Frightful….

On the way back from salsa dancing last Wednesday night, my dance partner and i realized that we needed some additional supplies for a Friday night Halloween party.  Stopping by one of the seasonal Halloween costume stores on the way home, i was a little concerned that i’d look out of place in the store.

One of the things that gets me jazzed up for salsa is wearing a flippy skirt with heels and my “snap on” hair*.  Last week, i was also wearing a funky new top that i’d found on sale somewhere.  Hot pink, with just the right amount of “skank” to make it fun!

Slightly self-conscious about my get up – especially for a woman close to fifty years old – we went in and wandered the crowded aisles looking for the necessary costume bits for the Friday night gig.  Finding most of what was needed, we headed up to the check out line.

The young woman working at the register was a bit on the ‘goth side’.  She  was very tall, weighed perhaps 85 pounds, and had long straight black hair.  She went through the check out process and was bagging up my purchases…

goth clerk:  That’s a great top!  Where did you get that?

daisyfae:  Found it on-line.  It was marked down.  i think i only paid about twenty bucks for it…

goth clerk:  It’s just really different.  The styling is just great…

daisyfae [enjoying the attention]:  Thank you!  We go salsa dancing on Wednesdays, so this seemed perfect…

goth clerk:  That’s just something I really think my Mom would like…

daisyfae:  [nearly audible pop, deflating] Ummm…. right…. thanks!

As soon as we’re out the door…

daisyfae:  Fuck you, Stick Girl!  Shouldn’t you be at home listening to “Dashboard Confessional” and cutting yourself?

~~~~~~~~~~~

* Which also adds to the fun on the dance floor, as i can whack my dance partner in the face with a slug of polyester curls on the fast turns!  Keeps him on his toes!

What cookies?

It’s been an unpleasant and slow slog, but i’ve managed to evaporate about 35 pounds since January.  On average, a pound a week.  Not great, not terrible.  But i’ve “plateaued” for a few weeks, and have been trying hard to jump start the weight loss again with lots of exercise and careful attention to diet.

That means no fucking cookies.

Having The Girl living with me again has had some benefits.  i haven’t had to go to the grocery in about two months.  She gets food.  She prepares it and leaves tasty vegetarian scraps in the refrigerator.  Much like Christmas morning, i am often delighted with the yummy green and crunchy* things wrapped in cellophane in the fridge some mornings…

The downside is that she also bakes, or brings home, sweets on occasion.  i have no willpower.   i eat them.  They don’t put up a fight.

Last night, she got home rather late, and i’d just finished my crunching and push-ups workout and was getting ready for bed.  i heard the crackling of the packaging before i smelled them… Oatmeal Chocolate Chips Ahoy!  Not a favorite, but definitely something that would serve as a tasty bedtime snack!

Keeping it to just two small cookies, when i could easily gnaw my way through the entire package in a few short minutes, i instructed her to get them out of sight by morning.

daisyfae:  Hide them!  The last thing i need is to wake up and find these on the counter in the morning…

Upon waking up, and successfully scratching my bits, i found myself in the kitchen.  The debris from her late night dinner was evident, as there were a few pots and pans and other assorted cooking crap piled in the sink, and some clutter and mess on the counter.  Still asleep, but attempting to make tea, i reached for the pile of paper towels left in front of the microwave – and realized just then what a brilliant young woman she’s become…

Upon closer inspection…

Ahhh…. the old “hide in plain sight” trick.  Not exactly what i had in mind…  They survived the morning, but probably only because i’m battling the headcoldfromhell and with 5 pounds of lugubrious secretions inside my head, i couldn’t even taste the damn things. 

Need to get her a spot on the UN Weapons Inspection Team.  Bet they’d never get anything past her…

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

* Not to be confused with the “green and slimy” things that tend to set up residence in the fridge when i’m left on my own for a few months…

Karma’s a bitch

Somewhere in a past life, i must have tortured puppies.  The cutest ones.  Slowly.  With dull, rusty implements….

In fact, i’ve done some pretty nasty things in this life, but nothing i’ve done has earned me the karmic punishment du jour.

Another “required training opportunity”.  This time?  It’s the ugly 10 day “systems engineering lip service” class that i’ve cleverly kicked down the road for about 7 years.  It has sproinged into life and latched it’s rabid jaws firmly on to my professional ass.  This is the last one required.  At least i hope so – or i’ll end up on the evening news amidst a bloodbath.

The last one was painful, but only five days.  The latest?  Ten days.  At the two day point, i’ve already chewed the insides of my cheeks bloody.  My credo is simple…

Stay awake.  Smile.  Be respectful to the instructors and my classmates.  Don’t shoot Bambi*.  Remember the course is “pass/fail” – there are no bonus points for over-achievement.  Do the minimum required/expected.  Leave the room in an efficient manner.  Don’t fuck over my team mates.  Repeat all of the above as necessary.

Usually i can spot him by the third day.  The crusty ‘elder professional’ who decides that the course will be significantly enhanced by endless contributions of war stories.   Oh, no… we have an over-achiever this time.  Rearing his head mid-day during the FIRSTFUCKINGDAY of a TENDAYCOURSE he regaled us with his vast knowledge of nothing anyone cared one micro-fraction of a nanofuck about….

On the first day?  We were fifteen minutes late for lunch because he just couldn’t contain his excitement about a cost/schedule over-run from 1987.  i could not make this shit up.  19-fucking-87.

On the bright side?  The two tag-team instructors are with us.  They have already promised us that if we behave, and stay on track, we can finish up the course requirements in a mere nine days, giving us all a magical three day weekend!  Woo-diddly-hoo!  Instructors who are just as interested in “checking the fucking box” as we are… this is a “win-win”!

If Mr. Elderfuckly Crustacean McYaptard doesn’t get with the program by tomorrow?  He’s going to find himself encased in a body cast of Post-it Notes, and stuffed unceremoniously in the supply closet with a broom for a butt-buddy for the remainder of the course….

Trust me, motherfucker, you DO NOT want to know what i've apparently done in prior lives...

* “Bambi”.  Standard callsign for the young, sweet and naieve engineers in attendance.  If they want to pipe up with some inane but marginally relevant tidbit from their personal experience, i will not roll my eyes and start pantomiming a game of Russian Roulette with my dry erase marker… They are cute.  They aren’t dangerously burnt out yet.  Like me…

Last call…

For the past twelve years, i’ve observed an annual ritual that marks the beginning of winter… It has nothing to do with the calendar, digging out cold-weather gear, the phase of the moon or the location of leaves with respect to the ground. 

It takes about 15-20 minutes, depending on how warm it is outside.  But when it’s done, i am ready.  My mental register is reset and my body prepared for cold. 

Waiting as long as possible, hoping for just one more warm day where i can eek out that last moment before giving up til spring.  Watching the skies.  Adjusting my plans to push the envelope as far into the year as possible.  Me and the true love of my life… On the road.  Basking in an October blue sky and sucking down the cool, dry air.

Today was the day.  Some years i can make it til early November, but my gut told me today was it.  Returning home from an afternoon bike ride, i set the wheels in motion.  Literally.  Grabbing the dog, we hit it…

In the Jeep.  She is my one and only.  And today was likely to be the last day of true Indian Summer.  We scooted off to the dog park, taking back roads and hitting every bump in the road with joy.   As the sun got lower, the chill set in, and we had to head home…

Before we left, i’d taken the hose to the doors and top, and left them on the warm concrete driveway to dry and soften* in the sun.  We pulled into the garage, and i unloaded the mutt back into the house.  And the ritual began…

Untie the bungees and straps, reset the frame, snap the top to the swing frame bar.  Standing on the seats, facing rearward, pull the top forward.  Doing gymnastics that could get me arrested in parts of Utah, i pull the front of the top into the groove above the windshield.  While standing on the hood. 

Climbing off, i tuck the flanges on the back of the top into the grooves.  Climbing inside, i then begin the brute force portion of the event – thwacking the support bars until the top is stretched and the cross beams are locked in place.  Re-stretching and aligning the velcro supports around the door frames.  Hanging the doors and making sure all’s well with the alignment.  The final maneuver? Release a gigantic sigh and call it a summer…

Winter.  Bring it…

From a Spring trip… He was smiling just as much today…

* There is an art to putting a soft top on a Jeep by yourself.  Best trick i’ve learned is to warm the black canvas top in the sun for an hour or so before attempting to stretch it onto the frame… i’ve busted open many a knuckle through the years attempting to put a brittle-cold cover back on my baby on a frigid day… hence the need for precision timing on the re-install… Too warm a day and i’ve probably jumped the gun, wasting precious jeep-time.  Too cold?  i’ll be bleeding from the fingertips and it’ll take an hour…

“Lord of the Flies” parenting, c.a. 1967

My childhood was idyllic.  Perhaps because life was actually good, or perhaps because i didn’t know there could be anything different.  My only view of other realities was through books, television and movies.  And other than “Swiss Family Robinson“, i never found a childhood situation i liked better.

In the end, it didn’t matter.  Until my hormones shipped me off to the realm of teen angst, i was a happy kid.

Dad worked, Mom was home.  In the late 1960’s suburbs in the midwestern United States, that was how things were.  Very few working Moms in the neighborhood.  Reading recent discussions on “the mommy wars” over at Anniegirl1138, got me reflecting on my own childhood.

Mom was responsible for all logistics at the homestead, was chauffeur for car-pooling operations, maintained order and was Chief Justice of the Family Supreme Court.  Did she hover?  Help us with homework?  Anguish over our choices of classes at school?  Insert herself into every aspect of our extra-curricular lives?  Not exactly…

Summer mornings were all pretty much the same.  My sister and i would wake up and forage in the kitchen for breakfast*, scratch our bits in front of the television for maybe a half hour, and were then expected to get our sorry asses outside.  For the entire day.  Mom had work to do**. Fortunately, there were dozens of children our age – the golden years were between 7 and 12 for me – so there was always someone to tag up with for adventures.

What did we do?  Nothing and everything.  No structured sports, summer camps or organized activities.  We filled the days with pick-up games of wiffle ball, kick ball, football, pickle or just random shit we’d make up.  Climbed trees.  Construction materials were stolen from building sites and turned into tree houses and forts.  Pylons (also stolen) set up in the largest driveways for bike rodeos.  We put on summer carnivals***.  We played “Capture the Flag” in the soybean field behind our house, against the older boys down the street….

Did our mothers have any fucking idea what we were doing?  Nope.  We’d stumble home around lunch time, grab something to eat, then it was back outside again.  We played Army.  We were spies, keeping notes on the activities of people in the neighborhood.  We’d become characters from TV shows… Brady Bunch, Gilligan’s Island, F-Troop****, Partridge Family, Lost In Space – and my personal favorite, Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea. 

Barbies?  Absolutely!  Intricate societal games with the collective Barbie Arsenal – trundled to someone’s garage in an armada of busted American Tourister suitcases that doubled as our Barbie houses.  These games would last an entire day… we’d build cities, create “soap opera” situations, work through adult problems as only children can do… At the end of the day, we’d often retrieve the Ken dolls from a corner of the garage, tied up with dirty shoelaces and abandoned.  On occasion, there were Barbie mutilations and sacrifice. 

Were there Moms watching this?  Nope.  Sometimes they’d wander by and offer Kool-Aid, but in general, we were on our own until dinner time.  Oh, we could run home mid-afternoon, but we had to make damn sure we didn’t wake up Mom, as she snored in front of “The Guiding Light”.  Much like awakening a hibernating grizzly, we knew better…

So long as we were home for dinner?  No one really gave a shit what we’d been doing all afternoon.  My first beer, my first cigarette, and my fist look at the soft-focus porn in Playboy magazines all happened before 5:00 pm on sunny summer days.

After dinner, and washing dishes, it was back outside.  Sometimes the older brothers and sisters in the neighborhood would join up for pick-up sports, set off fireworks or – joy of joys – to take us for rides on motorcycles and dirt bikes.  Helmets?  Huh?

One of my fondest memories is of something we christened “Twilight Call”.  Summer nights, dusk.   The parents would call their children home… Voices wafting through the warm summer air.  Each voice distinct, not just by the name being called… “Taaaaaaaa-meeeeeeee!  TAAAAAAAAAA-meeeeee!” came the tiny bird-like voice of Tammy’s mom.  If Tammy ignored it?  We all knew that it would be followed in a few minutes by the gruff, angry voice of her father – who scared the collective crap out of us.  “TAMMY!  TAMMY!”  At the first staccato burst transmission, we’d generally get Tammy’s ass moving on her way before he came out looking for her…

We knew our boundaries.  We worked within them.  We had to stay within vocal range.  Simple, and universally understood by parents and children alike.  

Were there injuries?  Of course… Every summer one of us broke an extremity on the cable swing down by the pond.  Salt-pellet buckshot in the ass for stealing apples.  Walking barefoot through a construction site, scavenging plywood for the walls of a fort-in-progress, i managed to step on a nail in a 2″x4″, which went through my foot.  Tetanus shot and a pressure bandage and i was on my way…

Given such happy memories of my childhood, did i afford my own children the same latitude?  Not entirely, but we attempted to preserve elements of it for them.  We chose our family home partly because it was in a landlocked neighborhood, with low traffic, allowing kids to ride bikes in the street.  Oh, and there was a creek running through it.  Crawdads.  Frogs.  Turtles.  Oh, hell yeah!  

My son was fortunate enough to have a pack of boys to run with, but the girl situation was limited – so there were lots of ‘girl parties’ and sleepovers with school friends.  Since both of us worked, the kids were in after school care until The Girl was eleven and The Boy was nine.  After that they had fairly strict operational constraints as latch key kids. 

For three summers, i took a month off – without pay – and was damn lucky my profession/employer allowed the option.  Just to let them hang out and be bored.  Not to have to get them up early every morning and bundle them off to ‘day camp’.  They at least had a taste of it…

It was a balance that worked well for our family.  Perfect?  Hardly.  But allowing children a chance to live a little “Lord of the Flies” style may be the best way to prepare them for the big bad world…

Much nicer than anything we ever constructed - and probably a few less rusty nails sticking out at face level...

* Quisp and Quake were favorites — WITH SPOONFULS OF SUGAR ON TOP.  Seriously. We put sugar on top of cereal.  Pop Tarts were another staple… Fruit?  Whazzat?

** And she worked her ass off.  Three loads of laundry a day.  She ironed sheets, shirts and Dad’s damn handkerchiefs.  Ironed. Handkerchiefs.  Yeah.  That’s what i said, even as a kid.  “But he’s just gonna blow his nose on them?!?!”  Food, cleaning, basic home maintenance. 

*** This is a topic for a future post, but basically, our gang of kids put on a successful summer carnival — autonomously — every summer for five years.  Raised money for charity.  Virtually NO parental involvement.

**** Which turned out to be fine training for my future stint as a supervisor…

down time…

i must be out of touch with a lot of things… my evenings are precious and full.  As i continue to battle the weight (down 35 pounds, a pesky 15 pounds to go…), exercise is at the top of the list. 

My job doesn’t afford a psychologically healthy opportunity for lunch-hour workout*, and any attempt to exercise in the morning is met with a violent uprising from my own body.  To the point where my brain has been told in no uncertain terms by parts of my body — “if you put on the running shoes, the bitch gets it!”

That leaves the short window of time after work.  i try to get in an hour or two of cardio.  Since i despise going to gyms, i prefer this to be outside, which is increasingly difficult as autumn settles in…  Often i will later work with weights or do pushups and crunches at home until i can’t move. 

i build my weeknight evenings around this routine.

From the time i get home (5:00 pm-5:30 pm) until the time i go to bed (midnight), i’m generally doing something… Once the exercise is covered, i’m paying bills, reading my favorite blogs, hoarking up the contents of my brain onto the ‘trailer park’, meeting up with friends for my Tuesday night pubbery, running errands before stores close, working on projects around the house…

Life maintenance and decompression.

What’s missing?  Apparently television… This seems to be what a lot of people do in the evening.  Scanning the facebook status listings after my workout tonight, i noticed a frightening number of references to “Thursday night television”.  Apparently?  It’s the best…  Gray’s Anatomy, The Office, Survivor…  Huh?  Can’t you catch The Office on reruns?  Don’t the other two suck?

Last week, i had a down night, completely to myself.  The Girl had a movie in the BluRay thingie and suggested that it might be worth my time to spend 90 minutes watching Coraline.  Curling up on the couch with the big brown smelly dog-like-object, i watched an entire movie.

Loved it.  Want to watch it in 3D.  Henry Selick, who directed “Nightmare Before Christmas”, put together a darkly comic and stunningly gorgeous flick about the evil underbelly of greener grass.  Unfortunately it sort of degraded into a video game somewhere in the middle, but it was still a beautiful film. 

When i moved into the Barbie Dream Condo last year, i had the home theater/digital audio system installed before i even had furniture in the living room.  Just over a year later, this was one of the first times i’ve actually put that big damn wall-mounted HDTV to use…. 

i may never get the television thing completely, but i think there are some movies to be watched this winter… methinks i’m in some need of a little more downtime… Suggestions welcomed!

* There is a fitness facility on-site.  During lunch hour it is infested with young hardbodied idiots, who piss me off for being alive.  i used to play basketball there, but am no longer competitive with the aggressive, tattooed pituitary cases that dribble full-court during the precious lunch hour.   Fuck ’em….

if this doesn’t make you smile…

then you are a crab… this is – at least momentarily – my favorite 1:07 on teh interwebz. 

Found via Andrew Sullivan’s Daily Dish, The Atlantic.  Perhaps one of the most thoughtful blog/collectives i’ve stumbled upon in mainstream-esque media…

Got a few weighty things on my mind, and finding this in my reader at 6am this morning not only made me smile, but it reminded me that no matter how challenging the present moments in your life may be?  You must never underestimate the value of being goofy…

These fellas not only made me giggle, but they gave me the most horrific earworm on a day where i was hosting a very distinguished professor from MIT… and feeling just a touch unworthy…. all’s well… just needed a mental health break. 

And no, i didn’t burst into a song/dance routine during our discussions.  But i thought about it…

Ladeeeeeez and gentlemen….

“Meow”, bitches…

Last night, i attended a local event that is pretty much the annual throw-down bash of the year.  It’s a fundraiser for the local AIDS Resource organization, and the best halloween event ever.  Several hundred people show up, and these folks know how to play. 

Masks are required.  The cool kids know to paint them on, because attempting to throw down for five hours with a plastic mask on your face just sucks.  The venue is typically an abandoned warehouse or loft space, done up with lights and theatrical props. 

Live entertainment includes fire-throwers, acrobats and the nationally recognized drag troupe…  Servers and hired dancers are wearing nearly nothing but body paint.  Never mind the entertainment of the crowd – these are people who take their costuming very seriously.

There are still over 55,000 new HIV infections in the US every year.  It’s not a problem that has been solved.  The fact that this is a highly successful fundraising event for something that matters?  Extra damn cool…  One of my friends, DK, has become a ticket ambassador, and her enthusiasm for this event is truly contagious. 

This years theme?  1930’s circus sideshow.  There were seven of us attending as our own ‘troupe’.  Pre-party and masque painting at my place before gametime.  After spending most of today recovering from tearin’ it up last night, some random thoughts…

 – Mask painting, costuming pre-party at my place from 6-8pm.  The dog was covered in glitter.  i was so fragged from trying to get everything done in the afternoon, i’d missed his walk – so he added to the artistic decor by painting a lovely wet sketch on my carpet.  Swirling and twirling around as the poor mutt attempted to hold it…  i couldn’t be mad.  My fault for not taking him out…

– DK had ‘hired’ a designated driver.  A young friend from the theater who is temporarily unemployed was hired to drive us there in her minivan.  So naturally, we are on our way to the party, in a family minivan.  And what’s the soundtrack?  Why “Dr. Horrible’s Sing-a-long Blog“, that’s what… Nowhere on earth could i have been in such a situation – costumed gaggle of festive humans, in a minivan, singing silly songs while stashing glow sticks in their undergarments.

– My ‘statistically significant other’ and i went as the Liontamer and his Lioness.  My children pointed out there wasn’t much sparkly gold clothing in the 1930’s, i was covered from head to toe in gold.  The costume was home made, and it was my intention to make the drag queens weep with envy.  i think i succeeded.  Until i dropped my 4″ sandals at the “coat check” at 11:00pm.  No way i was going to last another 3 or more hours…

– When my daughter came upstairs to assist with the group photoshoot, her words were “Holy shit, my mother looks like a hooker”.  i have achieved…. something…. not entirely sure what….

– Naturally, i was on a leash.  It was nearly impossible to find a gold dog collar and leash.  We tried every pet store in the area.  Until it hit me – “Where do you get such gear for your dog? WalMart!”  Success.  Oh, and it couldn’t be a retractable leash.  That would have been degrading… and no “monkey backpack” toddler leash… Geez… i have standards… 

– The leash proved challenging.  If my friend was off to the men’s room, he’d hand the leash off to someone else.  There was another ‘cat woman’ character there, and she felt compelled to ‘release’ me when she saw me.  A few years ago, if anyone had told me that i’d be perfectly happy being walked on a leash, while wearing 4″ gold stiletto ‘fuck me’ shoes and a gold afro in public at 47 years of age?  Ok…  i might have believed them.  i’ve always had a flair for drag-queen dramatics.

– Highlight of the evening, without question, was being invited onto a dance podium with a gorgeous young ‘tiger boy’.  Oh, shit.  We had fun.  Not that i’m an exhibitionist, mind you…. At one point, i told him, “Baby, i’m old enough to be your mother”.  Not missing a beat he said “Honey, you’re waaaaaay hotter than my mom” and proceeded to dry hump me.  There might be video.  It won’t be posted on facebook. 

For your amusement, a few pics….

he invited me up. i have witnesses.

i was wrong. there IS a heaven...

 

oh, to have been born of different genetics....

parental perceptions

After my first year at the university, i moved in with my future husband, EJ. i was 19 years old, and he was 26. Technically, i sort of went over for dinner one night, after hanging out with him for a week, and i stayed for over 20 years. We joked that i was “The Thing That Wouldn’t Leave”.

My parents weren’t wealthy, and i was the youngest of four. Dad retired that year also, so their finances were a bit of an unknown.  i knew they weren’t sure how they’d be able to cover my academic costs, especially since they were still paying some support to my older sister who was finishing up her undergraduate work.  Oh, and they were still throwing money at my two elder siblings, who were in various states of financial disarray in their lives.

i was living with EJ for a couple months when i realized i had moved in. Not a planned move, i just slowly started moving my things over to his place, which was within walking distance of the university. When my parents called* my apartment, my former roommates would tell them “she’s in class” if it was during the day, or “she’s in the shower” at other times… They’d then ring me to let me know to call my parents.

After about three months of this, i realized i needed to tell my parents, and get out of the lease at the old apartment.  i was working (through a co-operative engineering program for undergraduates), and after doing some math, realized that i could do it on my own.  It would be tight, but by sharing living expenses with EJ, it was manageable.  It was time to tell my parents…

EJ drove me down to the homestead, with the plan to just drop me off, and return for me in a few hours.  i wasn’t sure how the parents would react to this, and it had potential to be a “scene”… Subjecting my new partner to a howl-fest was perhaps not the best way for him to meet my parents for the first time. 

To this day, their reactions – so very different – tells me much about how they viewed their youngest daughter at the time. 

daisyfae:  Well, i’ve sort of moved in with my friend, EJ.  He’s 26, i met him through work.  He’s working on his Master’s Degree in Computer Science at The Other University, he’s very smart, kinda quiet and we get along well.  Since i’ve made this decision, i do not expect you to provide any more financial support.  i appreciate that you paid for my first year, but with working and sharing expenses with him, i can do it.

Mom:  You’re using birth control, aren’t you?

Dad:  Computer Science?  Must be very smart!  Does he have one of those personal computers**?

The initial meeting went reasonably well. Mom was cold.  Dad shook his hand and talked about computers for an hour.  EJ was cool and laid back.   It went pretty well with the folks from then on.  Over the years, there were still moments where they just couldn’t have responded more differently.

After living together for a year, we decided to buy a washer and dryer together.  Having saved up a little money, it would be absolute decadence not to have to use the communal washing machines, which were only open at odd hours and generally smelled like ass.  For me?  This was the first hint at commitment.  Purchasing major appliances.  Nothing says “i’m grown up now” like a Whirlpool…

Calling to share the exciting news with my parents, i got the following responses:

Dad:  It’s a big step.  You paid cash, and that’s the right way to do it.  Going in debt can cause trouble…

Mom:  Well, you know you separate the bright and dark colors from the white clothes…

Never mind the fact that i’d been doing my own laundry for a few years at this point….  But i guess that’s why it’s nice to have two parents.  It gives you license to ignore one…

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

* Footnote for my children and any other readers under 30: This was before mobile phones. We had a phone, attached to a wall. There was no voicemail, or even answering machine option, in those days. Trying times, for sure… but it made us strong…

** The answer was “Yes”, and at the time (1981) NO ONE had computers.  It was an Apple II+ and it was the total shit at the time…. and no, i wasn’t a golddigger…

cardiac kid…

My son, who is just a few months short of his 21st birthday, has inherited a self-destructive bent from his mother.  Although he’s very smart, and doing well at the university, i still worry about him.  A lot. 

While home on my lunch hour this week, we had a lovely mother-son text exchange.  Out of the blue, i got this:

The Boy:  Do you know my blood type?

daisyfae:  O pos – Why are you asking?

The Boy:  Well, I’m at this hospital, and they think it might be relevant.  Just kidding.  We were going over it in biology and I was curious.

daisyfae:  Fuck. You.

My mantra regarding my son is “keep him alive til he’s 25”.  Frequently, i wonder if his ol’ lady is the greatest threat to his continued existence…