My Toes Are Giddy With Anticipation

Moving is like finals. No matter how much prep you attempt to do, it is always a last-minute, late-night cram job. I’ve been stressing for the last week, trying each night after work and during the weekend to organize and pack as much as I could. Little by little, I was starting to see signs of progress. But tonight, with Raj’s help, I have finally seen the apartment begin to transform from my home into an emptyish blank-walled space in transition.

Despite the progress, it’s still a certifiable disaster area. It’s filled with boxes, odds and ends for which I have not yet managed to find homes, and dust bunnies the size of Godzilla lurking defiantly in the corners. In less than 48 hours I will be DONE moving into Raj’s apartment. Thank God.

Granted, I will be in the midst of unpacking craziness, but that will be so much better than the packing, cleaning and lifting that has to be done in order to get all of my stuff into Raj’s place. Tomorrow, I need to wake up, get an enormous cup of coffee, finish packing, and then head across town to pick up the truck and start my day of lifting boxes.

Currently, I am living for the pedicure, manicure, and massage that I plan to have on Saturday while Raj is watching the Final Four games. Here are some of my pictures of inspiration. I. Can. Not. Wait. A splurge, pampering, relaxation, and some serious snuggling time are definitely in order.

Comments From Cabbies

This morning, Raj and I had some “issues” relating to the impending move and our relationship come up while we were both at work. We were both tired and far too stressed out to deal with the issues in a mature, rational and loving manner. He said he couldn’t talk. I freaked out. I did not handle myself well. I was not mature. I was not balanced. There were tears, some raised voices, and some nasty expressions of hurt and anger flying at one another over email. It was not pretty. Email fights are just not a good idea. It’s too easy to pound the keyboard and hit the all caps button when you’re feeling hurt and angry, and hardly anything positive ever comes out of it. There’s always a need for extensive cleanup to fix the mess of bruised feelings and ragged emotions.

After work today, once we had both calmed down enough to remember that we care about one another, we met at Raj’s office and grabbed a cab to go to his house to “talk.” The cleanup process began in the cab, while we were still thawing, not quite ready to smile at each other. He told me that one of my particularly angry emails was “unacceptable,” and that it made him question whether he wanted to be in a relationship with “the kind of person” who could write that email. I told him that if he was questioning whether he wanted to be with me, then we probably shouldn’t be in a relationship. I said I didn’t want to be with someone who brought up breaking up every single time we had a fight. It’s impossible to feel secure in that type of situation. The conversation was calm, but weighty.

In New York, riding in the back of dark cabs speeding through the city, with cabbies who are often far too busy talking on their cell phones to pay more attention to their passengers than is required to ask “where to?,” I often get lulled into feeling secure and safe in what oftentimes feels like your own private, albeit tempory, space. It’s relaxing and calming, a brief respite away from the din of the cars and the throngs of people rushing up and down the sidewalks. I often take advantage of those moments of relative peace to catch up on my phone calls to friends and family, or to just relax.

In almost a year and half in New York, until tonight, I had only one negative experience with a cab driver. That time my cabbie was either mentally unstable, a daredevil driver, or on drugs. He took me on a careening trip through the city, alternating between speeding and violently breaking, causing me and the car to jerk around uncomfortably. Each time this would happen, he would cackle and burst into laughter. I’m serious, the man actually cackled. Repeatedly. On that occasion, I was genuinely alarmed, and a little afraid, and considered taking my chances on opening the back door and rolling out onto the pavement. Ultimately, I reached my destination safely, but it was unnerving. With that one exception, and excluding tonight, every cab driver I have ever had the opportunity to ride with in New York has been either friendly, professional, or has paid no attention to me whatsoever.

Tonight, however, I met a mean cabbie. When Raj and I reached Raj’s apartment building, I got out of the cab and stood a few feet away on the sidewalk waiting for Raj to pay. Raj was looking through his bags for singles, so a few moments passed before he was ready to get out of the cab. I was standing on the sidewalk, trying to politely wait for him as a show of good will, twisting my feet back and forth. I turned away from the cab and then turned back to see if Raj was making any progress.

As I turned back around, my eyes met the eyes of the cab driver who was staring directly at me out of his open window. I saw him clearly for the first time. He was a brown-skinned man with a white turban wrapped around his head. He was glaring at me and had a nasty look on his face. His stare was aggressive and I felt like he was giving me the evil eye. I felt uncomfortable, but then shook my discomfort away and told myself I was just being silly.

I broke eye contact with the cab driver, who was still staring at me, and walked towards the open door where Raj was still counting his money. He seemed to be fumbling, and he asked me to help him with one of his bags, which I did. He was a bit brusque, but I thought it was because we had just started our thawing process. Raj got out and shut the door and as we were walking towards his apartment, and as the cab was driving away, Raj told me that the cab driver had said something about me. I asked him what the cab driver said. Raj told me that the cab driver had asked him in English whether I was his girlfriend. Raj had replied, “yes,” and then the cab driver said something nasty about me in hindi. Raj doesn’t understand hindi, so he didn’t know what the cab driver said, but he felt sure that it was nasty and that it was directed at me.

The minute Raj told me, I started to cry. It was too much. All the stress about moving, all the work I have to get done, trying to have fun with my mom while she is here, and then all of the other relationship issues that Raj and I have, including the fact that he is Indian and I am white, and his family would prefer that it was otherwise. On top of all that, this Indian cab driver takes it upon himself to tell Raj something nasty about me. How mean! I’m always nice to cab drivers. I would never judge him because he is brown or because he’s wearing a turban, yet he judged me because of the conversation that Raj and I had, and because I’m white and I’m dating and Indian man. Granted, I don’t know this for sure, but that’s what it seemed like. For the third time this week, I find myself wanting to cry and say it’s not fair. Because it’s not.

When we got upstairs, I blubbered out that the “hindi cab driver hates me and he doesn’t think we should be together, and he thinks I’m nothing because he heard you say that you didn’t know if you wanted to be with someone who wrote that email, and that’s a horrible thing to say – to say that you are going to break up with someone over just one fight – and you shouldn’t say that lightly because it’s mean and it hurts me, and the cab driver knew it was mean, and he was mean to me too, and he starred at me like he hated me just because I’m white and because I’m with you, and he thinks the same as your family, that you shouldn’t be with me…” Cry. Cry. Cry.

Raj said, “First of all, the cab driver was a Sikh. Second of all, I made clear that I was having none of it. Damn it, I shouldn’t have tipped him. Third of all, your race and my race have nothing to do with the problems we’re having related to moving… Sweetie, can you please forget about the cab driver?” He also suggested that the cabbie may have made that comment because he was of a variety of male that believed that women should be silent and obey their boyfriends. Raj said that I’m “spunky” and that’s the way he likes me. Sweet of Raj to say, but whether it was because I’m white or a spunky woman, it was still unnecessary.

I tried to forget, and we talked and we resolved some things, but not everything. After an hour, when we had mostly defrosted, I had to leave. He has work to do, I have work to do, and it’s my mom’s last night in town. I already feel intensely guilty for not being able to spend enough time with her during the last few days, and for being stressed and a brat during the little time that we actually got to hang out together. I hate feeling like a horrible daughter, but that’s often how I feel when we hang out. I get too easily annoyed at little things. I should be better and more understanding. I love her a lot and I should communicate that better.

So I left him, even though I hate letting things go when there are still things left to be said between us. Still misinterpretations that need to be unravelled and hurt feelings that need to be soothed. I hope we’ll be able to do that during the next few days, and I hope we’ll get through this moving stress and that things will calm down and we’ll find that we’re happy sharing the same space. I think we will, or I would not have contemplated moving in together. But man is it hard to remember that in the heat of hurt feelings.

One thing we do not need during this stressful time, or ever, are mean stupid cabbies sticking their nose into our business. Even if we did bring it onto ourselves by talking about such weighty issues in the back of the cabbie’s cab. He still should not have said anything, and he should not have given me the evil eye. Mean cabbie.

Dishonourable "Honour Killing" in Italy

Every now and then, I come across a story that makes me want to snatch up all the men in the world (except for those proven to be good and worthy) and beat the living shit out of them until I turn them all into unrecognizable piles of bloody pulp. My brothers, father, boyfriend, and other men I know and love, excluded (and yours as well, if you can vouch for them). Today I came across such a story: “Mafioso Shoots Sisters Over “Dishonour.”

In Italy this weekend, 24 year old Giovanni Morabito, a member of the Calabrian Mafia, shot his sister, Bruna (32), 4 times in the face in an effort to murder her for having a child out of wedlock. Amazingly, the sister is still alive. She had given birth two weeks ago. The despicable prick of a brother showed no remorse and admitted:

I shot her, I shot my sister…She had a child by a man she was not married to. It is a question of honour. I would have shot her in the back, but she turned round. I am not sorry. On the contrary, I am proud of what I did. [I waited until she had given birth because under Mafia code] you don’t kill pregnant women.

This man deserves to have his testicles and penis cut off and fed to him while he is alive to know what he is eating. We’ll see then if he continues to feel pride for shooting his INNOCENT sister in the face 4 fucking times. Somehow, I think that if the punishment for honour killings was castration, we would see a lot less of them. This story makes me furious because it is so unjust.

Investigators believe that the sister was targeted, not only because of the child, but also because she had tried to distance herself from her Mafia family. Figures. Honour killings as an excuse used by males to settle unrelated scores are not news. I guess what enrages me the most is that this is an accepted excuse to commit murder. One dick is pissed that another dick put his dick near his sister, mother, daughter. So the first dick shoots the sister, mother, daughter (and sometimes the other dick) to avenge his so-called honour. Where the hell is the honour in killing anyone, least of all your sister, mother, daughter? It makes me want to cry. That poor woman.

How could a brother or father do this to his daughter or sister?

Apartment Moving Angst

It’s Sunday evening again and I’m thinking where did the weekend go?? It’s already a fading blur and I can’t believe it’s Monday again tomorrow. Today it hit me in the hardware store in Chelsea, around 2 pm, when the Russian woman behind the counter told Raj and I to enjoy the rest of our Sunday afternoon. I felt my chest clench slightly and I turned to Raj and asked wistfully, “Is it really Sunday already?”

We had just purchased sand paper and a bath tub plug, both integral elements of our apartment-improvement-make-Raj’s-space-our-space-and-both-of-us-happy plans. Bubble baths are very important to me. The sand paper was for a bar that Raj and I put up in my closet today to hold approximatley 1/3 of my clothes. Also incredibly important. We put it up all by ourselves. We also detached this unefficient wall monstrosity from IKEA leftover in Raj’s apartment from the previous tenant. It will be replaced on Thursday with a far more space efficient book shelf and bureau. Oh happy day. The weekend flew by because I was constantly busy either packing, carting things to Raj’s via taxi, or trying to spend some QT with my mom.

Yesterday, my Mom and I decided to go stand in line in Times Square to get 1/2 priced tickets to a Broadway Show. This is the second time we’ve done this, and each time it’s a bit too much effort for what we wind up with. I had envisioned a relaxing Saturday beginning with brunch in Soho and then leisurely strolling around, people watching, and shopping. However, as anyone knows who has gone in for the whole 1/2 priced Broadway thing, the whole experience takes up pretty much the whole day. We got up, had a quick breakfast, and then headed over to Times Square which was packed. After making our way to the end of an extremely long line, I ran and got us coffees from Starbuck’s while my mom saved our spot. I was actually enjoying the Times Square vibe at first. I hadn’t been to that part of the city for a while, and I have to admit I am always rather dazzled by the spectacle of all the lights and 40 foot ads. Who wouldn’t be?

After waiting for a little under an hour, we finally got up to the ticket booth and found that the only musicals available that we hadn’t seen were obstructed view seats for the Producers and full view seats for Ring of Fire. We went the full view seats and what we thought would be a Broadway version of “Walk The Line,” complete with cute Reese/June and Johnny/Joaquin look-a-likes, drama and dancing. From Times Square we zipped down to Union Square because my mom wanted to find some dress pants at Banana. That was really an error on my part, because we should have gone to the Banana near Macy’s on 34th street in light of the fact that we had only an hour and a 1/2 before the show started. Because of my poor planning, we ended up with 15 minutes to grab a bite to eat before the show. We opted for the only food in site, which happened to be a divey pizza place. Decent pizza, but pizza nonetheless. Alas, not the scrumptous brunch I had envisioned.

After taking our seats in the theater, we learned that “Ring of Fire” was actually “the songs of Johnny Cash.” One after another. No drama. Minimal dancing. There were some look-a-likes, 3 of each to be precise, but no cohesive story attached to any of them. It was a bit disappointing for both of us, although to be fair to the show, the cast had incredible voices and much of it was entertaining. The second act got a little slow, especially with all the prison songs. My favorite Johnny Cash songs (judging only from Walk The Line and Ring of Fire) are the ones he and June Carter sang together, and they did a few of those in the first act. I liked that song about getting my loving when I’ve got loving on my mind. I think the main problem for my mom and I wasn’t with the show, but rather that we were more in a “Beauty and the Beast” kind of mood than a foot-stomping country singing kind of mood. Talking about it later, we both concluded that it’s probably worth it to just pay the full price to get tickets for a show that you actually want to see, instead of running around all stressed for a 3rd place choice.

Saturday night was a lovely dinner at Doc’s with Raj and my mom. My mom had two cosmos, her drink of choice. Since I’m lacking a signature drink, I went with wine. The meal was good, though not as yummy as the meal my mom and I had on Friday at Ulrika’s. Now that place is awesome, whether you’re Swedish or not. And they sell Swedish candy. Yum!! I have to give it up the key lime pie at Doc’s though. Delicious.

After our day of apartment-improvements, a tired Raj and I watched Sopranos and Big Love with my mom, his sister and her boyfriend. Tony’s awake!! Has anyone figured out the meaning of his whole coma-dream parallel universe sequence yet? I have no clue. Who is Kevin Finnerty? On Big Love, I have only one thing to comment upon: That disgusting older man Roman with a fifteen year old?? Oh my God. So gross. At least she has an ipod to listen to now. The evening was fun, but over too soon, and in the background of all of it was this low wave vibration of stress that I know won’t stop until Thursday comes.

I can’t believe I move in 4 days!! I still have a lot to do, and I’m worried about the space at Raj’s. I want both of us to be happy and comfortable, a challenge in fairly small quarters with limited closet space. I’m also feeling pangs about my apartment. At one point today, I came back to my place to grab the rest of my clothes. I moved them to Raj’s pre-move to get them organized before the chaos of Thursday descends upon us. My place is currently a disaster area, with odds and ends strewn about and covering the entire floor space. Clothes for good will are piled up against the walls, and boxes, some packed, some empty, are everywhere.

Despite the mess, when I walked into my place, all I saw was everything that I’m going to miss about it. It’s enormous and spacious (relatively speaking and for an L studio), it has 2 giant closets with tons of shelving, shelving, cabinets and a medicine cabinet in the bathroom, a wall of windows that look out onto the Empire State Building, acres of empty hardwood covered floor (that I used to view cynically as wasted dollars), a bed side table on each side of my queen sized bed, a kitchen table, my bike with the flat tires, two book shelves, and space for all of the things that I have collected over the course of these last 31 years. And until Thursday it’s all mine. How is it going to feel to not have any space that’s just mine anymore? A very small part of me wonders if I’m going to freak out, but I try to not pay that part much attention. I would hope I’m more mature and balanced than that.

I gather that the way couples live together on top of each other like Raj and I are about to do, is through the powers of communication, patience, compromise, and compassion. I hope Raj is compassionate and understanding on Thursday, and on the days that will follow, because though I am very excited to move in with him, I’m a little sad to be leaving my space. He probably feels similarly.

Friday Morning Goddess: Kali

The Goddess Kali is worshipped in Hinduism as a ferocious manifestation of Parvati, an incarnation of the Devi or Mother Goddess. She is the Divine Mother, Goddess of Destruction, Conqueror of Time, and Triple Goddess of creation, preservation, and destruction. She is a Destroyer of Demons.

Kali is fearsome in appearance. She has wild eyes, a protruding tongue, and she wields a bloody sword. Kali holds the severed head of a demon, and she wears a belt of severed heads.

Kali is described in the Devi-Mahatmyam (also known as the Chandi or the Durgasaptasati) from the Markandey Purana written between 300-600 CE, where she is said to have emanated from the brow of the goddess Durga (slayer of demons) during one of the battles between the divine and anti-divine forces. Kali is considered the ‘forceful’ form of the great goddess Durga.

The unleashed form of Kali often becomes wild and uncontrollable. According to legend, only Shiva is able to tame Kali, a version of one of his consorts. Shiva tames Kali by challenging her to the wild tandava dance and outdoing her, or appearing as a crying infant and appealing to her maternal instincts. While Shiva is said to be able to tame her, the iconography often presents her dancing on his fallen body, and there are accounts of the two of them dancing together, and driving each other to such wildness that the world comes close to unravelling.

Here is one story of the manifestation of Kali: “The Gods were not able to kill the demon, Raktabija. Each drop of his blood that touched the ground turned into another Raktabija. Thus, every time he was struck, millions of his duplicates appeared all over the battlefield.”

“At this point the Gods were totally desperate, and they then turned to Shiva for help. Shiva, though, was so deep in meditation that he could not be reached. The Gods then turned to Shiva’s consort Parvati for help. The Goddess Parvati immediately set out to do battle with the demon, and it was then that She took the form of Kali.”

“Kali then appeared, with Her red eyes, dark complexion, gaunt features, hair unbound, and Her teeth as sharp as fangs. She rode into the midst of the battle on a lion, and it was only then that the demon Raktabija first began to experience fear.”

“Kali then ordered the Gods to attack Raktabija, while she spread Her tongue over the battlefield, covering it completely, and preventing even one drop of the demon’s blood from falling. In doing this, Kali revented Raktabija from reproducing himself again, and the Gods were then victorious.”

Feminine Beauty Is NOT A Load of Pornographic Crap

For the past few days I have been thinking about a post that Morphing Into Mama (“MIM”) wrote on “false advertising” and the firestorm of discussion it provoked, some thoughtful and some nasty, that you can read about here, here, and here, as well as in the comments to MIM’s post. In her post, MIM made the point that when people project themselves one way during the dating phase of a relationship, and then dramatically alter themselves after marriage (i.e. by cutting off their long luscious locks or significantly changing their weight), their earlier behavior is at least arguably a type of “false advertising.” This did not strike me as controversial in the least. Of course it’s false advertising to project an image of yourself while dating that you plan on unilaterally rejecting once you have “settled down” with a spouse.

It’s false advertising in the same way that it’s false advertising when single and dating to add the appearance of 1 or 2 cup sizes to your breasts with the aid of water bras or removable gel pads before you go out for an evening of scoping and flirting. If your breasts catch a boy’s attention (because he’s into that), it’s natural that it might be somewhat disappointing at the end of the evening when you take out your gel pads and show yourself as a bit less buxom than you had previously advertised yourself to be. Not that I’m saying there’s anything wrong with boob-enhancing devices. If you’re happy and it works for you, then by all means go for it. There’s nothing wrong with playing dress-up.

There’s also nothing wrong with little boobs. I have ‘em and I love ‘em. But, it’s realistic to appreciate that someone else, upon discovering apples, might be a tad let down if in fact they were expecting melons. This is just common sense. Personally, my boobs are of the small and perky variety, and though I do use push up bras for cleavage now and then, I’ve never been partial to heavily padding up my boobs because I never wanted to attract a boy with a promise that I couldn’t deliver on. I much prefer being upfront with who I am. It’s more fun that way, and it’s far simpler. It is also, as MIM suggests, a bit more fair.

In MIM’s false advertising post she candidly discussed her own body consciousness and admitted that she works to stay healthy and fit for herself and for her husband (emphasis added). I don’t want to add to the pile of words that have been shoved into her mouth, so here is the actual language she used:

“I am conscious of my weight, so I don’t snack, and I exercise…I work to maintain my figure for myself and my husband. If I had been 160 pounds when we married that would one thing. Then it would be totally unreasonable for him to want me to be 120 pounds. But it would be false advertising if he’d married his 120 pound girlfriend and ended up with a 160 pound wife.” She then commented, “Personally, I think it would be unfair to Husband if I gained a bunch of weight and did nothing about it.”

In a follow-up post, MIM explained that her main point was that: “people in an intimate relationship should be considerate of each other and understand that their physical appearance, and any MAJOR change to it, can affect their partner and their relationship.” Seems to me, that’s not very controversial either. Of course, people in intimate relationships should be considerate of one another, and of course major changes to one’s appearance can affect your partner. There is nothing novel or surprising about this.

However, to my surprise, MIM’s post sparked off a blogger controversy, and she was scathingly villified by several writers as a complicit victim of the patriarchy. For example, in an astonishing post that grossly and flagrantly mischaracterizes, misinterprets, and twists MIM’s words, “Twisty” of I Blame The Patriarchy accusesd MIM of “capitulat[ing] to the patriarchal feminine hotness imperative,” and being unable to “reject the authority of the Male Gaze.”

Twisty also attacks MIM for her alleged “weight-specific brand of sexy conformity to patriarchal hotness standards,” and suggets that MIM is displaying herself “according to male standards of fuckability as defined by pornography.” Twisty ended the post by imploring “all women, regardless of the degree to which they have been assimilated by Dude Nation, to extricate themselves with all possible speed from the prison of male fantasy. Feminine beauty is a load of pornographic crap.”

I’m down with rejecting the Male Gaze, and after reading many of MIM’s posts, I have a funny feeling that she might just be down with that too. MIM never suggested that she was conforming to anyone’s notion of beauty except her own. All she said was that the way she looks affects her partner, just as the way her partner looks affects her. This is not rocket science. Since when does acknowledging that the way you look might affect your partner mean that you are a prisoner of the Male Gaze?

MIM’s crimes, for which Twisty appears to believe MIM deserves to be drawn and quartered, apparently consist of being slender, having nice hair, looking hot, and being so “fuckable” that she could appear in a porno. What’s going on here? Who exactly is imposing comformist definitions of female sexuality? Is it the Patriarchy, is it MIM, or is it Twisty? I don’t think it’s MIM because she never made any reference to feeling any pressure whatsoever to conform to any image of female beauty, patriarchal or otherwise. She appears to be doing her own thing and trying to be healthy and fit up to her own standards in a way that works for her.

Does the fact that she is also cognizant that her maintaining her figure might be something from which her husband could derive some pleasure as well mean that she is a victim of the Patriarchy? I don’t think so. MIM herself makes clear that she thinks it would be equally unfair if her husband significantly changed his weight. Clearly, in their relationship, the notions of fairness, consideration, and of “checking in” go both ways. There are no draconian, patriarchal views of feminine beauty or “wifely duties” at play.

It can not be, as Twisty suggests, that any time a woman acknowledges that she is somewhat motivated by wanting to appear attractive to her lover that she must be a brainless, conformist, prisoner of the patriarchy. Take for example me. I wax, shave and lazer because I want to, and because I find myself sexier sans hair. That is my decision. It has not escaped my attention that porn stars and strippers are often hairless, nor that many men find hairlessness sexy. My Boyfriend among them. Does the fact that I wax my pussy while being aware that my Boyfriend is going to like it make me a prisoner of the Patriarchy? Not to me. What about if he preferred hair down there? Would I be less of a prisoner of the Patriarchy if I bucked cultural notions of feminine beauty by being hairy (and conformed to the Twisty Gaze), but conformed to my Boyfriend’s personal tastes and rejected MINE?

That would just be plain silly. Refusing to do something you want just because you don’t want to appear like your conforming to patriarchal notions of feminine beauty does not make you any less of a slave to the Patriarchy. It just makes you an unhappy slave. Doesn’t this all come down to figuring out what YOU want, and then following YOUR desires regardless of what the Patriarchy, Husband, Boyfriend, Twisty, or Bloggerdom say? That’s what MIM appears to be doing, and that’s why I like her. She does not deserve to be trashed by Bloggerdom for her honesty, introspection, and her stating of the obvious. Tsk, tsk to those who attacked her maliciously instead of trying to figure out what she actually meant.

All About Hazard

Today was a terrible day. Just 1 month shy of his first birthday, Hazard went under the knife. I hear you Miss Nibbles…I would have rather gotten a female and breed my pup with another lab but 1) I am not financially stable to worry about all of a sudden having pups that need shots/food and may not sell and 2) 2 dogs that mate would be a handful to take care of especially if it means a litter down the road. Poor Hazard had no idea what was going on today. He knew that when I turned on the highway it wasn’t any normal day going to work. He gave me a questioning look. At that point seeing his beautiful face so unknowing of the events to come, tears fell down.

We made it to the vet, Silver Creek Animal Clinic and I cried in the car; almost decided to say fuck it and keep my pup’s manhood. But I knew I would get a phone call to reschedule and in the long run, this is better for his health and will avoid any law suit for my stud impregnating another dog (which I would have no money to deal with). He was as puppyish as ever with his facial features and hyperactive qualities. We couldn’t get him to calm down so they gave him a sedative. Well, it didn’t really work. I waited for everyone and their dog to clear the area prior to entering the building after walking him to get some energy out because Hazard would want some booty or want to play. The sedative did nothing to calm his hormones when a female was around. The vet came out again and gave him some pain medication to see if that would work, and in 15 minutes he was feeling calm. So I walked him to a cage in the back and said goodbye.

Then I cried some more on the way to work feeling very guilty for doing this.

They said he would be ready at the earliest at 3 pm…I got a call at 12:00 saying that Hazard really wanted to go home. The tranqs had worn off quite a bit. My pup always talks like “Arrr, arrr…” (kind of like a Scooby Doo talk), I was nervous that taking his manhood would hurt his personality and verbal abilities, but no, I went to pick up my “baby boy” and I could hear him talking up a storm in the back. He stopped talking as soon as he heard my voice approaching. It was difficult for him to get in the car…but he made it. He has to wear a “volcano thing” around his neck so he doesn’t lick himself.

I feel absolutely horrible and hopefully over the next two weeks, he will be back to my precious pup; playful, and talkative. I hate looking at him with his big eyes looking at me thinking “what did you do to me?” I want to cry every time. More so today seeing his pain, I don’t want to have kids for a long time…Granted I won’t neuter them, but I know I will be more passionate about them than my pup (if you could believe that) and that means many more times of crying and perhaps times of feeling helpless.

These are actual pics of my precious pup. I love him so much. Figured it would be nice to use real ones instead of random pics.

Following In Scarlett’s Footsteps

My mom arrived at my apartment this morning at 7 am after taking the red-eye from Bean’s (the technical genius behind this blog) place in Utah. Two weeks ago, my mom single-handedly packed up her entire house in Savannah, Georgia and moved all of her belongings to Houston, Texas. It was a damn impressive feat. Unfortunately, as her house in Houston won’t be ready until May, my mom had to put all of her belongings in storage. She’s going to be living out of several large suitcases for the next two months, bobbing between my brothers’, bean’s, and my place before her house is ready. Being forced to hobo it out on the road isn’t ideal, but it’s nice for us kids because we get the opportunity to spend some quality time with her. One-on-one time is quite different than the normal holiday crazyness when all 4 of us + significant others are around stuffing our faces with sweet potatoes or ripping open Christmas presents. That’s great, and I wouldn’t trade those times for anything, but it’s still special to have some time with her just for me.

At first I didn’t hear her knocking this morning because I was completely zonked out. This week has been draining at work, and I still haven’t recovered from staying up until 4 am on Monday night reasearching. After knocking a few times, my mom smartly called my cell phone. I woke up and let her in, gave her a hug, noted that she has become a full on uberbabe skinny minny due to the South Beach Diet and her amazing self-discipline, and stumbled back into bed. She climbed over the boxes and piles of things scattered about my in-the-midst-of-being-packed apartment and crawled into the other side of the bed. We groggily chatted between yawns for about 20 minutes, before we both fell asleep. I went to sleep thinking how nice it was that she was here.

Since I moved out of my house to go to college 13 years ago, I have generally only seen my family on summer vacations (when I had them), during the Christmas and Thanksgiving holidays, and on other random occasions. This past year and a half, since I moved to New York – a place where I have felt very alone for most of my time here – I have spent a good deal of time thinking about how far away my family is and wishing that I was closer to them. During this past year, my mom has been living in Savannah, my brothers, Dad, and Stepmom in Houston, and my little sister in Utah. All of us have been far away from each other and sometimes, when I was lonely, it seemed so silly. For example, there was one afternoon where my brother, mom, and I all went to see the same movie on our own. We text messaged one another prior to the movie and then after to share our thoughts on it. Doing so made me feel connected to them and less alone, but it was no replacement to actually seeing them and spending time together.

Three months ago, when the large case I was on finally quieted down enough for me to breathe normally again, I started seriously looking for jobs. Faced with the decision about where to look, I contemplated Houston, as there is now a critical mass of my family members either living their or in transit to living there. It was strange to find myself thinking seriously about the possiblity of moving to Houston. All through law school, I had only one city in mind to move to from Michigan: New York. Every other city paled in comparison and I couldn’t imagine living anywhere else, certainly not the traffic-choked, strip mall covered, Bush-infested, urban sprawl of Houston!! Puh-lease!

Since moving to New York, I have confirmed that it is fact one of the greatest cities in the world. I love it here. Or rather, I should say, I love New York, and I love all the opportunities here, the energy, the people from all different places, the languages all around you, the fact that I can walk anywhere I want to or need to go, and the sense that everything anyone could possibly desire or wish to experience could be found here if you took the time to look. Except for mountains, trees (Central Park is still just a park), and front porches, New York has pretty much everything I would want in a city. However, I discovered to my complete surprise this year that that wasn’t enough.

I realized that living in a fantastic city when your community of friends and family is far away, can seem less than fantastic. It was hard for me this past year when I would go on my aimless wanderings around the city on the weekends. I would eat in a cute little restaurant or find a shop I liked or visit a museum that was wonderful. Weekend after weekend (when I was not working or too tired from work) I would wander about, with only myself to enjoy everything with. I think I’m great and all, and I generally have an impressive ability to keep myself entertained, but even I have limits to how much of just me I can take. There were many days where I wished I had someone around with whom to share this city.

So after a year of this, I find myself having done a complete 180, and would now actually consider moving to Houston to be near my family. The radical shift in my thinking still shocks me. It’s funny though how life works, because just as I reached the point of realizing that I had been too far away from my family for too long, something happened to make me stay in New York, at least for the immediate future. Raj came back into my life. Three months after we got back together, we decided to move in together, and now my thinking has shifted even more to the point where I found myself the other day asking Raj whether he would ever consider moving to Houston with me. He said he would consider it. He then asked me if I would ever consider moving to Detroit (where his parents live). Ouch. I said I would consider it, and then promptly decided that we didn’t need to worry about those things just yet. Those things, we could think about tomorrow. How in God’s name do couples figure out those big life decisions?

Movies, NCAA, and Hazard

A week ago I was ecstatic…my mom was on a plane to see me for a whole week. She left last night and is now with Buttercup. We had a blast together. We saw three movies, 2 with Tex, and one solo with just my Mom. The Hills Have Eyes was a good movie, genuine horror…meaning, stupid people doing everything they shouldn’t do. Eight Below was good. I love dogs, absolutely love them, so inevitably, I cried. I would never be able to leave my dog behind anywhere! Last but not least, The World’s Fastest Indian. This movie was good; Anthony Hopkins is always an excellent actor.

If anyone watches NCAA, I got you all beat…ESPN locked me out, so I was unable to get me final picks into the “competition” of friends and family online. But I was able to find tickets online, so Saturday night my Mom, Tex, and I were off to the NCAA. It was awesome. First game was Boston College vs. Montana. In a full crowd of Montana fans, literally, Boston College was booed when they came out on the court or shot the ball… My Mom and I cheered on Boston College from the start of the game till the finish. And I had a grin on my face when each and every Montana fan was let down by their team. Boston College opened a can of whoop-ass and beat them not just by one basket. Second game was Gonzaga vs. Indiana…I have never heard about Gonzaga prior to this tournament, but they were unbelievable on the court. Both teams played great on the court. Gonzaga is now moving up in the bracket.

Hazard had a great time…my Mom would walk up the driveway or on the grass and I would stand about 30 feet away, Hazard would run back and forth and back and forth. He loves my Mom and the attention he gets from her. We “sat” for my cousin’s dog to see if perhaps Hazard could have a friend to play with more frequently. This blew up in my face. Hazard isn’t neutered so all he wanted to do was “get her done…” I was happy that he still obeyed with such distractions like his hormones and this female “piece of meat” (Buttercup: he is a dog, they don’t converse prior to sexual engagement, so yes this female dog was strictly a piece of meat to Hazard). Fortunately this did not happen, well he “got on her” a little bit and then we separated the dogs for bedtime. The next morning between my Mom saying “You’re crazy. Hazard is a perfect dog and you are going to ruin him.” And Tex saying “I am not walking that dog, you can take care of both…we are not keeping this dog”… I was very comfortable to drop my cousin’s dog back off at his place.

I felt badly for Hazard unable to control himself and now seeing how he reacts to females at least when brought to the house, Tex and I agree that we need to take care of this issue while he is still a pup. Instead of ruining Hazard by getting another dog, we are going to completely deplete his chances of performing in a competition, and breeding this wonderful dog. He has an appointment with the vet tomorrow and they are going to snip him of his manhood, his desire for “booty”, but I am hoping it doesn’t strip him of his awesome personality, and slim handsome figure. If he gets fat I am going to be pissed.

So today, a week after my Mom coming into town, I have a headache from lack of sleep and the sadness of her leaving me. I brought Hazard to work with me to keep me company but I absolutely feel horrible that he is going to go in to the vet tomorrow and have his testicles removed. Each time I look at him, I am grateful that tranquilizers and painkillers do exist, because he is going to be knocked out completely for that procedure. The NCAA games rocked or rather Boston College and Gonzaga rocked, and even though I didn’t win in the online competition, I saw two games with my Mom that I will never forget. ( I found some cool pictures but am unable to upload them now…maybe next post.)

If Only Maverick Were Here To Save Katie From Scientology’s Fantatical Clutches

I’m seriously worried about Katie Holmes. What in God’s name is she doing?? Look at this picture. She continually dangles around Tommy Boy like a piece of clinging cotton candy, all squinty-eyed sugary smiles, while Tommy Boy has eyes only for the crowd watching him put on his courtship show. If your man is looking elsewhere when he’s smooching you, I have news for you: He’s not that into you. Katie needs to wise-up and ship-out before he gets his greedy little hands on his seed-child and tosses her unpregnant ass to the curb.

Also note the hard set of his jaw and his aggressively pursed lips. He looks like he’s having about as much fun as I did the last time I went to the dentist and stubbornly clamped my mouth shut after my dentist grazed a non-novacained tooth with her spinning drill bit. Tommy Boy’s piercing eyes are steely and cold, and his nose has to be poking Katie’s cheek uncomfortably. At least he looks like he’s clean shaven and not ripping up her face with his stubble. Though Katie’s face is radiating her usual star struck lovey-doveyness, the girl’s shoulders look tense, and she’s leaning away from Tommy Boy. Could this be an unconscious cry for help? Maybe she realizes deep down that she’s made a pact with some kind of devil, and that it’s not going to be so easy to get her and her baby out of the little psycho world she went skipping into.

Normally I think it’s kind of unfair – but amusing – to analyze the body language of celebrities based on a single photo. Everyone takes a bad picture occasionally, and one’s body language changes from one second to the next. However, in this instance, I feel no guilt whatsoever in using similar tactics to analyze Katie and Tom’s (I refuse to refer to them as “TomKat”) “relationship.” First of all, it was difficult to find a picture where Katie was not swooning all over Tom like a giant tinkerbell high on fairy dust, so this picture is far from an anomaly. When Katie’s not clinging to him, she’s allowing him to contort her body into odd unnatural publicity poses – all of which I suspect have as part of their agenda an effort to disguise the fact that Katie is 4 feet taller than Tommy in addition to proving how much these two “love” each other. Yeah, right.

Second, I have decided that Tom Cruise is an unequivocal and fanatical whack-job with far too much power and far too much time on his hands. He has made me afraid. Not just for Katie, but for all of us. Take the recent stunt he pulled by intimidating Comedy Central into yanking a repeat of South Park’s Scientology Episode off the air. Who does that? A freaking lunatic member of a cult who believes in aliens, and has voodoo mind-power, that’s who. Not that I’m suggesting that everyone who believes in aliens is a nut-job. I happen to believe that aliens quite possibly exist somewhere out in the universe, and will admit to entertaining the fascinating notion that maybe aliens visited earth a long, long time ago and helped out our ancestors (either that, or tagged them for review and possible future extinction ala Independence Day).

It’s not the alien component that freaks me out about the Cult of Scientology. Rather, it’s that I just don’t get it. I gather Ron Hubbard is the founder, and they believe that people get a build up of negative/evil thoughts and must somehow be purged of that negativity. Apparently, all of this is measured by an apparatus which resembles two coke cans attached by wires to some kind of electronic device. Sounds very scientific. I have so many questions about it. Why is it called Scientology? Who gave Scientology permission to imply that its beliefs are grounded in science? Why do we only hear about rich celebrity members of the cult? Why is John Travolta, who looks so innocent on the surface, a member of this cult? Maybe he’s been suffering under the same kind of voodoo magic that Tommy Boy is currently using to brainwash Katie? Why does nobody state the obvious and call it a cult?

Even if I liked Scientology, I would be supremely annoyed at Tom Cruise’s audacity in forcing Comedy Central to pull the South Park Episode. What was he afraid would happen? Maybe this has more to do with the fact that the episode poked fun at his sexuality, rather than it’s treatment of Scientology? Regardless, has he not heard of the First Amendment and the fact that the United States does not engage in outright censorship? At least not of cartoons that regularly make fun of all religions and ethnic groups equally. And what of that chef who resigned in protest. Puh-lease. This chef had no problem with South Park poking fun at the Jews, Catholics, Muslims, Hindus, and Buddhists. But the minute they poked fun at Scientology, this guy went ape shit and started blathering about the importance of “tolerance.” Give me a freaking break. I cannot stand hypocrisy, specially not when it’s tossed up to defend a freaky-deaky cult.

Here’s something funny though from the boys of South Park as reported by NPR. In response to Tommy Boy’s fanatical freak-out, the boys of South Park released the following statement:

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Scientology, you may have won THIS battle, but the million-year war for Earth has just begun! Temporarily anozinizing our episode will NOT stop us from keeping Thetans forever trapped in your pitiful man-bodies. Curses and drat! You have obstructed us for now, but your feeble bid to save humanity will fail! Hail Xenu!!!

– Trey Parker and Matt Stone, servants of the dark lord Xenu