So we opened The Vagina Monologues last night, after months of rehearsing and planning and some fretting. If you've ever been in a community show, you know there's this nerve-wracking phenomenon where someone always struggles with their lines to the point where you're thinking CRAP, this is going to be a DISASTER! And then at the final dress rehearsal everyone just pulls it out and you go PHEW, okay, I think it's going to be fine. (I wonder if that happens in professional productions, too? Probably not.) Anyway, it was all very exciting. Otto drove in with me to see the show ("Because it's...
When you think about having children, you dream of all the magical things you'll do together and all the memories you'll build. You hope you'll have similar interests and hopes and goals. Actual conversation from earlier today in the car, upon spotting a rather unfortunate-looking (read: dead) armadillo on the shoulder. Me: Oh no, Mr. Armadillo. That's not a good place for a nap! Monkey: Maybe he's very sleepy. Me: Like he was walking along, and suddenly he was just overcome with the need for a short rest? Monkey: Exactly. So he just flopped over on his back like that for a power-nap. Me:...
I can't remember if I mentioned that I finally upgraded to an iPhone 5 from my previous dinosaur-era model (deductible business expense, wooo!), which means I am only recently learning the wonders of Siri. Siri and I have a somewhat difficult relationship, although nowadays if I say to her, "Siri, what's my name?" she will gamely respond, "Your name is Miriam. But because we are friends, I get to call you Mir." (I don't know if we're truly friends, but I appreciate that Siri knows how to ingratiate herself.) It's true that this phone means I am forever feeling my age; last night at play...
So I'm doing The Vagina Monologues again this year, and while my father would insist that as a kid/teen I used to get cast in a play and have the whole script memorized the next day (this is an exaggeration), the older I get, the harder it is for me to memorize lines. Clearly my brain is failing. And the piece I'm in is a group round-robin style thing, so I am really struggling to get each of these single-lines-between-other-people's-single-lines down before we're supposed to be off-book in a few days. And the piece is SAD and HEAVY and HORRIFYING, so it's not exactly a joyfest. On the other...
I laid around with my virus-that-is-not-the-flu-dammit for a couple of days, and then I felt better and got up and did stuff. Then I felt sort of sick again. Then better. Now I am just annoyed by the whole thing; there is little I find as vexing as being sort-of-sick. Either I want to be Justifiably Ill and free to take to my bed without guilt, or I want to be well. This in-between thing where I just feel kind of punky is aggravating. Make up your mind, immune system! So for however many days, there, dinnertime would roll around and I'd be all, "Oh, you're hungry? Okay... ummmm... I think...
Monkey's birthday was delightful. I didn't even mind getting up early to make cinnamon rolls for him to bring in to school to share with his buddies, because he's just so darn delighted by it, and it doesn't hurt that our intrepid Hippie School head teacher always tells me what a great baker I am. Yes, it's all totally selfless, when I do this. Pay no attention to my preening in the corner. (Hey, I take affirmations where I can get 'em, people.) I'd actually made the dough the night before, and done everything short of baking them and making the icing---the rolls were in the fridge proofing...
I knew, but didn't really know, that the holidays would be hard this year. I knew intellectually, but didn't really grok how it would feel. It felt wrong to have Thanksgiving without Chickie---as thankful as I am for so many other things---and although we usually do the tree and the decorations the weekend after Thanksgiving, I didn't say anything, and neither did Otto or Monkey, so we just let it go. There's plenty of time. She'll be home in a few weeks, for a bit, and we'll try to figure out how to cram in all of the family togetherness we need around this year's unprecedented weirdness....
There have been a few requests to see my actual zombie hand, though I realize this is a delicate matter for some. The day I got my new splint (which meant the bandages got cut off and I got to see it for the first time) I was super-jazzed to show it to Monkey and Mario when they got home from school that afternoon. To my dismay, when I removed the splint, Mario said, "COOOOL!" at the same time that Monkey gagged, turned away, and yelled, "PUT IT BACK ON, THAT'S DISGUSTING!" So, you know... your tolerance may vary. Here, I'll make it a link for those who dare to click: This was my hand this...
This is not a post I wanted to write. I blog about many things, but I think I have yet to blog about this particular thing. And yet, here we are. Let us briefly retrace my medical steps of the last week. On Sunday night, I broke my stupid hand on a stupid apple. I then spent many hours in the emergency room with my long-suffering husband, and when we left we had a prescription for a heavy-duty narcotic (Narcotic 1). I had told the ER staff that I don't do well with narcotics; in fact, most of them make me throw up. So when I mentioned this, they threw in a prescription for an anti-nausea med...
