting with someone today and the subject of drinking copious amounts came up…and I said I seldom get sick or anything like that…but that reminded me of hanging my head out Chiquita’s car window!!!

Travel back in time with me to that fateful night!  You know what, Chiquita?  It’s been more than TEN years!  REALLY! Because I was getting my computer programming degree and Minime was just a speck, so like TEN WHOLE FREAKIN YEARS!  Anyhoooooooo, so Chiquita and I were out and about doing what we do with the Ninja and Some Guy, and someone decides (probably me, I have been known to be a total dumbass) that we should be drinking Everclear and Tang.  I believe the venue we were frequenting called that little number an OrangaTang. 

Tang is probably super if you’re in outer space.  I really don’t want to encourage anyone to mix their alcoholic drinks with it, even if they are orbiting our planet and are fresh out of sensible mixers.

Anyhoo, I drank this concoction in quantity quickly; my companions gave up on it (smart, smart people!).  And then, here’s the part that made the world go blurry, we decide to all start swapping drinks.  Drink, swap, drink, swap, the four of us sliding drinks around and around the table until they were all empty.  That was a very, very bad idea on top of the Tang and Everclear.

But I distinctly recall being absolutely 100% fine…until I stood up and really there was no solid floor under my feet, I was walking an imaginary tightrope, all wobbly and out of my mind.  Fast forward to the part where we need to leave because I’m convinced death is eminent.  My stomach was agitating like a Maytag, my head was swirling.

You ever felt so sick to your stomach, whether from drinking or stomach flu or whatever, that you find yourself praying you’ll throw up soon?  Because you know if you can get the evil out of your body, you will feel better.  I was in that zone.  I wanted the vile mix of I-don’t-even-know-what-everyone-else-was-drinking and Tang out of me and anywhere else.  I got hot, so freakin’ hot, and swimmy.  Chiquita was driving me home, and I was so hot I thought I was going to melt courtesy of the bubbling cauldron in my gut, so the only thing that made sense to do was hang my head out the car window most of the way home.  It made sense at the time.  I don’t think I barfed, but I remember that I wanted to very much, and the only thing holding me together was hanging my head out that car window like a dog…a drunk on Tang and who know’s what the hell else dog.

I’m older and wiser now, and I steer away from Tang at all costs these days.  Because I stay away from the Tang, I don’t have to stick my head out of a moving vehicle anymore.  So that’s the morale, maybe, I dunno: if you’re going to drink, don’t drink Tang unless you’re an astronaut.  Which I am not.  Amen.

Shame on me!

Not 24 hours later, I ended up arguing with Mr. Kat 2.0 again and I blame myself 100%.  First, I shouldn’t have answered the phone at all when I saw the number on caller ID; I was at work, I was tired and frankly, I was still irritated at him from yesterday, so I shouldn’t have taken the call.  Second, I can’t believe I fell right into yet another dispute when I know better than to even engage in it in the first place.

Here’s a sample of the irrational conversation from today:

Me: It’s your dog.

Him: He was our dog.

Me: No, you had him before we were even dating, before you even knew me,  thus he’s your dog.  Take responsibility for him.  (I’m calm at this point, completely factual.  Logic is my friend!)

Him: Well, you kept the storage building.

Me: What? What the f-ing hell are you even talking about? (I’m a little irritated at the new topic, but I’m not mad.  I cuss all day long, this use of ‘f-ing hell’ was merely emphasizing that I have no idea what he’s talking about)

Him: You kept the storage building, and that should be mine.

Me:  What does that have to do with the dog? (I’m trying to find the logic here, even though I know there really is none to be found!)

Him:  I think I paid more for the storage building than you did.

Me: (this is the part where I should’ve stopped the conversation because see how he changed the subject from the dog to something else completely random out of thin air? where did this topic even come from? random topics in mid-discussion to distract me are so annoying, but I know this trick of his and should’ve just hung up)  No, you didn’t, I have the check to prove what I paid but I don’t care about the money.  If you want it, please take it, move the damn building already! (see, at this point, I’m officially pissed, because his whining about the storage building has gone on for 18 months, and every time, I’ve said come get it if you will shut up because I’d much much much rather have peace than any storage building…but there’s no sport in taking the building, is there? It’s only fun for him if he gets to randomly argue with me about it)

Him: Why are you always so mad at me?

Me: ARG! (the conversation that followed was infused with a ridiculous number of angry obscenities flying from my mouth before I hung up in disgust, so we’ll just sum it up with ARG!)

So.  Shame on me for getting mired in the most idiotic of disputes, shame on me for falling for the random change of topic to turn nothing at all into an argument, shame on me.  I will do better next time; I will let voicemail pick up…and if I must talk to him, then I will try to keep the conversation focused and calm, not letting him digress into other conversational hot buttons just to stir up a fight out of thin air.  Above all, I will be grateful that he’s the only person that I argue so nastily with on the whole planet and I will be grateful that we don’t live together anymore, ever again, hallelujah for that.

Arg.

I have this ongoing conflict with Mr. Kat 2.0 about his dog (his dog before we were ever married, not a pet we got together), and I guess I just have to suck it up and accept that this is my dog now.

One of the 9012 reasons Mr. Kat 2.0 and I are not together would be that he is not responsible for anything…even if it actually is his responsibility, he will play the victim and lay on the “oh, I guess it’s just one more reason for you to hate me, one more thing I can’t do right.”  Arg.  Whoever you are in my life whether you are friends, family, coworkers, soccer teammates, whatever: take responsibility for yourself, your choices and your actions and you earn my respect, even if I don’t agree with your choices—at least own them and own the fallout that comes with them.  Playing victim makes me wanna puke on you.

When Mr. Kat 2.0 and I parted ways, he moved in with a buddy of his and he couldn’t take his dog right away.  I was understanding of that situation, knowing he needed time to get some funds together and come up with a plan of action, so I kept the dog for him.  He did not pay for dog food or anything else for his pet during this time.  When Mr. Kat 2.0 finally moved into a place of his own after more than a year of being shacked up with his pal, I approached him about taking the dog.  He blew it off with oh not right now, haven’t even got my stuff unpacked, etc.  Ok, still I was understanding, gave him more time.  Asked him again, and again… Stopped asking, started telling him to come get his dog.  When it comes right down to me being ready to drop the dog off on his porch and drive away, I find out he’s living somewhere where he’s not even allowed to have a pet.  He chose to move somewhere that has a no pets policy.  Lovely, lovely fellow, that Mr. Kat 2.0, so responsible!

Called Mr. Kat 2.0 this evening and asked what he was going to do about his living arrangements and his dog.  He starts in on the “oh, well I’m not there anymore to take care of him, wish I was there to help” passive aggressive victim shit that makes me want to scream.  I point out that he deliberately selected a place to live where he couldn’t have his dog, so he should either move or find a family member to take his dog.  His reply is the usual “I guess I can never do anything right, you just find more reasons to hate me, I can never fix this” yadda yadda.  My reply (at a volume so loud that a phone probably wasn’t even necessary at this point) was something to the effect of if he wanted to do something right, he could take responsibility for something as small as his dog, take the full responsibility and burden of that one situation and if he did something like that, then maybe for one second I could stifle the urge to kick his testicles into his tonsils.  This was met with more helpless victim yammering, so I hung up on him.

Arg. Arg. Arg.  I am mad at myself, because I knew before I even picked up the phone that he wasn’t going to be an adult…if he were an adult, he would’ve already driven over here and picked up his dog months ago or at the very least, offered to pay for the dog’s food.  So mostly right this second, I’m frustrated with myself for thinking that someone who always behaves the same (the helpless victim when not busy being the badgering complaining fight picking bully) is going to behave any differently today.  What the hell was I thinking?

I guess I was thinking that I’m tired.  I’m tired.  I’ve wrangled kids, worked all afternoon and the frustration of that senile little old dog trying to bite me for the 745th time today when I’m just trying to put him on a leash for a walk to keep him from pissing in my house again pushed me right over the edge.  And being so damn tired to the bone, I just wanted some help with a problem that shouldn’t even be mine to manage in the first place, so I foolishly called Mr. Kat 2.0 looking for that help and here I am now, even more tired to the core than I was before I called him.  He’s not going to help.  Ever.  Doesn’t matter that the dog was his before we were married.  He left the dog, he won’t take the dog.  I have to accept that the dog is mine now because I won’t send it to the shelter, won’t give it away to some random stranger in the newspaper—–Mr. Kat 2.0 in this instance is certainly taking advantage of my kind heartedness toward animals, and that, too, makes me angry, that he knows I just can’t make the dog disappear, I can’t do that, he’s managing to still use and manipulate me and that pisses me off.  Arg.  Mr. Kat 2.0 is not going to step up and be a man, be a grown up, take responsibility because that’s not who he is.  I can’t expect people to be who they aren’t.

what does Prince wear around the house?

Yes, I’m supposed to be studying, but sometimes these random thoughts are very important to consider.  What does Prince wear around the house?  Historically, he’s always been a very fashion forward, chic sort of person.  While I’ve seen photos of Madonna, for example, looking like hell on a stick as she goes out for coffee, Prince is always neat, presentable, elegant.

So.

It’s Sunday, late morning.  What do you think Prince is wearing right now?  Do you think he’s wearing yesterday’s tshirt (like me!) and some semi-sketchy-not-sure-when-these-were-last-washed flannel pajama pants (like me!) as midday approaches?  Do you think his significant other has to be all up in his face like “Prince, you’ve been wearing that Lakers sweatshirt for what, 3 days now? What is that on the front, nacho cheese?  You’ve got to put on something clean before my mother comes over and for god’s sake, brush your teeth!”  Yeah, it’s hard to imagine his Royal Purpleness sniffing at his cheese-stained 3 day old sweatshirt and going “But honeyyyyyyyyyyyy, I smell fine!”  Do you think he has some nasty hole riddled pair of sweatpants or flannel pj pants that his woman would set on fire if she could just get him parted from them for any length of time?  I’d like to think that Prince is a regular guy.  That thought comforts me.

Marilyn Manson completely rips off my karaoke song

So I’m not really for or against Marilyn Manson and his eponymous band.  Don’t mind at all to listen to the songs, some I even like, but I don’t give a rat’s ass about what Marilyn Manson wears, looks like, dates.  If you are paying close enough attention to be shocked or surprised at his appearance or his stage show or whatever, you are feeding into exactly what the band hoped for: attention, press, uproar.  Mister Marilyn Manson can call it artistic expression or whatever, but it all boils down to a big fat paycheck at the end of the day—the more the shock, the outrage, the bigger the paycheck.  Anyhooooo…

I like the Manson cover of “Sweet Dreams.”  Eerie, spooky, enjoyable stuff there, especially as the lyrics are whispered in your ear about three minutes into it, that’s fabulous.  I do not like the cover of “Personal Jesus” at all; Depeche Mode’s original version was uber sexy, let’s strip, get on the horse and ride, and even though they made it their own, Manson’s cover is hollow–on a vaguely related note, Rob Zombie’s “Pussy Liquor” has that same “Personal Jesus” type of riff, and it is completely dance on the coffee table and strip-worthy.  Some of Manson’s originals like “If I Was Your Vampire” are quite listenable, marrying the woe, doom and gloom of bands like The Cure with a more industrial flavor similar to NIN.

Marilyn Manson’s “Tainted Love” just pisses me off.  That’s my song.  That’s my on my knees, crawling on all fours, leaving the stage to mingle in the crowd karaoke song.  I do it justice.  It’s mine.  They ripped me off with this song.  It loses all its heartsick bitter jaded wonderfulosity in the Manson version. (What’s also terrible, maybe even worse, is H.I.M.’s cover of Chris Isaak’s “Wicked Game”…but that’s a tangent for another day) I think they need to blow it up, remove it from the universe, give it back to me, pretend it never existed and we’ll call it even.

poetry break!

it’s been a while since i’ve laid any poetry on ya, hasn’t it?  here’s a favorite by ee cummings, something sweet and shmoopy and wonderful…i love the line i fear no fate for you are my fate, my sweet.  so here, take a poetry break with me now, enjoy:

i carry your heart with me (i carry it in

my heart) i am never without it (anywhere

i go you go, my dear; and whatever is done

by only me is your doing, my darling)

i fear

no fate (for you are my fate, my sweet) i want

no world (for beautiful you are my world, my true)

and it’s you are whatever a moon has always meant

and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows

(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud

and the sky of the sky of a tree called life; which grows

higher than soul can hope or mind can hide)

and this is the wonder that’s keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart (i carry it in my heart)

my very special friends

The photos I took at my own birthday soiree weren’t all that great, I’m told.  Everyone is all blurry and obviously the camera angle is all crooked…and yeah, yeah, I’ve heard that I must have been so sloshed to take such horrible pictures.

It’s truth time.  It’s time to come clean about those photos, time to come clean about my friends in those photos.  I can’t be silent about this anymore.

Here’s the 411, I hope you can handle the reality, it’s pretty harsh: those photos, all those blurry photos I took from my birthday party…you need to stop making fun of them right now. 

The facts are not that I was so sloshed I couldn’t take a proper photo; instead, the cold truth is that all my friends are blurry around the edges.  That’s right:  All my friends are blurry.  Some of my friends are even askew and off center.  So what?  I’m ok with that!  There was nothing wrong with me or my camera at my birthday party, and darn it, there’s nothing wrong with my friends, my blurry fuzzy hard to recognize friends.  Blurry people are people, too, with feelings, hopes and dreams!  I won’t have anymore blurry bashing; if you can’t be open minded enough to accept the blurry people in my life, you just need to move on, man, move on…

birthday

Good birthday so far.  Got my first birthday kind thoughts in my email inbox at 12:12 AM (yes, I know, I shoulda been sleeping, tell me something I don’t already know), and it’s been all good since, but I have been so well celebrated with food that I might explode!  Gawd bless T for bringing my favorite juice smoothie AND a bendy straw this morning.  Warm cookies.  Breakfast casserole.  Haven’t even gotten into the banana split fixin’s I was generously gifted with today, and dinner awaits, too.  I’m so thrilled at being thought of this year, just giddy about it.  Karaoke and paintball tomorrow…come one, come all, let me shoot at you and sing horribly off key (but with enthusiasm) to you…