I'm OK with that.

"When the rain comes, they run and hide thier heads, they may as well be dead, when the rain comes."

I just found the vinyl 45 of my favorite cover of that song. It makes me happy. However, the rain that will be here for the next three days seems to scream..."update your computers while you can't go outside." I've been postponing this task for weeks. My desktop fan is on constantly and very loud. My laptop is still running Windows ME. It's also missing the "M" key, but I've begun to find that a charming quirk. So, now the rain is here, I'll run and hide my head, and try to do a little digital Spring Cleaning.

My plan was to get out on the bike this weekend and try and loosen up my winter knees. I will not be riding in the rain. My bike. I had this scheme to trade-in my bike, which is too small, and treat myself to a new hybrid that actually fit me. I shared this intention with my soon-to-be-X husband. He was very supportive of the idea. I actually believe that he is still trying to justify spending a few hundred dollars on his own biking interests last year. These interests, incidentally, included his extremely fit friend. I made all my arangements to bring the bike to the hip, local, bike shop and he (the soon-to-be-X) calls me and says that he just happened to be talking about my trade-in plans and someone has a hybrid that would fit me, and would I be interested, therefore avoiding the expense and the hassle (fun) of shopping for something for myself.

Considering my finances, this seems like a good idea. He leaves it in the garage for me to check out in the afternoon. It does fit perfectly. It is not hip, it is not new, but it's free. Next week I'll be riding around on my soon-to-be-X husband's girlfriend's hand-me-down not fancy bike. ...but I'm OK with that. Now I can spend the money I planned for the bike?..... on a tatoo.

It's time for a new chiropractor

Traveling for thirteen hours with a suitcase and a backpack on planes, rental cars and running through the airport in my clogs caused some twisting and turning of the vertebrea in my back and neck. This is not new. I am grateful that the hiking and vacationing were painfree, but it means that I was off to the uber-Republican chiropractor today. The assistant rubbed the stinky vapor cream on my back while she told me all about rebuilding her four wheeler. Then the doc came in and told me two of the EXACT SAME stories that he told me last time I was there. I was simply trying to stay relaxed as he suddenly used all his force to twist my neck into unatural positions, making frigntening (but gratifying) cracks and pops. Then, for some reason, he went off on Paris Hilton. This surprised me, both in it's random introduction to his monolgue and the general content. You see, he was explaining that Americans are not as mature as Europeans. He was saying how unfortunate it is that our young people aspire to the likes of celebrities for hire. The interesting part was the number of details he had commited to memory about her daily life. He could tell me which clubs paid her the most to show up and get photographed dancing at thier place. He even knew where she parked her private jet when she was in Miami. Then the kicker....he says "I read People magazine every Monday, and I can't believe all the things she does. I don't understand how she became a celebrity."


It's time for a new chiropractor.

home from UK

Pubs and Mountains, pubs and mountains. Coffee transitions to Tea which transitions to beer. This is a good way to regulate a life. The was beautiful. Audioslave and Foofighters were my constant soundtrack while I hiked and drank, hiked and drank.

Spaghetti straps or Snow Boots?

Snow. Snow and Ice. Snow and Ice and School. Snow and Ice and School on the day before the Spring Vacation starts. I have a sore throat. I am getting on my first international air flight ever in two days and I have a sore throat. Happy and Angry. Happy about vacation, angry that there is a nor'easter scheduled to arrive in the same hour that my plane is scheduled to depart. Good Luck, Bad Luck. Fate or just pain-in-the-ass reality. My eleven year old looked like a 14 year old when she showed up at the kitchen table in camflouge pants and a black spaghetti strap tank. I explained calmly that this was not an option for school. She called me names and changed her shirt. Then walked out into the 6 inches of wet snow in her slip on canvas sneakers and no socks. I said nothing about boots. I am a good Mother.

Blog worthy?

Dreams are beginning to annoy me. Problem solving in my subconscious is hard to avoid. I mean, I try to run away in the dream, and it just leads to some other revelation. There are these three locations in my dreams that haunt me. I suspect they have been locations for my dreams for a long time, but today I can recall each of them in a way that I haven’t before.

A bridge that’s a little bit like the Hoover dam, a little bit like the old Mystic River Bridge, and a little bit like the GW. There is no easy way into the flow, you have to cut across lanes, and if you don’t do it just right – you end up facing five lanes of head-on traffic. Somehow this process happens over and over in my dreams. Reminiscent of Blade Runner.

Next location, walking in a city with sky scrapers, in my mind – I know that it’s Las Vegas, but it’s on a hill, which makes no sense at all. There are always two major hotel casinos, one were I’m staying, one were I’m working. There is always elevator confusion, friends I can’t find because they are on the wrong floor and there is someone in danger that I can’t get to. The hotel has a big lobby, and a lounge with a grand piano, but no one playing it. There a fern bar, it’s all so vivid.

The third regular location of these dreams is a multilevel subway station. There are ramps, and a token booth with a scary fat lady. I can never see around the corners. Waves of people pass through in phases. When I’m there I’m usually trying to connect with my brother, and I am never sure which train I’m looking for, so I keep walking around and “just missing” the trains when they leave the platform. The station is the era of the Warriors (1970’s) definitely New York.

In each of these places I am never afraid, always nervous. I meander through them knowing that I just need to focus and I’ll be able to solve the mystery.

Blog-worthy sharing? No, just rambling, but this is what’s on my mind today, so this is what is blogged today.

Bon bons and beer

Easter bunny has come and gone. He didn't re-do my bathroom, or repair the vacuum cleaner, but the kids are happy. I spent two days with the "X-husband" - not "X" yet, but you get the idea. We went to his brother's house and saw a collection of his siblings and thier kids. The most akward part, his MOm gave me a big hug, and she won't speak to him. I guess she has a problem with the whole "other woman" thing, who d'ave thunk? Apparently the whole fam damliy has decided that nobody's gonna tell the Grandmother, who is two years past 100, about our "troubles". It was decided (by a bunch of other people) that she wouldn't be able able to handle it, and we could just fake it for a while. They are probably right, but there is a tiny part of me that wonders how he'd handle the rejection from his own grandmother. He seems to think that everyone is going to just tell him how happy they are for him. Unfortunately, that's not how things have been going.
I'm still waiting for the damn snow to melt. I don't run, I just don't. I don't have the time or the money to join a gym. If I want to go fast it will be on a motorcycle or a fast little sailboat. One person (me) and an aparatus that glides, I skate fast, I ride fast, I do NOT run fast. The only hope I have of any fitness of any kind is riding my bicycle (and I'm not a crazy college student riding in the 28 degree crispy morning air). So the f-ing snow has to melt before I can begin to work off the something fried with cheese meals that are a highlight of mud season around here.
Someone recently told me to "visualize what I want" and pursue it. So I'm visualizing a pub, a walk in the hills, sleeping in, and writing in a little composition notebook, and being alone. If I put all that together, I know what I want. I want to go on vacation so I can walk to a pub, drink beer and write in my little notebook for as long as I please. The good news is; that's exactly what I'll be doing next week - - - so I can manage a few more days with my faulty ipod, carple tunnel, and love handles. It's bon bons and beer in the UK for me soon enough!

The Easter Bunny can take care of it

Money stress sucks. It's that simple. I mean, I've had some spectacular emotional growth and self analysis breakthroughs (as well as professional analysis, don't worry). Just when I get a real sense of self-worth, and take joy in the sunrise, and laugh with my kids....I get the news that daughter number two needs even more orthodonture than daughter number one. shit. Money stress sucks.

Went shopping with the younger today, she needs running shoes (not a sport I have ever understood, but she's starting in a jogging club on Monday, and she's eight!). So running shoes, and of course the goth styled Vans knock-offs that were on sale. Oh, and a quick stop in the fabric store because she is in a pillow making phase. She had to get some new fabrics for the six pillows she has planned for the guest room. OK...then I wander into Newbury Comics and pass up a new Amy W. CD, which is what I want. As we leave she says "What about the Ugly Dolls that you promised us for Easter?" Unfortunately, she's right. I did promise them, and she's no fool, she waited until the sneakers, and the fabric were already purchased to remind me. So a quick forty bucks later we have two new Ugly Dolls for Easter. We cross the parking lot with all our bundles and she says "Since you got the Ugly Dolls, I gues that the Easter Bunny will have to take care of all the stuff in the baskets." I wonder if the Easter Bunny covers braces?