Black Friday

Well, OK, it's not black outside, but it's quite grey, and I'm sitting here, playing on Amazon (totally waiting for the $97 TV) and doing laundry. Living the dream, as it were.

I've not been writing not because I don't have a lot to say, but because it's all so deeply personal and would probably make me sound like a nutball were you to read the words that are muddling through my brain. GPOM and I split up, I think I told you, and it's been strange to determine how to live. I spent over four years trying to arrange and rearrange myself to please and be pleasing to someone who had a mistress whom he loved (and loves) more than me. That's an ego burn of the highest degree, especially when his love is an inanimate object. Can't compete with that, yet I try and fail and wonder why I do and become my own armchair psychologist.

I'm sure you know how well that works.

But I'll try again, as I always do, to rebuild and write and think and dream. Until then, I've got a giant bag of Swedish Fish to tide me over.

Godmother

Today Momma and I were chatting on the phone about the upcoming birthdays of my brother and my nephew. She asked me what I was getting for my godchild.

My godchild? I have a godchild? Wade's oldest doesn't count because she never had her kids baptized, so I'm an unofficial godmother to him, but not to any others, I said.

Yes, dear, she sighed to me. Don't you remember?

Was I at the christening?

Yes.

Who's the godfather?

Your sister-in-law's brother.

Are you sure I'm his godmother? Because I really don't remember it and that seems like something I'd remember.

Yes, you are. Remember? You thought it was odd that the godfather didn't know the Apostle's Creed.

Sunlight...

Oh, crap! I am my nephew's godmother! Man, I've been a really shitty godmother!

Yes, dear...now do you want me to include this spider Lego in his birthday box?

Yes, please.

Catch Up

I've been away. There's been plenty afoot around this place. But here's the good/bad news: I've been writing in my head for a while, so there will be a flurry of posts coming up. Ready yourself.

In the meantime, is it your phone ringing, or mine?

Lazy August

It's Saturday, and I should be working. But first, Hi! How are you? I'm well; I'm a bad redhead. I spend a lot of money to keep my hair a color approximating red and today I just couldn't be bothered to use the specialty shampoos and conditioners that deposit more red into my hair. Today was a Garnier Fructis and John Frieda kind of day.

I find it very difficult to work on weekends. I've got four meetings on Monday and the day starts early, so I want to get ready for them this weekend. I don't want to run around Monday morning like a nut trying to get case files together, do last-minute research, and probably balance a giant trash bag. But still, everything in me says that I should spent today and tomorrow reading books, watching TV, and listening to podcasts while playing endless rounds of mah jongg solitaire. I'll figure it out though. It'll probably be tomorrow before I do anything.

I used to love Sundays. Sundays were days of talking with Momma, napping, acting foolishly - all the things I like best in a day. For the past month or so, though, Sundays have turned into an extension of Saturdays. This doesn't mean that Sundays are bad days, but they're not the same, and occasionally I resent that.

I don't use washcloths. I don't know why I felt the need to tell you that.

I Didn't Get It

I'm going to flog the hell out of a dead horse. Bear with me, because I don't often keep as up-to-date with news as I should. I mean, I was excited about the SCOTUS decision regarding health care coverage, but I was also exhausted with Facebook and its political leanings, so I avoided a whole lot of coverage. My best thought regarding the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act was that we can't know what it's going to look like on the United States as we've never worn such an outfit.

Clever, no? Thanks.

I saw a whole lot of vitriol. I giggled over the number of lawyers (and their loved ones) who posted this:

I braced myself for what was bound to be at least a day-long battle of I'm-Smarter-Than-You comments on people's posts. What I was unprepared for was this:

I had to ask about this. I still have to ask about this. I don't understand what Dred Scott has to do with health insurance. If you guys know, please tell me. I'm serious here - I don't think I'm entirely an idiot. I can explain the difference between substantive and procedural due process with only a few examples in place of definitions, and I realize that explaining by example is a lesser form of definition than a true definition (but it's a lot easier).

I think of this today as I'm catching up with Popehat, a favorite blog of mine when I want to read something with substantially more thought put into it than I put into writing for you guys. (Apologies all around, but I consider this more a diary than a place for discourse, and diary entries really aren't known for pre-planning.) I was pleased to see Patrick's list of SCOTUS cases even more horrifying than this decision, and I agree whole-heartedly with him. 

I hope the (what is it now?) 33 attempts from the House Republicans to repeal the law will end, as we have better things to do, like figure out how else we can screw over those who pay for private insurance already. Tax hike, anyone? 

Karen Klein

I tried to watch the entire video of this woman being harassed on the bus by junior-high kids, but I couldn't do it. I could not get through all ten-ish minutes of the ordeal. Not being able to do so made me feel even worse, because here this woman had to endure such cruelty and know that she could not react, and I'm too big of a wuss to watch it from afar.

Some brave chick I am.

I am so very glad that the Reddits and the indegogos are helping this woman, and I hope she can enjoy a healthy retirement and vacation and maybe, I don't know, one of the punching bags that looks like a real guy? 'Cos I think I'd be into hitting one of those for an hour or year.

The whole episode reminded me of a class period I "taught" when I was a substitute teacher. Here, let me set it up for you:

I was in my late twenties and I was a substitute for a semester, mostly because my mother both threatened to kick me out of the house if I didn't start doing something useful and she was a teacher at the school, so I had a cozy quasi-permanent sub position. I worked with all four years of high school kids and for the most part, particularly over time, I really did enjoy it. I enjoyed it so much I considered staying in the school system, but that didn't pan out, and it's a story for another day.

I was engaged at the time, and the kids (they were freshmen, I believe) were really interested in my life. Anything to avoid working, and who doesn't like thinking that kids find an adult's story fascinating? So the kids asked me about my fiance, and how we met, and how long we had been together, and did I have a picture of him? Yes, I did, and I showed them, which caused one boy to grab the picture and throw it in the trashcan. This almost brought me to tears, and I didn't know how to respond, but the girls in the class did.

Thank goodness for girls who are young and true believers in true love! This boy got an earful about respect and kindness and , "GET HER PICTURE OUT OF THAT TRASH RIGHT NOW!" So he did, and we all moved on, and the class ended, and honestly, although I didn't hold his actions against that kid, I never showed another picture to a class again.

So I'm thinking that the greater tragedy for Ms. Klein is that the other kids on the bus weren't strong enough to shut down the cruelty of a few. I don't think anyone else could have really quieted the noise other than someone in their peer group.

Experiment

Like pretty much everyone I know, I have many email accounts. At last count, I think I have five. There might be more. Wait, I just thought of another, although I don't think I've ever used it.

Of those six email addresses, four are with gmail. I'm digging gmail as I get better and better using it. It's substantially awesome for work, because my cable and internet-based provider only allow about four gigabytes of data to be sent. Only FOUR. That's crap. Considering that my scanner does not have the ability to decrease the size of documents, you can imagine how many things I cannot send to clients or myself or the court system.

Think, for just a minute, how large a bankruptcy filing is. Potentially hundreds of pages. Hundreds of pages through my scanner would probably be about twenty gigs of data. My regular email system just exploded.

Anyway, the point of this is that I am currently signed into Google with at least two email addresses, one for work and one for fun, and I'm about to sign into another account with a third.

If you find you can't search today and Google is really slow, you can blame me.