My Karma is running me over.

That's about how I feel, right now. I'm not sure what I did recently to deserve this dose of yuck, but goddamn. This weird blight thing is looking like a Staph infection. Staph scares me, but it's treatable, I'm taking antibiotics, right now.

I fell down the last three steps, just a few minutes ago, and twisted the everlovingfuck out of my knee.

I'm tired but I can't sleep. Bored, but I can't read. Annoyed with certain people living in my house, who think World of Warcraft makes a great life career ("I only played seven hours today...what, I was taking a break...") I'm. Just. Pissy.

Seems like every nerve ending on my body is singing with some kind of pain, and or itching.

I need to get well. I need to get away for a little while.

On the up side, I started classes, today. I'm really enthusiastic about them both. The writing class looks to be difficult, but in a good way. The music/history class is a riot, the professors are fantastic, funny, old hippies. The writing professor is really a history/philosophy prof, but he's teaching the writing class, because like he said "I do enough of this shit on a day-to-day, that I'm qualified to teach it." Think Donald Sutherland in Animal House. Not the scene where he's padding across the kitchen bareassed, but the scene where he's like "do you want to smoke some pot?".

Maybe I twisted my knee, because I was thinking impure thoughts about my relatively hot writing teacher. Or, maybe I'm just clumsy with the tendancy to overanalyze everything...

Mostly good.

So, my dad is visiting, and it’s nice.  Not earth shattering, but, nice. Nice to see him. Nice to have him hanging around. I really wish they lived closer. This once a year shit is getting to be a real strain, he’s getting older, missing Alden growing up, etc.  Yesterday, I was housebound with some strange affliction (more on that later) and I cooked all day. The windows were open, September was breezing across the house, and I spent the whole day nurturing a Bolognese sauce, to later incorporate into some kickass lasagna.  I even made a pie, for dessert.  Music was playing low, Irv was home all day, and things couldn’t get more pleasant.  I really wish we had more time like that, to spend. He commented, even that he wished we lived closer together, because we would have a great time cooking together.  Today, Irv and Luiz decided to cut grass later in the afternoon and we went out all morning.  We spent the time shopping, hanging around Red Bank, the requisite Elsie’s visit (best subs in NJ).  Tomorrow I start classes, so it’ll be one of those “every person for themselves” sorta day.

So, yeah, having Dad around is nice.

Surrounding that, things have been weird.  Sunday afternoon, I was walking around, in the garden, picking tomatoes and eggplant.  A little later, at dinner, my face started to itch.  By night time, my whole lower face, from my cheeks down to my neck, focused around my chin, everything was swollen beyond recognition.  I downed Benadryl, and prayed for it to go away…it reduced somewhat, by Monday, but then my eyes swelled shut. One was just puffy, but the other eye was swelled closed.  Cold compresses, more Benadryl…the swelling is almost gone, now, but I’m still generally puffy and itchy.  I have a new one starting on my arm, today. My whole forearm…hard, painful, swollen, red/white, and itchy like a motherfucker.  When the swelling goes down, there’s a tiny little itchy bug bite right in the center. I had three on my face that I know of, and now one on my inner arm.  This. Sucks.  

More suckitivity.  They shut off our power today, due to some ridiculous accounting error, on their part.  Long, mundane story short, we had to pay something like $450 to get the power restored.  On the upside, it was only off for about an hour.  But, what the fuck…

Wolfboy and his puppies

Mm, I ran into Wolfboy, today.

I didn't recognize him, at first, he shaved his head, put on a few lbs. and grew some facial hair. I mean, it has been 8+ years...last time I saw him, he was stalking Irv and I through Pathmark, snarling. Irv and I were laughing...it was laughable.

So, he cruses up to me, at the school, and starts chatting. I start chatting back, thinking to myself "I know this guy...who is this guy...we used to hang out" Then, it hit me..it's Mark! At first, I felt all awkward, but then we started talking about our kids, and old friends, and stuff, and it was remarkably friendly, and pleasant. And, so ordinary!

I had to break up with him, because he thought he was a warewolf. He also had skinhead tendencies, and I hate that shit. He was a big poser, though, because he didn't really disrespect anyone, he just saw a few skinhead movies and thought they were really cool. But, he was crazy...he really did think he was this powerful, rippling muscled warewolf. He would howl at the full moon, and writhe around "changing" and, at the time, I was both afraid of him (not because he would tear me up, but because he was genuinely crazy) and sad for him. He was also sexually neurotic. He disliked fluids, he didn't like wetness, or sweat, or any natural sex-type-excretion. He wouldn't touch me, and it took him an hour of frantic concentrating to get off. I see he has three kids now, so probably he got over that little quirk.

But, I loved him, genuinely. We had so SO much stuff in common...I think we would have been better as friends, and never tried to be a couple. I had a few relationships like that. It was a nice easy conversation, talking about old friends, seeing people that are still around, etc.

I feel bad about the breakup, still. I was such a bitch when I was younger. I met another guy, a normal, athletic, smokin' hot artist-type, who was a tai-kwon-do champion, he was an Olympic hopeful, trained at the top school in NJ. After dealing with Mark's quirks, and his crying, and dealing with being his mommy, and his jealousy, pseudo-racisim, wolfyness...I just was totally in love with this other guy, and dumped Mark on the spot. In a letter.

I feel bad, because we'd had a huge fight, a few weeks, before, and he was getting better. It was one of those huge "sitting on the kitchen floor, clutching each other, crying, promising to make it better" fights. And, he got so much better, he turned into superboyfriend. Then, I broke up with him. He was all suicidal..calling me, crying... I was such a shit.

So, yeah, that's what I thought about, today, seeing Mark. He's still hot, though. His kid is adorable, and his wife is cute, and I'm thrilled that he's normal, now, or relatively normal, at least.

Of course, "the girls" Darlene, Angela, Sue, and Ronnie, all had to rib me.

I look forward to seeing him and his family again, we still seem to have all that stuff in common, he's still all metal, and I could use some more metal friends. I would love if Alden and his kid started hanging out.

I wonder if he still howls at the moon.

Stuff..

We have so much shit to do...my Dad's gonna be here in 3 days, and I wanted to get so much done. Not that he cares, of course, house tidiness only marginally registers on his personal meter...I just feel better. If we can't get motivated to tidy up the bookshelves, and mop the back half of the house for him visiting, I give up hope for getting motivated to do it, at all. One of those things. Though, It's 7:30, and I'm really sleepy right now. After I get home from taking Alden to school, I hope I can find it in myself not to pass out on the living room floor, like I did yesterday...

Luiz is no help. I tell him the night before...k, we're getting up early, go to bed at a normal time. He doesn't, and is a pain in the ass to wake up. I give up in the middle of trying to wake him up, and get all slackass, myself. It's such a cycle.

Oh, how I would love to be sleeping now.

Blogging about blogging

A little metablogging, here.

I stopped, because I thought my life wasn't exciting enough to blog about. Then, I miss it, because it's not about readership, being interesting, or trying to entertain people...but blogging is my therapy, lining up the thoughts, getting them down, pouring it out. I've always been more articulate in text than in speech, and ranting about stuff to an audience (willing or unwilling) with my voice just doesn't cut it. In fact, when I do, I often find myself getting more worked up, because just finding words to express myself can be frustrating. Or, worrying if I'm making sense or not. I think faster than I talk, so I stammer and fumble over my words, and I speak very fast. Typing slows that whole process down, and makes me inventory my mind, in a way.

So, this is therapy. I'm quite sure all my readers are gone, thank god.

Plus, the whole "gee, I'm sorry I took a week off from posting, I'll be better" thing really stinks. I type when I have things to type about. If I feel like I have to make updates, FOR people...guess what, I avoid it all together. This isn't for PEOPLE. This is for ME.

It's all about me, baby.

I'm tired, hungry, and I think I'm getting sick. My dad is gonna be here in 4 days, and it -still- looks like a bomb hit the house. I can't get anybody to do anything, except play games and watch TV. I'm really close to having one of Those Days, where I flip out, and everyone gets a little scared. That might be what we need.

Damn, it feels good to whine.

What else?

So, school started back up, for Alden.

The week prior, I was alternately excited for him, because I loved the first days of school, and worried. I've been trying to get him to read all summer long, and he's been uninterested, at best. I'd have him grab a book, and sit next to me on the couch, while we read together, for half hour blocks. He would, grudgingly, but I found out too late in the summer that he was sitting there staring into space for the duration. I started testing him on what he said he was reading, and he would stare blankly. So, the past few weeks, we were actively reading out loud, and I was giving him written Q&A on the material he read...I was dismayed at his progress, or lack thereof. In fact, he's gone backwards, this summer.

Today was the second day, and already his teacher had to see me after class, and show me an assignment that he didn't finish. He had to write a paragraph, on the most memorable thing he did, this summer... Not only did he not even do that, he destroyed the paper, in the process. Second day of school, and he's the only kid with homework. I was unhappy, to say the least. His teacher lectured him, on the spot. I lectured him all the way home, where my mother was hanging out in the driveway, she let him have it too. Irv came home briefly to pick up Luiz and the trailer, and Irv yelled at him. On his way out, Luiz also let Alden know how dissapointed he was.

I had to ask, after we got inside, and everyone was gone..."Alden, do you like this? Do you like your entire family so dissapointed with you? Is this how it's gonna be for the next 179 days?" He doesn't like it, but apparently that prospect didn't have enough impact to get him going, either. Starting at 4:00 I gave him a half hour to brainstorm an idea for his paragraph. He didn't do it in time. I took away his privelages for the rest of the day. I gave him till 5. He finished it by 5. I gave him 45 minutes to write a first draft (in my house, every writing assignment goes in drafts, without exception) of seven sentences...this isn't brain surgery, he's eight years old. 45 minutes, seven sentences. He didn't finish. He lost tomorrow's privileges too. Instead, I watched him line up erasers like cars, move his paper around till it was perfectly even to the bottom of the table, stare off into space, pick his toes, etc. Left alone, with no company and no outside stimuli, he would rather do nothing, than get his job done. I gave him till 6:30 to finish it, final copy, and all. He failed that too. He lost privileges till Thursday of next week. Losing privileges means no free time after school. He does his homework by a certain time, then his chores, then extra ones that I think of, then he sits with me, and reads his book, aloud (so I know he's not staring off into space). At 7 pm, he was going to lose them for 2 weeks, but he slid the paper in, one paragraph by 6:58.

I'm really distraught.

He's on a strict timetable, right now, with each stage of his day clocked out, he has to be. I hate living like this, I hate making him live like this, and I would never enact such strict measures, if I didn't think he needed it. He always gets a chance to prove himself, first, and he inevitably fucks up, forcing me to give him a strict, almost militaristic schedule.

Nothing seems to be getting through. No threat scares him. It got so bad, last year, we actually unplugged the TV and DVD player from his room, and removed it, for 6 months. We've taken everything away, till all he had was school, homework, chores, and sleep. Apparently, it still doesn't phase him. When life is good, which we get for brief windows, he gets lots of playtime, we have a huge yard, he has a thousand dollar swingset, xbox, ps2, endless movies, gameboy, and...he goes 70% of his life merely staring at these things longingly, as he screws another day away, taking 4 hours to finish what could be done in 15 minutes.

Now, not every day is like this. When he wants to, he will gladly dash out an assignment in 20 minutes. If he's interested in the work, or just feels like doing it. He reads ok still has a bit of trouble with comprehension, and he writes well. He has a vast understanding of sciences and interest in mathmatical stuff. If he were stupid, I could accept his issues, I would understand and work around it. The fact that he's not, makes this stuff all the more difficult.

Right now, I'm sitting here recovering from a slamming headache. This year cannot go on like this.