consider this your holiday letter

Happy December! If I seem enthusiastic, it is because the quarter ended last week--the teaching in the classroom part, anyway--and while I am not done with work (grading final projects, setting up next quarter's class webpage), I am at least done with the part that requires me to wear shoes for the next month.

Unfortunately I am not able to grade without typing, because that isn't much fun at the moment. Took a dive on a run the Monday before Thanksgiving--there was an oncoming bike, and I was busy watching him when I stepped into the dirt and sidewalk adjacent ground cover, rather than where I was stepping. I thought I had clear dirt. I found a pernicious root. I had time, as it tightened across my foot, to think oh fuck and then splat. A very stretched out, fully extended, but at least running uphill at the time splat.

Half of me hit the dirt, literally, and that half--except for a few neat scratches on my ribs--was fine. The half that hit the sidewalk was less fortunate. I got myself up before the poor cyclist could even dismount to assist, and toddled off toward home. At the time, I thought the scraped up knee was the issue. (Running tights are tough. Not a scuff on them, but the skin underneath was shredded.) I'd caught myself on the palm on that side, elbow flexed at about 90 degrees, wrist mostly flat, and everything straightened and moved. I feared for the wrist, but it seemed fine, and it was.

The elbow, however, having absorbed a great deal of force and shock, was sprained, which I discovered about the time I got home and tried to flex is beyond that 90 degrees in either direction. Oh ho ho, that wasn't happening. 

Since then, I have learned how very many things elbows are involved in besides bending, and how very unpleasant--or impossible--some of those things become. I have also learned how much of my yoga practice relies on straight elbows. 

I have not learned that I am bad at convalescing because I already knew that, and merely confirmed the continuation of that particular quality.

I could, and can, still knit, which is good! Because I have things* to finish by Christmas Eve. 

*Like that orange octopus D&D dice-bag beside Tinycat, except that one is mine.

I am thankful for boxes. And no boxes.

We are moved. We are (mostly) unpacked. The boxes, some of which have moved with us twice now, have been sent to the great recycling dumpster in the sky (really, the parking lot). Books are shelved, art is hung, and only two things broke. One of them, unfortunately, was a light bulb on a lethal collision with a bookshelf on the deep-pile* living room carpet.  I found out there was still glass in the carpet yesterday.

Ask me how I discovered this. I dare you.




*this is the carpet that comes with the place. I would have wood, if left to my own.

now is the autumn of your discontent

I am feeling cranky and at odds with... everything? Not really combative, more restless. Like I should be doing something but I'm not, and whatever I've forgotten/am neglecting is going to bite me in the ass. This is what happens when Type A personalities have nothing on the immediate agenda. I'm like a border collie without sheep. Pretty soon I'm gonna start chewing on the furniture and digging in the garden and okay, letting this metaphor go now.

Part of it's the university teaching quarter starts in 2 weeks, but the HS class already started, like, a month ago, and I'm in that limbo between working my ass off and having something to do one day a week for 3 hours. My just-finished novel (RORY TWO)  is off at my agent, and I haven't gotten the editorial notes on the first book (formerly SRP, now How Rory Thorne Destroyed the Multiverse, aka RORY ONE). I'm not writing anything at the moment. Not that I don't have ideas. It's just I don't want to go launching into a new project when I know revisions are coming.

Instead, I'm spinning a lot of fiber (like that bagful on the right. It's, like, 4-5 hanks of compatible colorways all mixed up to be spun out at random).  I'm making Christmas socks (2.5 pairs of 5, or halfway done!) and bingeing Netflix and Prime series. (The Good Place has to be one of the best things in a long time.) We've gone hiking a couple of times, now that things have mostly stopped burning. But the last couple of weeks I haven't had anything I had to do except the HS class.

Maybe that's it. I'm freaking out because I'm not under any deadlines. I'm...taking a vacation. It feels weird.

my new asshole neighbor

A young grey squirrel, eating spent grain and soggy cheetos left in the pot for sparrows and whatever the little brown-headed birds are called.

No. She is not cute. She's a tree rat. And unlike the actual rats (because we have real live wild rats--brown AND grey!) who live around here, she has no concern for the cats who haunt this patio on a regular basis.

Also, today, she ate the avocado. You can just see it in the photo, that slender green stalk of potential baby plant sticking up beside the hummingbird feeder (that's the black metal rod, which terminates in a glass bulb full of sugar water, which so far has escaped the squirrel's notice.) Against all odds, it was surviving my plant-care system of benevolent neglect. It was, like, still green and everything.

And today: broken. Devoured. Only a sad little fractured stem. Only I kill the plants on this patio, squirrel.

THIS MEANS WAR.

eyeballs

What is up with all the eye trauma on TV/cable shows today? I expect horrible shit on GoT (the violence-porn of the end of S3, The Mountain vs Oberyn, was pretty epic. I damn near walked out of my own living room). But now it's kinda everywhere. I think SoA started it, but now Gotham is guilty, and Daredevil. When did this become a thing?

This probably part of a larger what the fuck is up with violence porn in general. I don't want to write that post. I just want to watch a show without going oh jeez, eyeballs...! and metaphorically (sometimes literally) diving behind the Sumo.

canceling yule

Or at least, canceling the tree part. We have an old artificial tall and skinny tree. It's probably got mold or whatever it is artificial trees acquire over time. One hears one is supposed to replace them every 5 years, but one suspects the source of that recommendation is the artificial tree industry. This one, acquired for its lean silhouette, is not the most stable thing ever. Louhi, at a petite 9 months, managed to pull it over five years ago. That apartment was bigger, and the tree did no damage, and took no damage, and Louhi did not repeat the experience, having scared herself into better sense. She is most interested in pulling one, maybe two, ornaments off the tree and leaving them in conspicuous locations for us to find. No chewing, no destruction, just judicious ornament pruning.

Anyway, we've been contemplating the demise of that tree for awhile. We hadn't found a new tree we liked, and this apartment is small enough that the tall skinny tree was the best fit of any others. Then, this year I found an article about artificials vs. fresh cuts from a green perspective. Live cuts recycle. Artificials feed the landfills; they're are only greener if you keep them for a dozen years.  I admit, I've resisted cut trees for years because it seemed to me that there was more waste in cut trees, but show me the science and I'll revise my  treehugger response accordingly. I have no particular sentiment for plastic or live trees. It's all about the lights, for me, and the evergreen symbolism.

Anyway, we planned to keep this one until we move again, and then start with cut trees. Except, kitten.

I think tree vs. Idris will result in no winners and a prostrate tree, with Idris convinced that he needs to try that again. I am trying to think of alternatives--little live rosemary plants (but the kitchen table is in a dark corner), tiny fresh-cut trees (at least, when they fall, they will not take out the living room), or a garland wrapped around the wrought iron sun/moon floor-stand candelabra, which looks all solstice-y and offers places to hang stockings above kitten heads, with the added benefit of being unclimbable and fairly stable. Maybe a combination of the first and last. Bah. I don't know.

First world problems, right here.

aaaaand that's why

It's currently 81 degrees with 30 mph winds blowing out of the east (that's the desert). So yes. Migraines explained.

Less explicable is the complex's need to powerwash all the concrete surfaces this week, but whatever. The migraine has departed. I fear no excess noise.

hideous

Someone on my FB this morning posted a picture of the US in which only Texas was identified by name, and all the other regions had labels like boring and crap. California was singled out by shape and labeled hideous. Ah, Texans. Funny people. Leaving aside the bizarre tribalism that leads one to identify with one's  state, I suspect hideous refers to the politics of California, or the imagined politics (in which we are all dreaded liberals), or perhaps just Hollywood values. Probably not the weather, although much of CA is desert and much is cold and wet and only some of it is Mediterranean and temperate and oceanside, which is somehow the default when people imagine California.

But today, mid-September, is our SoCal midsummer and so yes, today the weather is hideous. Which is to say--it's a functionally cool 80 in the house, with fans, and 99 outside. At sunset. Yes. At least it's a dry heat. And this wave of hell should stop by Sunday, at which point the highs outside will exceed the current temperature inside by a couple of degrees. Last year, and the 7 years prior, we weathered (haha) the Santa Anas (which this isn't, quite, having spared us the desert winds) in the old student apartment, which got up to 96 inside once, while it was 101 outside. No AC. (We have AC in this place, but 80 is survivable.  I draw the line any hotter than that.)

It is the sort of night in which one consumes ice cream and frozen fruit and beer, and plots which really long movie one (and one's spouse) will see tomorrow. So far we're down to Spider Man 3D at the discount theatres, and Bourne Legacy at the full price, 2x as expensive theatre closest to the brew pub where we will likely drink eat dinner. Spider Man is sufficiently uninteresting to both of us that we'll probably do Bourne. So there.  That's plotted. Time for the ice cream.

And let it be noted here: Texas, and Texans, can never ever bitch about the weather in any other state. Ever.

May: The Month Without A Post

I wish I could indulge in the cliche about not knowing where the time went, dear me! but that would be an untruth. I know exactly where May went. I also know June would be on its way to joining May as the second month with no post, except there's a pile of dishes in the sink that I don't want to deal with, and stabbing out a post on the iPad on the somewhat attitudinal bluetooth keyboard from ThinkGeek seems like a better option.

I read and assessed 300 college entry essays last week, in addition to the 46 student essays I had to read and grade. It's been a very long 9 days of extended reading and sitting and here I am STILL reading and sitting, rather than doing those dishes. I really hate dishes.

The house is halfway packed. There's a great deal more detritus (I love that word) that needs to find its way outside. Sadly, that detritus includes several boxes worth of old SF paperbacks and assorted books. I have decided it's time to let the bookcases from college go, in all their fake wood veneer and particle board glory. And since the upcoming apartment is about 100 sq. feet smaller than the current digs, we won't replace the shelves. We're also losing the built-in bookcase in the living room. That, I will mourn. But only a few of the residents of *those* shelves aren't coming with. Gamebooks, people. It's all about priorities... and if I can get it in ebook, it can go away. If I can't, or the size matters (hush), then we keep it. But we are getting movers--not to pack, but to transport. We acquired some grownup furniture, and it's heavy, and I am not inclined to go it alone, just the two of us. Been there, done that, over it. Let someone else deal with the stairs.

I kinda like purging the excess stuff. I don't like being owned by things. I hate the boxing part, but not as much as dishes.

There has been shit going down at work that I will not detail here because sometimes, there are things you don't write down. The injustice really tweaks me. My powerlessness in the face of that injustice flat out pisses me off.

I think I am teaching Beowulf next fall, and that makes me happy. Of course, my copy (the Heaney translation) is in a box right now. I might use this as an excuse to get another edition on ebook. Can you ever have too many Beowulfs? I don't think so. Of course the students will not immediately see the value in reading a 2000 year old skaldic poem, but that's half my fun, right there. My new course director told us to teach something we love, and if we love it, our student will too. So on va voir.

The dishes are not doing themselves. Damn dishes.

I am almost through the 4th season of Mad Men and I'm still not certain I understand the devotion.

Mini donut makers are awesome, supersceded only by the mini donuts they produce. Aebleskiver, you may be in trouble.

Pooka just came through, either yowling for his supper or practicing echo-location. I suspect the former, since he walked head first into my chair. I may borrow his technique and go back and yowl at Nous, and see if that prompts him to come out here and get on that dinner thing. Or that dishes thing.

many littles make a much

My mother asked me today how my week had gone today. And I had to say, on the whole, it was pretty good. Began with a kickass teaching evaluation from one of my favorite professors. Ended with a kickass concert from my very favorite band. In between, there were some slingshot moments. So I said--well, little dramas. What do you mean? she asked. So I told her. And I'm telling you, too.

Thursday, delivery day for the farmer's co-op, I get a call. They delivered to the wrong address, they say. No box this week for us, sorry, account credited, delivery next week. This is annoying, but not the end of the world. I was a little sad to miss out on the butternut squash (listen. my ambitions are small), but hey. Then, Friday, I'm on the way home from meeting a friend and lo! in the middle of the sidewalk--the delivery box, sitting in front of the building to which it must've been delivered. I took it home. The lettuce did not survive its exposure, and a couple of the satsumas looked as if they had been stunt doubles for a hockey puck, but the rest of it was okay. I mean, cauliflower does not wilt, and radishes... radishes are strange red evil bundles of 'what the fuck do I do with this?', but they don't go bad overnight. And I got my butternut squash. Nyah.

Then Saturday, morning of the Much Anticipated Concert, Nous and a plate had a parting of ways. The plate hurled itself at the floor and burst. You know how sometimes plates just bounce? And sometimes they split and fall into neat broken halves? And how sometimes they combust on impact, throwing shards like a ceramic frag grenade? Yeah. Fortunately, none of the cats were in the kitchen at the time. Fortunately, none of the cat dishes were struck by the plate-bomb.  I, however, was not so fortunate. Of course I was barefoot. I caught a big piece of something sharp on the joint of my big toe, where it connects to the foot. At first, I thought it might've broken something. It was that kind of pain. And as I was hopping around, mindful of the rest of the shrapnel, securing a broom for Nous, the fairly deep cut made by the impact decided to bleed. Wet clean-up, aisle one! Two bandaids later, the bleeding had stopped. Managed to get the damn thing into a boot (concert. Not missing it. Fuck that.) and off we went. But it hurt the whole night, and really hurt whenever there was any pressure on it. But today, the swelling's down, the bruise has revealed itself as localized (kinda like a goose-egg. About that size, too), the cut is scabbed, and walking is okay. So there. Bullet (and urgent care) dodged.

And then today, which is technically a brand new week, we had The Incident In The Parking Lot.

We're walking to Trader Joe's for the weekly grocery run and we spot this asshole in a hot-rodded Camero. He guns past a car on a two-lane residential street. Asshole, we think. Then we watch him blast into the TJ's parking lot and do the same thing on one of the access streets. Clearly a man with a deathwish. Unfortunately, the dead party would be whoever he hit. That parking lot is full of elderly folks from the housing complex across the street, and moms with kids, and just people. It's also super narrow and stupid-twisty. Anyway. As we're making our way across it, who should come blasting up our aisle? Yes. Camaro-dick. He whipped into an open space maybe 5 feet in front of us, cutting us off very nicely. He showed no indication of having noticed two people crossing the aisle. Okay. We angled away from him, as if he were a rabid rhino on meth withdrawal.

At that point, he decided he'd fucked up his entry-angle and slammed his car into reverse to try, try again.

He missed me by 4 inches. I kid you not.

You know how some people get fight or flight? I'm pretty much always fight. I yelled at him, which penetrated the super loud music coming out of the open windows. Then I came around the driver's side.

"Goddamned motherfucking asshole watch where you're going what the fuck you almost hit me!"

Got my first look at the guy. Uncharitably, it kinda looked like this car might be his prosthetic masculinity. And his eyes got egg-sized when he grokked that I was yelling at him and coming at him and holy shit. 

Then Nous came around behind me--long hair, black leather jacket, beard, looking every inch the old-school black metalhead, yelling his own stream of invective. I believe it was "learn to fucking drive, you asshole."

Guy held up a peace sign, two fingers, looking scared. Right, guy. Peace. What the fuck ever. But by now, the brain reasserts itself: You are yelling profanity in a public place. It does not matter how scared and angry you are. Stop it.

So we walked away. As we're going toward the Trader Joe's (and the adrenaline slammed home into shakes and chest pain), the car next up the aisle rolled down its passenger window. Great.  I'm about to get chewed out for public profanity by some mom with kids. But the woman stuck her head out and said, "Good for you! Yes! You tell him!" and I realized that's the car Asshole burned past on the residential street.

I expected my mother to scold me for the whole public profanity thing. Instead, she laughed out loud. "You said that to him?"

"I did."

My father, when told the story, sighed and chuckled. I could imagine him shaking his head. "You know, your mother yelled quite a stream of swear words in German at a guy in Germany who ran into me. She really chewed him out. Made him apologize. Really embarrassed him."

Like mother, like daughter.

-----
I miss the Livejournal 'what's playing' feature. So, what's playing: Kidneythieves, "Taxicab Messiah."

purgatory

In the past seven-plus years in this apartment, we have had massive and repetitive power outages, repeated water outages, internet failures, and one memorable President's Day weekend when the heating broke. We've gone through two refrigerator meltdowns. There are ghosts in the heating elements of the stove and the oven. We do not discuss the sturdiness of the stairs, and we pretend not to notice the massive termite damage. We have had immediate downstairs neighbors arrested on domestic violence. We've had one murder and one attempted murder in nearby buildings. We regularly hear our next door neighbors screaming and banging on the floor in what appears to be celebratory glee having to do with a computer game. The people who live below us have the angriest two-year-old in the history of humanity and a disturbing habit of pouring a bottle of lighter fluid on the grill whenever they want to char steaks. We live at the nexus of three daycares, two of which are for infants and toddlers only.

And now we have a neighbor, newly put here to test us, who sings showtunes as if she is onstage projecting to the nosebleed seats without a microphone.

At least the fridge is working.

o my audience

All, like, three people out there who read this. Whatever. I was gonna say I don't keep this blog for Other People, but of course I do. There is some audience out there, even if it is the three people who do read it (one of whom is compelled by marital obligation). If I wanted a truly private journal, I would... well. Honestly, I would probably not write, because unless I am using a secret code known only to myself, there is a potential secondary audience besides myself.

But yeah, I'd handwrite in a book, if I wanted to privately ruminate about stuff. I used to do that. The dreaded diary. I think it had a lock, too, although I don't think I ever really got into the whole schtick. I remember keeping that diary when we moved from Oklahoma to Colorado, the year I turned... 12? Yeah. 12. And then, once we'd moved, I got the dog I'd been wanting desperately since I was old enough to say the word, and the diary was discarded in favor of puppy. I've kept more game diaries over the years, for people who live in my head and share a collective reality with a handful of players and a GM. But none for me. Blogging isn't a journal. It's partly reflective. But there's always, always an audience. 

It's an interesting rhetorical exercise. I like reading people's blogs, sometimes; other times I wonder why in the hell this person bothers, if all they want to do is carry on like it's the Jenny Jones show (is that even on anymore?  I don't know.). I mean, who's the audience for that? And my guess is, the blogger doesn't think anyone reads, or doesn't care, and possibly has the common sense of a small clam. But whatever. I don't read those blogs. I am not a voyeur.  And I despise whining and endless recitations of My Personal Drama, which is usually more like a poorly written late-night cable show than reality. Or perhaps it's too much like reality, and I am fortunate in my choices of personal associates. Again, whatever. Also, I think Twitter makes it too damn easy for people to say shit that is better left unsaid. But then, I think most shit is better left unsaid. Makes communication in this household very fun! Really.

Point is--and there is a point!--this post, right here, is about as reflectively, soul-baringly ruminative (I just wanted to write that word) as I am likely to get. It has been a soul-killing summer around here. Enthusiasm over socks and aebelskiver and sweaters aside--and those enthusiasms (is that a plural? Spellcheck thinks so. Huh) are genuine--it's been, well, not easy. Not easy, in the scale of have enough money, have a job, have food, have health. In other words, not hard by any standards at all which are real and practical.

And yet. I am, I suspect, mildly depressed. Or burned out. Or... something. See, there's this writing thing I do. Or rather, this writing thing I have not been doing much of at all, this summer, despite the oodles of time. I know what I have to do with Current Project. I have a plot, more or less, which may be the problem, actually. I think I know what's going to happen. When I think I know, I don't see a point in, you know, writing. Learning point: self cannot write to an outline. Self cannot plan. Self has to let the words happen, and the characters happen, and hold tight to the lifeline of theme. But more importantly, self has to sit her ass down and write, which she is not doing on a schedule anymore, and that is death. It is not that I can't write--when I force the sitting, the words come.  And then there's what I need to be doing, which is the dreaded query letters and synopses and all that crap. I know what has to be done, and how to do it. I just. Don't. Wanna. That's what baffles me. I don't want to. Since when don't I want to write? The fuck? And since when can't I force myself to do what needs to be done, even when it's unpleasant?

Thus, I am here. Writing. Even this blog counts as words on a page.

So anyway. Moving on. I will get over whatever this is, probably when school starts again, because I think I work best under pressure. Yes. That's it.

Also, I sold my last short story this month. Poor thing has been around since 2008, making the rounds. It went through workshop with my writing group, and I think they nailed its issues. One more revision, and it sold. I am...happy? Validated? Yes. Relieved, yes. Polishing up the first 5K of a novel for a contest at the end of the month. We'll see how that goes. I don't have any feelings about it yet, except that if I enter the novel in a contest, I can dodge the query letter/agent hunt a little longer.

This is me, pretending I am motivated! And career minded! And making progress!

No, what I'm doing is writing a long-ass post no one will read (aha! a real journal entry after all!). Workin' my shit out. Talkin' it through. Maybe I'll start keeping a dead-tree journal again, and spare the interwebz.

l'été est arrivé

So I'm reading my Yoga Journal this afternoon, after having done a little yoga, waiting for the korma to do its thing in the slow cooker (customarily, we say that it's cooking), and I came across an article on the most yoga-friendly cities in the US. To my total non-shock, Boulder was on the list. There was a little article about the town, the yoga it offers, its general population. And there were pictures. And I recognized those places. I recognized Pearl Street and the new-to-me-but-old-now renovations, the rock-bridge going up the middle of the street.

And I surprised myself. Had a little  tears-prickling-behind my eyes feeling, and an acute pain in my chest. Embarrassing, gods, I don't cry; I have a little chip of ice where my heart should be, and it pushes slush through my veins. Ask my students. They know. But seriously. I was homesick. Still. After damn near 7 years here, I miss there.

I never reckoned, as a child of the Air Force's cruel whims, to get attached to a place. We never lived in one more than 3 years until I was 12. I spent high school in the same town, and my parents still live there; but my home, the place I chose to go and spend 13 years of my life, is Boulder. 20-odd square miles surrounded by reality. Oz. Berkeley with fewer Californians (but only barely). Expensive little town, with high taxes voted in by people with the money to preserve their open spaces and their zoning laws. Well. Expensive by Colorado standards; the OC has violently readjusted my notions of cost and value. Pedestrian and bike friendly. Working public transportation. Pine trees and oak and maple and the foothills and the canyons. And winter. Wind. Snow. Sometimes thunder while the snow falls. The air is dry and thin, although wetter than a lot of places along the front range. The sun is out most days, sometimes brittle and cold, sometimes too close and too hot. And the mountains--gods, the mountains. Right. There.

I planned to love SoCal. I did. I came out here determined to want to live here forever and mourn bitterly when we moved away. I planned to love the sea, the sand, the everything except the traffic and how bad could that really be, anyway? Hell, baking would be normal again! Water would boil at the right temperature! And no scraping the car in the winter.

Okay. That last thing is pretty cool. There are a lot of good things about living in greater Los Angeles. I can, on a good day, make a list. But it's not Boulder. And those things can't make up for what's missing.

One of the things I miss about LJ is the what's-playing-now feature, like the mood thingie, only cooler. My mood is generally evident from my prose. But my music! Not so much.

So in the vein of missing that feature, what's playing now is Amorphis, "My Kantele," the version off Magic and Mayhem. It's about how people who say the kantele (which is an instrument, kinda like a guitar and a dulcimer had a transporter accident) was made by the gods, fashioned out of the great pike's bones and guts, are liars. The kantele is sorrow. It is grief. It is wounds and suffering. It's a little more intense a sorrow than homesickness. But the point is--the kantele is a Finnish instrument, and the grimness of the song comes from a people shaped by a land with a thousand lakes, scraped out by glaciers; a place that sees a lot of winter, and long summer days. It's a song about the shape and stamp place leaves in a person's soul.

Gods, I want to go home.