Suburb of Heaven

Planning for the Italy trip has been fun - there have been a lot of changes since I was last there so things like pre-purchasing some of our museum tickets and train tickets ahead of time has been a new deal. Wonder of wonders, the website for buying train tickets is very easy to navigate. The whole "nicer faster trains which require reserved seats" is not something I needed to do. Of course, the first time I had to buy a train ticket in Italy I ended up buying three of them (unsure that I was buying the right one) and ended up on a super-slow milk run train that was a great introduction to the Umbrian countryside but which was not so good for meeting my contact for the study abroad program in a timely fashion. He ended up picking me up a train station or two ahead of my destination and thus I got my first intro to the Italian driver.

It's also letting me stretch my expenses over multiple months, which is pretty great. By the time we get there the only costs I'll have to incur are food and some incidentals, which can still add up, but at least they're slightly more controllable.

I'm so wound up about this trip that I'm going to have to do some work to avoid mentally crashing after it, I think.

The husband has gotten into Zentangles recently - or rather, he prefers the mandala shapes over the freeform ones that you're supposed to lay down yourself. This has led us both into the world of the adult coloring book, which was something that I always vaguely knew was soothing but had never really thought about until it became a bit of a trendy thing. Relatives in Manila, my sister, a billion people on Pinterest - and after my Amazon order arrives, me too.

In ladyparts TMI news (avert if squeamish, although I won't get graphic), I've just made my first foray into the world of the Diva Cup. So far so good, although there were some interesting shenanigans the first time I tried to fold it up correctly and put it in. As in, boinging across the bathroom and bouncing comically. This is the second day I'm using it and so far so good, although the whole business of eventually being able to do it in a public restroom has me a little dubious.

Just got back from a meeting of the book club I'm a part of. We were discussing Fangirl, and talked about writing fanfic myself (one other girl there has) and some of the other ladies had read it. Amusingly, the person I'm closest with was basically, "I don't get it - not the attraction to reading it or writing it, and same with cosplay and other fannish stuff because it's all just make-believe like when you were five and pretending you were a puppy" so it was an interesting conversation. (I did not tell people where to find my fic or even what my fandoms were - both would be bridges too far! I did say that I was just writing one before I got to the party, which is indeed the case - yay for Be-Compromised.)

Anyway, I think I'm kind of the old lady of the group, although perhaps not by a whole lot. It's not a big deal in that specific sense, because I get along well with these people, but I'm really starting to...worry isn't the right phrase. Hmm. I feel like I'm not where I'm supposed to be in life, I suppose. Which for me means that I worry because I don't make a lot of money, feel pretty useless and uncertain about the whole career thing, and wonder where I'll be in five years.

God, I mentioned my salary in a conversation over Thanksgiving with just me, my husband, my father in law, and my stepmother in law and SMIL said, bewildered, "Isn't that the level where you get food stamps?"

Uh, ouch. Ouch, ouch, ouch. I'm surprised I didn't hide under the table for the rest of the trip.

I need to get back to therapy, but I don't know if it was helping me get anywhere. I feel like I need someone to whip me into shape, not listen to me.

But mostly, there has been a potential medical issue that's cropped up recently that's part of it. I'll go into a little bit of lady TMI here so stop reading if you're squicked by it.

So, I just had my period, like...two weeks ago. And I'm spotting again, right now, a not insignificant amount. And there are a lot of reasons that could be, but none of them are a whole lot of fun. It's possible I might have inherited my mother's endrometriosis - there are possible signs that could back that up. There are also the possibility of polyps. And there's also the possibility that I'm about to go into perimenopause. I'm 39. I am definitely old enough for it. But somehow the idea of it has set off little sirens in my head, ALERT, ALERT, ALERT.

I see my dr. in a week and a bit, so I can ask her about it then. But it's just roiled up all my insecurities about who I am and what I do, and I'm not sure how to process it all.

Bemo and I met up with some friends in Wilber, NE (The "Czech capitol of America!") for their annual Czech Days Festival. It's a really nice event - one of those small-town things where they're happy to have you there spending your dollars on funnel cakes and touring the tiny museum, but they'd be there anyway, with their giant range of polka bands (from little kiddies to oldsters), dancers (ditto), electing the queen, prince, and princess of the festival, and eating kolaches, the traditional danish/jelly doughnut-esqe pastry that the town is very proud of.

Their little town museum is also a fun place to wander around. It's full of scary department store mannequins dressed in historic costumes, odds and ends that townsfolk have donated, period-rooms-of-a-sort (complete with listening stations consisting of a cd player and headphones), and a woman weaving rag rugs sitting in the storefront.


A display of wrenches

One of my museum-coworker friends said that it made her feel great and sad at the same time - it was awesome that the townsfolk could come in and point out a dentist chair to their kid and go, "I sat there when I was your age! It was so scary!" But we both feel sad about the fact that nobody there knows how to preserve most of this stuff long-term, and it's deteriorating before everyone's eyes. Generally, these museums are run on a budget of minus five, and have a volunteer staff who love their collection but don't know how to care for it in the slightest. I think there are publications geared towards these sorts of museums, but they may not know about them. Perhaps we could find a way to send them over, but sometimes it doesn't matter if you know how to preserve, for example, a heavily beaded dress (hint - don't let it just hang off a regular hanger and don't pin post-it notes to it with straight pins) if you don't have the storage furniture, staff to store it, money to buy acid-free tissue paper and the training to know how to pad it out carefully, mannequins that will hold it without stress, etc.

( surprised stuffed bunny is surprised )

We then went to the Wilbur Hotel and ate duck with dumplings (and sausage with dumplings, and pork with dumplings) and really incredible sauerkraut that I surprised myself by scarfing up with great enthusiasm, and rye bread, and the aforementioned dumplings with were little extruded tubes that looked a lot like string cheese and had gravy on them, and applesauce and onion rings (Bemo insisted) and more kolaches and lemonade.

( hot men holding swords from days long ago )

And then we all waddled over (sauerkraut and those dumplings made for a pretty heavy meal) to a nearby quilt show. At this point Bemo and I bid them farewell and headed off to Omaha to look for a dress for me (they apparently went off and found a tank, judging by a photo I just saw on Facebook). I found a dress in Von Maur (a chiffony purpley pretty thing) that will work as my Best Woman dress for mom's upcoming wedding, and I'm glad I found it because I was feeling discouraged about the poor selection of dresses I had been finding up until now. (PS, am feeling discouraged about my weight and my eating habits again, which is funny to say after a description of eating sausage and dumplings, but it's mostly my day-to-day eating that I'm fighting with again, and so am feeling particularly unattractive and not in the best frame of mind to buy a pretty dress.)

And then we bought cat food and dish soap and diet soda and cleaning products because I am going to try and not leave my catsitter a filthy apartment to face. And we came home and did laundry as a giant storm rolled in, all yellow sky and ferocious winds and a few tree branches down in our front yard right as it started, and also the power flickered but thankfully didn't go off. It's cool and I have the windows open, much to the delight of the cats. Ratchet is particularly chuffed as he's been permitted to escort me to the basement laundry room a couple of times (he's good about not getting stuck anywhere or running off and evading me, so he gets to trot down the two flights of stairs and howl at the doors of the storage areas down there. I do not know what is in his tiny cat brain.

Tomorrow will be spent cleaning, I think. And lazing about, that too.

Ah, the co-op. Where I can have an interminable conversation with an 80+ year old woman about air conditioning filters, show a woman where the non-dairy, gluten free mac'n'cheese lives, so her kid can have something that looks "normal" while they try to figure out what he's allergic to, and flirt with a cute, dim young man in a long prairie skirt who was trying to get to Oregon eventually "because the energy is better there, you know?"

Also, I was so proud of myself for roasting a gorgeous whole chicken, and then I realized I had left the little "diaper" on the bottom by accident. I'm working on the idea that it's still safe to eat. It will be dismembered tomorrow for salad and sandwiches.

Also also, there was racquetball played (very badly) by me and the Bemo, and also some walking and light jogging on the indoor track, and then I went and undid it all by making chocolate chip cookies. Seriously, I need to cut this shit out. Eating at night is my biggest bad habit.

Actually, here's something more cheerful. A co-worker (and friend - she's the driving force behind the playreading group) snuck off and got married last week. Once we discovered this, we had this little tableau waiting for her in her office when she got back.





Museum people know how to make their own fun.

Pondering what I want to say about aikido, training, and the mat being a safe space to be wrong, something that I need more of in my life.

Have just accomplished 1/4 of one of my big work projects - getting a three ton sculpture moved to a temporary location. Will do the same with a smaller sculpture, and then bring them out again and place them in new locations around the campus. It was a gorgeous, blue-sky day, just the kind where you enjoy spending your whole morning outside watching a large piece of metal be gently tugged out of the ground, put on a truck, and then moved to a secure holding spot by a passel of very nice, very burly men.

Spent some time today trying on clothes and hating all of them, which, as is not uncommon with me, turned into a violent loathing of my body and the deep belief that I was nothing more than a grotesque animated potato of a human being. Target had nothing that looked good or fit well, and Lane Bryant was turning into an endless parade of disappointments. And then a woman put a dress back reluctantly next to me, saying, "It's cute and I love it, but it's not me," so I had a peek at it. It was a really cute black and white print dress, very 60s, with a sort of round collar neckline that I know is flattering for me, and I ended up buying it, despite it being a little pricey. I may return it since I have the sad feeling that it will join the other couple of awesome dresses I rarely wear, but then I'd love to use it an an excuse to get an great pair of shoes for my wide-ass feet. So, using an expensive purchase to rationalize another expensive purchase! Uh, go me?

Taxes done, forms sent off to hopefully correct an error from last year's taxes, forms sent off to student loan people to hopefully get some easement in that area. Still feel like I'm drowning in bills and paperwork, but at least I'm not quite up to my nose yet.

Cats at the vet - looks like Kit's bite is easy to treat and will just take me pilling her for a bit, which sucks because she's a strong, wily cat, but I can get it done. If Ratchet continues to try and bully her, I'm going to make a very attractive pair of earmuffs out of him. I think part of the problem is that we're in a smaller place now, and they feel like they can't stake out their own territories, or maybe they're getting a bit bored. Yesterday I made sure the front door to the apartment was shut and let Ratchet run up and down the stairs and stare out the big front window. If he could fit in the harness I bought ages ago on a whim, I'd take him out for a walk, but he's the size of a small (tubby) dog and I'd have to invest about forty bucks in a bigger harness and leash for him. At least he made himself very happy marking the corners of the hallway with his face.

Bemo's ECT still continues, with them expressing happiness that he's doing better and talking about starting to taper him down to twice, then once a week. This irritates me because it was presented as something different - a course of 8-12 sessions (we're on 15 now) which would be able to be stopped without any drawbacks. Except now I'm being told that you do taper them off, and that if you just stop sometimes the patient regresses and you have to start all over again. This is not information I was given to start with. I'm not sure if it would have changed anything had I known, but I'm still disgruntled about it. Also, Dr. ECT (she of the irritating hairstyle and stiletto boots) wants to change his meds, except he won't see her once he's done with the ECT, and I'm not going to change things on her say-so, psychiatrist or no. Bemo will tell his meds person about the changes Dr. ECT is suggesting, and get the two of them to talk...but I hope Dr. ECT doesn't bully the meds nurse into changing things when there's no need for it. Except there may be a need, because while he's getting better, he's not exactly Mr. Bright and Cheerful. (His sense of humor has come back some, and the crying fits have lessened but not disappeared, but he still has a lot of anhedonia and is now worrying about what will happen if the disability doesn't come through, if he'll ever be able to work again, who would ever hire him and could he even do a job again...) So who the hell knows...certainly not me.

Also, I'm not thrilled to have to continue to take big chunks of time out of my day for this - it's about three hours, two of which I take as sick leave, and while I'm feeling very grateful for a job that lets me do it, it obviously can't continue for too much longer.

And on that note, off to see some people about a sculpture move.

It's Dia De Los Muertos time again, and the museum's Great Hall has once again been filled with skeletons and skulls of all shapes and sizes. My giant sequined skull from two years ago has been borrowed to perch on top of the revolving doors, surrounded by tissue paper flowers and (fake) greenery, tissue paper flowers mark the intervals of the double staircase, an ofrenda takes up most of one of the galleries, papel picados hang from the windows, and the various paper mache constructions from schoolkids are everywhere.

This year, they didn't get the chance to work with the college students like they had in the past - sadly, I think that class was scrapped due to budget issues - so the paper mache pieces are not quite as well constructed, although they're definitely full of brio. There was a rash of falling heads overnight, and a couple of them simply fell over, but they've been tended to. Skeleton Godzilla trampling a city skyline has his head firmly attached, Skeleton Hello Kitty sits next to a very charming Skeleton Cheshire Cat (I'll place a bid on that one, but I'm sure I'll be outbid handily, because it's adorable and people will fight over it), a skeleton cowboy stands across from a skeleton Monopoly Man and a wee tiny and sort of disturbing Skeleton Ninja. Oh, and a Skeleton Spongebob is also in the Great Hall, as well as a Skeleton Stewie, which I hope a high schooler and not an elementary school kid made. Hell, I'm even a little dubious about a high schooler watching Family Guy, but they probably do.

Photos to follow if I can snap a few - especially of the Cheshire Cat.

(Hee, between tonight's Leverage and White Collar I can finally grouse about how tv is getting my profession All Wrong.)