Tuesday, January 30, 2007

So Long...

It feels like I've been away forever. I heard others say that once you get away, it's hard to come back. I didn't believe them at the time, but I have to say they were right. I used to crave being on here to the exclusion of other things. Now, if I'm having trouble getting on line, I often just don't bother. I'll go do something else. So, things are settling down. I've chalked January up as a "No Computer" month. I've rested, I've recovered, my head is no longer full of yucky stuff, so maybe I'll get back into a routine.

I've decided not to tell any more made up stories about my fictional past. I fear I have shattered the careful image I created. Go back to thinking I'm a sweet innocent lady.

Tuesday, January 23, 2007

The Bread Truck

The story you are about to hear is a cautionary tale. The names have not been changed to protect the innocent (namely me) and no animals were hurt in the telling of this tale. Professionals did not do the stunts, but don’t try this at home anyway; that would be pure craziness. Remember children: drugs and alcohol don’t mix; use them separately.

~ ~ ~

Things were different in the late seventies. People drank. People drugged. People sexed. People danced. These things happened openly and with a great sense of pride and excitement. You could walk into any office and see lines of coke running parallel across the desk of a company’s president with his workers ranged around him, everyone imbibing. People carried pills around like they were Valentine’s Day confections. Disco bounced and gyrated the bodies of silkily dressed girls and tight pantsed, polyester clad boys. Men wore gold chains around their exposed chests and knuckle rings with big stones on manicured fingers. Women went braless in all of their natural low cut bounty. Life partied heartily.

I came from a very middle class background and found it all fascinating. I flitted from one experience to another, marveling at the alien world I saw other people living.

One of the places that always fascinated me was Go-Go bars. We call them Gentlemen’s Clubs now. I got a job running the business side of the bar. I booked the dancers, ordered the alcohol, hired bartenders and kept the books. The owner always tried to get me to dance or tend bar. He thought a buxom blonde would be good for business. I politely declined as both positions required fewer clothes than I wanted to wear.

I got to know the women who danced (and other things) in these bars. I searched for the poor woman who danced to support her child or the one who tried to better her self by making money for college. Somehow these women never materialized. Most of these girls hooked from one drug hit to the next. Glamour didn’t party with any of them; desperation, heartache and addiction sat on barstools and twisted around poles.

Through one of these women, I found a doctor in Philadelphia who specialized in weight loss using “real” diet pills. Pink, white and green pills gave me energy and took away my appetite. I took sixteen of these in various combinations throughout the day. At night, blue pills would calm my body down enough for it to relax but they had the opposite effect on my mind. Under regular circumstances my dreams are peopled with fantastic beasts and heroes of epic proportion. While taking these prescription sleeping pills, monsters that made Godzilla look like a baby bunny chased me and psychopathic killers lusted after my loved ones. I stopped taking the sleeping pills.

I quit eating (but I looked good.) I slept about an hour a day and some people said I talked to myself in long drawn out and involved conversations. I went for a week like this.

The Go-Go bar owner had a party one night. It was the first time he allowed me to socialize with the dancers, bartenders and patrons. The owner bought drinks for everyone. Men showered me with attention, being the new girl in the group. I drank liberally and soaked up the sweet words directed at me. I became giddy with drink, pills, a lack of food, sleep and accolades. One man even sang to me.

When the bar closed at two, the party moved to an all-night club that had live bands. I drove myself and a few other party goers. We danced and drank until the sun came up. We went to a diner for breakfast. Toast and home fries tasted great after not eating for a week.

I drove home as the sun rose. I gave a lift to one of the dancers who went out with us to the late night club. The air chilled us and the dancer needed her rest, so we kept the radio off and the heat on and all of the windows closed. I’m so considerate.

Someone screamed in my sleep. I woke up slowly, wondering where all of the noise came from and who disturbed my peaceful slumber. I was cozy in the warm car and hadn’t felt this good in months. I heard screaming about someone being dead. I peeked out of my eyes.

On the left, out of the driver’s side window, the dancer ran up and down the highway, trying to flag down other drivers. Through the windshield and on the right, I saw trees. One tree even bent over the hood of the car. I went back to sleep.

I heard some tapping which I totally ignored. I was having some sort of sweet dream and I did not want to be disturbed. The tapping was accompanied by someone calling my name. Someone in a uniform leaned over me and opened the driver’s door. Other people in uniforms lifted me onto a stretcher.

I recognized that some of the people were emergency workers and others were policemen. The policemen kept asking me questions about what happened and wanted to know if I had been drinking. I giggled at that questions and answered honestly about partying all night long.

“Do you know what happened here?” asked one of the policemen.

“I fell asleep,” I answered.

“Do you know you hit something?” asked the other officer.

“Yes, I think I do.”

“Do you know what you hit?”

“I ran into the back of a Wonder bread truck.”

First, there was silence then everyone burst into laughter. The policemen, the ambulance workers, the other drivers who had stopped were all laughing at me.

“What’s so funny?” I mumbled in my half dozing state.

“You ran into a bread truck, alright,” said one of the cops, “you hit the back of an armored car.”

~ ~ ~

I suffered a fractured sternum and whiplash. The innocent dancer had a cut on her forehead. The car did not survive. No tickets were issued and no one lost their license. I gave up pills, cut down on my drinking and quit my job at the Go-Go bar.

I Gave Up

It became very clear to me that I should take a break.

On top of my internet woes at work, and the demands my family were placing on my time, I woke up Saturday morning with the most tremendous headcold. My throat throbbed and closed up in a raw, swollen mess. My head filled with so much mucus that I couldn't hold it up and so little oxygen got to my brain that I definitely qualified for the term "brain dead."

I spent all of Saturday and Sunday sleeping. I went to work Monday but not much work got accomplished. I took off today. After trowling Vick's Vapor Rub on my chest and up my nostrils all day, I can breath again.

Thanks everyone for your well wishes and your sympathy.

Wednesday, January 17, 2007

Conspiracy

I am having a paranoid moment. The world seems to be against me getting online to post and check everyone's sites. This is the first I've been able to get on here.

Explorer won't let me log on at work all of a sudden. My laptop won't boot up quickly. My family expects me to do things with them. I mean, really, this is just too much.

Hopefully, I'll be able to get on tonight. I have to go to work now. This just sucks. Have a nice day, too.

Sunday, January 07, 2007

Ideas

I have some pictures up of what my office/studio looks like now. I will put up new pictures as I improve the place.

I switched this blog to the new Blogger version. I apologize if it causes anyone trouble. All of the others were done a while ago. It really is easy to customize with this version.

I got this from Quilly. It made me think of a few stories. I’ll try to tell them next week.


1. Do you have any nicknames? Besides the ones you already know here, in the real world some loved ones call me Aunt Verdi. You figure it out.
2. What is your favorite drink? Gin & tonic.
3. Tattoos? I don’t think so.
4. Any piercing? Ears; two in the left, one in the right.
5. How much do you love your job? I love the people I work with and it is only a ten minute ride, but I’m bored and annoyed at the job its self.
6. Favorite vacation spot? Our log cabin in the PA mountains.
7. Ever been to Africa? No
8. Ever steal any traffic signs? No
9. Ever been in a car accident? Yes. I fell asleep and ran into the back of an armored car.
10. How many doors does your car have? 2
11. Salad dressing? Catalina
12 Favorite number? 13
13. Favorite holiday? Halloween
14. Favorite food? My mother’s spaghetti
15. Favorite day of the week? Any day I am not working.
16. Favorite brand of body soap? Dove
17. Favorite Tooth Paste? Crest
18. Favorite smell? Vanilla, lavender and cinnamon
19. What do you do to relax? Sleep
21. How do you see yourself in 10 years? Retired, living in the mountains and writing and crafting.
22. What do you do when you are bored? Depends on why I’m bored.

Put an X in front of all the things you have done. Remove the X from the things you have not. In your life have you ever:

(x) Smoked a cigarette
(x) Drank so much you threw up
( ) Crashed a friend's car
( ) Stolen a car
(x) Been in love
(x) Been dumped
(x) Been laid off/fired
(x) Been in a fist fight
(x) Been shot at – by an arrow. Had a gun pointed at me.
(x) Been stabbed – was attacked with a knife by a child I was babysitting, not actually stabbed.
(x) Snuck out of your parent's house
(x) Had feelings for someone who didn't have them back.
(x) Gone on a blind date
(x) Skipped school
( ) Seen someone die
(x) Been to Canada
( ) Been to Mexico
(x) Been on a plane
(x) Been lost
(x) Been on the opposite side of the country
(x) Swam in the ocean
(x) Felt like dying
(x) Cried yourself to sleep
(x) Played cops and robbers naked?
(x) Recently colored with crayons
( ) Sang karaoke
(x) Paid for a meal with only coins
(x) Done something you told yourself you wouldn't
(x) Made prank phone calls
(x) Laughed until some kind of beverage came out of your nose
(x) Caught a snowflake on your tongue
(x) Danced in the rain
(x) Written a letter to Santa Claus
(x) Been kissed under the mistletoe
(x) Watched the sun rise with someone you care about or love
(x) Blown bubbles
(x) Made a bonfire on the beach
(x) Crashed a party
(x) Gone roller-skating
(x) Gone ice-skating

Wednesday, January 03, 2007

Off and Flooding

We began the New Year with stopped up plumbing, but the good news is that my husband talked me into the sewer line protection program, so we didn't have to fork out loads of money to get upstoppered.

I also broke down and went through all of my old files. I produced three large bags of shredded paper for recycling. I feel lighter already and my office/studio is progressing. I'm taking pictures as I go along. I tried posting a couple the other day but blogger wasn't having any of it.

This weekend I will be doing blog housekeeping. There's so much interesting information and stories out there, but I can't read everything, so I'm going to limit myself to those of you lovelies who have stopped by and commented in the last three months.

I have so many projects to work on that I will need some discipline to get it all done.

I want to edit Happenstance for the practice. I want to finish Storytime. I want to participate in Cindra's barter program. I'd like to meet the very talented MO’A who lives very near me. I have to make my daughter's Renaissance Faire dress and cape (I made her corset last year, but she would like another.) There's decorating this new house of ours. I need to get my H/R certification since I'll need to start looking for a new job this year after ten years. So studying the laws and memorizing accronyms are on the horizon. That means I'll be re-doing my resume. Oh, and I need to squeeze in 50 - 60 hours of work a week to pay for my addictions. And I suppose I'll need to pay attention to my family, too.

Is 2007 over yet? I'm exhausted.