I spoke to my mother yesterday morning and we filled out our registration forms together to make sure we’d be in the same cabin. We’re not taking the same classes, but I think that’s a good thing because that way we can teach each other the things we’ve learned. Last night I put down my deposit and today Blake’ll mail the registration form. Keep your fingers crossed that I get the classes I want! A lot of the spring ones are already full! (But we’re going in September.)

My first choice classes were (was?) Spirit Session on the Thursday, Pages & Paint on the Friday and Vinyasa yoga on the Saturday morning.

Spirit Session is a photography class where the teacher shows you how to use the settings on your camera. I know most of the settings on my little camera, at least enough to get by, but I have no idea how to use our Digital Rebel SLR (I don’t even understand what SLR *is* – Blake’s tried explaining it to me a few times and I just don’t get it). The Rebel is first gen so it doesn’t do video, which sucks, and technically it’s Blake’s camera. I’d really like to get a newer one of my own one day because I have a hard time using someone else’s something, know what I mean? Like I’m afraid of messing up settings or something. But at least I’ll be learning how to use it for whenever I get my own and hey, maybe I’ll find out that my little camera is enough camera for me. Who knows.

Pages & Paint is a mixed media class where I think we create two pieces. The teacher, Sarah Ahearn Bellemare, wrote a book that came out this spring, called Painted Pages: Fueling Creativity with Sketchbooks and Mixed Media that I’ve added to my wishlist and that I’d really like to get for my birthday. Blake won’t get it for me, because he already got me a Smash Book (more on that in a future post) and Smash Book accessories, but maybe my mom or someone else might get it for me. Because I’m in Squam-mode, this book is all I can think about and I read every page of the preview on Amazon and it actually looks like a pretty decent book. So many of these types of books are just basically excuses for the artist to show her work and they don’t really teach you anything. This one teaches you something, it teaches you mixed media techniques and gives you uses for mixed media elements. Like, for example washi tape. Pretend I have no idea what to do with washi tape. This book would tell me what to do with washi tape. The book just looks good and I want it, dammit.

Vinyasa yoga is vinyasa yoga. Vinyasa is really just continuous movement. Because both yoga classes take place on Saturday morning with the same teacher, I’m guessing that if the majority chooses Vinyasa, we do Vinyasa, but if the majority of people choose “Gentle yoga” then we’ll be doing “Gentle yoga”. My mom and I don’t really care either way. I put Vinyasa down for my first choice but Gentle down for my second and third.

Belinda and her boyfriend, Brian, are coming too but I’m not sure what they’re picking for classes. I know Bel wants to take Tell It, which is a writing class but I’m not sure if she actually picked it or not. When I talked to her last night, she was still just deciding whether or not to go so I have no idea what classes she ended up choosing.

I’m not totally sure what my mom picked either but I think she said her first choices were Story Scarves and Raw Matters. Story Scarves is exactly what it sounds like, you make a scarf with your story on it, whatever that may be, not like, Little Red Riding Hood. Raw Matters is a writing course.

I’m kinda getting nervous though, because as I was getting the links to make this post and as my registration envelope is sitting on Blake’s desk, ready to go out, one of the fall classes is already closed! It’s not one of the ones I wanted to take, but I’m pretty sure it was one of my mom’s choices (Gypsy Heirloom). Eeeeep! That one though, is actually off-campus at an artist’s jewelry studio, so it probably had a very small number of spaces to fill. Still, I know my mom picked that one either for a first or second choice. :o/

Before I decided Squam was a possibility, I felt out the atmosphere around Sunnyland to see where the financials may come from and a number of you said that you’d be willing to donate to the cause. I’ve decided to do a ChipIn to collect donations/birthday gifts but I haven’t set it up yet because I’m not 100% sure of how much I’ll need. I know I’ll need $1200 for tuition and $200 for gas and I know one night they don’t feed us so we’ll have to go to a restaurant and there are some supplies on the class materials lists that I don’t have (I may be able to make a “grey card”? I’m still not totally sure what that is, it’s a photography thing) and on the last day of Squam they have an art fair and I may want to purchase a book or something if the financials work out that way so I’m still working out the bugs. Another example is that we’re camping in the woods and the only flashlight I own that works is one you’d put on a keychain, so I’ll have to buy a flashlight and a pack of extra batteries (possibly, I’m not sure what we have for rechargables). I also don’t own an umbrella, which I may need if I’m taking a primarily outdoor photography class and it’s raining. I also really, really want an apron for my birthday – which is March 1st, by the way – one like this:

When I paint and I get some on me or there’s excess or whatnot, I wipe/rub the paint into the arms of my chair because it’s canvas and soaks it right up. Not only am I getting a new chair eventually, likely within the next year because mine’s kaput, but when I go to Squam, I won’t have my chair. I need to get in the habit of wiping the paint somewhere else, that’s not my pants (I’m bad for that too) and I also could use an apron for when I’m splatter painting so I’m not ruining perfectly good t-shirts. I wasn’t really sure where you even buy aprons, but I went to the Curry’s website and this one looked pretty good for only $7.99. Canvas is good. White’s not my colour, but it wouldn’t be white for very long, I suspect. Anyway, I want it and that’s just an example of the little things I’m going to have to buy for this trip – oh, bug spray’s another one – that I’m going to have to sit down and think about before I’ll know the financials. Believe me though, you guys will be the first to know once I figure it out. OH! I’m also going to need a passport or an enhanced driver’s license to get across the border. I think a passport’s $80, not sure about the license. I’ll get whatever’s cheapest I guess. I still maintain that I’ll be able to get over the border just fine with a license and a birth certificate, but my mom insists that I have exactly what is needed to go to the US as dictated by the border patrol’s website, which I haven’t had a chance to look at yet.

Thank god this is 9 months away, there’s so much to do! Lists to make! Things to acquire! BUT IT IS GOING TO BE SO MUCH FUN!

My mom asked me yesterday – and I think it was a totally legit, fair question – how my agoraphobia was going to factor in and I told her what my shrink told me a couple of years ago when I asked her the same thing in regards to Touched By Fire, she said that if I’m in a place where my role is defined, I’ll do better than in a place where it is not. For example, at Touched By Fire, my role is “artist” so I know what I’m supposed to do and what’s expected of me but at the Leafs game last year, my role is NOT defined or is defined very loosely, so I can’t function. As far as Squam, my role is “artist” and “student”, two things I’m very good at, so the agoraphobia shouldn’t be a problem. There will definitely be some social anxiety but I have good drugs for that and my mom and Belinda will be there so I should be fine. And I’m like a dog, I like car rides (as long as the person driving isn’t a maniac) and I’ve driven to NYC from here like, 40 times which is the same distance, so I’m not worried about it. I *am* a little worried about being tempted to smoke with my mom smoking in the car and this trip being a little bit stressful, but I figure I’ll cross that bridge when it comes. Plus, Belinda wouldn’t let me smoke anyway and my mom won’t want to share, so I’ll probably be fine. By the time the trip rolls around, I’ll have been a non-smoker for 17 months, if I did the math right (I quit in May 2011, the trip is Sept. 2012).

It’s going to be a really good time, I think. It’ll be September so it won’t be too cold (unless you’re a wuss) but I don’t think we’ll be going swimming. I’m going to bring a bathing suit just in case though. I’m also going to bring a travel mug for tea and I’m going to get my mom to bring her electric kettle for tea in the cabin. I’m going to bring two cases of Diet Coke (the cabins have ice boxes, but I don’t know how big they are – doesn’t matter, I can drink room temperature Diet Coke) and a water bottle for water (duh). I drink a LOT, I dunno why, I’m just *always* thirsty. My mom got me this kickass cup that looks like a take-out cup from Starbucks, but it’s NOT the one from Starbucks, it’s BETTER because it’s MAPLE LEAFS and I love it. It’s for Diet Coke from the bottle though so I won’t be bringing it with me. I need cans so they’ll be more portable in a backpack. The one class, Pages & Paint, they want you to bring your favourite colours of paint so, money permitting, I’d like to get my favourite colours of paint in the Martha Stewart line. Black & white are fine with what I’ve got (Americana) and I have a few colours of Martha’s but I’d like to have some more to bring with me because it really is just excellent stuff. In the pictures on the Squam site, they’re all using Golden acrylics which are very very expensive. They’re the best, but I simply cannot afford that paint. I’ve been using Americana since the beginning but now that I’ve used Martha’s paint, I’ll never buy another bottle of Americana as long as she keeps making paint – it’s that good. I’d like to try her crackle medium to see how it fares against DecoArt’s Weathered Wood, which I’ve also used since the beginning, and she’s got some other mediums I’d like to play with as well, but that I don’t necessarily need for Squam. All I need for Squam is about $25 worth of colours, if they’re on sale. OH! ANd I’m going to have to bring all of my glitter of course – which I will gladly share with anyone who would like any because I have TONS and sparkle is just meant  to be shared!!!

When we were at my mom’s for “second Xmas”, she put out her cheese ball (gross!) with all kinds of crackers and stuff to spread it on and one of the things she put out were Ritz Munchables Pretzel Crackers. That’s the US site and I guess they have “buttery” and “cheesy” flavours but we have “original” and I think Blake said they had “sour cream and onion” or “ranch” or something like that at the store too. Anyway, the ones my mom got were “original” and they were amazing. Between the 7 of us, we easily polished off the entire box and last night Blake went to the store and brought home a box and between yesterday and this morning, I’ve eaten almost the whole box BY MYSELF. They should rename these things to Ritz Pretzel Crack! They’re hard to describe, you really just have to try them. They’re like Ritz crackers, they’re buttery like a Ritz, but they’re made out of pretzel dough so the outside is crunchy like a pretzel and they put coarse salt on top of them. They’re fucking GREAT. 18 thumbs up.

At 2pm today I have to have a root canal that’s apparently going to take an hour and a half to complete. :o( Nothing more to add to that except that it sucks. :o(

I feel like there was something else I wanted to say but I can’t remember what it is so I guess I’ll just end this post here and make a new post if I remember what it was.

OH! Now I remember!

I e-mailed Magic Pony/Narwhal Gallery on Wednesday I think. Here’s what I said:

—————————- Original Message —————————-
Subject: Hi.
From: “S. Crittenden” <Sunny@SunnyCrittenden.com>
Date: Wed, January 11, 2012 1:55 pm
To: contact@narwhalartprojects.com
contact@magic-pony.com
————————————————————————–

Hello there!

My name is Sunny Crittenden and I’m an artist living just a bit north of
Barrie.

In December I was in the art show Touched By Fire at Cooper’s Fine Art
Gallery and there I sold my painting entitled “Black & White”. This is it:

http://www.sunnycrittenden.com/gallery/main.php?g2_itemId=7319

It was at Touched By Fire that I met Colette French, the gallery’s
director, and she told my husband to call her once the holidays were over
because she had a space in mind for my work. That space was Magic
Pony/Narwhal Gallery.

I’ll be honest, I’ve never been to your space before and I rarely venture
into the city. I’m agoraphobic so I rarely venture into my own town of
2,000 people! However, your websites look interesting and I agree with
Colette that my work may fit in quite well. I was wondering what you might
think?

Here is the gallery of my work:

http://www.sunnycrittenden.com/gallery/main.php

Unfortunately my paintings don’t come across well in photographs because
they’re very very sparkly. I’m no photographer so I have no idea how to
photograph them as they are, so instead, I’ve taken a few short videos of
them, which show their sparkles better. Here they are:

1. http://youtu.be/IVsMx04gmb4
2. http://youtu.be/Ndudc9kjknc
3. http://youtu.be/zjVIUIhn-yU
4. http://youtu.be/_cDL-nPvLaI

Colette said that if the pictures and videos weren’t convincing enough,
that she would be willing to bring some of my pieces to your shop herself
to see what you thought.

I am brand new to the art world. I’ve just been selling my paintings on
Etsy for the past few years and this is my first time trying to sell/show
them outside of my own website and Touched By Fire. I’m not really sure
how this all works.

Thanks for your consideration,
Sunny Crittenden

Magic Pony hasn’t gotten back to me, but I got a nice rejection letter from Narwhal Gallery last night:

—————————- Original Message —————————-
Subject: Re: Hi.
From: “Narwhal Art Projects” <contact@narwhalartprojects.com>
Date: Thu, January 12, 2012 7:57 pm
To: sunny@sunnycrittenden.com
————————————————————————–

 

Hi Sunny,

Thanks so much for your email and for sending us some
of your work. At the moment we aren’t taking on any new artists as we’re
fully booked for the next couple of years – however we’ll make sure to
keep an eye on your website for future consideration. Good luck with
your artwork and all the best!

Kristin

Sooooo so much for that! But there may still be the possibility of Magic Pony maybe? I’m not sure if the rejection was JUST from Narwhal or if it was from both and I’m not sure if I should ask or if I should just leave it and wait for a reply and then if I don’t get one, I get Blake to call Colette to see what we should do next? I have no idea how this stuff works. And who knows, maybe Colette doesn’t have any other ideas either. It’s too bad though because I really do think my stuff would fit in well at Magic Pony. :o/

Okay I think that’s all I wanted to say. I hope you all have a wonderful weekend! Peace oot! <3

So my brilliant idea of doing a series of photos from my bed in the living room hasn’t been going so well, mostly because the lighting in here fucking sucks, but also because really? Not much happens from my vantage point and my four-legged subjects don’t often cooperate.

After this post I think I’m still going to take pictures from the bed but unless there are some really interesting ones, I don’t think I’m going to bother cropping and posting them. So here are the first set of pics, you decide if they’re interesting or not:

In the pic above, you can see my loving husband Blake, the towel my nurse uses so I don’t get soaked with saline and blood while she changes my vac dressing, my barf bowl (because my stomach is VERY sensitive now for reasons no one’s too clear on) and my awesomely blinged out mouse.

More Blake, because I love him. <3

I bet I’m on Facebook more than any other living person on planet Earth. And I don’t even play Farmville.

Blake’s guitar. Mine’s beside it (black Hello Kitty Strat! that I totally don’t know how to play!) but you can’t see it from the bed.

A somewhat blurry Lucky laying in front of my walker.

Madison and Blake. I forget why they were both looking at me.

My living room night table. We’ve got (from L to R):
- My super awesome wake-up light
- Tweezers
- Bottle of Tylenol 3
- Kleenex
- The remote for the fan
- Floss
- My glasses
- My phone
- Glasses cleaner
- Glasses case
- (At the back) TV remote on a pile of books
-  Shotglass containing hydromorph contin and colace
- Freezie mug likely full of limeade or 5-Alive
-  Mirror
- To the very right, beside the mug, you can see part of my vac machine

Exciting stuff!

Vac dressing from my vantage point.

Wes playing video games on some website called Poptropica.

And last but not least, the window I can’t see SHIT out of due to all those damn leaves!
Although even if the leaves weren’t there, I don’t think I’d see much but a field.

So there ya have it, scenes from my bed.

In other news, this week I stayed home by myself for the first time while Blake went to work. He works from home on the days Siske comes so he can wrangle the dogs if need be and help clean up afterward or get things for her after she’s put on her sterile gloves – stuff I can’t just do myself. Then on the days Siske *isn’t* here, he goes to work in Toronto and with the kids in school, that means I’m left to my own devices.

I was really nervous about the prospect but I stayed home by myself for 2 days this week and nothing bad happened so I’m not as worried about it as I was before. My big fear was someone coming to the door because I can’t go down the stairs to answer the door and if it was something like a heavy Amazon box, I wouldn’t be able to take it from the delivery person and put it somewhere because I just don’t have the strength. Also? I wear a hospital gown 95% of the time, which is open in the back and isn’t the most flattering thing in the world and I don’t exactly want strangers to see me in it.

But no one came to the door and Blake put a note on the door telling delivery people to just leave the packages at the door, so I don’t have to worry about it.

My other big fear was falling but now I know I can get up if I fall (as long as there’s something to hold onto and really, that’s everywhere) and really, prior to getting sick, how often did I fall in my own home? Like, never. So why would it be any different now? It’s true that I’m a little unstable on my feet just because I’ve only been walking on my own for about a month, but I only fell once at the hospital and that was after I’d been walking on my own for only a few days. Sooooo, I’m not really worried about falling anymore.

My first day home alone kinda sucked because I woke up to no internet. I instructed Madison on how to reset the modem by unplugging the power cord but she DIDN’T FUCKING LISTEN (which has been a problem with her recently) and she pulled out not just the power cord but the ethernet cable too, which she only loosely plugged back in so long story short, the internet could have come back on 5 minutes later but I wouldn’t have known about it because she fucked up the cords. It was only by fluke that I hobbled out of bed and checked them myself at around NOON and found that she hadn’t plugged the ethernet cable back in and when I plugged it in, I had internet seconds later. I could have killed her because really, the only thing I can do from this bed is use the internet or watch TV and I don’t watch TV very much, especially not during the day, so I ended up letting the hydromorph win and I took a nap instead.

But then! After I woke up and checked all my internet stuffs, I got hungry and I wanted Kraft Dinner but it was on the 2nd shelf in the kitchen cupboards and I can’t reach that shelf without a chair. So I got a chair and I put it right below where the Kraft Dinner is and I went to stand on it but my muscles aren’t strong enough yet to propel myself on one leg and onto the chair. I was afraid I’d fall and hurt myself if I attempted to do anything further so I put the chair back and got a fork, which I used to knock the Kraft Dinner onto it’s long edge, then I dug the fork into the seam of the top of the box and pulled and then I could reach it that way. THIS IS BECAUSE I’M A GENIUS.

I feel like a moron saying this, but making Kraft Dinner took a lot out of me. And then when it was finished cooking, I took about 5 mouthfuls and didn’t want any more.

On Blake’s way home he stopped at the “good” grocery store where they make the best pre-made salads and he got me a caesar salad to have the next time he went to work.

So on my 2nd day home alone, I figured I was all set for lunch because I had this caesar salad where all I had to do was add the packet of dressing, the packet of croutons and then shake it up but after I did that and took a bite, I immediately felt nauseous because it was just so gross. It’s not the salad’s fault, it was a perfectly good caesar salad, it’s just that apparently I don’t like caesar salad anymore which is just one more thing to add to the list. Blake ended up eating it that night for dinner and meanwhile the only thing I could find in the kitchen for lunch that I actually felt like eating was grapes, so that’s what I had for lunch that day.

Again, that day was pretty uneventful. All I did was nap (twice, because I take the hydromorph in the morning, then again at 2pm and it makes me sleepy – most of the time I fight it off, but if I’m bored, or more to the point, depressed, I just let sleep take over) and refresh Facebook and Google + about 5,000 times. I also posted a lot on the Camwhores forum. (By the way, I have 10 free trials, no credit card necessary, to Camwhores if anyone wants them. All you have to do is comment with your e-mail address, one that’s never received a free trial before, and I’ll send it to you. First come, first served. An added bonus to these free trials is that even after it expires, your account remains active, albeit in a limited capacity. You can still see the cams, just not the full archives, you can still chat on the tagboard and you can still post on the forums. I’m not sure if you can vote, I think so though. The only thing you really can’t do is see the archives past 12 images or watch live or archived streaming shows. Anyway, like I said, comment with your e-mail address and I’ll send them out!)

I think next week we’re going to do the same as this week with Blake working from home on Siske days and going into the office on non-Siske days. I’m not worried about this at all because nothing’s going to happen. I’m still uneasy about being alone with Siske though because I can’t wrangle the dogs (what if one got out? that would be a nightmare!) and the least we can do is clean up after her because we appreciate what she does for me, although technically I believe it’s her job to clean up after herself. Plus there’s the fact that she’s basically a stranger and I don’t feel comfortable with strangers in my house at all, but especially if I have to be alone with them. Eventually I’m going to have to get over this because Blake IS expected to be at work every day, it’s just that today is not that day. This week is not that week. I don’t know when it will be, maybe the week after this one, but we’re playing it by ear.

Tomorrow night we’re going to Toronto to see Mother Mother. When I was in the hospital, I was worried that I wouldn’t get out in time to go to this show and then when I did get out, I didn’t think I *could* go to this show for a number of reasons.

1. The show is at Sound Academy which is a big but essentially shitty venue because the floor is level so if you’re short and at the back, you can’t see anything and with my walker, I would have to be at the back. There IS a platform with tables and chairs on it but getting a table is next to impossible and there’s a big column in your way anyway. Also I wouldn’t be able to stand on the platform because I need my walker.

2. For obvious reasons, I couldn’t be in the pit or even in the crowd.

3. I can’t stand for long periods of time and there’s nowhere to sit, period, let alone somewhere to sit and still be able to see anything.

4. What the hell would I wear? Because my guts are swollen and all displaced, I look about 6 or 7 months pregnant and I don’t exactly have maternity clothes I could wear!

But Blake being Blake found a solution to most of these problems. He called the venue and asked about wheelchair accessibility and as it turns out there is an area to the left of the stage that’s sectioned off specifically for gimps like me and when Blake explained that I can’t stand for long periods of time, they said there would be a chair waiting for me when I got there. Problem solved. We’re going to get there early so there’s not too much of a crowd and we’re supposed to ask for a specific person when we get there who will get me set up in the designated area.

As for what to wear, I think I solved that problem when I went to see my shrink earlier this week. I have this awesome pair of black, drawstring yoga pants that my mother-in-law got me years ago that I absolutely love so when I went to my shrink I wore those, tied below my belly because there’s a hose connected to my (normal) bellybutton region which is totally in the way, and then I paired it with a grey, v-neck t-shirt that Charlie got me from Old Navy (which you can see in my recent cam pics) and over top of all that, I wore this grey, knitted hoodie with faux fur trim on the hood that I have. Casual but classy. Normally I would NEVER wear anything that casual to a show, that’s usually when I pull out all my Free People clothes, but right now I don’t really have much of a choice. I’m fine with it, though. Totally not a big deal. After everything I’ve been through over the summer and the indignities imposed upon me, I honestly could not give an entire shit as to what anyone at this show thinks of what I’m wearing.

So, with all problems solved, we’re going to see Mother Mother tomorrow! And while I was mopey today and basically decided not to go, now I’m thinking it’s a good idea. And so does my shrink and Siske. My shrink prescribed me more Ativan, which I’ll get Blake to pick up for me tomorrow and with that and a bit of lipstick, I should be pretty good to go!

And I think that’s all I’ve got in me for tonight. Have yourselves a lovely weekend and I’ll probably write more on Monday.

If you’ve been reading my blog for any great length of time, you’ll know that I’m not very good with birthdays. My own especially, but also other people’s. This year was no different, despite everyone’s best efforts.

First of all, last night Blake and I were screwing around with this pink aluminum baseball bat that I bought in the states last night and he had one end and I had the other and we were fighting over it in the dark (don’t ask why, it doesn’t matter). Long story short, I ended up getting nailed really hard with it, right above my right temple and today my head is literally mushy. My hair hurts. It hurts when I chew. We’re fairly certain I was/am concussed. I cannot deal with my emotions right now, like I have to control over them whatsoever. I woke up in much more pain today than when it first happened even and I basically spent all day crying.

I’ve been chowing down Tylenol 1 and Naproxen like it’s candy and that’s helped a little but but I think I’d be screaming if I wasn’t drugged up to the tits.

So that set up my birthday and made me a very unhappy person all day.

Then I had to go to metabolic clinic, which I really didn’t want to do because I really didn’t want to get out of my pajamas and make the time up on the weekend when I already have to work an extra 8 hours this weekend because of the time I missed for the funeral. But I went anyway. It was a module on stress and was mostly unhelpful, but at one point we had a 20 minute discussion on smoking and…

…after the class was over, I told Blake to stop at a store because it was my birthday and I’d smoke if I goddamned well pleased and I goddamned well pleased. So we had one in the car and I said I was just going to smoke today but when we got home I felt guilty and flushed the rest of the pack. Smokes are $10.25 a pack now, by the way.

After metabolic clinic I had to work for another 2 hours, so I did that and when I was finished, I told Blake I needed to sleep because all day, and this can apparently be a concussion thing, I was extremely drowsy. Like, I could barely stay awake during the metabolic clinic because the lights were off and they were doing a Powerpoint presentation. I actually closed my eyes during it a few times and kinda jolted awake.

So I slept from 6pm-7pm and then Blake went to get dinner (Chinese food), we ate, I felt sick, I took Gravol and then we did presents with the kids. Wes got me the next 2 Buffy the Vampire Slayer books for “season 8″, Madison got me a laughing Buddha cone incense holder with some incense and my step-mom sent down a small gift with Madison which included a $25 gift certificate for Starbucks, a leather journal, some neat sparkly nail polish and some lip balm. (This may or may not be common knowledge but I’m a lip balm/chapstick hoarder due to chronically chapped lips. It’s been an issue my whole life.)

Oh and before I go any further, I gained 2 lbs this week but lost an inch. This is what happens every week, I either gain or lose 2 lbs and gain or lose 1 or 2 inches on my waist but never at the same time. Also on the way home from metabolic clinic we checked the mail and the CD Blake ordered for me a while back finally came (Bossanova by the Pixies so now I have them all). The birthday card my mom sent me last Wednesday had not arrived yet, but it’ll probably be here Saturday when Blake checks the mail next.

After presents, we finished watching Big Love and then I started to watch last week’s Jersey Shore when suddenly I panicked that I couldn’t smoke again after today for a whole other year because the rule Blake and I made in the car was that I would only smoke on my birthday. So I popped 3 Ativan, grabbed my wallet and keys, put my shoes on with no socks and drove to the store where I paid another $10.25 for a pack of smokes. That’s now $20.50 for smoking today, for those doing the math.

Now Blake’s gone to bed and I’m staying up a little later than usual (I usually go to bed around 10/10:30pm) because I want to make the most of this smoking thing and also because if I’m tired tomorrow I can start work at 11am and finish at 7 because my work is flexible like that. My lungs feel like they’re on fire though and before I go to bed I’ll be flushing the rest of this pack and if I want smokes tomorrow I’m shit outta luck because I have to work and there’s no way I’m walking to the store. Plus, I’m a non-smoker again as of midnight so I’m just not going to go there again until next year.

In other birthday news, my treadmill from Charlie is going to be here this Saturday and my step-mom is taking the elliptical. To go with the treadmill, Blake bought me a new pair of shoes for my birthday, which I’m in love with. These ones:

Yeah I know, Shape Ups are supposed to be bullshit and they don’t do what they claim to do (tone your legs, give you better posture and some other stuff – I haven’t watched the DVD they came with yet) but I don’t care about that, I didn’t want them because they were Shape Ups. I wanted them because I love them and because there are no laces to do up and I don’t have to put on socks to wear them. I can throw them on with bare feet in 30 seconds, go on the treadmill for 10 minutes between answering e-mails, throw them off, continue working and repeat throughout the day. The metabolic clinic people want us walking 3k steps a day but I can only do a little less than half that just walking around the house, so my first goal for the treadmill is going to be that per day in small increments, working my way up to more and more.

Oh and Blake’s also getting my Team Canada jersey lettered with Sidney Crosby. :o) It’s at the pro-shop right now being done. I’m very excited.

Chali also got me a gift certificate for Lush, so any day now another Lush box is going to be at my front door waiting for me and I started planning both front and back yard gardens with Ruggedo yesterday.

So “stuff”wise, I made out like a bandit for my birthday and I’m very grateful for everything I got, it was just a bummer of a day and I’m glad it’s almost over.

The next thing I wanted to write about is sleep. My shrink gave up on giving me benzodiazapines for sleeping (although I’m still taking clonazepam) and she gave me an anti-psychotic instead, called loxapine, which seems to be working. She said there was a small chance that it would increase my appetite and if that happened to stop taking it but it seems to be having the opposite effect and I’m just not hungry these days.

Also helpful is this thing Kevin got me, it’s called a Wake Up Light (watch the video in that link, it’s sorta cool). I was really really skeptical when he suggested this thing but I’ve gotta admit that after a week or so of using it, it really is working. How it works is that you set it for when you want to wake up, in my case that’s 9am. So at 8:30am, the light comes on dimly and starts getting brighter and brighter until 9am when these little birdies (or radio) start chirping. I have my phone set for 9:15am and 9:30am as a back up but this week I’ve been getting up about 10 minutes before the birdies come on and it’s a totally different morning because the way you wake up feels like you naturally woke up (which I suppose in a way, you did) and you don’t hate the world because of your fucking alarm. At first I resented the birdies as much as the roosters (my phone’s alarm, which is the most obnoxious thing in the world) but now I don’t even hear them. This morning I woke up 3 minutes before the birdies because I think a part of me fears the birdies. But still, it felt like I woke up naturally so I didn’t wake up hating the world (well I did, but it had nothing to do with the birdies). I definitely recommend this Wake Up Light to anyone who has sleep issues or a hard time getting up in the morning, especially if you sleep in a pitch black room which I mostly do.

Anyway, I love the thing. It makes me a much nicer person and I cannot thank Kevin enough for being such a huge nerd for even knowing about stuff like this. And for getting it for me because he knew I’d never buy this for myself in a hundred million years.

I’m still struggling to get back into the swing of things after being in the US last week. My routine has been disturbed and when that happens, it takes me a long time to get re-acclimated. Before we got word that Blake’s grandma was going to go any second, I was actively working on Cammity Jane, which some of you know about and some of you don’t and I’m not going to re-explain it because you’ll just have to read it when it’s finished. I was going pretty full tilt on it though and I was actually really impressed with my own dedication to it because I never really finish anything when it comes to writing, especially anything good and in my opinion, this is good – or at least it’s going to be. Charlie’s helping me with continuity while I just get the story down and HOPEFULLY my friend Robert will edit my punctuation when I get it finish. (Robert, will you? I’ll even pay you to do so.) He’s an English teacher and knows more about grammar and punctuation than anyone I’ve ever met. I haven’t worked on it since we got back but I haven’t really had the time. I’m hoping to work on it from Charlie’s notes on what I have so far starting tomorrow though.

I’m also about halfway finished my Valentine girl who I really do believe is my best work to date. I’m really impressed with her and plan on not putting her up for sale. Right now she needs arms, her Valentine placards, varnish and corset stitching, then she’ll be finished. I meant to work on the placards tonight but got distracted by everything else.

So, I’m being productive, or at least I will be once I get back into the swing of things in Sunnyland and as soon as my head stops hurting, which will hopefully be soon.

One more thing before I finish this post: Charlie Sheen. Holy shit right? Check out this site, it’s hysterical. And that’s all I have to say about that.

Goodnight internets, and thanks everyone for everything. <3

Oh man.

So we’re back from Militiagan, we got back last night. When we got home, Alex & Ronny were here so we watched The Leafs lose pitifully to the Penguins while eating steak & potatoes for dinner and reminiscing about the lovely ol’ US of A, where Ronny also happens to be from.

Oh yeah, since I missed several days of work, this post is going to probably be all over the place because I’m working all day today.

Anyway, blah blah Ronny & Alex, dogs were happy to see us, so was cat. Kids are still up North (Blake’s picking them up right now but I bet they’ll be back by the time I finish this post).

So obviously, if you’ve been following along, Blake’s grandma, who was 98 or 99, finally died. She’d been dying for a really long time, as long as I’ve known Blake, and this was like…”finally”. People were sad of course, but like I said in a previous post, I think there was also a lot of relief.

We left for MI Wednesday night after I was done work and the drive was pretty uneventful, no issues at the border which we were worried about because Blake’s US passport is long expired, I don’t even have one, and Blake’s permanent residence card for Canada is expired as well. But no issues so whatever. We stop at a gas station just outside the border in MI and there I found a TREASURE TROVE of goodness, behold my bounty (oh PS, this post will have a lot of pictures):

You cannot get these everywhere in Canada. I’m told other provinces MAY have them from time to time but you cannot get these in Ontario. I was very excited.

But nowhere near as excited as I was to see THESE:

I loved these. We used to have these. They stopped making them or distributing them in Canada in 2002 and when I learned of this, I went out and spent around $100 buying up every box I could find, hoarding them for like, 2 years. I was SHOCKED when I saw them at this MI gas station. So I bought 9 of them. Not 10 because that would have been the whole box and what if someone else wanted one? So I just got 9.

Did I mention that I love these? Remember that. We’ll come back to it later.

We got to our hotel at around, god I don’t even know, I want to say it was near midnight. Our hotel room was pretty cool, it had a fridge, dishwasher, 2 element stove and a microwave but we got the handicap suite so it didn’t have a bath tub and therefore all the Lush stuff I’d brought with me never got used. Didn’t matter, there was no time on this trip for Lush baths anyway.

As it turned out, Thursday was to be the wake/viewing (they called it a viewing, my family would call it a wake, I dunno if they’re the same thing, they sure seemed the same) and Friday was going to be the funeral, so we planned on staying until Sunday but I had a minor freak out Friday night after way too much stimulation so we decided to leave Saturday instead. But I’m getting way way way ahead of myself.

So Thursday morning, we got up early and Blake went to visit his friend Mandy and her baby while I got an hour of work in and then we had to get ready vite vite vite because the wake was at 2pm. This is what I wore:

Another Free People outfit (with my Docs) because when I leave the house, that’s basically all I wear.
The skirt is sort of a peachy sheer thing and the sweater is a charcoal grey that flows out over your bum.
I was paranoid the whole time that I was showing everyone my ass but Blake assured me I was not.
I wore beige underwear just in case. ;o)

The wake was…overwhelming. Blake’s family is Albanian (this was his dad’s side) and a lot of them are newer immigrants from the last 20 years or so. And there are a lot of them. I can remember who everyone was and more or less how they were related to Blake but it was a lot to take in all at once. It was nice though, that they included our family in the big boards Blake’s Aunt Pat had made with pictures of the whole family and all the grandkids and stuff and Blake’s grandma looked pretty good, probably the best open casket job I’ve seen to date (I hate open casket though, I think it’s gross). “The family” got there at 2 which meant Blake’s Aunt Pat, his dad (who’s a fuckbag) and his dad’s wife Kim (who’s a mega-cunt), his Uncle John and these cousins from New Hampshire that I’d never met before, Marc (nice, old guy), his son Boyce and Marc’s sister (I think?) Diana who is 72 and a total riot. I loved the crap out of her and honestly, without our kindred spirits connecting I’m not sure I would have made it through the whole thing intact.

There were deciding the order of the procession to the cemetery the next day and it was funny because Blake is the last Vulpe male and he took MY last name when we got married, therefore Wes the other “last Vulpe male” has MY last name as well, so we Blake told them what kind of car we drove and his name, Blake Crittenden, his dad like, paused and gave him a look because I think this was news to him and it was SO FUNNY. Anyway, we were 2nd in line for the procession with Blake’s dad, Kim, Uncle John and Aunt Pat in Blake’s dad’s car being first. Then Marc, Boyce and Diana behind us and other people all behind us.

At the wake I met about a hundred and fifty million people, namely the aforementioned Albanians, Blake’s Uncle or cousin (???) Nico and his daughters Tina and Helena who I HAD actually met before but that was 8 years ago now and honestly, they were teenagers them so I barely paid any attention to them. Now they’re all grown up. I’m not sure was Tina’s in college for but Helena is just starting her residency to be a neurosurgeon. SUPER nice girls. I added them on Facebook the night after the funeral and from what I can tell, the whole innocent thing isn’t an act. These girls, well, women I guess, don’t really swear or drink or show their boobs on the internet or anything even remotely controversial from what I can tell. So strange. But nice girls nonetheless, I really enjoyed their company.

Something I noticed almost right away is how close the Albanians are with each other, like, they’re a REAL FAMILY, like the Greeks I knew growing up, who were also mostly recent immigrants. And it makes sense that they’re so close, because all they’ve really had is each other and the church which is just so interesting to me because my family sucks, on both sides. I mean, don’t get me wrong, I’m GLAD AS HELL that I wasn’t raised in a religious environment, but our family plays so many psychological games and there’s so much bullshit it’s unbelievable and with the Albanians, there’s none of that. They just love each other BECAUSE they’re family and that’s just what you fucking do. Like I remember when Wes was born, Nico and his family sent us baby clothes for him and this was BEFORE I’d even MET THESE PEOPLE. But Blake was their family and that’s just what you do BECAUSE they’re your family.

And that whole vibe or attitude or whatever was SO strong and so prevalent at the wake and the funeral and the “thing after the funeral with food” (reception?) that I was actually feeling really weird about it. Like on one hand I was totally jealous over it because I’ve never had that and I didn’t even really know I wanted that until that moment but also I got kissed and hugged by so many Albanians who I didn’t know and they just automatically embraced me wholeheartedly. I married Blake and I am their family, no matter what. I’m probably not even doing the experience justice but it was POWERFUL and I find myself like, craving these people. It really makes me sad that Pat deleted her Facebook but I promised to keep in touch via e-mail, which I will do. I added Tina and Helena, like I said, and I’m looking forward to dancing at their weddings one day. As much as I hate going places and as much as I hate the border and as much as I hate blah blah blah come hell or high water I will stay in contact with these people, to the best of my ability, with the…well I won’t promise, but with the possibility of visiting as often as we can. As I can, I guess. They are my family, no matter what.

More about them later though, the funeral was Thursday and we had to get up at ass o’clock because Blake was a pallbearer, they decided, which meant we had to be at the church super early. I think like, 8:45am.

The night before we tried to watch The Kids Are Alright but were too tired to finish it so we watch the other half Friday night. It was alright, I hope it doesn’t win any Oscars tonight. I love Annette Benning and thought she was genius as always, but there are so many other deserving films…anyway….

So we were at the church right on time. Here’s what I wore, which you’ve already seen me wear with jeans but this time I wore it with a black tulle skirt that matched the tulle of the slip so I was super gauzy and I loved it:

The church thing was weird. This was only the 3rd or 4th time I’d ever really been in a church and I’d never ever been in a church like that with all these icons and the stained glass windows and a chanting/singing priest and bible stuff in Albanian and incense and doing the sign of the cross (which I don’t even KNOW) and kissing icons and crosses and shit. It was crazy! And I was SO tired and the incense was making me SO sleepy that here I was, sitting in the front row with the family (more on that in a sec) half falling asleep. Pretending I had my eyes closed to listen, so I’d nod and look contemplative from time to time but really I was just about falling asleep. lulz. Blake and I both felt really awkward sitting in the front pew with the family and being 2nd in line in the procession. See, at first, at the wake, Nico was kind of a little bit short with us and Blake thinks it was because Blake sort of moved to Canada and never visited and the family felt abandoned and rightly so. All was forgiven by half an hour later, if in fact that’s what that was about, but still, Nico and his family stayed by Blake’s grandma’s side until the very end and we felt that they should have been sitting where we were because who the hell are we? I mean, to hell with what’s proper and let’s go with what’s right! But Pat & John wanted us so we just did as we were told. I felt horrible though, I mean, I’m not even family.

And then there’s the fact that I barely even KNEW Blake’s grandma, she was pretty well far gone by the time I met her  but I found myself getting a little “misty”, we’ll say, at the funeral just because, I think, of all the love and warmth that was just pouring out of all these people. It was incredible, I’ve literally never experienced anything like it.

Blake’s Uncle John was sitting beside me and he was pretty upset so I just hugged him and wiped his tears and told him I loved him. He’s suffering (pretty severely, I’d say) from early onset dementia and it is SO sad. He’s probably the person on Blake’s dad’s side I know the best and he is (was?) such a great person and to see him so unlike himself and out of it broke my tiny, black little heart. More about that later.

I gotta hand it to myself though, for being smart. Before we got to the church, I made Blake stop at a CVS and pick up a bunch of those mini travel Kleenexes for people, which I think was appreciated. Blake’s dad asked me for Chapstick too, which I gave him because I always have at least 3 in my bag, but Blake’s dad has herpes so we threw it in the garbage when we got back to the hotel so I wouldn’t use it by accident. *shudder* Herpes aside, I was glad to provide, even if he is a shitbag.

Next was the procession to the cemetery.
Meet Blake’s dad:

Yes, that is his real license plate. It’s on his fucking Escalade.
I hear his penis is minuscule.

You would think a funeral procession would be uneventful, and it was, except that I think we drove halfway across the state to get to the cemetery and then GUESS WHAT? I WAS IN ROSA FUCKING PARKS’ MAUSOLEUM! (Which is also a memorial.) That’s where the cemetery part of the funeral was! Inside it! I asked Blake if his grandmother was being uh, I don’t know the word for it, like put in a drawer there or however they do it, and he said he didn’t think so but his dad’s like, a bajillionaire so it’s totally possible. I was in absolute shock, I didn’t even know the whole Rosa Parks thing happened in Michigan or that she was from there. You’re goddamned right I Foursquared that! lulz again.

Speaking of Foursquare, I am totally bummed out that I didn’t get a badge for being in another country. I feel cheated. Especially considering the fact that I spent over $50 on data usage while we were there because I don’t have a roaming plan. Oops. And Charlie even warned me about that too, but it snuck up in me. :o/

After the funeral was FINALLY finished all of its components, Blake and I went back to the hotel because I’d forgotten my phone and was hating the crap out of his Blackberry, then we went to this fancy restaurant with valet parking for the reception. We were basically the last people to get there, which was fine, and we sat with who I’d call the “core” Albanians and they all spoke Albanian with each other and pretty much ignored Blake and I for the most part, which was fine. Normally I’d be paranoid in a situation like that that they were talking about me, but I didn’t feel like they were and truthfully, I don’t really feel like they are that kind of people. The mom, Tonzi, married to Nico, was really nice to me and asked about the kids and stuff so I showed everyone last year’s school pictures, which I had in my wallet. Then they went back to speaking Albanian and ignoring me, which again, was fine. I didn’t mind, especially because George (pronounced gee-u-rgie in Albanian) doesn’t speak English.  The food was excellent and I because I’m a big fat sucker, I asked Blake to please give his dad, who he hadn’t spoken to in 7 years, the pictures of the kids I had in my wallet.  So now I don’t have pictures of my own kids in my wallet anymore but I think I made an old man happy so that’s okay. I have the genuine articles. Maybe he wouldn’t be such a shitbag knowing what he’s been missing out on these past 7 years, right?

Nope.

Well, let’s give credit where credit is due: Rudy has never been anything but nice to me to my face and the same with Kim but neither one of them is warm toward me in any way and they’ve both been awful to Blake for most of his life and that’s why I hate them.

On Saturday we went to Pat’s to have breakfast and Blake’s dad (Rudy if that wasn’t obvs) was there, much to Blake’s dismay, as was John, Diana and Pat’s friend whose name is completely escaping my brain at this present moment but it’ll come to me. She was very nice and it bothers me that I can’t recall her name right now. :o/

Anyway, Blake’s dad was basically bragging about Blake’s niece being invited to the Junior Olympics for skiing and how she goes to a “magnet school”, which I think is a private school, which no doubt he pays for, and that Blake’s other 2 nieces, who are babies right now, will go to the same school because the public schools aren’t good enough. I have issues with this line of thinking, but whatever. Then he got on Blake about being healthier and stuff and telling both of us to get into winter sports and basically lecturing Blake to be more active, which he;s been lecturing Blake about since Blake was a toddler. Just falling back into fuckbag territory after Blake hasn’t spoken to him in 7 years, like nothing ever happened.

Luckily he left before we had breakfast so after that, we just had a good time with everyone else. Diana, as I mentioned, is GREAT and both her and Pat cleaned me out of business cards (lulz once more! They’re probably reading this right now, aloha, ladies!) which I thought was cute and supportive. I haven’t decided which one yet, but I think I’m going to send Pat one of my paintings. I’;m thinking “Shimmer II” off the top of my head, but we’ll see. Anyway, a great time was had by all, I think, we just sat around and shot the shit and it felt so relaxed and NORMAL and I loved it. John made me sad because he’s just not John anymore, he literally acts like a clown, like if you dressed him up and painted his face and taught him how to make balloon animals, there ya go. Like he’d tweak your nose and make faces at you and strange sounds and stuff, never making a lick of sense. So sad. And scary because with Blake and I, that could literally be either or both of our futures. I’m wondering now if there’s a genetic test you can get done to see if that would happen to you and if you test positive, if there’s anything you can do to prevent it. I know I’m susceptible being bipolar but I also know that being medicated early in life (relatively speaking) protects me somewhat, or that’s what I understand from talking to our family doctor about this whole thing.

So that was pretty much the whole funeral/trip EXCEPT, Blake took me to a Meijer for the first time and this is everything we hauled home because we just don’t have this shit in Canada!

Generic brand American mixed nuts are a must because Americans are less healthy than Canadians, or at least they have less food guidelines, and therefore they have a LOT more salt on their nuts than we do. These were actually kind of a let down in this regard, CVS actually has the best ones, but they were still pretty great.

There are no Keebler elves in Canada, just Santa’s elves.
I’ve never had these before but they looked pretty good.

“Better Made” is a Michigan brand and Ronny wanted us to bring him home some “hot” Better Made chips, which we did, but these looked good too so I grabbed a bag. After trying them last night, I wished I’d brought home a zillion more bags because they’re delicious.

In case it’s not obvious, I like pretzels and these looked pretty rad. Rold Gold is my favoured pretzel brand, but we don’t have the variety the US has.

I actually got this at a gas station.
It was pretty weird and despite the fact that I generally like all things cinnamon, especially Hot Tamales, I didn’t care for this very much so I gave the rest to Alex.

Canada doesn’t have Pepperidge Farm.
When I was living in New York, my boyfriend’s work, which was a sound studio, bought P. Farm stuff in bulk for clients and we used to steal it constantly. I was bummed I couldn’t find the soft Sausalitos but ya take what ya can get.

We have Goldfish crackers in Canada, so it’s weird we don’t have everything else P. Farm, but again, we don;t have the variety of Goldfish the US has. There must have been 10 different types at Meijer. I got the neon ones for my little sisters, I hope Blake remembers to give them to them.

OF COURSE we have Jones Soda here, Jones Soda was invented in BC!
I’ve just never seen it in 1L bottles. Especially with “litre” spelled wrong.

Tra la la la la!

More Better Made chips and my sexy-assed husband:

This was a total let down. Not like theatre popcorn on all.

Then we went down the cereal aisle…

(I always get Cookie Crisp but this is a NEW ONE!)

I’m kinda surprised we don’t have this here.

Blake’s favourite.

GOOD SOURCE OF VITAMIN D!

And last but not least, the only thing I really cared about because we don’t have it here and I don’t understand why: Cherry and Vanilla Coke Zero

We’ve never really had Cherry Coke here so it’s not surprising that we don’t have Cherry Coke Zero here but we used to have Vanilla Coke, which you can still sometimes get, yet we have no Vanilla Coke Zero? I think it’s a travesty that we don’t have either of these in our fair country and that it costs a million dollars to ship because it’s so heavy and that you can’t ship it in the winter or they’ll explode.

And that concludes my post on the US of A.
Glad to be home.

Edit: Blake tells me Rosa Parks did the bus thing in Alabama but moved to MI later in life.

Last night I wasn’t able to sleep for some unknown reason (like I ever know the reason) and then today I was in a lot of endo pain so I was on heavy painkillers and that made me sleepy as fuck and the whole thing resulted in me only working a half day today, which sucks, because I’m going to have to make it up on the weekend, which I already work anyway. And while we’re on that subject, working weekends for the past 3 weeks non-stop really has my nerves frayed but there’s nothing I can do about it because I need the flex time for the metabolic clinic. As soon as that sucker’s over (the end of March), I’m taking a weekend off.

So basically I slept a lot today, then I went to bed tonight around 9pm, but only slept an hour and now here I am, unable to sleep again. When I see my shrink on Friday, I am going to MAKE her rx me sleeping pills because this scenario happens far too often and now with me working weekends too, I don’t even have a day off to recharge so I’m going to burn out very quickly.

The metabolic clinic yesterday was the first of two modules done by the dietician and what I basically took away from it was how your plate is supposed to be set up. Half your plate is supposed to be vegetation, 1/4 is supposed to be a starch and 1/4 is supposed to be protein.

Actually, that class was actually kinda boring so let me fast forward to the exciting part: before each class, they weigh us, take our blood pressure and measure our waists and while I’m not going to tell you my stats, this week I lost 3 inches on my waist. It was student nurses who did it this time and I was convinced they didn’t measure properly so I had the head nurse measure me again after class and low & behold, I’d lost 3 inches. I haven’t lost any weight though, but apparently before the weight starts dropping, your body starts to rearrange your fat so that’s what’s going on.

So whatever, yay me.

Creepy nurse boy was there this time and…he was weirdly animated, unlike the first class (he wasn’t there last week). He high fived me at the end of class and kept giving me sideways glances and he’s either got a crush on me or I had something up my nose or something. The first class his staring freaked me out but now I’m just kinda humoured by the whole thing. And who knows, maybe I’m reading way more into things than what’s actually there. (I still theorize that he’s maybe seen me naked on the internets or can’t figure out where he’s seen me before and it’s online…*cough*)

Well, that’s all I really have to report. I should get back into bed and hopefully get some sleep because morning comes early and I cannot have another day like today, tomorrow.

PS. The dietician liked my latest kwish recipe (ham instead of bacon, diet cheese instead of full fat cheese, broccoli instead of onions) and I madce copies, with caloric breakdown, for everyone in the class. It was very well received.

This post is going to be done in pieces because technically I’m at work, so I apologize if it’s disjointed. Just for posterity, I started writing this at 10:30am.

Last night my mom, John and John’s son Chris were here, delivering to us a new fridge and stove. We didn’t particularly need a new fridge and stove, but John had updated his and his old ones didn’t have a home, so I called dibs for the sole reason that if we included a fridge and stove with the sale of our house, we might get more money for it. I like the fridge we have (it’s the only appliance I’ve ever picked out myself, not counting the washing machine, which I picked out too, but based on the fact that it was cheap) so we’d take that one with us, but put John’s fridge in its place when we start showing the house and then tell people the stove comes with the house too. The next house we have will probably have a stove and if it doesn’t, we’re financially stable enough right now that we could theoretically buy a new stove.

I’m still not sure about the washer and dryer though. Our washing machine is only 5 years old and the dryer is old, it came with the house. So I’m thinking we’d leave the dryer but take the washer, if the new house doesn’t come with one or both.

My mom gave me a Maple Leafs puck and I started bawling. She hugged me and I almost snotted all over her coat. She said she wasn’t mad at me for not being able to stay at the Leafs game on Saturday. I feel better about the whole thing now because my mom and John being mad at me for wasting the tickets was my biggest fear. I mean, they were a gift and the best Xmas gift I’ve ever gotten at that, too, which made the whole thing sting even more.

Anyway, I don’t want to talk about it.

Yesterday I finished reading The Colour Purple, which I loved, but I knew I would because I love the movie. The book is different of course, but not by much, it’s just the relationships, really, that are richer in the book than in the movie. For example, lesbianism between Celie and Shug is only really hinted at in the movie, but it’s blatant and more fleshed out in the book. When I finished it, I kinda felt sad though. That book won the Pulitzer Prize when it was originally published and I’ll never write anything even remotely close to being that good as long as I live. I may write a book or two before my time is up, even if they’re published on a vanity press, but I know they won’t be at par with any of the books I love and that bothers me. The solution of course, is to do better, but I’m not sure I can. I just don’t think I’m talented enough for it.

Blake is though, but he never writes anymore. I’m half-assedly (not really) working on something, but even I can recognize it as basically pulp trash that’ll probably never see the light of day. My friend Robert is casually helping me make it better though, but I’m still only half-assedly working on it (for example, I still haven’t even read the whole thing, since I started writing it over 6 years ago; I’m reading books instead).  Blake and I are brainstorming on a writing project that I think has a lot of promise, but who knows what’ll ever happen with that. We have the kernel of an idea, a GOOD idea, but that’s about it.

Speaking of creativity, yesterday 13 new canvases and 12 x 16 inch watercolour paper arrived. The canvases I got because I only had 12 x 12 inch ones and I wanted ones that were long enough to make flying fairies and angels on. The big watercolour paper is for making girls to put on the 24 x 48 inch canvas I bought a while back. I can really only work on one project or thing at a time, for example, if I’m reading a book, that’s all I can do, if I’m working on a story, that’s all I can do, if I’m working on a painting, that’s all I can do, I can’t do any other activities – except maybe watching TV – outside of the thing I’m working on. I don’t know why this is.

Last night after I finished The Colour Purple, I started reading Room, so I guess that’s my project for the time being, although at this point it’s relegated to the bathroom so it’s possible I can work on something at the same time, but probably not a writing project. I also still have to read Robert’s book, which should probably take priority over Room.

I also want to go to Michael’s this weekend and buy up all of their glitter paper because that shit is magic and I’m terrified they’ll discontinue it. It’s cardstock encrusted with glitter. I used it on the angel’s gown that I put in my sketchbook for The Sketchbook Project. The stuff’s $3.99 a sheet but totally worth it, in my opinion. I have one sheet of every colour, but I want to get as much of it as I can for the painting projects I have planned for the year, the first of which is that giant canvas, except I can’t figure out a background for it or WHERE to work on it because it’s so big, so that’s why I haven’t done anything with it yet. I also don’t have a circle-draw-er that’s big enough to do big girls, so I have to get one of those too.  I’m hoping to find something that let’s you trace big circles, like the circle ruler I have, rather than the math kind of circle-draw-er because that leaves a pointy dent in the middle and my girls’ eyes will never be uniform if I use one of those and that’s no good. But now I have the right size paper and I’m going to be buying more glitter paper this weekend (hopefully) and then I have to figure out my circle dilemma.

~*IT’S ALMOST KWISH TIME*~

My kwish is done and is cooling on the other side of my desk. Lately I’ve been making it with only 2 eggs, cut up shaved ham, frozen broccoli (in the bottom), a touch of salt and what I call “diet cheese” because I never really looked at the package so I’m not sure what its deal really is. I think it might be made out of 2% milk instead of regular milk or something, but it has like, half the calories of regular cheese and about 1/3 of the fat. I haven’t reduced the caloric count of this type of kwish, like on paper, mostly because I’m lazy, but I know it’s a big less than the 400 calorie kwish I originally made with regular cheese and bacon.

I’ve lost 3 & a half lbs in 2 weeks just by eating kwish for breakfast and eating less junk food.

And this brings me to….the metabolic clinic I’m in.

~*THE METABOLIC CLINIC DEBACLE*~

Okay so it’s not really a “debacle” but so far it’s felt like one. Last Tuesday I had to go to the clinic for 2 hours, see a dietitian for an hour and right after that, see a recreation therapist for an hour and it was all just way too much for one day.

The first “module” of the metabolic clinic was about the metabolism and metabolic syndrome, which all of the participants, including me, have because of our medications.  Long story short, all of our metabolisms are now slow because of the medications we’re on and that has lead us all to gain weight and in some cases gain weight AND crave food where there were no cravings before. I don’t have the craving food thing but I did when I was on risperidone and olanzapine and that’s what caused most of my weight gain, along with the slowed metabolism at the same time. I know I’ve explained this before.

So the beginning of the first clinic module was introductions, which I can’t really tell you about because everything is supposed to be confidential and I’m choosing to respect that for the most part, and just telling my side of things. After introductions, which took forever because this one girl wouldn’t stop talking, Dr. D, the shrink who runs the clinic, along with 2 nurses, did a powerpoint presentation that was like an introduction to the clinic and what we’re going to be talking about, what’s expected of them, what’s expected of us. After she was finished, we took a break so the smokers could go out and have a smoke and snacks were served (not all of them healthy, I might add, which I found kinda fucked up) and also during this time, binders and pedometers were handed out. The binders contained a copy of Dr. D’s presentation, the one the nurse was going to give after the break and a copy of the next week’s (this week’s) presentation called “My Body and I”.

They told us they wanted us to keep a food journal and to wear our pedometers with the goal being 3k steps per day, which I laughed at because, yeah right…and that was pretty much the end of the first module.

Something noteworthy before I continue though, is that there was this guy in the group who was a nursing student and he kept STARING AT ME. Like, overtly. It was creepy and I don’t know what his deal was. I mean, it’s possible he’s seen me naked on the internet and that’s the connection, but whatever it was it was so obnoxious I almost didn’t go to this week’s module.

Anyway, after the clinic I had to see the dietitian who I disliked. Her whole deal was following Canada’s Food Guide, which I mostly think is bunk. She didn’t like my high protein, low carb diet and asked that I start eating toast with my kwish so that is what I’m doing to mostly humour her. I used to eat 2 pieces of toast with my eggs before, so I know it’s probably not going to hurt me, but I don’t see why it’s necessary considering I’m not hungry after eating kwish, but whatever, that’s what she told me to do so that’s what I’m doing. She told me about the “glycemic index” and therefore I’ve been eating wholegrain honey wheat toast every day after my kwish even though I think toast is disgusting and we’re even out of jam, so all I have to put on it is margarine, which is just *shudder*.  She also said that I’m not eating enough calories in a day but she got sidetracked and failed to tell me how many calories I SHOULD be eating per day. From what I’ve read online, I need 2000 to MAINTAIN weight, 1500 to LOSE weight. I usually end up eating about 1200-1300, often less, sometimes more, but on AVERAGE, 1200-1300. I usually aim for meals to be 300-400 calories and snacks around 100 (x2). I don’t eat lunch because it’s now almost 1pm and I just finished BREAKFAST. If I ate lunch a few hours from now, I wouldn’t eat dinner.

Anyway, she was boring, judgmental, holier than thou and mostly uninformative. She’d never heard of the paleo diet, she’d never heard of the Android app “Calorie Counter” where you can use your phone to scan barcodes and it’ll bring up the nutritional information and she wanted me to eat way more than anything I’ve ever read says I should. Blake didn’t like her either.

After we saw her, we had to go across the road and see the recreation therapist, which was mostly useless too. She gave me “homework”, which I’ll scan at some point, but I still have no idea what the point of seeing this woman was. She was nice, an optimist to the core but not in an obnoxious way, but ultimately useless to me, I think. I do recreation quite well on my own, I don’t need someone to help me with that. She was talking about super longterm goals, none of which had anything to do with losing weight or getting more exercise, which I appreciated, but I don’t need her help with my art goals, which is what she focused on. (Which which which.) I’m supposed to see her again in February for reasons I don’t quite understand and then hopefully I’ll never have to see her again. I mean, we’re not even going to be living in the area by the time these “goals” come around, so they’re empty goals anyway. Like, one of her suggestions was to do local art shows in the future, well for one, I wouldn’t do that and for two, where is “local”? Anything “local” is a waste of time and like I said, we’ll have moved by the time these things roll around anyway so making them and seeing this woman is just a waste of my time. In fact, I don’t even think I’m going to go see her in February, I thought the whole thing was that useless. Nice lady, but seriously not needed. I can see how other people might need her services, I just don’t.

So that was all last Tuesday. Then yoga was cancelled. (Booooo.)

This Tuesday was module 2, “My Body & I”, which was more about metabolism and really a more fleshed out version of the first one. Staring nurse boy wasn’t there, there was another nurse GIRL, so maybe we get a different one each time.

Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that they take our blood pressure, weight and waist measurement before each class. I won’t tell you what my stats are but this week their scale said I GAINED a lb (Wii Fit disagrees by -3 lbs) but I lost an inch on my waist. The nurse said their scale sucked and to go with what the Wii Fit said. She also said I could gain depending on where I am in my menstrual cycle and I’m only a few days away so that’s a possibility too.

My pedometer wasn’t working properly, so I had them switch it with a new one (they come from the government) but the screen was so faint I could only read the numbers if I held it at the right angle, so I gave up on it and on our way home I stopped off at Wal*Mart and got Blake and I each new ones. I’ll give the old one back to the people at the clinic.

According to my new pedometer that actually works, I average about 1500 steps just puttering around the house. I have no idea how I’m going to double that though. (And I’m not looking for suggestions either. That’ll just piss me off.) What I need is a treadmill that I can use during my newly imposed forced breaks from work. That way I could read while I walk and I wouldn’t get sweaty & need a shower after like I do on the elliptical, which I hate and will not use because of the sweat factor and the “not being able to read while doing it” factor and the “not enough time to watch something on TV while doing it” factor. Also I just hate the fucking thing and it’s mostly used as a coat rack. A treadmill I’d actually use and that’s what I wanted to get originally anyway, but the elliptical was cheaper so that’s what we got. Blake uses it occasionally and I use it never.

Anyway, blah, I don’t have the money for a treadmill so I don’t even know why I’m going on and on about it. I have no idea how I’m going to double my steps.

And that’s pretty much all there is to the metabolic clinic so far.  It’s apparently won all these awards and stuff but so far they haven’t told me anything I didn’t already know and the only thing they’ve really said to do to lose weight so far is to walk 3k steps/day. Next week and the week after, the dietitian is going to be doing her powerpoint presentations, so we’ll see what she has to say. Also included in the group is a pharmacist, who’s going to talk to us one-on-one about our medications, which again, may be helpful for some, but there’s not a whole lot I don’t know about the ones I’m on because I know how to use the internet. But we’ll see what she has to say, I guess. She seems to be the most knowledgeable out of all the “professionals” involved in this thing and drugs are interesting to me so I don’t mind seeing her even though I have very little to discuss with her.

I’m not sure what next week’s module is about but there are 9 weeks left. On Tuesdays I work 2 hours in the morning and 2 hours when I get back from the clinic and then I make up the other 4 hours by doing 2 hours each on Saturday and Sunday. I hate working weekends, it’s really starting to burn me out, but I don’t really have a choice and I’m fortunate enough to have a flexible employer so I can’t really complain. When the clinic is done, she wants me to take 1 or 2 hour breaks every day and make up 5 hours on weekends, which is what I meant by “forced breaks”. I was really upset when she proposed this and I still kind of am because working 7 days a week really is burning me out and frying my nerves, but if I need her to be flexible to do this metabolic clinic then I have to be flexible for her too. She said that if I needed a weekend I could work my normal 8 hour shift during the week and take one, but I won’t be able to do that for another 9 weeks because of the stupid clinic.

People have told me that I could have used this opportunity to get a raise, but I trust my bosses to reward me for good work done when they feel it’s time. I’ve only been working for them for 4 & a half months.

What else? Hrm…

Blake got me a card for the new hair salon that opened up in town and after the metabolic clinic ends, I’m going to make an appointment for a cut & colour and I’m going to walk there and back myself. Or at least that’s the idea. We’ll see how it goes.

And that’s really all I can think of at the moment, so I think I’m going to look at Lush stuff while I answer work e-mails.

Hi Everyone. This is Blake. Sunny asked me to make a post about last night for her because she’s having a really hard time with it.

As I’m sure just about everyone already knows, we had tickets to go see the Leafs play the Washington Capitals last night and as I’d assume you also know, Sunny has a difficult time going to places with a lot of people. Most times we have plans to go to an event of some sort, for however much time that leads up to it, she will often burst out with statements like, “I don’t want to go” or something similar. Then we talk about it for a while and in the end, after much calming conversation, we end up at the event. To be honest, with the initial reaction that Sunny had when we got these tickets, I thought we might not even have that, but it started to creep in a couple weeks ago.

Yesterday started pretty smoothly though.  Sunny had to work until 4:00 and we were planning on leaving at 5:00. She finished work and got ready and we headed out.  She was very quiet in the car, but she was keeping it all together. It took around 2 hours to get there and find parking, but we made it. We walked into the ACC and were directed to our section.  While we were navigating the crowd, I could tell that Sunny was really uncomfortable and she said as much.  I thought that once we got to our seats and sat down, she would get into the game and would start enjoying herself.

When we got to our seats, there was about 5 minutes or so left of the first period. We checked in on foursquare (obviously) and watched a little hockey.  The intermission started and we watched some little kids play a bit of hockey and then Sunny turned to me and said that she needed to go.  I looked in her eyes and I could tell she was starting to lose her grip.

We headed for the doors and back to the car as fast as we could and then she broke down. On one hand, the crowd was too much for her, but on the other hand, she felt absolutely horrible that she couldn’t make it through the game. She wanted to. She knew that other people wanted her to. She knew that I wanted her to. Despite all that, she couldn’t do it and she felt like a failure.

We headed home and have talked a lot. She felt like I would be mad at her because I didn’t get to see my first Leafs game. She feels like her mom and John will be mad at her for not staying for the whole game when they got her such an awesome present. She feels like the whole internet will think she’s weak and a failure for not being able to do something as simple as going to an event that she wanted to go to in the first place. She feels like she wasted the tickets by not giving them to someone else who would have gone to the game and enjoyed it. She said she’d never actually realized how bad her agoraphobia was until last night.

I can’t really speak for everyone else, but I have a different perspective on all this. First and foremost, I think that an event that is important carries more stress than something that is not. This game was a HUGE thing for Sunny and because of that, going to it carried a lot more anxiety than something like going to the post office. On top of that, there was a lot more crowd to wade through than any other event we’ve been to in years. There was also no back corner to hide in away from the crowd, which is usually what we do at events. And lastly, the lights were all on.  I think all these factors made this a much more stressful situation than others things that we’ve been to in recent years.

I give Sunny a lot of credit for getting her shit together, getting in the car and eventually getting all the way to her seat. I’d call it giving up if she said, “This is too hard, so I’m not going to even try.”  I have a lot of respect for her that. Despite having so much anxiety about it, she actually got there and gave it a shot and I think the internet will feel the same way. I mean, it’s easy to look perfect if you only do easy things. Taking risks means that everything won’t always go as planned and you need to take risks to grow.

I hate seeing Sunny so down on herself for something that she can’t help. I saw her completely fall apart when she had her psychotic break. I saw her so apart that I was worried she’d never put herself back together. I’ve never been so scared in my life. Since that time, I’ve seen her struggle through a metric shit tonne of adversity and take huge steps to get her life back together. She’s quit smoking, she quit drinking regular Coke and adjusted her diet to much more healthy eating habits. She’s started making art more consistently. She’s been writing more consistently. She’s doing all that with a full time job that contributes so much to the wellbeing of our household. I could go on and on about successes in her life and I have to give her full credit for all of them. She decides on something, focuses herself and takes action to achieve whatever her goal is. Not least in her list are the steps she’s taken to get out of the house.

Every year she’s doing more and more things to get herself out in public and some of those times are without me. The Leafs game was the step that was a little too big, but at least she gave it a shot. I told her that I have no problem waiting until she’s ready and then we can try it again. It’s not something that we’ll accomplish this week, but we’ll get there eventually. Yesterday wasn’t a failure to do something she wanted to do. it was a success for making the effort rather than just wimping out and not even trying. She got to her seat, she watched some hockey and that’s certainly an accomplishment.

I told Blake an hour ago that I was coming to bed but I got engrossed by this Salon article about “Mormon mommy bloggers” and now it’s 12:30am.

My head is killing me, my glands are swollen, my throat is sore and my eyes are burning with fever so I know I’m getting sick and I should get some sleep, especially since I have to work tomorrow (oh yeah, I work weekends now, which I’m absolutely not thrilled about, but adjusting…) but this article really got me thinking about my own blogging habits, especially since Madison learned CSS today and is creating a site of her own. (And no, I’m not telling you where it is, although some of you may have a pretty good idea and I’m pretty sure it’s Googleable. If you find it, please be respectful and remember that she’s 12, okay?)

So these Mormon ladies who blog…they have impressively designed sites and take really nice pictures (well, a few of them do, a few in the article not so much) and it’s all very aesthetic and I’m really really jealous of this. Hell, I’m jealous of non-Mormon ladies who blog and have all of those elements too because I don’t.

In the beginning, when I blogged on a website I created myself with a mix of hand-coding and Dreamweaver, with graphics I created myself in Photoshop (I was especially proud of my SunnySlut.com burlesque design that I was going to link in this post but apparently the index.html page is missing so all that’s there now is a useless index full of eBay crap my friend Nicole asked me to host in 2001), but blogging that way was difficult, especially since I was updating the site and Live Journal at the same time, eventually getting a paid Live Journal account so I could embed it into my site with javascript that never worked properly with comments and then finally I gave up because I was doing 5x the work fixing code instead of actually writing and living my life and that was when I made the move to WordPress (2007). WordPress themes are CSS and I don’t know CSS and I don’t have the time to learn CSS (but I wish I did) or the mental aptitude for retaining such nerdery so I rely on Blake’s skills to shape this blog into…what it is, which is extremely bare bones, yet functional, while I use a premade theme on my Live Journal, which gets a billion more comments and conversations on it than my WordPress blog ever does. (WordPress blog = SunnyCrittenden.com.)

Which brings me to the next thing: my site (blog, whatever) apparently gets on average about 2500 unique visitors, if I’m reading the Google Analytics correctly, so why the fuck aren’t any of them commenting here? The only comments I really get are from casual passers-by or ladies I know from art circles who come here every few months and catch up on my adventures in bursts. And the trolls of course, but they’re useless – yet dedicated! my biggest fans! – whose comments I don’t let come through because they’re just trying to negatively affect me. Admittedly, sometimes it works, but i still won’t give them what they want, which is attention, which I also suppose I’m giving them now. *sigh*

Moving right along…

So I’ve been doing this blog thing for a decade. And a lot of people have been following my antics for that long and I think that’s sort of a weird accomplishment. It kind of pisses me off to see these hipster mommy bloggers, Mormon or otherwise, get featured in things like Salon articles or The Huffington Post or the New York times and all these other places when there are so many of us who have been doing this longer and (I’m not necessarily including myself here), better. In the comments of the Salon article I linked, there are a lot of people saying that the Mormon ladies’ blogs are glossed over and not true portrayals of their lives and after reading a few of them tonight for a while, I think I’m going to have to agree, whereas myself and the ladies I chill with, we show the good, the bad and the ugly, right along with the joyous events and happy things (another confession: I know in the past I’ve been very negative in my writing because I was depressed, don’t forget that I’m A) a human being and B) a mentally ill human being). I think out of all of the lady bloggers I know, I’m probably the biggest over-sharer of the bunch.

DON’T GET ME WRONG: I am NOT complaining that I haven’t been recognized by legitimate mass media or anything of the kind, it just bugs me that old schoolers, SUCH AS myself, get passed over for web 2.0ers. Y’know? Like all these YouTube “celebrities” have their own fucking Wikipedia articles that no one argues should be taken down because none of them have really “done” anything, yet my friend Steph the Geek’s Wikipedia article was taken down several times because people complained it was a vanity article when in fact, she’s done a HELL of a lot more than these YouTube brats. Cam culture is actually this huge, sort of integral thing within internet history, yet the only camgirls I know, the forebears of YouTube itself, who have their own Wikipedia articles are Jennifer Ringley, Ana Voog and Steph the Geek (who, as I said, had to fight to keep her article up, see the discussion of it to know what I’m talking about.) And for the love of kittens, I am NOT complaining here that I don’t have a Wikipedia article so please do not even go down that road. I have done NOTHING to merit such a thing and it bugs me when people in the past have suggested I have. My only real claim to fame, so to speak, is that…fuck, I don’t even know. I don’t really think I have one, to be perfectly honest.

I’m babbling, I know. I’m sick and I’m having “racing thoughts” and I totally forgot what the point of this post was.

I do know that it involved what I like to call a “site overhaul” that I’m hoping  to execute sometime in March with Blake’s help and possibly my friend Charlie’s excellent banner-making skills. The colours will probably remain the same because they are my colours and the “feel” probably won’t change, but I’m hoping to add more graphical elements and a better comment system. (Blake’s going to hate that I just said the latter because he spent a long time making the comments system I have now…) The reason I don’t have a more graphic website, as in a website with more graphics, is because I don’t know how to add them myself, which is another thing I’m hoping to remedy. For example, my sidebars are ALL text and the reason they are all text is because that’s all I know how to do. In my WordPress control panel, I have menus and buttons and shit that allow me to add links and things to my sidebars but in WordPress, I would have no idea how to add a .png in the sidebar that links to something. When my sketchbook for The Sketchbook Project gets digitized, I will have my own link on the project’s site where you can see it and where you can see my bio and pictures of my other work and things like that, so when that goes live, I would like to have in one of my sidebars a graphic from The Sketchbook Project (they are free and available), which I can link to that. Without having to ask Blake to do it.

I guess this is a resolution of sorts, to be more independent with my own…is it work? I’ve always sort of considered it work but at the same time it’s absolutely compulsive at this point so it’s just BEING. THIS RIGHT HERE is how I function, how I process my own thoughts. I absolutely cannot imagine my life without this outlet.

I don’t know if I’ve ever acknowledged this out loud, so I’m going to do so now: I think a BIG reason as to why I became a housebound agoraphobe (currently in recovery) is because on these here internets, at least in the places I frequent, I’m somewhat of a big fish. Meatside, not so much. On the internets, I have a lot of control over the environment and the interactions I have. Meatside, not so much, everything’s completely unpredictable and most of it is beyond your control. I hate that. On the internet, you can think before you speak/type (although I basically DON’T *grin*) but meatside every human interaction tends to be completely awkward, or at least that’s been my experience.

OH, y’know what? I made a phone call on Friday. To most people this is not a big deal in the slightest, people make phone calls every day, right? Well I don’t. i think the last conversation I had on a phone was with Alex maybe 2 months ago. The time before that was with Alex maybe 6 months prior to the last one. Basically the only person I talk to on the phone is Blake and I don’t even like to do that, especially now that he has his new job, which, by the way, I fucking hate because he’s not as accessible as he used to be and he’s a lot more stressed out/snippy.

And I’m totally straying from the point I was going to make in the paragraph previous to the last one, but I’ll get there eventually.

Friday I called my mom. See, I was supposed to mail my sketchbook for The Sketchbook Project on Friday because that was the deadline. I bribed Madison with Lush products to get home after school as soon as possible to run my sketchbook down to the post office before 4:30pm so it would be postmarked on time and I would have an extra half day to put the final touches on it. Since parts of my book got ruined, I was stressing hardcore Friday morning. I woke up at 6:15am because I could smell smoke in the house, as if someone had had a cigarette in my kitchen despite the fact that neither Blake nor I smoke anymore, but as it turned out there was a rogue pistachio that fell from the top cupboard into the bottom of the stove’s element and that caught on fire when Blake was making his coffee before work. I was glad though, that I was up early because I start work at 10am usually and being up so early meant that I could put arms on my girls in the sketchbook and have them be totally dry by the time Madison was to run like a crazy kid to the post office with my precious precious sketchbook.

By 9am I was stressing over this fucking sketchbook because it wasn’t perfect anymore but when I went to the project’s website to get the address I was supposed to mail it to, I saw that they extended the deadline to MONDAY. OH DEAR SWEET BABY JESUS WHO I DON’T EVEN BELIEVE IN, I was SO relieved. I knew my mom was stressed out about it too because we’d been talking about in on Facebook all week (she and a bunch of her friends were all doing it too) so I posted the link to the page that had the extended deadline on Facebook so my mom would see it but then I was afraid she wouldn’t see it in time and would mail her sketchbook out anyway, so I called her in her new home with John, where she’s been living for 2 years (or maybe 1? I dunno) and where I’d never called before. And we talked for about an hour, which is the longest conversation I’ve had on the phone in YEARS. Literally. It would have been longer but I was already half an hour “late” for work (the bosses don’t REALLY care what time I start, as long as I do the amount of hours I’m supposed to during the day so it was no big deal) so I cut it “short”.

This is totally fucked up, I know, but it’s also why I see a shrink once a month, but that phone call mentally exhausted me. Like, I needed to recover from it. One meatside (so to speak) social interaction messes with me and if I have too many “things” in one day, I can’t deal so I freak out completely and need extra psychiatric medication and lots and lots of “quiet time” to come down from it. I’m strong as an ox in some respects, but a fragile flower in others. I also get obsessed with time and I have no scope of how long things take because I’ve been homebound for so long, but that’s probably best saved for another post.

So back to my whole “I’m basically an internet addict” thing. As I’ve mentione din previous posts, I’ve been using Foursquare as an immersion therapy tool, the goal of which is to rank on the leaderboards against my friends and to earn stupid badges that are not even real. It’s dumb, I know, but it works and the people who follow me on Twitter (and now Facebook) seem to like following me around as I check in places. (Although not everyone is happy about it, I know Alex filters Fourquare posts out of her Twitter feed.) Foursquare is the ENTIRE reason I spent most of my first paycheque on a $700 smartphone, which probably sounds absolutely insane to most people, but you have to factor in the fact that I *am* somewhat insane and everyone told me that I should spend my first paycheque, being my first paycheque EVER, frivolously, so I did. And I saw it as both a tool for combating agoraphobia, but also as a means to take my internet friends with me wherever I went. No matter where I was, I could read Live Journal and comment, I could check my e-mail accounts, I could even watch the naked ladies uploading cam pics on Camwhores.com from a hospital emergency room when Alex’s brother lost HIS mind. (Which is still lost by the way, but that’s a whole other post and not really my story to tell so if Alex writes about it publicly I’ll just link that if anyone cares about the rest of that story.) Now that the internet was portable, I felt more empowered to leave the house because if anything awkward happened or whatever, I could tweet about it and have 5 people tell me it’s okay or give me a pat on the back for getting through it. The phone also has the most obnoxious alarm ever created which is necessary for me to get to work on time. My phone isn’t just a phone, it’s a tool of survival. Flame me all you want for being materialistic in this regard but keep in mind that prior to this year, the most I left the house was maybe, MAYBE once a month, now it’s usually every 4 days. I still can’t go anywhere by myself, but I think once life circumstances change (long story) things will improve in that area.

Having said that, a new hair salon opened up down the street from me and I’m considering, now that I’m being forced to take a 2 hour break from work every day so I can work on weekends *grumble*, having professionals dye and cut my hairs from now on as opposed to good ol’ L’Oreal Blondissmes and a prayer. Oh yeah, and letting a 12 year old cut my hair and giving me “layers”…I’ve been thinking about this for weeks but I don’t know the salon’s name or phone number and they’re too new to be Googleable or in the phone book so until I have that name and number, nothing can happen but I don’t know how to obtain that information. I supposed I could ask Madison to write it down on her way home from school. My point though, is that I’m taking steps and if I don’t do it  my way, it’ll never happen at all so people have no place to give me flack about it. (Not that anyone IS at the moment, I’m just being pre-emptive.)

By the way, my head is KILLING me and I should be sleeping. I’m not sure I can though. :o/

So these things, plus a billion more, are what’s keeping me up right now. I probably sound manic, but I’m not, just overly thoughtful and rambly and sick. It just kills me that these “Mormon mommy bloggers” are getting like, 50+ comments on each post they make and I wonder what kind of traffic they get or why that’s happening while my blog (not including posts x-posted to Live Journal) gets maybe one comment every 4 posts. Is it maybe because their blogs are connected to a network of churchy folk and mine is sort of in limbo? Like really, who IS my audience? At this point I have absolutely no idea who I’m writing this all for. I mean, myself obviously, although I don’t re-read my own posts, and Blake reads most of it and I think my mom does too and a few “internet friends” do, but for the most part, I have no fucking clue who you people are. And I’d like to, so tell me dammit. Tell me who you are. I can tell my IPs where people live, but that’s so little information as to who a person is and what their deal is and why they’re reading that I don’t even bother to look them up anymore. Live Journal people I mostly know because they of course have LJs too and at least half of them actually use them beyond reading purposes.

A few months ago, a few months in a row, my site became unaccessible mid-month because I was reaching my allotted bandwidth usage, which was a first. I asked Kevin, my good friend and site host, why this was suddenly happening and he said that it appeared as though people were going through my gallery a lot. He raised my bandwidth usage so these outages wouldn’t happen anymore, but it made me wonder why suddenly apparently a lot of people or at least more than “usual” were going trhough my gallery which really only exists because I don’t have or use ftp software. I upload things to the gallery to link in posts and that’s literally the only reason it exists. It seems to me that the only real motivation for going through my gallery would be to get to know me better which would appear to mean that maybe either new people were coming to the site who were unfamiliar with my, uh, work, or old people were…I don’t even know. Anyone got a theory as to why this might be happening? Because I haven’t the foggiest idea and found it very peculiar. Truthfully though, I haven’t looked at my Google Analytics in a long time because the stats really weren’t that interesting anymore. Hardly anyone links me because of my Camwhores connection and unpredictability/lack of filters, particularly when it comes to FUCKING language. I know a ton of girls with sites, a lot of whom I consider good friends, but my site doesn’t fit in with theirs because most of them are porn or pay-for-porn sites and their customers/viewers don’t wanna read my shit, they just want to see tits. And sometimes I show tits, which means my more straight-laces blog friends don’t link me either because their readers only want safe for work content, so I’m kinda fucked as far as linkage. Y’know what my primary source of traffic is? Steak and Blowjob Day because I wrote a stupid article about sucking cock in like, 2002, that apparently is very helpful. My site has very little to do with sex anymore and it 95% safe for work, but I keep that article and the ones like it up because those seem to be the crowd-pleaser and are a good place to put my Camwhores affiliate links.

The reason I bring up links is because links are where traffic comes from, traditionally, yet my traffic is all mostly independent; people coming here directly from my url, presumably bookmarked. I find this baffling. WHy are they so quiet? SPEAK UP! New blood comes from Steak & Blowjob Day and Camwhores and they’re not exactly looking for fairies, angels and mermaids, pictures of kids, videos of Blake doing stupid things and 4,000 word blog posts about basically nothing so I’n guessing most of them don’t stick around. HOWEVER, these people have to be the ones going through my galleries and eating up my bandwidth so WTF?

I just find it all very confusing. Nothing I do is linear or even all that explainable and I think I’ve always been clear about the fact that I have absolutely no idea what I’m doing on these here internets. Not a whole lot of what I do is really all that intentional and as I mentioned, most of it is compulsive.

~*A FEW DEEP BREATHS & AN ATIVAN LATER*~

Usually I don’t kill myself like this trying to figure it all out, I just let it BE and most of the time I’m okay like that, but nights like tonight I just want it all explained to me. I want to know who these people reading are and why they’re reading. Maybe if I knew that I could make this a better experience for them but maybe they all remain silent because they don’t want to interrupt or make me change a thing. I have no idea. Maybe they’re shy? Maybe they hate my crude comments system? WOuld it be better if people had to register to post on my site? Like have an account? Because I think that’s possible with WordPress…somehow. Like if people could post using their Facebook accounts or their openIDs or whatnot, maybe I’d get more comments? (Does this sound like I’m begging for comments? I hope not because that’s not what I’m going for here, I’m just trying to figure out why, if so many people read my crap on any given day, they are so damn quiet. What are they thinking? Why don’t they make contact? Am I an alien being viewed from the outside of a glass bubble or what?) I just wish I had some help understanding it all. Comments, maybe introductions, would help me understand it all but no matter how many times I’ve mentioned this phenomenon, nothing ever changes. The explanations don’t come.

OH! I KNOW! E-mail me! Sunny@SunnyCrittenden.com Make the subject line something topical though, like “HEY SUNNY, READ THIS!” because I delete most e-mails from people I don’t know without opening it because I don’t use anti-virus software and I’m paranoid about spam and viruses. Kevin or someone told me once that some of these e-mails I get are like “tester” e-mails where the person or company or bot or whatever that sent it would know if I clicked on it to open it or not and if I did, they would know that subject lines like that work so they’d use them on other people more often so I delete most e-mails that are suspect without opening them for that reason. Now that I’ve written that out, it sounds like someone probably fed me a line of bullshit and now that I think about it, I’ve no doubt deleted e-mails from real people who read my site. The key, I think, to getting me to open a piece of e-mail that’s legit is to use my name in the subject line or something. If anyone felt inclined yet doesn’t want to “share with the class” in the comments, totally feel free to e-mail me. I went through a phase a while back where I was getting a TON of e-mail, mostly from horny guys who had seen me naked, so I stopped replying for quite a long time to discourage e-mail, but I think I’m in a place where I’m ready and eager to begin receiving it again.

Something else I’ve been debating this week is my address. Now that I have a job, I have the means to get a PO box again, which is, I *think*, $120/year. I haven’t had one for the past couple of years because no one was sending me anything and my only income was from paintings and Camwhores, which doesn’t amount to a whole lot. My painting money allows me to replenish my art supplies and to get Blake & I Starbucks, which is right across the road from Michael’s and Curry’s (which is an art supply store that is having a 25% off canvases sale this weekend that I totally forgot about until now and hopefully I can get there tomorrow because I suddenly feel the urge to paint on irregular sizes canvases rather than square ones…holy tangent…)…and my Camwhores money is only about $20-$50/month and I usually buy my own food with it, like popcorn at the movies when Blake earns free movie passes through his work. My point is that until now, my earnings have been extremely meager and I think there are people out there who want to send me mail. It’s just this feeling I have and without going into details, I do have evidence to support this theory. SO this is why I would want a PO box.

HOWEVER.

I am of the belief that the world would rather hug you than hurt you and a large part of me doesn’t think it would be dangerous or reckless to publish not only my home address on my website but a link to my house on Google Maps so everyone can see the street view not just of where my house is but my whole town, especially if we move to where I want to move, which I happen to think is a very interesting town. My mother-in-law is probably reading this right now and shrieking in her head that this is a horrible idea and that if I do this I’m endangering the lives of my children, which is debatable I suppose; in the past she’s given us/me grief about not editing out our house number when I take pics of the front of the house. I actually DO edit out our house number 95% of the time, but sometimes I forget or I figure no one cares so I just leave it. I mean really, who wants to stalk me anyway?

At the same time, I am really really paranoid about kidnappers and stalkers. I never used to be but then I got this persistent troll whose IP is from Toronto and that made me worry a bit more. If my kids aren’t home by 4pm, I freak the fuck out and have 911 on speed dial because I know time is critical in kidnapping cases. I know Wes wouldn’t be prepared if something happened, meanwhile Madison would be because I’ve drilled it into her head that there are a LOT of strangers who know a LOT about her and that puts her at risk. I think it’s a very slim risk, but it’s still present. She and I have discussed this risk at great length and we’ve come to the conclusion together that yes, the risk is slim, and she’s fine with me sharing things about her anyway as long as she gets final approval (most of the time) and I’m getting off topic again…

So, people of the internet, do you think I should pay for a PO box that may or may not ever get used? Or do you think it’s safe to put my home address, which wouldn’t cost me any money, on my website? Is the Google Maps idea going too far? I should also mention that one of the “Mormon mommy bloggers” has her home address on her website, which I found interesting, and she’s basically doing a whitewashed version of what I’ve been doing for 10 years so…also I haven’t really discussed the address/PO box thing with Blake so I don’t have his take on it yet either. I’m just curious as to what my more internet savvy friends think of this.

And I think that’s the end of my babbling for tonight. If I continue I won’t get up in time to be finished work at a reasonable hour to make it to Curry’s to buy discounted canvases and possibly to go see True Grit AND be home in time for the season premiere of Big Love. If I don’t wake up in absolute misery healthwise…we’ll see.

By the way, this post is 4,854 words long. I think that may be a record. Kudos to your attention spans.

~*Goodnight internets.*~

- Life is pretty good right now.

- Slooooowly but surely I am making progress on a couple of paintings while mentally plotting the 24 x 48 inches of gallery stretched canvas I have sitting in my office.

- I am getting really really good at my job.

- My sleep schedule is getting a bit better yet I’m still sitting here an hour past bedtime waiting for Ativan to dissolve, so there is that.

- Ronny is painting the kitchen, it’s almost done and it looks good.

- Pomegranates.

- I farted during yoga tonight and survived. (No one heard, THANK GOD.)

- I’m reading The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini and can barely put it down. I also loved A Thousand Splendid Suns but I think I like The Kite Runner better. I think they’re making it into a movie.

- Tonight I watched the movie The Virgin Suicides, which I’d seen before and liked and knew it was based on a book, but had no idea until I went to add the movie to my wishlist that the author of the book was Jeffrey Eugenides whose book Middlesex is in my top favourite books of all time. The Virgin Suicides is now a must-read.

- I hold 10 different mayorships on Foursquare. Wut wut.

- Xmas shopping is allllllmost finished. This is helping with my yearly holiday stress induced freak out.

- The Walking Dead is so close to my nightmares that I require my night time dose of anti-anxiety medication an hour early or I can’t watch it. One episode I had to watch during the day because it just wasn’t happening before bed.

- I discovered during yoga tonight that part of my left calf is numb and still is 5 hours after discovery so that has me a little worried about a possible blood clot or some other dire affliction.

- Got paid today, so that’s awesome.

- Madison had to go to the hospital to get her ass x-rayed on Friday because her friend thought it would be HILARIOUS if she pulled Madison’s chair out from under her when she went to sit down. Thank god Ronny happened to be here so he could pick up the kids since Blake’s now 2 hours away.

- A very good friend of mine was just hired by the company I work for and she’ll be working with me. This is super extra awesome for about a million reasons.

- I need to be sleeping in the next 7 minutes or I won’t have a good tomorrow, so that is all.

I needed inspiration so tonight we went to Michaels’ with no real plan in mind except loosely “jewels, paint, paper & lace” because when you walk in the store, that’s the route we usually take to get to the important stuff.

I wore one of my new sweaters that Charlie got me for Xmas. :o)
Nice Tampax in the open medicine cabinet, huh?

The sweater is actually more grey than it appears in this picture.
I have no idea how the children get this mirror so messy. What are they doing, whipping their hair back & forth?

This picture shows the colour of the sweater better:

It also shows off my other pair of new glasses, which I don’t think you guys have seen yet.
Also, my boobs.

I wore one of my GlitzGlitter necklaces.
That one’s a pink Swarovski crystal.

But really the whole reason I’m making this post is because I found something really awesome at Michael’s that I don’t think I’ll use any time soon, but I had to buy them anyway.

GUESS WHAT THESE ARE?

Did you guess LEAVES?
Well I suppose you’d be right if you guessed leaves for that is what they actually are, but when *I* saw them, know what I thought they should be?

WINGS.

Inspiration was therefore a complete success, even though we never found any lace, which I’m almost completely out of. We also never found wide tulle ribbon with flecks of silver in it, which I use for my fairy wings and I’m almost out of too. :o/ I got white tulle ribbon with silver glitter embedded in it which is okay but not what I wanted at all and now that it’s home and being compared to what I’m almost out of, I don’t think it’s wide enough for what I use it for. I also got wide white tulle ribbon that just happens to be shiny and thought maybe I could splatter paint it with silver, like with a toothbrush or something, all at once. Just lay out out outside before it snows and do it all up at the same time. It’s a thought anyway.

I also bought coloured staples, which I’d wanted for my grant proposal but couldn’t find, tiny pink and blue Swarovski crystals to be used as bindis. I also got larger ones that look like diamonds. Two tubs of varnish, although when I came home I realized I already had three tubs in my paint box and one on the go so I’m probably good for that at the moment. I just get so nervous that they’re going to discontinue the stuff so I buy one or two tubs every time I’m there just in case. What else did I get? A silver chain that’s going to be used in a mermaid painting, I think. PINK DUCT TAPE for no real reason other than it was PINK FUCKING DUCT TAPE. Red satin roses which will be used when I finally start doing my burlesque dancers. LOTS & LOTS of paper, including glitter-encrusted paper that was $3.49 a sheet. A lot of metallic cardstock in all kinds of colours because I use it a lot. A few different shades of red and yellow paint, as well as a gold colour that I didn’t have because they didn’t have the gold colour I actually wanted but the one I got was close enough that it doesn’t matter.

Then I bought Blake Starbucks and I got dinner at KFC on the way home. Pretty uneventful, but all the stuff I got has me fairly fired up to get some paintings done so I suspect that’s what I’ll be doing tonight and tomorrow.