Eva was here

words to live by

2012-02-27T11:22:00.000-08:00

Yesterday I bought and applied some cheap nail polish, on a whim, and now I want to go back for like 8 more colors. It's Wet & Wild Mega Last Salon Color, and I'm going to give it to them; it is lasting pretty well. I might be hard on polish, but most of the time polish starts kind of rubbing off at the nail tips before 24 hours is up, and that has not happened yet with this one. PLUS, they have a lot of fun colors, and yesterday I got rid of approximately 20 bottles of polish I've had forever and don't like anymore. I need some fun colors for a mere $1.99 per bottle, don't you think? This has been an unpaid endorsement.

I moved the almond cheese from the cheesecloth/sieve/bowl draining system this morning and into a container. It was still a little moist in places, but I didn't know if it would get too dry if it kept draining all day while I'm at work. I'll tell you, it smells groce, but it tastes pretty good. I'm not sure what to do with it other than just ... eat it, with veggies or something, but maybe I'll think of things in which it could be an ingredient. In addition to finally making nut cheese this weekend, I started a tablespoon of 5 Star Sprout Mix a'sprouting, and I hope it's delicious. It should be--it contains fenugreek.

This morning on my walk to work, within a two block span I saw 3 pieces of gum, just spat out on the sidewalk. WHAT IS UP WITH THAT, DISGUSTING PEOPLE OF ELLENSBURG?? You couldn't wait until you saw a garbage can, or, barring that, you couldn't spit your gum into a bush? Try to be smarter!

Love,

Eva

Nut cheese, commencing the draining process

2012-02-26T07:46:00.001-08:00

3 things alphabetically

2012-02-24T11:06:00.000-08:00

A) Today I have a PT appointment at 4:30 that I will need to cut short by a few minutes so I can get to my 5:15 hair appointment. It's an EMERGENCY. My hair girl, Janelle (who I think I accidentally called Janine here once) and I are working to a new style, and it was going to be the A-line bob, but recently I've been seeing that style on a lot of post-menopausal women. There's nothing wrong with menopause or the ladies who have gone through it, but I'm not there yet and I want a funkier style, so I'm going to go back to a style I had before and loved. I gave it up because I couldn't get that style consistently when I was going to the beauty school and a different person cut my hair every time, but now with Janelle being the only cutter of my hair, I think this could work out. If it does, I will post a picture.

B) I had some varsity sleep last night, and I feel good. First contributor to good sleep: I lifted weights yesterday and that always promotes good sleep. Second contributor: Esther only yowled twice in the night. The first time was before I was even asleep and the second time was .... I have no idea. I went back to sleep. The only two yowls was unusual for her, because she's been yowling like ten times a night, and we have been Tired. I used to dislike her sleeping on my pillow, but if she's on my pillow she's not yowling, so now I WANT her on my pillow, even though sometimes that means I roll over and get a bundle of feet in the eyeball. I will TAKE it.

C) I'm so happy it's Friday. I'm going to make this a good weekend. I hope you have a good weekend too. XO

Love,

Eva

Guess what I'm making this weekend

2012-02-23T12:08:00.000-08:00

three things

2012-02-22T15:23:00.000-08:00

1) I joined Pinterest today and I'm confused. How do I do the what now? I know I'll figure it out, but in the meantime I feel stupid.

2) This morning I drank a big glass of water with chia seeds, and I know there are plenty of people who would disagree on this point (and possible gag while thinking about it), but I like beverages that have a lumpy texture. I'm going to start making smoothies with the seeds included, for breakfasts.

3) During our drive home on Monday, Chris and I talked about having a party this summer, and maybe making it an annual party, assuming it goes well. I hope this ends up happening, because for some reason I love the idea of having a big annual party.

Love,

Eva

unconventional solution

2012-02-21T16:38:00.000-08:00

For the past two weeks at least, my digestion has been a bit slow and unwilling. I tried all the tricks to speed it up, including one I'd not tried before -- coconut water -- but to no avail. Until yesterday!! I am here to report that Trader Joes roasted eggplant wrap with spicy tahini has resolved the problem, though Trader Joes would probably not thank me for this endorsement. It was both delicious and effective. You're welcome!

Love,

Eva

As seen at the gas station

2012-02-21T14:06:00.001-08:00

Chris and Milli

2012-02-21T14:04:00.001-08:00

update roundup

2012-02-21T14:03:00.000-08:00

I have a legit reason for not updating the past 4 days -- we went to Eugene to see family. This would not have prevented me from doing short updates via my phone, but I've grown paranoid about telling the internet when I'm away from home, even though it's unlikely anyone from Eburg or near enough for burgling reads this blog. It was a fun trip, overall, though a bit stressful because my parents aren't doing that well. My dad is physically unwell -- he is weak but doesn't do the exercises that will improve his strength, because he doesn't feel like it. My mom is stressed out about my dad and this is partly manifesting itself with her memory; things don't stick in her brain the way they should. I'm glad my brother is living in their house, to help out with things. I took my mom out for lunch on Sunday and we had such a nice time; we're going to do a girls only lunch every time I visit.

Our granddaughter is 9 months old but is pushing the limits of 12 month clothing. She's crawling and strong and curious and friendly. On Sunday night they were at my parents and she kept trying to get at my parents' dvr/tv/dvd setup, and Jh said she wouldn't stop unless we smacked her hand. So I smacked it, but truly, I barely touched her. I definitely caused zero pain, but she immediately stopped trying to get into the stuff and turned around and started crawling away. IT WAS A KNIFE IN MY HEART, YOU GUYS. I picked her up and hugged her and she did the thing she does where she grabs your shirt and clings to you and oh my god I will buy her a pony and a treehouse and a Maserati. She totally owns me.

Every time we're in Eugene, I think about moving to Eugene, but fortunately the weather was crap the entire time we were there -- rainy and cold --and that helped out a lot. I don't Really want to move; I just want all the stuff I like in Eugene to transport itself to Eburg, starting with the grocery store, Market of Choice. It's definitely my favorite supermarket ever. My former favorite was Central Market, but Market of Choice kicks Central Market right in the dick. Sorry Central Market.

Eugene also makes me want to go Full Hippy. Today at lunch I bought chia seeds and some "5 Star Sprout Mix" at the hippy market in town. This is partly because I drank Kombucha beverage with chia seeds in Eugene, and I liked it. I'm going to give Kombucha itself a miss, though, as I don't entirely trust it (google Kombucha side effects if you don't believe me). Do you know, I actually made my own Kombucha for several weeks in southern California in the mid-90s, and I didn't even know what it was. My friend gave me the starter and directions and so I made and drank it without question. The 90s were a confusing time. ANYway, I won't actually go full-on hippy, because I think that would require veganism, or at the very least, vegetarianism, and there's no way I could get enough protein without meat to support my weight training. Don't post a comment about combining proteins, because my 2010 foodborne infection has robbed my intestines of the ability to digest insoluble fiber, i.e. beans and brown rice and whole wheat. I miss eating that stuff and I've tried many times to get my intestines to accept it again, but so far it's a no go.

So, last thing, and without going into too much detail, but in Eugene I bought new bras and am so happy with them. I'm down one band size and 4 full cup sizes, and these bras are so pretty! No more thick fabric and steel girder construction needed.

Okay, gotta go!

Love,

Eva

PT

2012-02-15T13:18:00.000-08:00

I had my fifth PT visit this morning, and it was actually kind of fun. This is because I was seeing the improbably-named Mauricio, who I admit I didn't like super much the first time I met him, but now I like him a lot. The exercises he has me do are way more fun than the ones Andrea (other PT person) has me do. Today he had me get on a BOSU Ball (sorry; you'll have to Google it--WAIT open another tab!), with the ball side down, and manipulate it around in a circle. This was significantly more difficult than I thought it would be. I got him to promise that after I got good with the BOSU Ball, he would get on one too and we'll stick fight. I'm so glad for Mauricio, because Andrea is super nice, but the exercises are BORING.

Chris and I don't celebrate Valentine's Day, generally, but yesterday I gave him a heart shaped box of See's Candies, because our adorable niece, Frances, was selling them for school. Or I THINK it's for school; I didn't ask. Anyway, I also made him a crappy Valentine out of hot pink fun foam. He, in turn, got us some Thai food for dinner, which we ate while watching the second half of Downton Abbey, that we had not been able to finish the day before. It was a lovely evening and I'm glad we kept it low key.

Crazy Esther has stepped up her Varsity Yowling Program and she's gotten amazing at projecting her voice. She's not limiting her yowling to just nighttime now--she yowls during the day as well, usually from the kitchen, but sometimes from the sofa. I wonder what new features she'll roll out in the next Yowl upgrade.

Eva

I never used to even think about things like this

2012-02-14T09:01:00.001-08:00

This morning while I was walking to work, I petted a dog (Sparky) who was being walked by his man, and Sparky got all excited to be interacting with me and shoved his wet snout into my face and onto my mouth. Now I'm concerned I'm going to get Giardia or some other infection, and Happy Valentine's Day, everyone! Oy.

Love,

Eva

such a vow breaker

2012-02-13T14:05:00.001-08:00

Well well well, look who hasn't been posting every day. (it's me!) This cold has made me forgetful and lazy, but it's almost gone; just a little congestion left. This weekend I had more difficulties with my other, semi-ongoing health situation, and this morning I messaged my doctor through the medical office's new "patient portal". He was thoroughly unhelpful and I'm once again thinking about changing doctors. The only reason I haven't rashly switched to another doctor TODAY is because there's so little choice of doctors to switch to, in this small town, and I don't know any of them. What if I switch to someone and find that I am extremely uncomfortable with them? That would be worse, IHOP, than being in my current situation; having a doctor with whom I feel very comfortable but whose strengths do not include diagnosis. I asked my sis-in-law if she liked her doctor and she said NO, he's pompous and pious. So, scratch THAT doctor as a possibility. For now, I will continue with my doctor and hope I start to feel better soon, but after I start feeling better and less overwhelmed, this changing doctor issue will be revisited.

I managed to get out this weekend and do some errands, including to Yakima and TJ Maxx. I got some birthday gifts for Jh, and for myself I got three sweaters (all on sale) and a pair of exercise pants [Chris got pants and a new large skillet, with lid). I went home with my purchases and removed three sweaters (and a shirt) from my closet for Goodwill donation, and a pair of exercise pants from the closet for being thrown away (not suitable for donation). I love getting rid of stuff, even if I'm replacing it with other stuff. In this case, I was replacing larger clothing with smaller clothing, so it was even more satisfying, what with progress added in as a bonus.

Went to UU church yesterday, and MAN I really like those people. They are the most accepting group of weirdos I've ever known, and I'm so glad I decided to try going there.

Now back to work.

Love,

Eva

Hi, I'm still sick and I'm going to swallow this nighttime cold medicine now. Goodnight!

2012-02-10T20:03:00.001-08:00

Oops

2012-02-09T06:23:00.001-08:00

I realized this morning that I forgot to post yesterday. My excuse is that I'm sick (a cold) and though I thought about updating yesterday, I ultimately forgot to do it. So today you're getting this and the picture of the orchid sitting on the jar. It's on there because we needed to boost the orchid above the window sill so we could turn it sideways (the leaves were interfering), and if a person's going to use an empty jar for that, a person might as well put a Luke Skywalker in there. I know you agree.

Love,
Eva

One more of the orchid, this time with improvised base

2012-02-09T06:15:00.001-08:00

twig and berries

2012-02-07T08:28:00.000-08:00

Every so often, when I'm squirting lotion or conditioner or a similar thing into my hand, it will arrange itself into a cock and balls shape, and that never, ever fails to delight me. Am I a pre-pubescent boy? Signs point to yes.

Things to tell you

2012-02-06T10:44:00.000-08:00

On Friday night when we were eating pho with the fam, L asked me if I'd noticed any improvement in health since eliminating allergens from my diet, and I said my digestion was better but I hadn't noticed much else. That wasn't strictly true -- my rosacea has also improved, but I don't love to call attention to it in person, so I didn't mention it. I was thinking about it this weekend, and my digestion has actually improved a LOT, so though I'm hoping for other health benefits as well, if the only improvements turn out to be digestive, that'll be good enough.

I didn't make nut cheese this weekend, but I did make a cream of mushroom soup that I adapted from a vegan recipe I found online. The cream part is from coconut milk, but instead of using vegetable broth, I used beef broth, so I totally ruined the vegan aspect of it, due to my lack of proper vegan mindset. But it was delicious and it used up that giant tub of mushrooms Chris bought from Costco last week--WIN. I also made another loaf of dairy and egg-free bread (the standard partial-whole wheat bread we used to make contained an egg and dry milk powder) and I have to say, I like it better than the egg and milk bread; the texture is perfect. Six ingredients and turn on the bread machine -- pow! I love things that are easy.

I also love something that isn't easy -- Crazy Esther. I don't know what got into her last night, but she was a yowling MACHINE. She also apparently really needed a middle-of-the-night cuddle, so I gave it to her and that probably shut her yowl hole for a little while, but not for the rest of the night. My dreams were nutty and disturbing and I blame that cat. Maybe I'll start ruining her daytime sleep and see how SHE likes it.

UU service was good yesterday -- it was about vegetable gardening and ways to get a jump on gardening early (our growing season is a little short; the last frost date is Mother's Day). The speaker was a dude from the upper county who used to be a chef in Seattle but who now grows organic vegetables and works with the WIC program to teach people how to cook. Listening to him was inspiring and I'm excited to try planting our seeds early.

Oh my god I'm so tired. I'm a little worried about how I'm going to make it through the day, but I guess I just will.

Love,

Eva

Constant bloomer

2012-02-05T06:02:00.001-08:00

I wonder if he wore Wranglers

2012-02-04T15:20:00.000-08:00

I just read something that caused me to do the biggest, most dramatic gasp (hands to face and everything), and it went completely unappreciated because Chris isn't home and Esther's in the bedroom. I've been watching Project Runway All Stars, and I also just watched an old PR episode from way back that Tivo picked up as a suggestion, and I decided to read Austin Scarlett's Wikipedia page. The gasp came only a few sentences in, when I read that he's from COTTAGE GROVE, OREGON. That means absolutely nothing to you, but I grew up in Creswell, 8 miles from Cottage Grove, which is even smaller than Cottage Grove, and Cottage Grove is pretty damn small. Oh Austin Scarlett, how did you survive there?? He must have tremendous strength of character, is all I can say.

I love these cheapass lip glosses

2012-02-03T10:19:00.001-08:00

physical therapy

2012-02-02T10:58:00.000-08:00

I went to my first physical therapy appointment yesterday, to be evaluated, and I had my first real appointment this morning. The therapist who evaluated me and who I will see for about half my appointments says my hiking knee problem isn't one of strength but one of control. She's got me doing a lot of balance stuff, specifically targeting the knee area, and a little bit of targeted strength stuff. I can't say for sure it will solve my problem, but I'm glad to be doing something that Might help, at least.

In other medical news, I saw Doctor yesterday and left his office with a treatment that should help. I'm being deliberately vague about this, as the problem I'm experiencing is embarrassing to talk about, but let's just say I am now intimately acquainted with a device known as an Anuscope. I apologize and/or you are welcome, depending on your reaction to this revelation. After the exam portion of the visit, I suggested that Doctor, his nurse, and I each take a roofie, and his nurse laughed but MY DOCTOR DIDN'T KNOW WHAT A ROOFIE WAS. This dude, man. He couldn't be more than 5 years older than I am, but he is seriously out of touch. On the plus side, he probably doesn't know who the Kardashians are, so ignorance has its privileges.

My rational brain is back in charge now, and I feel much more mentally healthy. I've got perspective again! I'm really really looking forward to the weekend, and hope to get some fun projects done, or at least started. Also some cooking, probably. Last weekend one of the things I made was vegan lemon curd, and I give it 3 1/2 out of 5 stars. It is deliciously lemony, but it's thickened with corn starch, so it's not very curdy, but that's okay. It was good on the buckwheat pancakes we had for Tuesday night dinner though, so I consider it a success. Side note: Gwyneth Paltrow's buckwheat banana pancake recipe is quite good, and you can tell her I said so.

Oh hey, maybe this weekend I'll try making nut cheese. I like talking to Chris about this particular cooking ambition, because every time I say Nut Cheese, he giggles like a twelve year old, and that amuses me.

Love,

Eva

Turkey Ring

2012-02-01T15:06:00.001-08:00

Air Kings

2012-01-31T13:25:00.000-08:00

caution: negative headspace

2012-01-30T10:20:00.001-08:00

I'm having a hard time right now, in large part because my lady hormones are running super high, but also in part because I've had a minor return of some of the worst symptoms from my long mystery illness, and it's freaking me right the fuck out. The symptoms aren't nearly as bad as when I was sick, but I'm so afraid they're going to get bad, and basically I'm feeling very mentally ill today. I was momentarily buoyed by how delicious my breakfast half sandwich was--roast beef with vegenaise and alfalfa sprouts--but now I'm back to feeling like I'm going to have a giant meltdown any second now. I'm pretty sure that once I get my period [sorry dudes] I'll feel better, because the drop in hormones always corresponds with a greater sense of perspective, so I hope that happens soon. And if I'm not feeling a lot better, symptom-wise, by Wednesday, I'm going to make an appointment with Doctor and demand that he fix me. I already have a medical appointment on Wednesday, at 7:30 in the morning, for physical therapy on my weird knee problem (when I hike downhill, the outsides of both my knees hurt -- not sure if I've mentioned this before), so I might as well totally ruin the day with a second appointment, right? One thing I know for sure is, if I have to go in there to see him, it's going to require a whole Xanax. I use Xanax only seldom, and when I do I can almost always just take a half and it's enough, but I already know this is a 1 whole Xanax situation.

In addition to this business, I've reached a point in coping with the food allergy thing where I feel isolated. I'm pretty sure this is a normal way to feel and that it will pass, but the UU potluck yesterday was not that fun for me and I doubt I will go to another one. If I were the type of person who craves a lot of attention it would have been great, as I could have made a big deal about asking everyone what was in the food they brought for the potluck and talking endlessly about what I can't eat, but the idea of doing that is horrifying to me, so all I ate was raw fruit and vegetables and the cookies I made. That might be contributing to my mental illness, actually--the consumption of approximately one million cookies yesterday. They're really good cookies, though, and you can get the recipe by googling Joy the baker vegan ginger cookies. Can you tell I still haven't figured out how to make Blogger add a link? Stupid Blogger. Be more obvious!

Complain complain complain. The part of my brain still functioning normally assures me I'm blowing everything way out of proportion right now, and I know that's true. We'll return to our lighthearted programming soon. A spot of good news is that last night my husband the cop finished his last regularly-scheduled night shift for the NEXT TWO YEARS. He got chosen to be on a special task force type thing for two years that will mean he works 10 hour days, Monday through Thursday, except sometimes when he might have to work nights or weekends (unpredictable). This is really super wonderful good news; I'm very glad for him and for me.

Look, it's going to be fine. Everything's going to be okay.

Love,

Eva

it was a for real conversation

2012-01-29T14:35:00.000-08:00

Today as I was walking home from UU church, I saw Julian. He was walking the same direction as I, going to a friend's house, so we walked together. I can't remember the last time I saw him, but he updated me on his life. He now lives in the house next door to the one we used to rent, he has a 1 year old brother, he's 9 and he's in 4th grade. It was so great to talk to that kid, because he was able to actually have a conversation without being so distracted and hyper like he used to be. Obviously I don't really know him and never did really know him, but today I feel so optimistic for him in a way I didn't used to. He could have a future that doesn't include being incarcerated! I so hope that for him. After we went our separate ways, I was thinking about him and hoping he doesn't move away before he's grown up, because I'd like to keep running into him from time to time. I was also thinking I wish I had a lot of money so I could give him a scholarship to college someday. C'mon Universe! Make it rain.

Eva

PS Great -- now that make it rain chicken song is in my head.

Vegan double ginger cookies are a success

2012-01-29T10:13:00.001-08:00

one of those that stays with you

2012-01-28T17:10:00.000-08:00

This morning I dreamt I was carrying a newborn baby around in a Pyrex dish. It wasn't my baby, but it was okay that I had it, so I was taking it around with me and then I looked at it and realized it was dressed like a 1980s Madonna, so it had to be her clone. This is still weirding me out.

Today I have done laundry, lifted weights, changed sheets, made bone broth (it's still simmering), made a loaf of bread, grocery shopped, and made red curry tuna for dinner. Chris is on the treadmill in his pre-work mode, and after he leaves I will dust, vacuum, and mix up the dough for vegan ginger cookies. The instructions say it should rest in the refrigerator for several hours or overnight, so we're going to do overnight. In the morning before the UU potluck I will bake them up, and hopefully they'll be as good as they look, because the picture of them looks extremely delicious.

Esther says hi.

XO
Eva

Chris and Milli--Milli's pooping

2012-01-27T10:13:00.000-08:00

so this made me laugh

2012-01-26T09:58:00.000-08:00

Because of my new dietary restrictions, I've been doing some reading about vegan baking and have been printing or bookmarking recipes that look good. I saw a recipe for a vegan brownie that looked kind of delicious, and the site allowed people to rate and review the recipe, so I was reading some of the reviews. Almost all the reviews I read said the brownies were pretty good, but that they'd made some changes (the changes were detailed) and the changes made the brownies AMAZING. That was a tiny bit amusing to me, that no one could just leave the recipe alone, but the best review I read was some dude who said (this is not a word-for-word quote, though I am putting in quotation marks), "These don't contain any animal products, but I wouldn't call them vegan, because 'vegan' involves a certain mindset". HAHAHAHAHA what a douchewad.

Only somewhat relatedly (barely), this Sunday is the 5th one of the month, which means my hippy church is having a potluck that day instead of a service. I already hated potlucks, but this whole allergy thing is making me super hate them. Still, I missed the last two Sundays on account of learning how to cross-country ski, so I feel I should go anyway, and maybe I'll bake a vegan thing to take. I really like a lot of the UUs, so if take my vegan thing and go and just chat, it'll be worth it.

I can't believe I only just realized this

2012-01-25T08:44:00.000-08:00

This is my Great Aunt Ruby, who was born in 1906. I was thinking about her this morning and it occurred to me that if she'd been famous, she'd have been one of the great gay icons of all time. She was smart and super funny, she was beautiful and stylish, and she did not take shit from ANYone. She was an artists' model for much of her young adult life, and this picture is of a picture of an oil painting someone did of her. She died in 1999 and I miss her.

My Witness, or Tina, Come Get Some Ham

2012-01-24T14:17:00.001-08:00

Time for my monthly post!

2012-01-24T14:15:00.000-08:00

This is what I've been doing: Loads of things, but nothing all that newsworthy. This past week I've been thinking a lot about the food allergy test results I got back last Tuesday, which showed I'm allergic to cow and goat milk and milk products, including whey and casein; chicken eggs; chicken; and pineapple. I'm also moderately allergic to peanuts, so I can have those sometimes, but I have to entirely eliminate that other stuff from my diet for at least 6 months. After that I can try gradually reintroducing it, to see if my body's done being sensitive to it yet. As you can probably imagine, this has meant making some major dietary changes, and it's hard not to think about that practically all the time. I think it's going to be okay, but it's definitely an adjustment. Today I went out for a meal, for the first time since getting the results, and it was great success! It helped that I went to a Japanese restaurant and could order a tuna roll, but still, success. I have a fear of being a pain in the ass, and I know there are people who will view me that way in future, as I'm quizzing restaurant staff about ingredients, but I have to get over that and just do it. I asked today, just to be sure, if there was any dairy or egg in the tuna roll, and there was not. I refuse to take it personally that I also got a "are you kidding me with this question?" look. I mean, it IS a tuna roll, but I needed the practice.

So here's what I want to do with this blog: I want to post something every day. This will more or less always be a very short post, maybe even just a photo, but I am hereby pledging, with this Napoleon Dynamite figure as my witness, that I will post something every day. I'm doing this more for me than for the three of you who read this, but possibly/hopefully you will be slightly entertained as well. And to this end, I'm not going to write anything else today, so I can save some stuff for later this week.

Eva

catch-up

2011-12-22T11:22:00.000-08:00

Uh, hi. I haven't been around for awhile, and if your visit here is related to the Reverb blogging thingy deal, then I'll just go ahead and confess I'm not doing that after all. I signed up for it with the best intentions, and then I went out of town and got behind on the prompts immediately. After I returned home and was behind on the prompts and also had loads to catch up on at work and with Christmas shopping and etc, I decided I couldn't possibly participate in Reverb because I was too overwhelmed. Are there virtual rotten eggs and tomatoes that could be thrown at me? I'll leave that to you to investigate. I'm not sorry to not be participating, because it really would be too much, but I'm sorry I didn't realize that before signing up. I can be a little dumb sometimes.

My out of town trip was to Las Vegas for a work conference, and it was a stressful and terrible thing. After the first day I figured out how to avoid most of the terrible aspects of it (mainly centered around the obtaining of reasonably-priced meals in a timely manner) and was fine, though lonely for my husband and cat. At the end of the conference, my beloved Catie Anchev arrived and we spent two days hanging out, not gambling and not drinking. It was so much fun! We went to Hoover Dam and to the Neon Boneyard and ate good foods and talked until our throats hurt. Well, MY throat hurt, anyway. I guess it could have been a precursor to the cold I got sick with the day after returning home. There were so many sick people with hacking coughs at the conference by the last day that I knew it would be a miracle if I DIDN'T get sick. I'm still trying to shake that cold, and I've had it 17 days. SUPER HATE. ANYway, this conference is an annual thing, but I hope I will never ever be asked to go to it again--I'd hate to be fired for refusing to attend. I did have a great time with Catie, though, so the trip was worth it, overall.

Oh, before the conference, J and Jh and Milli came for their planned visit, and it was so great to see them. I tell you what, that baby is amazing. She's strong as an ox and her head is giant (she's 6 months old but she has a 12 month head), and at her 6 month check-up her doctor predicted she'd be walking in 2 to 3 months. I would not be surprised if she was--she can stand longer than your arms want to hold her up. She hasn't developed "stranger anxiety" (or whatever) yet, which meant she wasn't afraid of us at all and we were able to hold her lots and lots and she was happy. Yay! I'm so glad they visited.

Chris has to work the next 4 nights, 4 pm to 2 am, but hopefully he'll be able to come home for a little while on Saturday night, because his mom, L, I, and our nieces are coming over for Christmas Eve dinner. I've thought a lot about what food to make, and I think I'm just going to go with spaghetti, salad, and some kind of roasted veg, plus appetizers and dessert. I considered a roast, but L called that for Christmas dinner already, so I needed to think of something else, preferably something easy, since I don't want to spend hours and hours cooking very quietly while Chris sleeps. I need to use that time cleaning, anyway, because we fired our cleaning ladies for doing a crappy job. I loved having cleaning ladies, but at some point (as their cleaning got lazier and lazier) it didn't feel worth it, so we'll clean the place ourselves for now, and maybe hire someone different later, or maybe not.

Listen, I could blather on and on about unimportant things, but I'd get bored and even more tired than I already am. That demented cat that lives in my house has remembered the joys of nighttime caterwauling and has renewed her hobby with gusto. She's stopped waking me up with her whiskers in my face in favor of waking me up with her unearthly mournful wailing. I'm not sure which is worse.

Talk to you hopefully soon,

Love,

Eva

hippier and hippier all the time

2011-11-04T16:15:00.000-07:00

This morning Esther did something she does a lot, and it's so cute though it startles me every time. She'll lie in wait in the kitchen, behind the cabinets so I can't see her (it's an open plan kitchen), and then as soon as I step foot into the kitchen she'll shriek, "MEOWMEOWMEOW!!". I always jump. I love that cat so much.

I've become convinced that the problem I'm still having with my guts is a thing called Small Intestine Bacteria Overload, where the bacteria in your small intestine becomes imbalanced and you have more than you need to digest your food. And maybe some of that is bad bacteria. Look, I have a touch of the ADD -- you can't expect me to read every single word about a thing. Anyway, I already thought that could be my problem, and then I happened across a study on the internet that concluded there was a link between SIBO (lookit me, using acronyms) and rosacea. Considering I never had rosacea until I started having gut problems, I definitely think the two are linked. Recently I was listening to a podcast about digestion (yes. this is what it's come to) and someone mentioned taking oregano oil, because it has antibacterial properties. I bought some yesterday and made myself a gel cap with a few drops of oregano oil and some olive oil to dilute it, and swallowed that last night. After I swallowed it I started reading more about oregano oil, and apparently it can be a bit dangerous to take, as it has properties that are toxic in large doses. Oops! Should have read that first. I don't think it harmed me at all, because I feel fine today, but what I'd like to tell you is that my rosacea was SIGNIFICANTLY IMPROVED this morning. I didn't expect it to be -- I'd hoped my digestion might be better (and it seems to be) -- but I had no expectations for my skin. This doesn't exactly discourage me from using oregano oil, potentially dangerous though it may be. I think I'll make another appointment with the naturopath I've seen a couple times, to find out how to use it safely.

I'm so happy it's Friday, both because it's Friday and because Chris is off for the next three days. I told him all I want from him tonight are hugs and kisses and red meat. When he's working and I'm making my own dinners, I tend to subsist on eggs and chicken and cheese for my proteins and I get a little hungry for beef. I don't know when I turned into such a carnivore. Anyway, this weekend we will do mostly indoor things, including watching Paris is Burning, that we got from Netflix. Yay! I'm excited to see it. It's going to be chilly this weekend and even supposed to snow on Sunday, so I want to stay IN this weekend and be cozy. This is my plan.

Also in my plan is to get my hair cut tonight after work. I feel this style needs tweaking but I'm out of ideas. Hopefully Janine can suggest something cute.

Sighhh I have to call some people back. Keep it crispy.

Love,

Eva

things I would like to tell you

2011-11-02T16:20:00.000-07:00

1) This weekend I spent some time sewing and cursing because I was altering my bras so the cups are smaller and I can wear them for awhile longer. Bras are expensive ($50+) and I'm a cheapskate whenever possible. The cups were quite wrinkled from my bosoms shrinking with the rest of me, but now they're not, so even though the bras don't look awesome without clothes over them, I consider this Great Success.

2) Monday I dressed as a Dude for Halloween. I bought and wore used coveralls and wore a hat advertising "Gun Leather", whatever that is; it's Chris' hat. I wore Converse high tops and drew a Fu Manchu and pointy flavor saver on my face with brown eyeliner. You guys, a few people mistook me for a man at first glance! Mission accomplished. I had my annual exam with Doctor that afternoon and he was amused by my fake facial hair, and also I was able to tell him, "This year most of my questions are about my prostate", which I enjoyed. The appointment went fine--I was less nervous than I sometimes have been when talking to him--and then I went home to shower away my terrible hat head and wash off the fake facial hair. Good day!

3) Yesterday Chris went back to night shift. It's going to be an adjustment, as I'd gotten so spoiled with him on day shift. He'd been on 6 months of days, because when he was last supposed to go to nights (4 months ago), another deputy asked if Chris would trade him nights for days. Uh YEAH he would. This other deputy is something of a legend for his fervor in arresting drunk drivers, and that is best done at night, which is why he wanted to trade. ANYway, so Chris is back to nights, but only for two months; no big deal. I don't love his night shifts, but it'll only start to get really tiresome around week 6. Esther and I can handle it. We are stoic.

4) Last night I made a fire in our wood stove for the first time. Chris has always been the fire maker, but with him gone and it being chilly, I took matters into my own hands and built a fire the way he always does, and it caught without me having to coax it along at all. I know it's stupid, but that feels empowering. Another even stupider thing that felt empowering was last night when I set up coffee for the morning, I set the auto start feature, so it would start making coffee 15 minutes before my alarm goes off. I'd never done that before either! It's hard to believe I'm 43, isn't it.

5) J and Jh are coming to visit later this month! They're arriving the day after Thanksgiving and leaving the Sunday after that. I'm excited to see them, of course, but Super excited to see my granddaughter! I hope they let me take her to UU church before they leave so I can show her off.

That's all I can think of right now, even though it's been a long time since I updated. That's dumb.

Love,

Eva

mighty and less mighty

2011-10-13T10:33:00.000-07:00

Chris showed me this video a few weeks ago, of Benedikt Magnusson, a championship Icelandic weightlifter [and all-around giant pile of a man], preparing to lift, and then lifting, a ridiculous amount of weight. I sometimes think about it in the mornings when I'm preparing to lift a comparatively puny amount of weight but still need to work up the nerve to do it.

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/DchUE6Wy67s" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

This morning I squatted 97, benched 69, and upright rowed 72. Benedikt Magnusson could do those without even putting down his 2 liter Coke bottle.

Eva

attic pants

2011-10-12T11:41:00.000-07:00

This weekend I crawled up into the attic (which is not my favorite place, but I'm determined to stop being daunted by it) to get some clothes I've been storing for years and years. I've been storing them with the faith that one day I will be small enough to wear them again, and lo, this is finally happening. Much of what was up there I looked at and thought, "WHY was I keeping this?" -- those clothes went immediately into a donation bag. Others of what was up there I had to re-store under my bed, because they're still too small, but SOME things I was able to put into my closet. Today I'm wearing a pair of capri pants that it's technically a bit too chilly for, but I'm wearing them with hose and mary janes to stretch the capri pant season. I will wash them and put them into the donation bag after this, but I wanted to wear them once, at least, since I've been holding onto them so long. I wore a different (seasonally appropriate) pair of attic pants on Monday, and there's a skirt I'm going to be stubborn and wear once before giving away, because I've never worn it and it still has the tags on. I don't really like it anymore, but it fits now, so by god it's getting worn. I was noticing, when going through the clothes, that a lot of things I used to wear are dry clean only, and I don't really do that now, so I don't know what I'll end up keeping. Probably I'll keep whatever doesn't shrink when I wash it on cold/delicate--whatever shrinks will go to the Goodwill to be purchased by executive toddlers. Also I was noticing that I have a glut of adorable little black dresses; I blame TJ Maxx for making them so darn affordable. I am all set for future events that require a little black dress.

Last weekend we went to the 7th annual Eburg film festival, and it was good, like always. My favorite film festival films are documentaries and there were a lot of good ones to choose from. I love the film festival. This weekend will be our big yard/garden clean-up weekend and I'm really looking forward to it. In addition to cleaning up and harvesting, we're going to plant garlic for next year, and tulip and crocus bulbs, and I think it'll be satisfying work. I'm so glad we moved to a place that has 4 seasons, because there are things I like about each season, and also it's nice to be able to say, "Okay, now we're done gardening; let's get ready to hibernate for the winter", OR "Now we're done hibernating; what will we plant this year?". That kind of thing. I like doing different stuff at different times.

Just those for today.

Love,

Eva

They did!

2011-10-03T09:49:00.002-07:00

Wedding

2011-10-03T09:49:00.001-07:00

It turns out white wine triggers rosacea flare-ups too. Filing under: Lessons learned the hard way. Fun wedding, though.

Sent from my iPhone

monthly post

2011-09-30T10:25:00.000-07:00

So, as is usual at this time of year, my job has been nightmarish and horrible. I SWEAR it's been worse this year than in previous years, but my BroCo thinks we just forget how terrible it is from year to year. I don't know who's right, but I'm pretty sure it's me. ANYway, I haven't even thought about updating for a good three weeks now, but things are starting to be less horrible, and I think I can sneak in a quick update, in list form.

1) There's this older dude at my church who's been wanting to order t-shirts with our congregation name on them, and I've been telling him there should also be a howling wolf on there somewhere. He keeps saying No Wolf, and I keep telling him the wolf would put the shirts over the edge into pure awesomeness, but he won't have it [this is all a joke, of course]. On Sunday he brought an order form, and I don't really want a t-shirt, but all profits go toward the building fund, and MAN we really need a different building--we've outgrown the tiny one we're currently in. So I ordered a shirt, but then later that day Chris and I went to a thrift store and I found a t-shirt with not one but THREE wolves on them, and I bought it so I can cut the wolves off and attach them to my UU shirt (with fabric glue and some stitching). I can hardly wait to wear the hybrid UU/wolf monstrosity for the dude to see--it is extremely amusing to me.

2) I guess I never told you, but I saw a dermatologist in mid-August to see what can be done for my rosacea. She gave me a prescription for Oracea, which is like a low-level tetracycline, that's supposed to clear my skin without effing up my gut flora, and I've been taking one per morning as prescribed. So far this medication has done fuck all for my skin, and last weekend I looked up the clinical trials to see how long it took for people to see results. They indicated I should have seen results by now, so I started looking around the internets to see what ELSE I could do, and I discovered that for some people, different foods trigger rosacea outbreaks. Two of the most common triggers are chocolate and red wine. I don't drink red wine real frequently anymore, but I've been eating chocolate practically every single day for a few months now. I discontinued the chocolate and have not had red wine, and my skin looks Much better already. I figure I'll lay off the chocolate and wine indefinitely, and I hope that my skin will continue to improve. I do plan to eat one (1) of Vinman's amazing chocolate ganache rumballs in December, and if there are skin consequences, they will be worth it.

3) Another thing I did to try and improve my skin was buy mineral makeup on Sunday. It cost one million dollars (hyperbole) and for a few days I was convinced it was giving me a rash, but now I'm not sure. I think it might've been a product I was using in conjunction with the makeup--like, the two of them combined to form a powerful skin irritant, or something. I stopped using that product, and the rash has not returned. If it IS the makeup, it's just the powder, and in that case I will exchange the powder for a different brand.

4) I joined my sister in law's book club! It meets once a month and I think it will be v. fun. I'm also thinking I'll attend knit night once a month, because though I love to get my sleeps, I also need to develop SOME kind of social life, and book club and knit night are a good start.

5) Chris bought the Game of Thrones books for the Kindle app, and he put them on my phone as well, so we're both reading them. They're as good as everyone says and I'm looking forward to the show being on dvd so we can get it from Netflix. Oh by the way, I still love Netflix; I'm not even a little ruffled about the changes they made to their pricing structure. Charge me more, Netflix! You're still light years better than having to GO somewhere to rent dvds. Red Box, I'm giving you the side eye.

6) I'm so glad it's Friday. Tomorrow we're going to a wedding in Seattle that Chris will be officiating (a friend he's known since childhood), and while we're there we'll make a stop at Trader Joes (it's an emergency--we're out of panang tuna!) and maybe a quick stop at a bookstore so I can get the October book club book. Sunday I'll attend UU service and also work in our garden and ALSO roast as many tomatoes as possible. I experimented with roasting some last weekend, because we have so. many. tomatoes., and the experiment was a great success. I'm going to roast them and roast them and will freeze them in small containers. We had planned to can tomatoes this year, but we didn't follow through to buy any of the equipment and now it sounds like a giant pain in the ass. Maybe next year.

7) Tweet of the Day:

ShittingtonUK -- I'm taking song suggestions for a mixtape for a coworker whose twin babies were scratched up pretty bad by a mongoose and/or raccoon.

End of update!

Love,

Eva

Yay, it worked!

2011-09-09T09:46:00.000-07:00

Maybe that other photo I tried to send was over the file size limit or something. At any rate, that's a picture I took at the fair last weekend. I love love love Hipstamatic. I had bought one or two of their film/lens/flash paks, but a couple weeks ago I decided I needed every last pak and product and bought the rest. It cost me all of $6.99 for the rest and I consider that money well spent. So far my favorite favorite lens/film combo is the one I used with the below pic: Libatique 73 lens and Pistil film, but I will continue to experiment.

This message has been brought to you by Friday.

Love,
Eva

2011-09-09T09:39:00.001-07:00

weekend and other

2011-09-07T11:03:00.001-07:00

Last weekend was the best I've had in a long time. On Saturday I walked in the annual Rodeo parade with the Unitarians--it was such a weird experience, having all those people looking at us walk by. Sunday I lifted weights and went to church, and then went to the best wedding I've ever been to. My old friend (a dude I knew 20+ years ago and recently reconnected with on Facebook) got married to a lovely woman, and the ceremony was so great. They had a cute little old guy to marry them, but all he did was begin the ceremony by saying a few words of welcome, and then pronounce them married later, after they had each talked. Their part was so great--they each said what they loved about each other and why they wanted to marry each other, and what they promised each other. I'm getting a little teary just remembering it; it was very moving, and of course there were also lots of funny parts. It was a very low-key wedding, but so beautiful, and I'm very happy I was invited. Chris was invited with me but couldn't go because he had to work (this was a busy weekend for the cops), but I met up there with my friend, Diana. We saw a few people we knew, including a guy I had dated a million years ago, and he hasn't changed a bit. It was SO MUCH FUN, I can't even tell you.

So that was Sunday. Monday Chris and I went to the county fair for a little while, to see the animals and handicrafts and giant vegetables [NOTE: none of them were particularly giant]. We ate gyros that were gut bombs in our stomachs (neither of us has been eating many carbs, so that big squishy pita was a lot) and went home to rest our bellies. Then to the Goodwill later, where I found a few skeins (unsure how many--they're in a plastic bag) of a pretty mohair type yarn, a black velvet pencil skirt, and a pair of jeans that are too small but which I will be able to wear at some point this fall. Yay! I felt a little melancholic Monday night, about having to return to work the next day, but I got over it. I wish all my weekends could be that good.

Something making me happy this week is how hot it is here. It's been in the 90s, and tomorrow is supposed to be 100 degrees, and Thursday 101. I don't know why it is, but this summer I've been loving the heat; I feel a little lizardy, because I want to bask in it. This urge to bask is not really a good thing, as I've recently started taking an oral medication for my rosacea that makes a person more sensitive to the sun, but I've sunscreened up anyway, at times, to spend awhile outdoors. My neck got a little burned this weekend, but otherwise I've been okay. This week I decided to wear a skirt to work every day, since it's good weather for skirts, and who knows how long that will last. Today it's a black linen skirt with embroidery and sequins that I got at Goodwill for $3. Yesterday's skirt was also from a thrift store, as are the skirts I'll be wearing the rest of the week. I enjoy thrift; can you tell?

I recently started doing a thing that I'm hesitant to share, lest the thing or my intention in sharing the thing be misunderstood, but I'm going to tell you anyway. I have a coworker who gets on my every last nerve, all the time. I won't go into all the ways she irritates me, because I'd be typing all day, but suffice it to say she's more or less my arch-nemesis. SHE does not know this, because I've made an effort to hide my irritation most of the time, but yeah, she is intensely aggravating to me. I've known for the 3 years she's worked here that I need to find a way to let the aggravation go, because there is absolutely no point to feeling irritated by her, but that's turned out to be far easier acknowledged than done. I've gotten so tired of being enraged by her ALL THE FUCKING TIME that I've resorted to a desperate measure: I decided to pray for her, every night, when I'm in bed waiting to fall asleep. I'm not religious, in the sense that I don't subscribe to a particular religion and I don't believe in a deity, per se, but I do think there's something going on and that I'm being heard when I address the Universe. I guess this makes me New Age? Whatever. I already did a form of praying, though not specifically at night before sleeping, so the idea of praying for her wasn't super outlandish, but when it occurred to me to do it, I had to overcome some medium-strength resistance before I could start. All this being said, I actually think it's helping me to not hate her guts so much. I've only been doing it for 10 days or so, and I plan to keep it up in hopes that I can eventually let all her bullshit roll right off me. Oh, and as long as I was already doing this, I added a couple of other people who annoy me as well--not coworkers. In for a penny, in for a pound, right? And as long as I was making nighttime prayer a habit, I also added an opening ritual of listing 3 things I was thankful for from the day. I can't add anything else on, as I don't think I could stay awake long enough, but I'm just glad it's helping, because all that hating was really wearing me out.

Last thing for today: I'm having a lot of trouble feeling motivated at work. Can you tell? Oy,

Love,

Eva

Last post for today, I swear

2011-08-17T12:31:00.000-07:00

We're a little poor right now, while we pay off J&J's honeymoon from our credit card (as well as other small wedding-related purchases), but I'm using the iPhone's notes feature to keep track of the things I'm going to buy once the card is cleared.

To Buy When Not Poor:

Adele's music. Probably all of it.
Parasols
Extra headset for Rosetta Stone Spanish
Update to the GPS (needed!)
Mod Podge Dimensional Magic
East Village Mixtape Part 2
Food allergy testing [$189]

Several of those things are not expensive, but they're not necessary either, and currently I'm not making any unnecessary purchases. I need a dress for a wedding September 4th, but I probably have to get that even if we're still poor.

Another thing I'm using the notes for is keeping track of the hives I get. I just recently thought of doing that, so there's only one entry so far. I'm writing down when I got the hive, where [always on the face. Always! Why always the face?!], and the last thing I ate before the hive formed. Possibly the food allergy testing will reveal whatever is causing the hives, but I won't be able to afford that for awhile.

I bet you're glad I came back one last time today. You're welcome!

Love,
Eva

Answer = NO

2011-08-17T12:10:00.001-07:00

I'll figure it out. Don't worry.

Love,
Eva

Hooray for Technology!

2011-08-17T12:08:00.000-07:00

That last post was me testing out the mobile blogging thing. I'd signed up for it I can't remember when but never tried it. Now I feel it's Definitely an option. I don't know if it'll let me post a picture that way. Let's see. Please hold.

2011-08-17T12:04:00.001-07:00

Hello, does this work at all? I'm eating a frittata and hating on various people. But not YOU, my darling. Never you.

the balloon payment

2011-08-02T16:36:00.000-07:00

Hello! The last ..... holy shit, it's been a whole MONTH! ... has really flown by. Since I last posted, our son got married and went on a honeymoon, I had 2 weeks off work (which encompassed our son's wedding and etc), I got soft contact lenses, hiked a few times with Chris, and embarked upon a weightlifting program. Not a lot to report for a month, but that's okay. I mean, I did a lot of other stuff, but it was all small and not really worth talking about.

I got one of my student coworkers to stay with Esther while we were out of town for the wedding, and that cat gave her some trouble. She didn't want to take her pills [the student called me to ask for advice on that and became successful at ramming them down Esther's throat] and apparently she refused to use her litter box for pooping. She does that sometimes to us also -- deposits a few turds on the floor by the box -- but while we were out of town she never once pooped in her box. Also there was a thunder storm the day we were coming home and Esther freaked out about it, which is weird because she's always been so mellow about thunderstorms, unlike her poor dead sister, Lucy, who used to absolutely lose her shit during a thunderstorm. Literally, sometimes. I guess Esther is only mellow about storms when we're there. So at this point I'm thinking it's not even worth trying to go out of town while Esther is still alive, and that's a bit depressing.

A couple weeks ago, at about 2 in the morning, Esther came in to cuddle up to me and brought with her a strong smell of poo. I took her into the bathroom and wiped her butt clean (there was a Klingon), but in the morning I saw she had deposited some poo on the bed as well. I washed the quilt and sheets and two nights later, again in the wee morning hours, she barfed on the bed and also wiped her butt on the sheet. I washed the quilt and sheets and was thinking about how nowadays I'm putting way more into this cat than I'm getting back. But then I thought about how, when Esther and Lucy were kittens and younger cats--really until they were in their teens--I was getting way more than I was putting in. WAY more. When they were kittens they needed very little and entertained us 24/7 with their crazy feats and wrestling shows. Anyway, thinking about things this way made me realize that Esther's demented elderly cat years are the balloon payment. And THAT makes me think of Mitch Hedberg's joke about the easy payments and one hard payment. I just looked it up so I could get it right:

"You can have this product for four easy payments of 19.95." I would like to have a product that was available for three easy payments, and one fuckin' complicated payment! We ain't gonna tell you which payment it is, but one of these payments is gonna be a bitch. The mailman will get shot to death, the envelope will not seal, and the stamp will be in the wrong denomination; good luck, fucker! The last payment must be made in wampum!

My point is, this elderly cat is really difficult right now, but I owe her for all the years she was easy.

Okay, so this was an awesome update [wry face] but now I've gotta do some work stuff.

Love,

Eva

summer

2011-06-29T14:12:00.000-07:00

Last Thursday morning we took Esther to the vet and left her there, to board, for two days. It was a little embarrassing to bring in the giant paper sack containing her food, meds, catnip mouse, and (the largest item) her minky throw blanket, but we did it anyway and hope she was comforted by having her normal stuff around her. We then packed like crazy and drove to Eugene, arriving shortly before 3. We went to J and Jh's first, to drop off the kitchen table we got them at the Goodwill for $28 -- it's one of those old school chrome tables with the formica top, and is in pretty good shape, though not perfect. We gave them the table and cuddled the baby for awhile, then went to the restaurant my mom had booked for my dad's surprise 80th birthday party. I admit I was skeptical about the place, because it's kind of like a Denny's, but it turns out they had a downstairs "banquet room" area that was a good place for the party my mom planned. We, along with my siblings, decorated the room with the things my mom had bought, changed into party clothes and started greeting arriving guests. My parents arrived awhile later (there were hors d'oevres and wine for the guests in the meantime) and we all screamed SURPRISE! My dad was surprised. I had no doubt he would be, but my mom was worried. She snuck around and lied to him for weeks, and I'm glad she did because I know she LOVED doing it, but truly there was no need--he was never going to pick up on anything she was doing. He reads his books and doesn't pay attention to anything unless he has to because it involves him needing to do something. So he was super surprised and it took him awhile to get into the party swing of things, but he managed it and I think everyone had a very good time. The food was good (especially so because I didn't expect it to be) and my siblings made good speeches about our dad (mine was less good--I get scared talking in front of other people), and yeah: A success all around.

We stayed through Friday, got up way too early on Saturday, and drove like crazy to get back to town before noon, which is when the vet closed. We picked up Esther around 11:30 and she was SO glad to see us. They said she did fine with the boarding, though they needed to maintain a one empty cage buffer between her and other cats or she would have anxiety-induced asthma attacks (...), but otherwise she was good. We took her home and we all lazed about and then napped and then lazed a little more. Sunday we were more productive, especially since it was the UU garden tour. Ours was the first garden, so we waited for them to come to us, and then we joined the convoy to 3 other gardens. It was so much fun! I loved seeing other peoples' places and dogs and horses.

Chris and I are both obsessed with new hobbies. His might not be so much a "hobby" as mine: He is utilizing his birthday present from me (weights and equipment for lifting weights--I don't remember what it's all called; he bought it himself) to build the muscles. He's stepped up his protein consumption, including drinking glasses of milk (herk), and is lifting weights and thinking and researching about weight lifting during most of his waking, non-work hours. As for me, it's embroidery. I've been wanting to start doing it for awhile, but what finally got me started is I bought a Sublime Stitchery baby bib embroidery kit. I finished one bib and will start the other soon -- they're for my granddaughter, of course. I'm going to need a lot more practice to get good at it, but it's fun and I'm loving it. I ordered a few supplies this weekend (iron-on transfer pen and transfer paper and some stuff to make floss behave) and I'm excited to do more projects.

I was all into the Summer Burn, but then I didn't get my cds together before the beginning of summer so now I have to scramble to get them together and I'm apathetic. They're mostly done--I just need to go through them again to make sure the songs flow well--and then I can burn and mail them. Oy. I went out at lunch today to get a couple small gifties to go in with the cds to say sorry for being late. I'm pretty sure I'll be forgiven; most people who do Summer Burn are easygoing. So maybe I'll finally finish them tonight so I can take them to the post office tomorrow with the other things I need to mail. I'ma make it my goal.

In other news, lately I hate my job and I hate my job's ass FACE.

Love,

Eva

things I want to tell you

2011-06-18T14:37:00.000-07:00

1) I got my hair cut today, shorter than I was planning to go. Having to take my glasses off for the cut, thus rendering myself blind, doesn't always work out so well for me. Fortunately it should be grown out to the perfect length for our son's wedding next month. Grow, hair. Grow!

2) My allergies started up in earnest this week, and for the past two days I've been nauseated from them. Does anyone else get nauseated from their allergies? I no like. I used my neti pot this morning and that helped a little, but only for a short time. Bleargh.

3) I've got that song stuck in my head about the combination Pizza Hut and Taco Bell. Experience tells me it won't be going away anytime soon.

4) Today at the thrift stores we bought:

a. A dining table for J and Jh -- it's the kind with the chrome legs and sides and the formica top. It's not in perfect condition, but it's pretty good, and it's a good size. Chris texted them a picture of it and they said they like it, otherwise we wouldn't have bought it. I'm going to Eugene this week and will take it to them then.
b. A small skein of mohair yarn in a pretty color; currently residing in the deep freeze to kill any moths it might be carrying.
c. 8 yards of awesome vintage lining fabric ($4!). I can't wait to see what I line with it. [I'm thinking maybe a wool turquoise coat that I will sew with the skills I don't yet have but will surely acquire soon by magic.]
d. Chris found a cd set and a dvd set--both from the Great Courses company--and he was chuffed at the awesome deal he got.
e. A framed print of a Van Gogh painting.

5) Today we are:
a. Doing chores like laundry and grocery shopping.
b. Feeling like napping.
c. Thinking about projects we want to do [me: embroidery, knitting, sewing. Chris: growing muscles.]
d. Wearing our pajamas we put on after we got back from errands.

That's all for now but I'll post again soon. I set it up so I can post from my phone, which hopefully means more updates, but probably shorter ones. Yay? Yay.

Love,
Eva

tweeter of the day

2011-05-27T08:36:00.000-07:00

So there's a person on Twitter that's cracking me up. The premise behind the Twitter account is that someone set it up and told their old grandfather it was a search engine -- the Twitter name is oldmansearch. I don't buy that it's real (what old man would keep typing things into what he thinks is a search engine when it never finds anything?), but it's funny anyway.

Also, I'm still mad at Blogger for yesterday. It and I are in a fight.

Love,
Eva

goddammit...

2011-05-26T11:32:00.001-07:00

I forgot I couldn't edit a post without it getting all effed up! This is your most annoying thing, BLOGGER.

the story of Milli

2011-05-26T11:30:00.000-07:00

Hello! I was in Eugene for a few days for the birth of our granddaughter. The day before we left to go down there, the baby's mom, who I will call Jh (her first two initials) asked me if we were going to be in the delivery room. OMG, what? I had no idea we were invited to the delivery room, but she said we could absolutely be there, so we were. Her labor was induced--they started the process Sunday night--and Monday morning when we arrived at the hospital, her water had been broken and she was in pain. She was in the tub, which helped a little, but after she got out, she was hurting and crying and we were so sad for her. She asked for an epidural and it was administered, and right afterwards they put in a catheter, since she wouldn't be able to get out of bed and go to the bathroom. Our classy son kept checking her pee bag and she told him, "Jacob, quit creeping on my pee.", which pleased me. She was funny when she wasn't in pain. My other favorite thing she said was when a Harry Potter movie was playing on the tv; she said, "Oh my god, Dudley is a straight-up idiot.", which would probably be funnier if you heard her say it. She's got a funny way of saying stuff. Anyway, the epidural helped for a couplethree hours and then her pain started up again. It wasn't supposed to, but apparently sometimes if a baby is particularly low in the belly, the epidural doesn't quite kill the pain. She was miserable for awhile and then the anesthesiologist came back and did something that helped again.

Anyway, blah blah blah, it was a day of ups and downs, and then at about 7:30 pm or so, the nurse told her she was almost fully dilated, and they called her doctor back to the hospital. He arrived, cracking jokes (funny ones -- I loved that doctor). She was scared and crying; she said What if I can't push her out? What if I poop on the table? We were all encouraging her and her mom was wiping her tears, and then she made me laugh again by telling her mom, "Great, you just rubbed off my eyebrow.". The doctor had her give a couple pushes and then he said it was going to go faster than he'd expected, and he put on a whole bunch of gear, including goggles that contained a clear face shield. She started pushing at a little after 8 and the baby was born at 8:26. It was the craziest damn thing I've ever seen in my life, and that's saying something, what with YouTube and all. I still can hardly believe that whole entire baby came out of such a small area, but she did. Everyone who wasn't the doctor or a nurse was wearing the same surprised face, and then it was a blur of the baby being put on Jh's chest and various people crying and a lot of activity down at her bathing suit area that I wasn't looking at because I was looking at the baby and fumbling for my phone so I could take some pictures. Our son cut the cord and I didn't see it because I was looking at that bloody, cone-headed baby on her mom's chest and there were camera flashes and whooooooo it was nuts.

[A note, in case you didn't know -- we adopted our son when he was 8, so this was our first and only childbirth experience.]

Everyone was on a high after the birth and Jh was thrilled that she could finally drink some water--she'd been thirsty for hours and was only allowed ice chips. She drank water and then a little soda and then some orange juice; we just kept the liquids coming. The baby was resting on her chest and the nurse kept trying to make the baby cry more, because she had barely cried. The baby started to hate the nurse and cried every time the nurse touched her. People who had been waiting in the hall came in, one at a time, to see the baby--the euphoria was off the charts. After awhile Jh smelled the baby and said, "She stinks!". The nurse weighed the baby and took her footprints, and then gave the baby a sort of sponge bath. Jacob was called over to diaper and dress her after the bath--the baby was not amused. He had to wrestle her to get her arms in the sleeves because she was keeping her arms retracted, raptor-style, against her body. Jh said, "Jacob, your face looks like, 'This is my baby, and I'm not happy about it!'". Chris helped and finally she was all dressed and swaddled. Jh was getting cleaned up so Jacob held the baby (Milli) until Jh needed him to go home and get something for her, then I got to hold her. You guys, I don't know how this happened, exactly, but she's the most beautiful baby in the history of all time. Isn't that weird, that my granddaughter just happens to be the most beautiful baby ever born? It's such an odd coincidence. Anyway, then Chris held her, and then we went back to my parents' house, exhausted as though we had each pushed a baby out of our vaginas. We saw and held her again Tuesday and yesterday morning before we left town, and she does two things I love: 1) She always wants to have her hands over her face, and sometimes it looks like she's doing a gesture to indicate she can't believe all the fools she's having to deal with. 2) She furrows her brow as though she's very concerned about something--the situation in the Middle East, probably. Concern is a super cute expression on a newborn baby.

So, to wrap up, I'm in love with our granddaughter and I wonder how soon I can buy her a pony.

Love,

Eva

life changes

2011-05-13T10:00:00.000-07:00

I've been thinking about writing an update for a few days, but then could never figure out what I wanted to write. This is partly because I feel like there's so much happening in my life right now, but a lot of what's happening is going on inside my head: Changes in the way I'm thinking and feeling about most everything. Things are happening for real too, of course--there are a lot of transitions in the works. Two examples: Our son is making a transition to being a father and is making us grandparents, and our cat is in a transition from being alive to not being alive. She's not on her deathbed right now or anything, but she's in a decline we don't think she'll rally from. She's almost 18, so though we love her to an almost ridiculous degree, we recognize it's inevitable we will lose her, and we're just trying to make the rest of her life as happy and comfortable as possible. There are other things happening too--either not dramatic enough or TOO dramatic to go into--and basically the theme of this year so far is Change. I'm okay with that, but it feels scary too. I ask the Universe for help a lot, and the Universe humors me by asking exactly what I need help with. Do I need help breathing or sitting in my chair? And I say NO, I need help with EVERYthing, and it replies, Girlfriend, I'll help you when you need it, but right now you just need to return those emails and you don't need me for that. I'll tell you, it's annoying how correct the Universe always is.

Tweet of the Day

christianduguay -- If your name is Donovan, you can freak everyone out by not becoming a cashier at Whole Foods.

Chris has been doing tons of work in our garden lately, and it looks so nice. He's planted a bunch of crops, including a new little patch of raspberries, plus all the normal stuff like tomatoes, potatoes, herbs, lettuces, etc etc. Our friends, John and Jason, are going to give us a big clump of rhubarb, and I'm excited for that because we've never grown rhubarb before. Chris would probably be doing all this work anyway, but this year we're keeping in mind that on June 26th, a bunch of UUs are going to come over and look at the garden. This is part of their annual garden tour, which goes around to several members' gardens and also the community garden at the Catholic church. We're not trying to make the garden perfect for them, but we do want it to be nice, since it's going to be seen. I have not personally done that much garden work yet, but I'm definitely going to. It's just that Chris is doing it on his days off, and on my days off I've been doing things like laundry and grocery shopping and being hungover like I was last Sunday. In my defense, the home-brewed beers we were sampling at the CHARITY FUNDRAISER (see? it was totally for a good cause) on Saturday were very potent. Anyway, I'm so happy it's spring and is warming up, and I hope we have a scorching hot summer to make up for last year's ridiculously cold summer.

I feel good today. I did my normal walk-on-treadmill this morning and today was also a sit-ups and push-ups day. I had initially planned to do them every day, but the second day my abs said something that sounded like ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME? So I decided every other day was good. I know it's not exactly a huge workout, but I hadn't been doing any strength training at all, and I wanted to start somewhere manageable and work up from there. And I've noticed it's making a difference, so I'm happy with this for now, but I've been considering doing Body for Life again, because I loved how strong I got when I did that. And I also lost 12 pounds, which I could definitely stand to do again. Three times.

This weekend I have a whole bunch of things to get done -- many of them small, microchores -- and I'm actually looking forward to them. I'm also planning to help for a couple hours at my church's yard sale tomorrow and I'm leaving early today so I can take our donations to the church before 5. Church this, church that. Aren't you glad I became a UU? Don't answer that.

Love.

Eva

PS My doctor tests were negative. So my next thing is to get a HIDA scan (gallbladder test that involves a tiny amount of radioactivity) at some point, but I'm not rushing to schedule it.

I'm calling it out

2011-05-03T12:26:00.000-07:00

Look, I'm just going to say this. I'm not sorry Osama Bin Laden is dead, but I don't see it as being a solution to the Al Qaeda problem, or even as closure to the 9/11 attacks. The people his operatives killed that day are still dead, and Al Qaeda is not going to disband now that he's been killed. One has to assume there are guys lined up to take his place as Head Terrorist, and they're going to want revenge on the US for killing him, so then we'll have a new #1 Enemy and more people will be dead. I'm not saying we shouldn't have gone after him, but I don't think his death has really changed anything for the better, other than we got vengeance or whatever. Or, actually, let me amend that: The only thing this accomplished, aside from vengeance, was increase our president's approval rating, and I see that as a positive thing, considering I'd like him to be elected again next year. Okay. Good. But, like the Sassy Curmudgeon, I'm suspicious about the burial at sea thing. I can think of valid reasons to bury him at sea, but still it's uneasy-making.

And you know what, as long as I'm saying stuff some people will find offensive, I'll say one more thing. Every time there's a news story about Gabrielle Giffords -- like recovery milestones, or her travel to Florida to see her husband's space shuttle launch -- the unreported thing, the unasked question, gets more and more palpable. You know what it is, because you've wondered it your ownself: How disfigured is she? I know it's terribly crude to mention it and I'm a monster for typing what every single person is thinking when she's in the news, but it's a fact that she's not going to look the same now as before she got shot in the head. Maybe there are plans for her to have extensive plastic surgery before her face is revealed, and in any case, it's definitely no one's business, but my whole point is everyone's wondering the same thing and no one is saying they're wondering it. That feels weird, right? Am I the only one who thinks that feels weird?

Tweet of the Day

robdelaney [of course] -- This is a wonderful 9th birthday present for my "terror sex" baby, Trevor.

Things:

1) I like the way my haircut turned out. It's shorter than I've had it the past few cuts, but I like it this length and it feels awesomely springy.

2) Sunday I officially became a member of the UU church and I'm happy about that.

3) The weekend was good but felt short for some reason. I did a little (very little) work in the yard and made a start on the bunting for my granddaughter's bedroom, but didn't get it finished.

4) I ovulated last week and my stupid uterus doesn't seem to realize there's no baby in there, so like the previous 372 months I have ovulated in my life and have not become pregnant, I'm super super hungry and cannot seem to feel full. 25 minutes ago I ate two medium-sized bean burritos with cheese (homemade, with high fiber tortillas so they're practically health food) for lunch, and my stomach is still GROWLING, for fuck sake. Body, do you want to be fused to a couch someday?? Get it together.

5) And speaking of my body and the F word, I still haven't gotten my test results from my doctor and I guess I'm going to have to call those fuckers. "Fuckers" is one of my favorite things to say lately, because Jonny McGovern's Brittney Spears imitation includes her saying 'Fuckers' a lot in a southern accent, so I say it like that and it's fun. Poor Chris; he puts up with so much from me. Anyway, I hope they call me today because I so hate calling people and know I'll put it off until Friday, probably.

6) Nothing.

Love,

Eva

the royal they

2011-04-29T16:50:00.000-07:00

Oh royal wedding--you did not disappoint. I haven't watched the whole thing yet but I watched some of it this morning from Tivo, and the hats THE HATS! I'll watch the rest of it tonight and will swoon at the balcony kisses just like everyone else did. It's so nice we Americans can watch this kind of thing, since we really don't have anything that compares to a royal wedding. I've been trying to think of the closest thing we've got and all I can think of is the finales of beloved tv shows. Even our presidential elections/inaugurations aren't a royal wedding-sized big deal to most Americans, probably due to the dearth of interesting headwear, as well as the vicious political hatred of half the country for the other half. So yeah--thanks, William and Kate, for getting married--it was a lovely ceremony.

As I've mentioned before, my doctor is great and I like him and his nurse and the office in general, but something they could be so much better at is getting back to people with test results. He told me they should have the results of both my tests on Wednesday, but I'm still waiting to hear them. I know I could call and ask, but that combines my doctor anxiety with my slight phone phobia, so that's not going to happen unless I get really desperate to hear the results and I don't get them for a couple more business days. Maybe I'll send psychic CALL ME brainwaves at them and see if that does anything.

Tweets of the Day

badbanana -- If you don't have time to stop and smell the roses, at least pause and sniff the conference room speakerphone.

JohnFugelsang -- Donald Trump is the first man in history to try and take credit for someone else proving he's a liar.

I'm really happy to be having a weekend. There's a big "clean up the downtown" thing happening tomorrow, and I'd been thinking about participating but then decided not to. Now that I go to the UU church, I'm aware of all the activities I could be participating in, and I've been keeping myself busy with various thing the last several weekends. I realized that if I don't give myself a weekend off regularly, I could start to feel overloaded and harried, so on Saturday I will do chores and work in the garden and make colorful bunting for my granddaughter's bedroom. Sunday is the day I'll become a member of the UU church, and I don't know what that will involve exactly, but there's definitely no ritual sacrifice, so it'll probably be pretty low key. And Chris doesn't work this Sunday, so we can have a lovely afternoon together. Maybe a bike ride!

Love,

Eva

cat not for sale

2011-04-26T14:29:00.000-07:00

Quick quick quick quick

1) Dr. appt went fine. I did not cry, we made a plan for what tests to do to try and figure out what's wrong with me, and I left several vials of my blood behind in the office lab, as a start to that testing. I should hear back about that stuff tomorrow. I would absolutely love it if those come back positive and we don't have to go any further with this stuff, but I feel strangely pessimistic about it now. I WAS feeling like, shit yeah, that's definitely what's wrong with me, but now not so much. Annoying.

2) I didn't get my hair cut on Saturday because when I showed up for my appointment, I found they'd put me down for a tanning appointment instead of a hair cut. Good god--as THOUGH. I rescheduled for tonight at 5:15 and I hope that appointment didn't get messed up because my hair has reached a level of hideousness I don't want to live with one minute longer.

3) Easter was pretty good, except my church's oldest member who attends regularly (there's one older, but she rarely attends) got chest pains during the service and we called the EMTs to check her out. They were so kind and wonderful to her; I want to buy them both ponies. She went to the hospital and they kept her overnight but apparently couldn't find anything wrong with her heart, so that's good, but it was unsettling. She is beloved. Went home after church and made spinach quiche and a salad for dinner. Chris was sleeping all day until he went to work at 6:00, so it was low key and that's the way I like my Easters.

4) Today and tomorrow, I (and my two hiring committee members) are interviewing candidates for our open position. We started this whole hiring process several months ago, and then it stalled out because it looked like we weren't going to get funding for the position after all, then it was back on, then it was off, and now it's back on and we have to hurry our asses before it's back off again for good. Bureaucracy, man.

5) Esther cracked me up this morning. She sometimes makes meowing noises without opening her mouth -- like she's meowing through her nose -- and sometimes when she does that, she coughs as she's making her nose meow, like a little honk. This morning I surprised her by being right behind her when she didn't know I was there and she did the loudest nose meow honk of all time. It was delightful and I would not sell her for any amount of money; not even a billion dollars. Not that people are lining up to offer money for her, but you know what I mean, or you could at least make the effort to pretend you know what I mean. It's only polite.

Tweet of the Day

ShittingtonUK - Good thing it was the Island of MISFIT Toys. If it was the Island of Toys Everyone Wants, I bet drowned kids would wash up pretty regularly.

Love,

Eva

secret Barca fan

2011-04-21T16:46:00.000-07:00

Oof, this week has been Hard. My mystery ailment came back last week and got really bad this week, primarily consisting of recurring pain under my right ribs, next to my sternum. At its worst it was a 6 on the pain scale -- bad enough to make me scared I have cancer but not bad enough to necessitate a trip to the ER. I made an appt with my doctor over a month ago, for tomorrow afternoon, and I'm nervous to go in there but I have to go. This problem is obviously never going away on its own, though it has certainly changed from what it was at first. I suspect I know what's wrong and know what tests I'll be asking for, but I'm going to make Doctor brainstorm about what else could be wrong so we can test for that too. Oh man, I really don't want to go. Tomorrow at 3:30, if you think of it and want to send a shout-out to the Universe to help me be strong and calm the fuck down, that would be awesome and super appreciated.

This morning on the treadmill I was listening to the most recent Gay Pimpin' podcast, and Jonny McGovern was thanking all the people who donated to his Kickstarter project. He read the comment I made when I donated and said it was one of his most favorite notes he got from donors--as you can imagine, this pleased me and is still pleasing me, 9 hours later.

Something else that is pleasing me:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NXxSuzRpTps&feature=player_embedded

That's for those of you who have wondered what it would be like to have a bus run over a giant championship trophy, which is to say ALL OF YOU.

Saturday morning I'm getting my hair cut, which is great, because it really really needs it. One of the cop wives just opened her own salon, so Chris has ordered me to get my hair cut there and that's where I'll be going. Well. Okay, he didn't ORDER me, but he suggested I might try that salon, to support her endeavors, so I said sure. If I had a hair person I was super attached to, I would have declined, but since I've been going to the beauty school and get a different hair person every time, I'm amenable to trying someplace new. I'm not particular about my hair; I just want it to stop looking like something's living in it.

Love,

Eva

potential changes

2011-04-15T14:49:00.000-07:00

Tweets of the Day -- A Rob Delaney double header

robdelaney -- When a baby cries "for no reason", it's usually because a ghost is torturing it for bad things it did in its past life.

robdelaney -- "Africa" by Toto kicks every other song about Africa right in the dick.

This morning the big boss was talking to the staff about some organizational restructuring that's going on, and she mentioned she's requested that I be promoted and supervise the counseling staff. She talked to me about that earlier this week, and I would welcome that change being made, but I know how things work at this school and won't believe the promotion is happening until I see the HR letter detailing the terms of the promotion and whatnot. I do hope it works out, though it will mean supervising my most difficult coworker, The Mouth. I don't think The Mouth is going to work here too much longer, for various reasons, and now I have even more reason to hope she moves on soon. Or has some kind of stroke that affects only her personality and work ethic. If only strokes were that selective! If I end up supervising her, she and I will have to have a man-to-man talk about her lack of attention to detail, and I'm going to give her more work to do so she won't have 2+ hours per day free to talk on her cell phone.

The past couple of days, a small team of workers has been destroying the landscaped area in front of my office window. They're wrecking it to put in a new sign for our building, but I'm not sure what was wrong with the old one or why putting a new one in involves so much digging. I'm feeling a tiny bit cranky about the whole thing, partly because I liked that landscaping and partly because I resent every penny this place spends on something unnecessary while we're all still working for reduced pay. It's aggravating.

That's about all I have today. I have to work for 5 hours tomorrow, and it will be grueling, so I don't feel excited about my weekend and haven't made plans for it except for church on Sunday. It's so weird; I never thought I'd attend church ever again, but I just love the UUs so much, I truly want to go every Sunday and I miss it when I'm out of town. Very funny, Universe.

Love,

Eva

not sure how long I can hold out now

2011-04-14T12:44:00.000-07:00

When Chris picked me up from work on Tuesday, he revealed that he had gotten an iPhone earlier that afternoon and was in love with it. I have personally been resisting an iPhone for a long time, because of how creepy it is to me that people who own them are CONSTANTLY using them. I know I tend to get sucked into things and I know if I get an iPhone, chances are I will use it constantly too. And I don't want to! But Chris' iPhone can do so many cool things! And it's possible there are apps I could download that might actually help me be more organized or something. So I'll just go ahead and say I'm considering getting one, but I'm not sold yet. If you have an iPhone, what apps do you think are super awesome that you use all the time?

Yesterday was my monthly day off without pay, so I got my teeth cleaned. I don't know why this was, but WOW there was some painful scraping on the upper right side of my mouth--I can still feel it today. But my teeth are clean and I'm probably going to get a little bit of bonding put on my baby tooth, to fill in where my gum has receded, though I haven't made an appointment for it yet. I can't believe that stupid tooth is still so solid and I kind of wish it needed to be pulled out so I could justify getting invisalign. I know I could get it anyway, but I like to have firm, valid reasons for spending a lot of money, if at all possible.

Yesterday while I was getting scraped, Chris took Esther to the vet to get her checked for a possible bacterial infection. We thought that would involve a blood test, but the vet just examined her and then decided to give her an antibiotic shot when squeezing her trachea a little made her cough. Apparently that's A Sign. Already her coughing has greatly decreased, and she ate every bit of her canned food last night, which she hasn't done in awhile. I'm very glad. We suspect that maybe her bacterial infection and nighttime coughing (on my pillow) is what infected me with pink eye. There's no proving it, but at least when her infection gets cleared up, I shouldn't have to worry about the coughing and my eyeballs.

After the teeth cleaning and vet stuff, we decided to go shopping in Yakima. We went to Costco first and bought a small rug, two new pillows (for sleeping), bread, and something else I can't remember. Then we went to my favorite fabric store where I got 16 fabric quarters (pre-cut quarter yard bundles, in case you don't sew) and some other things. I was going to choose 16 different bolts of fabric and have them cut 1/4 yard of each, but what I didn't know is they were having a huge sale and the store was BIZZY. As part of the sale, the fabric quarters were 99 cents each, so that was a no brainer--lining up and getting all that cutting done while everyone behind me glared hate rays into my back had zero appeal. After the fabric store, we went to Target and got new small lamps for the guest room, and .... oh I don't remember. Some other stuff, mostly for the house. We were tired after all that shopping, so we went home and made dinner and then Chris had to go to work to interrogate someone while I stayed home and watched part of the documentary Surfwise. It's fascinating so far; I'll finish it tonight.

This morning before I went to work I went to the eye doctor, AGAIN, and I got a clean bill of health again. This time I hope it sticks. As per Chris' insistence, I told Dr. Sarah the theory of the cat coughing on the pillow and the pink eye, and she said it's possible that's what happened. Then she said, "So, I guess Chris wants me to say you shouldn't let her sleep on your pillow?" And I said YES, because I know that's exactly what he was hoping for, but she didn't say that. I could tell she thought it wouldn't be a horrible idea if Esther stopped sleeping on my pillow, but after I explained we'd cut a hole in the bottom of the bedroom door so Esther could go in and out, she recognized it would be a difficult habit to curtail. Then we talked about cats for awhile and then I came to work.

Tweet of the Day

SOPHIALAMARNYC - DO NOT TAKE AS COMPLEMENT, WHEN PEOPLE SAY: THEY WOULD LOVE U IN BERLIN. BERLIN THEY LOVE ANY CRAP SPECIALLY IF IT HAVE SEXUAL INNUENDO.

I love Sophia Lamar so much! I just found out today that she has a Twitter account, and the best part about it is she has a Puerto Rican accent EVEN ON TWITTER. Her Twitter feed reads exactly like she talks. Oh man, that's the best.

Today marks the two year anniversary of the day we buried Esther's sister, Lucy. I still miss her a lot, but not in the crushingly sad way I did at first. I miss the way she would sprint out of the litter box after pooping, and I miss how, every single night, after I got into bed, she would give my head a vicious bite (out of love, I assume). I miss how she would try to make me get up in the morning by running around the house noisily and then jumping on the bed to stare at me. I could go on and on. Oh Lucy, we were so lucky to have you in our lives for 15+ years. What a funny weirdo you were.

Hug your kitties for me!

Love,

Eva

this post has not been fact-checked

2011-04-12T14:42:00.000-07:00

I learned another Blogger lesson yesterday: If I edit a post I MIGHT lose my paragraph breaks. I don't know why yesterday's update all ran together like that after I made one small edit -- I looked at the html, and the paragraph breaks should still be there. WHATEVER, Blogger. My three readers are smart enough to realize where the breaks should be. Right ladies/gentlemen/particularly intelligent cats?

Tweet of the Day

ShittingtonUK -- Vumpires: Terrifying, but fair.

Here's something I've been thinking about that sucks. I've just rededicated myself to losing some of my body meat, and it bothers me that so many of the messages we get are that it's not enough to look healthy and groomed or whatever--we should be aiming to be HOT AND SEXY. If we are not HOT AND SEXY, making strangers burn with desire to make passionate love to us, we are somehow dismissible as people. Listen, message-senders (I know you're not listening), the only person I want to incite with lust is my husband. I'm not trying to be a GILF over here. I REFUSE. I am determined to wither down and be as healthy and fit as I can be, but not because I want to be the target of lustful glances, and it's ridiculous that people should be held to a HOT AND SEXY standard. A hundred years ago, most people only bathed like once a month or something*, but now we have to be at all times fuckworthy? Give me a break, America. I wish I had a drink right now and someone hateful in whose face it could be thrown.

Our poor Esther apparently ate some grass yesterday that didn't agree with her (we've been chaperoning her outside and allowing her to eat the neighbor's grass -- she's too highfalutin' for our grass), because when I got up this morning there were 4 small barfs to clean up, and then when I came back in from treadmilling in the garage there were two more small barfs. Plus, Chris said her litter box was kind of a horror show this morning. So she's been taking it easy today and being observed by Chris while I'm at work, and he said she hasn't barfed again, poor thing. I will admit it's making me uneasy because, coincidentally, Thursday marks two years since we had Esther's sister, Lucy, euthanized when her kidneys completely shut down. And poor Lucy was barfing a LOT in the hours before we could get her to a vet. I don't think Esther's kidneys could be shutting down, though, as their function was completely normal when she got her blood test last month, so I'll take loving care of her and hope she feels better tomorrow. If she doesn't, she might get a surprise trip to the vet.

Today I took my lunch hour early and went to loiter in front of our town's Planned Parenthood. There's a group of Catholics who've been there on Tuesdays to protest it, so the UU's and other liberal-types in town have also been showing up to support it. I was there in support, in case there's any question. I wasn't adequately prepared this week -- no chair and no sign -- but next week I will go again and will take both. I'm going to make a sign that says something good about Planned Parenthood on one side, and HONK IF YOU LOVE COOKIES on the other. That way I can strategically turn it around when someone drives by and hope all the honking discourages the Catholics. No offense to any Catholics reading this -- I know not all of you are anti-family planning. I've been trying to remember where HONK IF YOU LOVE COOKIES comes from (I did not make it up), and it was from The Simpsons, right? Everything good is.

Love,

Eva

*I basically made this up, but come on, you know people weren't bathing often back then.

maybe a little too much church talk. sorry.

2011-04-11T10:55:00.001-07:00

My church does this thing you will probably find cheesy, but I like it. The kids are in the sanctuary for a little bit of the service, and then the congregation "sings them out". Usually what happens is the congregation will sing the whole song, and then the children will get up and drift out lazily, but yesterday something wonderful happened. A surly almost-teen (I'm not great at telling how old kids are, but I estimate he's 12) was at church, and the second we started singing the song, he got up and strode from the sanctuary, with a facial expression that held teen contempt for everyone present. I laughed for the entire rest of the song and still, just remembering his face is buoying me like crazy. I love teen angst when I don't have to be involved.

I left the service a tiny bit early yesterday so I could be on time for Leah's birthday brunch. It was so much fun! I don't see her enough, or the girls, and I love them so seeing them is always great. Leah liked her gift and brunch was pretty good, though the salmon in my omelette was a little too ..... salmony. The kind of salmony where, 8 hours later, when you utter a petite, ladylike belch, you're still tasting fish. Sorry to be groce, but it was disturbing. ANYway, everyone else's brunch food was good, and basically I'm so happy we got to see them. The girls are ostentatiously carrying purses now and it makes me laugh. The End.

Last churchy thing to talk about: I made the vegan chili, except that when it came time to add the spices, we were 100% out of chili powder. Oops! I added a little extra cumin and some paprika and everyone said it was delicious--they might have been lying, but I don't think so. The meeting we had before eating soup was pretty good, though I didn't pay great attention through the section on the history of Unitarian Universalism because my undiagnosed ADD would not let me. I sometimes wonder how I've gotten this far in life without having anyone detect how little attention I give to meetings, classes, weddings, etc. Don't tell anyone; I'm trusting you not to blow my cover. The meeting did not give me any reason to change my mind about becoming a UU member, and the new membership service is May 1. They say we won't have to bite the head off a dove, but I hope there will be a spanking gauntlet, at least. Oh! It occurred to me this weekend that the UUs are the perfect people with whom to finally get my bicycle gang up and running. All I have to do is put an announcement in the bulletin for bicycle gang members, and I feel sure some people will join. Excitement! Maybe I wait until my membership is a sure thing so they can't kick me out so easy. Just in case.

Tweet of the Day

badbanana -- Just took a job ghost-eating meals for an actress.

Not a lot else to report. This weekend I saw 3 foreign movies via Netflix instant watch: 1) Vodka Lemon -- I liked it but it gave a whole new dimension to the word "desolate". 2) The Beaches of Agnes. Two thumbs up! 3) Paris. 1.75 thumbs up. Watching foreign movies is perfect on days when Chris is on night shift and therefore sleeping during the day. I can't understand the language anyway, so I can turn the sound way down and read the subtitles and give Chris a quieter house and better chance of long sleeps. Also this weekend I donated $50 to Jonny McGovern's Kickstarter project, did laundry, and read a little. I felt a bit less pressure to have an amazing weekend this weekend because Wednesday I'm taking my day without pay, so I'll spend that day with Chris and it'll be fun. I have to work half the day on Saturday the 16th (hissssss), so it turns out this is a great week to take my day without pay, though I didn't plan it like that in advance.

I have other things I could talk about, but I think I'll save them for another day this week, so I'll have something to update about.

Love,

Eva

oh, and I've been riding my bike around

2011-04-08T16:59:00.000-07:00

Tweet of the Day

AtomsOnBroadway - No warranty has ever been more void than the one that covered the grandparents' mattress in Willy Wonka & The Chocolate Factory.

I have little to report, Internet, in the way of exciting news. I finished my antibiotic drops and antibiotics and was feeling much better, but then my pinkeye came back and I started feeling a little rundown and congested again, so I saw my eye doctor again and have restarted antibiotic drops. Yesterday I also went back to see the same PA I saw when my pinkeye first reared its swollen head, but I did not get antibiotics; instead I was directed to use a neti pot. I'd bought one a couple weeks ago but hadn't used it, so last night I used it for the first time and it did do what it's supposed to do. I will continue to use it, and will maybe even do it twice a day this weekend. It did not magically make me feel less rundown, and I'm going to be super pissed if I have to feel like utter dogshit again before anyone will seriously consider that, hey, maybe the sinus infection hasn't gone away after all. BUT I'm trying to be positive about getting well and just take good care of myself, which last night included going to bed at 8:00. I felt geriatric, but I also feel better rested today.

The other things I have going on include a breakthrough on that sock I'm knitting [stop the presses!], and looking forward to the 3 hour pre-UU Membership class tomorrow. Well, I'm kind of looking forward to it, but not totally, since I don't feel that great. I need to make some kind of vegan soup for tomorrow, so I've settled on a chili that includes mushrooms and chipotle. Chipotle, Catie! Your favorite. I'll shop for the ingredients and make it tonight, then heat it up again in the morning and put it in the crock pot on Keep Warm. Sunday is Leah's birthday, so we're going to meet up with them for lunch and give her the lovely present I got her today during my lunch hour.

So here's where I tell you I have no idea how to make a link at Blogger. I thought I could use html, but that doesn't seem to work, and I don't know what the Make Link button wants from me. I know I'll figure it out eventually, but for now I want to clumsily tell you that you should read this super good article:

http://www.more.com/chernobyl-women-nuclear-holly-morris

...and you should go to YouTube and watch Selene Luna's "Hollywood Confidential" series. There are three and they're so great! I very much want someone to give her her own show so I can watch many more of those episodes. In one of the episodes, # 2 I think, she mentioned how Judy Garland used to do a thing before every performance, to shake off nerves and get her pumped up to do the show. She'd chant, "FUCK EM FUCK EM FUCK EM FUCK EM FUCK EM FUCK EM FUCK EM!" until she felt fired up and ready to go on. I liked that because, well obviously I'm not a performer, but I've had to do public speaking, and the times it's gone the absolute best are when I've been able to cultivate a hatred for the audience in advance. Maybe I'll purposely take on some speaking gigs (work-related) so I can use Judy's technique for success.

Tonight I'm going to put blue cheese in my salad! It'll be the first dairy I've had since I started taking the antibiotics and figured out I'd been rendered lactose intolerant. I've been loading up on probiotic-containing things, so I'm hopeful maybe I'll be able to get away with eating the cheese. If the cheese causes my entire digestive tract to fill up with air, I'll go back to being dairy free for a little while longer and hope things return to normal soon.

Have a great weekend!

Eva

it's windy today

2011-03-30T17:03:00.000-07:00

*TRUMPETING NOISE*

I'm feeling a lot better! Not 100%, by any means, but I'm at a good 80%, and that's a big improvement. Even though this antibiotic is causing some minor problems (TMI: yeast infection, and also I'm apparently temporarily lactose intolerant--I won't tell you how I know this), I'm happy to have it. I need to go to Super Top Number One Foods soon to buy a couple quarts of Good Belly -- a probiotic drink that doesn't contain dairy -- because for the duration, yogurt and kefir are right out, and I'd like to replace my massacred helper bacterias.

Hahaha it didn't occur to me when I was typing it, but what with this sudden lactose intolerance, my opening *trumpeting noise* is highly appropriate.

Ahem. Anyway.

Chris comes back from Dallas tonight--hooray! I've missed him, and plus he said he's going to make me a steak. Probably not until Friday, but still, I can hardly wait to eat a steak.

Here's a lesson I learned today: If I have a few extra free minutes in the morning, I should under no circumstances take that time to wax my eyebrows. I'd never waxed them before, because all I really need to remove are fine, blonde hairs between my brows, and previously I just haphazardly tweezed them, so I didn't realize my waxed brow would be pink all day long. Lesson learned, for sure.

Tweet of the Day

shanenickerson - Just saw a hot chick at Whole Foods with a dried booger on her forehead. For just a moment, there was balance in the universe.

Okay, now is the time of the day when I walk home and rapaciously eat some of that roast chicken I bought last night, and then virtuously eat some salad and drink fresh-squeezed grapefruit juice.

Love,

Eva

"You have kissing tonsils." - John, male nurse.

2011-03-27T09:21:00.000-07:00

Well, Internet, I have been SIIIICK. My throat got more and more sore last week and then on Wednesday in the late afternoon my left eye started gooping out loads of disgusting yellowish stuff and I realized I must have pinkeye. I'd never had it before and I wish I'd kept up the baby book my mom started for me as a child so I could record Baby's First Pinkeye. The eye was completely swollen shut on Thursday morning (as well as being glued shut--groce) and I couldn't believe how huge it was. I had to ice it for half an hour before I could open it a tiny bit and clean out all the gunk. Then another hour of icing until it was de-swollen enough to go to the doctor. The doctor's office (my doctor is on vacation so I saw a PA) sent me to my eye doctor, who gave me a prescription for antibiotic drops for daytime and an antibiotic ointment for overnight. I called in sick to work on Thursday and again on Friday, because in addition to the pinkeye, I felt awful. Saturday morning I woke up with a seriously painful throat (as well as pinkeye in my right eye also), and after I looked at it with a flashlight, I decided to go to the ER to get checked for strep. Our town doesn't have urgent care, so the ER was my only option. Anyway, the strep test was negative but the doctor gave me an antibiotic anyway, based on my symptoms, and I'm so thankful he did because I'm already feeling better. Not good, but better. This is my tale of woe. I've been super careful to avoid infecting Chris, and he's been super careful to avoid being infected, and so far so good. Fortunately for him he left this morning to go to a domestic violence training in Dallas, so he'll be away from my virulence for a few days. I'll miss him like crazy, but I'm glad he won't be here so he can hopefully stay healthy.

On the schedule for today: At least one nap, some laundry, update iPod, water plants, assorted small chores, feel angry at Interweave Knits. THEY know what they did.

Love,
Eva

five and then two

2011-03-22T14:53:00.000-07:00

1) I bought an invisible zipper foot just like I said I was going to. You didn't think I'd do it, but you were WRONG and I hope you feel silly.

2) Relatedly, when we were in Eugene we went to a bookstore and I got The Dressmaker's Handbook of Couture Sewing Techniques. I'm excited to finally learn the Right Way of doing things. My garments have generally looked okay from the outside, but the insides have been a mess.

3) It's been a little over 2 weeks since Catie took me and Kimmy to Daiso, but I still think about that store every single day. Catie has ruined my life.

4) My cold is taking its sweet-ass time transitioning from sore throat to horribly stuffed sinuses, and I wish it would hurry up. I'd rather wake up a million times during the night from not being able to breathe than wake up a million times during the night from stabbing throat pain.

5) The secret I mentioned a few entries ago is tellable now -- someone found the body of a guy the cops knew had been murdered (based on the crime scene) but which they were classifying as a missing persons case to try and lull the number one suspect into a false sense of security. The murder happened last summer and since then the detectives who work for the county sheriff's office have been working on the case, gathering evidence, and now that the body has been found and has spent a little time at the forensics lab, the suspect has been arrested. I'm not a super vengeful person, but I hope he's convicted and sent away for life.

Tweet of the Day

mindykaling - It's not yo-yo dieting if I plan on doing it consistently for the rest of my life.

Other Tweet of the Day

robdelaney - Whenever anything bad happens to me I assume it's because my cousin Ben & I touched our penis heads together when I was 9.

Rob Delaney is my very favorite Twitter comedian.

Love,

Eva

mostly griping

2011-03-21T13:12:00.000-07:00

Tweet of the Day

ShittingtonUK - If I were a werewolf, nothing would infuriate me more than seeing one of those YouTube clips of a cat that's learned how to use a toilet.

When we returned from Eugene last night, there was a note from Crazy Cat Lady to tell us there's a strong mildew smell in our house, and mildew is mold, and she's checked out our washing machine and it's not coming from there, so we need to get someone into our attic and crawl space to find out where it's coming from, because it could have serious effects on our health exclamation point!!!1! Wow. First of all, I'm super sensitive to mildew/mold smells, so if our house smelled like mildew, I believe I'd have detected it. Secondly, we live in a very dry climate -- about 8 inches precipitation per year, including snow -- so mold is not exactly a common problem here. 3) When we bought the house, 3 years ago, we had it thoroughly inspected, and there was no mold/mildew problem, so unless the dry weather has since spawned a terrible mold situation in our crawlspace, (we've been up in the attic and there's no mold smell) we're still fine. I think the reason she said that is I'd left a note for her, to remind her of Esther's food, water, and medicine stuff, and on there I included a request that she not give Esther anything she does not already get from us, because when Crazy Lady came over she'd been talking about giving Esther probiotics. She is clearly very attached to the idea that she knows what to do for cats better than anyone else (including vets), so for me to reject her superior knowledge must have stung, causing her to hallucinate a mold smell so she could be the expert of something again. When I called my mom to tell her we arrived home and weren't dead, I also asked her if she'd smelled mildew in our house when she visited last summer and she said a vehement no. I asked my brother-in-law/coworker this morning if he'd smelled mildew in our house and he said, "YOUR house? No!". So I will conclude it's all part of Crazy Lady's lunacy and will continue with the plan of not hiring her in the future. Also I think it's time to Yelp a truthful and therefore unflattering review of her business.

The visit to Eugene felt extremely short, probably because it was very short. It rained the whole drive down, rained practically the whole time we were there, and rained all the way back. I got a cold AND my period, so my throat hurt and I was crampy, but STILL, it was nice to see my sister and her family. My niece could not have cared less to see me (which, seriously, is totally fine, because she doesn't know me), but she fell in love with Chris immediately and wanted to play with him the whole time. When we left she said, "I love you!" to him, and then when her dad prompted her to say it to me as well, she glanced at me distrustfully and said nothing. It made me laugh. I'm glad to be back home and glad we won't be going anywhere again until late May, to see our granddaughter after she's born. I haven't talked much about our impending granddaughter because there's not a lot to say yet. Our son is in love and engaged to be married (in July) and their baby is due May 20th. He's 19 and she's 18 and their youth causes us worry and concern, but we hope they can beat the odds and make it work. As I keep reminding myself, some people do. Some people do. Some people do. Some people do. (I repeat until I doze off)

Subject Change. Here's another way in which I believe Esther's manifesting her dementia: She forgets it's not okay to step on my face and head. Write that down in the purple notebook you're keeping about her. Last night she yowled from another room [yowl translation: It's dark and I'm lost!], and after I loudly kiss-kissed at her to call her into our room, she jumped onto the bed and went to get on my pillow, but she wanted to walk on my face to get there. It's just a matter of time until I lose an eye.

I hate being at work today. I'm congested and have no energy or candy. Another complaint is that I'm at the point with the sock I'm knitting where I start the heel flap, but both the instructions and the errata are vague with the details, so I'll have to wing it and hope for the best. If I wanted to wing it, I'd make up my own sock pattern, Interweave Knits.

Love,

Eva

she was not deterred

2011-03-17T15:38:00.000-07:00

I can't imagine why I thought the Britta filter would deflect any lecturing from the cat sitter lady. It deflected the Water Lecture, but there was still plenty for her to tell me we're doing wrong, starting with the food. She asked where Esther's food was and I showed it to her and she said, "I don't like this food--it's full of preservatives.". Esther's current food is Science Diet for old cats, but we've been switching brands every time we buy new food, so she won't lose interest in it. I know Science Diet is no longer considered the number one cat food, but it's not like I'm feeding her a super cheap store brand. After she said that, Chris, who had been getting ready to start work, suddenly felt the need to leave the house early, so as to avoid getting all yelly, and he called me later to say this will be cat lady's last time taking care of Esther. I had independently come to the same conclusion, shockingly enough. Cat lady is a nonstop talker, and that's just the way God made her [shout-out to Kimmy's daughter, Sarah], and I was treated to a variety of cat and animal anecdotes, mostly about the ways she's miraculously cured her animals with homeopathic remedies. Did you know she cured her cat, Timmy, last year when he had gone dangerously downhill? I bet you didn't know that. She told me about her genius cure and added, "I thought we'd be burying him at Christmas. It seems like we always bury an animal at Christmas". What I said to that was, "Oh, how terrible", but what I THOUGHT was, "Yeah, there are always a lot of suicides at the holidays". I'm glad we won't be dealing with her again after this time. Like I said yesterday, she takes good care of Esther, but I'm positive we can find someone else to do that and who won't criticize everything we do. Esther's 17 1/2 years old and has had asthma since she was 3. I'm pretty sure we must be doing SOMEthing right, Crazy Cat Lady.

I guess that's all I have to tell you today.

Love,
Eva

not changing can be good too

2011-03-16T16:27:00.001-07:00

I wrote an update here on Monday and then deleted it, because I wrote that I'd switched doctors but then I found out the new doctor's receptionist had to ask me a whole bunch of questions and then submit my answers to the office manager, and she would approve me or not. I answered the questions and knew I'd have to wait until today to find out if I'd been approved (office manager not in office), but in the meantime I got an email from my doctor and started having second thoughts about switching. I decided this morning to cancel the request after I realized I was hoping the new doctor's office manager would deny it. I wonder if the gun-buying cooling off periods are that effective. I replied to my doctor's email, in which he asked me to come back in, to say I would make an appointment but that I needed him to know that when we meet it's very important to me that we make a plan for testing, because if we don't I might have a crazy-person meltdown. Had I mentioned my doctor anxiety here on Blogger yet? I can't remember, but I don't think I did. So, I have doctor anxiety, and it's super super high right now. That's more or less all you need to know, and at any rate, I am determined to get over it. My poor doctor; I bet he can hardly WAIT to see me [wry face]. Our appointments used to be so much fun before I got the mystery digestive infection.

I wish changing doctors wasn't such a big deal for me, and if my doctor was a jerk it would be easy breezy. The problem is he's a super nice guy and he's got a good sense of humor (unlike some doctors I've seen), and he's easygoing, and I have no idea if the doctor I was going to change to has those qualities. I know for a fact her receptionist was a Difficult Person, from the way she went about things, and while I'm sure I could have dealt with her, she didn't exactly sweeten the pot.

Tweet of the Day

badbanana -- Almost got into a dance battle in the parking lot. Thankfully, it ended in violence.

The cat sitter lady we've hired to visit Esther while we're in Eugene is coming over tonight, and I'm kind of dreading her. She's very competent and responsible and I know she'll take great care of Esther (we hired her once before), but she's kind of a nut. She left a long note last time, lecturing us about the litter we use and telling us we need a Britta filter for Esther's water, and yadda yadda blah blah. We did actually switch litters after that--NOT because she told us too--to a lower dust one, in hopes that it would help Esther's asthma, but that damn litter held onto pee smells like crazy, even though it was a clumping one. It stunk so bad Esther didn't want to get in there, and she peed on the floor a few times instead. We recently switched back to the magic litter and no more floor peeing. I have a Britta filter here at work that I'm going to take home tonight and for the weekend, to fake this lady out and make her think she helped us see the error of our ways. A little ego stroke for her when she's going to take care of my beloved kitty costs me nothing, and maybe Esther will get a couple extra minutes of petting each visit.

Love,

Eva

hungry

2011-03-11T15:51:00.000-08:00

My favorite podcast is Gay Pimpin', and I listen to it a lot because I'm working my way through the show's archives. I was listening this morning on the treadmill and was reminded of something Linda James (transvestite and drag queen but not a transsexual, I don't think) said awhile back that made me laugh. She said she was walking down the street and was approached by a drunk guy who slurred, "Excuse me, Miss...........can I borrow some money, Sir?" That's so funny to me and I love that Linda James told that story on herself.

Tweet of the Day

jenthevieve -- try this exit line the next time you have an argument: "I think I'll have a ciabatta roll."

Here's one of the many things I love about Chris: When he's on the job he carries a small notebook (spiral bound at the top) in the pocket of his uniform, and he will purposely buy ones that are ridiculous for a cop to be carrying. For instance, they'll be glittery hot pink or have flowers on them or maybe kittens--stuff like that. Also one time at the Goodwill he bought a small zipping nylon bag with a picture of the Jonas brothers on it to carry his breathalizer equipment in. He takes his job absolutely seriously, but there's no reason to banish whimsy, right? I love that man.

Halfway through the night last night Esther made her triumphant return to my pillow, much to my chagrin. Maybe tonight with Chris in the bed as well, she'll mellow out. Sometimes I think her agitation is due to his absence, like she's unsettled not to have both her people there. Whatever it is, it is less than conducive to sleep.

Right now I'm excited to have some kind of real dinner tonight and spend the weekend with Chris. I haven't seen him much for 10 days, due to his night shift schedule and my being gone last weekend, and it'll be so nice to see him for two whole days. I hope you have a super wonderful weekend also.

Love,

Eva

English costume dramas

2011-03-10T15:42:00.000-08:00

Here's one of the things about being a cop wife that's hard: When my husband tells me something extremely interesting and juicy and then says, "You can't tell anyone", it means I really can't tell anyone because if the information got out it could jeopardize an investigation as well as his career. This is a small town, so if I told even one person it's very likely the news would spread like wildfire, and I know that because it's happened before. I don't know who talked and started the gossip going last time, but it wasn't me. Anyway, I mention this because he told me something super interesting last night that I can't tell anyone, and I can hardly wait until the news is released so I don't have to sit on a big secret anymore. Which is not to say I don't want to know these things -- I'd much rather know a juicy thing than not know. Take note, Christopher. FYI, if you don't live in my town (and chances are very good you do not), the secret won't interest you overly much, so I know I've just done that annoying thing where I talk about something I can't talk about, but you probably won't care after I tell you the news anyway, which I will do after it's released.

Tweet of the Day

badbanana -- On this day in 1876, Thomas A. Watson became the first person to have an afternoon ruined by a phone call from the boss.

Speaking of Watson, you know how recently-ish that computer was on Jeopardy and of course beat all the humans? I remember reading something right after that about how somebody was developing computers to serve as doctors, and there was a minor to-do over that idea, but I've been thinking lately that I would LOVE to have a computer doctor. I mean, sure, it would have a very cold bedside manner, but on the other hand, I wouldn't have to be concerned about it dismissing me because I'm a woman and am therefore hysterical, unless of course that was programmed into it. So bring on the computer doctors, I say. They can't be worse than some of the human doctors I've seen. Creepy Duke Hospital oncologist, I mean you.

I'm still not quite caught up on sleeps but I'm getting there. I absolutely loved my weekend with the ladies but am glad we're staying home this weekend, especially since we have to go somewhere again soon. I got Chris hooked on Downton Abbey, so I predict that will occupy a good bit of our weekend, since we've each seen only the first three episodes. I had asked him if he was interested in watching it and he said no, so I started it by myself, but then after I told him how good it was he got interested and caught up to me so we could watch together. That's love.

Eva

great weekend with the broads

2011-03-08T14:35:00.000-08:00

Tweet of the Day

MJMcKean - I detest violence. Having said that, I would probably watch a show where the rejected girls slap The Bachelor to death.

Hello! I had such a wonderful time in San Jose this weekend with my lady friends. It rained and rained on Sunday, so we didn't get to go to the flea market, but we made up for it by sitting for hours in our pajamas, talking and eating peanut m-n-m's. On Saturday Catie took us to her beauty supply store, where she and Kimmy amassed OPI nail polishes and I studied the waxing supplies (I'm thinking about buying professional waxing stuff, but haven't yet due to the likelihood of that being a bad idea). After that, Catie took us to my new favorite store in the whole world -- Daiso. I got a few things and wish I'd gotten some other things I considered buying but didn't. Banana container, I'm looking at you. Google tells me there are 4 Daiso stores in the Seattle area, and I'm definitely adding it to my To Visit When in Seattle list. You'll come home with me eventually, banana container. A few weeks ago I packed a ripe banana in my work bag and it got smushed and its guts got on my favorite scarf. This would not have happened with the proper containment device.

Anyway, like I said, it was a super great weekend. We talked a lot and we stayed up a full 24 hours past my bedtime on Saturday night (hyperbole!) and we ate super great foods. I had zero travel problems, either way. Yesterday my shuttle even got back to E-Burg 25 minutes before the scheduled arrival time. I don't know why that happened, but I didn't question it. I walked home from the shuttle stop (only 15 blocks) and Esther was super happy to see me, just as soon as she remembered who I am. I don't know how he did it, but while I was gone Chris trained Esther to sleep in her bed on our bed and last night she did not have her usual bouts of nighttime crazy on my pillow. She slept on it for a little while at the start of the night, and once in the middle of the night she got lonely and came over for some love, but it didn't really disturb my sleep. I hope this is her new normal.

This morning I got up at 5:00 and had coffee for awhile. Then I prepared to get on the treadmill but happened to glance outside and see that it had snowed during the night, so my exercise changed from treadmilling to shoveling. I hope it doesn't snow again tonight; I'm totally over it and I miss walking on the treadmill and listening to my favorite podcast. Tonight I will have an avocado with corn salsa for dinner (or part of dinner, depending on how hungry I am) and will go to bed early, for lo, I have much sleep to catch up on. I hope you sleep a lot too.

Love,

Eva

this is how you go-go

2011-03-03T16:07:00.000-08:00

Tweet of the Day

robdelaney -- Don't throw the baby out with the bathwater. Throw it out with the regular garbage, but hidden really well at the bottom.

Here are some things I'm going to buy soon: 1) An invisible zipper foot for my sewing machine. I have a skirt pattern I love that involves an invisible zipper, and I've never put one in before, but there are video tutorials on the internet, so I'm going to give it a try. How hard could it be? 2) Dollhouse food, specifically miniature food on plates or platters. I will be gluing plates/platters of mini food onto the ring blanks I bought several months ago, and I hope I can find nachos (on ebay--I have an ebay gift certificate I'm trying to use up). 3) The East Village Mixtape, volume 1. This album is a few years old, but I didn't know about it until recently and I love it.

I got a lot of sleep last night and I'm feeling pretty good. I don't know how I managed to sleep so well with Esther's brand new pillow-hogging position, which involves her situating herself horizontally across the pillow, against the back of my head, but I did. If that cat wasn't so old and demented, there's no way I'd let her onto my pillow at night, but she's old and crazy and I love her too much. Part of her deal is, she gets anxious at night, and clingy, and she meows in a bizarre, mournful tone she never used to use before. I can't not comfort her.

Probably I was going to write a lot of funny stuff in this entry also, but I have run out of time. It's too bad because I'm sure I would have said some hilarious things.

Love,

Eva

now we're really getting started

2011-03-02T10:34:00.000-08:00

At my previous diary I would sometimes institute regular "features" that more or less went nowhere, and wouldn't it be fun if I continued that tradition here? Answer = yes! Here is my new feature that may or may not be around for very long: Tweet of the Day. This is exactly what it sounds like; a tweet that I choose to be my favorite for the day. The one I want to start with is actually from yesterday, but it's still amusing me and is the thing that made me think of Tweet of the Day in the first place. So:

Tweet of the Day

AlanCarr -- Even the dog whisperer would use the F word on my Bev

So, WOW I am super tired today--I was awakened at 3:00 and couldn't get back to sleep. I woke up in a way that's unfortunately become familiar to me: In a blind panic. What happens is I'm sleeping peacefully and then suddenly I'm awake and clawing my way out of bed, and I rarely remember why I think it's so important to get up. This morning two things woke me and had me throwing the covers back and getting out. 1) I dreamt I saw a giant red G, and while I was seeing it 2) Esther started yowling in an alarmed fashion, on my pillow, in my ear. Awake in a panic! Getting out of bed! I hate it. Any hypnotists in the house?

On Friday morning I'm getting on the Central WA shuttle to SeaTac airport, and at the airport will be getting on a flight to San Jose to see my beloved friends, Catie and Kimmy. I can hardly wait! I love those broads and we're going to have so much fun. A little bit I feel like a huge asshole to take Friday and Monday off work, since I just had two weeks vacation, but I'm glad we're getting together this weekend so we can go to the Alameda flea market. I've been wanting to do that forever! I hope it doesn't get rained out.

Love,

Eva

it's all for you

2011-03-01T15:48:00.001-08:00

Hi, look, no more black template! I was never in love with the black and then one of my reader friends pointed out that it was not eyeball friendly, so it is GONE. I like this one much better and don't know why I wasn't using it from the start. Fact two about me: I can be a little stupid.

I've been thinking about my super secret boyfriend, James Franco, and how disappointing his academy award hosting was, and I'm pretty sure we're going to have to break up. I was too old for him anyway, and plus our relationship wasn't really going anywhere on account of he doesn't know who I am. Sorry, James Franco. It's over between us. Someday you'll learn to love again.

Last night I dreamt Chris (my husband) killed our cat so I could be free of the crushing weight of responsibility I feel for her--it was not a happy dream. I dream about that cat a lot, probably because she sleeps on my pillow and I'm subconsciously aware of her presence all night long. And just now as I was typing that last sentence I remembered she gave me a hard swat to the face with her paw during the night last night. What the hell, Esther? I already suspected she has cat dementia, and this is another thing in support of that theory.

As part of my naturopathic treatment program, I'm taking a hydrochloric acid pill with meals, or two pills, depending on the meal (ex: lasagna = two pills). I think it's helping with my problems, but also every time I swallow one I get to think the words "dropping acid" in relation to myself. I never did take drugs, you know. My body is a temple! A temple that houses the world's strategic calorie reserve, which as you can imagine, is a very important thing. You're welcome, planet.

Love,

Eva

anonymous barf hands

2011-02-28T09:29:00.000-08:00

I watched the Academy Awards last night--kind of. I Tivo'd it and fast-forwarded through the parts I didn't care about, which was like 93% of the show. I didn't see any of the movies, except about half an hour of Inception, so I was mainly watching it to see my secret boyfriend, James Franco, and the dresses. Also my secret boyfriend in his hot pink dress and blonde wig--I knew the second Anne Hathaway appeared in a tux that James Franco would come out in a dress, but I enjoyed it anyway. Kind of watching the show reminded me how much I hate acceptance speeches. I hate them when the winner is unprepared and flounders around in that shocked/thrilled/adrenaline rush way and talks way too long because they can't remember who to thank. I also hate it when the winner has prepared a speech and delivers it well, because that seems a little too cocky to me. But mainly I hate the speeches where the winner doesn't thank ME, which has been every winner on every awards show in the history of all time. Ungrateful jerks. To sum up, I am virtually impossible to please when it comes to acceptance speeches, and the only way to do it is to say something utterly unexpected in your speech and/or thank me in your speech, which would also be utterly unexpected. You know, I think I'll write that down as a goal: Be thanked in an awards show acceptance speech. I will Oprah it into being! I don't know if people are already using Oprah's name as a verb, but we should be, and I'm starting now.

Oh, but during the red carpet show yesterday (also fast-forwarded a lot, but less, since there were so many dresses), my sweet cat, Esther, started the pre-vomit heaves, right in the middle of our lovely wool living room carpet. I quickly looked around the room, hoping to see a bowl or a plate we'd left on a table, and there was nothing, so I caught her barf in my hands. It was heinous, but preferable to cleaning it off the carpet, and even as the barf was in my hands I was sort of pleased at the juxtaposition of my low, barf-hands position, and the glamour on the television red carpet. Celebrities--they're nothing like us!

Love,
Eva

number one

2011-02-26T06:46:00.000-08:00

Hello from an undisclosed location, deep underground. I have just switched to Blogger after writing elsewhere for 10 years, and in part I made the switch because 10 years of entries made me feel a little weighted down and stuck. On the other hand, though, now that I've switched it feels daunting to be completely starting over, because if I want to tell you something that's a continuation of something that happened before, I can't just say, "Hey, remember that time I lost a contact lens and thought it fell into my bra so I was totally feeling myself up in front of a bunch of lunching construction workers? Well..." -- that kind of thing. So the few smart, gorgeous, wonderful people who have followed me over from the other place will have to endure some extra explanations and hopefully they will feel free to skim. For this first entry, I considered writing a couple paragraphs of expanded "About Me", but instead, like the Venture Brothers, I think I'll just start and let the facts reveal themselves slowly over the course of a few dozen episodes. Do you watch the Venture Brothers? That show is killer; I love it so much. Fact one about me: I love semicolons. Get used to them.

Okay, who's watching the new season of Survivor? [Spoiler Alert!] Only two episodes in, but it's clearly going to be a fantastic and ridiculous season. Philip. PHILIP. Do you think he had to get a note from his shrink, clearing him to be on the show? He is making the craziest, best television, and I'm just sorry Francesca was voted off first, because her willingness to take on his crazy was sooo entertaining. I want her to triumph at Redemption Island so she can stick around and interact with him again. And is it just me [it's not just me] or is Kristina maybe one of the worst Survivor players ever? First of all, she allied with Philip even though he's obviously batshit crazy. Secondly, she thought she could vote off Boston Rob because she had 3 votes and an immunity idol. Moronic! Not a lot to say, yet, about the other contestants, but I'm kind of sorry the former NFL player actually spoke in the second episode, because he said nothing in the first one, and his silence was intriguing.

Not sure what else to tell you right now, but I really love fresh-squeezed grapefruit juice, and I think I'll go make some.

Love,
Eva