Putting Myself Out There

I joined facebook with my real name and everything. No hiding. It’s a bit fun and scary. People I only have hazy memories of from my childhood are asking to befriend me. I hope I was kind to them. I suspect I wasn’t too awful, or they wouldn’t be asking to be friends. Right?

I went to my first Al-Anon meeting Friday. I hated it. I don’t know if I just wasn’t ready or if I should try another group. Half of the people were recovering addicts, and I didn’t expect that. It made me pretty uncomfortable. I really miss my women’s group. At least there I felt personally loved and supported.

I’m still reading voraciously, but I just haven’t taking the time to record my books in my book blog. Do I keep trying? Do I give up? Perhaps sporadic musings are better than no musings.

Looking for a Nagging Wife

Please excuse my absence. I have many things to post, but something in my brain has kept me from making contact with people. I have several photos that I took specifically to share with you, along with several ideas of things to blog about. I think I just finished a “mini depression.” I had several emails and phone calls to answer, but I couldn’t summon the energy to deal with them. They weren’t even awful calls/emails to make – friends, actually. Nice people. People I like!

It’s hard for those who have not experienced depression to understand what I mean, but I suspect most of you can sympathize with me. My mom once told me she had trouble sleeping for several nights. During the day she felt very tired and discouraged. She called me and told me that because of her insomnia she understood what it felt like to be depressed. The problem with that analogy is that when she was really tired, she knew that if she could just get some sleep she would feel better. When a person is depressed, the escape plan is not that clear cut.

I got a call at the beginning of the summer from my friend X asking about my mother. I got a message, I mean. I rarely get to the phone in time to answer it. We only have one phone that actually rings, and the ringer is set to the lowest level, because the ringing causes extreme irritation for family members. I got her message as I was leaving for Houston for my mom’s adventure. I couldn’t bring myself to pick up the phone and dial it and say hi. Her call made me feel loved, but she could never know that, since I wouldn’t call her and tell her.

There was a shooting on Sunday morning during a church service at the Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church. That’s the church my friend X went to for years before she moved to Texas. I was just emerging from whatever this little hibernation episode was, and I had to call her to let her know about the shooting, since for whatever reason it wasn’t high on the news priority list. I was afraid some of her friends had been hurt.

It turns out that X had been worrying about my mother and me for two months but didn’t know if calling me would be annoying or intrusive. I hadn’t called her to say “thanks for the call” or “my mom is doing fine now” or anything! Now I feel guilty, but I wonder why I couldn’t just pick up the phone and call her. I suspect something goes on in my head during those hibernation/depression times that convinces me that other people really don’t want to hear from me. It’s quite humbling to me when I find out people really like me or want to hear from me.

If I owe you a call or an email, hopefully I’ll get to it, but always feel free to nag me! Nagging really helps! ☺

Hello/Goodbye Dolly

As we were getting into the car to drive off to our summer vacation destination last Monday, my mother called me. She’s a bit of a news and weather junkie. I haven’t been paying attention to the news and weather much this summer.

Well, apparently if you are planning to go to the beach, you should be checking the weather. There was a tropical storm in the gulf.

We arrived at our hotel on Mustang Island late Monday afternoon. We bought water and gas with the locals and then tuned in to the Weather Channel. We enjoyed some time on the beach on Monday and Tuesday, and we tracked Tropical Storm Dolly as she made her way toward the gulf coast. Wednesday and Thursday were a different story. Dolly strengthened into a category 2 hurricane. We were prepared to evacuate back home if necessary, but the hurricane was not expected to cause us much trouble. We were only expecting rain.

We got rain. And rain. And wind. And rain. The furniture on the balcony was flying around and around but mainly staying in its little pen. Water came in from the door and windows. The carpet was saturated. It was fun and only a little bit scary. We never lost power, although the lights blinked and threatened a few times. We weren’t near the brunt of the storm, but it was a bit of an adventure to experience it.

We watched five movies rented from the front desk. We watched various reality shows. It was the most family time we have had for a while. The point of the vacation was to get away from the chores and everyday stuff, spend some time together, and to get a particular kid off of the computer. It was a fine five days away from home.

Random Tidbits - Religion

Here are a few interesting things I stumbled upon recently:

Kareem Salama is a Muslim country western singer from Oklahoma. He is currently touring Europe. I think he’s quite talented. I hope to see more talented Muslim Americans in the near future. I'm very tired of all the negative images of non-Christians in this country.

I’m not a metal head, and I don’t know how to judge the quality of metal bands. Father Metallo (aka Cesare Bonizzi) is an Italian Catholic monk that has recorded 15 heavy metal albums so far. He does this in his spare time when he is not doing missionary work in the Ivory Coast. He’s 62. I heard him sing, and he sounds like a screaming heavy metal guy.

Buddha’s Big Foot is a book that was published in May. It maintains that words attributed to Jesus are actually translations of things said by the Buddha six hundred years earlier. There are no reviews yet - that should be an interesting space to watch.

Farm Veggies

Recently I discovered CSA’s through a post at Vegan Lunchbox and the link to Local Harvest provided. I had never heard of Community Supported Agriculture, and was thrilled to discover that I could join a CSA here in Austin. I have tried the farmer’s market route, but the local markets are not close to home. I couldn’t swing the Wednesday evening market, and Saturday morning market made for hectic weekends already full of kid activities. I joined Johnson’s Backyard Garden and picked up my first box of locally grown organic goodness on Wednesday afternoon. My pickup site is a home between my house and Lorianda’s middle school. How convenient!

I made an eggplant casserole using many of the vegetables from my box. The kids and husband were troopers to actually try my experiment, but we soon realized that I will have to swap out any eggplant I receive in the future for something else. We ate everything but the eggplant. We just don’t like it. I have one more recipe I might try which involves peeling and dicing the eggplant, but the eggplant Parmesan-ish slices were pretty icky. Maybe it was my lack of cooking skillz. Maybe it wasn’t. Sometimes it’s just not worth experimenting the kids to death.

To my Anonymous friend (*hi L!!!*): There are internships at this farm a certain young lady might enjoy. Also, volunteering on Saturday mornings gets you some free produce. Send her out to work!

IPod Shuffle Songs I listened to and was distracted by while writing this:

The Eagles: Busy Being Fabulous
Creedence Clearwater Revival: Run Through the Jungle
David Byrne: Women Vs. Men
Basia: Brave New Hope
The Decemberists: Yankee Bayonet

~* May you be well and happy. *~

The Lost Pirate Returns

I took Lorianda to see The Pirates of Penzance performed by Austin’s Gilbert and Sullivan Society on Sunday. It was great fun! The girls’ music teacher was in the orchestra, and I always enjoy taking the girls to see people they know doing things they love. Lorianda saw a long lost friend there. It’s too bad Ninja Girl was off gallivanting around Germany, but these things can’t be helped. Ninja Girl has the misfortune to share a birthday with the hapless Frederic the Pirate, and we had been looking forward to seeing this musical with her. Next time!

Speaking of Ninja Girl, she comes home tonight!!!! I’m off to take a load to Goodwill (yay for decluttering madness!) and visit Hot Topic with Lorianda.

UPDATE: This didn’t get posted on Monday as I intended, so now I can tell you that Ninja Girl arrived home safely. We fed her and threw her into bed. My house feels full again. ☺

Blog Decluttering

I’m still working on my paperwork forest. I'm down to one messy basket. As long as I’m decluttering where the computer lives, I thought I’d declutter some things on the computer too.

I have subscribed to way too many blogs on my Google Reader. It only counts up to 1000 unread posts, and then it just says 1000+. It’s hard to let go of some of those blogs. They are all very interesting and well-written, which is why I subscribed in the first place. I am still feeling too “shy” to comment on most blogs, so although I feel a sense of connection to the authors, I am a lurker they know nothing about. I’m only a statistic at this point.

I unsubscribed to BoingBoing, which publishes all kinds of nerdy links (and some weird stuff I could do without). I had 665 unread BoingBoing items. I would have had more, but I go on binge “mark as read” flings to keep the numbers low. I discovered this crafty octopus Christmas tree and this Soviet version of Pooh on BoingBoing, which almost made it worth the hours it would take me to plod through the posts. Almost.

I’m well on my way to having a more manageable Reader – currently I have 4 unread posts. Woohoo!

Of course, I couldn’t get out of Blogland without discovering more fun blogs like Lunch in a Box and Vegan Lunch Box. I’m apparently in the mood for food blogs. These led me to the bento boxes on J-Box, and then to this wonderful manga cookbook. I think my kids are in for some fun this summer! I hope? Gee there I go again with my big ideas!

What do the rest of you use to read blogs? I know one lurker that uses Google Reader (*waves at N*), but what do the other four of you use? Haha! I think I’ll add that to my header – This blog is read by up to five people!

P.S. I find I’m not worrying about Ninja Girl’s adventures in Germany. I’m excited she has this chance. I talked with her a few days ago, and she sounds great. It’s funny that my mom’s hospitalization made for an easier transition/detachment.

P.P.S. Oh and my mom sent me a cake from We Take The Cake as a thank you gift for vacationing with her in the CCU. Great fun surprise and lovely presentation!

~* May you be well and happy. *~