Utils in Bat Country

A check in the pro column

One of the reasons I wanted to move back East was so I'd be able to attend the non  major holiday family events that wouldn't be feasible with an 8hr drive.  And since today was my uncle's birthday and my other aunt emailed me yesterday to say everyone was going to get together for a family dinner, I was happy to be able to make the drive up.

We met halfway between the two houses, in New Hope, PA which is an adorable little town.  Gorgeous stone farm houses, charming main street, bunches of restaurants and shops.  Am definitely going back there sometime this summer to wander around. There were 12 of us at dinner and true to form, we spent most of the time laughing. AJ had emailed P to ask what UJ wanted for his bday and she said ipad accessories (someone got a 3, lucky duck) and socks. So AJ told Gma who went to Macys and bought 7 pairs of various dark colored socks (along with the traditional birthday check).  UJ looked a bit confused when he unwrapped them and then P started cracking up and cackling that she couldn't believe they thought she was serious.  And when Gma then exclaimed, I couldn't believe he needed more socks, I just bought him socks for Christmas, what does he do with them?!, it only added to the hilarity. Unfunny in the retelling but, trust me, there were guffaws in person.

AJ and UP have one of the few no shoes allowed on inside houses among people I know and it's always a joke between all of us because I cannot remember until I'm halfway up the stairs and hopping around trying not to fall over and leave the precious, precious carpet unsullied.  So when I was getting dressed in some lovely springy Anthro pieces, I had to send him a picture showing how I obeyed all the rules because I am just that good of a person.

No shoes on upstairs, see UP!  I'm so facetiously cheeky.

Happy sighs for nights like this.

Name Game

Remember how I can't stand Stephanie and Swistle's commentors told me I was crazy for changing it and I said do not care, goodbye Stephanie!

So that's still going on (the name thing, not the being called crazy thing. At least, not by Swistle's commentors. Assuredly, by many other people though, as expected).  Much to the dismay of my mother.

My funny, funny extended family all had themselves a conversation a few weeks prior to Thanksgiving where they decided it would be hilarious if each of them picked out a new name for the place cards whereas mine would say Stephanie.  I'm told tears of laughter flowed during the picking out process. I'm actually pretty impressed by their cleverness.  Golf claps of approval, family.

Thus I was greeted by these at the Thanksgiving table.

How much do I love that Gma named herself Scarlett.  Fabulousness, right there.

And my own forlorn name looking even more despicable next to all the others new names of coolness.

My aunt, fellow romance novel lover, won name of the day with her choice of Sorcha.  Made even better when my cousins said she got it from one of her books.  Hee!  And I love the name and the series it's from so that makes it all the better.  Obviously must refer to her as Sorcha forevermore.

35

I went to bed last night with a niggling feeling of forgetting to do something.  But there hadn't been trick or treaters, I didn't forget to brush my teeth, door was locked...must be nothing.

Started getting into a new book (Dreams of a Dark Warrior by Kresley Cole, and damn why do I keep picking books where bad things happen to the characters for many hundreds of pages) when suddenly it clicked that, oh yeah, Mom and Dad's anniversary.

It was before midnight so I shot a quick text to both their phones and went back to the book.

Thought about it more on the way in and realized they've been married 35 years.

Well done, parents. 

Happy Anniversary!

Read and Watched in June

I have emerged victorious from both my month long class, and a grueling week at work. I am on day two of my "weekend", and I've even managed to accomplish a couple of things around the house. Right now, I'm waiting for the dishes to finish so I can reload, and perhaps find the energy for some laundry. My exciting life, let me show you it.

I'm coming late with the read and watch update, so I thought I'd give a little more this time around.

WATCHED

I've not been big on watching much of anything lately. I've been absorbed in books in a way I haven't been since long before graduate school went crazy on me, lo these many years ago. I read just about anything, good, bad, or indifferent with a frenzy that I can't quite explain. I've always loved to read, but something has changed recently. Perhaps it's working in a relatively mindless industry (sorry, but I ask people if they want tater tots with their meals...it's the equivelent to "do you want fries with that) and my brain is rebelling at the idea of becoming One of Those People. Not that I don't know plenty of smart and/or educated folks in the restaurant field. But it's capital D Different than academia, or even these ridiculous education classes I'm forced to undergo.

Thus, I've seen a grand total of ONE movie in the last month. And that was..."Love Actually". Which I have seen roughly 5464 times before.

[REDACTED]

READ

In June, I 'only' managed to get through three books. I say it like that because I read Stieg Larsson's Millenium trilogy. The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, The Girl Who Played With Fire, The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest, all of which have been turned into Swedish films in the last couple of years, and all of which are slated (much to my disdain) for American remakes in the near future. And the reason the 'only' is in there is that, unlike my penchant for trashy vampire books, Larsson's works aren't simple reads, aren't comfortable reads, and at roughly 700 pages each, they aren't short and sweet reads either. They are densely packed, full of violence of every nature, and get more and more out there as you read.

The first, Tattoo, is a straight-forward book about a woman who has gone through horrors in her life, made herself around them, and repeatedly gets stuck in shitty situations much outside of her own control. By the third book, I was shaking my head in disbelief thinking Larsson had gone a little too overboard with conspiracy theories and the like. I had already seen the films, so I knew some of what was coming, but per usual the books were superior and thus more involved.

Then I read the endnotes.

Since I'm not Swedish, and Sweden isn't exactly a world power of epic proportions, I was unfamiliar with many of the political figures the books mention, Prime Ministers assassinated in the 1970s and secret police officials that I suppose even Europeans might have a better understanding of than I do. Realistically, I only have so much room for information in my brain, and I apologize if I have any Swedish readers who are offended that 20th century Swedish political history hasn't been on my radar.

Come to find out, a large portion of the books that I found the most outlandish? Are based on real events. This kind of wacked out shit really happened in and to Sweden. Perhaps there was no real Girl but there were certainly a lot of bad folk who did some nasty things. Which, of course makes me think, if it could happen in Sweden, you KNOW it's happening here.

That's neither here nor there. What IS important is that I was compelled to read all three books as quickly as possible, even though I already knew what happened from the movies, because I think they're that good. Obviously I'm reading Larsson's books in translation (if I knew Swedish, I think I'd feel compelled to know more about the country, its history, etc. And then who knows if I would have enjoyed the books in the same way.) But whomever translated the works did a fine job, leaving in just enough Swedish to remind you this wasn't an American thriller while keeping you in the moment. Larsson's pacing is perfect, and he let's you anticipate just enough to keep you interested without giving anything away.

So yes, I only read three books in June. But those three books were roughly 2100 pages total. So I feel OK about it.

I've finally finished Emma, and have already read two more books in the last week, and am well on my way to finishing another today. I'll do my best to post reviews of these books next week...

Countdown

I've got the map of never ending

the recipes of (hopefully) delight

The email alerting Santa to the Anthro sale has been sent (am nearly having to restrain myself from ordering things myself), the returns have to be compiled, the bottom of foot blister must be lectured very sternly, the pie must not be forgotten in the freezer come 7am tomorrow, outfits need to be assembled (with accessories and shoes and hair product ha ha 3 oz container limits!) and even though I'm going to have to deal with this face

(and two 9+ hour drives)

I cannot wait to see my family.

Happy Thanksgiving!!

I’ve had several blog posts in my head over the last couple of weeks, but none of them have turned out the way I want them to. I could go back to what I was doing before, give you more songs from the list I was working on, or more tattoos. And I have plans to do that. But everything has been so up and down for me over the last couple of weeks, that sitting down to do those kind of posts just hasn’t seemed like something I wanted to do.

I had a considerable post about having just reread Catcher in the Rye and how kind of ridiculous it seems now, versus how Amazingly Awesome Wonderful I thought it was when I was a teenager. Holden Caulfield just doesn’t speak to me now the way he did 15 years ago when I first experienced the book. But the post turned into a big long complainykins session about hipsters, and that kind of crap. And I couldn’t really make it work in a better or different way.

Then I thought about writing about my dating life. As I pondered that, I thought about the fact that the blog is linked to my FaceBook page (which yes, I could remove, but eh), and thus any one of the 500+ people I’m friends with could click through to it at any moment. Including my parents. And then I thought it best that my dating life not make a grand debut here quite yet.

And then this happened:

Monday night, I served at the restaurant where I’ve been working. Because, you know, I damn near have my doctorate, would you like tots with that? No, seriously, we serve tater tots. And they’re really good. But I digress.

We do a late night sushi special on Mondays. Half price sushi from 10:30 to 12:30. Although we had a fair number of people in the place, many of them were sitting together, and thus not in my section. I held out, because we were trading tables and the next one in was supposed to be mine. A lo! A final table of women came in. They were boisterous and fun and drinking a lot, so I had images of dollar signs dancing in my head. And they did some shots! EVERYBODY! Dollar dollar bill y’all!

One of them noticed my tattoos. Grabbed my arm, actually, so as to see the Fail Better tattoo in all its glory (side note: don’t fucking touch tattooed people as though they’re clothes hanging on a rack. Unacceptable!) I chatted with them for a while about tattoos and they asked if they could see more. I said sure, apologized because I haven’t shaved my legs in a couple of weeks (OK, the post about dating wasn’t going to be that exciting after all), rolled up my pant leg so they could see some more of my work. As I was rolling it back down, one of the girls looked at me and said, “So, are you gay?”

The other girls at the table just stopped and stared at her. As did I. “What?”

“Are you gay?”

Ummmm.

“I’m going to go get your drinks.”

And I walked away.

Now, I’m not offended by the fact that that woman asked me that. I am slightly confused about why. The unshaved legs? The tattoos? Am I really that butch? Seriously?

When I returned to the table with drinks, she apologized. She was very sorry, sometimes she just says things without thinking, she sure hoped I wasn’t upset or offended. No, I promised her, I was fine. No big deal at all.

“So, are you gay or not.”

“I think,” I replied, “that I’m going to just leave that as a mystery for you.”

Witty Title Goes Here

After spending a shit-tastic day laying around my house lamenting the fact that I have very few shifts at the bar coming up (we haven't been busy, so we're cutting way back on shifts) and I have no money and my relationships are all more like Giant Fucking Train Wrecks than actual relationships and and and...

I busted out my new tea pot (thank you very much, guilty kind-of-ex-boyfriend with a credit card), heated up some water and went digging through my cabinet o' tea.

I’m not picky about tea, so long as it’s not lemon. But I do prefer my tea with caffeine. And yet, the box I chose is caffeine free fruit tea. I went with blueberry. Let me explain why (other than the fact that it’s blue-purple, and who doesn’t want to drink blue-purple tea?).

I’ve had what amounts to a summer and early fall of extreme highs and lows. During the high times, I have been confident that something is going to work out for me with regards to every aspect of my life. The lows have been more like today, where a fear over the future crashes down on my head like a shitton of bricks. And I don’t mean the distant future, will I ever be stable again kind of thing. I mean the holyshitwhereismyhousepaymentcomingfrom? kind of fear. These fears get stoked in the fires of the fact that I have very few friends in the mid-Atlantic, as all my people are in Michigan and Ohio (OK, not all of them, but you know what I mean). And a Doom Spiral to rival anything Steph has ever gone through starts. And by the end of the day, I’m sitting on the couch watching Love Actually for the seven millionth time, identifying with roughly 9/10ths of the characters in some way or another (I don’t have a dead wife, so Liam and I share little there) and eating an entire family size package of macaroni and cheese with hot sauce.

So, by early evening my shirt cuffs are covered in dried snot and salt water (who can afford Kleenex?), the dogs are sniffing around to see if I’m going to attempt to squeeze them to death anymore, and I’ve compulsively checked my email seventy bazillion times to see if the immaculately stupid message I sent this morning has garnered a reply yet.

Not that I’ve had a day like that, ever. I am calm and well-adjusted. Or something.

Which brings us back to the blue-purple tea of no caffeine.

My birthday was a day before one of my camping trips this summer, and my good friend Amy was sweet enough to buy me presents. Most of the things were stuff I have talked about here on the blog. A box of Dots, deviled ham, ramen noodles. All individually wrapped, so it was like a mini-Christmas for a birthday. A roll of toilet paper! A bottle of BoonesFarm! Because I’m the girl you can birthday shop for with $20 in a CVS. AND BE HAPPY WITH WHAT I GET!

In the packages of happiness, there was the box of tea from which I selected the blueberry passion excitement that I’m currently sipping on (and damn, it’s good with some honey in it!) And here is where I started to climb out of the Doom Spiral and back to Happy TassieLand.

In the crazy Civil War thing I do, we all belong to teams. Teams make up regions, and regions make up our national organization (think conferences in college football). There are rivalries between teams in each region, and national rivalries as well. For the last six years I belonged to a team rife with amazing shots, the best eight of whom made up our A team, and who won national competitions like it was picking apples off a tree. (OK, it wasn’t THAT easy, but they’re damn good shots and they won over and over and over…there are lots of folk who don’t like us for it.) (They don’t dislike me for it, as I’m not that good. But still.)

As the summer progressed, I made a decision to change teams. Over the weekend, the team I decided to move to voted on me (they don’t just take anyone, you know!) and I was voted in. I didn’t know it (I mean, I assumed I’d get in as I know all the guys, etc. But I didn’t know when they were having their meeting, etc.) and on Friday night I went to a big membership meeting for the whole organization, because there were elections for Board of Directors and blah blah blah too much information.

Suffice it to say, I walked into a crowded barn full of people to go to the meeting, and I was mobbed by the guys on the team. There was much smiling, hand shaking, hugging, congratulations, and welcome. These guys seemed genuinely excited that I was joining. When I went to their camp later that night, there was much of the same (and possibly some moonshine). And drinking this tea reminded me of that whole thing. So, even if I did make a complete ass of myself this morning with the stroke of the send button, and even if I’m flat broke, and there’s a mouse in my house, and my hopes for a decent job are mostly a little puddle of dried tears on my couch, and I may have to sell my car back to the dealership along with my soul…I still have one more weekend this fall to spend with these guys, to hang out around a campfire and relax, to shoot a little and more than likely freeze my ass off in a tent in Ohio in mid-October. And that might sound not that great to a lot of people, but I didn’t realize until today that it’s been propping me up all summer. Even when there has been drama and I’ve shot like shit, it’s been the basis for my sanity.

And so, a giant public thank you to Amy for that box of tea. And here, all she thought she was giving me was a tasty beverage.

The Upside of Saying Goodbye

Even though it was sad circumstances, it was so nice to see my family.  Some of my cousins I haven't seen in 5 or 6 years, which is crazy. 

The fun got started at the airport.  I got in a couple hours before my parents and D&L so I made the most of my return East and ordered the largest light-not-sweet iced coffee I could find and settled in to people watch.  I'm fascinated when people deplane to see if they walk on the Elite access banner or not.  The Elite side is actually more centered towards the door but most people choose to veer to the side and go out the normal corral.  Why?  Everyone's allowed to deplane on whatever side they like :)  Since my dad works for an airline he can get through security so he usually meets me at my gates when I fly in so it was nice this time to surprise them at their gate.

   

Dad rented a minivan and - you guys - did you know all the back windows roll down now?  And the doors are automatic? And there's fake gray wood paneling on the console? And genius on the rental company's part, they even have built in EZ passes. They've come a long way since I was last in a minivan back in 1999. 

       

I'm usually traveling with my non fancy pants self but when traveling with Dad, the Marriott  goes all out. I've certainly never seen an extended garment hook before.

   

My parents actually got engaged about 2 blocks from the funeral home so we went back to the site for a little recreation...romantic huh :)

 

And saw this in a store window.  How much do I need to own this?

 

It was great to see some relatives I haven't seen since I was a kid.

Great Uncle Carmine!
 

And, of course, we all got to share our memories of Pop.

 Army medic on the beach at Normandy then a few years later, a five year old a nine month old and three month premature triplets.
 

 I apparently started drinking at an early age.... like 3 hours after I was born?

 This is what I always remember about Pop. Christmas at the house, crammed with people, presents taller than I was, stockings on the entire mantel and sauce on the stove.  
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

 
 
 
 
 
 

He's just a guy...

I haven't talked about it too much but since Thanksgiving my throat's been doing this thing where it feels like there's a lot of pressure on it after I eat and I still feel queasy after pretty much every meal and while I've never been allergic to anything before I'm suddenly convinced I'm allergic to pretty much everything. Especially fish/shellfish. My cousin suddenly developed a severe shellfish allergy at 19, can't be in seafood restaurants, can't have fish in the house, epi pen, the whole nine yards.  And over the summer at the shore, I got sick after eating shellfish (never mind that my uncle didn't feel great either, I'm still the only one who got sick).  So, there's a sort of basis in my head at least for my newfound allergy to seafood.  I'm pretty sure I'm not actually allergic to any sort of food and this is all just severe anxiety manifesting itself in these physical ways.  But. It could happen! I bought shrimp cocktail to test my allergy but wouldn't eat it till D was around and it wasn't a weekend so there would be doctors around at the hospitals if my throat closed up.  

ANYWAYS.  I tell you this since I had tilapia and broccoli for dinner and I need something to take my mind off of focusing on my throat doifeelsomethingwhat'sthatzomgisthatpressureamisick.  And D put lemon and paprika on the fish so there's enough tangy/spice where it does cause a bit of the mouth tingle but it's not an allergy it's a normal spice feeling...right?  right?!  

ANYWAYS SQUARED.  Allright, so perhaps I am suffering from a bit of anxiety about the whole thing. Thus the post!

I was watching Gilmore Girls and it was the episode where Rory turns down Logan's marriage proposal and talking to Lorelai about how it's graduation day she should be so excited yet she's all torn up and he's just a guy and she should focus on herself.  Now, I DETEST Rory.  Love Lorelai, adore Emily, want to travel around the world with Paris but can.not.stand.Rory.  I'm actually a bit annoyed that it was Rory who caused such thoughts bouncing around my head but so it goes. 

I've been thinking about that whole idea for the past couple of days.  When does a guy, a relationship become  something you make decisions based on?  When does it flip from being a secondary to the primary?  I listen to my married friends and read different wedding blogs and people talk about not making a education/career/location/life/hell, dinner decision without being on the same page as their partner.  This doesn't strike me as odd for my friend who's been with her husband for 6 years but it might if she'd said things like that within the first six months.  But when is the line.  Do you have to be married before the relationship becomes the priority?  Engaged? Living together? Saying I love you? College graduation or not, it makes sense that Rory would have been torn up over Logan.  (Except, Logan, really?  Go to Philly and find Jess).  

D and I have been together for more than 8 years and while we're clearly unstable, I wonder how much we should take the other into consideration.  If I got a job offer in Italy, I'd say yes in a second. I plan on going back East within the next few years with or without D.  Is that right? Wrong? If he came home one day and said hey by the way I took a job in Peru, I'd be a bit miffed. But I still think of myself as mySELF as opposed to part of some family unit.  But I felt like this prior to the 'issues'. Am I selfish?  Letting society dictate that I shouldn't let myself be defined by a man and should always put myself first (unless there are swelling orchestrations in which case I have landed in a romantic comedy and should expect to see Ryan Reynolds coming around the corner with a bouquet of white peonies in which case yes I shall follow you and your abs of wonder anywhere).  When should I/do I stop making decisions for my career and me first and my relationship and us second? 

Wordless(ish) Wednesday

Get home from work and see a big box on the doorstep...hmmmmm.

Work through layers of cardboard to discover

 

For me?!  Who...

 

Awww, Dad...sniffle

But what kind of berries...

 

Happy, happy, yum, yum