For my final Team Pepper post I really wanted to find something profound to write. Something to uplift and inspire. Something that people far and wide will remember for years to come. Something from my own mind, rather than words regurgitated from the world wide web. Something barfed up from my own mouth… in a delicate way. A burp almost. But tangible. Something that my readers can latch onto and hold close to their hearts.
Here it goes.
Are you ready?
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Get off the damned computer and go outside already! The internet isn’t real life! Real life exists when you get off your ass and live it!!!
There are times when I feel so much, I could almost make up my own language. Because nothing in English can describe what I feel. With an overwhelming sense of torture can beauty–real beauty–penetrate my mind to press tears at the backs of my eyes and make my ears ring and it’s like OH OH OH I can’t stand it and I have to look away. Or dance.
How can one be surrounded with such stuff and survive? And yet I’ll follow it to the ends of the earth; craving it, desiring to be close to it no matter the cost.
In that moment that I am there, before the beauty, in the music, I am most alive… and grieving that it will die. And I with it.
You know what’s weird? The fact that now the penny has been taken out of circulation in Canada, you never find a penny on the ground anymore. The last coin I came across as I was walking was a dime. Are people more likely to just leave dimes on the ground now rather than pick them up? Or was this just some unfortunate soul who didn’t realize he or she was dumping his or her change out of his or her pocket?
Grammar really makes no sense, does it? My best friend’s brother, who was on the team that wrote spell check and grammar check, tells me that with all the different rules in all the different countries on grammar, it isn’t possible to write a grammatically correct sentence. One rule will be broken unless you completely ignore all the other countries and are never read outside of your own. Interesting stuff, that.
In other news, I have the weekend off. No kids. Lovely, eh? Yet I have so much to do, it’s hard to know where to start. I’m just plowing through everything as a result. Which is good, except I keep forgetting to eat and drink. I often make myself a cup of tea and leave it to steep… for an hour. I can’t stand cold tea, or coffee, or anything else that’s supposed to be hot when it’s cold. Except pizza. And occasionally spaghetti.
Not to diminish the severity of the impact ADD has on the lives of people who truly suffer with it, but is it possible to “catch” it in times of stress? Why do I ask? Let me tell you.
In the amount of time it took me to decide what I was going to write about today, click on my dashboard and get into “Add New Post,” I came up with six more things I want to write about – the last of which is the fact that spellcheck (I guess Firefox’s version) has finally chosen to insert its ass in my subject line. Apparently “Poblano” isn’t a word. Who knew?
So yeah, the other stuff in backwards order of the idea light bulb coming on over my head are:
1. I realized I haven’t answered any of my comments today, so I wanted to apologize for that in advance of my upcoming eye drops. I’ll try to get to some before I leave for the appointment however.
2. My battery works!! It’s ALIVE!!!! And yes, it was free. 😀
3. My occupational therapist appointment went well. I’ve got to do a few exercises, mildly limit my movement for a couple of weeks, and get my laptop into a better position. Oh, and move around once in a while. OH, and check out an aqua fitness program. OH! And get a body pillow. Good call to all of those who came up with the idea when I was considering a sleeping companion.
4. I’m working on writing enough “Scenes from the Second Seat on the Right” so they’ll keep publishing while I’m gone.
5. Beta readers!! I need a few people who are serious about wanting to beta my novel. I’ll be looking to find out if it’s interesting enough to captivate my audience, notes on any inconsistencies, and I’m planning to put a note in it of my own to ask about thoughts on splitting it into two or three books. I’d like to have it read while I’m away, if I can get it ready by the time I leave. Let me know if you want a copy! I’ll take three readers for now. Please email me at bacamjoly at gmail dot com if you’re interested.
6. … And now that I’m finally at my original idea for posting today, I’ve forgotten what it is.
What do you think? Am I ready for an ADD diagnosis yet?
My blog isn’t normally about my personal schedule, but because of the community I’ve kind of built around this site, I feel obligated to let you, my friends, know what’s going on for the next little while.
First, tomorrow, I’m going to an occupational therapist to see about my bad shoulder in the morning, and to an optometrist in the afternoon. I’ll have drops in my eyes, which probably means no screen time after that since the horrid things usually affect me for at least eight hours. I hope to be able to post tomorrow before I go.
Then this Saturday will be my last “live” SoCS entry until the 20th of December. I leave for Tokyo on Saturday the 6th and will be home on the 17th. Considering I leave Japan two hours after I arrive in Canada, I’ll be pretty bagged and doubt I’ll be online again until the 18th.
What this means for you, my dear participants in One-Liner Wednesday and SoCS, is that you’ll still be able to participate in both, except I won’t be around. I’ll have the One-Liners scheduled already for the 10th and the 17th, and for SoCS I’ll either do the same or I’ll have guest-posters here to organize things. I still have to contact the three people who said they might be willing to help out, to see if they’re still “in.”
I hope to have reliable enough wifi where I’m staying that I can check in once in a while, but I don’t plan on spending too much time online.
In the meantime, as you can probably imagine, I’ll be pretty busy getting ready to leave and doing as much Christmas shopping as humanly possible so I don’t need to do too much while I’m away. Luggage space will be limited. Again, what this means is that I won’t be able to read as many blogs as I usually do, or keep up with the comments. But I’ll do my best!
For anyone wondering how I’m paying for this (I’m looking at you, Social Services), I’ve been saving for years. There’s a reason I have only one pair of shoes, have a hair cut once every three years, and am still wearing a coat that was bought for me as a Christmas gift 30 years ago – and no, that’s not an exaggeration.
Oh, and as a side note, I just got a call from Best Buy to say my laptop battery is in – let’s hope it fits!!!
Okay, I admit it; sometimes my grammar isn’t perfect. Oh sorry, did I forget to ask you to sit down before I dropped my bombshell? That’ll heal, don’t worry.
But seriously, I get tired of trying to write right all the time. It takes, like, brain cells and stuff to make sure I edit the hell out of every single solitary sentence I compose. And so while I do try to do my best here on my blog, I don’t always make sure my comments, my emails and (oh God) my texts are the essence of grammatical excellence. In fact when I’m in a hurry, I’ve actually been known to write things like “u” instead of “you” when tapping out a message on my phone. Don’t all gasp at once!
Is it lack of professionalism? Is it laziness? Or is it a bid to preserve the ever-decreasing amount of grey matter I possess due to the many things I have to deal with in any given moment?
What’s your excuse?
This grammatically questionable post has been brought to you in conjunction with Mr. Mark’s Roadshow
I used this prompt to look up a new word. A new word for me, at least. I’d always wondered what it meant; now I know. The word is “insouciant.” It means easy-going, gay, happy-go-lucky, and untroubled.
I want to be insouciant. It’s pronounced “in-soo-see-ant” if you’re wondering. I want to be carefree and not worried about anything. And I think I can be, if I really want to. How, you may ask, would someone with as many people relying on them as I have be insouciant?
I think the key (or one of them) is in not procrastinating. I find that if I put things off I end up with a whole ball of stress sitting with me at the end of the day – stress caused by all the things I need to do tomorrow because I did none of them today. It adds up and I end up worrying. And uninsouciant. According to my spellcheck that’s not a word… and neither is spellcheck. Go figure. But will I worry about that? Hell no!
How else can I be insouciant? I think just by deciding not to worry about things I can be a little more carefree. Not to say that I don’t consider my responsibilities important… but only concentrating on what’s in front of me rather than doing things I’m supposed to be doing AND worrying that I’m not doing something else – that’s senseless. In fact, by fully focusing on the task at hand, I’m more likely to be more efficient at it than if my mind is elsewhere.
So here’s to insouciance! Practice with me, won’t you?
Me: I’ll start at the beginning, shall I? Here we go. In April, or maybe even March, I came in with my laptop because the battery was shutting the machine off at 70% power. You took it and you “fixed” it, but the battery was still fucked. So your manager promised me a new battery. Last week–yes, 7 or 8 months later–I finally got my new battery. I’d like to know if you can put it in for me. …oh wait! I can answer that question for you. NO! You can’t put my new battery in because you ordered the wrong one!
Geek Squad Mike: I have no idea which idiot ordered the wrong battery for you: here’s a new laptop, free of charge!
How it actually went:
Geek Squad Mike: How can I help you?
Me: I got the wrong battery.
Geek Squad Mike: What’s your phone number, I’ll look that up for you.
Ten minutes later:
Geek Squad Mike: (who has been joined by Geek Squad Dillon) We can order the new battery for you. I’ll leave you with Dillon: he knows more than I do. He’s the computer genius.
Me: Yes, he’s the computer genius who ordered the wrong battery for me last time.
For some reason, Geek Squad Dillon didn’t think that was funny.
True story.
This true story has been brought to you in conjunction with Mr. Mark:
lindaghill.com 