Back To You ~ John Mayer

Since last we met:

1. I have spent a lot of time thinking about how I could arrange for a Somali family to come stay with me. I would make them oatmeal every morning. Really, I have spent hours of brain power on feeding Somalis the oatmeal in my cupboard that I am not eating. It has become something of a fixation of mine.

2. I developed pleurisy at precisely 7:10 PM Monday night. I expect to die a slow death from it. Even though I have WebMD'd pleurisy, I have decided it is actually what those characters in Anne of Green Gables died from because I can't remember what it is called. Oh! Consumption! That is what it was! Yes. In my mind, pleurisy = consumption. Also I like the word pleurisy. Which is why I developed it at 7:10 PM Monday night. Symptoms include stabbing chest pains on left side when taking a deep breath. Also I coughed three times at approximately 8:45 PM Monday. I feel basically okay today but I think the symptoms come and go.

3. I suffered GREAT humiliation when I discovered that I had played one and a half games of chess fully believing my queen was my king and vice versa. Why must I learn such an easy lesson the hard way?  I also learned that in chess each move is vital and that the game goes much more smoothly for me when I move my pawns as little as possible at the beginning of the game. I am also learning to be offensive as opposed to defensive. Defend being my auto setting on any game. I am not an offensive person. No matter what Jesse the Esse may claim.

4. I have won and lost a fairly equal amount of games in Words with Friends.

5. I have started to enjoy "This American Life."   And by "enjoy" I mean that it is giving me a whole new mess of stuff to roll around in my brain and freak out about. Like Chernobyl. I know. I am late to the party. BUT if the current situation in Somalia is any indication of how this world works-everything old is eventually new again and humans just keep on making the same old mistakes so the way I see it, I am just ahead of the curve for when it comes out that Japanese officials totally mangled the proper handling of a nuclear disaster.

6. I read this hilarious article.

7. I got carried away at the library.

8. I called a truce with Chuck Norris since he begrudgingly produced a few blooms. For reference: 

Here is what I wanted. 

Here is what I got. 

9. I tried to plan posts for the next two weeks when I will be utterly unavailable. I have basically failed miserably so far but maybe in the next few days I will make it happen.

10. I went here!  In Tucson! Because we have one now! Yay! I actually went on "opening day" such was my excitement. I went with friends. It was grand. 

 11. I must now return to the extreme busyness that I have going on. It is entirely possible you won't hear from me again until.....oh.....September. Jus' sayin'.

All Day Sucker ~ Stevie Wonder

Being smart is really difficult.

No wait!

What I mean is getting smart is really difficult.

Was that last sentence grammatically correct?  I am not sure.

*sigh*

I took my television out of my bedroom. It was my constant companion. That is why it had to go. There is still the television in the living room, of course. But it is not the same. My soft sheets and plush mound of pillows are not in the living room.

So.

After spending the first few days of television-free time staring at the walls in my room, I decided if I was going to stop rotting my mind, maybe I should start expanding it. Side point: I have a vast capacity for sitting and staring at walls. Meg's Mind occupies itself for an alarmingly long time with no outside help. Is that a symptom of something? Also I talk to myself. And I respond. Jus' sayin'

Back to main point:

Expanding my mind. Trying to become smarter. Very difficult.

Here are my current endeavors:

1. Learning how to play chess. Chess confounds me. I am not strategic person. I am more a person of strategery.



I enlisted someone to help teach me but the poor person is good at chess. It is, apparently, not that fun for someone good at chess to play with someone who just moves the pieces around the board at random and then says, repeatedly, "Wait! What just happened?"

2. Crossword puzzles. Lots and lots of crossword puzzles. I love crossword puzzles. A lot.

3. Words With Friends. I have already learned that "qi" is a word. Go me! I lose every time I play. No me!

4. Listening to This American Life via their iPhone app. I have at my disposal every single episode ever aired. I have made it through half of two episodes. I am trying to just suck it up and make it through a whole episode but MAN! talk radio is just so deathly boring. Slam head on desk in despair boring. Listen to half an episode and then try to recover my will to live with music boring. Okay, I am being harsh. The half of the episode about how money was really just nothing was mildly interesting in a "wow this world is a desperate mess" kind of way.

5. Translating Russian to English. And not the cheater pig way. Do smart people say "cheater pig?" I do not use technology.  I have paragraphs printed in Russian and I use my Russian/English dictionary to translate them. My vocabulary is so low that I basically have to look up every single word. My hope is that dedicating myself to two paragraphs of translation a day will rapidly improve my Russian vocabulary.

How do you keep your mind sharp?
Or make it sharper?

Dirt Road Anthem ~ Jason Aldean

The comment section on yesterday's post has given me a whole new set of issues. We all know that was the last thing I needed. Seriously, if you read the post and missed the comments you need to check that mess out. Hilarious!

So the adorable Mugdha talks about music every Tuesday. Today I am going to talk about music too.

I was in the car with my sorta sister-in-law KayKay the other day and I was telling her about this new song I heard on the radio called "Novocaine." I was explaining that the lyrics of this song made me want to stop being a valid member of society and instead just stay in my room all day praying for today's youth because that song is so jacked up. Just after explaining all of this to her, the song came on the radio. But she refused to listen to it. She did not want to suffer with me. So I decided to make her suffer in other ways. Insert evil laugh here.

To begin, I reminded her of my love of Britney. Her immediate reaction was that it is Britney SPEARS! She has not earned one word moniker status. And I responded by explaining that not only had she become a one name star, that one name was "BritBrit."  You know, like KayKay! Surprisingly, KayKay's head did not explode from this although it was a close call.

Next up, I informed her that there was this new Jason Aldean song that I totally loved. Namely, I loved the chorus and just tried to pretend the rest of the song did not exist. Because the rest of the song was country rap. KayKay asked that I never ever ever ever use the phrase "country rap" ever again. I said that not only did this song feature "country rap" but that there is a remix of the song that features Ludacris. We both agreed this was horrendous but I then countered that it was better than that Tim McGraw/Nelly mess that hurts me to my very core. KayKay shrieked that she LOVED that Tim McGraw/Nelly mess and my head did explode. But I was about to exact my revenge..........

I played Lil' Wayne's foray into R&B "How To Love." And then just to rub salt and lemon juice into that open wound, I compared it to 112. It was at this point that KayKay blacked out from sheer pain and despair. I sort of see her point. What has this world come to? Ludacris has gone country. Jason Aldean is trying to rap. Lil' Wayne has issues with boundaries and so crosses them all the time, regardless of the consequences. Doesn't anyone know their place anymore?

And then I went to the library and checked out the following CD's"

1. Kellie Pickler's self-titled album.
 Way, way better than I expected. I had really low expectations though.

2. Forever Your Girl, Paula Abdul.



YouTube Link

 Enough said!

3. Country Strong Soundtrack
Was not overly fond of the movie but I love the song "Give In To Me."

4. Musiqinthemagiq, Musiq Soulchild
He isn't what he once was but he usually generates a few solidly good songs.

Fear ~ Drake (Updated Version)

Hierarchy of Fears

1. Domesticated Turkeys

2. Wild Turkeys

3. Chihuahuas

4. Space Mountain at Disney World.

5. Haircuts. I had a nightmare about my beloved hairdresser, Erin, giving me a bob. In my nightmare I wept inconsolably. Just thinking about the bob of my nightmare gives me chest pains. I get my hair trimmed when I absolutely must. That is stressful enough.  The haircut that started this phobia:

6. Flesh-eating bacteria. Also lots of other rare and/or improbable health issues. I tend towards being a hypochondriac. In case you hadn't noticed.  Also explains why this post made me totally freak out.

7. Strangers. Stranger Danger!!


Also for your amusement:

Hierarchy of Fears when I was a child:

-Please note that most of my fears were related to things that would happen in my sleep. It makes my occasional bouts with insomnia much less surprising.

1. My family members turning into vampires and biting me in my sleep.  Might explain why I HATE all things vampire-related to this day.

2. Recurring nightmare about a witch trapping me on the landing of our basement stairs. Probably brought on by my parents forcing me to sit on that landing until I could calm down when I was scared at night. Also, when I tell people that my parents used to do that they are horrified. Hehehehehehe wallow in that guilt mom and dad. You made your child sit on the dark, smelly, nasty basement stairs to calm down from nightmares and fears about her family turning into vampires whilst she slept.

In fairness, it probably also helped me develop the ability to calm myself down and rationally review my emotional responses to the issues I face ALL BY MYSELF. I self-therapize! Hey yo, dad you should totally start putting your clients on dank, nasty basement steps time-outs when they are totally losing their crap. People will start to sort their mess out real quick to get off those nasty steps. No lie.


3. Random criminal breaking into house and killing me in my sleep. Every night before I fell asleep I would weigh out whether or not I wanted to fall asleep facing the door so that I could see my impending death or sleep facing the window so that I could die blissfully ignorant. Seriously, every. single. night I would weigh out my options and make my choice. Face potential attackers or turn my back to them.

4. Lightning striking the huge sycamore tree in front of our house thereby knocking it over and squishing me in my sleep. I spent a lot of time trying to calculate if it would be an instantaneous death or a slow, agonizing one. Would I make it out alive but damaged? Was there any way to improve my chances?

5. My sister Margaux's fingers. So we all know that I am not fond of E.T. right? Yeah, I am seriously NOT fond of E.T. And I have serious issues with his fingers. And then one day I decided that my sister Margaux had E.T. fingers. And she would be all like, "ooooooo I will now lay my E.T. fingers upon you because you are totally grossed out by this." And I would be all, "GET YOUR E.T. FINGERS OFF OF ME!!!!!!!!!!!!" in a shrieking manner.  And sometimes I would get a little teary-eyed and panicked.

6. Strangers. In all sincerity, when I first heard of hermits and how they live all by themselves in the forest and interact with almost no one, I thought that I had discovered my "calling."

Special Note:
Sometimes I review what I have written and laugh at my audacity to consider myself "normal."

Fear ~ Drake

Hierarchy of Fears


1. Domesticated Turkeys

2. Wild Turkeys 

3. Chihuahuas 

4. Space Mountain at Disney World. 

Eight Days a Week ~ Beatles

Thoughts from this weekend:

1. Weekends are too short.

2. Watching a Hoarders marathon on A & E is a great way to develop new phobias and issues.

3. Watching these antics never gets old (surprisingly):







Aren't my adopted doggy nephews awesome?

Grace ~ Jeff Buckley

My older sister, Emma,  is five years older than me.  Sometimes this difference seems like light years. Sometimes it is more like:  Hey! Get out of my head! I was J to the U to the S to the T thinking that!

Por ejemplo, once when she was not living at home anymore she went out and bought this dress and miles away I was living at home and I also bought a dress and true story, we had bought the same dang polka dot dress!

Or the time I was all, "So I recently started listening to Jeff Buckley's Grace album..."
And she was all, "I've recently started listening to Jeff Buckley's Grace album!!"
But we each liked different songs off the album.

Or the other day when I sent her an email with a U2 video clip and she emailed me back to tell me that she had just emailed someone that exact same video clip.

She is one of the few people I can count on to understand what I mean when I say something is painful to watch. She gets similar feelings of physical discomfort when watching someone embarrass themselves, even if that someone is a fictional character on a television show or a movie. This might not seem of note, but I assure you that our levels of pain are much higher and our level of tolerance for embarrassment are much lower than average. The covering of eyes and cringing would make one think we are watching a horror movie. It is horrific to us.


We have the same basic level of pop culture junkie-ism. It is a fairly high level. We will destroy you in a pop culture trivia game. For reals.

We both have the same weird relationship with hugging and physical displays of affection. Neither of us are intentionally unaffectionate and yet,  you certainly can't call us affectionate either....."I guess I better hug you in case I die......"

It's funny. If you put any stock in birth order psychology, the second child goes the opposite of the first. But we aren't quite opposite. Our differences seem more like.....mutations.

If you put Emma in some sort of gamma ray flux capacitor irradiation solar pulse machine for a few minutes, you would get me. The more Type B, more dramatic, less sane version of her.

The version of our mutual DNA that says, "I hated the ending of that book!" at the exact moment that the others says, "The end of the book is the only thing that redeemed that mess!"  (The Double Bind being the book in question).

It seems like my mom and her three sisters always preached the gospel of  "Your Sisters Will Be Your Best Friends Some Day!" when I was growing up. I never really believed them. I couldn't see how the "different but the sameness" of my sisters and I would draw us together. As I got older it became not "different but the sameness" but rather "same, but with differences."  Lovely, charming, and okay, occasionally super irritating differences.

Do you know, I remember the exact moment in time when Emma and I crossed the sister/sister barrier and became sister/friends? Dead serious. The exact moment. We were driving down 55 together in her car. She started talking to me about her personal life. It wasn't a lecture or a surface conversation about pop culture. It was a rare insight into the heart of a person that few people ever get to see. And I realized at that moment, as she was talking to me, that something had shifted. I was no longer the protected and also disbarred little sister. I had been let in. I had become a friend.

Love you Em! And I am still waiting on that book to be available at the library. Read slow.

Logic Has No Place Here. Defined.

Look up there at the top of my blog. Notice how it says, "Logic Has No Place Here."


Example: Yesterday my lower back started hurting in a moderately inconvenient manner. No other symptoms. I decided my kidneys were failing. I decided to research it on WebMD, but then I got scared and decided NOT to research it because I would rather just die blithely unaware of my impending death. Because, yes, I was pretty sure that my moderate lower back pain with no other symptoms was acute renal failure and I was also pretty sure that acute renal failure equalled dying in my sleep last night. My friends were mostly concerned about whether or not I had a will and how would my shoes be handled upon my death. I told them that before I went to bed last night I would pile all of my belongings together and put a sign on top that said, "May the fiercest of you win!" But then I was really tired so I decided that my friends would just have to work all of that out on their own.

Example: Today I took a very large bite peanut butter for lunch and it got lodged in what I can only guess is my esophagus. It was painful. I attributed it to the kidney failure. Even though a drink of water quickly solved the problem.

Example: Today I am involved in a rather vehement and decidedly one-sided argument with one of the plants that creates The Secret Garden. I feel that since it rained lately, the Texas Ranger should burst forth with little purple blooms. The Texas Ranger has yet to respond to this. Tall and silent type I suppose. I am not sure the plant is even called a Texas Ranger. But how thrilling is it to have a Texas Ranger outside your front door? I shall call him Chuck Norris.

Example: I listened to approximately 5 minutes of classical music + NPR like programming on the radio today because I thought it might improve my ability to complete crosswords. But just 5 minutes. That should be sufficient, right?

Example: About 45% of my blog traffic comes from the Ukraine. Hi Ukraine! This simultaneously thrills and scares me. What does the Ukraine want with my blog? Don't they know that my blog is a complete and utter waste of time? Ukraine, I don't know how you found me, but I apologize. Please don't base anything logical off of me. Ever.

Fall Like Rain ~ Eric Clapton

It is hard to overstate the beauty of desert rain.

This is the view from my front door. Doesn't it look kind of like I live in The Secret Garden? I love the overgrown plants.

Much Love Monday: Crossword Puzzle Books

So I am currently suffering from a severe crossword puzzle addiction. 

I now own 4 crossword puzzle books. 

This is my new and beautiful favorite: 

It's the luxe edition because it is hard cover, spiral bound, and most lovely of all, it has gold gilded edges. 

And that is what I am loving this Monday. 

How about you?