It's been a loooooooooong ass time...

Since I last posted. Sorry about that. What happened? Well...

It's a weird story. Basically, my father in law (henceforth FIL for those not familiar with the internet shorthand) got remarried. Except he did it in the most ass way possible.

I knew he had been on some dates. But he didn't every really talk about them. If Josh called and he wasn't home, when the call was returned, he said he was hanging out at his friend's house. With no reason to think he was hiding anything I believed him.

Then, last June he called and told Josh he had a girlfriend and had had a girlfriend for about six months. Ok. That was a revalation that was going to take some time to process. So the processing began and the emotions started churning and as anyone who has ever lost a parent or parent in law knows, it's effing hard when the remaining parent moves into the dating stage.

So the processing was going along ok until he called a week, maybe two weeks, later and dropped the bombshell that they were getting married.

Yeah.

So suffice it to say that really, really fucked me up emotionally. I want to be clear here, I had no reservations about his choice of person, I know my FIL is a sensible person and he's not going to marry a jerk or a gold digger or anything like that. I also knew that he would remarry at some point and that is ok. But well, when you hide your dating, then hide your girlfriend then decide to marry her before either of us have ever laid eyes on her, that's fucked up. Really, really fucked up.

We met her shortly thereafter and yes, she was perfectly nice, and yes I do like her quite a bit, but it's taken about a year to stop feeling like he punched me in the gut, kicked Josh in balls, ran over my cats with a steam roller and set fire to my house. I know he didn't mean to hurt me this bad, but well, he did and that takes a while to recover from.

So that really effed me up in the head. I went six months and didn't do a lick of cross stitch. 'Nuff said.

Anyway, i'm back now, and thought I would start up the ol' blog again. There have been other developments, but i'll fill you in on those later. (Spolier alert: NO I am NOT pregnant!)

I Love You Prilosec...I'll Never Let Those Assholes Take You Away From Me.

Except that i'm realizing now after a somewhat greasy lunch and a lot of Crystal Light (acidic) that I forgot to take my Prilosec this morning. I have some Rolaids Soft Chews in my desk, but they are child's play compared to the Prilosec. I LOVE the Prilosec. Whenever some numbnut starts bitching about how we all take too many pills I think of my Prilosec and sigh longingly. Water used to give me heartburn. Water! So you can see the whole chaging my diet and drinking more water didn't do much to help. Better living through chemistry y'all.

Oh and by the way...

For all of those who expressed surprise at me going out with my freinds this weekend, along the lines of Brandi has freinds? and Brandi goes places? You all can kiss the lower part of the backside of the canister that is my body.

And Lo, The Seventh Seal Was Opened, And Brandi Went to the Club

No, really. I went to the club this weekend with a few freinds. It was a bithday celebration so I felt like an asshole not going. I had fund hanging out and shopping and having dinner with the girls, but I did not like the club.

It always pissed me off as a kid when people would say "How do you know you don't like it if you haven't tried it?" That still applies. Josh kept telling me Friday that I would go to the club and end up liking it and spending all my time there until I found someone new. No, I don't know what he was smoking. These are a few things I know about myself: I don't like loud places, I don't like crowded places, I don't like paying $10 to get in somewhere, I don't like paying huge amounts for drinks, I don't like being out super late, and I don't like paying large amounts of money for clothes that I can't wear to work.

This is what I know about the club: It is very loud and crowded. The cover varies, but can be pretty high. The drinks are too expensive to really catch a buzz on. No on even goes to the club before 10 pm. The clothes that you wear to the club are not clothes you can wear to work. At least not in my kind of work. So it's not a big leap to assume that knowing myself pretty well and what I like and don't like that I can safely guess that the club wasn't for me. But hey, I went. And I am know 100% certain that my life as a homebody who loves to cross stitch while watching tv and going to to bed early is for me. Just like I was before.

Posts I Would Have Put on Twitter This Weekend if I Was on Twitter.

1. Saturday morning i'm driving to Wal-mart and I see Grimace and the Hamburgler outside the McDonald's with ballons doing some sort of promotion. And I thought, do kids even know who Grimace and the Hamburgler are anymore? I haven't seen them in a commercial for McDonald's in ages.
2. My mail carrier still doesn't know what the large yellow DO NOT BEND stickers on my mail mean as I found another package marked that way crammed into my mailbox this weekend. I know you phone it in since you're a goverment employee, but come on.
3. I watched my first episode of Battlestar Gallactica this weekend with Josh. In the four minutes that Guyas Baltar was on screen in the first half of the show he proved himself to be a complete tool who I hate eventhough I probablly won't watch the show again. Unless he gets beaten up or killed. Then i'll tune in.
4. Edward James Olmos really does have skin the texture of a decorative autumn squash. It fits his charecter on BSG as Odama, but I feel for the man in the future.
5. I have a few questions about BSG. First of all, where do the Cylons get their make up and hair products from? They look great where as the Humans look like they haven't had soap in ten years. And where does all the booze come from? If they left Earth with the booze surely it's running low by now. Are they making toilet wine like in prison? And where the hell did the piano in the bar come from? This is just silly.
6. Have you seen the commercial for the weight loss cookies? The one where everyone is saying that they took the cookie from the cookie jar? And they say that you can save all this money by eating these diet cookies instead of real food? Yeah, you're supposed to have ONE COOKIE for breakfast, ONE for lunch, then I guess a sensible dinner as Slimfast used to call it. I'll tell you why you're saving money. Because starving is cheap! One cookie! A magical weightloss cookie that can't taste that good? Fuck you. I'll be fat.
7. Speaking of which, I found out at the doctors a few weeks ago that I have gained weight and am now above my personal limit by two pounds. And a few weeks ago I also found out I have high cholesterol. So i'm changing my diet a bit and hope to start exercising soon. Bleh.
8. Got completely lost yesterday trying to find Jessica's baby shower. (Yes, Jessica C. Check out her blog and her Etsy page.) I actually had given up on finding the place and was heading home when I noticed a sign for the church by the road and showed up an hour late. I hate being late as much as I hate being lost. But i'm glad I made it. I would have hated missing the shower even more.
9. While watching Spongebob this weekend (Yes I watch Spongebob. But only the older episodes. The new ones are unwatchable.) I saw a commercial for a Littlest Pet Shop playset. It came with an exclusive new pet, the porcupine. You dumbasses. No one wants a porcupine for a pet. Porcupines are wild animals and their quills break off once they've lodged in your skin. They are not cute or cuddly at all. The new pet should be a hedgehog. I know they are often confused, but come on. Google porcupine and tell me anyone would want one as a pet. As a former hedgie owner this really bugged me.

So that was my weekend if I had put it on Twitter. Which I didn't because i'm not on Twitter, because I don't get Twitter. Because i'm old. That is also why i'm not on Facebook or Myspace. I'm going to go polish my cane now and talk about how things used to cost less than they do now.

Have I Mentioned I'm A Consumer Whore Lately?

I haven't? Well here you go. I totally am. I bought a Snuggie.

Yes I know that the Snuggie is a ripoff of the Slanket. (Who came up with the name Slanket anyway? That sounds like some weird sexual act.)

Anyway I went to Walgreens Sunday night and they had Snuggies for $15. I had decided I wanted one after Christmas when I was trying to read with a blanket over me and found that I couldn't turn the pages of my book without disturbing the delicate way I had the blanket to cover my arms and my feet.

Of course I only needed one Snuggie, not two, and wasn't keen on the 6-8 week shipping time so I decided to wait until it showed up in stores like these things always do.

I will say that the fabric of the Snuggie is cheap. But considering that to make one of better fabric would involve going to the fabric store, picking out fabric, paying more than $15 for it (I would guess this thing uses 4-5 yards of fabric), prewashing, cutting the peices out and sewing them together, i'll just settle for the cheap fabric. Plus I got the book light.

So yes I bought a Snuggie. Last night I was able to cross stitch and stay warm at the same time. And now i'm ready at a moment's notice for some low-rent wizard cosplay.

Long Weekends are Looooooong.

Well this one was anyway.

We got snow! SNOW! Beautiful, white, fluffy snow! Like, four inches of it! Enough that classes here were cancelled Tuesday and Wednesday.

So my three day weekend turned into a five day weekend. Oh, it was niiiiiice.

I made a snowman, but he didn't send me any snowman themed furniture. Bastard.

I dyed Josh's hoodie since the black was fading.

I did laundry.

I washed dishes and cleaned up my kitchen.

I moved some things into the attic and others into the laundry room to be closer to the attic. (These things are Christmas decorations that still need to make the big move into the attic for another year.)

I watched the inauguration which is notable because I never watch that sort of thing.

I started work on getting my office into order.

I reorganized my cross stitch things.

I finished a UFO (unfinished object) from two years ago. (A small kit of Eeyore and a butterfly.)

I read The Worst Jobs in History and finished The Ghost Map. I picked back up The Subversive Stitch.

I watched a lot of stuff on my Tifaux and then deleted it which makes me very happy. I love to see my available time increase when I delete something.

Basically a whole lot of nothing. Or rather a whole lot of little things that I never seem to get around to doing. That being said I am glad to be back at work. I get stir crazy at home after a while. But it was very nice to relax when I needed to and not have to worry about when the things that needed to be done were going to get done.

Long weekends are loooooong. They're also very nice.

Topic Snack Mix

A little of this, a little of that...

Bride Wars. Ugh. You know, many, many women get married and have nice weddings with the poofy dress and the reception hall and all that without going batshit insane. I know it's hard to believe, but it's true. Most women don't get engaged and then loose their damn minds. Most are able to plan a lovely wedding with all the trimmings with out turning into a wedding obsessed bitch. And in this specific case (if I understand correctly the premise of the movie is that two weddings are booked on the same day, at the same time at the same location) the problem would come down to who signed a contract and made a deposit first. And I doubt this would happen or not be caught earlier in the process. Whatever. One more peice of Women are Crazy Bitches so Let's Continue Denying them Equal Rights crap from Hollywood. Fuck you.

I Was Bitten. This show should be two shows. The first show should be called Don't Fuck With Snakes or Other Dangerous Creatures Dumbass. The second should be called Holy Crap Talk About Some Bad Luck There. The first show could feature people like the guy who decided to take a poisonous rattle snake home for a pet, or the other guy who did the same thing, only put the rattlesnake into a TRASH BAG and didn't even tie it up so of course the snake got out of the bag and was PISSED! The second show could have the guy who was bitten by a Brown Recluse after picking up a blanket off the floor beside his bed and the guy who was mauled and nearly killed by a bear on a fishing trip. And there was the guy who was surfing and was attacked by a Great White Shark, but he was also on I Survived and it kinda bugs me when people like that double dip with the reality shows. Like this one guy who was on Mystery Diagnosis and on Mystery ER. Pick one. Anyway, i'll watch again and be horrified at the spectacularly bad luck of some and the breathtaking stupidity of others.

Intervention. I love some Intervention. But last week's episode about John the diabetic who didn't manage his condition was a crashing bore. I seriously could not bring myself to care. I even fast forwarded through the intervention itself. I felt for the guy not having any freinds and for his parents worrying about his health, but it wasn't good tv. Give me the people shooting up into their necks and freaks with feeding tubes for 14 years any day. That is compelling. John is boring.

Today on my way to work NPR had a story about the word of the year for 2008. They brought up all the variations on Obama, including Nobama which is already being used for his 2012 re-election campaign. That doesn't exist yet. Because he's not even taken office yet! People, let the man take office before talking shit about him possibly running for re-election four years from now. Really. Jeez.

Anyway, those are my assorted thoughts you are welcome to munch on.

I'm getting verklempt. Talk amongst yourselves.

This story was on Jezebel today and I had to share it. Nothing like badass bikers rescuing sweet little kittehs to make me tear up.

There are good people in the world. Sometimes those good people look like what we're told are bad people. You just never know.

ETA: Link to the story the NY Times did on these guys.

It's beginning to look a lot like...a bomb hit.

So let's say that you were to walk into my house right now. The front door and small foyer lead into the living room. Let's go around the living room counter-clockwise. You will see:

Empty curio cabinet in the middle of a reorganization that is on hold surrounded by various cardboard boxes that contain presents that need to be wrapped or very fragile frogs from the curio cabinet that are nestled in packing peanuts. Also three rolls of wrapping paper, some adhesive gift labels and a pop up tape dispenser.

TV and TV stand surrounded by not so fragile frogs from the curio cabinet in addition to all the ususal crap that finds it's way there for some reason.

In the corner, a naked North Carolina Frasier Fir in the stand with the prettier side facing the corner. Yes, we got a tree. No, it has not been decorated.

Fireplace that we don't use because we don't know how to use the gas logs. My silk topiaries look pretty because I put the bows on them last night. Above them is the mantle with the ususal assortment of wedding pictures surrounded by, you guessed it. More frog refugees from the curio cabinet who were originally on the sewing machine that was in the corner until we had to move it to make room for the tree.

Corner. This is where the magic happens. Yes this corner is my lair, nest, foxhole, flying coccoon. It contains my recliner from Goodwill, all the various projects i'm working on, and everything else important. Mail for me, my medicine, my DS, my Wii controller, various catalogs, my Animal Crossing strategy guide, usually some snacks. Everything. It will never be neat and clean. So! Moving on!

The couch. The couch is actually in good shape. There is no crap on it. There is plenty of crap around and in front of it on the coffee table. I don't know what this crap is. I only know that to keep the coffee table clean I would have to move it from the living room to the attic where it will never be used again. And then we would just start putting crap on the floor in front of the couch.

Desk. On the desk is a colony called New Froginton. Living here are the frogs who left the curio cabinet to start a new society of pious frogs who live simply and seek only to glorifiy their amphibious creator and escape the corrupt and sinful reign of King Ribbit. And the laptop. And in the chair is the stack of DVDs that was on the sewing machine before it was moved to make room for the tree. And there's a hole in the bottom of the sea.

Finally we come to the hope chest. This currently houses the two foot tall tree I decorated for my dolls, the presents I've wrapped so far and the various other things that reside there the rest of the year. I don't think a fly could find room to land on it in it's current state.

Oh, and the floor needs to be vacuumed. And in the kitchen we still have the box that the big TV came in. I've been throwing other boxes in it. And the sewing machine and it's chair are in the kitchen along with the ususal mess that's in the kitchen.

So my house is a wreck. More so than ususal. And getting things to where they need to be hinges on several things that don't seem like they're going to happen anytime soon. But that's ok. Because this is why hot chocolate tastes great with some Bailey's in it. To keep people from going mental during the holiday upheaval. Right? Right?

It's beginning to look a lot like...every other day the rest of the year.

So...this weekend.

Friday I mildly buzzed and watched The Nutcracker. I planned on a productive weekend of Christmas decorating. I was sooooo wrong about that.

Now this is the thing about my sleep disorder. I'm currently on Provigil. It helps a bit. I can get through my day at work without feeling like I need to nap under my desk George Costanza style. I don't feel great. I don't feel like my brain can tell the difference between night and day. But I do feel ok.

EXCEPT if I miss a dose. I have been instructed to not take the Provigil on the weekend. Well it took about three weekends for me to figure out that this isn't going to work. The first day I skip the meds I feel alright. I can tell I didn't take it, but otherwise I feel ok. But the second day without the meds...fuuuuuuuuuck. I feel like aaaaaaaass. Like I have some awful flu combined with a hangover. I want to sleep all day and when i'm awake I don't really want to move.

So why is this important? I forgot to take my meds Friday morning. So Saturday I felt like ass. In addition to this Josh was at the bar with his freinds watching the game all afternoon (Conference USA Champs bitches!) so he wasn't home to help me with the little I felt like doing and I really need him to help getting things out of the attic. When he got home from the bar at five he laid down and slept until about eight. So Saturday was shot.

Sunday I got up and went to Wal-mart, Target, Michaels, The Dollar Store and Walgreens in my usual morning grocery shopping/errand running. When I got home at eleven I needed to rest. (I still have to rest even with the Provigil. I don't sleep, but it helps me recharge.) I got up at 1:30 and ate lunch. We then went to K-mart since they were the only place I hadn't looked for a new wreath yet and I had heard that trees were being sold in the parking lot.

Now K-mart was crazy. The didn't have a wreath I liked. They didn't have the new pillows Josh needed. They did have a blood pressure machine.

At his last doctor's appointment Josh's blood pressure was a little high so they told him to keep a watch on it. So he decided this was the time. And his blood pressure was WAY high. Like both numbers in the three digit range. So I spent the rest of the time trying to convince him that he wasn't going to die RIGHT NOW. There were no trees in the parking lot and Josh was hungry because he didn't eat before we left the house like I suggested. So we called all this off and went home where Josh moped about his blood pressure and then fell asleep until about eight again. So Sunday was a bust.

Now it's Tuesday and the only sign of Christmas at our house is the stack of wrapped gifts on the hope chest because we don't have a tree to put them under.

So i'm not sure what to do. Josh is occupied the rest of this week with exams here at the university and still teaching at the community college since they have classes two weeks longer than the univeristy does.

I think my dolls will be dressed up and put out for Christmas tonight since Abigail's dress is coming in today. (I bought her Addy's Christmas dress. So pretty! It's a Civil War era style, but that's ok. Abigail likes to kick it old school.) But what about the tree? That's what really makes it feel like Christmas. I have three options.

Option 1: Wait until Josh has time to help me get things out of the attic and for us to go buy a tree. Pros: I don't have to do anything on my own that I can't handle and may lead to failure or disaster. We get to do this stuff together which is always fun. The overall awesomeness of a real North Carolina Frasier Fir. The one and only Chirstmas tree in my book. Cons: Time is slipping away and I don't want to put stuff up only to have to take it all down in a really short period of time. The wrestling with a live tree and getting it in a stand. Leaving it while we're gone and hoping it doesn't dry out too bad. Finding a place to buy a tree since the Lions Club isn't out at Wal-mart this year.

Option 2: Buy an artificial tree. Pros: I can put it up myself. It can be prelit so no fussing with lights. Prelit trees are getting more affordable. We'd have a tree ready to go if we're too broke to buy a real tree next year. All the branches are of equal strength so no fussing with heavy ornaments trying to get them on the right branch. No watering the thing. No cleaning up needles. Cons: Just not as pretty as a North Carolina Frasier Fir. Bigger out of pocket cost than a real tree. Josh still has to be there to help me get things out of the attic. We have to store the thing and the attic is getting crowded.

Option 3: Use my three foot high artificial tree. Pros: No watering or cleaning needles. We already have the thing. I can put it up. Cons: Josh will still need to help me get the ornaments from the attic. It's not prelit so i'll have to mess with lights. It will need to sit on a peice of furniture, most likely the sewing machine so the cats will have something to try and jump on the examine the thing. Since it's on the sewing machine there won't be room for many presents adn they'll have to sit on the floor. I'll feel like a cop-out for putting up a lame tree.

Josh is no help in this. He tells me it's all my decision. He does that a lot. It annoys the hell out of me. If he wants a big tree I wish he would just tell me and i'll strike Option 3 off the list and focus on 1 and 2. If he wants a real tree then i'll say ok and prepare to rally for that little outing. I need guidance dammit! It's his Christmas too! Of course him being so passive has it's positive side sometimes. This just isn't one of those times.

Of course this isn't just about the tree and the decorating. It's facing the fact that I have a chronic health problem that is going to make various parts of my life a real pain in the ass and I don't have much recourse. It's trying to be ok with my sleep disorder and meds fucking up my weekend plans and getting in the way of making the most of the time that I do have to do things.

I guess Charlie Brown isn't the only one who can take a wonderful thing like Christmas and turn it into a problem.

I really should relax and not worry about all this, but we'll be out of town of Saturday and for a few days surrounding the actual holiday so I feel like we need to get things done so we can enjoy them for as long as we can while we're here.

So I still don't know what we're going to do. We'll do something. But i'm not sure what. And that is driving me crazy!

Feeling festive? No akshually. But maybe we can fix that.

So this weekend I declared that we would put up the Christmas tree. Because if not now, when? If we wait until i'm feeling festive enough to initiate it (and I always have to initiate it) then it'll be January before the thing goes up.

I'm not sure why i'm not feeling it right now. I think part of it comes from living in NC where it doesn't get cold until November and rarely if ever snows. Snow would help with my mood. Or maybe not having to worry about all the effort that goes into Christmas. The tree, the moving things, the dragging crap out of the attic. I don't mind the shopping, but I just don't feel well enough to do everything else normally done at Chirstmas. Like baking. I love baking. But the prospect of getting my kitchen dirty and having to clean it makes me want to take a nap.

But I have resolved to try and get in the mood. Things are coming out of the attice tomorrow, i've ordered a Christmas dress for Abigail and i'm looking forward to dressing her and the other girls up. And tonight I decided to open the spumante I bought for Thanksgiving and get loaded and watch The Nutcracker.

Of course on second thought maybe that was a bad idea. When I was watching this the other night it just made me depressed that I never became a ballerina. (For realz. I seriously wanted to be a ballet dancer when I grew up. I didn't grow out of it when I hit puberty.) Oh well, what's more normal at Chirstmas than depression?

I guess the answer to that is dragging a live tree into your house to sit in water, cover with electric lights and surround with flamable things. And fattening food. And watching Russian people skip around in tights. Is that the magic of Christmas i'm starting to feel? Or is the alcohol starting to kick in? Meh. What difference does it make?

I would say that monkeys are delivering mail around here...

...but that would be an insult to some of God's most interesting and intelligent creatures. I'm fairly certain that a monkey could learn which mailbox in the mail room belongs to my department.

As for the people who somehow continue to address my mail to the English department despite the fact that I do not now, nor have I ever worked there, they have to be a special kind of stupid.

So...stupid animal. Hmmm. Sadly I think humans are the best fit here.

There is a flag on the field.

Insert whistle here. Team Put Up Our Chirstmas Decorations Two Weeks Before Thanksgiving has fouled. False start. You are penalized five yards and must repeat first down.