Praline is snuggled to my foot.

Mochi is on her back next to my shoulder, feet up like a little possum. Chuy's tail is sticking out from under the covers. Everyone is asleep and so soft and peaceful and safe. Having spent Wednesday night at Mom and Dad's, these moments are especially sweet for me on the first night back home. Through the stress and the pressure, my pups remain a constant joy to me and moments like this are among the greatest pleasures of my life. :)
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Yummy. Gouda sausage souffle at Panera

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Um, I, uh...

...think I want a cob house.

The making of a pair of Fluevog Miracles

It's really something to see the shoe going together. This will be a pair of Miracles from John Fluevog, he of My Favorite Shoes EVAR. Amazing to see the craftsman's facility with a very wicked razor, and just fun to watch, in general. I mean, if you like that sort of thing, which I do.

Slowly going insane here. Surgery is two weeks away. I can't believe I'm about to do that. It's grisly and magnificent all at the same time. Trying to focus on studies, and not really doing well. Manic, mostly, and not using that energy productively, either. Except for the million or so pecans I've picked up. Only having shelled a few hundred or so, I am weary of the task.

Love love love this shoe, btw. This style is such a sweet throwback to the shoes my Great Granny Smith used to wear in the early 70s. Very old-school and sensible. Maybe a slightly lower heel on her, but the tone was the same. A good, classic, serviceable style tha would have been quite at home in the 1930s or 1940s. Good enough for me.

Was just thinking about this today - I think I bought my first Fluevogs about 25 years ago. They had a platform creeper sole, huge buckle and a quilted glow-in-the-dark panel on the top of the shoe. They were ever so slightly flamboyant. I know: surprise, right? Anyway, I'll never forget wearing those shoes out, and being whirled around in a two-step on the dancefloor at a country/western gay bar in Dallas by a guy I went to school with whose last name was Strange. True story.

For a guy, I love these shoes, too. If I were a man, I'd wear a seersucker suit with these in every Jordan almond color available. Candy colored suede is its own reward, I say, and I'd aspire to be the dandy who could pull it off.

Uh, where was I?
Oh, I can't remember.

I think I'll go sniff my shoe cabinet for a second. Nothing going on here, and absolutely nothing strange. I promise.

;)

sad news.

I am greatly saddened to learn that one of my dearest friends has lost her youngest brother quite suddenly. Today I am holding her and her family close in my heart.

Toofies!!!

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Hymn to St Cecilia

This is one of the finest recordings I've found of this, among my most treasured choral pieces.

November 22 - Feast of Saint Cecilia


Saint Cecilia - Patron saint of musicians and church music

Cruddy.

I am sicky. Aching all over and aggravated because this has derailed plans for
Visiting dear friends for thanksgiving. :( I am definitely not up for what would've been a long drive, but CRAP!

Grump.



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Strange comfort.

Living in a house with no closets is not conducive to orderliness, but I find that my slovenliness has reached an absolute nadir.  Oh, sure, there are the occasional cursory efforts, the teeny stabs and quick lunges at cleaning, but mostly the stuff piles up around here like so many trappings of the unravelings of an unquiet mind.

So it was with abject glee that I regarded a recent post on Retronaut of this picture of Pablo Picasso in a bedroom.  See the hats and accessories and clothing piled higgledy-piggledy with books?  See the arty scribblings and half-executed projects strewn about? 

Anyway, it struck me: I'm a creative genius! That's what this means!

Great googly moogly, it's like someone time-warped my bedroom back to prime era Picasso.  Mostly I don't gad about in boxer shorts and popeye gear, though.  Mostly.

Twisty bendy psychological side-trip-- Picasso always identified with the bull, and a bull in a painting by him was a representation of self.  So what's up with the matador jacket?  Did he have his wife wear the jacket?  Or did he wear it in a fit of self-loathing?

Yes, I'm near demented with fatigue and anxiety. At least I can still laugh at something.

*********************

I dug up the superb documentary on The Donner Party by Ric Burns, and it finally hit me: those few people at work being shitty to everyone else, trying to point out the flaws of others to draw attention away from their own?  We're the Donner party.  Rats on a sinking ship.  Eat the others and maybe you can use the stiffs for a life raft.

*********************

Did I mention I have stress?

*********************

It sucked to go back to Dallas for an unplanned visit to the orthodontist, but it was a tonic to see Mom and Dad. 

I got to visit with Mom for a bit and Dad came home from an errand and told us he ran a coyote off from the front yard.  Big one.  Drove it around the neighborhood with the car.  Mom went to bed and I sat up watching tv with Dad for a bit.  The Ken Burns documentary on The Dust Bowl was on, and we watched that until it spooled out.  Gripping show, if you like that sort of thing. 

The people in the documentary are quite old, but they were small children at the time of the dust bowl.  One lady choked back tears as she talked about the government paying ranchers to kill their herds that were starving and were too poorly to sell.  Mom said "I remember Dad talking about that" and Dad said "Dad talked about that too!"  Heartbreaking bit of history, that. 

Anyway, Mom went to bed and Dad dialed around, landing the tv on a show about the mayan calendar/apocalypse/december 21/yada yada yada.  We exchanged quips.  After a very few minutes, Dad announced he was going to bed and I said i was, too.  Then he asked when my surgery is coming up.  Told him the 13th.  He said "you're gonna be all messed up for the end of the world, aren't you?"

:P

We laughed and laughed.

music for a Tuesday

Sunday, Puppy Sunday: swab and debonair

Isn't he a dashing little brute?


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Another poor showing on a test

I reviewed my test results and found some needless errors. My anxiety level is through the roof. I'm despairing that I might not even make a C. In that case, nursing school would be put off by another year. I'm feeling pretty low.

Work is stressful and the looming surgery is a constant distraction.
*angst*
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How I spent my lunch today.

Went out back with puppies and picked up lovely pecans which my braces prevent me from eating, alas!

I think I'll invent the pecan smoothie.  I have to go to Dallas Monday to see the orthodontist to unwonk my braces, as a rubbery piece of ham in an omelet undid my arch wire. *le sigh*

I may be having omelet smoothies from here on out. I can't afford to miss work and I can't afford spontaneous gas tanks squandered on needless tasks. 

The pecans are beautiful, though.   I'll probably shell some and bag them up to eat when my braces come off in about 7 months.  YAY!

Yay, urinary tract/ bonus puppehage

I never thought the urinary tract would be cause for celebration, but it is. We've hit one of the shortest chapters in the book in A&P II. YAYS!  I lurves me some short chapters.

This semester has been brutal in many ways. I'm hoping I can eke out a B. Still holding breath on that one.

The pupscape photo is from bed this morning, where we've come up with a new puppeh theme song. Wanna read it? Good. I thought you would. It goes:

Wild puppehs!

Wild puppehs!

WILD PUPPEHS GONE WIIIIIIIILD!

rinse, lather, repeat.  Sung to the tune of Wild Puppies Gone Wild™

Anyway, it ratchets them up to a high frenzy which is a wonderful way to start the day. The Mochi-in-hoodie photo is from yesterday. Poppa Dawg found the monkey hoodie and said it fairly screamed MOCHI so he had to get it. I have to giggle at the thought of his manly self moseying up to the register with this purchase.  Cute!  We put one of Praline's Skull sweaters on her and it was just all wrong. Mochi is a bouncy, flouncy, flopsy puppy and the monkey girl thing fits her better. Praline has skulls because she am fierce. Chuy is swab (TYPO! - meant to write suave but didn't have the heart to change it! laughing at myself here) and debonair, so he goes for classics like is brown and orange houndstooth he was wearing yesterday.  He is a dashing hound.

Speaking of warmness, I am utterly besotted with the electric blanket my mom gave me last year. About an hour before bed, I get it cranked up to 11, and then I lower it to 2 or 3 when I get in bed. It's got the most soporific effect on the pups, too. They normally tussle for 5 or 10 minutes at bedtime, because they love bedtime and it excites them. Seems contradictory, doesn't it? but with the bed pre-warmed, they squirt right under the covers and settle in for a yummy night's sleep.  I love the abject joy with which they greet every occasion - life lessons there. I stay cozy all night, and this despite a spate of 30-ish degree nights. I haven't had the house heater on once yet this year. I've got it set to come on if the mercury in the house dips below 60, but it hasn't happened yet. (Thanks to new windows and friends helping with insulating the attic-- I'm talking to Himself, MattG and aepilot_jim.)

Trying to get my ducks in a row for the coming semester, the end of this semester and the upcoming surgery. It's 4 weeks from tomorrow. yeesh.

Oh, and a chunk of ham dislodged a wire on my braces and I need to go to Dallas tomorrow night to be at the orthodontist first thing on Friday morning, and then it's hippity hop back home to work a full day. Remind me again why I have no down time?

It's good, though. Things are good, and I'm doing well. Life is always good if you have puppies. :)

Um. Wow.

 The Anointed One gets his place in a Nativity scene.  Wow.  I'm wondering if they cast him as one of the three wise guys.

What I have is a particular set of skills...

I don't know who you are.
I don't know what you want.
If you're looking for filthy lucre, I can tell you
I don't have money...
but what I do have are a very particular set of skills.
Skills that make me a dream come true for people like you.
If you don't give to Tam's tip jar now, that will be the end of it.
But if you do, I will look for you, I will find you...
...and I will adorn you.



My dear friend Tam has a problem and has no health insurance.  I've dropped a little money in her TipJar, but I'm limited in the financial arena.  What I DO have is a particular set of skills. Jewelry making skills.  For all my adult life I have railed against the insanity of having my money confiscated by the gubmint to pay for stuff for other people of which I don't approve.  I see here a chance to help out someone of whom I wholeheartedly approve and love dearly in the most expedient way possible.   That's what family does, and Tam felt like family the very first time I happened across her blog.  Then I met her in the paint and found I love her even more than I thought.  Anyway, I'm sort of thinking of what little cash I can pony up as the equivalent of all the beers I would have bought her over the years had she lived down the street.

This is my guns and roses necklace.  There are none like it.  This one is mine.  But if you'll contribute at least $25 to her tip jar, then you will have your name put into a raffle for lots of fabulous stuff among which will be a Guns And Roses necklace I'll try to get to you by Christmas, if your name is drawn and you choose this lot.  There will be a drawing and the first name drawn will be able to choose from among the array of fabulous prizes, among which mine will likely be the least, but will be as heartfelt as any.  The Guns and Roses necklace I make for the person who chooses that option will not be identical to the one below, but it will be very similar, will be one of a kind, and would be an item I'd retail for in the range of $150 to $250, depending on what components I'll include.  Some components will be sterling silver, but others will be plastic, glass, crystal and possibly pot metal, so metal allergies need not apply. There will be new and vintage, and hopefully some vintage Cracker Jack charms, of which I am particularly fond.  For every $25 you give, your name will be put in the pot once, for the drawing to take place on Thanksgiving.

Go to Old NFO's blog for details on how you can register your donation to get your name in the kitty for all the fabulous prizes.  There will be at least 2 pistols and one fabulous holster made by Mike.  I've got one of his holsters and believe me-- you WANT one.  Anyway, scrape up $25 or more and contribute.  It's for a good cause and you could walk away with something pretty valuable, but most of all, you'll be helping one of the finest women I've ever met, and the good feeling that should give you is something you can take to the bank.

Here is what I would do:

If my husband were on the line for an organization I found to be corrupt and on the hotseat to, oh, say, testify regarding something illegal/immoral/treasonous the administration did or failed to do, and if it would not help my country in any case, I would insist my husband claim publicly to be unfit to testify because he'd had an affair. I'd hold my head high. I'd wAnt my man as far from that shitstain of an organization as possible. But that's just me.

When one finds oneself with a coyote career, may as well go on and gnaw one's leg off to get out from under it.

But that's just me. Call me crazy.


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***updated, 14 November***

So, turns out that Petraeus really did have an affair, and it was probably not wife-approved.

*le sigh*

I'm disappointed, and I knew what I wrote above was from the Pollyanna school of human behavior, but, shoot. It's just ugly, is all. 

So, the administration knew about the affair(s) and held this over his head to ensure favorable testimony, and needed to keep him quiet at least through the election.  At this point, I really hope he goes in and I hope he tells the truth.  What's the worst that could happen to him?  It already has.

3am post from bed

Just did a post and now I'm doing another. Typing bleary-eyed on an iPhone yields mixed results. Autocorrect "fixes" some spelling I don't want it to, and doesnt correct some it should. Meh. So sometimes an "of" comes out as an "if" so I'm counting on you to read it as I meant it, and not what the phone actually wrote.
---------
My house smells like dogs live here. This does not fill me with joy, but having dogs in the house fills me with joy, so I'll take the smell, tyvm.
--------

Speaking of dogs, Praline is such a tart. I suspect she is why I'm awake now. Aepilot_jim is on the sofa and she has to bed-hop every hour or so. She apparently nudges him with her cold wet nose to check if he is sleeping, and I'm sure you can guess how that wakes him up.

Chuy pesters Jim for scritchins and generally tries to brain-squeegee/nasal lavage everyone foolish enough to make a lap in his vicinity. He is still incredibly cute, though.

Old NFO made the most wonderful dinner Thursday night and he is now cemented in Miss Mochi's affections for the sheer volume of fewds that hit the kitchen floor, requiring her to clean up same.

Grand time being had by all.


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Ambling shamblers: the state of attire on college campi.

I admit I graduated high school in 1984, which pretty much ensconces me in Grumpy Old Fart territory when it comes to campus fashion, but I take umbrage, nonetheless.

The era of my high school included a post-hippie generation of preppy folks who were by-golly not bloody hippies. In high school I had aspirations to stylishness and I generally wore dresses, which continues a preference for me. I often lamented how some classmates wore sweats to school, because it just looked woefully slovenly. After all, they were not abed sick, but out in public. A little self pride did not seem too much to ask, but perhaps I am a silly woman. No matter: my blog, my rules. I must bitch forthwith.

The campus at my university is littered with young adults who shuffle through the hallways in flip-flops, some of those festooned with sequins and crystals-- ya know-- for dressy days. The shuffle-slap shuffle-slap ostinato is a drab cadence for the walking dread. the lack of energy in their gait speaks volumes. I look at these kids and wonder how many are mortgaging their futures for degrees that will not yield them the careers to which they aspire, and the shuffling seems more apt. I would hire few, if any of them.

I actually respect the ones who come to class in pajamas for some modicum of honesty: the chicks in sweats who obviously spent loads of time on hair/makeup rate a hypocritical Boo/Hiss, to say the least. Pull yourself together, bitches! If you are going to that effort, at least invest the additional 3 minutes to yank something less slobbish from the closet. It won't kill you, I promise.

Skinny jeans on males? Run! Run screaming from anyone who advises you thus. There may be a guy on the planet who looks good in them, but you are not he. They make the make the torso look freakishly long and the legs as short as, well, mine. Ixnay the ookingfay skinny jeans.

And now we turn to the subject of sweatpants in general. Ladies, I'm talking to you. No female in any state if physical fitness should ever ever EVAR go out in public with any type of text across her arse. Trust me when I say that a luscious ass need not announce to the world that it is, in fact, JUICY, and to do so is to paint the lily. Worse still is the proclamation of teh hawtness on a back forty wot am decidedly NOT, and that's just sad. Further, even a nicely fit bum can look eye-bendingly wrong with 4" text swagged thereupon. Don't do it. Want to raise breast cancer awareness? Fine. Just leave off with the PINK-assed sweats, mkay? To recap, is stupid, pathetic and not pretty.

I'm all for living in the age in which the fates plopped oneself, so by all means, trend away. I'm just saying that everyone should have a bit more self awareness of what actually looks good on them, regardless if what the current craze may be or what the shop clerks tell them.

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Meanwhile, back at the ranch...

DeForest Kelley played a crooked news man in an episode of Bonanza.




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Ballad of a Politician - Regina Spektor

So glad this election season is almost over. 

Sunday, Puppy Sunday: chimenea Chooch!

Its not cold but it is a little cool, so I gathered up a bunch of dry twigs and burned them with some piñon. Sat down to study and Chuy jumped in my lap immediately. Which made me spill my beer. Drat.


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longer post to follow

Thursday I had anatomy lecture in the morning, worked most of the day and then went to anatomy lab for more squickful cat dissection. My ear (jaw) was hurting and I didn't feel up to the drive to Dallas so I blew off the PiL show.  Left home about 5:30 Friday morning for the drive to Dallas to meet with my surgeon, then lunch at an Indian place with aepilot_jim and then to the orthodontist for my adjustment.  Then to the Apple store to order (yes, order) my new iPhone 5. I was going to get the 4S, but I succumbed to Jim's peer pressure and ordered the 5.  He reasons that I change phones so infrequently that even the 5 will be obsolete by the time I change next time, so I might as well go whole-hog now.  Then, of course,  I proceeded to buy about $100 of accessories, including a heavy-duty Otter box to protect my investment. 

Went to Nordstrom Rack and got some mittens with a phone-screen-friendly patch on the index fingers so you can use your phone without de-mittening.

Had  a very nice visit with my parents Friday night/Saturday morning, then my niece and nephew and brother-in-law came over and the nice visit continued.  Headed home about Noon and ended up home before dark to reunite with the wee furballs.  Worked quite a bit on my Macroeconomics and a fair bit on anatomy.  More anatomy studying to be done today and a test to take.  I was a bit wobbly on my grades there for a bit, but I think I'm trending in a good direction. 

Sorry for spotty blogging of late, but work/school/sleep seems to be my entire existence much of the time, lately.  Happily so.  It's all for the cause.

Let's try that again, in blue this time.

Ow ow ow ow ow ow ow!!!!


-
Hot pink elastics faded with shocking rapidity. I like these better already. New, heavier gauge stainless steel wire is super- ouchy. Whimper. Much pitiful squeaking.

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I love that some grandpa is playing Public Image, Ltd for his granddaughters

Going to see PiL in Dallas Thursday night.  A couple of ladies from my old posse are going to be there.  WHEEEEE!  Which wild shoes to wear?  I must wear wild shoes.  Is the law, after all.



I keep thinking what a hideously impractical thing this is.  After anatomy lab tonight, I'll go quick like a bunny to Dallas and straight to the show.  The fact that it's so impractical is probably the best argument for doing so.  If someone will keep the emergency phone for me, I'll stay in Dallas through Saturday night to go see Latonia in Aida.  I'm thinking I won't get lucky on the emergency phone, though. Alas. :(

Friday I see my orthodontist and my surgeon.  My hot pink elastics have faded to pale pink and I'm wondering what I ate that made them fade so dramatically?


Hmph.  Maybe I'll get black elastics this time. 
CHeers.