Caustically Optimistic

astronaut diapers

In preparing to visit Texas I've made a list because I have to plan to plan because planning is succeeding and also terribly annoying.  I first needed to list what I'll list and then fill in the attendant lists then type the lists and check them for accuracy and then print them and hand serve them to anyone I've deputized on the lists and also email the lists so they're forever burned into the memory of the internet and this step also removes the ability to claim plausible deniability.

The list to prepare for this trip includes: pre-flight checklist, what to pack, itinerary, contacts and blessings, provisions, maps, worst case scenarios, in-flight entertainment, and structured activities for free time.

 A pre-flight checklist is pretty self-explanatory: what needs to happen to the car before we take off for Texas?  I need to get an oil change, tire rotation and complementary pre- trip inspection at the dealer.  It's important that I give he dealer a good chance to fleece me before I leave town.  If they didn't go over one hundred twenty points on the car they might miss out on hundreds of dollars of unneeded service work.  I also need to get the car's interior cleaned because it's pretty filthy.

Then, I have to consider what to pack.  I am going to need to bring underwear, lots and lot of underwear.  My first college roommate lives in the same city as Amy – who is traveling with me – and that roommate has a fetish for my underwear and I need to have enough underwear for him, and for me.  The last time I went to see Amy we had to buy underwear in the middle of the trip.  I may also need extra clothes to change in and out of, pajamas for sleeping and for the Hugh Hefner party Kevin is throwing in Oklahoma, City.  While I write this I realize that underwear was a huge fetish at my college, not just for my roommate but also for others.  My friend Tracey lives in constant fear that a sasquatch is going to steal her panties and advised me on more than one occasion to split my underwear up and hide them around my room in case it was raided.  What is wrong with you, Concordia?  Even Alex Vance is setting this aside in the list of, “no one wants this Photoshop!” 

Our itinerary is another issue. We like to stop along the way and have our photo made by the strange and horrible things that towns set up to lure people away from the interstate.  We also need to plan our trip along a reasonable route where we’ll get there quickly and with time to see our friend Kevin along the way as well.  While in Dallas we will also need a way to fill our time that is not spent visiting our sick friend, as she’ll need to rest and her husband works – whatever that is.  A co-worker suggested taking in a Dallas Cowboys game and as I know so much about football the idea seems as exciting as witnessing a live birth.  Also, I’m not an expert in how the National Football League schedules its games but I positive they don’t do things on demand.  That’s Gail. 

Before we leave on any trip together, because we cause mayhem wherever we are together, we need the blessing of our RA: the mighty Candace of Jurchen.  I have sent an offering to her and requested her blessing, I even sent a token of appreciation to her sister who is formidable but not quite as powerful.  We also had to ask Matt permission to visit and find out how to contact the people we need to along the way for our trip to be successful.  I also arranged the day off at work, which has put out a lot of people who I now owe favors or have called in all my chips.  Nicole and especially Matthew are absolutely any offering unto the Jurchen and any concession to the conglomerate that employs me.  We also petitioned the State Department for permission to leave the United States.   

We also needed to be provisioned for the trip.  Unleaded Dr. Pepper for me, leaded for her and a host of snacks that will remain unopened.  We always get a bunch of stuff and never touch it – and by ‘we’ I may have meant ‘I.’ Amy and I also stop to eat so we can stretch and use a bathroom we think is clean.  We have very strict rules about where we eat.  The chicken, if we eat chicken, must be white meat and they must serve Coke products.  Exceptions are made for Star Wars kids meals as they almost always come with Dr. Pepper (an exception to every rule!).  We tend to prefer Cracker Barrel but we eat at Denny’s because it’s free.  Amy and I enjoy Chinese food but you can never trust it; it’s a long trip and we don’t have Astronaut diapers – Bryan took those, too. 

In flight entertainment means that I have to come up with corny mix tapes of music for the trip, while Amy finds a book on a tape for us to listen to (or not).  We also need games to eat our time on the hours and hours between corny roadside attractions, and seeing Kevin.  Our mission isn’t a happy one and it’s essential that we don’t make the trip a crescendo to a very hard good-bye.  Mad-libs and Harry Potter on CD might lessen the fostering anxiety.  The most important thing we always do is maintain a record of every important event and present it to Matthew upon the completion of what we’re doing.  Amy and I have been doing this for over ten years and somewhere Matt has all these records treasured up in case there is ever a shortage of toilet paper. 

I skipped worse case scenarios because we like to dream those up on the way and in the car.  We’ll report back with the top ten horrible things that could, and should, have happened.  This will be in the record. 

In fact, we’ll be making a list on the trip of things we need to tell you about immediately and after we return.  Stay tuned.  

what goes around comes back around

Is there a checklist that will indicate if you are old?  I remember being in high school and college, riding in the back of the station wagon while my parents lamented the fact there was a radio station dedicated to playing their music from when they were a part of a demographic that actively consumed popular culture.  Can you see where this is going? 

Louisville, which has six or seven radio stations that don’t spew country music or political propaganda – don’t roll your eyes Suburban Island, I only listen to NPR for the pictures.  All these stations strive for mediocrity in a way that would make the laziest seventh grader proud.  I have never used my iPod so constantly as I’ve done in the last year. 

Friday, I was dispatched with a coworker across the city and while searching through the radio stations we found a song we recognized and stayed at that station.  After two or three songs we recognized and enjoyed they station went through the required station identification and they identified themselves as a radio station for my generation. 

My coach likes to explain people by their generation and I’m not sure if it bothers me because I dislike being painted by a wide brush or that I dislike that she’s right.  While my devotion to my coach is akin to the reckless abandon of religious fanaticism or Jonas Brothers fan girls but when I disagree with the Home Office it’s usually pretty sharp but it’s kept in house.  I was trying to ignore my coworkers driving – a two liter turbo is fun, but when someone is learning it, not so much – and do paperwork; instead I was kicking myself thinking that, “again, she’s right.”

So, this radio station was planned for me and my coworker, and everyone else our age.  It was embarrassing.  It was right up there with them making FAME into a movie and the whole summer being my childhood recycled from the Transformers to GI Joe.  I would rather run through the streets screaming, “I like Justin Timberlake’s music,” than admit my life has come to this: there is an oldies station dedicated to playing the music from my middle and high school days.     

Chaos Bean and I have been pretty disturbed by the whole affair, especially since we were in the deli on Sunday and Shoop by TLC was on the radio and considered acceptable.  I put half the songs I've heard so far on a CD last year for Kirsten and Betsy for our trip with our students of music that was cool when we were their age.  Apparently, we just needed to adjust our dial. However, my radio in the car is set to it and I'd set up Sirius in my car if I thought it'd accompany me to Texas next weekend. 

Really?  An oldies station, for me?  

an old standard

This is one of Nicole's favorite stories of mine, albeit a made up one, from my old blog.  I thought I'd repost it while I was thinking of other things so this doesn't have to be so morose.  

Today I went to Pizza Hut and I had to use the bathroom.  This bathroom was disgusting, I’d give you a description but I think you can fill in your own blanks.  I pity the person who has to clean that filthy hole.

But, I had to pee.  It wasn’t something that I could avoid or I would have.  I did what I had to do and went to flush the toilet.  Now, we all know the kick the flusher with your shoe trick so you don’t touch it with your hands.  The theory being that the sole of you shoe is already dirty from being on the ground and that you need to keep your hands clean.

 So, I kick the flusher or try to.  I was wearing my Air Saint Luke Sandals and you can’t really do that in sandals.  First I slipped and while I was slipping Saint Luke the Lefty fell off my foot and right into bowl.  So there I am, one sandal on and one sandal off.  I lean over to pull my sandal out of the toilet – it was not in the water yet.  I was in luck but when I leaned over, on one foot, to pull it out I slipped again.  I went to steady myself on something and hit the flusher.

 So, what happens?  I have one arm down the toilet and one arm on the flusher.  My sandal WAS dry and so WAS my arm.  So, now I’ve touched the dirty flusher, ruined my sandal and to make it even worse I have toilet water and urine all over my arm and part of my face.  Part of the beauty of Air Saint Luke the Lefty being in the toilet is that it caused the water to swirl and then FLY.

I’m just glad I didn’t have diarrhea.  

brightest and best

Brightest and best of the stars of the morning, dawn on our darkness and lend us your aid.

I have two responses to outside stimulus: apathy and OMG HOLY SHIT!  In the best of times I’d have Valerie to join in my apathy, Cindy to join in my OMG HOLY SHIT!, and Gretchen to shepherd our energies in the proper direction, validate our apathy, or retune us to the proper response.

We all need a little Gretchen in our lives; but I need more than you do. 

Today, Matthew informed us that if we were going to visit Nicole that it was the time.  Her cancer has spread.  I cried at my desk, at work, in full view of my coworkers. 

Yes, I cried when my grandmother died but it was out of bitterness that she never loved me, or remorse that there was never a place in my heart for her.  Yes, I cried when I realized that my relationship with my mother’s family had become intolerable, or that I had been an active ingredient in that unhealthiness.  All those were all selfish tears. 

Today I cried and it was like the other times, out of selfishness.  I’m going to lose an incredibly dear friend.  I will regret all the missed opportunities to let her know how titanic a presence she was in my life and I will regret the times I didn’t call or write out of that timid fear of not knowing what to say. 

When my grandmother died my great grandmother, the only one who lost something that day, gave me specific instructions about when it was okay to break ranks and show emotion and that any tears would be jealous ones because she’s gone Home and we have not (yet). 

When a friend died while I was at University and it was something I disclosed to very few people, one of them my coach.  Her words run though me at times like these.  She reminded me that when Lazarus died Jesus wept, but in the original Greek it says that Jesus’ soul raged in anguish.  You see, we’ll see Nicole again in Glory and we’ll have eternity with her; but the time between now and then seems like an eternity in and of itself from this end of it. 

When I had the opportunity to speak with Matthew it was over the Internet and I cried again, this time it was for him.  I cannot imagine, nor would I want to, what he’s going through.  I don’t know what it is to love someone and to lose that person so very soon. We are not old and we’ve not had that much time together.  He too is a great friend and I am blown away by his strength during this trial; even if it were just a show I’d be in awe that he did that for us.  I’m a hot mess, and she is just my friend and mentor. 

When Senator Kennedy died the President said that the difference between Senator Kennedy’s death and his brothers is that with Senator Kennedy we were afforded the great gift of being able to say, thank-you and good-bye. 

I believe that in the situation where I had the great gifts of Valerie, Cindy, and Gretchen the consensus would be that the opportunity be taken to visit Nicole and use that precious gift of time to say those things to her as well.

When my grandmother died I was dispatched on my father’s orders and great-grandmother’s wishes to bid her farewell and I regret this.  I’ve endured a great deal of abuse about my motives for going from family members, especially my grandmother’s psychotic younger sister.  There are other things like this that I’ve done that I now regret but the regret of having done something is never as acute as the regret of that which was left undone – both sins are forgivable but only one is tenable. 

If I can round Amy up, and I hope I can, we’ll go to Texas and visit Nicole and say goodbye.  If I cannot, and perhaps even if I can, Chaos Bean is going to travel with me (she’s picking out cowboy boots and hat so she can ‘blend in’ in Texas).  Other friends will go later but if I don’t go I’ll regret it forever because whenever I needed Nicole she was there for me and if I were in her place she’d have already visited.   

 My friends have always been God’s apology for the sorry bunch of losers he gave me for a family and foremost among them has always been Nicole.  There is hope of recovery but the cancer has spread so that while I hope I look back on this in eight or ten years and chuckle I’m not sure how much fight she has left in her.  She deserves rest.  She’s given us so much and more than anyone thought someone should have. 

There are so many gifts that Nicole has given us and her example of faith, humor, perseverance, love, tenacity, and a love of Nebraska and Husker Football that each of us will carry with us forever.  She is a gift that will never collect dust, end up in a yard sale or be outgrown.  At many a funeral or memorial you’ll hear, “well done, my good and faithful servant,” but in this rare moment it is true. 

Let us not give in to our apathy but instead give in to our compulsion to react.  Let us find ourselves in action.  

late to work

Why was I late to work this morning? 

This morning I woke up terrified that I might have contracted pink eye.  I am allergic to the things that grow in our yard and around our house so it isn’t unusual to wake up with pink, puffy eyes that itch horrible making you want to claw your eyes out, but this was different.  My eye was in HORRIBLE pain and I was sure that I was finally going blind.  This had to be the real deal conjunctivitis, if I could have seen better I’d have called Dr. Erin I would have done it but I have so many Erins in the book who knows who’d I’ve had called?

I went into the bathroom where I could contort my eye and eye lids so I could see what was going on in my eye, because in lieu of going to the doctor I can do some sort of natural medicine or witchcraft myself – and anyone who has been to Middle School as a teacher or a student knows that all witchcraft goes down in the bathroom.

After some rolling my eye around while trying to see what was going on with it I noticed several black spots.  I panicked.  Black spots on bright pink might do something for Chaos Bean when it comes to tights or purses but inside my eye?  I know I’m going blind and that terrifies me but I don’t want to go blind in the freaky-freaky. 

I climbed up on the sink so I could get a closer look at my eye – because I was already doing some special, special smart things and saw something truly terrifying.  I had a dead bug in my eye.  I am not sure what kind of bug it was but I could identify several legs and three main body sections.  The Contessa complains about the amount of spiders that she swallows in the night – and I keep telling her that nice girls don’t swallow, but whatever – but I get a bug in my eye?  Fat boy is always hungry, he could have crawled into my gullet but no, no he had to burrow in my eye. 

It took forever to get the stupid thing out my eye but I’ve become adept at washing my eye out from all the allergy junk out of my eyes.  It was difficult because I’d get a part out but the others would wash to another part of the eye.  I was late for work today, not because of the American Reinvestment and Reconstruction Act – which is my daily and true excuse and something for which I am truly thankful – nor because of an accident or other human induced sideshow on the side-roads but by one of God’s tiniest creatures.  

all the dogs have rabies

I was talking to Colleen on Facebook and she asked if I thought it was too late to get ice cream.   I told her no and waddled to the kitchen to see if we had ice cream and we did not.  This is an enormous shock because if we have anything it’s ice cream (and pickles).  I decided that I should go to McDonald’s and get one of their dollar sundaes. 

Chaos Bean and I piled into the car and went through the drive-through.  I grew up in Germany and have lived in Phoenix, Mexico so I am used to people not understanding me when I speak to them and I am used to not understanding people when they’re talking to me.  It’s preposterous that these people are clambering for English as our official language while simultaneously not being able to speak it.  Even when I lived in Alabama and spoke in a perfect pitch New York accent it wasn’t this ridiculous. 

So, we’re going through the drive-through and we order caramel sundaes and the person went back and forth with us about if we wanted Carmel sundaes.  This isn’t a point of debate whether it is called soda or pop (soda); caramel is a confection produced through the caramelization of sugar while Carmel is a city by the sea in California.  It isn’t like tomato, potato, or aunt – without the second ‘a’ you’re doing it wrong.  This took forever and having worked the drive-through at McDonald’s to drag myself across graduate school I realize that it isn’t easy but neither is it rocket science.  

Concurrently, do not presume to correct my pronunciation or diction in regard to the English language - something that I cherish and love behind Jesus and my family and before the Constitution and Belgian Chocolate.  The proper use and love of English is one of the things I've dedicated my life to and it hurts me when people question my ability to use it, especially when I am pronouncing a word that is actually French!  However, if you want people coming to this country to speak and understand English then I think it’s only fair to require it of the people born here and afforded a free and public education.  

It’s what John Adams wanted for you, it’s his legacy to us. 

When we finally got around to the payment window the person was confused by the five dollar bill I handed him and asked what it was and had to ask someone not wearing a shirt for help making change.  This wasn’t the best part though because it was at the last window that we ran into the real trouble.

It is, apparently, also difficult to make a sundae at McDonald’s.  I will walk you through the process: put the plastic cup under the spout and pull the lever for the ice cream to come out, once the ice cream is at the rim you put it under the caramel or fudge spout and pump twice, apply the appropriate top, supply the customer with spoons and nuts as desired.  Apparently this is very difficult as it took five minutes to do.  

Also, Old Dirty Bastard, when you present the sundaes don’t ask the costumer who has declined the peanuts at the last window, “are you sure you don’t want my nuts?”  He’s lucky that Chaos Bean (a) wanted ice cream (b) didn’t hear him, (c) and was wearing something she doesn’t like to bloody.  I have a ‘friend’ from who would sleep with anyone willing (and has) and even he wouldn’t want your nuts (and he’s renown for low standards – we are, after all, friends).

All in all it was a pretty wretched experience and is a good example of the need to maintain readiness for the Armageddon even in regard to ice cream.  This place is somewhere between the fifth and sixth ring of Hell.  If ordering and getting a sundae from McDonald’s takes this long, what is the world coming to?  With all the drama on the news and in the world today it seems like we should still be able to have an easy go of it at the Big M.  Apparently not.