"Workin on a chain gang-goin downdowndowndownmmm workin on a chain gang........ i don'tknowtherestofthewords..."

That's all that kept going thru my mind as hubby dragged the muck to me and I scooped it up and threw it in the huge garbage pail. poop. literally. excretement. feces. and toilet paper. and corn... ewww. our sewer backed up, and was all over the basement floor. everywhere. not only is that gross, but we sleep down there too. the smell was horrendous. it was equally as pungent after it was over and we mopped with bleach, but at least our death from asphyxiation would have been a clean one.

ugh.

hey, still taking contributors to decorate the pages of 24-7cool.com. I'm running out of ideas here... need some fressshhhh stuff. i know, i know... feel like everyone wants a piece of you? and you just can't take anymore of the fame and fortune? s'ok... i understand. it does get rather lonely at the top, just thought a little schmoozin' with the  rest of us might be good for your soul...

;Þ

Did you ever do something, and then a day or so later, you see that thing elsewhere? well, more specifically, I've drawn images, or painted pictures, that I see displayed in another medium days later. 

I once created a woman hanging from a tree (in my surrealistic style) and she was hanging above a raging mass of water, with all of these little critters gathered 'round watching her. The next day I heard on the news that there was a disaster flood in some third world country. 

Reading too much into it?

Yesterday I created a new image for 24-7, and this morning in the bathroom I happened to notice the container of drain cleaner had a pipe with water spewing out of it almost identical to the image I had created the day before! Is that weird or what? And hubby had just purchased that drain cleaner yesterday, 'cos we were having some drainage problems... AFter I created the image!

weird.... and no, I do not play the lottery.

<>

Nice pace around here lately. create, cook, phone, network... eat. gotta do finger food... things that I can bring in here and eat with one hand. I was r-e-a-lly craving a big ole' kosher dill pickle tonite, but I settled on some peppers instead. I love hot peppers. I usually polish off a huge jar in less than a week. Amo sentir la quemadura!

HEY! "24-7cool" is going to be featured in the EyeWire catalog!! for real... in a touchy-feelie real life publication. read the email and didn't know where to go with it. Lucy almost flew off of my lap when I screamed.

 Soy así que excitado podría poop! 

"Could I just ask you a question? How low can a blood pressure go before... well, ah, ..."

"Before a person dies?"

 "ya... I mean, I know it must be different for everyone, but...."

<>

"ma-a-ma.....ohmygodmaama... GET YOUR HANDS OFF OF ME..ma-a MAMA! we're here mama.... ohsweetjesus"

five people died this weekend. and one that is alive but dead. someone who i used to talk to. for years. she came in periodically for her tune-up. we never minded doing Jessie's treatment. cos she was never very sick. so we didn't have to be in there for an hour at a time. and now she's dying. that's the hell of it. we knew them all.

There are places I remember
                    All my life though some have changed
                    Some forever not for better
                    Some have gone and some remain
                    All these places have their moments
                    With lovers and friends I still can recall
                    Some are dead and some are living
                    In my life I've loved them all.    - The Beatles

so there. and it helped that I listened to dance music on the way home. and that I am out of there for another week. and that I won't be there when she dies.

<>

"What was with your set of the week?"

"hmm? oh, just didn't feel like doing anything... no time."

 "weird... it was kinda scarey"

and my mom had her 2 cents to throw in too.

"Maybe you're doing too much... and you should put more pictures of Lucy on there."

yes mother. I'm ok. and I really am. feel pretty damn good as a matter of fact.

got the taxes done. yay! have my clients and jobs all lined up in a nice, neat, orderly row... best of all, I have some T.I.M.E.

woo!

grrrrr... OHICOULDJUSTSPIT! you know, when something lousy happens, and it cancels out something that you were reeeally, really planning on (even tho you told yourself that "oh, it's ok, I won't plan on it so if it doesn't happen I won't be disappointed.") and then you get so pissed off that you come up with all these things you're gonna do? for revenge? but if you do you just spite yourself... dammit!

oooooo...dAMmitdammitdammit.

I am very pleased to see that it's only 3 a.m. Even tho for some reason, it bugs Jim that I stay up so late. oh, not all of the time... he's getting a bit better about that. but he's cooking breakfast tomorrow. eggs and bacon and pancakes. i would really prefer to stay in bed... better yet, wake me up when it's all cleaned up. ya, right. guess I can't really say too much. He's driving Jen back to school tomorrow.

Jen saw my old journal tonight. you know, the one that I wrote when I was a teen... way back when. I thought I showed her before, altho I did talk about my *childhood* with her when she was younger.  I felt the need to explain myself. tried to paint a bigger picture for her... maybe in hopes that she would understand a little better. because of everything that i thought i was... or wasn't.

excuses? maybe. but i think it helped. maybe opened her sheltered, innocent eyes at 14, that not every child is cherished and protected from bad things. stuff happens. and that not every daughter is daddy's girl like in the movies. like on "Father Knows Best." We're not all 'Princesses' or 'Pumpkins.' 

cos stuff happens. 

and I love her. and she knows. and that's all that matters now.

"WhaT is wROng with you???"

"Whaddaya mean?"

"you are like, way out there!"

when I picked Jen up from the park and ride, she thought I was acting weird. she thinks i have lost the ability to interact with other humans in the *real world*...  that i am a disinterested party, who just happens to be her mom, who is sitting next to her.

"I'm just tired."

so it simply takes me awhile to switch from "routine-driving-home-thinkingaboutsavinglives, to thinking about what jobs-I-have-to-work-on when I get home" mode, to eye-to-eye conversation with my wunderful daughter mode. it doesn't take long and we are in sync once again.

feeling kind of giddy-silly tho. I really am tired. I can only do the 11:00 p.m. to 3:00 a.m. thing a few days in a row. so I'm in bed before midnight, and it's morning, and things are cool...

daddy-o.

Jennie is coming home today. yay. i hope she likes lucy.

i love lucy.

 my eyes are puffy this morning. must have slept on my face.

tgif.

The first thing I do when I walk in the door is go straight down the stairs, throw off all my clothes, and hop in the shower. Last nite, I walked in the door, straight down the stairs, and flopped on the living room floor.

Dolly and Lucy followed me and smothered me with kisses and whimpers and little puppy bites.

 ":::lick,lick::: what's mommy doing on the floor? :::lick,lick:::"

Dolly is almost as big as me... well, maybe 3/4 as big. She was feverishly licking my arm as if to wash away the blood and pain and weariness of my day at the hospital.

I've been doing this for over 15 years. the hospital thing that is. yet it never becomes routine. oh, maybe the act of putting medicine in a cup and listening to patient's lungs... or dialing numbers on a machine and calculating the I:E ratio... the things that a trained monkey could do.

But everytime the trauma pager goes off to announce an 18 y/o male, gsw to head, unresponsive, BP 80/20, HR 134 ETA 5-8 min, it's never routine. It's never routine to hear a mother and father cry. They always say something different when their child is dying right before their eyes. sometimes they scream "WHY??" and call out to the god of their choice. sometimes they just moan and weep silently. But it's never routine. and it always hurts.

so i lay on the floor. for quite awhile. while Dolly and Lucy give me doggy kisses and puppy bites, and try to make mommy feel better.

"How late you stayin up?"

"Just gotta finish this page... why do you sound so annoyed?"

"You haven't even talked to me since I got home"

voices from the kitchen (him) to the office (me)... so I go in there to talk to him. kind of change the subject, kisskiss, and everything's ok.

I really should get to bed now. you know, if I go to bed now, and drink lots of water, then I have to get up in the middle of the nite to pee, then I stay up.... cos i love it in here when it's real quiet and dogs and people are sleeping... bring a carafe full of coffee, close the door, and just be.

"If you don't understand "I might have a project for you, please call me ASAP," then I don't know what to tell you. Good luck with your Web development business. You'll need it."

"OHhhh, well, excuse me, but your email just exuded such charm and charisma, I forgot myself for a moment. Sorry for asking for a little more information. silly me."

jerk. Like I should call the author of that abrupt and rude email because he has a business downtown with his name on the sign above the door? nope... I don't work that way. He sits on the pot with his sorry ass the same way I do, and I am not impressed.

:P

stompstompstomp.....

"Kitty, look at these....." stompstompstomp

"Now what."

I followed Jim into the living room where he began waving the fuzzy feather duster around on the window blinds.

"Christ, look at the dust on these things!"

so I stood there and watched him swish the damn dust around. at 11:00 at nite.

"hmmm..."

and what would you like me to do darling? and I walked back into my office. let me think. so how did I clean the house before? geessh. everything is falling apart around me. but you know what? I don't let it bother me anymore. of course I wouldn't say "then do it yourself thank you..." because he does. he's good that way.

and that's a good thing.

:)

Amazing what a little fresh air, a change of scenery, and Motown can do for a person! I figured it's been... 5 days! since I've been outta here. No wonder I was so gloomy. yessiree bob.

and I'm getting my work done. and we bought a crate for baby. and, yes, life is good.