Unbalanced

I tell you that I'm going to write more (whether it's good or not) and then I disappear for a week. I know, I know.

It's this mythical "Life Balance" thing. Have you heard of this elusive unicorn? I thought I had actually achieved a reasonable approximation of it. Or at least as close as you can get without cloning. I was all like, I have a great job and a reasonable amount of energy and I'm exercising and eating ok and my house is not a total biohazard (no more so than usual) and I'm scheduling time to blog. I even have time to read a book or two!

Then I realized I hadn't exchanged more than 3 words with Alfred in days, and my kid thought Bob the Builder was going to be the one showing up at parent-teacher interviews.

Okay. Well, I can massage that all in. I'll just move this workout and skip doing the dishes, and have takeout ONE day a week, it's not much to sacrifice to spend quality time with my family.

Oh, and my friends. Right. I should spend time with them too. Okay, so I'll skip a workout and go out for lunch with them, and spend some time on the phone instead of blogging.

Wait. That was the whole point. Also, what about those two committees I volunteered for? I sort of forgot about them.

OKAY. So I'll move the workout, skip the dishes, eat takeout TWO days a week, make some phone calls and stay up a little later. Eating nachos.

And....you see how this goes. You KNOW how this goes.

I don't think it's a Life Balance. I don't buy that anymore. I think it's a Life Rotation. This week I am a stellar exerciser but a crappy parent. Next week I am a junk food eater but a great friend. The week after I'll have an immaculate house and be avoiding emails asking why I haven't completed my responsibilities.

I wonder when I get to be a fantastic astronaut and a terrible surgeon? That will be fun.

Where do you strike YOUR balance?

Quantity over quality

It's not exactly a resolution, because we know how well I fare with those (if you're new here, spoiler: not very), but I promised myself that I would try to do two things about blogging this year. The first was blog more, because posting twice a month is a scant step up from not posting at all. The other was to take myself less seriously.

I can hear you laughing from here - because obviously I don't take myself seriously at ALL. What I mean is, I will stress less about whether the post is actually GOOD. I mean, I will try to make it good. For you guys. But sometimes, well, it's just going to be what's going on in my brain. Except in post form.

So regarding the first pledge, I bought a little keyboard dock for my tablet and told myself I'd go off on Sunday afternoons and sit in a coffee shop somewhere and blog. That hasn't happened yet. I mean, it's Sunday afternoon, and I'm sitting in front of my teeny keyboard attempting to blog, but I'm in my kitchen. It's cold out there and I don't feel like buying a $5 coffee shop calorie-fest.

Seriously, this keyboard is REALLY fucking small and annoying to type on. Seems like I'm doing okay with the "mental vomit" part of my resolution. So that's the deal. You may see more of me, it may not be that good. Or maybe you won't, and it will. Or! Maybe you won't, and it STILL won't be that good.

Actually, that seems likely.

Aren't you glad I share these things with you?

Dream interpretation

Okay! So, um, let’s talk about something else and move those pictures down the page.

Waaaaaayyyyy down.

Bump.

Bumpity bump.

BUMP.

Ahem.

How about that local sports team? Read any good books lately? Or…to be actually interesting, how about the Spin Cycle (now hosted by the lovely & talented Gretchen)? The topic is “dreams”.

Now, I dream fairly vividly (except when I was pregnant, which is pretty much the opposite experience of every other pregnant woman ever to have lived), so I could tell you some good ones. But nobody is ever interested in your dreams except for you, I know this. Unless they are trying to get into your pants, they are only being polite when they smile and nod as you say exuberantly, “And then George Takei walked in with my afternoon delivery of bumper stickers!”.

So I’m going to take a different approach and tell you a little anecdote.

Do you have a dream kitchen? Dream closet? Dream wedding? Dream vacation?

I don’t. I guess I’m easy to please, because I’ve never spent time deciding on what my ideal version of any of those things would be. As long as my kitchen is somewhat clean, my closet somewhat full, and I get to leave the country, I’m happy with any format. (And I’ll probably never get actually married, because, HOLY CRAP IS THAT A LOT OF WORK.)

But I realized just recently that I do have a dream house.

Sort of.

I had a (reasonably rare) date night with Alfred, who I am going to continue to call Alfred because it suits him better than Paul, and as Nicki pointed out, Paul is not a Batman reference. During our (actual, uninterrupted) conversation, he mentioned what kind of house he thought we should buy if we won the lottery.

“No way,” I said. “If we win the lottery I want to build a house that has a big library, and spiral staircases, and hidden passageways.”

“The kind that lead to paintings with eyeholes that you can spy through?”

“Exactly. And a graveyard in the back, and a greenhouse full of thorns but no roses. And we’d have to train our foliage to attack the mailman.”

He squeezed my hand. “It’s moments like this that remind me that I picked the right woman to spend the rest of my life with.”

I beamed. Exactly.

And if not, there’s always that graveyard.

I’m a woman of many personas. Well, at least two.

Soooooo, I think I promised you guys some pics from the derby photo shoot.

What do you think? Should I go with naughty?

Or bitchy? (Which…isn’t that far off from naughty. Apparently my repertoire is not as diverse as I’d like to think.)

Photos are courtesy of the amazingly talented Rob Vida.

Bout photos next month. Maybe. If I get benchmarked and I’m not too maimed and I’m not drooling through my mouthguard or losing major clothing. There’s a lot of Ifs in there, probably you should just forget I mentioned it.

Don’t let the door hit you in the ass on the way out, 2011

Without a doubt, 2011 had some sucky elements. Both my basement and my gall bladder tried to kill me. My father-in-law passed away. My ovaries were declared Failures.

But, I also got a wicked job with co-workers that I love. Alfred got a Day Job, so we’re on the same schedule and no longer have to communicate an entire day’s worth of angst in the 20 minutes before he starts an evening shift. I discovered a new passion in roller derby.

So how bad can an upcoming year that an ancient and mystical race prophesized would be the End of the World be?

Bring it on, Mayans.