crucible of ennui

It’s almost Thanksgiving again. I feel bad that Glenn has to work again on Thursday, but I am glad that he’ll be home on Saturday and Sunday. I want to make him something really special and yummy to eat… but the last few kitchen experiments have been less than… savory. 

We got a KICK ASS Kitchen Aid mixer and I had to try it out… so I was thinking cookies. I don’t know how, but I misread the ingredients and doubled the butter and the cookies ended up being just greasy crust lining the cookie sheet. Ew. So then I got all pissed off, determined to make the f’n cookies. I swear I triple checked all the amounts, but they still turned out crappy. I just can’t make cookies. Cupcakes – no problem. Muffins - makin’ em in my sleep. But for the life of me, I can’t make cookies.  Or pancakes, but that’s a story for another day.

Seriously. W.T.F.  

Maybe it’s because I don’t add enough love to the recipe. 

Maybe it’s because I cook with spite. 

It’s two of my most favorite topics in the world. Zombies and World of Warcraft.

whatever was on my hands must have been jalapeno juice, since my eyes are my BURNING.

BURNING.
pain of hellfire in my eyes.

I’m going to get mexican at lunch.

So I’m going through my closet…

Black
Black
Black
Gray
Black
Navy
Black

You get the picture. Ugh… it’s like I’m in high school again. All I need is to whip out the Depeche Mode and Cure tapes, start smoking clove cigs again and bitch about my parents.

I need to go shopping.

It’s raining buckets. And I so don’t want to be here at work. Way back in the day, Kristi (one of my oldest friends – I’ve known her since junior high school) and I would ditch class (in college) when it was rainy like this. We would head back to her condo, stop by Chan’s Wok on the corner for their tasty 2 item lunch special and camp out on the sofa playing Super Mario Brothers.

It was always fun over at Kristi’s. On days their poodle was scheduled for a groomer appointment, we would do something like paint it’s toe nails, give her a mohawk.

Before you call PETA, please note that this dog was well cared for. Maggie the Poodle lived quite the pampered life. I was over there around lunchtime one day and started poking around the fridge for something to eat. There was a tasty-looking little meatloaf on a plate under cling wrap, so I pulled it out, sliced off two pieces and popped it into the microwave. Kristi meanwhile was sitting on the other side of the breakfast bar just watching me put around their kitchen. I assemble what I think to be quite the meatloaf sandwich, with toasted bread, mustard and even a pickle spear. I am just about to bite into that sucker when Kristi looks over at me and says, “You know, that meatloaf is Maggie’s “special” food. The only people food in the house is popcorn.”

Stab her.

Which goes into another story of Kristi – the family ate lots of popcorn. All the time. Sometimes Linda would make a HUGE bowl of popcorn and that’s what they would eat for dinner. At Christmas time when everyone gave those big popcorn tins of flavored popcorn – sign that family up for 10. Heaven forbid if Kristi and her younger sister, Jenny, wanted the same flavor of popcorn. One would end up grabbing the bag and the other would give chase around the room until something got broke.

It’s all fun and games, till someone loses and eye. Then it’s a sport.

I’m pretty crabby/grumpy/bitchy at the moment. I’m a horrible housekeeper on many different levels, I procrastinate in every aspect of my life, I’m arrogant, jump to wrong conclustions and can spit a loogie farther than most men I know to this day.

Resolutions. I’m just not in the mood to make them. I feel like if I make a New Year resolution, it’s doomed to fall by the wayside.

The one thing I would love to change about myself is the determination and fortitude to finish projects. This would help me in so many different ways. I start out wonderfully, then lose steam way before anything gets accomplished. Then all my projects stack up, nothing gets done and I’m surrounded by piles of crap that are a reflections of my failure.  Which makes baby Jesus cry.

And I’ve got to say, it hurt to type out “failure.” Little tears of shame started to well up. Not sure if it’s self pity, inadequacy or frustration, maybe a combination of a few different things.

I hate PMS on January 1.

I’m cutting my hair tomorrow. I decided at the beginning of this year that I would grow it out one year and then get it cut, maybe even have 10 inches cut off to donate to Locks of Love, a place that makes wigs for children that loose their hair due to medical treatments for cancer, disease.

Hair cutting for women is different than when men get a cut. For women, hair conveys a vast array of messages.

Forced hair cutting in medieval times was done to shame a woman. Cutting and tearing hair are signs of grief in many cultures. Sometimes hair is hidden due to its many sexual overtones.

My favorite hair cutting story has to be a friend of mine, who in a blind misguided rage took scissors to her own hair. She had been arguing with her husband, went into the bathroom and emerged with horribly short hair. She was so angry that she wanted to make a drastic statement.

Wow. That’s some statement there, missy.

If I had more courage and knew I was going to get it cut short and styled… I’d totally try cutting my own hair. How bad could it be?!??!?

I hate zombies. Hate them. Some people have a thing against clowns. Some folks – it’s dolls and ventriloquist dummies. For me it’s zombies.

So I’m at the bookstore the other day and I see a copy of The Zombie Survival Guide by Max Brooks, the son of movie great-Mel Brooks. How could I resist? A manual that outlines what steps I can take to protect me and my own from a massive zombie breakout. Let me just say that this book is well written, hysterical and full of helpful hints that make all the sense in the world once explained. “Keep your hair short”, “2nd floor buildings are the best protection”, modes of practical transportation and how to travel through infested areas. It really is Complete Protection from the Living Dead.

I think my fear all started with a recurring zombie nightmare that started in my late teens. The theme would always be the same. But the first nightmare was the most horrific…

I am running through a graveyard, complete with requisite fog on the ground and above ground headstones, weatherworn and crumbled by time. As I’m running, hands break up through the ground, grabbing for my feet as I run over. It’s not long before the zombies are above ground, giving chase through the cemetery. I start to run slower and slower until the rhythm of my feet on the ground provide the tempo for “American Woman” by the Guess Who to start. And as I’m running away from the zombies with “American Woman” in my head, the hammering of my heart always wakes me up at this point.

To this day I can’t hear that song without feeling something bad is about to happen.

My focus for the upcoming year will be reinvention. It’s a milestone year – not for any superficial reasons. But the feeling that this year will be different. For Glenn. For myself. For Catherine – she will have so much to learn and experience.

Reinvention. How can I apply this concept in my own life to generate the most possibilities? I need to look at my career/job. I need to focus on getting my company off the ground. I need to be able to spend as much time as possible with my daughter. I need to win the lottery. I need to mastermind a plan to take over the world and it’s rich supply of chocolate.

Oh yes… it will all come together this year.