Dark Update

Scott and I ultimately decided we didn’t want to feel rushed to get married just because the fucking Mormons are on their delusional rampage.  We want to do it right, not do it because we’re pressured to do so.  We have our domestic partnership, we have each other.  Even if Mormons win their precious Proposition 8 battle, they’ve lost the bigger war.  Love prevails, and love is something Mormons don’t have in their so-called Christian world.  They also don’t have porn (except at Marriott hotels).  Fuck ‘em.

Starting on Friday at midnight (Halloween), I gave myself the gift of time:  no games (PC, console, hand-held, nada).  One month to write when I can and stay focused on a book.  I’m on day two of Nanowrimo, and I’m feeling comfortable.  For the record, I’m writing within an arcing story-line, and the November goal is book 1 of 3.

I’ve left the stained glass in the workshop and I haven’t pulled out yarn yet.  I have started learning a scripting language, but that knowing will be long-term, and I’m okay with taking months to figure it out.

No matter our intentions, life has a way of building our paths as we go.  The work re-implementation is not going to happen any time soon.  I could be the biggest cheerleader and motivator in the world, but the fact is there are several key vacancies, and Friday brought really horrible news of a co-worker’s fiance dying of a heart attack.  He was 23.  The department needs solace and comfort right now and nothing else.

I did go to Utahrd in October and I had a great time.  Sister Mary Lisa was there, and it was so damn good to see her.  I got to see Lynski on multiple occassions for deep talking and great meals.  At a party in Pleasant Grove (yes – who the fuck goes to Utah to party in Pleasant Grove – yeah, that’d be me.), I met other splendid folks, but please don’t ask me to link them because I’m an ornery bastard and getting tired of typing (love you, friends!).  My favorite word for the evening was “boobies.”  I met some folks from Ex-Mormon boards (FLAK, RfM, Post-Mormon) and from the ExMormon conference.  I did not attend the conference – I only met some folks at a bar and got hit on by a stupid twat monkey that bemoaned the fact that “all the cute ones are gay or married.”  Yeah, bitch, next time don’t wear a red dress and look like you’re ready to do the horizontal ramba right after you say “hi” to someone.

I may be over my need for a blogging break.  It feels good to be blogging, peoples, and thank you for your wondermous comments in my mental absence.

Hugs and love.

Blog Viagra, anyone?

Quick, someone send me some blog viagra.  I’ve gone flaccid.  I was chatting with Cele and I admitted that I hadn’t had a blog boner in quite a while.  I’m afraid I haven’t been up (ahem) to the task.

What have I been doing?  I’m glad I asked, so in no particular order:

• So scattered I didn’t even do my own post for Talk Thursday.  Oops.  Don’t bother with the guilt routine, I’m immune unless it’s self-administered, and I’m fine with my decision.
• Second Life.  Virtual crack.  When there’s so much going on in your own life (and when you need a little distraction from blogging), you too can create whoever you want to be today.
• Work projects are progressing nicely.  I’m in project management mode, which means “Morale cheerleader.”  Stern but supportive taskmaster.  I’ve gone from data whore to data pimp.
• B-day party for one of Scott’s co-workers who lives in an amazing house in Alamo.  Million dollar views, movie-star driveway, circular stairs, wine-cellar, suit-of-armor, built in keginator off the kitchen, wrap-around decks, master bathroom with glass ceilings and walls.  Materialism envy rears its head.
• Spore.  More virtual crack, but on the cute side.  No animated penii or breasticles or simulated strippers like in Second Life.
• Working out.  I’m at the “is this worth it?” stage, but get re-motivated when I see myself naked.
• Airport run with Scott to pickup a friend.
• Naps.  Twenty minutes and I’m good.  Refreshed.  Almost pleasant even.
• Brunch at Katy’s Creek (California Benedicts are to die for!) with Mark and Rommel.
• Domestic disaster.  We’re getting new carpet in the master bedroom (long overdue) on Friday.  Being the prepared people that we are, we started moving furniture over the weekend.  Sunday, while Scott was in the shower, I tried to move the bed by myself – you know – just scooch it one side at a time.  I scooched it, all right…. and broke the leg of the headboard.  Scott heard my f-bomb while he was showering.
• Bed-frame and mattress shopping.  When you’re a domestic disaster and you break something, go shopping.  Word.
• Tonight I painted one wall and ran. out. of. paint. (Is it only men who think that paint and inches go farther than they think they do?)  Yes, yes, I’ll post pictures, once we’re done, but our deadline is by Thursday night because the carpet guys come and do a remove and replace on Friday.

Bad Night

Details to follow – this is a placeholder for when I get up and write what happened. I’m fine, I’m good, but the evening was surreal and scary and slightly amusing and I didn’t get much sleep – but what a GREAT motivator to write. Details to follow… I’m outie for a few hours and will then update with the full details. Mwah.

***

Scott left for a week-long trip on Thursday. I don’t know how I ever survived my single years when I consider my phobias and fears that come out when I’m alone. At night. Trying to get to sleep. In the earlier years with Scott, if he was away, I’d sleep with a dimmed light. Here I am, all grown up at 40, and the first night he’s gone I didn’t sleep with the lights on, nor on the subsequent nights – the approaching full moon has been a great night light. I did make the rounds and lock the doors and windows, since I do that anyway because even when Scott is home he rarely remembers to lock things.

Saturday evening, and Midas and I and the hoard of cats were goofing on the computer or playing Soul Calibur IV. I started getting tired about midnight and took Midas into the front yard to do his thing, locked up the house, brushed my teeth, stripped down, then looked out the patio door. Four pairs of eyes were looking at me. Two pitbull dogs. I had a split second moment of thinking two things: “oh, double Cujo outside a glass patio door” next to “those are the neighbor dogs!”

Midas saw them seconds after I did and he started wagging his tail. The dogs were wagging in reply. I turned on the patio light, told Midas to stay where he was, then stepped outside. I could see across the yard to the fence where the dogs had come through a slat. The dogs were cowering at my feet and I rubbed their ears and talked quietly to them as I moved across the patio and deck to the back fence. Through the open space, the neighbor’s house was dark. The dogs ran back towards the patio door. I went inside and got a bowl of Midas’ food, and they’d go as far as the deck. When I tried to coax the dogs through the slat, one of them backed away and fell off the deck into the pool.

The poor dog started flailing and splashing and… howling. At that moment I realized I was naked and about to save a dog that didn’t know his way out of this swimming pool. I bent down and he followed my arm towards the stairs, but he was still terrified, and he started swimming/flailing back the way he’d come. I crouched down and grabbed the ruff of his neck and pulled him towards the steps, him splashing the whole time. One word for the combination of fear, splashing water, and a strong wind: shrinkage. I pulled him to the stairs and he lay there, panting for a good minute before he could move. I thought about laying down, too.

I used a portable gate and moved some chairs and made a make-shift kennel – I didn’t want them falling in the pool again. I dressed and left the house and walked around the block and left a note on the neighbor’s door – I had no idea if he was gone for the weekend, working or what.

I came back to the house and fixed a bowl of water and food for them – they devoured the food in moments. The yard looked safe, and it was about 1:00 when I got undressed and back to sleep unti the sounds of the dogs whimpering woke me up. I got a few hours sleep until 6 when the neighbor called, explaining he’d been on a swing shift, and he kept apologizing profusely about the dogs. I dressed and met him at the back fence. While he was still apologizing, I slammed the slat next to the one the dogs had removed, making a bigger space. He called for the dogs and they wouldn’t budge. I picked them up, one at a time, and put them through the fence. He was still apologizing and saying he’d repair the fence but I honestly wasn’t listening. I told him to have a good night and went back to bed.

After I’d come back from breakfast, the fence slats were already fixed.

I still won’t be reading thrillers or horror novels before going to bed… not until Scott gets home, anyway.

Has anything freaky/scary/unexpected happened to any of you lovely folks when you’ve been home alone?

Quick Recap of Past Week

• Other than a comment and reading other blogs, I neglected my own.
• Work was faboo.  We finished some major projects.  I work with some great folks.
• Lovely romantical dinner at a snazzy middle-eastern restaurant with Scott.
• Booked tickets for myself and Scott for September:  Julz’ wedding.
• Found out from our vet that Widget and Kiwi are not siblings from the same litter.  Kiwi is at least one, if not two, months older than Widget – probably five months old.  Widget is probably three months old.
• Scott got the 1960 Chrysler 300 started.  He’s currently on the patio cleaning parts of one of the carburetors.
• I hope to feel better tomorrow, since I’ve not felt too hot all day.
• I’m sure other things happened, but hell if I remember anything at the moment.

Blog and Links

In testing the various options of WordPress.com versus WordPress.org (blog versus community-based application), I’m discovering a few things about myself: I’m not nearly as technical as I’d like to be, I’m very resistant to change, and I’m a hypocrite for advocating learning at the same time that I whine and moan about learning something new. I will most likely NOT be hosting this blog on our domain. For now, I’m staying here. Yes, I’m comfortable with the status quo. Handle it. Intention and eventuality are rarely the same – such is life.

A side project I’m working on is clearing up my blogroll and links by consolidating the link pages and blogrolls into one page, period. One stop shopping.

I want to point out a few blogs that are important to me for various and non-related issues, as I’ll clarify below:

Dancing With Crazy – Emily Pearson. Funny, witty, dynamic, and holds-no-prisoners. Adept and adroit, she handles TBM trolls with a grace that I don’t have and never will.

Without Wax – Pete, a pastor at Cross Point Church in Tennessee. I love how he is creating an inclusive readership and community. I initially worried that I’d offend his sensibilities or sear his retinas, but the guy’s a trooper – and my experience of him so far is that he’s sincere and non-judgmental. Pardon the obvious, but he’s not Mormon.

Son of Tarot – Christopher Butler discusses his new deck, the Son Tarot, from a gay men’s perspective on the tarot archetypes. His Quantum deck is now out, too.

Erik’s sweet post to his husbear of 11 years made me smile. Beautiful couple. His most recent “stud(l)y break” post is going to be my next wallpaper.

My Prozac Cocoon – Tales from a Matrix Prescription. One of Eiain’s posts was featured on the front page for WordPress and I followed the link to his site, and I’m glad I did. He and his partner are in my thoughts and I’m wishing them health and happiness. I’m enjoying this growing community of blog brothers.

Planet Romach – Mark, Eiain’s partner, is the source of my extreme blog envy. I wanted a way to share music like he did. His musical selection hits all my buttons. Mark**, the shirtless wonder, is stunning – if I felt a quarter of the sexiness that this man exhibits, I’d be one confident hombre. With inspiration like him, I could one day be comfortable with my own hairy chest.

Readers – what site(s) do you love? Please share your link love of sites that inspire you, fill you with lusciousness, make you weep with joy, etc…

**my mistake – I posted this and screwed up Eiain’s and Mark’s names – someone slap me**

I Did It

I got the job.

I. Got. The. Job.

I would be remiss if I didn’t explain the implied but vastly understated series of exclamation points that follow the end of that last sentence.  Lets not forget the naked happy dance either, with a background stage filled with go-go guys (I hate saying “boys”) in skimpy shorts or briefs, and seven rounds of chilled tequila shooters.  Nor the loud music and laughter and whooping shouts of “oh yes!”

I gave two weeks notice on Friday.

I start the new gig on June 9th.  Since I’m going back to private industry, I’ll do something sensible for a change and not be blogging about work-related issues in the future.

Suffice to say it’s a great opportunity, the compensation is generous, the benefits are great, and I’m going new laptop shopping (compliments of the new gig).  I may have a small commute, but I’ll put the laptop to good use while I use the Bay Area Rapid Transit.

I wanted to write a post that didn’t sound like I was gloating, but failed miserably.  I’m so happy I could burst!

Thanks for the good rubbin’

Thanks, everyone. The two-person interview went swimmingly. LOTS of jaw-dropping when folks saw me in the nice suit and tie through the building. I own that I am gregarious and could charm the pants off a baseball team, BUT, it was nice being in the Zen of the moment and wowing said two potential supervisors/powers-that-be.

I find out most likely on Monday – and no later than next Wednesday.

Last night I slept badly. Actually, I didn’t sleep badly – I just couldn’t sleep. I woke up at 3 and then at 4 with flashbacks to the first interview panel. I was dreaming strategies on what to say, what topics to cover, what to emphasize. I tossed and turned and tried to turn off my brain – no such luck. At 5:00am, I rolled on Saturn who meowed at me in a what-the-fuck-are-you-doing kind of way, but Scott didn’t wake up. I knew I needed a little more sleep or I’d be a mess for the interview, so I got up and slept in the guest bedroom. Midas followed me in and slept by my feet. Saturn was stretched out by Scott, who didn’t stir when I slipped out of bed. I slept solidly from 5 to 7, and I’m glad that I did. No dreams. Just deep sleep.

After work tonight, Scott and I went to our favorite Italian place and had a nice time sharing the day and a beautiful meal. Tonight, I read blogs and did evites for the local folks for that looming birthday party for someone who’s turning 40. (Shh. Don’t talk about it.) Oh – and I started working on XV. I will need to distract myself the next few days because I could easily be a nervous wreck.

Evites

I messed with Evite yesterday for hours – more than FOUR hours to be completely honest. The biggest pain in the ass was trying to import/export my email addresses, and I ended up typing and/or copying/pasting each email addy, anyway. The next pain was formatting the damn thing. I don’t want to sound ungracious here, but Evite sucks worse than a Hoover. I would have been better off doing the entire thing via Outlook, with links, than trying to poke and prod their very rigid formats while dealing with their barrage of advertising sponsors.

The main reason I sent out Evites with pertinent info NOW was because some folks were getting antsy about accommodation options – totally understandable. (Hiya, sister – no, I don’t know where you’re staying yet – just book your flight and we’ll figure it out.) Some folks have kids and families and tight budgets, and let’s face it, celebrating birthdays usually ends in one’s teens. I happen to revel in birthdays, since it’s a great reminder that I’ve survived the very real possibility of not being born in the first place. Slight tangent, but I can remember being in the incubator while I was in the hospital after I was born (six weeks premature). Hell yes, I celebrate birthdays.  I celebrate fiercely.

Upcoming Events

• April – birthday announcements are in the works. Waiting on hotel info. Will send Evites by this coming Sunday. Will post general announcement here on the blog at the same time. No prior experience with Evite other than accepting or declining. Patience, please. What is known:
  • April 12th weekend
  • Our home in Concord.
  • Catering and bartender – I don’t want to worry about being host AND trying to have quality time with my friends.
  • If it’s warm enough, we’ll move the party to the pool-patio in the back. If not – we’ll be doing a little dancin’ in the living room
• February – Ground Zero meeting tomorrow with my interim boss and an interim co-worker, going over the topics of:
  • double standards (I don’t know the rules to “it’s okay for you, but not for me” – got that?)
  • management styles (Nazi, Germany, circa 1940’s, has a plethora of enthusiastic candidates – still.)
  • communication styles and the very lack thereof (Maybe someday everyone will experience telepathy and we’ll know how to read each other’s fucking mind.)
  • honesty – and how it’s a new policy (Lie to me once, and I’ll shrug. Do it more than once, and you’ll regret your existence. The regrets for some begin tomorrow.)

  

• March – we’re hosting JulieAnn one night before her Big Sur writing gig. I’m so excited for her, but the greedy part of me wishes she had a week out here.

• March (random as usual, since I just noticed I didn’t write this in chronological order) – annual user’s group conference in DC. I am doing 3 early morning panel sessions, facilitating 1 two-hour roundtable, and co-presenting 1 hour session. I’m building my alcohol tolerance levels now, since by mid-March my blood will be almost pure vodka. I remember one year flying home from DC on the 6 a.m. flight and waking up 6 hours later, arriving into Oakland, still buzzing.

But Wait There’s More!

I accepted the interim director position today.  Tomorrow, the department gets informed and I get to introduce myself.  The reception will be a mixture of warm to lukewarm to freeze-your-nuts-off cold.  I’ll be sure to wear my fur-lined Kevlar jockstrap.

My mom called.  Dad has had 10 of the 42 scheduled radiation treatments.  He’s doing great, though he gets tired early and he’s been a little nauseous.

My brother’s wife had her third child today – a 5 ounce baby girl, Shilo Dawn?  Shiloh Dawn?  I’m excited to see pictures.  I’m sure if I reminded them to use the camera I sent, they’d be right on that, like they’ve been on sending pictures of their goat Petey, which I haven’t seen yet.  (In no way am I comparing a baby girl and a pet goat.)

Saturn is doing much better since he’s getting the saline/elecrolyte solution twice a week.  Our vet and former neighbor makes house calls.  I love her.  She loves Saturn.  Saturn loves her.  The freak of a cat that he is… will sit in her lap with an i.v. in his back and purr.

Mark and I are finalizing hotel options (current price ranges are from 99 to 119/night) for a certain and imminent 40th birthday party in April – more info to follow in the next week.

On the blogging front, I’ve been a little quiet.  Lots of thoughts and images, but nothing is manifesting other than a jumble of flailing fingers on a keyboard and squinting my eyes at the bright monitor.  Work is much on my mind these days, and my one brain cell has a hard time shifting gears to any other reality.