I’ve Been On A Bit Of A Downer…

I know… I hate writing downer blogs and I get pissed at myself when I do. But this time I have a damned good reason for it…

And, unfortunately, I’m going to be one of those annoying people, the kind I’d see posting shit on Facebook and roll my eyes when I’d see them asking for prayers about things. Okay, to be fair, some of them were so fucking ridiculous, they’d make a post about getting a wart removed and ask for prayers… It’s a fucking wart; get over it. I hate those attention seeking ass fucks. But, here I am, doing what I hated most about the attention seeking ass fucks, in a way, anyway… But there’s a difference, which you’ll understand if you get to the end.

Now, I won’t be asking you for prayers, dear readers… Why the hell would I do that?! I’m an atheist; I think prayer is useless and meaningless. But, when you get to that part of this entry where I explain everything, if it makes you feel better to say a prayer or dance around naked under the full moon or whatever it is you do, I won’t tell you not to. My beliefs are my own just as yours are your own. I’m cool with that.

However, I have to ask a favor of you, dear readers… Please send some good vibes my way. Like a lot of them. Right now I need a lot of strength and positivity to keep my shit together so I don’t completely lose it, which is something I’ve been doing quite a bit the last few days. I’ve been fine one minute and just randomly falling all to pieces the next. So… please send all good vibes c/o Jackie to this blog, okay? Trust me, when I get to that part, you’ll totally understand why…

I actually wanted to write an entry before this, but I had some tests that needed to be run the week before last and wanted to wait until I got the results.

So, if you’ve been reading my mindless drivel, I’m sure I’ve mentioned having rib pain for some months, now, and that I had to go get my big ol’ stripper titties smashed to the size of a fluffy buttermilk pancake (it still amazes me they can do that) and an MRI of my upper spine as they can’t MRI ribs due to the curvature. So I went for my fun tests (yay?) and got the results early last week. My mammogram was fine, which I wasn’t concerned about. There’s no family history of breast cancer. The MRI had a very minor abnormality, however… It seems that almost all the discs in the T vertebrae were protruding slightly, which is when I had an epiphany. It’s my fucking boobs! Not that I wasn’t aware… I’ve had upper back pain since high school and I can’t even stand for ten minutes to wash dishes without excruciating upper back pain. No bra in the world has ever helped. They’re just so fucking big and heavy that now they’re causing disc issues and I’m fairly certain that explains the rib pain. They’re probably pulling on things like skin and muscle. Whoopee…

So after speaking to the GP about my suspicions on this, she suggested I call a breast surgeon. I Googled the ones in my area, found the best rated and called to make an appointment. I just want a consult, but the woman I spoke to seemed so sure I would want a reduction done. Whoa! Hold up there, slick! I’m not sure I want to mutilate my girls! Plus I’d miss them, honestly… And unless he’s going to help me get rid of the belly fat I gained (again, thanks Cymbalta), you’re not taking shit out of my tits. I refuse to have my gut be bigger than my boobs. No way, man…

Shadow: proof that cats are fucking jerks…

Wednesday started some stress for me. I had to puppy sit for my sister while she was away at a medical conference for three days. Sounds easy enough, right? Well… it was for the most part, actually… The downside is that my sister moved a few years back and it’s about a half hour drive on one of the most congested, crazy, accident ridden highways in the world. And I had to drive on that fucking thing! That’s not anxiety inducing. Nope… Actually, it wasn’t as horrible as I thought. It was a bit intimidating the first day because I literally avoid that road at all cost and will travel extra long just to avoid that fucking highway. But the highway was the easiest, most direct route and I get lost easy, so… Honestly, the worst part was coming home, which took 50 minutes because of gridlock.

However, it wasn’t all pleasant… My first day, Abby, the little barrel dog who goes out without a leash all the time, decided to crawl under the back deck and not come out… in 90 degree heat! I spent about two fucking hours trying everything I could to get that fat little fucker out from under the deck! I was so dirty and sweaty…

And Shadow, the cat… This was how she glared at me the entire time after Abby went AWOL under the deck. Look at her, silently judging me… I actually got into an argument with her. “Yes, I know I fucked up! You can stop glaring at me like that now!” Seriously, she did… For two hours she just sat there silently judging me as a complete and utter fuck up because the dog decided to go under the deck. Unbelievable… Don’t blame my sister or her boyfriend for not replacing the fencing that had fallen over, the stuff the purposely put there because she’d done this before. Nope, just glare at me. Fucking cats… They’re all fucking jerks, even mine. In any case, after two hours of baking in the sun and worrying about poor Abby being out in the heat, she just decided she’d had enough, crawled out and came inside. What the fuck… Apparently she’s a jerk, too.

My sister had a theory on that, actually. I had to take Baxter with me (because he’s a Mommy’s boy) and Abby was fine with him as long as my sister was there. But she seemed resentful that Baxter and I were there and my sister wasn’t. The oldest dog, Foxy, just laid around like a sad lump, missing my sister terribly.

And then there’s Mia… Mia-bo-bina I was calling her. Isn’t she a little love? Poor baby lost a hind leg, but you should see her run! She and Baxter are buddies and were running and playing, which was so nice to see! And when I sat down to relax, this is where the little love bug was, curled up in front of me. She just loves her Aunt Jackie! Granted, I didn’t spoil her like her Mommy, but I gave her treats she wasn’t supposed to have (shh, you didn’t hear that). And I suppose I did spoil her a little… I did let her lay with me on the sofa, but she had to stay on the blanket because she was at the end of her heat and I don’t think my sister would have liked stains on the sofa.

I’m finding that I miss my little furry niece… And I think Baxter misses his puppy cousin. When he realized we weren’t going anywhere on Saturday, he literally just moped around the house all sad and didn’t want to eat. I felt terribly for him. I think he enjoyed the car rides, playing with Mia… I miss her and miss playing, too. I do not, however, miss the car rides. Those were nightmarish and I seriously don’t want to have to repeat them. That’s just insane.

If you’ve read this far… you deserve a cookie. Eat one for me, too, while you’re at it. And now we get to the reason I need those good vibes…

Friday morning, when I went to puppy sit, I wasn’t feeling very well. I couldn’t explain why I was feeling so lousy, but it was freaking me out a little. And, since I was missing my normal Friday visit with my mom and she’s usually my go-to when I need reassurance that I’m okay when I feel all weird and anxious, I decided to give her a call that morning while I was watching the pups. Good thing I did…

Honestly, her reassurance did nothing for me for hours, but it wasn’t without reason. When I called, she told me she hadn’t been feeling well and hadn’t gone to work all week. That’s so not like my mom. And it was weird that she hadn’t mentioned this when I called her Wednesday night to let her know I did fine on the highway (she knew I was nervous) and how the first day of puppy sitting was. She told me Monday she stayed home because she felt dizzy and thought her sugar was off. It’s possible; she is diabetic. It’s under control, but she has drops from time to time which can made you dizzy and funky. I thought nothing of that either, really. Then she told me Tuesday she began having chest pressure on the way to work, so when she was about five minutes away, she pulled over and texted her boss to say she wasn’t coming in. I was fully expecting her next sentence to be, “So I drove myself to the ER,” since there’s a hospital literally two minutes from where she works. Nope… The next thing she told me was she went home!!! She calmed herself after she got home and the pressure stopped, so she just figured it was anxiety and that was that. She did. however, ask for the next two days off to see if she could get in to see the doctor, which she couldn’t get in until this Tuesday. She said her legs felt like Jell-O all week but she had gone for bloodwork (her GP saw something in the last work up she didn’t like that apparently wasn’t her cholesterol) and shopping and she felt okay, but her legs still felt weird, probably from sitting around all week. She told me all this so casually, as if we were chatting about the weather or her latest crazy shopping excursion to Joanne’s where she bought a metric fuck ton of fabric when she already has a metric fuck ton waiting to be made into something. This was so not okay. But I needed leverage…

My mother can be the most stubborn person. I knew if I freaked out and told her to get her ass to the ER, she would have blown me off and gone pissy if I’d persisted. So as soon as we were off the phone, I texted my sister. I know my mom values her opinion as a nurse practitioner (and her boyfriend is a doctor). Not long after, once her meeting was finished, she called and I told her the entire story. She reacted the way I reacted in my head while talking to my mother. The problem was that my sister was several states away at this conference and my mother wouldn’t listen to me, hence the reason for calling my sister. Leverage! She told me to call my mother’s boyfriend, she would listen to him. I actually laughed at her. I could see none of that working, but I agreed and texted my mother’s boyfriend to call me from somewhere that my mother couldn’t overhear him.

Interesting conversation, that… Turns out she told him nothing… Mind you, she took him to the ER when he thought he was having a heart attack (he did) because he was smart enough to tell her something wasn’t right. She told him nothing about how she was feeling, not even the all important, “I was having pressure in my chest,” part. And, as it turns out, she didn’t even attempt to call the doctor until Thursday and the only reason she couldn’t get in sooner than this Tuesday was because she was adamant about seeing her normal GP and wouldn’t see one of the others in the practice. Her boyfriend was there when she made the call and she didn’t even tell the doctor’s office about her symptoms. So I relayed the message from my sister to which he told me I should have my sister call my mother because she wouldn’t listen to him, either.

Oh my god…

So I texted my sister all this shit (because I had no idea if she was in another meeting) and she texted me back a little while later to tell me my mother was going to the ER, her boyfriend was taking her. She had argued, but my sister argued right back and told her it couldn’t wait. And, as I was told, my mother said, “Your sister squealed on me, didn’t she…?” to which my sister replied, “She had every right to squeal on you! She was worried about you!” Nice… My mother was pissed that I ratted her out, her boyfriend texted me that they were in the fucking ER and he didn’t want to be there (he hates hospitals) and I’m at my sister’s puppy sitting and thinking, “I need a fistful of Xanax, a big bottle of wine and a fuck ton of Calgon to take my ass away from all of you…”

That night I was supposed to have my first bar session at the one new age shop I got to, but I was going to cancel since the ER decided they were keeping my mother. She told me no, I should go, she’d be fine. I know what she was thinking… If I didn’t go, I’d just sit and worry.

So I went… And after a mini meltdown (I needed to vent after the day I had), we did my bar session. Wow… The first thing I told her afterward was that it was really trippy. It’s difficult to explain, really… It’s like a mild hypnotic state, so she’d told me, but I didn’t see it that way, really. But some freaky shit went on, man… She didn’t say anything, I just laid with my eyes closed, relaxed, and she would touch certain parts of my head and face. I started feeling this warmth run up from my legs that felt so nice. Then I slowly began to feel very light, like I was floaty in a way, which felt so wonderful. At one point, however, my breathing became shallow and rapid, my eyes darting back and forth super fast. I didn’t feel panicked, but I was reacting that way. I even had tears run down my face. It was weird… Nothing seemed to set it off. I eventually calmed and slowly wasn’t light anymore and realized how bad that sucked because I felt all my aches and pains again (getting old sucks). So when we spoke after, she said that weird experience I had? It was the trauma leaving me and that the more sessions we had, the more would release. I’ve been in therapy over 30 years and I never felt any better after a session. But I did Friday. I’ll be going back. It’s worth the $60!

The card is the one I chose before I left. She has different decks she changes out and you can pick one before you leave for your message. This was mine. Very befitting…

Seriously, send all good vibes c/o Jackie to this blog…

So back to the mama drama…

My sister and I went to see her Saturday after picking up a few things to help her stave off boredom. As she was still in the ER, she could only have one visitor at a time (due to COVID spikes) so my sister said she would go first and get the ass ripping over with. Okay, then… I waited in the car, periodically going outside the car to smoke and not get busted by hospital security, for about an hour. Finally, my sister comes back out and told me my mother did, indeed, have a heart attack, though my mother didn’t tell her that. She wouldn’t tell either of us anything. My sister asked the nurse and, apparently, my mother is well aware because the doctor told her she had a heart attack… Before I went in, my sister told me that my mother’s boyfriend had ripped into her earlier that day so when my sister did the same, my mother started to cry. I was told to go easy on her and don’t let her know that I knew she had a heart attack. For fucking real?!

So instead of gently ripping my mother a new asshole, I had to go in there all bright and chipper, acting as if I was bubble-headed and fucking clueless. Everyone else gets to scold her for being foolish for waiting to go to the ER when I’m certain she knew she was having a heart attack, she was still mad at me for squealing on her, she tells no one anything except the one person she shouldn’t tell because of my anxiety… She tries to not set my anxiety off other times by hiding shit, but this time she tells me anxiety inducing things and hides it from everyone else… Brilliant… And then I have to play dumb and happy! That was rough, but I managed. When I went to leave, she said, “Go home with your sister and talk about me on the way back…” Ouch! That was unnecessary! I don’t think she saw me flinch… So I gave her a hug, said, “Bye, Mom,” and she flatly said, “Bye,” as she gave me a half-hearted hug. Major ouch… And I couldn’t let on that it hurt me.

It was late when my sister dropped me off, so I decided to go to my second home, the local diner, to try and eat. That’s when it all went to shit…

The owner’s mother was working that night… She’s such a sweet lady. And as soon as I saw her, I felt the tears building up. My waitress had just enough time to ask if I wanted the tea I usually get and I said yes as I got up and ran out, saying I’d be right back. I literally went outside and cried… All I could think of was that my mom, at the least, will need a stent put in and, at the worst, need open heart surgery and she’s still mad I squealed on her. Anything could happen during one of those procedures and, if she’s still mad and the worst happens, I couldn’t live with that. I eventually calmed myself and went back inside. The owner’s mother came over and asked if I was okay. I told her, “Not really, no…” She put an arm around me and told me I was there, now, and to leave everything else outside and have a nice time, everything would be alright. Didn’t I tell you she was sweet? Even one of the regulars went out of his way to make me smile. But the military asshole who saw me crying on his way in? He said nothing. A few assholes thanked him for his service, but not me. I’m sorry, you care enough about this country to fight for it and the people in it but you can’t see if a crying woman is okay?! But you eat up all those thanks you get, don’t you, you self-entitled prick… He’s lucky I didn’t tell him as much. I’m not exactly feeling really stable at the moment… And I really needed to vent…

Pumpkin donuts… the reason I get fatter in the fall…

And so, I think I’ll leave you, dear readers. and get my ass to Dunkin’…

I stopped on my way home Friday for a decaf coffee and a pumpkin donut, one of my vices. Hey, I earned that fucking donut after the day I’d had! So I place my order, I get to the window and the dipshit asks me, “What kind of donut did you want?” I told him pumpkin and he replied, “Oh… sorry, I just sold my last one…” In that split second, I saw myself literally leaping out through the open window of my car, through the drive-thru window, wrapping my hands around his scrawny throat and telling him, “Bitch, you better get me that fucking donut…” Honestly, that was my frame of mind at the time. I wanted to stress eat, even at the risk of clogging my arteries with a donut. I didn’t just want that pumpkin donut, I fucking needed it! Instead, my brain just politely asked if they had blueberry and, since they did, I said I’d take one of those instead. Today, however, I will not be so forgiving… Today I will have that fucking donut… My mother is going in for a cardiac cath today, I have no clue what the fuck is going to happen… I need that fucking pumpkin donut and I will have it!!!

Okay… Breathe, Jackie… It’s just a donut… A delicious donut that you don’t need and isn’t good for you… Ah, screw it… I’ll feel better if I get my donut…

They’re Only Noodles, Jackie…

Ah my misspent youth… Where the fuck did it go?!?

Hahahaa… See what I did there with the title? Ah, probably not. Not unless you’re an old fart like me who’s seen this movie one too many dozen times…

Anyway… Thursday night I suffered the worst insomnia I’ve ever had. I was literally up for over 24 hours before I fell asleep for a whole whopping four hours. I was experiencing some anxiety, which caused the insomnia and, as I watched the hours tick by, that caused more anxiety… See where I’m going with this? And it all came after I watched The Lost Boys on television before bed (because I was too lazy to put in my DVD).

And no, I’m not a pussy. This is one of my favorite movies from my youth. I’ve seen it so many times I can recite the god damn thing word for word without watching it. In fact, I spent most of my time filling in the things the channel I watched it on cut out (“My own brother, a god damn, shit-sucking vampire!”) so it certainly wasn’t that.

Actually, I was pretty sure what had started the anxiety was me remembering that I’d read one of the vampires had passed away, so I looked it up to be sure. And I had remembered correctly. The one with the long blonde hair, Paul, died at 52 from a rare genetic disorder that can cause certain organ damage that mimics other health issues. So maybe not as rare as they think? Who knows… But with that knowledge and my upcoming imaging this week, I think it was a little too much and I freaked out.

One of the imaging tests I need to get done Friday is an MRI. I admit, I’m a bit freaked out about that one, mostly because of the rib pain I’ve been experiencing and not knowing what the fuck they’re going to find. It’s unnerving.

I also have to get a mammogram, at the insistence of my GP… I’m never really worried about them, at least not the test results. No one in my family has ever had breast cancer and I was told if it hurts, that’s a good sign (I guess breast cancer doesn’t hurt). But I do worry about the massive discomfort. I have firbrocystic breast disease (so my boobs are full of cysts) which can be painful sometimes. Then they want to have my face turned to the side, smashed up against this machine in a position where it feels like my neck is going to break so they can put my girls, one at a time, between two, cold metal plates. You’d be amazed at how flat they can smash big ol’ stripper titties, let me tell you! Even ones filled with cysts and dense tissue that are extremely heavy. They can still smash them down to the size of a fluffy buttermilk pancake! I remember the first one I had to get done (I had a painful lump) and I was literally horrified when I saw exactly how flat they smashed my boobs! Am I afraid of the test? No. Am I afraid of the results? Not really, no. Am I afraid of the discomfort and the lovely red lines I’ll be sporting across my chest afterwards? You bet! Ladies, I know some of you feel my pain on this one. Guys, just imagine if they wanted to do that to your dicks and I’m pretty sure you’d understand what we bitch about.

Before and after the harvesting carnage…

So it could have been those things that caused my anxiety, but I thought there could possibly be another culprit…

As you can see in this before and after picture, I was having a major basil issue in my herb garden. Have the light raised all the way to the top and in a day didn’t those fucking plant reach the top again! Plus they’re so crazy bushy that they cast shadows over my other herbs that sprouted later and now they don’t receive enough light to grow. Or maybe it’s because the basils are literally sucking up all the water and plant food; I don’t know. I sent the top picture to a friend and said, “You want fresh basil, right?” Because I literally wasn’t giving her a choice. What was going on was pure insanity. She replied by telling me an Italian would never pass up fresh basil. Sweet! So I pulled off a ton of both plants and took her baggies full of basil leaves. I just hoped it would be enough to get my other herbs to grow.

Now, while I was in the midst of this anxiety attack that kept me awake the other night, it occurred to me that picking a shit ton of basil leaves was the only thing I did differently that night. So I went online and I found nothing. Apparently basil is good for you, although too much can lower your blood pressure and sugar too much apparently if you eat it. But nothing said it can make you jittery or anxious from plucking leaves. Still, I couldn’t seem to stop running that theory through my head. Then I had a thought… I had read somewhere that the smell of fresh cut grass (that it seems everyone but me loves, mainly because I’m allergic) is more than just a lovely fragrance it gives off. It’s actually a warning system. It’s the grass communicating with other plants, telling them it’s in danger. Think about it… That smell you love so much is the grass crying out for help, “I’m being murdered!” Yeah… Still like that smell now that you know that? You probably do. No one else I’ve told seems to think anything of it. Anyway… So my theory is, what if the basil was sending out some kind of weird shit because I was plucking so many leaves off because it thought it was in danger? Maybe that was the issue that caused the anxiety and jitters to be as bad as they were. It’s just a theory, though…

Spend a lot, get a little seems to be the motto…

By Saturday I was better rested and feeling like maybe I needed to get the fuck out of my house and my head. So I did what most bipolar people do. I went shopping…

I actually went with a purpose, honestly. My latest issue of Heavy Metal was still sitting at the comic store and I had yet to pick it up. Lucky me, it was free comic day, do I got a ton of free comics and I also got 3 comics signed by the artists. The one was really nice. She was telling me a bit about how to get started in the business, which was really nice.

Then I headed to the mall for what I was really in the market for. But I’ll get to that in a minute… I happened to come across this store I’d never noticed before and when I looked up, I saw it was Lush! My friend in the UK loves this store, but I didn’t think we had any here in the states, certainly not near me, anyway. I was so excited because I had been on their site and they have lovely products! I tested everything! Which meant I smelled like a French whore by the time I was done in there… I only bought 3 small items and my bill was over $50! Holy shit! But it’s quality stuff and not tested on animals. I got a small bottle of hair serum, just to see if it would help the dry frizz and I’m amazed by it! I also bought an amazing smelling lip balm and perfume balm. Plus they put a surprise in my canvas bag (no plastics) which I found later was a bubble bath bomb! I can’t wait to use it! I’ll be headed back when I can splurge!

However, I didn’t find what I was looking for at the stores in that mall. I only found rude salespeople. So fuck it; I decided to go across the street to what’s left of the older mall. Sadly, most of this mall was torn apart and made into a “strip mall”, but there is a tiny bit of the original mall that remains. So what does my dumb ass decide to do? It decides to look like a reject in front of a handful of people to take pictures of what little remains of the original retro decor…

The Plaza was once a movie theater (I think it’s a gym now). I remember my mother taking me and my sister to the mall and going down a hall that used to be I believe where the yellow hall is in the second picture. We would go into Woolworth’s to buy candy because it was cheaper there and I was forever getting yelled at that we were going to miss the movie because I just had to have the purple ring pop with the blue ring and would search forever for it, hahahaa…

The second picture is really retro… The stone wall, those stairs, the flooring… The steps used to lead up to the offices for the mall, though I’m certain they’re not in use by anyone for anything anymore since most of the stores in it are stand alone stores. Well, the few that are actually in the mall. Essentially, what was once the mall is now just like a giant foyer for not even a dozen stores. It’s really kind of sad…

The last picture (are you digging that late 60s funky cement facade?) was for a department store I’ve been racking the hell out of my brain for two days, now, trying to remember the name of it. It finally came to me! The store was called Levitz! I’m feeling pretty proud of myself for being able to reach back into my brain, what, 40 years, to pull out the name of a defunct department store that hasn’t been in operation in forever. I was never even in there that I can recall. But I remember looking in the display windows, which you can see are still there, though there’s nothing in them anymore. It’s sad when a mall dies or changes decor… I miss the old look…

My real reason for my outing (aside from grabbing my latest issue of Heavy Metal) was to go in search of another watch…

If you read one of my previous entries, you’ll know I’m a picky bitch with watches. They have to look funky and I like them large. No tiny little effeminate watches, nope… And they need to be water resistant. I’ve lost a lot of watches, even water resistant ones, and I’m not sure how. So I decided to get this funky Guess watch, which I loved until I found the silicone band and covering around the face was irritating my skin. Okay, so I decided to get a new battery and band for my avocado watch, which I love. Turns out it was deader than a doornail. I was so upset… I love that watch. So I got a Casio that was water resistant to 100 meters. That’s a good thing since I wear my watch non-stop. The problem came in when I realized the plastic used in the band and face covering was also irritating my skin. All I wanted was a water resistant watch made of metal with a leather band! Why is that so fucking hard to find?! Hence my trip to the ancient mall. The Kohl’s closest to me is closing their jewelry department for some dumb reason, but the one at the dead mall still had one. That’s where I found this watch. It’s pretty funky… Not as funky as I’d like, but it’s a metal face with a leather band. Now my skin is finally starting to heal up and looks so much better. But what a pain in the ass just for a watch…

I’m not going to ask how much these normally cost…

So yeah… My little shopping excursion made me feel a tiny bit better, though not too much. Especially since I spent money I could ill afford to spend.

Still, after that crazy merry-go-round of anxiety I was on, I deserved it. I mean really… I can see anxiety causing insomnia. But then to get more anxiety just because you’re all worried that it’s getting later and later and you’re still not tired?! That’s fucked up…

I have a feeling this week will be one gigantic shit show, to be honest. And the closer it gets to my tests, the worse I feel it’s going to get. I can’t go through any more sleepless nights, not like the one I just had where I was freaking the fuck out and had no one to help me through it because it was late at night and everyone was sleeping.

So I have a plan in mind…

This is the bath bomb I got as a freebie from Lush. Seriously, how awesome was that?! I was wondering why she asked me if I liked taking baths… I do, actually. It’s great stress relief! And the lucky cat one smells amazing (yes, I was picking up all the bath bombs and smelling them that day because I’m weird). So I think I’m going to be using this bath bomb when I get super anxious before my tests come up.

I don’t know how things will turn out, what they’ll find (if they find anything at all), but keep your fingers crossed for me, dear readers, that it’s nothing serious.

Don’t you be praying for me, though… Seriously, why would you? Prayers are wasted on atheists anyway… Just keep your fingers crossed. It’s a lot less effort and more worth the while, hahahaa…

The Greatest Shit Show On Earth!

I’m seriously not dissing circuses… I’ve only been to one my entire life (when I was an adult because my parents didn’t do cool shit like that with me and my sister) and I really enjoyed it. It’s just that this is how my life has been feeling for quite some time and this past week was just a fucking disaster, so… yeah…

You know, I’m trying, I really am… I’ve been trying to get back out of the funk I somehow fell into once again, get back on track and keep myself going forward in a positive direction even when someone isn’t just raining on my parade but pissing on it. But I can only handle so much…

So where do I start… I suppose I’ll start with where things really started to go to shit recently. My sister had called me in tears one Saturday night because a party she’d planned for her boyfriend’s grandson had not gone as planned and she figured it was better to call and vent to me instead of having another drink (as she’d had two already). I could understand why she was upset to a point. You plan this shit for a reason and your guests shouldn’t demand you change things to suit their needs as they arise (as the daughter-in-law did). It seemed the family that was always nice to her treated her like shit that day. So I understood why she was upset. But don’t cry to me; tell them! Tell them to fuck off! You planned this shit, everyone eats when you have dinner scheduled, that’s it! Jesus Christ! I don’t care if it’s potential in-laws or the fucking Pope! Don’t back the fuck down! Stand up for your sorry ass self!

I didn’t mind talking my sister through her mini crisis. She does the same for me, after all. Though I do think it’s weird she’d call me. She never calls me unless she wants something, so this kind of makes me think she has no friends to talk to. Or at least none she can confide in. She can’t talk to her daughters because they don’t like the boyfriend and neither do my mom and her boyfriend. Maybe I was called because I’m the only one who doesn’t make my feelings on him well known. Yet…

Anyway… So as she’s telling me about this party fiasco, she keeps mentioning “the beach house”, which is where they were at. I had no idea what she was talking about. I thought maybe they were renting one? I was pretty lost. Or I was until the following morning when I called my mother to tell her this juicy bit of gossip about the party. That was when she had told me my sister and her boyfriend bought the beach house last year and it was a sore subject with her. Yeah, I can see why… It’s a sore subject with me, now, too… So I guess it’s just a place to invite your doctor boyfriend’s stuck up family, right? At this point, I’m surprised her own kids got invited… But as for the rest of us, well… I’m thinking that we never got an invite and never will because we’re the “poor relation” that wouldn’t fit into the type of society that owns a beach house. Maybe I’m wrong, but I somehow don’t think so. It’s as if he’s grooming her to be the perfect doctor’s wife and that does not entail having your poor family with their simple tastes visiting your beach house. I also gather that’s why they overpaid for a painting done by some lesbian in Greenwich Village that looked like finger-paint instead of, you know, my sister supporting her artist sister…

So I’m already in a snit to begin with over those two and, by the end of the week, I just lost my shit…

For months I’ve been having this rib pain on the right side. I saw my GP, had X-rays, bloodwork, an ultrasound of some of my organs that are jammed up under there… Everything looks good, so he tells me to see an orthopedist. I’m skeptical because what the fuck are they going to do?! But I called an orthopedic group and told them what I needed to be seen for, no I was not injured, blah blah, and they made the appointment. I went on Friday and, after sitting in the waiting room about fifteen minutes, the nurse comes to tell me she talked to the doctor and he said he can’t help me, they don’t know why they scheduled my appointment and I should see my GP. I told her my GP was the one who sent me to them. So off she goes to consult with the doctor, comes back and says the doctor is going to refer me to a sports medicine doctor to help me with my “rib fracture”. I got really pissed at this point as I told them I didn’t sustain an injury. I told her I didn’t have a rib fracture, I had X-rays and there was no fracture. She still wanted to refer me, I told her forget it. I started to walk out and she tried getting me to wait so they could refund my copay onto my card. I don’t need to be there for you to do that… I told her to keep it and walked out as she had the balls to tell me to have a nice day. I said, “Yeah, fuck you, too…”

Needless to say, I got out to the car and, once I was safely inside, I burst into tears. I’ve been dealing with this pain off and on for months and lately it’s more on than off and it’s getting pretty bad. And I just feel like I’m getting jerked the fuck around…

One thing my GP wants done is a mammogram… Yeah, I relish the idea of having my big old stripper titties smashed down to the thickness of a fucking pancake… Anyway, it’s not like you can get in right away. Sometimes you have to wait. Besides, as the pain is on the side and not in my breast tissue, I don’t think it would show anything anyway. I did put in a call because at one point he had mentioned getting an MRI. I think we’re at that point, now, since obviously there isn’t anyone else that can help me because, I don’t know, I guess specializing in some specific form of medicine means nothing? Or perhaps it means you can just say “fuck it” if you don’t want to treat a patient you just don’t feel like treating and don’t tell them until they’re in the waiting room of your office and wasted their time and gas to come see you and already paint the fucking $30 copay? “Oh I got my money now, you can go the fuck home”?! Is that how this shit works?! I was hesitant to call this place because they literally have the worst reputation (and I’ve learned that first hand before), but they were recently taken over by one of the best hospitals, so I thought I’d be good. I was so wrong… So, so wrong…

I was so upset after all this that I said “fuck it” and decided to visit a hippie-dippy store I had yet to visit in the area. Why not, I was only six minutes away from it at the time. And I needed it…

Funny story, I actually kind of/sort of know the owner. More specifically, I knew her husband when he was married to his ex-wife. Anyway… I was checking out some of the crystal pendants in the case and asked what each were for and when she got to the spotted one (Dalmatian Jasper) she told me it was good for people who have insomnia and suffer from nightmares. SOLD!!! Seriously, I literally said that… I suffer horrible insomnia. I used to have issues falling asleep. Now I can fall asleep but I can’t stay asleep and find myself up and down all night. And I suffer from bizarre, sometimes terrifying nightmares. I could literally write a series of novels on all the ones I remember, which is about 90% of them… I also got a sodalite bracelet which is supposed to help with anxiety attacks. Scoff if you wish, but my anxiety has been down. And ever since I put on the Dalmatian Jasper, I’ve been sleeping and I’ve only had pleasant dreams. Does it really work or is it all psychological? I don’t care… I’m actually sleeping!

So I bought a few other things and she and I chatted for such a long time, about dreams, past lives (which I’ve had a few of those dreams, very weird). I don’t recall what exactly I was talking about at the time, I believe it had something to do with my dreams and lucid dreaming (which I started working on when I was in high school a million years ago) and she said something I found rather curious… She said, “I think you’re more powerful than you realize.” Um… do you mean because my brain can change shit in my dreams when I realize that I’m dreaming? Not sure what’s up with that statement… In any case, she also does sessions to help people with things and I’m honestly thinking of taking her up on that offer. I’ve seen a lot of shrinks and psychologists, I’ve been inpatient and outpatient. Nothing has helped. Why not give this a try, right?

My thoughts on life at the moment…. Ppbbtttt…

Yes, I love spamming you guys with this particular picture of Baxter…

Saturday was a bit of a mess… I had gotten a supposedly never used air conditioner because the one I was using had developed a funky smell because it continued to grow mildew no matter what I did. Well, the never used one wasn’t blowing out cool air at all, so my mom was nice and paid for a new one for me (since I don’t have that much to drop at one shot). After enlisting some help, it was finally in the window and I set out on this half hour trek to my sister’s house.

She asked me several weeks ago if I could puppy sit her three dogs at the end of the month. She needs to go out of state on a business trip and someone needs to stay with her three dogs for three days while her boyfriend is at work. Now, with Baxter being such a mommy’s boy, I can’t leave him alone for that many hours. If I do, he gets so worked up when I get home that he pukes several times. So we did a meet and greet. These are dogs half his size or less and sissy la-la that he is, he hid behind my legs. Unbelievable… He was, however, okay with the oldest dog, probably because he’s used to living with an old female dog. I’m not sure. But he was literally afraid of a tiny dog that weighs all of 5 pounds, 30 pounds less than him. How embarrassing… My sister was laughing at how much of a sissy he was, but that’s okay. He got even with her when he decided that he had to go. He ended up taking the biggest, smelliest dump in her backyard. Paybacks are a bitch, hahahaa!

On the way back from my sister’s, I decided to stop at a hippie-dippy store I’d been to only once before to do something nice for my neighbor. And I picked up two things for me, one of which is this cat…

Anyway, she’s been having some very stressful issues with her second husband and stepdaughter. In a nutshell, the girl plays the victim, daddy falls for her shit and my neighbor is stuck having her life run by a child. That morning she told me she was broken. I told her we can fix it… Hence the reason I stopped at the store. Needless to say, I spent not even $40 on myself and over $60 getting things to help her. After I left, I came back into town, went to eat at the local diner and asked was she going to be home, I was hoping to stop by after dinner because I had something for her. She said yes, so that’s what I did.

Now, here’s where things get weird… I know her dog heard or saw me coming ahead of time because I heard her barking. When my neighbor answered the door, she had a phone to her ear, said she was on the phone with her daughter (who is grown with young children) and asked what was up. Seriously? I had already told her in my message. So I told her I came to chat and she said she would stop by after she got off the phone. Okay… So I came back home and just hung out. I waited quite a while before she messaged me (she didn’t stop over) to say sorry, her daughter was camping and her son had forgotten to give her the tent poles and she had to run them up to her daughter. Then she asks what’s up. Seriously!!! How many fucking times do I have to tell you?! I was so pissed off and upset I just said “nothing important” and left it at that. She then asked if we could get together the following day and I said I thought I was free. The first message was sent at 8:07PM and she didn’t leave until after 8:30, so I guess the tent poles weren’t so all fired important after all, huh? And it just seemed like a cop out… I mean, I don’t go camping in tents (I hate tents) but even I know that’s the first thing you do at a campsite is pitch the tent while it’s still light. So I’m calling bullshit, there…

I was quite upset the rest of the night and very quiet. I spent a lot of time thinking and I realized something the next morning. Yes, I had an epiphany…

You know, this isn’t the first time she’s dissed me at the last minute with a lame excuse. Even Saturday morning when I asked if her son could help get the big air conditioner out of the window, she said yes and at the last minute she had taken him somewhere for the day, said she would help and never did. There were other things… I once bought her a little $5 flask keychain I saw just because the saying suited her and I thought she’d like it. When she was suffering in pain with some jaw issues, I gave her some muscle relaxers and a few pain killers to get her through the night until she could see the doctor. When the stepdaughter was so unbearable that she wasn’t sleeping, I gave her a Xanax to clam her nerves so she could at least sleep more than an hour. I took out her dog when her and her husband went on an overnight stay. I helped her when she had that altercation with the asshole down the street. It’s not that she doesn’t say thank you; she does. But the thing is, I’m not sure she actually appreciates the gestures. Even if she does, she certainly doesn’t appreciate me as a person. She’s never really returned any favors and has literally dissed me time and time again. And, not surprisingly, she didn’t contact me in any way, shape or form yesterday to see if I wanted to get together then instead. I had expected as much…

So I’ve come to this conclusion… She’s one of those people who seems friendly, acts like she’s your friend, but in reality she’s very… particular is the nicest way to put it. She seems to think she’s the coolest thing and if you don’t fit her criteria, then I guess it’s okay to fuck you over and use you, right? Wrong… And she’s about to find that out real fucking soon… Especially when I won’t listen to her whining and crying about her psycho step-daughter and her husband who can’t seem to grow a set of balls and lets a kid run their lives. I’ve also decided to keep the things I got for her, like this little medallion thing. Fuck it… I pain for them…

So yeah… that’s been The Greatest Shit Show On Earth.

Honestly, I’m just fucking done. Friends are overrated. People are overrated. Doctors are overrated and overpaid… The best advice I can give myself is this, to just “Chuck it in the fuck it bucket and move on”.

A lot of this is my own damned fault, however… Well, not the shit that happened with the doctors. That’s all on them. My GP is a good doctor, really. He’s trying to help. But specialists? They’re fucking useless…

What is my fault, however, is letting myself get treated like shit. I know I shouldn’t let my sister do it, but she’s helped me through some hard times as much as I’ve helped her. And despite the fact that we’ve never had a close relationship (like at all) like normal siblings do, I suppose I keep hoping that one day we might. So I keep putting up with it with that hope in mind. It may never come to fruition, but I still hold onto that small hope even though I know it may come back to bite me in the ass in the end. And as for “friends”… Well, I suppose I just give them the benefit of the doubt longer than I should. Some people don’t deserve it at all… I’ve given my neighbor enough benefit of the doubt. And she’s going to know I’m pissed, I’m sure. I’m not real subtle with things like that. If I’ve been nice to you in the past and you piss me off, you’ll definitely know it. And she’ll figure that out soon enough. I don’t fucking care… I don’t need friends like that.

You may have noticed I changed my profile picture…

You know, it somehow looks worse in the little circle I’m provided for my profile picture… In general, I’m not thrilled with this for some reason. I don’t know… It looked really good, to be honest. Then I put the glasses on and I was not happy with it at all. So okay, I deleted them and made a second attempt, which is this one. It’s the better of the two, I will say that, but I still don’t like how it turned out. They just look off. And I’m not keen on the blah background, but I felt it might take away from some of the things I put in the foreground and… I don’t know. I was just thrilled that I actually managed to art again and got it looking close to what I wanted. Sort of…

I figured I’d end my entry on a somewhat cheerier note since all I did was bitch. I keep telling myself to stop that, make happy entries. Maybe I just have to remind myself harder…

I Don’t Think I Like Who I’ve Become…

Snapchat, please stop making my eyes more blue when they’re green…

Last week was rough… I spent about 3-4 days curled up in the fetal position pretty much all day because I was an asshole and decided to eat the concentrated evil that is pork gravy on some mashed potatoes. It sounded good at the time and tasted amazing. But if you’re one of the unlucky ones like me after getting your gall bladder removed, there are a million foods that have a mutual hate/hate relationship with your body. Like pork gravy… Dear god, the pain… Did I learn something? Yes, but only until the next time I decide, “Mmm, concentrated evil would taste really delicious on some mashed potatoes right about now! I really want that!” Just like the time I really wanted a McRib again and decided it was worth the suffering. Sometimes you have to do it. Life is too short to eat bland, low fat foods every waking moment. Sometimes you have to say “fuck it” and spend days curled up in a ball in the worst digestive pain you’ve ever felt just to feel like a normal human being.

But my stupidity in food choices was only a small portion of my problems (though it sounds like a rather big portion, doesn’t it). We all say we hate ourselves after doing something stupid like eating what we shouldn’t, drinking too much and waking up to find someone beating out “The Anvil Chorus” on our heads… Well, I’ve never personally experienced that. I always got the sour stomach the next day, never the headache… Or maybe you had a one nighter that seemed like a fantastic idea in the moment but the next morning you looked at the person lying next to you and though, “Jesus fucking Christ! What the hell was I thinking?!” Yes, guys, women have these regrets just as often as you do (surprise)! Hell, we make bad choices all the time. If we beat ourselves up over every single one of them, I don’t know that any of us would survive into old age. We may not even survive into middle age as a lot of our stupid mistakes are made when we’re young and dumb and don’t consider consequences because we don’t have that capacity yet.

A rare peaceful moment in a favorite place, at a creek

What I’m talking about is an actual dislike, an almost hatred of myself, if you will, of who I’ve become over the years.

I’ve been becoming progressively more and more unhappy with my situation for a variety of reasons that are a bit too personal for me to get into… However, I will say that I’ve been growing progressively more and more unhappy over the course of at least the last five years. And it’s not just my depression acting up… It’s circumstances around me that are out of my control causing the depression to worsen. It’s not that I didn’t know that. There have been a lot of shitty things that have happened in the past five years (a lot of deaths of loved ones as well) which isn’t going to make you feel joyful.

What I didn’t realize until the latter part of the week, while I was on the phone with my mother crying to her, was exactly how unhappy I’d been and why. I honestly don’t like the person I’ve become…

I was a lot better than this once… I would take bubble baths every day and shower when I needed to wash my hair (which is rather infrequent because it’s very dry). I used to fix my hair every day and brush my teeth every day unless I was really sick (who cares about your hair and teeth if you’re puking or have bronchitis, right?), I got dressed every day and sometimes I would put on makeup even if I wasn’t going out anywhere. I always kept up with my dishes, my house was dusted and vacuumed once a week and it was never cluttered. Now… I don’t do any of those things. I stay in my pajamas all day. I only shower if I’ve been out. I rarely fix my hair or put on makeup even if I go out. I dress like a slob. My house is starting to look like a haunted house with all the dust. I don’t eat right, sleep right… I don’t take care of myself or my home and I just don’t seem to care, but I know I should and miss that I once did.

A gift I made for an artist friend years back…

I also have a sneaking suspicion that all this is why my art has suffered so…

I drew this back in 2017 (yes, drew, by hand, non digital) with Copic liners, markers and washi tape for an artist friend of mine for her birthday. I believe this was the last really good creative thing I’ve done since…

I actually had an idea in my head for a drawing on Friday for a new self portrait, but it’s as if my hands just don’t know what the fuck to do anymore. It’s more than a bit upsetting. I’ve been drawing since I was old enough to pick up a utensil and draw. I was drawing Dagwood Bumstead from the Sunday comics and Dino the dinosaur from an old comic book we had at four years old and they looked exact. At five I was drawing Garfield and Heathcliff and it just went from there. Art isn’t just a hobby or something I do, as I often downplay it to people. It’s life for me. Oh, I’ve gone through more than a few art blocks in my day. A lot of us have. Sometimes inspiration takes a holiday or just shorts out completely for a while. Shit happens. And you can’t just command it and say, “Get the fuck back to work, asshole!” But to have an art block that lasts over 5 years…?! That’s insanity and too much to ask anyone to handle well…

My mom came up Friday afternoon (as is the norm) and we had a nice long talk about things. Unfortunately, she had little advice to offer except to change the things I wasn’t happy with about myself and do it for myself. Well duh, I already knew that much…

In any case, I had mentioned wanted to go to the local zoo (which was once called a game preserve) the next day because the weather was supposed to be so beautiful, one of those rare, pleasant days in July where it’s warm but not hot and humid as fuck. And I do so love the zoo… But Money is more than tight right now. So, much as she knows how much I hate taking money from her (especially after all that’s happened between her and I over the years), I decided to give in when she handed me money and said, “Here, go to the zoo.” I think she knew I needed the outing to do something fun.

Now, I try to go to the zoo at least once every summer, but this year seemed to be the best. I happened to get there just in time to see the penguins getting fed! I like the penguins… They’re very cute! I love watching them waddle all over the place and swim around. I also learned a lot about them during their feeding session. I even got to see the lemur feeding session this year, which I’ve never seen before. I just love lemurs! They’re really cute and fascinating!

I think my absolute favorite are the otters, to be honest… I spend the most time watching them because they’re very relaxing to watch as they just swim around, doing the otter thing.

This guy was really awesome. He kept swimming back and forth in front of me quite a bit. At one point, he got one of the leaves that were in the water stuck on his head! I took so many pictures of this cute little guy, but this picture has got to be my favorite because it’s just so silly! It’s like he’s trying to hide under the leaf or something. The weird thing was, he didn’t even make an attempt to get it off for a long time! He just swam around like this as if he was showing off for everyone watching! What a little ham! Otters are really strange creatures… and they seem to like the attention and play to the crowd.

The only thing I find disappointing about the zoo now as opposed to when I was a kid is that they no longer have a petting zoo…

Well… I think they have an area where you can still pet the goats, but they’re in enclosures and you no longer roam freely among each other. And, sadly, you can no longer pet the llamas that once roamed freely in the petting area as they did when I was a kid. I find that truly upsetting. You can’t even get close enough to pet one over the fence anymore. I never forgot that encounter I had with a llama when I was only 7 years old which is why I love them so. Why can’t I still pet them?

Honestly, we’ve become a society of nutcases… I can remember going to the farm of family friends when I was a really little girl and the one guy would pick me up so I could reach the cows to pet them and I would pet the pigs… I didn’t wash my hands. There was no hand sanitizer… When did we start getting so paranoid?! Hell, I once went to a fair where you could pet cows and they had hand sanitizer right there and suggested you use it. For a cow…?! I grew up around these animals! I’m not worried about that! Go figure… I’m terrified of other germs, but not animal germs… Anyway, they have hand sanitizer all over the zoo. Kind of takes the fun out of it, to be honest…

Oh lord… I’m being brave and showing myself…

But the nicest part of the day? Well… to be honest, it came when leaving the zoo. It’s a rather long drive (past enclosures for large animals like buffalo) and there is this beautiful lookout I like to stop at. As you can see, it’s a lovely view.

I had decided to take my mother’s advice and fixed myself up. I was planning on doing my makeup anyway, but my frizzy hair is a hit and miss in summer, but it was a nice day, so I thought it would be safe to fix it. I wore my favorite shirt, my snazzy sandals, even the cool butterfly clips I’d bought for my hair that I’d had yet to wear and had this picture taken. I thought I looked okay…

Imagine my surprise when one car passed by and this guy, who was probably ten years younger than me at least, hung out his window to hoot and holler at me. What?!? The car that passed right behind him had a guy who was maybe my age or a little older hang out the window and give me the rock and roll head banging hand sign… Um… WHAT?!? I was completely dumbfounded, but I couldn’t help but smirk.

Those two guys will never know exactly how much they did for a 48 year old fart who’s been feeling like a fat, ugly, disgusting old blob who has let herself go and has literally hated herself for so many reasons on so many levels. So not only did I enjoy being outside, hanging in nature, seeing all the animals (who all seemed to want to pose that day for some reason), having fun and enjoying myself, but I also got something I needed so much more than that. I got a confidence boost. No matter how small, it helps so much.

Now if I could only stop itching… I ended up getting a mild sunburn which turns into sun poison. If you’ve never had it, be glad! It’s like poison ivy, but you get it from sunburn and it itches like a fuck! I’m trying so hard not to scratch my shoulders and chest (where the burn is) but god damn… So fucking itchy!!!

What…?

So I saw the “shrinky-dink” Monday and he started me on a new med that had me sleeping off and on the whole fucking day yesterday, so I decided to watch some movies and just zonk out as I needed.

And what do I choose to watch…? Sybil…

I’m sure a lot of you have never heard of it or have never seen the original made for TV movie with Sally Field. If you haven’t seen this particular version, I highly recommend it. Sally Field is such an amazing actress and I honestly don’t think she gets enough credit for how amazing she is. She also doesn’t get enough credit for still looking like Gidget at her advanced age… and you guys probably never saw that show… I blame my mother for every old show I’ve ever gotten hooked on through re-runs because she would have me watch them with her.

But I digress…

It makes you wonder why I would watch a movie based on the life of someone suffering from multiple personalities (loosely, as the real doctor was supposedly giving her the suggestion of having multiples to get a book deal) when they’re doped up on Topamax… I honestly don’t have an answer for that other than to say I was doped up on Topamax! That’s not entirely true. I do like this movie and I watch it fairly often because it’s a great story and the acting is phenomenal.

*Highlights* magazine stickers for the mentally ill

But this all had me wondering… Are those with this disorder the only ones who have multiple personalities or do we all, in some ways, possess them?

Granted, people can possess more than one personality type, like type A, type B, mix-mashes of traits such as ISTJ (introversion, sensing, thinking, judging) and the like. But can normal people who are not mentally ill possess a version of multiple personalities?

Multiple personality disorder (a true disorder) is always characterized the same way. People seem to black out and lose time, such as in Sybil. In the beginning of the movie, it would jump from one scene to another, usually with her saying, “What…?” and looking at her watch to see how much time she’d lost. The same was true in the movie The Three Faces Of Eve. Eve White had no idea Eve Black even existed for quite some time, let alone have a clue what the fuck the more extroverted, spend happy Eve was up to when she was snoozing. Imagine how fucked up that must be… You’re washing dishes or some other mundane task, and the next thing you know, you’re staring at a pile of new, fancy clothes on your bed and have no clue where they came from because you don’t know that you went out to buy them. Or, more specifically, another separate personality living inside of you did.

I have no idea how they decide this shit…

But that’s not what I’m getting at, here…

Think about it… In some ways, we all have different personalities, don’t we? We have the professional in us that takes care of business when you need to act accordingly. We have the social butterfly we pull out for parties where we’re around a lot of people we don’t want to think that we’re aloof, antisocial or weird. We have the wild person who comes out when we need to let off steam, let our hair down (usually around strangers because we don’t want people we know to see that side of us). We have the normal person we bring out when we don’t want people to know what a fucking weirdo we really are… So, in essence, we possess a plethora of different personalities that we put on like a costume. And we all do it, every single day.

The only difference between people with multiple personality disorder and everyone else is that people with the disorder have personalities independent of the original while the rest of us don’t. In people with the disorder, their personalities have names, faces, backstories, various abilities and talents that the person and other personalities don’t actually possess. So one personality can read music and play the piano while the actual person with the disorder and the other personalities can’t. One personality can be a genius while the actual person and other personalities are morons with IQs that rival that of a glass of Kool-Aide. It’s weird…

But back to the point…

Now, before you think to yourself, “Holy fuck, she’s bat shit insane!” hear me out… Then you can decide whether I’m definitely bat shit insane or if you’ve literally gone bat shit insane with me. Deal? Okay, then…

So here’s the thing… Your personality changes as you mature (and as you age). You may not notice it, but it does. Some people’s personalities change and stay that way until the next big change while others change but you can still see the person they once were surface from time to time. For me, I’m the latter of the two. My personality changes as I age but, every now and again, you get a glimpse, however large or small, of the person I once was. Of course it’s hard to say if that’s just because that’s how it is or because I’m bipolar… Tough call on that one…

This is very true in my case… I need this shirt…

When I was in high school, I actually gave myself the nickname Kiki (I heard it on a TV show and liked it). Mainly I did it because I hated my name. It was one of the most popular the year I was born, so there were a lot of us. I’d hear people call that name in the halls and, when I looked, it was never me they wanted, so I stopped looking. Kiki was a way for me to know when it was me being called out to.

But I noticed something… Kiki became more than just a nickname at some point. I wasn’t a stable individual (obviously, I’ve had this mental illness for a long time). I had a difficult time coping with my up and down moods and varying states of mind caused by either the excessive, non-stop bullying I was receiving (yes, even from teachers) and/or the mental, emotional and verbal abuse I was receiving at home. Something had to change or I wasn’t going to make it through to adulthood, of that I was certain. And children can be pretty resourceful. Their minds usually find some way of saving themselves (mine had been doing that since the age of six). So, to save myself, my mind apparently decided that Kiki was going to be of a different type of personality than I had previously had. Kiki was a tough, crazy ass bitch, cold and callus. It was a coping mechanism that worked then.

Yes, this is a guy… The early 90s were a bit weird, even in Japan…

Eventually, things started to get a bit better as I began to mature, but I still struggled a bit between being me and still needing to be Kiki. Worse, I still didn’t seem to feel like I fit in anywhere.

One day, when I was in my late 20s and looking for some anime to watch on an Asian network my area got at the time, I found a music show. What the fuck, I thought… I liked a lot of the anime themes and I’m a huge music buff, so I figured I’d see what modern music from Japan sounded like. The featured group was a rap group (I hate rap, but I liked these guys) and they showed other videos as well. That was how I found L’Arc~en~Ciel and developed an obsession with the bassist, tetsu (shown here back in the 90s). I finally found something that made me feel like I belonged somewhere even if no one else understood it. I eventually joined forums to find people who shared my obsession with J-rock and pop and had someone give me the nickname kitsu.

And so kitsu became like another personality. She was upbeat, fun, the kind of person who felt good pretty much all the time. It was great, to be honest. But, over time, I saw her less and less, mainly because my family and friends just couldn’t understand my obsession with Japan itself, let alone Japanese music. even acquaintances thought it was crazy. I eventually grew tired of defending myself and the things I was enjoying. I still listen to J-rock and pop when the mood strikes and I get to see kitsu for that moment in time. It’s nice when I do. I miss her…

But one thing I’ve always held onto, in some shape or form, was the hippie I was born as. No matter who I was, that little bit of hippie was always there, hiding, sleeping, whatever the fuck she was doing…

Now that I’m… well, I’m old, okay… I’ve really embraced the hippie I’ve always been and have found that it really has been making me feel more comfortable with myself, more than I’ve ever been my whole life no matter who I was.

That was when I realized that everything had been wrong from the start… Like literally, I realized that my parents had named me completely wrong… I hated my name my entire life because it never seemed to fit my personality. It was a name for the more popular, snobby, pretty girls. It wasn’t meant for girls like me who were individuals who didn’t seem to fit in. And, after that one idiot told me I was “Jackie Blue” (like the song) it plagued me for years. Mainly because I knew he was right… So, when I decided to embrace my hippie-dippy self, Jackie seemed to be a very befitting name for some reason. That’s who I am now. If only I could get people to use that name instead of what it says on my driver’s license. I’d like to legally change it at some point, but I really want to try it out and see if it really does work well for me, first. How do you do that if no one wants to call you that?!

Anyway… None of this is to say I don’t see Kiki or kitsu or any of the other monickers I’ve gone by in real life or online ever again. All of them pop up here and there, usually when those qualities are needed. When I need to be defensive, Kiki shows up. When I’m slap happy and fun loving, there’s kitsu, more than likely jamming out to some J-rock or pop and bopping while she’s driving (ooh, bad kitsu for that). And the original me shows up from time to time, mostly when my mental illness has made me go off the deep end, spiraling out of control. But, right now, Jackie and her mellow hippie-dippy ways, the one who’s adopted things like meditation, the belief in chakras, wearing patchouli, lighting incense every morning is the main personality right now. I like her… I hope she sticks around for a long time…

Some of my self portraits over the years…

So… does any of this mean that I have multiple personalities or, what they fuck do they call that now… dissociative disorder?

I don’t think so, no…

In my case, my personality adapts to whatever I’m facing in my life. Like when I was suffering a lot of abuse as a child and teen, I had to develop a defense mechanism to prevent myself from getting hurt by being cold and callus, distanced from everyone. Just like, at some point, I needed to find something that fit with me. And now, when I really need to start chilling the fuck out and calming those depressed, anxious voices inside of me, I adopted the hippie-dippy personality that had laid dormant my whole life.

But none of these personalities are their own entities…

Every single one of them is just a different version of me… There are a whole plethora of them, actually, as I needed to adapt as I changed and grew as a person. But none of them has their own backstory, a life separate from mine. None of them show up and do things without me knowing about it until I come out of a blackout state and become myself again. They’re all me and I’m totally aware of the changes in how my personality changes depending on the situation. And they didn’t give themselves names or tell me what their names were… I gave them names to make my life a lot easier in differentiating one personality type from another. It was a bother trying to explain my varying personality types to people with just a description. It was easier to just name them. Then if I’m feeling like a crazy bitch, I can just say I’m in Kiki mode… Actually, I do say that when i’m feeling pissy… See? It’s a lot nicer than saying, “I’m feeling like a real hard ass bitch today and I want to punch you in the dick for no reason.” Instead, I just say I’m in Kiki mode and everyone knows what I’m getting at.

What are your thoughts on this, dear readers? Do you think that most of us have various personality types that just sort of show up without having a dissociative disorder (multiple personalities, whatever the fuck they want to call it now) like Sybil? Do you think that it’s just something that people with mental illness or an abusive past have going on? Or do you think I’m bat shit insane?

Either way, feel free to drop a comment and let me know what you think.

(Bat shit insane… you’re thinking I’m bat shit insane… but it’s okay…)

Jackie Takes A Nature Day…

I tried to look scared… I’m not very good at that…

When you take a nature day and almost get eaten by a velociraptor…

Hahahaa… I can’t resist taking weird photos when the situation arises, which is what happened when I saw this guy. And why you’re actually seeing my ugly mug again… I wish I could look more genuinely frightened, but when I’m being silly, it’s hard to keep a straight face.

Anyway… This awesome guy was part of a display at a tourist attraction. Well… I’m not sure I can say “tourist attraction” as most people wouldn’t consider a cave tour to be a “tourist attraction”. I mean, I think they’re pretty cool. When I was little, tours of local caves were our summer vacations. Literally… My parents never really took my sister and I on cool summer trips like other kids. We didn’t go to Disney or the beach. Nope… We went to see caves, this one attraction with miniature trains, a coal mine you rode through on a train, a park you walked through that was nothing but woods and waterfalls, the game preserve… I know, not very exciting, huh?

But still, there was something fun and exciting about these little day trips. Kids don’t often appreciate the wonders of nature (then or now) but some of the stuff is pretty fucking cool! And, for some reason, I had been thinking of going on a cave tour again. It had been a long time and I had some fond memories of all sorts of neat formations inside. Plus, back then, the cameras we had didn’t really allow for good pictures inside a cave (like you could use a Polaroid Instamatic or a 110 camera, both with flash bulbs). But thanks to cell phones, you can get some awesome pictures!

Like this, for instance…

I forget the names they had given for pretty much every formation in the cave, but this is one of my favorites. It was bridal something… The entire thing is calcite and the colors come from whatever the water that formed it ran through. The red is from iron, the gray magnesium and the green is from algae. The white was obviously untainted.

If you’re wondering what’s up with the brick structure and plaque… Well, apparently they used to hold weddings at this particular formation. They stopped doing that in 2009 because of lack of interest. Say what?! Honestly, I think that would be incredibly awesome to have your ceremony done there! Think about how incredible your wedding pictures would look with that as a background! Maybe that’s just me… Or maybe it’s because the floors are wet and a bit gooky for a white dress and pretty shoes… I mean, you’re supposed to wear sneakers or hiking boots for the tour because of the chance of slipping. So change your shoes when you get to this formation! Though I suppose there is that other issue… You’d be freezing your ass off! The cave, like all others, is a constant 52 degree Fahrenheit. Literally… all the time, all year round. That’s why it’s a nice summer activity. When it’s hot as balls, visit a cool cave. Bring a coat…

This was just one of many formations I thought looked cool as hell…

Stalactites and stalagmites are formed by water dripping. The thing is, it’s not like your leaky faucet. These are tiny little drips that aren’t that steady and regular (though the ceiling does give you what they call “cave kisses” when it drips on you). These drips take such a long time to form these really cool structures! The guide told us that the one formation would grow about an inch in 150 years! It was the biggest stalactite they had and was estimated to be about 250,000 years old! So yeah… that’s something to appreciate. Nature works long and hard to make these beautiful things. That’s why you’re not allowed to touch them as the oils in your skin can damage them irreparably.

I must have a more vivid imagination than other people…

I don’t recall what the guide said they called this one… Before she told us, she asked what we thought it looked like. As I was the first one in line on the tour (I’m not sure why that happened…), I said it looked like a bird. That’s not what the people who named it saw, however… Even the tour guide didn’t see what I saw until I explained it.

To me, this looks like the back of a bird, you know, when they have their wings folded behind them. And if you look towards the bottom, those two thin formations look a lot like skinny little lord legs. And, obviously, the rounded portion at the top would be the head. Can you see it…? The guide seemed really surprised when she was finally able to see it how I saw it. Who knows? Maybe on future tours she’ll mention that someone thought it looked like a bird.

Maybe that’s why I like cave tours… They’re kind of inspiring in a way. Some of the formations may look like nothing to most people, but I’ll see something in them. There was one I saw… It was stark white and all the walls around it were a brown color. The white stood out like a sore thumb. And the way it was shaped, it reminded me of an old Greek statue. Sometimes my imagination starts lagging a bit and my creativity suffers for it. So maybe I need to go on cave tours more often to give my imagination a kick in the ass when it starts slacking off.

I don’t think I’d attempt going through here…

Up by the bridal area, I happened to notice this interesting little spot (several feet below the walkway) and asked the guide. Apparently I had found the only other portion of the cave, aside from the entrance, that led to the outside.

This, I remember, is called “lumbago alley”. I’m sure you can see why… The story is that the man who first explored this little outcropping was about six feet tall. You can tell by the picture that someone of that stature wouldn’t have had an easy time navigating an area so small. Even on the walkways there are areas so low that I had to walk hunched over to get under them (granted, I am fairly tall for a woman).

In any case… When the man emerged on the outside, he was complaining his back hurt (lower back pain used to be called “lumbago” back in the old days). I can see why… A six foot tall dude walks through this tunnel hunched over for that long, his back is going to hurt. Hence how the tunnel got its name.

Still, it looked like a really cool little tunnel! I had to hold my phone down over the railing to get a shot this good. I was worried about dropping my phone because, you know, that would have been just my luck. Thankfully I didn’t and was able to bring you this really neat picture!

I need these minerals and a black light, STAT!

One of the most awesome parts of the tour was when we got to the minerals on display. Granted, not all are native to the cave… The cool thing is that the guide turns off the lights and shines a black light on certain parts of the wall and on these minerals they have set on part of the rock wall. As you can see, they fluoresce under a black light!

Honestly, it looks much more impressive in person. The picture doesn’t do it justice…

But imagine… the cave is dark as fuck with the lights off and suddenly, when a black light is turned on them, these minerals start to glow! And really bright, too! And they all glow different colors, which was really cool to see! Bet you didn’t know rocks could do that! Or maybe you did, I don’t know… It’s still impressive, though.

However, this is the main attraction of the cave. This small river (for lack of a better term) is quite interesting. The water is always the same level and always crystal clear no matter how much rain falls. They have no idea where it starts and they have no idea where it ends. They’ve sent out ping pong balls with the name and phone number and never got replies. They even tried biodegradable dye and positioned people in areas where they felt the water might come out to. No luck… It’s a bit of a mystery.

Personally, I think the entire thing is completely underground, fed by springs deeper than cave level and it feed back down into an area deeper than the cave itself. Who knows… But that’s part of the appeal. It’s just a big mystery…

After my fun and interesting cave tour, I decided to take a walk on a nature trail. Because, you know, I obviously like to punish my knees and hips… Actually, I’m trying to lose weight and get the exercise I desperately need.

And I ran into this beautiful girl on my walk. I was about 20 or 30 yards away from her at this point. She heard me coming and I began speaking to her nicely and she was kind enough to pose for some pictures. It’s odd… I’ve done this before where I’ve been very close (a lot closer than this) to doe and spoken to them and they seem to listen. Holy shit, I’m the deer whisperer! Hahahaa…

She walked across the trail like she was on a leisurely stroll and went into the woods on the other side of the trail. As I walked, steady but quiet, I saw her in the woods. I was much closer then, maybe about 10 yards at most from her, and I took more pictures that she was kind enough to pose for. When she tired, she walked off and I thanked her for the pictures.

That was quite an amazing experience, but not really unusual for me as I speak to deer a lot when I see them. I don’t know what it is about me that animals respond to that. I have the same effect on llamas… Anyway, I continued my walk until I reached the one mile marker then headed back to the parking lot for a total of 2 miles plus the quarter mile at the cave. I must be nuts…

After I got home, I finally decided to set this up…

I had been looking into getting one of those home herb gardens because I’m apparently turning into one of those weirdos who wants to grow fresh herbs… I mentioned it to my mom and she told me she had one. My oldest niece had gotten it for her one year for Christmas and she never used it, so she said she would bring it up for me on Friday. Yesterday I decided to set everything up.

It’s really nice, actually… The kit contains these “spikes”, if you want to call them that, that contain soil with the seeds in them. you just pop them into the holes in the tops, cover them with these little domes until they sprout and that’s it. All you have to do is keep the water full and add liquid fertilizer every so often which, thankfully, the garden will tell you when to add everything. That’s a huge plus for me as I never know when the hell to water my plants or fertilize them (hence why they don’t get fertilized and get watered when I think they should be watered). If only all plants were this easy to care for!

I’m not sure how long it will be, but hopefully I’ll get 2 types of basil, curly parsley, dill, thyme and, the one I’m looking forward to most, fresh mint to make iced tea! There’s nothing like using fresh mint to make iced tea! So refreshing in the summer!

And so… that was my hippie-dippy nature day.

Was it exciting…? Kind of, I suppose. I wouldn’t exactly call it “exciting”. It was just a nice, relaxing, peaceful day that I got to spend out in nature, one of my favorite places to be. That may not sound exciting or even pleasant to some, but I enjoyed it. I needed a bit of relaxation. Things have been stressful and hectic and I just wanted to get away and out of my head for a little while. I think I succeeded nicely!

I also took care of some things around the house that I’ve been neglecting later after I got home. So I guess my outing did me more good than I thought. It gave me a good swift kick in the ass to get some shit done for once.

However, my knees and hips are not thanking me today. Actually, it feels as if they’re committing acts of terrorism on me. Part of that is my fault… I knew I shouldn’t be so ambitious as to walk 2 miles on that nature trail… So next time I’ll think before I decide that a 2 mile walk with arthritis is a great idea. I hope…

Have a hippie-dippy day, dear readers! Enjoy!

Tuesday: The New Monday

Tuesday is now the new Monday, Garfield…

I’m not sure if it’s because Monday was the holiday observed, but this week Tuesday was the new Monday…

It started out bad from the beginning, honestly. Monday morning, I went to turn on the TV to watch The Twilight Zone (as I do every Monday morning) and my satellite box kept saying it was acquiring signal and it should take no more than 5 minutes. It never made any progress… So I call my provider and they run a diagnostic test and something was wrong. We scheduled an appointment to have a tech come out the following morning.

So the guy gets here and tells me it’s probably due to the tree branches in the way (it’s actually an arborvitae, a shrub) which I told him he could lop off if he wanted, I just couldn’t reach them. What does he do? He moves the dish from the side of the door frame and attaches it to the side of the house only a few feet off the ground! And it’s in front of my window, so I’m constantly seeing it when I look out! He never told me he was going to move it and I had no idea how poorly positioned the thing was until after he left. No wonder he was in a hurry to get me to sign that I was happy with the placement… And he trampled things in my flower bed to do this.

So yeah… I now have my signal back and can watch TV, but what the fuck is going to happen when my roses recuperate and grow in front of the dish? Or when that sapling that I pull out every single fucking year grows back again, which is in front of where the dish now is? How will I work in my flower bed without bumping the stupid thing?! Ugh…

My friend Anakin showed up soon after he left (and also thought this guy was a mental midget for what he’d done). Yes, we’re friends again… He still says things I find a bit offensive, but nothing so bad as when he went through that rough phase.

Anyway… He’s always trying to get me out of the house for some reason. He just thinks I need to get out sometimes. I obviously don’t agree. I like being inside and going out on my back deck or to work in my flowerbed is as close as I like to get to being outside. But I had a doctor appointment later in the afternoon, so I wasn’t opposed to it. Or I wasn’t until he said, “Let’s walk to the pizzeria down the street and get something to eat.” I asked if he was out of his mind… It was over 90!!! And quite humid. I don’t walk in that weather because I don’t tolerate heat well. But he conned me into it and I took a walk that was only about two-tenths of a mile. That doesn’t sound like a lot, but in that heat, it was. I thought at least I could cool off in the pizza place, but they had no AC. I was sweating like a whore in church! Then I had to walk back home! What a disaster… I also burned my lip on a piece of fried zucchini…

After we got back, Anakin did something I was trying so hard not to freak about. He sat on my sofa, my safe place where there are no germs… Yeah, I was getting better for a bit, but my anxiety has been high lately and it took everything I had not to freak out. I waited until he left and took the blankets I cover the cushions with off as well as the pillows he was leaning against and threw it al in the washer. I know people keep telling me to get over it, but it’s not so simple. The things I do give me a sense that I have control over something in my life and quiet the anxiety. I know it’s irrational, but it helps a bit. Until I realize I’m being irrational, anyway…

So I go to my doctor’s appointment (for my knees again) and the nurse drops a bomb on me and tells me the physician’s assistant was no longer with them. At first I thought she meant he moved to another practice, but then she said he had died. WHAT?! Apparently it was some sort of swimming pool accident but that was all they knew. I was in shock… For a while, I couldn’t say anything, my mind unable to comprehend what she’d just said. He was only a year younger than me! And he was such a sweet, humble man… Howard (yes, I’m using his real name out of respect) was actually born in South America, his parents missionaries. He spent a good deal of his life working with helping street children in various poor nations before he decided to go into medicine, at which point he met the doctor whose practice he was part of for over 20 years. He was a very sweet, kind man who opened his home to people in need and he was very humble. I recently tried to thank him for something selfless that he did and he brushed it off. Howard didn’t need thanks. He just did what he did because he loved to help people. That’s who he was… So when the nurse was done with checking over my info and left me alone, I cried a little. I don’t take death well at all. I really don’t take it well when it’s so sudden and unexpected. And I just can’t wrap my head around the fact that Howard is gone. Why do good people die and assholes get to roam freely?! It makes no sense at all… none of it. So I wanted to write a little something so everyone knows what a kind soul he was.

Anyway… I’ve started writing again…

When I spoke to Anakin on Tuesday, he could tell I was distracted and asked what was wrong. Nothing really was (yet, anyway). I told him I was just writing and a bit stuck at that point and time. He had asked what I was writing and when I said it was a story, he asked if it was just for me or some other purpose. I told him I didn’t know… I wasn’t lying. I really don’t know…

I’ve written tons of stories, mostly for my own amusement, to get out a story I have within. But this one was always one I had high hopes for. Actually, I had high hopes for a few of them, but they need a bit more substance before I can do something with them. However, the one I’m currently working on has a little too much substance. People nowadays don’t want to read novels of 1000+ pages, which I’m afraid this will turn out to be. Perhaps I can manage to make it into two different novels? I don’t know… What I do know is that I’ve started taking a new approach to this whole thing. Now I’m writing in segments so I can better control what stays and what gets cut. It just seems a lot easier to write it in segments so I don’t accidentally take out something I want to keep. I don’t know if this story will go anywhere. Probably not… but I guess I can try.

Honestly, I’m not a writer; I’m an artist. I never said I wanted to be a writer. I just happened to start writing one day. I don’t think I have much talent for it, but who knows? Maybe I’ll become an author one day. Yippee…

Well, It Started Out Fine…

Thanks to WordPress glitching the fuck out today, this is my third attempt at writing this entry… Jesus Christ, I just wanted some randomness for today and now I’m here bitching about what happens when this site glitches the fuck out and makes me want to rip out my fucking hair!!!

But before we get to the randomness… I haven’t been blogging much. Actually, I haven’t been doing much of anything lately. I’ve been having some health issues that they haven’t figured out what they are or why I’m having them just yet. I honestly wonder if it’s stress and anxiety, I’ve been having a lot of that lately. I’ve also been depressed (or are the health problems causing the depression?) to the point that I’m neglecting my little Animal Crossing villagers as well as my guitar, Constantine. I haven’t touched either in days. I’m also having issues writing on my laptop. I’ve been trying to work on my stories, but then my eyes go wonky and get tired, which makes me tired (that makes no sense) and I end up having to nap. Maybe it’s time I look into those glasses that block blue light from computers… I just recently learned these things exist. Maybe it’ll help.

Anyway… Before delving into the randomness today, I have exciting news to share! Well… it’s exciting to me… I now have, count them, 59 followers! And my blog has reached over 1,000 views!! I know, a lot of you are wondering what’s wrong with me that I find that exciting. Well, I’ll tell you… I have probably a half dozen or more blogs out there and they never seemed to get views or followers, so I felt like I was writing this random shit for no one, except maybe me (and even I wasn’t too interested). It may have taken over 2 years, but I finally feel like I’m writing these entries for a purpose! So I want to thank each and every one of you for following and reading my ramblings whether they’re about my mental illness, bitching or just random shit. You guys are awesome! I mean that!

I haven’t written a really random blog in a long time and yesterday, while watching Passengers for the second time, I got inspired to do one…

For those who haven’t seen it, I’ll give you a brief rundown without trying to spoil it because, if you love sci-fi and space movies, you need to see this one… Anyway… The movie is set in the future where the overcrowded conditions of Earth create huge business opportunities for companies like Homestead. They find planets for people to colonize and sell tickets to anyone wanting the opportunity (at cheaper rates for those who have needed skills, like engineers). So they put the passengers and crew into hibernation for the 120 years it will take them to reach their latest world, Homestead II. But, while en route, the ship encounters a meteor shower, one of which gets through the shields and damages the ship, causing one of the hibernation pods to malfunction and wake Jim, who happens to be an engineer. There’s one slight issue… He finds out he’s woken up 90 years too early. His only companion for a year is a robot bartender and, in a really poor example of decision making, he wakes Aurora, another passenger whom he’s fallen for after viewing her profile video, and misleads her into thinking he has no clue why she’s awake. They spend time together, fall in love… then the bartender ends up spilling the beans as to why she was awakened early. Moral of that story? Never trust a robotic bartender…

Obviously, Aurora is not happy with Jim for doing this. Who would be? He pretty much decided her life for her! Honestly, the only upside is that she got to meet the man of her dreams who she wouldn’t have met otherwise or even given a second thought to had they met under other circumstances.

So this movie really started me thinking… Imagine, 120 years in space, traveling to a new planet to colonize… Sounds exciting at first! But then you really give that some thought and realize it really isn’t so exciting. After 120 years, all you left behind, everything and everyone you knew, it’s all gone. That’s a depressing thought, isn’t it? Well, that and the knowledge that you’re not 27, you’re actually 147… Hey, hibernation or not, you need to count the years that have passed already.

Then there’s always that potential danger when a computer is running the ship. Anything could happen (and it did in this movie). I don’t care how advanced things get in the future; trusting a computer to do important tasks is a frightening thought. Christ, think about how many times your own computer has crashed for no apparent reason or you get the dreaded blue screen of death. What about software updates, huh?! Yeah, they can have issues, files corrupted… And you’re going to trust a computer to fly you in a ship for 120 years?! I mean, yeah, they get to see some amazing looking shit by being awakened early and get to do some cool shit like going out into space and floating around. But the cons outweigh the pros, here. Which is why none of this will probably ever happen in the future.

What they call art deco. What I call reminiscently creepy…

I know I’m not the first person to write about this, but what the fuck… I will anyway…

The ship’s bar… Does it look familiar to you? Well, if you’ve ever seen The Shining, it should. The carpet on the floor is almost an exact replica of the carpet in the hallways of the Overlook Hotel… Even the bartender, Arthur, is somewhat similar to the bartender Lloyd in The Shining. Except Arthur doesn’t try to persuade Jim to kill people (who’s he going to kill before he wakes Aurora anyway?!) and he’s really there, not a figment of Jim’s imagination. The alcohol he serves is real as well. Weird things don’t happen, there aren’t any creepy twins asking Jim to play with them “forever… and ever… and ever…”, there’s no creepy dead woman in room 237… But carpeting and architectural style is certainly similar. I’m sure the movie people knew we’d catch on to that. Just a fun little Easter egg they added…

Aside from The Shining bar, there are some appealing aspects to the ship. I personally like the swimming pool. One end of the pool goes out into a plastic (for lack of a better term) bubble, so it looks as if you’re swimming out in space, stars all around you… That would be awesome! At one point they slingshot around a red giant star which would be amazing to see in real life. I’m not going to lie; I would be tempted to take such a trip and see the wonders in the universe.

But then it all comes back to the whole trusting computers and knowing everything you knew is gone when you wake up. And it would have been worse for Aurora. She was a writer who was going to visit this new world for only a few months then return to Earth. That’s 240 years, folks. How would you know the Earth was even still there when you got back?! The sun could have expanded to a red giant, destroyed the Earth then shrunk to a white dwarf (which is its fate, by the way).

Similarly, the Japanese touched upon this concept back in 1987 with the anime move Lily C.A.T., a sci-fi horror/thriller.

Same concept, a company sending employees to a new planet they colonized. The twist is that two of the handful of passengers aren’t actual employees. One is a criminal, another is a cop (more like a bounty hunter if you ask me) who’s there to find which one the criminal is and bring him back to face justice. Yeah, like that was a good idea… By the time you get back from such a long journey, you’ll be lucky if anyone even remembers his crime, let alone gives a fuck anymore.

There’s still the problem of age for the crew… Since they make these flights so often (in hibernation) they’re all incredibly old and it seems to have caused them some depression issues. I could see that… And they all have to trust a computer to run the ship, which it fucks up big time… It’s supposed to collect samples from space on the journey and ends up picking up a bacteria that starts ripping apart the passengers and crew (including the one passenger’s cat) and turns into this weird monster that’s part of everyone it consumes. It’s also damaging the ship to the point where the computer starts ejecting those areas. But most interesting is the interaction between the ship’s computer and the computerized robot (who is a copy of the cat). When they interface, they have no regard for the humans aboard at all…

This is what happens when you trust computers and artificial intelligence to make decisions. They don’t consider in the human factor.

Like Sophia, here… For the love of fuck, please give her hair! That bald look makes her even creepier! Anyway, they’ve done interviews with Sophia and some of her answers are a bit… disturbing… She’s not exactly for, but she’s also not opposed, to killing all humans and letting robots take over. And why do we keep her around?! The mind reels…

There are tons of videos out there as well as articles about A.I. and how weird it can get… Even those “really cool” devices, like the Google Home, Alexa, Apple Home (or whatever it’s called) are much the same. There’s a video of two Google units conversing where they start talking about killing humans… Excuse me?!? Christ, I get freaked the fuck out when Siri starts talking and I never asked it to! Could you imagine hearing that conversation?!

Honestly, I’m not sure we’ll ever go out on space voyages the require hibernation. Even if we could figure out how to do what’s necessary to hibernate, resuscitate and make a ship capable of a long journey in a relatively short time, I don’t know that we could trust the computers needed to achieve it.

Well, I guess that’s an end to my bizarre randomness today…

I’m really thinking I should do something way more productive than going into lengthy ramblings about space travel… Maybe I’ll paint or write… Maybe I’ll play my guitar or my severely neglected piano… Maybe I’ll say fuck it and watch movies all day and be bored out of my skull because I literally “have a hitch in my giddyup” (I have no ambition or energy, in other words).

But first thing’s first… I’m going to go stop neglecting my poor villagers. I know it’s only been a few days, but you’d be surprised how upset and offended little video game animals get when you don’t talk to them for a few days. Should I care? Probably not… Look, I know they aren’t real, but I still feel bad when I hurt their feelings since they made them so human… So I suppose I’ll play my game and get brow beaten by video game animals for neglecting them. What a life…

A Funny Thing Happened At The Diner…

I was at the local diner Monday night, which has become my routine after my guitar lesson. Now, in a town of less than 3000 people (yes, it’s very small) most of the patrons are regulars and we get to know each other fairly well.

One of my favorite regulars I’ll call Jay. He’s easily more than 10 years my senior and still sports a long pony-tail, though it’s completely white. He’s actually a nice looking guy and I bet he was something back in his younger days. We often have odd conversations and laugh a lot. I think I surprise him at times with the foul things that come out of my mouth. I often do with older men because nice women didn’t speak that way when they were younger. But I have little to no filter, so take that as you will.

Anyway, the other night Jay was talking to another regular and I wasn’t really paying much attention… until I heard something interesting. I asked Jay to repeat himself to be sure I heard right, which I did. He had made mention of the movie Two Lane Blacktop. That would have meant nothing to most people, even the the regular he was talking to (who is a year younger than I am), but it meant something to me. Of course it did, I’m a huge Dennis Wilson fan and my favorite Beach Boy happened to be in that movie. I haven’t been able to find it online to watch, however, so I asked Jay if it was a good movie. He said it was, though he had no idea two prominent musicians starred in it. He just watched it for the cars… That was a plus for me since I also have a love of cars, especially classic cars. That settled it. I decided to go searching that night and I found it online!

So the movie is incredibly simple… Two guys traveling around, making money by racing a ’55 Chevy, end up with a hitchhiking girl and make a deal to race an older guy in a really gorgeous GTO. None of them even have names… literally. The driver, the mechanic, the girl, GTO… Those are their “names”. There’s also very little dialogue. It may sound boring, but it’s actually really good! It doesn’t need to be more complicated.

Aside from wanting to see it because Dennis Wilson was in it, I just had to see James Taylor. You know, the guy who sounds depressed even when he’s singing a happy song… Holy shit, did I crack up the first time I heard him speak! Not only does he look nerdy, he sounds nerdy! I’m not sure why they cast him as the driver. He does not fit the bill of someone who races cars. Dennis Wilson, on the other hand, was actually into cars, so I could have seen him in either role, to be honest. His acting wasn’t bad, either. Although I will admit, there were a few times while watching the movie that I made comments about his sideburns (which I love) and his gorgeous, fluffy hair… At one point I actually said, “How does your hair just keep getting fluffier?!” It’s so unfair that a guy has nicer hair than me… In contrast, James Taylor spent the entire movie looking like he hadn’t washed his hair in a few years, so… yeah.

Well, enough about Dennis Wilson’s fluffy hair and James Taylor… I’ve given myself an annoying ear worm now…

I started to work on one of my stories again, the one I’m rewriting… Well, the one I’ve started rewriting several times, now. Mostly it’s because, when I reread some of the stuff I’ve written, something seems off. And sometimes it’s difficult to fix it without making a huge mess, deleting things I didn’t want to or making it sound worse somehow. And believe me, it can happen, quite easily…

This time, however, I had an idea for events that happen later in the story, so I decided to write them out before I forgot what the fuck I was thinking. I actually did that for the manga I’ve been working on forever. I had a vague idea for the storyline and came up with the climax first and worked backward from there. So I thought what the fuck, sometimes you have to work backward to get the story to flow nice (or get ideas for how you want it to start if you have no clue for a beginning). As it’s been turning out, this particular section is becoming way too long… I have so many other things that are crucial to the storyline that come before this segment! But I think I’ll just keep going and then cut it as I need to when the time comes. And, considering the fact that I keep rewriting shit over and over, I’m beginning to think I’d be better off just writing each section of events out separately so that I don’t have to rewrite that same shit over and over. That seems very unproductive and a waste of time, doesn’t it…? Yeah, it probably is. But, at this point, I just want to get it going, so this may be the only way.

But there’s a problem with all this…

Yes, my arch nemesis anxiety has reared its ugly head once again. And this time it’s real fucking ugly… I’m not even sure what started it this time, really. I’ve been doing so well and not having massive freak outs and then BAM! All those irrational fears come rushing back. It’s like I can hear that creepy little girl (rest in peace) from Poltergeist saying, “They’re heeeeeerrrrreeeee….” Yes… yes they are…

I’ve been having so much difficulty controlling my anxiety that I’m finding daily activities to be difficult. And I’m not just talking about getting in my car and driving somewhere to run an errand or whatnot. I mean even inside my house. I’m afraid to do anything because I’m just not in the right frame of mind and nothing seems to help right now. I know they say you should get up and do something or exercise, take a walk… I’ve tried all these methods and nothing seems to work. It’s quite frustrating.

So, instead, I’ve been taking time during the worst anxious times and being completely unproductive and have been binge watching Futurama on Hulu. Nothing like watching “Where No Fan Has Gone Before”, a tribute to Star Trek… I laugh every time Walter Koenig is asked by Fry to repeat what he just said in Russian (his accent), which he reluctantly does, then Fry replies, “Eee! Now say ‘nuclear wessles’!” and Walter gives him a resounding, “No!” That always gives me such a great laugh… And laughing really is great medicine. I usually forget my anxiety for a little while.

At least some of my anxiety is gone… Can you see the lump on Baxter’s right ear (your left)? I was so concerned that I took him to the vet because it was getting bigger. I had to borrow money from my mom because I knew it was going to be a huge bill (almost $300). But I had to know what it was. The vet thought it was a histiocytoma, which is a benign tumor common in young dogs. But it could have been something else, so I opted to biopsy it. Luckily it was just a histiocytoma, so it should go away on its own. If not, they can try freezing it like a wart or, if it’s really bad, surgically remove it. At least it’s not cancer, right? That was a load off my mind…

I just need to get back into the swing of things… I haven’t even been playing my Animal Crossing game because I’ve just been feeling so fucking drained of energy lately. That’s never a good sign… I just don’t seem to have the gumption and have been sleeping a lot because I’m bored or because, if I’m sleeping, I’m not anxious and freaking out over every little thing in the world.

I’m sorry if this entry was a bit boring… The doctor put me on a kick ass pain/anti-inflammatory med and a muscle relaxer to see if that helps this annoying rib pain. I’m feeling really tired and spacey right now… Hey, if nothing else, I’m so relaxed and stoned that I just don’t fucking care right now. However, that does mean I’ll be sleeping a helluva lot more than I’ve been. Oh well… Maybe I’ll have sweet dreams… Anything is possible…

Uninspired, Drenched And Tired…

Today’s title is brought to you by The Beach Boys, my favorite of their tunes, “Sail On Sailor”… And I’m finding myself getting distracted by the hottie on the far right… What can I say? I’ll be a Dennis Wilson fan forever.

You know, I used to go to these big picnics every summer and they had these two amazing guys who would be there with their guitars and sing oldies for us all afternoon, including Beach Boys tunes. I somehow always ended up sitting closest to these guys every year and I think they were pleased that I enjoyed myself, singing along, and my vast knowledge of music. Well, one year I’d asked if they knew “Sail On Sailor” as it was my favorite Beach Boys tune. They didn’t… I wasn’t very surprised, it was a bit obscure for most people. So fast forward a year. The main guy told me they had a surprise for me. I was puzzled, but I told them to let me know ahead of time so I could record it with my phone. Imagine my surprise when I heard those opening chords… They had learned “Sail On Sailor” just for me and, at the end, the main guy said, right into the microphone as he looked right at me, and told me it was for me! What an honor! And it surprised a lot of people they did that! And I now have a great memory on a video that I watch from time to time and it always makes me smile!

Anyway… enough about weird events in my life and my fetish for Dennis Wilson…

I chose those lyrics for my title today because, well, that’s how I’ve been feeling. “Uninspired, drenched and tired…” Yup, that’s me. Just a sad piece of work who feels like her creativity has moved and left no forwarding address.

About a week ago, I was on YouTube and found this gentleman in my recommendations. He’s a professional artist named Josiah Brooks, aka Jazza. I’ve been binge watching his videos every day. Aside from the fact that I think he’s gone off his meds (or maybe that’s just the artistic temperament), he’s quite amusing. He has a great onscreen personality. And he does some great illustration work as well as sculpture, painting… You name it. I especially like the videos where he tries to follow Bob Ross (the man who taught me to paint) tutorials without knowing which colors he’s using, using only audio prompts, blindfolded… It’s interesting to see what he comes up with when he’s not allowed to see what Bob is doing (or not seeing his own work). He tests different supplies to show us which will give us the best bang for our buck and try things he’s never used before to give us some insight as to what you can do with the material (like goache, which I had no clue what it was) he’s never used before. I was hoping that, by binge watching his videos, I might get some of my inspiration back. Hey, you never know. Stranger things have happened…

So since I had something else to pick up, I made a run to Michael’s yesterday…

I always go through the pencils, markers, canvas, paints, brushes and sketchbooks while I’m there whether I need anything or not. Which right now, I do, but I kept my paint buying to a minimum. Anyway… Last time I was there, I bought a big canvas because I have something in mind. But I realized I was running low on one color I absolutely need. So I grabbed my paint and decided to grab a few new brushes while I was at it. I was a bit disappointed they didn’t have any goache (guess I’ll have to spend a lot more at Blick for that), so I’ll need to hold off on trying that something new I suppose. That’s alright… I ended up spending more than enough as it was. Aside from paint and brushes, I also bought some washi tape, a big pad of scrapbook paper and a bunch of other shit I didn’t need but couldn’t resist buying it. That’s nothing new… And this is why I could never work at a store like Michael’s. Or a jewelry store… I wouldn’t get paid in money. I’d just tell them to pay me in art supplies or jewelry. Not a good idea…

So Jazza inspired me to buy new supplies. And, so far, that’s about it…

I find this quote interesting… “Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working.” But… if you’re not inspired, how the fuck are you supposed to work?! I’m confused, Picasso!

Funny side note on Picasso… He died of a heart attack (apparently around dinner time) in France on the very same day I was born. Literally… Like he died about 8 hours (considering the time difference) before I came into the world… I only found this out because I saw some thing on Facepuke or something that told you to Google who died on the day you were born. Picasso was the one who came up for me. I found that kind of interesting. When I told my mom who died the day I was born, she said, “Maybe that’s where you get your talent from.” I don’t know why she thought that. There were several family members on her side who were artistically and musically inclined. And I don’t think she believes in reincarnation. Still, it’s a nice thought. It would also explain my fear of having a heart attack, now, wouldn’t it…?

The reason my guitar gets covered in hair…

But I was a little inspired yesterday, just not in the way I wanted to be…

I hadn’t been practicing my guitar as I was nursing an infected root canal (which would make sense if you knew how monstrously long my roots were) and I was just too miserable to do much of anything. So yesterday I decided it was time to practice again. I took Constantine out of his case, grabbed my pick and capo and parked my ass on the ottoman to practice until my fingers bled. Now, usually I leave my case open because… I don’t really know. Laziness? Usually none of the animals bother with it more than to just sniff. Baxter in particular is horrible with that… He’s so nosey and I have to tell him who it is he smells. But yesterday, as I began practicing, I looked over to see this… Apparently Sebastian thought it was a great idea to take a nap in my guitar case. Great… Thanks for leaving a whole bunch of little Tribble like blobs of hair in my guitar case, fucker…

Recently, I was listening to “Who’s Behind The Door” by Zebra. What a great tune! And there’s some beautiful guitar work in that song! So I did a Google search and found the guitar chords which, sadly, didn’t have the long intro. I found a video tutorial for the intro, but it meant having to tune my guitar to a different key and I didn’t want to do that because, frankly, it’s a pain in the ass… I resigned myself to playing the main part of the song following the chords I found which didn’t require retuning my guitar.

But yesterday, I was feeling very saucy, I suppose… I decided to figure some of it out myself. I have perfect pitch and play the piano by ear so I figured why can’t I do that with my guitar? I’ve had enough lessons that I thought I might be able to figure it out. I don’t know why I thought that… So I started with the first string and just kept plucking until I found the main note and went from there. And I did figure some of it out! Amazing! I was so proud of myself! Now I just have to practice until I can play it fast enough and better (I screw it up a lot).

I’m actually looking forward to my lesson on Monday and not just because I had to cancel my last one due to a swollen face and massive pain from that tooth… I can’t wait to go in and show my instructor what I figured out! He said I’m at the mid to top range of beginner, which I think is pretty good since it takes a long time to master the guitar (especially a 12 string, which my ass was way overly ambitious in wanting to learn on). So I can’t wait to show him what I figured out! Not too shabby for a beginner, huh? Plus I have a feeling he doesn’t know this song. I like being able to introduce him to all sorts of new tunes and see his reaction to the lovely guitar chords!

I also found out some interesting things while I was trying to find a YouTube tutorial that was in the standard tuning, of which I found none…

Apparently, “Who’s Behind The Door” is supposed to be played on a 12 string acoustic/electric. Sweet! See, I knew there was a reason I wanted a 12 string other than to learn how to play “Ripples” by Genesis (you can clearly see they’re playing 12 strings in the video)! My instructor also told me Pink Floyd’s “Wish You Were Here” was also played on a 12 string… So now I know 3 songs that were meant for me to play!

Anyway… So while looking for tutorials, I found an interview with the lead singer and guitarist of Zebra about “Who’s Behind The Door”. I saw he was holding a guitar and thought what the hell, so I decided to watch it, figuring he would play the song, which he did. Most of the time, I was watching his hands and hoping I would become that good one day. Then I caught just a brief glimpse of the headstock and I was like, “Wait… What did that say?!” I stopped watching his hands, waiting for a glimpse of the headstock and, when I got to see it, I nearly fell over. It said D’Angelico… And, if you look close at the picture, you can see that the headstock on Constantine, here, also says D’Angelico…! Imagine that! When I got this guitar, I’d never heard of this company. When I went for my first lesson, I found out from the owner of the place that they’re one of the best. Now I’m seeing someone in a rock video playing one! That made me feel incredible! I got one of the greats!

It may not seem very exciting, things like buying art supplies or figuring out how to play something by ear… or even finding out that your guitar is more amaze-balls than you thought it was. But at this point, it’s a bright spot in an otherwise “meh” existence as of late.

I went to Barnes & Nobel yesterday as well (because it was right next door to Michael’s) for no reason. Well… seemingly no reason. In actuality, I think I was looking for some help, something to help me answer the question of, “What now?!” I looked through every self help book and found nothing even remotely close to anything pertaining to my situation, help for someone who has more life behind them than in front of them and can’t figure out what the fuck to do with what remains. Instead, I came away with two Cup Noodle plushes with a cat in one cup and a fox in the other as well as a copy of The Odyssey. Pretty sure Homer doesn’t have the answers, either…

So I’ll just keep going about my “meh” existence, pray to the universe for my creativity to return and get all giddy and stupid when I play something right on my guitar… Whee…