some things i just don't think should come to pass. lord of the rings in musical format just doesn't seem right to me. i don't even want to think about it.

it's finally friday - what is it about 4-day weeks that make them seem longer than regular weeks? - and i feel like ass. i think i overdid it yesterday. in the early am my coworker mike & i walked around the st john's neighborhood, putting flyers on doors for our program & talking to people we encountered on porches or on the street. one elderly man told me all about how he'd been living in his house since 1947 after returning from fighting in japan in WWII etc etc etc and oh-yeah, he's got a 13-year-old great-grandson who could certainly benefit from our services.

an hour later we returned to do an outreach at one of the high schools in the neighborhood. it was blazing freakin' hot by that time & i was already wiped from walking around in the mid-morning heat. normally i like hanging out across the street from the school, stopping kids & trying to give them condoms. i kinda feel like i'm doing something illicit or revolutionary, but then i feel frustrated: why should i feel like i'm performing a subversive act by giving teenagers the tools to protect themselves from pregnancy & std's? shouldn't this just be a part of our society? shouldn't this be the accepted norm? and doesn't the fact that it's not speak volumes about why our society is so fucked up? and don't even give me that family values crap. it didn't work in the 50's and it ain't gonna work now! i think this notion that we're supposed to be normal and white and christian and all donna reed is why most people are so dysfunctional. we need to embrace our differences and even our vices and focus on reducing harm to ourselves in whatever context we happen to be in.

but what do i know? but here's what the bush administration thinks about birth control and i know that isn't right. we've got to get that asshole & his cabinet of evil out of the white house, folks! i seriously can't take another 4 years of this insanity. everyday i wake up and i feel like i'm living in the fucking twilight zone. once i was on top of the latest news & world events, thinking & analyzing & having intelligent discourse. i had a thirst for knowledge and a drive to change the world. but the events of the past couple of years have numbed me out so bad i can't even think straight half the time. i still want to change the world, but most of the time i just feel too tired and frustrated. i guess i'm letting them win. by letting them wear me down, i've let the terrorists (i.e. republicans) win.

okay, it's not even 8:30am on a friday morning. i can't even think about this right now!

on a brighter note, i'm completely proud of myself for finishing the ashtanga beginner's workshop & only missing one class. and the best part is that even though i missed a class, i missed it to see a good friend (though briefly) and not because i just didn't feel like going. i wanted to go. i wasn't being lazy! now i need to keep it up & go to class regularly. i realized yesterday that even when i'm beat (which i was) and feel physically & mentally wiped out (which i was), it may be difficult but at the end of the class, i still feel great. i'm going to change my lazy sedentary lifestyle - i'm determined!

i just wanted to clarify one thing with the world: the mavericks won on tuesday night because of my powers. during an adventuresome evening that included several visits to a 24 hour auto parts store and a rush down to barton springs to briefly see bryan before he headed back out west, andrew & i had a quick drink at a chain pool hall in north austin. the spurs-mavs game was playing on 3 large screen tv's over dolly parton playing on the jukebox, noises from a video poker game and two smaller tvs mounted on the wall above it, turned to different channels. it was almost halftime and the spurs were kicking ass. that's when i said, "you know, i really want the mavs to win so this will continue for another game. i'm really enjoying this all-texas western conference finals." fast forward about an hour & we're finally home. we turn on the tv & catch the last minute and a half of the game and guess who's now kicking spur booty? all because of me. yeah, that's right. i have that kind of power.

and today i'm sporting shorter, redder, sassier hair so my power is all-encompassing!

i could go into more detail on that, but now i've got to hit the streets and put some condoms in teenagers' hands. today is the last day of school after all & i'm sure there will be lots of fucking in the coming months. what else do teens do during the summer?

oh, you mean they're not all like me? seriously?

it's the end of the day and i wanted to share a quote a friend sent me several years ago. the page is yellowing, the corners are bent, it's got a few stains and holes from thumbtacks & staples that i've used to affix it to bulletin boards at various jobs. this quote has sustained me in times of trouble and confusion. thank you, lynne, for having the wisdom to send me this.

...Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves...Do not...seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will...gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer.

--Rainier Maria Rilke
Letters to a Young Poet, Letter No. 4

which harry potter book are you? (yes, i am a dork and yes, i am bored at work)



Which
Harry Potter Book Are You?

by Mina-Clare

memorial day weekend was fairly uneventful for me. however i did get my brakes done, which makes it the best weekend i've had in awhile! yes, my life is sad, sad, sad.

andrew & i had hoped to go to bastrop or buescher state park & go fishing. i haven't fished since i was a little girl, either down at the bay (seadrift, tx) with my granny & papaw or at my great-grandmother's place outside gonzalez with my pa, where we'd fish in the "tanks." one of my favorite childhood memories is of one of those fishing trips with pa. after a few hours of most likely unsuccessful fishing in the tank, we walked along the creek, me walking in the water, pa walking beside the creekbed. i was trying to catch bullfrogs & pa was farting & saying he'd stepped on a frog. i loved those trips with my grandparents to "mom's" place (mom was our name for my great-grandmother, nina houston dubose). i'd romp in the big barn, jumping from haystack to haystack; play with mom's old german shepherd; stare with curiosity and awe at the little one-room house with the cement floor where the undocumented mexican immigrants lived. looking back, i'm extremely disturbed that my relatives took advantage of the "wetbacks," as they called them. i'm even more disturbed that they used that word to describe them! i have no idea how much they were paid & how hard they were worked. sure, they were given a free place to live, but it was rather squalid. i was always told to stay away from their house, so i would sneak by it as often as i could, peering into their little doorway, hoping their dogs wouldn't bark & give me away. i remember nina showing me some schoolwork that one of the boys had done with pride & she was gushing about his accomplishments. i have the feeling that they were more than just the "wetback help" to her & that comforts me. she was a poet, after all, and i can't imagine a poet not being empathetic to their plight.

nina died a few days before my birthday when i was in the 5th grade. i'm fortunate that i got to know 3 of my 4 great-grandmothers in my lifetime. i'm fortunate that i still have all 4 grandparents alive & an active part of my life as i approach 30 years.

but i digress...the fishing trip was postponed til next weekend so that brakes could be fixed & work could get done around the house (alot less work was done than was talked about). it turns out to be rather fortunate because next saturday is the free fishing day! i wasn't really looking forward to buying a fishing license anyway, since i will probably fish all of one time, so this is perfect timing! so, after next weekend, when i catch fish like mad, everyone is invited to my place for a big ol' fish fry! i'm sure i'll catch enough to feed the masses.

besides having my brakes fixed, we took a little unintentional road trip. we were looking for some sort of lumber place or maybe a machine shop or something (i don't know, we were running errands; i wasn't paying attention) and ended up in smithville, which is a cute little town, if not slightly creepy. we stopped briefly in the downtown area & window shopped in some of the antique shops, of which there were many. actually, it wasn't much window shopping since most of the shops seemed to be of the endless shelves of chipped china & glass vases/quilt variety. we saw one shop with some really cool old bikes & noticed that there was a guy around back working on a bike. andrew walked up to him & attempted conversation, but the vibe we got was "get the hell out; i'm working on my bike." so we left.

on the way back, we stopped at a bizarre antiques place off highway 71. i'm not sure exactly what to call it - the flea market of antiques shops? basically it was a filed with strips of connected buildings with old-timey looking storefronts (and by "old-timey" i also mean "run-down") most of the shops had porches & the junk from the porches was spilling over into the yard. we pulled up and parked in front of one shop & walked up that row and across the field to an opposite row of shops. behind those 2 rows was another strip of shops and on the far end, one shop had a large overhang with tables set up, giant garage sale style. most of the tables were empty, so i'm thinking maybe there are certain days or weekends where they have big blow-out sales or something.

the thing about this little antique village was that most of the vendors didn't distinguish between "antiques" and "rubbish." i don't really consider a piece of rusty metal to be an antique. nor is a stained, slightly smushed garfield stuffed animal. and i certainly wouldn't call those cookie jars that make noises when you open them (like a cow that moos or whatever) - cookie jars that i saw for sale at the HEB just last year - antiques. needless to say, if you're an avid antiquer, skip this place. but it was an interesting side trip.

on the way back through bastop, i had my usual reaction to a sign that i see on a regular basis. bastrop consists of 3 things - a state park, a small town nestled on the colorado river & a strip of stores and fast food joints on highway 71. among the businesses on 71, there is a strip mall with a dental office. the sign for this office says, THE "DENTISTS." i'm tempted to stop in there one day & ask to see these dentists' credentials. now, why would you put "dentists" in quotation marks? are they not really dentists? and if not, who would go there??? this freaks me out. fortunately i have a dentist in austin, who keeps his degree prominently displayed on the wall!

in other news, my neighbors disassembled their above-ground pool this weekend. now, if they'd only put some sort of siding on their mobile home add-on! tar paper is not really an attractive option for the outside of your home. but, hey, right now we've got a big, brown, dead yard with piles of limestone & wood & brush waiting to be mulched. and a, uh, big tub that we're converting into a poor man's jacuzzi. but it's better than piles of trash (which thankfully our next door neighbors do not have!)

well, back to work for me...

whew! well, several hours later & the workshop dilemma is solved. wonderful mj was able to get it moved back to the original day & time & the speakers are still confirmed. i know everyone will now breathe a sigh of relief - i'm sure you were all on the edge of your seats wondering how that little drama was going to play out. but, hey, on a day like today, i'll take my little victories where i can, especially since my hair appointment was canceled. oh well, i guess the world will have to wait another weekend to see me with shorter, lighter, sassier hair.

i wish new hair was all i needed right now...

right now i feel like it doesn't matter that this blog has devolved into the pathic drivel that my life has become since NO ONE CAN READ IT ANYWAY!! can i just say that blogger.com sucks big ass? yes, i can and yes, it does. how many times does a blogspot.com site pop up when you type in the address or link to it? maybe one time out of 20? that's about the ratio i'm looking at right now.

as soon as i get my shit together, i want to build a better, more creative and far more interesting online journal on a totally different server. but i'm not making any promises for now...

btw, i have no idea what i'm doing every time i mess around with the code for this site. i've managed to screw something up here & i'm too tired to deal with it. computer genius i am not!

i give up. it's just too much. calgon needs to take me away before i lose my freakin' mind...

once again, i'm sleep-deprived. last night i had to move some major appliances that were donated to the lilith fund yard sale and, well, without going into too much detail, there were some snags & it was almost midnight by the time i got home...and had to help unload the truck. i was cranky, there were arguments. i missed the pro-choice vigil at the capitol, which i was kinda looking forward to, mostly for the camraderie.

i woke up at 6:30am to more drama, the nature of which i don't want to go into, and i'm having a difficult time as it is just holding it together, trying to pretend to my coworkers that i'm normal & healthy & stable and not about to have a breakdown - which means that i have to hole up in my office and avoid too much interaction for fear that i'll totally lose my shit.

then i get an email that the workshop that i've been busting ass on has been moved to a different day and time. a little background: i'm the co-chair for the national network of abortion funds violence against women task force (whew! mouthful!) the other co in the chair has been busy with ailing parents & other obligations (she runs a clinic, is on the national board, probably has 1800 other things going on in her life that are far more impressive than what i'm doing), so the job of keeping the task force alive has fallen to me. months ago we decided to have a workshop at the annual conference & after several lengthy conference calls, we came up with a plan.

and guess who's doing most of the execution of that plan? me. well, to be fair, a couple of other folks have done some great work & everyone on the task force is wonderful. but, i'm feeling all the pressure to pull this thing together, which is like trying to hold egg whites in my palm, and i'm not even going to the conference this year.

our panelists for the workshop have already fallen through twice. this week, just 3 weeks before the conference, i managed to come up with 2 speakers by calling every domestic violence shelter or advocacy group, sexual assault group and women's shelter i could find via the internet or referrals from some of the other cold calls i've made. the good news is that this is an issue where everyone involved is helpful and generous and when you say, "will you speak...for free?" they get excited about it and when it turns out they're not available, they'll give you 10 more names & suggestions.

now the date & time has changed & i know that one of my 2 speakers can't make it. i'm dreading having to call the other speaker. i never again want to have to organize something like this, in another city & state, for an event that i can't even attend. i think what freaks me out the most is that i won't even be there to make sure it all runs smoothly.

though if it bombs, i won't be there. and i've already given notice that this is my last activity as co-chair of this task force. on a positive note, i was praised for my work keeping the task force together with little board support and was asked once again if i'd be interested in running for the board.

i said no.

last year they called me & asked me to run. i sent in my bio & was all worked up about it. then a few days before the conference i got a message letting me know that they'd decided to go with someone else, the pool of candidates was so strong, blah blah blah. translation: they found someone better than me. whatever. it was a bit humiliating & it certainly put a slight damper on the conference for me, but i tried not to let it get to me. so, when the issue came up again this year, i was less than enthused. well, that and i'm being much more realistic about the fact that i don't have the time, energy or mental capacity right now to serve on a national board, and a working board at that!

well, it's back to work for me. and back to square one with this damn workshop. FUCK!! i was so proud of myself for pulling it all together yesterday & felt like a huge weight had been lifted. now it's come crashing back down. FUCK!!

today is the first day of NOT being the lilith fund board president. damn, it feels good! i was so happy at the board meeting last night to turn over my reign to melissa, who has picked it up and is running with it. whew! i knew she'd make a great president...i just hope she doesn't get as burnt out as i am right now.

i may have been a little too ecstatic at the board meeting last night and had a little too much wine. it's taken me about 5 minutes to type this much because my brain has these moments where everything just completely stops. wait, what was i just writing about?

oh well. i've got to get back to translating these 5 page consent forms from english to spanish. let me tell you, there is nothing more riveting at 9am than translating documents, especially considering how weak my spanish grammar is! fortunately for my hungover head, i've found a great free online translation service, so i can cheat a little!

uggg...back to work...

yes, i know the gap is evil, but i have to admit that i have a weakness for old slavy. i don't know what it is. it's certainly not those freakish commercials with morgan fairchild, that weird woman with the big glasses and the dog. maybe it's because it's such a mindless way to shop - it's all displayed in easily accessed fashion and the clothes are pretty basic. and it's affordable, which is really important to me.

last night i had some time to kill while waiting for andrew to show up for dinner (i think the theme to my life right now should be "waiting around for andrew to show up." how sad is that??). normally i would just lie around on my brother & sister's couch, staring at their 45 inch monstrosity of a television, but i had been informed that i was not to be there when my brother returned from his dinner non-date because they were going to watch movies alone. and hey, i'm more than willing to cooperate if it gets him just a little bit closer to getting some action!

i could have done any number of things. i could have gone for a walk, gone to the park, hung out at quack's or dolce vita, visited amanda & chris or melissa & luke. anything. but i just got a big check & that money is just begging to be spent. and, well, i'm running really, really low on summer attire. i'm serious. i think i own a total of 2 ragged, stained tank tops and 3 pair of threadbare shorts. it's time to stock up for the long, miserable, humid, oppressively hot summer ahead.

i'd already been to target (another favorite inexpensive place to shop) earlier in the day & i wasn't impressed by what they had (though i still managed to drop $100 on yoga outfits, toilet paper & various other vanity products, all of which i need, i tell you, I NEED!) target is about as large a store as i can handle. sure, i could probably find some bargains if i were willing to brave the mall or a department store like kohl's or something, but those places scare me. it's too much. i walk into a big room with racks and racks of clothes all crammed in & tons of people crowding the aisles and i panic. clothes shopping is traumatic enough when i'm 15 pounds heavier than i'd like to be. i don't need to add anything else to the mix.

ok, enough excuses. i went to old navy. i gave them my money. and the point to this rambling, uninteresting little anecdote is that i LOVE the new tank tops they have at old navy, the ones with the built-in bra. i love them! i'm wearing one right now & i feel completely boobalicious!! old navy just sent my superficial self-esteem through the roof! i'm going to go back & spend some more money there and buy more built-in bra tank tops in every color i might possibly wear. and then i'll go home & think, "oh god, i just gave a bunch of money to old navy. who knows what my cash is supporting. at the very least, i'm encouraging more of those horrible commercials, but what i'm really supporting are sweatshops and child labor and environmental destruction." but my tits look good. that's what's important, right? (i am so going to hell, if i'm not there already!)

speaking of hell, i went to gold's gym for the first time yesterday. why did i join the gym? i'm probably never going to go, thus wasting more of my money. it's not that i don't want to go. i want to be in there, sweating, pumping iron, blasting my buns, workin' my abs, doing cardio and crunches and push-ups and all that jazz. i want to be burnin' some carbs, fryin' some fat, workin' my glutes, baby. but the gym disgusts me. i walk in and it's this huge room full of grey machines, hundreds of people sweating all over them. beefy guys with their freeweights. blonde, tanned, tight little missies prancing around the cross trainers. not-so-blonde, not-so-tanned, not-so-tight women in their bike shorts & oversized shirts, looking miserable. the sound of metal clinking on metal, wheels spinning on bikes, the back-and-forth swoosh of the elliptical trainers. and on top of it all is some really bad top-40 hits. my flight response kicks into overdrive.

i had made an appointment for an "orientation," thinking that this would be a good time to visit the gym for the first time & get psyched up. okay, honestly i was dreading it. i knew what was in store - stepping on the scale, getting my fat ratio, discussing my "fitness goals." it's not fun. but, at least i thought i'd get to go through some sort of quickie routine. at least, that's what they've done in every other gym i've joined.

but at gold's, the orientation exists solely to sell me $50/hour personal trainer sessions. and to introduce me to the horror that is gold's gym. maybe it was just because my guy was new, but he totally sucked ass. after the horrifying weigh-in and body fat ratio (about double what my ideal would be), he asked me what kind of exercise i'm currently doing. he didn't seem very impressed when i told him i regularly practice ashtanga yoga. he acted like that wasn't real exercise or something. i'd like to see him go through an ashtanga class, sweat shooting out of every pore, struggling to control his breathing, and not call it real exercise. i tried to explain it as "power yoga," which is how most gym-heads would identify with it, but it didn't seem to register with him. i bet he thinks yoga is a "chick thing."

but he did manage to impart some bits of wisdom: "uh, yeah, so, uh, you should, like, do some resistance training, some cardio and uh, watch what you eat." total genius! oh, thank you, gold's gym god of fitness! you have saved me from the ignorance of thinking that sitting on my couch and eating cheesy puffs was the way to six-pack abs (that is, six pack of beer abs!) what would i have ever done without him??

ok, i did not go all the way down there and get all dressed up in workout gear for nothing, so i asked him to at least show me around. i had to tell him 3 or 4 times that i had joined through my work and i had never been there before. this was also something that didn't seem to compute. he kept asking me, "so, how many times have you worked out since you've joined?" i've never been here before. five minutes later: "so, you've been here how many times?" zero. hel-lo? did a free weight just fall on your head?

he takes me around the gym and shows me the ab & thigh area ("this is where most of the women work out.") and everything else. he refused to talk to me about anything much in depth, instead referring to the importance of dropping lots of money on personal training sessions. actually, i wouldn't mind doing some personal training (but certainly not with that guy), but only if it came as an xmas gift or something. if i were to pay for it on my own, i'd have to sacrifice something else like eating or making my car payment. these were not priorities i expected my meathead friend to understand.

finally, i managed to escape the nightmare orientation session under the guise of going to "work out." after about 5 minutes on a dysfunctional stationary bike that somehow managed to be hard on my knees, i had to get out of what is basically the fitness equivalent of the aforementioned crowded mall or department store scenario. i don't think i can go back there alone. i need emotional support in order to face the gym!

this is a great account of how the texas democratic reps pulled off the quorum-buster last week. i especially like how they keep referring to the redistricting bill being "rammed down their throats." nice analogy to tom delay trying to rape texas democrats by forcing his small dick down their throats with his unfair redistricting bill! but i guess delay forgot that you can't force a blow job when the recipient still has some teeth!!

it must be monday. i'm tired. i don't want to deal with anything. i overslept. when i went to grab my 2-gallon water dispenser, the plastic spigot thingy caught on the side of the car, ripped off & water gushed all over my sandals.

then, when i went to view my weekly top ten conservative idiots list, i found out about this: conservative ice cream. yes, folks, we can now enjoy flavors such as "gun nut," "i hate the french vanilla," and "school prayerleens & creme."

okay, i'm ready to go back to bed!

right now i should be completing my human participants protection education exam online, but, well, everytime i try to read it, i find myself reading the same sentences over & over again. i'm just not up to boring online education modules today. too tired...

so, the spurs sent the lakers away crying last night. yay!! i was supposed to go watch the game at a bar with friends, but i was a complete emotional basketcase after yoga & the thought of facing other humans was too much to bear. and i also had this thought about how much i wanted the spurs to send the lakers packing, especially in LA, and how i'm sick of feeling disappointed by the world. i just knew that the spurs would end up losing & i wasn't in the mood for it. so, instead i turned on will & grace and suspended my emotions for awhile.

then andrew showed up to take me to dinner & we turned on the game to check the score. my mood instantly improved when i saw that the spurs were up by 20 points with 3 minutes left in the game! man, that LA crowd did NOT look happy. ha! and then i regretted not going to the bar to watch with everyone.

but i think being alone & indulging in some mind candy was probably the best idea for me. after work, i considered just driving straight home & going to bed. but i've made a commitment to establish a regular ashtanga practice and i paid money i didn't really have to take this class, so i went to the yoga studio. i was so out of it, i walked into the studio with my shoes on (HUGE no-no!). at that point, i felt like turning around & going home was probably a good idea, but i stuck it out anyway. i was able to set my thoughts aside & concentrate on my breathing & the postures for the next hour & a half, but during the deep relaxation, i started to quietly cry a little. then, on the drive to my siblings' house, i full-on started bawling. i felt like everything is too much and i can't take anymore.

i'm sick of working all the damn time and always being broke. i'm sick of my weird head trips & insecurities and not being able to have normal, healthy, productive human relationships. i'm sick of feeling sick of everything. i'm sick of trudging through life, feeling like if i just stick it out long enough, it'll get better.

but how? how are things going to improve by my just letting time pass, without really doing anything except surviving? in some ways, all it will take is time. i have a certain number of years to go on paying off my debts. once that's done, my financial situation won't be quite as distressing...at least i would hope! if i stay with this job long enough & keep learning, i'll get more experience, thus increasing my chances of getting into a decent graduate program or getting an even better job down the road, still doing something meaningful. with time, i'll be able to afford to go to graduate school (this is tied into the debt thing, putting off grad school is not something i'm happy about).

but the rest of it must involve some sort of active participation on my part. in some ways, i've started this journey. yoga practice is part of that - not only working on my physical health but also my mental & spiritual well-being. but i think maybe counseling is in order so i can sort out the rest of it. though i am so put off by even the thought of finding a counselor and getting into all that. it's just such a huge pain, having to find a counselor, especially one that won't suggest i solve my problems with the latest innovation from pfizer. and i don't want to be labeled. i can't stand all the labeling. i don't want to be boxed into some sort of definition of this, that or the other disorder. i think i'm more complex than that!

[sigh] i think it would also help if i hadn't felt rejected by the last counselor i saw. i was 20 years old - geez, 9 years ago! - and taking advantage of the free counseling services at the university to sort through all my shit, and i had lots of shit to sort through! i was really trying to make the counseling work, opening up to the therapist & hoping for something, anything, to relieve my confusion & numbness. but i guess the therapist (or therapist-in-training probably. i'm sure cheap-ass ut uses grad students for their free counseling services) wasn't really interested in helping me sort through anything. it was nearing the end of the semester & the end of my set number of free hours of therapy. at the beginning of the session, she said, "well, looks like we only have a limited amount of time left. so, if you want to continue with therapy, maybe you should think about finding someone to do that with." translation: i have no interest in listening to your drivel anymore. what do you say after that? how do you open up to someone who pretty much told you - albeit in an indirect way - that they don't want to continue therapy with you? so, i sat there quietly, grappling with this dilemma, when she said, "you know. i just had this fantasy that you got up and walked out of the room."

"well, wish granted," i replied and i got up and left. fucking bitch! what kind of professional demeanor is that? what business did that person have going into the counseling field? more than 9 years later, this still makes me angry. if i have one regret in life, it's that i didn't have the power at that time to make a complaint against her. i wish i could remember her name so i could look her up & see if she's still practicing. i wish i could expose her. but i guess i'll have to get over that.

well, it's almost 10am & i have just a mere 11 hours of working to go - 5 more here, 5 at the convention center and an extra hour to drive from one job to the next.

i'm sick of having to work two jobs & spending the majority of my weekends at a mindless events staff job that makes me want to scream (and doesn't even really pay all that much anyway). i'm sick of working two jobs & still being broke most of the time.

there comes a time in everyone's life when we have to face the fact that our parents have had sex, and possibly still have sex...and not just the one, two, three times that you & your siblings were conceived. there comes a time when we have to come to grips with the possibility that our kinkiness might just be genetic. there comes a time when we have to accept that our parents might be making internet porn.

i would like to share a conversation that my sister recently had with my parents while she was visiting them. i must confess that i'm not ready to think of my dad's member as a "beast."

So my parents received a new digital video recorder in the mail today. The conversation that ensued will forever scar me.

Mom to dad: "Why is there a remote?"
Dad to mom: "So you can control the camera when you are making your romantic movies."
Me: "Ahhhhh!"
Dad to me: "What?"
Me to dad: "If I am looking at internet porn one day and see you two going at it I will personally drive down here and beat that image out of my
mind through your's."
Dad: "You don' t want to see me and your mom gettin' dirty...she still looks pretty good."
Me: "Ahhhhh! Ahhhhh! Ahhhhh! No, HELL NO..., besides mom wouldn't do that."
Mom: "Why do you think I'm such a good girl...like some kind of virgin?"
Me: Jaw hits floor, the image of my prudish mother shattered. I knew my dad was dirty, but now my mom is telling me she is a slut too.

Cut to later, mom is at work, Dad is getting ready to go.

He comes into the computer room, "So have you thought about where you are going to work when you graduate?"
Me: "I have a job dad, there's no shame in delivering pizzas when you are thirty."
Dad: "I'm not pressuring you, I just thought maybe I could offer some suggestions...You know you could always come work for your mother."
Me: "She couldn't afford me."
Dad: "What are your requirements?"
Me: "Thirty dollars and hour...forty hours a week, of which I will only work thirty."
Dad: "Well maybe you should talk to Heidi Fleiss" (You know the Hollywood Madame)

Conversation continues on a downward spiral...several minutes later here's where it gets disturbing.

Dad: "You should get a job where you can hire me."
Me: "What you want to be a pimp?"
Dad: "No I want to be a prostitute."
Me: "Well I guess I could pimp you out as a bear to the gay guys."
Dad: "No, I have to have some scruples...women only."
Me: "You know Dad, there is a specific body type required to be a gigolo."
Dad: "Oh, I have the requirements (inferring his cock is huge, for those of you who are a little dense)... When you find me and your mom on the
internet you'll be asking whose that beast?"
Me: "Ahhhh! Ahhhh! Ahhhh!

i think ashton kutcher is hotter than ever after this little revelation.

and that reminds me of something my heb grocery store clerk told me yesterday when i handed her my check with PRO-CHOICE written across it:

"I hear ya! Those that sit and judge don't have any idea."

of course, i was totally obsessed with the fact that i'd just written a hot check for groceries that mostly consisted of generic canned vegetables and bulk chicken breast and how that meant i couldn't afford to fill up my gas tank before thursday, which means i can't get to work unless i sell some plasma or andrew makes some money or i write another hot check on wednesday, hoping that my direct deposit goes through in time. so, it took me a few seconds to get that she was referring to the message on my check.

i had to post again because i'm so impressed with the democratic state representatives here in the texas house! today 53 reps sent sick notices to the republican leadership, preventing a quorum & effectively shutting down the texas house for four days. it's a HUGE deal because they actually had to flee the state so the state troopers and/or texas rangers couldn't hunt them down and make them come to work. imagine if your boss did that when you called in sick!

and i'm stealing this from amanda's site, because i thought it was so great. check it out, it's pretty damn hilarious!

sooooo, it's monday & a new week. i get paid this week so it can't be all bad! FINALLY, i can eat again! may has been kinda rough. i can't wait to get my end of the month paycheck for 3 weeks & my check from the teacher retirement system.

with that nice little windfall, i'm going to go on a shopping spree for...a refrigerator! yay! that's just how i envisioned myself spending my hard-earned money: on a major appliance. yep, this weekend a whiff of rancid meat alerted us to the fact that our refrigerator has died, though it lives on in the form of high utility bills since the motor is constantly running in a vain attempt to actually cool something. all dairy and mayonaise-based products have found new homes in the garbage & everything else now lives in the freezer, where it is almost as cool as the fridge would be. so, until we eat up all the perishables, we'll keep running the fucking thing.

and if that wasn't enough, we also have carpenter ants whittling away at the frame of the house! yes, it's barrels of fun out on the ranch, folks! it's not enough that we've got to re-tile the bathroom floor, install a bathroom sink, tile the kitchen floor (the existing floor is painted plywood, i kid you not!), redo the walls of the bathroom (i know about the carpenter ants because the shower is currently without walls, which means we only take baths. i normally prefer a bath to a shower, but it sure makes washing my hair difficult!)

but i'm hanging in there & making the best of it. this weekend we got some painting done & finally did enough work in the living room so it looks like a real living room & not a dumping ground for random boxes & things. my goal for the week is to finish painting the bedroom & turn it into an actual bedroom & not a construction zone.

last night i also got to experience the other joys of country living - VERY inconsiderate neighbors. i woke up around 1am to the sounds of barking dogs. these dogs continued to bark, nonstop, for about 2 hours before my groggy brain kicked in enough to remember that i have a pedestal fan & the white noise might block out the sound. i was going to call the cops (even though we don't have municipal police, so i doubt the sheriff or whoever would have done anything anyway), but i wasn't sure which property it was coming from. though this evening i think i'll take a little stroll & locate the culprits & maybe leave a little note in their mailbox about putting their mutts in at night.

some say that living out in the boonies is nice. it's quiet. you have lots of space. you're not very close to your neighbors. all these things are true. i love all our trees. i love walking out on the back porch naked & not worrying about who might see me. but there is a dark side to the country: apparently some people move out to the country to avoid things like neighborhood associations and health standards. these people move their run-down mobile homes onto little plots of dirt & commence never improving their lot in life. not only do they never plant grass or bother with any landscaping, not only do they never give the ol' double-wide a fresh coat of paint, but they neglect to use trash collection services. yes, they just let the garbage pile up in the yard, rusty bedsprings sticking out for little billy bob jr to get tetanus, rotting sofas and rancid dirty diapers forming a mound. they chain their pit bulls to the trees & don't bother to try & shut them up when they bark ALL. NIGHT. LONG. sometimes they decide to make the mobile home even more permanent, like our above ground pool-owning next-door-neighbors, and they build an extension on to the home. but, why bother to spend the money to apply brick of vinyl siding when you can have a lovely tar paper house? yes, this is the monstrosity i get to look at everyday.

but on the other side of our house, our neighbors live in quiet & have so many trees that we can't really see their house (though the glances i've gotten have assured me that it's a house that did not arrive on wheels). there are some really nice farmhouses down the road and even a few random subdivisions with the usual tract housing here & there (why you would want to move out to the middle of nowhere yet still live in suburbia is beyond me).

i'm trying not to be judgemental about these people. if they want to live in filth, that's their decision. if they want to perpetuate the stereotypes of poor white trash, then there's not a whole lot i can do about it. but when i only get 3 hours of sleep because of their barking mutts, they've crossed the line!

so, i'm beginning another week of work where i feel too overwhelmed and mentally exhausted to deal with this job...or rather deal with figuring out what to do all day. i'm still not convinced that i'm actually going to be good at this job because so far it hasn't really started. and then i feel even worse because i think that maybe there's something i should be doing (besides updating my blog), yet don't know what that is. so, i'm just faking it for now, hoping that i don't get canned because andrew & i can't both be unemployed at the same time. in that case, it's good that the fridge doesn't work cuz we can't afford to put stuff in it anyway!

10:20 am and i've got 5 hours & 40 minutes to go. fortunately at least 1 of those hours will be spent at an ice cream party/meeting and another 2 at an off-site meeting (and at least 30 minutes to get there, even though it'll only take 10). how many times can i check my email in 5 hours?

so, i don't have much of anything interesting to say. i spent 2 days in san antonio last week at a training on the "youth connections" curriculum we're going to be using. what's your sunshine & cloud for today? yeah, it had some seriously lame aspects that i will NOT be using! and on saturday i went back to san antonio for my aunt carla's 50th birthday party. i was suffering from a weather/barometric pressure-induced headache & didn't enjoy myself at all. but yesterday i saw X2 and loved it! rebecca romyn-stamos is so hot as mystique. i totally want to be her.

that's why i joined the gym! gee, i'm sure i'm only a couple of months away from supermodel physique, right? and through association i'll sort of be on a no-starch, no-carb diet. andrew is on a new health kick & since i'm broke & he's buying the groceries, it's going to be all proteins, fruits & veggies for the foreseeable future. i could stand to lose a few pounds, so i'm not complaining too loudly. and if it makes him feel better & gives him the energy he's been lacking (and by extension gets some shit done around the house), then i'm really not complaining!

since my life has become about as dull as it gets, i thought i'd share this little story from salon:

Report: Man charged in foot-licking

May 5, 2003 | MILFORD, Mass. (AP) --

A man convicted of licking the feet of three female shoppers in Rhode Island is facing a trial in June on charges he allegedly licked a woman's foot in a Massachusetts supermarket.

Raymond C. Dublin, 35, of Rhode Island, is finishing a one-year sentence for simple assault charges in connection with the foot-licking complaints in Rhode Island.

He will appear before a Milford District Court judge for a bench trial on the Massachusetts charges on June 2, The MetroWest Daily News of Framingham reported.

Dublin allegedly sneaked up behind a woman last year at a Bellingham supermarket and licked her feet and toes. He faces charges of assault and battery and lewd and lascivious behavior, the paper reported.

Dublin also has run into trouble for other sex offenses in the past.

In 1991, he was convicted of first-degree sexual assault and sentenced to 15 years with 10 to serve; in 1998 he was convicted of second-degree sexual assault and sentenced to 15 years with five to serve, the newspaper said.