We have a knitting thing going on now.  Spawn is going to knit scarves for the world and LLO is going to make a coaster maybe. Which is fun.  So’s the other day, Spawn asked me if I wanted a scarf for Christmas and since I’ve been a mother going on 16 years now I know the right answer to that question.  (That would be “yes”, by the way.)  So she asked me what color.  And I answered, somehow forgetting the code, that I like green and purple and I already have a purple scarf so how about green.  Yes, we do answer all questions with long answers in my land.  Unless the answer is no.  But anyhow. Spawn proceeds to tell me that she thinks she’ll make one out of this cool yarn that she’s seen that is black and red and blue.  And hello- I said green, girlfriend.  Alas, I know how it is and I will love the black, red, and blue scarf that my girl makes me and that’s that.

LLO has been cracking me up with her knitting talk.  Not so much action. Because that girl is a talker not an acter.  Well, she is an actor, but that’s a different thing entirely.  Anyhow.  Been trying to get the LLOster to knit since this summer when her goal was to watch screens 24 hours a day and I thought maybe she could do something else. Naturally, with Spawn knitting around the world, LLO wants in on the action.  Yay.  The other day she was spouting about how unique she is because she’s knitting instead of ___ (forget what she said) and how many 11 year olds knit instead of (that) and on and on.  Of course I agreed.  Because the girl is unique, no matter that she’s made it to row 4 of the project.  Anyhow, last night, we get home and she’s got all this homework (which is where the actor thing comes in, because holy moly the girl has perfected drama).  And I hear Spouseman say to her “do you have knitting homework?”.  Which made me laugh because it makes perfect sense to me to knit at 10something at night rather than do the math homework.  I get that.

And then there’s me.  I gave up knitting when the little people came into my life because it’s hard to get to the end of the row when you have little people with immediate needs and I kept forgetting which way I was going and it just was a frustrating pain in the heiney and that’s that.  But I have plenty of yarn from back in the day when I collected.  (And I still collect, but it’s for crochet which doesn’t have the end of the line issue and requires less juggling.)  I started a sweater quite a long time ago and it’s been there in my basement taunting me.  So I looked at it this weekend.  And it’s not the color I thought.  I thought it was teal and bright and it’s not.  But anyhow.  I found the receipt in the bag.  Seriously. Knitting sweaters is an expensive proposition.  The receipt is from 1993.  Oh. My. Goodness.  I may touch it some more.  On principle.  It would be a good color for Spawn.  Maybe I’ll ask her what color sweater she would like.

oh my goodness

there IS a line button

---

what else does this thing do?

I have done some craziness so I have to leave it just so.  And that’s ok.
I’ve decided that my new goal is learning to play the ukelele and studying up on calculus (which was incomprehensible those bazillion times I tried.)
I’ve decided that I don’t have to do anything with freaking Christmas that I don’t really want to do. 
And I don’t care what anyone says about it.
Oh, golly. LLO just finished reading Bridge to Terabithia.  That stinks. (It has a sad ending.)
I’ve decided that it is perfectly acceptable to burn stuff in my backyard. 
As long as I don’t burn down the house and I’m not sure that matters so much either.
I’ve decided that watching movies is a good thing.
I dug out a project that I started before small people.  I may actually work on it.  I may not.
I have to go help LLO make metaphors for Thanksgiving food now. 
Earlier tonight I helped Spawn translate German. 
I’m that kind of awesome.
Well.  Sort of.  Because tomorrow Spouseman is scheduled to have a birthday and I have bupkus.

---

Now that I’ve titled this bad boy, I don’t know where to begin.  It’s all melodrama, I think.  So maybe it doesn’t even matter where I begin. Or end.

In general, I’m in an opting out frame of mind right now.  I have somewhere to go in a little bit, and I’m not sure that I’m going to make myself.  I’m running out of excuses except that I just don’t feel like it.  I want to hide.  We bought a relative a funny t-shirt a couple years ago and I think I should own it myself.  It says, “I read your t-shirt, that’s enough social interaction for today.”

I opted in to Thanksgiving with the in-laws and out of Thanksgiving with my p’s.  I opted in for spouseman’s cousin, who I really like, and her husband, who makes me laugh,  and doing a puzzle with her (and my mother-in-law) and holding her 5 month old grandson, who is freaking adorable.  (Egads.  Grandson.  I’m not sure that she’s 40 yet.  In fact, I think she is not.)  I really think she and her entourage are the only reason.  My brother-in-law was in a mood.  The bed we sleep in there is a torture device.  And that freaking bird clock drives me crazy.  My father-in-law thinks it’s hilarious.  He puts batteries in that clock just for me.  I’m serious.  So every hour on the hour some birdsong lets me know that time is ticking (slowly).  I packed an outrageous quantity of projects and activities for those two days.

So, why on earth did I opt into their Thanksgiving and opt out of my p’s?  Because I’m desperately tired of doing double holidays, which we always do.  My mom was already irritated that we weren’t coming on Thanksgiving itself, so she didn’t care that we didn’t come at all this weekend and doesn’t seem to care if we go next Saturday either.  Or maybe that’s just my irrational feelings towards my brother who lives with them (for many and justified reasons, probably).  He’s a selfish, obnoxious prick.  There, I said it.  And my relationship with my parents is suffering for it, whether they are aware of it or not.  The last time I visited, I was there to do my mother a favor and the first hour of our visit was a full report on my brother’s job and schooling.  My brother has been in some kind of higher education for most of the past 20 years.  I actually think he’s been in nursing school since LLO was a baby.  And I don’t care.  Sorry, but I don’t.  I don’t care what his job is, because he changes jobs like most people get their hair cut.  I don’t care how far he’s driving or how hard he’s working or whatever.  Because it doesn’t appear to me that my mother cares about what’s going on with us.  She didn’t know how hard I was working.  She didn’t know how hard the beginning of middle school was for LLO.  I don’t think she knows that Spouseman has slightly migrated jobs.  She doesn’t know these things because I didn’t tell her.  But you know what?  She didn’t ask either.

This was not what I was going to whine about.  Because the other day, Spawn says to me that she feels differently about her grandparents.  She was telling me about how my crazy uncle was giving her a hard time because my kids don’t know my mom’s side of the family.  Well, we don’t see them.  And there are thousands.  OK, hundreds.  Anyhow. She had the thought that these people aren’t really her relatives because we share no genetics.  And the reason that she feels differently about her grandparents is that she is biologically related to one set and not the other.  Holy crap.  Are you kidding me?  But then I wonder if this is really true.  It doesn’t seem to me like my parents feel about me the same way that I feel about my kids and honestly I probably don’t feel the same way about them that my kids feel about me.  But is that really because of genetics?  Or is it because of who these people are?  My in-laws have been thrusting themselves on us since the grandchildren were delivered by the stork.  They drove 3 1/2 hours one way for a day trip every week when Spawn was a baby until I couldn’t stand it any more.  My parents waited for us to visit them.  My in-laws beg us to let them visit.  My parents nag that we don’t come see them. 

I remember when I was a kid, that’s how it was for us too.  We visited the grandparents, they did not come to us.  Spouseman’s grandmother lived next door to them.  You know she wasn’t waiting to be visited.  So, no, I don’t think it’s biology.  I think it’s who these people are.  They are who they are, faults and all.  Just like I am who I am: antisocial, unforgiving, tired, melodramatic.

I should stay quiet.

I dream about shoes more than a normal person.  I’m sure of it.  Last night’s foray into my subconscious was bizarre-ish. This is the part I remember (I know there was more as I do so much traveling in my dreams these days.)  I climbed some kind of ladder thing and when I got to the top there was a hanging (? from the sky?) wire shelf filled with shoes which I then threw to the ground one at a time.  Then I climbed over the last rung of the ladder thing and slid down an incredibly high slide.  It was summertime, which was nice.  I enjoyed the heat and a wardrobe that doesn’t involve corduroy and sweaters thank you very much.

I’m on Thanksgiving break already. No school tomorrow. YAY!  (oops. I shouldn’t say it that enthusiastically.  yay.)  We don’t go back until next Tuesday because of the whole deer slaying action.  yay.  I’m glad to live in a part of the state where we get a day off school so people can traipse around shooting Bambi.  And I’m even more excited because we are not doing our usual T-giving traveling.  We’re only hitting one set of parents this year.  So several days in my own house with my own people and one of those days we can do our own Thanksgiving spread.  Which I like to do.  First I have to get a turkey though.  Oops.

I have two silly cats.  They have a unique method of letting us know they want to come in.  They launch themselves onto my window screen.  It’s about 6 feet up, so impressive I think.  It cracks me up to see these varmints splayed out on the screen (I can’t seem to catch it with my camera).  For a while, it scared the bejeebers out of me to hear that sound.  Used to it now.  Not thrilled about it in the middle of the night.  But some bozo keeps letting them out at nighttime.

It’s funny what kids think is important.  Well, not funny, really.  Surprising.  When you think you know how they think, they say something unexpected.

I think there’s a very real possibility that someday I will be a crazy recluse.  There are days I don’t leave the house.  And I like it.  And if I didn’t have someone dragging me to something I wouldn’t go even someplace fun.  In a moment of weakness, I agreed to go to a holiday party.  Thank goodness it is two weeks away.  I think.  I know I have a Christmas Eve party to go to.  I’m kinda hoping a friend has her Christmas party, but half hoping she doesn’t too.  So, yup.  At some point in my life, I’m going to wear pajamas all the time and never leave my house.  Thank goodness, you all won’t know unless I tell you.

 

Today I am doing that: resting on my laurels.  In the only way that I can.  Which involves very little resting and very little plant life.

First event of the morning (aside from a glorious family sleep in- it was almost 9am before anyone in the fam moved) was LLO’s unloading of 6 weeks of pent up emotion.  Wow. That girl has some stuff.  Also, I see that I have taught her very well how to freak out about the holidays, because she is desperate to go shopping.  She has so many presents to buy and the world will end if she doesn’t get them today.  I suppose it’s like Hagrid says “better out than in.”  Especially since Spawn told me the other day that she was miserable in middle school.

Other major coups:  LLO spontaneously decided to take her dirty laundry out of her room and made noises that tell me she’s actually thinking about putting clean laundry away.  Spawn admits that she has homework this weekend.  It’s only Saturday morning, this usually doesn’t come up until Sunday late afternoon.

I’m upset.  On the one hand, I worked my butt off and I deserve to graduate.  But on the other hand, I do not know that my advisor read the final version of my paper before he approved it.  This bugs me.  I know he read the rough drafts because he had plenty to say about them.  Final.  Nuttin.  And I’ve written a heck of a lot of papers in these past 2-3 years and these profs just don’t say squat.  They promise comments and the only thing they deliver is an overall grade for the class.  I think you have an obligation that if you make someone write something, you ought to read it and say something.  Anyhow.  Back to the final.  Did he approve it because I submitted to the process or did he approve it because it was worthy?  Should it matter to me?

Is this the problem with my whole life?  That I care what someone else thinks?  That when I take measure it’s with someone else’s yardstick?  I need a new yardstick.

On that note, I’m going to go clean out my fridge which is disgusting.

Then we’re going to watch LOTR in the middle of the day (gasp).

 

I’m compiling a list of the things I want to do starting exactly then when I can.

• refinish the kitchen table which i have completely trashed with the assorted stuff i do at that table
• figure out how to fix the porcelain in what used to be a nice kitchen sink
• read a book every week
• go roller skating
• finish something
• figure out how to turn off the random commercials that start playing on the computer randomly
• write a poem worthy of publication in some random magazine
• read a book every week.  from start to finish.
• OH MY GOSH! teach spawn to drive.
• drink a lot
• read all the books i collected last year
• paint on a canvas
• get rid of stuff
• play more games
• go to parties willingly
• finish that bench i started painting in may-ish
• grow a plant
• figure out how to turn the tv on
• reacquaint my children with nagging mother
• figure out how i get to the beach this summer
• inherit a small fortune
• grow a pineapple
• crochet a tree cozy

ok. that should about do it.

execute: derives from Latin exsequi, “carry out, follow up; punish”

I’ve got something on my mind.  Truthfully, I can’t be bothered with things like facts.  I just know what I think is morally wrong.  This opinion is developing constantly as my gut feeling is confronted by what is related.  I’m not about influencing people:  your opinion is worth as much as mine. (at least to you) But mine is mine and I feel like talking about it.  Perhaps that’s enough preamble. 

I awakened this morning to the shocking news, which I hoped was just the creation of my bizarre and sometimes worrisome imagination, that there was an execution scheduled for this very day in the beautiful state of Pennsylvania.  I was stunned.  I hadn’t even known that my home state, where I have lived most of my life, in fact, had the death penalty.  Let alone that there was a death chamber (whatever it is, I do not care what method was chosen as optimal to kill somebody legally) not 20 minutes from where my children lay their sweet heads.  Perhaps we should cue patriotic music here or We Are The World or something.  How in the heck does a state founded by Quakers have the death penalty as an option?

Anyhow.  I was late to work so I did what I usually do for information.  Not google this time, but an obnoxious Facebook post whereupon I received confirmation that my state had scheduled this act of barbarism on this night.  (My mother’s birthday, incidentally.  Also my mother-in-law.  Although I doubt either one of them would have any qualms with the death penalty, both being fine church-going women. meow)  This thought rocked my faith in the world.  How in the heck do you justify the punishment of killing a human being for killing another human being?  I realize there are other sides to consider.  I realize that perhaps the family of the girl who was killed would sleep better at night knowing the animal who killed her was no longer on the earth.  I realize that some people can’t be rehabilitated.  But I just can’t accept that this is right.  My mind refuses to see how it makes sense for someone(s) to decide that a man (even an evil man) should not be alive because he made the decision that someone else should not be alive. 

And it makes my brain explode to think what this means.  Remember when Osama Bin Laden was executed?  I do.  People cheered.  Call me un-American, but I could not.  It made me sick to my stomach the joy that the crowd found in his death.  Don’t get me wrong, I’m no saint.  I do not mind that his time on earth has ended.  But to cheer for another human being’s death does not sit well with me.  That someone deliberately targeted this person for death makes me feel a little dirty.  Yes, certainly, this decision probably saved thousands of lives and maybe retribution itself is sweet.  Which is what makes this issue so complicated.  

If I can’t stand the idea of killing someone who is guilty, what can I possibly think about wars and abortion, when innocent people are involved?  My father was in Korea, but he doesn’t talk about it with me.  He has with spouseman.  I’ve certainly run across people and heard about people who came back from wars.  And I watched Forest Gump.  (that was supposed to be humor)  And I’m sorry for them.  I can’t imagine serving my country that way.  I will call it that, no matter how much of a pacifist I am, because I understand that they have sacrificed much for what they believed in.  And I’ve never been in the position that I needed to choose an abortion, for which I’m very grateful.  I always suspected that a friend in high school had one, but I never asked and I never judged.  I wouldn’t want to make that choice is all.

Life is so freaking complicated.  

I was relieved that the execution was stayed.  Postponed maybe.  But it didn’t happen tonight and this just feels right.  Call me an idealist or a simpleton if you feel better doing so, but I think life is something far from disposable.   

• i cannot walk and chew gum at the same time.  at least not today.
• are you kidding me?  xanga double spaces everything except bullets?  what is up with that?
• i had to put real clothes on at 5pm (it was pajama day at work, but not anywhere in the real world)
• advisor essentially said my idea was good, but that i needed to change it to fit his.  and you know what, that’s ok too.
• i don’t care about that.  at all.  because it’s all bs.
• my fan club is awesome sauce.  i feel like i’ve got a cape.
• up until the point where i’m awake enough to actually do anything.
• i think i’m going to quit drinking coffee sometime soon. 
• have you noticed i really have nothing to say?  it’s true. i have nothing to say
• i was silly at work today. 
• it was light when the alarm went off this morning and pitch black at 7pm.  i hate that.  gimme back my summer.
• spawn told me today that the dad of a kid she knows died of a heart attack while changing the oil in his car. that just seems so wrong to me.
• lots of things are wrong, if you think about it.
• which is why i don’t.  no thinking here.

 

#whim sh 35. CREATE a mandala. This was fun and I must say pretty therapeutic.

1. Write a POEM in which socks and death are mentioned

I wore socks to a funeral today.

The barbershop chorus sang Swing Low Sweet Chariot

The dress code was casual and bright.

Actually I didn’t wear socks, I wore painted shoes.

The preacher sang a song about dancing at funeral.

The School Board Quartet mentioned The Music Man.

And how the man who died was uncomfortable with the

role of saying unkind words.

His last name makes me think of truth.

Death is sometimes a kindness.

He sang until two days before he died.

It wasn’t the cancer that claimed him,

but the cancer treatments.

Sometimes I believe in Heaven.

 

Whim sh 24. Write 22 HAIKU about animals. Ha. which I’ve been working on for freaking ever. Plus you will accept it as 2.13 #bluemooncat enormous thing write a children’s book.  There was going to be illustrations and stuff, but I lost interest.  Get over it. 

An armadillo

Acts attentive. After all

Ants are attractive.

 

Bandicoots burrow

By night best bugs and mammals

Big feet batter prey

 

Capybara chews

Coarse grass continuously

‘Cause they’re colossal

 

 

No dodo dances

Disappeared through human hands

Distinct but extinct

 

Elephants often

Erupt most eloquently

Horton hears haiku?

 

Fairest flamingo

Flits in flamenco fashion

Filter feed  fuschia

 

Garrulous gibbon

Goes gallivanting in trees

An agile swinger

 

Hippopotamus

Have hinges hovering high

Or harpsichord teeth

 

Iguanas hang out

In the canopy. Catch me?

 Chicken of the trees

 

Mighty Jag-u-ar

No difference where you are

Always wants more lunch

 

Kakapo parrot

Uncommon, can’t fly, owl face

Keeps climbing nightly

 

Little slow loris

Leaves toxic bite, hangs at night

Longer lived in wild

 

Mini  Marmosets

Make moves in the canopy

Germline chimerism

 

[which occurs when the germ cells (for example, sperm and egg cells) of an organism are not genetically identical to its own. It has recently been discovered that marmosets can carry the reproductive cells of their (fraternal) twin siblings, because of placental fusion during development.]

 

‘Ndangered numbat

Ne’er puts baby in her pouch

She doesn’t have one.

 

The otter oughtter

Occupy water and land

Only more of them

 

Pademelon puts a

Precious package in her pouch

Yup, marsupial

 

Querulous Quetzal

Quickly questions the quiet:

Admire my plumage

 

Rattlesnake rhumba

Is far less about dancing

Than a group might think

 

Serval sleek and smart

Softly slinks in savanna

Specialized searcher

 

Tuatara tricks-

Looks like lizard but is reptile

Crested tino-saur

 

Unusual Uakari

Undertakes lunch under trees

Bald is beautiful

 

A volt of Vulture

A vision of revulsion

Better than a wake

 

The wild Wildebeest

Wanders a willy nilly

Until he’s eaten

 

X-ray tetra swims

So exhausted we see bones

Here fishy fishy

 

Yester Yak yodelled

Yakkety yak, won’t come back

Great fur cow threatened

 

Ze size of Zebu

Zomehow keeps zis humpy cow

Zestful in ze heat

 

Wiki is my close friend as well as http://a-z-animals.com , which is written just as my level.