Rhonda's Rodent Revival

 It will take me a little bit to write this as I am typing with one hand.  I broke my arm two weeks ago yesterday. I’m right-handed, and of course I broke my right arm.  I figure there is just no point in breaking one’s non-dominant arm. Unless of course, one breaks both.  And someone who saw my arm told me that one summer she broke one arm, and that October she broke the other one.  That just sucks.  

But anyway.  I was just trying to explain why this will take a while.  (I did try doing it 2-handed, but it hurt. I see the orthopedic surgeon tomorrow for follow-up, I can see what he thinks about typing.)  On the other hand (both figuratively and literally), maybe being more focused/hung up  on my typing will loosen up my writing, which is a big part of why I wanted to have a blog.  I used to love writing, and would like to be able to do it with less drama than I usually make of it.

I have not been posting anywhere as much as I want to be, and it’s interesting that now that it’s a little harder, I’m doing it.  And it’s a good lesson in not procrastinating,because whatever I’m struggling to do now might end up being harder later.  My next task is to clean my room, which is really a substantial corner of a larger room.  I have wanted to get organized since, oh, June, when I moved in.  And that really would be much easier with two arms.  And I kept finding excuses not to do it when I had no physical reasons to make it more difficult.  

But now I really want it done.  It’s Tuesday, and I have a friend coming to spend Friday night.  A friend who knows my long history of struggling against chaos, and who is pretty neat.  So it would be great to show off a neat space. And the thing is that I like neat, too.  

But I don’t want a neat room.  I want a neat lair.  I am thinking in part of the spaces, studios, houses, apartments, whatever,  that serial killers on tv dramas have.  Spaces that reflect their obsession, but are also functional.  And functional for their particular needs.  The Ice Truck Killer on Dexter has a very stripped down apartment, but he has a walk-in industrial freezer for dissecting and storing bodies.  And a very good security system.

I want to find ways to decorate with some of the functional and semi-functional things I have.  I have several jars of beads and buttons that I use for sewing or crafts, and I’d like to set up those jars so they add to the decor.  I like hanging and dangly things, and I have more stuff than I really have room for, so I’m trying to hang pretty bags from the ceiling and use those for storage.  I need to find better ways to accommodate things in progress, such as sewing projects and things awaiting a trip to the thrift store or recycling station.  Okay, enough writing about it, time to go do.  More later….

I have to get up early an do a whole bunch of things, so I am not going to stay up late.  I haven’t eaten any potato chips since my last post, but I have played some solitaire, especially one night when I really wanted potato chips. I played a bunch of solitaire to keep me from thinking about potato chips.  Is that progress?  Substituting one addictive behavior for another?    I realized that another reason I want to stop eating potato chips is that they are the only salt snack food that I think about or crave when they are not there.  I like Doritos for example, but if I am home with no Doritos, it’s really rare that I’ll start thinking, oh I want Doritos.    

I was being good about not eating after 9 pm, too.  Last night I had a bit of a frustrating time at work, and I said to myself on the way home from work, ‘Self, just because this was a frustrating night, this does not mean that I will go home and eat.’ But then I got home and there was the cheese on the counter, and I had a bite, and then another bite, and then I finished it, and then I ate the rest of the soy ice cream in the freezer.  Ugh.

So tonight I got off work a little after 9 pm.  I had eaten a few bites of hummus at work after 9, but not very much.  I came home and put out the garbage and watered flowers, and kept thinking about sour cream and onion potato chips.  It is nice to have a party store within easy walking distance, and I walked over to it, and walked around and around.  They didn’t seem to have the right kind sour cream and onion potato chips (ridged as opposed to flat).  I thought about getting some ranch flavor Munchies (containing Doritos, pretzels, sun chips and something else).  I thought about getting some hot dogs, but meat is dead, and didn’t get that way in a good way, and besides meat is so environmentally intensive, and at 13 I had the courage of my convictions about not eating meat, and I want to get back in the veggie groove.  I thought about getting some canned salmon.  And then I thought that I really want to be better about not eating after 9, and a few bites of hummus, well taboule too, don’t mean that the whole plan is ruined, and that I should come home and eat like a pig.  So I got a four-pack of Kahlua Mudslides, and came home and had two.  Well, actually I had one on the way home, in violation of Ann Arbor’s open bottle law.   So I both kept to my plan (coz drinking after 9 is ok), and get to feel a little naughty, as opposed to feeling like a goody-two-shoes, which makes it harder to stick with the plan.  Coz I hate feeling like a goody-two-shoes, and it makes me want to rebel.

Tomorrow, up early, and productive.  Maybe I will write about how I want a lair….

I am not going to write very much, I am going to go to bed.  But I am writing because I am not, repeat, not, going to go to the party store down the street and buy sour cream and onion potato chips, which I very much want. I am trying to get in the habit of not eating after 9 p.m.  And it’s 10:05 p.m. now.  If I want potato chips in the morning, I still have the option.  The things I eat after 9 p.m. are rarely things I need to eat, and while I still sleep well if I eat right before bed, I feel sort of gross and snake-like if I eat a bunch and then go to bed.  I’m also really trying not to eat potato chips, one because they are not food, they are these bizarre renderings of the potato, and two because they are one of the few things that I will eat, not only past the point of fullness, but past the point of nausea.  What is a good salty substitute?  Pretzels with hummus, maybe?  Plain pretzels are kind of boring.  

The other thing that I’m really trying to quit, though I like it so much, is pop.  It’s not good for living creatures, but that’s not my main reason for wanting to quit.  It freaks me out that in a world where so many people are hungry, so many resources go into the production, distribution, marketing and consumption of flavored sugar water.  Anyway, this is more about my bizarre compulsive eating habits than anyone wants to know.

I should make a phone call.  Actually 2.  But my cell phone is down to the point where it is saying low battery.  I’m currently living with a friend, who does have a landline, but these are both long distance calls, and I’m not sure if she has unlimited long distance (this is something I need to ask her, but right now, she’s not here, so I can’t.)  It’s 9 pm, which means if I call from my phone, these calls will be free.  But one of the people I’m supposed to call (it’s sort of work-related, activist work anyway) had complained to me about people calling her late, like 9,10 pm.  So maybe I shouldn’t call her.  And I kind of want to talk to her before I call the other person, though of course I could talk to him, and tell him that after I talk to her, I will call him back.

So why don’t I just plug in my cell phone and call?  Well, because I’m not unpacked/settled in (despite having been here over a week), and because I packed in a very disorganized way, I have no idea where my phone chargers (I have at least 3) are.  And I was going to be downstairs (in the basement, where I’m staying) unpacking tonight.  I even skipped a meeting that I (sort of) wanted to go to, in order to stay home and unpack and organize.  But instead I’ve been upstairs, doing a little email, eating carrots, hanging out with the dog and cats, doing the very critical thing of downloading ring tones to my phone (which shortly won’t be ringing at all, as it will be dead), etc.  I did pay my cell phone bill, which really needed to be done.

So why don’t I go downstairs and unpack?  Why am I so intimidated by all this stuff, which is mine, which I wanted enough to move? I will go down now, and try to make some headway, and more thoughts tomorrow….

So this is a Buffy the Vampire Slayer reference, and it makes me realize that I need a link to a Buffy site under thinking and obsessing, because I definitely do both about Buffy.  Anyone have a favorite BtVS fan site?

In Season 5, the gang is in the astronomy section of the UC Sunnydale Library, researching.  Xander asks, “why are we here to research a killer snot monster?” And Giles says, “because it’s a killer snot monster from outer space.  I can’t believe I just said that.”  I can’t remember if the monster kills people with its snot, or kills them in some other way, and secretes snot wherever it goes.

I made a decision that I’m not going to say bad things about people I know on my blog.  Bad things about elected officials etc, all good.  Bad things about friends, family, acquaintances, not so much.  Because things get around, and one never knows who will find one’s blog. And it’s one thing to vent about people to a friend verbally, or even to write it down in my journal, and another to put it out in cyberspace for all to see.  Not that I really think that that many people are reading this, but it’s the principle of the thing.  And I’d hate to have someone I was venting about accidentally stumble on this, start reading, and realize it’s all about them.

I actually was on the bus once, listening to two people say rather derogatory things about two other people, who were never mentioned by name.  But as I was listening, I realized that the two people were one of my housemates and a friend of his.  I almost said something, but didn’t.  But it made me realize what a small world it is.

So what does all this have to do with killer snot monsters?  Not that much.  But I’ve been frustrated by a bunch of things lately, and I confess I have caught myself saying ‘killer snot monster’ from time to time.  As if it were an expletitive?  An innvocation?  (I hope not, as on Buffy, the killer snot monster only comes when summoned.) A funny thing to say and distract myself?  Who knows.

The killer snot monster is drawn to, and kills people, who are in some way mentally disturbed.  It is  a total exaggeration to say that the people I’m frustrated with are mentally disturbed, but they are making me a little crazy, and if I were a killer snot monster, I would have no empathy for their troubles, I would just kill them.  Ha, ha.

Isn’t this a nice nonviolent thought.  A week ago, I helped Sheri with a Train the Trainers for Nonviolent Peaceforce (nonviolentpeaceforce.org) , an amazing organization.  And, barring unforseen circumstances, in mid-June I’m co-training people who might be on a Peace Team at Lansing Pride.  This is with Michigan Peace Team, another amazing organization michiganpeaceteam.org.  And yet, here I am, filled with partial desires for murder.  Partial as I know I don’t really want to see anyone dead.  Except Henry Kissenger, and he already is. (HK has always been my exception when I say, ‘I wouldn’t wish that (serious illness, traumatic events, profound suffering, etc) on anyone.’   So does this make me a hypocrite?  Or someone who realizes that the violence of the world lives in  me as well as in US foreign policy?

On that question, I must scuttle.

Well, a few last notes.  I haven’t played solitaire since my last post, over a month ago!  But this is not as impressive as it seems, as my computer is not letting me get online recently, and I’m actually posting this from someone else’s computer. 

And a question, for anyone to answer.  Do grown-ups voluntarily drink apple juice?  I don’t mean if they’re having stomach difficulties, working at a pre-school, or somehow having nothing else available.  

Blessings (and no snot) to all.

I have just played my last game of computer solitaire.  I am determined.  I do it to procrastinate, and I do it when I don’t know what to do with myself, and I do enjoy it, but in some ways I don’t even enjoy it.  I get into this weird compulsive things, where I think I can’t stop till I win, but I am aware of time slipping away, and feeling guility about it, so I can’t really concentrate on the game, so it’s harder to win, so I keep playing and am feeling increasingly guilty, and also frustrated, because I know I’m not doing it right, and I think to myself, ‘is this really how I  want to spend my life, playing spider solitaire on the computer?” And the answer is NO, no it is not, and yet, I do enjoy it enough, or have a strong enough desire to procrastinate, that I come back to it. 

I am somewhat procrastinating now by writing on my blog, but at least at the end I will have something to show for it, a post.  (And I am also hoping that by writing, I will improve my writing  and de-stress writing some.  Because I used to love to write, and then it got really stressful, off-putting, something, and I kind of stopped.)  What do I have to show at the end of time spent playing solitaire?  Nothing.  I will say that again, nothing.

No more solitaire. I am determined.  I won’t set my goal as high as to stop procrastinating, but at least I can procrastinate one thing by working on another. 

But there are some satisfactions and lessons of solitaire.  The main satisfaction is seeing order made out of chaos.  Whether it’s a game with alternating black and red, or piling up the suit, card by card, I start with this whole chaos of cards and end up with order.  And even when it’s a tricky game, the rules for establishing order are fairly simple.  There is so much in my life right now that feels chaotic, and I’m not sure how to go about establishing order.

The lessons.  One is to take my time and really look.  Because it’s easy to miss things, even sometimes things that are obvious.  And sometimes I realize that I have been working, working on one suit, moving things around in all kinds of complicated ways, only to realize that there is one suit I could finish with one or two simple moves.  But I have gotten so locked into this one way of doing things that I have missed an obvious opportunity.

But I think I have learned all the lessons that solitaire has to offer, and I can move onto other things.  I think even Yoda would agree that my training in solitaire is complete. 

My next task, after posting this, is to put away and in a way that makes sense, my box of odd found objects that I am saving for art projects.  A way that makes sense in that things will be easy to find; it will be easy to put things away; like items will be stored with like items; items will be stored close to their point of use; and good use will be made of available space.  I don’t want to end up doing that weird thing in which, to make absolute best use of space, I have put the blender blade and the drill bits together in the silverware drawer, while the blender and the drill are in the garage, because in terms of use, this makes no sense at all.  Okay, enough writing about organzing, time to do it.

So when I started this blog, and I’m not sure how long ago it was now, but several weeks ago at least, I said to myself that I was not going to get all hung up on my first post, and want to say the perfect thing and instead write nothing.

But today I did something that I want to boast about, so I am finally writing. From my house, I can take the #4, 5 or 6 bus. The #6 is the one I take least often, and for the last week, I haven’t taken it at all. I did today, though, and I on the way back home, I saw that the used condom that I have been noticing by the side of the road for a while was still there. I didn’t have a platic bag on me, but conveniently next to the condom were a smashed paper cup and a tissue. So I used the tissue to scooch the condom into the paper cup, and brought it home in my handy canvas bag (already full of recycling picked up by the side of the road) and threw it out and washed my hands very well.

Don’t get me wrong, I am glad people are practicing safer sex. And I don’t think that many diseases are spread by used condoms thrown out of car windows (that’s my best guess as to where it came from). But yuck. And I don’t think it’s prudishness that I think this. I think that I was motivated to finally pick up that condom, because I had thought about, but decided against, picking up the used diapers I’d already passed by the side of the road. If I’d had a plastic bag, I might well have.

Okay, I confess, I did have some plastic bags with me. But these are quality, large, extra-sturdy department store bags, and I didn’t want to waste them on gross garbage. Is this very neurotic? It made me realize, though, that I want to start carrying some regular plastic grocery bags with me. Those I can use to pick up litter. Because I have been thinking, as I walk along picking up bottles and cans for recycling, that there really is so much litter–non-recyclable, straight-up garbage–by the side of the road. (Question: I have never really understood about dashes, is this a proper use of them??) And this is at least as unsightly and unecological as the recyclables. And if I put it right in the grocery store bag, I can just tie it up and throw it in the garbage when I get home. The recycling I usually clean out when I get home, but the garbage I can just throw out, which is a super-liberating thought. And I don’t want to put really gross things in a bag that I will keep in my backpack, even if I mostly use that bag for picking up recyclables.

So these are the bags I need in my backpack: A bunch of standard grocery bags for picking up garbage, or other needs that come up (wet bathing suits, etc.) A few nicer plastic bags that can be used for whatever, or given to other people. Then 2 or 3 captain’s chair bags for recycling. These are a weird shape for most things, but cans and bottles fit in them nicely. They are also easy to throw over my shoulder, even with a backpack. And they are sturdier and more resusable than plastic grocery bags. And also a few cloth bags for groceries or other shopping. I need to be better about putting the captain’s bags back in my backpack after bringing them home full of recycling. Otherwise I end up picking up bottles and putting them in the cloth bags (which is what I did today, because I didn’t have any captain’s bags with me) and then the cloth bags get gross from dirty bottles, and then I don’t want to put groceries in them.

What will help is setting up a place where I can dump the recycling from the captain’s chair bags, and put the bags back in my backpack and deal with the recycling later. The most sensible thing, I think, is to put one of my collapsible hampers in the garage, and dump things in there. I had theoretically done that, but then I wasn’t very organized about it, and the space got kind of chaotic, and I didn’t want to deal with it, and the whole garage is kind of chaotic with a bunch of stuff that is not mine. But that still makes the most sense, and I surely if I can deal with other people’s used condoms, I can deal with a little garage mess. And on that note of wisdom, I am saying, yeah, my first post, and finishing.