Just some stuff.

My grandmother fell and broke her hip, or more accurately, my grandmother's hip broke and she had a fall as a result. She is having surgery for it tomorrow. I'm more than a little worried and upset. I've been lucky enough to have both my grandmothers around for a good long while.. I mean, not everyone is lucky enough to get to their 30's and still have grandparents around. Hell, I know people not much older than me who have already had to deal with losing both parents. So I'm lucky, I know that much.

Because I realize this, it's all the more upsetting to face the fact that they are both of them not as young as they used to be.

god. Isn't that the most ridiculous saying? Not as young as you used to be. Well no shit. I'm not as young as I used to be either. in fact, i'm a whole day older than i was yesterday. Seriously, what an idiotic saying. I feel like punching myself. It's as bad as saying "It's always in the last place you look!" Again, no shit.

I digress.

So I'm clearly worried, and I don't really know what to do. Damnit.

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So, my hearing sucks. It's terrible. I'm pretty sure years of headphone abuse combined with a history of chronic ear infections (the over prescribing of antibiotics for said infections eventually, I believe, leading to my ulcerative colitis, but that's a story for another day) have done irreversible damage. I don't hear a lot of ambient noise, and I can have trouble making out what people say, especially if they talk low, fast and don't enunciate well.

I know it can be frustrating for those around me, having to repeat things to me, and me not always understanding things the first time around. It's not like it's not frustrating for me. I hate having to ask people to repeat things, or not to whisper to me. I hate having to fill in the blanks sometimes when people talk to me. I hate that I have to watch movies with the closed captioning on half the time, otherwise I have to have the TV blaring. I've had tests done, and looked into hearing aids, but for the actual amount of difference an aid would make is negligible, as apparently the loss "is only minor."

I'm told that I don't have any fluid build-up but... Well, I love to swim. Love it. A few years ago I went cliff jumping at Grundy lake and when I hit the water, it rushed into my ear and I couldn't hear properly for weeks afterward. Now I find that when I swim, if I stick my head too far under, my ears and head feel like they are going to explode with pressure.

I don't know if I should go back for another second opinion or not.

Hell. Not great mood overall. I kind of wish I had my covered porch again so I could watch the storm.

Come to think of it, I'd probably forgo shaving, too. #Revolution

Since its inception, The Well-Travelled One and I have been pretty regular viewers of Revolution, the dystopian-future drama set 15 years after a human-made disaster wipes out almost all electricity (and for some reason, combustion engines, because why not?) and the world, especially North America, goes to shit.

Like, I said, Dystopian.

Without giving away too many spoilers, last night after many many episodes worth of almost non-stop gratuituous violence, we FINALLY got to see a little sex.  Not a lot, because I'm pretty sure this is a network show and not HBO.  I make this assumption due to the fact that for a future where people are getting slaughtered left, right and center, there's surprisingly little cussing.  Graphic violence in multitudes is cool, but please, no cussing or hint of side-boob, right NBC?

So a couple of characters who will remain unnamed ended the episode by engaging in some implied naked fun time.

This morning I got to thinking.. if I were living in a dystopian future would there be any purpose to wearing a bra?  I'm thinking no.  At least not for me.  I know there are women who HAVE to wear bras, otherwise face massive discomfort, so I'm not about to begrudge more endowed ladies their undergarments, even when the world is going to hell in a handbasket.

As my friend Nic pointed out, all that running from zombies, robots, authorities etc. could very well make some kind of support a necessity, in which case I'd probably settle for binding myself instead of oh.. I don't know.. MATCHING BRA AND PANTY SETS?  Somehow I think if my life was constantly under threat, I'd not care much what my underpants looked like, and would be more worried about not constantly shitting them every time someone was trying to kill me.

Like how Aaron looks 90% of the time he's on screen.

Where in a dystopian future with no electricity where our heroes are consistently on the run from forces that would see them dead, does {redacted for spoilers} get a fucking matching Victoria Secret bra and panty set?

Did she sew them herself?

In the immortal words of Sweet Brown, "Ain't nobody got time for that."

Are they shipped by steamships from sweatshops that have gotten even sweatier since the lights (and thus the air conditioning.. because sweatshops totally have THAT) went off?  How the hell would they get to her?  The main protagonists are ALWAYS ON THE MOVE.  CONSTANTLY.

And NOBODY is going to convince me that these are they same underoos she's had for the last fifteen years.  The show is set in 2027, so she'd have to have bought them last year, in 2012 at the latest.  I'm a buyer of underpants and a purchaser of brassieres, and the shit that gets manufactured and sold in stores in present-day North America is NOT made to withstand 15 years of fighting, killing, running, plotting and the occasionally beating against a rock to launder them.  She would have stabbed herself with the underwire a thousand times over by now.

I guess in an electricity-void, dystopian future where hair always looks conditioned, EXIT signs in building still glow red and people inexplicably drink whiskey from late 19th-century antique glass bottles in spite of the fact that their 15-year-old empty Canadian Club 26ers would probably work just as well, a little bit of realism when it comes to the characters gotchies is probably too much to ask.

Dream journaling: Those who work in glass office buildings...

I woke up oddly disoriented after this one. It's been a while since I've been able to recount the details of a dream vividly.

I'm in a kitchen talking to one of my best friends about a party she's throwing for her daughters. She's freaking out a bit because in this reality, it's custom to purchase gifts for party guests, not the other way around. I'm not on the phone but I'm not really sure I'm speaking to her in person either. While we talk, I'm trying to get at a small CD player on the counter because I am determined to make my ex-husband listen to "Lovecraft in Brooklyn" for nor reason other than it's a pretty awesome song that I think everyone should listen to.

Having given up, I drive into work. Downtown is jam packed busy, so by the time I get there, it's after dark. My friend is there with her daughters. She is meeting me since I decided to give her some money to buy my kids present, since I don't really get why she's buying them anything when it's her kids birthday.

Getting out of the car, I notice that a huge crowd has gathered outside made up of my co-workers, Tim horton's employees (in this reality, Tim's hasn't moved down the street yet) and other various people who also work in the building. There is the sound of commotion and crackling electricity. Lights in the windows are flickering off and on and I vaguely recall that the building is scheduled for demolition. It seems odd to me that we all showed up for work anyway, and distressing that we're all standing in the parking lot instead of getting the hell out of there.

There an eerie silence as suddenly all the lights in the windows flicker and go black. I start to turn and run, but not before each individual glass pane starts shattering and blowing out wards. Shards and bits of glass rain down on the crowd and I run, admits the screaming, eyes closed against the bits of glass that have blown into my face and hair. Blind but aware of my friend and her girls near by I run across the street, oblivious to oncoming traffic, until I reach the opposite parking lot.

Once across the street, I carefully brush the glass off myself and pick it out of my hair and turn to survey the damage and wait for the eventually collapse, expecting something like what you see in those stock-footage reels of collapsing buildings.

I look over and a group of people have picked up my car and have managed to fold it like one of those collapsible laundry hampers. No, no no, I tell them but they carry it across the lot, unfold it and lovingly dust off the debris.

Later I am at an outdoor cafe, run by the guy who hosts our open mike. I can't get to my guitar, the place is too crowded. My Nanny is there and I'm trying to have a conversation with her, but my phone rings. A voice on the other end speaks in a muffled voice in a language I can't understand. The voice sounds apologetic, so assuming they have a wrong number I try to disengage, but each time I do, the voice on the other end gets belligerent and threatening. Finally I tell the voice that I am not paying to listen to this and hang up, but I worry after that the voice will call back to berate me some more.

Saturday quickie: shopping day with the kiddies

A few quick thoughts after spending the day shopping with my girls (a rare treat indeed).

- nothing emphasizes how badly our local mall sucks than going to an out of town mall. Really, our mall sucks.

- I hope that my girls remain as enthusiastic about bathing suit shopping as they are right now. I hope it never becomes an experience they dread, fraught with self-loathing and shame, like it does for so many women.

- What's a surefire way to dissuade me from spending money in an awesomely huge candy store the likes of which I've never seen? Tell me 10% of proceeds go towards sending missionaries to India. Colonialism makes the sweetest candy taste bitter.

- Pro-tip for customer service people. It's cool to tell someone their discount card is no longer valid, has expired or whatever. What's not cool is disbelieving it ever was valid and implying that the customer is either stupid or a liar. "I don't believe that ever happened," makes just such an implication. It's too bad, because I liked those pants and would have liked to buy them, except I don't spend money in places that insult me to my face, okay Addition-Elle?

Gah. It begins.

My eldest spawn will be 12 in a month. She operates under the delusion that the digits are reversed and she's actually 21. For her age, she is a pretty confident with her self-image and has a pretty experimental sense of style.

This sounds awesome, but as the parent who has to step in and remind her that she is still only 11, it can be fraught.

The teen years are approaching and I fear its arrival the way others have feared Y2K or the end of the Mayan calendar. And like the four horsemen of the Apocalypse, various signs rear their head, signalling impending doom.

I took her and her stepsister (only a few months younger) shopping today. With their own money. When it's my money I usually have more control over clothing choices, usually by harness the power of being really, really cheap.

My kid has a predilection towards clothes that are not always age-appropriate. See aforementioned "12-going-on-21" thing. The challenge I find is explaining why something is inappropriate without resorting to shaming or telling her she's going to look like Jodie Foster in Taxi Driver.

In the period of less than an hour I found myself having to talk my not-yet-twelve year old out of:

- Neon pink short-shorts. This was easy enough to argue, since closer inspection revealed we were in the size 4-6x section. She's a 12. Easy Peasy

- 3-inch spike heels. Vetoed on the basis that heels are really, really bad for you. I have no doubt they fuck up the spine and legs of any grown woman. I don't even want to think of what those kind of heels would do to someone who is still growing.

- A yellow string bikini. Oof. I sputtered and stammered at that one and suggested trying some other styles. The other styles were all more expensive (probably due to the greater amount of fabric) and thus out of her limited price range. Finally, I appealed to her sense of broke-assedness and reminded her that I had already planned to take her and her sister bathing suit shopping next weekend. What kid wants to spend their own money on something mom was going to buy them anyway? She reluctantly put the suit back. Near miss on that one.

This is what I'm dealing with already and we haven't even hit high school yet. Gord help us all.

An open letter to the guy who insulted me as I went for breakfast.

Dear Asshole,

Today I got up and went for breakfast. The man friend was not up for it, so I decided to take a book for company instead. Seeing as it was a lovely, sunny, brisk morning I decided to walk to the restaurant. It seemed like it could shape up to be a decent day.

Thanks and a hearty "Fuck You" for ruining it.

As I was entering the front door of our local dining establishment, you and your probably equally douchey friend were coming out. I guess my appearance caught you eye because you felt compelled to exclaim "Wow! Holy fucking teeth!" at me.

For those who may not have seen pictures, I have prominent front teeth and a bit of an overbite. I know this, because assholes and dentists have insisted on pointing this out to me pretty much since my adult teeth came in. I'm 32 years old. It's nothing I haven't heard before. Doesn't mean it doesn't feel just as shitty now as it did when I was a kid.

So, thanks a lot for reducing me to feeling a goddamned awkward twelve-year-old and making me feel ugly and insecure once what you had said registered.

And then.. And THEN, you had the audacity to look outraged when, realizing that I had just been insulted to my fucking FACE, I turned around and told you to fuck off. Like I was the asshole here.

My apologies to any diners who were within earshot of that, by the way.

Believe me, that was the least you deserved for not keeping your bloody comments to yourself. A full-on public shaming would have been fitting so you could have felt as humiliated as I did at that moment, but unfortunately I'm not verbally eloquent when I'm upset. Hence why I blog.

So fuck you for making me feel like shit about myself when I was just minding my own business, enjoying my Saturday. Fuck you for the fact that I was just a little scared about walking home after breakfast, in case you and your friend decided I needed to be put in my place for speaking up. And fuck you for the good possibility that had the man friend been with me, you probably wouldn't have said shit because I'm pretty sure that's precisely the kind of cowardly piece of excrement you are.

I hope a large piece of frozen airplane toilet water crushes you from a great height.

And with that, my TV decided to channel Kurt Cobain.

I'm feeling rather grateful. It's been a stressed out week and a bit, but as the dust (and smoke and burning plastic smell - but more on that later) settles, I'm feeling immense gratitude.

I'm grateful that a week and a half after my sciatic episode, I'm pretty much pain-free. I've known people with sciatic injuries who have suffered for months and years on end. To be about 99% recuperated before I even had my first physio appointment, is pretty A-okay if you ask me.

I'm grateful that when my car started needing work, I had friends who were willing to step in and help with advice and work. I'm also grateful that when the need became especially urgent and said friends were unavailable due to circumstances beyond their control, financially I still had the option  of going to a shop and get the work done, armed with the advice given me.

I'm especially grateful that my pain-in-my-broken-ass kept The Well Travelled One and I home last Thursday night when my 6 year old Electrohome CRT television decided to literally go out in a blaze of glory. Let's be clear, when I say it was 6-years-old I refer only to the timeline in which I bought it. I wouldn't be surprised if they stopped manufacturing them much sooner. Its time was due. So as I sat there watching season 4 of Newsradio, Phil Hartman's head got really skinny, then kind of fat, then a little of both. I wondered if it was the connector and the WTO, who had a side view of the set from the vantage point of the computer desk calmly stated "actually, no, it's a small fire" before jumping over to quickly unplug it from the wall and disconnect all the peripherals.

So I am grateful that we had turned down the chance to go to karaoke, otherwise the girls would have been home, probably watching My Little Pony, wondering why Rainbow Dash's face was distorting when the set went up in flames. Thank Gord for oddly timed coincidences. Putting aside the most obvious, horrific possible outcome of that scenario.. Well, one traumatic house-fire is enough for any kid. But since my broken ass kept us home, the fire remained contained to the back of the casing, the only evidence a lingering smell of scorched plastic.

Better to burn out than fade away indeed. Tell that to all my other electronics that simply stopped working and didn't feel the need to get all showboat-y about it.

My body betrays me, once again.

Illness is an asshole.

There was a time when slowly, over a period of months, my life oozed away and my body, in it's attempts to keep that life in place became a ticking time bomb.

I rose, I recuperated, I fell once again. The threat still existed but had grown weak. There came a long, long period of good health, where my body felt strong, felt functional.

This time, when the signs began to show themselves, I was prepared, and I swore I'd be pro-active and take control before this thing took hold of me. I got the meds, I got the supplements and I embarked on a self-care plan.

Sunday, the pain in my legs began and I panicked. I had a full on panic attack, terrified that once again, I had that bomb, that cluster of cells, deep inside that was ready to break free and lodge itself in my lungs, in my brain. I feared Death. I feared everything I had worked for slipping away from me.

I'm not going to die. Not yet, anyway. Not statistically sooner than anyone else.

A swirling deluge of relief, annoyance and shame washed over me when the doctor reported there was no sign of clotting.

Relief, for obvious reasons. Not dying! Yay!

Shame for the worry and fear that had manifested in myself and affected those I love.

Annoyance because my diagnosis, an injured sciatic nerve, was just another fucking issue to deal with. And annoyance because the pain, which mimics the pain that nearly killed me, is triggering as hell. Annoyance because I don't have the luxury of assuming a pulled muscle.. The leg pain could mean a few days discomfort, or it could mean a lifetime of anti-coagulants (Three Strike Rule, y'all) and higher risk of stroke, heart disease or pulmonary embolism. I don't have the luxury of saying "Meh, I'll walk it off."

I'm optimistic, though. Today, the pain is tolerable. I've faced worse than this, and so have countless others. I have hope that this is a short term injury (the most plausible cause being a slight misjudgement of a step at a friend's house that brought my foot down a little too hard) if the improvement between today and yesterday is any indication.

@UltimateGuitar Doesn't Think Straight Girls Play.

Oh, ultimate-Guitar.com I am just about fucking done with you.

It was bad enough that I downloaded your stupid, supposedly free iPad app, which was NOT FREE because after download the app it wants you to get a paid subscription to actually access any of the fucking tabs and now every time I use your site I get prompted to download the bloody app again... NO I DON'T WANT TO DOWNLOAD YOUR STUPID FREE-NOT-FREE APP!

*deeep breath*

Where was I?

Oh yeah. If that wasn't enough, I see you're pandering to the horny frat boy set.

Stereotypically slim, large breasted model with epic cleavage and glasses poses as a music teacher. Caption reads "Learn Songs with The Teacher of your Dreams"

That's not the teacher of MY dreams.

And here I thought I was going to get to learn with Slash, or Andy McKee, or Leona Boyd.  I'm guessing they mean the teacher of your wet dreams.. In which case, I'm still clearly not their target demographic, even though I use their site frequently and have been playing guitar for pretty near 20 years now.  But I guess girls don't play guitar, or if they do, maybe UG assumes we're all Tegan & Sara or the Indigo Girls. (I'd be okay with being either, but sadly, I'm not).

In case you're wondering, I clicked and guess where it goes? Yup.  To their "free app."

Which, by the way, still isn't free.

*sigh*

Makes me miss the OLGA.

The only organs people should worry about in public bathrooms are bladders and colons.

Think about all the times you've used public washrooms. Now ask yourself how many times someone in a public washroom has openly waved their genitals at you? Not very often, I'm guessing? Now out of the probably minuscule number of people who have waved their genitals at you, how many have been trans folks?

Anectdata here, but I can unequivocally state that I have never ever had a trans woman wave her genitals at me in a public washroom. Although I can't back it up, I'm fairly confident, however that I have at some point in time shared a public washroom with a trans woman without even knowing it, my ignorance of such events likely being a result of the distinct LACK of genital waving in public washrooms.

Which is why i don't get what the big fucking deal is with letting trans people use the washroom that corresponds with their identity. Arizona, can you answer this for me?

If you accept the premise that trans women are women, full stop, you accept that there is no greater threat allowing trans women to use women's facilities. The presence of differing genitalia shouldn't enter into it. I mean, when was the last time someone told you to drop trou or present your birth certificate before allowing you to go pee?

The problem is that a lot of people don't accept this premise, which sucks, because it's really not that difficult to wrap your head around. What makes a woman a woman? Not boobs. I know dudes with nicer boobs than mine. We still accept that the profoundly flat-chested and breast cancer survivors still identify as women. Not a uterus, since I'm sure post-hysterectomy patients still define themselves as women. It's an innate sense of being a woman. It just so happens that some of the people with this sense of womanhood happen to have penises, or have had one at some point.

So instead of freaking out about the possible genitals of whomever you may be asking for an extra square of toilet paper, maybe just figure if you're in the ladies, and their in the ladies, chances are it's a lady. Then worry a little more about what's going on in your own stall.