I am so reluctant to admit this.
After a recent episode of Chelsea Lately, I was totally inspired. The motivation and inspiration to do more and to do better with my life came from a musician (of music I never liked) turned actor (in movies I never liked) on a talk show hosted by a sailor-mouthed lush (this I do like!). It was Tyrese Gibson, whom I obviously have nothing in common with, except rock hard abs.* He was promoting his new book, How to Get Out of Your Own Way and talked about how most often, we are our own biggest obstacle between ourselves and our goals. And I was like, “No, brotha. That’s money.” But the more I thought about it, the more I realized I was kind of slackin’.
I’m of the goal-setting, list-making variety. And I need to feel that the majority of my down time still has to be productive in some way. Folding laundry while watching the baseball game. Listening to educational podcasts while driving. I have struggled with the impossibility to come home and sit down. I get anxiety on the drive home from work sometimes, thinking about all of the things I need to do. This makes my end of the night comedown that much more rewarding but the many hours before it completely exhausting. I will complain to Josh about his not doing enough around the house until he sets me straight. He does his part. Not doing as much as I do is not a fault of his. I set stupid-high standards and buzz around like a Tasmanian devil (assuming they do consistently whirl around like that of the Looney Tunes** character) until I’ve exhausted myself.
It is hard for me to really relax on a weekday if it is still light outside. (I do allow for a lot more down time on weekends.) I am the goddamned opposite of lazy, is what I’m saying. Sometimes it sucks. But I let the chores and ennui of the daily life get in the way of real, personal self-improvement. I vowed to learn to speak Spanish and just stopped after a couple of lessons and index card study sessions. I have all of these plans for the front and back yard of my house but don’t allow the amount of time they’ll take. I want to do these creative projects for the first time in my life, but I’m putting the laundry first. And Tyrese is the guy who made me see my own big ass stuck in the way of things. This is funny, yes? I think so.
The laundry and the sweeping and the dusting and vacuuming can wait, right? The roof won’t come down if I dedicate a solid thirty minutes a day to a new language?
But do you promise?
-CJ
*Sike.
**Um, why ‘tune’ like music and not ‘toon’ like cartoon? Why hasn’t this been protested? We must put a stop to this!
Mother’s Day is about as cool as my birthday. I’m so content to have nice things coming my way all day via phone call or text or Facebook or flowers or champagne. I enjoyed it more this year than almost any before, except for the tiff between my man and I that kept us from having brunch together. Which just made for more time to be spent with my folks, my aunt and uncle, my little sister, my kid, and my cousin that was celebrating his 20th birthday on what was supposed to be a day exclusively for his mama. The audacity of being born! If I could have eggs Benedict and mimosas for every meal of every day, I would. Without hesitation.
After brunch, I dropped my kid sister off with her boyfriend to do mother’s day with the ladies in his family. It was so grown up of her. I don’t think I was in those kind of relationships in high school, where you gave a crap about the other person’s relatives. Relationships at that time were for passionate make-outs and not much else. But as we know, my almost sixteen-year-old sister is light years above me when it comes to maturity.
Over at my parents’ house, champagne was opened and kiwi strawberry juice was added and poker was played. I was the recipient of multiple bright sunflowers from my mom and from my sister-in-law and an orange daisy from my brother’s friend, which kind of melted my heart in a way that almost made me squeeze him with enough fervor to pop his eyes out.
When kid and I got home that night, Josh was scurrying around, room to room, closing doors behind him. I couldn’t figure out what he was up to but I was champagne-tired and ready to whip off my bra and put on my loosest fitting pajamas. Just as my eyes got heavy, I felt his weight on the mattress. Softly, quietly, he gave me and kiss and said all the things that I wanted to hear while presenting me with a silver gift bag and a construction paper card with a pink daisy on the front. Looking at it now on my corkboard at work, I’m thinking he used the cover of Cunt: A Declaration of Independence as a guide. It looks a lot like the book cover/my arm tattoo, and oh my God, I love it so much harder right now.
Okay I asked him and he didn’t use the book. Still. Well done, sir.
As masculine as he is, which, despite his sexy purple shirts, is a lot… Josh can clothes shop for a woman better than anyone else. I would fully trust him to start my wardrobe over from scratch, to dress me for any occasion, to pick anything from undergarments to hair flowers for me. In the gift bag were two tops that I was immediately in love with and a pair of dark denim capris. He bought all the right sizes, nailed my style and kept comfort in mind. Monetary gifts can be few and far between when they’re this good. They can be kept until the end of the night on Mother’s Day when they’re this good.
To all of you raising a little one, helping someone else raise theirs, taking care of kiddos on the side or for work, or step-momming… happy (late) Mother’s day. You are (probably) really wonderful.
-CJ
An embarrassing amount of years ago, my dad got me a really nice photo printer. In the many moves I’ve made and borrowed computers I’ve utilized, I never hooked it up. And still it sat, sealed in it’s original box, at the top of the pantry or linen or coat closet (whatever it is) for the last three years at 2B until recently, when I pulled it down, tore it open and followed the instructions carefully to install it. Naturally, now it is too old and my laptop is too new and they are not compatible. I figured there would be some sort of update I could download from the Canon website but I’ve had no luck. Now this beautiful printer is back in its box, much to Mo’s dismay, and I have this horrible guilt about never having used it back when it was expensive. Now I’d be lucky to fetch forty bucks for it on craigslist, me thinks.
When said box was empty:
I should really call those posts “Mo In, On & Around Stuff.”
For Cinco de Mayo, I opted out of tacos and beer with the ladies and pulled a double workout. Can you believe that shit? After I rewarded myself with a little red wine, I got a tempting invite via text to hit the gay bar for a drag show. Despite planning to stay in for the night, I hustled into something clean and did a sloppy little number with my hair to go cheer on some queens. It was a damn good show, as always. The beer was flat and gross but you couldn’t beat the company. One of the girls and I hit the punk rock bar on the way home for some free drinks. I’m not sure how we pulled that off. We picked up greasy, salty food for the ride home and I was up for work three hours later.
Today’s my broseph’s secondy-second birthday. He’s going to get all beered out at a dive in hometown. I probably will not be clinking pitchers with him but I’m talking about his day of days on the interwebs, so I did my part.
-CJ
After feeling so confident that I was thoroughly understanding the many new intricacies of the new job, I printed some forty plus color pages and quadruple-finity checked them.
They were covered in red ink where corrections are required when I left the office. So, ya know. SON OF A. But it’s best that I’m the one catching these and not the folks who would have the ability to rip us off several hundred dollars because the new project manager is an asstard.
Over the weekend, I bar hopped around with Ree. It was the tamest night of drinking we’ve ever had. We maintained a reasonable volume, didn’t drunkenly swear newfound friendships to other patrons, and were each at our own homes before one o’clock. I didn’t even find any unexplainable notes on a bar napkin in my purse the next morning.* My mid-twenties went directly to into my mid-fifties this year. My most exciting lunch break used to be a giant mug of beer and a grilled cheese. Now it’s a whole wheat flat bread sandwich at the park, where I can get fresh air and quiet time to read.
I am reading a comic book, if that helps.
*We had an especially drunken week night once and the next afternoon, we hit a Starbucks on our lunch break. When I went for the cash in purse, I pulled out a crumbled napkin that said “rebel girl, rebel girl, rebel girl” in red ink. Ree recalled me hiding what I was writing and but had no explanation for the nonsense. I’m still trying to figure out how some repetitive Bikini Kill lyrics could be so top secret.
My mama hosted a jewelry party on Sunday that was champagne brunch themed. I piled up handmade hair flowers and enjoyed too many snacks and glasses of bubbly mixed with various fruits and juices. It was quickly becoming nap time in the later afternoon but I had to force out the reserve energy to get my happy ass to a huge thirtieth birthday in LA at this place. The birthday girl had rented it out for the night. Of the FOUR HUNDRED people that were invited, a solid ONE HUNDRED FIFTY had RSVP’d. I am confident that I don’t know that many people who would care to see my face on my birthday, dirty thirtieth or otherwise. But I have about four years to get there.
I’ve successfully untagged myself from most of the pictures that occurred over the last few days.
By this morning, my throat was equally raw and phlegmy from all the flavored cigars. From carrying them around, my purse smells so, so awful.
I SAID PURSE.
-CJ
I canNOT drink like I used to.
This is very sudden. My unusually high tolerance for all sorts of alcohol seems to have shriveled and withered and croaked. A few weekends back, I went to a birthday gathering at a dive bar. I was 6-7 Hefs and 2-3 vodka tonics down when I got to the bar, which might offer explanation of my having vomited everywhere later that evening, but I digress. I took in more beer and a few shots in a celebratory manner for the birthday girl and was completely out of commission for about a week afterward. Life without a gall bladder has an effect after heavy drinking, turns out.
I just used Google to determine if the correct word was afterward or afterword.
I can’t say (or type) afterward without thinking of that soul crushing “Friday” song. Which I will not link. “Sunday comes afterwards.”
Mind-boggling, the badness.
Then I hear that song in Ralph Garman’s McDonald employee voice that he can’t seem to stop doing on the Hollywood Babble-On podcast. Which I will link! Because it is awesome.
I am much like Dug the dog, in the movie Up. SQUIRREL!
Last night I was decided to give in to a draft beer craving and hit a local sports bar with some friends which turned into an all-nighter on a goddamned weeknight. This hangover is one I wouldn’t wish on an enemy. My drinker’s remorse is fucking tangible. I’m glad my cell phone is dead so I can’t scan through any horrific texts I may have sent. Regardless of intake, my hangovers are never usually this bad.
I am not used to feeling like I rolled around in a cement mixer before being run over by it but it seems I might have to get used to it.
Or I could just stop drinking, but. Well. We know how that’ll go.
-CJ
Dear sitee-site,
I survived one work week at the new job. I went in with zero excitement, much to my dismay. Work was work was a paycheck was a job, new place, old place, where is happy hour held this week? But the transition has been smooth, the work is steady, the people are nice and that giant private office upstairs? All mine.
Please feel free to send me some living, breathing greenery to keep me company.
There’s a Thai place nearby. I’m slacking on my quest to try new foods so I think I’ll head there for lunch soon. What’s a picky girl to order from a Thai menu?
The other day when I picked up Kiddo from school, there were some screaming kids on a nearby playground, around her age (or size at least), and one yelled, “I’LL SMACK THE KOREAN OUT OF YOU.” No shit.
I had to have a quiet chat with the super amazing after-school supervisor gal about Kiddo. I was afraid we were in a bully situation and mine was not the victim. There’s a younger girl in the same after-school program that has told Kiddo once in front of me and once in front of Josh that she hopes Kiddo will be “nicer tomorrow.” Which totally freaked me out to the point that I couldn’t even take my kid’s word that she wasn’t being mean. Super amazing after-school supervisor gal assured me that the other child complaining about everyone and everything and I should definitely not worry about my kid being mean to anyone. Exhale. But when it came to speaking her mind, apparently Kiddo’s got the gold medal. The gal told me how she’s so straight forward that some of the other kids have trouble even trying to react to her.
I’m good with her telling someone deadpan that she doesn’t want to play with them, as long as she’s not shoving them while she does it.
Alright, turning off the mom and turning on the SEX DRUGS AND ROLL ‘N ROLL.
A bunch of my actual family members went out to Vegas two weekends back for my Floridian cousin’s wedding. She and her new spouse decided to forego the fancypants wedding and put that kinda dough toward a reverse vasectomy so they could make BEBES*.
*I KEEP DREAMING I’M HAVING THEM. At least once a week, I’m taking care of a newborn and the memories of almost a decade ago come flooding back.
Upon arrival at the Orleans, Josh and I freshened up and hit the casino with various members of my family. Within an hour, I was pocketing this:
& yelling at various strangers, “I JUST WON FIVE HUNDRED DOLLARS.” This was a huge boost for us, being that we had only booked one night with our meager earnings and would be booking the second night once we arrived. We were able to have a good time, guilt free, and leave our bank account untouched.
The wedding was short and sweet, Vegas style. My sister-in-law took one jillionty pictures on her awesome, gigante new camera:
wedding prep
I took some grainy cell shots, as usual:
It was so, so fun. I am reminded that my extended family is so, so cool and I can’t wait until we all get together again.
-CJ
Dear website,
I’m going to change the way I utilize this place. I usually come here with a plan of action… or at least a topic. Or a picture of my cat on top of something new*. And then I ramble on and take that topic to its wordy death. My inspiration comes and goes but the coming part is most often during times of bloglessness. As in, I’m working or driving or half awake in the middle of the night. I need to make use of the time that I do have for writing, ideas or no ideas, and just go with it. There’s plenty of prompt websites (I especially like oneword.com) and I’ve noticed in keeping a paper journal that I write in weekly, I can go on and on once I get started. I just need to get some words out to keep a steady head.
*SPEAKING OF
Yeah. A golf club.
Please note angry secondary cat in the background.
My apologies in advance for any lack of structure you may find here in coming posts.
-CJ
This post is brought to you by my college library’s internet access. Something happened last week after Kiddo was done using my laptop. The laptop that I am militant about, running updates on and removing unnecessary crap and saying sternly about how nothing is to be downloaded do you hear me.
One time I got a very random text from a weird six digit number, saying something about my temporary password. I looked around, confused, deleted it and moved on with whatever I was doing. Drinking rum and playing Dr. Mario is a safe assumption. Cutting the skin around my nails with cuticle cutters is another. I found out a few minutes later that some random pop-up had asked for a phone number and Kiddo typed on in my cell, which I should never have had her memorize, because it’s not once been used for an emergency but only handed out freely to second graders and plugged into random kid-friendly joke websites.
She loves her jokes.
On that note: Why were the teacher’s eyes crossed?
Because she couldn’t control her pupils!
HARHAR
So, yes. Something happened. Something that has stripped my computer’s ability to connect to the internet. The connection is “excellent” and the bill is paid and the little connection indicator is green at the bottom of the screen. But the page will not load. It has been a few days of hell, especially when, for an upcoming Vegas trip, I listed a bunch of crap on Ebay in hopes of making some gambling and spending money. And I could refresh my seller page all damn day in hopes of watching the green numbers climb. As of today, we’re a happy fifty-two bucks richer and in high hopes that someone will buy that coffee maker.
Today I rejoined the work force for a few hours. It was a weird transition, the iced coffee procurement, the freeway traffic, the quiet morning hours or e-mail sorting and the like.
Around 12:30, I submitted a written resignation from my job*. By one p.m. I had not heard a breathe of response. Granted, my boss is on vacation, but I know she’s checking e-mail by phone. And my supervisor was copied but if she has had any reaction, it was probably in the direction of human resources, asking what to do in our boss’ absence. Or something. Either way, by one o’clock I could wait with baited breath no longer and I left to meet with a surgeon’s assistant for a check-up. My wounds are healing nicely, she said, as she removed the tape holding me together. Or, you would think it was holding me together because I was so terrified of it being removed. It was lifting and gathering shirt lent and looking most unsexy but I was so, so scared of pulling it off all four incisions. She yanked it gleefully and sent me home. And I sent me to the library on campus to do the homework I postponed for an entire week. An entire week that I didn’t even have to work but I still avoided my homework. I am without excuse. And I just remembered I have to do my vocabulary work…
*A bigger, better, un-refusable opportunity came my way with very little effort on my part. And I’d had it up to higher than I can reach with the management of my department. If asked, my reasoning would be something like, “Y’ALL SUCK.” With a flip of my hair, I hope to be out on good terms this Friday. But by the way my supervisor and I fight, it could be as soon as tomorrow morning if they feel like being big jerks.
Which would just free up my Wednesday afternoon for a lecture I really wanted to check out.
/geek
Friday night we’re taking the new! hybrid!* down the loooong fifteen freeway stretch from Orange County into Las Vegas. My awesome cousin is getting hitched and I couldn’t be more thrilled for her. Secretly, I’m pretty thrilled for some kid-free, hotel time with my honey too. Guilty pleasures await.
*Josh got a sweet new ride.
-CJ
The only other surgery I’ve ever had was the cesarean when Kiddo was born. Gallbladder surgery is no where near similar but it does have the whole abdominal incision thing going for it. Being that this surgery was actually planned, unlike Kiddo’s birth, and I had already recovered from a surgery that was like gallbladder removal times millfinity, I was not worried or scared or stressed in the slightest. Having it all over with was what I focused on and seriously, it was a damn breeze.
Except, leaving the house before daylight.
And being directed to the wrong hospital.
And having the ditsiest nurse assigned to help me when I first arrived.
And having two piercings stuck in my body.
And having the nurse stick my hand with a needle in the wrong place leading to SO MUCH PAIN.
Really though, so breezy.
My saintly mother picked me up before the sun rose on Friday morning. We headed over to a deserted hospital where the sole employee there directed us a few miles away to a different location. So much for my preparation notes that included the cross streets. Growling ensued on my part, Mom took the reigns and got me to the necessary office to be strapped with the necessary bracelets and to sign away the necessary rights and the like. Up one floor, Mom was given my belongings and asked to wait in the lobby. Nurse Ditzypants put me on a scale and noted my weight in kilograms. As she was writing it down, she forgot the number and asked me if I recalled it. I told her I had no idea why the number I saw was about half my actual weight. I got back on, she giggled and switched to pounds and then asked me again if I remembered what it had said.
I was assigned a bed and a supahsexy paper robe with purple (!) booties. Ditzypants came back when I was decent and jammed a long needle into the back of my hand. I cried out in pain, which is unlike me for a few reasons; needles do not bother me in the slightest and I have a serious (irrational) issue with showing weakness in front of a stranger. I finally had to tell her, “I think you’re doing something wrong, this shouldn’t feel like this.” She agreed and switched to my other hand. I was losing my patience with her and I still had an hour and a half until the surgery. Without explanation, she lowered a tiny TV on an adjustable arm in front of me and put on cartoons before walking away. I looked around, slightly confused and afraid to touch the channels, but immediately irritated by whatever the WotWots are. My mom was brought back up and this is when we met Louie. He was an older man with a thick accent and a shock of white hair. He took my vitals and then raised an eyebrow to two piercings I hadn’t removed. The surgery would require something to be cauterized, which could lead to burns if metal was present in the body. I’d taken out the bellybutton and lobe earrings but couldn’t remove two others, both about ten years old, from my ears. One was in the rook and the other at the very top of my cartilage, near my head. Pliers in hand, Louie asked why I would have such “strange” piercings and declared I must have been a “rascal.” His sweet and funny demeanor redeemed Ditzypants’ ditziness. Once the metal was out, some miniature jumper cables were placed on my chest and I yelped with urgency, “WAIT, THE BOBBYPINS!”
Of course there were bobbypins. My house is littered with two things: cat hair and bobby pins.
Mom was sent to the lobby again and I was wheeled out by a new nurse, through some corridors, down an elevator, all the while telling passersby, “WEEEE!”
My wheelybed was tucked into a dim corner while the operating room was prepped. I cuddled up with a blanket and drifted off until the super cool surgeon (looooove her) woke me with a pat on the leg. More wheeling around before I struggled to hide my bare ass cheeks as I lifted from wheelybed to operating table in a large, white room with reeeally unforgiving lights above my face. An oxygen mask appeared over me. The last time I had worn one of those, I puked in it. The nurse swore it was only oxygen but the room started to spin after a minute and I gave her confused eyes and a muffled, “should the room be moving?!” Apparently, I was on my way under. I forced my eyes wide and then woke up in recovery.
No memory of feeling sleepy, of closing my eyes, of even relaxing. I was just… gone.
My first waking thoughts were of a seriously emotional gratitude toward my mom and the idea that I would take her to Catalina sometime.
I wanted to sleep. My eyes were heavy and I’d never felt so warm and comfortable. But if I know my mom and I’m pretty sure that I do, she would not fully exhale until she knew everything was done and I was still in one piece. It had been a long time of her holding her breath, about two and a half hours. I asked multiple times if they could bring her in and I imagine the nurse was calling me a pathetic little whiner behind my back.
Mom finally came into the recovery area and we had about an hour or so to chat and let my body relax. I was sore but certainly didn’t feel like there were four incisions in my stomach, going all the way through the skin, fat and muscle. When it came time to dress, I found myself at the most vulnerable I’ve probably ever been. At twenty-six years old, I found my mom helping me put my underwear on. If I wasn’t under the happy influence of painkillers, I may have burst into mortified tears. Instead we just giggled and I was discharged shortly after.
Easy peezy, lemon squeezy.
Recovery at home has been painful. The gas used to bloat my abdomen during surgery causes shoulder and neck pain. My back is aching something fierce because of how much I’m favoring my front half with an old lady hunch. Laughing and coughing are pretty much out of the question. I’m reminded so much of those days after my c-section when I begged everyone around me not to be funny. The anesthesia could possibly settle in my lungs and cause pneumonia (or something) so I was given a strange breathing apparatus to strengthen my lungs.
I am at my sexiest when in recovery, obv.
I said jokingly that I’ve been spoon fed since I got home, but it’s really the truth. My mom has gone so far above and beyond, down to reclining the armchair I’m in every time I need to move, refilling my juice cup constantly, serving me meals and snacks, re-bandaging me wounds. She has all but wiped my ass and I honestly think if I asked nicely, she might even do that. I could not be more grateful.
Tonight my dad served me a plate of steak, fried shrimp, a baked potato and vegetables. I think I could have surgery every day for this kind of star treatment.
If you’re reading this Mom, you have absolutely no idea how much it has meant to have you by side for every single second of this.
Last week, I momentarily swore off alcohol. Not for Lent, mind you. I only rode the Catholic train as a wee one. (When asked what I gave up last week, I told a friend, “um, cabbage?”) It took a lonely all nighter last Friday with half a bottle of Bacardi Select and some cheesy comedy DVDs, followed by Saturday night with half a bottle of Captain Morgan Tattoo at Josh’s relative’s house and some Barenjager shots at our favorite dive, where the shots are poured before we’ve found a seat. To top it off, a Sunday night drag show at a nearby gay bar consisting of at least ten Captain and Diets, plus a new favorite shot. Shake Frangelico and Chambord over ice, top it with whipped cream if you please. The name is perfect for its taste: Nuts & Berries.
Come Monday, I was hurtin’ something awful with no one to blame but myself.
And now it’s the following weekend and the most intoxication I can get is from a double dose of Norcos while my gut muscles heal back together. I’m sans gall bladder as of yesterday morning and thanking my saint of a mother for going above and beyond in her care for me. I’m completely spoiled and so grateful for it.
