Caterwauling

Just because I can juggle a lot of balls in the air at the same time doesn’t make me a trained seal.

*sigh*

Told Demure!TM (via e-mail, which she hates) I am too busy to meet today. Because, oh, I am. She chose not to acknowledge my e-mail, instead disturbing me in-person to tell me that she already had another meeting scheduled during our time slot so SHE is the one who can’t meet with ME.

Um, OK. Think she would’a told me that in advance, in the (odd) event I might have actually needed to meet with her? But I digress — she always has to one-up me, to show that it’s she who’s too busy for me. Yeah, whatever. Not the first time, not the last. But in any event, she insisted I need to find time to meet with her. Why? Isn’t my job to produce a magazine? Doesn’t the magazine go to press this week? Didn’t she get the paper proof yesterday? Doesn’t she realize that with Angie out sick all week, I am doing double-time to make miracles occur?

Like Ted says, just because murder is illegal doesn’t mean some people don’t just need killin’.

On iTunes: Tori Amos, “Silent All These Years”

Inspired by Erica’s memory of the first penis she saw, I remembered when I first lay eyes on a real one.

I was a freshman in high school, and I’d gone to my local Carnegie Library branch. (Yeah, that was back when we actually had to go hang out all day in a room full of dusty books when we had to do research — how old this makes me feel now!) I was doing some research on journalism careers (amazing that I would end up as one!), and I saw movement over some books in the next aisle. Sure enough, there was some greasy old dude stroking himself, watching me. It took me a few seconds to figure out what exactly he was doing, but duh, I was slow but not stupid. Ick. I ran out of the stacks and found some other people to hang around. Shortly afterward, skeevy guy came out of the stacks, and from then on, I went to a different library. I never did tell anyone what happened that day, and I feel dirty even remembering it.

*shudder*

On iTunes: 20 Fingers, “Short Dick Man”

OK, so I’ve been hot for my downstairs neighbor for about 10 minutes. I saw his girlfriend and realized that I am way cuter, so it wouldn’t be too hard to get a lil upstairs/downstairs action going, right?

Until I actually looked at his car. Nothing wrong with it per se, but the rosary hanging from the rearview mirror didn’t exactly make me wet my pants. But now that I am in the house, overlooking the parking lot, I see the “Bush/Cheney” sticker on the bumper. Oh HELL no! I’m gonna go write another ode to my vibrator — looks like we’ll be spending even more quality time together. …

On iTunes: ‘Til Tuesday, “I Could Get Used to This”

1. Checkmate: Anti-semitic ex-pat chess-playing nerd Bobby Fischer was arrested in Japan this week, under the grand charges of attending a chess match in Yugoslavia against the U.S. government’s wishes. If you were to discard your patriot status, where would you go, and what board game would you play when you got there?

I’m going to France. Half of the United States hates our friendly cheese-eating friends anyway, so I need to keep up my reputation as a rebel. What board game would I play there? Honey, I’d go ride Johnny Depp up and down the Cote d’Azur like a parade float — the only games I’ll be playing are hide-the-salami or stick-your-pole-in-my-Swiss-cheese-hole!

2. Dear Santa: In addition to loving McSweeney’s because it’s brilliant, the Writers of the Friday Five especially love their open letters to things or people who will not likely respond. The Friday Five challenge today is to fashion your own open letter, or at least tell us to whom or what you would write it.

Oh, now that’s some funny shit there in those letters! We all dream about whom we would tell off (I’m sure we can all come up with “an open letter to that motherfucker who screwed up our lives”), but it’s way more creative to come up with something positive. And while I cannot match the ode to a Playboy poster, I certainly owe a thank-you to my favorite vibrator.

Dear Purple People Eater,

Forever yours,

Goddess Dawn

3. Sending the Wolf: California ex-surfer, high school dropout achieves success by starting his own business, which is cleaning up dead people. At what job that nobody else wants would you most excel? And what job could not possibly pay enough money for you to ever consider?

Man, that story creeps me the fuck out. Reminds me of something Angie was telling me about earlier today, how some military installation collects dead bodies and trains its people on how to tell how long someone has been dead — if the flies start laying eggs and shit in a body, you know how long it’s been since they croaked, etc. Gory shit. I was turning green, just listening to it.

I can’t really name a job I’d want to do just because nobody else would want it. I’m prissy, damn it. Don’t wanna ruin my manicure unless I’m scratching up someone’s back in the throes of passion.

I would hate to be the cleaning lady who takes care of the restrooms at the Veggie Patch, where I work. At any given time, there is either shit or someone shitting in one of the three ladies’ room stalls, and I don’t think even a gas mask can prevent us from getting some kind of carcinogens in our lungs from the funk our colleagues emanate.

4. You gotta fight for your right: This ballsy 15-year-old went to his state’s Supreme Court to protect his outstanding mullet without being expelled from school. First rate his mullet, on a scale of 1 to 10, 10 being highest. Then, look back fondly on your high school days. If you could do it again, what right would you work so passionately to protect in your younger, more rebellious years?

Asking me to look back fondly on my high school days is about as likely to happen as me dropping to a size zero in the next two minutes. But alas, I’ll play along and pretend I didn’t dream of gutting my then-friends (especially my gay boyfriend at the time) with an X-acto knife.

But since we’re talking about mullets and high school, OK. I can relate to that — I went to high school in the Pittsburgh area, where some still consider mullets to be all the rage. And that kid’s about a 9 on the mullet — or skullet — scale.

In my high school years, my mom got a stern talking-to from my newspaper adviser, who was annoyed with how much swearing I did. Mom, of course, told her that it’s not like I’m smoking crack; I was an honors student who said “fuck” and “shit” when I was under pressure. I found it hilarious that journalists are the ultimate watchdogs of free speech, yet my own adviser was trying to censor me. I know it’s not a huge deal now that I’m 30 (fuck!) to be swearing, but back then, it was a tremendous release as well as a shock to uptight assholes when a “good” kid like me would start cursing up a shitstorm. Pleased the hell outta me to make people’s eyebrows shoot to the sky and make them uncomfortable. I shoulda bitch-slapped that nasty cunt when I had the chance!

5. T.C.B.: The Writers of the Friday Five love Bubba Ho-Tep and recommend you see it immediately if you have not. If you could fight a mummy with two supposedly dead celebrities, who are actually not dead and living in a retirement home, who would you choose and why?

Never saw “Bubba Ho-Tep.” Sounds like a dance number, a la “Achy Breaky Heart” or something (sorry, I’ve been watching VH1’s “I Love the 90s” a little too intensely!).

*updated*

Just seein’ if I can blog. Blogger added some new features, and it seems I can’t blog from Camino. Wonderful. 🙁

Update

Damn, they’re quick. I sent a message to Blogger late last night, and I am blogging from Camino again. Hurrah!

Funny how I was on such a blogging kick earlier this week, and now, I’m out of original thoughts.

I am doing something new this magazine cycle: I am doing all I can do and not worrying about things beyond my control. It’s empowering. I always worry about what *can* go wrong, because it helps me to solve crises before they occur. But the lesson I recently learned is that I just can’t prepare for the “who’da thunk it” events — I can only take a moment to reel from them and then go about fixing them.

I’ve let a lot of shit at work slide — I am very priority-oriented, and if something has little or nothing to do with my current issue of the paper, I put it on the back burner … often, until I forget it’s back there and it just goes away. That’s not me — I am not a person who does the bare minimum to get by. Today is a big day of playing catch-up. Or, rather, it will be, after I get just one more cuppa coffee in my system.

I’ve been alternating between insomnia and narcolepsy. My wrist is killing me, and when I can attempt to sleep through the pain, my kitten Kadi starts ripping up the house. She wakes up every night at 3 a.m., and, by default, so do I.

I’ve been having dreams about the men with whom I work. For the most part, this is scary. Angie swears I need to get out more, if I dream about these guys. 🙂

Oh, in better news, Angie and I have tickets to see Cyndi Lauper at Wolftrap next month. Yay! It’s the little things, ya know?

I worked from home yesterday. Amazing how much I get done without the phone ringing off the damn wall. Not to mention, but I didn’t get started till 10:30 a.m. (much like a typical day in the office). I worked late, of course, but it was great following my body clock and not having to feel like people are clocking my hours. Got everything done at 9 p.m. in the comfort and sanctity of my apartment. God, how grand it is to NOT have your energy drained from you in an office setting!

Speaking of office settings, oh god. Queen of the Underworld just paid me a visit in my humble office. I should’ve felt the air change. She was in a meeting before coming over, and she took a break to do some calisthenics in my office. Seriously, she was doing leg lifts and bends and stretches, asking me inane questions. I was in no mood for that shit.

On iTunes: Melissa Etheridge/Shakira, “Come to My Window/Inevitable (Live)”

Amy is asking why, with her grandmother’s recent death, she can’t sleep or function, thinking about how horribly she was treated and how she just wants to hold someone accountable. I wrote an epic respose, but I wanted to post it here, too, because I was completely in the same boat and also have more questions than answers. I need to get this vitriol out of my system once and for all. …

I feel your pain. The thing is, the loss of your grandmother brought back all the horrible memories of when I went through the same thing five years ago. I mean, getting old is no fun, and elder care services are so desperately needed. But these hospitals and nursing homes have no clue about things like bedside manner or, for that matter, human decency. It’s made clear to you as a family member that you are just a nuisance — that you are standing in the way and keeping them from doing something else when you’re forced to harass them for basic things that they should know to be providing. It’s also made clear to you that they have no real desire to save your loved one or to prolong their lives in any way, shape or form. And they make it resoundingly obvious that they are doing the minimal amount of work to keep themselves from getting fired — that if your loved one can live without that glass of ice water, they really didn’t need it, then, did they?

My grandmother died when we were away from the hospital — we’d gone to dinner because my grandfather is diabetic and needed to eat. She chose that time to leave us, probably knowing we had seen her suffer enough. But prior to that, they practically forced our hands to sign a DNR form. So they upped the morphine (without our knowledge), and off she went … without us. And when we got the call saying she was dying but still alive (she had died before they made the call — either they didn’t know or they didn’t want to tell us over the phone), we ran stoplights and practically mowed down Fourth of July revelers who were stopped in the street to gape at fireworks. We almost killed ourselves to get to see her before she was gone, and well, she was long gone by the time we got there (in the seven minutes it took).

But wait, there’s more.

We were standing at her bedside, weeping and trying to come to terms with our brand-new and totally unexpected loss. A nurse saw us and tossed in a fucking box of tissues onto my grandmother’s stomach. Yes, threw a box of Kleenex on a dead woman’s stomach. Grief gave way to fury — we could not properly mourn after such a ridiculous showing of assholitry. My mom, knowing she couldn’t wrap an IV tube around the offending nurse’s neck, did the only thing she could think of: she picked up her cell phone and called our friend the mortician. To make arrangements. A two-minute call.

Same nurse flies in and starts screaming at us. Screaming bloody fucking murder about the cell phone — told her to shut it off or leave. My mom told her she was lucky she didn’t bludgeon her with it. Nurse retreated, cursing her out.

These are the memories I have. And these are the stories I hear from others and hate knowing that our elders are just plain disrespected.

Talking with you and learning about your grandmother’s experiences really brought back these memories — our lives are so short, and in my circle of friends, it seems we’re always wishing away the present. How often we say, “If I can just get through this” or “When I go to my next job” or “In five years, this will be a faded memory.” Yeah, and in 30, 40 or hell, maybe even in 10 years, we will be the ones so dependent upon other human beings (strangers) for basic levels of care that they are seemingly incapable (or barely capable) of providing.

It goes back to, if we don’t make things right, who’s going to do it for us? That sounds selfish and that’s not at all the point of this. I totally get your need for accountability — I know what it feels like to want to cause even just a fraction of the pain that was caused to your family by all of the injustices.

I have no advice, no solutions, nothing to make it all better. But I am reminded of the scene in “Steel Magnolias” when Sally Field goes apeshit at Shelby’s funeral, saying she just wants to hit somebody, and hit them hard, just to make them feel her pain of losing her daughter.

I hope you get some rest; I hope you achieve some solace eventually. You’re not alone — your pain is unfortunately nothing new, nor is it the last time a family member is left wondering why it all had to happen this way.

I just got home from work and went hunting for the ashtray. Couldn’t find it. Then I remembered that I dumped its contents in the trash this morning and took out the trash.

Guess where my ashtray is? In a fucking landfill somewhere. 🙁

Give me my passport to Insane — I’ve just passed Delirious!

On iTunes: k.d. lang, “Don’t Smoke in Bed”

It’s almost 8:30 p.m. EST and I’m here at work for at least another coupla hours. I am fried. Delirious. Postal.

How can I tell? I was just editing an article on whatever the House of Representatives is up to, and there was a mention of President Shrub. Here’s the deal: I saw “President Bush,” and I changed “Bush” to “Shrub.” Unthinkingly. You know, because it’s the job of a national publication editor to fuck up an article. But the real question is, would anyone notice?

Pass me the No-Doz and another Diet Coke, thanks. …

On iTunes: Kelly Clarkson, “The Trouble With Love Is”

I just got a call to be in a Veggie Patch focus group tomorrow afternoon because everyone else who was supposed to be in it is under deadline and just can’t make it. Um, in MY world, editorial deadline was an hour ago and I have about half of my expected submissions and should get the remainder tomorrow. But no, I’m not under deadline or anything. And my attendance is mandatory. *softly weeping*

On iTunes: Roberta Flack, “The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face”