Wiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii

I HAVE A WII!!!

I went to Target to pick up a sleeping bag for this weekend (and a couple other things I'm going to need) and, with no intention of actually buying anything, walked down the video game aisle. They had four Wiis behind the pretty clear glass. I had to consult with mom on this one, but we decided that we wanted one. I watched one get sold while we were waiting for the staff to bring up a patio set that mom also wanted. I let dad wait for that while I bought the Wii, and a good thing too, because it was the last one on the shelf when I got to it. I have a Wii!!

The patio set was a pain in the hand. Really! It was heavy and awkward and not going to fit in the trunk of my little Saturn. In the attempt to get it in the back seat, my hand slipped from the bottom of the box. This caused the middle fingernail on my left hand to break a good third into the quick of my nail bed. Yes, it hurt. Yes, it bled. Yes, I have a nice cushy bandage on it right now. Unfortunately, I crochet in an atypical way that requires the use of that finger (more than the typical way does), so I was not able to finish either of the two projects I'm working on like I wanted to.

Maybe it will be less sore by this evening. Maybe. The Wii probably won't get set up until next week. Maybe Monday when I'm off. Yeah, that'd be a good day to do that!

Trusting Instincts

Remember LDS and her garden gnome inspiration? She made her way to the doctor yesterday, certain he was going to tell her she had some freaky tumor. No, there really is a garden gnome in there, and she's been feeling it kick. She came to me this morning, mostly laughing and quite shocked, to tell me the news.

Her "affliction" has been going on for months. Five to six months, actually. She joked that other mothers get nine months to prepare and she gets to do it in three. She also joked that she used to make fun of those women who didn't know they were pregnant, and is now one of them. If you don't know how to recognize the signs, I guess you could miss it. I had my suspicions; she's one of those people who likes to say she can't have kids. Apparently, the plumbing works fine.

So, for all you ladies out there who think it's just intense stress, consider your signs: feeling and getting sick, back aches, unexplained weight gain, and maybe feeling something moving around in your intestines. Look out; you just might actually have something moving around in there!

I told her if she had a girl, she could name her Naomi and call her Nome for short (I knew someone in college with said nickname). She and her girlfriend are going to have their hands full in a few months.

People around the office like to joke that there's something in the water that makes people pregnant. It does seem to happen a lot here. What's really funny is that whenever it comes up, everyone always turns to me like I'm going to be next. If that's the case, I hope everyone is prepared for the Second Coming.

I already made her a gnome, but now I wonder if I can make a little birthing doll....

Living History

Fox, Fae, dad, and I went to the National Museum of the American Indian yesterday. I've heard several things about this place: that it's incomplete, it doesn't have a lot of information, also that it's really great, and that you can go through it in one or two hours. While it looks like there could have been more exhibits, there was a ton of information. So much, in fact, that we had a hard time taking it all in during the course of one afternoon. I missed a lot that I know would interest me. That just means we'll have to go back.

This is the fountain on the Mall side of the building. There was a huge boulder on the other side of the walkway that amplified the sound made by the waterfall. It was really neat.


One of the exhibits was an exploration of women's dress. Here is just one example. I am not sure if I'm remembering correctly, but I believe this was a three-hide dress. Yes, all those colors are tiny seed beads. Amazing!

None of my outings are ever complete without some dolls. This is only one part of the case of dolls. Some were very abstract and some were exceptionally detailed. I bought a pair of Navajo dolls in the gift shop.

Those of you who know me also know that I love languages. Did you know that Cherokee actually has a written form? You Windows Vista users have a font loaded on your computers. This was the part of the museum that made me quite sad. Oral traditions are so easy to lose. As young people stop learning their native languages, the stories that are told in them will be lost. Some languages have already been lost, though the descendants of those who once spoke them remain. I mourn the loss of words, and all the wonderful stories that could be told by them.

I admit that I haven't done a really good job of describing this place. It's one of those things that you just have to see. This museum is unique. It's not all about something that is gone, it's about people and culture that is still around today. Frankly, no amount of blogging I could do today would do it justice. How about I just say we were there for about five hours, and didn't come close to reading every word.

Less Guilty

Mom reported that Aunt Betty had surgery on Saturday, so it turns out that it's a good thing we didn't go. She might have been in surgery when we got there, or busy recovering and not very coherent. I don't know when we'll get a chance to go because I'll be working a festival this next weekend; maybe she'll be home soon.

I'm off to spend my day in town with Fox, Fae, and dad. I'll tell you all about it tomorrow!

No More Weekends

I went in to work this morning, but I told Adolf gas was too expensive and I wasn't going to come in any more weekends. I guess Adolf understood that. Even so, this morning was a waste. There was nothing that I was doing that I couldn't have done during the week. In fact, I could have gotten more done if it was a weekday. No more weekends.

The drive home was just like a Friday evening. It took me an hour and forty-five minutes. Bleh.

Mom and I were going to visit Aunt Betty in the hospital today. She fell on Thursday and broke a hip and shoulder. Unfortunately, they didn't bring her to the hospital that's nearby, they took her to one that's some forty-five minutes away. Add in my early morning spent at work, my extremely long Saturday drive home, the heat (and it's hot!), and the fact that both mom and I seem to be getting over a bit of a cold, we just couldn't summon up the energy to make the trek to visit her. I don't know when we will be able to; I'll be busy next weekend, but she will be there for a while because they're talking surgery.

Mom is concerned about her dog, Shelley, who is in a kennel right now. Shelley is very well trained, an adorable little Sheltie, but we know she's going to miss being at home. We don't know if someone is coming to help Aunt Betty out while she heals. It's not good for Shelley to stay in the kennel for so many weeks.

I feel bad that we didn't make it to the hospital. If it was the one nearby, it wouldn't have been an issue at all. I feel bad that I couldn't push aside my own fatigue to visit someone who really needs to know her family is thinking of her.

An Interesting Revelation

As I was curled up in my bed last night, I started thinking, as thoughts are want to do when you'd rather be sleeping.

I had no fear in London. On my first trip, I walked like I knew where I was going. I rode the Underground alone. That city was filled with wonderful things, but I didn't feel like I stuck out like a tourist (whether I did or not is another matter). Being alone there didn't scare me.

I had no fear in Paris. Even with one guy pushing us along so he could piggy back into the Metro. I know I didn't look like a tourist here, and even not speaking the language, I walked like it was familiar.

I had no fear in New York. I admit I didn't ride the Subway, but I hailed cabs and wandered aimlessly looking for places where I was supposed to be. I was not even what this country would consider an adult yet, but I wasn't afraid of being there.

I fear DC. I don't ride the Metro alone (I have other reasons for being Metro-phobic), I don't go into the city alone. I avoid being there late at night, if I can. Any times I have been, I've been not as collected as I could have been. I don't know what it is that makes London, Paris, or New York any more safe and comfortable than DC. Don't get me wrong, I love living in that city's proximity, and I love going into town to see the many wonderful things that are there to be seen. I do it, and I fear it.

Perhaps it's because of the proximity. I don't hear about attacks on joggers in Hyde Park, but I do hear about them in Rock Creek Park. I don't hear about bank robberies or high speed chases or children getting hit by stray bullets in any other city. But I hear about them here. It's not that I'm naive to think such things don't happen in other cities, they're just not in my face as often as they are where I live. Honestly, what city wants the tourists to hear about the bad things anyway? But it makes me walk the streets with more fear than any other place I may go.

This little before sleep revelation answered some questions that have recently come up. It's a rather strange position to find myself. But, now I understand.

I Owe You Some Pictures

But I only have one. Since the little bear that Miss Luna hugged all night, I made another bear and a magpie (that's a kind of bird, people around the office think it's a penguin, I think it's very un-penguin-like). I don't have pictures of them yet. I do have the below cell-phone pick of one I'm rather proud of.

On Tuesday, LDS said she had a stomach ache. She said it felt like something was in there (think "Alien"). Her girlfriend says there's a garden gnome in there. A garden gnome! In her stomach! As crazy as that sounds, it made for some good inspiration.

Here's my little feel-better crocheted garden gnome. I finished him in about three hours (over Tuesday and yesterday evening) and gave him to LDS today.

I'm actually feeling further inspired. I can make a lot of little gnomes. And maybe add other elementals too (undines and salamanders and sylphs, maybe). LDS and I aren't very fond of doctors, so next I think I'll make a happy doctor gnome. There was no pattern, I just started stitching with this awesome multicolored yarn with shades of red and green and white. It seemed gnomish to me, though you can't see much of it under his beard.

Today was "bring your kids to work day." I don't have any kids, of course, but some of my coworkers do. My desk is rather popular, even for people in other departments, because it's covered in origami and, now, amigurumi. I actually took home a lot of my origami. My desk it a lot less cluttered at the moment. One little girl came back with a piece of pink paper and asked me to fold a jumping bunny. I gave her a quick tutorial. What do ya know? A fun day for me too!

Thoughts Flow

I recently created a buyer account on Etsy, so I can support Moon and her store. The amount of wonderful things that can be had there is amazing. I've bought a handful of supplies that I've been wanting to get for some time, a couple little toys, a really awesome piece of jewelry (and I'll talk more about this at a later time), and I have a growing list of things I want. Fear not, I'm not overspending.

I've been pointed to Etsy before, but never really gave it a chance. I admire all of those sellers though; people who have an idea and can make money doing it. It's mind-boggling.

I wish I had something to offer. I wish there was something I could do that people needed or wanted and would be willing to pay me to do it. But I have no skills and I have no talent.

I am not unique. There is nothing that I do that can't be done by others. There is nothing that I have that no one else has. There is nothing that I make that someone might need.

Nothing will save me. I will always work for The Man.

I stopped dreaming. I wanted to be an actor, but I can't act. I wanted to get married, but I am alone. I wanted to have children, but I have only myself. I wanted to be a nun. Let's just not talk about that one.

Maybe I can talk a little about that one. See, it wasn't a want, it was a know. I knew at a very young age that cloistered would be the life for me. I knew it as a child, and I knew it in my early teens, and I knew it when I started Catholic high school.

There's oddness in my first year of high school. My life saw major theological changes. My studies of world cultures and religions expanded greatly. My own spirituality took a 180° turn. Still, I was going to be a nun. I didn't hide my spiritual discoveries in school, yet they still accepted me into the Peer Ministry program my senior year. I led prayer circles backstage before curtain and before swim meets and soccer games. I was going to be a nun. That would have worked fine except for that little Catholic requirement, which no longer fit my beliefs and hasn't since.

I finally unlearned that knowledge, more recently in the grand scheme of things than I really care to admit. Turtle likes to joke about how happy she is that I "got over that," because she thinks I have an attractive figure (and I guess she means it would be a shame to tie it up in a habit and veil). Honestly, I don't disagree, but whatever my physical assets may be, they're not enough to help me find a life partner. Just enough to make some of my female friends wish they had what I had, for all the good they don't seem to realize it hasn't done me.

Sure, looks aren't everything. In a handful of years, they won't be anything, but that also means I don't have anything appealing intellectually either. It's not something I'm doing; I've been willing to settle for less than my ideal for some years now. Even compromising, eliminating the standards I created in my head that no real human can possibly attain, hasn't opened up any prospects. The problem must be me. This is why I've given up on wanting to be married. And that leads to why I've given up on wanting kids. Mayhap I should revisit the nun thing....

I actually wasn't intending on putting the latter half of this post here; I wasn't planning on that tangent at all, in fact. I thought about putting it on the blog that no one reads (see, I had a blog that only a few people could read, but no one did, so I changed it so that no one can. Now I can type whatever I want there and not have to worry about who may see it. No one sees it!), but it's here now and I'm not reaching for the backspace. I guess that means this is all I really have for today. For the record, I'm not singing the "boo-hoo, poor me" song either. I'm quite complacent with my fate.

Full Pink Moon

So named for the prevalent pink flowers of spring, this moon is also called the Fish Moon, the Sprouting Grass Moon, or the Egg Moon, depending on the region.

At the request of a friend, I spent this esbat sending Reiki to someone who needed a little healing. Full moons are great for healing rituals as it is, but with all of my supplies packed up in moving anticipation, a Reiki session was just perfect for my current circumstances.

Everything on the moving front is on hold right now with no estimated time of return. It's disappointing on many levels, because if this falls through I would have lost some much needed funds in the attempt and, of course, not improved my living situation any.

While I'm a few days behind in getting this esbat post up, I hope everyone had a great day, and I hope you're all blooming with excitement at the thought of the many gay festivities surrounding the upcoming sabbat.

Like the Train Wreck

Something horrific happens and people often say they should turn away, but don't.

I just read an extremely disturbing article on a website that I respect (and still do), that pointed me to another disturbing article that pointed me to another disturbing article on yet another website that I respect (and still do). It was nothing racy; they were articles about real people from the Middle Ages and today, who did truly horrific things to other real people. Some of those things made my stomach turn just to read about them, and yet, I kept reading.

Maybe we keep looking when we think we shouldn't because we've already seen something we immediately wished we hadn't seen. How much more damage to our delicate, caring, empathetic psyche can we do? Really, I'm not going to be scarred for the rest of my life because I know some uncomfortable facts (that's an understatement), but I could have done without the gory details just the same. Though, I'm much happier to have just read about them rather than witnessed them first hand.

It makes me wonder why we watch at all. An accident on the highway causes major delays mostly from the people who slow down just to look at what's going on as they drive by. I wonder what they are hoping to see. Damage? Blood? Dead bodies? And what difference does it make to them to have or have not seen it? Or, is it simply the fact that we are a curious race, in general, and like to know what is going on? If that's the case, we're also a "doubting Thomas" kind of people, because the radio reports that tell us what we want to know aren't enough, we have to see it for ourselves.

It's a rather peculiar thing when you think about it.