A Transition - No Pithy Phrase Is Moving

So a couple of years ago I started a blog on Wordpress for writing, because Wordpress has more up to date functionality and is in many ways easier to use.

I intended to use that one for "professional" writing things and this one for personal, but in the last two years I've discovered a couple of things.

1) I don't do well at "professional" website writing...it ends up way too generic and I feel like it's boring, therefore it's probably pretty boring to read. Gross. No.

2) I'm too old and busy to hide the freak flag. Fuck that.

I exported all of THIS blog this afternoon and uploaded it to my other one, which will be quickly renamed No Pithy Phrase as well, but the address is way easier: http://jessicasettergren.com.

This is my last post on Blogger, so if you follow me here and want to keep up with my weirdo blog stuff, please come on over to the insanity at the new address. If you've had enough, hey, I totally get it and thanks for playing.

I'll likely leave this site as is for a while and I haven't deleted any of the content, just migrated it over.

Chemo is an Interesting Monster - Round 2

Yesterday I had my second round of treatment for the two drug cocktail. For people keeping score, I'm now 1/2 way through the first 4 cycles. I'll have an additional 12 of a different drug after these are done. I am tolerating it ok as long as I stay on top of my nausea-med schedule and am very careful about eating on time/sleeping when I need to. Except for this whole immune system thing.

The following may be TMI, so feel free to stop here with reassurance that as of this morning I still have hair, I'm not horking everywhere, and I'm going to beat this with somewhat less energy/determination than Maggie Smith while she Professor McGonnegal'd during breast cancer chemo, but still, I'll get there. Yes I just made McGonnegal a verb, and why shouldn't she be?

I went to Round 1 on the 16th with a cold. THE cold everyone else is getting right now, with the cough that lasts a couple of weeks and generally makes life miserable and snotty. The nurses all felt terrible for me as I coughed into a mask while they did the chemo dance. So let's discuss the actual process here.

1. weight/BP/temp collected
2. Remember that port under the skin in my chest I had surgically installed on the 9th? The one where I HORRIFIED my surgeon by casually commenting I'd get an all-over skull tattoo before my hair grows back (to which he visibly recoiled before patting my knee and saying "you do you", and my mom and I cackled like a couple happy witches in the pre-op room)? At chemo, you pick whatever heated reclining chair you prefer out of the 3 areas of chairs, grab a snack and some water, and settle in for a WHILE. Then, the nurse comes to stick an L shaped needle into the port and tape it down, which makes me instantly IV'd.
3. IV flush. I can taste and smell rubbing alcohol in the back of my throat. Gross. 
4. Port draw. Chemo nurses are very charming, kind vampires who take as many vials of blood as they want, thanks. 
5. Now we start the drugging, but not chemo yet. First, three small syringes of prescription anti-nausea meds. Those stay in my system about 48 hours, so this morning I'm currently on 5 different drugs just to combat nausea. FUN! My mouth is dry. 
6. My treatment currently consists of two different chemotherapy: the first is bright red and comes in 3 big syringes. The nurse has to administer them by hand because each syringe goes in over 10 minutes and if any gets on my skin it's a bad deal. We chat about her kids and how the holidays are going and other random things, then after the third one is in we wait a few minutes with the saline drip. 
7. Please note the saline drip or some other liquid has now been pumping fluids into my central line IV for about an hour straight. 
8. The final round of IV drugs hangs for about an hour. My bladder can NEVER make it that long, but luckily the bathrooms are huge and the IVs are on wheels, so much like the boys in Armageddon I can wheelie myself down the hall to pee. Unlike them, I get to be in real clothes and there's no anal probing first. I promise that link is SFW. If you don't know what I'm talking about, go watch Armageddon again. 
9. AFTER the chemo is done, I get my alien attachment. Instead of anything icky, it's more like  temporary insulin pump that sticks to my belly and waits 27 hours before injecting a booster that helps my bone marrow make more white blood cells. Turns out this one is pretty damned important. 

Remember the cold? So I tolerated round 1 of chemo just fine, didn't have some of the worse side effects that could happen (I knocked on all the wood, really). But I had that stupid cold. Which was fine until Saturday, then it kicked my ass in no uncertain terms. I spent Saturday night until Monday morning in bed, unable to do anything but drink water and throw up and sneeze and cough. I lost 18lbs. I went in for chest x-rays on Monday last week to check for pneumonia - nope, just bronchitis. "Just" bronchitis. So last week while Christmas was sort of happening I was drugged to the teeth with a steroid, big time cough syrup, antibiotics, and an inhaler. And orders to go directly to the ER if I get a temperature at all. Fun times. Remember how Chemotherapy is intended to kill rapidly-growing cells (this is why hair loss is a side effect - it can't distinguish which KIND of fast-growing cells)? That means white blood cells too...which make up the majority of your immune system and are made in bone marrow. One week after chemo, Oncology does labs again to check how low my immune system dropped because that gives us a baseline. Mine was frighteningly low...so I've been mostly hermiting or wearing a mask when I'm out in public because I can't get strep. I can't get the flu. I can't get whatever next cold is coming around...I don't want a repeat of that weekend before Christmas.

TODAY is the day after treatment 2, and I mostly feel good. I figure the cough will stick around a while yet but I seem to be over the rest, and the worst thing I'm dealing with today is random tiredness. Eating breakfast (so I can take pills) required a 20 minute nap afterward. Walking up the stairs to login at work took a few minutes of pause at the top. Invalid-ness sucks when you're used to doing your own thing, I'm not gonna lie. But this is temporary, and I'm 1/2 way through my first 4 cycles. Tonight my family is doing Christmas dinner and presents and stuff (we had important people out of town last week) and I'm excited I'll be able to taste fancy food...and see what chemo makes weird.

A Booby Prize

Wednesday was a day of doctors. I suppose I should be getting used to that, but so far I haven't. My surgical follow up was exactly as planned, except for getting a LOOK and a very snarky "and now you're sore, AREN'T YOU" comment from the surgeon for shoveling that morning. Yeah yeah. Lesson learned. Sadly, even though I'm healing fine and all my franken-ness is now stitch-free, the inside isn't fully healed (hence the chastisement for shoveling, because heavy lifting/labor could tear scar tissue and cause issues). Therefore, he said wait until after the new year to go back to kickboxing. This was Wednesday morning, before that last test came back and before I met my Oncologist. We'll get back to that in a minute.

Related: a friend of mine apparently objects to "Frankenboob" not because it's rude, nor because it's inaccurate (after all, Frankenstein was the doctor, not the monster), but because it does't "roll off the tongue in a poetic way". I have the best mental image of him testing, out loud, each different technical and slang term for every part of a breast to find the right combo(he assures me that's exactly what happened while stuck in traffic the other day). "Frankenboob" will now be "Frankenknocker". FK for short, which works for me on multiple levels. 

It DOES sounds more lyrical. I have no argument.

Wednesday afternoon I met my team at MN Oncology. It's ridiculous that FK has a team.

My Oncologist is also very kind and direct, a quality I appreciate since she had less than stellar news. The two tumors I had removed were sent to a lab in California for something called an Oncotype test. Essentially it's a genetic test done on the tumor itself, which is then plugged into a statistical database that's been built over however many decades of cancer research of my particular type to spit out a percentage of likelihood my cancer would come back anywhere in the body. The tumor originally found on my mammogram isn't a big deal: it's grade 1 (slow growing, not aggressive). That littler one though, that's the mean one. Grade 3 is more aggressive: my risk factor is too high.

So. I will have a port put into my chest sometime next week and get an electrocardiogram on my heart sometime in the next two weeks (did you know one of the awesome side effects for chemo can be heart damage? I didn't either.) and on the 16th I'll start five months of chemo (assuming, of course, that everything goes according to plan, which honestly hasn't happened since I went in for a routine mammogram). Radiation will start after chemo. There isn't currently any detectable cancer in my body, just to be clear: the intent of this round of treatment is to kill anything that's too small to detect so it doesn't come back anywhere else (that's what metastatic means - breast cancer with a wandering streak).

There's a door prize for getting told you're starting chemo in a couple of weeks. A nurse's assistant came in to give me a large 3 ring binder full of information, a nice clear list of which drugs are administered when, the side effects, and when I should call the office if side effects are bad. Along with the binder she awkwardly handed me a thermometer, like she KNEW it's ridiculous. But since three different kinds of fun poison will be dribbled in the port (each session will be a couple hours) and the drugs will kill off good cells and bad ones, my immune system will be sad and slow. Monitoring for fever will be a thing, and apparently adults don't usually have a thermometer at home, so they give everyone one when treatment starts.

Aren't I just a barrel of fun these days? Yeah, I think so too.

Kickboxing is off until next fall at the earliest (I've sadly already texted the head instructor in Burnsville to ask if we can put my membership on hold or if I should just start over, because it's too expensive to just let it sit and bill every month for that long). Honestly I'm pretty pissed about that.

I won't be able to shovel my own driveway this winter after all (looking into snow removal services now). I'm pissed about that too, for the expense and the inconvenience. However, I may not be so pissed about it when I don't have to bundle up and slide down my driveway. We'll see.

The rest I don't know about yet. Not everyone has the same side effects, but I plan for the worst and hope for better. Christmas/Yule stuff will depend entirely on how I react to treatment, which is every other week starting the 16th for two months, then weekly for three more months.

The big question here is will I rock the Telly Savalas look, or will I wig out...I don't know that yet either.

I suppose I could cancel the appointment I have for a haircut in December, though.

An Unexpected Unpleasant Side Quest

So, it's easier to just put this into a blog post than repeat things over and over for peeps who don't know yet. I haven't been around much the past few weeks for writing or anything else (other than horror movies and related distractions) because I'm in the middle of a thing.

It turns out, finding out I have breast cancer is a cognitive pause in brain function, followed by a weird hotdish of panic, practicality, research, and learning how to just not know what the fuck is going on.

Get your mammograms, peeps. This is not how I expected to spend my favorite season.

Facts as of today:

• I have "Invasive Ductal Carcinoma" which is the most common (80% of all breast cancers, according to the Komen website) form. It's very small, very early, and wouldn't have been found without going to a routine mammogram. 
• I've done a couple of tests and have a couple more coming up, but overall the treatment right now is a lumpectomy scheduled for early November, and most likely a round of radiation after. 
• Final determination for treatment will be decided by the pathology results after surgery, so chemo/hormone therapy could still happen, but as of today not likely. 
• I am expected to recover fully - this is non-aggressive (Grade 1) and I've never heard "you're young" so often from anyone since I turned 40, but apparently my age and the size/grade make a HUGE difference. 

This is a shitty path to take, but right now it's just another series of things I have to fit into my schedule. That's not to say it's no big deal: the past couple of weeks have been full of terror, but today is good.

Today I have a plan.
And I'm convinced by my medical team it'll be ok.
And I need a good name for the tumah (it IS a tumah, and if you haven't seen Kindergarten Cop you're probably too young to read any of this post) so I can say I'm kicking its specific cancerous ass.

Fucked Up Things I've Discovered (so far):

1. I am WAY TOO TALL for the stupid half-gown shirt things used at the breast center. Sigh. I am not a midriff-baring-shirt person...wtaf. 
2. Everything after the radiologist says "we see something, you need a biopsy asap, how's next Tuesday" sounds like the Peanuts adults mumbling. 
3. Breast biopsy needles look like an ear piercing gun's meaner older sibling, and sound equally as obnoxious. 
4. Breast biopsy procedures look suspiciously like a Xenomorph's second mouth taking super fast tiny Alien bites on the ultrasound machine. WELL OF COURSE I WATCHED IT...do you know me?
5. Breast MRIs are significantly more undignified than anything I've done outside a gyno office. Yes, I'm certain my indignity has only just begun, but you know...that was a new one for me. You sort of kneel/lie face down on an unholy offspring of a massage table and udder-milking setup, with all upper body weight on the sternum and ribcage between/under the boobs, because they have to hang into boxes for the scans. There is no full breath to be had (just re-reading that sentence made me take a HUGE breath in), and the 1/2-milker-box thing takes up any extra space in the MRI tube.So there is NO room to adjust. Related: I really need to lose some weight. Also related: SURPRISE I'm not claustrophobic.  
6. Turns out I can be in a seriously uncomfortable position without moving for 20 minutes out of sheer stubborn refusal to have to do this bullshit again (if you move during the longest scan, 9 minutes, they reschedule you for another day). 
7. I am capable of meditating while my ribs bruise.
8. Spa music and noise cancelling headphones don't get rid of the MRI noise. 
9. No amount of music can distract from feeling a troupe of fairies frantically dancing on my back during the final scan. Fucking weird. 
10. MRI dye doesn't give you superpowers. I'm sorely disappointed. 

And now, I'm off to snuggle one of my favorite babies AND have dinner and watch horror movies with some of my favorite family.

Today is good. 

More Things Ragnar Ate and Drunk Walrus Impersonations. These Are Unrelated.

Once in a while, I re-up a subscription to one of those monthly boxes of random fun stuff, just because who doesn't like getting a box of something NOT bills in the mail? 

This month, it was a witchybox full of various pagan bits and pieces (um, let's be clear I mean bits and pieces of things that are often associated with witches and pagans, not bits and pieces OF a pagan...that'd be gross, and way messier than this box turned out to be). 

Ragnar apparently thought the box smelled fascinating. Therefore, Ragnar ripped the box apart in the middle of my office floor when I was in another room. 

Interestingly, there was some incense, some bath salts (the sort for bathing in, not the sort that turn a person into a face-eating zombie), a candle or two, a set of Tarot Cards...and the ONLY thing he destroyed was the box the cards came in. My wall-eating, shoe-devouring, garbage destroying dog OPENED the jar of bath salt and very carefully didn't eat any, and left everything else alone. 

I'm fairly certain that box came with some sort of anti-dog-destruction spell, and it seems to be persistent. 

Last night I used some of the salts. I usually leave the bathroom door open a little so they don't scratch at it when I'm in a bath, and Ragar slammed his way enthusiastically into the room per usual. Then he stopped, all four legs went completely stiff, his hackles went up just a little, and he stared in horrified disbelief. Seriously, his message "WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK ARE YOU DOING?" was crystal clear, and hilarious. He wouldn't come near the bathtub, and jumped back if I moved the water. He made a ridiculous whine/growl noise and ran out of the room. 

You guys, I'm not kidding: he went to get Angus. My dog tattled on me for being in the bathtub, and brought the actual ruler of the household in to check. Ragnar stayed over a foot away from the tub while Angus jumped on the side, licked my knee, batted the water a little, and settled there to watch floating lavender bits. It's possible he stuck his face in the water and sneezed. I was laughing too hard to be certain. 

Ragnar continued his protest by lying on the bathroom floor and keeping both eyes on us, clearly worried the horrible water monster would kill us both. He grumbled like an old man for the entire time. 

He also ate both of my last two pairs of sunglasses recently: he gets zero sympathy. 

In other news, I'm taking my open-water scuba diving certification dives this weekend. In order to do said dives, I'm required to go to the scuba shop and try on wetsuits (because it's September in MN and lakes are starting to cool off, especially at 20 feet down). 

Have you ever tried on a wetsuit? I mean the 7mm version, not the cute skinny 3mm half suits used for warm weather/warm water stuff. Have you ever tried to pull on a pair of tights that REFUSE to allow you to pull them all the way up so the crotch is, well, in the crotch? It's infinitely harder to do when the fucking tights are weird rubbery material that squishes under your fingers and doesn't move much. 

WHO INVENTED THIS FRESH HELL? Seriously, I'd like to put the wetsuit creator in the same room as the dipshit who invented thong underwear or control-top pantyhose and beat them all with something humiliating. Like a giant dildo. 

I'm 6' tall, and I'm not one of those willowy thin tall chicks. Wrangling my buns into that thing involved flailing, heavy breathing, sweating, swearing, and eventually falling over like a damn drunk walrus. And having dropped off my yoga practice and not having any natural contortionist ability, I had to leave the dressing room and get help to zip it up. Since I wasn't actually GOING diving, I wasn't in a swimsuit - awesome. 

I have to do this tomorrow and Sunday in front of people...if I don't cause the rest of the divers to fall overboard and drown from laughing too hard, I deserve a goddamned medal. 

I Regret That Email, Just A Little

I opened an email yesterday in my phone. 

Writing that sentence is weird. I'm a tail-end GenXer...that means it was a HUGE deal for me to get a regular old corded phone in my room as a teenager. Email was still a newish thing in schools/colleges when I went to UMD as a freshman; it was there and we all used it for fun, but nothing class-related. The year after I graduated college was the first to issue computers to incoming freshmen in addition to computer labs as part of the semester fees. If you're too young to remember any of that and wonder what sort of "back in the olden days" I'm talking about, don't worry: pretty soon that'll be in history classes. But 20 year old me would've had utterly no clue how I could check email on any phone. 

I'm wandering today: I'm trying a new sort of non-Starbucks-addiction coffee with a nifty cold-brew carafe thingy. Apparently sugar rush of a mocha hits faster than the caffeine, so I'm getting used to a longer fog since this is sans all extras. Incidentally, Ragnar is lying on the office floor next to me eating the cardboard box for the carafe. Since his teeth are full of cardboard instead of sheetrock, I'm ignoring it. 

So...yesterday evening I opened an email in my phone for a retailer I very occasionally purchase from but usually just browse the paper catalog. 

This morning I have 2 follow up emails from them, 8 hours apart, saying "did you see something you liked?" and "we noticed you were looking: don't forget". What the actual fuck, creepy catalog retailer? I mean, I know there is ZERO privacy on the interwebz, and that what you put out there is there forever even if you try to take it down, and that the NSA is watching all data. Whatever. I figure I could choose not to participate. But retail stalker emails showing exactly the last thing you looked at on their website, asking if you forgot your purchase, feels more like one of those bad perfume salespeople at the mall chasing you. She's wearing WAY too much of her own product and too-bright lipstick bleeding over the edges of her lipline or on her teeth, and following you three stores down the hall spraying that shit on the back of your head screaming "but you wore some, you MUST want to buy...I NEED A SALE!" 

This is why I keep my yahoo address for online shopping. And blogs. And maybe I'm just old...except I never liked the approaches from pushy lotion and perfume kiosk people at the mall either. 

Ragnar just left the room and it's suspiciously silent downstairs. I should go check on the status of the walls. 

Back with Spam - Oh Gloria, Your Marketing Fails.

I mean...I guess it's convenient that I can have groceries or pizza delivered right along with someone named Leah?

Honestly, Leah, even if I had the appropriate gear you're asking for, I have to say I'm not really the "any will do" type.

Dear Yahoo mail and the Gloria Coopers of the world (I assume she's the madam in this case?)...still not a dude.

What the actual fuck.

PS: Dear Instacart,

Stop enabling my laziness, you terrible siren song of convenience. Next time I have an I'm-crabby-bring-me-chocolate-or-die craving and can't bother to put on pants*, I'm looking you up, with a note saying just knock and leave groceries outside the door, because I still can't be bothered to pants. Thanks!


*You probably think this mood is too specific to occur often. You are wrong. 

A Series of Events, Mostly Fortunate

I was reminded recently via an unexpected and unusual channel that I've not blogged since Chewy's death, and since the reminder came with an "are you ok" query from an ex-boyfriend I had twenty years ago...

I am still alive.

This fall held a series of big changes and an overabundance of work...and I've been behind the curve on a lot of thinking and decisions. It's not depression, per se, but a sort of backlog of to-do items, both physical and not. I grew up on a hobby farm with horses - if you don't clean the shit out of the stalls regularly, it takes an astoundingly short amount of time for a mess to become a mountain. Seriously you guys, I've had this GIANT Ikea bookshelf installed in my guest room since August and it stood empty, glaring at me, until last week. Did you know librarianizing* your fiction after moving a couple of times leaves you with a list of missing titles you're SURE you used to own and have no idea where they ended up between here, Texas, and back here? Infuriating, and likely to be expensive. Sigh.

Honestly, everything writing-related has taken a back seat to sleep, including this blog. So, in effort to get back on the carpal-tunnel horse I'll include a few random items in this post. And tomorrow, I'll post the overdue Tiffany Reisz review I owe.

• I have ALMOST successfully completed my legal name change, and certainly this process after a divorce is a room in hell for the most banally evil sorts. I mean really...with a marriage certificate you just need to send a single piece of paper without any explanation.  When I went to Wells Fargo, I sat down and said "let's just start here: I'm changing my legal name, here's the documentation, I'm divorced, and I'm not sorry."** I'm equally annoyed and amused at explaining that their pity response is misplaced. The WF guy was cool, and said "ok, congrats then, let's fix this!

• I have a bunch of new books to read and review for Ancient History Encyclopedia. I also have that Tiffany Reisz book...and I need to decide pretty damn quick if I'll keep publishing under the old name or the new old name (I went back to my maiden name...technically I could've gone to ANY name, but "Awesome" seems too obvious and "Settergrendel" would only confuse people MORE than my actual last name, which is pronounced exactly as it's spelled and yet mispronounced about as often as I'm called sir. So, at least weekly. 

• I got my updated social security card AND my updated passport within 2 weeks. My driver's license is now 8 weeks and counting: good job MN DMV, you're officially months slower than the feds. My stupid TSA Pre-Check number has an expected wait time of NINETY DAYS before they even call to tell me what to do next to change my name. 

• Angus is a horrid and adorable homicidal fluffball who has scarred the shit out of my arms and legs. I'm considering getting him a puppy. I'm also considering putting together a book out of the Evil Overlord Facebook posts I've done (and those I have in a list waiting to be posted). 

• I now have five months to lose enough weight to be relatively comfortable on a flight from MN to Iceland to Glasgow. Shit. Related: I upgraded the gym membership earlier this week so I can continue not going to any gym but feel guilty when I see the receipt once a month. 

• I totally should've gone with Settergrendel. 

*Yes. I made up that word. What else accurately describes obsessively not only alphabetizing my books by author, but ensuring they're in correct SERIES order? That's right: Librarianizing. 

**As previously documented in this blog, while ex-husband and I are quite good friends to this day, the divorce wasn't a terrible thing, and ultimately better for us both. We had a celebratory dinner at Fogo de Chao the day we filed. 

Lo There.

Thank you Chewy, for spending most of your life here with us. We were lucky.  

When you see Thor, tell him I miss him, too. 

A Collection of "WTF" Moments

I don't have a real post today, just a couple things not sufficient to be separate postiness. 

Yesterday I realized that Lifetime is both blatant and subtle in their fitness encouragement. The towels in the locker room, for example, don't fit anyone with over 110lbs OR with a D cup. Because what better way to make a woman feel huge than by providing a scratch hand towel for showers. Honestly, I'm both irritated and vaguely impressed at the all-encompassing reminders within those walls to get in shape. And every time I go, I think "what am I doing here, I could hike and lift weights at home for free". 

Chewy is hanging on like a champ, far longer than I thought he would. He's discovered the fabulous world of painkillers, and gets about two hours per day of perkiness. Death and I still hang on the couch while Chewy snores (he's sleeping about 20 out of every 24 hours). I considered asking him to teach me Backgammon or Canasta, but decided I don't really want to play games with Death. 

Therefore, since I hold the control to the remote, I've gotten him addicted to The Real Housewives of New York and Below Deck Mediterranean. MWAHAHAHA. 

Hey! I don't watch them...I have no idea what you're talking about. I read instead!  

Anyway...I'm done with this post, except I found some neat things in my iphone notes: 

Cal King Sheets - It's not that weird - I have to give family a birthday list, this happens to be the first item

Knitting Assassin - Have you SEEN the eyeball-poker weapons used for knitting? Seriously. Fear the quiet ones.

The first time she ate his heart... - No lie, I have no idea what this was for, and that only makes it better. 

the path of flames - Random book title I keep meaning to find in the library.

Quilters Dark Web - Jodie, I'm looking at you for a quilt that opens a dimensional portal. Preferably not to Hell - be careful.

 

Lickubus - Incubii are male sex demons. Succubii are female sex demons...NOTHING I add to this is appropriate for anyone. Move along. 

Dad's sloppy joes - After all the others I know it sounds dirty. Nope - actual recipe. Yum. Also, seems like an excellently weird non-sequitor from the Lickubus note.

Ta tu cuis anois - "you're hers now".  In reference to Brighton Beach north of Duluth, MN, where Lake Superior occasionally uses her deadly power not to sink ships, but to gently sculpt rocks into heart shapes. I LOVE that. 

If someone ever stole my phone, I think the horror of the weird shit in there would prompt them to give it back before I kill them. 

Opening a Memory Box in My Brain.

Yesterday I visited the house I grew up in for the first time in a decade. Ten years ago, my parents moved to California for work adventures and rented out the 40-some acre hobby farm. Now, they're getting it ready to sell and I had a chance to poke around rooms I lived in from nine to nineteen. None of these memories are related - they all struck in random pictures from the dusty trunks in the attic of my head.

And as I drove down the back-roads in the country from my grandma's house to my old place, memories bounced around behind my eyeballs - some sort of washing over in a quick flash, some giving a hard Junebug-on-the-windshield smack to my brain.

The house my best friend lived in on Martin road, where I spent long Friday nights with her plotting futures. We went to prom with our boyfriends as a double date - that was the time I lost the $100 bill down the front of my dress (people, this is the shit that happens when I foolishly attempt to be sexy or flirtatious, seriously) and royally pissed off my boyfriend. Rightly so, really. She and I are friends on Facebook now, and it seems like life went a lot like the intended plan for her, which is awesome. My path has twisted and turned so often I can't even remember what I wanted during those long conversations. Funny how that works.

I passed that spot on the two lane road in the country where my little Mazda 323 hit a patch of slush on my way to work in the mall. I was seventeen. I think I spun a total of three and a half times that day, somehow managed to stay in the center of the road instead of flying off into the ditch, and ended up facing the right way in the wrong lane. I remember the exhilaration and fear, and giggling as I moved over into my own lane and went off to work. Pretty sure I never told my parents THAT one.

My high school boyfriend's house, still standing back in the trees behind the wooden privacy fence, although the bar across the road is gone and a new stop sign has been added on the corner. His parents were always home when I spent time there.

His parents had very different rules for their son than mine had for their daughter, and some kisses will never be told.

I had a 10:30 curfew in high school. I'd leave his house frantically at 10:20 for the fifteen minute drive home and speed the whole way, usually getting there a minute or two late.

I can still be made late by a romantic relationship. I'm still not sorry.

The road I lived on clearly hasn't been resurfaced since long before I moved away. The houses along the way are the same. The eagles still hang out in the treeline fifty yards back from the road, watching for anything hit by the speeders going over fifty-five. The one on the road as I passed gave me a distinct LOOK before lazily spreading an impressively terrifying wingspan and flying out of the way of my truck. I'm glad I wasn't on a bike.

The fence is down. The front pastures where first Kalli, then later Shadow, met me at the corner when the bus dropped me off after school are mostly gone. Only the line of mowed lawn versus thigh-high grasses marks the place the fence once kept our horses contained. The river, once easily visible where it splits one of the pastures, is lined by tall bushes and overgrowth without the herd keeping the space cleaned out. I used to drop my bookbag, duck under the fence, and jump on for a quick ride before going in the house, or go stick my feet in the cold water where it ran fast enough over the rocks to discourage leeches, and hang out with the herd for a while. Some days I'd just race Shadow from the end of the driveway to the gate. I always lost, but he's do an extra lap just for fun, and I could watch him run in joy forever. My big grey gelding who hated to walk when dancing or galloping was so much more fun. I wonder if he was happy with the three little girls who took over his care when I moved to the city and sold him to another family. I hope they spoiled him rotten while he lived.

The big wooden fence along the road is down, too. Even the area in the other pasture, where I watched a moose step over the five foot fence like it was a minor bump in the road.

The back was no different - fencing all down, burrs growing where no herds keep the overgrowth under control.

The arena where Shadow and I practiced dressage, the bit of barbed wire where I got the scar on my thigh when I was eleven, the gates I could open from horseback...they're all down, hidden in the tall grass as traps for the unwary.

I didn't even bother with the barn. Judging by the state of the garage and house, I think seeing the place I spent the most time outside of my own room in the same condition would just make me sad.

The house is...well, let's say a decade of renters has not been kind to the house, who now looks more like a decrepit, sad, toothless creature too far gone to help. I remember working with Dad to put the addition on the back, the room where we celebrated Christmas for years before they moved. I remember the spring I graduated from high school was when we renovated the bedrooms, the bathrooms, and the kitchen. I lived for a couple of months in a old camper in the driveway while my room was under construction. I used to bitch that I'd only get a fancy new room with NEW CARPET for a little while (turned out to be a year before I moved out), and that my parents installed a dishwasher right as I'd be leaving so my sisters wouldn't have to hand-wash on their chore night. Oh the unfairness of it all!

The carpet in my old room is the same deep blue, underneath all the stains. I used to sleep under the once-new window and have nightmares that Freddy Kruger could get into my room through that first floor slider. I probably shouldn't have watched late night tv back when Friday the 13th was an actual show...good imagination.

I don't remember my bedroom being quite so small, but then I was smaller when I lived in it, so I suppose time and distance play tricks on spatial relations.

I miss being able to smell horses and river when I slept with the window open. I miss going out in the cold dark winter nights to look for northern lights above the hill. I miss how quiet it is, living where there is no major freeway or busy city street or airport flight patterns all within earshot.

Part of me is sickly happy the house and buildings are in their current condition - I think it might be harder to imagine selling the place to a new family if it looked as it did when my parents moved out. And maybe someday I'll be lucky enough to again live where I don't share walls or yard-visibility with my neighbors, where I don't have to leash my dog and I can have horses in a pasture. We'll see.

Random Crap and Totally Inappropriate Lyrics

Does anyone else feel like 2017 is an extended (terrible) episode of the Twilight Zone? And that's all I'm going to say about the Oompa Loompa in charge, because I think it's covered better by all the media (social and mainstream) out there.

So, I haven't been here much since Thor died. I haven't honestly written much at all since then: worried about Chewy, hanging out with the family while they were in town for holidays, helping my ex get his stuff (well, the stuff left in my house/garage) ready to move down to Texas. My poor drawer-o-journals has been untouched for a couple of weeks now, which is pretty horrid since I MAY have bought yet another recently. *Sigh* yes, I have a problem. 

Tomorrow, I'm going to my first writing conference. It's stupid, but I'm beyond nervous: I'm bringing a page for critique (anonymously, thank all the deities out there) by agents, and signed up to do a pitch session. I can't decide if I'm pushing my boundaries in effort to become a professional writer someday, or if I'm just paying dearly for a moment of insanity months ago when I signed up to do this thing. Let's just all cross appendages that I stay within the non-arrestable forms of inappropriate behavior, shall we? 

Google says "arrestable" isn't a word. I disagree. 

I'm too nervous to come up with decent funny blog items tonight, but I AM back. And so instead I'll subject you to the dirtiest song I've actually ever heard (ok, that's not entirely true). No, I didn't know this song existed until the other day. Feel free to make fun of the video (which, if you listen to the lyrics has NOTHING to do with the song)...I did. Then I heard "cunning linguist" and really paid attention and HOLY CRAP they played this on the radio. Awesome and awfulsome. 

Not The Theme I Was Looking For This Week

This isn't a real post. It's not even a Star Wars post. Mostly because I'm still not really up to writing a lot yet. But I did have a WTF moment, so: 

Yesterday I found a news headline warning Canadians NOT to try to shove the moose licking their cars, because 1000lb moose can be...fussy...about being shoved. 

And, also, it's fairly pointless AND likely to piss off said 1000lb car-licking moose. 

But apparently in Canada (and, not gonna lie, potentially in northern Minnesota) people are bafflingly willing to try to push a giant cranky deer out of the way, and have to have a warning issued to not be so goddamned stupid? 

I'm not kidding. It wasn't even on HuffPo: it was BBC. 

http://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-news-from-elsewhere-38329779 

Anyway...today I discovered a website advertising "bargain moose" in my list of referring pages. 

What exactly constitutes a BARGAIN moose, as opposed to a full price moose? 

Is it the level of car-licking crankiness involved? 

Lo There Do I See My Beloved Thor

I love you, my dearest Furface. Thank you for giving me nearly 12 years of love, protection, companionship, and important lessons. You leave a crater behind, and we will miss you forever. 

May Valhalla be full of bunnies and cheeseburgers and snuggling and fetch, and may the gods watch over you. Don't nip Slepnir, honey - even you can't evade eight hooves.   

An Argument for Flowers and Frivolity

So I'm not usually a flowers sort of girl. If I have a yen to have some in the house I'll often just buy some myself, and I tend to befriend (with or without a romantic relationship attached) practical, generally awesome men who insist they do not ever give flowers to anyone. OF COURSE I considered the practical, generally awesome women in my group as well: they're about a 50/50 split for and against, but those who don't do the flower thing usually don't feel a need to give a reason other than "I don't like flowers." See counterpoint #2.

At Renaissance Festival, one of my fabulous friends had a rose sent to me anonymously, just because she knew it would brighten my day, and ever since then I've been rolling the usual arguments against gifting flowers in my head when discussing the custom with friends/lovers/etc.

1) "Flowers die/Why would I buy someone I care about a present that dies/How is that a symbol of my affection?" 

So, let's blow off the obvious argument that physical beauty is temporary, because insisting flowers have no value because their physical beauty only lasts a short time can be extended to other things. You know...like your hot partner who may not be so hot later. I'm sure that's not the intent of the argument.

Everything dies. Pets die: do we NOT have a pet because we'll outlive them? Cars die. Gardens die. For crying out loud, even electronics die. The argument against buying flowers because they die is ridiculous: what's unsaid is "they die too fast."

Ultimately, it is based on a faulty assumption that the person will outlive the flowers. There are no guarantees that any of us will still be here tomorrow. Flowers are an indication that you appreciate the NOW- the current state of your recipient's beauty, the current affectionate thought you had for them, the current state of your relationship.

2) "I'm not spending money on something so frivolous/I don't like flowers."

To be fair, I hear this one less, but I have still heard it, and it's the most annoying reason. The argument is just...sigh. It's a lie. There is value in frivolous things. OH DO LET ME GIVE YOU AN EXAMPLE. How often do you pay for beer/pizza in a bar, or get Chinese takeout/delivery when you could make groceries you already have in your fridge at home?

What you're really saying is YOU don't value the effect a flower has on your partner enough to pay for it, but you're happy to pay for frivolous things YOU value. Hmm. So, that becomes a "when you purchase something expressly to give as a gift, do you buy something YOU like, or do you buy something you know THEY like?" discussion.

I think there IS an argument for buying someone flowers if s/he has expressed a desire to receive them and values them as a gift, simply because it would make them happy regardless of your feelings on the topic. My ex-husband and I had almost this exact discussion over a decade ago about roses, and he did occasionally bring them home or send them to me even though he still thinks they're silly, because he knew it mattered to me. I loved that he made the gestures, because I knew he did it purely to give me something I liked.

Today, Starbucks is the MOST frivolous thing I spend my money on. I mean really...I recognize the terrible silliness and waste. And yet, taking me out for coffee or bringing me my favorite drink when I wake up is one of the kindest things a person can do for me: it makes my whole day, and I'm not lying when I say I feel absolutely LOVED because of it. Because of a stupid $6 glass of caffeine and chocolate that we all know is ridiculous.

3) "Flowers aren't useful, they just sit there." 

Let's be clear that giving flowers isn't really a physical gift. Sure, they're pretty and smell nice, but that's after the recipient has already gotten the real present: the FEELING. The rose I received at Fest didn't last longer than a day or two, but that was weeks ago and I still remember the feelings I had when I got it: surprise, joy, a little bafflement that anyone would bother doing such a gesture for me.

Flowers impart an instant "aww, someone thought of me" feeling. The feeling can be romantic, homey, happy, warm fuzzies of friendship, or any of a bazillion variations. Receiving a flower is an instant of brightness to a day. Flowers in a home conveys a happy, inviting energy right along with their beauty and scent, not unlike burning candles or incense.

4) "Well, why don't women buy ME flowers?"

Ah, the WORST of all arguments, because it's a classic turn-the-topic-back-to-me tactic which pretty much indicates there's no reason to try to rationally discuss it any further. Ultimately, this argument become a moot point. If you repeatedly vocalize your distaste for something as a gift, why on earth would anyone would give that gift to you?


Look, I'm not saying anyone should change their mind if they really hate giving flowers over something else - I'm just offering counterpoints to the reasons I hear most often. Life is often dark and difficult and just plain exhaustingly hard. Flowers might be frivolous, but life NEEDS a little bit of that sometimes. My particular circle of friends and loved ones, men and women, are generally excellent: thoughtful, considerate, kind, and both frivolous and practical. I'm lucky that way, or maybe I'm particularly choosy that way in the people with whom I surround myself. And because of it, I still expect if I want a dozen roses on my table I'll need to pick them up myself. Ultimately, I'm good with that. And speaking of, it's a gloomy day today. I think my counter vase needs some colorful residents - Cub flower section, here I come.

After Starbucks. Priorities, people. Priorities.

Dear Universe: Point to You.

So, this* showed up in my mail yesterday. I am, indeed, amazed.


And not un-coincidentally, I laughed the sort of cathartic, belly-wrenching, tear-streaming, choking snort-laugh that only happens when ALL THE THINGS stifled inside are suddenly and shockingly jarred loose. Those of you who reached, offering kindness and chocolate and sandbar (or alcohol bar) support, I love you. Thank you for helping me until I found a way to shore.


Which I have, Universe, you colossal weirdo. Because, who the fuck expects THIS in the mailbox? Clearly, the photographer surprised her: of all the candid camera  shots...




Pretty sure SHE'S amazed...at just how far she can get her own tongue up her nose.

*For the record, I did look up the organization. It's a non-profit dedicated to helping people not only get fed, but start their own livestock farms for continued prosperity. So while I can make fun of the catalog itself, (from what little research I did) it seems like a cool concept. 

Fortune Favors the Weird

So, I collect "interesting" fortune cookie fortunes. I don't put "in bed" on the end when I read them out loud...mostly because I've gotten some impressively awful ones over the years.





If you're feeling down, try throwing yourself into your work. Or anywhere other than work, because what the fuck will make you feel LESS happy when you're depressed than drowning in work?? Why not throw yourself into a hot bath with wine and chocolate, or in bed with your significant other, or on the floor with a cuddly dog?



Avert misunderstanding by calm, poise, and balance. And good aim when you lose calm, poise, and balance and start throwing things. Not that I throw things. I'm more likely to go to the range or the heavy-bag for an hour...in which case I reiterate: good aim.

Deep faith eliminates fear. So does a deep bottle of wine. Just sayin.





If you love something, set it free...if it returns, keep it and love it forever. Unless it's cake. If it's cake, eat it all and enjoy every delicious bite, because who knows when you'll get cake again?





BLANK I've gotten no less than three blank fortunes. It's the universe warning me about the zombie apocalypse, I'm sure. See? WHO KNOWS when you'll get cake again?




Cookies go stale. Fortunes are forever. WELL. That's not ominous at all.




All things have an end. As if the blank fortunes needed to be clearer in their DOOM DOOM DOOM messaging...




Fortune Not Found: Abort, Retry, Ignore? FUCKING REALLY?? REALLY??

I'm Not Even That Caffeinated Today.

I'm taking a break from the book to blog, because what's better for a writing break than...more writing? I don't know how to explain that it IS different. So, while my bloodthirsty eagle soars over the steppe and considers human snacks (in my head, people, in my head), here are some random items of note, none of which are enough for a real post:

• Someone found my blog by googling "pithy snake" which I find both disturbing and intriguing. 
• I put out mouse traps because fall = the critters in the crawlspace attempting to invade. Baited with peanut butter. 
• Fucking ants ate ALL the goddamned peanut butter off both traps in such an efficient and interesting manner (seriously, it's like they had their own tiny highway or fire brigade bucket line) I just let them have it all. 
• So...Dear Lowes: I need rodent poison for the crawlspace, peanut butter for the traps in my house, and ant killer.
• The AC guy told me all about his divorce last week while he was waiting for his counterpart to come help him fix the compressor. AC guy is a new one - taxi drivers, plane passengers, library patrons, and all manner of random acquaintances are all on the list of "strangers who tell me all their personal stuff". I am amused. 
• AC guy totally paid for his listening session by going into the crawlspace to turn the outside water back on, despite having an expressed fear of spiders. He couldn't find the spigot, but did confirm creatures of the furry AND arachnid variety in abundance in the fucking crawlspace. 
• Dear Lowes: please add a shop vac (for mouse poop and spiderwebs), some sort of Shelob killer, and perhaps a person braver than I am to venture down there. 
• A couple people have asked in the past why I don't just go get a counseling degree and open a practice. I actually have an answer because I've considered it. Were I to get a degree it would be in trauma counseling, not relationship/marriage counseling. And in general, while I'll give advice if asked I try really hard to ONLY be an ear and let people figure out their shit on their own. I seem to be found when I'm needed by those who need an ear (let's be clear that in the cases to which I'm referring, it's not ME they're looking for, it's a sympathetic and/or non-judgmental human willing to listen), and fuck making a living off that - I'd be exhausted all the time. 
• In Spam mail I read the subject line too fast and could've sworn the email said "Dental Breast Implants", which I found to be a heartily disturbing mental image, and a seriously funny ad. Sadly, it was really for normal dental implants, no boobs involved. 
• In all honesty, I took a break from both the book AND the blog to watch this week's episode of Killjoys on SyFy. If you aren't watching this show, what the fuck is WRONG with you? You're missing absolute gold. And OH LOOKY THERE, the whole first season is streaming on Syfy's website. 

I have another couple thousand words to go today, so this is the end of my not-post. There is another goddamned cellar spider in the corner of the ceiling at the top of my stairs. Last time one of those dudes hung out there, a wolf spider the size of my palm came to eat him. No, thank you, 8 legged wonders of horror. I appreciate your function OUTSIDE the house. 

Vacuum, then write. 

PS: It's 5:30pm in August, and it's 66 degrees out. YES YES YES!

I Heart Internet News

Blame Jay Leno for my never ending amusement at awfulsome headlines. 

Religious People Say They Don't Watch Porn. Internet Data Says Otherwise. Um, I feel like "duh"should be somewhere in this headline. Maybe even "fucking duh?". 

Catholic Bishop's Advice For Divorced, Remarried Catholics: Stop Having Sex. Clearly, he thinks they should just watch more porn. In true creepy fashion, said Bishop actually suggests remarried divorcees should live like 'brother and sister'.  I think he reads too much VC Andrews and needs to be sent back to Seminary.  

Here's how long you can look someone in the eye without creeping them out. OOH! A new skill to learn for commuting and long, uncomfortable meetings. 

How can people with narcolepsy drive safely? Um...

Stop judging ugly fruits and vegetables. You're hurting their feelings, you insensitive jerkfaces. Right before you slice them into tasty tasty salad toppings. 

Just a reminder that alligators show up in trees. What the fuck. Now they can climb goddamned trees, so in Florida you not only have to worry about SNAKES dropping out of a tree on your head (oh yeah, it happens people), but fucking ALLIGATORS can ambush you from above? Who allowed this shit? Darwin, I'm looking at you. 

Live out your dreams of frolicking with farm animals through virtual reality.  Seems like a legit alternative to Pokemon. Or internet porn? Remember the post about billy goats? Yeah. I'm stopping now. 

Starbucks is giving all US workers a raise. And, by the way, raising drink prices by 30 cents. Once, long long ago, I convinced my ex to quit smoking by saying "do you REALLY want to spend $10 a day on cigarettes?" I suppose I'm going to have to break the iced mocha addiction soon for the same reason. 

Why I Can't Ever Attend the Kentucky Derby

I watch the Triple Crown every year...from the no-hat-required, jeans-friendly couch in my house. My family texts off and on all day before the Kentucky Derby: after all, for those of us in Minnesota the Derby is the last sign that winter is truly over, because horse racing season has begun. It's similar to Winter/Construction being the two seasons up here, except Race season is far less annoying traffic-wise.

Anyway, we make fun of the horrendous outfits (OH MY GOD Rutledge, really? How far the mighty Top Gear host hath fallen), the hats that could apply for their own zip code and MUST require a gallon of mint juleps just to step out the door (assuming a head that huge could get through a doorway), and the host (who apparently stole life-size My Little Pony hair to create that cotton candy pink thing on his head).

I know it sounds mean, but if you're going to go to a multi-million dollar event wearing a hat that literally looks like you stole it from Strawberry Shortcake and be on camera, I have no sympathy.

This year, we discovered it's possible I need a new prescription for my glasses.
ACTUAL horse's name: DESTIN.
What I saw: DESITIN (for those of you without spawn or diaper-changing duties EVER in your life, Desitin is a baby butt cream).

I'm not kidding, the following texts flew from LA to Duluth, MN, to Minneapolis yesterday:

Me: That horse Destin? I keep seeing "Desitin instead and I think his name is BUTT CREAM.
Me: GO BUTT CREAM!
Mom: Run your butt off!!
Aunt: RUN BUTT CREAM RUN!
Aunt: What # was Butt Cream??

Race happens (NO TEXTING DURING THE RACE!)

Aunt: Poor Butt Cream came up from the rear...butt lost.*
Mom: ROFL
Aunt: Butt Creme will get it in the end.

And that's why I can't ever go the Kentucky Derby in real life. 

*For the record, Destin kicked himself into serious high gear on the final stretch and came from the back of the pack to 6th.
Go Butt Cream!

Dear porn surfers: I bet THIS wasn't what you were looking for when you googled "butt cream" and, again, NO SYMPATHY. Mwahahahaha.