By Word and Dead...

Scott's back at work today. He recovered enough yesterday to transport Cordelia to Daisies, so I'm hopeful that all is well. We may never know what caused the problem.

Cordelia asked me not to stay for the Daisies meeting. That was hard (but necessary). Scott and I went home and watched TV for about fifty minutes. I imagine Scott got some amusement out of watching me make myself wait patiently for the right time to put my coat on and head for the car again. Part of me wanted to go back immediately so as not to be late picking Cordelia up.

I asked the psychiatrist today about borrowing her light box. There's a waiting list, so it will be two or three weeks before I get my turn. I'm hopeful that it will be helpful this year since I've been wanting light.

The pain levels from my leg are down. Sitting on the couch still hurts, but many other things no longer do or do at a level that's ignorable. I'm continuing the PT exercises and hoping that the improvement continues. Scott's starting to look at replacement couches, but I'm still hoping we won't need to go that far.

Last day of work before a five-day weekend for me. HOORAY!

juniper200 linked me to a New York Times article this morning about finding help for mental/emotional issues when you don't have health insurance. It's a difficult subject, mental illness, and the article makes what might be considered some mild mis-steps, if only in perception, but overall it's useful. (I loled a little at "seek out the child psychologist at your child's school". I'm guessing this person has not sent a child to public school in quite a while.)

For those who are lucky enough to have insurance, you can also check out this article on getting treatment and the Mental Health Parity Act.

Anyway, it reminded me of some links I wanted to share from the last HR mailing that I got (the same one that recommended the webinars and caused the webinar plague of Canada).

One Day One Job: A blog about entry-level jobsearching for college grads.
Careers in Nonprofits: Because nonprofits are awesome!
Alltop: Everything ever about careers.
Vistaprint: offering free business cards, though you pay postage and they try to sell you everything else in creation while you're ordering. Still, the designs are neat. I got a set that proclaim me to be "Research, Administration, and Design" :D

How did the job fair go, anyway? Anyone get any bites from it?

It took a trip to Urgent Care last night to find out why it felt like I'd been punched in ther lower right back, was pukey, dizzy, and feeling like I had to pee but couldn't get anything out.

I've got a kidney stone I'm trying to pass.

So, I've got a perscription for an antibiotic (apparently I also have a slight kidney *infection*) and another for a Vicaden equivalent. I've also had to call off work today 'cause the symptoms hit hardest in the evening time, and I can't drive with them going on. At least not safely.

*shakes head* I just hope I pass it before Thursday 'cause they're gonna *need* me Friday at work.

I have very few kinks, compared to most of fandom, but I will admit this: I have a thing for drunken sex. I don't know why. Not nonconsensual sex, eurgh, and it has to be a very specific type of drunk!sex, but when it's done right I am all over it.

AND THEN FOXY WROTE ME SOME. For me! So I'm recc'ing it. I'm recc'ing it hard. :D (Also I beta'd it, and it's a rule!)

Title: Pub Fiction
Rating: R
Summary: Jack makes sure Ianto gets home. Because he just can't drive in that state.

There's a cabdriver named Fozzie in it. Go on, you know you want to.

Scott is sick. He went to UHS after throwing up at work and was told that it's too soon to know what's wrong. We might still be lucky and have it be a rapidly passing stomach bug. I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

That probably means no Daisies tonight. I can't see dragging Scott out for the transportation. I wish, once again, that I could drive.

Illness in the house leaves me worried about my Yuletide fic (among all the other worries). I do at least have a completed draft. It's unbeta'd as of yet, but it's my third draft. I mainly worry that I'll be too sick to post when the archive finally does open. Well, that, and I worry about coming up with a title.

Illness in the house also has me fretting about the busy second half of the week. Cordelia is heavily invested in our plans coming to fruition. I hate the thought of disappointing her (and of having all three of us stuck in the house with no relief for five days!). Currently, we plan to have Thanksgiving with Scott's parents. Cordelia will spend Thursday night with her cousins. Friday is the family birthday party for our niece, and Scott and I will go up after he gets off work to attend and to retrieve Cordelia. Saturday is a potluck at jss's place.

Chapter eight of Valet of Anize is up! Orphans, meteorites, and mine mysteries abound. You can find it here. Feedback welcome, as always!

btw, someone -- god, I've lost track of who, if it was you please tell me so I can credit you -- linked me to an article about organogenesis, which seems to imply that Carry's nuskin bandage may not be far off in our future.

Fascinating stuff, though I can't avoid thinking of it as wearing foreskins.

MY MUM SENT ME PEAPOD.

She is the best mother I have! :D



Sourdough bread, olive oil, apples, a GIGANTIC TURKEY BREAST, my favourite hibiscus tea, stuffing, dalmatia fig spread (omg nom), two small pumpkins, and cookies.

Guys, I'm going to brine the hell out of that turkey breast. I can buy the cooler tomorrow and put the turkey in on Wednesday and cook it on Thursday. And then eat leftover turkey for the REST OF MY LIFE. I can even make apple-onion stuffing!

Also, I love the Jamaica Tease Co. Hibiscus Tea, but I find them very weird. The "Jamaica Tease" phrase is branded everywhere on the bottle, but if you read the label or go to the website they are very proud of the fact that they use only the finest Mexican hibiscus tea.

Maybe they get it from, you know, Jamaican Mexico? Like the Dutch East Indies.

The pot from Jamaican Mexico must be amazing.

My leg feels better this morning! And miraculously I am not hung over from last night. (Uh, Jean, I totally meant to email you but then I fell asleep. :/ )

So I just made the MOST DELICIOUS OMELETTE EVER.

Here's how you do it:

Fry some bacon and set the bacon aside. (This is the traditional start of every southern recipe ever.)

Into the bacon fat put chopped up leftover french fries and onion straws (like onion rings, only not rings) from last night's meal.

Fry until crispy!

Add two beaten eggs. Cook. Flip! Sprinkle with cheese and then cook some more.

Consider briefly photographing it for your blog before being so enticed by the omelette that you go NOM NOM NOM instead. With bacon.

The recipes tag on this post is very much in airquotes. "Recipes".

R came over this evening. I give you your nightly quote:

R: Oh, so, you gotta see these shoes I bought from this guy.
Sam: Fancy shoes?
R: So fancy.
Sam: Wait, who is 'this guy'? Like, a guy at a department store? Or, ahahaha, some guy on the street?
R: YOU LAUGH BUT HE SOLD ME SOME GREAT SHOES.
Sam: You bought shoes from a random dude on the street?
R: And they are the finest footwear I have ever acquired. So, it was two in the morning, right --
Sam: You bought shoes from a random dude on a street at two in the morning.
R: HE WAS A SHOE-SHINE!

Apparently they're really nice shoes.

Either my flex spending account thinks I'm trying to rip them off, or they're trying to rip me off.

Maybe they think no one person can sustain this much injury in a year. It's baffling sometimes, truly.

For those of you outside the States -- health insurance, which I pay for every month, pays 80% of all my doctor bills. I have to pay the other 20%. To make up the difference, my company offers a "flex card" which is a credit card where a fixed amount is taken out of your paycheck pre-taxes and put on the card to pay for medical expenses. You tell them yearly how much money you want on the card, and they take a little each month to make up that amount, even though you get all that money on the card immediately.

Yes. Welcome to the reason we long for socialised medicine.

Anyway, I carry $600 on my flex spending account, which I've been using to pay for medical treatment for a broken leg, chiropractic adjustments, a sinus infection, and various over-the-counter painkillers and band-aids and such.

Every month, now, my flex card kicks a letter out to me saying JUSTIFY YOUR EXPENDITURES, SEND US RECIEPTS. It's not supposed to do this; the only time this is supposed to happen is if it's something hinkey, like you bought a Nintendo on your flex account or something.

Instead, my letter has WHAT ABOUT THIS BILL FROM NORTHWESTERN MEDICAL CENTER printed on the request. What the fuck do they think I'm buying at a MEDICAL CENTER if not MEDICAL TREATMENT? Prostitutes? Can I get those at a hospital? Maybe they think my theraputic massages for the left arm I CAN'T MOVE have a happy ending or something.

Relatedly, I decided to go for a walk today and now I can't put any weight on my left leg. I've had it elevated and I'm applying ice on and off, but if it's still nonfunctional tomorrow it's back to the Immediate Care centre for me tomorrow.

Argh.

We are starting this years InsaneJournal holiday sale. From now until the end of the day Friday, November 27 we are going to be holding a sale on Self-Committed[paid] accounts and Extra Userpics.

The prices are be as follows

Self-Committed[paid]
1 Month -> $5
6 Month -> $15 $10
12 Month -> $25 $18

Extra Userpicx
6 Month -> $10 $5
12 Month -> $20 $15

Then on Friday November 27th from 8am until 4pm (Eastern US time) we will be running a very special sale on Permanently Insane accounts.

My mother has a theory, which is genius I think, that the worse the economy is at Christmas, the more lights and decorations people put up. My own anecdotal evidence gathered since the age of ten suggests this is mainly correct. It's some kind of reaction formation thing. "We have no money, so this is going to be the BEST, BRIGHTEST CHRISTMAS EVER!"

Seriously, look around yourselves on December 18th. You'll see what I mean.

I have a new theory that is related to this: when the economy tanks, television writers start KILLING EVERYONE. I suspect it has something to do with desperation to retain viewers as the ad money dries up and things get more competitive, making use of the link between profundity and death. Which does exist, but not nearly as intensely as most professional writers think it does (see: modernist theatre's relationship to the end-of-show suicide. Just because it worked for Chekhov* doesn't mean it works for everyone).

At the end of the day, if one is searching for meaning in modern life -- meaning and ratings -- then death's not a bad way to go. That's crass to say aloud, but it's also true. And there's nothing inherently wrong with an examination of death, self-sacrifice, and our place in the world.

But seriously now.

The debate goes back and forth endlessly about the meaning or lack thereof in a given death on a given show, and if someone does find beauty and meaning in death, that's okay. I understand, better than I used to, why people do; if not emotionally, then at least intellectually. My theory isn't about whether a given character's death is profound or stupid.

It's just that there's been so much death on so many of my shows that I'm afraid to turn on the television. Meaningful or not, I'm tired of it. I'm scared next Tuesday Abby's going to get shot. I feel like I can't watch TV until unemployment drops back below 8%.

So until then I'll just be over here with my Stranger Than Fiction DVD.

* At the end of The Sea Gull, which culminates in an offstage suicide, the audience in Moscow was silent for a full minute. Chekhov thought he was ruined; he thought the play had tanked. It turned out, nobody could gather their wits enough to applaud, at first. This is an epic legend, in theatrical circles.

I'm bendy again!

Say what you like about chiropractors, and I don't deny a lot of it, but I can bend over without looking like an old man for the first time in weeks. My wii fit trainer approves. He didn't even yell at me when I fell over during the Sun Salute. Which is a hard yoga pose to fall over during. But the point is I fell over because I'm a klutz, not because I had no lower-back mobility.

Also I have nasal spray that the doctor recommended, but I've never really used nasal spray before. Is it supposed to drip back out? I feel like my brains are falling out my nose when I use it.

HI. I'M SAM STARBUCK, BUT YOU CAN CALL ME MR. OVERSHARE.

First, a humorous antecdote from work.

ME: Okay. You take the garbage back, and I'll attack the floor.
COWORKER: ...aww, don't attack the floor.
ME: It looked at me funny.

...I was proud of myself. I don't usually think that fast :3c


L'anyhoodle, in a couple of weeks I shall be taking my pharmacy tech certification test, the reason for my absence from the interwebs--even had to skip out on NaNo and most of autumnwrite for it. And it is my intention to then catch back up on all my fannish activities, because I miss them very very muchly.

I do already know a few things that I'm going to do/work on: Song of the Wind (MKR), the sequel to A Perfect Act (DC/MK), and finishing That Darn Fic over on the Layton meme, like...a year after I started it XD And some stuff for 100fandomhell because I has ideas, oh yes I do. I also have some maintenance stuff I want to get done on candyfics, but that can wait.

So! I would like some RECS! Movie, TV show, anime/manga, book, cartoon, whatever! I just want some new stuff to watch and/or read when this whole stupid test is over and done with :D I like just about everything, so lay it on me pleeeeeeeeease? Let us share fannish interests!


*sits back to count how many times Doctor Who appears in comments because I know at least two, if not three of you are going to recommend it here* I had a really awesome review for What You Wish For on ff-dot-net that explained to me why I should watch that show. That was a fun review to read :D

Also, I need to upload the rest of my icons over here at some point...

There've been a couple of parenting challenges recently. The first and more easily resolved was our discovery that one of the little boys at Cordelia's table in class had been saying unspecified mean things to her. That came out when I was asking her why she didn't eat her snacks any more. She told me that her tummy hurt too much at snack time.

When pressed, she didn't want to talk about the details. Scott and I both tried, but she still thinks that not talking about things makes them less real. The lack of information limited our options when we talked to her teachers. She's now sitting at another table as part of a larger reshuffle, but watching and trying to see what happens with the little boy is about all the teachers can do. They can't talk to him without more information from Cordelia or another witness.

The second challenge is longer term and thornier-- The school sent home a note asking parents to talk to their children about race and about not making unkind comments relating to race. Cordelia is aware of race in a very vague way but not as much as she could be. I haven't wanted to scare her, and I still have my own issues with early training that race was never to be spoken of.

I'm not entirely sure how to explain race in a way that's both accurate and makes sense to a six year old. I need to do it, though. She and one of her best buddies (the home schooled black boy who lives down the block) made plans for her to *buy* him. I was appalled and had to explain to her why I was appalled. Cordelia found the idea of slavery sufficiently terrible that she denied that it ever happened. She doesn't want reality to include misery or malice.

I think that the plan may have owed some confused connection to the fact that the little boy is adopted. Cordelia said he wanted not to have to listen to his parents. She also said she can't tell him that their 'plans have melted' even though they have. I think she's a bit worried that he'll bring it up again and expect her to do something I've told her is wrong.

At any rate, I want to do this right so as to help Cordelia be a good human being who treats other people well. I want to do it without unnecessary trauma to her (or to anyone else). I just have to guess what's necessary.

I have a rough draft of my Yuletide fic. It's crap and just barely long enough, but I know what to do for the first rewrite. After I do that, I'll be looking for beta readers. With luck, I'll have the dratted thing done quickly so that I don't fret about it. Of course, I finished the draft Tuesday and haven't done anything more since.

I'm marking time until next week. The PT says that the exercise I've been doing should start to help after two weeks, in other words, some time around Monday. I think things are a little better, but it's hard to tell. I might just be wishing for it.

Title: Sebastian and the Beast: Ch2, pg 21/?
Rating: Pg-13
Beta: yume_no_kage
Summary: Beauty and the Beast with a twist (and a wriggle)
A/N: XD I have too much fun drawing strange horses. (And yes that was supposed to be 'fault' *facepalm* Shall fix later)

Sebastian and the Beast Ch2, pg 21


[Cover]
Ch 1: 1&2, 3, 4, 5, 6&7, 8, 9, 10, 11.
Ch 2: 1, 2, 3&4, 5, 6, 7, 8&9, 10, 11, 12&13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20

Colour Pages
Field Promotion

Title: Sebastian and the Beast: Ch2, pg 21/?
Rating: Pg-13
Beta: yume_no_kage
Summary: Beauty and the Beast with a twist (and a wriggle)
A/N: XD I have too much fun drawing strange horses. (And yes that was supposed to be 'fault' *facepalm* Shall fix later)

( Sebastian and the Beast Ch2, pg 21 )


[Cover]
Ch 1: 1&2, 3, 4, 5, 6&7, 8, 9, 10, 11.
Ch 2: 1, 2, 3&4, 5, 6, 7, 8&9, 10, 11, 12&13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20

Colour Pages
Field Promotion

And then the chiropractor tried to kill me.

For real, I'm typing this with the last ounce of muscle strength left in my body. She worked me over for half an hour. She found every painful part of my body and PRESSED ON IT.

She thinks my shoulder pain from last week is actually some ribs that are "poking out" which I figure, that can't be good. So she's going to poke them back in, I guess.

My body hates me. The feeling is mutual.

I am back from the doctor's office! I HAVE A DOCTOR. Not the Doctor, but a pretty good substitute. That was easier than I thought.

Dr. K gave me a specific amount of Vitamin D/Calcium to take every day, told me to buy saline nasal spray, took four vials of blood for various other issues, and said I'd hear from her in a week or two.

She was also very impressed with my ability to break myself, and gave me a neurological exam. All my neurologues are in order! So that's good.

Before I forget, and I should have recc'd this when linking to the GF cookbook the other day, ecaterin has assembled a Gluten-Free Recipe Archive with articles, recipes, and tips for GF living. She tells me she'll be updating it as she finds new info, so. Good resource!

That's all I got. That and a bandaid that says "OUCH" on it for my arm.