Unmentionables

The Hubby and I were discussing unmentionables this weekend. I never realized men (and I suppose that's a generalization) were so excited by unmentionables. Please stop reading here if you're easily embarrassed. : )

I've never really thought about panties and bras as anything other than utilitarian clothing and my garmets reflect that thought process. I have gotten a little "racey" over the years and branched away from white to a variety of fun colors but aside from that nothing exciting.

I do not understand the thong at all and I've tried one but they're incredibly uncomfortable.

Apparently lacey things are a big plus for some men. For those females reading this, what's your take on underwear? Utilitarian? Sexy? The Hubby said he thought women wore things like that for themselves as well as their significant others. I've read articles that say wearing lacey, sexy underwear under your every day work clothes gives you a secret sense of power or something. If you do that do you find it to be true?

The conversation then turned to the younger generation and their preference for shaving and waxing certain areas of their bodies, both men and women. Really? My cousin, who's a 20 something, told us lots of guys now a days (like I'm some ancient old lady) shave. Really? Hmmm, I don't find that attractive at all.

Non sequitor
My baby turned 7 this weekend, I can't believe it. Friday night we celebrated my nephew's birthday, he turned 5, and Saturday we celebrated The Boy's birthday with a skating party. Fun was had by all until my Mom took a spill and broke the hell out of her arm. It was so bad she passed out, the ambulance came and rushed her to the ER. It broke in two places, had to be jerked back into place, casted and she'll have to have surgery.

I am...

...like Pablo Picasso.
Today, October 25 is the birthday of the artist Pablo Picasso, born in Malaga, Spain (1881). He had trouble getting out of bed in the morning, and usually spent the afternoon conversing with friends. It was at night that he did most of his work, usually in the dark, except for two spotlights shining directly on his canvas. He didn't use a palette -- he just had the cans of paint sitting on the floor, and he would dip the brushes right in and then wipe the excess off on newspapers. He stood up while he painted, often for three or four hours at a time. Then once in a while, he'd take an hour off to go sit at the other end of the room in a wicker armchair and stare at his painting, analyzing his work.

...a smart ass. Am I really? For those that know me in real life, do you consider me a smart ass as in witty or a mean smart ass? If one analyzed such things I would say people who are smart asses or attempt humor are probably a tad bit insecure and they use the humor as a shield.

...an alcoholic neanderthal. I do not know about wines or fancy, sophisticated liquors. What I really hate are people who are alcohol snobs and who think they are sophisticated simply because they order high falutin wines or drinks. I'd like to stuff a joint in their mouths and say, shut the hell up.

...possibly bi-polar. I know, I know, I should wash my mouth out with soap and go stand in the corner or something because I've trashed my nut job sister over this for years. I am not all of a sudden now going to become my sister's best friend, but when I step out of myself sometimes I think I could be bi-polar. For no reason at all I can become jocular and happy go lucky and the next day one little thing (like receiving hate mail and getting questioned about my abilities) can sink me down low, I say way down low.

...verging on the cusp of needing West Wing therapy. I received an email from Amazon that I can pre-order the 7th and last season on DVD. I'm jonesin' for it. We're on our second viewing of the seasons now and I have to say I love it just as much the second time around, if not more. I don't think I've ever been so enamored with a TV show. Sure, I love ER and watched it regularly, but this, this is something totally different.

Climb every mountain; getting manis and swimming with sharks

Climb every mountain
It was Boys and Girls weekend at our house. The Boys went on their first Cub Scout camping trip. I don't know who was more excited, the Hubby (who's been roped in to being a leader, complete with the uniform and all!) or the Boy who has already earned his first badge!

They left Sat. morning and I was concerned because it's getting down around 35 degrees here at night now and they were going to the mountains. I called them at 2ish and the Hubby sounded winded and about to keel over. (He later admitted he was afraid of having a heart attack on the mountain and that he would have had to been hauled off.)

Him: Huff, puff, we're climbing a mountain. I'll call you later.

Never heard from him again. I was a bit worried but he'd warned me they might not have cell phone coverage in BFE.


They got home Sunday before noon and they'd had a great time. Apparently their hike was on a huge mountain (see picture of the area but not necessarily the mountain they climbed) with a tiny trail that sometimes had ropes to help you climb. A bit much for 6 year olds I think. One kid broke his arm. It was cold at night but they managed. The Boy said his favorite part was throwing sticks in the fire.

Getting manis
While they did BOY stuff the Girl and I got a manicure. A first for both of us. Having never done such a thing I just picked a place on a whim. There were two women and one man working there. They were not overly friendly, but then I don't know that they spoke much English. I was getting concerned while we were waiting. The guy manicurist switched the TV to football and proceeded to watch it while he was doing someone else's nails. When a customer was paying for her services she asked why her daughter didn't get such and such treatment with her manicure and the response was we do it if we have time. She asked, but you charge the same regardless? Yes. I was thinking of walking out when we got called to our tables. We got them done, it was fun and though I won't go back to that place again I will do it again. I won't, however, let me talk them into getting my eyebrows waxed because that was a bitch, it doesn't look all that different, my brows are still tender and my face felt greasy all day.

After the manis we shopped some, rented a movie and I got Starbucks. We had a good day and stayed up late watching TV in my bed. It was nice to have the Girl to myself for a day, even if I did get the random questions about periods and hormones.

Swimming with Sharks
So the hate mail I received a few weeks ago has turned into an issue at work. It has been incredibly difficult for me and my confidence has been cut to the quick to put it mildly. I went from a job where I pretty much felt I could do no wrong and that people adored me (seriously, I was good at what I did) sort of like being a medium sized fish in a big pond to a job where everyone is second guessing me, criticizing me, questioning my judgement and attacking me like a big fish in a little pond swimming with sharks. I have uncovered a mafia in my new industry and apparently I have pissed them off. I do not thrive in this type of environment. Sadly I've let it bring me down and in fact for the last two weeks I've been paralyzed to do much of anything, make any decisions, write anything etc.

Today I am making a decision to say fuck it and do what I know I'm good at, stand up to the man and show them what I'm made of and if I get fired I get fired. I can find another job. I am woman, hear me ROAR!


Non sequitur
Ok, not that I'm a Satan worshipper or anything, but have you noticed you don't see many Halloween decorations that are devil-related these days? What's up with that?

Freebird and a dilemma

Last night at dinner the kids were being their normal selves. You'd think we mainlined them coke or something by the way they act sometimes; both talking at the same time, the Boy jumping up from his seat to show us a dance move on the kitchen floor or the Girl going on about the operation she just watched on Discovery.

I was sitting there, fairly about to explode with pride at the dinner I'd made--fried chicken (which I've done about five times in my life), homemade HEART-SHAPED biscuits (if Bisquick constitutes homemade) and fresh broccoli. I was beaming.

The kids were talking about songs and words in songs etc. and I said even when they're teen agers there will probably be music I won't let them listen to. They didn't bite on that and didn't really care. Then the Hubby and I started talking and he brought up all these songs we listened to (he still tries to convince me Love Shack by the B52's is about an orgy) and I can't be a prude when it comes to the kids.

True, I wouldn't be a prude but neither do I think they need to listen to songs about killing hos or shooting cops or belittling women, etc. The Hubby said well as long as the Boy doesn't come home with his baggy pants showing his boxers. I said that could be a problem especially with our Boy who freebird's 99% of the time. (Wow, that was a circuitous story to tie into the title of this post!)

...and now for the dilemma.

Friday afternoon I was visiting a showroom for work. It was late in the afternoon, around 5ish and aside from some guys working on the loading docks the streets were fairly deserted in this part of town. It was still daylight so I wasn't really scared or anything but I was watchful, had my keys in my hand ready to get in the car. I was in a public parking lot on a corner, about 15 other cars in there and every once in awhile cars would pass on the street. I got in the car and a young guy started walking toward the car. He had his hands in his pockets and I started getting nervous because it was obvious he wanted to ask me something. I started the car and reached for my cell just in case. I cracked the window, after debating whether I should even do that or not. He asked if I could jump his car. I told him I didn't have cables, he said he did, I said I had to get to an appointment and was sorry I couldn't help him.

I've thought about that and feel badly. Had someone else been with me I wouldn't have hesitated. Was I being too cautious? Yes, he was black but even if he were purple I felt uncomfortable one on one with a stranger in a deserted lot.

Magdalene laundries

Last night we started watching this movie, The Magdalene Sisters, about girls who were kept in convents in Ireland and forced to work in the laundries. It was disturbing. I didn't realize until the credits that it was based on a true story.

Magdalen Asylums were homes for "fallen" women, most of them operated by different orders of the Roman Catholic Church. It has been estimated that 30,000 women were admitted during the 150-year history of these institutions, often against their will. The last Magdalen Asylum in Ireland closed on September 25, 1996.

The Magdalene Sisters is a semi-fictionalized, composite account of the stories of four inmates. It opens in 1964 at an Irish wedding with a priest coiled around a drum, furiously banging away. The shaman is musically transfixed. His sweaty-collared appearance suggests that he may also be engaged in some manner of soul cleansing, no doubt involving an element of sexual release. Concurrently a young woman, Margaret (Anne-Marie Duff), is being raped by her cousin. When she reenters the wedding room, word of her violation round-robins through the crowd. The next morning, Margaret’s father ships her off to the Magdalene Laundry.

Rose (Dorothy Duffy) has just had a child out of wedlock. Priest and parents rip the baby from her breast, force her to sign adoption papers and send her to the laundry.

Bernadette (Nora-Jane Noone) is reaching adulthood in St. Attracta’s Orphanage. When she innocently flirts with the local factory boys, she too is sent to the laundry.

The three sack-clothed girls are met by the convent’s Mother Superior, Sister Bridget (Geraldine McEwan), the provider of the “earthly means to help cleanse your very soul.” “All men are sinners ... therefore all men are open to temptation,” croons the diabolical head nun as she berates the girls for being “temptation” incarnate. Simultaneously, this Bride of Christ is greedily counting rubber-banded rolls of money in front of a photograph of the late President John F. Kennedy.

In the laundry, supervised by the semi-mad Katy—a 40-year veteran of the institution—the girls meet Crispina (Eileen Walsh), a mentally handicapped girl who refuses to wash priest collars. Crispina, whose real name is Harriet (the girls are routinely renamed by the nuns) has had a child out of wedlock, the father an anonymous soldier. Father Fitzroy, the asylum priest, is also sexually molesting the innocent, feeble-minded girl.

In one sadistically graphic scene, naked girls are lined up in the shower room as two nuns mock and compare the girls’ body parts. Apparently, this does not fall under the sinful category of lust or “impure thoughts.”

Bernadette incites the others to consider an escape, insisting “that all the mortal sins in the world would not justify this place.” But the consequences of a failed attempt can be grave. Director Mullan himself portrays a crazed father who brutally pummels his daughter in the asylum dormitory after an aborted escape.

A Corpus Christie celebration in town provides the girls with a short respite from their grueling life. But while officiating at the mass, Father Fitzroy is exposed before all as Crispina’s seducer through an avenging act by Margaret (both victim and victimizer come down with an irritating rash). With unabashed cruelty, the nuns send Crispina to an insane asylum, where she dies from anorexia at age 24.

Some years later, Margaret is released through her brother’s efforts, but not without one last humiliation at the hands of Sister Bridget. Bernadette, fearful of becoming a “lifer” like Katy, daringly leads Rose out of the convent, threatening to bludgeon with holy artifacts any nun who stands in their way. A postscript intimates that life after the asylum was grim for the three remaining Magdalenes.

Mullan’s film is an angry, direct work that displays an abundance of commitment on the part of both its creator and actors. The film depicts a society that up until only a few years ago tolerated Church-sanctioned torture and extreme levels of exploitation. One reviewer likened the “Magdalenes” to the Guantánamo Bay prisoners.

I pulled this stuff from other places to explain it. I just couldn't put it into words because I'm still reeling from it. I'm dumbfounded things like this happen, can still happen, in this day and age. I don't understand how people can be so cruel to other people; it's worse yet they do it in the name of God.

The first time I...

...heard Drops of Jupiter by Train was about 3 years ago over a restaurant PA system.

...got drunk and threw up I was 5-6 years old. My parents thought it would be ok to give me beer.

...experienced death I was about 8 years old and my great grandmother died in her sleep at my grandma's house.

...remember writing poetry was in the third grade. It went something like this:

Rain makes the world seem dull and gray,
but listen to what the flowers say.
Tomorrow when the sun is full and bright
the rain will have kept us fresh
and full of color and light.
Sun, the soil, fresh air and rain
make children and flowers bloom again.

...realized I wanted to have a job that involved writing was in junior high. I would make up products and write ad copy for them.

...met my husband I was a smart ass toward him. (I know, imagine that!)

...French kissed a boy I was 14.

...saw Rod Stewart in concert I was in college, it was his Out of Order tour in 1989 I think.

...had an overnight hospital stay was when I had my gall bladder taken out about 10 years ago.

...saw people smoking weed I was in high school at a Monsters of Rock concert.

...got hate mail at work over an editorial was today.

Whew

Thursday when we got home there was a message from the dermatologist office the Hubby had been to a few weeks ago. He'd gone in to have a suspicious mole removed and the doctor told him on first sight it was skin cancer but he'd have to verify that with tests.

So we swallowed that bit of fun. Skin cancer. Not as serious as other things but still it was cancer. The Hubby was to have a follow up visit last week, which we had to reschedule for this week.

Thursday's voicemail was from the nurse who said it's important for you to speak with the doctor. Like that doesn't make the hair on the back of your neck stand up. Friday morning we called and were told the nurse was out until Monday. We drove to the office. It's closed until Monday. The Hubby made a few more calls to no avail. We had to suffer all weekend wondering WTF was going on.

As much as you don't like to think the worst I did (and I'm sure he did too though we both tried to play it off like it was no big deal.) It's a horrible thing knowing where your creative mind will wander when faced with such a wait.

This morning the Hubby talked to the nurse--who is now and will always be on my shit list. She said they noticed he didn't make his appointment last week; uh, yeah did you also notice I rescheduled the damn thing? No, no I didn't see that. Well the results came back and it is skin cancer. Uh yeah, that's what he told me when he sliced the thing off. Oh, well, we just wanted to tell you the lab results and to make sure you come back in because now that you've had skin cancer once you're more likely to get it again and we need to stay on top of these things. Uh, yeah tell me something I don't know beeotch. So are you telling me there's nothing else? Yes, that's right. Ok, well next time do not call me on a Thursday and leave a message that it's important if you know you won't be back in the office until Monday. Oh, I'm sorry I didn't think about that. STUPID CUNT! Ok, I'm sorry for that but damn! You don't have cancer in someone's file and leave a message like that.

I feel like calling that nurse and leaving her a message--hey, you're blood work came back. You're pregnant, it's not your husband's, you have herpes, genital warts and diabetes. Oh yeah, you have cancer too and about 3 months left to live. IDIOT!