Birdwalk

So many thoughts, so little time

Oh my gosh I've been so busy but I have all of these things buzzing around in my head and finally two spare minutes to get it down. I've included helpful subheads for easy reading.

Who wants to hear about my butt?

I went on my very first trail ride this weekend. It was an absolutely gorgeous day, sunny, breezy, not very buggy...we saw a fox, deer, wild turkey...I was riding my very favorite horse, Nickel. Everything seemed just perfect until...hey...gee my butt kinda hurts...what's going on back there? Apparently, something was rubbing me the wrong way (literally) and it just got worse with every step. By the time I got home that little irritation had gone from blister to outright abrasion...and just imagine what that felt like when I got in the shower. Now I basically have weeping sores on the inside of my buttcheeks and oh boy is it uncomfortable. I'm on a search for some kind of product or article of clothing that will stop that from EVER, EVER happening again. Suggestions are welcome.

Now that's gross

Our shower drain seemed to be running a little slow...nothing pronounced, just the water didn't seem to be draining as quickly as it used to. So my husband went out and bought some of that Foaming Pipe Snake, which, judging by the name, sounds to me like something rabid you'd want to take steps to avoid, not pour down your shower drain. So he pours this stuff in and you're supposed to wait an hour and then rinse water down the drain. Well, after about ten minutes, he calls me into the bathroom saying, "You've got to see this." I walk into the bathroom and look into the shower and apparently the drain had -- all on its own -- coughed up the biggest hairball you've ever seen. Michael said he thought a rat had crawled out of the drain. It was mostly my hair, although I am not certain that it wasn't partially the previous owner's hair, too. Of course now the drain is running great, so there you go.

Snippets

Last night I was on line at the ice cream place for 40 minutes. While on line, I was forced to listen to other people's conversations (note to self; get ipod ASAP.) Here are just a few of the fascinating things I heard people saying:

"...and then her boyfriend says, 'Because I'm trying to ask you to marry me!'...
"...we don't like her on the sheets, it's ok if she's on the bed but not touching the sheets..."
"...if you can't wait patiently, you can go sit in the car while your sister and I get ice cream..."


Home improvement

In the past two weeks, we've basically had to rearrange every piece of furniture in our entire house. Last weekend, we had the wood floors on the entire first level of the house refinished, so all of the kitchen, living room and dining room furniture had to be moved into the garage temporarily, then, moved back. We did it all ourselves and let me tell you we have the heaviest dining room table in the history of the world. I am amazed at how unbelievably heavy that thing was. Then, this past weekend we had to move everything from the two upstairs bedrooms because we had that entire level re-carpeted. I have had just about enough of this, because I am not the kind of person who does well when my home is in chaos, but let me tell you the place looks great.

Cough it up

Yesterday when visiting my parents for Mothers Day, Mickey ate a knee-high stocking. We panicked, yelled at each other for awhile, then called the vet, who told us to force two tablespoons of hydrogen peroxide down his throat to make him barf it up before it reached his intestine. Which we did.

For future reference, two tablespoons of hydrogen peroxide will not only make a dog immediately disgorge the contents of his stomach, but will pretty much turn him inside out for the next two hours. Do NOT try this at home.

(No, really, don't try this at home...a second opinion from another vet said that they no longer recommend this particular treatment because if you do it wrong it can cause serious damage to the trachea.)

A dim view

Ok. That's it. I give up. Although I do not like the person I am, I can't make myself be the person I think I should be. I simply can't make myself act, think, and behave as if I were someone else. I have tried and it just won't work, and I'm just plain tired of feeling like crap.

I am a grouchy, sarcastic, vindictive, overly sensitive, insecure, easily annoyed person with a very short fuse. (I am also fat, but that's not such much a personality issue as it is an appearance one -- but I'm really good at beating myself up for that too.) That's right -- I AM NOT PERFECT. I am quite familiar with the negative aspects of my personality, and yes I am aware that they vastly outweigh the positive ones. I will continue to try valiantly to overcome these natural tendencies, but I'm tired of feeling guilty for being human.

Overall, I am convinced that I'm still a good person. As numerous as my faults are, there are people out there who are way, way worse than me and at the end of the day my motives are good. Also, while we're on the subject, I'm tired of trying to buy my way into heaven by taking such good care of everyone. I'm not the world's mommy and sometimes I need someone to take care of me.

Black Tie Events

So I was at this black tie event last night. I used to enjoy these things, but now I pretty much look at them as an evening where I get to make painful small talk about nothing with people I don't know, wear uncomfortable clothes, and eat too much salty food that leaves me bloated the next day. Sometimes they're fun, but generally I'd rather be home watching tv. Anyway.

So I'm at this thing last night and I noted two things: I don't like overly fussy cheese displays. This particular one had an intricate Jenga-like stack of cheese slices in the middle of the tray and it just grossed me out because I just don't like my food to be played with excessively, and I just couldn't get it out of my head that some sweaty person had worked to create that little cheese-sculpture and probably touched it all with bare hands. I also realized that I could totally pick out the women who are on the "career track" from a mile away. Career track isn't the right word, but you know what I mean...these are the women who are committed to the corporate lifestyle, of schmoozing and ambition and climbing the corporate ladder and all that. I am not saying this in a disparaging way, because I have great admiration for these women and I used to be one of them. Although I probably did not do a very good job at it because I am not on that particular treadmill any longer. But I digress. I was watching these women, specifically one who was the honoree for the evening, the other was a group of account executives who were seated at our table. These women all came across as a little tightly-wrapped, and frankly, borderline abrasive. The honoree, in fact, brushed rudely past me at some point in the evening on her way to the ladies' room, while I was having my picture taken, actually, saying, "I gotta go NOW." When she accepted her award, she mentioned the company she works for several times, and mentioned the company's credo, which she somehow managed to equate to her own commitment to volunteer work. As if she was so committed to her employer that she LIVED their philosophy, day in and day out. It was scary. The account executives breezed up to our table, stuck out their hands and asked us our names and where we're "from", which really meant "which company do you work for?" Actually, I'm not being accurate there -- they actually breezed up to MY HUSBAND, stuck out their hands TO HIM, and asked HIM where he's from. They pretty much ignored me, I guess they assumed that I'm just "the little woman" and don't have much to add to the conversation and couldn't possibly have any value to them in terms of furthering their career. (In fact, I don't. But I'm still pissed that they assumed that.) It was really insulting. I might as well have been a cardboard cutout.

So in an odd way, this event helped me feel better in knowing that even though I'm no longer doing what I thought I'd be doing with my life -- climbing a corporate ladder somewhere, earning the respect of my peers and being a fabulous boss, blah blah blah -- I don't think I really wanted to do that anyway. Not that I have any idea what I DO want, but at least now I know I don't want to be one of THEM.