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

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.

 

 

Have We Met?

I could not remember the word "table" the other day. This is the second time I have forgotten that particular word. This can't be good.

In general, I am not unduly freaked by what my brain does in this post-menopausal veil of tears. I have managed to get by for the past 57 years on what the Lord gave me to fill my noggin. True, I cannot calculate gratuities in restaurants (or even see the bill in a poorly lit joint) and so I pretty much just give the waitperson ten dollars, walk into a wall and say goodbye to the coat rack. And true, when I am standing in my bedroom wearing only my pajama bottoms I often cannot remember if I am in the middle of taking them off or putting them on, oh, and I often introduce myself to people I have met only moments earlier, sometimes introducing myself to them over and over again at one event, but, you know, whatev.  That kind of shit happens to me every day. You deal with it. No big whoop.

Still, not being able to retrieve the word "table" was troubling. Especially since I was at a restaurant and my friends were waiting for met at a corner table and I was trying to tell the person seating me that my friends were already there, waiting for me over there, at that...uh....er....shit...fuck...

Thankfully, the word did come to me. On my drive home. TABLE! Fuck. I wanted to call my friends to tell them that I finally remembered the word but I couldn't remember where I put my phone. Fuck. (It was in my hand. Fuuuuck.)

Maybe the brain has a limit of words it can retain. I have been endeavoring to increase my vocabulary lately; perhaps my brain had to delete some words that have been in there since 1954. "Table" would certainly be one of them. As in kitchen table. The words "more" and "more food!" and "are you going to finish that?" have probably been in my rotation since my verbal beginning, as well. Food words. Learned them early, used them often. Served me well.

I grew up with a mother who took after her mother who ate lunch from the backyard garden. Nasturtiums, herbs, whatever was edible and grown in the soil of her West LA apartment, that's what was for lunch. No Fritos or Wonder Bread for the Browns. I foraged and sowed my meals there, managing still to eat myself sick. Truly, the tastiest thing in Grandma Esther's house was the box of Aspirgum, which Karen and I devoured each time we were there. If you were born after 1954, you will not know what this is, so I will tell you: aspirin in chewing gum form with a candy coating. I know, right? Why, you ask? And, delicious, is my answer. Also, I never had even one headache as a child. Although I have about a gajillion stomach ulcers.

My point is, I will eat anything, evidently. Also, on an unrelated topic, all my underpants are shrinking. Cheap cotton is my guess.

Wait, no. My point is, why can't I remember the word "table"?

Well, as the old words leave my brain, leaving room for the new arrivals ("osteoarthritis", "thinning vaginal wall" and "Xanax refill"), I suppose I will have to make do with hand gestures, nodding and a smattering of Esperanto.

I better hold on to "nice to meet you", however.  You know, for when I say hello to the coat rack for the third time.

 

 

 

(Don't bother) Seek(ing because) Ye Shall (never) Find (it, anyway)

The following is a list of shit I can't find and have made numerous attempts to find but life is short so I have given up and I will either buy a new one or live without it:

1. My yakisoba pillow. It held and caressed my face like a lover. A gentle lover. A gentle, macho lover. Who rides a Harley. And bakes cinnamon rolls. A gentle, macho, swashbuckling lover who kisses me with the perfect balance of burning desire and superior aloofness. A lover who considers it his honor to work three jobs in order to support me financially so I can write my blog, refill the Sangria and work on my tan. A lover who pines for me and worries I am out of his league.  And who thinks of me when he sees a Paul Gauguin painting. Or a Paul Klee, when he is stoned. God, I miss that pillow.

2. My blue Mephisto sandal, left foot. Last seen in New York, August, 2010. And until I actually meet the man in the parable who has no feet, I will continue to feel sorry for myself for having only one Mephisto sandal.

3. Directions to the laser hair removal place that people keep recommending to me (note to self: WTF? Just how obvious IS my facial hair that after schmoozing with me for a few minutes, people casually mention a great hair removal place?)

4. The deed to Robin's and my burial plot. Also, I can't remember if we are getting buried or cremated because I wasn't fully paying attention when we voted. I  know we are sharing a plot with Karen and Craig.  (How FUN is that going to be? I want to be put next to my sister so we can stay up late in Eternity and watch PROJECT RUNWAY.) Oh, wait, I remember: we are getting cremated because Karen hates to be cold. This is a huge sacrifice on my part because I hate to be hot. Maybe I can be cremated on "low". Or "cold smoke". Robin is pretty handy with his Traeger smoker, he could DIY and save a few shekels. Buy himself that rotisserie attachment. Or a trophy wife.

5. The piece of paper onto which I write my weight when I weigh myself. Also the box with the electric combination lock and exploding Anthrax into which I put the piece of paper. Also, the fireproof vault into which I put the box. Also, the two guards in front of the vault.

6. The bag of baby artichokes that I KNOW for sure I put in the crisper a few months ago and I KNOW for sure I did not cook and eat. As God is my witness, I will not buy another bag of baby artichokes until I find that one.

7. Robin's DNR paperwork from his surgery last year. I want to do something creative with it for Valentine's Day, like a decoupage paperweight or something.

8. The Ziplock bag of 200 wooden chopsticks that I stole from some restaurant in the late 1980's and have kept in a kitchen drawer in case I ever find myself faced with an impromptu sushi party for a crowd. I currently only know three Japanese people but I want to be prepared. In case they bring friends.

9. Lyrics to a song I started in 1970, during my Joni Mitchell dulcimer period. I don't want to finish the song so much as burn the lyrics. When one is so full of hubris and marijuana as to rhyme "psychedelic poodle" with "do do do doodle" (or with anything, really), one must take care to leave no evidence behind.

10. The scathing letter I wrote to Dick Cheney a few years back, telling him that if I ever meet him I am going to do everything I can to punch in the face. Where IS that letter? I wonder if I mailed it. Hunh. You know, the Dick has been laying low lately. Maybe he got my letter. I might look all old and squishy and shit, but I honestly believe if I was face to face with the Dick, I could totally kick his ass. I have deep anger from which to draw upon.

11. My notes with numbers 11-20 that I wanted to include in this blog post. Shit.