fuck you murphy

Yesterday was a fucking joke.  It all started when my irregular and impossible to track period decided to pay me a visit.

You see boys and girls, the joys of perimenopause means that I went from so damn predictable that the calendar people would call me to make sure they have their days right...  to...  it could be anywhere from 21-30 days in between and the whole ordeal could take anywhere from 3-7 days instead of 5.  Then...  there's the possibility that I could have another one a week later. 

So that hit first thing in the morning with cramps designed to cripple me and hormones to fuck up my already fucked up attitude.

I legitimately tore into my kid about being a lazy fuckhead twice in an hour.
TWICE.
Not saying he didn't deserve it...  because he did...  but I could have handled the entire thing with much more grace than I did...  but when you have rampaging hormones and feel like someone is riding a steam roller over your guts from inside your body...  not to mention the whole "kidneys feel like they're gonna fly out my back and kill someone" and the muscles in my legs not relaxing... and has anyone ever told you that their menstrual cramps feel like labor?  Cause mine do.  Same fucking sensation I dealt with when I had the boy...  only difference is there's no an anesthesiologist around to numb my ass up.

All this on top of the dental appointment it took 45 minutes to get to...  only to find an empty dental office with locked doors and a 23minute wait later they finally showed up 13 minutes past my appointment time.  The entire staff had gone out to lunch together...  and left no one behind to man the phones, let people in, etc...  I guess transferring the phones to the doctor's cell is certainly something you can do...  but when someone is already having a Murphy's Law kind of day, has to drive 45 minutes to see you and will be going home in rush hour traffic...  you might want to be on time.

Profuse apologies don't work for me.  Apologize once and then don't do it again.  The tenth time you apologize for something...  I'm not listening anymore.  You've already proven that you don't care...  Problem?  Love my dentist, love the staff...  hate the way she runs her business.  Receptionist will call every 45-120 minutes the day before your appointment.  They will do this until you answer or return their call to confirm that you will actually be at your appointment.  There's no "call us if you can't make it" and the assumption that you'll be there.  It's a constant barrage of annoyance and I inevitably have to work the day before...  so no good.  Also... the commute.  Three cities over when I have dentists close enough to walk to.  I have to find a new one...  and I don't want to but I can't do that again. 

Yesterday kept going wrong.  To the point where even the boy noticed it.  I could not catch a break and that made two solid shit head fuck you days.

Today I work from 11am to 8pm and I work with the same fucking assholes that I worked with on Wednesday.  I'm pretty confident that Useless will either be at the other clinic (to keep her away from me), that she'll have called in "because she needs to study" or she'll leave early... same excuse.

I suppose calling in and saying, "I need to bake.  The only thing in the world I want to do is make my fucking Christmas cookies.  Nobody will let me.  I've spent 12 days trying and 12 days being denied.  I'd also like to put some fucking ornaments on my tree, which I also seem unable to do.  So I won't be at work today."  I suppose that would be a kind of fucked up thing to do...  the day before my office manager gets married...  so I know he'll leave early today...  but I want to do it soooo bad...  so bad.

Yesterday's nonsense left me with quite a bit to do this morning, but it's all manageable and I'll deal with it after my walk...  and may call/text the OM and inform him that I may be late because I have things I need to catch up on as coming in to work sorely behind every single day is bullshit.

FML

When someone is covering a shift, working on their day off...  it's common courtesy to give them the option to go home early if such a thing becomes possible...  especially if they're not getting another day off during the week to make up for it...  What's rude as fuck is to try to get the entire day off...  you already have someone working their day off for another co-worker...  so now you gonna try to get the day off?  Finangle a half day?  Fuck you.  Useless fucking new girl came in for less than 40 minutes and that I will never understand because she drove an hour to get there.  In rush hour traffic.  Then again, this is the girl who has to to be told repeatedly to take her fucking lunch because working until an hour before your shift ends isn't the same thing and is, in act, illegal.

I can not tell you how many times I've sat her down, showed her the schedule and informed her that because she was late for her lunch, I had to take a short lunch to ensure everyone was on staff when the appointments started back up...  and while everyone else got an hour or more for their lunch...  I got 45 minutes because she felt folding the laundry and wrapping packs was more important.  She always apologizes, and then does the same shit the following week...  so I keep getting short lunches and everyone wonders why I'm pissed off...

So I'm working my day off...  and I'm coming in an hour early to open the clinic...  and Useless gets to work, proceeds to get in my way, annoy the fuck out of me and make me repeat myself because she couldn't get the concept of the simple tasks I was asking her to complete... those tasks that are her job...  those things that relate to the clients and patients who are in the building at that moment...  not the fuckers who are coming in the next day...  she was overly concerned with pulling charts for the next day...  and we had a solid block of appointments from 9-10...  and she comes in at 9 and starts worrying about something that is A: not her job and B: not something that needs to be worried about at 9am.

If I have appointments to check in, a phone to answer, and people to charge out...  why are you standing in the receptionist area working on something that isn't even necessary until tomorrow...  you are the technician and need to be in the back helping the doctor not up here getting in my way.  I snapped at her - more than once - for getting in my way.

I swear to the gods if I hear the words "I can do that." one more fucking time I will punch in her gods damned teeth.  I'm halfway through a sink of dirty dishes and up to my elbows in soapy water when she walks past with an armload of charts and says, "Oh, I can do that!"  and smiles at me like she's doing me a fucking favor... while hovering over me as though waiting for me to stop so she can come take over...  even though she has an armload of charts...  I scowl and tell her to finish what she's doing.  I scowl and tell her that I can finish the job I started.  I scowl and tell her three other things that need to be taken care of that nobody is actively doing at the time...  and when I finish the dishes she's sitting in the break room "having a break" but none of the other tasks are completed, or even started... because she doesn't like doing those things...  I can not tell you how many times I have walked away to get something, to answer a phone...  and return to find her finishing the things I start...  yet tasks she dislikes never get completed unless I myself do them...  so every bottle of alcohol, cleaning solution, peroxide and hand soap hits empty since nobody will fill them but me...  and I not only let them get empty to make a point, but I ask her twice a week to fill them up and she always takes a break right after I do.

She will go to wherever the task she most wishes to complete is.  If she wants to charge people out she will go up front - even though she is scheduled to work in the back and we have someone scheduled to work up front.  If it's not the office manager up front...  she will just push and nose her way into the receptionist area and not listen to you when you tell her to stop.  She says, "I'm just trying to be helpful!" 

In the meantime...  the work she is supposed to be doing is not being done and you can't do your job because she is getting in your way...  and she's apologetic and smiling but doesn't go back and do the stuff she's supposed to be doing...  she stays up front and does the stuff she wants to do. So then you're in back doing the stuff she's supposed to be doing...  and then her ineptitude and incomplete training result in a mistake-or she's faced with something she doesn't know how to deal with...  and you're fixing everything she fucked up...  because she never asks for assistance, she just moves forward like she knows what she's doing and she doesn't listen so if you do happen to be there she'll fuck it up while you're standing next to her telling her to stop, no, don't do that... 

Best part of all of this is...  I can not continue to be nice to her if she won't listen, won't learn and keeps doing the same shit and making the same mistakes...  and I'm gonna be mean, and I'm gonna snap...  and she's gonna cry and go running to the OM and then he's gonna have to talk to me about my attitude and then I'm just gonna get more pissed off because I have talked to him about this, and talked to him about this, and talked to him about this... 

But WTF ever because that son of a bitch (no offense I really do love his mother she's awesome) came in two-and-a-half hours late...  took an hour-and-a-half long lunch...  and then left early...  leaving me to work a 9+ hour shift on my day off - most of it alone as the people who are actually scheduled to work that day managed to finangle most  of it off.

Today I have to go to the dentist.
In an hour and ten minutes I have to get my kid... 
My husband has been turning his alarm off...  untreated sleep apnea can really fuck with your sleep patterns...  and your spouse's sleep patterns...  which is awesome because nothing will make someone fucking hate your god damned guts more than the person whose sleep you fuck with every single fucking day...  and I'm about to either stop sleeping in the bed and use the fucking recliner in my office as a chair...  which will do wonders for all the joint and nerve issues I have...  just fucking wonders...  or I'm gonna buy my son a bigger bed and move his bed into my office so I have somewhere to sleep...  where I can actually fucking sleep...  the whole fucking night... 

And I'm going to get about a half an hour of alone time today.
That's it.
A half an hour.
Because my fucking husband can not get out of bed.
Because I have to pick my kid up early so we can go to the dentist.
Because I have to work all week.
I should get my normal days next week...  but after that it's no alone time outside of my commute until mid-January...  and when I stop and think about that...  and consider the horrific cramps I'm currently experiencing...  I just can't fucking keep fucking doing this.

My husband has to step the fuck up.
He has to do something about the sleep apnea so we both sleep better so I don't wake up every morning fantasizing about smothering him with a pillow...  so that he can get up and get to work at a reasonable time instead of putting me in a position where I waste half my day waiting for him to get out of bed.
The resentment is strong.
The resentment becomes outright hatred.
It's cyclic.
But seriously.
I'm almost in loathing mode again.
Don't do a god damned thing to help out around the house without making it seem like you're conquering Everest.  Eat twice as much food as you need to so I get screwed out of a lunch this week (hey-that's why I make four portions of things, not so you can eat for two)...  keep in mind I cannot afford to eat out every day like you do...  I eat out for lunch once or twice a month.  Maybe.  If I'm lucky. 
Regardless...  you're eating two portions...  you're not working out...  your fucking shirts do not fit and you walk around with an inch or two of exposed belly yet continue to insist that you wear a size large t-shirt...  but you're gonna lose weight sitting on the couch playing phone games, watching sports and eating twice as much as everyone else in the household.  Yes.  I see your master plan.  You will simply explode.

what's the rush

the amount of things I have to do is overwhelming and not knowing where to start is extremely frustrating.  I know, start with the things that still need to be finished.  I'm on it. Regardless, the realization that in order to empty the box in the front room I will have to paint two rooms simultaneously is rather...  exhausting.  So here I am.  Errands to run, chores to do and I'm staring at Facebook with a cup of coffee waiting for my Kleptocat to return to me because the store I want to visit doesn't open for another half an hour and what's the rush?
The rush is the sheer amount of shit I have to do today and the fact that literally every second matters when you're hoping against hope for the opportunity to binge Grey's Anatomy later.
Tore the boy's room apart yesterday.  Even the closet.  It's amazing.  Hopefully he won't ask for a single god damned thing back and I can get rid of it all in three months time...  have to finish sorting the Legos and hoping to spend some time doing that later.  Had to stop last night as my back was killing me and I'm pretty sure that the skin on my fingers was going to start cracking and bleeding from the pulling apart of so many of the tiny plastic pieces and do not let me forget to get the stuff from the backyard... 

well fuck you too

System update incapacitated my phone for about 30 minutes and it was *all* bullshit.  I don't have the option of starting the update whenever it's convenient, I have to be "asked" by my phone... after awhile "remind me later" is a response my phone will no longer find acceptable. 
Once I'm informed that the update is complete...  my phone still doesn't work because the update is not complete - the download is.  It still needs to actually integrate the update into the system and *that* takes time that my phone kindly does not tell me it needs. 
So it appears to crash, screen goes dark, notifications start coming in...  but I cannot turn off the phone, restart the phone or even change the volume.

So I'm forced to listen to my phone chime and ding at me while I rage incoherently at it.

My lazy Sunday morning - killed in a fog of rage because I wanted to quickly check a text to make sure it wasn't something important.. 

Then Amazon had to send me *ANOTHER* Email asking me to update my payment information... because I forgot to update the card when the bank sent me a new one out of the blue because somewhere I used it had been compromised... but I FIXED THAT by going into my account and literally removing EVERY OTHER CARD that was there just a few minutes after placing the order.  The order I placed last week.  That I just now got an Email asking me to update payment info... which I did last week...  my head fucking exploded.

All of this is on top of the joy of listening to the chorus of my husband's fucking alarm and his god damned nose for a solid 20 minutes ON MY DAY TO SLEEP IN.  Do something about the sleep apnea before MY sleep deprivation causes problems...  oops.  Too late.  I don't understand.  I really don't fucking understand.  You know that you have sleep apnea and you sleep like absolute shit because of it...  your spouse is CONSTANTLY complaining about how your snoring - caused by your sleep apnea - is affecting her sleep in a very negative way...  but do you do anything about it?  Nope.  You just get quiet and act butt-hurt when she's pissed off because her sleep got fucked with...  AGAIN...  and you don't seem to give a fuck.  Take fucking pills to go to sleep.  Get dependent on them.  Have to DOUBLE YOUR FUCKING DOSE because you've been on them for so many years.  Pills make snoring worse.  Some good answers.  I thought I married an intelligent man.

To top it all off I've just informed the boy that if he fucking mentions the Nintendo Switch ONE MORE TIME he's not getting it for Christmas.  He won't stop.  Have we ordered it?  We'd better order it.  Has it been delivered?  We have to make sure the package doesn't get stolen.  When he opens it on Christmas NOTHING ELSE WILL MATTER and he's gonna set it up and play a level of a game before he opens the rest of his presents and on and on and on and on and I fucking made him cry.

I'm SICK OF IT.

Apparently I'm a ball of rage today.
I find it preferable to the ball of incredible sadness and misery I was for the last couple of days but I don't think anyone else will.

the problem with sunday

Sundays are hard.  They're hard because they're my only real day off...  I don't have to work, I don't have to take the boy to school, I can sleep in and lay about the house...  but they're also the only day we're really together as a family, so it's the day for family outings and such...  but they're also the day that I feel is best to catch up on the stuff that I fell behind on during the work week...  but then...  I just want to do nothing all day and fuck it all.

So the coffee cup is empty and the joint is gone and I'm struggling with what to do with myself.
I can sit here and waste time for hours, I've proven my skills.

The thing is...  no matter what choice I make today...  I'll feel as though I wasted the day.  Sunday is about finding balance.  Doing just enough of each thing that I wish to accomplish to feel that I've had a productive day...  yet not feel as though I wasted my opportunity for a lazy day.

This probably means that yard work is better done on Tuesday.

So far I've managed to balance today fairly well but I'm starting to get anxious about getting things done and am finding it difficult to do nothing.

Damn first world problems and shit.

depression fucking sucks

I read a lot of bullshit on the internet.
I don't know why.
It's entertaining but essentially useless.
Brides tell the how they were left at the alter.
Retail workers share their worst customers.
I eat this shit up and I know damn well that I'm doing it to avoid the things I should be doing...  in some cases I get so caught up in Ask Amy and Miss Manners clicking from page to page and cussing out ad after ad when I honestly just want to read my book.
So why don't I open the book?
It's right there.
Right next to me.
Instead I get pissed off about the people who can't seem to deal with a co-worker who won't stop drinking their beverages.  I get irritated at the guy whose fiance wants more time to plan their wedding and isn't willing to consider a short engagement...  when the dude's mom is fucking dieing.  Dump. Her. Now.
An hour goes by and I realize I haven't eaten dinner, I haven't done my chores and now I don't have time to read, or watch my shows, or work on any of the projects I have piling around me... mocking me.

I do this to avoid...  But why do I avoid the pleasure of reading for a little before dinner?  Why do I skip dinner so I can do my chores?  Why do I go to bed hungry and unsatisfied because I never took the time to watch one of my shows...  even though when I got home from work I had plenty of time to get everything done...

can't focus on the thing

Although I love the extra time I get when I start work late I do not love getting home late.

There is so much.
So, so much.

I wish I had time to sit down and do this daily.
Motivation.
That's the big one.
Every morning I sit here with a million thoughts running through my head, seeking an outlet...  even if they're stupid, meaningless, random ramblings the thing is...
The thing is it's so much better for me to just let it all out.  To sit here and let it pour out so it's not cluttering up my mind.
My brain is like a stove.  A good eight burner stove top.  Every burner going at once.  Sometimes its so hard to keep the seven burners that aren't immediate from boiling.  If more than two start to roll a panic attack hits and then all bets are off.  I could be fine in a few minutes or it could take a couple hours and I spend the rest of the day shaky and jumpy.  The slightest thing could set off another panic attack and if there's more than one a day I don't want to know what will happen.
I usually have one on the way to work every Wednesday.
Should be fun.
The anxiety starts to ramp up...
But we won't discuss that.
Again...  so much.

I can't focus on any one thing because there are too many things.  When I do manage to focus on something I run out of time and the daily grind interferes and then who knows how long it will be for me to get back to the thing?
Pressing needs.
Pressing desires.
No time.  It's an hour of chores that stretches into two hours...  then it's time to fold all the laundry and give treats to the cats and three other things pop up and in the interest of not starting another huge list I take care of them just to find that it's time to fold more laundry and make dinner and I never got to the thing.

Making it a point to focus on certain things in my life is helping to get things done but my kitchen cabinets are out of fucking control and they're getting to the point where I don't know how much longer I can handle it.  But the curtains.  I need to focus on hemming and making and hanging the curtains.

No time.
If I could take the day off I would be able to focus on the curtains today.
I could get so much done because there's nothing else to do.
This is why I want to cut my days down to three...  to give me that day to focus on the thing.  Whatever the current thing may be.

post con lack of motivation

Honestly, conventions are exhausting.  If I still wore that dam FitBit it would have exploded.  Of course, all the driving I also did brought the fact that I need my wheel bearings checked to my attention.  I've had this problem before, it's no fun.  I drove that one until the wheel bearing gave out, that was...  and interesting drive.  Ever drive a car with a wobbly wheel?  I don't recommend it.  Scary.  So I'll get that dealt with in the next couple of weeks as it's still minor.  Of course, our mechanic retired and closed up shop so the joy of finding a new mechanic is overwhelming.  As a woman this experience can be extra super fun.

My work schedule is finally back to normal after three weeks of having to constantly remind myself what day of the week it was and which days I had to be at work.  It's a balm to my poor tired brain and coupled with the con exhaustion I'm finding it very hard to give a damn that there are three days worth of dishes in the sink, we're running out of clean underwear, and the fridge is empty.

I have a pretty long list for today...  almost an entire sheet of paper...  I had all the drive and motivation to do it last night, went to bed optimistic.  Went to bed with a game plan.

Overslept by ten minutes and once the boy was dropped off at school I promptly came home and did nothing.

I know damn well I'm using the excuse of the spousal unit's state of unconsciousness.
I'll get started when he gets up.
Besides, I'd like to run my errands first and I have no desire to back his car out of the driveway to unearth my own.

Let me finish this joint and I'll get my ass in gear...  or something.

who needs sleep

Confusion and forgetfulness.  Kinda awful.
I know there's depression and anxiety in there and to add the hormonal bullshit of dealing with the perimenopause is taking its toll on me.
Did I mention sleep?  I need so much more of it.
I recognize that I need to make changes in my life for the betterment of my health but who doesn't?  Getting more sleep as I get older is apparently part of that but it's really hard.  Part of why I don't get enough sleep is because I treasure my quiet  time in the evenings and I'm incredibly selfish.  In the moment I'd rather have an hour to watch a show or read.  Of course the next morning I'm irritated and wish I could get another hour of sleep.
I keep telling myself to stop, to get the sleep, the books and shows will be there tomorrow.
But then I remember that by doing so I'm the one who is making changes to my lifestyle in order to accommodate someone else because...  in all honesty...  at least 2/3 of the time I'd get an extra 20-40 minutes of sleep every night if my husband would get his fucking CPAP for his sleep apnea and stop snoring loud enough to rattle the windows.
Or he would rattle the windows if we hadn't had them replaced last week.
That was a busy, crazy day but it's so nice having decent windows that open smoothly, lock reliably and cut out more noise from outside.
Windows aside...  He would sleep a lot better as well and I wouldn't have to listen to him constantly bitching about how he didn't sleep and he's so tired.
I want to punch him every time he says he's tired.

This entire week has been bullshit and there's no point in laying it all out.  Scheduling, dealing with humanity, traffic, parental drama...  it's a story and-a-half and not very interesting.

Having to get up before the sun rose was not a pleasant experience.
I work a half day today, day five of seven days where six of them I have to work and three of them are spent at a convention.  After work I'll come home, get cleaned up, and drive 40 miles to the Con.  No idea how long I'll be there, but I'll be back tomorrow and Sunday as well...
I'm unexcited about the Con and would rather spend this afternoon and tomorrow home alone in bed.
At least my schedule reverts to normal after this.
Three weeks of a weird schedule have screwed with me.  I lost September and can't keep the days of the week straight.

the horrible fucked up shitty ass no good week

This has been one hell of a week.
Wednesday I seriously considered calling in sick to work...  I had forgotten that one of my co-workers is on vacation this week so it wouldn't have worked anyway, but the whole reason I went in there was because I was expecting my cat's ashes back that day.  I'd been told a week before that he'd be brought in that day...  and he wasn't.  I was livid, and I was horrifically sad.  I cried for hours.  I made it through the day, including the last minute appointment that ensured I stayed until almost nine pm.  The appointment included blood, urine, x-rays, fluid administration and fine needle aspirate of multiple lumps.  We got all the results in today, conclusive.  Lymphoma.  He's dieing.  He's a great dog.  I'm sad.
Yesterday my friend died in my arms.  My canine friend.  Ten years old, Golden Retriever, cancer.  Fuck cancer.  His mom and dad stayed until he was sedated so I lay down next to him, wrapped my arms around him, put my head on his and told him how loved he was while he took his final breath.  I stayed with him a few moments after and cried.  I will miss him so much.
I was also inches away from a terrible collision moments after leaving work.  Someone thought making a right hand turn in front of me would be a good idea, luckily I had just enough room, when I swerved to avoid him, I got the car back into the right hand lane and regained control instantly.  Although for a split second I was afraid my car was gonna fall onto its side.
Today the window guys came in to get exact measurements so they can order the new windows we're finally getting.  I'm looking forward to not having to wipe the condensation off the windows every day this winter.  Hopefully we don't have a recurrence of the mold issue we had last winter.  That was horrific, but easily dealt with and only surface mold from the moisture collecting in the drapes and running down the wall to the tops of the baseboards behind the bed.  So nasty.  Anyway...  the window guys have informed us that we can't have the windows that I want, not my first choice, not my second choice, in any of the bedrooms.  Because?  Egress.  There's some law, whether it's city, county, state or whatever that says I need a certain square footage when the window is open in order to facilitate egress.  In other words: the window needs to be big enough for someone to get out of the house if there's a fire or other event.
So I'm not excited about the windows.
I don't fucking care anymore.
We need new windows, so we will get new windows.
It's like buying new scrubs for work, or school uniforms for the boy.
WoopDeeFuckingDoo.
I'm sad that I'm no longer excited about this thing I've wanted and waited for for a year-and-a-half.
I want my fucking cat.

I did get my new computer on Thursday, it's in a box under my bed.
I also got a raise on Wednesday, so that was pretty awesome.
Today I get the evening to myself after I put the boy to bed because the spousal unit is out.  Time to myself is precious during summer vacation - I am grateful for this.

However...  my plans of coming home from work tomorrow and spending the evening cleaning my desk and setting up my new computer and speaker system have been completely blown to hell because my mother-in-law wants to take us out to dinner at Sweet Tomatoes.
I wonder what fucking coupon she found.
I don't like her.  I don't want to spend any time with her and having to go out to dinner with her sounds like the perfect way to end this horrible fucked up week.
At least I spent less at the grocery store than I anticipated.  I buy a ham tomorrow and maybe I'll have enough money leftover to at least do one more fun thing with the boy before he starts school...  which reminds me.  I'll have to leave notes for my husband about school supplies and uniforms...

Tomorrow is another busy day and I'm not happy about it and I want this week to be over.  Over-time aside, I'm sick to death of being at work and I want to take a week off, send my family to Siberia and sit around the house with the cats doing whatever the fuck I want for seven days.

Never happen.

hypocrisy hurts my brain

Let us not speak of the things I do all day.
Let us instead speak of the things I do not do.

The spouse is starting to crack down on certain things the boy does that he does not approve of.  He seems to have a hard time understanding that the reason the boy sees these things as acceptable is because his father does them.  To tell him to go do something "else" and to "put away the screen" when you would rather be playing your phone game is incredibly hypocritical of you.  Yes, the spouse acknowledged that but how do I respond?  The boy has come to me many times because his desires to get up, to go out, to be active...  are thwarted by his father's desire to sit still, do stare at a screen, to be lazy...  yet the boy is scolded for being lazy.  When I am home with the boy we go out, we do things, we do not spend the entire day staring at screens...  yet this is the belief my husband has.

He does not notice what I do all day, unless I don't do it.
If I stop doing things for a week or so he starts to notice that the house is messy, he complains about having no clean socks or underwear, he bitches about the cat hair...  he has no idea that bare minimum one hour of my day is spent taking care of these things...  the cat hair, the dust, the laundry, the dishes...  I know he doesn't think dinner fucking cooks itself but the kitchen is not magical, the floors don't eat the hair and the couch doesn't shake itself off every couple of days like a wet dog.

He wants the boy to ride his bike, but the only one of us with a bike is me...  and that requires me to get out every day on my bike...  on my days off that's not a problem...  but the days I work?  The spouse is still sleeping when I leave for work and after my 45 minute commute he's still sleeping...  He's asleep when I clock in and by that point I've been up for three hours, have done most of the daily chores, gotten the boy to school/camp and prepped dinner for that evening.  After an eight hour shift I have an hour drive home through typically worse traffic than I encountered that morning and once I arrive I'm bombarded with neediness from four cats and two people who all want my opinion, my attention, me.  All I want to do is put my shit down and eat my dinner...  but that can take forever to get to, especially when my presence sends a subconscious signal to my husband that he can now relinquish the dinner responsibilities and leave me to time the sides and get everything out of the oven when the timer goes off.  ALL I WANT TO DO IS SIT DOWN AND TAKE OFF MY SHOES but by the time I've got the side going, my shit finally put away and have had a moment to go to the bathroom it's time to eat...  and as previously stated... the kitchen will not clean itself.  The solution is not to have the boy clean the kitchen, but to split the duty, to share the load, to not leave it on my shoulders every single night.  If I don't do the dishes there's a 90% chance that those dishes will still be in the sink when I wake up in the morning... and if I get mad about it...  I'm unreasonable and the bad guy.

So I'll sacrifice a little more of my free time to get the boy out of the house even more...  to make sure to do it when the spouse can see, to photograph it when it happens and slather the information all over social media so he's aware that the boy and I did not spend the entire day sitting around the house with our faces in our screens...  after all...  we wouldn't want to spend our days together the same way he spends his days with his dad.  That's not fun at all.

it's a lack of respect to be honest with you

I can't keep up.  I admit it loud and proud and that's why I only work four days a week.  I can't keep up with all of it otherwise.  Furthermore, unlike the rest of my co-workers, I have to have my days off consecutive or I completely lose my shit.  It would probably be different if I had some help around the house but despite making sure every single dish is washed I inevitably wake up to find a dirty dish or two or three in the sink...  Despite making sure we never run out of clothes and the fact that I keep up a steady run of laundry for two or three straight days every week my husband still has a pile of clothes on his nightstand that could potentially suffocate him should it fall.  It could be worse, but I started folding his clothes so they would stack better after an unfolded stack of clothes really did fall down...  but not on him...  no...  I could never be so lucky as to have him be the victim of the consequences of his inaction.

I'm tired of hearing "this hurts so bad" from him.
Like I'm walking around feeling great all the time.  I've dealt with chronic pain longer than he has...  but he seems to forget that.
I hate hearing about how fat he is.  He bitches constantly about it...  but rarely does anything about it...  and when he does he just bitches about how much it hurts.  He'll become the fat guy with chronic pain who can't do anything about his weight because of the pain.  Meanwhile I'm over here wishing I could feel normal for just ten fucking seconds and I'm skinny.  I'm active.  I'm strong.  I don't let it stop me.

I'm tired of him getting pissed off at the boy...  when he does the very things he tells the boy not to do.  Or doesn't do the things he tells the boy to do...  and then wonders why the boy thinks his father doesn't like him.

I'm tired of the lazy.  I come home from a long day at work and spend another hour doing things around the house before I sit down.  I'm on my feet all day long at work...  he comes home from his job where he sits, and he sits.  He sits and sits and sits and whines about being fat and bitches about how things don't get done and says he needs to stop wasting his weekends but stays up way too late, sleeps half the day away and then sits and sits and sits because sports and cell phone games are more important than anything else.  I work around him and get pissed off that he's sitting...  and he never gets up - motivated by my action to do something...  So I sit.  I sit and read and read and read until that's all I want to do because the fantasy world is so much more interesting than the fat and lazy spouse who bitches about being fat and lazy yet has a multitude of excuses for why he can't stop being fat and lazy.

too much too little

These last few days have been rough, interesting, stupid and...  there have been moments of fun.  I have tons I want to write about but of course I postponed actually writing until there wasn't enough time for me to actually write about anything meaningful.

We said goodbye to Number 3 three days ago and my heart is still breaking.  We still start crying randomly, the other four cats are all off kilter and things are just not right around here.  I'll start healing when I get his cremains back in five days.  Fifteen years with that cat.  I miss him so much, there's a huge hole...

The spouse infuriated me with the "it's okay when you do it but not when I do it" line - again.  He has no idea how hypocritical it is.  Especially when he uses it when I'm in the middle of telling him why it's different, or that it's really not the same thing at all.  He doesn't listen to me, so I don't know why I try.  Last night I learned that the only way to avoid issues when we're out walking somewhere is to let him get super far ahead of me, don't complain or even comment on it and just let it happen.  I can't keep up and if I pull ahead because I see a good way through the crowd he -for some unknown reason- will not follow me at all.  I've proven that I can break through crowds better than he can, but he has to lead the way or I leave him behind and he gets pissed off and sulks.  However, if I get pissed off and sulk I'm being unreasonable.  Lesson learned.  Got it.  No problem.  I'll struggle and flail through crowds in a mad attempt to keep up with you and be super fucking happy about the fact that you pull so far ahead you can't see me, can't hear me and have no idea where I am.  Never mind that I never get more than 10 feet ahead of you and am fully aware of where you are at all times - you have to be in front.

I'm exhausted but that's not new.
The house is a total wreck and I'm struggling to care.
It's totally time to go and I can't even remember the other things I wanted to mention.

random thoughts of cats and things

On Sunday the spousal unit took the boy to his monthly LARP.  It had been awhile since they'd gone, it's one of the few social things the boy willingly does and I'm glad he had his interest re-sparked when he participated in a huge LARP at the last convention.  On Sunday they learned that this week there was a week-long camp.  So the boy signed up.  Yesterday I had my first real day alone since summer vacation started.  I cleaned the house, did most of the laundry and a friend came over for dinner to hang out and spend some time with our oldest cat.  Number Three will be crossing the Rainbow Bridge in a few days.  His osteoarthritis has resulted in fractures in both hind legs.  Degenerative Joint Disease means these bones are simply disintegrating, becoming weaker and weaker.  These fractures will never heal, and eventually he will snap a bone instead of simply cracking it.  Once I confirmed the second break, with two doctors examining Number Three, I determined that when his food was gone I would schedule his euthanasia.  Well, he's almost out of food.  It's Tuesday...  I'm figuring Sunday or Monday.  Number Three is fifteen-years-old.  I've had him since he was 5 weeks old...  he's been in my life longer than I've known my husband.  My heart is breaking, but he's been living in this pain for over two years.  I can't run the risk of him truly snapping a limb, not when I can prevent him having to experience that.  My heart is breaking.

Today I have a whole list of things to do.  Rather reasonable list and something I can easily accomplish within a couple of hours or so.  I should really get up and get to work but my motivation has gone off with the boys.  I managed a pancake for the Spawn, made sure he had everything he needs for the day and kissed them before waving forlornly as they pulled out of the driveway.  As much as I cherish my time alone I get lonely and start to miss the boy.  Over the holiday they were both home, we had things going on, the boy spent Tuesday with his grandmother and I didn't see him again until late Wednesday, then had early mornings on Thursday and Friday - was exhausted and barely spent time with him either day - Saturday we hung out a bit but Sunday he was gone all day, yesterday he was gone all day... gone all day today and tomorrow I'm back at work.

It's weird how much I miss him when we're not together.  I dread the increase in time apart as he gets older.  I wonder if it will hurt less or if I'll just get used to it?

I hate the fourth of july

Confession...  I hate the Fourth of July.
It's not the holiday itself, or what it stands for...  I have no problems with the fact that my country gained their independence from England and consider myself to be patriotic.  It's the fact that every single Fourth I get sidelined and forced to do things I don't want to do-and don't consider fun-because it's what my in-laws want to do.

I straight told my husband that I didn't want to do any of it, that I was upset that it had worked out in such a way that I had to do all of it and really wish that my feelings had been taken into consideration.  I did my best, had a few moments of fun, was not regretful when it was said and done...  but this morning I'm sitting here looking at the week I have ahead of me...  and after the last three days of   "I'm gonna do the- Never mind..." because no one else seemed to care about what I was doing, what I had to do, or what I had done...  so I'm looking at the week I have ahead and the few things that I have planned out or that I desire to do...  and I'm wondering how much of it is going to get fucked up in an effort to placate his mother, will get fucked up because he won't look at the calendar, or will get fucked up because nobody cared that I wanted to be included and went off without me.

I'm so tired of feeling ignored and sidelined in my own life...  while everyone sits around and calls me selfish because I want to spend my free time alone.  When I attempt to talk about it people tell me that it's part of having a family and part of being a parent...  but my child does not sideline me, he's often the only one who cares enough to find out what's wrong or to pull me into something and help me have fun.  Having a family does not mean bending over backwards to make your mother-in-law happy at the expense of your own sanity.

But it's go crazy trying to satisfy her every whim, or she makes my husband feel horrible because I don't want to do something, tells people that I'm not there because I hate her (not because I'm working, tired after working, or simply don't enjoy the event) and before I know it I'm inches from divorce and have to spend the next two years explaining to people that the time in question I had to work odd hours, or had a health issue that prevented me from attending the events.  I've had to do this.

So it's pick your battles...  last night I was putting on my shoes, I pulled my pants up over my knees, pulled my sock to my knee, pulled on the shoe and was proceeding to lace it.  My mother in law stared at my leg as though there were something horrific about it and asked me what was on my leg.  I told her, "My pants, my sock and my shoe."  She continued to stare, the look turning to one of horrified disgust, the look on her fact was deeply and incredibly insulting and she continued to ask me what was on my leg...  three or four times she asked, "What's on your leg?" and each time I (or my mother) told her, "Nothing - my sock, my shoe, my pants."  I got pissed and snapped at her.  She got pissed because we weren't answering her question.  She wasn't specifying color, location, she wasn't telling us what she was seeing and just kept asking me what was on my leg while staring at it like the flesh was melting from my bones.

My husband got mad at me because I snapped at his mother.
He paid no attention to the entire ordeal until he heard my tone change.
My mother had to jump to my defense while I walked out of the house.
It was fucking ridiculous.
All because my mother in law couldn't specify, "What is the white thing on your leg?"  or understand that when I said, "Nothing is on my leg except my sock, my shoe and my pants."  that the white thing she saw might be a fucking sock.

This kind of shit happens all the time and I'm always the one at fault and I'm always the one who gets scolded or bitched at for being mean.

FML

I hate the fourth of july

I hate the Fourth of July.  I said it.  I hate it.  This Red-blooded American Girl who is 6-7 generations born (depending on which branch of the tree you decide to follow) absolutely loathes Independence Day.  It's quite obviously not what it stands for that elicits such a visceral feeling...  instead, it's the way I get treated and the bullshit nonsense we have to do as a family and the ego and the snot freezing boredom.

The in-laws never make up their mind until the last minute.
My mother is never included and doesn't make plans or accept invitations because she's waiting to hear from us...  but she never contacts, never bugs, never gets insistent because that one year she did it all went really sour...  because my in-laws bitched, made up their mind last minute, my mom was stuck with all the work, nobody told her when they were coming over and the whole thing was just a fucking nightmare.

This year I made an effort and was immediately shot down with attitude.
My husband didn't realize there was no child care for the entire week and texted her about taking our son for one of the three days we need help...  and she said she would but was incredibly bitchy about it.

Did she contact me?  No.
It's still all my fucking fault that the in-laws have AGAIN waited until the last minute.
This is how it is every single year.
So next April I'm going to start planning a Fourth of July BBQ and I'm going to create an Event on Facebook, send out a fucking Evite and just make a big god damned deal about it.  I will plan the whole thing myself a good 8-10 weeks in advance so nobody will have any excuse to not go and I won't have to go to some fucking block party where I don't know anybody and attempt small talk for hours with people I have absolutely nothing in common with.

I'm absolutely fuming about the whole thing.
The subtle passive aggressive bullshit from this woman is killing me.
I want to send her a scathing text apologizing to her for my asshole in-laws and finish it up with a simple, "I can't believe I'm apologizing for them, when you'll never acknowledge that you too were at fault when you didn't contact me or ask me about the Fourth anymore than I did you.  Instead, I get to shoulder all the fucking blame for something we both did."

It's not like we don't know this is going to happen.
It's not like it's fucking new or anything.
I have to go do whatever they want because I so frequently don't, and also because I haven't done any of the family hang out shit the last couple of weeks because it's all been stuff I don't like to do or has happened when I've been at work.
I'm really not looking forward to Tuesday...  or Wednesday morning when I drop the boy off with her for the day...
In fact, I'd like this week to be over already, can it be next weekend already?
Assholes.
Every single one of them.

lazy asshole

The inability to pay attention.
The fact that plans are made involving me and I'm not told...  or no plans are made and at the last minute it becomes my problem...  but control over the last two vacations because the fucking hotel that I reserved in February had no hot water for two nights (like that's my fucking fault) and the last two trips were not without their problems... and those problems were 90% due to things he didn't think of, his not paying attention, his male ego.

He probably shouldn't have married a woman who presents as genderqueer.
A "manly" woman.
A woman whose personality and thought process is so evenly split 50/50 that she's often mistaken for being homosexual, bisexual or transgender.

I was deeply offended when he told a mutual friend that "neither of us have any experience" with "handy-work" despite the things I've done over the years that he's either seen first hand or heard about from myself and others.

He takes it upon himself to jump into projects and gets all gung ho and then wastes half the day sleeping, plays games on his phone another four hours, then frantically runs to the hardware store...  He either forgets things while he's there or doesn't make sure that he has all the necessary tools and supplies while making his list and inevitably makes an assumption that we have something when we do not.  After a minimum of two trips to the hardware store it's always too late to do the thing so he sits back down with his games and that's the end of it...  until he sleeps through half of tomorrow, plays his games another three or four hours, then jumps up like the couch is on fire to get to work on something that he'll spend more time preparing and gathering together the items for than he'll actually spend doing the work itself.

Then I have to be so proud of the manly home-owner who spent two days and 8 hours patching one coffee can sized spot on the wall and reassure him that yes, he did a fine job...  but not that it will require re-texturing because he doesn't know what the fuck he's doing and won't just relax and let me do it.

It's totally possible to patch a wall and match your texture at the same time...  Instead he has to go back, sand them all down and before I paint I will have to re-texture...  which doesn't save me any time in the process at all.  None.

I swear.  I'm gonna snap.

whole day screwed up

I got a new computer mouse so I literally have no excuse for not getting done the things I need to get done on the computer...  which is making sure I have backups of everything I need backups of and deleting all the unnecessary shit that has cluttered up on this thing along with frequent disk clean ups which will all culminate in a defrag which will hopefully give this thing a few more months.  It's a slow death... and I have no idea how long we'll be on hospice.  Summer will be rough.
I also have the flash drives I require in order to accomplish this task to my satisfaction.
So I'm sitting here working on it and doing the whole music thing and I'm going insane because I really wanted to be outside today but the spousal unit has hired the damn gardener to come and remove the weeds from the backyard.
But he bought a weed whacker yesterday because he wanted to do it himself.
I'm so confused.
There's something incredibly sad about deleting pictures off my phone.  I've got them backed up, it's cool...  it's just...  weird.
I'm anticipating a new phone for Mother's Day and if I don't get it I might be a little sad.
I'm really pissed off that everything I wanted to do today got fucked up because of the spousal unit's schedule or inattention.
Admittedly I made plans without making myself aware of his meeting because I didn't check the schedule...  but he didn't check with me before hiring the gardener to come today or making plans with a visiting friend for the night.  I'm not in a position where I have to half flake on someone, can't do what I wanted to do, and have to be home early to put the kid to bed because it's a school night.
But he'll be out having fun and staying up late, which means he'll sleep in super late, which means that tomorrow I'll probably spend a couple of hours sitting around the house waiting for him to wake the fuck up so I can get on with my day... and I'm loathe to wake him because of his insomnia issues... although I did wake him up this morning so maybe I won't be so shy tomorrow.
Regardless.  I'd better get this cat off my lap and get a few more things done.  I may be miffed at my inability to do what I wanted to do but it's not keeping me from being productive!

Too many thoughts

I'm literally at a loss for what to do.
I so seriously want to finish watching Stargate SG1 that it's burning my brain.  I want to be done with the series.  I'm halfway through the penultimate season and I just have to finish it.  So I could sit down and do that.
Then there's the epic ongoing neverending music project that I could do in conjunction with removing the photos off my soon to be replaced phone and that's doubly productive and enjoyable.
Then there's the simple fact that I don't know if I've done my reading for the day... I'm literally four pages behind... so I could also read.
I feel that no matter which choice I make I'm making a good choice and I should follow my bliss.
But I'm sitting here wondering how I'm going to get through the next 13 days without any liquid income.  I literally have no money to spend and still need to buy chicken and a ham.  When I run out of cigarettes or weed, that's it.  I'm out until I get paid.
I'm going slightly insane with the weird bookeeping that has occurred in my checking account.  If I don't balance that shit to the penny at the end of every single day that I make any purchases I get myself fucked up after a month or two.  It should be part of my morning routine.
This should be pretty easy to remember as I have to keep an eye out for that check I wrote to the damn school for the field trip...  it always takes them forever to deposit checks and it annoys me sooo much...  but having to spend virtually nothing for the next two weeks will keep it easy and me honest...  of course I'm cat sitting for an epic period of time while I'm broke so I'll get a rush of cash shortly after getting paid... which will be nice.  I'll feel flush for a couple of weeks.  Then I'll be broke again after the first of the month... and the convention... my sanity is questionable and I'm almost consistently high.
I'm going to go watch Stargate.

May begins

Sometimes, at the end of the day I'm left completely exhausted and yet wondering what on earth I did all day to warrant being so tired.  I've organized photos, lifted them all off the computer and saved them to a flashdrive.  I've begun the process of retrieving photos from my phone - a tedious and extremely time consuming task that will also result in further progress being made on my playlists.  So it's a win-win, but it's tedious and time consuming.  I've eventually got to get these pictures all developed and into photo albums because I'm old school like that.  Of course, I have nowhere to put the photo albums until I get the bookshelf from my mom's...  this is a conundrum that has me willing to rent a car to get it done.

I've made progress in the yard.  I dug a hole and am filling it with rocks...  it's right where the rain gutter drains and it made sense to do something there so I don't put a plant there and watch it drown.  When all is said and done and things have grown in a bit it'll look just fine.  Next step is to finish clearing the area behind the garage and to grab some ice plant bits from the area between the clinic and our neighbor.  Hopefully I can get enough of it to take that it fills in and works around the lava rocks, creating something at least mildly attractive in that otherwise dead space.

We have to get a weed whacker and then we have to rent a rototiller.
My husband is going to kill himself with this task...  but once that's done I've got a few ideas percolating which include building and installing a gate, putting in a brick lined, raised bed along the back of the house for herbs.  I've got chives and rosemary currently...  I've also got ideas for the other fence line as a place to put more succulents.  But the ones that aren't in ground are in pot and doing all right, I've got some babies cooking and a powerful need for a couple of new varieties...  but we'll see what happens over the next few weeks while I clear the area in front that's the next place for planting...  I've also got mad plans to get started on painting the kitchen.  I've chosen the blue and I've chosen the white so I think it's time to tackle the laundry room...

Dear gods its been hot and I can't take it.  Hopefully we're able to get new windows - those will help immensely in the winter.  If the bathroom doesn't get really awful we might be able to get an air conditioner next year and put off the bathroom remodel until 2019.   Oh that would be so nice...  to only have one more stifling summer...  but time will tell and we'll see and first things first we've got to take care of the credit card bills and get these fucking vacations and this gods forsaken convention done and over with.

Happy fucking May...  I have the extreme pleasure of going to work tomorrow...

Spiral depression

Uber productive yesterday, but even further behind on my reading.   When all I wanted to do was sit down and play a stupid game while consuming an entire box of crackers...  I sat down and watched my team lose, and worked on a craft project I desperately need to finish.  I made actual, real progress.  I slept well, I woke up well, my kid was a subtle shit and I called him on it...  I called him on the whole "Not doing chores" as well, informing him that he earned no allowance last week because he didn't do shit.
If you don't work you don't get paid.  Fact of life.
He's at daycare, we parted on a good note and I'm smoking a joint before work.
Responsible adult.

Speaking of work...
Lets just not.

Plans for the day consist of not sinking any deeper into this morass than I already have.
I spend four days at work getting more and more depressed with each moment that I'm there.  The evenings I can at least peek my head above the swamp and relax...  but then I wake up in the morning and the realization that I have to go to that place just drags me down.  Being there weighs me down.  Leaving there and I start to lighten up but I'm not able to pull myself completely out of it before I'm waking up the next morning starting the whole cycle over again.  The weekends-three days though they may be-are not long enough to fully pull myself out of the slump.  I know the solution is to find a new job and that is on the huge and incredibly long list of shit to do...  but it's there, and it will happen.  In the meantime I have all these responsibilities around the house and all these things that need to be done, that should be done, that have been half done for so long that actually finishing them may signify the end times...  and that weighs on me...  I need to quit my job and take a month off work...  but then there's no guarantee that I'll find something in a timely fashion...  and there's no guarantee that I won't have to spend the bulk of my time off looking for something.  Then I think about cutting my hours, and then I think about how hard it is to stretch that paycheck as it is...  and then I think about all the ways I waste money and how I could improve and then I get depressed and I overspend with "retail therapy" because that makes me feel better for a minute.

I know what I need to do.
I need to resist the dragon and not spend my money on frivolous crap because it makes me feel better.  I need to use that money to buy the things I need in order to do the things I need to do.  I need to work on the things that need to be done, because there is plenty that can be done without spending any money and I can let money build up.
I need to quit smoking cigarettes because I spend a fucking fortune on those.  If I quit smoking I'll have more money for groceries, if I have more money for groceries I'll be happier all the way around.  This is all easier said than done.

I'm a creature of habit - aren't we all?  The normalcy of my schedule is constantly being fucked with due to vacations and this "something happening every month from February through June" is really starting to get on my nerves.  I'm barely recovered from Disneyland when the spouse is absent for 2 weeks, now I'm starting to get back into the swing of things and next week we're leaving for 5 days...  again.  I'll barely recover from that before the convention starts and I'm driving all over the place, late nights, barely home, etc... etc...  and less than two weeks later I'll be on a damn plane to the other side of the country.

Once we return from that nonsense it will be the height of summer.  The house will be an oven and the in-laws will be in town demanding my time and criticizing my life.

I find myself already longing for fall...  which is something that usually doesn't happen until July.  I want all the trips behind me, the inlaws in Arizona where they belong and a steady schedule of spawn in school, everyone at work.  I want the spousal unit's insomnia issues cleared up so that he's up and out of the fucking house earlier every morning so I can maximize my time.

My dreams for August.
In the meantime, I want to call in sick to work and spend the day puttering around in the yard...  but it's fucking raining, and it's going to rain all day.  So I guess I'll go to work...  although it's probably going to be dead, and even though this means I can catch up on my reading it also means that I will be pissed due to the fact that I'm there when I have things I could be doing here at home...

Like sitting around playing stupid video games and eating that box of crackers...

overwhelming and depressive circle...

Got a lot of work done in the yard a couple of days ago.  Despite wanting to do more yesterday I decided to spend the day cleaning the house instead...  it needed to get done and I figured I'd get back outside today...  But there is water coming from the sky.  In my defense I checked the weather about four days ago before making plans for my weekend.  It was not supposed to rain today when I last checked...  but the fact is...  I'm going to have to be more diligent in checking the weather on my days off over the next couple of months.  Fucked up California "spring" means I could be outside sweating in the sun on Monday and wind up sequestered indoors with a hoody and fluffy blankets on Tuesday.

To be perfectly honest with you this gives me the opportunity to get to work on other things that desperately need to get done.  I'm overwhelmed by the sheer amount of things that I need to accomplish...  to the point where I want to cut my hours and have an extra day every week to deal with them.  I feel that without that extra day there's no point working on anything...  even the things I could easily finish over the course of a couple of baseball games, or a solid afternoon of focusing on them.

I literally have a "craft list" of things that need to get taken care of...  projects I began before my son was born that only need a good 8-12 hours of work put into them....  mind you...  the spawn is ten.  Half done things, things saved with intention...  things I've saved for when I get to a certain point in the house I can use them...  and yet I've done nothing.

Part of it is not knowing where to start, but I have a lists.  But then I think about the first thing and how nice it will be to cross that off the list, but the list is so long it overwhelms me and I just sit down and play Animal Crossing.  Or I realize that although this is the perfect time to get to work on something...  I'm so far behind on my reading I should just sit and do that for an hour.  Or I lay down on the couch and pass out....  or I get lost in Facebook for a few hours...  or I get high and get caught up in the daily minutia.  Even when all the things that need to be done on the daily to keep this family and our lives rolling forward are finished for the day I don't sit down and focus on something.  I don't roll out the poster I've been coloring for 20 years, I don't pick up the needlepoint I've been working on for 2 years, I just play Animal Crossing or go to bed early  to avoid it all...  When I have a day...  like today...  where nothing is planned or the plans fall through...  and I'm sitting here wasting my time and wanting to talk about how overwhelmed I am and how frustrated and depressed I am and all I'm really doing is wasting time so that when I finally do get up and get the chores done, and get the errands run...  I won't have the time to sit down and do anything productive, or actually cross anything off the list...

I'll postpone and postpone and get more and more depressed about it.  I'll make myself momentarily content by taking an entire day to break down a room and scrub it from floor to ceiling but then nothing is actually taken care of, completed...  it's just moved, re-packaged, added to a different list...

So I spend all this time beating myself up about all this undone shit.  Every opportunity I have to do even a small thing to check off a list or get myself closer to being willing to tackle the bigger stuff... and I don't do it.  I fuck around.  I go have a cigarette, I stare at a wall, I bug the shit out of my family, I kill time...

I know that if I just do the things I'll feel better.
I'll feel better if I do the things.
It's that fucking simple.
But I've even sat down to do the things, had the things arranged and was ready to go and then I just picked up the 3ds and pushed the things to the side, or got distracted by the dirty dishes, or the need to clean out the fridge, or watched a video with the spawn, or whatever and then...  there was no more time to do the thing so I put the thing away.

I know I'm not the only person who does this.
I know I'm behind on my reading, but during the baseball game this afternoon I'm determined to work on one of the things...  if I focus I might even finish it...  which would be amazeballs.

too much i can't keep up when i'm depressed

Depression is great.  When it's caused by your job it's even better.
Put May on the wall calendar... Starting to stress out about the fact that I have nothing to wear to this wedding we're going to and we leave in two weeks.
But nobody will leave me the fuck alone about the trip in June.
I still have to contact the pet sitter for our trip this month.  Which is April.
If the yard is mentioned to me one more time I'm going to cry.  I don't know how many times I can make my plans and opinions known to someone who hasn't lifted a finger save to call the gardeners...  I'm also getting incredibly frustrated with this constant bringing up of things I've told him are on my list.  I can't do all the things at once, and I can't do things when he gets the random bug up his ass...  I've told him I have other, smaller, things that I want to take care of before I tackle a big project.  I've also informed him that I'm not in any hurry.  After a year he's suddenly in a huge rush to get things done...  well...  maybe he should focus on his garage/man cave then, because whatever he does out there won't piss me off or get in my way...  furthermore...  he has so much going on right now and hasn't even done the taxes so the fact that he's flipping out about the yard right now is getting on my nerves.  If he starts something at this point in time - it will remain unfinished until I deal with it or after Memorial Day.  He is booked pretty solid until then and even once Memorial Day is passed we have this damn trip in June.  July his parents will be here eating up our free time while criticizing our lives and I know that part of him feels he has to have visible progress on things in order to keep them quiet, shut them up, make them happy...  I don't fucking care.  Thing is, we'll need to spend a Sunday painting or doing yardwork and they'll have a problem with it because they'll want to see us and spend time with us but they'll also freely, cruely, excessively criticize the weeds we're cultivating in the backyard.

I need to step up the search for a new job by getting my cover letter polished and sending out a few resumes.  If I half-assedly look for a job over the next month or so I can feel like I'm actually doing something, instead of waiting for the new job to come to me...  because although that has happened, it's not a very good way to deal with the current situation.

I am lazy.

Once the April trip is over I can step it up but...  if I'm not gainfully re-employed by Memorial Day I may have to quit anyway.  I'm killing myself and have too much sense of responsibility to quit when I need the money... so I can get things done around the house... so my husband will back the fuck off...  it's so frustrating to know that I'm the only one who has done anything for a year, and then we hit that magic mark and he suddenly cares, gets obsessive and starts doing things...  at least he's finally doing things, but why can't he take the project and finish it before he flips out and moves on to something else...  that's what I'll tell him to do when he finishes the taxes...  that he hasn't started and are due in 9 days...

Don't worry about anything else until you've patched all the spots the electrician cut out the drywall.  I'm tired of looking at these squares and screws.  Get to work.

So begins 2 weeks alone...

Today is the day the spousal unit leaves for two weeks.
I'm not sure how I feel about this.
On one hand I'm a bit excited about two weeks "to myself."
On the other hand I'm nervous about two weeks as a single parent.

But it will be over too soon, and I'll find myself wishing I'd spent the time differently and gotten more things done that are difficult to get done when everyone is home.

Work is not going well.
There's just too much to talk about there, too much to say...  but when the boss doesn't care that the Office Manager is creating a hostile work environment...  what are you gonna do?  When one has been told to "not complain about anything or anyone" how is anything going to be fixed?

The answer to both of those questions is "find a new job."  Once the spousal unit returns from his sojourn to the future I'll be stepping up the search and firing off my resume like I'm unemployed.  I've reserved the right to quit - on the spot - with our without a new job, if things get too bad.

That two hour long panic attack I had last week resulted in rumors about my having troubles at home.  No one has asked me, no one has confirmed this, the assumption is being made, someone started the rumor, and it's made its way around the clinic.  The best part?  The only reason I'm even aware of this heinous defamation is because the one person who has been forbidden to speak to me told me.

So many labor board violations it's not even funny.

The spawn and I have many plans for the two weeks that it will be just the two of us.  We'll camp out on the air mattress in the living room and watch movies before bed.  He's going to be very sick on Monday and unable to go to school.  We're going to the movies, out to dinner and even have the pleasure of attending a baseball game.  He'll get to spend time with two close family friends and both of my parents as well.

Today I have a list of things to do, and a small stack of other things to do on top of the list...  it's kind of sad when your list has be found by completing the stack of tasks first.  But it's honestly the only way I can make sure all the things get done.  Stack them on top of the list and dig for it.

All the fucking great things

You know what's fucking great?

I'll tell you.

Getting sick as fuck the day after you get home from vacation.
When your spouse doesn't care that you're sick... until you flat refuse to do a god damned thing and then they're only mad because they have to do dishes.
When your boss allows favoritism, sexism and who the fuck knows what else kill morale... and employees start leaving like fleas on a drowning rat.
When someone you used to respect commits a felony - on camera.
Coughing.
Coughing is fucking awesome.
Being sick for so long post vacation that you've been without weed for so long that all your joints are starting to non-function due to pain and the nerves are firing off at random times more and more frequently and more and more intensely every day and every attempt to medicate leaves you coughing and crying because you HURT TOO BADLY TO CURL INTO A FETAL POSITION.
Have I mentioned how fucking awesome coughing is?
Coughing is the BEST!!!
Waiting 2 weeks to get the food you're craving - that's fucking great.


So I've been great.
Just fucking great.
But I think I've almost beat this cold and although it was pretty grim for a couple days I never did lose my voice.  An over-abundance of caution and extra dose of FUCK THIS GOD DAMNED PAIN I SWEAR TO GOD AFTER 20 YEARS YOU'D THINK I'D BE USED TO THIS SHIT means I've not developed a URI or pneumonia so that's amazing.
I need to pluck my eyebrows, shave the AMAZING amount of hair off my upper lip...  or give in and to into public in drag - can I pass?  Can I pass?

The answer to that question is YES.  YES I CAN PASS WITHOUT EVEN REALLY TRYING AND IT FREAKS PEOPLE THE FUCK OUT.

Come to terms with it.
Genderqueer and here to stay but don't, oh dear gods don't tell my husband because he'll deny it and get offended and THEN HE'LL GET PISSED OFF!!!!  Oh what the fuck did I marry?

My ten year old spawn literally asked me today why I didn't divorce his dad?
I had to tell him that I do love the fucking asshole, but it's mostly financial.  I don't want to spend my life working my ass off... and that may be selfish but I enjoy spending time with my kid and have no desire to turn him into a latchkey, move hundreds of miles away from my entire family so I can afford to live... cause where we at right now it wouldn't happen and we'd be living in the car...  the car I wouldn't be able to pay insurance on so I couldn't drive and...  yes.  I do love my husband but sometimes I wonder myself...

WHY AM I HERE?

He ignored me while I was sick.
I asked for things and he never got them for me EVEN THOUGH I WAS SICK...

The best, or worst really depending on your point of view...  the best was that on Tuesday I asked for 2 things for the spawn's lunch.  I ASKED FOR TWO THINGS FOR OUR CHILD'S LUNCH.  Not for me, for our kid....  and he didn't get them.  He forgot.  He forgot even though he went to two other places after he came home.  He forgot even though he could have gone out and gotten them at any point...  he forgot on Wednesday too...  and Thursday he forgot and by Friday it was a fucking moot point because the spawn and I were making due and it was all good but the whole fucking point is that if you tell me to ask you for something when I need it...  and I ASK FOR SOMETHING FOR OUR CHILD and you fucking ignore me...  THEN WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK DUDE???  Saturday he asked if I still needed him to pick those things up... those things for the child's SCHOOL LUNCH THAT I ASKED FOR ON TUESDAY.

No.
No I didn't need them.
By this point I'd gotten paid, and would be going grocery shopping the next day.
So no.
I got them myself.
Thanks.
But no.

WHY AM I HERE?
I didn't want to have a kid.
I'm a parent.
I didn't want to get married.
I'm a spouse.
I didn't want to buy a house.
My name is on a fucking mortgage.

I'm living someone else's dream...
...and they wonder why I'm depressed.

habitually developing a spousal complaint issue

There's this annoying pattern I'm facing and I keep trying to break out of it...  but I never really seem to be able to.  Part of why I decided to create and make effort to maintain this blog is to help me break these habits that I don't want anymore...  accountability, tracking, etc...  also, sometimes articulating them makes them more real, increasing the reality makes beating them that much easier.  Personal demons and all that.

Every week I spend my days off getting done ALL THE THINGS and when I go back to work on Wednesday I have this great sense of accomplishment.  I'm going to keep up with all the things and do the minor daily maintenance so I don't fall behind.  When my days off come around I'll only have to worry about the housework and some laundry-instead of all the laundry.  I can spend some much needed time out in the yard and start getting the big things done, the little things that lead to the big things, I can pull this house together and start taking the images in my head and making them reality.

But then I spend the week getting further and further behind.  With the eight hour work day and the being gone 11 hours a day for three days and then 9 hours on another day.  The unhelpful husband who literally spends an entire day sitting around to the point of having a sore back...  despite the glaringly sedentary life he already leads and the constant lamentation about his weight gain and the difficulties he's facing in trying to get the weight off.

It's Monday morning and the spawn is at school and I'm sitting here with my second cup of coffee.  I've been up for 2 hours and have plans to get much accomplished today in the hopes that I can spend a significant portion of tomorrow working on (and perhaps hopefully finishing) one of the ongoing craft projects.

However I'm rather limited on how much I can accomplish before the spousal unit arises.  His alarm is set to go off in about nine minutes, but I'm sure he'll hit that snooze button repeatedly and wake up much closer to ten...  then bitch about how he needs to get up earlier.

He loves to give me advice on how to deal with emotional and hormonal things he has never experienced...  but when I try to give him advice on how to re-set his clock he blows me off.  It's more than willpower - I've worked weird hour shifts for years at a time.  I've had to re-set my clock three or four times (not counting college) and all the years we've been together he's had erratic sleep patterns...  and I keep trying to explain to him that focusing on better sleep habits may be a better answer to his insomnia than this addiction to anti-depressants...

But what the fuck do I know?\

That aside I've learned from experience that if I get up and start making noise, turn up the music and get to work cleaning he'll wake up sooner than ten because the noise won't let him sleep.

It's retribution for all the mornings I can't get back to sleep because of his snoring.  When you partially awaken to roll from one side to the other (four cats in bed-don't mess with them) it can be a bitch to slide back into deep sleep when your spouse is snoring right in your ear.

Enough bitching about the spouse, that could go on for hours and hours and hours but I love the son of a bitch so that's that.

The point I'm trying to make here is this:  I'm going to bust my ass today doing all the things, and tomorrow I will hopefully have adequate time to devote to the next big thing on the big list and perhaps even take care of the secondary project list which is 5-15 minute tasks.  I'd like to get these balls rolling... and not let them roll back down the hill every week when I go to work.

I've started doing the chores in the morning - but that really increases my morning crankiness.  I fucking hate it.  But I hate coming home after work, exhausted and hungry, just to spend another hour busting my ass before I can eat or even sit down.  I keep reminding myself of this - and it's making the morning tasks easier.  But I'm still not being consistent.

Laundry.  I try to get it all done before I go to work so I can time and do loads during the week without letting it all build up again.  But no.  Even if I do the laundry it just sits in the dryer until I need the dryer and then I have a backlog of shit to fold and people are running out of things because I'm not putting laundry away.  I know a lot of it is habit development...  and I'm working on it.

One of my biggest peeves is that the boys will take a lazy day...  and yet when I want a lazy day it's incredibly difficult unless my husband is occupied with friends or meetings.  He has his lazy Saturday and then wants to do things on Sunday...  spoiling my lazy day.  Sunday is literally the only day that I don't have to wake up at six, and that's only provided I don't have anything going on.  Superbowl parties, rounds at work, sometimes I get one Sunday a month - and I want to do NOTHING which he manages a couple times a fucking week...  but I can't.  I can barely take a nap that lasts longer than 45 minutes without being rudely awoken and then scolded for being pissed off about it.

I may use the vacuum this morning for more solid retribution.
Yesterday was fucking ridiculous.

spousal unit bitch fest

There are a lot of things I hate talking to my husband about.
Generalized statements, or examples cannot be used.
You have to be specific and you can not use absolutes.

If you say, "You never put your shoes away."  He looks at you, raises his eyebrow, and in an incredibly defensive tone says, "NEVER?"  You literally have to come to him with fucking numbers...  "Okay honey, in the last 58 days you have only put your shoes away twice...  so it appears as though we have a shoe putting away problem that I'd like to address"

He thinks he knows what I'm going to say, and therefore does not wholly listen to me.
He will interrupt me to ask someone else a question and carry on a mini-conversation while I'm talking...  and this is often done when I'm relaying important information or answering a question that he just asked.
Comparative analogy is completely lost on him.  It's like he doesn't have a BA in English... or write for a living.
He interrupts me - constantly - yet is deeply offended when I interrupt him...  even when he is taking an obscenely long pause in between his sentences.  I am not the only person who notices his long pauses, many of his friends have commented on them as well.  The problem I face is that he interrupted me and I'm going to forget what I wanted to say so as soon as I get an opening I shove it in there.  When he gets mad and says he wasn't done, I tell him I wasn't done either and he should have let me finish before he started...

Deeply apologetic.
Which would mean a whole lot more if the disrespect weren't constant and completely unnoticed.

You'd think, all these years together and all these times I've called him out that he'd at least be putting some effort in, or that he'd have made some improvement...  but nope.  Not at all.
I, however, am growing less and less tolerant of it every day...
...and somehow this is starting to be a problem.

So he's in a work meeting in the dining room...  even though he has an office in his man cave with a big fancy desk he bought that he never uses...  and because he has to talk loud and our house is small...  he may as well be here in the room with me.  Gods forbid I get those dishes done...  but yesterday he worked from home and when I came home from my late shift at work and stood there doing all the dishes he was super apologetic for not doing them...  and tonight, when I was pissed off about something he had the gall to ask me if there was anything he could do to help...  while I was standing in front of a sink full to the fucking brim with dirty dishes.

So yeah.
I'm just ready to have him not be in my presence for a couple of days while I work through the lovely perimenopausal PMDD symptoms and rampaging murderer and happy girl child.  But he wants to get "frisky" tonight...  like I'm a fucking puppy.

every morning

Every morning I spend time on social media and news sites.
Every morning for the last 9 days that time online has become all consuming.
I spend more time and energy keeping up with what's going on under the new administration than I spend doing things I enjoy.
Not that I don't enjoy killing trolls.  Because I really, really do.  I love killing trolls and am becoming exceptionally good at it.  I don't care if this makes me bad. I don't care what impression I'm making.  I see falsehoods and ignorance and I have to speak up.

I see this new administration creating within the American people something all the Obama haters could never accomplish.  Distrust of the government by the American people in record numbers.

Never, an all the history of our country has there been such high numbers of people who disapprove of the president.

What troubles me the most is the man's complete and utter inability to understand why he is disliked-despite the fact that it's right in front of his nose every time he picks up his phone and opens the Twitter app.

That alone is proof of his psychological instability.

I can see why some people would agree with some of his policies.
I can not see why so many people agree with so many of his policies.
Granted, their numbers are not large - and dwindle daily - but I still have a very hard time accepting that so many Americans are still unable to understand that he possesses qualities undesirable for the leader of a nation.

I do not understand why no one seems to care about what is going on in the South China Seas.

If he truly brings this country to war - people will die because he's a selfish pig.
Some of those people will gladly go to their deaths fighting for something they believe in because their eyes are half open or they're blinded by their love of an unattainable ideal built on a foundation of fear, racism, sexism and lies...

As a scholar of history with a working knowledge of politics and a logical mind

I'm absolutely fucking terrified.

thought I lost the computer

Thought my computer had completely died on me.  If anything it spurred me to get my ass in gear on the stuff I have sitting around waiting for me because...  one of the projects further down the road is to backup everything on the computer.

Yes, I'm bad about that.  Incredibly so.  But I'm a fucking work in progress and right now the only thing I want is a pint of ice cream.

It's been a long and exhausting day.  The house is clean, I pulled out the vacuum and cleaned all the floors.  The rugs are drying but I can't hang them outside because of the weather... rain and sun then more rain then the sun...  it's totally bi-polar.

On the whole topic of the computer it turns out I just need to uninstall Mozilla and move completely over to Google Chrome, which is fine, I've been in the process of that for awhile so it's not like it's a huge ass deal or anything.

Dinner is almost ready and my back is killing me.  The last load of laundry is in the washing machine and I've managed to complete everything on the list today.  I just need to brush my poor arthritic cat who can't bathe himself and I'm down to simple personal maintenance.  like that pint of ice cream.

I get one more day off before I go back to work...  and I honestly hope that this week doesn't feel like a waste of my time, like last week.  I hate going to work to sit on my ass and do nothing.  I know some people like getting paid to do nothing...  but I have better things to do and I'd rather be doing them.

But I've got a lot on the books for tomorrow, so I'm gonna pull that out and go over it before dinner...  maybe I can get one or two things done tonight...  maybe.

don't alienate the white woman

You are so beautiful, and you are so intelligent.
Twenty something of Latin and Scandinavian descent...
You've spent your entire life in the Southern United States...
You've come out as bisexual, and have even begun experimenting with your gender identity.
You worship old gods, some would call them dead.

You need to stop stomping all over cisgendered white women.
You have to.
You're killing your allies.

This fight is not for or about people of color, immigrants, or the LGBTQ community...  this fight is not for the disabled, it's not for the women...  it's not for the veterans or the poor or any other individual community.  This fight is for every single one of us.  Maybe it took more, maybe it took longer, maybe it took this final straw to break the collective backs of white women across the country because we're more accustomed to holding our tongues and holding these burdens?

Did you ever fucking stop to think about that?

No.

Look at the history of WHITE CISGENDER WOMEN in America and tell me we haven't been, and are not still being, oppressed.  We were oppressed before the slaves were brought here, we were oppressed on the fucking boats, before the existence of the Native Americans was even known.  We were oppressed before we came here...

You say don't compare the struggles of the Irish to the struggles of the African.
Read your history little girl.
Your white cisgender female friends aren't riding the coattails of their minority counterparts.  Every advancement in women's rights and equality in this country was not because of a woman of color or a woman of the LGBTQ community.

Read your history little girl and understand that the group longest oppressed in this great fucked up nation of ours is not you - it's us.  WOMEN. PERIOD.  No qualifiers.  Just the presence of a fucking uterus.

This goes back so far that any division within our ranks is despicable.
We are oppressed all over the world.
We were oppressed by our own men before the knowledge of other races existed.
We were lower than slaves, then the same as slaves, then perhaps slightly higher...  property?  Yes.
We are women.
That's all that matters.

and today we have a new president

I'm in a rather sad state at the moment, and I recognize the depression for what it is, I also recognize the reason.  It's not sorrow.  I'm afraid, but I'm not afraid for myself, I'm afraid for my country, the world, and just fucking people in general.  I'm not liking what I'm seeing.

I'm not comfortable being labeled as a liberal, although I've used the term to describe myself and have accepted the label for years.  Over the last four to six years I've felt a continued disconnect with liberals in general and the Democratic Party in particular and I know I'm not alone.

I'm re-educating, further educating and broadening my bandwidth.
I'll find the proper label at some point, probably Libertarian.  Probably.

I have a load of laundry in the basket waiting to be folded, a load in the dryer that needs to be folded and a load in the washer that need to be put in the dryer.
But all I can do is sit here.

It's honestly been rather difficult to even get things done for the last few days...  and I know I haven't come here and spilled anything recently, but that's not for lack of desire.

I had a doctor's appointment the day before yesterday that left me sorely disappointed and solidified my desire to find a new doctor.  I could have gone on and on about that...  but I found myself on social media killing time and writing incredibly long and detailed status updates that I never posted.. . things that should have been written here...  the reason I fucking created this thing.

I'm just falling back into old habits instead of holding true to my determination to get shit done and get shit under control and start making progress on fixing up this house and making it what I want it to be.

I think I've settled on a blue for the kitchen.

It's raining a lot.  It's beautiful but freeways are closing and roads are flooding and the mountain is falling.  There was lightening.

I know the reason for all of this is the election, the inauguration, the fear I have...

I also know that this too shall pass and we'll be all the stronger for it, but when?  When will it pass and when will we be stronger?

Life is too short to condemn ourselves to such...  hatred and bigotry.
The most unpopular president in American History.
A man whose popularity has actually declined since he was elected.
I cannot fathom where we will go from here...

But the laundry isn't going to fold itself.

the anger boils but it all boils down to one thing

I had such an epically fucked up day I can't even begin to describe it, I don't want to re-live it and laying out all the trivialities that made it so awful just makes me look like an asshole.
At least I'm not a stupid asshole.
But seriously.

If you have a dog that has been showing signs of pain for six days and you've already shelled out 10K on back surgery...  why do you wait until one hour before the vet closes to even call them?  Then you show up 15 minutes before they close and all you want is pain meds.

It's like the asshole who always shows up ten minutes before we close to buy food.  Dude...  we've closed the books and put up the chairs, half the lights are out and we're literally only here because we're getting paid to be and you never know when an emergency is going to call.  We're technically open...  but we're not big box.  We leave when we close so we do all the procedural stuff beforehand... and your last minute $40 bag of food just guarantees us an extra five minutes sitting here doing stuff we already did.

I have a lot of problems with the way people treat those in customer service.  As a result of this I usually go out of my way to make a sales person smile, feel useful or be useful.  If I don't need them, I'm honest, go back to the conversation you were having with your friend, if I need you-I'll get you-you're good.  If I'm the last minute person I ask, "Did you close your books?  If you did that's totally fine, I'll come back tomorrow!"  I get it.  I want to go home at the end of the day too.

Now don't get me started on the bullshit traffic I had to deal with on the way home.
Or the fact that I cannot gain weight and I'm frustrated because I'm uncomfortable in my own skin.
I just don't want to work anymore... because I'm done.
I love my job, my clients and my boss...  but days like today are so...  each one brings me one step closer to walking off the job...