A-Twitter

I'm a work in progress; please take a look at the right over there to make sure I've put you on my Buddies list the way you want to be. Let me know if you don't want to be there at all. I'm still working on it. I'm going to leave this up for awhile, and see if I can double-post for the immediate now.

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Okay, so, an entry. Two things on my mind. One, kids, do they ever grow up? Every day, I feel sorrier for what I put my mother through, almost until the end. I was sometimes just a snotty brat. And I love my kids and I love being with them, but sometimes, I wish I could just smack one. Had a moment with K before when she was suddenly affronted, if that's the right word, and said a hurtful thing, and I was .. well, hurt. Anyway, we're better now, all good, but it shook me up a little, that along with the fact that I've got to admit that these hearing aids are not up to snuff. I guess I'll deal with that when I see the audiologist on Wednesday. I hope this isn't the moment that he stops being on my side, because he has been wonderful so far.

And then, of all things, it looks like the sewer pipe is backing up into the basement. Know what that means? Water on the basement floor, of course! Does it never end? So I put in a call to the plumber and hopefully he can come after school tomorrow; I cannot take off more school time for this, and I can't take any school time any day this week, starting Tuesday, because I'll be going to the play every night, and I can't do that if I haven't been in school that day. Argh.

I could just scream. Instead, I had a piece of cake. I've gained about four pounds in the last two weeks. Swell.

So I'm just a little tense. This would be a good time to go to sleep. I might as well, since I just used up my dinner points on cake. (Just kidding.)

34 days of school to go, not counting the workshop day when I won't be there. Seven weeks. Boy.

watching Some tattoo show :: entry #003/1455

Report

Well, the report from the medical front is that I am not having rashes from the pollen in the air or from the iron supplement I took for a few days. Once again, I am in a medical situation I have never ever heard of, although the doctor -- I saw her this morning -- tells me that she has seen it enough to know what it is in me. Here it is: when I get a virus of some kind, my body will now likely respond to it by breaking out in hives. Especially if I am under any other kind of stress. This happened in November, you may recall, the week after Thanksgiving. I had a stomach bug that kept me out of work for three days, and while that was going on, my back broke out in a rash that my since-retired doctor said was shingles. New doctor says it probably wasn't shingles. It's hives. She put me on a new anti-histamine routine, and says I can take benadryl three times a day and bathe in the benadryl cream, if I need to.

Swell.

My stomach flu is eh, not really limiting my activities or even what I eat, since what I eat has no relationship to how I feel. (I wouldn't eat spicy foods under any circumstances, and I really don't have to worry about anything else.)

What's the stress? Well, when this all started, which was more or less Monday, you may recall that I was living in Basement World and working my fanny off there, post-flood. Since then, we're on yet another death-watch for little Q, which I haven't mentioned here because I always freak out and think she's dying and then she bounces back, so maybe she will again, but still, it's stressful to keep an eye on her, to think about what's coming, and so forth.

Tomorrow, I'm going with R to check out a couple of possible new apartments. Sunday, it seems like we will finally get around to having lunch with the Sibs and most of her assorted children. Looking forward to that, anyway. It's such a dreary day today, cold and wet (but the basement's dry) that it's nice to have something to look forward to.

Yet another vacation week used up. Each time, it just makes me long that much more for summer vacation, or retirement. I know people who swear that they can never retire, because what would they do? Gee, I don't think it would take me two minutes to figure out what to do. I read four books, this week, I think, and am working on another. (By Christopher Moore, it's called Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal.) I got so much done in the basement, and got my closet in order. When I retire, if I can go through a carton a week, they can probably sell the house when I die instead of torching it rather than go through all the crap in it. I know that's what my sister has been doing, going through her attic and basement and closets. It must provide a nice sense of, I don't know, closure is the word that comes to mind, to know that you're not drowing in crap and that all your things are in order.


watching Dr. Phil :: entry #1443


watching Law and Order SVU :: entry #1498

Random Sunday, and Today's Report

Sunday, later

I just remembered this conversation I had the other day with the SCM. I was telling him that I was hoping to buy a pair of rubber gardening boots after school, for working in the wet basement. I told him that I had planned to wear the Hubs' boots, but realized at once that that would be absurd, as I wouldn't be able to walk in them and would probably kill myself just going down the basement stairs. He says:

"You and [Hubs' name] don't wear the same size shoes?"

I swear, I did not know what to say at first. Finally, I said the only thing that really you possibly could say: "No-o-o!" with that tone in my voice that says "Of course not! What's wrong with you?" And he says, after a minute,

"Oh." I just looked at him.

"[Wife's name] and I wear about the same size. We can wear each other's shoes." Now I didn't know where to look. And he continues!

"I have really small feet and hands."

I said, looking at all the important papers on my desk, "Uh ... oh. Okay."

Seriously. What man will say that to anyone?

---

Here's a bit more on the Yiddish glossary. The syllable in caps is the syllable that is stressed. Any time you see "kh", it means the guttural "ch" sound, which you may know from the Yiddish word "chutzpah", often seen in English.

Okay, little bird is faigeleh. That's FAY-gu-luh.
Farblunget, for mixed up, is fah-BLUNGE-it.
Farcokte, full of shit, is fah-COCK-tuh.
Farbissiner punim, two words for a bitter face, would be fah-BIS-sin-ner POO-nim.
Farmisht, bewildered, is fah-MISHT.

It's not knowing where to put the accent, really. Because the words were not originally written in the English alphabet, all English spellings are more or less just the way the word sounds. (Real Yiddish, the way all my grandparents wrote it, is written in Hebrew script, which means there are no vowels used. Don't ask.)

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So the Hubs finishes all his garden work on Sunday and comes in to take a shower, and comes out of the bathroom, all dressed and squeaky clean, and stands before us at the family room doorway, and K lets out a shriek. I look up and his beard is gone. His beard is gone! He has had a full beard and mustache for about 20 years; K barely remembers him without it. (Or with black hair, for that matter.) He had told us on Easter during the ride down to his parents that he was toying with the idea of shaving it off. And he did. He left the mustache. How does he look now? Like every picture of his grandfather I have ever seen. Like every old Italian man. That's the neatly trimmed little mustache he has. If it were up to me, I'd say grow the beard back or shave off the mustache, or grow the mustache long like Mark Twain. He didn't look like everyone else before, and now he does. It's very weird.

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All over our neighborhood, and in various parts of town, it looks like the houses have been turned inside out. It looks like there are more possessions out on the curb for trash pick-up tomorrow -- all water-damaged, I presume -- than what could possibly be left inside. Hmm. Our curb is only about half-full, that is, only about half the width of the house. Hmm.

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Monday, almost 6.00 pm

I have had me quite the day. Grandma Ida would be bursting with pride. (Except she would be kvelling.) I have worked my ass off. My back is very sore (as would be anyone's without an ass to hold it up), but not spasming, as my back is wont to do, just sore and achy from bending and lifting all day. To whit:

I was at Target by 8.15 to buy more shelves (I had bought some nice big ones yesterday, which the Hubs had brought downstairs, but I was getting some smaller ones), and then to the supermarket for a few things, my first trip of the day to the recycling center (with empty cardboard boxes), and then ... home, I guess. I started working downstairs a little after 9.00.

All I can tell you is that over the course of the next five hours, I only stopped to go back to recycling twice, and followed up one of those trips with a short break on the phone with my sister while I sipped a Dunkin Donuts iced latte. Other than that, I worked continuously, assembling shelves, shifting stuff around, taking out more garbage. I filled the curb. I had gotten the latte on my way back from recycling trip #2, and on my way out to #3, I decided that what I wanted more than anything else -- for lunch; I hadn't eaten -- was to fulfill my recent longing for coffee ice cream, so I did that, had an ice cream cone for lunch. I had already worked it off, in spades.

One itty bitty tiny glitch for the day. Trip #3 included an old printer that was down in the basement, never to be used again. After the nice man at recycling took it out of the car for me, I saw ... an ink stain on the front passenger seat. A good inch by two inches maybe. Ink. On the front passenger seat.

Of R's car.

That was the closest I came to breaking down and crying all day. I have her car for two days so that the Hubs' and mine can be serviced. After trip #3, all I had to do was eat my ice cream and drive home. But no. I ate the ice cream (of course), but once I was home, I had to go to work on that stain. I got most of it, but some remains. Now, there's some other kind of stain -- coffee, probably -- only an inch or two away, and much bigger, but you know how bad you feel if you borrow something and can't return it in the same condition. I don't think she'll care since it's not actually a big wet inkblot at this point, but I feel bad about it. I'm also over it.

As you may have gathered, I've had very little to eat today. It seems that the secret to weight loss for me is to keep busy and for it to be hot. I can't eat when it's too hot, and it's 85 degrees now, at 6.10. So here's another year when we went from winter directly to summer, without stopping for spring. I guess when I go back to school next week, I'll find out if the a/c in the new library works.

And now I must eat, because I'm having a whole low blood sugar experience. I was going to cook something -- really, I was! -- but I think something quick in the microwave is a better plan. But of course, first I must post this! I have priorities!


watching Reba :: entry #1440

Better Now

An update, but first, the last Yiddish word I used in the last entry was faigeleh. Literally, a faigeleh is a little bird, and is often a term of endearment for small children, especially girls. My grandmother almost always called me faigeleh, as in "Faigeleh, can you hand me ... " whatever it was, as you might call someone "Sweetie." However, in more contemporary slang (which goes back a good 50 years or more) faigeleh is also used to indicate a homosexual man, or a man with effeminate tendencies. It is not always derogatory, althougth it can be. It can be merely descriptive, as gay now is, or it can be hurled as an insult. But it's not the origin of the English insult fag, which is actually English, as in British, in origin, and comes from faggot, which means a burning bundle of sticks or wood used to start a bigger fire.

Okay, class dismissed.

The rug in the basement is gone, and was not that hard to get rid of. It was a little challenging to get the stuff moved off it, and some things had to be repacked, but the rug cut up into strips very easily, and when the Hubs got home, he carried the pieces outside. I had also left a narrow strip since the stuff on top of it was too heavy; I planned to get shelves and put them up on Monday and then the rug would be gettable, but the Hubs somehow managed to get that out, too. So there are no wet boxes sitting down there, nothing in imminent danger, and I think, nothing prone to smelling. I still have work to do, as in the shelves and re-arranging everything for future safety, but it's all much more managable now. And it turns out that the shelves I need are on sale at Target this week for half of what I paid for the ones I already have, and got a few years ago elsewhere. Score. I may be dropping by Target every day this week until I have enough to cover every basement wall.

I cleaned up my desk. I cleaned up the coffee table. I finished Jailbird. I finished Dead-Eye Dick. So I'm on the move. Next: Galapagos. And getting those bills paid. And I gathered up all the shoes and put them in a laundry basket. Yes, things are looking up. I don't feel so ... okay, whatever the word was that I couldn't find, I don't need it anymore. I'm okay.

Oy. Gotta put the last wash in.


watching Today in New York :: entry #1439

The Dullest Knife in the Drawer

Honestly, I am not functioning at full brain capacity on this whole wet basement thing. First, why didn't I go out and buy a pump Monday morning the minute I got up, instead of not thinking of it until this afternoon, when everyone was sold out? And why have I been waiting for the house to start to smell instead of getting some air fresheners or something? I thought of that this afternoon. Now we're all vanilla and fresh linen, whatever the hell that smells like.

I have also realized that there's a limit to what I can do down there. Even if I have the energy and the best of intentions, there are just things that I cannot move. I can see, for example, that I can start to cut up chunks of the carpet remnant there, but I can't move the milk crate full of record albums off of it. I also have a pretty big carton full of paperback books -- yes, I'm sad there; these are all the Star Trek books I lovingly read during a somewhat depressed late 80s-early 90s and they're what got me through -- that I can't move now that's it's waterlogged. The Hubs is just going to have to stay home from work on Saturday and drag the heavy stuff up and out. I can vacuum and I can cut up the carpet, but I know my limits.

So K subbed again, and is now working at the store again. The Hubs is teaching tonight, so I'm on my own until 8.15 or so. I've already made my lunch for tomorrow and picked out my clothes. Got the coffee maker set up for my first morning cup.

I had a pretty busy day today, six classes, not to mention yet another stupid conflict over library staffing. Do they not get this in the main office? I DON'T CARE ANYMORE. LEAVE ME THE FUCK OUT OF IT AND STOP TALKING TO ME. Thank you.

Now, tomorrow should be interesting. Each year for the last five years or so, the drama teacher (of whom I am very fond) has been charged with making an amusing video which is shown as part of the senior awards ceremony. He is very clever and very good at it, and this is the last year that he has two students working on it who will certainly become real filmmakers some day. They are gooood. Anyway, the video generally involves some sort of alleged plotline, but the essence is teachers making funny cameo appearances. I was supposed to be in it last year, but they forgot to tell me ahead of time and I was out that day since I didn't know. But they have a part for me this year and are filming it tomorrow.

I'm not sure what the part is, only that the SCM is in it each year and he looks like a crazed mad bomber, so I'm reluctant to share the scene with him since I don't want to look like an idiot, but we'll see how it goes. In addition to tomorrow's scene, many of us are to be in the final scene, which sounds like something from the party scene on Laugh-In. The plot this year is a 1960s adventure, and those of us who lived it are encouraged to dress appropriately. (Not tomorrow; this scene is to be shot at some future time.) As if any of us could still fit in our 60s clothes! I have my bell bottoms, but I'm guessing they wouldn't come up over my thighs, not to mention that I didn't grow boobage until I was about 20, so I don't have any tops from then that would fit. Although I might go with a Moody Blues tie-dye, even though it's from the 90s. Looks worn enough to be from the 60s, though.

When I went out to get the air fresheners just a little while ago, I couldn't help but notice that it appears to be spring at last. Ho hum. Too little too late. How can I enjoy spring when my basement is a swamp and all that work looms ahead of me?

And now I remember the reason that I never burn scented candles or use air fresheners or that stuff. My eyes are starting to sting. Hey, allergies! Something else to look forward to.

Do you suppose they have any openings on Main Street? I could sell balloons, or sing with the Barbershop Quartet, or anything. Hey, I could sweep up after the horses in the parade.

watching Reba :: entry #1436

Where's That Baby Book?

You know how you record the milestones of your child's life in her baby book?

Today was K's first day in front of a classroom. They called her late last night to sub at the high school today, and she went. I swear I wanted to take a picture of her "first day of teaching" outfit. (She looked adorable, I might say, and not 17, which is the goal when you're a first-day substitute who's 5'2" and slight.)

I did see her a few times during the day, and all seemed to be going well. The amazing thing is that when she left the high school at 2.45, she had to zip over to her job in the Giant Jeans Conglomerate, where she's working today from 3 to 8. So, a 12 hour day for her.

Both my children have a very good work ethic. Jack would be incredibly proud.

So, minutes after I finished my list last night, Boo began to poop here, there, and everywhere. The perfect end to the perfect day. And I cannot use my washer and dryer until the plumber tells me it's okay, since they were sitting in an inch or so of water. That would be the plumber who was supposed to come today at 3 but didn't because other people have no heat or hot water and all we have is a leaky sink. They swear they're coming tomorrow. Please.

I did use the pump I got yesterday to get rid of as much water as I could from the laundry area, so I guess it's going to dry. Even so, I have all kinds of stuff on the machines that I saved from sitting in puddles, so it'll be a logistical puzzle whenever it happens, unless the floor is completely dry and I can put that stuff back down on it again.

Here's what I really want: a team of strong men to take everything out of my basement, clean it all up, and then put stuff back neatly, on shelves, with nothing at all resting on the floor except the rubber-coated bottoms of the shelf uprights. Perhaps that's too specific. Honestly, I would call someone from the local paper, but I wouldn't even know what to look for or whom to call. And there are plenty of people in town way worse off than we are, so whoever it is that does this is going to be booked up with more important problems.

I actually did one little something for myself before. After I'd re-scheduled the plumber and then taken Q to get her claws clipped -- she was walking on tippy-toe -- I went to Barnes and Noble and got two Kurt Vonnegut novels that I've never read: Slapstick and Galapagos. Slapstick was his first one I didn't read, if that makes sense, and I know that Galapagos is one of R's favorites. I may start after dinner, which is happening in five minutes, if I'm not distracted by some shiny object.


watching Still Standing :: entry #1434

List

[copied from dland]

1. At some point during the storm yesterday, late afternoon probably, it became clear that our basement was starting to fill up with water. We checked on it here and there and then went to sleep.


2. When I woke up at midnight or so, half of the power in the kitchen was out. Because this has happened before, I knew that this meant that somewhere in the basement there was something plugged into an electrical outlet and the wire was sitting in water. Because I was more asleep than awake, I left a note on the counter explaining this, and went to bed.


3. The Hubs got up at 3.30 and so did I, so I explained this to him. He said he'd seen my note when he'd gotten up before and hadn't really slept since then. He got up and pulled the plug downstairs, then reset the breaker and then began to bail water off the floor and into the utility sink in the basement. He did this until six, when he took a shower and went to work.


4. While he was downstairs, I logged in for a personal day today and went back to sleep. When he went to work at six, I got up and went downstairs.


5. For the next several hours, I would pointlessly run the little shop-vac for twenty minutes at a time and then do something else for a while (eat breakfast, drink coffee.)


6. Somewhere in here, I saw on the news crawler that R's train line into the city today was closed due to flooding, but that the bus would be honoring train tickets. I emailed her at some point to see if she was at work. When she answered, she said she'd left home at 8.35 and gotten into the office at 10.30. It's normally a 20 minute train ride, but not if you're on a bus.


7. K got up early to go to school, and I told her that there was no way she was driving there on potentially flooded roads, so she stayed home. She came downstairs to help me and immediately pulled a muscle or pinched a nerve or something in her neck and was in great pain. She came upstairs and put ice on it, and then went back to bed.


8. Using the shop-vac was like shoveling sand against the tide. I decided that my time would be better spent by cleaning up some of the water damage. By the time they came to collect the trash around noon, I had filled the curb with bags of destroyed books and clothes and other things that had been in cardboard boxes sitting on the basement floor.


9. Around 2.00, I remembered that my parents had had a surface pump for occasions like this and I went to the local hardware store to get one, but they were out, of course. They said that they were expecting a shipment between 4.00 and 4.30. Meanwhile, K saw the chiropractor a few doors down, so she was feeling a bit better.


10. K and I discussed the logistics of tomorrow being her first day available to substitute and how we would work that out in the morning if she got called.


11. I went back to the hardware store, where the delivery truck was late and I stood there for two hours. Very bad for the old back. Got a pump.


12. Pulled into the driveway at six, just as the Hubs was getting home. We went in and looked at the water and it was really much better. (Hasn't rained much today.) So the water was not deep enough for the pump. He changed his clothes and started shop-vaccing.


13. I made macaroni and cheese for me and K for dinner. While I was washing the pot afterwards, the Hubs called me downstairs to see that water from the kitchen sink was pouring into the basement. (This is not, however, the source of the basement flood, which is heavy rain and a 57 year old foundation.) Finally got him to stop working after 45 minutes. It'll dry up at some point.


14. K got the call to work tomorrow, but in the junior high, where she wouldn't be finished until 3.00, and she has to be at her other job at 3.00 tomorrow. Now she thinks that the sub lady doesn't like her and will never call her again. Who knows?


15. Called the plumber, who is coming to fix the sink tomorrow after 3.00, when I get home.


16. Made my lunch for tomorrow. Oh wait, I did that before K got the call, when I thought I might not have the opportunity in the morning, with both of us getting ready. My bad.


17. I am ready to freaking drop. On top of this, I had my normal stress reaction today, which means I was in the bathroom every ten minutes. If I have gained an ounce today, then I just don't know. It would be a fitting end to the day, though.

watching Little People, etc. :: entry #1433