Coming up: Mediations continue their merry-madness. And Adella once more descends through Franz Kafka's The Doctor Visit. Will she emerge from the shifting Matroyshka with new pills? Will Dr. House's illegal intervention kill or save her? Gum goes the way of the gas guzzler, as oral fixations succumb to eco-guilt. What new lives shall be taken in the compost heap of Pacific Northwestern trash tetris? Father of the Pink Beard returns in a huff and puff of nicotine. And our hero sets out upon his endless infinite mountain quest with a battered spoke, while Sis & Brood, Inc. promises a visit of epic food proportions. Sherpas shall be required. Running rampages come in every context while poisonous produce lurks in the kitchen and smoke seeps from the stove. Can anyone survive the weekend?
Separate your bottles, retrieve your paring knife, and check your grocery list twice.
Mediation Mojo Don't Fail the Feets Now And Attack of the Eco Guilt
Here at work, we are entering Bout 3 of Mediation Madness in our grand Year of the Muddled. Mediation.
A recap for those of you following the series points: Mediation #1 didn't go. Last minute pile of bloviating nothing from the other side necessitated rescheduling. Mediation #2 happened on Monday. It appeared that rime would ridge Satan's heinie before any "agreement" would be reached between these particular parties, after all the "delightful" ways various involved professionals have been poking hornets nests with lit sparklers... but implausibly, the mediation actually did resolve in a signed agreement.
Of course, the fall out of that agreement continues, as one of the agreements had to do with the "use" of a certain "professional" whom I won't call-out in so many words, other than to call this professional Dr. Looney-Tunes. Dr. Looney-Tunes is a therapist. Well, technically a counselor (distinctions galore). Let's just say DLT and our client don't get along. But of course DLT is professional, so it is definitely is all our client's fault that during DLT's "communications therapy" communications between the parties has deteriorated. Anyways, now that DLT has been informed of the mediation agreement (ending that part of DLT's services) DLT is turning to our office to argue with the agreement. Just short of going in for a court order to force our client to spend more time in the clinician's chair. A little odd, but that's life. Seriously, if you're thinking about getting a therapist, ask your family law attorney friends first. We've got horror stories and success stories on almost every counselor/shrink/trepanation specialist in town!
Anyways, so Mediation #2 was a victory won at quite the cost. We are also crediting my strange wallet and gas line escapades with taking some of the mad juju away from the mediation site to allow agreements.
And that brings us to Mediation #3. If Monday's mediation victory could be bought at a cost, then surely the cost of today's would involve loss of limb or the lives of family pets... but, you know, we're trying to stay optimistic here. Maybe swine will flutter in with alae of resolution before we subsequently have to rush to the courthouse with legal motions afluttering. Maybe!
In the meantime, the (W)right homestead has settled concertedly into its climate controlled equipoise. The bike-and-chain has his Pathfinder back unscathed and frisky as ever. The air conditioning protocols are being developed. The new room arrangement continues to be the how did we not stumble into this earlier? And no additional peanut butter and jelly sandwiches were frozen at 4 a.m. this morning. So all is well...
Well... well, maybe with a little disappointment as a coda to an utterly not-disappointing date night. Turns out that the big race in Port Gamble was cancelled yesterday. This leaves Andrew without an insane way to punish himself for "series points" come the weekend. Since his entire week has been targeted towards training up to this event, it took him aback a bit. There is a pretty heavy chug-a-chug of the internal recalculations for both of us. Him for rearranging his cycling goals for the rest of the month. Me rearranging my little calendar slots for the next few days. Lots of brain power, I assure you.
In other news, we have finally started using the incredibly accessible and affordable local FoodPlus! Program. It's basically an add on to our garbage/recycling service. They partner with Green Earth Technologies for full-scale composting services. I've dallied with composting before, but never fully committed. Our prior tenants must have used the service, because we had the proper bin for FoodPlus! next to our garbage can. We just haven't enough waste to add on a waste removal service. I already don't need garbage or recycling pick ups as often as the most liberal intervals. Of course, I do indulge in a lot of food prep, and I'm sure that the garbage disposer doesn't need the entire dregs of a pot of broth pulp...
After realizing that the office also goes through about twenty forests' worth of paper towels a month, I realized I could consolidate office compost and home compost and maybe make it worth it. So, we're experimenting. Works great at home. Requires carting some kitchen waste in smelly bags from work. But nothing bad.
The funny side effect is that it is making me super aware of my waste production. The same way diets of any kind work as much because you're suddenly aware of what you've been cramming into your coconut-cream-pie-hole... Unlike recycling, which apparently inspires people to give themselves karma-credits to the point that they feel more justified being jerks elsewhere, composting makes me feel really, really self-conscious about the non-compostable "garbage" I create. Particularly the gum wrappers.
I've admitted to being a chain-chewer with a pretty compulsive habit before. Sometimes I wean off the wriggly's when all that gunk starts to agitate my stomach. But more recently, I've been realizing that an obscene percentage of my remaining waste consists of gum wrappers and those little petroleum pleasure sticks that come in them.
Benightedly, I did one of those google maunders through the possibility that either gum or its wrappers could be composted or otherwise handled. It can't. The stuff is mostly as durable as radioactive cockroaches wearing lasers on their heads.
And, of course, I had to stumble right onto a few environmental impact assessments of the production of gum, costs of removing it, etc. etc. Stories of little birds eating gum and exploding (or was that alka seltzer... whatever) So, while I don't buy into that whole "it's unnatural and will KILL YOU WITH ITS BRAIN!!/nutrasweet" line, I am once again taking a pause on the compulsive chewing... for now.
Which opens up a whole new world of oral fixations. I do think gum chewing is good for oral hygiene, breath freshening, saliva production, and stress management. So substitutes could be valuable. Smoking, probably not a better alternative. Toothpicks, though, I already sometimes use. And I do hate forests. I also rather enjoy chewing on parsley and fennel seed (old habit). So I'm trying these out. I think something a little mintier wouldn't hurt.
I'm sure I'll lose my guilt and go a little wild eventually. It is my one true addiction, gum smacking. But we'll just pretend it's Lent again and I have a new 40 day challenge.
So, I suppose while I bend over backwards to reduce my miniscule carbon footprint with alternatives to the old petrol pleasure tar, I'll head back up to my bedroom and crank up the a/c to hiemal and hope that Mediation #3 can be coaxed into a frozen-hades type scenario this morning.
Waiting For Aunt Flo*
The Medical Matryoshka Re-commences With Follow-Up Fun and Likely Bonus Referral Out
* FN: "Aunt Flo" is vernacular for a specific phase of the female cycle that appears to involve wearing white stretch pants, running on beaches, and doing lots of yoga... at least based on commercials. While this is in reference to that "time" or - in this case - lack of time "of the month," no further disgusting details or references will be included to curl the masculine toes or scrunch the faces of the constitutionally queasy.
As a this-is-the-internet-so-deal-with-the-TMI-or-no catch ya up, I've been struggling with some cyclical fall out of what we think had to do with being underweight for a few years. I gained some weight with a shocking amount of specialist guidance required (seriously, not easy to change a set point either way) and have been taking hormones that induce a fluctuating state of magnificent PMS to pregnancy symptoms at all times so as to make up for whatever symptoms I might have missed in the intervening years.
It is time for the legendary FU (so it can feel, sometimes) with Doctor Specialist Number 1 who will be likely referring me to Doctor Specialist Number 2 some time later today. As medical mysteries go, mine is fairly prosaic and mostly doesn't interfere with my day to day functioning (in fact, often simplifies life astronomically), but I wouldn't mind some form of theoretical clarity.
And/or not waiting in a room for several hours only to be escorted to yet another room to then get sent to another building to wait in yet another room. Maybe if that kind of waiting around felt like it had more pay off. Human beings like a sense of control in their lives, even an illusory one. I totally understand at this point why so many people turn to alternative medicines and prayer and whatever else: medical science seems to wanna move slowly and cautiously (sometimes) and that's hard for a patient. Just having a sense of agency, possibly in the form of some tincture or daily action, helps. Incidentally another vote for the placebo.
I'm ornery today (see above comment about the fluctuating hormones and the perma-PMS). It's not that bad. It's not my dentist (and choirs of angels sing at mere mention of my eerily perfect dental experience), but it is a nice time to read my strange French crime novel and not worry about work. And I actually like my doctor.
Anyways, perhaps today will be the day that Dr. House storms into my waiting room, does something unethical and borderline criminal while fighting off screaming extras and a few regulars in hockey masks, and explains that everything can be cleared up if I just drop two hits of acid and drink some purple-berry kool-aid! One never knows.
Andrew's exciting race for Saturday has been cancelled, so he's rolling with the punches by torturing himself minus the race fee. Seven hours of cycling this weekend after coming home at 6:40 last night and immediately hopping on a bike and planning a jello-legged Friday "lunch-ride" in the interim. And the a/c churned upstairs in our little tamarin-cave. I love holing up in the bedroom. Reminds me of my halcyon days of twenties and roommates, where I lived in my room between sneak-outs to the kitchen or bathroom.
And with that, I bid you a happy Friday. No doubt updates shall be forthcoming. Most likely of the "and then the assassin got bad stomach cramps when he attacked the ex-contractor buddy of the alcoholic philanthropist who is harboring a dark secret about the bratty child that the crazy woman is now nannying!" variety. Because I am not gonna make the mistake of forgetting my book this morning!
Also, I made yucca for the first time yesterday. Well, bought it and made it not-poisonous (I hope!). Reports on whether I keep over from poor preparation shall also be forthcoming! If I survive!
Naw, I'll give you the thumbnail now just in case. Yucca is one of the most rapaciously consumed carbohydrates in the galaxy according to several websites I stumbled onto after picking up a weird stick of a root next to the jicama. It was on sale! How could I resist?
It's covered in waxy tree bark, contains a "woody core" (apparently - I didn't find any in the little twig I got), and enough cyanide to make a person sick if it is consumed raw. Several helpful sites informed me of the way to make it edible and it boils down (har har) to this:
1. cut into 4-6 inch barks.
2. Use a paring knife to cut off the waxy peel.
3. cut sticks in half and then in half again to have long quarters. At this point, theoretically the woody core is revealed, but I'll take somebody else's word on that.
4. Boil for 20-40 minutes until it is translucent. Or, in my case, covered in remaining vegetable broth and boil until you smell smoke from upstairs, to whence you wandered to leap into a cold shower after believing there to be at least another fifteen minutes of broth to boil with the yucca.
5. Come downstairs dripping and holding onto a towel, though not wearing one and transport the entire pot into the sink. Run cold water liberally until the risk of smoke has diminished.
6. Soak the crap out of the pan.
7. Once again check for the aforementioned "woody core". Cut at the corner randomly and call it good.
8. Cube and enjoy.
It's pretty good, and I've enjoyed adding it to my salads, food mish-mashes. More work than most of the foods I prefer to eat, but any food that doesn't kill me OR successfully burn the house down is a success in my book!
Magical Mystical Pill Organizer Like an Advent Calendar for anytime, but with pills!
I have so needed a pill organizer for longer than I can recall. I have a great memory (implications of prior sentence not withstanding). For some things. Numbers, if I've worked out mnemonics for them. Names, with the same mnemonic caveat. Every detail of every conversation, musical twist, emotional texture and sapor of scent... all that is indelibly etched into the crevices of my cranium. But little things like "what did I just do five seconds ago"? Not always as well. The body is an efficient thing and will seek to cut mental costs wherever possible: hence habit! Habit is great, in that is bypasses conscious lucubration and delves quietly down into the automatic processes that make sure things get done.
Until it's not.
Like if it's a so-called "bad" habit. Trying to break a tendency encoded into muscle or behavioral memory takes a whole lot of conscious thought to override and ends up being far more taxing. And sometimes, since it was so automatic, you don't really remember the doing of it.
We remember struggle. We don't remember easy. And taking pills is easy. It's automatic. It's thoughtless. Until the web of routines is shaken with a tremor. Then all hell breaks loose. Did I take my pill? Did I just drink my coffee and forget it? If I don't remember should I take one just in case and risk overdosing myself or leave it alone and risk underdosing?
Always a conundrum. I have had a series of memory encoders to bring conscious thought (thus memory) back into it. In the mornings I make a grand production of taking my pill. First I'd just announce the fact that I was doing so to Andrew, but as that became routine, I had to add little memorable nuances. It's now become a morning ritual for me to display the pill I intend to ingest with grand flourish and narrate the entire process between pill and final swallow. Little comments on the temperature of the coffee and the returning of the bottle are helpful. Andrew has an allergy pill he takes at the same time.
That works pretty well. In the evenings, I just send him a chat that I'm about to take my pill, which works as a written record should I doubt myself later.
Of course, sometimes I get all into the announcements and the intention without actually taking the pill in question. Maybe there was a last minute thing that sidetracked me and I'm back to the "should I double-up or skip a pill" weighing of pros and cons.
My next variation was to turn the pill bottles upside down after ingesting them, and then switching them in the morning. This works quite well, unless they fall during the day, or I also forget to to place them one way or another.
So, finally I have found a pill container to my liking. The nice thing about these are that I can refer to a calendar, check sky or my watch for the a.m./p.m. part, and be fairly certain of my answer. Also, if I keep a decent pill popping compliance, I"ll have a little reminder of what day of the week it is... which never hurts in our sometimes distempritis-stricken lands.
I'm sure I"ll find some way to complicate this as well in my memory, but at least I have a cute new toy that matches my socks.
Happy Saturday! Hope it's full of excitement and August adventuring. Dan of the Pink Beard is back from a year long Arabic intensive in Jordan, and stopping by Bellingham before heading off to George Washington University. Bike-and-chain will be doing a four-and-a-half hour bike ride. And I'm going to help Papa T with the very first grocery run in anticipation of the Sis and Brood's upcoming visit. They travel up to his home in the Canadian Gulf Islands for the first week. The Gulf Islands are very remote, and transportation of foods across borders is complicated, AND feeding three fussy children is a fool's errand... so the grocery bills shall hit astronomical and the compost piles shall reach the sky!
You Got me Runnin' (well, maybe); Baby What you Wan' Me to Do? The Running of the DINKS and Afternoon at the Cinema
This morning the DINKS shall run by golly! Or maybe not. Who can tell. We missed the last two DINK runs together. Two weekends ago, I went out dancing the night before and my arch was aching. Besides the Tour de France was on. Last weekend, Andrew's car cavils and pre-wedding negotiations took on an entirely different connotation of running (with the implied like decapitated poultry trailing after).
My ambitions for running have a decided fair-weather clause. My definition of fair-weather is a narrow enough band to make life difficult for all involved. If it's below 50 degrees out - so, say, winter or early spring or fall or sometimes during the summer- then my toes go turgid and my fingers shrivel into little blue iceballs no matter the level of insulating intervention. The numb toes is a little problematic for things beyond comfort even. On the other side, if it gets much above 60 - so say, any part of summer other than that special band of witching hour through which we generally slumber - then I get hot. I don't mind getting a little sweaty, but humidity is usually attendant with the warmer weather. And I don't do humidity. My lungs, particularly, don't enjoy respiring water. I have yet to develop gills. As of 5:52 a.m., it is 61 degrees out and 91% humidity. This bodes ill for said ambitions. Of course, my ebbing ambitions don't pound a death knell in the DINKy running plans, as much as they imply there shall be great gnashing of teeth, lamentations and (possibly literal) bellyachings during the experience. Lucky Mr. (W)right!
Yesterday was a mad dash of a different kind. Andrew had intended to embark upon a 4.5 hour bike ride. But his wheel had different ideas. It snapped a spoke midway through. So he returned after a mere 2.5 hours. Lazy bones, I know! Never fear, he'll be doing the 4.5 one today probably.
While Andrew was off, I served as Supermarket Sherpa for Papa T, a man with a list and a lot of terror. He can handle his own groceries, but THE FALCONERS ARE COMING!! Annually, Sis & Brood (Inc.) come out for most of August. Their first leg of the trip always involves going off to the Gulf Islands where my Dad has a house on a teeny tiny little island in the middle of nowhere. Food is not easily acquired once at the home. And food that the kids are willing to eat on any given day is not easily acquired or even imagined... ever. I swear, the household garbage disposal is offered more viands than several small island nations.
So, Papa T had the first phase of the list for this annual outing. This list involves brand specific, highly detailed instructions that must be met on peril of additionally volatile temper tantrums while stuck on a remote island with nowhere to run. So it's important to get it right. And Freddy's is hard to navigate for most people, what with its narrow aisles and dearth of common sense placement of any given object. I was pretty on yesterday, though. I surveyed the list, divided the items into clusters, and systematically moved through the store on a full scale and quite targeted sweep. Round One down in twenty-five minutes. New record for me. This clearly is a new career path that I might benefit from investigating.
Papa T will be going back for more stuff the day before the trip, as he lacks storage capacity for anything perishable and will be throwing the remaining US-bought groceries into coolers immediately. He will then do a final run of produce in Canada before getting onto the ferry. Quite the production. I may become embroiled in the Thursday in-country run.
Upon returning home, I made Sunday-night dinner. Because it's nice in the kitchen in the mornings and it sucks to have the oven on in the afternoon stew of summer. And we had plans for dinner this evening.
What plans? With whom? When??? If you're my friend Dan Pink Father of the Beard, you want to know all that in detail in lieu of merely accepting a goodbye. I love Dan, but he has a different set of boundaries than my very private, contrary, and introverted self. And humans often tend to entrench into contrasting roles when met with contrast, I become more recalcitrant the more he queries. Based solely on a teenage campaign of his to get me to play chess with him, for instance, I shall never touch a chess piece. I'm oddly difficult like that. But when we're not playing fifty billion personal questions, Papa Pink Beard my oldest friend and I'm glad to have him for a visit between his Arabic language program in Jordan and his Masters program as GWU.
He's just back from nearly a year in Jordan. Having spent two years in Romania a few years back, we've already gone through the DEAR GOD, AMERICA!! type culture shock. He's never really been a fan of American culture, so it's always been a bit of a mismatch. Travelling outside the country mostly appears to be a relief for him. This time back, he was much mellower about the experience, though I found it quite funny that the "American" things over which he caviled were some of my favorite aspects.
To wit:
(1) In Jordan, a host could never elliptically imply that a guest should leave because that host has something else to attend to; it's an unspoken rule, at least in this part of the US, that there are certain commonly understood codes that wrap up a visit (rising from a seat, theatrically checking a watch, busing dishes, referring to upcoming plans, a certain timbre to the word "Well.." not otherwise elaborated) that consist of a no questions asked opportunity for a polite guest to make excuses. As somebody who gets queasy at the thought of having a drop-in guest, at least having the mutually respected illusory plans, is respite for me. And when I spend time with almost anybody I need to have it blocked out as a specific period of time, with plans on either end. If I don't wrap up within a determined period of time, I run the risk of tapping out my introvert-energy battery and breaking into tears. Which is awkward.
(2) In this part of the US, our fashion is closer to pajamas and active wear. He feels it's sloppy and disrespectful. I feel that it's a highly nuanced hierarchy of social cues, investments, and a heckuva lot more nuance than he's seeing. Also, it's a lot more comfortable than having to kit up in heels and well pressed linens before leaving the house. Don't get me started on makeup and hair torturing products. But I've previously made my peace with all this, as you all know.
(3) Americans are more obsessed with time and the use of its passage. True. But I'm even more obsessed with time and planning than the average. Dan did refer to a Swiss friend who found his stay in Jordan particularly vexing due to that sense of timelessness. Dan was amused that when this friend's father visited, his subsequent thank you note said "thank you for all the planning." Dan found this quite alien. I feel I need to hop the first plane to Switzerland. A land of planning! Where schedules are literally followed! Oh the merriment.
(4) You can't smoke just anywhere. Apparently there's a whole lot of chain-smoking in Jordan. Here in the the Pacific Northwest in particular, smoking is pretty limited to college ramshackles and some of the less savory streets of downtown. It's kind of a social taboo at this point.
(4) Ok, actually I found this one interesting. Dan was commenting that people here speak much too loudly. He subsequently followed up that Jordanians had no problem yelling as a way of emphasizing speech and it was not taken as hostile or aggressive. He added that he had taken to yelling in those contexts as well, as it's sometimes the only way to be heard. I did note that he was speaking far less loudly than he used to. He has the kind of resonant voice that can fill a room ,so the muting was certainly a contrast. On this note, it's a muddle. I agree that people speak far too loudly here (mandatory eavesdropping abounds at the commanding volumes of average conversation), but then again, I don't really find the yelling or the talking over each other thing very appealing.
Anyways, to fill the time, we all went to Lucy, which is the ultimate Luc Besson film. It takes Besson to utterly new heights. Insipid psuedo-scientific philosophical ideas crammed into a blender with a little touch of Old Boy and a whole lot of suggested but ne'er developed plot conceits. It makes Prometheus look like a well-stitched film! Crazy action. Morgan Freeman giving a fairly hilariously rambling lecture to a bunch of serious looking students with an admirably straight face. And more stock footage interjected than most documentaries. I can't decide whether this is kind of film's answer to T.S. Eliot's The Waste Land, or the editor just realized that the movie was only forty minutes in final cut and started pasting in cheetahs and exploding stars. Either way, it was awesomely insipid in the most delicious of ways. And one most certainly emerges in kind of a bemused daze.
The whole thing looks kind of like a really bad acid trip. Which is not a bad thing, but you do feel a hangover afterwards. I may not be able to speak anything resembling sensical sentences for quite some time. Fortunately, few people will likely know the differences.
And with this and that and the other, it's likely time to get on with my day and prepare for another steamer. Might even give the husband a bit of a run-around one way or another before his ridiculous bike ride. Carrots quiver in terror as I contemplate the post-run phase of my morning.
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