hold my hand - hootie and the blowfish no idea why this song came to mind 🤭 that vid

bring me down - miranda lambert
 

 I got you - devon cole for you 

The water sign trine of Venus and Mars suggests that no matter what you lay down at the altar of love, the act of giving makes you richer, if not in the way you wanted, then in other ways — for instance, richer in wisdom or in compassion. For this reason, love's sacrifices cannot be. All pure-hearted gestures can only be teachers. (Not my horoscope, just the whole universe today)

Piece by Piece buy it, they'll stream it over and over (so you can think)

Oh God. It just occured to me. Sinking pit in my stomach falling into my groin nauseous feeling, as I sit here and watch Wallace & Gromit while thinking adult thoughts behind my face like we all do in front of family all our lives somehow especially the adorable awesome precious death sentences that are children. Most thoughts are dark [omg how is anyone surviving watching the news on top of it all?? cannot take it], so I am reaching for thoughts that make me feel better, the trains of thoughts that don't lead to that furious TEMPER trapped in my belly, anything but that please Goddess give me a break from that, so of course I'm sitting here pulling up that torso in my mind. I'm so starving and seething I might be able to nearly pop one off while holding perfectly still just thinking about it right here, ha. Then it HITS ME: he could be getting married, like now, before I can tell him the story at all, he might be on his honeymoon this week, right fucking now he could be boarding a plane for Mexico, hence his quiet at the moment, which I was perfectly fine with (better than fine, I like to simmer, until I had this realization) - and if so, the meeting in a bar will come after the wedding again. 

I'm letting that siiiiink in. 

Please, Jesus, do not let Toughie be getting married right now and then letting it sink in on some beach that he hasn't stopped thinking about my relatively innocent torso shot for even one single waking minute. 

Toughie, hear my voice, I can feeel you dude, and you do NOT want to do THAT, it will be cataclysmic and we will never get over it, not really really over it, it'll be kind of always there in back of mind. You don't survive sex like that, there isn't even a word for it in English, you're rebirthed by it, excurciating lifewise and yet your lungs will take the biggest breath they can then scream then do it again and again until you pass out writ large. And then face life as a different person than the one you had been. Bonded to the person who just cleaved you, and vice versa. That's why it's me dude, because I've already rebirthed you once (at least once! - considering how long ago the teaching then all the mentoring-y jazz later, I might have put ideas in your head just when you needed an idea over and over, I can't even do that fuddmath), that's why it's me you want (to kill you by sucking your soul out your dick and never really letting it all the way go again). You want me to deconstruct all of you with the full force of my attention 👁. I have done that thing. Yes. 

Do not do not do not ask me to make landfall on a shiny new stupid fucking marriage, cz 🌀🌀🌀🌀🌀🌪🌪🌪🌪🌪🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥💣💣💣...

Wait, I have the therapist! If only he doesn't call before I see her again, I'll tell HER the story, the survey, ass tat and all. There's no way I see her green-lighting doing that shit again. Right? 🤔 "You should do what you want. What are the consequences of that choice for you, his consequences are 100% not your problem, this thought exeriment is for your life only." That is what she would say. And she might be rather delighted by the ass tat story as an example of my adaptive self empowerment psychshit whatever, "brutally sane". 

I'm going to take a klonopin lol seriously and thank God kids are pinning me here (don't run with scissors god dammit) where I will have time to let this "set a spell", as they say. (I need to look that saying up, actually 🤔) And I won't be free to whip up slowly and with all my might a huge orgasm to summon him with by screaming his name like a dodge ball thrown back hard. Again.

I'm not even going to try to think about my consequences. Because if I try, I will just think about his dick, because I need to get some dick and pizza and ice cream into me, badly, thus I can't don't won't give a shit AT BEST. Slapping folks with "DUH!" in a way that makes them feel good (better) is my favorite passtime. To me, it will be overwhelmingly instictive *yes* like a vampire that's been trying to be good by only eating rats for centuries. I will fall on it. I didn't know last time, any of this, and it could not have been a PATTERN because it hadn't happened before. I mean, cmon, I know they're all thinking about fucking me, I'm standing there lol. The OG-Fudd (new blog name, Buddy) was the first one to launch a sneak attack. Using a stupid fucking marriage after a befuddlingly sexy narration of his engagement that made no earthly sense (it made only Fudd sense lol). Now it might be a PATTERN, and hmmmm I was apx what I weigh now, full yoga body, I can feel my pulse in my twat. Full circle. Sometimes I just lie here and feel my pulse, with no object in mind, just acknowledging its tempo alive-alive-alive, for which I am grateful. 

Hopefully the therapist will help me "flesh these ideas out" as we say in the teachbiz. 

Welp.

kiss the girl - shakey graves (Disney cover) I was just rolling it around in my mouth lalalaa repost 

Toughie. After the last rabbs tree frog, i.e. rare and touchy and potentially last of his species. Known for holding the thought of getting laid by his kind for 14 years of mating calls that went unheard. His blog name. If needed.

Today was not for thoughts about Toughie, though I do believe it worked to take my mind entirely off work and onto him rather feverishly yesterday as a way to prepare myself for today. It put me in the right vibrational register to work some magic. Today was for my new priest. We met ALONE finally, not mediated through Nebraska.

[Aside: I do wonder if my attempts to make his life as caresfree as I could only made Font feel cornered 🤔. If I were younger and more reckless, I might have tried to catch a frog on the down low over that feeling 🤔 No, hahaha, I would have punched it right in the face, just like I am doing right now, not snuck a frog. But that's a personality difference -  cornered is still a fucked up thing to have to feel, regardless.] [Sorry? 🤷🏻‍♀️]

The priest understands my position. He told me that since he began the medical humanities program as its first appointed chair, each time he has needed a specific kind of help, "Jesus lowers a basket with what I need in it. I needed exactly you, and then there you were." Not everyone would prefer to have a boss who does their performance reviews with Jesus. But I do. I know his mama from the block. 

devon cole - w.i.t.c.h  a work of art is a man's body to me, the space between the hip bones, fuzzy south of belly button territory, simmer simmersimmer - if I only landed today, nothing else ever happens between us, Toughie's torso was just what I needed to get in the magic mood to strike (just what I needed, and there it was 🙏)

I'm snowed in. Kinda walking in circles thinking out loud in explanatory mode. It's an old habit of teaching, kind of pregaming a lecture/class, or for online, I often have to think out loud to get the right wording at a student. I'm always talking just to one of them, I just don't know which one it is. He mentioned that he remembers I never used PowerPoint, and of course never an overhead (lit ain't math), so I was just talking. A little standoffish but funny. He fantasized and thought about me, but only when he did his homework (the writing) - in class, he couldn't take his eyes off M's nipples, nobody could apparently. We were hippies, bra shma for her, I was more reserved but 👢. 

Aside: let me remind you that M married my Ex last summer, so he's going back 25 years with this shit. Detailed memory of what I was wearing. That's some Fudd mutant superpower hahaha

Then it occurred to me - it's not a SURVEY, I'm prepping an old school teach: a self-exploratory question, followed by discussion. And let me tell you what I was always thinking: how do I turn on my one student? The one who is really paying attention (and falling in love)? I wanted to seduce. And I did. All the time. Still do. Men, women, all kinds. And the better I understand the students (as a TYPE, like NUR students are a school of nursefish), the better I can do it. And I find out who that one is sometimes by what they write - if it sounds increasingly like it's TO ME, that's a one. Another one. And I write back. And so it goes as they stream by me. I never speared any of them, catch and release only. By that time that one fucker ran at me, he wasn't a fish, and he had been simmering a while, a good thing for tough meat, which all men are (or they're not the tasty kind). One might throw a dodge ball at me, out of the blue, after YEARS of just dicking around mostly. Getting stupidly engaged or whatever, like we all do. 

Or throw a torso photo.

I'm totally fucking this dude. I will. I am letting that sink in. 

I mean, you never know for sure until the first kiss. But. If he gets anywhere near me, which the torso shot (wow) (as friends, just comparing our 2024 stress related weight loss, him going first - still totally plausible deniabity, he can still back up) (but, wow - and he's right, for certain kinds of people [us] pressure forges us somehow and we get way hotter), I'm going to ask him that question, 1-5, and then we will have follow-up discussion. I'll remind him this is how we used to do it, maybe, but I bet he won't need reminding. He will remind me of things very long forgotten, and no matter what number he picks on the original "survey", he's going to be simmering harder. If he's a 3 going in, that would be perfect, I'd leave him be and I'd tell him why in the most straightforward (painfully delightfully detailed) way possible why I must not set his life on fire with MY superpowers. And he will be a good boy a while longer, simmer simmer. But maybe he's a reckless 4, in which case 💣

Once, I was wrong, only ONCE (Bale Dave) did a marriage stand up to me and I never did get with that guy, which no doubt saved me a HUGE headache (his wife is a saint). 

So I could be wrong. But this feels very fuckward bound. 10 younger and 10 steps ahead of me, from behind, 25 fucking years behind. Yes.

And as for Nebraska, I told him on our very first date, since he'd just come out of a poly relationship it was discussed, that I would not be into poly with women, only men. And I rarely like people (I barely like him, for instance, much of the time). So more men probably wouldn't come up, but if it did 🤷🏻‍♀️ and also that he was free to stick his dick wherever he wanted, I don't do jealousy anymore (hard No, never again), honesty is all I require, no extra women because too much drama and nothing in it for me, so I would respectfully decline but not lose my shit over it. I don't believe in owning other people anymore. "I don't believe in owning other people anymore", is word for word what I said. And that has been true this whole time. So if he expected engaged to mean that changed, No, I did not consent to any change in my contract language. Even if I did want to marry him, which my 🔥 at this coworker further proves I do not cz my virgo vagina only ever wants to imprint on one at the end of the day, I'd still strike at this guy if he keeps swimming right up to me. This one is a very rare illusive species that I'm really into and hardly ever spot. So. 🤷🏻‍♀️

I only ever say what I actually mean. Nebraska never says what he means unless "I think about your hair every minute" is a true statement 🤢. Give me a fucking break. It simply never occurs to him that I mean what I say. So he doesn't pay attention to it at all. 

My therapist, "HIS problem, you're getting the hang of this, slowly but surely." Yup, that's his problem, not mine. And I'll tell him straight up, and that he is free to decide he can't live with that. But I'm still poised to spear this dude, either a broiling sooner or a simmering later. And I'm still going to Phoenix in February. And that's that.

The only way those things don't happen is if, once I get to Phoenix and he hears "you are in time out, Buddy", Nebraska blows it all up, the whole academic program that came apx 90% out of my and another woman's head (the woman I am replacing, who quit), so if I walk out the door, the work he says he loves so much also goes. Then I come home that day, leaving him to teach the rest of it alone. I have not taken 1 cent yet, only a TITLE that I earned already by teaching for free, so I don't owe anybody anything, very purposefully so. That would leave me with far fewer options and angry as all fuck at drunk lifedrivers (I SAID no fucking trainwrecks, EVER motherfucker, on our first fucking date, REMEMBER??). And then he dies. Not because I hexed him (more) but because I can see that is what will happen to him, if that's what he chooses to do. He will panic, then drink, then die. Nebraska will die without me; I will not die without him. 

Nebraska isn't sober enough to drive, so yea I'm taking the fucking keys now. Or getting entirely out of the car. 

smib

He's got an itch for a new tattoo, he texts me, out of the blue, with a selfie of his torso. I guess if he walks down this road and ends up with my name on him somewhere 🤷🏻‍♀️. I am fully aware 👁 of what that costs. But, I bite. I punch too. And I do not like biting into bullshit or punching air. It frustrates me then angers me then angry hexes fly out of my nipples. That's just the way it is, the way I am, so don't be a bitch boy, take it to the floor or get out my door. 

[image withheld - except from my sister, who was like, you gotta be shitting me 🤭🤭🤭]

Methinks he might need a blog name soon 🤔 I will mull that 🤔

what comes naturally - blackberry smoke

I'm working on a survey. On a scale of 1-5, how fed up are you with the relationship you're in?

1 = if we could just solve Problem X, I would be living happily ever after, she's my person (so I'm just griping)

3 I dunno if I can hack this shit much longer but I'm 50% hopeful, and I don't want to split up the dogs blabla so I gotta just plod on...

5 I am willing to be deported or wtfever for something new to happen / all I am is pissed all the time / this is no way to live dog or no dog (fuck this)

‐-------------------------

I'm always too wordy for good surveys :/ I have been taking this survey informally / organically of women, and the basic upshot is that they've learned to shoulder their burdens because the devil you know. And they supplement their diets, as it were.

Now I'd like to ask this question of a man. And probably he won't tell me no matter how I word it because men are whatever the hell they are 🤷🏻‍♀️ a self-defeating species 🤷🏻‍♀️. And yet. They do smell good. And I'm in a frisky mood. And he started it, thinking I won't bite. But I BITE, that's just to be expected of my personality type, says my therapist (love her, so spunky), we all have to learn to accept that, especially me. I have been barely able to eat in months, I need to accept it: I bite. I want to eat the apple, and that is a good personality type, I need to embrace it. Someone had to eat the apple, and it was someone like me. 

He's my type, if history is any guide. Younger, not a ton (he wouldn't want more babies, jeezus 🙄) but enough not to presume he's driving. He's my equal career-wise, but that has not always been the case, so there isn't that condescension in him that I've come to loathe in successful men. And apparently fucking me occured to him years ago (he's a Fudd - I should put the definition on urbandictionary so you guys have a brand), and as a joke he started confessing that ancient crush. Because we're friends, and lately, like for a year, we've been ramping up the mutual emotional support for putting up with long distance relationships. So we're talking about intimacy at that point, thus ha ha crush confession jokes. Lots of jokes about everything, he's funny, and in a naughty 'you can't say that' kind of way 🥰. (My sister and I just laughed AGAIN about the barbie lost up the ass in the ER, we are still laughing about it). He just got engaged recently - I congratulated him - there was a diamond. I was pretty sure that the diamond was the sign of death, or at least gonna be a quick return to lamenting, but hey, what do I know? Maybe he would live happily ever after, so I quelled the urge to 🙄. Today he skipped right to wanting to meet me in a bar to discuss a mutual fucking support group as soon as I asked "did the diamond effect wear off yet?". Can he maybe get under my desk?, he asked.

Thus my need for a survey. Because he's a friend, if he wants to stay with that woman, I am not the fuckbuddy he's looking for, and I don't need a fuckbuddy that I'm HOLDING BACK WITH, I've got one of those, he's called a fiancé. I'm a 4.9 on the survey, with therapeutic advice to do what I want, and holding back ain't it. So. I feel like I need to warn this dude or something. "He's an adult, explain your intensity preferences, let him make his own decisions." She makes it sound so easy. 

I kind of branded a guy on the ass once and I'm not even a little sorry, in fact it's still one of my all time hottest moments, a thing of beauty that still makes me a little wet to think on it - that story should tell ya everything you need to know about my "intensity preferences". I'll tell him that story at the bar, or not, depending on the survey results 🤔

Or we will retreat. And he will give me shooting lessons "sometime", as previously discussed. I can conjure him behind me at the range, hard against my bubble butt while he teaches me how to keep both eyes open. That's how that's gonna go down if we pull that trigger, I already assumed.

We shall see 🤷🏻‍♀️

And how do you put down a man that you don't hate?, I am not even mad anymore (kinda sorta), I just cannot keep on being engaged to Nebraska, it makes him think we're getting married, NO. And oh by the way, I work there now (told ya I'd get an official appointment in AZ, God dammit) in part because of his relentless effort to capture me, which I haaaate, but I do like the job, he's going to have to get used to having won the partner hire and lost the partner, which will not go swimmingly, I fear. He just doesn't understand that is only going to get him hexed half to hell. "Tell him you want to take a step back and reevaluate your feelings and your options. You have every right to do so. He doesn't sound like an asshole, he sounds like someone who should RESPECT YOUR WISHES, as would be your legal right to demand now. It's your job not his, your choice not his. DO WHAT YOU WANT. And keep doing it. That will make you well again." She makes it sound so simple.

reaper - wild coyote & badd wolf (snake remix)

I love this weather. I can rapunzel my little brains loose. 

I never ever watch/hear the news, not once since around dinnertime 11/5/2024. This country would elect a shoe before it would elect any woman, and my gut knew that before any results started coming in. Didn't need to see it. Don't have to give anyone my attention at all - nobody can FORCE ME (yet) to do that. So the calendar is fuzzy with nobody reminding me what shitty thing is going on today every day, thus I forgot that it's still the weekend, MLK day is off and every pending promise of "I'll get it done over the weekend" still stands / I'm not late (yet).

I think the dictator is also being sworn in today, but my dick has flowers and bees all around (my new favorite phrase meaning "I don't give a shit").  

MLK made his wife miserable, so while I'm still woohoo on the letter from Birmingham as far as civil rights history for students goes, I know what he would have been to me as a man (misery). But thanks for the day off, Buddy. That and a win for Bills makes this weather feel like a gift.

hurray for the riff raff - hawkmoon the kind of girl they warned me about lalalaaaa, very catchy

Bonus track - I'm not posting it (resolution) but trust me, I'm not skipping the shopping process regarding who offers what next 💃

"VIRGO You're magnetic because you're honest, unfiltered and unapologetic. Just watch how it draws the right energy to you. Exciting love prospects align with the truth of who you are, proving that honesty is your most attractive quality." 

 

I read in the sun all day, unmolested 

If Aquarius season were a wine, it might be called "Enlightenment," with a label highlighting a socially provocative image featuring the spirit of individuality. On the nose would be humanitarian ideals. The first swish would conjure collective innovation, with notes of technology, friendship and our better angels. The toast would be one of friendship. Cheers!

I avoid Aquarius people. One of the very worst heartbreaks of my life comes back around to make me sick with the memory of it in Aquarius season. If your friends spurn you completely and leave you to cry on a lover, a mean one, who knows you're all alone now, torture is what happens next. Torture you think you deserve, being whatever kind of wrong it is that brought that to your door. After all the pesto you made. So no, the age of Aquarius can bite me. Aquariuses just put up pedestals, set humans on those to tee them up, then knock the life out of them with golf clubs, feeling righteous about it and everything else they do/are. Those friends taught me not to have friends.

As much as I like looking at cowboys these days, you just shouldn't turn your back on folks born in Texas. 

screw you, we're from Texas - ray wylie hubbard

Fight Club 2.0, I need a laugh bad enough to hit you for it.

My 👁 doesn't really have a sense of humor.

So, I'm in! 

I sent it out to a whole bunch of people. Some got it and laughed. Some didn't get it at all (why?). Globug and the friend with the dick pic habit immediately wanted to do it, start a club, right now, and Mr DP added "if you hit me hard enough, G-, I'll call you daddy" 🤣. I might need a laugh hard enough to take him up on it, made me an offer I couldn't refuse finally, said my name and everything. 

no shit, Sherlock, that ain't just TODAY 🙄

Sunshine came for a sleepover. She came to me by way of the woman-owned weed store where they like to listen to Morrissey and sing along, which is so weird and oddly adorable. I made pasta because I must stop losing weight now, force myself to eat again, just like every time before when peacocks knock me down and piss me off so bad, shockwaves send everything flying, my jaw locked, my heart stuck on Rampage.  

I do not take unhappiness gracefully. I do not take a punch well. I go down hard and come right back up swinging and scratching and hexing my ass off. Every time.

Then when it was all talked out, we binged Yellowstone again. Because, cowboys. We all want Rip. My sister and I want RIP on our tombstones after we spend ourselves completely fucking him to death, and my mother would too if her hips could take it. Because we are all Beth, unfit company for the faint of heart. Because life isn't for the faint of heart at all. 

So what's it gonna be, Buddy? playlist keep the wolves away - uncle lucius 

trouble about my soul - the trishas 

on the river - whiskey myers

save your soul - joey stylez

traveling alone - jason isbell 

Charli XCX - Lipgloss sucks 🤨

'Adventuhre' ahead. Have faith. (And prepare as if you're a virgo.)

In this unusual lunar week, the moon shifts from a wolf to a cat to the maiden who can take care of them both. Virgo's capable energy makes quick work of what needs doing and leaves no detail untended. The grounded precision inspires confidence, making it a time of quiet but potent action. Execute tasks. The emotions will catch up. (Not my horoscope, just general advice for all signs today.)

Execute tasks. The emotions will catch up. 

Such as,

Sign up for new credit cards, better and more specific rewards (nerd wallet), transfer any balances, cancel the old ones, re-look through every kind of recurring payment you have and transfer those onto the new cards (get your $ separated out, points yours). Do you really watch all those cable stations? Consolidate all that shit to be as cheap as you can get away with - an adult child is great help with this in exchange for them having the passwords too, but probably any autistic bro or techy friend would do same. All self-care stays on the expenses list; your body will fall apart if you don't keep it up, think of yourself as a mint condition vintage Fiat, more valuable, so keep it mint. Get access to your retirement funds, 401 whatever it is, especially if you've been sticking $5/week in it for umpteen years and have no clue (turns out I have an annuity) (I have zero idea what that is). Once you see it, and realize your degree isn't going to help you understand $ any better than the blue collar brain you grew up with, hand it over to someone else. (3 someones in my case: first my own assigned TIAA person, then a teams call with sister and her Fidelis dude.) You might feel young, rocking your decades old jeans will sure do that!, but if you aren't feeling anymore (if you ever did) "this is the last person I will ever make love to", then you have to face some hard facts, which means you need to deal with money in that light, even if you hate it (which I do). Basically, get your shit together to "go", whatever that will wind up looking like. Take a trip, it's good practice, not one of those all inclusive things, I mean a head out to somewhere ALONE and think on your feet and have all your $ where you can see it and pay bills by phone etc., and find out where you're actually welcome while you're at it. All very illuminating. 

SELF RELIANCE isn't (alas) raising a chicken and getting a gun (which wouldn't help you much, since you're not allowed a pistol, can't find bullets for a shotgun bc all the bad guys already have all the bullets, and nobody will teach a woman to hunt, so that might be fun someday or whatever but isn't really a Thing 🤨. AND besides, did you know that microsoft bought Three Mile Island?, and that AI companies are quickly doing the same, self powered no infrastructure investment for your sorry 'just trying to get to work on time' ass, and Elon [let's give him a blog name 🤔 what word in English means your tshirt doesn't fit over your middleaged manbelly you douchebag- ? Douchebag, let's just go with that] DOUCHEBAG is in charge of NUKES worldwide by Starlink, so what the fuck do you think you're gonna do with a gun in an age wherein an AR15 is laughably analog anyways? shoot your neighbor or maybe your lying lover, whom I'm telling you not to trust NOW vs shoot later); self-reliance is being alone with only yourself to rely on today, simple as that. Because more than likely, you're already more alone than you think.

As terribly painful as it has been to have to rely on knowing REALITY on my own like the goddamn Matrix, it was good practice, a good muscle to build back up because almost everyone will lie to you. Don't even think about tv or talk radio (GET OFF, take your mind back, you're strong enough, BE strong enough), let alone your partner in your bed (almost a given that person is lying to you), and be a bit dubious of "friends" whose main interest seems to be getting you to verify their beliefs. Think about corporate retreats, inherently full of utter shit that you are to cheerfully embrace 🤢 -  then stand back and put strong boundaries between yourself and everything that is any personal life version of that - you will need to do this to withstand all the stupid advice and thoughtless comments you WILL get once it's known that 'happily ever after' isn't what you're living. My therapist's favorite was "I wouldn't worry about growing old alone, AIDS is rampant in nursing homes" - she's a professional but that broke her, "as if you'll need to wait til you're 80 to get laid, but hey AIDS isn't really that bad 🤣". Especially when you might as well just die anyway, you old cunt. "Right!🤣🤣"

All of this sucks. Really really sucks and hurts. But I'll repeat, like a mantra, what my doctors said, and my oldest friend, and my sister, in almost the exact same wording within days of each other: There are adventures ahead for you.

Choose your adventuhre (that's how Bug pronounces it) playlist: 

against the grain - juliana riolino for belting it out (upbeat)

against the grain - city and colour for having to follow your heart (downtempo)

Bonus track- I didn't say close your heart, just care selectively and then do a better job by those select few

Tomorrow they would see beyond the bend in the road. They would know what lay before them...~The Familiar

There are many ways to discuss problems, including the option of not discussing and hoping it goes away. This is a day to avoid that style and opt for clearing the air with something brave and proactive. The lunar opposition to Mars in domestic Cancer throws an adage into the mix: "Tell me early, I'm your friend. Tell me late, I'm your critic."

No.

Yesterday I typed out a long bit of authenticity and sent to my sister instead of the target audience - sis is my conciliari going forward in these matters. For now, as advised, I'm holding my tongue. I've never actually played Texas Hold Em, but I can infer.

texas hold em - james otto (queen bee cover) come pour some sugar on me honey tooo lalalaaa - ya can't really COVER Beyoncè, cmon, but Globug objects to the nakedness in the original video. Note, she does not object to her Yaya teaching her "don't be a bitch, boy" is an oft-useful phrase in life.

"VIRGO You're magnetic because you're honest, unfiltered and unapologetic. Just watch how it draws the right energy to you. Exciting love prospects align with the truth of who you are, proving that honesty is your most attractive quality."  Soon.

Thinking while driving while music while snow and snow and snow. 

I think about dying. I want to die in a really funny way. But I can't just wish for that, I have to think of examples so the universe gets the idea. There was this one guy who came into a bar and my friend said he should be more interesting because he takes people up in hot balloons for a living, but he's dull, and also not hot, BUT death by crashing a balloon because you were blowing the hot hot balloon guy would be pretty funny. Especially in, like, Iowa. I should keep my eyes peeled for hot hot balloonists (starting when I'm 70, no rush!) whenever I'm in the midwest, I concluded.

meaning well - mia kelly

She didn’t weep, though she wished she could. Instead, she looked into the darkness, unable to fathom what she had done. It was as if she were standing at the base of a wall, looking up and up. She had no way of knowing how tall the wall might be or how wide or what shape the building might have. Was she looking at a palace or a prison? It’s over, she told herself. It’s done. ~ The Familiar, L Bardugo

nature - the culls 

Oh wait, forgot:  "VIRGO You're magnetic because you're honest, unfiltered and unapologetic. Just watch how it draws the right energy to you. Exciting love prospects align with the truth of who you are, proving that honesty is your most attractive quality." 

🤣 

odd funny ft Eli

Single moments, split decisions, random lucky breaks, it's dizzying to contemplate. My oldest friend said offhandedly yesterday that her whole life could have been awful when her mom married someone just 4 years older than we are, but he was a really good guy, loving step-dad. Random lucky break. 

In all the years I've known her, since 6th grade, I never once thought of her stepdad (Mike) as any younger than her mom, I didn't know that fact until now -  grown ups were grown ups, either good or bad, and I still see that way instictively, knee-jerk. Maybe Mike wiped out any inclination I had to sort adults by age instead, with huge consequences in my own life. I spent as much time as I could at their house growing up, mine being so relentlessly unhappy and chaotic, and every memory I have of Mike is as a source of kindness. My friend's mom died young, like Mark, life cut off halfway lived. From all that, eventually came the son my friend is now raising, her younger sister's baby that she adopted the same year that I miscarried mine, a loss of my life as I knew and loved it, layers of me scorched off that knitted themselves back together in a full-body scar-casement. Always stiff.

It's funny, odd funny, how much LOSS is LIFE defining. Here this kid is, sitting next to me in the backseat, loudly quiet - I know that sound, the inner choppy water of feeling loved and lost at the same time. I hold memory of just about everyone who went into the making of this kid - his birthmother (in the wind) obsessively loved professional wrestling as a teenager; his grandmother (gone) cut her own hair at the kitchen table, laughing easily; and now, the serious look on his father's familar face beams determined care-love at him in the rear view mirror, and I remember that face in his wedding photo 35 years ago to the day, a kid himself with eyes WIDE ("wtf just happened"). 

Already this child is in motion toward decisions with lifelong consequences, which he might well start making in that very same high school hallway. 

back in the blue - lucette ft mariel buckley I'm fucked up but so what lalalaaa

Oh, I forgot, in WI I'm a 10. My looks aren't what ails me, but still, it doesn't hurt my feelings to get upgraded. By the end of the night I'd settled on the drummer (Waylon) just for fun (talent is sexy) and/or dating the nice man (Michael) who sat next to me at the bar, both of whom were also sober. I did neither, of course, I was very happy to get back to my dog. But it's the principle: here I'd have the pick of (human) litters. And as I am unbearably lonely anymore, that's a worthwhile factor to consider...

I look better, I think, a little healthier (?)

where I was standing when Mark first made contact, outside the bio lab where I didn't want to dissect a frog - from that one refusal to murder an amphibian, three little girls eventually manifested on this earth, in Buffalo, where they have colds and are waiting for me to come back 💗

I didn't smoke weed or eat a gummy, I didn't have sex with myself or anyone else, I didn't take a sleeping pill, I didn't eat a big meal (I rarely eat anymore, cannot make myself want what I do not), the only exercise I got was cleaning (I'm always cleaning).

The only thing different was the thing I've been longing longing longing to do: talk to a friend. Someone who just REALLY knows me 😪

first deep sleep cycle I've had since I got this tracker last spring

Maybe I'm not coming back. I will, I mean I have to, my kids are there (but don't own anything) and my doctors (can be replaced) and my current paycheck (remote and those fuckers raped that school)...  .. I dunno  .... I mean, what would you do? 

tell me how - loryn taggart👁

"VIRGO You're magnetic because you're honest, unfiltered and unapologetic. Just watch how it draws the right energy to you. Exciting love prospects align with the truth of who you are, proving that honesty is your most attractive quality." 

Dball in the Treehouse

 

Mom: Horses should really fly, I mean they're good but they could be even better.

(Her mind never ceases to out-weird me.)

life advice wise, McBurgandys is solid, a lot better than a fucking gratitude journal 🤨 

hey Everyone, stop giving life advice to people getting divorced or who got fired or sick etc, just shut the fuck up unless you've got McBurgandy up your sleeve or some shit 🤨

I emptied my dad's apartment, 8 bags of garbage just off the floor and out the fridge. My oldest friend came to help, (re)confirming: one of the things I'm missing in the life I have now is FRIENDS, not warm acquaintances or coworkers, I mean A COMMUNITY. I don't have that and it's a hurty hole in my heart.

his breakfast, I shit you not

look, it's THE FLOOR

You're not thinking about this the right way but I get it, when it became obvious that I was never going to get credit due EVER, it was devastating because once you know it's EVER then the whole work harder thing fuck that and at first I couldn't get out of bed but then I gave myself permission to let him worry about it (but) no I know you're not married and you can't stand being in someone else's hands fatewise, but when you see that it's EVER then you know it's already in someone else's hands, it always has been (I can't breathe) just breathe and listen to me, wait back up tell me about your retirement savings (uhhh tiaa-cref?) like a 401k or whatever is that what that is nevermind I'm googling it, that's fine, here's what you do, you get these people on the phone and get them to move all that to where you get a planner dude from Charles Schwabb, Fidelis, doesn't matter, then sell your house (but) fuck it you know you're going to anyway so sell the fucking thing (I have all this stuff) oh my god have you never watched storage wars (like the pawn people?) just store it all in temp control (but where will I be?) WITH HIM let his ass pay the bills you go to a yoga class or whatever (but health insurance) I didn't say quit your job, keep it, stay at a hotel when you go to Buffalo to work (gross, no) you've got a cottage April-October that's a solid half year, then 6 weeks off for the holiday break when you'll go on vacation with sisters and girlfriends (lol) seriously stop having him plan your trips do it yourself and put it on his credit card (I have no access to his credit card) 😳🤯🤨 when did you get retarded (you can't say) shut up Jesus GET HIS FUCKING CREDIT CARD AND BOOK YOURSELF A TRIP and if he balks after all you've gone through well then I'd say you're right it's time to give up on him but um let me talk to him first ok? (LOL ok) you're going to call Fidelity or Vanguard and you're gonna move most of your 401k over to be managed with all the cash you get from that house until you're sitting on a million dollars and you're going to do what I did in that moment you're going to see it, you're going to CRY, ball your eyes out, all that work you did, it didn't earn you respect because that's not something we can ever get, but you can still reap value, and you're gonna get it sitting in his house which he pays for obviously it's his fucking house while you're deciding what he should bring home for dinner (but what if he like wants to split all that?) HA then charge him for 5 years back rent for staying with you all those times and stop sucking his dick EVER that'll shut that stupid shit down and you go back to building that nestegg with your financial adviser that's YOURS, you save every fucking dime you make at that job until the place goes under, all the more reason to move your 401 (can I do that?) oh my fucking IT'S YOUR MONEY I get it Gin, you have been wrung out bad, but it's still there, all you worked for and saved and scrimped and walls you patched and painted, and your health you clawed back from the brink, all that is yours, salvageable in the form of some cash and some freedom (😭) big sister I say this with all love, it's time to grow the fuck up everyone will always take whatever they can from you and leave you when there's nothing more they can get (😪) look, PhD in ENGLISH = you have an unique valuation system (sigh) but think of it this way, even if you don't trust him and have quite a few decent reasons to choke him out, what do you have to lose? 

Nobody in my world really gets what an NEH grant is, or how impossible it is to get 2 of them in different categories entirely, for work that straddles multiple national priorities, at a little bullshit private school in one of the poorest cities, and then HAVE IT ALL STOLEN, no $, no credit, no good bye cake 🖕. One of my mentees got on the national achievement award task force to right it, try too, appalled for me and mortified for us. I'm grieving. 

But grief aside, my sister is dead right.

Interlude: I drive to Tbone's (toxin shedding), the first major destination of this Fear and Loathing late-life bildungsroam: the dogs PLAYING TOGETHER. He's been obsessed with having this play date since I got him that dog, Benjamin the son he never had (seriously, and we are not even Jewish wtf), and whom he's never trained in any way, but fuck it, you have to love something or you can't go on (smoke em if you got em!), so now he has this shitty dog (whom I shall inherit and/or be wiping both their asses, some kind of you really whizzed that thing coming fur suuuure) with whom he eats every meal from McDonald's while letting the ripped apart packaging pile up around his recliner. 

Aging: A Cautionary Tale

Later I call Nebraska and relate all this and that my sister is right and that if this is an *extremely elaborate * booty call, it's about time he called it that and stop being FULL OF SHIT. 

"Fair," he says. 

😳

He might have no idea how much BAD BLOOD he's brewing in me. Even if he isn't totally full of shit and some of this becomes workable, a deep grudge is drilling into me. I Did The Suitable Thing, for which I would be rewarded with correspondingly suitable things, at the very least not a life kick to the twat and my "partner" barely blinks and keeps on drinking prosecco 🖕. We had an understanding motherfucker🌪. But what leverage do I have?, now that dyc fucked me over royally?? (a: none), and Nebraska knows that, helped it become that way (cornering me), and my sister's words ring like a bell everyone will always take whatever they can from you and ditch when there's nothing left to get

Wait, is this a novel? Are umpteen women driving everywhere and nowhere in a frazzled sometimes sexually agitated URGE (not unlike a T-Rex), Wild but more limited mobility / likely to be murdered (statisically) when mobile? Gen X women, 💣, we all snapped and are now out driving through climate events, toxin shedding to chris stapleton radio and ducks on our dashboards? 🐤

Which just reminded me of a good rule of thumb I applied when Andrew tried to opine me to death: "I care what you think/feel *exactly as much* as you care what I think/feel. On any and all subjects." Got real quiet after that. 

Maybe that's why it's quiet now too.

 👁

another day down - jesse roper (love that siiiighh at hello)

Armscrossy P.S."VIRGO You're magnetic because you're honest, unfiltered and unapologetic. Just watch how it draws the right energy to you. Exciting love prospects align with the truth of who you are, proving that honesty is your most attractive quality." 

 

Now that I know the phrase "dry gangrene", it occurs to me at inconvenient times just to scare me, as if frigid temperatures and expansive grimy landscapes might cause my arms to turn to black stumps not covered by insurance. But this is a 'live and learn' type trip so fyi: Don't get snowed stuck in Toledo if you can help it and don't try the beet reuben. 

Why?

The value in life comes from its fragility- the knowing that it could all be lost at any moment. Bet on yourself. Buy the ticket, take the ride.~ Cormac McCarthy

"VIRGO You're magnetic because you're honest, unfiltered and unapologetic. Just watch how it draws the right energy to you. Exciting love prospects align with the truth of who you are, proving that honesty is your most attractive quality."

I'm gonna go get Dball some doggy klonopin for the road. He and I both got our hairdid yesterday. Gonna pack Earline (my jeep identifies as female), then watch for my weather window. I've got routes scoped out to home country, then up to Winnipeg and/or down to Memphis. All I know for sure is going. Staying isn't currently productive; it's just waiting (for what?).

scared - adrian sutherland  

 

A friend asked me a couple days ago what would make me happy and I couldn't list the givens  "healthy kids healthy self decent paycheck blabla" out of bounds and also not "love that won't kill me (or make me murdery)" bc 90% of people would say that too, "I mean FOR YOU to be happy, specifically."

"In your wildest dreams, start there," she said to my long perplexed silence. 

I need wildest dreams, I suddenly realized. Fuck.

😳

My therapist strongly supported the idea that after WI, I go somewhere. Anywhere. Else. Just to see if I liked it, fuck it. 

"Shake the snowglobe."

On my way back from yoga, I played the radio song. I was thinking, where would I go? Talking to Nobody or Whoever There Is, play me a song? 

Go to Gospel First Nation, Manitoba very oddly specific

My horoscope today and every day until it becomes true, my only resolution (=prophesy):

VIRGO You're magnetic because you're honest, unfiltered and unapologetic. Just watch how it draws the right energy to you. Exciting love prospects align with the truth of who you are, proving that honesty is your most attractive quality.