Telling it like I see it
so don't ask if you don't want to know
She’s dead to me now
May 25th
I’m done. I’m not even pretending I have a sister anymore.
Not that she’s acted like a sister in oh, I dunno… YEARS! But this is the last straw. She kicked her daughter out on the street (again) with no warning but a “Get the FUCK out of my house NOW!” for simply posting on Facebook that she was spending time with her son.
I knew this adoption was a bad idea. It was wrong. I said that Queen Bitch legally adopting her grandchild after taking the kid away in the first place would cause Miss B lifelong grief. I said that going that far would take away the main reason Miss B would have to get her shit together. And despite that, she has. She got away from DanTheAsshat, has a great job and is going to school. She’s happy and doing great, and celebrates that baby. She completely understands she’ll never get that kid back, because the adoption was pushed through when Miss B was still the underdog. But he’s still her son. It’s not like he was adopted out to strangers, in which case my feelings would be different. Did Queen Bitch honestly believe she could adopt the boy and the connection between he and Miss B would automatically change to sister and brother?
How can a mother do that to her daughter? Tough love is one thing, this is just selfish bullshit. If I were there I would be over there in a heartbeat and tell her exactly what I think of her parenting skills, her communication skills and her overall fucked up mentality. She has never treated Miss B right (including sending her to me years ago after choosing her man over her kid) and has blamed her for bullshit over the years just to… what? And then she cuts people out of her life for not treating ALL the kids equally when SHE doesn’t treat all the kids equally? Stupid deluded cunt. Every time I think about this I feel like throwing up… and then shipping it to her.
Whatever happened to manners?
May 22nd
I volunteered for an event this weekend. This isn’t about Ignite Phoenix (which was kick-ass) but about some of the people attending.
My job was to greet people coming in one of the doors and to hand them the program and quickly and cheerfully explain it was a conversational cootie-catcher they could fold up and use to socialize with their seat-mates. Easy peasy.
There were three types of people coming through that door.
- 10% People I actually knew who smiled back and chatted for a moment before moving on.
- 30% People who accepted the program and smiled back, possibly commenting about the ingenuity of the program.
- 60% Snotty-ass people who brushed past me neither making eye contact or acknowledging me at all.
The whole atmosphere of an Ignite Event is socializing, igniting ideas and just being open for new experiences, right? It’s certainly not your usual Scottsdale upper crust la-dee-dah ignore the help thing. I may have passed people on the street handing papers out without acknowledgement, but usually I at least say no thank you. And I certainly wouldn’t ignore someone inside a building wearing a t-shirt with the event logo prominently displayed on her chest. Rude!
So this is to the rude people out there. Ignite Phoenix (as well as any Ignite out there) is staffed by VOLUNTEERS. From the lowly program pusher to the emcee, from the tech people making it look and sound good, to the t-shirt and program designers, nobody gets paid to do this. We volunteer because we believe in the event. Your lousy $10 ticket doesn’t entitle you to treat anyone like the help. In fact, nothing entitles you to treat anyone like the help. As far as that goes, many events in the Phoenix area are organized and staffed by volunteers that deserve your respect for taking time out of their already busy lives to make these events the very best they can.
Take a split second to acknowledge the people providing you with priceless services and entertainment and you might just get more out of them. Don’t be rude. It only makes you look like crap.
About May 21st
May 17th
If you don’t know what the deal is by now, come out from under your rock and pay attention to the world for five minutes.
So for me, I haven’t yet pinned down my feelings completely. There’s a part of me that of course laughs at the gullibility (stupidity?) of some people, following along and especially ridding themselves of their worldly goods and campaigning on the word of one person. They sort of deserve what they get when nothing happens, and yet they don’t. People that gullible should be protected?
Another part of me wishes I had the charisma to start some false religion and get people to give me money and goods and treat me like I was something special. In turn I’d slowly and carefully turn them from anything biblical and eventually leave them high and dry and yet… smarter.
And yes, there is a teeny tiny part of me that thinks that if ANYTHING happens, at least that would answer the damned question already. Not that I would or could or even want to go to heaven. I cannot imagine anything more boring or eternally annoying to be stuck with religious zealots who’ve been proven right. I’d rather stay here or go to hell with the interesting people.
Different Atheist boards I read are coming up with all kinds of ideas. From staging a rapture to freak out a fundie friend (mean) to sincere volunteering to care for pets of those who are sure they are going to be raptured rapturized taken (humane). I’ll just probably sit back and chuckle.
Either way, I’m fairly confident I and everyone else who plan to attend Girls Night Out Saturday night will be there and ready to get their fun on.
And y’all will still be around as well. In fact, I can’t think of one person I know who’s acceptable by their rules anyway.
Breakfast of Champions
May 16th
No, not Wheaties anymore. I tend to dump sprinkle so much sugar on Wheaties to make them palatable that it kind of takes away from it’s good-for-you-ness.
I’ve been on a steady diet of Oatmeal Crisp Crunchy Almond. I figure it’s also whole-grain, I like almonds and it has more flavor than plain Wheaties. And it’s usually just a bit cheaper. Now I don’t know much about these nutrition labels but I use 1% milk rather than skim (eww yuk) and I dump a crapload of raisins on top. The reason I chose the almond version over the raisin version is raisins are cheaper to add-on than almonds.
Speaking of raisins, I make a special trip to Fresh and Easy to get my raisins. Their raisins are so much better than Sunmaid. Sunmaid, no matter what size packaging you buy, get sticky and hard almost as soon as you open them, But the raisins I get from Fresh and Easy never get sticky and stay soft – all the way to the bottom of the bag. And they’re cheaper than Sunmaid so win-win. Just in case you ever wanted the skinny on raisins.
Sure, I still have to occasional bowl (or two) of Coco-Roos or Lucky Charms – usually as a midnight snack – but for the most part I’ve been sticking to Oatmeal Crisp every morning for about 2 months now.
Unfortunately I’ve also been taking prednisone almost as long, so I have no clue if it’s helping my weight at all. Maybe I’m not getting fatter as quickly. Who knows. But it has to be better for me, right?
Chip chip chip
May 14th
It occurred to me just now that when your friends post requests for you to vote for someone they know for some random award or contest it chips away at your integrity to follow through.
Don’t get me wrong, I posted a request just a couple of weeks ago for my friend’s daughter in a radio contest. In my mind I thought if they wanted to people could peruse all of the entrants and could choose H’s video. Or just save time and pick hers to be nice, which is what (as if anyone did) most people would do.
You see it all the time on twitter and facebook. Just now someone put out a request for his friends to vote for his cousin to get Teacher of the Year somewhere. I barely know him, I don’t know her so my vote is bogus, right? Does the fact that he has bunches of loyal friends voting make her, in fact, Teacher of the Year worthy? Maybe she IS the best teacher on the planet, but how do I know?
Sometimes we put out or respond to the requests thinking we’re doing a good thing to help someone, but isn’t it cheating? Does everything have to be a popularity contest dependent on how many friends and friends of friends you have?
Fine, it’s a minor thing (unless you’re the other guy in the contest) but I can feel it’s chipping away at our collective integrity under the guise of social media friendship.
@msemphasis raises her glass to @pink
May 10th
It’s cute how the earworm in the 4-year-old’s head is @Pink’s Raise Your Glass. Except she didn’t have the words just right so I pulled up the video to listen to over and over. It’s the first time I’ve seen it and it’s AWESOME!
I want to ask so many questions! Like what was the most fun part to do, the sumo wrestler or feeding the calf? Who’s idea was the whole women’s breast milk for the calf anyway? I can’t decide what is my favorite part! I love the waking up with different religious icons too.
So Kira and I were dancing around the living room singing to Pink. And although I’m pretty sure a 4-year-old and her 50-year-old grandmother are NOT in her demographic I’m absolutely sure Pink wouldn’t mind.
Oh yeah, I opened a twitter account for Kira. She’s not such a SmallChild anymore so her new online name is @MsEmphasis.
EDIT: Someone pointed out my earwig/earworm mistake. I blame it on the bifocals.
Big Sister? Big Something.
May 8th
I think I’ve mentioned that my sister hasn’t spoken to me in years and I still don’t know why. Oh well, her loss. I’m a great person to be around and fuck her if she misses the chance.
And there were years she didn’t speak to our Mother either. Mom is a difficult person to be around. She’s bitchy (yes, more than me) and snarky (where the hell do you think I get it) but other people just seem to LOVE her. Her friends and family think she’s great while we kids and our families know the inner bitch. I maintain a relationship with her only because it was one of the last things my Grandmother asked of me while she was still coherent… before the Alzheimers took her away. It wouldn’t bother me a bit if I could feel like I was left off the hook for that either.
The thing is, Mom has gotten better. Apparently being married to the worst human being on the planet has softened her and made her nicer. She can actually speak in complete sentences without snark now and is actually funny and nice to us when she works at it.
Then my sister’s daughter (the only child of hers that I actually have a relationship with) had some shitstorm in her life including a child that Beth ended up taking in and started adoption proceedings for. We visited a couple of times when I was there and it was all so civil so I never did get to have an in-depth conversation as to why she shut me out. In the meantime Mom (somehow) started short weekly visits over there to spend time with the boy. He’s too much for Mom at her own house and Beth won’t let him out of her sight anyway. And apparently Mom was on her best behavior during these visits to not jeopardize future visits.
So… now its been like 6 weeks since Beth has scheduled a visit or even answered the phone when Mom calls. She’s cut her out again with no explanation as usual. And now Mom whines to me during my weekly duty calls. And I chatted with niece on Facebook and it’s because Mom supposedly opened her mouth and said something negative about Beth’s other kids.
Fuck that. We all know who we’re dealing with. Beth is the spoiled brat who cuts people off with no explanation whenever she feels offended by anything. I even told niece to tell her mother I said she needed to grow a pair and have a grown-up conversation with her own fucking mother and stop forcing everyone else to mediate. Niece is in the middle, I’m in the middle and the boy doesn’t get to see his Great-Grandmother when he’s too little to understand all the past history shit. But she won’t… she’ll just carry on in her little world feeling justified in treating people like garbage. And Mom doesn’t even remember saying anything but knowing her penchant for snark I’m pretty sure something was said.
So on this Mother’s Day I’m left with a crying mother, a bitch for a sister, and they both live too far away for me to do anything but vent here and then try not to care. I wish I could be immature and just close any connection with those people.
I envy you people with good relationships with your family. Happy Mother’s Day to those that deserve it.
50 is fantastic… so far!
May 2nd
Oh. My.
Well, my birthday celebrations actually started the Friday before the actual date but other than the residual bruising on my boobs, I was ready to continue.
Last Thursday was #EVTM so I went up to Liberty Market to hang with that gang and received even more birthday wishes. I have such good friends!
Friday I got up and finished packing, took myself for my free birthday breakfast at Liberty Market – yes, it’s THAT good, you go two days in a row when you get the chance – and then picked up Krystal to get the rental car. After a rough start because car rentals at the fucking airport aren’t set up for local people and we blew half an hour trying to find the right place, we scored a Charger and went back to her place and loaded up the car with their stuff. Picked up Max, had lunch and finally got on the road to VEGAS BABY! Made it to the Stratosphere just in time to get decked up, gather the troops, pre-drink and go out.
Because CJ met us there and both she and Krystal (and I) love karaoke I decided we’d go a half-block away to Dino’s Lounge. Yes, it was a dive bar but aren’t those the best places for Karaoke? We had a BLAAAAAST! Max and Casey and his friend Jeff got up and sang Happy Birthday (so did everyone else in the packed bar) and then CJ sang my favorite CJ-sings-Karaoke song, The Homecoming Queen’s Got a Gun, to which I got up in my drunken way and cheered her on. Then Krystal rocked Shoop. I flirted with the numerous guidos around me and got as drunk as I’ve ever been. I must’ve had 8-9 vodka cranberries throughout the night. Everyone had a great time!
Unfortunately Vegas was experiencing a surprise cold spell and we froze our asses off walking to and from the bar. Nobody brought warm clothes except maybe CJ. We’re idiots.
Speaking of guidos, Vegas is overrun with Jersey Shore wannabes but damn do they dress nice and smell good. Lots of flirting and leaning in close, but that’s all. Most of those young men were tolerant of this old bat so it’s all good.
Saturday started with buffet breakfast with CJ, Crystal O’hara and her daughter Colleen (see, I remember her name now) and Shannon – then Max and Krystal eventually showed up. Us girls then headed to the outlet mall where I tried on 6 bras and started crying cuz I can never find a bra that fits right. Poor CJ was so patient with me. Then back to the room for a nap after which we dressed up and met at Nine Fine Irishmen for the BEST DINNER EVER!
I had the cider braised salmon (with a couple of ciders) and it was fantastic. Other than the food, I don’t think anyone was really enjoying the experience so we split up and went our separate ways.
Ended up back at my hotel and made CJ walk all the way to the HOT TUB!!1 only to find out they close the pool area at 6pm BOO! Who the fuck closes a hotel pool at 6pm? The Strat, apparently. So we went back to my room and dressed up again and went up to the Air Bar at the top of the tower, where the evening disintegrated even further. I’m drinking the whole time, but still. We were all getting tired and cranky by then so I gave up and went to bed.
Sunday morning we all gathered once more to watch Casey take the leap from the top of the tower. There’s video of that on my Facebook page if you want to watch.
So… there were down moments but it was mostly way up. I had the best time ever, wore make-up *gasp* and Krystal made my hair look great! I got to flirt a bit, got plenty drunk and spent a really great weekend with my sons and friends. We’re planning another family trip in November when Ginnie turns 21 and can go along.
Awesome start to my year 50!
Mystical Science
Apr 27th
When my doctor went over my recent blood work results I was dumbfounded. Next time I’m going to have to record my visit because I just can’t remember it all, but the key points are:
According to the numbers I’ve been exercising. Really? Not so much. Sure, I get a bit more exercise now that I’m breathing better, but it’s not like I’m out there trying. More like walking from the parking lot without stopping to rest.
According to the numbers my liver is not handling my alcohol level well. Really? I have two or three drinks a WEEK. And I only started drinking like 5 years ago, so it’s not a long-time drinking thing. Fucking liver is in for it this weekend. (Vegas baby!)
According to the numbers my cholesterol is fine and my heart-related cholesterol is great. I’m as healthy as I can be!
She sees a few white blood cells in my blood, and something about fighting a UTI (which I really don’t remember having) so we’ll check again in 6 months.
All that misinformation from a few tubes of blood?
Actually, my breathing is great. I think I’ve used my albuterol inhaler once in the last couple of weeks as compared to a couple of time an hour like 4 months ago. I feel fantastic!
My blood pressure is iffy, so I now need to keep a chart. My weight is a little high (gained 10 pounds) but I blame that on the steroids – and maybe on the Butter Pecan Ice Cream I’ve used to replace cigarettes. What shall I use to replace the ice cream?
Maybe I should exercise more now that I feel better. Maybe after the spring pollen season passes because the only time I do feel any tightness is when I’m outside.
I’m telling you, when they first put me on 20 mg a day of prednisone I was good, then it was lowered to 15 and then 12 mg a day and I started feeling the bloating and gaining the weight. After Friday I’m supposed to go down to 10 mg a day and I wonder how I’ll feel after that. Though how I can feel more side-effects the less I take stumps both of us. Right now I just feel FAT though I’m sure that damned ice cream doesn’t help.
I really want to go back to smoking. Shaddup.
Want your own billboard?
Apr 26th
You can go here and make one like these, and if they really like it it could become a real billboard somewhere out there.
Let me know if you see my mug out there in the world.
