Do You Realize?

Of Dogs and Death

It's 4:35 a.m., and I'm sitting in my living room, listening to our dog struggle mightily to take in enough oxygen to keep her little body alive. My husband & I were in bed, with Poogan at our feet making the same brave attempts to breathe, taking turns lying down beside her and in our regular positions in bed. As we lay there with our heads next to hers, petting on her, my husband posed an interesting idea, one that some might find painful. The idea was simply this: Might Poogan be more comfortable downstairs, instead of on the bed? We made the decision to go downstairs. We put Poogan in the floor, in the spot where she loves to lie, and we went to the sofa to camp. She's moved about downstairs as she wishes, and, not surprisingly, she's not stayed with us for more than a couple of minutes.

This was so hard for us to do. As human pet owners, with human emotions and attachments, we want to be there with our pets for every one of their last moments. But do they want us there? We like to think that, yes, they are put at ease by having us there, but I actually think the opposite might be true. I think having us there, hovering, doting, worrying, only adds to any anxiety they may be feeling. They are dogs, and dogs are not humans. We share some of the same emotions, yes, but not our attitudes of death.

Think of how dogs choose to die, if given the choice. Alone. Away from their pack. Even domestic dogs do this. I grew up with animals, and I could never understand my parent's gentle but mysterious explanations when a dog "went off to die." But I've always known that they do. And yet, in a dog's final moments, we still want to "be there for her (or him)." In times of grief, rational thought need not apply.

When I die, I do, indeed, want my "pack" around me. I don't think I want to be alone. But, then, I'm only human.

Crash

Yesterday was not my day. I was rear-ended in traffic, for the second time in three months. As if that weren’t coincidental enough, consider this: I have been hit by other drivers no less than seven times in the last seventeen years. Adding to the absurdity of this number are the almost unbelievable stories that go along with most of them. (I emphatically assure you, however, that they are true.) I am a walking example of Murphy’s Law, as it applies to motor vehicles.

For example, when I was eighteen, I was traveling down the narrow, recently paved country road on which I lived. As I came around a sharp curve, I noticed there was a large truck speeding toward me in my lane. I swerved into the ditch to try to avoid hitting him, but he was too far in my lane; a collision was inevitable. I was so shaken up (as this sort of thing hadn’t yet jaded me) that I let the driver convince me that, since I had hit him, the accident would be my fault; luckily, he was such a nice guy, he said he wouldn’t call the police since his truck wasn’t damaged too badly. What a guy. Shaken, I drove home, where my mother told me nicely what an idiot I was for falling for that line of bullshit, and we called the police. It turns out the guy also lived on this road, apparently had several outstanding arrest warrants, and he was drunk when the accident happened (he was dead drunk an hour after the accident, passed out in his floor). I had to pick him out of a police photo line-up so they could add a DUI to his charges.

Another time, I was stopped at a stop sign when I was rear-ended by a girl I had gone to school with. She had a passenger in the car. No one was hurt, the cars were only slightly bumped and bruised, and so after the police made their report, we went on our merry way. A couple of days later, I got a letter from an ambulance-chasing slimeball personal injury lawyer, offering to sue the other driver for me. What a guy. I threw the letter away, not even considering this a remotely legitimate reaction to the wreck, even though the other driver was, indeed, at fault. A few days after that, I got another letter from the same ambulance-chasing slimeball personal injury lawyer, informing me that the passenger of the other car had retained his services & that she would be suing me for “loss of consortium” on her part; I was being charged in the suit with “negligence in stopping.” Are you kidding me? I was stopped at a stop sign, moron! I had to answer ten pages of questions regarding my personal life and driving record and the accident in question, and I had to drive to Atlanta to give a deposition. After all that pain in my ass, the other party dropped the suit. Surprise, surprise (since they had no grounds for anything anyway).

Still another time (Yes, there are more!), a girl hit me as I was pulling out of a parking lot. The police were summoned, insurance cards were checked, reports were made, phone numbers were exchanged. She told us she “knew a good body shop who would give us a good deal.” What a gal. We went with her suggestion even though we wanted a different body shop. After the work was done, we found out that the girl’s insurance had been canceled for non-payment of premiums the day before she had hit me, which she had conveniently not told either us or the officer. When we confronted her & asked that she pay for the work, she agreed and said she would. She then filed for bankruptcy rather than pay anything. So, in the end, we had work done by a body shop we never would have chosen, and we had to pay for it ourselves.

If I’ve learned anything from all these driving experiences is that whatever’s going to happen will happen. (Also, if the person at fault offers to do something nice, do not believe them.) I AM still searching for that invisible target on my car, though. I’m painting over that sucker.

New Year, New Stuff

Hello, faithful (and not-so-faithful-but-who-could-blame you) reader(s)! I've had one or two kind people tell me they miss my blog. Thank you. To be honest, I miss my blog. I haven't written in a good long while, mainly because I've been content, but I miss it. So, my New Year's resolution is to start the blog up again, even though I'm still happy. How's that sound?

Don't answer that so quickly in the positive. The second most asked question I've been getting from Facebook friends lately is: How did you make those amazing looking Jello shots you have photos of from New Year's eve? So, today I'll share with you the wisdom of Jello shots. See? All that excitement over the return of my wit & wisdom, now wasted on Jello shots. Sorry.

As you may imagine, Eldest is home from college. When she learned we would be going to  Paul & Vera's for New Year's Eve, she made the oh-so-collegiate suggestion of making Jello shots. As someone had made some at a not-that-long-ago party and I remembered them being somewhat of a crowd-pleaser, even with our mostly-middle-aged friends, I decided that might be a fun, if not exactly good, idea. But, I also decided I wasn't going to produce boring, half-assed Jello shots either; if I'm putting in the time and effort to do this, mine will be memorable.

Via a website that would make your inner science geek laugh out loud with drunken glee, one which used the scientific method for making Jello shots, I found some scientific tips for some decidedly above average flavored Jello shots. I also found some tips that should be common sense to anyone with taste buds and a shady past: apparently Jello shots made with gin or bourbon taste like ass. Umm, I could have told you that, and I didn't even have to waste the time, money, or effort to make the damn things!

So, armed with scientific justification, I headed to the liquor store. An hour or so and several wasted stops later, I began to cook. Following you will find the basics of Jello shots, interjected with all the tongue in cheek you can stand.

1. Don't assume you have enough room in the fridge for Jello shots. Be prepared to take out the milk, orange juice, butter and/or eggs in order to make room, hopefully a whole shelf. Don't take out the wine. Simply relocate it to another shelf; milk and OJ are more dispensable.

 

2. The basic recipe for Jello shots is 8 oz. boiling liquid (generally not alcohol if you want good-tasting shots), small pkg. of Jello, and 8 oz. of cold liquid (alcohol, schnapps, or alcohol/water if the alcohol is strong enough. This can be manipulated in many surprising ways. For example, I used Starbuck's espresso roast coffee for the boiling water and used unflavored gelatin to make a super yummy coffee/Frangelico/Starbuck's creme liqueur concoction.

3. There are a few options for dispensaries for Jello shots: real shot glasses (not an option if you're making 120 Jello shots in 8 flavors), little paper pill cups that are used in hospitals everywhere (which your husband should NOT be asked to obtain, even if he is a doctor and should be able to hook you up), or little plastic cups (which come in teenie weenie 1 oz., which I think some hospitals might use, and don't have lids, or 2 oz., which are used by restaurants nationwide and are called "portion cups" or "souffle cups" and have handy lids, making for easy stacking). We finally found our cups at the liquor store, of all places; I guess savvy liquor store owners know that their clientele might need Jello shot cups.

 

4. A tip that I did NOT get until it was too late, and one that will definitely be used next time? Turn the cups upside down before refrigerating. Otherwise, most will need to employ the "Finger First" method of eating the Jello shot (see below). Tipsy, this isn't a big deal. Sober, some may be squeamish. Drunk, some may not be able to pull this off.

5. For maximum fun, make a variety of flavors and colors. I used a variety of liquors and liqueurs and had a good representation of color from the rainbow. Be creative.

6. Still have Jello shots well into the party? Play a drinking game with them! We used a very simple, but very fun, game that someone brought (which I've played many times, sans alcohol, and it was still fun), and after two rounds, we were making headway! After all was said and done, we had approximately ten of our one hundred twenty shots still standing.

7. Do not assume that just because something is a liqueur and not liquor that it isn't strong. I didn't get the hint that 99 Bananas liqueur was 99 proof. Mixed with (New!) Tropical Fusion flavored Jello, it produced a shot that barely gelled at the normal recipe proportions and did amazing puckery things to people's faces .

8. Do not play drinking games with two different sized shots. Some will invariably insist on reaching for the teenie weenie size when it's their turn to man up.

9. Coffee-flavored shots are good when dropped in a cup of coffee. They melt immediately & give you super-caffeinated, somewhat alcoholic goodness in a mug.

10. Berry Blue jello, while very pretty, really tastes like kitty ass, and therefore makes shots that sort of resemble kitty ass and turpentine. Or kitty ass and suntan lotion, if you happen to mix it with Malibu coconut rum. I will continue a quest to find something that tastes decent with it because of its important addition to the color variety, but I'm not really hopeful.

 

For those who want specific recipes, I don't remember specifics, as I was really just winging it myself. Generally, if I used a low-alcohol-content schnapps, I used 3/4 cup with 1/4 cup vodka to bolster the potency as the cold liquid. If you use high-alcohol-content liquor (or, you know, 99 Bananas liqueur), it might be wise to use water to cut the potency if you're aiming for palatable. The final flavors (and our clever names for them)? Maliblu (Berry Blue Jello with Malibu coconut rum), Cherry Cordial (black cherry Jello with vodka), Schnapps My Cherry (cherry Jello with Peach schnapps/vodka), Sour Midori (Melon Fusion Jello with Midori/sweet & sour mix/vodka), Emerald City (lime Jello with Midori/vodka), Tropicana (Tropical Fusion Jello with 99 Bananas liqueur), Just Peachy (apricot Jello with Peach schnapps/vodka), and Starbuck (unflavored gelatin, coffee, Starbuck's creme liqueur, and Frangelico).

Since I would be a bad person if I didn't state the obvious, don't consume all these Jello shots & think you can drive. They have more alcohol than you think in them. Have a Designated Driver, walk, or take a cab. Be safe. That is all.

White Privilege

Because I'm on my way out to a drum line competition, I'm going to share something that someone else wrote. I got this in my email box (thanks, Blue!), and I thought it was spot-on. Thank you, Tim Wise, whoever you are; your name is quite descriptive, if this piece is any indication.

This is Your Nation on White Privilege
By Tim Wise
9/13/08

For those who still can't grasp the concept of white privilege, or who are looking for some easy-to-understand examples of it, perhaps this list will help.

White privilege is when you can get pregnant at seventeen like Bristol Palin and everyone is quick to insist that your life and that of your family is a personal matter, and that no one has a right to judge you or your parents, because "every family has challenges," even as black and Latino families with similar "challenges" are regularly typified as irresponsible, pathological and arbiters of social decay.

White privilege is when you can call yourself a "fuckin' redneck," like Bristol Palin's boyfriend does, and talk about how if anyone messes with you, you'll "kick their fuckin' ass," and talk about how you like to "shoot shit" for fun, and still be viewed as a responsible, all-American boy (and a great son-in-law to be) rather than a thug.

White privilege is when you can attend four different colleges in six years like Sarah Palin did (one of which you basically failed out of, then returned to after making up some coursework at a community college), and no one questions your intelligence or commitment to achievement, whereas a person of color who did this would be viewed as unfit for college, and probably someone who only got in in the first place because of affirmative action.

White privilege is when you can claim that being mayor of a town smaller than most medium-sized colleges, and then Governor of a state with about the same number of people as the lower fifth of the island of Manhattan, makes you ready to potentially be president, and people don't all piss on themselves with laughter, while being a black U.S. Senator, two-term state Senator, and constitutional law scholar, means you're "untested."

White privilege is being able to say that you support the words "under God" in the pledge of allegiance because "if it was good enough for the founding fathers, it's good enough for me," and not be immediately disqualified from holding office--since, after all, the pledge was written in the late 1800s and the "under God" part wasn't added until the 1950s--while believing that reading accused criminals and terrorists their rights (because, ya know, the Constitution, which you used to teach at a prestigious law school requires it), is a dangerous and silly idea only supported by mushy liberals.

White privilege is being able to be a gun enthusiast and not make people immediately scared of you.

White privilege is being able to have a husband who was a member of an extremist political party that wants your state to secede from the Union, and whose motto is "Alaska first," and no one questions your patriotism or that of your family, while if you're black and your spouse merely fails to come to a 9/11 memorial so she can be home with her kids on the first day of school, people immediately think she's being disrespectful.

White privilege is being able to make fun of community organizers and the work they do--like, among other things, fight for the right of women to vote, or for civil rights, or the 8-hour workday, or an end to child labor--and people think you're being pithy and tough, but if you merely question the experience of a small town mayor and 18-month governor with no foreign policy expertise beyond a class she took in college and the fact that she lives close to Russia--you're somehow being mean, or even sexist.

White privilege is being able to convince white women who don't even agree with you on any substantive issue to vote for you and your running mate anyway, because suddenly your presence on the ticket has inspired confidence in these same white women, and made them give your party a "second look."

White privilege is being able to fire people who didn't support your political campaigns and not be accused of abusing your power or being a typical politician who engages in favoritism, while being black and merely knowing some folks from the old-line political machines in Chicago means you must be corrupt.

White privilege is when you can take nearly twenty-four hours to get to a hospital after beginning to leak amniotic fluid, and still be viewed as a great mom whose commitment to her children is unquestionable, and whose "next door neighbor" qualities make her ready to be VP, while if you're a black candidate for president and you let your children be interviewed for a few seconds on TV, you're irresponsibly exploiting them.

White privilege is being able to give a 36 minute speech in which you talk about lipstick and make fun of your opponent, while laying out no substantive policy positions on any issue at all, and still manage to be considered a legitimate candidate, while a black person who gives an hour speech the week before, in which he lays out specific policy proposals on several issues, is still criticized for being too vague about what he would do if elected.

White privilege is being able to attend churches over the years whose pastors say that people who voted for John Kerry or merely criticize George W. Bush are going to hell, and that the U.S. is an explicitly Christian nation and the job of Christians is to bring Christian theological principles into government, and who bring in speakers who say the conflict in the Middle East is God's punishment on Jews for rejecting Jesus, and everyone can still think you're just a good church-going Christian, but if you're black and friends with a black pastor who has noted (as have Colin Powell and the U.S. Department of Defense) that terrorist attacks are often the result of U.S. foreign policy and who talks about the history of racism and its effect on black people, you're an extremist who probably hates America.

White privilege is not knowing what the Bush Doctrine is when asked by a reporter, and then people get angry at the reporter for asking you such a "trick question," while being black and merely refusing to give one-word answers to the queries of Bill O'Reilly means you're dodging the question, or trying to seem overly intellectual and nuanced.

White privilege is being able to go to a prestigious prep school, then to Yale and then Harvard Business school, and yet, still be seen as just an average guy (George W. Bush) while being black, going to a prestigious prep school, then Occidental College, then Columbia, and then to Harvard Law, makes you "uppity," and a snob who probably looks down on regular folks.

White privilege is being able to graduate near the bottom of your college class (McCain), or graduate with a C average from Yale (W.) and that's OK, and you're cut out to be president, but if you're black and you graduate near the top of your class from Harvard Law, you can't be trusted to make good decisions in office.

White privilege is being able to dump your first wife after she's disfigured in a car crash so you can take up with a multi-millionaire beauty queen (who you go on to call the c-word in public) and still be thought of as a man of strong family values, while if you're black and married for nearly twenty years to the same woman, your family is viewed as un-American and your gestures of affection for each other are called "terrorist fist bumps."

White privilege is being able to sing a song about bombing Iran and still be viewed as a sober and rational statesman, with the maturity to be president, while being black and suggesting that the U.S. should speak with other nations, even when we have disagreements with them, makes you "dangerously naive and immature."

White privilege is being able to claim your experience as a POW has anything at all to do with your fitness for president, while being black and experiencing racism and an absent father is apparently among the "lesser adversities" faced by other politicians, as Sarah Palin explained in her convention speech.

And finally, white privilege is the only thing that could possibly allow someone to become president when he has voted with George W. Bush 90 percent of the time, even as unemployment is skyrocketing, people are losing their homes, inflation is rising, and the U.S. is increasingly isolated from world opinion, just because white voters aren't sure about that whole "change" thing. Ya know, it's just too vague and ill-defined, unlike, say, four more years of the same, which is very concrete and certain.

White privilege is, in short, the problem.

Where in the world is Do You Realize?

I know I have been conspicuously scarce lately. Lots of reasons, few of them good.

Mostly affecting my blogging is the fact that my video card went kaput on the laptop. While I don't mind hijacking hubby's computer long enough to check in on Facebook, I really feel guilty about taking over long enough to compose a blog post.

Secondly, we've finally found a residential treatment center for Youngest. For insurance purposes, he had to spend time as an inpatient first, though, and then move directly to RTC, so for two weeks we've been caught up in insurance hassles, eeeaaarrrrly morning inpatient visitation, driving, and settling in at the new RTC.

All this will be included in a post soon, hopefully. As will my thoughts on Sarah Palin (and I have a lot of them). As will my answers for the meme for which I was recently tagged. I miss the blog, and I miss my readers (both of you)! (If anyone misses my endless wit and crazy shit that much, you can always hit me up on Facebook.)

Second Letter to the Person Who Stole My Purse

Dear Degenerate Asshole Madam:

Thank you so much for arranging for the return of my purse  cash  keys and wallet with the broken zipper. It was also kind of you to remember how much I loved the scavenger hunt my husband put together when he gave me my purse and for you to arrange something similar by shoving the keys and wallet underneath a mattress in a skanky rattrap motel. It was really a fucking cowardly act thoughtful touch. The man in the motel office was so nice when he passed them to me underneath the bulletproof glass barrier!

What kind of fragrance do you wear? I'm just wondering, because the wallet smells of Eau de Fish Fry. A vast improvement over the simple scent of leather! And thank you for rubbing off all the magical Florentine fairy dust that made that wallet so special, replacing it with your skanky hand grease special essence.

I'm so excited about next week, because I just know you're planning another hide & seek game for my purse, since you forgot to leave it under the mattress with the wallet & keys. I can't wait to see where you put it! A crack house, perhaps, or maybe in your john's boyfriend's car?

Fuck Thank you very much,
Lori V.

And it just keeps coming...

So, the week from hell is still barreling relentlessly forward.

Today I found out I could possibly have a parotid gland tumor; I have a CTScan scheduled for Wednesday and will get the results next Monday. A huge percentage (80-99%, depending on whom you believe) are benign, but require removal anyway, because they just continue to grow.

Also today, I was so distracted I ran out of gas.

Also also today, Youngest got himself bitten by a rat. Not a pet rat. A real, bona fide, disease harboring rat. And so we spent our evening in the emergency room.

What lovely experiences could tomorrow have in store that could even remotely compare to the week I've had thus far? I can hardly stand the anticipation.

I'll start posting again more regularly when I can dig out of this dung heap. This exciting and interesting dung heap. But a dung heap nonetheless.

Texas Longhorn Game Day Fashion 101

I went to visit Eldest at school this weekend. It was the weekend of their first game (Saturday), so I got to experience Austin in full game-day glory. Can you grasp the concept of 150,000 people shoved into one relatively small area, all dressed in burnt orange? I felt positively blasphemous in my turquoise tank top.

Now, normally, Austin fashion falls into the "anything goes" category. It's quite the melange. There's a bit of every possible fashion sense to be found in Austin, which makes it pretty groovy in my book. You'll always be grounded to the Longhorn aesthetic by a goodly number of students in their "Hook 'Em Horns" orange gear, but it's usually a small smattering, just enough to remind you of where you are. The goal of fashion in general here is to wear what you like, like what you wear, and hope that a little piece of you shines through.

Game days, on the other hand, are a completely different story. The entire city's fashion aspirations magically align, and suddenly everyone looks fantastic in burnt orange. The goal suddenly becomes totally different. A little more challenging in some respects. On game days, it is imperative that you wear something, ANYTHING, in the only color that exists on the color wheel: burnt orange. However, you still want your personality to make an appearance, so the big trick is to search for clothing items that are your style but made in that one hideous, unifying color. The entire second floor of the Co-op is reserved for women's clothing (with a stunning array of styles but not much in the way of color selection)! I saw girls in cute little shift dresses in burnt orange, polos in burnt orange, flip flops in burnt orange, Soffe shorts in burnt orange, baseball tees in burnt orange, and on and on it went; it was truly a sight to behold, this veritable ocean of orange threatening to pull you under in its insidious current.

Something strange overcomes you when you go to Austin. Even those of us with no school spirit to speak of suddenly have the urge to "throw the horns" and buy something hideously orange. Even me. Yes, even me.

Letter to the Person Who Stole My Purse Yesterday

Dear Degenerate Asshole Madam:

Yesterday you hit the jackpot. You scored yourself a Louis Vuitton Batignolles bag! Congratulations! Oh, you don't know what that is? Its the fine-ass purse you stole off the back of some distracted, unsuspecting woman's chair yesterday. That woman would be me, and I'm fucking enraged slightly miffed.

Yes, I understand that you probably needed the cash in my wallet for your next meth fix diapers. I get that; really, I do. But couldn't your skanky ass you have just taken the cash and left the wallet? I've had it for six years; it's one of the few things I bought for myself at the market in Florence. The zipper doesn't even reliably work anymore, but it's filled with memories.

Yes, I know that you thought my credit cards would come in handy. But I had those cancelled before you made it to the corner store for your Mickey's Malt Liqor and cigarettes, bitch school supplies. And the DMV knows my driver's license number was stolen, so the driver's license won't do you a damn bit of good, even if by some miracle you looked even slightly like me or thought of stealing my identity. (But I know you weren't planning that, silly.) You can use my Kroger Shopping Rewards card if you'd like, though. I didn't cancel it.

Yes, I realize that you think my purse looks fantastic with your crack whore chic wardrobe. However, that purse will never hold memories for you. You'll never be able to say your husband picked it out all on his own one Christmas, then sent you on a scavenger hunt to find it, filled with Butterfingers, at the end. But you'll have memories, too, girl. Like, remember that one time I saw that woman minding her own business at Subway and she forgot her purse and so I stole that mofo? Those were the days!

Oh, yes, I'm certain that my son's Nintendo DS will make one of your young 'uns very happy. But what will the other five think of you playing favorites? Oh, I know; just tell them they can have something out of the next purse you steal. That will fix everything.

Thank you for making my life a nightmare for a few days, having to have my car towed and re-chipped because you now have my damn car keys, having to have my safety deposit box drilled out because you now have my damn bank key, and having to change the locks on my house because you now have my address and my fucking house key, too!

Fuck off and die,
Lori

P.S. I really and sincerely hope that karma is real and that you will be reincarnated as a pubic louse living on a meth addict.

The journey of a life. (For Eldest...)

Today I'm on a journey.  I'm on a physical, six hour journey to what right now seems to be the end of the earth. I'm on an emotional, seventeen-years-in-the-making journey to what right now seems to be an impossible acceptance. I'm driving Eldest, my firstborn, my magical girl, to college.

What will happen when we get there?

Will I choke? Will it be upon words that I haven't said, out of pride, or on words that I have said, in anger?

Will I cry? Will they be tears of relief, knowing that she possesses the heart of a warrior, or will they be tears of despair, knowing that she also possesses the heart of a little girl?

Will I die? Will my heart implode, folding upon itself from the weight of her leaving, or will it explode like so much dynamite with the joy of vicarious freedom?

I have known, or should have known, for seventeen years that this day would come. How selfish of me now to feel that I am being cheated out of one last year with her. Heaven (if there is such a Place) knows that I have all-to-easily and glibly voiced my desire for this day to hurry up. How silly of me now to wish it away.

But I am. And I do. Because this journey is not mine alone, nor the accompanying feelings. This is a journey that has been made since time immemorial. These are feelings that a multitude of mothers have endured since time began.

Time alone will tell what will happen today. I suspect that, yes, I will choke, and I will cry, and a part of me might die. But another part of me, a part of which I am exceedingly proud, will start to live today.