frolic

i am going to be a fucking photo addict. after the initial clusterfuckery involving the demon in my 20# laptop, i am finally getting this to work, two photographs at a time.
herein lies entropy, the newest kitten. you cannot see the cyclopian absense of her right eye. she is a little shit.

and this is tiresias, yawning ferociously.

i cannot capture a flattering picture of the tombs. she is obese, flecked with dandruff, and absolutely surly when i approach her.
two cats, one eye! woo-hoo! they are like twitterpated teenagers, rolling around, licking one another. it is nauseating.

i am not that crazy cat lady. i am not.

in alaska

for every



there's a

"america's villians of the 20th century were frank lloyd wright for romanticizing the suburbs & henry ford for making the suburban dream accessible."

so sayeth one paco underhill, whose book 'call of the mall' must be read by anyone appalled/fascinated/bewildered by american culture. for example: makeup counters are always adjacent to the shoe department, so the ladies have something to occupy themselves whilst waiting for the minion to return with the size they requested. or: the layout of supermarkets invariably house the dairy products in the back, since most people always buy milk and they have to slog through everything else to get there, but consumers have grown annoyed by the inefficiency of that, and convenience stores have capitalized on milk-selling, so some supermarkets now have 'common buy' sections right near the entrance, as well as the full-throttle bowels-o-the-beast dairy area, or as i have just coined, the dairea.
fucking interesting to me, anyhow. i like knowing how i am unconsciously manipulated on a constant basis. i read 110 pages in one sitting, drinking 48oz of progressively watered-down tea from one wilting bag. i can be miserly even as i peruse tales of excess.
it is good to be back in warshington, even though i miss s and her clan like fuck. i worked 13 hrs apiece on sunday and monday, 12 on tuesday, 9.5 yesterday. today is freezing cold and very mellow. i made some delicious stuffing and burned the shit out of my mouth. this is, to my shame, the first time i have actually cooked something for myself in months. i typically feel culinarily witty if i add spices to a can of soup (that i then proceed to eat cold, from the can, with a fork since i don't like spoons. cold canned soup is actually very tasty- as long as it is not the condensed variety, obviously.)
alaska, though. i procured a digital camera whilst there and tomorrow i will try to post some photographs. the anecdotes will have to wait until then.
since being back:
-listened to ween's 'captain fantasy' over and over. this was my soundtrack when i was about 13, sitting in the nb hall at service high, sulking with my headphones. it is juvenile as fuck but still pretty great. i have not heard anything of ween's after 'the mollusk.' it is odd, how one can love the shit out of a band but never pursue them further.
-learned that heating up one of the 1L fluid bags/hot water bottles from work and keeping it in my lap on the drive home from work helps me freeze a tiny bit less. "don't you have a heater?" one of the other techs, a guy who once owned a bug, asked. "yeah, but it's not hooked up" i said. "why?" "because it's been too cold to mess with it" i said. yeah, funny. i am a shitty bug owner. but damned if they don't teach you how to improvise.
-had my employee review. "excellent across the board" they said. this is at my tacoma job (i don't start in seattle until next week). twice a year everyone reviews everyone. it is a stressful experience, made especially bullshittish by the fact that we must put our names at the top. i was reminded of the evil slam books of my youth. i will fucking miss that place. i will still be on call for relief shifts. "do i get to keep my locker?" i asked, half-joking. "of course" they replied. good, since i have a stupid rosie the riveter sticker permanently adhered to it, and i feel rather guilty.
-cases at work: angus, the GDV with thrombocytopenia (discovered after already in surgery) that bled out post-op, from every orifice, mainly his ass. another GDV surgery (jessie) last night that i was monitoring, neccessitating a gastrotomy because the stomach tube wouldn't pass, proceeding to spill a huge mass of stomach contents, including spaghetti, into the abdominal cavity; the stray cat with hideous flea dermatitis who i fell in love with, despite his pendulous gonads; everything else is a fucking blur, by choice. lots of DKA, lots of wounds (including a yorkie who was shot through her kidney), lots of strays. i am rather exhausted still.
*
suburbia be damned; i do love frank lloyd wright. my pulse slows just looking at his buildings.

and what shall

i am happy and i feel good about everything.
or: it is all handle-able. there is nothing that cannot be dealt with.
i needed this.
more later.

what was

nothing changes here. this is cockle-warming and depressing at once. the only real difference: my world is somewhere else now.
i arrived in anchorage as the sun was setting. tis a damned homely place. i was grinning uncontrollably as i got off the plane. everything was tinted golden: the scant snow, the puny trees, the filthy pickup trucks on the road. being back prompts an eerie "well, of course" feeling- it's home in a very seamless and clausterphobic way, like the smell of a former lover's neck- you know it far too well and it's both wonderful and "get the fuck away from me"... anchorage is a former lover's neck. i should make bumper stickers.
my insomnia has followed me here. i do not recall the last time i slept more than 5 hours in a night. but here it is six-thirty a.m. and will be pitch black outside for hours, and i only just remembered whilst sitting here (in a dark room) that oh yeah, it's my birthday too. and thanksgiving. and the 44th anniversary of JFK's assassination. and one of the babies in an adjacent room just woke up crying.
*
we went to darwin's last night. of course. i saw so many people i knew, people i knew FROM THERE... people who were STILL THERE, nearly six years later, looking a bit aged... it was really fucking good to see some people, very stultifying to see others- most of the latter were s's friends anyhow, people i smiled politely at in passing, people who called me "bree". ike and tina on the hi-fi. the smell of popcorn. the remodeled bathroom where the position of the toilet forces my knees against the wall. a crushed can somersaulting down the alley in the wind. IT IS WARMER HERE THAN IN SEATTLE. i was complimented on my firm handshake. the very good thing about s having kids and therefore a curfew: we leave early and lucidly. responsibility? self-pride? the people i remembered who were there when we arrived were possibly still there when we left.
anchorage is a dirty, pathetic little town. i fucking left for many, many reasons. but i do love this place. i love the blue lights in the town square, the neighborhood by elderberry park, the murals behind the panhandler bar, the alaska zoo charity-things hanging all over the gas station i will always know as a mapco, the fucking amazing fries at peggy's with the stacks of pie boxes on the u-shaped bar, the sloppy back roads and the cars parked in yards and people's inherent effusiveness, that giddy feeling that i could possibly run into someone i know at any time, the proof of a past.

shitterpated

i got the job at the local ER. for the first time in almost five years, i will be working in the city where i live. i am very pleased about this.
raining like hell. no place sells rain-x. my car is a death trap. the classic rock station is doing their entire catalog a-z as a holiday precursor. the disc jockey said "isn't this just one of those beautiful pacific northwest days that you dream about?" as i hydroplaned blindly. "it's a good day" said he, "to slog through the ARRRs." 'roundabout' was the last one i heard before i exited my vehicle, still repeating 'arrrr' to myself, swaggering around puddles.
a child is wailing in the library. it is echoing off the high ceiling. the other people at the computers were all looking disgustedly towards the source. "i was doing that earlier this week" one of the guys said. i laughed out loud, an obvious eavesdropper.
s will be in texas while i am in alaska. he grew up in college station. he has a barely perceptable accent. it is charming as fuck, actually. last night i hung out in his lair, alternately drawing and looking at his banksy book while he went through a huge bag of junk mail. he found a box of cellulose packing peanuts. "i don't want to just throw them away" he said. i suggested he flush them. twenty minutes later they were still there, even after being mushed up by the toilet brush. "you should leave it for your roommates" i said. and he did. we were standing in the bathroom, cackling in front of a toilet that looked as if someone had just had a hellacious caseous shit, and i thought "i really adore this guy." he has been a very fucking good friend.
'dandelion', the rolling stones, 1967: backing vocals by john lennon and paul mccartney. recommended.

gary and melissa loved to make love

i met with the neurologist today. i am so tired of fucking students trailing the doctors- some privacy, please? or at least some modicum of a pleasant bedside manner? she was an unsmiling cunt. i hope she fails medical school.
the doctor showed me my latest MRI in comparison with the one taken 17 months ago. the initial splotches of inflammation are still there, joined by some other pea-sized random blips across my brain. it is like looking at cells at work, seeing what is normal and what is not, how even the abnormal is strikingly beautiful because it indicates proof. he didn't seem too concerned with any of it. he did, as i anticipated, urge me to start medication. "it's your brain, after all" he said. he described the weekly injection i would give myself, an "immuno-modifier", and how it could cause "flu-like" symptoms that "normally go away in a few months", and i said "i don't want to resign myself to that and admit that i have an issue that needs continuous treatment," all the while thinking that, miserable as the relapses are, 2 in a year and a half is not that horrid a frequency, and at least i know that what i experience now is ME, not some fucking pharmaceutical side-effect. i wish he'd offer me medical marijuana instead.
my third and final steroid infusion was today. i had my own room, a television with a remote, and two hours flipping between 'roseanne' and the food network. i had forgotten how fucking vapid the food network is. i was thinking especially rude things about sandra lee.
afterwards: i found out i got the fucking job at the local ER. i had my working interview there on friday, the day my symptoms began in earnest, and i was not on the proverbial ball whatsoever. i hit the veins, did everything well, but mentally i was not as... lively as i could have been. but apparently i made a good enough impression. "everyone really liked you and think you'd be a great addition to our team" the HR woman wrote me in an email. that fucking made my day. the caveatL the schedule sucks. but it is open to fluctuation- this is an incredibly mecurial field. she is allowing me a few days to mull it over.
it is nice to know i don't suck too badly.
it is even nicer to know that i can muster competence even with my brain covered with plaque.
and i can move a bit more of my face today.
the little things matter the most. i actually feel really fucking optimistic right now- and it may be the 'roids talking, but i also feel a hell of a lot less vulnerable than i did a few days ago.
i have always hated the soft-porn tittiness of that giada chick from the aforementioned food network, but she made something today that sounded pretty damn good, and those who can eat dairy should try this to, i don't know, impress the ladies.
i leave you with:
saute some diced onions and carrots and, i don't know, celery, in olive oil. add a package of frozen-defrosted-drained spinach and some sliced roma tomatoes. (i'm thinking mushrooms too. everything is better with mushrooms.) mix. it is pretty. in another bowl mix a container (whatever size- 8 oz?) of marscapone cheese, 1/4c grated parmiagno-reggiano, salt, pepper, and i can't remember if there was anything else, but methinks some toasted pine nuts would kick fucking ass. mix the cheese-gloop and add half the sauteed vegetable olio to it. then! you have this cute stack of pancakes- i think that would sort of suck, why not tortillas? like, ooh, those spinach or sundried tomato or rosemary ones? oh my god that would be fucking delicious! so screw the pancakes, do the tortillas. put a bit of the filling in each tortilla, or tortilla-scrap, top with mozarella, and roll them up. place them in a buttered baking dish. puree the rest of the vegetable medley and pour over the top. smother with more parmesan. add more mozzarella too. would smoked gouda be too much here? perhaps in lieu of the mozarella? fuck, i miss cheese. apparently.
bake at 350 or so for 35 minutes? or 25 minutes? i was probably flipping back to roseanne at that point. anyway, keep an eye on it.
vicarious cheese. i am sick.

what matters?

more MS.
just in time for alaska.
i have an IV catheter taped in place, hidden under my sweater on my right forearm. my elbow veins are shot from the multiple prods i recieved yesterday. "don't go shootin' up!" the male nurse said jovially as he, against hospital orders, sent me home with the IV in. "i'll do my best" i replied drily.
yesterday: i called my neurologist to describe the paralysis besetting the right side of my face. it is funny now, but it most fucking certainly wasn't when i first noticed it friday night. i had actually noticed something weird as far back as wednesday, i realize now: i was putting on chapstick and found it very difficult to rub my lips together. the cool (and i mean this unironically) thing about MS: i sm hyper-aware of every tiny vacillation in my body, anything that is at all unusual. scary thing is, i'm always fucking right.
he recommended i go to the ER. mentioned stroke, bell's palsy. shit, thought i, i have something ELSE? something NEW? i wasn't concerned about stroke, but the bell's palsy thing was new... i remembered reading about it in a fully illustrated medical book years ago- along with grave;s disease, and all those other unnattractive neuro syndromes that make for unsightly photographs.
took the bus to the ER. got a private room with a television. watched the last half of 'psycho' on the in-room television. ("i helped pick out the dress she was buried in. periwinkle blue.") had ~20mls (i asked; "you'll remake it by dinnertime") of blood drawn. went up to the MRI. they gave me headphones, set too blaringly to, per my request, the classic rock station, which was playing 3-song sets for the weekend, so i was immobile and helpless in the MRI for about 50 minutes, stuck with fucking ZZ top and van halen and several of my other least fucking favorite bands, in triplicate, thinking halfway through "what if i have a fucking brain tumor?" feeling tears go down my cheeks, itching, unable to wipe them away.
back to the room with the telly, now turned to fucking entertainment tonight, the doctor confirming MS resurgence, tethering me to the bed with an IV pump for an elephant-felling infusion of solu-medrol, stuck with the terrible television because the hospital had its remotes habitually stolen.
('such great heights' is playing at the cafe right now. this is a fucking great song. i wonder how many dewy-eyed couples lost their virginity to this.)
after i left the ER, six hours later, i burst into near-hysterical tears, yelled "FUCK" into the darkness, and kicked the shit out of the side of some building. i felt better after that.
met with s. i need more that what he can give, at least this week. but he was good for a few hours, anyway. he listened to me rand and didn't flee in revulsion while i repeatedly cried and blew my nose in public. we had tea and coffee. i am glad i did not have any alcohol last night. it would not have been wise.
today: calmer. know your enemy, then get on with it. the terror and helplessness that plagued me for the last few (incredibly draining) days has given way to... mellow. i can even find humor in it. how is it possible, for example, that i can flare my fucking nostrils but not raise my right eyebrow? i know. i've practiced. went back to the ER for a second hour-long steroid bolus. the room today was far crappier, seperated by a curtain from a 52-year-old man with rectal bleeding. i heard it all: his boyfriend bringing him food, the heart monitor beeping nonstop for about 5 minutes due to his tachycardia, the doctor giving him a rectal exam and vocalizing what he found. i stayed on my side, reading a book about how fat was always considered the aesthetic ideal until recently, and how the pendulum should swing back soon, and at one point i fell asleep, in the fetal position, knee-length hospital gown over my jeans and t-shirt.
they're playing fucking billy bragg! "a new england" is one of the best songs ever! fuck. life is sometimes poignant enough to make me cry. i think i cried everything i could yesterday. now i am left quietly, wholeheartedly appreciating.
no edit.

the deeper the cushion

this has been a fucking frustrating week. and there is really nothing i can push all the blame onto, which handily exacerbates my surliness.
some of the worst moments of my life are directly related to sex.
*
i took entropy to work with me yesterday with hopes of having her jaw-wire, and ideally her uterus, removed. i was feeling like shit already. the doctors flaked around until about 10pm, when the doctor i'd asked hours before to help me- the owner of the clinic- tried to pry the fucking wire out without any anesthesia. i was holding her, she was crying, and a group of technicians was standing around, all watching with the same horrified "why the fuck isn't the doctor using sedation" expressions. i had to ask several times before entropy was fully sedated. and this fucking pissed me off. why do i pretend to have loyalty to a job that treats its employees and their animals so disrespectfully? i would be furious if i was a client and my pet was handled that way. i have not had much loyalty to the place since my decision to stay in seattle, i admit; i am going through the motions, fairly blatantly. the fact that this week has been otherwise fucked up has not helped my attitude much. i left last night with an unspayed cat and a desperate need for a cigarette.
things will change soon.
the teapot that i've had for years -admittedly hideous with tulips on the side- burned through its base today. i did not know that could actually happen. i was heating water for tea and absently listening to the perpetual hiss of water hitting the electric burner; it wasn't until dribbling scalding water all over the counter that i properly investigated. i must make more tea than i realize. this is one of those crappy items that has travelled with me since 1997, to every place i have ever lived; i bought it at some thrift store for a pittance. it is a small accomplishment to wear an object completely the fuck out.
it has occurred to me as i have packed, then unpacked, my world o' shit over the last month, how i tend to hold onto things. i have books from when i was a kid, plants from 6 years ago, things on my refrigerator that i remember from the refrigerators in anchorage. it is comforting to maintain a sense of 'place', no matter where- like when i was backpacking by myself, and i would empty out my bag and look at everything, how seeing my clothes and the shit stuffed into my wallet was somehow validating, gave me proof that i existed outside of this precise instant.
how very first-world, i think disgustedly upon rereading that last paragraph.
*
i am about halfway through 'no shame in our game', yet another what's-wrong-with-america tome; i also recommend 'the working poor' for a similar theme.
...left to my own at-home devices, i guiltily find myself rereading the chapters of 'valley of the dolls' involving the clusterfuckery of neely o'hara. i try to justify my vices with a semblance of balance, however skewed.