Dr. Strangemom (or, how I learned to stop worrying and love the blog)

Watch For Falling Testicles

God help me. We are getting a puppy.

We almost got one a few months ago but there were some undescended testicle issues that put the brakes on that one. Which turned out to be fortuitous since this next puppy, thankfully, is going to be a girl. One set of testicles - undescended or otherwise - is all I can handle these days. As it is, after 32 years together, Robin still piddles when I come home from work. Well, he does pee in the backyard every day when he comes home from work. I have all the testosterone-driven male impulses I can take around here.

What is it with males and peeing outside? I mean, Robin has his name on the actual deed of our house; he doesn't need to mark his territory anymore. Maybe he worries that the squirrels are trying to buy us out or something.

I don't have anything against boys, per se. I raised two and I adore them. But as an entire gender, let's face it, boys are weird. For one thing, they totally think that their penises make them super hot. I will stand naked in front of the mirror only if I am court ordered (which would be a very effective deterrent to crime. "Mrs. Dr. Strangemom, you have robbed from the workers and given to the Tea Party. You are hereby sentenced to stand naked in front of the mirror for twenty minutes. In harsh light. And WITH your glasses on, Madam. And no squinting.") No thanks. I want to be cremated with my Spanx on.

Robin, on the other hand, will stand naked in front of a mirror just to give himself a extra little  confidence boost before going out into the world. He will pose and turn and do that Vegas shooting-your-finger thing at his reflection.

"Dude," his Penis will say to him, arching up for a High Five, "get a load of us. The girls are gonna be pretttty lucky to be near this." And Robin's brain will nod in agreement, in respect, in awe of Penis. And Penis will say, "let there be testosterone" and a sea of testosterone will coarse throughout Robin's body. And Penis will say, "this is Good." And He will piddle a little bit on the rim of the toilet seat. And He will not wipe it up. Because, you know, he is Penis.

And Robin will look at me looking at him, and he will wonder if I am as turned on as he is. And Penis will tap him on the shoulder and whisper to him, "don't let her harsh your mellow, dude. We are awesome."

And Robin and Penis will prove their awesomeness by going into our suburban back yard and peeing on the hydrangea.

So, yeah. This next puppy is going to be a girl. Which means her issues with be with her weight, finding the right bra and hitting the glass ceiling. I can't wait to teach her about Spanx.

 

A Mother's Day Story About Hemmoirhoids

The thing about being pregnant for the first time is that as far as you know, it's all about labor. The fact that an actual baby arrives at the end of it, and then you have to raise it forever, well, that part is just so unimaginable that it doesn't exist.

Labor. Contractions. Breathing. Hee hee hoo. Hoo hoo hee. Find your focus spot. Yeah, yeah, whatev. I figured I'd get through it or die trying and either way, it was all all cool. Plus, for fuck's sake, the Queen Mum had babies and she seems way detached from her lady parts so if she could do it, I could do it.

So, yeah. Contractions. I didn't obsess too much over them when I was pregnant. For me, it was all about the pushing part of the deal.

Because of, well, you know. Hemorrhoids.

In my family, the word "hemorrhoids" is spoken in the same hushed tones as the words, "Holocaust" or "pork". Hemmorhoids are feared and revered --the ultimate proof that Our People Suffer. And they are the Purple Heart of pregnancy, for sure. How much do you love your baby? Enough to have a prehensile tail of blood vessels hanging out of your ass for the rest of your life, that's how much. Now give Mommy a big kiss and go to grad school.

Years before I got pregnant, years before I got my period, I knew that pregnancy brings hemorrhoids. I might not even have been sure at that point that pregnancy brings a baby, but through generations of ancestral knowledge I knew not to push.

My mom said, "it's a conundrum. They tell you to push the baby out, and you want to, but you have to think about hemorrhoids and be careful."

Sophie's choice.

As my due date drew near and the baby's room was readied and the birth plan was written (my first piece of fiction, come to think of it), I practiced my fakeout pushing. Never mind that no woman in the history of EVER has been able to fake push out a baby; no woman ever had the fear of hemorrhoids put  in her like I did.

Remind me next time you see me to show you my fake, hemorrhoid fooling, ooh ooh I'm pushing the baby out face. All scrunched from the neck up; below the waist I am as loose as a bowl of overcooked linguine. Luckily my years of faking orgasms gave me a strong foundation in this ruse.

So, the big day arrives. I am in the labor room. It's time to push. I know what to do.

But there's an unforeseen problem. No one told me that it's not that you HAVE to push, like someone is forcing you; it's that you MUST push, like your body won't take no for an answer. If you have never had a baby, the only thing I can tell you it's like is when you get a dozen fresh bagels from the bakery and you have to climb into the back seat (where you put them, you know, to discourage eating them before you get home) during a red light and tear open the bag. And eat them all.

Which, coincidentally, was what I had eaten that morning before I realized I was in labor.

And so when I gave in to my primal urge that afternoon and pushed, pushed hard while Robin held my hand and gave me encouraging words that, frankly, aggravated the fuck out of me (" I could care less if you love me right now. Just get this baby out of me or go home and clean the house"), I knew that nothing - not even the dreaded hemorrhoids - could keep me from helping my baby be born. So I pushed with everything I had. I pushed so hard that all it took was, like, three good pushes and it was out.

"Boy or girl?" I asked Robin. Before he could answer me, I added, "and you know what? Pushing is not that hard. I don't know what everyone complains about. I guess I am even more awesome than I realized."

Robin looked at me with that kinda bemused, kinda disgusted at me face, the face he makes when I say shit like, "I actually look thinner when I gain weight because of, you know, the way my clothes fit me." Only this look was less bemused and more disgusted.

"Well? Boy or girl? What is it? And why isn't it crying?"  Uh-oh.

"Well," Robin said, "Because it's a poop."

What?

"You pooped. When you pushed so hard just now, you pooped. That's what's on the delivery table. A  POOP."

Really? Hunh.

"You still have to push the baby out."

Really? Hunh.

So I did. And it was fine. No big whoop. And no you-know-whats.

The gift that does NOT keep on giving. Best Mother's Day gift a child could ever give a mother.

 

There's something that's been bugging me since Passover. It's the whole liberation thing. Don't tell anyone, but.....I am just not all that into liberation.

You know what liberation brings?  Responsibility.

So, um, yeah. No thanks.

As a slave in Egypt, what would I worry about? Nothing, that's what. Room and board: check. Permanent employment: check. Year-long suntan: check. Slaves have all the damn luck. No bills to be paid, no writing deadlines, no having to choose colors for a bathroom remodel, no hours wasted perusing the Internet for vacation houses on Whidbey Island, no asparagus to return to Trader Joe's because it had a super funky smell, no afternoons at the Toyota dealership reading magazines and eating their free popcorn while they detail my car, and no feeling bloated after a huge meal of eggplant parmigiana.

Yeah, slavery. Man, that would be the life. Sun, job security, a dip in the river. Okay, I will just say it: Why did we leave Egypt?

Was there a vote? Because I think I would have to have cast mine with the Hell No, We Won't Go To The Promised Land movement. The drones, the slackers, the lovers of routine - these are my people.

But nooooo, we ALL had to be free, and now look at us. Liberated. Stressed. Looking for work. Texting while we drive. Throwing our underpants into the washing machine and not noticing that the used maxi pad is still stuck to it. 

That would not have happened to me in Egypt.

Someday, my Pharoah will come.

I hoped Robin would be one of those misogynistic, old school chuavenist pigs who didn't want their women to work or worry their pretty little heads about anything. I mean, he was all muscly and macho when I met him, and he dressed like Billy Jack. You hook up with a guy who wears a big black Stetson and carries a sword - you make some assumptions, you know?

Turned out, however, that macho, sword-wielding Robin was all about equality and feelings and scented candles and shit. When I told him that I wanted stay home and be a housewife, he laughed so hard one of his fillings popped out.  Then we had our first major fight. That was 32 years ago. I'll let you know when it's over. He thinks he won because I have a job but joke on him - I go to work for, like, seven minutes a day and then I come home and I just sit up here reading Us Weekly and watching Mob Wives, and every week or so I pump out a blog post and call it a day. So maybe I did okay in the end.

Still, I would totally rock an Egyptian tan.

 

 

 

100 Places Not to Visit Before You Die

Who thought of that stupid Facebook thing, anyway? You know, that app where everyone lists all the places they've been and shares their bucket list and seizes the day and puts pins on the map and shit? What a load.

100 PLACES TO VISIT BEFORE YOU DIE. Fuck that shit. No one needs to go anywhere. Everything you need is here. Plus, when you stay at home, time passes slowly. Which is like you are living longer. And you are not part of the clusterfuck which is the Santa Monica Freeway. On which a person could die on their way to LAX to visit one of the 100 places. Has no one else thought this thing through?

Being an intellectually curious person, however, I decided to check out the list. Let's take a look at the first 10:

1. Los Angeles --oh. Well, that one is okay. Because I've been there so there's no further travel involved on my part.  Also, they have El Pollo Loco in LA. Which, as far as I know, they do not have in actual Mexico.

2. Lake District --I don't even know where or what that is. I have been to a few lakes, however. Not a fan. I don't enjoy swimming in standing water that isn't chlorinated. Or that houses life forms other than human swimming by me. I'm barely okay with humans. Because you totally know they are peeing. Naturally occurring warm current, my ass.

3. Ngorongoro Crater -- Wikipedia advertises it this way: "The main feature of the NCA is the Ngorongoro Crater, a large, unbroken, unflooded volcanic caldera --"  Yawn. I don't even want to finish reading about it. Also, the words "large, unbroken, unflooded volcanic caldera" sound, I don't know, vaguely vaginal. Yuck.

4. Loch Ness -- Another reason to avoid lakes. I do, however, enjoy the gutteral "ch" in the name because it's like Yiddish.  Which would make the monster Jewish. Which would ROCK. A treyf-eating, college-eschewing, rugby-playing, Navy Seal-joining, mother-estranging, hairless back-sporting, tattoo-ed  spendthrift. Run for your lives! Hide your blond daughters!

5. Republic of Seychelles -- I like that its name is also a command - "say SHELLS". Every time someone says the name of the place, I could say, "Okay, SHELLS".  And I'd laugh merrily. I could probably stay there for two weeks on that joke alone. I would kill in the Republic of Seychelles.                           

Seychelles. Okay, SHELLS. Hah.

6. Ibiza --people wear bikinis there. Pass.

7. Patagonia -- A few years ago I ordered moisture-wicking socks from the catalog. They refunded me TWICE. And they never realized it. What a bunch of boobs. Still, I better keep a low profile and stay away. Don't want to wind up in some Patagonian prison getting funky moisture-laden crud on my feet.

8. Great  Barrier Reef --  Again, I suspect that bathing suits are required. Again, pass. As God is my witness, I am never holding my stomach in again. EVER. Unless I meet Theodore Bikel. Or I am interviewed on CONAN. To promote my novel. Which I have to finish writing. Which is why I cannot visit any of these places. I have real work to do.

9. Nine Hells -- Of course I was drawn to this place. I Googled it but the only description of Nine Hells was about Baator, from Dungeons and Dragons. And frankly, I lived through one of my kid's obsession with D & D; I really don't ever need to hear one more thing about it. I imagine this Nine Hells place to be the back room of a huge comic book store where dorks in capes ridicule you with elvish insults. And you have to wear a bikini.

10. Ring of Fire Volcanoes -- Oh for fuck's sake, do the creators of this list even know what a vacation is?  A destination called Ring of Fire Volcanoes does not sound relaxing to me. I bet they don't even have a chlorinated pool there. Also, any place called Ring of Fire Volcanoes makes me worry about hemorrhoids.

I tell you what: I am going to get working on my own list. As soon as I get dressed, run to New Seasons Market and pick up a couple of cranberry panini rolls. They are to die for.

 

Born (58 years ago today) To Be Aggravated

My birthday is almost over. Only thirteen more hours. Thank God.

I have a shitload of things I want to do today and they don't seem, I don't know, birthdayish kinds of things, so I have to wait until tomorrow. Which, frankly, flies in the face of everyone's wishes to me to have a great day today. Because a great day is not, at least not for me, a day when I have to hold off on writing a To Do list for Robin. Well, technically, a To Do Alfucking Ready list.  Shit I've been holding off saying to him. Burying it. Seething. Amassing evidence, making my case. In legal terms, I've been in Discovery and now I am ready for Opening Arguments. Well, not arguments, exactly. He doesn't get to talk.

Truth be told, spending my entire birthday writing this list is just about the greatest way I could imagine  spending it. I have three new glitter pens - turquoise for household maintenance projects, orange for special projects, and gold for writing my feelings about his not having gotten these things done - and a pound of cardstock. I am so totally amped. I am going to run out and get a back up gold pen. In case the first one runs out.

All that's left is for me to wait thirteen more hours until I can buckle down to work.

Which persona will I be when I write the list... Long-suffering martyr? Eggshell-tiptoeing enabler? Nazi work captain? Superior high falutin' life coach? Workaday bitch? According to Robin, I tend towards the Mt. St. Helen's school of communication - I spew off a few, unnoticed puffs of steam and then, POW. Next thing he knows, he is coughing up bits of lung and ash and wondering what happened to the sweet 25 year old girl he married. The one who believed he was perfect just the way he is.

I'll tell you what happened to her: she got tired of waiting for the fucking den carpeting to be replaced and the fucking deck to be powerwashed, and she got mean. And fat. And, as I glance at today's circled date on the calendar, old.

Hmm. I might need a few more pens.

Still, if one subscribes to the notion that what one does on one's birthday sets the tone for the entire year, then, I must put off writing The List until tomorrow. Because I really don't want to be That person. The person who, on her birthday, presents her spouse of 32 years with a list of his trangressions against her. On cardstock, written in color-coded glitter pens. Laminated. Framed in a 20 x 40 gold leaf frame. With six wallet-size copies.

I want to be that Other person. The one who devotes her birthday to being grateful for the blessings she has. Yes. That's who I am going to be. It can't be that hard.

Especially if he brings home a cake tonight.

 

For What It's Worth

Right at this very moment, even as you are reading this, the penny is losing value.  It has lost almost 97% of its value so far. That's what they said on NPR. It is shocking, right? I cannot believe it.

I also cannot really understand what it means since a person needs math for this issue. And not only am I woefully clueless about math, I am quite against it. So I must weigh in as against this devaluation business. Even if it occurs during a Democratic administration, I am against it. And I make it a point to never be against anything in a Democratic administration.

I had decided to keep my disapproval to myself. You know, because it's an election year and the world is watching me. But now, economists and NPR commentators feel that because of the devaluation, we should stop making pennies.

And this is where I have to get involved.

Are we going to discard everything that has lost its value? Because I have a bad feeling about that. Frankly, I worry that after they've wiped out the pennies, they will be coming after me. Because, well, talk about your rapid devaluation.

Time was when I could get, I bet, five hundred dollars for me. At least. But just like the penny, in the past decades I have been passed around, lost in couch cushions, discarded into Ronald McDonald House coin boxes at the drive-through window, used to steady an uneven card table and given to homeless people on freeway exits. Who snort derisively because they know worthless when they see it.

The irony is this: the less value I offer, the more money it takes to keep me going. For fuck's sake, my bras alone cost over $200.00 a year. And even that's only if I remember to not put them into the dryer. There was a time when I could fashion a workable brassiere for myself out of two handkerchiefs and a sprig of dried rosemary. I was not a drain on the economy back then.

And there's the matter of my shoes.

In my youth, shoes were optional. At best, they were a five dollar pair of Chinese embroidered slippers. These days it takes the Army Corps of Engineers working with Dansko and Mephisto to figure out how to not make my feet hurt in shoes.

I need about three hundred dollars a month to keep me in Xanax and Zantac. Which I often get mixed up, resulting in a calm stomach during anxiety attacks and falling into a stoned stupor after I eat Indian food. Which reminds me, I should get some more reading glasses.

Oh, and let's not forget the plethora of root canals ahead of me. It takes a whole lotta cheddar to keep up with my devaluation.

Well, cheddar and Kegels. Although lately, I have not been keeping up with the K's. I figure when my bladder gives way to complete incontinence, I will simply stop laughing so hard and that will keep my underpants dry.

I know. No chance I will stop laughing. Not as long as Ann Romney keeps calling herself a typical working mother.

Despite my devaluation, and in defense of my economic worth, however, I want to offer this: soon I will be pretty much single-handedly be keeping Depends in business.

 

 

 

Dr. Strangemom 6:28

Consider the endodontists how they work: they toil (for, like, 35 minutes), they spin (and drill a bit); and yet I say unto you, that the rest of us (hard workers) in all our glory are not arrayed like one of these.

Nor do we drive brand new Range Rovers.

I am not against endos, per se; please understand that. It's just that after his toiling and spinning and root canaling, my fucking molar still hurts. And he drives away in his brand new Range Rover. And I am left to brush my teeth with my head tilted down because God forbid any cold toothpaste should touch my tooth and make my head explode with pain.

It could be a hate crime against the Jews. I will vett this guy to see if he has any ties to Mengele. Now that I think of it, he had an almost inaudible gutteral "kh" when he said the word "machine". And he was very organized. And I could swear he clicked his heels as he left the room when the root canal was over.

So, before I go back there again next week (okay, it is possible that I had two molars needing root canals and now it's the other one that hurts), I just want to consider the life of the endo. You know, as compared to the life of, say, me.

If someone came to me for my expertise and skill (which will be determined at some point in my life before I die. I hope) and after paying me thousands upon thousands of dollars for services rendered, and after I jetted off to, oh, Fiji, for a much needed vacay and then that someone called me to say that, basically, the work I did was ineffective (or unbearably painful), I would think that I am the kind of person who would fly home from Fiji and remedy the work as a freebie. Maybe even send the person an Edible Arrangements bouquet as a pre-emtpive apology. Unless I had given the person a bad root canal because then, you know, the cold fruit would fucking KILL them with pain when they bit into it. But I would like to think that that's the kind of professional I am.

I would not, I hope, get that someone's call and say to them, "oh, that means that there's MORE to the problem than you thought. That means that I need many more thousands of dollars immediately. So, you know, I can hurt you again."

I am beginning to think that my parents might have been right about my majoring in Ethnology of Non-Western Music and Dance with a specialty in Bulgarian singing. And how it wouldn't lead to a career that would afford me trips to Fiji. Or trips to the gas station.

Wait! I know! I am going to call the University of California at Santa Cruz and tell them that my degree is ineffective. I am going to demand my money back and insist they do it again. AND that they send me an Edible Arrangements bouquet as an apology.

Which will fucking KILL me with pain when I bite into it, but I don't care.

 

Give A Man A Fish. And Then Give Him Some Soap.

When I tell you that my most exciting news is that I discovered a new recipe for salad dressing, you will understand why I haven't written lately.

I'll tell you what: writing a blog is a lot of pressure. Not the writing part, of course, the writing part is great. It's the having to actually do shit so I can write about it - that's the bitch of it.

What do other people do with their time? I really have no idea. I mean, I listen. I hear. I recognize words like "skiing" and "concert" and "coast" and I get it that those words are attached to weekends and the people saying them. But what I don't get is how they do these things. And why.  And when they find time to watch TV and check in on Facebook. And make soup. And organize their pajamas drawers so that you can easily grab a matched pajama outfit instead of hunting to find the top that goes with the bottoms.

What? Really? You don't?

See, that's the trouble with America. Nobody takes the time to put on a matching pair of pajamas anymore. Me, I put more time into getting dressed for bed than I do into going out during the day.

I shower at night. And I put on matching pajamas. And - if the gods of neurosis are smiling down on me - the sheets are fresh out of the dryer. OMG, I am getting all blissed out just thinking about it. Oh, also, the sheets and pillow cases and comforter are white. And if my pajamas happen to also be white, well, I could have an orgasm just climbing into bed. A nice, clean, white, WASPy orgasm.

Robin, on the other hand, enjoys an evening of sweaty Tai Chi, grilling fish over an open fire, having a bowel movement and then climbing, naked, into bed with me.

Also, sometimes he says he has washed his hands from the fish smell but all he has really done is rinsed them. I know because I spy on him.

And when I tell him in the nicest way possible that he is utterly repulsive and to go wash his hands WITH SOAP, he says, "you can't smell the fish on my hands." And then he makes a big deal out of smelling his hands - deeply - so as to prove his point. He often ends it with, "ahhhhh..."

And then the fight begins.

It is one of our best fights. I like to call it, YOU STINK. NO I DON'T. YES I DO. NO I DON'T.  Sometimes this fight can go on longer than it would have taken Robin to take off his skin, drop it off at the cleaners and bring it back fresh.

I contend that the person himself (the "smellee") is not allowed to weigh in on whether or not he smells like fish. Robin's contention is that I am not really getting to the heart of the matter in my therapy - my need to control.

I don't know, if I walked around smelling like fish and a person pointed it out to me, I really don't think I would argue with them. Same as if someone told me I had spinach in my teeth. I wouldn't challenge the observation. In fact, I would welcome it. Shit like that, I want to know.

I once came home from a six-hour recording session and saw that I had a bigass streak of ketchup on my face. I called my friend Trudy, who had been in the studio with me, and I said, "what the fuck, Trudy? You have been with me all day  - why didn't you tell me I had a bigass streak of ketchup on my face?"

Her answer - probably true - was that she honestly hadn't noticed. Which begs a pantload of questions about Trudy, but that's besides the point.

Still, I guess it's better than when I was eight months pregnant, at the OBGYN and wearing only the sheet, with my feet in the stirrups and the medical student asked my doctor, "why did she take her clothes off and put her feet up if all you are doing today is taking her blood pressure?"

And my doctor said, "she's been doing it for the past four months. I didn't want to embarrass her."

Um, too late for that, Doc.

But at least he didn't tell me I smelled like fish.

 

 

The Road To Success

Despite what Facebook is telling me, I am NOT ready to maximize blog readership by using Pininterest. Chalk it up to my dearth of ambition (it is nearly the crack of noon and I am still in my pajamas) or to my decision to learn NOTHING new anymore because, really, don't we all know enough shit at this point in our lives? Maximizing anything seems, well, exhausting.

I am not about maximizing. Even my bra is minimizing.

I am, however, still working on designing a double-headed yamulka out of my old bras. You know, for Jewish twins conjoined at the head. I want to make Judaism accessible for everyone because, frankly, our people cannot afford to lose anyone. You know, what with Madonna and Scarlett and Lindsay and Demi probably not being in it for the long run.

I hold no truck with these people, these celebrity Jews. For one thing, they look happy. Well, not Demi, not lately, but still.  I don't know what kind of sick Judaism they are practicing, but it is NOT supposed to make you happy, for fuck's sake. Judaism is supposed to make you worried. And constipated. And then, hungry. For a nice piece chicken. Broiled, no skin.  Our people are all about chicken. And cleaning. In that reverse order.

Take me, for instance. Right now, I am extremely worried that one day I will be constipated from eating chicken with the skin on, and stuck sitting somewhere in a funky bathroom. I am Jewish through and through, baby.

The ambition thing, however, probably flies in the face of my cultural history. Jews are not, for the most part, a slacker people. My ancestors had to have possessed at least a modicum of ambition because, well, they came to America. I would have stayed back in Russia, worrying about the chicken, cleaning my hovel. Waiting until I had a good poop.

So, no, Pininterest, I will maximize my blog readership in the way God intended: I will worry.

And then, eat.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hope? Nope.

Clearly, it is just a myth that if you get enough sleep, eat a healthy diet, get daily exercise and think noble thoughts, you will wake up each morning at the crack of dawn, bound out of bed and face the new day with a smile and a toned pelvic floor.

Not that I'd know anything about that. My lifestyle runs a bit more to the, I don't know, pre-suicidal.

I suffer a sweaty, fitful night's sleep, wake up at the crack of noon, carb-load like I am going to run the fucking Boston marathon, buy new underwear each month to avoid the exertion of going downstairs to the washing machine, and keep my head filled with bitter, poisonous envy of the good fortune of anyone I know.

Still, this lifestyle is not as awesome as you'd think. I wake up every morning with a headache and lurch to the bathroom to spit out my bite guard before I gag on it. I chew down my Prozac with an Advil, lurch to the kitchen to hit the "on" button on the coffee maker, lurch back to the bathroom to measure my facial moles and recalculate the day of my death from melanoma, remember that I did not put coffee or water into the machine last night, lurch quickly back to the kitchen to turn off the coffee maker before I burn the empty carafe (again), eat one of the bajillion things I will regret eating that day, bask in self-loathing and then return to the computer to remind myself that I am a hack and nobody thinks I am funny.

Maybe I should get more fiber. I seem to have lost my joie de vivre.

I'm in a bad way. You see, there is a slight possibility of good news.

Living here on the bottom, it's pretty hard to hurt yourself when you fall down a few notches. Disappointment? Yeah, I'm already there. Rejection? Got it. Bad news? Puhleese. Like I know from anything else in this vale of tears. Allowing myself to rise up, to even glimpse the shiny underbelly of hope, well, that is just asking for trouble. I come from a people who knows that unexpected news is never good. I mean, after the third time Nazi's show up uninvited to your door and it's NOT because they are bringing you a bundt cake to welcome you to the neighborhood, well, you learn to hide behind the bookcase.

So I just live behind the bookcase now and rarely come out unless the cake thing is an absolute  certainty.

Claire said to me, "you would rather fail immediately than ever wait and have a chance at success?"

I love how Claire gets me.  And, duh.  Nazis rarely come to the doors of my people with the sole (or even adjunct) intention of bringing cake. Well, maybe German chocolate cake. Which, I bet, they would force us to watch them eat and not offer us any. Those sick fucks. Thank God we defeated them.

Great. Now I want cake.