Let's Talk About Sex

Um, so...

Yeah.

You know when people say things are better than sex and you are, like, "Whhhhaaaaatt?"

Like, um, NO SUSAN, your strawberry cream-cheese bites are not 'better than sex"

Or, NO HELEN, your "seekrit fambly resoppee" broccoli casserole is not better than sex.

Like, YO, ladies...if you are having a magical gustatory experience and you claim it is better than sex then you are CLEARLY not having the right kind of sex.

Just saying...

However.

I had an experience today that - while I can honestly say it is not better than sex-  it could seriously be a suitable replacement during these uncertain times when life is all topsy-turvy and men are trash.

That experience is stretching.

About a month ago, I was shown a video of 'stretch gyms', where you go lay on a table and let someone stretch you out and apply a set of straps and giant, vibrating massagers to your muscles.

They push and pull and contort you in some very interesting ways.

Looked interesting, and - in the most ambivalent way - both relaxing and stimulating.

I promptly forgot all about it.

Until last week.

I got an email that a local 'stretch place' was offering free consultations.

I signed up.

I got stretched today.

It was fucking glorious.

Like, massages are the shit, but have you ever been stretched?

My boy Cody did a medical assessment, discussed my fitness goals, and then...

MF went right to town on my muscles.

It was fucking glorious.

I left that place glowing like a candle.

COVID has put a serious damper on my sex life, and food and booze make me fat, so they are out as coping strategies.

45 minutes of having my limbs pulled and stretched and I am a new woman.

$400 a month to get this done 2X per week?

TAKE MY MONEY.

Look, if you need a slightly transcendental experience and you don't want to take drugs or have sex with random dudes off of Tinder, then I highly recommend you call "Stretch Zone" in Vancouver and get your stretch on.

Worth every penny.

I am totally giving up sex in favor of getting stretched.

Maybe not forever, but DEFINTIELY for the next 12 weeks.

I mean, starting on Friday.

Me after 12 weeks of glorious stretch!

Hit The Road, Jack

I decided I was going to spend all of the Full Moons in 2021 near a body of water.

I spent the January Full Moon day at Wintler Park.

I had planned on spending the February Full Moon at these totally dope cabins in Stevenson, but was struck with a brain-wave (mild stroke?) to take my sulky teen and the Terrible Twins – Harlow Grey and Weston James – to the beach.

Bad idea.

Westy J. had a major meltdown when he realized he was going to be away from his Mumma – AFTER I spent 20 minutes on the phone with NASA, wrangling his car seat into my vehicle.

We decided to leave him behind and hit the road for Newport to get some Vitamin Sea, check out the tidepools, and visit the Yaquina Lighthouse.

For most of the trip Harlow chattered away in her little magpie voice, frequently entreating me to “Wook, Mimi! Wook at that!!”.

Lexi was continuously hollering at her that Mimi was too busy driving to ‘wook’, and to be quiet, to which Harlow either threatened to call the cops on her, or shoot her dead. 

 

We got to Newport, hit the beach, flew kites, drew things in the sand and watched the waves erase them.

It was gorge.

Roo and Hoho flying a kite.

 

We got to our hotel, got pizza, and then watched the sun set.

<3

It was gorge.

 

I woke up at 4am, convinced there was an offshore earthquake and that a tsunami was imminent.

Cursing myself for parking in the underground garage, I noticed the gorgeous full moon sailing over the sea, illuminating the black waves with a slick of white light.

It was gorge.

swoon

 

We got up early, I ate my trash protein bar and drank my Emergen-C while the girls feasted on donuts, fruit, and hot chocolate.

Breakfast of champions.  :(

We checked out the tide pools while Lexi harangued me about what time we were getting home so she could get online with her gamer friends.

We got to the lighthouse and Harlow immediately threw a tantrum and demanded to be taken home, an idea Lexi fully endorsed.

I threw in the towel and we headed home, never mind my plans to spend the day relaxing in the sunshine on the beach.

I could have stayed right here the entire day.

The girls demanded McDonalds for lunch, where I got front-ended in the drive-thru by a thoroughly unrepentant driver who failed to check his rearview mirror before slamming his car into reverse and slamming into my front bumper.

No damage, but the driver – who looked and sounded exactly like the dude who owned Anakin and his mom in the Phantom Menace – tried to tell me it was my fault because my white vehicle reflected the sun into his eyes.

 

We finally made it to the Heath Residence, at which point Harlow and Lexi got into a brawl over Harlow trying to keep one of Lexi’s toys; one that Lexi was unwilling to part with.

 

Leaving a screaming toddler, her whining brother behind and getting home to a shit ton of bags that needed to be unpacked, a vehicle that smelled like grease and was full of the detritus of an abortive trip to the coast (sand, McDonalds trash, fruit snack and chip wrappers), I decided that my March Full Moon trip to Stevenson is going to be entirely child-free.

 

I cannot wait.

You've Got A Friend In Me

 

One of my favorite humans had a birthday this weekend.

My Anna-Boo.

I missed her birthday because of a family beach trip ( more on that later), but I love her just the same.

We have been friends for 19 years and I decided to open this year’s “500 WAD” by celebrating her.

My last blog post was about losing a dear friend and how it hurt me.

I have lost a lot of friends in the last twelve months and some hurt, but some were such a relief.

How I lost those friends was recognizing that time had passed and the person I saw as a friend was not who they are today.

Like, I slapped a coat of concrete on who you were and tried to carry that "you" with me.

But you aren’t that person anymore, and I don’t like who you are now.

It has happened several times in the last 12 months...

So I wondered, is that me and my Anna-banana?

NOPE.

I love her.

As soon as Australia lets trash Americans in, I am sleeping on her couch – hopefully without Huntsmans, because they show up every day.

Time has passed, our children have grown, but the love I have for my girl is unending,

I was in the room when her youngest child was born, cringing on the floor so the mirror the Dr held up to show her Nick did not show me her rude bits.

I was in the airport with her as she left me, hugging her kids and saying goodbye, but I would be there soon.

I am here now, loving my girl…worried that I cant tell her enough how much I love her or how much her friendship means to me.

We have had the best times… RITA, clubs where I licked her face for cameras, watching American Idol and eating the best food.

We have had the worst times.  She has lost so many people and I have tried to be there and support her through CAMBO and Andrea and everything else.

Some friendships end because we grow and move on and become different people.

Some friendships end because this is life and this is just how things go.

Some friendships never end because this person is your person and you will never let them go.

You will always love them and be there for them and NEVER EVER let them go.

I love you, Anna-Boo.

You are the most beautiful, gorgeous, courageous, best-bicep-having, loving human I have ever known.

I am sorry I missed marking your birthday on social media, but I know you don’t care about things like that.

I am sorry I haven’t dragged Samantha down to Oz, but COVID effed that up and it’s not my fault.

Here is what I know about you:

You are strong, smart, gorgeous, able, and caring.

Here is what I know about me:

I am grateful, lucky, and so SO blessed to have you, my Anna-Boo, in my life,

 

PS – I kinda get the feeling we should be BFFs forever….or something like that.

Also, RYAN GOSLING!!!

So Hard To Say Goodbye

 So, I'm not doing graphics or Jason Momoa or Ryan Gosling. 

I'm too sad.

Look, I know the last 4 years have been the most divisive years ever. 

I just didn't know i would have to lose a friend.

If you read my shit posts regularly,  you know my friends are EVERYTHING to me.  

Life is so fucking short and if you find your humans, YOU EMBRACE THAT SHIT FOREVER AND YOU TELL THEM EVERY DAY.

My Matty C was one of my favorite humans in high school. 

He was so sweet and  funny and heartfelt.  

I loved him. He made my days so bright. 

FFWD to 2012 and he is all about my anti Obama posts , he laughs and talks shit with me

FFWD to today and he is the worst, most terribly misogynistic person in my inner circle. 

How do you cut someone  loose when you remember how happy you were to see them every day?

How do you cut the cord when the cord ties you to the person you tried to be every day?

I fucking loved this kid. 

But I hate the way his mind works today.

So...now I say goodbye to my favorite kid ever. 

Do I do it because he is a Republican?

Nope.

Do I do it because he is a QCumber?

Nope.

I still loved him through all of that because he was my buddy and we had been through too much to let that be barriers. 

Tonight,  with his vicious,  misogynistic  rhetoric, he crossed a line we can never get back from. 

I am so sad 

So. So. Sad.

I have loved  this kid since 1992.

It's 2021.

You do the fucking math.

I'm heartbroken 

Literally crying over him when I have WAY bigger things to cry about. 

But, I am crying for him.

My friend.

Later days, dude

 

.

To The Sales Development Representative That Played Me False

About a week ago, I posted on my Facebook about how a genius marketing dude offered me breakfast burritos to meet with him.
Like...

DUH.

Alas!

I replied enthusiastically, got a weak counteroffer as a reply, and was prepared to let the whole matter drop until......

Well, read for yourself, let's just say I was a little hangry this morning.

Dear Austin,

I am not entirely sure you are a person or if, perhaps, you are a bot shooting insincere offers of breakfast burritos out to an unsuspecting populace.  Regardless, you need to be informed that offering breakfast burritos with no intention of delivering said tortilla-wrapped deliciousness is not very comme il faut.  

I replied to your rather bizarre, but oddly tempting offer, in the affirmative, albeit somewhat reluctantly.  I don't need yet another sales pitch from a marketing company, but it can be argued that I do need breakfast burritos occasionally.  In addition, I found your assertion that millennials were an 'under-served' demographic rather intriguing, and was looking forward to hearing how your company would address that issue.

The response I received was somewhat perplexing -- you counter offered with coffee on Wednesday -- quite a downgrade if you ask me.  I didn't reply until now, because I was convinced at that point that the original email was spam.

After a hectic morning of rescuing abandoned kittens from a dumpster in unseasonably frigid weather, my Assistant asked me about the burritos; looking, I believe, for the kind of physical and emotional pick-me-up that something as glorious as a warm breakfast burrito could surely provide.  Imagine her dismay when I informed her that your burritos were not offered in good faith!  She was quite disappointed, "Austin", and I was immediately moved to write to you in response to that, as good Assistants are like gold dust and I try to make sure mine stays happy.

In closing, I feel the need to inform you. "Austin", that offering breakfast burritos to potential clients and then using coffee as the 'switch' is bad form.  Not only does it besmirch your company's reputation (A***O will always be synonymous with dodgy sustenance offers to me), but think of all of the poor millennials that will continue to be "under-served" because I don't know how to reach out to them.  Perhaps in the future you, or the person that created the email to spam out will be more careful with what you offer.

 Good day,

If that offer was genuine, the poor dude won't know what hit him, and rightfully so!  False offers of food should be right up there on the criminal justice scales with disorderly conduct or disturbing the peace.

Me in my feelings!

Thank heavens for Door Dash!

Do You Call This An Anniversary An Annual Heartache, or Just Something You Never Forget?

Three years.

36 months.

1095 days.

That’s a long time, isn’t it?  A lot can happen in 3 years. 

A newborn goes from a helpless little creature to a walking (trash)talking toddler in 3 years.

A shrub goes from a seedling to a thriving, healthy plant.

A new car is no longer new after 3 years.

So why does it feel like 3 years ago was yesterday? 

I work in the same office I worked in 3 years ago.  I don’t sit at the same desk, I am now the HBIC, but I still remember exactly how I felt, phone in hand, nagging and lecturing Jim to go back to the hospital.

He had checked himself out, AMA, and was blabbering on in his 'I-know-more-than-anyone’ way he had.  “No, you don’t understand,“ he rumbled into the phone.  He then proceeded to tell me all the reasons he had for not needing to remain in the hospital, one of which included ‘needing’ to get out on the Harley….

I was super mad and let him know he was going to get it BIG TIME when I got home.  I also called him an a*hole.  In the nicest possible way, though. 

When I got home, he conveniently wasn’t there, so I just started making dinner for me and Lexi.

And then I got the call….

The next few hours were a blur that I was unable to recall for a couple of days.

Went to the wrong hospital.  Don’t even remember the drive to the correct one, I just know it happened in about half the amount of time that drive would normally take.

Waiting, phone calls, waiting, waiting. 

Nothing.

Over.

Never again.

Getting Lexi the Hell out of there because I did not want her finding out in that place in front of all of the people that were gathered there, hoping and then broken.

More blur.

Days, weeks, blur.

Moving out of our house.

Holding a service and spending time with his amazing sister and niece.

Coping.  Coping. Not coping.  Trying to hold it together for Lexi.

Finally turning a corner after reaching out to a friend from high school in the middle of the night 9 months later and her just really breaking it all down for me.

Days, months, and – incredibly – YEARS have passed since we said goodbye to Lexers' Daddy, my BFF, platonic life partner, and constant adversary in all things health-food and money-saving.

There is one constant through all of the things that have happened since Jimbo took his last ride – Love.

Lexi and I have been surrounded by love every minute of every day, week, and year since August 2, 2016.  Not only by our family, who we could never have got through this without, but also by Jim’s friends. 

All of his friends knew of or had met Daddy’s “Roo”; he talked about her all the time, and took her to the bar for T-bone steaks in his office multiple times a week on school breaks when she wanted to stay home with Daddy.

I knew some of his friends a little, and some just from all the gossip he would tell me at home.  But it didn’t matter one bit how well I knew or didn’t know any of them.  They just showed up and loved us and took us into their lives and I am so grateful.

Clearly, thanks to Lexi, knowing Jim made my life better.  He was a great friend, and truly part of my family – he watched out for my sister and my niece like they were his own kids, and one of the last things he did was show up at my sister’s house unannounced and drop off a pack-n-play for my new niece Harlow.  No one had asked him to get it, he just showed up with a gift because that’s what he did. 

Besides his legacy – both literal and physical – in my family, Jimbo left me with amazing friends.  He left me and Lexi with a crazy diverse tribe of whack-a-doodles (kidding!) who check in on us, who invite us to do things, who hang out with us at the Farmers Market, check in daily, weekly, or monthly on Facebook and just really have become part of our lives.

Three years is a long time.

The friendships that were brand new in the days after Jimbo’s death feel as vital and vibrant as friendships I have had since childhood, for which I am super grateful.

But three years is also no time at all when I think about what it felt like to look at my niece and shake my head no to her unasked question while I was loading Lexi into her car.

It feels like it happened yesterday.

Lexi and Daddy headed out for a ride on Daddy's 'Girlfriend'.  He loved taking her out on that thing! <3

Here Comes The Sun

Daylight Savings Time has come, and I could not be more happy.

There are an infinity of news articles relating a spike in strokes, heat attacks, car-smashups, and unproductive days on the Monday following DST, but I just don't get it.

When you have insomnia, DST literally means nothing.

"Spring forward", lose an hour of sleep.

"Fall Back", gain one.

Blah, blah, blah.

Living with sporadic insomnia, none of those times mean a damn thing when it comes to sleep patterns, REM sleep, loss/gain of hours.

For about a decade, DST has meant absolutely nothing to me -- coming OR going -- which makes DST just about as life-affecting as my FWBs. 

However, going off of DST in 2018 had a massively profound effect on me.  

Why?

No fucking clue, it just did.

November 2018-December 2018 were 2 of the hardest months of my life, and I have no actual reason why.

All I know is that I was so depressed when the sun set as I was wrapping up my work day, that I didn't even want to leave my desk.

Anyone that reads this blog on the regular -- hellloooo, Russians, according to my 'stats; -- knows that I have gained a shit-ton of weight in the last 12 months.  Some of it was guilt, some of it was gluttony, but most of it was just because I was so depressed at locking my office door in the pitch black, that the concept of cooking food in my house made me want to rip my left arm off and club myself over the head with it.

If you knew how much $$$ I have forked over to DoorDash the last 4 months so that my child doesn't get scurvy from eating food solely out of boxes or cans, you would be sick.

I know I am.

Literally sick.

Every dollar I spend, I equate to how many hours at work it took to earn it.  Granted, I am paid very well (thanks, MT and ARS!!), but I legit could be driving my new Charger to Hawaii with the money I have squandered on delivery food recently. 

It's so bad that my daughter -- who avoids the 'w' word - work - like the plague, suggested I start driving for DoorDash in my 'spare' (HAH!) time to offset the money I am hemorrhaging.

Anyway, in addition to not cooking, I have holed myself up in my bedroom, drinking sparkling water (seriously, it's an addiction), and trying on clothes that will no longer fit over my ever-expanding girth, and them throwing them on the floor.  My closet looks like a graveyard for hangers, and my bedroom looks like Goodwill vomited all over the floor.  

There was some very brave (deranged) woman that posted a pic of her crazy, messy kitchen on Insta and explained that depression was unwashed dishes, food thrown out and not eaten, and un-mopped floors.  

While I would never be crazy (brave) enough to post a picture of my bedroom on any social media site, let it suffice to say that my bedroom is a direct expression of my mental turmoil.

This year, the dark affected me worse than it ever has.

This year, the dark crept into my windows and over my heart.

I, legit, don't know why.

I just know that the early dark made me want to run away and hide from everything I would have normally done -- oil change, laundry, eating right, cooking dinner, reading stories, hanging up clothes, recycling Vos bottles and Lacroix, Bubly, Perrier, and Dasani cans, watching movies, listening to music, etc.

I have spent less time with family and friends the last 4 months than I ever have in my entire life.

I packed an additional 15 pounds of pure lard onto my small, but manly, frame in the past 4 months.

I have not gone out and done anything on the weekends, except when I absolutely had to, in the past 4 months.

I have dissembled, prevaricated, cancelled, and flaked more in the last 4 months than I ever have in my whole life.

I am not entirely sure why that is.  As someone that is far more comfortable with self-deprecation than introspection, I have managed to do a fine job at shoving all of this into the Scarlett O'Hara-approved, "I-won't-think-about-this-today-I-will-think-about-this-tomorrow" box, which may not be the best way to handle things.

Until today.

The kiddos wanted to stay inside and play video games, but I insisted on a trip to the park.

They ran and played in the gloriously sunny, but chilly and windy, day.

I played too.

I jumped on a swing and went so high Lexi cautioned me against breaking it -- but that may have been because she was assessing my girth vs. the 75lb kids the swing was built for, and not because of my aerodynamic excellence.  

Just saying.

I didn't care, though, I just pumped my legs and got so high the chains went slack and snapped on the way down.  When I went up I went so high it felt like I could have done a loop-the-loop over the top bar.

Exhilarating.

Just like third grade.

I went down the twisty slide so fast, it spilled me out onto the bark chips.  

Bliss.

I raced my 12-year-old child and she beat me twice -- beat me, the 100 and 400 yard-dash blue ribbon-winner (clearly a sign I need to get on the treadmill STAT), but I just laughed and ran back to the play structure to go down the slide one more time.

When we went home, I sorted the thrift-shop-explosion on my floor into 'Keep because you are too fat for everything else", "Donate because you haven't worn that in 5 years", and "Keep because you will wear this again when you are not a fucking hippo" piles.

I recycled the sparkling water containers, and then smudged my room with cedar and lavender.

Am I turning over a new leaf?

Studies would tell you that an old dog (moi) can not learn new tricks.

But I can tell you that I saw this at 7:15 tonight.

LIGHT.

And it was enough.

Enough to get me fired up.

Enough to get me excited about tomorrow and the day after tomorrow and the day after that.

Enough to smile at the darkness, knowing it will be shorter tonight than it has been for months.

That's enough for me.