mmdc: The Spring Refresh

Yeah, so. You all know the story. You start creating blog entries here and there, but never find the time to actually complete them because life sucks you away at a moment’s notice. And then when you do go back to try and complete them, you find that you really don’t give a shit anymore and trying to flesh anything out makes you want to chew your own face off.

So that’s where I am. (Have you noticed that I use the word “So” wayyyyyy too often in my blog?)(OK, you didn’t need to all agree so quickly and vehemently) I don’t care if I go back and finish all my half-entries from March. I typically will give it the old college try, but at this point in time I would rather swallow a pile of moldy foreskin.

I know. Nice visual.

Well get used to it. This entry is going to contain at least a few more sentences of a disgusting nature. I’ll let you know when to stop reading. (I suspect that only Ange and a few of the die-hard females will be sticking around for that segment)

Let’s catch up with times, shall we?

• Work officially sucks balls harder than before. It sucks so bad, I actually broke down in tears last Thursday and really just wanted to be carted off to a mental institution. I got home that night and drank my way through two bottles of red wine before passing out cold on my bedroom floor. Since I don’t want anyone else to have to deal with the crap I am currently dealing with on a daily basis, I shall, from here on out, cease with any complaints about work on my blog. Because trust me, I could weigh this thing down like a fucking boat anchor if I continued on that topic. Expect to only hear anything extremely noteworthy (read: coworkers doing stupid shit) from the work sector until further notice. Which will probably be FOREVER.

• School! Is so GOOD! I am no longer enrolled in that ridiculous pottery class and it’s done a world of good for my scholastic morale. After being insulted and ridiculed by my teacher for my lovingly-crafted slightly-lopsided pot (that actually looks more like a spittoon now that I’ve futzed with it a bit), I just could not stomach going back to that stupid class anymore. The thought of hunching myself over a damn wheel for one more night of being cramped and dirty and confused was too much to take. I got home from work that afternoon and called my mom and said “Mom, if I said that I would pay for your fees to take pottery at a REAL art school, would you please drop this class with me?!” She was hesitant at first until I laid it out for her. How miserable I was, how confused I was, how tired I was, and how not caring I was about paying $150 to take the same class at the Davis Art School. She wheedled momentarily about her projects which were at present languishing in the damp closet alongside my own half-finished pieces. I told her I was going to pick them up that night. “OK!” she said. “Fair enough!” And thus the bonds were broken. And I felt so goddamned good from that moment forward, it was incredible. It was like I had a new lease on life (which would quickly be set fire to by THE HELLHOLE THAT IS MY JOB).

  Incidentally, I didn’t go to class that very night to retrieve our pieces. Mom said “Don’t go in when she’s there. She’s going to say something to you and you’re going to snap and beat her to death with a bag of clay…” Instead I showed up the following Monday before math and carried all our stuff to the car, boards and all. I doubt the woman even realizes we’re gone. Stupid wench.

• OK, if you gross out easily, here’s the part where you’ll want to, like, go play some solitaire or wash your feet or something…

  Mid-February of course brought my annual menstrual cycle. You have never known true uterine joy until you’ve bled for almost two months straight. And I don’t just mean spotting. I mean full on flow. Waterfalls. Broken dams. Tsunamis.

  Before I continue, I suppose I should give a little briefing on this. After I went off the pill in ’97, my menstrual cycle was all wacky, as is wont to happen when one stops taking hormones of any sort. This is only supposed to carry on for about a year afterwards, so you can imagine my surprise when, two years later, I was still having bizarrely irregular periods. My gyno at the time told me “Oh some people just adjust differently! You’ll be fine.” Meantime, I’m having a period every couple of months that lasts for two weeks solid and is accompanied by PMS symptoms so intense, other people actually start tracking my cycle so they know when to avoid me. Within a few years, things DID even out…but instead of becoming normal, they just got weirder. I was having my cycle once a year. And my gyno couldn’t give me answers and didn’t seem concerned. And since any lab samples came back OK, neither of us ever pursued anything further. And hell, who couldn’t love having only one period a year?! WOO!

  Well. This has become a nuisance now. It may be clockwork (every mid-Feb through end of March), but it’s just exhausting to endure and frankly a bit disgusting. For my uterus doesn’t just send out a crimson wave. No, that would be easy. It also sends out chunks.

  Yeah, that was the gross-out part, people. Sorry. It’s going to continue.

  Now, a lot of you will nod your head and be like “Oh yeah, I’ve had that…clots and whatnot.” Yeah. Um. No you haven’t. Not like this. I’m not talking about anything small. I’m talking fist-sized. FIST. SIZED. Take your hand, ball it up into a fist. THAT size. The kind your body has to actually give birth to. Yes, muscle contractions of a lesser variety, but labor pains nonetheless. And not just one of these fists. MULTIPLE. Over the course of about five days. Along with a steady torrent of the fluid variety. And during those five days, plus the two days preceding and following, I am nothing short of physically miserable. Nausea, abdomnial pains, back pains, light sensitivity, temperature sensitivity, tension headaches, things leaving via every possible exit…really, it’s no shock that I’m an unbelievable cunt during that time, right?

  And of course, all this arrives right in the middle of a high-tension time of year for me. Because life really needs to have maximum suckage whenever possible. On the plus side, if any of you own stock in Pamprin, Aleve, Playtex, Always (with wings!), those French heating patches, or Charmin, you will be seeing big windfalls by quarter’s end. You’re welcome.

• Not looking forward to the Festival this year. Looking forward to Karlos’s visit. Things even out.

  Oh don’t get me wrong. The Festival is going to be awesome for all those who attend. But for us organizers, it’s feeling a bit like an albatross on our necks this time ’round. All four of us are just so overwhelmed with our lives…I have no doubt we’ll be back to our old chipper selves eventually and 2008 will rock the soda shop. But for right now, I think I had more fun doing a cost benefit analysis of having central heating and AC installed in my house than any work I’ve recently done on fest planning. All I can say is…celebrities are REALLY BAD AT COMMUNICATING. Le *sigh*.

• Cutter turned 18 a few weeks back. He also graduates high school in June. If there was ever a time for me to feel ancient, now would be it. However, I’ve become numb to age. Coworker Tom says it’s a sign of acceptance. I say it’s just an act of self-preservation. If I forget that time is marching right over my ass, I won’t feel quite so shitty about my life. Right? Work with me here, people.

• VAST concert in two weeks! Woo! Not sure how I’m feeling about it though. I’ve been rather ambivalent this time ’round, and I partly blame the issues I’ve had with the fan club this year. Fan club members get free VIP passes to the VAST show of their choice. Awesome. However, ever since renewing my membership in November and changing my fan club e-mail addy, I’ve not received any fan club e-mails. And it appears that I’m not the only person suffering from this issue. A good number of us have complained on the message board at VAST’s website and the admin there has been kind enough to resend us messages via the board’s PM system. Which is well and good, but it’s clear that something is broken on their end and needs to be addressed. Like sometime this century.

  I’ve not received a confirmation on my VIP pass request yet and I’m starting to become concerned. That in and of itself is irritating. I also viewed a live webcast of VAST’s Cleveland show last Friday, and it was…shall we say…less than stellar. Lots of equipment issues and such. Yeesh. Now I can’t help but ask myself if driving all the way into SF for a show that I may not have a pass to and might end up sucking balls is worth my time and energy. Dunno. I’ll have to marinate on this one for a bit. I’ve been doing a lot of that lately. Marinating. I’m starting to feel very tasty.

OK. That’s about all I have right now. Right. On with your day. Sorry for the gross-out moment. Gotta share, right? Love it. You know you do.