Category: crazy

Hard To Believe This is Me

Over the years I have suffered a certain amount physical ailments for which medical doctors can find no cause. The better part of discretion will keep me from detailing my woes (what my beloved grandmother used to call the “organ recital”).

But suffice to say, 1) it’s been going on for a while, 2) ow, 3) four different doctors have said, “want me to write you a big script for liver killing pain meds?” to which I said “no thank you”.

After years of wailing and moaning, a friend suggested I try acupuncture. I figured what the hell, I had exhausted my options with regular doctors so why not try something different?

I am not completely sure what I think about acupuncture. I vacillate from “it’s utter bullmuffins” to “hey, there may be something to this.”

Actually, over the past year or so, I have gotten quite a bit of relief from having those little needles stuck into me. Whether it’s all psychosomatic or not isn’t my place to decide. I just know I feel better, and that’s all that matters.

Since I moved to a different city several months ago, it was untenable for me to visit the same needle sticker as it was just too far away.

At the end of last week I had my first visit with a local hokey-poker to see if she could pick up where the last guy left off.

During the course of this visit, the new gal asked me if she could use a technique in addition to the needles. I say hey, why not. Give it a shot.

The technique was called cupping. My first thought was “oh that’s nice, she’s going to hug me and gently cradle my sensitive places. How thoughtful.”

No, turns out that kind of cupping is best left to The Good Man. She meant taking these glass bowl looking deals, heating them up and plopping them on my well oiled back, creating suction.

Holy smokes it hurt. A lot.

I’d seen photos of celebrities with these big sucker marks on their back and shook my head and chuckled at the time, thinking “buncha weirdos”. And yet here I was letting this lady do the same to me. What I don’t really understand is how those lilly-sensitive spoiled celebs are able to put up with this “treatment” while I had tears of pain rolling down my face.

What have I become? Who am I?

I’m old, that’s what. The days of rubbing a little horse liniment on the owie places is over. If these painful glass jars can help me feel better, well, fine.

When I whimpered a little and called out for my mommy, she said “oh, is that too much?” and she lightened the suction a little.

Finally she removed those sea serpent suckers from my skin with a moist sound and said, “Ok, you’re done. By the way, you might want to mention to your spouse or significant other what happened here. They may be a bit shocked to see the marks on your back.”

Marks? Holy crap, I look like I was treated with a meat tenderizer. My whole upper back was a raw red with big round sucker marks scattered about.

I went home and whined to The Good Man who gave me good clucking sounds and lots of sympathy. Then he did the kind of cupping that I like and that made me feel a lot better.

The skin on my back still isn’t all that pleased but whatever happened last week between the needles and the jars seems to have helped. The pain is standing a little off to the side and I seem to be improving.

Hard to believe a little girl from New Mexico who once held up a hand and solemnly swore, “I believe in the future of farming…” Is now laying on a table letting this woo woo stuff happen.

But I am and this is me and I’ll be damned if this crazy stuff might be helping a little.

: shrug :






Now this is the kind of cupping I am looking for.




Image found here.




Aw Hell Nah

So there I was perusing my Facebook feed when one of my favorite pages to follow, ¡Orale! New Mexico posted this:




For reference: La Llorona

My first thought was “this HAS to be a joke! I must remand myself to the Google for confirmation!”

Turns out it is no joke, it’s a real park in Las Cruces.

Yes, La Llorona, a scary story told in my childhood. A Mexican fable intended to keep kids away from arroyos and rivers. My sadistic grade school teachers would shut off the lights in the classroom and whisper to us the story of the woman who had drowned her own child and wandered near waterways intent on stealing and drowning little kids.

Real educational stuff!

Mention La Llorona and Hispanic kids everywhere will shudder. Some will cross themselves. A few will weep.

What the hell Las Cruces? So you think it’s fun to scare the bat crap out of every child and most adults? Who are you Las Cruces? I don’t even know you anymore!

And for the record, I will NOT be visiting any park named for La Llorona. I won’t drink a La Llorona margarita. And no wailing woman milk.

Just. No. Especially this time of year. La Llorona likes the cold and damp of Autumn. Gah!

Oh Fair New Mexico, how I love and am confused by you so.





Image Copyright 2013, Joe Wigelsworth for ¡Orale! New Mexico. All rights reserved.




This Is Why I Can’t Have Nice Things

I always thought I was a good, solid responsible kind of girl. I keep my shoes tied, wear my safety belt and look both ways before crossing the street.

I try very hard to keep myself in check.

Actually, that “keep myself in check” sometimes wanders over in to the range of OCD. Ahem, yes.

One thing I have always been good at is hanging on to a pen. Doesn’t have to be a good pen or a fancy pen, just…I tend to hang on to a pen I like until it runs out of ink. I rarely lose pens. I have handfuls and handfuls of the things. I always have a couple spare in my bag, several in my car, a lots on my desk. I am the girl who will hand out pens to forlorn people in the meeting who show up without.

But lately it seems I can’t be made responsible for a damn simple blue felt tip PaperMate Flair pen. I am shedding these things like I am a Siberian Husky living in Death Valley. I have gone through half a box of these freaking things in the past month alone and lost another one just this morning.

One was jettisoned when I put my work notebook and pen on top of my car because my hands were full. I had to load my computer and other things into the backseat. I remembered to get the notebook but not the pen. I felt such sadness when I heard it roll across the roof of my car and then I saw it whip off on a curve, over a guardrail and down an embankment near my office. Ooops.

I’ve lost several more in the parking lot outside of the building where I usually meet with work clients. I have found three now that I dropped while heading into a meeting and as they lay there abandoned, another car drove over them. Smush. Blue ink bleeding out while the pen I callously dropped lay there dying, telling me how its cap feels so….cold….

Also, I recently discovered a sizable hole in the pen-holding pocket of my favorite messenger bag. So I think a few more cherished felt tips have exited my life that way.

Then there are those simply unaccounted for. Lost. Wandering this world alone, just begging for a nice piece of paper so they can feel useful.

The careless disregard that I show my favorite office supplies is appalling! Shocking. I don’t recognize the person I have become.





Have you seen me?




The Many Faces of Starbucks

It’s both a blessing and a curse that immediately next door to the building where I work is a Starbucks. This means I visit the green mermaid several times a week, spending both precious dollars and time worshiping at her fins.

But I’m not sorry. It’s a nice break in the day to lay down arms in email form and go next door to grab a cup of something nice.

So in my recent near daily adventures to the ‘bucks as I stand in line and observe, I have started to get a bead on the various faces of the customers of Starbucks.

Here’s my thoughts, in no particular order (feel free to add your own in the comments)

The Stalker – This person places their order and immediately moves to the pickup area. The Stalker doesn’t care if there were ten people ahead who ordered first and are still waiting, nope. They will set up camp right there at the edge of the pickup spot, blocking everyone else from grabbing their order when ready. Often they will have also ordered a pastry and they will stand there mouth breathing and chewing their petit vanilla scone like a cud while staring dully at the barista. At their worst, The Stalker will pick up and check each cup that comes out to see if it is their order. They do this even if the barista has called a name that isn’t their own. It is as if by sheer force of their will, they can turn the beverage into theirs, because they are the center of the universe.


The Can’t Be Bothered – This person places their order, pays the tab and then disappears. Their drink is made in due time and the barista calls their name or their drink order. No response. So the drink sits there getting cold (or warm, depending). And it sits. And sits. If it has whip cream on top, this starts to wither and ooze. The barista calls out the name or drink over and over and everyone looks at everyone wondering who the heck ordered this drink and won’t pick it up. No one really knows where The Can’t Be Bothered has wandered off to.


The Planner – This person orders their drink and then moves to the sweetener station where they grab their sugar packets, stirrer, coffee jacket, straw, napkins, etc. They stand there waiting with sugar packets pre-shaken down and ready to pour (in some cases already torn open). They look like special teams ready to take delivery of the pigskin, hands open and ready to receive. The very second the cup hits the countertop, bam, they are on it, sugar, stir, jacket, lid, booyah! And out.


The Conspiracy Theorist – This person has ordered a special drink for a special snowflake in a special way and they are convinced the barista will make a mistake. The barista sets the drink down, The Conspiracy Theorist swipes it up off the counter and looks at it in askance as though it will betray them at any moment. “Does this have four pumps?” they will ask, “Is this no foam?” or “did you heat this to exactly 230 degrees?”. The barista will nod and give affirmative answers through clenched teeth that try to make a smile but can’t quite. God help the barista who gets it wrong, “Oh, gosh, no, I forgot and only put three pumps. Let me fix that.” This just encourages The Conspiracy Theorist.


The Indecider – This person stands patiently in line, gets to the front, and doesn’t know what they want to order. They take something like twenty minutes just to decide what they want and then of course they use a gift card that doesn’t have enough money so then they dig around in pockets or purse or backpack for the 72 cents to pay off the rest of their tab. I often want to throw a dollar bill at them so they will just finish the heck up. Argh! And as they dawdle the line starts queuing up out the door and onto the sidewalk. Boo!


Ok, that’s only the beginning of my log of personality types at the ‘bucks. Much like Jane Goodall, I am out there living among them. I will continue to take notes as new classifications arise.




Ah, a stalker family!

Yes, I blurred that person’s face




Image found here.




You Will Be Assimilated

Over the past year I have gone from working at a huge highly institutional company that had no time or inclination to give a rip about each individual employee to a very small company that really cares a lot about each and every person. Everyone keeps an eye on each other which is both beautiful and positive and also has some downsides.

As such, this place is very big on having these company portraits taken of everyone. These are to be used on our website and as our icon on our email and generally used as the official image of record for the employee.

Since I had missed the quite recent window for portraits taken by our official photographer, I offered up this photo for use:





I think it’s a nice photo. It was taken by a professional photographer and it’s one I’m not ashamed to show.

Many people complimented the photo, they really liked it. There was just one problem…..

The background. It’s green. The “official” photos have an institutional blue background, so my photo stuck out. Heck, I was fine with that. I don’t mind sticking out like the proverbial sore thumb, but this caused much, much consternation among the compliance type people.

So phone calls were made, calendars were checked and the official photographer was called in on a Friday morning to correct this issue.

Here is my new, official, doesn’t stick out, looks like everyone else crappy photo:





Observations: Well, first of all, my hair was HUUUGE that day. I usually wash my mane at night and let it air dry naturally which makes it soft and gives me nice easy waves. I was utterly lazy the night before the photo shoot and instead showered and washed the locks in the morning, which means blow dry city. Add a little humidity that day and *booosh* I had one big hair entity all unto itself.

Next, I look like a school principal. Ugh. The angle, unflattering. The backdrop, bleah. My crazy, crazy eyes. All of it.

Finally, the official photographer guy really Photoshopped this up. While I appreciate the kindness he did to the zit on my lip, he also boosted the warmth a little too much and now I look a little flushed and my hair is not really that red in real life.

So. Weird.

But the folks who hang the photos on the wall and post them to the corporate webpage are very happy. My photo blends in with everyone else. Nothing out of place. Everybody looks the same. No sore thumbs.

In other words, I’ve been assimilated.

Not sure how I feel about that.

______

Edit: This afternoon, several hours after I wrote this, I ran into the guy who had his photos taken at the same time as I did. He brought it up. “Hey, do you like your photo?” he asked. “Not really” I replied. “Yeah,” he said, “I don’t either. I look weird. Do you think we can have them retaken?” — I love this idea. Stay tuned!