Boowasborn's Xanga

All Clear

Tue, 03 Nov 2009 20:24:47 GMT

Just a quick update for those interested. I went to the neurosurgeon and basic gist is to wait 6-12 months and maybe then get more pics taken then and deal with the individual symptoms as they arise. My symptoms are not so severe that they warrant any more immediate action and that is good news.

I was disappointed that I did not get a quick solution for the things that have been happening, but then are there ever any of those?

Feeling every bit the whiny baby is enough to quell my complaints and worries for the time being.

Now on to better things.

Sundry? No, It's Saturday

Sun, 01 Nov 2009 02:13:37 GMT

The necessity for scary has somewhat diminished within the last week, so this Halloween, quiet as it is, comes as a welcome repose.

Recounting the frightening and stressful bits only serves to increase the depth and length of the new wrinkle between my brows, so for vanity's sake, I will not do it. However, there were gems to be had and I found some.

My kiddos wrote their spooky short stories and they were wonderful. Gory as all get out but wonderful.

While the symptoms of the Chiari seem to be building, it helps a great deal to get through whatever quirks arise knowing that it may not have to last forever. And that is a gem worth holding on to right now. I find out more on Tuesday.

Wanting things, material things, never seems to happen to me without pangs of guilt, but with my latest two ME WANTS! that feeling is oddly not present. My two darlings are: Final Draft and a stationary bike. The thoughts of using those two things cheer me up considerably.

(What? A zombie kitty is far more interesting to look at than a stationary bike. It's a fact. At least you weren't Rick Rolled.)

So the gem list is short but when that happens it has become a great release to turn to the monkey. He has a way of pulling out the silly even when I cannot seem to find it myself.

Here is his latest:

Tale of the Monkey Shark

And in an effort to pay homage to the creepy, here is one of the photo edits I have yet to post anywhere else.

I tried to make a human peacock but my mad scientist gene was on the fritz again.

Hey, I am not forgetting the little things. I am well aware and appreciative of those nuances that brighten days. I heard a man in line at the grocery say to another, "Everyday I wake up above the dirt, I call it a win." As do I. The alternative would be very uncomfortable. And I had one such win. On a rare night out, a musician gave me a card of his up coming show dates. He turned it over to explain to me that I could use the other side as a scratch pad to write things on, like phone numbers. AND I only had to check with one person to assure myself that he was not really overly concerned about awareness of the multiple uses of paper products. I am not dead yet apparently.

Will be round soon. I hope you all are doing okay. Much love and snack sized candies to you!

Coloring: Fall Shorts

Sun, 25 Oct 2009 00:55:35 GMT

Yellow

“Once when I went this old woman was handing out home made cookies. She had them all wrapped up with two cookies in each bag! Can you imagine that?! I threw them away in her lawn as we walked away. Gross!”

“You should have waited to throw them away where she wouldn’t see.”

“It was dark. She couldn’t see.”

“She would have found them in the morning. People don’t poison you from their own kitchens. They do put stuff in candy you can’t trace though. I heard of that happening.”

“I was just little. I didn’t know. And I was scared.”

“Yeah, but you still think it’s gross. I think it’s kind of nice the way she put all that work into it.”

“You... some people like home made stuff. I don’t do home made stuff. Not food. Not clothes. Not nothing.”

“Sometimes home made stuff is the best. I love Thanksgiving and that’s all about home made stuff.”

“Okay. I’ll give you Thanksgiving. But not trick or treating.”

Crimson

“I saw this kid I knew from high school on Facebook. He was such a complete jerk then. Now I guess he’s found Jesus.”

“So you accepted his friendship then.”

“Why not?”

“Have any good memories of the guy?”

“No. He actually really hurt a few friends of mine. He seemed to get off hurting people’s feelings. He was always nice and sweet in front of adults though.”

“And you accepted his friendship.”

“Well, his status update said something about loving Jesus, so I thought he might have changed or something.”

“That’s really sweet how he announced to the world that would be watching that he loved Jesus. Nice. Have you sent him a message?”

“No!”

“Why? Don’t you want to make contact again? Keep up with him and his life and all that?”

“No. Not really. Stop judging me!”

“Oh, I’m not. I’ve done it too. I think everyone does. It’s so nice to see people again and all, but really we just don’t want to seem like bitches.”

“Are you going to delete me?”

“Not yet.”

Jade

“I can’t wait for Halloween this year.”

“Are you going trick-or-treating?”

“No. Im too old for that.”

“Are you going to hand out candy or go to a scary movie?”

“No. I don’t have the money for it.”

“Why are you so excited about Halloween this year then?”

“I just am. It feels good to be excited about something. You said you’re excited. Are you handing out candy?

“Only if you promise to come to my front stoop. I promise to have the good candy.”

“Okay! Do I get to... I mean do I have to dress up?

“Yes. And you have to tell me what constitutes good candy or you are getting dental floss.”

Hoodie Mods (And Other Fancy Stuff)

Sat, 17 Oct 2009 23:27:50 GMT

I mentioned previously that hoodies have been banned at many schools and other places, and in truth, I wouldn't wear them to school anyway. They're too hot for me with the hood. Still, so many kids like them and have several, I thought why not modify them to be acceptable for the dress code? I asked for volunteers and two freshmen offered up hoodies they liked but didn't wear much (and with the new rule, didn't wear at all) for me to play with. Here are some of the results so far:

Baby Blue Fleece Bound and Zippered

This was my first try at turning the hood into a collar. It was simple to do. However, I bought cheap white thread and it was a nightmare to use with the fleece binding. I finally scavenged some older stronger thread from the bottom of the box and it came out okay. The pockets are a bit misaligned, but since it was a practice hoodie with stains all over it, no big loss. I will wear it for workouts and I am putting in a snug iPod pocket to make it even more useful.

She said she'll wear it now!

This was my second attempt at a collar. I chose the red binding to make it pop a little. After cutting off the hood and splitting it down the center, sewing on the double fold binding (Double fold is important because it is folded inward on either side making a finished edge automatically.), it is a snap to sew in a zipper! People kept telling me: "I don't sew! I can't do something like that." But I am not a good seamstress either! I can hardly sew a straight line but with thread the same color as the binding, my wobbling doesn't show. With the added inch or so due to the binding width and the zipper, there was more room and the young lady that let me practice on it seemed happy with it.

Collar Only

But this one made me nervous because guys can be very picky about their clothes and I did not want to disappoint this gentleman. He was happy with it. I made sure to wash both of the ones I made for students to see how the seams would hold up and they did very well. It's satisfying to make something usable again.

Mine Without Collar

This was the first one I did. I removed the hood just under the seam that attached it to the body and split it up the center. I bound it with black and put in a black zipper that starts two inches below the neckline and ends right above the bottom ribbing. I hate how sweatshirts leave me looking like a balloon and this solved that. It hangs like a cardigan now and it is my favorite. I am going to mod all my other school themed ones the same way. I don't like things around my neck if they aren't scarves or the occasional necklace.

Hmmmm.

When I went to the cutie patootie married orthopaedist who wears cool boots we discussed my carpal tunnel and arm pains. I have a course of action for that. However, he told me to call a neurosurgeon due to something else he spotted in the MRI: a Chiari Malformation. The yellow arrow points to it in the first picture. (The second picture is an x-ray that I only posted because I think it is pretty.) Basically, I have to find out if my little cerebellum hang is within the normal range or not.

I am kind of hoping it is not because for the last two years I have had pretty much every symptom they list on the pages I have read about Chairi malformations. The worst one for me is the near constant nausea. I have had a lined trash can beside the computer desk for a while because extended time here makes me vomit. And a few weeks ago I had to sit down on the floor while doing dishes due to a severe wave of nausea and loss of balance. When I got up to go to my bedroom to lay down, I made it as far as the dining room and hit the floor. My head was propped up on the kitty treat bag and I stayed there for about 20 minutes waiting for whatever it was to pass. I did not lose consciousness at all and the only way I can describe it is that it felt like my head was swimming. (I know that doesn't describe it very well but that's all I got!) What I am hoping for is to find out how to make the nausea, headaches and other fancy stuff (like waking up with shooting pains going through my extremities) go away.

It's not life threatening so far as I have read, but my fear is that I will be told it is totally normal and I will have to continue trying to find the reasons for the myriad craptastic things that have been bugging my shell. It would be excellent to have answers. I have an appointment in November and we'll see what the new doc says.... and if he is cute and married as well. (Ooh, I need to Google him.)

I thought about waiting to blog about it until after the appointment or if I should blog about it at all, but screw it. I used the tv at work to create a kind of light box and got cool shots of it so why not? Creepy! And it is the season for creepy!

Other Goodness

Hollo's PaperCraft is one of those places I have heard about forever but have never been to. Teachers and crafty types talk about it with oohs and aahs. So when my hairdresser spoke of it excitedly (she is going to make her own holiday cards), I decided to look it up and map it out. Oh em gee. The place is killer. I bought a mixed bag and all the boxing I will need for shipping holiday nom noms. (They will be much smaller this year btw.) And I scored cheaper rates than what I could have done online (a first). My favorite buy was 4 scribble pads made of posterboard, 17X22 with ~50 pages per pad. Dooood! They were $3.50 each. Big score for class projects.

I also found some pre-cut card stock the size of business cards and tiny envelopes to match them. I thought it would be a neat side project (to do during times when I would normally doodle away boredom) to hand make business cards for the monkey puppet. Needless to say, most if not all of my cards for a while are going to be hand made and silly as I want them to be. So there.

Adjacent Tangent

Tomorrow is for blog reading and nom nom making for my new neighbors, who, by the way, rock. The father, John, is on permanent disability and is home most of the day everyday. He has a great vibe and his wife seems sweet too. They have a bunch of elephants and blue lights in their yard. I love it! John has told me that he keeps an eye out and I never need to worry about people breaking into the house as long as he's around and I believe him. He also decided to donate the back half of his yard (which matches mine in length) to the NAC for growing things too. How cool is that?!

I hope everyone is well and enjoying the cool weather. Will be around to read you all very soon!

Swamp Talk

Mon, 12 Oct 2009 00:25:01 GMT

Overheard

"So whaddaya think, Sal? Is she ever going to write something about us? I mean look at Helmut over there. He looks like a helmet. That one is easy pickings. She could write about that."

"Vernon. What in blue blazes has Helmut got to do with anything? He's just a bump on a log for crying out loud. Hardly inspirational."

"Hey, quit talking about me like I'm not here. And scoot over."

"I told him not to eat the furry worms. They cause indigestion. And now look. Some lady is going to take his picture and he's about to burst with a cloud of swamp gas. I swear he does it on purpose."

"Good Lord woman. Do you not know how to work you own technology? Use the flash if you expect to get my stripes with all this back lighting. Here, wait a second. I'll move a bit so you can get the full effect of the glory that is me. Be sure to crop out that rotting bumble bee. It's my dinner and I don't have enough to go around."

Literally Literary: Serendipity for the Dip.

Mon, 05 Oct 2009 02:47:39 GMT

I, or rather the monkey, was able to meet one of my favorite authors, Neil Gaiman. That's the short of it, but there is quite a long of it as well. I will not trouble you with every detail but I will give you the ones that should lend some credence to one phrase that does apply to me specifically: I would forget my small intestines were they not attached.

First, I thought the reading was Saturday and I drove to meet my friend. The reading was the next day though. No wonder I could not find her. This was not a complete waste of time as I was able to use my newly acquired understanding of the directions: left and right. Cut to Sunday.

I neglected to tell my friend that the reading would be at a satellite branch of the Cleveland Public Library. She had been excellent in arranging transportation for us to the main branch downtown. We would have needed it. It was a home game for the Browns and traffic would have been unnerving. We figured it out with little time to spare and retraced our steps to arrive at the proper place in time. We thought.

I suspected there would be a crowd but had nothing to back that up. Nobody at work knew who I was talking about when I jumped with excitement telling them about my plans, and several other people said they didn't expect there to be a crowd. There usually isn't. There was. Over 1000 people showed up and there was not even standing room available in the over flow room!

I sat to film with the monkey outside of the venue thinking I would just wait to have a book signed and talk to people in line. However, out of the blue a woman came by with a small pack of people and asked me, "Would you like to sit on the floor down in front?" Ahem. All kinds of hecks yeah!

The reading and the talk was wonderful. And truth be told, I like sitting on the floor better. It relaxes me. But after, the line for signing stretched yards. It had to be nearly a hundred yards. That's a football field and to my mind a more interesting one than in the stadium across town. I found my friend again and she worked a little communication magic for Fillup. Instead of getting a book signed, he was permitted to drop off a little bag of treats to Mr. Gaiman and that is in the video below.

We left without standing in line again because by that time it was clearly going to take hours. I dropped her off at her place and realized I had lost my phone. I called it from her phone and the security guards at the event had found it and were holding it. When I went back across town again, the guard let the monkey ask him a few questions. I gave him The Graveyard Book then. It felt good to do and if you go to that link you can hear it. Then I peeked inside to see how the line was progressing. Mr. Gaiman spoke at 2 pm and was still there signing books after 6 pm. And there were likely a couple of hundred people still waiting. The guy is a giver. I felt for him. He spent hours in that chair and will spend hours in more to come. He made sure to get the people who had brought children in a special line and those that came early went first. That was very considerate.

And because of all of my backtracking and forgetfulness, the timing turned out to be perfect. I missed the traffic from the Browns game. I got the best parking spots and I got a great seat! Oh, and I got to meet a literary rockstar. Oh yeah. I admit to shaking a little. His work is important to me. On my professional battlefield his books have broken down at least two fortresses of word haters and fortified the ranks of the book eaters. That soldier deserves some honor and I was very happy to have the chance to see him.

Meeting Mr. Gaiman

A Brief Shore Leave

Fri, 02 Oct 2009 00:53:58 GMT

I am well and I hope you are too. But running purposefully aground seems necessary in order to jot down a few thoughts even as simple as good wishes.

Other things I would love to write about but lack time are these:

Why are my males doctors always so cute and always so married?

The woman who gave me the reiki massage was very good at reiki and enjoyed telling me of my angels and a past life. I enjoyed her enjoyment more than the actual readings.

I locked myself out of my car and busted the windshield trying to get in. It was fixed but ended my fun budget thereby nixing the much anticipated Comicon.

A free reading from Neil Gaiman is happening around here though and that's even better than a con. I wonder if he'd pose with my monkey?

I've been writing 1500 word or less bits in different voices as exercises to prep for the possibility of entering a contest or two. I need the practice.

The people on the ring of fire and the people who deal with internal disasters.

How the earth is long overdue for a shift and how big time fatalism is good for perspective.

Hoodies are being banned all over the place thanks to thugs who use them to commit anonymous crimes in front of cameras, and how cool would it be to have a website dedicated to hoodie mods so that people can recycle their hoodies in creative ways. I did one. It's decent. Photo later.

That's about it from here. How is it over there? *She says shoving her craft back into the sea.*

A Correction of Felicity

Thu, 01 Oct 2009 23:51:43 GMT

On her knees and resting her arms on her well made bed Helen thought, “I am supposed to talk to you now, God, but I don’t know what to say.” She paused to looked up the way she’d seen others do in movies and television shows and picture books, but she became distracted by the texturized ceiling and found at least three faces in the mottled clumps before scolding herself to get back to prayer. “Sorry about that, Lord. My imagination runs away with me. All of my teachers tell me so. They even wrote it on my report card. Mom thinks it is a compliment but she’s weird. So what have you been up to lately? You always seem so nice when I see you in pictures. And all the people I know say you love everybody. I read in Anne Frank that she thought all people were good at heart. She reminded me of you. I said so too, and at lunch later Mike told me Anne Frank was Jewish and that Jews killed Jesus. Your son. So I tried to hate her but I can’t. I hope you don’t mind. I think Mike is wrong, but not on purpose.”

Two rooms away at the end of a stretched telephone cord her mother spoke in turns. There was a silence, a waiting and a listening, and then her mother would mumble for a while. “God. I am sorry also that I am so distracted. I hear mom’s voice and it sounds like she’s underwater from here, but I know if I get closer I could hear her words very clearly. How do I know that? I guess it is something you gave to me before I was born because I have always known things like that. Simple stuff that just happens. I seem to know all that stuff and how it all works. I guess I should thank you for that, so thank you.”

Hearing the winding down tones in her mother’s voice, Helen felt it was time to conclude her own conversation, “I better go now. I don’t know if you heard me. I didn’t have any requests or anything. I am sorry to have wasted your time, you know, in case you thought this was important and were tuning in. Oh, and I am sorry for fighting with my sisters. We didn’t fight today, but we do most days, so I am sorry about that. I hope I can still use that for confession though. It’s so hard to think of things to confess, and that one is really good because it’s almost always true. Well, good night. It must be daylight in China now. I hope the Chinese treat you well today. I don’t know any Chinese people, but I do know that Craig Helpburn is crazy when he says if we dig deep enough we can find them. I am going to dream about that though. I am going to dream about digging so deep that I come up under the bed of a Chinese girl and we will be friends and share a secret passage. Night!”

She stood, pulled down her covers and shifted her way into bed being careful not to unloose the neat covers too much. She fell to sleep on her back, her hands touching as if in prayer over her chest. Her last thought before dreaming was to wonder why she never awoke in that position.

“Clear your desks except for a piece of paper and a pencil,” Sister Michelle commanded from the doorway to the fourth grade classroom and everyone obeyed with a quiet crunching of book bags and notebooks. “Please put your name in the top right corner of your paper and underneath write the date.” Happy that she’d finished quickly enough to hear others pencils still scratching, Helen felt optimistic about whatever the quiz might be. “Now listen carefully. You will write out a brief description of what you prayed to God last night. You will skip every other line. Are there any questions?” She turned around to see if anyone in her class would come up with something for the nun. Betsey had her hand raised and looking back to Sister Michelle, she saw the nun’s eyebrows crease in preparation to be unamused. “Yes, Betsy? This better not be your usual silliness.” Betsey spoke, “Do we start on the top line or the second line? If we start on the second line then how do we know what every other line is?” Sister Michelle moved to Betsey’s desk and she wanted to turn around to see what would happen, but knew it was wrong to do that. “Class.” Sister Michelle announced, “Please begin the assignment and pay no attention as I help Betsey understand.”

She looked at her paper and put her pencil tip between the first two blue lines, but then wondered if she should start on the top blue line instead. So she paused to listen to how Betsey was instructed to do it so she would not make a mistake. Sister Michelle whispered to Betsey firmly, “You will get to writing this second or we will move your desk again, young lady. I have had just about enough of this silliness.” After a short pause Betsey was escorted to a desk in the front of the room where she put her head on her arms. Betsey’s back moved a little and it was hard to tell if she was crying or laughing. She watched Betsey’s back hoping for some insight and felt a jolt of electric pain surge through her when Sister Michelle appeared at her side and breathed down at her. The nun hadn’t touched her, but here was pain anyway.

Helen held her pencil on the top line and looked up to see if that was the correct place to start. “Ahem,” was her only answer and she turned to her paper writing the capital letter “I” on the top blue line. Her pencil disappeared up out of her hand and she felt a pinch at her elbow. She sat still and waited to see if the pinch would lead her to the hallway or to move her desk to sit next to Betsey’s, but the pinch just stopped and her pencil was dropped in front of her. She picked it up and erased the letter “I” and wrote it again in the space between the top blue line and the second blue line. She felt Sister Michelle move away.

Helen wrote, “I prayed to God last night by my bed. I talked to him about how I know things and how he must have put them in my head before I was born. I was pretty sure that I knew almost everything about how stuff works last night. I didn’t ask about how to skip blue lines though and I probably should have. I will tonight. I also told God that I couldn’t hate Anne Frank. And about China. I am sorry if it wasn’t right to do that.”

The day went by without further errors and when upon her knees again with sleep making her shoulders slump, she thought to God, “The paper was white with blue lines on it and one red one running down the edge. The lines made the white appear to be lines but it wasn’t. It was plain white just like the snow before someone walks in it. I wasn’t trying to be funny. I swear. I’m sorry. I just want to do it right. You never tell me anything or send me any signs to know if I am doing it right. So from here on out, I am going to keep doing what I am doing until I hear from you, okay? Let me know if I am doing it wrong and I will fix it, otherwise, I will think that you’re okay with me. I’m tired. I love you and all the people. I even love Sister Michelle. I love Betsey too. I hope she wasn’t crying. Good night.”

She lifted herself into bed and lay awake for several minutes unable to shut her eyes. She got out of bed again and resumed her praying position. “I am sorry, God. I just wanted to tell you that I feel guilty about ratting Sister Michelle out to you in my heart. That wasn’t right to do. She’s a good nun and deserves better. Please do not take my feelings that I just had and use them to punish her, okay? Or Betsey. I have one request. Please make both of them happy? Thank you. And good night for real this time.”

Helen crawled over the edge of her bed and fell to sleep uncharacteristically on her side. She dreamed of tiny skaters leaving blue and red tracks on a field of flat white.

Follow Your Bliss or Marginally Insane Penchant

Wed, 23 Sep 2009 00:24:10 GMT

How does one motivate a room of people who are tired, sticky with the humidity of the day and generally unamused? Better yet, how does one motivate such people to give a flying rat's tiny booty about say, Dickens? Drugs, physical prodding and profanities are not permitted.

I do not know if such a scenario would be intimidating to anyone. It's not to me, but writing it out like that in a question form makes me feel all creative and can-do-have-done. I say that knowing that even the slightest indication of self back patting would not only cause shooting pains in my arm, but would also seemingly ensure that I will never be able to do so again, motivate the people that is. (Is that fate I see? Got my tempty poking stick right here.)

This type of scenario is one of the best things about my job. I may be ill to say so, but when I get a chance at something like that, all else fades away and I launch full force into moto mode like a dog after a slab of bologna. It may be my bliss or it may simply be an indulgence brought on by the lack of any desire to thrill seek by jumping out of perfectly good in flight planes. (Not that there is anything wrong with that.)

I have it on very good authority (I read your blogs) that you all have some things that are similar. You cannot resist a little sompin sompin that very well might put another less adept person into coma, but I am curious about those things nonetheless. Will you indulge me? Will you tell me what you love to tackle?

What blows your hair back, turns your crank and fires your jets to action hero bit chomping bliss?

And if you'd just like to see the new magnet I bought, well, I guess I will post that below.

Magnet critic Annie Buddy says, "I have little bit of anxiety when it comes to the dichotomy of pure lower case expression that includes punctuation, but other than that and the odd desire to white out the second phrase and Sharpie mark over it 'i'm just livin' in it.' I have no problems with this minimalist magnet. The minus gary lew is a little disturbing. Why is he not included in particular? Tell me you did not pay good money for this. I swear, it'd burn a hole in your pocket wouldn't it? Sheesh."

A Trip on the Dusko Side

Sun, 20 Sep 2009 23:31:41 GMT

I find it handy when in the swirling eddies of despair that sometimes loom in the troughs of the roller coaster that is pms to blame all of my frustrations on someone else. Preferably not of my gender and preferably not a person in my immediate circle of friends, family or acquaintances (though the latter has sometimes been a last resort a likely a reason why my circles are pretty darned small). Keeping to this rule has helped me maintain the precarious and fragile relationships that have been known to bottom out for years due to a misplaced oath for a pox on the unborn and whatnot.

By chance I came across this man, Dusko Lokin, or rather, I came across one of his musical cassette tapes.

One of the requirements for me to fully jettison my baggage is that the target for my vitriol must be real, and Dusko certainly is. He has a Facebook page so he must be real. It would be a total betrayal of my core if I said I blamed all of the world's woes upon Mr. Lokin without a shred of remorse. The thing is I package up the remorse and save it until after all other issues are purged and then I open the package, feel bad and shortly after, forgive myself. Mr. Lokin may not take this as lightly as I seem to, but really, if one considers the very valuable position of being a target in lieu of others to whom irreparable harm may come, it's a pretty noble ride. After all, there is no bad publicity.

He is so earnest and lovably dorky, two traits known to virtually send me into irrational spasms of adoration, that he is a perfect surrogate for all my pent up rage. Also, I know almost nothing about him. He could be anything which is very important because I need to make him into a few things. He needs to have entitlement issues, be incompetent as a leader, deceptive and a touch passive aggressive. I have no idea if Mr. Lokin is a fan of the environment but for at least three to five days a month he is a polluter of the most vile ilk. Whether or not in reality he dons thick boots to go out in search of stray puppies for stomping, I have no clue, but for a brief window of time I view this as his primary pass-time. In all likelihood he is an innocent. I mean just listen to his music. So plaintive and heartfelt. I do not know what he is saying or even what language is spoken in Yugoslavia, but I have thought he must be telling me that I need to be more of a docile female and perhaps learn to make and eat a few thick noodles to be worthy of his love.

Yeah, I go a bit off the beam. I will admit that. I also make up dark songs that I text to friends and am eternally grateful for their input and the fact that they do not simply ban my number. Some find it very difficult to understand how important it is to find humor in the darkest of thoughts, but by luck I have found several people who can and have added excellent lines of utter darkitude which when I read, I do actually laugh out loud. My favorite this month and a shoe-in for the all time PMS Dark Quote Hall of Fame™ came from a friend who shall remain nameless (It's not easy being dark in public as not everyone understands.). It is brief, eloquent and down right dismal. I give you: Love is fiction. Srsly, it takes talent and a keen insight into the abyss to come up with three words that sum up the absurdity of down that some hormonal imbalances can evoke. I can't always do it. I need Dusko.

With blogs and especially here on Xanga we tend to be supportive and positive people for one another. We dig for bright sides and if none can be found we offer sympathy and well wishes. And that is excellent. For certain it would be a bad idea to put an all-call out for deeply negative phrases in the hopes that others might also get a laugh. That would be like asking people to cut themselves to compare the colors of blood each one produces. Totally unhealthy and effed up big time. Still, I am glad I have friends who can sum up the steely snark necessary to actively participate in these very unsportsman like dialogs. Without them I would feel less jolly about the intermittent downs. I would not be certain the mood was temporary and that I am not alone in it all. There is nothing so reassuring when one is descending as having a friend along to crack you up with their own opacity of gloom. When I was younger, my sister used to simply sock me or twist sensitive parts of my body until I screamed, but now that I am so bloody old and my tolerance level has grown, only metaphors and cursing seem to work to quell the utter utterness of it all.

And if a friend is not available or amenable to such due to off cycles or random bouts of happiness, I always have Dusko.