Oh, Hello

Since about 2014 I've had stabbing, transient anxiety that this blog was deleted due to inactivity. In college, I didn't check my Hotmail account for like 2 months, and when I logged back in there was NOTHING. Five years of communication gone. Earlier this year I remembered I had a Yahoo account that I hadn't checked in about 2 years, and when I finally got into it, it was a void. Emails from my late mother were gone forever - my heart felt as empty as my inbox. 

Don't think I haven't considered committing a heinous crime against humanity just to get the FBI or NSA to recover my emails in search of clues to my motivation. 

<Insert But her emails joke here>

Rather than just check Butter No Parsnips, I ignored it. If I didn't look, I couldn't be disappointed. It could exist in a state like a bad interpretation of Schrödinger's Cat. Maybe it's here, maybe it's not, I just didn't know if I could bear to open that box. If you're reading this, we both know the answer. It's here! Hooray! Such a relief! Right? 

What I didn't know the answer to, is if I cared so much, why did I stop? What long, dark tea-time of the soul was I wrestling with? Why am I back now? Gentle reader, this blog let one facet of my personality open up and be honest. These writings are not a perfect representation of me, but they are a perfect representation of one piece of me, and when my brother had cancer I stopped letting myself be honest in real life. Because a couple of my friends followed me, I couldn't let them see what was happening on my inside while I lied in the real world. The rage and frustration and sheer pain couldn't come out in one place while I tried to smile in another. That was the first blow. 

Surviving physical therapy school consumed most of my time, and when I graduated I assumed I'd start writing again. But, no. Losing my brother nearly killed me. It was also the start of the first cracks in my marriage that I could not fix with mental Bondo putty. They spiderwebbed through the foundation, and once I finally started me career and felt like everything was going to come together, the marital structure started to turn to dust. Now my smile was plastered on, and virtually admitting to anything else was impossible. That was the killing blow. 

This isn't good work. In high school my dreams of being a novelist felt entirely attainable, and I think my high school self would maaaaybe be horrified by what I've done with the written word. But let me tell that loveable b*tch something - she deeeeeefinitely wrote shitty poetry and needs to back up. It's my work, and like a mother with her ugly-ass baby, my love is fierce and protective. 

That'll do Butter No Parsnips, that'll do.

Build Your Wings on the Way Down

In the 6th grade, I fell in love with Ray Bradbury.

I was one of those kids that read incessantly.  I often ran out of things to read between trips to the library, because if I checked out as many books as I could read I'd lose one or two.  Anyway, my English teacher only assigned a few of the short stories in our textbook, so I decided to read the rest of them.  Of the lot, I still remember two.  Carnal Knowledge by T. Coraghessan Boyle was memorable because parts were funny, but there were sexy bits I didn't understand.  I probably remember it because of the confusion and the not wanting to ask my parents what was really going on.

But The Pedestrian by Ray Bradbury resonated with me.  I didn't feel confused, I felt I'd reached enlightenment.  When I finished it I felt my heart racing and my brain clamoring and my skin prickling.  It was as if he'd written the story just for me, to let me know I wasn't alone and I wasn't crazy.  Whoever wrote this, I thought, has feelings just like mine.  I think he knows me already.

At eleven-years-old I didn't understand that the stories in my textbook were written by authors that had written other things, so I didn't search the library for his books.  A few years later my eleventh-grade English class read Fahrenheit 451, which is my favorite book to this day.  A couple months prior to that assignment my class had the chance to attend one of his speaking engagements.  If I had read the book first, I would have hung on his every word.  Actually, maybe it is for the best that I was unaware of his awesomeness, because I would have cried in front of my entire stupid class because my idol was so close but not close enough to thank.

The Pedestrian is more precious to me today than it was twenty years ago.  How many times have we tried to hold a conversation with someone who keeps looking at their phone for texts?  How many times have we competed with a motherfucking screen to gain someone's acknowledgement?  How many times have we wanted to scream STOP CHECKING TWITTER AND PAY ATTENTION TO MEEEEEEEE!!!  

The only other famous people whose deaths caused me genuine grief* are Jim Henson and Fred Rogers.  Like them, Ray Bradbury changed the way I looked at the world and how I felt about myself.  I have purposefully paced myself for reading his works so I don't run out of new stories by the time I'm 35.  I know I'll continue to be shaped by his imagination, and for that I am thankful.

Rather, I am thankful for everything you gave me, Mr. Bradbury.






*I am tearing up right now.

The End of the Middle

I'm impatiently awaiting my grade for the last final exam of my second year of PT school, and I'm killing time on the computer so I can obsessively check for my grade.  I have posted very little about my life since 2010, for a couple of reasons.  Firstly, it was difficult to express the process of losing my brother to cancer.  I hope you never know what it is like.  It was also hard to jive what I'd say to people with what I wanted to write to the internets.  Face to face, I felt I had to put up a brave front.  If you saw me and are thinking "THAT was a brave front?  I've seen a quivering mass of Jell-o hold up better!" then I say "You have no idea what I was like on the inside."  ANYWAY I felt like I couldn't say one thing to people and the truth to the internets.  But I couldn't lie to the internets either, I mean, who does that? 

Secondly, I was afraid that every post I wrote about school would devolve into "You guuuuysss, it's so haaaaarrrrrrrrrd.  I mean, soooooooo hard!"  It took three years of hardcore effort to be accepted, and then for three more years I just whine about how reeealllllllyyyy hard it is?  WHO DOES THAT?

Next week (if I pass this last final) I start another clinical rotation, and I realized I never told any stories from the first one!  Which is one reason I'm on blogger!  If I had actually written anything, rest assured you would have been emotionally moved, entertained, and gained a new appreciation for life itself.  This would have been your favorite blog, and you would refreshed Butter No Parsnips in the hopes I'd written another gem as frequently as I've been checking Blackboard for my grade .  Alas, the opportunity passed me by, and you just happened to stumble across this measly post in December because you wanted my recipe for Christmas cookies and you thought maybe I'd blogged about it in 2007.

Hmmmm, posting about cookies might actually be a good idea.  I can't whine about how hard that is. 

The Ratings: Vegetarians

Ovo-Lacto Vegetarian: Ahh, the lazy man's vegetarianism. The rules are simple: If the answer to "Am I eating a dead animal?" is "No," then ur doin it right. However, if the answer is "No, because he's still alive," then you are a sick fuck and not a vegetarian. A

Vegan: I have to admire someone that eats a cruelty-free diet that allows for french fries and whiskey binges if one so desires. Back in The Day, I wanted to go vegan and be able to claim No Animals Were Harmed in the Making of this Couscous Delight*. Try as I might, I could never give up the cheesecake and make the leap. I mean, have you had vegan cheesecake? I've eaten tastier plastics, thank you. A+

Ovo Vegetarian: Really? I don't get it. One: Dairy makes eggs better. Two: You've managed to forgo milk, cream, ice cream, sour cream, kefir, yogurt, butter, ghee, creme fraiche, and 10,000 types of cheese, but giving up eggs is a bit too much to ask? Ovo vegetarians are without the moxy of a vegan yet lack the easy-goingness of the "Don't mind me, I'll just order the cheese pizza/fettuccine alfredo/fried mozzarella" ovo-lactos. I'm sure you ovos have your reasons, but I doubt they're as logical and benevolent as my reasons for downing an entire jar of Nutella. C-

Vegan Rawist: Oh for the love of Pete, did none of you rawist people ever learn about science? Or evolution? Seriously, you can't argue with me that we don't have teeth like a jungle cat so we didn't evolve to eat meat AND turn a blind eye to having teeth that are ill-suited to gnawing on fibrous vegetation for hours at a time. You know what our teeth are evolved for? Pudding! D

Pescatarian: OK now, some of my best friends are pescatarians, and as a diet in general I give it an A-. But pescatarians that call themselves vegetarians make me feel a tad bit stabby. It's like claiming Hannibal Lecter was not a consumer of human flesh because he only ate the fancy bits. For nine years as an ovo-lacto I had the Sisyphean task of re-explaining to everyone that I will not eat your tuna salad because One: I hate pickle relish and Two: Fish are made of muscles, muscles are MEAT and just give me a gorram grilled cheese sammitch already. F



*Except for the squirrel the Kroger delivery van hit, that is.

The Ratings: Christmas Festivities

Christmas Eve: I spent the day working on an apple pie. It used to be a fairly easy pie to make, until MacGyver pointed out he preferred soft apples in chunks for the filling. So instead of running six apples through the Cuisinart and throwing them in the pie dough, I have to chop 10 apples by hand, cook them down, and drain them before assembling the pie. YAY. The pie was for the Cooper family Christmas Eve dinner. The one dish I get excited about is my faux mom/aunt's cheesy potatoes. The socialization was better than usual because I scored a seat close to VBG and her sister, and Nico let me hold him for about an hour. I keep my eye on a certain uncle because he made a pass at MacGyver a few years back. When he grabbed MacGyver's ponytail, I slapped his hand and told him to be glad I didn't have a knife. My fingers stung for a good five minutes afterwards. B

Christmas: We skipped brunch with MacGyver's immediate family and I slept till nearly 11am. We watched Mythbusters and cuddled on the couch with the kitties. We hit the Woodwose family Christmas Extravaganza of Awkward Silences, and when I scanned the room I discovered my favorite uncle (on that side, duh) wasn't there, and my favorite aunt (ditto) was engaged in a boring conversation about dogs (I love dogs, but I don't give a fuck about whose neighbor owned what breed back in the day) with one of MacGyver's most despised cousins (it's not that he's flaming and closeted that bothers him, it's that he's a selfish prick). So we sat near his grandma who was playing cards with some of her kids. Attempts at conversation were futile. KT and her crew arrived, and after some small talk prodding she recounted Sunny's misadventures with gluten-free baking. Sometime after we left an uncle threw a cousin out of the house for insulting his mom and aunt something awful. We split after an hour to see True Grit with my dad and brother. I really enjoyed it. Since nothing else was open, the four of us had Chinese food for dinner. A-

Boxing Day: Because my eldest brother couldn't visit until the 26th, I organized a family dinner the day after Christmas. My entire family (except one sister-in-law) gathered at the family farm. I made triple-chocolate and cranberry-orange cookies, MacGyver made grilled teriyaki salmon, I coached my brother through making potato soup, my sister brought a delicious salad (a monumental event), Ruth brought fruit salad, and my youngest brother brought rolls. This was the meal I was fantasizing about through the Cristmas Eve Cooper Family Dinner of Repetition and Mediocrity (except those potatoes!). This was the meal I had organized and delegated and could be proud of. This was the meal I missed because I was sick and stayed home to vomit in privacy. F---

Piss and Vinegar Tom

At MacGyver's family gatherings, there is a woman I avoid. She is MacGyver's dad's brother's wife's mother. This woman only sees me on Christmas Eve and the occasional Thanksgiving, she's not related to me, and I'm fairly sure she doesn't even know my name. However, she always demands to know when I'm going to make some babies.

Here's the thing: my biological clock is broken. I love my nieces and nephews and my friends' kids, but I have no desire to spawn my own. The ticking of MacGyver's biological clock is nearly deafening. It's a sad point of contention, and if anything ends our relationship, it's this.

So. Every time this woman asks me about subletting my womb, it is a pointed stick to my heart. No, Lady, I am not pregnant. I may never be pregnant. And there's a chance the love of my life may someday leave me because of it.

To amuse myself, while I avoid her I think of things I would like to say, but am too polite to say out loud.

She asks, "When are you going to have babies?" and I mentally reply:
-"No hablo inglés."
-"When I run out of 2-for-1 abortion coupons."
-"When I run out of wire coat hangers."
-"I'm barren, and your question deadens my soul."
-"Shut the fuck up."
-"When sleep and money lose their appeal."
-"When the novelty of aborting them wears off."
-"When I'm too drunk to remember the condom."
-"When the black market price of blue-eyed infants plummets."
-No words. Just a swift punch to the throat.
-"AFTER YOU DIE."

Liquid Sin

I was the perfect daughter.

Mostly.

During my teenage years, I made the effort to not misbehave, ever. My motivation came from my mother's rare and unpredictable illness. Seriously. Do you know what agnogenic myeloid metaplasia is? Of course you don't. She had a lot of ups and downs, and I was riddled with fear that I might do something to disappoint her, and then she'd die, and she'd die disappointed in me.

It was horrible. Also irrational. But real.

Anyway, I never ever broke curfew, smoked, drank,* backtalked, argued, had sex, talked on the phone too long, or ignored schoolwork. I flossed, went to mass, studied hard, followed the rules, and smothered my desire to give Doug a concussion with my biology textbook because that would be wrong despite how vindictively satisfying I knew - nay, fantasized - it would feel.

However. There was a major point of contention between my father and me. It inspired the closest thing to arguments I ever had with a parent. I protested on my behalf when confronted. I indulged in it behind his back. And the vice behind all of this?

Orange juice.

I drank orange juice by the glassful every day, sometimes twice a day. Dad did not approve. He said I shouldn't drink an entire glass of it, I should use a juice glass. And if I was still thirsty, I could have water. What he called a juice glass was a pimento-cheese spread jar. It held four measly ounces. I pointed out that a serving size was EIGHT, and it said so on the label. I left out the fact that I drank two to four times that amount daily. He told me it was too expensive. Apparently, orange juice is made of liquid platinum and the tears of baby unicorns. And that is why it cost an entire six dollars per bottle.

After he made noise about how he couldn't support my habit, I'd mutter "Fine" and act like I repented, but on the inside I was all "Give me orange juice or give me death!."

Later, I'd drink all the damn OJ I wanted. When I ran out, mom bought more. Repeat. Because I was just that kind of rebel.



*Except when my brother gave me that Apple Jack when my parents were out of town. It doesn't count if your big brother gives it to you, right?

Epiphany. Or something.

I thought I'd post a random thought, but I couldn't remember my password to log-in. And I was all "I don't need you to email me my password, Blogger! I'm better than that!" Because, you know, that would show weakness and I'd be attacked by a bear even sooner than I anticipated.

And then I remembered my password. But I used it with the wrong user name.

Go me!

So now I can post that thing I was thinking, which went something like: "If I ever meet someone less cool than me, some jerkwad is going to tell me it's an ironic lack of coolness. Which is cool. And I would no longer have someone I could lord my coolness over. FML."



That is all. Good night.

Point of No Return

In a matter of days, I will begin graduate classes for physical therapy. I began preparing to apply to this program just over three years ago, and I will graduate in just under three years.

Three years ago I was a social worker, my mother was alive, my brother Job didn't have cancer, I was living with my brother Chevy, and my antidepressant was working beautifully. None of that is true now. I can't help but to worry about what is going to happen in the next three years. Will my 80-year-old father live to see me graduate? What will the stress of work+school do to my marriage? Will I still be agnostic, or will I be atheist? Or muster a belief in God? What will I weigh?

As tough as taking night classes and applying to grad school was, I'm nervous that was the easy part. If my classmates are unitards, I won't have the luxury of a whole different class next semester - I'm going to be with the same people for three years. What if I can't make friends and most of the classwork is group work and presentations? And if I do flunk out, I will have thousands of dollars of student loans, no degree, and no career. Awesome. I've had nothing but nightmares the last couple of weeks.

The time has come to put on my big girl pants and grab school by the throat.

Rare Photo of the North American Carpet Flounder

I Ate the Garden

MacGyver has been out of town for days, and if I don't have someone else to cook for, I tend to not cook at all. Last night I had precisely no food in my fridge, not nearly enough to fill my empty belly.



My first step to remedying the situation was to pick a big bowl o' snow peas. Our first planting is currently producing like sex-crazed rabbits, and the pods are weighing the plants down. It's so beautiful. Wasps kept flying out of the pea patch and toward my head, at one point I was dancing around yelling "LET'S BE ADULTS HERE!" and tried to reason with them to leave me the hell alone. Back in the kitchen I heated up olive oil with a heavy-handed dash of red pepper flakes and globs of minced garlic - the classy kind from the jar. After a quick stir-fry my snow peas were bright green and dotted with the flavorings. I ate the entire bowlful with my hands and felt sinful doing it.



I grabbed a knife and thinned the lettuce in the backyard. The greens are more mature than baby but far from full-grown. I washed them up and picked out the weeds and slug, then dried them (five paper towels later I remembered my salad spinner, d'oh!) and inspected them carefully for more slugs. I drizzled the lettuce with Caesar dressing and chewed thoughtfully - the leaves were crisp but not chilled, the texture was nearly buttery, and the babiest leaves were sweet.



Still hungry, I headed the the strawberry bed. I picked the overripe berries, the berries that were dark, dark red and had lost their luster. I selected a few of the younger, vibrant ones to eat right away, but the majority went into the mini-blender with some cheap vanilla ice cream and milk.

I didn't once regret not ordering pizza.

Cats and Floors do not Mix

First, MacGyver and Friend ripped up the old flooring. Beneath it was some rotten subfloor and a crooked joist. This had to be fixed, so out came the rotten wood, giving us a nice view of our creepy cellar. Most of it was repaired that day, but there was a hole where the fridge usually sits. MacGyver didn't think the hole was big enough for any of the cats to fit through. A few hours later we couldn't find Moca, our smallest cat*. We checked the cellar out of desperation. She was there, covered in mud and cobwebs, fur full or roly-polys. She started protesting even before we gave her a shower.

MacGyver's brother-in-law came over to lay the vinyl flooring. Part of the process required glue to be spread over the entire surface. That's when Domino ran in. She got glue all over her paws and ran around the kitchen, jumping on appliances and windowsills, trying to outrun the stickiness. When MacGyver finally caught her, he took her outside so I could hose down her paws. The chore was complicated by my inability to stop laughing.

*She's really a baby monster

I'm Back

Holy expletive, it's been so long since I blogged that I almost forgot my password.

Life hasn't been totally awesome since I last wrote, gentle readers. After a long and painful struggle with cancer, my brother died. He was only 34. My family is tight, and losing him was like losing my left arm: I can get by without him, but it's SO GODDAMN HARD and I never forget he's gone. Actually, sometimes I do. Sometimes I see something and go to send him a picture message, or I wonder what he'd like me to make him for dinner this week. Then I remember he's gone, and life stands still just so I can feel like everything has fallen apart. I celebrated my birthday without him, attended our friend's wedding without him, and I wonder how life can possibly go on when his has ended. It doesn't seem just or possible. But that's the way it is, and I have to keep waking up every day.

My depression took a turn for the worse when I lost him, and out of desperation tried an antipsychotic. It worked really well, and I'd still take it except the side effects were terrible. The least unmentionable side effect was the weight gain: fifteen pounds in two months. This was due largely to the constant, unending hunger. I switched meds; this pill makes me sleepy, a nice change from inhaling every morsel in sight. I'm exercising a lot more, and I'm slowly seeing results. Normally I'd be more upset, but this is the fourth worst thing to happen this year, so it's bearable.

32

Though healed, the scar is palpable.

No News is Bad News

My brother has been in hospice since August. The last few months have been very tough for my whole family: we're still grieving for mom while watching Job slip away, and being with him has been like dancing over eggshells.

He took a turn for the worse this week. He just started sleeping more and more, a sign the oncologist told us to watch for before he died. He's losing control of his arms and hands; he tries to take a drink and spills water everywhere. He fights with us for control, demanding that we let him do things that he is incapable of. I've known many people who've died, but no one has fought death with such a bitter intensity.

He smells like death.

I feel hollow.

The Ratings: Simple Machines

The Pulley: What part of simple don't you understand, pulley? You never track straight and you're never there when I need you. Also, do you know how hard you are to rig up in a jiffy? You suck. D

The Lever: Hypothetically, you can move the world with a long enough lever and a fulcrum on which to place it. People have been pondering that awesomeness for centuries, but the lever has never stepped up to the plate and actually done it. What a pussy. On the other hand, bored second graders can whip up a lever with a pencil and ruler and launch erasers at other people's heads. That I like. B+

The Inclined Plane: Inclined to do what, exactly? I had a lot of experience with inclined planes in Physics I, and they're inclined to just lie there while someone else does all the work. However, it makes movie theaters wheelchair-accessible. Props for that. C+

The Wedge: The wedge is more than the sum of its parts; never before have two inclined planes been so hardcore. The wedge is all about destruction and death metal, rawr! Wedges bring to mind axes, nails, incisors, ice picks, and gouda. A

The Screw: Why screw is a euphemism for sex, I do not know. It's not like the penis spins like a Japanese sex toy or anything. Since it is a euphemism, this simple machine conjures up ideas not meant for readers with delicate constitutions. That's pretty nifty. Also, I like how screws hold together vital bits of my house and refrigerator and remote control and other important things. A-

Yes, I Can

I'M GOIN' BACK TO SCHOOL, Y'ALL!!!

I have been working for this since March of 2007. I took 10 science and math prerequisite classes, studied my ass off to earn all As, job-shadowed for over 140 hours, went through the application process twice, faced rejection once, and received an acceptance letter yesterday.

I start classes June 14, 2010, and I graduate in the spring of 2013 with a Doctorate in Physical Therapy.

I AM SO UN-FUCKING-BELIEVABLY HAPPY!!!


Yay!

Where the Sidewalk Ends

One of the things I miss about living in Bloomington (besides Aver's pizza, theatrical productions, lower humidity, hawt guys, and The Chocolate Moose) is the plethora of hiking trails, so on vacation in Acadia MacGyver and I made hiking a priority. A trail we had our eye on from the start was the Precipice Trail, widely considered the toughest hike in the park. We didn't attack it the very first day, we waited until I was lulled into a false sense of security after summitting Mount Penobscot.

When we hit the trailhead I read multiple warnings: hikers should turn back if they were prone to acrophobia, pets and small children were not allowed, and there was the risk of your heart exploding and the park service would not be the ones dragging your sorry ass out while you clutched your chest dramatically. Twenty feet in MacGyver had to turn back for a forgotten item, I said I'd wait there because I was not going to do that twenty feet again if I didn't have to. It was practically vertical! Well, it was definitely UPWARDS. As I waited for him a dragonfly the size of my forearm zoomed around some trees and charged me, and stopped to hover half an inch from my right ear. It sounded like a locust apocalypse, and I could just see it out of the corner of my eye, lurking like something from The Mist. I felt pretty awesome about it until my partner returned. I asked MacGyver if he'd ever been bitten by a dragonfly, and he reassured me that he had, and it hurts like a bitch.

The Precipice Trail is the hardest trail I've ever done. For half a mile I heaved my poor, pathetic body against the grain of gravity, and the one time I didn't maintain three points of contact I nearly lost my balance and hurtled to my death. At strategic points along the trail iron bars were drilled into the granite, creating ladders, handholds, and bridges. Several times I scooped up trail dust to combat sweaty palms, a hazard when clinging to a smooth iron rung bolted to a treacherous cliff face. The warning signs had not been joking around; I broke out in cold sweats more frequently as I ascended, calmed only with the promise that death would be swift if I fell.

Besides being an arduous death march, the Precipice Trail offers absolutely gorgeous views of the ocean, forests, and other mountains. I wished my mother could have seen this before she died, and felt heartbroken she was gone. Everyone knows it sucks to lose a loved one, but it's hard to comprehend the chronic missing-piece feeling that dogs you the rest of your life. Minutes later I came up behind a woman whose hair looked just like mom's did. It was bittersweet, feeling like I could see her but not touch her.

When we reached the summit the sky was turning gray, the temperature was dropping, and the breeze had a bite to it. I, however, was burning up, and stripped down to my camisole to cool off. We suspected the rain would start soon, but I was loathe to leave; I had made it to the top and I was going to stay on top. On the summit I had my picture taken with the mom-ish woman facing away from the camera, because that's the kind of freak I am. I chatted with her for a while and learned she and her husband live in Denver, and they were in Maine on a bicycle tour. I was secretly pleased she was a sweet lady. MacGyver and I took pictures and soaked in the views, and eventually headed down Mount Champlain the back way, getting a close-up of a squirrel on our way.

The Precipice Trail was jam-packed with beauty and danger, and I can't wait to hike it again.

In My Opinion

I just watched X-Men Origins: Wolverine on DVD.

The plot was convoluted, the dialogue sucked, the pacing was erratic, Gambit and Sabretooth were miscast, the character development was lacking, Hugh Jackman posed more than acted, the climax fizzled, and the ending was a letdown.

Other than that, it was actually pretty bad.

Here We Go Again

I have become one of Those Bloggers, the ones that post every couple of months. In my defense I'll state that my life is Very Busy, and I don't have internet at home, and it's not like I have groupies anxiously waiting with bated breath for my next post. It is kind of nice to have some aspect of my life with a low-set bar, to have low standards and not really care.

Since I last posted MacGyver and I road-tripped to Acadia and Shenandoah National Parks, and BOY HOWDY was that awesome. I climbed mountains with ocean views and biked carriage trails and science-geeked out on geology/astronomy/birding activities. I earned a senior ranger badge and ate clam chowder and posed for mucho photographs. I have officially visited 43 states now, and hope to visit 5 more before I'm 30. Good times.

When we returned home I was informed Job needs companionship 24/7, so my sister keeps a schedule of who can sit with him when. The whole situation is just horrible: he's in a lot of pain and is dying slowly, so he could be in pain for months more. He's grouchy a lot, and illogical, and frustrates the Hell out of me. I'm grieving for the brother I had. There's a lot more to the story, but this is all for now. Can't use up all my fodder at once, can I?

My best friend is pregnant and I threw her a baby shower last Saturday. I planned and organized the fuck out of that thing, making lists and spreadsheets and visualizing what would be needed when, and launched myself into a baking/cooking rampage the day before and got to bed at 3 a.m. I had help and appreciate it very much, but some things I wanted done a certain way and decided to do myself. In the end it was worth it, the shower went pretty smoothly and a good time was had by all. Then I went home and napped.

MacGyver has resumed the kitchen remodel! The walls are all mudded and He has built casings for the over-fridge and under-sink cabinets. I'm positively tingly with giddiness.

Shenandoah National Park